1895.] Alexander E. Caddy — Asoka Inscriptions in India. 155 



portion of the column in a plaster jacket, and of stripping it the same 

 evening. 



10. As they now lie in the Museum, these mould plaques are 

 curved slabs of plaster of Paris measuring, most of them, 23" x 15", 

 and a little over an inch in depth, enclosing a piece of wire netting 

 bound in an iron frame. Each has been barked from the column after 

 being blocked on to it by pouring the liquid plaster into a cell, the 

 inner side being the inscribed stone surface ; the outer a stout sheet 

 of tin, the net being suspended in the hollow. A rubber tube led the 

 plaster quietly to the bottom of the well, thus saving much laborious 

 manipulation. These I brought into Bettiah and left there till my 

 return from the northern Lauriya, 



Among other objects of interest shown me by Mr. Gibbon at Bettiah 

 were a few stones from tlie coping of a well near Tribeni, which bore 

 the honeysuckle ornament of the Erectheum, common to several Asoka 

 columns, and of which he permitted me to take casts, which I have with 

 me now at the Museum. He also arranged for my dak to Lauriya 

 Navandgarh. 



11. At Lauriya Navandgarh the work was soon in train. Araraj 

 experiences had taught us some lessons, and we saw the pbster gradually 

 covering the inscribed portion of the column in regular slabs. 



This pillar is somewhat smaller than that at Araraj ; the latter is 

 massive, and its capital, if it had any, was long since lost. This is 

 tlie more graceful of the two, and is surmounted by a lion capital. The 

 shaft and inscription are in the same condition as that at Araraj, and 

 in the same material. The couchant lion faces the rising sun. He sits on 

 a circular abacus, the rim of which is girdled by a string of hans {i\iQ 

 sacred geese of the Buddhists). This rests on a cable string-course 

 which crowns a Persepolitan lotus-capital or terminal, whose grace- 

 fully drooping petals end just outside an e^tg and dart ovolo, the en- 

 tablature finishing below in a second cable string-course. The design and 

 workmanship disclose both knowledge and power. The jaw of the lion 

 has been destroyed. 



12. I had a rajmistri go up to the entablature and mould off a 

 portion of the goose frieze and of the terminal, so that Avhen the column 

 is set up in the Museum it will not end quite abrui^tly. 



,13. At the Navandgarh Lauriya^ while examining one of the ancient 

 barrows which characterise this village, I found two belts of iron in the 

 same prependicular axis, from which I surmised they must have bound 

 the earth end of some tall pole. It is probable the report noted by 

 General Cunningham regarding an iron coffin may have had its origin 

 in some such find. From here I returned to Bettiah by elephant, and 



