Wade Davis, ‘INTO THE SILENCE: The Great War, Mallory, and
the Conquest of Everest ‘, 2011:
“…The British climbers admired the Sherpas, but made little
effort to understand their world. Younghusband famously said that there were
hundreds of Tibetans living at the base of Everest who could have reached the
“summit any year they liked. Yet the fact remains they don’t. They have not
even the desire to. They have not spirit.” Beetham believed, too, that there
was something fundamentally missing in the Sherpa character. He stated, “It has
been said that these men could easily reach the top if they themselves really
wished to do so. I do not believe it for one moment … they have acclimatized
bodies but lack the right mentality.”
Norton wrote that the Sherpas were “singularly like a
childish edition of the British soldier. They have the same high spirit for a
tough and dangerous job; the same ready response to quip and jest. As with the
British soldier the rough character often comes out strongest when up against
it in circumstances where the milder man fails.” From Norton this was high
praise. He was not a nuanced man when it came to culture, but he recognized
courage and authenticity when he saw it.
Of all the men, it was the good doctor Hingston who came
closest to sensing something sublime in the Tibetan way of being. Even as Sandy
Irvine and the Sherpas made their way up the corridor of the East Rongbuk for
the final assault, Hingston, back at base camp, had a remarkable encounter. He
recalled in his journal on the evening of May 28:
This morning I explored a narrow gorge in which a hermit had
taken up his abode. I did not approach his cell too closely; but it appeared to
consist of a natural cave partially closed in by a stone wall. He was literally
buried in the mountains, surrounded only by cliffs and stones and a frozen
torrent, which rushed through the gorge. He has been in his cell for three
years and intends to stay there for another two. Once a month food supplies are
sent him from the monastery; but beyond this he never sees a human being. It is
a genuine and I imagine a miserable hermitage in cold and barren mountains at
17,000 feet. Of course he will earn great merit by it and will be considered an
especially saintly lama when he returns to monastic life. No doubt he regards
our attempt to climb Mount Everest in much the same light as we look on his
incarceration. Each to the other must seem futile and ridiculous; yet each in
its own way earns merit, and each is no doubt of equal value, the gain being
purely moral and spiritual and of little, if any, practical use.
…”
Artist: Peter C. Vey. July 2000
