1848.] Miscellaneous. 233 



it is probably amongst other inscriptions (unpublished), lying in your 

 library.* He replied saying, he should like to have a facsimile, 

 but I don't think any one could have been more correct than the one 

 I sent. He however lithographed the inscription with the Khulsa, 

 which is in the face of the stone, which was apparently formerly the 

 top of a pillar. He said it was in the Sanskrit not Pali. The style 

 of the letter nearly that of the Allahabad, No, 2. Is not that 

 a transition Pali? I have a copy on the other side of the water of 

 the Journal containing two Allahabad inscriptions. But the last 

 inscription which I discovered and copied about a year ago, is in a 

 character somewhat older I presume. However, I have been floun- 

 dering in the dark for want of the Journals containing the labours of 

 Prinsep, Wathen, &c. &c. I will send you copies of both of these 

 inscriptions ; and, if I can manage it, of one upon a coin which I found 

 a few months ago, but which our chief brahman of the temple here 

 cannot decypher. I have proved beyond doubt that there was a 

 Hindu colony settled in Province Wellesley and Keddah, and I think 

 it had been preceded by a Buddhist population. But I have not yet 

 closed my researches, which have here to be conducted under many dis- 

 advantages (beyond our boundary), such as almost impervious jungles, a 

 population who will afford no assistance whatever, and Siamese jea- 

 lousy. I am engaged on and have nearly finished a paper for the Jour- 

 nal of the Indian Archipelago, on subjects relating more to our section 

 of the globe than to India. But I have MSS. on my shelves, which 

 I hope to be able to send, I will not promise very soon, to your 

 Journal. I have been trying to get some Pali scholar, amongst the 

 Buddhist priests, to assist me in explaining some MSS. in that lan- 

 guage. But they are a sadly ignorant set, and even as regards their 

 own Deity and his holy places, they are obliged to confess that I know 

 more than they do, and that is not a great deal either. 



I have little hope that the Archaeological field of Sumatra will soon 

 be laid open. It is a sealed book. We only now want to have a col- 

 lection of all the ancient inscriptions extant to the eastward, to decide, 

 on Prinsep's system, the various periods when Buddhists and Hindus 

 migrated there. It seems to me at present that most if not all of these 



* We fear not. We have searched diligently and found none but such as have been 

 published.— Eds. 



