Meru, then, is confined between the mountains Níla

Mahábhárata* calls them Vaswokasárá, Naliní, Pávaní, Jambúnadí, Sítá, Gangá, and Sindhu. The more usual legend, however, is the first; and it offers some trace of actual geography.† Mr.

सप्तमी चान्वगात्तासां भगीरथरथं तदा ।

भगीरथोऽपि राजर्षिर्दिव्यं स्यन्दनमास्थितः ॥

Rámáyana, Bála-káńda, XLIII., 11-14. This reference is to the genuine Rámáyana, that which has been lithographed in India.

* The Bhishma-parvan, 243, is, I presume, the passage referred to: वस्वोकसारा नलिनी पावनी च सरस्वती ।

जम्बूनदी च सीता च गंगा सिन्धुश्च सप्तमी ॥

Apparently, eight rivers are here named; the fourth being the Saraswati. The commentator Nilakantha, who adopts the reading

at the end of the second verse, asserts that Pávaní and Saraswati are one name only, i. e., the purifying Saraswati. His words are: पावनी सरस्वतीत्येका ।

The commentator Arjuna Miśra, who is silent on this point, adopts the reading, in place of Я, and explains it as denoting that the Sindhu is "the seventh division", namely, of the Ganges: सिन्धुः सप्तमः । सप्तमो भेदः ।

I have changed, in the note to which these remarks are appended, the order in which Professor Wilson named the rivers in question. That order will be seen in the quotation which I make immediately below.

Professor Wilson has since written as follows: "According to one Pauráńik legend, the Ganges divided, on its descent, into seven streams, termed the Naliní, Pávaní, and Hládiní, going to the east; the Chakshu, Sítá, and Sindhu, to the west; and the Bhagirathi or Ganges proper, to the south. In one place in the Mahábhárata, the seven rivers are termed Vaswokasára, Nalini, Pávaní, Gangá, Sítá, Sindhu, and Jambúnadí; in another, Ganga, Yamuna, Plakshaga, Rathastha, Saryu, Gomati, and Gandaki. In a text quoted and commented on by Yáska, we have ten rivers, named Gangá, Yamuna, Saraswati, Śutudri, Parushni, Asikni, Marudvŕidha, Vitastá, Árjíkiya, and Sushoma. Of these, the Parushúi is identified with the Irávati, the Árjikiya, with the Vipȧs, and the Sushoma, with the Sindhu. Nir., III., 26. The original enumeration of seven appears to be that which has given rise to the specifications of the Puranas." Translation of the Rig-veda, Vol. I., p. 88, note.

The text above referred to, as quoted by Yáska, in the Nirukta, is the Rig-veda, X., 75, 5.

and Nishadha (on the north and south), and between Mályavat and Gandhamádana' (on the west and east).

Faber, indeed, thinks that Meru, with the surrounding Varsha of Ilávŕita, and its four rivers, is a representation of the garden of Eden. (Pagan Idolatry, Vol. I., p. 315.) However this may be, it seems not unlikely to have originated in some imperfect account of four great rivers flowing from the Himalaya, and the high lands north of that range, towards the cardinal points: the Bhadrá, to the north, representing the Oby of Siberia; and the Śítá, the river of China, or Hoangho. The Alakanandá is well known as a main branch of the Ganges, near its source; and the Chakshu is, very possibly, as Major Wilford supposed, the Oxus. (As. Res., Vol. VIII., p. 309.) The printed copy of the Bhagavata, and the MS. Padma, read Vankshu: but the former is the more usual reading. It is said, in the Váyu, of Ketumála, through which this river runs, that it is peopled by various races of barbarians:

केतुमालं महाद्वीपं नानाम्लेच्छगणैर्युतम् ।

The text applies the latter name so variously as to cause confusion. It is given to one of the four buttresses of Meru, that on the south; to one of the filament mountains, on the west; to a range of boundary mountains, on the south; and to the Varsha of Ketumála. Here another mountain range is intended; or a chain running north and south, upon the east of Ilávŕita, connecting the Níla and Nishadha ranges. Accordingly, the Váyu states it to be 34000 Yojanas in extent, that is, the diameter of Meru, 16000, and the breadth of Ilávrita on each side of it, or, together, 18000. A similar range, that of Mályavat, bounds Ilávŕita on the west. It was, probably, to avoid the confusion arising from similarity of nomenclature, that the author of the Bhagavata substituted different names for Gandhamádana in the other instances; calling the buttress, as we have seen, Merumandara, the southern forest, Sarvatobhadra,† and the filament

* Vide supra, p. 115, note 3. + Vide supra, p. 117, note 1.

It lies between them, like the pericarp of a lotos. The countries of Bhárata, Ketumála, Bhadráśwa, and Uttarakuru* lie, like leaves of the lotos of the world, exterior to the boundary mountains. Jathara and Devakúta are two mountain ranges, † running north and south, and connecting the two chains of Níla and Nishadha. Gandhamádana and Kailása extend, east and west, eighty Yojanas in breadth, from sea to sea. Nishadha and Páriyátra are the limitative mountains on the west, stretching, like those on the east, between the Níla and Nishadha ranges. And the mountains Triśringa and Járudhi are the northern limits (of Meru), extending, east and west, between the two seas.1 Thus

mountain, Hamsa; § restricting the term Gandhamádaná to the eastern range: a correction, it may be remarked, corroborative of a subsequent date.

These eight mountains are similarly enumerated in the Bhagavata and Váyu. But no mention is made, in them, of any seas (अर्णवान्तर्व्यवस्थित); and it is clear that the eastern and western oceans cannot be intended, as the mountains Mályavat and Gandhamádana intervene. The commentator would seem to

understand 'Arnava' as signifying 'mountain'; as he says, 'Between the seas means within Mályavat and Gandhamádana?: माल्यवद्गन्धमादनयोर्मध्यादर्णवस्थान्तर्व्यवस्थितौ ।|| The Bhagavata describes these eight mountains as circling Meru for 18000 Yojanas in each direction, leaving, according to the commentator, an interval of a thousand Yojanas between them and the base

† adeuda, which, four lines lower, is rendered "limitative mountains", and, further on, "boundary mountains".

Páripátra appears to be the more usual reading.

§ It is not altogether evident that the Bhagavata-purána, V., 16, 27, though it omits Gandhamádana, intends to substitute Hamsa in its stead. || This is from the smaller commentary on the Vishnu-puráńa.

I have repeated to you the mountains described, by great sages, as the boundary mountains, situated, in pairs, on each of the four sides of Meru. Those, also, which have been mentioned as the filament mountains

(or spurs), Sítánta and the rest, are exceedingly delightful. The valleys embosomed amongst them are the favourite resorts of the Siddhas and Chárañas. And there are situated, upon them, agreeable forests, and pleasant cities, embellished with the palaces of Lakshmí, Vishnu, Agni, Súrya, and other deities, and peopled by celestial spirits;* whilst the Yakshas, Rakshasas, Daityas, and Dánavas pursue their pastimes

of the central mountain, and being 2000 high, and as many broad. They may be understood to be the exterior barriers of Meru, separating it from Ilávrita. The names of these mountains, according to the Bhagavata, are Jathara and Devakúta on the east, Pavana and Páriyátra on the west, Triśŕinga and Makara on the north, and Kailása and Karavíra on the south. Without believing it possible to verify the position of these different creations of the legendary geography of the Hindus, it can scarcely admit of doubt that the scheme was suggested by imperfect acquaintance with the actual character of the country, by the four great ranges, the Altai, Muztag or Thian-shan, Ku-en-lun, and Himalaya, which traverse central Asia in a direction from east to west, with a greater or less inclination from north to south, which are connected or divided by many lofty transverse ridges, which enclose several large lakes, and which give rise to the great rivers that water Siberia, China, Tartary, and Hindusthán. (Humboldt on the mountains of Central Asia, and Ritter., Geogr. Asia.)

in the vales. These, in short, are the regions of (Paradise, or) Swarga, the seats of the righteous, and where the wicked do not arrive even after a hundred births.

In (the country of) Bhadráśwa, Vishnu resides as Hayasíras (the horse-headed); in Ketumála, as Varáha (the boar); in Bhárata, as the tortoise (Kúrma); in Kuru, as the fish (Matsya); in his universal form, everywhere: for Hari pervades all places. He, Maitreya, is the supporter of all things: he is all things. In the eight realms, of Kimpurusha and rest, (or all exclusive of Bharata), there is no sorrow, nor weariness, nor anxiety, nor hunger, nor apprehension: their inhabitants are exempt from all infirmity and pain, and live (in uninterrupted enjoyment) for ten or twelve thousand years. Indra* never sends rain upon them: for the earth abounds with water. In those places there is no distinction of Krita, Tretá, or any succession of ages. In each of these Varshas there are, respectively, seven principal ranges of mountains, from which, O best of Brahmans, hundreds of rivers take their rise.

1

More ample details of the Varshas are given in the Mahábharata, Bhagavata, Padma, Váyu, Kúrma, Linga, Matsya, and Márkańdeya Puránas: but they are of an entirely fanciful nature. Thus, of the Ketumála-varsha it is said, in the Vayu, the men are black, the women of the complexion of the lotos; the people subsist upon the fruit of the Panasa or jack-tree, and live for ten thousand years, exempt from sorrow or sickness. Seven Kula or main ranges of mountains in it are named; and a long list of countries and rivers is added, none of which can be identified