little packets. The leaves, of which the rolls had been made up, proved on the average 11 inches high.
Owing to the damp that must have once reached them through the mud floor some of these rolls had decayed in parts. But others were recovered more or less complete, and though the translations of four of these, which I obtained through the kindness of Professors Chavannes and Douglas, are only provisional, they amply suffice to settle all doubts as to the date and character of the records. Two of them, dated in the third year of the Chien-Chung period, corresponding to A.D. 782, are bonds for small loans specified in copper cash or grain issued on interest to different borrowers by one Chien-ying, who is designated as a priest of the Hu-kuo monastery. As security for these loans the borrowers, whose names and ages are appended together with those of certain relatives as sureties (mother and sister, wife and daughter), pledge the whole of their household goods and cattle irrespective of any valuation. A third document, dated in the year equivalent to A.D. 787, records an agreement of similar purport, without clearly showing the name of the lender. That this unknown capitalist was also in some way connected with the Hu-kuo monastery becomes very probable from the contents of the fourth paper (reproduced already in nay " Preliminary Report ") . This, undated, conveys instructions from the three priests superintending the Hu-kuo convent to the monk or caretaker in charge of some outlying landed property of theirs. He is therein directed how to carry out certain urgent field-labours, employing all available men in cutting grass for three days after receipt of the order, while one labourer is to be retained to irrigate the fields, &c.
From the nature of these petty records it can safely be concluded that the ruined dwelling-house in which they were found, together with the adjoining shrine, represents either the Hu-kuo convent, or a monastic residence directly attached to it. The Chinese designation of the convent (Hu-kuo, literally " country-protecting ") aiid the Chinese names of the superintending priests, which are recorded in the last-named document, leave little doubt as to the nationality
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