The Samaritans possess three Chronicles, written in that mixed Hebrew idiom peculiar to them. In substance idential with one another, they differ in form. One is quite short, the second a little more expanded, and the third a further enlargement of the two previous ones. Of these Chronicles the second has been published by Dr. A. Neubauer, “Chronique Samaritaine” (Asiatique), 1869; and separately, Paris, 1873), from a copy made by the present High Priest under the title Tolidoth (T.).

We could hardly fail to read with interest and close attention Professor Hultzsch's note, published at p. 728 above, on the Rūpnāth recension of the Last Edict of Aśōka: particularly because his views are calculated to be completely subversive of the chronological arrangement laid out by me at p. 27 above, and to require us to find an entirely new date for the death of Buddha. Accepting what is plain, that the figures 256 are a date, he has revived the view that they mark the number of years elapsed since the renunciation of Buddha, when he left his home and went forth as a wandering ascetic mendicant into the houseless state, in the search for true knowledge.

There is a close affinity between the aboriginal tribes of Sumatra and the Sakais of Malakka, so well studied by a long series of English authors. From the long list of eminent works about these interesting peoples I can cite only a few of the most important. A complete bibliography is to be found in the standard work of Skeat and Blagden, The Pagan Races of the Malay Peninsula, which can be regarded as an encyclopædia on this matter.

In a review of Professor Louis de la Vallée Poussin's book Le Védisme, p. 472 of this Journal, Mr. A. Berriedale Keith makes the following remark: “He [Poussin] is inclined with Barth and Winternitz not to reject as wrong Jacobi's great chronological argument: we think this is to be much too favourable to it. It cannot survive Whitney, Thibaut, and Oldenberg's onslaught.” As Mr. Keith probably does not stand alone in this opinion, may I be allowed to say a few words on this head?

The inscriptions connected with the Myazedi pagoda at Pagan, Burma, are inscribed on two pillars. One of these pillars stands within the walls of the pagoda and is four-sided, having four inscriptions of the same general purport expressed in four different languages, viz., Pali, Burmese, Talaing, and an unidentified language. The other pillar is in the Kubyaukkyi cave, to the west of the pagoda. It has three inscriptions, which are apparently replicas of those that are on the first pillar excepting the Talaing version, which (it seems) is wanting; but they are not in such a good state of preservation as are those on the first pillar.

In reviewing the discoveries that have been made by the Archæological Department in India during the year 1908–9, I propose to start with one of unique historical interest—the only lithic record that has yet been found in which reference is made to the Indo-Greek rulers of the Panjab.

The circumstances in which this inscription has been discovered are stated by Mr. Marshall on p. 1053 f. above; and a reproduction of it is given in Plate I, a, with a reading and translation by Dr. Bloch. I edit the record, as an accompaniment to Mr. Marshall's remarks, from a photograph and an ink-impression received from him: owing, however, to the manner in which the record had been covered with paint, the ink-impression does not help much beyond the photograph. The writing covers an area about 1 ft. 10 in. wide by 1 ft. 8½ in. high. The size of the letters, that is, of those which are formed between the top and bottom lines of writing without any projections above or below, ranges from about 1⅛ to 1⅞ inches.

I Read the two lines of this inscription, illustrated in the plate at p. 1054 above, thus:—

Trīni(triṃni ?) amutapadāni [kā]le(?) anuṭhitāni neyā ti v[uttaṃ?] damaṃ cāga apramādo.

Neyā is probably the Sanskrit jñeyāt. Amutapadāni and cāga stand for the Sanskrit amṛitapadāni and tyāga. Anuṭhitāni (i.e. anuṭṭh°) is the Sanskrit anuṣṭhitāni.