Page:The Visit of the Teshoo Lama to Peking.djvu/31

Rh Captain Turner states, that "in Thibet it is the custom, to preserve entire the mortal remains of the sovereign Lamas only, every other corpse being either consumed by fire or given to be the promiscuous food of beasts and birds of prey." It seems, however, that the corpse of the Pan-ch'an was burned, as the inscription speaks of 化 (燒化) (burnt) remains, and the term 舍利 (sarîra) used by the Emperor, indicates the bodily relics or ashes left after cremation of a Buddha or saint. The ancient Chinese terms for the 塔 in which these relics are enshrined, are 佛圖, 浮屠, corresponding to the topes or stupas in India, the chorten's in Tibet, while the term "tchaitya" [支提, 支帝] is used, according to the 法苑珠林, only in describing the buildings containing no relics.

Koeppen states that the Emperor ordered the body of the Pan-ch‘an "to be embalmed and placed in a receptacle of gold, shaped like a pyramid, in sitting position with, under-crossed legs, as in this position Buddhist holy men are obliged to die." The text of the inscription seems to contradict this statement, and I am inclined to believe that Koeppen made a mistake, confounding the attitude in which the priests are disposed for cremation with the subsequent enshrinement, which latter is of course only the arrangement for the preservation of half-destroyed fragments of bone. Koeppen sates further-more, that "the octagonal, 15 fathoms (Klafter) high obelisk of marble in the neighbourhood (?) of the monastery of Khuang-sse, where the prelate had died, is covered on its top with a pure-gold bonnet (Haube) of the shape of a Lamaist mitre." This obelisk is of course the dagoba, situated in the grounds of the Yellow Temple, and