in Lang-darma’s forehead. The apostate fell dead where
he stood. This audacious act, which laid the foundation
of Lamaic supremacy, is annually recorded by
a mystery play, on the spot of Lang-darma’s assassination.
But in the description of it, vividly written
in his book on Lamaism, Colonel Waddell suggests
that neither in its origin nor in its realistic details
is the play based upon the facts we have mentioned.
It has been slightly adapted so as to record the
crime, but as a matter of origin it is of a far greater
antiquity.
There remains yet to be described the sacred heart
and centre, not of Lhasa alone, but of Central Asia, and
I have been asked to reprint as it stands the description
of the Jo-kang which appeared in the Times of the
24th of September. Though somewhat doubtful, I
have therefore, writing months afterwards, not cared to
make alterations, even though some improvements, such
as an added detail or the better turn of a sentence, might
increase the literary value of the description. Such
additions as are necessary I have added as distinct
interpolations. There is to me an intense pleasure in
looking back over the pages of my note-book to see the
scrawled sketches and illegibly-jotted notes which I
was careful to make during an experience which,
for sheer interest, I suppose will rarely, if ever, be
repeated. I almost think, if I may say so in no spirit
of boasting, that perhaps no traveller will ever have the
chance exactly to feel as much again, however far his
travels, however dangerous his pilgrimage. Unexpectedly
there rose up an opportunity of seeing that, without
which a visit to Lhasa would have been after all but Outside the great doors of the Cathedral of Lhasa. The Do-ring is immediately behind the
reader, slightly to his left.