On fine days the wares are spread on the cobbles of the street, and the coloured cloth and china make a pretty show against the background of garden flowers. At the doors of the shops stand pale Nuwaris, whose ancestors from Nepal settled in Lhasa generations ago. They wear a flat brown cap, and a dull russet robe darker than that of the Lamas. The Cashmiri shopkeepers are turbaned, and wear a cloak of butcher's blue. They and the Nuwaris and the Chinese seem to monopolize the trade of the city.
British officers haunt the bazaars searching for curios, but with very little success. Lhasa has no artistic industries; nearly all the knick-knacks come from India and China. Cloisonné ware is rare and expensive, as one has to pay for the 1,800 miles of transport from Peking. Religious objects are not sold. Turquoises are plentiful, but coarse and inferior. Hundreds of paste imitations have been bought. There is a certain sale for amulets, rings, bells, and ornaments for the hair, but these and the brass and copper work can be bought for half the price in the Darjeeling bazaar. The few relics we have found of the West must have histories. In the cathedral there was a bell with the inscription 'Te Deum laudamus,' probably a relic of the Capuchins. In the purlieus of the city we found a bicycle without tyres, and a sausage-machine made in Birmingham.
With the exception of the cathedral, most of the temples and monasteries are on the outskirts of the city. There is a sameness about these places of worship that would make description tedious. Only the Ramo-ché and Moru temples, which are solely devoted to sorcery, are different. Here one sees the other soul-side of the people.
The Ramo-ché is as dark and dingy as a vault. On each side of the doorway are three gigantic tutelary demons. In the vestibule is a collection of bows, arrows, chain-armour, stag-horns, stuffed animals, scrolls, masks, skulls, and all the paraphernalia of devil-worship. On the left is a dark recess where drums are being beaten by an unseen choir.
A Lama stands, chalice in hand, before a deep aperture cut in the wall like a buttery hatch, and illumined by dim, flickering candles, which reveal a malignant female fiend. As a second priest pours holy water into a chalice, the Lama raises it solemnly again and again, muttering spells to propitiate the fury.