The Newar women are never confined. At eight years of age, they are carried to a temple, and married, with the ceremonies usual among Hindus, to a fruit called Bel, (Ægle Marmelos, Roxb.) When a girl arrives at the age of puberty, her parents, with her consent, betroth her to some man of the same cast, and give her a dower, which becomes the property of the husband, or rather paramour. After this, the nuptials are celebrated with feasting, and some religious ceremonies. Among the higher casts, it is required that girls should be chaste till they have been thus betrothed; but in the lower casts, a girl, without scandal, may previously indulge any Hindu with her favours; and this licentiousness is considered a thing of no consequence. Whenever a woman pleases, she may leave her husband; and if, during her absence, she cohabit only with men of her own cast, or of a higher one, she may at any time return to her husband’s house, and resume the command of his family. The only ceremony or intimation that is necessary, before she goes away, is her placing two betel-nuts on her bed. So long as a woman chooses to live with her husband, he cannot take another wife, until she becomes past child-bearing; but a man may take a second wife, when his first chooses to leave him, or when she grows old; and at all times he may keep as many concubines as he pleases. A widow cannot marry again; but she is not expected to burn herself; and may cohabit with any Hindu as a concubine. The children, by the betrothed wife, have a preference in succession to those by concubines; the latter, however, are entitled to some share. A man can be betrothed to no woman except one of his own cast; but he may keep a concubine of any cast, whose water he can drink. If the woman’s cast be lower than his, the children are called Khas, and are considered as belonging to the cast of the mother, but are somewhat elevated on account of their father’s birth. A custom of the Newars, which was observed on the 11th of August by Colonel Crawford, deserves to be mentioned on account of its oddity. Each man on that day purchases a small quantity of boiled rice, mashed into a soft substance, and carries it to the field which he has cultivated. He then searches the field for frogs, and to every one that he can discover he gives a small portion of the boiled rice, at the same time uttering a prayer, and requesting the frog to watch over and protect his crop. The Newars are a peaceable people, and not so much addicted to assassination as the Parbatiyas; but possess all the other vices of that barbarous race. Colonel Kirkpatrick {43} doubts, whether the Newars have at any period been a warlike nation; but the long resistance which they made against Prithwi Narayan appears to me to indicate abundant courage, while his success seems to have been more owing to his cunning, and to his taking advantage of their internal dissensions, than to a superiority in the art of war.