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Show The Ananda, a Temple of Pagan. Prepared by the Nonaraphlc SoClety. Washington, D. U v in u - PUAN, Burma's Sacred City, is solemnity and mystery; about it is enchantment. Here, 90 mile southwest of Mandalay, the traveler trav-eler finds himself In the midst of a veritable forest of temples and pagodas, pago-das, large and small, nearly perfect or almost unrecognizable because of decay. de-cay. Before their vast bulks the traveler trav-eler becomes painfully conscious of his littleness and insignificance. His mere presence seems an impertinence, ine crumbling walls, the fallen pinnacles and the desolation are eloquent of the vanity of fame, the hollowness of glory, and the futility of human effort. Of the 5,000 or more temples that are still to be seen, the Amanda, the Thatbyinnyu, and Gawdawpalin, standing stand-ing all three within a circle of a quarter quar-ter of a mile radius, are surpassingly beautiful and majestic. The Ananda rises like a structure of foam. On its summit, like the flame iinnn some altar, a slender, golden and embarked for ceyion i But unseen hands were fighting on the side of the sovereign of Ceylon and sacred tooth. The ship sped swiftly on through the night. Yet when the travelers awoke it was to find themselves anchored a little below be-low Pagan! Baffled but not defeated, Anawrata sent an envoy to Sangabodhi, the king, an envoy who bore many costly presenls and who was Instructed to demand the tooth of Guatama In return. re-turn. Gautama Supplied Teeth. Sangabodhi, unwilling to surrender his most precious possession, yet fearful fear-ful of arousing the ire of so dreadful a monarch as the king of Pagan, was in sore straits. In his distress he expressed ex-pressed the wish that he might have two such teeth. No sooner had be given utterance to this desire than the tooth produced a fellow exactly resembling re-sembling Itself! In fact, the two were indistinguishable until the original jii itcoif hv risinsr into the air and performing miracles. The duplicate 'was placed in a casket of gold and delivered to the envoy, who carried it back with great pomp to Pagan. To solve the difficulty of choosing a site for the enshrinement of the prize, the casket was placed on the back of a white elephant, and it was announced that wherever the animal halted there should be the resting place of the tooth. Much to the disappointment of all, the elephant bearing his precious burden bur-den crossed the river and knelt down near the Tangyi hills. This was very "far from the palace, and the king expressed ex-pressed his regret that he also had not two sacred teeth. Here again the wish was father to the miracle. Immediately there were two teeth instead of one! The duplicate was placed on the elephant's ele-phant's back and the beast was bidden to move on. Five times the elephant halted before be-fore reaching the neighborhood of the palace, and at each place the tooth was miraculously multiplied, until at last the site of the Lokananda was reached and the king professed himself him-self satisfied. At each stop a shrine was built, and at the last was reared the pile which stiil remains as one of the monuments to Anawrata's greatness. spire gathers the radiance of the sun and flings it forth again to every quarter. It is the first of all the temples tem-ples to command the traveler's attention; atten-tion; it is the last upon which he gazes as the swift steamer bears him away. The Thatbyinnyu has suffered more from time and neglect than has the Ananda. Its walls are blackened and much of the detail of its ornamentation ornamenta-tion has fallen away. It is hardly beautiful; it is majestic. The third temple has neither the exquisite ex-quisite beauty of the Ananda nor the sublimity of the Thatbyinnyu; yet in the perfect harmony of its proportions, the refinment of every detail, it has a charm of its own. It contributes with the others to the spell which Pagan casts over even the most careless visitor. Lovely View From Circuit House. Past the Gawdawpalin the path leads on to the circuit house. At every step is revealed some new grouping of effects, some new harmonies of proportion pro-portion or felicities of detail, and from the spacious veranda of the resthouse the view is one never to be forgotten. Westward the river and the hills, silver sil-ver and gold and blue in the sunset; near at hand the Gawdawpalin, with orange light and soft purple shadows mingling and shifting over Its huge battlements; farther away the Ananda and the Thatbyinnyu, now indistinct In the twilight; and all around, the half-seen outlines of pagodas. Heroic achievements, the basest villainy, vil-lainy, successful subtlety all these are mingled in the history of this ruined city. The greatness of Pagan, and with it reliable Burmese history, dates from the accession of Anawrata, about A. Anawrata's end was tragic. One day, as he was riding through the forest on an elephant, he struck his head against the branch of a tree In which dwelt two nats Teinbin and his wife, Lein-bin. Lein-bin. In a fit of rage the monarch dragged Leinbin down from the tree and beat her mercilessly. Teinbin, In his turn, enraged at the king's cruelty, lay in wait for Anawrata Anaw-rata in the depths of the jungle. Taking Tak-ing the form of a huge white buffalo, he furiously charged the unhappy monarch mon-arch and succeeded In Impaling him upon one of Ills horns. The body was never found. D. 1017. This truly remarkable monarch mon-arch won by the sword a splendid empire em-pire and established a dynasty that continued in power .for more than 200 years. At the beginning of his reign he devoted himself to the moral and religious uplift of his people. A corrupt cor-rupt and degrading "Naga-worship." or obedience to devils, In the form of serpents, bad come through Assam from northern India. Anawrata's Great Reform. Soon after Anawrata ascended the throne Buddhist missionaries arrived at Pagan from the country of the Talaings, a people dwelling to the south and, as a result of the frequent and easy communication with India by sea, highly civilized. These Taiaing missionaries found the king a zealous convert. He' expelled the priests of the abominable cuh; that for so many-years many-years had debauched his people, strictly strict-ly proscribed the Naga worship, and did everything in his power to further the efforts of the preachers. His fervor had, however, one lamentable lament-able result. Hearing that there were in Thaton, the Taiaing capital, copies of the Buddhist Sacred Books and several sev-eral precious relics, he sent n noble envoy to beg for such portions s might be spared. Ills reasonable request re-quest was refused In a singularly So. lent and shortsighted manner. With characteristic energy Anwrata assembled an army and a fleet and moved against Thaton. lie was com-pletely com-pletely successful, and as the spoils of victory he carried back to PaKn not only the books and the priceless relics but the king and queen of the fallen city, together win, prli.dpnl nobles rich treasure, 32 white elephants, and a host of 30,000 artificers and scholars' This signal success only fmmt,(, t, fiame of Anawrata's zeal. A fr0"b held for enterprise was found In (W ln. There was In that Island a most" sacred relic, nothing less than a tooth of ( autama. Such a tropl,v W11, yond price and its possession by p.,,,,,,, would sanclify and eble the k n" name Accordingly, ,,, for captains, mounled on malchless steed J Anawrata hastened to the senIC' Conquered by the Chinese. For more than two centuries the successors of Anawrata more or less worthily maintained the dignity and prestige of Pagan. But In the' north was developing a power that was soon to engulf not Pagan only, but nlmosi: the entire continent of Asia. Kublal Khan In 1254 conquered what Is now Yunnan, and the Chinese were thus brought Into contact with Burma. To the resulting conflict there could be but one Issue. In.l2S(l Pagun fell lv-fore lv-fore invaders from thoMiorth, never flgaln to attain historical significance Of the great battle between (ho two armies on the plain of Vociatn, Marco Iolo gives a graphic and spirited account. ac-count. Though, under the circumstances, he fa 1 of Pagan was Inevitable, the Inst king of that unfortunate capital stands in pitiful contrast to the great Amnvrata. Known to history as layokpyemln, ,he King Who' Ua Away lM-on, the Chinese, he was utler-ly utler-ly unworthy of his noble ollleo. In the imgalnzodl ls an Inscription VhK ominenionues his achievements at fho table. Here It Is recorded that ho zzjisr fowr ,h- ""- While ,h0 Chinese host was vet a S (r n, " i n he cooks whom he had ,!lU(M1 .,... I J', ; v need that H i . " ' " " V . ; ;t.';''"'' :;;:rt::;;;;.;;'';;r,,r;.:;:,,.3 issir |