GEOGRAPHICAL RESULTS OF THE TIBET MISSIOTT. 273 



a turquoise. Anon it would show out in various shades of richest 

 violet. Often, when overhead all was black with heavy rain clouds, 

 we would see a streak of brilliant light and color flashing from the 

 far horizon of the lake; while beyond it and beyond the bordering 

 mountains, each receding range of which was of one more beautiful 

 shade of purple than the last, rose once more the mighty axial range 

 of the Hinuilayas, at that great distance not harsh in their whitey 

 coldness, but softly tinted with a delicate blue, and shading away into 

 the exquisite azure of the sky. What caused the marvelous coloring 

 of this lake, which even the Tibetans call the turquoise lake, we could 

 none of us say. Perhaps it was its depth, perhaps it was its saline 

 character, or some chemical component of its water. But whatever 

 the main cause, one cause at least must have been the intensity of 

 clearness in the liquid Tibetan sky, so deep and so translucent that 

 even the sky of Greece and Italy would look pale and thick beside it. 



For three days we marched along the shores of this beautiful lake, 

 and then we ascended our last pass and looked down onto the Brah- 

 majjutra River and almost upon Lassa itself. But the sacred city 

 was still left hid. Masses of mountains in range after range were all 

 we could see in that direction, and Cieneral ]\Iacdonald had still the 

 very serious obstacle of the Brahmaputra Eiver, now in almost its 

 full flood, to overcome before we could reach our goal. The Brah- 

 maputra we found to be divided into numerous channels, but we 

 were able to cross it at a spot where it narrowed to 200 yards, 

 though not without the loss by drowning of the one officer to whom, 

 of all others in the force, our success in reaching Lassa was due — ■ 

 Maj. G. H. Bretherton, the chief supply and transport officer. The 

 river rushed in wdiirling vortices past a cliff, from which Captain 

 Sheppard, R. E., suspended a wire rope to the opposite side and 

 upon it rigged up a flying ferry. The river valley was from 3 to 5 

 miles wide, and, like the Gyantse Valley, richly cultivated with wheat 

 and barley, dotted over with hamlets, monasteries, w^ell-built and 

 comfortable residences of the great men of the country, and Avith 

 pleasant groves of poplar, walnut, and even a few- peach and apricot 

 trees. The side valleys were also w'ell cultivated, and the hillsides, 

 though bare of trees, were covered with grass, which should afford 

 excellent pasturage for many more sheep and goats than we actually 

 saAv there. It was altogether a smiling prospect, and doubts as to 

 the possibility of being able to supply our troops Avith the necessaries 

 of life, for the year round if required, Avere at once removed. 



I was now met by a variety of deputations, each one of increasing 

 w-eight and importance, and each more urgent than the last in beg- 

 ging me not to proceed to Lassa. The Dalai Lama himself even 

 wrote to me, an act of unprecedented condescension on his part, and 

 he sent his high chamberlain to say that if we went to Lassa his 



