The ancient name of a priest by profession, meaning “praepositus” or praeses. He was the friend and counsellor of a chief, the minister of a king, and his companion in peace and war. (M. Müller’s Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 485.) ↩
Lakshmi, the Goddess of Prosperity. Raj-Lakshmi would mean the King’s Fortune, which we should call tutelary genius. Lakshichara is our “luckless,” forming, as Mr. Ward says, an extraordinary coincidence of sound and meaning in languages so different. But the derivations are very distinct. ↩
The Monkey God. ↩
Generally written “Banyan.” ↩
The daughter of Raja Janaka, married to Ramachandra. The latter placed his wife under the charge of his brother Lakshmana, and went into the forest to worship, when the demon Ravana disguised himself as a beggar, and carried off the prize. ↩
This great king was tricked by the god Vishnu out of the sway of heaven and earth, but from his exceeding piety he was appointed to reign in Patala, or Hades. ↩
The procession is fair game, and is often attacked in the dark with sticks and stones, causing serious disputes. At the supper the guests confer the obligation by their presence, and are exceedingly exacting. ↩
Rati is the wife of Kama, the God of Desire; and we explain the word by “Spring personified.” ↩
The Indian Cuckoo (Cuculus Indicus). It is supposed to lay its eggs in the nest of the crow. ↩
This is the well-known Ghí or Ghee, the one sauce of India, which is as badly off in that matter as England. ↩
The European reader will observe that it is her purity which carries the heroine through all these perils. Moreover, that her virtue is its own reward, as it loses to her the world. ↩
Literally, “one of all tastes”—a wild or gay man, we should say. ↩
These shoes are generally made of rags and bits of leather; they have often toes behind the foot, with other similar contrivances, yet they scarcely ever deceive an experienced man. ↩
The high-toper is a swell thief, the other is a low dog. ↩
Engaged in shoplifting. ↩
The moon. ↩
The judge. ↩
To be lagged is to be taken; scragging is hanging. ↩
The tongue. ↩
This is the god Kartikeya, a mixture of Mars and Mercury, who revealed to a certain Yugacharya the scriptures known as “Chauriya-Vidya”—Anglicè, “Thieves’ Manual.” The classical robbers of the Hindu drama always perform according to its precepts. There is another work respected by thieves, and called the “Chora-Pancha-shika,” because consisting of fifty lines. ↩
Supposed to be a good omen. ↩
Share the booty. ↩
Bhawani is one of the many forms of the destroying goddess, the wife of Shiva. ↩
Wretches who kill with the narcotic seed of the stramonium. ↩
Better known as “Thugs,” which in India means simply “rascals.” ↩
Crucifixion, until late years, was common amongst the Buddhists of the Burmese empire. According to an eyewitness, Mr. F. Carey, the punishment was inflicted in two ways. Sometimes criminals were crucified by their hands and feet being nailed to a scaffold; others were merely tied up, and fed. In these cases the legs and feet of the patient begin to swell and mortify at the expiration of three or four days; men are said to have lived in this state for a fortnight, and at last they expired from fatigue and mortification. The sufferings from cramp also must be very severe. In India generally impalement was more common than crucifixion. ↩
Our Sati. There is an admirable Hindu proverb, which says, “No one knows the ways of woman; she kills her husband and becomes a Sati.” ↩
Fate and Destiny are rather Muslim than Hindu fancies. ↩
Properly speaking, the husbandman should plough with not less than four bullocks; but few can afford this. If he plough with a cow or a bullock, and not with a bull, the rice produced by his ground is unclean, and may not be used in any religious ceremony. ↩
A shout of triumph, like our “Huzza” or “Hurrah!” of late degraded into “Hooray.” “Hari bol” is of course religious, meaning “Call upon Hari!” i.e. Krishna, i.e. Vishnu. ↩
This form of suicide is one of those recognised in India. So in Europe we read of fanatics who, with a suicidal ingenuity, have succeeded in crucifying themselves. ↩
The river of Jaganath in Orissa; it shares the honours of sanctity with some twenty-nine others, and in the lower regions it represents the classical Styx. ↩
Cupid. His wife Rati is the spring personified. The Hindu poets always unite love and spring, and perhaps physiologically they are correct. ↩
An incarnation of the third person of the Hindu Triad, or Triumvirate, Shiva the God of Destruction, the Indian Bacchus. The image has five faces, and each face has three eyes. In Bengal it is found in many villages, and the women warn their children not to touch it on pain of being killed. ↩
A village Brahman on stated occasions receives fees from all the villagers. ↩
The land of Greece. ↩
Savans, professors. So in the old saying, “Hanta, Pandit Sansara.”—Alas! the world is learned! This a little
