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/70

46 contains the ruins of a very lofty mud fort. The fort is said to have been built by Mir Mustafá, Lord of Telâda. No date is assigned either to the fort or to Mir Mustafá, but the people have a vague idea of his having been one of Shir Shah’s nobles. This Mir Mustafá must have been a man of some note, as a ghat and ferry of the city of Patna are named after him; and on this ground, as the fort of Patna was built in Shir Shah’s time, it is not improbable that Mir Mustafá was one of his nobles. In the village are a number of fragments of Brahmanical statues; one of Durga slaying the Mahesasur; on a pedestal is sculptured a seated Buddha. There are besides other Buddhist fragments showing that it was once a place of note, both with Buddhists and Brahmans.

 BATHANI HILL.

A short way south of Gowror is Bathan or Bathani hill and village. The hill is a small conical one and quite isolated; it is about 5 or 6 miles to the west of the entrance of the valley of old Râjagriha. Buddhist legends say that Buddha, travelling from Kapila to Râjgir before attaining the Buddhahood, entered Râjgir by the east gate, and, having collected alms, went to the Banthawa hill to eat the food he had collected. The hill is named Pandhawa (Spence Hardy, p. 163) in the Ceylon records, and Banthawa in the Siamese records (Alabaster, p. 136), both names bearing a close resemblance to the name Bathan of the solitary hill noticed. But against this identification is the distinct statement made in both the Burmese and Siamese versions, that Buddha left the city of Râjgir by the same gate he had entered, viz., the east gate (Spence Hardy does not say anything regarding the gate by which he left the city). If, as stated, Buddha left the city by the east gate, which could only have been the one leading through the long ravine to the Panchâna river, near Gidha Dwâra, Bathan could hardly have been the hill he went to to eat his meal, as it would have been a distance not of 6 but of over 18 miles by that circuitous route. I content myself by simply noting the close similarity of name and the objections to its identification with Bathawa hill.

There is mention in the Mahábhárata, ch. 20, ver. 30, of a hill named Gorath. Bhima, Arjuna, and Krishna, when going to Girivraja to slay Jarâsandha, came, as before noticed, viâ Vaisâli, and, crossing the Ganges and the Son, arrived in the kingdom of Magadha; then "ascending the Goratha hill, 