The Valley of Eyes Unseen

A newspaper report of a scholar's strange death draws the opening narrator back to his friendship with Ronald Mirlees. Found at his desk in a Shanghai hotel, Mirlees has left another puzzle: the writings on which he had been working cannot be found. His research into treasures associated with Chinese Buddhist temples supplies a background of disputed scholarship, dangerous expeditions and hidden wealth.

Gilbert Collins's novel, first published in 1923, combines adventure in China and Tibet with science fiction and mystery. In a later mountain scene, Stephen Poyning discovers that he can communicate with unfamiliar valley inhabitants through classical Greek. A search through melting snow turns a question of language into an immediate struggle to find missing companions. Readers interested in early speculative adventure will find scholarly knowledge tested against physical danger, with the origins of an isolated community adding another strand of uncertainty.