In one of the smaller temples was an image of Lingam, “covered with oil and red ochre, and flowers were daily strewed on its circular top. This Lingam is larger than usual, occupying with the altar, a great part of the room. In most Ling rooms a sufficient space is left for the votaries to walk round whilst making the usual invocations to the deity (Maha Deo). This deity is much frequented by female votaries, who take especial care to keep it clean, washed, and often perfume it with oderiferous oils and flowers, whilst the attendant Brahmins sweep the apartment and attend the five oil lights and bell ringing.” This oil vessel resembled the Yoni (circular frame), into which the light itself was placed. No symbol was more venerated or more frequently met with than the altar and Ling, Siva, or Maha Deo. “Barren women constantly resort to it to supplicate for children,” says Seeley. The mysteries attended upon them is not described, but doubtless they were of a very similar character to those described by the author of the “Worship of the Generative Powers of the Western Nations,” showing again the similarity of the custom with those practised by the Catholics in France. The writer says:—“Women sought a remedy for barrenness by kissing the end of the Phallus; sometimes they appear to have placed a part of their body, naked, against the image of the saint, or to have sat upon it. This latter trait was perhaps too bold an adoption of the indecencies of Pagan worship to last long, or to be practised openly; but it appears to have been innocently represented by lying upon the body of the saint, or sitting upon a stone, understood to represent him without the presence of the energetic member. In a corner in the church of the village of St. Fiacre, near Monceaux, in France, there is a stone called the chair of St. Fiacre, which confers fecundity upon women who sit upon it; but it is necessary nothing should intervene between their bare skin and the stone. In the church of Orcival in Auvergne, there was a pillar which barren women kissed for the same purpose and which had perhaps replaced some less equivocal object.” The principal object of worship at Elora is the stone, so frequently spoken of; “the Lingam,” says Seeley, and he apologises for using the word so often, but asks to be excused, “is an emblem not generally known, but as frequently met with as the Cross in Catholic worship.” It is the god Siva, a symbol of his generative character, the base of which is usually inserted in the Yoni. The stone is of a conical shape, often black stone, covered with flowers (the _Belia_ and _Asuca_ shrubs). The flowers hang pendant from the crown of the Ling stone to the spout of the _Argha_ or _Yoni_ (mystical matrix); the same as the Phallus of the Greeks. Five lamps are commonly used in the worship at the symbol, or one lamp with five wicks. The Lotus is often seen on the top of the Ling. VENUS-URANIA.—THE MOTHER GODDESS