is devoted to the inculcation of his favourite precept. 'Let small and great exert themselves.' Thus it appears that Edict I was published in five widely separated regions, a clear proof that much importance was attached to its teaching.
The Rûpnâth inscription was placed in a singularly wild and out-of-the-way glen, 'a perfect chaos of rocks and pools overshadowed by rugged precipices fifty to sixty feet high, in whose clefts and caverns wild beasts find a quiet refuge.' Indeed, while Mr. Cousens was taking a photograph, he was being watched by a panther crouching less than twenty yards away. The spot, which is still visited by pilgrims who worship the local deity as a form of Siva, became sacred by reason of the three pools one above another; which are connected in the rainy season by a lovely waterfall. The detached boulder upon which the edict is inscribed lies under a great tree just above the western margin of the lowest pool, and may have fallen from its original position higher up[1].
The Sahasrâm recension is engraved on the face of the rock in an artificial cave near the summit of a hill to the east of the town, now surmounted by a shrine
- ↑ Rûpnâth is 14 miles west of Sleemanậbâd Railway Station. Cousens, Prog. Rep. A. S. W. I., 1903-4, para. 113; Bloch, Annual Rep. A. S. E. Circle, 1907-8, p. 19. Dr. Bloch obtained a good impression, which has not yet been published. See also Cunningham, Reports, vii. 58; ix. 38; and Inscr. of Asoka, p. 21, Pl. xxix; Ind. Ant., xxii. 298.
