Page:Three Years in Tibet.djvu/76

46 Lo; the same precaution had been taken on all the other bye-ways and pathways lending into Tibet, however secluded and narrow, even though narrow enough for just one person to pass. And I had reason to believe that this information was well founded; so that it became inevitable that I should give up my idea of entering Tibet by smuggling myself into its north-western plain. But there is ebb and flow even in troubles.

One evening, while still staying at the Governor's, my servants, having regaled themselves with the local drinks even to boisterousness, began a-quarrelling, which largely consisted of exposing each other. In brief, each accused the other of a somewhat cheerless intention of making short work of me when opportunity should arrive, with the upshot that they both came to me, each with a demand that he would like to be discharged if the other were to continue in my service. I could not have had a better opportunity, and I there and then dismissed both of them, after having paid them off rather liberally. I also gave some money with some little present in kind to the old woman, and bade her go with the men. And thus I got rid of an imminent danger to my life. But there remained the greater problem of what to do next, to retrace my steps back to Kātmāndu being out of the question, while the route I had chosen for myself had become unavailable.

It happened that, enjoying the Governor's hospitality like myself, was a Mongolian scholar named Serab Gyaltsan, who was acting as a doctor of medicine, besides giving lessons in religious Texts to the local priests. I had not been long at Governor Harkaman's before I became acquainted with this person, and soon found him to be a man possessed of profound knowledge of not only Buḍḍhism but also of literary subjects. Whatever were the reasons on my part, he and I after a while