Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 7.djvu/284

URALI spades, flint and steel. A man after marriage lives with his wife, apart from his parents. Pollution of a very aggravated kind is observed during the menstrual and puerperal periods. On these occasions a separate mātam (hut), called the pāttu-pandal, is put up at a distance from the dwelling hut. Here the woman stays for three days. After bathing on the fourth day, she shifts to another mātam still nearer, and stays there for one or two days. On the seventh day she rejoins the family. In cases of confinement, twelve days are spent in the remotest hut, and five days in the nearer one. But for another period of twenty days the woman is not permitted to touch any one in the house, or even the roofing of the hut. During these days food is prepared by others, and given to her. The water in which those who are confined, and those who are in their menses bathe, is considered to be defiled beyond remedy. Hence, for bathing purposes some secluded and out-of-the-way pool, called pāttuvellam, is selected. Urālis coming to the low country hesitate to drink water, on the score that it might be thus polluted. When the woman delivers herself of her first child, her husband observes three days' pollution, but none for subsequent confinements. On all such occasions, the maternal relations of the woman have to observe five days' pollution. On the eighteenth day after birth, the eldest member of the family names the child, and bores the ear. The head of the child is shaved as soon as it is able to walk, and a tuft of hair is left in front. The corpses of the Urālis are not burnt, but buried at a sufficient distance from the house. A new cloth is put into the grave by each relative. After filling in the grave, they erect a shed over it, within which the chopping knife of the deceased, a quantity of boiled rice, and some chewing materials (betel and nuts)