abruptness to form the lion-shaped mass of Chagpo-ri.*
Chagpo-ri is crowned with a small square yellow jong, and
immediately hidden from view by the topmost pinnacle
on which the jong is placed is a medical college resting,
as it were, on the lion’s withers. Immediately on the
south again runs the stream of the K yi chu. So much
could be seen or guessed from the halting-ground,
whence the high road leads straight into the western
gate between the two high rocky citadels. The first
thing that the traveller notices is the embankment of
sand constructed by a Depen of the name of Karpi in
1721. This man, by order of the Chinese conquerors,
had immediately before pulled down the walls which
defended Lhasa more from the assaults of nature than
of man, and he found it necessary to undertake the construction
of these enormous containing walls— to which
I have referred in the last chapter— to save Lhasa from
the encroachment of the water-sodden plain around.
The Kaling chu is an artificially constructed waterway
which diverts from the town itself all the water coming
down towards it from the two valleys lying immediately
north of Lhasa, in one of which Sera Monastery, two
miles away, is clearly to be seen, a small nest of white
houses buttressing the foot of the rock and ensigned
with a gilded roof or two. This double embankment is
a striking feature ; the road runs parallel along the
northern side of it for 500 yards, and one can see the
tops of the trees which fill the square “ ling ” or plantation
abutting on to it to the south. At last the embankment
turns northwards, and we cross it by a primitive
bridge under the wide branches of a poplar tree. After
* It will be remembered that at the first view of {.hasa, Polala and Chagpo-ri stooi
out like two pyramids across the plain.
The Kaling chu.
THERE IS NOTHING TO BE SAID ABOUT THIS EXCEPT THAT
TO SOME EXTENT IT SUGGESTS THE SNOW AND VEGETATION
OF THE PLAIN IN WHICH LHASA LIES.