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JUNE, 1899.7
FOLKLORE IN SOUTHERN INDIA ; No. 45.
165
and then visit friends and drink rice liquor. In the temple they make offerings of flesh, fowls and fruit, and make a troublesome noise with Chinese drums and tire-works. Illuminations begin on the first of the year, and on the thirteenth is a great feast of lanterns.3 0:1 new year's day the Chinese remain awake to keep spirits from coming. In Scotland, the month of May is unlucky; so it was in Rome. In Northumberland, the first man who came in after the old year was dead brought a shovel of coal or whisky. In England, in 1450, the twenty-eighth of every month was held unlucky.? In Saxon England, the last Monday of April, the beginning of August, and the first Monday of December were unlucky. It is unlucky to marry on Friday according to Christian tradition because Christ was crucified on Friday. The time of death is a great spirit-time. In Coorg it is believed that demon-spirits, called Kuli, carry off ancestral spirits at the hour of death. If people think that a demon has carried off an ancestor, they go to a medium who has power over the demon, and beg bim to force the demon-spirit to let the ancestral ghost free. The people of the house sit round the medium, who throws a handful of rice on them, and the ancestral spirit lights on the back of one of them, who falls into a swoon and is carried into the house. When the possessed person recovers, the spirit is supposed to have gained its right place in one of the family. If mourners come from a distance to redeem the soul of the dead, they do not fall in a swoon, bat the moment the spirit gets on the back of one of them all hurry home without looking back till the spirit and his carrier are enfe in the family.10 The belief that death makes the house unclean by turning it into an abode of bodiless spirits remains in England slightly Christianised. In Northumberland, the wrath of God rests on the death-visited house till the clergyman has come. Formerly the clergyman blessed a house after a death.11 Times of prosperity or triumph are special spirit-times. The Hindu on any accession of fortune must perforrn mindrites or sraddhas to his ancestors.13. Among the Hottentots the triumphing warrior is met by girls who sing, the priest cuts marks on his chest, and he is given a new name. 13 Among the Romans the triumphing hero was crowned with laurels, and close behind him Conscience in the form of a slave whispered "thou too art mortal."14
(To be continued.)
FOLKLORE IN SOUTHERN INDIA, BY PANDIT S.. NATESA SASTRI, B, A., M.B.L.S.
No. 45.- The Story of Kesava.
( A Variant of the Irechaustible Pag.) In the declining days of the Dvâparayuga there lived, in a certain village near the Kollimalai Mountains, a poor Brahman family, consisting of a husband and wife and half a dozen children. Most of the inhabitants of the villago wero more or less poor, and the poorest of all were the family just mentioned. Almost every day the father would go out begging and return with enough rice for a thin gruel. The hungry children had their portions first, and whatever remained was shared between the parents. None of these children was able to help the family in any way, as the eldest, was a boy of only thirteen years of age. For what after all could a Brahman boy of thirteen do in the way of helpiug his family ? For the caste rules at the end of the Dvâ parayuga were very strict. Ho could not dig nor bear a burden nor do any labour which could bring one or two fanams as wages. The only assistance he could 3 Careri in Churchill, Vol. IV. pp. 387-389.
• Gray's China, Vol. I. p. 252. . Henderson's Folk-Lore, p. 34.
• Op. cit. p. 73. Jotles' Crotons, p. 308.
• Op. cit. p). S04. • Henderson's Folk-Lore, p. 33; Dyer's Folk-Lore, . 241. 10 Rico's Mysore, Vol. III. p. 261. 11 Henderson's Folk-Lore, p. 63.
11 Colebrooke's Miscellaneous Essaye, Vol. I. p. 204. 18 Hohn's Toni Goam, p. 23.
14 From MS notes
