were the Usuns, who bordered on the Chinese Empire. We know that Buddhism reached these districts at a very early date.

When it first reached China we cannot say, for the unofficial introduction must have long preceded its official acceptance under Mingti. In As'oka's time, Hwangti, who had assumed the title of "King of Kings," in imitation of Seleucid magniloquence, had begun the erection of the Great Wall that was to isolate China from disagreeable neighbours. The break-up in Central Asia had already begun; Scythian hordes were already on the move, and had troubled the Bosphorus, Macedonia, Asia

[paragraph continues] Minor, and Rome with their presence, the Hiungnu were already restive in their places in Western China, when Buddhism plunged, at the death of As'oka, into a dark night which lasted for over two centuries. Before it took the plunge it had already shown its ambition to become a world-religion. When it emerged it had somewhat changed its character, though it still retained its ambitious projects. It had, moreover, gained for itself a most relentless and formidable rival.

Footnotes

^28:1 It is said that the falsification of the date was made in China, where the Buddhists were anxious to show that their religion was much more ancient than anything of native Chinese origin, it being claimed that Laotze, in particular, had borrowed much from S'akyamuni. It may also be that, supposing the Buddhists of North-West India and Afghanistan to have had any acquaintance with Judaism, there may also have been a desire to antedate Isaiah's prophecy of the Virgin Birth. See Hultzsch, "The Rupnath Edict," in J.R.A.S for July, 1909.

^29:1 Fleet, "The Day on which the Buddha died," J.R.A.S, January, 1909.

^29:2 V. A. Smith, "Asoka," pp. 115 ff.

^30:1 V. A. Smith, "Asoka," p. 132.

^30:2 Smith translates this Edict to the effect that "256 years have elapsed since the Tathagata, a statement which, if correct, would make S'akyamuni's death to have been B.C. 508. Kern gives many details about these missionaries and their spheres of labour. I have not dwelt at any length on them, as I think what I have given in the present chapter will suffice for showing the expansion of Buddhism.

^31:1 Japanese writers assert that Buddhism was preached at this time in Further India and Burma. There is nothing in As'oka's inscriptions to justify this assertion, for the Kamboja mentioned there have nothing to do with Cambodia. The list given in the Singhalese books (see Kern, ii. 287) of the apostles sent forth after As'oka's Council is somewhat vague in its statements.

^33:1 There was absolutely no other monarch in the world from whom elephants could be obtained.