your way to paralokam (the other world). I gave you milk and fruit. Go to the world of the dead. I gave gingelly (Sesamum) and milk. Enter yamalokam (abode of the god of death). Eleven descendants on the mother's side and ten on the father's, twenty-one in all, may they all enter heaven." He then puts the bricks into the water. On their return home, the sons of the deceased are presented with new clothes. It is recorded, in the Gazetteer of the Tanjore district, that, when a man dies, camphor is not burnt in the house, but at the junction of three lanes. Some Paraiyans, on the occurrence of a death in a family, put a pot filled with dung or water, a broomstick and a fire-brand at some place where three roads meet, or in front of the house, in order to prevent the ghost from returning. An impression of the dead man's palm is taken in cow-dung, and stuck on the wall. In some places, e.g., at Tirutturaippundi, the Paraiyans observe a ceremony rather like that observed by Valaiyans and Karaiyans on the heir's return from the burning-ground on the second day. Three rice-pounders and a chembu (vessel) of water are placed outside the door, and the heir sits on these, chews a piece of fish, spits thrice, and then goes and worships a light burning in the house. Tattooing is practiced on women and children of both sexes, but not on grown men. With children it is confined to a simple line drawn down the forehead. Among Paraiyans who have become Roman Catholics, the device is sometimes a cross. Women, like those of other Tamil castes, frequently have their arms elaborately tattooed, and sometimes have a small pattern between the breasts. A legend runs to the effect that, many years ago, a Paraiyan woman wished her upper arms and chest to be tattooed in the form of a bodice. The operation was successfully carried out till the region of the heart was reached, and then a vulnerable part was punctured by the needles, with the result that the woman died. Whence has arisen a superstitious objection to tattooing of the breasts.