BEGGARS. 
129 
so small and inconsiderable. There is one, indeed, 
which should not be passed over in silence. It is a 
handsome building, dedicated to Mahadeva or Siva. 
Within it are two statues of the divine bull, beauti- 
fully sculptured, and there is also a small brazen 
image of Surya, the Apollo of the Hindoo Pantheon, 
standing erect in his car, drawn by a horse with seven 
heads. It is upon the whole well executed, though 
the Indian artists are certainly in general far less 
successful in their casts than in their sculptured 
figures. In this temple the floors are literally co- 
vered with the sacred waters of the Ganges, from 
the quantity used at their daily offerings. Near 
the entrance, a number of lazy, fat Bramins daily 
congregate for the sole purpose of begging, and in this 
they far transcend even the mendicant friars of the 
Christian church. It is really astonishing what im- 
mense sums they annually levy upon the charitable 
and religious of their own creed, who think they do 
God service by administering to the necessities — 
which stand for debaucheries, as many of them are 
the most debauched wretches in existence — of His 
vicegerents upon earth. Alas for Braminical sanc- 
tity ! The extent to which mendicity is frequently 
carried among the Bramins in India is scarcely to be 
conceived ; and the airs of authority which these 
sturdy beggars assume are as arrogant as they are 
disgusting. Such is their ascendancy over the minds 
of the superstitious population, that they levy an 
enormous tax in this way, and from that portion 
too of the community which can with difficulty pro- 
cure the necessaries of life. In the province of Bengal 
