"Mr. Vincent Smith, of the Bengal Civil Service, a learned antiquary, has published in the Allahabad 'Pioneer' a statement as to the nature and significance of recent discoveries of Buddhist antiquities in India. The first of these is the home of Gautama Buddha, who lived about 500 B. C., and who is known to have been the son of the Raja of Kapilavastu, a small state in the Nepal Terai, bordering on the modern Oudh. The site of Kapilavastu has long been eagerly sought for, and it is only within the past three years that the accidental discovery of an inscribed pillar erected by the Emperor Asoka, in the third century B. C., fixed with certainty the site of the city. The ruins, which were lately visited by Mr. Smith, are, so far as is yet known, all of brick; they are for the most part buried in jungle, and are so extensive that many years would be required for their exploration. The city was destroyed during the lifetime of Gautama, and when the first of the famous Chinese pilgrims visited the place, in 410 A. D., it was a mass of desolate ruins, and there is no indication that it has since been occupied. This fact gives exceptional interest to the excavations now in progress, for they are bringing to light buildings more ancient than any previously known in India. {58} More interesting even than Kapilavastu is the discovery of the Lumbini Garden, the traditional birthplace of Gautama. The sacred spot has been found marked by another of Asoka's pillars, on which the inscription is perfect. This is also in Nepalese territory, five miles from the British frontier. The pillar stands on the western edge of a mound of ruins, about a hundred yards in diameter, and on the south side of the mound is the tank in which the child's mother bathed after his birth. Another discovery which was made in a stupa, or brick tumulus, close to the British frontier, is that of relics of Buddha himself. These consist only of fragments of bone, which were deposited in a wooden vessel that stood on the bottom of a massive coffer, more than four feet long and two feet deep, cut out of a solid block of fine sandstone. This coffer was buried under eighteen feet of masonry, composed of huge bricks, each sixteen inches long. The wooden vessel was decayed, and with it was an exquisitely finished bowl of rock crystal, the largest yet discovered in India, and also five small vases of soapstone. All these vessels were partially filled, in honor of the relics, with a marvellous collection of gold stars, pearls, topazes, beryls, and other jewels, and of various objects delicately wrought in crystal, agate, and other substances. An inscription on the lid of one of the soapstone vases declares the relics to be those of Buddha himself, and the characters in which the inscription is written are substantially the same as those of the Asoka