the pride of their most pious successors,—this also is familiar reading in Catholic history, and had its counterpart at Lhasa about the beginning of the eighteenth century, when the Potala (Vatican and St. Peter's combined) and other notable buildings were beautified and enlarged. The occasional prominence of the pontifical ` ` nephew" was also then illustrated in the person of Sangji Gyamtso, putative natural son of that celibate, the Dalai Lama, who had founded the Potala.
How familiar is this figure in royal and pontifical European records ! Talented, ambitious, unscrupulous, accomplished, the scandal and the pride of a Court and nation, this Sangji Gyamtso ruled as regent for many years. The death of his patron was for a long time cleverly concealed, and, even when announced, Gyamtso was able to give a satisfactory explanation of his duplicity. The troublous Mongol interventions gave reasons of state ; he retained his influence and, when a new Incarnation was to be discovered, was able to direct the directing spirits toward a dissolute youth, upon whom he had evidently lavished his destructive care since the date of the concealed death, nearly sixteen years before.
The Jesuit, Father Desideri, who was in Lhasa from 1716 to 1721, witnessed the last efforts of the Mongols from the north (this time from Dzungaria) to control Tibetan polity. The definite triumph of Chinese arms occurred in 172o, when Lhasa was taken from the foreign troops and the native faction which supported them. This European observer, who doubtless thought of the invariable pillage and
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