1891.] of the Northern Buddhists. 73 



Far to the west lies De-va-chan,* 

 That happy land of Buddhist bliss ; 

 Where reigns the saintly sovereign, 

 Amitabha, of Light — boundless. 

 Who e'er His name in faith implores, 

 On re -birth gains that blessed land ; 

 His dying eyes shall see the Lord — 

 The Teacher and his priestly band. 

 No women there, nor fleshly birth ; 

 But from a diamond lotus flower 

 Bursts blooming forth the new born soul. 

 In the glorious company of 

 Amitabha our needs are few, 

 But food and drink and raiment rare 

 And alms-bowl all appear when wished. 

 The Buddhas of the quarters tea 

 Unite in praise of De-va-chan ; 

 Our prayer hence will e'er be this 

 " To be born in that Paradise." 

 N. B. — Buddha, Amitabha and Amitayusa are the different mani- 

 festations of the same spiritual entity. 



Col. J. Waterhouse submitted a communication from Mr. W. Mc- 

 Carren, Manager of the Arakan Oil Company's works, Kyouk Phyoo, 

 and said : — 



At the August meeting, after the reading of Col. Mainwaring'a 

 paper on his new theory of the Barisal Guns I remarked that on read- 

 ing a paper by Prof. Redwood on the Oil-wells of India, which was 

 published last year in the Journal of the Society for Chemical Industry, 

 and in which mention was made of gas explosions occurring in the 

 Islands of Cheduba and Ramree from the mud volcanoes, it seemed 

 not impossible that with favourable conditions of wind and atmosphere 

 the sound of these explosions if loud enough might be carried across 

 the Bay of Bengal so as to be heard in the localities where the Barisal 

 Guns are heard. 



On looking up a paper in Vol. XI of the Records of the Geological 

 Survey of India, by Mr. Mallett on " the Mud Volcanoes of Ramri and 

 Cheduba," referred to by Prof. Redwood, I found it stated that these ex- 

 plosions of gas were said by the natives to be most frequent in the rainy 

 season. 



* De-ya-chan is the Tibetan of Sukhavati. 



