The Great Dagoba Now Remains A Heap Of Mouldering Brickwork,
Still Retaining Its Form, But Shorn Of All Its Beauty.
The
stucco covering has almost all disappeared, leaving a patch here
and there upon the most sheltered portions of the building.
Scrubby brushwood and rank grass and lichens have for the most
part covered its surface, giving it the appearance rather of a
huge mound of earth than of an ancient building. A portion of
the palace is also standing, and, although for the most part
blocked up with ruins, there is still sufficient to denote its
former importance. The bricks, or rather the tiles, of which all
the buildings are composed, are of such an imperishable nature
that they still adhere to each other in large masses in spots
where portions of the buildings have fallen.
In one portion of the ruins there are a number of beautiful
fluted columns, with carved capitals, still remaining in a
perfect state. Among these are the ruins of a large flight of
steps; near them, again, a stone-lined tank, which was evidently
intended as a bath; and everything denotes the former comfort and
arrangement of a first-class establishment. There are
innumerable relics, all interesting and worthy of individual
attention, throughout the ruins over a surface of many miles, but
they are mostly overgrown with jungle or covered with rank grass.
The apparent undulations of the ground in all directions are
simply the remains of fallen streets and buildings overgrown in
like manner with tangled vegetation.
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