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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 







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the: four- headed and many-armed god hanuman in the: 

 temple oe kankroli: rajputana 



This weird guardian and protector of the marble dam at Lake Raj 

 Samand is richly decorated with gold and in colors. 



icles of Raj Singh reads : "That instead 

 of rain a pestilential vapor blew from 

 the west. The streams dried up, fishes 

 became extinct. Cities were depopulated, 

 the seed of families lost. Trees were 

 stripped of their bark and eaten. Foul 

 things unknown as food were devoured. 

 . . . Then the hope of all was lost, 

 for man ate man." 



Lake Raj Samand is not only a monu- 

 ment to the thousands who perished, but 

 literally the water of life to the gener- 

 ations of the future. 



The construction of these lake dams 

 shows prevision and a knowledge of the 

 difference between perpetual springs and 



others in this region 

 w h i c h have been 

 known to disappear 

 suddenly, sucked into 

 the vortex of under- 

 ground rivers, such as 

 the Sarasvati, that 

 mysterious stream 

 which loses itself for 

 all time under the 

 sands of the Rajpu- 

 tana Desert. 



marble: raised by 

 incunkd planes 



These royal build- 

 ers must have inher- 

 ited, too, in no small 

 degree, the construc- 

 tive art of their Indo- 

 J Aryan forebears, to 

 have combined scenic 

 effects of surpassing 

 beauty with practical 

 benefit to the race. 

 The engineering feats 

 which converted these 

 vast arid wastes into 

 fertile rice and graz- 

 ing fields inspire 

 additional admiration 

 when it is borne in 

 mind that the work 

 was done by hand 

 labor, dynamite for 

 blasting and derricks 

 being unknown in 

 that day. 



When heavy blocks 

 of marble were to be 

 carried to great 

 heights, inclined planes were used, as in 

 the case of the "wagon"-shaped stones on 

 the top of the Dravidian temples of 

 southern India, which were raised to 

 their present position by inclined planes 

 four miles long, constructed of stout 

 bamboo. 



This part of Mewar seems an enchanted 

 region, for in the cold season — that is, 

 cold at night and in the early morning — 

 a curious phenomenon occurs, which the 

 people call see kote, or "winter castles." 

 The lakes, the marble dams, mountain 

 palaces, temples, fortresses, and the blue 

 tent-like Aravallis appear high up in the 

 cloudless ether. The visions differ some- 



