A RUN THROUGH KATHIAWAR. 243 



and are to carry us up to Gi'rnar, we have representa- 

 tives of the older and quasi aboriginal race which seems 

 to have peopled India before any Aryan invasion, and 

 who must have had a hard time of it in establishing 

 the divinity of humanity in face of the hostile and 

 then unterrified wild-beast world. In its Yadii princes 

 we have a connection with the first of the Aryan 

 invasions, and many special connections with the 

 earlier legends of Hinduism. Before the famous 

 sculptured edict of Ashoka, we stand beside the 

 establishment of Biidhism that wonderful religion, 

 which seems dying out in the East, and yet (if not 

 directly, yet in the writings of the German philoso- 

 pher Schopenhauer, and his disciple Von Hartmann) 

 is to-day again challenging the attention of the thought 

 of Europe. Then follows the corrupt Budhism of the 

 Jains, finding its most magnificent development in the 

 temples of Gi'rnar and Palitana ; and finally, the last 

 wave of Muhammadaii conquest sweeps from the 

 north over the land, and the keen, cruel, unfruitful 

 light of the Crescent glitters over it. 



This sequestered little kingdom was well fitted for 

 displaying these developments in a simple yet com- 

 plete and powerful manner. The Yadii princes and 

 their followers could look back reverentially to the 

 slopes of the Himalaya and cherish the traditions 

 and the habits of their forefathers undisturbed, to 

 an extent few of the communities of their race were 

 in India, by modifying circumstances. The Biidhists 



