Page:Wanderings of a Pilgrim Vol 1.djvu/152

 infinite good: fortunately, she has no children. And these are the people called in Europe the "mild inoffensive Hindoos!"

The woman was mistress of a good house and about 800 rupees; the brothers of her deceased husband would, after her destruction, have inherited the property.

The burning of the widow is not commanded by the shāstrs: to perform suttee is a proof of devotion to the husband. The mountain Himalaya, being personified, is represented as a powerful monarch: his wife, Mena; their daughter is called Parvuti, or mountain-born, and Doorga, or difficult of access. She is said to have been married to Shiv[)u] in a pre-existing state when she was called S[)u]tēē. After the marriage, Shiv[)u] on a certain occasion offended his father-in-law, King D[)u]ksh[)u], by refusing to make sālām to him as he entered the circle in which the king was sitting.

To be revenged, the monarch refused to invite Shiv[)u] to a sacrifice which he was about to perform. S[)u]tēē, the king's daughter, however, was resolved to go, though uninvited and forbidden by her husband. On her arrival, D[)u]ksh[)u] poured a torrent of abuse on Shiv[)u], which affected S[)u]tēē so much that she died.

In memory of this proof of great affection, a Hindoo widow burning with her husband on the funeral-pile, is called a S[)u]tēē.

The following passages are from the Hindoo Shāstrs:—

"There are 35,000,000 hairs on the human body. The woman who ascends the pile with her husband, will remain so many years in heaven."

"As the snake draws the serpent from its hole, so she, rescuing her husband (from hell), rejoices with him."

"The woman who expires on the funeral-pile of her husband, purifies the family of her mother, her father, and her husband."

"So long as a woman, in her successive transmigrations, shall decline burning herself, like a faithful wife, on the same fire with her deceased lord, so long shall she not be exempted from springing again to life in the body of some female animal."

"There is no virtue greater than a chaste woman burning