ADVENTURES OF GILBERT GO-AHEAD (from Robert Merry's Museum, July 1853, pp. 22-28)
We remained a short time only at the city of Giga-Gounggar, for we were both anxious to get to Lassa. We took our departure on two small horses or ponies, and advanced at the rate of about twenty miles a day. The roads were bad, and we were obliged to ford nearly all the rivers, for the want of bridges. The country through which we travelled presented a number of villages, though in some cases half the dwellings were mere tents of coarse cloth.
On the second day we came to the famous Lake Palte, which is about thirty miles in diameter. It consists of a ring of water with an island in the center about four miles across. There is a celebrated Thibetian temple on this island; my friend, Butter Pate, had a desire to go there, but after some deliberation he gave up the idea, and we proceeded on our course. He described the lake and the island, which he had often visited, as exceedingly beautiful. The latter is considered a place almost sacred on account of a prevailing legend, half civil and half religious, which my companion related to me, as follows:--
"You must know that while other nations came from various inferior sources--some from weed, some from fish, some from rats, and some from ants, the Thibetians claim descent from a more honorable source, viz: from the apes. These creatures, as any one can see, are much superior to all other brutes, having hands, and sometimes walking erect like men. It required only a single step in advance and man was created.
"Now you must also know, that in ages gone by--about 460,000 million of years ago--the whole earth was peopled only by races of vermin, fishes, insects, birds, and quadrupeds. The monkeys were the master race, and of these the apes were the most civilized and enlightened. Everywhere they were the ruling people. The kings and queens and nobles of the earth were all apes: their subjects were only monkeys.
"But Thibet was more happy than any other country--for here there was a sublime race, exalted by nature above all others. They were apes, indeed, but they had no tails--a sufficient evidence of their superiority to all other tribes. Then arose the fathers and founders of our religion and our government. Such a mark of the favor of Heaven toward our country, from the beginning, is one for which the Thibetians can never be too grateful. Happy are we to know that this preference has been continued to the present day. The lineaments of our sublime parentage, the primeval apes, are still visible in the countenances of the priesthood, and, indeed, of all the upper classes of Thibet; and let me say, in passing, that what thus marks us as the favorites of
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Heaven in our very countenances, is carried out and illustrated in our religious and civil state. Here in Thibet is the city of Lassa--the holy of holies--the center of light--the dwelling place of Godama! Here in Thibet is the temple of Pootala; here is the Grand Lama--God's representative on earth--whose presence is more effulgent than the sunrise, whose breath is more balmy than the dew of evening, and whose soul is more glorious than the sky of summer. Such is the beginning, the head of our religion: and see the benefits our system confers on society! Our country is governed by two powers, the state, and the church. In them lie the intelligence, the virtue, the wisdom of the whole community. These two powers engross all the wealth of the land. They are the masters; all the rest are servants. Thus we have realized a perfection of aristocracy more completely than any other country. By a perfect union of the civil and ecclesiastical power, we have attained the height of human government and human civilization. The free, the gifted, the privileged--those who began without tails--by the rights of nature, by the dispensations of providence, by the profound and holy dictates of Buddhism, these few govern the many."
"And how do you manage it?" said I.
"By keeping the masses poor and ignorant," was the reply. "We, the priesthood, take education exclusively into our own hands, and so we teach these underlings just what we have a mind to; we do not allow them to think for themselves; we instruct them in obedience to authority; we train them to habits of devotion to Buddhism; we make them believe that the Lama and his priests have power over men here in life, and after death. We tell them that hell is a mighty cavern, filled with horrors, such as scorching fires, venomous serpents, horrid monsters, and agonising diseases, all of which are at our command. We bring up the lower classes to live in fear of us; because we make them believe that if they do not serve us, if they do not follow our instructions, we shall set upon their souls, after death, all the unspeakable punishments of hell."
"And thus," said I, "you rule the people."
"That is not all," said my friend; "Besides the terrors of eternity, we are obliged to adopt a sharp system of police, to keep the multitude in order. Men cannot be governed merely by fears of the future; the wholesome influence of present discipline and punishment is necessary. There is no perfect government but by the co-operation of the civil with the priestly power. Authority has its beginning in religion; it is the church that lies at the bottom of all right and all policy in government. But the church always finds it convenient and necessary to bring to its aid the sword of civil authority. Thus by severe punishments, by whippings, by tortures, by imprisonment, and by executions, inflicted by the police, added to the threats of future misery, we have
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attained the perfection of government to which I have alluded."
"I understand it all," said I; "but you were going to tell me the legend of the Island of Palte."
"Yes; and I beg your pardon for this digression. Well, in a very remote age, the borders of Lake Palte were settled by a numerous tribe of monkeys. The land was fertile, and the climate delightful, so that monkeys were attracted from all the country round about, and hence this region became crowded with inhabitants.
"Now, up to this time, every monkey in the neighborhood had been born with a tail; to be without, was considered as much a deformity and a misfortune, as it is now among men to be without a nose. But at length a rumor was circulated that on the island of Palte, there was a family of monkeys who were all tailless. This created a great sensation, and indeed no small degree of disgust--for the very idea was shocking to the ignorant and degraded people of the border.
"It must be understood that at this time the art of navigation had not been invented, and consequently, to cross the water of the lake, five miles in width, to the island in the center, was too great an undertaking to be thought of. But strange to say, one fair summer morning, a long black thing like a log, was seen to leave the island, and gliding on the surface of the lake, came steadily toward the shore. At last it struck against the land--after which two beings dressed in furs came forth, and walked upon the land! The monkeys all fled at first, but soon they came forward timidly, one by one, peeping and skulking about. After a little time, however, the two strange beings were surrounded by thousands of the monkey inhabitants of the shore. Some of the head men of the latter approached the strangers, and the following dialogue ensued:
"Head Monkey. Who are you? what do you come here for?
"Islander. We are your brethren; but we have been favored by heaven with wonderful revelations. We have come to impart them to you.
"Head Monkey. And what are these wonderful revelations?
"Islander. We bring you the art of sailing upon the waters; you see we have come in a canoe from our home in yonder island.
"Head Monkey. And what else can you show us?
"Islander. We can draw the Spirit of Life from inanimate matter; see here--and saying this, the stranger rubbed two sticks together and a flame leaped forth and devoured the grass and leaves around. The monkeys shrunk back in terror.
"Head Monkey. And what else can you do?
"Islander. We can teach you to cut down trees and build houses, and other useful articles--and saying this, the stranger cut down a tree with an axe which he held in his hand and began to build a house.
"Head Monkey. But if I judge rightly, you have no tails.
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"Islander. It is true we have none, but,--"
["]The speaker was not permitted to go on, for immediately there was a great agitation among the vast crowd of monkeys. Some began to scream and hiss, and some jumped up and down and foamed at the mouth. Some ran to the trees and swung back and forth by their tails, uttering hideous cries. Others rushed upon the strangers with sticks and stones, and the latter, to save their lives, took to their canoe, and gliding over the water reached their island in safety.
"But that was not the end. The rude monkeys, who were mere imitators, set to work to find sharp stones, so as to cut down trees: but they only cut their fingers and legs off. They tried to make canoes, by which hundreds of them got drowned. Then they rubbed sticks together and produced fire, but one autumn night, during a high wind, the flame seized upon the forest, and the wide settlement of monkeys along the border of the lake was consumed and exterminated.
"After many years, a new tribe arrived and peopled the border of the lake. The islanders came and attempted to teach them, but they too were vain, conceited, and arrogant, and were destroyed, like their predecessors.
"At last the islanders who had become numerous, settled along the shore. They were all apes without tails, and these became the founders of our religion. After a time monkeys came and settled among them, and thus our nation was begun. In after times, when apes and monkeys became men, some of them went to the island of Palte, and found the grave of the first pair of apes. Over this spot they erected a temple, which is now one of the most famous in Thibet."
"It is a very droll story, but of course it is a mere fiction," said I.
"Not at all," said Butter Pate, "or if it be a fiction, it is adopted by the priesthood, and therefore all the common people are bound to believe it."
"What is sanctioned by the Grand Lama and his followers, I suppose, though at the outset it be a lie, becomes as good as gospel, for the multitude."
"Certainly, what we have sanctified is henceforth holy, at least for the vulgar, the common people."
"And has your legend of the apes of Lake Palte any particular meaning?"
"Yes, and it is this: as the divine Buddha made a distinction in the four-handed family, elevating a few to the dignity of apes, while the great mass were left in the condition of mere monkeys, so he has made a distinction among men. The higher class comprise the lamas, or priests, and the civil rulers. These are designed always to have dominion over the lower and more degraded mob. Hence you will see, wherever Buddhism prevails, that the government and the priesthood, acting together, rule the masses, and make them their servants and slaves. The things of this world were made for priests and magistrates, and for those whom they favor: inferior things were made for the rabble. Thus gold and
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jewels, and precious stones, are all to be found in the palaces of princes, and the temples of the priesthood: rulers and lamas have splendid dwellings, and live on the first-fruits of the field and the flock. The common people dwell in huts of rude stone, or in tents; their dress consists of rough cloth or the untanned skins of wild beasts: their food is only that which the upper class has rejected."
"And this you call the perfection of society?"
"Certainly; and do you not agree with me?"
"It is very different from what prevails in my country."
"No doubt, for you are heathen: but tell me how it is in your country."
"We regard all men as equal in the sight of God; and entitled to the same rights, and under the same laws."
"Do you consider a common man equal to a priest?"
"Certainly; in the eye of the law, and in the sight of God."
"Have you no privileged classes?"
"None."
"How then are the rabble kept in order?"
"We have no rabble."
"You must excuse me for doubting what seems so absurd."
"I will explain. You start with a principle that there is and must be an upper and a lower class. What you thus avow as a principle, you do all in your power to bring about in fact. You keep wealth and knowledge in the hands of the few; your very doctrine is that the many were made to be slaves of the few, and in order to keep them in a state of degradation and servitude, your laws, your religion, all your policy, and all your proceedings, tend to keep from them the free light of truth and knowledge. You enslave their minds first, and their bodies afterward. You begin your work in childhood; you do not help the mind to become strong, and go forth in its vigor, to reap the glorious harvest of life; you teach the mind a routine of hollow ceremonies, and false legends; you train it up to a servile and base worship of hideous images; you inculcate slavish obedience to the priesthood; and the child thus abused, and cheated, and blinded, grows up a man, only to be your dupe and your tool.
"Our system is the reverse of all this. The fundamental principle of our religion is that all have equal rights, and this is the corner stone of our political institutions. Being equal in rights, we seek equality in education, instruction, and intelligence. We have schools where all can be instructed. Each man is there permitted to choose his profession; to go forth and seek happiness in his own way. Such is the operation of this system that we have no rabble. All, or nearly all, can read and write. All, or nearly all, are acquainted with Geography and History, so far as to be able to form just opinions, and to choose and pursue a safe path in life. There you will see, that while you govern by authority, by fear, by tyranny, over the body and mind, withering, degrading,
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and stultifying both, we give instruction and liberty to all; and thus strengthen, elevate, and bless society at large."
"This is sheer boasting."
"Let me prove that I am right. Look around you, here in Thibet! What is the state of your country? Why nine-tenths of the soil is a mere desert, and has been so for ages. You have no great cities, and you have few arts. Your roads are miserable, and your bridges are contemptible. All but a few thousand of your people live in wretched tents, or mere sheds built of rough stone. Half the people of Thibet are dressed in the raw hides of beasts. The greater part of your entire nation are but little above the brutes. You even, you, a priest, are so degraded to deem it an honor to your nation and yourself to have descended from apes, the most filthy and disgusting of brutes! And how is it in my country? Why, every farmer has a house, which would be, here, deemed almost a palace. All the children of our schools are taught more than your Grand Lama and all his priesthood ever knew. Your nation in Thibet has no importance. Your people do not increase; knowledge has no progress, art no development. You have not a newspaper or an almanac in all Thibet. And this is what you call the perfection of life! This is the state of things, begotten, and perpetuated, and perfected by your system of Buddhism--of giving all power to the few--of giving control of men's minds and consciences to the priesthood."
"My friend Go-ahead, I really pity you. You are stark mad. You have a high fever, and talk nothing but nonsense."
"Nay, I was never more sober."
"Then you are a most wicked and profane man. What, decry the priesthood!--speak contemptuously of the Grand Lama! This is sheer infidelity, and if you are not discreet, you will be seized and proscribed as a heretic. I counsel you to keep your mad and impious notions to yourself, till you are out of Thibet."
"I pray you not to be uneasy on my account, good Butter Pate; you have promised to introduce me to the Grand Lama, and I know what belongs to good manners and discretion well enough to keep out of mischief. I have not come to Thibet to teach or preach religion. This is not my vocation. I am, however, no more an infidel than yourself. I reverence true religion, and I respect its honest and faithful minsters. I believe that religion believed, preached, and wrought into the hearts of men, by a devoted ministry, is essential to national peace and prosperity, as well as to individual happiness here and hereafter. But it is a true, not a false, religion that I believe thus essential. It is an honest, not a trickish, priesthood that I mean. It is religion and a priesthood that unite to give the mind of man light, liberty, and knowledge, as assistants and helpers in his redemption--that alone commands my respect; all others I deem false, and fatal to human happiness. But, see, what object is that
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which shines so far away to the east, in yonder plain?"
"That," said the priest after gazing intently for a minute, "that is the glorious temple of Pootala; and yonder to the left is Lassa." Saying this, he descended from his pony, and prostrated himself on his face, towards the holy city. He mumbled a number of prayers, and performed various ceremonies with his hands in the air, frequently touching his face and breast. He then remounted and we proceeded with a quick pace. At the end of four hours, we began to enter the city. The description of it must be reserved for another chapter.
S. G. G.
[To be continued.]
ADVENTURES OF GILBERT GO-AHEAD (from Robert Merry's Museum, August 1853, pp. 53-59)
The city of Lassa, which we were now approaching, being the seat of the Grand Lama, is the holy city of the Buddhists. It is what Rome is to the Catholics, and Mecca to the Mahomedans. I was quite prepared, therefore, as we descended into the plain on which the city stands, to see my friend Butter Pate in a state of great excitement. He made motion with his hand, like crossing himself, frequently raised his arms to the skies, and got off his pony and kissed the earth at every half mile of our journey.
At length his religious ecstasies seemed to be passed, and he then directed my attention to what he deemed the splendid aspect of the place. Com-
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pared with the rest of Thibet, Lassa is really a handsome town. It stands in a fertile valley, surrounded with mountains, on a small river called Galdajo, which is a branch of the Sanpoo. It has no defensive walls, and it looks all the better as you approach it, for you see the houses, streets, towers, and bazaars, which really produce an agreeable effect upon the beholder. The place is not large, there being less than 30,000 inhabitants, but the state or culture around it, the good roads and bridges, as you approach it, and the sumptuous character of the edifices, give it that aspect of wealth, power, and art, which characterize a capital.
As we entered the place, and passed along the streets, I observed that the houses were built of brown stone, generally two stories high, with roofs of various shapes, some round like cupola; and some like square and some like octagonal pyramids. A few appeared very much in the style of the fanciful pavilions, with bending roofs, which we see pictured on old-fashioned chinaware. The principal streets were paved with stone, with narrow sidewalks. I observed several temples, with tall pointed turrets and canopies, which had a very gaudy appearance.
Lassa is not only the seat of the Buddhist religion, but it has considerable trade in silk, goats' hair, woolen cloths, velvets, linens, prints, silver, gold dust, and precious stones. There are extensive markets, where the goods are exposed for sale on mats. Here are public officers called inspectors, who fix the prices of each article, and from these there is no deviation. I here saw merchants from Nepaul, Hindostan, Bootan, Bokhara, and China. These, with their various costumes, their camels loaded and harnessed for travel, or lying down in groups, and munching their fodder in the streets; their various countenances, varying from jet black to orange yellow; all combined to render the scene one of the most curious and striking I have ever seen. Everything around told me that I was in a fair of a strange country.
We passed directly through the city, which spreads out to a considerable extent, and proceeded at once to the great temple of Pootala, which lies in a north-westerly direction from the town. In rising a little eminence in our way, I caught a view of this famous edifice, as celebrated among the Buddhists, as is the church of St. Peter's at Rome among the Catholics. It really presents a most strange and gorgeous aspect. It consists of a central structure of great elevation, surrounded by many smaller edifices, built on to it, so as to appear like one building. As the sun was setting, the golden canopies and turrets of various forms and sizes presented a general blaze of splendor. Butter Pate evidently enjoyed my surprise and admiration.
"What do you think of the descendants of the apes now?" said he triumphantly.
"I am very hungry, my friend," said I. "After dinner I can give a better opinion."
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"Well," said the priest, "our journey is near its end. We have but two miles to go--for the temple of Pootala is my house, and it shall be yours. But look around--is not this a glorious scene?"
The hill on which we were at the moment, gave us a commanding view of the valley in which Lassa is situated, and I must confess the view is one of the fairest in the world. This plain is same fifty miles in diameter, and is watered by various streams, and encircled by mountains, the tops of one group rising to the clouds, and covered with everlasting snow. It was now late in the autumn, but grapes in abundance swung from the vines, pears and plums were in the gardens and orchards, and numerous fields, spreading down the hillsides to the plains, showed the deep yellow tint of wheat and barley-stubble grounds, from which the recent harvest had been reaped.
When we had come within about half a mile of the Grand Temple of Pootala, I began to be more and more aware of its enormous elevation and its vast extent. The central edifice rose, from a broad base of other edifices, in seven distinct stories, and appeared to me to is at least four hundred feet in height. Around it, in the plain, I saw many other temples, many of them very considerable in size, but appearing insignificant, in contrast with the principal building.
When at last we approached this, the air seemed suddenly filled with a murmur, as if it had been thronged with a swarm of bumble-bees. This grew louder at every step, and soon I could distinguish the booming of gongs, the jingle of pans and triangles, the banging of drum, the groaning of horns, with the loud chanting of human voices. As we turned the corner of the great avenue, we came upon a procession, consisting of at least two thousand priests, having very much the appearance of a Catholic ceremonial. The music indeed was loud, harsh and barbarous, but the banners lifted in the air, the images of enormous candles, carried by boys, and the huge mantles worn by the high dignitaries, all contributed to give the grotesque spectacle at once an imposing resemblance to what I had witnessed in Catholic countries.
As the procession passed, I could hardly repress my desire to burst into an incessant laugh, for the leading idea of every person seemed to be, to make the utmost noise in his power. Among the instruments, were hautboys, cymbals, and trumpets, which, with the gongs, horns, pans, and other sonorous instruments, were all made to produce their utmost clangor. The fellows who worked the wind instruments, blew till they looked as if about to die of apoplexy, and the singing priests outroared all the bulls of Bashan. Never in my life have I heard such stentorian voices.
Everything around the great temple, bespoke the religious character of the place. The people all seemed to be lamas or monks. The general dress was that of a woolen vest, with red sleeves. Over the shoulders was a large
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mantle. The waist and hips were covered by a short petticoat, and the legs by huge boots, either of cloth or sheep-skins, with the wool inside. The greater part of the priests had a well-fed, coarse, jolly look. Their black tartar eyes stood out with fatness, and a deep cherry color glowed in the cheeks, even through the swarthy skin that covered them. Most of them had a dirty appearance, and I judged as I passed close to one of them, that a sweet breath and a clean person were not deemed essential parts of the Buddhist faith or practice.
Following my companion now amid the throng of people, and the wilderness of turnings among the buildings, I came at last to a small court, which we entered by a low archway. Here we were met by a servant who took a flag that hung at the door, and shook it over us as a charm. We then entered, and winding through staircases, and entries, and corridors, till I was as giddy as a windmill, we came at last to a cell, into which we were admitted by a priest. He soon recognized Butter Pate, and after mutually shaking a flag over each other's heads, they began to talk in a very free and friendly style. Two servant-priests were now required to bring us food, and we soon sat down on the floor to our meal.
The Buddhist Church denies marriage to the priests, and the higher clergy pretend to live on vegetables, and a low diet. But in Thibet animal flesh is abundant, and vegetables comparatively scarce, so that meats are allowed to the people as well as the priests. We had, on the present occasion, roast kid, and a horse-steak, with a vile tea-porridge made of tea leaves, mixed with flour, butter, salt and some detestable drug. I had often seen this dish before, and could never abide it. The horse-meat so relished by those Tartars I avoided with loathing. I, therefore, stuck to the kid chop, and such was my appetite that our host was obliged to replenish his dish three times. Water was for drink, and then mares' milk; but, as I did not seem entirely satisfied, Butter Pate asked our landlord if he had no wine. The latter immediately produced a large skin sack, and poured out about a pint of the contents for each. A painted wheel was then given to each of us, and having each whirled it round on its axis three hundred and thirty-three times--which was considered equal to saying three hundred and thirty-three prayers--we gazing all the time at the wheel, we were considered to have obtained the necessary indulgence, and so we quaffed the liquor, sour as it was, in a very merry and hearty fashion.
I liked my first introduction to the great temple very well. I had no difficulty in discovering that Butter Pale was in point of fact a pretty fair type of the priests in general. He was a good tempered easy man, cunning by habit, cheating by privilege, and making dupes of the rest of the world, as if they were only made for his benefit. He believed about five per cent. of his religion--the rest was trick, artifice and fortune, used
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to gull the people, and make them his servants and slaves. There was, however, nothing malignant in his temper. The masses were so ignorant, so enslaved by habit, as to submit to their degradation and servitude, without doubt or question. Gratified in his voluptuous wants and wishes, the world rolled on easily and cheerily with the Reverend Father Butter Pate, as it did, indeed, with the whole brotherhood at Pootala.
I have not time or space to give a detailed account of all that I saw and experienced at their wonderful place. I must, therefore, hurry on with my account.
It is well known that Thibet is now a mere province of China, it being called in the language of that country, Si-Tsang. Little Thibet and Ladak are included with it in the China maps, but are not regarded as a part of it by Europeans.
In remote ages, Thibet was an independent country, inhabited by a race called Sanmiao. They were a rude people, living on their flocks, and cultivating a little of the land. The Chinese called their country, Keang, or land of demons. The Thibetians themselves, however, believed that their Adam and Eve were two handsome apes, and hence denominated their country the Ape Land. Even now, the people boast of their monkey lineage.
After thousands of years of war with the Chinese, the Thibetians became subject to the latter, about the 12th century. The Buddhist religion was originated in Northern Hindostan by Sakya, often called Godama, about the year 1000 B.C. He wrote certain religious books, which are the basis of Buddhism, to this day. In subsequent ages, his doctrines were spread by missionaries over all the surrounding countries. It took root in Thibet, am well as elsewhere. When the famous Zinghis Khan conquered a great part of the Asiatic World, he sent an ambassador to the head priest or Lama, in Thibet, and made a sort of treaty with him. From this beginning, the Grand Lama of Thibet gradually grew in spiritual authority, and this being favored by the Chinese government, which urged him to establish its authority over Thibet, Tartary, and China itself, the people of whom had become imbued with Buddhism, he was raised at last, in the superstitious minds of the people, to be God himself, or at least, to be God's agent, with full power on earth.
The Chinese took the civil government of Thibet into their own hands, and they keep some soldiers in Lassa and other principal towns. But they leave the whole business of religion to the Grand Lama and his priests. Every district has its bishop, and every bishop his inferior clergy. As the people implicitly believe their religion, and that what the priests tell them is true and right, they submit in all things to their will. They, the priesthood, have had no difficulty in keeping the whole wealth of the country in their hands. The temples are exceedingly numerous, and are, in fact, the palaces of the priests, who live very luxurious lives, fattening
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and flourishing on the servile labor of their dupes.
The people of Thibet are, therefore, divided into two classes- -the upper class, or nobility, are the clergy--the lower class, or vulgar, are the laity. Marriage is considered a degrading and low business, for the priests do not practise it: it is, therefore, left to the lower class. Such is the state of a country where ignorant priests have unbounded sway, and where the people submit without doubt or question to their instructions and guidance.
The lamas or monks are of various degrees of rank and authority, as in the Catholic Church. The Dalai Lama, is the supreme head, but at Teshoo Lomboo, a few miles to the east of Lassa, there is another lama of high rank, and second only to the supreme Pontiff of Pootala. There are, also, ten other dignified lamas, called Kootocktoos, in different parts of the Chinese empire.
When I had been a few days at Pootala, and had recovered from the fatigue of my journey, I went with my friend Butter Pate, over the greater part of the great palace Temple. I found it to be of incredible extent, there being at least five thousand apartments for the monks and priests, and the establishment of the Great Lama. The number of monks who are sent out here, together with those who are continually coming from all parts of India, China, Tartary, and even more remote countries, either for study in the various theological schools, or on pilgrimages, is enormous. I should think fifteen thousand persons were always in the great Temple and the four celebrated monasteries, or seminaries, in the immediate vicinity. Few thousand are always connected with these four schools.
Many of the apartments in the great palace are exceedingly gorgeous, and several of the pinnacles on the roof are sheeted either with gold or silver. There are numerous libraries, the Thibetians having a literature, in which writing is like the Hebrew, from right to left. Their books are all devoted to religion and the abstract philosophy connected with it. The leading doctrine is that of transmigration of souls, which means that the people believe they have lived as insects, birds, quadrudes, or other creatures, in a former state. The great effort of religion is not to live pure lives, but to sink all existence in meditation. To be absorbed into Buddha or God, as a drop of water is lost in the ocean, seems to be the highest object of the devout. The priests occupy the common people with charms, miracles, and pompous processions, but teach them no morality. As to the priests themselves, some are studious, devout and sincere, but in such cases, their devotion only leads them into mystic labyrinths of speculation, or, perhaps, the silent and barren seclusion of the cloister. No stronger contrast between their religion and ours can be given, than that, with us, it leads to truth, charity, tenderness, pity, justice,--to good works before God and man; while here, it leads to falsehood, cunning, trick, artifice, and that subtle robbery
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by which one set of men steal from others, under religious pretenses, their property, their liberty of thought, and their independence of nature.
What else could we expect? Our religion teaches us, that for every thought, word, and deed, we must account to a holy God; in all our conduct, we stand under his eye and in his presence. We can go to no broker and settle for our sins. How elevating is such a consciousness! But in Thibet the people are taught to settle their religious accounts with the priests; to pay for their sins by turning painted wheels; by the use of images, and amulets, and charms; by pilgrimages to certain religious shrines, by gifts to the priests, and by donations to the holy places. How degrading to the mind and morals, is such a system of imposition!
S. G. G.
[To be continued.]
ADVENTURES OF GILBERT GO-AHEAD (from Robert Merry's Museum, September 1853, pp. 86-92)
The longer I remained in Thibet, the more deeply did I become interested in the people and their strange institutions. The very obscurity or their religious notions excited me to a more thorough examination of them.
I found Lassa to be a more populous town than I at first supposed; and I discovered, after a time, that it was entirely enclosed by a wall, entered by five gates, each of which is fortified. There are in the city a printing-office, a hospital for the small-pox, and other institutions. There are also a great number of convents, and indeed all over the country they are very numerous. It is said there are no less than three thousand in Thibet.
It appears that the idea of my friend Butter Pate, that the Thibetians are descended from monkeys, is really the belief of the country; and indeed the people are proud of this descent. They are taught by the learned that at first the country was peopled by animals and demons. After a certain time, God lent to Thibet the King of the monkeys, who led there the life of a hermit; all his time was taken up in religious devotion; his great desire being to pray and think himself into nonentity, which is the highest aim of the Buddhist faith. There he would sit, on a stone in his cave, for twenty-four hours together, snoozing away, and scarcely daring to wink, lest he should wake from his stupor, and break the tranquility of his dream, which seemed to border upon the hoped-for-nothingness.
Just as he was on the point of being snuffed out like a candle, there appeared before him a female maqua or demon. What she was like the books do not tell us, but I suspect she was a sort of spirit-rapper. At any rate, she woke up the King monkey, and made herself look very lovely, and then proposed to marry him.
"Oh, but I can't do that!" said he.
"Why not?" cried she.
"Why, I never thought of such a thing!"
"But you can think of it now."
"Nay; all my time is taken up with my religious duties!"
"Duties, indeed! What good does it do any body for you to sit there all day and all night, and snooze away your existence, as if you were a lump of dirt?"
"Why, I hope soon to be absorbed!"
"What good will that do?"
"I shall get rid of existence."
"Oh, bah! it will be much better to live with me!"
Saying this, the beautiful demon smiled and the monkey smiled too; and so they were united, and became the Adam and Eve of the Thibetian race.
Now, this seems very absurd to us, but the Buddhists believe that mankind have all existed in a previous state, in the form of various animals. By this legend they claim to have had a
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monkey, the most cunning of beasts, for their common parent; and hence this story is readily believed by them, and at the same time it is the foundation of a national pride, inasmuch as it assigns to hem so sagacious a progenitor.
The Buddhists are divided into a great many sects, but they all hold to the doctrine of transmigration of souls, and all conceive that the great end and aim of a religious life, is to get rid of individual existence, and to be absorbed into and become a part of the deity. They conceive that originally God existed in a state of perfect calm, and nothing existed but him. But after millions of ages passed away, he exerted his will, and the four elements, fire, air, earth, and water, were produced. In process of time, animals, and at last men, were created. All this Creation was only an afflux from the deity, and finally all will be again absorbed by him, and then he will relapse into his original state of blissful stupor and repose.
These theologians, it would seem, believe that God made a blunder in thus creating matters and things in general; that in fact he is convinced of it, and that he desires to get back to the original state as quick as possible. For this reason, he commands good men not only to put themselves out of existence, but to persuade other people to do the same. Whether the priests are forbidden to marry for this same general reason, I am not informed.
When I had been about three weeks at Pootala, I reminded Butter Pate of his promise to introduce me to the Grand Lama, and expressed a desire to have this fulfilled. He replied that he was ready to do as he said, but it was necessary for me to be prepared to make the Sublime Pontiff a handsome present. I asked my friend what I had better give him. He replied that the richer the present, the richer would be the blessing bestowed upon me. I inquired if five dollars would do.
"Not for a man who has two hundred and fifty dollars sewed up ill his belt," was the reply.
"But the Sublime Lama don't know anything about that."
"He knows everything."
"Indeed! I thought he spent all his time in a calm, dosing indifference to this world, and all its interests."
"Do not judge him by yourself; he is like a sponge which sucks in water through a thousand pores; he drinks in knowledge from the air, and nothing escapes him."
"Really, I did not know that; I will present him with ten dollars then."
"Twenty would be more suitable to your character as a stranger, and the first representative of your country that has appeared at Pootala."
"No, no; that's too much, I will give ten; if that won't do, I'll go home without seeing his holiness at all."
"Well; ten will do, but you know that you must give the same sum to the under lamas."
"Indeed! is that the rule?"
"Certainly."
"And who are the under lamas?"
"They are holy men who are ap-
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proaching the state of beatific absorption into the divine essence."
"Well, what do they want money for, if they are so near being snuffed out?"
Butter Pate here gave me a cunning leer, as much as to say, "It don't do to examine these matters too closely. The best way is to pay your money, and ask no questions."
I took the hint, and counted five dollars into Butter Pate's hand. "There," said I, "is one half for the under lamas, the other five dollars I shall present to his sublime Excellency himself. When will you present me?"
"To-morrow there are a hundred and fifty pilgrims from Ceylon, Java, Burmah, Anam, Cochin China, Japan, Corea, and Kamschatka, to be presented, and you can go in with them."
To this I agreed. The next day, at twelve o'clock, we all mounted to the great temple, by an immense number of steps. The edifice itself is situated on a lofty hill, or mountain, and when I had reached the upper stories, the view presented to us was in the highest degree imposing. The town of Lassa, situated in the midst of the valley, from this point, seemed a splendid city of lofty houses, on account of its temple-palaces in the suburbs. On the brows of the mountains in the distance, a great many convents are visible, some of them of a grand appearance. The country itself was marked with natural fertility and artificial wealth. Several national roads could be traced for many leagues, some of them leading to towns or villages of considerable size. The atmosphere was so clear that we could distinguish remote objects, thus placing the prominent features of the valley, as if on a map, before our eyes.
After attaining the fifth story of this edifice, we entered into an immense hall, and here I expected to find the object of our visit; but I soon perceived this to be only an ante-room. On one side, there was a small low archway, and here two or three at a time of the company were allowed to enter. After two hours, I was admitted into the apartment. It was about twenty feet square, but so dark, that at first I could see nothing. After straining my eyes, I began to see, high up on a sort of shelf, a dim outline of a figure, squatting upon its haunches. Gazing at it intensely, I saw that it was a small, shrunken man, dressed in a this mantle, and wearing on his head a cloth, having something the form of a turban. His skin had the color and texture of a seared leaf, and his expression was that of a person stupefied with some narcotic drug. This was the Grand Lama.
I entered at the same time with a priest from Ceylon. He brought rich offerings of cinnamon, diamonds, and gold dust, and laid them at the feet of the pontiff. He bowed reverently, and kept his eyes bent upon the floor. His holiness did not deign even to wink. The priest remained absorbed at his feet for half an hour. Then, not daring to look up, he retired. It was now my turn.
I must confess that there was something in the scene that rather damped my spirits. It is true, that I never saw
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a more withered, snuffy, insignificant little personage, than that now before me. The room in which he sat was paltry, and all around had an aspect of meanness. But the awe which he inspired, and a recollection of it--the profound reverence in which he was held by 400 millions of mankind, for a moment imposed upon my imagination; but it was but for a moment.
Imitating, in some measure, the Ceylonese priest, I approached the throne or shelf of his holiness, and bowed low. I then looked up, and waited for his reverence to speak: but he said nothing.
"How do you do, sir?" said I.
There was no answer. "I hope your excellency is well today," I added. There was not a word. The great Lama did not move a lip nor an eye-lid. He was as still and stiff as if he had been mesmerized. I laid five dollars at his feet. I perceived a dim twinkle in one corner of his left eye, but it instantly vanished, and I could get no more out of him. So, after a few minutes, I wished his worship good-day, and departed. As I left the room I saw Butter Pate standing in the shadow of the doorway, and perceived that he had witnessed my proceedings. He looked at me inquisitively, as much as to say, "well--is not he sublime?" I rolled up my eyes, and went my way.
"So," I said to myself when I was alone, "this is the Grand Lama--the head of the Buddhist faith--the living Gadama--God on earth! It is he in whose footpath the flowers spring up; he whose breath is like a divine odor, converting hundreds of deserts into blooming and fruitful plains; he who can bring living waters from the barren rock; he, the paring of whose toe-nails can save the body from pestilence and the soul from perdition! Such, at least, is the faith of millions of deluded men." Oh! how shocking to me appeared this monstrous delusion, and how base and detestable the priests and other cunning men, who contribute to keep up the imposition!
It was some days before I recovered my equanimity; I was, indeed, disgusted with the whole system of things, which, it was evident, was founded not only in falsehood but in fraud. It appeared to me perfectly evident that the lamas, or gylongs, or priests, are nearly all of them a set of hypocrites, who understand perfectly well that their whole religious system is a fiction, and that the Grand Lama himself is a humbug. A few of them, certainly, are sincere, but by far the greater part, familiar with the cheats and juggles put upon their deluded followers, have a real contempt for mankind, using their religion and its various arts only as means of making tools of their fellow men.
I did not think it worth while to tell all my feelings to Butter Pate: he, however, easily guessed them. He was, in fact, neither surprised nor offended that I despised the profession to which he was devoted, and I became satisfied that he had pretty much the same opinion of it as myself.
I now began to think of quitting Thibet, for I saw no advantage in stay-
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ing here any longer. But what course was I now to adopt? Here I was, in the very centre of Asia, and take which way I would, it was a long road; however, while I was deliberating upon this subject, my plans were determined by a very unexpected event.
I must premise, that before I left Connecticut, I had joined a Total Abstinence Society, and during all my wanderings, I had stuck to my principles. It is owing to this fact, that I had been able to pass through so many trials and vicissitudes with a good constitution, and without getting into any fatal difficulties. If my wandering and unsettled turn of mind had led me through a long series of adventures--and misadventures--if, indeed, according to the proverb, I had been a rolling stone and gathered no moss--still, I was alive and well, and had yet a chance of doing something in the world. I looked upon myself, in regard to drink, as good as insured; but, alas! it turned out that my strength was not so great as I imagined.
About four days after my visit to the Grand Lama, I was invited by a little fat lama, about four feet high, and as yellow as a carrot, to sup with him. I had made his acquaintance through Butter Pate, who represented him as an excellent fellow, and I had certainly found him an amusing companion. I accepted his invitation, and at the time appointed I went to his cell. I found here no less than eleven lamas--five of whom I knew to be regarded as holy men, for they sat all day in different niches of the chief temple, seeming to be lost in a divine stupor. The pilgrims, on their way to the Grand Lama, were accustomed to make them handsome presents, on account of the fame of their sanctity. I had before found out that after dark, when the temples were vacated, they were accustomed to descend and stretch their legs, benumbed by being coiled up under them all day. I had suspected, also that they took ample compensation for their privations, by good suppers, and now and then a glass of spirits.
We had a luxurious meal, according to Thibetian ideas, among which horseflesh was the chief luxury. There was plenty of arrack, a kind of fiery whiskey, made of rice, and the lamas drank pretty freely; though, always saying a prayer between each swallow. They soon became merry, and most of them begin to sing and dance. The five holy men were among the gayest of the party. Now, I must confess that I had a sort of malicious pleasure in seeing these sanctimonious hypocrites in this condition and I longed to get them tipsy. To encourage them, I drank also, and was soon as bad as any of them. We kept up till daylight, when it was time for the five priests to go to their squatting places. They were very drunk, and reeled hither and thither, as they went forth, to their several chapels. They made a good deal of noise, but it was very early in the morning, and there chanced to be nobody in the way, to notice their strange conduct.
They all contrived to mount upon their platform, and by the time the
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pilgrims began to gather in for their devotions, they seemed to have resumed their wonted state of tranquil beatitude. But just as a company of priests from southern Hindoostan came in, and stood before them in mute reverie, all the five priests began to make up mouths, writhe upon their seats, and make all sorts of absurd growling noises, like so many bears. The pilgrims fled in dismay, and immediately a cry ran from chapel to chapel, that sorcery had invaded the holy place; and that five gylongs of extraordinary sanctity had become bewitched.
The news spread over the vast temple of Pootala in a few minutes; from thence it was communicated to the other monasteries, and in an hour all the great avenues and squares and halls of the temple were filled with excited people, lamas, and Chinese soldiers. I was quite sober by this time, and was among the crowd, greatly amused by the scene. At last, I heard twenty voices cry out at once, "There he is; seize him!" At the same time, I saw them point at me. I soon learned that I was regarded as the sorcerer, and immediately saw the danger I was in, if the excited mass were to get me in their power.
Plunging into the thick of the crowd, I pushed my way to a small square, and threading several familiar passages, I soon reached my lodgings. I locked myself in; but in a few minutes I heard Butter Pate thumping and calling at the door. I let him in, and asked him what was to be done. "Follow me!" said he, quite out of breath; at the same time he pushed back a secret spring in the wall, and a door flew open. We entered, and sped along a dark passage, till we came to a flight of stairs. We groped our way up them, which I perceived to be rough, and hewn out of the solid wall. We continued to ramble along through a great number of courts, corridors, and passages, some lighted by openings in the ground above, and some as dark as night.
At the end of an hour, we emerged into the vault of a small stone temple. We ascended to the ground-floor, carefully looking around, to see if any person was there. We found no one, and accordingly walked forth. I now discovered that we had ascended to the very top of the mountain, which rises several thousand feet behind the temple of Pootala, and this we had achieved by an underground passage, wrought in the rock. On both sides of us, to the right and left, the rocky terraces of the mountains are occupied by monasteries, of which we could count more than a hundred, encircling the valley beneath.
We had now time to breathe. After a while I said to my friend, "Well, you have saved me from being torn to pieces, but what shall I do now?"
"You see yonder plain," said he, pointing to the north, "and beyond, a range of mountains, lying along the verge of the horizon like a cloud?"
"I do," said I.
"Well, that plain is the northern part of Thibet, and the masses beyond are the Kien-lun mountains. There lies your road."
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"But suppose I choose to go the other way?"
"You will lose your liberty--perhaps your life."
"You are jesting, friend Butter Pate!"
"Not at all."
"But really, I had nothing to do with all this rumpus; I am no sorcerer."
"But you was at the supper, and the five holy lamas who got tipsy must have an excuse, and so they will say it was sorcery, and they will lay it all to you. If you once get into the hands of the Grand Lama, you will be fried like a saddle of mutton, or drowned in a lake of pitch, or smothered in the raw hides of buffaloes, or dragged to death at the heels of 'a Yak!'"
"What a delightful prospect! And you really think I must go?"
"There is no other way, if you would save your life."
"But, my dear friend Butter Pate, how can you part with me?"
"You can soften our passing by a present."
"Of how much?"
"I leave it to your generosity."
"You have saved my life--I owe you all I have--here is my purse, take what you will."
"I will take twenty dollars, you will need the rest."
Accordingly the lama counted out twenty dollars, and then, having given me various directions and instructions, we parted. I was forced to confess that in spite of his duplicity and meanness, Butter Pate had treated me with kindness. His tax upon my purse had been light, considering that I was completely in his power, and that he might easily have taken the whole. "After all," said I to myself, "the conscience of man sees a just God in the heavens, however the craft of lamas and gylongs may obscure the horizon with the deeds of darkness and error. These poor pagans of Thibet, without the light of Gospel, have many amiable traits of character, and their crimes and vices are not worse than those which are common in lands blessed with the Bible, and all the institutions of a true and pure religion. Let me not be too severe upon them, then. As God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, so he adapts his dispensations to the circumstances of his children, of whatever name or faith they may be."
S. G. G.
[To be continued.]
ADVENTURES OF GILBERT GO-AHEAD (from Robert Merry's Museum, October 1853, pp. 117-120)
It will be readily conceived that having worn out my welcome at Lassa, my situation was very embarrassing. Which way should I steer--north, south, east, or west? That was the question.
It was now November, and though in the valley of Lassa it was still mild and pleasant weather, I knew that in the higher table lands around, the air was already spiced with the keen winds of winter. I was inclined, therefore, to turn to the south and enter Hindostan, as I knew I should there find a warm and pleasant climate. But between me and that country lay the terrible barriers of the Himalaya Mountains--which, at this season, I knew to be impassable in the direction I must take. I should have been glad to have entered China, and worked my way to the sea, but this lay to the east, and, in order to get there, I must pass through Thibet, which I deemed impossible now that the government at the capital had become irritated against me.
I saw no other way, therefore, than to proceed westward and take my chance of what might happen. It was better to be at liberty, even in the wilds of Tartary, then imprisoned, or perhaps beheaded, in Thibet. My resolution was, therefore, soon taken. After a few hours' thought and preparation, and still having about two hundred dollars in my pocket--for I had scarcely dipped into my purse at Lassa--I set forth, taking the direction of what is called Little Thibet.
As I trudged along on foot, I revolved all sorts of schemes in my head, as to what I should do. Of course, one of my chief objects was to travel. To go ahead was as much a necessity for me as for water to run down hill: but, after all, I liked to do something as I went along. It was very pleasant to see different countries, and study geography a-foot, and learn manners and customs by one's own observation and experience: it was pleasant enough to have an adventure now and then--but yet it seemed that it was time for me to be looking out for solid advantages, which might serve me when I should return home and settle down at Sandy Plains.
In short--thriftless as people may think me--I assert it as a fact, that I have never entirely lost sight of the main chance. To make my fortune has been always my main object. In this I set out, and for this I have kept a-going. And even now, in Central Asia, cut off by distance and the obstacles of nature from the whole civilized world, and from all its thoroughfares and pathways, I did not wholly give up the ship. My first object was to secure the means of living; these I had, for a time at least, sewed into the waistband of my pantaloons. If this money should get exhausted, I thought of exhibiting myself as the TALL MAN, for, being six feet two inches high, I was a perfect prodigy among these Thibetians. If that should not do, why I could try something else.
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But then, as to making money, getting a ship-load of gold, or my pockets full of diamonds, what chance was there of these things in going to Little Thibet, or Great Tartary! Why, to say the truth, just none at all. The best I could hope was to go there, and then to go away again; and I was to do this in the winter season.
It was a chill prospect before me, but I pulled my goat-skin cap sharp over my brow, set it due west, and went ahead. For several days I proceeded over undulating grounds, gradually rising into the higher table lands of Central Asia. The weather grew colder at every step. The drought was very severe, and the ground was like powder. Every particle of moisture seemed to be taken out of the earth by the cold blasts that swept, day and night, over the land, bearing along thick clouds of dust with them.
The effects of this intense drought were very remarkable. The rocks along the shaggy sides of the mountain were split into fragments, and, as they fell, seemed dissolved into dust. The leaves of the trees could be ground to powder between the fingers. As I traveled along, I found that the timbers of the houses were also split, and the inhabitants were obliged, often, to cover them with wet cloths, or throw buckets of water upon them, to preserve them. In these regions timber never rots: the flesh of sheep and goats, exposed to the air, becomes so dry that it may be ground like wheat, into a sort of meat bread--like the beef-biscuit made in Texas. This is frequently practised; travelers are generally supplied with it, and, is point of fact, I found it convenient to take it along with me in my journey. Indeed, flesh-bread is common all over Thibet, and especially in the higher portions where the drought is more general.
For ten days I pursued my march alone, though I met numerous shepherds and some villagers on the way. I had become so tanned as to have a Tartar complexion, and my goat-skin coat and cap, with a pretty good stock of Tartar phrases, enabled me to pass as a native of the country. When the people rolled up their eyes at my altitude, I suggested that a man born in the Himalaya mountains might be expected to be a little taller than the inhabitants of the flat country, twenty thousand feet below. Thus I passed along, without suspicion or hindrance.
At last I fell in with a company of merchants, returning from a trading expedition to Tchintoo, in China. They were about sixty in number, and mostly from Little Buchara and the vicinity. I concluded to join them, and as all came mounted on horses, I bought a tough, small horse for eleven dollars, and proceeded with them. There is little snow in these regions, even during winter, but as it was now nearly December, there was a good deal of driving hail and sleet. These, urged by the swift, keen wind, were often very severe. We, however, advanced rapidly--at least fifty miles a day. We soon reached the Kien-lun mountains, which proved a
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formidable barrier. These are 16,000 feet high, and the tops are covered with perpetual ice. At this time, the whole range, down to the valleys, was wrapped in snow. We, however, passed them in the space of four days, and now entered upon the great desert of Central Asia. This bears the general name of Cobi, or Gobi, and extends in several patches, intersected by fertile spots, at least 1200 miles. Its width varies from 200 to 600 miles.
We were now in the southern edge of Chinese Tartary, or Turkestan. Our design was to pass through the towns of Khoten and Yarkhand, into Little Bucharia. Our general course, therefore, was across the desert, to the north-west. The extent of the desert here, in the direction in which we were to cross it, was about three hundred miles. It appears at a distance, like a sea of sand, presenting an even, level line along the horizon, but, in passing over it, I found it to consist of a slightly undulating surface of hard, dry, sterile earth. Here and there we met with patches of thistle, and other prickly plants; and at long intervals we found wells where we watered our beasts. The weather was not cold, but the wind swept with a constant blast across the plains, occasionally raising clouds of dust and obliging us to stop and turn our backs, or even to dismount, and lie flat on the ground, till the gust had exhausted itself.
There was a sort of road, dimly traced by the hoofs of the animals, which had often traveled the route, which directed our course. On the third day after entering upon the desert, we overtook a caravan, comprising about a hundred dromedaries and some twenty horses. The persons in this company were mostly traders, who had been to Hindostan. Several of them were great travelers, and one of them had visited Constantinople and St. Petersburg. I learned from these persons that the whole central portion of Asia, almost unknown and unheard of in our country, is the theatre of a very extensive trade, in which the camels and dromedaries are used for transportation, especially across the deserts. Hence the camel is called the "ship of the desert."
The people with whom I was travelling were all Tartars, but of a great variety of tribes. The inhabitants of Central Asia are broken up, like our American Indians, into numerous families. These differ in some respects, but there is, nevertheless, a general resemblance. They have a skin of the color of a seared leaf, with black hair and black eyes. The latter are small, and have a dip downward toward the nose. Those in our company were mostly Mahometans.
The journey was very tedious, and occupied fifteen days. At the end, our horses were completely worn out. The dromedaries looked very thin, and had a sad, woe-begone look, but this is their ordinary condition and aspect. In fact, I know of nothing that looks more melancholy and despairing than the whole camel tribe. Their form, their gait, their countenance, seem to say that
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the camel is born unto toil, privation, and hard work, from the beginning to the end. I had supposed the creature gentle, patient, and resigned, but he is, on the contrary, snappish, quarrelsome, and discontented--and requires the utmost care, patience, and encouragement on the part of his driver. If not petted, and favored, and encouraged, he gives himself up to the sulks, or perhaps to despair, in which case he lies down in the desert, and after the vultures and ravens have taken his flesh, his bones remain as a tombstone, till they are buried and forgotten in the sand.
At last we arrived at Khotan, which I found to be a considerable town, encircled by a mud wall, some ten feet high. This is, however, only a pretence; for as a matter of military defence, it is easily broken down, and in many places, it is in a complete state of decay. Here, as I learned, there is a Chinese governor and a garrison, but I did not see them, as my stay was short. Khotan has a considerable manufactory of silks, leather, paper, &c. It is noted as a market for musk, and also for a kind of jasper, which is here called yu. The inhabitants are of the tribe known as Usbecks, and are deemed a very handsome race by the people in this quarter. For my part, I was constantly reminded by them of our American Indians, from their copper complexion, their smooth skin, their small, black, piercing eyes, and their straight, coarse black hair.
Having remained at Khotan two days, I proceeded with some dozen of our party, on the route toward Yarkand, which lies some two hundred and fifty miles northwest of Khotan. The country improved as we advanced, and as we approached Yarkand, the territory appeared to be covered with villages. The suburbs of the city indeed extend for some miles around and outside the walls. These consist of a high rampart of earth, and are strengthened by two citadels, one in, and one without the town. The garrison consists of about seven thousand Chinese soldiers. They are recruited from boys of fifteen or sixteen years old, who serve some fifteen years, and are then dismissed.
I found Yarkand to be quite an interesting place, but I must reserve farther particulars for another chapter.
S. G. G.
ADVENTURES OF GILBERT GO-AHEAD (from Robert Merry's Museum, November 1853, pp. 149-150)
Tt had been my intention to visit what is called Little Thibet, but I found it lay far to the south and out of my way, for I had now determined to steer nearly west, and return home by way of Persia and Turkey. How little we know beforehand what may happen to us will be displayed in the sequel.
I believe I have said that a strict watch is kept all along the Chinese frontier, to see that nobody comes in or goes out, unless it may be certain persons licensed for these purposes. Now I had no license, and as it was my desire to pass from Little Bucharia, one of the Chinese provinces, into the territory of Great Bucharia, which is a Tartar principality, I was somewhat puzzled to know what to do. At last I went to see Muz Fuz, an Armenian merchant, with whom I had crossed the desert of Gobi, and asked his advice. Mr. Fuz was a man of middle height, but of great breadth, his body being rather flat and shingly; his hair black as a cone; he had black eyes, and a close, solid-looking black beard. Altogether he was what may be called a handsome man, though as to that, I never saw but two or three handsome men in my life. What the girls call 'a pretty young man," generally reminds me of a smooth mould candle, and what older women call "ducks," and "dears," and so on, as I have generally found them silly and conceited, so they appear to me like monkeys smiling at their own beauty in a looking-glass. After all, it is well enough for a woman to be handsome, but for a man, it is of no sort of consequence, beyond having an agreeable and respectable look.
I found Muz Fuz at breakfast, and though he professed to be a Christian, he was sitting on a cushion, his legs under him, like any Turk. Some unleavened cakes and a dish of pomegranates seemed to constitute his frugal meal. He made the Moslem sign of welcome, bowing and putting his hands to his forehead, as I entered. He asked me also to join him in his repast.
You seldom offend a man by sharing his meal. So I sat down, and was helped to what the table offered. After a few moments Fuz looked keenly through his shaggy eyebrows at me, as much as to say,
"Well, sir, what is your will?"
I answered immediately.
"I want to get a pass into the Khanship of Bucharia."
"Are you a licensed merchant?" said he.
"No," was my reply.
"Are you a privileged lama, as Kootooktoo, or gylong?"
"Not a bit of it."
"You are forbidden to pass the frontier, then?"
"And therefore must pay."
"Exactly."
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"How much?"
"Fourteen dollars."
"Agreed--there is the money!"
"And there is the pass!"
So Muz Fuz handed me a greasy piece of silk paper, dabbed with three or four Arabian characters. I thanked him, shook his hand, and was about to depart.
"Stay," says Fuzzy--"are you a Christian?"
"Yes."
"Well, then, I must be frank with thee. That is a pass into Great Bucharia: thou wilt need a pass out of China!"
"Well done! If I go into Great Bucharia, of course I can't stay in China."
"I see--you are a philosopher, not a merchant. In philosophy, going into Bucharia means quitting the Celestial Empire. In trade, they are two distinct things, and cost fourteen dollars each."
"Well, friend Muz Fuz, you ought to have been born in Connecticut. I really feel as if you were a relative--a cousin, at least. If you will change that tall dogskin cap for a hat, cut off your beard, and go with me, I warrant you a handsome fortune in the clock line."
"Speak not lightly of my beard, for it is my glory. I would part with it, perhaps, for a hundred carats in diamonds of the first water, for it would grow again. But we lose time. Do you wish the pass?"
"Is there no help for it?"
"None."
"Come, be reasonable, take half price!"
"I can not abate a farthing. Do you know that I risk my neck in these transactions?"
"Why, are these papers forgeries?"
"Undoubtedly."
"And you have the face to charge fourteen dollars apiece! And you confess them to be forgeries? In our country, a man who does such things should have a face of brass."
"Do as you please."
"Is there no other way?"
"Why have you come to me?"
"I was advised to do so."
"Well, you have come. What cause is it of yours, if these papers be false, provided they answer your purpose?"
"Will they answer my purpose?"
"Yes; if you are discreet."
"What does being discreet mean?"
"Giving the officers two dollars each at the frontiers."
"In addition to the fourteen?"
"Certainly, and for this reason. The passes are false; and to prevent the officers from discovering it, blind their eyes with silver, though gold is better!"
"O, friend Fuzzy; give us your hand; you are a wise man. Adieu!"
"Not so fast. Stay a moment. One thing must be remembered. You pronounce the name of the country you are about to visit, Bucharia. This is offensive. The true title of the country is Bokhara, meaning the Treasury of Sciences. Beware; remember the adage that the 'tongue has the color of a man's soul.' Farewell."
And so we parted.
S. G. G.
[To be continued.]
ADVENTURES OF GILBERT GO-AHEAD (from Robert Merry's Museum, December 1853, pp. 179-183)
I passed the frontier without difficulty, taking care to follow the directions of the Armenian, as to blinding the view of the officers with a few pieces of silver. They glanced their little, black oblique eyes at the passes, and I thought they knew well enough that they were fictitious. Indeed I was told that the fraud was understood by the government and the officers, and that both shared in the profits of this system of counterfeit and plunder.
Four days' travel brought me to Samarcand, one of the most celebrated places in Tartary. It is situated on the little river Logd, and contains about ten thousand inhabitants. The outer wall is rather a series of defences, now completely decayed: it encloses a space thirty miles in circumference. The inner wall is of earth, and is much smaller, enclosing only the present city. Between the two, however, are gardens, parks, fields, and extensive suburbs.
The place has all the marks of ancient grandeur and present decay. Gardens and cultivated fields now cover the sites formerly occupied by edifices of stone and marble. The two hundred mosques, some of white marble, which three or four hundred years ago, adorned the city, are mostly in ruins. Of the forty ancient colleges, only three remain fully organized. The buildings of two of them are still handsome, one being ornamented with bronze and enamelled bricks, and the other noted for the elegance of its architectural proportions. The tomb of the famous Temour, the Tartar, or Tamerlane, or Timour Bic, (for he had as many names as a counterfeiter,) is still in good formation, and is admired for its superb dome, the walls of which are richly decorated with jasper and agate.
Samarcand, though it has sunk into an inferior town, was the capital of the Magderan empire, in the most splendid period of its history. Here, too, rest the ashes of the renowned Temedum, as well as those of his family. It is therefore a kind of holy city, a Mecca, or a Jerusalem, with the Usbekians. A king of Tartary who has not included Samarcand in his dominions, is not regarded as a true or legitimate sovereign.
Before I began to travel in Central Asia, I had heard very little of the Tartars, except as a barbarous race, who resembled in personal appearance our American Indians. This resemblance is indeed very striking, but I found Tartary to be much more populous and farther advanced in civilization, than I supposed. This part of it, in which I now was, seemed indeed not only to be a fine country naturally, but the people were actually much farther from the savage state than I expected.
I began to be greatly interested in the history of the country, for it seems that the principal nations of the earth originated in these high central plains of Asia, and here, too, some of the most
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famous conquerors of the world began and ended their career. Zingis Khan, the first of their restless chiefs, originated near lake Baikal. He belonged to a small tribe called Mongols, which signifies brave and forward. The people in these regions are divided into small tribes, some forty of which were united in warlike enterprises by Zingis's father, but at his death, two-thirds of them refused to obey his son, who then bore the name of Temugin. He was only twelve years old, but he fought them, conquered them, and reduced them to obedience. This exploit gained him fame, respect, and influence, but he was afterwards obliged to seek assistance from the great khan of the empire, who was under obligations to his father. The khan, in gratitude to his father, and esteem for Zingis, then called Temugin, reinstated him in his paternal dominions, and gave him his daughter in marriage.
Temugin had been educated with the greatest attention, and the care of his childhood was confided to a very able minister. He was well versed in all the exercises which belong to a Tartar education. He could shoot his arrow or strike his lance with unerring aim, either when advancing or retreating,--in full career or at rest. He could endure hunger, thirst, fatigue, cold, and pain. He managed his fierce and heavy war-horse, or his light and impetuous course; with such consummate skill, by word, or look, or touch, that man and beast seemed but one animal, swayed by one common will.
Having gained some military success for his father-in-law, his high favor at the court excited jealousies both in his family and in the empire. He had further rendered himself unpopular by inducing the khan to assume more authority than the subject princes could willingly accede to. The princes therefore rose against the khan, and defeated him in battle; but his son-in-law replaced him on the throne, by winning for him a brilliant victory. This victory was tarnished, however, by cruelty; for Temugin scalded seventy of his enemies to death, by flinging them alive into seventy caldrons of boiling water.
Envy and revenge did not cease their machinations, but at last means were found to render his father-in-law jealous of so famous a son. Temugin, after exhausting every conciliatory method, thought himself obliged to build up a party of his own, in self defence. Recourse was at last had to arms, the khan was slain, and Temugin, after some further struggles with his enemies, one by one, succeeded to the empire.
He was now forty years old, and, wishing to secure himself in his extensive dominions, he convoked all the princes of his empire at Karakorum, his capital, to do him homage. They all met here on the appointed day, clothed in white. Advancing into the midst, with the diadem upon his brow, Temugin seated himself upon his throne, and received the congratulations and good wishes of the khans and princes. They then confirmed him and his descendants in the sovereignty of the Mongol empire, de-
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claring themselves and their descendants divested of all rights.
After some further victories, he renewed the ceremonial in a still more simple and signal manner. Standing on a plain mound of turf, near the banks of the Selinga, he harangued the assembled princes with an eloquence natural to him, and then sat down on a piece of black felt which was spread upon the earth. This felt was revered for a long time afterwards as a sacred national relic. An appointed orator then addressed him in these words: "However great your power, from God you hold it: He will prosper you if you govern justly: if you abuse your authority, you will have become black as this felt, a wretch and an outcast." Seven khans then respectfully assisted him to rise, conducted him to his throne, and proclaimed him lord of the Mongol empire.
A relative, a saint and prophet, naked, like the marabouts of the present day, approached. "I come," said he, "with God's order, that you henceforth take the name of Zingis Khan, that is--greatest khan of khans." The Moguls ratified this name with extravagant tokens of joy, and considering it a divine title to the cayans of the world, looked upon all opposing nations as enemies of God.
Nothing was now impossible to Zingis. By a rapid succession of victories he found himself, in the year 1226, master of a territory stretching from Corea, in Asia, to Hungary, in Europe, a span of five thousand miles. The descriptions of his butchering and his slaughtering, are terrific. His conquest of the empire of Kharasm, which embraced Great Bokhara, and the surrounding country, and which was governed by a sultan named Mamond, may be taken as an example of his operations. The destructive conqueror rushed upon all parts of his kingdom at once.
One hundred and fifty thousand Kharasmians were slain in the first battle. Like a devouring conflagration, the invaders swept from city to city, leaving behind them only heaps of cinders. A body of Chinese engineers, skilled in mechanics, and perhaps acquainted with the use of gunpowder, assisted the destroyer. Samarcand, Balkh, Bokhara, and many other cities, which flourished with the wealth and trade of centuries, now underwent a pitiless ruin, from pinnacle to foundation. The sultan's armies were almost uniformly defeated. He himself, driven to miserable extremity, came to the shores of the Caspian, and embarking in a boat, amid a shower of arrows, escaped to an island only to die of sickness and despair; yet not until he had enjoined his son Jelaleddin to avenge him. Tossed by every wave of fortune, this dauntless and persevering man did all that man could do to perform the injunctions of a dying father; but hemmed in by the loss of city after city, he was at last driven to an island of the Indus.
Here he burned his ships, except one for his family. His soldiers died round him, defending themselves like tigers at bay. The Kharasmians now took refuge
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in the rocks where the Tartar cavalry could not penetrate; but being reduced to only seven hundred men, the Sultan disbanded them. The unfortunate Jelaleddin, having embraced his family, and torn himself away from them, now took off his cuirass, stripped himself of all his arms but his sword, quiver, and bow, mounted a fresh horse, and plunged into the river. In the midst of the stream, he turned round and emptied his quiver in defiance against Zingis, who stood on the bank. The ship in which the family of the dethroned monarch had embarked, split as it left the shore, and they fell into the conqueror's hands, who afterwards murdered them.
The fugitive prince passed the night in a tree, from fear of wild beasts. On the next day, he met some of his soldiers. He now collected all the fugitives he could muster, and, being joined by an officer of his household, with a boat laden with arms, provisions, money, and clothing, he established himself in India. But, unable to endure exile, he returned to his country, and after many misfortunes, died in obscurity, shortly after his conqueror.
When Zingis had thus conquered a great part of China, subdued all central Asia, overturned the kingdom of the Saracens, subjugated a great part of the Greek empire--being on the banks of the Indus, he at last yielded to the desire of his soldiers for repose, and the enjoyment of the wealth they had gathered with so much toil and blood. Returning slowly, encumbered with spoil, he cast an eye of regret round him, and intimated his intention of rebuilding the cities he had swept away. As he passed the Jaxartes, there came to meet him two of his generals, whom he had sent round the southern shore of the Caspian, with thirty thousand men. They had fought their way through the passes of the Caucasus, traversed the marshy regions near the Volga, crossed that and the desert, and came back by the north of Lake Aral--an unexampled feat, is ancient or modern times.
As soon as the princes and generals were returned from their several expeditions, Zingis assembled them together in a large plain, which, though twenty-one miles in extent, scarce furnished room for the tents and equipages of his countless hosts. His own quarters occupied six miles in circuit. A white tent, capable of containing two thousand persons, was spread over his throne, on which lay the black bit of felt used at his coronation. But now, instead of the primitive simplicity of the vagabond Tartar, all the luxury of Asia glittered in the dress, horses, harness, arms, and furniture of the vast assemblage. The emperor received the homage of his powerful vassals with majesty, and that of his children and grandchildren, who were introduced to kiss his hand, with tenderness. He graciously accepted their presents, and in return distributed among them magnificent donations. The soldiery also partook of the liberality of the great robber of robbers.
The mighty khan, who was fond of public speaking, now pronounced an oration, commending his code of laws:
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to these he attributed all his success and conquests, which he minutely enumerated. The ambassadors from the several countries subjected to his dominion, were then admitted to an audience, and dismissed well satisfied. The whole ceremonial was concluded with a grand festival, which lasted many days. At the daily banquets were served up every thing most exquisite--in fruits, game, liquors, and edibles--to be had in any part of his boundless dominion.
Such festivals were followed by new triumphs, and prosperity seemed always to attend the conqueror's enterprises. He died A. D. 1226, at the age of seventy, having reigned twenty-two years, and preserved to the last his complete ascendancy over the surrounding nations and his own. His magnificent funeral was unsullied with the human sacrifices which desecrated the obsequies of his ancestors. His simple sepulchre, beneath a tree whose shade he had loved, became an object of veneration to his people, who were wont fondly to embellish it.
This famous man was characterised by qualities fitting him for a conqueror--a genius capable of conceiving great and arduous designs, and prudence equal to their execution; a native and persuasive eloquence; a degree of patience enabling him to endure and overcome fatigue; an admirable temperance; a superior understanding; and a penetrating mind, that instantly seized the measure proper to be adopted. His military talents are conspicuous in his successfully introducing a strict discipline and severe police among the Tartars, until then indocile to the curb of restraint.
Such was the celebrated Zingis Khan. We are apt to be dazzled by the deeds of a conqueror, and in the excitement of our sympathy to forget the actual horrors of such a career of violence. It is supposed that the hand of Zingis caused the death of five millions of human beings, without naming other millions who were brought to a miserable and premature grave by sorrow, disappointment, and slavery. No less than fifty thousand towns and cities were destroyed by this conqueror, and even now, after a lapse of six centuries, many of the countries he ravaged have not recovered from the devastation he inflicted.