IIIFカラー高解像度
国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
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| IIIFカラー高解像度 |
| India and Tibet : vol.1 | |
| インドとチベット : vol.1 |
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引用情報
PROCESSION THROUGH LHASA '265
a problem. His residence was on the far side of the
city, and the point was whether we should ride through
Lhasa or round it. It was risky to ride through this
sacred city, swarming with monks who had organized the
opposition against us. We had been so recently fighting
against them that we could not be sure of their attitude.
Peace was not yet concluded, and they had shown no
signs, so far, of really negotiating, but had, on the con-
trary, been doing their best to stave us off from Lhasa.
So our reception was uncertain, and, if anything hap-
pened to us, the matter-of-fact, common-sense person at
home would, without compunction, have criticized me for
running the risk without any necessity. But from my
point of view there was a necessity. All this trouble had
arisen through the Tibetans being so inaccessible and
keeping themselves so much apart ; and now I meant to
close in with them, to break through their seclusion, to
brush aside their exclusiveness, and to let them see us and
us see them as the inhabitants of the rest of the world see
each other ; and I meant to make a beginning at once.
So I determined now, on the very first day after our
arrival, to ride right through the heart of the city of
Lhasa.
The Chinese Resident sent his bodyguard with pikes,
and three-pronged spears, and many banners to escort us,
and of our own troops I took two companies of the Royal
Fusiliers and the 2nd Mounted Infantry. Two guns and
four companies of infantry were also kept in readiness in
camp to support us at a moment's notice.
Many a traveller had pined to look on Lhasa, but now
we were actually in this sacred city, it was, except for the
Potala, a sorry affair. The streets were filthily dirty, and
the inhabitants hardly more clean than the streets ; the
houses were built of solid masonry, but as dirty as the
streets and inhabitants ; and the temples we passed, though
massive, were ungainly. Only the Potala was imposing ;
it rose from the squalid town at its base in tier upon tier
of solid, massive masonry, and, without any pretence at
architectural beauty or symmetry, was impressive from its
sheer size and strength and dominating situation.
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