170 Shells as evidence of the Migrations. 
Thurston™ also cites a curious custom among the Chettis 
(traders) of Southern India of unmarried girls wearing a 
necklace of the money-cowry and beads, it being “ unusual 
for unmarried girls to wear any badge of their condition.” 
This association of cowries with the unmarried is of great 
interest in view of a somewhat similar custom in East 
Africa, to which reference is made on another page. 
Thurston further states that “when a Hasalara or Hasala 
(forest tribe) of Mysore dies, somebody's evil spirit is 
credited with the mishap, and an astrologer is consulted 
to ascertain its identity, He throws cowry (Crpr@a 
moneta) shells or rice for divination, and mentions the 
name of some neighbour as the owner of the devil. There- 
upon the spirit of the dead is redeemed by the heir or 
relative by means of a pig, fowl, or other guerdon,” 
( Thurston, of. cit, pp. 164-5). 
Turning to Ceylon we find that Hildburgh, in his 
“Notes on Sinhalese Mayic,”'” states that cowries are 
worn as amulets by infants. This same writer also gives 
illustrations (pl. xi.) of masks worn by devil-dancers in 
which sometimes the upper, or both upper and lower, 
teeth are formed of cowry-shells. Culin, in his “ Chess 
and Playing-Cards,”'” describes a cowry game, Kawadi 
Kelia, in which cowries of different kinds are used as men, 
each player also having three cowries as dice. This game 
is clearly related to the Hindu game of Pachisi, also 
played with cowries. The shells are thrown as dice and 
the counts are according as the apertures fall uppermost 
or not. “The game of Pachisi,” says Culin, “may be 
'®8 E. Thurston, ** Ethnographic Notes in Southern India,” Madras, 
1906, p. 68; In his article on ‘* Some Marriage Customs in Southern India” 
(Madras Govt. Mus. Bulletin, vol, iv., No. 3, 1903, p. 155), Thurston gives 
the species as Cyfrwa arabica. 
19% Journ, Kh. Anthrop. Lust., vol. 35 (1908), p. 193. 
4° Keport U.S. Nat. Mus,, for 1896 (1898), pp. 851-4. 
