"Ever since I was five years old, a tiny precocious child of Paris, I wished to move out of the narrow limits in which, like all children of my age, I was then kept. I craved to go beyond the garden gate, to follow the road that passed it by, and to set out for the Unknown." Preface, p. xxxi

"What decided me to go to Lhasa was, above all, the absurd prohibition which closes Thibet." Preface, p. xxxiv

"What would be the end of this new attempt? I was full of hope. A previous experience had proved to me that in the disguise of a poor traveler I could escape notice." Chapter I, p. 2

"The Dokar Pass now stood before us, most impressive against a gray evening sky. It is a depression in a gigantic barren range whose Cyclopean slopes sag like cables outstretched across rivers to...