222:13 The sacred syllable Om has been already described (p. 1. n. 1). The Gayatrí, or holiest verse of the Vedas, not to be uttered to ears profane, is a short prayer to the sun, identified as the supreme, and occurs in the tenth hymn of the fourth section of the third Asht́aka of the Sanhitá of the Rig-veda: 'We meditate on that excellent light of the divine sun: may he illuminate our minds.' Such is the fear entertained of profaning this text, that copyists of the Vedas not unfrequently refrain from transcribing it, both in the Sanhitá and Bháshya.

222:14 Or, in the text, with the prayer that commences with the words Súrya jyotir, 'That which is in the sun (or light) is adorable,' &c. The whole prayer is given in Colebrooke's account of the religious ceremonies of the Hindus. As. Res. V. 355.

223:15 But this comprehends the two Sandhyás, 'morning and evening twilight.' Two Náris, or half a Muhúrtta before sunrise, constitute the morning Sandhyá; and the same interval after sunset the evening. Sandhya, meaning 'junction,' is so termed as it is the juncture or interval between darkness and light; as in the Váyu and Matsya: ###.

223:16 The four months are named in the Váyu, and are, 1. the Saura, or solar-sydereal, consisting of the sun's passage through a sign of the Zodiac: 2. the Saumya or Chándra or lunar month, comprehending thirty lunations or Tithis, and reckoned most usually from new moon to new moon, though sometimes from full moon to full moon: 3. the Sávana or solar month, containing thirty days of sunrise and sunset: and 4. the Nákshatra or lunar p. 224 asterismal month, which is the moon's revolution through the twenty-eight lunar mansions.