Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India.djvu/413

Rh absorbed in meditation, he was startled by an extra-ordinary spectacle. He saw before him a deep and apparently bottomless pit. Around its edge some unhappy men were hanging suspended by ropes of grass, at which here and there a rat was nibbling. On asking their history, he discovered to his horror that they were his own ancestors compelled to hang in this unpleasant manner, and doomed eventually to fall into the abyss, unless he went back into the world, did his duty like a man, married a suitable wife, and had a son, who would be able to release them from their critical predicament." This legend is recorded in detail in the Mahābhārata. A curious mock marriage ceremony is celebrated amongst Brāhmans when an individual marries a third wife. It is believed that a third marriage is very inauspicious, and that the bride will become a widow. To prevent this mishap, the man is made to marry the arka plant (Calotropis gigantea), and the real marriage thus becomes the fourth. If this ceremony is carried on in orthodox fashion, it is generally celebrated on some Sunday or Monday, when the constellation Astham is visible. The bridegroom and a Brāhman priest, accompanied by a third Brāhman, repair to a spot where the arka plant (a very common weed) is growing. The plant is decorated with a cloth and a piece of string, and symbolised into the sun. The bridegroom then invokes it thus: — " Oh! master of three lōks, Oh! the seven-horsed, Oh! Rāvi, avert the evils of the third marriage." Next the plant is addressed with the words: — "You are the oldest of the plants of this world. Brahma created you to save such of us as have to marry a third time, so please become my wife." The Brāhman who accompanies the bridegroom becomes his father-in-law for the moment, and says to him: — " I give you in marriage