Note 87 — Volume II.

Disposal of the dead. 20. No one is allowed to die in the house. The bodies of the dead are carried on a bier to a neighbouring stream, where they are placed on a pyre, the head north and the feet south. The nearest relative of the dead person walks five times round the pyre, and first scorching the mouth of the corpse with a grass torch sets light to the pyre. Leaving it burning, the man who fired the pyre with his friends goes and bathes. When they return to the house they sit in the courtyard, and one man with a wisp of grass sprinkles water on their feet out of an earthen pot. Then they sit in silence for an hour round the chief mourner, and as they go away wash their hands in a mixture of sugar and water. The next morning the chief mourner collects the bones and ashes and consigns them to a neighbouring stream. From that time until the tenth day he keeps aloof from every one, cooks for himself, and does not sleep on a bed. He eats only once a day. Each time before he eats he lays out food for the spirit of the dead along the road by which the corpse was carried to cremation.87 On the tenth day the clansmen assemble at a tank and shave their heads. Thence they go to the house of the deceased, where a goat is sacrificed in the name of the deceased, some liquor is poured on the ground, and the meat is boiled with rice and eaten. They have no srâddha ceremony, and no Brâhman or Mahâbrâhman officiates at the funeral ceremony, nor are any spells (mantra) or verses recited.