CHAPTER IV.

THE WORSHIP OF THE SAINTED DEAD.

Aipssa d' ikonto kat' asphodelon leimôna

Entha te naiousi psychai, eidôla kamontôn.

Odyssey, xxiv. 12, 14.

Ancestor-worship: its Origin.

The worship of ancestors is one of the main branches of the religion

of the Indian races. "Its principles are not difficult to understand,

for they plainly keep up the arrangements of the living world. The

dead ancestor, now passed into a deity, simply goes on protecting

his own family, and receiving suit and service from them as of old;

the dead chief still watches over his own tribe, still holds his

authority by helping friends and harming enemies; still rewards the

right and sharply punishes the wrong." [365] It is in fact the earliest

attempt of the savage to realize the problems of human existence,

as the theology of the Vedas or Olympus is the explanation which

the youth of the world offers of physical phenomena. The latter is

primitive physics, the former primitive biology, and it marks a stage

in the growth of anthropomorphism when the worship of unseen spirits

in general passes to that of unseen spirits in particular.

Among the Aryans and Drâvidians.

It is admitted on all sides that this form of worship was general

among the Aryan nations; [366] but it is a mistake to suppose, as

is too often done, that the worship was peculiar to them. That such

was not the case can be proved by numerous examples drawn from the

practices of aboriginal tribes in India, who have lived hitherto

in such complete isolation, that the worship can hardly be due to

imitation of the customs of their more civilized neighbours.

Thus, on the tenth day after a death in the family, the Ghasiyas of

Mirzapur, about the most degraded of the Drâvidian tribes, feed the

brotherhood, and at the door of the cook-house spread flour or ashes a

cubit square on the ground. They light a lamp there and cover both the

square and the light with a basket. Then the son of the dead man goes a

little distance in the direction in which the corpse had been carried

out, and calls out his name loudly two or three times. He invites him

to come and sit on the shrine which his descendants have prepared for

him, and to consume the offerings which they are ready to present. It

is said that if the deceased died in any ordinary way and not by the

attack of a Bhût, he often calls from the burying ground and says,

"I am coming!" After calling his father's spirit two or three times,

the son returns to the house and examines the flour or ashes, and

if the deceased did not die by the attack of a Bhût, the mark of his

spirit is found on the flour or ashes in the shape of the footprint

of a rat or a weasel. When this is observed, the son takes a white

fowl and sacrifices it with a knife near the cook-house, calling

to the spirit of his father--"Come and accept the offering which is

ready for you!" Some of them strangle the fowl with their hands, and

before killing it sprinkle a little grain before it, saying--"If you

are really the spirit of my father, you will accept the grain!" Then

he goes on to his father's spirit--"Accept the offering, sit in

the corner and bless your offspring!" If the fowl eats the grain,

there is great rejoicing, as it implies that the spirit has quietly

taken up its residence in the house. If the fowl does not eat, it is

supposed that some sorcerer or enemy has detained the spirit with the

ultimate object of releasing it some time or other on its own family,

with whom it is presumably displeased because they have taken no

care to propitiate it. If the soul does not answer from the burial

ground, or if there is no mark on the square of ashes, it is assumed

that he has fallen into the hands of some Bhût or Pret, who has shut

him up in the hollow stalk of a bamboo, or buried him in the earth;

in any case there is a risk that he may return, and the rite is still

performed as a precautionary measure.

Among the Kharwârs the holiest part of the house is the south room,

where it is supposed that the Devatâ pitri or sainted dead reside. They

worship the spirits of the dead in the month of Sâwan (August) near

the house-fire. The house-master offers up one or two black fowls and

some cakes and makes a burnt offering with butter and molasses. Then he

calls out--"Whatever ghosts of the holy dead or evil spirits may be in

my family, accept this offering and keep the field and house free from

trouble!" Many of the Kharwârs are now coming more completely under

Brâhmanical influence, and these worship the Pitri at weddings in the

courtyard. The house-master offers some balls of rice boiled in milk,

and a Brâhman standing by mutters some texts. They are now so advanced

as to do the annual service for the repose of the sainted spirits at

the Pitripaksha or fortnight of the dead in the month of Kuâr (August).

The other Drâvidian tribes follow similar customs. Thus, the Korwas

worship their dead relations in February with an offering of goats,

which is done by the eldest son of the dead man in the family

cook-house. Their ancestors are said not to appear in the flesh after

death, but to show themselves in dreams if they are dissatisfied

with the arrangements made for their comfort. On the day on which

they are expected to appear the householder makes an offering of

cakes to them in the family kitchen. The Patâris think that the dead

occasionally attend when worship is being done to them. At other times

they remain in the sky or wander about the mountains. Sometimes they

call in the night to their descendants and say--"Worship us! Give

us food and drink!" If they are not propitiated they give trouble

and cause sickness. The Kisâns and Bhuiyârs of Chota Nâgpur adore

their ancestors, "but they have no notion that the latter are now

spirits, or that there are spirits and ghosts, or a future state,

or anything." The Bhuiyas revere their ancestors under the name of

Bîr or Vîra, "hero," a term which is elsewhere applied to ghosts of

a specially malignant character. The Khariyas put the ashes of their

dead into an earthen pot and throw it into a river. They afterwards

set up in the vicinity slabs of stone as a resting-place for them,

and to these they make daily oblations. The only worship performed by

the Korwas of Chota Nâgpur is to their dead relatives, and the same is

the case with other allied races, such as the Bhîls and Santâls. [367]

Spirits Mortal.

Most of these Drâvidian tribes believe that like themselves the

spirits of the dead are mortal. What becomes of them after a couple

of generations no one can say. But when this period has elapsed

they are supposed to be finally disposed of some way or other,

and being no longer objects of fear to the survivors, their worship

is neglected, and attention is paid only to the more recent dead,

whose powers of mischief still continue. The Gonds go further and

propitiate for only one year the spirits of their departed friends,

and this is done even if they have been persons of no note during

their lifetime; but with worthies of the tribe the case is different,

and if one of them, for example, has founded a village or been its

headman or priest, then he is treated as a god for years, and a

small shrine of earth is erected to his memory, at which sacrifices

are annually offered. [368] It is said that the Juângs, who until

quite recently used to dress in garments of leaves, are the only one

of these tribes who do not practise this form of worship. [369] But

these races are particularly reticent about their beliefs and usages,

and it is more than probable that further inquiry will show that they

are not peculiar in this respect.

Ancestors Re-born in Children.

Among many races, again, there is a common belief that the father or

grandfather is re-born in one of his descendants. The modern reader

is familiar with examples of such beliefs in Mr. Du Maurier's "Peter

Ibbetson," and Mr. Rider Haggard's "She." Manu expresses this belief

when he writes--"The husband after conception by his wife, becomes

an embryo and is born again of her; for that is the wifehood of a

wife, that he is born again by her." The feeling that children are

really the ancestors re-born is obviously based on the principle of

hereditary resemblance. Hence the general feeling in favour of calling

a child by the name of the grandfather or grandmother, which is about

as far as the rustic goes in recognizing the ascending line. The

Konkan Kunbis, and even Brâhmans, believe that the dead ancestors

sometimes appear in children. Among Gujarât Musalmâns the nurse,

if a child is peevish, says, "Its kind has come upon its head." The

same idea is found among the Khândhs. Among the Laplanders of Europe

an ancestral spirit tells the mother that he has come into the child,

and directs her to call it after his name. [370] Another variant of

the same belief is that common among some of the Drâvidian races that

the ancestor is revived in a calf, which is in consequence well fed

and treated with particular respect.

The Srâddha.

The ordinary worship of ancestors among Brâhmanized Hindu races has

been so often described in well-known books as to need little further

illustration. [371] The spirits of departed ancestors attend upon the

Brâhmans invited to the ceremony of the Srâddha, "hovering round them

like pure spirits, and sitting by them when they are seated." "An

offering to the gods is to be made at the beginning and end of the

Srâddha; it must not begin and end with an offering to ancestors,

for he who begins and ends it with an offering to the Pitri quickly

perishes with his progeny." The belief is common to many races that the

spirits of the dead assemble to partake of the food provided by the

piety of their relations on earth. Alcinous addressing the Phæacians

tells them--"For ever heretofore the gods appear manifest among us,

whensoever we offer glorious hecatombs, and they feast at our side

sitting by the same board." And the old Prussians used to prepare a

meal, to which, standing at the door, they invited the soul of the

deceased. "When the meal was over the priest took a broom and swept

the souls out of the house, saying--'Dear souls! ye have eaten and

drunk. Go forth! go forth!'" [372]

The place where the oblation is to be made is to be sequestered,

facing the south, the land of departed spirits, and smeared with

cow-dung. The use of this substance is easily to be accounted for,

without following the remarkable explanation of a modern writer, who

connects it with the dropping of the Aurora. [373] "The divine manes

are always pleased with an oblation in empty glades, naturally clean,

on the banks of rivers, and in solitary spots." The ceremony is to

be performed by the eldest son, which furnishes the Hindu with the

well-known argument for marriage and the procreation of male issue. We

have seen that the Drâvidians also regard the rite as merely domestic

and to be performed by the house-master.

The orthodox Hindu, besides the usual Srâddha, in connection with

his daily worship, offers the Tarpana or water oblation to the

sainted dead. The object of the annual Srâddha is, as is well known,

to accelerate the progress (gati) of the soul through the various

stages of bliss, known as Sâlokya, Sâmîpya and Sârûpya, and by its

performance at Gaya the wearied soul passes into Vaikuntha, or the

paradise of Vishnu.

Hindus do not allow their sons to bathe during the fortnight sacred to

the manes, as they believe that the dirt produced by bathing, shaving,

and washing the apparel will reach and annoy the sainted dead. The

story goes that Râja Karana made a vow that he would not touch food

until he had given a maund and a quarter (about one hundred pounds) of

gold daily to Brâhmans. When he died he went to heaven, and was there

given a palace of gold to dwell in, and gold for his food and drink,

as this was all he had given away in charity during his mortal life. So

in his distress he asked to be allowed to return to earth for fifteen

days. His prayer was granted, and warned by sad experience he occupied

himself during his time of grace in giving nothing but food in charity,

being so busy that he neglected to bathe, shave, or wash his clothes,

and thus he became an example to succeeding generations. [374]

Degradation of Ancestor-worship.

The worship which has been thus described easily passes into other

and grosser forms. Thus, in the family of the Gâikwârs of Baroda,

when they worship Mahâdeva they think of the greatest of this line of

princes. The temple contains a rudely-executed portrait of Khândê Râo,

the shrine to the left the bed, garments, and phial of Ganges water,

which commemorate his mother, Chimnâbâî. Govind Râo has an image

dressed up, and Fateh Sinh a stone face. [375]

In Central India Râjputs wear the figure of a distinguished ancestor

or relation engraved in gold or silver. This image, usually that of a

warrior on horseback, is sometimes worshipped, but its chief utility

is as a charm to keep off ghosts and evil spirits. [376]

The aboriginal Bhuiyas of Chota Nâgpur, "after disposing of their dead,

perform a ceremony which is supposed to bring back to the house the

spirit of the deceased, henceforth an object of household worship. A

vessel filled with rice and flour is placed for the time on the tomb,

and when brought back the mark of a fowl's foot is found at the bottom

of the vessel, and this indicates that the spirit of the deceased

has returned." [377] This is, as we have seen, common to many of the

Drâvidian tribes, and we shall meet instances of similar practices

when we consider the malignant variety of ghosts.

A curious example of the popular form of ancestor-worship is given by

General Sleeman:--"Râma Chandra, the Pandit, said that villages which

had been held by old Gond proprietors were more liable than others to

visitation from local ghosts, that it was easy to say what village was

or was not haunted, but often exceedingly difficult to say to whom the

ghost belonged. This once discovered, the nearest surviving relation

was, of course, expected to take steps to put him to rest. But,"

said he, "it is wrong to suppose that the ghost of an old proprietor

must be always doing mischief. He is often the best friend of the

cultivators, and of the present proprietor too, if he treats him with

proper respect; for he will not allow the people of any other village

to encroach upon the boundaries with impunity, and they will be saved

all expense and annoyance of a reference to the judicial tribunals

for the settlement of boundary disputes. It will not cost much to

conciliate these spirits, and the money is generally well laid out."

He instances a case of a family of village proprietors, "who had for

several generations insisted at every new settlement upon having the

name of the spirit of the old proprietor inserted in the lease instead

of their own, and thereby secured his good graces on all occasions." "A

cultivator who trespassed on land believed to be in charge of such a

spirit had his son bitten by a snake, and his two oxen were seized with

the murrain. In terror he went off to the village temple, confessed

his sin, and vowed to restore not only the half-acre of land, but to

build a very handsome temple on the spot as a perpetual sign of his

repentance. The boy and the bullocks all then recovered, the shrine was

built, and is, I believe, still to be seen as a boundary mark." [378]

Worship of Worthies.

From this family worship of deceased relations, the transition to

the special worship of persons of high local reputation in life,

or who have died in some remarkable way, is easy. The intermediate

links are the Sâdhu and the Satî, and the worship finally culminates

in a creed like that of the Jainas, who worship a pantheon of deified

saints, that of the Lingâyat worship of Siva incarnated as Chambasâpa,

or the godlike weaver Kabîr of the Kabîrpanthis. The lowest phase of

all is the worship by the Halbas of Central India of a pantheon of

glorified distillers. [379]

The Sâdhu.

The Sâdhu is a saint who is regarded as "the great power of God,"

the name meaning "he that is eminent in virtue." He is a visible

manifestation of the divine energy acquired by his piety and

self-devotion. We shall meet later on instances of deified holy men of

this class. Meanwhile, it may be noted, we see around us the constant

development of the cultus in all its successive stages. Thus, in Berâr

at Askot the saint is still alive; at Wadnera he died nearly a century

ago, and his descendants live on the offerings made by the pious; at

Jalgânw a crazy vagabond was canonized on grounds which strict people

consider quite insufficient. There is, of course, among the disciples

and descendants of these local saints a constant competition going

on for the honour of canonization, which once secured, the shrine

may become a very valuable source of income and reputation. But the

indiscriminate and ill-regulated deification of mortals is one of the

main causes of the weakness of modern Hinduism, because, by a process

of abscission, the formation of multitudinous sects, which take their

titles and special forms of belief from the saint whose disciples

they profess to be, is promoted and encouraged. Thus, as has been

well remarked, Hinduism lies in urgent need of a Pope or acknowledged

orthodox head, "to control its wonderful elasticity and receptivity,

to keep up the standard of deities and saints, and generally to prevent

superstitions running wild into a tangled jungle of polytheism." [380]

It would be out of place to give here any of the details of the

numerous sects which have been founded in this way to commemorate the

life and teaching of some eminent saint. The remarkable point about

this movement is that the leaders of these sects are not always or

even constantly drawn from the priestly classes. Thus the Charandâsis,

who are Krishna worshippers, take their name from Charan Dâs, a Dhûsar,

who are usually classed as Banyas, but claim to be Brâhmans; Jhambajî,

the founder of the Bishnois, was a Râjput; Kabîr, whoever he may have

been, was brought up by a family of Muhammadan weavers at Benares;

Nâmdeo was a cotton carder; Râê Dâs is said to have been a Chamâr;

Dâdu was a cotton cleaner; many of them are half Muhammadans, as

the Chhaju-panthis and Shamsis. It is difficult to estimate highly

enough the result of this feeling of toleration and catholicism on

the progress of modern Hinduism.

Miracle-working Tombs.

These saints have wrested from the reluctant gods by sheer piety and

relentless austerities, a portion of the divine thaumaturgic power,

which exudes after their death from the places where their bodies are

laid. This is the case with the shrines of both Hindu and Musalmân

saints. Many instances of this will be found in succeeding pages. Thus

at Chunâr there is a famous shrine in honour of Shâh Qâsim Sulaimâni,

[381] a local saint whose opinions were so displeasing to Akbar that

he imprisoned him here till his death in 1614 A.D. His cap and turban

are still shown at his tomb, and these, when gently rubbed by one

of his disciples, pour out a divine influence through the assembled

multitude of votaries, many of whom are Hindus. This holy influence

extends even to the animal kingdom. Thus the tomb of the saint Nirgan

Shâh at Sarauli in the Bareilly District abounds in scorpions, which

bite no one through the virtue of the saint.

Hindu saints of the same class are so directly imbued with the

divine afflatus that they need not the purifying influence of fire,

and are buried, not cremated. Their Samâdhi or final resting-place

is usually represented by a pile of earth, or a tomb or tumulus of

a conical or circular form. Others, again, like some of the Gusâîns,

are after death enclosed in a box of stone and consigned to the waters

of the Ganges. These shrines are generally occupied by a disciple or

actual descendant of the saint, and there vows and prayers are made

and offerings presented.

The Satî.

The next link between ancestor-worship and that of special deceased

worthies is seen in the Satî, or "faithful wife," who, before the

practice was prohibited by our Government, was bound to bear her

deceased lord company to the world of spirits for his consolation and

service. The rite seems to have at one time prevailed throughout the

Aryan world. [382] It undoubtedly prevailed in Slavonic lands, [383]

and there are even traces of it in Greece. Evadne is said to have

burnt herself with the body of her husband, Capaneus, and Oenone,

according to one account, leaped into the pyre on which the body

of Paris was being cremated. There are indications that the rite

prevailed among the Drâvidian races, and it has been suggested that

the Hindus may have adopted it from them. Even to the present day

among some of the Bhîl tribes the wife of the dead man is carried

along with him on the bier to the burning ground, where she is laid

down. There she breaks her marriage necklace, and her ornaments are

consumed with the corpse of her husband, obviously a survival of the

time when she was actually burnt with him. [384]

It is unnecessary here to enter into the controversy whether or not

the rite was based on a misinterpretation or perversion of one of the

sacred texts. That in old times the Satî was treated with exceptional

honour is certain. In some places she went to the burning ground

richly dressed, scattering money and flowers, and calling out the

names of the deities, with music sounding and drums beating. In some

places she used to mark with her hands the gateways and walls of the

chief temple, and she sometimes marked in the same way a stone for

her descendants to worship, a practice to which reference will be made

later on. On such stones it was the custom to carve a representation

of her, and in many places a Chhatri, or ornamental cenotaph pavilion,

was erected in her honour. The small shrines in honour of the village

Satî are found often in considerable numbers on the banks of tanks

all over Upper India. They are visited by women at marriages and other

festivals, and are periodically repaired and kept in order. According

to Mr. Ibbetson, [385] in the Delhi territory, these shrines take the

place of those dedicated to the Pitri, or sainted dead. They often

contain a representation in stone of the lord and his faithful spouse,

and one of his arms rests affectionately on her neck. Sometimes, if he

died in battle, he is mounted on his war steed and she walks beside

him; but her worshippers are not always careful in identifying her

shrine, and I have seen at least one undoubted Revenue Survey pillar

doing duty as a monument to some unnamed local divinity of this class.

Among the warrior tribes of Râjputâna, the Satî shrine usually takes

the form of a monument, on which is carved the warrior on his charger,

with his wife standing beside him, and the images of the sun and the

moon on either side, emblematical of never-dying fame. Such places

are the scene of many a ghostly legend. As Col. Tod writes in his

sentimental way [386]--"Among the altars on which have burnt the

beautiful and brave, the harpy or Dâkinî takes up her abode, and stalks

forth to devour the heart of her victims." The Râjput never enters

these places of silence, but to perform stated rites or anniversary

offerings of flowers and water to the manes of his ancestors. There

is a peculiarly beautiful Satî necropolis at Udaypur, and the Satî

Burj, or tower at Mathura, erected in honour of the queen of Râja

Bihâr Mal of Jaypur in 1570 A.D., is one of the chief ornaments of

the city. [387]

The Satî and the Pitri.

The connection between the special worship of the Satî and that of the

Pitri or sainted dead will have been remarked. In many places the Satî

represents the company of the venerated ancestors and is regarded as

the guardian mother of the village, and in many of the rustic shrines

of this class the same connection with the Pitri is shown in another

interesting way. The snake is, as we shall see, regarded as a type

of the household deity, which is often one of the deified ancestors,

and so, in the Satî shrine we often see a snake delineated in the

act of rising out of the masonry, as if it were the guardian mother

snake arising to receive the devotion of her descendants.

The Satî having thus secured the honour of deification by her

sacrifice, is able to protect her worshippers and gratify their

desires. Some are even the subject of special honour, such as

Sakhû Bâî, who is worshipped at Akola. [388] Even the Drâvidian

Kaurs of Sarguja worship a deified Satî, another link connecting

the cultus with the aboriginal races. She has a sacred grove,

and every year a fowl is sacrificed to her, and every third year

a goat. Col. Dalton [389] observes that the Hindus who accompanied

him were intensely amused at the idea of offering fowls to a Satî,

who is accustomed to the simpler bloodless tribute of milk, cakes,

fruit and flowers. This is the form of the offering at Jilmili, the

Satî shrines belonging to the local Râja. The curses of a dying Satî

were greatly feared. Numerous instances of families ruined in this

way are told both in Râjputâna and in Nepâl, the last places where

the rite is occasionally performed. [390]

The arrangements for the cremation varied in different places. In

Western India she sat in a specially built grass hut, and keeping her

husband's head in her lap, supported it with her right hand, while

she kindled the hut with a torch held in her left hand. Nowadays in

Nepâl the husband and the Satî are made to lie side by side on the

pyre. The woman's right hand is put under the husband's neck, and

round her face are placed all kinds of inflammable substances. Three

long poles of undried wood are laid over the bodies--one over the

legs, the second over the chest, and the third over the neck. Three

men on either side press down the poles till the woman is burnt to

death. There have been cases in which the wretched victim tried to

escape, and was dragged back by force to her death.

A curious modification of the practice of Satî, which so far has been

traced only in Râjputâna, is what is known as Mâ Satî, or mother Satî,

where the mother immolates herself with her dead child. Colonel Powlett

[391] remarks that in inquiring about it one is often told that it is

really Mahâ Satî, or "the great Satî." He adds that there can be no

doubt that mother Satî really prevails, but was confined to the sandy

and desert tract, where domestic affection is said to be stronger

than elsewhere. "In one large remote village I found five monuments

to Mother Satîs, one a Chhatri or pavilion of some pretensions. A

Râjput lady from Jaysalmer was on a visit to her father's family

with her youngest son. The boy was thrown when exercising his pony,

dragged in the stirrup and killed. His mother became Satî with her

son's body, and probably her example, for she was a person of some

rank, led to the subsequent practice of Mâ Satî in the same district."

Modern Saints.

We have already noticed some instances of the canonization in modern

times of saints and holy men. Of worthies of this kind, who have

received divine honours, the number is legion. This deification of

human beings is found in the very early Brâhmanical literature. One

of the most noteworthy ideas to be found in the Brâhmanas is that

the gods were merely mortal till they conquered Death by their

sacrifices. Death, alarmed, protested to the gods, and it was then

arranged that no one should become immortal by the force of his piety

without first offering his body to Death. Manu declares that "from

his birth alone a Brâhman is regarded as a divinity, even by the

gods." [392] Modern practice supports this by calling him Mahâ-râja

or "Great king," and he rises to heaven as a deity, like many of the

famous kings of old. [393] In the same way the Etruscans had certain

rites through which the souls of men could become gods and were

called Dii Animales, because they had once been human souls. Quite in

consonance with Indian practice they first became Penates and Lares

before they rose to the rank of the superior deities. [394]

Deification in Modern Times.

A few examples of modern deification may be given to illustrate this

phase of the popular faith. Thus, one Gauhar Shâh was quite recently

canonized at Meerut because he delivered a prophecy that a windmill

belonging to a certain Mr. Smith would soon cease to work. The

fulfilment of his prediction was considered ample evidence of his

sanctity, and the question was put beyond the possibility of doubt

when, just before his death, the holy man directed his disciples to

remove him from an inn, which immediately fell down. Another saint

of the same place is said to have given five years of his life to the

notorious Begam Samru, who died in 1836, in all the odour of sanctity.

Shaikh Bûrhan.

Shaikh Bûrhan, a saint of Amber, was offered a drink of milk by Mokul,

one of the Shaikhâwat chiefs, and immediately performed the miracle of

drawing a copious stream of milk from the udder of an exhausted female

buffalo. "This was sufficient to convince the old chief that he could

work other miracles, and he prayed that through his means he might no

longer be childless. In due time he had an heir, who, according to the

injunction of Bûrhan, was styled, after his own tribe, Shaikh, whence

the title of the clan. He directed that the child should wear the cross

strings (baddiya) worn by Muhammadan children, which, when laid aside,

were to be deposited at the saint's shrine, and further that he should

assume the blue tunic and cap, abstain from hog's flesh, and eat no

meat in which the blood remained. He also ordained that at the birth

of every Shaikhâwat a goat should be sacrificed, the Islâmite creed or

Kalima recited, and the child sprinkled with the blood." These customs

are still observed, and the Shaikh's shrine is still a sanctuary,

while his descendants enjoy lands specially assigned to them. [395]

Salîm Chishti.

The power of conferring male offspring has made the reputation of many

saints of this class, like the famous Salîm Chishti of Fatehpur Sîkri,

whose prayers were efficacious in procuring an heir for the Emperor

Akbar. Up to the present day childless women visit his shrine and hang

rags on the delicate marble traceries of his tomb to mark their vows.

Deification of Noted Persons.

Besides this sainthood which is based on sanctity of life and approved

thaumaturgic powers, the right of deification is conferred on persons

who have been eminent or notorious in their lives, or who have died

in some extraordinary or notorious way. All or nearly all the deified

saints of Northern India may be grouped under one or other of these

categories.

Harshu Pânrê.

We have already given an instance of the second class in Hardaul Lâla,

the cholera godling. Another example of the same kind is that of Harshu

Pânrê or Harshu Bâba, the local god of Chayanpur, near Sahsarâm in

Bengal, whose worship is now rapidly spreading over Northern India, and

promises to become as widely diffused as that of Hardaul himself. He

was, according to the current account, a Kanaujiya Brâhman, the family

priest of Râja Sâlivâhana of Chayanpur. The Râja had two queens, one of

whom was jealous of the priest's influence. About this time the priest

built a fine house close to the palace, and one night the Râja and the

Rânî saw a light from its upper story gleaming aloft in the sky. The

Rânî hinted to the Râja that the priest had designs of ousting his

master from the kingdom; so the Râja had his house demolished and

resumed the lands which had been conferred upon him. The enraged

Brâhman did dharnâ, in other words fasted till he died at the palace

gate. This tragical event occurred in 1427 A.D., and when they took his

body for cremation at Benares, they found Harshu standing in his wooden

sandals on the steps of the burning Ghât. He then informed them that

he had become a Brahm, or malignant Brâhman ghost. The Râja's daughter

had been kind to the Brâhman in his misfortunes and he blessed her,

so that her family exists in prosperity to this day. But the rest

of his house was destroyed, and now only the gateway at which the

Brâhman died remains to commemorate the tragedy. [396]

Harshu is now worshipped as a Brahm with the fire sacrifice and

offerings of Brâhmanical cords and sweetmeats. If any one obtains his

desires through his intercession, he makes an offering of a golden

sacred cord and a silken waist-string, and feeds Brâhmans in his

honour. Harshu's speciality is exorcising evil spirits which attack

people and cause disease. Such spirits are usually of low caste and

cannot withstand the influence of this deified Brâhman.

Ratan Pânrê.

Another worthy, whose legend much resembles that of Harshu, is Ratan

Pânrê, who is venerated by the Kalhans Râjputs of Oudh. The last of

the race, Râja Achal Nârâyan Sinh, ravished the daughter of Ratan

Pânrê. He pleaded in vain to the wicked Râja for reparation, and at

last he and his wife starved themselves to death at the gate of the

fort. He too, like Harshu, spared a princess of the Râja's house,

but he cursed the rest of his family with ruin. After he died his

ghost went to the river Sarjû and claimed her assistance in revenging

himself on the Râja. She at last consented to help him, provided

he could get the Râja into his power by inducing him to accept some

present from him. So he went to the Râja's family priest and induced

him to take from him a sacred cord with which he was to invest the

Râja. When Achal Nârâyan Sinh heard to whom he was indebted for the

gift he flung it away in terror. But soon after an angry wave rushed

from the Sarjû, and on its crest sat the wraith of Ratan Pânrê. It

swept away his palace and left not a soul of his household alive. [397]

Mahenî.

There is a similar case among the Hayobans Râjputs of Ghâzipur. In

1528 A.D. their Râja Bhopat Deva, or perhaps one of his sons, seduced

Mahenî, a Brâhman girl, a relation of their family priest. She burned

herself to death, and in dying, imprecated the most fearful curses on

the Hayobans sept. In consequence of a succession of disasters which

followed, the tribe completely abandoned their family settlement

at Baliya, where the woman's tomb is worshipped to this day. Even

now none of the sept dares to enter the precincts of their former

home. In the same way, in the case of Harshu Pânrê no pilgrim will

eat or drink near his tomb, as the place is accursed through the

murder of a Brâhman. [398]

There are numerous other cases of this deification of suicide Brâhmans

in Northern India. The forms in which they sought vengeance by their

death on their persecutors are diversified in the extreme. There is

a case of a Brâhman in the Partâbgarh District who, when turned out

of his land, to avenge himself, gathered a heap of cow-dung in the

centre of one of the fields and lay down on it till he was devoured

by worms. This happened sixty years ago, but his fields still stand

a waste of jungle grass in the midst of rich cultivation, and neither

Hindu nor Muhammadan dares to plough them. [399]

At the last census of the North-Western Provinces over four hundred

thousand people recorded themselves as worshippers of various forms

of the Brahm or malignant Brâhman ghost. Most of these are Râjputs,

who were probably the most violent oppressors of Brâhmans in the

olden days.

Nâhar Khân.

Another instance of the same type may be given from Râjputâna. Jaswant

Sinh of Mârwâr had an intrigue with the daughter of one of his chief

officers. "But the avenging ghost of the Brâhman interposed between

him and his wishes; a dreadful struggle ensued, in which Jaswant

lost his senses, and no effort could banish the impression from his

mind. The ghost persecuted his fancy, and he was generally believed

to be possessed of a wicked spirit, which when exorcised was made to

say he would depart only on the sacrifice of a chief equal in dignity

to Jaswant. Nâhar Khân, 'the tiger lord,' chief of the Kumpâwat clan,

who led the van in all his battles, immediately offered his head in

expiation for his prince; and he had no sooner expressed his loyal

determination, than the holy man who exorcised the spirit, caused

it to descend into a vessel of water, and having waved it round his

head, they presented it to Nâhar Khân, who drank it off, and Jaswant's

senses were instantly restored. This miraculous transfer of the ghost

is implicitly believed by every chief of Râjasthân, by whom Nâhar

Khân is called 'the faithful of the faithful,' and worshipped as a

local god." [400]

Gangânâth and Bholanâth.

Two other godlings of the Hills owe their promotion to the tragic

circumstances of their deaths. Gangânâth was a Râja's son, who

quarrelled with his father and became a religious mendicant. He

subsequently fell into an intrigue with the wife of an astrologer,

who murdered him and his paramour. They both became malignant ghosts,

to whom numerous temples were erected. When anyone is injured by the

wicked or powerful, he has recourse to Gangânâth, who punishes the

evil-doer. Of the same type is Bholanâth, whose brother, Gyân Chand,

was one of the Almora princes. He had him assassinated with his

pregnant mistress, both of whom became malignant ghosts, and are

especially obnoxious to gardeners, one of whom murdered them. This

caste now specially worships them, and a small iron trident is

sometimes placed in the corner of a cottage and resorted to in

their names when any sudden or unexpected calamity attacks the

occupants. [401]

Bhairwanand.

Similar is the case of Bhairwanand, the tribal deity of the Râikwâr

Râjputs of Oudh. He was pushed into a well in order to fulfil a

prophecy, and has since been deified. [402]

So with the queen of Ganor, who killed herself by means of a poisoned

robe when she was obliged to surrender her honour to her Mughal

conqueror. He died in extreme torture, and was buried on the road to

Bhopâl. A visit to his grave is believed to cure tertian ague. [403]

Vyâsa.

Next come those mortals who have been deified on account of the glory

of their lives. Vyâsa, the compiler of the Vedas, has been canonized,

and there is a temple in his honour both at Benares and Râmnagar. In

the latter place he has been promoted to the dignity of an incarnation

of Siva, whereas in Benares he has a temple of his own. His worship

extends as far as Kulu, where he has an image near a stream. Pilgrims

offer flowers in his name and set up a stone on end in commemoration

of their visit. [404]

Vâlmîki.

Vâlmîki, the author of the Râmâyana, is worshipped in the same

way. He has shrines at Bâlu in the Karnâl District and at Baleni

of Meerut. Baliya, the headquarters of the district of that name,

is said to be called after him. The Aheriyas and Baheliyas, both

hunting tribes of the North-Western Provinces, claim descent from

him, and he has now, by an extraordinary feat in hagiolatry, become

identified with Lâl Beg, the low caste godling of the sweepers. [405]

Various Saints.

Many other worthies of the olden time are worshipped in the same

way. From the Himâlaya to Bombay, Dattâtreya, a saint in whom a

part of Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva was incarnate, is worshipped by

Vaishnavas as a partial manifestation of the deity, and by Saivas as

a distinguished authority on the Yoga philosophy. He has temples both

in Garhwâl and in the Konkan, like Parâsara Rishi, the reputed author

of the Vishnu Purâna, who wished to make a sacrifice to destroy the

Râkshasas, but was dissuaded by the saints, and then scattered the

fire over the slope of the Himâlaya, where it blazes forth at the

phases of the moon. [406] In like fashion the records of the last

census have shown worshippers of the poets Kâlidâsa and Tulasi Dâs,

as in Bombay their great writers Dnyânadeva and Tûkarâm are deified

by the Marâthas. Nearly seven thousand people in the North-Western

Provinces adore Vasishtha, the famous Rishi, and many others Nârada

Muni, who is a well-known personage and generally acts as a sort of

Deus ex machinâ in the folk-tales. On the whole in the North-Western

Provinces over a quarter million people recorded themselves as votaries

of these deified saints, devotees and teachers.

The same form of worship largely prevails in the Panjâb. Among other

worthies we find Syâmji, a Chauhân Râja who is said to have given his

head to Krishna and Arjuna on condition that he should be allowed to

witness the fight between the Kauravas and Pândavas; Dhanwantari,

the physician of the gods; Drona Achârya, the teacher of military

science to the heroes of the great war. The Kumhârs or potters worship

Prajapati, the active creator of the universe; and the Kâyasth scribes

adore Chitragupta, who keeps the register of the deeds of men, which

will be opened at the last day. This is quite irrespective of a horde

of tutelary saints, who are adored by various tribes of handicraftsmen.

Deified Robbers.

Even the thieving and nomadic tribes have as their godlings deified

bandits. Such is Gandak, the patron of the Magahiya Doms, and Salhes,

who is worshipped by the Doms and Dusâdhs of Behâr. He was a great

hero and the first watchman. He fought a famous battle with Chûhar Mâî

of Mohâma, and is the subject of a popular epic in Tirhût. With his

worship is associated that of his brother Motirâm, another worthy of

the same kind. [407] At Sherpur near Patna is the shrine of Goraiya or

Gauraiya, a Dusâdh bandit chief, to which members of all castes resort,

the higher castes making offerings of meal, the outcastes sacrificing

a hog or several young pigs and pouring out libations of spirits on

the ground. But even here the primitive local cultus is in a state

of transition, as in the case of Salhes, who, according to some, was

the porter of Bhîm Sen. [408] Doubtless he and his comrades will some

day blossom forth as manifestations of one or other of the higher gods.

Another bandit godling is Mitthu Bhûkhiya, a freebooter, worshipped

by the Banjâras or wandering carriers. He has a special hut, in which

no one may drink or sleep, and which is marked with a white flag. The

tribe always worship him before committing a crime. They assemble

together and an image of the famous tribal Satî is produced. Butter

is put into a saucer, and in this a light is placed, very broad at

the bottom and tapering upwards. The wick, standing erect, is lit,

an appeal is made to the Satî for an omen, and those worshipping

mention in a low tone to the godling where they are going, and what

they propose to do. The wick is then carefully watched, and should

it drop at all, the omen is propitious. All then salute the flag and

start on their marauding expedition. [409]

Vindhya-bâsinî Devî, the personification of the Vindhyan range,

is, as we have seen, the goddess of the Thags, and the Dhânuks, a

thieving tribe in Behâr, worship one of their chiefs who was killed

in a skirmish with the Muhammadans six hundred years ago, and whose

ghost has since been troublesome. He is worshipped in a shrine of

brick, and one of the members of the tribe acts as his priest. [410]

Râja Lâkhan.

We have already spoken of Gansâm, one of the tribal deities of the

Kols. Another famous Kol deity in Mirzapur is Râja Lâkhan. One story

of him is that he came from Lucknow, a legend based, of course,

on the similarity of the name. But there can be no reasonable doubt

that he was really Lakhana Deva, the son of the famous Râja Jaychand

of Kanauj, who is known in the popular ballads as the Kanaujiya

Râê. There is an inscribed pillar erected by him near Bhuili in the

Mirzapur District, and he was perhaps locally connected with that

part of the country in some way. [411] Some say that he was taken to

Delhi, where he became a Musalmân, and the popularity of his name in

the local legends points to the theory that he was possibly one of

the leaders of the Hindus against the Muhammadan invaders. All this

being granted, it is remarkable that he, a Râjput, and almost as much

a stranger to those primitive jungle dwellers as his Muhammadan rival,

should have found a place in the Drâvidian pantheon.

Râja Chandol.

Another deity of the same race is Râja Chandol, who is said to

have been a jungle Râja of the Bhuiyâr tribe. He was attacked by

his neighbour the Râja of Nagar, who overcame him and cut off his

head. Meanwhile the conqueror forgot his patron deity, and his temple

was overturned and the image buried in the earth. One day a goldsmith

who was passing by the place heard a voice from beneath the ground

saying that if he dug there he would find the idol. He did so, and,

digging up the image, which was of gold, cut it up and sold it. But

his whole household came to ruin, and then the Râja of Nagar restored

the temple, and the Kols remembered Râja Chandol and have venerated

him ever since.

Belâ.

The goddess Belâ was the sister of Lakhana Deva, whose story has

been already told. Once, the story goes, Siva went to pay a visit to

Hastinapura, and the bell of his bull Nandi disturbed the brothers

Arjuna and Bhîma, who, thinking the god a wandering beggar, drove

him out of the palace. Then he cursed the Râjput race that among

them should be born two fatal women, who should work the ruin of

their power. So first was born Draupadî, who caused the war of the

Mahâbhârata, and after her Belâ, to whom was due the unhappy warfare

which paved the way to the Musalmân invasion. Belâ now has a famous

temple at Belaun on the banks of the Ganges in Bulandshahr.

We shall come elsewhere on instances of the belief that human beings

were sacrificed under the foundations of important buildings. Nathu

Kahâr, the godling of the Oudh boatmen, is said to have been buried

alive under the foundations of the fort of Akbarpur in the Faizâbâd

District, where a fair is held in his honour. [412] At the last census

one hundred and twenty-four thousand persons recorded themselves as

his votaries.

Jokhaiya.

Jokhaiya, who had by the same enumeration eighty-seven thousand

worshippers, was a Bhangi or sweeper, who is said to have been killed

in the war between Prithivî Râja of Delhi and Jaychand of Kanauj. He

has a noted shrine at Paindhat in the Mainpuri District, where a

sweeper for a small fee will kill a pig and let its blood drop on

his shrine.

Ramâsa Pîr.

So, the godling invoked by the Pindhâri women when their husbands

went on marauding expeditions, was Ramâsa Pîr. He was a well-known

warrior killed in a battle at Ranuja, near Pushkar. Saturday is his

day for prayer, on which occasions small images of horses in clay or

stone are offered at his shrine. The figure of a man on horseback,

stamped in gold or silver, representing the godling, was found on

the necks of many of the Pindhâris killed in the great campaign of

1817-18. It was worn by them as an amulet. He is now known as Deva

Dharma Râja, which is one of the titles of Yama, the god of death,

and Yudhisthira, his putative son.

Râê Sinh.

Another local godling of the same class is Râê Sinh, whose legend is

thus told by General Sleeman: "At Sanoda there is a very beautiful

little fortress or castle, now occupied, but still entire. It was built

by an officer of Râja Chhattar Sâl of Bundelkhand about 1725 A.D. His

son, by name Râê Sinh, was, soon after the castle had been completed,

killed in an attack upon a town near Chhatarkot, and having in the

estimation of the people become a god, he had a temple and a tank

raised to him. I asked the people how he became a god, and was told

that some one who had been long suffering from quartan ague went to

the tomb one night and promised Râê Sinh, whose ashes lay under it,

that if he could contrive to cure his ague for him, he would during the

rest of his life make offerings at his shrine. After this he never had

an attack and was very punctual in his offerings. Others followed his

example and with like success, till Râê Sinh was recognized universally

among them as a god, and had a temple raised to his name." "This is

the way," remarks General Sleeman, "gods were made all over the world

and are now made in India." [413]

The Pîrs and Sayyids.

We now come to a more miscellaneous class--the Pîrs and Sayyids. Some

of these we have encountered already. We have also seen instances of

some holy men who, like Paul and Silas at Lystra, have been raised to

the rank of deities. These saints are usually of Muhammadan origin,

but most of them are worshipped indiscriminately both by Musalmâns

and low class Hindus. The word Pîr properly means "an elder," but

according to Sûfi belief is the equivalent of Murshid, or "religious

leader." Sayyid, an Arabic word meaning "lord" or "prince," is probably

in many cases a corruption of Shahîd, "a martyr of the faith," because

many of these worthies owe their reputation to having lost their lives

in the early struggles between Islâm and Hinduism. Mr. Ibbetson notes

that he has seen a shrine of some Sayyids in the Jâlandhar District,

who were said to have been Sikhs, who died in the front of the

battle. It took the form of a Muhammadan tomb, lying east and west,

surmounted by two small domes of Hindu shape with their openings

to the south. Under each, in the face of the tomb, was a niche to

receive a lamp. [414]

This and many other instances of the same kind illustrate in an

admirable way the extreme receptivity of the popular belief. We

have here a body of saints, many of whom were deadly enemies of the

Hindu faith, who are now worshipped by Hindus. This is well put by

Sir A. Lyall--"The 'Urs, or annual ceremony of these saints, like the

martyr's day of St. Edmund or St. Thomas of Canterbury, has degenerated

into much that is mere carnal traffic and pagan idolatry, a scandal

to the rigid Islâmite. Yet, if he uplifts his voice against such

soul-destroying abuses, he may be hooted by loose-living Musalmâns as

a Wahhâbi who denies the power of intercession, while the shopkeepers

are no better than Ephesian goldsmiths in crying down an inconvenient

religious reformer." [415] And the same writer illustrates the fusion

of the two creeds in their lower forms by the fact that the holy Hindu

now in the flesh at Askot has only recently taken over the business,

as it were, from a Muhammadan Faqîr, whose disciple he was during

his life, and now that the Faqîr is dead, Narsinh Bâwa presides over

the annual veneration of his slippers. Similarly at the Muharram

celebration and at pilgrimages to tombs, like those of Ghâzi Miyân, a

large number of the votaries are Hindus. In many towns the maintenance

of these Muhammadan festivals mainly depends on the assistance of the

Hindus, and it is only recently that the unfortunate concurrence of

these exhibitions with special Hindu holidays has, it may be hoped

only temporarily, interrupted the tolerant and kindly intercourse

between the followers of the rival creeds.

In many of these shrines the actual or pretended relics of the deceased

worthy are exhibited. Under the shadow of the Fort of Chunâr is the

shrine of Shâh Qâsim Sulaimâni, of whom mention has been already

made. The guardian of the shrine shows to pilgrims the turban of the

saint, who was deified about three hundred years ago, and the conical

cap of his supposed preceptor, the eminent Pîr Jahâniya Jahângasht;

but, as in many such cases, the chronology is hopeless.

The Panj Pîr.

The most eminent of the Pîrs are, of course, the Panj Pîr, or five

original saints of Islâm. They were--the Prophet Muhammad, 'Ali, his

cousin-german and adopted son, Fâtima, the daughter of the Prophet and

wife of 'Ali, and their sons, Hasan and Husain, whose tragical fate

is commemorated with such ardent sympathy at the annual celebration

of the Muharram. [416] But by modern Indian Muhammadans the name is

usually applied to five leading saints--Bahâ-ud-dîn Zikariya of Multân,

Shâh Ruqa-i-Âlam Hazrat of Lucknow, Shâh Shams Tabrîz of Multân,

Shaikh Jalâl Makhdûm Jahâniyân Jahângasht of Uchcha in Multân,

and Bâba Shaikh Farîd-ud-dîn Shakkarganj of Pâk Patan. Another

enumeration gives the Châr Pîr or four great saints as 'Ali and

his successors in saintship--Khwâja Hasan Basri, Khwâja Habîb 'Ajmi,

'Abdul Wâhid. Another list of Pîrs of Upper India gives their names as

Ghâzi Miyân, Pîr Hathîlê, sister's son of Ghâzi Miyân, Pîr Jalîl of

Lucknow, and Pîr Muhammad of Jaunpur. It is, in fact, impossible to

find a generally recognized catalogue of these worthies, and modern

Islâm is no less subject to periodical change than other religions

organized on a less rigid system. [417]

Caste Saints.

The worship of the original saints of Islâm has, however, undergone

a grievous degradation. We are familiar in Western hagiology with

the specialization of saints for certain purposes. St. Agatha is

invoked to cure sore breasts, St. Anthony against inflammation,

St. Blaise against bones sticking in the throat, St. Martin for

the itch, St. Valentine against epilepsy, and so on. So St. Agatha

presides over nurses, St. Catherine and St. Gregory over learned men,

St. Cecilia over musicians, St. Valentine over lovers, St. Nicholas

over thieves, while St. Thomas à Becket looks after blind men,

eunuchs, and sinners. [418] So almost all the artizan classes have

each their special patron saint. The dyers venerate Pîr 'Ali Rangrez,

the Lohârs or blacksmiths, Hazrat Dâûd, or the Lord David, because

the Qurân says--"We taught him the art of making coats of mail

that they might defend you from your suffering in warring with your

enemies." The Mehtars or sweepers have Lâl Pîr or Lâl Beg, of whom

something more will be said later on. In the Panjâb Sadhua Bhagat is

the saint of butchers, because once when he was about to kill a goat,

the animal threatened that he would revenge himself in another life,

and so he joined the sect of Sâdhs, who refrain from destroying animal

life. The barbers revere Sain Bhagat or Husain Bhagat. He is said

to have been a resident of Pratâppura in the Jâlandhar District, and

his descendants were for some time family Gurus or preceptors of the

Râja of Bandhogarh. One day he was so engaged in his devotions that he

forgot to shave the Râja's head, but when he came in fear and trembling

to apologize, he found the Râja shaved and in his right mind. Then it

was found that the deity himself had come and officiated for him. So,

Nâmdeo, the Chhîpi or cotton-printer, became a follower of Râmanand,

and is regarded as the tribal saint.

Domestic Worship of the Pîr.

Muhammadan domestic worship is largely concerned with the propitiation

of the household Pîr. In almost every house is a dreaded spot where,

as the Russian peasant keeps his holy image, is the abode or corner

of the Pîr, and the owner erects a little shelf, lights a lamp every

Thursday night, and hangs up garlands of flowers. Shaikh Saddu,

of whom we shall see more later on, is the women's favourite Pîr,

especially with those who wish to gain an undue ascendency over

their husbands. When a woman wishes to have a private entertainment

of her own, she pretends to be "shadow smitten," that is that the

shadow of some Pîr, usually Shaikh Saddu, has fallen upon her, and

her husband is bound to give an entertainment, known as a Baithak or

"session," for the purpose of exorcising him, to which no male is

allowed admittance. At these rites of the Bona Dea, it is believed

that the Pîr enters the woman's head and that she becomes possessed,

and in that state of frenzy can answer any question put to her. All

her female neighbours, accordingly, assemble to have their fortunes

told by the Pîr, and when they are satisfied they exorcise him with

music and singing.

The Pachpiriyas.

But it is in the eastern districts of the North-Western Provinces and

Behâr that the worship has reached its most degraded form. No less

than one million seven hundred thousand persons at the last census,

almost entirely in the Gorakhpur and Benares Divisions, recorded

themselves as Pachpiriyas or worshippers of the Pânch Pîr. It

is impossible to get any consistent account of these worthies,

and the whole cultus has become imbedded in a mass of the wildest

legend and mythology. [419] According to the census lists these

five saints are, in the order of their popularity--Ghâzi Miyân,

Buahna Pîr, Palihâr, Aminâ Satî and Hathîlê or Hathîla. In Benares,

according to Mr. Greeven, there are no less than five enumerations

of the sacred quintette. One gives--Ghâzi Miyân, Aminâ Satî, Suthân,

'Ajab Sâlâr and Palihâr; a second--Ghâzi Miyân, Aminâ Satî, Suthân,

'Ajab Sâlâr and Buahna; a third--Ghâzi Miyân, Aminâ Satî, Buahna,

Bhairon and Bandê; a fourth--Ghâzi Miyân, Aminâ Satî, Palihâr,

Kâlikâ and Shahzâ; a fifth--Ghâzi Miyân, Suthân, 'Ajab Sâlâr, Buahna

and Bahlâno. Among these we have the names of well-known Hindu gods,

like Bhairon and Kâlikâ, a form of Kâlî. Among the actual companions of

Ghâzi Miyân are, it is believed, Hathîlê Pîr, who is said to have been

his sister's son, Miyân Rajjab or Rajjab Sâlâr, and Sikandar Diwâna,

the Buahna Pîr, who are all buried at Bahrâich, and Sâhu Sâlâr,

father of the martyr prince, whose tomb is near Bârabanki.

In Behâr, again, the five saints are Ghâzi Miyân, Hathîla, Parihâr,

Sahjâ Mâî and 'Ajab Sâlâr, and with them are associated Aminâ Satî,

Langra Târ, who is represented by a piece of crooked wire, and Sobarna

Tîr, the bank of the Sobarna river. Here we reach an atmosphere of

the crudest fetishism. A little further west Sânwar or Kunwar Dhîr,

of whom nothing certain is known, is joined with them, and has numerous

worshippers in the Gorakhpur and Benares Divisions.

The Pânch Pîr and the Pândavas.

It has often been remarked that the five Pândavas have strangely passed

out of the national worship. At the last census in the North-Western

Provinces only four thousand people gave them as their personal

deities, and in the Panjâb only one hundred acknowledged them. Now

in the west the title of Pânch Pîr is sometimes given to five Râjput

heroes, Râmdeo, Pâbu, Harbu, Mallinâth and Gûga, [420] and it is

at least a plausible theory that the five Pîrs may have originally

been the five Pându brothers, whose worship has, in course of time,

become degraded, been annexed by the lower Musalmâns, and again taken

over by their menial Hindu brethren.

As a matter of fact, the system of worship does not materially differ

from the cultus of the degraded indigenous godlings, such as Kârê

Gôrê Deo, Bûrhê Bâba, Jokhaiya, and their kindred. The priests of

the faith are drawn from the Dafâli or Musalmân drummer caste, who

go about from house to house reciting the tale of Ghâzi Miyân and

his martyrdom, with a number of wild legends which have in course

of time been adopted in connection with him. An iron bar wrapped in

red cloth and adorned with flowers represents Ghâzi Miyân, which is

taken from door to door, drums are beaten and petty offerings of grain

collected from the villagers. Low caste Hindus, like Pâsis and Chamârs,

worship them in the form of five wooden pegs fixed in the courtyard

of the house. The Barwârs, a degraded criminal tribe in Oudh, build

in their houses an altar in the shape of a tomb, at which yearly in

August the head of the family sacrifices in the name of the Pîrs a

fowl and offers some thin cakes, which he makes over to a Muhammadan

beggar who goes about from house to house beating a drum.

Ghâzi Miyân.

The whole worship centres round Ghâzi Miyân. His real name was Sayyid

Sâlâr Masaud, and he was nephew of Sultân Mahmûd of Ghazni. He was

born in 1015 A.D., was leader of one of the early invasions of Oudh,

and is claimed as one of the first martyrs of Islâm in India. He was

killed in battle with the Hindus of Bahrâich in 1034 A.D. Close to

the battle-field was a tank with an image of the sun on its banks, a

shrine sacred in the eyes of all Hindus. Masaud, whenever he passed it,

was wont to say that he wished to have this spot for a dwelling-place,

and would, if it so pleased God, through the power of the spiritual

sun, destroy the worship of the material. He was, it is said, buried

by some of his followers in the place which he had chosen for his

resting-place, and tradition avers that his head rests on the image

of the sun, the worship of which he had given his life to destroy.

There is some reason to believe that this cultus of Masaud may have

merely succeeded to some local worship, such as that of the sun, and

in this connection it is significant that the great rite in honour of

the martyr is called the Byâh or marriage of the saint, and this would

associate it with other emblematical marriages of the earth and sun

or sky which were intended to promote fertility. [421] Masaud, again,

is the type of youth and valour in military Islâm, and to the Hindu

mind assumes the form of one of those godlike youths, such as Krishna

or Dûlha Deo, snatched away by an untimely and tragical fate in the

prime of boyish beauty. So, though he was a fanatical devotee of Islâm,

his tomb is visited as much by Hindus as by Muhammadans. Besides his

regular shrine at Bahrâich, he has cenotaphs at various places, as at

Gorakhpur and Bhadohi in the Mirzapur District, where annual fairs are

held in his honour. The worship of Masaud, which is now discouraged by

Muhammadan purists, embodied, even in early times, so much idolatry

and fetishism as to be obnoxious to the puritanic party; it fell

under the censure of the authorities, and Sikandar Lodi interdicted

the procession of his spear. [422] Nowadays at his festivals a long

spear or pole is paraded about, crowned at the top with bushy hair,

representing the head of the martyr, which, it is said, kept rolling

on the ground long after it was severed from the trunk. [423]

Sakhi Sarwar.

Sakhi Sarwar, or "generous leader," the title of a saint whose

real name was Sayyid Ahmad, is hardly popular beyond the Panjâb,

where his followers are known as Sultânis, and are more than four

hundred thousand in number. [424] No one knows exactly when he lived;

some place him in the twelfth and others in the thirteenth century;

but there are other traditions which would bring him down to the

sixteenth. Whatever be the exact time of his birth and death, he

was one of the class of Muhammadan saints, like Bahâ-ud-dîn and

Shams Tabrîz, who settled and practised austerities in the country

about Multân. Other names for him are Lâkhdâta or "the giver of

lâkhs," Lâlanwâla, "he of the rubies," and Rohiânwâla, or "he of the

Hills." His life, as we have it, is but a mass of legends. He once

cured a camel of a broken leg by riveting it together. Miraculously,

as so many of these saints do, he gave two sons to one Gannu of

Multân and married his daughter. The hill that overlooks his tomb at

Nigâha in the Dera Ghâzi Khân District, at the edge of the Sulaimân

mountains, is said to have been infested by a fearful giant. This

monster used at night to stand on the hill-top and with a torch lure

unwary travellers to their destruction. Against him Sakhi Sarwar and

his four companions waged war, but all except the saint were killed;

and such was the fall of the monster that the hill trembled to its

base. Within an enclosure are seen the tombs of the saint, his lady,

Bîbî Râê, and a Jinn who fell before the onset of the hero. To the

east is the apartment containing the stool and spinning-wheel of

Mâî 'Aeshan, Sakhi Sarwar's mother. It is a curious instance of the

combination of the two rival faiths, so constantly observable in this

phase of the popular worship, that close to the shrine of Sakhi Sarwar

is a temple of Vishnu, a shrine of Bâba Nânak, the founder of Sikhism,

and an image of Bhairon, who appears in the legends as the servant

or messenger of the saint. The tomb presents a curious mixture of

Musalmân and Hindu architecture. It was recently destroyed by fire,

and two rubies presented by Nâdir Shâh, and some valuable jewels,

the gift of Sultân Zamân Shâh, were destroyed or lost.

The Sultâni sect, in large numbers, under the guidance of conductors

known as Bharai, make pilgrimages to the tomb. Near it are two dead

trees, said to have sprung from the pegs which were used to tether

Kakkî, the saint's mare. The walls are hung with small pillows of

various degrees of ornamentation. Persons who suffer from ophthalmia

vow gold or silver eyes for their recovery. They vow to shave the

hair of an expected child at the temple, and its weight in gold or

silver is presented to the saint. Some childless parents vow to him

their first child, and on its birth take it to the temple with a cord

round its neck. There are numbers of sacred pigeons attached to the

shrine, which are supported by an allowance realized from certain

dedicated villages. The marks of 'Ali's fingers and the print of

his foot are still shown to the devout in consideration of a fee to

the guardians, and a visit is considered peculiarly efficacious for

the cure of demoniacal possession, exhibiting itself in the form of

epilepsy or hysteria.

Besides the shrine at Nigâha, there are numerous other shrines of

the saint, of which the most celebrated are those connected with the

annual fair at Dhonkal in Gujrânwâla, the Jhanda fair at Peshâwar,

and the Kadmon fair at Anârkali, near Lahore. At Dhonkal there is a

magic well which was produced by the saint, the water of which is

much in request. At Anârkali a class of musicians, called Dholis,

take young children, who are presented at the tomb, and dance about

with them. In the neighbourhood of Delhi he is not held in so much

respect, but shrines in his honour are common, vows and pilgrimages

to him are frequent, and Brâhmans tie threads on the wrists of their

clients on a fixed day in his name. Under the name of Lâkhdâta he

has become the patron deity of athletes, and especially of wrestlers.

In the central districts of the Panjâb, his shrine, an unpretending

little edifice, is to be seen outside nearly every hamlet. "The shrine

is a hollow plastered brick cube, eight or ten feet in each direction,

covered with a dome some ten or twelve feet high and with low minarets

or pillars at the four corners, and a doorway in front, opening out

generally on a plastered brick platform. Facing the doorway inside are

two or three niches for lamps, but otherwise the shrine is perfectly

empty. The saint is especially worshipped on Thursdays, when the shrine

is swept, and at night lamps are lit inside it. The guardians of the

shrine are Musalmâns of the Bharai clan, who go round on Thursdays

beating drums and collecting offerings. These offerings, which are

generally in small change or small handfuls of grain or cotton, are

mainly presented by women. Another method of pleasing the saint is by

vowing a Rôt; the Rôt is made by placing dough to the extent vowed on

a hot piece of earth, where a fire has been burning, and distributing

it when it is baked. He is also worshipped by sleeping on the ground

instead of on a bed. Wrestling matches are also held in his honour,

and the offerings made to the performers go towards keeping up the

shrine at Nigâha. A true worshipper of Sultân will not sell milk on

Thursday; he will consume it himself or give it away."

Sarwar is essentially a saint of the Jâts, and he is also revered

by Gûjars and Jhînwars, and women even of the Khatri and Brâhman

castes adore him. He has, according to the last returns, over four

hundred thousand worshippers in the Panjâb, and eight thousand in

the North-Western Provinces.

Gûga Pîr.

Another noted local saint is Gûga Pîr, also known as Zâhir Pîr,

"the saint apparent," or Zâhir Dîwân, "the minister apparent," or in

the Panjâb as Bâgarwâla, as his grave is near Dadrewa in Bikâner,

and he is said to have reigned over the Bâgar or great prairies of

Northern Râjputâna. Nothing is known for certain about him, and the

tales told of him are merely a mass of wild legends. According to some

he flourished somewhere about the middle of the twelfth century, when

Indian hagiolatry was at its zenith. Others say that he was a Chauhân

Râjput, a contemporary of Prithivî Râja of Delhi, while by another

story he died with his forty-five sons and sixty nephews opposing

Mahmûd of Ghazni. He is said to have been a Hindu with the title

of Gûga Bîr, or "the hero"; and one account represents him to have

become a convert to Islâm. "He is said to have killed his two nephews

and to have been condemned by their mother to follow them below. He

attempted to do so, but the earth objected that he being a Hindu, she

was quite unable to receive him till he should be properly burnt. As

he was anxious to revisit his wife nightly, this did not suit him,

and so he became a Musalmân, and her scruples being thus removed,

the earth swallowed him and his horse alive." [425] In another and

more degraded form of the legend current in Muzaffarnagar, he is

said to have jumped into a pile of cow-dung, where he disappeared,

a series of stories which remind us of the Curtius myth. [426]

Another elaborate legend represents Gûga to be the son of the Rânî

Bâchhal, and fixes his birthplace at Sirsâwa in the Sahâranpur

District. About the time of the invasion of Mahmûd of Ghazni, she

married Vatsa, the Râja of Bâgardesa, or the Râjputâna desert. By

the influence of that ubiquitous saint, Gorakhnâth, she conceived in

spite of the intrigues of her sister, and her child was called Gûga,

because the saint gave to his mother, as a preservative, a piece of

gum resin known as Gûgal. His cousins attacked him and tried to rob

him of his kingdom, but Gûga defeated them and cut off their heads,

which he presented to his mother. She, in her anger, ordered him to

go to the place where he had sent her nephews; so he requested the

earth to receive him into her bosom, which she refused to do until

he became a convert to Islâm. He then went to Mecca, and became a

disciple of one Ratan Hâji, and on his return the earth opened and

received him, with his famous black mare Javâdiyâ. [427]

The mare has, of course, a story of her own. Gûga had no children,

and lamenting this to his guardian deity, he received from him two

barley-corns, one of which he gave to his wife and the other to his

famous mare, which gave birth to his charger, hence called Javâdiyâ

or "barley-born." We find this wonderful mare through the whole range

of folk-lore, but the best parallel to her is the famous mare of Gwri

of the golden hair, and Setanta in the Celtic tale. [428]

From Scotland, too, we get a parallel to the magic birth: "Here are

three grains for thee that thou shalt give thy wife this very night,

and three others to the dog, and these three to the mare; and these

three thou shalt plant behind thy house; and in their own time thy wife

will have three sons, the mare three foals, and the dog three puppies,

and there will grow three trees behind thy house; and the trees will be

a sign, when one of thy sons dies one of the trees will wither." [429]

It is needless to say that this is a stock incident in folk-lore.

Gûga and Snake-worship.

But it is in his function as one of the Snake kings that Gûga is

specially worshipped. When he is duly propitiated he can save from

snake-bite, and cause those who neglect him to be bitten. His shrine

is often found in association with that of Nara Sinha, the man-lion

incarnation of Vishnu, and of Gorakhnâth, the famous ascetic,

whose disciple he is said to have been. He is adored by Hindus

and Muhammadans alike, and by all castes, by Râjputs and Jâts, as

well as by Chamârs and Chûhras. Even the Brâhman looks on him with

respect. "Which is greater," says the proverb, "Râma or Gûga?" and

the reply is, "Be who may the greater, shall I get myself bitten by

a snake?" in other words, "Though Râma may be the greater, between

ourselves, I dare not say so for fear of offending Gûga."

He is represented on horseback, with his mother trying to detain

him as he descends to the infernal regions. He holds as a mark of

dignity a long staff in his hands, and over him two snakes meet, one

being coiled round his staff. Both the Hindu and Muhammadan Faqîrs

take the offerings devoted to him, and carry his Chharî or standard,

covered with peacocks' feathers, from house to house in the month of

August. As is the case with godlings of this class all over India,

it is significant of the association of his worship with some early

non-Aryan beliefs that the village scavenger is considered to be

entitled to a share of the offerings presented at his shrine.

According to the last census Gûga had thirty-five thousand worshippers

in the Panjâb and one hundred and twenty-three thousand in the

North-Western Provinces.

Worship of Tejajî.

Another godling of the same kind is Tejajî, the Jât snake godling

of Mârwâr. He is said to have lived about 900 years ago. One day he

noticed that a Brâhman's cow was in the habit of going to a certain

place in the jungle, where milk fell from her udder into the hole

of a snake. Teja agreed to supply the snake daily with milk, and

thus save the Brâhman from loss. Once when he was preparing to visit

his father-in-law, he forgot the compact, and the snake appearing,

declared that it was necessary that he should bite Teja. He stipulated

for permission first to visit his father-in-law, to which the snake

agreed. Teja proceeded on his journey, and on the way rescued the

village cattle from a gang of robbers, but was desperately wounded in

the encounter. Mindful of his promise, he with difficulty presented

himself to the snake, who, however, could find no spot to bite, as

Teja had been so grievously wounded by the robbers. Teja therefore

put out his tongue, which the snake bit, and so he died. He is now a

protector against snake-bite, and is represented as a man on horseback,

while a snake is biting his tongue. [430] Tejajî and Gûga, as snake

godlings, thus rank with Bhajang, the snake godling of Kâthiawâr, who

is a brother of Sesha Nâga, and with Mânasâ, the goddess of Bengal,

who is the sister of Vâsuki, the wife of Jaratkâru, and mother of

Astikâ, whose intervention saved the snake race from destruction by

Janamejâya. [431]

Worship of Bâba Farîd Shakkarganj.

Bâba Farîd Shakkarganj, or "fountain of sweets," so called because he

was able miraculously to transmute dust or salt into sugar, was born

in 1173 A.D., and died in 1265. His tomb is at Pâkpatan, and he enjoys

high consideration in Northern India. He was a disciple of Qutb-ud-dîn

Bakhtyâr Kâki, who again sat at the feet of Muîn-ud-dîn Chishti of

Ajmer, also a great name to swear by. Farîd's most distinguished

disciple was Nizâm-ud-dîn Auliya, who has a lovely tomb at Ghayâspur,

near Delhi. Farîd was very closely associated with Bâba Nânak,

and much of the doctrine of early Sikhism seems to have been based

on his teaching. He is said to have possessed the Dast-i-ghaib, or

"hidden hand," a sort of magic bag which gave him anything he wished,

which is like the wishing hat and inexhaustible pot or purse, which

is a stock element in Indian and European folk-lore. [432]

The Emperor, it is said, tried to humble him when he came to Delhi, but

he answered in the famous proverb--Delhî dûr ast--"Delhi is far away,"

the Oriental equivalent to Rob Roy's "It is a far cry to Lochow."

The Musalmân Thags looked on him as the founder of their system,

and used to make pilgrimages to his tomb. He is believed to have

been connected with the Assassins or disciples of the Old Man of

the Mountain. [433] Every devotee who contrives to get through the

door of his mausoleum at the prescribed time of his feast is assured

of a free entrance into Paradise hereafter. The crowd is therefore

immense, and the pressure so great that two or three layers of men,

pushed closely over each other, generally attempt the passage at the

same time, and serious accidents, notwithstanding every precaution

taken by the police, are not uncommon. [434]

He comes in direct succession to some of the worthies to whom reference

has been already made. To Khwâja Muîn-ud-dîn Chishti succeeded Khwâja

Qutb-ud-dîn Bakhtyâr Kâki, and Bâba Farîd followed him. They were

the founders of the Chishtiya order of Faqîrs.

Besides his shrine at Pâkpatan he has another famous Dargâh at

Shaikhsir in Bikâner, which is called after him, and the Jâts used

to esteem him highly until, as Col. Tod [435] says, "The Bona Dea

assumed the shape of a Jâtnî, to whom in the name of Kiranî Mâtâ,

'Our Mother of the ray,' all bend the head." Another legend fixes

his tomb at Girâr, in the Wârdha District of the Central Provinces.

The zeolitic concretions of the Girâr hill are accounted for as the

petrified cocoanuts and other articles of merchandise belonging to

two travelling dealers who mocked the saint, on which he turned their

whole stock-in-trade into stones as a punishment. They implored his

pardon, and he created a fresh supply for them from dry leaves, on

which they were so struck by his power that they attached themselves

to his service till they died. [436]

In the Western districts of the North-Western Provinces the

first-fruits of the sugar-cane crop are dedicated to him.

He was a thrifty saint, and for the last thirty years of his life he

supported himself by holding to his stomach wooden cakes and fruits

whenever he felt hungry. In this he resembled Qutb-ud-Dîn Ushi, who

was able by a miracle to produce cakes for the support of his family

and himself. [437]

Minor Saints.

Of the minor saints the number is legion, and only a few instances

can be given. At Makanpur in the Cawnpur District is the tomb of Zinda

Shâh Madâr, who gives his name to the class of Musalmân Faqîrs, known

as Madâri. He is said to have been a native of Halab or Aleppo, and to

have come to this place in 1415 A.D., when he expelled a famous demon

named Makan Deo, after whom the place was named. Low class Hindus and

Musalmâns worship him because he is supposed to save them from snakes

and scorpions, and the Kahâr bearers, as they go through jungle at

night, call out Dam Madâr! The saint is said to have had the power

of restraining his breath, whence his name. In the holy of holies

of his shrine no woman is allowed to enter, no lights are lighted,

no hymns are chanted and no food is cooked.

'Abdul Qâdir Jilâni, who is said to take his name from Jil, a

village near Bâghdâd, is another noted saint. He is also known as

Pîr-i-Dastgîr, Pîr-i-'Azam, Ghaus-ul-'Azam, and was born in 1078 A.D.,

and died at Bâghdâd. Some say that he is identical with Mîrân Sâhib,

who is worshipped all over Northern India. He is said to have been a

magician, and to have subdued to his service a Jinn named Zain Khân,

whom he treated with great cruelty. One day the Jinn surprised his

master in a state of uncleanness and slew him, but even then he was

unable to escape from the influence of this arch-magician, who rules

him in the world of spirits. Mîrân Sâhib is said to be buried at

Ajmer, but he has Dargâhs at Amroha, in the Morâdâbâd District, at

Benares and at Bûndi. By another account the tomb at Amroha is that

of Shaikh Saddu or Sadr-ud-dîn, who was once a crier of the mosque,

and near his are pointed out the tombs of his mother Ghâziyâ or Asê

and of Zain Khân, the Jinn. The saint of Jalesar, Hazrat Pîr Zari,

is also known as Mîrân Sâhib, and he is by some identified with the

Amroha worthy. In Karnâl he is said to have led the Sayyid army against

the Râja of Tharwa, and had his head carried off by a cannon ball

during the battle. He did not mind this, and went on fighting. Then a

woman in one of the Râja's villages said--"Who is fighting without his

head?" upon which the body said--"Haq! Haq!" "The Lord! the Lord!" and

fell down dead, calling out--"What? Are not these villages upside down

yet?" upon which every village in the Râja's territory was turned

upside down and everyone killed except a Brâhman girl, the paramour

of the Râja. Their ruins remain to authenticate the story. Now the

saint and his sister's son, Sayyid Kabîr, are jointly worshipped. We

shall meet this headless hero again in the case of the Dûnd, and it

will be remembered that a similar legend is told of Ghâzi Miyân.

Villages Overturned.

Of these villages which were overturned by a curse we have many

examples all over the country. The ruins at Bakhira Dih in Basti

are said to have been a great city which was overthrown because a

Râja seduced a Brâhman girl. At Batesar in Agra is the Aundha Khera,

which records a similar catastrophe. So Bângarmau in Unâo is called

the Lauta Shahr or "overthrown city," because Mîrân Sâhib destroyed

it to punish the curiosity of the Râja who wanted to know why the

robes of the saint which a washerman was washing gave forth a divine

perfume. So the town of Kâko was overwhelmed by the saint Bîbî Kamâlo

because the Buddhist Râja gave her a dish cooked of the flesh of rats,

which came to life when she touched them. At Besnagar in Bhopâl the

king and his subjects clung to a heavenly chariot and were carried

to the skies and their city was overthrown, and the saint Qutb Shâh

overturned the city of Sunit because the Râja used to kill a child

daily to cure an ulcer with which he was afflicted. [438]

Abû 'Ali Qalandar is hardly known beyond the Panjâb. He came from

Persia and died at Pânipat in 1324 A.D. He is usually known as Bû 'Ali

Qalandar, and it is said that he used to ride about on a wall. He

prayed so constantly that it was laborious to get water for his

ablutions each time; so he stood in the Jumnâ, which then ran past

the town. After standing there seven years the fishes had gnawed his

legs and he was so stiff that he could hardly move, so he asked the

Jumnâ to step back seven paces. She, in her hurry to oblige the saint,

went back seven Kos or ten miles, and there she is now. [439]

Many other saints are said to have had similar power over rivers. So

recently as 1865 A.D., a miraculous bridge of sand was built over

the Jumnâ at Karnâl by the prayer of a Faqîr, of such rare virtue

that lepers passing over and bathing at both ends were cured; but the

people say that the bridge had got lost when they came there. [440]

It was only the prayers of the saint Farîd-ud-din Shakkarganj which

stopped the westward movement of the Satlaj, and the intercession of

a holy Rishi changed the course of the river at Bâgheswar. [441]

Bû 'Ali gave the Pânipat people a charm which dispelled all the flies

from the town, but they grumbled and said that they rather liked

flies; so he brought them back a thousandfold. He was buried first at

Karnâl, but the Pânipat people claimed his body, and opened his grave,

whereupon he sat up and looked at them till they became ashamed. They

then took away some bricks for the foundation of a shrine; but when

they got to Pânipat and opened the box, they found his body in it;

so he is now buried in both places, and there is a shrine erected

over the place where he used to ride on the wall.

Malâmat Shâh.

Malâmat Shâh is treated with much respect in Bârabanki. The disciple in

charge of his tomb calls the jackals with a peculiar cry at dusk. They

devour what is left of the offerings, but will only touch such things

as are given with a sincere mind and not to be seen of men. A religious

tiger is also said to come over from Bahrâich and pay an annual visit

to the shrine. [442]

Miyân Ahmad.

At Qasûr is the tomb of the saint Miyân Ahmad Khân Darvesh, on which

the attendants place a number of small pebbles. These are called

"Ahmad Khân's lions," and are sold to people who tie them round the

necks of children troubled in their sleep. [443]

Shaikh Saddû.

Shaikh Saddû has been mentioned in another connection. His visitations

cause melancholy and hypochondria. He is exorcised by the distribution

of sweets to the poor and the sacrifice of a black goat. He once found

a magic lamp, like that of Alâuddin, the powers of which he abused,

and was torn to pieces by the Jinn. [444]

The list of these worthies is immense. We can only mention in passing

Shâh Abdul Ghafûr, commonly known as Bâba Kapûr, a disciple of Shâh

Madâr, whose shrine is in Gwâlyâr; Mîr Abdul 'Ala, the Nakhshbandi who

is buried at Agra; Sultân Bayazîd, who kindled a lamp which lighted

the world for one hundred and twenty miles, and thus drove the Jinn

from Chatgânw in Bengal, where he is worshipped; Shaikh Kabîr, known

as Bâla Pîr, the son of Shâh Qâsim Sulaimâni of Chunâr, whose shrine

is at Kanauj; Shaikh Muhammad Ghaus of Gwâliyâr; and Sidi Maula, who

possessed the power of transmuting metals into gold. Lastly comes

Shâh Daula, whose shrine is at Gujarât in the Panjâb. His priest

is able to confer offspring on childless people on condition that

they dedicate the first child to the saint, and this child is then

born with the head of a rat. Some wretched imbeciles with rat-like

features are found at his tomb. [445]

These wonder-working shrines belong to Hindu as well as Musalmân

saints. In the Etah District is the tomb of Kalyân Bhârati, a

Hindu ascetic. He was buried alive at his own request about four

hundred years ago. Before his death he announced that exactly six

months after he was dead the arch of his tomb would crack, and so

it happened. Now a mound of earth in the centre is supposed to mark

the head of the saint. The virtue of his shrine is such that if any

one take a false oath within its precincts he will die at once. The

tomb is hence largely used for the settlement of disputes, and many

a wearied district officer longs that there were more such places

throughout the land.

Shrines Which Cure Disease.

Many of these local shrines owe their reputation to notorious cures,

which have been performed by the intervention of the local saint. At

Chhattarpur is the shrine of Rûkhar Bâba, an ascetic of the Gusâîn

class, who has the power of removing fever and ague, and hence among

the many tombs of his brethren his is kept clean and white-washed,

while the others are neglected. [446] A shrine in Berâr is noted for

its power in cases of snake-bite and scrofula. A large two-storied

gate of its enclosure owes its erection to the gratitude of a wealthy

tailor, who was cured of sore disease of the loins. [447] Recently at

the shrine of the saint of Fatehpur in the Sahâranpur District, the

Faqîr in charge informed me that when the people bring sick children

to him, he pulls off a leaf from the tree overhanging the tomb, blows

upon it, and says to the disease, "Begone, you rascal!" and the child

is cured. At the tomb of Pîr Jahâniyân in the Muzaffargarh District,

people suffering from leprosy and boils get the incumbent to prepare

baths of heated sand, in which the diseased part, or the whole body

is placed. The efficacy of the remedy is ascribed to the thaumaturgic

power of the saint. [448] The tomb of Makhdûm Sâhib in the Faizâbâd

District is famous for the exorcism of evil spirits, a reputation

which it shares with the shrine of Bairâm at Bidauli in Muzaffarnagar,

and that of Bîbî Kamâlo at Kâko, half-way between Gaya and Patna. [449]

So, in Bengal, the chief disease shrines are those of Tarakeswara in

Hughli, sacred to Mahâdeva, of Vaidyanâtha in the Santâl Parganas,

and Gondalpâra in Hughli, famous in cases of hydrophobia. "The device

followed at the last place is for the bitten person, after fasting,

to defray the expense of a special service, and to receive a piece of

broad cloth impregnated with the snuff of a lamp-wick, and secreted

in the heart of a plantain. As long as this charm is preserved and the

patient abstains from eating of this variety of plantain, the effects

of the bite are warded off. Another plan is for the patient to take

a secret medicine, probably cantharides, pounded with twenty-one

pepper-corns, before the twenty-first day. This causes the patient

to throw off some mucus, known as 'the dog's whelp,' and this leads

to cure." [450]

In the Partâbgarh District are to be seen here and there

strange-looking brick-built erections called Kûkar Deora or "dogs'

house," in the shape of cupolas or pyramids. Some of them are supposed

to be the treasure houses of the ancient races. If a man walks round

one of these seven times and then looks in at the door, he will be

cured from the bite of a mad dog. [451]

Sayyid Yûsuf.

Dr. Buchanan gives a case at Patna of a certain Sayyid Yûsuf, who

manifested himself to a poor blind weaver and told him that he would

recover his sight next day. At the same time the saint ordered his

patient to search for his tomb and proclaim its virtues. The weaver,

on recovering his sight, did not fail to obey the orders of his

benefactor, and he and his descendants have since then lived on the

contributions of the faithful, though the tomb is a mere heap of clay

and has no endowment. [452]

The tomb at Faizâbâd known as Fazl-ul-haqq, or "Grace of God," brings

good luck if sweetmeats are offered every Thursday, and another, called

'Ilm Bakhsh, or "Wisdom-giver," causes boys who are taken there to

learn their lessons quickly. [453] The same result may be secured by

a charm which is found in the Samavidhana Brâhmana--"After a fast of

three nights, take a plant of Soma, recite a certain formula and eat

of the plant a thousand times, you will be able to repeat anything

after hearing it once."

Wonder-working Tombs.

There are other tombs which present special peculiarities. Thus,

not long since crowds of people assembled at Khetwadi, in Bombay,

to see a shrine erected by some sweepers to Zâhir Pîr, which at

intervals seemed to oscillate from its foundations. At Anjar in

Sindh are the tombs of a noted outlaw named Jaisar Pîr and his wife

Turî Khatrânî, who were originally buried apart, but their tombs

are gradually approaching, and it is believed that at their meeting

the world will be destroyed. So there is a wall at Gurdâspur which

a Faqîr saw being built, and asked the master-mason if he considered

it to be firm. The mason said that he believed it to be substantial,

whereupon the holy man touched it and made it shake, and it has gone

on shaking ever since. At Faizâbâd is the tomb of a saint, and some

time ago the metal top of one of the pinnacles took to shaking, and

the weaver population were so impressed that they levied a tax on the

community for its repair. At Jhanjhâna is the tomb of Sayyid Mahmûd,

who was buried next to one of his disciples. But the latter is too

modest to place himself on an equality with his master, so his tomb,

however much it is repaired, always sinks to a lower level than that

of his preceptor. At Bârabanki is the tomb of the saint Shaikh Ahmad

Abdul-haq, who thought he could acquire some useful information by

keeping company with the dead. So he got himself buried alive, and

after six months his grave opened of its own accord and he was taken

out half dead.

The Nine-yard Tombs.

There is another class of tombs which are known as the Naugaza or

Naugaja, that is to say tombs nine yards long. In these rest the

giants of the older world. There is one of these tombs at Nâgaur in

Râjputâna, and several others have been discovered in the course of the

Archæological Survey. [454] Five of them at Vijhi measure respectively

29, 31, 30 and 38 feet. Mr. W. Simpson calls these tombs Buddhistic,

but this is very doubtful. [455] The belief largely prevails among

Muhammadans that there were giants in the early times. Adam himself

is said to have been sixty yards in height, and there was a monster

called 'Uj in the days of Adam, and the flood of Noah reached only

to his waist. There is a tomb of Noah at Faizâbâd which is said to

have been built by Alexander the Great, and not far off are those of

Seth and Job. The latter, curiously enough, are gradually growing in

size. They are now 17 and 12 feet long respectively, but when Abul

Fazl wrote they were only 10-1/2 and 9 feet long. [456]

Shrines with Images or Relics.

The reputation, again, of many shrines rests on the assumed discovery,

generally by means of a dream, that an ancient image or the bones of

a martyr were buried on the spot, and in their honour a shrine was

established. Thus, the great temple at Bandakpur in the Damoh District

owes its origin to the fact that a Pandit in 1781 A.D. dreamed a

dream, that in a certain spot lay buried in the earth an image of

Jagîswar Mahâdeva, and that if he built a suitable temple over the

place indicated, the image would make its appearance. On the strength

of this dream the Pandit built a temple, and it is asserted that

in due course of time the image developed itself without the aid

of man. [457] So, the Bhairava temple on the Langûr peak owes its

establishment to a cowherd having found on the spot a yellow-coloured

stick, which on his attempting to cut it with an axe, poured out

drops of blood. Frightened at the sight, the cowherd fled, only to

be visited at night by the god in his terrible form, who commanded

him to set up his shrine here. A similar legend is attached to the

Nârâyana image in Nepâl. [458] The celebrated shrine of Hanumân at

Beguthiya was discovered by a wandering ascetic, [459] and a Gûjar

cowboy is said not very long ago to have found in one of the Sahâranpur

jungles the image of the goddess Sâkambarî Devî, which now attracts

large numbers of worshippers. The Mahârâja of Balrâmpur some time ago

noticed a rude shrine of Bijleswarî Devî, the goddess of lightning,

and remarked that he would build a handsome temple in honour of her,

were it not for the sacred banyan tree which shaded it and prevented

the erection of the spire to the proper height. That very night the

tree was uprooted by a hurricane, and a handsome temple was erected,

this manifestation of her power having made the goddess more popular

than ever. [460]

Mistakes are, however, sometimes made. This was the case some time

ago at Ajudhya, where certain images were discovered and worshipped,

until a learned Pandit ascertained that they were actually the deities

of the aboriginal Bhars, who used to sacrifice Brâhmans to them. They

were really Jaina images, but it is needless to say that their worship

was immediately abandoned. [461]

As is only natural, shrines which have been discovered in this way at

the outset rest under a certain degree of suspicion, and have to make

their reputation by works of healing and similar miracles. If they

fail to do so they sink into disrepute. Such was the case with a very

promising shrine, supposed to be that of the saint Ashraf 'Ali, whose

bones were found accidentally not long ago at Ahraura in the Mirzapur

District. It enjoyed considerable reputation for a time, but failing

to maintain its character, was finally discredited and abandoned.

Continuous respect is naturally accorded to ancient saints and local

godlings, who have long since established their claim to recognition

by a series of exhibitions of their thaumaturgic virtues. But the

competition is so keen and the pecuniary value of a successful

institution of this kind so considerable, that the claims of any

interloper must be well tested and approved before it establishes

its position and succeeds in attracting pilgrims.

The Curing of Barrenness.

Barrenness is in popular belief mainly due to the agency of evil

spirits. Sterile women were in Rome beaten with rods by the naked

youths who ran through the city at the Lupercalia. The barren,

as Shakespeare says, "Touched by this holy chase, shake off their

sterile curse." In Bombay it is believed that the cause of not

getting children is that the man or his wife must have killed a

serpent in their former birth, whose spirit haunts them and makes the

woman barren. To get rid of the spirit which causes sterility, the

serpent's image is burnt and its funeral rites are performed. [462]

The desire for male offspring is so intense that some of these shrines

do a thriving trade in providing nostrums for this purpose.

One extraordinary method of procuring children, which long troubled

our magistrates in Upper India, was for the would-be mother to burn

down the hut of some neighbour. The Panjâbi woman, who under the reign

of British law is prevented from burning the house of her neighbour,

now takes a little grass from seven thatches and burns it. [463]

In another form of the charm the Khândh priest takes the woman to

the confluence of two streams, sprinkles water over her to purify her

from the dangerous influence of the spirit and makes an offering to

the god of births.

Some special influence has been in many lands considered to attach

to a person who has been publicly executed, and to the appliances

used by the hangman.

Recently at an execution in Bombay, the hangman was observed to

carefully secure the rope, and particularly that part of it which had

encircled the neck of the culprit. He stated that he could sell every

quarter inch of it, as it averted evil spirits and ghosts, and even

prevented death from hanging. This idea accounts for the respect paid

throughout Europe to the mandrake, which is supposed to be generated

from the droppings of the brain of a thief on the gallows. In Cornwall

a wen or strumous swelling can be cured by touching it with the hand

of a man who has been publicly hanged. [464] According to the same

principle, barren women in India bathe underneath a person who has

been hanged, and women of the middle classes try to obtain a piece

of the wood of the gallows for the same object.

Another practice depends upon the principle that creeping under

a bent tree or through a perforated stone expels the demon. Other

instances of this will be given in another place. Hence in Gujarât,

when an ascetic of the Dûndiya sect dies, women who seek the blessing

of a son try to secure it by creeping under the litter on which his

corpse is removed. [465]

A rite carried out with the same object rests on a sort of symbolic

magic indicating fertility. Along the roads may often be seen trees

almost destroyed by a noxious creeper known as the Akâsh Bel. Women

in hope of offspring often transplant this from one tree to another,

and are thus a decided nuisance to a district officer with a taste

for arboriculture.

But the most approved plan is to visit a shrine with a reputation for

healing this class of malady. There the patient is given a cocoanut,

which is a magic substance, a fruit, or even a barley-corn from the

holy of holies. Mr. Hartland has recently made an elaborate study of

this subject, and he points out the principle on which the eating of

such substances produced the desired effect. "Whether from an analogy

between the normal act of impregnation and that of eating and drinking,

or because savages had learnt that at least one mode of operating

effectively on the organism, for purposes alike of injury and healing,

was by drugs taken through the mouth, this was the favourite method

of supernatural impregnation."

And again--"Flowers, fruit and other vegetables, eggs, fishes,

spiders, worms, and even stones, are all capable of becoming human

beings. They only await absorption in the shape of food, or in some

other appropriate manner, into the body of a woman, to enable the

metamorphosis to be accomplished." [466]

The same idea constantly occurs in Indian folk-lore. The barren queen

is given the juice of a pomegranate by a Faqîr, or the king plucks one

of the seven mangoes which grow on a special tree, or a beggar gives

the princess the drug which causes her to give birth to twins. [467]

Even in the Râmâyana we read that Râja Dasaratha divides the oblation

among his wives and they conceive. Even nowadays in Florence, if a

woman wishes to be with child, she goes to a priest and gets from

him an enchanted apple, with which she repairs to Saint Anna, who

was the Lucina of Roman times, and repeats a prayer or a spell. [468]

Some holy men, it must be admitted, do not escape the tongue of

slander for their doings in this department of their business.

Harmless Saints and Godlings.

Most of these saints and godlings whom we have been considering, are

comparatively harmless, and even benevolent. Such is nearly always

the case with the ghosts of the European dead, who are constantly

deified. Perhaps because the Sâhib is such a curiously incomprehensible

personage to the rustic, he is believed to retain his powers in the

other world. But it is a remarkable and unconscious tribute to the

foreign ruler that his ghost should be beneficent.

The gardener in charge of the station cemetery in Mirzapur some time

ago informed me that he constantly sees the ghosts of the ladies and

gentlemen buried there coming out for a walk in the hot summer nights,

and that they never harm him.

But with ordinary graves it is necessary to be cautious. As appears

in the cycle of tales which turn on the magic ointment which enables

the possessor to see the beings of the other world, spirits hate being

watched. The spirit, for instance, often announces its wishes. When

the Emperor Tughlaq began to build the tomb of the Saint Bahâwal

Haq, a voice was heard from below, saying, "You are treading on my

body." Another site was chosen at a short distance, and the voice

said, "You are treading on my knees." He went a little further,

and the voice said, "You are treading on my toes." So he had to go

to the other end of the fort, and as the voice was not heard there,

the tomb was built. If you visit an old tomb, it is well to clap

your hands, as the ghost sometimes revisits its resting-place, and

if discovered in déshabille, is likely to resent the intrusion in a

very disagreeable manner. So it is very dangerous to pollute a tomb

or insult its occupant in any way, and instances have occurred of

cases of epilepsy and hysteria, which were attributed to the neglect

of these precautions.

Thus, there is nothing permanent, no established rule of faith in the

popular belief of the rustic. Discredited saints and shrines are always

passing into contempt and oblivion; new worthies are being constantly

canonized. The worst part of the matter is that there is no official

controller of the right to deification, no Advocatus Diaboli to dispute

the claims of the candidate to celestial honours. At the same time the

system, though often discredited by fraud, admirably illustrates the

elastic character of the popular creed. Hinduism would hardly be so

congenial to the minds of the masses, if some rigid supervising agency

disputed the right of any tribe to worship its hero, of any village

to canonize its local worthy. The steady popularity of the system,

for the present at least, shows that it satisfactorily provides for

the religious wants of the people.