to those who dwell surrounded by mountain fastnesses, state that the unfrequented passes of the hills are inhabited by cannibals, whom, curiously enough, they entitle ogres. I could not discover how the belief or the word had originated." It is, however, not in the passes of the hills, but in a part of Gírnar itself and of its jungly basins in which Aghoras still linger. When Mrs Postans remarked that they were curiously enough called “ 'ogres," it was evidently a form of the word Aghora which she heard. The stricter form, I believe, of the title of the two-legged man-eater is Aghori, but he is usually called Aghora on Gírnar; and this is frequently abbreviated to Aghor, pronounced Ughor, which latter sound is almost precisely the same as ogre. Very likely our word is derived from it, but I have not gone sufficiently into that point.

Colonel Tod, on his visit to Gírnar in 1822, heard a good deal about the Aghoras, but it is not certain that he saw any, though on the top of Goruknath he met a very wild maniacal ascetic whom he took to be an Aghora, and who may have been one of the community beside whom I slept. The Colonel wanted much to ascend Kalika; but a sudden attack of lameness- I which of course was ascribed to the intervention of the dread goddess-prevented him from even making the attempt. Mr Williams, a friend who was with him, made to him the following statement on the subject: "When I was in Kathiawar, there were three or four men who literally lived like wild beasts, realising the story of Nebuchadnezzar, except that they also ate raw and human flesh. One of these devils came, I think in 1808, to Baroda, and actually ate the arm of a dead child. Another came into the camp of the Sirsoho of Kathiawar,

but he was not suffered to remain, although they covered him with shawls; and at one of the Jatras at Gírnar, one of these Aghoris. came to the rock among the pilgrims, who made pooja, or worship to him, and clad him with shawls, turbans, rings, &c. He sat for some time, and at length, with an idiotic laugh, sprang up and darted into the forest." Mr Burgess only says that they are supposed to haunt Kalika; and adds, "without a guide it would have been useless attempting to reach that almost inaccessible point, to which, says common report, if three set out, but two may be expected to return.'

A brief reference has been made to the Aghoras by the late Professor H. H. Wilson, in his Sketch of the Religious Sects of the Hindus' (Calcutta, 1846); but even that reference I must abbreviate in order to adapt it for polite readers. After alluding to the Paramahansa, the ascetic who becomes "equally indifferent to pleasure or pain, insensible of heat or cold, and incapable of satiety or want," the Oxford Professor goes on as follows: "The same profession of worldly indifference characterises the Aghori or Aghorapanthi; but he seeks occasions for its display, and demands alms as a reward for its exhibition. The original Aghori worship seems to have been that of Devi, in some of her terrific forms, and to have required even human victims for its performance. In imitation of the formidable aspect under which the goddess was worshipped, the ap pearance of her votary was rendered as hideous as possible, and his wand and water pot were a staff set with bones and the upper half of a skull. The practices were of a similar nature, and flesh and spirituous liquors constituted at will the diet of the adept. In proof of their indifference to worldly

objects, they eat and drink whatever is given to them, even carrion, &c. They also inflict gashes on their limbs, that the crime of blood may rest upon the head of the recusant; and they have a variety of similar disgusting devices to extort money from the timid, credulous Hindu. They are fortunately not numerous, and are universally detested and feared."

Gírnar is exactly the place where this order of devotees would be likely to be found lingering; and, from what one of the officers of the Nawab reluctantly admitted to me, I doubt not they do exist there, and that I saw some of them; though, to make anything like intimate acquaintance with them, it would be necessary to live for some days in the jungly basin at the foot of Kalika. Many of the Indian devotees go through terrible privations, and pass into a state in which they are hardly responsible for their actions, and become Aghoras in fact if not in name.

The

word seems to have originally meant "Fire-eater," but it is now associated with the eating of anything dreadful.

I am sorry to say that my attempted ascent of Kalika turned out a failure. I wished to start early in the morning; but all my efforts could not get the asceticswho were to accompany me to show the way to move before nine. They objected that they had religious rites to perform, but what these were I could not discover. At last, however, we got off, leaving behind the unfortunate Man of Pleasure, who could not be prevailed upon to attempt an interview with the Dread Mother. He had the same story as one mentioned by Colonel Tod, to the effect that when mortals are rash enough to make the ascent, they are joined by some devotee who offers to show

them the way, and soon devours them, after having appeared as the Dread Mother herself. I did not like the idea of leaving him alone, so I suggested to him that the Dread One might take advantage of our absence, appear before him in the shape of a Bawa, and swallow him up where he was; but this idea, which did not seem to have struck him before, knocked him, as it were, into still more of a heap. The ascent of Kalika, however, was still more dreaded by him; and such a feeling on the part of a Brahman resident so near Gírnar, and also a Government official, went far to convince me that the dread mount is dangerous-that is to say, that steps are taken to make it so. I then suggested that he might return to the Khengar palace; but this, he said, his duty to me would not allow of. Thus puzzled between his duties and his fears, the Man of Pleasure had reached an apex of misery unrelieved by any happiness, and I was very glad to leave my rifle with him as a protection from Aghoras, and to give him leave to fire it occasionally.

Starting about nine in the morning, with V. V. and two or three of the Bawas, I found that the foottrack, which at first was visible, soon came to an end, and that an unexpected difficulty presented itself. From the high top of the Datatrya it looked easy enough to ascend Kalika; but on trial I found that its side was thickly covered with huge blocks of rough granite. These blocks were close enough to each other-most provokingly sobut they were far too large to admit of leaping from one to the other, even had leaping been possible for me. Consequently we had to scramble up one side of each rough block of granite only to scramble down the other, and there found ourselves in immediate contact with a similar

exasperating obstacle. This, as I say, was wholly unexpected; and I had also the disadvantage of being lame with rheumatism. By the time we had got about a third of the way up the peak I saw quite clearly that though I might contrive to reach the summit by nightfall, the fatigue and suffering involved would be so great that there would be nothing left for me when I did get there, but at once to sink into the arms of the Dread Mother: and the Bhairava Jap would have afforded a much pleasanter route than that. I tried to get V. V. and the Bawas to return to their nest for my haps and make some ar

rangements for my passing the night where I was, and finishing the ascent next day; but they would not assent to anything of the kind, and so I had to return. Greatly relieved was the Man of Pleasure when he saw me again. He had become nervous, and had nearly consumed all my cartridges, firing them off against a rock, at intervals of about ten minutes, to keep off ogres, and to keep up his fainting spirits; but, when he saw me safe back, a tinge of happiness came over the mountain of his misery, though clouded by a dark misgiving as to what might next be in store for him.

J. R. S.

connection

THE duty assigned to the Royal Commission on Army Retirement, whose Report has now been before the public for the last two months, was perhaps the most important in with military affairs that has ever had to be undertaken in peace time. For on the solution they arrive at of the problem set before them to work out, depends whether the abolition of purchase is to destroy the efficiency of the army, or whether new conditions could be found for furnishing that essential part of an efficient army, a body of officers in the vigour of life. The Commission have faced and solved the problem boldly, and both the army and they are to be congratulated on the result-a result the more satisfactory because, while that body contained some members of conspicuous ability, the conservative element in military matters was fairly, indeed liberally, represented on it. Its composition was in this sense thoroughly judicious. The recommendation of men of a different stamp from that of some members of the Commission holding strong opinions in favour of abolishing purchase, or generally belonging to the advanced school of military thought, if they might have given us a more original scheme, would not have carried the military world with them; and any proposals advanced by them would have had to run the gauntlet of fresh criticism. In fact, the publication of the Report would have been merely the first step in the matter; they would next have had to bring round public opinion, and still more the military authorities, to their way of thinking. But the recommendations of a Commission composed as was this one, may at

VOL. CXX.-NO. DCCXXXIII.

once be taken for granted as representing the very least that is necessary in the way of change; and the almost entire absence of criticism of the Report on its appearance, shows the moderation of spirit in which it has been framed. Considering how many interests are touched by them, it may be assumed that there is a general agreement of the necessity for doing at least as much as the Commission recommend.

If, however, the Commission have not gone further than was absolutely necessary in dealing with some parts of their work, their scheme is in other respects vigorous and far-reaching. They have firmly grasped the cardinal principle which underlies the whole matter-namely, that if promotion is to continue to be as rapid without purchase as it was under the purchase system, it is useless to look to any arrangement in the way of vacancies at the top of a regiment for supplying the needful outlet. In fact, as soon as ever the matter is inquired into, that becomes plain which everybody who had taken the trouble to think about it saw must be the case. Sir Charles Trevelyan, and other would-be military reformers of his school, used to lay down that the object of all reform of this kind should be to make the army "a profession." The Commission on the other hand point out, that in order that the army may be a profession for the few, it must not be a profession for the many. The ordinary outlet afforded in other professions by vacancies at the top will not suffice to secure efficiency for the army. Not only must there be retirements in all grades, but those occurring in the lower ranks must

2 R

be more numerous than those which take place in the higher. It was because, under purchase, most of the men who entered the army remained in it only for a few years, that those who held on could rise to the higher grades before they were overtaken by old age. It was because the majority of the officers who entered the Prussian army did so with the object of spending their lives in it, that the Prussian officers used to be as a body much too old for their work. This condition has now passed away, at any rate for a time, partly from the large augmentation made to that army in recent years, and partly also from pensions being now available in almost all grades, the rates of which are very liberal in comparison with the rate of pay drawn while in the active army. The different reserves also afford a retreat to many; to which may be added that, as pointed out by General Beauchamp Walker in his evidence, the work thrown on Prussian officers nowadays is severe enough to wear most men out by the time they reach field-rank, and thus to hasten their retirement. Hard work, in fact, seems to do for that army what foreign stations and bad climates do for ours. But if Europe continues for long at peace, the difficulty will certainly arise in the Prussian army again, especially in consequence of the large proportion maintained of junior to senior officers, there being in the infantry no less than four subalterns to one captain. The Commission, therefore, recognising the fact that the comparatively rapid promotion which used to obtain in the English army was due to the large proportion of retirement in the lower grades, which, again, was the direct result of purchase, have wisely proposed that purchase should virtually be re-established, but purchase by the State instead of by

By this

the officers themselves. means alone can that block in the higher grades be prevented, which the Government have guaranteed should not be allowed to occur. At any time after eight years' service an officer is to be entitled to a sum in ready money on retirement, varying according to length of service, but generally rather more than the old regulation prices; while in case these inducements should, after all, not prove sufficiently attractive to maintain the needful number of retirements to insure adequate promotion for those who remain behind, they propose a system of enforced retirements after certain maxima periods of service in each grade. This condition is absolutely necessary if the scheme is to work successfully, and there is no doubt that it may hit some men hard; but the public good must be the first consideration, and the reservations proposed by the Commissioners seem to go as far as is fair and reasonable in the way of protecting existing interests. It is on this point, however, that the scheme will suffer shipwreck if it is not to pass; but it is to be hoped the Government will have sufficient firmness to withstand any objections that may be raised in the interests of those who will be unfavourably affected in this way. If we are to have an efficient army, it is absolutely necessary that the lower ranks be kept clear of all officers who reach middle life without having had the good fortune to get promoted into the upper. any considerable mutilation is made of the scheme in this respect, it must prove a failure. Of course no one can tell beforehand whether or not the payments alone will prove sufficient for the purpose, by inducing a sufficiency of optional retirements, or how far resort to compulsory retirements will be found

If