A FAMOUS EXPLORER.

Waipukurau Press, Issue 306, 10 September 1908, Page 7

A FAMOUS EXPLORER.

Dr Sven Anders Hedin, the famous explorer, who was recently erroneously reported as missing in Thibet, has earned for himself the title of “ the Stanley of Asia.” Few living men have gone through such thrilling experiences and had so many hair-breadth escapes as has Dr Hedin, and his knowledge of Thibet is greater than that, of any other living European. His love of travel must have been born with him, for he was quite a small boy when he became fired with the ambition to explore the unknown regions of the earth. Dr Hedin is a bachelor, aud when not engaged in travel he lives quietly •* at Stockholm surrounded by his ►■• - favourite books, and devoting his time to his beloved archeology and botany. One of Dr Hedin’s most terrible experiences was during a former journey he made in Thibet, when he suffered agonies owing to the high altitudes at which he and his party were travelling. “ The experience was weird and awful,” he says. “ Even to unbutton one’s coat meant acute pain and tension to an overwrought heart, which literally was at the point of breaking. My only safety lay in the fact that I never left the saddle for a single moment, -from morning till we pitched camp in the evening. Had I done so, my heart would have given way.” The horses, too, suffered severely. Out of forty-five, forty-four succumbed, and thirty out of thirty- — nine camels also died on the way. Dr Hedin has some thrilling stories to tell of the hardships he has undergone through having to go without water. One time he was nine days without the life-giving fluid, and he and his followers were reduced almost to death s door. When at- last he saw a .small pool, he drank five pints ■without stopping.