Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 1.djvu/397

 CHAP. III. KAILAS, ELURA. 349 temples in the rock. Almost every one who sees these temples is struck with the apparently prodigious amount of labour bestowed on their excavation, and there is no doubt that their monolithic character is the principal source of the awe and wonder with which they have been regarded, and that, had the Kailas been an edifice of masonry situated on the plain, it would scarcely have attracted the attention of European travellers. In reality, however, it is considerably easier and less expensive to excavate a temple than to build one. Take, for instance, the Kailas, the most wonderful of all this class. To excavate the area on which it stands would require the removal of about 100,000 cubic yards of rock, but, as the base of the temple is solid and the superstructure massive, it occupies in round numbers about one-half of the excavated area, so that the question is simply this whether it is easier to chip away 50,000 yards of rock, and shoot it to spoil (to borrow a railway term) down a hillside, or to quarry 50,000 cubic yards of stone, remove it, probably a mile at least to the place where the temple is to be built, and then to raise and set it. The excavating process would probably cost about one-tenth of the other. The sculpture and ornament would be the same in both instances, more especially in India, where buildings are always set up in block, and the carving executed in situ. Nevertheless, the impression produced on all spectators by these monolithic masses, their unalterable character, and appearance of eternal durability, point to the process as one meriting more attention than it has hitherto received in modern times ; and if any rock were found as uniform and as easily worked as the Indian amygdaloidal traps, we might hand down to posterity some more durable monument than many we are now erecting at far greater cost.