1865.] Report of the Archaeological Survey. 167 



quarries which for ages past have furnished materials for sculptors and 

 architects of Upper India. All the ancient statues that I have met 

 with in Rohilkhund and Oudh are made of this stone, and there can 

 be little doubt that the Buddhist custom of making gifts of statues 

 and pillars to the various monasteries must have created such a steady 

 demand for the sculptor's works as would have ensured the continuous 

 employment of many skilled workmen. Many of the Bactrian Greeks 

 may thus have found remunerative service amongst the Indian Buddhists. 

 Indeed, this is the only way in which I can account, not only for the 

 very superior execution of many of the earliest specimens of Indian 

 art, but also for many of their ornamental details, such as the fluting of 

 the pillars in the Western Punjab architecture and the honeysuckle and 

 astragal ornaments of Asoka's monoliths, all of which are of undoubted 

 Greek origin. In the great fort of Narwar there still exists a Roman 

 Catholic chapel, with a burial-ground attached, containing fifty tombs 

 of all sizes, of which two only are inscribed. One records the death of 

 a German, named Cornelius Oliver, in A. D. 1747 ; the other of a 

 young girl named Margarita, the daughter of a Hakim or Doctor. 

 The first is recorded in Portuguese, the other in Persian. That the 

 fifty tombs are those of Christians is proved, not only by the presence 

 of the cross on several of the uninscribed head-stones, but by the occur- 

 rence of letters I. H. S. surmounted by a cross, on the wall imme- 

 diately above the altar. I presume that these Christians were gunners 

 who formed the artillery portion of the garrisons of the important 

 fortress of Narwar. Here, then, we have the clearest proof of the 

 existence of a small body of foreigners in the very heart of India, who 

 were permitted the open exercise of their religion by the most bigoted 

 of all mankind, the Indian Muhammadans. Such also I think may have 

 been the position of a small party of Bactrian Greeks amongst the 

 tolerant Buddhists of the great city of Mathura, about the beginning 

 of the Christian era. Their very names are unknown, and their occupa- 

 tions are uncertain, but their foreign religion is attested beyond all 

 doubt by the presence of a Bacchic altar, bearing the known figure of 

 the wine-bibbing Silenus. 



III.— KHALSI OR SRUGHNA. 

 185. About 15 miles to the westward of Masuri, and on the right 

 bank of the Jumna just above the junction of the Tons river, there 



