197
proposed to send away all his servants to ensure privacy except a boy who required to take down our questions. He then enquired about the offerings brought by us which consisted of betel-leafs, areca nuts, bits of saffron and plantains. After counting the number of things brought, with a great show of accuracy and explaining to us the method of selecting the nadi applicable to the enquiry in hand, he ordered the boy above mentioned to enter in a book the address of the questioner, the number of things brought by him and the questions proposed, after answering himself, however, that a currency note of 5 Rupees was placed in his hands which he was pleased to call an "Asurapatram" (paper of the Raksham or demons). He appeared to be very particular about the point of time when the questions were declared though it did not appear what use was made of this fact in finding out the nadi or interrupting the same. He then asked me if I had any questions to put, and when I told him that I would propose my questions after seeing the result of my friend's enquiries he appeared to be dissatisfied and said that it would be very convenient for him if I were to ask my questions also immediately and pay down my fees. I did so and the same process of calculation was gone through in my case. After these preliminary preparations were finisned two books were taken out of the box and placed on a stand called Vyasapeetham. One of these books which appeared to be old was then opened; after looking at it for a while, the astrologer opened his box and took out a third book which appeared to be new, saying that the account in the old book began with the answers, but that the preface required had to be read from another book. My readers will be pleased to notice here that no calculation was needed to select this new book and that in all probability this single book contains the prefatory remarks to every answer given to every enquirer, as no attempt was made by the astrologer to select one book from a number of such books.
When the astrologer began to read from this new book we found that the scene opened in Vykuntham with Narayana
