nths old, but as a rule no penalty attaches to the breaking of the
betrothal. The betrothal is celebrated by the distribution of one or
two rupees' worth of liquor to the neighbours of the caste. As among
other low castes, on the day before the wedding procession starts,
the bridegroom goes round to all the houses in the village and his
sister dances round him with her head bent, and all the people give
him presents. This is known as the Binaiki or Farewell, and the bride
does the same in her village. Among the Jharia Telis the women go
and worship the marriage-post at the carpenter's house while it is
being made. In this subcaste the bridegroom goes to the wedding in
a cart and not on horseback or in a litter as among some castes. The
rule may perhaps be a recognition of their humble station. The Halia
subcaste can dispense with the presence of a Brahman at the wedding,
but not the Jharias. In Wardha the bridegroom's head is covered with
a blanket, over which is placed the marriage-crown. On the arrival of
the bridegroom's party they are regaled with _sherbet_ or sugar and
water by the bride's relatives, and sometimes red pepper is mixed with
this by way of a joke. At a wedding of the Gujarati Tells in Nimar
the caste-priest carries the tutelary goddess Kali in procession,
and in front of her a pot filled with burning cotton-seeds and oil. A
cloth is held over the pot, and it is believed that the power of the
goddess prevents the cloth from taking fire. If this should happen
some great calamity would be portended. Rathor Teli girls, whether
married or unmarried, go with their heads bare, and a woman draws
her cloth over her head for the first time when she begins to live
in her husband's house.

6. Widow-remarriage

Divorce and widow-marriage are permitted. In Chhattisgarh a widow
is always kept in the family if possible, and if her late husband's
brother be only a boy she is sometimes induced to put on the bangles
and wait for him. If a _barandi_ widow, that is one who has been
married but has not lived with her husband, desires to marry again
out of his family, the second husband must repay to them the amount
spent on her first marriage. In Chanda, on the other hand, some Telis
do not permit a widow to marry her late husband's younger brother
at all, and others only when he is a bachelor or a widower. Here
the minimum period for which a widow must remain single after her
husband's death is one month. The enga