India and Tibet : vol.1 / 307 ページ（カラー画像）

0307	India and Tibet : vol.1
インドとチベット : vol.1

0307

India and Tibet : vol.1

インドとチベット : vol.1

CHAPTER XVI

THE TERMS

I HAVE often been asked what were my feelings when I

first saw Lhasa—whether I was not filled with a sense of

elation. I was filled with nothing of the kind. It was

n when I left Lhasa that I really had all that feeling of

r intense relief and satisfaction which everyone experiences

when he has set his heart on one great object and attained

it. When I left Lhasa I had my treaty, and—what I had

always put at more value than the treaty itself—the good-

will of the people. When I arrived at Lhasa it was very

doubtful if I should be able to get a treaty at all, and still

more doubtful if I could get it with the good-will of the

people, without which any paper treaty would be useless.

To negotiate a treaty with a people acknowledged by those

who knew them best—the Chinese, the Nepalese, and the

Bhutanese—to be most obstinate and obstructive, time

was required. To break through the reserve of so ex-

clusive a people, to make friends of men with whom we

had just been fighting, still more time was essential. Yet

it was just time that was denied me. I had pressed for it

in June, but in too ineffectual a manner, and had been

rebuffed. 'Though this was an avowedly political Mission,

military considerations were allowed to preponderate. I

could only stay in Lhasa a month and a half or two

months. We must be back before the winter. And thus

tied, I had to set to work with all speed, but with the

outward appearance of having the utmost leisure, to

negotiate the treaty. Hurried as I was, I had yet to

assume an air of perfect indifference whether the negotia-

tions were concluded this year, next year, or the year after.

And irritated though I might be, I had above all to

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