India and Tibet : vol.1 / 15 ページ（カラー画像）

0015	India and Tibet : vol.1
インドとチベット : vol.1

0015

India and Tibet : vol.1

インドとチベット : vol.1

PREFACE

AN apology is needed for the length of this book. When

it was passing through the press, a Parliamentary Blue-

book appeared containing much important information as to

recent developments, and what I had intended as only the

account of our relations with Tibet up to the return of the

Mission of 1904 I thought with advantage might be extended

to include our relations to the present time. The whole

forms one connected narrative of the attempt, protracted

over 137 years, to accomplish a single purpose—the estab-

lishment of ordinary neighbourly intercourse with Tibet.

The dramatic ending disclosed is that, when that purpose

had at last been achieved, we forthwith abandoned the

result.

The reasons for this abandonment have been—firstly,

the jealousy borne by two great Powers for one another ;

and, secondly, the love of isolation engrained in us islanders.

I have suggested that our aim should be to replace jealousy

by co-operation, and, instead of coiling up in frigid isolation,

we should expand ourselves to make and keep friendships.

The means I have recommended are living personalities

rather than dry treaties, and what Warren Hastings and

Lord Curzon wanted--an agent at Lhasa--is to me also

the one true means of achieving our purpose.

I am fully conscious of having made mistakes in that

part of the conduct of these affairs which fell to me to

discharge. The exactly true adjustment of diplomatic

with military requirements, and of the wishes of men in

England with the necessities of the situation in Tibet,

could only be made by a human being arrived at perfec-

tion. N of yet having arrived there, I doubtless made

many errors. I can only assume that, if I had never

made a mistake, I should never have made a success.

vii

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