Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 432

PRECONCERTED EFFECTS
392
It
will,
doubtless, be easily guessed that these pitiable
outcome of a premeditated understanding
between the shameless charlatans who practise them. But
the multitude who pay for being treated to a spectacle of
this kind, and who look upon the actors with fear and
admiration, are fully persuaded that all their contortions
It must, however, be
are due to supernatural causes.
admitted that these men go through their parts with really
admirable skill and precision. On many an occasion they
have been seen to perform sleight-of-hand tricks with such
fooleries are the
rare skill as to astonish persons of a
turn of mind than the Hindus
much
less
credulous
*.
CHAPTER XXII
The Poetry
of the Hindus.
the very earliest times poetry has been very much
vogue with the Hindus, and it is still held in high regard
by them. One is even inclined to believe that at first they
had no other written language. Not one of their original
ancient books is written in prose, or in the vulgar tongue
not even the books on medicine, which are said to be very
numerous in the Sanskrit language.
From
in
We may naturally infer that the practice of writing in
a style and idiom beyond the comprehension of the vulgar
was mainly due to the artful precaution of the Brahmins,
who found in it a sure means of excluding all other castes
from participating in a knowledge of which they wished to
retain a monopoly.
It is quite certain that all the Hindu books in prose are
It is in verse that the eighteen Puranas,
of modern origin.
and other similar works, have been translated from the
Sanskrit into Tamil, Telugu, and Canarese, and, I think,
into all the other vernaculars of India.
1
The magic
art
is
still
firmly believed in throughout India.
How-
whereby magical powers can be acquired are so rigorous
and the consequences of any violation or infringement of
ever, the rules
and
difficult,
to be so dangerous to the man who attempts to practise
them, that only a very few ever become adepts. In all parts of the
country men are to be seen who are said to have become mad on account
(if some violation of the prescribed ceremonies for the acquisition of the
black art.
Ed.
them supposed