The Great Lama Temple by Esther Singleton

C. F. GORDON-CUMMING

This morning soon after 5 A. M. Dr. Dudgeon took me to see the / Yung-ho-kung, a very fine old Lama temple, just within the wall, at the / north-east corner of the Tartar city. It contains about 1,300 monks of / all ages, down to small boys six years old, under the headship of a / Lama, who assumes the title of "The Living Buddha."

These monks are Mongol Tartars of a very bad type, dirty and greedy / of gain; and, moreover, are known to be grossly immoral. They are / generally offensively insolent to all foreigners, many of whom have / vainly endeavoured to obtain access to the monastery, -- even the silver / key, which is usually so powerful in China, often failing to unlock the / inhospitable gates.

That I had the privilege of entrance was solely due to the personal / influence of Dr. Dudgeon, whose medical skill has happily proved so / beneficial to the "Living Buddha," and several of the priests, as to / ensure him a welcome from them. It was not, however, an easy task / to get at these men, as a particularly insolent monk was acting as / door-keeper, and attempted forcibly to prevent our entrance. That, / however, was effected by the judicious pressure of a powerful shoulder, / and after a stormy argument, the wretch was at length overawed, and / finally reduced to abject humility by threats to report his rudeness / to the head Lama.

At long last, after wearisome expostulation and altercation, every / door was thrown open to us, but the priest in charge of each carefully / locked it after us, lest we should avoid giving him an individual tip, / or _kum-sha_, as it is here called. Happily I had a large supply / of five and ten cent silver pieces, which the Doctor's knowledge of / Chinese custom compelled our extortioners to accept. At the same time, / neither of us could avoid a qualm as each successive door was securely / locked, and a vision presented itself of possible traps into which we / might be decoyed.

Every corner of the great building is full of interest, from the / brilliant yellow china tiles of the roof to the yellow carpet in the / temple. The entrance is adorned with stone carvings of animals, and / the interior is covered with a thousand fantastic figures carved / in wood -- birds, beasts, and serpents, flowers and monstrous human / heads mingle in grotesque confusion. It is rich in silken hangings, / gold embroidery, huge picturesque paper lanterns of quaint form, / covered with Chinese characters and grotesque idols, canopied by very / ornamental baldachinos.

Conspicuous amongst these idols is Kwang-ti, who was a distinguished / warrior at the beginning of the Christian era, and who about eight / hundred years later was deified as the God of War, and State temples / were erected in his honour in every city of the Empire. So his / shrine is adorned with all manner of armour, especially bows and / arrows -- doubtful votive offerings. He is a very fiercelooking god, / and is attended by two colossal companions, robed in the richest gold / embroidered silk. Another gigantic image is that of a fully armed / warrior leading a horse. I believe he is Kwang-ti's armour bearer. / In various parts of the temple hang trophies of arms and military / standards, which are singular decorations for a temple wherein Buddha / is the object of supreme worship.

But the fact is, that though Kwang-ti is the God of War, he is also / emphatically "Protector of the Peace," and his aid is invoked in all / manner of difficulties, domestic or national. For instance, when / the great salt wells in the Province of Shansi dried up, the sorely / perplexed Emperor was recommended by the Taouist High Priest to lay / the case before Kwang-ti. The Emperor, therefore, wrote an official / despatch on the subject, which was solemnly burnt, and thus conveyed / to the spirit-world, when, lo! in answer to the Son of Heaven, the / Warrior-god straightway appeared in the clouds, mounted on his red / war-horse, and directed the Emperor to erect a temple in his honour. / This was done, and the salt springs flowed as before.

Kwang-ti again appeared in 1855, during the Taiping rebellion, to / aid the Imperial troops near Nankin, for which kind interposition, / Hien-feng, the reigning Emperor (whose honour-conferring power extends / to the spirit-world), promoted him to an equal rank with Confucius! So / here we find him reverenced alike by Taouists and Buddhists!

All the altar-vases in this temple are of the finest Pekin / enamel -- vases, candlesticks, and incense-burners, from which filmy / clouds of fragrant incense float upward to a ceiling panelled with / green and gold. Fine large scroll paintings tempted me to linger / at every turn, and the walls are encrusted with thousands of small / porcelain images of Buddha.

In the main temple, which is called the Foo-Koo, or Hall of Buddha, / stands a cyclopean image of Matreya, the Buddha of Futurity. It is / seventy feet in height, and is said to be carved from one solid block / of wood, but it is coloured to look like bronze. Ascending a long / flight of steps, we reached a gallery running round the temple about / the level of his shoulders. I found that this gallery led into two / circular buildings, one on each side, constructed for the support of / two immense rotating cylinders, about seventy feet in height, full of / niches, each niche containing the image of a Buddhist saint.

They are rickety old things, and thickly coated with dust, but on / certain days worshippers come and stick on strips of paper, bearing / prayers. To turn these cylinders is apparently an act of homage to the / whole saintly family, and enlists the good-will of the whole lot. Some / Lama monasteries deal thus with their 128 sacred books and 220 volumes / of commentary, placing them in a huge cylindrical bookcase, which they / turn bodily, to save the trouble of turning individual pages -- the / understanding having apparently small play in either case.