Shekar Dzong.

June 17 we spent resting at Shekar. In the morning Morshead and I went to call on the Jongpen; he lives in a poor house at the foot of the hill, his official residence being three-quarters of the way up, but he wisely prefers to live at the bottom, not being very fond of exercise. He was busy adding on to his house, and we were shown into the old part in which he was living. He gave us the usual Tibetan tea and sweetmeats and then insisted on our having macaroni and meat seasoned with chillies, which was excellent, followed by junket served in china bowls. He had some very fine teacups of agate and hornblende schist with finely chased silver covers, which I admired very much. That afternoon several of us went up to visit the big monastery of Shekar Chö-te. This consisted of a great number of buildings terraced one above the other on a very steep rocky slope. A path along the face of the rock brought us to several archways under which we passed. We then had to go up and down some picturesque but very steep and narrow streets until we came to a large courtyard. On one side of this was the main temple. In this temple were several gilt statues of Buddha decorated all over with turquoises and other precious stones, and behind them a huge figure of Buddha quite 50 feet high. Every year, they told us, they had to re-gild his face. Around were eight curious figures about 10 feet high and dressed in quaint flounces which they said were the guardians of the shrine. We then went up steep and slippery ladders, in almost pitch darkness, and came out on a platform opposite the face of the great Buddha. Here were some beautifully chased silver teapots and other interesting pieces of silver, richly decorated in relief. Inside the shrine, which was very dark, the smell of rancid butter was almost overpowering as all the lamps burnt butter. The official head of the monastery showed us round. He was apparently appointed from Lhasa and was responsible for all the revenues and financial dealings of the monastery. We were given very buttery tea in the roof courtyard, which was a pleasant spot, and here I photographed a group of several monks. They had never seen a camera or photographs before, but they had heard that such a thing was possible and were very much interested in it. Before leaving we went in to see the Head Lama who had lived over sixty-six years in this monastery. He was looked upon as being extremely holy and as the re-incarnation of a former abbot, and they therefore practically worshipped him. There was only one tooth left in his mouth, but for all that he had a very pleasant smile. All around his room were silver-gilt Chortens inlaid with turquoises and precious stones and incense was being burnt everywhere. After much persuasion the other monks induced him to come outside and have his photograph taken, telling him that he was an old man, and that his time on earth was now short, and they would like to have a picture of him to remember him by. He was accordingly brought out, dressed up in robes of beautiful golden brocades, with priceless silk Chinese hangings arranged behind him while he sat on a raised dais with his dorje and his bell in front of him, placed upon a finely carved Chinese table. The fame of this photograph spread throughout the country and in places hundreds of miles away I was asked for photographs of the Old Abbot of Shekar Chö-te, nor could I give a more welcome present at any house than a photograph of the Old Abbot. Being looked upon as a saint, he was worshipped, and they would put these little photographs in shrines and burn incense in front of them.

The Abbot of Shekar Chöte.

About midnight that night I was suddenly awakened by yells and loud shouting and hammering close to my tent and next to that in which Bullock and Mallory were sleeping. The latter turned out and found that a Tibetan had seized an ice axe and a mallet and was busy hammering on our store boxes. He gave chase, but failed to catch the intruder. Some of our coolies, however, found out where he had gone to, and Chheten Wangdi had him handed over to the Jongpen. On investigation in the morning the man proved to be a madman whom his parents always kept locked up during nights when the moon was full, but he had managed to escape, so we handed him back to his family.

Our transport was very slow in arriving, and there were so many delays that it was midday before the procession finally moved off. The loads, too, were very badly put on and kept falling off, also the transport was quite the worst that we had yet had. For about 5 miles the path went up and down hill and through much sand until we came to the bridge over the Bhong-chu. This bridge consisted of four or five stout pillars of loose stones which acted as piers, on which were laid a few pieces of wood, on which flat stones were placed. It was a rough form of bridge, but served at ordinary times for its purpose. During the course of this summer, however, after heavy rain, these piers so dammed up the water as to cause it to rise some 4 or 5 feet on the upper side of them with the result that the immense weight of water swept the whole bridge away. Bullock and Mallory with half a dozen coolies had left early in the morning, intending to bivouac out for a couple of nights and climb one of the hills to the South of the Bhong-chu in order to get a view of Mount Everest. After we had gone about 5 miles we met them close to the bridge, as they had lost their way and had been walking for about 15 miles: not having found the bridge, they had forded the river and had got wet up to their necks in crossing it. At dusk we reached the village of Tsakor, where we found a tent pitched for us, and here we spent the night. Our transport did not turn up till nearly nine o'clock, and so we all slept in the mess tent. From here to Tingri was still another 20 miles—the path following the right bank of the Bhong-chu the whole way. In places the river was as much as 200 yards wide and flowed very sluggishly. We were told that the waters were very low, but that next month, when the rains had broken, the river often filled the whole of the bottom of the valley. On the way we passed some very handsome black-necked cranes as large as the Saurus crane. These had black heads and bills, with red eyes, light grey bodies and black tails with fine feathers. On this march the midges were dreadfully annoying the whole way, and we were surrounded with clouds of them the whole time. Their bite was very tiresome and extremely irritating. On the way we passed a Mongolian who had taken eleven months in coming from Lhasa and who was on his way to Nepal. His method of progression was by throwing himself at full length down on the ground. He then got up and at the spot where his hands touched the ground repeated the motion again. As we approached Tingri, the valley widened out and bent round to the South. Tingri itself was situated on the side of a small hill in the middle of a great plain, from which, looking to the South, was visible the wonderful chain of snowy peaks, many of them over 25,000 feet in height, which extends Westwards from Mount Everest. We crossed the Ra-chu—a tributary of the Bhong-chu, partly by bridges and partly by fords; it was split up into a number of small and very muddy channels that took their rise from the Kyetrak Glacier. Tingri was to be our first base for reconnoitring the Northern and North-western approaches to Mount Everest. It was June 19 when we arrived there, so that it had taken us just a month's travelling from Darjeeling to perform this part of our journey.

Footnote:

[3] Dzong means fort.