ROOF OF THE WORLD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20087, 2 May 1927, Page 13

ROOF OF THE WORLD

LIFE IN MYSTERIOUS TIBET. HIGHEST TOWN ON EARTH. MISSIONARY’S VIVID WORD , PICTURES.

Vivid experiences of extraordinary interest have been the lot for 30 years past of the Rev. J. H. Edgar, who is at present on furlough in Dunedin. Mr Edgar is one of the well known family of Edgars, of Tapanui. and in 1898 he went out as _ a missionary under the China Inland Mission. He was in China during the terrible times of the Boxer rebellion, and in 1901 he was appointed to work among the Tibetans. With occasional absences through ill-health, he has been engaged in bringing the Gospel to the Tibetan people ever since. He has been in charge of large churches and has baptised hundreds of people, but ho told an interviewer yesterday that he likes to think of himself more particularly as a pioneer missionary. This is his third furlough during his long period of service, and there are some months of it still to run. In order to give a true idea of Tibet, Mr Edgar said the best way would bo to describe in some detail one of the famous towns in that country. Mr Edgar chose for this purpose the town of Litang, a religious and political centre of Eastern Tibet, situated 2300 miles west of Shanghai. Mount Cook, the highest point in New Zealand, is only 12,394 feet above sea level, but the area of which Mr Edgar proceeded to speak is 1500 ft higher. It is a very remarkable fact that the Tibet snow line, near 30 degrees North latitude is above 18.000 ft. It is a fact, also that travellers have crossed passes 17.000 ft in midwinter and found them free from snow. “On the other hand,” said Mr Edgar, "I have seen eternal snow in Dutch New Guinea near the equator, 3000 ft lower. Tibet has the highest snowline in the world.

TWO MILES AND A-HALF ABOVE THE SEA.

Litang has beep described as the richest town in Tibet. It _is about 14,000 ft, or more _ than two miles . and a-half above the tide. This means that life there is not quite the same at it is in Dunedin. For instance, hero boiling water is hotter by 26 degrees. This means that cooking in Litang is a much prolonged process. But, perhaps, the most striking way to illustrate the inconvenience of living in high altitudes is to mention the fact that 100 men working above 12,000 ft are required to do work easily completed by 50 at sea level. Indeed, when two miles and a-half up you find exertion painful; you get giddy when stooping, and may suffer in much the same way as do the victims of violent mal de mor. And although Litang is much nearer the sun than Dunedin its temperature may average from 20 degrees to 30 degrees lower. It has been affirmed that only one month of the 12 —August—is free from frost. This means that no cereal will ripen, and vegetables never grow to any size. THE PLAIN OF LITANG.

Litang, a plain, a town and a lamasery, is 200 miles west of the frontier mart of Tatsienlu. Tt is not reached by shooting up in a captive balloon, but by 10 arduous day’s journey, which include the crossing of 13 passe® over 15,000 ft. The scenery en route is wonderful—on one plateau 15.000 feet, more than 40 peaks over 20,000 ft may be counted. Among them is one unsurveyed giant which the unduly optimistic might consider a rival of Everest itself! The plain of Litang is a depression amid rolling downs and bare rugged mountains. No trees are to bo seen, and in winter when tli© north winds chilled to zero blow with hurricane force, the traveller readily imagines himself on Siberian tundras near the pole of maximum cold. But in summer the scene is agreeably changed. Nature smiles, and a general reincarnation ia tho result. The adjacent downs are robed with grass, the greenness of which would put th<* Emerald Isle to shame, and the plain is carpeted with flowers of all the shapes and shades an artist could desire. If you add to this a soft and soundless atmosphere, tinted with the gold of dancing sunbeams, Litang might suggest a land little different, in essentials, from the Happy Valley of Rnsselas, the Abysinnian prince. The plain has an area of 100 square miles, and its value may be gauged by the official statement that during Juno, 1924, 50,000 sheep. 40,000 yak, and 1000 horses were fattening on its green pastures. THE MAGICIAN’S CURSE. But the fertile land of Litang will produce no vegetables nor fruit trees; neither will cereals ripen there. This is a mystery alike to Chinese and Tibetans. Hence they confidently assert that Litang, like some heroes in fairy talcs, is the victim of a magician’s curse. Years ago a Lamamaster of black magic, annoyed ■ at China’s death sentence, on the execution ground cursed the land for ever with sterility. A _ wily Chinese official 150 years later visited me with _ the object of obtaining my services against the back magic of the Tibetan martyr. LITANG CITY DESCRIBED.

The secular population of Litang city and environs may be 5300 souls. A mass of_ flat-roofed bouses about 10 feet high joined together, it gives the impression at a distance of a number of small fields with flags, poles,, and incense shrlnoa erected in a haphazard and inconsequent manner. There is magical machinery to ensure the peace and safety of the settlement. When somewhat nearer the visitor finds that a passage like a rugged ditch, 10 feet deep, runs through the fiold-like features. This is_ really the main street of Litang, which divides the town into two equal halves. As you proceed down this alley, doors, are seen which guard the entrance to artificial caves 180 feet deep and nine feet wide. These burrows are the houses of the Litangese. They are dirty, musty, highly uncomfortable, and, being all joined up in one mass, the doles of light and sunshine filter in from holes and cracks in the roofs. Through these, also, the heavy smoko from constant oow manure hres finds an exit leisurely by devious paths and very circuitous routes. I must admit that I have wept bitterly in Litang houses —not, it is true, for friends in happier lands and fairer climes, but because of the quantities of pungent smoke omitted by green brushwood and cow manure fires in the highest town on earth. AN ATROCIOUS MAIN STREET.

The ditch-like feature referred to above —the main and only street of Litang—is nine feet wide and probably 2000 feet long. It is so atrociously paved that human purpose might be questioned, and so filthy that its counterpart might reasonably be sought in some department of Dante’s Inferno. Early in the morning men have tied mules, horses, yak, and sheep to posts and rings in the wall. These creatures, at first extending themselves at divors angles and comforting themselves in sundry attitudes, are soon only confused items in a surging mass so Cackod that a man in a hurry could ardly squirm through. What a motley mass it is 1 Hordes of the wildest, dirtiest men on earth, and the ugliest women in Asia, shout and jostle as they work their way through the seething crowd ana almost every boast of burden known to the steppes. Such masses in Litang—foulsmelling nomads, fearless brigands, portly lamas, and women with bizarre coiffures, and faces “uglified” as a protective measure—usually repels and often unnerves the missionary because it is always suggestive of an accident about to happen! The disfigurement of tho women is intended as protection against the lamas, but it seems really quite unnecessary, as Nature has already been peculiarly kind to them in that respect. THE GLORY OF LITANG.

But the glory of Litang is it lamasery with a roll call of 3700 clerics. As every family aims at having one of its members a Lama it is assumed that this number represents the families under two famous princes who formerly lived in fine ancient Egyptian-like castles not far away. This double principality had seventeen nolitical divisions, and each division had a lamasery with an abbot and lamas in Litang Then to insure order and efficient co-operation one abbot-genera!—an important incarnation, appointed by Lhasa—has jurisdiction over the entire community In this way the lamasery, having within its walls reprt sentatives of all the families in the principality, became the centre for rich and poor from its verv gates to the most distant tent; and when wc remember that the Titang Lamasery—only one of thousands —is, as thev all are, linked up with Lhasa, the city of the Incarnate God of the Tibetans, the secret of the centralising and civilising power of Lamaism may

be grasped. Such lamaseries, also are the great educational centre# of Tibet, and the trader and civil functionary must dance to the abbot’s tune. These centres, also, are usually very wealthy. Indeed, at times the impression persists that they have some difficulty in using their gold to advantage. They have not the wives, and horses, and apes, and peacocks of the ancients, but certain roofs and towers and turrets and temple ornaments are plated with the precious metal from l-16th to l-Bth of an inch in thickness. I have personally measured that myself in company with a specialist in mineralogy. The gold is not found among the rocks of Tibet, which are igneous, and it has probably been carried there by glaciers in days when the topography of the country wae quite different.

A FAMOUS PRINTING PRESS. In the Litang lamasery is a famous printing press where a 108 volume Buddhist “Bible” is produced. I myself was the first to disco ver its existence. When finished and found a caravan of 36 yak would bo required to deliver it at the doors of the purchaser. But 1000 animals would find difficulty in transferring the printing blocks to new quarters. Inside, the great buildings a series of desperately haunted halls_ immersed in eternal twilight gloom. Silent, spectral forms—the lamas on duty—seem to be always moving to and fro and a ghostly orchestra not infrequently interprets what might be the bliss of the Nirvana negation, after a rough-and-tumble conflict with spiritual enemies in high places. I have seen many _ Europeans enter a large lamasery indifferent, or slightly curious, but, as a rule, they leave it deeply impressed, and mystified. Why? Can you imagine the feelings of the man who has sailed with the Flying Dutchman? or of one who haddined with the Wandering Jew? or slept in the halls of Prester John? I cam because I have been in Tibetan lamaseries.

AN EXCITING MOMENT, The ritual is ornate, .and the music suggests a tumultuous delirium. On one occasion, to mo at least, it suggested something else. One morning when about 1000 instruments were about to perform, without being invited thereto. I took up a position which would enable mo to watch the progress of the performers. They began. Fortune at first seemed to favour me, but later played mo an" unkind trick. A lama musician, tired of his part, looked up and beheld—not the face of his mistress. but the hateful blue eyes of an intruding European. This was serious. Word wont round like magic; the vmd surging music ceased, and -2000 blazing eyes fixed me with a power equal to that of the Ancient Mariner. But in my case the compulsion to fly was more than a match for the mesmeric gaze, and I "M soon escaping from the building with a precipitance that might have suggested the leaving of the district also as part oi my programme. But almost immediately my soul was comforted and my fears calmed. For the grand orchestra had resumed its tempestuous course, and tnat meant the danger was past. THE PRIESTS’ FOOD. Litang is one of the few religious centres in Tibet where the priests are allowed to eat moat. The slaughter of 1000 yaks yearly indicates that the indulgence is appreciated. But the staple diet of the lamas, hero ns elsewhere, is tsamba, —barley meal and butter mixed together in a small wooden basin. This diet suits the Tibetans admirably. It is very nourishing, slightly - stimulating, and requires the least amount of cooking in a treeless land. The barley is roasted and ground; the butter is alwas very dirty and often objectionably rank; and the vile tea is stewed until it is thick and black. Then, to make it more undrinkable—from out point of view —salt and washing soda are usually added. Before using, the leaves are carefully strained from the liquid. In liitang the quantities of meal, butter, and tea required are enormous. In the kitchen there arc many cauldrons of copper about Bft in diameter and 4ft deep. In these the tea is boiled, and the furnaces, fed by huge logs, remind one of factory engines, or suggest a colony of Brobdignagian gourmands rather than ascetic Buddhists. DIRT AND GODLINESS. The inmates of the Litang Lamasery disprove the inference that cleanliness and Godliness are closely connected. Litang is very religious but notoriously dirty. tiow» ever, to be fair, the only reason known to me why anyone there should wash tn a religious one. The people __ wash once a year and the custom is explained in this way. TTiousands of years ago a famous Buddha formed the habit of bathing onoe a year in the adjacent hot_ springs, and the Litangese, who admire him greatly, soak themselves in the same waters annuany whether they require it or not. The Tibetan insists that dirt keeps the heat in and the cold out. Hence it is necessary to remind a correctly trained European that ho would accomplish no useful purpose, but lose much influence by stressing the opposite view. RELIGIOUS DEVOTEES.

The Lamasery of Litang is an important pilgrim centre. Many devotees circumambulate it scores of times during the year, and at least one old woman worshipped it so fervently and with such regularity that her constant kneelings had worn grooves in the tough sward. Around litang at times “prostrating pilgrims may be seen. The programme of such men is to prostrate themselves for years over the terrible country between the Chinese frontiers and Lhasa. They stand bolt upright with arms extended; then dropping on both knees throw themselves forward with outstretched arms. A mark is made at the point touched, and then the movement is reversed until the upright position is regained. Then the devotees walk over to the marked position and continue the prostrations. _ The effect of the exercise on the hands is so severe that all such pilgrims wear steel-palmed gloves, and these when worn through are kept as testimonies of the ascetic’s bona fidcs. A GREAT EDUCATIONAL CENTRE. Litang, as you may imagine, is not one of the pleasant places of the earth, but the missionary must always remember it is one of the great educational centres of Tibet, So, since 1903, it has been my most important objective, and in 1911 when a mission hall has been rented with the lamas in full sympathy it seemed as if my day dreams were being fulfilled. But in 1911, also, came the Great Revolutimi, and one of its details was the closing of Litang to Europeans for 13 years. In 1924. however, Dr Crook and I again walked its dismal streets. CLOSE CALL FROM BRIGANDS. Our journey had been anything but pleasant. It had rained every day and the brigands were so numerous that an escort of 20 rifles accompanied us. One night we camped on a bog at 14,000 ft in a cold drenching rain. By 2 a.m. we were uncomfortable that some one began to boil tea, and the party was well on its way two hours later. That early start, no doubt, saved our lives, because later on we turned a corner and behold a strong band of brigands preparing to ambush. They knew of our approach and intended to exterminate us, but had misjudged the time, and we were able to face them in the open. But it was touch and go; such men ebopt to kill and rarelv miss. But our guardian angels by working over time, had confounded their politics and saved our lives. A SUCCESSFUL CAMPAIGN. Our sojourn in Litang was very pleasant and quite successful from a missionary 6 standpoint. On the last afternoon we visited the famous hot springs and with the local official, and an imposing escort, galloped over the brigand infested plain. Scores of encampments were visited and in spite of baying bloodhounds and grunting yak with tails erect, eyes ablaze, and lets of steam pouring from dilated nostn's. wo wore able to put large quantities of literature into the hands? of nomads, lamas, and brigands. Never perhaps did missionaries complete their task with such rollicking abandon. And no doubt wo will be excused for having some suggestion of the joy that was Tambourlaine s when ho soliloquised: “Is it not passing bravo to bo a And ride in triumph thro* Persepohs.’’