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

278 TIBET.fitted out, at an immense expence, for the purpose of visiting unknownregions, and navigating distant seas. Men of learning and of scienceembarked on these occasions, to whom the desire of acquiring and diffusingknowledge, were sufficient inducements to attempt the mosthazardous and laborious enterprises.In these voyages, lands had beendiscovered, and nations explored, of which neither history, nor tradition,supplied the slightest information; and navigators, by publishingtothe world their obser\'ations, and their accounts of these newlydiscoveredcountries, had communicated much curious and importantknowledge. Hence followed a succession of queries and remarks,which itwould be endless to repeat.Their own geographical knowledge was very limited. I could notiorm, with any degree of precision, an idea of the ancient extent of thekingdom of Tibet, or of the age of their religious institutions: for neitherof us could recognize places, from the names by which they wereknown to the other ; and dates were equally obscure, since they haveno specific aera, from which they begin to reckon the lapse of time.The cycle of twelve years is in use here, as it is in western Tartary.But for my better information on these topics, they promised me anabridgetl history of Tibet, from their own annals.This I afterwards received ;but my knowledge of the language wasnot sufficient to enable me to avail myself of the information it contained; and my residence amongst them, though I had the aid of apreceptor, was too short to admit of my making any considerable proficiencyin the dialect of Tibet,Tlie present was an opportunity too fiivourable to be neglected, and