Kashmir, Sir Younghusband Francis Edward [the best novels to read .TXT] 📗
- Author: Sir Younghusband Francis Edward
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It may be wondered why so high a peak has no name. The reason is that, though high, it is not visible from any inhabited place. It is hidden away in a remote mountain region behind other peaks of almost as great magnitude, which being nearer overshadow it—as Mount Everest itself is overshadowed from Darjiling by the Kinchinjunga range. There is no village within six days' travel of K2 on either side, and, consequently, until it was fixed by observation of the Survey, it was unknown. Colonel Montgomerie, when making the survey of Kashmir, discovered K2. It was among a series of peaks on what is known as the Karakoram range, and each of these he designated by the capital letter K, after Karakoram, and by a number, K1, K2, K3, etc. So it came about that what proved to be the second highest mountain in the world became known, not by any name, but by merely a letter and a number.
In 1887, on my way from Peking to India, I passed close under K2 on its northern side, and in a paper read before the Royal Geographical Society in the following year made some reference to it. At the conclusion of my lecture, the late General Walker and Sir Henry Rawlinson proposed the name of Godwin Austin, after the survey officer who made the topographical survey of the southern portion of the Karakoram range. This name was adopted by the Geographical Society, and now appears on many maps. But it has never been accepted by the Government of India, and Colonel Burrard in his above-mentioned treatise now writes:—"Of all the designations suggested for the supreme peak of the Karakoram that of K2 has now the widest vogue, and it will be in the interests of uniformity if this symbol be adopted in future to the exclusion of all others. The permanent adoption of the symbol K2 will serve to record the interesting facts that a mountain exceeding 28,000 feet in height had not been deemed worthy of a name by the people living under its shades, and that its pre-eminent altitude was unsuspected until it was brought to light by trigonometrical observation."
With these observations I entirely agree.
K2 was, as I have said, discovered by Colonel Montgomerie in 1858. He took the first observation to it from Haramokh, the conspicuous peak on the north side of the valley of Kashmir, at a distance of 137 miles. I saw it first from the north from the Aghil range which I discovered in 1887, and I subsequently passed close under it both then and in 1889, and never shall I forget the impression it left on me as I rounded a spur, and looking up a valley saw, quite unexpectedly, this real mountain monarch towering almost immediately above me, very abrupt and upstanding, and with immense masses of ice accumulated at its base. I have also seen Mount Everest from the north, and it is remarkable that both these peaks, which are so inconspicuous from the southern side, should stand out so boldly from the north. K2 is not so massive a mountain as Kinchinjunga and Nanga Parbat. It is rather the bold culminating peak of a range.
The height of K2 is put down as 28,250 feet above the sea. How can we be certain that this is right? The reply is that we cannot. The observations have been made from immense distances, and are consequently liable to certain errors which have been discussed by Colonel Burrard.
It was observed from the following stations:—
Station. Height above Sea. Distance. Shangruti 17,531 78·9 Biachuthusa 16,746 99·0 Marshala 16,906 58·6 Kastor 15,983 66·0 Thurigo 17,246 61·8 Haramokh 16,001 136·5 Kanuri-Nar 15,437 114·3 Barwai 16,304 88 Thalanka 16,830 74·7And apart from the errors due to distance there are others which must always be counted on. As he remarks, no telescope is absolutely perfect; no level is entirely trustworthy; no instrumental graduations are strictly exact; and no observer is infallible. Then, again, the peaks themselves do not always have clearly defined summits, though K2 happens in this respect to be a model for observation, and as it has been observed on several occasions from different stations, the errors in the mean value of height due to faults of observation are, probably, in Colonel Burrard's opinion, less than ten feet. Another source of error is the adoption of possibly erroneous altitudes for the stations of observation. The altitude of K2 was observed from Haramokh and other stations, but the altitude of Haramokh itself may be a few feet wrong, and the altitude of K2 on this account may be thirty feet in error. Another element of uncertainty in determining the height of a peak is caused by the variation in the amount of snow on its summit. There is clearly more snow on the summit of a peak in winter than in summer, and in a hot, dry summer there may be less than in a generally cloudy, snowy summer. A more complicated description of error is introduced by the deviation of gravity from the normal in great mountain ranges. The attraction of the great mass of the Himalaya mountains and of Tibet pulls all liquids towards itself as the moon attracts the ocean. The liquid in levels on the theodolites with which observations of the peaks are made is similarly affected: the plates to the theodolites in consequence cannot be exactly adjusted, and when apparently truly levelled are in reality tilted upwards towards the mountains. At Kurseong, near Darjiling, they would be as much as 51" out of true level and at Mussouri about 37".
MOUNT HARAMOKH, FROM THE ERIN NULLAH
But the most serious source of uncertainty in the measurement of the altitude of a peak is the refraction of the atmosphere. A ray of light from a peak to an observer's eye does not travel along a straight line, but assumes a curved path concave to the earth. The ray enters the observer's eye—I quote from Colonel Burrard—in a direction tangential to the curve at that point, and this is the direction in which the observer sees the peak. It makes the peak appear too high. This refraction is greatest in the morning and evening, and least in the middle of the day; it is different in summer from what it is in winter. One of the great Himalayan peaks visible from the plains of India would appear, from observations with a theodolite made to it from the plains, to fall 500 feet between sunrise and the afternoon, and to rise again 300 feet before sunset; and even in the afternoon, when it would appear lowest, it would still be too high by perhaps 700 feet. This is obviously a very fruitful source of error, and the difficulty of determining the error is increased by the fact that the curvature of the ray varies with the rarefaction of the atmosphere. In the higher altitude, when the rarefaction of the atmosphere increases, the ray assumes a less curved path. All these possible sources of error due to the rarefaction of the atmosphere have been most carefully studied, but even now we must allow 10 to 30 feet as possible error due to the rarefaction of the atmosphere.
A MOUNTAIN GLEN, BEFORE THE MELTING OF THE SNOWS
Summarising the possible sources of error in fixing the height of K2 we may say the error may be from—
Errors of observation 20 ft. Adoption of erroneous height for observing station 30 ft. Variation of snow-level from the mean Unknown Deviation of gravity Unknown Atmospheric refraction 10 to 30 ft.K2, as I have said, though on the borders of the Kashmir State, and visible from the range which bounds the Kashmir valley, is not visible from the valley itself. But Nanga Parbat can be seen from near Baramula and from a few other parts of the valley, and is the most striking object in the view from Gulmarg and other points of the northward-facing slope of the Pir Panjal. It ranks eighth among the mountains of the world, except K2 all the others being in the Nepal Himalayas. The order of the mountains is:—
Feet. Mount Everest 29,002 K2 28,250 Kinchinjunga 28,146 Makalu 27,790 T15 26,867 Dhaulagiri 26,795 XXX 26,658 Nanga Parbat 26,620Being more accessible than the remote K2 the observations for its height were made at much closer quarters, the nearest observation point being 43 miles distant instead of 61 as in the case of K2. It was observed in all from eleven different points, of which the most remote was 133 miles. But until it had been measured by the Survey it had been marked on maps as only 19,000 feet.
Colonel Burrard says it is "the most isolated and perhaps the most imposing of all the peaks of Asia." It certainly is remarkable for its isolation. With the exception of subordinate pinnacles rising from its own buttresses, no peak within 60 miles of it attains an altitude of more than 17,000 feet. Throughout a circle of 120 miles' diameter Nanga Parbat surpasses all other summits by more than 9000 feet. And its upper 5000 feet are precipitous. It stands out therefore in solitary nobleness, and it can be seen on its northern side rising 23,000 feet from the Indus, there only 3500 above the sea. But whether it is of all mountains the really most imposing it is not easy to say, and personally I almost cling to Kinchinjunga. Rakaposhi in Hunza, which is 25,550 feet in altitude, and can be seen rising sheer up from the Hunza River 5000 feet above sea-level, is also wonderfully impressive. There is a peak on the Pamirs 25,146 feet high which can be seen rising abruptly from the plains of Turkestan, which are but a little over 3000 feet; and there is the Musherbrum Peak near K2 which is 25,660 feet—all of which I have seen, and which I find it hard to place exactly in order of relative impressiveness. But if Nanga Parbat cannot be placed in unquestionably the first position, it will in most men's estimation approximate to it, and must in any case be reckoned among the few most striking sights in the world.
Of what are these great peaks built up? No one has yet ascended their summits, and as Mr. Hayden points out, the geologist has to do his work at close quarters, and not like the surveyor from a distance. So the composition of the highest peaks is rarely known in any detail, though the general character of the rocks can be ascertained with a fair approximation to certainty, from observation of material on the flanks, and from a distant view of the weathering character and apparent structure of the peaks themselves. From such observations it has been found that almost all the peaks of 25,000 feet or more in height are composed of granite, gneiss, and associated crystalline rocks. It had long be supposed that some of the granites found on the flanks of the great peaks which presented a foliated appearance were of sedimentary origin, and had therefore been once deposited beneath the sea. But their truly intrusive nature was recognised by the late Lieutenant-General M'Mahon, who proved conclusively that the great central gneissose rock of the Himalayas was in reality a granite crushed and foliated by pressure. It may certainly
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