Note 137 — Chapter III · TOTEMISM AND FETISHISM.

What has been called the Aryan fire-drill, the Aranî, which in one sense means “foreign” or “strange,” and in another “moving” or “entering,” “being inserted,” is not apparently nowadays used in the ordinary ritual for the production of fire for the Homa or fire sacrifice. The rites connected with the sacred fire have been given in detail in another place.137 In Northern India, at least, the production of the sacred fire has become the speciality of one branch of the Brâhmans, the Gujarâti, who are employed to conduct certain special services occasionally conducted at large cost by wealthy devotees, and known as Jag or Yaksha, in the sense of some particular religious rite.