2.  The name is misspelled Sohan in the author’s text.  The Son rises at Son Munda, about twenty miles from Amarkantak (A.S.R., vol. vii, 236).

3.  ’Sacrificantibus, cum hic more Romano suovetaurilia daret, ille equum placando amni adornasset.’

4. [Greek text]—­Iliad xx, 73.

5. Iliad xxiii. 140-153.

6.  Mr. Crooke observes that the binding was intended to prevent the object of worship from deserting her shrine or possibly doing mischief elsewhere, and refers to his article, ’The Binding of a God, a Study of the Basis of Idolatry’, in Folklore, vol. viii (1897), p.134.  The name is spelt Johilla in I.G. (1908), s.v.  Son River.

7.  Monier Williams denies the barber’s monopoly of match-making.  ’In some parts of Northern India the match-maker for some castes is the family barber; but for the higher castes he is more generally a Brahman, who goes about from one house to another till he discovers a baby-girl of suitable rank’ (Religious Thought and Life in India, p. 377).  So far as the editor knows, the barber is ordinarily employed in Northern India.

8.  During the operations against the Pindhari freebooters.  Many treaties were negotiated with the Peshwa and other native powers in the years 1817 and 1818.

9.  The word in the text is ‘revenue’.

10.  Concerning the prophecy that the sanctity of the Ganges will cease in 1895, see note to Chapter 1, ante, [13].  The prophecy was much talked of some years ago, but the reverence for the Ganges continues undiminished, while the development of commerce and manufactures has not affected, the religious feelings and opinions of the people.  Railways, in fact, facilitate pilgrimages and increase their popularity.  The course of commerce now follows the line of rail, not the navigable rivers.  The author, when writing this book, evidently never contemplated the possibility of railway construction in India.  Later in life, in 1852, he fully appreciated the value of the new means of communication (Journey, ii, 370, &c.).

CHAPTER 4

A Suttee[1] on the Nerbudda.

We took a ride one evening to Gopalpur, a small village situated on the same bank of the Nerbudda, about three miles up from Bheraghat.  On our way we met a party of women and girls coming to the fair.  Their legs were uncovered half-way up the thigh; but, as we passed, they all carefully covered up their faces.  ‘Good God!’ exclaimed one of the ladies, ‘how can these people be so very indecent?’ They thought it, no doubt, equally extraordinary that she should have her face uncovered, while she so carefully concealed her legs; for they were really all modest peasantry, going from the village to bathe in the holy stream.[2]