THE CHINESE PILGRIM 141
almost as if it were a capital. He seizes the moment of his arrival there to give one of his gem-like pictures of the whole country and its civilisation. He describes the Government, the freedom with which men come and go, untroubled by passport regulations, and the self-restraint with which justice is administered and the criminal punished. We must remember that these were the times of Vikramaditya, said to have been " of Ujjain." Was Ujjain, perhaps, the name of all Western India, and Mathura its metropolis? Compared with Mathura, Pataliputra appears relatively unimportant. It was older, grayer perhaps, and more imposing. It had been "the capital of Asoka." Its palaces were still marvellous. Ecclesiastically, too, it was strong as well as noted. Royal delegates were posted there from each of the provinces. But commercially, and perhaps even politically also, we feel that the centre of power in India was at the time of I^a-Hian's visit at Mathura. From this he makes his way, by Samkassa and Kanauj, into the heart of Buddha's own country — Sravasti, Kapilavastu, Kusinagara, and so on, down to Ganga, a chain of sites that by the painstaking labours of so many archaeologists have now been in great measure recovered. From Ganga he returns to Pataliputra, and thence makes his way to Benares and Kausambi. Again making Pataliputra his headquarters, he seems to have spent three years in the Buddha country learning Sanskrit and copying manuscripts. And finally he sailed down the Ganges, through the kingdom of Champa, and
