Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v3.c43.t1.322

v3.c43.t1.322

An Atit Monastery.—We descended along a natural causeway, the rock being perfectly bare, without a particle of mould or vegetation. Small pillars, or uninscribed tablets, placed erect in the centre of little heaps of stone, seemed to indicate the scene of murders, when the Bhil lord of the pass exacted his toll from all who traversed his dominion. They proved, however, to be marks placed by the Banjaras to guide their tandas, or caravans, through the devious tracks of the forest. As we continued to descend, enveloped on all sides by woods and rocks, we lost sight of the towers of Bhainsror, and on reaching the foot of the Pass, the first object we saw was a little monastery of Atits,¹ founded by the chiefs of Bhainsror: it is called Jhalaka. We passed close to their isolated dwelling, on the terraced roof of which a party of the fraternity were squatted round a fire, enjoying the warmth of the morning sun. Their wild [703] appearance corresponded with the scene around; their matted hair and beard had never known a comb; their bodies were smeared with ashes (bhabut), and a shred of cloth round the loins seemed the sole indication that they belonged to a class possessing human feelings. Their lives are passed in a perpetual routine of adoration of Chaturbhuja, the ‘four-armed’ divinity, and they subsist on the produce of a few patches of land, with which the chiefs of Bhainsror have endowed this abode of wild ascetics, or with what their patrons or the townspeople and passengers make up to them. The head of the establishment, a little, vivacious but wild-looking being, about sixty years of age, came forth to bestow his blessing, and to beg something for his order. He, however, in the first place, elected me one of his chelas, or disciples, by marking my forehead with a tika of bhabut, which he took from a platter made of dhak-leaves;² to which rite of inauguration I submitted with due gravity. The old man proved to be a walking volume of legendary lore; but his conversation became insufferably tedious. Interruption was in vain; he could tell his story only in his own way, and in order to get at a point of local history connected with the sway of the Ranas, I was obliged to begin from the creation of the world, and go through all the theogonies, the combats of the Surs and Asurs, the gods and Titans of Indian mythology; to bewail with Sita the loss of her child, her rape by Rawan, and the whole of the wars of Rama waged for her recovery; when, at length, the genealogy of the family commenced, which this strange being traced through all their varying patronymics of Daityas, Riks, Guhilot, Aharya, Sesodia; at which last he again diverged, and gave me an episode to explain the etymology of the distinguishing epithet. I subjoin it, as a specimen of the anchorite’s historical lore: