spread Buddhism throughout his dominions would be likely to distribute
the relics as widely as he distributed his pillars and inscriptions.
But later Buddhist kings could not emulate this imperial impartiality
and we may surmise that such a monarch as Kanishka would see to it
that all the principal relics in northern India found their way to his
capital. The bones discovered at Peshawar are doubtless those
considered most authentic in his reign.

Next to the tooth, the most interesting relic of the Buddha was his
_patra_ or alms-bowl, which plays a part somewhat similar to that of
the Holy Grail in Christian romance. The Mahâvaṃsa states that
Asoka sent it to Ceylon, but the Chinese pilgrim Fa-Hsien[61] saw it
at Peshawar about 405 A.D. It was shown to the people daily at the
midday and evening services. The pilgrim thought it contained about
two pecks yet such were its miraculous properties that the poor could
fill it with a gift of a few flowers, whereas the rich cast in myriads
of bushels and found there was still room for more. A few years later
Fa-Hsien heard a sermon in Ceylon[62] in which the preacher predicted
that the bowl would be taken in the course of centuries to Central
Asia, China, Ceylon and Central India whence it would ultimately
ascend to the Tusita heaven for the use of the future Buddha. Later
accounts to some extent record the fulfilment of these predictions
inasmuch as they relate how the bowl (or bowls) passed from land to
land but the story of its wandering may have little foundation since
it is combined with the idea that it is wafted from shrine to shrine
according as the faith is nourishing or decadent. Hsüan Chuang says
that it "had gone on from Peshawar to several countries and was
now in Persia.[63]" A Mohammedan legend relates that it is at Kandahar
and will contain any quantity of liquid without overflowing. Marco
Polo says Kublai Khan sent an embassy in 1284 to bring it from Ceylon