Harkness, Henry: A description of a singular aboriginal race inhabiting the summit of the Neilgherry Hills, or Blue Mountains of Coimbatoor, in the Southern Peninsula of India (London, 1832)

72 HAPPY RE-UNION.

the centre of a small circle which they formed around
her, she was escorted to her father's morrt.

Near relations of different sexes consider it pollution
if even their garments should touch, and the horror which
this young woman expressed, for she was still young and
pretty, at the recollection of her father's attempting to
seize her, and several other circumstances connected with
her return to her husband, gave to the pair a considerable
degree of interest, and left on our minds an impression in
their favour, very different to that which the statements
of the opposite party had made.

The herd, however, was still to be recovered, for with-
out it they were deprived of their principal means of
sustenance. The abundance and richness of their buffaloe
milk would have enabled them to make cheese, and there-
fore to supply themselves with a store of one kind of food
in cases of experiencing any such calamity as the present;
but this none of them seem to have ever thought of
having recourse to ; and as the grain which they receive
from the other tribes, as well as the wild roots and
fruits which they collect, form only supplemental parts of
their diet, when deprived of their kine, they are deprived
of their staple article of sustenance. The herd, however,
as before mentioned, was eventually recovered, and the
gratitude of this now happy pair shewed itself on several
occasions. On one of these, Pinpurz gave us the whole of
his history, a summary of which will be found in the
sequel.