Kei-kei—ho, hooo!”
From this point I enjoyed one of the grandest views I have ever had in Tibet—the valley of the Tsang-po was before me, the great river flowing in a deep gorge at the foot of forest-clad mountains. Here and there was to be seen a little hamlet, most of the white-walled houses surrounded by a cluster of tall trees.
By 3 o’clock we had reached the foot of the pass, the way down being over a tedious zigzag for over five miles. Along the wayside grew brambles and wild roses, a few evergreens and rhododendrons, and some flocks of sheep were grazing on the hillsides.
Then we came to a sluggish stream, and shortly after reached the straggling village of Khamba partshi,[33] with some forty wretched stone hovels. Passing through a patch of barley surrounded by pollard willows, we reached the sandy banks of the Tsang-po, and followed along it to Tongbu, the surrounding plain being known as Khamba chyang tang. [[143]]
Two women weeding their barley patch approached me as I rode by, and offered me a bunch of the young sprouts, in the hope, as Tsing-ta explained, that I would give them some money. This is a custom obtaining throughout Tibet, and is called lubul.
Further on, near Toi-tsi, we saw women making bricks, and some donkeys and yaks were carrying away those which had become sufficiently dry to be used. Two miles beyond this point we came to the famous Palchen chuvori monastery and the chain bridge (chag-zam) over the Tsang-po. This bridge, built, tradition says, by Tang-tong gyal-po in the fifteenth century, consists of two heavy cables attached at each end to huge logs, around which have been built large chorten.[34]
The bed of the river here is about 400 feet broad, but at this season of the year it spreads out several hundred feet beyond the extremities of the bridge, and travellers are taken across in boats.
The monastery of Palchen chuvori was also built by Tang-tong gyal-po, who is likewise credited with having constructed eight chain bridges over the Tsang-po, 108 temples, and 108 chorten on the hills of Chung Rivoche, in Ulterior Tibet, and of Palchen chuvori, in Central Tibet, or U. The Palchen chuvori monastery, where there are upwards of one hundred monks, is supported by the toll collected at the ferry.
We and our ponies crossed the river in a roughly made boat about 20 feet long, but a number of skin coracles were also carrying travellers and freight from one side to the other. It was sunset when we reached the village of Jim-khar, belonging to the Namgyal Ta-tsan, the great monastic establishment of Potala at Lhasa. Here we obtained lodgings for the night in the sheepfold attached to the house of the headman, or gyan-po. All the members of the gyan-po’s family were ill with small-pox, and he himself had but [[144]]recently recovered from it. It began to rain shortly after our arrival, and what with the leaks in the roof and the noise made by nine ponies tied up near us, we passed a miserable night, and were glad to resume our journey at the first streak of dawn. After proceeding some distance we came in sight of the ruins of Chu-shul djong, on a ledge of rocks about a mile from where the Tsang-po is joined by the Kyi chu, the river of Lhasa. Some two hundred years ago Chu-shul was a place of importance, but now it is but a village of about sixty houses, surrounded by wide fields, where barley, rape, buckwheat, and wheat are grown.[35]
Passing near the hamlets of Tsa-kang and Semu, the road in many places so boggy that the ponies sank in the mire up to their knees, we came, after about four miles, to the ruins of Tsal-pa-nang,[36] where we overtook some of the attendants of the Lhacham on their way to Lhasa. After conversing with them for upwards of an hour, they rode on ahead, as they were desirous of reaching Netang by sunset; and they advised us to put up in the Jya-khang (or Chinese post station) of the same place, where we would find good accommodation.