Note 193 — K (continued 5)

“It may,” Mr. Walhouse writes, “be noted that the Koragars alone of all the slave or other castes eat the flesh of alligators (crocodiles), and they share with one or two other divisions of the slaves a curious scruple or prejudice against carrying any four-legged animal, dead or alive. This extends to anything with four legs, such as chairs, tables, cots, etc., which they cannot be prevailed upon to lift unless one leg be removed. As they work as coolies, this sometimes produces inconvenience. A somewhat similar scruple obtains among the Bygas of Central India, whose women are not allowed to sit or lie on any four-legged bed or stool.” Like the Koragas, the Bākudas of South Canara “will not carry a bedstead unless the legs are first taken off, and it is said that this objection rests upon a supposed resemblance between the four-legged cot and the four-legged ox.”193