20 P. NEOGI.
Could be effected by the rude hand-labour of the Hindus we are
at a loss to understand." Though the two distinguished chemists
have made a mistake, as has already been pointed out, in think-
ing that the Delhi pillar is 60 feet high, while as a matter of fact
its height is 23 feet 8 inches, nevertheless their eulogy is thoroughly
well-deserved. Roscoe and Schorlemmer were evidently ignorant
of the existence of the Dhar pillar, which is 43 feet 8 inches long.
and the numerous iron girders in the temples of Orissa, some of
which are even 35 feet in length. These gigantic beams and pillars
were constructed, as has been explained afterwards, by forging
small blooms of wrought iron.
Fergusson, the great archaeologist, has written "Taking A.D. 400 as a mean date-and it certainly is not far from the truth-it opens our eyes to an unsuspected state of affairs to find the Hindus at that age capable of forging a bar of iron larger than any that have been forged even in Europe up to a very late date, and not frequently even now. As we find them, however, some centuries afterwards, using bars as long as this in roofing the porch of the temple at Kanarak, we must now believe that they were much more familiar with the use of this metal than they afterwards became. It is almost equally startling to find that after an exposure to wind and rains for fourteen centuries, it is un1- rusted, and the capital and inscription are as clear and as sharp now as when put up fifteen centuries ago."[1]
The opinion of two engineers is given below. One engineer says, Nothing heretofore brought to light in the history of metallurgy seems more striking to the reason as well as the imagination, than this fact that from the remote time when Hengist was ruling Kent and Cedric landing to plunder our barbarous ancestors in Sussex down to that of our Third Henry, while all Europe was in the worst darkness and confusion of the Middle Ages-when the largest and best forging producible in Christendom was an axe or a sword blade these ancient peoples in India possessed a great iron manu- facture, whose products Europe even half a century ago could not have equalled." Another engineer's opinion will also be found to be interesting" while considering forging of large masses of iron
- ↑ Fergusson, "History of Indian and Eastern Architecture," Vol. II, p. 260.
