1 92 Sport and Life in the Further Himalaya 



fashionable form of jewellery among Ladaki ladies. 

 Others, the first view of which had been the 

 principal object of our visit, contained Tibetan 

 antiques, mostly teapots, huge in size and of 

 extraordinary design, in silver, copper, or brass 

 inlaid with the precious metal, and in wood. There 

 were quaintly-designed pipes, some of which were 

 fashioned out of antelope horns and mounted with 

 silver and turquoise, chang jugs, drinking bowls, 

 and personal ornaments. But in Tibet, as in 

 Europe in the dark ages, art seems mostly 

 to have found expression in the adornment of 

 ecclesiastical buildings, and in the production of 

 images, pictures, and vessels used in worship. 



I suppose there is no country in the world 

 where religion is so prominent a feature as in 

 Ladak and Tibet, where the monasteries form a 

 more conspicuous landmark than church spires at 

 home. Wherever there is a village, and often 

 where there is not, in remote and desolate places, 

 the eye is drawn to white cubical piles perched 

 up on precipitous crags. From below, the imag- 

 ination is caught by their massive sloping walls, 

 the yak's -tail banners, and the black figures of 

 monks silhouetted against the sky, while the swell 

 of musical instruments that now and again floats 

 down from these high places awakes conceptions 

 of exalted worship. A closer view of course 



