The material of all the stone temples noticed is a moderately fine sandstone, carefully cut and set without cement; the workmanship is plain, but good; the pillars, that were afterwards added to support the roofs of the mahamandapa, are plain, with square ends and octagonal shafts.
On a low hill or rise named Láthondongri (dongri means small hill) between Pákbirrá and Báramásiá, near Kharkiágarh, is a place known as Khalbir’s sthana; here are numerous votive chaityas and round and oblong cut-stone blocks; the place is clearly a cemetery of the Bhumiyas, but why they should have fixed upon a rocky eminence for a site I do not understand; nor am I certain whether the votive chaityas and cut stone lying there, and marking the sites of tombs, were brought from a distance, or were found on the spot; in the latter case, a large temple must have stood on the eminence, of which, however, no traces but these scattered stones remain The supposition that the stones were brought from the ruins of temples in some other spot is, however, not very probable, as from the known penchant of Hindu architects, and of architects in general, for eminences as sites for their structures, it is extremely probable the eminence here was once crowned by a temple. The hill is densely covered with scrub, and ruins of a temple or temples may exist, unknown to those who acted as my guides.
Tradition calls the votive chaityas, which in form are conoidal frusta, and resemble the native dhole or drums, petrified dhols, and relates that, on a certain occasion, musicians and their instruments, while celebrating a wedding, were converted into stone; what has become of the musicians no one pretends to be able to say.
Half a mile to the east are the ruins of two temples in the sâl jangal; one was Saivic from the lingam in situ. Most of the stone has, however, been carried off elsewhere, and only a few remain; the mouldings, judging from the fragments that remain, appear to have been somewhat shallow.
DHÁDKI TANR.
Not far from this, at Dhádki Tanr, near Tulsi Garyá and Asanbani, was a large temple, in an enclosure 120 feet square; the temple faced east, and had a mahamandapa, and the other chambers usual in complete temples; the mahamandapa had windows in the projecting ends of the transept, as in the temples at Khajurâha and elsewhere, but, unlike them, the
