Note 7 — APPENDIX I

The second day we wished to start at dawn, but we met fifteen or sixteen men of that village coming by the road we were to pursue, all armed, and they told us that there were three elephants in the way, so we waited until nine o’clock and in the meantime the elephants sought their pasture. This second day we supped at the foot of a very high mountain over which our road lay, and as there was no village and there were elephants about, after supper we climbed part of the mountain and slept there. After midnight we climbed nearly all the rest of the mountain by moonlight, with great labour and fatigue. On reaching the summit other great mountains appeared, and others beyond them, at which we were all astounded, for some of them were so steep that we were obliged to descend in a sitting posture. When the Errari found himself on these mountains, he said that God was punishing him for his sins, and that going up and down such mountains would shorten their lives by ten years. The chatim, our guide, looking down from a mountain, said that merely looking down dazzled his eyes, and so said the Naires on other occasions in similar circumstances. But I could not restrain my laughter, and began singing hymns in Malabar against pagodas, whereupon the others laughed too, and joined in the hymns. It was now noon, and we had still another mountain to climb before reaching the village of the Badagas, neighbours of the Thodares, but we were so tired that we could go no further. We wished to dine, and there was very good cold water flowing from a mountain, but we had no fire. The Errari offered to go up with the Brahmin and to send us down a light. I would not suffer him to take so much trouble, nor was it necessary, for the chatim, our guide, struck fire from two twigs, and thereupon everyone sat down to rest, cooking his rice meanwhile. When we had rested we climbed the mountain and reached the village of the Badegas. It is a village of 150 to 200 souls, called Meleuntaõ.7 The Cacenar is reported to have visited it. Here we found the chief of the Todeos and spoke with him. He promised to go and assemble the rest, that we might speak to them. In this village they have fowls, cows, goats, rice, lentils, mustard seed, garlick, and honey. They brought me some wheat in the husk, which was very difficult to remove, and therefore it seemed to me more like barley or some other grain than wheat. The Badagos are like the Malabars, and they say there are two other villages like this in these mountains, four, five, and six leagues distant from each other. These trade with the Thodares and sell them rice, buying buffalo butter from them, which they carry to Manaracathe for sale. The next day I wished to discourse to these Badagas concerning our law. I showed them the pictures of Our Lady of St. Luke, telling them that the child was God, who became man to teach us his law and save us. I showed them a gilt Bible and told them that it was the book of our law, and as they all surrounded me, I went up into a high place and the Errari with me. I spoke in Malabar and the Errari interpreted in Canara, which is their language. A Badaga who understood Malabar could not contain himself, but came up to where I was and spoke to me in Topas.8 Then I taught him that the law given to us by the God made man was contained in ten commandments, &c., and they all rejoiced at the ten commandments and their explanation. Only at the sixth9 commandment the Topas Badaga represented to me that the Malabars also had many wives. I told him that this law was not the law of the Malabars, but of God, and that they did wrong in having many wives, whereupon he was satisfied. Finally I told him that I had not come to teach the Thodares only, but them also if they would accept this law. They replied that the law was very good, but they did not dare adopt it, neither could I live in these barren mountains, &c. I make no doubt that if a priest were there they would all be converted. While I was in this village of Melentaõ the priest of the Thodares came thither, but he remained outside the village, for he may not touch a woman. I went to see him and found him seated on the ground with seven or eight others seated near him. He was a huge man, well proportioned, with a long beard and hair like a Nazarene falling on his shoulders, the front hair drawn back over his head, leaving his forehead uncovered. His dress was a shawl from the waist to the knees, and the rest of his body was naked; he held a sickle in his hand. When I had come up to him and sat down, he asked me how I was; I replied that I was well and all the better for meeting him, for it proved to me that God was my guide, since I had come from so far to see the Thodares and immediately met with their chief. He asked the purpose of my coming. I replied that I had come to see the Thodares, having heard that we were of the same race and laws, and that last year one of our people visited them and gave us a very good account of them. I asked him if they knew from whom they were descended. He said no, and thereupon would have taken leave of us. Then I said that it was not right to wish to leave us so soon, since we had come so far solely to visit them, and upon this he remained. Then I inquired of those around who he was, and what was his office. They replied that he was called Pallem and was like the Belicha Paro among the Malabars. Belichaparo is he who takes care of the pagoda, and sometimes the devil enters into him, and he trembles and rolls upon the ground, and answers questions put to him in the name of the pagoda. I asked if the Thodares had pagodas; they replied that they had a live buffalo cow for a pagoda, and they hung a bell round its neck, and the Pallem offered it milk every day, and then let it loose in the fields to graze with the rest. And every month or thereabouts, the Pallem seizes the buffalo by the horns and trembles, saying that the buffalo bids them change the pasture, and thereupon they change their place and pasture. By the milk and butter of this buffalo and that of its children and grandchildren, which already reach 120, this Pallem is maintained. On this mountain where I was there were 100 Thodares,10 and they had three pallems between them, each having his buffalo for a pagoda. When the buffalo dies the Thodares assemble, choose one of these hundred, tie the bell round its neck, and it becomes a pagoda. Besides the buffalo they have 300 pagodas to whom they also make offerings of milk. I asked him why he carried the sickle in his hand, and he replied that God commanded him to carry no other arm or stick but only that sickle. He used it to scratch his head, which was swarming with lice, and they could be seen crawling among his hair. I asked if he was married; he answered that he and his younger brother were married to the same woman, but as he might not touch a woman in the house she always lived with his brother, but he sent for her into the bush every week or so, when it was a fine day. And when he liked he sent for any of the wives of the Thodares whom he chose, and the husbands allowed it so long as he paid them. I asked if they had books and he said no; none of them can read or write. He also told me that they had a father whom God took up to heaven, body and soul, and the buffaloes looked up to heaven after him, and that was why they made offerings to the buffaloes. At last I gave him one of the looking-glasses from Calicut, with which he was very pleased and said he would give it to his wife. Then I took leave of him, after showing him the pictures and Bible, at which he wondered. Besides this pallem they have another whom they call Ferral,11 who is present when they give the buffaloes salt water, and he trembles, bidding them give them drink, and they will give much milk, and grow fat, and give butter in plenty, &c.