Page:Footfalls of Indian History.djvu/114

86 FOOTFALLS OF INDIAN HISTORY midst the Wheel of the Law. The dress of the Master is the Indian chudder of fine white muslin. And in some form or other there is always a suggestion of the lotus in the throne, although it may take the form of folds of drapery. In all these respects we have a very distinct approach to the type of Buddha which is fixed in our minds as representative of Sarnath and also of Sanchi. The face here is characterised by a much greater masculinity than that of Sarnath — whose ostentatious technical perfection shows it to be a late example of the style — but there are all the same elements in the composition as a whole : the flying devas, the wheel, the lotus, and the halo ; and the dress is of the same fine and barely visible order. In Cave Fifteen, especially, a greatly heightened beauty is obtained by the fact that the halo is detached from the head of the figure, thus producing a shadow, which gives an air of life and freedom to the statue. This is only one out of many signs that the type is not rigidly fixed, but is to be seen at Ajanta as at Sanchi or Sarnath itself, playing round a general symbolistic convention. This Buddha is integral to Caves Seven, Eleven, Fifteen, Sixteen, and Seventeen, at any rate ; and that these caves precede Cave Nineteen in date there can be no doubt. A similar type of Buddha is also integral to the series of Caves numbered Six to One, but since it is probable that these were excavated after Seventeen, we dare not base upon them any argument which might depend upon their being