﻿OF THE HINDUS, &C. 277 



salutation to DuATRt, &c: and they immediately 

 proceed to their own repast. 



Hkre too, as in every other matter relating to 

 private morals, the Hindu legislators, and the au- 

 thors of the Puranas, have heaped together a multi- 

 tude of precepts, mostly trivial, and not unfrequently 

 absurd. Some of them relate to diet^ they prohibit 

 jnan\' sorts of food altogether, and forbid the con- 

 stant use of others ; some regard the acceptance of 

 food, which must on no account !je received if it be 

 given with one hand, nor \^itiiout a leaf or. dish; 

 some again prescribe the hour at which the two daily 

 meals Mhich are allowed, should be eaten (namely in 

 the forenoon, and in the evening) ; others teumeratc 

 the places (a boat for example) wdiere a Hindu must 

 not eat, and specify the persons (his sons and tlie 

 inmates of his house) with whom he should eat, and 

 those (his wife for instance) with whom he should 

 not. The lawgivers have been no less particular in. 

 directing the posture in which the Hindu must sit ; 

 the quarter towards which he ought to look, and the 

 precautions he should take to insulate himself, as it 

 ■were, during his meal, lest he be contaminated by 

 the touch of some undetected sinner who may be 

 present. To explain even in a cursory manner the 

 objects of all these would be tedious, but the mode 

 in which a Hindu takes his repast, conformably with 

 such injunctions as are most cogent, may be briefly 

 stated, and with this I shall close the present essay. 



After \irashing his hands and feet, and sipping 

 water without swallowing it, he sits down on a stool 

 or cushion (but not on a couch nor on a bed), be- 

 fore his plate, which must be placed on a clean spot 

 of ground that has been wiped and smoothed in a 

 quadrangular form, if he he a Bra/unaf/a ; a trian- 

 gular one, if he be a Cshatriya ; circular, if he be a 

 Vais'ya ; and in the shape of a crescent, if he belong 

 to the fourth tribe. "When the food is first brought in 

 he is required to bow to it, raising both hands in the 



T 3 form 



