An Embassy to the Court of the Teshoo Lama in Tibet - Prajna Quest

IG2BOOTAN.,I understood from Poorungheer that the festival which now occupiedthe attention of the Booteeas, was the Durga Pooga, the great autumnalfestival of the Hindoos.An effigy of Durga, in combat with the cliief of the Raccusses,Soomne Soom, is exhibited during this period amidst a most gaudygroup of evil genii, and auxihary gods, forming a picture, in ahorelievo, sufficient to fill the breadth of a large saloon, as shewy asbrilliant colours, and tinsel ornaments can make it. This effigy isremoved, on the last day at noon, and conveyed in procession to theGanges, where Durga and her associates are committed alltogether tothe deep. During this latter part of the festival, which is generallyknown in Calcutta by the appellation of the Nautches, the houses of themost opulent Hindoos, are open to European visitors, and constantlyattract a prodigious concourse of company.This festival, which isone of the most famous among the Hindoos,gives occasion also in Bootan, to a great display of ingenuity. Therepresentation iscontinued from the commencement to the close of thefestival, which lasts, in the whole, ten days.It is here termed Mullaum.I was present only at the commencement of it, during the three first days,and, I am sorry to say, was too ignorant of their mythology, to understandthoroughly the meaning of the masque. The great court yardof the palace, was the scene of representation.The Daeb Raja withallthe Gylongs, sat very gravely in the surrounding colonnade lookingon. He politely provided us with seats, near himself.The grotesque figures that exhibited themselves in the combatfoi"med altogether the most fantastic motley group, it is possible to