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Religious processions to some sacred place or shrine are sometimes impressive from the enormous number of pilgrims taking part in them. One day a large procession of Hindus from a neighbouring village, on their way to the temple at Yerandawana, passed alongside the Mission compound. They had with them a god, which they were carrying in a palanquin.
A den in the hillside, visible from the Mission bungalow at Yerandawana, is still spoken of as the "Tiger's den," and a remote, but probably true tradition lingers of an immense tiger who lived there and who was eventually hunted down and slain by order of the then ruler of the district.
But the value of the offering is in the scent of the flower, and not in the beauty of its colour or form. The Yerandawana village children often come to the church with their cap or pocket filled with flowers plucked in this fashion, which they present as an offering.
If he is paid by the day, bearing this in mind, he retaliates by doing as little work as possible. Hence labourers are almost always paid by the job. A Hindu wood-merchant took a contract for clearing a large tract of forest land some miles beyond the Yerandawana settlement.
Their explanation of the presence of children in their midst is that they are orphans, or that they have been given to them by parents in fulfilment of a vow. One of the small sub-sections of the community took up their quarters in the verandah of a shut-up house in Yerandawana. Passing through the village one evening, I came upon them just as they were about to sit down to their evening meal.
We hung up the corpse on a thorn hedge near by, as a warning to his tribe. But a snake is a dainty morsel to many creatures, and by the morning it was gone. Indians walking noiselessly with bare feet run a special risk, especially at night when snakes are on the move. But in spite of the number in the Yerandawana neighbourhood, I have never known a case of snake-bite.
The Mohammedans of the district would then build up the, not very expensive, tomb as a tribute to his religious profession, without much reference perhaps as to the amount of strictness with which he fulfilled his obligations. The tomb at Yerandawana is in a very exposed situation.
We met two or three young fellows belonging to the large colony of medicine-men who live in Yerandawana, but who do not mix much with the other villagers. They are a roving, easygoing race, fond of hunting and drinking, and with a largely developed element of mischief and fun.
Hindus often have projects which are purely castles in the air, and it is difficult to know whether the projector is deceiving himself, or whether it is merely in the spirit of boastfulness, that he speaks of the great things that he is going to do. A middle-aged Brahmin called at the Yerandawana Mission bungalow and said that he was going to start a laundry on a large scale in the village.
Going round and round making mortar for the masons. Oh bullocks! go faster, go faster! The masons will cry out, oh bullocks, for more mortar more mortar. So, go faster, go faster," etc., etc. On bright moonlight nights large parties of men and women come trotting briskly along the Yerandawana road, bearing baskets of fruit on their heads for the Poona market.
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