BO-TREE, ANar.o-Slxmr, grows all over India. One of these is to be found within the precincts of every Buddhist temple in Ceylon, and it is frequently met with in deserted localities, or near the sites of ancient villages, and there the occurrence of a solitary Bo Tree, with its circular buttress of stonework round the stem, indicates the existence, at some former period, of a Buddh ist temple in the vicinity. The planting of the Bo Tree in Ceylon, a ceremony coeval with and typical of the introduction there of Buddhism, is one of the most striking passages in the 18th chap ter of the Mahawanso, entitled ' The obtaining of the Bo branch ; ' and the 19th chapter describes the arrival of the Bo Tree. A tree of unusual dimensions, which occupies the centre of a sacred enclosure at Anarajapoora, is still reverenced as the identical one which the sacred books record to have been planted by Mahendra 250 years before the Christian era. consequently in the year 1900 it will be 2150 years old. So sedulously is it pre served, that the removal of a single twig is pro hibited; and even the fallen leaves, as they are scattered by the wind, are collected with reverence as relics of the holy place.
When Asoka, 250 B.C., sent his son Mahendra and his daughter Sangainitta to introduce Buddh ism into Ceylon, one of the most precious things which they carried with them was a branch of that celebrated pipal tree beneath which Sakya be came a Buddha, and which is still growing from the top of a small pyramid at Gaya. It was received with the utmost reverence by Devan ampiyatisso, and planted in the most conspicuous spot in the centre of his capital. There it has been reverenced as the chief and most important numen of Ceylon. The city is in ruins, its great daghobas have fallen to decay, its monasteries have disappeared ; but the great Bo Tree still flourishes; annually thousands repair to the sacred precincts within which it stands, to offer up prayers for health and prosperity. On the altars at the foot of the sacred Bo Tree, the Buddhists place offer ings of flowers and perform their accustomed devotions.— Tennent's Ceylon ; Ten sent, Christi anity in Ceylon; Hardy's Eastern Monachisin.