BRITISH MISSIONS TO BHUTAN
with respect to the views and interests of the Raja of Bhutan, by whose concurrence alone the proposed commercial intercourse with Tibet can be made to flourish. I should be sorry to suggest a doubt of its ever receiving a check from any conduct in that Government of a hostile tendency.”
There can be no doubt in the mind of any reader of the accounts of Bogle’s and Turner’s Missions that both these officers were well received and treated, and that the general disposition of the Bhutan Government towards the Company was cordial and friendly, and Turner’s confidence that the Bhutan Government meant to fulfil its engagements was not a foolishly misplaced one at the time, as Eden would seem to imply. Hastings actually succeeded in establishing Purangir Gosain as a diplomatic agent at the Tibetan Court, and Indian merchants had commenced by the year 1786 to pass freely through Bhutan into Tibet. Thus so far it must be acknowledged that Bogle’s Mission was successful, and that the Bhutan Government did fulfil its engagements. Unfortunately the Nepal war with Tibet, which broke out in 1792, destroyed all these bright prospects. The Tibetans and the Chinese Government suspected that we were covertly assisting the Nepalese. We lost their confidence, and the Tibetan passes were closed to natives of India, most probably through Chinese influence. Thus the chief object of Bogle’s negotiation was defeated, while so far as the further development of trade with Bhutan itself was concerned, what had been gained was lost by the series of frontier disputes which took place between the Company and the Bhutan Government, and the consequent rupture of the friendly feeling between the two Governments which had been established by Bogle’s and Turner’s Missions.
The chief object of the fifth Mission, under Pemberton, was to enable the Government to enter into direct communication with the Bhutan Durbar, as it had become evident that the frontier officers of Bhutan had
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