The Pyramid of Peace did not appear, however, to have infused equal confidence into the hearts of the herdsmen; for, one fine morning, they all decamped together, bag and baggage, and went with their herds and flocks to seek a less dangerous position elsewhere. They invited us to follow their example, but we preferred to remain where we were, for in the desert there is scarcely one place more secure than another. The flight of the shepherds, besides, seemed to us a guarantee that our tranquillity would not be disturbed, for we considered that the brigands, when they learned that no flocks remained in the valley of Tchogortan, would feel no interest in paying us a visit. We therefore, in our turn, raised up in our hearts a Pyramid of Peace, in the form of a firm reliance on the divine protection; and, thus fortified, we abode calmly and fearlessly in our adopted home.
For some days we enjoyed the most profound solitude. Since the disappearance of the herds and flocks, the argoleers, having nothing to do, had kept away. We were alone with a Lama, left in charge of the Lamasery. Our animals profited by the change, for now all the pasturages of the valley were theirs; they could browse wherever they liked over the valley, fearless of meeting a single competitor.
The desert, however, became after a time, once more alive, and towards the commencement of September, the Lamas of the Faculty of Medicine repaired to Tchogortan, for the purpose of botanizing. The disposable houses received all they could contain, and the rest dwelt in tents, sheltered by the great trees of the Lamasery. Every morning, after they have recited their prayers in common, drunk their buttered tea, and eaten their barley-meal, all the students in medicine tuck up their garments, and go forth on the mountains, under the guidance of one of their professors. They are each provided with a long iron-pointed stick, and a small pick-axe; a leathern bag, filled with meal, is suspended from the girdle, and some carry at their backs great tea-kettles, for the Faculty spend the entire day on the mountain. Before sunset, the Lama physicians return laden with perfect faggots of branches, and piles of plants and grasses. As you see them weariedly
descending the mountains, supported by their long staves and bearing these burdens, they look more like poaching woodcutters than like future doctors in medicine. We were often obliged to escort in person those of the number who had special charge of the aromatic plants; for our camels, which, attracted by the odour, always put themselves in pursuit of these personages, would otherwise inevitably, and without the smallest scruple, have devoured those precious simples, destined for the relief of suffering humanity. The remainder of the day is occupied in cleaning and spreading out on mats these various products of the vegetable kingdom. The medical harvest lasted eight whole days. Five other days are devoted to the selection and classification of the various articles. On the fourteenth day, a small portion is given to each student, the great bulk remaining the property of the Faculty of Medicine. The fifteenth day is kept as a festival, in the form of a grand banquet of tea with milk, barley-meal, little cakes fried in butter, and boiled mutton. Thus terminates this botanico-medical expedition, and the illustrious Faculty gaily returns to the Grand Lamasery.
The drugs collected at Tchogortan are deposited in the general drug-room of Kounboum. When they have been thoroughly dried in the heat of a moderate fire, they are reduced to powder, and then divided into small doses, which are neatly enveloped in red paper, and labelled with Thibetian characters. The pilgrims who visit Kounboum, buy these remedies at exorbitant prices. The Tartar-Mongols never return home without an ample supply of them, having an unlimited confidence in whatever emanates from Kounboum. On their own mountains and prairies they would find exactly the same plants, the same shrubs, the same roots, the same grasses; but then how different must be the plants, shrubs, roots, and grasses that grow and ripen in the birth-place of Tsong-Kaba!
The Thibetian physicians are as empirical as those of other countries—possibly somewhat more so. They assign to the human frame forty hundred and forty maladies, neither more nor less. The books which the Lamas of the Faculty of Medicine are obliged to study and to learn by heart, treat of these four hundred and forty maladies, indicating their characteristics, the means of identifying them, and the manner of combating them. These books are a hotch-potch of aphorisms, more or less obscure, and of a host of special recipes. The Lama physicians have not so great a horror of blood as the Chinese physicians have—they bleed sometimes, and cup often. In the latter operation, they first subject the skin of the part to slight excoriations; and afterwards place over it a bullock’s horn, open at the point. They exhaust
the air within, and when a sufficient vacuum is obtained, stop up the hole with a pellet of chewed paper. When they wish to remove the cup they have only to remove this mastic.
The Lama physicians attach extreme importance to the inspection of the patient’s water. They always require various specimens of it, collected at different hours of the day and night. They examine it with the most minute attention, and take the greatest heed to all the changes undergone by its colour. They whip it, from time to time, with a wooden spatula, and then put it up to the ear to ascertain what degree, if any, of noise it makes; for in their view, a patient’s water is mute or silent, according to his state of health. A Lama physician, to attain the character of thorough ability in his profession, must be able to treat and cure a patient without having ever seen him, the inspection of the water sufficing as a guide in the preparation of his prescriptions.
As we have said elsewhere, in speaking of the Tartar-Mongols, the Lamas introduce many superstitious practices into medicine. Yet, notwithstanding all this quackery, there is no doubt that they possess an infinite number of very valuable recipes, the result of long experience. It were, perhaps, rash to imagine that medical science has nothing to learn from the Tartar, Thibetian, and Chinese physicians, on the pretext that they are not acquainted with the structure and mechanism of the human body. They may, nevertheless, be in possession of very important secrets, which science alone, no doubt, is capable of explaining, but which, very possibly, science itself may never discover. Without being scientific, a man may very well light upon extremely scientific results. In China, Tartary, and Thibet, everybody can make gunpowder; yet it may be safely propounded that not one of these powder-makers can explain scientifically this chemical operation; each man has a good receipt for making the powder, and he makes it.