Mr. Fergusson, however, tells us that the prin cipal Jain works are in Rajputana, Gwalior, and Bundelkhand. Their sculptures almost entirely are restricted to the representation of their twenty-four hierarchs, whom they call Tirthan kara, to each of whom, as mentioned at page 402, a symbol is attached, — generally some animal, fish, or flower ; in one instance a crescent, in another a thunderbolt. Some of the Jaina temples are of great beauty. They have their shrines on the hills of Palitana, Girnar, Gwalior, Mount Abu, and Parasnath, but also in deep secluded valleys. That at Muktagiri, near Gawilghur, is in a deep, well - wooded valley, traversed by a stream with several waterfalls. At Sadri there is a group of temples, the principal one having been erected by Khumbo, rang of Udaipur, in a lonely silent glen, below his fort of Komulmer, dedicated to Adinatha or Reshabdeva, the first and greatest of the Jaina saints. It covers 48,000 square feet. The rock at Gwalior, in Central India, has one remarkable Jaina struc ture, dedicated to Padmanatha, their sixth Tir thankara, and the rock on all sides has a series of caves or rock-cut sculptures, most of them mere niches to contain statues, all of them excavated between 1441 and 1474. One of the figures is 57 feet high. In their temples the saint is very numerously represented by images in cells or niches. At Chandravati, a few miles southward from Mount Abu, is a ruined city, with extensive remains of Jaina temples of the same age as those on the mount.
Jaina images are in Canara called Chindeo, a corruption of Jainadeva.
The Jain has been a builder of temples, has cut out cathedrals in the rock, andpiled up towers and spires at his great places of pilgrimage for the last thousand years. Their temples are mag nificent; the most ancient of them are at Girnar, the most exquisite on Mount Abu, the most extensive and still flourishing at Satrtmjaya near Palitana. The last mentioned were beautified and restored by Siladitya, and it is the most ancient and most sacred of the Jain shrines of Gujerat. Almost every Indian city has contri buted to its "adornment. Palitana, or the abode of the Pali, is the name of the town at the foot of the sacred mount Satrunjaya (signifying victorious over the foe), the JaM temples on which are sacred to Budheswara, or the lord of the Buddh ist. Palitana seems derived from the pastoral (Pali) Scythic invaders bringing in their train the Buddhist faith, which appears indigenous to India. Palestine, which, with the whole of Syria and Egypt, was ruled by the Ykos, or Shepherd Kings, who for a season expelled the old Coptic race, may have had a similar import to the Pali tana founded by the Indo-Scythic Pali.
The bill of Satrunjaya at Palitana, in the Gohelwar district at the mouth of the Gulf of Cambay, is dedicated to Adinath, the first of the 24 hierophants of the Jains. Each temple con tains images in marble of Adinath or of some other of the Tirthankara, and perhaps no fabric of human workmanship in India is more calculatet to arouse wonder, admiration, and lusting reinem• limo° than Palitana in its unique and mysterious perfection.
Abn, in Jain estimation, is the holiest spot or earth. Dilwarra, according to tradition, has been famous from a remote antiquity. Hindu templer are said to have existed, to which, since A.D. 1034, pilgrims have resorted ; but all traces of them have disappeared. On their traditional site, how ever, at Dilwarra, Bimul Salt, a rich Jain mer chant, and others, erected tho celebrated Jain temples which are now there. The Jain priests of Abu are chosen from amongst the youth of the Ossi tribe or Oswal of the Marwari people. They never marry, but live a sad'hu or pure ascetic life, and arc scrupulously careful to avoid destruction of animal life. They move about with a cloth
over their mouths to prevent insects entering ; they use incessantly a small brush or broom to sweep aside all living creatures ; they eat seldom, generally once daily, and they never partake of stale food, lest in the interval since its cooking animalcule may have formed in it.
The ancient Persian fire-worshippers, like the present Jain, placed a bandage over the mouth while worshipping.
The Jains have five great tirthas, or places of pilgrimage, to which the large bands of pilgrims called Sanghas may be seen slowly marching every cold season. These places are Parisnath, near Calcutta ; Mount Abu, the sanatorium of Rajputana; Chandragiri in the Himalaya; Girnar in Gujeiat ; and Satrunjaya in Kattyawar.
Parasnath is the highest point of the Bengal range of hills south of Rajmahal. It is one of the Jaina pilgrim shrines, and nineteen of their twenty-four Tirthankara are said to have died and been buried there ; amongst others, Pars wanatha, the last of them but one. The temples on it are numerous. But Jainism never seems to have taken a firm place in Bengal ; and when the Pala dynasty of Bengal, about A.D. 1203, left Buddhism, and accepted the Vaishnava and Saiva superstitions, Jainism seems to have disappeared. There seems also to have been a pause, at least in the north of India; but a revival occurred in the 15th century, especially under Rana Khumbo of Mewar, A.D. 1418-1468, who made his capital at Chitore. Though deficient in the extreme grace and elegance that characterized the earliest examples, those of the middle style are bold and vigorous expressions of the art.
The temples on Parasnath are contemptible. But the number of pilgrims, men and women well-to-do in the world, who journey from very distant spots to Parasuath, is considerable. Slowly and toilsomely they may bo seen climb ing the hill, and presenting their offerings to the figures within the temple, marching thrice round the building with low and not unmelodious chant.
Of the five great places of pilgrimage, Satrunjaya is now the most popular. Like Parasnath, it is it solitary peak. It rises to a height of about 2000 feet, a little to the south of Palitana in Katty awar. Leaving that town, the visitor passes along a broad and clear road, shaded by the banyan tree, and supplied by wells of pure water, the work of devotees. The steep ascent begins with a wide flight of steps guarded by elephants, and is marked all the way up by miniature shrines covering marble slabs, on which the soles of two feet are carved, with Devanagiri inscriptions. There aro frequent resting - places, considered especially holy, which are associated with events in the legends of Ilharata and Krishna. The Hindus are represented by Ilantnan, the monkey god, and the Muhammadans by the shrine of a saint, both marking the cessation of conflicts with the Jains. From the summit the view is magnificent. That a sect numbering less than half a million of people all over India should send forth so many pilgrims every year to the five tirthas, is explained by the fact that pilgrimage is an essen tial part of their worship,—is, indeed, the only means by which the devotee may attain to that complete annihilation, which, as distinguished from the Buddhist absorption, is the result of the breath, the only soul which they seem to believo in, leaving the body.
They have an extensive literature, Puranas of their own, works in grammar, astronomy, mathe matics, and medicine. They were the first who reduced the Canarese language to writing, and cultivated it to a high degree of perfection. The best epic poem in the Tamil language, the Chinta mani, was by a Jaina.—Barth, p. 140; Taylor's Catalogue, iii. pp. 424-436.