the monuments appears to prove that Vikramaditya reigned six hundred years after the epoch indicated by the books.1

It is to the same hero that the Hindu legends attribute the expulsion of the Scythians from India. These people had penetrated to the Greeks of Bactriana two centuries before Christ, and had gradually subdued them. One of their kings, Kanishka, a convert to Buddhism, had shortly before our era founded an empire comprising Afghanistan, the Punjab, and Rajputana. We know nothing of the history of the Scythians in India, unless it be that they propagated the artistic influence of the Greeks, as we see by some statues at Muttra.

According to the inscriptions interpreted by Cunningham, we should probably include amongst the contemporaries of Vikramaditya [see footnote] the Rajah Harshavardhara, who reigned from 607-648 and of whom the Chinese pilgrim, Hwen Tsang, who visited India in 634, speaks as one of the most powerful sovereigns of the north of India. His capital was Kanauj, one of the most ancient cities of India, for a long time the seat of the Gupta dynasty, and supposed to have been one of the cradles of Aryan civilisation. Ptolemy mentions it, 140 years after Christ, under the name of Kanogiya. The kingdom of which it was the capital in the days of Hwen Tsang extended from Kashmir to Assam and from Nepal to the Nerbudda.

Kanauj lies east of Agra, a few miles from the Ganges. All the traditions agree in extolling its splendour. It filled Mahmud of Ghazni with admiration when he attacked it in 1016 A.D. Ferishta says that as he approached it, he saw "a city which raised its head as high as heaven, and which, in fortifications and architecture, could justly boast that it had no rival."

Of this ancient capital which, if we are to believe Hwen Tsang, was three miles in length, there remains not a stone to tell its history. As in the case of many famous old capitals, the destruction of the monuments anterior to the Mohammedan invasion was so complete that, in spite of all his investigations, Cunningham could not succeed in recovering a single relic. The oldest thing which he observed at Kanauj is an inscription dating only from 1136 and consequently later than the Mohammedan invasion. All the existing monuments of this town are exclusively Mohammedan, though sometimes constructed from the débris of ancient Hindu monuments.

Kanauj is one of those great ancient capitals whose history we know only from vague traditions and a few inscriptions. To those who have seen the remains of the small number which have escaped destruction, as, for instance, Khajurao, it is impossible to ascribe the enthusiastic descriptions of the splendour of these antique cities solely to the writers' imagination.

Kanauj, Khajurao, Mahoba, and many other famous towns of which the name and the ruins are all that now survive, were the seats of mighty empires. Of these the most celebrated were governed by kings of the Rajput race, the only one whose dynasties still exist and which has preserved, if not its independence, at least its institutions and its customs. Unfortunately, we know almost nothing of the history of the Rajputs till the time when

[1"The name Vikramaditya," says Sir W. W. Hunter in his Brief History of the Indian People, p. 81, "is a title meaning 'A Very Sun in Prowess,' which has been borne by several kings in Indian history. But the Vikramaditya of the first century before Christ was the greatest of them, great alike as a defender of his country against the Scythian hordes, as a patron of men of learning, and as a good ruler of his subjects." This will explain the confusion that has enveloped the name. See also the previous section on "Traditional Kings."]

they entered into conflict with the Mohammedans. The latter succeeded in destroying their capitals and in thrusting them back to the steep and mountainous regions of Rajputana, but they only obtained from them a purely nominal submission.

The whole of this period, which extends from the successors of Asoka to the revival of Brahmanism and even to the Mohammedan invasions, is thus almost as obscure as that which preceded it, and but for the monuments it has left us we should know practically nothing about it. Historical documents are equally lacking for the period of the revival of Brahmanism, or the neo-Brahmanical period. Coins and monuments are about the only authorities which we can consult concerning it.d

CHAPTER III. MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE

ANCIENT HINDUS

THE first complete picture of the state of Hindu society is afforded by the code of laws which bears the name of Manu, and which was probably drawn up in the ninth century before Christ. But to gain accurate notions even of the people contemporary with the supposed Manu, we must remember that a code is never the work of a single age, some of the earliest and rudest laws being preserved and incorporated with the improvements of the most enlightened times. To take a familiar example, there are many of the laws in Blackstone, the existence of which proves a high state of refinement in the nation; but those relating to witchcraft, and the wager of battle, afford no correspondent proof of the continuance of barbarism down to the age in which the commentaries were written.

Even if the whole code referred to one period, it would not show the real state of manners. Its injunctions are drawn from the model to which it is wished to raise the community, and its prohibitions from the worst state of crime which it was possible to apprehend. It is to the general spirit of the code, therefore, that we must look for that of the age; and even then, we must soften the features before we reach the actual condition of the people. We have adhered to the usual phraseology in speaking of this compilation; but, though early adopted as an unquestionable authority for the law, we should scarcely venture to regard it as a code drawn up for the regulation of a particular state under the sanction of a government. It seems rather to be the work of a learned man, designed to set forth his idea of a perfect commonwealth under Hindu institutions. On this supposition it would show the state of society as correctly as a legal code; since it is evident that it incorporates the existing laws, and any alterations it may have introduced, with a view to bring them up to its preconceived standard of perfection, must still have been drawn from the opinions which prevailed when it was written. These considerations being premised, we shall now give an outline of the information contained in Manu.

DIVISION AND EMPLOYMENT OF CLASSES

The first feature that strikes us in the society described by Manu is the division into four classes or castes (the sacerdotal, the military, the industrial, and the servile). In these we are struck with the prodigious eleva

tion and sanctity of the Brahmans, and the studied degradation of the lowest class.

The three first classes, though by no means equal, are yet admitted into one pale they all partake in certain sacred rites, to which peculiar importance is attached throughout the code; and they appear to form the whole community for whose government the laws are framed. The fourth class and the outcasts are no further considered than as they contribute to the advantage of the superior castes.

A Brahman is the chief of all created beings; the world and all in it are his: through him, indeed, other mortals enjoy life; by his imprecations he could destroy a king, with his troops, elephants, horses, and cars; could frame other worlds and regents of worlds, and could give being to new gods and new mortals. A Brahman is to be treated with more respect than a king. His life and person are protected by the severest laws in this world, and the most tremendous denunciations for the next. He is exempt from capital punishment, even for the most enormous crimes. His offences against other classes are treated with remarkable lenity, while all offences against him are punished with tenfold severity.

Yet it would seem, at first sight, as if the Brahmans, content with gratifying their spiritual pride, had no design to profit by worldly wealth or power. The life prescribed to them is one of laborious study, as well as of austerity and retirement.

The first quarter of a Brahman's life he must spend as a student; during which time he leads a life of abstinence and humiliation. His attention should be unremittingly directed to the Vedas, and should on no account be wasted on worldly studies. He should treat his preceptor with implicit obedience, and with humble respect and attachment, which ought to be extended to his family. He must perform various servile offices for his preceptor, and must labour for himself in bringing logs and other materials for sacrifice, and water for oblations. He must subsist entirely by begging from door to door.

For the second quarter of his life, he lives with his wife and family, and discharges the ordinary duties of a Brahman. These are briefly stated to be, reading and teaching the Vedas; sacrificing and assisting others to sacrifice; bestowing alms, and accepting gifts.

The most honourable of these employments is teaching. It is remarkable that, unlike other religions, where the dignity of the priesthood is derived from their service at the temples, a Brahman is considered as degraded by performing acts of worship or assisting at sacrifices, as a profession. All Brahmans are strongly and repeatedly prohibited from receiving gifts from low-born, wicked, or unworthy persons. They are not even to take many presents from unexceptionable givers, and are carefully to avoid making it a habit to accept of unnecessary presents. When the regular sources fail, a Brahman may, for a mere subsistence, glean, or beg, or cultivate, or even (in case of extreme necessity) he may trade; but he must in no extremity enter into service; he must not have recourse to popular conversation, must abstain from music, singing, dancing, gaming, and generally from everything inconsistent with gravity and composure.

He should, indeed, refrain from all sensual enjoyments, should avoid all wealth that may impede his reading the Vedas, and should shun all worldly honour as he would shun poison. Yet he is not to subject himself to fasts, or other needless severities. All that is required is, that his life should be decorous and occupied in the prescribed studies and observances. Even his

dress is laid down with minuteness; and he may easily be figured (much as learned Brahmans are still), quiet and demure, clean and decent, "his hair and beard clipped, his passions subdued, his mantle white, and his body pure"; with a staff and a copy of the Vedas in his hands, and bright golden rings in his ears. When he has paid the three debts, by reading the scriptures, begetting a son, and performing the regular sacrifices, he may (even in the second portion of his life) make over all to his son, and remain in his family house, with no employment but that of an umpire.

The third portion of a Brahman's life he must spend as an anchorite in the woods. Clad in bark or in the skin of a black antelope, with his hair and nails uncut, sleeping on the bare earth, he must live "without fire, without a mansion, wholly silent, feeding on roots and fruit." He must also submit to many and harsh mortifications, expose himself, naked, to the heaviest rains, wear humid garments in winter, and in summer stand in the midst of five fires under the burning sun. He must carefully perform all sacrifices and oblations, and consider it his special duty to fulfil the prescribed forms and ceremonies of religion.

In the last period of his life, the Brahman is nearly as solitary and abstracted as during the third. But he is now released from all forms and external observances: his business is contemplation; his mortifications cease. His dress more nearly resembles that of ordinary Brahmans; and his abstinence, though still great, is not so rigid as before. He is no longer to invite suffering, but is to cultivate equanimity and to enjoy delight in meditation on the Divinity; till, at last, he quits the body "as a bird leaves the branch of a tree at its pleasure.

Thus it appears that during three-fourths of a Brahman's life, he was entirely secluded from the world, and during the remaining fourth, besides having his time completely occupied by ceremonies and in reading the Vedas, he was expressly debarred from the enjoyment of wealth or pleasure and from the pursuit of ambition. But a little further acquaintance with the code makes it evident that these rules are founded on a former condition of the Brahmans; and that, although still regarded as the model for their conduct, they had already been encroached on by the temptations of power and riches.

The king must have a Brahman for his most confidential counsellor; and by Brahmans is he to be instructed in policy as well as in justice and all learning. The whole judicial authority (except that exercised by the king in person) is in the hands of Brahmans; and, although the perusal of the sacred writings is not withheld from the two nearest classes, yet the sense of them is only to be obtained through the exposition of a Brahman.

The interpretation of the laws is expressly confined to the Brahmans; and we can perceive, from the code itself, how large a share of the work of legislation was in the hands of that order.

THE PROPERTY OF THE BRAHMAN

The property of the sacred class is as well protected by the law as its power. Liberality to Brahmans is made incumbent on every virtuous man, and is the especial duty of a king. Sacrifices and oblations, and all the ceremonies of religion, involve feasts and presents to the Brahmans, and those gifts must always be liberal: "the organs of sense and action, reputation in this life, happiness in the next, life itself, children, and cattle, are