| 113. Lama with Shell-Trumpet. |
| 114. Lama with Flute used in Religious Services. Sketches by the Author. |
As in the two preceding years the New Year festival of 1907 was of a more solemn character than usual, and had attracted larger bands of pilgrims, for the Dalai Lama had taken flight when the English advanced to Lhasa, and this cowardly pope dwelt, misunderstood and despised, in Urga in Mongolia, after abandoning his country, where all was in confusion, to the mercy of the invaders. Many a pilgrim, who would otherwise have gone to Lhasa, now resorted to Tashi-lunpo in preference, where the Panchen Rinpoche, the Pope of Chang, had stuck to his post when the country was in danger. The Chinese had posted up a long proclamation at all the street-corners in Lhasa, in which they declared that the Dalai Lama was deposed because he had exposed his people to danger instead of defending them, and appointed the Tashi Lama in his place as the highest administrator of the home affairs of Tibet. True, the mob had torn down this proclamation and trampled it in the dust, and the Tashi Lama had refused his acquiescence, but nevertheless it was still apparent, two and a half years later, that the Tashi Lama enjoyed a far higher reputation than the Dalai Lama. For though the Dalai Lama was supposed to be omnipotent, all-seeing, and omniscient, his troops had been defeated by infidel strangers; although he had promised his warriors invulnerability, they had been shot down like pheasants by the English machine guns; although he had solemnly sworn that no harm could befall Lhasa, the abode of the gods, the enemy had occupied the town, while the invincible one, the almighty, the incarnation of the deity, had taken to headlong flight like the most cowardly of marauders, more cowardly and meaner than the worst mercenary from Kham. The Tibetans may be forgiven for beginning to doubt the infallibility of the Dalai Lama after the butchery at Guru and Tuna, though the priests were ready with plausible explanations of these events.
The Tashi Lama, on the other hand, had stuck to his post, and was the object of the reverence and respect traditionally paid to the chief priests in Tashi-lunpo. He was the highest prelate in Tibet, while the Pope of Lhasa was wandering a homeless fugitive about Mongolia. At the New Year festival of 1907 it was easy to perceive what great prestige and what boundless confidence were attached to the person of the Tashi Lama. The crowds in festive robes who thronged the platforms and balconies were soon to behold with their own eyes the holiest of the holy in Tibet. And the nearer the time approached, the greater became the excitement and expectation. They had been sitting here for hours, for weeks and months they had toiled through desolate mountains, and now——
Suddenly from the uppermost platforms on the roofs ring out deep, long-drawn-out blasts of horns over the country; a couple of monks show themselves against the sky; they blow on singular sea-shells, producing a penetrating sound, which is echoed back in shrill and yet heavy tones from the fissured rocks behind the convent; they summon the Gelugpa, the brotherhood of yellow monks, to the festival. The venerable lamas whose duty it is to attend on me, explain everything to me, but I do not find it easy to follow them, especially as their words are translated to me by a Mohammedan. They say that this first blast gives notice that the monks are drinking tea together. Then a shout of joy bursts forth from the lips of all the assembled multitude, for now the ceremonies begin.
On the right hand, on the other side of the court, a gallery is placed obliquely resting on five pillars, and from it a stone staircase of eleven steps leads down to the court. The gallery is now concealed by heavy black curtains characteristic of all lama monasteries. Invisible choristers, among whom we seem to distinguish voices of men and youths, now intone a mystic chant. It is subdued, deep, and slow; it quavers in religious enthusiasm beneath the dark vaults of the gallery, and seems to proclaim with full conviction:
| “In every land the whole world round This song of praise shall soon resound.” |
The murmuring voices are silent and the chant swells up crescendo and then falls again, and seems to die out in some distant under-world, as though the singers had reached the portals of Nirvana. Enthralling, mystical, full of yearning and hope is this wonderful Losar hymn in Tashi-lunpo. Nothing of the kind I have heard, neither the chanting in the Isaac Cathedral in St. Petersburg, nor in the Uspenski Sobor, the cathedral of Moscow, has made a deeper impression on me; for this chant is grand and powerful, and yet at the same time soothing as a cradle song, intoxicating as wine, and sedative as morphia. I listen to it with a solemn feeling, and miss it when the murmur of voices begins again, drowning the final notes.
| 115, 116, 117. Lamas in Dancing Masks. Sketches by the Author. |
Above this gallery is a second, which is open to the Dojas-chimbo, as the court is called. Only the middle is covered with a curtain of yellow silk with red stripes, and with heavy gold fringes and tassels at the bottom. Behind this curtain the pope takes his place; he is so holy that his whole person may not be exposed to the gaze of the multitude, but a small rectangular opening is made in the curtain that he may be able to watch the proceedings. After an interval, long copper trumpets give forth a new signal; the holy one has left the Labrang, and is on his way to the performance. A procession of high lamas enters the gallery, each bearing some of the robes and pontifical insignia of the Tashi Lama. A low, reverential, and subdued murmur is heard, the multitude rises, on the tip-toe of expectation, all is still as the grave, and all eyes are turned towards the door of the gallery through which the procession enters. He comes, he comes! Then there is a murmur more reverential than before among the crowd, who all rise and remain standing, with their bodies bent and their hands on their knees, inspired with deep devotion at the approach of the Panchen Rinpoche. He walks slowly to his place, sits down with crossed legs on a couple of cushions, and then only his face can be seen through the opening in the silken curtain. Apparently he is rather a young man; on his head he wears a large yellow mitre, which, however, resembles a Roman helmet or a French infantry helmet; his pontifical robe is of yellow silk, and in his hand he holds a rosary. At his right hand sits his younger brother, Kung Gushuk, the Duke, our host, in a dress of red and yellow, and at the right hand of the latter we see three other secular lords in yellow. To the left of the Tashi Lama sits the minister of state, Lobsang Tsundo Gyamtso, a little fat cardinal with a head like a billiard ball, and beside him the tutor of the Tashi Lama, Yonsin Rinpoche, and his deaf and dumb mother Tashi Lamo, a little woman with a shaven head and a red and yellow dress embroidered with gold—I should have taken her for a man if I had not been told who she was. In the semi-darkness behind them is a row of high lamas, all in yellow garments—their ordinary dress is red. It is truly an imposing scene. We seem to have before us the whole conclave of venerable cardinals of Buddhistic catholicism. And this impression is not weakened by the way in which they move and speak. One can imagine how softly they speak to one another in the presence of His Holiness; their movements are dignified and formal, slowly and gracefully they assume the sitting posture of Buddha; their gestures are noble; when they converse, bending slowly towards one another, an air of genuine striking nobility pervades the whole picture without the slightest touch of anything that can be called vulgar.
The crowd has seated itself again, but frequently pilgrims from far-distant lands stand up embued with religious awe, bow, fall on their knees, press their foreheads against the ground, and pay homage to the Grand Lama as to a god. My eyes frequently meet his; apparently he is extremely interested in his guests. Before the commencement of the spectacle he had sent a lama to my garden to present me with a large kadakh, a long narrow piece of fine white silk, as a greeting of welcome and a polite token of esteem. Now several monks came gently behind my chair; a table, or more correctly a stool, was set down, and a whole collection of brass bowls were placed on it, filled to overflowing with the finest mandarin oranges from Sikkim, dried fruits from Nepal, raisins from India, figs from Si-ning-fu, sweetmeats from Bhotan, dried peaches from Baltistan, and Tibetan cakes. And tea-cups of Chinese porcelain were filled again and again with thick buttered tea. They said: “The Panchen Rinpoche begs you to partake of these.” I immediately caught his eye, rose and bowed, and he nodded to me with a friendly smile. All the refreshments left over—and the quantity was not small—were given to my companions.