The Boy Travellers in the Far East, Part Third: Adventures of Two Youths in a Journey to Ceylon and India; With Descriptions of Borneo, the Philippine Islands and BurmahKnox, Thomas Wallace
General
The Boy Travellers in the Far East, Part Third: Adventures of Two Youths in a Journey to Ceylon and India; With Descriptions of Borneo, the Philippine Islands and Burmah
Knox, Thomas Wallace
East Indies -- Description and travel -- Juvenile literature
Contrary to their expectation, our friends found that the statue of the
god was only a log rudely fashioned into the shape of a human body
without arms, while the figures on each side of him had rude
representations of hands uplifted. The priests explain this deficiency
by saying that Jaganath, or "the lord of the world," has no need of
hands, as he can perform everything without their aid. Sometimes on
festival occasions they fasten golden hands to his shoulders, and adorn
him with jewels: his eyes are supposed to be of fine diamonds of
enormous value; but according to tradition one of them was stolen by a
sailor, who managed to conceal himself in the temple one night, and
since then the diamonds have been removed and bits of glass put in their
place.
The guide told them that the service of the temple consisted of a daily
offering of fruit and flowers, together with articles of food, such as
rice, butter, milk, salt, vegetables, cocoa-nuts, and the like. Four
times a day the temple is closed for the god to take his meals, and it
is hardly necessary to say that the food which has been collected is
eaten by the priests and other attendants of the place. It has been
estimated that the value of the offerings averages nearly twenty-five
dollars daily, and all of it goes to the support of the priests. In
addition to these offerings of food there are donations of money and
jewels from wealthy pilgrims, which are estimated by Mr. Hunter to
amount to more than $300,000 a year.
The pilgrims come from all parts of India to worship at this shrine:
many of them are women, and they are collected by missionaries who are
sent out from Pooree to the number of about six thousand every year.
They go all over the country, and each has his field of labor assigned
to him. He shows to the people the great advantages of a journey to the
sacred shrine, and as soon as he has collected a band of pilgrims he
starts with them for the holy spot. Most of the pilgrims are poor, and
they go on foot and beg their subsistence as they proceed. Now and then
a wealthy merchant concludes to make the pilgrimage, and he does it with
carts and wagons and a whole train of servants, and it sometimes happens
that a prince comes with dozens of elephants, and everything in grand
style.
[Illustration: A HINDOO DEVOTEE.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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