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/81

Rh sanctum; and as the votary is not allowed to go beyond the threshold of the entrance, he completes his devotions much mystified by the to him inexplicable illumination of the statue, which he probably ascribes to supernatural causes.

Priestcraft has been as much an inherent feature of Buddhism as of every other religion.

The vault now would of course prevent this illumination of the object of worship in the cell, and at present the cell is dark.

The vault is only one brick deep at the crown, but as the bricks are disposed vertically it has great strength. There is or was a thick coating of mortar terrace over it. The upper chamber resting on the vault is 11½ feet square, but the wall is only 7 feet thick in front; this is due partly to dilapidation and partly to a very slight taper in the wall itself.

The chamber is roofed by slightly overlapping courses of bricks; thus the great height of the tower roof is a constructive necessity.

The external shape of the tower, however, differs from that of the great Buddha Gaya temple in being a curved and not a straight-sided pyramid; it is consequently more graceful than the temple at Buddha Gaya. The ornamentation externally consists of a great oval on each face, at a point nearly in the middle of the total height of the tower proper, and of various mouldings and indentations rather sparingly used; the whole of the ornamentation is of brick cut to shape, and it is evident from the way the ornaments are distributed that the whole of it was cut on the external faces of the tower after it had been built up plain. The labour required may easily be imagined; to this is due the fact that the face of the brick-work is so even; for I do not think it possible, without subsequent laborious rubbing down, that any amount of care in setting the bricks, and in the preservation of the shape and sharpness of edges of the brick during manufacture, could produce the wonderfully smooth even face that the work has to this day, notwithstanding the ravages of time.

The temple does not appear to have been originally covered with plaster, but portions of it are now covered with plaster, the remains, no doubt, of a coat put on at some subsequent period.

The tower is, or was, surmounted by a cylindric pinnacle like the temple of Buddha Gaya. This sort of pinnacle is very remarkable, and its form resembling a lingam may be