CHAPTER LXIX
KAMBA TSENAM, FATHER OF THE ROBBERS
At the Namchen camp we bought a large supply of rice, meal, barley and tsamba, sugar, stearin candles, soap, and five hundred cigarettes,—all procured from Tsongka. A rich merchant, Ngutu, who owned fifty horses and mules and two hundred yaks, sold us two mules and a horse, besides cloth for new garments, boots, and caps. Abdul Kerim hastened to make me a Tibetan costume of fine Lhasa cloth; on my head I wore a Chinese silk cap swathed with a red turban; I stalked about in silk Chinese boots, and had an elegant sword in my girdle. In my Ladaki saddle with its variegated fittings, and riding a milk-white stallion, I looked in this makeshift outfit quite like a Tibetan of rank (Illust. 343).
| 348. Trooper of the Escort. 349. Tibetan of Teri-nam-tso.
350. Young Shepherd of Bongba. Sketches by the Author. |
Here a large meeting was held in Dorche Tsuen’s tent, where the question of my return route was discussed. Dorche Tsuen insisted on the necessity of my crossing the Samye-la again, and I answered, as before, that I intended to take no other way than over a pass east of the Samye-la. Then he appealed to the nomads at hand, who no doubt had received their instructions beforehand, and they all affirmed that the Chang-tang could be reached by no other pass than the Samye-la. However, we had heard from the horse-driver on the Gebuk-la that a way led over the mountains directly north of Kamba Tsenam’s tent. But then the nomads, who would have to let us yaks on hire, replied that the road was so bad that we could not reach the Tarok-tso in three months, and that, for their part, they would not let their yaks go, and come to grief on the detritus of the pass. Then we offered to buy yaks, but found no one who would sell his animals. After Dorche Tsuen had informed me that those who travelled from Saka into Bongba with hired yaks had to change both men and pack animals at Buptö on the upper Buptsang-tsangpo, I proposed to divide my caravan into two sections, one of which, under Abdul Kerim, would cross the Samye-la, while I with the other half marched over the eastern pass; we would meet on the lower course of the Buptsang-tsangpo. Ngutu, a genial old man of Mongolian origin, supported me, giving it as his opinion that it was of no consequence which pass I crossed myself, provided that the main part of the caravan went over the Samye-la; but Dorche Tsuen was still obstinate, and tried to frighten me with a tale of ten well-armed robbers whose haunts were in the country north of the mountain I wished to pass over.
“If the country is unsafe,” I returned, “it is your duty to provide me with an escort of ten soldiers.”
“The soldiers belong to the garrison of Saka-dzong, and cannot be employed elsewhere.”
“Listen to me, Dorche Tsuen, and do not be so short-sighted. If you give me ten soldiers, you will be able to control my movements. I will pay them 2 rupees a man per day for their services, that is, 20 rupees a day altogether. You can well believe that I cannot afford such a great expense for a long time, and therefore you will have a guarantee that I shall not take a long roundabout way. When I have rejoined Abdul Kerim’s party I shall be beyond the limits of your province, and the escort can return.”