Note 44 — Chapter VII · TREE AND SERPENT WORSHIP.
Reading edition
The Nāg panchmi is observed as a vrat or vow, generally by women. They do not take any meal on this day, but live only on kulera. On this day, her Highness the Mahārāni of Baroda, mounted on an elephant, goes in procession to the woods to worship an ant-hill. The pipers who accompany the procession blow their pipes, and allured by the sound, the snakes come out of their holes, when they are worshipped and fed with milk.44