Page:Hindu Feasts Fasts and Ceremonies.djvu/161

Rh and the succeeding new moon day, i.e., two days after that combination a great ruin will come over India. India may not be entirely depopulated or devoured by floods, but famine, pestilence, war and other miseries will reign over the whole country. This is the strong belief and November 1899 is the expected time.

What a firm hold this belief has taken possession of the Hindu mind will become plain to our readers if they refer to the Madras Mail of the 24th October last. It will be found there that an astrologer addressed the Dewan in the Mysore Representative Assembly held in October last to make provision for performing pujas (worship) to the planets and to propitiate them to avert the impending catastrophe of the year Vikari (1899 A.D.), Kaliyuga 5000. Some of the members appeared to have been seriously occupied with that matter. The Dewan promised to place the subject before the Maharajah. Eight planets, it is said, according to the astronomical calculations in this country, meet together in November 1899, in the mansion of Scorpio, and not six as the Mysore astrologer stated. Some astrologers