Читать книгу Three Years in Tibet - Ekai Kawaguchi - Страница 24

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After leaving the sandy beach of the Brahmapuṭra behind, about a quarter of a mile’s trudging brought me to the outer edge of another expanse of undulating plain, the elevations here and there assuming the height of hills. Following the upper course of the river to the north-west, I saw the titanic heights of the Himālayas, rising one above another. Here I had to pasture my sheep, and, while taking a rest myself, I drank deep and full of the grandeur of the scenery. The sight here obtainable of the mighty peaks covered with glittering snow from the top to the bottom was sublime in the extreme, incomparably more so than what one sees from Darjeeling or Nepāl. As for the Brahmapuṭra, it looked like a shining streamer hung out from the bosom of a great mountain, and waving down and across an immense plain, till the eyes could follow it no more. The sight gave me an uta:

The distant clouds about the snowy range

Pour forth the mighty Brahmaputra stream,

That darts into the farthest skies which meet

The far horizon of the distant lands.

The river in its pride majestic seems

The waving standard of the Buddha, named

Vairochana, all Nature’s Brilliant Lord.

Like all the others of my production, this may not be worth the name of uta. Call it a silly conceit of imagination, if you like; but when I made these lines, I was feeling so jubilant that I could not help giving vent to my emotion; for, conceit or no conceit, the imagination would have been impossible to me, had I not succeeded in penetrating into the untrodden wilderness of Tibet.

The sheep had now finished grazing, and dividing the burden of my luggage among the three—myself and the two sheep—I started making easy progress onward. I found the country around full of pools of water, varying in size all the way from a hundred yards to a mile or so in circumference, and I gave it the name of Chi-ike-ga Hara—Plain of a thousand Ponds. About four o’clock in the afternoon I finished the day’s journey by encamping near a good-sized pond. I then went about to collect the usual fuel, but found none, except the dung of the wild horse, and I concluded that the neighborhood was never visited even by yaks. The night was extremely cold, so much so that I could not sleep at all, and the following is an uta that occurred to me in the midst of shivering:

On these high plateaux here no sound is heard

Of man or beast, no crickets sing their tunes,

The moon above, and I, her friend, below.

The following day I made about twelve miles before noon, over a country much the same in topography. Proceeding north-west in the afternoon, I came to the base of a huge mountain of snow, which I could not think of crossing. For a while I went into meditation, and then wended my way in a direction which fortunately proved to be the right one for my purpose, as I found out afterwards. Right in the direction, but all wrong in other respects, as what I have to tell will show.

As I pushed onwards, I soon came upon a region which was quite the opposite of the country I had traversed in its entire absence of water supply; neither a pool nor a brook was to be seen within the eye’s range. I continued my progress until about seven o’clock in the evening—I had walked about twenty-seven miles, all told, that day—but not a drop of water could I find, and I felt as withered up as could be. As for my sheep, there was some green grass growing for them to graze on. I had no tea—in fact could not have any—that evening before I went to sleep. It is wonderful how one gets accustomed even to hardships; I slept well that night.

NEARLY DYING OF THIRST.

Before sunrise the next morning, on resuming my journey, I thought I espied a stream of water coursing through a sandy country at a distance which I judged to be about seven miles in the direction of my progress. Not having had a drop of water, or anything whatever in liquid form, since the afternoon of the previous day, I was of course thirsty; but now I had prospect at least of obtaining some quenching draught, and allaying the thirst with a pinch of hotan, now and then, I made good headway. On reaching the supposed river, what was my disappointment and dismay! Instead of a stream of water, I found there the dry bed of a river, strewn with white pebbles glittering in the sun! Then I could not help imagining myself to be a mere shadow, wandering in mad quest of a soothing draught in the hot region of the nether world, where all water turned into fire when brought to the mouth. Once more I stood me unto my full length, and looked round for water; but none could be seen, nothing but some blades of grass growing here and there to the height of about five or six inches. I could do nothing but endure the thirst, and wend my way on in the direction I had chosen—north-west. After proceeding for some distance, I once more thought that I perceived a body of water in the midst of another desert of sand, but on coming to the spot the glittering specks of sand once more disillusioned me only to intensify my thirst.