But this was essentially and, what is more to the
point, apparently also a different thing from the
passage of troops.
The road to the J elep was therefore at first adopted
for more reasons than the mere fact that so much at
least of the long journey was familiar from our experience
in 1888. In the last chapter I have given
some description of the road between Rang-po and
Chumbi. From this point onwards the interest was
doubled for those who penetrated for the first time
through its gorges. From the Maharajah’s palace there
is a view of the windings of the valley to the point
where the flat alluvial spur of New Chumbi juts out from
the e a s t; the river here makes a final turn and the
high wooded shoulder of the hill above cuts off all view
of the features of the upper reaches of the river. In
this part of the valley there was not perhaps very much
to attract the eye. Certainly in winter, when the first
sight of it was obtained, there was nothing to suggest
the extraordinary beauty of the brief summer months.
The hills come down steeply on either side, elbowing
the quick Ammo chu into a tortuous and almost torrential
course. Rinchengong itself is a straggling hamlet
with a few good houses in it, originally collected there,
not only as a station on the high road to India, but
as a convenient colony for the service - of the monks
of the Kag-ue monastery high on the hill above. The
poorer houses are huddled together, dirty and unkempt,
in the bed of the stream which here flows down from
Ya-tung a mile or two up the valley. The better houses
are removed a few hundred yards away. Some, across
the river, are attached to fertile fields, and two, at least,
on this side have evidently belonged to owners of some
taste and refinement. In the middle of the town, the
large handsome house of Ugyen Kazi stands up brave
with fluttering prayer flags beneath the steep sandy ridge,
crowned with the fir trees which jut out and protect
Rinchengong from the northern blast down the valley.
Up above the houses, just where this promontory
Chema Village. The descent from the Y a k la to the Chumbi Valley is seen in the
centre.
joins its parent cliff, is hidden in a cleft of the rock
one of the hermit cells which are to be found scattered
in the most unlikely places over the length and breadth
of the country. This one is a crazy structure of wood
and woven bamboo, precariously perched upon a wooden
stage, wherever the rock has afforded no purchase.
There the occupant of the cell spends an uneventful
v o l . 1. 7