The period of mourning for adults of the family is ten days, and
for children three, while in the case of distant relatives it is
sufficient to take a bath as a mark of respect for them. The male
mourners shave their heads, the walls of the house are whitewashed
and the floor spread with cowdung. The chief mourner avoids social
intercourse and abstains from ordinary work and from all kinds of
amusements. He debars himself from such luxuries as betel-leaf and
from visiting his wife. Oblations are offered to the dead on the
third day of the light fortnight of Baisakh (June) and on the last
day of Bhadrapad (September). The Kunbi is a firm believer in the
action of ghosts and spirits, and never omits the attentions due to
his ancestors. On the appointed day he diligently calls on the crows,
who represent the spirits of ancestors, to come and eat the food which
he places ready for them; and if no crow turns up, he is disturbed at
having incurred the displeasure of the dead. He changes the food and
goes on calling until a crow comes, and then concludes that their
previous failure to appear was due to the fact that his ancestors
were not pleased with the kind of food he first offered. In future
years, therefore, he changes it, and puts out that which was eaten,
until a similar _contretemps_ of the non-appearance of crows again
occurs. The belief that the spirits of the dead pass into crows is no
doubt connected with that of the crow's longevity. Many Hindus think
that a crow lives a thousand years, and others that it never dies of
disease, but only when killed by violence. Tennyson's 'many-wintered
crow' may indicate some similar idea in Europe. Similarly if the Gonds
find a crow's nest they give the nestlings to young children to eat,
and think that this will make them long-lived. If a crow perches in
the house when a woman's husband or other relative is away, she says,
'Fly away, crow; fly away and I will feed you'; and if the crow then
flies away she thinks that the absent one will return. Here the idea
is no doubt that if he had been killed his spirit might have come home
in the shape of the crow perching on the house. If a married woman
sees two crows breeding it is considered a very bad omen, the effect
being that her husband will soon die. It is probably supposed that
his spirit will pass into the young crow which is born as a result
of the meeting which she has seen.
Mr. A. K. Smith states that the omen applies to men also, and
relates a story of a young advocate who saw two crows thus engaged
on alighting from the train at some station. In order to avert the
consequences he ran to the telegraph office and sent messages to all
his relatives and friends announcing his own death, the idea being
that this fictitious death would fulfil the omen, and the real death
would thus become unnecessary. In this case the belief would be that
the man's own spirit would pass into the young crow.