autumn and spring crops. In Wardha he gets 50 lbs. of grain per plough
of four bullocks or 40 acres. For new implements he must either be
paid separately or at least supplied with the iron and charcoal. In
Districts where the Barhai or carpenter is a village servant he is
paid the same as the Lohar and has practically an equal status. The
village barber receives in Saugor 20 lbs. of grain annually from each
adult male in the family, or 22 1/2 lbs. per plough of land besides
the seasonal presents. In return for this he shaves each cultivator
over the head and face about once a fortnight. The Dhobi or washerman
gets half the annual contribution of the blacksmith and carpenter, with
the same presents, and in return for this he washes the clothes of the
family two or three times a month. When he brings the clothes home he
also receives a meal or a wheaten cake, and well-to-do families give
him their old clothes as a present. The Dhimar or waterman brings water
to the house morning and evening, and fills the earthen water-pots
placed on a wooden stand or earthen platform outside it. When the
cultivators have marriages he performs the same duties for the whole
wedding party, and receives a present of money and clothes according to
the means of the family, and his food every day while the wedding is
in progress. He supplies water for drinking to the reapers, receiving
three sheaves a day as payment, and takes sweet potatoes and boiled
plums to the field and sells them. The Kumhar or potter is not now paid
regularly by dues from the cultivators like other village menials,
as the ordinary system of sale has been found to be more convenient
in his case. But he sometimes takes for use the soiled grass from
the stalls of the cattle and gives pots free to the cultivator in
exchange. On Akti day, at the beginning of the agricultural year,
the village Kumhar in Saugor presents five pots with covers on them
to each cultivator and is given 2 1/2 lbs. of grain. He presents the
bride with seven new pots at a wedding, and these are filled with
water and used in the ceremony, being considered to represent the
seven seas. At a funeral he must supply thirteen vessels which are
known as _ghats_, and must replace the household earthen vessels,
which are rendered impure on the occurrence of a death in the house,
and are all broken and thrown away. In the Punjab and Maratha country
the Kumhar was formerly an ordinary village menial.

27.