the living buddha does not die. his soul sometimes passes intothat of a child born on the day of his death and sometimestransfers itself to another being during the life of the buddha.

this new mortal dwelling of the sacred spirit of the buddha almostalways appears in the yurta of some poor tibetan or mongol family.

there is a reason of policy for this. if the buddha appears in thefamily of a rich prince, it could result in the elevation of afamily that would not yield obedience to the clergy (and such hashappened in the past), while on the other hand any poor, unknownfamily that becomes the heritor of the throne of jenghiz khanacquires riches and is readily submissive to the lamas. only threeor four living buddhas were of purely mongolian origin; theremainder were tibetans.

one of the councillors of the living buddha, lama-khan jassaktu,told me the following:

"in the monasteries at lhasa and tashi lumpo they are keptconstantly informed through letters from urga about the health ofthe living buddha. when his human body becomes old and the spiritof buddha strives to extricate itself, special solemn servicesbegin in the tibetan temples together with the telling of fortunesby astrology. these rites indicate the specially pious lamas whomust discover where the spirit of the buddha will be re-incarnated.

for this purpose they travel throughout the whole land and observe.

often god himself gives them signs and indications. sometimes thewhite wolf appears near the yurta of a poor shepherd or a lamb withtwo heads is born or a meteor falls from the sky. some lamas takefish from the sacred lake tangri nor and read on the scales thereofthe name of the new bogdo khan; others pick out stones whose cracksindicate to them where they must search and whom they must find;while others secrete themselves in narrow mountain ravines tolisten to the voices of the spirits of the mountains, pronouncingthe name of the new choice of the gods. when he is found, all thepossible information about his family is secretly collected andpresented to the most learned tashi lama, having the name oferdeni, "the great gem of learning," who, according to the runes oframa, verifies the selection. if he is in agreement with it, hesends a secret letter to the dalai lama, who holds a specialsacrifice in the temple of the "spirit of the mountains" andconfirms the election by putting his great seal on this letter ofthe tashi lama.

if the old living buddha be still alive, the name of his successoris kept a deep secret; if the spirit of buddha has already gone outfrom the body of bogdo khan, a special legation appears from tibetwith the new living buddha. the same process accompanies theelection of the gheghen and hutuktus in all the lamaite monasteriesin mongolia; but confirmation of the election resides with theliving buddha and is only announced to lhasa after the event.