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and end of the rains. When the time has come the Gaontia headman or the Baiga priest fetches a branch of the _karma_ tree from the forest and sets it up in his yard as a notice and invitation to the village. After sunset all the people, men, women and children, assemble and dance round the tree, to the accompaniment of a drum known as Mandar. The dancing continues all night, and in the morning the host plucks up the branch of the _karma_ tree and consigns it to a stream, at the same time regaling the dancers with rice, pulse and a goat. This dance is a religious rite in honour of Karam Raja, and is believed to keep sickness from the village and bring it prosperity. The tribe eat flesh, but abstain from beef and pork. Girls are tattooed on arrival at puberty with representations of the _tulsi_ or basil, four arrow-heads in the form of a cross, and the foot-ornament known as _pairi_. Mal _Mal, Male, Maler, Mal Paharia._ [150]--A tribe of the Rajmahal hills, who may be an isolated branch of the Savars. In 1911 about 1700 Mals were returned from the Chota Nagpur Feudatory States recently transferred to the Central Provinces. The customs of the Mals resemble those of the other hill tribes of Chota Nagpur. Sir H. Risley states that the average stature is low, the complexion dark and the figure short and sturdy. The following particulars are reproduced from Colonel Dalton's account of the tribe: "The hill lads and lasses are represented as forming very romantic attachments, exhibiting the spectacle of real lovers 'sighing like furnaces,' and the cockney expression of 'keeping company' is peculiarly applicable to their courtship. If separated only for an hour they are miserable, but there are apparently few obstacles to the enjoyment of each other's society, as they work together, go to market together, eat together, and sleep together! But if it be found that they have overstepped the prescribed limits of billing and cooing, the elders declare them to be out of the pale, and the blood of animals must be shed at their expense to wash away the indiscretion and obtain their readmission into society. "On the day fixed for a marriage the bridegroom with his relations proceeds to the bride's father's house, where they are seated on cots and mats, and after a repast the bride's father takes his daughter's hand and places it in that of the bridegroom, and exhorts him to be loving and kind to the girl that he thus makes ove
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