A RUN THROUGH KATHIAWAR. 317 



the appearance of perspiration, on the large cold 

 marble statue to which the pilgrim's attention is 

 chiefly directed. Moreover, when a dozen of pilgrims 

 or so are collected in that cold underground apart- 

 ment, the moisture of their warm breaths will con- 

 dense upon the cold marble figure before them, just 

 as moisture condenses upon a tumbler with ice in it, 

 or on the windows of a crowded church which on the 

 outside are exposed to cold. A better illustration of 

 the effect of the Amijhara in condensing the moisture 

 conveyed into the air around it may be found in the 

 cold stone pillar of a church which has been lighted 

 and is filled by a large congregation. In a very short 

 time such a cold pillar so condenses moisture that it 

 becomes quite wet ; and this is what the Amijhara 

 must soon become when even half-a-dozen worshippers 

 are set to pray before it. It must necessarily perspire 

 very soon, or rather, present the appearance of doing 

 so ; and the more votaries there are to pray before it, 

 and the greater their excitement, the more it will 

 perspire. This is quite in accordance with all I could 

 learn in regard to the perspiring qualities of the Ami- 

 jhara ; but it is not impossible that the silver plate in 

 the arm may have something to do with an artificial 

 exudation of water, or of " nectar " of some kind, when 

 the pilgrims have been worked iip into a sufficient 

 stain of >jiiKxi religious excitement. That is very 

 likely, and is certainly fully paralleled by the coarse 

 and transparent trickery which seems to impose upon 



