We said good-bye to Guffaru and his followers on July 2, and riding in a south-westerly direction over the plain, set up our camp 191 on the left bank of the Brahmaputra, which here carried down 1978 cubic feet of water. Next morning the baggage was taken over, and we had also the honour of helping over the river a high lama, whose acquaintance I had made in Tashi-lunpo. He wore a yellow robe with a red mantle, and had a small yellow wooden hat as bright as metal. His servants were armed with guns and swords, and took all their baggage over the river on yaks. But, unfortunately, the yaks got into deep water and began to swim, so that, of course, all their baggage was thoroughly soaked. We also helped a shepherd with some lambs over to the other side, and if we had waited longer we might have done a ferryman’s work all day with our boat (Illusts. 240, 241).
Then we crossed over two other arms, and the total discharge of the Brahmaputra at this place proved to be 3249 cubic feet. The figures, however, obtained on gauging the river so near its source, are of inferior value, especially when the melting of the snow has quite set in, partly because the source streams rise towards evening, carrying the water from the day’s thaw down to the main valley, partly because the volume of water depends to a great extent on the weather. At the first downpour of rain the rivers are little affected, for the water is absorbed by the dry soil; but when this is soaked through, the water runs off, and the rivers swell enormously after a single rainy day. When the sky is overcast without rain they fall, but in quite clear weather the sun thaws the snow and causes the rivers to rise again.
It was a long day’s journey, for in many of the tents the people refused to give us the help we wanted, and therefore we passed on to the great tributary Gyang-chu, which comes from the south and receives many streams from the northernmost range of the Himalayas.
I have no time to give an account of the geography of this region on the south side of the Brahmaputra. I will only say that during the following days we were cut off from the main river by low mountains, and that we did not encamp again on its bank till July 6, when we came to the Cherok district. We had left several tributaries behind us, and the main stream carried only 1554 cubic feet of water.
After another short day’s march we rejoined Guffaru’s party in Shamsang (15,410 feet) on the great high-road, where twenty-one tents were now standing. The chiefs of the neighbourhood were very attentive, and did not say a word against my proposal to go up to Kubi-gangri, which shows its snowy peaks to the south-west, and in which the sources of the Brahmaputra were said to lie. They procured us provisions for twelve days, and we had not had so free a hand for some time. Here nothing had been heard of Chinese or Tibetan pursuers from Lhasa.
| 238. Women in the Village of Namla. |
| 239. Inhabitants of the Village of Namla. |
CHAPTER XLII
IN SEARCH OF THE SOURCE OF THE BRAHMAPUTRA