The following pages bring together passages from Chinese books, some of which have been translated before in a different context, illustrating them by reproductions of woodcuts which are unfamiliar and of great interest.

When the Spaniards came to settle Manila in 1571 Dionisio Capulong was a young boy. His father was one of the rulers in the region and all were scions of the Muslim royal family of Brunei. The father astutely complied—to a certain extent—with the colonising Spaniards. His son subsequently pursued an ambivalent career alternately working for and rebelling against the Spanish colonisers. Ultimately he became a landowner in the Spanish mode. This is his story. Even from only Spanish reports one can discern great astuteness and opportunism, which enabled the elite to keep local supremacy. Tracing the career of Dionisio Capulong sheds light on the elite in pre-Spanish Manila and environs as well as on Manila's earliest Spanish years.

In the autumn of 1915 I found at Buârâ a few leaves of a Persian MS. forming part of an unknown work devoted to the biography of the famous saint Shay Aḥmad-i-Jâm, surnamed Zindah-Fîl. There were only thirteen leaves, 23 by 18 and 16 by 13·5 cm., written on old Oriental paper, eighteen or nineteen lines in a page, in a comparatively elegant old character (like that of MSS. copied at Herât). This MS. was copied apparently in the tenth or eleventh century a.h. (The first page is written perhaps with a different qalam, but the hand seems to be the same as in the other parts.)

At the present moment scholars seem to be agreed about the date of Nahapāna, and some are of opinion that lie was the founder of the Śaka era. This theory was propounded by M. l'abbé Boyer in his paper entitled “Nahapāna et l'ère Śaka”. Though the theory has not met with general acceptance, eminent scholars are still to be found who maintain this opinion even at the present date. In 1913, during the great debate on the date of Kanishka, Dr. J. F. Fleet said, “I hold that the era [Śaka era] was founded by the Kshaharāta king Nahapāna, who reigned in Kāṭhiāwār and over some of the neighbouring territory as far as Ujjain from a.d. 78 to about a.d. 125, and held for a time Nāsik and other parts in the north of Bombay, and who seems to have been a Pahlava or Palhava, i.e. of Parthian extraction.” There are others who, though they do not assert that Nahapāna was the founder of the Śaka era, maintain that the dates in the inscriptions of his son-in-law Ushavadāta at Nasik and Karle, and of his minister Ayama at Junnar, are Śaka dates. Mr. V. A. Smith says, “Almost all students are agreed that the inscriptions and coins of the Chashṭana line of Satraps are dated in the Śaka era, and I see no reason for doubting that the Kshaharāta records are dated in the same way.”

In the 38th section of his Itqān the polygraph Suyūṭī furnishes a summary of a monograph called al-Muhadhdhab fī mā waqa‘a fi'l-Qur'ān min al-mu‘arrab, in which he dealt with the question whether the Qur'an contained any foreign words, and if so, to what language they belonged. The orthodox felt some difficulty about admitting the existence of such an element in the language of the Sacred Book, which claims to be in perspicuous Arabic; it was, however, difficult to maintain that the proper names which occur in the volume were all of Arabic origin, and certain other words have an obviously foreign appearance. Suyūtī himself compromises by admitting in such cases the foreign etymology, but maintaining that the words had received Arabic naturalization.

In the districts of Bihár and Patna the Jains are called Sráwacs. The number of this sect settled there is not great, amounting only to three hundred and fifty families; but they possess considerable wealth, having all engaged in trade, and many of them with success. They have, therefore, seventeen priests (yatís); fifteen of whom constantly reside at Patna, and two at Bihár. With the two latter I had several interviews, and they were abundantly communicative, the chief of them being a man of considerable learning. At Patna they declined all intercourse with me; which, I am told, proceeded from their being very shallow, and afraid of exposing their ignorance. A Saryuriya-Bráhman, of the sect of Vishnu, named Góvinda, was brought to me at Patna, as the only person there able and willing to give me information relative to the Sráwacs. He said that he had been employed to instruct some of the Yatis in the Sanscrit language, which gave him an opportunity of reading their books and knowing their customs. Finding the employment profitable, he was, I believe, a principal means of keeping the Yatis at a distance from me: he was, however, abundantly diligent in procuring information. In travelling through the district I had also an opportunity of conversing with a great many pilgrims, who had come from Bundelkhund, and were visiting the holy places at Gaya, &c. From these sources I collected some information respecting this sect, which I now offer, in addition to that which I have given in my account of Mysore.

From what I can collect regarding the Sráwacs, or laity of the Jains, they appear to be the only considerable remnant in India of the earlier Jains, or Arhatas. They follow principally the trade of Banyas, dealing in grain; and as Sráwac Banyas, necessarily adhere to the Jain laws: but as their particular calling seems to have required rules for their guidance, much of the twelve vratas refers to their commercial transactions, as connected with moral duties. I do not think these vratas formed a part of the older Jain institutes at all; nor could such a code be brought to apply to any except the subordinate tribes, it being quite unsuitable to any purpose of government.

From about the year 1823 the education of the people had been a matter of increasing concern to those responsible for the administration of the East India Company's territories in India. The authorities both in London and in India began to recognize that it was closely connected with the carrying out of the plans and policies of the Government. In London it was beginning to be realized that efficient government was altogether beyond the capacity of the East India Company unless Indians were employed on a scale greater than hitherto had been considered expedient. In India the increased importance attached to education led, in 1823, to the creation of the Committee of Public Instruction, and during the next few years there developed within the Committee a group which sought primarily to increase facilities in India for education along Western lines through the medium of the English language.

In submitting these notices to the attention of the Society, the object is to bring under its view the internal revenue economy of a Hindu village that has never been under the direct control of any European officer of the East-India Company, in order to exhibit a fair specimen of ancient usages in the south of India, and to shew with accuracy, the proportion of the produce of the soil customarily taken in kind, in latter times, as land revenue, the rights of the parties paying revenue, and those of the individual who, by grant from the sovereign, is entitled to collect that revenue.

The composition of an Indian court of justice, conformably with the ancient Hindu institutions, being very imperfectly understood, and many erroneous notions having become prevalent on this subject, it appears to deserve a more full investigation than it has yet undergone; and, with this view, I submit to the Society the result of a careful perusal of original authorities of Hindu law relating to that point.

The Ariyapariyesana-Sutta in the Majjhima-Nikāya specifically mentions these two as the main points of Buddhism: (1) Paṭiccasamuppāda and (2) Nibbāna. The first point is the basic idea of Buddhism as a system of thought, and the second, the goal of Buddhism as a religion. The former is introduced as idappaccayatā, “causal relations.” The latter is introduced as sabbasaṅkhāra-samatho sabbūpadhipaṭinissaggo taṇhāhākkhayo virāgo nirodho, “the stilling of all plastic forces or the renunciation of all worldly ties, the extirpation of craving, passionlessness, peace.” The Sutta does not, however, offer any formula to interconnect the two.

I am to-day at Ser Yazd, eight farsakhs south of Yazd, on my road to Kennan…. As I suppose the Gabrs interest you most, I will begin my rambling letter with them. I heard at Shiraz, where there are occasionally a few Gabr shopkeepers, that in Kermán there are only a few illiterate Gabrs; so when I at Darebjard heard that the road lies for six days through a complete desert, without any habitation, or the least cultivation, I determined to go straight to Yazd, which would be passing over ground that had been travelled by few or no Europeans before. I found at least on my map many places laid down wrong, even Yazd; and I am now on the road to Kermán, only on account of my having heard at Yazd, that though there are there only one hundred houses, (or about four or five hundred Gabrs), still they have from olden time a good many books, far more than there are in Yazd; whether it be true or not, I shall tell you by and bye.

There are few facts in Eastern history better authenticated than the invasion of India by Mahmúd of Ghizni: the details of his sack of Pattan Somnath have been narrated, in some detail, even by the accurate Gibbon, and a few particulars, therefore, regarding the present condition of this far-famed temple and city, collected in October, 1830, may not be unacceptable to the Society.

The following account of the early relations between the countries east and west of the Halys is the result of a journey made from Smyrna by the Hermus valley, Doghanlu, Angora, Boghaz Keui, and Euyuk to Sivas (May 13 to June 29, 1881), on which Col. Sir Charles Wilson kindly invited me to accompany him. The Roman roads of the district were a frequent topic of conversation; and the knowledge of the routes, on which this article rests, has been gained from his skill. I afterwards found that the information I had thus acquired from Mm of the Roman roadsystem had an important bearing on the early history of these countries.

Geographical Position.—About nine miles inland of Pondicherry on the Coromandel coast, Lat. 11° 56′ N., are beds of limestone rising in gentle undulations, and running in a S.E. by E. direction, almost parallel with the coast, for a distance, as far as I was able to trace, of about four or fire miles. Of these strata no detailed account had been published up to the date of my visit in March, 1840. They are seen to crop out near the villages of Sydapett, Carassoo, Coolypett, and Vurdavoor, from a superincumbent tertiary lateritic grit imbedding large quantities of silicified wood, and of which a description has been given by Lieutenant Warren: who has, however, overlooked the fossil limestone. The beds of the latter dip very slightly easterly. The greater part of the surface of the limestone is concealed by the soil and vegetation. A short distance further towards the west it is again covered by beds of the silicified wood deposit, and both are underlaid by plutonic and hypogene rocks, which crop out near the village of Trivicary, and form the western boundary of the fossiliferous beds. Rolled and angular fragments of the hypogene rocks are scattered here and there over the limestone, as well as fragments from the silicified wood beds, and from the limestone itself; the surface of the latter has evidently been exposed by the denudation of the superincumbent beds. It appears in surface-worn tables traversed by innumerable fissures.