CHAPTER II.
THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF THE TIBETAN QUESTION.
F or many years there were almost no relations between
the English conquerors of India and T ib e t; but so far
as any might be said to exist, they were, if anything,
friendly. The policy of isolation which the authorities
of Lhasa adopted had been formulated first in the early
years of the eighteenth century, and we must not suppose
that even previous to that date the lamas would have
been willing to allow strangers to come to their capital
in any numbers. But, as a matter of fact, the incredible
remoteness of Lhasa, and the extreme difficulty of the
road thither, had always prevented any but the hardiest
from even attempting the grim journey. When, therefore,
it became obvious that European trade and
European traders were going to flourish in the Far East,
it made no great difference that the Lhasan authorities
decided once for all that strangers were not welcome
there. This decree, however, they did not put into
force with extreme rigour for a long time, and it is possible
that Bogle, so late as 1774, might after all have
succeeded in overcoming the opposition of the Regent.
Chinese supremacy over Tibet nominally dates from
the year 1720, and as about that time the policy of
isolation was adopted, it is not unreasonable to suppose
that the Chinese pressed it upon the Tibetans with the
idea of making a “ buffer state ” of the most impenetrable
description between their western province
THE FORBIDDING OF THE LAND 27
and the unknown but growing power of the foreigners
in India. Perhaps it was not the white foreigners
alone that they dreaded- Nadir Shah’s invasion of
India in 1727 must have been the cause of some
anxiety to the Middle Kingdom. In any case we may
fairly accept the definite statement of many travellers
that the isolation of Tibet was in its origin a Chinese
device. But they taught willing pupils, and the tables
are now so far reversed that the Chinese are unable to
secure admittance into the province even for the strangers
to whom they have given official permission. Mr. W.
W. Rockhill, than whom no man has earned more
deservedly a reputation for Tibetan erudition, has of
course long wished to visit Lhasa. The American
Government, on three occasions, has sent in a request
to the Chinese that he should be permitted to make
the journey, and that the Tibetan authorities should be
compelled to receive him. The first promise was readily
granted ; the second, that which presupposed a real
suzerainty over the Tibetans, they were frankly unable
to make. They did their best : three times, as
the suzerain power, they sent an order to Lhasa. Three
times the Dalai Lama flatly and unconditionally refused
even to consider Mr. Rockhill’s admission.* The main
responsibility, therefore, for the exclusion of foreigners
from Tibet rests now with the Lamaic hierarchy. But
the great game of exchanging responsibilities is as well
known to those oriental hermits as it was to the firm
of Spenlow and Jorkins. At one time the Chinese said
that they were willing enough to allow strangers to
travel freely in Tibet, but they deplored their inability
to coerce the Lhasan Government; the Lhasan Government,
on the other hand, stated that they would be
* This we discovered after our arrival in Lhasa.