6
that these various editors have done,—I am not sure but I should have said, in consequence of what they have done,—the real nature and intent of this perfectly direct and simple-hearted utterance seem at many points wholly misapprehended, One editor finds in it—apparently for no other cause than that it is now the thing to do—a complete code of civil law. Another finds in it a complete ritual of religious observance and ceremony. Another varies the now somewhat hackneyed performance of discovering the lost tribes of Israel, by unearthing, forsooth from the ruins of a forest-monastery,—or rather from the word aranyic which means 'forest-monastery'—his long-lost Aryan brothers![1] Setting all such notions aside, it has been my earnest endeavor to know the thing as it really is, and to understand as a native would, just what it says—its natural drift and import. The quest, begun in the interest of philology pure and simple, has proved of absorbing interest, has taken me far afield, has opened up unexpected realms of thought and of life. If it be then your will to accompany me a little way on this quest, let us begin.
THE STONE.
The stone is a short stumpy obelisk almost without taper, terminating above in a sort of low four-square Shape and material. dome. The material is a fine-grained compact rock not yet precisely determined, neither too hard for easy working, nor too soft to hold the inscription well under proper care. It stands 34 inches high above its mason-work pedestal; its faces are rough-hewn below, but above are worked to a smooth surface, forming an area for the inscription of about 14 inches by 23 on each side. In company with another stone from Sŭkhothăi, of Present position. later date, it now occupies the westernmost but one of the row of little open Salas on the north side of the main temple-building of Wăt Phră Kæo within the Royal Palace.
Of the earlier history of the stone absolutely nothing is History. known save what is said in the inscription itself, ll. 80—97. While the language there leaves something to be desired in the way of explicit connection of
- ↑ See Notes, ll. 51—52.
