“A palmyra tree in the jungle near Ramnād with seven distinct trunks, each bearing a goodly head of fan-shaped leaves is,” General Burton writes,[65] “attributed to the action of a deity, and stones smeared with oil and vermilion, broken cocoanuts, and fowl’s feathers lying about, testify that pūja and sacrifice were performed here.”
On the Rangasvāmi peak on the Nīlgiris are two rude walled enclosures sacred to the god Ranga and his consort, within which are deposited various offerings, chiefly iron lamps and the notched sticks used as weighing-machines. The hereditary priest is an Irula (jungle tribesman).[66] Certain caves are regarded by the Muduvars of the Travancore hills as shrines, wherein spear-heads, tridents, and copper coins are placed, partly to mark them as holy places, and partly as offerings to bring good luck.
Prehistoric stone cells, found in the bed of a river, are believed to be the thunderbolts of Vishnu, and are stacked as offerings by the Malaiālis of the Shevaroy hills in their shrines dedicated to Vignēswara the elephant god, who averts evil, or in little niches cut in rocks.
Of a remarkable form of demon worship in Tinnevelly, Bishop Caldwell wrote that[67] “an European was till recently worshipped as a demon. From the rude verses which were sung in connection with his worship, it would appear that he was an English officer, who was mortally wounded at the taking of the Travancore lines in 1809, and was buried about twenty-five miles from the scene of the battle in a sandy waste, where, a few years ago, his worship was established by the Shānāns of the neighbourhood. His worship consisted in the offering to his manes of spirituous liquors and cheroots.”
A similar form of worship, or propitiation of demons, is recorded[68] by Bishop Whitehead from Malabar. He was told that “the spirits of the old Portuguese soldiers and traders are still propitiated on the coast with offerings of toddy and cheroots. The spirits are called Kāppiri (probably Kaffirs or foreigners). This superstition is dying out, but is said to be common among the fishermen of the French settlement of Mai (Mahé).”
On one occasion, a man who had been presented with two annas as the fee for lending his body to me for measurement, offered it, with flowers and a cocoanut, at the shrine of the village goddess, and dedicated to her another coin of his own as a peace-offering, and to get rid of the pollution caused by my money.
[1] See Bishop Whitehead, “The Village Deities of Southern India,” Madras Museum Bull., 1907, v. No. 3.
[2] Ibid., 1901, iii. No. 3, 270–1.
[3] ”Gazetteer of the Tanjore District,” 1906, i. 219.