It is quite different from anything yet seen. It is a town in itself, a town of many levels and many dwellings. Facing the central group of rocks, on the ground level, are the remains of a small "Tooth Temple," where at some time in its varied history the sacred relic may have been hidden.

From here a flight of steps, renewed, leads easily to the summit of the great outcrop, whence is revealed a splendid panorama. The huge hill of Mihintale, eight miles away, with a dagaba stuck like a wen on its side, shows up sharply from a rich tree-clad plain. Near it is the still sharper outline of Ritigala. And on all sides the eye wanders easily to the limit of sight.

There is so much to see immediately round the bases of the giant boulders that it would take a considerable time to trace it all out. A confused impression remains of low boundary walls marking the outlines of spacious hall and refectory, and stumps of pillars showing where the roofs were upheld. The oldest part of the monastery is coeval with Mihintale and the dawn of Buddhism in the land, but much has been added later. The first group of rocks was at one time thickly covered with buildings, and on the far side the ground-remains tell their own tale.

On the summit of the middle group are traces of decayed dagabas, but much more interesting than these are the great boulders, tumbled at all angles, some so lightly poised that it looks as if a shower of raindrops would overbalance them, and others firmly set, a growth of the mass itself. Amid these boulders, underneath their hanging

eaves, nestling into their curved sides, are the cells, or caves of individual monks. Each has been careful to cut a horizontal dripstone above his dwelling so that the floods of rain-water might not follow the curve inwards to his living-room, and across and above the drip-stone are queercut markings of a date more ancient than any inscriptions on slabs yet found. These are in the Brahmi-lipi letter record" and have been deciphered. They tell of individual ownership in a community where most things were held in

common.

It needs more imagination than the average man possesses to reconstruct this rabbit-warren as it must have been in the time of its glory. But we might attempt it, peopling the cool shadows of the great rocks with the shaven, brown-faced men, noting the sudden precipices falling from the thresholds of their habitations, the queer little steps cut from the face of the rock; conjuring up the bird's-eye view they must have had of the beautiful buildings below, lying spread out like a draught-board between this group and the next, with the sunlight and shadow showing on the tiled roofs and paved courtyards and decorated entrances; and to complete the picture it is necessary to imagine some of the saffron-clad monks flitting up and down and in and out like some strange species of giant moth, passing steadily barefoot along the terraces, over the little connecting bridges, and up and down the sun-baked slopes of the rocks, while around and about their groups of island homes the great jungle-covered plain billowed and rolled like a green ocean.

The most interesting of all the caves is to be found in the third or most southerly group of rocks. It is spacious, and the lintel and doorposts still stand in position, resembling those left at the Gal-gé. The heaps of bricks, worn and tumbled, on each side, show where the outer wall stood. That it is now tenanted by innumerable bats at least one sense testifies.

The inscription shows it to have been the "Cave of Kuma, son of the Chief Tisa." This is cut at a higher level than the entrance, and is found above a sort of fault or shaft on one side, down which air and a feeble glint of light may have reached the occupant.

Vessagiriya is one of the last of the great monasteries to be excavated completely. In the Report of the Archæological Survey published in 1914 we read a full account of it, and gather the extent of its power in the days when its grounds reached up to Isurumuniya and the bund of Tissa-Wewa.

CHAPTER VII

PAVILION, PALACE, OR MONASTERY?

LYING west of Anuradhapura is a galaxy of buildings of supreme interest whose use and design have puzzled the most experienced heads; they are likely to remain an insoluble problem unless fresh evidence is forthcoming.

There are no less than fourteen similar groups of buildings so far excavated, strung out along the Outer Circular Road and the Arripu Road, which cuts it as the arrow bisects the bow. These are built on a plan differing entirely from the usual five-of-cards type of monastery so often exemplified. The characters which distinguish them reappear in all, and the differences are in minor points. One marked similarity is that they are all built, apparently of set purpose, on rocky sites, and the rock, wherever possible, is worked into the building, allowed for, and adapted. The plan of all is of two buildings, or platforms, an outer and an inner, built with geometrical exactitude and linked by a stone of such dimensions and so ponderous that the wonder is how it was ever placed where it is. This crosses a chasm, or moat, which surrounds the inner building, but its weight precluded its having been anything in

the nature of a drawbridge, for in some instances it amounts to over thirty tons.

The outer building is entered by a porch, and gives no evidence of ever having had any pillars, whereas the inner one in every case has been plentifully supplied with pillars, many of which, as stumps or complete, remain.

The "bridge" stone has a short flight of steps ascending to it on both sides, and the threshold of the inner building is paved by a large flat stone, in which the grooves cut for the door-sockets are conspicuous. All the buildings are distinguished by a notable plainness; with one or two small exceptions, noted hereafter, there is nothing in the nature of ornament to be found on them.

There are outbuildings in various positions fitted into the general plan as the character of the ground allows; they generally surround the twin central block, and in some cases the remains of an ambulatory or covered walk can be traced as well.

The drive along the Outer Circular Road is an easy one. The first group of ruins passed is not of very great interest; by far the best specimens are to be seen near the junction of the Arippu and Outer Circular Roads or in the former. It is therefore advisable to turn at once down the leafy arch of this deserted route, and explore the Blocks numbered A and B by the Survey. Block A is of particular interest, for here in February, 1913, under the superintendence of Mr. Perera, of the Archæological Survey, there were excavated by the coolies two tiny gold images of the sedent Buddha: one of solid bronze coated with gold,