[308] See the work quoted, p. 125-129. The members of this sect consider a teacher named Hari Vans as their founder. This person settled at Vrindavan, and established a math, or “convent,” there, which exists to our days, and in 1822 comprised between forty and fifty resident ascetics. He also erected a temple there that still exists, and indicates by an inscription over the door that it was dedicated to Sri Rádhá Vallabha by Hari Vans, Samvat 1641, or A. D. 1585. Rádha, the favourite mistress of Krishna, is the object of adoration to these sectaries, who worship Krishna as _Rádhá-Vallabah_, “the lord or lover of Rádhá,” whose adoration Mr. Wilson thinks an undoubted innovation in the Hindu creed. He says (_ibid._, p. 125): “The only Rádhá that is named in the Mahábharat is a very different personage, being the wife of Duryodhana’s charioteer, and the nurse of Karna. Even the Bhagavat makes no particular mention of her amongst the Gopis of Vrindhavan, and we must look to the Brahma Váivarta Purána (Krishna Janana Khanda) as the chief authority of a classical character, on which the pretensions of Rádhá are founded.” We know the difference of opinion which exists among the Indianists about the antiquity to be attributed to the Puranas, and which has not yet found a positive decision. It is probably from the last mentioned Púráná that Jayadéva (see note, p. 180) took the theme of his admirable poem, in which the love of Krichna and Rádhá is described in the most glowing colours. [309] Rama, obliged to cede the throne to his brother Bharatta, having on that account been banished by his father, lived with his wife Sitá, and his younger brother Lakshmana upon the mountain Chitra Kotá, in Bundelkand, whence he descended towards the south into the woods of Dandakam. Every where he protected the Rishis, destroying their enemies, the Rakshasas. The head of these was Rávaná, king of Lanka (Ceylon), who, in order to take revenge of Rama, carried away by a successful stratagem, Ráma’s beloved consort, Sîtá. The unfortunate husband, to release his wife, concluded an alliance with Hanuman and Sugriva, chiefs of the savage inhabitants, called monkies, of southern India, and by their aid passed over to the island, took its capital, Lanka, and killed the tyrant, Rávańa, in a battle. Sitá was released, but, for proving her purity preserved, she underwent the ordeal of fire: it proved satisfactory; her innocence was manifest to the multitude, but, it appears, not quite so to the mind of her husband, who separated from her. [310] This is not correct: विराग _virága_ is interpreted “the absence of desire or passion; the disregard of all sensual enjoyments, either in this or the next world.”