[563] If Lieut. Cole, instead of repeating plans and details of buildings which had already been published by Gen. Cunningham, had given us a plan and details of this unknown building, he might have rendered a service all would have been grateful for. What I know of it is principally derived from verbal communication with Col. Montgomerie, R.E.
[564] ‘Embassy to Ava in 1795.’ London, 1800, 4to., 27 plates.
[565] ‘Journal of Embassy to Court of Ava,’ 1827. 4to., plates.
[566] ‘Mission to Court of Ava in 1855.’ 4to., numerous illustrations.
[567] If any of our 1001 idle young men who do not know what to do with themselves or their money would only qualify themselves for, and carry out such a mission, it is wonderful how easily and how pleasantly they might add to our stores of knowledge. I am afraid it is not in the nature of the Anglo-Saxon to think of such a thing. Fox-hunting and pheasant-shooting are more congenial pursuits.
[568] ‘Mahawanso,’ p. 71.
[569] R. F. St. John, in the ‘Phœnix,’ vol. ii. p. 204, et seqq. Sir Arthur Phayre, in ‘Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal,’ vol. xlii. p. 23, et seqq.
[570] Sir A. Phayre, loc. cit.
[571] Crawfurd’s ‘Embassy to Ava,’ vol. ii. p. 277.
[572] It has recently become the fashion to doubt the holding of this convocation 100 years after the death of Buddha; but this very pointed allusion to it, in the early Burmese annals, so completely confirms what is said in the ‘Mahawanso,’ that the fact of its being held does not appear to me doubtful.