SACRED BABOONS. 



'33 



forbearance ; but the worshippers of Brahm have, be- 

 sides, been taught to regard certain species of the brute 

 creation as half divine, and, consequently, altogether 

 inviolate and entitled to the active charity of every true 

 believer, the most privileged of the zoological demi- 

 gods being the bhunder baboon (Papio Rhesus), the 

 Honuman (Semnopithecus entellus\ the Brahmin cow, 

 the pigeon, and the common crocodile. In Hindostan 

 the public spirit of wealthy philanthropists rarely rises 

 above the orthodox conservatism of the national mind ; 

 bequests are not devoted to public improvements, but 

 rather to the maintenance in statu quo of incorporated 

 societies and multitudes of secular and clerical mendi- 

 cants; and Sir Emerson Tennent estimates that the 

 produce of fully ten per cent, of all the stipends of a 

 most charitable population of one hundred and sixty 

 millions is consecrated to the support of lazy or mis- 

 chievous brutes. The Dheva-Ghee, or purveyance sys- 

 tem for necessitous animals, comprises some forty or 

 fifty hospitals and several hundred food-dispensaries, 

 some of them large enough to maintain a brigade of 

 able-bodied Sepoys. All the Brahmin temples of the 

 Bengal Presidency feed pigeons ; many of them both 

 pigeons and cows. Cows and monkeys enjoy the free- 

 dom of several wealthy cities, are permited to camp 

 in the streets and help themselves to whatever garbage 

 and surplus fruit the market affords. Near Benares 

 there are enclosed tanks where sacred crocodiles are 



