wrists. The following saying shows that the second marriage of widows
is looked upon as quite natural and normal by the cultivating castes:

"If the clouds are like partridge feathers it will rain, and if a
widow puts lamp-black on her eyes she will marry again; these things
are certain." [60]

A bachelor marrying a widow must first go through the ceremony with
a ring which he thereafter wears on his finger, and if it is lost he
must perform a funeral ceremony as if a wife had died. If a widower
marries a girl she must wear round her neck an image of his first
wife. A girl who is twice married by going round the sacred post is
called Chandelia and is most unlucky. She is considered as bad or
worse than a widow, and the people sometimes make her live outside
the village and forbid her to show them her face. Divorce is open to
either party, to a wife on account of the impotency or ill-treatment
of her husband, and to a husband for the bad character, ill-health
or quarrelsome disposition of his wife. A deed of divorce is executed
and delivered before the caste committee.

12. Impurity of women

During her periodical impurity, which lasts for four or five days, a
woman should not sleep on a cot. She must not walk across the shadow
of any man not her husband, because it is thought that if she does
so her next child will be like that man. Formerly she did not see
her husband's face for all these days, but this rule was too irksome
and has been abandoned. She should eat the same kind of food for the
whole period, and therefore must take nothing special on one day which
she cannot get on other days. At this time she will let her hair hang
loose, taking out all the cotton strings by which it is tied up. [61]
These strings, being cotton, have become impure, and must be thrown
away. But if there is no other woman to do the household work and she
has to do it herself, she will keep her hair tied up for convenience,
and only throw away the strings on the last day when she bathes. All
cotton things are rendered impure by her at this time, and any cloth
or other article which she touches must be washed before it can be
touched by anybody else; but woollen cloth, being sacred, is not
rendered impure, and she can sleep on a woollen blanket without its
thereby becoming a defilement to other persons. When bathing at the
end of the period a woman should see no other face but her husband's;
but as her husband is usually not presen