Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 29, 1918.djvu/139

 of Sociology and Folklore. 129

depth, to smear the sides of it with clay, and to place within it a lighted lamp. If the lamp burns uniformly and brightly, the ground is fit for building, otherwise it is bad. Another method was, after excavating the pit, to replace the earth in it. If it should fill the hole and leave a surplus, the omen, according to the rules of sympathetic magic, was favourable ; if it barely filled the hole, it was indifferent ; if it proved insufficient to fill it, the site was positively bad. The presence or absence of certain trees, again, was a good test of the suitability of the site. If bones, especially those which proved to be those of Chandala or outcast were found on excavating the foundations, the omen was highly in- auspicious. Even if no bones were found, the wise man was advised to perform a special act of expiation to avoid the chance of such dangerous things being found later on.^ In North India it is believed that if when the excavation is being made the first stroke of the spade turns up charcoal, which savours of the funeral pyre or suggests that fire may destroy the building, the masons will soon die ; if broken tiles appear, their wives will die ; if ashes are found, the owner will die ; if bones, his wife will die.^

The jungle-dwelling Savaras place on the proposed site as many grains of rice as there are married couples in the household, and cover them over with a coconut shell. These are examined next day, and if none are missing, the site is approved.^ When the Shans of Upper Burma are fixing the site of a house, ten baskets of rice are brought to the place, and a grain from each is laid in the middle of the ground, and covered with a mat or basket. Next morning if they are found to be uninjured by ants, grubs, or other creatures, the omen is favourable.* In Madras, if the owner should fall ill while the work is going on, no one would

Rajendralala Mitra, The Indo- Aryans, i. 90 et sec/. ^ North Indian Notes and Qtterits, v. 144.

■■'Thurston, op. cit. vi. 311 ; cf. Census Report Bengal, 191 1, i. 46. ■• Gazetteer Upper Burma, part ii. vol. i. 441.