In a similar niche on the right as you walk towards the centre through the western portico there is a small figure of the builder of the Pagoda, King Kyansittha, a remarkably intrepid warrior whose chief adventures happened before he came to the throne in the reign of his mightier predecessor, King Naurata.
Naurata was the greatest of all the kings of Pagan—it was under his rule that its territory increased till it stretched from Siam to Kachin and China, and from Chittagong to Tonquin, and it was Naurata who destroyed Thaton and brought 30,000 prisoners thence to Pagan, including artists and craftsmen, as well as a king and queen.
Kyansittha was in disgrace for some years before Naurata was killed by a white buffalo in the jungle. It was all about a certain present to Naurata from his vassal, the King of Pegu. The present was a princess in a golden palanquin, the King of Pegu's very beautiful daughter; and Kyansittha, who seems to have been able to resist everything except temptation, lifted the purdah, with the disastrous consequence of Naurata's jealous wrath. He only returned from banishment upon Naurata's death, and the building of this Ananda Pagoda was the chief event of a reign apparently much quieter than that of his stormy and zealous predecessor. Verily, great building is more lasting than the kingdoms of men!
On the outside of the Ananda Pagoda I saw a line of green glazed tiles upon the outer walls. All round the base a series of such tiles a foot square is let in just above a lower flange in the position of a dado. Each of them is a separate figure illustrating a Jataka story, and each has the title underneath it upon the tile in old Burmese characters. Many have been restored in an absurd way (which has led to their being wrongly described) and some have disappeared, but a great number remain, and careful drawings should be made of these spirited reliefs before it is too late.
Near the Ananda there is a small museum containing a number of stone slabs found at Pagan, covered with inscriptions in the old Burmese square lettering. Among the objects in the museum are some good small bronzes, wooden figures of Nats and some small votive bricks in the shape of a pointed arch, within which Buddhas have been stamped upon the clay. So little interest, however, are any English visitors expected to take in these objects that the labels are only in Burmese characters.
On one of my days at Pagan, Tambusami drew my attention to someone riding towards us on a white horse. This was Mr Cooper, who had come over from Nyaungoo to call upon me. Tambusami and a Burman did the best they could to make a show with our diminished stores, and after dinner on the wide veranda we found that we both knew Haslemere and the old Portsmouth Road and Paris, and then Mr Cooper, who was a subdivisional magistrate, told me about the kind of cases that are brought before him in the Pagan district,—about an island for one thing. Now at Salay, just along the river, there is an island which has been steadily growing in size. Originally it was the property of one village on the mainland. It had been allotted to the villagers after it had first appeared, and then some time ago it increased suddenly in size a great deal more, coming up out of the river. Then the headman of another village, on the strength of saying that he had a verbal order from the Barman township magistrate, allotted plots to his own friends and relations. Naturally the people of the first village were objecting.
BURMESE DWARF (3FT. 5IN. HIGH) SUFFERING FROM CATARACT.