Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 3.djvu/547

Rh Their conduct is regulated by certain well-defined rules. They should not enter a house by the front door, unless this is unavoidable, and, if they must so enter it, they must not leave by the same way. If they enter by the back door, they depart by the front door, which they leave wide open. They should not commit robbery in a house, in which they have partaken of rice and curds. Curds always require salt, and eating salt is equivalent to taking the oath of fealty according to their code of honour. They ease themselves in the house in which they have committed a theft, in order, it is said, to render the pursuit of them unsuccessful. In a note on the initiation of Yerukala girls into the profession of fortune-telling in Vizagapatam, Mr. Hayavadana Rao writes that it is carried out on a Sunday succeeding the first puberty ceremony. A caste feast, with plenty of strong drink, is held, but the girl herself fasts. The feast over, she is taken to a spot at a little distance from the settlement called Yerukonda. This is said to be the name of a place on the trunk road between Vizianagram and Chicacole, to which girls were taken in former times to be initiated. The girl is blindfolded with a cloth. Boiled rice and green gram are mixed with the blood of a black fowl, black pig, and black goat, which are killed. Of this mixture she must take at least three morsels, and, if she does not vomit, it is taken as a sign that she will become a good Yeruka or fortune-teller. Vomiting would indicate that she would be a false prophetess. When a wandering Korava dies, he is buried as quickly as possible, with head to the north, and feet to the south. If possible, a new cloth is obtained to wrap the corpse in. The grave is covered with the last hut which the deceased occupied. The Koravas immediately