28 FOOTFALLS OF INDIAN HISTORY
could now be excavated along that line, there is no saying what discoveries might be made of buried temples and transitional cities. For a whole millennium in history would thus be brought to light.
On the great road from Dhauli to the north, again, there must have been some point at which a route branched off for Benares, passing through Gaya, and crossing the Punpun River, following in great part the same line by which Shere Shah's ddk went later and the railway goes to-day.
Let us suppose, however, that two thousand and more years have rolled away, and that we are back once more in that era in which Dhauli was a fortified capital city. The elephant-heralded decree stands outside the gates, proclaiming in freshly-cut letters of the common tongue the name of that wise and just Emperor who binds himself and his people by a single*^ body of law.
"I, King Piyadassi, in the twelfth year after my anointing, have obtained true enlightenment," the august edict begins. It goes on to express the royal distress at the imperialistic conquest of the province, in Asoka's youth, and assures his people of his desire to mitigate this fundamental injustice of his rule by a readiness to give audience to any one of them, high or low, at any hour of the day or night. It further enumerates certain of the departments of public works which have been established by the new government, such as those of wells, roads, trees, and medicine. And it notes
