“Why,” they then both asked, “did you not show us this paper at once? It would have saved us all discussion.”
“Because the passport is made out for Eastern Turkestan and not for Tibet,” I answered truthfully.
“That does not matter, now that you are here. You have an excellent Chinese passport, and therefore are under Chinese protection.”
The young Chinaman took the passport and went off with it, while Mr. Lobsang Tsering put further questions to me and examined our weapons and other articles. At last I asked him whether he would like to see our garden, and I hurriedly ate my breakfast during his absence. Then the Chinaman came back and declared shortly that I might attend the festival, that especial seats were reserved for myself and a couple of my people, and that a chamberlain of the Tashi Lama’s court would call for us at the proper time. Now I blessed the Chinese passport which had caused me so much vexation at the time, and I blessed the Indian Government which had forced me to procure it; I blessed Count Wrangel, who had obtained it so quickly, and I blessed the Chinese ambassador in London, who had written out the passport with permission of his Government. But I had never dreamed that it would be of the slightest use to me, being issued for another country than Tibet.
This was our entry into Shigatse, and these were our first experiences there. Not a finger had been raised to stop us, no inquisitive people had jostled us in the streets to gaze at us. But now, when we had already set up house in the town, our presence in the place excited as general astonishment as if we had dropped down straight from heaven. That this stroke had succeeded, and through no action of mine, was due to certain peculiar circumstances. Hlaje Tsering had himself for some unexplained reason reopened the bag in which he had caught us, and the chieftains dwelling south of the Ngangtse-tso probably thought: “If the Governor of Naktsang lets them pass, we cannot stop them.” It was also lucky for us that some of these chiefs had betaken themselves to the New Year festival at Tashi-lunpo, and that we ourselves were lost in the crowd of other pilgrims when we came to the great highway; for during the days of the New Year the Tibetans are like capercailzies at breeding time: they neither see nor hear. And, lastly, I, the only European of the caravan, had ridden into the town when night had already spread a veil of darkness over the earth.
| 110. The Upper Balcony of the Court of Ceremonies in Tashi-lunpo. |
CHAPTER XXIV
THE NEW YEAR FESTIVAL