Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 21.djvu/59

Rh their various tasks, them also they admonish to enlightenment.

12. From this place, O Ma#fughosha, I see and hear such things and thousands of ko/is of other particulars besides; I will only describe some of them.

13. I see in many fields Bodhisattvas by many thousands of ko/is, like sands of the Ganges, who are producing enlightenment according to the different degree of their power.

14. There are some who charitably bestow wealth, gold, silver, gold money, pearls, jewels, conch shells, stones 1, coral, male and female slaves, horses, and sheep;

15. As well as litters adorned with jewels. They are spending gifts with glad hearts, developing themselves for superior enlightenment, in the hope of gaining the vehicle.

16. (Thus they think): 'The best and most excellent vehicle in the whole of the threefold world is the Buddha-vehicle magnified by the Sugatas. May I, forsooth, soon gain it after my spending such gifts.'

17. Some give carriages yoked with four horses and furnished with benches, flowers, banners, and flags; others give objects made of precious substances.

18. Some, again, give their children and wives;

The text has sahkhasili; according to the Tibetan version this would mean crystal, but that is impossible because jankha is well known to be a conch shell. Burnouf hesitatingly renders it by 'des conques, du cristal;' see, however, Lotus, p. 314. I have been unable to find out what meaning the compound, be it a Dvandva or a Tatpurusha, is intended to convey.