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

TIBET. 2,33public business of importance ; and indeed between people of everyrank and station in life, the presenting u silk scarf, constantly forms anessential part of the ceremonial of salutation.If persons of equal rankmeet, an exchange takes place : if a superior is approached, he holdsout his hand to receive the scarf, and a similar one is thrown acrossthe shoulders of the inferior by the hand of an attendant, at the momentof his dismission. The colour that is employed on this occasion, iseither white, or crimson ; but the latter is least frequently used, whiteappearing to have an universal preference. This manufacture is of athin texture, resembling that sort of Chinese stuff called pelong, andis remarkable for the purity of its glossy whiteness. They are commonlydamasked, and the sacred words, Ooin maunee paimee oom, areusually interwoven near both ends, which terminate in a fringe.Theydiffer materially in size and quality, and arecommonly proportioned,by him who presents, to his own condition, and the degree of respecthe means to pay his guest.Trivial and unmeaning as this custom mayappear to Europeans, long and general practice has here attached toit the highest importance. I could obtain no determinate informationas to its meaning or origin, but I find that it has indeed a most extensiveprevalence. It is observed, as I have before noticed, in all theterritory of the Daeb Raja ; it obtains throughout Tibet •,it extendsfrom Turkistan to the confines of the Great Desert ; it is practised inChina, and, I doubt not, reaches to the limits of Mantchieux Tartary.I view it merely in the light of an emblem of friendship, and a pledgeof amity. In the course of my travels, every person who visited me,observed this mode of salutation ;and as we were among a people not