Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 7.djvu/157

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
131
TODA

by an enclosure or wall formed of loose stones piled up two or three feet high [with openings too narrow to permit of a buffalo entering through it]. The dairy is sometimes a building slightly larger than the others, and usually contains two compartments separated by a centre planking. One part of the dairy is a store-house for ghee, milk and curds, contained in separate vessels. The outer apartment forms the dwelling place of the dairy priest. The doorways of the dairy are smaller than those of the dwelling huts. The flooring of the dairy is level, and at one end there is a fire-place. Two or three milk pails or pots are all that it usually contains. The dairy is usually situated at some little distance from the habitations. The huts where the calves are kept are simple buildings, somewhat like the dwelling huts. In the vicinity of the mands are the cattle-pens or tuels[tu], which are circular enclosures surrounded by a loose stone wall, with a single entrance guarded by powerful stakes. In these, the herds of buffaloes are kept at night. Each mand possesses a herd of these animals." It is noted by Dr. Rivers that "in the immediate neighbourhood of a village there are usually well-worn paths, by which the village is approached, and some of these paths or kalvol receive special names. Some may not be traversed by women. Within the village there are also certain recognised paths, of which two are specially important. One, the punetkalvol, is the path by which the dairy man goes from his dairy to milk or tend the buffaloes; the other is the majvatitthkalvol, the path which the women must use when going to the dairy to receive butter-milk (maj) from the dairy man. Women are not allowed to go to the dairy or to other places connected with it, except at appointed times, when they receive buttermilk."