hna the Satakarni. Nor has Vandalism in the guise of the
Mahayana school been alone at work here. The tenth cave once contained a
relic-shrine or _dagoba_ similar to the relic-shrines at Karli,
Shivner and Ganesh Lena; but in its place now stands a hideous figure of
Bhairav aflame with red-lead, and nought remains to testify to the former
presence of the shrine save the Buddhist T capital, the umbrellas and the
flags which surmounted it. The eleventh cave bears traces of Jain sacrilege
in the blue figure of the Tirthankar or hierach who sits cross-legged in
the back wall and in the figure of Ambika on the right. But the most
conspicuous example of the alteration of ancient monuments to suit the
needs of late comers is the twentieth cave, where the colossal Buddha, who
muses with his attendants in the dense darkness of the inner shrine, has
been smeared with black pigment and adorned with gold tinsel and is proudly
introduced to you by the local _pujari_ as Dharmaraja, the eldest of
the five Pandavas, the surrounding Bodhisattvas being metamorphosed into
Nakula, Sahadeva, Bhima, Arjuna, Krishna and Draupadi, the joint wife of
the five! Alas for "the Perfect One" in whose honour, as the inscription
tells us, "the wife of the great war-lord Bhavagopa" commenced building the
cave in B.C. 50. He has long been forgotten and the hand which he uplifts
in token of the Four Verities, discovered after great agony and temptation
beneath the Tree of Wisdom, is now pointed out as the wrathful hand of the
demi-god of the Mahabharata. Once and once only in these later days has the
Buddha evinced his displeasure at the modernization of his ancient shrine.
About the year 1880 came hither a Bairagi, naked and wild, who walled off a
corner of the cave and raised a clay altar to his puny god. Sacrilege
intolerable! And the Buddha through the hand of an avaricious Koli smote
him unto death and hurled his naked corpse down hill. The titanic figure is
still worshipped by the Hindus: flowers and lighted lamps are daily offered
up to him by the ignorant Hindu priest; but he sits immutable,
inarticulate, content in the knowledge that to them that have understanding
his real message of humanitarianism speaks through the clouds of falsehood
which now enwrap his Presence.

Much might be written of the strange medley of creeds which are symbolised
in these caves. The Nagdevas with their serpent-canopies, which are relics
of a primordial Sun and Serpent