146 THE HIGHLANDS OF CENTRAL INDIA. 



He is the great First Cause of all things, but himself 

 endowed with neither form nor moral qualities. He is 

 unrepresented, and receives no adoration. A Hindu will 

 accurately describe all the gods of his pantheon ; but of 

 Bhagwan he has no idea, except that he is the great Creator. 

 He is, in fact, that " Unknown God " whom humanity has 

 never yet learned to approach save through the medium of 

 some human or anthropomorphous substitute. 



I have not yet touched on the religion of the Korkus. It 

 is, I think, purer than that of the Gonds. The powers of 

 nature are equally adored, such as the Tiger God, the Bison 

 God, the Hill God, the Deities of Small-pox and Cholera. But 

 these ^are all secondary to the Sun and the Moon, which, 

 among this branch of the Kolarian stock as among the Kols 

 in the far East, are the principal .objects of adoration. I have 

 seen nothing resembling Fetichism among them ; and if, 

 as some consider, that is the earliest form in which the 

 religion of savages developes itself, the Korkus would seem in 

 this respect to have advanced a stage beyond the Gonds. The 

 sun and the figure of a horse (a Scythian emblem of the sun) 

 are carved on wooden posts, and receive sacrifices. They also 

 sacrifice to the manes of their dead, but only for a certain 

 period, to "lay" them. Belief in sorcery and witchcraft is 

 not so prevalent among them as with the Gonds and Bygas. 

 Their semi-Hindu chiefs have accepted Siv& and his com- 

 panions ; but the common Korkus seem to care little about 

 them, excepting in the immediate neighbourhood of his great 

 shrine in the Mahddeo hills. A few glorified heroes receive 

 attention, but not to nearly so great an extent as among the 

 G6nds. 



In disposing of the dead, the aboriginal tribes all appear 

 to have formerly practised burial ; but those who have been 



