garret under the roof, inhabited by the attendant | shipers of the holy person to whom alone the monks. Passing through the outer door, we adoration is given. enter a vestibule in which are tall praying machines, which are kept continually turning, and the quantity of prayer and supplication thus ground out is astonishing. From this vestibule the main body of the temple is entered by folding doors studded with copper bosses. The walls and floor are plastered over with clay, upon which are depicted allegorical representations of Boodh, and various other figures. The pillars and cross beams are ornamented with brilliant colors, vermilion, green, gold, and azure, disposed in masses of color, with slender streaks of white between. In the general arrangement of the colors, particularly in separating the heavier masses of color, they have in a measure anticipated those principles of decorative art adopted in the Great Exhibition of London. The altars and images are placed opposite the entrance. The chief image is placed behind the altar, under a canopy. He is represented sitting cross-legged, with the left heel elevated, the corresponding hand resting on the thigh. In this hand he holds the padmi, or sacred lotus and jewel. The right hand is either raised in benediction, or holds the dorje, or thunderbolt. On either side of him are arranged the lesser divinities and saints, male and female. In portraying the aspect of the divinities, the aim of the artist seems to have been to represent them with an air of calm and serene contemplation. It must be borne in mind that, properly speaking, the Boodhists are not idolaters. The images are not idols; they are objects of reverence, not of adoration. In theory at least, no image is any thing more than the symbol of the being in whose honor it is erected; a token to remind the wor One must be cold and unimaginative if his deepest emotions are not stirred when standing among the memorials of a faith which counts more votaries than any other upon the globe. Turn which way you will the eye is met by some beautiful specimen of carving or coloring. The dim light which finds its way through the narrow windows pierced in the thick walls subdues into harmony much that would seem harsh and glaring if beheld under a stronger light. Incense and sweet-smelling herbs, burned by the priests on entering, add no little to the general effect, harmonizing with the grave and decorous deportment of the worshipers. In some respects the Lamas have engrafted the peculiarities of the old religion of the mountains upon the purer and more spiritual doctrines of Boodhism. Perhaps out of complaisance to the instinctive feelings of the people, they still make offerings and present supplications to the spirits who preside over Kinchin-junga and his giant brotherhood of peaks. And in the solemn presence of those great summits which rise in perpetual solitude, as inaccessible to any living thing of earth as are the calm stars, it is almost impossible for us not to feel sympathy with the belief that peoples them with beings of a higher order than ourselves, whose serene existence knows none of the cares and anxieties which dis turb our mortal life. Though we can not embrace we must yet sympathize with these fair humanities of old religion. In the temple worship there are few or no traces of this admixture of foreign elements. As you enter you see a group of Lamas sitting crosslegged upon benches running along the side of the apartment. One, with finger upraised in the attitude of enforcing attention, is reading aloud | out an amount of supplication too great to be from some sacred book. After a while all join in chanting a hymn, while the attendant boys beat the gongs and cymbals, blow the conches and thigh-bone trumpets, and wheel the manis, every stroke of whose tinkling bells announces that the supplications of the audience have again ascended to the deity. The sacred implements in these temples are curious enough. First in importance is the mani, or praying machine. It is a cylinder of leather, of any size up to that of a large barrel or even easily estimated. There is another kind borne in the hand, which can be made to revolve by a very slight movement of the owner. These are usually carried about by the wandering priests, half mountebank, half Lama, and whole beggar, who perambulate the country, managing to pick up a very comfortable subsistence, though they not unfrequently present a very dilapidated appearance in the matter of clothing. If these cylinders do their work in a satisfactory manner-and those who use them have no doubts on that score-no SACRED IMPLEMENTS, IN BOODHIST TEMPLES. hogshead, placed vertically upon an axis, so that | labor-saving machine ever invented can begin to compare with them. What is a sewing machine that makes a thousand stitches a minute, a printing machine that throws off twenty thousand sheets in an hour, compared with an instrument which repeats all the supplications in the prayer-book as often as a cylinder can be made to revolve on its axis? The implement next in importance to the mani is the trumpet, made of a human thigh bone, perforated through both condyles. These are often handsomely mounted and decorated with silver. There is some peculiar sanctity attached to the bones of a Lama which is held to give a special efficacy to the trumpets manufactured from them. It can not fail to be vastly consolatory to these holy men to reflect that not only are their throats exercised in performing the sacred offices while they are living, but for generations after they are dead their bones will still continue to enact an important part in divine worship. We have heard of enthusiastic devotees of science who derived great pleasure from the hope that after their death concern. Besides these religious edifices, in traversing the steep mountain paths we frequently encounter rude memorials, consisting merely of a pile of stones, from which projects a staff ornamented with a streamer. The Lepchas never pass these their bodies might subserve the cause to which | stant motion, praying away night and day on its they were devoted, by finding their way to the own account, or for the benefit of whom it may dissecting room; and that many a lesson upon anatomy would be illustrated by means of their skeletons in a lecture-room. This is doubtless a noble function for one's body to perform, but it hardly equals that to which any Lama may reasonably hope his thigh-bones may attain. Nor is this honor exclusively destined for the Lamas. Bones of unusual size are in great demand. Any man who chances to be gifted with limbs of extraordinary length may hope to attain this preeminence. In fact, in a country where saints are more common than giants, an inch or two in the length of a bone will counterbalance a number of degrees of sanctity. The first European who died at Dorjiling was a man of extraordinary stature, and it is confidently affirmed that his body was dug up by some enthusiastic resurrectionists, for the sake of converting his thigh-bones into trumpets. In addition to the manis and trumpets, the principal implements of worship found in the Boodhist temples are the dorje, or double thunderbolt - which the Lamas use much as the Catholic priests do the cross-bells, cymbals, gongs, conch-shells, and brazen cups. These latter are perhaps intended to represent the sacred lotus, which bears so important a part in Boodhist mythology. LEPCHA DEVOTIONS. without pausing for a moment to go through with their devotions. They walk slowly around them three times, always from left to right, repeating the mystical Om padmi; then pause with heads bowed and pigtails streaming behind, apparently repeating their prayers; and conclude the ceremony by making a votive offering of three pine cones. The ceremony concluded, they walk off, smirking, grinning, nodding, and elevating the corners of their eyes, in the joyful consciousness of having performed their religious duties in the most edifying and satisfactory manner. Some of the temples are very humble edifices, consisting merely of a building of a single room, with sliding shutters over the window-slits, furnished in a rude manner; but the implements of worship correspond in general to those found in temples of more pretension, though of smaller size and cheaper construction. Even in these there are not unfrequently implements of no little beauty, and the worship is performed with as much apparent earnestness and solemnity as in the larger structures. The most singular religious structures are the praying-mills which occur at During our naturalist's journeyings he was preintervals along the courses of the mountain tor- sented to the Rajah of Sikkim. The reader must rents. They consist simply of a slight hut built not imagine that the ceremony was very pompover the stream, large enough to contain a mani. ous or imposing; for the country is very small The shaft descends through the floor, and being and thinly inhabited. Still there are formalities provided with floats at the lower extremity, dip-to be observed every where in approaching royal ping into the water, the cylinder is kept in con- personages; and as constant botanizing and geo gar an action as dying; but some day, when he had become tired of his earthly tabernacle and pink hat, would just shift them both, and reappear somewhere else, in a new body and a fresh hat to match. logizing in all sorts of rough places had reduced the shooting-jacket which he wore to a state of woeful dilapidation, the Doctor was obliged to borrow a coat for the reception. He likewise furnished himself with a quantity of red cloth and beads by way of presents, and was ushered In the mean while, like many another sainted into the presence of royalty. The audience-room sovereign-such for instance as the "royal marwas merely a shed, some twenty feet in length, tyr" Charles I. of England, and Saint Louis XVI. made of bamboos, and wattled up at the sides. of France-he had suffered his dominions to fall The royal body-guard just then on duty consisted into a rather bad way. He had by way of Dewan, of a couple of soldiers in red jackets, with bows or Prime Minister, a certain Thibetan, who conslung over their shoulders. His Majesty, how-trived to display upon the limited stage to which SIKKIM SOLDIERS. he was restricted all the vices proper to a royal favorite. As a natural consequence, he was thoroughly detested, and the court of Tumlong became the scene of intrigues as busy as those of Paris or Vienna. It was a great point with the Dewan to prevent any interview between the Rajah and the English Resident at Dorjiling. When, after a while, the interview was appointed to be held at a little. town situated on the banks of a river which formed the boundary between the dominions of the Rajah and the acquisitions of his European neighbors, the Minister tried every means to frustrate it. Arrows were shot over ever, possesses a few Sepoys armed with mus- the stream, to which were attached letters urging kets. As they entered the audience-chamber, the visitors to return, and demonstrating that it was they saw a score or so of the Rajah's relatives- quite impossible that the interview should take the royal family, in fact-drawn up on each side place. The reasons assigned were conclusive of the apartment. At the further end was a enough, though hardly consistent with each other. wicker platform covered with purple silk, em- One letter would solemnly assert that the Rajah broidered in white and gold; above this was a was very sick at his capital; the next would just tattered blue canopy. This platform was the as solemnly declare that he had gone to Thibet, throne, and upon it was seated cross-legged an whence he would not return for nobody knew insignificant, funny-looking old fellow, whose lit- how long. This was scarcely read and considertle angular eyes winked and twinkled like stars ed before another missive would be seit over anin a cold night. He wore a robe of yellow silk, nouncing that he was deeply engaged in his deand had upon his head a broad-brimmed, low-votions, and could by no possibility receive the crowned hat of pink silk, covered with tassels of foreigners, and so on. silken floss. The wearer of this very juvenile costume had apparently passed man's allotted three-score years and ten, without having picked up much wisdom by the way. He was a great saint, and quite above attending to any sublunary business, but kept himself in a state of serene self-contemplation; and, as his subjects believed, was quite prepared to be absorbed in the divine essence of Boodh. They thought that he was something quite out of the common way, who could not think of doing so common-place and vul Finding at last that the interview could not be prevented, the Dewan concluded to be present. He made his appearance in the audience-chamber clothed in a superb robe of purple silk wrought with gold, and gave the visitors a very cool reception. He had contrived to have the articles they had brought for the Rajah delivered before the audience was granted, instead of during its continuance, thus giving them the appearance of being intended as tribute rather than as presents. He managed to have the interview cut down to a brief period. As a signal for its close white silken | rious obstacles in their way. At length, at the scarfs were thrown over the shoulders of the vis- close of the following year, he ventured upon a itors, to whom presents were also made, consist- decisive step, which ultimately lead to his dising of China silks, bricks of tea, cattle, ponies, grace and ruin. In company with the English and a quantity of the precious commodity, salt. Resident, together with a considerable party, the Doctor was on his way to the capital of the Rajah, when they were all suddenly seized by a band of the followers of the Dewan, and detained as prisoners, in the hope of extorting certain stipulations which the Minister was very desirous of gaining. They were carried to the capital, and This was in December, 1848. The whole of the ensuing year was spent by Dr. Hooker in traversing the mountains in various directions, making botanical and geological collections. The Dewan was much opposed to these journeyings, and succeeded on some occasions in throwing se sum is stated to have been twelve shillings. kept in close confinement for a month, though | ure in the Parliamentary Blue Book. The exact subjected to no very serious ill-treatment. The Doctor spent the time in making meteorological observations, playing upon a sort of Jew's harp, and smoking. At length the news reached the Rajah that the English were actually sending a body of troops to punish him for his seizure of their representative. He became terribly frightened, and packed the prisoners off with all the haste he could muster. The Dewan was disgraced, and his property taken from him, in punishment for having led his master into such a difficulty. The upshot of the matter was that the English government seized upon a portion of the Rajah's territories, lying at the foot of the mountains, which they formally annexed to their own dominions. The process of annexation was performed in a very summary manner. Four policemen marched in solid phalanx up to the treasury, of which they took formal possession in the name of the British government, announcing to the inhabitants of the district that the territory was confiscated: an arrangement in which they acquiesced with the most perfect equanimity. It is but fair to add that the amount of treasure which fell into their hands was hardly sufficient to figVOL. IX.-No. 53.-R R Here we must part with our worthy friend the Doctor. We have abstained from all mention of his scientific labors. Those who would know how he botanized and geologized, watched the thermometer and barometer, registered the rain gauge, measured the heights of mountains and the depth of valleys, will find all these particu lars laid down in his "Journals." After exhausting the natural history of the Himalayas, he had still a year at his disposal. Bhotan and Nepaul were untrodden fields; but no European could visit them without imminent peril. So he decided upon the Khasia Mountains, at the head of the great delta of the Ganges and the Burrampooter. He descended the Himalayas, floated down the Ganges to Calcutta, where he was greeted by a box of living American plants, which had been brought in a frozen state in a vessel laden with ice from Wenham Lake. This ice is much used by physicians in cases of inflammation, and sells in the Calcutta market for a penny sterling a pound. From Calcutta he proceeded to his new field of research, whither we will not now follow him. |