Lieut. -Colonel Tod on the Religious Eslallisliments of Mi-war. 293 



and Kaniya, is highly prejudicial to society. Moses appointed but six cities 

 of refuge to the whole Levite tribe ; but the Rana has assigned inore to the 

 shrine of Crishna alone than the entire possessions of that branch of the 

 Israelites, who had but forty-two cities, while Kaniya has forty-six. The 

 motive of such sanctuary in Rajast'han was originally the same as that of 

 the divine legislator ; but it has been corrupted and abused, and the most 

 notorious criminals deem the temple their best safeguard. Yet some princes 

 have been found iiardy enough to violate, though indirectly, the sacred sirna. 

 Zalim Sing of Kotah, a zealot in all the observances of religion, had the 

 boldness to draw the line when selfish priestcraft interfered with his police ; 

 and though he would not demand the culprit, or sacrilegiously drag him 

 from the altar, he has forced him theuce by prohibiting the admission of 

 food, and threatening to build up the door of the temple. It was thus the 

 Greeks evaded the laws, and compelled the criminal's surrender by kindling 

 fires around the sanctuary. The towns of Kaniya did not often abuse their 

 privilege ; but the author once had to interpose, where a priest of Eklinga 

 had harboured a murderer when on the point of being secured. The priest 

 so far respected the wishes of the Rana as to induce the man to quit the 

 asylum : but as the example was pernicious, and Pahona, the town within 

 whose bounds the murder had been committed, had been gained by a forged 

 grant, the author wilfully incurred the award for resuming church land (a 

 sixty-thousand years' residence in hell) and recommended that Pahona (of 

 eight thousand rupees annual revenue) should be reunited to the fisc. The 

 unusual occurrence created a sensation, but it was so indisputably just that 

 not a voice was raised in opposition. 



Let us now revert to the endowments of Nat'hdwara. Herodotus furnishes 

 a powerful instance of the estimation is which sacred offerings were held by 

 the nations of antiquity. He observes that these were transmitted from the 

 remotest nations of Scythia to Delos* in Greece ; a range far less extensive 

 than the offerings to the temple {dewal) of Crishna in Mewar. The spices 

 of the isles of the Indian archipelago; the balmy spoils of Araby the blest; 

 the nard, or frankincense of Tartary ; the raisins and pistachios of Persia ; 



• 



Apollo was the object adored in Delos, as at Nat'hdwara. Numerous Greek proper names 

 can have Sanscrit derivations ; and for Delos we have Dewal-es, i. e. " temple of the God."' 

 Such is the origin of Debeil (corrupted from Dtvoal, the temple), the capital of Lower Sinde. 

 The numerous Delwaras (sometimes written Dull) have tlic same etymology. Dmahmia, i. e. 

 " the place of the temple." 



