Note 18 — Chapter VII · TREE AND SERPENT WORSHIP.

The Tulsi plant is worshipped daily by the Hindus in general, and women in particular, by keeping the plant near their houses. The god Vishnu is worshipped particularly by the leaf of this plant.17 The Tulsi plant is considered by the people to represent the goddess Luxmi, the wife of Vishnu. Hindu women will not take their meals before worshipping the Tulsi plant daily in the morning. It is also said that the god Vishnu, in his eighth incarnation called Krishna, had loved Vrunda, the wife of a demon. After her death she was burnt, but on her burning ground there grew the Tulsi plant. As Krishna loved Vrunda very dearly, he began to love this plant also, and hence the image of Bál Krishna, or the god Vishnu, is married to this plant every year on the 12th day of the bright half of Kártik (November).18 As it is also believed that the god Vishnu resides in the Tulsi plant, the worship of this plant is equivalent to the worship of the god Vishnu.19