National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
| |||||||||
|
India and Tibet : vol.1 |
POLITICAL AND SCIENTIFIC RESULTS 337
now the Maharaja of Bhutan, has formally placed himself
under our protectorate.
Besides these political results, there were also scientific
results of no mean value. Captain Ryder's survey opera-
tions have already been referred to. Mr. Hayden made
valuable geological collections, which are on view in the
Museum at Calcutta, and which are described by him in
the Records of the Geological Survey of India. Captain
AValton's natural history and botanical collections are
placed in the Natural History Museum at South Kensing-
ton and in Kew Gardens, and have been described in
various scientific works. Colonel Waddell was unable to
discover any secrets of the ancient world said to be hidden
in Tibet, but he made a collection of Tibetan manuscripts,
which are deposited in the British Museum.
If all these political and scientific results may not
seem to the ordinary Englishman to amount to much,
the most obtuse must at least see one good that came
from the Mission—the proving for all time that we can
get to Lhasa, and that, even at the cost of crossing the
Himalayas in mid-winter, we will see our treaties observed.
Anyone practised in affairs knows the advantage of a
reputation for enforcing obligations, and this at least
accrued to us from the Mission of 1904.
But I have already mentioned that the Secretary of
State felt himself unable to approve of the 'Treaty as
signed, and I have now to show how it was that some of
the advantages to which the Indian Government attached
most importance had to be abandoned.
A week after the signing of the Treaty the Government
of India telegraphed to me that the Secretary of State
considered that a difficulty was presented by the amount
of the indemnity, especially when the provision for its pay-
ment was read in conjunction with Clause VII. of the
Treaty, the effect being that our occupation of Chumbi
might have to continue for seventy-five years. This was, the
Secretary of State said, inconsistent with the instructions
conveyed in his telegram of July 26, and with the declara-
22
|
Copyright (C) 2003-2019 National Institute of Informatics and The Toyo Bunko. All Rights Reserved.