Mane J tester Memoirs, Vol. lix. (191 5), No. 10. 85 



Ixxii.). From thence he sailed in a great ship which 

 carried about two hundred men, and which was navigated 

 by observing the sun, moon and stars. In this ship Fah 

 Hian reached Ye-po-ti (probably Java) in which country 

 heretics and Brahmans flourished, but the law of Buddha 

 was not much known {lb., 1, lxxx.). Here the pilgrim 

 embarked for China on board another ship carrying two 

 hundred men, amongst whom were Brahmans. These 

 proposed to treat the sramana as Jonah was treated, and 

 for the same reason, but some of those on board took his 

 part. At length when their provisions were nearly 

 exhausted, they reached China {lb., 1, lxxxi., lxxxii.). All 

 these ships appear to have been Indian and not Chinese. 



" Fah Hian mentions that pirates were numerous in 

 those seas {lb., 1, lxxx), which shows that the commerce 

 must have been considerable" (p. 171). 



" It seems in the highest degree improbable that this 

 close connection between the Sun and the serpent could 

 have originated, independently, in countries so far apart 

 as China and the West of Africa, or India and Peru. 

 And it seems scarcely possible that, in addition to this, 

 the same forms of worship of these deities, and the same 

 ritual, could have arisen, spontaneously, amongst each of 

 these far distant peoples. The alternative appears to be 

 that the combined worship of the Sun and serpent-gods 

 must have spread from a common centre s by the migra- 

 tion of, or communication with, the people who claimed 

 Solar descent, 



" So universally was the Naga held sacred, that it 

 would seem to have been the earliest totem of the people 

 who claimed descent from the Sun-god" (p. 183). 



I have quoted so extensively from Oldham's fascinat- 

 ing work because the conclusions at which he arrived 

 from a study of the ancient literature of India is confirmed 



