The Kama Sutra - Page 50/585

There are also the following verses on the subject.

"The male servants of some men carry on the mouth congress with their

masters. It is also practised by some citizens, who know each other

well, among themselves. Some women of the harem, when they are amorous,

do the acts of the mouth on the yonis of one another, and some men do

the same thing with women. The way of doing this (_i.e._, of kissing the

yoni) should be known from kissing the mouth. When a man and woman lie

down in an inverted order, _i.e._, with the head of the one towards the

feet of the other and carry on this congress, it is called the "congress

of a crow."

For the sake of such things courtezans abandon men possessed of good

qualities, liberal and clever, and become attached to low persons, such

as slaves and elephant drivers. The Auparishtaka, or mouth congress,

should never be done by a learned Brahman, by a minister that carries on

the business of a state, or by a man of good reputation, because though

the practice is allowed by the Shastras, there is no reason why it

should be carried on, and need only be practised in particular cases. As

for instance, the taste, and the strength, and the digestive qualities

of the flesh of dogs are mentioned in works on medicine, but it does not

therefore follow that it should be eaten by the wise. In the same way

there are some men, some places and some times, with respect to which

these practices can be made use of. A man should therefore pay regard to

the place, to the time, and to the practice which is to be carried out,

as also as to whether it is agreeable to his nature and to himself, and

then he may or may not practise these things according to circumstances.

But after all, these things being done secretly, and the mind of the man

being fickle, how can it be known what any person will do at any

particular time and for any particular purpose.

FOOTNOTE:

[Footnote 39: This practice appears to have been prevalent in some parts

of India from a very ancient time. The "Shushruta," a work on medicine

some two thousand years old, describes the wounding of the lingam with

the teeth as one of the causes of a disease treated upon in that work.

Traces of the practice are found as far back as the eighth century, for

various kinds of the Auparishtaka are represented in the sculptures of

many Shaiva temples at Bhuvaneshwara, near Cuttack, in Orissa, and which

were built about that period. From these sculptures being found in such

places, it would seem that this practice was popular in that part of the

country at that time. It does not seem to be so prevalent now in

Hindustan, its place perhaps is filled up by the practice of sodomy,

introduced since the Mahomedan period.]