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INDIA

In the handicrafts of India, 7.e. gold, silver, and metal
work, enamels, jewellery, and household decoration, the
art of India is still pre-eminent, especially in those
branches which are in least demand. The gold work of
India is perhaps best known in the forms produced in
Southern India, and generally called. Swami. Swami
work is the representation of the Puranic gods in gold
ornaments, such as bracelets, armlets, &amp;c., and very much
of it finds its way to Europe. In India the demand is
chiefly for household idols in gold and silver—certain
gods being always distinguished by embodiment in gold,
and others in silver. Situla, the goddess of smallpox, for
instance, is always silver. The silver work of India is
famous all over the world. Kashmir parcel gilt silver
(said originally to have been derived from a Mongol
source), with its Lucknow imitations, as well as Katch,
Gujrat, and Burma “sarais”” and bowls in silver repouss¢,
generally exhibiting bold relief combined with intricate
detail in design, are familiar in almost every English
household with an Indian connection.
A vast amount of Indian jewellery still retains its
primitive barbaric forms, some of which are of almost
prehistoric origin, and most of them have furnished the
basis for modern European patterns. English ladies will
5e pleased to learn, on the authority of Sir George Birdwood,
 that the “heart and serpent” form of European
oracelets is probably derived from the silver fig-leaf (the
heart-shaped leaf of the “pipal” or Indian fig), which
still forms the sole adornment of the women of some of
the wild tribes in Central India, and which is usually suspended
 from a serpentine form of waist-belt. The same
authority mentions that a curious form of brooch worn
by the Ladaki women in the Northern Himalayas is
identical with one found in certain Keltic remains in
Ireland. The form is evidently derived from symbols
of serpent and phallic worship. The subject of Indian
jewellery is so extensive and so varied that the reader
who wishes to study it must be referred to the pages
of Sir G. Birdwood’s most interesting book. It is an