CHAPTER XV.

WORSHIP OF THE DEITIES, AND RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES.

DAILY SERVICE. Offerings. Musical instruments. Prayer-cylinders. —PERFORMANCE OF RELIGIOUS DRAMAS.-Sacred DAYS AND FESTIVALS.-Monthly and annual festivals. The ceremony Tuisol. The ceremony Nyungne.RITES FOR THE ATTAINMENT OF SUPERNATURAL FACULTIES. -PECULIAR CEREMONIES FOR ENSURING THE ASSISTANCE OF THE GODS. 1. The rite Dubjed. 2. The burnt-offering. 3. Invocation of Lungta. 4. The Talisman Changpo. 5. The magical figure Phurbu. 6. The ceremony Thugdam Kantsai. 7. Invocation of Nagpo Chenpo by moving the arrow. 8. The ceremony Yangug. 9. Ceremonies performed in cases of illness. 10. Funeral rites.

Daily service.

THE ordinary daily service, instituted for the praise of the Buddha, consists in the recital of hymns and prayers in a manner intermediate between singing and reading. The service is accompanied by instrumental music; offerings are presented, and perfumes are burnt. This kind of service is celebrated by the Lamas three times a day, at sunrise, noon, and sunset; and lasts each

time about half an hour. Laymen may be present, but they take no active part in the performance; those who are present are required to make three prostrations, touching the ground with their forehead, when they receive from the Lamas the benediction. On certain days more time is spent in the religious services; the prayers and ceremonies have then reference to the festival of the day; public processions not unfrequently precede the solemnities which take place in the temples, and on some few occasions, even religious dramas conclude them.

Offerings. Blood forms no part of these: they consist chiefly of flour, clarified butter, and tamarind-wood, Ombu in Tibetan. To some particular gods flowers are offered, or, if they cannot be obtained, grain, which is thrown into the air so as to fall down upon the image. To the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas cones of dough, Zhalsai, literally "meat, food," are offered, similar in shape to the Tsatsas (see p. 194), but differing from them in this respect, that they contain no relics or other sacred objects; also the feathers of a peacock are set up in narrow-necked vessels before some of these gods.

Musical instruments. Of all the instruments used by the Tibetans for their service, such as drums, trumpets, flageolets, and cymbals, the trumpets are certainly the most remarkable, being generally made of human bones. Thigh bones give the finest trumpets; they sound very deep. To the top of the bone is fastened a mouthpiece of brass, while the other end is ornamented by brass wire, or leather rings; and the instrument (the construction of which requires but a very trifling outlay)

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is ready for use. Besides this kind of trumpets, there are still larger ones of copper, from 6 to 7 feet long, which are only made in Lhássa, and which are very expensive.

The flageolets are of wood, and are generally double ones, each tube having seven holes along the upper side and a larger one underneath for the thumb.

The drums are hemispherical, joined on their convex side; upon the skin sacred sentences are frequently written. The drums are beaten in a very curious manner. There are two small leather balls attached to a rope of some length fastened to the drums at the point of their junction; the drums are taken in the hand and shaken in such a manner as to cause a swinging motion of the two balls, which are thus brought into contact with the drums, and cause no little noise. The large tambourines, which are fixed upon a stick about three feet long, are beaten with a bamboo cane, which, on account of its elasticity, strikes the skin often, but not very heavily. The cymbals are very similar to those used in Europe; they are kept in boxes of twisted bast.

All Tibetan music is slow, sounds deep, and is far superior to that of the Hindus of India. Although it cannot be asserted that there is much melody in Tibetan music, yet the instruments employed produce a certain harmonious combination and rythmical succession of sounds.

Prayer-cylinders. An instrument peculiar to the Buddhists, and very characteristic of their religious notions, is the prayer-cylinder, in Tibetan called Khorten, also Mani,

2

or Mani chos khor. The use of these instruments may probably have originated in an exhortation to a frequent reading of the holy books and to the recital of sacred sentences, in order to the attainment of a knowledge of the tenets of the Buddhist doctrine. In the course of time the mere reading or copying of the holy books and writings had come to be regarded as a work of merit, and as one of the most efficacious means for becoming purified from sin and delivered from metempsychosis. Few men, however, knew how to read at all, and those who did were prevented by their occupations from doing so frequently; and therefore, as I believe, the Lamas cast about for an expedient to enable the ignorant and the much-occupied man also to obtain the spiritual advantages attached to an observance of the practice mentioned; they taught that the mere turning of a rolled manuscript might be considered an efficacious substitute for reading it.

The cylindrical cases, in which the prayers to be turned are enclosed, are generally of metal; but envelops of wood, and leather, or even of coarse cotton, are not rare. They are from three to five inches high and two to three inches in diameter. A wooden handle passes through each cylinder and forms its axis. Round this axis long strips of paper or pieces of cloth are rolled, with printed sacred sentences; all these rolls are again covered by an un-printed piece of cotton stuff. To facilitate the turning of the cylinders, a small pebble or a piece of metal is fastened to

1 Mani "a precious thing;" chhos "the doctrine;" khor, from 'khor-ba "to turn;" brten "to hold, support."

2 See the Address to the Buddhas of confession, or Confessor Buddhas, Chapter XI.

it by a string, so that a very gentle movement of the hand maintains a steady and regular revolving motion.

Besides the prayer-cylinders of these ordinary dimensions there are some of very large size permanently fixed near monasteries. A man is employed to keep them constantly in motion, or occasionally they are turned by water, like mills, and revolve day and night. Numbers of smaller ones are also ranged at the entrance of monasteries, along the walls, and are turned by passers-by or by those who enter the temple. They are generally so close to each other that anyone going by may easily cause all to revolve one after the other without interruption, by gliding over them with the hand. The number of these prayer-cylinders set up in one single monastery is quite astonishing; thus, the inscription relating to the foundation of the monastery of Hímis, in Ladák (see p. 183), states that 300,000 prayer-cylinders were put up along the walls of the monastery. Though this is an exaggeration in oriental style, the actual quantity is nevertheless very considerable.

Each revolution of the cylinder is considered to be equal to the reading of as many sacred sentences or treatises as are enclosed in it, provided that the turning of the cylinder is done slowly and from right to left; and the effect is made dependent upon a strict observance of these two rules. A slow motion is enjoined because those who turn the cylinders must do so with a faithful, quiet, and meditative mind. The motion from right to left was adopted in order to follow the writing, which runs from left to right. Some of the larger prayer-cylinders