is so little as not to satisfy a cow, or smells badly, or is covered with froth. The milk of animals with undivided hoofs, of a camel, a ewe, a deer, or a buffalo, is unfit for ancestral oblations. If an obsequial rite is looked at by a eunuch, a man ejected from society, an outcast, a heretic, a drunken man, or one diseased, by a cock, a naked ascetic 3, a monkey, a village hag, by a woman in her courses or pregnant, by an unclean person, or by a carrier of corpses, neither gods nor progenitors will partake of the food. The ceremony should therefore be performed in a spot carefully enclosed. Let the performer cast sesamum on the ground, and drive away malignant spirits. Let him not give food that is fetid, or vitiated by hairs or insects, or mixed with acid gruel, or stale. Whatever suitable food is presented with pure faith, and with the enunciation of name and race, to ancestors, at an obsequial oblation, becomes food to them (or gives them nourishment). In former times, O king of the earth! this song of the Pitris was heard by Ikshwáku, the son of Manu, in the groves of Kalápa (on the skirts of the Himálaya mountains): 'Those of our descendants shall follow a righteous path who shall reverently present us with cakes at Gaya. May he be born in our race who shall give us, on the thirteenth of Bhádrapada and Mágha, milk, honey, and clarified butter; or when he marries a maiden, or liberates a black bull 4, or performs any domestic ceremony agreeable to rule, accompanied by donations to the Brahmans 5!"

Footnotes

332:1 See Manu, III. 266, &c. The articles are much the same; the periods of satisfaction somewhat vary.

332:2 The expression Gavya implies all that is derived from a cow, but in the text it is associated with 'flesh;' and, as the commentator observes, some consider the flesh of the cow to be here intended: but this, he adds, relates to other ages. In the Kali or present age it implies milk and preparations of milk, The sacrifice of a cow or calf formed part of the ancient Śráddha. It then became typical, or a bull was turned loose, instead of being slaughtered; and this is still practised on some occasions. In Manu, the term Gavya is coupled with others, which limit its application: 'A whole year with the milk of cows, and food made of that milk.' III. 272.

333:3 Nagna is literally 'naked,' but, as explained in the following chapter, means a Jain mendicant. No such person is included by Manu (III. 239, &c.) amongst those who defile a Śráddha by looking upon it. The Váyu contains the same prohibition.

333:4 Níla vrisha; but this animal is not altogether or always black. In the Bráhma P., as quoted in the Nirńaya Sindhu, it is said to be of a red colour, with light face and tail, and white hoofs and horns; or a white bull, with black face, &c.; or a black bull, with white face, tail, and feet.