XX GREA T INGENUITY OF PR A YER- WHEELS 355 



prayers upon them. Here I took a photograph of a 

 group of the holy men themselves.^ 



The sides of this enclosure were studded with prayer- 

 wheels. These were mostly small barrel-shaped boxes, 

 revolving on the longer axis. A touch of the hand in 

 passing set them going, and their weight kept them 

 revolving for some little time. The ingenuity of the 

 idea that lies at the bottom of these curious things is 

 wonderful. I opened, with the consent of the Lamas, 

 the top of one which was slightly cracked, and took out 

 of it a circular piece of birch bark. This was 5 inches in 

 diameter, and each side had been stamped (probably 

 from a wooden block as their books are done), with five 

 rings of printed matter. Each barrel was about 8 inches 

 long, therefore each held over 7 inches in thickness 

 of birch - bark circles, one on top of another. Now 

 these are about as thick as ordinary paper, of which 

 some sixty leaves will go to a quarter of an inch, say, to 

 be on the safe side, 200 to an inch. Therefore there 

 would be some 1400 bark circles in a barrel, or 2800 

 printed surfaces. On each surface the sacred sentence, 

 " Om mani padmi om"^ or some other prayer, is prob- 

 ably entered at least ten times. As a matter of fact, 

 I believe it to be entered much oftener, but this may 

 be taken as a minimum ; then a single revolution of 

 the barrel is equivalent to turning the prayer or the 

 mystic sentence round, 10 x 2800, or 28,000 times. But 

 a touch of the finger will revolve the barrel at least ten 

 times, and a strong push probably thirty or forty times, 



1 See illustration on p. 345. 



^ The exact meaning of this sentence is not known, but the nearest translation is 

 said to be, " Oh ! the Jewel in the Lotus Flower ! " 



