Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India.djvu/448

Brahman has dots or specks all over it. This stone, if properly worshipped, is believed to ensure to its owner prosperity and eternal life. The third, the Mutchya Murti, is a long-shaped flat stone with a vadana that gives it a resemblance to the face of a fish. It bears two chakrams, one inside and one outside the vadana, and also has specks and dots on it in the shape of a shoe. There are four or five varieties of this species, and it also, if duly worshipped, will infallibly enrich its possessor. One salagram there is which has no vadana, and is known as the ugra chakra sālagrām. It is quite round with two chakrams, but it is not a particularly safe one to possess, and is described as a ' furious sālagrāma,' for, if not worshipped with sufficient ardour, it will resent the neglect, and ruin the owner. The first thing to do on obtaining a sālagrām is to find out whether or not it is a lucky stone, for a stone that will bring luck to one owner may mean ruin for another. The tests are various; a favourite one is to place the sālagrām with its exact weight of rice together in one place for the night. If the rice has increased in the morning (and, in some cases, my informant assures me, it will be found to have doubled in quantity), then the stone is one to be regarded by its lucky holder as priceless, and on no account to be parted with. If, on the other hand, the rice measures the same, or — dreadful omen — has even become less, then let the house be rid of it as early as possible. If no purchaser can be found, make a virtue of necessity, and send it as a present to the nearest temple or mutt (religious institution), where the Gurus know how to appease the wrath of the Deity with daily offerings of fruits and flowers. A sālagrām will never bring any luck if its possession is acquired by fraud or force. The story runs that once a Brāhman, finding