Meer Hassan Ali, B.: Observations on the Mussulmauns of India: descriptive of their manners, customs, habits, and religious opinions ; made during a twelve years residence in their immediate Society (Band 2) (London, 1832)

HINDOO FAIR. 349

I hope to be forgiven for introducing in this
Letter a few anecdotes and occurrences, which
may illustrate that faulty side of the character
of a people who have not derived those advan-
tages which are calculated to displace supersti-
tion from the mind of man;—in a word, they
are strangers to that Holy volume which teaches
better things.

A fair- had been held at Lucknow one after-
noon, not immediately within our view, but
the holiday folks passed our house on the
road to and from the scene of action. This
fair or mayllah is visited by all ranks and
classes of Natives; but it is strictly a Hindoo
festival annually kept up in remembrance
of the celebrated Kornea, of Hindoo mytho-
logic celebrity, who according to their tra-
dition, when but a child, on a certain day
killed with his slender arm a great tyrant, the
giant Khaunce. Had there ever existed a
suspicion that the Hindoos sprang from any of
the tribes of Israel, I should have imagined the
event they celebrate might have reference to
the act of David, who with his single arm