Aditya's great grand-daughter, Savi's grand-daughter, and my daughter Arkakanya." All the ceremonies, such as making hōmam, tāli-tying, etc., are performed as at a regular marriage, and, after the recitation of a few sentences from the Vēdas, the plant is cut down. " The plant," Mr. A. Srinivasan writes,*[1] " is named arka after the sun. When the car of the sun turns towards the north, every Hindu applies the leaves of this plant to his head before he bathes, in honour of the event. The plant is, besides, believed to be a willing scapegoat to others' ills. Oil and ghī applied to the head of the victim of persistent illness has only to be transferred to this plant, when it withers and saves the man, even as Baber is said to have saved his son. The poet Kalidāsa describes sweet Sakuntala, born of a shaggy dweller of the forest, as a garland of jasmine thrown on an arka plant. ' May the arka grow luxuriant in your house' is the commonest form of curse. ' Be thou belaboured with arka leaves ' is familiar in the mouths of reprimanding mothers. Adulterers were, half a century ago, seated on an ass, face to the tail, and marched through the village. The public disgrace was enhanced by placing a garland of the despised arka leaves on their head. [Uppiliyan women convicted of immorality are said to be garlanded with arka flowers, and made to carry a basket of mud round the village.] A Telugu proverb asks 'Does the bee ever seek the arka flower? ' The reasons for the ill-repute that this plant suffers from are not at all clear. The fact that it has a partiality for wastes has evidently brought on its devoted head the dismal associations of desolation, but there would seem to be more deep-seated hatred to the plant than has been
- ↑ * Madras Christian College Magazine, March, 1903.
