Many Kaikōlan families have now abandoned their hereditary employment as weavers in favour of agriculture and trade, and some of the poorer members of the caste work as cart-drivers and coolies. At Coimbatore some hereditary weavers have become cart-drivers, and some cart-drivers have become weavers de necessité in the local jail.
In every Kaikōlan family, at least one girl should be set apart for, and dedicated to temple service. And the rule seems to be that, so long as this girl or her descendants, born to her or adopted, continue to live, another girl is not dedicated. But, when the line becomes extinct, another girl must be dedicated. All the Kaikōlans deny their connection with the Dēva-dāsi (dancing-girl) caste. But Kaikōlans freely take meals in Dāsi houses on ceremonial occasions, and it would not be difficult to cite cases of genuine Dāsis who have relationship with rich Kaikōlans.
Kaikōlan girls are made Dāsis either by regular dedication to a temple, or by the headman tying the tāli (nāttu pottu). The latter method is at the present day adopted because it is considered a sin to dedicate a girl to the god after she has reached puberty, and because the securing of the requisite official certificate for a girl to become a Dāsi involves considerable trouble.
"It is said," Mr. Stuart writes,*[1] "that, where the head of a house dies, leaving only female issue, one of the girls is made a Dāsi in order to allow of her working like a man at the loom, for no woman not dedicated in this manner may do so."
Of the orthodox form of ceremonial in connection with a girl's initiation as a Dāsi, the following account
- ↑ * op. cit.
