62 ON THE ORISSA COAST 



non- Hindu acquaintance, and to this end have secluded 

 themselves behind a high wall which may not be 

 approached. A broad road runs northward from the 

 great gate, and ends in an enclosed garden. It is 

 along this road that the devotees drag the car of 

 Jaganath when the god makes his annual visit to his 

 garden-house. For the rest, Puri is full of lodging- 

 houses for the accommodation of pilgrims, and of tanks 

 where the pilgrims cleanse their souls, often at the 

 expense of their bodies' health. At the time of our 

 visit the main streets were replete with mendicants, 

 and the bye-lanes with monkeys. 



If we could not come near the temple of Jaganath, 

 we, at anyrate, had no difficulty in seeing the remains 

 of the fine temple of the Sun at Kandrak, about 20 

 miles to the north-east of Puri. This old ruin, which 

 is black with age, stands all alone in a wide, sandy 

 plain beside the sea. It seems to have originally 

 consisted of two square halls, one of which is now 

 only a mound of fallen stones. The other, which is 

 almost intact, must be over 120 feet high, the walls 

 being about 60 feet from plinth to cornice, and the 

 equally lofty roof being built in overlapping tiers, 

 pagoda fashion, and crowned by a triple dome. In 

 each wall there is a richly-carved doorway, besides 

 which the walls and the roof are one riotous mass of 

 sculptures of gods and men and animals. But, unfor- 

 tunately, these sculptures have a consistently obscene 



