W. L. Samuells — Gond Legend of Baghesar. 
119 
1872.] 
The substance of the above was told me by a Gond of the Tviisru 
clan, at the marriage of whose daughter I was present ; and it was then 
that I witnessed the pranks of the demon Baghesar from which I was led 
to make enquiry as to his antecedents. 
It is only at the marriages of members of the five clans, who are named 
in the heading to this paper, that Baghesar manifests his presence in the 
manner narrated in the story. With them he is held hi reverence as a 
deified spirit ; hut with other Gonds, Baghesar is simply one of the many 
spirits to whom propitiatory offerings are yearly made. According to the 
latter he has no such origin as that ascribed to him by the five clans before- 
mentioned, but is simply regarded as 1 the concentrated essence of spirits’, 
which have issued from those Gonds who have met their deaths by tigers ; 
for, according to local belief, the spirits of all Gonds thus killed, are said 
to unite and form the one great spirit Baghesar ; and it is simply with a 
view to saving their flocks and herds, and their own lives also, from the 
ravages of tigers that the inhabitants of every Gond village yearly make 
offerings to propitiate this demon. And to this extent I find the same 
spirit is known and propitiated by the people of these wild parts generally. 
At the marriage ceremony which I witnessed, Baghesar entered into and 
possessed two men. One was the puj dr ( or priest, and the other a looker 
on. The puj dr i is always told off specially for this duty, in ease none of 
the company should happen to get involuntarily possessed. A woman, on 
the occasion referred to, was also taken worse, but got quickly bundled out 
of the way from motives of public decency. 
The manner in which the two men seized the kid between their teeth 
and by that means killed it, was a sight which could only be equalled in a 
zoological garden or menagerie on feeding days. 
But this exhibition of fiend-like butchery is only allowed to be partially 
witnessed, for, as soon as the kid has been fairly pinned, the members of the 
family who are standing by, throw blankets or cloths over the demoniacs, 
as they say it is a sight not fit for all eyes to behold ; a point which no 
civilized being would be likely to dispute with them. 
The demoniacs I saw, were permitted to exercise their teeth on the 
kid’s carcase some time after it had sounded its last gurgling note : and this 
indulgence, judging from the motions of the covering cloths, was entered 
into with an amount of zest and gusto that was positively brutal ; and from 
an orange-sucking sound that was occasionally audible, a horrid suspicion 
crossed my mind that they had even gone to the extent of blood-sucking, 
though of this I could not be positive. 
The bride’s father at length dragged out the mangled and lifeless body 
of the kid and put it aside ; and the men emerging from their covering 
disported themselves like electrified frogs d la Ghamasan, another gentleman 
