humbled the Pandiyans and assumed the title of Madurantaka 

 (death of the Madura city). Allowing for great exaggeration, 

 the language of the inscriptions shows that even the best days 

 of the ancient dynasties were those of wars and violence, that 

 the ambition of every king was to humble the pride of his 

 neighbours and to spoil their territories, and that these exhaust- 

 ing wars must have entailed on the people an immense amount 

 of misery, which, of course, was borne with patience and 

 resignation, as they had had no experience of a happier condition. 

 Large portions of the country were also covered with jungle or 

 inhabited by tribes hardly reclaimed from savagery. From a 

 letter of a Jesuit missionary, written in the beginning of the 

 18th century, it appears that on the Tinnevelly coast, which is 

 now a fully cultivated and densely populated tract, " a large 

 jungle had for some time past been infested by tigers to such a 

 degree that after sunset no inhabitant of any village situated in 

 its neighbourhood dared to move outside his door. Watch was 

 kept in every village at night and large fires were lighted for 

 the purpose of scaring the monsters away. Even in the day- 

 time travelling was not quite safe, and numbers of people had 

 disappeared who had, without doubt, been seized and devoured 

 in lonely places." The country lying on the outskirts of 

 Trichinopoly town appears to have been covered with jungle 

 and infested by robbers in the middle of the 16th ctntury. 

 The same was the case in the Coimbatore district also. Marau- 

 ders were so numerous that a traveller by night was almost 

 certain to fall into their hands. Wild beasts were so common 

 that one missionary lost thirty of his acquaintances by their 

 ravages within six months. Both in the Pandiya and Chola* 

 countries large tracts were, and still are, inhabited by Kallers, 

 whom Father Martin, who lived in the 18th century in the 

 vicinity of Kaller country, described as more barbarous than 

 any savages in any part of the globe. His assertion is corrobo- 

 rated by Ward and Connor's survey account, which states that 

 ^' a horrible custom exists among the females of the Colleries. 

 When a quarrel or dissension arises between them, the insulted 

 woman brings her child to the house of the aggressor and kills 

 it at her door to avenge herself, although her vengeance is 

 attended with the most cruel barbarity. She- immediately 

 thereafter proceeds to a neighbouring village with- all her 

 . goods, &c. In this attempt she is opposed by her neighbours, 

 which gives rise to clamour and outrage. The complaint is 

 then carried to the head Ombalakar, who lays it before the 

 elders of the village and solicits their interference to terminate 

 the quarrel. In the course of this investigation, if the husband 

 finds that sufficient evidence has been brought against his wif^ 



