y.

At Vaisali, a pest like modern cholera was depopulating the kingdom, due
to an accumulation of festering corpses. Buddha, summoned, caused a
strong rain which carried away the dead bodies and cured every one. At
Gaudhara was an old mendicant afflicted with a disease so loathsome that
none of his brother monks could go near him on account of his fetid
humors and stinking condition. The "Great Physician" was, however, not
to be deterred; he washed the poor old man and attended to his maladies.
A disciple had his feet hacked off by an unjust king, and Buddha cured
even him. To convert certain skeptical villagers near Sravasti, Buddha
showed them a man walking across the deep and rapid river without
immersing his feet. Purna, one of Buddha's disciples, had a brother in
imminent danger of shipwreck in a "black storm." The "spirits that are
favorable to Purna and Arya" apprised him of this and he at once
performed the miracle of transporting himself to the deck of the ship.
"Immediately the black tempest ceased, as if Sumera arrested it."[255:2]

When Buddha was told that a woman was suffering in severe labor, unable
to bring forth, he said, Go and say: "I have never knowingly put any
creature to death since I was born; by the virtue of this obedience may
you be free from pain!" When these words were repeated in the presence
of the mother, the child was instantly born with ease.[256:1]

Innumerable are the miracles ascribed to Buddhist saints, and to others
who followed their example. Their garments, and the staffs with which
they walked, are supposed to imbibe some mysterious power, and blessed
are they who are allowed to touch them.[256:2] A Buddhist saint who
attains the power called "_perfection_," is able to rise and float along
through the air.[256:3] Having this power, the saint exercises it by
mere determination of his will, his body becoming imponderous, as when a
man in the common human state determines to leap, and leaps. Buddhist
annals relate the performance of the miraculous suspension by Gautama
Buddha, himself, as well as by other _saints_.[256:4]

In the year 217 B. C., a Buddhist missionary priest, called by the
Chinese historians Shih-le-fang, came from "the west" into Shan-se,
accompanied by eighteen other priests, with their sacred books, in order
to propagate the faith of Buddha. The emperor, disliking foreigners and
exotic customs, imprisoned the missionaries; but an angel, genii, or
spirit, came