On the fifth and last day, the whole community marched with music to the village temple, and offered a concluding sacrifice at the Potraj altar. A lamb was concealed close by. The Potraj, having found it after a pretended search, rendered it insensible by a blow of his whip, or by mesmeric passes--a survival of the idea of the voluntary victim. Then the assistants tied the Potraj’s hands behind his {303}back, and the whole party began to dance round him with orgiastic joy. Potraj joined in the excitement, and soon came under the present influence of the deity. He was led up, bound, to the place where the lamb lay motionless. Carried away with divine frenzy, he rushed at it, seized it with his teeth, tore through the skin, and eat into its throat. When it was quite dead, he was lifted up; a dishful of the meat-offering was presented to him; he thrust his blood-stained face into it, and it was then buried with the remains of the lamb beside the altar. After that, his arms were untied, and he fled the place. I may add that as a rule the slaughterer of the god everywhere has to fly from the vengeance of his worshippers, who, after participating in the attack, pretend indignation as soon as the sacrifice is completed. The rest of the party now adjourned to the front of the temple, where a heap of grain deposited on the first day was divided among all the cultivators, to be sown by each one in the field with his piece of flesh. After this, a distribution was made of the piled-up heads of the buffaloes and sheep slaughtered on the third and fourth days. These were evidently considered as sacred as divine heads generally in all countries and ages. About forty of the sheeps’ heads were divided among certain privileged persons; for the remainder, a general scramble took place, men of all castes soon rolling together on the ground in a mess of putrid gore. For the buffaloes’ heads, only the Pariahs contended. Whoever was fortunate enough to secure one of either kind carried it off and buried it in his field. Of the special importance of the head in all such sacrifices, Mr. Gomme has collected many apposite examples. The proceedings were terminated by a procession round the boundaries; the burial of the head of the sacred buffalo close to the shrine of the village goddess; and the outbreak of a perfect orgy, a “rule of misrule,” during which the chief musician indulged in unbridled abuse of all the authorities, native or British.