While the Bodhisattva roamed about here and there aimless, alone and without a companion, he saw a lofty and splendid jambutree and sat down, his legs crossed, beneath its shade. Sitting there, he fixed his thoughts upon one subject.

About that time five strange risi's skilled in the fivefold knowledge and possessed of supernatural power, flew through the air from South to North. When they came above that part of the forest, they became as it were held back and could go no further. Filled with anger and impatience, they spoke this verse: "We, who have been able to fly through the air, above the city of the immortals andover the dwellings of yak$a's and gandharva's, are held back at this part of the forest. Whose is the might that can destroy our supernatural power ?" And there answered the deity of that part of the forest and spoke to the rsi's this verse: "The offspring of the race of the king of kings, the son of the Cakya-king, radiant with the brilliance of the morning sun, shining with the color of the unfoldinglotus flower, lovely as the face of the moon, the lord of the world, the wise one, has come here into the forest, his thoughts given only to meditation, honored by gods, gandharva's. naga-princes and yaksa's, having accumulated his merit in hundreds of ko,ti's of lives; his might destroys your supernatural power". And when the r,si's heard these words of the deity, they flew down to the earth and saw the Bodhisattva in meditation, pure of body and glittering like a heap of brilliance. Turning their thoughts towards the Bodhisattva, they praised him with verses.

When the rsi's had praised the Bodhisattva with these verses and walked three times round him turning their right side towards him, they vanished through the air. Meanwhile king ,Cuddhodana found no content, not seeing the Bodhisattva. He said: "Where is the prince gone to ? I see him not". Then many people went out on all sides to seek the prince, And a councillor not belonging to them, saw the Bodhisattva sitting in meditation in the shade of the jambu-tree, his legs crossed. By that time of day the shadows of all trees had shifted, but the shade of the jambu had not deserted the person of the Bodhisattva. (128: 18; 129: 12, 19; 131: 1, 19).

Though in some of the well-known events in the life of the Buddha, the sculptors have followed certain ancient traditions from the continent, as well as the text,this is not the case with the equally well-known scene of the First meditation" under the jambu-tree. In the old-Indian art, the laksana that distinguishes this event, is the presence of a farmer behind his ox-drawn plough, to make it clear that the meditation is the one of the village and no other. On the Barabud. ur there is no sign of the farmer-ploughman. The Bodhisattva sits in the prescribed attitude with crossed legs in dhyana-mudra, on a slope between two trees. To the right are more trees, and to shew that this is a forest and not a pleasure-garden or suchlike, two deer are lying near the Bodhisativa. We can appreciate the impossibility of doing justice to the faithful shadow, in sculpture! The episode of the r$i's is represented. With hair dressedin the knotted fashion usual among ascetics and the accustomed necklace, all wearing beards, they are kneeling on the left of the relief making a respectful sembah; the front one bows so far forward that his hands rest on the ground. Two heavenly ones are hovering above the ,r$i's, also making a sembah, according to Pleyte (p. 63) the wood-god and a Companion; in my opinion more probably (why should the wood-god be floating in the air, and whence comes the never-m entioned companion ?) a couple of not-specially described heavenly beings who witness the miracle. Also rather obscure is the identity of the large group sitting on the right under the trees, that consists of servants and soldiers. Here too, I cannot agree with Pleyte, who looks upon them as the minister and his suite, who when the king had become anxious, found the prince (p. 63). The text distinctly states that the councillor, as soon as he discovered the Bodhisattva, hastily informed the king, who at once set off for the jambu-tree to do homage to his son. There is no accommodation here for the councillor and his (nowhere mentioned) suite; it would be more likely that this is the king doing homage, as in fact is to be met with on Gandhara-reliefs. But on the Barabudur scene, the objection to that is, besides the difficulty of the rsi's having taken flight before the king arrives, that the figure sitting in the foreground is an umbrella-bearer, and that this umbrella, judging by the attitude of the bearer, belongs to the Bodhisattva, while nowhere in the group is a person in royal robes to be found. The simplest explanation seems to be that it is after all only the Bodhisattva's ordinary retinue, that the sculptor can not resist inserting even where the suite is not present in the text.

The next chapter begins with a conversation between Cuddhodana and the (;akya's who warn the king that, according to the prophecy, the prince will become either a Buddha or a ruler of the world, and that as the latter is the more desirable, it would be well to bind him to this world by marriage.