It is noted by Risley[4] that, while the crowd hacked the body of the victim, they chanted a ghastly hymn, an extract from which illustrates very clearly the theory of sympathetic magic underlying the ritual:—
“As the tears stream from thine eyes,
So may the rain pour down in August;
As the mucus trickles from thy nostrils,
So may it drizzle at intervals;
As thy blood gushes forth,
So may the vegetation sprout;
As thy gore falls in drops,
So may the grains of rice form.”
In another report, Colonel Campbell describes how the miserable victim is dragged along the fields, surrounded by a crowd of half intoxicated Kondhs who, shouting and screaming, rush upon him, and with their knives cut the flesh piecemeal from the bones, avoiding the head and bowels, till the living skeleton, dying from loss of blood, is relieved from torture, when its remains are burnt, and the ashes mixed with the new grain to preserve it from insects. Yet again, he describes a sacrifice which was peculiar to the Kondhs of Jeypore.