"The importance attached to the possession of a white elephant," says Captain Yule, "is traceable to the Buddhist system. A white elephant of certain wonderful endowments is one of the seven precious things the possession of which marks the Maha chakravartti Raja, 'the great wheel-turning king,' the holy and universal sovereign, a character who appears once in a cycle, at the period when the waxing and waning term of human life has reached its maximum of an asanhkya in duration. Hence the white elephant is the ensign of universal sovereignty."
FOOTNOTES:
[3] Narrative of a Mission to the Court of Ava, in 1855. By Captain Henry Yule, Secretary to the Envoy.
[4] Western foreigner.
[5] Priest; literally, "Great Glory."
[6] Yule's Narrative.
[7] 1. Charity; 2. Religious Observances; 3. Self-denial; 4. Learning; 5. Diligence; 6. Patience; 7. Truth; 8. Perseverance; 9. Friendship; 10. Impartiality.
[8] Athenkhya is a corruption, or Burmese pronunciation, of asankhya, Sanscrit, from the negative a and sankhya, "number,"—literally, "innumerable"; but as a Buddhist period, it is expressed by a unit and one hundred and forty ciphers. Yule.
[9] Yule's Narrative.
[10] "Amid lovely prospects of rich valleys, and wooded hills, and winding waters, almost every rock bore on its surface the yellow gleam of gold. True, according to the voyager, the precious metal was itself absent; but Sir Walter [Raleigh], on afterward showing the stones to a Spaniard of the Caracas, was told by him that they were madre del oro, mother of gold, and that the mine itself was further in the ground."—Hugh Miller.