should not be surprised to be told that the amount spent within the last thirty years alone amounts to a crore of rupees. Being Saivites, they do not generally care for Vaishnava temples. And, even among Saiva temples, only such as have special sanctity, and have been sung about by the Saiva Nainars or Bhaktas, are patronised by them. They have devoted large sums to the establishment of comfortable choultries (rest-houses), feeding houses, Vedic and recently also Sastraic pathasalas (schools). They have established schools for the education of the Kurukal or the priestly class. And, in fact, every charity of the orthodox Hindu type finds generous support among them." It is recorded, in the Gazetteer of the Madura district, that the gopurams of the Madura temple "have been repaired of late years at great cost by the Nattukottai Chettis. The northern tower used to consist only of the brick and stone-work storeys, and was known in consequence as the mottai (literally bald) gopuram. Recently, however, a courageous Chetti, who cared nothing for the superstition that it is most unlucky to complete a building left unfinished, placed the usual plaster top upon it." In recent years, the temple at Chidambaram has been renovated by the Nattukottai Chettis, who "have formed for this and similar restorations a fund which is made up of a fee of four annas per cent. levied from their clients on all sums borrowed by the latter. The capital of this is invested, and the interest thereon devoted exclusively to such undertakings." [110] In 1906, the purificatory ceremony, or kumbabishekam, of the Sri Pasupathiswara Swami temple at Karur was performed with great pomp. The old temple had been thoroughly overhauled and repaired by the Nattukottai Chettis. The ceremony cost about fifty thousand rupees. Many thousands were fed, and presents of money made to a large number of Vaidiki Brahmans. In the same year, at a public meeting held in Madras to concert measures for establishing a pinjrapole (hospital for animals), one of the resolutions was that early steps should be taken to collect public subscriptions from the Hindu community generally, and in particular from the Nattukottai Chettis, Gujaratis, and other mercantile classes. Still more recently, the kumbabishekam festival was celebrated at Tiruvanaikkaval, the seat of a celebrated temple near Trichinopoly, which was repaired by the Nattukottai Chettis at a cost of many lakhs of rupees.