Peking to Lhasa : vol.1 / Page 115 (Color Image)

0115	Peking to Lhasa : vol.1

TO I.AN-CHOW 81

26. It is 168 miles from Meng-kung, 217 from

Tanpa, and 325 from Ta-chien-lu. It is a dirty

little city containing from ten to twelve thousand

inhabitants. It is situated on the Min River and

lies on the north-west edge of the Chengtu plain.

It has a very poor climate, with constant rain,

gloom and damp. Here Pereira stayed for three

days with Mr. J. M. Edgar of the China Inland

Mission, a frequent traveller between Chengtu

and Batang. From him Pereira gathered that

the Ch'ang originally occupied Tibet. About

A.D. 400 they set up a dynasty which took the

title of T'upa. This degenerated into T'u-fan or

T'u-bo. The present - day Tibetans call them-

selves Bö. Lha-sa (spelt with one s) means the

place of a god. There are three special types of

Tibetans : (1) the beak-nosed, who are allied to

the black Lolu ; (2) the lighter Circassian type ;

(3) the Mongol type. Tibet was a land to which

the conquered and oppressed fled, and inter-

marriage among these produced the present

hybrid race.

Pereira, on leaving Kwan-hsien on January 29,

took a general northerly direction for some time,

making for Lanchow-fu, and at first following up

the valley of the Min River. He had a rough climb

over the Nian-tzu-ling, 5000 feet, on January 30,

and then descended again amid wild mountain

scenery, into the valley through which darted the

impetuous Min River over a rocky course, but

comparatively small at this time of year. He

passed a few large convoys of ponies carrying skins.

Wen-chwan-hsien, 4220 feet, is a diminutive walled

city with hardly twenty houses. A rope-bridge

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