Page:Wanderings of a Pilgrim Vol 1.djvu/98

 A pan of water is suspended over this stone during the hottest month in the year, exactly in the same manner as over the toolsee in the sketch; and during the same month another pan is placed under the stone, in which the water is caught, and drunk in the evening as sanctified.

Ward mentions that some persons, when ill, employ a Brahmin to present single leaves of the toolsee sprinkled with red powder to the shalgram[)u], repeating incantations. A hundred thousand leaves are sometimes presented. It is said that the sick gradually recover as each additional leaf is offered. When a Hindoo is at the point of death, a Brahmin shows him the marks of the shalgram[)u], of which the sight is supposed to insure the soul a safe passage to the heaven of Vishnoo. When an Hindoo takes an oath, he places a sprig of toolsee on a brass lota, filled with the sacred water of the Ganges, and swears by Gunga-jee. If a small part of the pebble god be broken, it is committed to the river. I bought several of these stones from a Brahmin at the great Mela at Prag. I gave two old Delhi gold mohurs to a native jeweller, to make into an ornament for the forehead after a native pattern. My jemmadār took the mohurs, and, rubbing them on a shalgram[)u], gave it to me to keep, in order to compare the purity of the gold on its return when fashioned, with that of the red gold I had given the man to melt. In making fine jewellery the natives put one-fourth alloy; they cannot work gold so impure as that used by English jewellers, and contemptuously compare it to copper.

In the plate entitled "The Thug's Dice," Fig. 6 represents the shalgram[)u], shalgram, or salagrama; it is a small heavy black circular stone, rather flattened on one side, with the cornu Ammonis strongly marked upon it.

Fig. 5 is one covered by the leaves of the kala toolsee, purple-stalked basil.

No. 7 is still heavier, perfectly black and smooth, without any marks. This was the touchstone, and a little gold still remaining upon it.