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RELICS OF POPULAR SUPERSTITIONS. 



power to save it. He had seen tMs elephant in Ceylon when 

 driven by its hunters into the trap prepared for it, and had given 

 it liberty by drawing out the stakes which prevented its escape.* 

 Trusting to the grateful sagacity of this noble animal, he threw 

 himself, with his face upward, before the sleeping boy in the road of 

 the idol's chariot, an action which the Brahmins saw without dis- 

 pleasure or surprise, as believers expect honour on earth and immor- 

 tality in heaven from its touch. Not a breath was heard among the 

 spectators, and the music sunk into the softest sound of the flutes 

 used to charm the rock-serpent and cobra-capella, lest it should 

 disturb the sleeper ; but when the wheels had rolled within a foot 

 pace, the elephant suddenly paused, fixed his mild eyes on his for- 

 mer benefactor, and raising the nearest wheel with his trunk, pass- 

 ed him and his slumbering boy in safety. A long and deep cry 

 escaped the crowd, the lamps were suddenly extinguished, and 

 Ibrahim felt himself raised from the earth, muffled in his shawl, 

 and conveyed away in a kind of litter. He began to fear that his 

 rashness had only changed the child's fate and his own into a more 

 lingering misery, as the Brahmins profess to believe that those 

 whom their divinity passes without a touch, are reprobated for 

 ever. Many hours and many changes in his conveyance passed 

 before the veil was taken from his eyes. They beheld 'a stupen- 

 dous chamber resting on columns of rock illuminated by a thou- 

 sand lamps. The flat roof, the turbaned capitals of the pillars, 

 and the three-formed god, whose face sparkled with jewels amongst 

 a crowd of inferior images, informed him that he stood in the 

 cavern temple of Elephanta ; and the linen scarfs and zenaai'sf 

 worn by those who surrounded him, announced the highest order 

 of Brahma's priests. One of superior stature and aspect held the 

 hand of a woman covered with a silver veil, and addressed Ibra- 

 him in these words — 



* A modern traveller says, the elephant-kraal, or trap, resembles a funnel, 

 several hundred feet in length, and divided into three chambers, the last and 

 smallest of which is guarded by strong posts or stakes driven into the ground, 

 and men holding bundles of lighted straw. Two tame elephants are usually 

 employed to lead the captive out, oppresssing him with all their weight, and 

 sometimes beating him with their trunks, while his groans and resistance ex- 

 press his indignation. 



t The zenaar, or Brahminical thread, is composed of three cotton threads, 

 each forty-eight yards long, twisted together, folded, and thrown over the 

 left shoulder. 



