896 Vestiges of tlie Kings of Gwalior. [No. 4, 



tury observes :* " No attempt whatever has been made to set aside 

 my implied assignment of bim on the basis of an ascertained date 

 to the first half of the second century, and the time of Budhagupta, 

 on which his own depends, is hypothetically reckoned by the Babu 

 in an era which perhaps began in A.. D. 278. The result is a 

 difference of three hundred and thirty-five years." The ascertained 

 . date to which the writer so emphatically appeals is contained in a 

 foot-note to his paper on the Eran inscriptions, (Ante Vol. XXX. 

 p. 15) in which he says ; " Since writing this paper I have had time 

 before sending it to the press, to refer for a solution of the date in ques- 

 tion, to my friend Bapu Deva S'astrin, Professor of Mathematics in 

 the Benares College. He apprises me in reply that it conforms to the 

 era of Vikramaditya and does not conform to that of Salivahana. 

 It is therefore, all but demonstrably certain that Budhagupta was 

 reigning on Thursday, the 7th of June, in the year of our Lord one 

 hundred and eight, new style. Toramana must have flourished short- 

 ly after him with something of likelihood indeed as his next suc- 

 cessor." Thus the basis is no other than the ipse dixit of Pandita 

 Bapu Deva, opposed as it is to the deductions of Prinsep, Thomas, 

 Cunningham, and other distinguished orientalists. I have the 

 highest respect for the Pandita's learning. But I know not how 

 he can positively deduce from the data of the Eran document, that 

 it was recorded in the era of Vikramaditya and of no other. The date 

 there given is : " In the year 165, on the J 2th day of the light fort- 

 night of the month of A'shadha," according to the revised decypher- 

 ment published in the last volume of this Journal, and " 165, the 

 thirteenth day of the light fortnight, in the month of A'shadha" 

 agreeably to Prinsep's reading. f The facsimile published by Prin- 

 sep is in favour of his version, but the accuracy of that document has 

 been questioned, and therefore until another facsimile is published, it 

 is impossible to decide which of the two is the correct reading. And 

 since the premise thus remains undecided, deductions founded upon 

 it must necessarily be very dubious. Even were I to admit the date 

 of the re-decypherer, I do not think it would follow, (I have not 

 the leisure now to calculate,) that the 12th of the light fortnight in 

 Ashadha on the meridian of Grvvalior could be conjoined with a Thurs- 

 day only on the 165th year of Vikramaditya, and on no other year. 

 * Ante Vol. XXX. p. 387. t Ante Vol. VII. p. 634. 



