Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 233

KILLING SACRED ANIMALS
193
be openly set at naught. The Israelites, when in captivity
in Egypt, begged for permission from Pharaoh to make
a pilgrimage into the desert, there to sacrifice to God
without fear of interruption, because they would have been
liable to be all massacred or stoned had they dared to
perform such sacrifices in the sight of the idolatrous Egyp-
tians, who worshipped as gods some of the very animals
that they required for their sacrifices \
Cambyses made himself more execrable in the eyes of
the Egyptians by killing the ox Apis, than by all the
cruelties and acts of tyranny of which he was guilty in
2
dealing with this peaceable people
The Egyptians considered that to kill, even by accident,
one of their sacred animals was the most heinous of crimes.
Whoever was guilty of such an act was invariably put to
death. A Roman soldier was torn in pieces by the popu-
lace, in spite of the terror that the name of Rome inspired,
Diodorus, who
for having by mischance killed a cat.
records this incident, also mentions that during a famine
the Egyptians preferred to devour each other rather than
touch the animals they held sacred.
The Hindus would also carry their scruples to the same
In whatever straits they might be they would
point.
prefer to die rather than save their lives by killing cattle.
From this we may conclude that, though they daily witness
the slaughter of these sacred animals by Europeans, without
uttering any loud complaint, they are far from being in-
But restrained by the fear which
sensible to the insult.
these foreigners have always inspired in them, they con-
tent themselves with complaining in secret and storing up
Pious
in their hearts all the indignation that they fee