The Ta Lama, as a final effort, begged me to stay here for a day; and, last of all, as he was shaking hands with me—a ceremony which lasted a quarter of an hour—entreated me not to enter Lhasa city. I told him that I had the highest admiration for his eloquence and power of persuasion, and would have great satisfaction in telling the Dalai Lama that he really had done his utmost to delay us. I, of course, realized the position in which he stood, and that it was his business by every means in his power to prevent us reaching Lhasa. At the same time, I was sure, I said, that a man of his sense knew in the bottom of his heart that the Tibetans were extremely fortunate in having been able to secure our peaceful entry to Lhasa, and prevented the capture of the city by force of arms. We had promised not to occupy Lhasa if we were not further opposed, and with that promise they must be content.
The Ta Lama, though excessively urgent towards the close of the interview, was perfectly polite throughout. But so extraordinarily impracticable are these Tibetans that he evidently thought that, because I had assured him at previous interviews that we wished to make a friendly settlement, we were therefore committing a sort of breach of faith in now advancing to Lhasa. I had never ceased to assure him that we did intend to advance, but now that we actually were advancing he regarded it as a grievance.
For the next two days we marched steadily on towards Lhasa, expecting at each corner we turned to catch sight of the Potala in the distance, or at least to hear from the reconnoitring parties of mounted infantry that they had seen its gilded roofs. On August 2, at our last camp, a dozen miles only from Lhasa, which now really could be seen in the distance, I received the final deputation, which had come to make the last great effort to induce us to stop. It consisted of the old Ta Lama, the General who had met Mr. White and me at Khamba Jong, and had since been promoted to the post of Councillor, and known as the Tsarong Sha-pé, the Chinese official deputed by the Resident, the Abbot in private attendance on the Dalai Lama, a Secretary of Council, and the Abbots of the three great Lhasa monasteries. They repeated the usual requests that we should not go to Lhasa. I reiterated my usual statements that we must go there. They said that if we would remain where we were they would supply us with everything—of course, on payment. The Dalai Lama’s private Abbot made a special appeal on behalf of the religion of Tibet. I told him I was particularly interested in hearing his views on religion, but I trusted he would not object to my reminding him that, while he was an eminent authority on religion, he had little experience of politics. In political life, when a country repudiated a treaty, declined to negotiate a new one, and attacked the Envoy who was sent for that purpose, it was considered that that country had committed three very serious offences, any one of which would be justification for the capture of the capital of the offending country. In the present case, out of consideration for the special sanctity of the city, we were prepared, if we encountered no opposition, to abstain from capturing Lhasa, and I trusted the Abbot would appreciate the consideration. Perhaps if he had himself been fired on continually for two months he would not have been equally moderate. The Abbot laughed, but remarked that they also had had to suffer.