For the first six months of its life, a child's food consists of nature's fount and cow's milk. It is then, before the sixth month is over, given boiled rice for the first time. The ceremony takes place either in the middle room of its father's house, or at a temple. The child's grandfather, or the eldest male member of the family, sits on a mat, and takes the child in his lap. With a gold ring he applies honey three times to its mouth, and then gives it a little rice three times. Female relations who are present follow his example, giving the child first honey, and then rice. Several women, with the lighted lamp and other articles, carry the child into the yard, to show it the sky. They go round a cocoanut tree, and stand before the front door, facing west. An elder among the women of the house stands at the front door, calls out the name of the child three times, and asks it to come inside. The relations give little presents of ornaments, and there is a feast. It will be observed that even a child's life is not entirely free from ceremonial. When it has grown up, it undergoes more of it, and, when it has lived its course on earth, is the subject of still more ceremonial long after it is dead. All these affairs involve some expenditure, but the one which literally runs away with money is marriage. The others are not extravagances, nor are they as costly as might be implied from the continual feasting of a large number of people. We must not think of these feasts as of a banquet at the Carlton, but as simple affairs, at which simple people are content with simple though pleasing fare. When a child is provided by nature with teeth, it is the subject of a little ceremony, during which it is expected to disclose its natural propensities. The usual mat and other articles are arranged, and there are in addition a large flat bell-metal plate containing a rice cake, a knife, a palmyra leaf grantham (book), a cocoanut, and a gold ornament. The child is let loose, and allowed to pick out anything from the plate. If it takes the cake, it will be greedy; if the knife, brave; if the book, learned; if the cocoanut, a landlord; and, if the gold ornament, rich. A child's head is shaved in the third or fifth year. The barber, who performs the operation, is allowed to take away the rice which, with the lamp, is at hand. He also receives a fanam and a new cloth. The people of the child's mother bring rice cakes.