Gridhra-Kuta Hill, and Legends. Fa-Hien Passes a Night on It. His Reflections.

Entering the valley, and keeping along the mountains on the south-east, after ascending¹ fifteen le, (the travellers) came to mount Gridhra-kuta.1 Three le before you reach the top, there is a cavern² in the rocks, facing the south, in which Buddha³ sat in meditation⁴. Thirty paces to the north-west there is another, where Ananda was sitting in meditation, when the deva Mara Pisuna,2 having assumed the form of a large vulture, took his place in front of the cavern, and frightened the disciple⁵. Then Buddha, by his mysterious, supernatural power, made a cleft⁶ in the rock, introduced his hand, and stroked Ananda’s shoulder, so that his fear immediately passed away. The footprints of the bird and the cleft for (Buddha’s) hand are still there, and hence comes the name of “The Hill of the Vulture Cavern.”

In front of the cavern there are the places where the four Buddhas⁷ sat. There are caverns⁸ also of the Arhats, one where each sat and meditated⁹, amounting to several hundred in all. At the place where in front of his rocky apartment Buddha was walking from east to west (in meditation), and Devadatta, from among the beetling¹⁰ cliffs on the north of the mountain, threw a rock across, and hurt Buddha’s toes,3 the rock is still there.4

The hall where Buddha preached his Law has been destroyed, and only the foundations of the brick walls remain. On this hill the peak is beautifully green, and rises grandly up; it is the highest of all the five hills. In the New City Fa-hien bought

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