a religion no longer acknowledged, and scarcely known among them by name: when he reflects upon that boundless profusion of active, unwearied skill and patience, the noble spirit of generous emulation, the patronage and encouragement which the arts and sciences must have received, and the inexhaustible wealth and resources which the Javanese of those times must have possessed!"
In attempting to describe the Chandi Sewo, or Thousand Temples, which form a principal part of these ruins, he laments his inability to convey any adequate ideas, satisfactory to his own mind, even of the actual dismantled state of this splendid seat of magnificence and of the arts.—"Never," he observes, "have I met with such stupendous, laborious and finished specimens of human labor, and of the polished, refined taste of ages long since forgot, and crowded together in so small a compass, as characterize and are manifested in this little spot; and, though, I doubt not, there are some remains of antiquity in other parts of the globe more worthy the eye of the traveller, or the pencil of the artist, yet Chandi Sewo must ever rank with the foremost in the attractions of curiosity, or of antiquarian research."
I have preferred giving you the words of Captain Baker, while the subject was fully impressed on his mind, and while in the midst of the objects which he contemplated:—there is a feeling excited at such a moment that gives a coloring to the picture, and which is weakened in the faded tints of a more distant view.
Next to Prambanan, the ruins of Boro Bodo may be ranked as remarkable for grandeur in design, peculiarity of style, and exquisite workmanship. This temple is in the district of Boro, under the residency of the Kadu, whence I presume it takes its name; Bodo being either a term of contempt, cast upon it by the Mahometans, or erroneously so pronounced, instead of Bud' ho—which, in its general acceptation, in the Javanese language, is synonimous with ancient, or heathen. It is built so as to crown the upper part of a small hill, the summit terminating in a dome. The building is square, and is composed of seven terraces rising one above the other, each of which is enclosed by stone walls; the ascent to the different terraces being by four flights of steps, leading from four principal entrances, one on each side of the square. On the top are several small latticed domes, the upper part terminating in one of a larger circumference. In separate niches, or rather temples, at equal distances, formed in the walls of the several terraces, are contained upwards of three hundred stone images of devotees, in a sitting posture, and being each above three feet high. Similar images are within the domes above; and in compartments in the walls, both within and without, are carved in relief, and in the most correct and beautiful style, groupes of
