Note 28 — G

3. Another class of these mendicant Brâhmans is known as Sarvanriya Gangâputra. There is some doubt whether they are really Brâhmans at all, and some connect them with other mendicant singers like the Khapariyas. They claim, however, to be Brâhmans and wear the Brâhmanical cord. They carry about a pair of sticks called kadalkâth, which they rattle together very much in the same way as the “bones” used by negro minstrels. Some have an iron rattle called charua, with bells (ghunghru) which ring as they walk along. Most of them wear an iron bangle on the right wrist, which is used to keep off the evil spirits who surround them, attracted by their singing. They derive their name from their custom of going about and singing songs in commemoration of the tragic legend of Sravana, who is sometimes known as Sravana Rishi. He is by one account said to be the sister’s son of Râja Dasaratha, of the solar race and King of Ajudhya. His father and mother were blind, and prayed to the gods for a son, which was granted; but it was decreed at the same time that their son’s wife should be faithless. So when he came of age Sravana refused to marry; but his parents insisted on his taking a wife. When he brought her home she turned out to be an evil woman, faithless to her husband and harsh in conduct to his parents. She had a dish made with two compartments, one of which she filled with good food for her husband, and the other with foul scraps for his father and mother. One day the food was changed by accident, and Sravana discovered her deception. So, as the old people were near their end, their dutiful son resolved to take them in a basket (kanwari) slung across his shoulder to the Ganges. On the way he came to the village of Sarwan, in the Unâo District, where the legend is now localised, and laid his burden by the banks of a tank while he went into the jungle to rest. It so chanced that Râja Dasaratha was hunting in the forest, and hearing something move in the brushwood, he discharged an arrow, which killed Sravana. His parents, in their despair, cursed the Râja, and to their curse is said to be due the trouble which afterwards fell on the royal house. “From that day to this no Kshatriya has lived in the town which is founded on the spot and is called Sarwan. Many Râjputs have tried it, but evil has overtaken them in one way or another. The tank remains to this day, and by it lies under a tree the body of Sravana, a figure of stone; and as he died with his thirst unquenched, so, if water is poured into the navel of the stone figure, the hole can never be filled up, but is inexhaustible in its demand.”28