trail. This mellow yogin, an archetypal figure of the Tibetan plateau, is Shabkar Lama, Tsogdrug Rangdrol, author of The Flight of the Garuda.Shabkar Lama was the scion of a nomad family in a tribal area in the far northeast of the Tibetan ethnic region. In this area there were no aristocratic families ensconced in their hereditary castles producing tulkus for the local establishment monasteries in each generation. His tribal society was democratic and egalitarian. His wonderful life story reflects the humility of a beggar, the magnanimity of a saint without a shred of pretension or affectation, and the good humor and compassion of a man familiar with the hardship of life on the survival line. Lacking the advantages of a princely monastic education, he was a scholar nevertheless,but a scholar who wrote from experience, directly from his heart—he lived what he wrote and taught. Free of political and social bias, following the spirit of Dzogchen, he had no time for sectarian distinctions and took initiation and instruction from not only Nyingnn lanias but teachers of every school. It was this impartial ethos that was the foundation of the great nonsectarian revival in eastern Tibet in the nineteenth century. He heralded the great Khyentse Wangpo (i 820—92), Jamgon Kongtrul Lodro Taye (1813—99), Patrul Rinpoche (1808—87), and Mipam Jamyang Gyatso (i 846—1912), who were the figures most prominent in the full blooming of the eastern Tibetan renaissance.Shabkar Lama was born in Rebkong in Amdo in 1781. At this time the Gelugpa school dominated Amdo through its great