gigantic figure standing on the golden lotus blossom, its
head lost in the shadows of the temple roof. They kissed its silken
draperies, soiled by the lips of other thousands, and each one
gathered a handful of sacred dirt from the temple floor. From niches
in the walls hundreds of tiny Buddhas gazed impassively on the
worshiping Mongols.

[Illustration: The Great Temple at Urga]

[Illustration: A Prayer Wheel and a Mongol Lama]

[Illustration: Lamas Calling the Gods at a Temple in Urga]

[Illustration: Mongol Praying at a Shrine in Urga]

The scene was intoxicating in its barbaric splendor. The women in
their fantastic headdresses and brilliant gowns; the blazing yellow
robes of the kneeling lamas; and the chorus of prayers which rose
and fell in a meaningless half-wild chant broken by the clash of
cymbals and the boom of drums--all this set the blood leaping in my
veins. There was a strange dizziness in my head, and I had an almost
overpowering desire to fall on my knees with the Mongols and join in
the chorus of adoration. The subtle smell of burning incense, the
brilliant colors, and the barbaric music were like an intoxicating
drink which inflamed the senses but dulled the brain. It was then
that I came nearest to understanding the religious fanaticism of the
East. Even with a background of twentieth-century civilization I
felt its sensuous power. What wonder that it has such a hold on a
simple, uneducated people, fed on superstition from earliest
childhood and the religious traditions of seven hundred years!

The service ended abruptly in a roar of sound. Rising to their feet,
the people streamed into the courtyard to whirl the prayer wheels
about the temple's base. Each wheel is a hollow cylinder of varying
size, standing on end, and embellished with Tibetan characters in
gold. The wheels are sometimes filled with thousands of slips of
paper upon which is written a prayer or a sacred thought, and each
revolution adds to the store of merit in the future life.

The Mongol goes farther still in accumulating virtue, and every
native house in Urga is gay with fluttering bits of cloth or paper
on which a prayer is written. Each time the little flag moves in the
wind it sends forth a supplication for the welfare of the Mongol's
spirit in the Buddhistic heaven. Not only are the prayer wheels
found about the temples, but they line the streets, and no visiting
Mongol need be deprived of trying the virtue of a new d