of the wooden eats while the ceremony of investiture is performed. The priest first offers a burnt sacrifice, and worships the shaligramů, repeating a number of prayers; the boy's white garments are then taken off, and he is dressed in red, and a cloth is brought over his head, that no shoodru may see his face; after which, he takes in his right hand a branch of the vilwu, and a piece of cloth in the form of a pocket, and places the branch on his shoulder. A poita of three threads, made of the fibres of the suru, to which a piece of deer's skin is fastened, is suspended from the boy's left shoulder falling under his right arm, during the reading of incantations, By the help of the priest, the father now repeats certain formulas, and some passages from the védŭs; and, in a low tone of voice, lest any shōōdrů should hear, pronounces the words of the gayutree to the boy three times, the son repeating it after him, viz. “ Let us meditate on the adorable light of the divine ruler (Savitree):* may it guide our intellects." After this, the sură poita is taken off, and the real poita, consisting of six or more threads of cotton, and prepared by the wives or daughters of bramhŭns, is put on. During the investiture with the cotton poita, the father repeats the appointed formulas, and fastens the sură poita to the vilwă staff. Shoes are now put upon the boy's feet, and an umbrella in his hand; and thus apparelled as a Brumhŭcharee, with a staff upon his shoulder, and the pocket hanging by his side, he appears before his mother, repeating a word of Săngskritů, who gives him a few grains of rice, a poita or two, and a piece of money. He next solicits alms of his father and the rest of the company, who give according to their ability, some a roopee, and others a goldmohür; sometimes as many as a hundred roopees are thus given. The boy then sits down, while his father offers another burnt-sacrifice, repeating incantations; and at the close of these ceremonies, the boy, being previously instructed, rises in a pretended passion, and declares that he will leave home, and, as a Brumhucharee, seek a subsistance by begging; but his father, mother, or some other relation, taking hold of his arm, invites him to follow a secular life; in consequence of which, he returns, and sits down. Certain formulas are now repeated, when the boy takes a bamboo staff instead of his vilwŭ one, and throws it over his shoulder like the former. Other forms are repeated, after which the father presents a fee to the priest, and the boy goes into the

The sun.
H

house, a woman pouring out water before him as he goes. To this succeeds the service called sundhya; at the close of which, the boy eats of the rice which has been offered in the burnt-sacrifice; and thus the ceremony ends.

The following duties are enjoined on a youth after his investiture. During twelve nights, he is to sleep only on a bed of kooshi, or on a blanket, a deer's skin, or on a carpet called doolicha, made of sheep's wool, and painted different colours. He is enjoined to eat only rice and spices, without oil, salt, &c. once a day, nor must he see a shōodrů, nor suffer a person of this cast to see him; with his face covered, he is to bathe in the river very early, continually committing to memory the forms of the daily service, including the gayutree; nor is he permitted to leave home without his Brumhicharee staff. Ifthe boy's father have been in the habit of eating undressed food occasionally in the house of a shōodru, then, on the day of investiture, a certain person of this cast is allowed, with a present in his hand, to see the boy's face, but he lays himself under an obligation to be kind to the boy in future life. At the end of the twelve days, the boy throws his Brämhucharee staff into the Ganges, lays aside the character of a mendicant, and enters upon what is called grůst'ha-dhărmă, i. e. a secular state; on which day a few bramhuns are feasted at his house.

As the egg, at one time impregnated with life, is afterwards hatched by the parents, so the receiving of the poita and the gayutree is accounted the second birth of bramhuns, who are from that time denominated dwijú, or the twice-born. If a boy who has recently received the poita be awkward at washing it, and gives it to another, he must hold the clothes of the other while he washes it, that he may not be said to part with it, or lose the virtue of it, for a moment. The repeating of the gayutrēē is supposed to be an act of infinite merit, and to wipe away the foulest sins.

Having been invested with the poita, at any convenient time after this the boy may be married. For the ceremonies of marriage, see a succeeding article.

Of these ten ceremonies, called Singskară, the three first only are performed for the first child; but the seven last for every child. Strict bramhins, in the southern parts of Hindoost'hanů, attend to most of them for their daughters as well as their sons.

The smritees assign to bramhuns the offering of sacrifices; the offices of the priest hood; the study of the védus; explaining the shastrus to others; giving alms; and receiving presents. Till the iron age, the bramhins, it is said, employed the whole day in religious ceremonies; but at present, the greater part of the persons of this order curtail these duties, and bring the performance of what they imagine thenselves compelled to attend to, within the compass of an hour or less. One bramhŭn in a hundred thousand may repeat the morning and noon services separately, but almost all unite them, after which they cat, and proceed to business; a few repeat the evening service, either at home, or by the side of the river.

Formerly, only one order, called Satshutee bramhuns, were found in Bengal, all of whom were equal in honour. Matters stood thus till the time of Adishōōră, a Bengal raja, who, offended with the ignorance of the bramhŭns then in Bengal, and wishing to offer a sacrifice to obtain rain, solicited from Veeru-singhů, the king of Kanyŭkoovjů, five bramhuns, to officiate at this sacrifice. The first bramhuns were rejected, because they wore stockings, and rode on horses; those afterwards sent by the king were approved: their names were Bhüttü-narayünü, Dükshů, Védü-gürbhů, Chandürü, and Shree-hurshů. These priests went through the sacrifice to the great satisfaction of the monarch, who gave them grants of land, in what the Hindoos call the province of Rarhй; and from these five bramhuns are descended almost all the families of bramhuns now in Bengal; they still retain the family names of their original ancestors, as Kashyŭpůs, from Kushyupů, the sage; Bhürüdwajus, from the sage Bhŭrūdwajŭ; Sandilyŭs, from the sage Sandilyŭ; Savurnus, from the sage Săvărnă; Batsyus, from the sage Bitsyů. Some of the descendants of these Kinojů bramhŭns, in consequence of removing into the province of Vüréndrů, were called Varéndră bramhins, and those who remained in Rarhu, received the name Rarhees. These comprize all the bramhuns in Bengal, except the voidikus, and about 1,500 or 2,000 families of the Satshätee, or original Bengal bramhuns, of whom there were about 700 families in the time of Adishoorü. The voidikus are said to have fled from Orissa

Those bramhuns who have not two garments, take with them, when about to perform the sundhya, a second poita, as it is improper to perform this ceremony having on only one garment.

from the fear of being made vamacharees; and, on account of studying the védůs more than others, they were called voidiku bramhŭns.

Băllalsénů, the voidyŭ king, whose name will be found in page 24, seeing among the bramhans, both rarhees and varéndrus, a great deficiency in their adherence to the shastrus, determined to divide them into three orders, distinguishing one as a peculiar order of merit, to entitle a man to enter which, the following qualifications were required to observe the duties of bramhuns, to be meek, learned, of good report, to possess a disposition to visit the holy places; be devout; to possess a dislike to receiving gifts from the impure; be attached to an ascetic life, and to be liberal. The bramhons whom he found possessed of these nine qualities, he distinguished by the name of kooleenus.* In the next order, he classed those who had been born bramhŭns; who had passed through the ten sungskarus, and had read part of the védus; these he called Shrotriyus,+ and he directed, that those who had none of the nine quaiifications, should be called Vungshujus.‡

When Băllalsénů made these regulations, he distributed, at a public meeting, all the bramhuns of the country into these orders. After him, Dévee-bürů, a ghutüků bramhun, called another meeting of the bramhans, and rectified the disorders which had crept in among the different classes.

In each of these orders, other subdivisions exist, principally through irregular marriages, all of which are recorded in the Koolu shastru, studied by the Ghutukus, f which work was begun when the kooleenus were first created, and may be called the kooleenu's book of heraldry.

To a koolēnu the seat of honour is yielded on all occasions; yet the supposed superiority of this order, in natural or acquired talents, no where exists.

* From koolu, a race. In this order he formed two ranks, which are called Mookhyŭ and Gounů koolēēnŭs. +From shroo, to hear ; or, learned in the shastră. From vungshu, a family. contracting marriages for others: from ghůtů, to unite.

Men employed in

The distinctions thus created by Bullalsénů are most tenaciously adhered to in the marriage of the different orders: a kooleenŭ may give his son in marriage among his `own order, or to the daughter of a shrotriyu; but if the family marry among văngshŭjus, in two or three generations, they become vungshujus. A koolēnu must give his When the daughter to a person of his own order, or she must remain unmarried. daughter of a superior kooleenů is married to the son of an inferior person of the same order, the latter esteems himself highly honoured; if a koolēnu marry the daughter of a shrotriyu, or of a vůngshuju, he receives a large present of money; in particular instances, two thousand roopees; but in common cases a hundred. The shrotriyus and văngshujus expend large sums of money to obtain kooleenŭ husbands for their daughters; and in consequence the sons of kooleenus are generally pre-engaged, while their unmarried daughters, for want of young men of equal rank, become so numerous, that husbands are not found for them; hence one kooleenů bramhun often marries a number of wives of his own order. Each kooleenă marries at least two wives: one the daughter of a bramhŭn of his own order, and the other of a shrotriyu; the former he generally leaves at her father's, the other he takes to his own house. It is essential to the honour of a kooleen, that he have one daughter, but by the birth of many daughters, he sinks in respect; hence he dreads more than other Hindoos the birth of daughters. Some inferior kooleenus marry many wives: I have heard of persons having a hundred and twenty ;* many have fifteen or twenty, and others forty or fifty each. Numbers procure a subsistence by this excessive polygamy: at their marriages they obtain large presents, and as often as they visit these wives, they receive presents from the father; and thus, having married into forty or fifty families, a kooleenů goes from house to house, and is fed, clothed, &c. Some old men, after the wedding, never see the female; others visit her once in three or four years. A respectable kooleēnu never lives with the wife who remains in the house of her parents; he sees her occasionally, as a friend rather than as a husband, and dreads to have offspring by her, as he thereby sinks in honour. Children born in the houses of

their fathers-in-law are never owned by the father.

In consequence of this state

of things, both the married and unmarried daughters of the kooleenus are plunged in

Thus the creation of this Order of Merit has ended in a state of monstrous polygamy, which has no parallel in the history of human depravity. Amongst the Turks, seraglios are confined to men of wealth; but here, a Hindoo bramhún, possessing only a shred of cloth and a poita, keeps more than a hundred mistresses.