THE HINDU RELIGION. 87 



practice it was to destroy children.. In its origin, this 

 festival does not seem to have had any connexion 

 with the vernal equinox, nor with the close of the 

 year ; but with the close of winter and the beginning 

 of Vasania, or the hidian spring. However, it now 

 corresponds with the end of the lunar year, and the 

 approach of the equinox. 



P. 7g. The Tila sancranU, or day on which the 

 sun passes from Dhanush into the sign Macara^ is 

 the festival of the winter solstice. It must have been 

 so fixed, at the period when the Indian calendar for 

 the solar year was reformed, and the origin of the 

 ecliptick was referred to the first degree of Mesliu. 

 It derives its name from the ordained use of iila or 

 seed oi hid'ian sesamum, six different ways, in food, 

 ablutions, gifts, and offerings : or, according- to a 

 vulgar explanation, it is so called, because thence- 

 forward the days increase at the rate of a t'lla or grain 

 of sesamum in each da)^ A similar festival is regu- 

 lated by the lunar month ; and has several times 

 shifted its day. It is kept on the twelfth of the bright 

 half of Magha, according to the Vishnu d'hermottara ; 

 and on the eleventh, according to other authorities. 

 Probably it once belonged to the first day of the 

 lunar Md(rha. 



The Vdstu pujd, as an annual ceremony, is pecu- 

 liar to D'hdcd and districts contiguous to that pro- 

 vince : but is not practised in the western parts of 

 Bengal; and, so far as I am informed, is altogether 

 unknown in other parts of India. The word Vdstu 

 signifies, not the habitable earth in general, but the 

 §ite of a house or other edifices in particular. 



G4 



