the continuance of my journey, and I camped there for two days, during which time my diligent application of some camphor tincture, which I had with me, to the injured parts, gradually relieved me of my suffering. On resuming our journey, now down the mountain, I could not help being profoundly impressed with the power of impenetrable solitude, for the path lay through a valley where nature, in her wildest seclusion, reigned supreme. My sense of loneliness was heightened by the note of the cuckoo, which now and then broke the oppressive silence, and an uta then came to me thus:
In tortuous paths my lonely way now lies
Among rough mountain tracks and scenes all wild;
The rocks and giant trees in silence stand,
With naught to break the silent depths around
Except the solitary cuckoo’s notes,
That makes the awful silence more profound.
CHAPTER VIII.
Dangers Ahead.
So the days passed and with these days I came to know more or less of the different characteristics of my two servants; I found one to be a rather impatient fellow, but prompt of decision, and the other a quiet man with some education, of which he was not a little proud. The latter seemed occasionally to hurt the feelings of the impatient one, and more than once collisions had already occurred between the two. As for the old woman pilgrim, she was a good honest soul, and that was all there was about her, except that she seemed to know all about the two men. I took pains to be strictly impartial in all my dealings with the three, though her age entitled the old dame to special consideration on my part, and she had it in full when I thought fit. It came to pass that, apparently because of this treatment, the old woman came to think a great deal of me. I had noticed in her manner something indicating that she wished to speak to me, but was afraid to do so in the presence of her two companions; so one morning I caused her to go a considerable way ahead of us, and I started with my servants afterwards. Burdened with my luggage as the men were, and riding on a horse as I was, it was only natural that I should soon leave them lagging far behind, and overtake the old woman. The good soul turned furtively back, and asked if the two men were a long distance behind. I told her that they must be at least five miles behind. Then she made a revelation to me, and it was not of a very reassuring kind; for according to her I was doomed to be killed. In short she told me that the impatient fellow was a robber and murderer, having committed many crimes while at home in Kham, and that, though the quiet one was not so bad a man, he had yet killed a fellow-creature in a quarrel. At all events neither would think twice before taking a man’s life. The old dame thought it certain that they, or at least the impatient one, would pounce upon me as soon as we reached the north-west plains of Tibet, and rob me of all my money and effects, as well as of my life! Thereupon I said: “That could not be; for they are both men of great honesty and uprightness.” She returned: “Konjogsum (Holy Trinity)! send to me death, if I tell a lie!” These are words of adjuration to which Tibetans attach great importance, and I could not persuade myself to regard my informant’s warning as a mere string of falsehoods. So another trouble ahead was added to my burdened mind.
After travelling twelve days more and only making a distance of about one hundred miles, we reached a Himālayan village called Tukje, where then lived the local Governor, named Harkaman Suppa. Through Gya Lama’s introduction I enjoyed the privilege of being received as a guest by this Governor. Two days after my arrival there the special man whom Gya Lama through his thoughtful kindness, as already told, had sent to accompany me so far, took leave of me, apparently well satisfied that my two servants were and would be all right. But they were far from being all right, and I felt that I would never be able to accomplish my journey unless I got rid of them. While I was worrying myself with these thoughts, I came across information about the route that lay before me that proved to me another source of discouragement. In effect, it was that three months before the Tibetan Government had detailed five soldiers to guard, against all foreigners and any strange person, the road in my route which lay through the State of Lo; the same precaution had been taken on all the other bye-ways and pathways leading into Tibet, however secluded and narrow, even though narrow enough for just one person to pass. And I had reason to believe that this information was well founded; so that it became inevitable that I should give up my idea of entering Tibet by smuggling myself into its north-western plain. But there is ebb and flow even in troubles.
One evening, while still staying at the Governor’s, my servants, having regaled themselves with the local drinks even to boisterousness, began a-quarrelling, which largely consisted of exposing each other. In brief, each accused the other of a somewhat cheerless intention of making short work of me when opportunity should arrive, with the upshot that they both came to me, each with a demand that he would like to be discharged if the other were to continue in my service. I could not have had a better opportunity, and I there and then dismissed both of them, after having paid them off rather liberally. I also gave some money with some little present in kind to the old woman, and bade her go with the men. And thus I got rid of an imminent danger to my life. But there remained the greater problem of what to do next, to retrace my steps back to Kātmāndu being out of the question, while the route I had chosen for myself had become unavailable.
It happened that, enjoying the Governor’s hospitality like myself, was a Mongolian scholar named Serab Gyaltsan, who was acting as a doctor of medicine, besides giving lessons in religious Texts to the local priests. I had not been long at Governor Harkaman’s before I became acquainted with this person, and soon found him to be a man possessed of profound knowledge of not only Buḍḍhism but also of literary subjects. Whatever were the reasons on my part, he and I after a while came to an agreement for the exchange of knowledge, he instructing me in Tibetan Buḍḍhism and literature and I teaching him Chinese Buḍḍhism. This understanding arrived at, we took leave of Tukje and set out for Tsarang in the province of Lo, where the Mongolian scholar had his home. On our way thither, we visited the famous Chumik Gyatsa. Chumik Gyatsa means a hundred fountains, and is the Mukuṭināṭh of Samskṛṭ, which Hinḍūs as well as Buḍḍhists regard as a place of great sanctity. The place apparently obtained the name it bears from the numberless springs abounding thereabout, and a spot of particular fame there was called Sala Mebar, Chula Mebar, Dola Mebar, which means burning in earth, burning in water, burning in rock. On seeing the spot I found this mystery to be nothing more than the fancy of the ignorant natives, who saw a burning jet of natural gas escaping from a crevice in a slab of rock, that formed a lid, so to say, over and close to the surface of a beautiful crystal-like fountain, which was about one by two feet in size, so that its prolonged flame looked, at the first glance, as if it were crawling over the water. I noticed, however, that the mountains round about bore ample evidences of old volcanic eruptions, at one time or another, an extinct crater now changed to a pond, lava-rocks, and so on, being all present. We passed a night encamped on the bank of the river Kālīgaṅgā, that flows at the foot of the mountain which we had just descended, after leaving the ‘hundred fountains’ behind us. The following morning we had a disastrous time for three hours in trying to cross a stream. In the first place I made a blunder in attempting to wade across the stream on my horse, which, with my weight on his back and treacherous mud-beds under his feet, found himself in a perilous condition as soon as he had walked a few steps into the stream. I, of course, got off him at once and climbed upon the bank behind me. I then set about throwing into the river, near where the horse was, stones, rocks, and broken branches of trees that I found lying about, in order to improvise there a passable footway for myself as well as for the Mongolian scholar and his animal. Stones flying and muddy water splashing around him scared my horse, and, with a wild effort, he struggled out and landed himself on the opposite bank; but my friend’s pony remained immovable till we had managed to build a way across for ourselves and pulled him after us. That day we stopped in a village called Samar (red clay). On the next we again climbed half-way
