THE PEOPLE

CASTES.

The Hindus as divided between males and females are 4,69,225 and 4,55,605 respectively. According to percentage they are 84.2. These are divided into various socially differentiated groups better known as castes. In consonance with the changes in Government policy, the Census enumeration has ceased to take cognisance of these groups since 1941. However, the castes have not ceased to exist and what was true 50 years ago is materially true even today and what the old Gazetteer of Yeotmal district has recorded might be reproduced here as helpful, to follow the position as it is today in regard to the various castes. The account of castes from the old Gazetteer which used 1901 Census figures is given below.

Kunbis.

The great cultivating caste of the Kunbis constitutes 22 per cent of the population, though they are not as numerous in Yavatmal as in other districts of Berar. Kunbi patels hold 765 out of the total of 1,736 villages. The most numerous caste are the Gonds who number 47,000 persons or 8 per cent of the population. The Andhs (21,000), Kolams (16,000) and Pardhans (13,000) are also fairly numerous. Gond patels hold 28 villages, Andhs 25 and Kolams 11. These are all considered aboriginal tribes though the Andhs are now completely Hinduised. The Dhangars or Hatkars are another fairly important caste, numbering 22,000 persons and being patels of 138 villages. The Hatkars are Dhangars or shepherds who adopted military service and hence obtained a higher rank than the ordinary Dhangars. They came from the Pune country, wore beards like the Marathas and Rajputs, but this practice is now extinct. Other important landholders are the Brahmans who have 301 villages, the Muhammedans 103 and the Marathas 65 while the pateli rights of the remaining villages are distributed among a number of castes. The Brahmans nearly all belong to the Desastha sub-caste whose home was the country around Pune, but their marriages are now arranged locally. They are further divided into sects called Rgvedi or Yajurvedi according as they follow the ritual of Rgveda or Yajurveda in their prayers. The Yajurvedis are further divided into Kanva and Madhyandina sects of whom the former permit a man to marry his maternal uncle's daughter while the latter do not Intermarriage is forbidden between all these three sects although they belong to the same Desastha sub-caste.

The Kunbis number 1,22,000 persons or nearly a quarter of the population and are the representative agricultural class to which the bulk of the patels and cultivators belong. The principal sub-castes are Tilore, Ghatole and Dhanoje. The Tilores are generally considered the highest and they say that their ancestors came from Therol in Rajputana but the name may not improbably be derived from the cultivation of the til plant. The Ghatoles are those who came from above the ghats towards Basim and Buldhana. The Dhanojes are probably Dhangars or shepherds who have become Kunbis. In Wun, the Dhanojes are said to rank as the highest sub-caste. There is also a sub-caste of Vanjari Kunbis, being no doubt Banjaras who have taken to cultivation and been received into the caste.

The services of the barber and the washerman must be requisitioned at a betrothal among the Kunbis. The barber washes feet of the boy and the girl and places vermilion on the foreheads of the guests. The washerman spreads a sheet on the ground on which the boy and the girl sit. At their weddings, the Kunbis worship a pick-axe as the implement of cultivation. They tie one or two wheat cakes to it and the officiating Savasa carries it over the shoulder; it is then placed on the top of the marriage shed and at the end of the five days' ceremonies, the members of the two families eat the dried cakes with milk. At the wedding, the bride and the bridegroom are placed on two wooden seats and a curtain is hung between them; the relatives then throw rice coloured with turmeric over them and the Brahman priests repeat the marriage auspicious verses. The cur fain is removed and their foreheads are made to touch. Then they change their seats. After this some one of the bride's party takes some thin cakes known as papad and breaks them over the heads of the bridegroom's party, but the meaning of the custom is not known. At the end of the ceremony, the barber and the washerman take the bride and bridegroom on their own shoulders and dance to music in the marriage shed. The bride and the bridegroom throw gulal over each other and the guests also throw it over them. For this the barber and the washerman receive small presents.

The Kunbis permit the remarriage of widows but the Desmukh families, who have now become Marathas, forbid it. Divorce is permitted but a divorced woman cannot marry again unless she is permitted to do so in writing by her first husband. If a woman's husband dies she returns to her father's house and he arranges her second marriage which is known as choli-patal or giving her new clothes. For the marriage, the bridegroom proceeds to the bride's house and a seat is set with a cloth over it on which an areca nut is placed. The bridegroom takes a sword and places its point against the nut and then kicks the sword with his foot so as to knock the nut off the seat. This is in token of the displacement of the deceased husband. Next day as the couple go to the bridegroom's house they bury the nut on the boundary of the village so as to lay his spirit. They leave early in the morning. When a widower or a widow marries a second time and is afterwards attacked by illness, it is ascribed to the ill-will of their former partner's spirit. A metal image of the first wife or husband is made and worn in an amulet on the arm or around the neck.

After the birth of a child the mother remains impure for twelve days. A midwife is called who always breaks her bangles and puts on new ones after she has assisted at a birth. If delivery is prolonged, the woman is given hot water and sugar or camphor in a betel leaf. On the 12th day, the mother's bangles are thrown away and new ones put on; if the child is a boy he is named on the 12th day and if a girl, on the 13th. After a child is born, they burn some turmeric and jowar flour and hold it in the smoke to avert the evil eye. Babies arc also branded on the stomach with a burning piece of turmeric, perhaps to keep off cold. For the first day or two, after birth, a child is given cow's milk mixed with water or honey and little castor oil and after this it is suckled by its mother. If she is unable to do this, a wet nurse is called in. The mother gets no regular food for the first two days taut only sonic sugar and spices. Until the child is six months old, its head and body are oiled every second or third day. The body is well hand-rubbed and bathed. The rubbing is intended to make the limbs supple and the oil to render the child less susceptible to cold. The Kunbis are very kind to their children and never harsh or quick-tempered. They seldom refuse a child anything.

If a woman is barren and has no children, one of the local remedies practised by the Sarodis or wandering soothsayers is that she should set fire to somebody's house. So long as some small part of the house is burnt, it does not matter if the lire be extinguished, but the woman should not give the alarm herself. It is not clear in what way this remedy is supposed to produce fertility. One explanation suggested is that when a house is set on fire, a number of insects will be killed and on rebirth one of them may become a child in the womb of the woman who set fire to the house. Another method is that a barren woman cuts a piece of the breast cloth of a woman who has children and after burning incense on it, wears it as an amulet. At the Pola festival, the magicians make balls of black thread and throw them over a rope of mango leaves under which the bullocks pass. The bails are thus believed to acquire magical properties and a barren woman will buy a piece of the thread and wear it round her wrist as an amulet. If a woman's first children have died and she wishes to preserve a later one, she sometimes weighs the child against sugar or copper and distributes the amount in charity. Or she gives the child a bad-name like Daghria, a stone; Kacma, sweepings; Ukandia, a dung hill. These customs are not peculiar to this caste but are generally representative of the superstitious ideas of many other classes of the population.

The kunbis bury or burn their dead, burial having perhaps been adopted in imitation of the Muhammedans, unless it is a relic of the old Dravidian custom. The village has generally a field set apart for the disposal of the corpses, which is known as smasan. Separate localities in it are sometimes assigned to the different castes and to Hindus and Muhammedans. The Hindus fill up the earth practically level with the ground after burial and erect no monument, so that: after a few years another corpse-can be buried in the same place. The Muhammedans raise the grave above the ground and sometimes erect monuments of carved stone but in ten or fifteen years, the traces of most of their graves even vanish. But for this, the smasan would in course of time get full and would have to be extended. When a Kunbi dies the body is washed in warm water and placed on a bier made of bambooes with a net work of San-hemp. Ordinary rope must not be used. The mourners then take it to the grave, scattering almonds, sandal-wood, dates, betel-leaf and small coins as they go. Halfway to the grave the corpse is set down and the bearers change their positions, those behind going in front. Here, a little wheat and pulse which have been tied in the cloth covering the corpse are left on the way. The grave is dug three or four feet deep and the corpse is buried naked on its back, with the head to the south. On the way to the grave the corpse is covered with a new unwashed cloth and when the grave is filled in, it is covered over with stones and thorns to keep off jackals and hyenas and the cloth is placed on the top. When a man dies, the principal mourner i.e., the eldest son or next younger brother or the nephew of the deceased, has the whole of his face and head shaved and the hair is tied up in a corner of the grave cloth. If there are no male relations, the widow takes their place and a small lock of her hair is cut off and tied up in the cloth. The chief mourner who is designated in this manner is considered to he the heir of the deceased, but it is not clear what the ceremony of tying up the hair in the cloth signifies. When the corpse is being carried off for burial, the widow breaks her mangalsutra and wipes off the kunku or the vermilion from her forehead. The mangalsutra consists of a string of black glass beads with a piece of gold and is always placed on the bride's neck at the wedding. She does not break her glass bangles at all but on the eleventh day changes them for new ones. After the burial, one of the mourners is sent to get an earthen pot. This is filled with water at a river or stream and a small piece is broken out from it with a stone. One of the mourners then takes the pot and walks round the corpse with it. dropping a stream of water all the way. Having done this he throws the pot behind him over his shoulder without looking round and then all the mourners go home without looking behind them. The stone with which the hole has been made in the earthen pot is held to represent the spirit of the deceased. It is placed under a tree or the hank of a stream and for ten days, the mourners come and offer it pindas or balls of c coked rice, one on the first day, two on the second and so on up to ten on the tenth day. On this last day, a little mound is made to represent Mahadeva with four miniature flags round it and three cakes of rice are placed on it. All the mourners sit round the mound until a crow comes and eats some of the cakes. Then they say that the dead man's spirit is freed from anxiety about his household and mundane affairs and has taken his departure to the next world. But if no real crow comes to eat the cake, they make a sham crow out of kusa grass and touch the cake with it and consider that a crow has eaten it. After this the mourners go to a stream and put a little cow's urine on their bodies and dip ten times in the water or throw it over them. The officiating Brahman sprinkles them with holy water in which he has dipped the toe of the right foot and they present to the Brahman the vessel on which the funeral cakes have been cooked and the clothes which the chief mourner has worn for ten days and on coming home they give him a stick, an umbrella, shoes, a bed and anything else which they think the dead man will want in the next world. On the thirteenth day they feed the caste fellows and the Brahman comes and ties a new pagri round the chief mourner's head with the back side in front. The chief mourner breaks an areca nut on the threshold, places it in his mouth and spits out of the door, signifying the final ejectment of the spirit of the deceased from the house. Finally, the chief mourner goes to worship at Maruti's shrine and the whole business is finished After this, all the relatives of the deceased invite the family to their house for a day and give them a feast and if they have many relations, this may go on for a considerable time. If the relatives are too poor to give a feast, they present a new cloth to the widow during the period of mourning.

Besides the partial adoption of burial instead of cremation, the customs of the Kunbis show the influence of Islam in several other particulars, due no doubt to the long period of Muslim dominance in Berar. The Dhanoje Kunbis usually revere Dawal Malik, a Muhammedan saint, whose tomb is at Uprai in Amravati district. An urus or fair is held here on Thursdays, the day commonly sacred to Muhammedan saints and on this account, the Kunbis will not be shaved on Thursdays. They also make vows to beg at the Muharram festival and go round begging rice and pulse. They give a little of what they obtain to Muhammedan beggars and eat the rest. At the Muharram, they tie a red thread on their necks and dance round the Alawa. This is a small hole in which fire is kindled in front of the tazia or tomb of Hussain.

The Kunbis cat fowl and eggs and flesh of wild boars. Contrary to the practice in the Central Provinces, the different sub-castes who do not intermarry will, nevertheless, take food from each other and this is also the custom with several other castes.

Malis.

The Malis or Marals number 23,000 persons or four per cent  of the population and are chiefly occupied in growing vegetables and garden crops. They have several local sub-divisions such as the Kosaria, Phulmali, Bhange, Bawne, Jire, Harde, Ghase and Pahad. The Kosarias are apparently immigrants from the Central Provinces as the name is found among many castes there and is derived from Kosala. the old term for Chatisgad. Among the Kosarias and Pahads, the women will wear glass bangles only on the left hand and brass and silver ones on the right. The marriages of the Kosarias are generally celebrated in the vegetable gardens;; the bride and the groom stand one on each side of an irrigation ditch, the bride facing the east and the bridegroom the west. A plantain leaf is placed in the ditch and water is poured over it. Relatives throw rice and turmeric over the couple. The bridegroom has a basing or a triangular frame of date-palm leaves placed on his head. The Kosaria Mali's do not eat fowls or drink liquor. The Pahadas appear to be an occupational sub-caste, recruited from other castes, their calling being to sell in the weekly markets the vegetables grown by other Mali's. They take food from other Malis and if any Pahad is destitute, the Kosaria Malis will raise a subscription and start him in business again. Pahad women wear nose rings which Kosaria Mali's will not do. The Ghase sub-caste were formerly the only one who would grow and boil turmeric. However, the Kosaria and Jire Malis also grow turmeric nowadays. The Ghase Mali's will not sell milk or curds, an occupation to which the Phulmalis. though of the highest sub-caste, have no objection. The Phulmalis derive their name from their occupation of growing or selling flowers. Bawnes are named after the Berar plain, which used to be popularly known as Bawan-Berar, because it furnished 52 lakhs of rupees of revenue as against six lakhs only from the Jhadi or hill country. The same name is found among the Kunbis, Mahars. Dhobis and other castes. The Jires are so named because they were formerly the only sub-caste who would sow cumin (jire), but this distinction no longer exists as other Malis, excepting perhaps, the Phulmalis now grow it. The Jire Malis will not grow onions.

Banjaras.

The Banjaras number 36,000 persons or 6 per cent of the population residing principally in the forest tracts to the south of the district. They are also known as Labhana from their former occupation of carrying salt. The Mathuria sub-caste are the highest and they wear the sacred thread. They do not permit remarriage of widows and abstain from eating flesh or drinking liquor. They generally live a reputable life. When a Banjara betrothal is to be made, a betel leaf and a large handful of unrefined sugar are distributed to everybody. The price to be paid for the bride amounts to Rs. 40 and four young bullocks. Prior to the wedding, the bridegroom goes and stays for a month or so in the house of the bride's father. The period was formerly longer but now extends to a month at the most. While he resides at the bride's house, he wears a cloth over his head so that his face cannot be seen. The wedding day may be any in the bright fortnight of the month and prior to its celebration they bring the branches of eight or ten different trees at night and perform the fire sacrifice with them. For the marriage, 21 new earthen pots are brought from the potters and arranged in four lines with a stake in the centre. The bride and bridegroom sit on each side of this stake, while cold water is poured over the bridegroom's body. Then they stand up and the Brahman clasps their right hands, making them hold a rupee and a cowrie in them and ties a knot in their clothes; then the bridegroom drags the bride seven or eleven times round the post inside the four lines of pots. The bride pretends to be unwilling, hanging back and sitting down and an old woman comes and prods her from behind to make her go on. The women then put a large plate of rice or meat on the ground and tell the bridegroom to pick it up. standing round and beating him as he attempts to do so. Before her departure, the bride goes round to the houses of her friends and weeps. After the wedding the bride's father returns to the couple one of the bullocks which he has received as her price. A Brahman must be employed at marriage, but the Banjaras have caste priests of their own known as Warthia. One section of the caste acts as musicians at festivals and weddings and they are known as Dhabe.

The women wear two little sticks fixed up right in their hair over which their cloth is drawn. Their front hair hang down beside the face and behind it is woven into a plait with silk thread and hangs down the hack. They have large ornaments of silver tied over the head and hanging down besides the cars. To these are attached little bells. Their arms are covered with bangles of ivory and they have tinkling anklets on the feet. The women wear skirts and short clothes drawn over the shoulders and along their skirts double lines of cowries are embroidered. Their breast clothes are profusely ornamented with needle work embroidery with small pieces of glass sewn into them and arc tied behind whereas Maratha women ordinarily tie them in front.

Andhs.

The Andhs are stated in the Census Reports to be an aboriginal tribe and probably are so. Nothing can be ascertained as to their origin and they are not found in any other province. They have now adopted all the practices of Kunbis and are hardly distinguishable from them in dress or personal appearance. They cultivate in the ordinary manner like them. They employ Brahmans as their priests and profess to be Vaisnavas by religion, wearing sect marks on their foreheads.

Gonds and Pardhans.

Like the Andhs. the Gonds and Pardhans have adopted Hindu dress and customs to a larger extent than in Madhya Trades, Although they are really of the same tribe, the two are distinguished, at any rate, by name. The Pardhans are the bards and musicians of the Gonds. Together they form about 10 per cent of the population. The Gonds have three sub-divisions: The Raj-Gonds, Dadves and Mokasis. The name of the last may possibly be derived from the fact that they held a privileged tenure under the Canda Kings and they rank even higher than the Raj-Gonds who will take food at their hands. The Dadves take food from either of the other two. Besides these sub-castes which are endogamous, the Gonds are also divided into sections that worship different number of gods and no two persons who have the same number of gods may marry with each other. The worshippers of four, five, six, seven and twelve gods are locally distinguished, the last not being known in Madhya Prades. The tribes speak Gondi among themselves, but can talk Marathi with outsiders and they dress like the Kunbis. They are tenants and labourers and a few are patels of villages.

Kolams.

The Kolams are a Dravidian tribe akin to the Gonds, but distinct from them who reside principally in the Wun taluka. They have language of their own. In some respects they retain very primitive customs, but in dress, they can hardly be distinguished from Kunbis. They are not considered as impure by the Hindus and are permitted to enter Hindu Temples. They will eat the flesh of rats, tigers, snakes, squirrels and of almost any animal except a jackal.

Marriage among them is usually adult; neither a betrothal nor a marriage must be held in the month of Paus (December) because in this month ancestors are worshipped. Monday is also considered to be an inauspicious day for a wedding. They have a curious survival of marriage by capture. If a father cannot find a bride for his son, he collects a number of friends and goes to capture an unmarried girl from another village. They take sticks with them and hide themselves in a forest and seize her when opportunity occurs. The girl calls her friends and if they come to her rescue, a fight ensues with sticks in which, however, no one may hit an antagonist on the head. If the girl is captured, the marriage is subsequently performed. If she is rescued, the father of the boy usually pays a few rupees for her to her father. Usually nowadays, the whole affair is arranged beforehand and is only a pretence. The marriage ceremony resembles that of the Kunbis, except that the bridegroom takes the bride on his lap and their clothes are tied together in two places. After the ceremony, each of the guests, takes a few grains of rice and after touching the feet, knees and shoulders of the bridal couple with the rice, throws it over his own back. Widow remarriage and divorce are permitted. They bury their dead and observe mourning for one day or five days in different localities. The spirits of deceased ancestors are worshipped on any Monday in the month of Paus. The mourner goes and dips his head into a tank or stream, on the bank of which a fowl is sacrificed and a feast given to the caste fellows. He then has the hair of his face and head shaved. They worship their implements of agriculture on the last day of Caitra (April), applying turmeric and vermilion to them. In May they collect the stumps of jovar from a field and burning them to ashes make an offering to them of turmeric and vermilion. After This They begin To prepare their fields for the next sowings. The Kolams have a curious way for protecting a village from diseases. All the men go outside the village and on the boundary, at four opposite points, they bury a fowl and mark the place with a stone. The Naik or headman then  sacrifices a goat and other fowls to their god and placing four men by the stones proceeds to sprinkle salt all along the boundary line except across one path on which he lays his stick. He then calls out to the men that the village is closed and that they must enter it by that path. This rule is enforced and if any stranger enters the village by any other than the appointed road, they consider that he must pay the expenses of drawing the boundary circuit again. This line is called bandes and they believe that wild animals and diseases cannot cross it and are prevented from coming into the village along the open road by the stick of the Naik.

Tambatkar, Panchal and Waddar.

The district has a number of small migratory castes. The Pancals and Tambatkars are respectively blacksmiths and copper- smiths. Some of them are migratory and go about in tents from village to village looking for work. Tambatkar is an occupational term and people of any caste may adopt the profession. They take their bellows, moulds and hammer with them as they go about.

The Panchals are described as a wandering caste of smiths living in grass-mat huts and using as fuel the roots of thorn bushes, which they batter out of the ground with the back of the short-handle axe, peculiar to themselves. They live in small pals or tents and move from place to place with buffaloes, donkeys and occasionally ponies to carry their kit. There are two divisions, the Berari and the Dakhani Pancals and the women of the former may be distinguished by wearing their clothes tucked in at the back (kasota). The Waddars are a Telugu caste, who are stone-breakers and earth workers. Other stone-breaking castes are the Pathrots or Paitharvats and the Gotephods who also make and repair hand-mills [A considerable part of the information on migratory castes and criminal classes is taken from Kitts' Berar Census Report (1881) and some details also from Mr. Gayer's lectures on the Criminal Tribes of India.].

Bahurupis and Chitrakathis.

The Bahurupis are an occupational group who have developed into a caste. The men are by profession story tellers and mimics, imitating the voices of men and the notes of animals; their male children are also taught to dance. Their favourite disguise is that of a religious mendicant; they are often so successful as to entail on their victims temporary loss of caste through an involuntary breach of its laws. But they have various other disguises and can give a plausible imitation of Europeans. The Mahar, Mang and Maratha sub-divisions are the most common.

The Citrakathis are wandering mendicants said to have come from Pune district. Their women have a brass plate with a coating of wax; and placing a bamboo stick upright in the centre of the plate, they run fingers up and down it, producing a sound to which they sing. The men occasionally sell buffaloes and milk and also beg, carrying a flag in their hand and shouting the name of their God, Hari Vithal. They also have performing dolls suspended by wire or hair behind a sheet and give performances like a Punch and Judy show. Their favourite representation is the catching of a thief and his trial and punishment. They are an honest people. The Sarodis are fortune tellers and also take about performing dolls. They have Pancangs or almanacs written on palm-leaves from which they pretend to predict the future. The Sarodis come from Bombay and are devotees of Khandoba.

Kolhatis.

The Kolhatis are acrobats and give performances on the tightrope. Mr. Kitts gives the following description of them:— " They have two divisions, the Dukar and Kham Kolhatis. The Dukars are so called because, their normal occupation is to hunt the boar with dogs and spears. They kill a boar when they worship, every second year or so their great god, Bhagvan from whom they say they are all descended. So also in honour of a male ancestor a boar and for a female a sow is killed. The Kham Kolhatis are the division whose little huts of grass may be seen at fairs from one end to another. Both divisions are worshippers of ancestors and believe that the spirits of dead ancestors enter the bodies of the living. The Kham Kolhatis bury their dead, placing the body on its left side with the head to the north. The Dukar Kolhatis sometimes burn the bodies of adults and on the third day bring back the skull and placing it on a bed offer to it vermilion, dates and betel-leaves. A feast is held for three days and the skull is taken back with dancing and song to the cemetery where it is buried and a mound raised over it, a red stone being placed on the mound. Each division has its recognised burial place. The Kham Kolhatis sacrifice a goat to the silver image of Paramesvara instead of a pig and they also worship Khandoba. They celebrate their marriages with a feast of pork.

Gopals.

The Gopals are another caste of acrobats resembling the Kolhatis. The Panguls are a class of beggers who climb trees in the early morning and sing the praises of God followed by the phrase ' Dan ale' or ' a gift is coming'; they also clip the hair of buffaloes for the villagers. The Pardhis are hunters, their name having this meaning in Marathi. There are several divisions of them. Of these the Takandars are a class of village menials who roughen the surfaces of millstones with a hammer and chisel. The Sikari Pardhis hunt game with matchlocks and the Phanse Pardhis snare all kinds of game from a button quail to a black buck. The last class are the Langoti Pardhis. Other classes are Kaikadis and Cenduvala Kanjars. They act under a chief who is appointed for life. They camp together and when the rainy season is over, they take their wives and donkeys with them, their ostensible occupation being to make baskets and mend grinding millers. They worship Bhavani and often carry with them small images of the goddess which they invoke in telling fortunes. The Cenduvala Kanjars prepare net purses. Minas and Baoris also visit the district disguised as merdicant Brahmans ". [Central Provinces District Gazetteers, Yeotmal, Vol. A, 1908, pp. 58 to 78.]

Deities.

Hanuman.

Hanuman or Maruti, is the principal deity of the Maratha country. He is usually represented with a monkey's head and a long tail carved in half relief in red vermilion on a white stone slab. He is the tutelary deity of the village and is found everywhere, even on uninhabited or deserted village sites. His principal attribute is strength. Once in thirteen months, it is said, the planet Jupiter moves from one sign of the Zodiac to another and on this occasion Maruti is worshipped with special ceremony. He must, therefore, be in some way or other connected with Jupiter or Guru as he is known to the Hindus, though the precise relation is inexplicable. Milk, curds and bel leaves are offered to him and a garland of swallow wort flowers is placed round his neck. On Saturdays, people fast in his honour, so that he may avert the evil influence of the planet Saturn. The full moon day of Caitra is also his special festival as it is considered to be his birth-day. Maruti is the son of Vayu the Wind-god and Anjani and his name is derived from Marut, or the name of the Vedic deity of wind.

Khandoba.

Khandoba is also a favourite local deity of the Marathas. He is a warrior incarnation of Siva and was looked up to for support in the struggles against the Muhammedans. He is represented as an armed horseman, accompanied by his faithful watch dog, who was accustomed to guard him as he slept. On this account, the Marathas consider the dog, to some extent, as a sacred animal and they feed him on Khandoba's birth day, i.e., on the 6th day of Margasirsa. On this day, they begin to eat new onions and brinjals which are not consumed during the rains, the period of observance of several fasts by the Hindus. Childless people vow that if they got a daughter they would devote it to Khandoba and girls devoted in this way are called Muralis. The Waghyas are in some cases boys who have similarly been vowed to Khandoba, in other words, simply men who accompany the Muralis and play the daf or leather drum while the Murali sings and dances. The Murali has a Kasati or small brass bell which she rattles in her hand. The Waghyas are so called because, they carry a little bag made of tiger skin to contain the holy turmeric which they dab on the faces of those who pass by in requital of alms. Worshippers of Khandoba hire the Waghyas and Muralis to sing and play at their houses on festive occasions.

Marai or Mahisamma.

Marai or Mahisamma is the goddess of small-pox and cholera and is a local form of Devi, the consort of Siva. She is represented by a round stone painted with vermilion which is always placed outside the village. She is worshipped on Tuesdays and also by persons suffering from small-pox, cholera or fever. Women's clothes are placed on the stone as offerings and goats are let loose in honour of the goddess. These are taken by the priest of Devi who disposes of them as he likes. The priest is always a Kunbi or a member of one of the other castes and not a Brahman. When an epidemic cholera threatens, a public subscription is raised in the village and about a hundred fowls with some goats and two male buffaloes are purchased. The goats and fowls are killed in honour of the goddess. Four pigs are then buried alive at the corners of the village. A peg of the wood of Khair tree (Katechu) is thrust into each pig's mouth and its jaws are held together so that it may not cry out. If one of the pigs should squeal, the whole ceremony fails. A platform is then raised in the name of goddess Mahisamma and one of the buffaloes is sacrificed to her, its head being buried in front of the patel's house. The other buffalo is sacrificed before the altar of the goddess. Each tenant dips some grains of jowar in the blood of the buffalo and buries them in an earthen pot beneath the central pole of his threshing floor. Other grains are thrown in the fields and it is believed that this ceremony will secure abundant crops. The rope by which the bullocks are tied at the time of threshing is also dipped in the blood of the buffalo.

Satvai.

Satvai is the goddess of child-birth. On the fifth day after the birth she is believed to visit the house and to write the destiny of the child on its forehead, which writing it is said, may be seen on a man's skull, when the flesh has come off it after death. On that night some one must remain awake for the whole night or if Satvai comes and finds everybody asleep, she will take away the child. The child will get convulsions and die and this is looked upon as her handiwork. Satvai lives in a mango-grove, outside the village, being represented by a stone covered with vermilion and on the first day the child can be taken out of doors, the mother goes with it to the grove, accompanied by two or three friends and makes an offering of a cradle, a small pumpkin and other articles. Sometimes, she spends the day in the grove with the child, taking her food there.

Asra.

Asra is the goddess of water. She lives in tanks and wells and is represented by a stone with vermilion on it. She is worshipped in the month of Asadha (July) but she is not specially propitiated for rain.

Cankhanvali.

Cankhanvali is a godling who resides in mud forts being located always in the south-western tower of the fort which he protects. He has a platform and a white flag which is renewed on the Dasara day when the patel offers him a goat and other things, There is a proverb har burjme Cankhanvali which is applied to a man who always wants to have a finger in other people's business.

Waghoba.

Waghoba is the wooden image for a tiger which is placed on the border of the village towards a forest and is worshipped by the family of a man who has been killed by a tiger.

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