Down below in the valley basin lay the Dumbok-tso asleep under its ice mantle, out of which rose a small rocky ridge, the Tso-ri or “Lake Mountain.” Up above the heights were still bathed in sunshine. The Dumbok-tso was the most important discovery of the day. The watch-fires burned in front of the tents and threw a yellow light on the surroundings.

Then the day’s notes were filled in, and Robert, as usual, labelled the rock specimens we had collected. “Dinner is ready,” says Tsering, as he brings in fresh fuel, and the shislik and sour milk are served and placed on the ground before my bed. Then I am left alone with a thousand memories of Swedish Christmas feasts, and the words: “Christmas is now under every roof,” and “Frozen is the limpid lake, it waits for the winds of spring,” from the poet Topelius’ Christmas song, rings in my ears. The Christian community in our camp consisted only of Robert and myself, but we determined to celebrate the Christmas festival so that the heathen also might have their share in the enjoyment. For some time we had kept all the candle ends, and now had forty-one pieces of various lengths. We set up a box in the middle of my tent, and arranged the candles on it so that the largest stood in the middle, and the others became smaller and smaller towards the corners. That was our Christmas-tree. When all the candles were lighted we threw back the flaps of the front of the tent, and the Ladakis, who meanwhile had assembled outside, gave vent to a murmur of astonishment. They sang softly in rising and falling tones. I forgot for a time the solemnity of the moment, and gazing into the flickering flames of the candles let the minutes of the holy night glide slowly by. The sentimental air was now and then interrupted by a thundering khavash and khabbaleh in which all joined, howling like jackals. The flutes performed the accompaniment, and a saucepan served as a drum. Lamaist hymns at a Christmas festival under the constellation of Orion! Dimly illuminated from the tent, and flooded by the silvery light of the moon, my men presented a weird appearance as they turned themselves round in their native dance, keeping time to the noise of the saucepan. The Tibetans of the neighbouring tents perhaps thought that we had all gone mad, or perhaps that we were executing an incantation dance, and had lighted sacrificial lamps to propitiate our gods. What the wild asses, grazing on the lake shore, thought of it, no one can tell.

Our young guide, who had been placed in the middle of the tent door, caused us much amusement. He stared, now at the lights, now at me, without uttering a sound, sat like a cat on the watch with its fore-paws on the ground, and did nothing but gaze. He would have wonderful stories to tell his fellow-tribesmen, which would certainly lose none of their effect by the embellishments added by himself and amplified in the course of repetition. Perhaps the memory of our visit still survives in the country, in a legend of singular fire-worshippers who danced and bellowed round an altar adorned with forty-one burning candles. When the youth was asked how he liked the illumination, he made no answer. We laughed till our sides ached, but that did not disturb him; he continued to glare with eyes full of astonishment. When he had somewhat recovered his senses next morning, he told Tundup Sonam in confidence that he had had many experiences, but that he had never met with anything so extraordinary as the evening’s entertainment. He would not sleep with us that night, but went off to the tents of his people, and on the first holiday he begged permission to return home.

The lower the candles burned down, the brighter the stars of Orion shone into the opening of the tent. The corner lights had long gone out, and only a couple in the middle continued to flicker. Then I distributed a small sum of money among the men, beginning with Robert and Muhamed Isa. That was the only Christmas present. After this the men retired to their fires, which had in the meantime gone out. Two had to stay behind to explain to me one of the songs in which the word Tashi-lunpo had repeatedly occurred. It was more difficult than I expected to translate the song. In the first place, the men did not know it well themselves, and, secondly, they did not know the meaning of some of the words it contained. Other words they understood well enough, but they could not translate them into Turki or Hindustani. First we wrote out the hymn in Tibetan, then Robert translated it into Hindustani, and I into Turki, and finally from the two translations we concocted an English version which had no sense or meaning. But by repeatedly taking the song to pieces and analyzing it, we at last made out what the subject was—it was a glorification of the monastery Tashi-lunpo, which was the goal of our hopes. The learned who happen to be acquainted with ancient Tibetan hymns will be very much amused if they take the trouble to read the following translation. It certainly has the merit of forming a record in poetic license.

Now rises the sun shining in the east, From the eastern lands over the heights of the east. It is now the third month that the sun mounts up, Pouring forth floods of heat. First fall the beams on the temple, The house of the high gods, and caress The golden battlements of Tashi-lunpo, The roof of the venerable cloister temple, And with threefold brilliance glitter the pinnacles in the sun. On the highest meadows of the temple vale Shy antelopes graze in thousands. Hard is its crumbly soil, but still Rich is the vale and green and lovely, And grass thrives on its poor land, And brooks ripple down with cool water. The highest, ice-covered mountains glitter Like transparent glass. The nearer summits Rise like a row of lofty chhortens, And close at their feet beat the blue waves Of the Yum-tso, playing on the holy strand. Take water from the lake and fill The sacrificial bowls of the holy idols, Moulded of brass. Then decorate with silk cloths Of every kind and colour, which from Pekin come, And adorn also with veils the tall golden images of the gods, And fill the temple halls with hanging standards. Take kadakh cloths, holy and dear, Of best silk from the town of Lhasa, And lay them on the forehead of Buddha’s image.

So ended our Christmas Eve in the wilderness, and while the glow of the Christmas fire sank down in the ashes I read the old Bible passages relating to this day, put out my light, and dreamed of Christmas festivals in the north, and of Tashi-lunpo down in the south behind the mountains, the goal towards which we had been struggling amid suffering and privation all through the cold winter, and which was still far off and perhaps even beyond our reach.

CHAPTER XVIII

TEN DAYS ON THE ICE OF NGANGTSE-TSO