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Gangetic rivers perform for the plains of Northern India ,and of the position which they hold in the thoughts of thepeople.
Gangetic
pilgrim-
ages.
Of all great rivers on the surface of the globe, none cancompare in sanctity with the Ganges , or Mother Ganga, as sheis affectionately called by devout Hindus. From her source inthe Himalayas , to her mouth in the Bay of Bengal, her banksare holy ground. Each point of junction of a tributary withthe main stream has its own special claims to sanctity. Butthe tongue of land at AllahdMd, where the Ganges unites withher great sister river the Jumna , is the true Prayag , the placeof pilgrimage whither hundreds of thousands of devout Hindusrepair to wash away their sins in her sanctifying waters. Manyof the other holy rivers of India borrow their sanctity from asupposed underground connection with the Ganges . Thisfond fable recalls the primitive time when the Aryan race wasmoving southward with fresh and tender recollections of theGangetic plains. It is told not only of first-class rivers ofCentral and Southern India, like the Narbada , but also ofmany minor streams of local sanctity.
An ancient legend relates how Ganga , the fair daughterof King Himalaya (Himavat) and of his queen the air-nymphMenaka, was persuaded, after long supplication, to shed herpurifying influence upon the sinful earth. The icicle-studdedcavern from which she issues is the tangled hair of the godSiva. Loving legends hallow each part of her course; andfrom the names of her tributaries and of the towns along herbanks, a whole mythology might be built up. The southernoffshoots of the Aryan race not only sanctified their southernrivers by a fabled connection with the holy stream of thenorth. They also hoped that in the distant future, their riverswould attain an equal sanctity by the diversion of the Ganges ’waters through underground channels. Thus, the Brahmansalong the Narbada maintain that in this iron age of the world(indeed, in the year 1894 a.d.), the sacred character of theGanges will depart from her now polluted stream, and takerefuge by an underground passage in their own Narbada river.
The estuary of the Ganges is not less sacred than hersource. Sagar Island at her mouth is annually visited by avast concourse of pilgrims, in commemoration of her act ofsaving grace; when, in order to cleanse the 60,000 damnedones of the house of Sdgar, she divided herself into a hundredchannels, thus making sure of reaching their remains with her