e woman wiped her bloody hands on the _Tarop_
trees and so the _Tarop_ tree ever since exudes a red juice like blood.

Next morning they went on and came to a spring and drank of its water
and afterwards the woman bathed in it and the blood stained water
flowed over all the country and so we see stagnant water covered
with a red scum. Going on from there they reached a low lying flat
and halted; almost at once they saw a thunder storm coming up from
the South and West; and the woman sang--

"A storm as black as the _so_ fruit, brother,
Is coming, full of danger for us:
Come let us flee to the homestead of the liquor seller."

But the brother answered--

"The liquor seller's house is an evil house:
You only wish to go there for mischief."

So they stayed where they were and the lightning came and slew
them both.

CLXIX. Pregnant Women.

Pregnant women are not allowed to go about alone outside the village;
for there are _bongas_ everywhere and some of them dislike the sight of
pregnant women and kill them or cause the child to be born wry-necked.

A pregnant woman may not make a mud fireplace for if she does her child
will be born with a hare-lip; nor may she chop vegetables during an
eclipse or the same result will follow. She may not ride in a cart,
for if she does the child will be always crying and will snore in its
sleep; if she eats the flesh of field rats the child's body will be
covered with hair and if she eats duck or goose flesh the child will
be born with its fingers and toes webbed. Nor may a pregnant woman
look on a funeral, for if she does her child will always sleep with
its eyes half open.

CLXX. The Influence of the Moon.

If a child is born on the day before the new moon the following
ceremony is observed. After bathing the child they place an old broom
in the mother's arms instead of the child; then the mother takes
the child and throws it out on the dung heap behind the house. The
midwife then takes an old broom and an old winnowing fan and sweeps
up a little rubbish on to the fan and takes it and throws it on the
dung hill; there she sees the child and calls out. "Here is a child
on the dung heap" then she pretends to sweep the child with the broom
into the winnowing fan and lifts it up and carries it into the house;
and asks the people of the house whether they will rear it. They ask
what wages she will give them and she promises to give them a he