Page:A Handbook of Indian Art.djvu/69

Rh the Bodhīsattva with a poisoned arrow. Reflecting that by self-sacrifice he might gain a step towards the attainment of perfect knowledge, the wise beast assisted the hunter in sawing off the six tusks, and died before his companions came to the spot. The Queen, when she received the trophies, was struck by remorse, and likewise died. The elephant in another birth became the Buddha, and the jealous Queen attained peace of mind as one of the sisters of the Order.

In their illustrations of these jungle stories, dear to the Indian villager, the Buddhist sculptors testify to that intense love of the forest wild, and intimate knowledge of the life of its denizens, which are so conspicuous in Indian poetry and literature. Pl. V,, gives the panel of the middle transom of the south gateway. On the left the King of the Elephants, the Bodhīsattva, is cooling himself in a lotus pool in the forest surrounded by the rest of the herd, two of whom hold the insignia of royalty over his head. On the right he is shown, together with his attendants, promenading in the jungle in royal state, knowing full well that the huntsman concealed behind a tree is preparing the deadly arrow. The subject is repeated on the northern and western gateways; in the latter case the smoother and less vigorous technique suggests that the ivory-carvers who executed some of the panels of the south gateway also had a hand in parts of the western torana.

The Sānchī sculptures also show the derivation of that great school of Buddhist sculpture which, after being transplanted to Amarāvatī at the mouth of the Krishna river and to Ceylon, finally took root in Java, and in the sixth century blossomed into the splendid reliefs of the great Borobūdūr stūpa. Besides similarities in the grouping of figures, there is, in the expressive