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dition) formed of the ashes of Bus maasoort it is held in particular veneration by this sect, as the chief seat of their appropriate sacrifice; and the fact of its retaining little or no moisture, is held to be a mi fáculous proof that the ashes of the giant continue to absorb the most violent and continued rain. This is a remarkable example of easy credulity. I have examined the mountain, which is of a sloping form, and composed of coarse granite.

The name of Seetee is stated by the bramins of the vicinity to be an abbreviation of Sree-putteeShweragerree, or the hill of the husband of Sree and Ishwara.

Siva's adventure with the giant of the ashes is stated by these bramins to be related in one of the Puranas, with some change in the circumstances, which does not seem to improve its merit as a tale. The flight of Siva is continued through the seven lower and seven upper regions to Vicunta, the paradise of Vishnou, who there appears in the form of a young Bra min, and with the aid of Maya (delusion) persuades the giant that Siva never yet uttered a truth, and that the boon was fallacious, as he might easily ascertain by placing his right hand on his own head.

Swatadry, or Belacul (the white mountain), a temple near the south-eastern frontier of Mysoor, claims, in common with many other places, the honour of possessing the ashes of Busmaasoor; and I am informed that the descent of Vishnou in the form of a damsel, as stated by the Murresoo wokul, is related in the Sthalla Purana, or local history of the origin of that temple; but

the bramins whom I have consulted have not been able to trace in any document the incident of the husbandman and his wife, nor the existence of any written authority for the sacrifice practised by this extraordinary sect.

It is not a little remarkable, that neither the Dewan of Mysoor, nor any of his suite, nor of the bramins belonging to the resident's office, had ever heard of this singular practice, or were acquainted with the existence of this subdivision, of the sect of Murresoo wokul.

ON THE NAIRS. From the same.

The Nairs, or military class of Malabar, are, perhaps, not exceeded by any nation on earth in a high spirit of independence and military honour; but, like all persons stimulated by that spirit without the direction of discipline, their efforts are uncertain, capricious, and desultory. The military dress of the Nair is a pair of short drawers, and his peculiar weapon is an instrument with a thin but very broad blade, hooked towards the edge like a bill-hook, or gardener's knife, and about the length of a Roman sword; which the weapon of the chiefs often exactly resembles. This hooked instrument, the inseparable companion of the Nair whenever he quits his dwelling on business, for pleasure, or for war, has no scabbard, and is usually grasped by the right hand, as an ornamental appendage in peace, and for destruction in war. When the Nair employs his musquet, or his bow, the weapon which has been described is fixed in an in

stant by means of a catch in the waist-belt, with the flat part of the blade diagonally across his back; and is disengaged as quickly whenever he drops his musquet in the wood, or slings it across his shoulders for the purpose of rushing to close encounter with this terrible instrument. The army of Hyder had not before engaged so brave or so formidable an enemy; their concealed fire from the woods could neither be returned with effect, nor could the troops of Hyder be prevailed on to enter the thickets, and act individually against them. In every movement through the forests, with which the country abounds, bands of Nairs rushed by surprise upon the columns of march; and, after making dread ful havoc, were in a moment again invisible, On one occasion they were so imprudent as to depart from their characteristic warfare, and openly defended the passage of one of those rivers with which the province is everywhere intersected to discharge the mountain torrents. Hyder, by passing a column of cavalry at a higher ford, and combining their charge on the flank of the Nairs with a heavy discharge of grape in front, made a dreadful carnage among them. As he advanced to the southward he secured his communications by a series of block houses; and the Nairs, perceiving the object of these erections, impeded his progress by the defence of their own small posts. One of these, which my manuscripts name Tamelpelly, was surrounded by Hyder in the following manner: first, a line of regular infantry, and guns with an abbatis; second, a line of peons; third, of cavalry. This disposition

was made for the purpose of striking terror, by not allowing a man to escape destruction. The Nairs defended themselves until they were tired of the confinement, and then leaping over the abbatis and cutting through the three lices with astonishing rapidity, they gained the woods before the enemy had recovered from their surprise,

ON THE JUNGUM. From the same.

From conversation with some intelligent Jungum priests, I learn that they derive the name from a contraction of the three words, junnana, to be born; gummana, to move; murrana, to die. The word jungum thus constantly reminds them of the most important dogma of the sect, namely, that the man who performs his duties in this world shall be exempted from these changes in a future state of existence, and shall immediately after death be re-united with the divine spirit from which he origi nally emanated. This doctrine, not altogether unknown to the braminical code, is pushed by the jungum to the extent of denying the metempsychosis altogether. This sect condemns as useless and unmeaning the incessant detail of external ceremonies, which among the bramins of every persuasion occupies the largest portion of their time, and forms the great business of their lives. The jungum disclaim the authority of these gods upon earth, as they impiously and familiarly call themselves. The priests of the jungum are all of the fourth or servile cast, and habityally distinguish the bramins by the opprobrious appellation of dogs;

yet, strange to tell, in some districts, by reciprocal concessions, and a coalition of religious dogmas with temporal interests, they have descended to receive as their spiritual preceptors the cast of which they have been successively the martyrs and persecutors, and are consequently considered as heretics or renegadoes by the genuine jungum.

The religion which inculcates what is real, in preference to the observance of form, is, according to this sect, of great antiquity; and they consider Chen Bas Ishwur, a native of Callian in the Deckan, the reputed founder of the sect in the eleventh century, to have been only the restorer of the ancient true belief; and in spite of the most sanguinary persecutions, they are found scattered in considerable numbers over the Concan, Canara, Deckan, Mysoor, and every part of the south of India, and constitute a considerable portion of the population of Coorg, the Rajahimself being of that persuasion, as were the former Rajas of Mysoor, Bednore, and Loonda.

The fanciful notions of internal and external purity and uncleanness (the former having a twofold division of bodily and mental) are the foundation of most of the distinction of casts which seem so absurd to Europeans. To the question of what is the difference between such and such a cast, the first answer will certainly be to indicate what they respectively can and cannot eat; but when we consider the plausible dogma not altogether unknown in Europe, that a regular and abstemious life (which they would name the internal purity of the body) contributes to mental

excellence, we may be disposed to judge with more charity of the absurdity of these distinctions. The Jungum priests and the elect among their disciples abstain altogether from animal food; while the Sheneveea bramins of the Concan and the Deckan indulge in fish ; and many of Bengal, Hindostan, and Cashmire, eat the flesh of fawn, of mutton, and whatever is slain in sacrifice: the bramins of the south abhor these abominations, but the latter at least is distinctly authorized by Menu and all the ancient Smirtis, as the most bigoted are compelled to admit.

In the leading traits of the doctrine of the Jungum which have hitherto been noticed we recognize the hand of a rational reformer. The sequel is not so favourable. The Jungum profess the exclusive worship of Siva; and the appropriate emblem of that deity in its most obscene form, enclosed in a diminutive silver or copper shrine, or temple, is suspended from the neck of every votary as a sort of personal god; and from this circumstance they are usually distinguished by the name of Ling-ayet, or Lingevunt. They profess to consider Siva as the only god; but on the subject of this mode of devotion they are not communicative, and the other sects attribute to them not very decent mysteries. It is however a dogma of general notoriety, that if a Jungum has the mischance to lose his personal god, he ought not to survive that misfortune.

Poornia, the present minister of Mysoor, relates an incident of a Ling-ayet friend of his who had unhappily lost his portable god, and came to take a last farewell.

The Indians, like more enlightened nations, readily laugh at the absurdities of every sect but their own, and Poornia gave him better counsel. It is a part of the ceremonial preceding the sacrifice of the individual, that the principal persons of the sect should assemble on the bank of some holy stream, and placing in a basket the lingum images of the whole assembly, purify them in the sacred waters. The destined victim, in conformity to the advice of his friend, suddenly seized the basket and overturned its contents into the rapid Caveri. Now, my friends, said he, we are on equal terms: let us prepare to die together. The discussion terminated according to expectation. The whole party took an oath of inviolable secrecy, and each privately provided himself with a new image of the lingum.

Mr. Ellis considers the Jungum of the upper countries, and the Pandarum of the lower, to be of the same sect, and both to deny in the most unequivocal terms the doctrine of the metempsychosis. A manuscript in the Mackenzie collection ascribes the origin of the Pandarums, as a sacerdotal order of the servile cast, to the religious disputes which terminated in the suppression of the Jain religion in the Pandian (Madura) kingdom, and the influence which they attained, to the aid which they rendered to the bramins in that controversy; but this origin seems to require confirmation. In a large portion, perhaps in the whole, of the braminical temples dedicated to Siva in the provinces of Arcot, Tanjore, Trichinopoly, Madura, and Tinnevelly, the Pandarum is the high priest of the temple, and

has the entire direction of the revenues, but allows the bramins to officiate in the ceremonial part according to their own good pleasure, as a concern altogether below his notice. He has generally the reputation of an irreproachable life, and is treated by the bramins of the temple with great reverence; while on his part he looks down with compassion at the absurd trifles which occupy their attention.

These facts seem to point to some former revolution in which a Jungum government obtained the superiority over the braminical establishments, and adopted this mild mode of superseding the substantial part of their authority. It is a curious instance of the sooder being the spiritual lord of the bramin, and is worthy of farther historical investigation.

ON THE JAIN. From the same.

The following abstract is the result of several conversations with Dhermia, a Jain bramin far advanced in years, whom Lieutenant Colonel Mackenzie has discovered and taken into his service since that essay was written; and corresponds in what relates to their doctrines, with the notes of similar discussions taken by Pere Dubois, a worthy and intelligent missionary who has lived for seventeen years among the Hindoos as one of themselves.

The ancient religion of India, and, as Dhermia supposes, of the whole world, was uniform: namely, the worship of one God, a pure spirit, indivisible, without form, or extent, or any corporeal attribute, omniscient, all powerful,

possessing infinite wisdom, and 'infinite happiness. Absorbed in the contemplation of his own perfections, he interferes in no respect in the government of the universe, or in terrestrial concerns. Having originally given to all things their appointed order and course of action; having rendered punishment the inevitable result of vice, and happiness after death the sure reward of virtue; he leaves mankind to the consequences of their actions, and considers with indifference the complicated effects of good and evil upon earth which necessarily arise from the operation of free-will.

After death the virtuous go to Heordwaloga (Paradise), and the wicked to Ashdaloga (Hell), for a determined number of years, according to the measure of their actions upon earth; at the expiration of that period they return again on earth to a new state of existence, determined also by their conduct in the last; and thus to circulate through various transmigrations. But a superior degree of sanctity purifies the soul from the grossness of corporeal contact, and causes it to be reunited for ever with the divine spirit. The twenty-four Teerters, or saints, of this religion have thus been deified, and they are worshipped accordingly, as being intimately and inseparably united with God.

Although the fourfold division of casts prevails among the Jain, and they, like the ordinary Hindoos, have their bramins, we are obliged for want of more convenient terms to discriminate the sects, by calling the doctrine of the latter that of the bramins, and the former that of the Jain. To the

bramins the Jain attributes all the corruptions of the present state of religion; the fabrication of the four vedas; the eighteen Pooranas; the blasphemous doctrine of the Trimourty, or three Gods, and the monstrous fables which relate to it; the Avatars of Vishnoo; the obscene worship of the lingum, of cows and snakes, of the sun, the stars, the planets, and the elements; the sacredness of the waters of the Ganges, and other rivers; and the whole catalogue of modern superstition. These corruptions, as the Jain affirms, did not take place at once, but have been gradually introduced; and among them the crime of murder, in the sacrifice of animals, which though less frequent now than at some former times, is still practised in the Egniam.

Even the remnant of the Jain which had survived the repeated persecutions incited by the bramins has not escaped the corruption of the times; and the rites of their religion in the temples formerly most sacred (as those of Canara, Baligola, and Mudgery) are now performed by unqualified persons of the third cast; whom Dhermia considers as heretics. I have myself conversed with the Gooroos of the two former places, mentioned by Major Mackenzie and Doctor Buchanan in the ninth volume of the Asiatic Researches; and they have acknowledged to me that they are Vaysias. The Jain bramins appear to have been the select objects of persecution; and in all Mysoor not more than fifty or sixty families now remain. I have heard of none in any other part of the south, and the only temple where the rites of the reli

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