No. 28.— 1884.] first fifty jatakas. 



151 



enumerating several kinds of deserts." Now this needless 

 dissertation is not found in the Sinhalese version. 



Again, his lordship pointed out that in the 15th Jataka, 

 the compiler built up his story about the deer, who would 

 not go to school, upon a mistake ; reading Kalehi for Kaldki 

 in the text. In the Sinhalese translation no allusion is 

 made to time at all; the translator's words are sapta 

 kalayen, and not kdlayen. 



Provincialisms are to be detected in the Jatakas. Some 

 of these are written in indifferent Sinhalese ; some contain 

 a few Tamil expressions and words. From these facts I 

 conclude that the work must have been done by several 

 persons, and not by the King himself, as one might be lead 

 to believe from the statement in the Mahavamsa. In the 

 Sinhalese Introduction to the Jatakas it is said that the work 

 was accomplished by the exertions of the minister Werasinha 

 Pratiraja at the personal request of the minister Prakrama, 

 and no mention of the King is made at all. 



The statement in the Mahavamsa is that the King, having 

 made a monk who came from the Cola country his 

 tutor, learnt the purport of all the Jatakas from him. He 

 subsequently translated all the 550 Jatakas into Sinhalese, 

 and had the translation read before monks who were learned 

 in the Tripitakas. The version was then carefully recorded 

 in books and published throughout the Island. The version 

 was entrusted to the learned monk Me'dhankara, who and 

 his pupil in succession were enjoined to preserve it, and for 

 that purpose a hermitage was built for him and was deli- 

 vered to him with four villages for his and their mainte- 

 nance. 



