Two women weeding their barley patch approached me as I rode by, and offered me a bunch of the young sprouts, in the hope, as Tsing-ta explained, that I would give them some money. This is a custom obtaining throughout Tibet, and is called lubul.
Further on, near Toi-tsi, we saw women making bricks, and some donkeys and yaks were carrying away those which had become sufficiently dry to be used. Two miles beyond this point we came to the famous Palchen chuvori monastery and the chain bridge (chag-zam) over the Tsang-po. This bridge, built, tradition says, by Tang-tong gyal-po in the fifteenth century, consists of two heavy cables attached at each end to huge logs, around which have been built large chorten.[1]
The bed of the river here is about 400 feet broad, but at this season of the year it spreads out several hundred feet beyond the extremities of the bridge, and travellers are taken across in boats.
The monastery of Palchen chuvori was also built by Tang-tong gyal-po, who is likewise credited with having constructed eight chain bridges over the Tsang-po, 108 temples, and 108 chorten on the hills of Chung Rivoche, in Ulterior Tibet, and of Palchen chuvori, in Central Tibet, or U. The Palchen chuvori monastery, where there are upwards of one hundred monks, is supported by the toll collected at the ferry.
We and our ponies crossed the river in a roughly made boat about 20 feet long, but a number of skin coracles were also carrying travellers and freight from one side to the other. It was sunset when we reached the village of Jim-khar, belonging to the Namgyal Ta-tsan, the great monastic establishment of Potala at Lhasa. Here we obtained lodgings for the night in the sheepfold attached to the house of the headman, or gyan-po. All the members of the gyan-po's family were ill with small-pox, and he himself had but
- ↑ A. K. thus describes this bridge: "The bridge is formed of two iron chains, one on each side; from the chains thick ropes are suspended to the depth of four yards; by these ropes planks, three feet long and one foot broad, are supported lengthwise, so as only to admit of one person crossing at a time. The chains are stretched very tight, and are fastened around huge blocks of wood buried beneath immense piles of stone; the length of the bridge is about 100 paces." 'Report on the Explorations,' p. 31. This is the usual style of Chinese suspension bridge common throughout Western China and Tibet. This one was in all likelihood built by the Chinese in the eighteenth century. I am not aware that the Tibetans ever build this style of bridge; theirs are usually of wood and of the cantilever description. See my 'Diary of a Journey,' p. 304.—(W. R.)
