Page:Picturesque Nepal.djvu/202

 My gown of glory, Hope's true gage

And thus I'll take my pilgrimage—

Whilst my soul, like a quiet Palmer,

Travelleth towards the land of Heaven."

The pilgrimage is a characteristic feature of most religions of the Orient, and was a common event until recent years with the devout people of the West, but since the time of the Crusades it has declined in Europe. Nepal, like many another Eastern country, can boast of one spot within its confines more holy than any other, for far in the bosom of "the encircling mountains" lies the Sacred Lake of Gosainthan. Due north of the Valley of Nepal, and, where the eternal snows hang highest in the ethereal space, one bold bluff peak stands out whose precipitous sides appear inaccessible to every living thing except the vulture floating in the blue. Yet every year hundreds of devotees painfully scale this great mountain in order to worship a rock which is thought by the pious to represent the deity Nila-kenta, or to bathe in the holy pool in which that massive boulder is sunk. No European has yet been permitted