Page:History of India Vol 2.djvu/166

 134 ASOKA MAURYA orders was not the way to win the favour either of heaven or their master. The kingdom of Kalinga had maintained a consider- able military force, which was estimated by Megasthe- nes as numbering sixty thousand infantry, one thousand cavalry, and seven hundred war elephants. The oppo- sition offered to the invaders was so stubborn that the conquest involved immeasurable suffering. The victor records with sorrow that 150,000 persons were carried into captivity, one hundred thousand were slain, and that many times that number perished from famine, pestilence, and the other calamities which follow in the train of armies. The sight of all this misery and the knowledge that he alone had caused it smote the conscience of Asoka, and awakened in his breast feelings of " remorse, pro- found sorrow, and regret." These feelings crystallized into a steadfast resolve that never again would ambi- tion lead him to inflict such grievous wrongs upon his fellow creatures, and four years after the conquest he was able to declare that " the loss of even the hundredth or the thousandth part of the persons who were then slain, carried away captive, or done to death in Ka- linga would now be a matter of deep regret to his Majesty." The king acted up to the principles which he pro- fessed, and abstained from aggressive war for the rest of his life. About this time he came under the influence of Buddhist teaching, his devotion to which increased more and more as the years rolled on. The " chief est