This book has been written with the hope that the
information acquired during past years may prove of
interest and use to others who may be brought into
contact with this part of the world, or whose sympathies
have been drawn towards those mysterious marvels of
the Forbidden Land which have attracted the minds
of so many.
TH E ESCORT OF ARMED POLICE
CHAPTER II
ASKOT AND THE ABORIGINAL RAJ1S
T h e most picturesque, as well as the most interesting,
spot, from which to commence this narrative, is Askot,
distant some seventy miles from Almora and ninety
miles from Taklakot, the latter being the first large town
one meets on entering Tibet, where there is the seat of
a Jongpen and a large monastery ruled by a powerful
lama. The most direct approach to Askot from the
plains of India is along a fairly good road running
parallel to the frontier of Nepal, the large mart of
Tanakpur, which is at the foot of the Himalayas, being
only some eighty miles distant; should at any time
the forty miles intervening between Tanakpur and the
railway at Pilibhit be linked up, Tibet would be directly
brought into close contact with some of the large cities
and manufacturing centres of India, such as Delhi,
Cawnpore, and Lucknow, and indirectly with Calcutta
and Bombay. In the afternoon after our arrival the
Raj bar of Askot paid us a formal visit accompanied by
his two eldest sons. He is a fine specimen of a native
gentleman, and has always received the greatest consideration
at the hands of Government. He claims
descent from the Kings of Katyur, who ruled from Kabul
to Nepal, and who have left a memento of their name in
that portion of the Almora District which is known as
Katyur. Askot, as I have said, commands the roads
leading to the principal passes into Tibet, while, from its