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The existence of any such representation in a temple at once fixes it as originally dedicated to the worship of Vishau, or some of his Avatars. { The 10th or coming Avatar of Vishau is Kalki, or the Horse, of which we shall have several opportunities of speaking when we come to describe the sculptures of the Amravati Tope, where the horse frequently appears as an important character, but with a réle not easily understood. The Chakra or Wheel, hich occupies the principal place among Buddhist emblems both at Sanchi and Amravati, afterwards becomes one of the principal emblems of Vishnu. But perhaps the most striking coincidence is to be found at Puri. The Temple there occupies the site where the ¢ooth relic of Buddha was long enshrined, and the worship of Vishnu under the name of Jaganath, as there practised, is little else than very corrupt Buddhism. 72 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. possibly be applied with advantage. It is sufficiently vague, but perhaps if would be wiser to wait for more definite knowledge before applying any terms.* The subject is only mentioned here because it will recur again and again in the following pages, and unless these generalizations are borne in mind, the sequel will hardly be intelligible. The sculptures at Sanchi and Amravati may not suffice to settle these questions, but if I am not mistaken they throw as much or more light “upon them than any other documents that have yet been brought to light. Mopern WorsuHip oF TREES AND SERPENTS IN INDIA. Few probably have read the preceding pages without it occurring to them to ask the question, Does Serpent Worship exist in India at the present day, and if so, to what extent? If the inquiry were addressed to even our best-informed Indian authorities, the reply would probably be negative. We have actually possessed India now for more than a century. The Asiatic Society was established in 1784. Since _ then, with the branch societies in Madras and Bombay, and the Asiatic Societies of England, France, and Germany, some hundreds of volumes have been published, containing some thousands of papers. As not one of these is devoted to Serpent Worship, or even describes it as existing, it may well be argued that it cannot possibly now be found there. To this line of argument the answer is plain. None of these thousand and one papers are devoted to the ancient worship of the Serpent, nor do any of them contain anything beyond the haziest allusions to the Naga or his previous influence. Yet, if I mistake not, before this work is concluded, it will appear that the Serpent did play an important part in the mythology of India, and that his worship not only prevailed, but amare | influenced forms: of, faith where we would least enapect his presence. The truth of the matter seems to be that attention has not hitherto been specially directed to the subject, and till this is the case, the most obvious evidences might be passed by without being noticed. As an instance of this, I may perhaps be allowed to quote against myself what _ occurred at Ajanta. I spent a considerable time in exploring these caves, but my mind was full of architecture. I measured everything, drew every detail, and fami- liarized myself with every architectural affinity. But neither then nor subsequently+ did I note the presence of any Nagas. Now that my attention is turned to it, I find in drawings and photographs twelve or fifteen sculptured representations of the seven- headed Naga, and there may be many more. JI now also recollect seeing Nagas in all the Jaina temples at Abu, at Sadree, and elsewhere, but I then passed them over. Now I cannot take up a photograph. of any temple belonging to the group of religions which include the Buddhist, Jaina, or Vaishnava faiths, without seeing snakes everywhere, but in places where neither I nor anyone else detected them before. - “* It would take a volume to discuss, and an unlimited number of references to establish these conclusions. _ At present I will only refer to two inscriptions; that at Buddh Gy4, Asiatic Researches, vol. I. p. 284, and that of Belgola, vol. XVII. p. 270. + I have twice published on the subject of these caves ; first, on- ine Rock-cuteemples of India, folio, 1845, and subsequently, a volume on the same subject in 1864, illustrated by photographs by Major Gill. MODERN WORSHIP OF TREES AND SERRENTS IN INDIA. | 73 The same I-believe to be the case with the living worship. In Forbes” Oriental Memoirs,* in Bishop ‘Heber’s Travels, and in fifty other places, allusions are made to the feelings of respect and reverence paid by.the natives of India to snakes, and no one can reside long in the country without perceiving it; yet, except™in Miss Frere’s charming little volume, entitled “Old Deccan Days,” I hardly know a book . in which snakes, and especially seven-headed snakes,+ play an important part, or which reflects the feelings of the natives regarding them. The stories of serpents there related are only an accidental selection out of thousands of similar legends, all which might easily be localized or traced to their source, and many of which will no doubt be investigated so soon as attention is really directed to the subject. _ Two instances of Serpent Worship, at Munnipore and Sumbulpore, have already been. mentioned (page 61). Two others are still more remarkable. In the great temple at Madura the three principal images in the Tosak Khana are a golden (?) image of Ilanuman, another of Garuda, the VdAhana of Vishnu, but the terrible enemy of the snakes. Between these two stands an image of the seven-headed Naga, richly jewelled, and under a splendid canopy. In the .great temple at-Seringham, likewise, the principal images are two golden statues of the seven-headed N aga, larger apparently than that at Madura, and even more richly jewelled;§ and I have no doubt that many other such might be found, but they have not yet been looked for. In the meanwhile the following two paragraphs, introduced incidentally in two works published in London during the present season, may serve to indicate the class of illustrations which will no doubt be .found everywhere when looked for. “ At “ the Nag Kin or Serpent Well, in the city of Benares,”’ says Mr. Sherring, “ the “ Naég or Serpent is worshipped. In a niche in the wall of one of the stairs is “a figure representing three Serpents (query, a three-headed Serpent), and on the “ floor is an emblem of Mahadeva in stone, and a snake crawling up it. The well * Vol. II. pp. 329, 384, &e. + In the narrator’s narrative (p. xxvii.), the following singularly naive and interesting passage occurs :-—“ All “ the cobras in my grandmother’s stories were seven-headed. This puzzled us children, and we would say to “ her,. ‘ Granny, are there any seven-headed cobras now, for all the cobras we see that the conjurors bring “ ¢round have only one head each.’ .To which she used to answer, ‘ No, of course there are no seven-headed ¢eobras now. That world is gone, but you see each cobra has a hood of skin, that is the remains of another * ‘head? Although we often looked for seven-headed cobras we never could find any of them.” Had they . not been converted to Christianity they might have believed in them, even if they had not seen them. t No one at all familiar with the subject, who reads these tales, can fail to be struck with the similarity that exists between them and many of. those collected by the brothers Grimm and others from German and Scandinavian sources, and also with some of the -more ancient Grecian myths. The usual mode of accounting for this identity, which can hardly be accidental, is to assume that the tales were originally invented by ‘Aryan nurses beside the cradles of the race in Balkh and Bokhara, and that they were carried east and west by their Alumni when they set out on their travels some 4,000 or 5,000 years ago. The results of my reading have led me to conclusions widely different from this fashionable hypotliesis. My belief is that all the serpents and dragons, all the dwarfs and magicians of these tales, all the fairy mythology, in fact, of the east and west, belongs to the Turanian races. These, as I have frequently had occasion to mention, underlie the:Aryan races everywhere in Europe as in Asia, and occasionally crop up here and there through the upper crust, often when least expected. So far as I understand the idiosyncrasy of the two races, nothing can be more antagonistic to the tastes and feelings of the Aryans than these wild imaginings ; while few things, on the contrary, could ‘be more congenial to the comparatively infantile intellect of the Turanian race. § Both these groups were photographed by Captain Tripe, and published by him for Government. with other views of the temples in evhich they are found. I had hoped to have obtained more information regarding them before publishing, but have been unsuccessful. (4799.) ; Kk 74 | INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. . is visited for religious purposes only once a year, namely, on the 24th and 25th “‘ days of the month of S&wan, when immense numbers of persons come to it from “ all parts of the city. The women come on.the first day, the men on the second; “ they offer sacrifices both to the well and to Nageswar, or the Serpent God.” * , The other relates to Tree Worship.. “In Beerbhoom once a year the whole “ capital repairs to a shrine in the jungle, and makes simple offerings to a ghost “ who dwells in a Bela Tree.” “The shrine. consists of three trees—a Bela Tree “on the left, in which the ghost resides, and which is marked at the foot with ** blood; in the middle is a Kachmula Tree; and on,the right a Saura Tree.