Page:Footfalls of Indian History.djvu/67

48 FOOTFALLS OF INDIAN HISTORY much carved. That it would have been possible, however, to withdraw the women into the lower storey in time of war may be seen from buried ruins at Ujjain, which are shown by the pandas as part of Vikramaditya's palace, and appear to have belonged to a fortress of Asoka's time. Here, built of hard grey stone now black with age w^e have what seems to be the inside corner, and part of the courtyard, of just such a building as the Sanchi sculptures would lead us to expect as the dwelling of a king or noble. Outside, the walls would be almost blind ; inside, they are honeycombed with many-pillared halls and ver- andahs, and one room with raised floor that represents an old Indian form of bedchamber and bed in one. In times of peace these were, we may suppose, the quarters assigned to men- at-arms. The building is of a massiveness that rivals nature, and there kre a few pillars still left — amongst the many that the succeeding sovereigns decorated in different degrees and different styles — whose simplicity of -form enables any observer that knows Sanchi to feel fairly confident in assign- ing the building as a whole to the reign of Asoka, or earlier.

Of such a form, then, though perhaps smaller and less elaborate, may we suppose the palace of Rajgir to have been, and in the streets about it the more plebeian dwellings of the townsfolk must,^ though small and comparatively huddled, have been like unto it. True, their lower storeys