352 



LALLY LAMA. 



attraction. His lecture room was a kind of nursery, 

 from which a multitude of his scholars were trans- 

 planted to the directorship and management of 

 domestic and foreign observatories. His work Des 

 I'anaiu- tie Navigation et specialement tin I'aiinl da 

 L*tngurilt*! (1778 folio) contains a general history of 

 all the ancient and modern canals, which had pre- 

 viously teen undertaken, accomplished, and even 

 projected. Such a work had, till then, been a 

 desideratum, and this is now of the greatest advan- 

 tage to the engineer. His Bibliographic astronomiqitc 

 (1 vol. 4to.) is a copious catalogue of all the works 

 that had ever appeared on the subject of astronomy. 

 As he was a member of all the great academies, he 

 formed, as it were, a common bond of union between 

 them, while he communicated, from one to the other, 

 whatever each one produced worthy of notice. His 

 activity was remarkable. Lalande enjoyed for a long 

 time a splendid reputation ; but his imprudent free- 

 dom, the independence with which he expressed his 

 opinion in the most turbulent times, the often 

 offensive severity which he was accustomed to use 

 against systems which deserved no notice, and the 

 habit of publicly declaring his sentiments where he 

 might better have been silent, all this made him 

 numerous enemies, who persecuted him, and suc- 

 ceeded so far, that his real merit has been called in 

 question. His character was, in fact, a strange 

 mixture of great and commendable qualities united 

 with striking singularities, which may have proceeded 

 from vanity and the desire to attract attention. 

 Lalande, however, was kind, generous, full of feeling, 

 and, in his own way, religious, although his enemies 

 accused him of atheism. His death took place 

 April 4, 1807. 



LALLY, THOMAS ARTHUR, count; a brave, but im- 

 prudent and unfortunate Irish officer in the service of 

 France. He was of a family which had followed the 

 fortunes of James II., and, having entered the French 

 anny,he signalized himself so much in the battle of Fon- 

 tenoy,that he was made a brigadier-general on the field 

 of battle. He also drew up the plan of a descent upon 

 Britain, which would have been tried but for the 

 defeat of Charles Edward at Culloden. In 1756, he 

 was selected to restore the French influence in India, 

 for which purpose he was made governor of Pondi- 

 cherry. It was soon perceived, however, that he 

 wanted the prudence, moderation, and disinterested- 

 ness necessary for so distant and critical a scene of 

 action ; and, after a little partial success against the 

 English, in the first instance, he was finally obliged 

 to retire to Pondicherry, which was besieged and 

 taken by the British, January 16, 1761, the garrison, 

 with Lally, being made prisoners of war. On this 

 catastrophe, a torrent of invective assailed the unfor- 

 tunate leader from all quarters, he having offended 

 every body concerned, by his haughty humour, and 

 violent temper and conduct. He was even accused 

 of having sold Pondicherry to the British, notwith- 

 standing the avowed hatred which, as a Jacobite, he 

 felt for them. He arrived a prisoner of war in Bri- 

 tain, in September, 1761, and, the following month, 

 was allowed to return to France, where, after a long 

 imprisonment, he was brought to trial for treachery, 

 abuse of authority, and unjust exactions. Being 

 found guilty, lie was condemned to be decapitated, 

 which sentence was executed May 6, 1766, in the 

 sixty-eighth year of his age. In 1778, his son, Lally- 

 Tollendal, obtained possession of the estates of his 

 father, with a revisalof the proceedings, which were 

 manifestly unjust, count Lally being one of the vic- 

 tims to public clamour, like admiralByng,and many 

 more who have been sacrificed to the unpopularity of 

 an incapable administration 



LALLY-TOLLENDAL, TROPHIME GERARD, 



marquis of, son of the preceding, born at Paris, 

 March 5, 1751, devoted himself to the military pio- 

 fession. He soon made himself known by his writ- 

 ings in defence of his lather's memory, and embraced 

 the cause of the revolution with alacrity, but, at the 

 same time, with prudence. During the increasing 

 popular excesses, he joined his friend Mounier in 

 Switzerland. From hence he returned, but was 

 arrested, and escaped almost by a miracle the mas- 

 sacre of September. He thereupon fled to England, 

 and, while in that country, offered his services as 

 the defender of Louis XVI., but was not accepted. 

 After the 18th Brumaire, he returned to France, 

 took an active part in public a Hairs, under Louis 

 XVIII., and was by him called to the chamber of 

 peers, where he has ofteii defended moderate princi- 

 ples with true eloquence. He was also a member of 

 the French academy. He died at Paris, in March, 

 1830. 



LAMA (in the Tangutanese dialect, mother of 

 souls, pastor of souls') is, among the Mongols, the 

 appellation of all the members ot the priestly order ; 

 but among the Calmucs it signifies only the more 

 distinguished. Hence the religion of the Mongols 

 and Calmucs is called Lamaism. In this religion 

 the Shigemooni is honoured as the highest God, and 

 the Dalai-lama (i. e. the great lama), as his repre- 

 sentative. He is at the head of both ecclesiastical 

 and secular affairs in Thibet, which may be consid- 

 ered as a theocratical state. He is considered not as 

 a mere visible representative of the divinity on earth, 

 but as a real divinity himself, dwelling among men. 

 The belief in his eternal existence is connected with 

 the doctrine of the transmigration of souls. His 

 worshippers believe that the divinity, as soon as it 

 leaves the body of the Dalai-lama, immediately takes 

 possession of some other body in a supernatural way, 

 so that he only changes his exterior form, and not 

 his actual existence. Among a people who possess 

 such a regular hierarchical system, it is a matter of 

 small consequence who stands at the head. The 

 usual residence of the Dalai-lama is in two monas- 

 teries situated in the vicinity of the capital, Lassa, 

 in each of which he dwells alternately. He is sur- 

 rounded in every direction by a vast number of 

 priests ; but no woman is permitted to pass the night 

 in the building where he lodges. This arises, un- 

 doubtedly from the purity which is attributed to him; 

 for he is called the immaculate. The natives, as 

 well as a great crowd of foreigners (for all the Mon- 

 gol tribes in Russia acknowledge him), undertake 

 r atiguing pilgrimages in order to pay their homage 

 to him, and obtain his blessing. He receives them 

 sitting upon a kind of altar, upon a large and splen- 

 did seat, with his legs crossed. The tartars, next 

 to the inhabitants of Thibet, pay him the greatest 

 reverence. They come to him from the most distant 

 regions, and the princes, to whom he shows no more 

 respect than toothers, submit to the same ceremonies 

 as their people. He salutes no one, never uncovers 

 his head, rises up before no one, and is satisfied with 

 laying his hand upon the head of his worshipper, who 

 believes that he has thereby obtained the pardon of 

 his sins. His worshippers believe that the supreme 

 divinity lives in him, that he knows and sees every 

 thing in the deepest recesses of the heart, and never 

 needs to make inquiry in regard to any thing. If he 

 does this, it is only that unbelievers and the evil, 

 minded may not have cause for complaint. He 

 sometimes distributes, it is said, little balls of conse- 

 crated dough, which the Tartars use in many super- 

 titious practices ; but it is not true, that balls made 

 from his excrement are distributed, preserved in 

 golden boxes, and even mixed with articles of food. 

 His power was once greater than it is now, and he 



