A few days later came the news that the pillar which Mr. White had erected on the Jelap-la had been demolished by the Tibetans, and the stoneware slab on which the number of the pillar had been inscribed had been removed by them. And on June 11 Mr. White telegraphed that the pillar he had erected on the Donchuk-la had been wilfully damaged, and as this was an unfrequented pass he considered the outrage must be deliberate. He subsequently stated that the numbered slab here also had been taken away, and that the destruction of the pillar was most probably the work of three Lamas sent from Lhasa to watch the proceedings of the Tibetan Commissioners at Yatung.
This was brought to the notice of the Chinese Resident by the Viceroy, and a reply was received that the Council of State had sent no orders for the destruction of the pillar, and that he had given orders that a strict examination should be made into the affair, and the people who stole the slab from the pillar be severely punished. At the same time, the Amban suggested that the work of delimiting the frontier should be postponed “until after the expiry of the free period when the treaty was to be revised.”
When informed of this proposal, our Minister at Peking stated his opinion that it would be best to be firm in the refusal of a postponement, and he solicited the Viceroy’s authority to repeat to the Chinese Government what he had previously informed them, that, if obliged, the British Commissioner would proceed alone.
The Bengal Government also urged that Mr. White “should be authorized to proceed with his own men alone to lay down the boundary and set up pillars on the passes along the eastern frontier where no dispute was known to exist.” But the Lieutenant-Governor was informed that the Government of India were not prepared to insist upon the early demarcation of the frontier, and directed that Mr. White should return to Gantok forthwith, or, at any, rate withdraw at once from the immediate neighbourhood of the border.
The Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Charles Elliott, acknowledged that it was difficult for Mr. White to remain indefinitely in his camp on the frontier, but declared that it was impossible to disguise the fact that a return to Gantok practically meant the abandonment of the demarcation. He believed that the authorities in Peking were anxious that the delimitation should continue without delay, but it was plain that the Amban at Lhasa was unable to give effect to the wishes of his Government in consequence of the opposition manifested by the Lamas, who exercised the real authority in Tibet. The contemplated withdrawal of Mr. White to Gantok would undoubtedly, he thought—and events proved him to be absolutely right—cause a loss of prestige, would be looked upon by the Tibetans as a rebuff to British authority, and would encourage them in high-handed acts and demands, and possibly outrages. He had no doubt that if the British Government had only to deal with Tibet, the wisest policy would be to give them warning that unless they at once made arrangements to co-operate in the work of delimitation it would be done without them, and that unless they appointed a ruler on their side who could protect the pillars set up, the British Government would march in and hold the Chumbi Valley in pawn, either temporarily or permanently. Such a brusque and high-handed line of conduct, added the Lieutenant-Governor, was the only one that frontier tribes who have reached the stage of civilization of the Tibetans could understand. But the affair, he allowed, was complicated by the relations of Government with China, and our desire to uphold the weak and tottering authority of the Chinese in Lhasa, the result of which was that the people who were in real power were not those we dealt with, and that the people we dealt with had no power to carry out their engagements with us. In the circumstances, Sir Charles Elliott advocated such negotiations with the Chinese Government as would leave the British Government free to march in and hold the Chumbi Valley, with their consent, and without any detriment to the Chinese suzerainty, but with the object of assisting them to establish their authority more firmly at Lhasa. At any rate, we ought, he considered, to intimate in a firm and friendly way to the Peking Government that either they must get their orders carried out or we must. He reminded the Government of India that nothing had been exacted as the result of the British victories at Lengtu and on the Jelap-la—not even compensation for the cost of the campaign—and he urged that we should now insist that we would protect our own interests if China could not carry out her engagements.[[8]]
These, in the light of future events, appear reasonable and sensible proposals; but the Government of India, in pursuance of their policy of forbearance and moderation, would not accept them. They ordered Mr. White definitely to return to Gantok. They noticed that the returns of trade between British territory and Tibet showed a marked increase, and they hoped that the continued exercise of moderation and patience would gradually remove Tibetan suspicions as to our aims and policy.
A few months after this was written, in November of 1895, Mr. Nolan, the Commissioner of Darjiling, an officer who had for many years been conversant with the Tibetan question, and who held civil charge of that division of Bengal which adjoins Sikkim and Bhutan, and who supervised our relations with those two States as well as our trade with Tibet, visited Yatung, and had conversations with Chinese and Tibetan local officials. His report of the state of affairs there is one of the most interesting published.[[9]] He found that the imposition of the 10 per cent. duty at Phari was no new exaction, but had existed for a long time. He found, also, that the reason the Tibetans did not meet Mr. White in the previous summer to delimit the boundary was that they wished the general line of the frontier should be agreed upon, in the first instance, with reference to maps, and the ground visited only after this was done. But he found, too, that the Tibetans repudiated the treaty. The “Chief Steward,” the sole Commissioner on the part of the Tibetan Government for reporting on the frontier matter, “made the important statement that the Tibetans did not consider themselves bound by the Convention with China, as they were not a party to it.” He reported further, that the Tibetans had prevented the formation of a mart by building a wall across the valley on the farther side of Yatung, by efficiently guarding this and by prohibiting their traders from passing through. Mr. Korb, a wool merchant from Bengal, had come to Yatung to purchase wool from some of his correspondents on the Tibetan side, who had invited him thither; but the Tibetans prevented his correspondents from coming to do business with him. Tibetan merchants were similarly prevented from seeing Mr. Nolan.
Mr. Nolan’s conclusion was that, even though the duty which was collected at Phari was neither special nor newly imposed, yet exaction was inconsistent with the treaty provision that trade with India should be exempt from taxation; and also that the first clause in the Trade Regulations, providing that “a trade-mart shall be established at Yatung,” which “shall be open to all British subjects for the purposes of trade,” had not been carried into effect.