Mr. Franklin, in his "Buddhists and Jeynes," says:
"A striking instance is recorded by the very intelligent traveler (Wilson), regarding a representation of the Fall of our first parents, sculptured in the magnificent temple of Ipsambul, in Nubia. He says that a very exact representation of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden is to be seen in that cave, and that the serpent climbing round the tree is especially delineated, and the whole subject of the tempting of our first parents most accurately exhibited."[16:1]
Nearly the same thing was found by Colonel Coombs in the South of India. Colonel Tod, in his "Hist. Rajapoutana," says:
"A drawing, brought by Colonel Coombs from a sculptured column in a cave-temple in the South of India, represents the first pair at the foot of the ambrosial tree, and a serpent entwined among the heavily-laden boughs, presenting to them some of the fruit from his mouth. The tempter appears to be at that part of his discourse, when
'——his words, replete with guile,
Into her heart too easy entrance won:
Fixed on the fruit she gazed.'
"This is a curious subject to be engraved on an ancient Pagan temple."[16:2]
So the Colonel thought, no doubt, but it is not so very curious after all. It is the same myth which we have found—with but such small variations only as time and circumstances may be expected to produce—among different nations, in both the Old and New Worlds.
