e ghosts of departed
Dhobis when revisiting the glimpses of the moon, and is held to have
magical powers. If a man requires a love-charm he should steal a
_supari_ or areca-nut from the bazar at night or on the occasion of
an eclipse. The same night he goes to the Dhobi's stone and sets the
nut upon it. He breaks an egg and a cocoanut over the stone and burns
incense before it. Then he takes the nut away and gives it to the woman
of his fancy, wrapped up in betel-leaf, and she will love him. Their
chief festivals are the Holi and Diwali, at which they drink a great
deal. The dead are buried or burnt as may be convenient, and mourning
is observed for three days only, the family being purified on the
Sunday or Wednesday following the death. They have a caste committee
whose president is known as Mehtar, while other officials are the
Chaudhri or vice-president, and the Badkur, who appoints dates for
the penal feasts and issues the summons to the caste-fellows. These
posts are hereditary and their holders receive presents of a rupee
and a cloth when members of the caste have to give expiatory feasts.

5. Occupation: washing clothes.

Before washing his clothes the Dhobi steams them, [551] hanging
them in a bundle for a time over a cauldron of boiling water. After
this he takes them to a stream or pond and washes them roughly with
fuller's earth. The washerman steps nearly knee-deep into the water,
and taking a quantity of clothes by one end in his two hands he raises
them aloft in the air and brings them down heavily upon a huge stone
slab, grooved, at his feet. This threshing operation he repeats until
his clothes are perfectly clean. In Saugor the clothes are rubbed
with wood-ashes at night and beaten out in water with a stick in the
morning. Silk clothes are washed with the nut of the _ritha_ tree
(_Sapindus emarginatus_) which gives a lather like soap. Sir H. Risley
writes of the Dacca washermen: [552] "For washing muslins and other
coloured garments well or spring water is alone used; but if the
articles are the property of a poor man or are commonplace, the water
of the nearest tank or river is accounted sufficiently good. Indigo is
in as general use as in England for removing the yellowish tinge and
whitening the material. The water of the wells and springs bordering
on the red laterite formation on the north of the city has been for
centuries celebrated, and the old bleaching fields of the European
factories