182 The " Kols" of Chota-Nagpore. 



certain that he highly appreciates her. Although he is not known 

 to have for her any more endearing epithet than "my old woman," 

 yet by no civilized race are wives treated with more consideration 

 than by the untutored Ho. The whole of the domestic arrange- 

 ments are under her exclusive management. She is consulted on 

 all occasions, and I know one or two husbands whom I am almost 

 inclined to regard as henpecked. The Kols seldom take a second 

 wife during the lifetime of the first, but I know instances of their 

 having done so. The wife always cooks for her husband, and when 

 the dinner is ready, they sit down and eat it together like Christians ; 

 but the Oraons have followed the Hindoo custom of making the 

 woman eat the leavings of her lord. 



It is customary with all these tribes to pay particular attention to 

 omens, when any of them set out to arrange the preliminaries of a 

 marriage. The Hos who are more under the influence of this 

 superstition than their cognates or than the Oraons, have a long list 

 of deterrent signs, which have been described by Tickell in his paper 

 above quoted. I subjoin the most noticeable of those that are observed 

 by the Oraons. 



1.* On leaving the house " to win a bride", they look out for 

 omens. If a cow calls and the calf responds, it is good. If there is no 

 response, the wooing is postponed or abandoned. 



2. If they find a dead mouse on the road, they must stop and 

 make a diagnosis. If ants and flies have possessed themselves of the 

 carcass, it is good, they go on. If the insects appear to have shunned 

 it (which is not very likely to happen), they go back. 



3. It is not good to meet oxen or buffaloes with their horns 

 crossed, or to see a hawk strike a bird, or to come upon women 

 washing clothes. It is good to see people burying a dead body, and 

 to find on their road a cow giving milk to her calf. 



4. If they see a man cutting a tree, and the tree falls before they 

 can get past it, it is very bad. If they pass before it falls, it is all 

 right. A certain bird heard on the left gives a note of joy ; if heard 

 on the right, he is a harbinger of woe. 



5. If, on approaching the village of the girl, they come on women 

 with water-pots full, it is a happy omen. If they meet a party with 

 empty water-pots, it is a bad one, 



