1890.] P. N. Bose — Chhattisgar : notes on its tribes, sects and castes. 277 
of the creation of the world and of the Gonds. It presents a very life- 
like picture of the primitive condition of the Gonds. When they were 
born. 
“ Hither and thither all the Gonds were seattered in the 
jungle ; 
Places, hills and valleys, were filled with the Gonds. 
Even trees had their Gonds. How did the Gonds conduct them- 
selves ? 
Whatever comes across them, they must needs kill and eat it ; 
They made no distinction. If they saw a jackal they killed 
And ate it; no distinction was observed; they respected not ante- 
lope, sambar and the like. 
They made no distinction in eating a sow, a quail, a pigeon, 
A crow, a kite, an adjutant, a vulture. 
A lizard, a frog, a beetle, a cow, a calf, a he- and she-buffalo. 
Rats, bandicoots, squirrels — all these they killed and ate. 
So began the Gonds to do. They devoured raw and ripe things ; 
They did not bathe for six months together ; 
They did not wash their faces properly, even on dunghills they 
would fall down and remain. 
Such were the Gonds born in the beginning. 
A smell was spread over the jungles. 
When the Gonds were thus disorderly behaved. 
They became disagreeable to Mahadeva, 
Who said ; “ The caste of the Gonds is very bad ; 
I will not preserve them, they will ruin my hill Dhavalagiri ; 
I perceive here and there smells.’ ” 
In a note on this passage, the editor observes : “ This somewhat 
sarcastic description .... of the habits of the Gonds is probably of 
Hindu origin.” But, the description is not at all sarcastic ; nor is it 
even exaggerated. I have personal experience of Gonds whose habits 
are exactly the same as those so vividly depicted in the above jiassage. 
In fact, the present normal condition of the Gonds living in jungles is 
not far different from the primitive condition described in it. 
The song then goes on to relate how for their misbehaviour all the 
Gonds except four were imprisoned by Mahadeva. The four Gonds who 
escaped the fate of their brethren, 
“ travelled onward over hills. 
Thence they went and saw a tree rising upright as a date tree, which 
they climbed and looked about. 
They said: ‘There is no hiding place for U8,' 
K E 
