284 THE TEMPLE. 



markers." They may be attached at any part of the rosary string, 



but are usually affixed at the 8th and 21st bead on either side of 



the central bead. 



They are used in the following manner : — When about to tell the 



^ , beads, the counters on each string are slid up the 



Use 01 counters. i • /-^ i x- i r ^i i i ^i 



string. Un completing a cycle oi the beads the 



lowest counter on the dorje-string is slid down into contact with 



the dorje. And on each further cycle of beads being told a further 



counter is slipped down. When the ten have been exhausted, they 



are then slid up again and one counter is slipped down from the 



bell-string. The counters thus serve to register the utterance of 108 X 



10 X 10 ^ 10,800 prayers or mystic formulas. The number of 



formulas daily repeated in this way is enormous. The average daily 



number of repetitions may in the earlier stages of a lama's career 



amount to 5,000 daily, but it depends somewhat on the zeal and leisure 



of the individual. A layman may repeat daily about five to twenty 



bead-cycles, but usually less. Old women are especially pious in 



this way, many telling over twenty bead-cycles daily. A middle-aged 



lama friend of mine has repeated the spell of his tutelary deity alone 



over 2,000,000 times. It is not uncommon to find rosaries so worn 



away by the friction of so much handling that originally globular 



beads have become cylindrical. 



Affixed to the rosary are small odds and ends, such as a metal 

 tooth-pick, tweezer, small keys, &c. 



The materials of which the lamaic rosaries are composed may to a 

 certain extent vary in costliness according to the 

 Material of beads, wealth of the wearcr. The Khen-pos or abbots 

 of large and wealthy monasteries have rosaries of pearl and other 

 precioiis stones, and even of gold. Turner relates^ that the Grand 

 Tashi Lama possessed rosaries of pearls, emeralds, rubies, sapphires, 

 coral, amber, crystal, and lajDislazuli. 



But the material of the rosary can only vary within rather narrow 

 limits, its nature being determined by the particular sect to which the 

 lama belongs and the particular deity to whom worship is to be paid. 



The yellow rosary or Se-thcng^" vide fig. 1, is the special rosary 

 of the ge-luk-pa or " reformed school," also called 



TeUow rosary. ^ the yellow-hat sect " (sha-ser). The beads are 

 formed from the ochrey-yellow wood of the chang-chhub,^ literally 

 "the Bodhi tree" or tree of suj^reme wisdom, which is said to grow 

 in Central China. The wood is so deeply yellow that it is doubtful 

 whether it be really that of the pijjal [Ficits rch'giosa) which was the 

 Bodhi tree under which Gautama attained his liuddhahood. These 



' Embassy to Tibet, page 261, 1800. | » Ser-plireng. | = byang-chliub. 



