In the meantime, the body of the king had been placed on the scaffold over the platform.  The two queens were also laid down beside the corpse, one on the right hand, and the other on the left, and they joined hands by stretching them over the body.  The astrologer having then declared that the happy moment was come for firing the pile, the Brahmins repeated several prayers in a loud voice, and sprinkled the pile with holy water.  When these ceremonies were finished, a signal was given, and the pillars which supported the pyramid and the scaffold were suddenly taken away.  Immediately the women were covered with the falling mass of timber, which tumbled over them with a crash.  At the same instant the pile was fired in all its parts.  On one side, the nearest relative of the king applied his torch, and on the other side, the priest; while the Brahmins, in every quarter, were pouring jars of melted butter on the flames, creating so intense a heat as must instantly have consumed the victims.  Then the multitude shouted for joy, and the relations approaching the pile also set up a loud cry, calling them by their names.  They supposed that they heard a voice in answer pronouncing Enna? that is, What? but the fall of the platform, and the immediate bursting out of the flames, must have stifled them at once.

Such was the miserable cud of these poor unhappy queens—­unhappy victims of the most cruel religion that ever disgraced the earth.

Not unfrequently the sons take a prominent part in destroying their mothers.  This will appear from the following case.  A Brahmin died, and was brought to the place of burning.  His wife was fastened to the pile, and the fire was kindled, but the night was dark and rainy.  When the fire began to scorch the poor woman, she contrived to disentangle herself from the dead body, and creeping from under the pile, hid herself among some brushwood.  In a little time it was discovered that there was but one body on the pile.  The relations immediately took the alarm, and searched for the poor creature.  The son soon dragged her forth, and insisted that she should throw herself on the pile again, or drown or hang herself.  She pleaded for her life at the hands of her own son, and declared that she could not embrace so horrid a death; but she pleaded in vain.  He urged, that he should lose his caste if she were spared, and added, that either he or she must die.  Unable to persuade her to hang or drown herself, the son and the others present tied her hands and feet, and threw her on the funeral pile, where she quickly perished.

[Illustration:  BURNING OF WIDOWS]