S26 OR CUTTACK. 



ated widow lets herself down into a pit, at the bottom of which the dead 

 body of the husband has been previously placed with lighted faggots above 

 and beneath. The latest returns show the whole number of victims who 

 destroy themselves annually in the above revolting manner, to average at 

 from twenty to thirty for the entire district of Cuttack. 



Kfearafc. ^ ue Arka or Pad am Khetr is distinguished by its containing the remains 

 of the celebrated temple of the sun, called in our charts the black Pagoda 

 which is situated amidst the sand hills of the sea shore, near the site of the 

 old village of Kanarak, eighteen miles north of Jagannath Puri. The Jag - 

 mohan or antichamber is the only part of the building which exists in to- 

 lerably good preservation. The great tower has been shattered and 

 thrown down by some extraordinary force, either of an earthquake or light- 

 ning, and in its fall seems to have injured that side of the adjoining edifice 

 which looks towards it. A small section however still remains standing, 

 about one hundred and twenty feet in height, which viewed from a dis- 

 tance gives to the ruin a singular appearance, something resembling that 

 of a ship under sail. The whole of the outer enclosures of the temple 

 have long since disappeared, and nothing is left of the edifice called the 

 Bhog Mandap but a heap of ruin, completely buried under a sand hill. 



The black Pagoda even in its present imperfect and dilapidated con- 

 dition, presents a highly curious and beautiful specimen of the ancient 

 Hindu temple architecture, and as it has long been completely deserted, 

 we may here study at leisure and without interruption, some of the most 

 striking peculiarities of that style. 



The deity of the place is called by the vulgar Sooruj Deo (Surya), and 

 at full length, Chunder Sooruj Birinji Narayan. The origin of the wor- 

 ship of a divinity so little honored in India generally speaking, is ascribed 

 to Samba, the son of Krishna, who having been afflicted with leprosy and 

 banished from his father's Court at Dwarka, as a punishment for acciden- 



