1881.] 
Sarafc Chandra Das —Contributions on Tibet. 
213 
CHAPTER I. 
Monarchy (416 B. C. to 617 A. D.) 
(Bon Period.) 
Four hundred and seventeen years, according to Buton’s 12 chronology, 
after the nirvana of Buddha, in the year 416 B. C., was born in India, Nah- 
Thi-tsanpo 13 the first of the Tibetan kings who established universal sway 
over Tibet. The fifth son of king Prasenajit of Kosala 14 was born with 
obliquely drawn eyes and light blue eyebrows of the colour of turquoise. 
As soon as he came out of his mother’s womb, the infant was found possessed 
of webbed fingers and two rows of teeth, fully developed, and white as a 
conch shell. Apprehending great evil from such ominous signs in the in¬ 
fant, the parents packed it up in a copper vessel and floated it away on the 
river Ganga. A farmer finding it, carried it to his wife who nursed it. 
Being a simple-hearted man, he did not try to pass off the child as his 
own, but revealed the truth; and the strange story of the forlorn royal 
child became known to all. Informed of the antecedents of his life, how 
he had been thrown into the Ganga by his royal parents and nursed by 
the good farmer’s wife, the youth’s mind was overcast with sorrow and 
thoughtfulness. Being born a prince, he could not bend his mind to apply 
itself to the lowly pursuits of a farmer’s life. After passing many a day 
in anxiety and melancholy, he quitted the farmer’s house, bidding his country 
a mournful farewell, with a firm determination either to reign as a king or 
not live at all. He proceeded northward to the Himalaya mountains 
subsisting on wild fruit. Unmindful of the difficulties of a mountain 
journey or of death, he travelled further and further north, till by the 
blessing of Arya Chenressig he arrived at the summit of the Lhari 15 snowy 
mountains of Tibet and surveyed the surrounding regions. His heart was 
12 The great Tibetan author Buton was born at Tho-phug in the year 1290 A. D. 
He became the abbot of the Shalu monastery near Tasilhunpo. He was the first 
great Tibetan scholar who compiled the two well-known Encyclopaedias of the Bud¬ 
dhist scriptures, called Kah-gyur and Tan-gyur, which were formerly scattered in 
detached pieces among different monasteries. He wrote the great critical chronologi¬ 
cal work, called Khapa-kah-chad, which is followed by the Gelugpa writers, and 
composed 40 volumes in different branches of sacred literature, astrology, medicine 
and history. 
13 This famous monarch is said to have been sent to India to be born in a royal 
family of undefiled race in order to spread Buddhism in Tibet. The spirit of Chen- 
re-ssg entered into him to make him one of the dynasty of Prasenajit. 
14 Ehsala rgyal, i. e., King of Kasala. 
or fyi; of Bod. 
