THE SOUL AND ANOTHER LIFE.
When a person dies everything is done to prevent the disembodied
spirit being attracted to its old home or disturbed. Even paddy is
not pounded in the house as the sound may attract it.
The day after burial the dead man's belongings are given away in
charity and an almsgiving of kenda (rice gruel) to priests or beggars
takes place. A little of the kenda in a gotuwa (leaf cup) is kept on
a tree or at a meeting of roads and if a crow or any other bird eats
it, it is a sign that the deceased is happy; otherwise it indicates
that it has become a perturbed spirit. Seven days after, there is
an almsgiving of rice when a gotuwa of rice is similarly made use of
for a further sign. Three months after is the last almsgiving which
is done on a large scale; relatives are invited for a feast and all
signs of sorrow are banished from that day.
The object of this last almsgiving is to make the disembodied spirit
cease to long for the things he has left behind and if this be not
done the spirit of the dead person approaches the boundary fence of
the garden; if the omission be not made good after six months it takes
its stand near the well; when nine months have elapsed it comes near
the doorway, and after twelve months it enters the house and makes
its presence felt by emitting offensive smells and contaminating food
as a Peretayâ or by destroying the pots and plates of the house and
pelting stones as a gevalayâ or by apparitions as an avatâré or by
creating strange sounds as a holmana; it is afraid of iron and lime
and when over boisterous a kattadiya rids it from the house by nailing
it to a tree, or enclosing it in a small receptacle and throwing it
into the sea where it is so confined till some one unwittingly sets
it free when it recommences its tricks with double force. A woman who
dies in parturition and is buried with the child becomes a bodirima;
she is short and fat, rolls like a cask, kills men whenever she can;
if a lamp and some betel leaves be kept where she haunts she will be
seen heating a leaf and warming her side; the women chase her away
with threats of beating her with an ikle broom; if shot at she turns
into a chameleon (yak katussâ). If a person dreams of a dead relative
he gives food to a beggar the next morning.