The Remains at Pagan. [No. 1. 



Among the ruins of the ancient city on the 8th February, 1826, 

 the Burmese under the hapless Naweng-bhuyen, or " King of 

 Sunset,"* made their last stand against Sir Archibald Campbell's 

 army, which remained encamped there for some days afterwards. 

 Havelock, in his history of the Campaign, notices the numerous 

 monuments, but says ; " the sensation of barren wonderment is the 

 only one which Pagahm excites. There is little to admire, nothing 

 to venerate, nothing to exalt the notion of the taste and invention 

 of the people which the traveller might already have formed in 

 Rangoon or Prome." It will be seen presently that we differ widely 

 in opinion from Colonel Havelock. 



The account that conveys the most truthful impression of Pagan 

 is probably that contained in the travels of Mr. Howard Malcom, 

 an American missionary traveller. 



Mr. Crawfurd indeed devotes several pages of his admirable book 

 to the detailed description of some of these buildings, and gives an 

 engraving of that which he considered the finest architectural work 

 among them. Prom his selection in this instance I utterly dissent. 

 The temple which he has engraved is, as compared with the 

 greater works at Pagan, paltry and debased. It is altogether 

 uncharacteristic of the peculiar Pagan architecture ; nor is it indeed 

 well or accurately represented in the print. Mr. Crawfurd's 

 descriptions too, an accurate observer as he is, fail somehow to leave 

 with his readers any just impression of these great and singular 

 relics. Prom that preference of his which has been referred to, 

 it strikes me that he did not himself do justice to the grandeur or 

 interest of these buildings, and therefore could not enable his readers 

 to do so. With the assistance in illustration that we enjoy, we 

 ought to be able to do better. 



In Pegu and lower Burma, the Buddhist pagoda is seldom found 

 in any other form than that of the solid bell-shaped structure, 

 representing (though with a difference) the topes of ancient India 

 and the Chaityas of Tibet, and always supposed to cover a sacred 



* Otherwise Laya-thooa. Ho fled to Ava, and appeared before the king de- 

 manding new troops. The king in a rage ordered him to be put to death. The 

 poor fellow was tortured out of life before he reached the plaee of execution. — 

 Judson's Life, I. 2U5. 



