that he made the acquaintance of certain
influential men of the Kaken Khel, who offered to see him safely
through the dangerous districts outlying Kaffirstan, and give him the
opportunity of being the first European to set his foot in that land of
romance. The snow-capped summits of some of the more southerly peaks of
Kaffirstan had been seen and fixed by McNair during the progress of the
Afghan campaign, and it had ever been a dream with him to reach those
mighty spurs, and torn those peaks to account by using them as the
basis of a topographical map of the country. He did reach them, as the
records of the R.G.S. sufficiently show, and he may fairly claim to be
the first Englishman to lift even a corner of the veil of mystery which
has ever shrouded that inaccessible country so far as its topographical
conformation is concerned. This excursion won for him the Murchison
Grant of the Society, and established his position as a leading
practical geographer. For the last few years of his life he has been
almost incessantly occupied in the rough work of frontier surveying,
which his knowledge of frontier people and power of winning their
confidence and help especially fitted him to undertake. At the time of
his death he was employed in the Baluchistan Survey party in the
completion of a triangulation series which should carry the great
Indian system to the Kojak range, and furnish a scientific and highly
accurate base for future extension into Afghanistan. This was a duty
which severely taxed even his vigorous constitution. It involved
incessant labour in examining lofty mountain peaks in order to select
suitable sites for stations, and subsequently days and nights of
anxious watching during the progress of the observations, whilst food
and water (when snow was not lying on the ground) were scarce, and
mists and clouds hung round the mountains. No doubt it tried him hard,
and when typhoid attacked him at Quetta he seemed unable to make a good
fight for his life. He was able, however, to reach Mussoorie, where he
died on the 13th August, leaving a gap in the Department which he
served so well which it will be exceedingly hard to fill.

End of Project Gutenberg's Memoir of William Watts McNair, by J. E. Howard

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEMOIR OF WM WATTS MCNAIR ***

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