Chapter 15

Badaga Temple.Badaga Temple.The other agricultural ceremony is called Devvē habba or tenai (Setaria italica), and is usually celebrated in June or July, always on a Monday. It is apparently performed in honour of the two gods Mahālingaswāmi and Hiriya Udaya, to whom a group of villages will have temples dedicated. For example, the Badagas inthe neighbourhood of Kotagiri have their Hiriya Udaya temple at Tāndanād, and Mahālingaswāmi temple at Kannērmukku. This Devvē festival, which should on no account be pronounced duvve, which means burning-ground, is celebrated at one place, whither the Badagas from other villages proceed, to take part in it. About midday, some Badagas and the temple pūjāri go from the temple of Hiriya Udaya to that of Mahālingaswāmi. The procession is usually headed by a Kurumba, who scatters fragments of tūd bark and wood as he goes on his way. The pūjāri takes with him the materials necessary for doing pūja, and, after worshipping Mahālingaswāmi, the party return to the Hiriya Udaya temple, where milk and cooked rice are offered to the various gods within the temple precincts. On the following day, all assemble at the temple, and a Kurumba brings a few sheaves ofSetaria italica, and ties them to a stone set up at the main entrance. After this, pūja is done, and the people offer cocoanuts to the god. Later on, all the women of the Madhave sept, who have given birth to a first-born child, come, dressed up in holiday attire, with their babies, to the temple. On this day they wear a special nose ornament, called elemukkuththi, which is only worn on one other occasion, at the funeral of a husband. The women do pūja to Hiriya Udaya, and the pūjāri gives them a small quantity of rice on mīnige (Argyreia) leaves. After eating this, they leave the temple in a line, and wash their hands with water given to them by the pūjāri. This ceremonial, performed by women of the Madhave sept, is called Mandēdhanda. As soon as the Devvē festival is concluded, the reaping of the crop commences, and a measure or two of grain from the crop gathered on the first day, called nīsal, is set apart for the Mahālingaswāmi temple.The most important gods of the Badagas are Heththeswāmi, Mahālingaswāmi, Hiriya Udaya, Mādeswara, Mānkāli, Jadeswāmi, and Nīlgiri Rangaswāmi. And at the present day, some Badagas proceed to the plains, to worship at the Saivite temple at Karamadai in Coimbatore, or at Nanjangōd in Mysore.The festival in honour of Heththeswāmi is celebrated in the month of January at Baireganni. It is sometimes called ermathohabba, as, with it, ploughing operations cease. It always commences on a Monday, and usually lasts eight days. A Sēdan or Dēvānga weaver comes with his portable hand-loom, and sufficient thread for weaving a dhubati (coarse cloth) and turban. At Baireganni there is a special house, in which these articles are woven. But, at other places where the festival is observed, the Badagas go to the weaver’s village to fetch the required cloths. Early on the second morning of the festival, some of the more respected Badagas and the weaver proceed to the weaving house after bathing. The weaver sets up his loom, and worships it by offering incense, and other things. The Badagas give him a new cloth, and a small sum of money, and ask him to weave a dhubati and two kachches (narrow strips of cloth). Daily, throughout the festival, the Badagas collect near the temple, and indulge in music and songs. Until the last day, they are not permitted to set eyes on the god Heththeswāmi. On the morning of the last day, the pūjāri, accompanied by all the Badagas, takes the newly woven cloths to a stream, in which they are washed. When they are dry, all proceed to the temple, where the idol is dressed up in them, and all, on this occasion only, are allowed to look at it. Devotees pay a small offering of money, which is placed on a tray near the idol. The crowd begins to disperse inthe afternoon, and, on their way back to their villages, the wants of the travellers are attended to by people posted at intervals with coffee, fruit, and other articles of food. If the Badagas have to go to a weaver’s village for the cloths, the weaver is, when the order is given for them, presented with four annas, after he has bathed. When handing the money to him, the Badagas bawl out “This is the fee for making the cloths to be worn by Heththe Iramāsthi and Parasakti Parvati.” On the last day of the festival, the cloths are washed, and one of them is made to represent an idol, which is decorated with waist and neck ornaments, and an umbrella. All prostrate themselves before it, and make offerings of money. Fruits and other things are then offered to Heththeswāmi and some recite the following prayer. “May all good acts be remembered, and all bad ones be forgotten. Though there may be a thousand and one sins, may I reach the feet of God.”The following further information in connection with the Baireganni festival is given by Bishop Whitehead. “The people from other villages offer money, rice, fruits, umbrellas of gold or silver for the goddess, cloths, and buffaloes. The buffaloes are never killed, but remain as the property of the temple. The pūjāri calls the representatives of one village, and tells them what Hetheswāmi says to him,e.g., ‘This year you will have good [or bad] crops; cholera or small-pox, good [or bad] rain, etc.’ As the people present their offerings, they prostrate themselves, kneeling down and touching the ground with their foreheads, and the pūjāri gives them some flowers, which they wear in their hair. The people and the pūjāri play on the kombu [horn], and ring bells while the offerings are being made. After the offerings have finished, all the men dance, in two companies, infront of the temple, one shouting ‘How-ko, How-ko,’ and the other ‘Is-hōli.’ The dance was taught them by the Todas, and the words are Toda.”Badagas Making Fire.Badagas Making Fire.In connection with the Jadeswāmi festival the ceremony of walking through fire [burning embers] is carried out at Mēlūr, Tangālu, Mainelē, Jakkanāre, Tenād, and Nidugala. At Mēlūr and Tangālu, the temples belong to the Hāruvas, who carry out all the details of ceremony. The temple at Tenād is owned by the Udayas, by whom the ceremonial is performed. In other places, the celebrants are Badagas. The festival is observed, on an elaborate scale, at Nidugala during the month of January. All those who are going to walk over the burning embers fast for eight days, and go through the rite on the ninth day. For its performance, Monday is considered an auspicious day. The omens are taken by boiling two pots of milk side by side on two hearths. If the milk overflows uniformly on all sides, the crops will be abundant for all the villages. But, if it flows over on one side only, there will be plentiful crops for villages on that side only. The space over which the embers are spread is said to be about five yards long, and three yards broad. But, in some places,e.g., Jakkanāre and Mēlūr, it is circular as at the Muhammadan fire-walking ceremony. For making the embers, the wood ofEugenia JambolanaandPhyllanthus Emblicaare used. For boiling the milk, and setting fire to the wood, a light obtained by friction must be used. The process is known as niligolu, or upright stick. The vertical stick is made of a twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, which is rotated in a socket in a long thick piece of a bough ofDebregeasia velutina, in which a row of sockets has been made. The rotation is produced by a cord passed several times round the vertical stick, ofwhich each end is pulled alternately. The horizontal block is pressed firmly on the ground by the toes of a man, who presses a half cocoanut shell down on the top of the vertical stick, so as to force it down into the socket. A Badaga, who failed in an attempt to demonstrate the making of fire by this method, gave as an excuse that he was under worldly pollution, from which he would be free at the time of the fire-walking ceremony. Though the Badagas make fire by friction, reference is made in their folk legends, not to this mode of obtaining fire, but to chakkamukki (flint and steel), which is repeatedly referred to in connection with cremation. After the milk boiling ceremonial, the pūjāri, tying bells on his legs, approaches the fire pit, carrying milk freshly drawn from a cow, which has calved for the first time, and flowers ofRhododendron arboreum,Leucas aspera, or jasmine. After doing pūja, he throws the flowers on the embers, and they should remain unscorched for a few seconds. He then pours some of the milk over the embers, and no hissing soundshouldbe produced. The omens being propitious, he walks over the glowing embers, followed by an Udaya, and the crowd of celebrants, who, before going through the ordeal, count the hairs on their feet. If any are singed, it is a sign of approaching ill fortune, or even death. In an account of the fire-walking ceremony, in 1902, it is noted that “the Badagas strongly repudiate the insinuation of preparing their feet to face the fire ordeal. It is done to propitiate Jeddayswāmi, to whom vows are invoked, in token of which they grow one twist or plait of hair, which is treasured for years, and finally cut off as an offering to Jeddayswāmi. Numbers of Chettis were catering to the crowd, offering their wares, bangles, gay-coloured handkerchiefs, as well as edibles. The Kotas supplied the music, and anancient patriarch worked himself up to a high pitch of inspiration, and predicted all sorts of good things for the Badagas with regard to the ensuing season and crops.”The following legend, relating to the fire-walking ceremony, is recorded by Bishop Whitehead. “When they first began to perform the ceremony fifty or sixty years ago, they were afraid to walk over the fire. Then the stone image of Mahālinga Swāmi turned into a snake, and made a hole through the temple wall. It came out, and crawled over the fire, and then went back to the temple. Then their fear vanished, and they walked over the embers. The hole is still to be seen in the temple.”Of the fire-walking ceremony at Mēlūr, the following account is given in the Gazetteer of the Nīlgiris. “It takes place on the Monday after the March new moon, just before the cultivation season begins, and is attended by Badagas from all over Mērkunād. The inhabitants of certain villages (six in number), who are supposed to be the descendants of an early Badaga named Guruvajja, have first, however, to signify through their Gottukārs, or headmen, that the festival may take place; and the Gottukārs choose three, five, or seven men to walk through the fire. On the day appointed, the fire is lit by certain Badaga priests and a Kurumba. The men chosen by the Gottukārs then bathe, adorn themselves with sandal, do obeisance to the Udayas of Udayarhatti near Kēti, who are specially invited and feasted; pour into the adjacent stream milk from cows which have calved for the first time during the year; and, in the afternoon, throw more milk and some flowers from the Mahālingasvāmi temple into the fire pit, and then walk across it. Earth is next thrown on the embers, and they walk acrosstwice more. A general feast closes the ceremony, and next day the first ploughings are done, the Kurumba sowing the first seeds, and the priests the next lot. Finally, a net is brought. The priest of the temple, standing over it, puts up prayers for a favourable agricultural season; two fowls are thrown into it, and a pretence is made of spearing them; and then it is taken and put across some game path, and some wild animal (a sāmbhar deer if possible) is driven into it, slain, and divided among the villagers. This same custom of annually killing a sāmbhar is also observed at other villages on the plateau, and in 1883 and 1894 special orders were passed to permit of its being done during the close season. Latterly, disputes about precedence in the matter of walking through the fire at Mēlūr have been carried as far as the civil courts, and the two factions celebrate the festival separately in alternate years. A fire-walking ceremony also takes place annually at the Jadayasvāmi temple in Jakkanēri under the auspices of a Sivāchāri Badaga. It seems to have originally had some connection with agricultural prospects, as a young bull is made to go partly across the fire-pit before the other devotees, and the owners of young cows which have had their first calves during the year take precedence of others in the ceremony, and bring offerings of milk, which are sprinkled over the burning embers.”At the Sakalathi festival, in the month of October, Badagas, towards evening, throw on the roofs of their houses flowers ofPlectranthus Wightii,Crotalaria obtecta,Lobelia nicotianœfolia,Achyranthes aspera, andLeucas aspera. On the following day, they clean their houses, and have a feast. In the afternoon, numbers of them may be seen in the streets drawing in front of their houses pictures in wood-ashes of buffaloes, bulls, cows,ploughs, stars, sun and moon, snakes, lizards, etc. They then go into their houses, and wash their hands. Taking up in his clean hands a big cake, on which are placed a little rice and butter, the Badaga puts on it three wicks steeped in castor oil, and lights them. The cake is then waved round the heads of all the children of the house taken to a field, and thrown therein with the words “Sakalathi has come.” The cake-thrower returns home, and prostrates himself before a lamp placed in the inner room, and repeats a long formula, composed of the various synonyms of Siva.In the month of November, a festival called Dodda Habba (big feast) is celebrated. In the afternoon, rice is cooked in whey within the hāgōttu, and eaten on mīnige leaves. Throughout the day the villagers play at various ball games.A festival, which is purely local, is celebrated near Konakore in honour of Mahangkāli. A buffalo is led to the side of a precipice, killed by a Kurumba with a spear, and thrown over the edge thereof. There is a legend that, in olden days, a pūjāri used to put a stick in the crevice of a rock, and, on removing it, get the value of a buffalo in fanams (gold coins). But, on one occasion, he put the stick in a second time, in the hopes of gaining more money. No money, however, was forthcoming and, as a punishment for his greed, he died on the spot.All Badaga villages, except those of the Udayas, have a hut, called holagudi, for the exclusive use of women during their monthly periods. A few months before a girl is expected to reach puberty, she is sent to the holagudi, on a Friday, four or five days before the new moon day. This is done lest, in the ordinary course of events, the first menstruation should commence on an inauspicious day. The girl remains in the holagudi onenight, and returns home on the following day clad in new cloths, leaving the old ones in the hut. When she arrives at her house, she salutes all the people who are there, and receives their blessing. On Sunday she goes to the houses of her relations, where she is given kadalai (Cicer arietinum) and other food. She may not enter the inner apartment of her house until she has seen the crescent moon. Badaga women observe five days menstrual pollution. If a woman discovers her condition before washing her face in the early morning, that day is included in the pollution period. Otherwise, the period must be prolonged over six days. On the third day she bathes in cold water, using the bark ofPouzolzia(thorēkōlu), and on the fourth day is allowed a change of clothing after a bath. On this day she leaves the hut, and passes a portion of the night in the verandah of her house. After cooking and eating her evening meal, she bathes, and enters the outer room. Early on the following morning, the spot which she has occupied is cleaned, and she bathes in a stream. Returning home, she eats her food in the outer room, where she remains till next morning. Even children may not be touched by a menstruating woman. If, by chance, this happens, the child must be washed to remove the pollution, before it can be handled by others. This restriction is apparently not observed by any other tribe or caste.Writing concerning marriage among the Badagas, Harkness states12that “it is said to be common for one who is in want of labourers to promise his daughter in marriage to the son or other relative of a neighbour not in circumstances so flourishing as himself. And, these engagements being entered into, the intended bridegroomserves the father of his betrothed as one of his own family till the girl comes of age, when the marriage is consummated, and he becomes a partner in the general property of the family of his father-in-law.”A man may marry a girl belonging to the same village as himself, if he and she are not members of the same exogamous sept. In most cases, however, all the inhabitants of a village are of the same sept, and a man has to take as his wife a girl from a village other than his own.Among all sections of the Badagas, adult marriage is the general rule, though infant marriage is also practised. Marriage is preceded by a simple form of courtship, but the consent of the parents to the union is necessary. A girl does not suffer in reputation if she is rejected by a number of suitors, before she finally settles down. Except among the Udayas, the marriage ceremony is of a very simple nature. A day or two before that fixed for taking the girl to the house of her husband-elect, the latter proceeds to her village, accompanied by his brothers, who, as a token of respect, touch the feet of all the Badagas who are assembled. The bride is taken to the house of the bridegroom, accompanied by the Kota band. Arrived there, she stands at the entrance, and her mother-in-law or sister-in-law brings water in a vessel, and pours it into her hands thrice. Each time she lets the water fall over her feet. The mother-in-law then ties round her neck a string of beads (māle mani), and leads her to the outer room (edumane), where cooked sāmai (Panicum miliare) and milk is given to her. This she pretends to eat, and the bridegroom’s sister gives her water to wash her hands with. The bride and two married women or virgins (preferably the bridegroom’s sisters) go to a stream in procession, accompanied by theKota musicians, and bring therefrom water for cooking purposes in decorated new pots. The bride then salutes all her new relations, and they in turn give her their blessing. The ceremonial concludes with a feast, at the conclusion of which, in some cases, the bride and bridegroom sit on the raised verandah (pial), and receive presents.“Though,” a correspondent writes, “the Badaga is simple, and his wants are few, he cannot resist the temptation of wine and women. The Badaga woman can change husbands as often as she pleases by a simple system of divorce, and can also carry on with impunity intimacy within the pale of her own community. It is not uncommon to find Badaga women changing husbands, so long as youth and vigour tempt them to do so, and confining themselves eventually to the last individual, after age and infirmity have made their mark, and render such frolics inexpedient.” A former Magistrate of the Nīlgiris informs me that he tried more than one case, in which a married man filed a complaint against another man for kidnapping or enticing away his wife for immoral purposes. The father of the woman was always charged as an abetter, and pleaded that, as no pariyam (bride price) had been paid by the husband, though he and the woman lived together as man and wife, no criminal offence could be proved against either the father or the abductor. Polygamy is permitted, and the plurality of wives is a gain to the husband, as each wife becomes a bread-winner, and supports her children, and the man makes each wife superintend one department of the day’s work. Remarriage of widows is very common, and a widow may marry the brother of her deceased husband. It is said to be etiquette among the Badagas that, when a woman’s husband is away, sheshould be accessible to her brothers-in-law. Instances occur, in which the husband is much younger than his wife, who, until he has reached maturity, cohabits with her paternal aunt’s son, or some one whom she may have a fancy for. The marriage ceremony of the Udayas is carried out on an elaborate scale, and is based on the type of ceremonial which is carried out by some castes in the plains. Before dawn on the marriage day, the brothers and cousins of the bridegroom go, accompanied by some Udayas and the Kota band, to the forest, whence they bring two sticks ofMimusops hexandra, to do duty as the milk-posts. The early hour is selected, to avoid the chance of coming across inauspicious objects. The sticks should be cut off the tree at a single stroke of the bill-hook, and they may not be laid flat on the ground, but placed on a blanket spread thereon. The Udayas, who joined in the procession, collect twelve posts ofMimusopsas supports for the marriage booth (pandal). In front of the house, which is to be the scene of the wedding, two pits are dug, into which cow-dung water is poured. The pūjāri does pūja to the milk-posts by offering sugar-cane, jaggery (crude sugar), etc., and ties two threads thereto. The posts are then placed in the pits by five people—the parents of the bridal couple and the priest. The booth, and dais or enclosure, are then erected close to the milk-posts. On the second day, the bridegroom’s party, attended by Kota musicians, dressed up in dancing costume, go to the house of the bride, where a feast is held. The bride then salutes a lamp, and prostrates herself at the feet of her parents, who bless her, saying “May your body and hands soon be filled (i.e., may you have a child), and may your life be prosperous.” The bride is taken in procession to the house of the bridegroom,accompanied by some Udayas, and a Toreya carrying a bag of rice. At the entrance to the house she is blindfolded, and her mother-in-law pours water over her feet, and waves coloured water (ārathi) in front of her. She then enters the house, right foot foremost, and sits on a mat. Three married women, nearly related to the bridegroom, proceed, with the Kota musicians, to a stream, carrying three pots decorated with leaves ofLeucas aspera. The priest does pūja, and the pots are filled with water, and brought back in procession to the marriage dais. The water is poured into three vessels placed thereon three times by each of the three women. Within the marriage enclosure, two raised platforms are set up by a Toreya. The bridegroom, after going round the enclosure three times with his brothers and sisters, enters it, and bathes with the water contained in the vessels. He then dresses himself in new clothes, and is carried to the outer room by his maternal uncle. The bride is then treated in like manner, but is taken to the inner room. At a fixed auspicious hour, the bridal couple repair to the enclosure, where the bridegroom stands on a mat. A screen is held up by four or five men between him and the bride, who stands facing him, while the priest ties the ends of their clothes together. They then link their little fingers together, the screen is removed, and they seat themselves on the mat. The bridegroom’s sister brings a tray with a mass of rice scooped out into a cavity to hold ghī for feeding a lighted wick (annadha ārathi) on it, and, placing it before the bridal pair, sits down. The tāli, consisting of a golden disc, is worshipped by the priest, and given to the bridegroom, who ties it on to the bride’s neck. In some places it is tied by four or five elders, belonging to different villages, who are not widowers. The contractingcouple then put on wreaths called sammandha mālai, or wreaths establishing relationship, and the wrist threads are tied on. The bride’s sister brings some rice and milk in a cup, into which the linked fingers of the bride and bridegroom are thrust. Taking up some of the rice, they put it into each other’s mouths three times. After they have washed their hands, the maternal uncle or priest asks them if they have seen Aranjoti (the pole-star), and they reply in the affirmative. On the third day, presents are given to the newly-married couple, and the wrist threads are removed. Going to a stream, they perform a mimic ceremony of sowing, and scatter cotton and rice seed in two small pans made by a Toreya with cow-dung. Widow remarriage is permitted among the Udayas, and a widow may marry a cousin, but not her dead husband’s brother. At the marriage ceremony, a priest makes a mark with sacred ashes on the foreheads of the contracting couple, and announces the fact of their union.It is noted by Dr. Rivers that “Breeks has stated that the Toda custom is that the house shall pass to the youngest son. It seems quite clear that this is wrong, and that this custom is absolutely unknown among the Todas. It is, however, a Badaga custom, and among them I was told that it is due to the fact that, as the sons of a family grow up and marry, they leave the house of the parents and build houses elsewhere. It is the duty of the youngest son to dwell with his parents, and support them as long as they live, and, when they die, he continues to live in the paternal home, of which he becomes the owner.”A ceremony is performed in the seventh month of a woman’s first pregnancy, which is important, inasmuch as it seals the marriage contract, and, after its performance,divorce can only be obtained through the decree of the panchāyat (tribal council). Moreover, if it has not been performed, a man cannot claim the paternity of the child. The ceremony is called kanni kattodu or kanni hākodu (thread tying or throwing). The husband and wife are seated in the midst of those who have assembled for the occasion, and the former asks his father-in-law whether he may throw the thread round his wife’s neck, and, having received permission, proceeds to do so. If he gets the thread, which must have no knots in it, entangled in the woman’s bunch of hair (kondai), which is made large for the occasion by the addition of false hair, he is fined three rupees. On the day of the ceremony, the man and his wife are supposed to be under pollution, and sit in the verandah to receive presents. The mats used by them for sleeping on are cleaned on the following morning, and they get rid of the pollution by bathing.A first confinement must not take place within the house, and the verandah is converted into a lying-in chamber, from which the woman is, after delivery, removed to the outer apartment, where she remains till she is free from pollution by catching sight of the crescent moon. If a woman has been delivered at her father’s house, she returns to the home of her husband within a month of the birth of the child on an auspicious day. On arrival there, the infant is placed near the feet of an old man standing by a lamp within the milk-house. Placing his right hand over the head of the infant, the old man blesses it, and a feast is held, before the commencement of which two cups, one containing milk, and the other cooked rice, are produced. All the relations take up a little of the milk and rice, and touch the tongue of the baby with them.A child receives its name on the seventh, ninth, or eleventh day. A sumptuous meal is given to the community, and the grandfather (paternal, if possible) milks a cow, and pours the milk into a brass cup placed in the milk-house. With it a little cooked sāmai grain is mixed. The babe is washed with water brought from a stream; marked on the forehead with sacred ashes; a turmeric-dyed thread is tied round its waist; a silver or iron bangle placed on its wrists; and a silver bead tied by a thread round its neck. Thus decorated, the infant is taken up by the oldest man of the village who is not a widower, who gives it a name, which has already been chosen. The elder, and the child’s parents and grandparents then place a little milk in its mouth.Children, both male and female, go through a shaving ceremony, usually when they are seven months old. The infant is seated in the lap of a Badaga, and, after water has been applied to its head by a Badaga or a barber, the maternal uncle removes some of the hair with a razor, and then hands it over to another Badaga or a barber to complete the operation.Of the death rites as carried out by the Badaga sub-division, the following note was recorded during a visit to Kotagiri. When death is drawing near, a gold coin, called Vīrarāya hana or fanam, dipped in butter or ghī, is given to the dying man to swallow. If he is too far gone to be capable of swallowing, the coin is, according to Mr. Natesa Sastri, tied round the arm. But our informants told us that this is not done at the present day. “If,” Mr. Gover writes,13“the tiny coin slips down, well. He will need both gold and ghī, the one to sustain his strength in the dark journey to the river of death, theother to fee the guardian of the fairy-like bridge that spans the dreaded tide. If sense remains to the wretched man, he knows that now his death is nigh. Despair and the gold make recovery impossible, and there are none who have swallowed the Birianhana, and yet have lived. If insensibility or deathly weakness make it impossible for the coin to pass the thorax, it is carefully bound in cloth, and tied to the right arm, so that there may be nought to hinder the passage of a worthy soul into the regions of the blessed.” The giving of the coin to the dying man is apparently an important item, and, in the Badaga folk-tales, a man on the point of death is made to ask for a Vīrarāya fanam. When life is extinct, the corpse is kept within the house until the erection of the funeral car (gudikattu) is completed. Though Gover states that the burning must not be delayed more than twenty-four hours, at the present day the Badagas postpone the funeral till all the near relations have assembled, even if this necessitates the keeping of the corpse for two or three days. Cremation may take place on any day, except Tuesday. News of a death is conveyed to distant hamlets (hattis) by a Toreya, who is paid a rupee for his services. On approaching a hamlet, he removes his turban, to signify the nature of his errand, and, standing on the side of a hill, yells out “Dho! Dho! who is in the hamlet?” Having imparted his news, he proceeds on his journey to the next hamlet. On the morning of the day fixed for the funeral, the corpse is taken on a charpoy or native cot to an open space, and a buffalo led thrice round it. The right hand of the corpse is then lifted up, and passed over the horns of the buffalo. A little milk is drawn, and poured into the mouth of the corpse. Prior to this ceremony, two or three buffaloes may be let loose, and one of them captured, after themanner of the Todas, brought near the corpse, and conducted round the cot. The funeral car is built up in five to eleven tiers, decorated with cloths and streamers, and one tier must be covered with black chintz. At the funeral of a young man, the Rev. A. C. Clayton noticed that the car was surmounted by a flag, and hung about with bread, oranges, plantains, and the bag containing the books which the youth had used in the Basel Mission School.14By the poorer members of the community the car is replaced by a cot covered with cloth, and surmounted by five umbrellas. Immediately after the buffalo ceremony, the corpse is carried to the car, and placed in the lowest storey thereof, washed, and dressed in coat and turban. A new dhupati (coarse cloth) is wrapped round it. Two silver coins (Japanese yens or rupees) are stuck on the forehead. Beneath the cot are placed a crowbar, and baskets containing cakes, parched paddy, tobacco, chick pea (Cicer arietinum), jaggery and sāmai flour. A number of women, relations and friends of the dead man, then make a rush to the cot, and, sitting on it round the corpse, keep on waiting, while a woman near its head rings a bell. When one batch is tired, it is replaced by another. Badaga men then pour in in large numbers, and salute the corpse by touching the head, Toreyas and female relations touching the feet. Of those who salute, a few place inside the dhupati a piece of white cloth with red and yellow stripes, which has been specially prepared for the purpose. All then proceed to dance round the car to the music of the Kota band, near male relations removing their turban or woollen night cap, as a mark of respect, during the first three revolutions. Most of the male dancers are dressed up ingaudy petticoats and smart turbans. “No woman,” Mr. Natesa Sastri writes, “mingles in the funeral dance if the dead person is a man, but, if the deceased is a woman, one old woman, the nearest relative of the dead, takes part in it.” But, at the funerals of two men which we witnessed, a few women danced together with the men. Usually the tribesmen continue to arrive until 2 or 3P.M.Relations collect outside the village, and advance in a body towards the car, some, especially the sons-in-law of the dead man, riding on ponies, some of them carrying sāmai grain. As they approach the car, they shout “Ja! hoch; Ja! hoch.” The Muttu Kotas bring a double iron sickle with imitation buffalo horns on the tip, which is placed, with a hatchet, buguri (flute), and walking stick, on the car or on the ground beside it. When all are assembled, the cot is carried to an open space between the house and the burning-ground, followed by the car and a party of women carrying the baskets containing grain, etc. The car is then stripped of its trappings, and hacked to pieces. The widow is brought close to the cot, and removes her nose ornament (elemukkuthi), and other jewels. At both the funerals which we witnessed, the widow had a narrow strip of coloured chintz over her shoulders. Standing near the corpse, she removed a bit of wire from her ear-rings, a lock of hair, and a palm leaf roll from the lobe of the ear, and tied them up in the cloth of her dead husband. After her, the sisters of the dead man cut off a lock of hair, and, in like manner, tied it in the cloth. Women attached to a man by illegitimate ties sometimes also cut off a lock of hair, and, tying it to a twig ofDodonæa viscosa, place it inside the cloth. Very impressive is the recitation, or after-death confession of a dead man’s sins by an elder of the tribe standing at the head of thecorpse, and rapidly chanting the following lines, or a variation thereof, while he waves his right hand during each line towards the feet. The reproduction of the recitation in my phonograph never failed to impress the daily audience of Badagas, Kotas and Todas.This is the death of Āndi.In his memory the calf of the cow Belle has been set free.From this world to the other.He goes in a car.Everything the man did in this world.All the sins committed by his ancestors.All the sins committed by his forefathers.All the sins committed by his parents.All the sins committed by himself.The estranging of brothers.Shifting the boundary line.Encroaching on a neighbour’s land by removing the hedge.Driving away brothers and sisters.Cutting the kalli tree stealthily.Cutting the mulli tree outside his boundary.Dragging the thorny branches of the kotte tree.Sweeping with a broom.Splitting green branches.Telling lies.Uprooting seedlings.Plucking growing plants, and throwing them in the sun.Giving young birds to cats.Troubling the poor and cripples.Throwing refuse water in front of the sun.Going to sleep after seeing an eclipse of the moon.Looking enviously at a buffalo yielding an abundance of milk.Being jealous of the good crops of others.Removing boundary stones.Using a calf set free at the funeral.Polluting water with dirt.Urinating on burning embers.Ingratitude to the priest.Carrying tales to the higher authorities.Poisoning food.Not feeding a hungry person.Not giving fire to one half frozen.Killing snakes and cows.Killing lizards and blood-suckers.Showing a wrong path.Getting on the cot, and allowing his father-in-law to sleep on the ground.Sitting on a raised verandah, and driving thence his mother-in-law.Going against natural instincts.Troubling daughters-in-law.Breaking open lakes.Breaking open reservoirs of water.Being envious of the prosperity of other villages.Getting angry with people.Misleading travellers in the forest.Though there be three hundred such sins,Let them all go with the calf set free to-day.May the sins be completely removed!May the sins be forgiven!May the door of heaven be open!May the door of hell be closed!May the hand of charity be extended!May the wicked hand be shrivelled!May the door open suddenly!May beauty or splendour prevail everywhere!May the hot pillar be cooled!May the thread bridge15become light!May the pit of perdition be closed!May he reach the golden pillar!Holding the feet of the six thousand Athis,Holding the feet of the twelve thousand Pathis,Holding the feet of Brahma,Holding the feet of the calf set free to-day,May he reach the abode of Siva!So mote it be.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.The recitation is repeated thrice, and a few Badagas repeat the last words of each line after the elder. It was noticed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton that, during the recitation, the people surrounded the bier on three sides, leaving a lane open to the west. The sins of the dead man were transferred to another as sin-bearer, and finally passed away down the lane. As the ceremony witnessed by us differs materially from the account thereof given by Gover nearly forty years ago, I may quote his description. “By a conventional mode of expression, the sum total of sins a man may do is said to be thirteen hundred. Admitting that the deceased has committed them all, the performer cries aloud ‘Stay not their flight to God’s pure feet.’ As he closes, the whole assembly chants aloud ‘Stay not their flight.’ Again the performer enters into details, and cries ‘He killed the crawling snake. It is a sin.’ In a moment the last word is caught up, and all the people cry ‘It is a sin.’ As they shout, the performer lays his hand upon the calf. The sin is transferred to the calf. Thus the whole catalogue is gone through in this impressive way. But this is not enough. As the last shout ‘Let all be well’ dies away, the performer gives place to another, and again confession is made, and all the people shout ‘It is a sin.’ A third time it is done. Then, still in solemn silence, the calf is let loose. Like the Jewish scapegoat, it may never be used for secular work.” Dr. Rivers writes that “the Badagas let loose a calf at a funeral, to bear the sins of the deceased. It is possible that the calf in the Toda ceremony may have the same significance. If so, the practice has not improbably been borrowed, and the fact that the bell which is hung on the neck of the calf is kept by Kotas or Badagas suggests that the whole incident may have been borrowedby the Todas from one or other of these races.” At the funerals, of which we were spectators, no calf was brought near the corpse, and the celebrants of the rites were satisfied with the mere mention by name of a calf, which is male or female according to the sex of the deceased. At the funeral witnessed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton, a cow-buffalo was led three times round the bier, and a little of its milk, drawn at the time, put into the mouth of the corpse. Then a buffalo calf was led thrice round the bier, and the dead man’s hand laid on its head. By this act, the calf was supposed to receive all the sins of the deceased. It was then driven away to a great distance, that it might contaminate no one, and it was said that it would never be sold, but looked on as a dedicated sacred animal. If a dead man leaves a widow in a state of pregnancy, who has not performed the kanni kattodu or marriage thread ceremony, this must be gone through before the corpse is taken to the pyre, in order to render the child legitimate. The pregnant woman is, at the time of the funeral, brought close to the cot, and a near relation of the deceased, taking up a cotton thread, twisted in the form of a necklace without any knots, throws it round her neck. Sometimes the hand of the corpse is lifted up with the thread, and made to place it round the neck. At the funeral of the young man, Mr. Clayton saw this ceremony performed on his pregnant wife. After a turmeric-dyed cord had been taken from the hands of the corpse and tied round her neck, she was again brought to the side of the bier, and her ear-rings, nose ornaments, and other articles of jewellery, were removed in token that she had become a widow. Soon after the recitation of sins, all the agnates go to the house of the dead man, at the entrance to which a gunny-bag is spread, whereon a smallquantity of paddy is poured, and a few culms ofCynodon Dactylonand a little cow-dung are placed on it. The eldest of the agnates, sickle in hand, takes some of the paddy, and moves on, raising both hands to his forehead. The other agnates then do the same, and proceed in Indian file, males in front and females in the rear, to the corpse. Round it they walk, men from left to right, and women in the reverse direction, and at the end of each circuit put some of the paddy on its face. The cot is then carried to the burning-ground, a woman heading the procession, and shaking the end of her cloth all the way. The corpse is laid on the pyre with its feet to the south, and the pyre lighted by the eldest son standing at the head. The sticks of which the car was constructed are added to the fuel, of which the pyre is built up. In some places the son, when lighting the pyre, repeats the words “Being begotten by my father and mother, I, in the presence of all and the Dēva, set fire at the head after the manner of my ancestors and forefathers.” The Rev. A. C. Clayton records that, before the procession started for the burning-ground, some female relatives of the dead man tied locks of their hair round the toes of the corpse, and others went three times round the bier. On the day following the funeral, the bereaved family distribute rice to all the Badagas of the hamlet, and all the near relations of the deceased go to the burning-ground, taking with them two new pots. The fire is extinguished, and the fragments of the bones are collected. A tray is made of the fronds of the bracken fern (Pteris aquilina) covered with a cloth, on which the bones are placed together with culms ofCynodongrass and ghī. The Badagas of the hamlet who are younger than the deceased salute the bones by touching them, and a few men, including the chief mourner,hold the tray, and convey it to the bone pit, which every hamlet possesses. Into it the bones are thrown, while an elder repeats the words “Become united with the line of your relations, with your class, and with the big people,” or “May the young and old who have died, may all those who have died from time immemorial up to the present time, mingle in one.” When the pit has been closed up, all return to the spot where the body was burnt, and, clearing a space, make a puddle, round which they stand, and throw into it a handful of korali (Setaria italica), uttering the words “May deaths cease; may evils cease; may good prevail in the village; in virtue of the good deeds of the ancestors and forefathers, may this one mingle with them.” This ceremony concluded, they repair to a stream, where a member of the bereaved family shaves a Toreya partially or completely. Some take a razor, and, after removing a patch of hair, pass the Toreya on to a barber. All the agnates are then shaved by a Badaga or a barber. The chief mourner then prostrates himself on the ground, and is blessed by all. He and the Toreya proceed to the house of the deceased. Taking a three-pronged twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, and placing a mīnige (Argyreia) leaf on the prongs, he thrusts it into a rubbish heap near the house. He then places a small quantity of sāmai grain, called street food, on the leaf, and, after sprinkling it thrice with water, goes away.

Badaga Temple.Badaga Temple.The other agricultural ceremony is called Devvē habba or tenai (Setaria italica), and is usually celebrated in June or July, always on a Monday. It is apparently performed in honour of the two gods Mahālingaswāmi and Hiriya Udaya, to whom a group of villages will have temples dedicated. For example, the Badagas inthe neighbourhood of Kotagiri have their Hiriya Udaya temple at Tāndanād, and Mahālingaswāmi temple at Kannērmukku. This Devvē festival, which should on no account be pronounced duvve, which means burning-ground, is celebrated at one place, whither the Badagas from other villages proceed, to take part in it. About midday, some Badagas and the temple pūjāri go from the temple of Hiriya Udaya to that of Mahālingaswāmi. The procession is usually headed by a Kurumba, who scatters fragments of tūd bark and wood as he goes on his way. The pūjāri takes with him the materials necessary for doing pūja, and, after worshipping Mahālingaswāmi, the party return to the Hiriya Udaya temple, where milk and cooked rice are offered to the various gods within the temple precincts. On the following day, all assemble at the temple, and a Kurumba brings a few sheaves ofSetaria italica, and ties them to a stone set up at the main entrance. After this, pūja is done, and the people offer cocoanuts to the god. Later on, all the women of the Madhave sept, who have given birth to a first-born child, come, dressed up in holiday attire, with their babies, to the temple. On this day they wear a special nose ornament, called elemukkuththi, which is only worn on one other occasion, at the funeral of a husband. The women do pūja to Hiriya Udaya, and the pūjāri gives them a small quantity of rice on mīnige (Argyreia) leaves. After eating this, they leave the temple in a line, and wash their hands with water given to them by the pūjāri. This ceremonial, performed by women of the Madhave sept, is called Mandēdhanda. As soon as the Devvē festival is concluded, the reaping of the crop commences, and a measure or two of grain from the crop gathered on the first day, called nīsal, is set apart for the Mahālingaswāmi temple.The most important gods of the Badagas are Heththeswāmi, Mahālingaswāmi, Hiriya Udaya, Mādeswara, Mānkāli, Jadeswāmi, and Nīlgiri Rangaswāmi. And at the present day, some Badagas proceed to the plains, to worship at the Saivite temple at Karamadai in Coimbatore, or at Nanjangōd in Mysore.The festival in honour of Heththeswāmi is celebrated in the month of January at Baireganni. It is sometimes called ermathohabba, as, with it, ploughing operations cease. It always commences on a Monday, and usually lasts eight days. A Sēdan or Dēvānga weaver comes with his portable hand-loom, and sufficient thread for weaving a dhubati (coarse cloth) and turban. At Baireganni there is a special house, in which these articles are woven. But, at other places where the festival is observed, the Badagas go to the weaver’s village to fetch the required cloths. Early on the second morning of the festival, some of the more respected Badagas and the weaver proceed to the weaving house after bathing. The weaver sets up his loom, and worships it by offering incense, and other things. The Badagas give him a new cloth, and a small sum of money, and ask him to weave a dhubati and two kachches (narrow strips of cloth). Daily, throughout the festival, the Badagas collect near the temple, and indulge in music and songs. Until the last day, they are not permitted to set eyes on the god Heththeswāmi. On the morning of the last day, the pūjāri, accompanied by all the Badagas, takes the newly woven cloths to a stream, in which they are washed. When they are dry, all proceed to the temple, where the idol is dressed up in them, and all, on this occasion only, are allowed to look at it. Devotees pay a small offering of money, which is placed on a tray near the idol. The crowd begins to disperse inthe afternoon, and, on their way back to their villages, the wants of the travellers are attended to by people posted at intervals with coffee, fruit, and other articles of food. If the Badagas have to go to a weaver’s village for the cloths, the weaver is, when the order is given for them, presented with four annas, after he has bathed. When handing the money to him, the Badagas bawl out “This is the fee for making the cloths to be worn by Heththe Iramāsthi and Parasakti Parvati.” On the last day of the festival, the cloths are washed, and one of them is made to represent an idol, which is decorated with waist and neck ornaments, and an umbrella. All prostrate themselves before it, and make offerings of money. Fruits and other things are then offered to Heththeswāmi and some recite the following prayer. “May all good acts be remembered, and all bad ones be forgotten. Though there may be a thousand and one sins, may I reach the feet of God.”The following further information in connection with the Baireganni festival is given by Bishop Whitehead. “The people from other villages offer money, rice, fruits, umbrellas of gold or silver for the goddess, cloths, and buffaloes. The buffaloes are never killed, but remain as the property of the temple. The pūjāri calls the representatives of one village, and tells them what Hetheswāmi says to him,e.g., ‘This year you will have good [or bad] crops; cholera or small-pox, good [or bad] rain, etc.’ As the people present their offerings, they prostrate themselves, kneeling down and touching the ground with their foreheads, and the pūjāri gives them some flowers, which they wear in their hair. The people and the pūjāri play on the kombu [horn], and ring bells while the offerings are being made. After the offerings have finished, all the men dance, in two companies, infront of the temple, one shouting ‘How-ko, How-ko,’ and the other ‘Is-hōli.’ The dance was taught them by the Todas, and the words are Toda.”Badagas Making Fire.Badagas Making Fire.In connection with the Jadeswāmi festival the ceremony of walking through fire [burning embers] is carried out at Mēlūr, Tangālu, Mainelē, Jakkanāre, Tenād, and Nidugala. At Mēlūr and Tangālu, the temples belong to the Hāruvas, who carry out all the details of ceremony. The temple at Tenād is owned by the Udayas, by whom the ceremonial is performed. In other places, the celebrants are Badagas. The festival is observed, on an elaborate scale, at Nidugala during the month of January. All those who are going to walk over the burning embers fast for eight days, and go through the rite on the ninth day. For its performance, Monday is considered an auspicious day. The omens are taken by boiling two pots of milk side by side on two hearths. If the milk overflows uniformly on all sides, the crops will be abundant for all the villages. But, if it flows over on one side only, there will be plentiful crops for villages on that side only. The space over which the embers are spread is said to be about five yards long, and three yards broad. But, in some places,e.g., Jakkanāre and Mēlūr, it is circular as at the Muhammadan fire-walking ceremony. For making the embers, the wood ofEugenia JambolanaandPhyllanthus Emblicaare used. For boiling the milk, and setting fire to the wood, a light obtained by friction must be used. The process is known as niligolu, or upright stick. The vertical stick is made of a twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, which is rotated in a socket in a long thick piece of a bough ofDebregeasia velutina, in which a row of sockets has been made. The rotation is produced by a cord passed several times round the vertical stick, ofwhich each end is pulled alternately. The horizontal block is pressed firmly on the ground by the toes of a man, who presses a half cocoanut shell down on the top of the vertical stick, so as to force it down into the socket. A Badaga, who failed in an attempt to demonstrate the making of fire by this method, gave as an excuse that he was under worldly pollution, from which he would be free at the time of the fire-walking ceremony. Though the Badagas make fire by friction, reference is made in their folk legends, not to this mode of obtaining fire, but to chakkamukki (flint and steel), which is repeatedly referred to in connection with cremation. After the milk boiling ceremonial, the pūjāri, tying bells on his legs, approaches the fire pit, carrying milk freshly drawn from a cow, which has calved for the first time, and flowers ofRhododendron arboreum,Leucas aspera, or jasmine. After doing pūja, he throws the flowers on the embers, and they should remain unscorched for a few seconds. He then pours some of the milk over the embers, and no hissing soundshouldbe produced. The omens being propitious, he walks over the glowing embers, followed by an Udaya, and the crowd of celebrants, who, before going through the ordeal, count the hairs on their feet. If any are singed, it is a sign of approaching ill fortune, or even death. In an account of the fire-walking ceremony, in 1902, it is noted that “the Badagas strongly repudiate the insinuation of preparing their feet to face the fire ordeal. It is done to propitiate Jeddayswāmi, to whom vows are invoked, in token of which they grow one twist or plait of hair, which is treasured for years, and finally cut off as an offering to Jeddayswāmi. Numbers of Chettis were catering to the crowd, offering their wares, bangles, gay-coloured handkerchiefs, as well as edibles. The Kotas supplied the music, and anancient patriarch worked himself up to a high pitch of inspiration, and predicted all sorts of good things for the Badagas with regard to the ensuing season and crops.”The following legend, relating to the fire-walking ceremony, is recorded by Bishop Whitehead. “When they first began to perform the ceremony fifty or sixty years ago, they were afraid to walk over the fire. Then the stone image of Mahālinga Swāmi turned into a snake, and made a hole through the temple wall. It came out, and crawled over the fire, and then went back to the temple. Then their fear vanished, and they walked over the embers. The hole is still to be seen in the temple.”Of the fire-walking ceremony at Mēlūr, the following account is given in the Gazetteer of the Nīlgiris. “It takes place on the Monday after the March new moon, just before the cultivation season begins, and is attended by Badagas from all over Mērkunād. The inhabitants of certain villages (six in number), who are supposed to be the descendants of an early Badaga named Guruvajja, have first, however, to signify through their Gottukārs, or headmen, that the festival may take place; and the Gottukārs choose three, five, or seven men to walk through the fire. On the day appointed, the fire is lit by certain Badaga priests and a Kurumba. The men chosen by the Gottukārs then bathe, adorn themselves with sandal, do obeisance to the Udayas of Udayarhatti near Kēti, who are specially invited and feasted; pour into the adjacent stream milk from cows which have calved for the first time during the year; and, in the afternoon, throw more milk and some flowers from the Mahālingasvāmi temple into the fire pit, and then walk across it. Earth is next thrown on the embers, and they walk acrosstwice more. A general feast closes the ceremony, and next day the first ploughings are done, the Kurumba sowing the first seeds, and the priests the next lot. Finally, a net is brought. The priest of the temple, standing over it, puts up prayers for a favourable agricultural season; two fowls are thrown into it, and a pretence is made of spearing them; and then it is taken and put across some game path, and some wild animal (a sāmbhar deer if possible) is driven into it, slain, and divided among the villagers. This same custom of annually killing a sāmbhar is also observed at other villages on the plateau, and in 1883 and 1894 special orders were passed to permit of its being done during the close season. Latterly, disputes about precedence in the matter of walking through the fire at Mēlūr have been carried as far as the civil courts, and the two factions celebrate the festival separately in alternate years. A fire-walking ceremony also takes place annually at the Jadayasvāmi temple in Jakkanēri under the auspices of a Sivāchāri Badaga. It seems to have originally had some connection with agricultural prospects, as a young bull is made to go partly across the fire-pit before the other devotees, and the owners of young cows which have had their first calves during the year take precedence of others in the ceremony, and bring offerings of milk, which are sprinkled over the burning embers.”At the Sakalathi festival, in the month of October, Badagas, towards evening, throw on the roofs of their houses flowers ofPlectranthus Wightii,Crotalaria obtecta,Lobelia nicotianœfolia,Achyranthes aspera, andLeucas aspera. On the following day, they clean their houses, and have a feast. In the afternoon, numbers of them may be seen in the streets drawing in front of their houses pictures in wood-ashes of buffaloes, bulls, cows,ploughs, stars, sun and moon, snakes, lizards, etc. They then go into their houses, and wash their hands. Taking up in his clean hands a big cake, on which are placed a little rice and butter, the Badaga puts on it three wicks steeped in castor oil, and lights them. The cake is then waved round the heads of all the children of the house taken to a field, and thrown therein with the words “Sakalathi has come.” The cake-thrower returns home, and prostrates himself before a lamp placed in the inner room, and repeats a long formula, composed of the various synonyms of Siva.In the month of November, a festival called Dodda Habba (big feast) is celebrated. In the afternoon, rice is cooked in whey within the hāgōttu, and eaten on mīnige leaves. Throughout the day the villagers play at various ball games.A festival, which is purely local, is celebrated near Konakore in honour of Mahangkāli. A buffalo is led to the side of a precipice, killed by a Kurumba with a spear, and thrown over the edge thereof. There is a legend that, in olden days, a pūjāri used to put a stick in the crevice of a rock, and, on removing it, get the value of a buffalo in fanams (gold coins). But, on one occasion, he put the stick in a second time, in the hopes of gaining more money. No money, however, was forthcoming and, as a punishment for his greed, he died on the spot.All Badaga villages, except those of the Udayas, have a hut, called holagudi, for the exclusive use of women during their monthly periods. A few months before a girl is expected to reach puberty, she is sent to the holagudi, on a Friday, four or five days before the new moon day. This is done lest, in the ordinary course of events, the first menstruation should commence on an inauspicious day. The girl remains in the holagudi onenight, and returns home on the following day clad in new cloths, leaving the old ones in the hut. When she arrives at her house, she salutes all the people who are there, and receives their blessing. On Sunday she goes to the houses of her relations, where she is given kadalai (Cicer arietinum) and other food. She may not enter the inner apartment of her house until she has seen the crescent moon. Badaga women observe five days menstrual pollution. If a woman discovers her condition before washing her face in the early morning, that day is included in the pollution period. Otherwise, the period must be prolonged over six days. On the third day she bathes in cold water, using the bark ofPouzolzia(thorēkōlu), and on the fourth day is allowed a change of clothing after a bath. On this day she leaves the hut, and passes a portion of the night in the verandah of her house. After cooking and eating her evening meal, she bathes, and enters the outer room. Early on the following morning, the spot which she has occupied is cleaned, and she bathes in a stream. Returning home, she eats her food in the outer room, where she remains till next morning. Even children may not be touched by a menstruating woman. If, by chance, this happens, the child must be washed to remove the pollution, before it can be handled by others. This restriction is apparently not observed by any other tribe or caste.Writing concerning marriage among the Badagas, Harkness states12that “it is said to be common for one who is in want of labourers to promise his daughter in marriage to the son or other relative of a neighbour not in circumstances so flourishing as himself. And, these engagements being entered into, the intended bridegroomserves the father of his betrothed as one of his own family till the girl comes of age, when the marriage is consummated, and he becomes a partner in the general property of the family of his father-in-law.”A man may marry a girl belonging to the same village as himself, if he and she are not members of the same exogamous sept. In most cases, however, all the inhabitants of a village are of the same sept, and a man has to take as his wife a girl from a village other than his own.Among all sections of the Badagas, adult marriage is the general rule, though infant marriage is also practised. Marriage is preceded by a simple form of courtship, but the consent of the parents to the union is necessary. A girl does not suffer in reputation if she is rejected by a number of suitors, before she finally settles down. Except among the Udayas, the marriage ceremony is of a very simple nature. A day or two before that fixed for taking the girl to the house of her husband-elect, the latter proceeds to her village, accompanied by his brothers, who, as a token of respect, touch the feet of all the Badagas who are assembled. The bride is taken to the house of the bridegroom, accompanied by the Kota band. Arrived there, she stands at the entrance, and her mother-in-law or sister-in-law brings water in a vessel, and pours it into her hands thrice. Each time she lets the water fall over her feet. The mother-in-law then ties round her neck a string of beads (māle mani), and leads her to the outer room (edumane), where cooked sāmai (Panicum miliare) and milk is given to her. This she pretends to eat, and the bridegroom’s sister gives her water to wash her hands with. The bride and two married women or virgins (preferably the bridegroom’s sisters) go to a stream in procession, accompanied by theKota musicians, and bring therefrom water for cooking purposes in decorated new pots. The bride then salutes all her new relations, and they in turn give her their blessing. The ceremonial concludes with a feast, at the conclusion of which, in some cases, the bride and bridegroom sit on the raised verandah (pial), and receive presents.“Though,” a correspondent writes, “the Badaga is simple, and his wants are few, he cannot resist the temptation of wine and women. The Badaga woman can change husbands as often as she pleases by a simple system of divorce, and can also carry on with impunity intimacy within the pale of her own community. It is not uncommon to find Badaga women changing husbands, so long as youth and vigour tempt them to do so, and confining themselves eventually to the last individual, after age and infirmity have made their mark, and render such frolics inexpedient.” A former Magistrate of the Nīlgiris informs me that he tried more than one case, in which a married man filed a complaint against another man for kidnapping or enticing away his wife for immoral purposes. The father of the woman was always charged as an abetter, and pleaded that, as no pariyam (bride price) had been paid by the husband, though he and the woman lived together as man and wife, no criminal offence could be proved against either the father or the abductor. Polygamy is permitted, and the plurality of wives is a gain to the husband, as each wife becomes a bread-winner, and supports her children, and the man makes each wife superintend one department of the day’s work. Remarriage of widows is very common, and a widow may marry the brother of her deceased husband. It is said to be etiquette among the Badagas that, when a woman’s husband is away, sheshould be accessible to her brothers-in-law. Instances occur, in which the husband is much younger than his wife, who, until he has reached maturity, cohabits with her paternal aunt’s son, or some one whom she may have a fancy for. The marriage ceremony of the Udayas is carried out on an elaborate scale, and is based on the type of ceremonial which is carried out by some castes in the plains. Before dawn on the marriage day, the brothers and cousins of the bridegroom go, accompanied by some Udayas and the Kota band, to the forest, whence they bring two sticks ofMimusops hexandra, to do duty as the milk-posts. The early hour is selected, to avoid the chance of coming across inauspicious objects. The sticks should be cut off the tree at a single stroke of the bill-hook, and they may not be laid flat on the ground, but placed on a blanket spread thereon. The Udayas, who joined in the procession, collect twelve posts ofMimusopsas supports for the marriage booth (pandal). In front of the house, which is to be the scene of the wedding, two pits are dug, into which cow-dung water is poured. The pūjāri does pūja to the milk-posts by offering sugar-cane, jaggery (crude sugar), etc., and ties two threads thereto. The posts are then placed in the pits by five people—the parents of the bridal couple and the priest. The booth, and dais or enclosure, are then erected close to the milk-posts. On the second day, the bridegroom’s party, attended by Kota musicians, dressed up in dancing costume, go to the house of the bride, where a feast is held. The bride then salutes a lamp, and prostrates herself at the feet of her parents, who bless her, saying “May your body and hands soon be filled (i.e., may you have a child), and may your life be prosperous.” The bride is taken in procession to the house of the bridegroom,accompanied by some Udayas, and a Toreya carrying a bag of rice. At the entrance to the house she is blindfolded, and her mother-in-law pours water over her feet, and waves coloured water (ārathi) in front of her. She then enters the house, right foot foremost, and sits on a mat. Three married women, nearly related to the bridegroom, proceed, with the Kota musicians, to a stream, carrying three pots decorated with leaves ofLeucas aspera. The priest does pūja, and the pots are filled with water, and brought back in procession to the marriage dais. The water is poured into three vessels placed thereon three times by each of the three women. Within the marriage enclosure, two raised platforms are set up by a Toreya. The bridegroom, after going round the enclosure three times with his brothers and sisters, enters it, and bathes with the water contained in the vessels. He then dresses himself in new clothes, and is carried to the outer room by his maternal uncle. The bride is then treated in like manner, but is taken to the inner room. At a fixed auspicious hour, the bridal couple repair to the enclosure, where the bridegroom stands on a mat. A screen is held up by four or five men between him and the bride, who stands facing him, while the priest ties the ends of their clothes together. They then link their little fingers together, the screen is removed, and they seat themselves on the mat. The bridegroom’s sister brings a tray with a mass of rice scooped out into a cavity to hold ghī for feeding a lighted wick (annadha ārathi) on it, and, placing it before the bridal pair, sits down. The tāli, consisting of a golden disc, is worshipped by the priest, and given to the bridegroom, who ties it on to the bride’s neck. In some places it is tied by four or five elders, belonging to different villages, who are not widowers. The contractingcouple then put on wreaths called sammandha mālai, or wreaths establishing relationship, and the wrist threads are tied on. The bride’s sister brings some rice and milk in a cup, into which the linked fingers of the bride and bridegroom are thrust. Taking up some of the rice, they put it into each other’s mouths three times. After they have washed their hands, the maternal uncle or priest asks them if they have seen Aranjoti (the pole-star), and they reply in the affirmative. On the third day, presents are given to the newly-married couple, and the wrist threads are removed. Going to a stream, they perform a mimic ceremony of sowing, and scatter cotton and rice seed in two small pans made by a Toreya with cow-dung. Widow remarriage is permitted among the Udayas, and a widow may marry a cousin, but not her dead husband’s brother. At the marriage ceremony, a priest makes a mark with sacred ashes on the foreheads of the contracting couple, and announces the fact of their union.It is noted by Dr. Rivers that “Breeks has stated that the Toda custom is that the house shall pass to the youngest son. It seems quite clear that this is wrong, and that this custom is absolutely unknown among the Todas. It is, however, a Badaga custom, and among them I was told that it is due to the fact that, as the sons of a family grow up and marry, they leave the house of the parents and build houses elsewhere. It is the duty of the youngest son to dwell with his parents, and support them as long as they live, and, when they die, he continues to live in the paternal home, of which he becomes the owner.”A ceremony is performed in the seventh month of a woman’s first pregnancy, which is important, inasmuch as it seals the marriage contract, and, after its performance,divorce can only be obtained through the decree of the panchāyat (tribal council). Moreover, if it has not been performed, a man cannot claim the paternity of the child. The ceremony is called kanni kattodu or kanni hākodu (thread tying or throwing). The husband and wife are seated in the midst of those who have assembled for the occasion, and the former asks his father-in-law whether he may throw the thread round his wife’s neck, and, having received permission, proceeds to do so. If he gets the thread, which must have no knots in it, entangled in the woman’s bunch of hair (kondai), which is made large for the occasion by the addition of false hair, he is fined three rupees. On the day of the ceremony, the man and his wife are supposed to be under pollution, and sit in the verandah to receive presents. The mats used by them for sleeping on are cleaned on the following morning, and they get rid of the pollution by bathing.A first confinement must not take place within the house, and the verandah is converted into a lying-in chamber, from which the woman is, after delivery, removed to the outer apartment, where she remains till she is free from pollution by catching sight of the crescent moon. If a woman has been delivered at her father’s house, she returns to the home of her husband within a month of the birth of the child on an auspicious day. On arrival there, the infant is placed near the feet of an old man standing by a lamp within the milk-house. Placing his right hand over the head of the infant, the old man blesses it, and a feast is held, before the commencement of which two cups, one containing milk, and the other cooked rice, are produced. All the relations take up a little of the milk and rice, and touch the tongue of the baby with them.A child receives its name on the seventh, ninth, or eleventh day. A sumptuous meal is given to the community, and the grandfather (paternal, if possible) milks a cow, and pours the milk into a brass cup placed in the milk-house. With it a little cooked sāmai grain is mixed. The babe is washed with water brought from a stream; marked on the forehead with sacred ashes; a turmeric-dyed thread is tied round its waist; a silver or iron bangle placed on its wrists; and a silver bead tied by a thread round its neck. Thus decorated, the infant is taken up by the oldest man of the village who is not a widower, who gives it a name, which has already been chosen. The elder, and the child’s parents and grandparents then place a little milk in its mouth.Children, both male and female, go through a shaving ceremony, usually when they are seven months old. The infant is seated in the lap of a Badaga, and, after water has been applied to its head by a Badaga or a barber, the maternal uncle removes some of the hair with a razor, and then hands it over to another Badaga or a barber to complete the operation.Of the death rites as carried out by the Badaga sub-division, the following note was recorded during a visit to Kotagiri. When death is drawing near, a gold coin, called Vīrarāya hana or fanam, dipped in butter or ghī, is given to the dying man to swallow. If he is too far gone to be capable of swallowing, the coin is, according to Mr. Natesa Sastri, tied round the arm. But our informants told us that this is not done at the present day. “If,” Mr. Gover writes,13“the tiny coin slips down, well. He will need both gold and ghī, the one to sustain his strength in the dark journey to the river of death, theother to fee the guardian of the fairy-like bridge that spans the dreaded tide. If sense remains to the wretched man, he knows that now his death is nigh. Despair and the gold make recovery impossible, and there are none who have swallowed the Birianhana, and yet have lived. If insensibility or deathly weakness make it impossible for the coin to pass the thorax, it is carefully bound in cloth, and tied to the right arm, so that there may be nought to hinder the passage of a worthy soul into the regions of the blessed.” The giving of the coin to the dying man is apparently an important item, and, in the Badaga folk-tales, a man on the point of death is made to ask for a Vīrarāya fanam. When life is extinct, the corpse is kept within the house until the erection of the funeral car (gudikattu) is completed. Though Gover states that the burning must not be delayed more than twenty-four hours, at the present day the Badagas postpone the funeral till all the near relations have assembled, even if this necessitates the keeping of the corpse for two or three days. Cremation may take place on any day, except Tuesday. News of a death is conveyed to distant hamlets (hattis) by a Toreya, who is paid a rupee for his services. On approaching a hamlet, he removes his turban, to signify the nature of his errand, and, standing on the side of a hill, yells out “Dho! Dho! who is in the hamlet?” Having imparted his news, he proceeds on his journey to the next hamlet. On the morning of the day fixed for the funeral, the corpse is taken on a charpoy or native cot to an open space, and a buffalo led thrice round it. The right hand of the corpse is then lifted up, and passed over the horns of the buffalo. A little milk is drawn, and poured into the mouth of the corpse. Prior to this ceremony, two or three buffaloes may be let loose, and one of them captured, after themanner of the Todas, brought near the corpse, and conducted round the cot. The funeral car is built up in five to eleven tiers, decorated with cloths and streamers, and one tier must be covered with black chintz. At the funeral of a young man, the Rev. A. C. Clayton noticed that the car was surmounted by a flag, and hung about with bread, oranges, plantains, and the bag containing the books which the youth had used in the Basel Mission School.14By the poorer members of the community the car is replaced by a cot covered with cloth, and surmounted by five umbrellas. Immediately after the buffalo ceremony, the corpse is carried to the car, and placed in the lowest storey thereof, washed, and dressed in coat and turban. A new dhupati (coarse cloth) is wrapped round it. Two silver coins (Japanese yens or rupees) are stuck on the forehead. Beneath the cot are placed a crowbar, and baskets containing cakes, parched paddy, tobacco, chick pea (Cicer arietinum), jaggery and sāmai flour. A number of women, relations and friends of the dead man, then make a rush to the cot, and, sitting on it round the corpse, keep on waiting, while a woman near its head rings a bell. When one batch is tired, it is replaced by another. Badaga men then pour in in large numbers, and salute the corpse by touching the head, Toreyas and female relations touching the feet. Of those who salute, a few place inside the dhupati a piece of white cloth with red and yellow stripes, which has been specially prepared for the purpose. All then proceed to dance round the car to the music of the Kota band, near male relations removing their turban or woollen night cap, as a mark of respect, during the first three revolutions. Most of the male dancers are dressed up ingaudy petticoats and smart turbans. “No woman,” Mr. Natesa Sastri writes, “mingles in the funeral dance if the dead person is a man, but, if the deceased is a woman, one old woman, the nearest relative of the dead, takes part in it.” But, at the funerals of two men which we witnessed, a few women danced together with the men. Usually the tribesmen continue to arrive until 2 or 3P.M.Relations collect outside the village, and advance in a body towards the car, some, especially the sons-in-law of the dead man, riding on ponies, some of them carrying sāmai grain. As they approach the car, they shout “Ja! hoch; Ja! hoch.” The Muttu Kotas bring a double iron sickle with imitation buffalo horns on the tip, which is placed, with a hatchet, buguri (flute), and walking stick, on the car or on the ground beside it. When all are assembled, the cot is carried to an open space between the house and the burning-ground, followed by the car and a party of women carrying the baskets containing grain, etc. The car is then stripped of its trappings, and hacked to pieces. The widow is brought close to the cot, and removes her nose ornament (elemukkuthi), and other jewels. At both the funerals which we witnessed, the widow had a narrow strip of coloured chintz over her shoulders. Standing near the corpse, she removed a bit of wire from her ear-rings, a lock of hair, and a palm leaf roll from the lobe of the ear, and tied them up in the cloth of her dead husband. After her, the sisters of the dead man cut off a lock of hair, and, in like manner, tied it in the cloth. Women attached to a man by illegitimate ties sometimes also cut off a lock of hair, and, tying it to a twig ofDodonæa viscosa, place it inside the cloth. Very impressive is the recitation, or after-death confession of a dead man’s sins by an elder of the tribe standing at the head of thecorpse, and rapidly chanting the following lines, or a variation thereof, while he waves his right hand during each line towards the feet. The reproduction of the recitation in my phonograph never failed to impress the daily audience of Badagas, Kotas and Todas.This is the death of Āndi.In his memory the calf of the cow Belle has been set free.From this world to the other.He goes in a car.Everything the man did in this world.All the sins committed by his ancestors.All the sins committed by his forefathers.All the sins committed by his parents.All the sins committed by himself.The estranging of brothers.Shifting the boundary line.Encroaching on a neighbour’s land by removing the hedge.Driving away brothers and sisters.Cutting the kalli tree stealthily.Cutting the mulli tree outside his boundary.Dragging the thorny branches of the kotte tree.Sweeping with a broom.Splitting green branches.Telling lies.Uprooting seedlings.Plucking growing plants, and throwing them in the sun.Giving young birds to cats.Troubling the poor and cripples.Throwing refuse water in front of the sun.Going to sleep after seeing an eclipse of the moon.Looking enviously at a buffalo yielding an abundance of milk.Being jealous of the good crops of others.Removing boundary stones.Using a calf set free at the funeral.Polluting water with dirt.Urinating on burning embers.Ingratitude to the priest.Carrying tales to the higher authorities.Poisoning food.Not feeding a hungry person.Not giving fire to one half frozen.Killing snakes and cows.Killing lizards and blood-suckers.Showing a wrong path.Getting on the cot, and allowing his father-in-law to sleep on the ground.Sitting on a raised verandah, and driving thence his mother-in-law.Going against natural instincts.Troubling daughters-in-law.Breaking open lakes.Breaking open reservoirs of water.Being envious of the prosperity of other villages.Getting angry with people.Misleading travellers in the forest.Though there be three hundred such sins,Let them all go with the calf set free to-day.May the sins be completely removed!May the sins be forgiven!May the door of heaven be open!May the door of hell be closed!May the hand of charity be extended!May the wicked hand be shrivelled!May the door open suddenly!May beauty or splendour prevail everywhere!May the hot pillar be cooled!May the thread bridge15become light!May the pit of perdition be closed!May he reach the golden pillar!Holding the feet of the six thousand Athis,Holding the feet of the twelve thousand Pathis,Holding the feet of Brahma,Holding the feet of the calf set free to-day,May he reach the abode of Siva!So mote it be.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.The recitation is repeated thrice, and a few Badagas repeat the last words of each line after the elder. It was noticed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton that, during the recitation, the people surrounded the bier on three sides, leaving a lane open to the west. The sins of the dead man were transferred to another as sin-bearer, and finally passed away down the lane. As the ceremony witnessed by us differs materially from the account thereof given by Gover nearly forty years ago, I may quote his description. “By a conventional mode of expression, the sum total of sins a man may do is said to be thirteen hundred. Admitting that the deceased has committed them all, the performer cries aloud ‘Stay not their flight to God’s pure feet.’ As he closes, the whole assembly chants aloud ‘Stay not their flight.’ Again the performer enters into details, and cries ‘He killed the crawling snake. It is a sin.’ In a moment the last word is caught up, and all the people cry ‘It is a sin.’ As they shout, the performer lays his hand upon the calf. The sin is transferred to the calf. Thus the whole catalogue is gone through in this impressive way. But this is not enough. As the last shout ‘Let all be well’ dies away, the performer gives place to another, and again confession is made, and all the people shout ‘It is a sin.’ A third time it is done. Then, still in solemn silence, the calf is let loose. Like the Jewish scapegoat, it may never be used for secular work.” Dr. Rivers writes that “the Badagas let loose a calf at a funeral, to bear the sins of the deceased. It is possible that the calf in the Toda ceremony may have the same significance. If so, the practice has not improbably been borrowed, and the fact that the bell which is hung on the neck of the calf is kept by Kotas or Badagas suggests that the whole incident may have been borrowedby the Todas from one or other of these races.” At the funerals, of which we were spectators, no calf was brought near the corpse, and the celebrants of the rites were satisfied with the mere mention by name of a calf, which is male or female according to the sex of the deceased. At the funeral witnessed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton, a cow-buffalo was led three times round the bier, and a little of its milk, drawn at the time, put into the mouth of the corpse. Then a buffalo calf was led thrice round the bier, and the dead man’s hand laid on its head. By this act, the calf was supposed to receive all the sins of the deceased. It was then driven away to a great distance, that it might contaminate no one, and it was said that it would never be sold, but looked on as a dedicated sacred animal. If a dead man leaves a widow in a state of pregnancy, who has not performed the kanni kattodu or marriage thread ceremony, this must be gone through before the corpse is taken to the pyre, in order to render the child legitimate. The pregnant woman is, at the time of the funeral, brought close to the cot, and a near relation of the deceased, taking up a cotton thread, twisted in the form of a necklace without any knots, throws it round her neck. Sometimes the hand of the corpse is lifted up with the thread, and made to place it round the neck. At the funeral of the young man, Mr. Clayton saw this ceremony performed on his pregnant wife. After a turmeric-dyed cord had been taken from the hands of the corpse and tied round her neck, she was again brought to the side of the bier, and her ear-rings, nose ornaments, and other articles of jewellery, were removed in token that she had become a widow. Soon after the recitation of sins, all the agnates go to the house of the dead man, at the entrance to which a gunny-bag is spread, whereon a smallquantity of paddy is poured, and a few culms ofCynodon Dactylonand a little cow-dung are placed on it. The eldest of the agnates, sickle in hand, takes some of the paddy, and moves on, raising both hands to his forehead. The other agnates then do the same, and proceed in Indian file, males in front and females in the rear, to the corpse. Round it they walk, men from left to right, and women in the reverse direction, and at the end of each circuit put some of the paddy on its face. The cot is then carried to the burning-ground, a woman heading the procession, and shaking the end of her cloth all the way. The corpse is laid on the pyre with its feet to the south, and the pyre lighted by the eldest son standing at the head. The sticks of which the car was constructed are added to the fuel, of which the pyre is built up. In some places the son, when lighting the pyre, repeats the words “Being begotten by my father and mother, I, in the presence of all and the Dēva, set fire at the head after the manner of my ancestors and forefathers.” The Rev. A. C. Clayton records that, before the procession started for the burning-ground, some female relatives of the dead man tied locks of their hair round the toes of the corpse, and others went three times round the bier. On the day following the funeral, the bereaved family distribute rice to all the Badagas of the hamlet, and all the near relations of the deceased go to the burning-ground, taking with them two new pots. The fire is extinguished, and the fragments of the bones are collected. A tray is made of the fronds of the bracken fern (Pteris aquilina) covered with a cloth, on which the bones are placed together with culms ofCynodongrass and ghī. The Badagas of the hamlet who are younger than the deceased salute the bones by touching them, and a few men, including the chief mourner,hold the tray, and convey it to the bone pit, which every hamlet possesses. Into it the bones are thrown, while an elder repeats the words “Become united with the line of your relations, with your class, and with the big people,” or “May the young and old who have died, may all those who have died from time immemorial up to the present time, mingle in one.” When the pit has been closed up, all return to the spot where the body was burnt, and, clearing a space, make a puddle, round which they stand, and throw into it a handful of korali (Setaria italica), uttering the words “May deaths cease; may evils cease; may good prevail in the village; in virtue of the good deeds of the ancestors and forefathers, may this one mingle with them.” This ceremony concluded, they repair to a stream, where a member of the bereaved family shaves a Toreya partially or completely. Some take a razor, and, after removing a patch of hair, pass the Toreya on to a barber. All the agnates are then shaved by a Badaga or a barber. The chief mourner then prostrates himself on the ground, and is blessed by all. He and the Toreya proceed to the house of the deceased. Taking a three-pronged twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, and placing a mīnige (Argyreia) leaf on the prongs, he thrusts it into a rubbish heap near the house. He then places a small quantity of sāmai grain, called street food, on the leaf, and, after sprinkling it thrice with water, goes away.

Badaga Temple.Badaga Temple.The other agricultural ceremony is called Devvē habba or tenai (Setaria italica), and is usually celebrated in June or July, always on a Monday. It is apparently performed in honour of the two gods Mahālingaswāmi and Hiriya Udaya, to whom a group of villages will have temples dedicated. For example, the Badagas inthe neighbourhood of Kotagiri have their Hiriya Udaya temple at Tāndanād, and Mahālingaswāmi temple at Kannērmukku. This Devvē festival, which should on no account be pronounced duvve, which means burning-ground, is celebrated at one place, whither the Badagas from other villages proceed, to take part in it. About midday, some Badagas and the temple pūjāri go from the temple of Hiriya Udaya to that of Mahālingaswāmi. The procession is usually headed by a Kurumba, who scatters fragments of tūd bark and wood as he goes on his way. The pūjāri takes with him the materials necessary for doing pūja, and, after worshipping Mahālingaswāmi, the party return to the Hiriya Udaya temple, where milk and cooked rice are offered to the various gods within the temple precincts. On the following day, all assemble at the temple, and a Kurumba brings a few sheaves ofSetaria italica, and ties them to a stone set up at the main entrance. After this, pūja is done, and the people offer cocoanuts to the god. Later on, all the women of the Madhave sept, who have given birth to a first-born child, come, dressed up in holiday attire, with their babies, to the temple. On this day they wear a special nose ornament, called elemukkuththi, which is only worn on one other occasion, at the funeral of a husband. The women do pūja to Hiriya Udaya, and the pūjāri gives them a small quantity of rice on mīnige (Argyreia) leaves. After eating this, they leave the temple in a line, and wash their hands with water given to them by the pūjāri. This ceremonial, performed by women of the Madhave sept, is called Mandēdhanda. As soon as the Devvē festival is concluded, the reaping of the crop commences, and a measure or two of grain from the crop gathered on the first day, called nīsal, is set apart for the Mahālingaswāmi temple.The most important gods of the Badagas are Heththeswāmi, Mahālingaswāmi, Hiriya Udaya, Mādeswara, Mānkāli, Jadeswāmi, and Nīlgiri Rangaswāmi. And at the present day, some Badagas proceed to the plains, to worship at the Saivite temple at Karamadai in Coimbatore, or at Nanjangōd in Mysore.The festival in honour of Heththeswāmi is celebrated in the month of January at Baireganni. It is sometimes called ermathohabba, as, with it, ploughing operations cease. It always commences on a Monday, and usually lasts eight days. A Sēdan or Dēvānga weaver comes with his portable hand-loom, and sufficient thread for weaving a dhubati (coarse cloth) and turban. At Baireganni there is a special house, in which these articles are woven. But, at other places where the festival is observed, the Badagas go to the weaver’s village to fetch the required cloths. Early on the second morning of the festival, some of the more respected Badagas and the weaver proceed to the weaving house after bathing. The weaver sets up his loom, and worships it by offering incense, and other things. The Badagas give him a new cloth, and a small sum of money, and ask him to weave a dhubati and two kachches (narrow strips of cloth). Daily, throughout the festival, the Badagas collect near the temple, and indulge in music and songs. Until the last day, they are not permitted to set eyes on the god Heththeswāmi. On the morning of the last day, the pūjāri, accompanied by all the Badagas, takes the newly woven cloths to a stream, in which they are washed. When they are dry, all proceed to the temple, where the idol is dressed up in them, and all, on this occasion only, are allowed to look at it. Devotees pay a small offering of money, which is placed on a tray near the idol. The crowd begins to disperse inthe afternoon, and, on their way back to their villages, the wants of the travellers are attended to by people posted at intervals with coffee, fruit, and other articles of food. If the Badagas have to go to a weaver’s village for the cloths, the weaver is, when the order is given for them, presented with four annas, after he has bathed. When handing the money to him, the Badagas bawl out “This is the fee for making the cloths to be worn by Heththe Iramāsthi and Parasakti Parvati.” On the last day of the festival, the cloths are washed, and one of them is made to represent an idol, which is decorated with waist and neck ornaments, and an umbrella. All prostrate themselves before it, and make offerings of money. Fruits and other things are then offered to Heththeswāmi and some recite the following prayer. “May all good acts be remembered, and all bad ones be forgotten. Though there may be a thousand and one sins, may I reach the feet of God.”The following further information in connection with the Baireganni festival is given by Bishop Whitehead. “The people from other villages offer money, rice, fruits, umbrellas of gold or silver for the goddess, cloths, and buffaloes. The buffaloes are never killed, but remain as the property of the temple. The pūjāri calls the representatives of one village, and tells them what Hetheswāmi says to him,e.g., ‘This year you will have good [or bad] crops; cholera or small-pox, good [or bad] rain, etc.’ As the people present their offerings, they prostrate themselves, kneeling down and touching the ground with their foreheads, and the pūjāri gives them some flowers, which they wear in their hair. The people and the pūjāri play on the kombu [horn], and ring bells while the offerings are being made. After the offerings have finished, all the men dance, in two companies, infront of the temple, one shouting ‘How-ko, How-ko,’ and the other ‘Is-hōli.’ The dance was taught them by the Todas, and the words are Toda.”Badagas Making Fire.Badagas Making Fire.In connection with the Jadeswāmi festival the ceremony of walking through fire [burning embers] is carried out at Mēlūr, Tangālu, Mainelē, Jakkanāre, Tenād, and Nidugala. At Mēlūr and Tangālu, the temples belong to the Hāruvas, who carry out all the details of ceremony. The temple at Tenād is owned by the Udayas, by whom the ceremonial is performed. In other places, the celebrants are Badagas. The festival is observed, on an elaborate scale, at Nidugala during the month of January. All those who are going to walk over the burning embers fast for eight days, and go through the rite on the ninth day. For its performance, Monday is considered an auspicious day. The omens are taken by boiling two pots of milk side by side on two hearths. If the milk overflows uniformly on all sides, the crops will be abundant for all the villages. But, if it flows over on one side only, there will be plentiful crops for villages on that side only. The space over which the embers are spread is said to be about five yards long, and three yards broad. But, in some places,e.g., Jakkanāre and Mēlūr, it is circular as at the Muhammadan fire-walking ceremony. For making the embers, the wood ofEugenia JambolanaandPhyllanthus Emblicaare used. For boiling the milk, and setting fire to the wood, a light obtained by friction must be used. The process is known as niligolu, or upright stick. The vertical stick is made of a twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, which is rotated in a socket in a long thick piece of a bough ofDebregeasia velutina, in which a row of sockets has been made. The rotation is produced by a cord passed several times round the vertical stick, ofwhich each end is pulled alternately. The horizontal block is pressed firmly on the ground by the toes of a man, who presses a half cocoanut shell down on the top of the vertical stick, so as to force it down into the socket. A Badaga, who failed in an attempt to demonstrate the making of fire by this method, gave as an excuse that he was under worldly pollution, from which he would be free at the time of the fire-walking ceremony. Though the Badagas make fire by friction, reference is made in their folk legends, not to this mode of obtaining fire, but to chakkamukki (flint and steel), which is repeatedly referred to in connection with cremation. After the milk boiling ceremonial, the pūjāri, tying bells on his legs, approaches the fire pit, carrying milk freshly drawn from a cow, which has calved for the first time, and flowers ofRhododendron arboreum,Leucas aspera, or jasmine. After doing pūja, he throws the flowers on the embers, and they should remain unscorched for a few seconds. He then pours some of the milk over the embers, and no hissing soundshouldbe produced. The omens being propitious, he walks over the glowing embers, followed by an Udaya, and the crowd of celebrants, who, before going through the ordeal, count the hairs on their feet. If any are singed, it is a sign of approaching ill fortune, or even death. In an account of the fire-walking ceremony, in 1902, it is noted that “the Badagas strongly repudiate the insinuation of preparing their feet to face the fire ordeal. It is done to propitiate Jeddayswāmi, to whom vows are invoked, in token of which they grow one twist or plait of hair, which is treasured for years, and finally cut off as an offering to Jeddayswāmi. Numbers of Chettis were catering to the crowd, offering their wares, bangles, gay-coloured handkerchiefs, as well as edibles. The Kotas supplied the music, and anancient patriarch worked himself up to a high pitch of inspiration, and predicted all sorts of good things for the Badagas with regard to the ensuing season and crops.”The following legend, relating to the fire-walking ceremony, is recorded by Bishop Whitehead. “When they first began to perform the ceremony fifty or sixty years ago, they were afraid to walk over the fire. Then the stone image of Mahālinga Swāmi turned into a snake, and made a hole through the temple wall. It came out, and crawled over the fire, and then went back to the temple. Then their fear vanished, and they walked over the embers. The hole is still to be seen in the temple.”Of the fire-walking ceremony at Mēlūr, the following account is given in the Gazetteer of the Nīlgiris. “It takes place on the Monday after the March new moon, just before the cultivation season begins, and is attended by Badagas from all over Mērkunād. The inhabitants of certain villages (six in number), who are supposed to be the descendants of an early Badaga named Guruvajja, have first, however, to signify through their Gottukārs, or headmen, that the festival may take place; and the Gottukārs choose three, five, or seven men to walk through the fire. On the day appointed, the fire is lit by certain Badaga priests and a Kurumba. The men chosen by the Gottukārs then bathe, adorn themselves with sandal, do obeisance to the Udayas of Udayarhatti near Kēti, who are specially invited and feasted; pour into the adjacent stream milk from cows which have calved for the first time during the year; and, in the afternoon, throw more milk and some flowers from the Mahālingasvāmi temple into the fire pit, and then walk across it. Earth is next thrown on the embers, and they walk acrosstwice more. A general feast closes the ceremony, and next day the first ploughings are done, the Kurumba sowing the first seeds, and the priests the next lot. Finally, a net is brought. The priest of the temple, standing over it, puts up prayers for a favourable agricultural season; two fowls are thrown into it, and a pretence is made of spearing them; and then it is taken and put across some game path, and some wild animal (a sāmbhar deer if possible) is driven into it, slain, and divided among the villagers. This same custom of annually killing a sāmbhar is also observed at other villages on the plateau, and in 1883 and 1894 special orders were passed to permit of its being done during the close season. Latterly, disputes about precedence in the matter of walking through the fire at Mēlūr have been carried as far as the civil courts, and the two factions celebrate the festival separately in alternate years. A fire-walking ceremony also takes place annually at the Jadayasvāmi temple in Jakkanēri under the auspices of a Sivāchāri Badaga. It seems to have originally had some connection with agricultural prospects, as a young bull is made to go partly across the fire-pit before the other devotees, and the owners of young cows which have had their first calves during the year take precedence of others in the ceremony, and bring offerings of milk, which are sprinkled over the burning embers.”At the Sakalathi festival, in the month of October, Badagas, towards evening, throw on the roofs of their houses flowers ofPlectranthus Wightii,Crotalaria obtecta,Lobelia nicotianœfolia,Achyranthes aspera, andLeucas aspera. On the following day, they clean their houses, and have a feast. In the afternoon, numbers of them may be seen in the streets drawing in front of their houses pictures in wood-ashes of buffaloes, bulls, cows,ploughs, stars, sun and moon, snakes, lizards, etc. They then go into their houses, and wash their hands. Taking up in his clean hands a big cake, on which are placed a little rice and butter, the Badaga puts on it three wicks steeped in castor oil, and lights them. The cake is then waved round the heads of all the children of the house taken to a field, and thrown therein with the words “Sakalathi has come.” The cake-thrower returns home, and prostrates himself before a lamp placed in the inner room, and repeats a long formula, composed of the various synonyms of Siva.In the month of November, a festival called Dodda Habba (big feast) is celebrated. In the afternoon, rice is cooked in whey within the hāgōttu, and eaten on mīnige leaves. Throughout the day the villagers play at various ball games.A festival, which is purely local, is celebrated near Konakore in honour of Mahangkāli. A buffalo is led to the side of a precipice, killed by a Kurumba with a spear, and thrown over the edge thereof. There is a legend that, in olden days, a pūjāri used to put a stick in the crevice of a rock, and, on removing it, get the value of a buffalo in fanams (gold coins). But, on one occasion, he put the stick in a second time, in the hopes of gaining more money. No money, however, was forthcoming and, as a punishment for his greed, he died on the spot.All Badaga villages, except those of the Udayas, have a hut, called holagudi, for the exclusive use of women during their monthly periods. A few months before a girl is expected to reach puberty, she is sent to the holagudi, on a Friday, four or five days before the new moon day. This is done lest, in the ordinary course of events, the first menstruation should commence on an inauspicious day. The girl remains in the holagudi onenight, and returns home on the following day clad in new cloths, leaving the old ones in the hut. When she arrives at her house, she salutes all the people who are there, and receives their blessing. On Sunday she goes to the houses of her relations, where she is given kadalai (Cicer arietinum) and other food. She may not enter the inner apartment of her house until she has seen the crescent moon. Badaga women observe five days menstrual pollution. If a woman discovers her condition before washing her face in the early morning, that day is included in the pollution period. Otherwise, the period must be prolonged over six days. On the third day she bathes in cold water, using the bark ofPouzolzia(thorēkōlu), and on the fourth day is allowed a change of clothing after a bath. On this day she leaves the hut, and passes a portion of the night in the verandah of her house. After cooking and eating her evening meal, she bathes, and enters the outer room. Early on the following morning, the spot which she has occupied is cleaned, and she bathes in a stream. Returning home, she eats her food in the outer room, where she remains till next morning. Even children may not be touched by a menstruating woman. If, by chance, this happens, the child must be washed to remove the pollution, before it can be handled by others. This restriction is apparently not observed by any other tribe or caste.Writing concerning marriage among the Badagas, Harkness states12that “it is said to be common for one who is in want of labourers to promise his daughter in marriage to the son or other relative of a neighbour not in circumstances so flourishing as himself. And, these engagements being entered into, the intended bridegroomserves the father of his betrothed as one of his own family till the girl comes of age, when the marriage is consummated, and he becomes a partner in the general property of the family of his father-in-law.”A man may marry a girl belonging to the same village as himself, if he and she are not members of the same exogamous sept. In most cases, however, all the inhabitants of a village are of the same sept, and a man has to take as his wife a girl from a village other than his own.Among all sections of the Badagas, adult marriage is the general rule, though infant marriage is also practised. Marriage is preceded by a simple form of courtship, but the consent of the parents to the union is necessary. A girl does not suffer in reputation if she is rejected by a number of suitors, before she finally settles down. Except among the Udayas, the marriage ceremony is of a very simple nature. A day or two before that fixed for taking the girl to the house of her husband-elect, the latter proceeds to her village, accompanied by his brothers, who, as a token of respect, touch the feet of all the Badagas who are assembled. The bride is taken to the house of the bridegroom, accompanied by the Kota band. Arrived there, she stands at the entrance, and her mother-in-law or sister-in-law brings water in a vessel, and pours it into her hands thrice. Each time she lets the water fall over her feet. The mother-in-law then ties round her neck a string of beads (māle mani), and leads her to the outer room (edumane), where cooked sāmai (Panicum miliare) and milk is given to her. This she pretends to eat, and the bridegroom’s sister gives her water to wash her hands with. The bride and two married women or virgins (preferably the bridegroom’s sisters) go to a stream in procession, accompanied by theKota musicians, and bring therefrom water for cooking purposes in decorated new pots. The bride then salutes all her new relations, and they in turn give her their blessing. The ceremonial concludes with a feast, at the conclusion of which, in some cases, the bride and bridegroom sit on the raised verandah (pial), and receive presents.“Though,” a correspondent writes, “the Badaga is simple, and his wants are few, he cannot resist the temptation of wine and women. The Badaga woman can change husbands as often as she pleases by a simple system of divorce, and can also carry on with impunity intimacy within the pale of her own community. It is not uncommon to find Badaga women changing husbands, so long as youth and vigour tempt them to do so, and confining themselves eventually to the last individual, after age and infirmity have made their mark, and render such frolics inexpedient.” A former Magistrate of the Nīlgiris informs me that he tried more than one case, in which a married man filed a complaint against another man for kidnapping or enticing away his wife for immoral purposes. The father of the woman was always charged as an abetter, and pleaded that, as no pariyam (bride price) had been paid by the husband, though he and the woman lived together as man and wife, no criminal offence could be proved against either the father or the abductor. Polygamy is permitted, and the plurality of wives is a gain to the husband, as each wife becomes a bread-winner, and supports her children, and the man makes each wife superintend one department of the day’s work. Remarriage of widows is very common, and a widow may marry the brother of her deceased husband. It is said to be etiquette among the Badagas that, when a woman’s husband is away, sheshould be accessible to her brothers-in-law. Instances occur, in which the husband is much younger than his wife, who, until he has reached maturity, cohabits with her paternal aunt’s son, or some one whom she may have a fancy for. The marriage ceremony of the Udayas is carried out on an elaborate scale, and is based on the type of ceremonial which is carried out by some castes in the plains. Before dawn on the marriage day, the brothers and cousins of the bridegroom go, accompanied by some Udayas and the Kota band, to the forest, whence they bring two sticks ofMimusops hexandra, to do duty as the milk-posts. The early hour is selected, to avoid the chance of coming across inauspicious objects. The sticks should be cut off the tree at a single stroke of the bill-hook, and they may not be laid flat on the ground, but placed on a blanket spread thereon. The Udayas, who joined in the procession, collect twelve posts ofMimusopsas supports for the marriage booth (pandal). In front of the house, which is to be the scene of the wedding, two pits are dug, into which cow-dung water is poured. The pūjāri does pūja to the milk-posts by offering sugar-cane, jaggery (crude sugar), etc., and ties two threads thereto. The posts are then placed in the pits by five people—the parents of the bridal couple and the priest. The booth, and dais or enclosure, are then erected close to the milk-posts. On the second day, the bridegroom’s party, attended by Kota musicians, dressed up in dancing costume, go to the house of the bride, where a feast is held. The bride then salutes a lamp, and prostrates herself at the feet of her parents, who bless her, saying “May your body and hands soon be filled (i.e., may you have a child), and may your life be prosperous.” The bride is taken in procession to the house of the bridegroom,accompanied by some Udayas, and a Toreya carrying a bag of rice. At the entrance to the house she is blindfolded, and her mother-in-law pours water over her feet, and waves coloured water (ārathi) in front of her. She then enters the house, right foot foremost, and sits on a mat. Three married women, nearly related to the bridegroom, proceed, with the Kota musicians, to a stream, carrying three pots decorated with leaves ofLeucas aspera. The priest does pūja, and the pots are filled with water, and brought back in procession to the marriage dais. The water is poured into three vessels placed thereon three times by each of the three women. Within the marriage enclosure, two raised platforms are set up by a Toreya. The bridegroom, after going round the enclosure three times with his brothers and sisters, enters it, and bathes with the water contained in the vessels. He then dresses himself in new clothes, and is carried to the outer room by his maternal uncle. The bride is then treated in like manner, but is taken to the inner room. At a fixed auspicious hour, the bridal couple repair to the enclosure, where the bridegroom stands on a mat. A screen is held up by four or five men between him and the bride, who stands facing him, while the priest ties the ends of their clothes together. They then link their little fingers together, the screen is removed, and they seat themselves on the mat. The bridegroom’s sister brings a tray with a mass of rice scooped out into a cavity to hold ghī for feeding a lighted wick (annadha ārathi) on it, and, placing it before the bridal pair, sits down. The tāli, consisting of a golden disc, is worshipped by the priest, and given to the bridegroom, who ties it on to the bride’s neck. In some places it is tied by four or five elders, belonging to different villages, who are not widowers. The contractingcouple then put on wreaths called sammandha mālai, or wreaths establishing relationship, and the wrist threads are tied on. The bride’s sister brings some rice and milk in a cup, into which the linked fingers of the bride and bridegroom are thrust. Taking up some of the rice, they put it into each other’s mouths three times. After they have washed their hands, the maternal uncle or priest asks them if they have seen Aranjoti (the pole-star), and they reply in the affirmative. On the third day, presents are given to the newly-married couple, and the wrist threads are removed. Going to a stream, they perform a mimic ceremony of sowing, and scatter cotton and rice seed in two small pans made by a Toreya with cow-dung. Widow remarriage is permitted among the Udayas, and a widow may marry a cousin, but not her dead husband’s brother. At the marriage ceremony, a priest makes a mark with sacred ashes on the foreheads of the contracting couple, and announces the fact of their union.It is noted by Dr. Rivers that “Breeks has stated that the Toda custom is that the house shall pass to the youngest son. It seems quite clear that this is wrong, and that this custom is absolutely unknown among the Todas. It is, however, a Badaga custom, and among them I was told that it is due to the fact that, as the sons of a family grow up and marry, they leave the house of the parents and build houses elsewhere. It is the duty of the youngest son to dwell with his parents, and support them as long as they live, and, when they die, he continues to live in the paternal home, of which he becomes the owner.”A ceremony is performed in the seventh month of a woman’s first pregnancy, which is important, inasmuch as it seals the marriage contract, and, after its performance,divorce can only be obtained through the decree of the panchāyat (tribal council). Moreover, if it has not been performed, a man cannot claim the paternity of the child. The ceremony is called kanni kattodu or kanni hākodu (thread tying or throwing). The husband and wife are seated in the midst of those who have assembled for the occasion, and the former asks his father-in-law whether he may throw the thread round his wife’s neck, and, having received permission, proceeds to do so. If he gets the thread, which must have no knots in it, entangled in the woman’s bunch of hair (kondai), which is made large for the occasion by the addition of false hair, he is fined three rupees. On the day of the ceremony, the man and his wife are supposed to be under pollution, and sit in the verandah to receive presents. The mats used by them for sleeping on are cleaned on the following morning, and they get rid of the pollution by bathing.A first confinement must not take place within the house, and the verandah is converted into a lying-in chamber, from which the woman is, after delivery, removed to the outer apartment, where she remains till she is free from pollution by catching sight of the crescent moon. If a woman has been delivered at her father’s house, she returns to the home of her husband within a month of the birth of the child on an auspicious day. On arrival there, the infant is placed near the feet of an old man standing by a lamp within the milk-house. Placing his right hand over the head of the infant, the old man blesses it, and a feast is held, before the commencement of which two cups, one containing milk, and the other cooked rice, are produced. All the relations take up a little of the milk and rice, and touch the tongue of the baby with them.A child receives its name on the seventh, ninth, or eleventh day. A sumptuous meal is given to the community, and the grandfather (paternal, if possible) milks a cow, and pours the milk into a brass cup placed in the milk-house. With it a little cooked sāmai grain is mixed. The babe is washed with water brought from a stream; marked on the forehead with sacred ashes; a turmeric-dyed thread is tied round its waist; a silver or iron bangle placed on its wrists; and a silver bead tied by a thread round its neck. Thus decorated, the infant is taken up by the oldest man of the village who is not a widower, who gives it a name, which has already been chosen. The elder, and the child’s parents and grandparents then place a little milk in its mouth.Children, both male and female, go through a shaving ceremony, usually when they are seven months old. The infant is seated in the lap of a Badaga, and, after water has been applied to its head by a Badaga or a barber, the maternal uncle removes some of the hair with a razor, and then hands it over to another Badaga or a barber to complete the operation.Of the death rites as carried out by the Badaga sub-division, the following note was recorded during a visit to Kotagiri. When death is drawing near, a gold coin, called Vīrarāya hana or fanam, dipped in butter or ghī, is given to the dying man to swallow. If he is too far gone to be capable of swallowing, the coin is, according to Mr. Natesa Sastri, tied round the arm. But our informants told us that this is not done at the present day. “If,” Mr. Gover writes,13“the tiny coin slips down, well. He will need both gold and ghī, the one to sustain his strength in the dark journey to the river of death, theother to fee the guardian of the fairy-like bridge that spans the dreaded tide. If sense remains to the wretched man, he knows that now his death is nigh. Despair and the gold make recovery impossible, and there are none who have swallowed the Birianhana, and yet have lived. If insensibility or deathly weakness make it impossible for the coin to pass the thorax, it is carefully bound in cloth, and tied to the right arm, so that there may be nought to hinder the passage of a worthy soul into the regions of the blessed.” The giving of the coin to the dying man is apparently an important item, and, in the Badaga folk-tales, a man on the point of death is made to ask for a Vīrarāya fanam. When life is extinct, the corpse is kept within the house until the erection of the funeral car (gudikattu) is completed. Though Gover states that the burning must not be delayed more than twenty-four hours, at the present day the Badagas postpone the funeral till all the near relations have assembled, even if this necessitates the keeping of the corpse for two or three days. Cremation may take place on any day, except Tuesday. News of a death is conveyed to distant hamlets (hattis) by a Toreya, who is paid a rupee for his services. On approaching a hamlet, he removes his turban, to signify the nature of his errand, and, standing on the side of a hill, yells out “Dho! Dho! who is in the hamlet?” Having imparted his news, he proceeds on his journey to the next hamlet. On the morning of the day fixed for the funeral, the corpse is taken on a charpoy or native cot to an open space, and a buffalo led thrice round it. The right hand of the corpse is then lifted up, and passed over the horns of the buffalo. A little milk is drawn, and poured into the mouth of the corpse. Prior to this ceremony, two or three buffaloes may be let loose, and one of them captured, after themanner of the Todas, brought near the corpse, and conducted round the cot. The funeral car is built up in five to eleven tiers, decorated with cloths and streamers, and one tier must be covered with black chintz. At the funeral of a young man, the Rev. A. C. Clayton noticed that the car was surmounted by a flag, and hung about with bread, oranges, plantains, and the bag containing the books which the youth had used in the Basel Mission School.14By the poorer members of the community the car is replaced by a cot covered with cloth, and surmounted by five umbrellas. Immediately after the buffalo ceremony, the corpse is carried to the car, and placed in the lowest storey thereof, washed, and dressed in coat and turban. A new dhupati (coarse cloth) is wrapped round it. Two silver coins (Japanese yens or rupees) are stuck on the forehead. Beneath the cot are placed a crowbar, and baskets containing cakes, parched paddy, tobacco, chick pea (Cicer arietinum), jaggery and sāmai flour. A number of women, relations and friends of the dead man, then make a rush to the cot, and, sitting on it round the corpse, keep on waiting, while a woman near its head rings a bell. When one batch is tired, it is replaced by another. Badaga men then pour in in large numbers, and salute the corpse by touching the head, Toreyas and female relations touching the feet. Of those who salute, a few place inside the dhupati a piece of white cloth with red and yellow stripes, which has been specially prepared for the purpose. All then proceed to dance round the car to the music of the Kota band, near male relations removing their turban or woollen night cap, as a mark of respect, during the first three revolutions. Most of the male dancers are dressed up ingaudy petticoats and smart turbans. “No woman,” Mr. Natesa Sastri writes, “mingles in the funeral dance if the dead person is a man, but, if the deceased is a woman, one old woman, the nearest relative of the dead, takes part in it.” But, at the funerals of two men which we witnessed, a few women danced together with the men. Usually the tribesmen continue to arrive until 2 or 3P.M.Relations collect outside the village, and advance in a body towards the car, some, especially the sons-in-law of the dead man, riding on ponies, some of them carrying sāmai grain. As they approach the car, they shout “Ja! hoch; Ja! hoch.” The Muttu Kotas bring a double iron sickle with imitation buffalo horns on the tip, which is placed, with a hatchet, buguri (flute), and walking stick, on the car or on the ground beside it. When all are assembled, the cot is carried to an open space between the house and the burning-ground, followed by the car and a party of women carrying the baskets containing grain, etc. The car is then stripped of its trappings, and hacked to pieces. The widow is brought close to the cot, and removes her nose ornament (elemukkuthi), and other jewels. At both the funerals which we witnessed, the widow had a narrow strip of coloured chintz over her shoulders. Standing near the corpse, she removed a bit of wire from her ear-rings, a lock of hair, and a palm leaf roll from the lobe of the ear, and tied them up in the cloth of her dead husband. After her, the sisters of the dead man cut off a lock of hair, and, in like manner, tied it in the cloth. Women attached to a man by illegitimate ties sometimes also cut off a lock of hair, and, tying it to a twig ofDodonæa viscosa, place it inside the cloth. Very impressive is the recitation, or after-death confession of a dead man’s sins by an elder of the tribe standing at the head of thecorpse, and rapidly chanting the following lines, or a variation thereof, while he waves his right hand during each line towards the feet. The reproduction of the recitation in my phonograph never failed to impress the daily audience of Badagas, Kotas and Todas.This is the death of Āndi.In his memory the calf of the cow Belle has been set free.From this world to the other.He goes in a car.Everything the man did in this world.All the sins committed by his ancestors.All the sins committed by his forefathers.All the sins committed by his parents.All the sins committed by himself.The estranging of brothers.Shifting the boundary line.Encroaching on a neighbour’s land by removing the hedge.Driving away brothers and sisters.Cutting the kalli tree stealthily.Cutting the mulli tree outside his boundary.Dragging the thorny branches of the kotte tree.Sweeping with a broom.Splitting green branches.Telling lies.Uprooting seedlings.Plucking growing plants, and throwing them in the sun.Giving young birds to cats.Troubling the poor and cripples.Throwing refuse water in front of the sun.Going to sleep after seeing an eclipse of the moon.Looking enviously at a buffalo yielding an abundance of milk.Being jealous of the good crops of others.Removing boundary stones.Using a calf set free at the funeral.Polluting water with dirt.Urinating on burning embers.Ingratitude to the priest.Carrying tales to the higher authorities.Poisoning food.Not feeding a hungry person.Not giving fire to one half frozen.Killing snakes and cows.Killing lizards and blood-suckers.Showing a wrong path.Getting on the cot, and allowing his father-in-law to sleep on the ground.Sitting on a raised verandah, and driving thence his mother-in-law.Going against natural instincts.Troubling daughters-in-law.Breaking open lakes.Breaking open reservoirs of water.Being envious of the prosperity of other villages.Getting angry with people.Misleading travellers in the forest.Though there be three hundred such sins,Let them all go with the calf set free to-day.May the sins be completely removed!May the sins be forgiven!May the door of heaven be open!May the door of hell be closed!May the hand of charity be extended!May the wicked hand be shrivelled!May the door open suddenly!May beauty or splendour prevail everywhere!May the hot pillar be cooled!May the thread bridge15become light!May the pit of perdition be closed!May he reach the golden pillar!Holding the feet of the six thousand Athis,Holding the feet of the twelve thousand Pathis,Holding the feet of Brahma,Holding the feet of the calf set free to-day,May he reach the abode of Siva!So mote it be.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.The recitation is repeated thrice, and a few Badagas repeat the last words of each line after the elder. It was noticed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton that, during the recitation, the people surrounded the bier on three sides, leaving a lane open to the west. The sins of the dead man were transferred to another as sin-bearer, and finally passed away down the lane. As the ceremony witnessed by us differs materially from the account thereof given by Gover nearly forty years ago, I may quote his description. “By a conventional mode of expression, the sum total of sins a man may do is said to be thirteen hundred. Admitting that the deceased has committed them all, the performer cries aloud ‘Stay not their flight to God’s pure feet.’ As he closes, the whole assembly chants aloud ‘Stay not their flight.’ Again the performer enters into details, and cries ‘He killed the crawling snake. It is a sin.’ In a moment the last word is caught up, and all the people cry ‘It is a sin.’ As they shout, the performer lays his hand upon the calf. The sin is transferred to the calf. Thus the whole catalogue is gone through in this impressive way. But this is not enough. As the last shout ‘Let all be well’ dies away, the performer gives place to another, and again confession is made, and all the people shout ‘It is a sin.’ A third time it is done. Then, still in solemn silence, the calf is let loose. Like the Jewish scapegoat, it may never be used for secular work.” Dr. Rivers writes that “the Badagas let loose a calf at a funeral, to bear the sins of the deceased. It is possible that the calf in the Toda ceremony may have the same significance. If so, the practice has not improbably been borrowed, and the fact that the bell which is hung on the neck of the calf is kept by Kotas or Badagas suggests that the whole incident may have been borrowedby the Todas from one or other of these races.” At the funerals, of which we were spectators, no calf was brought near the corpse, and the celebrants of the rites were satisfied with the mere mention by name of a calf, which is male or female according to the sex of the deceased. At the funeral witnessed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton, a cow-buffalo was led three times round the bier, and a little of its milk, drawn at the time, put into the mouth of the corpse. Then a buffalo calf was led thrice round the bier, and the dead man’s hand laid on its head. By this act, the calf was supposed to receive all the sins of the deceased. It was then driven away to a great distance, that it might contaminate no one, and it was said that it would never be sold, but looked on as a dedicated sacred animal. If a dead man leaves a widow in a state of pregnancy, who has not performed the kanni kattodu or marriage thread ceremony, this must be gone through before the corpse is taken to the pyre, in order to render the child legitimate. The pregnant woman is, at the time of the funeral, brought close to the cot, and a near relation of the deceased, taking up a cotton thread, twisted in the form of a necklace without any knots, throws it round her neck. Sometimes the hand of the corpse is lifted up with the thread, and made to place it round the neck. At the funeral of the young man, Mr. Clayton saw this ceremony performed on his pregnant wife. After a turmeric-dyed cord had been taken from the hands of the corpse and tied round her neck, she was again brought to the side of the bier, and her ear-rings, nose ornaments, and other articles of jewellery, were removed in token that she had become a widow. Soon after the recitation of sins, all the agnates go to the house of the dead man, at the entrance to which a gunny-bag is spread, whereon a smallquantity of paddy is poured, and a few culms ofCynodon Dactylonand a little cow-dung are placed on it. The eldest of the agnates, sickle in hand, takes some of the paddy, and moves on, raising both hands to his forehead. The other agnates then do the same, and proceed in Indian file, males in front and females in the rear, to the corpse. Round it they walk, men from left to right, and women in the reverse direction, and at the end of each circuit put some of the paddy on its face. The cot is then carried to the burning-ground, a woman heading the procession, and shaking the end of her cloth all the way. The corpse is laid on the pyre with its feet to the south, and the pyre lighted by the eldest son standing at the head. The sticks of which the car was constructed are added to the fuel, of which the pyre is built up. In some places the son, when lighting the pyre, repeats the words “Being begotten by my father and mother, I, in the presence of all and the Dēva, set fire at the head after the manner of my ancestors and forefathers.” The Rev. A. C. Clayton records that, before the procession started for the burning-ground, some female relatives of the dead man tied locks of their hair round the toes of the corpse, and others went three times round the bier. On the day following the funeral, the bereaved family distribute rice to all the Badagas of the hamlet, and all the near relations of the deceased go to the burning-ground, taking with them two new pots. The fire is extinguished, and the fragments of the bones are collected. A tray is made of the fronds of the bracken fern (Pteris aquilina) covered with a cloth, on which the bones are placed together with culms ofCynodongrass and ghī. The Badagas of the hamlet who are younger than the deceased salute the bones by touching them, and a few men, including the chief mourner,hold the tray, and convey it to the bone pit, which every hamlet possesses. Into it the bones are thrown, while an elder repeats the words “Become united with the line of your relations, with your class, and with the big people,” or “May the young and old who have died, may all those who have died from time immemorial up to the present time, mingle in one.” When the pit has been closed up, all return to the spot where the body was burnt, and, clearing a space, make a puddle, round which they stand, and throw into it a handful of korali (Setaria italica), uttering the words “May deaths cease; may evils cease; may good prevail in the village; in virtue of the good deeds of the ancestors and forefathers, may this one mingle with them.” This ceremony concluded, they repair to a stream, where a member of the bereaved family shaves a Toreya partially or completely. Some take a razor, and, after removing a patch of hair, pass the Toreya on to a barber. All the agnates are then shaved by a Badaga or a barber. The chief mourner then prostrates himself on the ground, and is blessed by all. He and the Toreya proceed to the house of the deceased. Taking a three-pronged twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, and placing a mīnige (Argyreia) leaf on the prongs, he thrusts it into a rubbish heap near the house. He then places a small quantity of sāmai grain, called street food, on the leaf, and, after sprinkling it thrice with water, goes away.

Badaga Temple.Badaga Temple.The other agricultural ceremony is called Devvē habba or tenai (Setaria italica), and is usually celebrated in June or July, always on a Monday. It is apparently performed in honour of the two gods Mahālingaswāmi and Hiriya Udaya, to whom a group of villages will have temples dedicated. For example, the Badagas inthe neighbourhood of Kotagiri have their Hiriya Udaya temple at Tāndanād, and Mahālingaswāmi temple at Kannērmukku. This Devvē festival, which should on no account be pronounced duvve, which means burning-ground, is celebrated at one place, whither the Badagas from other villages proceed, to take part in it. About midday, some Badagas and the temple pūjāri go from the temple of Hiriya Udaya to that of Mahālingaswāmi. The procession is usually headed by a Kurumba, who scatters fragments of tūd bark and wood as he goes on his way. The pūjāri takes with him the materials necessary for doing pūja, and, after worshipping Mahālingaswāmi, the party return to the Hiriya Udaya temple, where milk and cooked rice are offered to the various gods within the temple precincts. On the following day, all assemble at the temple, and a Kurumba brings a few sheaves ofSetaria italica, and ties them to a stone set up at the main entrance. After this, pūja is done, and the people offer cocoanuts to the god. Later on, all the women of the Madhave sept, who have given birth to a first-born child, come, dressed up in holiday attire, with their babies, to the temple. On this day they wear a special nose ornament, called elemukkuththi, which is only worn on one other occasion, at the funeral of a husband. The women do pūja to Hiriya Udaya, and the pūjāri gives them a small quantity of rice on mīnige (Argyreia) leaves. After eating this, they leave the temple in a line, and wash their hands with water given to them by the pūjāri. This ceremonial, performed by women of the Madhave sept, is called Mandēdhanda. As soon as the Devvē festival is concluded, the reaping of the crop commences, and a measure or two of grain from the crop gathered on the first day, called nīsal, is set apart for the Mahālingaswāmi temple.The most important gods of the Badagas are Heththeswāmi, Mahālingaswāmi, Hiriya Udaya, Mādeswara, Mānkāli, Jadeswāmi, and Nīlgiri Rangaswāmi. And at the present day, some Badagas proceed to the plains, to worship at the Saivite temple at Karamadai in Coimbatore, or at Nanjangōd in Mysore.The festival in honour of Heththeswāmi is celebrated in the month of January at Baireganni. It is sometimes called ermathohabba, as, with it, ploughing operations cease. It always commences on a Monday, and usually lasts eight days. A Sēdan or Dēvānga weaver comes with his portable hand-loom, and sufficient thread for weaving a dhubati (coarse cloth) and turban. At Baireganni there is a special house, in which these articles are woven. But, at other places where the festival is observed, the Badagas go to the weaver’s village to fetch the required cloths. Early on the second morning of the festival, some of the more respected Badagas and the weaver proceed to the weaving house after bathing. The weaver sets up his loom, and worships it by offering incense, and other things. The Badagas give him a new cloth, and a small sum of money, and ask him to weave a dhubati and two kachches (narrow strips of cloth). Daily, throughout the festival, the Badagas collect near the temple, and indulge in music and songs. Until the last day, they are not permitted to set eyes on the god Heththeswāmi. On the morning of the last day, the pūjāri, accompanied by all the Badagas, takes the newly woven cloths to a stream, in which they are washed. When they are dry, all proceed to the temple, where the idol is dressed up in them, and all, on this occasion only, are allowed to look at it. Devotees pay a small offering of money, which is placed on a tray near the idol. The crowd begins to disperse inthe afternoon, and, on their way back to their villages, the wants of the travellers are attended to by people posted at intervals with coffee, fruit, and other articles of food. If the Badagas have to go to a weaver’s village for the cloths, the weaver is, when the order is given for them, presented with four annas, after he has bathed. When handing the money to him, the Badagas bawl out “This is the fee for making the cloths to be worn by Heththe Iramāsthi and Parasakti Parvati.” On the last day of the festival, the cloths are washed, and one of them is made to represent an idol, which is decorated with waist and neck ornaments, and an umbrella. All prostrate themselves before it, and make offerings of money. Fruits and other things are then offered to Heththeswāmi and some recite the following prayer. “May all good acts be remembered, and all bad ones be forgotten. Though there may be a thousand and one sins, may I reach the feet of God.”The following further information in connection with the Baireganni festival is given by Bishop Whitehead. “The people from other villages offer money, rice, fruits, umbrellas of gold or silver for the goddess, cloths, and buffaloes. The buffaloes are never killed, but remain as the property of the temple. The pūjāri calls the representatives of one village, and tells them what Hetheswāmi says to him,e.g., ‘This year you will have good [or bad] crops; cholera or small-pox, good [or bad] rain, etc.’ As the people present their offerings, they prostrate themselves, kneeling down and touching the ground with their foreheads, and the pūjāri gives them some flowers, which they wear in their hair. The people and the pūjāri play on the kombu [horn], and ring bells while the offerings are being made. After the offerings have finished, all the men dance, in two companies, infront of the temple, one shouting ‘How-ko, How-ko,’ and the other ‘Is-hōli.’ The dance was taught them by the Todas, and the words are Toda.”Badagas Making Fire.Badagas Making Fire.In connection with the Jadeswāmi festival the ceremony of walking through fire [burning embers] is carried out at Mēlūr, Tangālu, Mainelē, Jakkanāre, Tenād, and Nidugala. At Mēlūr and Tangālu, the temples belong to the Hāruvas, who carry out all the details of ceremony. The temple at Tenād is owned by the Udayas, by whom the ceremonial is performed. In other places, the celebrants are Badagas. The festival is observed, on an elaborate scale, at Nidugala during the month of January. All those who are going to walk over the burning embers fast for eight days, and go through the rite on the ninth day. For its performance, Monday is considered an auspicious day. The omens are taken by boiling two pots of milk side by side on two hearths. If the milk overflows uniformly on all sides, the crops will be abundant for all the villages. But, if it flows over on one side only, there will be plentiful crops for villages on that side only. The space over which the embers are spread is said to be about five yards long, and three yards broad. But, in some places,e.g., Jakkanāre and Mēlūr, it is circular as at the Muhammadan fire-walking ceremony. For making the embers, the wood ofEugenia JambolanaandPhyllanthus Emblicaare used. For boiling the milk, and setting fire to the wood, a light obtained by friction must be used. The process is known as niligolu, or upright stick. The vertical stick is made of a twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, which is rotated in a socket in a long thick piece of a bough ofDebregeasia velutina, in which a row of sockets has been made. The rotation is produced by a cord passed several times round the vertical stick, ofwhich each end is pulled alternately. The horizontal block is pressed firmly on the ground by the toes of a man, who presses a half cocoanut shell down on the top of the vertical stick, so as to force it down into the socket. A Badaga, who failed in an attempt to demonstrate the making of fire by this method, gave as an excuse that he was under worldly pollution, from which he would be free at the time of the fire-walking ceremony. Though the Badagas make fire by friction, reference is made in their folk legends, not to this mode of obtaining fire, but to chakkamukki (flint and steel), which is repeatedly referred to in connection with cremation. After the milk boiling ceremonial, the pūjāri, tying bells on his legs, approaches the fire pit, carrying milk freshly drawn from a cow, which has calved for the first time, and flowers ofRhododendron arboreum,Leucas aspera, or jasmine. After doing pūja, he throws the flowers on the embers, and they should remain unscorched for a few seconds. He then pours some of the milk over the embers, and no hissing soundshouldbe produced. The omens being propitious, he walks over the glowing embers, followed by an Udaya, and the crowd of celebrants, who, before going through the ordeal, count the hairs on their feet. If any are singed, it is a sign of approaching ill fortune, or even death. In an account of the fire-walking ceremony, in 1902, it is noted that “the Badagas strongly repudiate the insinuation of preparing their feet to face the fire ordeal. It is done to propitiate Jeddayswāmi, to whom vows are invoked, in token of which they grow one twist or plait of hair, which is treasured for years, and finally cut off as an offering to Jeddayswāmi. Numbers of Chettis were catering to the crowd, offering their wares, bangles, gay-coloured handkerchiefs, as well as edibles. The Kotas supplied the music, and anancient patriarch worked himself up to a high pitch of inspiration, and predicted all sorts of good things for the Badagas with regard to the ensuing season and crops.”The following legend, relating to the fire-walking ceremony, is recorded by Bishop Whitehead. “When they first began to perform the ceremony fifty or sixty years ago, they were afraid to walk over the fire. Then the stone image of Mahālinga Swāmi turned into a snake, and made a hole through the temple wall. It came out, and crawled over the fire, and then went back to the temple. Then their fear vanished, and they walked over the embers. The hole is still to be seen in the temple.”Of the fire-walking ceremony at Mēlūr, the following account is given in the Gazetteer of the Nīlgiris. “It takes place on the Monday after the March new moon, just before the cultivation season begins, and is attended by Badagas from all over Mērkunād. The inhabitants of certain villages (six in number), who are supposed to be the descendants of an early Badaga named Guruvajja, have first, however, to signify through their Gottukārs, or headmen, that the festival may take place; and the Gottukārs choose three, five, or seven men to walk through the fire. On the day appointed, the fire is lit by certain Badaga priests and a Kurumba. The men chosen by the Gottukārs then bathe, adorn themselves with sandal, do obeisance to the Udayas of Udayarhatti near Kēti, who are specially invited and feasted; pour into the adjacent stream milk from cows which have calved for the first time during the year; and, in the afternoon, throw more milk and some flowers from the Mahālingasvāmi temple into the fire pit, and then walk across it. Earth is next thrown on the embers, and they walk acrosstwice more. A general feast closes the ceremony, and next day the first ploughings are done, the Kurumba sowing the first seeds, and the priests the next lot. Finally, a net is brought. The priest of the temple, standing over it, puts up prayers for a favourable agricultural season; two fowls are thrown into it, and a pretence is made of spearing them; and then it is taken and put across some game path, and some wild animal (a sāmbhar deer if possible) is driven into it, slain, and divided among the villagers. This same custom of annually killing a sāmbhar is also observed at other villages on the plateau, and in 1883 and 1894 special orders were passed to permit of its being done during the close season. Latterly, disputes about precedence in the matter of walking through the fire at Mēlūr have been carried as far as the civil courts, and the two factions celebrate the festival separately in alternate years. A fire-walking ceremony also takes place annually at the Jadayasvāmi temple in Jakkanēri under the auspices of a Sivāchāri Badaga. It seems to have originally had some connection with agricultural prospects, as a young bull is made to go partly across the fire-pit before the other devotees, and the owners of young cows which have had their first calves during the year take precedence of others in the ceremony, and bring offerings of milk, which are sprinkled over the burning embers.”At the Sakalathi festival, in the month of October, Badagas, towards evening, throw on the roofs of their houses flowers ofPlectranthus Wightii,Crotalaria obtecta,Lobelia nicotianœfolia,Achyranthes aspera, andLeucas aspera. On the following day, they clean their houses, and have a feast. In the afternoon, numbers of them may be seen in the streets drawing in front of their houses pictures in wood-ashes of buffaloes, bulls, cows,ploughs, stars, sun and moon, snakes, lizards, etc. They then go into their houses, and wash their hands. Taking up in his clean hands a big cake, on which are placed a little rice and butter, the Badaga puts on it three wicks steeped in castor oil, and lights them. The cake is then waved round the heads of all the children of the house taken to a field, and thrown therein with the words “Sakalathi has come.” The cake-thrower returns home, and prostrates himself before a lamp placed in the inner room, and repeats a long formula, composed of the various synonyms of Siva.In the month of November, a festival called Dodda Habba (big feast) is celebrated. In the afternoon, rice is cooked in whey within the hāgōttu, and eaten on mīnige leaves. Throughout the day the villagers play at various ball games.A festival, which is purely local, is celebrated near Konakore in honour of Mahangkāli. A buffalo is led to the side of a precipice, killed by a Kurumba with a spear, and thrown over the edge thereof. There is a legend that, in olden days, a pūjāri used to put a stick in the crevice of a rock, and, on removing it, get the value of a buffalo in fanams (gold coins). But, on one occasion, he put the stick in a second time, in the hopes of gaining more money. No money, however, was forthcoming and, as a punishment for his greed, he died on the spot.All Badaga villages, except those of the Udayas, have a hut, called holagudi, for the exclusive use of women during their monthly periods. A few months before a girl is expected to reach puberty, she is sent to the holagudi, on a Friday, four or five days before the new moon day. This is done lest, in the ordinary course of events, the first menstruation should commence on an inauspicious day. The girl remains in the holagudi onenight, and returns home on the following day clad in new cloths, leaving the old ones in the hut. When she arrives at her house, she salutes all the people who are there, and receives their blessing. On Sunday she goes to the houses of her relations, where she is given kadalai (Cicer arietinum) and other food. She may not enter the inner apartment of her house until she has seen the crescent moon. Badaga women observe five days menstrual pollution. If a woman discovers her condition before washing her face in the early morning, that day is included in the pollution period. Otherwise, the period must be prolonged over six days. On the third day she bathes in cold water, using the bark ofPouzolzia(thorēkōlu), and on the fourth day is allowed a change of clothing after a bath. On this day she leaves the hut, and passes a portion of the night in the verandah of her house. After cooking and eating her evening meal, she bathes, and enters the outer room. Early on the following morning, the spot which she has occupied is cleaned, and she bathes in a stream. Returning home, she eats her food in the outer room, where she remains till next morning. Even children may not be touched by a menstruating woman. If, by chance, this happens, the child must be washed to remove the pollution, before it can be handled by others. This restriction is apparently not observed by any other tribe or caste.Writing concerning marriage among the Badagas, Harkness states12that “it is said to be common for one who is in want of labourers to promise his daughter in marriage to the son or other relative of a neighbour not in circumstances so flourishing as himself. And, these engagements being entered into, the intended bridegroomserves the father of his betrothed as one of his own family till the girl comes of age, when the marriage is consummated, and he becomes a partner in the general property of the family of his father-in-law.”A man may marry a girl belonging to the same village as himself, if he and she are not members of the same exogamous sept. In most cases, however, all the inhabitants of a village are of the same sept, and a man has to take as his wife a girl from a village other than his own.Among all sections of the Badagas, adult marriage is the general rule, though infant marriage is also practised. Marriage is preceded by a simple form of courtship, but the consent of the parents to the union is necessary. A girl does not suffer in reputation if she is rejected by a number of suitors, before she finally settles down. Except among the Udayas, the marriage ceremony is of a very simple nature. A day or two before that fixed for taking the girl to the house of her husband-elect, the latter proceeds to her village, accompanied by his brothers, who, as a token of respect, touch the feet of all the Badagas who are assembled. The bride is taken to the house of the bridegroom, accompanied by the Kota band. Arrived there, she stands at the entrance, and her mother-in-law or sister-in-law brings water in a vessel, and pours it into her hands thrice. Each time she lets the water fall over her feet. The mother-in-law then ties round her neck a string of beads (māle mani), and leads her to the outer room (edumane), where cooked sāmai (Panicum miliare) and milk is given to her. This she pretends to eat, and the bridegroom’s sister gives her water to wash her hands with. The bride and two married women or virgins (preferably the bridegroom’s sisters) go to a stream in procession, accompanied by theKota musicians, and bring therefrom water for cooking purposes in decorated new pots. The bride then salutes all her new relations, and they in turn give her their blessing. The ceremonial concludes with a feast, at the conclusion of which, in some cases, the bride and bridegroom sit on the raised verandah (pial), and receive presents.“Though,” a correspondent writes, “the Badaga is simple, and his wants are few, he cannot resist the temptation of wine and women. The Badaga woman can change husbands as often as she pleases by a simple system of divorce, and can also carry on with impunity intimacy within the pale of her own community. It is not uncommon to find Badaga women changing husbands, so long as youth and vigour tempt them to do so, and confining themselves eventually to the last individual, after age and infirmity have made their mark, and render such frolics inexpedient.” A former Magistrate of the Nīlgiris informs me that he tried more than one case, in which a married man filed a complaint against another man for kidnapping or enticing away his wife for immoral purposes. The father of the woman was always charged as an abetter, and pleaded that, as no pariyam (bride price) had been paid by the husband, though he and the woman lived together as man and wife, no criminal offence could be proved against either the father or the abductor. Polygamy is permitted, and the plurality of wives is a gain to the husband, as each wife becomes a bread-winner, and supports her children, and the man makes each wife superintend one department of the day’s work. Remarriage of widows is very common, and a widow may marry the brother of her deceased husband. It is said to be etiquette among the Badagas that, when a woman’s husband is away, sheshould be accessible to her brothers-in-law. Instances occur, in which the husband is much younger than his wife, who, until he has reached maturity, cohabits with her paternal aunt’s son, or some one whom she may have a fancy for. The marriage ceremony of the Udayas is carried out on an elaborate scale, and is based on the type of ceremonial which is carried out by some castes in the plains. Before dawn on the marriage day, the brothers and cousins of the bridegroom go, accompanied by some Udayas and the Kota band, to the forest, whence they bring two sticks ofMimusops hexandra, to do duty as the milk-posts. The early hour is selected, to avoid the chance of coming across inauspicious objects. The sticks should be cut off the tree at a single stroke of the bill-hook, and they may not be laid flat on the ground, but placed on a blanket spread thereon. The Udayas, who joined in the procession, collect twelve posts ofMimusopsas supports for the marriage booth (pandal). In front of the house, which is to be the scene of the wedding, two pits are dug, into which cow-dung water is poured. The pūjāri does pūja to the milk-posts by offering sugar-cane, jaggery (crude sugar), etc., and ties two threads thereto. The posts are then placed in the pits by five people—the parents of the bridal couple and the priest. The booth, and dais or enclosure, are then erected close to the milk-posts. On the second day, the bridegroom’s party, attended by Kota musicians, dressed up in dancing costume, go to the house of the bride, where a feast is held. The bride then salutes a lamp, and prostrates herself at the feet of her parents, who bless her, saying “May your body and hands soon be filled (i.e., may you have a child), and may your life be prosperous.” The bride is taken in procession to the house of the bridegroom,accompanied by some Udayas, and a Toreya carrying a bag of rice. At the entrance to the house she is blindfolded, and her mother-in-law pours water over her feet, and waves coloured water (ārathi) in front of her. She then enters the house, right foot foremost, and sits on a mat. Three married women, nearly related to the bridegroom, proceed, with the Kota musicians, to a stream, carrying three pots decorated with leaves ofLeucas aspera. The priest does pūja, and the pots are filled with water, and brought back in procession to the marriage dais. The water is poured into three vessels placed thereon three times by each of the three women. Within the marriage enclosure, two raised platforms are set up by a Toreya. The bridegroom, after going round the enclosure three times with his brothers and sisters, enters it, and bathes with the water contained in the vessels. He then dresses himself in new clothes, and is carried to the outer room by his maternal uncle. The bride is then treated in like manner, but is taken to the inner room. At a fixed auspicious hour, the bridal couple repair to the enclosure, where the bridegroom stands on a mat. A screen is held up by four or five men between him and the bride, who stands facing him, while the priest ties the ends of their clothes together. They then link their little fingers together, the screen is removed, and they seat themselves on the mat. The bridegroom’s sister brings a tray with a mass of rice scooped out into a cavity to hold ghī for feeding a lighted wick (annadha ārathi) on it, and, placing it before the bridal pair, sits down. The tāli, consisting of a golden disc, is worshipped by the priest, and given to the bridegroom, who ties it on to the bride’s neck. In some places it is tied by four or five elders, belonging to different villages, who are not widowers. The contractingcouple then put on wreaths called sammandha mālai, or wreaths establishing relationship, and the wrist threads are tied on. The bride’s sister brings some rice and milk in a cup, into which the linked fingers of the bride and bridegroom are thrust. Taking up some of the rice, they put it into each other’s mouths three times. After they have washed their hands, the maternal uncle or priest asks them if they have seen Aranjoti (the pole-star), and they reply in the affirmative. On the third day, presents are given to the newly-married couple, and the wrist threads are removed. Going to a stream, they perform a mimic ceremony of sowing, and scatter cotton and rice seed in two small pans made by a Toreya with cow-dung. Widow remarriage is permitted among the Udayas, and a widow may marry a cousin, but not her dead husband’s brother. At the marriage ceremony, a priest makes a mark with sacred ashes on the foreheads of the contracting couple, and announces the fact of their union.It is noted by Dr. Rivers that “Breeks has stated that the Toda custom is that the house shall pass to the youngest son. It seems quite clear that this is wrong, and that this custom is absolutely unknown among the Todas. It is, however, a Badaga custom, and among them I was told that it is due to the fact that, as the sons of a family grow up and marry, they leave the house of the parents and build houses elsewhere. It is the duty of the youngest son to dwell with his parents, and support them as long as they live, and, when they die, he continues to live in the paternal home, of which he becomes the owner.”A ceremony is performed in the seventh month of a woman’s first pregnancy, which is important, inasmuch as it seals the marriage contract, and, after its performance,divorce can only be obtained through the decree of the panchāyat (tribal council). Moreover, if it has not been performed, a man cannot claim the paternity of the child. The ceremony is called kanni kattodu or kanni hākodu (thread tying or throwing). The husband and wife are seated in the midst of those who have assembled for the occasion, and the former asks his father-in-law whether he may throw the thread round his wife’s neck, and, having received permission, proceeds to do so. If he gets the thread, which must have no knots in it, entangled in the woman’s bunch of hair (kondai), which is made large for the occasion by the addition of false hair, he is fined three rupees. On the day of the ceremony, the man and his wife are supposed to be under pollution, and sit in the verandah to receive presents. The mats used by them for sleeping on are cleaned on the following morning, and they get rid of the pollution by bathing.A first confinement must not take place within the house, and the verandah is converted into a lying-in chamber, from which the woman is, after delivery, removed to the outer apartment, where she remains till she is free from pollution by catching sight of the crescent moon. If a woman has been delivered at her father’s house, she returns to the home of her husband within a month of the birth of the child on an auspicious day. On arrival there, the infant is placed near the feet of an old man standing by a lamp within the milk-house. Placing his right hand over the head of the infant, the old man blesses it, and a feast is held, before the commencement of which two cups, one containing milk, and the other cooked rice, are produced. All the relations take up a little of the milk and rice, and touch the tongue of the baby with them.A child receives its name on the seventh, ninth, or eleventh day. A sumptuous meal is given to the community, and the grandfather (paternal, if possible) milks a cow, and pours the milk into a brass cup placed in the milk-house. With it a little cooked sāmai grain is mixed. The babe is washed with water brought from a stream; marked on the forehead with sacred ashes; a turmeric-dyed thread is tied round its waist; a silver or iron bangle placed on its wrists; and a silver bead tied by a thread round its neck. Thus decorated, the infant is taken up by the oldest man of the village who is not a widower, who gives it a name, which has already been chosen. The elder, and the child’s parents and grandparents then place a little milk in its mouth.Children, both male and female, go through a shaving ceremony, usually when they are seven months old. The infant is seated in the lap of a Badaga, and, after water has been applied to its head by a Badaga or a barber, the maternal uncle removes some of the hair with a razor, and then hands it over to another Badaga or a barber to complete the operation.Of the death rites as carried out by the Badaga sub-division, the following note was recorded during a visit to Kotagiri. When death is drawing near, a gold coin, called Vīrarāya hana or fanam, dipped in butter or ghī, is given to the dying man to swallow. If he is too far gone to be capable of swallowing, the coin is, according to Mr. Natesa Sastri, tied round the arm. But our informants told us that this is not done at the present day. “If,” Mr. Gover writes,13“the tiny coin slips down, well. He will need both gold and ghī, the one to sustain his strength in the dark journey to the river of death, theother to fee the guardian of the fairy-like bridge that spans the dreaded tide. If sense remains to the wretched man, he knows that now his death is nigh. Despair and the gold make recovery impossible, and there are none who have swallowed the Birianhana, and yet have lived. If insensibility or deathly weakness make it impossible for the coin to pass the thorax, it is carefully bound in cloth, and tied to the right arm, so that there may be nought to hinder the passage of a worthy soul into the regions of the blessed.” The giving of the coin to the dying man is apparently an important item, and, in the Badaga folk-tales, a man on the point of death is made to ask for a Vīrarāya fanam. When life is extinct, the corpse is kept within the house until the erection of the funeral car (gudikattu) is completed. Though Gover states that the burning must not be delayed more than twenty-four hours, at the present day the Badagas postpone the funeral till all the near relations have assembled, even if this necessitates the keeping of the corpse for two or three days. Cremation may take place on any day, except Tuesday. News of a death is conveyed to distant hamlets (hattis) by a Toreya, who is paid a rupee for his services. On approaching a hamlet, he removes his turban, to signify the nature of his errand, and, standing on the side of a hill, yells out “Dho! Dho! who is in the hamlet?” Having imparted his news, he proceeds on his journey to the next hamlet. On the morning of the day fixed for the funeral, the corpse is taken on a charpoy or native cot to an open space, and a buffalo led thrice round it. The right hand of the corpse is then lifted up, and passed over the horns of the buffalo. A little milk is drawn, and poured into the mouth of the corpse. Prior to this ceremony, two or three buffaloes may be let loose, and one of them captured, after themanner of the Todas, brought near the corpse, and conducted round the cot. The funeral car is built up in five to eleven tiers, decorated with cloths and streamers, and one tier must be covered with black chintz. At the funeral of a young man, the Rev. A. C. Clayton noticed that the car was surmounted by a flag, and hung about with bread, oranges, plantains, and the bag containing the books which the youth had used in the Basel Mission School.14By the poorer members of the community the car is replaced by a cot covered with cloth, and surmounted by five umbrellas. Immediately after the buffalo ceremony, the corpse is carried to the car, and placed in the lowest storey thereof, washed, and dressed in coat and turban. A new dhupati (coarse cloth) is wrapped round it. Two silver coins (Japanese yens or rupees) are stuck on the forehead. Beneath the cot are placed a crowbar, and baskets containing cakes, parched paddy, tobacco, chick pea (Cicer arietinum), jaggery and sāmai flour. A number of women, relations and friends of the dead man, then make a rush to the cot, and, sitting on it round the corpse, keep on waiting, while a woman near its head rings a bell. When one batch is tired, it is replaced by another. Badaga men then pour in in large numbers, and salute the corpse by touching the head, Toreyas and female relations touching the feet. Of those who salute, a few place inside the dhupati a piece of white cloth with red and yellow stripes, which has been specially prepared for the purpose. All then proceed to dance round the car to the music of the Kota band, near male relations removing their turban or woollen night cap, as a mark of respect, during the first three revolutions. Most of the male dancers are dressed up ingaudy petticoats and smart turbans. “No woman,” Mr. Natesa Sastri writes, “mingles in the funeral dance if the dead person is a man, but, if the deceased is a woman, one old woman, the nearest relative of the dead, takes part in it.” But, at the funerals of two men which we witnessed, a few women danced together with the men. Usually the tribesmen continue to arrive until 2 or 3P.M.Relations collect outside the village, and advance in a body towards the car, some, especially the sons-in-law of the dead man, riding on ponies, some of them carrying sāmai grain. As they approach the car, they shout “Ja! hoch; Ja! hoch.” The Muttu Kotas bring a double iron sickle with imitation buffalo horns on the tip, which is placed, with a hatchet, buguri (flute), and walking stick, on the car or on the ground beside it. When all are assembled, the cot is carried to an open space between the house and the burning-ground, followed by the car and a party of women carrying the baskets containing grain, etc. The car is then stripped of its trappings, and hacked to pieces. The widow is brought close to the cot, and removes her nose ornament (elemukkuthi), and other jewels. At both the funerals which we witnessed, the widow had a narrow strip of coloured chintz over her shoulders. Standing near the corpse, she removed a bit of wire from her ear-rings, a lock of hair, and a palm leaf roll from the lobe of the ear, and tied them up in the cloth of her dead husband. After her, the sisters of the dead man cut off a lock of hair, and, in like manner, tied it in the cloth. Women attached to a man by illegitimate ties sometimes also cut off a lock of hair, and, tying it to a twig ofDodonæa viscosa, place it inside the cloth. Very impressive is the recitation, or after-death confession of a dead man’s sins by an elder of the tribe standing at the head of thecorpse, and rapidly chanting the following lines, or a variation thereof, while he waves his right hand during each line towards the feet. The reproduction of the recitation in my phonograph never failed to impress the daily audience of Badagas, Kotas and Todas.This is the death of Āndi.In his memory the calf of the cow Belle has been set free.From this world to the other.He goes in a car.Everything the man did in this world.All the sins committed by his ancestors.All the sins committed by his forefathers.All the sins committed by his parents.All the sins committed by himself.The estranging of brothers.Shifting the boundary line.Encroaching on a neighbour’s land by removing the hedge.Driving away brothers and sisters.Cutting the kalli tree stealthily.Cutting the mulli tree outside his boundary.Dragging the thorny branches of the kotte tree.Sweeping with a broom.Splitting green branches.Telling lies.Uprooting seedlings.Plucking growing plants, and throwing them in the sun.Giving young birds to cats.Troubling the poor and cripples.Throwing refuse water in front of the sun.Going to sleep after seeing an eclipse of the moon.Looking enviously at a buffalo yielding an abundance of milk.Being jealous of the good crops of others.Removing boundary stones.Using a calf set free at the funeral.Polluting water with dirt.Urinating on burning embers.Ingratitude to the priest.Carrying tales to the higher authorities.Poisoning food.Not feeding a hungry person.Not giving fire to one half frozen.Killing snakes and cows.Killing lizards and blood-suckers.Showing a wrong path.Getting on the cot, and allowing his father-in-law to sleep on the ground.Sitting on a raised verandah, and driving thence his mother-in-law.Going against natural instincts.Troubling daughters-in-law.Breaking open lakes.Breaking open reservoirs of water.Being envious of the prosperity of other villages.Getting angry with people.Misleading travellers in the forest.Though there be three hundred such sins,Let them all go with the calf set free to-day.May the sins be completely removed!May the sins be forgiven!May the door of heaven be open!May the door of hell be closed!May the hand of charity be extended!May the wicked hand be shrivelled!May the door open suddenly!May beauty or splendour prevail everywhere!May the hot pillar be cooled!May the thread bridge15become light!May the pit of perdition be closed!May he reach the golden pillar!Holding the feet of the six thousand Athis,Holding the feet of the twelve thousand Pathis,Holding the feet of Brahma,Holding the feet of the calf set free to-day,May he reach the abode of Siva!So mote it be.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.The recitation is repeated thrice, and a few Badagas repeat the last words of each line after the elder. It was noticed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton that, during the recitation, the people surrounded the bier on three sides, leaving a lane open to the west. The sins of the dead man were transferred to another as sin-bearer, and finally passed away down the lane. As the ceremony witnessed by us differs materially from the account thereof given by Gover nearly forty years ago, I may quote his description. “By a conventional mode of expression, the sum total of sins a man may do is said to be thirteen hundred. Admitting that the deceased has committed them all, the performer cries aloud ‘Stay not their flight to God’s pure feet.’ As he closes, the whole assembly chants aloud ‘Stay not their flight.’ Again the performer enters into details, and cries ‘He killed the crawling snake. It is a sin.’ In a moment the last word is caught up, and all the people cry ‘It is a sin.’ As they shout, the performer lays his hand upon the calf. The sin is transferred to the calf. Thus the whole catalogue is gone through in this impressive way. But this is not enough. As the last shout ‘Let all be well’ dies away, the performer gives place to another, and again confession is made, and all the people shout ‘It is a sin.’ A third time it is done. Then, still in solemn silence, the calf is let loose. Like the Jewish scapegoat, it may never be used for secular work.” Dr. Rivers writes that “the Badagas let loose a calf at a funeral, to bear the sins of the deceased. It is possible that the calf in the Toda ceremony may have the same significance. If so, the practice has not improbably been borrowed, and the fact that the bell which is hung on the neck of the calf is kept by Kotas or Badagas suggests that the whole incident may have been borrowedby the Todas from one or other of these races.” At the funerals, of which we were spectators, no calf was brought near the corpse, and the celebrants of the rites were satisfied with the mere mention by name of a calf, which is male or female according to the sex of the deceased. At the funeral witnessed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton, a cow-buffalo was led three times round the bier, and a little of its milk, drawn at the time, put into the mouth of the corpse. Then a buffalo calf was led thrice round the bier, and the dead man’s hand laid on its head. By this act, the calf was supposed to receive all the sins of the deceased. It was then driven away to a great distance, that it might contaminate no one, and it was said that it would never be sold, but looked on as a dedicated sacred animal. If a dead man leaves a widow in a state of pregnancy, who has not performed the kanni kattodu or marriage thread ceremony, this must be gone through before the corpse is taken to the pyre, in order to render the child legitimate. The pregnant woman is, at the time of the funeral, brought close to the cot, and a near relation of the deceased, taking up a cotton thread, twisted in the form of a necklace without any knots, throws it round her neck. Sometimes the hand of the corpse is lifted up with the thread, and made to place it round the neck. At the funeral of the young man, Mr. Clayton saw this ceremony performed on his pregnant wife. After a turmeric-dyed cord had been taken from the hands of the corpse and tied round her neck, she was again brought to the side of the bier, and her ear-rings, nose ornaments, and other articles of jewellery, were removed in token that she had become a widow. Soon after the recitation of sins, all the agnates go to the house of the dead man, at the entrance to which a gunny-bag is spread, whereon a smallquantity of paddy is poured, and a few culms ofCynodon Dactylonand a little cow-dung are placed on it. The eldest of the agnates, sickle in hand, takes some of the paddy, and moves on, raising both hands to his forehead. The other agnates then do the same, and proceed in Indian file, males in front and females in the rear, to the corpse. Round it they walk, men from left to right, and women in the reverse direction, and at the end of each circuit put some of the paddy on its face. The cot is then carried to the burning-ground, a woman heading the procession, and shaking the end of her cloth all the way. The corpse is laid on the pyre with its feet to the south, and the pyre lighted by the eldest son standing at the head. The sticks of which the car was constructed are added to the fuel, of which the pyre is built up. In some places the son, when lighting the pyre, repeats the words “Being begotten by my father and mother, I, in the presence of all and the Dēva, set fire at the head after the manner of my ancestors and forefathers.” The Rev. A. C. Clayton records that, before the procession started for the burning-ground, some female relatives of the dead man tied locks of their hair round the toes of the corpse, and others went three times round the bier. On the day following the funeral, the bereaved family distribute rice to all the Badagas of the hamlet, and all the near relations of the deceased go to the burning-ground, taking with them two new pots. The fire is extinguished, and the fragments of the bones are collected. A tray is made of the fronds of the bracken fern (Pteris aquilina) covered with a cloth, on which the bones are placed together with culms ofCynodongrass and ghī. The Badagas of the hamlet who are younger than the deceased salute the bones by touching them, and a few men, including the chief mourner,hold the tray, and convey it to the bone pit, which every hamlet possesses. Into it the bones are thrown, while an elder repeats the words “Become united with the line of your relations, with your class, and with the big people,” or “May the young and old who have died, may all those who have died from time immemorial up to the present time, mingle in one.” When the pit has been closed up, all return to the spot where the body was burnt, and, clearing a space, make a puddle, round which they stand, and throw into it a handful of korali (Setaria italica), uttering the words “May deaths cease; may evils cease; may good prevail in the village; in virtue of the good deeds of the ancestors and forefathers, may this one mingle with them.” This ceremony concluded, they repair to a stream, where a member of the bereaved family shaves a Toreya partially or completely. Some take a razor, and, after removing a patch of hair, pass the Toreya on to a barber. All the agnates are then shaved by a Badaga or a barber. The chief mourner then prostrates himself on the ground, and is blessed by all. He and the Toreya proceed to the house of the deceased. Taking a three-pronged twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, and placing a mīnige (Argyreia) leaf on the prongs, he thrusts it into a rubbish heap near the house. He then places a small quantity of sāmai grain, called street food, on the leaf, and, after sprinkling it thrice with water, goes away.

Badaga Temple.Badaga Temple.

Badaga Temple.

The other agricultural ceremony is called Devvē habba or tenai (Setaria italica), and is usually celebrated in June or July, always on a Monday. It is apparently performed in honour of the two gods Mahālingaswāmi and Hiriya Udaya, to whom a group of villages will have temples dedicated. For example, the Badagas inthe neighbourhood of Kotagiri have their Hiriya Udaya temple at Tāndanād, and Mahālingaswāmi temple at Kannērmukku. This Devvē festival, which should on no account be pronounced duvve, which means burning-ground, is celebrated at one place, whither the Badagas from other villages proceed, to take part in it. About midday, some Badagas and the temple pūjāri go from the temple of Hiriya Udaya to that of Mahālingaswāmi. The procession is usually headed by a Kurumba, who scatters fragments of tūd bark and wood as he goes on his way. The pūjāri takes with him the materials necessary for doing pūja, and, after worshipping Mahālingaswāmi, the party return to the Hiriya Udaya temple, where milk and cooked rice are offered to the various gods within the temple precincts. On the following day, all assemble at the temple, and a Kurumba brings a few sheaves ofSetaria italica, and ties them to a stone set up at the main entrance. After this, pūja is done, and the people offer cocoanuts to the god. Later on, all the women of the Madhave sept, who have given birth to a first-born child, come, dressed up in holiday attire, with their babies, to the temple. On this day they wear a special nose ornament, called elemukkuththi, which is only worn on one other occasion, at the funeral of a husband. The women do pūja to Hiriya Udaya, and the pūjāri gives them a small quantity of rice on mīnige (Argyreia) leaves. After eating this, they leave the temple in a line, and wash their hands with water given to them by the pūjāri. This ceremonial, performed by women of the Madhave sept, is called Mandēdhanda. As soon as the Devvē festival is concluded, the reaping of the crop commences, and a measure or two of grain from the crop gathered on the first day, called nīsal, is set apart for the Mahālingaswāmi temple.

The most important gods of the Badagas are Heththeswāmi, Mahālingaswāmi, Hiriya Udaya, Mādeswara, Mānkāli, Jadeswāmi, and Nīlgiri Rangaswāmi. And at the present day, some Badagas proceed to the plains, to worship at the Saivite temple at Karamadai in Coimbatore, or at Nanjangōd in Mysore.

The festival in honour of Heththeswāmi is celebrated in the month of January at Baireganni. It is sometimes called ermathohabba, as, with it, ploughing operations cease. It always commences on a Monday, and usually lasts eight days. A Sēdan or Dēvānga weaver comes with his portable hand-loom, and sufficient thread for weaving a dhubati (coarse cloth) and turban. At Baireganni there is a special house, in which these articles are woven. But, at other places where the festival is observed, the Badagas go to the weaver’s village to fetch the required cloths. Early on the second morning of the festival, some of the more respected Badagas and the weaver proceed to the weaving house after bathing. The weaver sets up his loom, and worships it by offering incense, and other things. The Badagas give him a new cloth, and a small sum of money, and ask him to weave a dhubati and two kachches (narrow strips of cloth). Daily, throughout the festival, the Badagas collect near the temple, and indulge in music and songs. Until the last day, they are not permitted to set eyes on the god Heththeswāmi. On the morning of the last day, the pūjāri, accompanied by all the Badagas, takes the newly woven cloths to a stream, in which they are washed. When they are dry, all proceed to the temple, where the idol is dressed up in them, and all, on this occasion only, are allowed to look at it. Devotees pay a small offering of money, which is placed on a tray near the idol. The crowd begins to disperse inthe afternoon, and, on their way back to their villages, the wants of the travellers are attended to by people posted at intervals with coffee, fruit, and other articles of food. If the Badagas have to go to a weaver’s village for the cloths, the weaver is, when the order is given for them, presented with four annas, after he has bathed. When handing the money to him, the Badagas bawl out “This is the fee for making the cloths to be worn by Heththe Iramāsthi and Parasakti Parvati.” On the last day of the festival, the cloths are washed, and one of them is made to represent an idol, which is decorated with waist and neck ornaments, and an umbrella. All prostrate themselves before it, and make offerings of money. Fruits and other things are then offered to Heththeswāmi and some recite the following prayer. “May all good acts be remembered, and all bad ones be forgotten. Though there may be a thousand and one sins, may I reach the feet of God.”

The following further information in connection with the Baireganni festival is given by Bishop Whitehead. “The people from other villages offer money, rice, fruits, umbrellas of gold or silver for the goddess, cloths, and buffaloes. The buffaloes are never killed, but remain as the property of the temple. The pūjāri calls the representatives of one village, and tells them what Hetheswāmi says to him,e.g., ‘This year you will have good [or bad] crops; cholera or small-pox, good [or bad] rain, etc.’ As the people present their offerings, they prostrate themselves, kneeling down and touching the ground with their foreheads, and the pūjāri gives them some flowers, which they wear in their hair. The people and the pūjāri play on the kombu [horn], and ring bells while the offerings are being made. After the offerings have finished, all the men dance, in two companies, infront of the temple, one shouting ‘How-ko, How-ko,’ and the other ‘Is-hōli.’ The dance was taught them by the Todas, and the words are Toda.”

Badagas Making Fire.Badagas Making Fire.

Badagas Making Fire.

In connection with the Jadeswāmi festival the ceremony of walking through fire [burning embers] is carried out at Mēlūr, Tangālu, Mainelē, Jakkanāre, Tenād, and Nidugala. At Mēlūr and Tangālu, the temples belong to the Hāruvas, who carry out all the details of ceremony. The temple at Tenād is owned by the Udayas, by whom the ceremonial is performed. In other places, the celebrants are Badagas. The festival is observed, on an elaborate scale, at Nidugala during the month of January. All those who are going to walk over the burning embers fast for eight days, and go through the rite on the ninth day. For its performance, Monday is considered an auspicious day. The omens are taken by boiling two pots of milk side by side on two hearths. If the milk overflows uniformly on all sides, the crops will be abundant for all the villages. But, if it flows over on one side only, there will be plentiful crops for villages on that side only. The space over which the embers are spread is said to be about five yards long, and three yards broad. But, in some places,e.g., Jakkanāre and Mēlūr, it is circular as at the Muhammadan fire-walking ceremony. For making the embers, the wood ofEugenia JambolanaandPhyllanthus Emblicaare used. For boiling the milk, and setting fire to the wood, a light obtained by friction must be used. The process is known as niligolu, or upright stick. The vertical stick is made of a twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, which is rotated in a socket in a long thick piece of a bough ofDebregeasia velutina, in which a row of sockets has been made. The rotation is produced by a cord passed several times round the vertical stick, ofwhich each end is pulled alternately. The horizontal block is pressed firmly on the ground by the toes of a man, who presses a half cocoanut shell down on the top of the vertical stick, so as to force it down into the socket. A Badaga, who failed in an attempt to demonstrate the making of fire by this method, gave as an excuse that he was under worldly pollution, from which he would be free at the time of the fire-walking ceremony. Though the Badagas make fire by friction, reference is made in their folk legends, not to this mode of obtaining fire, but to chakkamukki (flint and steel), which is repeatedly referred to in connection with cremation. After the milk boiling ceremonial, the pūjāri, tying bells on his legs, approaches the fire pit, carrying milk freshly drawn from a cow, which has calved for the first time, and flowers ofRhododendron arboreum,Leucas aspera, or jasmine. After doing pūja, he throws the flowers on the embers, and they should remain unscorched for a few seconds. He then pours some of the milk over the embers, and no hissing soundshouldbe produced. The omens being propitious, he walks over the glowing embers, followed by an Udaya, and the crowd of celebrants, who, before going through the ordeal, count the hairs on their feet. If any are singed, it is a sign of approaching ill fortune, or even death. In an account of the fire-walking ceremony, in 1902, it is noted that “the Badagas strongly repudiate the insinuation of preparing their feet to face the fire ordeal. It is done to propitiate Jeddayswāmi, to whom vows are invoked, in token of which they grow one twist or plait of hair, which is treasured for years, and finally cut off as an offering to Jeddayswāmi. Numbers of Chettis were catering to the crowd, offering their wares, bangles, gay-coloured handkerchiefs, as well as edibles. The Kotas supplied the music, and anancient patriarch worked himself up to a high pitch of inspiration, and predicted all sorts of good things for the Badagas with regard to the ensuing season and crops.”

The following legend, relating to the fire-walking ceremony, is recorded by Bishop Whitehead. “When they first began to perform the ceremony fifty or sixty years ago, they were afraid to walk over the fire. Then the stone image of Mahālinga Swāmi turned into a snake, and made a hole through the temple wall. It came out, and crawled over the fire, and then went back to the temple. Then their fear vanished, and they walked over the embers. The hole is still to be seen in the temple.”

Of the fire-walking ceremony at Mēlūr, the following account is given in the Gazetteer of the Nīlgiris. “It takes place on the Monday after the March new moon, just before the cultivation season begins, and is attended by Badagas from all over Mērkunād. The inhabitants of certain villages (six in number), who are supposed to be the descendants of an early Badaga named Guruvajja, have first, however, to signify through their Gottukārs, or headmen, that the festival may take place; and the Gottukārs choose three, five, or seven men to walk through the fire. On the day appointed, the fire is lit by certain Badaga priests and a Kurumba. The men chosen by the Gottukārs then bathe, adorn themselves with sandal, do obeisance to the Udayas of Udayarhatti near Kēti, who are specially invited and feasted; pour into the adjacent stream milk from cows which have calved for the first time during the year; and, in the afternoon, throw more milk and some flowers from the Mahālingasvāmi temple into the fire pit, and then walk across it. Earth is next thrown on the embers, and they walk acrosstwice more. A general feast closes the ceremony, and next day the first ploughings are done, the Kurumba sowing the first seeds, and the priests the next lot. Finally, a net is brought. The priest of the temple, standing over it, puts up prayers for a favourable agricultural season; two fowls are thrown into it, and a pretence is made of spearing them; and then it is taken and put across some game path, and some wild animal (a sāmbhar deer if possible) is driven into it, slain, and divided among the villagers. This same custom of annually killing a sāmbhar is also observed at other villages on the plateau, and in 1883 and 1894 special orders were passed to permit of its being done during the close season. Latterly, disputes about precedence in the matter of walking through the fire at Mēlūr have been carried as far as the civil courts, and the two factions celebrate the festival separately in alternate years. A fire-walking ceremony also takes place annually at the Jadayasvāmi temple in Jakkanēri under the auspices of a Sivāchāri Badaga. It seems to have originally had some connection with agricultural prospects, as a young bull is made to go partly across the fire-pit before the other devotees, and the owners of young cows which have had their first calves during the year take precedence of others in the ceremony, and bring offerings of milk, which are sprinkled over the burning embers.”

At the Sakalathi festival, in the month of October, Badagas, towards evening, throw on the roofs of their houses flowers ofPlectranthus Wightii,Crotalaria obtecta,Lobelia nicotianœfolia,Achyranthes aspera, andLeucas aspera. On the following day, they clean their houses, and have a feast. In the afternoon, numbers of them may be seen in the streets drawing in front of their houses pictures in wood-ashes of buffaloes, bulls, cows,ploughs, stars, sun and moon, snakes, lizards, etc. They then go into their houses, and wash their hands. Taking up in his clean hands a big cake, on which are placed a little rice and butter, the Badaga puts on it three wicks steeped in castor oil, and lights them. The cake is then waved round the heads of all the children of the house taken to a field, and thrown therein with the words “Sakalathi has come.” The cake-thrower returns home, and prostrates himself before a lamp placed in the inner room, and repeats a long formula, composed of the various synonyms of Siva.

In the month of November, a festival called Dodda Habba (big feast) is celebrated. In the afternoon, rice is cooked in whey within the hāgōttu, and eaten on mīnige leaves. Throughout the day the villagers play at various ball games.

A festival, which is purely local, is celebrated near Konakore in honour of Mahangkāli. A buffalo is led to the side of a precipice, killed by a Kurumba with a spear, and thrown over the edge thereof. There is a legend that, in olden days, a pūjāri used to put a stick in the crevice of a rock, and, on removing it, get the value of a buffalo in fanams (gold coins). But, on one occasion, he put the stick in a second time, in the hopes of gaining more money. No money, however, was forthcoming and, as a punishment for his greed, he died on the spot.

All Badaga villages, except those of the Udayas, have a hut, called holagudi, for the exclusive use of women during their monthly periods. A few months before a girl is expected to reach puberty, she is sent to the holagudi, on a Friday, four or five days before the new moon day. This is done lest, in the ordinary course of events, the first menstruation should commence on an inauspicious day. The girl remains in the holagudi onenight, and returns home on the following day clad in new cloths, leaving the old ones in the hut. When she arrives at her house, she salutes all the people who are there, and receives their blessing. On Sunday she goes to the houses of her relations, where she is given kadalai (Cicer arietinum) and other food. She may not enter the inner apartment of her house until she has seen the crescent moon. Badaga women observe five days menstrual pollution. If a woman discovers her condition before washing her face in the early morning, that day is included in the pollution period. Otherwise, the period must be prolonged over six days. On the third day she bathes in cold water, using the bark ofPouzolzia(thorēkōlu), and on the fourth day is allowed a change of clothing after a bath. On this day she leaves the hut, and passes a portion of the night in the verandah of her house. After cooking and eating her evening meal, she bathes, and enters the outer room. Early on the following morning, the spot which she has occupied is cleaned, and she bathes in a stream. Returning home, she eats her food in the outer room, where she remains till next morning. Even children may not be touched by a menstruating woman. If, by chance, this happens, the child must be washed to remove the pollution, before it can be handled by others. This restriction is apparently not observed by any other tribe or caste.

Writing concerning marriage among the Badagas, Harkness states12that “it is said to be common for one who is in want of labourers to promise his daughter in marriage to the son or other relative of a neighbour not in circumstances so flourishing as himself. And, these engagements being entered into, the intended bridegroomserves the father of his betrothed as one of his own family till the girl comes of age, when the marriage is consummated, and he becomes a partner in the general property of the family of his father-in-law.”

A man may marry a girl belonging to the same village as himself, if he and she are not members of the same exogamous sept. In most cases, however, all the inhabitants of a village are of the same sept, and a man has to take as his wife a girl from a village other than his own.

Among all sections of the Badagas, adult marriage is the general rule, though infant marriage is also practised. Marriage is preceded by a simple form of courtship, but the consent of the parents to the union is necessary. A girl does not suffer in reputation if she is rejected by a number of suitors, before she finally settles down. Except among the Udayas, the marriage ceremony is of a very simple nature. A day or two before that fixed for taking the girl to the house of her husband-elect, the latter proceeds to her village, accompanied by his brothers, who, as a token of respect, touch the feet of all the Badagas who are assembled. The bride is taken to the house of the bridegroom, accompanied by the Kota band. Arrived there, she stands at the entrance, and her mother-in-law or sister-in-law brings water in a vessel, and pours it into her hands thrice. Each time she lets the water fall over her feet. The mother-in-law then ties round her neck a string of beads (māle mani), and leads her to the outer room (edumane), where cooked sāmai (Panicum miliare) and milk is given to her. This she pretends to eat, and the bridegroom’s sister gives her water to wash her hands with. The bride and two married women or virgins (preferably the bridegroom’s sisters) go to a stream in procession, accompanied by theKota musicians, and bring therefrom water for cooking purposes in decorated new pots. The bride then salutes all her new relations, and they in turn give her their blessing. The ceremonial concludes with a feast, at the conclusion of which, in some cases, the bride and bridegroom sit on the raised verandah (pial), and receive presents.

“Though,” a correspondent writes, “the Badaga is simple, and his wants are few, he cannot resist the temptation of wine and women. The Badaga woman can change husbands as often as she pleases by a simple system of divorce, and can also carry on with impunity intimacy within the pale of her own community. It is not uncommon to find Badaga women changing husbands, so long as youth and vigour tempt them to do so, and confining themselves eventually to the last individual, after age and infirmity have made their mark, and render such frolics inexpedient.” A former Magistrate of the Nīlgiris informs me that he tried more than one case, in which a married man filed a complaint against another man for kidnapping or enticing away his wife for immoral purposes. The father of the woman was always charged as an abetter, and pleaded that, as no pariyam (bride price) had been paid by the husband, though he and the woman lived together as man and wife, no criminal offence could be proved against either the father or the abductor. Polygamy is permitted, and the plurality of wives is a gain to the husband, as each wife becomes a bread-winner, and supports her children, and the man makes each wife superintend one department of the day’s work. Remarriage of widows is very common, and a widow may marry the brother of her deceased husband. It is said to be etiquette among the Badagas that, when a woman’s husband is away, sheshould be accessible to her brothers-in-law. Instances occur, in which the husband is much younger than his wife, who, until he has reached maturity, cohabits with her paternal aunt’s son, or some one whom she may have a fancy for. The marriage ceremony of the Udayas is carried out on an elaborate scale, and is based on the type of ceremonial which is carried out by some castes in the plains. Before dawn on the marriage day, the brothers and cousins of the bridegroom go, accompanied by some Udayas and the Kota band, to the forest, whence they bring two sticks ofMimusops hexandra, to do duty as the milk-posts. The early hour is selected, to avoid the chance of coming across inauspicious objects. The sticks should be cut off the tree at a single stroke of the bill-hook, and they may not be laid flat on the ground, but placed on a blanket spread thereon. The Udayas, who joined in the procession, collect twelve posts ofMimusopsas supports for the marriage booth (pandal). In front of the house, which is to be the scene of the wedding, two pits are dug, into which cow-dung water is poured. The pūjāri does pūja to the milk-posts by offering sugar-cane, jaggery (crude sugar), etc., and ties two threads thereto. The posts are then placed in the pits by five people—the parents of the bridal couple and the priest. The booth, and dais or enclosure, are then erected close to the milk-posts. On the second day, the bridegroom’s party, attended by Kota musicians, dressed up in dancing costume, go to the house of the bride, where a feast is held. The bride then salutes a lamp, and prostrates herself at the feet of her parents, who bless her, saying “May your body and hands soon be filled (i.e., may you have a child), and may your life be prosperous.” The bride is taken in procession to the house of the bridegroom,accompanied by some Udayas, and a Toreya carrying a bag of rice. At the entrance to the house she is blindfolded, and her mother-in-law pours water over her feet, and waves coloured water (ārathi) in front of her. She then enters the house, right foot foremost, and sits on a mat. Three married women, nearly related to the bridegroom, proceed, with the Kota musicians, to a stream, carrying three pots decorated with leaves ofLeucas aspera. The priest does pūja, and the pots are filled with water, and brought back in procession to the marriage dais. The water is poured into three vessels placed thereon three times by each of the three women. Within the marriage enclosure, two raised platforms are set up by a Toreya. The bridegroom, after going round the enclosure three times with his brothers and sisters, enters it, and bathes with the water contained in the vessels. He then dresses himself in new clothes, and is carried to the outer room by his maternal uncle. The bride is then treated in like manner, but is taken to the inner room. At a fixed auspicious hour, the bridal couple repair to the enclosure, where the bridegroom stands on a mat. A screen is held up by four or five men between him and the bride, who stands facing him, while the priest ties the ends of their clothes together. They then link their little fingers together, the screen is removed, and they seat themselves on the mat. The bridegroom’s sister brings a tray with a mass of rice scooped out into a cavity to hold ghī for feeding a lighted wick (annadha ārathi) on it, and, placing it before the bridal pair, sits down. The tāli, consisting of a golden disc, is worshipped by the priest, and given to the bridegroom, who ties it on to the bride’s neck. In some places it is tied by four or five elders, belonging to different villages, who are not widowers. The contractingcouple then put on wreaths called sammandha mālai, or wreaths establishing relationship, and the wrist threads are tied on. The bride’s sister brings some rice and milk in a cup, into which the linked fingers of the bride and bridegroom are thrust. Taking up some of the rice, they put it into each other’s mouths three times. After they have washed their hands, the maternal uncle or priest asks them if they have seen Aranjoti (the pole-star), and they reply in the affirmative. On the third day, presents are given to the newly-married couple, and the wrist threads are removed. Going to a stream, they perform a mimic ceremony of sowing, and scatter cotton and rice seed in two small pans made by a Toreya with cow-dung. Widow remarriage is permitted among the Udayas, and a widow may marry a cousin, but not her dead husband’s brother. At the marriage ceremony, a priest makes a mark with sacred ashes on the foreheads of the contracting couple, and announces the fact of their union.

It is noted by Dr. Rivers that “Breeks has stated that the Toda custom is that the house shall pass to the youngest son. It seems quite clear that this is wrong, and that this custom is absolutely unknown among the Todas. It is, however, a Badaga custom, and among them I was told that it is due to the fact that, as the sons of a family grow up and marry, they leave the house of the parents and build houses elsewhere. It is the duty of the youngest son to dwell with his parents, and support them as long as they live, and, when they die, he continues to live in the paternal home, of which he becomes the owner.”

A ceremony is performed in the seventh month of a woman’s first pregnancy, which is important, inasmuch as it seals the marriage contract, and, after its performance,divorce can only be obtained through the decree of the panchāyat (tribal council). Moreover, if it has not been performed, a man cannot claim the paternity of the child. The ceremony is called kanni kattodu or kanni hākodu (thread tying or throwing). The husband and wife are seated in the midst of those who have assembled for the occasion, and the former asks his father-in-law whether he may throw the thread round his wife’s neck, and, having received permission, proceeds to do so. If he gets the thread, which must have no knots in it, entangled in the woman’s bunch of hair (kondai), which is made large for the occasion by the addition of false hair, he is fined three rupees. On the day of the ceremony, the man and his wife are supposed to be under pollution, and sit in the verandah to receive presents. The mats used by them for sleeping on are cleaned on the following morning, and they get rid of the pollution by bathing.

A first confinement must not take place within the house, and the verandah is converted into a lying-in chamber, from which the woman is, after delivery, removed to the outer apartment, where she remains till she is free from pollution by catching sight of the crescent moon. If a woman has been delivered at her father’s house, she returns to the home of her husband within a month of the birth of the child on an auspicious day. On arrival there, the infant is placed near the feet of an old man standing by a lamp within the milk-house. Placing his right hand over the head of the infant, the old man blesses it, and a feast is held, before the commencement of which two cups, one containing milk, and the other cooked rice, are produced. All the relations take up a little of the milk and rice, and touch the tongue of the baby with them.

A child receives its name on the seventh, ninth, or eleventh day. A sumptuous meal is given to the community, and the grandfather (paternal, if possible) milks a cow, and pours the milk into a brass cup placed in the milk-house. With it a little cooked sāmai grain is mixed. The babe is washed with water brought from a stream; marked on the forehead with sacred ashes; a turmeric-dyed thread is tied round its waist; a silver or iron bangle placed on its wrists; and a silver bead tied by a thread round its neck. Thus decorated, the infant is taken up by the oldest man of the village who is not a widower, who gives it a name, which has already been chosen. The elder, and the child’s parents and grandparents then place a little milk in its mouth.

Children, both male and female, go through a shaving ceremony, usually when they are seven months old. The infant is seated in the lap of a Badaga, and, after water has been applied to its head by a Badaga or a barber, the maternal uncle removes some of the hair with a razor, and then hands it over to another Badaga or a barber to complete the operation.

Of the death rites as carried out by the Badaga sub-division, the following note was recorded during a visit to Kotagiri. When death is drawing near, a gold coin, called Vīrarāya hana or fanam, dipped in butter or ghī, is given to the dying man to swallow. If he is too far gone to be capable of swallowing, the coin is, according to Mr. Natesa Sastri, tied round the arm. But our informants told us that this is not done at the present day. “If,” Mr. Gover writes,13“the tiny coin slips down, well. He will need both gold and ghī, the one to sustain his strength in the dark journey to the river of death, theother to fee the guardian of the fairy-like bridge that spans the dreaded tide. If sense remains to the wretched man, he knows that now his death is nigh. Despair and the gold make recovery impossible, and there are none who have swallowed the Birianhana, and yet have lived. If insensibility or deathly weakness make it impossible for the coin to pass the thorax, it is carefully bound in cloth, and tied to the right arm, so that there may be nought to hinder the passage of a worthy soul into the regions of the blessed.” The giving of the coin to the dying man is apparently an important item, and, in the Badaga folk-tales, a man on the point of death is made to ask for a Vīrarāya fanam. When life is extinct, the corpse is kept within the house until the erection of the funeral car (gudikattu) is completed. Though Gover states that the burning must not be delayed more than twenty-four hours, at the present day the Badagas postpone the funeral till all the near relations have assembled, even if this necessitates the keeping of the corpse for two or three days. Cremation may take place on any day, except Tuesday. News of a death is conveyed to distant hamlets (hattis) by a Toreya, who is paid a rupee for his services. On approaching a hamlet, he removes his turban, to signify the nature of his errand, and, standing on the side of a hill, yells out “Dho! Dho! who is in the hamlet?” Having imparted his news, he proceeds on his journey to the next hamlet. On the morning of the day fixed for the funeral, the corpse is taken on a charpoy or native cot to an open space, and a buffalo led thrice round it. The right hand of the corpse is then lifted up, and passed over the horns of the buffalo. A little milk is drawn, and poured into the mouth of the corpse. Prior to this ceremony, two or three buffaloes may be let loose, and one of them captured, after themanner of the Todas, brought near the corpse, and conducted round the cot. The funeral car is built up in five to eleven tiers, decorated with cloths and streamers, and one tier must be covered with black chintz. At the funeral of a young man, the Rev. A. C. Clayton noticed that the car was surmounted by a flag, and hung about with bread, oranges, plantains, and the bag containing the books which the youth had used in the Basel Mission School.14By the poorer members of the community the car is replaced by a cot covered with cloth, and surmounted by five umbrellas. Immediately after the buffalo ceremony, the corpse is carried to the car, and placed in the lowest storey thereof, washed, and dressed in coat and turban. A new dhupati (coarse cloth) is wrapped round it. Two silver coins (Japanese yens or rupees) are stuck on the forehead. Beneath the cot are placed a crowbar, and baskets containing cakes, parched paddy, tobacco, chick pea (Cicer arietinum), jaggery and sāmai flour. A number of women, relations and friends of the dead man, then make a rush to the cot, and, sitting on it round the corpse, keep on waiting, while a woman near its head rings a bell. When one batch is tired, it is replaced by another. Badaga men then pour in in large numbers, and salute the corpse by touching the head, Toreyas and female relations touching the feet. Of those who salute, a few place inside the dhupati a piece of white cloth with red and yellow stripes, which has been specially prepared for the purpose. All then proceed to dance round the car to the music of the Kota band, near male relations removing their turban or woollen night cap, as a mark of respect, during the first three revolutions. Most of the male dancers are dressed up ingaudy petticoats and smart turbans. “No woman,” Mr. Natesa Sastri writes, “mingles in the funeral dance if the dead person is a man, but, if the deceased is a woman, one old woman, the nearest relative of the dead, takes part in it.” But, at the funerals of two men which we witnessed, a few women danced together with the men. Usually the tribesmen continue to arrive until 2 or 3P.M.Relations collect outside the village, and advance in a body towards the car, some, especially the sons-in-law of the dead man, riding on ponies, some of them carrying sāmai grain. As they approach the car, they shout “Ja! hoch; Ja! hoch.” The Muttu Kotas bring a double iron sickle with imitation buffalo horns on the tip, which is placed, with a hatchet, buguri (flute), and walking stick, on the car or on the ground beside it. When all are assembled, the cot is carried to an open space between the house and the burning-ground, followed by the car and a party of women carrying the baskets containing grain, etc. The car is then stripped of its trappings, and hacked to pieces. The widow is brought close to the cot, and removes her nose ornament (elemukkuthi), and other jewels. At both the funerals which we witnessed, the widow had a narrow strip of coloured chintz over her shoulders. Standing near the corpse, she removed a bit of wire from her ear-rings, a lock of hair, and a palm leaf roll from the lobe of the ear, and tied them up in the cloth of her dead husband. After her, the sisters of the dead man cut off a lock of hair, and, in like manner, tied it in the cloth. Women attached to a man by illegitimate ties sometimes also cut off a lock of hair, and, tying it to a twig ofDodonæa viscosa, place it inside the cloth. Very impressive is the recitation, or after-death confession of a dead man’s sins by an elder of the tribe standing at the head of thecorpse, and rapidly chanting the following lines, or a variation thereof, while he waves his right hand during each line towards the feet. The reproduction of the recitation in my phonograph never failed to impress the daily audience of Badagas, Kotas and Todas.

This is the death of Āndi.In his memory the calf of the cow Belle has been set free.From this world to the other.He goes in a car.Everything the man did in this world.All the sins committed by his ancestors.All the sins committed by his forefathers.All the sins committed by his parents.All the sins committed by himself.The estranging of brothers.Shifting the boundary line.Encroaching on a neighbour’s land by removing the hedge.Driving away brothers and sisters.Cutting the kalli tree stealthily.Cutting the mulli tree outside his boundary.Dragging the thorny branches of the kotte tree.Sweeping with a broom.Splitting green branches.Telling lies.Uprooting seedlings.Plucking growing plants, and throwing them in the sun.Giving young birds to cats.Troubling the poor and cripples.Throwing refuse water in front of the sun.Going to sleep after seeing an eclipse of the moon.Looking enviously at a buffalo yielding an abundance of milk.Being jealous of the good crops of others.Removing boundary stones.Using a calf set free at the funeral.Polluting water with dirt.Urinating on burning embers.Ingratitude to the priest.Carrying tales to the higher authorities.Poisoning food.Not feeding a hungry person.Not giving fire to one half frozen.Killing snakes and cows.Killing lizards and blood-suckers.Showing a wrong path.Getting on the cot, and allowing his father-in-law to sleep on the ground.Sitting on a raised verandah, and driving thence his mother-in-law.Going against natural instincts.Troubling daughters-in-law.Breaking open lakes.Breaking open reservoirs of water.Being envious of the prosperity of other villages.Getting angry with people.Misleading travellers in the forest.Though there be three hundred such sins,Let them all go with the calf set free to-day.May the sins be completely removed!May the sins be forgiven!May the door of heaven be open!May the door of hell be closed!May the hand of charity be extended!May the wicked hand be shrivelled!May the door open suddenly!May beauty or splendour prevail everywhere!May the hot pillar be cooled!May the thread bridge15become light!May the pit of perdition be closed!May he reach the golden pillar!Holding the feet of the six thousand Athis,Holding the feet of the twelve thousand Pathis,Holding the feet of Brahma,Holding the feet of the calf set free to-day,May he reach the abode of Siva!So mote it be.

This is the death of Āndi.

In his memory the calf of the cow Belle has been set free.

From this world to the other.

He goes in a car.

Everything the man did in this world.

All the sins committed by his ancestors.

All the sins committed by his forefathers.

All the sins committed by his parents.

All the sins committed by himself.

The estranging of brothers.

Shifting the boundary line.

Encroaching on a neighbour’s land by removing the hedge.

Driving away brothers and sisters.

Cutting the kalli tree stealthily.

Cutting the mulli tree outside his boundary.

Dragging the thorny branches of the kotte tree.

Sweeping with a broom.

Splitting green branches.

Telling lies.

Uprooting seedlings.

Plucking growing plants, and throwing them in the sun.

Giving young birds to cats.

Troubling the poor and cripples.

Throwing refuse water in front of the sun.

Going to sleep after seeing an eclipse of the moon.

Looking enviously at a buffalo yielding an abundance of milk.

Being jealous of the good crops of others.

Removing boundary stones.

Using a calf set free at the funeral.

Polluting water with dirt.

Urinating on burning embers.

Ingratitude to the priest.

Carrying tales to the higher authorities.

Poisoning food.

Not feeding a hungry person.

Not giving fire to one half frozen.

Killing snakes and cows.

Killing lizards and blood-suckers.

Showing a wrong path.

Getting on the cot, and allowing his father-in-law to sleep on the ground.

Sitting on a raised verandah, and driving thence his mother-in-law.

Going against natural instincts.

Troubling daughters-in-law.

Breaking open lakes.

Breaking open reservoirs of water.

Being envious of the prosperity of other villages.

Getting angry with people.

Misleading travellers in the forest.

Though there be three hundred such sins,

Let them all go with the calf set free to-day.

May the sins be completely removed!

May the sins be forgiven!

May the door of heaven be open!

May the door of hell be closed!

May the hand of charity be extended!

May the wicked hand be shrivelled!

May the door open suddenly!

May beauty or splendour prevail everywhere!

May the hot pillar be cooled!

May the thread bridge15become light!

May the pit of perdition be closed!

May he reach the golden pillar!

Holding the feet of the six thousand Athis,

Holding the feet of the twelve thousand Pathis,

Holding the feet of Brahma,

Holding the feet of the calf set free to-day,

May he reach the abode of Siva!

So mote it be.

Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.

Badaga Funeral Car with the Corpse.

The recitation is repeated thrice, and a few Badagas repeat the last words of each line after the elder. It was noticed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton that, during the recitation, the people surrounded the bier on three sides, leaving a lane open to the west. The sins of the dead man were transferred to another as sin-bearer, and finally passed away down the lane. As the ceremony witnessed by us differs materially from the account thereof given by Gover nearly forty years ago, I may quote his description. “By a conventional mode of expression, the sum total of sins a man may do is said to be thirteen hundred. Admitting that the deceased has committed them all, the performer cries aloud ‘Stay not their flight to God’s pure feet.’ As he closes, the whole assembly chants aloud ‘Stay not their flight.’ Again the performer enters into details, and cries ‘He killed the crawling snake. It is a sin.’ In a moment the last word is caught up, and all the people cry ‘It is a sin.’ As they shout, the performer lays his hand upon the calf. The sin is transferred to the calf. Thus the whole catalogue is gone through in this impressive way. But this is not enough. As the last shout ‘Let all be well’ dies away, the performer gives place to another, and again confession is made, and all the people shout ‘It is a sin.’ A third time it is done. Then, still in solemn silence, the calf is let loose. Like the Jewish scapegoat, it may never be used for secular work.” Dr. Rivers writes that “the Badagas let loose a calf at a funeral, to bear the sins of the deceased. It is possible that the calf in the Toda ceremony may have the same significance. If so, the practice has not improbably been borrowed, and the fact that the bell which is hung on the neck of the calf is kept by Kotas or Badagas suggests that the whole incident may have been borrowedby the Todas from one or other of these races.” At the funerals, of which we were spectators, no calf was brought near the corpse, and the celebrants of the rites were satisfied with the mere mention by name of a calf, which is male or female according to the sex of the deceased. At the funeral witnessed by the Rev. A. C. Clayton, a cow-buffalo was led three times round the bier, and a little of its milk, drawn at the time, put into the mouth of the corpse. Then a buffalo calf was led thrice round the bier, and the dead man’s hand laid on its head. By this act, the calf was supposed to receive all the sins of the deceased. It was then driven away to a great distance, that it might contaminate no one, and it was said that it would never be sold, but looked on as a dedicated sacred animal. If a dead man leaves a widow in a state of pregnancy, who has not performed the kanni kattodu or marriage thread ceremony, this must be gone through before the corpse is taken to the pyre, in order to render the child legitimate. The pregnant woman is, at the time of the funeral, brought close to the cot, and a near relation of the deceased, taking up a cotton thread, twisted in the form of a necklace without any knots, throws it round her neck. Sometimes the hand of the corpse is lifted up with the thread, and made to place it round the neck. At the funeral of the young man, Mr. Clayton saw this ceremony performed on his pregnant wife. After a turmeric-dyed cord had been taken from the hands of the corpse and tied round her neck, she was again brought to the side of the bier, and her ear-rings, nose ornaments, and other articles of jewellery, were removed in token that she had become a widow. Soon after the recitation of sins, all the agnates go to the house of the dead man, at the entrance to which a gunny-bag is spread, whereon a smallquantity of paddy is poured, and a few culms ofCynodon Dactylonand a little cow-dung are placed on it. The eldest of the agnates, sickle in hand, takes some of the paddy, and moves on, raising both hands to his forehead. The other agnates then do the same, and proceed in Indian file, males in front and females in the rear, to the corpse. Round it they walk, men from left to right, and women in the reverse direction, and at the end of each circuit put some of the paddy on its face. The cot is then carried to the burning-ground, a woman heading the procession, and shaking the end of her cloth all the way. The corpse is laid on the pyre with its feet to the south, and the pyre lighted by the eldest son standing at the head. The sticks of which the car was constructed are added to the fuel, of which the pyre is built up. In some places the son, when lighting the pyre, repeats the words “Being begotten by my father and mother, I, in the presence of all and the Dēva, set fire at the head after the manner of my ancestors and forefathers.” The Rev. A. C. Clayton records that, before the procession started for the burning-ground, some female relatives of the dead man tied locks of their hair round the toes of the corpse, and others went three times round the bier. On the day following the funeral, the bereaved family distribute rice to all the Badagas of the hamlet, and all the near relations of the deceased go to the burning-ground, taking with them two new pots. The fire is extinguished, and the fragments of the bones are collected. A tray is made of the fronds of the bracken fern (Pteris aquilina) covered with a cloth, on which the bones are placed together with culms ofCynodongrass and ghī. The Badagas of the hamlet who are younger than the deceased salute the bones by touching them, and a few men, including the chief mourner,hold the tray, and convey it to the bone pit, which every hamlet possesses. Into it the bones are thrown, while an elder repeats the words “Become united with the line of your relations, with your class, and with the big people,” or “May the young and old who have died, may all those who have died from time immemorial up to the present time, mingle in one.” When the pit has been closed up, all return to the spot where the body was burnt, and, clearing a space, make a puddle, round which they stand, and throw into it a handful of korali (Setaria italica), uttering the words “May deaths cease; may evils cease; may good prevail in the village; in virtue of the good deeds of the ancestors and forefathers, may this one mingle with them.” This ceremony concluded, they repair to a stream, where a member of the bereaved family shaves a Toreya partially or completely. Some take a razor, and, after removing a patch of hair, pass the Toreya on to a barber. All the agnates are then shaved by a Badaga or a barber. The chief mourner then prostrates himself on the ground, and is blessed by all. He and the Toreya proceed to the house of the deceased. Taking a three-pronged twig ofRhodomyrtus tomentosus, and placing a mīnige (Argyreia) leaf on the prongs, he thrusts it into a rubbish heap near the house. He then places a small quantity of sāmai grain, called street food, on the leaf, and, after sprinkling it thrice with water, goes away.

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