About one hundred miles to the north-north-east of the city of Bangkok there stands an isolated hill, whose sides are greatly scored with "rays" that plainly indicate its volcanic origin. As all the surrounding land is but a wide stretch of low level plain, flooded in the rainy season, the jagged peak is a conspicuous object for many miles away from its base. The hill is known as Mount Prabat. The name "Pra-bat" is a compound of two words, meaning "the holy foot," and is given to the hill because popular superstition asserts that in a hollow in its rocky sides there is a footprint of the holy Buddha.

Thousands of people every year make their way to the spot to worship this memento of their Master's presence on this earth. From Bangkok the pilgrims ascend the Menam Chow Phya in boats, until they reach the old ruined capital of Ayuthia, from which point, the rest of the journey, some fourteen or fifteen miles, is made by land. Some people trudge the whole way on foot; some ride in the picturesque buffalo carts, or in the cumbersome bullock waggons; while others travel by means of elephants. The howdah of the elephant is no gorgeously caparisoned seat, like those so often seen in Indian pictures, but is merely a plain wooden saddle, covered over with a light canopy of basket-work which shields the head from the heat of the sun, and the thorns of the long spiny creepers that hang from the branches overhead. The Siamese elephant does not kneel in order to allow the passenger to mount, but he lifts one of his front legs, and bends it at the knee so as to form a kind of step. A sharp iron spike, stuck in the end of a long rod or pole, is the weapon used by the mahout or elephant driver to guide the beast and to urge it to greater speed. It functions both as whip and reins.

The road, in the height of the pilgrim season, is thronged throughout its whole length with crowds of people going and returning, and there are plenty of enterprising Chinese and Siamese at convenient intervals along the track, anxious to make a little honest profit by supplying the devotees with food. Rice is the chief article offered for sale, and is cooked in bamboo shoots, which here take the place of the ordinary iron pot. Sugar obtained from the palm tree, and wild honey in the comb, from the trees in the neighbouring forest, are also largely disposed of as palatable forms of light refreshment.

On the hill, and round about it, there are many temple-like buildings and houses for the attendant priests. Salas, rooms for preaching, halls filled with hundreds of idols, and huts made of bamboo for the use of the pilgrims abound at the base of the hill, and testify to the large number of worshippers who annually frequent the place. On trees and temples, on shrines and shanties, are hung innumerable bells, which when light are swung by every breeze, and when heavy are banged by the worshippers. A native band performs hour by hour, and endeavours, unsuccessfully, to drown the clear sweet melody of the bells in its harsh discord of gongs and drums. The mountain is dotted all over with the usual white spire-crowned pagodas, and, over the footprint, a particularly beautiful shrine has been erected. Its roof is built in seven stories which overlap each other, and upon the summit rests a very tall prachadee with a snow-white spire and a richly gilded base, which indicates with dazzling brilliancy, the whole day through, the exact locality of the sacred spot. The whole structure is placed on a small projecting platform in the rock, and the ascent is made by a series of about fifty or sixty steps cut in the solid rock. Up these steps all truly devout Buddhists crawl on their hands and knees, and as the result of the visits to the shrine of thousands of worshippers who year by year have come to bow before the footprint of their ancient teacher, the steps are distinctly worn and polished.

The external walls of the building are covered with brightly coloured mosaics; the outer surfaces of the heavy doors and windows are beautifully inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and the whole of the interior is decorated with a series of perspectiveless frescoes, illustrating various scenes from the life of Buddha. The platform of rock is about thirty feet square; and inside the building the floor is laid with plates of solid silver covered over with a carpet of pure silver net-work, which is polished intensely bright by the knees of the devotees. Two copies of the sacred footprint are hung on the walls. Both are made of pure gold, and one of them has all the mystic symbols inlaid with precious stones. The footprint itself is about four feet long and one foot and a half broad, and both in size and shape bears no resemblance whatever to the footprint of anything either human or divine. It is in a dark hole, and cannot be distinctly seen. The golden copies on the wall are apparently purely imaginative. Railings of solid bars of silver enclose the depression in the rock, and render minute examination perfectly impossible. A gilt canopy with flowing curtains of cloth of gold is suspended from the roof immediately above the object of the people's veneration.

The numerous worshippers enter on their knees. They carry wax candles in their hands, and crawl up to the depression, prostrate themselves devoutly at its edge, fasten a bit of gold-leaf on the sides of the hole, sprinkle holy water on their heads, and then crawl out again on hands and knees. Offerings of bottles, looking-glasses, wax and paper flowers, and other tawdry objects are heaped in piles on the floor. The more valuable gifts are carefully preserved elsewhere. Those who cannot afford to give anything at all, satisfy their consciences by carefully fanning the footprint itself.

The Siamese are not the only people in the world who have been known to reverence a supposed footprint, nor is Prabat the only place where the impress of the feet of the holy of old is pointed out. The footprint superstition is world-wide. There is the well-known footprint on Adam's Peak in Ceylon, which is claimed by the Buddhists as marking the place where Buddha once stood. It is worshipped by the Brahmins as being that of Siva, while the Mahomedans assert that it was made by Adam, and Christians have been known who have stated that they believe it to be the footprint of St. Thomas. On the Kodam Rasul Hill near Hyderabad, the Mahomedans have found a footprint of Mahomed. At Thanet, St. Augustine left the marks of his feet upon a rock upon which he pressed heavily when he landed upon our heathen shores. In a circular chapel over a foot-like depression in the rocky sides of the Mount of Olives, the footprint of Christ is pointed out to travellers. On the other side of the world the inhabitants of the island of Samoa exhibit a similar memorial of Tiitii; while the ancient Mexicans claimed to possess an equally authentic relic of Tezcatlipoa.

In a "Life of Buddha", written in Sanskrit, it is said that when Gautama was born he bore in his person a number of signs or personal peculiarities that at once foretold that his ultimate destiny was that of a powerful emperor or of a widely renowned and worshipped teacher. There are thirty-two chief and eighty minor signs given, and they mostly refer to personal characteristics considered handsome or beautiful in men or women according to the Oriental idea of beauty. Some of them do not appear to the mind of the European to be at all conducive to an impressive or handsome presence. For instance, the wonderful being who is born with the thirty-two major distinguishing marks of future greatness or holiness, has amongst other things, a skin of the colour of gold, arms so long that they reach far below the knees when he stands upright, and a thin butterfly kind of tongue long enough to reach round and enter his ears when fully produced. Upon his fingers and toes there should be a network of lines described with mathematical regularity.

The worship of the footprint in the Far East extends back for many years, and in many of the oldest sculptures that have been brought from India, there are to be seen distinct representations of the sole of a foot with the mark of a wheel in the centre. At first, all other marks, except this universal one of the wheel, varied considerably in character, and were few in number. But the imaginations of the Eastern worshippers gradually added further ornamentations until the sole of the foot was covered entirely by a collection of symbols. The elaboration of these signs reached its greatest height in Siam and Burmah.

There is nothing in the earliest scriptures to warrant the present widely-spread superstition, and, in fact, it is not until many years after Buddha's death that any mention of such a belief is to be found in the Sanskrit writings.

The Prabat relic in Siam was discovered in 1602 A.D., by a hunter named Boon. It is very probable that he had at some time or other been a pilgrim to Ceylon, for such pilgrimages to Adam's peak were not uncommon in those days. One day when hunting in the forest he noticed a depression in the rock, which he thought resembled the relic in Ceylon. He proclaimed his discovery to many people, and the king, hearing the report, sent a body of learned monks to the place to examine the footprint and report upon its authenticity. They examined and compared it with the copies they possessed of the one in Ceylon, and returned to the king, declaring that it was perfectly genuine. Thereupon, the sovereign, being only too willing to accept the conclusions of the monks, made no further enquiry as to the character of the discovery, but built a shrine over it, and ordered his people to worship it annually. This they gladly did, for their national pride was intensely gratified by the belief that they had in their country so unmistakable a proof that the holy Buddha had once resided amongst them.

In all the well-known Buddhist footprints the figure of a wheel or disc occupies the centre. It probably first represented speed, and was therefore symbolical of fleetness of foot, an attribute of greatness in early days. In later times it lost the form of an ordinary chariot wheel, and became the Chakkra or quoit of Vishnu and Indra. Its form is well seen in the watermark on Siamese stamps, and on the old Siamese coins. In the hands of Vishnu and Indra it was a powerful weapon of destruction, as it always annihilated all those enemies against whom, in their wrath, they hurled it. In the Buddhist mythology it has lost its material character, and taken on a new significance, as representing the pure moral teachings of Gautama, which when cast by holy men against the ignorance and sin of the world will effectually destroy them.

The other marks on the footprints in Siam and Burmah are later designs added by credulous and imaginative worshippers. They are grouped symmetrically round the central Chakkra, and represent various attributes of royal power, and holiness, or else are symbolical of different natural and supernatural ideas. The principal of them are mentioned below. There are the sixteen heavens of the formed Brahmas, and the six heavens inhabited by the inferior angels or Devas. Another sign represents Mount Meru, the centre of each system of the universe. There are also depicted on the sole of the foot, the seven mountains which form a ring round Mount Meru, and the seven belts of deep dark ocean that lie in the valleys between them, and in whose waters monstrous fishes and water-elephants gambol and amuse themselves. Then there is another ocean, the eighth, in which float four worlds inhabited by human beings. In the first of these worlds, the men have faces such as are familiar to the dwellers upon our own particular planet. In the second, the faces of the inhabitants are square in shape, while those of the third have a round moon-like visage, and those of the fourth have countenances bounded by semi-circles. Another compartment of the footprint holds Mount Chakrawan, the great mountain of crystal which encircles the world and forms a wall around it. The heavens are represented by a group of stars. The Himalaya Mountains, that appear so often in Hindoo legends, are not forgotten, nor are their seven lakes in which bloom lotuses of many different colours, ever omitted. Five rivers flow from the Himalaya Mountains, and on their banks are the great forests inhabited by fabulous beasts and birds. The Naga king, the seven-headed cobra who shielded Buddha, with his seven hoods, during a time of danger, finds a place in another compartment. But amidst all these curious and mystic symbols there is no animal of evil disposition, for upon the foot of the holy man there was nothing of bad omen. Figures representing royal authority occur in the form of a palace, a flag, a throne, a royal sword, a white seven-storied state umbrella, a spiral crown, and a golden ship.

It is rather surprising that the late king, who was very hostile to many popular superstitions, encouraged the worship at the shrine on the hill at Prabat. Perhaps he half believed in it himself, or perhaps he thought it good for his people to be reminded as often and as forcibly as possible of the life of the founder of the national faith. The reader need scarcely be told that not only is the whole footprint purely fabulous, but that also there is nothing in the authentic history of ancient times to warrant the notion that Buddha ever set foot in Siam at all.

The two following stories referring to Buddha's feet are given by Alabaster, as being translated from the Burmese "Life of Buddha" by Bishop Bigandet.

The story goes on to relate how the father made a further offer of his daughter to Buddha, and how the saint preached to the parents a sermon that stilled their longings to possess him for a son-in-law. They returned home with their still unmarried daughter. She never forgave the man who had refused her love, and cherished for him a lively and life-long hatred.

The other story tells of a visit paid by the saint Kathaba to the pile upon which Buddha was laid for his cremation.