Page:Life in Java Volume 2.djvu/196

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

180 LIFE IN JAVA.

amine minutely the subject of each, unless, in- deed, the traveller could repeat his visit several times. One represents two athletic figures strug- gling together for a box, while a man and woman from an adjacent house look upon the scene with great consternation and alarm. Next to this is seen a gigantic figure in a sitting posture, with one knee raised and tied to a tree. Two men, who look like attendants, are on the left, and on the right an altar with the flame rising in a pyramidal form. Bevond the altar is a figure leanino; against a kind of pillar, holding in his left hand a lotus flower. This last alto-relievo Is supposed to repre- sent a giant overpowered, and about to be made an auto da fe of, a scene to which the procession represented above may probably be a prelude, as the giant is seated on an elephant, with an air of apparent resignation to his fate, amidst a crowd of people assembled to witness the triumph of their deity over mundane strength. Rama precedes the

�� �