Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 533

FEASTINC4
THE BRAHMINS
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the mourning drink a little of this water, and sprinkles some
drops on their heads. By this means they obtain purifica-
tion from the defilement which they have contracted by
taking part in the funeral ceremonies.
The heir gives to each person present an areca-nut and
a betel-leaf, and to the widow a white cloth, which she
immediately puts on.
Finally, all return to the house of the deceased, where,
after having inspected the lamp, which ought to have been
kept burning all this time on the spot where the deceased
breathed his last, each one takes leave and does not enter
his own house till he has washed his feet at the door.
Being now left alone, the heir takes the five little earthen
pots in which he had sown some seeds on the first day, offers
them puja, and then throws them into the water.
On the eleventh day, as soon as his ablutions are over, he
goes to summon nineteen Brahmins, to whom he first of all
offers a feast to be eaten by proxy for the deceased.
Then
he puts into a basket a large earthen chatty containing two
measures of rice, and into another basket several more
earthen pots of a smaller size. He provides himself with
liquefied butter, gingelly oil, darbha grass, flowers, &c, and,
accompanied by the Brahmins invited, goes to the edge of
the tank.
There he digs a small hole, blesses it with man-
trams, places therein his little earthen pots, and lights a fire.
At the four corners of the hole he places darbha grass and
sprinkles oil all round it.
He spreads some boiled rice on
a plantain leaf, sprinkles it with ghee, and makes it into
thirty-six little balls, which he throws subsequently into the
fire one after the other.
To this fire he makes profound
obeisance, beseeching it to grant the deceased access into
the Abode of Bliss.
He then distributes dasa-dana and
gives the Brahmins some betel.
The latter then go to bathe
themselves, and return to assist in the ceremony of the
deliverance of the bull.
For this purpose a bull three years old is chosen. It must
be all of one colour, either white, red, or black. After
washing it they smear it with sandalwood-paste and akshatas,
decorate it with garlands of flowers, and with a red-hot iron
brand on the right haunch the figure of one of Siva's
weapons called snlah. The chief mourner implores this god