Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 3.djvu/240

its mouth. Among certain sections of Lingāyats it is customary, contrary to the usual Hindu practice, to invite the friends and relations, who have come for the funeral, to a banquet, at which the priest is a guest. It is said that the priest, after partaking of food, vomits a portion of it, which is shared by the members of the family. These practices do not seem to be followed by the Chingleput Lingāyats. A second bath is given to the corpse, and then the nine orifices of the body are closed with cotton or cloth. The corpse is then dressed as in life, and, if it be that of a priest, is robed in the characteristic orange tawny dress. Before clothing it, the consecrated cow-dung ashes are smeared over the forehead, arms, chest, and abdomen. The bier is made like a car, such as is seen in temple processions on the occasion of car festivals. To each of its four bamboo posts are attached a plantain tree and a cocoanut, and it is decorated with bright flowers. In the middle of the bier is a wooden plank, on which the corpse is set in a sitting position. The priest touches the dead body three or four times with his right leg, and the funeral cortège, accompanied by weird village music, proceeds to the burial-ground. The corpse, after removal from the bier, is placed in the grave in a sitting posture, facing south, with the linga, which the man had worn during life, in the mouth. Salt, according to the means of the family, is thrown into the grave by friends and relations, and it is considered that a man's life would be wasted if he did not do this small service for a dead fellow-casteman. They quote the proverb " Did he go unserviceable even for a handful of mud?" The grave is filled in, and four lights are placed at the corners. The priest, standing over the head of the corpse, faces the lamps, with branches of Leucas aspera and Vitex Negundo at