EASTERN HINDOOSTAN. 



Pagoda. 



Splendid 

 Choultry'. 



qiieftion, he made a folemii oath before the affembly of Brab- 

 mins, that he derived really and truly his religion from the god 

 Brahma. This impofture fucceeded for a great length of time, 

 till in the year 1744? Pope BenediSi XI. detefting the fraud of 

 thefe Jefmt-Brahmins, declared their whole proceedings to be 

 impious and unlawful. 



The pagoda at Madura is among the moft fuperb in all 

 India ; 1 faw numbers of drawings made on the fpot by Lieut. 

 Pater/on, with all the wild fculptures fketched with great accu- 

 racy. The figures were cololTal, men, tigers, and elephants. 

 The tigers are as big as life, all cut on fingle ftones, fome of 

 which were not lefs than thirty-five feet long. How muft our 

 rude Druidical temple of Stone Hinge fink below this work ; fu- 

 perior in works of elegant art, and much more fo in the vaft 

 fize of the ftones, lifted up to their places, in days, as antient 

 perhaps, as thofe in which the Britons reared a boafted pile. 



]Mr. Blackadir, in the Arcbaelogia, vol. x. p. 449, gives a cu- 

 rious account of this pagoda, and of the attendant Choultry, or 

 building for the overflow of devotees. It is well known that in 

 other places choultries are the fame as Caravan/eras erected on 

 the fides of roads for the reception of travellers. It was built 

 by Trimul Naik, king of Madura. It was begun in 1623, was 

 twenty-two years in building, and coft a million fterling. It has 

 four rows of pillars, each of a fingle ftone twenty feet high. 

 The roof confirts of long ftones reaching from capital to capital; 

 every capital is carved diiferently with fome legendary tale. 

 The deity of the temple is Choc a Lingam, not prefented in an 

 obfcene form, but in that of a block, with the outline of a hu- 

 man 



