'•^Igwetht/eBaokirjf'i.

'Yi^ILE-^MWJlI^SinrY-

Gift of
Henry H. Townshend
1925

#

E/ECOE/ID

OF THE

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS:
Translated from the Chinese

BY

HEEBEET A. GILES,
Of H. M.'s Consular Service.

London : TEUBNEE & CO.
Shanghai : .KELLY & WALSH.

£35*
399FVcL

PREFACE.

The " Eeoord of the Buddhistic Kingdoms " is a mea
gre narrative of one of the most extraordinary journeys
ever undertaken and brought to a successful issue. A
Buddhist priest, named Fa Hsien, travels from China
through India to Ceylon, on to Sumatra and back to
China by sea ; his object being to obtain copies of the
Sacred Books of Buddhism for the further enlightenment
of his fellow countrymen at home.
This work was translated into French by Eemusat, but
he did not live to superintend its publication. He had,
in fact, only revised about one half, that half being ac
companied by valuable and exhaustive notes. In this
state it fell — we were almost saying, among thieves — into
the hands of Klaproth, who, with the slender assistance of
Landresse and his own very considerable aplomb, managed
to fiU up the blanks of the latter portiop, add some bulky
notes after the manner, but lacking the scholarship, of
Eemusat, and generally patch up the whole in a form
presentable to the public. This was subsequently trans
lated into English by a Mr. Laidlay.
In 1869 the Eev. S. Beal, Chaplain in Her Majesty's

11 KECOED OF THK
Fleet, published a new version of the travels of Fa Hsien,
in which he corrected some of the mistakes, grammatical
and otherwise, which disfigured Eemusat's translation ;
but managed, it has appeared to us, to introduce in the
process a very considerable number of his own. Whe-
this is so or not we shall leave to the discrimination
of those of our readers who understand Chinese, and will
take the trouble to follow the notes in which we point out
Mr. Beal's errors, or seek to justify any renderings of
our own which may differ from those adopted by our
predecessors. We would submit that the present transla
tion was undertaken solely with a view to get at an
exact grammatical analysis of the text. We do not
pretend to have elucidated any new points in the great
field of Buddhism, or to have succeeded in identifying
any of the hitherto unknown or doubtful localities visited
or mentioned by Pa Hsien. This would be the province
of those who have devoted more time than ourselves to
the fascinating study of ancient geography ; — not, indeed,
that we mean to insinuate that translation is our own
particular province, for we would gladly have seen this
task in the hands of some such accomplished scholar as
Mayers, Edkins, or Eitel. In that case, future students
of the " Buddhistic Kingdoms " would have had at their
disposal an English version, proof against any criticism
that could be brought to bear. As it is, we can only hope
that the present translation will be found a much more
accurate rendering than that published by Mr. Beal, who
in the year 1869 seems to have been quite unqualified for
the task he undertook. He certainly corrected a great
many of Edmusat's blunders, speaking somewhat unctu
ously of the "looseness" of the French version, but we

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. HI
could not dismiss from our minds the unpleasant suspi
cion that Mr. Beal had drawn upon the valuable notes to
that despised volume to a greater extent than he was
frank enough to acknowledge. We shall avoid this im
putation by invariably quoting the sources of information
given ; and whenever we have occasion to raise a ques
tion as to the proper way of translating any passage, we
shall try to put the arguments for and against both views
before the reader in as impartial a manner as possible.
Our object will be to express the real meaning of the text
in the most simple language, unadorned with tawdry
flowers of composition : in fact, rather partaking of the
rugged, unpolished style of the original. We shall well-
come any strictures, however severe, that may lead us to
a better appreciation of this difficult author. We have
not spared the feelings of Mr. Beal, and we court no
quarter ourselves. For there is nothing disgraceful in
misunderstanding a sentence of Chinese; it need not
brand anyone with infamy or overwhelm him with shame.
In support of which dangerous theory and for the en
couragement of all erring students of Chinese, we will
now relate how a very extraordinary blunder was once
made by a celebrated sinologue, and escaped the eagle eye
of criticism for many years, during which period the au
thor of its existence rose to power and fame, and is now
Her Majesty's Minister at the Court of Peking.
In the Hsin Ching Lu, published in 1859 by Sir Thomas
Wade, a translation is given of the first chapter of the
well-known Sacred Edict. Paragraph 37, on page 50,
contains Sir Thomas Wade's rendering of a Chinese pro
verb quoted in the original text. For the benefit of those
who have not a copy of this work at hand we will give the

IT

KBOOBD OF THK

passage in Chinese, accompanied by Sir Thomas Wade's
version and what is unquestionably the correct one ; so
as to shew the slippery nature of the Chinese language
even in the hands of an acknowledged master of it, at
that date of fifteen years' standing among the ranks of
sinologues. ,

TEXT.

Sir ThomoB Wade'e
Translation: — " And
again a proverb says
With equal truth. It
may be well to kill
another ; it is perdi
tion to kill oneself."

rr

^

»

X

^

A

^

m

m

m

rr

n

B

^

s

fS^

The correct trani'
lation: — "And again
a proverb weU saya.
Good as those may
be, they are Strang-
ers; bad as these
may be, they are
(part of) oneseU."

The allusion is to quarrelling brothers who seem dis
posed to make friends among outsiders rather than of
each other, and the proverb signifies in plain English
that "A bad brother is better than a good stranger."
The catch lies in the word ^ which besides meaning
" to slay " is often used as an intensive of a preceding
adjective, e.g., ^ ^ — good beyond all expression. But
there is yet further consolation in store for the timorous.
Dr. Williams in his new dictionary, published after forty
years' study of Chinese, quotes the above proverb under
the character ^ with the following eccentric mistransla
tion : — "If you love the child greatly, yet he is another's :
" if you feel that he is a ruined child, still he is my own."
Dr. Williams further makes the mistake of reading f^
in the ^ ^, whereby he quite destroys the very clear
antithesis between flf and ^.
We need only add that Fa Hsieu's Beoord contains

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. V
many much more obscure passages than the trifling
proverb given above. The difficulty of correctly inter
preting the written language of China has long been a
household word ; and where even the strongest fall, the
weak need not be ashamed to slip.

OKIGINAL INTEODUCTION.^

The "Record of the Buddhistic Kingdoms," in one
volume, was composed by Sung Shih, otherwise called Fa
Hsien. Tu Yu^ in his T'ung Tien quotes this work, but
makes the author Fa Ming. He did so because the word
Hsien had been appropriated by the emperor Chung
Tsung,^ and men of the T'ang dynasty had substituted
Ming. For this reason there occur in the original com
mentary the four words " changed because imperially ap
propriated." Fa Hsien returned during the I Hsi period* of the Chin
dynasty, having started from Ch'ang-ngan and travelled
> This has never to our knowledge been translated before ; neither
have the two Notet by native scholars which follow Chapter XL. See
Appendix. * Here i^ •^. Mr. Mayers, in his Chinese Reader's Manual,
gives /^I jjiS, who is evidently the same individual.' " 9th century
A.D. A scholar of profound erudition.'' His great work, the jj ^t
is classed by Mr. WyUe in his Notes on Chinese Literature among
" Treatises on the Constitution." It was in 200 books, divided into
8 sections on Political Economy, Music, Geography, etc.
2 A.D. 648.
•• The style I Hsi began A.D. 405. Fa Hsien got back to China
in the twelfth year or A.D. 417.

Vlll EECOED OF THE
to India, passing through more than thirty countries. On
arriving at the capital, * he and a Buddhist priest put this
book together between them. Hu Chen-heng« had it cut
on blocks and entered in his private catalogue, naming it
on the cover according to its old designation, viz. —
" Eeeord of the Buddhistic Kingdoms." Yet in his note
at the end Cheng-heng says it ought to be called the
" Narrative of Fa Hsien." Now in Li Tao-yiian's com
mentary on the Shui Ching'' where he quotes " From this
point following the range, the pilgrims journeyed south
west for fifteen days"" and so on, eighty-nine words in
all; and where he quotes " On the upper Ganges there is
a country"" and so on, two hundred and seventy-six
words in all, — in both these cases he speaks of the " Nar
rative of Fa Hsien." Chen-heng's statement is therefore
not without authority. In the Miscellaneous Eecords of
the Sui dynasty 'there is an entry of the " Narrative of Fa
Hsien," in two volumes, and of the "Biography of Fa
Hsien," in one volume, the authors' names not being giv
en ; and in the Geographical Miscellany the " Eeeord of
the Buddhistic Kingdom," in one volume, is mentioned,
with a note saying that it was composed by the Buddhist
priest Fa Hsien. Thus we have two distinct entries in
one work and three separate names, so that it is not ab
solutely necessary to change the title to the " Narrative of
Fa Hsien."

» Nanking.
" A celebrated scholar of the Ming dynasty.
' The earliest work on the water-courses of China. Li Tao-yiian
flourished during the Northern Wei dynasty. WyUe.
' Chapter VII.
» Chapter XXV.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. IX
In this book we find India made the Middle Kingdom
and China treated as a foreign country. This is because
the ecclesiastics give precedence to their religion, which
anomaly is not worth arguing about. Again, Yii-t'ien,^ "
or as it is now called Ho-t'ien, has been from time imme
morial devoted to Mahommedanism, as is amply borne
out in " the Illustrated Notices of Western Countries,"
reproduced in the present dynasty by Imperial authority.
Yet Fa Hsien iuforms us that there were fourteen Bud
dhist monasteries and several tens of thousands of priests,
which statement we need not accept as literally true.
Nevertheless, the old Buddhistic records of the Six Dy
nasties have stood the test of time ; and since both the
style in which they are written is antique and elegant,
and as narratives they have not been equalled in later
generations, there is no reason why they should not be
preserved to extend the stock of information on such mar
vellous subjects.
In Fa Hsien's work we have " the third year of Hung
Shih, being the cyclical year Chi Hai." According to the
History of the Chin dynasty, speaking of Yao Ch'ang, the
second year of Hung Shih corresponds with the fourth
year of Lung Ngan, ^ ^ and should be the cyclical year
Keng Tzii. Fa Hsien's " Eeeord " is therefore one year
wrong. ^* On the other hand, the History of the Chin
dynasty (§ National Eecords), speaking of Chao Shih-hu,
1" Khoten.
" Or A.D. 400.
1 2 As Chi Hai £ "^ would be only the third year of Lung
Ngan, or A.D. 399. But, gi anting that the j:;! is not a misprint
for _, we make Fa Hsien to be two years wrong. For if the se
cond year of Hung Shih was ^ •}, the third would be ^ J; °'
A.D. 401,

X BEOOBD OF THE BUDDHISTIO laNQDOMS.
says the sixth year of Chien Wu corresponds with the
fifth year of Hsien K'ang, the cyclical characters being
Chi Hai ; but it is stated in the Chin-shih-lui 3 that on
the tablets of Chao Heng-shan and Li Chiin, as well as in
the ancestral hall of Hsi Men-pao, the sixth year of Chien
Wu is made to correspond with the cyclical year Keng
Tzu. This again is a mistake of a year. 1* The reason
is that at the above period the various States were sepa
rated from and contending with each other, and the style
of the reign was recklessly changed, sometimes annually,
sometimes even oftener, without there being any fixed rule.
Further, the North and South being divided, and events
being reported in various ways, it is diflBcult to decide
that history must necessarily be right and Fa Hsien
wrong. In the present edition, the original text is given
word for word, that the precept may be carried out of
" putting aside points of which we are in doubt," ^ '
Anonymous,

> ° A catalogue of inscriptions.
i4 Which the reader need not trouble himself to test.
" Imi Yil, Chapter U. ^ K P ^-

EECOED
OF THE
BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS,

CHAFTEE I,
Formerly, when Fa Hsien was at Ch'ang-an,^ he was
distressed at the imperfect state of the Disciplines ; ^ and,
subsequently, in the second year of Hung Shih, the Chi-
hai^ of the cycle, he agreed with Hui Ching, Tao Cheng,
Hui Ying, Hui Wei and others to go to India and try to
obtain these Disciplines. They started from Ch'ang-an,
crossed the Lung (mountains), and arrived at the country
of Ch'ien Kuei* where they spent the rainy season. The
rainy season over they went on to the country of Nou
CHAPTEB 1.
1. Now Hsi-an Fu "g -g JjJ, the capital of Shan-hsi |^ 'g'.
2. One of the three classes into which the Sacred Books of
Buddhism are divided : — (2) j^ ejiing, aphorisms (of Buddha him
self) ; (2) ^ lii, disciplines ; and (3) |j^ lun, discourses (on theo
logy, metaphysics etc).
3- G ^, or A.D. 399.
4. ^g 1^^ the name of a prince. Mr. Beal writes these two
characters Eon Kwei. ^ ^ Nou fan in the next sentence is
also the name of a prince.

2 EECOED OF THE
T'an, and crossing the Yang-lou range arrived at the
garrison city of Chang-yeh. Chang-yeh was in a state of
rebellion and the roads impassable ; and therefore the
Prince, being anxious about them,* kept them there at
his own expense." Thus they fell in with Chih Yen,
Hui Chien, Seng Shao, Pao Yiin, Seng Ching and others ;
and rejoicing to find their errands the same, they spent
the rainy season together. The rainy season over they
again went on to Tun-huang, where there is a fortified
encampment eighty li from east to west and forty U from
north to south.' Having stayed here one month and
some days. Fa Hsien and others, five in all, went on
ahead in the train of some officials", and where thus once
more separated from Pao Yiin and his colleagues. The
prefect^ of Tun-huang gave all necessaries for crossing
the desert (of Gobi). In this desert there are a great
many evil spirits, and hot winds. Those who encounter
them (the winds) perish to a man. There are neither
birds above nor beasts below. Gazing^" on all sides as
5. The words ^ Wl have been omitted by Mr. Beal.
6. Literary, " became their patron " ^ j^.
7. About 26 miles by 13. We may here notify the reader that
throughout this translation we shall keep to the Chinese measure
ments whether in li, feet, or inches. It is difficult to determine
what was the exact value of either at the time when this volume was
written. Julien fixes the li at J of the English mile, and the foot
may possibly have been near about what it is now — a little iMger
than the English foot.
8. The text has |^ -(g ^ ^. Eemusat gave, "a la suite de
quelques ambassadeurs," and it is difficult to get anything else out
of the text as it stands. Mr. Beal has, " made arrangements to set
out in advance of the others," which implies that he has changed
151 into 511, though he does not say so or even allude to the doubt
fulness of the passage. But see Chapter IV, note I.
9- ±*^-
10. Mr. Beal's rendering of the following sentence would be

BUDDHISTIO lUNGDOMS. 8
far as the eye can reach in order to mark the track, it
would be impossible to succeed but for the rotting bones
of dead men which point the way. After travelling se
venteen days, about 1,500 li, they arrived at the country
of Shan-shan.'^^ CHAPTEE n.
This land is rugged and barren. The clothes of the
people are coarse, like those of the Chinese, the only dif
ference being that they use felt and serge. '^ The King of
the country is a convert^ to Buddhism. There may be
some 4,000 priests, all belonging to the Lesser Develop
ment.' The religion of India is universal among the
people and Shamans* of these* kingdoms : but there are
distinctions of refinement and coarseness (in their
practice of it). From this point travelling westwards,
the nations that one passes through are aU the same in
this respect, except that the Tartar dialects they speak are
rather a hindrance than an aid to the student of the text. He has
avoided the difficulties of construction by giving a not over correct
paraphrase. 11. " At present called the desert of Makhai." BeaU
CHATEB II.
1. This ^ is stUl commonly used in Peking by the working
classes. Peking carters are often called fl^ f^ •?.
2. Mr. Beal has " well affected to ; " but ^ ^^ V stronger than
that. Cf. ^ ^, used in the present day for actual conversion to
Christianity. 3. "La petite translation consiste dans la morale et le cults
extfirieur." RSmusat. The Hinayana.
4. Ascetics.
5. The word ^ chu, all, frequently precedes ^ in this nai»
rative with the meaning we have here given to it.

4 BECOED OF THE
not the same. However the Buddhist priests all study
Indian books and the Indian spoken language. (Fa Hsien
and his companions) having stayed here somewhat more
than a month, again travelled north-west for fifteen days
and arrived at the country called Wu-i.» The priests of
the Wu-i country also number over 4,000, aU belonging to
the Lesser Development, The rehgious observances are
properly attended to. ' When the Shamans of the land
of Ch'in^ arrive here, they are all unprepared" for the
rites of these priests. Fa Hsien having obtained the
protection of Fu Hsing-t'ang and Kung-sun^" remained
6. 1^ ^. B^musat changes ^ into '^ " qui a la mgme
valeur," and explains it as the Ouigour country.
7. The text has J'^ glj ^ ^ which Mr. Beal wrongly joins
to the following sentence and translates " When Fah Tsih and Tsai
Tch'ang (two Buddhist priests of the land of Thsin, arrived at this
country, they were unable to conform to some of the customs of the
rehgious community)." For the four characters quoted above Ee
musat has "Us sont, quant £l la loi, exacts et bien regies," in which
he mistakes ^l] for a particle. But ^ glj is quite as common a
term as S^ ^Ij . Mr. Beal's rendering is absurd.
8. ^ China, from the name of " a feudal state which arose
with Fei-tsz' Mfe ^ B.C. 897, and gradually extended over the
whole of Shensi and Eansuh, tUl, in B.C. 221, under the Emperor
First .^ ^ 4 "i^ it subdued all China, and was called the Ts'in
dynasty." Willianis.
9. Unaccustomed to.
10. This passage has been a stumbling-block to M. Efimusat and
Mr. Beal aUke ; in fact, the latter follows servilely the extraordinary
translation of his predecessor. The text runs, — 9^ ^ •^ -^ fx
^ & W. MM ji^ ^ ^.' ^^^ °"' of ttiese characters
Mr. Beal sees no difficulty in extracting this result : — " Fa Hian,
therefore, having obtained a pass, proceeded to the palace (hall) of
the reigning Prince, Kuug Sun, where he remained two months and
some days." There is some excuse for Bgmusat who only wrote
out his translation in the rough and never put the finishing touches ;
bvl-t what is to be urged in deference to Mr. Beal who can calmly hand
ovei such a version to the uninitiated pubho without even hinting that

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. O
two months and some days after which he returned to
Pao Yuu and tlie others. ^^ They all agreed that the
people of the Wu-i country did not cultivate politeness or
their duty towards their neighbour,^'' and werecold^*
in their treatment of strangers. Subsequently,'^'' Chih
Yen, Hui Chien, and Hui Wei went back to Kao-ch'ang
in order to obtain necessaries for the journey ; but Fa
Hsien and his party, being provided with these things by
Fu and Kung-sun, went on forthwith towards the south
east. The country was uninhabited, and the difficulties
of travelling by land and water and the hardships they
went through were beyond all comparison. After being
on the road a month and five days they arrived at
Yii-t'ien.^* CHAPTER m.
This country is fertile and prosperous. The people
are well off and all converts to Buddhism. They play
rehgious music to each other for amusement.^ The
there is a difficulty of any kind? Of the correctness of our own
translation there can be no reasonable doubt, and the only stone an
adverse critic could possible oast is one that we shall anticipate him
by throwing om'selves. It is rather unusual to give the surname
^ and name i§ of one of two people (Fu Hsing-t'ang), and only
the surname of the other (Kung-sun) . But almost in the next line
they are spoken of as Fu and Kung-Sun.
11. Who, as Mr. Beal justly supposes, had by this time arrived
at the Wu-i country.
12. ^ which Mr. Beal omits as if it were part of jj^.
13. Literally, thin ^.
14. The whole of this passage differs grammatically speaking
from MM. Efimusat and Beal's translations, though the general
sense is the same.
15. Khoten. Bemusat. CHAPTBK III.
1. M. Eemusat:— "o'est la loi qui leur procure la fglicitS dont

6 EECOED OF THE
priests number several tens of thousands, » mostly belong
ing to the Greater Development. ^ They all obtain their
food from a common fund.* The people live scattered
about;* and before the door of every house they build
small pagodas. The smallest may be about two change
high. They build houses for travelling priests' and en
tertain all who arrive, giving them anything else they
may want. The King of the country lodged Fa Hsien
and his companions comfortably in a monastery called Chii-
ma-ti belonging to the Greater Development. At the sound
of the gong," three thousand priests assemble to eat.
ils jouissent." Mr. Beal : — " take dehght in attending to ther re
ligious duties." The text:— j^ fi ^ ^ ^. The character ^
is here unquestionably yo music, and not le joy. We also venture
to think that our own translation is the only one which disposes
satisfactorily of (JQ " to each other."
2. Mr. Beal translates "ten thousand men," and says he prefers
" taking sho as a verb." But such a preference is totally uncalled
for and inadmissible.
3. "La grande translation a pour base une theologie abstruse,
une ontologie raffin^e, le mysticisme le plus exalte." Bemusat.
The Mahayama.
4. The text is ^ ^ ^ ^, and it is truly somewhat tempt
ing to copy Mr. Beal and make them aU sit down to dinner together.
But the sentence means that there is a single fund for the support
of all the priests, and that the revenues of the various temples,
contributions of subscribers &o., are all thrown into a common stock
from which an allowance of so much is made for the keep of each
member. This rendering is confirmed later on, where the numbers
mentioned are too great to admit of Mr. Beal's translation.
S- A ^ M. ^- Mr. Beal says "this is a perplexing passage,"
but the phrase is common enough in ordinary books, novels, and
of ten met with in proclamations. Compare M S^ M. //ti.
6. Twenty Chinese feet.
''• ED ^ M- LiteraUy, " priests from the fom- quarters." Mr.
Beal makes this improvement on Ei^musat's " de forme carree "
8. The text i^ - ^ ff ij tfi ;J3| :^. Mr. Beal's note saya
" Kien for Kien-ti, i. e., GhantS or Gong." We have nothing better
to ofler, and commit this sentence to the ingenuity of our readers.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS, 7
When they enter the refectory their demeanour is grave
and orderly : they sit down in a regular order ; they all
keep silence; they make no noise with their bowls etc.;
and when the attendants ^ serve more food they do not
call out to each other but only make signs with their
hands. ^0 Hui Ching, Tao Cheng, and Hui Ta, started
in advance towards the country of Chieh-ch'a, but Fa
Hsien and the others wishing to see the procession of the
images remained three months and some days. In this
country there are fourteen large monasteries without
counting the smaller ones. Beginning on the 1st of the
4th moon, they sweep and water the streets inside the city
and decorate the principal thoroughfares. Over the city
gate they stretch a large awning with all kinds of orna
mentation, and there the King and Queen^^ and maids-
of-honour reside. The priests of the Chii-ma-ti monas
tery belong to the Greater Development, which ^^ is
At the same time we must object to Mr. Beal's idea that the three
thousand priests take their meal together, it only implies that the
hour was the same.
9- ^ A ^^ heen utterly ignored by M. Beal whose transla
tion is otherwise a considerable improvement on Eemusat's absurd
rendering. Mr. Beal gives "when they (i. e. the priests) require
more food there is no chattering one with the other, but etc."
Now as we have just been told that " they all keep sUence " it would
seem unnecessary to repeat the remark in another form. Further
^ never means to chatter. The TS} J\^ are the menials who wait
upon the priests. Their heads are shaved but have not been branded
with three (or more) marks ^ J^ that are the pride of an ordained
priest, and signify to the public that he lias rfinounoecl for ever flesh,
wine and woman.
10. Mr. Beal wrongly joins ^ with ^, and translates it
" fingers," instead of with ^. The text is fg £][ ^ ^ ^.
11. The text is ^ JJ ^ A ?i< "iC- ^^- ^^^^ translates
"the King and the court ladies, with their attendants."
12. Not the priests, as Mr. Beal renders it in defiance of grammar.

EECOED OF THE

deeply venerated by -the King. They take the first place
in the processions. At a distance of three or four li from
the city a four-wheeled image car is made, over thirty
(Chinese) feet in height, looking like a movable pavihon,
and adorned with the seven precious substances,^' with
streaming pennants and embroidered canopies. The
image is placed in the middle^of the car, with two attend
ants P'u-sas^" and followed by all the demi-gods. These
are beautifully carved in gold and silver, and suspended
in the air.^* When the image is one hundred paces
from the city gate, the King takes off his cap of state and
puts on new clothes. Then, barefoot, holding flowers
and incense in his hand, he proceeds with his attendants
out of the gate to meet the image, bows down his head to
the ground, scatters the flowers and burns the incense.
When the image enters the city, the Queen and maids-of-
honour on the top of the gate scatter far and wide^«
all kinds of flowers, which fall in clouds, and thus
decorate the implements of worship.^' The cars are
all different; and each monastery has a day for its
procession, ^8 beginning at the 1st of the 4th moon
and lasting to the 14th when the processions terminate
13. Gold, sUver, emeralds, crystal, rubies, amber, and agate.
14. Bodhisatvas.
15. The text reads "^ # ^ ^ ^ ^ J5§ ^ ^. Mr.
Beal translates, "all are made of gold and silver, whilst gUttering
gems are hung suspended in the air." He lias put the comma on
the wrong side of ^.
le. The text ia, ^ ^ |^ ^. Mr. Beal skips over the
puzzling ^.
17. ia -^M ^^M- ^^^- Eeal translates the two middle
words as "sumptuously," and either includes therein or omits
altogether the two following words ¦^ M. .
18. A friend would persuade us to "render this passage as if a
single procession of images visited the different monasteries in tui-u.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 9
and the King and Queen go back to their palace. Seveu
or eight li to the west of this city there is a monastery
called the Wang-hsin Temple. It took eighty years to
build, and tJie reigns of three Kings before it was com
pleted. '¦s It may be two hundred and fifty feet high,
and is ornamentally carved and inlaid,'^" and covered
with gold and silver. All kinds of jewels combine to
complete (its magnificence). Behind the tower there is
an oratory, decorated most splendidly. The beams,
pillars, folding doors, and windows, are all gilt. Besides
this there are apartments for the priests, also beautifully
ornamented beyond all expression. All the kings of the
six countries to the east of the hills make large offerings
of whatsoever very valuable jewels they may have, using
very few themselves. ^^^ CHAPTEE IV.
The processions of the fourth moon being over, one of
the party, Seng Shao, set out with a Tartar Buddhist^
19. A simple enough specimen of Chinese grammer, but one
which Mr. Beal has utterly misunderstood, and rendered, "During
the last eighty years three kings have contributed towards its com-
pletion. The text has f|; Jjc ;^ _j- ^ ^ £ J -^ jjjj.
Bemusat's translation is correct.
20. We fail to see how Mr. Beal gets " There are many inscribed
plates of gold and silver within it " out of ^ ^ ^1 ^ ^ ^
m±-
21. Whatever these last four characters A ffl ^ ^ ^^^
mean, Mr. Seal's rendering " in such abundance that bat few of
them can be used" is quite out of the question. They seem to us
simply to signify that jewels were not much used by tha people
of that country. CHAPTEB rv.
!• ^ ils ?^ A' Efemusat: — "alasuited'unprctre barbare."

10 EECOED OF THE
towards Cbi-pin.'' Fa Ilaien and the others went on to
the Tzu-ho country where they arrived after a journey of
twenty-five days. The king of the country is devoted to
(Buddhism). 3 There are more than a thousand priests,
mostly belonging to the Greater Development. After
stopping here fifteen days, the party went south for four
days, and entering the Onion range arrived at the
country of Yii-hui, where they rested. When their rest
was over,'' they journeyed twenty-five days and arrived at
the country of Chieh-ch'a,* where they rejoined Hui Ching
and the others. CHAPTER Y.
The King of this country holds the Pan-che-yueh-shUi.
The Pan-che-yiieh-shih is in Chinese a, five-year s-gi-eat -as
sembly. At the time of the assembly he invites Shamans
from all quarters, and they come in vast numbers.^ The
place where the priests sit is adorned beforehand^ with
streaming pennants and canopies embroidered with lotus-
flowers in gold and silver. The backs of the seats are
Beal: — "in company with a faUow-disciple belonging to the country
cf the Ouigours."
2. " La Cophgne ou le pays arrose par le Cophes.'' Bemusat.
3. The text has ^ J ^ jg. Mr. Beal gives " The king of
the country, by the determined energy of his character," adding in a
note that " this translation is doubtful.'' We heartily agree with
him. 4. Mr. Beal says this must be Kartohou.
CHAriEK V.
1. Literally, " in clouds."
2. g^ i has been the same force as ^g. Mr. Beal joins it on
to the Jast sentence, but it is only foir't'o suppose that all these
nrmugemonts were made before the arrival of the Shamans.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 11
covered with spotless drapery, etc' The King with all
his ministers make their offerings according to rite. It
may last for one,'' two, or three months, and is generally
in the spring. The King, when the assembly is over,
further bids all his ministers arrange offerings for pre
sentation,* which may last one, two, three, or five days.
When all the offerings have been made, the King takes
his own horse,. saddle, and bridle, with those ridden by
his prime minister and high officials ;^ also much white
cloth and all lands of jewels, such as the Shamans re
quire, and together with his ministers vows to give these
things as alms (to the Shamans.) When they have been
thus given as alms, they are redeemed from the priests
with money. This country is mountainous and cold.
With the exception of wheat uo grain will grow and ripen.
When the priests have " gathered in tbeif harvest' (or,
3. Mr. Beal's translation of the last two sentences is : — " They
then proceed to decorate the priests' session-place with silken flags
and canopies. (In the midst) they erect a draped throne adorned
with gold and silver lotus flowers, and behind it they arrange the
seats for the priests." The text runs thus : — E^ i0t J^ ?R fa" ^
It is a very difficult passage.
4. Mr. Beal follows Klaproth and makes — ^ the first month
of the year. This translation is unquestionably wrong.
5. A second ceremony in which the King takes no part.
6. A most unsatisfactory passage, of which we do not profess to
have found the translation, but only a guess at the meaning. Mr.
Beal, however, trips hghtly through it as usual, without hinting at
its obscurity. We gladly transfer it to the ingenious reader : — •
xxxx|l|3;flj-S|.
7. We quote Mr. Beal's translation, which is based on Bemusat's.
having nothing better to offer ; but we only accept it under protest.
The text reads^ fW^ IS ^ E • ¦^°^ ^ often means harvest,
but ^ does not mean to collect it. J[^ in the _Il ^ ^ is to
gather in (a harvest).

12 EECOP.D OF THE
"received their dues,") the mornings forthwith become
frosty." Therefore the King regularly begs the priests to
make the wheat ripen before they collect their harvest.
In this country there is a spittoon that belonged to
Buddha, made of stone and of the same colour as
Buddha's alms-bowl. There is also one of Buddha's teeth,
and in honour » of this tooth the people of the country
have built a pagoda. There are more than one thousand
priests, all belonging to the Lesser Development. From
the hiUs eastward the people wear coarse clothes like the
Chinese, but also^° differing in their use of felt and serge.
The rites and ceremonies of the Shamans are varied, and
too numerous to mention. This country is in the middle
of the Onion range, and from this point onwards all plants,
trees, and fruits, are different from those of China, with
the exception of the bamboo, guava,^^ and sugar-cane.
CHAPTER VI.
From this point travelling westwards towards North
India, the pilgrims after a journey of one month succeed
ed in crossing the Onion range. On the Onion range
there is snow winter and summer alike. There are also
venomenous dragons, which, if provoked,^ spit forth poison-
8. ^ ^ ^U ^. Mr. Beal: — "the weather becomes cloudy
and overcast."
9. ^, which Mr. Beal translates "over" (the tooth).
10. That this, as in Chapter 2.
11. Mr. Beal says " pomegranate," but the text gives ^ ^ ^
which we believe to be the guava. CH-iPTEE VI.
1. Mr. Beal liaa thus happily rendered ^ ^ ^ ^ ; but he

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. l.*i
ed winds, raiu, snow, sand-storms, and stones. Of tliose
viho encounter these dangers not one in ten thousand
escapes. The people of that country are called "men of
" Snowy Hills." Having passed these mountains, they
arrived in North India. Just at the frontier, there is a
small nation called T'o-h, which also has priests, all of
the Lesser Development. In this country there was for
merly a Lo-han,- who using the power of transportation,
carried a clever artisan up to the Tou-shu Heaven ' to ob
serve the length, breadth, colour and features of the Mi
le ^ P'u-sa, that- when he returned he might carve an
image of him in wood. Altogether he made three jour
neys of observation, and afterwards completed an image
eighty feet in length, the foot* of which is eight feet long.
On fast-days it always shines with a brilliant light. The
kings of these countries vie with each other in making
offerings to it. It has been for a long time in this coun-
try. CHAPTER VII.
Along the mountains, in a south-westerly direction,
they journeyed for fifteen days, over a difficult, precipi
tous, and very dangerous road.^ The mountains are
has made a terrible muddle of the next sentence by putting a full
stop at ^poison and making the wind, raiu etc., a separate affair
from the dragons.
2. .An Arhaii or saint. The eighteen Lo-han were Buddha's
personal disciples.
3. " The Tushita Heavens." Beal.
4. Maitreya Bodhisatva, the " laughing god " of Chinese temples,
and the "expected" Buddha.
5. The text has J£, ^ /V J^. Of {^ which usually means
"to sit cross-legged," we can give no satisfactory explanation.
CHAPTER VII.
1. Mr. Beal has quite mistaken the parsing of this passage.

14 EBCORD OP THE
like a stoue walll,000jVu2 in height. Coming near the
edge, the sight gets confused ; and wishing to advance,
the foot finds no resting-place. ¦! Below there is a river
by name Hsin-t'ou. The men of former times cut away
the rock to form a path, making a ladder of the side of the
rock, seven hundred steps in all. Having got down the
ladder, tJie river is crossed by a bridge of ropes. The
two banks of the river by are somewhat less than eighty
paces apart. According to the Chiu-yi,* neither Chang
Ch'ien nor Kan Ying of the Han dynasty reached this
point. The priests asked Fa Hsien if he knew when Bud
dhism first went eastwards. Fa Hsien rephed, " When
" I asked the people of those parts they aU said that ac-
"cordingtoan old tradition Shamans from India began
' ' to bring the Aphorisms and Disciplines across this river
"from the date of putting up the image of Maitreya Bod-
"hisatva." This image was put up about three hundred
years after the Nirvana of Buddha, v.hich corresponds
with the reign of P'ing-waug* of the Chou dynasty, and
from this date it was said that the Great Teaching began
to be spread abroad at the setting up of the image. That
^ M ii PI S ^ ^ if€- He translates it, "The real is
difficult and fatiguing. Steep crags and pricipices constantly inter
cept the way." We do not see whence he gets all this. We make
of it 1 demonstrative pronoun, 1 substantire, 2 dissyllabic adjectives,
1 monosyllabic ditto, and one adverb.
2. Ajen is about 10 feet.
3. Mr. Beal adds,— "and you are lost,"— from his own inner
consciousness. 4- -Jit ,^ j'Jj 'IS- ECmusat suggests ^, and Klaproth »
stop at pjj, i. e. "nine fords." But there was a work called the
iL #H .|f i|5 IE o" ¦which was based the J^ |^ |£ to which
this passage evidently refers. It is a topographical description of
the Empire.
C. 770—719 B.C.

BUDDHISTIC KIXGDOMS. 15
but for the transmission of Sakya's doctrines by the
mighty Maitreya, none could have caused the Three Pre
cious Ones" to be preached abroad and foreigners' to
become acquainted with the faith. That the revelation
of tliese mysteries was clearly not the work of man, and
that thus the dream of Ming-ti of the Han dynasty was
not without foundation." CHPTEE VIII.
Crossing the river, the pilgrims arrived at the country
of Wu-ch'ang. This country is due north of India. The
language of Central India is universally used. Central In
dia is the same as the Middle Kingdom. The clothes and
food of the people are also like those of the Middle King
dom.'' The religion of Buddha is very flourishing. '^ The
places where the priests live permanently are called Seng-
chia-lan. There are altogether five hundred of them, all
belonging to the Lesser Development. If any wandering
mendicants^ arrive, they will take charge of all' of
6. The Buddhist Trinity of Buddha, the Law, and the Church.
7. ^ ^, translated by Mr. Beal "men on the outskirts of the
world." 8. This is aU clearly what " was said." Mr. Beal's translation of
the concluding sentence appears to us rather mixed. ^ -^1 S
^ :t PI * ^M*. * ij mm:tm^^ mm £
" We may conclude therefore, with certainty, that the origin of the
difiusion of the law of Buddha was no human work but sprang f i-om
the same cause as the dream of Ming-ti."
This dream was supposed to refer to Buddhismjf and led to an
expedition to bring back the sacred books.
CHAPTET vnl.
1. Mr. Beal evidently puts a stop before ^ ; we, after it, ^ ^
being a common phrase.
2. A Pi-ch'iu, or Bikshu.
3. The jg all does not refer to the priests as Mr. Beal gives it.

16 RECORD OF TUE
them for three days, after which they bid them shift for
themselves.* Tradition says when Buddha came to
Northern India he visited this country. Buddha left a
foot-print here which appears large or small according to
the faith of each particular person. It exists to this
day. Also the stone he dried his clothes upon, and the
place where he converted the wicked dragon, are still to
be seen. The stone is fourteen feet high by more than
twenty feet in breadth. One side of it is smooth. Hui-
ching, Tao-cheng, and Hui-ta, went on ahead towards
Buddha's shadow in the country of Na-chieh.* Fa Haien
and the others remained in this country (Wu-ch'ang) for
the rainy season. When it was over they went south tili
they arrived at the country of Su-ho-to,
CHAPTER IX.
In this country Buddhism is also popular. Of old, the
heavenly Indra Shakra, in order to try the Bodhisatva,^
changed himself into a kite and a dove.^ (The Bodhisatva)
cut off a piece of his flesh to ransom the dove, and on the
spot perfected his inteUigence as a Buddha.' Subse-
4. The text tas JQ' jg ^ fg ^ — jt; |^. Mr- Beal
says, — " The stone is about 12 feet high and 24 feet square."
5. NagarahSra. Bemusat. CHAPTEK IS.
I. That is, Buddha in an earlier stage.
2. Mr. Beal translates ^ ¦j'-^ as " caused the appearance of (a
hawk &o.)" Either will do. In this particular case, his is perhaps
the better.
3. The passage is worth quoting :_f|j I^ ^ ^ ;^ ^ lU
nKMMm^Wtm^^^- Mr. Beal translates it,—
^' (On which, Bodhisatwa), tearing his own flesh, gave it in substitu-

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 17
quently, when wandering with his disciples, he said,
" This is the very spot where I cut off my flesh to ransom
the dove." Thus the people of the country came to
know, and erected at the place a pagoda adorned with
gold and silver. CHAPTER X.
From this point descending eastwards for five days,
they arrived at the country of Chien-t'o-wei, which was
governed by Fa Yi the son of King A Yii. ^ When Buddha
was a Bodhisatva he also sacrificed his eyes for a fellow-
creature, and on that spot too a pagoda has been built
adorned with gold and silver. The inhabitants of this
country belong principally to the Lesser Development. "
CHAPTER XI.
From this point travelling eastwards for seven days
there is a country called Chu-ch'a-shih-lo, which in Chi
nese means " to cut off the head."^ When Buddha was
tion for that of the bird. When Buddha had arrived at complete
wisdom, he passed by this place with his disciples, on which he spake
to them thus : " That is to say he puts a full stops a ^^, leaves out
^ altogether, and begins a new paragraph at /[^.
CHAPTER X.
1. Asoka.
2. This last sentence has been inadvertently left out by Mr. Beal.
CHAPTER XI.
1. We cannot pass over this literal translation of ^ ^M ^i*-
out mentioning that these words have a common metaphorical
meaning of "to enter the priest-hood," taken from the custom of
confining the hair with a metal ring called a ^ . 4 very usual
phrase is ^ ^f |^ ^^—When did you become a priest 1 Priest*

18 RECORD OF THE
a Bodhisatva he sacrificed his head for a fellow- creaiure.
Hence the name. Again travelling eastwards for two
days the pilgrims arrived at the place where he gave his
body to feed a hungry tiger. In these two places there
are also great pagodas, adorned with all kinds of precious
stones. The Kings, Ministers, and people of all the neigh
bouring countries vie with each other in making offerings,
in scattering flowers and lighting lamps' without inter
mission. Together with the above-mentioned two pagodas,
the people of the district call these the Four Great Pagodas.
CHAPTER xn.
From the Chien-t'o-wei country travelling southwards
two days, the pilgrims arrived at the country of Fo-lou-
sha. Formerly, Buddha visiting this nation in company
with all his disciples, said to A-nan, "After my Nirvana,
" a king of this country, byname Chi-ni-chia, > wLU build
" a pagoda on this spot." Subsequently, when Chi-ni-
chia came into the world and was making a tour of
inspection, 2 the heavealy Indra Shakra, wishing to
originate in him the idea, changed himself into a shepherd
boy building a pagoda in the road. The king asked
who do not shave the head and wear these metal (often gold) rings
to confine the hair, are called Lo-hans. (Arhans). But even
ordinary priests with shaven heads frequently wear thera. Ti.le
Shun-pao of 13th September 1876, under the heading ^ fl' Ui ^
where we have # ^ ^ ^.
2. Mr. Beal translates ^ jj^ by "burning incense."
CHAPTER XII.
1. Kanishka.
2. We have borrowed this rendering from Mr. Beal. The text has
Hi ^ .5^ HI- II# Bemusat gives "• • se mit a vovager. Et
comme il parcourait oe pays * • "

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 19
the boy, saying, " What are you doing ? " He replied
" I am making a pagoda for Buddha." The king said
" Very good," and at once built a pagoda over the boy's
more than 400 feet high, and adorned with all kinds of
precious stones. Of all the pagodas and temples the
pilgrims saw, not one could be compared with this for
sohdity and beauty. ' Tradition says that of the pagodas
of Ko-fu-fi-* this is the highest. When the king had
completed this pagoda, the small pagoda issued from the
south side of the great pagoda, over three feet in height.
Buddha's alms-bowl is in this country, and formerly a
king of the Yiieh-shih got together a large army to attack
this country, wishing to carry it off. When he had
subdued the country, being an ardent supporter of
Buddhism, he wanted to take the bowl away
with him ; and accordingly, having first made
offerings to the Three Precious Ones, he decorated
a huge elephant and put the bowl on its back.
The elephant then fell down and was unable to move.
Then a four-wheeled cart was made, and the bowl being
put in it, eight elephants were harnessed to draw it.
When again they were unable to move, the King knew
that its time had not yet come, 5 and was full of shame
3. Mr. Beal is here guilty of a very serious mistranslation. Fol
lowing in ESmusat's footsteps, he renders this passage, — " all who
passed by and saw the exquisite beauty and graceful proportions of
the tower and the temple attached to it, exclaimed in deljght, " these
are incomparable tor beauty." The text is /ii ^ fJ^ ^ ip- ;®
4. " Jambudwipa, the continent to the south of Mount Sumeru,
which according to Chinese Buddhists includes both India and
China." Beal.
5. Mr. Beal says " that the destiny of the alms-bowl (in that
kingdom) was not completed." ^ ^0 M ^'^ ^ ^ ^''

20 RECORD OF THE
and regret. Therefore he built a pagoda on that spot,
and also a monastery, leaving a garrison' to guard the
bowl, and making all kinds of ofl'erings. There may be
about 700 priests. When it is near midday, the priests
bring out the bowl, and together with the people make all
kinds of offerings. They then eat their midday meal;'
and in the evening, at the time of burning incense, they
bring it out again. It might hold over two gallons, and
is of several colours, chiefly black. The four joinings are
clearly distinguishable. ^ It is about i of an inch" thick,
and is transparent^" and bright. Poor people throw a
few flowers in, and it is fuU ; but very rich people, wish
ing to make offering of a large quantity of flowers, (may
throw in), a hundred, thousand, or ten thousand bush
els without filling it. Pao Yiin and Seng Ching mere
ly made their offerings to the bowl and went back.
Hui Ching, Hui Ta and Tao Cheng, had previously
gone on to the country of Na-chieh to worship Bud
dha's shadow, tooth, and skull-bone. Hui Ching fell Ul,
and Tao Cheng remained to nurse him. Hui Ta came

literally, — "the king knew that his (connection) with the bowl (and
the bowl's) connection (with him) had not arrived."
6. Mr. Beal translates f^^^^^y" delayed his own de
parture, and remained to guard the relic."
7. This and the following sentence have been wrongly rendered
by Mr. Beal : — "So again, after the midday meal, as evening ap
proaches, at the time of burning incense (i. e. evening service), they
do Ukewise."— an unpardonable translation of #S ^ 4* ^ M
mmmm m m.
8. Being originally four bowls made into one by a fiat of Buddha.
Mr, Beal gives " The seams where the four parts join together are
bright." 23 ^^ BJ- (The italics may well be ours.)
9. The text has — ^. Mr. Beal says " two inches."
10. Surely this is meant by ^. Mr. Beal gives " poUshed."

BUDDUISTIC KIXGDOMS. 21
back aloue to the Fo-lou-sha country where he met (the
others), and then Hui Ta, Pao Yiin, and Seng Ching, re
turned to China. Hui Ching fulfilled his destiny '^^ at the
temple of Buddha's bowl and died. Thus, Fa Hsien went
ou alone to the place of Buddha's skull-bone.
CHAPTER XIII.
Travelling westwards 16 yu-yen,^ the pilgrims arrived
at the frontier of the Na-chieh country. In the city of
Hsi-lo there is the shrine" of Buddha's skull-bone. It is
entirely covered with gold and the seven precious stones.
The king of the country deeply venerates this skull-bone.
and fearing lest it should be stolen, ^ has appointed eight
men of the leading families in the kingdom, who have
each a seal to seal it up and guard it. In the morning,
when the eight have all arrived, each inspects his own
11. The text reads,-S ^^ M ^ i% ^ ^ ». % }^\-
Mr. Beal translates, " (Meanwhile) Hwui King having set out for
the temple of Buddha's alms-bowl, after his arrival, died there."
His note says " The whole of this passage is obscure, and if it were
not for some addenda to the work, would be untranslatable. I have
regarded the expression 'won sheung' (tt ^) as equivalent to
' died,' for it is used in this sense in the 20th chapter ; and for the
word 'shan' 'a mountain,' which has no sense or meaning at all
in the connection of the text, I have substituted 'ju' (^p) thus
forming the well-known phrase ' ju shi ' ' accordingly.' " The emen
dation of ^p for [[[ seems excellent, but Mr. Beal has taken no
notice of Jf^ which should here be read in the ^ ^ . Eemusat
gives, "Hoei king se plaisait extraordinairement dans le temple du
pot de Foe." CHAPTER xm.
1. ^1^, ox yojana. Varies from 5 to 9 English miles.
2. i^ ¦^, or Vihara.
3. Mr. Beal has in his translation "and substitute another in
its place." But the text gives only |J7 f^.

22 RECORD OF THE
seal, and then they open the door. When the door is
open they wash their hands in scented water and bring
out Buddha's skull-bone, placing it on an altar outside the
shrine, and using a round block of the seven precious
substances to support it underneath, and a glass bell to
cover it ; * all these being richly studded with pearls and
precious stones. The bone is of a yellowish white colour,
4 inches in diameter, 5 and raised in the middle. Every
day, after the relic has been brought out, those in charge
of the shrine mount up to a high tower, beat a large drum,
blow the conch, and clash the cymbals. When the king.
hears this, he proceeds to the shrine and makes offerings
of flowers and incense. The offerings made, every one
bows' in his proper turn and departs. Entering by the
east and leaving by the west gate, the king every morning
makes offerings and worships in this manner, and then
transacts affairs of State. The scholars and elders also
4. Mr. Beal's translation gives, " On this throne there is a circular
table composed of seven precious substances, with a crvstal bell-
shaped cupola on the top." We cannot congratulate him upon this
effort. The text reads j^ ^ ^ MM^^f MM MM ± ¦
With our translation of the second ^g, may be compared the phrase
y^^^^- . , ...,..,
5. Mr. Beal gives "about four inches square. The text has
Ht Ul pO -vj- which seems to mean that taken either squarewise
or roundwise the skull was 4 inches across. Mr. Beal's note says
"fang-un may mean either a circle or square; but the meaning here
is evidently 4 inches each side."
6. The text has ?^ ^ llM M W "i- ^Cr. Beal b.its "he
(the king) repeatedly bows his head to the ground in adoration and
departs." It was something to get rid of li^mnsafs absurd notion
of " carrying the reUo to his head ; " but Mr. Beal's interpretation I'f
7};j ^ is quite erroneous, and his emendation of "teug-lai" for
" tiuK-tai " is as uncalled-for as it is (to ns) incomprehensible,
IM ^ i^ '^ common Buddhist phrase for an obeisance; not a kotou
on the knees, but a profound bow until the head almost touches the
ground, the hands being raised to the forehead.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 23
first make ofi'orings and then attend to their domestic
bn.?iue.'^3. Every day it is the same ; there is never any
remissness,'' and when all the offerings are finished, the
skull-bone is put back in the shrine. In the shrine there
is a " liberation " pagoda" made of the seven precious
substances, which is sometimes open and sometimes
shut," and over 5 feet in height. In order to fill it, there
are regularly every morning before the gate of the shrine
sellers of flowers and incense, so that all who want to
make offerings may buy what they require. The kings
of these countries also regularly send officers to make
offerings. The place of the shrine is 40 paces square.
Though heaven should quake and earth gape, this spot
would not move. From this point travelling north one
7. The text reads 0 Q i\i M., ^J] ^ M 'l# ^"^ ^^''- ^^^^
translates it, " this, in fact, is the first and uutailing duty of every
day," without making the shghtest comment and leaving us to infer
that he only made a guess at its meaning. For ;w] in this passage
cannot mean first, and the opposite ideas of remissness and energy
expressed by the two words f^ and i|^ are entirely left out of the
question. To arrive at our own translation we have been obliged
to substitute ^, which is often found joined with ^, and then
the rendering is simple enough. ^ ^ is a common enough phrase
and gives somewhat the force of ^ f^ to the sentence. But for
those who object to any manipulation of the text we have still an
alternative. Pat a stop after ^J], and translate, " Every day begins
thus; there are no (distinction of) neghgenoe and zeal," — that is. all
go through exactly the same amount of religious ceremony per diem,
Eemusat says, "II en est ainsi tons les jours, et ce premier devoir
n'admet aucune difference de zele ou de relaohementie" Whatever
the real meaning may be, our readers have the thing now in their
own hands.
8- 't '3& ®f S^ i§) which Mr. Beal strangely enough asserts
" may be translated ' seven Dagobas etc' "
9. ^ §^ ^ ^. Mr. Beal says "partly soUd and partly hollow."
Efimusat makes a number of " tours de delivranoe * • * * les unes
ouvertes, les autres fermees."

24 RECORD OF THE
yu-yen, the pilgrims arrived at the capital of Na-chieh,
where the Bodhisatva bought some five-stalked flowers
for an offering to Ting Kuang'^" Buddha. In this city
there is also a Buddha's-tooth pagoda ; the ceremonies
of worship are the same as for the skull-bone. One
yu-yen to the north-east brought them to the mouth of a
valley where there is Buddha's pewter staff, and a shrine
in which it is worshipped. The staff is made of " bull's
"head"^^ sandal-wood, and is about 16 or 17 feet in
length. It is in a wooden sheath, from which one hundred
or even one thousand men would fail to move it. Travel
ling westwards for four days through this valley, there is a
shrine for worshipping Buddha's seng-chia-li.^^ When
there is an excessive drought in this country the people and
of&cials,'-' gathering together, bring out the garment and
worshipping make offerings to it. Bain immediately falls
in abundance. Half a yu-yen to the south of the city
there is a cave. It is at the so'ith-westof thePo^* moun
tain. Buddha left his shadow in it. Looking at it from
a distance of ten or more paces, it is a life-size sUhonette
of Buddha, of a golden colour, hke in features, ''- ' bright
and shining. The nearer one goes, the more indistinct
10. Dipaukara. Beal.
11. G6strohandana. Beal — who omits the word ^ pewter in
the last sentence, and thus avoids an apparent anomaly.
12. The long robe or Sanghati worn by all priests.
13. )^ ^ A- Mr. Beal says " the chief personages of the king
dom;" Eemusat, "les habitants."
14. ^ [Ij. Mr, Beal says "a large mountain ;" Bfimusat, "une
montagne." 1^- ^ ij. Mr. Beal says "with all its characteristic signs,"
which is a servile acceptation of Eemusat's rendering, both given
without note or comment as if there was no diificulty whatever.
Wo, personally, barely profess to understand these two words and
leave them in our readers' hands.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 25
it gets, still appearing to be there. ^» The Kings of all
the neighbouring countries have sent skilful artists to
sketch it, but they have not been able to do so. The
people of the country have a tradition that the thousand
Buddhas^' will all leave their shadows here. About a
hundred paces to the west of the shadow, Buddha, when
ahve, shaved his head and cut his nails, and with the
help of his disciples built a pagoda seventy to eighty feet
in height, as a model for pagodas in future. It exists to
this day, and by its side there is a temple in which there
are seven hundred priests. In this place there is a
pagoda in honour of all the Lo-hans and P'i-chih'^^ Bufl-
dhas, of whom nearly ^» a thousand have dwelt here,
CHAPTER XIV.
In the second ¦winter moon,^ Fa Hsien and his com
panions, three in all, going south crossed the Little
Snowy Mountains. These mountains retain* the snow
16. Of the meaning of this passage we hold there can be no doubt
of any kind, grammatical or otherwise, and we must stigmatise Mr.
Beal's version as faulty in the extreme. The text has ^ j^ ^ f||^
^fi jm W- Mr. Beal gives, " On turning away or going nearer,
the resemblance to the reahty becomes less and less distinct." Now
vrithout noticing his mistranslation of ffl or his wholesale omission
of the last four characters, we would point out that it is not the
"resemblance" which gradually becomes less distinct, but the whole
shadow that loses its intensity.
17. Mr. Beal adds " of the present Kalpa."
18. Pratoeka Buddhas.
19. ^ ^. Mr. Beal says "as many as a thousand;" Eemusat
" nulle." ' CHAPTER xrv.
1, That is the 11th moon, winter being reckoned to begin from
the 10th moon,
2. ^ Mr. Beal, copying Bemusat, makes it snow there both

26 RECORD OF THE
summer and winter alike. On the northern side, which ia
in the shade, it is frightfully cold, and when the wind
gets up it makes one shiver and keep the mouth shut.^
Hui-ching was unable to advance farther ; he foamed at
the mouth, and said to Fa Hsien, " I cannot recover ;
" you had better go on while you can, or we shall all
" perish." Fa Hsien* throwing himself over (the corpse)
cried out in lamentation, " The original design cannot be
"carried out. It is destiny." There being no help for it,
they once~more exerted themselves, and having got across
to the south of the range, arrived at the Lo-i* country.
summer and winter. The text means that the snow never melts.
3, Mr. Beal gives a marvellous translation of this passage : —
" The exceeding cold which came on suddenly in crossing the
northern slope of the mountain, which Ues in the shade, caused the
men generally to remain perfectly silent (to shut their months)
through fear." The text reads thus:— [Ij ;jb 1^ 't' >^ ^ ^
^ A '^ ^ ^- Semusat merely shirks it, giving a general idea
of the cold. We have understood ^ with ^ as the best solution
of the difficulty.
4. The following difficult passage Mr. Beal quietly translates in
his own way without a hint as to its obscurity. This is what he
makes of it : — Fa Hain cherished him (to supply warmth) and pite-
ously invoked him by his famihar name, but it was all ineffectual to
restore life. Submitting therefore to his destiny, he once more
gathered up his strength and pressed forward." The text reads.
That Mr. Beal should not know the common phrase^ p ht. to
soothe a corpse, ia remarkable ; that he should invent snppUes " of
warmth," and Hui-ching's " familiar name " without breathing a
word about the forced nature of his interpretations is unfair to the
general reader ; and that he should translate ;$ ^ /^p W ¦^ ^
as "it was all ineffectual to restore him to life " makes his position
as translator of an obscurely-worded Chinese took somewhat difficult
to understand. We offer our own translation with the utmost defer
ence to the judgment of any one who will show where we have erred
and point out a more likely rendering. Hui Ching is a misprint for
Hui Ying. See Note by Hu Chen-heng at the end of the translation.
5. Afghanistan. Beal.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 27
In that district there are three thousand priests, all be
longing to the Greater Development. Here they passed
the rainy season, and when it was over they proceeded
southwards for ten days and arrived at the country of Po-
na,8 where there are also over three thousand priests, all
belonging to the Lesser Development. From this point
traveUing on for three days, they again crossed the Hsin-
t'ou river, on both banks of which the land is flat.
CHAPTER XV.
On the other side of the river there is a country called
P'i-t'u,^ where Buddhism is very flourishing, both of the
Greater and Lesser Developments. When the people of
the country saw Buddhist priests from China coming
among them, they were much affected and said, " How
" is it possible for foreigners to have learnt the principle
" of family renunciation, and to seek afar the religion ? "
They all gave the pilgrims whatsoever they wanted, and
treated them according to the law (of Buddha.)
CHAPTER XVI.
From this point travelling south-east for somewhat less
than eighty yu-yen, the pilgrims passed many temples
containing nearly 10,000 priests. Having passed by all
these places, they arrived at a country by name Mo-t'ou-
6. Mr. Beal says this name " has been identified with Bannu,"
CHAPTER XV.
1. Mr. Beal gives two possible identifications of this place which
he calls Pi-cfta. The text, however, has B^t ^ Pi-*'M; and if this
is coiTeot, Mr. Beal's speculations ate scattered to the winds.

28 EECOED OF THE
lou,^ and also* crossed the Pu-na, on the banks of which
there are twenty monasteries with some 3,000 priests.
Buddhism is gradually' becoming popular. In all the
countries of India to the west of the Sha^ river, the Kings
have everyone firm faith in the religion of Buddha. When
they make offerings to the priests, they take off their caps
of state ; and then aU the members of the royal family
with the Ministers of state feed the priests with their own
hands." After this, they spread a carpet on the ground
and sit down before them, opposite the principal seat.
Sitting in the presence of priests they dare not use a
couch. The rites and ceremonies of worship in vogue
CHAPTER XVI.
1. MathSura. Beal.
2. Mr. Beal translates, "Here, again, we followed the course of
the river Po-na (Jumna). [The force of ' again ' seems to be that they
had followed previously the course of the Indus.] " Mr. Beal is not
usually so particular about the meaning of every word. The text has
X i^ ^ J5I5 Mj *^® ^''^* character of which does not mean
"again" in Mr. Beal's sense.
3. Mr. Beal translates {^ ^ ^ )^ ty " The Law of Buddha
is in a reviving condition." Both renderings seem admissible.
4. The text of this passage is/^£j?JqJ2iW 5C^^
MW^^Miij^ fi- To begin with, £, is here used
for J^. Mr. Beal translates, " all the kingdoms beyond the sandy
deserts are spoken of as belonging to western India." We fail to see
how he arrives at this. In a note he adds, " The passage may also
be translated thus, ' The continuation of sandy deserts being passed
(we arrived at) the various kingdoms of western India.' "  which
to our mind is still more difficult to identify with the original. The
only point is the second g which after all is no great obstacle. It
is not unusual to meet ^ ^ ^ ¦^. As for ^ Jpf it seems
to be the name of a river and not " sandy deserts."
5. Mr. Beal indulges in "conduct the priests to their several
palaces, for the purpose of providing them with food," and all that
out of .^ g ;f^ ^. -We look on this as an unpardonable vagary,
given without note or comment of any kind.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 29
amongst all these Kings while Buddha was still alive
have been handed down by tradition to this day. To the
south of this is a country called the Middle Kingdom, the
climate of which is temperate without frost or snow, the
people well off and happy without registration or official
restrictions. « Only those who till the King's land pay in
so much. Those who want to go away, may go:'' those
who want to stop, may stop. The King in his administra
tion uses no tortures ; criminals are merely fined accord
ing to the gravity of their offences. Even for a second at
tempt at rebellion the punishment is only the loss of the
right hand. The King's body-guard have all fixed sala
ries. Throughout the country no one kills any living thing,
or drinks wine, or eats onions or garlic ; but they keep
their Chan-ch'a^-los apart. Chan-ch'a-lo is the name for
a leper. ° They live away from other people, and when
they approach a city or market they beat a piece of wood
to distinguish themselves. Then people know who they
are and avoid coming in contact with them. In this
country they do not keep pigs or fowls, there are no deal
ings in cattle, no butchers' shops or distilleries in their
6. Mr. Beal says "there are no Boards of Population and Revenue."
The text has M ]^ ^ "^ f^. -It is possible that Mr. Beal could
think ^ meant a "Board" in this passage?
7. We are sure Mr. Beal has given a wrong turn to this passage,
but it is too long and not important enough to quote.
8. In the text ^. If necessary to be identified as in the follow
ing note, we must read ^. Mr. Beal says "with the exception
of the Chandalas, they eat neither garlic or onions. The text has
z>^-mmmmm^.m'
9. The text has ^ ^ ^ A> ^^^ ^ common meaning of
^S J^ in Ch nese, as evidently here intended by Fa Hsien, is leper.
Mr, Beal rightly copying Eemusat, translates it " a wicked man,"
and says in a note " The Chandalas (Tsandalas) were outcasts of
Indian society, those who had no caste, the lowest of mortals,"

30 REOORD OF THE
market-places. As a medium of exchange they use
cowrie shells. Only the Chan-ch'a-los go hunting and
deal in flesh. From the date of Buddha's Nirvana, the
Kings, elders, and gentry of all these countries built
shrines for making offerings to the priests, and gave them
land, houses, gardens, etc., and men and bullocks (to cul
tivate them.) The title-deeds^" were written out, and
subsequent Kings handed them down one to another, not
daring to destroy ' ^ them, in unbroken succession to this
day. Houses for the priests to five in,' * beds, mattresses,
food, and clothes, are never wanting wherever they may go.
The priests usually occupy' * themselves in benevolent min
istrations, in chanting the Ching, or sitting in meditation.
If a stranger priest arrives, the old resident priests go out to
meet him and carry his clothes and bowl. They give
him water for washing his feet and oil for anointing
them,'* with an extra meal.^* By and by when he has
10. The text gives ^ ^ '^ $^, Egmusat says, "L'actedeces
donations dtait traced sur le fer," and adds in his note "Oes dona
tions dtaient gravies sur des plaques de cuivre ou d'autre metil,"
Mr. Beal translates " engraved on sheets of copper," without saying
anything more about it. From a shght acquaintance with the ~
-f' — ^ , where the phrase |i| |S often occurs, we had been
taught to regard |||{ merely as giving a sense of " vahdity " to the
^, and not as expressive of the substance on which they written.
¦'¦¦'• M St .^ ^' ^^- ^^'^ says "so that no one has dared
to deprive them of possession."
12. 11^ ft ft Jfc g^ ¦^. Mr. Beal says "AU the resident
priests have chambers, etc." He also translates .^ as " coverlets "
instead of "mattresses."
13. The expression ^ ^ may (but does not necessarily) imply
that the priests gain money thereby.
14. Mr. Beal is here guilty of an egregious blunder. The text is
as plain as possible. ^ gg JE ^Jij ^ J£ f^. Yet Mr. Beal goes
out of his way to find tfie following translation :—" They then pre
sent him with water to wash his feet and cleanse them from the

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS, 31
rested they ask him his age'^ and placi" in the priest
hood, and give him a room with sleeping appliances, all
according to regulation. In places where the priests reside
they build pagodas to She-li-fo, to Mu-lien, and A-
nan;" also towers in honour of the A-pi-t'an, Lii, and
Ching. '9 When they have settled down a month or so,
all the families which belong to the religion*" organise a
subscription and make offerings to the priests. They ar
range an extra meal at which the priests assemble and ex
pound the Law of Buddha. When this is over they make
offerings at the pagoda of She-li-fo of all kinds of
incense and flowers ; they keep lamps burning all night,
mire," adding in a note, "I do not think there is any allusion to
oil here, as Efimusat supposes. I take ' tsuh-yu ' to signify any pol
lution of the feet, whether dirt, or the heat of travel," Thus Mr.
Beal writes himself down as utterly ignorant of the rhythm of Chinese
composition. Eemusat's mistakes, overwhelming as they are in
number, do not embrace such simple passages as this,
15. That is a meal taken at other than the usual time allowed by
Buddhist regulations. The text has Mfe ^ ^, and we have taken
our rendering direct from ESmusat who says " une collation extra
ordinaire," and gives a long note in support of his translation. He
acknowledges, however, that the same expression "semble plus
diffioUe a expUquer " in a subsequent passage. We leave it to our
readers. 16, That is, how many |^ ^ , or Decembers, he has seen.
17. A priest's PjiJ ^ is not easy to translate into English. It
is his number among the ^ ^ or disciples of the old priest who
as a spiritual father introduced him to rehgious life. In answering
the question it is usual to give the old priest's name, and the date
of entry into the church. Mr. Beal gives " they ask him his age,
according to which they allot him a chamber, etc." Eemusat is not
so bad as that: — "ils s'informdrent du nombre et de I'ordre des
sacrifices qu'ils avaient k pratiquer."
18. Siriputra, Mogalan, and Ananda.
19, The Abhidharma, the Disciplines, and the Sutras.
20. Literally, "those who long for happiness." ^ |g.

32 RECORD OF THE
and cause those people to join in the worship.*' She-li-
fo was originally a Brahman. Once meeting Bud
dha, he begged to enter the priesthood. So did the great
Mu-lien and the great Chia-yeh.** The great majority
of female mendicants make offerings at the pagoda of A-
nan, because it was A-nan who begged Buddha to allow
women to enter the priesthood, and therefore' ^ the novi
ces chiefly make offering to Lo-yiin. Teachers of the A-pi-
t'an worship the A-pi-t'an ; teachers of the Disciplines
worship the Disciplines. The time for worshipping is
once a year : each have their own day. The Ma-ho-yen**
school worships the Pan-ja-po-lo-mi. Wen-shu-shih-U,
Kuan-shih-yin*» and others. When the priests have
gathered in their harvest,*" the elders, gentry and
Brahmans, all bring various things such as clothes etc. of
which the Shamans stand in need, and present them to
the priests, who also make presents to each other. Since
the Nirvana of Buddha these rules of dignified etiquette
for the guidance of the holy brotherhood have been hand
ed down without interruption. From the ford over the
Hsin-t'ou river to Southern India, down to the southern
sea, it is between 40,000 to 50,000 li. The country is aU
21, Eemusatis justly puzzled with these four words •fi^ {^ A f^
" qui ne se he avec ce qui prec6de, ui avec ce qui suit, mais qui est
sans difference dans les deux feditions," Mr. Beal says " throughout
the whole night they burn lamps piovided by those men for the pur
pose." We think |gj \ must refer to ^ fg, but fail to see a
satisfactory solution,
22, Kfisyapa, Beal.
23. The text ^^^ ^ '^ W M ^ ^^ M ^. Mr. Beal
says " The Sameneras principally affect the worship of Efthula.
24. Mahayana, or Greater Development.
25. Pr&gna Pslranita, Manjusri, and AvalokitSswara. Bimusat.
26. See Chapter 5, note 7.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 33
level. There are no big mountain streams, but only small
rivers. * ' CHAPTER xvn.
From this point travelling south-east eighteen yu-yen
there is a country called Seng-ehia-shih.' It was there
that Buddha descended after having been three months
in the Tao-h* Heaven preaching the Law for the benefit
of his mother. When he went up to the Tao-li Heaven,
he used his supernatural power and did not let any of his
disciples know. Seven days before the time had expired
he cast aside his invisibility. Then A-na-lii' with his
divine eye saw the world-honoured One afar off, and said
to the venerable Mu-lien, "You can go and salute the
"world-honoured One." Mu-lien therefore went, and
prostrating himself at Buddha's feet, they saluted each
other.* When the salutations were over, Buddha said,
" Mu-hen, after seven days I shall descend to Yen-fu-t'i."
Mu-hen then returned, and at the appointed time the
27. Mr. Beal gives " There are no great mountains or valleys,
but stiU there are rivers," and justifies himself for this rendering
by quoting Jnhen. The text has ^ ^^i ll] Jl| IE W M ?K'
and it seems to us there is a direct antithesis between JpT -jif and
|lj Ji|. We construe j£ in the unusual but not unknown sense of
the disjunctive O . CHAPTER xvn.
1. The modem Sankisa. Beal.
2. " The Triyashtrinshas heaven." Beal.
3. Aniruddha. A Lo-han and cousin to Buddha.
4. Mr. Beal says " prostrated himself in adoration of the marks
on the foot of Buddha " — which may or may not be correct — and
utterly ignores the next four words, we fear, wilfully, not knowing
what to make of them. The text lias gg ^ f|§ J£ ^ i^ |?!(1 Dj;.

34 RECORD OF THE
rulers of the eight kingdoms, withall the officers and
people, not having seen Buddha for a long time and being
very desirous of gazing upon him, collected Uke clouds in
this country to wait for the world-honoured One. Then
the female mendicant Yu-po-lo communed with her own
heart. " To-day Kings, Mhiisters, and people, should all
" go out to meet Buddha. I am a woman : how can I get
" the first sight ? " Buddha at once by the exercise of his
supernatural power changed her into a holy chuan-lun
Prince,^ theveryfirsttosalutehim. When Buddha was about
to come down from the Tao-h Heaven, he produced by a
miracle three flights of jewelled steps. Buddha came
down the middle flight made of the seven precious sub
stances." Brahma also produced silver steps, and at
tended on the right with a white dusting-brush' in his
hand. The divine ruler Shih produced steps of red^ gold
and attended on the left with an umbrella of the seven
precious substances. All the countless host of gods
descended in Buddha's suite. When Buddha had come
down, the three flights entirely disappeared in the earth
with the exception of seven steps. Subsequently, king
A-yiin wanted to get to the bottom of them, and sent
men to dig. They got down as far as the Yellow Spring,«
but without coming to an end of them. Thereupon the
5, " A Chakravarrti EAja." Beal.
^- ¦fife -ffi "f* IE 'b !S PS _t fr- Mr. Beal says somewhat
incorreouy, "Buddha standing above the middle ladder which was
made of seven precious substances began to descend."
7. Generally a yak's tail.
8. Strictly purple ^,
9. Mr. Beal says "a spring of yellow water," but surely the mean
ing here is the yellow spring, that is, down to the very gate of hell.
This rendering seems much more in accordance with the spirit of
the passage.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 35
king became more than ever a devout believer, and built
a shrine over the steps, and on the middle flight made a
full-length image, sixteen feet in height. Behind the
shrine he erected a stone column thirty cubits in height,
and on it he placed a lion. Inside the column at the
four sides'" are images of Buddha. Both from inside
and outside it is transparent," and as clean as glass.
Some heretic teachers contended for this spot with the
Shamans, and the latter were getting the worst of the argu
ment'" when they all made this solemn statement : — " If
" right of residence in this place belongs to the Shamans,
'¦ there should now be some miracle (in proof thereof).
" When they had said this, the lion at the top of the pillar
roared loudly in attestation (of their right). Thereupon
the heretics were sore afraid, and yielding retired. Be
cause Buddha had taken Divine food for three months,
his body emitted the fragrance of heaven, unlike that of
mortals, so he at once bathed himself. On the spot
where he did so a bath-house was subsequently built
which is still in existence. On the spot were Yu-po-lo,
the female mendicant, sainted him first of all, a pagoda
has also been lately raised. Where Buddha, when among
mankind, cut off his hair and naUs a pagoda has been
10. Which, consequently, we must regard as having been square.
11. Mr. Beal says " shining," here again missing the force of ^,
12,' With regard to the last half of this sentence Mr, Beal makes
one of the most extraordinary of his numerous mistranslations. The
text is as simple as possible. — ^^ ijj? f 5 iffl M — which means that
the g of the Shamans was beginning to 1^ bend or give way.
Yet Mr, Beal on these five words perpetrates the following : — " Then
the Shamans agreed to any condition for settling the question that
might be considered reasonable," Lord Burleigh's shake of the hand
is nothing to it.

35 RECORD OF THE
made ;'' » also on the spots where the three former
Buddhas and Shih-chia Wen Buddha had sat down, or
at places where they had taken exercise;'* and also
where images of the various Buddhas have been made. ' »
These are all in existence still, and at the spot where,
with the heavenly ruler Shih and Brahma in attendance,
Buddha descended, there is also a pagoda. Counting
priests and nuns there are about 1,000 here. They
obtain their meals from a common fund, and belong
some to the Greater, some to the Lesser, Development.
Where they live'" there is a white-eared dragon which
acts as a patron to these priests by making the land
fertile, causing rain to fall in due season, and warding
off all kinds of calamities, so that the priests dwell in
peace. The priests out of gratitude for such kindness
have built a dragon shrine and have prepared a place for
the dragon to lie down" They also make "special
" contributions "'a of food offerings for the dragon,
13, This must be the meaning though it is not a translation of
the text,-g| ^j^n^^MMJki^ if.
1^' IS fi ^- '^° M''- Beal is due the credit of this improved
rendering, "
IS- 1^ i^ W i^ ^ ^ M- Mr,Bealsays " also where there
are marks and impressions left on the stones by the feet of the different
Buddhas," Where he gets it all from it is not so easy to say.
16, Mr, Beal joins .J'^ ^ dwelling-place on to the end of the
last sentence and renders it " agree to occupy the same place." This
was one of Eemusat's eccentricities.
17. Mr. Beal has " placed a resting place (seat) for his accom
modation," The text is j^ -g; ^ ^, of which ^ for a dragon
appears to have puzzled Mr, Beal, who bus also failed to see the force of
^ to spread out,
18, We have taken this from Mr, Beal as the equivalent of
^ ^, the first character of which that gentleman says is com
mon in Buddhist works denoting that which causes " merit '' and
therefore happiness. We have met ^p ^ before in the light Utera-
turo of China, but have always taken it to mean simply " food,"

BUDnillSTIO KINGDOMS, S7
and every day select three members of the fraternity
to go and eat in the dragon's shrine. At the end
of each rainy season, the dragon suddenly changes
its form to that of a small snake with white edges
to its ears. When the priests are aware of this
they fill a copper bowl with cream and throw the dragon
into it ; and as they proceed from the highest seat to the
lowest it appears as if bowing. When the dragon has
gone all round, it dissolves away. ' ^ Every year it comes
out once. This country is very productive ; the people
are flourishing, and happy ^^ beyond all comparison.
When men of other nations come, they invariably take
care of them-' and give them what they require. Fifty
19, Confident that Mr, Beal, who follows partially in the wake of
Bemusat, has utterly misrendered these last two sentences, we pro
ceed to give the text and his translation for the benefit of our readers,
f^ fi[ m ± m^ mm ammn^u ±mm'r m
^i.i9.^?^W.MU it ^.— "The body of priests, re-
cognizing him, place in the midst for his use a copper vessel full of
cream. The serpent' then proceeds to come down from the highest
part of the alcove, constructed for his accommodation, to the lowest
part, all the while moving as though he would pay his respects to
all those around him. He then suddenly disappears." First of all
it is difficult to say why such a plain phrase as J^ g| -g- rfj
should be slurred over by the merest tyro, " Taking the dragon,
they throw it into (the bowl)," where it subsequently ^ "dissolves
(in the cream)." The only obscure point is who " proceeds from
the highest seat to the lowest," though the dragon in its snake form
being once in the bowl we can hardly suppose it to get out for the pur
pose of coming down and then get in again to be dissolved. Besides
"fx i, implies the gait of man, and not the orawlia|; ffi of a snake.
The bowl containing the snake is evidently carried down by a priest,
which would easily account for the " bowing " movement of the
reptile's head. There are other little inaccuracies in Mr. Beal's
version of this passage, which the student of Chinese cannot fail to
perceive. 20. Mr. Beal says " rich " for ^.
21. ffl ;:p g ^— the very phrase used in Chapter II, See

38 RECORD OF THE
yu-yen to the north of the temple, there is a temple called
Huo Ching, ^^ Huo Ching is the name of an evU spirit.
Buddha formerly transformed this evil spirit, and posteri
ty has built a shrine on the spot as a religious offering to
him. ^ ' A Lo-han took some water to wash his hands ;
the w&ter dripped on the ground and is still to be seen
there. In spite of sweeping, it still remains and cannot
be removed. In this place there is another pagoda to
Buddha. A good spirit regularly sweeps and sprinkles
it. No human aid is required. * * The king of a heretic
country said, " As thou canst do this, I will bring a great
" army to quarter here. Wilt thou even then be able to
" keep it clean ? " The spirit caused a great wind to blow,
and made, it clean. In this place there are one
hundred small pagodas, A man might spend a whole day
counting without finding out their number. If any one
is bent on knowing, then let him place a man by the side
of each pagoda, and when this is done let him count the
men. According to their number, he wiU be able to
ascertain the number of pagodas.^ * There is a monastery
Note 10, This passage is loosely rendered by Mr, Beal.
- 22. >x it-
^^- & ^ ^ ^ ffi' Mr. Beal joins these five characters to
the next sentence, thus: — "At the time of the dedication of the
Vihara, (an arhat spUt, etc") But can JV signify " at the time
of?" 24. Mr. Beal here makes a great blunder in spite of Eemusat's
correct translation to guide him. The text has ^ /1p ^ A Ij
and Mr. Beal renders it "which at first (was buUt) without a human
architect," He seems to be quite ignorant of other uses of iij,
and thinks it always must mean " at the beginning."
25. Thus there is some sense in this passage ; but we must warn
our readers that to arrive at this we have been obliged to make a
trifling emendation in the text, which should read A SS ^ ^
>J? ^ ^ pj" ^ ^. We call particular attention to the /^
not which makes nonsense of the sentence ; for surely to say that if

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 39
¦with 600 or 700 priests, inside which there is a spot
where P'i-chih Buddha ate and passed into Nirvana.^"
The place is as big as a cart-wheel, and all around there
is vegetation ; but on this spot alone there is none. The
place where he dried his clothes is also without vegetation.
The marks left by these clothes have been there ever since
and are still to be seen. CHAPTER xvm.
Fa Hsien spent the rainy season at the shrine of the
dragon. When it was over he went seven yu-yen to the
south-east and arrived at the city of Chi-jao-i,' which is
on the banks of the (ranges. There two monasteries, both
belonging to the Lesser Development. Six or seven li to
the west of the city, on the north bank of the river, is
the place where Buddha preached for his disciples. Tra
dition says he preached on "The bitterness of Death;"
also on " Life is but a Bubble" and such themes.* A

any one really wants to find out the number of these pagodas, the
following is the way, and then to add " but you will not be able to
succeeds," is not such a probable text as to give the method and
finish with " and thus you are enabled to get at their number."
Those who prefer the text at all costs will of course adopt the former ;
yet our own translation is obtainable easily enough by the mere
conversion of /p into ")] — in itself a very probable misprint. Mr.
Beal translates the above quotation, " But even in this case, it can
never be known how many or how few men will be required."
26. Mr. Beal says " ate (the fruit of Nhrvana)."
CHAPTER XVIII.
1, Kanouj. Klaproth.
2. Mr, Beal says " he preached concerning impermanency and
sorrow, and also on the body being Uke a bubble and so on." The
text has ^ ^ ^ g ^ # in Ja }* ^. 'Mr. Beal con-
strues ^ he preached ^ % impermanency W and sorrow.

40 EECOUD OF THE
pagoda was built in this place which stiU exists. Crossing
over the Ganges and proceeding south three yu-yen, the
pilgrims came to a forest named A-li. Buddha preached
in it ; and on all the spots where he walked or sat down
pagodas have been built. CHAPTER XIX.
From this point going south-east ten yu-yen, the
pilgrims arrived at the great nation of Sha-chih.' Out
side the south gate of the city of Sha-chih, on the east of
the road, is the place where Buddha formerly bit a branch
off a willow tree* and stuck it in the ground, whereupon
it grew to the height of seven feet, neither increasing nor
diminishing. The heretics and Brahmans in their envy
would have cut it down or pulled it up and thrown it to a
distance ; but it always came up as before on the same
spot. Here there are also four places where Buddha
walked and sat, and pagodas have been built on them
which still exist.' CHAPTER XX.
From this point going south eight yu-yen, the pUgrims
arrived at She-wei,' the capital of the country Chii-sa-lo.'
CHAPTER XrS.
1. Kasi. Beal.
2, Mr. Beal gives, " While here he bit off a piece from the
Dslntakachta stick with which he cleansed his teeth, and fixing it
etc." The text has only -fw :2|S ^£ jlfc Pg tl S ^ ±^'
the first four characters which Mr. Beal has wrongly joined to the
end of the preceding sentence.
3. Mr. Beal says " The ruins of these still exist. But the text
has nothing about ruins, jj^ Iff ^ ^5". • The character ^ is
here an illative particle, CHAPTER XX.
1. SrAvast!. Bemusat.
2. K6sala or Oude. Bt^musat.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 41
Inside the city the people are few and scattered, in aU
about two hundred families. It is the city which King
Po-ssu-ni^ governed. On the site of the old shrine of
Ta-ai-tao, on the site of the well and wall* of the elder
Hsii-ta, and on the spot where Yang-chuo Mo, who was
converted and entered Nirvana, was burnt, men of after
ages have built pagodas, all being inside this city. The
heretics and Brahmans becoming envious, wished to
destroy them ; whereupon the heavens thundered and
flashed lightning with a splitting crash, so that they were
not able to succeed. Twelve hundred paces outside the
south gate of the city, on the west side of the road, the
elder Hsii-ta built a shrine. On the eastern face he made
the entrance, and on each side placed a stone pillar', the
3. PrasenSidjit. Eemusat.
4. Efimusat made a complete failure of this paragraph ; and
although Mr. Beal has availed himself of Julien's scholarship we are
not sure that he has altogether succeeded. Ta-ai-tao is Mahipra-
japatl, Buddha's aunt. But Mr. Beal translates ^S as "the
foundations (of the house)" of Sudatta, whom he calls somewhat
unnecessarily "the nobleman" ^ ^ . Now we can find no
authority for translating Jp ^£ as " foundations," but we can find
a great many for the literal rendering we have given. A recluse
who withdraws himself from the world in order to devote himself
to reUgion, takes up his position by the side of a well or spring and
there builds a small piece of wall, facing which he spends the days
and nights in meditation, unprotected from the wind and rain ex
cept by his ie , and Uving on such herbs as he can gather, washed
down by a drink of water from hi^, yf.
Yang-chuo Mo = Angoulimalya. Julien.
5, The text runs ^^:^|p]§aP!^M|ta^ —
yQ XX ¦ Mr. Beal translates "This chapel opens towards the East.
The principal door is flanked by two side chambers, in front of
which stand two stone pillars." Except that it is not necessary to
be so strictly hteral with regard to ^ which here does duty very well
for ^ , Mr. Beal's rendering has just as much chance of being
correct as our own ; in fact, we translate it differently chiefly to show

42 RECORD OF THE
one to the left bearing the figure of a wheel, the one to
the right that of an ox. The water in the ponds was
clear, the trees luxuriant in foUage, and the flowers of
various hues, truly beautiful to behold, so that it was
called the Chih-hun" shrine. When Buddha went up to
the Tao-li heaven to preach the Law for his mother dur
ing ninety days. King Po-ssu-ni longing to see him, carved
out of sandal- wood' an image of Buddha and placed it on
his (Buddha's) seat. Afterwards when Buddha returned
to the shrine, the image immediately quitted its place and
came forth to meet him. Buddha said " Eeturn to your
" seat ; after my Nirvana you shall be the model for the
" four schools to copy." The image accordingly returned
to the seat. This image was the very earhest of all
images, and is that which later ages have copied.
Buddha then removed to the small shrine on the
south side, apart from the image and about twenty
paces distant. The Chih-hun shrine was originally
in seven compartments^. The Kings of these count
ries vied with each other in making offerings,
hanging embroidered banners and canopies, scattering
that there are two ways, according as the stop is put after §3
or after P .
6. IK iS. ¦ Mr. Beal in his Preface says "Chi-iin grounds, i.e.
elaborate gardens."
7. See ante.
8, We think there has here been a general misconception of the
form of this shrine. Egmusat translates 'ti ill by "sept stages,"
and Mr, Beal has put it into English as "seven stories" [sic).
Now M. may mean a storey, but it also means a section or part of
a suite measured horizontally. We are further borne out in this
view by the occurrence of the same word in a subsequent sentence —
Ta= i'f FB M. '}& they made it of two compartments in extent,"
not in height. If, however, Eemusat's emendation of J5 for Jg,
is admitted, we shall be unable to claim this support.

BUDDIIISTIU KIXGDOMS, 43
flowers, burning incense, and lighting lamps from dusk
to dawn», day by day without ceasing. A rat holding in
its mouthi" a lamp-wick set fire to the embroidered ban
ners and canopies, and thus it came to pass that the seven
compartments of the shrine were destroyed. The Kings
and people of these countries were all very grieved and
angry, saying' ' " The sandal- wood image has been burnt."
But four or five days later when they opened the door of
a small shrine on the east side, they suddenly beheld the
original image (there). They were all very much re
joiced, and joining together rebuilt the shrine. They
made it of two compartments in extent, and removed the
image to its original position. Fa Hsien and Tao Cheng
on arriving at the Chih-hun shrine reflected that formerly
the world-honoured One had dwelt here twenty-five years ;
and that since they had been risking their lives among
the outer barbarians, of all those who with the same
object had traversed all these nations together, some had
gone back and others were dead'*. And now when they
9. Mr, Beal says " while lamps shone out day after day with
unfading splendor," by which he does not do justice to $g B^
which means that the lamps were kept burning all night,
10, Mr, Beal says "gnawing at the wick," but the character
•j^ impUes running off with the wick in its mouth,
11. Mr, Beal wrongly gives " supposing that the sandal wood
figure had also been consumed,"
12, Mr. Beal, servilely copying Eemusat, has here committed
one of his most glorious blunders. We will give the text of the
whole passage, H^ M 'M ^ %J] PJ flK S ^ -^ ;^ # IS
mmmmm-^^mm ^-^n'^M- For this
Mr, Beal gives " When Fah Hian and To Ching arrived at this
chapel of Chi-un, they were much affected to think that this was
the spot in which Buddha had passed twenty-five years of his Ufe,
Around them stood many strangers, all occupied in similar reflec -

44 RECORD OF THE
saw Buddha's vacant place, their hearts were moved to
grief. The priests who lived there came forth and asked
Fa Hsien, saying, " From what nation do you come ? "
He replied " From the land of Han." The priests sighed
and said, " Good indeed ! Is it possible that foreigners can
" come hither seeking the Law ? " Then they spoke one
to another, saying, "Ever since (the Law) has been
" transmitted by us priests from generation to generation,
" no Buddhists from the land of Han have been known to
" come here ! " Four li to the north-west of the shrine
there is a grove of trees called " Recovered Sight.'' Form
erly, there were five hundred blind men hving at the side
of the shrine''. Buddha prayed for them and they all
recovered their sight. The blind men were delighted,
and sticking their staves in the ground made obeisance.
These staves accordingly grew to a considerable size, and
as people venerated them and did not venture to cut them
down they became a grove, and obtained this name. The
priests of Chih-hun after their midday meal generally
come into this grove to sit in meditation. . Six or seven li
to the north-east of the Chih-hun shrine, mother P'i-she-
chiii* made a shrine, and invited Buddha and the priests.
tions. They had traversed a succession of strange countries. Per
haps they might be spared to return home, perhaps they would
die ! " Such a translation well deserves a dozen notes of admira
tion at the end instead of the single one that Mr. Beal modestly
appends. Six consecutive characters are utterly ignored, and a host
of strangers, all making the same refiectious as our two pilgrims,
are improvised solely as a means of attaching some signification
to ^.
13. ^ ^ '^ ii, ]Ifc. Mr. Beal gives "dweUing on this spot,
who were in the habit of attending the Chapel," We do not know
^ in this sense, but not being quite satisfied with the hteral ren
dering, willingly hand over the difficulty to our readers.
14. Visflka-mdtawi. Beal.

BUDDniSTIC KINGDOMS, 45
It is still in existence therein. The gre&t yiian-lo^ " of
the Chih-hun shrine has two entrances, one to the east
and the other to the north. This garden is on the spot
where the elder Hsii-ta spread gold money and bought
the ground'". The shrine is in the middle of it. Bud
dha lived here a long time preaching salvation to men.
On all the spots where he walked and sat, pagodas have
been built, each with its particular iiame ; as, for instance,
the place where the Sun-to-H>s committed murder and
accused Buddha. Seventy paces to the north, outside
the east entrance of the Chih-hun, ou the east side of the
road, Buddha formerly argued with ninety-six schools of
heretics. The King, Ministers, gentry, and people came
together in crowds to listen, when a heretic woman,
named Chau-che-mo-na' », becoming envious, arranged
some clothes in such a manner as to make herself appear
enceinte, and coming into the midst of the priests accused
Buddha of breaking the Law. Thereupon the heavenly
ruler Shih changed himself into a white mouse and bit
her girdle in two. The clothes then fell down, and imme
diately the earth gaped and she went down alive to the
1.5. Mr. Beal says " the ruins of this chapel still exist," and adds
in a note, "the word ku used in the original, although generally
used adverbially, denoting a conequence of an action, has also the
sense of ku, ancient or old." The text has Jf[^ ^ gX -{i., or ac
cording to Mr. Beal hX the ruins jj^ ^ of this place ^ still
exist. 16. The text has ^ •^. Mr. Beal translates it " Garden en
closure," as if IS) partly ou the strength of the re-appearance of
this character in the next sentence. He is doubtless right.
17. In order to obtain a certain plot of land on which to build a
shrine for Buddha, he had to cover it for the owner with gold coin.
18. 5^ P£ f !l ^ # W ft M- Mr. Beal says " the place
where Buddha was accused of murdering the woman Sundara."
19. Chifichimana. Beal.

40 RECORD OF THE
Infernal Eegions. There is also the place where Tiao-ta* "
with poisoned nails wished to injure Buddha and
went down alive to the Infernal Piegions. Poste
rity has marked all these spots for recognition. More
over, where the argument took place a shrine has
been built, over sixty feet in height, with a sitting
Buddha inside. On the east of this road there is a tem
ple*' belonging to the heretics, called "Ying-fou."** It
is alongside of the road, on the opposite side to the shrine
at the place of the argument, and is also over sixty feet
in height. The temple is called "Ying-fou" because
when the sun is in the west the shadow of Buddha's shrine
falls upon it; but when the sun is in the east, the shadow
of the temple falls northwards and thus never touches
Buddha's shrine. Whenever the heretics sent people, as
they often did, to look after the temple, sweep and sprinkle
it, burn incense, light lamps, and make offerings, the
next morning the lamps were always found iu Bud
dha's shrine. The Brahmans in their anger said "You
" Shamans are always taking away our lamps to worship
" your Buddha."* ' They therefore remainedin attendance
that night, and saw the deities they themselves worship-
20. D§vadatta. Bimusat.
21. 5^ ^- Devaiaya. Bemusat.
22. ^ S' " shadow covered."
23. This appears to us nearer the original than Mr. Beal's
translation of Efimusat's rendering "pourquoi ue nous y opposerions
pas?" — " why do not we put a stop to it?" The whole sentence is
M a? PI® fs tl & §t ^ f^ ^- ^ ;j; Jt. Egmusat and
Mr. Beal make these words spoiieu by the Brabmnus among them
selves, not to the Shamans ; but the sense they give to the last four
characters seems to us out of the question as ^ never means we,
and ^ i|- fits in very well with the ^ in the last sentence.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 47
ped** take the lamps, walk three times round Buddha's
shrine, and offer them to him. When they had done
this, they suddenly disappeared. Thus, the Brahmans
came to know the greatness of Buddha's divinity, and at
once left their homes and entered his priesthood.**
Tradition says that near about the time that this happen
ed the Chih-hun shrine was surrounded by ninety-six
monasteries, all inhabited by priests*", except one which
was empty. In this country*' there are ninety-six
schools of heretics, all of which acknowledge the present
state of existence. *= These have each their disciples,
who also aU beg their food, but do not hold an alms-bowl.
They further seek salvation*' by building alongside of
24 P, iH; Hf ^ ^ %4 M'- Beat's translation of this is a
gratuitous mistake, for Eemusat gives it correctly enough. Mr.
Beal, however, puts a stop at S^ and renders it " saw how the thing
was done," joining J^ 2^ on to the next sentence. We refer Mr.
Beal to the ng ^ passim for the use of ^ as we have given it.
25. ^ ^ X m.-
26. Literally, " aU of which had dwelling places for priests, ex
cept one place which was empty."
27. The text has llf* tt* i3 ^ *'"., and Mr. Beaj translates
by " In this country of mid-India," which is of course wiong, and
which we are ashamed to say put us temporarily off the right scent.
LuckDy, however, we came across the very phrae some weeks later
iu Book II, Part II, Chapter 10, of the works of Mencius, namely
^ Wi^ M fia ^ ^ ^ M' -which quite disposes of Mr,
Beal. An analogy between pb jg and the Latin medio regno was
suggested by a friend, Mr. G. M. H. Playfair, who ia^destined some
day to take a high place among Sinologues. Such similarities, how
ever, will hardly bear dissection, though we consider the present
example happy enough to deserve quotation.
28 "^ 4:1! '^^ tfe Bemusat says " qui tons connaissent le
monde actuel." Mr. Beal says " aU of whom (sic) allow the reahty
of worldly phenomena."
29, Mr, Beal has entirely omitted jj^ ^ fg J^ ^ {gg, Puzzled

48 RECORD OF THE
desert roads houses of charity where shelter and food are
given to travellers, or to passing priests of Buddha — but
for a different period. Tiao-ta^ ° has also some priests
remaining. They worship the three past Buddhas, but
not Shih-chia-wen" Buddha. Four li to the south
east of the city of She-wei is the spot where Buddha
stood by the roadside when king Liu-li'* wanted to
destroy the She-i^ = nation. A pagoda has been buUt
there. Fifty li to the west of the city, there is another
city called Tou-wei.^* It is the place where Chia-yeh''
Buddha was born. There where the father and son met.
and where he entered Nirvana, pagodas have been buUt,
A great pagoda has also been raised over the remains of
the body of Chia-yeh Ju-lai.'" CHAPTER XXI.
From the city of She-wei travelling south-east twelve
yu-yen, the pilgrims arrived at a large town called Na-p'i-
probably by Eemusat's translati n of these words, — "Escherehent
aussi le bonheur dans les dfiserts et sur les routes," We submit
our translation to the approval of our readers, who will probably
agree wiih us that even an unsuccessful effort is better than slurring
over a passage as if there was no real difficulty in it,
30, Devadatta, Bemusat.
31. Shakya Muni,
32, ViroMhaka. Beal.
33 "^ iS- Because Mr. Beal cannot identify ShS-i, he says it
must be the " country of the Sakya family." It would have been,
to say the least, polite to acknowledge that this speculation is more
correctly the property of ESmusat. Ch. xx.. Note 37.
34, Mr, Beal says " Cunningham identifies this place with
Tadwa." 35, KSsyapa, BSmusat.
36, Ju-lai — TathAgatii. Bemusat.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 49
chia,' which is the place where Chii-lo-ch'in* Buddha
was born. On the spot where the father and son met
and where he entered Nirvana, there are also monasteries'
and pagodas. From this point going north less than a
yu-yen, ttiey arrived at the city where Chii-na-han-mou-
ni* Buddha was born. On the spot where the father and
eon met and where he entered Nirvana, pagodas have in
both cases been built. CHAPTER XXII.
From this point going east one yu-yen, the pilgrims ar
rived at the city of Chia-wei-lo-wei. ^ Inside the city there
is neither King nor people; it is just like a wilderness.
There are only priests and some tens of families,* and
that is all. On the spot where formerly was the palace
of King Pai-ching a representation has been made of the
heir-apparent and his mother, at the moment that, riding
on a white elephant, he entered the womb of his mother. '
CHAPTER XXI.
1. Unknown.
2. Erakuchanda. Bimusat.
3. Mr. Beal omits the " monasteries."
4. Eanakamuni. Bemusat.
[From this point Klaproth is chiefly responsible for the notes
appended to each chapter of Eemusat's translation, but for con
venience we shall still continue to quote them as before imder the
name of Bemusat."] CHAPTER XXII.
I. Kapilavastu. Bemusat.
2. W^ I ^' Mr. Beal as usual says, " about ten families."
3. The following is the text of this sentence :— ^ ^|? 3E 1^ ^
mi^±^n^m7i-k'j'm^mAn^^^^. Mr.
Beal gives, " In the place where stand the ruins of the palace of
Sudh6dana, there is a picture of the Prince-apparent and his mother.

50 RECORD OP THE
On the spots where the Prince issued from the east gate,
saw a sick man, and turned about his chariot to go home,
pagodas have been raised. Also, where A-i inspected the
heir-apparent;* where Nan-t'o and the others struck the
elephant, dragged, and threw it* (outside the city wall) ;
where the arrow going south-east thirty li entered the
ground and caused a spring of water to gush forth, which
posterity made into a well for travellers to drink at ;
where Buddha, having attained Wisdom, came back to
see his father the King ; where the five hundred Shih-tzu«
left their families and made obeisance to Yn-po-U ; where
the earth quaked six times;' where Buddha prayed for
all the Devas, and the four heavenly Kings guarded the
four doors so that the King his father could not get iu ;
where Ta-ai-tao presented Buddha with a priest's robe as
he sat facing the east underneath the Ni-chii-lii^ tree,
which tree still exists ; and where King Liu-h killed the
Shakyas' who had aU previously obtained the rank of
Hsii-t'o-hun^o — towers have been built which are still
(supposed to be) taken at the time of his miraculous conception.
The Prince is represented as descending towards his mother, riding
on a white elephant. " Eemusat gives Sudh6dana for king Pai-ching.
4. In order to tell his fortune.
6. Mr. Beal has omitted ^ threw, though he explains in his
note (from Julien) that D§vadatta struck the elephant with his fist
and killed it, Nanda seized and dragged it aside, and Buddha threw
it outside the city walls."
e. m^-
7. 'a\ ^ ! more correctly, as Egmusat has it, " de six
mani&res." Mr. Beal says " six times in succession."
8. Nyagrodha. Bimusat.
9. Women whom he (Viroudhabka) had carried away for his
harem, but who refused to accept their position. Julien.
10. " Srdt&panna, est le nom de la premiere olasse des S'ravakas
ou auditeurs de Bouddha." Bimufat.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 51
in existence. Several li to the north-east of the city
there is a royal field, where the heir-apparent sat under a
tree and watched men ploughing. ^ ^ Fifty li to the east
there is a royal garden, called Lun-min'*, where the
Queen, entering the pool, bathed herself, and coming out
twenty paces on the north side of the pool, raised her
hands to grasp the branch of a tree,'^^ and facing the east
brought forth the heir-apparent. When the Prince was
born he walked seven steps, and two dragon-kings^*
washed his body. At the place where he was washed a
well has been made, and also at the above-mentioned
bathing pool, ' * from which the priests are now accustom
ed to get their drinking-water. All Buddhas have four
places everlastingly fixed. (1). Where they attain per
il. Mr. Beal says " watched a ploughing-match," but gives no
explanation of or authority for such rendering. E€musat says
" considgra des laboureurs," and quotes a passage to shew that the
young prince was invited to take an interest in agriculture " afin
que ses reflexions ne se portassont pas sur la doctrine."
12. Lumbini. Also expressed in Chinese by ^ 3^ f»jt.
13. Mr. Beal says "holding a branch of the (Sala) tree in her
hand " for $ -^ ^ ^t ^ He has omitted the next two
characters altogether, ^ IhI facing the e"''^^-
14. Eemusat says in a note " Deux rois des dragons, frSres, I'un
nomme Ea lo, et I'autre Yii Kia lo."
15. A troublesome sentence to translate satisfactorily. Mr. Beal,
as is his wont with difficult passages, avoids exposing his weakness
by taking no notice at all of the last five characters. The text runs
i^ ;^ ^ f^ ^ S Jt Sfc JIf "ffi The difficulty is of course with
r . Does it mean literally "over (the well)," or merfly " beside,"
for which there would be sufficient authority in 5t -t W ^- Or
may _£, refer to (_t %) the bathing-place " above-mentioned ?"
Eemusat gives the following forced translation: — " airendroitou cette
ablution eut lieu, il se forma aussit6t un puits ; et c'est t ce puits
aussi bien qu'al I'etang oiL avait eu lieu le bain, que les religieux ont
ooutume de puiser I'eau qu'ils boivent." It seems to us pretty clear
that there were two wells, one at each place.

52 RECORD OP THK
feet wisdom. (2). Where they turn the wheel of the
Law. ' « (3). Where they preach and refute the heretics
in argument. (4). Where they descend after having been
up to the Tao-li heaven to preach the Law for the benefit
of their mothers. The other places are announced ac
cording to circumstances. ' ' The country of Chia-wei-lo-
wei is very desolate and barren, with very few inha
bitants. ' 8 On the roads, white elephants and lions are
to be feared ; travellers must not be incautious.
CHAPTER xxm.
Travelling eastward' five yu-yen from Buddha's birth
place, there is a country called Lan-mo.* The king of
this country, obtained a share^ of Buddha's remains, and
when he got back he buUt a pagoda which was called the
Lan-mo pagoda. By the side of the pagoda is a pool,
16. " C'est une expression allfegorique employee pour indiquer
qu'un Bouddha a commence S, prfeoher la doctrine." Bimusat.
17. ISi HO 1^ B# S^ §1 iB- Mr. Beal gives "With respect
to other places, they are chosen according to the time when the
several Buddhas come into the world." But J§ is only the com
plement of 7J^.
18. Mr. Beal here makes another of his uncaUed-for emendations.
The text is extremely simple :— A .K^ ^ jES&W^
& ^ etc., but Mr. Beal must needs put a stop at fff and render
it " you seldom meet any people on the roads."
CHAPTER xxm.
1. Klaproth has inadvertently placed this sentence at the end
of one chapter and at the beginning of the next. Mr. Beal puts it
at the end of chapter xxii, but it seems more appropriate here.
2. " This place is identical with ESmagamo of the Mahawanso."
Beal. 3. One of the eight parts into which his remains were divided
after cremation.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS, 53
and in it there is a dragon which is always guarding the
pagoda, and worships there day and night. When king
A-yii came into the world, he wanted to destroy the eight
pagodas* and make eighty-four thousand pagodas. When
he had already destroyed seven, he next wished to des
troy this one ; whereupon the dragon assumed its shape, '
and led king A-yii into the building. Then when he had
seen aU the implements of worship, (the dragon) said to
the king, " If you can worship more efficiently than this,
" then you may destroy it." (The dragon then) led him
forth," (saying) "I will not contend with you." King
A-yii, knowing that these implements of worship were not
of this world, at once returned home. Hereabout the
vegetation is rank. No one sprinkles or sweeps;' but
occasionally a herd of elephants taking wat^r with their
trunks, sprinkle the ground, or bring flowers and incense
to offer at the pagoda. Some Buddhists of these coun
tries, wishing to worship at the pagoda, when they saw
the elephants, were very much afraid and hid themselves
4. Built over the eight portions of his remains.
5, The text has || HI H #• Mr. Beal says, " The Dragon
therefore assumed a body," and refers to Julien as his authority for
stating in a note "Namely that of a Brahman." The Chinese
phrase, however, implies nothing beyond the sense attached to it in
our translation, and simply means "became visible (as a dragon)."
5a Jp is a synonymous phrase.
6. The two words 4^ -^ which we have thus translated are
considered by Mr. Beal as part and parcel of the dragon's speec,
his version of this sentence being, " If you can excel me in these .
particulars, then you may destroy the tower, go and do so at mice,
I will have no quarrel with you." The italics are our own— a tribute
of astonishment, if not of admiration, at this handling cf the two
characters given above, which are undoubtedly iu antithesis to-
#* * A-
7. The inside of the pagoda.

54 RECORD OF THE
behind trees ; (then) beholding the elephants perform the
ceremonies according to the Law, the Buddhists were
overcome with sorrow and gratitude ;« (with sorrow
because) here there were no monks for the performance
of rites at the pagoda, so that the (duties of) sprinkhng
and sweeping devolved upon elephants. These Buddhists
therefore gave up their Five Commandments^ and became
Shamis, themselves cutting down the grass and shrubs,
levelUng the spot, and thus making it neat and clean.
They persuaded the king of the country to made dwelling-
places for priests, to serve as a temple. '" At present
there are priests in residence. The above events are
quite recent, and from the date of their occurrence until

8. Mr. Beal here ignores the character ^ appreciation of the
elephants' services, and thus escapes the somewhat clumsy con
struction of the next few v,-ordB.
9. Ordinary Buddhists are bound to observe only five (A) com
mandments ; but for those who enter the priesthood there are five
(B) more, ten in all.
II. Thou shalt not take life.
2. „ ,, ,, steal
3. „ „ „ commit adultery.
4. „ „ „ lie.
5. „ „ „ drink wine,
II, „ „ ,, sit on a large or lofty couch.
2. ,, ,, „ have flowers or ribbons on thy dress.
3, ,, ,, ,, sing, dance, or witness plays.
4. ,, „ „ wear jewellery.
5. ., ,, ,, eat except at certain hours.
10. The text hasfB-ffciai ^ ^ ^ M ^ '^ ^
•^ ^ W fW {i- Mr. Beal says " They further stimulated the
King of the country to help make residences for the priests. More
over, they built a temple, in which priests still reside." We fail to see
how Mr. Beal arrives at this very plausible rendering. To make any-
thingatallof it, wehavebeen obligedasusualtochange ^ into JJ.
Mr. Beal further leaves out altogether the next four characters

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 55
now' ' , the head of the temple has always been a Shami.
From this point going east three yu-yen, on the spot
where the heir-apparent sent back his charioteer^* and
got away from his white horse, a pagoda has been built,
CHAPTER XXIV,
From this point going east four yu-yen, the pilgrims
arrived at the Ashes pagoda,' where there is also a
monastery. Proceeding further twelve yu-yen, they
arrived at the city of Chii-i-na-chieh.* To the north of
the city, where between two trees, on tha bank of the
Hsi-lien river, the world-honoured One, with his head to
the north, entered Nirvana ; where Hsii-po^ last of all
attained Wisdom ; where in his golden coffin the world-
honoured One was worshipped for seven days ; where
Chin-kang-U-shih* threw down his sceptre : and where
the eight kings divided the remains — in all these places
pagodas have been built, and monasteries, all of which
exist to this day. In this city the inhabitants are very
11. We consider that /fB ^ is sufficiently expressed by this
rendering, Mr. Beal says " there has been a regular succession of
priests till now,"
12. Eemusat says " renvoya son char et quitta son cheval blanc."
Mr, Beal says " dismissed his charioteer Tohandaka, and the royal
horse, previous to their return," The text has >K ¦? 36. ^
B 1& <li iS /^- The fact that Buddha's horse was very anxious
to accompany him explains the use of |^ , but i5 seems a Uttle
awkwardly placed. CHAPTER XXIV.
1. BuUt on the spot where Buddha's body was burnt.
2. " La viUe de Kousiu^ra des livres pali." Bemusat.
3. Subhadra. Eemusat.
4. Vadjrap^ni. He threw down his sceptre and rolled on the
ground for grief at the death of Buddha. Eemusat.

56 RECORD OF THE
few and scattered, and only such as are connected with
the priesthood. From this point going south-east twelve
yu-yen, they arrived at the place where all the Li-chii* wish
ed to follow Buddha into Nirvana , but Buddha would not hear
of it. Longing for Buddha, they were unwilling to depart ;
whereupon Buddha produced a great, deep stream which
they could not cross ; and then, giving them his alms-bowl
as a memorial, sent them away to their homes. A stone
pillar has been put up on which this is inscribed.
CHAPTER XXV.
From this' point going east five yu-yen, the pilgrims ar
rived at the country of P'i-she-li. ^ To the north of the
capital of P'i-she-li there is a large forest and a shrine in
two compartments* where Buddha once dwelt; also the
5, " Habitants de la ville de Pfti die li (Vais'ali)," Eemusat,
The rest of this chapter has received severe treatment at the hands
of Klaproth. Hardly two consecutive words are properly translated.
and the sense is completely altered. Mr. Beal has given it correct
ly, but we must differ from hiin as to the last seven characters. He
says "On this they went back and erected a stone pillar, although
he has already used up in the preceding sentence the only character
Pii to which such meaning could be attached.
CHAPTER XXV.
1. Vais'dli. Bemusat.
2. Mr. Beal gives the following somewhat confused rendering of
this passage : — " To the north of the city of this name (or, to the
North of the capital city of Vaisalt) there is the Yih&ra of the great
forest (Mahftvaua VihSra) which has a double tower (or a tower o!
two stories [sic] )." The text has M 4fc II^ # S IS ^^ "&>
and seems to yield more readily a forest and a shrine, as Eemusat
originally took it. M |^ does not mean either a " double tower
or a tower of two storeys ; but simply that the shrine was divided
into two 1^, whioh character may but does not necessarily signify
an upper chamber.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 67
pagoda (built over) half the body of A-nan. Inside this
city the woman An-po-lo» formerly build a pagoda in
honour of Buddha, which is still in existence. ' Three li
to the south of the city, on the west side of the road,
where was the garden which the woman An-po-lo gave to
Buddha for a dwelling-place ; a"ad where Buddha, about
to enter Nirvana, issuing with his disciples from the west
gate of the city, turned round to the right, ¦* and beholding
the city of P'i-she-li said to his disciples " This is the last
" place I shall visit "* — on these spots men of later genera
tions have build pagodas. Three li to the north-west of
the city there is a pagoda called Fang-kung-chang," the
origin of which name was as follows : — On the upper'
Ganges there was a king whose concubine was delivered
of an unformed foetus. The Queen in her jealousy said
¦"Your delivery is a bad omen," and accordingly enclosed
it in a wooden box and threw it into the Ganges. Lower
down the stream the king of another country was taking
a stroll when he saw on the water the wooden box. He
opened it and found inside one thousand boys, upright
3. AmraddrikS, or daughter of the mango tree. Beal.
4. Mr. Beal adds " as a token of respect," but alludes to "an
ingenious note " by Mr. Laidlay, whioh it is to be regretted he has
not given.
5- ^ ^ M^P^f ^ M- Mr. Beal gives " In this place I
have performed the last religious act of my career," .But there is
no authority (except Klaproth's) for such an interpretation of iy.
Eemusat himself was very wide of the mark : — " C'fest un lieu od
je reviendrai bien longtemps aprSs ceci."
6- "^ ^ i^ = lay down bows and (other) weapons. IJC is a
general term for ^ ^ ; not "clubs" as Mr. Beal chooses to
translate it.
7. _tl fMi which Mr. Beal unnecessarily renders " On one of
the superior affluents of &c." But the _t merely implies that this

58 RECORD OP THE
and of striking appearance." The king at once took
them out and brought them up, and when they were
full-grown they were very brave and strong, so that when
ever they went to war their enemies were invariably
compelled into submission. Subsequently, they went to
attack the country of the "king their father, at which the
latter was overcome with anxiety. His concubine asked
the king why he was anxious. He replied, " The king
" of that country has one thousand sons incomparably brave
" and strong, and they propose coming to my country;
"therefore I am anxious." His concubine said, "Be not
"anxious; but make a lofty chamber on the east side of
"the city, and when the enemy" comes place me up in it.
"I shall be able to keep them off." The king did so, and
when the enemy arrived, the concubine called oat to them
from the chamber, " You are my sons ; ' " why do you rebel
"againstme ?" They replied " Who are you that says you
" are our mother ?" The concubine said, " If you do not
"believe, all look up and open your mouths." She then
pressed her two breasts, and each gave forth five hundred
king Uved " higher up " than the other, in whioh sense we use the
word "upper." It might well be omitted altogether provided due
force were given to the following f ^.
8. 9m jti ^ W- Mr, Beal vrrongly renders these words "very
fair and just of a size." If J^ was to be used in its other sense,
it would give the exact contrary to "just of a size ;" but here it is
undoubtedly to be taken in its superlative sense.
9. Mr. Beal translates ^ as " robbers," apparently ignorant
that this is the common term applied to thieves, rebels, and hostile
armies aUke,
10. For no earthly reason Mr. Beal elects to put this half of her
speech in an interrogative form, — "Are you my children all ? "—
thus spoiling the whole turn of the sentence. We aro occasionally
tempted to beheve that Mr. Beal indulges ia these vagaries solely
for the sake of differing from Eumusat,

BUDDHISTIO KI.NODOMS. 69
jets of milk which fell into the mouths of her thousand
sons. Then they knew that she was their mother and
laid down their bows and other weapons. The two kings,
their fathers, by meditating upon these circumstances
attained the state of P'i-chih Buddhas, and the pagoda
buUt in memory of them is still in existence. Afterwards,
when the world-honoured One attained wisdom, he said
to his disciples " This is where formerly in my time the
" bows and weapons were laid down,"" Thus posterity
came to know, and built a pagoda on the spot. Hence
the name. The thousand boys are the same as the thou
sand Buddhas of the Kalpa of sages. ' * Buddha standing
by the pagoda of Fang-kung-chang said to A-nan, " After
"three months I must enter Nirvana" ; on which the king
of devils" confused A-nan so that he did not request
Buddha to remain in the world. From this point going
east three or four li, there is a pagoda. A hundred years
after the Nirvana of Buddha some mendicant priests of
P'i-she-U having broken the Disciphnes in ten particulars
stated that Buddha had said such was the proper prac
tice;'* whereupon the Lo-hans, the mendicants who
observed the Disciplines, and the lay-brothers," in all
11. Arriving at this translation, which the text wUl only bear
with a strain, it was consoUng to find that ESmusat had come to
the same conclusion, — " le lieu oil jadis on avait dgposfi." Buddha
said :^ ^ "a B# S^ 5' -Ot ;^> and §^ is apparently the no
minative case to J5[ as Mr. Beal has given it : — " This is the place
where I formerly laid aside my bow and my club." But this does
not make sense.
12. H ^* " ^^ kalpa dans lequel nous vivons, est un Bhadra-
kalpa ou kalpa des s<iges vertueux." Bemusat.
13. Mara.
14. M "a f^ ^ in :^' ^^- Ssal gives the last two charac
ters in the oratio recta.
15. Mr. Beal has omitted all mention oi J\ y^ ^ which we

60 RECORD OF THE
seven hundred ecclesiastics, examined and compared the
Disciplines over and over again. ' » Posterity has built a
pagoda on the spot which is also still in existence.
CHAPTER XXVI
From this point going east four yu-yen, the pilgrims
arrived at the confluence of the five rivers. When A-nan
going from the country of Mo-chieh' to P'i-she-h wished
to enter Nirvana, the gods informed king A-she-shih* who
at once proceeded with all haste and with his soldiers
pursued him to the river. The Li-chii, hearing that A-nan
had arrived, also came to meet him ; and when they were
all^ on the river (banks), A-nan reflected that by advanc
ing he would incur the hatred of king A-she-shih, and by
returning, the enmity of the Li-chii. Therefore, in the
middle of the river he entered the fiery state oisan-mei* and
translate " lay -brothers." These last do not shave the entire head,
and have not been branded, i.e. ordained.
16. Mr. Beal says "afresh;" but 15 = Ji W m^ny times.
Mr. Beal takes it as if the priests produced a revised copy of the
Disciphnes ; the text, however, seems only to imply that a search
was made for the passages quoted by the Nonconformists.
CHAPTER XXVI.
1, Magadha, Bemusat.
2. Ajatasatru, " C'etait un roi de Magadha qui vivait vers I'an
868 avant notre Sre." Bimusat. Mr, Beal places him, according to
the Hindoo records, B. C. 560.
3. 1& ^ij fpj jl^i-S- tiie king and his soldiers on one side, the
Li-chii on the other. Mr. Beal ignores ^ and says the Litchavas
set out to meet him " and arrived at the bank^of the river."
4. .ri 0^ " Samadhi, c'est a dire la plus profonde mfiditation
religieuss, laqueUe sort alors du corps du d(5funt et le consume pour
lo leproduirc dans toute la beautfi dont il fitait orno pendant sa vie."
Eemusat,

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 01
passed by cremation into Nirvana. His body was divided
into two parts, one for each side of the river ; and the
two kmgs having each obtained one half of his remains
returned and raised pagodas over them.
CHAPTEW XXVII.
Having crossed the river and journeyed south one yu-
yen, the pilgrims arrived at the country of Mo-chieh-t'ii and
the city of Pa-lien-fo, * the latter of which was (formerly)
ruled by king A-yii. The king's palace and courts were
all constructed by spirits whom he employed to pile stones,
build walls and gates, carve ornamental designs and en
grave' — truly not the work of mortals. These still exist.
King A-yii's younger brother having attained the position
of Lo-han was in the habit of residing at the Ch'i-she-
chiieh hiU,* his idea of enjoyment being undisturbed
meditation. The king very respectfully asked him to
come and practise his religious ceremonies* at home ; but
he, liking the quiet of the hill, refused to accept the invi
tation. The king then said to him "If you will only
CHAPTER XXVII,
1, Magadha,
2, Patna,
3, The text has % ^ "^ Ml% M "X M W: Mr- Beal
gives " The massive stones of which the walls are made, the door
ways and the sculptured towers, are no human work," We can find
nothing about towers or "massive" stones in the text. For the
former Mr. Beal has evidently mistaken ^. The whole sentence
is moreover wrongly separated from the verb ^ on which it
depends. 4. Gridhrakiita or the Pic du Vautour. Eemusat.
5. Mr. Beal here translates ¦^ ^ "to receive (or present) his
religious offerings." But it hardly seems doubtful which must be
meant in the present passage.

C2 RECORD OF THE
"agree to como, I will make a hill for you in the middle of
" the city," Accordingly he prepared food and drink, and
calling together all the spirits said to them, " Tomorrow
"when all of you accept my invitation, there being no
"seats," each bring your own." On the following day the
spirits arrived each carrying a huge cube' of stone some
four or five paces (every way). When the spirits had
done with them as seats, the king made them make a
great hill,^' and further at the foot of it construct a stone
room with five square stones, thirty feet in length, twenty
feet in breadth, and more than ten feet in height. There
was a Brahman belonging to the Greater Development,
named Lo-t'ai-ssu-p'o-mi," who lived in this city. His
intellect was vigorous and hia knowledge extensive ; there
was nothing that he did not understand. He led a pure
and solitary hfe. ' " The king of the country reverenced
him as his teacher, ' ^ and when he went to pay his re
spects did not venture to sit down. If the king from a
feehng of affection and veneration grasped his hand, when
he let go the Brahman would make haste to wash it.'*
6. Klaproth got into a glorious state of confusion over this
simple sentence.
7. For the meaning of J^ ^ we shall look to the assistance of
a friendly reader. Mr. Beal avoids the difficulty with his usual
skiU. 8. f^ >^ 5 ill • The Jz refers to Hi and not 5 as Mr.
Beal erroneously takes it.
. 9. Mr. Beal can give no " satisfactory opinion as to the correct
restoration of this name ;" and — it may be a coinoidenoe — Efimusat
is equally mute.
10. !^ 'M ^ "^ ^- Mr, Beal says "he lived apart occu
pied in silent meditation," But there is nothing here about "medi
tation."' He has apparently confused J§ and ^.
11. " Eeligious superior (Guru),'" Beal.
12. Mr. Beal absurdly renders this M 66 by " washed himself
from head to foot."

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 63
He was perhaps over fifty years of age.' » All the coun
try looked up to and relied on this one man. He diffused
widely the Law of Buddha, so that the heretics were un
able to discredit it.' * By the side of king A-yii's pagoda
the priests built a Mo-bo-yen ' » monastery, very imposing
in appearance. There is also a temple of the Lesser
Development, the two together numbering six or seven
hundred priests, of grave and decorous aspect, each taking
his proper place.' ' Virtuous Shamans from all quarters,
13. Mr. Beal here falls into a gross blunder, and one which had
already been perpetrated by Klaproth. He joins this sentence on
to the next and translates it, " For something like fifty years the
whole country looked up to this man and placed its confidence on
him alone." The text has ^RTS + fSsSilgiSjH:
— A.
14. Here again Mr. Beal, this time differing from Eemusat, com
mits an enor of liaison. This sentence ends 7 €S ^ i&il 1^
(the last character being evidently a misprint for ^) and the next
begins with ^ f^, but Mr. Beal gives it " were unable to obtain
any advantage at aU over the priesthood."
15. Mahayana, or the Greater Development.
16. We cannot refrain from giving this passage with the render
ings of Beal and Eemusat. A^'tWft^i^SlJ^^Rr
iSE9:#l^^^P1S. etc. For this ESmusat gives "x x
six et sept cents religieux. On y voit aussi des colleges admirablo-
ment bStis dans un style majestueux et grave. Les Cfto men d'nne
haute vertu des quatre parties du monde &o." Mr. Beal says " x x
six or seven hundred priests, all of them exceedingly well conducted.
In the College attached to the temple one may see eminent Shamans
from every quarter of the world, &c." We will confine ourselves to
an analysis of Mr. Beal's version. He puts a comma at ^ and a
full stop at ^, thus producing a most un-Chinese ^ntenco of two
adjectives ; and further makes ^ govern ^ f^ as its accusative
case. Such a bungle quite throws into the shade the French ver
sion, wherein the proper division of sentences is retained, although
the result is fully as monstrous as Mr. Beal's. We venture to as
sert that Ip ^ has here nothing whatever to 'do with "colleges"
ofanykind. The idea intended is that of ?JC ^ o,- rho "order" of

04 RECORD OP THE
and also scholars, desirous of advancing themselves in the
moralities, come together at this temple. The Brahman
teacher is called Wen-shu-shih-li, ' ' and is very much
looked up to by the Shamans and mendicants of the
Greater Development. He too resides in this monastery.
Of all the countries of central India, this has the largest
cities. The people are prosperous, and emulate each
other in the practice of virtue. Every year regularly on
the 8th of the 2nd moon they have a procession of images.
They make a four-wheeled car of five storeys by lashing
together bamboos ; and on it there are crescent-headed
javelins and partisans.' ^ It is more than twenty feet in
height. It is hke a pagoda in appearance, and draped
round with a kind of cashmere which is painted in various
colours. They make images of all the gods, using gold,
silver, and glass to ornament them, and suspending over
them embroidered banners and canopies. At the four
sides they make niches, each with a Buddha sitting inside
and a P'u-sa standing in attendance. There may be
twenty cars, every one of which is differently decorated.
On this day all the ecclesiastics and laymen in the district
assemble, and occupy themselves with singing and rare
music,' » burning incense, and making offerings of flowers
seniors and juniors in the priesthood. The words'^ ^ in their
ordinary sense will be found in one of the early chapters of Mencius.
17, Mailjusri. Bimusat.
18. Mr, Beal translates these last few characters 'b ^ ^Sl ilE
E^ by " the whole being supported by a centre post resembUng a
large spear with three points," ESmusat comes far neai'er with
" soutenus par des lances," The allusion is to two kinds of weapons
which are often seen on these image cars. The first ^ ^ is, as
we have given it in the text, crescent-headed ; the |^ ^ has the
crescent of metal at the side,
19. f^ i§liiC M- For this Mr. Beal gives " There are aU

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. G5
etc. The Brahmans come out to invite the Buddhas, who
enter the city in regular order, and in it pass two nights. ' °
All night long there are .lamps burning, music playing,
and offerings being made. All these nations act in a
similar way. The benevolent and educated persons of
this country have instituted a free hospital within the
city; and hither come all poor or helpless patients^'
suffering from all kinds of infirmities. They are well
taken care of, and a doctor attends them, food and medi
cine being supphed according to their wants. Thus they
are made quite comfortable, and when they are well they
may go away. When A-yu destroyed the seven pagodas
to make eighty-four thousand others, the first made was
a great one about three li to the south of this city. In
front of this pagoda there is an impression of Buddha's
foot (over which) a shrine has been raised, the entrance
of which faces the north and is opposite the pagoda.^'
sorts of games and amusements," and later on translates ^ by
" games" where it could hardly be anything but yo music.
20. -^ i^ ^ A M A. M P^ S ^ Mr. Beal ignores the
•^, regarding it probably as an accidental repetition of the last
word. He then proceeds to understand the character ^ cars, and
translates, " and one after the other the cars enter the city. After
coming into town they take up their several positions.'.' The italics
are ours, being a sUght tribute to the ingenuity that could extort
such a meaning from the characters ^ -fg, which in ordinary
Chinese hterature, epistolary and otherwise, are understood in the
sense we have given. To sleep one night is Sf^ ^.
21. It is obviously absurd to make this " hospital" a refuge for
the poor, tho destitute, the cripples, &c., as Eemusat and Beal take
this passage. The woids ^ ^ JBi ^ are here used as adjec
tives qualifying the classes of patients who would be admitted.
22. J^ 4fc IpI ^- Mr. Beal ignores the last two of these
characters and ends his sentence with " the gate of which faces the
north."

66 RECORD OF THE
To the south of the pagoda there is a atone pillar, fourteen
or fifteen feet in circumference, and thirty odd feet in
height. On it there is an inscription as follows : — " King
"A-yii presented Yen-fu-t'i to the priesthood and redeemed
"it again with money. He did this three^ ^ times." Three
or four hundred paces to the north of the pagoda king
A-yii built the city of Ni-li.** In it there is a stone
pillar, also about thirty feet in height. On the top of it
there is a lion, and on the pillar there is an inscription
giving the origin of the city of Ni-li, and the year, month,
and day (on which the inscription was written).'*
CHAPTER xxvin.
From this point going south-east nine yu-yen, the pil
grims arrived at a small Ku-shih' hill, on the top of which
there was a stone chamber facing the south. When
Buddha was seated within, the heavenly ruler Shih on
this spot edified him with celestial music, playing there
for a considerable time on the lute for Buddha's enjoy-
23. in :^ H M- Mr. Beal says " four times."
24. Klaproth can find " nuUe autre mention de cette vUle." Mr.
Beal identifies it with NSla.
25. For this Mr. Beal says " (he) also engraved an historical
record on the front of the pillar, giving an account of the successive
events connected with the city of Ni-lai (sic), with the corresponding
year, day, and month." The text has simply 'tJ Jl ^ pS 13
ifiJ&W.M^^'Bi^^k B J^. The y,»-y»«» of a city
is merely its raison d'etre, and is correctly rendered in Bfemusat's
translation. The date given might be that of the completion of the
city, but is more probably that of the day on which the inscription
was engraved on the pillar put up in commemoration of its comple
tion. CHAPTER XXVIII.
1. Literally, " orphan stone " ; — a common name for sohtary
hills. Mr. Beal says " a small rooky hUl."

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 67
ment^. He then proceeded to ask Buddha forty-two
questions, writing them all down one after another upon
a stone with his finger. The traces of this writing still
exist^. Here there is also a monastery. From this
2. As this passage cost us a considerable amount of time and
thought, and as the results obtained differ essentially from those
previously put forward by Messrs. Eemusat and Beal, we will place
all three before the indiilgent reader, accompanied by the text, and,
in our own case, by authorities for translating various characters as
wehavedone. ^ ^ ^ :^ f^ ^ f^ ^ M % M ^ mW
^ ^ W ^ Eemusat originally rendered this " Foe s'y fitant
assis, le roi du eiel Chy, avec les musiciens celestes, y fit exSouter
le Pan tcha, et pincer du khin eu I'honneur du Bouddha.'' Klap
roth altered this to " Foe s'y gtant assis, le roi du ciel Chy y fit
pinoer du khin par les musiciens cSlestes Pan tcha, en I'honneur
du Bouddha," and states in his note that he can find no " ficlaircis-
sement " on the term Pan tcha. Mr. Beal now enters the field with
" On one occasion, when Buddha was sitting in the middle of this
cell, the Divine Sekra took with him his attendant musicians, each
one provided with a five-stringed lute, and caused them to sound
a strain in the place where Buddha was seated." Mr. Beal, con
trary to his wont, has attempted to express the last and somewhat
unimportant character ]^ which had been ignored by Eemusat and
Klaproth, and of whioh we can offer no more satisfactory explana
tion than is imphed rather than expressed in our own translation,
namely, that where Shih played, there he asked his forty-two ques
tions. But he makes a school-boy blunder over ff* which only
means inside and not necessarily in the middle of the chamber.
As for the rest, Mr. Beal dances lightly over it without note or
comment as if there was no difficulty whatever about it. We will
now account for our own version : " When Buddha was seated
within, the heavenly ruler Shih ^ taking ^ HI celestial music
H^ gave him pleasure, jjB very much 5^ striking ^ the lute ^
(here Ze) to dehght {^ Buddha." Eeferenoe to K'albg Hsi's dic
tionary win shew the characters ^x and j^ used in the senses in
which we have ventured to understand them.
3. fi W 1^ ¦^ or " The ruins of these marks still exist," as
Mr. Beal should translate it if he would lay any claim to consistency.
We are astonished that he did not here detect his own mistake of
translating '^ ruins.

68 RECORD OF THE
point going south-west one yu-yen, they arrived at the
village of Na-lo*, the birth-place of Bhe-li-fo,= and
the village to which he returned to enter Nirvana.
Therefore a pagoda was erected here, which is still in
existence. From this point gomg west one yu-yen, they
arrived at the new city of Wang-she « which was built by
king A-she-shih, and in which there are two monasteries.
Three hundred paces outside the west gate, king A-she-
shih, having obtained a share of Buddha's remains, built
a lofty, spacious, and handsome pagoda. Four li to the
south of the city they entered a valley stretching away south
wards' and arrived at (a space) within five hiUs. The five
hills surround it, giving the appearence of a walled city. It
was (the site of) King P'ing-sha's" old city, which was
five or six li from east to west and seven or eight li
from north to south. The place where She-li-fo and
Mu-lien first saw Ngo-pi:^ where the Ni-chien-tzu">
made a fire-pit and, poisoning the food, invited Buddha ;
where king A-she-shih'^'^ gave wine to a black elephant
in order to injure Buddha ; where, at the north-east cor
ner of the city^2 Ch'i-chiu'^ built a shrine in An-p'o-lo's
4. N41andagrSma. Beal.
6. Sariputra.
6. EajagrOia. Bimusat.
7. The ^ |p] here seems to refer rather to the position of the
valley than to the route of the pilgrims.
8, BimbSsara, Bimusat.
9, Asvadjit, (qui va 3, cheval), Eemusat.
10. A Nigrantha, or ascetic, named Srlgupta, Beal, iiom Julien.
11, Hsiian Tsang ascribes this crime to Devadatta. Bimusat.
12. The text has M ^ 4b ^ ft •+•• We can make nothing
satisfactory out of the last two characters. Mr, Beal renders them
by " in the middle of a crooked defile," and Klaproth skips them
without saying so,
13, " (The physician) Djtvaka, Beal,

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. (!',)
garden, and h.aving invited Buddha with his 1250 disci
ples made offerings to them ; — these places still e.tist, ' '
The city is a waste ; there are no inhabitants.
CHAPTER XXIX.
Entering the valley and bearing round' the mountains
to the south-west for fifteen U, the pilgrims. arrived at the
Ch'i-she-chiieh= hill. ''Three li from its summit there is
a cave in the rock facing south, where Buddha formerly
sat in meditation. Thirty paces to the north-east there
is another cave in the rock in which A-nan sat in medi
tation. The evO. spirit Po-hsiin,^ having changed himself
into a vulture, stood before the cave to frighten A-nan.
Buddha by his supernatural power pierced the rock, and
stretching out his hand stroked* A-nan's shoulder. His
14. " Mr. Beal still persists in talking about "ruins " which here
could only be those of the shrine, whereas the word " exist " iu the
text refers to aU the above-mentioned places which are StiU pointed
out. CHAITBB XXIX.
1. The text has if^ [Ij 1^ f| ± + S M- Mr. Beal
gives skirting the mountains along their south-eastern slope." The
first character seems to be a misprint for H ; of _tl we can make
nothing very satisfactory.
2. Chapter xxvii, note 4.
3. " Un des noms de Mara." Bimusat.
4. Here we have one of Mr. Beal's unaccountable aberrations
from sense, grammar, rhythm, and everything that should be kept
in view by free and hteral translators ahke. The text, too simple
to embarrass even the flighty Klaproth, is as follows :— ^ ^ j^
Plf il ;B ffl iP © ih- Yet Mr. Beal has, "with his outspread
hand touched the head of Ananda. On this he bore up against his
fear and found peace." — adding in a note to make it ten times
worse, " I here translate "ma" (sic) by " touched the head," and
" kin " (the shoulder) by " able to bear." It may, however be
rendered " touched the shoulder of Ananda, on which his fear

70 RECORD OF THE •
fear was thus allayed. The marks of the bird and the
hole for (Buddha's) hand are still to be seen ; hence the
name " Vulture-cave-hill." In front of the cave is the
spot where the four Buddhas sat down, and also the caves
where each of the Lo-hans sat in meditation, several
hundred in all. Also the place where Tiao-ta standing
among the rocks on the north of the mountain wickedly
wounded Buddha on the toe with a stone ^ as he was
walking up and down in front of the cave. The stone
is still in existence. The haU in which Buddha preached
has been destroyed ; nothing but the foundations of the
brick walls remain.^ The peaks of this mountain are
picturesque and imposing;" it is the highest of the five.
Fa Hsien having bought incense, flowers, oil, and lamps
in the New city, hired two mendicants, who knew the way,
to carry them.'' He then went up the Ch'i-she-chiieh
was immediately allayed." As if there could possibly be any other
way of translating this passage, least of all that which Mr. Beal
adopts in his text. For fj* is here an active verb, ^ never means
" to touch the head," the rhythm of both halves of the sentence
would be utterly destroyed by putting on a stop at ^, the phrase
^ '|!jj " to bear up against fear " is unknown to the Chinese
language, and " found peace " is a gloss on the text which there was
not the slightest necessity for inserting in a plain unvarnished
narrative. 5. The text has M M M ]}i '^t t^li^ f^ ^. M IS ^
TO Je 3 H • Mr. Beal says, "Ddvadatta, standing on the mountain
between the northern eminences, rolled down athwart his path a
stone which wounded a toe of Buddha's foot." What authority Mr.
Beal has for his "northern eminences " he does not condescend to
tell us, and we must therefore reject his somewhat violent separation
ofJflj from li[. The character gP never means " to roll down,"
and i^ need not necessarily be taken in its literal sense " athwart."
6. An excellent rendering of .S llj [l]^ ^ jj^ ^ which we
have borrowed word for word from Mr. Beal.
7. Mr, Beal is quite wrong with his " procured the assistance of

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 71
hill and made offerings of flowers and incense, and burnt
lamps all night. ^ (There) his feelings overcame him,
but he restrained his tears" and said, " Buddha formerly
" hved here, and delivered the Shou-leng-yen.'^° I, Fa
" Hsien, being born (at a time when I could) not meet
" Buddha, can only gaze upon his traces and his dwelling-
" place." Whereupon he chanted the Shou-leng-yen in
front of the cave. He remained one night and returned
to the New city.^^
two aged Bikshus to accompany him to the top of the peak," The
text has '^ I^ ff J^u fl3 5S* Now •^ means "long resident,"
and therefore may be held to imply that they knew the way : it
never signifies " aged," which by the way would be the very last
qualification in the world for a mountain guide, jg is to trans
port things as well as to conduct people, and the former is un
questionably its meaning here. Mr, Beal's error has arisen from
imitating Klaproth's wrong punctuation. A full stop at jg makes
the passage simple enough.
8- ^ M iM ^' Mr. Beal treats us to "and lit his lamps,
so that their combined lustre illuminated the gloom of the cave."
Apart from the utter Lord Burleighism of this sentence, we may
remark that if Mr. Beal had read a few of the proclamations against
gambling, so frequently issued in China, he would have discovered
that ipg H|3 may be roughly rendered by the words of a well-known
Bacohanahan lyric — " till dayhght doth appear."
9. Mr. Beal has "Fah Hian was deeply moved, even tiU the
tears coursed down his cheeks," which is the exact opposite of what
we are told in the text. 'fU ^ M M ^IX M M m •
10. The name of a well-known Sutra.
11. This sentence forms a striking instance of Klaproth's ignor.
ance of the Chinese language and a singular want of acumen on the
part of Mr. Beal. We will presume that the render l^iows the divi
sion of the Fo kuo chi into chapters to be purely arbitrary, and the
work first of Efemusat, afterwards of Klaproth ; the original being
one continuous narrative from beginning to end. Now Klaproth
chose to end one chapter in the middle of a sentence, so to speak,
and to carry on the remainder to the beginning of the next chapter.
The result is of course ludicrous, but Mr. Beal did not notice the
absurdity and has followed faithfully in the beaten track. The text

72 RECORD OF THE
CHAPTER XXX.
About three hundred paces to the north of the Old City,
on the west side of the road, the pilgrims arrived at the
Bamboo Garden shrine of Chia-lan-t'o,'^ which is still in
existence, and is swept and sprinkled by priests. Two or
three li to the north of shrine is the Shih-mo-she-na or,
in Chinese, the field of tombs for throwing in' the dead.
Bounding 3 the southern hill and going three hundred
paces south, there is a stone chamber called the Pin-po
lo* cave. Buddha frequently sat in meditation here after
his meals. Six li further west, on the north side of the
hill and (consequently) in the shade, there is a stone
chamber called Chii-ti,* where, after the Nirvana of Bud
dha, the 500 Lo-hans compiled the Ching. When the
Ching were brought out, " three empty seats were prepared
gives -^Jh-^SlRJifMlUWM^b, etc. Mr. Beal
translates " and remained there the entire night. — Cliapter XXX.
Eeturning towards the New City, after passing through the old
town, etc." The unfortunate ending of chapter XXIX at -fg makes
nonsense of the beginning of chapter XXX.
CHAPTEB XXX.
1. Kalanda, the squirrel which saved a, king's hfe by making a
noise in his ear when a snake was approaching. Beal, quoting
Manual of Buddhism.
2. Mr. Beal says " laying." But ^ has a stronger and more
repulsive meaning than that.
3. Here we have the character ^ which we can only consider,
with the 3^ above mentioned, as a misprint for f^.
4. Mr. Beal says Julion renders this the " Pipal cave," but tells
us nothing further as to its meaning.
5. Mr. Beal says in a note, " This is plainly the Sattapanni cave
of the Mahawanso.''
6. {i{ (^ I}$ for which Mr. Beal gives " At the time when the
books were recited." Wo do not know this meaning of {ij.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 78
and very handsomely decorated. The one on the left was
for ShI-li-fu, and the one on the right for Mu-lien,
Out of the five hundred one Lo-han was wanting, and
just as the great Chia-yeh was mounting his throne,
A-nan was outside the door unable to enter. A pagoda
was built on this spot which is still in existence. Bound
ing the mountain, there are also a great number of caves
where the Lo-hans used to sit in meditation. Issuing
from the north of the old city and going east three li,
there is Tiao-ta's- cave, fifty paces from which there is a
great square black rock. Formerly, a mendicant priest
walking backwards and forwards on the top, reflected as
follows :' — " The sorrows of life are of short duration. In
" death there is defilement. I loathe this body." Thereupon
he seized a knife with the intention of killing himself ;
but again he reflected, " The world-honoured One has
" set his canon against self-slaughter ;" and further " al-
" though this is so, I now only desire to slay the three
" baneful thieves."^ He then took the knife and eut his
throat. At the beginning of the cut" he became a Hsii-
7. Mr, Beal puts what the Bikshu said in the oratio obliqua for
no particular reason that we can see except the uncourteous one
that he did not thoroughly understand the text. We have ,§[ 'I|^
^ # ^ H =g ^ # ^ if M .i ^ #• For this
Mr. Beal gives the following marvellous production : — " meditating
on the impermanency, the sorrow, and vanity of his present life .
Arriving thus at an unsound state of mind, disgusted at the sorrows
of hfe, he drew etc." Where Mr. Beal gets his ' ' unsound state of
mind " from is more than we can say. The defilement to be feared
after death is of course the corruption of the body. But we must
refer the reader to chapters xviii and xxxii where the same phrase
occurs. 8. " Eaga, dwesa, moha — evil desire, hatred, ignorance." Beal.
9. Here Mr. Beal evidently mistranslates. He says "On the
first gash" ; but it is clear from the text that there was only one cut.

74 RECORD or THE
t'o-hun;^'' when half through, an A-na-han;^^ when
quite through, a Lo-han ; whereupon he entered Nirvana.
CHAPTER XXXI.
From this point going west four yu-yen, the pilgrims
arrived at the city of Chia-yeh,^ also a complete waste
within its walls. Journeying ten more li to the south,
they arrived at the place where Bodhisatva formerly pass
ed six years in self-mortification. There is a wood there.
From this point going west three li, they arrived at the spot
where Buddha entered the water to bathe, and a god
pressed^ down the branch of a tree to pull him out of the
pool. Also, by going two li north, at the place where
the two lay-sisters' presented Buddha with milk and rice-
water. Two li to the north of this, Buddha, sitting on a
stone under a great tree and facing the east, ate the milk
10. Srotapanna. " Class of those Buddhists who have entered
the stream of Buddhist conduct." Edkins.
11. Anagami. The class of those who being freed from fciults do
not come again into the world of death and deception.
CHAPTER XXXI.
1. Gaya. Bimusat.
2. Mr. Beal saya " the Deva held out the branch of a tree," which
gives quite a wrong idea of what happened. The verb ^ means
to press or to bend down, and the reference here is to a branch on a
tree, not to a piece broken oft.
3. M M'A ^ i^ ^M M- On this sentence Klaproth
says in a note, " M. ESmusat, prenant Mi kia pour un nom propre "
translated accordingly. He himself altered Eemusat's version into
" les fiUes des families retu'ges ", explaining in a note " qui se sont
61oign6es du monde." Mr. Beal gives " the village-girls," and says
they were the daughters of Sfijdta, the lord of the viUage of Ouro-
vilva ; but this may be quite true and at the same time throw no
light on the use of the character ^. Our own explanation is that
^ ^ is a not uncommon synonym for ^ ^, and that the two
women were membars of a kind of religio laxa such as was proposed

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 75
and rice-water .4 The tree and the stone are both there
stiU ; the latter being about six feet in length and breadth
by over two feet in height. In Central India the heat and
cold are equally divided ; trees will five" several thousand,
and even so much as ten thousand years. From this
point going north-east half a yu-yen, the pilgrims arrived
at the cave where Bodhisatva, having entered, sat
down cross-legged with his face to the west and reflected
as follows : — " If I attain perfect Wisdom, there should
" be some miracle (in token thereof)." Whereupon the
silhouette of Buddha appeared upon the stone, over
three feet in length, and is plainly visible to this day.
Then Heaven and Earth quaked mightily, and the gods
who were in space cried out, saying, " This is not the
" place where past and future Buddhas have attained and
" should attain perfect Wisdom. The proper spot is be-
" neath the Pei-to tree, less than half a yu-yen to the
" south-west of this." When the gods had uttered these
words, they proceeded to lead the way with singing in
order to conduct him thither. Bodhisatva got up and
followed, and when thirty paces from the tree a god gave
him the Chi-hsiang grass.^ Having accepted this he went
to Queen Catharine previous to her divorce from Henry VIII.
These "lay sistsrs" do not shave their heads like the female
priestesses ^ ffy, though they live entirely on a vegetable diet
and are otherwise supposed to lead rehgious lives.
4. Mr. Beal says that Buddha here "eat (sic) the rice and mUk."
Egmusat gives " du riz au lait." The character ^ signifies what
is commonly known in China as congee.
5. Mr. Beal wrongly makes this statement a consequence of the
equal heat and cold, coining a conjunction that has no existence iu
the text.
6- ^ SP J^* Mr. Beal gives, "the grass-mat of Ki-tseung
(Santi)," apparently as if Ki-tseung was the Chinese transUteration
of Santi. Taken literally it is merely the "happy omen grass,"

76 RECORD OP THE
on fifteen paces farther, when five hundred dark-coloured
birds came and flew three times round him, and departed.
Bodhisatva went on to the Pei-to tree, and laying down
his Chi-hsiang grass sat down with his face to the
east. Then the king of the devils sent three beautiful
women'' to approach from the north and tempt him ; he
himself approaching from the south with the same object.
Bodhisatva pressed^ the ground with his toe, whereupon
the infernal army retreated in confusion and the three
woman became old. From the above-mentioned place
where Buddha suffered mortification for six years (dowu-
wards^ ), — on all these spots men of after ages have buUt
pagodas and set up images, aU of which are still in
existence. Where Buddha, having attained perfect Wis
dom contemplated the tree for seven days, experiencing
the joys of emancipation ;!* where Buddha walked back
wards and forwards under the Pei-to tree for seven days ;
where the gods produced a jewelled chamber and wor
shipped Buddha for seven days ; where the beautiful-
given to Buddha, as Mr. Spence Hardy tells us, by the Brahman
Santi. 7. .Zi 3S 3t> for which Mr. Beal gives " three pleasure girls."
We suspect this to be a gloss of his own. 3E is invariably used,
as far as we know, in a good sense ; it is even occasionally taken as
a synonym of ^ -f , and here seems to express simply the good
looks of the three women without reference to their morals. In
this view we are borne out by the use of the character ^ old in
the next sentence.
8. Here again Mr. Beal mistranslates 5k "struct the ground
with his toe."
9. That is, through the text. We have translated this sentence
too literally for the general reader, but perhaps not too much so for
the student who would understand the original word for word.
10. We have borrowed Mr. Beal's happy rendering of ^ ^ j^

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 77
scaled blind dragon^i walked round Buddha for seven
days; where Buddha sat facing the east on a square
stone beneath the Ni-chii-lii tree and Brahma came to
salute him ; where the four heavenly kings offered their
ahns-bowls ;^^ where the five hundred traders gave him
cooked rice^^ and honey ; where he converted Chia-yeh
and bis brothers, master and disciples to the number of
one thousand souls {^* — on all these spots pagodas have
been raised. At the place where Buddha attained perfect
Wisdom there are three monasteries, all inhabited by
priests. The priests and people gave (the pilgrims) what
food they required without stint.i* The strictness with
11. So Eemusat has it. Mr. Beal, however, strikes out a path
for himself with " where the blind dragon Manlun." The text has
5* ^ B Si) and therefore Mr. Beal's " Manlun " must be re
presented in the text by the first two characters wen Un. At the
same time, Manlun seems much more like the last two characters
which are actually read mang lung, but of course mean "bUnd
dragon." 12. Which he changed, by a miracle, into one, so as to cause no
disappointment by his acceptance of either. See ante.
13. Or " cooked wheat." This passage is quoted in K'ang Hsi's
dictionary under the character ^, explained by ^ or ^^^.
Efemusat gives "riz grille" which is the first of these two; Mr.
Beal says " wheat" which is neither.
14. The t6xih3£MMM5t f^M^=f A M- Mr.
Beal has apparently takes 8$ as a verb, — " each of whom was at
the head of 1,000 disciples." Whatever the facts of the case may
be, the text seems to point only to a total of 1,000 men.
15. The text has ^ ft 15 ^^^B&M^^tP"-
For this Mr. Beal, following Efemusat, gives "All the ecclesiastics
are suppUed with necessaries by the people, so that they have
sufScient and lack nothing." That is to say, Mr. Beal makes
3« f^ the dative case and ^ ^ the nominative, picking them
out much as if the sentence was a Latin verse, and utterly ignoring
the fundamental principle that " the whole of Chinese grammar de
pends upon position." Fa Hsien is evidently, as elsewhere, alluding
to the help given to himself and his companion.

78 RECORD OF THE
which, while Buddha was still alive, the holy brotherhood
observed the Disciplines and a decorous manner of sitting,
rising, and entering the company of others, is the same
to this dayi6. From the Nirvana of Buddha to the pre
sent time, the sites of the four great pagodas have been
handed down" (by tradition) without a break. The four
great pagodas were (1) on the spot where Buddha was
born, (2) where he attained perfect Wisdom, (3) where
he turned the wheel of the Law,^^ and (4) where he enter
ed Nirvana. CHAPTER xxxn.
Formerly, when king A-yii was a boy, and was playing
in the road, he met Shih-chia Buddha out begging. The
boy was pleased, and gave him a handful of earth as
alms. Buddha took it and threw it down^ on the ground
where he exercised himself. In return for this act the
16. The unusually long protasis of this sentence has been cur
tailed by Mr. Beal. He makes a separate clause of the first half.
17. The text has sunply ifB }S /p ^. For this Mr. Beal
gives " have always been associated together," whioh, apart from its
erroneousness, is more difficult to understand than the very text
itself. 18. That is, preached. CHAPTER xxxn.
1. The text has {ft # S ^ i^ fj ifi. Mr. Beal gives
" Buddha received it, and on his return sprinkled it on the ground
on which he took his exercise." He thus takes J^ in its sense of
" going home," and makes a verb of tS- This seemed so plausible
that we were nearly adopting it without question. On reconsidera
tion, however, we prefer to submit another version so that the
reader may choose for himself. In this j^ Va is taken to signify
" returned it to the dirt."

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 79
boy became an " u-on-wheel "^ king and ruled over Yen-
u-t'i. On assuming the iron-wheel he made a royal pro
gress' through Yen-fu-t'i, and saw between the two hills
T'ieh and Wei* a hell for punishing wicked people. The
. king then asked his suite " What is the meaning of this ?"
They answered "It is Yen-lo, the king of the devils,
" punishing wicked people." The king, having reflected,
said " So even the king of the devils can make a hell for
" punishing wicked people.^ I am a ruler of men, why
" should not I make a hell for punishing wicked people —
" eh ? " He then asked his ofi&cers " Who is able to make
" a hell for me, and to superintend the punishment of the
" wicked ? " They rephed " Only a very bad man could
" do this." The king accordingly sent officers to search
in aU directions for a bad man. They saw® by the side of
2. A Chakravarti.
3- ^ fJ- Mr. Beal says " going (through Jambudwipa) in
the administration of justice." But the words we have itahcised do
not convey the correct meaning of ^ fj which thus applied, as
now to the Governor of a province, would merely mean a tour of
inspection and not a judicial circuit.
4. Mr. Beal, copying Eemusat, and regardless of the great prin
ciple we alluded to in note 15 of the last chapter, translates the
names of these hillg by " surrounded by an iron wall " — meaning,
of course, the heU. The text has ^ ^ g |g llj F4 ii ^
ia W A. If the meaning were what Mr. Beal gives ^ H
would immediately precede Jj^ ^and not be separated as they now
are. 5. The text has 5H1§ |g M it Vo IP A, the force of
which is quite lost in Mr. Beal's " The Demon king, "in the exercise
of his fimction, requires to have a place of punishment for wicked
men." The important character ^ is thus totally ignored.
6. This eUiptical abruptness is one among many specimens of
the terse ruggedness of Fa Hsien's style whioh we have endeavoured
to preserve in our translation rather than indulge in more elegant
toumures which have no existence in the original.

80 RECORD OF THE
the P a tall, burly man, of a black colour, with yellow
hair and dark eyes;^ He used his feet to hook up fish, ^
and his mouth to whistle to birds and beasts ; and when
they came he would shoot or slay them; none ever
escaped him. When they had got this man, he was
brought before the king who secretly instructed him as
follows : — " You make a square of four high walls, and in
" it plant all kinds of flowers and fruit, with beautiful
" vales and pools, and decorate it so exquisitely that people
" shall long to gaze upon it. Make a gate to the enclo-
" sure,!" and when any one enters, seize him directly and
" administer punishBient according to his deserts.^^ Do
" not let him get out. If you catch me going in, punish
" me in the same way, and do not let me go. I now
" salute you as the ruler of hell." A mendicant going
round collecting alms, entered this door, and when the
'?• M fffi 7^ M- Mr. Beal gives, " They saw, by the side of
a running stream," But jjft is more probably the name of the
stream ; at any rate, some authority would be necessary to sanction
Mr, Beal's (and Eemusat's) rendering.
8. Mr, Beal says " red hair and light eyes," The text has
^S M 1« ra ' 8.nd as the last character expresses several shades
it is only fair to translate it, in a doubtful case, by the most common
of its meanings, whioh would be dark green.
9. Closely translating Eemusat's translation, Mr, Beal has made
a mess of a not very diffioult passage —£J[ Wi ^^ $1^ M, tJ P? '^
^— as follows:—" x x with feet like talons, and a mouth Uke that
of a fish. When he whistled to the birds and beasts, etc." That is
to say, Mr. Beal puts a full stop at P , instead of a comma at ^,
making P dependant on j^. There can be doubt about the cor
rectness of our reading.
10. Mr, Beal says, "Then, having made a wide gate."—
^ JE PI ^;
11. W.® m iP> which Mr. Beal erroneously renders " sub
ject him to every kind of infernal torture.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 81
attendants^ saw him they at once seized him in order
to administer punishment. The mendicant was very
frightened, and pleaded " Give me a few moments that I
" may eat my midday meal." Meanwhile, some one came
in, and the attendants threw him into a mortar and
pounded him till he foamed bloodi* (at the mouth). The
mendicant, seeing this, reflected : — " The sorrows of life
" are of short duration : dying, it is like a bubble or like
" firoth.i*" Thereupon he became a Lo-han, and^^ when
the attendants seized him to throw him into a cauldron
of boiling water, the mendicant's heart was exceeding
glad, the fire was extinguished and the hot water became
cold, a lotus-flower growing up in the middle on which
the mendicant sat down. The attendants at once went
and said the king, " Something wonderful has occurred
"in the hell; we pray Your Majesty to go and see."
The king said, " I formerly made an agreement ; now I
" dare not go." The attendants said " This is no small
" matter : Your Majesty ought to go at once ; the former
" agreement is cancelled." The king therefore entered
in, and the mendicant having prayed for him, he believed
and was made free (of sin). Thereupon he destroyed
12. ^ 2j£— a common phrase for the attendant devils who carry
out the punishments of Purgatory. Vide the 3E JS «^* Mr. Beal
takes it to mean the lately-appointed keeper.
13, ^ J^ '^ 1^ ifj) whioh Mr. Beal translates "till a red
froth formed on the surface of the mass."
14. Begarding this sentence, which we have been mfcch tempted
to translate k la Beal — vaguely, we must refer the reader to Chapter
XXX, Note 7.
IS. Mr. Beal puts a fuU stop at Lohan, and translates the next
two characters gj flff by "This having trarMpired," evidently having
no very clear idea as to the meaning of the word we have italicised,
which, if anything, should have been occurred or taken place.

82 RECORD OP THE
the hell and repented of all the wickednesses he had
previously committed, and from that time forth beheved
in and venerated the Three Precious Ones,i^ often going
beneath the Pei-to tree to repent him of his faults, to
reproach himself, and pass the time in fasting.^'' The
queen asked where her husband went so frequently and
the courtiers replied, " He is frequently under the Pei-to
*' tree." The queen waited until the king was away from
the tree, and then sent men to cut it down. When the
king came and saw this, stupified with grief he fell down
on the ground. His ministers threw water on his face,
and after a long time he came round. Thereupon, he
banked it up on all sides with bricks,!^ and poured a hun
dred pitchers of cow's-milk on the roots, throwing himself
at full length on the ground and making this vow : — " If
" the tree does not hve, I will never rise." When he had
thus vowed, the tree began to grow at the top of its
roots,^^ and exists to this day. It is now rather less than
100 feet high. CHAPTER XXXni.
From this point going south three li, the pilgrims ar-
16. The Buddhist Trinity. See ante.
17. The text has ^ 7\. @, the second character being pro
bably a. misprint for /"v- At the same time, we may mention that
a category of " eight abstinences " does actually exist.
18. iM- Not " piled up the earth '' as Mr. Beal gives it.
19. -^ Jl M ^- Mr. Beal has " (the tree immediately) be
gan to force up small branches from its roots,"— according to whioh
the original tree must be supposed to die, to save which was the
king's object in bricking and watering. The text is inadequate, but
the meaning is clear. When the part out off was replaced over its
roots still in the ground, in whioh position it was maintained by the
bricks, the whole tree miraculously went on gi-owing from the top

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 83
rived at a mountain called Chi-tsu.i The great Chia-yeh
is at present in this mountain. He split the mountain
to get in. The place where he entered will barely admit
a man. 2 Going down to a great distance there is a
niche* in which stands a full-length image of Chia-yeh.
Outside the niche is the place where he used to wash his
hands, and the people of the district, if they have the
headache, use the earth (from that spot) for plasters, and
are at once cured. Therefore, since that time* there
have been Lo-hans on this mountain, and when the de
votees of the neighbouring countries come yearly to make
their offerings to Chia-yeh, the Lohans appear by night
to the steadfast^ ones, converse with them, and resolve
of its old roots upwards through the joining, as if nothing had hap
pened. CHAPTER XXXIII.
1- il S or "Cock's Foot." (Kukutftpadagiri. Beal.)
2. The text has A 1^ ^ ^ A, which Mr. Beal cautiously
and erroneously paraphrases by ' ' This entrance is now closed up."
First of all this is not the meaning, and secondly Mr. Beal has been
led astray by Klaproth's false punctuation, thereby including the
first two characters ( "j" yv) of the following sentence .
3. ^ ?L or " side hole, " out of which Mr, Beal gets "a deep
" chasm, " and in which he places "entire body of KSayapa." But
the words we have italicised are in the original ^s ^ — a common
term for a " full-length " image,
4. The text hasjlbllj't'BIJ HIKW etc. Klaproth trans
lates n bK by " k I'ouest," and takes good care to say nothing
about it. Mr. Beal gives " as soon as the sun be^ns to decline,"
adding in a note that the phrase BP H IK "is a most unusual ex
pression." We venture to go farther and doubt its existence alto
gether, pp 0 is certainly not "unusual" ; neither is wC Wj
and we deem it safer to translate accordingly, without seeking for
more than lies upon the very surface of the text.
5. JL? iiw M ^) which Mr, Beal, translating Rfimusat, renders

64 RECORD OF THE
their doubts. They then suddenly vanish. On this
mountain there are quantities of trees ; also a great many
lions, tigers, and wolves, so that travellers have to be
cautious. CHAPTER XXXIT.
Fa Hsien returning to the city of Pa-lien-fo, followed
the Ganges ten yu-yen to the west and arrived at a
shrine called Kuang-yeh,^ where Buddha formerly lived,
and which still has its priests. Again following the Gan
ges twelve yw-yen towards the west, the pilgrims arrived
at the country of Chia-shih^ and the city of Po-lo-nai.
About ten li to the north-east of the city is the wild-deer
park of the Immortals. s A P'i-chih Buddha once hved
here, and wild deer often came* hither to pass the night.
When the world-honoured One was about to attain perfect
Wisdom, the gods in space sang these words : — " The son
" of king Pai-cheng left his home to learn Wisdom ; seven
" days hence he will become a Buddha." The P'i-chih
Buddha, hearing this, immediately entered Nirvana;
hence this place was named the wild-deer park of the
Immortals. When the world-honoured One had entered
Nirvana, a shrine was subsequently raised upon this spot.
"distressed with doubts," or the exact opposite of the real meaning.
The principle here expressed is the same as that of modern spiritualism,
namely, that manifestations are only discernible by believers. The
" doubts " mentioned lower down are such as might occur to any one
without impugning his fidelity to the creed.
CHAPTER xxxiv.
1. li^-
2. Kasi, and its city of Benares. Bimusat.
3. fill A, OT Rishis.
4. Mr. Beal wrongly puts this in the present tense.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 85
Buddha wishing to convert Chii-lin and the others, five
in all,^ these five said among themselves, " The Shaman
" Ch'ii-t'an^ practised self-mortification for six years, living
" on a single hemp-seed' and one grain of rice daily, but
" was unable to attain perfect wisdom. Moreover,^ he has
" gone back into the world and given himself up to lust,
" evU-speaking, and evil scheming. What Wisdom is there
" in this ? When he comes to-day, let us carefully avoid
" speaking with him." On the spot where when Buddha
arrived the five men aU got up and saluted him ; also,
sixty paces to the north where Buddha sat facing the
east, and by his preaching converted Chii-lin and the rest
of the five ; where, twenty paces to the north of this,
Buddha communicated the prophecy concerning Mi-lo ; »
and where, fifty paces to the south, the dragon I-lo-po
asked Buddha " When shall I be freed from this dragon
" body ?" — on all these spots pagodas have been ¦ raised.
There are now two monasteries in the (park), both inha
bited by priests. Journeying thirteen yu-yen to tho
north-west of the deer-park shrine, there is a country
5. The ascetics who had remained with him during the six years
mentioned below,
6. Gautama.
7, Mr. Beal says "one grain of millet." But the text has
~ ft-
8, The following sentence reads <JJ A A F^ ^ JS* P M-
The last three characters are often collectively expressed, as in chapter
— an -^ ^ — ,«; _ . .

XXX, by Zl RW) or by Zi: -^ or .Ti ^. For theabove text Mr.
Beal gives an almost exact translation of Eemusat ; — "how much less
shall he now obtain that condition, by entering into men's society and
removing the checks he placed upon his words and thoughts and ac
tions.'' But for "how much less" we should require jql ^ and
not simply 51'
9. That he, Maitreya, should succeed him. Beal.

8G RECORD OP THE
called Chii-shan-mi.io The shrine there is called the
"garden of Chii-8hih-lo,"ii and was formerly inhabited
by Buddha ; for which reasoni^ there are priests there,
now, chiefly of the Lesser Development. Going east
wards eight yu-yen is the place where Buddha converted
the evil spirits ;i* also the spots where he walked
and sat down when he dwelt here, on aU of which pago
das have been raised. There are also monasteries with
perhaps over a hundred priests. ,
CHAPTER XXXV.
From this point travelling south two hundred yu-yen^
there is a country called Ta-ch'in.^ Here is a monastery
of the former Buddha Chia-yeh, made by hollowing out
a great rock. It has five storeys in aU ; the lowest being
made in the form of an elephant, with five hundred stone
chambers ; the second like a lion, with four hundred ; the
third like a horse, with three hundred ; the fourth Uke an
ox, with two hundred ; and the fifth like a dove, with one
hundred. At the very top there is a spring of water which
10. KSustobi. Bimusat. The second character is read shan,
( ~ W ) > and not chang as Mr. Beal gives it.
11. Gochira. Beal.
12. Here we have Mr. Beal's favourite blunder in a most outrage
ous form. Apropos of the garden we have 'f^ h ¦^ ^ ^ wL
^ 1 H ¦ ^°i' *^i^ Mr. Beal gives " * * in which Buddha formerly
dwelt ; it is now lying in ruins . There are congregations here, etc.''
But he has to forge the adverb " here " to make sense, there being
no "here" in the text.
13. Or "a» evil demon," as Mr. Beal renders it^
CHAPTER XXXV.
1. Deccau, Bimusat.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 87
runs in front of each chamber and encircles each storey
round and round, in and out, untU it reaches the bottom
storey where, foUowing the configuration^ of the building,
it flows out at the door. In the chambers^ on every storey
windows have here and there been bored in the rock to
admit Ught, so that it is quite bright in them and no
where dark. In the four corners of this building the rock
has been bored and steps made in the stone for getting
to the top. At present* people ascend by a smaU flight
of steps made in a similar way, and thus reach the spot
where some one in olden times left a footprint. Therefore
this temple was named Po-lo-yiieh, which is the Indian
name for a dove. In it there are constantly Lo-hans
residing. The land^ is uncultivated and there are no

'2. j^ M' Mr. Beal says " (flowing) past the chambers as
before." 3. Mr, Beal gives " in various parts of the building," which is not
an accurate rendering of ^ ^ ^ ^.
4, This sentence is worth transcribing : — -^ A jif ']» $S W
± JE # ^ ^ A — HI ^ Si ^- For this Mr, Beal gives,
" Men of the present time point out a small ladder which reaches up
to thehighest point (of the rock) by which men of old ascended it, one
foot at a time," He adds in a note "Eemusat seems to have mistaken
the wording of this passage, but the translation I have given is not
satisfactory to myself . " We should imagine this last sentiment will
be warmly echoed by all students of Chinese ; and that such as possess
a co^ of Eemusat's translation will see at a glance that his rendering
is much nearer the mark than Mr, Beat's. The real difficulty is
with 7p which is here used in its less common sense of "imitation."
*!'* ^ w is "a small cKmimgr flight," the second character being
a kind of numerative or classifier. The reader will perhaps recall
Mencius' celebrated saying W 7t» ^ S.. — climb a tree to catch fish.
5. The text has jifc i 515 *• Eemusat says " Cette coUine
est d&erte," with which Mr. Beal would have made a better show
than with his own "The land is hilly andban'en," where he takes
5S as an adjective. First of all the " dissyllable " H5 ^ is not

88 RECORD OF TEE
inhabitants. Only at a good distance from the mountain
are there villages, all (the inhabitants) of which are here
tics, and ignorant alike of the Law of Buddha, of Shamans,
of Brahmans, and the various sects. They frequently see
people come flying and enter the temple ; and when some
devotees of the neighbouring countries came to pray at
this temple, these village-people said to them, " Why do
" you not fly ? AU the pilgrims we see here, fly 1"^ The
devotees retorted'' " Because we have no wings." The
country of Ta-ch'in is mountainous and the roads difficult
to travel ; ^ even those who know the way, if they want to
go, should send a present of money or goods to the king
of the country, who will thereupon depute men to escort
them, these passing them on from one (stage) to another
and shewing them the short cuts.^ Fa Hsien was unable
to go thither ; he states what he heard from the people
of the country.
Chinese ; secondly 5[}, or £, or ffi, is a classifier of land and
gives the force of extent. Had Eemusat changed " coUine " into
" terre " ho would have been aU right. The rhythm of the next
four characters exactly corresponds : — ^ A .S ^ •
6. A simple enough sentence : — ^ €>( jtb ^ jB A H ^•
Yet Mr. Beal goes out of his way, and, we hope, out of everybody
else's, to concoct the following : — We behold the rehgious men who
occupy those chambers constantly on the wing.'' And this merely
because ^ happens to be the numerative of chambers !
7. J^ A ^ @ ^- ESmusat wisely, if disingenuously, omit
ted the two characters which give the whole point to the devotees'
reply. Mr. Beal says "answered by way of excuse." But jJ^'S
means a quick answer, spoken to the point, a repartee ; or as we have
expressed it "retorted." Mr. Beal further translates their answer
too literally — " Because our wings are not yet perfectly formed."
8. Mr. Beal, closely following Eemusat, has here made another
wrong liaison. The text has J|: ^ J^ H flO ^ J^.^ fi M
^ ^a etc, Mr, Beal says "the roads dangerous and difficult to

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 89
CHAPTER XXXVI.
Journeying eastwards from the country of Po-lo-nai,
the pilgrims came again to Pa-lien-fo. Fa Hsien's object
was to get the Disciplines, but in the various countries
of northern India they were handed down orally from
teacher to teacher, there being no written copy to refer
to ; and therefore he extended his journey as far as Cen
tral India, where in a monastery of the Greater Develop
ment he obtained a copy of the Disciplines according to
the Ma-ho-seng-chihi school, as practised by the first
congregation of priests while Buddha was still alive.
At3 the Chih-hun shrine eighteen and more copies have
find. Those who wish to go there ought, etc," whereby, besides his
own blunder of making ^ depend on |P , he slurs over a very neat
Chinese idiom. BB is here the exact ec[uivalent of " et quand
meme " in French ; and the ^ makes a substantive of ot •
*53^ ^ 3^ i&- ^oT this Mr. Beal has "each party pointing
out their own roads and intricate bye-paths,
CHAPTER XXXVI,
1. " School of the MahSsangikas, " Beal
2, We are bound to trouble the reader with the text of this pas-
sage:-]K gS g i^ -§" « ^ TJS S €^ + A ^ § W
m^ :km T^ m M >h >h j> m ^ M m m- Mr,
Beal gives, " In the chapel of Chi-un (Jetavana) there is a tradition
that this was originally their copy, or, that this school originally
sprung from them. The eighteen sects in general have each their
own Superior, but they are agreed in their dependence on the Great
Eefuge '(found iu Buddha, Dharma, Sangha). In somq, minor details
of faith they differ as well as in a more or less exact attention to some
matters of practice." How Mr. Beal gets at this result is to us a
great mystery. He might at any rate have hinted at the difficulty of
the passage. We have since referred it to several eminent sinolo
gues ; and from one— Mr. Mayers, H. M. Chinese Secretary at Pe
king  we have received an exhaustive analysis and final settlement
of this very puzzhng paragraph. See Appendix,

90 RECORD OF THE
been handed down, each of which has its commentary.
The great Jcuei is not different from the small, any trifling
discrepancies being rectified by omission or addition. At
the same time these are the most comprehensive and
complete. He got moreover a manuscript copy of the
DiscipUnes, containing seven thousand stanzas, as used
by the Sa-p'o-to^ assembly, and practised by the priests
in China. This also has been handed down orally from
teacher to teacher , without being committed to writing.
He further obtained from this assembly extracts from the
A-pi-t'an,* amounting to six thousand stanzas; also a
copy of the Yen^ Sutra, amounting to two thousand five
hundred stanzas ; also a roll of the Fang-tengS Pan-ni-hun
Sutra, amounting to five thousand stanzas ; and also a
copy of the Ma-ho-seng-chih A-pi-t'an. Therefore Fa-
Hsien stopped here three years to study the ¦written and
spoken languages of Brahma and to copy the Disciplines.
Now as to Tao Cheng, when he arrived in the Middle
Kingdom and observed the regulations of the Shamans
and the grave decolum of the priests, finding them so
worthy of notice,'' he reflected with a sigh, " In the outer
3. SarvSstivMas . Beal.
4. Abhidharma.
5. ^M M Mr. Beal says "Sutras in their abbreviated torra.''
But K'ang Hsi's dictionary tells us that IS = ijf> and the latter
means amplified or expanded.
6. Here Mr. Beal says " an expanded volume (VS,ipoulya) of the
Parinirvslna Sutra-" But the text has — ^R "JJ -^ ^ fj^
^fi 3^1 and jf ^ being part of the title (see K'ang Hsi), we
have no character left for " expanded."
7. ^ V pT US' out of which Mr. Beal gets "even in the
midst of worldly influences,'' the same being a gloss of his own and
leading to the conclusion that he did not understand the first two
characters.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 91
" land of Ch'in (China) the priests have the Command-
" ments and Disciplines imperfect. "8 He then made this
vow, " From this time untU I become a Buddha, may I
" never be born again in a foreign^ land." He therefore
continued to remain and did not go back. But Fa Hsien's
original object was to diffuse a knowledge of the Com
mandments and Disciphnes throughout the land of Han ;
he therefore went back alone.
CHAPTER XXX'Vn.
FoUo'wing the course of the Ganges eighteen yu-yen to
the east, there is on the south bank the large country of
Chan-po.i Where Buddha's shrine was and where he
walked up and down, as weU as on the spots where the
four Buddhas sat down, pagodas have been buUt, and
priests now live. From this point going east about fifty
yu-yen, Fa Hsien arrived at the country of To-mo-U-ti,'^
where there was a sea-port.' In this country there are
8. Mr. Beal puts this in the oratio obliqua. We believe this is,
strictly speaking, incorrect.
9. JS f&> i.e., anywhere but in India. Mr. Beal insists on
translating these words " a frontier country."
CHAPTEE XXXVII.
1. "Tchampa, le nom de I'ancienne capitals de Kama, roi du
pays d'Angadesa." Bemusat, — from which source Mr. Beal's note is
evidently condensed, but without acknowledgment,
2. "Tamralipti, la moderne Tamlouk, situSe sur la droite de la
riviSre Hougli, un peu au dessus de son embouchure dans la mer."
Bimusat, — with the same comment that we made in the last note.
3. iP 7G t^ P ) which taken literally and grammatically would
mean that the @ country just mentioned "was a sea-port," but
which has evidently the signification given in our text . Mr. Beal
translates these four characters " Here it is the river empties itself
into the sea," as already rendered by Eemusat.

92 RECORD OF THE
twenty-four monasteries, all with resident priests. The Law
of Buddha is also flourishing. Fa Hsien remained here
two years copying the Ching and drawing pictures of the
images.* He then took passage on a large merchant
vessel, and setting sail proceeded towards the south-west
with the first' of the winter monsoon. After fourteen days
and nights, he arrived at the land of Lions,* said by the
inhabitants to be seven hundred yu-yen distant (from In
dia). This country is on a great island, and is fifty yu-yen
from east to west, thirty yu-yen from north to south. The
small islands round about are nearly one hundred in num
ber, and distant one from the other ten, twenty, and two
hundred li. They are all subject to the mother island,
and produce chiefly'' pearls and precious stones. There
is one part where the Mo-ni beads^ are found ; it is about
4. S '^' for which simple phrase Mr. Beal gives " and taking
impressions of the figures (used in worship). " What this means we
are unable to divine, but the original makes it clear enough that he
wanted drawings of the images to take back with him to China.
5. 4^ ¦^ Wi "© wl ' for whioh Mr. Beal gives " catching the
first fair wind of the winter season," evidently taking ^ with J^
instead of with ^. The last two characters are transposed in con
versation. 6. Ceylon.
7. ^ ffl ^ © etc, for which Mr, Beal gives " Most of
them produce precious stones, etc," which is quite as inaccurate
as Eemusat's "On en tire beaucoup de choses prScieuses,"
8, j^ ^ ^- Mr. Beal gives "The Maui gem" which
amounts to saying "the gem gem," for this is the signification of
Mani. Klaproth had already stated in a note that ijS meant " en
gfinSral un joyau ;" and also that the jewel intended was a carbun
cle and not a pearl, which Mr. Beal re-states as if an independent
conjecture of his own. In support of this theory we may add the
usual name for a carbuncle, namely, ^ ^ JS- On the other
hand, we do not think that 3^ here means either a pearl or a car
buncle, but simply a bead as iu ^ ^ or ;§ ^ a Buddhist rosary

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS, 93
ten li in extent. The king has men to guard it ; and if
any one finds any, the king takes three out of every ten.
CHAPTER XXXVIH.
This country had originally no inhabitants ; only devils
and spirits! and dragons lived in it, with whom the mer
chants of neighbouring countries came to trade. When
the exchange of commodities took place the devils and
spirits did not appear in person, but set out their valuables
with the prices attached. Then the merchants, according
to the prices, bought the things and carried them off.
But from the merchants going backwards and forwards
and stopping^ (on their way), the attractions of the place
became known to the inhabitants of the neighbouring
countries who also went there, and thus it became a great
nation. The temperature is very agreeable' in this coun
try ; there is no distinction of summer and winter. The
trees and plants are always green, and cultivation of the
though we do not mean to imply that they were found already shaped
in the form of bead.s. Mr. Beal makes one point by calling to the
recollection of his readers the formula " Cm mani padme hum I "
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
1. Mr. Beal omits 7-^, probably considering it a part of ^.
2. 0 |§ A J^ fi {i- Mr. Beal makes {^ "the sojourn
of the merchant in the country," that is, in Ceylon. But this
would not have caused "the attractions of the place "to become
known, 1± is awkwardly placed, and only seem^ intelligible in
the sense in which we have taken it.
3. ^ @ ft 3®- Mr. Beal gives, "This country enjoys an
equable climate " which is the same translation that he gives in
another place of f)^ ft though the two phrases differ widely in
meaning. ft j^ means what suits people, something like "^ ^,
as we see in such phrases as j@ ^K wH ^ •

94 RECORD OP THE
soil is carried on as men please, without regard to seasons.
Buddha came to this country desiring to reform a wicked
dragon, and by his supernatural power placed one foot to
the north of the royal city, and the other on the top of a
mountain, being fifteen yu-yen apart. Over the impression
to the north of the royal city a great pagoda has been
built, 400 feet in height, decorated with gold and silver
and all the precious substances combined.* By the side
of the pagoda a monastery has also been buUt, caUed
Wu-wei-shan,6 where there are five thousand priests ; be
sides which there is a Chapel of Buddha of gold and sUver
carved work with all the precious substances, and in it an
image made of dark jade,* over twenty feet in height, the
whole of which glitters with the seven preciosities, the
countenance being grave and dignified beyond aU expres
sion,'' and on the right palm a priceless pearl. Fa Hsien
had been many years from the land of Han ; the people
with whom he had been thrown into connection had aU
been foreigners ; the hUls, streams, plants, and trees on
which his eyes lighted were not those of former times .
moreover, those who had travelled with him were separat
ed from him — some having remained behind, and others
having died. Now, beholding only his own shadow,^ he
4. f^ ^ ^ JES> which Mr. Beal glosses thus: — "and every
precious substance combines to make it perfect," the italicised words
being evidently extracted from ^¦
5. ^ ;^ ill- "NofearhUl."
6. Serpentine,
7, The text has M 49 J^ M # e" ^ %• Mr. Beal gives
"whilst the various characteristic marks ai-e so gloriously portrayed,
that no words can describe the effect." Where this comes from we
are unable to say ; in our opinion, tB seems clearly to signify the
face of the image.
8, Mr, Beal's translation of the four characters we have thus

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 95
was frequently sorrowful at heart ; and when suddenly
by the side of this jade image he saw a merchant make
offering of a white silk fan from China, his feelings 9
overcame him and his eyes filled with tears. A former
king of this country sent envoys to Central India to get
seeds^" of the Pei-to tree, which he planted by the side of
the Chapel of Buddha, (and which grew) to the height of
two hundred feet.^^ As the tree bent over to the south
east, the king feared it would faU, and therefore
placed a prop of eight or nine wei^^ in circumference
rendered is sufficient to repel any claims he may advance to be
considered an authority on the Chinese language. The text has
S ^ ''k Ci> and for this Mr, Beal gives us as the meaning,
— "to think upon the past was all that was left him ! " — with a few
more notes of admiration of our own. It is true Mr, Beal hiis founded
his own upon E6musat's unlucky version ' ' en rfifl^chissaut au pass^, ''
but the French translation was published in 1836 and Mr. Beal's in
1869. We consider that the idea of Fa Hsien finding only his own
shadow remaining out of all those he had been so long accustomed to
see, deserved a better treatment than it received at the hands of Mr.
Beal. 9. The text has 7 ^ 'I* ^ etc., over which Mr. Beal makes
the blunder of an unfledged student interpreter. He says " Un-
perceived (Fa Hian) gave way etc.'' But /p ^, we may inform
Mr. Beal — for hardly anyone else can need the information — is sub
jective and not objective. The idea here is that of involuntariness,
or spontaneity, and can hardly be translated into English. It occurs
again in the last chapter, and there Mr. Beal takes notice of it at all.
10. _^ ^ ¦^. Mr. Beal says "a slip of the Pei-to tree."
11. It is somewhat tempting to take the tail end of this paragraph
and make it the beginning of the next, as Mr, Beal does :— " When
it was about 220 feet high, the tree began to lean 'etc, "—but we do
not consider that the text admits this reading,
12, Mr. Beal makes a general bungle of this paragraph. The text
has here '^ i^ 7\. il M ^t±M- Mr. Beal says _" (The
king) placed eight or nine props round the tree to support it." First
of all, if a tree is falling it would be useless to put props all round it.
Secondly, ^ placed as it is, could not possibly give this significa-

96 RECORD OF THE
to support it. Where the tree and prop met, the
former shot out and piercing the prop right through
to the ground, took root, (the shoot) being about
four wei in circumference. Although the prop was
split, it still encircles the shoot and has not been taken
away. At the foot of the tree a shrine has been built
with a sitting Buddha which ecclesiastics and laymen
worship without ceasing. In the city a Buddha's-Tooth
shrine has also been buUt, made entirely of the seven
precious substances. The King strictly observes the rites
of Brahma, and the religious sentiments of the population
inside the city are also firmly estabUshed ^^. Ever since
this country has been under a Government i*, it has
tion ; and thirdly a wei is a measure, being either a span with the
fingers or with the arms, in which sense it is perfectly intelUgible
here. Moreover, Mr, Beal has eight or nine props but only oree shoot,
though he states that ' ' the props " (in the plural) were pierced
though the centre, showing clearly that he got into hopeless confusion
and slurred over the text as best he could,
13. The text has ^W^^fiM^^M^WiS^M-
For this Mr. Beal gives ' ' The king purifies himself according to the
strictest Brahmanical rules, whilst those men within the city who
reverence (this relic) from a principle of beUef, also compose their
passions according to strict rule." In translating this passage we
should have gladly availed ourselves of some friendly assistance ; but
we have been quite unable to harmonise Mr. Beal's rendering with
the text, not to mention that we should have found it difficult to
divest ourselves of a prejudice that thxjse who are not faithful over
small matters can hardly be looked up to as authorities when greater
issues are at stake,
14. In continuation of which apparently violent remarks as to
Mr. Beal's powers as a translator, we have only to quote a few simple
words in his very next sentence which would amply justify even the
the severest strictures. The text has ^ § jfc ^ Gi ?$£ (the 2i
being written as usual for iJ), and for this Mr. Beal gives us
" This kingdom, from the time when (this chapel) was erected," —
thus referring J^ back to the shrine of which we had already taken

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 97
known neither famine, revolution i^, nor rebellion. In the
treasury of the priests there are many precious stones and
priceless Mo-nis. When the King went in to see this
treasury, the sight of the Mo-ni beads made him en'vious,
and he wanted to carry them off by force is. At the end
of three days he came to his senses, and going to visit the
priests knocked his head on the ground in repentance of
his former errors, saying to them, " I desire you priests
" to make a regulation, namely, that from this time forth
" you do not permit a King to enter this treasury until he
" has been a mendicant for forty years i', when he may
" be aUowed to enter." In this city there are many
scholars and rich people. The dweUings of the Sa-pu is
merchants are very elegant : the streets and roads are
level and well kept. At the heads of four streets there
are preaching Halls, and on the 8th, 14th, and 16th of
each month, a high platform is prepared, and ecclesiastics
and laymen come together from aU quarters i9 to hear the
a final leave, and ignoring }p as if its occurrence in the text had no
meaning whatever. We commend to Mr. Beat's attention the com
mon phrase Jj^ § ^ ^.
15. These last two are ^ ^i translated by Mr. Beal "calamity
or revolution. " But ^ must here be read in the ¦£ ^ with the
meaning disruption of the government (novse res).
16. ^ ^. The sense of the first character is lost in Mr. Beat's
"take it away with him."
17. ^ ib B ^ 0 + li- Mr. Beal gives, " except he is
a member of the fraternity and of forty years of age .'1 But the gram
mar of the words will not allow of this separation into two clauses.
Literally, it would be "until (he is) a full forty-year Bikshu," —
whatever that may mean.
18. ^ ^. Mr. Beal translates this "Sabcean," or merchants
of Saba. E6mus-at throws no light on it.
19. 7^ "^ 0 ^) for which Mr, Beal gives, "the religious
members of the community of the four classes," to which we are

98 RECORD OF THE
Law. The people of the country say there are between
fifty and sixty thousand priests altogether, aU of whom
obtain their food from a common fund ^. The King se
parately provides a common stock of food inside the city
for five or six thousand (more) 21, and those who want
some take their bowls in their hands and go to fetch it,
returning with them filled according to the capacity of
each. Buddha's tooth is usually brought out in the mid
dle of the third moon. Ten days previously the King
decks out a lar^ elephant and deputes some one who
speaks weU to dress up in royal clothes and ride the
elephant, beating a drum and proclaiming in a loud
voice, " The Bodhisatva for three a-seng-chih 22 kalpas
" practised self-mortification without sparing himself ; he
" gave up his country, wife, and chUd ; he took out his
" eyes to give to a fellow-creature ; he cut off his flesh
much .tempted to add — " of nonsense." For it is only by utter viola
tion of all rule that Mr. Beal can arrive at the above meaning. If
anything, it must be "ecclesiastics awd laymen of the four classes,"
and then the question would arise what are the four classes to
which ecclesiastics and laymen belong. We have preferred to take
0 ^ as the common contraction of 0 Jj A ^^t and thereby
escape the difficulty of classes altogether.
20. The absurdity of "take their meals in common" for ^ ^
here begins to dawn upon Mr. Beal. He has changed his text to
" live in community, " the vague meaning of which he explains in
parentheses by the old incorrect translation quoted above.
21. Apparently because the term here employed is A and not f^,
Mr, Beal has chosen to translate it by "persons," as it priests were
not meant, which is quite against the sphit of the passage as imphed
in the character S'J-
22. L'asankya equivaut & cent quadrillions," Piimusat. Mr, Beal
tells us that it takes twenty antah-kalpas to make one asankya-kalpa,
and that were the surface of the earth to increase in elevation at the
rate of only one iucli in one thousand year*, it would reach the height
of 28 miles before the Kntah-lii'l^'ii was finished.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS, 99
"to save a dove, his head to give as alms ; ho
" gave his body to a hungry tiger ; he did not stint his
" marrow and brains. Thus in various ways he suffered
" for the benefit of living creatures, and accordingly became
"a Buddha tarrying forty-nine years on earth to preach
" and convert (sinners), giving rest to the weary, and
" saving those who knew not salvation. When his relations
" with li-ving creatures had been fulfilled,^^ he entered Nir-
"vana, and since that time^*, 1497 years, the Eye of the
" world has been pitt out and aU living creatures have
" sorely grieved. Ten days hence Buddha's tooth will be
" brought forth and be taken to the Wu-wei-shan shrine.
" Let all those ecclesiastics and laymen of this country who
" wish to lay up happiness for themselves, help to level tho
" roads, adorn the streets, and prepare flowers, incense,
" and the implements'^ of worship." When he has recited
these words, the king then proceeds to make on both
sides of the road'^ representations of the five hundred
different forms under which the Bodhisatva successively
23. The text has |r ^ i^ ^, for which Mr. Beal gives us
" Having passed through countless births," not one single word of
which are we able to identify with the original. Efimusat was much
nearer with "Tousles etres vivants 6tant ainsi sauv&," though he
(or Klaproth) evidently did not quite grasp the meaning of ^•
24. Mr. Beal quite spoils this sentence by almost exactly copying
Eemusat's incorrect rendering . He says, "Since that event is 1497
years (sic). The eyes of the world were then put out, etc."
25. The text has ^M ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^'> ^°^ "«'^i«Ji Mr.
Beal gives " scatter every kind of flower, and offer incense in religious
reverence to the EeUc." ^ is thus utterly ignored, as it had pre
viously been by Eemusat.
26. "^ 'M M ^- Mr. Beal takes no notice of ^. A Chinese
definition of the first two characters is TOJSM''oT*r^ra~~"
^^ iil ^ A fi —which we leave to the ingenious reader.

100 RECORD OF THE
appeared; for instance, as Hsii-ta-na*'', or as a flash of
lightning, as the king of the elephants, as a stag, or as a
horse. These representations are aU beautifully painted
and have a life-like appearance. The Tooth is then
brought out and passes along the centrales street,
receiving homage all the way along. Arriving at the
HaU of Buddha^^ in the Wu-wei-shan shrine, ecclesiastics
and laymen flock together in crowds, burn incense, Ught
lamps, and perform the various reUgious ceremonies day
and night without ceasing. After nineteen days they
return it to the shrine in the city. This shrine is opened
on fast-days for worship according to the Law. Forty
li to the east of the Wu-wei-shan shrine there is a hUl
with a shrine on it caUed Po-t'i,^'' where there are about
two thousand priests. Among them there is a distin-
guished^i Shaman named Ta-mo-chii-ti^^, whom aU the
people of this country respect and look up to. He has
lived in a stone cell for more than forty years. By
27. Mr. Beal says " The French edition gives Sou-ta-nou, but
mine has Su-jin-nou." He might have guessed that the middle
character A was a misprint for y^, as otherwise it would not be so
readily identified with the Sanscrit sutana.
28. 'T' Jb nn fT' Mr. Beal's " along the principal street,'' is
an improvement on Eemusat's "par le miheu de la route," but we
see no reason why the text should not be hterally translated,
29, Mr, Bealmisunderstandsthegrammaticalrelationofthesewords.
The text has glj ^ ;^ lH '^ ^ _fc, but Mr. Beal gives "When
they arrive at the Abhayagiri Vihara, they place it in the Hall of
Buddha,'" Eemusat was equally inaccurate in his rendering of the
last three characters — " on moiite si la salle de Foe," Wu-wei-shan is
evidently in the genitive case.
30. B6dhi. " Fah Hian no doubt refers to the celebrated Mahin-
tald, eight miles due east of Auuradhapura." Beal.
31- i/C 1^— "used for ifoidcMite, il, title like Eeverond, given to
Buddhist priests. " Williams.
32, Dharmakoti or Dharmagupta, Beal.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. 101
constant exercise of kindness ho has succocdod in influen
cing snakes and rats so that tliey wiU live together in the
same ceU^ without hurting one another.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
Seven li to the south of the city there is a shrine,
called Mo-ho-pi-ho-lo,i with three thousand resident
priests. Among them was one distinguished Shaman who
was so pure in his conduct that all suspected him of being
a Lo-han. When he was at the point of death the king
came to see him, and when the priests were assembled ac
cording to regulation he asked' " Has the Bikshu attain
ed perfect Wisdom ?" They then spoke out the truth
and repUed " He is a Lo-han." When he was dead the
king buried him with the ceremonies of a Lo-han as laid
do'wn in the Sacred Books. Fifty li to the east of the
shrine a great pUe of wood was collected, over thirty feet
square and about the same height. Sandal-wood, gar-
roo-wood, and aU kinds of scented woods were placed at
33. 1^ Jfc —• ^—evidently in his own cell. Yet Mr, Beal
says "so that they stop together in one habitat,'' The use of a
" tall " term like habitat ought to carry conviction with it, but un
fortunately the Chinese word ^ has not that signification, and more
over has just been used to express . the cell in which the old priest
hved, CHAPTER XXXIX.
1, " C'est le Sanscrit mahdvihdra, le grand temple, ou plutotle
grand monastere." Bimusat.
2, As far as grammar is concerned this paragraph might be
rendered " asked the Bikshu, ' Hast thou attained perfect Wisdom V
He then spoke out the truth and said he was a Lo-han,"

102 RECORD OF THE
the top," and at the four sides steps were made.* Over it
was spread a piece of clean white cashmere, which sur
rounded and quite covered the pyre, and on the top^ of
this a oar was made, in form like the hearses used here,
but without the dragon.6 At the time of the she-weii the
king and his subjects from aU quarters^ coUected together,
and "with offerings of flowers and incense, foUowed the
3, Mr. Beal says, "iVear the top they placed tiera of sandal- wood,
etc, ; " but neither of the words we have italicised has any existence
in the text.
4, Mr. Beal takes the Jl from the - beginning of the next sen-
sence and adds it on here — "by which to ascend it." But this
though not necessarily erroneous, spoils the rhythm of the first
sbntence and leaves the second bald,
5. We should Hke to relegate this troublesome _L , as Mr. Beal
does, to the end of the last sentence, but such violation of grammar
and rhythm, '' non dl, non homines," and certainly not the ordinary
rules of Chinese composition would permit. _C is troublesome
because it would appear that the car is made on the top of the pyre,
whereas it is only hoisted up at the time of the cremation.
6. The text has iS ^ f | ,^, Jf, and these words were a
great puzzle to Klaproth and Landresse who finally left them un
translated, adding in a note that no " renseignement " on the subject
could be obtained, but that probably they signified a bier without any
ornaments of dragons or fishes. This was a very creditable surmise.
Mr, Beal, however, rushes into the field with " except that there are
no dragon-ear handles to it," thus avoiding the French translator's
mistake of regarding ^ as fishes, but committing the more
egregious blunder of rendering the final particle B- by ' ' ear, " and
further introducing the idea of "handles" which has no existence in
tho text. Had Mr, Beal ever watched a funeral procession in China
he would have observed that the bier on which the coffin is carried to its
final resting-place has a figure-head of a dragon striving to swallow an
enormous pearl strung on a cord, one end of which is fastened iu the
dragon's throat and the other held by a man who precedes the bier ,
The character J^ is of course untranslateable.
7. Cremation.
8, We have here tho same characters 0 ^ as in chapter xxxviii
(see note 19), but Mr, Beal now says nothing about "the four classes."

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 103
car to the burial ground, the king himself making offer
ings of flowers and incenso. When these were finished,
the car was placed on the top of the pyre ; lophantus oil 9
was poured aU over it, and a Ught appUed. As the fire
was burning up every one was moved by a feeling of re
verence, and each took off his upper garment and, with
the feather fans^" and umbrellas, threw them from a dis
tance into the midst of the flames, so as to help on the
cremation. When it was all over, the bones were coUected
and a pagoda raised. Fa Hsien did not arrive while
he was stiU aUve, but only in time to see his funeral.
The king being steadfast in his belief in Buddhism wished
to make a new shrine for the priests. He therefore gave
them a great banquet, and when they had finished he
selected a couple of fine oxen''- and decorated their horns
9- oS W' Oil of sweet basil. Mr, Beal gives " oil of cinnamon, "
10. The text has ^ ^ ^ ^, for which Mr, Beal gives us,
"their wing-Hke fans, which they use as sun-shades," the absurdity of
which we need not stop to point out. In modern times 3^ ^
has come to mean the paraphernalia (^ ^) of a mandarin, but
formerly its signification was that given in the text, namely, large
feather fans which were carried in front of every petty prince or
chieftain. This of course appUes to China ; but whether the same
custom of carrying these fans existed in Ceylon or whether in tho
time of Fa Hsien these two characters had already acquired their
general sense of ^ ^, we must leave to the researches of the
reader, A survival of the "feather fans " may be traced iu the huge
wooden (?) fans carried before the emperor at the present day,
IL The text has ^ ^ i ^ — M- The reader will observe
we have left the word i untranslated. Messrs. K&musat and Boal
render the sentence respectively "un couple de bons bceufs de labov/r''
and " a pair of strong worTcing oxen," There are three other ways of
expressing i , all of which have more claim to correctness than the
above : —
1, — Oxen of the country, or ^ Jta T^-
2, — Oxen as opposed to J% t^ or water-buffalos.

104 RECORD OF THE
with gold, silver, and other valuables. He also made a
golden plough,i2 and with his own hands ploughed the
four sides of a c7i'ing,^« which he subsequently ceded, po
pulation, fields, houses and aU," writing out title-
deeds'5 for the same. Everi^ since that time, these
have been handed down from generation to genera
tion, and no one has dared to destroy or alter
them. When Fa Hsien was in this cmmtry he heard
a Buddhist pUgrim from "India reciting the ching from a
lofty dais, say, " Buddha's alms-bowl was originaUy in
Pi-she-li. It is now in the country of Chien-t'o-wei.
3, — Oxen made of clay, like those used by the Emperor when he
goes through the form of breaking the soil at the Temple of
Earth.
Mr, Beal makes i equivalent to ^ ffl 6^, which is therefore
not the same as our No. 2, for water buffalos are commonly employed
in agriculture all over the East.
12. i^ M ^ ^- Mr, Beal says "a beautifully gilded plough."
But 5J, which here equals ^, belongs to "f^, and has nothing to
do with the appearance of the plough. Taking it erroneously, as Mr.
Beal doe.s, it could stiU never mean "beautifully gilded," but a
plough of good gold. Eemusat has "une belle charme d'or."
13. I li ^ "S E3 S- Mr. Beal says " the four sides of
the allotted space.'' But the character ^ is a land measure equal
to about fifteen square acres and tells us exactly how large the allotted
space was. Its size tempts us to believe that the oxen were of clay
and that the king did not actually go round it himself.
14. Meaning that the revenue derived therefrom should in future
belong to the priests.
15. ^ 2p, which Mr. Beal again renders by "a metal plate."
See ante.
16, In'defiance of all laws, syntactical and otherwise, Mr, Beal
makes this sentence a kind of legend engraved on the " metal plato, "
Tho first four characters vrill be enough to convince the ordinary
student of the gross inaccuracy of such a rendering. They are
S ^ E ^^— translated by Mr. Beal "From this time." The
^ would have been ¦^ ¦

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS, 105
After a certain number of years," (Fa Hsien, at the time
when he hoard the recitation, had the exact number, but
has now forgotten it) it will be taken on to the western
Yiieh-shih country ; after another period, to the land
of Yii-t'ien ; after another, to the country of Ch'ii-
tz'u ;i* after another, back again to China ; after another
on to Ceylon ; and.after another, back again to Central
India. When it has arrived in Central India, it will then
be taken up to the Tou-shu heaven, and Maitreya Bod-
dhisatva, seeing it, wUl exclaim with a sigh, " The alms-
bowl of Shih-chia-wen has arrived." Thereupon all the
gods wiU make offerings of flowers and incense for seven
days, and when these have expired it wiU be returned to
Yen-fu-t'i where a sea-dragon king will take it into his
dragon palace. Then when Mi-lo attains perfect Wisdom,
it wiU again be divided into four and revert to its original
position on mount P'in-na. After Mi-lo has attained per
fect wisdom, tho four heavenly kings will proceed to re
cognise him as Buddha with the same ceremonies as in
17. We are now "treading on thin ice." The text has
^ ^ B ^, and Mr. Beal renders it "In somewhat like a
hundred years," adding in a note " M, Julien has pointed out in his
preface to the life of Hiouen Thsang, the mistake in the Chinese Text
throughout this passage — the word ' tsien ' a thousand, being mis
printed for 'kan,' " The name of Stanislas Julien is enough to com
mand the respect and attention of all readers ; but the authority of
no one should be allowed to interfere with freedom of thought and
speech, or bind down the disciple to an unwilUng acquiescence in the
dictum of the master. We do not consider that ~p is ^ a misprint for
rp. We have no difficulty in understanding t* 0 as a vague term
of years, the exact number of which Fa Hsien had forgotten ; and,
moreover, the sentence seems to require some initial particle, such as
S to make it intelligible. If after all ^ ~p 0 ^ is right, then
we should say it must mean "so many hundred years," and not
" about a hundred years, " as Mr. Beal gives it.
18. This country is that known as Kharachar. ' BcaJ.

1G6 RECORD OP THE
the case of former Buddhas. The thousand Buddhas of
this kalpa of sages wiU aU use this alms-bowl ; and when
it is gone the Law of Buddha will gradually die out.
When the Law of Buddha is extinct, the life of man will
decrease in length to about five or ten years' duration ;
rice and butter will both disappear ; mankind wiU be very
wicked ; the sticks they grasp wiU change into knives and
clubs :i9 they wiU wound and slay each other. Those
amongst them who have done any good works wUl flee up
into the mountains, and when the wicked have MUed
each other to thejast man, they wiU again come forth
and say among themselves, ' Of old men Uved to a great
age ; but because of the great wickedness (of this genera
tion) and constant violation of the law, our term of years
has thus been shortened to only ten years. Let us now
one and all practise good works ; let us raise 'within
ourselves a spirit of compassion and mercy ; let us cul
tivate humanity and justice."" Thus, 'with the general
practice of sincerity and justice, the duration of Ufe ¦wUl
continually be doubled until it reaches 80,000 years.' When
Mi-lo enters the world and begins to turn the wheel of the
Law, he will first save those disciples to whom Shih-chia
bequeathed the Law, those^i who have entered the priest-
19. The text has |E /{C H'J ^ J^ 7J ^' and the translation
we have given is anything but satisfaetory, M'J might possibly be
a misprint for 'gj • Mr. Beal translates the last two characters by
"sharp clubs (or, knives and clubs) ." ATe object to an alternative
on such a simple phrase.
20. Mr , Beal here strangely brings what men " say among them
selves to" an abrupt close, making the next sentence part of Fa
Hsien's narrative.
21. This passage is quite misrendered by Mr. Beal, He says "his
earliest converts will be the followers of the bequeathed law of Sakya
Buddha, who have forsaken their families, and sought refuge in the

RUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 107
hood, and those who hold to the three refuges, the five
eommandments, and the rules for fasting, as weU as
making offerings to the Three Precious Ones. Secondly,
and thirdly, he will save those whose destiny^a it is (to be so
saved)." Fa Hsien thereupon 'wished to write down these
sayings, but the man said "There is no text of this : I
merely repeat what I have heard. "^
CHAPTER XL.
Fa Hsien remained in this country for two years.
After repeated search he obtained a copy of the Mi-sha-
saii DiscipUnes. He first got the Great A-han^ and the
tliree sacred names, and observed tho five gi'cat commandments, and
attended to their religious duties in making continued offerings to the
three precious objects of worship." But it seems clear to us from the
syntax of the original that three distinct classes are spoken of, and
not one as Mr. Beal would make out. If his single class were
ffi ^ A, the mention of only five commandments would be in
correct ; but apphed to the laity as distinguished from the clergy, it
becomes intelligible and correct. The text has 5C W. ^ 5S3 3!E <S
^?liJ^AS^HIf£3^g?ifi«H^
22. The text has W i^ ^. Mr. Beal says "those who, by
their previous conduct, have put themselves in a condition for salva
tion." This is not a bad amplification of ^C, but is too diffuse for a
professedly literal tran.slation,
23, The text has jlfc ^ ^ ^ ^ ifc P tl B^. Mr. Beal
says, "This is no sacred book, but only what I have leai-nt by
memory, and repeat verbally." We should like to see how Mr. Beal
adapts his text to the original, and also to hear him " repeat " any
thing otherwise than "verbally." The latter half of the sentence is
strikingly ellipticah In full it would be something like ?^ M ^
A ^ n ^ W H B.
CHAPTEE XL,
1, School of the Mahisaaikas. Beal,
2. Agnma. Landresse.

108 reooud of the
Miscellaneous A-han, and subsequently a set of miscella
neous Tsang, all of which China was without. When he
had obtained these in their original tongue, he took
passage on board a large merchant-vessel, on which there
were over two hundred souls, and astern of which there
was a small vessel in case of accident at sea and the
destruction of the big vessel. Catching a fair wind, they
proceeded east for two days when they encountered a
heavy gale, and the ship sprung a leak. The merchants
wished to pass on to^ the smaU vessel, but the men on
her, afraid that too many would come, cut the rope in
two.* The merchants were very frightened, for death was
close at hand; and fearing that the ship would fill,
immediately took what bulky goods there were and threw
them into the sea. Fa Hsien also took his pitcher and
ewer with whatever else he could spare' and threw them
into the sea ; but he was afraid that the merchants would
throw over his books and images, and accordingly^ fixed
his whole thoughts on Kuan-shih-yin and prayed to the
sainted priests of the land of Han, (saying,) " I have
journeyed far in search of the Law. Oh that by your
awful power you would turn back the flow (of the leak),
that we might arrive at some resting-place ?'' Thus' the
3, The text has ®, Mr, Beal says "haul up," which would
necessitate his saying a little farther down " to haul up Canton "
instead of "to arrive at " that place,
4. iP OT *S ^J for which Mr, Beal gives " cut the towing-
cnhle and fell off," as if he had quite misunderstood the meaning of
the last character,
6, This seems to be the force of ^ ^ ; not simply " other
portions of his property " as Mr. Beal rend&rs it,
6, We have here following a sentence which seems worth the
passing attention of the reader. The text has I'^ ~* *L? J^ 11 'IS
^ ]R 1^ ^ JII Jtfe ^ f^- Ignoring Klaproth's version, as

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 109
gale blew on for thirteen days and nights when tlioy
arrived alongside of an island, and then, at ebb tide,
they saw the place where the vessel leaked and forthwith
stopped it up, after which they again proceeded on their
way. This sea is infested by pirates : to meet them^ is
death. The expanse of ocean is boundless; east and
being merely a wild guess at the meaning without reference to the
syntax, we pass on to Mr, Beal's. He says, " And so with earnestness
of heart he invoked Avalokit&wara, and paid reverence to tho
Buddhist saiuts (the priesthood) of the land of Han." He further
gives two notes explaining (1) that "the phrase yih-sin one heart, is
a very usual one in Buddhist liturgical works," and we might add in
almost every Chinese work that ever was put together. Mr. Beal
then tells us "it denotes the union of the soul of the supplicant with
the ideal object of worship, what we should call, perhaps, spiritual
worship" — all of which we must take leave to designate in the forcible
slang of the United States as "high falutin'." The character — *
is simply a common intensive ; """ )Lf with the whole heart, ""¦ ^
very early in the morning, etc. , etc. The second note informs us that
the phrase kwai ming is equivalent to the Sanscrit Naino, a term of
invocation in prayer ; also that there is a corresponding expression
kwai i y- Wl ^)> sometimes used. Thus we have Wii W a, verb
joined to the preceding Jg! by the copulative ^, where we most
certainly should have looked for SE- We prefer "prayed" as the
translation of SnJ w •
7. The text has here the usual 50 :^' We must protest strongly
against Mr, Beal's rendering of these two words. He says "Never-
theless, the hurricane, etc., " which of course seems like a Jesuitical
sneer at Fa Hsien's prayers, though it is the height of absurdity to put
the remark into Fa Hsien's own mouth. We gladly accept the
alternative that " nevertheless " was a mere sUp of the pen,
8. Here Mr. Beal falls into a grave error. The text has
is ^ S« S' f°r which Mr, Beal gives "wh(J, coming on you
suddenly, destroy everything." But Bt has not here its common
meaning " suddenly ;'' it stands for the more usual M'J- The sen
tence is hterally " meeting (the pirates), then none saved '' — to keep
the same number of words as in the original. Moreover, the last two
characters refer to life and not to property. Klaproth's translation is
correct.

110 EECOED OF THE
west are not distinguishable ; only by observation of the
sun, moon, and stars.^ is progress to be made. In cloudy
and rainy weather, (the ship) moved according to the
wind without keeping any definite course.^'' In the dark
ness of night nothing was to be seen but the great waves
beating upon each other and flashing forth light like fire,
huge turtles, sea-Uzards, and such Uke monsters^i of the
deep. Then the merchants would^^ lose hearty not know
ing whither they were going, and the sea being deep ¦with
out bottom they had moreover no place where they could
cast anchor and stop.i^ When the sky cleared up, they
were then able to tell east from west and again to proceed
on their proper course. Had they struck a hidden rock,
there would have been no way of escape. Thus it was
for more than ninety days untU they reached a country
9, Mr. Beal here adds " in their motions," which is either super
fluous or else a mistranslation of the two concluding characters
mm- 10, ^ m W T^ ^ M K^ W> M M '^- Mr, Beal's
translation of this passage is unworthy an olficer who has sailed in
Her Majesty's fleet, and is most certainly not the meaning of the text.
He says " If it is dark, rainy weather, the only plan is to steer by
the wind without guide," Can this be the explanation of the loss of
the Vanguard ! — substituting foggy for rainy weather,
11, " Monstra natantia."
12. Mr. Beal puts this in the ¦wrong- tense. He says, " The mer
chant men were now much perplexed," as if Fa Hsien was alluding
to one particular occasion, though we are told plainly in almost the
next sentence that this went on for 90 days,
18, These last few words are X H T 5 {^ ;^- Mr. Peal
quite mistakes the grammar of this passage. Ho says "so- that there
was not even a rock for anchorage.'' But ^ is the anchor itself,
stones being used for that purpose even iu the present day. Only a
week ago we noticed some fishermen weigh anchor near Ch'ao-chou
Fu, and up came two large blocks of stone lashed to a couple of sharp-
pointed stakes in such a manner as to make a \-ery good holdfast,
P is of course a verb.

BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS. Ill
called Yeh-p'o-t'i,^* where there were plenty of heretics
and Brahmans but not enough Buddhism to be worth
mentioning. After having stopped in this country five
months,i5 Fa Hsien again shipped on board another large
merchant vessel which also carried over two hundred
persons. They took with them provisions for fifty days
and set sail on the 16th of the 4th moon. Fa Hsien
settled himself on boardi^ and a north-east course was
taken in order to arrive at Canton." Over a month had
elapsed when one night in the second watches they en
countered a violently gale with tempestuous rain, at which
14. ^ Ik v£> Java. WhUe putting the notes to this last ch.ap-
ter we have received a copy of Mr, Groenevoldt's Notes mi the Malay
Archipelago and Malacca, in which he gives a translation of a part of
this chapter. He has made Mr. Beal's version his basis, correctmg
the most glaring, hut we are bound to say not all, of Mr. Beat's many
errors. From him we learn that " Yava Dwipa does not mean, as
has been thoughtlessly said and repeated, the country of the barley, for
the simple reason that barley could not grow there."
15. ^ ^ H — a not uncommon phrase equivalent to 3l .^ 5w
J® ^ 65 0 ¦?• Mr. Beal impro^vises "the best portion of five
months, "
16. ^ H JK US -t ¦^ ^' Mr. Beal gives " Fah Hian
was very comfortable on board this ship, " which of course is absurd,
Mr. Groeneveldt says " While Fahien was on board of this ship ; "
but this is not quite accurate when taken with the context,
17. ^ jrA- Messrs, Beal and Groeneveldt both make this
" the province of Canton," as if any part of it would do equally well
with another. It seems clear to us that the port of Canton is meant.
18, "^ ^ H ^> for which Mr. Beal (and Mr. Groeneveldt)
gives " at the stroke of two in the middle watch of the night." First
of aU we can "hardly believe that a gale of wind burst upon them
exactly at the stroke of two ; and secondly, we fail to discover any
thing about the " middle " watch. From time immemorial the Chi
nese night has been divided into five watches, and it was during the
second of these— say about 10 p.m.— that the storm broke. The
text is hterally "night drum second (watch) time." Klaproth was
right enough.

112 EECOED OP THE
the merchants and others were very much frightened, but
Fa Hsien again fixed his whole thoughts upon Kuan-shih-
yin and the (sainted) priests of the land of Han, and was
accorded^" the protection of their awful power until day
broke. When it was Ught, the Brahmans took counsel,
saying, " Taking this Shaman on board has been to our
disadvantage, causing us to get into this great trouble.
We ought to land the mendicant on an island ; it is not
right to endanger aU our Uves for one man." To whioh
Fa Hsien's patron*i replied, " If you land this mendicant,
you shall also land me with him ; if not, you had better
kiU me, for supposing you land this Shaman, when I
reach China I will report you to the King of the country
who is a supporter of Buddhism and honours the
priesthood." The merchants wavered and did not dare
to land him just then. At this time the sky was con
stantly clouded, and the captain of the ship kept losing
his reckoning.22 So they went on for seventy days untU
19. Literally, "a black wind," or as Mr. Beal translates it "a
black squall, " But ^ can hardly be taken here in its primary sense.
20. ^ M t'f ^ ^ M 5C 9*. which Mr. Beal (and Mr,
Groeneveldt, though in different words) most erroneously renders
" to exert their Divine power in his favour, and bring them daylight."
He thus ignores ^i with its special meaning oi " receiving tsora ».
superior " altogether, though it clearly implies the response of tho
higher powers to his prayer, carried out in the ^ protection afford
ed through tho night. Such translation as "bring them daylight''
is positively beneath notice,
21, iffi ^ His ddnapati.
22. Mr, Beal translates this last sentence " the pilots began to
look at one another in mutual distrust," vrisely adding— o utinam
ssepius I — " This passage is obscure," Mr, Groeneveldt makes a faint
effort at improvement by changing Mr. Beal's last three words mto
"without knowing what to do." The text has ^ gi|j fe ^ j^ f|,
and the key-move is to read TO iu tho ^ ^ meaning to see, to
observe. Our rendering is porhap,s too free. Literally, it should read,

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 113
the provisions, water, and congee, were nearly exhausted,
and they had to use sea water for cooking, dividing the
fresh water amongst them so that each man got about
two pints.28 When aU was nearly consumed, the mer
chants consulted and said, " The ordinary time for the
voyage to Canton is exactly fifty days. We have now
exceeded that Umit by many days : can we have done
otherwise than go 'wrong?" Thereupon they proceeded
north west in search of land, and after twelve days and
nights arrived south of the Lao^* mountains in tho
Ch'ang-kuang district,^' where they obtained fresh water
and vegetables. And now,^^ after having passed through
much danger, difficulty, sorrow, and fear, suddenly roach-
"The saihng-master iu his observations kept going astray." A
al B^ is a land-mark, or guide of any kind. We are fully justified
by the context in using the imperfect tense.
23 . It is somewhat tempting to tack these opening words on to
the last sentence and with quite a different meaning, namely, ' • for
each to use up as he pleased." The text has 3^ ® •^ ^, which
would almost bear such interpretation ; but the next sentence would
then be left •without " a head."
23. JJt ^ ¦jif hR — a simple sentence which Mr. Beal insults
his readers by translating ' ' Shall we then undertake tho navigation
ourselves i" This is truly more ridiculous than Klaproth's " nous
n'avons plus de ressources."
24. Mr, Beal says in a note " The mountains of Lau— for there
are two— are situated iu the southern portion of the Shantung pro
montory in the department of Lai-chow," — all of which, by the way,
as well as his following note, is taken from the French edition with
out acknowledgment,
25. ^ ^ $I)- Of course we do not use district in its modern
sense. 26, The foUo-wing exquisite passage is badly mutilated both by
both Mr, Beal and Mr. Groeneveldt. Thetext is too long to quote,
but we may mention for the benefit of students of the original that
we put a stop after the ^ of ^ ^. and not before fiS- We
cannot find the English equivalent of ^ ^ li huo.

114 RECORD OF THE
ing this shore and seeing the old famiUar Li huo, they
knew it was their fatherland, but not observing either
inhabitants or any traces of such, they did not know what
part it was. Some said they had not got as far as Can
ton ; others said they had already passed it Being in a
state of uncertainty, some of them got into a smaU boat
and went up a creek to search for someone whom they
might ask about the place. These secured two hunters
and brought them back^v (to the ship), telUng Fa Hsien
to act as interpreter and question them. Fa Hsien began
hj reassuring them and then quietly^s asked " What
people are you ?" They repUed " We are foUowers of
Buddha." He further asked " What is it you go among
the hills to seek ?" They then began to lie, saying,
" To-morrow is the 15th of the 7th month '^ we wanted
to get something to sacrifice to Buddha." Fa Hsien then
asked " What country is this ?" They answered " This
is Ch'ang-kuang in Ch'ing-chou, belongingso entirely to
the Liu family." When they heard this, the merchants
were very glad, and at once requested that their goods
27. Thetext has ^ M Jl A ^P tH ^. Mr, Beal trans
lates it ¦" Just at this moment, two nien who had been hunting were
returning home." It would be superfluous to point out to the intel
ligent student of the text the utter inaccuracy and want of meaning
in such a rendering.
28. 1^ ^- Mr, Beal thinks proper to take no notice of the
first character here given,
29, Tho festival of 4* 5C-
30, Mr, Beal says "dependent on the Leaou family." But what
is meant is the very common phenomenon of a large tract of coun
try belonging to a family or clan, all tho members of whioh bear the
same name and live in the same village, being unable, according to
Chinese law, to intermarry amongst themselves, but each obliged to
seek a wife with a different surname from one of the neighbouring
hamlets.

FUi^T'TTTSTTr ra>Tr,DOMP. 115
(might be landed) and sent men with them to Ch'ang-
kuang. The Prefect, Li I, who was devoted to the Law
of Buddha, when he heard that a Shaman had arrived
who had brought Sacred Books and images with him in a
ship^i from beyond tho sea, immediatly proceeded with
his retinue to the sea-shore to receive these books and
images and take them back to his city. The merchants
then went ofi" on their way to Yang-chow, * * * * [32].
invited Fa Hsien to remain a winter and a summer.
When this period was over, Fa Hsien, far separated from
tiie assembly of ecclesiastics for many years, was desirous
of reaching Ch'ang-an, but because of the great impor
tance of his undertaking, he accordingly proceeded south
towards the capital, and handed over to the ecclesiastics
(there) the Sutras and Precepts (he had brought back).
Fa Hsien spent six years in travelling from Ch'ang-an
to Central India. He stayed there six years, and took
three more to reach Ch'ing-chou. The countries he
31. Mr. Beal here makes a most lamentable mistake, though the
text is as simple as it well could be. He says that this Li I " took
a ship and embarked and came on board to see (Fa Hian). Then,
immediately engaging men from the nearest shore, he dispatch
ed the books etc, " But we are getting weary of pointing out Mr.
Beal's endless mistakes which come thicker and faster as we ap
proach the end . In fact, we will now take our final leave of Mr.
Beal, just warning the reader that from this point to the conclusion
of the so-called fortieth chapter his translation is one extraordinary
tissue of blunders, to do justice to which it would be necessary to
quote every word of the original Chinese : He has qjpiite misunder
stood the grammar and meaning of the whole of the last page, and
has shewn himself utterly incompetent to translate a far easier
volume than the Fo Kuo Ohi. We have heard of other and similar
works by Mr. Beal, but we solemnly trust it wiU never be our mis
fortune to see them.
32. Here occur four characters of which we can make absolutely
nothing, They are fll f^ % >}\i

116 RECORD OF THE
passed through amounted to rather less than thirty.
From the west of the Sandy Desert all the way to India,
the dignified position of the priesthood and the good
results of reUgious iafluenee were beyond all expression.
As, however, the ecclesiastics had no means of hearing
about these things, he gave no thought to his trifling Ufe,
coming home across the sea and encountering aU kinds
of difficulties. Happily, he was accorded the awful pro
tection of the Three Honoured Ones, and was thus pre
served in his hour of danger. Therefore he 'wrote down
on bamboo slips and silk what he had done, desiring that
the worthy reader^s should share this information.
[End of Fa Hsien's Narrative.]
It was in the year Chia Yin, the twelfth of the reign of
I Hsi of the (Eastern) Chin dynasty, when the star of
longevity was ruling,^* in the summer, that 1,^5 Ngan Chii,
went out to meet Fa Hsien, the Buddhist, and when he
arrived kept him with me in the Winter suite.^ Because
when discoursing together, to repeated questions about
his travels he answered affably and without hesitation, in
every way in keeping with tho truth, I therefore urged
him to write out in detail that which he had previously
sketched. Fa Hsien again told the whole story from
33. ^ ^. Hero it appears to us and to the Chinese commen
tator, ends the narrative of Fa Hsien, the following passage having
been added by an anonymous hand during the Chin ¦§• dyn.isty.
Mr. Beal, however, says that Fa Hsien's words end at " brought
back," a few lines higher up, but gives no authority,
34. ^ BE ^ M : Canopus.
35, ^ ^ ^' Mo is commonly used iu this way. It is ap.
parently the name of some brother priest.
36, ^ ^, A fanciful name, somewhat corrospondiug to our
Blue Room, Oak Room, and such terms,

•nrrinrn'=;Tic kingdoms. 117
beginning to end, and said " Looking back on what I have
gone through, involuntarily my heart throbs and a per
spiration breaks out. That, in the dangers I encountered
on foot or other-mse, I did not spare this body, is because
I devoted my energies wholly to this one object ; therefore
I risked my Ufe in places where there was no certainty of
escape, iu order to accomplish even a fraction of what
I hoped for." Thereupon I was much affected, and
sighing (said), " This kind of man is rarely seen. From
the time that the Great Teaching »' began to flow east
wards, there has been no one forgetful of his life in the
cause of reUgion to be compared with Fa Hsien." Then
I knew that sincerity never faUs to move (the gods) ; for
if it had not (moved them in the present instance), then
Fa Hsien would not have received the reward for his
exertions. There cannot be good service without success,
and the man who brings his labours to a successful issue
 is he not the man who neglects that which is geno-
raUy prized,''' and values that which is generally ne
glected?" 87. Buddhism.
88, Namely, Ufe.
39. The Law of Buddha.

^ov_r7"Ti,a*'T=

APPENDIX.

NOTE BY SHfiN SHIH-LUNG,
As regards records of the bringing back of Sacred Books
from India, we have only the narratives of the two priests
Fa Hsien and Yiian Chuang^ in the Buddhist collections,
and the accounts of Sung Yiiu and Hui Sheng in the An
nals of the Lo-yang monastery, which have any claim
upon our attention. Yet although the Annals of the
monastery are exact and agreeably written, the narratives
in the Tsang* go more into detail and are more elegant
in style. Preeminently so is the Eeeord of the Buddhistio
Kingdoms, which in general scope, elegance, terseness,
comprehensiveness of style is not inferior to the models of
the Chin dynasty. These narratives differ somewhat as
to the places visited. Fa Hsien traveUed from Tun-huang
westwards, and returned by sea from Ceylon ; Yiian
Chuang left Liang-chou by the Jade Gate^ and came
ba^k by way of Khoten ; but Sung Yun went from Ch'ih-
1. The celebrated Buddhist priest jfC ^ who went to India in
the seventh century.
3. ^^n

120 EECOED OF THE
Ung" to Mang-ku-hun,6 and back by the same route, thus
exemplifying the apophthegm of Shakya Muni that " the
ways" are many : they cannot be aU enumerated." With
regard to the Desert, the Onion range, Hsiian-tu,' and
the Snowy mountains, these were visited by all aUke.
Further, with regard to the passage in Lii Shih's^
"ISTotes" giving the quotation from the Fo Kuo Chi as
found in the Commentary to the "Water Classic," namely
that " the Ganges flows south-east, passing through
the city of Chii-i-na-chieh. To the north of the city
between the two trees etc," I have been unable to find
these words in the original work. They have probably
been omitted in the process of copying, and Shan Ch'ang
has undoubtedly some grounds for what he says. »
From my early youth I have ever had a deep venera
tion for the Gospel of Mercy ,^° though myself grovelling
in the dust and abominations of this world ; and though
neither my teachers nor my friends have any of them been
great travellers, and I myself have been averse to leaving
home, — yet whenever I hear of others risking their Uves
in dangerous places or seeking the Truth^'^ in strange
4. w M' Mr. Beal says " Barren Eidge."
5. Our transliteration of these characters is strictly according to
the text which gives IU; 'fr ^- Mr. Beal writes it " To-ku-wan," as
if the first character was |}£> and tells us in a note that the people
intended were " Eastern Turks," We leave the point to our
readers, 6. This is intended as a play upon the word j^,
7. mm. ^
8. S J5 ^ IB- We have been unable to identify this Q.
9. What these last few words refer to, and who Shan Ch'ang
^ j^ was, we have been hitherto unable to discover.
10. Buddhism—^ #.
11. M

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS, 121
lands, I feel what a duU, useless creature I am, and my
tears begin to flow.
Done at Hsin-shui, by Shen Shih-lung."^ ^
12. ^ j; f|. We can diaoover nothing about this individual
from the very slender sources at our command.
Mr. WyUe, in his Notes on Chinese Literatwe, makes the very
singular mistake — for a scholar — of always reading the surname
^ Ch'in, instead of Shin according to the old orthography, or
Shen, according to Sir Thomas Wade's.

NOTE BY HO 0H£N-HEHG.
The old title of this work was " The Narrative of Fa
Hsien." According to a Buddhist priest of the Sung
dynasty it should be caUed the " Eeeord of the Buddhistio
Kingdoms." The " Eeeord of the Buddhistic Kingdoms,"
iu one volume, occurs only in the geographical section of
the History of the Sui dynasty : so that the above state
ment does not seem to have sufficient foundation. There
were, however, originaUy two " Narratives of Fa Hsien,"
the first of which in two volumes has been lost, and the
second of which, in one volume, is the work we have now.
At the end of the narrative, a man of the Chin dynasty
added " being asked to write down in detail what he had
previously sketched, Fa Hsien again went over the whole
from beginning to end." Hence the single volume, which
was afterwards expanded into a more detailed account in
two volumes, but never became popular in that form and
accordingly disappeared. Hui Chiao,^ a Buddhist priest
of the Liang dynasty, states that there was another and
1. Lived under the Liang dynasty, and published an enlarged
edition of the ^ ff' i|P> mentioned below.

122 RECORD OF THE
more extensive " Narrative" of the travels of Fa Hsien iu
these countries which should be caUed " The Greater
Narrative of Fa Hsien" by way of distinction.
With regard to the text of the " Eeeord," there are
certain points that deserve some attention. For instance,
" the second year of Hung Shih" is, according to Yao
Hsing's* Chronology, the fourth year of the style Lung
Ngan in the reign of the emperor Ngan Ti of^the Chin
dynasty. Again, " the nation of Ch'ien Kuei" is the fief
of Wan-ch'uan,3 governed by Ch'i-fu-ch'ien-kuei. Simi
larly, " the prince of Chang-yeh" is Tuan yeh, prince of
Liang. And " the prefect of Tun-huang, named Li Kao"
(^ f^), is the Wu Chao* prince of Liang, named Li
Kao (^ ^), for the latter in the third month of that
year received instructions from Tuan Yeh to take charge
of Tun-huang, and as Fa Hsien spent the rainy season at
Chang-yeh before going on to Tun-huang, it is evident
that his Kao (Jg) should be Kao (^), the fact that the
two words are pronounded alike being the reason of his
orthographical mistake. So with his " kingdom of Nou
T'an ; " for in the year he passed through, Li-lu-ku the
Bald^ had but just usurped the throne, and did not die
till two years afterwards when Nou [T'an reigned in his
stead. Thus he was wrong in speaking of Nou T'an,
probably because his memory faUed him when he subse
quently (wrote his narrative). Further, the Shamans
who started with him from Ch'ang-ngan were Hui Ching,
Tao Cheng, Hui Ying, and Hui Wei, and those he met
2. M^ M- We can find nothing about him.
4. A title SC HS-
5. This is aU we can make of ^ ^ ^1J ^ JR.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS. 123
at Chang-yeh were Chih Yen, Hui Chien Seng Shao,
Pao Yiin, and Seng Ching, making nine in all (including
Fa Hsien). When they arrived at the land of Wu-i,
Chih Yen, Hui Chien, and Hui Wei, went back to Kao-
ch'ang ; and when the others arrived at the Wang-hsin
temple in Khoten, Seng Shao left them and went to Chi-
pin. Then again at Peshawur, Hui Ta, with Pao Yiin,
and Seng Ching, returned to China, and Hui Ching died
at the temple of Buddha's alms-bowl, so that the indivi
duals meant in the passage'' " Fa Hsien and the others,
three in aU, went south and crossed the lesser snowy
mountains," must be Tao Cheng and Hui Ying. How
then do we find' " Hui Ching was unable to go on"?
The coUection of Ecclesiastical Biographies by Hsiao
Liangs also gives Hui Ching, which should be Hui Ying
— a mistake which has been made ever since the epoch
of division between the north and south. Tao Cheng
remained finaUy in India ; but Hui Ta's name does not
occur among the nine mentioned above. Was he then
" traveUing with them by a different road" ?''
Done at Wu-yiian
by Hu Chen-heng.^ o
6. Chapter xiv.
7. As in Chapter xiv ad init.
8- M i^ ^ fl" Jl^- We pass the first two characters over to
our readers.
9. A proverbial expression : fifc 3!^ ?f& ^•
10. A celebrated scholar of the Ming dynasty. See Wyhe's
Notes p. 194.

Translation of a Passage from Chapter XXXVI.
BY W. F. MAYERS.

At this Sangharama of the Mahayana order he ob
tained a copy of the Precepts (Vinaya), to wit, the Pre
cepts of the assembly of the Mahasangika, which were
those observed by the first great assembly, convened
during the lifetime of Buddha. This work was given
forth (or, handed down, promulgated^) at the Jetavana
temple. Besides this,^ the eighteen schools' each have
1. The character ^, here translated "work," might possibly
also be ^held to signify " commencement," or " original," but the
context seems to forbid such a rendering. The construction of the
sentence is so pecuUar as to leave the meaning, in any case, obscure,
even to a Chinese reader. It should be noted that pen, in the sense
of " work " or " volume," is a word found in use on the same page
of Fah Hien's narrative. The ¦writers of the T'ang dynasty speak
of the ^ Sf6 or Sanskrit works brought to China by Fah Hien.
2. The expression |§ 'f^ is perhaps the most puzzUng of aU in
this extremely obscure extract. It is a compound unrecognized by
any Chinese authority, but it can scarcely be intended to convey
any other meaning than that given to it in the translation.
3. For the eighteen schools of ancient Buddhism see A. Csoma
de Kbros, As. Ees. xx, p. 298, and Eoeppen, Die EeUgion des Bud
dha, p. 152 ; also WassiUef, Le Bouddhisme, passim, and p. 62,
" le Vinaia commun a toutes les Scoles." Kumaradjlva, quoted in

126 RECORD OP THE BUDDHISTIC KINGDOMS.
canons" of their own, which are identical in their main
tenour.* In minor points of difference they may treat the
subject with different degrees of freedom." This, how
ever, is the most comprehensive and complete of aU (the
treatises).
the Fan Yih Ming I Tsi, refers to eighteen pu or schools, but these
appear to be rather the heretical schools than those which would be
recognized by Fah Hien as appertaining to Buddhism proper.
Kumaradjlva remarks that the eighteen pu are derived from the six
piU or Tirthya, of whom Piirana KSshyapa was the first. Each of
these six heretical teachers, he states, combined in himself three
qualities, viz., universal knowledge, supernatural endowments, and
a knowledge of the 'Vedas. Thrice six are eighteen, and thus arose
the eighteen sects or classes of doctrine. Cf. Eitel, Manual of
Chinese Buddhism, p. 147.
4. The compound expression ^ ^ may mean either teacher
or teachings, i.e. doctrine in a reUgious sense. It is iUustrated by
by seven quotations in the P'ei WSn Yiin Fu, of which the first is
extracted from the commentary on the Kuh-liang Chwan. It is
there defined as p .^ ^ ^ — the fixed rule of daily observance.
Upon this the translation given above is based. In sundry passages
from ¦writings of the T'ang dynasty, the compound obviously signi
fies a Teacher. In the foUo^wing passage from the ^ ^ -ij i^
it apparently means "teachings":— |i6 M PfB ^ 41 ^ ^ ^•
5, The expression 'J^ |^ is identical in meaning with ^ Sk
the "upshot" or main tenour of a proposition. It has no con
ceivable connection ¦with the dogma of the ^ ^ or TrJsharana, —
the Three Refuges, and the earUer translators are mistaken in ac
cepting it in this sense.
6. The expression ^ ^, UteraUy signifying "to open and to
close,'' is quoted in the P'ei Wen Yun Fu from six different authors,
commencing ¦with the ^ f£ and extending to the Poems of Sn
She. In the -writings of Hwai Nan Tsze it is used as a parallel to
Wjl OT — movement and repose, or simply " motion ;" and a -writer
named Luh Kiieh employs it, in a similar manner, as a paraUel to
'u Rp — union and separation, or point of junction or resemblance.
(Cf. T. T. Meadows on the " Synthesis of Contradictories." In the
text, the expression appears to signify the degree of harmony with,
or departure from, the prescriptions of the Vinaya obtained by Fah
Hien, which the various schools indulge in.

LIST OF
COUNTEIES, TOWNS, &c.
VISITED BY FA HSIEN.

Chan-po  gj Jg  91.
Chang-yeh  ^i^  2.
Ch'ang-an  M^  1,115.
Ch'ang-kuang  -g J^  113,114,115.
Chi-jao-i  ^ ^ H  39.
Chi-ni-chia  MMM  18-
Chi-pin  g ^  10.
Chi-tsu  H ^  83.
Ch'i-she-chiieh  ¦§ g |jg  69.
Chia-shih  JJg /J  84.
Chia-wei-lo-wei... ^ i^ jH ^  49, 52.
Chia-yeh  §) |j5  74.
Chieh-ch'a  i^ ^  7, 10.
Chien-to-wei  ?i P£ ^  17, 18.
Ch'ing-chou  ^ j[fl  114,115.
Chii-i-na-chieh... ^ ^MM  ^^'

128 RECORD OF THE
Chii-sa-lo  ^HM  40.
Ch'ii-tz'u  jg ^  105.
Chu-ch'a-shih-lo.. ^ ^ Jf JH  17.
Chung-kuo  i:fi ^  29.
Fo-lou-sha  ^S^  18' 21.
Hsiao-hsiieh shan... p|» g |Jj  25.
Hsi-lo  pjll  21.
Hsin-t'Ou  ^ g|  14, 27, 32.
Kao-ch'ang  ^ ^  5.
Ko-fu-t'i  ^ ^ ^  19.
Lan-mo  ^^  ^^'
Lao Mountains  ^ ll]  H^-
Lo-i  ji^  26.
Lun-min  f^ Jg  51.
Lung Mountains ... ^ |lj  1.
Ma-t'ou-lo  ^ ^ ^  27.
Mo-chieh-t'i  MMM  ^l-
Na-chieh  ^ t^  16, 20, 21.
Na-lo  =515 il  68.
Na-p'i-chia  JJJ tSft fllD  ^9.
Ni-U  e/gsp  66.
Pa-lien-fo  E jE 5&  ^1' 89.
P'i-she-U  ft'^iS  56, 57.
Fi-t'u  m^  27.
P'in-na  MM  l^^-
Po-lo-nai  JSH^  84, 89.
Po-na  ^i5  27.
^^-^^  MM  28.
Sha (river)  ^  28.
Sha-chih  Jib ffffi  40.

BUDDHISTIO KINGDOMS.

129

Shan-shan  ^ gg  3.

She-i  -g. ^ .
ShI-wei  ^^ .
Shih-tzu  ^ ^ .
Su-ho-to  ijlPflf ^,
Ta-ch'in  ^1® .

48.
40, 48.
92, 105.
16.
86.

To-mo-li-ti  % WM%  91-

P£®

T'o-U 
Tou-wei  fP^
Ts'ung-Ung  ^^
Tun-huang  ^fj ^
Tzu-ho  ^ -Q.
Wang-she  tg ¦^
Wu-ch'ang  '^ "^
Wu-i  il H
Yang-chou  ^ }^s\  115.
Yang-lou (M'ntains) ^ ;jg
Yeh-p'o-t'i  •% ^ ^
Yen-fu-t'i  ^^ ^
Yii-hui  ]5f^ ^
Yii-t'ien  ^^
Yiieh-shih  ^ J^

13, 48, 10, 2.
10.68. 15, 4,

12.

16. 5.

66.

2.
111. 33,
10. 5, 105.
19, 105.

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