Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 7.djvu/239

Rh silks, gold coins, jewels and other rich offerings in the interior, he walks round by the Sevaimandapam, and re-enters the Tulamandapam. He walks thrice round the scales, prostrates himself before it, bows before the priests and elderly relatives, and obtains their sanction to perform the Tulapurushadānam. He then mounts the western scale, holding Yama's and Surya's pratimās in his right and left hand respectively. He sits facing to the east on a circular heavy plank cut out of fresh jack-wood (Artocarpus integrifolia), and covered with silk. He repeats mantras (prayers) in this position. The opposite or eastern scale then receives the gold, both coined and in ingots, till it not only attains equality but touches the ground, and the scale occupied by the Mahārāja rises high. The Mahārāja then comes down, and, sitting facing to the east, places the gold, the Tulupurusha pratimā and other pratimās, with flowers, sandal paste, etc., in a basin of water, and, meditating on Brahma or the Supreme Being, he offers the contents to Brāhmans generically." Of the gold placed in the scale, one-fourth is divided among the priests who conduct the ceremony, and the remaining three-fourths are distributed among Brāhmans. For use in connection with the ceremony, gold coins, called tulabhāra kasu, are specially struck. They bear on one side the Malayālam legend Sri Padmanābha, and on the other a chank shell. In connection with the tulabhāram ceremony as performed at the temple of Kāli, the goddess of cholera and small-pox at Cranganore in the Cochin State, Mr, T. K. Gopal Panikkar writes as follows.* " When a man is taken ill of any infectious disease, his relations generally