Bengali_.--Bengali immigrants are usually Brahmans or Kayasths.

_Bengani_.--(Brinjal.) One of the 1444 sections of Oswal Bania.

_Benglah_.--An immigrant from Bengal. Subcaste of Bharbhunja.

_Beora Basia_.--(Hawk.) A totemistic sept of Bhatra.

_Beraria_, _Beradia_.--(Belonging to Berar.) A subcaste of Bahna,
Barai, Barhai, Chamar, Dhangar, Dhimar, Kasar and Kunbi.

_Beria_.--A caste of gipsies and vagrants, whose women are
prostitutes. Hence sometimes used generally to signify a prostitute. A
subcaste of Nat.

_Besra_.--(Hawk.) A totemistic sept of Bhatra and Rawat (Ahir).

_Besta_.--A Telugu caste of fishermen. They are also called Bhoi and
Machchnaik, and correspond to the Dhimars. They are found only in the
Chanda District, where they numbered 700 persons in 1911, and their
proper home is Mysore. They are a low caste and rear pigs and eat
pork, crocodiles, rats and fowls. They are stout and strong and dark
in colour. Like the Dhimars they also act as palanquin-bearers, and
hence has arisen a saying about them, 'The Besta is a great man when
he carries shoes,' because the head of a gang of palanquin-bearers
carries the shoes of the person who sits in it. At their marriages
the couple place a mixture of cummin and jaggery on each other's
heads, and then gently press their feet on those of the other seven
times. Drums are beaten, and the bridegroom places rings on the toes
of the bride and ties the _mangal-sutram_ or necklace of black beads
round her neck. They are seated side by side on a plough-yoke, and the
ends of their cloths are tied together. They are then taken outside
and shown the Great Bear, the stars of which are considered to be
the spirits of the seven principal Hindu Saints, and the pole-star,
Arundhati, who represents the wife of Vasishtha and is the pattern of
feminine virtue. On the following two days the couple throw flowers
at each other for some time in the morning and evening. Before the
marriage the bridegroom's toe-nails are cut by the barber as an act of
purification. This custom, Mr. Thurston [422] states, corresponds among
the Sudras to the shaving of the head among the Brahmans. The Bestas
usually take as their principal deity the nearest large river and call
it by the generic term of Ganga. On the fifth day after a death they
offer cooked food, water and sesamum to the crows, in whose bodies
the souls of the dead are believed to reside. The food and water are
given to satisfy the h