Maya and
Rohuna afforded on every occasion a refuge to the royal family when
driven from the northern capital, and furnished a force to assist in
their return and restoration. Walagam-bahu, after many years'
concealment there, was at last enabled to resume the offensive, and
succeeded in driving out the infidels, and recovering possession of the
sacred city, an event which he commemorated in the usual manner by the
erection of dagobas, tanks, and wiharas.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii.]

[Illustration: THE ALU WIHARA NEAR MATELLE.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 89.]

But the achievement by which most of all he entitled himself to the
gratitude of the Singhalese annalists, was the reduction to writing of
the doctrines and discourses of Buddha, which had been orally delivered
by Mahindo, and previously preserved by tradition alone. These sacred
volumes, which may be termed the Buddhist Scriptures, contain the
Pittakataya, and its commentaries the Atthakatha, and were compiled by a
company of priests in a cave to the north of Matelle, known as the
Aloo-wihara.[1] This, and other caverns in which the king had sought
concealment during his adversity, he caused to be converted into rock
temples after his restoration to power. Amongst the rest, Dambool, which
is the most remarkable of the cave temples of Ceylon from its vastness,
its elaborate ornaments, and the romantic beauty of its situation and
the scenery surrounding it.

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, ch. i. p. 43. Abouzeyd states that at that
time public writers were employed in recording the traditions of the
island: "Le Royaume de Serendyb a une loi et des docteurs qui
s'assemblent de temps en temps comme se reunissent chez nous les
personnes qui recreillent les traditions du prophete, et les Indiens se
rendent aupres des docteurs, et ecrivent sous leurs dictee, la vie de
leurs prophetes et les preceptes de leur loi."--REINAUD, _Relation,
&c.,_ tom. i. p. 127.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 62.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 50.]

The history of the Buddhist religion in Ceylon is not, however, a tale
of uniform prosperity. The first of its domestic enemies was Naga, the
grandson of the pious Walagam-bahu, whom the native, historians
stigmatise by the prefix of "chora" or the "marauder." His story is thus
briefly but emphatically told in the _Mahawanso_: "During the reign of
his father Mahachula, Chora Naga wandered through the island leading the
life of a robber; returning on the demise of