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)

134 PURIFICATION AFTER THE FUNERAL.

wards, the head to the north, and a sort of pent roof
raised over it composed of logs of wood. On these a
large quantity of ghee was poured, and the whole being
encircled with little heaps of different kinds of grain, fire
was applied to it by the representative of the deceased,
and then by others of the party.

All the females who had attended the funeral remained
on the spot where the bier had been first set down, ex-
cepting the widow of the deceased, who, endeavouring to
approach nearer to the pile, or rather making a show of
doing so, was surrounded by the other relatives, and made
to divest herself of her upper garment and a part of her
jewels. These were thrown on the pile, and a new gar-
ment being given to her, she was escorted back to her
home. After they had remained for some time, and
until the body was nearly consumed, the whole party
returned to the village, and mixing up a little orpi*
and water, sprinkled themselves with it, as a means of
purification.

We understood that the party would return to the
burning place the next morning, for the purpose of
sprinkling a little water on the pile, collecting the bones
of the deceased, and such portion of the metal which had
composed the ornaments as they could find, and putting
the former into an earthen pot, that they would bury it

* The ordure of the cow.