THERE CAN BE NO OTHER COUNTRY so rich in mountains as Nepal. This narrow strip of territory, lying between Sikkim and Garhwal, occupies 500 miles of India’s northern border; and since this border coincides roughly with the 1500-mile-long Himalayan chain, it follows that approximately a third of this vast range lies within or upon the confines of Nepal. Moreover, besides being numerous, the peaks of the Nepal Himalaya are outstandingly high. Apart from Everest and Kangchenjunga and their two 27,000 ft. satellites, there are six peaks over 26,000 ft., fourteen over 25,000 ft., and a host of what might be called slightly stunted giants of 20,000 ft. and upwards, which cannot be enumerated because they are not all shown on existing maps.

In trying to grasp the general lay-out of this mountain region it is convenient to divide it into three parts, represented—from west to east—by the basins of the Karnali, the Gandak, and the Kosi. These three important rivers, some of whose tributaries rise in Tibet north of the Himalaya, all flow into the Ganges. The Karnali drains the mountains of western Nepal between Api (23,339 ft.), near the Garhwal border, and Dhaulagiri (26,795 ft.); the basin of the Gandak occupies central Nepal between the Annapurna Himal and the Langtang Himal; and the Kosi drains the mountains of eastern Nepal from Gosainthan (26,291 ft.) to Kangchenjunga. It should be understood that, except for Everest and those peaks on the Nepal-Sikkim border, most of which (except Kangchenjunga) have been climbed, this enormous field has remained untouched, unapproached, almost unseen, until this year (1949) when the first slight scratch was made.

Nepal is an independent kingdom. Like Tibet it has always sought isolation and has secured it by excluding foreigners, of whom the most undesirable were white men. A man fortunate enough to have been admitted into Nepal is expected to be able to explain on general grounds the motives behind this invidious policy and, on personal grounds, the reason for such an unaccountable exception. But now that the advantages of the Western way of life are becoming every day less obvious no explanation should be needed. Wise men traditionally come from the East, and it is probable that to them the West and its ways were suspect long before we ourselves began to have doubts. Anyhow, for the rulers of countries like Nepal and Tibet, whose polity until very recent days was medieval feudalism, the wise and natural course was to exclude foreigners and their advanced ideas. And the poverty and remoteness of those countries made such a policy practicable. A hundred years ago the rulers of China and Japan regarded foreign devils with as much distrust and aversion, but unfortunately for them their countries had sea-coasts and ports; and, unlike Tibet and Nepal, promised to become markets which no nation that lived by trade could afford to ignore.

The Nepalese, who number about five millions, are mostly Hindus. Consequently it has been suggested that the Brahmins have been the most fervent advocates of an exclusive policy. It does not seem logical, because a thin trickle of European visitors has long been admitted to the sanctum sanctorum of the Katmandu valley, whereas in remote parts, where Hinduism sits lightly or merges into Buddhism as the northern border is approached, the ban has been most rigid. A simple explanation is that the early rulers of Nepal, themselves independent and warlike, having established their sway over a turbulent people, naturally wished to remain masters in their own house. With the example of India at hand, these rulers, not without reason apprehensive and suspicious of the British, concluded that the best way of remaining in power was to have as little as possible to do with Europeans. And since this avowed policy was approved and respected by the Indian Government, it could be strictly maintained.

Writing in 1928 Perceval Landon (Nepal, two vols.) estimated that only some 120 English and ten other Europeans had been permitted to enter the Katmandu valley; while from the time of Brian Hodgson (British Resident from 1833 to 1843) onwards not even the British Resident has been allowed to set foot outside the valley. Since 1928 the number of visitors to Katmandu must have increased considerably but the mesh is still fine. However, in 1948 a party of Indian scientists had been allowed to investigate the upper basin of the Kosi river in eastern Nepal where they climbed to the Nangpa La, a 19,000 ft. pass west of Everest; and in the winter of 1948–9 an American party led by Dr Dillon Ripley was busy collecting birds in the foothills of central and eastern Nepal.

Thus encouraged, at the end of 1948 the British Ambassador at Katmandu (Sir George Falconer) sought permission for a climbing party to visit the Nepal Himalaya; and the Prime Minister, when he understood that the project had the blessing of the President of a small band of harmless eccentrics who had no other axe to grind than an ice axe, readily consented. There were, however, conditions attached. Instead of going as we had hoped to the vicinity of Gauri Sankar (23,440 ft.), whence we could also have had a look at the south side of Everest, we were to confine ourselves to the Langtang Himal; and instead of merely gambolling upon the mountains we had to undertake some serious scientific work. Science, of course, is no laughing matter, but I use the word serious advisedly so that there may be no mistake.

Except for the Nepal side of Kangchenjunga, which Hooker, Freshfield, and Dyhrenfurth’s party had visited, the Nepal Himalaya is unknown to Europeans. No one part was less interesting or exciting for us than another; but the second of these conditions meant not only a change in the composition of the party but a change, almost a volte face, on the part of a leader who had hitherto refused to mingle art with science. To be too stiff in opinion is a grave fault; a man should be sure of more than his principles before deciding never to break them. Benedick, when he swore he would die a bachelor, did not expect to live until he was married; and just as the great Henry once deemed Paris worth a Mass, so I thought a glimpse of the Nepal Himalaya worth the swallowing of a strong prejudice.

The party finally consisted of four, two scientists, or embryo scientists and two very mature climbers. Botany and geology were two obvious fields in which all that a first visit demanded were the collecting of specimens and the noting of data—tasks more suited to the embryo than to the full-blown professor. A botanist was quickly forthcoming in Mr O. Polunin, a master at Charterhouse, who was acceptable to the British Museum for whom most of the collecting was to be done. Blotting-paper and a love of flowers is not enough for the disciple of Linnaeus. Finding a geologist gave some trouble. The number of them who do anything so vulgar as battering the living rock in the field is extraordinarily minute. As weathering agents they can be dismissed. I worked steadily through a list of twenty of the older practitioners, none of whom seemed eager to pluck his rusting hammer from the wall to strike a blow for his faith. Nor would they detail a subordinate for the job. Research, setting and answering examination papers, kept the whole geological strata of England firmly in situ. A very willing victim was at last found in J. S. Scott, and his University, St Andrews, came to our aid with a handsome grant.

Having no wish to be bound too tightly to the wheel of science Mr Peter Lloyd, who was my fellow climber, and myself were prepared to pay for our own amusement. There was little difficulty in raising what money was needed for the others; for I have remarked elsewhere upon the readiness of some learned bodies to support and encourage minor enterprises of this sort, provided that among those who go upon them are men able and willing, as our Russian friend put it,1 to tear a few more rents in Nature’s veil. Breathing this rarefied air of high purpose must have gone to my head. Encouraged by the impreciseness of the map of our area, I found myself suggesting to Lloyd that we, or rather he, should undertake to improve it. This would be of benefit to future mountaineers, and would put all four members of our party on the same high intellectual plane. Lloyd, to whom theodolites were strange but who was familiar with much more recondite instruments, welcomed the idea.

Nepal is usually referred to as ‘unknown’. Possibly the reader has already mistakenly inferred that the whole country, including the Nepal Himalaya, is unexplored, whereas there are maps of the whole country on a ¼-in. scale. One of the pleasing traits of the Westerner or Paleface is to assume that what is not known to him cannot be known to anyone. ‘Unexplored’ country means country unexplored by him, rather in the grand manner of Mrs Elton who had never been to Box Hill and talked ardently of conducting an exploring party there. Unknown Nepal must have become thoroughly well known to the fourteen Indian surveyors (European officers of the Indian Survey Department were excluded) who in three seasons, 1924–7, surveyed the whole 55,000 sq. miles from the ‘terai’ along the Indian border to the Himalaya. Even before this, Nepal must have been tolerably familiar to its inhabitants, and some of the remote valleys were made known to the outside world by a few of the devoted...