ian kingdoms he had
ruled.

The General rose and all the others followed him. He took leave of each
one separately and sternly. Only before Jahantsi Lama he bent low while
the Hutuktu placed his hands on the Baron's head and blessed him. From
the Council Chamber we passed at once to the Russian style house which
is the personal dwelling of the Living Buddha. The house was wholly
surrounded by a crowd of red and yellow Lamas; servants, councilors of
Bogdo, officials, fortune tellers, doctors and favorites. From the front
entrance stretched a long red rope whose outer end was thrown over the
wall beside the gate. Crowds of pilgrims crawling up on their knees
touch this end of the rope outside the gate and hand the monk a silken
hatyk or a bit of silver. This touching of the rope whose inner end is
in the hand of the Bogdo establishes direct communication with the holy,
incarnated Living God. A current of blessing is supposed to flow through
this cable of camel's wool and horse hair. Any Mongol who has touched
the mystic rope receives and wears about his neck a red band as the sign
of his accomplished pilgrimage.

I had heard very much about the Bogdo Khan before this opportunity
to see him. I had heard of his love of alcohol, which had brought on
blindness, about his leaning toward exterior western culture and about
his wife drinking deep with him and receiving in his name numerous
delegations and envoys.

In the room which the Bogdo used as his private study, where two Lama
secretaries watched day and night over the chest that contained his
great seals, there was the severest simplicity. On a low, plain, Chinese
lacquered table lay his writing implements, a case of seals given by
the Chinese Government and by the Dalai Lama and wrapped in a cloth of
yellow silk. Nearby was a low easy chair, a bronze brazier with an
iron stovepipe leading up from it; on the walls were the signs of the
swastika, Tibetan and Mongolian inscriptions; behind the easy chair a
small altar with a golden statue of Buddha before which two tallow lamps
were burning; the floor was covered with a thick yellow carpet.

When we entered, only the two Lama secretaries were there, for the
Living Buddha was in the small private shrine in an adjoining chamber,
where no one is allowed to enter save the Bogdo Khan himself and one
Lama, Kanpo-Gelong, who cares for the temple arrangements and assists
the Living Buddha during his prayers of solitude. The secr