LORD DALHOUSIE ACTS 265 
He had already burned his fingers with the Government. 
But after a personal appeal from Hooker, Lord Dalhousie sent 
him ' an explicit statement from the Colonial Office of what 
it is conceived our relations with Sikkim ought to be.' In Dr. 
Campbell's hands this was a useful guide for negotiations— 
finally Lord Dalhousie in September addressed a letter to the 
Rajah with peremptory orders 
to give me full leave to travel to, the Snowy Passes and to 
grant me every assistance. No one expected that his Lord- 
ship would do this ; and considering how ambiguous are our 
relations with that crusty imbecile, and how much caution 
the carrying out of the object requires, it is the very strongest 
proof Lord Dalhousie could give of his true interest in my 
behalf. 
To make the Government bestir themselves ' has cost me 
a world of pen, ink, and paper and the backing of very powerful 
friends.' Prudence, however, bids him add : 
Pray say httle of these projects of mine ; there are so 
many slips 'twixt cup and lip, and the objects to be attained 
do so fully jump with even my most sanguine expectations 
that I cannot venture to hope for perfect success. 
Further he reassures his mother : 
No danger whatever will attend the excursion ; a Httle 
plague and difficulty must be anticipated from the Rajah's 
innumerable petty headmen, and I am quite prepared to 
receive a great deal of insolence,— to put up with every- 
thing short of direct opposition. 
No answer had come from the Rajah by October 1, but 
all was ready for a start by the end of the week, to Jongri at 
least (the village on the spurs of Kinchin already mentioned) 
if direct opposition were offered to the route east of the moun- 
tain and the Sikkimese passes into Tibet, on the manifestly 
untrue ground that Kinchin was a holy mountain, never visited 
by anyone, and that the Lhassa authorities must be consulted. 
It seemed certain that he must go alone, for illness or accident 
had laid up the only friends whom he could trust as traveUing 
