When a boy has attained his twelfth year his parents fix a day, to make him “thejo,” by offering him a piece of consecrated thread to wear round his neck. If, on the day previous to the fixed one, it thunder or rain, the ceremony is postponed for eight successive days, and if it should rain again, the same measure would be taken. On the morning of the day appointed he is anointed and bathed, within an enclosure made of four banana-leaves stuck into the ground. He is conducted to the altar, where the priest, after the preliminary services, cuts three locks from the hair of his head. He comes down from the altar for the first time to undergo other ceremonies. Now the family barber shaves his head all over, and passes two gold rings through the lower part of his ears. Here a merry fun is practised. The boy, when he sits before the barber, holds a banana in his hand, with which he is required to strike him when he has finished his duties. Sometimes the boy holds a green, and consequently hard, banana in his hand, so to warn the barber to be very careful in his operation, that he might not suffer afterwards. When all this is ended he comes up to the altar, where, besides the family priest, his father or uncle is required to take part in the ceremony. After invoking the presence of the deities and presenting offerings to the spirits of the fourteen ancestors, the father first puts a cord, made of hairy leaves of _shur_ (a kind of white reed), round the boy’s neck, which lies on his left shoulder, and, hanging round the left arm, makes a fold thereby. Then a _pobithoo_, consecrated thread, made of three stitches tied into a knot, which symbolizes the holy, mysterious union of the three, Brohmo, Bishnōō, and Shibă, into one. A piece of _shabor_, skin of deer, is tied with that thread. He wears a yellow or red robe, holds in his hand dundŏs, two staves, one made of Bāle wood and the other of Baoor or Bass. The leaves and fruit of the bāle are the chief favorites of Shibă, so much so that a dry bāle leaf is acceptable to him before a thousand varieties of odorous flowers. (In fact, almost every Hindoo deity is peculiarly fond of some especial leaf or flower, without which their worship is invalid. Thus Shibā loves _bāle leaf_ or _tri-pothro_, “three leaves in one stem.” Toolshēē, a leaf of a plant, is the favorite of Bishnōō; joba, a kind of large red flower, Kallee is fond of. The Shuresh-Shuttee likes _bakus_ and gholghasa, the sun is fond of Corobēē, oliander, &c.) The mother of the boy comes first to give alms--a little raw rice, money, and a piece of thread--to the second born, who takes it in a yellow bag answering the purpose of a contribution box. The hundreds of guests who are invited in on this occasion are required, by their religious custom, to give gifts of a little money and a piece of thread. Occasionally some virtuous woman manages to offer the first gift, by paying all