ear; collects something more through his numerous disciples, who
wander over the country; and spends the whole in feeding all the
members of his fraternity (Bairagis), devotees of Vishnu, as they
pass his temple in their pilgrimages. Every one who comes is
considered entitled to a good meal and a night's lodging; and he has
to feed and lodge about a hundred a day. He is a man of very pleasing
manners and gentle disposition, and everybody likes him. He was on
his return from the town of Ludhaura,[3] where he had been, at the
invitation of the Raja of Orchha, to assist at the celebration of the
marriage of Salagram with the Tulasi,[4] which there takes place
every year under the auspices and at the expense of the Raja, who
must be present. 'Salagrams'[5] are rounded pebbles which contain the
impressions of ammonites, and are washed down into the plains of
India by the rivers from the limestone rocks in which these shells
are imbedded in the mountains of the Himalaya.[6] The Spiti valley[7]
contains an immense deposit of fossil ammonites and belemnites[8] in
limestone rocks, now elevated above sixteen thousand feet above the
level of the sea; and from such beds as these are brought down the
fragments, which, when rounded in their course, the poor Hindoo takes
for representatives of Vishnu, the preserving god of the Hindoo
triad. The Salagram is the only stone idol among the Hindoos that is
_essentially sacred_, and entitled to divine honours without the
ceremonies of consecration.[9] It is everywhere held most sacred.
During the war against Nepal,[10] Captain B------, who commanded a
reconnoitring party from the division in which I served, one day
brought back to camp some four or five Salagrams, which he had found
at the hut of some priest within the enemy's frontier. He called for
a large stone and hammer, and proceeded to examine them. The Hindoos
were all in a dreadful state of consternation, and expected to see
the earth open and swallow up the whole camp, while he sat calmly
cracking _their gods_ with his hammer, as he would have cracked so
many walnuts. The Tulasi is a small sacred shrub (_Ocymum sanctum_),
which is a metamorphosis of Sita, the wife of Rama, the seventh
incarnation of Vishnu.

This little _pebble_ is every year married to this little _shrub_;
and the high priest told me that on the present occasion the
procession consisted of eight elephants, twelve hundred camels, four
thousand horses, all mounted