IS'ote on the defaced Statues of the Jains. 



[April 



Jaina colossal statue of Gomuta Rai/a on the rock of Srava7i Be^gola, 

 in Mysore, saiM to be 70 feet 3 inches in hei^iht is of granite. The 

 Duke of Wellington, who visifed it, was of ouini n that the rock had 

 been cut down until nolhiug but the image remained. This opinion 

 I found corroborated by the testimony of the pnVsts and natives of the 

 locality, and the truncated «hape of the rock on the summit. The 

 jealousy of the Yaitis permitted only a cursory examination cf the base, 

 which has every appearance of having been cut down to the "plane on 

 which it rests, and was probably one of those prodigious blocks, fre- 

 quently seen as tors and logging stones on thegrHnitic elevations of pen- 

 in^ular India. In gazing on the gigantic proportions of this colossus, 

 and the hill constituting its base, from the plain below, one cannot 

 avoid being reminded of the story of Dinocrates the sculptor, proposing 

 to cut dow n mount Athos into a stupendous statue of Alexander, holding 

 a town in his left hand, and in the right a large basin to receive the 

 streams issuing from the mountains sides. 



Another Jaina statue in granite, of the same personage, though of 

 infeiior dimensions, occurs at Carculla, in Canara. It is said to be 

 thirty-eight feet in height*, and to have been sculptured A. D. 1431. 

 Both have hitherto escaped destruction, and possibly owed their safety 

 to the superstitious feeling of veneration, which objects of great mag- 

 nitude, wondrous art, or strange deviations from nature, rarely fail of 

 inducing in the minds of all Hindus, without reference to caste. 



I have already mentioned that the religious statues of the Jains are 

 either in one erect or sitting posture: they are generally naked, and in 

 attitudes betokening a state of repose, consistent with the metaphy- 

 sical ideas entertained by this sect of a state of future beatitude; or of 

 the profound abstraction and meditation on things divine, essential to 

 the perfect attainment of that state. To this circumstance, supersti- 

 tious adherence to ancient models as well as to the operation of the 

 beau ideal of Hindu sculptors, which is highly unfavourable to the 

 demonstration of the finer shades of anatomical development, and the 

 expression of mind by its action upon the features, may be mainly 

 attributed the tame and insipid character of their single statues, so 

 odious to eyes that have been accustomed to look upon the exquisite 

 productions of a Praxiteles, Chantrey, or Canova. The same causes 

 prevented the Egyptians, from rising in the art of sculpture; who, we 

 are informed by Mr. Wilkinson, even at the latest periods continued to 



• One foot less than the celebrated statue to Minerva, of ivory and gold in the Pan- 

 theon at Athens, by Phisiias, 



