The Kalmucks, Like most of the other offshoots of the Mongol stock, are Buddhists, or rather Lamites. According to the opinion of all writers, Buddhism began in India, and Buddha, afterwards deified by his followers under the name of Dchakdchamouni, was its founder and first patriarch. Opposed by the fanaticism of the children of Brahma, the new creed made little progress, and appears to have been cruelly persecuted in the beginning. The learned researches of M. Abel Remusat have, however, demonstrated that there was a succession of twenty-eight Buddhist patriarchs in India. It was not until about A.D. 495, that Bodhidharma, impelled no doubt by the persecutions of the Brahmins, set out for China, where the doctrines of Buddha had already made considerable progress, as well as in Thibet and great part of Tartary. Eight centuries, nevertheless, elapsed before the successors of Bodhidharma emerged from their obscure and precarious condition: it was to the grand fortunes of the celebrated Genghis Khan they owed that royal splendour they afterwards enjoyed under the name of Dalai Lama.
According to Klaproth, the first traces of Buddhism are recorded in a Mongol book, entitled "The Source of the Heart," written in the time of Genghis Khan. It is there related that the conqueror, when about to enter the countries occupied by the Buddhists, sent an embassy to their patriarch with these words: "I have chosen thee for my high priest, and for that of my empire; repair to me; I give thee charge over the present and future weal of my people, and I will be thy protector." The desires of Genghis Khan were quickly fulfilled; from that time forth the patriarchs often resided at the conqueror's court, and their religion was at last adopted by the greatest Mongol warriors. In the reign of Genghis Khan's grandson, Buddhism was already become a power; and then it was that the high priests, assuming the title of Dalai Lama, fixed their residence in Thibet, where they continued to be treated as actual monarchs, until dissensions and rivalries destroyed all the prestige of their authority, and they became confounded with the other vassals of the empire of China.
When Buddhism installed itself in Thibet, that country was already peopled with Christians, and the Nestorians had many monasteries there. The religious tolerance of the Mongol monarchs was unlimited: all creeds enjoyed equal protection in their capital. The Christians were especially numerous in the imperial city, where they had a church with bells, and were long presided over by an Italian Archbishop. The effect of this general toleration, and of the potent action of the principles of Christianity, must necessarily have been to modify Buddhism to an important degree; and we believe, with M. Remusat, that we must refer to this period for the origin and explanation of the many points of analogy between it and the doctrines of Christians.
Pallas and Bergmann have written much on the religious cosmogony of the Kalmucks; we will follow them in their investigations, and endeavour to complete them by means of our own observations.
There was in the beginning an immense abyss, called Khoubi Saiagar, exceeding in length and depth 6,116,000 berez (about 12,000,000 leagues), and out of this abyss the Taingairis, or aerial spirits, existing from all eternity, drew forth the world. First rose fiery-coloured clouds, which gathered together until they dissolved into a heavy rain, every drop of which was as big as a chariot wheel, and thus was formed the universal sea. Soon afterwards there appeared on the surface of the waters an immense quantity of foam, white as milk, and out of it issued all living creatures, including the human race. We will say nothing of those hurricanes which, arising from the ten parts of the world, produced in the upper hemisphere that fantastic column, as lofty as the ocean is deep, round which revolve the various worlds of the Buddhist universe. But we cannot forbear to mention the ingenious explanation by which the astronomers of Thibet accounted for the periodical revolutions of the day. According to their sacred books, the mystic column has four faces, of different colours, argent, azure, or, and deep red. At sunrise the rays of the sun fall on the argent side, in the forenoon they are reflected from the azure, at noon from the gold, towards the close of day from the red surface, and the concealment of the orb behind the column is what produces night.