We stopped for the night in a large stone house, from which we had a view towards the south over a great mountain known in Tibetan as Chomo-Lhari (the mountain of the Mother Goddess). There are many mountains of this name in Tibet, where nearly every snowy peak is accounted sacred to the deity and is called by her name. Some say that there are twenty-one Chomo-Lhari in Tibet, some give the number as thirty-two; but as nearly every large mountain goes by that name, the number must be far greater. This particular Chomo-Lhari sits, like the Buḍḍhist deity Vairochana, with an air of great solemnity in one corner of the plain, with its head in the clouds; while the snowy peaks which range themselves on either side of it, embracing the lake as it were with their gigantic masses, look like the Boḍhisaṭṭva Avalokiṭeshvara (representative of the great Mercy of Buḍḍha) and Boḍhisaṭṭva Manjushrī (representative of the great knowledge of Buḍḍha) offering before the great Buḍḍha Vairochana a sacrifice of silent praise. The whole scene seemed to me like a picture of the Buḍḍhist Heaven.
On this plateau, as on the great north-western plain of Tibet, neither wheat nor barley will grow, and the district is fit only for pasturage, and that only during the summer months. Lake Lham tso abounds in fish of all kinds, from seven to twelve inches in length, and it is much frequented during the summer by fishermen who catch and dry the fish for winter consumption. During the winter, when fishing is impossible, they take to begging, and so the population around the Lake consists mainly of people who are half fishermen and half beggars.
[CHAPTER LXXXIV.]
Five Gates to Pass.
On June 9th we were as usual early on horseback, and on our road towards the south. Tenba seemed to fall back into his old suspicious mood. We were due to reach the first Challenge Gate on the following morning, and he possibly feared that if anything leaked out he would be arrested and put into jail. So he began his attacks on me again.
“The other day,” he said, “you said that there was no need for us to take the secret path, but there you were wrong. It is not nearly such difficult travelling as you suppose. I have been over it twice myself, and the wild beasts can always be scared away by lighting fires. The officers at Phari are, as I have told you, both strict and extortionate. Fourteen or fifteen yen ought to be enough, but you may have to pay thirty or even fifty. You will be detained for three or four days at the very least, possibly for a week. If you are anxious to get on quickly you had better take the secret path. Why waste money and time?”
“Well,” I replied, “if the officials want to bleed me, I suppose they must. I have no objection to being bled. It will be one way of making an offering to the Dalai Lama.”
Again my feigned nonchalance cleared his mind of doubt, though it surprised him not a little. But a short time later a most strange and weird thing took place. We had gone some five miles further, when suddenly a band of ill-favored savage-looking men, four in number, stood in my path, made a profound bow, and begged me to do them a favor.
“We are on our way from the north,” they said in excited tones, “and we were taking salt to sell at Phari. Last night, while our watchmen were dozing, some robbers came up and drove off forty-five of our yaks. We do not know whether they were Tibetans or Bhūṭānese, but we intend to pursue them whoever they are, and we desire you to find out by divination which way they have gone.”