Practically, then, the religion of the Tibetans is but of a degraded form. Yet one does see gleams of real good radiating through. The Tashi Lama whom Bogle met was a man of real worth. His successor of the present day produced a most favourable impression in India, and excited the enthusiasm of Sven Hedin. Deep down under the dirty crust there must be some hidden source of strength in these Lamas, or they would not exert the influence they do. Millions of men over hundreds of years are not influenced entirely by chicanery and fraud. And I think I caught a glimpse of that inner power during a visit I paid to the Jo Khang Temple.
This temple, or cathedral, as it has sometimes been styled, has been fully described by Sarat Chandra Das, Perceval Landon, and others. The latter especially has given a remarkably vivid description of his impression. It is, as Colonel Waddell has aptly styled it, the St. Peter’s of Lamadom, and is chiefly noteworthy as containing the image of Buddha, made in India, but brought to Lhasa from China by the Chinese Princess who married a Tibetan King and introduced Buddhism into the country.
I visited this temple with full ceremony after the Treaty was signed, and was received with every mark of cordiality by the Chief Priest. I was even shown round what might be called the high-altar, in spite of my protestations that I might be intruding where I should not go. The actual building is not imposing. The original temple, built about A.D. 650, according to Waddell, has been added to, and the result is a confused pile without symmetry, and devoid of any single complete architectural idea. One sees a forest of wooden pillars grotesquely painted, but no beautiful design or plain simple effect. Moreover, dirt is excessively prevalent, there is an offensive smell of the putrid butter used in the services, and the candlesticks, vases, and ceremonial utensils, some of solid gold and of beautiful design, are not orderly arranged.
Still, this temple, from its antiquity, from its worn pavements marking the passage of innumerable pilgrims, from the thought that for a thousand years those wanderers from distant lands had faced the terrors of the desert and the mountains to prostrate themselves before the benign and peaceful Buddha, possessed a halo and an interest which the beauty of the Taj itself could never give it.
Here it was that I found the true inner spirit of the people. The Mongols from their distant deserts, the Tibetans from their mountain homes, seemed here to draw on some hidden source of power. And when from the far recesses of the temple came the profound booming of great drums, the chanting of monks in deep reverential rhythm, the blare of trumpets, the clash of cymbals, and the long rolling of lighter drums, I seemed to catch a glimpse of the source from which they drew. Music is a proverbially fitter means than speech for expressing the eternal realities; and in the deep rhythmic droning of the chants, the muffled rumbling of the drums, the loud clang and blaring of cymbals and trumpets, I realized this sombre people touching their inherent spirit, and, in the way most fitted to them, giving vent to its mighty surgings panting for expression.
Besides these visits to monasteries and temples, we also saw something of the Tibetans socially during our stay in Lhasa, and Captain Walton, through his skill in medicine, attracted many hundreds to his hospital, and was able to get on terms of intimacy with unofficial Tibetans of the highest position. Many would come and dine with us, for the Tibetans, though they have the ordinary class distinctions which are found in every people, have not those rigid caste barriers which are such a hindrance to social intercourse in India. Even the ladies were very nearly induced by the persuasive Captain O’Connor to come to tea, and the wives of the Councillors had actually accepted an invitation, when at the last moment shyness overtook them. Women are much to the fore in Tibet, and have great influence with their husbands, so we especially regretted not having seen them.
The Tibetans, though they have their reputation for seclusiveness, are not by nature unsociable. We found them quite the reverse, and Kawaguchi says that they were “originally a people highly hospitable to strangers.” This more natural sentiment was, he says, superseded by one of fear and even of antipathy, as the result of an insidious piece of advice which, probably prompted by some policy of its own, the Government of China gave to Tibet, and which was to the effect that if the Tibetans allowed the free entrance of foreigners Buddhism would be destroyed and replaced by Christianity. The people had, too, the idea that we sought their gold-mines.
Whatever seclusive feeling they may have had, they abandoned it when the Treaty was concluded. They came to our gymkhanas, and wondered why only the first should be given the prize when all the rest had covered exactly the same distance. They watched with wonder Vernon Magniac and other inveterate sportsmen pulling fish out of the river by pieces of string attached to long sticks. They watched theatrical performances, and marvelled at our display of fireworks; and they did a magnificent business with us in the sale, not only of supplies for the troops, but also of innumerable curios, brass and bronze figures, turquoise ornaments, embroideries, silks, etc.
The Tibetans are, indeed, born traders. Kawaguchi calls them a “nation of shop-keepers.” Men and women—and the women more than the men—priests and laity, all trade. And this is another irony of the situation, that a people who are naturally sociable, and who are thus, too, born traders, should have been put for so long in their seclusive position. But of late years the departure of Lhasa merchants to India had been becoming more frequent, and Kawaguchi says that circumstances were impressing the Tibetans With the necessity of extending their sphere of trade, and they realized that if their wool trade was stopped the people would be hard hit, for sheep-rearers constituted the greater part of the whole population.
How it was, from a Tibetan point of view, that of recent years we became estranged is worth hearing. It was, according to Kawaguchi, the explorations of the Bengali gentleman, Sarat Chandra Das, coupled with the frontier troubles which followed, that changed the attitude of the Tibetans towards us. The two events had not the slightest connection with one another, but the Tibetans seemed to have been alarmed that the harmless journeying of Sarat Chandra Das in 1881 was a deliberate design on our part to subvert their religion. As to the frontier troubles—presumably those of 1886—Kawaguchi himself says that it was the Tibetan Government who “most indiscreetly adopted measures at the instance of a fanatic Nechung (oracle), and proceeded to build a fort at a frontier place which strictly belonged to Sikkim.”