NOTE BY MR. G. A. GRIERSON, C.I.E. 249
bhang plant from the
Himalayas and gave it to mankind. Jōgis are well-known
consumers
of bhang and ganja, and they are worshippers of Çiva.
In folk-songs, ganja or
bhang (with or without opium) is the invariable drink of
heroes
before performing any great feat. At the village of Bauri in Gaya
there is a huge hollow
stone, which is said to be the bowl in which the famous hero Lōrik
mixed his ganja. Lōrik
was a very valiant general, and is the hero of numerous folk-songs.
The epic poem of Alhā
and Rūdal, of uncertain date, but undoubtedly based on very old
materials (the heroes lived
in the twelfth century A.D.), contains numerous references to ganja
as a drink of warriors.
For instance, the commencement of the canto dealing with Alhā's
marriage, describes the
pestle and mortar with which the ganja was prepared, the amount of
the intoxicating drink
prepared from it (it is called sabzī) and the amount of
opium (an absurdly exaggerated quan-
tity) given to each warrior in his court.
That the consumption of
bhang is not considered disreputable among Rajputs may be
gathered from the fact that Ajabēs, who was court poet to the
well-known Maharaja Bishwa-
nath Singh of Riwa, wrote a poem praising bhang and comparing
siddhi to the "success"
which attends the
worshipper of "Hari." Here there is an elaborate series of puns.
The
word siddhi means literally 'success,' and
hari means not only the god Hari, but also
bhang.
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