e
example of Asoka. We are at liberty I suppose, if we like, to
assign that cyclic year 69 to the meeting of this Council: this
year or its neighborhood. So that all this may have had
something to do with the missionary activity that responded to
Han Mingti's appeal. But there is something else to remember;
something of far higher importance; namely, that during all this
period of her most uncertain chronology, India was in a peculiar
position: the Successors of the Buddha were more or less openly
at work there;--a long line of Adept leaders and teachers that
can be traced (I believe) through some thirteen centuries from
Sakya-muni's death. We may suppose, not unreasonably, that
Kashiapmadanga and Gobharana were disciples and emissaries of the
then Successor.

It is, so far, and with so little translated, extremely hard to
get at the undercurrents in these old Chinese periods; but I
suspect a strong spiritual influence, Buddhist at that, in the
great events of the years that followed. For China proceeded to
strike into history in such a way that the blow resounded, if not
round the world, at least round as much of it as was discovered
before Columbus; and she did it in such a nice, clean, artistic
and quiet way, and withal so thoroughly, that I cannot help
feeling that that glorious warriorlike Northern Buddhism of the
Mahayana had something to do with it.

It was not Han Mingti himself who did it, but one of his sevants;
of whom, it is likely, you have never heard; although east or
west there have been, probably, but one or two of his trade so
great as he, or who have mattered so much to history. His name
was Pan Chow; his trade, soldiering. He began his career of
conquest about the time the major Han Cycle was due to recur,--in
the sixties; maintained it through three reigns, and ended it at
his death about when the Eastern Han half-cycle, started in 35,
was due to close;--somewhere, that is, about 100 A.D., while
Trajan was beginning a new day and career of conquest in Rome.

XXI. CHINA AND ROME: THE SEE-SAW (CONTINUED)

During the time of Chinese weakness Central Asia had relapsed
from the control the great Han Wuti had imposed on it, and that
Han Suenti had maintained by his name for justice; and the Huns
had recovered their power. One wonders what these people were;
of whom we first catch sight in the reign of the Yellow Emperor,
nearly 3000 B.C.; and who do not disappear from history unt