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AUCUST, 1895.] SPECIMENS OF MODERN BRAHMANICAL LEGENDS.
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scaring belief seems to appear in Ovid's remark, 15 that parched grain and salt purify. If a Cumbrian girl is jilted, the youths rab her with peas straw.16 At a Corsican wedding, from the balconies girls strew flowers and grains of wheat as the bride passes,17 In old legends, Seth is said to have put three seeds in Adam's mouth,18 In Ireland, formerly when any one entered upon a public office, women in the streets and girls from the windows sprinkled him and his attendants with wheat and salt,19 On St. Agnes' Eve, in Scotland, girls go into a field, and say: - "Agnes eweet and Agnes fair, hither, hither now repair."20 In England, it was believed that straw would stop a witch. She could not step over it.21 In England, beans were sacred to the dead. They were supposed to contain the souls of the dead.23 In England, wheat used to be strewn before the bride on her way to church.23 Wheat ears are mentioned as worn with rosemary in wedding garlands in England in the six. teenth century.24 In North England, when the last sheaf is cut, a figure is raised on a pole crowned with wheat ears, and adorned with ribbons, and is carried home in triumph. It is called the kern or corn baby. Each cottage has its kern baby niade of oat cake.25 That peas are ominous or magical is sbewa by the North England saying: - "Set a peapod with nine peas over the lintel, who ever comes in first will be your husband. 26
(To be continued.)
SPECIMENS OF MODERN BRAHMANICAL LEGENDS.
BY G. K, BETHAM.
No. I. - The Mañjguni-Purána. This is a short history of the holy place of Mañigunt, known as Venkatesa-Mahatmya, and taken from the Mahápurána called Sahyadri-Khanda.
Preliminary Notes. Mañjgunt is a small village situated in the west of the Taluka, or Revenue Sub-division, of Sirsi, in the Collectorate of North Kanara, Bombay Presidency. According to the latest enumeration it contains 35 houses, and boasts of a population of 362 sonls (194 males and 168 females). It is clean and healthy and possesses good water, and it is beautifully situated near the brow of the Western Ghâts. Though but a small village, it is & place of some local importance, on account of the large temple sacred to Sri Venkataramaņa, which is located there.
The Mañjgani temple enjoys a yearly income of Rs. 1,600 from Government, which is given in lieu of the lands once attached to the temple, but now resumed. This income is supplemented by the takings of the játra, or religious fair, which is held here annually. The yearly expenditure is estimated at about Rs. 800; the outgoings being laid out on the expenses of the fair, the pay of the temple attendants — about 20 —, and the expenditore on the daily worship of the idol.
The fair is held in the month of Chaitra, the great day being the day of the full moon in that month. It commences six days before the day of the fall moon, i. e., on the tenth of Chaitra, and on that day the image of Sri-Veákataramaņa is placed on the lower tier of the smaller of his two cars, dragged down to a tank and then broaght back again. The god is thus taken every day for five days in the flower (or small) car, each day a fresh tier, or story,
15 Op. cit. ii. 20. 15 Sweet Anne Sage, a novel (1868), Vol. II. p. 248. » Brand's Popular Antiquities, VOL. III. p. 165. 91 Henderson's Folk-Lore, p. 181. 23 Dyer's Folk-Lore, p. 198. * Henderson's Folk-Lore, p. 87.
16 Henderson's Folk-Lore, p. 4. 18 Yule's Marco Polo, p. 397. 2 Dyer's Folk-Lore, p. 184. 23 Brand's Popular Antiquities, Vol. I. p. 115. 24 Knight's Shakespeare, p. 82. 26 Dyer's Folk-Lore, p. 19.
