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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
(MABCH, 1921
we were skinning them; an order came from our battalion :'Do you , the working party to kill the sheep, come quickly to your battalion ; the battalion has been ordered to advance.' Such an order was heard, and making haste we tore off the skins from the sheep. Each man putting one sheep on his shoulders and running, we reached the place where our battalion had been halted, but the battalion had gone. Only the headquarters section are waiting for us there. Arriving there, I handed over the sheep very correctly to the Jemadar Adjutant. He loaded them on a camel and took them away to where the battalion was. Then the Jemadar Adjutant Sahib called Dalbir who had killed the sheep and brought them back. And they counted them. Twenty-six sheep they found all right: but not seeing the lumps of fat on the hind quarters of the sheep he asks the Jemadar Adjutant: These lumps of fat, where have they gone and who has eaten them ?' The other gives answer: Till I loaded them on the camel, it was all right; but coming here, it was a little dark. I unlonded them from the camel and piled them in one place. Having piled them up, while going to seek for you, in the time before I came back, who indeed has cut them off and taken them away, I have no information.' Saying Never mind !', we two separated the portions for all the companies and the officers and distributed the sheep. On that day it seemed to our minds as though our great festival in the Rains is coming. So it seemed. On other days we had not got even water to drink : on this day we got both water in plenty and we got meat. So cooking and eating all this, each man also drank two waterbottles-full of tea. Indeed it seemed like Dasehra. All night it was very beautiful. Then in the early morning came the order : 'An attack will be made.' On that the men say: Yesterday night as we were eating meat and tea, all night long it seemed like Dasehra. That strength must be driven out.' So on the twelfth day we attacked the Turks.
- Notes.
työ bākhara : työ singular for plural ti. phiţin < Engl. fatigue. sodchan < sõdhchan. juwāp < H. jawab.
TATU MARKS IN BURMA.
BY RAI BAHADUR B. A. GUPTE, F.Z.S.; CALCUTTA. WHILE travelling in Burma on duty in 1902, I collected some notes on the tatu marks of the people of that country. One curious feature of the practice I noted was that in Burma tatuing is confined to the male sex, while in India females alone bear these marks. Another most conspicuous feature consists in the fact that in Barma the thickest lines and the boldest designs are selected. Even when they are linear, each line is sometmes as thick as the little finger, and each of the figures drawn occupies a space as much as would cover the palm. So copious and so thickly set are these bold designs that they completely cover nearly the whole of the body between the umbelicus and the knees below. Above the umbelious the chest and even the upper limbs are also subjected to the operation. The difference lies only in the pigment selected, red being used for the upper, and blue for the lower part of the body. So painful was the operation, that in olden days, instances of death were not rare. The British Government stopped this torture. Nowadays, enlightened people do not tatu their sons.
