[176] We have heard much about the difficulty of taming these birds. Some go so far as to assert that they pine away and die when deprived of their liberty. The Affghans seem to find nothing hard in the operation, as they use the birds for fighting. They show excellent pluck, and never fail to fight till death, although steel and silver are things unknown.
[177] Seven pounds for a full grown, 5l. for a young animal. When the reward is claimed the tusks must be given up. Tuskers, however, are not often met with in these days.
[178] Every swamp on and about the hills is full of small leeches,—the lake also abounds in them,—which assail your legs, and swarming up the trees, drop down your shirt collar to your extreme annoyance. They are quite useless for medical purposes, as the bite is highly inflammatory.
[179] The Maroo Bungla, or log-house, as the natives call the Avalanche bungalow.
[180] The first name is a corruption of the second, which is derived from Vadacu, “the north,” these people having migrated from that direction.
[181] The worship of the terrible and destructive incarnation of the Deity.
[182] Signifying the “unenlightened or barbarous,” from the Tamul word Erul, darkness.
[183] “Cooroombar,” or “Curumbar,” literally means “wilful, or self-willed.” Sometimes the word mulu, a “thorn,” is prefixed to the genuine name by way of epithet, alluding to the nature of the race.
[184] So Captain Harkness writes the word, remarking, that “as this tribe kill and eat a great deal of beef, it was no doubt intended by their Hindu neighbours that they should be called ‘Gohatars,’ from go, a cow, and hata, slaying.” “Cuv,” in the Toda dialect, means a “mechanic.”
[185] Many of the words have been corrupted, and the pronunciation has become nasal, not guttural, like that of the Todas. The Kothurs can, however, express themselves imperfectly in Canarese.