Note 1 — Chapter XII · PURUSHAPURA, OR PESHÂWAR. PROPHECY ABOUT KING KANISHKA AND HIS TOPE. BUDDHA’S ALMS-BOWL. DEATH OF HWUY-YING.

Going southwards from Gandhâra, (the travellers) in four days arrived at the kingdom of Purushapura.1 Formerly, when Buddha was travelling in this country with his disciples, he said to Ânanda,2 ‘After my pari-nirvâṇa,3 there will be a king named Kanishka,4 who shall on this spot build a tope.’ This Kanishka was afterwards born into the world; and (once), when he had gone forth to look about him, Śakra, Ruler of Devas, wishing to excite the idea in his mind, assumed the appearance of a little herd-boy, and was making a tope right in the way (of the king), who asked what sort of thing he was making. The boy said, ‘I am making a tope for Buddha.’ The king said, ‘Very good;’ and immediately, right over the boy’s tope, he (proceeded to) rear another, which was more than four hundred cubits high, and adorned with layers of all the precious substances. Of all the topes and temples which (the travellers) saw in their journeyings, there was not one comparable to this in solemn beauty and majestic grandeur. There is a current saying that this is the finest tope in Jambudvîpa.5 When the king’s tope was completed, the little tope (of the boy) came out from its side on the south, rather more than three cubits in height.