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Excerpt from Agastya in the Tamil Land No tradition is so widespread throughout the length and breadth of the Tamil country as that concerning sage Agastya and his numerous exploits. Of all the mythic, semi-historic and historic personages of the Aiyan annals, who have figured in South Indian History, Agastya has occupied the foremost place and secured the largest homage of the cultured and the masses alike. He meets us from the very start of Aryan History, being a composer of certain hymns of the earliest of the Vedas, the Rg Veda. Still he seems to have been not included amongst the seven holy sages, the Prajāpatis, or the progenitors of the human race. These were Gotama, Bharadwaja, Viswamitra Jamadagni, Vasistha, Kasyapa and Atri. Even later Puranas, like the Vāyu and the Visnu, which have amplified the list of the primitive sages by including Bhrgu and Daksa, have only quietly passed Agastya over. This circumstance may lend some colour of support to the doubt whether Agastya is not after all the sage of a later day. However that be, posterity has made ample amends for this omission by raising him to a still higher position and assigning him a place among the Stars. The Star Canopus, which sheds its brilliance in the Southern heavens, is believed to be none other than the austere Sage Agastya, the semi-divine benefactor of the human race, who has been thus honoured by a grateful posterity. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; an