Page:Report of a Tour Through the Bengal Provinces of Patna, Gaya, Mongir and Bhagalpur; The Santal Parganas, Manbhum, Singhbhum and Birbhum; Bankura, Raniganj, Bardwan and Hughli in 1872-73.djvu/133

Rh left the village, and my efforts to obtain a sight of the coins failed. I dug down to the rock below, but without finding anything. The tope was built of brick and was covered with strong lime plaster; a part of the lower circumference was still intact, and I left it undisturbed.

To the west of it another and a larger mound appears, also said to be the ruins of a tope. It was dug into by the Executive and Assistant Engineers when the head-quarters of the Bihár Local Roads Division was at Giriyak; it is said to have yielded only some ashes, so that this was clearly a tope built on the ashes of some Rahat. Two other mounds, one at the south-east end of the hill (not of the spur), and one to north-west of it, are also said to have yielded coins; the coins were found only a few years ago, and the result was that every one began actively to dig in search of treasure; the last find was, as I have related, from the small tope on the extreme north peak, but the whole of the ruins were in the meanwhile dug up; and as the result of the diggings, brick-bats, could be easily disposed of as road metal (of which large quantities are here stacked,) there was no fear of the labor of the diggers going entirely to waste, even if they found no treasure.

The two mounds which are said to have yielded coins are clearly the remains of buildings, monasteries or temples, not of topes, as the straight walls can yet be traced, though for the most part dug up by the depressed line of hollows thus left; they are traditionally said to have been respectively the Baithak and the Kachari of Báwan Subáh. On the largest piece of level ground on the hill, which, however, is not in the highest part, are the ruins of extensive buildings, traditionally said to have been the palace of Báwan Subáh; the building really appears to have been a large monastery, with rows of cells round a court-yard; perhaps a temple, now dug up, existed in the middle; at present there is, just where it ought to have been, a suspicious-looking depression.

There are no statues on the hill; one solitary mutilated block exists to show that statues were not wanting, but the demand for stone metal for roads is said to have operated very effectually in bringing about the destruction of all conveniently movable stone blocks. At the foot of the hill on the north side are a few statues in fair preservation; a remarkably fine one lies in the mango tope near the well at the foot of the hill, and two or three others lie further off; these last are, however, mutilated considerably. I could see no remains of