The small picture (Ch. lxi. 009) reproduced here on half-scale
is remarkable for its peculiar colour scheme and for its archaic
appearance in composition and drawing. It represents Kṣitigarbha in his
combined character as Patron of Travellers, Regent of Hell, and Lord
of the Six Worlds of Desire. We have already above, when dealing with
the paintings reproduced in Plate XXV, had occasion to indicate briefly
the several functions which have made this Bodhisattva one of the most
popular figures in the Buddhist Pantheon of the Far East.[86] Our
observations here may, therefore, be restricted to particular features
of his presentation.
The picture is painted on indigo blue silk which, though much broken,
especially on the edges, yet retains the strong colours of the painting
in great freshness. Kṣitigarbha in stiff hieratic attitude is
seated on a red Padmāsana with his left leg resting on a small lotus
and the right bent across. With his right hand raised he grasps the
mendicant’s staff, while the left, palm uppermost, is held outwards
empty. Over an under-robe of yellow with vermilion border he carries a
maroon-bordered mantle of perished colour, while a traveller’s shawl of
maroon covers head and shoulders. Gilded diamonds sprinkle shawl and
borders. The face and breast are gilded, but the exposed portions of
the limbs are painted light red.
From the large circular halo in blue, vermilion, and white spread out
on either side three waving rays in the same colours, intended to bear
figures representative of the Six Worlds (_gati_) as seen in Plate XXV;
but these have not been drawn in. On either side of the Bodhisattva
stands an amply robed figure with hands in adoration. From the fashion
in which the hair of the figure on the left is done in two knobs it can
be recognized as a man, while the hair descending in a roll on the neck
of the other figure marks it as a woman. Whether the donor and his wife
are intended is not certain.
In slanting rows descending from Kṣitigarbha’s lotus seat the Ten
Infernal Judges are shown sitting on their heels, five on each
side. They wear magisterial robes with head-dresses of varying
shapes and carry narrow rolls of paper in their hands. Their faces,
drawn in three-quarter profile, show some endeavour at individual
characterization. Behind them on the right stand two men, with belted
coats and wide-brimmed hats, holding a small and a very large roll of
paper respectively. A third man, in a corresponding position on the
left, carries what appears to be a writing-brush.
In the foreground we see again, crouching, a white lion, of very
stylized form. A man’s figure, probably representing the soul of a
departed, stands in adoring pose at its head, while on the opposite
side another person with grotesque features raises his hands
imploringly towards Kṣitigarbha. Both as regards its archaic style of
design and its peculiar hard colouring the picture has no pendant in
our collection. But, as Mr. Binyon has justly observed, it remains
at present uncertain ‘whether the primitive features may not be due
to provincial style preserving old tradition rather than to actual
antiquity’.[87]