GANGETIC HINDOOSTAN. 



enemies at once, and bring home two heads from the fame 

 peifon. 



When the men go to war they go in the night, and make 

 their attack by furprife, and fpare neither women nor children, 

 and always cut off the heads in order to bring them home as tro- 

 phies of vi<5lory. They alfo he in ambiiQi, and wait a length of 

 time in expe6tation of their foes, whom they deftroy without 

 mercy ; but fhould they in either cafe be difcovered, they make 

 a daftardly retreat. When a conqueror returns he is met by 

 his friends and family with favage exultations, with founding 

 conch-fhells and the collilion of plates of metal. The wife and 

 hufband pour fermented liquor alternately into each other's 

 mouths, and he waflies his bloody hands in the liquor they are 

 drinking. There are rewards for bringing home the head of a 

 foe ; if any captive is brought alive, it is the prerogative of a 

 chieftain to take it off his flioulders. 



At weddings and funerals they make a feaft, and kill a 

 Gayal or mountain bullock, or a hog. If at a funeral, they boil 

 the meat, and pour fome of the broth into his mouth, and tafle 

 forae of the fame liquor as an offering to his foul ; this they 

 repeat feveral days. After wrapping the body in a fort of 

 fhroud, they place it on a ftage with a fire beneath, pierce it with 

 a fpit and dry it, cover it with two or three folds of cloth, in- 

 elofe it in a cafe, and bury it, and like more civilized people 

 fcatter fruits and flowers over the grave. 



The food of the Cuci is the flefh of elephants, hogs, deer, or Food of. 



3 B 2u other 



371 



