606 DESCRIPTION OF SELECT COINS, 



ment is of course of more recent date than the most modern of the Coins. 

 The subversion of the Bactrian kingdom brings us within little more than 

 a century of Christianity ; and about that time, and for one or two centu- 

 ries after it, we know fronl Chinese accounts, as well as from the fathers 

 of the Christian Church, that the Buddhist religion flourished, especially 

 in Bactria and the north western provinces of India, — circumstances 

 strongly corroborative of the supposed origin and history of the monument, 

 leaving no doubt of its being aJBauddha structure, and rendering it pro- 

 bable that it was erected about the commencement of the Christian aera. 



