RIVALS OF THE STATUE OF LIBERTY.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1478, 9 February 1887, Page 2

RIVALS OF THE STATUE OF LIBERTY.

[ " The Sttfue of Liberty juit In**-**, rated at New York," says a London y*u*r 9 " is described as towering 'to the sklee above all known statues of the present " and the past,' and as ' the Great Saltern i of stages.' ' A much higher statue exiiti and has long existed m Afghanistan . The little knowledge which has been obtained of this statue or statues— for there Me more than one — has been hitherto oon-» fined generally to a few Indian arobfoolo* gists, bat we are now indebted to theAfghau Boundary Commission— »ud more partionlaily to Captain the Hon. M. G. Talbot, R. 8., of tho Surrey department, and Captain Mftitland, of the Political department — for muoh more complete information than we have yet received. Theoe statues are on the principal road between Kabul and Balka at • looallty known as Baraian. At that place the road passes through valleys with high scarped oliffa of conglomerate. Probably about the early centuries of the Christian era the Buddhißts excavated numeroue caves as monasteries for themselves Id the rook of these valleys. These ano'ent excavations still exist, and can be oounted by thousands. In addition to thtse, a number of statues of Buddha were cut out ' of the solid rook. Two, at least, are still standing, and the largest was measured by Captain Talbot with the. theodllte, so that we now Know the haiglfto at least t> , few inohea. The measurement gave it as 173 ft high ; that is iriore by a few inohes than the Kelson ooluipn m Trafalgar Square and nearly 70ft higher than th« New York figure. The figure of Buddha, is the real « Great Eastern ' of ttatats. 'i he celebrated Memnon statues of Egypt would otly ooine up tp^be k&ee of tut mighty ikan. At Bfini&^^ere is another figure of Buddha 120H[l^, Theia «r» eroot at *n ding figuroa p^hore is also e> Hitting figure 80ft high^Tfcare Me the regains of two other figorte, but they Me m a ruinous condition— -one of them Ii estimated to have been 60ft or 60ft high. These statues, were originally, we know> either gilt or covered with metal, The Chioeie pilgrim, Hlouen Thsang, pasted the spot m the first half of tha seventh oentnry, ad,, and from him we have* description of at least the largest two figures as they existed at that date. The. ' statues have of course suffered from tlam* Armies have often passed by the, to*d«. Genghiz Khan and Timur-lung/t did jo* but they had only bows emd. urowi to throw at the idols " I The man wbQ, \?cnt to the country "fee Wat and obange," says the waiter got most his change and the landlord got th« net*