This is explained by the fact that once, when intoxicated with victory, she danced so furiously as to shake earth and heaven, threatening to involve all things in one common ruin. The gods besought Siva to arrest his wife in her mad career of joy, and this he effected by casting himself under her feet. Perceiving this, she was so shocked, that she thrust out her tongue to a great length, and remained motionless.[1]
At one side of the temple forked stakes are fixed in the earth, through which the heads of goats or buffaloes are passed to be severed by the axe of the sacrificer, and below is a mound of Ganges mud, to catch the blood of the victims. The soil is ever wet with gore from the daily sacrifices; and at certain seasons the whole place runs with the blood of the multitudes of victims offered at the shrine of this demon. No Christian could look upon this hideous block and the immortal men, creatures of God, who fell down and worshipped it, without praying that God would hasten the time when Kali should be dragged from her den and cast out as an unclean thing, and God,
- ↑ To run out the tongue is the common expression of astonishment or surprise among the Hindu women.
44
