Books of travel are of all kinds, from the dry records of laborious statisticians to the trivial diaries of globe-trotters. Explorers, seamen, archaeologists, naturalists, dreamers, what type of man or woman has not written a book of travel? They are read, they are forgotten and ninety-nine out of every hundred pass away into oblivion. Yet there are others. Alas! There aren’t many. Great books are rare, same as the people of genius and character are. To write a book of travel appeals irresistibly to large numbers of persons who have no creative power, whose books are the mere reflection of a shallow curiosity and of a foolish egotism? These mediocre works, though they spread a sort of suburban light upon the beautiful and wild places of earth, pale into trivialities on comparison with the achievement of the true travellers who by reason of their fortitude, their imagination, their insight and their ability to evoke the atmosphere and colour of the world, have produced books that rank as literature and last for centuries.