Were not they accustomed thus nightly in their cells to obferve the celeftial phænomena, how could their various fasts and festivals, which are, for the most part, regulated by the pofition of the heavenly bodies, and particularly by the entrance of the moon into the refpective nac Shattras, or lunar manfions, have been instituted with such astronomical precifion? What is the RAAS JATTRA but the circular dance of the planets round the fun? What are the eternal contests of the Soors and Afloors, or bright and sable genii, represented in the festival dramas of India, especially at the great equinoctial feast of Durga, but emblematical representations of the imagined contests of the fummer and winter figns for the dominion of the varied year, and the different afpects of the planets? What is meant by the great celestial dragon, that on every eclipse seizes with his teeth the affrighted fun and moon, but the afcending and the descending nodes? What is the ferpent with a thousand heads on which Veefhnu fleeps at the folftitial period, but the hydra of the skies, that vast constellation, the numerous ftars inclosed in which are poetically called its flaming heads, vomiting fire, and on which the Greeks founded the ftory of the Lernæan hydra, flain by Hercules, (that is, the conftella

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tion

tion Hercules,) the foot of which latter afterism, on the celestial sphere, is placed near the head of the former. Thefe dramatic exhibitions at the various festivals of India, nearly all founded upon aftronomical obfervation, instituted in the earliest periods of the Indian empire, allufive to phyfical phænomena, and the meaning of which is not at this day fully comprehended by the Indian audience themselves, I can confider in no other light than as relics of the facred myfteries anciently exhibited in the holy grove and the gloomy cavern, where, as in the Mithratic myfteries, the conftellations were reprefented by forms fimilar to thofe under which they were defignated in the heavens; where, while Seeva rode on the bull, Veeshnu flew on the eagle of the sphere, and became fucceffively incarnate in the fishes, the boar, (an afsterism in the Chinese zodiac,) the testudo, and the lion. At this late period, and with the few genuine documents of remote Indian antiquity in our poffeffion, we can only be guided by analogy in forming our judgement relative to the ancient mysteries practifed in the religious exhibitions of the brachmanian magi; and that judgement may, in a great degree, be regulated by the glimmering information which has defcended to us, relative

relative to the doctrines and practices of their Perfian brethren, the disciples of Zoroaster, in the neighbouring mountains of Media, during periods in which we have few authenticated accounts of thofe flourishing in Hindoftan.

The initiation, therefore, into these profounder mysteries, I confider as peculiar to the second Afherum, in which both the constitution and the mind of the afpirant were endued with matured and manly vigour, to bear, with lefs injury, the trying severities which distinguished it, the first Asherum being a state of comparative infancy. The third Asherum, on the description of which we must now enter, is the ftate of imbecil age. The accumulation of horrors which mark this ftate, I fhall infert almost verbatim from Abul Fazil.

THE THIRD DEGREE, or BANPERISTH. When a brahmin, determined to be a banperifth, arrives at advanced age, or becomes a grandfather, he gives up the management of his family to his fon, or some other relation, and he then bids adieu to the world. He quits the populous city for eternal folitude, and, retiring to the defert, he there

builds

builds himself a cell or grotto, where he gradually weans his heart from all worldly concerns, and makes preparation for his last journey. If his wife, through affection, wishes to accompany him to this woody folitude, it is allowable; but the fecluded pair muft fubdue all carnal inclinations, and become cold as the rock on which they repofe.

Here the hoary devotee cherishes the perpetual fire for facrifice, and wraps his aged limbs in a vestment made of the leaves or bark of trees; a coarfe lungowtee being the only piece of linen that he may wear. He never cuts his hair nor pairs his nails. At morning, noon, and evening, he performs his ablutions with the findehya; and every morning and evening the howm, in the fame manner as is directed for the gerifhth; but his ablutions are now trebled, and he lives, as it were, in the purifying wave. Yet, folitary and forlorn, he hangs down his head, bending under the weight of imaginary crimes. In filence not to be broken, and with reverential awe, he perpetually reads and meditates on the holy Vedas. He never fuffers fleep to oppress his eye-lids in the day-time, and, in the night, he takes his fcanty repofe upon the bare ground.

ground. In the fummer months, he fits in the ardent beam of a tropical fun, furrounded with four fires. During the four rainy months, he dwells upon a ftage raised above the water by four poles, but entirely expofed to the inclemency of the weather. In the

four winter months, he fits all night in cold water. He inceffantly performs the fast of Chanderayan, and eats only when night approaches.

To sustain life in his voluntary exile, he is allowed to amass a store of provisions fufficient for one year; but he is abfolutely forbidden to taste any food artificially prepared by man, and he exifts folely upon dried fruits and grain that grows wild in the deferts. That grain is not to be cooked even by himself, he is only allowed to soften it with water. When he cannot collect provifions himself, he applies to other ban perifths, or, if they cannot supply him, he then through abfolute neceffity goes to the next town for fuch food as charity may fupply him with, but he remains there no longer than is neceffary for the purpose of obtaining that food.

If worn down by a long course of unrelenting severities, the animal fpirits fink, and he becomes weary of life: he then, by the permiffion