The mother is never kept alone in the room, a light is kept burning in it night and day, and the oil of the margosa is much used in the room for protection; care is taken that the navel cord is not buried and a little of it is given to the mother with betel if she fall severely ill. Visitors to the lying-in-room give presents to the midwife when the child is handed to them, especially if it is the first-born one.
A month after birth, the babe, nicely dressed and with tiny garlands of acorus calamus (wadakaha) and allium sativum (sudu lûnu) tied round its wrists and lamp-black applied under the eye-brows, is for the first time brought out to see the light of day (doṭṭavadanavâ); and it is made to look at a lamp placed in the centre of a mat or table, with cakes (kevum) made of rice-flour, jaggery, and cocoanut oil, plantains, rice boiled with cocoanut milk (kiribat), and other eatables placed around it. The midwife then hands round the little child to the relatives and gets some presents for herself.
The rite of eating rice (indul katagânavâ or bat kavanavâ) is gone through when the child is seven months old; the same eatables are spread on a plantain-leaf with different kinds of coins, and the child placed among them; what it first touches is carefully observed, and if it be kiribat it is considered very auspicious. The father or grandfather places a few grains of rice in the child’s mouth, and the name that is used at home (bat nama) is given on that day. The astrologer, who has already cast the infant’s horoscope and has informed the parents of its future, is consulted for a lucky day and hour for the performance of the above observances.
The children are allowed to run in complete nudity till about five years and their heads are fully shaved when young; a little of the hair first cut is carefully preserved. From an early age a boy is sent every morning to the pansala, where the village priest keeps his little school, till a certain course of reading is completed and he is old enough to assist the father in the fields. The first day he is taught the alphabet a rite is celebrated (at pot tiyanava), when a platform is erected, and on it are placed sandal-wood, a light, resin, kiribat, kevum, and other forms of rice cakes as an offering to Ganêsâ, the god of wisdom, and the remover of all obstacles and difficulties. At a lucky hour the pupil washes the feet of his future guru, offers him betel, worships him, and receives the book, which he has to learn, at his hands, and, as the first letters of the alphabet are repeated by him after his master, a husked cocoanut is cut in two as an invocation to Ganêsâ. A girl is less favoured and has to depend for her literary education on her mother or an elder sister; more attention, however, is paid to teach her the domestic requirements of cooking, weaving and knitting, which will make her a good wife.
On the attainment of the years of puberty by a girl she is confined to a room, no male being allowed to see her or be seen by her. After two weeks she is taken out with her face covered and bathed at the back of the house by the female inmates, except little girls and widows, with the assistance of the family laundress, who takes all the jewellry on the maiden’s person. Near the bathing-place are kept branches of any milk-bearing tree, usually of the jak tree. On her return from her purification, her head and face, still covered, she goes three times round a mat having on it kiribat, plantains, seven kinds of curries, rice, cocoanuts, and, in the centre, a lamp With seven lighted wicks; and as she does she pounds with a pestle some paddy scattered round the provisions. Next, she removes the covering, throws it on to the dhôbî (washerwoman) and, after making obeisance to the lamp and, putting out its wicks by clapping her hands, presents the laundress with money placed on a betel leaf. She is then greeted by her relatives, who are usually invited to a feast, and is presented by them with valuable trinkets. Everything that was made use of for the ceremony is given to the washerwoman. In some cases, till the period of purification is over, the maiden is kept in a separate hut which is afterwards burnt down. Girls who have arrived at the age of puberty are not allowed to remain alone, as devils may possess them and drive them mad; and till three months have elapsed no fried food of any sort is given to them.
The ‘shaving of the beard’ is the rite the young man has to go through, it is performed at a lucky hour and usually takes place a few days before marriage; the barber here plays the important part the laundress did in the other. The shavings are put into a cup, and the person operated on, as well as his relatives who have been invited, put money into it; this is taken by the barber; and the former are thrown on to a roof that they may not be trampled upon.
Marriages are arranged between two families by a relative or a trusted servant of one of them, who, if successful, is handsomely rewarded by both parties. The chances of success depend on the state of the horoscopes of the two intended partners, their respectability which forms a very important factor in the match, the dowry which used to consist of agricultural implements, a few head of cattle, and domestic requisites, together with a small sum of money to set the couple going, and, if connected, the distance of relationship. Two sisters’ or brothers’ children are rarely allowed to marry, but the solicitation of a mother’s brother’s or father’s sister’s son is always preferred to that of any other.
A few days before the marriage, the two families, in their respective hamlets, send a messenger from house to house to ask, by presenting betel, the fellow-villagers of their own caste for a breakfast; and the guests bring with them presents in money. Only few, however, are invited to the wedding; and the party of the bridegroom, consisting of two groomsmen, an attendant carrying a talipot shade over him, musicians, pingo-bearers, relatives and friends, arrives in the evening at the bride’s village and halts at a distance from her house. A messenger is then sent in advance with a few pingo-loads of plantains, and with betel-leaves equal in number to the guests, to inform of their arrival; and when permission is received to proceed, generally by the firing of a jingal, they advance, and are received with all marks of honour; white cloth is spread all the way by the washerwoman, and at the entrance a younger brother of the bride washes the bridegroom’s feet and receives a ring as a present. A sum of money is paid to the dhôbi (washerwoman) as a recompense for her services. They are then entertained with music, food and betel till the small hours of the morning, when the marriage ceremony commences. The bride and bridegroom are raised by two of their maternal uncles on to a dais covered with white cloth, and having on it a heap of raw rice, cocoanuts, betel leaves and coins. A white jacket and a cloth to wear are presented by the bridegroom to the bride; betel and balls of boiled rice are exchanged; their thumbs are tied together by a thread, and, while water is poured on their hands from a spouted vessel by the bride’s father, certain benedictory verses are recited. Last of all, a web of white cloth is presented by the bridegroom to the bride’s mother; and it is divided among her relatives.
In connection with this presentation it is said that if the mother-in-law be dead, the web should be left in a thicket hard by to appease her spirit.
On the day after the wedding the married couple return to their future home with great rejoicing, and on their entering the house a husked cocoanut is cut in two on the threshold.