The Lamaseries and the Lamas, as well as the land and property belonging to them, are absolutely free from all taxes and dues. Each Lama and novice is supported for life, and receives an allowance of tsamba, bricks of tea, and salt. The Lamas are recruited from all ranks. Honest folks, murderers, thieves, swindlers—all are eagerly welcomed in joining the brotherhood. One or two male members of each family in Tibet take monastic orders, and thus the monks obtain a powerful influence over each house or tent-hold. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that in Tibet half the members of the male population are Lamas.
In each monastery are found Lamas, Chibbis,[7] and a lower grade of ignorant and depraved Lamas—slaves, as it were, of the higher Lamas. The latter dress, and have clean-shaven heads like their superiors. They do all the handiwork of the monastery; but they are mere servants, and take no direct, active part in the politics of the Lama Government. The Chibbis are novices. They enter the Lamasery when young, and remain students for many years. They are constantly under the teaching and supervision of the older ones. Confession is practised, from inferior to superior. After undergoing successfully several examinations, a Chibbi becomes a Lama, which word translated means "high-priest." These Chibbis take minor parts in the strange religious ceremonies in which the Lamas, disguised in skins and ghastly masks, sing and dance with extraordinary contortions to the accompaniment of weird music of bells, horns, flutes, cymbals, and drums.
Each large monastery has at its head a Grand Lama, not to be confounded with the Dalai Lama of Lhassa, who is believed, or rather supposed, to have an immortal soul transmigrating from one body into another.
The Lamas eat, drink, and sleep together in the monastery, with the exception of the Grand Lama, who has a room to himself. For one "moon" in every twelve they observe a strict seclusion, which they devote to praying. During that time they are not allowed to speak. They fast for twenty-four hours at a time, with only water and butter-tea, eating on fast-days only sufficient food to remain alive, and depriving themselves of everything else, including snuff and spitting—the two most common habits among Tibetan men.
The Lamas have great pretensions to infallibility, and on account of this they claim, and obtain, the veneration of the people, by whom they are supported, fed, and clothed. I found the Lamas, as a rule, intelligent, but inhuman, even barbarously cruel and dishonorable. This was not my own experience alone. I heard the same from the overridden natives, who wished for nothing better than a chance to shake off their yoke.
Availing themselves of the absolute ignorance in which they succeed in keeping the people, the Lamas practise to a great extent strange arts, by which they profess to cure illnesses, discover murders and thefts, stop rivers from flowing, and bring storms about at a moment's notice. Certain ceremonies, they say, drive away the evil spirits that cause disease. The Lamas are adepts at hypnotic experiments, by which means they contrive to let the subjects under their influence see many things which are not there in reality. To this power are due the frequent reports of apparitions of Buddha, seen generally by single individuals, and the visions of demons, the accounts of which terrify the simple-minded natives. Rather than get more closely acquainted with these evil spirits the ignorant pay the monastery whatever little cash they may possess.
Mesmerism plays an important part in the weird Lama dances, which show the strangest kind of movements and attitudes. The dancer finally falls into a cataleptic state, and remains rigid, as if dead, for a long time.
The larger Lamaseries support one or more Lama sculptors, who travel to the most inaccessible spots in the district, in order to carve on cliffs, rocks, stones, or on pieces of horn, the everlasting inscription, "Omne mani padme hun," which one sees all over the country.
Weird and picturesque places, such as the highest points on mountain passes, gigantic bowlders, rocks near the sources of rivers, or any spot where a mani wall exists, are the places most generally selected by these artists upon which to engrave the magic words alluding to the reincarnation of Buddha from a lotus flower.
The prayer-wheels, those mechanical contrivances by which the Tibetans pray to their god by means of water, wind, and hand power, are also manufactured by Lama artists. The larger ones, moved by water, are constructed by the side of, or over, a stream. The huge cylinders on which the entire Tibetan prayer-book is inscribed are revolved by the flowing water. The prayers moved by wind-power are merely long strips of cloth on which prayers are often printed. As long as there is motion there is prayer, say the Tibetans, so these strips of cloth are left to flap in the wind. The small prayer-wheels, revolved by hand, are of two different kinds, and are made either of silver or copper. Those for home use are cylinders about six inches high. Inside these revolve on pivots the rolls of prayers which, by means of a projecting knob above the machine, the worshipper sets in motion. The prayers can be seen revolving inside through a square opening in the cylinder. The prayer-wheel in every-day use in Tibet is usually constructed of copper, sometimes of brass, and frequently entirely, or partly, of silver. The cylinder has two movable lids, between which the prayer-roll fits tightly. A handle with an iron rod is passed through the centre of the cylinder and roll, and is kept in its place by means of a knob. A ring, encircling the cylinder, is attached to a short hanging chain and weight. This, when started by a jerk of the hand, gives the wheel a rotatory movement, which must, according to rule, be from left to right. The words "Omne mani padme hun," or simply "Mani, mani," are repeated while the wheel is in motion.