the best example of the Muhammadan sacred fire is that at the Imâmbâra at Gorakhpur. There it was first started by a renowned Shiah Faqîr, named Roshan 'Ali, and has been maintained unquenched for more than a hundred years, a special body of attendants and supplies of wood being provided for it. There seems little reason to believe that the fire is a regular Muhammadan institution; it has probably arisen from an imitation of the customs of the Hindu Jogis.

It is respected both by Hindus and Musalmâns, and as in the case of the fires of the same kind, maintained by many noted Jogis, its ashes have a reputation as a cure for fever. We shall meet with the same belief of the curative effects of the ashes of the sacred fire in the case of the Holi. The ashes of the Jogi's fire form a part of many popular charms. In Italy, the holy log burnt on Christmas Eve, which corresponds to the Yule log of the North of Europe, is taken with due observances to the Faunus, or other spirits of the forest.' In Ireland part of the ashes from the bonfire on the 24th of June is thrown into sown fields to make their produce abundant. The ceremony of strewing ashes on the penitent on Ash Wednesday dates from Saxon times. A modern Muhammadan of the advanced school has endeavoured to rationalize the curative effect of the ashes of the Gorakhpur fire by the suggestion that it is the potash in it which works the cure, but probably the element of faith has much to do with it.1

VOLCANIC FIRE; WILL-O'-THE-WISP.

Fire of a volcanic nature is, as might be expected, regarded with veneration. Such is the fire which in some places in Kashmîr rises out of the ground.'

The meteoric light or Shahâba is also much respected. In Hoshangâbâd there is a local godling, known as Khapra

'Leland, "Etruscan Roman Remains," 103.

2 "Folk-lore," iv. 359.

3 Dyer, "Popular Customs," 92.

"North Indian Notes and Queries," i. 199.

Hugel, "Travels," quoted by Jarrett, "Ain-i-Akbari," ii. 314.

Bâba, who lives on the edge of a tank, and is said to appear in the darkness with a procession of lights.' In Rohilkhand and the western districts of Oudh, one often hears of the Shahâba. In burial-grounds, especially where the bodies of those slain in battle are interred, it is said that phantom armies appear in the night. Tents are pitched, the horses are tethered, and lovely girls dance before the heroes and the Jinn who are in their train. Sometimes some foolish mortal is attracted by the spectacle, and he suffers for his foolhardiness by loss of life or reason. Sometimes these ignes fatui mislead the traveller at night, as Robin Goodfellow "misleads night wanderers, laughing at their harm," or the Cornish piskies, who show a light and entice people into bogs. There appears to be in Northern India no trace of the idea which so widely appears in Europe, that such lights are the souls of unbaptized children."

THE TOMB FETISH.

Next comes the respect paid to the cairn which covers the remains of the dead or is a mere cenotaph commemorating a death. We have already seen instances of this in the pile of stones which marks the place where a tiger has killed a man, and in the cairns in honour of the jungle deities, or the spirits which infest dangerous passes. The rationale of these sepulchral cairns is to keep down the ghost of the dead man and prevent it from injuring the living. We see the same idea in the rule of the old ritual, that on the departure of the last mourner, after the conclusion of the funeral ceremony, the Adhvâryu, or officiating priest, should place a circle of stones behind him, to prevent death overtaking those who have gone in advance.*

2

The primitive grave-heap grows into the cairn, and the

1 "Settlement Report," 121.

North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 117; Hunt, "Popular Romances," 81; Campbell, "Popular Tales," ii. 82.

3 Conway, "Demonology," i. 225.

Rajendra Lâla Mitra, "Indo-Aryans," i. 146.

cairn into the tomb or Stúpa.' In the way of a tomb Hindus will worship almost anything. The tomb of an English lady is worshipped at Bhandâra in the Central Provinces. At Murmari, in the Nâgpur District, a similar tomb is smeared with turmeric and lime, and people offer cocoanuts to it in the hope of getting increased produce from their fields. The tomb of an English officer near the Fort of Bijaygarh in the Aligarh District was,,when I visited the place some years ago, revered as the shrine of the local village godling. There is a similar case at Râwalpindi. There is a current tale of some people offering brandy and cigars to the tomb of a European planter who was addicted to these luxuries in his lifetime, but no one can tell where the tomb actually exists."

MISCELLANEOUS FETISHES.

We have already referred to the Sâlagrâma fetish. Akin to this is the Vishnupada, the supposed footmark of Vishnu, which is very like the footmark of Hercules, of which Herodotus speaks."

There is a celebrated Vishnupada temple at Gaya, where the footprint of Vishnu is in a large silver basin under a canopy, inside an octagonal shrine. Pindas or holy balls and various kinds of offerings are placed by the pilgrims inside the basin and around the footprint. It was probably derived from the footmark of Buddha, which is a favourite subject in the early Buddhistic sculptures. Dr. Tylor, curiously enough, thinks that it may have some connection with the footmarks of extinct birds or animals imprinted on the strata of alluvial rocks."

1

Ferguson, "Tree and Serpent Worship," 88; "History of Indian Architecture," 60; Cunningham, "Bhilsa Topes," 9; Spencer, " Principles of Sociology," i. 254 sq.

2 "Central Provinces Gazetteer," 63; "Panjâb Notes and Queries," ii. 8; "North Indian Notes and Queries," ii. 93.

3 iv. 82.

Monier-Williams, "Hinduism and Brâhmanism," 309.

5 Tennent, "Ceylon, ii. 132; Ferguson, "Indian Architecture, 184, with engraving; Tylor, "Early History," 116.