They also carry a kind of battle-axe. They are a brave as well as a warlike people, and are the terror of the inhabitants of the plains. Even the Khonds, who will be presently described, ready as they are to fight among each other, and skilled as they are in the use of the bow and the battle-axe, stand in awe of the Sowrahs, and do not like to be drawn into a quarrel with them. They are especially afraid of these enemies, because the favorite mode of attack with the Sowrahs is to make a raid under cover of night, and, after securing all the plunder they can seize, and doing all the harm in their power, to return to their hill fastnesses as rapidly as they issued from them.
General Campbell thinks that their mode of life may have something to do with this superiority, and that their more abstemious and less dissipated life renders them stronger and more enduring than their self-indulgent neighbors. In some places, Sowrahs and Khonds dwell together in tolerable amity, but both of the tribes, although they may derive their origin from the same source, and both assert themselves to be the aboriginal inhabitants of the land, and to have a right to its possession, preserve their own characteristic differences so rigidly that there is no difficulty in distinguishing a Sowrah from a Khond.
The ceremony of marriage among the Sowrahs, [illustrated] on the following page, is thus described by Mr. Hooper: “A young man, or his friends for him, having selected a bride, messengers are sent to her parents, and finally the young man goes, bearing a pot of toddy, or other present. If the consent of the parents is obtained, the ceremony is commenced by fixing three posts in the ground, between which the bride and bridegroom, with their respective friends, assemble, and a feast is commenced at which nearly every person gets drunk upon toddy.
“The bride and bridegroom sit together, while turmeric water is poured on their heads. Presents of cloth, beads, rings, etc., are exchanged, fowls, and if possible sheep, are sacrificed to propitiate the demons, and the flesh is then cooked, made up into balls with some sort of grain, and distributed among the party. On these occasions they all join in a dance, which seems to consist principally in hopping from one leg to the other, at each movement snapping their fingers and uttering an ejaculation, while at intervals the whole of the dancers come bumping together, and then separate.
“If the parents of the bride refuse to consent to the marriage, it frequently happens that the friends of the bridegroom watch their opportunity, and if the girl is found alone, they seize and carry her off. The relatives of the girl then pursue and attack the opposite party, but, even though successful in retaking her, they are prohibited by their customs from giving her in marriage to any one else. Should such a thing be attempted, the parties would have to fight it out in a more serious manner with bows and arrows.”
(1.) A SOWRAH MARRIAGE.
(See [page 1386].)
(2.) MERIAH SACRIFICE.
(See [page 1391].)