268 
TIBET. 
influence of religious prejudice. The regeneration of their Lama is said 
to have taken place, in times of remote antiquity, near the site of the 
ancient and ruined city of Gowr; and all those places held in vene¬ 
ration by the Hindoos, as Gya, Benares, Mahow, and Allahabad, are 
equally objects of superstitious zeal, with a votary of the Tibet faith, 
who thinks himself blessed above his fellow disciples, if he can but 
perform a pilgrimage to these hallowed spots. 
Gunga Sagor, an uninhabited island, situated at the confluence of 
the Ganges with the sea, and the pagoda of Jagarnaut, upon the coast 
of Orissa, are also deemed places of equal sanctity, and occasionally 
visited, from the same motives of zealous but mistaken piety. Nor are 
the advantages, whatever they may be, resulting from these pilgrimages, 
confined to those alone, who personally perform them; he who promotes 
them by his persuasion, and supports the pilgrim by his purse, claims 
to himself, nearly an equal share of merit. So that agents are often 
hired, to visit these holy places, from whence they bring to their em- 
ployers, some sacred pledge, picked up on the sea shore, or a portion 
of the consecrated stream, possessed of incalculable efficacy in all their 
subsequent devotions. 
The late Teshoo Lama, I was told, had the merit of having thus 
performed his pilgrimages by proxy, to Cashi, Prag, Gunga Sagor, 
and Jagarnaut. Indeed, though these pilgrimages cannot be accom¬ 
plished, but at the imminent hazard, of the pilgrim’s falling a martyr to 
the intemperate heat of Hindostan, or to the enervating atmosphere of 
the low lands, yet an enthusiastic spirit is not to be repressed, by the 
melancholy fate of former adventurers. 
