L^.visioD BL2003 Settioo .Cl4" V. 2. FOLK-LORE OF NORTHERN INDIA YAMA, GOD OF DEATH, BORNE BY HIS MESSENC2R3. Frontispiece^ Vol. II. THE POPULAR RELIGION AND FOLK-LORE r. / OF NORTHERN INDIA W. CROOKE, B.A. BENGAL CIVIL SERVICE IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. II. A NEW EDITION, REVISED AND ILLUSTRATED WESTMINSTER ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & CO. 2, Whitehall Gardens, S.W. 1896 ^^ CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE The Evil Eve and the Scaring of Ghosts . . . . i CHAPTER II. Tree and Serpent Worship 83 CHAPTER III. TOTEMISM AND FETISHISM I46 CHAPTER IV. Animal-Worship 201 CHAPTER V. The Black Art 259 CHAPTER VI. Some Rural Festivals and Ceremonies . . . . 2S7 BiBLIOGRAPHV 327 Index 333 FOLK-LORE OF NORTHERN INDIA. CHAPTER I. THE EVIL EYE AND THE SCARING OF GHOSTS. Nescio quis teneros oculus mihi fascinat agnos. Virgil, Eclogues, iii. 103. AsMA 'BINT 'Umais relates that she said, " O Prophet ! the family of Ja' afar are affected by the baneful influence of the Evil Eye. May I use spells for them or not ? " The Prophet said, " Yes ; for if there were anything in the world which would overcome fate, it would be the Evil Eye." — Miskat, xxi.-i. Part II. The belief in the baneful influence of the Evil Eye prevails widely.* According to Pliny," it was one of the special superstitions of the people of India, and at the present day it forms an important part of the popular belief But the investigation of its principles is far from easy. It is very closely connected with a number of kindred ideas on the subject of diabolical influence, and few natives care to speak about it except in a furtive way. In fact, it is far too serious ' For some of the literature of the Evil Eye see Tylor, " Early History," 134; Henderson, "Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 1S7 sq. ; Westropp, " Primitive Symbolism," 58 sqq. ; Gregor, '' Folk-lore of North- East Scotland," 8. * " Natural History,'' vii. 2. VOL. II. B 2 Folk-lore of Northern India. a matter to be discussed lightly. Walking about villages, you will constantly see special marks on houses, and symbols and devices of various kinds, which are certainly intended to counteract it ; but hardly any one cares directly to explain the real motive, and if you ask the meaning of them, you will almost invariably be told that they are purely decorative, or that they have been made with some object which obviously conceals the real basis of the practice. One, and perhaps the most common theory of the Evil Eye is that " when a child is born, an invisible spirit is horn with it ; and unless the mother keeps one breast tied up for forty days, while she feeds the child with the other (in which case the spirit dies of hunger), the child grows up with the endowment of the Evil Eye, and whenever any person so endowed looks at anything constantly, something will happen to it." ^ So, in Ireland we are told that " the gift comes by Nature and is born with one, though it may not be called into exercise unless circumstances arise to excite the power ; then it comes to act like a spirit of bitter and malicious envy that radiates a poisonous atmosphere, which chills and blights everything within its reach." - In Bombay the " blast of the Evil Eye is supposed to be a form of spirit possession. In Western India all witches and wizards are said to be, as a rule, evil-eyed. Of the rest, those persons only who are born under certain circumstances are believed to be evil-eyed. The circumstances are as follows : — Among the Hindus it is believed that when a woman is pregnant, she begins to conceive peculiar longings from the day of conception, or from the fifth month. They consist in eating various fruits and sweetmeats, in walking under deep shades, or in gardens where brooks gurgle, or in putting on rich clothes or ornaments, and in many other like things. If in the case of any woman these desires are not gratified, the child whom she gives birth to becomes weak and voracious, and is said to have an Evil Eye. If Ibbetson, " PanjS,b Ethnography," 117. Lady Wilde, " Legends," 24. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 3 such a person sees a man or woman eat anything which he feels a longing for, the eater either vomits what he or she has eaten, or falls sick. By some it is believed that if a person come from without at the time of dinner, and enters the house without washing his feet, the man who is eating becomes sick or vomits the food he has eaten, or does not feel longing for food for some time, until the blast of the Evil Eye is warded off." Mr. Campbell explains this on the principle that " as he comes from places where three or four roads meet, and which are spirit haunts, an evil spirit accompanies him without entering his body, from the place of its residence by which he has passed. If he washes his feet, the spirit goes back ; but if he enters the house with spirit-laden feet, the spirit enters the house with him, and affects any one of the persons eating." ^ The real fact seems to be that in most cases the Evil Eye is the result of covetousness." Thus, a man blind of an eye, no matter how well-disposed he may be, is almost certain to envy a person blessed with a peculiarly good pair of eyes. But if the blind man's attention be distracted by something conspicuous in the appearance of the other, such as lamp- black on his eyelids, a mole, or a scar, the feeling of dissatis- faction, which is fatal to the complete effect of the envious glance, is certain to arise. This theory that the glance may be neutralized or avoided by some blot or imperfection is the basis of many of the popular remedies or prophylactics invented with the object of averting its influence. Hence comes the device of making an intentional blot in anything one values, so that the glance of the Evil Eye may be deprived of its complete satisfaction. Thus, most people put lampblack on the eyes of their children as a protection against fascination, because black is a colour hateful to evil spirits ; it has the additional advantage of protecting the eye from the fierce heat of the Indian summer. Women when delivery approaches often mark themselves with black • Campbell, " Notes," 207. - On this see valuable notes by W. Cockburn in " Panjab Notes and Queries," i. 14. B 2 4 Folk-lore of Northern India. to avert the demon who causes protracted labour. It is also believed that a person whose eyelids are encircled with lampblack is incapable of casting the Evil Eye himself; and it is considered nice in a woman to ornament herself in this way, since because she herself, except at some crisis of her life, such as marriage or parturition, is not liable to fascina- tion, it shows her indisposition to covet the beauty of others, with the inference that she has no cause to do so. On the same principle, when a parent has lost a child by any disease which, as is usually the case, can be attributed to fascination or other demoniacal influence, it is a common practice to call the next baby by some opprobrious name, with the intention of so depreciating it that it may be regarded as worthless, and so protected from the Evil Eye of the envious. Thus a male child is called Kuriya or " Dunghill ; " Kadheran or Ghasita, " He that has been dragged along the ground;" Dukhi or Dukhita, "The afflicted one ; " Phatingua, " Grasshopper ; " Jhingura, " Cricket; " Bhikhra or Bhikhu, " Beggar ; " Gharib, " Poor," and so on. So, a girl is called Andhri, " Blind ; " Tinkauriya or Chhahkauriya, " She that was sold for three or six cowry shells;" Dhuriya, "Dusty;" Machhiya, "Fly," and so on.^ All this is connected with what the Scotch call " fore- speaking," when praise beyond measure, praise accompanied with a sort of amazement or envy, is considered likely to be followed by disease or accident.^ Thus Professor Rhys writes of the Isle of Man : ' " You will never get a Manxman to say that he is very well. He usually admits that he is ' middling ; ' and if by any chance he risks a stronger adjective, he hastens to qualify it by saying * now * or 'just now,' with an emphasis indicative of his anxiety not to say too much. His habits of speech point back to the time 1 For many lists of such names see Temple, " Proper Panjabis,'' 22 sqq. ; "Indian Antiquary," viii. 321 sq. ; x. " Panjab Notes and Queries," i. 26, 51 ; iii. 9. 2 Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland," 3;. ' "Folk-lore," iii. 85. Names of 321 sq.; The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 5 when the Manx mind was dominated by the fear of awaking malignant influences in the spirit world around him." So, in Ireland, to avoid being suspected of having the Evil Eye, it is necessary when looking at a child to say, ** God bless it ! " and when passing a farmyard where the cows are ■collected for milking to say, " The blessing of God be on you and all your labour ! " ^ The same customs prevail in India. Thus, if a native gentleman brings his child to visit a European, he dislikes to hear it praised, unless the praise be accompanied with some pious ejaculation. And it is safer to speak in a com- plimentary way of some conspicuous ornament or piece of dress, which is always put on as a protective. In connection with the question of naming, a reference may be made to some taboos which are probably based on similar principles. A name is part of a person in the belief of savages, and a man can be injured through his name as well as through the parings of his nails or hair, which are carefully looked after. Thus with all Hindus two names are given to children, one secret and used only for ceremonial purposes, and the other for ordinary use. The witch if she learns the real name can work her evil charms through it." Hence arises the use of many contractions and perversions of the real name and many of the nicknames which are generally given to children, as well as the ordinary terms of endearment which are constantly em- ployed. We have this name taboo coming out in a cycle of folk-tales, such as " Rumpelstilzchen," "Tom Titty Tot," and " Whuppity Stoorie." Here the imp or gnome has a secret name of his own, which he thinks it impossible for any one to find out, and he himself uses it only when he thinks he is sure to be alone. This seems to be the most rational explanation of the curious taboo according: to which a Hindu woman will not ■* Lady Wilde, " Legends," 20. " " Folk-lore," i. 273 ; Spencer, " Principles of Sociology," i. 242 ; Lubbock, " Origin of Civilization,'' 243 ; Farrer, " Primitive Manners," 119 sq. 6 Folk-lore of Northern India. name her husband, or if she wants to refer to him, does so in some indirect way as the father of her child and so on. To this, however, there is one notable exception. Thus, writing of Bombay, Mr. Campbell says : ^ "At marriages, coming of age, first pregnancy and festive days, such as the Nagpanchami and Mangala Gauri in August, it is usual for the woman to recite some couplet or verse in which the husband's name occurs. At marriages this naming is, in practice, little more than a game. An old man or an old lady gets close to the door and refuses to allow the young women to go until they have told their husbands' name. At the pregnancy ceremony the same custom is observed." Mr. Campbell takes this to be "part of a ceremony whose object is to drive to a distance any spirits whose influence might blight the tender life of the unborn child. This seems natural when it is remembered that the names of men are either the names of gods, of precious stones, or of spices, all of which have a power to scare spirits ; and as repeating the thousand names of Mahadeva is a service in which he greatly delights, apparently because it keeps spirits at a distance, so this repeating of the husband's and wife's name seems to have the same object." The name, in other words, is kept secret on account of its sanctity, and the custom would be based on the same rules of taboo which have been designed among most savages for the protection of kings and other persons of dignity from the influence of evil spirits. Another mode of protecting boys from demoniacal influence is based on the same idea of the blot of imperfec- tion. Boys of rich parents are often dressed in mean or filthy clothes so that they may be considered unworthy of the malicious glance of some envious neighbour or enemy. Still another device, that of dressing up the boy during infancy as a girl, in other words a pretended change of sex, may perhaps lead us on the track of a possible explanation of some very curious and obscure practices in Europe. ' " Notes," 400. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 7 We know that legends of actual change of sex are not unknown in Indian folk-lore. Thus, we have the very primitive legend of Ida or Ila, who was the daughter of the Manu Vaivaswata, who prayed to Mitra and Varuna for a boy and was given a girl. But the prayers of her father to the deities resulted in her being changed into a man, Sudyumna. Siva changed him back again into a woman, and she, as Ila, became the wife of Budha. In more modern times we have the very similar story of the daughter of the Bhadauriya Raja. He had a daughter, who was seized by force for the seraglio of the Emperor at Delhi, but she fled to the temple of Devi at Batesar and by the aid of the god- dess was changed into a boy. By another version of the tale he arranged with another Raja that their children should be contracted, if one chanced to be a boy and the other a girl. Both had daughters, but the Raja concealed the circumstance and allowed the marriage to go on as if his child was a son. When the fraud was detected the girl tried to commit suicide in the Jumna, but came out a boy, and everyone was satisfied.^ One explanation of the custom of pretended change of sex as shown in the case of the Amazons, has been thus explained by Mr. Abercromby : ' " The great desire of women, more especially during a period of warlike barbarism, is to bear male children. Turning our attention to the result of flattening a girl's breasts and letting her wear male attire, it is obvious that a sex distinction has been obliterated, and she has become externally assimilated to a male youth. Moreover, the object has evidently been intentional. It would be no outrage to the reasoning powers of the Sarma- tians to suppose that they believed a woman's chances of bearing male children were vastly enhanced by her wearing a man's dress, and by being in some degree conformed to the male type by forcible compression of the breasts during maidenhood. They would argue thus : a woman wants to 1 Cunningham, " Archjeological Reports,'' vii. 6. 2 "Folk-lore,'' ii. 179. 8 Folk-lore of Northern India. bear male children, therefore she ought to be made as much like a man as possible. A conviction of this kind is gained by a process identical with the immature reasoning that underlies what is called sympathetic magic." This may possibly be one explanation of the practice among Chamars and other low castes in Northern India, when at marriages boys dress up as women and perform a rude and occasionally obscene dance. Among the Modh Brahmans of Gujarat, at marriages, the bridegroom's maternal uncle, whose special position is almost certainly a survival from times when descent through the mother was the only recognized form, dresses as a Jhanda or Pathan Faqir, whose ghost is dangerous, in woman's clothes from head to waist, and in men's clothes below, rubs his face with oil, daubs it with red powder, goes with the bride and bride- groom to a place where two roads meet (which, as we have seen, is a haunt of spirits), and stays there till the pair offer the goddess food.^ Now, there are numerous customs which have been grouped in Europe under the name of the False Bride. Thus, among the Esthonians the false bride is enacted by the bride's brother dressed in woman's clothes ; in Polonia by a bearded man called the Wilde Brant ; in Poland, by an old woman veiled in white, and lame ; again, among the Esthonians, by an old woman with a birch-bark crown ; in Brittany, where the substitutes are first a little girl, then the mistress of the house, and lastly, the grandmother." The supposition may then be hazarded, that in the light of the Indian examples the object may be that some one assumes the part of the bride in order to divert on himself from her the envious glance of the Evil Eye. With the same object it is very common in India to bore the noses of little boys and thus to make them resemble girls. The usual names of Nathu or Bulaqi, the former where the ring was placed in the side of the nose and the latter in the septum, are evidence of this. ' " Bombay Gazetteer," v. 45 sq. - " Folk-lore," iv. 147. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 9 The theory of the blot of imperfection again appears in the custom of not washing the face of a little boy till he is six years old/ Similarly, young men, if vigorous and stout, consider themselves very liable to the fascination of lean people, and tie a rag round the left arm, or a blue thread round their necks, often twisting the blue feathers of the roller bird into the thread as an additional precaution. Nor do they care to expose their bodies to the public gaze, but wear a light shawl of a gaudy colour, even in the warmest season of the year. Should such a youth, if sufficiently con- ceited about his personal appearance, detect a suspicious person looking at him, he will immediately pretend to limp, or contort his face and spasmodically grasp his ankle or his elbow as if he were in pain, to distract and divert the atten- tion he fears. So, all natives dread being stared at, particularly by Europeans ; and you will often see a witness cast his eyes on the ground when the magistrate looks him full in the face, sometimes because he knows he is lying and fears the consequences, but it is often done through fear of fascina- tion. A European, in fact, is to the rustic a strange in- scrutable personage, gifted with many occult powers both for good and evil, and there are numerous extraordinary legends current about him. We shall return to this in deal- ing with the wonderful Momiai story. Here it may be noted that he has control over the Jinn. There was a place near Dera Ghazi Khan so possessed by them that passers- by were attacked. A European officer poured a bottle of brandy on the spot and no Jinn has been seen there ever since. A very dangerous ghost which some time ago used to infest a road in the Rurki Cantonment was routed in the same way by an artilleryman, who spat on him when he came across him one dark night. The nails of a European, like those of the Rakshasa, distil a deadly poison, and hence he is afraid to eat with his fingers, as all reasonable people do, and prefers to use a knife and fork. ^ " Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. 42. 10 Folk-lore of Northern India. A few other examples illustrating the same principle may be given here. When a man is copying a manuscript, he will sometimes make an intentional blot. A favourite trick is to fold the paper back before the ink of the last line has time to dry, so as to blot and at the same time make it appear the result of chance. We have noticed the same idea in the case of carpet patterns. A similar irregularity is introduced in printing chintzes and like handicrafts, and this goes a long way to explain the occasional and almost unaccountable defects to be found in some native work. The letter from a Raja is spotted with gold leaf, partly to divert fascination and partly to act as a scarer of demons. In fact the two conceptions meet and overlap all through the theory of these protectives. Another plan is to paint up some hideous figure on the posts or arch of the door. The figure of a Churel or the caricature of a European with his gun is often delineated in this way. Others paint a figure of Yamaraja or some of the gods or saints for the same purpose, and the regular guardian deities, like Hanuman, Bhairon, or Bhim Sen, often figure on these protective frescoes. So in Italy Mania was a most frightful spirit. " Her frightful image used to be hung over the doors to frighten away evil. This is quite identical with the old Assyrian observance recorded by Lenormant of placing the images of evil or dreaded deities in places to scare away the demons themselves." * Confectioners, when one of their vessels of milk is exposed to view, put a little charcoal in it, as careful Scotch mothers do in the water in which they wash their babies." The idea is probably connected with the use of fire as a charm. In Scotland it used to be the practice to throw a live coal into the beer vat to avert the influence of the fairies, and a cow's milk was secured against them by a burning coal being passed across her back and under her belly immediately after calving.^ In India, if a cow gives a large quantity of ^ Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 53. ' Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland," 7. ' Brand, " Observations," 753. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. ir milk, the owner tries to hide it, and if it chances to get sour,, he attributes the loss to fascination, or the machinations of some enemy, witch, or demon. A mother while dressing her baby makes a black mark on its cheek, and before a man eats betel he pinches off the corner of the leaf as a safe- guard. When food is taken to the labourer in the field, a piece of charcoal or copper coin is placed in the basket as a preservative ; and when horses while feeding throw a little grain on the ground, it is not replaced, because the horse is believed to do this to avoid fascination. Grooms, with the same object, throw a dirty duster over the withers of a horse while it is feeding, and they are the more particular to do this when it is new moon or moonlight, when spirits are abroad. In the same way, when a man purchases food in the open market, he throws a little into the fire, and when a man is having a specially good dinner, he should select an auspicious moment and do the same. The same idea accounts for various customs of grace-giving at meals.. Thus, when the Brahmans at Plana begin dinner they repeat the name of Govinda ; the Shenavis say, Har ! Har I Mahddeva, and when half finished sing verses ; the Mhars never eat without saying Krishnarpana I or " It is dedicated to Krishna " ; ' the Muhammadan, when he begins to eat, says, Bismillah /— " In the name of God ! " and when he finishes he says, Al-hamdulillah I — " Praise be to God ! " Orthodox Hindus pretend that this offering of food at a meal is a sacrifice to Annadeva, the god of food ; but here many varied beliefs, such as fear of fascination, earth and fire worship, appear to combine to establish these and similar practices. We now come to consider the various articles which are believed to have the power of scaring spirits, and counteract- ing demoniacal influence of various kinds. First among these is iron. Why iron has been regarded as a scarer of demons has been much debated. Natives of India will tell you that it is the material out of which 1 Campbell, "Notes," 184- 12 Folk-lore of Northern Indl^. weapons are made, and that an armed man should fear nothing. Others say that its virtues depend on its black colour, which, as we shall see, is obnoxious to evil spirits. Mr. Campbell' thinks the explanation may be that in all cases of swooning and seizures iron is of great value, either applied in the form of the cautery or used as a lancet to let blood. The real reason is probably a very interesting sur- vival of folk-thought. We know that in many places the 5tone axe and arrow head of the Age of Stone are invested with magic qualities, and Mr. Macritchie has gone so far as to assume that the various so-called fairy houses and fairy hills which abound in Europe are really the abodes of a primitive pigmy race, which survive to our days as the fairies. The belief in the fairies would thus go back to a time anterior to the use of metals, and these supernatural beings would naturally feel an abhorrence for iron, a new discovery and one of the greatest ever made b}^ man. There is good evidence in custom that the Age of Stone existed in many places up to comparatively modern times. The Hebrews used a stone knife for circumcision, their altars were for- bidden to be hewn, and even Solomon ordered that neither liammer nor axe nor any tool of iron should be heard while his Temple was building. The same idea appears in many cases in India. The Magahiya Doms, who are certainly one of the most primitive races in the country, place iron under a stringent taboo, and any Magahiya who breaks into a house with an iron implement is not only put out of caste, but it is believed that some day or other he will lose his eye- sight. The Agariyas, the primitive iron smelters of the Central Indian Hills, have deified iron under the form of Lohasura, as the Kaseras or brass-founders worship brass as Kansasura. This idea appears in many various forms. We have already noticed the use of iron as a charm against hail. In the same way a sword or knife is placed in the bed of the young mother. She is, at this crisis of her life, particularly ' "Notes," 34. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 15, exposed to the influence of evil spirits, as the Scotch fairies are very fond of milk, and try to gratify their desires on *' unsained " or unchurched women. ^ There is a case in the Indian Law Reports, where the knife thus placed near the woman was used to murder her.^ Pliny advises that a piece of iron should be placed in the nest of a sitting hen to save her eggs from the influence of thunder. This is now done in Sicily, with the object of absorbing every noise which might be injurious to the chickens.^ So, the Indians of Canada put out swords in a storm to frighten off the demon of thunder.^ The common belief is that the evil spirit is such a fool that he runs against the sharp edge of the weapon and allows himself to be wounded. The magic sword constantly appears in folk-lore. We have Excalibur and Balmung ; in the tales of Somadeva it confers the power of making the wearer fly through the air and renders him invincible ; the snake demon obtains from the wars of the Gods and the Asuras the magic sword Vaiduryakanti. " Whatever man obtains that sword will become a chief of the Siddhas and roam about un- conquered ; and that sword can only be obtained by the aid of heroes." ' While a house is being built, an iron pot, or a pot painted black, which is good enough to scare the demon, is always kept on the works, and when it is finished the young daughter of the owner ties to the lintel a charm, which is also used on other occasions, the principal virtue of which consists in a small iron ring. Here is combined the virtue of the iron and the ring, which is a sacred circle. In India iron rings are constantly worn as an amulet against disease, as in Ireland an iron ring on the fourth finger cures rheu- matism. The mourner, during the period of ceremonial impurity, carries a knife or a piece of iron to drive off the ' Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland," 5. 60, 62. 2 Reg. vs. Lalla, " Nizamat Adalat Reports," 22nd September, 1853.. ^ Gubernatis, "Zoological Mythology," ii. 281. " " Folk-lore," i. 154. '" Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 3S6, 575 ; ii. 64. 14 Folk-lore of Northern India. ghost of the dead man, and the bridegroom in the marriage procession wears a sword as a protection ; if he cannot procure a hcence from a magistrate to carry a real sword, he gets one made of lath, which is good enough to frighten the evil spirit. In this case he fastens an iron spike to the point. On the same principle the blacksmith's anvil is used as a hail charm, and any one who dares to sit on it is likely to be punished for the contempt by an attack of boils. The Romans used to drive large nails into the side posts of the door with the same object. We have already noticed the value of iron nails for the purpose of laying the ghost of the •Churel, and such nails are in India very commonly driven into the door-post or into the legs of the bed, with the object of resisting evil spirits. The horse-shoe is one special form of the charm. The wild Irish, we are told, used to hang round the necks of children the beginning of St. John's Gospel, a crooked nail out of a horse-shoe, or a piece of wolf-skin.' Why the horse-shoe should be used in this way has been much debated. Mr. Farrer thinks it may be connected with the respect paid to the horse in folk-lore.^ The Irish say that the reason is that the horse and ass were in the stall when Christ was born, and hence are blessed for evermore.^ The idea that its shape connects it with the Yoni and phallicism hardly deserves mention. One thing is clear, that the element of luck largely enters into the matter ; the shoe must have been found by chance on the road. Mr. Leland says, " To find and pick up any- thing, at once converts it into a fetish, or insures that all will go well with it, if we say when taking it up, ' I do not pick it up,'— naming the object — * I pick up good luck, which may never abandon me ! ' '^ This, combined with the general protective power of iron, is probably a sufficient explanation of the practice. The custom is common in India. The great gate of the mosque at Fatehpur Sikri is covered with them, and the practice is general at many shrines. ' Brand, " Observations," 339. - " Primitive Manners," 293. •'' Lady Wilde, " Legends," 181. ^ " Etruscan Roman Remains," 264. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 15 There is also a cycle of legends which connect iron with the philosopher's stone and transmutation into gold. The great Chandra Varma, who was born of the embraces of Chandrama, the Moon god, possessed the power of con- verting iron into gold. Laliya, a blacksmith of Ahmadabad, made an axe for a Bhil, who returned and complained that it would not cut. Laliya, on looking at it, found that the blade had been turned into gold. On questioning the Bhil, he ascertained that he had tried to sharpen it on what turned out to be the philosopher's stone. Laliya, by pos- session of the stone, acquired great wealth, and was finally attacked by the king's troops. At last he was obliged to throw the stone into the Bhadar river, where it still lies, but once some iron chains were let down into the water, and when they touched it the links were converted into gold.' Gold and Silver Protectives. Gold, and in a less degree silver, have a similar protective influence. The idea is apparently based on their scarcity and value, and on their colour — yellow and white being obnoxious to evil spirits. Hence a little bit of gold is put into the mouth of the dying Hindu, and both gold and silver, combined with tigers' claws and similar protectives, are largely used as amulets. These metals are particularly effective in the form of ornaments, many of which are images of the gods, or have some mystic significance, or are made in imitation of some sacred leaf, flower, or animal. This is one main cause of the recklessness with which rich natives load their children with masses of costly jewellery, though they are well aware that the practice often leads to robbery and murder. Copper and Brass Protectives. Next come copper and brass. The use of copper in the • " Bombay Gazetteer," v. 123; and for another instance, see Jarrett, " Ain-i-Akbari," ii. 197. i6 Folk-lore of Northern India. form of rings and amulet cases is very common. Many of the vessels used in the daily service of the gods, such as the Argha, with which the daily oblations are made, are made of this metal. So with brass and various kinds of alloy used for bells, drinking and cooking utensils. The common brass Lota is always carried about by a man during the period of mourning as a preservative against the evil spirits which surround him until the ghost of the dead man is finally laid. Copper rings are specially worn as an antidote to pimples and boils, while those of iron are sup- posed to weaken the influence of the planet Sani or Saturn, which is proverbially unlucky and malignant. His Evil Eye, in particular, brings misfortune at intervals of twenty- four years ; all offerings to him are black, and consequently ill-omened, such as sesamum, charcoal, buffaloes, and black salt ; and only the Dakaut, the lowest class of Brahman priest, will accept such offerings.^ Coral and Marine Products Protectives. Next in value to these metals come coral and other marine products, which in the case of the Hindus probably derive their virtue from being strange to an inland-dwelling people, and as connected with the great ocean, the final home of the sainted dead. Coral is particularly valued in the form of a necklace by those who cannot afford the costlier metals, and its ashes are constantly used in various rustic remedies and stimulants. In Gujarat a coral ring is used to keep off the evil influence of the sun,^ and in Bengal mourners touch it as a form of purification. According to the old belief in England, coral guarded off lightning, whirlwind, tempests and storms from ships and houses, and was hung round the necks of children to assist teething and keep off the fallings sickness.^ So with shells, particularly the Sankha or conch shell, which is used for oblations and is regarded as sacred to Vishnu. It is blown at his temples when the deit}^ 1 Lai Bihari De, " Folk-tales," io8 sqq. ; Wilson, " Indian Caste/ ii. 174- = " Campbell, " Notes," 69, ' Brand, " Observations," 344, 733. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 17 receives his daily meal, in order to wake him and scare off vagrant spirits, who would otherwise consume or defile the offering. This shell, in popular belief, is the bone of the demon Panchajana, who, according to the Vishnu Purana,' " lived in the form of a conch shell under the ocean. Krishna plunged into the water, killed him, took the shell, which constituted his bones, and afterwards used it for a horn. When sounded it fills the demon hosts with dismay, animates the gods, and annihilates unrighteousness." All these shells appear to derive part of their virtue from the fact that they are perforated. The cowry shell, which is worn round the neck by children as an antidote to the Evil Eye and diabolical influence, is supposed to have such sympathy with the wearer that it cracks when the evil glance falls upon it, as in England coral was thought to change colour and grow pale when its owner was sick. The cowry shell is, with the same object, tied round the neck or pasterns of a valued horse, or on a cow or buffalo. The shell armlet worn by Bengal women has the same protective influence.^ Precious Stones Protectives. Precious stones possess similar value. Sir Thomas Brown would not deny that bezoar was antidotal, but he could not bring himself to believe that *' sapphire is preservative against enchantments." In one special combination of nine varieties, known as the Nauratana, they are specially efficacious — the ruby sacred to the sun, the pearl to the moon, coral to Mars, emerald to Mercury, topaz to Jupiter, diamond to Venus, sapphire to Saturn, amethyst to Rahu, and the cat's- eye to Ketu. In the mythology the gods interrupted Parvati when she was with Mahadeva, and nine jewels dropped from her anklet. When he looked at them he saw his image reflected in each of them, and they appeared in the form of the nine Kanyas or heavenly maidens. The Naulakha or nine lakh necklace constantly appears in Indian folk-lore. ^ V. 21. ^ For further examples see Campbell, "Notes," 126 sqq. VOL. II. C i8 Folk-lore of Northern India. In the story of the Princess Aubergine we read that " inside the fish there is a bumble-bee, inside the bee a tiny box, and inside the box is the wonderful nine lakh necklace. Put it on and I shall die." And in one of Somadeva's stories, at the marriage, Jaya gives the bride a necklace of such a kind that, as long as it is upon a person's neck, hunger, thirst, and death cannot harm him.' It is of jewels that the lamps which light fairy-land are made. Many of the precious stones have tales and qualities of their own. Once upon a time a holy man came and settled at Panna who had a diamond as large as a cart-wheel. The Raja, hearing of this, tried to take it by force, but the saint hid it in the ground out of his way. He told the Raja that the diamond wheel could not leave his dominions, and that no one could ever find it. The Muhammadans say that all the diamonds found since, in these famous mines, were fragments of the wheel.^ The wearing of a ring of sapphire, sacred to Sani or Saturn, is supposed to turn out lucky or unlucky, according to circumstances. For this reason, the wearer tries it for three days, that is, he wears it on Saturday, which is sacred to Saturn, and keeps it on till Tuesday. During this time, if no mishap befalls him, he continues to wear it during the period when the planet's influence is unfavourable ; but should any mishap befall him during the three days, he gives the ring to a Brahman.'' The amethyst obtains its name because any one who wears it cannot be affected by wine. The turquoise or Firoza is a mystic stone in India. If you bathe wearing a turquoise, the water touched by it protects the wearer from boils, and snakes will not approach him." Shylock got a turquoise from Leah which he would not have given for a wilderness of monkeys, because it changed colour with the health of the owner, and the Turkeys, says an old writer, " doth ' Temple, " Wideawake Stories," 83 ; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 478. ^ Cunningham, " Arclijeological Reports," vii. 50. ^ Campbell, "Notes," 119. •* " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 53. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 19 move when there is any peril prepared to him that weareth it." ^ So the onyx, known as the Sulaimani, or stone of Solomon, has mystic virtues, as, according to Burton, carbuncles and coral, beryl, pearls and rubies were believed to drive away devils, to overcome sorrow, and to stop dreams." Beads Protectives. With poorer people beads take the place of gems, and in particular the curious enamelled bead, which probably came from China and is still found in old deserted sites, mostly of Buddhistic origin, enjoys special repute. We have already met with the parturition bead, and in Kolhapur there is a much-valued Arabic stone which, when any woman is in labour, is washed and the water given to her to drink. In Scotland the amber bead cures inflamed eyes and sprains, as in Italy looking through amber beads strengthens the sight.^ Here the perforation confers a mystical quality. As an antidote to the Evil Eye blue beads are specially valued, and are hung round the necks and pasterns of horses and other valuable animals. The belief in the efficacy of beads is at the basis of the use of rosaries, which, as used in Europe, are almost certainly of Eastern origin, imported in the Middle Ages in imitation of those worn by Buddhistic or Hindu ascetics, who ascribe to them manifold virtue. Such are those of the Tulasi or sacred basil, worn by Vaishnavas, and those of the Rudraksha, worn by Saivas. Blood a Protective. Blood is naturally closely connected with life. " The flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat." Hence blood comes to be a scarer of demons. In Scott's Lay the wizard's book would not open till he smeared the cover with the Borderer's curdled gore. In 1 " Brand, " Observations," 733. 2 » Anatomy of Melancholy," 434- 3 Henderson, " Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 146 ; Leland. " Etruscan Roman Remains,'' 267. C 2 20 Folk-lore of Northern India. Cornwall, the burning of blood from the body of a dead animal is a very common method of appeasing the spirits of disease/ and the blood sacrifices so prevalent all over the world are performed with the same object. A curious Evil Eye charm is recorded from Allahabad. A woman of the Chamar or carrier caste gave birth to a dead child. Think- ing that this was due to fascination, she put a piece of the cloth used at her confinement down a well, having previously enclosed in it two leaves of betel, some cloves, and a piece of the castor-oil plant." Here we have, first, a case of well- worship ; secondly, the use of betel, cloves, and the castor- oil plant, all scarers of evil spirits ; and thirdly, an instance of the use of blood for the same purpose. We have else- where noticed the special character attached to menstrual or parturition blood. But blood itself is most effectual against demoniacal influence. There are many cases where blood is rubbed on the body as an antidote to disease. In Bombay some Marhatas give warmed goat's blood in cases of piles, and in typhus, or red discoloration of the skin with blotches, the patient is cured by killing a cock and rubbing the sick man with the blood. Others use the blood of the great lizard in cases of snake-bite.' A bath of the blood of children was once ordered for the Emperor Constantine, and because he, moved by the tears of the parents, refused to take it, his extraordinary humanity was rewarded by a miraculous cure. Similarly, among the Dravidians, the Kos drink the blood of the sacrificial bull ; the Malers cure demoniacs by giving the blood of a sacrificed buffalo ; the Pahariyas, in time of epidemics, set up a pair of posts and a cross beam, and hang on it a vessel of blood." So, the Jews sprinkled the door-posts and the horns of the altar with blood, and the same customs prevail among many other peoples. We shall meet with instances of the same rite when ' Hunt, " Popular Romances," 213. 5 " Panjib Notes and Queries," iii. 67. * Campbell, " Notes," 49 sq. * Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 115, 270, 272. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 21 dealing with the blood covenant and human sacrifice. On the same analogy many Indian tribes mark the forehead of the bride with blood or vermilion, and red paint is smeared on the image of the village godling in lieu of a regular sacrifice. Incense. Similarly, incense is largely used in religious rites, partly to please with the sweet savour the deity which is being worshipped, and partly to drive away demons who would steal or defile the offerings. Bad smells repel evil spirits, and this is probably why assafoetida is given to a woman after her delivery. In Ireland, if a child be sick, they take a piece of the cloth worn by the person supposed to have overlooked the infant and burn it near him. If he sneezes, he expels the spirit and the spell is broken, or the cloth is burned to ashes and given to the patient, while his forehead is rubbed with spittle. In Northern India, if a child be sick, a little bran, pounded chillies, mustard, and sometimes the eyelashes of the child are passed round its head and burned. If the burning mixture does not smell very badly, which it is needless to say is hardly ever the case, it is a sign that the child is still under the evil influence ; if the odour be abominable, that the attack has been obviated.' Similarly, in Bengal, red mustard seeds and salt are mixed together, waved round the head of the patient, and then thrown into the fire.' This reminds us of the flight of the Evil One into the remote parts of Egypt from the smell of the fish liver burnt by Tobit, and an old writer says: " Wyse clerkes knoweth well that dragons hate nothyng more than the stenche of breenynge bones, and therefore they gaderyd as many as they might fynde, and brent them ; and so with the stenche thereof they drove away the dragons, and so they were brought out of greete dysease.' ' " Panjab Notes and Queries," i. 51. ' Risley, " Tribes and Castes," i.i. 209. 3 Brand, " Observations," i66. »» a 22 Folk-lore of Northern India. Spittle. We have just met with an instance of the use of spittle for the scaring of the disease demon or the Evil Eye. This is a very common form of charm for this purpose. In one of the Italian charms the performer is directed to spit behind himself thrice and not to look back. In another, " if your eyes pain you, you must take the saliva of a woman who has given birth only to boys, not girls. And she must have abstained from sexual union and stimulating food for three days. Then, if her saliva be bright and clear, anoint your eyes with it and they will be cured." ' At Innisboffin, in Ireland, when the old women meet a baby out with its nurse they spit on the ground all round it to keep fairies from it. In Wicklow they spit on a child for good luck the first day it is brought out after birth. ^ In several of the European folk-tales we find that spittle has the power of speech. The habit of spitting on the handsell or first money taken in the morning is common. It is done " either to render it tenacious that it may remain with them and not vanish away like a fairy gift, or else to render it propitious and lucky, that it may draw more money to it." ^ Muhammad advised that when the demon Khanzab interrupted any one at his prayers, he was to spit over his left shoulder three times. In India, spittle is regarded as impure. Hence a native cleans his teeth daily with a fresh twig of the Nim tree, and regards the European's use of the same tooth-brush day after day as one of the numerous extraordinary impurities which we permit. Hence, too, the practice of spitting when any one who is feared or detested passes by. When women see a falling star they spit three times to scare the demon. In Bombay, spittle, especially fasting spittle, is used to rub on wounds as a remedy. It cures inflammation of the eyes, an idea which was familiar to the Jews. It guards children against the Evil Eye. In the Konkan, when a person is affected by the Evil Eye, salt and mustard are waved round ' Leland, "Etruscan Roman Remains," 260, 279 ; Hartland, " Legend of Perseus," ii. 258 sqq. 2 " Foik-lore,'' iv. 358, 361. 3 Brand, loc. cii., 724. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 23 his head, thrown into the fire, and he is told to spit. In Gujarat, when an orthodox Shiah Musalman travels with a Sunni, he spits, and among the Roman Catholics of Kanara, at baptism the priest wets his thumb with spittle and with it touches the child's ears and nostrils.^ Salt. We have seen above that salt is also used in the same way. Salt, apparently from its power of checking decay, is regarded as possessing mystical powers. All over Europe the spilling of salt in the direction of a person was con- sidered ominous. " It was held to indicate that something had already happened to one of the family, or was about to befall the person spilling it, and also to denote the rupture of friendship." ^ The custom of putting a plate of salt on a corpse with the object of driving oif evil spirits is common in Great Britain. We have already seen that salt is given to children after they have eaten sweets. Many classes of Hindu ascetics bury their dead in salt. It is waved round the head of the bride and bridegroom, and buried near the house door as a charm. In classical antiquity it was mixed with water and sprinkled on the worshippers. Salutation. Another way of dispelling evil spirits is by the various forms of salutation, which generally consist in the invocation of some deity. The Hindu says, "Ram! Ram!" when he meets a friend, or Jay Gopal! "Glory to Krishna!" or whoever his personal god may be, and the same idea accounts for many of the customs connected with the reception of guests, who, coming from abroad, may bring evil spirits with them. The Separable Soul: Waving. Another series of prophylactics depends on the idea of the ' Campbell, " Notes," 131 ; Tylor, " Primitive Culture," ii. 439. " Brand, loc. cit.^ 668. 24 Folk-lore of Northern India. separable soul or that spirits are always fluttering in the air round a person's head. Hence a long series of customs known as Parachhan, performed at Hindu marriages in Upper India, when lights, a brass tray, grain, and household implements like the rice pounder or grindstone are waved round the head of the married pair as a protective. In Somadeva's tale of Bhunandana we find that he " performs the ceremony of averting evil spirits from all quarters by waving the hand over the head." * This is perhaps one explanation of the use of flags at temples and village shrines, though in some cases they appear to be used as a perch, on which the deity sits when he makes his periodical visits. Hence, too, feathers have a mystic significance, though in some cases, as in those of the peacock and jay, the colour is the important part. Hence the waving of the fan and Chauri over the head of the great man and the use of the umbrella as a symbol of royalty. A woman carrying her child on her return from a strange village, lest she should bring the influence of some foreign evil spirit back with her, will, before entering her own homestead, pass seven little stones seven times round the head of the baby, and throw them in different directions, so as to pass away any evil that may have been contracted. When a sorcerer is called in to attend a case attributed to demoniacal possession, he whisks the patient with a branch of the Nim, Madar, or Camel thorn, all of which are more or less sacred trees and have acquired a reputation as preservatives. When this is com- pleted, the aspersion of the afflicted one, be he man or beast, with some water from the blacksmith's shop, in which iron has been repeatedly plunged and has bestowed additional efficacy upon it, usually follows. Blacksmith, Respect for. The respect paid to the trade of the blacksmith is a curious survival from the time of the early handicrafts and the substitution of weapons of iron for those of stone.* In ^ Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 198. ' Schrader, '•' Prehistoric Antiquities," 163 sqq. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 25 Scotland the same belief in the virtues of the water of the forge prevails, and in Ireland no one will take anything by stealth from such a place.^ In St. Patrick's Hymn we have a prayer against " the spells of women, of smiths, and of druids." Culann, the mystic smith, appears in Celtic folk- lore. In all the mythologies the idea is widespread that the art of smithing was first discovered and practised by super- natural personages. We see this through the whole range of folk-lore, from the Cyclopes to Wayland Smith, who finally came to be connected with the Devil of Christianity." Water. We have already referred to water as a protective against the influence of evil spirits. We see this principle in the rite of ceremonial bathing as a propitiation for sin. It also appears in the use of water which has been blown upon by a holy man as a remedy for spirit possession. Among many menial tribes in the North-Western Provinces with the same object the bride is washed in the water in which the bridegroom has already taken his wedding bath. Again, on a lucky day fixed by the Pandit the rite of Nahawan or ceremonial bathing is performed for the protection of the young mother and her child two or three days after her confinement. Both of them are bathed in a decoction of the leaves of the Nim tree. Then a handful of the seeds of mustard and dill are waved round the mother's head and thrown into a vessel containing fire. When the seeds are consumed the cup is upset, and the mother breaks it with her own foot. Next she sits with grain in her hand, while the household brass tray is beaten to scare demons and the midwife throws the child into the air. All this takes place in the open air in the courtyard of the house. Here we have a series of antidotes to demoniacal 1 Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland," 45 ; Lady Wilde, " Legends," 205. 2 " Folk-lore," ii. 292 ; Rhys, " Lectures," 446, 553 ; Campbell, " Popular Tales," Introduction, Ixx. ; ii. 98 ; Hartland, " Legend of Perseus," 1. yj. 26 Folk-lore of Northern India. possession, the purport of which will be easily understood on principles which have been already explained. Grain. With this use of grain we meet with another valuable antidote. We have it in Great Britain in the rule that " the English, when the bride comes from church, are wont to cast wheat upon her head." ' It survives in our custom of throwing rice over the wedded pair when they start on the honeymoon. On the analogy of other races one object of the rite would seem to be to keep in the soul which is likely to depart at such a crisis in life as marriage. Thus, " in Celebes they think that a bridegroom's soul is apt to fly away at marriage, so coloured rice is scattered over him to induce it to stay. And, in general, at festivals in South Celebes rice is strewed on the head of the person in whose honour the festival is held, with the object of retaining his soul, which at such times is in especial danger of being lured away by envious demons." ^ This rite appears widely in Indian marriage customs. Among the Mhars of Khandesh, on the bridegroom approach- ing the bride's house, a piece of bread is waved round his head and thrown away.^ In a Kunbi's wedding a ball of rice is waved round the boy's head and thrown away, and at the lucky moment grains of rice are thrown over the couple. Among the Telang Nhavis of Bijaypur the chief marriage rite is that the priest throws rice over the boy and girl. The grain acquires special efficacy if it be either parched, and thus purified by fire, or if it be stained in some lucky or demon-scaring colour." Thus, in Upper India grain parched with a special rite is thrown over the pair as they revolve round the marriage shed, and this function is, if possible, performed by the brother of the bride. Rice stained yellow with turmeric is very often used for this purpose. Another device is to make a pile of rice, with a 1 Brand, " Obsenations," 355. 2 Prazer, " Golden Bough," i. 125. 3 "Bombay Gazetteer," xii. 117. * Campbell, " Notes," 95. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 27 knot of turmeric and a copper coin concealed in it. This at a particular stage of the service the bride knocks down with her foot. The Lodhis of the Dakkhin, in the same way, put a pile of rice at the door of the boy's house, which he upsets with his foot. All through Northern India the exerciser shakes grain in a fan, which is, as we shall see, a potent fetish, and by the number of grains which remain in the interstices calculates which particular ghost is worrying the patient. On the same principle the Oraons put rice in the mouth of the corpse, and the Koiris, when they marry, walk round a pile of water-pots and scatter rice on the ground.' The custom of sprinkling grain at marriage appears in many of the folk-tales. Urad. We are familiar in Roman literature with the use of beans at funerals, and at the Lemuria thrice every other night to pacify the ghosts of the dead beans were flung on the fire of the altar to drive the spirits out of the house. The same idea appears in the Carlings or fried peas given away and eaten on the Sunday before Palm Sunday.^ No special sanctity appears to apply to the pea or bean in India, but they are replaced by the Urad pulse, which is much used in rites of all kind, and especially in magic, when it is thrown over the head of the person whom the magician wishes to bring under his control.^ Barley. Barley, another sacred grain, is rubbed over the corpse of a Hindu and sprinkled on the head before the cremation rite is performed. So, the Oraons throw rice on the urn as they take it to the tomb, and sprinkle grain on the ground behind the bones to keep the spirit from coming back.'* 1 Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 261, 321. - Brand, " Observations," 58. ^ Hartland, " Legend of Perseus," ii. 289. * Dalton, ioc. cii., 261. 28 Folk-lore of Northern India. Sesamum. Til or black sesamum, again, has certain qualities of the same kind. Hence it is used in the funeral rites, and in form of Tilanjali or a handful mixed with water is one of the offerings to the sainted dead, and made up in the form of a cow, called Tiladhenu, it is presented to Brahmans. Sheaves. Most grains in the ear have also mystic uses. It is hung up over the house door to repel evil spirits, and in Hos- hangabad they tie a sheaf of corn on a pole and fasten it to the cattle shed as a preservative.' The combination of seven kinds of grain, known as Satnaja, is an ingredient in numerous charms and is used in many forms of worship. Milk. So with the products of the sacred cow, which are, as might have been expected, most valuable for this purpose. Hence the use of Ghilor or clarified butter in the public and domestic ritual. Milk for the same reason is used in offer- ings and sprinkled on the ground as an oblation. Cow- dung, in particular, is regarded as efficacious. After the death or birth impurity the house is carefully plastered with a mixture of cowdung and clay. No cooking place is pure without it, and the corpse is cremated with cakes of cow- dung fuel. Even the urine of the cow is valued as a medicine and a purificant. The cow guards the house from evil, and every rich man keeps a cow so that^his glance may fall on her when he wakes from sleep, and he regards her as the guardian of the household. Colours. Colours, again, are scarers of evil spirits. They particu- larly dread yellow, black, red, and white. The belief in the efficacy of yellow accounts for the use of turmeric in the 1 " Settlement Report," 274. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 29 domestic ritual.^ A few days before the marriage rites commence the bride and bridegroom are anointed with a mixture of oil and turmeric known as Abtan. The bride assumes a robe dyed in turmeric, which she wears until the wedding. The marriage letter of invitation is coloured with turmeric, and splashes of it are made on the wall and worshipped by the married pair. In the old times the woman who performed Sati, and nowadays married women who die, are taken to the pyre wrapped in a shroud dyed with turmeric. The corpse is very often smeared with turmeric before cremation, a custom which is not peculiar to the so- called Aryan Hindus, because it prevails among the Tharus, one of the most primitive tribes of the sub- Himalayan forests. The same principle probably explains the use of yellow clothes by certain classes of ascetics, and of Chandan or sandal-wood in making caste marks and for various cere- monial purposes. Yellow and red are the usual colours of marriage garments, and the parting of the bride's hair is stained with vermilion, though here the practice is probably based on the symbolical belief in the Blood Covenant. The same idea is probably the explanation of the flinging of red powder and water coloured with turmeric at the Holi or spring festival. Black, again, is feared by evil spirits, and the husbandman hangs a black pot in his field to scare spirits and evade the Evil Eye, and young women and children have their eyelids marked with lampblack. In the Mirzapur Baiga's sacrifice the black fowl or the black goat is the favourite victim, and charcoal is valued, some put into the milk as a preservative and some buried under the threshold to guard the household from harm. Grasses. For the same reason various kinds of grass are considered sacred, such as the Kusa, the Diarva, the Darbha. Among the Prabhus of Bombay juice of the Durva grass is poured into the left nostril of a woman when the pregnancy and coming ' " North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 29. 30 Folk-lore of Northern India. of age rites are performed, and the Kanaujiya Brahman husband drops some of the juice down her nose when she reaches maturity/ The Sholapur Mangs when they come back from the grave strew some Hariyali grass and Nim leaves on the place where the deceased died. The MAnj grass is also sacred, and a thread made of it is worn at one stage of the Brahman's life. Some of these sacred grasses form an important ingredient in the Sraddha offerings to the sacred dead, some are used in the marriage and crema- tion ritual, on some the dying man is laid at the moment of dissolution. They are potent to avert the Evil Eye, and hence the mother of Rama and Lakshmana, when she looks at them, breaks a blade of grass." Tattooing. Next come special marks made on the body. Such are the marks branded on various parts of their bodies by many classes of ascetics, and the caste marks made in clay or ashes by most high-class Hindus. It has been suggested that many of these marks are of totemistic origin. That this is so among races beyond the Indian border is almost certainly the case.' But though tattooing, a widespread practice of the Indian people, very possibly originated in totemism, still, as far as has hitherto been ascertained, no distinct trace remains of a tribal tattoo, and it is safer at present to class marks of this kind in the general category of devices to repel evil spirits. Among purely sectarial marks we have the forehead mark of the Saivas, composed of three curved lines like a half-moon, to which is added a round mark on the nose ; it is made with the clay of the Ganges, or with sandal-wood, or the ashes of cowdung, the ashes being supposed to represent the disintegrating force of the deity. The mark of the Vaishnavas is in the form of the foot of Vishnu, and consists of two lines rather oval drawn the whole length of the nose and carried forward in ^ Campbell, " Notes,'' 92. * Growse, " Ramayana," 99. ^ Frazer, " Totemism,'' 26 sq. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 31 straight lines across the forehead. It is generally made with the clay of the Ganges, sometimes with the powder of sandal-wood. The Sakta forehead mark is a small semi- circular line between the eyebrows, with a dot in the middle. The practice of tattooing is common both among the Aryan and Dravidian races, but is more general among the lower than the higher castes. Thus, the Juang women tattoo themselves with three strokes on the forehead just over the nose, and three on each of the temples. They attach no meaning to the marks, have no ceremony in adopting them, and are ignorant of the origin of the practice. The Khariya women make three parallel marks on the forehead, the outer lines terminating at the ends in a crook, and two on each temple. The Ho women tattoo themselves in the form of an arrow, which they regard as their national emblem. The Birhor women tattoo their chests, arms, and ankles, but not their faces. The Oraon women have three marks on the brow and two on each temple. The young^ men burn marks on their fore-arms as part of the ordeal ceremony ; girls, when adult, or nearly so, have themselves tattooed on the arms and back. The Kisan women have no such marks ; if a female of the tribe indulges herself in the vanity of having herself tattooed, she is at once turned adrift as having degraded herself. Here we may have some faint indications of a tribal tattoo, but among most of the tribes which practise the custom it has become purely protective or ornamental.^ Among the Dravidian tribes of the North-Western Pro- vinces tattooing generally prevails. The Korwas and many other of these tribes get their women tattooed by a woman of the Badi sub-division of Nats. They are tattooed only on the breast and arms, not on the thighs. There are no ceremonies connected with it, nor any special pattern. Any girl gets herself tattooed in any figure she approves for a small sum. Well-to-do women always get it done ; but if a woman is not tatooed, it is not considered unlucky. The, 1 Dalton, "Descriptive Ethnology,'' 157, 161, 191, 219, 251. 32 Folk-lore of Northern India, men of the tribe are not tattooed. The Ghasiya women tattoo themselves on the breasts, arms, thighs, and feet. They say that when a woman dies who is not tattooed, the Great Lord Parameswar is displeased and turns her out of heaven, or has her branded with the thorn of the acacia. In the same way among the Chamars, when a woman who has not been tattooed dies, Parameswar asks her where are the marks and signs which she ought to possess to show that she had lived in the world. If she cannot show them, she will in her next birth be re-born as a Bhutni, Pretni, or Rakshasi. At present among low-caste women the process of tattoo- ing is regarded as a species of initiation, and usually marks the attainment of puberty. It thus corresponds with the rite of ear-piercing among males. To the east of the North- West Provinces a girl is not allowed to cook until she is tattooed with a mark representing the Sita ki Rasoi or cook- house of Sita, and in Bengal high-caste people will not drink from the hands of a girl who does not wear the Ullikhi or star-shaped tattoo mark between her eyebrows. A Chamar woman who is not tattooed at marriage will not, it is believed, see her father and mother in the next world. This reminds us of the idea prevalent in Fiji, that women who are not tattooed are liable to special punishment in the land of the dead.' In Bombay the custom has been provided with a Brahmanical legend. One day Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu, told her husband that whenever he went out on business or to visit his devotees she became frightened. Hearing this, Vishnu took his weapons and stamped them on her body, saying that the marks of his weapons would save her from evil. Hence women in Bombay tattoo themselves with the figures of the lotus, conch shell, and discus, and from this the present custom is said to have originated." In Upper India the forms of the tattoo marks fall into ^ Bholanath Chandra, " Travels of a Hindu," i. 326 ; " Panjab Notes and Queries,'' i. 27, 99 ; Farrer, " Primitive Manners," 125. " Campbell, " Notes,'' p. 134. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 33 various classes. Some are rude or conventionalized represen- tations of animals, plants, and flowers. The operators carry- round with them sketches of the different kinds of ornament, and the girl selects these according to taste. The peacock, the horse, the serpent, the scorpion, tortoise, centipede, appear constantly in various forms. Others, again, are representations of jewellery actually worn — necklaces, bracelets, armlets, or rings. Others, again, are purely religious, such as the trident or matted hair of Siva, the weapons of Vishnu, and the cooking house of Sita, the type of wifely virtue. Some of these marks were probably of totemistic origin, but they have now become merely orna- mentative, as was the case in Central Asia in the time of Marco Polo, where they were regarded only as " a piece of elegance or a sign of gentility," and among the Thracians, as described by Herodotus.' It may be noticed that in the time of Marco Polo people used to go from Upper India to Zayton in China to be tattooed.^ These animal forms of tattooing are found also among the Dravidian tribes of the Central Provinces, where the forms used are a peacock, an antelope, or a dagger, and the marks are made on the back of the thighs and legs. In Bengal tattooing is used as a cure for goitre.^ We may close this long catalogue of devices intended to scare spirits, with a number of miscellaneous examples. It seems to be a well-established principle that evil spirits fear leather. On this is perhaps based the idea of the shoe being a mode of repelling the Evil Eye and the influence of demons. We find this constantly appearing in the folk-lore of the West. Thus, the Plighlanders paid particular attention to the leaving of the bridegroom's left shoe without buckle or latchet, to prevent the secret influences of witches on the wedding night. ■* And Hudibras tells how — 1 Yule, " Marco Polo," ii. 69, 99 ; Herodotus, v. 6 ; and for the Dacians, Pliny, " Natural History," vii. 10; xxii. 2. 2 Lor. cit., ii. 218. ^ Hislop, " Papers," ii., note ; Risley, " Tribes and Castes," i. 292. ^ Brand, " Observations," 399. For the Indian versions of Cinderella and her shoe, see " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 102, 121. VOL. II. D 34 Folk-lore of Northern India. Augustus having by oversight Put on his left shoe 'fore his right, Had like to have been slain that day By soldiers mutinying for pay." Maidens in Europe ascertain whether they will be married and who will be their future husbands by throwing the slipper at the new year. The throwing of old shoes at an English wedding seems on the same principle to be based on the idea of scaring the demon of barrenness. According to Mr. Hartland/ the gipsies of Transylvania throw old shoes and boots on a newly married pair when they enter their tent, expressly to enhance the fertility of the union. In the same way in India, people who are too poor to afford another protective place on the top of their houses a shoe heel upwards. This seems to give some additional efficacy to the charm, because we find the same rule in force elsewhere. Thus, in Cornwall, a slipper with the point turned up placed near the bed cures cramp. ^ In Puna, if a man feels that he has been struck by an incantation, he at once takes hold of an upturned shoe.^ The fear which spirits feel for leather is also illustrated by the procedure of the Dravidian Baiga, who flagellates people suffering from demoniacal possession with a tawse or leathern strap. In the Dakkhin a person troubled with nightmare sleeps with a shoe under his pillow, and an exorcist frightens evil spirits by threatening to make them drink water from a tanner's well. We shall see that this is one way of punishing and repelling the power of witches. The Puna Kunbis believe that a drink of water from a tanner's hand destroys the power of a witch. In the Panjab, if a man sits on a currier's stone, he gets boils." The same principle probably accounts for much of the fear or contempt generally felt in India regarding shoe-beating as a form of punishment. At the same time it is said in Persia and Arabia that the dread of a flagellation with the slipper is ^ " Legend of Perseus," i. 171. 2 Hunt, " Popular Romances," 409. ^ Campbell, " Notes," 105. * " North Indian Notes and Queries,'' i. 86. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 35 based on the idea that while a flogging with the regular scourge involves little discredit, a beating with anything not originally intended for the purpose, such as a shoe or knotted cloth, is disgraceful. The same feeling for the power of leather possibly explains the use as a seat of various kinds of skins, such as those of the tiger and antelope, by many kinds of ascetics, and in the old ritual the wife with her husband sat on the hide of a bull to promote the fertility of their union. Garlic. GarHc, again, from its pungency, is valued in the same way. Garlic was one of the substances used by Danish mothers to keep evil from children.' The Swedish bride- groom sews in his clothes garlic, cloves, and rosemary. Garlic was an early English cure for a fiend-struck patient. ^ Juvenal said that the Egyptians had gods growing in their gardens, in allusion to their reverence for onions or garlic. In Sanskrit garlic is called Mlechha-kanda, " the foreigner's root," and its virtues for the removal of demons are so well known that it will be often seen hung from the lintel of the house door. The same idea may account for the very common prejudice among some castes against eating onions. Glass. Glass in the form of beads, which seem to derive some of their efficacy from being perforated, is also very useful in this way. Mirrors from time immemorial have been held to possess the same quality. " Fascinators, Hke basilisks, had their own terrible glance turned against them if they saw themselves reflected," " Si on luy presenie un miror, par endardement reciproque, ces rayons retournent siir l' autheur d' iceux." Philostratus declares that if a mirror be held before a sleeping man during a hail or thunder-storm, the storm will cease. ^ Hence women in India wear mirrors in ^ Brand, " Observations," 335. I Campbell, "Notes," 91, quoting Chambers, "Bojk of Days,'' 720. " Leland, '• Etruscan Roman Remains," 93. D 2 36 Folk-lore of Northern India. their thumb rings, and the Jatni covers her sheet with httle pieces of shining glass. Pieces of horn, especially that which is said to come from the jackal, and that of the antelope, are also efficacious. The bazar Banya treasures up the gaudy labels from his cloth bales for the same purpose. Garlands of flowers possess the same quality, and so do various fruits, such as dates, cocoanuts, betel-nuts, and plantains, which are placed in the lap of the bride or pregnant woman to scare the evil spirits which cause barrenness, and sugar is distributed at marriages. The bones of the camel are very useful for driving off insects from a sugar-cane field, and buried under the threshold keep ghosts out of the house. Pliny says that a bracelet of camel's hair keeps off fever.' Lastly, the demon may be trapped by physical means. " To be delivered from witches they hang in their entries whitethorn gathered on May Day." ^ So, many of the menial castes in the North-West Provinces keep a net and some thorns in the delivery room to scare evil spirits. There are certain persons who are naturally protected from the Evil Eye and demoniacal agency, or who have control over evil spirits. Such is a man born by the foot presentation, who can cure rheumatism and various other diseases by merely rubbing the part affected. Men with double thumbs are considered safe against the Evil Eye, and so is a bald man, apparently because no one thinks it worth his while to envy such people. According to English belief, children born after midnight have power all through their lives of seeing the spirits of the departed. In India, people who are born within the period of the Salono festival in August are not only protected from, but possess the power of casting, the Evil Eye. The same is the case of those who have acci- dentally eaten ordure in childhood. We have already noticed the mystic power of cowdung. Dung generall}' is ' " Panjab Notes and Queries," iv. 132 ; Campbell, * Notes," 284. - Brand, '' Observations,'' 121. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 37 offensive to spirits. It was believed in Europe that horse- dung placed before the house or behind the door brought good luck.' Women who eat dung possess, as we shall see, the power of witchcraft. A man with only one eye is dreaded because he is naturally envious of those with good sight, and he is prover- bially a scoundrel. The giant with one eye is familiar in folk-lore, and he is generally vicious and malignant. We have the black man of Celtic folk-lore who has only one eye and one leg." In the Irish tales Crinnaur, like the Cyclopes, has only one eye. Sindbad in his third voyage encounters a monster of the same kind. Laplanders have a one-eyed giant Stalo, and in one of the modern versions of the Perseus myth there are two hags who have only a single eye between them. The same idea appears in Indian folk-lore. The planet Sukra is said to have only one eye. Such was also the case with the monster Kabandha, who was killed by Rama, and Arayi, the female fiend of the Veda. The one-eyed devil appears in one of the Kashmir tales.* GoNDs : Procedure in Cases of Fascination. The Gonds have a special procedure in cases of deaths which they believe to have occurred through fascination. The burning of the body is postponed till it is made to point out the delinquent. The relations solemnly call upon the corpse to do this, and the theory is that if there has been foul play of any kind, the body on being taken up, will force the bearers to convey it to the house of the person by whom the spell was cast. If this be three times repeated, the owner of the house is condemned, his property is destroyed, and he is expelled from the neighbourhood.'' Amulets. In ordinary cases most people find it advisable to carry an ' Brand, " Observations," 598. - Rhys, " Lectures." 348 ; Miss Cox, " Cinderella," 489 ; Grimm, " Household Tales," ii. 429 ; Hartland, " Legend of Perseus," i. 12. •* Knowles, " Folk-lore of Kashmir," 333. ■• Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology,'' 2S3. 38 Folk-lore of Northern India. amulet of some kind as a preservative. An amulet is pri- marily a portion of a dead man or animal, by which hostile spirits are coerced or their good offices secured.' The amulet, then, in its original sense, is supposed to concen- trate in itself the virtues and powers of the man or animal of which it formed a part. Hence the claws of the tiger, which represent in themselves the innate strength and bravery of the animal, are greatly esteemed for this purpose, and the sportsman, when he shoots a tiger, has to count over the claws carefully to the coolies in charge of the dead animal, or they will certainly misappropriate them. In the same way a portion of the umbilical cord is placed among the clothes of the mother and infant to avert the Evil Eye and scare the demons which are then particularly active. Mr. Ferguson may be correct in his opinion that in India, prior to the distribution of the remains of the Buddha at Kusinagara, we have no historical record of the worship of relics ; "' still the idea must have prevailed widely among the Hindu races, out of whom the votaries of the new faith were recruited. With some of these relics of the Buddha, such as his begging bowl, which was long kept in a Dagoba or Vihara erected by King Kanishka, then removed for a time to Benares, and finally to Kandahar, where it is now held in the highest respect by Musalmans, and has accumulated round it a cycle of legends like those connected with the Sangrail, we reach the zone of pure fetishism. Another form of amulet is a piece of metal, stone, bone, or similar substance worn on the person, with an invocation inscribed on it to some special god. These are very com- monly used among Muhammadans. By Hindus the " Yantras or mystic diagrams are thought to be quite as effective in their operation as the Mantras or spells, and, of course, a combination of the two is held to be absolutely irresistible. An enemy may be killed or removed to some other place, or a whole army destroyed, or salvation and ^ Spencer, "Principles of Sociology." i. 254, note, 301. 2 "History of Indian Architecture," 57 sqq. ; Cunningham, "Archzeo- logical Reports," ii. 87 ; xvi. 8 sqq. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 39 supreme felicity obtained by drawing a six-sided or eight- sided diagram and writing a particular Mantra underneath. If this be done with the blood of an animal killed sacrificially in a Smasana or place where corpses are burned, no power in earth or heaven can resist the terrific potency of the charm." ^ On the same principle Hindus head their letters with the words Srt Rdmjtl "the great god, Rama," or the figures 74, of which one not very probable explanation is that they represent the weight in maunds of the gold orna- ments taken from the Rajput dead at the famous siege of Chithor. The equilateral triangle is another favourite mystic sign. According to the Christian ideas, the figure of three triangles intersected and containing five lines, is called the pentangle of Solomon, and when it is delineated on the body of a man, it marks the five places in which our Saviour was wounded ; it was, therefore, regarded as B.fnga deinoiiujft, or a means of frightening demons.^ Similarly in Northern India, the equilateral triangle is regarded as a mystic sign, and the little broadcloth bags hung round the necks of children to avert the Evil Eye are made in this shape. The diamond shape is also approved because it contains two equilateral triangles base to base. Another form of mystic sign is the mark of the spread hand with the fingers extended. This is made by the women of the family on the outer wall and round the door-post, and is considered to be particularly efficacious. Mr. Campbell suggests that the custom is based on the belief in the hand being a spirit entry. ^ Natives will tell you that it is because the number five, that of the fingers, is lucky. However this may be, the custom is very generally prevalent. The Bloody Hand of Ulster, worn as a crest by the Baronets of one creation, is well known. ^ The Uchlas of Puna strew sand on the spot where the dead man breathed his last. They cover the spot with a basket, which they raise next morning 1 Monier-Williams, " Brahmanism and Hinduism,'' 203. - Aubrey, " Remaines," 57. ' " Notes," 177. ■* Westropp, " Primitive Symbolism," 58 sqq., 61 sqq. 40 Folk-lore of Northern India. in the hope of finding the mark of a palm, which shows that the dead is pleased and brings vigour on the family ; and the Thakurs on the fifth day after the birth of a child dip a hand in red powder and water and make a mark on the wall of the lying-in room, which they worship.' At the rock-cut temple of Tilok Sendur in Hoshangabad, an annual festival is held, and those who come to demand any special benefit, such as health or children, mark their vow by staining their hand dipped in red paint against the rock wall, fingers upward. If the prayer be heard, they revisit the place and make the same mark, this time with the fingers downward ; but whether Mahadeva is not gracious to his votaries, or whether it is that the sense of favours to come is not keen enough after the prayer of the moment has been granted, the hand-stamps pointing downwards are not a tenth in number of those pointing upwards.^ The stamping of the hand and five fingers immersed in a solution of sandal-wood has always been regarded as a peculiarly solemn mode of attesting an important document, and it is said that Muhammad himself adopted this practice.''^ There are numerous varieties of these protective amulets. One purpose which they serve is the procuring of offspring. Children naturally require special protection. Thus, the Mirzapur Korwas tie on the necks of their children roots of various jungle plants, such as the Siyar Singhi, which owes its name and repute to its resemblance to the so-called horn of the jackal. In cases of disease the Kharwars wear leaves of the Bel, a sacred tree, cloves and flowers selected by a Brahman. In the Konkan, in order that a child may not suffer from the Evil Eye, a necklace of marking nuts is put round its neck.'* The Gujars of Hazara hang the berries of the Batkar tree {Celtis caucasid) round the necks of men and animals to protect them from the Evil Eye.* The pious Musalman inscribes on his amulet the five verses known as ^ " Bombay Gazetteer," xviii. 473, 426. ^ '' Settlement Report," 59 sqq. ^ Tod, "Annals," i. 383, note, 411, note. ^ Campbell, "Notes," 251. ' " Panjab Notes and Queries,'' ii. 44. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 41 Ayatu-1-Hi£z or " verses of protection," or he makes a magic square with the letters making up the word Hafiz, " the protector." Many village Musalmans use little stone or glass tablets for the same purpose. Some have a hocus- pocus inscription purporting to be a verse of the Quran in x\rabic ; others have the name of Fatima coupled with that of the famous martyrs Hasan and Husain. Another amulet of a very elaborate character is described as containing a piece of the umbilical cord encased in metal, a tiger's claw, two claws of the large horned owl turned in opposite direc- tions, and encased in metal, a stone known as the Athraha ka manka, because it has the property of turning eight colours according to the light in which it is placed (probably a tourmaline or quartzose pebble), and a special Evil Eye destroyer in the shape of a jasper or marble bead. These live articles are necessaries, but as an extra precaution the amulet contained some crude gold, a whorled shell, an ancient copper coin, some ashes from the fire of a Jogi ascetic, and the five ingredients of the sacred incense. The owner admitted that it would have been improved had it also contained a magic square.' This reminds us of the necklace of amber beads hung round the neck of Scotch children to keep off ill-luck, and the Irish scapular, a piece of cloth on which the name of the Virgin Mary is written on one side, and I.H.S. on the other, which are preservatives against evil spirits. In old times in England such charms were called Characts, and one found with a criminal contained an invocation to the three holy kings, Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar.' One of the most valuable of these protectives is the magic circle, which appears in various forms through the whole range of folk-lore. The idea is that no evil spirit can cross the sacred line. Thus, in Mirzapur they make a circle of grain round the circular pile of corn on the threshing-floor to guard it from evil. Among some castes the circle round ' " Panjab Notes and Queries," iii. i86. " " Folk-lore," ii. 75 ; Lady Wilde, " Legends,'' no; Brand, " Observa- tions,'' 754. 42 Folk-lore of Northern India. which the bride and bridegroom revolve at marriage is guarded by a circular line of string hung on the necks of a number of water-pots surrounding it. We have seen how the Baiga perambulates his village and drops a line of spirits round the boundary to repel foreign ghosts. This accounts for the stone circles which are found both in Europe and in India, and in Ireland are considered to be the resort of the fairies.^ We have constant references to the same custom in the folk-tales. Lakshmana, in the Ramayana, draws such a circle round Sita when he is obliged to leave her alone. We have many references to the circle within which the ascetic or magician sits when he is performing his sorceries. Thus, in the story of Nischayadatta, the ascetics "quickly made a great circle with ashes, and entering into it, they lighted a fire with fuel, and all remained there muttering a charm to protect themselves." In the tales of the Vetala, we find the mendicant under a banyan tree engaged in making a circle, and Ksantisila makes a circle of the yellow powder of bones, the ground within which was smeared with blood, and which had pitchers of blood placed in the direction of the cardinal points." The same idea appears in the magic circle used as an ordeal, or to compel payment of a debt. Thus, we read in Marco Polo : ^ " If a debtor have been several times asked by his creditor for payment and shall have put him off day by day with promises, then if the creditor once meet the debtor and succeed in drawing a circle round him, the latter must not pass out of this circle until he shall have satisfied the claim, or given security for its discharge. If he in any other case presume to pass the circle, he is punished with death, as a transgressor against right and justice." In Northern India this circle is known as a Gururu or Gaurua, and a person who takes an oath stands within it, or takes from inside an article which he claims. In one form of this ceremony the circle is made on the ground with calf's dung 1 Lady Wilde, loc. dL, 79. 2 Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 2)37 '■> ii- 233, 358. ^ ii. 279. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 43 by an unmarried girl, and in the centre is placed a vessel of water. If money is in dispute, the amount claimed is placed in the water vessel by the defendant. The narrator tells a story to prove the efficacy of the rite : — " My father owed a Kalwar one rupee and the Kalwar claimed five. The matter was brought before the tribal council, and the Kalwar swore to the five rupees upon the Gaurua. Within an hour his boy, while playing behind the house, was carried off by a wolf. He was rescued, but he was under the curse of the Gaurua, and shortly after he put his finger into a rat hole, was bitten by a snake, and died within the hour." ^ The Ring, Bracelet, and Knotted Cord. From the same principle arises the belief in the magic virtue of the ring, the bracelet, and the knotted cord. To begin with rings — we have in Plato the story of Gyges, who by means of the ring of invisibility introduced himself to the wife of Candaules, King of Lycia, murdered the latter and got possession of his kingdom. This is like the cloak or cap which appears so constantly in folk-lore. In the Indian tales invisibility is generally obtained by means of a magic ointment, to which there are many parallels in Western stories. We find also the magic ring, which, hke that of Ala-ud-din, when touched procures the presence and aid of the demons. A woman's nose-ring in India has special respect paid to it, and for a stranger even to mention it is a breach of delicacy.^ It is the symbol of married happiness, and is removed when the wearer becomes a widow. Among Muhammadans, Shiah women remove their nose-rings during the Muharram as a sign of mourn- ing. There was an old habit in England of marrying by the rush ring, " but it was chiefiy practised by designing men, for the purpose of debauching their mistresses, who sometimes were so infatuated as to believe that this mock 1 " North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 61. - Tod, "Annals,'' i. 457 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries,'' i. 169. 44 Folk-lore of Northern India. ceremony was a real marriage.^ In the same way in India a ring of Kusa grass is put on the finger during the most sacred rites and at marriage. The custom appears in the folk-tales. The ring represents an imperishable bond between the giver and the receiver, and is a symbol of the original blood covenant, which is an important element in the belief of all primitive people.^ The idea of the magic ring constantly appears in folk- lore. Thus, we have the ring placed in a sacred square and sprinkled with butter-milk, which immediately gives whatever the owner demands. In one of the Kashmir tales the merchant's son speaks to the magic ring, and immediately a beautiful house and a lovely woman with golden hair appeared.^ So, in the tales of Somadeva, Sridatta places a ring on the finger of the unconscious princess and she immediately revives ; the disloyal wife here, as in the "Arabian Nights," takes a ring from each of her lovers as a token.'' The same idea attaches to the bracelet, which is in close connection with the soul of the wearer. Such is the Chan- danhar or sandal-wood necklace of Chandan Raja, and Sodewa Bai is born with a golden necklace round her neck, concerning which her parents consulted the astrologers. They announced, " This is no common child; the necklace of gold about your daughter's neck contains your daughter's soul. Let it, therefore, be guarded with the utmost care ; for if it were taken off and worn by another person, she would die." ^ The same idea appears in the Kashmir tales, where Panj Phul refuses to give up her necklace, as "it contains the secret of her life, and was a charm to her against all dangers, sickness and trials ; deprived of it she might become sick and miserable, or be taken away from ' Brand, " Observations," 359. - Trumbull, " Blood Covenant," 65 ; Lubbock, " Origin of Civilization," 25; Tylor, "Early History," 128 sq. ; Jones, "Finger-ring Lore," 91 sqcj. ^ Kno.vles, " Folk-tales," 23. ■» Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 61 ; ii. 80; Lane, "Arabian Nights," i.9. ° Miss Frere, " Old Deccan Days," 230, 236. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 45 them and die." ^ All this is based on the conception of the external soul, to which reference has been already made. The Mais of Birbhum exchange necklaces at marriages, and the Princess Kalingasena wears a bracelet and necklace of lotus fibre to secure relief from the pains of love." The same idea shows itself in the use of strings and knots. In Northern India a piece of bat's bone is tied round the ankle as a remedy for rheumatism, and answers to the eel- skin, which is used for the same purpose in Europe.'* In the Shetland Islands, to cure a sprain, a thread of black wool with nine knots is tied on the injured place with a metrical spell. ^ An Italian charm says : " Take from a live hare the ankle bone, remove the hair from his belly, from the hair make a thread, and with it tie the bone to the body of the sufferer, and you will see a wonderful cure." * In Ireland a strand of black wool is tied round the ankle, and a charm is recited to cure a sprain ; a red string is tied round a child's neck in chincough and epilepsy.*' In Hoshangabad a thread is tied round the ankle as a remedy in fever. If possible, a bit of Ashtara root should be fastened in the knot, and before tying it an oblation of butter is burnt before it.^ Similarly, a peacock's feather tied on the ankle cures a wound. In the Panjab, it is a charm against snake- bite to smoke one of the tail feathers of the peacock in a tobacco pipe.^ The Rajput father binds round the arm of his new-born infant a root of that species of grass known as the Amardub or " imperishable " Dub, well known for its nutritive qualities and luxuriant vegetation, in the same way as Scotch women wear round their necks blue woollen threads or small cords till they wean their children.^ We ' Knowles, " Folk-tales," 467. ^ Risley, "Tribes and Castes,'' ii. 49 ; Tawney, loc. cit^, i. 300. ^ Henderson, " Folk-lore of Northern Counties,'' 155 ; Gregor, " Folk- lore of NorthEast Scotland," 145. ■• " Notes and Queries.'' i. ser. iv. 500. ^ Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 259. 8 Lady Wilde, " Legends," 195, 197, 199. 7 •' Settlement Report," 278, 286. ^ " North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 15. 3 Tod, "Annals," i. 415; Henderson, "Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 20. 45 Folk-lore of Northern India. have already noticed the efficacy of various grasses as spirit scarers. Lastly, the cord itself has powers in folk-lore, and we meet with the magic cord, which, tied round the neck of the hero by a witch, makes him turn into a ram or an ape/ The belief in the efficacy of the magic circle accounts for a variety of other customs. Thus, in a family sacrifice among the Chakmas of Bengal, round the whole sacrificial platform had been run, from the house mother's distaff, a long white thread which encircled the altar, and then carried into the house, was held at the two ends by the good man's wife. Among the Haris, at marriages, the right hand little finger of the bridegroom's sister's husband is pierced, and a few drops of blood allowed to fall on threads of jute, which are rolled up in a tiny pellet. This the bridegroom holds in his hand, while the bride attempts to snatch it from him. Her success in the attempt is considered to be a good omen of the happiness of the marriage.^ Here we have a survival of descent in the female line, the blood covenant, and the magic influence of the cord all combined. Connected with this is the belief in the forming a con- nection by knotting the magic string. We have the Euro- pean true love-knot, an emblem of fidelity between the pair betrothed. So in Italy interlaced serpents and all kinds of interweaving, braiding, and interlacing cords are valuable as protectives because they attract the eyes of witches.^ Thus, among the Karans of Bengal, the essential part of the marriage ceremony is believed to be the laying of the bride's right hand in that of the bridegroom, and binding their two hands together with a piece of string spun in a special way." This belief in the mystic power of knots is common in all folk-lore.' The clothes of the bride and bridegroom ^ Knowles, "Folk-tales of Kashmir," 71; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 340. 2 Risley, " Tribes and Castes." i. 173, 315. ^ Leland, "Etruscan Roman Remains," 168. ■* Risley, loc. cit., i. 425. ^ Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 576, quoting Lenormant, " Chal- dean Magic and Sorcery,'' 141; Ralston, "Songs of the Russian People," 288. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 47 in Upper India are knotted together as they revolve round the sacred fire. A similar belief explains the wearing of the Janeu or sacred thread by high-caste Hindus. The knots on it, known as Brahma-granthi, or " the knots of the Creator," repel evil influences, and Muhammadans on their birthdays tie knots in a cord, which is known as the Salgi- rah or " year knot." Face-covering. Another device to avoid fascination or other dangerous influence is to cover the face so as to prevent the evil glance reaching the victim for whom it is intended. Thus, at widow marriages in Northern India, the bride and bride- groom are covered with a sheet during the rite, probably in order to avert the envious or malignant influence of the spirit of the woman's first husband. It is in secret that the bridegroom marks the parting of the bride's hair with vermilion. So in Bombay,^ the Chitpawan bride in one part of the wedding service has her head covered with a piece of broadcloth. The Ramoshis tie the ends of the bride's and bridegroom's robes to a cloth which four men of the family hold over them. The Dhors of Puna put a face-cloth on the dead, which is a general practice all over the world. The same belief is almost certainly at the root of much of the customs of Pardah and the seclusion of women. It is as much through fear of fascination as modesty that women draw their sheet across the face when they meet a stranger in the streets. We come across the same feeling in the rule by which all doors were closed when the princess in the "Arabian Nights" went to the bath, and when not long ago the Mikado of Japan and other Eastern potentates took their walks abroad. We thus reach by another route the cycle of Godiva legends." Omens. Closely connected with the class of ideas which we have 1 Campbell, " Notes," 60. ■2 Harland, " Science of Fairy Tales," 79 sqq. 48 Folk-lore of Northern India. been discussing is the belief in omens. This constitutes a very important branch of folk-lore both in the West and in the East. The success of a journey or enterprise is believed in a great measure to depend on the object which was first seen in the morning, or observed on the road at an early period of the march. Thus, according to Theophras- tus, " The superstitious man, if a weasel run across his path, will not pursue his walk until some one else has tra- versed the road, or until he has thrown three stones across it." And Sir Thomas Brown writes : " If an hare cross the highway, there are few above threescore years that are not perplexed thereat, which, notwithstanding, is but an augurial terror according to that received expression, Inauspicatum dat iter oblatus lepiis. And the ground of the conceit was probably no greater than this, that a fearful animal passing by us portended unto us something to be feared ; as upon the like consideration, the meeting of a fox presaged some future imposture." Tulasi Das, in his Ramayana, sums up the favourable omens : — " On the left-hand side a blue-necked jay was picking up food, as if to announce the very highest good fortune ; on a fair field on the right were a crow and a mungoose in the sight of all ; a woman was seen with a pitcher and a child ; a fox showed himself winding about ; and in front a cow was suckling its calf ; a herd of deer came out on the right ; a Brahmani kite promised all success ; also a Syama bird perched on a tree to the left ; a man was met bearing curds, and two learned Brahmans with books in their hands." ' The face of a Teli or oilman, perhaps from the dirt which accompanies his business, is about the worst which can be seen in the early morning ; but, with the curious incon- sistency which crops up everywhere in phases of similar belief, that of a sweeper is lucky. His face should be always looked at first, but on meeting a Brahman, the glance should start from his feet. ' Growse, 146. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 49 The Thags, like all criminal tribes of the present day, were great believers in what Dr. Tylor calls Angang or meeting omens.' With them, if a wolf crossed the path from right to left it was considered a bad omen ; if from right to left the import was uncertain. The call of the wolf was considered ominous ; if heard during the day, the gang had immediately to leave the neighbourhood. The same idea attached to a crow sitting silent on a tree, which is curiously in contradistinction to the Roman belief — Saepe sinistra cava praedixit ab ilice comix. It was also considered very unlucky if a member of the gang had his turban knocked off by accidentally touching a branch. The jungle tribes have a strong belief in such omens. The Korwas of Mirzapur abandon a journey if a jackal cross the .road from the left, or if a little bird, known as the Suiya or small parrot, calls in the same direction. The Pataris and Majhwars return if the Nilgae cross the road from the right. All natives have more or less the same feeling, and scientific treatises have been written on the subject. Men- tioning a monkey in the morning brings starvation for the rest of the day; though looking on its face is considered lucky. Hence monkeys are commonly tied in stables to protect horses, and an old adage says that "the evil of the stable is on the monkey's head." So, in Morocco the wealthy Moors keep a wild boar in their stables, in order that the Jinn and evil spirits may be diverted from the horses and enter into the boar." For the same reason an EngKsh groom is fond of keeping a cat near his horses. If a dog flaps its ears and shakes its head while any business is going on, disaster is sure to follow, and people careful in such matters will stop the work if they can. The baying of a dog indicates death and misfortune, an idea common in British folk-lore.^ The time when screech-owls cry and lean dogs howl, And spirits walk and ghosts break up their graves. ^ "Primitive Culture," i. 120. ^ Frazer, "Golden Bough," ii. 151. ^ Henderson, " Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 48 ; Lady Wilde, '• Legends," 146 sqq. VOL. II. TT 50 Folk-lore of Northern India. Even the little house lizard is, like his kinsfolk, the " mur- dering basilisks, their softest touch as smart as lizard's stings," considered by the BengaHs very unlucky, and when they hear its twittering they postpone a journey.' The hare is always a bad omen. He is a god among the Kalmucs, who call him Sakya Muni, or the Buddha, and say that on earth he allowed himself to be eaten by a starv- ing man, for which gracious act he was raised to domineer over the moon, where they profess to see him. There are traces of the same idea in Upper India.' The sites of many cities are said to have been founded where a hare crossed the path of the first settler. The hare is detested by the agricultural and fishing population of the Hebrides, and it is one of the ordinary disguises of the witch in European folk-lore.^ Black is, of course, unlucky, and if a man, when digging the foundations of a new house, turns up a piece of charcoal, it is advisable to change the site. Owls are naturally of evil omen. Even the stout-hearted Zalim Sinh, the famous regent of Kota, abandoned his house because an owl hooted on the roof.^ The hooting of the owl is a sign that the bird means to leave the place, and wise people would do well to follow his example. One kind of owl, the Raghui Chiraiya, learns people's names, and if any one by chance answer his call he is sure to die. To see a Dhobi, or washerman, who is associated with foul raiment, is exceedingly dangerous. I once had a bearer who was sadly afflicted because on tour he had to sleep in the same tent with a Dhobi. The old man was constantly bruising his shins over the ropes and pegs, because he was in the habit of stumbling out before dawn with his hands ^ Lai Bihari De, " Govinda Samanta," i. 12. 2 Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 66. It has been suggested that the idea arose from the Sanskrit word sasin, meaning '• hare- marked" or " the moon " ; but this seems rather putting the cart before the horse. Conway, " Demonology," i. 125; Gubernatis, "Zoological Mythology,'' ii. 8; Aubrey, " Remaines," 20, 109. 3 "Bombay Gazetteer," vi. 126; Gregor, "Folk-lore of North-East .Scotland," 128 ; Lady Wilde, '' Legends," 179. ■» Tod, " Annals," ii. 577 sq. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 51 pressed over his eyes to protect himself from the sight of his ill-omened companion. A one-eyed man is, as we have already said, very unlucky. When Jaswant Rao Holkar lost one of his eyes, he said, " I was before bad enough : but now I shall be the Guru, or preceptor, of rogues." ' I once had an office clerk afflicted in this way, and his colleagues refused to sit in the same room with him, because their accounts always went wrong when he looked in their direction. When it was impossible to provide any other accommodation for him, they insisted that he should cover the obnoxious organ with a handkerchief when he had to work in their neighbourhood. One of the last of the Anglo-Indians, who had become thoroughly orientalized, used to insist on his valet, when he came to wake him, holding in his hand a tray containing some milk and a gold coin, so that his first glance on waking might fall on these lucky articles. Numbers. There are mystic qualities attached to numbers. Thus, when Hindus have removed the ashes from a burning ground they write the figures 49 on the spot where the corpse was cremated. The Pandits explain this by saying that when written in Hindi the figures resemble the conch-shell and wheel of Vishnu, or that it is an invocation to the forty- nine winds of heaven to come and purify the ground. It is more probably based on the idea that the number seven, as is the case all over the world, has some mystic application. So in the folk-tales the number three has a special applica- tion to the tests of the hero who endures the assaults of demons or witches for three successive nights. The idea of luck in odd numbers is universal, and the seventh son of a seventh son is gifted with powers of healing. Bodily Functions. The functions of the body supply many omens. Thus, in 1 Malcolm, " Central India," i. 253, note. E 2 52 Folk-lore of Northern India. Somadeva we read : *' My right eye throbbed frequently, as if with joy, and told me that it was none other than she." ^ " When our cheek burns, or ear tingles, we usually say some one is talking of us," writes Sir Thomas Brown, *' a conceit of great antiquity, and ranked among superstitious opinions by Pliny. He supposes it to have proceeded from the notion of a signifying Genius, or Universal Mercury, that conducted sounds to their distant subjects, and taught to hear by touch." The number of beliefs of this class is infinite and recorded in numerous popular handbooks. Lucky and Unlucky Days. So, there are days which are lucky and unlucky. A Persian couplet lays down that one should not go east on Saturday and Monday ; west on Friday and Sunday ; north on Tues- day and Wednesday ; south on Thursday. Even Lord Burghley advised his son to be cautious as regards the first Monday in April, when Cain was born and Abel slain ; the second Monday in August, when Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed ; the last Monday in December, which was the birthday of Judas. Akbar laid down that the clothes "which came into his wardrobe on the first day of the month Farwardin were unlucky." The way some people get over omens of this kind is to send some article ahead of the traveller on the unlucky day, which absorbs the ill omen, which would otherwise have fallen upon him. The catalogue of superstitions of this class might be almost indefinitely extended. The principles on which most of them depend are clear enough. They rest on a sort of sympathetic magic. Things which are good-looking, people who are healthy or prosperous, give favourable omens, while those that are ugly, or of low caste, or associated with menial or unpleasant duties, and so on, are ominous. Euro- peans in India usually quite fail to realize the influence which such ideas exercise over the minds of the people. Most of us have been struck by the almost unaccountable * Tawney, loc ctf., \\ 128. - Blochmann, " Aini Akbari,'' i. 91. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 53 failure of natives to attend a summons from the Courts, to keep an appointment to meet a European officer for the inspection of a school or market. If inquiries are made it will often be found that some idea of this kind explains the matter. Thus, Colonel Tod describes how he had a visit from Manik Chand. " He looked very disconsolate and explained that he had seven times left his tent and as often turned back, the bird of omen having each time passed him on the adverse side ; but that at length he had determined to dis- regard it, as having forfeited confidence he was indifferent to the future." ^ The same idea of good or evil omen attaches to many places and persons. " Nolai was built by Raja Nol. Its modern appellation of Barnagar has its origin in a strange, vulgar superstition of names of ill omen, which must not be pro- nounced before the morning meal. The city is called either Nolai or Barnagar, according to the hour at which the mention becomes necessary." " So with the town of Jammu in Kashmir, which is unlucky frorn its association with Yama, the god of death ; with Talwara in the Hoshyarpur District, which is connected with the sword {talwdr) ; with Rohtak, which should be called Rustajgarh, and with numerous other places in Northern India. Thus, if people want to speak of Bulandshahr in the morning they call it by the old Hindi name of Unchganw; Bhonganw in Mainpuri they call Pachkosa ; Nanauta in Saharanpur, Phutashahr ; Mandwa in Fatehpur, Rotiwala, and so on.^ So, there is hardly a village in which it is not considered ominous to name before breakfast some one who, from his misery, rascality, or some other reason, is considered un- lucky. In Mathura there is a tank built by Raja Patni Mall. " Should a stranger visit it in the morning and inquire of any Hindu by whom it was constructed, he will have con- ' "Annals," i. 694. 2 Malcolm, " Central India,'' i. 12, note. ' "North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 137, 207; ii. 28; iii. iS ; " Panjab Notes and Queries," i. 15, 87, 137. 54 Folk-lore of Northern India. siderable difficulty in eliciting a straightforward answer. The Raja, it is said, was of such a delicate constitution that he could never at any time take more than a few morsels of the simplest food ; hence arises the belief that any one who mentions him the first thing in the morning will, like him, have to pass the day fasting." ^ When we wonder at people suffering bondage of this kind, we must not forget that similar beliefs prevail in our own country. '' In Buckie there are certain family names which no fisherman will pronounce. The ban lies particularly heavy on Ross. Coull also bears it, but not to such a degree. The folks of that village talk of spitting out the bad name." - A similar euphemistic form of expression is often used in regard to animals. If you are civil and do not abuse the house rats, they will not damage your goods.'' The Mirzapur Pataris when they have to mention a monkey in the morning, call him Hanuman, and the bear Jatari, or "he with the long hair," or Dimkhauiya, "he that eats white ants." The Pankas call the camel Lamb- ghincha or "long-necked." "I asked the Raja," says Gen. Sleeman, "whether we were likely to fall in with any hares, making use of the term Khargosh, or * ass-eared.' " " Certainly not," said the Raja, " if you begin by abusing them by such a name. Call them Lambkanna or ' long-eared,' and you will get plenty." It is, of course, easy to avoid the effect of evil omens by the use of a little tact and wit, as was the case with William the Conqueror, and there are many natives who are noted for their cleverness in this way. Of an Eastern Sultan it is told that, leaving his palace on a warlike expedition, his standard touched a cluster of lamps, called Surayya, because they resembled the Pleiades. He would have turned back, but one of his officers said, " My Lord ! our standard has reached the Pleiades;" so he was relieved, advanced, and was victorious. ' Growse, " Mathura," 128. ^ Gregor, '• Folk-lore of North-East Scotland," 200 sq. ^ " North Indian Note and Queries,'' i. 15. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 55 Facilitating Departure of and Barring the Ghost. We now come to consider the various means adopted to facilitate the journey of the departing soul, and to prevent it from returning as a malignant ghost to bring trouble, disease, or death on the survivors. First comes the custom of placing the dying man on the ground at the moment of dissolution. This is done partly, as we have seen, through some feeling of the sanctity of Mother earth and that anyone resting on her bosom is safe from demoniacal agency, and partly that the spirit may meet with no obstruction in its passage through the air. This last idea prevails very generally. Thus, in Great Britain, death is believed to be retarded and the dying person kept in a state of suffering by having any lock closed or any bolt shut in the dwelling.^ The tortures which the soul undergoes in its journey to the land of the dead are vividly pictured in some of the sacred writings.^ He is scorched by heat and pierced by wind and cold, attacked by beasts of prey, stumbhng through thorns and tilth, until he at last reaches the dread river Vaitarani, which rolls its flood of abominations between him and the other shore. So, when a Hindu dies, a lamp made of flour is placed in his hands to light his ghost to the realm of Yama. Devout people believe that the spirit takes three hundred and sixty days to accomplish the journey, so an offering of that number of lamps is made. In order, also, to help him on his way, they feed a Brahman every day for a year ; if the deceased was a woman, a Brahmani is fed. The lamps are hghted facing the south, and this is the only occasion on which this is done, because the south is the realm of death, and no one will sleep or have their house door opening towards that ill-omened quarter of the sky. With the same intention of aiding the spirit on his way, the relations howl during the funeral rites, like the keeners ' Hunt, " Popular Romances," 379 ; " Contemporary Review," xlviii. 108 ; Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland," 206. 2 Monier-Williams, " Brihmanism and Hinduism," 293. 56 Folk-lore of Northern Indl\. at an Irish wake, in order to scare the evil spirits who would obstruct the passaj^e of the soul to its final rest.' Another plan is to carry out the corpse by a special way, which is then barred up, so that it may not be able to find its way back. The same end is attained by carrying out the corpse feet foremost. Thus Marco Polo writes : " Some- times their sorcerers shall tell them that it is not good luck to carry the corpse out by the door, so they have to break a hole in the wall, and to draw it out that way when it is taken to the burning." It is needless to say that the same custom prevails in Great Britain." The Banjaras of Khandesh reverse the process. They move their huts after a death, and make a special entrance instead of the ordinary door, which is supposed to be polluted by the passage of the spirit of the dead." A somewhat similar custom prevails among the Maghs of Bengal. When the friends return from the crema- tion ground, if it is the master of the house who has died, the ladder leading up to the house is thrown down, and they must effect an entrance by cutting a hole in the back wall and so creeping up.^ The theory appears to be that the evil spirits who were on the watch for the ghost may be lurking near the route by which the corpse was removed. We have the same idea in the European custom of saluting a corpse which is being carried past. Grose distinctly states that the homage was really offered to the attendant evil spirits.^ So, the Birhors of Bengal, on the sixth day after birth, take the child out of the house by an opening made in the wall, so as to evade the evil spirit on the watch at the door.'' The most elaborate precautions are, however, devoted to barring out the ghost and preventing its return to its former home. The first of these consist of rules to prevent the ' Spencer, " Principles of Sociology,'' i. 153. 2 Gregor, loc. cit., 206 ; Conway, " Uemonology," i. 53 ; Farrer, " Primitive Manners," 23. * •' Bombay Gazetteer," xii. 107 ; Campbell, " Notes," 394. ■* Risley, " Tribes and Castes," ii. 34. * Brand, " Observations," 450. ^ Dalton, "Descriptive Ethnology,'' 219. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 57 breach of the curiosity taboo. All through folk-lore we have instances of the danger of looking back, as in the case of Lot's wife. One of the maxims of Pythagoras was : " On setting out on a journey, do not return back ; for if you do the fairies will catch you." ^ In one of the Kashmir tales the youth is warned not to look back, otherwise he would be changed into a pillar of stone." In one of the Itahan spells the officiant is told : " Spit behind you thrice and look not behind you."^ In an Indian tale the god promises to help the Brahman and to follow him. The Brahman looks back and the deity becomes a stone. ^ The danger of looking back is that the person's soul may be detained among the ghosts of the dead. This is the reason why Hindu mourners do not look back when they are return- ing from the cremation ground, and so we find that in Naxos it is a rule that none of the women who follow the bier must look back, for if she do she will die on the spot, or else one of her relations will die.'^ Another means is to bar the return of the ghost in a physical way. Thus, when the Aheriyas of the North- western Provinces burn the corpse, they fling pebbles in the direction of the pyre to prevent the spirit accompanying them. In the Himalayas, when a man has attended the funeral ceremonies of a relative, he takes a piece of the shroud worn by the deceased and hangs it on some tree in the cremation ground, as an offering to the spirits which frequent such places. On his return, he places a thorny bush on the road wherever it is crossed by another path, and the nearest male relative of the deceased, on seeing this, puts a stone on it, and pressing it down with his feet, prays the spirit of the dead man not to trouble him." Among the Bengal Limbus, the Phedangma attends the funeral, and delivers a brief address to the departed spirit on the general ' "Folk-lore," i. 155. - Knowles, " Folk-tales," 401. ^ Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 260. * " North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 10 ; iii. 90. ' " Folk-lore," iv. 257. ^ "Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 832 ; Tylor, " Primitive Culture," ii. 126; Wilson, " Essays," ii. 292 ; Spencer, " Principles of Sociology," i. 147. 58 Folk-lore of Northern India. doom of mankind and the succession of life and death, concluding with the command to go where his fathers have gone, and not to come back to trouble the living with dreams.' Practically the same custom still prevails in Ireland. When a corpse is carried to the grave, it is the rule for the bearers to stop half-way while the nearest relatives build up a small monument of loose stones, and no hand would dare to disturb this monument while the world lasts." In the case of the Dhangars and Basors, both menial tribes in the North-Western Provinces, we come across an usage which appears to be of a very primitive type and to be intended to secure the same object of barring the return of the ghost. After they have buried the corpse they return to the house of the dead man, kill a hog, and after separating the limbs, which are cooked for the funeral feast, they bury the trunk in the courtyard of the house, making an invoca- tion to it as the representative of the dead man, and ordering him to rest there in peace and not worry his descendants. In the grave in which they bury this they pile stones and thorns to keep the ghost down. Many other mourning customs appear to be based on the same principle. Thus, the old ritual directs that all who return from a funeral must touch the Lingam, fire, cow- dung, a grain of barley, a grain of sesame and water — " all," as Professor De Gubernatis says, " symbols of that fecundity which the contact with a corpse might have destroyed." ^ The real motive is doubtless to get rid of the ghost, which may have accompanied the mourners from the cremation ground. In Borneo rice is sprinkled over them with the same object, and the Basutos who have carried a corpse to the grave have their hands scratched with a knife and magic stuff is rubbed into the wound to remove the ghost which may be adhering to them.^ ^ Risley, "Tribes and Castes," ii. 19. - Lady Wilde, " Legends," 83. ^ " Zoological Mythology," i. 49. ■* Frazer, " Golden Bough," i. 154. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 59 In Upper India, among the lower Hindu castes, when the mourners return after the ceremony, they bathe, water being a scarer of ghosts, and at the house door they touch a stone, cowdung, iron, fire, and water, which have been placed outside the house in readiness when the corpse was removed. They then touch each their left ears with the little finger of the left hand, chew leaves of the bitter Nim tree as a sign of mourning, and, after sitting some time in silence, disperse. Others, as the Ghasiyas, pass their feet through the smoke of burning oil, and others merely rub their feet with oil to drive away the ghost. The same idea of barring the return of the ghost by means of fire is found among the Nats of Kathiawar, who burn hay on the face of the corpse before cremating it, and among the Thoris, who brand the great toe of the right foot of the deceased.' This sitting in silence after the funeral is commonly ex- plained merely as a mark of sympathy for the bereaved relatives, but an analogous custom in Ireland leads to the inference that the real reason may be to give the ghost time to depart, and not to interrupt in any way its progress to the spirit land. On the west coast of Ireland, after the death no wail is allowed to be raised until three hours have elapsed, because the sound of the crying would hinder the soul from speaking to God when it stands before Him, and would waken up the great dogs that are watching for the souls of the dead to devour them.'^ We have in these rites and in the ordinary ritual some further illustrations of the protective influence of various articles which scare evil spirits. Thus, after the cremation the officiating Brahman touches fire and bathes in order to purify himself and bar the return of the ghost ; and the relative who lights the funeral pyre keeps a piece of iron with him, and goes about with a brass drinking vessel in his hand as a preservative against evil spirits while the period of mourning lasts. The system of protection is exactly the same as in the case of the young mother and her child ' " Bombay Gazetteer," viii. 159. 2 Lady Wilde, " Legends," 83. 6o Folk-lore of Northern India. during the period of impurity consequent on parturition. As the Hedley Kow, the North British gobhn, is pecuHarly obnoxious at childbirth, so the Rakshasi of Indian folk-lore carries off the baby if the suitable precautions to repel her are neglected.' Another method of barring the ghost is to bury the dead face downwards. This is common among sweepers of Upper India, whose ghosts, as seen in the probable connec- tion of the Chuhra and the Churel, are always malignant. The same custom prevails among the Charan Banjaras of Khandesh. With this may be contrasted the Irish custom of loosening the nails of the coffin before interment, in order to facilitate the passage of the soul to heaven." A more elaborate ritual is that performed by the Mangars of Bengal. " One of the maternal relatives of the deceased, usually the maternal uncle, is chosen to act as priest for the occasion, and to conduct the ritual for the propitiation of the dead. First of all he puts in the mouth of the corpse some silver coins and some coral, which is much prized by the Himalayan races. Then he lights a wick soaked in clarified butter, touches the lips with fire, scatters some parched rice about the mouth, and, lastly, covers the face with a cloth. Two bits of wood about three feet long are set up on either side of the grave. In the one are cut nine steps or notches, forming a ladder for the spirit of the dead to ascend to heaven ; on the other every one present at the funeral cuts a notch to show that he has been there. As the maternal uncle steps out of the grave, he bids a solemn farewell to the dead and calls upon him to ascend to heaven by the ladder prepared for him. When the earth has been filled in, the stick notched by the funeral party is taken away to a distance and broken in two pieces, lest by its means the dead man should do the survivors a mischief. ' Henderson, "Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 14,271 ; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara,'' i. 305, 546; Tylor, "Primitive Culture," ii. 194 sq. ; "Contemporary Review," xlviii. 113; Grierson, " Behar Peasant Life," 388 ; " Folk-lore," ii. 26, 294. - " Bombay Gazetteer," xii. 109 ; " Illustrations of the History ard Practices of the Thags," 9. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 6i The pole used to carry the corpse is also broken up, and the spades and ropes are left in the grave." ' Among other devices to bar the return of the spirit may be noted the custom after a death in the family of preparing a resting-place for the ghost, until on the completion of the prescribed funeral rites it is admitted to the company of the sainted dead. Thus, among high-caste Hindus a jar of water is hung on a Pipaltree for the refreshment of the spirit. The lower castes practise a more elaborate ritual. When the obsequies are completed they plant by the bank of a tank a bunch of grass, which the chief mourners daily water until the funeral rites are over. In Bombay Mr. Campbell writes : ^ " With a few exceptions generally among almost all classes of Hindus, when the dead is carried to the burning ground, on nearing the cemetery, a small stone is picked up and applied to the eyes, chest, and feet of the deceased. This stone is called Jivkhada or the spirit stone, is considered as the representative or type of the deceased, and offerings of milk and water are given to it for ten days." Further he says : " On nearing the burning ground a small stone is picked up, and with it the feet, nose, and chest of the deceased are touched thrice. This stone is called Ashma, and is considered as a type of the deceased, and to it funeral oblations are offered for ten days. The bier is then put down, and a ceremony called Visranti Sraddha is performed by the chief mourner, who comes forward and offers two balls of rice, called Bhut or ' spirit,' and Khechar, or ' roamer in the sky,' to the deceased. A hole is dug and the balls are buried there, and the litter is raised again on shoulders by four persons and carried to the cemetery." The same idea of barring the return of the ghost accounts for the tombstone and cairn. British evil spirits have been secured in this way. Mr. Henderson tells of a vicious spirit which was entombed under a large stone for the space of ninety years and a day. Should any luckless person sit on 1 Risley, " Tribes and Castes," ii. 75. ^ « Notes,'' 214, 473. 62 Folk-lore of Northern India. that stone, he would be unable to leave it for ever.' In India, when a Ho or Munda dies, a very substantial coffin is constructed and placed on faggots of brushwood. The body, carefully washed and anointed with oil, is reverently laid in this coffin, and all the clothes, ornaments, and agri- cultural implements that the deceased was in the habit of using are placed with it, and also any money that he had with him when he died. Then the lid of the coffin is put on and the whole is burned. The bones are collected, taken in procession to the houses of friends, and every place where the deceased was in the habit of visiting. They are finally buried under a large slab, and a megalithic monument is erected to the memory of the dead. A quantity of rice is thrown into the grave with other food.^ This custom of parading the corpse also prevails in Ireland. " I believe it is the custom in most, if not all, small towns in the south for a body to be carried, on its way to the graveyard, round the town by the longest way to bid its last farewell to the place. If the body be that of a murdered man, it is, if possible, carried past the house of the murderer. In county Wicklow, if an old church lies on the way to the grave, the body is borne round it three times." ^ The Korkus of Hoshangabad have a remarkable method of laying the ghost. " Each clan has a place in which the funeral rite of every member of that clan must be performed ; and however far the Korku may have wandered from the original centre of his tribe, he must return there to set his father's spirit to rest, and enable it to join its own family and ancestral ghosts. In this spot a separate stake {munda) is set up for every one whose rites are separately performed, and if a poor Korku performs them for several ancestors at once, he still puts up only one stake. It stands two or two and a half feet above the ground, planed smooth and squared at the top ; on one side is carved at the top the ' " Folk-lore of the Northern Counties,'' 264. - Dahon, " Descriptive Ethnology," 202 sq. ^ " Folk-lore," iv. 360. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 63 likeness of the sun and moon, a spider, and a wheat ear, and below it a figure representing the principal person in whose honour it is put up, on horseback, with weapons in his hands. If more than one person's death is being celebrated, the rest are carved below as subordinate figures. I could not learn that the spirits are supposed to specially haunt this grove of stakes, or that Korkus have any dread of going near it at night ; but they are far bolder than Hindus in this respect. When the funeral rite is to be performed, the first thing is to cut a bamboo and take out the pith, which is to represent the bones of the deceased, unless he has been burnt, in which case the bones themselves will have been preserved. A chicken is then sacrificed at the grave, and all that night the mourners watch and dance, and smg and make merry. " Next day they go out very early, and cut down some perfectly unblemished tree, either teak or Salai, not hollow or decayed or marked with an axe, which they cut to make the Munda stake. It is brought home at once and fashioned by a skilful man. In the afternoon it is carried to the place where cattle rest outside the village at noontide, and is washed and covered with turmeric like a bridegroom, and five chickens are sacrificed to it. It is then brought home again, and the pith representing the bones is taken outside the village and hung to some tree for safety during the night." (The idea, as we have elsewhere seen, is more probably to allow the ghost an opportunity of revisiting them.) " All the friends and relations have by this time assembled, and this evening the chief funeral dinner is given. Next day, the whole party set out for the place where the stakes of their clan are set up, and after digging a hole and putting two copper coins in it, and the bones of the deceased or the pith which represents them, they put the stake in and fix it upright. Then they offer a goat or chickens to it, which are presently eaten close by, and in the evening the whole party returns home." ^ All this ritual, carried out by one of the most primitive 1 " Settlement Report," 263 sq. 64 Folk-lore of Northern India. Indian tribes, admirably illustrates the principles which we have been discussing. The obvious intention of the custom is to provide a resting-place for the spirit of the dead man, so that it may no longer be a source of danger to the survivors. Similar customs prevail among other aboriginal races of the Central Provinces. In some places they burn their dead and then erect platforms, at the corners of which they place tall, red stones. In other places a sort of low square mound is raised over the remains of the deceased, at the corners of which are erected wooden posts, round which thread is wound to complete the sacred circle, and a stone is set up in the centre. Here offerings are presented, as in the jungle worship of their deities, of rice and other grains, fowls or sheep. On one occasion after the establishment of the Bhonsla or Marhata Government in Gondwana a cow was offered to the manes of a Gond ; but this having come to the notice of the authorities, the relations were pubhcly whipped, and all were interdicted from doing such an act again. To persons of more than usual reputation for sanctity offerings continue to be presented for many years after their decease. In the District of Bhandara rude collections of coarse earthenware in the form of horses may be seen, which have accumulated from year to year on the tombs of such men.' The Pauariyas of Chota Nagpur bury their dead, except the bodies of their priests, which are carried on a cot into the forests covered with leaves and branches and kept there, the reason assigned being that if laid in the village cemetery their ghosts become very troublesome. The bodies of people who die of contagious disease are similarly disposed of, the fact of death in this way being supposed to be the direct act of one of the deities who govern plagues.' In a country where immediate burial or cremation is necessary and habitual, we need not expect to meet many examples of the customs, of which Mr. H. Spencer gives ' Hislop, "Papers," 19. 2 Ualton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 274. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 65 examples/ of placing the body on a platform or the like in order to secure its personal comfort and conciliate the spirit. With the object of keeping a place ready for the spirit, some tribes are careful to preserve the body. The Singpoo of the north-eastern frontier keep the bodies of their dead chiefs for several years, and the Kukis dry the dead at a slow fire," practices which among more civilized races rise to embalm- ing, as among the Chinese and Egyptians. The Tharus of the sub-Himalayan Tarai have a custom of placing the corpse on the village fetish mound during the night after death, and then the mourning goes on. The practice is perhaps intended as much to prevent, by the sanctity of the spot on which it is placed, the spirit from harming the survivors, as from any special desire to conciliate it. Among all Hindus, of course, as far as exigencies of the rapid disposal of the remains allow, it is habitual to treat the dead with respect ; corpses are carefully covered with red cloth, and removed reverently for burial or cremation. There is also among some tribes the custom of disinterring corpses after temporary burial. Thus, the Bhotiyas of the Himalayas burn their dead only in the month of Karttik ; those who die in the meantime are temporarily buried and disinterred when the season for cremation arrives. The Kathkaris, a jungle tribe in Bombay, dig up the corpse some time after burial and hold a wake over the ghastly relics. They appear to do this only in the case of persons dying of cholera or small-pox, with some idea of appeasing the deity of disease. In parts of Oudh the custom is said still to prevail among the lower castes during epidemics, and it has recently attracted the attention of the sanitary officers.^ The Funeral Feast. The funeral feast is evidently a survival of the feast when the dead kinsman was consumed by his relatives, who ^ "Principles of Sociology," i. i6i. 2 Dalton, "Descriptive Ethnology," 12; Tylor, " Primitive Culture," ii. 33 sq. ^ "North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 7; iii. 17; Campbell, " Notes," 495- VOL. II. F 66 Folk-lore of Northern India. wished thus to partake of the properties of the dead. By another theory the feasting of the mourners is intended to resist the attempt of the ghost of the dead man to enter their bodies, food being offensive to spirits. Mutilation a Sign of Mourning. Perhaps the only distinct survival of the ceremonial mutilation so comm.on among savages as a sign of mourning, is the shaving which is compulsory on all the clansmen who shared in the death pollution. In the Odyssey, at the death of Antilochus, Peisistratus says, " This is now the only due we pay to miserable men, to cut the hair and let the tear fall from the cheek," and at the burial rites of Patroklus " they heaped all the corpse with their hair which they cut off and threw thereon." The cutting of the hair is always a serious matter. " Amongst the Maoris many spells were uttered at hair-cutting; one, for example, was spoken to consecrate the obsidian knife with which the hair was cut ; another was pronounced to avert the thunder and lightning which hair-cutting was believed to cause." ' This ceremonial shaving is also perhaps the only survival in Northern India of puberty initiation ceremonies. In some cases the hair cut appears to be regarded as a sacrifice. Thus between the ages of two and five the Bhils shave the heads of their children. The child's aunt takes the hair in her lap, and wrapping it in her clothes, receives a cow, buffalo, or other resent from the child's parent.^ Respect Paid to Hair. All over the world the hair is invested with particular sanctity as embodying the strength of the owner, as in the Samson-Delilah story. Vishnu, according to the old story, took two hairs, a white and a black one, and these became Balarama and Krishna. Many charms are worked through hair, and if a witch gets possession of it she can work evil to the owner. An Italian charm directs, "When you enter ^ Frazer, " Golden Bough," i. 196. - " Bombay Gazetteer,'' iii. 220. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 67 any city, collect before the gate as many hairs as you will which may lie on the road, saying to yourself that you do this to remove your headache, and bind one of the hairs to your head." ' The strength of Nisus lay in his golden hair, and when it was pulled out he was killed by Minos. It is this power of hair which possibly accounts for its preserva- tion as a relic of the dead in lockets and bracelets, or, as Mr. Hartland shows, the idea at the root of these practices is that of sacramental communion with the dead.^ We have already come across instances of growing hair as a curse. Mr. Frazer gives numerous examples of this custom among savage races, and in the Teutonic mythology the avenger of Baldur will not cut his hair until he has killed his enemy. In the folk-tales hair is a powerful deus ex macJiina, human hair for choice, but any kind will answer the purpose. It is one of the most common incidents that the hero recognizes the heroine by a lock of her hair which floats down the stream.^ A curious instance of mutilation regarded as a charm may be quoted from Bengal. Should a woman give birth to several stillborn children, in succession, the popular belief is that the same child reappears on each occasion. So, to frustrate the designs of the evil spirit that has taken posses- sion of the child, the nose or a portion of the ear is cut off and the body is cast on a dunghill. Food for the Dead. Another means for conciliating the spirit of the dead man is to lay up food for its use."* This is intended partly as provision for the ghost in its journey to the other world. 1 Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 281. - " Legend of Perseus," ii. 320. ^Temple, "Wide-awake Tales," 414 ; "Legends of the Panjab,'' i. Introduction xix. ; "Folk-lore," ii. 236; Miss Cox, "Cinderella," 504; Clouston, " Popular Tales," i. 341 ; Campbell, " Santal Folk-tales,'' 16 ; Grimm, " Household Tales," ii. 382. ■* Spencer, "Principles of Sociology," i. 157, 206; Tylor, "Primitive Culture," i. 482 ; Lubbock, " Origin of Civilization," yj ; Farrer, " Primi- tive Manners," 21 sq. F 2 68 Folk-lore of Northern India. But in some cases it would seem that there is a different basis for the custom. As we have seen, it is dangerous to eat the food of fairy-land, and unless food is supplied to the wandering ghost, it may be obliged to eat the food of the lower world and hence be unable to return to the world of men. According to the ancient Indian ritual it was recom- mended to put into the hands of the dead man the reins of the animal killed in the funeral sacrifice, or in default of an animal victim at least two cakes of rice or flour, so that he may throw them to the dogs of Yama, which would other- wise bar his passage/ and the same idea constantly appears in the folk-tales where the hero takes some food with him which he flings to the fierce beasts which prevent him from gaining the water of life or whatever may have been the test imposed upon him. The use of pulse in the funeral rites depends upon the same principle, and in the Greek belief the dead carried vegetables with them to hell, either to win the right of passage or as provisions for the road. Articles left with the Corpse. Hence too comes the practice of burning with the corpse the articles which the dead man was in the habit of using. They rise with the fumes of the pyre and solace him in the world of spirits. The Kos told Colonel Dalton that the reason of this was that they were unwilling to derive any immediate benefit by the death of a member of the family. Hence they burn his wearing apparel and personal effects, but they do not destroy clothes and other things which have not been worn. For this reason, old men of the tribe, in a spirit of careful economy, avoid wearing new clothes, so that they may not be wasted at the funeral.^ The custom of laying out food for the ghost still prevails in Ireland, where it is a very prevalent practice during some nights after death to leave food outside the house, a griddle cake or a dish of potatoes. If it is gone in the morning, the 1 Gubernatis, "Zoological Mythology,'' i. 49. 2 "Descriptive Ethnology,'' 205. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 69 spirits must have taken it, for no human being would touch the food left for the dead, as it might compel him to join their company. On November Eve food is laid out in the same way.^ There are numerous examples of similar practices in India. The Mhars of Khandesh, when they remove a corpse, put in its mouth a Pan leaf with a gold bead from his wife's neck- lace. At the grave the brother or son of the dead man wets the end of his turban and drops a little water on the lips of the corpse.^ So the Greeks used to put a coin in the dead man's mouth to enable him to pay his fare to Charon. In the Panjab it is a common practice to put in the mouth of the corpse the Pancharatana or five kinds of jewels, gold, silver, copper, coral, and pewter. The leaves of the Tulasi or sweet basil and Ganges water are put into the mouth of a dying man, and the former into the ears and nostrils also. They are said to be offerings to Yama, the god of death, who on receiving them shows mercy to the soul of the deceased. The same customs generally prevail among the Hindus of Northern India. Among the Buddhists of the Himalaya, Moorcroft was present at the consecration of the food of the dead.^ The Lama consecrated barley and water and poured them from a silver saucer into a brass vessel, occasionally striking two brass cymbals together, reciting or chanting prayers, to which from time to time an inferior Lama uttered responses aloud, accompanied by the rest in an undertone. This was intended for the use of the souls in hell, who would starve were it not provided. The music and singing, if we may apply the analogy of Indian practices, are intended to scare the vagrant ghosts, who would otherwise consume or defile the food. The same is the case among the Dravidian races. Thus, the Bhuiyars of Mirzapur after the funeral feast throw a cupful of oil and some food into the water hole in which the 1 Lady Wilde, " Legends," 118, 140. 2 " Bombay Gazetteer," xii. ii8 ; •' Folk-lore,'' iv. 245. ^ " Travels in the Himalaya," i. 342. 70 Folk-lore of Northern India. ashes of the dead man are deposited. They say that he will never be hungry or want oil to anoint himself after bathing. The Korwas, when burning a corpse, place with it the orna- ments and clothes of the deceased, and an axe, which they do not break, as is the habit of many other savages. They say that the spirit of the dead man will want it to hack his way through the jungles of the lower world. When the Bhuiyars cremate a corpse they throw near the spot an axe, if the deceased was a man, and a Khurpi or weeding spud, if a woman. No one would dare to appropriate such things, as he would be forced to join the ghastly company of their owners. Where the corpse is burned they leave a platter made of leaves containing a little boiled rice, and they sprinkle on the ground all the ordinary kinds of grain and some turmeric and salt as food for the dead in the next world. All these tribes and many low-caste Hindus in Northern India lay out platters of food under the eaves of the house during the period of mourning, and they ascertain by peculiar marks which they examine next day whether the spirit has partaken of the food or not. Among the jungle tribes there is a rule that the food for the dead is prepared, not by the house-mother, but by the senior daughter-in-law, and even if incapacitated by illness from performing this duty, she is bound at least to commence the work by cooking one or two cakes, the rest being prepared by one of the junior women of the family. Among the more Hinduized Majhwars and Pataris we reach the stage where the clothes, implements of the deceased, and some food are given to the Patari priest, who, by vicariously consuming them, lays up a store for the use of the dead man in the other world. This is the principle on which food and other articles are given to the Mahabrahman or ordinary Hindu funeral priest at the close of the period of mourning. Among the Bengal tribes, the Mai Pahariyas pour the blood of goats and fowls on their ancestral memorial pillars that the souls may not hunger in the world of the dead. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 71 Among the Bhumij, at the funeral ceremony, an outsider, who is often a Laiya or priest, comes forward to personate the deceased, by whose name he is addressed, and asked what he wants to eat. Acting thus as the dead man's proxy, he mentions various articles of food, which are placed before him. After making a regular meal, he goes away, and the spirit of the deceased is believed to go with him. So among the Kolis of the Konkan, the dead man's soul is brought back into one of the mourners. Among the Varlis of Thana, on the twelfth day after death, a dinner is given to the nearest relations, and during the night the spirit of the dead enters into one of the relations, who entertains the rest with the story of some event in the dead man's life. Among the Santals, one of the mourners drums by the ashes of the dead, and the spirit enters the body, when the mourner shaves, bathes, eats a cock, and drinks some liquor.' Among the Bengal Chakmas, a bamboo post or other portion of a dead man's house is burned with him, probably in order to provide him with shelter in the next world. Among the Kamis, before they can partake of the funeral feast, a small portion of every dish must be placed in a leaf plate and taken out into the jungle for the spirit of the dead man, and carefully watched until a fly or other insect settles upon it. The watcher then covers up the plate with a slab of stone, eats his own food, and returns to tell the relatives that the spirit has received the offering prepared for him. The Fly as a Life Index. The fly here represents the spirit, an idea very common in folk-lore, where an insect often appears as the Life Index. An English lady has been known in India to stop playing lawn-tennis because a butterfly settled in the court. In Cornwall wandering spirits take the form of moths, ants, and weasels." We have the same idea in Titus Andronicus, ' Risley, "Tribes and Castes,'' i. 126, 174, 395; ii. 71 ; "Bombay Gazetteer,'' xiii. 187 ; Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 218. 2 Hunt, "Popular Romances," 82. 72 Folk-lore of Northern India. when Marcus, having been rebuked for killing a fly, gives as his reason, — " It was a black, ill-favoured fly, Like to the empress Moor; therefore I kill'd him.'' A fly is the guardian spirit of St. Michael's well in Banff.' Recalling the Ghost. But while it is expedient by some or other of these devices to bar or lay the ghost, or prevent its return by providing for its journey to, and accommodation in the next world, some tribes have a custom of making arrangements to bring back the soul of the deceased to the family abode, where he is worshipped as a household spirit. Some of the Central Indian tribes catch the spirit re-embodied in a fowl or fish, some bring it home in a pot of water or flour.'^ Among the Tipperas of Bengal, when a man dies in a strange village separated from his home by the river, they stretch a white string from bank to bank along which the spirit is believed to return.^ This illustrates an idea common to all folk-lore, that the ghost cannot cross running water without material assistance. Among the Hos on the evening of the cremation day certain preparations are made in anticipation of a visit from the ghost. Some boiled rice is laid apart for it, and ashes are sprinkled on the floor, in order that, should it come, its footsteps may be detected. On returning they carefully scrutinize the ashes and the rice, and if there is the faintest indication of these having been disturbed, it is attributed to the action of the spirit, and they sit down shivering with horror and crying bitterly, as if they were by no means pleased with the visit, though it be made at their earnest solicitation.^ Ashes. This use of ashes as a means of identifying the ghost, constitutes in itself quite an important chapter in folk-lore. ' Brand, " Observations," 519. ^ Tylor, " Primitive Culture," ii. 152. ^ Risley, loc. cit., ii. 326. •* Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnologj', 204 sq. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. • 'jz It reminds us of the Apocryphal legend of Bel and the Dragon. The idea probably originally arose from the respect paid to the ashes of the house fire by primitive races, among whom the hearth and the kitchen are the home of the household godlings. There are numerous instances of this practice from Europe. In the Western Islands of Scotland on Candle- mas Day the mistress takes a sheaf of oats, dresses it in woman's apparel, and after putting it in a large basket beside which a wooden club is placed, cries three times, ^' Briid is come ! Briid is welcome ! " Next morning they look for the impression of Briid's club in the ashes, which is an omen of a good harvest.' Ash-riddlin is a custom in the northern counties. The ashes being riddled or sifted on the hearth, if any one of the family be to die ^vithin the year, the mark of a shoe will be impressed upon the ashes.^ In Wales they make a bonfire, and when it is extin- guished each one throws a white stone into the ashes. In the morning they search out the stones, and if any one is found wanting, he that threw it will die within the year.^ In Manxland the ashes are carefully swept to the open hearth and nicely flattened down by the women before they go to bed. In the morning they look for footmarks on the hearth, and if they find such footmarks directed to the door, it means in the course of the year a death in the family, and if the reverse, they expect an addition to it by marriage.'* According to one of the Italian charms, " And they were accustomed to divine sometimes with the ashes from the sacrifices. And to this day there is a trace of it, when that which is to be divined is written on the ashes -with the finger or with the stick. Then the ashes are stirred by the fresh breeze, and one looks for the letters which they form by being moved." * Amongst some Hindus, on the tenth night after the death of a person, he who fired the funeral pyre is required to sift 1 Dyer, "Popular Customs," 57. ^ Ibid., 199. Mbid., 398. " "Folk-lore," ii. 310. ' Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 345. 74 Folk-lore of Northern Indl\. some ashes, near which a lamp is placed, and the whole covered with a basket. Next morning the ashes are ex- amined, and the ghost is supposed to have migrated into the animal whose mark appears on the ashes. ^ So, at the annual feast of the dead, the jungle tribes of Mirzapur spread ashes on the floor, and a mark generally like that of a chicken's foot shows that the family ghosts have visited the house. " On New Year's Eve," says Aubrey, " sift or smooth the ashes and leave it so when you go to bed ,* next morning look, and if you find there the likeness of a coffin, one will die ; if a ring, one will be married." ' In North Scotland, on the night after the funeral, bread and water are placed in the apartment where the body lay. The dead man was believed to return that night and partake of the food ; unless this were done the spirits could not rest in the unseen world. This probably accounts for the so- called " food vases " and " drinking cups " found in the long barrows.' All Hindus believe that the ghosts of the dead return on the night of the Diwali or feast of lamps. Replacing Household Vessels. After a death all the household earthen pots are broken and replaced. It has been suggested that this is due either to the belief that the ghost of the dead man is in some of them, or that the custom may have some connection with the idea of providing the ghost with utensils in the next world.^ In popular belief, however, the custom is explained by the death pollution attaching to all the family cooking vessels, which, if of metal, are purified with fire. The vessel is the home of the spirit : " At most Hindu funerals a water jar is carried round the pyre, and then dashed to the ground, apparently to show that the spirit has left its 1 " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 35. ' "Remaines," 95 ; Henderson, "Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 57- * Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland,' 213. * Frazer, " Contemporary Review," xlviii. 117; Spencer, "Principles- of Sociology," i. 195. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 75 earthly home. So, the Surat Chondras set up as spirit homes large whitewashed earthen jars laid on their sides. So, to please any spirit likely to injure a crop, an earthen jar is set on a pole as the spirit's house, and so at a wedding or other ceremonies, jars, sometimes empty, sometimes filled with water, are piled as homes for planets and other marriage gods and goddesses, that they may feel pleased and their influence be friendly." * We have already met with the Kalasa or sacred jar. The same idea of the pollution of earthen vessels prevailed among the Hebrews, when an earthen vessel remaining in a tent in which a person died was considered impure for seven days.^ Funeral Rites in Effigy. When a person dies at a distance from home, and it is impossible to perform the funeral rites over the body, it is cremated in effigy. The special term for this is Kusa-putra, or "son of the Kusa grass." Colonel Tod gives a case of this when Raja Ummeda of Bundi abdicated : " An image of the prince was made, and a pyre was erected on which it was consumed. The hair and whiskers of Ajit, his suc- cessor, were taken off and offered to the Manes ; lamenta- tions and waihng were heard in the Queen's apartments, and the twelve days of mourning were held as if Ummeda had really deceased ; on the expiration of which the installa- tion of his successor took place." ^ Ghosts Lengthening Themselves. Ghosts, as we have already seen in the case of the Naugaza, have the power of changing their length. In the well-known tale in the Arabian Nights the demon is shut up in a jar under the seal of the Lord Solomon, as in one of the German tales the Devil is shut up in a crevice in a 1 Campbell, "Notes," 334. ^ Numbers xix. 15. * " Annals," ii. 542. 76 Folk-lore of Northern India. pine tree, and the ghost of Major Weir of Edinburgh resided in his walking-stick.' Some of the Indian ghosts, hke the Ifrit of the Arabian Nights, can grow to the length of ten yojanas or eighty miles. In one of the Bengal tales a ghost is identified because she can stretch out her hands several yards for a vessel." Some ghosts possess the very dangerous power of entering human corpses, like the Vetala, and swelling to an enormous size. The Kharwars of Mirzapur have a wild legend, which tells how long ago an unmarried girl of the tribe died, and was being cremated. While the relations were collecting wood for the pyre, a ghost entered the corpse, but the friends managed to expel him. Since then great care is taken not to leave the bodies of women unwatched. So, in the Panjab, when a great person is cremated the bones and ashes are carefully watched till the fourth day, to prevent a magician interfering with them. If he has a chance, he can restore the deceased to life, and ever after retain him under his influence. This is the origin of the custom in Great Britain of waking the dead, a practice which " most probably originated from a silly superstition as to the danger of a corpse being carried off by some of the agents of the invisible world, or exposed to the ominous liberties of brute animals." ^ But in India it is considered the best course, if the corpse cannot be immediately dis- posed of, to measure it carefully, and then no malignant Bhut can occupy it. We have already met with instances of a similar idea of the mystic effect supposed to follow on measuring or weighing grain. Kindly Ghosts. Most of the ghosts whom we have been as yet considering are malignant. There are, however, others which are friendly. Such are the German Elves, the Robin Good- 1 Grimm, " Household Tales," ii. 402; Clouston, "Popular Tales,"!. 380. 2 Lane, "Arabian Nights,"!. 71; Lai Bihar! De, " Folk-tales," 198, 274. 3 Brand, " Observations,' 435. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 'j'j fellow, Puck, Brownie and the Cauld Lad of Hilton of England, the Glashan of the Isle of Man, the Phouka or Leprehaun of Ireland. Such, in one of his many forms, is the Brahmadaitya, or ghost of a Brahman who has died unmarried. In Bengal he is believed to be more neat and less mischievous than other ghosts ; the Bhuts carry him in a palanquin, he wears wooden sandals, lives in a Banyan or Bel tree, and Sankhachurni is his mistress. He appears to be about the only respectable bachelor ghost. In one of the folk-tales a ghostly reaper of this class assists his human friend, and can cut as much of the crop in a minute as an ordinary person can in a day. ^ So, the Manx Brownie is called the Fenodyree, and he is described as a hairy, clumsy fellow who would thresh a wh ole barnful of corn in a single night for the people to whom he felt well disposed.^ This Brahmadaitya is the leader of the other ghosts in virtue of his respectable origin ; he lives in a tree, and, unlike other varieties of Bhuts, does not eat all kinds of food, but only such as are considered ceremonially pure. He never, like common Bhuts, frightens men, but is harmless and quiet, never plaguing benighted travellers, nor entering into the bodies of living men or women, but if his dignity be in- sulted, or any one trespass on his domains, he wrings their necks. Tree Ghosts. Hence in regard to trees gr eat caution is required. A Hindu will never climb one of the varieties of fig, the Ficus Cordifolia, except through dire necessity, and if a Brahman is forced to ascend the Bel tree or Aegle Marmelos for the purpose of obtaining the sacred trefoil so largely used in Saiva worship, he only does so after offering prayers to the gods in general, and to the Brah madaitya in particular who may have taken up his abode in this special tree. These tree ghosts are, it is needless to say, very numerous. ^ Lai Bihari De, " Folk-tales of Bengal," 198,206; " Govinda Samanta," i. 135 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 199. 2 '• Folk-lore," ii. 286. 78 Folk-lore of Northern India. Hence most local shrines are constructed under trees, and in one particular tree, the Bira, the jungle tribes of Mirza- pur locate Bagheswar, the tiger godling, one of their most dreaded deities. In the Konkan, according to Mr. Camp- bell,' the medium or Bhagat who becomes possessed is called J had, or " tree," apparently because he is a favourite dwelling-place for spirits. In the Dakkhin it is believed that the spirit of the pregnant woman or Churel lives in a tree, and the Abors and Padams of East Bengal believe that spirits in trees kidnap children.- Many of these tree spirits appear in the folk-tales. Thus, Devadatta worships a tree which one day suddenly clave in two and a nymph appeared who introduced him inside the tree, where was a heavenly palace of jewels, in which, reclining on a couch, appeared Vidyatprabha, the maiden daughter of the king of the Yakshas ; in another story the mendicant hears inside a tree the Yaksha joking with his wife.^ So Daphne is turned into a tree to avoid the pursuit of her lover. The Brahmaparusha. But there is another variety of Brahman ghost who is much dreaded. This is the Brahmaparusha or Brahma Rakshasa. In one of the folk-tales he appears black as soot, with hair yellow as the lightning, looking like a thunder-cloud. He had made himself a wreath of entrails ; he wore a sacrificial cord of hair ; he was gnawing the flesh of a man's head and drinking blood out of a skull. In another story these Brahma Rakshasas have formidable tusks, flaming hair, and insatiable hunger. They wander about the forests catching animals and eating them.'' Mr. Campbell tells a Marhata legend of a master who became a Brahmaparusha in order to teach grammar to a pupil. He haunted a house at Benares, and the pupil went to take lessons from him. He promised to teach him the whole 1 " Notes," 165. - Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 25. ^ Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 229; ii. 116; Tylor, "Primitive Culture,'' i. 476; ii. 148, 215. •* Tawney, loc. cit., ii. 338, 511. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 79 science in a year on condition that he never left the house. One day the boy went out and learned that the house was haunted, and that he was being taught by a ghost. The boy returned and was ordered by the preceptor to take his bones to Gaya, and perform the necessary ceremonies for the emancipation of his soul. This he did, and the uneasy spirit of the learned man was laid.^ We have already en- countered similar angry Brahman ghosts, such as Harshu Panre and Maheni. The Jak and Jakni. The really friendly agricultural sprites are the pair known in some places as the Jak and Jakni, and in others as Chordeva and Chordevi, the " thief godlings." With the Jak we come on another of these curious survivals from the early mythology in a sadly degraded form. As Varuna, the god of the firmament, has been reduced in these later days to Barun, a petty weather godhng, so the Jak is the modern representative of the Yaksha, who in better times was the attendant of Kuvera, the god of wealth, in which duty he was assisted by the Guhyaka. The character of the Yaksha is not very certain. He was called Punya-janas, " the good people," but he sometimes appears as an imp of evil. In the folk-tales, it must be admitted, the Yakshas have an equivocal reputation. In one story the female, or Yakshini, bewilders travellers at night, makes horns grow on their foreheads, and finally devours them ; in another the Yakshas have, like the Churel, feet turned the wrong way and squinting eyes ; in a third they separate the hero from the heroine because he failed to make due offerings to them on his wedding day. On the other hand, in a fourth tale the Yakshini is described as possessed of heavenly beauty ; she appears again when a sacrifice is made in a cemetery to get her into the hero's power, as a heavenly maiden beautifully adorned, seated in a chariot of gold sur- rounded by lovely girls ; and lastly, a Brahman meets some ' " Notes," 146 sq. 8o Folk-lore of Northern India. Buddhist ascetics, performs the Uposhana vow, and would have become a god, had it not been that a wicked man compelled him by force to take food in the evening, and so he was re-born as a Guhyaka/ In the modern folk-lore of Kashmir, the Yaksha has turned into the Yech or Yach, a humorous, though powerful, sprite in the shape of a civet cat of a dark colour, with a white cap on his head. This small high cap is one of the marks of the Irish fairies, and the Incubones of Italy wear caps, " the symbols of their hidden, secret natures." The feet of the Yech are so small as to be almost invisible, and it squeaks in a feline way. It can assume any shape, and if its white cap can be secured, it becomes the servant of the possessor, and the white cap makes him invisible.* In the Vishnu Purana we read that Vishnu created the Yakshas as beings emaciate with hunger, of hideous aspect, and with big beards, and that from their habit of crying for food they were so named.^ By the Buddhists they were regarded as benignant spirits. One of them acts as sort of chorus in the Meghaduta or " Cloud Messenger " of Kah- dasa. Yet we read of the Yaka Alawaka, who, according to the Buddhist legend, used to live in a Banyan tree, and slay any one who approached it ; while in Ceylon they are represented as demons whom Buddha destroyed.'* In later Hinduism they are generally of fair repute, and one of them was appointed by Indra to be the attendant of the Jaina Saint Mahavira. It is curious that in Gujarat the term Yaksha is applied to Musalmans, and in Cutch to a much older race of northern conquerors.* At any rate the modern Jak and Jakni, Chordeva and Chordevi, are eminently respectable and kindly sprites. They are, in fact, an obvious survival of the pair of corn ' Tawney, loc. cit., i. 337, 204; ii. 427, 83. "' Temple, "Wide-awake Stories," 317 ; "Indian Antiquary," xi. 260 sq. ; Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 163. s As \{ ixoiw J aksh, "to eat ;" a more probable derivation is Yaksh, "to move," " to worship." " Spencer Hardy, " Manual of Buddhism," 269 ; Conway, " Demono- logy," i. 151 sq. * " Bombay GazeUeer,'' v. 133, 236. The Evil Eye and the Scaring of Ghosts. 8i spirits which inhabit the standing crop.' The Jak is com- pelled to live apart from the Jakni in neighbouring villages, but he is an uxorious husband, and robs his own village to supply the wants of his consort. So, if you see a com- paratively barren village, which is next to one more pro- ductive, you may be sure that the Jak lives in the former and the Jakni in the latter. The same is the character of the Chor or Chordeva and the Chorni or Chordevi of the jungle tribes of Mirzapur Ghosts which Protect Cattle. In the Hills there are various benevolent ghosts or god- lings who protect cattle. Sain, the spirit of an old ascetic, helps the Bhotiyas to recover lost cattle, and Siddhua and Buddhua, the ghosts of two harmless goatherds, are invoked when a goat falls ill." In the same class is Nagardeo of Garhwal, who is represented in nearly every village by a three-pronged pike or Trisula on a platform. When cows and buffaloes are first milked, the milk is offered to him. It is perhaps possible that from some blameless godling of the cow-pen, such as Nagardeo, the cultus of Pasupa- tinatha, " the lord of animals," an epithet of Siva or Rudra, who has a stately shrine at Hardwar, where his lingam is wreathed with cobras, was derived. Another Hill godling of the same class is Chaumu or Baudhan, who has a shrine in every village, which the people at the risk of offending him are supposed to keep clean and holy. Lamps are lighted, sweetmeats and the fruits of the earth are offered to him. When a calf dies the milk of the mother is considered unholy till the twelfth day, when some is offered to the deity. He also recovers lost animals, if duly propitiated, but if neglected, he brings disease on the herd.^ Another cattle godling in the Hills is Kaluva or Kalbisht, who lived on earth some two hundred years ago. His enemies persuaded his brother-in-law to kill him. After his ' Frazer, " Golden Bough," ii. 17. ' "Himalayan Gazetteer," iii. 117. ^ Ibid., ii. 833 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries,'' i. 56. VOL. II. G 82 Folk-lore of Northern India. death he became a benevolent spirit, and the only people he injured were the enemies who compassed his death. His name is now a charm against wild beasts, and people who are oppressed resort to his shrine for justice. Except in name he seems to have nothing to say to Kalu Kahar, who was born of a Kahar girl, who by magical charms compelled King Solomon to marry her. His fetish is a stick covered with peacock's feathers to which offerings of food are made. He has more than a quarter of a million worshippers, according to the last census, in the Meerut Division. Bugaboos. We close this long list of ghostly personages with those who are merely bugaboos to frighten children. Such are Hawwa, probably a corruption through the Prakrit of the Sanskrit Bhuta, and Humma or Humu, who is said to be the ghost of the Emperor Humayun, who died by an untimely death. Akin perhaps to him are the Humanas of Kumaun, who take the form of men, but cannot act as ordinary persons.' These sprites are to the Bengali matron what Old Scratch and Red Nose and Bloody Bones are to English mothers,^ and when a Bengali baby is particularly naughty its mother threatens to send for Warren Hastings. Akin to these is Ghoghar, who represents Ghuggu or the hooting of the owl."* Neki Bibi, " the good lady ;" Mano or the cat ; Bhakur ; Bhokaswa ; and Dokarkaswa, "the old man with the bag," who carries off naughty children, who is the Mr. Miacca of the English nursery.'' 1 Ganga Datt, " Folk-lore,' 71. ' Aubrey, " Remaines," 59 ; Henderson, " Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 263. * Ghoghar in Bombay takes the form of a native seaman or Lascar " Bombay Gazetteer," iv. 343. '' Jacobs, "English Fairy Tales.'' CHAPTER II. TREE AND SERPENT WORSHIP. Sylvarum numina, Fauni Et satyri fratres. Ovid, Metamorp. iii. 163. AvTCip (IT aVTCJ Kvdveog iXeXiKTO dpuKcov, Kf(pa\a\ 8e o'l ^crav Tpeiy dfj.(j}iaTpe(f)ees, ivos av)(^evos eKne(j)vv'uii. Iliad, xi. 38-40. The worship of trees and serpents may be conveniently considered together ; not that there is much connection between these two classes of belief, but because this course has been followed in Mr. Ferguson's elaborate monograph on the subject. The worship of trees appears to be based on many con- verging lines of thought, which it is not easy to disentangle. Mr. H. Spencer ' classes it as an aberrant species of ancestor worship : " A species somewhat more disguised externally, but having the same internal nature ; and though it de- velops in three different directions, still these have all one common origin. First, the toxic excitements produced by certain plants are attributed to the agency of spirits or demons ; secondly, tribes that have come out of places characterized by particular trees or plants, unawares change the legend of emergence from them into the legend of descent from them ; thirdly, the naming of individuals after plants becomes a source of confusion." According to Dr. Tylor,^ again, the worship depends upon man's animistic theory of nature : " Whether such a tree ' " Principles of Sociology," i. 359. 2 "Primitive Culture," ii. 221, 89, G 2 84 Folk-lore of Northern India. is looked on as inhabited by its own proper life and soul, or as possessed like a fetish by some other spirit which has entered it or used it for a body, is often hard to deter- mine. The tree may be the spirits' perch or shelter (as we have seen in the case of the Churel or Rakshasa), or the sacred grove is assumed to be the spirits' resort." Mr. Frazer has given a very careful analysis of this branch of popular religion.' He shows that to the savage in general the world is animate and trees are no exception to the rule ; he thinks they have souls like his own and treats them accordingly ; they are supposed to feel injuries done to them ; the souls of the dead sometimes animate them ; the tree is regarded sometimes as the body, sometimes as the home of the tree spirit ; trees and tree spirits give rain and sunshine ; they cause the crops to grow ; the tree spirit makes the herds to multiply and blesses women with offspring ; the tree spirit is often conceived and represented as detached from the tree and even as embodied in living men and women. The basis of the cultus may then perhaps be stated as follows : There is first the tree which is regarded as embody- ing or representing the spirit which influences the fertility of crops and human beings. Hence the respect paid to memorial trees, where the people assemble, as at the village Pipal, which is valued for its shade and beauty and its long connection with the social life of the community. This would naturally be regarded as the abode of some god and forms the village shrine, a convenient centre for the religious worship of the local deities, where they reside and accept the worship and offerings of their votaries. It may, again, be the last survival of the primitive forest, where the dispossessed spirits of the jungle find their final and only resting-place. Such secluded groves form the onl}^ and perhaps the earliest shrine of many primitive races. Again, an allegorical meaning would naturally be attached to various trees. It is invested with a mystic power owing to the mysterious waving of its leaves and branches, the ' " Golden Bough," i. 39. Tree and Serpent Worship. 85 result of supernatural agency ; and this would account for the weird sounds of the forest at night. Many trees are evergreen, and thus enjoy eternal life. Every tree is a sort of emblem of life, reproducing itself in some uncanny fashion with each recurring spring. It has some mystic connection with the three worlds — Quantum vertice ad auras Aetherias tantum radice in Tartara tendit. Like Yggdrassil, it connects the world of man with the world of gods, and men may, like Jack of the Beanstalk, climb by its aid to heaven. In this connection it may be noted that many Indian tribes bury their dead in trees. The Khasiyas of East Bengal lay the body in the hollow trunk of a tree. The Nagas dispose of their dead in the same way, or hang them in coffins to the branches. The Mariya Gonds tie the corpse to a tree and burn it. The Malers lay the corpse of a priest, whose ghost often gives trouble, under a tree and cover it with leaves.^ Similar customs prevail among primitive races in many parts of the world. The tree embodies in itself many utilities necessary to human life, and many qualities which menace its existence. Its wood is the source of fire, itself a fetish. Its fruits, juices, flowers or bark are sources of food or possess in- toxicating or poisonous attributes, which are naturally con- nected with demoniacal influences. Trees often develop into curious or uncanny forms, which compel fear or adora- tion. Thus according to the old rituaP trees which have been struck by lightning, or knocked down by inundation, or which have fallen in the direction of the south, or which grew on a burning ground or consecrated site, or at the confluence of large rivers, or by the roadside ; those which have withered tops, or an entanglement of heavy creepers ^ Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology,'' 56, 40, 43, 283 ; Hislop, " Papers," 10. '^ " Brihatsanhita," Rajendra Laia Mitra, " Indo-Aryans," i. 245. 86 Folk-lore of Northern India. upon them, or are the receptacles of many honey-combs or birds' nests, are reckoned unfit for the fabrication of bed- steads, as they are inauspicious and sure to bring disease and death. The step from such behefs to the worship of any curious and remarkable tree is easy. Hence the belief that the planting of a grove is a work of religious merit, which is so strongly felt by Hindus, and the idea that the grove has special religious associations, shown by the marriage of its trees to the well, and other rites of the same kind. In the Konkan it is very generally believed that barrenness is caused by uneasy spirits which wander about, and that if a home be made for the spirit by planting trees, it will go and reside there and the curse of barren- ness will be removed.^ Though this branch of the subject has been pushed to quite an unreasonable length in some recent books,^ there may be some association of tree worship with the phalhc cultus, such as is found in the Asherah or " groves " of the Hebrews, the European Maypole, and so on. This has been suggested as an explanation of the honour paid by the Gypsy race in Germany to the fir tree, the birch and the hawthorn, and of the veneration of the Welsh Gypsies to the fasciated vegetable growth known to them as the Broado Koro.^ In the same way an attempt has been made to connect the Bel tree with the Saiva worship of the Lingam and the lotus with the Yoni. But this part of the subject has been involved in so much crude speculation that any analogies of this kind, however tempting, must be accepted with the utmost caution. Further than this, it may be reasonably suspected that this cultus rests to some extent on a basis of totemism. Some of the evidence in support of this view will be discussed elsewhere, but it is, on the analogy of the various modes in which the Brahmanical pantheon has been recruited, not improbable that trees and plants, like the Tulasi and the ^ Campbell, " Notes," 225. ' Forlong, " Rivers of Life ;" Westropp, " Primitive Symbolism." ' Groome, "Encyclopaedia Britannica," s.v. "Gypsies." Tree and Serpent Worship. 87 Pipal, may have been originally tribal totems imported into Brahmanism from some aboriginal or other foreign source. On the whole it is tolerably certain that there is more in tree worship than can be accounted for either by Mr. Ferguson's theory that the worship sprang from a perception of the utility or beauty of trees, or by Mr. Spencer's theory of nicknames. It is sufficient to say that both fail to account for the worship of insignificant and comparatively useless shrubs, weeds, or grasses. Tree worship holds an important part in the popular ritual and folk-lore. This is shown by the prejudice against cutting trees. The jungle tribes are very averse to cutting certain trees, particularly those which are regarded as sacred. If a Kharwar, except at the time of the annual feast, cuts his tribal tree, the Karama, he loses wealth and life, and none of these tribes will cut the large Sal trees which are fixed by the Baiga as the abode of the forest godling. This feeling prevails very strongly among the Maghs of Bengal. Nothing but positive orders and the presence of Europeans would induce them to trespass on many hill-tops, which they regarded as occupied by the tree demons. With the Europeans, however, they would advance fearlessly, and did not hesitate to fell trees, the blame of such sacrilege being always laid on the strangers. On felling any large tree, one of the party was always pre- pared with a green sprig, which he ran and placed in the centre of the stump when the tree fell, as a propitiation to the spirit which had been displaced so roughly, pleading at the same time the orders of the strangers for the work. In clearing one spot an orderly had to take the dah or cleaver and fell the first tree himself before a Magh would make a stroke, and was considered to bear all the odium of the work with the disturbed spirits till the arrival of the Europeans relieved him of the burden.^ In folk-lore we have many magic trees. We have the Kalpataru or Kalpadruma, also known as Kalpavriksha, or Manoratha dayaka, the tree which grows in Swarga or the ' "Calcutta Review,'' xxvi. 512. 88 Folk-lore of Northern India. paradise of Indra and grants all desires. There is, again, the Parijata, which was produced at the churning of the ocean, and appropriated by Indra, from whom it was re- covered by Krishna. The tree in the Meghaduta bears clothes, trinkets, and wine, which is hke the Juniper tree of the German tale, which grants a woman a son. Many such trees appear in the Indian folk-tales. The King Jimutaketu had a tree in his house which came down from his an- cestors, and was known as " the giver of desires " ; the generous Induprabha craved a boon from Indra, and became a wishing tree in his own city ; and the faithful minister of Yasaketu sees a wave rise out of the sea and then a wishing tree appears, " adorned with boughs glittering with gold, embellished with sprays of coral, bearing lovely fruits and flowers of jewels. And he beheld on its trunk a maiden, alluring on account of her wonderful beauty, reclining on a gem-bestudded couch." ^ So, in the story of Devadatta, the tree is cloven and a heavenly nymph appears. "We have trees which, like those in the Odyssey, bear fruit and flowers at the same time, and in the garden of the Asura maiden *' the trees were ever producing flowers and fruits, for all seasons were present there at the same time." " We have many trees, again, which are produced in mi- raculous ways. In one of the modern tales the tiger collects the bones of his friend, the cow, and from her ashes spring two bamboos, which when cut give blood, and are found to be two boys of exquisite grace and beauty."^ So in Grimm's tale of*' One Eye, Two Eyes, and Three Eyes," the tree grows from the buried entrails of the goat. In another of Somadeva's stories the heroine drops a tear on the Jambu flower and a fruit grew, within which a maiden was pro- duced.* The incident of the tree which grows on the mother's grave and protects her helpless children is the common property of folk-lore. Again, we have the heavenly > Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sigara," i. 174 ; ii. i8r, 592, 286. ^ Ibid., ii. 270. ' " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 123 ; Grimm, " Household Tales," ii. 429. * Ibid., ii. 142. Tree and Serpent Worship. 89 fruit which was given by the grateful monkey, and freed him who ate it from old age and disease, like the tree in Aelian which makes an old man become younger and \'Ounger until he reaches the antenatal stage of non- existence/ We have many instances of trees which talk. The mango tree shows the hero how the magic bird is to be cut out of it ; the heroine is blessed and aided by the plantain tree, cotton tree, and sweet basil ; she is rewarded by a plum and fig tree for services rendered to them.- In one of the Kashmir tales the tree informs the hero of the safety of his wife. So, in Grimm's tale of the " Lucky Spinner," the tree speaks when the man is about to cut it down.* In one of the stories, as a link between tree and serpent worship, the great palace of the snake king is situated under a solitary Asoka tree in the Vindhyan forest. In the same collection we meet continually instances of tree worship. The Brahman Somadatta worships a great Asvattha, or fig tree, by walking round it so as to keep it on his right, bowing and making an oblation ; Mrigankadatta takes refuge in a tree sacred to Ganesa ; and Naravahana- datta comes to a sandal tree surrounded with a platform made of precious jewels, up which he climbs by means of ladders and adores it.'* We have a long series of legends by which certain famous trees are supposed to have been produced from the tooth- twig of some saint. The famous hawthorn of Glastonbury was supposed to be sprung from the staff of Joseph of Arimathea, who having fixed it in the ground on Christmas Day, it took root immediately, put forth leaves, and the next day was covered with milk-white blossoms.' Tra- ditions of the Dantadhavana or tooth-brush tree of Buddha still exist at Gonda ; another at Ludhiana is attributed to Abdul Qadir Jilani ; there is a Buddha tree at Saketa, and 1 Grimm, " Household Tales," ii. 596. ' Temple, "Wide-awake Stories,'' 413. =• Knowles, "Folk-tales," 184; Gnmm, /oc. at, ii. 428. " Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 153 ; ii. 387, 460. * Dyer, " Popular Customs," 467. go Folk-lore of Northern India. the great Banyan tree at Broach was similarly produced by Kabir. So, the Santals believe that good men turn into fruit-trees.' Next come the numerous sacred groves scattered all over the country. These, as we have seen, are very often re- garded as a survival from the primeval jungle, where the forest spirits have taken refuge. The idea is common both to the Aryan as well as to the Dravidian races, from the latter of whom it was possibly derived. Thus, among the jungle races we find that there are many groves, known as Sarna, in which the Cheros and Kharwars offer triennial sacrifices of a buffalo or other animal. The Kisans have sacred groves, called Sa. The Mundari Kols keep " a fragment of the original forest, the trees in which have been for ages carefully protected, left when the clearance was first made, lest the sylvan gods ot the place, disgusted at the wholesale felling of the trees which pro- tected them, should abandon the locality. Even now if a tree is destroyed in the sacred grove, the gods evince their displeasure by withholding seasonable rain." This idea of the influence of cutting trees on weather has been illus- trated by Mr. Frazer from the usages of other races.' So, among the Khandhs, " that timber may never be wanting, in case of accidents from fire or from enemies, a con- siderable grove, generally of Sal, is uniformly dedicated by every village to the forest god, whose favour is ever and anon sought by the sacrifice of birds, hogs, and sheep, with the usual accompaniments of rice and an addled egg. The consecrated grove is religiously preserved, the trees being occasionally pruned, but not a twig cut for use without the formal consent of the village and the formal propitiation of the god." ^ Among the Kols, in these groves the tutelary deities of the village are supposed to sojourn when attending to the wants of their votaries.'' In the Central Provinces ^ Fiihrer, " Monumental Antiquities," 304 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries,'' i. 4, 37 ; " Bombay Gazetteer," ii. 355. 2 " Golden Bough," i. 61. ' " North Indian Notes and Queries,'' ii. 112. ■• Dalton, "Descriptive Ethnology," 129, 132, 141, 186, 188. Tree and Serpent Worship. 91 the Badiyas worship the manes of their ancestors in a grove of Saj trees/ In Berar the wood of the Pathrot forests is beheved to be dedicated to a neighbouring temple, and no one will cut or buy it ; and in other places in the same province the sacred groves are so carefully preserved, that during the annual festivals held in them it is the custom to collect and burn solemnly all dead and fallen branches and trees." Among the higher races the same feelings attach to the holy groves of Mathura, each of which has appropriated one of the legends of the Krishna myth. Thus, there is a particularly sacred grove at Bhadanwara, and it is believed that any one violating the sanctity of the place by telling a lie within its precincts will be stricken with leprosy. In another at Hasanpur Bara the trees are under the pro- tection of the curse of a Faqir, and in many places people object to having toddy collected from the palm trees, be- cause it necessitates cutting their necks.^ In the Northern Hills the Sal and bamboos at Barmdeo are never cut, as they are sacred to the local Devi." In Kulu, "near the village were a number of cypresses, much decayed, and many quite dead. Some of my people had begun to strip off their dry branches for fuel, when one of the conductors of our caravan came to me in great agitation, and implored me to command them to desist. The trees, he said, were sacred to the deities of the elements, who would be sure to revenge any injury done to them by visiting the neighbour- hood with heavy and untimely snow." " In a village in Lucknow, noticeable among the trees is a " single mango tree, of fine growth and comely shape. It is the survivor of some old grove, which the owner, through straitened circumstances, has reluctantly cut down. He called it Jak, or Sakhiya, the witness of the place where the old grove stood."^ Jak is, as we have seen, the Corn 1 Hislop, " Papers," 20. - " Berar Gazetteer," 29, 31. ' Growse, " Mathura," 70, 76 sqq., 83, 420, 470, 458. * "Himalayan Gazetteer," iii. 47. * Moorcroft, "Travels," i. 211. * " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 16. 92 Folk-lore of Northern India. spirit. The preservation of these little patches of the primeval jungle, with a view to conciliate the sylvan spirits of the place, is exactly analogous to what is known in Scotland as the " Gudeman's Croft," " Cloutie's Croft," or " Gudeman's Field." Often in Northern India little patches are left uncultivated in the corners of fields as a refuge for the spirits, as in North Scotland many farmers leave a corner of the field unfilled, and say it is for the " Aul Man," or the Devil.' Some trees are, again, considered to be mystically con- nected with the fortunes of people and places. Thus, the Chilbil tree at Gonda, which, like others which have already been mentioned, sprouted from the tooth-twig of a saint, was supposed to be mysteriously connected with the fate of the last of the Gonda Rajas, His kingdom was to last until the day a monkey sat on the tree, and this, it is said, happened on the morning when the Mutiny broke out which ended in the ruin of the dynasty.* In the same way the moving wood of Dunsinane was fateful to the fortunes of Macbeth. We have already referred to some of the regular tree sprites, like the Churel, Rakshasa, and Bansapti Ma. They are, like Kliddo, the North British sprite, small and dehcate at first, but rapidly shooting into the clouds, while everything it overshadows is thrown into confusion.^ How sprites come to inhabit trees is well shown in an instance given from Bombay by Mr. Campbell. " In the Dakkhin, when a man is worried by a spirit, he gives it a tree to live in. The patient, or one of his relations, goes to a seer and brings the seer to his house, frankincense is burnt, and the sick man's spirit comes into the seer's body. The people ask the spirit in the seer why the man is sick. ' Conway, " Demonology," i. 315 sq. ; Farrer, "Primitive Manners," 309 ; Sir W. Scott, " Letters on Demonology," 79 ; Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland,'' 116, 179; Henderson, "Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 278. 2 "Oudh Gazetteer," i. 566 ;''Fuhrer, "Monumental Antiquities," 304. See instances collected by Hartland, " Legend of Perseus," ii. 35 sqq. ^ Henderson, loc. cit., 273. Tree and Serpent Worship. 93 He says, ' The ghost of the man you killed has come back, and is troubling you.' Then they say, 'What is to be done ? ' The spirit says, ' Put him in a place in his or in your land.' The people say, ' How can we put him ? ' The spirit says, ' Take a cock, five cocoanuts, rice, and red lead, and fill a bamboo basket with them next Sunday evening, and by waving the basket round the head of the patient, take the ghost out of the patient.' When Sunday afternoon comes they call the exorcist. If the ghost has not haunted the sick man for a week, it is held that the man was worried by that ghost, who is now content with the proposed arrangement. If the patient is still sick, it is held that it cannot be that ghost, but it must be another ghost, perhaps a god who troubles him. " The seer is again called, and his familiar spirit comes into him. They set the sick man opposite him, and the seer throws rice on the sick man, and the ghost comes into the patient's body and begins to speak. The seer asks him, ' Are you going or not ? ' The ghost replies, ' I will go if you give me a cock, a fowl, a cocoanut, red lead, and rice.' They then bring the articles and show them to the spirit. The spirit sees the articles, and says, ' Where is the cocoanut ? ' or, ' Where is the rice ? ' They add what he says, and ask, ' Is it right ? ' ' Yes, it is right,' replies the spirit. ' If we drive you out of Bapu, will you come out? ' ask the people. ' I will come out,' rephes the ghost. The people then say, ' Will you never come back ? ' 'I will never return,' replies the ghost. ' If you ever return,' says the seer's spirit, ' I will put you in a tanner's well, sink you, and ruin you.' ' I will,' says the spirit, ' never come back, if you take these things to the Pipal tree in my field. You must never hurt the Pipal. If you hurt the Pipal, I will come and worry you.' " Then the friends of the patient make the cooked rice in a ball, and work a little hollow in the top of the ball. They sprinkle the ball with red powder, and in the hollow put a piece of a plantain leaf, and on the leaf put oil, and a wick, which they light. Then the Gadi, or flesh-eating priest, 94 Folk-lore of Northern India. brings the goat in front of the sick man, sprinkles the goat s head with red powder and flowers, and says to the spirit, * This is for you ; take it.' He then passes three fowls three times from the head to the foot of the sick man, and then from the head lowers all the other articles. The Gadi, or Mhar, and some friends of the patient start for the place named by the spirit. When the party leave, the sick man is taken into the house and set close to the threshold. They put water on his eyes, and filling a pot with water, throw it outside where the articles were, and inside and outside scatter cowdung ashes, saying, ' If you come in you will have the curse of Rama and Lakshmana.' When the Gadi and the party reach their destination, the Gadi tells the party to bring a stone the size of a cocoanut. When the stone is brought, the Gadi washes it and puts it to the root of the tree and sets about it small stones. On the tree and on the middle stone he puts red lead, red powder, and frankincense. The people then tell the spirit to stay there, and promise to give him a cocoanut every year if he does them no harm. They then kill the goat and the fowls, and, letting the blood fall in front of the stone, offer the heart and liver to the spirit, and then return home." ' From ceremonies like these, in which a malignant spirit is entombed in a tree and its surrounding stones, the transition to the general belief in tree sprites is easy. The use of the various articles to scare spirits will be understood from what has been already said on that subject. The Karam Tree. Passing on to trees which are considered specially sacred, we find a good example in the Karam {Neuclea parvifolid), which is revered by the Kharwars, Manjhis, and some of the other allied Dravidian races of the Vindhyan and Kaimur ranges. In Shahabad, their great festival is the worship of the sacred tree. " Commenced early in the bright portion of > Campbell, " Notes," 221 sq. Tree and Serpent Worship. 95 the month Bhadon (August — September), it continues for fifteen days. It marks the gladness with which people wind up their agricultural operations all over the world. The festivities begin with a fast during the day. In the evening the young men of the village only proceed in a gay circle to the forest. A leafy branch of the Karam is selected, cut, and daubed with red lead and butter. Brought in due state, it is planted in the yard in front of the house, and is decorated with wreaths of wild flowers, such as autumn yields to the Hill men with a bountiful hand. The homely ritual of the Kharwar then follows, and is finished with the offering of corn and molasses. The worship over, the head of the village community serves the men with a suitable feast. But the great rejoicing of the season is reserved for a later hour. After dinner the men and women appear in their gala dress, and range themselves in two opposite rows. The Mandar, or national drum of the aborigines, is then struck, and the dance commences with a movement forward, until the men and women draw close. Once face to face, a gradual movement towards the right is commenced, and the men and women advance in a slow but merry circle, which takes about an hour to describe. " Under the influence of the example of the Hindus, the practice of a national dance in which women take a promi- nent part is already on the dechne. When indulged in, it is done with an amount of privacy, closed to the public, but open to the members of the race only. It is difficult, however, to explain why the Karam tree should be so greatly adored by the Kharwars. It is an insignificant tree, with small leaves, which hardly affords shelter or shade, and possesses no title to be considered superior to others in its native forest. Nor in the religious belief of the Kharwars have we been able to trace any classic tale connected with the growth of the Karam grove, similar to that of the peaceful olive of old, or aromatic laurel. One im- portant, though the last incident of the Karam worship is the appearance of the demon to the Kharwar village men. g6 Folk-lore of Northern India. Generally at the conclusion of the dance the demon takes possession of a Kharwar, who commences to talk, tremble, and jump, and ultimately climbs up the branch of the Karam and begins to eat the leaves. Consultation about the fortunes of the year then takes place, and when the demon has foretold them the festivities are concluded." ' This account omits two important points which enable us to explain the meaning of the rite. The first is that when the festivities are over the branch of the Karam tree is taken and thrown into a stream or tank. This can hardly, on the analogy of similar practices to which reference has been already made, be anything but a charm to produce season- able rain. Another is that sprigs of barley grown in a special way, as at the Upper India festival of the Jayi, which will be discussed later on, are offered to the tree. This must be an invocation to the deity of the tree to prosper the growth of the autumn rice, which is just at this time being planted out. I have seen the Karama danced by the Manjhis, a Dra vi- dian tribe in Mirzapur, closely allied to the Kharwars. The people there seem to affect no secrecy about it, and are quite ready to come and dance before Europeans for a small gratuity. The men expect to receive a little native liquor between the acts, but the ladies of the ballet will accept only a light supper of coarse sugar. The troupe consists of about a dozen men and the same number of women. The sexes stand in rows opposite to each other, the women clinging together, each with her arms clasped round her neighbour's waist. One man carrying the sacred Mandar drum, beats it and leads the ballet, hopping about in a curious way on one leg alternately. The two lines advance and retreat, the women bowing low all the time, with their heads bending towards the ground, and joining occasionally in the refrain. Most of the songs are apparently modern, bearing on the adventures of Rama, Lakshmana, and Sita ; some are love songs, many of which are, as might have been expected, rude and indecent. The whole scene is a curious picture of ^ " Calcutta Review,'' Ixix. 364 sq. Tree and Serpent Worship. 97 genuine aboriginal life. At the regular autumn festival the ceremony degenerates into regular saturnalia, and is, if common rumour be trusted, accompanied by an absolute abandonment of decency and self-respect which culminates in the most unrestrained debauchery. The modern explanation of the dance is embodied in a folk-tale which turns on the verbal confusion between Karam, the name of the tree, and the Sanskrit Karma, meaning " good works." It is, of course, comparatively modern, and quite useless as a means for ascertaining the real basis of the custom, which is probably a means of propitiating the tree god to grant favourable weather. The Fig Tree. Among the sacred trees the various varieties of the fig hold a conspicuous place. Many ideas have probably united in securing reverence for them. Thus the Banyan with its numerous stems may fitly be regarded as the home of gods or spirits. Others are valued as a source of food, or because they possess juices valued as drink or medicine. Such is the Umbar, the Udambara of the Sanskrit writers, which is known as Kshira Vriksha or " milk tree," and Hemadugha or " golden juiced," the Ficus glomerata of botanists, from the succulent roots of which water can be found in times of drought. The juice has, in popular belief, many valuable properties. A decoction of it is useful for bile, melancholy, and fainting ; it prevents abortion and increases the mother's milk.^ According to the old ritual, of its wood is made the seat of the father god Vivasvat, which is specially worshipped at the close of the Soma sacrifice ; the throne on which Soma is placed is made of it, and so is the staff given by the Adhvaryu to the sacrificer at the initiation rite, and the staff of the Vaisya student. So with the Pipal ( Ficus religiosa) , which is connected with old temples, as it forces its roots into the crumbling masonry, grows to a great age, and, like the poplar, moves its leaves at ' Campbell, " Notes," 237. VOL. II. H gS Folk-lore of Northern India. the slightest breath of wind. The EngHsh tradition about the aspen is that since its wood was used to make the Cross it ever trembles with shame. The Pippala or Asvattha is said by some to be the abode of Brahma, and is sometimes invested with the sacred thread by the regular Upanayana rite. Others say that in it abide Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, but specially Vishnu in his incarnation as Krishna. Others, again, connect it with Basdeo or Vasudeva, the father of Krishna. The Vata or Nyagrodha {Fiats Indicd) was, according to the ancient ritual, possessed of many virtues, and the king was directed to drink its juice instead of that of the Soma.^ The famous Allahabad fig tree is mentioned in the Ramayana and in the Uttara Rama Charitra. Rama, Sita and Lakshmana are said to have rested beneath its branches. Another legend tells how the Rishi Markandeya had the presumption to ask Narayana to show him a specimen of his delusive power. The god in answer to his prayer drowned the whole world in a sudden flood, and only the Akshaya Vata or imperishable Banyan tree raised its head above the waters, with a little child seated on its topmost bough, that put out its head and saved the terrified saint just as he was on the point of drowning. The Buddhist pilgrim, Hwen Thsang, says that in his time before the principal room of the temple there was a tree with wide-spreading branches, which was said to be the dwelling of a man-eating demon. The tree was surrounded with human bones, the remains of pilgrims who had offered themselves at the temple, a custom which had been observed from time immemorial. General Cunningham identifies this tree with the Akshaya Vata, which is still an object of worship. The well-known Banyan tree of Ceylon is said to be descended from it.''* It was under the Bodhi tree at Gaya that the Buddha obtained enlightenment. The great sacred Banyan tree of the Himalaya is said to have reached from Badarinath to ' Haug, " Aitareya Brahmanam," ii. 486 sq. * Cunningham, "Bhilsa Topes," 24 ; " Archaeological Reports," i. 5 sq. ; Ferguson, "Eastern Architecture," 69; Fiihrer, "Monumental Anti- quities," 127. Tree and Serpent Worship. 99 Nand Prayag, a distance of eighty miles.' In Bombay women worship the Banyan tree on the fifteenth of the month of Jeth in honour of Savitri, the pious wife of Satya- van, who when her husband was cutting a Banyan tree was struck by the axe and killed. Yama appeared and claimed her husband, but at last he was overcome by the devotion of Savitri and restored her husband to her." Of the Gular {Ficus glomei-atd) it is believed that on the night of the Divali the gods assemble to pluck its flowers ; hence no one has ever seen the tree in blossom. It is unlucky to grow a Gular tree near the house, as it causes the death of sons in the family. High-caste Hindu women worship the Pipal tree in the form of Vasudeva on the Amavasya or fifteenth day of the month, when it falls on Monday. They pour water at its roots, smear the trunk with red lead and ground sandal- wood, and walk round it one hundred and eight times in the course of the sun, putting at each circuit a copper coin, a sweetmeat, or a Brahmanical cord at the root, all of which are the perquisite of beggars. An old woman then recites the tale of the Raja Nikunjali and his queen Satyavrati, who won her husband by her devotion to the sacred tree. Hence devotion to it is supposed to promote wedded happi- ness. In Rajputana the Pipal and Banyan are worshipped by women on the 2gth day ofBaisakh (April — May) to preserve them from widowhood.'' The Pipal is invoked at the rite of investiture with the sacred thread at marriages and at the foundation-laying of houses. Vows are made under its shade for the boon of male offspring, and pious women veil their faces when they pass it. Many, as they revolve round it, twist a string of soft cotton round the trunk. The vessel of water for the comfort of the departing soul on its way to the land of the dead is hung from its branches, and beneath it are placed the rough stones which form the shrine of the village godhng. Its wood is used in parts of ^ "Himalayan Gazetteer,'' ii. 783. - Campbell, " Notes," 238. ■'' Tod, "Annals," i. 611. H 2 roo Folk-lore of Northern India. the Arani, or sacred fire-drill, and for the spoons with which butter is poured on the holy fire. When its branches are attacked by the lac insect, a branch on which they have settled is taken to the Ganges at Allahabad and consigned to the Ganges. This, it is believed, saves the tree from further injury. The tree should be touched only on Sunday, when Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, abides in it ; on every other day of the week, poverty and misfortune take up their quarters in it. The son of a deceased parent should pour three hundred and sixty brass vessels of water round its root to ensure the repose of the dead man. Hindus on Sunday after bathing pour a vessel of water at its root and walk round it four times. Milk and sugar are sometimes mixed with the water to intensify the charm. When the new moon falls on Monday, pious Hindus walk one hundred and eight times round it and wind cotton threads about the trunk. In rich Hindu families small silver models of the tree answer the same purpose. When a statement is made on oath, the witness takes one of the leaves in his hand and invokes the gods above him to crush him, as he crushes the leaf, if he is guilty of falsehood. Though Sir Monier-Williams gives currency to it, it may be suspected that the story of the Banyas who objected to Pipal trees being planted in their bazar, as they could not carry on their roguery under the shade of the holy tree, has been invented for the delectation of the confiding European tourist. As a matter of fact you will often see merchants plant the tree in the immediate neighbourhood of their shops. It is needless to say that this regard for the Pipal extends through Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Sumatra, and Java.' The Sal. The Sal or Sakhu is also a holy tree. It is held in much respect by the jungle races, who consider it the abode of spirits and erect their shrines under its shade. The Bagdis ' See instances collected by Wake, "Serpent Worship," i8. Tree and Serpent Worship. ioi and Bauris of Bengal are married in an arbour made of the branches of the Sal {S/iorea robusta) after they have been first married to a Mahua tree {Bassia latifolia). Patches of this tree are often reserved as fragments of the primitive jungle, of which it must have constituted an important part. The Shisham. The Shisham or Sison, the Sinsapa of the Sanskrit writers, is in the tales of Somadeva the haunt of the Vetala.' The Jand. In the Panjab the Jand tree {Prosopis spicigenx) is very generally reverenced, more especially in those parts where it forms a chief feature in the larger flora of the great arid grazing tracts. It is commonly selected to mark the abode or shelter the shrine of some deity. It is to it that, as a rule, rags are dedicated as offerings, and it is employed in the marriage ceremonies of many tribes. Most Khatris and Brahmans perform rites to it, especially at festivals con- nected with domestic occurrences. A custom prevails in some families of never putting home-made clothes upon the children, bat of begging them from friends. This is, as we have already seen, done with the view of avoiding the Evil Eye. The ceremony of putting on these clothes is usually performed when the child is three years of age. It is taken to the Jand tree, from which a bough is cut with a sickle and planted at the root of the tree as a propitiation of the indwelling spirit. The Swastika symbol is made before it with the rice, flour, and sugar brought as an offering to the tree. Nine threads from the Mauli, or string used by women to tie up their back hair, are then taken out and cut into lengths, one of which is tied round the tree with the knot characteristic of Siva or Krishna, and another round a piece of dried molasses, which is placed on the Swastika. Man- tras or spells are repeated and the sugar and rice are distri- * Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 293. 102 Folk-lore of Northern India. buted among the women and children ; for no male adult, except the officiating Brahman, attends the ceremony. The Brahman then dresses the child in the new clothes, on which he impresses the mark of his hand in saffron, and girds the child's loins with a hair string, on which is tied the bag or purse containing the Brahman's fee. The hair string has in front a triangular piece of red silk, which, as we have already noticed, is one of the most famihar forms of amulet intended to repel the influence of evil spirits. Similarly at marriages, they perform the ceremony of cutting off and burning a small branch of the tree, and offerings are made to it by the relations of persons suffering from small-pox.' The Aonla. The Aonla [Emblica officijtalis) is another sacred tree. It is considered propitious and chaste, and is worshipped in the month of Karttik (December) by Brahmans being fed under it, hair strings {mauli) being tied round it, and seven circumambulations made in the course of the sun. The eleventh of the month Phalgun (February) is sacred to it, and on this occasion libations are poured at the foot of the tree, a string of red or yellow colour is bound round the trunk, prayers are offered to it for the fruitfulness of women, animals, and crops, and the ceremony concludes with a reverential inclination to the sacred tree." The Mahua. The Mahua {Bassia latifolia), which so admirably combines beauty with utility, and is one of the main sources whence the jungle tribes derive their food and intoxicants, is held in the highest respect by the people of the Central Indian Highlands. It is the marriage tree of the Kurmis, Lobars, Mahilis, Mundas, and Santals of Bengal. Many of the 1 Ibbetson, " Panjab Ethnography," 1 18 ; " Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. 55 ; O'Brien, " Multani Glossary," 82. 3 "Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. 74; EUiot, "Supplementary Glossary," 26. Tree and Serpent Worship. 103 Dravidian races, such as the Bhuiyas, adore it, and a branch is placed in the hands of the bride and bridegroom during the marriage ceremony. They also revolve round a bough of the tree planted in the ground by the Baiga or aboriginal priest. Some of the semi-Hinduized Bengal Gonds have the remarkable custom of tying the corpses of adult males by a cord to the Mahua tree, in an upright position, previous to burial. It is also the rule with them that all adult males go to the forest and clear a space round an Asan tree {Terniinalia alata tormentosd) , where they make an altar and present offerings to the tribal godling, Bara Deo, after which they have a general picnic' The Cotton Tree. The Salmali or Semal {Bombax heptaphylluvi) is likewise sacred, an idea perhaps derived from its weird appearance and the value of its iibre, which was largely used by the primitive races of the jungle. It gave its name to one of the seven Dvipas or great divisions of the known continent, and to a special hell, in which the wicked are tortured with the Kuta Salmali, or thorny rod of this tree. In the folk- tales a hollow cotton tree is the refuge of the heroine." The posts of the marriage pavilion and stake round which the bride and bridegroom revolve are very commonly made of its wood among the Kols and allied Dravidian tribes, as are also the parrot totem emblems used at marriages by the Kharwars and many menial castes. The Bansphors, a branch of the great Dom race in the North-Western Pro- vinces, fix up a branch of the Gular and Semal in the marriage shed. " Among the wild tribes it is considered the favourite seat of gods still more terrible than those of the Pipal, because their superintendence is confined to the neighbourhood, and having their attention less occupied, they can venture to make a more minute scrutiny into the ^ Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 148, 281, 283 ; Rousselet, " India and its Native Princes," 369 sq. * Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 162. 104 Folk-lore of Northern India. conduct of the people immediately around them. The Pipal is occupied by one or two of the Hindus triad, the gods of creation, preservation, and destruction, who have the affairs of the universe to look after, but the cotton and other trees are occupied by some minor deities, who are vested with a local superintendence over the affairs of a district, or perhaps of a single village." ' The NiM. The Nimba or Nim {Azidirachta Indicd) is sacred in con- nection with the worship of the godlings of disease, who are supposed to reside in it. In particular it is occupied by Sitala and her six sisters. Hence during the season when epidemics prevail, from the seventh day of the waning moon of Chait to the same date in Asarh, that is during the hot weather, women bathe, dress themselves in fresh clothes, and offer rice, sandal-wood, flowers, and sometimes a burnt offering with incense at the root of the tree. The Nim tree is also connected with snake worship, as its leaves repel snakes. In this it resembles the Yggdrassil of Europe, the roots of which were half destroyed by the serpents which nestled among them. The leaves and wood of the ash tree, the modern successor of the mystic tree of Teutonic mythology, are still regarded throughout all Northern Europe as a powerful protective from all manner of snakes and evil worms.' In Cornwall no kind of snake is ever found near the ashen tree, and a branch of it will prevent a snake from coming near a person.^ Nim leaves are, it may be noted, useless as a snake scarer unless they are fresh."' The leaves are also used throughout Northern India as a means of avoiding the death pollution, or rather as a mode of driving off the spirit which accompanies the mourners ^ Sleeman, "Rambles and Recollections," ii. i8 ; Tylor, "Primitive Culture," ii. 225. - " Quarterly Review,'' cxiv. 226; "Folk-lore,'' iii. 88. ^ Hunt, " Popular Romances," 420. •• Temple, " Legends of the Panjab," i. 473. Tree and Serpent Worship. 105 from the cremation ground. Hence after the funeral they chew the leaves and some water is sprinkled over them with a branch of the tree. "So great is the power of the Nim over spirits and spirit disease, that in Bombay, when a woman is delivered of a child, Nim leaves and cow's urine are, as a rule, kept at the entrance of the lying-in room, in order that the child and its mother may not be affected by an evil spirit, and on their New Year's Day it is considered essential for every Hindu to worship the Nim tree and to eat its leaves mixed with pepper and sugar, that he may not suffer from any sickness or disease during the year. In practice very few worship the tree, but its leaves are generally eaten by most of them. Among the Chitpawan Brahmans, a pot filled with cow's urine is set at the door of the lying-in room with a Nim branch in it, and anyone coming in must dip the branch in the urine and with it sprinkle his feet. Among Govardhan Brahmans of Puna, when a child is born, Nim leaves are hung at the front and back doors of the house. In Ahmadnagar, when a person is bitten by a snake, he is taken to Bhairoba's temple, crushed Nim leaves mixed with chillies are given him to eat, and Nim leaves waved round his head. Among the Namdeo Shimpis of Ahmadnagar each of the mourners carries from the pyre a twig of the Nim tree, and the Kanphatas of Cutch get the cartilage of their ears slit, and in the slit a Nim stick is stuck, the wound being cured by a dressing of Nim oil." ' We have already found this tree connected with Sun worship, as in the case of the Nimbarak Vaishnavas, as well as with that of Sitala, the goddess of small-pox. Among the wilder tribes it is also revered. The Jogis, a criminal tribe in Madras, reverence it and brand their dogs with a representation of the tree.^ The Banjaras, or wan- dering carriers, use a branch of the tree as a test of con- tinence. The jealous husband throws it on the ground and says, " If thou be a true woman, lift that Nim branch." ' Campbell, " Notes," 234. ^ Mullaly, " Notes on Madras Criminal Tribes," 20. io6 Folk-lore of Northern India. The Doms, or vagrant sweepers of the Eastern District of the North-Western Provinces, hold the Nim tree sacred to Kali or Sitala, and the Kurmis dedicate it to Kali Bhavani, and worship this tree and the Pipal under which the image of Devi is placed.' The Cocoanut. The cocoanut is considered one of the most sacred fruits, and is called Sriphala, or the fruit of Sri, the goddess of prosperity. It is the symbol of fertility, and all through Upper India is kept on shrines and presented by the priests to women who desire children. One of the main causes of the respect paid to it seems to be its resemblance to a human head, and hence it is often used as a type of an actual human sacrifice. It is also revered for its uses as food and a source of intoxicating liquor. But it is not a native of Northern India, and is naturally more revered in its home along the western coast. In Gujarat and Kanara it represents the house spirit, and is worshipped as a family god. The Konkan Kunbis put up and worship a cocoanut for each of their relations who dies, and before beginning to cut the rice, break a cocoanut and distribute it among the reapers. The Prabhus, at every place where three roads meet, wave a cocoanut round the face of the bridegroom, and break it into pieces to repel evil influences. The Musalmans of the Dakkhin cut a cocoanut and lime into pieces and throw them over the head of the bridegroom to scare evil spirits. Among some classes of ascetics the skull is broken at the time of cremation with a cocoanut in order to allow the ghost to escape. In Western India, at the close of the rains, cocoanuts are thrown in to pacify the sea. Its place as a substitute for a human sacrifice in Northern India seems to have been taken by the pumpkin, which is used in much the same way. The Mimosa. The Khair, or Mimosa {Acacia catechu) seems to owe most ' "Panj4b Notes and Queries," iii. 38. Tree and Serpent Worship. 107 of the estimation in which it is held to its use in producing the sacred fire. It forms, on account of its hardness, the base of the Arani or sacred fire-drill, and in it the wedge of the softer Pipal wood works and fire is produced by friction. The Yupa or sacrificial post to which the victim was tied for the sacrifice was often made of this wood. In the great horse sacrifice of the Ramayana, twenty-one of these posts were erected, six made of Vilva {Agle marmelos), six of Khadira or Acacia, six of Palasa {Butea frondosa), one of Udumbara {Ficus glovierata), Sleshmataka {Cordia ftiyxd), and one of Devadru, the Deodar pine tree. Of the Khair tree Bishop Heber thus writes in his Journal : ^ " As I returned home I passed a fine tree of the Mimosa, with leaves at a little distance so much resembling those of the mountain ash, that I was for a moment de- ceived, and asked if it did not bear fruit. He answered, ' No ; but it was a very noble tree, bemg called the *' Im- perial tree," for its excellent qualities. That it slept all night, and was alive all day, withdrawing its leaves if any one attempted to touch them. Above all, however, it was useful as a preservative against magic ; a sprig worn in the turban, or suspended over the bed, was a perfect security against all spells. Evil Eye, etc., insomuch that the most formidable wizard would not, if he could help it, approach its shade. One indeed, they said, who was very renowned for his power (hke Lorrinite of Kehama) of killing plants and dry- ing up their sap with a look, had come to this very tree and gazed upon it intently ; ' but,' said the old man, who told me this with an air of triumph, ' look as he might, he could do the tree no harm,' a fact of which I made no question. I was amused and surprised to find the superstition, which hi England and Scotland attaches to the rowan tree, here applied to a tree of nearly similar form." This superstition regarding the rowan tree and the elder is familiar in European folk-lore. In Ireland the roots of the elder and those of an apple tree which bears red apples, boiled together and drunk fasting, expel evil 1 i. 287. io8 Folk-lore of Northern India. spirits. In connection with this idea that the mimosa sleeps at night, pious Hindus prefer not to eat betel leaves after sunset, as catechu forms part of the ingredients with which they are prepared. The Plantain. The plantain is also sacred, probably on account of the value of its fruit. The leaves are hung on the marriage booth, and a branch is placed near the pole or sacred fire round which the bride and bridegroom revolve. In Madras, when premature deliver}^ takes place, the child is laid on a plantain leaf smeared with oil, the leaf is changed daily, and the baby is thus treated for the period which is less than the normal time of delivery. In Bengal, in conse- crating an image of Durga, a plantain tree is brought in and bathed. It is clothed as a woman with Bel apples representing the breasts ; nine sorts of leaves smeared with red paint are hung round the breast and it is worshipped.' The leaves are also used as a remedy for wounds and ulcers, a practice which prevailed in the time of Shakespeare. In " Romeo and Juliet " Benvolio says : — • " Take thou some new infection to thine eye, And the rank poison of the old will die." To which Romeo answers : — " Your plantain leaf is excellent for that.'' " For what, I pray thee ? " " For your broken skin." In the folk- tales the deserted wife sweeps the ground round a plantain tree and it gives her a blessing.^ The Pomegranate. So with the pomegranate, which among the Parsis of Bombay is held in high respect. Its twigs were used to make the sacred broom, its seeds, in order to scare evil ' Ward, " Hindus," ii. 13, quoted by Campbell, " Notes," 229. 2 Lai Bihari De, " Folk-tales," 280. Tree and Serpent Worship. [og spirits, were thrown over the child when it was girt with the sacred thread, and its juice was squeezed into the mouth of the dying.' In its fruit Anar Shahzadi, the Princess Pomegranate, commonly lies hidden. But it is in Upper India considered unlucky to have such a tree in the house, as it is envious and cannot bear that any one should be lovelier than itself.^ The Tamarind. The Oraons of Bengal revere the tamarind and bury their dead under its shade.^ One special rite among the Dravi- dian races is the Imli ghontna or " the grinding of the tamarind," when the mother of the bridegroom grinds on the family curry stone some pods of the tamarind. The tree was a special favourite with the early Musalman conquerors, and the finest specimens of it will be found in their ceme- teries and near their original settlements. The Siras. In the Panjab the leaves of the Siras {Acacia sirisa) are a powerful charm. In many villages in Upper India they will be seen hung up on the rope crossing the village cattle path, when epidemics prevail among men or animals." In this case the effect of the charm is enhanced by adding to them a tile covered with some hocus-pocus formula, written by a Faqir, and rude models of a pair of wooden sandals, a mud rake, a plough-share and other agricultural implements which are considered effectual to scare the demon which brings the plague. The Mango. The Mango is used in much the same way. It is, as we shall see, used in making the aspersion at rural ceremonies. ' Campbell, loc. cit.^ 229. * " North Indian Notes and Queries,'" i. 207. ^ Dalton, "Descriptive Ethnology,'' 189. * " Sirsa Settlement Report," 154. no Folk-lore of Northern India. The leaves are hung up at marriages in garlands on the house door, and on the shed in which the rite is performed, and after the wedding is over these are carefully consigned to running water by the bride and bridegroom. It is also used as a charm. Before you see a flower on a mango tree shut your eyes and make some one lead you to a tree in flower. Rub the flowers into your hands, and you thus acquire the power of curing scorpion stings by moving your hand over the place. But this power lasts only for one year, and must be renewed when the season of flowers again returns. The TuLAst. The Tulasi or holy basil [Ocyinum sanctum) is closely connected with the worship of Vishnu. At the last census over eleven hundred persons in the North-Western Pro- vinces recorded themselves as worshippers of the plant. It is known in Sanskrit as Haripriya, or " the beloved of Vishnu," and Bhiltaghni, or " destroyer of demons." It seems to owe the favour with which it is regarded to its aromatic and healing properties. Vishnu, so runs the legend, was fascinated with the beauty of Vrinda, the wife of Jalandhara, to redeem him from whose enthralment, the gods applied to Lakshmi, Gauri, and Swadha. Each gave them seed to sow where Vishnu was enchanted. The seeds given by the deities sprang up as the Dhatri or Embhca Myrobalan, the Malati or jasmine, and the Tulasi, or basil, and appearing in female form they attracted the admiration of the deity and saved him from the wiles of Vrinda.' Another legend comes from Bombay." Tulasi was daughter of the Raja Dharmadhwaja, and by her devotions gained the favour of Vishnu, but she married the demon Sankhachuda, who by the virtue of his wife overcame the gods. They appealed to Vishnu, but he could not help them, as the demon was his votary. At last it was resolved that he should personate her husband and gain her love. ' Wilson, "Works," iii. 68. ^ Campbell, " Notes," 248. Tree and Serpent Worship. hi When Tulasi was aware of the deception she was about to curse him, but he pacified her by promising to marry her and make her name immortal. He added that those women who married an image of him to the Tulasi on the eleventh day of the month Karttik would prosper. The Tulasi is also connected with Sita and Rukmini, and the prayer to her is : "I adore that Tulasi, in whose roots are all the places of pilgrimage, in whose centre are all the deities, and in whose upper branches are all the Vedas." The plant is specially worshipped by women after bathing, and more particularly at the full moon of Karttik, if the bathing be in the Ganges. The chief ceremony is, however, the marriage of the infant Krishna to the plant, which is carried out by pious people, often at a considerable cost, in accordance with the standard ritual. The Palasa. The Palasa or Dhdk is sacred, partly on account of its use in producing the sacred fire, and partly because its orange blossoms are used to dye the coloured dust and water thrown about at the Holi festival. It is supposed to be in some way connected with the Soma, and by one account was produced from the feather of the falcon imbued with the Soma. Its trifoliate leaves represent the trident, or the three great gods, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, or birth, life, and death. The leaves are used to form the platters employed at various feasts and religious rites ; the wood in the Yupa, or sacrificial pole, and in the funeral pyre. In one respect it resembles the rowan, which is also a sacred tree, but why this is so has been much debated. " Possibly the inaccessible rocks on which the tree is not unfrequently found to grow and the conspicuous colour of its berries may have counted for something, but this falls de- cidedly short of a solution of the question. One kind of answer that would meet the case, provided it be countenanced by facts, may be briefly indicated, namely, that the berries of the rowan were used in some early period in the brew- 112 Folk-lore of Northern India, ing of an intoxicating drink, or better still, of the first intoxicating drink known to the Teuto-Aryan Celts." ' The connection between the Palasa and the Soma perhaps indi- cates that this may have been the case. It was again a Vedic custom to drive the cows from their calves by striking them with a rod of a Palasa tree. In Yorkshire it used to be the custom for " farmers to have whip-stocks of rowan tree wood, and it was held that thus supplied, they were safe against having their draught fixed, or their horses made restive by a witch. If ever a draught came to a standstill, then the nearest witchwood tree was resorted to, and a stick cut to flog the horses on with, to the discomfiture of the malevolent witch who had caused the stoppage." In some parts of Scotland the milkmaid carries a switch of the magical rowan to expel the demon which sometimes enters the cow ; and in Germany, striking the cow with this magical wand is believed to render her fertile.* The Bel. The Bel {Aegle marnielos) is specially dedicated to Siva, because it has three leaflets in the leaf, and because of its medicinal value. Siva is called Bilvadanda, " he with a staff of the Bel wood," and its leaves are used in his service. Its leaves laid on the Lingam cool and refresh the heated deity. The wood is one of those used for the sacrificial post. Its fruit is called Sriphala, because it is supposed to have been produced from the milk of the goddess Sri. The Bamboo. The bamboo is sacred on account of its manifold uses and because among the jungle races fire is produced by the friction of two strips of bamboo. Besides this it contains a sort of manna, known as Banslochan or Tabashir, which is ' Rhys, " Lectures,'' 359. 2 Kelly, " Curiosities,' 159; Conway, *' Demonology," i. 126; Guber- natis, "Zoological Mythology," i. 225 ; Dyer, "Popular Customs," 274 ; Brand, "Observations," 616. Tree and Serpent Worship. 113 in high repute as a medicine. The flowering of the bamboo is generally regarded as a sure sign of famine. The bamboo often appears in the folk-tales. Thus in one of the tales of Somadeva/ ''they asked Sumeru about the origin of the bow, and he said : ' Here is a great and glorious wood of bamboo canes ; whatever bamboos are cut from it and thrown into this lake, become great and wonderful bows ; and those bows have been acquired by several of the gods, and by Asuras and Gandharvas and distinguished Vidyadharas.' " In one of the Santal tales,' the bamboo grows from the grave of the murdered girl, and remonstrates when the Jogi goes to cut it, but out of a piece he finally makes a flute of wondrous sweetness. Among the jungle races the bamboo often is used to make the poles of the marriage shed, while the central post is made of the wood of the holy Siddh tree, the Hardwickia binata. In Gujarat,^ the Turis, to keep off evil spirits, lay two slips of bamboo in the lying-in room. The Prabhus of Puna at their marriages put bamboo baskets on the heads of the bride, bridegroom, and guests. The Mhars and Mangs make the married pair stand in bamboo baskets. The Muasis of Bengal make the wedded pair revolve round a bamboo post. The Birhors worship Darha in the form of a split bamboo ; the Kacharis and Garos worship a bamboo planted in the ground ; the Rajmahal hill-man worships three bamboos with streamers, as Chaunda Gusain/ The use of the bamboo decorated with a streamer as a perch for the deity is common at all low-caste shrines in Northern India. The Sandal. The Sandal, again, in the form of powder or paste is very largely used in all Hindu rites, and in making the marks characteristic of sect or caste. " In Bombay, every evening, the Parsis burn sandal chips in their houses, as the smell of ' Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 439. 2 Campbell, "Santal Folk-tales," 54. ■' Campbell, "Notes," 239. "• Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 109, 220, 234, VOL IL I 114 Folk-lore of Northern India. sandal is supposed to drive away evil spirits, and the Puna Ghadsis or musicians say that they are sprung from sandal wood, because it is one of their tribal guardians/ " The Birch. The Bhurja, a species of birch, is also sacred. It, too, is supposed to drive away evil spirits. Its bark, now called Bhojpatra, is used for writing charms, and for other mystic purposes. When a corpse is burnt by low-caste people, when a person dies at the hands of an executioner, when he dies on a bed, or when he is drowned and his body cannot be found, a rite known as Palasvidhi is performed. An effigy of the deceased is made, in which twigs of the Palasa tree represent the bones, a cocoanut or Bel fruit the head, pearls or cowry shells the eyes, and a piece of birch bark or the skin of a deer the cuticle. It is then filled up with Urad pulse instead of flesh and blood, and a presiding priest recites a spell to bring life into the image, which is symbol- ized by putting a lighted lamp close to the head. When the light goes out, life is believed to be extinct and the funeral rites are performed in the regular way, the only exception being that the period of impurity lasts for three, instead of ten days. Other Sacred Trees. The number of these trees and plants which scare evil spirits or are invested with other mystic qualities is infinite. We may close the catalogue with the Babul or Kikar {Acacia Arabica), which when cut pours out a reddish juice. One of these trees, when the Musalmans tried to cut it near a shrine at Lahore, is said to have poured out drops of blood as a warning. But on the whole it is an unlucky tree, and the resort of evil spirits. If you throw water for thirteen days successively on a Babul tree, you will get the evil spirits which inhabit it into your power. They tell of a man who ^ Campbell, loc. cit,, 232. Tree and Serpent Worship. 115 did this near Saharanpur, who when taken to his cremation, no sooner was the light set to his pyre than he got up and walked home, and is alive to this day. His neighbours naturally look on his proceedings with a certain degree of suspicion. The ghost of a man burnt with this wood will not rest quietly, and any one who rests on a bed made of it is afflicted with evil dreams. An old servant of mine once solemnly remonstrated against the use of such a bed by his master. Such a bed, he remarked, should be only used for a clergyman guest, who by virtue of his profession is naturally protected against such uncanny visitations. Tree Marriages. We now come to discuss the curious custom of marriages to trees. This prevails widely throughout Northern India. Thus, in some parts of Kangra, if a betrothed but as yet unmarried girl can succeed in performing the marriage ceremony with the object of her choice round a fire made in the jungle with certain wild plants, her betrothal is annulled, and this informal marriage is recognized.^ In the Panjab a Hindu cannot be legally married a third time. So, if he wishes to take a third wife, he is married to a Babul tree (Acacia Arabica), or to the Akh plant {Asclepia gigantea), first, so that the wife he subsequently marries is counted as his fourth, and the evil consequences of marry- ing a third time are thus avoided.- In Bengal, writes Dr. Buchanan,^ " Premature marriage is considered so necessary to Hindu ideas of prosperity, that even the unfortunate children who are brought up for prostitution are married with all due ceremony to a plantain tree, before the age when they would be defiled by remaining single." In the North-Western Provinces, among some of the higher classes of Brahmans, if a man happens to lose one or two wives and is anxious to marry a third, the ceremony of his third ' Ibbetson, "Panjab Ethnography," 119. 2 " Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. 42 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 27. ^ "Eastern India," iii. 555. I 2 ii6 Folk-lore of Northern India. marriage is first gone through with an Akh plant. The family priest takes the intending bridegroom to the fields where there are Akh plants and repeats the marriage formula. This is known as Arka Vivah, or Akh marriage, and it is believed that the plant itself dies soon after being married. In Oudh, it is very unlucky to marry a couple if the ruling stars of the youth form a more powerful com- bination than those of the female. The way to get out of the difficulty is to marry the girl first to a Pipal tree. In the Panjab, rich people who have no children marry a Brahman to a Tulasi plant. The pseudo-father of the bride treats the Brahman ever afterwards as his son-in-law, which, it is needless to say, is a very good thing for the Brahman,^ If the birth of a child does not follow this ceremony, they have good reason for apprehending that a messenger from Yama, the god of death, will harass them on their way to the spirit world. In Bombay, among the Kudva Kunbis of Gujarat, when there are certain difficulties in the marriage of a girl, she is married to a mango or some other fruit tree. Mr. Camp- bell " accounts for this on the principle that a spirit fears trees, especially fruit trees. Among another branch of the same tribe, when a girl is marriageable and a bridegroom cannot be found, the practice is to substitute a bunch of flowers, and the marriage ceremony proceeds. Next 'day, by which time the flowers have begun to fade, they are thrown into a well, and the bride of yesterday is considered a widow. As a widow can marry at any time without social discredit, the parents find a husband for her at their leisure.^ So in Bengal, the Rautiyas before the wedding go through the form of marriage to a mango tree.^ Among the Mun- dari Kols, " the bride and bridegroom are well anointed with turmeric, and wedded, not to each other, but the bride to a Mahua tree, and the groom to a mango, or both to ^ " North Indian Notes and Queries," ii, 151 sq. ^ " Notes," 461. ^ " Bombay Gazetteer," vii. 61. * Risley, " Tribes and Castes," ii. 201. Tree and Serpent Worship. 117 mango trees. They are made to touch the tree with red lead, and then to clasp it, and they are tied to it." ^ Among the Kurmis, the bridegroom on the wedding morning is first married to a mango tree. He embraces the tree, is for a time tied to it in a peculiar manner with a thread, and he daubs it with red lead. Then the thread is removed from the tree, and is used to attach some of the leaves to the bridegroom's wrist. The bride is similarly wedded to a Mahua tree." Similarly in the Himalayas, if anyone desires to marry a third time, whether his other wives are alive or not, he is married to the Akh plant. He builds an altar near the plant, or brings a branch home and plants it near the altar. The regular marriage ceremony is then performed, and a thread is wound ten times round the plant with the recita- tion of appropriate verses. Four days the plant remains where it was fixed, and on the fifth day the celebrant is entitled to commence the marriage ceremony with his third wife. Similarly, a person is married to an earthen jar, when from some conjunction of the planets the omens are unfavourable, or when, from some bodily or mental defect, no one will marry the boy or girl. The usual ceremonies are gone through, and the neck of the boy or girl is connected by a string with the neck of the vessel, and water is sprinkled over them with a brush made of five leaves.^ In Nepal every Newar girl is, while a child, married to a Bel fruit, which, after the ceremony, is thrown into some sacred river. When she arrives at puberty a husband is selected for her, but should the marriage prove unpleasant, she can divorce herself by the simple process of placing a betel-nut under her husband's pillow, and walking off. Widows are allowed to re-marry ; in fact, a Newar woman is never a widow, as the Bel fruit to which she first married is supposed to be always in existence.* ^ Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 194. - Ibid., 319. ^ Atkinson, " Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 912, * Wright, " History of Nepal,'' 33. ii8 Folk-lore of Northern India. Before considering a possible explanation of this group of customs, we may note other instances of pseudo-marriages. We have, in the first place, instances of the marriage of girls to a god. " In the Gurgaon District, in the Rewari Tahsil, at the village of Bas Doda, a fair is held on the 26th of Chait and the two following days. I was told that formerly girls of the Dhinwar class used to be married to the god at these festivals, and that they always died soon afterwards, but that of late years the practice has been discontinued." ^ Again, we have some traces of the allied custom of com- pulsory religious prostitution. It is said that Santal girls are required to submit to compulsory prostitution once in their lives at Telkupi Ghat. " It is said that the custom originally arose from the killing of a girl by her parents for incontinence ; since when, girls have been permitted to do as they please, and what was once permissive has become compulsory." " There is no reference to this in Colonel Dalton's account of the Santals, and Mr. Beglar's authority is not quite satisfactory. But on the analogy of similar rites in Babylon, as described by Herodotus, it is very likely that such a custom once prevailed. There is some evidence that similar customs once prevailed at the temple of Jaggannath and other Indian shrines. We have, again, folk-tale references to the same custom in a tradition of the Vallabhacharya sect of the daughter of a banker, who, by her devotion to him, won the love of the god Krishna in the form of an image. Finally the deity revealed himself, and she went with him to Brindaban and remained with her divine husband till he carried her off to the heaven of Vishnu. This, however, is hardly perhaps more than an example of the mystic union of the god with his worshippers, which forms such a large part of the Vaishnava hagiology, and is familiar in the tales of Krishna and the Gopis. There is, again, among children in the neighbourhood of Saharanpur, a game which may be a survival of some more 1 " Settlement Report," 38. - " Archaeological Reports," x. 177. Tree and Serpent Worship. iig primitive rite. At the Tij festival, which occurs in the rainy season, girls dressed in their best go to a tank near the city. After dropping offerings into the water in honour of Khwaja Khizr, they divide into two parties, each of which selects a leader, one of whom is known as the bride and the other a bridegroom. The latter is decorated with a paper crown decked with tinsel. The clothes of the pair are knotted together, and they are made to walk round a Tulasi plant or a Pipal tree on the banks of the tank, in a mock form of the marriage ritual. Meanwhile each party chaffs the other, saying, " Your bride (or bridegroom) is one-eyed." They return home with merriment of this kind, and when they come to the house the knot tied in the garments of the pair is unloosed. We have, again, instances of the marriages of, or to animals. In parts of the Panjab, if a man have lost two or three wives in succession, he gets a woman to catch a bird and adopt it as her daughter. He then marries the bird, and immediately pays over the bride-gift to the woman that adopted his bird-bride, which he divorces. After this he can get himself married to another woman, and she will probably live.' So, there have been many instances of Rajas marrying animals with the customary rites. Some years ago, one of the Gaekwars of Baroda spent a large sum in marrying some favourite pigeons, and a Raja of Nadiya spent a lakh of rupees in marrying two monkeys. Lastly, there are numerous survivals of what can hardly be anything else but tree marriage. Among the Bawariyas, a vagrant tribe in Sirsa, the bride and bridegroom go outside the village to a Jand tree, which, as we have seen already, is regarded as sacred, move round it seven times, and then cut off a branch with an axe." In a Bhil marriage, the pair walk round the Salyara tree, which is placed in the marriage booth, twelve times."' We have a similar custom among most of the menial tribes. The Kols make the ^ " North Indian Notes and Queries,'" i. 15. - '"Settlement Repoit," 167. •'' " Bombay Gazetteer,'' iii. 221. 120 Folk-lore of Northern India. marriage booth of nine bamboo poles, with a bamboo or a branch of the Siddh tree as the central post. As the bride- groom smears the parting of the bride's hair with red lead, he makes a daub of the same substance on the tree. Much the same custom prevails among all the inferior castes. The worship of trees at marriage prevails in Madras, where some Rajas worship at their marriages the fire and the Vahni tree, a twig of which is used as an arrow at the hunting feast at the Navaratri or Dasahra.^ On the whole, it seems probable that this custom of pseudo-marriages may be based on various principles. The popular explanation of the custom is, as we have seen, that it is intended to avoid the curse of widowhood, the tree- husband being always alive ; the woman, even if her husband die, can never be a widow, nor can the parents be liable to the contempt which, according to popular Hindu belief, awaits those who keep a girl who has reached maturity unmarried. But when we find the same custom prevailing among races who habitually permit pre-nuptial infidelity, and among whom every marriageable widow is either subjected to the levirate or made over to a stranger, it seems obvious that this cannot be the original explanation of the practice. Again, according to Mr. Frazer, who has collected numerous examples of the custom, "it is difficult to separate from totemism the custom observed by totem clans in Bengal of marrying the bride and bridegroom to trees before they are married to each other." ^ But the idea that, as we have seen in one of the cases of tree marriages, the tree itself is supposed to die soon after the ceremony, seems to point to the fact that the marriage may be intended to divert to the tree some evil influence, which would otherwise attach to the wedded pair. We have an instance of a somewhat analogous practice from Bombay. " Among the Konkan Kunbis, when a woman is in labour and cannot get a speedy delivery, some gold orna- ment from her hair is taken to a Rui plant (the Dhak — ^ Oppert, " Original Inhabitants," 73. - "Totemism," 33 sqq. DEVI AND THE COBRA. Tree and Serpent Worship. i2f Callotropis gigantea of Northern India), and after digging at its roots, one of the roots is taken out, and the ornament is buried in its stead. The root is then brought home and put in the hair of the woman in labour. It is supposed that by this means the woman gets speedy dehvery. As soon as she is dehvered of a child, the root is taken from her hair and brought back to the Rui plant, and after digging at its root the ornament is taken out and the root placed in its former place." ' The idea seems to be that the evil influence hindering parturition is thus transferred to the plant. And this may be one explanation of the practice where, as we have seen, a man is married to a bird, or so on, when his former wives have died. The bird acts as the scape-animal, and carries the disease spirit away with it. Lastly, we have seen instances in which the wedded pair are made to clasp the tree or are tied to it in some special way. There are numerous cases in which women, in order to procure offspring, clasp an idol, like that of Hanuman and one of the other guardian deities. The clasping of the tree at marriage may possibly be a sort of sympathetic magic to bring on the pair the fertility and power of repro- duction, of which vegetable life is the well-known symbol. We have the same principle of the wedding of the grove to its well, and every Hindu who goes to the expense of making a tank, does not drink of its waters until he has married the tank to a plantain or some other tree growing on its banks. Tree and Serpent Worship. In the story of the king and his son, told in the Baital Pachisi, the king supplicates the sacred tree to give him a son. The request is granted, and the king then implores the tree to make his people happy ; the result was that poor wretches, hitherto living in the woods, came forth and con- certed measures to seize his kingdom. Rather than shed blood, the old king, his queen, and his son retired to a lofty 1 Campbell, " Notes," 250. 122 Folk-lore of Northern India. mountain. There the son finds something white lying under a mimosa tree. On inquiry he learnt that it is a heap of serpents' bones left there by Garuda, who comes daily to feed on serpents. On hearing this, the king goes towards a temple, but is arrested by the cry of a woman, who says : " My son to-day will be eaten by Garuda." She and her people were, in fact, serpents in human shape. The king was moved to pity, and as in the famous legend of Buddha and the tigress, he offered to expose himself to Garuda in the room of her son. This is discovered ; Garuda releases the king, and at his request re-animates the serpents to whom the bones belong.' Here we have an example of the combination of tree and serpent worship, and it would be easy to adduce more in- stances, as has been done by Mr. Ferguson and other writers of his school. But in deahng with this phase of belief much caution is required. As Dr. Tylor observes : " Serpent-worship unfortunately fell years ago into the hands of speculative writers, who mixed it up with occult philosophies, Druidical mysteries, and that portentous nonsense called the Arkite symbolism, till now sober students hear the very name of ophiolatry with a shiver." " It is almost needless to say that snake-worship prevails largely in Northern India. The last census showed in the North-Western Provinces over twenty-five thousand Naga worshippers ; one hundred and twenty-three persons re- corded themselves as votaries of Guga, the snake god. There are also a certain number who worship Sanp Deota, or the snake godling, and Ahiran, another deity of the same class, who is worshipped in Sultanpur by daily offerings of red lead, water, and rice. Sokha, said to be the ghost of a Brahman killed by a snake, has nearly fourteen thousand worshippers. In the Panjab, again, there are over thirty- five thousand special votaries of the snake godlings, of which the great majority worship Guga. 1 Manning-, " Ancient India," ii. 330 sq. ; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sigara,'' i. 1S5. ^ " Primitive Culture," ii. 2^9. Tree and Serpent Worship. 123 That the cultus of the snake has been derived from aboriginal behefs appears tolerably certain. The Hindus of Vedic times looked on the serpent with fear and dislike. It was impersonated as Ahi or Vritra, the snake demon which brings darkness and drives away the kindly rain. The regular snake-worship, as we now find it, was obviously of a later date. It does not appear difficult to disentangle the ideas on which snake-worship is based. To begin with, the snake is dreaded and revered on account of the mysterious fear which is associated with it, its stealthy habits, its sinuous motion, the cold fixity of its gaze, the protrusion of its forked tongue, the suddenness and deadliness of its attacks. It would be particularly dreaded by women, whose habits of walking barefoot in fields in the early dawn, and groping in dark corners of their huts, render them specially exposed to its malice. The chief basis of the cultus would then be fear, as in the case of the tiger and other beasts of prey. It would soon be discovered that there were various harmless snakes which would, as house-hunters, come to be identified with the ancestral ghosts as the protectors of houses and goods. The power of controlling and taming the more venomous snakes would then be discovered, and the snake-charmer would come to be regarded as the wisest of mankind, as a wizard, and finally as a priest. We have thus three aspects under which the snake is worshipped by many savage races — as a dreaded enemy, as the protector of home and treasure, as the accompaniment and attribute of wisdom. The village temple would be often in early times a storehouse of treasure, and the snake, respected as its guardian, would finally, as in Kashmir, be installed there as a god. Next, we have the early connection between the serpent and the powers of nature, the cloud and the rain, as appears in the familiar Vedic legend of Indra and the Dragon Ahi, and Seshanaga, the great world serpent, which appears in so many of the primitive mythologies. The serpent would again receive respect as the emb lem 124 Folk-lore of Northern India. of life ; his shape would, as in many forms of primitive ornament, be associated with the ring, as a symbol of eternity ; he is excessively long-lived, and periodically renews his life. He has, further, as in the Saiva cultus, become associated with phallicism, and with the sexual powers, as in the Adam legend. " The serpent round the neck of Siva denotes the endless cycle of recurring years, and a second necklace of skulls about his person, with numerous other serpents, symbolizes the eternal revolution of ages and the successive dissolution and regeneration of the races of mankind." ^ Lastly, the cultus may have a totemistic basis. As Strabo describes the Ophiogeneis or serpent races of Phrygia actually retaining physical affinity with the snakes to whom they were to be believed to be allied, the Cheros of the eastern districts of the North-Western Provinces and the Bais Rajputs of Oudh profess to be descended from the Great Serpent. Gautama Buddha himself is said to have been of serpent lineage. But the great serpent race was that of the Nagas, to whom much ill-considered argument and crude speculation have been devoted. According to one theory they were Skythic emigrants from Central Asia, but whether antece- dent or subsequent to the so-called Aryan inroad is disputed. They seem to have been accustomed to use the serpent as a national symbol, and hence became identified with the snake. Some of the myths seem to imply that they suffered perse- cution at the hands of the Brahmans, such as the tale of the burning of the Khandava forest, the opening scenes of the Mahabharata, and the exploits of the youthful Krishna. They are, again, associated with Buddhism on monuments like those of Ajanta, and another theory would make them out to be the Dasyus, or aboriginal races of Upper India, who were the first to adopt Buddhism and were extermi- nated in the Brahmanical revival. Little, in fact, is known of them, save that they may have been early worshippers ^ Monier-Williams, " Brahmanism and Hinduism," 319 sqq. If H -^•■'^ '^r < o u ..> ■1 Q < Ml .4- P < > „«»* /^ Tree and Serpent Worship. 125 of the snake, may have embraced Buddhism, and may have introduced the worship into India from some northern home.' But Mr. Ferguson's theory that snake-worship was of purely Turanian origin is, to say the least, very doubtful, and his belief that Saivism is antagonistic to snake-worship, and that Vaishnavism, which he regards as a modification of Buddhism, encourages it, is opposed by the numerous examples of the connection of the serpent with the Lingam. Seshanaga. Below the seven Patalas-, according to the Vishnu Parana, is Vishnu incarnated as Seshanaga, and known by the name Ananta, or " Endless." He has a thousand heads adorned with the mystical Swastika, and in each head a jewel to give light. He is accompanied by Varuni, the goddess of wine (who has nowadays been replaced by Madain, who is venerated by Chamars in Oudh), supports the world on his head, holds in one hand a pestle and in the other a plough, which, as we shall see later on, connects him with agri- culture. Snake Shrines. In various places snakes are provided with special shrines. Thus, in Garhwal, Seshanaga is honoured at Pandukeswar ; Bhekal Nag at Ratgaon ; Sangal Nag at Talor ; Banpa Nag at Margaon, and many others of the same kind." In fact, all along the Himalaya the worship extensively prevails. Kailang Nag is the chief Himalayan godling, and as the ' Wheeler, " History of India," i. 148 ; " Gazetteer Central Provinces," Ixiii. ; Ixxii. ; Campbell, " Notes," 269 ; Ferguson, " Tree and Serpent Worship," Appendix D; Elliot, "Supplementary Glossary,'' s.v. " Gaur Taga"; Tod, "Annals," i. 38; Atkinson, "Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 280 sqq., 297 ; Temple, " Legends of the Panjab," i. 414 sq. 2 Bhekal Nag is perhaps the Sanskrit bheka, "frog." It has been suggested that the gypsy iS^^z^o- or Devil is connected with Bheka, and thus allied to serpent-worship (Groome, " Encyclopaedia Britannica.'' Art. " Gypsies"). Sir G. Cox (" Introduction," 87, note) makes out Bheki, or "the squatting frog," to be an old name for the sun. For the Hima- layan snake shrines see Atkinson, loc. cit., ii. 374 sq. 126 Folk-lore of Northern India. Vedic Ahi controls the clouds, so he gives fine weather. A victim is killed, and one of his disciples, after drinking the blood, gets into a state of afflatus. Finally, he gasps out that the sacrifice is accepted, and falls down in a state of exhaustion. The old shrine to the serpent deity at Kangra, known as Baghsu Nag, has been converted into a Saiva temple under the name of Baghsunatha, another instance of the adoption of strange deities into orthodox Hinduism. " The Nag is specially the guardian of cattle and water- springs. According to the legend, the valleys of Kashmir and Nepal were in some remote period the abode of Nagas. The milk of a cow is usually presented to a Nag, and goats and sheep are usually sacrificed to him, as to other godlings. So far as I am aware, the only place in the Himalaya where the living snake is worshipped is at the foot of the Rotung pass." ^ The Nepal serpent king is Karkotaka, who dwelt in the lake Nagavasa, and Siva in the form of Karkotaka Naga has a temple at Barha Kotra in the Banda District. In one of the Nepal temples is a representation of a Nag Kanya, a serpent maiden or mermaid, sitting on a tortoise.^ This serpent maiden constantly appears in Indian folk-lore. Such is Vijayavati, daughter of Gandamalin, one of the snake kings, who is of surpassing loveliness, rescues and marries the hero. She is represented by the Melusina of European folk-lore, and one of her kindred survived to our own day, to appear as Elsie Venner in one of the finest novels of this generation.^ Curious as it may appear, all the Kashmir temples were originally surrounded by artificial tanks, constructed in order to propitiate the Nagas. Ancient stones covered with figures of snakes are occasionally to be seen worked up into the walls of modern buildings. Abul Fazl says that in his time there were nearly seven hundred figures of snake gods existing in Kashmir. The snake, it is needless to say, is a common emblem in temples all over the country. An 1 Oldham, " Contemporary Review," April, 1885. 2 " Oldfield, " Sketches," ii. 204 ; Wright, " History," 85. 3 Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 173, 544. Tree and Serpent Worship. 127 ancient temple at Bilaspur in the Central Provinces has, as its only image, that of the cobra,' Snake-worship appears constantly in history and legend. There is a passage in Plutarch from which it appears to have been the custom to sacrifice an old woman (previously condemned to death for some crime) to the serpent gods by burying her alive^on the banks of the Indus. Ktesias also mentions the worship of snakes, and in the Buddhist legends snakes are often referred to as the guardian deities of towns.^ In the folk-tales, Naravahanadatta worships snakes in a grove sacred to them, and Bhimabhatta goes to the temple of the chief of the snakes, which he finds full of long wreaths of flowers in form like serpents, and a great lake sacred to Vasuki, studded with red lotuses, which seemed like clouds of smoke from the fume of snake poison.^ A curious legend tells how Kadru and Vinata were the two wives of the patriarch Kasyapa, the former being the mother of the serpent race, and the other of the birds. A discussion arose between them regarding the colour of the tails of the horses of the sun, Vinata insisting that they were white and Kadru that they were black. It was agreed that whichever of the two was proved to be wrong should serve the other. So Kadru contrived to fasten one of her black snakes on to the back of one of the horses, and Vinata, thinking this was the real tail, accepted defeat ; so the snakes rule the birds for ever. Nahusha, according to one version of his legend, aspired to the love of the queen of India when her husband con- cealed himself because he had killed a Brahman, A thousand Rishis bore the litter of the presumptuous sinner through the air, and when in his pride he touched Agastya Muni with his foot, the offended sage cursed him, and he became a serpent. Finally he was pardoned by the inter- cession of Yudhishthira, threw off his serpent form, and was raised to the heaven of the gods. ^ •' Calcutta Review," li. 304 sq. ; liv. 25 sq. ; Ferguson, " Eastern Architecture,'' 289 ; " Central Provinces Gazetteer," 86. " Tawney, loc. cit. i. 577. ^ Ibid., i. 312; ii. 225. 128 Folk-lore of Northern India. Near Jait, in the Mathura District, is a tank with the broken statue of a hooded serpent in it. Once upon a time a Raja married a princess from a distant land, and wished to bring her home with him. She refused to come until he announced his hneage. Her husband told her that she would regret her curiosity, but she persisted. At last he took her to the river and warned her again, but in vain. Then he told her not to be alarmed at anything she saw, adding that if she did so, she would lose him. Saying this, he began to descend slowly into the water, all the time trying to dissuade her, till the water rose to his neck. Then, after a last attempt to induce her to abandon her curiosity, he dived and reappeared in the form of a Naga, and raising his head over the water, he said, " This is my lineage. I am a Nagavansi." His wife could not suppress an exclama- tion of grief, on which the Naga was turned into stone, where he lies to this day. Here we have another instance of the consequences of the violation of the curiosity taboo. ^ The town of Nigohan in the Lucknow District is said to have been founded by Raja Nahuk of the Chandravansi line of kings. Near it is a large tank, in which the legend says that the Raja, transformed into a snake for the sin of kilhng a Brahman, was compelled to live. Here at length the Pandava brothers, in their wanderings after their battle with the Kauravas, came, and as they went to draw water, the serpent put to each of them five questions touching the vanity of human wishes and the advantages of absorption from the world. Four out of the five brethren failed to answer and were dragged under the water, but the riddle was solved by the fifth. The spell was thus loosed, and the Raja's deliverer had come. The Pandu put his ring round the body of the serpent, and he was restored to human form. In his gratitude he performed a great sacrifice, and to this day the cultivators digging small wells in the centre of the tank in the dry season, come across the burnt barley, rice, and betel-nuts used in the sacrifices." 1 "Archaeological Reports," vii. 4. - " Settlement Report," 121. Tree and Serpent Worship. 129 The old Buddhist traveller thus describes the serpent deity in the temple at Sankisa in the Farrukhabad District — " A white-eared dragon is the patron of this body of the priests. It is he who causes fertilizing and seasonable showers of rain to fall within their country, and preserves it from plagues and calamity, and so causes the priesthood to dwell in securit3^ The priests, in gratitude for these favours, have erected a dragon chapel, and within it placed a seat for his accommodation ; and, moreover, they make special con- tributions in the shape of religious offerings to provide the dragon with food. Towards the end of each season of rest, the dragon incontinently assumes the form of a little serpent, both of whose ears are white. The body of priests, recog- nizing him, place in the midst for his use a copper vessel full of cream. The serpent then proceeds to come down from the highest part of the alcove, all the while moving, as though he would pay his respects to all those around him. He then suddenly disappears. He makes his appearance once every year." ^ According to Gen. Cunningham, the only spot which can be identified with any certainty at Sankisa is the tank of the Naga, which still exists to the south-east of the ruins. The name of the Naga is Karewar, which appears to mean " the black one," and that of the tank Kandaiya Tal. Milk is still offered to him on every day of May, the Nagpanchami festival in August, and at any other time when rain is wanted.' There are many instances of this control of the Naga over the weather. Thus, in Nepal, when Raja Gunkamdeva committed incest, the gods in their wrath withheld the rain. Finally the Raja managed to catch the great Naga Karkotaka, and the other Nagas came and worshipped him and gave him each a likeness of himself drawn with his own blood, and declared that whenever there was a drought hereafter, plen- tiful rain would fall as soon as these pictures were worshipped. So, Gorakhnatha confined the nine Nagas, and there was ^ Beal, " Travels of Fah Hian,'' 67 sq. ' "Archaeological Reports," i. 274. VOL. II. K 130 Folk-lore of Northern India. a drought until Matsyendranatha appeared and released them, on which the clouds gave rain/ The plan of propitiating the Naga with an offering of milk is found also in the case of the Durham legend of the Lambton worm and the dragon of Deerhurst in Gloucestershire." The sacred dragons of this kind are innumerable. The Buddhist cave at Pabhosa in the Allahabad District was the home of a monster of this class, who was subdued by Buddha.'^ That in the dragon tank at Ramagrama used to assume the form of a Brahman.'' Dr. Buchanan tells of another at Bhagalpur. " They showed me a hole in a rock opening into a hollow space close by the path leading up to their village. They said that this hole was the abode of a very large serpent, which they considered a kind of god. In cold weather they never saw it, but in the hot season it was constantly observed lying in the hollow before its den. The people pass by it without apprehension, thinking it under- stands their language, and would on no account injure one of them, should even a child or a drunken person fall on it." ' But all such snakes are not friendly. In the Hitopadesa, the faithful mungoose takes the place in the legend of Beth- gelert of the hound and kills the deadly snake. Some reference to this famous folk-tale will be made in another connection. Aghasura, " the evil demon," the king of the serpents, tried to devour the divine infant Krishna. When he and his foster-father Nanda were asleep together, a huge boa-constrictor laid hold of Nanda by the toe, and would speedily have devoured him, but Krishna, hearing his cries, ran to his side and lightly set his foot on the monster's head. At the very touch the serpent was transformed, and assumed the figure of a lovely youth ; "for years ago a Ganymede of Heaven's Court, by name Sudarsana, in pride of beauty and exalted birth, had vexed the holy sage Angiras when in deep ' Wright, '• Histoi-y of Nepal," 85, 141. ' Henderson, " Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 289 ; "Gloucester- shire Folk-lore," 23. 3 Fiihrer, " Monumental Antiquities," 144. ■* Beal, loc. cit., 90. * " Eastern India," ii. 149. Tree and Serpent Worship. 131 contemplation, by dancing backwards and forwards before him, and by his curses had been metamorphosed into a snake, in that vile shape to expiate his offence, until the advent of Krishna." ^ We have already spoken of another famous Mathura snake, the Naga of Jait, whose tail is supposed to reach underground to Brindaban, seven miles away." The curious dragon cave at Kausambhi at Allahabad was one of the last notable discoveries of the Archaeological Survey.^ The Snake Gods. Besides the sacred Nagas there are the regular snake gods. The serpent deity of Benares is Nagiswar, who is repre- sented by a serpent twining round the chief idol, and like his kindred rules the weather. The Ndg Kuan, or dragon well, is one of the oldest shrines in the city." Tara is the snake goddess of the Kols, and the Khandhs call her Tara Penu, the heavenly "star snake." Vasuki, the "abider," now known as Basuk Nag, has many shrines, and in all of them, as at Daraganj, near Allahabad, described by Sir Monier- Williams,' the priest in charge is always a man of low caste, a fact pointing to the non-Aryan character of the worship. He forms one of the triad of the snake gods which rule the snakes of earth and hell, his fellows being Sesha and Takshaka, " he who cuts off." Vasuki often appears in the folk-tales. We find him resisting Garuda, the destroyer of his subjects. His brother's son Kirtisena is, according to one legend, a Brahman, and weds a mortal maiden by the Gandharva form ; his eldest brother Vasunemi presents a benevolent Savara with a magic lute ; Vasuki himself marries the princess Yasodhara, and their son is Priyadar- sana. Vasuki has a thousand ears. Once he served the gods by becoming the rope which the mount Mandara was 1 Growse, " Mathura," 55, 58. - Ibid., 71. ^ "Reports" xxi. 2, "Academy," 23rd April, 1887. ■* Sherring, " Saci'ed City,'' 75, 87 sqq. ; Fiihrer, " Monumental Anti- quities," 211. For weather snakes see Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 438- '' " Brihmanism and Hinduism," 323. K 2 132 Folk-lore of Northern India. whirled round, and the sea was churned and produced Sri or Lakshmi, goddess of wealth.' The foot of the celebrated iron pillar at Delhi was driven so deep in order that it might rest on the head of Vasuki. A Brahman told the king that this would secure the stability of his kingdom. The Raja doubted this, and had the pillar dug up, when its base was found wet with the blood of the serpent king. Owing to the incredulity of the Raja it could never again be firmly fixed, and his want of faith led to the ultimate downfall of his dynasty. The same tale has reached the Himalaya, and is told of the foundation of Almora." The Sinhas. Next come the Sinhas, or snake godlings of the Panjab and the western parts of the North-Western Provinces. " They are males, and though they cause fever they are not very malevolent, often taking away pain. They have got great power over milch cattle, and the milk of the eleventh day after calving is sacred to them, and libations of milk (as in the case of the Sankisa dragon) are always acceptable. They are generally distinguished by some colour, the most commonly worshipped being Kali, ' the black one,' Hari, ' green,' Bhura, ' grey,' Sinh. But the diviner will often declare a fever to be caused by some Sinh no one has ever heard of before, but to whom a shrine must be built. And so they multiply in a most perplexing manner. Dead men also have a way of becoming snakes — a fact which is re- vealed in a dream, when again a shrine must be built. If a peasant sees a snake he will salute it, and if it bite him, he or his heirs, as the case may be, will build a shrine on the spot to prevent the recurrence of such an occurrence. They are the servants of Vasuki Naga, King of Patala, or Tar- tarus, and their worship is certainly connected with that of the Pitris or ancestors, though it is difficult to see exactly in what the connection lies." ^ 1 Tawney, loc. cit., i. 32, 55, 538 : ii. 568. 2 Gangadatta, " Folk-lore of Kumaun," Introduction, vii. s Ibbetson, "Panjab Ethnography," 114; "Legends of the Panjab," i. 426. Tree and Serpent Worship. 133 Connection of Snakes with Ancestor-worship. The connection is thus explained by Mr. Spencer : " The other self of the dead relative is supposed to come back occasionally to the old house ; how else is it possible of the survivors sleeping there to see him in their dreams ? Here are creatures which commonly, unlike wild animals, come into houses ; come in, too, secretly at night. The impli- cation is clear. That snakes which specially do this are the returned dead, is inferred by people in Asia, Africa, and America ; the haunting of houses being the common trait of the kind of snakes reverenced and worshipped." ^ The benevolent household snake, which in the folk-tales assists the hero and protects the family of which he is the guardian, thus represents the soul of some deceased ancestor which has taken up its residence there. That the dead do appear as snakes is familiar in European folk-lore. Thus, for instance, the pious i5ineas saw his father Anchises in the snake which crept from his tomb. We have already come across the same idea in the case of the Sati. It was an old European idea that this household snake, if not conciliated, and when dead buried under the threshold, a sacred place, prevented conception." Deified Snake Heroes. We have already mentioned the regular snake godling Guga. With him are often worshipped his father Jaur or Jewar Sinh, and Arjan and Sarjan, his twin half-brothers.^ Pipa, the Brahman, is another deity of the same class in Rajputana. He was in the habit of giving milk to a serpent whose retreat was on the banks of the Sampu, or Snake Lake. The serpent used in return to present him daily with two pieces of gold. Being obliged to go away on business, he gave instructions to his son to continue the ' "Principles of Sociology," i. 345; Gubernatis, "Zoological My- thology," ii. 407 sq. ; Wake, "Serpent-worship," 105 ; Tylor, ''Primitive Culture," ii. 240. - Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 132. ^ " Panjab Notes and Queries," i. 2. 134 Folk-lore of Northern India. offering ; but the youth, deeming it a good opportunity of becoming master of the treasure, took a stick with him, and when the serpent came forth for his expected food, he struck him violently. But the snake managed to retreat into his hole. On his return, the young Brahman related his adventures to his mother. She was horrified at the account, and forthwith made arrangements for sending her son away out of danger. But in the morning when she went to call him she found to her horror that her son was dead, and a huge snake lay coiled up beside his body. Pipa on his return was inconsolable, but, stifling his thoughts of revenge, he propitiated the monster with copious libations of milk. The serpent was appeased, and revealed to Pipa the treasures which he guarded, commanding him to erect a monument which should transmit the knowledge of the event to future ages. Hence Pipa has become a sort of snake godling, and the town of Pipar and the Sampu Lake still by their names commemorate the legend.^ This famous tale, which was originally founded on a story in the Panchatantra, has come into European folk-lore through the Gesta Romanorum, and forms an excellent example of a genuine Indian folk-tale which has been naturalized in Western lands." The incident of the animals which produce gold is common both in European and Indian folk-lore. Even Marabhuti in the tale of Somadeva is able to spit gold, and every one knows Grimm's pretty tale of the " Three little men in the wood," in which a piece of gold drops from the mouth of the good girl every time she speaks. Snake Treasure Guardl\ns. Snakes throughout folk-lore are the guardians of treasure.^ The griffins of Scythia guarded the treasures coveted by the 1 Tod, " Annals," i. T]'] sqq. - Clouston, "Popular Tales," i. 127; Grimm, " Household Tales," ii. 405; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 454 ; Jacobs, "English Fairy Tales," 207, 251. * Gubernatis, '-Zoological Mythology," ii. 407 ; Clouston, loc. cit., i. 126. Tree and Serpent Worship. 135 Arimaspians ; the dragon watched the golden apples of the Hesperides ; in the Nibelungenhed the dragon Fafnir keeps guard over a vast treasure of gold, which Sigurd seizes after he has killed the monster. It is a common Indian belief that when a very rich man dies without an heir, he cannot take away his thoughts from his treasure, and returns to guard it in the form of a monstrous serpent. But after a time he becomes tired of this serpent life, and either in a dream, or assuming the human voice, he asks the persons living near the treasure to take it and offer him one of their dearest relatives in return. When some avaricious person complies with the serpent's wishes, he gets possession of the wealth, and the serpent then enters into some other state of exist- ence. Instances of treasure speaking are not uncommon. Some time ago two old ladies, whose houses were divided by a wall, formally applied to me to have the wall excavated in the presence of respectable witnesses, because a treasure- guarding snake was often heard speaking from inside the wall, and begging some one to take over the wealth which was in his charge. Snake charmers are supposed to have the power of recognizing these serpent treasure guardians, follow them stealthily to their holes, and ask them to point out the deposit. This they will do in consideration of the offering of a drop of blood from the little finger of a first-born son,^ an obvious survival of human sacrifice, which is constantly found connected with the serpent cultus. Various suggestions have been made to account for the idea of snakes guarding treasure. By one theory there is some connection between the snake and primitive metal- lurgy ; by another, that the snake may have been the totem of the early jewellers ; by a third, that the jewelled head of the snake is at the bottom of the matter." But it seems more probable that the idea is based on the conception of the snake as a haunter of houses and temples, and the divine protector of the inmates and their wealth. ^ " Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. 91. ^ Conway, " Demonology,'' i. 353 sq. 136 Folk-lore of Northern India. Indian folk-lore is full of such stories. In the Dakkhin tale, Seventee Bai gets possession of the enormous diamond which the cobra used to take about in his mouth ; and in the Bengal story Faqir Chand obtains the serpent's crest- jewel.' The same idea appears in the Arabian Nights. Mr. Forbes tells rather a ghastly tale on this subject. He personally investigated a mysterious chamber supposed to contain treasure. Viewed from above it was a gloomy dungeon of great depth. He desired his men to enter it, but they positively refused, alleging that " wherever money was concealed, there existed one of the Genii in the mortal form of a snake to guard it." He at last prevailed on them to descend by means of ropes. They had not been at the bottom many seconds, when they called out vehemently that -they were encircled by a large snake. Finally he observed something like billets of wood, or rather more resembling a ship's cable coiled up in a dark hole. Then he saw the monster raise his head over an immense length of body, coiled in volumes on the ground. A large snake was subse- quently destroyed by fire, but no treasure was found, " the owner having doubtless already removed it." " Powers of Snakes in Folk-lore. Manifold are the powers of snakes in folk-lore. He can strike people dead with his look from a distance, like the " death-darting eye of cockatrice " in " Romeo and Juliet." He has the power of spitting fire from his mouth, which destroys his enemies and consumes forests. His saliva is venomous, and there are many stories of snakes spitting venom into food. In one of the versions of Bethgelert, the prince, but for his guardian bird, would have drunk as water the venom of the black snakes which drips from a tree. In the legends of Raja Rasalu, Guga, and Newal Dai, the snake has power to kill and restore to life ; it has the faculty of ' Miss Frere, "Old Deccati Tales," 33; Lai Bihari De, "Folk-tales " 19- 2 "Oriental Memoirs," ii. 19, 385. Tree and Serpent Worship. 137 metamorphosis and flying through the air. In one of the Kashmir tales, the Brahman, wishing to get rid of his wife, gives her a snake in a bag ; but when she opens it, it turns into a beautiful little boy.^ We have, again, the world-wide story of the snake rescued by the traveller, which rewards the service rendered to him by biting his benefactor. When Indra carried off the nectar, the snakes licked the bed of Kusa grass on which the vessel lay. The sharp edges of the grass cut them as they licked, so they have had double tongues ever since.- Every Indian rustic believes in the Domunha or snake with a mouth at both ends, which is, as might have been expected, most virulent. There are snake women, like Lamia or Vasudeva, the mystic serpent, who go about at night, and by day resume their hateful form. The humanity of the serpent race comes out clearly in the legend of Safidon, which attributes the leprosy still found in the Panjab to the sacrilegious acts of Vasuki, the king of the serpents.^ Modern Snake-worship. Some instances may be given of the form assumed by the worship of the snake in modern times. The great snake festival is the Nagpanchami, or " Dragon's fifth," held on the fifth day of the month of Bhadon. In the Hills it is called the Rikhi or Biruri Panchami. Rikheswara has now become a title of Siva as lord of the Nagas, a form in which he is represented as surrounded by serpents and crowned with the chaplet of hooded snakes. On the day of the feast the people paint figures of serpents and birds on the walls of their houses, and seven days before the festival they steep a mixture of wheat, gram, and pulse in water. On the morn- ing of the feast they take a wisp of grass, tie it up in the form of a snake, dip it in the water in which the gram has ^ Knowles, " Folk-tales," 492. ' Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 182. ^ Tawney, loc. ct'L, ii. 99 ; Temple, " Legends of the Panjab," i. Intro- duction, XV.; "Wideawake Stories," 193, 331. 138 Folk-lore of Northern India. been steeped, and offer it with money and sweetmeats to the serpents.^ In Udaypur on this day they strew particular plants about the thresholds of houses to prevent the entrance of venomous reptiles, and in Nepal the day is observed as the anniversary of a great struggle between a famous Naga and Garuda, the foe of the serpent race." In the eastern districts of the North-West Provinces on this day milk and dried rice are poured into a snake's hole ; while doing this they call out " Snake ! snake ! " The feeding of snakes on this holiday is done in much the same way in Bombay,"^ After the Diwali in Kangra, a festival is held to bid good-bye to the snakes, at which an image of the Naga made of cowdung is wor- shipped. If a snake be seen after this it is called "ungrate- ful," and immediately killed.* In the North-Western Provinces the usual custom is for the head of the family to bathe on the morning of the feast, to paint on the wall of his sleeping-room two rude repre- sentations of serpents, and to make offerings to Brahmans. On this day people pray to what Dr. Buchanan calls "the chief eight dragons of the pit," ^ girls throw some playthings into the water, and labourers take a holiday and worship the tools of their craft. In Behar during the month of Sawan (August) crowds of women calling themselves Nagin, or " wives of the snake," go about begging for two and a half days, during which period they neither sleep under a roof nor eat salt. Half the proceeds of the begging are given to Brahmans, and the other half invested in salt and sweetmeats, which are eaten by all the people of the village." In Garhwal, the ground is freely smeared with cowdung and mud, and figures of five, seven, or nine serpents are ^ Atkinson, " Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 851. - Tod, "Annals," i. 614 ; Wright, " History," 37. ^ Rousselet, " India and its Native Princes," 28. ^ " Panjab Notes and Queries," iii. 75. '" " Eastern India," ii. 481. ** Grierson, " Bihar Peasant Life,'' 405; " IMaithili Chrestomathy," 23 sqq., where examples of the songs are given ; " Panjab Notes and Queries,'' iii. 38. Tree and Serpent Worship. 139 rudely drawn with sandal-wood powder or tumeric ; rice, beans, or peas are parched ; lamps are lighted and waved before them ; incense is burnt and food and fruit offered. These observances take place both morning and evening, and the night is spent in listening to stories in praises of the Naga.' In parts of the North-Western Provinces, with the usual Nagpanchami, is performed what is known as the Gurui festival. On that day offerings are made by women to the Dragon godling Nag Deota. Girls let dolls float in the water of some convenient river or tank, and the village lads beat the dolls with long switches specially cut for the pur- pose. The legend of this rite is thus told. When Raja Janamejaya held the Sarpa Sattra or snake rite in order to destroy Takshaka, the king of the serpents, all the snakes were captured by spells and killed. But Takshaka escaped and was found to have taken refuge with Indra, on whose throne he seated himself in the shape of a mosquito. Indra was ordered to produce the fugitive, and begged the life of Takshaka, which was granted on condition that he was banished from the land. So the snake king took the shape of a Brahman lad and retired to the Caucasus. There he settled and married, but he foolishly told the story to his wife, and she being unable to keep the secret, it finally reached the ears of Janamejaya, who sentenced him to death. Takshaka then retorted by ordering Janamejaya to cause everyone in his dominions to kill his wife as a revenge for his own wife's treachery. Janamejaya was unwilling to issue such a cruel order, so he consulted the Brahmans. Finally, it was proclaimed that on the Nagpanchami, every woman, to prove her devotion to her husband, should make a doll and offer it up as a vicarious sacrifice for herself. It would seem that the rite is the survival of some rite of human sacrifice in connection with snake-worship. The Agarwala Banyas, who say that they are descended from Raja Vasuki, have a special rite in honour of Astika Muni, who is said to have been the instructor of Vasuki. ^ Atkinson, " Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 836. 140 Folk-lore of Northern India. They bathe and make marks representing the snake on the walls of the house, which they worship, feed Brahmans, and do the Arti or lamp rite. Each woman takes home with her some of the sesamum offered to the snake, which they sprinkle with the recitation of a spell in their houses as a means of driving away venomous snakes. Cure of Snake-bite. In Hoshangabad there were once two brothers, Rajawa and Soral ; the ghost of the former cures snake-bite, and that of the latter cattle murrain. The moment a man is bitten, he must tie a string or a strip of his dress and fasten it round his neck, crying, " Mercy ! O God Rajawa ! " To call on Ghori Badshah, the Delhi Emperor, who conquered the country, or Ramji Das Baba will do as well. At the same time he makes a vow to give so much to the god if he recovers. When he gets home they use various tests to ascertain if the poison is in him still. They take him in and out over the threshold, and light a lamp before him, acts which are supposed to have the effect of developing latent poison. They then give him salt and leaves of the bitter Nim tree. If he can take them he is safe. These are all, as we have already seen, scarers of evil spirits, in this case the snake demon. If he cannot take them, the whole village goes out and cries to Rajawa Deo until he recovers. No one (Sir C. A. Elliott's informant told him) had been ever known to die of a snake-bite after this treatment. But the god has no power over the dreaded Biscobra, which takes its name from the Hindi Bishkhapra, Sanskrit Vishakhar- para, or " poison-headed," which is said to be so deadly that its very breath is venomous, one of the numerous popular delusions out of which it is hopeless to argue the rustic. The bitten man must not untie the string round his neck till the day when he goes to offer what he vows, which should be, at latest, on the next Dasahra ; but if he attempts to cheat the god by offering ever so little less than he pro- mised, he will die on the spot in agonies.' ^ "Settlement Report,'' icosq. Tree and Serpent Worship. 141 All through Upper India the stock remedy for snake-bite is the exorcism of the Ojha or sorcerer, a performance known as Jhar Phunk, consisting of a series of passes, massage, and incantations, which are supposed to disperse the venom. Many, too, have faith in the so-called " Snake stone," which seems to be usually a piece of bone soaked in blood and repeatedly baked. This is supposed to have absorbent properties and to draw the venom out of the wound. It probably works by faith, and is as effective as the Achates or Agate of which Pliny writes : " People are persuaded that it availeth much against the venomous spiders and scorpions, which property I could very well believe to be in the Sicilian Agate, for that so soon as serpents come within the air and breath of the said province of Sicily, as venomous as they be otherwise, they die thereupon." ^ The Snake in Folk-lore. The references to the snake in folk-lore and popular belief are so numerous that only a few examples can be given. The Dhaman {Ptyas mucosus), a quite harmless snake, is said in Bombay to give a fatal bite on Sundays, and to kill cattle by crawling under them, or putting its tail up their nostrils. Its shadow is also considered malignant. It is believed to suck the milk of cattle, and that if a buffalo is looked on by it, it immediately dies. Of the Ghonas snake it is believed that it bites only at night, and at what- ever hour of the night the victim is bitten, he dies just before daybreak.^ About these snake stones some curious tales are told. By one account, when a goat kills a snake, it eats it and then ruminates, after which it spits out a bead, which, when applied to a snake-bite, absorbs the poison and swells. If it be put into milk, and squeezed, the poison drips out of it like blood, and the bitten person is cured. If it be not put in milk it will burst in pieces. By another account, in the pouch-like appendages of the older Adjutant birds [^Leptoptilos 1 " Natural History," xxxvii. 10. ' " Gazetteer," xi. 36. 142 Folk-lore of Northern Indl\. Argala) the fang of a snake is sometimes found. This, if rubbed over the place where a poisonous snake has bitten a man, is supposed to prevent the venom spreading to the vital parts of the body. Others say that it is found within the head of the Adjutant, and that it is only necessary to rub it to the bitten place and put it into milk, when it becomes black through the venom. What was known as the Ovum Anguinum of the Britons is said to have been a bead which assists children to cut their teeth and cures the chincough and the ague. Mr. Campbell ^ says he once possessed one of these " snake's eggs," which was a blue and white glass bead and supposed to be a charm used by the women of the prehistoric races. A very common incident in the folk-tales is that the heroine is beset by snakes which come out of her nose or mouth at night and kill her newly-wedded husband, as the evil spirit kills the husband of Sara in the marriage chamber, until the hero lies awake and succeeds in destroying them. Another power snakes possess is that of identifying the rightful heirs of kingdoms, and, as in the case of Drona, who found the Ahir Adiraja sleeping in the shade of the hood of a cobra, announce that he is born to rule." So in the mythology the Naga king Machalinda spreads his hood over the Buddha to protect him from the rain and flies.^ Many of these Nagas indeed are friendly, as in the case of the Banjara, who, in order to avoid octroi duty, declared his valuable goods to be Glauber salts, and Glauber salts they became until they were restored to their original condition by the intercession of the kindly Naga of the Gundwa tank.* In one of Somadeva's tales the friendly snake clings round the Raja till he promises to release the Bodhisattwa out of prison. Snakes and Euphemism. Snakes should, of course, be addressed euphemistically as " Maternal uncle," or " Rope," and if a snake bites you, you ■> '■■ Popular Tales,'' ii. 385. ^ Fiihrer, " Monumental Antiquities," 28. ^ Hardy, " Manual of Buddhism," 146. ■• " Oudh Gazetteer," i. 597. Tree and Serpent Worship. 143 should never mention its name, but say, " A rope has touched me." The Mirzapur Kharwars tell of a man who once came on a Nagin laying her eggs. When she saw him she fell at his feet and asked him to throw the eggs in a water-hole. So he took up the eggs on a bamboo sieve and went with her to the brink. The Nagin plunged in and said, " Do not be afraid ! Come on ! " He followed her, the waters dried up, and he came to the palace of the Nag, who entertained him royally, and offered to give him anything he wished. The boor asked only for a pan, pot, and spoon, which the Naga gave him, and he came home to find his relations doing the death ceremonies in his honour, believing he had been carried off by a tiger. He said nothing of his adven- tures till the day of his death, when he told the story. So the Naga in other tales of the same class blesses and rewards the lucky man who has delivered the young snake from his persecutors who caught him while in the upper air. So in the Arabian Nights, the relations of Jullanar of the sea show their gratitude to the king who is kind to her on earth. On the basis of the same idea which has been already referred to in the case of the Churel, it is believed that if the shadow of a pregnant woman fall on a snake it becomes blind.^ The Snake Jewel. The snake, like the " toad ugly and venomous," wears on his head the Mani or precious jewel, which is a stock sub- ject in Indian folk-tales. Thus, in one of Somadeva''s stories, " when Nala heard this, he looked round, and beheld a snake coiled up near the fire, having his head encircled with the rays of the jewels of his crest." ' It is sometimes metamorphosed into a beautiful youth ; it equals the treasure of seven kings ; it can be hidden or secured only by cowdung or horsedung being thrown over it ; and if it is acquired the serpent dies. It lights the hero on his ' " Panjab Notes and Queries," i. 15, ' Tawney, " Kathi Sarit Sagara," i. 564 ; ii. 315. 144 Folk-lore of Northern India. way to the palace under the sea where is the silver jewelled tree ; or it is possessed by the sleeping beauty, who cannot return to her home beneath the waters, and loses the hero until it is recovered. Its presence acts as an amulet against evil, and secures the attainment of every wish. It protects the owner from drowning, the waters parting on each side of him, and allowing him to pass over rivers dry-shod.' The Rainbow and the Snake. So the rainbow is connected with the snake, being the fume of a gigantic serpent blown up from underground. In Persia it was called the " celestial serpent." We have already seen that the Milky Way is regarded as the path of the Nagas in the sky. It is possibly under the influence of the association of the snake, a treasure guardian, that the English children run to find where the rainbow meets the earth, and expect to find a crock of gold buried at its base.^ The Household Snake. The belief in the influence of the guardian domestic or national snake is universal. When the Persians invaded Athens the people would not leave the city till they learned that the guardian snake had refused its food and abandoned the citadel. A snake at Lanuvium and at Epirus resided in a grove and was waited on by a virgin priestess, who entered naked and fed it once a year, when by its acceptance or refusal of the offering, the prospects of the harvest were ascertained. The Teutons and Celts had also their sacred guardian snake. In the Panjab Hills, every householder keeps an image of the Naga or harmless snake, as contrasted with the Sanp, which is venomous. This snake is put in charge of the householder's homestead, and is held responsible that no cobra or dangerous serpent enters it. It is supposed to have ^ Temple, " Wideawake Stories,'' 304, 424 ; " Panjab Notes and Queries," i. 15, 76. 2 Sleeman, " Rambles," i. 42 ; Conway, " Demonology," i. 354. IMAGE OF THE HOUSEHOLD SNAKE. 144. Tree and Serpent Worship. 145 the power of driving all cobras out of the place. Should rain drive the house snake out of his hole, he is worshipped. No image of a cobra or other venomous snake is ever made for purposes of worship. Ant-hills are believed to be the homes of snakes, and there the people offer sugar, rice, and millet for forty days.' These correspond to the benevolent domestic snakes, of whom Aubrey says that "the Bramens have them in great veneration ; they keep their corne. I think it is Tavernier mentions it." " They are, in fact, as we have already seen, the representa- tives of the benevolent ancestral ghosts. Hence the deep- rooted prejudice against killing the snake, which is both guardian and god. " If," says Mr. Lang,' " the serpent were the deity of an earlier race, we could understand the pre- judice against kiUing it, as shown in the Apollo legend." The evidence accumulated in this chapter will perhaps go some way to settle this question, as far as India is con- cerned. ^ " Panjab Notes and Queries," iii. 92, 59. " " Remaines," 39. He perhaps refers to Tavernier, " Travels ' Ball's Edition), i. 42 ; ii. 249. ^ "Custom and Myth," ii. 197. VOL. II. CHAPTER III. TOTEMISM AND FETISHISM. Olim truncus eram ficulnus, inutile lignum, Cum faber incertus scamnum faceretne Priapum, Maluit esse deum. Horace, Sat. I. viii. 1-3. " A TOTEM is a class of material objects, which a savage regards with superstitious respect, believing that there exists between them and every member of the class an intimate and altogether special relation." ^ As distinguished from a fetish, a totem is never an isolated individual, but always a class of objects, generally a class of animals or plants, rarely a class of inanimate objects, very rarely a class of artificial objects. Origin of Totemism. As regards the origin of totemism great diversity of opinion exists. Mr. Herbert Spencer considers that " it arose from a misinterpretation of nicknames; savages first took their names from natural objects, and then confusing these objects with their ancestors of the same name, paid the same respect to the material totem as they were in the habit of doing to their own ancestors." '' The objection to this is, as Mr. Frazer shows, that it attributes to verbal misunder- standings far more influence than, in spite of the comparative mythologists, they ever seem to have exercised. Sir J. Lubbock derives the idea from the practice of naming persons and famihes after animals, but " in dropping 1 Frazer, " Totemism," i ; and his article on " Totemism," in " Ency- clopaedia Britannica," 9th Edition 2 " Principles of Sociology," i. 367. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I47 the intermediate links of ancestor-worship and verbal mis- understanding, he has stripped the theory of all that lent it even an air of plausibility." ^ Recent inquiries in the course of the Ethnographical Survey of Bengal and the North-Western Provinces enable us perhaps to approach to a solution of the problem. To begin with, at a certain stage of culture the idea of the connection between men and animals is exceedingly vivid, and reacts powerfully on current beliefs. The animal or plant is supposed to have a soul or spirit, like that of a human being, and this soul or spirit is capable of transfer to the man or animal and vice versa. This feeling comes out strongly in popular folk-lore, much of which is made up of instances of metamorphosis such as these. The witch or sorcerer is always changing into a tiger, a monkey, or a fish ; the princess is always appearing out of the aubergine or pomegranate. We have, again, the familiar theory to which reference has already been made, that the demon or magician has an external soul, which he keeps occasionally in the Life Index, which is often a bird, a tree, and an animal. If this life index can be seized and destroyed, the life of the monster is lost with it. These principles, which are thoroughly congenial to the beliefs of all primitive races, naturally suggest a much closer union between man and other forms of animal or vegetable life than people of a higher stage of development either accept or admit. With people, then, at this stage of culture, the theory that the ancestor of the clan may have been a bear or a tortoise would present no features of impro- bability. This theory accounts, as Mr. Frazer shows, for many of the obscure rites of initiation which prevail among most savage tribes and in a modified form among the Brahman- ized Hindus. The basis of such rites is probably to extract the soul of the youth and temporarily transfer it to the totem, from which in turn fresh life is infused into him. * " Origin of Civilization," 260, and Mr. Frazer's criticism, loc. cit. L 2 148 Folk-lore of Northern India. Lastly, the result of the Indian evidence is that it is only in connection with the rules of exogamy that totemism at the present day displays any considerable degree of vitality. The real basis of exogamy in Northern India seems to be the totem sept, which, however, flourishes at the present day only among the Dravidian tribes and those allied to them. But it would, it is almost certain, be incorrect to say that while totemism is at present most active among the Dravidians, in connection with marriage, it was peculiar to them. It is more reasonable to infer that it continues to flourish among these races, because of their isolation from Brahmanical influence. As among the inferior races of the Gangetic valley, the primitive family customs connected with marriage, birth, and death have undergone a process of denudation from their connection with the more advanced Hindu races which surround them, so to a large degree in Northern India, the totemistic sept names have been gradually shed off, and replaced by an eponymous, local, or territorial nomenclature. In short, under the pressure of higher culture, the kindred of the swan, turtle, or parrot have preferred to call themselves Kanaujiya or " men of Kanauj," Sarwariya or " residents of the land beyond the Sarju river," and Raghuvansa or Bhriguvansa, " descendants of the sages Raghu or Bhrigu.'^ We find, then, among such races, as might have been expected, that at the present day the totemistic sept system exists only in obscure and not easily recognizable forms. Folk etymology has also exercised considerable influence, and a sept ashamed of its totemistic title readily adopts some title of the eponymous type, or a local cognomen sounding something like the name of the primitive totem. It is perhaps too much to expect that a careful exploration of the sept titles or tribal customs of Northern India will lead to extensive discoveries of the primitive totemistic organization. The process of trituration which has affected the caste nomenclature for such a lengthened period, and the obscuration of primitive belief by association with more cultured tribes, have been so continuous as to leave only a TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I49 few fragments and isolated survivals ; but it is by a course of such inquiry that the totemistic basis of the existing caste system can alone be reached. I have considered this question in the light of the most recent evidence in another place/ and it is needless to repeat the results which were there arrived at. For the purpose of such an investigation it is convenient to have some sort of working classification of the tests of, and the forms in which, totemism usually appears. These have been laid down by the late Professor Robertson-Smith as follows : — {a) The existence of stocks named after plants, animals, or similar totems. [i?) The prevalence of a conception that the members of the stock are of the blood of the eponym, or are sprung from a plant, etc., of the species chosen as the totem. (c) The ascription of a sacred character to the totem. Stocks Named from Animals, Plants, etc. First as to the stocks named from animals, plants, etc. There are two divisions of the Pura Brahmans of the Dakkhin, known as Bakriyar and Chheriyar, founded on the names of the male and female goat. In Upper India, the Kachhis or market gardeners, and the Kachhwaha sept of Rajputs allege that they take their names from the Kachchhapa or tortoise, as the Kurmis refer their name to the Kurma or turtle. The Ahban Rajputs and the Ahiwasis of Mathura connect their names with Ahi, the dragon. The Kalhans Rajputs derive their name from the Kalahans or black goose. Among Brahmans and other high castes, Bharadvaja, ** the lark, the bringer of food," has given its name to many sections. Mr. Risley thinks that the fact of there being a Kasyapa division of Kumhars or potters, who venerate the tortoise, points to the name being a corruption of Kachchhapa, the tortoise, in which case their name would have the same origin as that of the Kachhis already mentioned. ' " Tribes and Castes," Introduction. i^o Folk-lore of Northern India. Many people, again, claim kindred with the sun and moon. Such are the Natchez of North America and the Incas of Peru.' There are many children of the sun and moon in Arabia,^ and gypsies of the east of Europe have a legend that they are descended from the sun and moon ; the sun having debauched his moon sister, w^as condemned to wander for ever, in consequence of which their de- scendants can never rest.^ So in India, the Stirajbansi and Chandrabansi Rajputs are said to take their names from Suraj, the sun, and Chandra, the moon, respectively. According to Captain J. Montgomerie," round Kashmir, and among the aboriginal tribes of the Himalayan slopes, men are usually named after animals, as the Bakhtiyaris, one of the nomad tribes of Persia, name their children usually not after the Prophet, but after wild animals, such as the wolf, tiger, and the like, adding some descriptive epithet. In the same way a tribe of Lodi Pathans in the Panjab are known as Nahar or " wolf." This is said to be due to their rapacity, and may be as likely a nickname as a survival of totemism.^ Totem Names among the Dravidians. The evidence of this point is, as has been already said, much more distinct among the Dravidians than among the more Hinduized races. Details of such names among the Agariyas, Nats, Baiswars, and Ghasiyas have been given in detail elsewhere.* Thus, to take the Dhangars, a caste in Mirzapur, allied to the Oraons of Bengal, we find that they have eight exogamous septs, all or most of which are of totemistic origin. Thus, Ilha is said to mean a kind of fish, which members of this sept do not eat ; Kujur is a kind of jungle herb which this sept does not use ; Tirik is probably 1 Frazer, " Golden Bough," i. 13, note. - Robertson-Smith, "Kinship," 17. 3 Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 90. ■• Quoted by McLennan, " Fortnightly Review," 1869, p. 419. '" O'Brien, " Multani Glossary," 260 sq. •* " Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh," s.v.v. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 151 the Tirki or bull sept of the Oraons. In Chota Nagpur, members of this sept do not touch any cattle after their eyes are open. It illustrates the uncertainty of these usages that in other places they say that the word Tirki means " young mice," which they are prohibited from using/ Again, the Mirzapur sept of the Dhangars, known as Lakara, is apparently identical with that called Lakrar among the Bengal Oraons, who must not eat tiger's flesh as they are named after the tiger ; in Mirzapur they derive their name from the Lakar Bagha, or hyaena, which they will not hunt or kill. The Bara sept is apparently the same as the Barar of the Oraons, who will not eat the leaves of the Bar tree or Ficus Indica. In Mirzapur they will not cut this tree. The Ekka sept in Mirzapur say that this name means *' leopard," an animal which they will not kill, but in Chota Nagpur the same word is said to mean " tortoise " and to be a totemistic sept of the Oraons. So, the Mirzapur Dhangars have a Tiga sept, which they say takes its name from a jungle root which is prohibited to them ; but the Oraons of Bhagalpur have a Tig sept, which, according to them, means " monkey." The last of the Mirzapur septs is the Khaha, which, like the Khakkar sept of the Oraons, means " crow," and neither will eat the bird. Similar instances might be almost indefinitely repeated from usages of the aUied tribes in Mirzapur and the adjoining Bengal Districts. The Panjab Snake Tribe. In the Panjab there is a special snake tribe. They observe every Monday and Thursday in the snake's honour, cooking rice and milk, setting a portion aside for the snake, and never eating or making butter on those days. If they find a dead snake, they put clothes upon it, and give it a regular funeral. They will not kill a snake, and say that its bite is harmless to them. The snake, they say, changes its form every hundred years, and then becomes a man or a 1 Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 254 ; Risley, " Tribes and Castes," ii. 327- 152 Folk-lore of Northern India. bull.^ So, in Senegambia, " a python is expected to visit every child of the Python clan within eight days after birth ; and the Psylli, a snake clan of ancient Africa, used to expose their infants to snakes in the belief that the snakes would not harm true-born children of the clan." ^ So, in Northern India the Bais Rajputs are children of the snake, and supposed to be safe from its bite, and Naga Raja is the tribal godling of the Bajgis. There is a well-known legend of a queen of India, who is said to have sent to Alexander, among other costly presents, a girl, who, having been fed with serpents from her infancy, partook of their venomous nature. The well-known tale of Elsie Venner has been already referred to in the same connection. ToTEMisM IN Proper Names. The subject of Indian proper names has not yet received the attention it deserves. The only attempt to investigate the subject, so far, is that of Major Temple.'^ In his copious lists there is ample evidence that names are freely adopted from those of animals, plants, etc. Thus we have Bagha, " Tiger " ; Bheriya, " Wolf " ; Billa, " Cat " ; Chuha, " Rat," and soon from animals ; Bagla, " Heron " ; Tota, " Parrot," and so on from birds ; Ajgar, " Python " ; Mendak, " Frog " ; Kachhua, " Tortoise ;" ; Bhaunra, " Bumble Bee"; Ghun, ** Weevil " ; Dimak, " White Ant," etc. From plants come Buta, " Tree " ; Harabansa, " Green Bamboo " (or more probably Hari-vansa, " the genealogy of Hari " or Vishnu) ; Nima, " Nim tree " ; Pipal, " Pipal tree " ; Gulaba, " Rose " ; Imliya, " Tamarind " ; Sewa, " Apple " ; Ilacha, " Carda- mum " ; Mirchi, " Pepper " ; Bhutta, " Maize." The evidence of nomenclature must, of course, be received with caution. The essence of totemism is a confessed belief in animal descent, a name declaring that descent and some sacredness attached to the animal or other fancied ancestor. Many of these names may be nicknames, or titles of oppro- ' " Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. gi. ^ Frazer, " Golden Bough," ii. 95. 3 " Dissertation on the Proper Names of Panjabis," 155 sq. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 153 brium selected, as we have already shown, to baffle the Evil Eye or the influence of demons. Besides, as has been pointed out, it does not necessarily follow because an English- man lives in " Acacia Villa " or " Laburnum Cottage," and calls his daughter " Rose " or " Violet," that he is in the totemistic stage. At the same time, it is quite possible that further inquiry will discover undoubted instances of totemism in the nomenclature of Northern India, as is the case with other races in a similar stage of culture. Descent from the Totem. We next come to Professor Robertson-Smith's second test, the belief in descent from the totem. This branch of the subject has been very fully illustrated by Mr. Frazer.' As in old times in Georgiana, according to Marco Polo, all the king's sons were born with an eagle on the right shoulder marking their royal origin,^ so Chandragupta, king of Ujjain, was the son of a scorpion. " His mother accident- ally imbibed the scorpion's emission, by means of which she conceived." " The Jaitwas of Rajputana trace their descent from the monkey god Hanuman, and confirm it by alleging that the spine of their princes is elongated Hke a tail. In the Ramayana, one of the wives of King Sagara gives birth to a son who continues the race ; the other wife produces an Ikshvaku, a gourd or cane containing sixty thousand sons. The famous Chandragupta was miraculously preserved by the founder of his race, the bull Chando.'* The wolf is in the same way traditionally connected with the settlement of the Janwar Rajputs in Gudh, and they beheve that the animal never preys on their children. Every native believes that children are reared in the dens of wolves, and there is a certain amount of respectable evidence in support of the belief.* 1 " Totemism," 3 sqq. - Yule, " Marco Polo," i. 52. ■' Hardy, " Manual of Buddhism," 251. •* Max MilUer, "Ancient Sanskrit Literature," 290. ' "North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 10; ii. 215 ; iii. 144; Ball, "Jungle Life," 455 sqq. 154 Folk-lore of Northern India. Similar examples are numerous among the Dravidian tribes. The Cheros of the Vindhyan plateau claim descent from the Naga or dragon. The Raja and chief members of the Chota Nagpur family wear turbans so arranged as to make the head-dress resemble a serpent coiled round the skull, with its head projecting over the wearer's brow. The seal of the Maharaja and the arms of his family show as a crest a cobra with a human face under its expanded hood, surrounded with all the insignia of royalty. The Santal legend ascribes the origin of the tribe to the wild goose, and similar stories are told by the family of the Raja of Sinh- bhfim, the Hos, the Malers, and the Kurs.^ Special Respect Paid to the Totem. Next come instances of special respect paid to the totem. Some idea of the kind may be partly the origin of the worship of the cow and the serpent. Dr. Ball describes how some Khandhs refused to carry the skin of a leopard because it was their totem." The Kadanballis of Kanara will not eat the Sambhar stag, the Bargaballis the Barga deer, and the Kuntiballis the woodcock. The Vaydas of Cutch worship the monkey god whom they consider to be their ancestor, and to please him in their marriage ceremony, the bridegroom goes to the bride's house dressed up as a monkey and there leaps about in monkey fashion.^ It is possibly from regard to the totem that the Parihar Rajputs of Rajputana will not eat the wild boar, but they have now invented a legend that one of their princes went into a river while pursuing a boar and was cured of a loathsome disease.'' There is a Celtic legend in which a child is turned into a pig, and Gessa is laid on Diarmid not to kill a pig, as it has the same span of life as himself.^ The Bengal Bawariyas take the heron as their emblem, and must not eat it.^ The Orissa Kumhars abstain from 1 Dalton "Descriptive Ethnology," 126, 162, 165 sq., 179 185, 209, 231, 265. ' " Jungle Life," 600. ^ Campbell, " Notes," 7. * " Rajputana Gazetteer," i. 223. ^ Rhys, " Lectures," 508. " Dalton, /oc. «/., 327. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 155 eating, and even worship the Sal fish, because the rings on its scales resemble the wheel which is the symbol of their craft.' The peacock is a totem of the Jats and of the Khandhs, as the Yizidis worship the Taous, a half mythical peacock, which has been connected with the Phoenix which Herodotus saw in Egypt." The Parhaiyas have a tradition that their tribe used to hold sheep and deer sacred, and used the dung of these animals instead of cowdung to plaster their floors. So the Kariyas do not eat the flesh of sheep, and may not even use a woollen rug. The same prohibition of meats appears to be a survival of totemism in Arabia.-' The Devak. One of the best illustrations of this form of totemism is that of the Devak or family guardian gods of Berar and Bombay. Before concluding an alliance, the Kunbi and other Berar tribes look to the Devak, which literally means the deity worshipped at marriage ceremonies ; the fact being that certain families hold in honour particular trees and plants, and at the marriage ceremony branches of these trees are set up in the house. It is said that a betrothal, in every other respect irreproachable, will be broken off if the two houses are discovered to pay honour to the same tree, in other words if they worship the same family totem and hence must belong to one and the same endogamous group.^ The same custom prevails in Bombay. " The usual Devaks are some animals, like the elephant, stag, deer, or cock, or some tree, as the Jambul, Ber, Mango, or Banyan. The Devak is the ancestor or the head of the house, and so families which have the same guardian do not intermarry. If the Devak be an animal, its flesh is not eaten ; but if it be a fruit tree, the use of the fruit generally is not forbidden, though some families abstain from eating the fruit of the tree which forms their Devak or badge." " Mr. Campbell ^ Risley, " Tribes and Castes," Introduction, xlvii. - Conway, " Demonology," i. 27 ; " Herodotus," ii. 73. 3 Dalton, /oc. cit., 131, note; Ball, loc. cit., 89; Robertson-Smith, " Kinship," 306 sq. '' " Berar Gazetteer," 187. " Campbell, "Notes," 8 sqq. 156 Folk-lore of Northern India. gives numerous examples of these family totems, such as wheat bread, a shell, an earthen pot, an axe, a Banyan tree, an elephant. Oil-makers have as their totem an iron bar, or an oil-mill ; scent-makers use five piles, each of five earthen pots, with a lighted lamp in the middle. The Bangars' Devak is a conch-shell, that of the Pardesi Rajputs an earthen pot filled with wheat, and so on. Many of these are probably tribal or occupational fetishes, of which instances will be given in another place. The Vahanas and Avataras. Some have professed to find indications of totemism in the Vahanas and Avataras, the " Vehicles " and the *' Incarnations " of the mythology ; but this is far from certain. It has been suggested that these may represent tribal deities imported into Hinduism. Brahma rides on the Hansa or goose ; Vishnu on Garuda, half eagle and half man, which is the crest of the Chandravansi Rajputs ; Siva on his bull Nandi ; Yama on a buffalo ; Karttikeya on a peacock ; Kamadeva on the marine monster Makara, or on a parrot ; Agni on a ram ; Varuna on a fish. Ganesa is accompanied by his rat, whence his name Akhuratha, " rat- borne." This an ingenious comparative mythologist makes out to represent " the pagan Sun god crushing under his feet the mouse of night." ' Vayu rides on an antelope, Sani or Saturn on a vulture, and Durga on a tiger. The same is the case with the Avataras or incarnations of the deities. Vishnu appears in the form of Varaha, the boar ; Kurma, the tortoise ; Matsya, the fish ; Nara Sinha, the man-lion ; Kalki, the white horse. Rudra and Indra are also represented in the form of the boar. The Boar as a Totem. How the boar came to be associated with Vishnu has been much disputed. One and not a very plausible explanation ^ Gubernatis, " Zoological Mythology,'' ii. 68 ; and see Lang, " Custom and Myth," 113. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 157 which has been suggested is that it is because the boar is a destroyer of snakes.' We know that in Rajputana there was a regular spring festival at which the boar was killed because he was regarded as the special enemy of Gauri, the Rajput tribal goddess. " The comparative mythologists account for the spring boar festival by connecting it with the ceremonial eating of the boar's head at Christmas in Europe, as a symbol of the gloomy monster of winter, killed at the winter solstice, after which the days get longer and brighter.^ Mr. Frazer explains it by the killing of the Corn Spirit in the form of the boar."* But it is, perhaps, simpler to believe with Sir A. Lyall ° that " when the Brahmans convert a tribe of pig-worship- ping aborigines, they tell their proselytes that the pig was an Avatar of Vishnu. The Minas in one part of Rajpu- tana used to worship the pig. When they took a turn towards Islam they changed their pig into a saint called Father Adam, and worshipped him as such." Mr. Frazer has pointed out that the " customs of the Egyptians touching the pig are to be explained as based upon an opinion of the extreme sanctity rather than of the extreme uncleanness of the animal ; or rather to put it more correctly, they imply that the animal was looked on not simply as a filthy and a disgusting creature, but as a being endowed with high super- natural powers, and that as such it was regarded with that primitive sentiment of religious awe and fear in which the feelings of reverence are almost equally blended." There are indications of the same belief in India. Thus^ in Baghera " the boar is a sacred animal, and the natives there say that if any man were to kill a wild boar in the neighbourhood, he would be sure to die immediately after- wards, while no such fatal result would follow if the same man killed a boar anywhere else." ^ In the same way the Prabhus of Bombay eat wild pork once a year as a religious 1 Conway, " Demonology,'' i. 144. - Tod, "Annals,'' i. 599. ^ Gubernatis, loc. at., ii. 13. * " Golden Bough,'' ii. 26 sqq., 58. * "Asiatic Studies," 264. •"' '• Archaeological Reports," vi. 137. 158 Folk-lore of Northern India. duty. The Vaddars of the Dakkhin say that they are not troubled with ghosts, because the pork they eat and hang in their houses scares ghosts. We know that among the Dravidian races and many of the menial tribes of Hindustan the pig is the favourite offering to the local godlings and to the deities of disease. Swine's teeth are often worn by Hindu ascetics, and among the Kolarian races the women are forbidden to eat the flesh. In Northern India the chief place where the worship of Vishnu in his Varaha or boar incarnation is localized is at Soron on the banks of the Burhi Ganga, or old Ganges, in the Etah District. The name of the place has been derived from Sukarakshetra, " the place of the good deed," because here Vishnu slew the demon Hiranyakesu. It is certainly Sukarakshetra, " the plain of the hog." ^ Garuda, another of these vehicles, is the wonder-working bird common to many mythologies — the Rukh of the Arabian Nights, the Eorosh of the Zend, the Simurgh of the Persians, the Anka of the Arabs, the Kargas of the Turks, the Kirni of the Japanese, the Dragon of China, the Norka of Russia, the Phoenix of classical fable, the Griffin of chivalry and of Temple Bar. From totemism we get a clue to many curious usages, especially in the matter of food. From this idea probably arose the unclean beasts of the Hebrew ritual. Many Hindu tribes will not eat the onion or the turnip. Brah- mans and Bachgoti Rajputs object to potatoes. The Rajputs place a special value on the wood of the Nim tree ; one clan alone, the Raikwars, are forbidden to use it as a tooth-stick. Some Kolarian tribes, as we have already seen, refuse to use the flesh or wool of the sheep. The Murmu, or Santals of the blue bull sept, will not eat the flesh of that animal. The system of the Oraons is more elaborate still, for no sub-tribe can eat the plant or animal after which it is named. So, the Bansetti Binjhiyas, who take their name from the bamboo, do not touch the tree at a wedding ; the Harbans Chamars, who are said to be in ^ Fiihrer, "Monumental Antiquities," 88. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I59 some way connected with a bone (yhaddd), cannot wear bones in any shape ; the Rikhiasan Chiks do not eat beef or pork ; the Sanuani Dhenuars cannot wear gold ; the Dhanuar Khariyas cannot eat rice gruel. Numerous instances of this kind are given by Mr. Risley.^ The transition from such observances and restrictions to the elaborate food regulations of the modern castes is not difficult. Fetishism Defined. Fetishism is " the straightforward, objective admiration of visible substances fancied to possess some mysterious influence or faculty. . . . The original downright adoration of queer-looking objects is modified by passing into the higher order of imaginative superstition. First, the stone is the abode of some spirit, its curious shape or position betraying possession. Next, the strange form or aspect argues some design or handiwork of supernatural beings, or is the vestige of their presence upon earth, and one step further leads us to the regions of mythology and heroic legend." " The unusual appearance of the object is thus supposed to imply an indwelling ghost, without which deviation from the ordinary type would be inexplicable. Hence fetishism depends on animism and the ghost theory, to which in order of time it must have succeeded. Fetishism Illustrated in Afghanistan. The process by which the worship of such a fetish grows is well illustrated by a case from Afghanistan. " It is sufficient for an Afghan devotee to see a small heap of stones, a few rags, or some ruined tomb, something, in short, upon which a tale can be invented, to imagine at once that some saint is buried there. The idea conceived, he throws some more stones upon the heap and sticks up a pole or flag ; those who come after follow the leader ; more stones and 1 "Tribes and Castes," ii. Appendix; Dalton, loc. cit., 162, note, 213, 254. ^ Lyall, "Asiatic Studies,' 9 sq. i6o Folk-lore of Northern India. more rags are added ; at last its dimensions are so consider- able that it becomes the vogue ; a Mullah is always at hand with a legend which he makes or had revealed to him in a dream ; all the village believe it ; a few pilgrims come ; crowds follow ; miracles are wrought, and the game goes on, much to the satisfaction of the holy speculator, who drives a good trade by it, till some other Mullah more cunning than himself starts a saint of more recent date and greater miraculous powers, when the traffic changes hands." ' The same process is daily going on before our eyes in Northern India, and it would be difficult to suggest anything curious or abnormal which the Hindu villager will not adopt as fetish. The Lorik Legend. The legend of Lorik is very popular among the Ahir tribe,, and has been localized in the Mirzapur District in a curious way which admirably illustrates the principles which we have been discussing. The story is related at wearisome length, but the main features of it, according to the Shahabad version, are as follows : Siudhar, an Ahir, marries Chandani, and is cursed by Parvati with the loss of all passion. Chandani forms an attachment for her neighbour Lorik and elopes with him. The husband pursues, fails to induce her to return, fights Lorik and is beaten. The pair go and meet Mahapatiya, a Dusadh, the chief of the gamblers. He and Lorik play until the latter loses everything, including the girl. She urges that her jewels did not form part of the stake, and induces them to gamble again. She stands opposite Mahapatiya and distracts his attention by giving him a glance of her pretty ankles. Finally Lorik wins every- thing back. The girl then tells Lorik how she has been insulted, and Lorik with his mighty sword cuts off the gambler's head, when it and the body are turned into stone. Lorik had been betrothed to a girl named Satmanain, who was not of age and had not joined her husband. Lorik had an adopted brother named Semru. Lorik and Chan-^ ' Ferrier, " Caravan Journey," i86. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. i6i dani, after killing the gambler, went on to Hardoi, near Mongir, where Lorik defeated a Raja and conquered his country. Lorik was finally seized and put into a dungeon, whence he was released by the aid of the goddess Durga. He again conquered the Raja, recovered Chandani, had a son born to him, and gained considerable wealth. So they determined to return to their native land. Meanwhile Semru, Lorik's brother by adoption, had been killed by the Kols and all his cattle and property were plundered. Lorik's real wife, Satmanain, had grown into a handsome woman, but still remained in her father's house. Lorik was anxious to test her fidelity ; so when she came to sell milk in his camp, not knowing her husband, he stretched a loin cloth across the entrance. All the other women stepped over it, but the delicacy of Satmanain was so excessive that she would not put her foot across it. Lorik was pleased, and filling her basket with jewels, covered them with rice. When she returned, her sister saw the jewellery and charged her with obtaining them as the price of her dishonour. She indignantly denied the accusa- tion, and her nephew, Semru's son, prepared to fight Lorik to avenge the dishonour of his aunt. Next day the matter was cleared up to the satisfaction of all parties. Lorik then reigned with justice, and incurred the dis- pleasure of Indra, who sought to destroy him. So the goddess Durga took the form of his mistress Chandani and tempted him. He succumbed to her wiles, and she struck him so that his face turned completely round. Overcome by grief and shame, he went to Benares, and there he and his friends were turned into stone and sleep the sleep of magic at Manikarnika Ghat. The Mirzapur Version. The Mirzapur version is interesting from its association with fetishism. As you descend the Markundi Pass into the valley of the Son, you observe a large isolated boulder split into two parts, with a narrow fissure between them. Further on in the bed of the Son is a curious water-worn rock, which, VOL. II. M i62 Folk-lore of Northern India. to the eye of faith, suggests a rude resemblance to a head- less elephant. On this foundation has been localized the legend of Lorik, which takes us back to the time when the Aryan and the aboriginal Dasyu contended for mastery in the wild borderland. There was once, so the tale runs, a barbarian king who reigned at the fort of Agori, the frontier fortress on the Son. Among his dependents was a cowherd maiden, named Manjani, who was loved by her clansman Lorik. He, with his brother Sanwar, came to claim her as his bride. The Raja insisted on enforcing the Jus primae 7ioctis. The heroic brethren, in order to escape this infamy, carried off the maiden. The Raja pursued on his famous wild elephant, which Lorik decapitated with a single blow. When they reached in their flight the Markundi Pass, the wise Manjani advised Lorik to use her father's sword, which, with admirable forethought, she had brought with her. He preferred his own weapon, but she warned him to test both. His own sword broke to pieces against the huge boulder of the Pass, but Manjani's weapon clave it in twain. So Lorik and his brother, with the aid of the magic brand, defeated the infidel hosts with enormous slaughter, and carried off the maiden in triumph. If you doubt the story, there are the cloven boulder and the petrified elephant to witness to its truth, and both are worshipped to this day in the name of Lorik and his bride with offerings of milk and grain. This tale embodies a number of incidents which con- stantly appear in the folk-tales. We have the gambling match in the Mahabharata and in the tale of Nala and Damayanti, as well as in the Celtic legend of the young king of Easaidh Ruadh." The magic sword and the various fidelity tests appear both in the folk-tales of the East and West. ' Muir, " Ancient Sanskrit Texts," v. 425 sq. ; Lai Bihiri De, "Folk- tales of Bengal," 193 sq., 277 ; Temple, " Legends of the Panjab," 48 sqq. ; " Wideawake Stories," 277 sqq. ; Campbell, " Popular Tales," i. 2 ; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 323 ; and for fidelity tests, Grimm, " Household Tales," i. 453 ; Tawney, loc. cit., ii. 601 ; Clouston, " Popular Romances," i. 43, 173. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 163 Of living creatures turned into stone we have many instances in connection with the Pandava legend, as in Cornwall, the granite rocks known as the " Merry Maidens " and the " Pipers " are a party who broke the Sabbath, were struck by lightning, and turned into stone.' JlRAYA BhAVANI, Of a similar type is Jiraya Bhavani, who is worshipped at Jungail, south of the Son. In her place of worship, a cave on the hillside, the only representative of the goddess is an ancient rust-eaten coat of mail. This gives her name, which is a corruption of the Persian Zirah, meaning a coat of armour. Close by is a little stream, known as the Suaraiya, the meaning of which is, of course, assumed to be " Hog river," from the Hindi Suar, a pig. Here we have all the elements of a myth. In one of the early fights between Hindu and Musalman, a wounded hero of Islam came staggering to the bank of the stream, and was about to drink, when he heard that its name was connected with what is an abomination to the true believer. So he preferred to die of thirst, and no one sees any incongruity in the fact that the armour of a martyr of the faith has become a form of the Hindu goddess. The shrine is now on its pro- motion, and Jiraya Bhavani will be provided with a Sanskrit etymology and develop before long into a genuine manifestation of Kali. Village Fetish Stones. It is hardly necessary to say that, as Sir J. Lubbock has shown, the worship of fetish stones prevails in all parts of the world." There is hardly a village in Northern India without a fetish of this kind, which is very often not appro- priated to any special deity, but represents the Gramadevata 1 Tylor, " Primitive Culture," i. 352, note ; " Wideawake Stories," 419 sqq. : " Panjab Notes and Queries," iv. 201 ; Knowles, "Folk-tales of Kashmir," 192 ; Tawney, loc. cit., i. 123 ; Grimm, loc. at., ii. 400 ; Hunt. "Popular Romances," 178. 2 Also see Rhys, " Lectures," 206 ; Lang, " Custom and Myth," 52. M 2 164 Folk-lore of Northern India. or Ganw-devi, or Deohar, the collective local divine cabinet which has the affairs of the community under its charge. Why spirits should live in stones has been debated. Mr. Campbell perhaps presses the matter too far when he suggests that stones were by early man found to contain fire, and that heated stones being found useful in disease, cooking, and the like may have strengthened the idea. " The earliest theory was perhaps that as the life of the millet was in the millet seed and the life of the Mango tree was in the Mango stone, a human spirit could live in a rock or a pebble. The belief that the soul, or part of the soul of a man, lives in his bones, seems closely connected with the belief in the stone as a spirit house. Probably it was an early belief that the bones should be kept, so that if the spirit comes back and worries the survivors he may have a place to go to." ' It is quite possible that the worship of stocks and stones may not in all places be based on exactly the same train of ideas. To the ruder races, the more curious or eccentric the form of the stone 's, the more likely it is to be the work and possibly the abode of a spirit, and in a stoneless land, like the Gangetic plain, any stone is a wonder, and likely to be revered. The conception of the worshipper will always vary in regard to it. To the savage it will be the actual home or the occasional resting-place of the spirit ; to the idolater of more advanced ideas it will be little more than a symbol, which reminds him of the deity without shape or form whom he is bound to worship. Other fetish stones, again, by their form prove that they are the work of another or a higher race. Thus, on the village fetish mounds we often find the carved relics of some Buddhistic shrine, or the prehistoric stone implements, which were the work of a forgotten people. Lastly, many stones lend themselves directly to the needs of the phallic cultus. One form of stone is regarded with special reverence, those that have holes or perforations. Among these may ' " Notes," 163. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 165 be mentioned the Salagrama, a sort of ammonite found in the Gandak river, which has perforations, said to be the work of the Vajrakita insect and hence sacred to Vishnu. The story goes that the divine Narayana once wandered through the world in the form of the Vajrakita or golden bee. The gods, attracted by his beauty, also took the form of bees, and whirled about him in such numbers that Vishnu, afraid of the consequences, assumed the form of a rock and stopped the moving of Garuda and the gods. On this Garuda, followed by all the gods, made each a separate dwelling in the rock for the conversion of the infidels. So the Cornish Milpreve, or adder stone which is a preservative against vipers, is a ball of coralline limestone, the sections in the coral being thought to be entangled young snakes.^ In Italy, pieces of stalagmite full of cavities are valued as amulets. The respect for these perforated stones rests, again, on the well-known principle that looking through a stone which has a hole bored through it improves the sight. All over the world it is a recognized theory that creeping through the orifice in a perforated stone or under an arching stone or tree is a valuable remedy in cases of disease, Mr. Lane describes how women in Cairo walk under the stone on which the decapitated bodies of criminals are washed, in the hope of curing ophthalmia or procuring offspring. The woman must do this in silence, and with the left foot fore- most.- In Cornwall, Mr. Hunt writes : " In various parts of the country there are, amongst the granitic masses, rocks which have fallen across each other, leaving small openings, or there are holes, low and narrow, extending under a pile of rocks. In nearly every case of this kind, we find it is popularly stated that any one suffering from rheumatism or lumbago would be cured if he crawled through the opening. In some cases nine times are insisted on to make the charm complete." * So, walking under a bramble which has formed a second root in the earth is a cure for rheumatism, and ' Hunt, "Popular Romances,'' 418. " " Modern Egyptians," i. 325. ^ " Popular Romances," 177. i66 Folk-lore of Northern India. strumous children were passed nine times through a cleft ash tree, against the sun. The tree was then bound up, and if the bark grew the child was cured, if the tree died the death of the child was sure to follow.' In the same way at many shrines it is part of the worship to creep through a narrow orifice from one side to the other. At Kankhal, worshippers at the temple of Daksha creep through a sort of tunnel from one side to the other. The same is the rule at the temple at Kabraiya in the Hamirpur District, and at many other places of the same kind." The same principle probably accounts for the respect paid to the grindstone. Part of the earliest form of the marriage ritual consisted in the bride standing on the family grind- stone. At the present day she puts her foot upon it and knocks down little piles of heaped grain. It is waved over the heads of the pair to scare evil spirits. In Bombay it is said that sitting on a grindstone shortens life, and the Kunbis of Kolaba place a grindstone in the lying-in room, and on it set a rice flour image of a woman, which is wor- shipped as the goddess, and the baby is laid before it. Such a stone readily passes into a fetish, as at Ahmadnagar, where there is a stone with two holes, which any two fingers of any person's hand can fill, and the mosque where it stands is, in consequence, much respected.^ Much, however, of the worship of stones appears to be the result of the respect paid to the tombstone or cairn, which, as we have already said, keeps down the ghost of the dead man, and is often a place in which his spirit chooses to reside. These rude stones are very often smeared with ruddle or red ochre. We have here a survival of the blood sacrifice of a human being or animal which was once universal." Such sacrifices rest on the principle that it is necessary to supply attendants to the dead or to the tribal gods in the other * " Popular Romances," 412, 415. ^ Fiihrer, " Monumental Antiquities," 173. ^ " Bombay Gazetteer," xi. 56 ; xvii. 698. " Robertson-Smith, " Kinship," 49 ; Lubbock, " Origin of Civilization," 306 ; Tylor, " Primitive Culture," ii. 164 ; Conway, " Demono ogy,'' ii. 284. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 167 world ; and the commutation of human sacrifices, first into those of animals, and then into a mere scarlet stain on the fetish stone, is a constantly recurring fact in the history of custom.^ It may be worth while to discuss this transition from the Indian evidence. Human Sacrifice among the Indo-Aryans. That human sacrifice prevailed among the early Aryans in India is generally admitted. The whole question has been treated in detail by that eminent Hindu scholar, Rajendra Lala Mitra. He arrives at the conclusion that, looking to the history of the ancient civilization and the ritual of the Hindus, there is nothing to justify the belief that the Hindus were incapable of sacrificing human victims to their gods ; that the Sunasepha hymns of the Rig Veda Sanhita most probably refer to a human sacrifice ; that the Aitareya Brahmana refers to an actual and not to a typical human sacrifice ; that the Parushamedha originally required the actual sacrifice of men ; that the Taitareya Brahmana enjoys the killing of a man at the horse sacrifice ; that the Satapatha Brahmana sanctions human sacrifice in some cases, but makes the Parushamedha emblematic ; that the Puranas recognize human sacrifices to Chandika, but prohibit the Parushamedha rite ; that the Tantras enjoin human sacrifices to Chandika, and require that when human victims are not available, an effigy of a human being should be sacrificed to her." Human Sacrifice in the Folk-tales. There is ample evidence from the folk-tales of the exist- ence of human sacrifice in early times. We have in the tales of Somadeva constant reference to human sacrifices ^ Spencer, " Principles of Sociology," i. 268 ; Lang, " Custom and Myth," i. 270. - " Indo-Aryans," ii. 70 sqq. ; "Journal Asiatic Society, Bengal," 1876 ; Max Miiller, " Ancient Sanskrit Literature," 408 sq. ; Muir, " Ancient Sanskrit Texts," i., ii., passim ; Wilson, " Rig Veda," i. 59, 63 ; " Essays," ii. 247 sqq. ; Atkinson, " Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 800, 867. i68 Folk-lore of Northern India. made in honour of Chandika or Chamunda. We find one Muravara, a Turushka or Indo-Scythian, who proposes to make a human sacrifice in memory of his dead father ; we have expiatory sacrifices to Chandika to save the Hfe of a king. In one of the Panjab tales a ship will not leave port till a human victim is offered. In one of the modern tales we have an account of a man and his family who sacrifice themselves before the god Jyoti Bara, " the great diviner," who is worshipped by the Sansya gypsies.' The folk-tales also disclose ample evidence of cannibalism. The Magian cannibals of the Book of Sindibad used to eat human flesh raw, and the same tale is told by Herodotus of the Massagetae, the Padaei of India, whom Col. Dalton identifies with the Birhors of Chota Nagpur, and of the Essedones near Lake Moeotis.^ It is needless to say that Indian folk-tales abound with references to the same prac- tices. We have cannibal Rakshasas in abundance, and in one of Somadeva's stories Devaswamin, the Brahman, looks out and finds his " wife's mouth stained with blood, for she had devoured his servant and left nothing of him but the bones." And in the tale of Asokadatta we have a woman who climbs on a stake and cuts slices of the flesh of an impaled criminal, which she eats.^ In the Mahabharata we find the legend of Kalmashapada, who, while hunting, meets Saktri, son of Vasishtha, and strikes him with his whip. The in- censed sage cursed him to become a cannibal. This curse was heard by Viswamitra, the rival of Vasishtha, and he so con- trived that the body of the king became possessed by a man- eating Rakshasa. Kalmashapada devoured Saktri and the hundred sons of Vasishtha, who finally restored him to his original state. In a tale recently collected among the Dravidian Manjhis, a girl accidentally cuts her finger and some of the blood falls upon the greens, whereupon her 1 Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 336 ; ii. 253, 338 ; Temple, " Wide- awake Stories,'' 147; Lai Bihari De, "Folk-tales," 194; Miss Frere, " Old Deccan Days," 6 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 1 1 1. 129 ; iii. 105. 2 Burton, " Arabian Nights," iv. 376. 2 Tawney, loc. a'/., i. 212 ; ii. 616. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 169 brothers, finding that it flavoured the mess, killed and devoured her/ Human Sacrifice in Modern Times. Up to quite modern times the same was the case, and there is some evidence to show that the custom has not quite ceased. Until the beginning of the present century, the custom of offering a first-born child to the Ganges was common. Akin to this is the Ganga Jatra, or murder of sick relatives on the banks of the sacred river, of which a case occurred quite recently at Calcutta. At Katwa, near Calcutta, a leper was burnt alive in 1812 ; he threw himself into a pit ten cubits deep which was filled with burning coals. He tried to escape, but his mother and sister thrust him in again and he was burnt. They believed that by so doing he would gain a pure body in the next birth." Of this religious suicide in Central India, Sir J. Malcolm wrote : " Self- sacrifice of men is less common than it used to be, and the men who do it are generally of low tribes. One of their chief motives is that they will be born Rajas at their next incarnation. Women who have been long barren, vow their first child, if one be given to them, to Omkar Mandhata. The first knowledge imparted to the infant is this vow, and the impression is so implanted in his mind, that years before his death he seems like a man haunted by his destiny. There is a tradition that anyone saved after the leap over the cliff near the shrine must be made Raja of the place ; but to make this impossible, poison is mixed with the last victuals given to the devoted man, who is compelled to carry out his purpose.'* The modern instances of human sacrifice among the Khandhs of Bengal and the Mers of Rajputana are suffi- ciently notorious. It also prevailed among some of the Dravidian tribes up to quite recent times. The Kharwars, ' '• North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 65. - Ibid., ii. 22. '■' " Central India," ii. 210. 170 Folk-lore of Northern India. since adopting Hinduism, performed human sacrifices to Kali in the form of Chandi. Some of our people who fell into their hands during the Mutiny were so dealt with. The same was the case with the Bhuiyas, Khandhs, and Mundas. Some of the Gonds of Sarguja used to offer human sacrifice to Burha Deo, and still go through a form of doing so.' There is a recent instance quoted among the Tiyars, a class of boatmen in Benares ; one Tonuram sacri- ficed four men in the hope of recovering the treasures of seven Rajas ; another man was killed to propitiate a Rak- shasa who guarded a treasure supposed to be concealed in a house where the deed was committed." About 1881 a village headman sacrificed a human being to Kali in the Sambalpur District, and a similar charge was made against the chief of Bastar not many years ago. Of the Karhada Brahmans of Bombay, Sir J. Malcolm writes : ^ " The tribe of Brahmans called Karhada had for- merly a horrid custom of annually sacrificing to their deities a young Brahman. The Sakti is supposed to delight in human blood, and is represented with fiery eyes and covered with red flowers. This goddess holds in one hand a sword and in the other a battle-axe. The prayers of her votaries are directed to her during the first nine days of the Dasahra feast, and on the evening of the tenth a grand repast is pre- pared, to which the whole family is invited. An intoxicating drug is contrived to be mixed with the food of the intended victim, who is often a stranger whom the master of the house has for several months treated with the greatest kind- ness and attention, and sometimes, to lull suspicion, given him his daughter in marriage. As soon as the poisonous and intoxicating drug operates, the master of the house un- attended takes the devoted person into the temple, leads him three times round the idol, and on his prostrating himself ' Campbell, " Khondistan," /aj-j'z'wy Frazer, "Golden Bough," i. 384 sqq. ; " Rajputana Gazetteer," ii. 47 ; Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology,'' 130, 147, 176, 285 sq., 281. ^ Chevers, " Medical Jurisprudence," 406, 411. ^ Campbell, " Notes," 339 ; Wilson, " Indian Caste," ii. 22 sq. ; " Bombay Gazetteer," x. 114. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I7I before it, takes this opportunity of cutting his throat. He collects with the greatest care the blood in a small bowl, which he first applies to the lips of the ferocious goddess, and then sprinkles it over her body ; and a hole having been dug at the feet of the idol for the corpse, he deposits it with great care to prevent discovery. After this the Karhada Brahman returns to his family, and spends the night in mirth and revelry, convinced that by the bloodthirsty act he has propitiated the goddess for twelve years. On the morning of the following day the corpse is taken from the hole in which it had been thrown, and the idol deposited till next Dasahra, when a similar sacrifice is made." There seems reason to suspect that even in the present day such sacrifices are occasionally performed at remote shrines of Kali or Durga Devi. Within the last few years a significant case of the kind occurred at Benares. There are numerous instances from Nepal. ^ At Jaypur, near Vizagapatam, the Raja is said, at his installation in 1861, to have sacrificed a girl to Durga.' A recent case of such sacrifice with the object of recovering hidden treasure occurred in Berar ; a second connected with witchcraft at Muzaffarnagar.'^ At Chanda and Lanji in the Province of Nagpur there are shrines to Kali at which human sacrifices to the goddess have been offered almost within the memory of this generation. Besides the religious form of human sacrifice in honour of one of these bloodthirsty deities, there are forms of the rite which depend on the mystic power attributed to human flesh and blood in various charms and black magic. In connection with human flesh a curious story is told of a man who went to bathe in the Ganges, and met one of the abominable Faqirs known as Augars or Aghor- panthis, who carry about with them fragments of a human corpse. He saw the Faqir cut off and eat a piece of the flesh of a corpse, and he then offered him a piece, saying ' Wright, " History," 11, note. - Ball, " Jungle Life," 580. ^ "North Indian Notes and Queries,'' i. 112, 148. And for other in- stances, see Balfour, " Cyclopcedia," iii. 477 sqq. 172 Folk-lore of Northern India. that if he ate it he would become enormously rich. He- refused the ghastly food, and the Faqir then threw a piece at him which stuck to his head, forming a permanent lump/ In one of the tales of Somadeva the witches are seen flying about in the air, and say, " These are the magic powers of witches' spells, and are due to the eating of human flesh." In another the hero exchanges an anklet with a woman for some human flesh.^ The same mysterious power is attributed to human blood.. The blood of the Jinn has, it is hardly necessary to say,, special powers of its own. Thus, in one of the Kashmir stories the angel says : " This is a most powerful Jinn^ Should a drop of his blood fall to the ground while life is in him, another Jinn will be quickly formed therefrom, and spring up and slay you." ^ Bathing in human blood has been regarded as a powerful remedy for disease. The Em- peror Constantine was ordered a bath of children's blood,, but moved by the prayers of the parents, he forbore to apply the remedy and was rewarded by a miraculous recovery. In one of the European folk-tales a woman desirous of offspring is directed to take a horn and cup herself, draw out a clot of blood, place it in a pot, lute it down and only uncover it in the ninth month, when a child would be found in the pot. In the German folk-tales, bathing in the blood of innocent maidens is a cure for leprosy.^ The same beliefs largely prevail in India. In 1870, a Musalman butcher losing his child was told by a Hindu conjuror that if he washed his wife in the blood of a boy, his next infant would be healthy. To ensure this result a child was murdered. A similar case occurred in Muzaffar- nagar, where a child was killed and the blood drunk by a barren woman.^ In one of the tales of Somadeva the preg- * " Panjab Notes and Queries," iii. 75. 2 Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 157, 214. =* Knowles, " Folk-tales," 2. * Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 294 ; Grimm, " Household Tales," i. 396 ; Hartland, " Legend of Perseus," i. 98. '" " Report Inspector-General Police, N.-W.P., 1870," page 93 ; " Pan- jab Notes and Queries," ii. 205 ; iii. 74, 162 ; Chevers, '' Medical Juris- prudence," 842, 396 : Campbell, " Notes," 338. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I73 nant queen asks her husband to gratify her longing by fiUing a tank with blood for her to bathe in. He was a righteous man, and in order to gratify her craving he had a tank filled with the juice of lac and other extracts, so that it seemed to be full of blood. In another tale the ascetic tells the woman that if she killed her young son and offered him to the divinity, another son would certainly be born to her. Quite recently at Muzaffarnagar a childless Jat woman was told that she would attain her desire if she bathed in water mixed with the blood of a Brahman child. A Hindu coolie at Mauritius bathed in and drank the blood of a girl, think- ing that thereby he would be gifted with supernatural powers. It would be easy to add largely to the number of instances of similar beliefs.' Survivals of Human Sacrifice. There are, in addition, numerous customs which appear to be survivals of human sacrifice, or of the blood covenant, which also prevailed in Arabia." Among the lower castes in Northern India the parting of the bride's hair is marked with red, a survival of the original blood covenant, by which she was introduced into the sept of her husband. We see that this is the case from the rites of the more savage tribes. Among the Kewats of Bengal, a tiny scratch is made on the little finger of the bridegroom's right hand and of the bride's left, and the drops of blood drawn from these are mixed with the food. Each then eats the food with which the other's blood has been mixed. Among the Santals blood is drawn in the same way from the little finger of the bride and bridegroom, and with it marks are made on both above the clavicle.^ Human Sacrifice and Buildings. One standing difficulty at each decennial census has been the rumour which spreads in remote tracts that Government ' " North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 148; iii. 71, - Robertson-Smith, " Kinship," 48 sq. ' Risley, " Tribes and Castes," i. 456 ; Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology,'' 220. 174 Folk-lore of Northern India. is making the enumeration with a view of collecting victims to be sacrificed at some bridge or other building, or that a toll of pretty girls is to be taken to reward the soldiery after some war. Thus, about a fort in Madras it had long been a tradition that when it was first built a girl had been built into the wall to render it impregnable.^ It is said that a Raja was once building a bridge over the river Jargo at Chunar, and when it fell down several times he was advised to sacrifice a Brahman girl to the local deity. She has now become the Mari or ghost of the place, and is regularly wor- shipped in time of trouble." In Kumaun the same belief prevails, and kidnappers, known as Dokhutiya, or two-legged beasts of prey, are said to go about capturing boys for this purpose. In Kathiawar, if a castle was being built and the tower would not stand, or if a pond had been dug and would not hold water, a human victim was offered.^ The rumour that a victim was required spread quite recently in connec- tion with the Hughli Bridge at Calcutta and the Benares water-works. The Narmada, it was believed, would never allow herself to be bridged until she carried away part of the superstructure, and caused the loss of lives as a sacrifice. At Ahmadabad, by the advice of a Brahman, a childless Vanya was induced to dig a tank to appease the goddess Sitala. The water refused to enter it without the sacrifice of a man. As soon as the victim's blood fell on the ground, the tank filled and the goddess came down from heaven and rescued the victim.'' In building the fort of Sikandarpur in Baliya, a Brahman and a Dusadh girl were both immolated.* The Vadala lake in Bombay refused to hold water till the local spirit was appeased by the sacrifice of the daughter of the village headman. When the Shorkot fort was being built one side repeatedly fell down. A Faqir advised the Raja to put a first-born son under the rampart. This was done and the wall stood. The child's mother went to Mecca, and returned with an army of Muhammadans ; but they ' " Folk-lore," iv. 260. " " North Indian Notes and Queries,'' iii. 40. ^ Ibid., 106. ■* " Bombay Gazetteer," ii. 349 ; xiv. 49. •• Fiihrer, "Monumental Antiquities," 194. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I75 could not take the fort. Then a Faqir transformed himself into a cock and flew on the roof of the palace, where he set up a loud crow. The Raja was frightened and abandoned the place. As he was leaving it, he shouted, " Shame on thee, O Fort ! to remain standing ! " and the walls at once fell down.^ Modifications of Human Sacrifice. There are also many instances of the transition from human sacrifices to those of a milder form. Thus, when Ahmadabad was building, Manik Bawa, a saint, every day made a cushion, and every night picked it to pieces. As he did so the day's work fell down. The Sultan refrained from sacrificing him, but got him into a small jar and kept him there till the work was over." The Villalis of Puna on the fifteenth day after a death shape two bricks like human beings, dress them, and lay them on a wooden stool. They weep by them all night, and next day, taking them to the burning ground, cremate them. Among the Telugu Brah- mans of Puna, if a man dies at an unlucky time, wheaten figures of men are made and burnt with the corpse. The Konkani Marathas of Kanara on the feast of Raulnath get a man to cut his hand with a knife and let three drops of blood fall on the ground.^ Formerly in Hoshangabad, men used to swing themselves from a pole, as in the famous Bengal Charakh Puja. In our territories this is now uncommon, as the village headmen being afraid of responsibility for an accident, generally, instead of a man, fasten up a white pumpkin, which they swing about.* At the installation of a Bhuiya Raja, a man comes forward whom the Raja touches on the neck, as if about to 1 For similar instances see " Archaeological Reports," v. 98 ; " Bombay Gazetteer," XX. 144; "Folk-lore Records," iii. Part II. 182; " Oudh Gazetteer," iii. 253; "Indian Antiquary," xi. 117; "Calcutta Review," Ixxvii. 106 ; Lai Bihari De, " Folk-tales," 130 ; " Panjab Notes and Queries," iii. no; "North Indian Notes and Queries,'' ii. 27, 63,93; Campbell, " Santal Folk-tales," 106., - " Bombay Gazetteer," iv. 276. ^ " Campbell, " Notes," 348. ^ " Settlement Report," 126. 176 Folk-lore of Northern India. cut off his head. The victim disappears for three days ; then he presents himself before the Raja, as if miraculously restored to life. Similarly, the Gonds, instead of a human sacrifice, now make an image of straw, which they find answers the purpose. The Bhuiyas of Keunjhar used to offer the head of their prime minister to Thakurani Mai. She is now transformed into the Hindu Durga and accepts a sacrifice of goats and sheep.' In Nepal, after the Sithi Jatra feast, the people divide into two parties and have a match at stone-throwing ; formerly this used to be a serious matter, and any one who was knocked down and fell into the hands of the other side was sacrificed to the goddess Kankes- wari. The actual killing of the victim, as in the case of sacrifices to the goddess Bachhla Devi, has now been dis- continued under the influence of British officers." We shall meet later on in another connection other instances of mock fights of the same kind. MOMIAi. In connection with human sacrifice may be mentioned the curious superstition about Momiai or mummy. The virtues of human fat as a magical ointment appear all through folk-lore. Othello, referring to the handkerchief which he had given to Desdemona, says, — " It was dyed in the mummy which the skilful Conserved of maidens' hearts.'' Writing of witches Reginald Scot says: " The devil teacheth them to make ointment of the bowels and members of chil- dren, whereby they ride in the air and accomplish all their desires. After burial they steal them out of their graves and seethe them in a cauldron till the flesh be made potable, of which they make an ointment by which they ride in the air." In Macbeth the first witch speaks of — " Grease that sweaten From the murderer's gibbet.'' ' Dalton, "Descriptive Ethnology," 146, 281 ; Risley, "Tribes and Castes," i. 115. 2 Wright, "History," 35 sq., 156, note, 126, 205, 265. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 177 Indian witches are believed to use the same mystic prepara- tion to enable them to fly through the air, as their European sisters are supposed to use the fat of a toad/ Human fat is believed to be specially efficacious for this purpose. In one of Somadeva^s stories the Brahman searches for treasure with a candle made of human fat in his hand." One of the Mongol Generals, Marco Polo tells us, was accused of boiling down human beings and using their fat to grease his mangonels ; and Carpini says that when the Tartars cast Greek fire into a town they used to shoot human fat with it, in order to cause the fire to burn more quickly.'' So, in Europe a candle of human fat is said to have been used by robbers with the Hand of Glory to prevent the inmates waking, and on the Scotch border the torch used in the mystic ceremony of " saining " was made from the fat of a slaughtered enemy. ^ In India, the popular idea about Momiai is that a boy, the fatter and blacker the better, is caught, a small hole is bored in the top of his head, and he is hung up by the heels over a slow fire. The juice or essence of his body is in this way distilled into seven drops of the potent medicine known as Momiai. This substance possesses healing properties of a super- natural kind. Sword cuts, spear thrusts, wounds from arrows and other weapons of warfare are instantly cured by its use, and he who possesses it is practically invulnerable. In Kumaun, this substance is known as Narayan Tel or Ram Tel, the "oil of Vishnu or Rama." It is further believed that a European gentleman, known as the Momiai-wala Sahib, has a contract from Government of the right of enticing away suitable boys for this purpose. He makes them smell a stick or wand, which obliges them to follow him, and he then packs them off to some hill station where he carries on this nefarious manufacture. As an instance of this belief, " A very black servant of a ^ Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 594. " Ibid., i. 306 ^ Yule, "Marco Polo," ii. 165. * Henderson, " Folk-lore of the Northern Counties,'' 54, 200 sqq. VOL. II. N 178 Folk-lore of Northern India. friend of mine states that he had a very narrow escape from this Sahib at the Nauchandi fair at Meerut, where Govern- ment allows him to walk about for one day and make as many suitable victims as he can by means of his stick. The Sahib had just put his hand in his pocket and taken out the stick, which was dry and shrivelled and about a span long, when the servant with great presence of mind held out his hands and said, ' Bas I Bas ! ' ' Enough ! enough ! ' Thus intimidated, the Sahib went away into the crowd. In con- nection with Momiai, a lady here narrowly escaped a very uncanny reputation. Some of her servants gave out that she possessed a Momiai stick, for which she had paid a hundred rupees. On hearing this an inquiry was made which brought out that the lady had missed a pod of vanilla about seven inches long, of a very special quality, that she kept rolled up in a piece of paper among some of her trinkets. The ayah who mislaid it was scolded for her carelessness, and told that it was worth more than she thought. She promptly put two and two together. The shrivelled appearance which is sup- posed to be peculiar to mysterious sticks, such as snake charmers produce, the fuss made about it, and the value attached to it convinced her that her mistress owned a Momiai stick." ^ These mystic sticks appear constantly in folk-lore. We have the caduceus of Hermes, the rod of Moses, the staff of Elisha, the wand of Circe, or of Gwydion or Skirni. In one of Somadeva's tales the Kapalika ascetic has a magic stick which dances. In one of the Kashmir tales the magic wand placed under the feet of the prince makes him insensible, when laid under his head he revives. Many people in England still believe in the divining rod which points out concealed springs underground." Every native boy, particularly those who are black and fat, believes himself a possible victim to the wiles of the dreaded Momiai Sahib, who frequents hill stations because 1 " North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 190. 2 Miss Cox, " Cinderella," 485 ; Knowles, " Kashmir Tales," 199 ; Clouston, "Popular Tales," i. 88; Rhys, "Lectures," 241; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 612. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I79 he is thus enabled to carry on his villainous practices with comparative impunity and less danger of detection. Even to whisper the word Momiai is enough to make the crowd of urchins who dog the steps of a district officer when he is on his rounds through a town, disperse in dismay. Surgeons are naturally exposed to the suspicion of being engaged in this awful business, and some years ago most of the coolies deserted one of the hill stations, because an enthusiastic anatomist set up a private dissecting-room of his own. Freemasons, who are looked on by the general native public as a kind of sorcerers or magicians, are also not free from this suspicion. That such ideas should prevail among the rural population of India is not to be wondered at, when in our own modern England it is very commonly believed that luminous paint is made out of human fat.' The Danapurwala Sahib. Another of these dreaded Sahibs is the Danapurwala Sahib, or gentleman from Dinapur. Why this personage should be connected with Dinapur, a respectable British cantonment, no one can make out. At any rate, it is generally believed that he has a contract from Government for procuring heads for some of the museums, and he too has a magic stick with which he entices unfortunate travellers on dark nights and chops off their heads with a pair of shears. The influence of these magic wands by smelling may perhaps be associated with the fact that the nose is a spirit entry, as we have seen in the case of sneezing. Fetish Stones. To return after this digression to fetish stones. Of this phase of belief we have well-known instances in the coronation stone in Westminster Abbey, which is associated 1 " Folk-lore Record," iii. Part II. 283. For the commonplace Momiai which is used as an application by women before parturition, see Watt's "Dictionary of Economic Products," ii. 115. N 2 i8o Folk-lore of Northern India. with the dream of Jacob, and the Hajuru'l Aswad of Mecca, which Sir R. Burton beheved to be an aeroKte. No one will bring a stone from the Sacred Hill at Govardhan near Mathura, because it is supposed to be endowed with life. The Yadavas, who are connected with the same part of the country, had a stone fetish, described in the Vishnu Purana, which brought rain and plenty. There are numerous legends connected with many of these fetish stones, such as that in the temple of Daksha at Kankhal and Gorakhnatha in Kheri,^ which are said to owe the fissures in them to the blow of the battle-axe or sword of one of the iconoclast Muhammadan Emperors. Of Gorakhnatha it is said that Aurangzeb attempted to drag up the great Lingam, and failed to do so even with the aid of elephants. When he came to investigate the cause of his failure, tongues of flame burst from the bottom of the pillar. The stalactites in the Behar Hills are regarded as the images of the gods."^ The pestle and mortar in which a noted Darvesh of Oudh used to grind his drugs are now worshipped, and a leading family in the Lucknow District keep before their family residence a large square stone which they reverence. They say that their ancestors brought it from Delhi, and that it is the symbol of their title to the estates, which were granted to them by one of the Emperors. He enjoined them to take it as the foundation of their settlement, and since that time each new Raja on his acces- sion presents flowers, sweetmeats, and money to it.^ A great rock in the river above Badarinath, the famous shrine in the Hills, is worshipped as Brahm Kapal or the skull of Brahma, and Nanda Devi, the mountain goddess of the Himalaya, is worshipped in the form of two great stones glittering with mica, and reflecting the rays of the sun."* At Amosi in the Lucknow District they worship at marriages and birth of boys the door-post of the house of an old Rajput leader, named Binaik, who is honoured with the 1 Fiihrer, " Monumental Antiquities," 284. 2 Buchanan, " Eastern India," i, 526. 3 " Oudh Gazetteer," i. 303 ; ii. 415. " Atkinson, " Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 311, note, 792 sq. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. i8i title of Baba or " father." * At Deodhura in the Hills the grey granite boulders near the crest of the ridge are said to have been thrown there in sport by the Pandavas. Close to the temple of Devi at the same place are two large boulders, the uppermost of which is called Ransila, or " the stone of battle," and is cleft through the centre by a deep, fresh-looking fissure, at right angles to which is a similar rift in the lower rock. A small boulder on the top is said to have been the weapon with which Bhimsen produced these fissures, and the print of his five fingers is still to be seen upon it. Ransila itself is marked with the lines for playing the gambling game of Pachisi, which, though it led to their misfortunes, the Pandavas even in their exile could not abandon. There are many places where the marks of the hoofs of the horse of Bhimsen are shown.' " One spot on the margin of Lake Regillus was regarded during many ages with superstitious awe. A mark, resembling in shape a horse's hoof, was discernible in the volcanic rock ; and this mark was believed to have been made by one of the celestial chargers." ^ Fetishes among the Santals. The Santals, like all uncivilized races, have a whole army of fetishes. A round piece of wood, nearly a foot in length, the top of which is painted red, is called Banhi, or " the protector of the jungle." Another stands for Laghu, the goddess of the earth, who is sometimes represented by a mountain. An oblong piece of wood, painted red, stands for Mahamai, " the great Mother," Devi's daughter ; a small piece of white stone daubed with red is Burhiya Mai, or *' the old Mother," her granddaughter ; an arrow-head stands for Dudha Mai, " the milk Mother," the daughter of Burhiya ; a trident painted red represents the monkey god Hanuman, who executes all the orders of Devi. " Sets of these symbols are placed, one on the east and one on ths 1 "Oudh Gazetteer,'' i. 6i. - " Himalayan Gazetteer," ii. 282. ■•* Macaulay, " Battle of Lake Regillus," Introduction. i82 Folk-lore of Northern India. west of their huts to protect them from evil spirits, snakes, tigers, and all sorts of misfortune." ^ Very similar to this is the worship of Birnath, the fetish of the Mirzapur Ahirs. His platform, which is made of clay, usually contains one, three, or five rude wooden images, each about three feet high, with a rough representation of a human face sculptured on the top. He was, it is said, an Ahir who was killed by a tiger, and he is now worshipped by them in times of trouble. His special function is to protect the cattle from beasts of prey. The worshipper bathes, plasters his platform with fresh clay, and laying his offering on it, says : " Birnath ! Keep our cattle safe and you will get more." The same form of worship prevails all along the Central Indian Hills. " In the south of the Bhandara District the traveller frequently meets with squared pieces of wood, each with a rude figure carved in front, set up close to each other. These represent Ban- garam, Bangara Bai, or Devi, who is said to have one sister and five brothers, the sister being styled Kali, and four out of the five brothers being known as Gantaram, Champaram, Naikarim, and Potlinga. They are all deemed to possess the power of sending disease and death upon men, and under these or other names seem to be generally feared in the region east of Nagpur. Bhimsen, again, is generally adored under the form of one or two pieces of wood standing three or four feet in length above the ground, like those set up in connection with Bangaram's worship." ^ Fetish Stones which Cure Disease. Many of these stones have the power of curing disease, and the water with which they have been bathed is con- sidered a useful medicine. This is the case with a number of sacred Mahadeva Lingams all over the country. A common proverb speaks of the old woman who is ready enough to eat the Prasad or offering to the god, but hesitates ' Dalton, " Descriptive Ethnology," 220. - " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 2. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 183 to drink the water in which his feet have been washed. In Western India no orthodox Brahman will eat his food till he has thrice sipped the water in which his Salagrama stone has been washed.' We have already noticed the fetish bowl, the washings of which are administered by midwives to secure easy parturition. So, in Western lands the stones fetched by Merlin had the power of healing if washed in water and the patient bathed in it." Stone celts are, in Cornwall, supposed to impart a healing effect to water in which they have been soaked.^ In Java a decoction of the lichen which grows on fetish stones is used as a remedy for disease.^ In the Isle of Lewis cattle disease is attributed to the bites of serpents, and the suffering animals are made to drink water into which charm stones are put ; in the High- lands large crystals of a somewhat oval shape were kept by the priests to work charms with, and water poured thereon was given to cattle as a preventative of disease.* Fetish Stones the Abode of Spirits. The virtue of all these fetish stones rests in their embody- ing the spirits of gods or deified men. As we have shown, this is a common principle of popular belief. In one of Miss Stokes's Indian tales, " The man who went to seek his fate," the fate is found in stones, some standing up and some lying down. The man beats the stone which embodies his fate because he is miserably poor. Mr. H. Spencer thinks that the idea of persons being turned into stones may have arisen from instances of actual petrifaction of trees and the like ; but this is not very probable, and it is much simpler to believe with Dr. Tylor that it depends on the principles of animism." ^ Campbell, " Notes," 30. - Rhys, " Lectures," 193. ^ Hunt, " Popular Romances," 427. ■* Forbes, "Wanderings of a Naturalist," 103. '" Henderson, "Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 165; Brand, "■ Observations," 621. « " Principles of Sociology," i. 109 sq., 310; Tylor, "Primitive Cul- ture," i. 353- 184 Folk-lore of Northern India. Family Fetishes. Some fetishes, like the Bombay Devaks, are special to particular families. Such is the case with the Tharus, a non-Aryan tribe in the sub-Himalayan Tarai. Each member of the tribe constructs a hollow mound in front of his door, and thereon erects a stake of Palasa wood {Butea frondosa), which is regarded as the family fetish and periodically worshipped. Tool Fetishes. Next comes the worship of the tool fetish, which, accord- ing to Sir A. Lyall, is " the earliest phase or type of the tendency which later on leads those of one guild or walk m life to support and cultivate one god, who is elected in lieu of the individual trade fetishes melted down to preside over their craft or trade interests." ^ A good example of this is the pickaxe fetish of the Thags. When Kali refused to help them in the burial of their victims she gave them one of her teeth for a pickaxe, and the hem of her lower garment for a noose. Hence the pickaxe was venerated by the Thags. Its fabrication was superintended with the utmost care, and it was consecrated with many ceremonies. A lucky day was selected, and a smith was appointed to forge it with the most profound secrecy. The door was closed against all intruders ; the leader never left the forge while the manufacture was going on ; and the smith was allowed to do no other work until this was completed. Next came the consecration. This was done on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Friday, and care was taken that the shadow of no living thing fell upon the axe. The consecrator sat with his face to the west, and received the implement in a brass dish. It was then washed in water which was allowed to fall into a pit made for the purpose. Then further ablutions followed, the first in sugar and water, the second in sour milk, and the third in spirits. The axe was then marked from the head to the point with * "Asiatic Studies," 16, TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 185 seven spots of red lead, and replaced on the brass dish with a cocoanut, some cloves, white sandalwood, and other articles. A fire was next made of cowdung and the wood of the Mango and Ber tree. All the articles deposited on the brass plate, with the exception of the cocoanut, were thrown into the fire, and when the flame rose the Thag priest passed the pickaxe with both hands seven times through the fire. The cocoanut was then stripped of its husk and placed on the ground. The officiant, holding the axe by the point, asked : " Shall I strike ? " The bystanders assented, and he then broke the cocoanut with the blunt end of the weapon, exclaiming, " All hail, Devi ! Great Mother of us all ! " The spectators responded, " All hail, Devi, and prosper the Thags." If the cocoanut was not broken at one blow, all the labour was lost ; the goddess was considered unpropitious, and the entire ceremony had to be repeated. The broken shell and kernel of the cocoanut were then thrown into the fire, the pickaxe wrapt in white cloth was placed on the ground towards the west, and all present prostrated them- selves before it.^ Here we have another example of magic in its sympathetic form, the use of sundry spirit scarers, which have been already discussed, and the cocoanut representing an actual human victim. Weapons and Implement Fetishes. In the same way soldiers and warlike tribes worship their weapons. Thus, the sword was worshipped by the Rajputs, and when a man of lower caste married a Rajput girl, she was married, as in the case of Holkar, to his sword with his kerchief bound round it.' This sword-worship is specially performed, as by the Baiswars of Mirzapur and the Gautam sept of Rajputs. The Nepalese worship their weapons and regimental colours at the Dasahra festival. At the Diwali, 1 " Illustrations of the History and Practice of the Thags." 46 sqq. 2 Tod, '-Annals," i. 615 ; " Panjab Notes and Queries," iii. 221. .i86 Folk-lore of Northern India. or feast of lamps, on the first day they worship dogs ; on the second day cows and bulls ; on the third day capitalists worship their treasure under the name of Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth ; on the fourth day every householder worships as deities the members of his family, and on the fifth day sisters worship their brothers/ The same customs prevail among the artisan castes in Northern India. The hair-scraper of the tanner is worshipped by curriers, and the potter's wheel, regarded as a type of productiveness, is reverenced at marriages by many of the lower castes. Even the clay which has been mixed by the potter has mystic powers. When a person has been bitten by a mad dog, a lump of this clay is brought, and the wound is touched with it while a spell is recited." Carpenters worship their yard measure ; Chamars swear by the shoemaker's last, and the children of the Darzi or tailor are made to worship the scissors. In Bengal, the Alakhiya sect of Saiva ascetics profess profound respect for their alms-bag ; the carpenters worship their adze, chisel, and saw; the barbers their razors, scissors, and mirror. At the Sripanchami, or fifth day of the month of Magh, the writer class worship their books, pens, and inkstand. The writing implements are cleaned, and the books, wrapped in white cloth, are strewn over with flowers and the leaves of young barley.^ The same customs prevail in Bombay. A mill is the Devak or guardian of oil-makers ; dancing girls worship a musical instrument ; jewellers worship their pincers and blowpipe ; curriers worship an axe, and market gardeners a pair of scales."* In the Panjab, farmers worship their oxen in August, their plough at the Dasahra festival, and they have a cere- mony at the end of October to drive away ticks from their cattle ; shepherds worship their sheep at the full moon of 1 Oldfield, "Sketches," 344, 352. - " North Indian Notes and Queries,'' iii. 54. 2 Wilson, "Essays," ii. 188; Risley, "Tribes and Castes,'' i. 16,67, 93,451- ■* Campbell, " Notes," 9. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 187 July ; bankers and clerks worship their books at the Diwalt festival ; grain-sellers worship their weights at the Dasahra, Diwali, and Holi, and, in a way, every morning as well. Oilmen worship their presses at odd times ; artisans salute their tools daily when they bathe ; and generally the means of livelihood, whatever they may be, are worshipped with honour at the Diwali, Dasahra, and Holi.' So the Pokharna Brahmans, who are said to have been the navvies who originally excavated the lake at Pushkar, worship in memory of this the Kudala, or mattock." All these customs are as old as the time of the Chaldeans, " who sacrifice unto their net and burn incense unto their drag, because by them their portion is fat and their meat plenteous."^ Among these implement fetishes the corn-sieve and the plough, the basket, the broom, and the rice-pounder are of special importance. The Corn-sieve. The corn-sieve or winnowing basket, the Mystica vannus lacchi of Virgil, has always enjoyed a reputation as an emblem of increase and prosperity, and as possessing magical powers. The witch in Macbeth says : — " Her husband's to Aleppo gone, Master of the Tiger; But in a sieve I'll thither sail." It was used in Scotland to foretell the future at AUhallow Eve. Divination was performed with a pair of shears and a sieve. Aubrey describes how " the shears are stuck in a sieve, and the maidens hold up the sieve with the top of their fingers by the handle of the shears, then say, * By St. Peter and St. Paul, he hath not stolen it.' After many adjurations the sieve will turn at the name of the thief." * In India the sieve is the first cradle of the baby, and in ^ " Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. 20 sq., 93. - Tod, "Annals,'' ii. 320 ^ Habakkuk i. 16; Isaiah xxi. 5. * Dyer, " Popular Customs," 400 ; Brand, " Observations," 209, 773 ; Aubrey, " Remaines," 25. i88 Folk-lore of Northern India. Bombay the winnowing fan in which a newly-born child is laid is used on the fifth day for the worship of Satvai. This makes it impure, and it is henceforward used only for the house sweepings. In Northern India, when a mother has lost a child, she puts the next in a sieve and drags it about, calling it Kadheran or Ghasitan, " the dragged one," so as to baffle the Evil Eye by a pretence of contempt. All through Upper India, at low-caste marriages, the bride's brother accompanies the pair as they revolve in the marriage shed, and sprinkles parched grain over them out of a sieve as a charm for good luck and a means of scaring the demon which causes barrenness. So Irish brides in old times used to be followed by two attendants bearing high over the heads of the couple a sieve filled with meal, a sign of the plenty that would be in the house, and an omen of good luck and the blessing of children.* We have already seen that this rite survives in the custom of flinging rice over the newly-married pair as they leave for the honey- moon. This habit of scaring the spirits of evil by means of the sieve appears in a special usage at the Diwali festival. Very early in the morning the house-mother takes a sieve and a broom, and beats them in every corner of the house, ex- claiming, " God abide, and poverty depart ! " The fan is then carried outside the village, generally to the east or north, and being thrown away, is supposed, like the scape- goat, to bear away with it the poverty and distress of the household. The same custom prevails in Germany. The Posterli is imagined to be a spectre in the shape of an old woman. In the evening the young fellows of the village assemble, and with loud shouts and clashing of tins, ring- ing of cow-bells and goat-bells, and cracking of whips, tramp over hill and dale to another village, where the young men receive them with like uproar. One of the party re- presents the Posterli, or they draw it in a sledge in the shape of a puppet, and leave it standing in a corner of the ' Lady Wilde, " Legends/' Ii6. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 189 other village. In the same way the Eskimo drive the demon Tuna out of their houses.' Among the Kols, when a vacancy occurs in the office of the village priest, the winnowing fan with some rice is used, and by its magical power it drags the person who holds it towards the individual on whom the sacred mantle has fallen. The same custom prevails among the Oraons.^ The Greeks had a special name, Koskinomantis, for the man who divined in this way with the sieve, and the practice is mentioned by Theocritus.^ The sieve is very commonly used in India as a rude form of the planchette. Through the wicker-work of the raised side or back a strong T-shaped twig is fixed, one end of which rests on the finger. A question is asked, and according as the sieve turns to the right or left, the answer is " Yes " or " No." This is exactly what is known as " Cauff-riddling " in Yorkshire and Scotland.'' In the eastern districts of the North-Western Provinces, when the Ojha or " cunning man " is called in to cure disease, or possession by evil spirits, he puts some sesamum into a sieve, shakes it about, and then proceeds to identify the ghost concerned by count- ing the number of grains which remain stuck between the reeds. At a Santal cremation, a man takes his seat near the ashes, and tosses rice on them with a winnowing fan till a frenzy appears to seize him, and he becomes inspired and says wonderful things.^ It is one of the curiosities of comparative folk-lore that this instrument should be credited with magical powers all over two continents.^ The winnowing basket, again, perhaps from its associa- 1 Grimm, " Teutonic Mythology," 934 ; Frazer, " Golden Bough," ii. 164. 2 Dalton, "Descriptive Ethnology," 1S7, note, 247. 3 " Idylls," iii. 31. ■» Henderson, " Folk-lore of the Northern Counties," 52 ; Gregor, " Folk-lore of North-East Scotland,'' 43, 92. ^ Dalton, loc. cit., 218. B "Academy," 23rd July, 1887; "Gentleman's Magazine," July, 1887 ; Henderson, loc. cit, 233; Brand, "Observations," 233; Lady Wilde, " Legends," 207. igo Folk-lore of Northern India. tion, like the winnowing fan, with the sacred grain, has mystic powers. In Scotland it was used in the rite of creeling as a means of scaring barrenness. " The young wedded pair, with their friends, assemble in a convenient spot. A small creel or basket is prepared for the occasion, into which they put some stones ; the young men carry it alternately, and allow themselves to be caught by the maidens, who have a kiss when they succeed. After a great deal of innocent mirth and pleasantry, the creel falls at length to the young husband's share, who is obHged generally to carry it for a long time, none of the young women having compassion upon him. At length his fair mate kindly relieves him from his burden ; and her com- plaisance, in this particular, is considered as a proof of her satisfaction at the choice she has made.' " In Bengal, at the full moon immediately following the Durga Puja, the festival of Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, is held. In every Hindu house a basket, which serves as the representative of prosperity, is set up and worshipped. This basket, or corn measure, is filled with paddy, encircled with a garland of flowers, and covered with a piece of cloth. They sit up all night and watch for Lakshmi to arrive, and any negligence in watching is believed to bring misfortune on the family.' The Broom. The same idea applies to the broom used in sweeping the house or collecting the grain on the threshing-floor. We have already seen the use of it to drive out poverty. " Pythagoras warned his followers against stepping over a broom. In some parts of Bavaria, housemaids in sweeping out the house are careful not to step over the broom for fear of the witches. Again, it is a Bavarian rule not to step over a broom while a confinement is taking place in a house ; otherwise the birth will be tedious, and the child will always remain small with a large head. But if anyone 1 Brand, " Observations," 354- " " Calcutta Review," xviii. 60. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. IQI has stepped over a broom inadvertently, he can undo the spell by stepping backwards over it again." ' So, in Bombay, they say you should never step over a broom, or you will cause a woman to suffer severely in childbed. In Bombay, some old Hindu woman, to cure a child affected by the Evil Eye, waves salt and water round its face and strikes the ground with a broom three times ; and among the Bani Israils of Bombay, when the midwife drives off the blast of the Evil Eye, she holds in her left hand a shoe, a winnowing fan, and a broom.^ In Italy, the broom is an old Latin charm against sorcery. The Beriyas, a gypsy tribe of the Ganges-Jumna Duab, drive off the disease demon with a broom. In Oudh, it is said, when a broom- stick has been done with, it should always be laid down, and not left standing. Maha-Brahmans, who gain by officiating at funeral ceremonies, are alleged to violate this rule in order to cause deaths.^ The Rice-pounder. The rice-pounder, too, has magical powers. We have seen that it is one of the articles waved round the heads of the bride and bridegroom to scare evil spirits. In Bengal, it is worshipped when the child is first fed with grain. And there is a regular worship of it in the month of Baisakh, or May. The top is smeared with red lead, anointed with oil, and offerings of rice and holy Durva grass made to it. The worship has even been provided with a Brahmanical legend. A Guru once ordered his disciple to pronounce the word Dhenk at least one hundred and eight times a day. Narada Muni was so pleased with his devotion, as he is the patron deity of the rice-pounder, that he paid him a visit riding on one, and carried off his votary to heaven."* 1 "Folk-lore," i. 157; ii. 293. ' Campbell, "Notes,'' 53. =* " Panjab Notes and Queries,'' iii. 202 ; Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 79. •• " Calcutta Review," xviii. 51. ig2 Folk-lore of Northern India. The Plough. Next comes the plough as a fetish. The carrying about of the plough and the prohibition common in Europe against moving it on Shrove Tuesday and other holidays have, like many other images of the same class, been connected with Phallicism.^ But, considering the respect which an agri- cultural people would naturally pay to the chief implement used in husbandry, it is simpler to class it with the other tool fetishes of a similar kind. In India, as in Europe on Plough Monday,^ there is a regular worship of the plough at the end of the sowing season, when the beam is coloured with turmeric, adorned with garlands, and brought home from the field in triumph. After that day it is considered unlucky to use it or lend it. The beam is put up in the village cattle track when rinderpest is about, as a charm to drive away the disease. Among some castes the polished share is fixed up in the marriage shed during the ceremony. Among the Oraons, the bride and bridegroom are made to stand on a curry stone, under which is placed a sheaf of corn resting on the plough yoke, and among the same people their god Darha is represented by a plough-share set upon an altar dedicated to him.^ Here we have the mystic influence of grain and iron combined with the agricultural implement fetish. Fire. Fire is undoubtedly a very ancient Hindu protective fetish, and its virtue as a scarer of demons is very generally recognized. One of the earliest legends of the Hindu race is that recorded in the Rig Veda, where Agni, the god of fire, concealed himself in heaven, was brought down to earth by Matarisvan, and made over to the princely tribe of Bhrigu, in which we have the Oriental version of the myth of Prometheus. In the Vedas, Agni ranks next to the Rain god, and takes precedence of every other god in connection ' Cox, " Mythology of the Aryan Nations," ii. 119, note. - Chambers, " Book of Days," i. 94 sq. 3 Dalton, loc. cit., 252, 258. ^^'^<^ <'^V' ^ jtr.iMJ*^ ^^>T3a»gtS3Pt. ■ . PRIESTS OF THE SACRED FIRE. /. .93. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I93 with sacrificial rites. Even the Sun godling is regarded as a form of the heavenly fire. One of the titles of Agni is Pramantha, because on each occason when he was required he was summoned by the friction of the Arani, or sacred fire- drill. This word Pramantha is probably the equivalent of the Prometheus of the Greeks. Origin of Fire-worship. According to Dr. Tylor, " the real and absolute worship of fire falls into two great divisions, the first belonging to fetishism, the second to polytheism proper, and the two apparently representing an earlier and later stage of theological ideas. The first is the rude, barbarous adora- tion of the actual flame which he watches writhing, devour- ing, roaring like a wild animal ; the second belongs to an advanced generalization that any individual fire is a manifestation of one general elemental being, the fire god." ^ In a tropical country it would naturally be associated with the worship of the sun, and with that of the sainted dead as the medium by which the spirit wings its way to the other world. Among many races fire is provided for the ghost after interment, to enable it to warm itself and cook its food. As Mr. Spencer points out, the grave fire would tend to develop into kindred religious rites.* The Sacred Fire. But it is almost certainly erroneous to class the sacred Are as an institution peculiar to the so-called Aryan races. The Homa is, of course, one of the most important elements of the modern Hindu ritual ; but at the same time it pre- vails extensively as a means of propitiating the local or village godlings among many of the Dravidian races, who are quite as likely to have discovered for themselves the mystical art of fire production by mechanical means, as to have 1 " Primitive Culture," ii. 277. 2 " Principles of Sociology;" i. 158, 273. VOL. II. O ig4 Folk-lore of Northern India. adopted it by a process of conscious or unconscious imitation from the usages of their Hindu neighbours. The production of fire by means of friction is a discovery which would naturally occur to jungle races, who must have constantly seen it occur by the ignition of the bamboo stalks rubbed together by the blasts of summer. From this would easily be developed the very primitive fire-drill or Asgara, used to this day by the Cheros, Korwas, Bhuiyas and other Dravidian dwellers in the jungle. These people even to the present day habitually produce fire in this way. A small round cavity is made in a dry piece of bamboo, in which two men alternately with their open hands revolve a second pointed piece of the wood of the same tree. Smoke and finally fire are rapidly produced in this way, and the sparks are received on a dry leaf or other suitable tinder. The use of the flint and steel is also common, and was possibly an early and independent invention of the same people. Even to the present day in some of their more secret worship of the village godlings of disease, fire is produced for the fire sacrifice by this primitive method. The Fire-drill. What has been called the Aryan fire-drill, the Arani, which in one sense means " foreign " or " strange," and in another "moving" or "entering," "being inserted," is not apparently nowadays used in the ordinary ritual for the production of fire for the Homa or fire sacrifice. The rites connected with the sacred fire have been given in detail in another place. ^ In Northern India, at least, the production of the sacred fire has become the speciality of one branch of the Brahmans, the Gujarati, who are employed to conduct certain special services occasionally conducted at large cost by wealthy devotees, and known as Jag or Yaksha, in the sense of some particular religious rite. The Arani in its modern form consists of five pieces^ The Adhararani is the lower bed of the instrument, and is 1 "Tribes and Castes of the N.-W.P. and Oudh," s.v. " Agnihotri." TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. I95 usually made of the hard wood of the Khadira or Khair — Acacia catechu. In this are bored two shallow holes, one, the Carta, a small shallow round cavity, in which the plunger or revolving drill works and produces fire by friction. Close to this is a shallow oblong cavity, known as the Yoni or matrix, in which combustible tinder, generally the husk of the cocoanut, is placed, and in which the sparks and heated ashes are received and ignited. The upper or revolving portion of the drill is known as Uttararani or Pramantha. This consists of two parts, the upper portion a piece of hard, round wood which one priest revolves with a rope or cord known as Netra. This part of the implement is known as Mantha or " the churner." It has a socket at the base in which the Sanku, a spike or dart, is fixed. This Sanku is made of a softer wood, generally that of the Pipal, or sacred fig tree, than the Adhararani or base ; and each Arani is provided with several spare pieces of fig wood for the purpose of replacing the Sanku, as it becomes gradually charred away by friction. The last piece is the Upamantha or upper churner, which is a flat board with a socket. This is pressed down by one priest, so as to force the Sanku deep and hard into the Carta or lower cavity, and to increase the resistance. The working of the implement thus requires the labour of two priests, one of whom presses down the plunger, and the other who revolves the drill rapidly by means of the rope. It is not easy to obtain specimens of the implement, which is regarded as possessing mystical properties, and the production of the sacred fire is always conducted in secret. We have in one of the African folk-tales a reference to the production of the fire by friction, in which the hyaena gets his ear burnt. 1 In one of the tales of Somadeva we read, *' Then the Brahman blessed the king and said to him, ' I am a Brahman named Naga Sarman, and bear the fruit, I hope, from my sacrifice. When the god of fire is pleased with this Vilva sacrifice, then Vilva fruits of gold will come out of the fire cavity. Then the god of fire will appear in 1 Grimm, " Household Tales," ii. 547. O 2 196 Folk-lore of Northern India. bodily form, and grant me a boon, and so I have spent much time in offering Vilva fruits.' Then the seven-rayed god appeared from the sacrificial cavity, bringing the king a golden Vilva fruit of his tree of valour." * The Agnikunda, the hole or enclosed space for the sacred fire, out of which, according to the popular legend, various Rajput tribes were produced, is thus probably derived from the Garta or pit out of which the sparks fly in the fire- drill. The Agnihotri Brahman has to take particular care to preserve the germ of the sacred fire, as did the Roman vestal virgins. It is in charge of the special guardians at some shrines, such as those of Sambhunath and Kharg Jogini at Nepal.^ The Muhammadan Sacred Fire. But it is not only in the Hindu ritual that the sacred fire holds a prominent place. Thus, in ancient Ireland, the sacred fire was obtained by the friction of wood and the striking of stones, and it was supposed " that the spirits of fire dwelt in these objects, and when the priests invoked them to appear, they brought good luck to the household for the coming year, but if invoked by other hands on that special day, their influence was malific." ^ So, among the Muhammadans in the time of Akbar, " at noon of the day when the sun enters the 19th degree of Aries, the whole world being surrounded by the light, they expose a round piece of a white shining stone, called in Hindi Slirajkrant.* A piece of cotton is then held near it, which catches fire from the heat of the stone. The celestial fire is committed to the care of proper persons." '" Perhaps 1 Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 322. 2 Oldfield, " Sketches,'' ii. 242 ; Wright, " History," 35 ; and compare Prescott, " Peru,'' i. chap. 3 ; Lubbock, "Origin of Civilization," 312. 3 Lady Wilde, "Legends," 126. ^ Abul Fazl appears to have confused Suraj Sankranti or the entrance of the sun into a constellation with Surya-Kanta or " sun-beloved,'' the sun-crystal or lens, which gives out heat when exposed to the rays of the sun. * Blochmann, " Ain-i-Akbari," i. 48. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 197 the best example of the Muhammadan sacred fire is that at the Imambara at Gorakhpur. There it was first started by a renowned Shiah Faqir, named Roshan 'Ali, and has been maintained unquenched for more than a hundred years, a special body of attendants and supplies of wood being provided for it. There seems little reason to believe that the fire is a regular Muhammadan institution ; it has probably arisen from an imitation of the customs of the Hindu Jogis. It is respected both by Hindus and Musalmans, and as in the case of the fires of the same kind, maintained by many noted Jogis, its ashes have a reputation as a cure for fever. We shall meet with the same belief of the curative effects of the ashes of the sacred fire in the case of the Holi. The ashes of the Jogi's fire form a part of many popular charms. In Italy, the holy log burnt on Christmas Eve, which corre- sponds to the Yule log of the North of Europe, is taken with due observances to the Faunus, or other spirits of the forest.' In Ireland part of the ashes from the bonfire on the 24th of June is thrown into sown fields to make their produce abundant.^ The ceremony of strewing ashes on the peni- tent on Ash Wednesday dates from Saxon times.^^ A modern Muhammadan of the advanced school has en- deavoured to rationalize the curative effect of the ashes of the Gorakhpur fire by the suggestion that it is the potash in it which works the cure, but probably the element of faith has much to do with it.^ Volcanic Fire ; Will-o'-the-Wisp. Fire of a volcanic nature is, as might be expected, regarded with veneration. Such is the fire which in some places in Kashmir rises out of the ground.* The meteoric light or Shahaba is also much respected. In Hoshangabad there is a local godling, known as Khapra ^ Leland, " Etruscan Roman Remains," 103. - " Folk-lore," iv. 359. ^ Dyer, " Popular Customs," 92. ■* " North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 199. ' Hugel, " Travels," quoted by Jarrett, " Ain-i-Akbari,'' ii. 314. ig8 Folk-lore of Northern India. Baba, who lives on the edge of a tank, and is said to appear in the darkness with a procession of lights.^ In Rohilkhand and the western districts of Oudh, one often hears of the Shahaba. In burial-grounds, especially where the bodies of those slain in battle are interred, it is said that phantom armies appear in the night. Tents are pitched, the horses are tethered, and lovely girls dance before the heroes and the Jinn who are in their train. Sometimes some foolish mortal is attracted by the spectacle, and he suffers for his fool- hardiness by loss of life or reason. Sometimes these ignes fatui mislead the traveller at night, as Robin Goodfellow " misleads night wanderers, laughing at their harm," or the Cornish piskies, who show a light and entice people into bogs.^ There appears to be in Northern India no trace of the idea which so widely appears in Europe, that such lights are the souls of unbaptized children.^ The Tomb Fetish. Next comes the respect paid to the cairn which covers the remains of the dead or is a mere cenotaph commemo- rating a death. We have already seen instances of this in the pile of stones which marks the place where a tiger has killed a man, and in the cairns in honour of the jungle deities, or the spirits which infest dangerous passes. The rationale of these sepulchral cairns is to keep down the ghost of the dead man and prevent it from injuring the living. We see the same idea in the rule of the old ritual, that on the departure of the last mourner, after the con- clusion of the funeral ceremony, the Adhvaryu, or officiating priest, should place a circle of stones behind him, to prevent death overtaking those who have gone in advance."* The primitive grave-heap grows into the cairn, and the 1 " Settlement Report," 121. 2 "North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 117; Hunt, " Popular Romances," 81 ; Campbell, "Popular Tales," ii. 82. 3 Conway, " Demonology," i. 225. * Rajendra Lala Mitra, " Indo-Aryans," i. 146. TOTEMISM AND FeTISHISM. 199 cairn into the tomb or Stupa.^ In the way of a tomb Hindus will worship almost anything. The tomb of an English lady is worshipped at Bhandara in the Central Provinces. At Murmari, in the Nagpur District, a similar tomb is smeared with turmeric and lime, and people offer cocoanuts to it in the hope of getting increased produce from their fields. The tomb of an English officer near the Fort of Bijaygarh in the Aligarh District was„when I visited the place some years ago, revered as the shrine of the local village godling. There is a similar case at Rawalpindi. There is a current tale of some people offering brandy and cigars to the tomb of a European planter who was addicted to these luxuries in his lifetime, but no one can tell where the tomb actually exists.'^ Miscellaneous Fetishes. We have already referred to the Salagrama fetish. Akin to this is the Vishnupada, the supposed footmark of Vishnu, which is very like the footmark of Hercules, of which Herodotus speaks.^ There is a celebrated Vishnupada temple at Gaya, where the footprint of Vishnu is in a large silver basin under a canopy, inside an octagonal shrine. Pindas or holy balls and various kinds of offerings are placed by the pilgrims inside the basin and around the footprint." It was probably derived from the footmark of Buddha, which is a favourite subject in the early Buddhistic sculptures. Dr. Tylor, curiously enough, thinks that it may have some connection with the footmarks of extinct birds or animals imprinted on the strata of alluvial rocks.* 1 Ferguson, " Tree and Serpent Worship," 88 ; " History of Indian Architecture," 6o ; Cunningham, " Bhilsa Topes," 9 ; Spencer, " Prin- ciples of Sociology," i. 254 sq. 2 " Central Provinces Gazetteer," 63 ; " Panjab Notes and Queries," ii. 8 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 93. 3 iv. 82. * Monier-Williams, " Hinduism and Brahmanism," 309. * Tennent, " Ceylon, ii. 132 ; Ferguson, " Indian Architecture,;' 184, with engraving; Tylor, "Early History," 116. 200 Folk-lore of Northern India. Even among Muhammadans we have the same idea, and the Qadam-i-Rasul, or mosque of the footprint of the Prophet at Lucknow, used to contain a stone marked with his footmarks, which was said to have been brought by some pilgrim from Arabia. It disappeared during the Mutiny.' There is another in a mosque at Chunar and at many other places. The same respect is paid to the footprint of Ramanand in his monastery at Benares, and the pin of Brahma's slipper is now fixed up in the steps of the bathing-place at Bithur, known as the residence of the infamous Nana Sahib, where it is worshipped at an annual feast. 1 " Oudh Gazetteer," ii. 370. CHAPTER IV. ANIMAL-WORSHIP. TS 8f Koi AvTOfi(8cov vnaye ^vyov ojKeas ittttovs Xdvdov Kal BaXiou, rw ufia TrvoiTJcri TTfTeadrju Tovs eT€Ke Z€ nvefxa) "Apnvia IloMpyr} BoaKOjjLeirq Xnfjiuivi, napa poov Slufavolo. Iliad, xvi. 148-51. Origin of Animal-worship. We now come to consider the special worship of certain animals. The origin of this form of belief may possibly be traced to many different sources. In the first place, no savage fixes the boundary line between man and the lower forms of animal life so definitely as more civilized races are wont to do. The animal, in their belief, has very much the same soul, much the same feelings and passion as men have, a theory exemplified in the way the Indian ploughman speaks to his ox, or the shepherd calls his flock. To him, again, the behef is famihar that the spirits of his ancestors appear in the form of animals, as among the Dravidian races they come in the shape of a tiger which attacks the surviving relatives, or as a chicken which leaves the mark of its footsteps in the ashes when it re-visits its former home. So, all these people believe that the witch soul wanders about at night, and for want of a better shape enters into some animal, takes the form of a tiger or a bear, or flies through the air like a bird. All through folk-lore we find the idea that man has kinship 202 Folk-lore of Northern India. with animals generally accepted. We constantly find the girl wooed by the frog, marrying the pigeon, elephant, eagle, or whale. Every child in the nursery reads of the frog Prince, and no savage sees any particular incongruity in his marriage and transformation. In more than one of the Indian tales the childless wife longs for a child and is delivered of a snake. The incident of animal metamorphosis is also familiar. Thus, in one of Somadeva's tales his mistress turns a man into an ox ; in another his wife transforms him into a buffalo ; in a third the angry hermit turns the king into an elephant.* Everyone remembers the terrific scene of trans- formation into various animals which makes up the tale of the second Qalandar in the Arabian Nights. Animals, too, constantly assume other shapes. In one of the Bengal stories the mouse becomes a cat. In other Indian tales the golden deer becomes the mannikin demon, the white hind becomes the white witch, the hero's mother becomes a black bitch, the hero himself a parrot, and so on.^ In fact a large part of the incidents of Indian stories turns on various forms of metamorphosis, and every English child knows how the lover of Earl Mar's daughter took the shape of a dove. "We have again the very common incident in the folk-tales of animals understanding the speech of human beings, and men learning the tongue of birds, and the like. Solomon, according to the Quran, knew the language of animals ; in the tales of Somadeva, the Vaisya Bhashajna knows the language of all beasts and birds, a faculty which in Germany is gained by eating a white snake.^ Then there is the large cycle of tales in which the grateful animal warns the hero or heroine of approaching danger, as in the story of Bopuluchi, or brings news, or produces gold. 1 Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," i. 342 ; ii. 135, 230, 302, 363 ; " North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 13 ; Clouston, "Popular Tales," i. 448. - Lai BiMri De, " Folk-tales," 139. 2 Tawney, /oc. «'/., i. 499 ; ii. 276 ; Grimm, " Household Tales," No 33 ; i- 357 ; Knowles, " Folk-tales of Kashmir," 432 ; Campbell, " Santa. Folk-tales," 22 ; Miss Cox, '* Cinderella," 496 ; Campbell, " Popular Tales," i. 283. Animal Worship. 203 The idea of grateful animals assisting their benefactors runs through the whole range of folk-lore/ Another series of cognate ideas has been very carefully analyzed by Mr. Campbell. The spirits of the dead haunt two places, the house and the tomb. Those who haunt the house are friendly ; those who haunt the tomb are unfriendly. Two classes of animals correspond to these two classes of spirits — an at-home, fearless class, as the snake, the rat, flies and ants and bees, into which the home-haunting or friendly spirits would go ; and a wild, unsociable class, such as bats and owls, dogs, jackals,"or vultures, into which the unfriendly or tomb-haunting spirits would go. In the case of some of these tomb-haunting animals, the dog, jackal, and vulture, the feeling towards them as tomb-haunters seems to have given place to the belief that as the spirit lives in the tomb where the body is laid, so, if the body be eaten by an animal, the spirit lives in the animal, as in a living tomb.^ Other animals, again, are invested with particular qualities, fierceness and courage, strength or agility, and eating part of their flesh, or wearing a portion as an amulet, conveys to the possessor the qualities of the animal. A familiar in- stance of this is the belief in the claws and flesh of the tiger as amulets or charms against disease and the influence of evil spirits. Many animals, too, are respected for their use to man or as scarers of demons, as the cow ; as possessors of wisdom, like the elephant or snake; as semi-human in origin or character, as the ape. But it is, perhaps, dangerous to attempt, as Mr. Campbell has done, to push the classifica- tion much farther, because the respect paid to any particular animal is possibly based on varied and diverging lines of belief. Lastly, as Mr. Frazer has shown, many animals are re- ^ Temple, " Wideawake Stories," 74, 412 ; Lai Bihari De, loc. cit., 40, 106, 134, 138, 155, 2IO, 223; "Cinderella," 526; "North Indian Notes and Queries," iii. 13 ; Clouston, loc. cit., i. 223. 2 Campbell, " Notes," 259. 204 Folk-lore of Northern India. garded as representing the Corn spirit, and are either revered or killed in their divine forms to promote the return of vegetation with each recurring spring. Horse-worship. To illustrate some of these principles from the worship of certain special animals, we may begin with the horse. War horses were so highly prized by the early Aryans in their battles with the aborigines, that the horse, under the name of Dadhikra, " he that scatters the hoar frost like milk," soon became an object of worship, and in the Veda we have a spirited account of the worship paid to this godlike being. ^ Another horse often spoken of in the early legends is Syama Kama, ** he with the black ears," which alone was considered a suitable victim in the horse sacrifice or Asvamedha. One hundred horse sacrifices entitled the sacrificer to displace Indra from heaven, so the deity was always trying to capture the horse which was allowed to roam about before immolation. The saint Galava, who was a pupil of Visvamitra, when he had completed his studies, asked his tutor what fee he should pay. The saint told him that he charged no fee, but he insisted in asking, till at last the angry Rishi said that he would be content with nothing less than a thousand black- eared horses. After long search Galava found three childless Rajas, who had each two hundred such horses, and they consented to exchange them for sons. Galava then went to Yayati, whose daughter could bear a son for any one and still remain a virgin. By her means the three Rajas became fathers of sons, Visvamitra took them, and to make up the number, had himself two sons by the same mystic bride. In the Mahabharata, Uchchaihsravas, " he with the long ears," or " he that neighs loudly," is the king of the horses, and belongs to Indra. He is swift as thought, follows the 1 "Rig Veda," iv. 33 ; Datt, " History of Civilization," i. 72 sq., 79 ; Monier-Williams, " Brahmanism and Hinduism," 329. Animal Worship. 205 path of the sun, and is luminous and white, with a black tail, made so by the magic of the serpents, who have covered it with black hair. In the folk-tales he consorts with mares of mortal birth, and begets steeds of unrivalled speed, like the divine Homeric coursers of ^neas.^ In the tales of Somadeva we find the king addressing his faithful horse, and praying for his aid in danger, as Achilles speaks to his steeds Xanthos and Balios, and in the Karling legend of Bayard.'' We meet also with the horse of Manidatta, which was " white as the moon ; the sound of its neighing was as musical as that of a clear conch or other sweet-sounding instrument ; it looked like the waves of the sea of milk surging on high ; it was marked with curls on the neck, and adorned with the crest jewels, the bracelet, and other signs, which it seemed it had acquired by being born in the race of Gandharvas." At a later mythological stage we meet Kalki, the white horse which is to be the last Avatara of Vishnu, and re- minds us of the white horse of the Book of Revelation. We meet in the Rig Veda with Yatudhanas, the demon horse, which feeds now upon human flesh (like the Bucephalus of the legend of Alexander), now upon horseflesh, and now upon milk from cows. He has a host of brethren, such as Arvan, half horse, half bird, on which the Daityas are sup- posed to ride. Dadhyanch or Dadhicha has a curious legend. He was a Rishiand. Indra, after teaching him the sciences, threatened to cut his head off if he communicated the know- ledge to any one else. But the Aswins tempted him to disobey the god, and then, to save him from the wrath of Indra, cut off his head and replaced it with that of a horse. Finally Indra found his horse-head in the lake at Kurukshetra, and using it as Sampson did the jaw-bone of the ass, he slew the Asuras. We have, again, Vishnu in the form of Hayagriva, or " horse-necked," which he assumed to save 1 Wright, " History," 165 ; " Iliad," v. 265 sqq. ; Tawney, " Katha Sarit Sagara," ii. 593. 2 Tawney, ?