A History of Hindu Chemistry from the Earliest Times to the Middle of the Sixteenth Century A.D. v1.c14.10

v1.c14.10

“Taking A. D. 400 as a mean date—and it certainly is not far from the truth—it opens our eye to an unsuspected state of affairs to find the Hindus at that age capable of forging a bar of iron larger than any that have been forged even in Europe up to a very late date, and not frequently even now. As we find them, however, a few centuries afterwards using bars as long as this lat in roofing the porch of the temple at Kanaruc, we must now believe that they were much more familiar with the use of this metal than they afterwards became. It is almost equally startling to find that after an exposure to wind and rain for fourteen centuries, it is unrusted, and the capital and inscription are as clear and as sharp now as when put up fourteen centuries ago.