ON Mount Caucasus. 523 



ark to the famous peak, called from that circum- 

 stance, Nau-banday with a cable of a prodigious 

 length, he must have built it in the adjacent coim- 

 try. Nau (a ship) and bandha (to make fast), is the 

 name of a famous peak situated in CasJimir, three 

 days journey to the north north east of the pur- 

 ganah of Z,«r. This famous place is resorted to by 

 pilgrims, from all parts of India, who scramble up 

 among the rocks to a cavern, beyond which they 

 never go. A few doves frightened with the noise^ 

 fly from rock to rock : these the pilgrims fancy to 

 be their guides to the holy place, and believe, that 

 they are the genuine offspring of the dove, which 

 Noah let out of the ark, at all events in the nume- 

 rous legends, which I have extracted from the Pii- 

 rdnas relating to Satyavrata and the ark, no- 

 mention is made of his letting out the dove : the 

 whole story I shall give in abstract. Satyavrata 

 having built the ark, and the flood increasing, it was 

 made fast to the peak of iV«7^-6a?i^//^, with a cable 

 of prodigious length. During the flood, Brahma' 

 or the creating power was asleep at the bottom of 

 the abyss : the generative power of nature, both 

 male and female, were reduced to their simplest 

 elements, the Linga and the Yoniy assumed the 

 shape of the hull of a ship since typified by the Ar- 

 ghd ; whilst the Linga became the mast.* In this 

 manner they were wafted over the deep, under the 

 care* and protection of Vishku. When the wa- 

 ters had retired, the female power of nature appear- 

 ed immediately in the character of Capoth'zvari or 

 the dove, and she was soon joined by her consort, in 

 the shape of Capotes' lOara. 



The mountains of Coh-S'uleiman are sometimes 

 called by the natives the mountains of the dove : the 



* Maha'-de'va is sometimes represented standing erect in the mid- 

 dle of the Arghd in the room of the mast. 



2 L 2 whole 



