IN THE IS! AND OF ELEPHANT A. 433 



r was of the human size, the figure in question 

 would bear the proper proportion as an infant ; but 

 as he is of enormous magnitude, a human being, full 

 ■grown, would appear but an infant by the side of 

 him ; and thus it is, I imagine, that people have 

 been deceived : a ca.^;e by no means uncommon in 

 circumstances like the present. 



The sitting male and female figures, having a bull 

 rouchirg at the feet of the former, are Siva and his 

 Goddess; and thus are they represented in the pago- 

 das of the present da- . 



No person can mistake the figure with the human 

 body and elephant's head for any other than Gan e'sa, 

 the Hindu God of Wisdom, and the first born of 

 Siva; and thus is he represented at present. 



From what has been advanced, it will appear in- 

 comestible, I imagine; that this is a Hindu temple ; 

 whence the Lingam is a testimony sufficient of Siva's 

 having presided here, without the other evidences 

 which the intelligent in the Hindu mythology will 

 have discovered in the course of this account. 



To deduce the aera of the fabrication of this struc- 

 ture is not so easy a task; but it was, no doubt, pos- 

 terior to the great schism in the Hindu religion, 

 which, according to the Puranas, 1 learn, happened 

 at a period coeval with our date of the creation. Be 

 this as it may, we have accounts of powerful princes 

 who ruled this part of the country of a later date, 

 particularly of one who usurped the government in 

 the ninetieth year of the Christian sera, famed for a 

 passion for architecture* Many worse hypothesis have 



Vol. IV, V been, 



