Three Hindu ascetics walking on burning embers. Gouache painting by an artist of Thanjavur (Tanjore).

One of the men wears an ornate, conical head-dress, brightly patterned knee length trousers, sash, beads, earrings and garlands; his forehead and upper body are decorated with tilaka, or religious markings and he holds a gilded bamboo cane in his right hand; the other two men wear white dhotis (loin-cloths) edged in red, and white cloths knotted round their heads; one beats an udaku (?), or small hourglass shaped drum, the other shakes two ring-shaped rattles (?)