MARITAL JEALOUSY 169 



Reference has been made on an earlier page to the 

 Kolarian tribes. Among these tribes the agricultural 

 festivals are marked by an outburst of sexual licence. 

 The Oraons celebrate in the spring a sacred marriage, 

 like that of the Leti Islanders, " at which all shame 

 and morality are laid aside." If not to the Santals, 

 the same licence is imputed in an extreme form to the 

 Hos. The Larka-Kols offer sacrifices in January to a 

 bhut or demon called Deswali, winding up with un- 

 bridled saturnalia. 1 Among the Chingpaw of Upper 

 Burmah twice a year there is a general holiday and 

 feasting which is the occasion of much debauchery 

 and licentiousness. Apart from these festivals the 

 Chingpaw displays no narrow and puritanical morality. 

 In the last chapter we saw that no marriage takes 

 place without previous intercourse. The dwelling- 

 houses are from one hundred and fifty to two hundred 

 feet long, and are built to accommodate more than one 

 family. The young men and women have separate 

 rooms ; but as no restraint is laid on their movements 

 they frequently pass the night in each other's quarters. 

 The result is that illegitimacy is very prevalent. It is 

 not considered a disgrace for an unmarried woman to 

 be a mother. The father of her child is not bound to 

 marry her, unless he have been formally betrothed to 

 her ; and he is only called on to support her until the 

 child is a month old. An effort, however, is always 

 made to get a pregnant girl married to the father of 

 her child ; but a woman thinks it no shame to forsake 

 her lover and marry some one else. Nor does the fact 

 requires further consideration than is possible to give here. See 

 Mayne, 123; Ind. Census, 1901, xx. 170, 174; xxvi. 280, 288, 



3<>7 337- 



1 Hahn, Kolsmission, 92, 99. 



