Reviewing the history of the ancient monuments of the island, not one can pass without a repetition of the sad tale of spoliation. However unpleasant it be to record in every single instance the culpable negligence of a Government stiffening general indifference and almost encouraging downright robbery, the rapid deterioration of those splendid edifices allows no alternative in the matter of explanation. When officials and private individuals of the ruling race set the example, the natives saw no harm in quarrying building material on their own account for their own houses, and they had no time to lose in the rapid process of the razing of their _chandis_ for the adornment of residency and assistant-residency gardens, the construction of dams, sugar-mills and indigo factories. Temple stones have been found in many villages round the Mendoot and particularly in Ngrajeg, about two miles distant on the main road, there is no native dwelling in the substructure of which they have not been used.[135] Though the wealth of the _dessa_ Ngrajeg in this respect may be explained by its once having boasted its own _chandi_, of which nothing remains but the foundations, there is abundant proof that the chief quarry of the neighbourhood on this side of the river was the Mendoot as the Boro Budoor on the other. From a juridical standpoint, the natives in possession of such spoil, acquired by their fathers or grandfathers, have a prescriptive right on it not disputable in law, averred the administration at Batavia, and so whatever the architects in charge of the restoration needed, had to be bought back and diminished still further the disposable funds. Leaving the doubtful points of this legal question and the enforcement in practice of the theoretical decision for what they are worth to Kromo or Wongso, ordered to part with his doorstep or coinings, there is _no_ doubt that it is illegal and highly censurable to demolish temples, and temples like the Mendoot at that, to secure building material for Government dams and bridges. What happened in Mojokerto with the bricks of Mojopahit and has been complained of elsewhere, I saw happen in 1885 with Mendoot stones, freely used for abutments, piers, spandrel fillings, etc., when near by the spanning of the Progo was in progress. That bridge has since succumbed like the railway bridge then in course of construction farther down the Progo, a warning which, if heeded, might have prevented, for instance, the chronic misfortunes of the railway bridge in the Anei gorge, West Coast of Sumatra.