Page:Sushruta Samhita Vol 1.djvu/375

Chap.XXIX.] sent on a different errand and incidentally calling at a physician's house, or one who has quarrelled on the road, or messengers who come riding on camels, donkeys or in carts, or on foot in one unbroken line, should be looked upon as inauspicious messengers.

Similarly, messengers, who call at the house of a physician, holding in their hands a rope, club, or any other weapon, or who come dressed in black, red, yellow, wet, dirty or torn garments, or with the upper sheets placed or arranged on their right shoulders (Apasavya), or clad in single cloths without such upper sheets on, as well as those, who are possessed of additional or smaller number of limbs, or look disturbed and agitated, or whose bodies are in any way mutilated or such, as look fierce and haughty, or speak in a rough and harsh tone, or utter any term implying death, should be regarded as augurs of evil.

Likewise, a messenger, tearing off a blade of grass or a chip of wood with his fingers, or handling the tip of his nose or the nipples of his breast, or pulling the ends of his cloth or hair, or the ring-finger of his hand, or brushing his nails and hair, or standing with his fingers in his ears or nostrils, or waiting with his hands placed on his cheeks, chest or head, or about the regions of the arm-pits, as well as one, who has arrived at the house of the physician with bits of human skull or stone, or with ashes, bones,