Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 2.djvu/456

IZHAVA and armlets, and garlands of flowers, the poor boys are brought to present a little of their blood to the sanguinary goddess. Three times they march round the temple; then an iron is run through the muscles of each side, and small rattans inserted through the wounds. Four men seize the ends of the canes, and all go round in procession, with music and singing and clapping of hands, five or seven times, according to their endurance, till quite exhausted. The pūjāri now dresses in a red cloth, with tinsel border, like a Brāhman, takes the dancing-club in hand, and dances before the demon. Cocks are sacrificed, water being first poured upon the head; when the bird shakes itself, the head is cut off, and the blood poured round the temple. Rice is boiled in one of the sheds in a new pot, and taken home with the fowls by the people for a feast in the house. At Mayanādu, the Bhagavathi of the small temple belonging to the Ilavars is regarded as the sister of the one worshipped in the larger temple used by the Sūdras, and served by a Brāhman priest; and the cars of the latter are brought annually to the Ilavar's temple, and around it three times before returning to their own temple. At the Ilavar's temple, the same night, the women boil rice in new earthen pots, and the men offer sheep and fowls in sacrifice. In further illustration of the strange superstitious practices of this tribe, two more incidents may be mentioned. An Ilavatti, whose child was unwell, went to consult an astrologer, who informed her that the disease was caused by the spirit of the child's deceased grandmother. For its removal he would perform various incantations, for which he required the following, viz.: — water from seven wells, dung from five cowsheds, a larva of the myrmeleon, a crab, a frog, a green snake, a virāl fish, parched rice, ada cake,