An Embassy to the Court of the Teshoo Lama in Tibet - Prajna Quest

;200 TIBET.great influence among the herdsmen.The musk deer too, which producea valuable article of revenue, are in great abundance in the vicinityof these mountains. This animal is observed to delight in the mostintense cold, and is always found in places bordering on snow. Twolong curved tusks, proceeding from the upper jaw, and directed downwards,seem intended principally to serve him for the purpose of diggingroots, which are said to be his usual food; yet it is possible theymay also be weapons of offence. Mr. Hastings had once in his possessiona beautiful deer, of a different species, but armed with teeth ofthe same construction and position, with which he wounded everyother kind of deer in the same inclosure with him;rising on his hindlegs, and striking downwards.He was smaller than a common goat,vet had scored deep gashes in the tough skin of a Ghouz, which is thelargest species of stag known in India.I had a great desire to send specimens of these animals into Bengalbut I was discouraged by the reports I heard, that numerous attemptshad been already made in Tibet, to convey them alive to Mr. Hastings,one of which only had succeeded, I was moreover assured, that, whenseparated from its own climate, and its native wilds, the life of themusk deer was always of short duration, and that itwas, in fact, incapableof being domesticated ; or else its odour, for which it is nowpersecuted, might probably be obtained, like that of the civet, withoutthe destruction of itslife.They are about the height of a moderately sized hog, which theyresemble much, in the figure of the body ; but they are still morelike the bog deer, so termed in Bengal, from the same similitude.