eam is a sign of death. A cock which crows in the night should
be instantly killed and thrown into the darkness, a custom which some
would be glad to see introduced into much more civilised centres. The
woodpecker and owl are birds of bad omen. The Baigas do not appear to
have any idea of a fresh birth, and one of their marriage songs says,
"O girl, take your pleasure in going round the marriage-post once and
for all, for there is no second birth." The Baigas are generally the
priests of the Gonds, probably because being earlier residents of
the country they are considered to have a more intimate acquaintance
with the local deities. They have a wide knowledge of the medicinal
properties of jungle roots and herbs, and are often successful in
effecting cures when the regular native doctors have failed. Their
village priests have consequently a considerable reputation as skilled
sorcerers and persons conversant with the unseen world. A case is
known of a Brahman transferred to a jungle station, who immediately
after his arrival called in a Baiga priest and asked what forest gods
he should worship, and what other steps he should take to keep well
and escape calamity. Colonel Ward states that in his time Baigas were
commonly called in to give aid when a town or village was attacked
by cholera, and further that he had seen the greatest benefit to
result from their visit. For the people had so much confidence in
their powers and ceremonies that they lost half their fright at once,
and were consequently not so much predisposed to an attack of the
disease. On such an occasion the Baiga priest goes round the village
and pulls out a little straw from each house-roof, afterwards burning
the whole before the shrine of Khermata, the goddess of the village,
to whom he also offers a chicken for each homestead. If this remedy
fails goats are substituted for chickens, and lastly, as a forlorn
hope, pigs are tried, and, as a rule, do not fail, because by this
time the disease may be expected to have worked itself out. It is
suggested that the chicken represents a human victim from each house,
while the straw stands for the house itself, and the offering has
the common idea of a substituted victim.

7. Appearance and mode of life.

In stature the Baigas are a little taller than most other tribes,
and though they have a tendency to the flat nose of the Gonds,
their foreheads and the general shape of their heads are of a better
mould