“And they, Ananda, who now or when I am dead shall be a lamp and a refuge to themselves, seeking no other refuge but taking the Truth as their lamp and refuge, these shall be my foremost disciples—­these who are anxious to learn.”

This discourse is succeeded by a less convincing episode, in which the Buddha tells Ananda that he can prolong his life to the end of a world-period if he desires it.  But though the hint was thrice repeated, the heedless disciple did not ask the Master to remain in the world.  When he had gone, Mara, the Evil one, appeared and urged on the Buddha that it was time for him to pass away.  He replied that he would die in three months but not before he had completely established the true religion.  Thus he deliberately rejected his allotted span of life and an earthquake occurred.  He explained the cause of it to Ananda, who saw his mistake too late.  “Enough, Ananda, the time for making such a request is past[375].”

The narrative becomes more human when it relates how one afternoon he looked at the town and said, “This will be the last time that the Tathagata will behold Vesali.  Come, Ananda, let us go to Bhandagama.”  After three halts he arrived at Pava and stopped in the mango grove of Cunda, a smith, who invited him to dinner and served sweet rice, cakes, and a dish which has been variously interpreted as dried boar’s flesh or a kind of truffle.  The Buddha asked to be served with this dish and bade him give the sweet rice and cakes to the brethren.  After eating some of it he ordered the rest to be buried, saying that no one in heaven or earth except a Buddha could digest it, a strange remark to chronicle since it was this meal which killed him[376].  But before he died he sent word to Cunda that he had no need to feel remorse and that the two most meritorious offerings in the world are the first meal given to a Buddha after he has obtained enlightenment and the last one given him before his death.  On leaving Cunda’s house he was attacked by dysentery and violent pains but bore them patiently and started for Kusinara with his disciples.  In going thither he crossed the river Kakuttha[377], and some verses inserted into the text, which sound like a very old ballad, relate how he bathed in it and then, weary and worn out, lay down on his cloak.  A curious incident occurs here.  A young Mallian, named Pukkuisa, after some conversation with the Buddha, presents him with a robe of cloth of gold, but when it is put on it seems to lose its splendour, so exceedingly clear and bright is his skin.  Gotama explains that there are two occasions when the skin of a Buddha glows like this—­the night of his enlightenment and the night before his death.  The transfiguration of Christ suggests itself as a parallel and is also associated with an allusion to his coming death.  Most people have seen a face so light up under the influence of emotion that this popular metaphor seemed to express physical truth and it is perhaps not excessive to suppose that in men of exceptional gifts this illumination may have been so bright as to leave traces in tradition.