84 Description of Ancient Remains of [No. 2, 



Stone Pillar. 

 Sond-ha-Talao. 



Before closing this paper, we would direct attention to a stone 

 pillar standing in the midst of a tank between the city of Benares 

 and the Buddhist remains at Sarnath. The tank is called Sona-ka- 

 Talao, or the Golden Tank, and is situated on the opposite side of 

 the river Burna, near the road which branches off from the high road 

 leading to Grkazeepore, and almost close to the point of its junction 

 with several other roads. The road is a portion of the Panch-kosi 

 or sacred boundary of Benares. Proceeding along it for somewhat 

 less than a mile, you arrive at the tank, which is to the right of it, 

 and is approached by a strong and well built ghaut, on which are 

 several Buddhist figures, brought most probably from Sarnath. It 

 is three hundred yards in length, and one hundred and forty in 

 breadth. In the midst of it is a round pillar, eighteen feet high and 

 upwards of nine in circumference, composed of great blocks of stone 

 cut in quadrants and put together without cement or mortar. There 

 is no inscription on the pillar, and no mason marks, so that we have 

 been totally unable to assign any date, even approximately, to its 

 erection. Its base is always, we believe, surrounded by water ; yet it 

 would be worth while to ascertain whether any inscription exists 

 below. We probed it to its foundations, but found no face for an in- 

 scription. It is likely that both the pillar has somewhat sunk, and that 

 formerly the tank was less choked with mud than it is now. In 

 appearance therefore the pillar was once higher than at the present 

 time. It was probably surmounted formerly by a lion or some other 

 figure, and on close examination bears marks of extreme old age. 



Besides allusions to a few other ancient structures, we have in 

 this paper traced out remains, more or less abundant, of six 

 Buddhist vihars or monasteries and four Buddhist chaityas or tem- 

 ples, still existing in Benares, and have pointed out the sites 

 on which they stood or are still standing. Add to these the 

 remains at Bakarya Kund already described in a former paper, and 

 we have the remains of seven monasteries and at the least seven 

 chaityas. The monasteries are doubtless a portion of the thirty 

 monasteries and upwards which Hwan Thsang, the Chinese traveller 



