nfavourable and the gall bladder must not
be over full. Invocations to deduce omens from the appearance of
the entrails are quoted on page 11 of Col. Bivar's Report. From the
first invocation quoted by him it appears that the method of drawing
the augury from the fowl differs slightly in detail from that which
has been described to me by certain Khasis, but both descriptions
agree in the main, and the slight dissimilarity in detail may be due
to the methods of obtaining auguries varying slightly in different
localities. Divination by breaking eggs and by other means, although
not strictly sacrifice with the Khasis, partakes of the nature of a
religious ceremony. Such divinations are of almost every-day occurrence
in a Khasi house, and always precede sacrifices. The Khasis, moreover,
do nothing of what they consider to be of even the least importance
without breaking eggs. When a Khasi builds a new house, or before
he proceeds on a journey, he always breaks eggs to see whether the
building or the journey will be lucky or not. The description of
egg-breaking given by Shadwell in his account of the Khasis is not
altogether correct. A detailed description of this method of divination
will be found in Appendix C. The description can be depended upon,
as it is the result of my personal observations of egg-breaking on
several occasions. A board of the shape shown in the diagram (Appendix
C) is placed on the ground, the egg-breakers' position being that
indicated in the diagram. After the egg has been smeared with red
earth, it is thrown violently down and the contents and the fragments
of egg-shell fall on the board. Auguries are drawn from the positions
of the fragments of shell on the board, and from the fact of their
lying with the inner sides facing upwards or downwards. Another method
of egg-breaking is for the diviner to wrap up the egg in a plantain
leaf with the point uppermost, or merely to hold the egg in his hand
in this position without wrapping it up, and then to press another
egg down upon it. If the end of the egg so pressed breaks at once,
this is a good sign, but if it remains unbroken, the egg has a god
in it, and the omen is bad.

A common method of divination is by means of the _shanam_, or
lime-case. The diviner holds the lime-case by the end of its chain,
and addresses the god. He then asks the lime-case a question, and if
it swings, this is supposed to be an answer in the affirmative; if
it does not mov