432. perennial spring, and periods for seed time and harvest are regulated by the taste of the husbandman. This statement has reference to the multitude of tanks which rendered agriculture independent of the periodical rains. Fa Hian speaks of the lofty monuments which were the memorials of Buddha, and of the gems and gold which adorned his statues at Anarajapoora. Amongst the most surprising of these was a figure in what he calls "blue jasper," inlaid with jewels and other precious materials, and holding in one hand a pearl of inestimable value. He describes the Bo-tree in terms which might almost be applied to its actual condition at the present day, and he states that they had recently erected a building to contain "the tooth of Buddha," which was exhibited to the pious in the middle of the third moon with processions and ceremonies which he minutely details.2 All this corresponds closely with the narrative of the Mahawanso. The sacred tooth of Buddha, called at that time Dáthá dhátu, and now the Dalada, had been brought to Ceylon a short time before Fa Hian's arrival in the reign of Kisti-Sri-Megha-warna, A.D. 311, in charge of a princess of Kalinga, who concealed it in the folds of her hair. And the Mahawanso with equal precision describes the procession as conducted by the king and by the assembled priests, in 1 It was whilst looking at this statue that FA HIAN encountered an incident which he has related with touching simplicity:-"Depuis que FA HIAN avait quitté la terre de Han, plusieurs années s'étaient écoulées; les gens avec lesquels il avait des rapports étaient tous des hommes de contrées étrangères. Les montagnes, les rivières, les herbes, les arbres, tout ce qui avait frappé ses yeux était nouveau pour lui. De plus, ceux qui avaient fait route avec lui, s'en étaient séparés, les uns s'étant arrêtés, et les autres étant morts. En réfléchissant au passé, son cœur était toujours rempli de pen- Fa Hian. 2 FA HIAN, Foě Kouě Ki, ch. xxxviii. p. 334-5. which the tooth was borne along the streets of Anaraja- A.D. poora amidst the veneration of the multitude.1 One of the most striking events in this period of Singhalese history was the murder of the king, Dhatu Sena, A. D. 459, by his son, who seized the throne under the title of Kasyapa I. The story of this outrage, which is highly illustrative of the superstition and cruelty of the age, is told with much feeling in the Mahawanso; the author of which, Mahanamo, was the uncle of the outraged king. Dhatu Sena was a descendant of the royal line, whose family were living in retirement during the usurpation of the Malabars, A. D. 434 to 459. As a youth he had embraced the priesthood, and his future eminence was foretold by an omen. "On a certain day, when chaunting at the foot of a tree, when a shower of rain fell, a cobra de capello encircled him with its folds and covered his book with its hood." He was educated by his uncle, Mahanamo, and in process of time, surrounding himself with adherents, he successfully attacked the Malabars, defeated two of their chiefs in succession, put three others to death, recovered the native sovereignty of Ceylon, “ and the religion which had been set aside by the foreigners, 1 Mahawanso, ch. xxxvii. p. 241, | 249. After the funeral rites of Gotama Buddha had been performed at Kusinara, B.C. 543, his "left canine tooth was carried to Dantapura, the capital of Kalinga, where it was preserved for 800 years. The King of Calinga, in the reign of Maha Sen, being on the point of engaging in a doubtful conflict, directed, in the event of defeat, that the sacred relic should be conveyed to Ceylon, whither it was accordingly taken as described (Rajavali, p. 240.) Between A.D. 1303 and 1315 the tooth was carried back to Southern India by the leader of an army, who invaded Ceylon and sacked Yapahoo, which was then the capital. The succeeding monarch, Prakrama III., went in person to Madura to negotiate its 66 surrender, and brought it back to TURNOUR'S Account of the Tooth 2 This is a frequent traditionary 459. A.D. he restored to its former ascendency." He recalled 459. the fugitive inhabitants to Anarajapoora; degraded the nobles who had intermarried with the Malabars, and vigorously addressed himself to repair the sacred edifices and to restore fertility to the lands which had been neglected during their hostile occupation by the strangers. He applied the jewels from his head-dress to replace the gems of which the statue of Buddha had been despoiled. The curled hair of the divine teacher was represented by sapphires, and the lock on his forehead by threads of gold. The family of the king consisted of two sons and a daughter, the latter married to his nephew, who "caused her to be flogged on the thighs with a whip although she had committed no offence;" on which the king, in his indignation, ordered the mother of her husband to be burned. His nephew and eldest son now conspired to dethrone him, and having made him a prisoner, the latter "raised the chatta" (the white parasol emblematic of royalty), and seized on the supreme power. Pressed by his son to discover the depository of his treasures, the captive king entreated to be taken to Kalawapi, under the pretence of pointing out the place of their concealment, but in reality with a determination to prepare for death, after having seen his early friend Mahanamo, and bathed in the great tank which he himself had formerly constructed. The usurper complied, and assigned for the journey a "carriage with broken wheels," the charioteer of which shared his store of 66 parched rice" with the fallen king. "Thus worldly prosperity," says Mahanamo, who lived to write the sad story of the interview, "is like the glimmering of lightning, and what reflecting man would devote himself to its pursuit!" The Raja approached his friend and, "from the manner these two persons discoursed, side by side, mutually quenching the fire of their afflictions, they appeared as if endowed with royal prosperity. Having allowed him to eat, the thero (Mahanamo) in various ways administered consolation and abstracted A.D. his mind from all desire to prolong his existence." The 459. king then bathed in the tank; and pointing to his friend and to it, "these," he exclaimed to the messengers," are all the treasures I possess." He was conducted back to the capital; and Kasyapa, suspecting that the king was concealing his riches for his second son, Mogallana, gave the order for his execution. Arrayed in royal insignia, he repaired to the prison of the raja, and continued to walk to and fro in his presence; till the king, perceiving his intention to wound his feelings, said mildly, "Lord of statesmen, I bear the same affection towards you as to Mogallana." The usurper smiled and shook his head; then stripping the king naked and casting him into chains, he built up a wall, imbedding him in it with his face towards the A.D. east, and enclosed it with clay: "thus the monarch Dhatu- 477. Sena, who was murdered by his son, united himself with Sakko the ruler of Devos."1 The parricide next directed his groom and his cook to assassinate his brother, who, however, escaped to the coast of India.2 Failing in the attempt, he repaired to Sihagiri, a place difficult of access to men, and having cleared it on all sides, he surrounded it with a rampart. He built three habitations, accessible only by flights of steps, and ornamented with figures of lions (siho), whence the fortress takes it name, Siha-giri, "the Lion Rock." Hither he carried the treasures of his father, and here he built a palace, " equal in beauty to the celestial mansion." He erected temples to Buddha, and 1 Mahawanso, ch. xxxviii. To this hideous incident Mahanamo adds the following curious moral: "This Raja Dhatu Sena, at the time he was improving the Kalawapi tank, observed a certain priest absorbed in meditation, and not being able to rouse him from abstraction, had him buried under the embankment by heaping earth over him. His own 66 living entombment was the retribu- I am indebted to the family of A.D. monasteries for his priests, but conscious of the enor 477. mity of his crimes, these endowments were conferred in the names of his minister and his children. Failing to "derive merit" from such acts, stung with remorse, and anxious to test public feeling, he enlarged his deeds of charity, he formed gardens at the capital; and planted groves of mangoes throughout the island. Desirous to enrich a wihara at Anarajapoora, he proposed to endow it with a village, but "the ministers of religion, regardful of the reproaches of the world, declined accepting gifts at the hands of a parricide. Kasyapa, bent on befriending them, dedicated the village to Buddha, after which they consented, on the ground that it was then the property of the divine teacher." Impelled, says the Mahawanso, by the irrepressible dread of a future existence, he strictly performed his "aposaka" 1 vows, practised the virtue of non-procrastination, acquired the "dathanga," and caused books to be written, and image and alms-edifices to be formed. Meanwhile, after an interval of eighteen years, Mogallana, having in his exile collected a sufficient force, returned from India to avenge the murder of his father 1 A lay devotee who takes on himself the obligation of asceticism without putting on the yellow robe. 2 The dathanga or "teles-dathanga" are the thirteen ordinances by which the cleaving to existence is destroyed, involving piety, abstinence, and self-mortification. - HARDY'S Eastern Monachism, ch. ii. p. 9. |