10 THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY. [January, 1873. of Southern India. Another that they were built in order to protect the followers of Salivahana from a rain of fire which had been foretold by one of the prophets of the land. All the many accounts agree in ascribing these circles to the handiwork of a pigmy race. The following ex¬ tracts with regard to the “ rain of fire” from Vol. VII. (pp. 278, 279, 289) of the Madras Journal of Science and Literature are interesting:— “Through his (S'alivahana’s) wickedness there was no rain—a great famine—much distress, and one house distant ten miles from any other house ; the country little belter than a waste benighted wilderness. The ascetics retiring to the wilderness in secret made murmuring complaints to S iva and Vishnu. S'iva, to avenge the desolation, solicited from the Adi Parabarama (Supreme Being) a fire- rain. Athi-scshan beforehand apprized S'alivahana of its approach in a dream. Salivahana announced to all the followers of Sarvesvarer the coming tire- rain, and recommended them to build stone-houses, or to remain (on the day fixed) in rivers ; by both of which means they would be preserved unin¬ jured by the fire-ram. They followed his advice, some quarrying stones and building houses, others watching on the banks of the largest rivers ; and they were all on the alert. S'iva, opening his front- let eye, sent a rain of fire. S'&livahana’s people took refuge in their stone-houses and he himself with his army on the banks of the KAveri (here used to designate a river in general) avoided it by plunging in the water. S'iva, seeing this, had re¬ course to the Supreme Being, and by meditating on the five lettered mantra, sent down a shower of mud. Those in stone houses were thereby blocked up and suffocated ; those in rivers came out and escaped. °00000°©ooooo “ One instance may be given of the fire-rain of which mention occurs at the commencement of the MS. The Jains have a doctrine that a rain of fire always goes before the periodically recurring universal deluge. ° 0 ° ° ° But though the aforesaid notion of the Jains may have suggested the idea of fire-rain, yet it seems in the document under notice to be a symbol made use of to denote divine judgments : whether the idea, in this sense, may be borrowed from a well-known historical fact or otherwise, let others determine. ° ° ° ° ° “The fire-rain rather seems to bo a symbol of the anger of S'iva ; in plainer terms, an insurrec¬ tion against S'alivahana ; and if so the shower of mud may have a symbolical meaning also and may help to the meaning of a tradition which states that Uriyur, the capital of the Chola kingdom, was destroyed by a shower of sand or mud.” We have here a reason why the houses or kistvaens were made of stone, i. e.} to protect their inhabitants from the fire-rain, and how they were filled up by a shower of mud. NOTES ON JUNNAR T A LUKA, PUNA ZILLA. By W. F. SINCLAIR, Bo. C. S. There is perhaps no other tract in the presi¬ dency of the same extent which offers so many points of interest as the Junnar Taluka, called formerly Sivaneri, after the famous fort of that name; and certainly I know of none which con¬ tains within so small a space so much variety of climate and production. Junnar is the northernmost taluka of the Puna Collectoratc, marching with Nagar, and lies upon a series of mountain rivers which empty themselves into the Ghor, something in the shape of a three-pronged fork. The prongs are the valleys of three streams which, gradually converging, form in their delta the narrower socket. The southernmost of these, the Mina, rising in the deep glen of Ainboli, flows eastward ; at first through a narrow but fertile valley, called after it the Minaner. It is as troublesome and capricious in its small way as the Ganges, and plays havoc every year wTith boundaries, and sometimes with crops, for the first ten miles of its course, changing from one bed to another in the deep lacustrine beds of clay and gravel, which offer no foundation for any work that might restrain it within due bounds. The ryots are well aware of its cha¬ racter, and accordingly most of the villages are set pretty well back from the stream. In one, however, Nirgude, there is unfortunately a fine temple of Maruti, built upon a knowe, that was probably considered secure, about a hundred years back. But the river, constantly encroach¬ ing, had at the time of my visit cut away the ground from under the village to such an extent that it was disappearing at the rate of eight or ten houses a year. Government offered a new site, but the villagers declined to leave Maruti. As it was impossible to found any protecting work in the treacherous substrata, I suppose Maruti is by this time himself in a fair way to join his worshippers in the bed of the Mina. This temple is (or perhaps teas) remarkable for its fine cloisters, built, I believe, in the last century by a member of the Kulkarnis family, who had grown rich in the service of Madhaji Sinde on the plunder of Hindustan.
