BRITISH MISSIONS TO BHUTAN
with the Tongsa Penlop, and the Dharma and Deb Rajas and councillors were mere puppets in his hands. Finally the old Penlop and his adopted son, the young Penlop, became quite friendly, and after the Mission had been sixteen days at Paro without any communication having been received from the Deb Raja the old Penlop advised Eden to proceed, gave him guides, and promised to arrange to send on his letters.
At the next stage more messengers arrived from the Durbar, and the same efforts were made as before to induce the Mission to return, with the same result. At Simtoka the Mission found the ex-Deb in retirement. He declined to receive a visit from Chebu Lama, on the grounds that any member of the Mission holding any communication with him might excite the suspicion of the Durbar against it, which was considerate of him. After crossing the Dokyong-la Pass (10,019 feet) the Poonakha Valley came in view, and on March 15 the Mission reached Poonakha. There the party were met by a messenger to say that they must not approach by the road which passed under the palace gates, and they were sent to their camping-ground by a route so precipitous that they had great difficulty in making the descent. The subsequent ill-treatment of the Mission, and how Eden was forced under compulsion to sign an agreement to surrender the Assam Duars, how the Mission narrowly escaped from worse treatment by forced night-marches from Poonakha to Paro, were reported confidentially to Government, and the details are not supplied in his general report. They are to be found in Rennie’s “History of the Bhutan War.” The opposition to the Mission was entirely directed by the then Tongsa Penlop, father of Sir Ugyen, who was no doubt actuated by his desire to get back the Assam Duars, which were part of his chiefship, and the annexation of which had affected his personal interests even more closely than those of the Durbar. Judging by subsequent events, it would have been wiser, no doubt, for Eden to have returned to Darjeeling instead of pushing
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