typical specimens of the frescoes recovered from the temple, and briefly explaining some of the specially interesting points they present.
The fresco composition reproduced in the colour plate (P1. v.), broken as it is, serves as a good illustration of what the wall decoration must have been in the friezes which once encircled the rotunda. The two pieces of painted plaster now united in the panel about three and a half feet wide were discovered in a detached condition at the foot of the north-eastern segment of the dado. Their position there, nearest to the wall and behind two other layers of frescoed plaster, makes it probable that they had fallen from the wall portion immediately above the dado. The outer fresco layers, which a photograph taken at the time of excavation clearly shows, are likely to have belonged to a second frieze on a higher part of the wall. The broad black streak which runs across the red-brick background on the top was evidently intended to separate the two friezes. The permanent preservation and joining of the badly broken pieces from the lower frieze could be effected only by replacing the friable mud and straw at the back of the painted clay surface with a fresh backing of plaster of Paris. This delicate operation was effected at the British Museum by my artist helpmate Mr. F. H. Andrews, and my second assistant Mr. J. P. Droop, with extreme care and skill. The slightest attempt at supplementing missing bits of the original fresco surface or at other ` restoration has been rigorously avoided. Even the mud of the original backing was removed only in order to prevent the salts contained in it from exuding on the coloured surface under the influence of the moisture which it would otherwise have absorbed from the plaster of Paris needed to strengthen and join the whole.
The panel thus safely preserved represents the upper portion of a typical scene of Buddhist iconography. On
the left we see Buddha standing, dressed in a simple robe of that dark red-brown colour which Indian tradition since
ancient times prescribes for ascetics and saintly preachers of all sects. The halo and the characteristic top-knot of hair, partly broken, make it quite certain that the teacher
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