Page:Narratives of the Mission of George Bogle to Tibet (1879).djvu/156

Intr.] BOGLE'S APPOINTMENT TO RANGPUR. cli Warren Hastings had no intention of losing the results to be derived from Bogle's first mission to Tibet, and the friendship he had formed for the Teshu Lama. He resolved to continue the same policy, with a view to establishing free commercial intercourse between Tibet and Bengal. On the 19th of April, 1779, George Bogle was "appointed to proceed again to Bhutan and Tibet, for the purpose of cultivating and improving the good understanding subsisting between the chiefs of those countries and the Government, and to endeavour to establish a free and lasting intercourse of trade with the kingdom of Tibet, and the other states to the northward of Bengal." In the course of the summer news arrived that the Teshu Lama had undertaken a journey to Peking, and the mission was consequently postponed. Mr. Bogle then wrote the important memorandum, proposing to meet the Lama at Peking, which is printed at p. 207. In September, 1779, Mr. Bogle was appointed to succeed Mr. Purling as Collector of Raugpiir, where he was on the high road to Bhutan, and in a position to encourage commercial intercourse, and to superintend the annual fair. He writes to his sister Anne: "I am at length fairly out of Calcutta again, and although not in my Bhutan hills, I am within sight of them. Yet I felt a pang at leaving Mr. Hastings, for whose character and abilities I have a respect bordering on veneration." To his brother Robert, who by this time had returned home to Daldowie, he writes, on 18th of January, 1780: "I have schemes and projects for introducing new articles of commerce through Bhutan, and of perfecting what has already cost me so much trouble. The narrow-minded jealousy of the Bhutanese opposes obstacles, but my