There is a saying current among the Mutrachas that the Mutracha caste is as good as a pearl, but became degraded as its members began to catch fish. According to a legend, the Mutrachas, being Kshatriyas, wore the sacred thread. Some of them, on their way home after a hunting expedition, halted by a pond, and were tempted by the enormous number of fish therein to fish for them, using their sacred threads as lines. They were seen by some Brahmans while thus engaged, and their degradation followed. In the Telugu country, two divisions, called Paligiri and Oruganti, are recognised by the Mutrachas, who further have exogamous septs or intiperulu, of which the following are examples:-- Avula, cow. Arigala, a dish carried in processions. Busi, dirt. Ella, boundary. Guvvala, doves. Indla, house. Iga, fly. Koppula, hair-knot. Katari, dagger. Marri, Ficus bengalensis. Nakka, jackal. Puli, tiger. Talari, watchman. Tota, garden. Uyyala, a swing. Thumu, iron measure for measuring grain. During the first menstrual seclusion of a girl, she may not have her meals served on a metal plate, but uses an earthen cup, which is eventually thrown away. When she reaches puberty, a girl does up her hair in a knot called koppu. In the case of confinement, pollution ends on the tenth day. But, if a woman loses her infant, especially a first-born, the pollution period is shortened, and, at every subsequent time of delivery, the woman bathes on the seventh or ninth day. Every woman who visits her on the bathing day brings a pot of warm water, and pours it over her head. Muttal (substitute).--A sub-division of Maran. Muttan.--In the Madras Census Report, 1901, the Muttans are summed up as "a trading caste in Malabar. The better educated members of it have begun to claim a higher social status than that usually accorded them. Formerly they claimed to be Nayars, but recently they have gone further, and, in the census schedules, some of them returned themselves as Vaisyas, and added the Vaisya title Gupta to their names. They do not, however, wear the sacred thread, or perform any Vedic rites, and Nayars consider themselves polluted by their touch."