but it might with perfect propriety be brought into the corridor for inspection; which was done. This took place during the excitement about the ' Ilbert Bill,' giving natives magisterial authority in the provinces over Europeans; and there followed most violent and offensive articles in several native newspapers reviling Mr. Justice Morris, who was believed to be hostile to the Bill. The Editor of the Bengallee newspaper, an educated man, and formerly a member of the Covenanted Civil Service, the author of one of the most unscrupulous and violent articles, was summoned for contempt of court. He made an apology and complete retractation, but was sentenced to two months' imprisonment."
The sacred chank, conch, or sankhu, which has been referred to in connection with ceremonial observance, is the shell of the gastropod mollusc Turbinella rapa. This is secured, in Southern India, by divers from Tuticorin in the vicinity of the pearl banks. The chank shell, which one sees suspended on the forehead and round the neck of bullocks, is not only used by Hindus for offering libations, and as a musical instrument in temples, but is also cut into armlets, bracelets, and other ornaments. Writing in the sixteenth century, Garcia says: — "This chanco is a ware for the Bengal trade, and formerly produced more profit than now . . . . and there was formerly a custom in Bengal that no virgin in honour and esteem could be corrupted unless it were by placing bracelets of chanco on her arms; but, since the Patans came in, this usage has more or less ceased." " The conch shell," Captain C. R. Day writes,*[1] " is not in secular use as a musical instrument, but is found in every temple, and is sounded during
- ↑ * Music and Musical Instruments of Southern India and the Deccan, 1891.
