The Holi : a Vernal Festival of the Hindus. 6 1
Sometimes certain things, regarded as " offerings," — a theory which, as I shall try to show later on, seems to be mistaken, — are thrown into the fire. Thus, in the Raigarh District, at the Holi feast, the village headman takes a hen, seven eggs, twenty-one cowry shells, — seven being a mystic number, — and some rice to the place where the fire is to be lighted, and there buries these things in a hole about a foot deep, and on the top of them plants a branch of the castor- oil plant. It is not stated that the fire is built up round the branch, but, from parallel instances, this is probably the case.-^ From many reports of such " offerings " they seem to be in the nature of firstfruits. Thus, in the Madras District of Nellore, a fire is lighted in every village, on which a cake is placed, and the right of bringing this is regarded as an honourable privilege.-- The Ramoshis, a forest tribe in the Deccan, light a small heap of cow-dung cakes before each house, in the middle of which is set a small piece of sugar-cane, a copper coin, and five pieces of dried coco kernel.23 In Sambalpur, in the Central Provinces, the Mahalgundi or Gundikai festival is held at the full moon of the month Phalguna, the date of the Holi in North India. On that day, for the first time, people eat new gram, the fruit of the mango, and, among the lower classes, the viahua {Bassia latifolia) flowers, just as new rice is eaten at the Nuakhia festival, later in the year. These foods are eaten by the male members of the family, sitting together, facing eastwards. Some of the new food is offered to the family and village god. The Gonds of the same District offer fruits to their god, Burha Deo ; this is an offering of first- fruits, and takes place at the time of the Holi.-* Among the Pavras, a forest tribe in Bombay, every one brings a piece of bread, some rice, and a cock ; portions of these are
-^ Chhatisgarh Feudatory States Gazetteer (1909), vol. i, p. 171. — Nellore District Manual (1873), p. 195. ^Bombay Gazetteer, vol. xviii. (1885), Part, i., p. 414. "^Sambalpur Gazetteer (1909), vol. i., p. 87 et seq.
