In the Forbidden Land Part 35

CHAPTER Lx.x.xI

A bearer of bad news--Marched off to the mud-house--Mansing--Insults and humiliations--Iron handcuffs instead of ropes--The Rupun's sympathy--No more hope--In the hands of the mob.

EARLY in the afternoon a soldier entered the tent, and striking me on the shoulder with his heavy hand, shouted:

"_Ohe!_" (This is a Tibetan exclamation always used by the rougher cla.s.ses when beginning a conversation. It corresponds to "Look here.")

"_Ohe!_" repeated he; "before the sun goes down you will be flogged, both your legs will be broken,[34] they will burn out your eyes, and then they will cut off your head!"

The man, who seemed quite in earnest, accompanied each sentence with an appropriate gesture ill.u.s.trating his words. I laughed at him and affected to treat the whole thing as a joke, partly because I thought this was the best way to frighten them and prevent them from using violence, and partly because the programme thus laid before me seemed so extensive that I thought it could only be intended to intimidate me.

However, the words of the soldier cast a gloom over my friendly guard in the tent, and when I tried to cheer them up, they answered bluntly that I would not laugh for very long. Something was certainly happening, for the men rushed in and out of the tent, and whispered among themselves. When I spoke to them they would answer no more, and on my insisting, they made signs that their lips must from now be closed.

About half an hour later, another person rushed into the tent in a great state of excitement, and signalled to my guards to lead me out. This they did, after making my bonds tighter than ever, and placing extra ropes round my chest and arms. In this fas.h.i.+on I was marched off to the mud-house and led into one of the rooms. A large number of soldiers and villagers a.s.sembled outside, and after we had waited some time, Mansing, tightly bound, was brought into the same room. My pleasure at seeing my man again was so great, that I forgot all about what was happening, and paid no attention to the insults of the mob peeping through the door.

After a while a Lama came in with a smiling face and said he had good news to give me.

"We have ponies here," he said, "and we are going to take you back to the frontier, but the Pombo wishes to see you first to-day. Do not make any resistance. Let us exchange the ropes round your wrists for these iron handcuffs."

[Ill.u.s.tration: SOLDIER LAYING BEFORE ME THE PROGRAMME OF TORTURES]

Here he produced a heavy pair of them, which he had kept concealed under his coat.

"You will not wear them for more than a few moments while we are leading you to his presence. Then you will be free. We swear to you by the Sun and Kunjuk-Sum that we will treat you kindly."

I promised not to resist, chiefly because I had no chance of doing so.

For greater safety they tied my legs and placed a sliding knot round my neck; then I was carried out into the open, where a ring of soldiers with drawn swords stood round me. While I lay flat on my face on the ground, held down firmly, they unwound the ropes from around my wrists, and the iron fetters, joined by a heavy chain, were subst.i.tuted for them. They took some time in fastening the clumsy padlock, after which, all being ready, they unbound my legs.

They made me stand up again, and knowing that I could not possibly get my hands free, they began to load me with insults and offensive terms, not directed to me as an individual, but as a _Plenki_, an Englishman. They spat upon me and threw mud at me. The Lamas behaved worse than any of the others, and the one who had sworn that I should be in no way ill-used if I would submit quietly to be handcuffed was the most prominent among my tormentors and the keenest in urging the crowd on to further brutality.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MY HANDCUFFS]

Suddenly the attention of the crowd was drawn to the approach of the Rupun with a number of soldiers and officers. He seemed depressed, and his face was of a ghastly yellowish tint. He kept his eyes fixed on the ground, and, speaking very low, ordered that I should again be conveyed inside the mud-house.

A few moments later he came in and closed the door after him, having first cleared the room of all the people who were in it. As I have mentioned before, Tibetan structures of this kind have a square aperture in the ceiling by which they are ventilated and lighted.

The Rupun laid his forehead upon mine in sign of compa.s.sion, and then sadly shook his head.

"There is no more hope," he whispered; "your head will be cut off to-night. The Lamas are bad and my heart is aching. You are like my brother, and I am grieved...."

The good old man tried not to let me see his emotion, and made signs that he could stay no longer, lest he should be accused of being my friend.

The mob again entered the room, and I was once more dragged out into the open by the Lamas and soldiers. Some discussion followed as to who should keep the key of my handcuffs, and eventually it was handed over to one of the officers, who mounted his pony and rode away at a great rate in the direction of Lha.s.sa.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PADLOCK AND KEY]

[34] A form of torture in which, after placing the legs upon two parallel logs of wood, a heavy blow is given with a mallet, fracturing both legs.

CHAPTER Lx.x.xII

A pitiful scene--A struggle to get to Chanden Sing--Brutally treated--A torturing saddle--Across country at a gallop--A spirited pony--Sand deposits and hills--Speculation--More hors.e.m.e.n coming towards us.

JUST then I heard the voice of my servant Chanden Sing calling to me in a weak agonised tone:

"_Hazur, Hazur, hum murgiaega!_" ("Sir, sir, I am dying!") and, turning my head in the direction from which these painful sounds came, I perceived my faithful bearer with his hands bound behind his back, dragging himself on his stomach towards the door of one of the other rooms of the mud-house. His poor face was hardly recognisable, it bore the traces of such awful suffering.

I could stand no more. Pus.h.i.+ng my guards aside with my shoulders, I endeavoured to get to the poor wretch, and had nearly reached him when the soldiers who stood by sprang upon me, grappling me, and lifting me bodily off my feet. They threw me on the back of a pony.

Though I now feared the worst, I tried to encourage my brave servant by shouting to him that I was being taken to Taklakot, and that he would be brought after me the following day. He had exhausted his last atom of strength in creeping to the door. He was roughly seized, and brutally hurled back into the room of the mud-house, so that we could not exchange a word more. Mansing, the coolie, was placed, with his arms pinioned, on a bare-backed pony. The saddle of the pony I had been thrown upon is worthy of description. It was in reality the wooden frame of a very high-backed saddle, from the back of which some five or six sharp iron spikes stuck out horizontally. As I sat on this implement of torture, the spikes caught me in the small of my back.

My guard having been augmented by twenty or thirty mounted men with muskets and swords, we set off at a furious pace. A horseman riding in front of me led my pony by means of a cord, as my hands were manacled behind my back; and thus we travelled across country for miles.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "SIR, SIR, I AM DYING"]

But for those awful spikes in the saddle, the ride would not have been so very bad, for the pony I rode was a fine spirited animal, and the country around was curious and interesting. We proceeded along an apparently endless succession of yellow sandhills, some of them as high as two or three hundred feet, others not more than twenty or thirty. The sand seemed to have been deposited more by wind than by water, though it is also possible that the whole basin, not very high above the level of the huge stream, may at some time have been altogether under water. The whole s.p.a.ce between the mountain-range to the North of the Brahmaputra and the river itself was covered with these sand mounds, except in certain places where the soil was extremely marshy, and where our ponies sank in deep soft mud. We splashed across several rivulets and skirted a number of ponds. From the summit of a hill to which they led me, I could see that the hills were of much greater circ.u.mference and height near the river edge, becoming smaller and smaller as they approached the mountain-range to the North. Moreover, they increased in number and size the farther we went in an easterly direction.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SPIKED SADDLE]

The circ.u.mstances under which I was now travelling did not permit me to ascertain the quality of the sand, or make any accurate investigations as to where the sand came from, but a glance at the country all round made me feel sure that the sand had been conveyed there from the South. This one could plainly see from depressions and wavelike undulations, showing that it had travelled (roughly) in a northerly direction; and although, having been unable to ascertain this for a fact, I do not wish to be too certain with regard to the movements and sources of these sand deposits, I was pretty firmly convinced that the sand had been deposited there by the wind, which had carried it over the Himahlyan chain from the plains of India.

My guard scoured the country from the high point of vantage to which we had ascended. Away in the distance to the East, we saw a large number of hors.e.m.e.n raising clouds of dust; and, riding down the hill, the ponies sinking in the soft sand, we set off in the direction of the new comers, the surface at the bottom of the hill being more compact and harder.

CHAPTER Lx.x.xIII

At an unpleasant pace--Drawing near the cavalcade--A picturesque sight--A shot fired at me--Terrible effects of the spikes along my spine--The rope breaks--An ill omen--A second shot misses me--Arrows--The end of my terrible ride.

WE travelled mile after mile at an unpleasant pace, until we arrived at a spot where, drawn up in a line, was the cavalcade we had seen from the summit of the hill. It was a beautiful sight as we approached it, though the pain which I was undergoing rather detracted from the pleasure I should otherwise have taken in the picturesque scene. There were about a hundred red Lamas in the centre, with banner-men whose heads were covered by peculiar flat fluffy hats, and the same number of soldiers and officers in their grey, red and black tunics; some two hundred hors.e.m.e.n in all.

The Pombo, in his yellow coat and trousers and his queer pointed hat, sat on a magnificent pony a little in front of the crowd of Lamas and soldiers.

Curiously enough, when close to this new crowd, the horseman who led my pony let go the rope, and the pony was lashed cruelly and left to its own devices. The soldiers of my guard reined up and drew aside. The pony dashed off in the direction of the Pombo and, as I pa.s.sed close to him, a man named Nerba (private secretary of the Tokchim Tarjum), knelt down, and, taking aim with his matchlock resting on its prop, deliberately fired a shot at me.

Although (I learned afterwards) this Nerba was one of the champion shots in the country, and the distance from the muzzle of his matchlock to me not more than four yards, the bullet missed me, whizzing past my left ear. Probably the speed at which my animal was proceeding saved me, as the marksman could not take a very steady aim; but my pony, startled at the sudden report of the matchlock at such close quarters, took fright, and began rearing and plunging. I managed to maintain my seat, though the spikes in the saddle were lacerating the lower part of my spine terribly.

[Ill.u.s.tration: NERBA FIRING AT ME]