shall say where they paused? We know that there are at this day in St.
Petersburg certain books on black paper taken from a Buddhist temple
found in a remote northern corner of Russia. It was much less of an
undertaking, and much less singular, that Chinese priests should pass,
by short voyages, from island to island, almost over the proposed
Russian route for the Pacific telegraph to America. That they _did so_
is explicitly stated in the Year Books, which contain details relative
to _Fusang_, or Mexico, where it is said of the inhabitants that 'in
earlier times these people lived not according to the laws of Buddha.
But it happened in the second "year-naming" "Great Light" of Song (A.D.
458), that five beggar monks, from the kingdom Kipin, went to this land,
extended over it the religion of Buddha, and with it his holy writings
and images. They instructed the people in the principles of monastic
life, and so changed their manners.'

But I am anticipating my subject. In another chapter I propose, on the
authority of Professor Neumann, a learned Sinologist of Munich, to set
forth the proofs that in the last year of the fifth century a Buddhist
priest, bearing the cloister name of Hoei-schin, or Universal
Compassion, returned from America, and gave for the first time an
official account of the country which he had visited, which account was
recorded, and now remains as a simple fact among the annual registers of
the government.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

* * * * *

THE SPUR OF MONMOUTH.