Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 6 (Indian and Iranian).djvu/142

98 INDIAN MYTHOLOGY Vala is distinctly thrust to the background, though the epic constantly celebrates the slayer of Vala and Vrtra; Susna now appears as a Danava who was in possession of the soma. The Raksases are the more prominent fiends: they are dangerous to women during pregnancy; in the shape of dog or ape they attack women; they prowl round the bride at the wedding, so that little staves are shot at their eyes. Often, though human in figure, they are deformed, three-headed, five-footed, four-eyed, fingerless, bear-necked, and with horns on their hands. They are both male and female; they have kings and are mortal. They enter man by the mouth when he is eating or drinking; they cause madness; they surround houses at night, braying like donkeys, laughing aloud, and drinking out of skulls. They eat the flesh of men and horses and drink the milk of cows by their magic power as ydtudhdnas, or wizards. Their time is the coming of night, especially at the dark period of new moon; but in the east they have no power, for the rising sun dispels them. The Pisacas are now added to the numbers of demons as a regular tribe: they eat the corpses of the dead; they make the living waste away and dwell in the water of the villages. Magic is used both against Pisacas and against Raksases, the latter of whom are especial enemies of the sacrifice, and against whom magic circles, fire, and imprecations of all kinds are employed. More abstract are the Aratis, or personifications of illiberality. Other spirits, like Arbudi in the Atharvaveda, can be made to help against an enemy in battle. A few individual names of demons are new, and although Makha, Araru, Sanda, and Marka (the Asuras' purohitas) are all ancient, a vast number are added by the Grhya Sutras — Upavlra, Saundikeya, Ulukhala, Malimluca, Dronasa, Cyavana, Alikhant, Animisa, Kirhvadanta, Upasruti, Haryaksa, Kumbhin, Kurkura, and so forth. None of these has individual character: the spirits of evil which surround human beings at every moment, and particularly at times like marriage, child-birth, the leaving of a