In addition to the eminently useful task of teaching youth, the Buddhistic recluse devotes occasionally some portion of his time to the useful labour of copying manuscripts on palm-leaves, either for his personal use or to increase the small library of his monastery. The work is considered as a very excellent one, deserving of great merits, and much recommended by the rules of the society. It is a matter of regret that the native laziness of the Phongyies, as well as their total want of order in acquiring knowledge, thwart to a great extent the practical working of the wise provisions made by the framer of the rules. Were it not for such causes, copies of all the best and most interesting works on the religious system of Buddhism would be greatly multiplied, and could be easily procured; whilst now they are exceedingly scarce and hardly to be had at all. The few copies to be had with much difficulty are to be paid for very high. All the books are made of palm-leaves. The leaves are about twenty inches in length, and from three to four in breadth. On each face of the leaf from seven to nine or ten lines are written. A copyist uses a style of iron by way of pen. With the sharp point he scratches the epidermis of the leaf to form the letters. In order to render the letters perfectly visible, he rubs over the page just written with a piece of rag some petroleum, which, penetrating into the parts scratched by the style, causes the letters to become quite distinct and apparent. The Talapoins spend the best part of the day sitting in a cross-legged position, chewing betel and conversing with the many idlers that are always to be found in great numbers about their dwellings. When tired of the vertical position, they adopt the horizontal one, reclining the head on pillows and gently submitting to the soporific influence of good Morpheus. They have always in their hands a string of beads, on which they are wont to repeat certain devotional formulas. The most common is the following, “Aneitsa, duka, anatta;” meaning that everything in this world is subjected to the law of change and mutability, to that of pain and suffering, and to that of entire and uninterrupted illusion. There is, indeed, an immense field opened to a reflecting mind by these three very significative expressions for carrying on serious and prolonged meditation; but none of the Talapoins, at least of those I have been acquainted with, are capable of understanding comprehensively their meaning. They often repeat the forty great subjects of meditation, and the rule enjoins them to be zealously addicted to contemplation, which is pronounced to be the chief exercise of a true follower of Buddha. But how can there ever be expected from weak and ignorant persons the habitual practice of so high an exercise, requiring an intellectual vigour of the very first order? They must repeat on their beads at least a hundred and twenty times a day the four following considerations on the four