417 



any other purpose required; no time remaining for him to attend 

 to husbandry or lo provide for his family, it is but just he should 

 be maintained at the public expense; this is also lo be applied to 

 the washerman and the smith, who work for the village, without any 

 other emolument. In some places, particularly in Mysore, there 

 is an appropriation of grain lo ihe saktis, or destructive spirits; and 

 perhaps to many other deities who may be the objects of hope or 

 fear in the worship of the villagers. 



The occupation of massaulchee, or torch-bearer, although gene- 

 rally allotted to the village barber, in the purgunnas under my 

 charge, may vary in other districts. The massaul, or torch, in In- 

 dia, is composed of coarse rags, rolled up lo the size of an Eng- 

 lish flambeau, eighteen or twenty inches long, fixed in a brass 

 handle: this is carried in the left hand; in ihe right the massaul- 

 chee holds a brass vessel containing the oil, with which he feeds 

 the flame as occasion requires. By these means a bright extensive 

 light is kept up. A great number of torch-bearers are assembled 

 at the Hindoo festivals, especially weddings; they give a brilliant 

 effect to the spectacle, and illustrate the parable of the ten virgins. 

 It is introduced in another place, though not for the purpose of 

 mentioning the mode of supplying the oil, which is thus clearly 

 ascertained. The wise virgins took oil in the vessels with their 

 lamps; the foolish omitting that necessary store, their vessels failed 

 them when they most needed a supply. I have sometimes, during 

 a midnight journey in the ravines and nullahs between Baroche 

 and Dhuboy, infested by wild beasts, and wilder men, been in a 

 perilous situation from a failure of oil in a tract where there were 

 no villages to replenish the vessels. 



VOL. II. 3 h 



