CLXV.  The Next World.

This is what the Santals say about the next world.  After death men have a very hard time of it in the next world. Chando bonga makes them work terribly hard; the woman have to pound the fruit of the castor oil plant with a pestle; and from the seeds Chando bonga makes human beings.  All day long they have to work; those women who have babies get a little respite on the excuse of suckling their babies; but those who have no children get no rest at all; and the men are allowed to break off to chew tobacco but those who have not learnt to chew have to work without stopping from morning to night.  And this is the reason why Santals learn to chew tobacco when they are alive; for it is of no use to merely smoke a huka:  in the next world we shall not be allowed to knock off work in order to smoke.  In the next world also it is very difficult to get water to drink.  There are frogs who stand on guard and drive away any who comes to the water to drink; and so when Satals die we send drinking vessels with them so that they may be able to run quickly to the water and fill the vessels and get away before they are stopped.  And it is said that if a man during his lifetime has planted a peepul tree he gets abused for it in the next world and is told to go and pick the leaves out of the water which have fallen into it and are spoiling it and such a man is able to get water to drink while he is picking the leaves out of it; but whether this is all true I cannot say.

CLXVI.  After Death.

When grown-up people die they become ancestral bongas and sacrifices are offered to them at the Flower and Sohrai festivals; and when children die they become bhuts.  When a pregnant woman dies, they drive long thorns into the soles of the feet before the body is burned for such women become churins.  The reason of this is that when the churin pursues any one the thorns may hurt her and prevent her from running fast:  and so the man who is pursued may escape; for if the churin catches him she will lick all the flesh off his bones; they especially attack the belly and their tongues are very rough.

There was once a man who had been to get his ploughshare sharpened by the blacksmith and as he was on his way home it came on to rain, so he took shelter in a hollow tree.  While he was waiting for the weather to clear he saw a churin coming along singing and she also came to take shelter in the same tree.  Fortunately she pushed in backwards and the man took the ploughshare which was still nearly red hot and pressed it against her back; so she ran away screaming and he made good his escape in the other direction; otherwise he would assuredly have been licked to death.

CLXVII.  Hares and Men.