14 Migratory Tribes of [No. 145. 



a trade of her charms, and too stiff to take a part in the athletic 

 exhibitions. Two or three hundred rupees are expended in marrying 

 a young wife ; but the ceremonies for the older women are completed 

 in a day, and cost only ten or twelve rupees. Yet, notwithstanding 

 this mode of life, they are not unprolific, my informant having seen 

 five, six, seven, and even eight children born of one woman who had 

 been devoted in her infancy to the gods. 



They never eat the hog, the cow, the bullock, or the horse. They 

 call themselves Mahrattas, but their religion seems essentially different 

 from the Hindus aroundthem. They own attachment to none of the 

 three great divisions of the brahminical faith, and when asked whom 

 they worship, they reply, " Narayan," the Spirit of God ; but the 

 particular object the Bhatoo pays his devotions to is the bamboo, with 

 which all their feats are performed. At the village of Thekoor, near 

 Kittoor, the shrine of the goddess Karewa has been erected on the 

 summit of a hill, around the base of which dense forests of bamboo 

 grow. One they select, and the attendants of the temple consecrate 

 it. It is now called " Gunnichari" (Chief,) and receives their worship 

 annually. To it, as to a human chief, all respect is shewn ; and in 

 cases of marriage, of disputes requiring arbitration, or the occurrence 

 of knotty points demanding consultation, the gunnichari is erected 

 in the midst of the counsellors or arbiters, and all prostrate themselves 

 to it before commencing the discussion of the subject before them. The 

 Bhatoos do not keep idols. 



All the dead are buried ; when they consign one of their people to 

 the earth, they place rice and oil at the head of the grave, and stand 

 near to watch what creature comes to eat it, drawing the happiest 

 omen of the state of the departed from the crow visiting the spot. 



THE MUDDIKPOR. 



Many names have been given to the migratory people we are now 

 noticing ; Keeli Katr, or Kootaboo, Kublgira or ferryman, Koli, and 

 Barkur, are those most usually employed; but Muddikpor is the 

 designation they apply to themselves. They are generally tall and 

 powerful men, with an olive-yellow complexion, and are now very 

 numerous throughout India. They say their original locality was 

 the village of Talicot, near Sorapore, and that however far they be 



