In 1774 a deputation was sent to carry back an answer to the Lama, and to offer him suitable presents. It was [[372]]furnished also with a variety of articles of English manufacture, to be produced as specimens of the trade in which the subjects of the Lama might be invited to participate. The result was, that in 1779, when the Lama visited the Emperor of China at Pekin, desirous of improving his connexion with the Government of Bengal, he desired the British envoy to go round by sea to Canton, promising to join him at the capital. The Emperor’s promise was at the same time obtained to permit the first openings of an intercourse between that country and Bengal, through the intermediate channel furnished by the Lama.
The death of both the Lama and the envoy, however, which happened nearly at the same time, destroyed the plans thus formed.
Soon after the receipt of the letters announcing the Lama’s death, intelligence arrived of his reappearance in Thibet! His soul, according to the doctrines of their faith, had passed into and animated the body of an infant, who, on the discovery of his identity by such testimony as their religion prescribes, was proclaimed by the same title as his predecessor.
Warren Hastings then proposed a second deputation to Thibet, and Captain Turner was accordingly nominated on the 9th January, 1783.
His mention of the sculptured stones and inscription is as follows:—
“Another sort of monument is a long wall, on both faces of which near the top are inserted large tablets with the words ‘Oom maunee paimee oom’ carved in relief. This is the sacred sentence repeated upon the rosaries of the Lamas, and in general use in Tibet. Of the form of words to which ideas of peculiar sanctity are annexed by [[373]]the inhabitants, I could never obtain a satisfactory explanation. It is frequently engraven on the rocks in large and deep characters, and sometimes I have seen it on the sides of hills; the letters, which are formed by means of stones fixed in the earth, are of so vast a magnitude as to be visible at a very considerable distance.”
M. Hue’s account of an explanation of the formula, which he received from the highest authority at Lassa, is as follows:—“Living beings are divided into six classes—angels, demons, men, quadrupeds, birds, and reptiles. These six classes of beings correspond to the syllables of the formula, ‘Om mani padmè houm.’ Living beings by continual transformations, and according to their merit or demerit, pass about in these six classes until they have attained the apex of perfection, when they are absorbed and lost in the grand essence of Buddha. Living beings have, according to the class to which they belong, particular means of sanctifying themselves, of rising to a superior class, of obtaining perfection, and of arriving in process of time at the period of their absorption. Men who repeat very frequently and devotedly ‘Om mani padmè houm,’ escape falling after death into the six classes of animate creatures, corresponding to the six syllables of the formula, and obtain the plenitude of being, by their absorption into the eternal and universal soul of Buddha.”
One traveller only I have been able to find who mentions the sentence as I have done. M. Jacquemont writes, in his “Letters from Cashmere and Thibet,” in 1830:—“I am returned from afar; I have often been very cold; I have had a hundred and eighteen very bad dinners: but I think myself amply recompensed for these trans-Himalayan miseries by the interesting observations and vast collections [[374]]which I have been able to make in a country perfectly new. The Tartars are a very good sort of people. It is true that to please them I made myself a little heathen after their fashion, and joined without scruple in the national chorus, ‘Houm mâni pani houm.’ ”
Judging by the system of spelling he has adopted in other instances in his letters, this would be nearly—as regards the two main words—the same pronunciation as I have given. He however, in another part, follows it still more closely, and at the same time shows that he is aware of a translation which, although probably the true one, has no connexion whatever with the words as he himself actually represents them.
He says—“In Thibet they sing a good deal also—that is, one or two inhabitants per square league—but only a single song of three words—‘Oum mani pani;’ which means, in the learned language, ‘Oh, diamond water-lily!’ and leads the singers direct into Buddha’s paradise.