will smoke, for example, and eat opium. They perhaps, also, have less influence in religious and social matters over other castes than in the south. The lower classes do not make them the ready namaskáram obeisance which is usual in Tanjore, for example, nor is there the same anxiety to follow their social and domestic ceremonies. Nor do the Telugu Bráhmans hold themselves as severely aloof from the upper non-Bráhman castes as in the south. It has already been mentioned that they seldom live in separate quarters in the villages, and they will give a respectable non-Bráhman food in any part of their houses except the kitchen, a piece of latitude which would be most unusual in Tanjore.
Attached to the caste is the beggar community called Vipravinódis ('amusers of Bráhmans'), who are professional sorcerers and jugglers who decline to perform unless some Bráhman is present, and subsist chiefly on alms begged from the members of that caste. Several unconvincing tales are told to account for this odd connection between two such widely differing classes but, as will be seen immediately, several other castes in this district have beggar communities attached particularly to them and in some cases these are declared to consist of their illegitimate descendants.
The Ráazus also stand high in the social scale. They are numerous in the Amalápuram and Rámachandrapuram taluks, and there is a large colony of them in Tuni town. They say they are Kshatriyas, wear the sacred thread, keep their womenkind strictly gósha, have Bráhmanical gótras, decline to eat with other non-Bráhmans, and are divided into the three clans of Súrya (sun), Chandra (moon), and Machi (fish) Rázus, of whom the first claim to be descended from the kings of Oudh, of the same lineage as Ráma; the second, from the kings of Hastinápura, of the same line as the Pándavas; and the third from Hanumán and a mermaid. These subdivisions may eat together, and among the zamindars the first two intermarry. The solar line is the commonest in this district. Written contracts of marriage are exchanged; the wedding is performed in the bride's house; at the pradánam ceremony no bondu (saffron thread) is tied round the bride's neck; the bridegroom has to wear a sword throughout the marriage ceremonies, and he is paraded round the village with it before they begin; and the saffron thread (kankanam) which is tied round the wrists of the couple is of wool and cotton instead of cotton alone.
The Rázus are chiefly employed in cultivation. Their turbans are made to bunch out at the left side above the ear, and one end of them hangs down behind. They do not shave
