5 3 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



geographer, was permitted, a little more than a year ago (in 1880), to 

 add a little to our geographical knowledge of the eastern part of the 

 Thibetan highland, particularly of the table of Chung-yen, where no 

 European had ever before penetrated. The priests used every means 

 in their power to prevent our carrying out our project of going to 

 Lassa ; and, when they at last came out against us with a thousand 

 soldiers, we were compelled to leave the main road and force our way 

 to the south. 



The Thibetans belong to the great Mongolian race, but they are 

 distinguished in many respects, and to their advantage, from their con- 

 geners, the Mongols proper and the Chinese. The external character- 

 istics which they have more or less in common with them are the 

 small black eyes, the prominent cheek-bones, the flattened nose, large 

 mouth, and thin lips. They are, like all mountaineers, stout and strong. 

 When I saw Thibetans for the first time at Ta-tsien-lu, I was prepos- 

 sessed with them. They had come down out of the high mountains 

 and wild clefts expressly to see us Europeans. The contrast between 

 them and the Chinese was made clear not only by their imposing ap- 

 pearance, but also by their earnest quietude and the grave demeanor 

 they maintained in the midst of the crowd of shrieking and boisterous 

 Chinese townsmen. These robust, muscular figures, with weather- 

 browned, wrinkled, thin, earnest faces, were the people called " wild " 

 by the Chinese ; and their black, deep-set eyes, framed in a tangled 

 forest of straggling hair, glowed with the fierce fire of religious fanati- 

 cism. 



The men are always armed, if not with a Chinese matchlock, with 

 the sword of their country, a weapon often of marvelous workmanship, 

 having the hilt adorned with turquoises and the sheath richly chased. 

 Every one wears on his breast, as an amulet against evil spirits, a cas- 

 ket of gold, silver, or copper, containing various forms of incantation. 

 The women and girls, with their two braids of raven hair, their bright- 

 ly colored, chubby cheeks, their ample drapery, and their precious or- 

 naments of metal and jewels, drive their puny Chinese rivals quite out 

 of the field of comparison. Variety rules in the Thibetan dress, par- 

 ticularly in the arrangement of the women's hair. Sometimes it is 

 worn in two braids, sometimes re-enforced with great structures of 

 yak-hair ; always, if the wearer is able, adorned with jewels, silver or- 

 naments, or strings of coins. The women's faces are never clean, but 

 the custom prevails of soiling them purposely. 



Their dwellings are situated, either scattered or in little hamlets, 

 wherever tillable soil can be found. Their houses rather resemble de- 

 fensive towers than residences : they are made of drift-stones, of one 

 story or more, and are expected to accommodate the domestic animals 

 as well as the family ; and, if the house is of one story only, the ar- 

 rangement is apt to be rather promiscuous. The separation is more 

 effective if the house has an additional story ; but in the houses of 



