The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1888-10-18
THI-BEIT WANG TSUE:
Or, the jewellers on the Roof of
the World"
Something About This Extraordinary Peo-
ple-Their Peculiar Manners, Gus
toms and Religious Rites
The Delai Lamas.

This extraordinary people, the Thi-
belt Wang T'sue, owe their nationality
to princely Chinese rebel, who on ac-
count of some court intrigue took
refuge with his family among those
mountainous regions now called Thibet.
Establishing himself on the Yarling
river, he gathered to his standard the
wild. hairy, motlntain-cave dwellers of
this lofty plateau. With the Khuenlun
Mountains on the north and the mighty
Himalayas on the south, Wong Chou
felt himselfinvincible and impregnable;
and SO 1t proved, for this settlement of
savages fourished, and in course of
time developed one of the strangest
civilizations in the world.
In order to understand this people.
their manners, customs and religious
rites, we must glance at their country.
1t is the loftiest plateau on the globe,
glrt with steep barriers and with ex-
tremes of temperature, in some parts
freezing every night, even in summer,
while In others the noon sun is more
nerce and scorching than in the hot
test regions of Hindostan. From its
lofty table-land descend some of the
greatest rivers of Asia, the Indus, the
brahmapootra, the Irrawady, the Gan
ges, the Hohang-ho, At their sources
mountains pile upon mountains, some
pare and volcanic, others covered with
prlmeval forests, frightfully tangled
together with huge creepers, as yet
unnamed by the botanist. The highest
peaks soar in awful grandeur, vapor-
crowned and snow-clad, assuming in
'ne rising and setting sun forms of un-
speakable splendor. The annual trans
formations of this land of mountain
ana valley are magical; eyergreens,
Nrns, lichens, MOSES, thousands of
mountain rills, and lnyriads of flowers
hh II with music, fragrance and dewy
eeauty; in winter storms, darkness,
neavy mists and terrifying silence en-
sfap the land-now and then this awful
sllence is broken by avalanches of ice
ana snow, laundering and booming
ao"n tne mountains as with the roar
ing OF distant cannon. And above all
Hhen night comes on, there is nowhere
: iaad SO weird; it is full of milky
apofs OF serpentine form, of shades
a,u phantoms, inspiring in the minds
" It's inhabitants a sense Of awe
mystery and sublimity. 1t is not
strange that the dwellers on the "Roof
y .ne World should be what they are
inc most superstitious, reverential.
:, ,el'glous and credulous people on the
lace Of the earth.
nowhere, as in Thibet, does Buddh-
.sn and Its mysterious doctrine of the
ssnsnlgratlon OF souls hold sway so
ss'o.ute. ss The mountain caves are
a.'ed With male and female ascetics
auo practice the most austere forms of
isaance' abstinence and self-torture.
8 0ruer to work out their deification:
{ Wnat was once the lair of wild
sssS's' i've Thibetian maidens, who for
ssa1s scourge themselves with bruises.
.'c'liy themselves by continual fasts.
asers and pious lneditations, in the
spe f,.p mat they may become mothers to
saso ~ Delal Lamas; here are converts
- - Monasteries without end, temples.
salanes and pagodas without n,,,,ha,.
e;e,s ;.sa WIN pilgrims, saints. sages, ma
ssa' ls' fanats (saints in the various
mas es OF deifcation), arahats, both
a. 's ana female. Here is enshrined
great Delai Lama himself, the latest
ls ls.s incarnation of the Buddha. be-
is,.,s,, sssu IN as 9 veritable man-god, pure
sh h1al1loie. omnipresent and onniscient
~, o Is worshiped with the most
ny sa'p'uous OF pagan rituals morning.
ss0a and night as a heavenly deity: |