First edition of this important work. The names of Bogle and Manning are remembered as those of the first Englishmen to enter Tibet. George Bogle (1746-1781) joined the East Indian Company in 1769. There he very quickly won the approval of Warren Hastings, the governor of Bengal, who in 1774 appointed Bogle to act as envoy to the Lama of Tibet. Bogle more than succeeded in his mission to open communications between England and Tibet: the friendship that developed between him and the Teshu Lama continued by correspondence once Bogle had returned to India.Thomas Manning (1772-1840) "was considered the first Chinese scholar in Europe" (DNB). His desire to penetrate to the heart of the Celestial Empire took him to Canton in 1807 and on to Calcutta in 1810. Having studied medicine in England to provide him with some means whereby he might fulfil his desire, Manning proceeded with a single servant and without official government sanction to Rangpur. By the 29th October 1811 he reached Parijong on the Tibetan border, where he was met by a Chinese general with troops. When Manning succeeded in curing some of the troops of illness, he was allowed to travel in their company as a medical man. By this route, he finally reached Lhasa, where he remained for several months. Not only did Manning thus become the first Englishmen to visit Lhasa, but also the first to obtain interviews with the Dalai Lama. It seems incredible that the accounts of these two men remained unpublished for so long. Clements Markham proved an excellent choice as the eventual editor of Bogle and Manning's surviving manuscripts. His able recension of their texts gains from the lengthy introduction which prefaces them. In it Markham offers an authoritative description of the Himalayan region's geography, an historical sketch of Tibet and its relations with the outside world, and biographical portraits of Bogle and Manning. In this way he finally made available the truly remarkable stories of these two men