Page:Journey to Lhasa and Central Tibet.djvu/293

 home. During forty-nine days after the drawing of the last breath, food and drink are offered to the departed in his favourite dish; and incense, consisting of barley, butter, and juniper spines, is burnt.

During this period of bardo, as the interval between death and regeneration is called, the departed spirit is believed to wander, and in order to prevent its being subject to misery, on the forty-ninth day some of the clothes, shoes, head-dress, coins, etc., which belonged to the deceased, after being washed and sprinkled with saffron-water, are presented to some incarnate lama for his blessing. The last service is conducted by a Tantrik lama, with a view to expelling all the evil spirits and hungry ghosts which haunt the house of the departed.

On the seventh day after death, prayers are moreover offered for the deceased's well-being, and alms in coin, food, tea, gold, and silver are distributed among religious men. This is repeated on every consecutive seventh day until the forty-ninth day, when a grand feast is given to the congregation of lamas. Nowadays, however, the rich people of Lhasa generally distribute alms, at the rate of one tanka each to the monks of Sera, Dabung, and Gadan, dispensing with the other costly ceremonies. They also present the clothes belonging to the deceased to the professors and heads of those monasteries. Some bequeath the whole of their property to these monastic institutions or to Lamas of great repute.

The practice of making wills has been followed by the Tibetans from very remote times. Every man of property leaves a will bequeathing his movable property to his children or friends, and leaving instructions for the performance of his funeral obsequies and other pious works.

The cutting up and distributing of a corpse is a practical illustration of the Tibetan belief that charity is the highest of all the moral virtues. That man is said to be most virtuous whose funeral is attended by the largest number of vultures, while if his corpse attracts but a small company, the very dogs not deigning to touch his defiled remains, he is judged to have led a sinful life.

The dead bodies of pregnant and barren women, and also of lepers, are packed in leather bags and thrown into the waters of the great Tsang-po. A Tibetan proverb says, "She whose son dies after birth is white barren (rab-cha karpo); she whose daughter dies after birth is partly barren (rab-cha tavo); she who has borne no children