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The Jaina Canon and Early Indian-Court Life
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of patterns representing wolves, steers, horses, crocodiles, birds, snakes, men, kinnaras, insects, cows, elephants, woodland creepers and lotus-plants. Behind this delightful curtain, a jewel-inlaid seat is placed, and covered with a soft mattress, over which a white cloth is spread.
After having supervised these preparations with his own eyes, the king sends for the eight chief astrologers, each of whom represents a different branch of the complicated and advanced art of ancient astrology. Having taken their bath and performed their morning rites, dressed in plain, but spotlessly clean garments, adorned with a few good ornaments of value, and carrying with them as purifiers and emblems of good augury, white rape-seed and Dūrvă grass, they appear in the Darbar hall, and hail the king with the greeting of victory. The king receives them with great respect, and they take their seats on the eight places of honour.
Only after all these preliminaries are gone through and the whole scene has arranged itself, gay with colours, graceful, and yet solemn, like an Ajantā fresco, the king sends word to the queen, inviting her to witness the consultation. She responds at once, quietly takes her place behind the curtain, and listens to the eager questions of the king and the assured answers of the wise men, till at the end they are reverentially dismissed with gifts of all varieties of eatables, flowers, garments, perfumes, ornaments and means of sustenance that will last them all their lives.
Then the king shows himself behind the Bordah to talk the event over with his consort, till she finds it the proper moment to take her leave, and retires, walking with the dignified and graceful gait of the Rājahamsa, to her own apartments.
The canonical writings of the Svetāmbara Jainas, from which the above gleanings have been taken, are said to go back, in their original shape, to the apostles of Vardhamāna Mahāvīra, whose Nirvāṇa took place in 527 B.C. Still, Jaina tradition itself admits that they have undergone various transformations, and that
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