IN SUM ATM A, 



219 



after which they letimied, preceded by an old female relative 

 of the bridegroom, who spread cloths before them all the way 

 to a spot iu the centre of the village. Here a couple of matis 

 a little distance apart, had been placed, on the one of which 

 the bridegroom and his relatives, and on the other the bride 

 and hers, seated themselves, each with their umbrolla and 

 siri-l.K)X before them. During the intervals of music that 

 attended the ceremony, the yontha of the bridegroom's pirty 

 pelted, as if slily and clandestinely, with handiiils of yellowed 

 rice the bride and her attendant maidens, who retnrned 

 the compliment, while the fowls were enticed to pick up the 

 grains that fell on the ground. This was supposed to lie an 

 invocation to the Dewa to bless the union and grant sufiieient 

 food, with at least a superabundance for the fowls to pick 

 up* The t)ld relative made various inquiries at both parties : 

 " Will he have this woman?'* "Will she have this m^ln?*' 

 When the "I will ! " had been publicly mhl and returned in 

 the IVice of the village, she presented a lump of rice to the 

 bride who took a bite, and the rest she placed in the mouth 

 of the bridegroom— in token that the wife was to have the 

 same board as her husband. After sitting for an honr or 

 so in the face of the village, to make brother's with all tho 

 inhabitants, and as an advertisement of their new relations, 

 the procession continued its way to the house of the bride- 

 groom, where a feast was provided. The closing act of the 

 ceremony was the removal by the husband of all his wife's 

 ornaments and jewels, which she could never again resume 

 unless sho wished to commit that supreme crime in the eves 

 of her husband, of appearing to wish that she were a imviden 

 again. 



All day long the boys used to amuse themselves under my 

 window with a game called Lepar , that interested me nuieh 

 partly from the nu-ity of games among the ehihlren, as well as 

 from the enthusiastic manner in which they played it. Each 

 player, furniahe<l with a quoit-shaped disk cut out of a cocoanut 

 shell, |>layed forward from a stance, so as to sti-ike either one or 

 (according to the number of players) more disks arranged on 

 the ground some forty or fifty feet distant. Each played in 

 succession ; his turn continuing after his first three shots, till 

 he failed to drive his own against any of the goal disks, Tho 



