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252
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[SEPTEMBER, 1897.
Modern Europe, air-spirits continued to be held unfriendly to man. One phase of Christianity inclined to transfer responsibility for drought, cold, floods and storm to the Prince of the Power of the Air, who was little, if at all, different from the devil. The sound of Christened Church bells drove away the storm-spirit. The Red Indians think of the Great Spirit as the wind, always invisible, but taking part in the festivals which men make in bis honour. It is the great spirit that blows like a blast through all present at a tribe meeting, filling each with the wind of sympathy and enthusiasm.72 That the storm and the whirlwind are spirits, or the abodes of spirits, is an almost universal belief. The Dyaks of Borneo think the wind is a spirit.73 The Bushmen say: "The wind was once a person, he became a bird."7 Reginald Scotts suggests that the air is believed to be the chief resort of spirits, because when spirits are seen they leave no trace. Had they been of water moistness would remain : had they been of fire something would have burned: had they been of earth, some trace would be left. The Jews believed that the souls of the evil dead wandered between the earth and the moon.76
(To be continued.)
MISCELLANEA.
30ME NOTES ON THE FOLKLORE OF THE TELUGUS.
By G. R. SUBRAMIAH PANTULU.
(Continued from p. 224.)
XXXIX.
IN days long gone by there lived on the banks of the Krishna, a crane on a silk-cotton tree. Once upon a time it beckoned a swan passing by and said:"Your body resembles mine in colour, but your beak and legs are red. I have not come across a bird of your kind till now. Who are you? What is your errand ?"
Whereupon the swan gave the following answer:-"I am a swan, I am an inhabitant of Brahma's Manasasaras. I am coming thence."
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The crane then asked what things were procurable there and what formed' the chief article of its food. To which the swan replied:-" As
these things are made by angelic hands, it is beyond my comprehension to describe the grandeur of the place; but you may hear some of the important things procurable. In and around that region are found golden earth, ambrosia, gold lotuses, heaps of pearls, clouds of perfumes, and the tree of paradise. Every object thereof is a wonder:"
HOLY STONES.
IT has been stated that naturally perforated stones (possibly artificially enlarged) exist in parts of India, the neighbourhood of Bombay and Gujarat have been cited as localities, and that people who have passed through them are supposed. to have become new-borni. e., to receive a new
When the swan informed the crane that it partook of the buds of such lotuses, the latter impatiently asked the former if any oysters were procurable there. On receiving a reply in the negative, the latter burst into a fit of laughter and said:"Why prattle of the exeellences of a place void of oysters? It is a pity you do not know the excellenees of oysters." Thus the crane put the swan to shame.
Moral:-People will talk big about the meanest things if they like them, and disparagingly of the best things if they do not like them.
NOTES AND QUERIES.
birth of the soul. Can any one state exactly where such stones are to be found, and whether they are still in common use in such a sense, as, for instance, when the Maharaja of Travancore, a Nair by birth, is made a Brahman by passing through a golden cow?
COSMOPOLITAN in P. N. and Q. 1883.
71 Gentleman's Magarine Library, "Popular Superstition," p. 107. 73 Reville's Les Religions des Peuples Non-Civilisés, Vol. I. p. 218.
1 Straits Journal, December 1878, p. 127.
18 Reginald Scott's Discovery of Witchcraft, p. 43.
74 Lang's Custom and Myth, p. 55,
Te Napier's Folklore, p. 11.
