The composition of this Yaksin or woman-sprite under a flowering vine appears at a first glance to possess dynamic energy, but closer inspection reveals its absence. Stella Kramrisch remarks that, creamy and luxuriant though the modelling is, it is not shaped throughout by rhythmic energy. The right outline of the figure vacillates and the drawing of the leg is weak. The body is heavy and lifeless, and though carved in relief is so wanting in construction that it looks boneless and flaccid. The figure is squashed and flat instead of being rounded as the curves demand. The arms are too thin for the broad waist and the right arm appears dislocated from the body. The expression of the face and body is cold and reminds one of some of the worst European sculpture.

Owing to the exigencies of war I failed to get my copies of the Journal of the American Oriental Society between 1939 and 1945, and it is only within the last few days that I have seen Dr. Ludwig Bachhofer's most interesting article on “Greeks and Sakas in India” which appeared in the Journal as far back as December, 1941. In that article Dr. Bachhofer pays a warm tribute to Dr. W. W. Tarn's epoch-making work on The Greeks in Bactria and India, but at the same time challenges some of the views expressed by that great scholar. Though very late in the day I hope I may be allowed to add a few comments on what Dr. Bachhofer has said. I do so with no little hesitation, because failing eye-sight now makes it difficult for me to read or write, and still more difficult to re-examine the numismatic data and other minutiæ referred to by Dr. Bachhofer. On the other hand, half a life time spent in excavations at Taxila and other sites on the North-West Frontier of India has put me in possession of many relevant facts, of which it is evident that Dr. Bachhofer is still, through no fault of his own, in ignorance; and it is clearly my duty to make these facts known to others without loss of time. Already, it is true, I have written a full and comprehensive account in three volumes of the results of my long labours at Taxila, but though the manuscript of this book was sent to the Cambridge University Press at the end of 1945, I fear that in prevailing conditions it may be a year or two before it can be published; and in the meantime eminent scholars like Dr. Bachhofer may be spending valuable hours on problems which have in effect already been solved.

It is well known that the time of Zoroaster and the date of his birth or that of the announcement of his mission have not so far been indisputably established. In spite of very numerous writings published during more than two centuries, in which the question has been studied by many scholars, no unanimous conclusion has been reached. The opinions of famous scholars in the last eighty years have differed so widely that the date suggested has ranged between the eleventh or tenth centuries and the last part of the sixth century B.C. We are still hardly near to agreement on the matter.

I Feel bound to record my grateful sense of obligation to those Sinhalese Buddhists, whether belonging to the Holy Order or laymen, who have helped me in the preparation of these the following notes. Their courtesy was unfailing and their readiness to impart information inexhaustible. As for the humbler and less educated Buddhists of Ceylon, it is impossible not to be touched by their simple devotion and by the vivid manner in which their religion enters into their life.

The palmleaf manuscript containing the text of the Prajñâpâramitâ-piṇḍลrtha by Dinnâga was found in the monastery of Žalu which I visited in autumn 1939. It consists of three leaflets without indication of any date. This small book is an epitome of the Aṣṭasâhasrikâ-prajñâ-pâramitã and it is intended to classify the arguments expounded in this treatise and to adapt its long repetitions to the logic of a rational and intelligible scheme.

A Part from the evidence already discussed, the Sūtra period yields very little information for the study of the gotras. The Buddhist and Jaina canonical works, however, do supply some valuable confirmation of the general picture we have been able to extract from the Brahmanical texts. These canons as we know them now are admittedly late, and for the most part may be taken to reflect the life of a different geographical region from that of the Sūtras. Yet they must contain much genuine tradition of the lifetimes of the respective founders, and it is therefore of considerable interest that the gotra-names recorded agree with the Brahmanical sources. As is well known, the Buddha was a Gautama (see p. 84 ); and since the Gautamas were included in the Āngiras group, he is also on occasion addressed as Āngirasa. In addition, numerous Brahmans appear in the Pali books, with most of the commoner gotra-names.

This brings us to the point where we must consider in more detail the action of the celebrated Dominican Friar Domingo Fernandez Navarrete, and his long-standing feud with the Portuguese Jesuits of the China Mission. Navarrete was born at Peñafiel and entered the Dominican Order in 1635, going to the Philippines in 1648, whence he proceeded to China ten years later. Unlike many of his Order, he was a cultured man of great ability, and a competent Sinologue for his century. Arrested on the occasion of the persecution of 1665, he was deported to Canton with the Jesuits and Franciscans from Peking and the provinces. Here he took a leading part in the ecclesiastical Junta held to discuss the controversial question of the Confucian Rites and allied topics in 1667–68. He escaped from Canton in rather equivocal circumstances in December, 1669, and after a short stay at Macao sailed to Europe by way of India and the Cape of Good Hope. On reaching Rome he was made Procurator of the Philippine Mission, and returned to Spain in 1674, publishing the first volume of his highly controversial Tratados Historicos, Politicos, Ethnicos, y Rdigiosos de la Monarchia de China two years later at Madrid. The work created a sensation on account of its outspoken criticisms of the Jesuits in China, but nowadays it is read more for the author's vivacious description of his own eventful odyssey in the Far East. A second volume entitled Controversias Antiquas y Modernas de la Mission de la Gran China was printed at Madrid in 1679, but never published, since the Inquisition suppressed it after the first 668 pages had been printed off.