Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 28, 1917.djvu/164

132 unlucky; if on the right, hardly less unlucky. No business ought to be conducted on that day.

(4) Mira-an or Para-yashi or Ruma-an ("desperate," or "the last extremity"). If a bird flies across the line of direction either at right angles or diagonally, it is unlucky unless it occur soon after Mi-shukku, when it would be very lucky.

If a woman who is in child encounter the omen of Maga-ran when on her way to the fields or about to draw water, she at once returns home. If men engaged on a head-hunting expedition observe any of the three kinds of unlucky omen they build a hut on the spot and spend the night there, consulting the omens again next morning. So, too, any one of these unfavourable signs will cause the postponement of a visit to arrange a marriage or other matter of importance.