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14 THE EXPLORATION OF THE CAUCASUS
complete would have been, under the circumstances, imjfossible.'
Accordingly, they were content to fix trigonometrically, mostly, if"
not altogether, from the northern side, the heights and positions of
a few prominent summits. They discovered, and General Chodzko,
through Petermann's Mitteilungen, communicated to the western
world the existence of the three great peaks which they named
Dykhtau, Koshtantau, and Adai Khokh. But they omitted altogether
Dongusorun, Ushba, Tiktengen, Tetnuld, Janga, Shkara, Ailama and
Burdjula —in short, all the peaks that are not conspicuous from the
northern steppe. The frozen fastnesses were in most cases represented
by conventional signs ; a blue smear here and there served
as an indication of glaciers, and above the snow-level a number of
brown ridges were laid down without much care, in some cases
with no care at all, as to their correspondence with natui'e. In
taking this course the surveyors followed the precedent of the first
stafi'-maps of the Alps, except those of the Swiss Government.
Government surveyors do not, I think, always realise fully their
responsibility to Science. It might be better in most cases if country
not at all, or imperfectly, surveyed as to topographical detail were
left blank, or at least distinguished in some striking manner from
the more authentic portions of a map. For not only the public, but
also its teachers, naturally accept a government map as equally
authoritative in every part. Even a scientific traveller may easily
fall into the same mistake.
The literature of the Caucasus furnishes a striking instance of
the confusion and darkening of knowledge that may thus be
wrought. The defects of the five-verst map have raised up a crop of
delusions that are far harder to eradicate than simple ignorance. In
1 There is in the Royal Geographical Society's Library in Savile Kow a curious tract issued in
186.3 by General Chodzko, giving some account of his twenty-five years' labours. At times his
officers worked under the fire of hostile villagers. Nor were they less brave in facing natural
difficulties, bo far as their means availed them. The General camped for several days on the
top of Ararat ; he climbed Zilga Khokh, a peak of 12,645 feet on the watershed south of
Kasbek, in order to connect his Ciscaucasian and Georgian stations. More than this without
ice-craft he could not do. It is curious that none of the great peaks were triangulated from
stations south of the chain. This is the reason why the mountains on the watershed, including
Tetnuld, Ushlja, and Shkara, escaped notice. See also notes by General Chodzko in the years
1859 and 1862, in Petermann's Mitteilungen.