3 OCTOBER 1908, Page 16

On Monday the Dalai Lama was received at Peking. He

arrived, as the Times correspondent tells us, in a special train, and the station was decorated, not ai for one coming to acknowledge the suzerainty of China, but as for an Empetete. Escorted by cavalry, preceded by trumpeters, and seated in an Imperial sedan-chair with yellow-clad bearers, the Dalai Lama passed to the yellow lamasery, which had been appointed as his residence. It was a picturesque procession of wild, sunburnt Tibetans, mounted on ponies, that wended its way through the streets with weird music. banners flying, and Imperial umbrellas carried behind the chair. Police were stationed every few yards, and perfect order was maintained: Hundreds of yellow-robed lamas met the pontiff and led the way to the lamasery. It was a strange spectacle for the Tibetans to witness Chinese sightseers following the pro- cession on bicycles along the broad macadamised roads. It was equally incongruous to see among the paraphernalia carried by the Tibetans field-glasses and cameras. The railways have changed Peking within ten years from an insanitary and untidy town into a modern city. The enter- raining description of it by the Times correspondent makes one acknowledge the reality of the New China about which so much has been said and written.