exorcists, hastens to inform her betrothed husband of the happy issue of the exorcism.  “The spirit,” he says, “had cast thy beloved into a sleep as deep almost as that of death.  But we have rescued her from his attacks, and laid her down in such and such a place.  Go seek her.”  Then going from house to house through the village he cries to the inmates, “Come, let us burn the demon who would have taken possession of such and such a girl, our friend.”  The bridegroom at once carries his wounded and suffering bride to his own house; and all the people gather round the post for the pleasure of burning it and the demon together.  A great pile of firewood has meanwhile been heaped up about it, and the women run round the pyre cursing in shrill voices the wicked spirit who has wrought all this evil.  The men join in with hoarser cries and animate themselves for the business in hand by deep draughts of an intoxicant which has been provided for the occasion by the parents-in-law.  Soon the bridegroom, having committed the bride to the care of his mother, appears on the scene brandishing a lighted torch.  He addresses the demon with bitter mockery and reproaches; informs him that the fair creature on whom he, the demon, had nefarious designs, is now his, the bridegroom’s, blooming spouse; and shaking his torch at the grinning head on the post, he screams out, “This is how the victims of thy persecution take vengeance on thee!” With these words he puts a light to the pyre.  At once the drums strike up, the trumpets blare, and men, women, and children begin to dance.  In two long rows they dance, the men on one side, the women on the other, advancing till they almost touch and then retiring again.  After that the two rows join hands, and forming a huge circle trip it round and round the blaze, till the post with its grotesque face is consumed in the flames and nothing of the pyre remains but a heap of red and glowing embers.  “The evil spirit has been destroyed.  Thus delivered from her persecutor, the young wife will be free from sickness, will not die in childbed, and will bear many children to her husband."[156] From this account it appears that the Banivas attribute the symptoms of puberty in girls to the wounds inflicted on them by an amorous devil, who, however, can be not only exorcised but burnt to ashes at the stake.

Sec. 6. Seclusion of Girls at Puberty in India and Cambodia

[Seclusion of girls at puberty among the Hindoos; seclusion of girls at puberty in Southern India.]

When a Hindoo maiden reaches maturity she is kept in a dark room for four days, and is forbidden to see the sun.  She is regarded as unclean; no one may touch her.  Her diet is restricted to boiled rice, milk, sugar, curd, and tamarind without salt.  On the morning of the fifth day she goes to a neighbouring tank, accompanied by five women whose husbands are alive.  Smeared with turmeric water, they all bathe and return home, throwing away the mat and other things