1936 - 1937 Mission Diary

The official diary of the Gould mission to Lhasa sent by the British government. Read more about the mission diary.

January 25th, Monday.

Today we had a large lunch party of officials who had not been invited before. There was Ringang's elder brother, a genial man who was once Depon in Kham. Kusho Choden Tendar the busy monk Telegraph-master was another guest; after lunch he went round to Dagg's tent and to his unbounded delight had a wireless conversation with Nainital. His brother - another monk official, Mipon Seksing, an old City Magistrate and Mondo, one of the boys who were at Rugby, completed the party. The last mentioned studied mineralogy when in England. On his return to Tibet he started to dig for gold but the authorities in each place - fearing that the gods would be disturbed - immediately hurried him on to the next district. After a time he gave it up and returned to the cloister. At present he is charge of the Potala treasure.

In the afternoon the Nepali representative, who is a high-caste Hindu and therefore unable to lunch with us, came to see the cinema show which invariably follows our lunch-parties.

Author: Frederick Spencer Chapman [see handwritten annotations in Diary by Hugh Richardson in MS. Or. Richardson 2, Bodleian Libary, Department of Oriental Collections, University of Oxford]

Page Reference: Pt XIII p.2