Staircases ascend from gallery to gallery in a straight line on each of four sides. These have pointed arches with carved keystones, and formerly were guarded by heavy banisters and carved lions. The parapeted walls of the galleries were once decorated with four hundred and thirty-two niches, each with three turrets, and contained four hundred and thirty-two life-sized Buddhas, seated on lotus cushions.
Boro Boedor, Java, showing one part of the gallery
The three upper circular terraces are individually adorned with thirty-two, twenty-four, and sixteen openwork bell-shaped cupolas, or dagobas, each containing a Buddha in sitting posture. Inside this circle rises the central dagoba of huge, imposing dimensions, the final crown to the whole structure. This is modelled after the same type as the smaller ones, but its walls rise perpendicularly from the base, which has the form of a huge lotus cushion in a beautiful frame, and ends at the top in a slightly rounded dome rising at least twenty-seven feet above the highest terrace. Of the cone which formerly surrounded this dagoba nothing is left except part of the pedestal, a stone block afterwards fashioned into a seat five feet high by ten feet broad. This is reached by some rough stone steps. The cupola, or dagoba, was at one time entirely closed, but when opened some years ago it was found to contain a large unfinished figure of Buddha.
Our party climbed to the seat alluded to, and what a view presented itself!—a wide valley or plain, miles in extent, surrounded by the towering Minoch mountains in the distance, with lesser mountains seemingly as foothills, but nevertheless some of them volcanic craters; villages almost concealed by the masses of foliage, with whole tracts of palms and masses of green,—and all bathed in the glorious sunlight. We sat spellbound, and finally descended the long flight of stairs feeling we had had a morning's experience which never could be repeated. In the words of Dr. Gronneman (to whom we owe a debt of gratitude for his explanations), "upwards of a thousand years have since rolled over the Boro Boedor; earthquakes and ash showers have disjointed its walls, and rank vegetation has disintegrated its foundation, ... and shortsighted fanatics have defaced its works of art, but still the ruin stands there, an imposing fact, a powerful creation of the thinking mind, an epic in stone, immortal even in its decadence."
We walked to the pleasant rest house, called Passagrahan, for our luncheon. Soon the rain which had threatened us fell in torrents, but neither this fact nor any other obstacle dimmed our enthusiasm as we sped on our homeward way. To prove my own absorption in the day's programme I would state that I amused the party on our arrival at the train by saying to our Malay servant, "Buddha, will you take my wrap?" his name being Pandox.