30 
P. Doyal —An ancient Cave. 
[No. 1, 
An ancient Cave and some ancient Stupas in the District of Gaya .— 
By Parmeshwar Dotal. 
The District of Gaya is very rich in archaeological remains of great 
interest, and most of them are connected with the rise and spread of 
Buddhism. Some of these were visited by the Chinese pilgrims in the 
5th and 7th centuries of the Christian era, and the identification of the 
places mentioned in their itineraries with the existing ruins has been 
one of the chief aims of the researches made by the archaeologists of 
the past century. Almost all the places mentioned by Fa-Hien and 
Hwen Thsang have been since visited and explored by Major Kittoe, 
General Cunningham, Dr. Stein and other antiquarians; but one of the 
most important of them, the Pragbodhi cave, does not appear to have 
been visited by any of them, as will appear from the following para¬ 
graphs. 
In order to make the subject of the present note more clear, extracts 
from Hwen Thsang’s and Fa-Hien’s discriptions are given below :— 
Fa Hien writes :— 
“ Thence ( i.e . fromBakraur) going to the north-east half a yojan, 
you come to a stone grotto; Phou sa entering it and facing the west, sat 
with his legs crossed and thought within himself ‘ in order that I should 
accomplish the law, I must have a divine testimonial.’ Immediately his 
shadow depicted itself on the wall; it was three feet high. 1 The weather 
was clear and brilliant, heaven and earth were both moved, and all the 
gods in that space explained, it is not in this place that all the Foes 
past and to come should accomplish the law. To the south-west, a little 
more than half a yojan is the pei-to tree, where all the Foes, past and to 
come, should accomplish the law. Having said this, they sang to him 
and showed him the way retiring.” 2 
1 James Legge has translated this sentence thns :— 
“ On the wall of the rock there appeared immediately the shadow of a 
Buddha, rather more than 3 feet in length, which is still bright at the present 
day.” 
2 Fa-Hien’s description, abstracted from Major Kittoe’s note published on 
pages 953 to 970 of the Journal of the Asiatic Society for September 1847. 
