JUDAS MACCABEUS JUGGLERS. 



269 



the Epistle o/St Jude, though the name in the Greek 

 is the same in both instances. 



JUDAS MACCABEUS. See Jews. 



JUDAS' TREE, (cercis Canadensis), a small tree, 

 remarkable for the beauty of its rose-coloured flowers, 

 which, appearing in a profusion before the develop- 

 ment of the leaves, render it, on a distant view, very 

 similar in appearance to a peach tree in blossom. 

 The structure of the flowers, however, is widely dif- 

 ferent, and places it in the natural family leguminosee, 

 The leaves are large, simple and cordate. It is found 

 only in the more southern parts of Europe and Amer- 

 ica. 



JUDGES, in Hebrew history. See Hebrews. 



JUDICA ; the fifth Sunday after Lent ; so called 

 because the primitive church began the service on 

 that day with the words Judica me, Domine (Ps. xliii. 

 '..). 



JUDITH ; widow of Manasses ; a Jewish heroine 

 of great beauty, virtue and courage, whose history 

 is given in the book which bears her name, the author 

 and age of which are unknown. The Catholic church 

 admits it into the canon, but it has been generally 

 considered apocryphal by Protestants. Judith, it is 

 well known, is represented as going out to the tent of 

 Holofernes, an Assyrian general, who was besieging 

 Bethulia, charming him with her beauty, and taking 

 advantage of the admission to his tent, thus afforded 

 her, to cut off his head, while he slept, with his own 

 sword. Some writers have given an allegorical inter- 

 pretation to this history. 



JUGERUM ; a Roman measure ; a piece of ground 

 which could be ploughed in one day by a yoke of 

 oxen ; a Roman acre, 240 feet long, 120 feet broad 

 (28,800 sq. feet). It was the unit of field-measure, 

 and divided into ^jugerum (actus quadratus) 14,400 

 Roman square feet ; ljugerum (cltma)=3QOO. Actus 

 minimus was a strip four feet wide and 120 feet long 

 = 480 Roman square feet. Twojugera were called 

 hccredium ; 100 heeredia made one centuria, and four 

 ce/ituriee (=800 jugera) one saltus. In the time of 

 the kings, two jugera were reckoned a sufficient 

 allowance for a father of a family ; at a later period, 

 seven ; 376 B. C., fifty; but, even at a still later 

 period, it was considered dishonourable for a senator 

 to possess more than 500 jugera. 



JUGGERNAUT, or JAGANATH (i.e. the lord 

 of the world) ; the most celebrated and sacred temple 

 in Hindostan, in the district of Cuttack, on the coast 

 of Orissa. The temple stands near the shore, not far 

 from the Chilka lake, in a waste, sandy tract, and 

 appears like a shapeless mass of stone. The idol is 

 a carved block of wood, with a hideous face, painted 

 black, and a distended, blood-red mouth. It is mag- 

 nificently dressed, and the appellation of Juggernaut 

 is one of the names of Vishnu, the preserver of the 

 world. (See Indian Mythology.) On festival days, 

 the throne of the image is placed on a tower sixty feet 

 high, moving on wheels, accompanied with two 

 other idols his white brother, Balaram, and his 

 yellow sister, Shubudra who likewise sit on their 

 separate thrones. Six long ropes are attached to the 

 tower, by which the people draw it along. The priests 

 and their attendants stand round the throne on the 

 tower, and occasionally turn to the worshippers, with 

 indecent songs and gestures. The walls of the tem- 

 ple and the sides of the car are also covered with 

 obscene images, in large, durable sculpture. While 

 the tower moves along, numbers of the devout wor- 

 shippers throw themselves on the ground, in order to 

 be crushed by the wheels, and the multitude shout in 

 approbation of the act, as a pleasing sacrifice to the 

 idol. In the temple, a number of prostitutes are kept 

 for the pilgrims who come there, and also several 

 consecrated bulls, which are commonly fed by the 



pilgrims with herbs. A bone of Crishna is preserved 

 in the temple as a precious relic, but shown only to a 

 few. Every year, particularly at two great festivals, 

 in March and July, the pilgrims flock in crowds to 

 the temple. It is calculated that there are at least 

 1,200,000 of them annually, of whom it is said nine 

 out of ten die on the road, of famine, hardship, ai-d 

 sickness ; at any rate, it is a well known fact that the 

 country, for miles round the sacred place, is covered 

 with human bones. Many old persons undertake the 

 pilgrimage that they may die on the holy ground. 

 Not far from the temple is a place called Golgotha 

 by the Europeans, where the corpses are thrown, and 

 dogs and vultures are always feeding on the carrion. 

 The contributions of the pilgrims amount to a consid- 

 erable revenue (about 12,000 per annum), which 

 falls to the government, after deducting the expenses 

 of the temple. The English took possession of the 

 province in 1803, and forbore to exact the contribu- 

 tion of the pilgrims, during the marquis of Welles- 

 ley's administration ; but on his departure from 

 India, the Bengal government passed an ordinance 

 for the management of the pagoda, and the taxing of 

 the pilgrims. The superintendence of the temple and 

 priests was given, in 1809, to the rajah of Kurdah, 

 with the charge of executing the old regulations. A 

 road from Calcutta to the temple has been made 

 since 1810, to which a wealthy Hindoo, rajah Suk- 

 moy Roy, contributed 16,000 sterling, on condition 

 of its being called by his name. 



JUGGLERS; men who perform, in public, tricks 

 of legerdemain. In the middle ages, the name of 

 jongleurs was given to the instrument-players who 

 accompanied the Troubadours. Afterwards these 

 performers employed themselves in tricks and games, 

 which, if Ducange's derivation of jongleur fromjocu- 

 laris, or joculator, is correct, must have been their 

 original occupation. They accompanied with drama- 

 tic action the songs which they helped to sing ; they 

 were buffoons, and united in bands, which had many 

 privileges. They formed in Paris a society, the mem- 

 bers of which dwelt together in the Rue des Jong- 

 leurs, afterwards St Julien des Menetriers. Those 

 whom we now call jugglers, men of wonderful activity, 

 and skilful equilibrists, were then distinguished by the 

 name of bateleurs, or batalores. From the accounts of 

 travellers, we know that in Hither and Farther Asia, 

 between the old Ganges and the Orontes, where the 

 limbs are very pliant, the arts of balancing, of tumb- 

 ling, and of moving the body rapidly, and with per- 

 fect regularity, are still ^reserved, and have been 

 handed down for thousands of years. Fanatical pen- 

 ances, and the excitement of religious orgies, in those 

 countries where the body is capable of the most un- 

 natural contortions, first gave rise to these tricks of 

 jugglery, which were thought to assist in atoning for 

 the past, or in predicting and determining the future. 

 Thus originated there the juggling tricks, which are 

 likewise met with among several tribes of North 

 America. Raised to an art by the Hindoos, a people 

 addicted to meditation, and fond of games, these tricks 

 became a profession, which is still exercised in its 

 highest perfection in China, on the coasts of Coro- 

 mandel, and in both peninsulas, on this side, and 

 beyond the Ganges. During the last few years, the 

 people of Europe have been able to verify the 

 accounts of the agility, the muscular strength, and 

 the suppleness in the limbs of these Hindoos, by the 

 sight of jugglers, who, from time to time, .have 

 exhibited in Britain, and the continent. 



Bottiger has proved that, in ancient times, there 

 were still more wonderful exhibitions of this kind. 

 That which appears to be the most extraordinary 

 trick of these jugglers the swallowing the sword, 

 and the catching several knives thrown quickly into 



