the precursor of the present volume, the reconnaissance of mount everest in 1921, sets forth fully the successful and strenuous work which was accomplished in that year and which has rendered possible the expedition of the present year. the whole of our work lying in country which had never previously been explored by europeans, it was rendered absolutely necessary for a full examination of the whole country to be made before an attempt to climb mount everest could possibly be carried out. we have to thank colonel howard-bury and his companions, especially his survey officers, for their important work, which rendered our task in arriving at our base comparatively simple.
the object of the expedition of 1922, of course, was the actual attack on the mountain in an attempt to climb it; but no great mountain has ever succumbed to the first attempt on it, and therefore it is almost inconceivable that so tremendous a problem as the ascent of mount everest should succeed at the very first effort. in fact, i myself am more than satisfied, almost astounded, at the extraordinary success attained by my companions in this endeavour. the 18problem that lay in front of us, i think, should be first explained.
mount everest, as all know, lies on that part of the himalaya which is narrowest. it is, therefore, exposed very rapidly to the first assaults of the south-west monsoon, and this monsoon advances up the bay of bengal at an earlier period in the year than that of its western branch, the gulf current. it is this fact which supplies the greatest difficulty to be faced in an attack on any of the great peaks which lie in this region, giving one an unusually short season. however, to a certain extent this is counteracted by the fact that the winter climate in this portion of the himalaya is far drier than it is in the west. there is less deposit of snow on the mountains in this section of the himalaya than there would be, for instance, in the kashmir mountains, and this, to some extent, makes up for the early advance of the monsoon, and consequent bad weather, which renders any exploration of the great heights during the time that the monsoon blows an impossibility.
towards the end of may the monsoon arrives in darjeeling, and then, according to the strength of the current, quickly approaches the southern faces of the himalaya, and, as the current strengthens, drifts across their summits and through the gorges and over the lower ridges. the problem, therefore, of any party exploring in these mountains resolves itself into the rapidity with which they can establish their base of operations in a suitable locality to explore the mountains and to climb them. during the 19period of the very great cold, naturally, the upper heights are impossible, and camping on the upper glaciers is in itself also almost impossible. travelling across tibet in march, crossing high passes of over 17,000 feet is such that, although it might be perfectly possible to do, it would be a great strain on the stamina of the party, and likely to detract from their condition. we had, therefore, to adapt our advance into tibet so as to make it at the latest possible moment, in order to avoid the very worst of the weather, and yet at the earliest possible moment, so that we could arrive at the foot of our mountains with sufficient time to attack them before the weather broke up and rendered mountaineering an impossibility at a great height. it resolves itself, then, almost into a race against the monsoon.
this was our problem, and it is my special province in these opening chapters to show how we tackled it.
during the winter of 1921–2, the mount everest committee, owing to the lateness with which the party had returned after the reconnaissance, had to work at very top speed. they had to collect all the necessary stores for the party, and not only that, but also to select a suitable mountaineering team; this was a considerable difficulty. finally the party was made up as follows: myself as leader, colonel e. l. strutt as second-in-command, and dr. longstaff the official doctor and naturalist of the expedition. the climbing party pure consisted of mr. mallory (of last year’s expedition), dr. somervell, dr. wakefield, and major norton. we had three transport officers, one 20of whom belonged to the alpine club, and was considered an assistant of the climbing party, mr. c. g. crawford, of the indian civil service. the official photographer was captain noel. two officers in the indian army were attached to the expedition as transport officers—captain j. g. bruce and captain c. g. morris. later, on our arrival in darjeeling, the party was further reinforced by major morshead, who had been one of the survey party of the previous year, and whose general knowledge of tibet and of tibetans was of great service to us; and last, but not least, captain george finch, who came not only as a most important member of the climbing party, but also as the scientific expert in charge of the entire oxygen outfit.
this large party was collected in darjeeling by the last week in march, and in a few days we were all ready to make a start. i myself preceded the party by about a month, arriving in delhi to interview the indian authorities about the 25th of february. through the kindness of the commander-in-chief, lord rawlinson, we were supplied with four young non-commissioned officers of captain bruce’s regiment, the 2nd battalion 6th gurkha rifles, and an orderly of the 1st battalion 6th gurkha rifles, and right well all these five gurkhas carried out their duties. as will be seen later, one of them, lance-naik tejbir bura, very highly distinguished himself.
i arrived in darjeeling with captain bruce on march 1, and there i found that our agent in india, mr. weatherall, had carried out the instructions which he had received from 21england in the most efficient manner. the large quantity of stores which we had ordered previously were all beautifully packed and ready for transportation; the tents of the previous year all mended and in good order; the stores of different kinds, such as there were, which had been left also from the previous year, had been put into order; and last and most important, 150 porters had been collected for our inspection and from whom to make a selection. he had also for us a large number of cooks to choose from, a most excellent individual to look after the tents, chongay, who proved quite invaluable to us, and a local cobbler who had expressed his willingness to come with the expedition.
owing to the tremendous hurry in which all arrangements had to be made in england, the stores were forwarded in different batches. on our arrival in calcutta, we interviewed mr. brown, of the army and navy stores, whose work, both for the expeditions of 1921 and of 1922, has been quite beyond praise. he told us that only one instalment of stores had yet arrived, but that the ships containing the remainder were expected shortly. luckily for us, we had at the army and navy stores, and acting in the interests of the expedition, a most capable agent. as the ships containing the stores arrived, the latter were unloaded, rapidly passed through the customs, and forwarded on to kalimpong road, which is the terminus of the darjeeling railway and the teesta valley. on arrival there they were met by our representative in no less a person than captain morris, handed over to the contractors who were 22moving our stores, and forwarded on to tibet in advance of the expedition. this naturally required a great deal of arranging.
i must mention that, shortly after our arrival in darjeeling, we were joined by captain morris, who immediately left for kalimpong, two stages on our journey, to which place the whole of the outfit of the expedition was sent. we could not spare the time to wait for the arrival of the oxygen, and therefore, when the party finally left darjeeling, captain finch, the scientist in whose charge the whole of the oxygen and scientific apparatus had been put, remained behind with mr. crawford to bring it up. luckily, the ship arrived in calcutta just as we were leaving, and therefore the delay was less than we had anticipated.
the people of darjeeling, both the british and the native inhabitants—whether tibetans or hillmen—were all immensely interested in our expedition, and mr. laden la, the deputy superintendent of police, was, if anything, the most enthusiastic of them all. mr. laden la has himself rendered excellent service to government, and has travelled greatly in tibet. he is himself a tibetan, and, i believe, is an honorary general in the tibetan army. his influence in darjeeling and the district is great, and his help to the expedition was invaluable. he arranged in darjeeling, both as head of the buddhist association of darjeeling, and in conjunction with the committee of the hillmen’s association, that the whole of the party should be entertained by these two associations, and that the chief 23lamas and brahmins of the district should bless and offer up prayers for the well-being and success of the party. the entertainment went off most excellently, and it was altogether a most interesting function. the nepalese members of the party were blessed by the brahmins, but also, in order to confirm this blessing, further received the blessings of the lamas. i think there is every reason for supposing that this small function assisted in bringing home to all our porters and followers what was expected of them by their own people, and it was very likely a good deal in consequence of this that they behaved on the whole so extremely well. for it must be understood that all these hill people, whether nepalese or tibetan, are very light-hearted, very irresponsible, very high-spirited, and up to the present time prohibition as a national measure is not exactly a popular outlook; in fact, none of them on any occasion, unless well looked after, lost any opportunity of looking on the wine when it is red—or any other colour.
our cooks had to be chosen with a good deal of care. captain bruce and myself took the most likely candidates out into the hills and gave them a good trial before we engaged them. one of them, who was a nepalese, had been an old servant of my own for many months; he was the only gurkha among them. the other three (for we gave ourselves an ample outfit of four cooks) were bhotias (tibetans). they were the greatest success, mostly because they are hard-working and ready to do any amount of work; but they were good cooks too. captain noel also 24engaged an excellent servant (also a cook), and major norton’s private servant (another tibetan) was very capable in the same way; so that we were thoroughly well provided with an ample outfit, and wherever we were we could count on having our meals properly prepared. this is one of the important points in tibetan travel, from the want of which i believe a certain amount of the illness that was experienced in the previous year was due.
we also engaged almost the most important subordinate member of the expedition—the interpreter, karma paul. he was quite young, and had been a schoolmaster in darjeeling. he had also worked, i believe, for a time in an office in calcutta. he was quite new to the kind of work that he would have to do. but he was a great acquisition to the expedition, always good company and always cheerful, full of a quaint little vanity of his own and delighted when he was praised. he served us very well indeed from one end of the expedition to the other, and it was a great deal owing to his cheerfulness and to his excellent manners and way with the tibetans that we never had the smallest possible misunderstanding with any officials, even of the lowest grades, to disturb our good relations with the tibetans of any kind or class. he also was bilingual, for he had been born in lhasa, and still had relations living there.
on march 26 the whole expedition started off for kalimpong by rail, with the exception of captain finch and mr. crawford, who remained to bring on the oxygen. owing to the kindness of the himalayan railway company, we 25were all taken round by rail to kalimpong road free, the whole expedition travelling up the teesta valley in the normal manner, with the exception of captain noel, who elected to ride on the roof of the carriages in order to take pictures with his cinema camera of the teesta valley. the junction at siliguri, where the teesta railway branches off from the main line, is only 300 feet above the sea, the terminus at kalimpong road about 700 feet above the sea, and therefore as one dives down from the hills one enters into tropical conditions and passes through the most magnificent tropical jungle and the steepest gorges and ravines. it is a wonderful journey. even the long spell of hot and dry weather and the heat haze at this time of year were unable to spoil the scenery. and though we saw it almost at its worst time, it remained gorgeous.
at kalimpong the expedition broke up into two parties, but before we left we had a very pleasant function to attend. i had been charged by sir robert baden-powell to deliver a message to the scouts of dr. graham’s homes for european children at kalimpong. not only that, but incorporated with these scouts was the first small body of nepalese boy-scouts. it was a very interesting function indeed, and a most enthusiastic one.
from there we pushed on stage by stage over the jelep la into the chumbi valley. of course, journeys through sikkim have often been described. again we were disappointed. on my first arrival in darjeeling, the cold weather had hardly finished, but now (march 28) we were well into 26the hot weather of bengal, and in consequence we were also in the hot-weather haze. during the whole of our journey we never got a single view of the gorgeous southern faces of the himalaya, of kanchenjanga and of its supporters, and especially of the wonderful siniolchum peak. this was a very great disappointment, as from several points on our road a view of the southern face can be obtained. nevertheless, a journey through sikkim is always a wonderful experience. the steep and deeply cut valleys, the wonderful clear mountain streams, and the inhabitants and their means of cultivation, are all full of interest. the depth of the valleys is always striking, and can never be anything else. when one thinks that from rongli chu, situated only at 2,700 feet above the sea, one rises in one continuous pull to close on 13,000 feet on the ridge which looks down on the gnatong bungalow, and travels through cultivation and forest the whole way, passing through every phase of eastern himalayan landscape, one cannot cease to be continually impressed by the scale of the country. we were too early for the rhododendrons on the way to gnatong, but there were just sufficient in flower to give us a mental vision of what these wonderful rhododendron forests would be like in another three weeks.
on the way to gnatong, at a height of 11,500 feet, we came to the little village of lungtung. here there was a tea-house kept by some nepalese. it was spotlessly clean, or at least all the cooking arrangements were, and here, as we came up, we all indulged in tea and the local cakes, and 27found them both excellent. not only that, but the little lady who kept the shop was full of talk and full of chaff, and we all sat down and enjoyed ourselves for more than an hour, keeping up a continuous flow of conversation. all the men joined us as they came up, and i am afraid we made rather a noise. as a matter of fact, all through sikkim these little tea-shops are to be found, and the tea is generally quite drinkable. this little lady’s shop, though, was particularly well run and attractive. when we left we promised to call and see her again on our return, which promise we were able to fulfil.
the higher portions of the road from gnatong over the jelep are a very great contrast. it is almost like a march through the highlands of scotland, and hardly represents or brings to one’s mind the fact that one is among great mountains. the jelep, which is 14,300 feet above the sea, is a perfectly easy pass, crossed by a horrid pavé road, very much out of repair, the descent into the chumbi valley being, for animals, the last word in discomfort. we employed altogether in our two parties about eighty mules from the chumbi valley, and we were all immensely struck by this wonderful transport. there is a considerable trade carried on between tibet and chumbi in particular for seven or eight months in the year, as on this road quantities of tibetan wool are brought down for sale at kalimpong, very nearly all of it being brought by the chumbi muleteers, and most efficient they are. they thoroughly understand the loading and care of mules, and the pace they travel at is 28something to see. it is only understood if one walks for long distances with, or often behind, a train of laden mules. no doubt, owing to the continual changes from cold to warmth and heat, many sore backs are occasioned, and further, owing to the tremendous stress and continuous labour involved, many mules are worked that have no business to be worked. the muleteers themselves, when talked to about it, say that it distresses them, but they are hard put to it to carry out their work, and see no method very often of being able to fulfil their contracts and at the same time lay up their mules.
after crossing the jelep la, and leaving sikkim, it is almost like diving into kashmir, so great is the difference in the general appearance of the country and in its forests. while we were sitting on the top of the jelep we had the most splendid view of chomolhari (23,800 feet). it showed itself at its very best; the day was quiet and very warm. chomolhari stood out clearly, and still with plenty of atmosphere round it. snow-streamers were blowing out from its summit. it showed its full height, and did full justice to its shape and beauty. it is a great mountain which completely dominates phari and its plain, and is the striking feature as one enters tibet from the chumbi valley. we all admired it enormously, but the enthusiasm of the party was somewhat damped when i pointed out to them that our high advanced base on everest, in fact, the camp that we hoped to establish on the north col, called the chang la, which had been marked out the year before by mr. 29mallory, was, in fact, only about 600 feet lower than the top of chomolhari itself.
frozen waterfall, chumbi valley.
on arrival at richengong, which is at the foot of the valley which forms the junction between the jelep valley and the valley of the ammu chu, which is the chumbi valley, we were met by mr. macdonald, the british trade agent, who lives at chumbi, and his wonderfully dressed chuprassis, and also by a guard of honour of 90 panjabis, who supplied a small guard both at yatung, in chumbi, and also at the british post in gyantse, on the road to lhasa. we had a very pleasant ride by the chumbi valley to yatung. i had previously supplied myself in darjeeling with a treasure of a pony, gyamda by name, who was locally very well known in darjeeling. he was only 12? hands, but had the go and the stamina of a very much bigger animal. he was attended by a sais who was nearly twice as big as himself, and was one of the finest-built tibetans i saw the whole time. gyamda himself hailed from the town of gyamda, which is about 12 miles south of lhasa. his enormous sais hailed from lhasa itself, and, unfortunately, could hardly speak a word of anything but tibetan. however, he improved by degrees, and very soon we got on very well. he adored the pony gyamda, but had the habit of giving it, unless looked after, at least a dozen eggs mixed with its grain. when we stopped him doing this, he was caught hugging the pony round the neck and saying to it, “now they have cut your eggs, you will die, and what shall i do?” gyamda carried me right through 30the expedition, and could go over any ground, and came back as well as he left, never sick or sorry, and always pleased with life.
we marched from chumbi on april 5, accompanied by mr. macdonald and his son, who had come to help us make all our transport arrangements when we should arrive in phari. mr. macdonald helped us on all occasions, and we cannot thank him enough for all the trouble he took from now on and during the whole time the expedition was in tibet. it was owing very largely to his help that we were able in phari to get our expedition on so soon, for he warned the two dzongpens of phari dzong beforehand to obtain adequate transport for us.
again, the march from yatung to phari has been described on many occasions, but it is quite impossible to march through it without mentioning its character. it is, especially at the time of year we went through, one of the darkest and blackest and most impressive forested gorges that i have ever seen, and almost equally impressive is the debouchment on to the phari plain at the head of the gorge, dominated as it is by our old friend chomolhari.
we arrived in phari on april 6, and made our first real acquaintance with the tibetan wind. phari is 14,300 feet, and winter was scarcely over; the weather also was threatening. luckily, there is a little british government rest-house and bungalow and serai at phari, and there we found comfortable quarters. we were joined on the following day by the rest of the party. this really formed 31the starting-point of the expedition, and, further, it was my birthday, and the bottle of old rum, 120 years old, specially brought out for this occasion, was opened and the success of the expedition was drunk to. if we had known what was in front of us, we should have put off the drinking of this peculiarly comforting fluid until the evening of the day of our first march from phari. the two phari dzongpens, probably owing to the fact that phari is on the main route between lhasa and india, were far and away the most grasping and difficult of any officials that we met, but no doubt their difficulties were pretty considerable. although there is a great quantity of transport to be obtained in phari, at this time of the year it is in very poor condition. grazing exists, but one would never know that it existed unless one was told, and also unless one saw herds of yaks on the hillsides apparently eating frozen earth. everything was frozen hard. we had difficulty, therefore, in obtaining the transport required. we found here collected the whole of our stores, with the exception of the oxygen. our excellent tindel,[1] chongay, who had gone on ahead, had got it all marshalled; the tents were also pitched and in good order.
1. tent-mender.
on april 8 we set out from phari, but had been obliged to reinforce the local transport by re-engaging fifty of the chumbi mules. we had been obliged to do this because we were unable to get a sufficiency of transport that was capable of carrying loads in phari itself. but these 32fifty mules were our salvation; without them, as it turned out, we should have been in a bad way.
there are two roads that lead from phari to khamba dzong, our next objective; the short road passing over the tang la and the donka la, and a long road which starts first on the road to lhasa and turns finally after two marches to the west. on account of the short time at our disposal, and having regard to the fact that we had now in earnest begun our race with the weather, we chose the shorter route. owing to the condition of the animals, all had agreed that the yaks could not possibly, even by the short road, get to khamba dzong under six days. we therefore divided our party again into two. the advance party, with fifty chumbi mules and a large collection of donkeys and particularly active bullocks, and even some cows, were to march to khamba dzong in four days, and were to be followed by 200 yaks in charge of our sardar, gyaljen, and two of the gurkha non-commissioned officers, to wit, naik hurké gurung and lance-naik lal sing gurung, the other two gurkhas being in charge of the treasure-chest which accompanied the first party; lance-naik tejbir bura and lance-naik sarabjit thapa were to march with the first party.
the sardar gyaljen had accompanied colonel howard-bury’s party on the first expedition, and had, apparently, from the accounts given of him in last year’s volume, not been a very great success. i, however, gave him a second chance. he was a thoroughly capable man, and i had 33every hope, as he knew that i had heard about him and had also seen the report that had been made of him by colonel howard-bury, that on this occasion he would pull himself together and do well; in this we were not disappointed. of course, as all sophisticated men in his position are likely to do, he was out to benefit himself; but we were able pretty successfully to cope with this failing, and, generally speaking, his services were of great value, especially on certain occasions. altogether, i think, he was a success.
of course, we were rather well qualified from this point of view—both morris and geoffrey bruce had an excellent knowledge of nepal and of the nepalese, and nepalese is the one eastern language which i may say that i also have a good knowledge of. all sherpas are tri-lingual—that is to say, they talk their own sherpa dialect of tibet, tibetan as a mother-tongue, and nearly all of them nepalese as well. owing to their being subjects of nepal, the official language (that is, nepalese) is the one they are obliged to employ in dealing with the authorities. also nearly every one of the tibetans we employed and who came with us from darjeeling spoke nepali as their second language. in consequence of this, nearly the whole of the work usually done by a sardar of coolies in darjeeling was carried out by the officers of the expedition, who dealt directly both with the men and with the people of the country.
on april 8 we started out. there was for a good long time a tremendous scrimmage getting all the different loads packed on to the animals, and dividing the animals, 34especially as the tibetans had no idea of being punctual, and in consequence the yaks, ponies for riding, mules and bullocks, all drifted in at different times during the morning. finally, however, our two large mixed convoys were got off. it was really a great piece of luck being able to keep the fifty chumbi mules. these were laden in the early morning with what was necessary for our camp and despatched well before the rest of the luggage. the great convoy of 200 yaks was finally marshalled and sent off under the charge of the gurkhas and the sardar, but the advance party’s luggage was spread over miles of country. in consequence of this, geoffrey, morris, and myself were delayed until quite late in the morning.
nuns at ta-tsang.
our first march was about 16 miles, and the day was very threatening. we pushed along on ponies at a good pace and crossed the tang la, which is a little over 15,000 feet, in rough, but not actually wet, weather. luckily, the country is very open, over plains of more or less frozen grass. over the main chain of the himalaya the clouds had settled, and it was evident that the weather was breaking. a little after noon it broke with a vengeance. the clouds settled down, it began to snow heavily, and the wind increased to half a hurricane. luckily, however, most of our local men knew the road well, otherwise in this great open and undulating country one could very easily get lost. the track, which was fairly well marked otherwise, was completely and rapidly obliterated in places. it was certainly a rather disheartening start. morris was delayed for a time to look 35after some luggage; geoffrey and myself pushed on. going pretty quickly, we were able to pick up different parties, and were lucky enough to pass one small encampment of tibetans. it was curious to see yaks contentedly chewing the cud, the whole of their weather-side being a mass of frozen snow. they seemed to be quite as happy lying out in a blizzard as though they had been ordinary civilised cows in a barn.
about what is usually known as tea-time we sighted the camp. our excellent followers had got a few tents up, and i was fortunate enough myself to find that the porter who was carrying my big coat had already arrived. nearly all indian camp servants who are accustomed to travelling in the himalaya are good in a crisis, and, when things get bad, come to the fore; but on this occasion they surpassed themselves. it must be understood that, in tibet, very, very seldom can anything but dried yak-dung be found to make a fire with. on this occasion the snow had obliterated everything, and in consequence a fire had to be otherwise improvised. some tents had been pitched, a fire had been got going, and very soon a hot meal and hot tea were forthcoming. the rest of the party gradually collected, but it was not until well after nightfall that the whole of the advance transport had managed to arrive. as a first march it certainly gave the party a very good idea of what they might have to put up with in tibet; it was a real good entry into tibetan travel. however, nobody was much the worse, and, the weather having cleared during 36the night, we had a brilliant sight the following morning.
on april 9, we made what i think was the hardest march undertaken on the expedition. our path led us over the ridge in its three bifurcations which runs north from pawhunri and rapidly rises from our last camp, each of these ridges being just 17,000 feet, slightly more or less, and most of the path being at about 16,000 feet of elevation. at any time early in april great cold would be expected at such a height, but on this day the wind was blowing right over the himalaya direct from the snows across these passes, and howling down the gorges between them. it was painfully cold, and the wind never abated from morning to night. we left about seven o’clock in the morning, and it was well after nightfall again before our transport was collected at our next camp at hung-zung-trak. longstaff and myself pushed on in search of the camp for most of the day together, arriving before any of the animals at about 4.30 to five o’clock in the evening, and made our camp at the above-named place under some overhanging cliffs with fairly good grazing—such as grazing is in april—and with a stream beneath the camp from which water could be obtained. we were very shortly followed by our magnificent chumbi transport, which had been pushing along at a tremendous pace the whole day long. i do not know what we should have done without it.
what was very much brought home to us was the absolute necessity of windproof material to keep out the tremendous cold of these winds. fortunately, i had a very 37efficient mackintosh which covered everything, but even then i suffered very considerably from the cold. it simply blew through and through wool, and riding without windproof clothing would have been very painful. it was also very fortunate for us that the weather was really fine and the sun shone all day. i think we should have been in a very bad way indeed if the blizzard had occurred on the second day out from phari, and not on the first.
however, by night we were all comfortably settled down, although the whole of our advance stores did not arrive until after ten o’clock at night again. unfortunately, three of our porters who had stayed behind with the slowest of the bullocks lost their way after dark. they stayed out the whole night without bedding or covering, and in the morning continued to the nunnery of tatsang, which was about 4 or 5 miles further down the valley and rather off our direct route. we here heard of them and retrieved them. these men had not yet been issued with their full clothes, and how they managed to sit out the night clothed as they were and without any damage of any kind passes one’s comprehension. so low was the temperature that night that the quickly flowing stream outside our camp was frozen solid.
we halted the next day, as the transport was overdone, and the following day (april 11) made another long, but very interesting, march direct to khamba dzong, leaving the monastery of tatsang on our right and crossing high plains on which were grazing large herds of kyang and 38gazelle. the mounted men had great fun trying to round up and get as close as possible to the herds of kyang; they were trusting up to a point, but never let us go close enough to get a good snap photograph of them. finally, the road led from the high plateau down to khamba dzong, through what to several of us immediately became astonishingly familiar country; for the whole surroundings of the khamba dzong valley reminds one very much of the scenery on the north-west frontier of india. but what a difference in climate!
we camped at khamba dzong where last year’s expedition had camped, and were very well received by the same dzongpen. we were gratified to find dr. kellas’ grave in good order, and we further added to it a collection of great stones. the inscription on the grave in english and tibetan was clear and clean. we were delayed in khamba dzong for three whole days, partly because of the difficulty in collecting animals; also two days to allow our main convoy of 200 yaks to catch us up, and we had the good luck to be joined by finch and crawford, who had pushed on at a great pace with the oxygen apparatus. they showed evident signs of wear and tear, being badly knocked about by the weather. the storm had caught them on the jelep la, and as this is more south, there had been a very much greater fall of snow, so much so that the chumbi valley was inches deep in it. they spoke very highly indeed of all their followers, cooks and tibetans, and especially of a capital boy, lhakpa tsering, who had come along with them as their 39special attendant. he was quite a young boy, but had made the march in two days with them to tatsang, where they stayed for the night, without showing any particular signs of fatigue, running along beside their ponies. i make a considerable point of the following: i think great exertions and long marches at these high altitudes before acclimatisation is complete would have tended to exhaust, and not to improve, the training of the party, whereas to have a pony with one and be able to walk or ride when one felt tired or blown, gradually allowed the body to adjust itself. at any rate, i am perfectly certain that if every one had been obliged to walk instead of being able to ride, even on the terribly inadequate ponies that were supplied to them in tibet, but which, at any rate, gave them the much-needed rest, they would not have arrived at the rongbuk glacier fit to do the work which they afterwards successfully tackled.
our march from khamba dzong to tinki and from tinki to shekar was exactly by the route followed by colonel howard-bury in the previous year, and calls for no particular comment on my part, with the exception that two small parties of finch and wakefield and mallory and somervell made a good attempt at gyangka-nangpa to climb a 20,000-foot peak, sangkar ri, on the way. this they were not quite able to do.
we had no difficulty in crossing the great sand-dunes where the yaru river joins the arun, as we were able to cross it in the early morning before the wind had arisen. 40but on that morning, when we came to the junction of the valley of the arun, we had a most wonderful and clear view of mount everest to the south. although it was over 50 miles distant in a straight line, it did not look more than twenty. the whole of the face that was visible to us was smothered in snow. the entire setting of the piece was very strange; the country was almost bare enough to remind one of a crumpled egyptian desert, and the strangeness and wonder was hugely increased by the south of the valley being filled with this wonderful mountain mass.
at shekar, where we arrived on april 24, we were again delayed for three days getting transport. we found the dzong filled with lamas. there is a great monastery in shekar itself, and one of less account a little further beyond. the great lama of shekar is an extremely cunning old person and a first-class trader. in his quarters at the monastery he had immense collections of tibetan and chinese curios, and he knew the price of these as well as any professional dealer. we saw a great deal, in fact, a great deal too much, of the lamas of shekar. they were the most inconceivably dirty crowd that we had met in tibet; the dirt was quite indescribable. although the people in lhasa in good positions are reported to be generally cleanish, here in the more out-of-the-way parts of tibet washing appears to be entirely unknown, except to the dzongpens, and i believe that the ordinary dzongpen only has a ceremonial bath on new year’s eve as a preparatory to the new year, and i should not be at all surprised if mrs. dzongpen 41did too. at any rate, the dzongpens’ families were always infinitely better cared for in this respect than anyone else. these people, however, have the most terribly dirty cooks it is possible for the human imagination to conceive. for this reason i never was very happy as a guest, and although the food provided for one’s entertainment was often quite pleasant to eat, it was absolutely necessary not to allow one’s imagination to get to work.
the three days’ delay at shekar was greatly due to the movement of officials and troops marching by the same route from tingri to shigatse, and as they had commissioned every available animal, they interfered considerably with our movements. shekar was not comfortable during these days; the wind was not continuous, but came in tremendous gusts, and dust-devils were continually tearing through the camp and upsetting everything. shekar, as colonel howard-bury has described it, is wonderfully situated. the pointed mass of rock rises direct from the plains, and the white monasteries and white town are built on its sides. the illustration will describe it much better than i can. shekar means “shining glass.” all the towns and houses on the sides of the mountain are brilliantly white and show up very clearly against the dark browns and reds of the hillside. it is no doubt this appearance which gives it its name.
the dzongpen at shekar was a most important official. the whole of the country south of shekar and the rongbuk valley where we were going were in his jurisdiction. we 42hoped that if we could only gain his own goodwill as well as his official goodwill, it would be of very great advantage to us. we entertained each other freely, and he was very pleased with the lengths of kin kob[2] which i gave to himself and his wife, and also with the photographs of the dalai and tashi lamas which i gave to him. by showing him pictures and taking his own picture, we were able to make great friends with him, to our great advantage. he sent with us his agent, chongay la, who served us well during the whole of our time in the rongbuk glacier; in fact, without him we should have had great difficulty in obtaining the large amount of stores, grain, and tibetan coolies which were necessary for us in order to keep our very large party properly provisioned when we were high up on the mountain-side.
2. brocade.
among our other presents was the inevitable homburg hat. wherever we went we presented a homburg hat. i had provided myself with a large number of these hats from whiteaway and laidlaw before leaving darjeeling. these were a cheap present, but very much valued. any high man of a village known as a gembo la would do anything for a homburg hat; it was ceremoniously placed on his head and was invariably well received. in fact, all recipients visibly preened themselves for some time afterwards.
from shekar our route differed slightly from colonel howard-bury’s. he had taken the direct road to tingri, but our objective was the rongbuk. therefore we crossed 43the arun for the first time, and, crossing by the pang la, descended into the dzakar chu. this was one of the pleasantest marches that we had made. the country was new—even mallory had only been over part of it. the pang la (meaning “the grass pass”) was altogether very interesting, and from its summit, where we all collected and lunched, we had again a fine view of everest, and on this occasion the mountain was almost clear of snow and gave one a very different impression. we here recognised the fact that everest, on its north face, is essentially a rock peak. unfortunately for us, it did not remain clear of snow for long, rough weather again coming up; the next time we saw it we found it again clothed from head to foot in snow.
four marches from shekar found us at rongbuk, the final march from chodzong to the rongbuk monastery being extremely interesting. there is only one word for it: the valleys of tibet leading up to the rongbuk monastery are hideous. the hills are formless humps, dull in colour; of vegetation there is next to none. at our camp at chodzong, however, on the hillside opposite our camp, there was quite a large grove of thorn-trees. we had visions of a wood fire very quickly damped when we were told that this grove was inhabited by the most active and most malicious of demons, and that he would promptly get to work if we interfered and carried away any sticks from his grove.
the upper rongbuk valley is an extremely sacred 44valley; no animals are allowed to be killed in it. in fact, the great mani at the mouth of the valley opposite the village of chobu marks the limit beyond which animals are not allowed to be killed. we were told that if we wanted any fresh meat it was all to be killed lower down the valley and carried up to us. the tibetans themselves live very largely on dried meats, both yak meat and mutton. i have never tried it myself, and its appearance was enough to put off anyone but a hungry dog, but i am told that when cooked it is by no means bad. most tibetans, however, eat it raw in its dried state. i bought quantities of both sorts for the porters. they cooked it as they would cook fresh meat, and it seemed to suit them very well. for the sake of their health, however, i gave them, whenever possible, fresh meat, and with the very finest results.
rongbuk monastery and mount everest.
rongbuk means “the valley of precipices or steep ravines.” the lepchas of sikkim are occasionally called “rong pa,” i.e., the people of steep ravines. it is also used for upper nepal, or rather for the people on the southern faces of the himalayan heights, as they are people of the steep ravines. i have also heard it used to mean nepal itself. some five miles up the valley one comes out on to a plateau and is suddenly almost brought up against the walls of the rongbuk monastery. here also, as we came out to the rongbuk monastery, we found the whole southern end of the valley filled with mount everest and quite close to us—apparently. in any european climate one would have said that it was a short march to its base, and one would have 45been terribly wrong. the air is astonishingly clear; the scale is enormous. the mountain was 16 miles off.
we pitched our camp just below the monastery with considerable difficulty, as the wind was howling rather more than usual. then we went up to pay our respects to the rongbuk lama. this particular lama was beyond question a remarkable individual. he was a large, well-made man of about sixty, full of dignity, with a most intelligent and wise face and an extraordinarily attractive smile. he was treated with the utmost respect by the whole of his people. curiously enough, considering the terrible severity of the climate at rongbuk, all his surroundings were far cleaner than any monastery we had previously, or indeed subsequently, visited. this lama has the distinction of being actually the incarnation of a god, the god chongraysay, who is depicted with nine heads. with his extraordinary mobility of expression, he has also acquired the reputation of being able to change his countenance. we were received with full ceremony, and after compliments had been exchanged in the usual way by the almost grovelling interpreter, karma paul (who was very much of a buddhist here), the lama began to ask us questions with regard to the objects of the expedition. he was very anxious also that we should treat his people kindly. his inquiries about the objects of the expedition were very intelligent, although at the same time they were very difficult to answer. indeed, this is not strange when one comes to think how many times in england one has been 46asked—what is the good of an exploration of everest? what can you get out of it? and, in fact, what is the object generally of wandering in the mountains? as a matter of fact, it was very much easier to answer the lama than it is to answer inquiries in england. the tibetan lama, especially of the better class, is certainly not a materialist. i was fortunately inspired to say that we regarded the whole expedition, and especially our attempt to reach the summit of everest, as a pilgrimage. i am afraid, also, i rather enlarged on the importance of the vows taken by all members of the expedition. at any rate, these gentle “white lies” were very well received, and even my own less excusable one which i uttered to save myself from the dreadful imposition of having to drink tibetan tea was also sufficiently well received. i told the lama, through paul, who, fortunately enough, was able to repress his smiles (an actual record for paul, which must have strained him to his last ounce of strength), that i had sworn never to touch butter until i had arrived at the summit of everest. even this was well received. after that time i drank tea with sugar or milk which was made specially for me.
the expedition at base camp.
left to right, back row: major morshead, captain geoffrey bruce, captain noel, dr. wakefield, mr. somervell, captain norris, major norton.
front row: mr. mallory, captain finch, dr. longstaff, general bruce, colonel strutt, mr. crawford.
a word about tibetan tea: the actual tea from which it is originally made is probably quite sufficiently good, but it is churned up in a great churn with many other ingredients, including salt, nitre, and butter, and the butter is nearly invariably rancid, that is, as commonly made in tibet. i believe a superior quality is drunk by the upper classes, but at any rate, to the ordinary european taste, 47castor-oil is pleasant in comparison. one of the party, however, had managed to acquire a taste for it, but then some people enjoy castor-oil!
the lama finally blessed us and blessed our men, and gave us his best wishes for success. he was very anxious that no animals of any sort should be interfered with, which we promised, for we had already given our word not to shoot during our expedition in tibet. he did not seem to have the least fear that our exploring the mountain would upset the demons who live there, but he told me that it was perfectly true that the upper rongbuk and its glaciers held no less than five wild men. there is, at any rate, a local tradition of the existence of such beings, just as there is a tradition of the wild men existing right through the himalaya.
as a matter of fact, i really think that the rongbuk lama had a friendly feeling for me personally, as he told the interpreter, karma paul, that he had discovered that in a previous incarnation i had been a tibetan lama. i do not know exactly how to take this. according to the life you lead during any particular incarnation, so are you ranked for the next incarnation; that is to say, if your life has been terrible, down you go to the lowest depths, and as you acquire merit in any particular existence, so in the next birth you get one step nearer to nirvana. i am perfectly certain that he would consider a tibetan lama a good bit nearer the right thing than a britisher could ever be, and so possibly he may have meant that i had not degenerated so very 48far anyhow. i should have liked to know, however, what the previous incarnations of the rest of the party had been!
i think in my present incarnation the passion that i have for taking turkish baths may be some slight reaction from my life in the previous and superior conditions as a tibetan lama.
the following morning, in cold weather, as usual, we left to try and push our camp as high up as possible. our march now became very interesting, and we passed on our road, which was fairly rough, six or seven of the hermits’ dwellings. these men are fed fairly regularly from the monasteries and nunneries, and do not necessarily take their vows of isolation for ever all at once. they try a year of it and see how they get on before they take the complete vows, but how it is possible for human beings to stand what they stand, even for a year, without either dying or going mad, passes comprehension. their cells are very small, and they spend the whole of their time in a kind of contemplation of the om, the god-head, and apparently of nothing else. they are supposed to be able to live on one handful of grain per diem, but this we were able successfully to prove was not the case; they appear, as far as we could make out, to have a sufficiency of food always brought to them. however, there they are in little cells, without firing or warm drinks, all the year round, and many of them last for a great number of years.
our march took us right up to the snout of the main rongbuk glacier, and on arrival there we vainly endeavoured 49to get our yak-men to push up the trough between the glacier and the mountain-side. there was promptly a strike among the local transport workers, but the employers of labour were wise enough to give in to their demands. if we had pushed further up, we must have injured a great number of animals, and finally have been obliged to return. so we found a fairly good site, protected to a small extent from the prevailing west wind, and there we collected the whole of our outfit and pitched our camp. i do not think such an enormous cavalcade could possibly have mounted the rongbuk glacier before. there were over 300 baggage animals, about twenty ponies, fifty or sixty men in our own employ, and the best part of 100 tibetans, either looking after us or coming up as representatives of the shekar dzongpen. finally, all were paid off, and the expedition was left alone in its glory. the date was the 1st of may.
