Page:Castes and tribes of southern India, Volume 5.djvu/241

Rh with a brush of chamatha tied with karuga grass. Three pālas are placed on the west of the pyre parallel to the places where the feet, waist and head of the corpse rested, and bones are removed from the feet, waist and head with tongs of chamatha, and placed in the respective pālas. The bones are then washed in milk, and all put into an earthen pot (kudam) with some karuga grass on the top. The pot is covered with a cloth, taken to a cocoanut tree and buried in a pit, the cloth being removed and the top filled with mud. A plantain is planted in the trench that was dug near the pyre. On the eleventh day, all the members of the family purify themselves,and perform oblations of water and balls of rice. This constitutes the first sraddha, which must be repeated on each anniversary of the eleventh day." "The funeral rites of women are similar; but, if the woman is pregnant at the time of death, the body has first to be purified seven times with pounded kusa grass, cow-dung, cow's urine, ashes and gold, and to receive māttu. The belly is cut open four inches below the navel, and, if the child is found alive, it is taken out and brought up; if dead, it is put back in the womb with a piece of gold and some ghee. Children not more than ten days old are buried with little ceremony, but all others are burnt." * When a Nambūtiri is believed to have been guilty of an offence against the caste, or when there is a caste dispute in any grāmam, the proper course is to represent the matter to the king (in Malabar the Zamorin), who refers it to the Smarta having jurisdiction over that particular grāmam, ordering him to try the offender after holding a proper enquiry. Minor offences are punishable