4. Occupation and

social status.

his visitor's feet. A bride-price of about Rs. 20 is usually paid, which is increased somewhat if the bridegroom is a widower, and decreased if the bride has been seduced before marriage. The marriage is performed by throwing coloured rice over the couple. Divorce and the remarriage of widows are permitted. A bachelor who marries a widow must first go through the ceremony with an arka or swallowwort plant, this being considered his real marriage. The Injhwārs usually bury the dead, and in accordance with Dravidian custom place the corpse in the grave with the feet to the north. When the body is that of a young girl, the face is left exposed as it is carried to the grave. The regular ceremonies are performed for the welfare of the deceased's soul, and they try to ascertain its fate in the next incarnation by spreading flour on the ground overnight and looking in the morning for anything resembling the footmark of a human being, animal or bird. On the festival of Akhātīj and in the month of Kartik (October) they offer libations to the dead, setting out a large pitcher of water for a male and a small one for a female. On the former they paint five lines of sandalwood to represent a man's caste-mark, and on the latter five splashes of kunku or the red powder which women rub on their foreheads. A burning lamp is placed before the pitchers, and they feed a male Māli or gardener as representative of a dead man and a female for a woman.

The Injhwārs are generally labourers and cultivators, while the Sonjharias wash for gold. The women of the Maratha or Chandewār subcaste serve as midwives. Their social status is low, and in the forest tracts they will eat snakes and crocodiles, and in fact almost anything except beef. They will admit members of the Brāhman, Dhimar (waterman), Māli and Gowāri castes into the community on payment of a premium of five to fifteen rupees and a dinner to the caste-fellows. The candidate for admission, whether male or female, must have his head shaved clean. Both men and women can obtain pardon for a liaison with an outsider belonging to any except the most impure castes by giving a feast to the community. To be beaten with a shoe involves temporary excommunication from caste, unless the

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striker be a Government official, when no penalty is inflicted. If a man kills a cat, he is required to have an image of it made in silver, which, after being worshipped, is presented to a temple or thrown into a river.

1

Jādam.1-A branch of the well-known Yādu or Yadava sept of Rājpūts which has now developed into a caste in the Nerbudda valley. Colonel Tod describes the Yādu as the most illustrious of all the tribes of India, this name having been borne by the descendants of Buddha, progenitor of the Lunar race. The Yadavas were the herdsmen of Mathura, and Krishna was born in this tribe. His son was Bhārat, from whom the classical name of Bhāratavārsha for India is held to be derived. It is related that when Krishna was about to ascend to heaven, he reflected that the Yadavas had multiplied exceedingly and would probably cause trouble to the world after he had left it. So he decided to reduce their numbers, and one day he persuaded one of his companions to dress up as a pregnant woman in jest, and they took him to the hermitage of the saint Durvāsa and asked the saint to what the woman would give birth. Durvāsa, who was of a very irascible temper, divined that he was being trifled with, and replied that a rice-pestle would be born by which the Yadavas would be destroyed. On the return of the party they found to their astonishment that a pestle had actually, as it were, been born from the man. So they were alarmed at the words of the saint and tried to destroy the pestle by rubbing it on a stone. But as the sawdust of the pestle fell on the ground there sprang up from it the shoots of the Gondla or Elephant grass, which grows taller than the head of a man on horseback. And some time afterwards a quarrel arose among the Yadavas, and they tore up the stalks of this grass and slew each other with it. Only one woman escaped, whose son was afterwards the King of Mathura and the ancestor of the existing tribe. Another body, however, with whom was Krishna, fled to Gujarat, and on the coast there built the great temple of Dwarka, in the place known as Jagat Khant

1 This article is partly based on a paper by Bihari Lal, Patwari, of Hoshangabad.

or the World's End. The story has some resemblance to that of the sowing of the dragon's teeth by Cadmus at Thebes. The principal branches of the Yadavas are the Yaduvansi chiefs of Karauli, in Rājputana, and the Bhatti chiefs of Jaisalmer. The Jādams of Hoshangābād say that they immigrated from Karauli State about 700 years ago, having come to the country on a foray for plunder and afterwards settled here. They have now developed into a caste, marrying among themselves. In Hoshangābād the caste has two subdivisions, the Kachhotia who belong principally to the Sohagpur tahsil, and the Adhodias who live in Seoni and Harda. These two groups are endogamous and do not marry with each other. The Kachhotia are the offspring of irregular unions and are looked down upon by the others. They say that they have fifty-two exogamous groups or sections, but this number is used locally as an expression of indefinite magnitude. All the sections appear to be named after villages where their ancestors once lived, but the preference for totemism has led some of the groups to connect their names with natural objects. Thus the designation of the Semaria section may be held to be derived from a village of that name, both on account of its form, and because the other known section-names are taken from villages. But the Semaria Jādams have adopted the semar or cotton-tree as their totem and pay reverence to this.1

Infant-marriage is favoured in the caste, and polygamy is also prevalent. This is often the case among the agricultural castes, where a man will marry several wives in order to obtain their assistance in his cultivation, a wife being a more industrious and reliable worker than a hired servant. No penalty is, however, imposed for allowing a girl to reach adolescence before marriage, and this not infrequently happens. If a girl becomes with child through a man of the caste she is united to him by a simple rite known as gunda, in which she merely gives him a ring or throws a garland of flowers over his neck. A caste feast is

1 Semaria is a common name of villages, and is of course as such derived from the semar tree, but the argument is that the Jādams took the name from the village and not from the tree.

Totem is perhaps rather a strong word for the kind of veneration paid; the vernacular term used in Bombay is devak.

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also exacted, and the couple are then considered to be married. The remarriage of widows is permitted, but it is known by the opprobrious name of Kukar-gauna or 'dog-marriage,' signifying that it is held to be little or no better than a simple illicit connection. Divorce is also somewhat common in the caste, notwithstanding that the person who occupies the position of co-respondent must repay to the husband the expenses incurred by him on the marriage ceremony. Some women are known to have had ten or twelve husbands. The Jādams are proprietors, tenants and labourers, and are reckoned to be efficient cultivators; they plough with their own hands and allow their women to work in the fields. They will also eat food cooked with water in the field, which is against the practice of the higher castes. They eat flesh, including that of the wild pig, and fish, but abstain from liquor, and will take food cooked with water only from Jijhotia or Sanādhya Brāhmans who are their family priests. A Brāhman will take water from the hands of a Jādam in a metal, but not in an earthen, vessel. Boys are invested with the sacred thread at the time of their wedding, a common practice among the higher agricultural castes, and one pointing to the hypothesis suggested in the article on Gurao that the investiture with the sacred thread was in its origin a rite of puberty. The women wear a peculiar dress know as sawang, consisting of a small skirt of about six feet of cloth and a long body-cloth wrapped round the waist and over the shoulders. They also have larger spangles on the forehead than other women. The women of the caste are emancipated to an unusual degree, and it is stated that they commonly accompany their husbands to market for shopping, to prevent them from being cheated. Dr. Hunter describes the Jādam as a brave soldier, but a bad agriculturist; but in the Central Provinces his courage is rated less highly, and a proverb quoted about him is: 'Patta khatka, Jādam satka,' or 'The Jādam trembles at the rustle of a leaf.'

Jādua-, Jāduah-Brahman.'-This is the name of a

1 This article is based on an account of the Jāduas by Mr. A. Knyvett,

Superintendent of Police, Patna, and kindly communicated by Mr. C. W. C.

class of swindlers, who make money by pretending to turn other metals into gold or finding buried treasure. They are believed to have originated from the caste of Bhadris or Jyotishis, the astrologers of western India. The Jyotishi or Joshi astrologers are probably an offshoot of the Brahman caste. The name Jādua is derived from jādu, magic. The Bhadris or Jyotishis were in former times, Mr. Knyvett writes, attached to the courts of all important rājas in western India, where they told fortunes and prophesied future events from their computations of the stars, often obtaining great influence and being consulted as oracles. Readers of Quentin Durward will not need to be reminded that an exactly similar state of things obtained in Europe. And both the European and Indian astrologers were continually searching for the philosopher's stone and endeavouring by the practice of alchemy to discover the secret of changing silver and other metals into gold. It is easy to understand how the more dishonest members of the community would come to make a livelihood by the pretence of being possessed of this power. The Jaduas belong principally to Bihār, and Mr. Knyvett's account of them is based on inquiries in that Province. But it is probable that, like the Bhadris, travelling parties of Jāduas occasionally visit the Central Provinces. Their method of procedure is somewhat as follows. They start out in parties of three or four and make inquiries for the whereabouts of some likely dupe, in the shape of an ignorant and superstitious person possessed of property. Sometimes they settle temporarily in a village and open a small grain-shop in order to facilitate their search. When the victim has been selected one of them proceeds to his village in the disguise of a Sadhu or anchorite, being usually accompanied by another as his chela or disciple. Soon afterwards the others come, one of them perhaps posing as a considerable landholder, and go about inquiring if a very holy Brahman has been seen. They go to the house of their intended dupe, who naturally asks why they are seeking the Brahman; they reply that

Plowden, Deputy Inspector-General of Police, Bengal, through Mr. G. W. Gayer, in charge of the Central

Provinces Criminal Investigation Department.