I had trusted him, he had been faithful in his
way, and later I found that nothing was missing.
He was a brutal
ruffian, one of a band of irregulars sent by the Maharajah of Kashmir
to garrison the fort at Leh. From it they used to descend on the
town, plunder the bazaar, insult the women, take all they wanted
without payment, and when one of their number was being tried for
some offence, they dragged the judge out of court and beat him!
After holding Leh in terror for some time the British Commissioner
obtained their removal. It was, however, at the fort at the Indus
bridge, as related before, that the crime of murder was committed.
Still there was something almost grand in the defiant attitude of the
fantastic swash buckler, as, standing outside the bungalow, he faced
the British Commissioner, to him the embodiment of all earthly power,
and the chief of police, and defied them. Not an inch would he stir
till the wazir gave him a coolie to carry his baggage. He had been
acquitted of the murder, he said, 'and though I killed the man, it
was according to the custom of my country - he gave me an insult which
could only be wiped out in blood!' The guard dared not touch him,
and he went to the wazir, demanded a coolie, and got one!
Our party left Leh early on a glorious morning, travelling light, Mr.
Redslob, a very learned Lhassa monk, named Gergan, Mr. R.'s servant,
my three, and four baggage horses, with two drivers engaged for the
journey. The great Kailas range was to be crossed, and the first
day's march up long, barren, stony valleys, without interest, took us
to a piece of level ground, with a small semi-subterranean refuge on
which there was barely room for two tents, at the altitude of the
summit of Mont Blanc. For two hours before we reached it the men and
animals showed great distress. Gyalpo stopped every few yards,
gasping, with blood trickling from his nostrils, and turned his head
so as to look at me, with the question in his eyes, What does this
mean? Hassan Khan was reeling from vertigo, but would not give in;
the seis, a creature without pluck, was carried in a blanket slung on
my tent poles, and even the Tibetans suffered. I felt no
inconvenience, but as I unsaddled Gyalpo I was glad that there was no
more work to do! This 'mountain-sickness,' called by the natives
ladug, or 'pass-poison,' is supposed by them to be the result of the
odour or pollen of certain plants which grow on the passes. Horses
and mules are unable to carry their loads, and men suffer from
vertigo, vomiting, violent headache and bleeding from the nose,
mouth, and ears, as well as prostration of strength, sometimes
complete, and occasionally ending fatally.
After a bitterly cold night I was awakened at dawn by novel sounds,
gruntings, and low, resonant bellowing round my tent, and the grey
light revealed several yaks (the Bos grunniens, the Tibetan ox), the
pride of the Tibetan highlands. This magnificent animal, though not
exceeding an English shorthorn cow in height, looks gigantic, with
his thick curved horns, his wild eyes glaring from under a mass of
curls, his long thick hair hanging to his fetlocks, and his huge
bushy tail. He is usually black or tawny, but the tail is often
white, and is the length of his long hair. The nose is fine and has
a look of breeding as well as power. He only flourishes at altitudes
exceeding 12,000 feet. Even after generations of semi-domestication
he is very wild, and can only be managed by being led with a rope
attached to a ring in the nostrils. He disdains the plough, but
condescends to carry burdens, and numbers of the Ladak and Nubra
people get their living by carrying goods for the traders on his
broad back over the great passes. His legs are very short, and he
has a sensible way of measuring distance with his eyes and planting
his feet, which enables him to carry loads where it might be supposed
that only a goat could climb. He picks up a living anyhow, in that
respect resembling the camel.
He has an uncertain temper, and is not favourably disposed towards
his rider. Indeed, my experience was that just as one was about to
mount him he usually made a lunge at one with his horns. Some of my
yak steeds shied, plunged, kicked, executed fantastic movements on
the ledges of precipices, knocked down their leaders, bellowed
defiance, and rushed madly down mountain sides, leaping from boulder
to boulder, till they landed me among their fellows. The rush of a
herd of bellowing yaks at a wild gallop, waving their huge tails, is
a grand sight.
My first yak was fairly quiet, and looked a noble steed, with my
Mexican saddle and gay blanket among rather than upon his thick black
locks. His back seemed as broad as that of an elephant, and with his
slow, sure, resolute step, he was like a mountain in motion. We took
five hours for the ascent of the Digar Pass, our loads and some of us
on yaks, some walking, and those who suffered most from the 'pass-
poison' and could not sit on yaks were carried. A number of Tibetans
went up with us. It was a new thing for a European lady to travel in
Nubra, and they took a friendly interest in my getting through all
right. The dreary stretches of the ascent, though at first white
with edelweiss, of which the people make their tinder, are surmounted
for the most part by steep, short zigzags of broken stone. The
heavens were dark with snow-showers, the wind was high and the cold
severe, and gasping horses, and men prostrate on their faces unable
to move, suggested a considerable amount of suffering; but all safely
reached the summit, 17,930 feet, where in a snowstorm the guides
huzzaed, praised their gods, and tucked rag streamers into a cairn.
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