obligation for important constructive criticism on the book as a whole. To Major W. L. Campbell, British Political Representative in Tibet, Bhutan, and Sikkim during my sojourn in Gangtok, I am indebted for much encouragement and scholarly aid, and for the gift of two valuable paintings prepared by his orders in the chief monastery of Gyantse, Tibet, to illustrate the symbolism of the Bardo Thödol text, and herein reproduced. To his predecessor and successor in the same post, Sir Charles Bell, I am also a debtor for important advice at the outset of my Tibetan research, when in Darjeeling. To Mr. E. S. Bouchier, M.A. (Oxon.), F. R. Hist. S., author of Syria as a Roman Province, A Short History of Antioch, &c., my heartiest thanks are due for the assistance which he has so kindly rendered in reading the whole of this book when in proof.
Sardar Bahadur S.W. Laden La, Chief of Police, Darjeeling, who sent me to Gangtok with a letter of introduction to the late Lāma Kazi Dawa-Samdup, the translator of the Bardo Thödol; Dr. Johan Van Manen, Secretary of the Asiatic Society, Calcutta, who lent me Tibetan books which proved very helpful while the translation was taking shape, and who afterwards contributed advice concerning translations; and Dr. Cassius A. Pereira, of Colombo, Ceylon, who criticized parts of the Introduction in the light of Theravāda Buddhism, are among many others to whom my thanks are due.
Thus, under the best of auspices, this book is sent forth to the world, in the hope that it may contribute something to the sum total of Right Knowledge, and serve as one more spiritual strand in an unbreakable bond of good will and universal peace, binding East and West together in mutual respect and understanding, and in love such as overleaps every barrier of creed and caste and race.
Jesus College, Oxford,
Easter, 1927.
