CHAPTER II

DOMESTIC LIFE

[1. Occupation.] The entire population may be classed as agriculturists, as only a few people, as will be afterwards described, live on contributions of rice given them in exchange for services rendered to the community. There are no shop-keepers, and, except the blacksmith, no craftsmen, each household being capable of existing on its own labours. The men build the house and cut the jhum, they help in the weeding and harvesting, and procure fresh meat by their skill in setting snares and hunting. Periodically they visit the nearest bazar, often a journey of several days, to purchase salt and the few requisites that their own industry cannot produce, consisting chiefly of brass cooking pots, iron to be made into daos or finished daos. Nowadays, it is true, the wants of the people are slowly increasing, and looking-glasses, umbrellas, needles, and Manchester goods are finding their way into the most remote villages. The women folk fetch the wood and water, cook the food and do the greatest part of the weeding and harvesting; they also make all the clothing for the whole household from cotton grown in the jhums, which they themselves gather, clean, spin, and weave into strong cloth.

A Lushai woman has to rise early, fill her basket with empty bamboo tubes, and trudge off before daylight down to the spring, which is generally some way down the hill, and the supply of water is frequently so scanty that it takes her some time to fill her bamboos. Having conveyed her basketful to the house, she has to set to work cleaning the rice for the day. The necessary amount of unhusked rice has been dried the previous day on the shelf over the hearth, and this she now proceeds to pound in a mortar in the front verandah, and winnow on an oval bamboo tray till it is clean enough for use. The breakfast of rice has then to be cooked, and by the time it is ready her husband is awake. After the meal the real work of the day begins. In the cold weather the women settle themselves to some of the operations connected with clothmaking, while the men prepare to pass a day of complete enjoyment, lying in the sun and smoking, the younger ones combining this with courting any of the pretty clothmakers; while the children play around entirely uncontrolled, save when a shrill-voiced mother calls one of them to assist her in some domestic operation. About noon there is a meal of rice and herbs, after which work is resumed and continued till the evening, when the housewife has to make another journey to the spring, and on her return the pigs must be fed with a mixture composed of rice husks and a species of edible arum bulb, mashed and boiled together, the fowls enticed into their baskets, and finally the family collected for the evening meal, which varies little from the two previous ones, but some garnish, a little meat, dried fish, or some savoury vegetable is generally added. As soon as it is dark, all the female members of the family gather round the hearth, and carry on such work as can be carried on by what light they can get from the fire; though in villages near fir forests some pine splinters are generally kept handy for use when an extra bright light is required for a few minutes. The men either gather in the "zawlbuk" or in some house where there is drink going, but the young bucks sneak off to court their lady loves, which the girls' parents give them every facility for doing. In the other seasons of the year, that is from March to December, the people are engaged in their jhums from the morning to the evening meal, as is described later on.

Lushai parents are very fond of their children, and fathers are often seen carrying their infants about. In times of scarcity, what rice can be got is reserved for the young children, the rest of the people living on yams, jungle vegetables, and the pith of the sago palm. The children assist their parents as much as they can, tiny girls accompanying their mothers to the spring, and bringing up one or two bamboos of water, while the lads help their fathers in cutting the jhum. No one, however, takes any care of children, and they are allowed to run about the village as they like, in all weathers, which no doubt accounts largely for the heavy mortality among them, as their clothing is of the scantiest.

Teknonymy is very common. The parents of a child called Thanga will generally be known as Thanga-Pa and Thanga-Nu, and I have come across old widows whose real names were unknown. There is a strong and general dislike among all Lushais to saying their own names. When we first occupied the hills, a man would not tell you his name; if asked he would refer to someone else and say, "You tell him." The following explanation, given me by a Lushai, seems to me scarcely satisfactory:--"Lushais are shy of saying the name of their father and mother and their own names. Because it is their own name they are shy of saying it. Some people are shy because their names are bad. Their parents' names--because they are their parents they never call them by their names, therefore they are shy of saying them. Their own names also they never say; just for that reason they are shy of saying them. The names of their brothers and friends they are always saying, therefore they are not shy of saying them." Long ago another explanation was given me. When a man kills another, he calls out his own name: "I, Lalmanga, have killed you!" so that the spirit of the dying man may know whose slave he will be in Mithi-Khua, the dead man's village; it was suggested that it was unlucky to say one's name on less important occasions.

[2. Weights and Measures.] In every village there is a small flat basket, the size of which is fixed by the chief, which is used for all retail dealings in rice and such goods, but large quantities are measured by the number of loads, a load being about 50 lbs. After the harvest the unhusked rice is piled in a conical heap. A Lushai will tell you that his crop is "chhip-zawn," that is, the heap is level with the top of his head; "silai-zawn," that is, level with the end of his gun held up perpendicularly over his head. This is about a record crop; lesser quantities are denoted by the height of his hand or hoe or axe held up. Time he measures by the time a pot of rice takes to cook--i.e., about an hour--or by the time he can hold a sip of nicotine in his mouth; he has terms for each period of the day, denoting the usual occupation; he also divides the year according to the agricultural occupation proper to it. Terms expressing measures of length are very numerous. Short lengths are expressed by reference to the human body, as we speak of a span; but the Lushai has sixteen or seventeen of these, extending from "chang-khat"--i.e., from the tip to the first joint of the first finger--to "hlam," which is the distance a man can stretch with both arms extended. Longer distances he expresses by terms such as the distance of the nearest jhum, the distance of the furthest jhum, the distance a mithan will wander during the day, the distance a man can travel before his mid-day meal, &c.--terms which, though well understood by the people, are a little perplexing to strangers. Measures of weight are scanty; a curious one is "chuai"--i.e., as much as can be supported if suspended from the tip of the first finger palm downwards. Many of the stars and constellations have received names; most of them have some story attached to them. The months are lunar months, and some have names, but these are but little known or used.

[3. Villages.] The Lushai likes to perch his village on the top of a ridge or spur, partly because, hillsides being steep, it is difficult to find sites elsewhere, partly for the sake of the climate, but chiefly, I think, in order to get a good defensive position. His migratory habits disinclining him to make the elaborate defences over which the Chins, Nagas, and other dwellers in permanent villages took so much pains, he therefore sought for a site which was difficult of approach. When we first occupied the country, every village was surrounded by one or more lines of stockade made of timber, with several rows of bamboo spikes outside it. At each gateway was a block house, and others were built at suitable places on the roads along which enemies were expected to come, and were occupied whenever an attack was apprehended. Tradition speaks of villages of 3,000 houses, and, though this is probably an exaggeration, still from an examination of the sites it is evident that they must have been very large, and even when we occupied the country villages of 400 and 500 houses were not uncommon, and there were two or three of 800 houses.

Now that all fear of being raided has gone for ever, people no longer feel the need of living together in large communities, and the size of villages is steadily decreasing. The peculiar vagabond strain in the blood of the Kuki-Lushai race, if not controlled, leads to villages splitting into hamlets and hamlets sub-dividing, till in the Manipur Hills we find single houses in the midst of dense jungle, several miles from the next habitation. This could never happen among tribes belonging to the Naga group, with whom intense love for the ancestral village site is a leading characteristic. A short distance outside the village by the roadside there generally are several platforms of logs with posts round them adorned with skulls of animals, gourds, rags, and old pots. These are memorials of deceased heroes, and will be more fully dealt with later on.

The gate itself was composed either of two large slabs of timber, or of a number of stout saplings suspended from a cross bar by holes cut through their upper ends; during the day these were drawn aside, but at night they hung perpendicularly in the gateways and were firmly secured between two cross bars. Passing through the gate, one finds oneself in a sort of irregular street leading up to the highest point of the village, where there is generally an open space, from which other streets branch off. On one side of this space will be the chiefs house, with the "zawlbuk," or bachelors' hall, opposite it. The villages of powerful chiefs are beautifully laid out in regular streets which follow the natural features of the ground. When Colonel Lister in 1850 captured the village of Shentlang he was so impressed with the regularity with which the villages within sight were laid out that he was easily led to believe these were cantonments inhabited solely by warriors. If the village is a large one and contains a mixed population, it is divided into several quarters, or "veng," which are generally inhabited by people of the same clan, and each will have its zawlbuk, a large building constructed by the united labour of the men of the veng or the village. As the mithan or gyal (tame bison) belonging to the village pass the night under the zawlbuk, it is generally built on rather a steep hillside, so that the natural fall of the ground may allow ample room for the animals under the raised floor and ensure good drainage. It is built, as are all other buildings in the village, of timber and bamboos, tied together with cane and thatched with either cane leaves or grass--if the former, then the ridge of the roof is straight and gable-ended; if the latter, it is far higher in the centre, whence it curves down somewhat abruptly to each gable. Access to the building is obtained by a platform of rough logs at the uphill end, where the front wall commences some 3 1/2 feet above the platform. Having stooped under this wall you are confronted by a low matting partition, surmounted by a huge log, the whole some 3 feet high, over which you scramble and find yourself in a large bare room varying from 15 to 50 feet long and 15 to 30 feet wide, according to the size of the village, with a square earthen hearth in the centre on which a few logs are always smouldering, and at the far end is a raised sleeping platform extending the whole width of the building. The young boys of the village have to keep up the supply of firewood for the zawlbuk, this duty continuing till they reach the age of puberty, when they cease sleeping in their parents' houses and join the young men in the zawlbuk. Until that time they are under the orders of the eldest or most influential boy, who is their "hotu," or superintendent. The zawlbuk is the particular property of the unmarried men of the village, who gather there in the evening to sing songs, tell stories, and make jokes till it is time to visit their sweethearts, after which they return there for the rest of the night. Travellers not having any friends in the village use the zawlbuk as a rest-house, but eating and drinking are seldom, if ever, carried on there. The zawlbuk is an institution common to many tribes, but among the clans I am dealing with it is confined to the Lushei and the clans most nearly allied to them. Its appearance among the Chiru and Vaiphei emphasises the close connection between these clans and the Lusheis.

The houses all abut on the street, but small gardens are often found at the back, in which sugar cane, beans, cucumbers, &c., are grown. The houses of the chief's advisers and wealthy men are generally grouped near his, but should the chief have more than one wife, or should he have some less fortunate relations dependent on him, their houses will be found scattered through the village, each forming a centre of a quarter or a veng, from the inhabitants of which the chief allows them to collect the dues, which are his by right.

The steepness of the hillside is no obstacle to house building, and frequently the roof of one house will be lower than the floor of the one immediately above it. The Lushais have been nomadic ever since their ancestors started on their western trek some 200 years ago. The method of cultivation which they follow is very wasteful, and a large village soon uses up all the land within reach, and then a move becomes imperative. Their custom of burying their dead within the village tends to make a site unhealthy, especially as the water supply is usually so situated as to receive the drainage of the village, and when the rate of mortality rises unduly high, a move is at once made. In old times these moves were often of considerable length--sometimes as much as two or three days' journey--and sometimes a halt for a whole season would be made at some temporary site, the people living in huts alongside their cultivation. The selection of a new site is a matter of much thought, and before a final decision is arrived at, a deputation of elders is sent to sleep at the proposed site, taking with them a cock. If the bird crows lustily an hour before daybreak, as all good cocks should, the site is approved of. Sites of villages which have been burnt by enemies are eschewed as unlucky, and a chief when re-occupying a site of some other chief's village generally tries to establish himself slightly to one side or other, in hopes that the new site will bear his name for many years.

As soon as the move has been decided on, arrangements are made for cutting the jhums near the new site, and during the rains all the workers live either in the jhum houses, or in temporary shelters built near the new site, to which, after the harvest, they laboriously carry all their belongings on their own backs, as they own no beasts of burden. These constant moves have had a great share in moulding the Lushai character, for when you have to carry all your worldly goods from your old to your new house every four or five years, it is not strange if you are disinclined to amass more than is absolutely necessary, and gradually become content with very little, and prefer ease and idleness to toiling in the hopes of being able to add to your worldly possessions. This I believe to be the explanation of the difference between the Lushai and the Chins, the latter being eager to earn money by work or trade, while the former far prefer to lie smoking in the sun.

[4. Houses.] The house of a commoner consists of three parts, the front verandah, approached by a rough platform of logs, the main room, and a small closet partitioned off at the far end, beyond which there will sometimes be a small bamboo platform. The verandah is termed "sum-hmun," from the "sum," or mortar in which the paddy is cleaned, which has its place here. On one side the careful housewife stacks her firewood, and the front wall of the house is the place on which the householder, if he is a sportsman, displays the skulls of the animals and birds he has slain; among them hang baskets in which the fowls lay, and even sit on their eggs, hatching out as numerous and as healthy broods as do the most pampered inhabitants of model poultry farms. The fowls spend the night in long tubular bamboo baskets, hung under the eaves, access to which is gained by climbing up an inclined stick from the front verandah. Hens with broods are shut up each night in special baskets with sliding doors.

From the verandah a small door, about 2 1/2 feet by 4, with a very high sill, opens into the house. This door is placed at the side furthest from the hill, and consists of a panel of split bamboo work attached to a long bamboo which slides to and fro, resting in the groove between two other bamboos lashed on to the top of the sill, in which there is generally a small opening, with a swinging door, for use of the dogs and fowls when the big door is closed. Immediately inside the door, in one corner, are collected the hollow bamboo tubes which take the place of water pots; opposite will often be a large circular bamboo bin containing the household's supply of paddy. Next to this is a sleeping platform, known as "kum-ai," beyond which is the hearth of earth, in the centre of which three stones or pieces of iron are fixed, on which the cooking pot rests. The earth is kept in its place by three pieces of wood, that in front being a wide plank with the top carefully smoothed, which forms a favourite seat during cold weather. The earth is put in wet and well kneaded, and eventually becomes as hard as brick. Along the wall an earthen shelf serves the double purpose of keeping the fire from the wall and affording a resting place for the pots. Over the hearth are hung two bamboo shelves, one above the other, on which to-morrow's supply of paddy is dried, and various odds and ends are stored. These shelves also serve to keep the sparks from reaching the roof. Beyond the fireplace is another sleeping place, called the "kum-pui"--i.e., big bed--which is reserved for the parents, while the young children and unmarried girls use the kum-ai; the bigger boys and young men, as has already been stated, sleeping in the zawlbuk. Beyond the kum-pui comes the partition dividing off the small recess used as a lumber room, and often as a closet. The beds and hearth are always on the side of the house nearest to the hillside, and do not usually extend quite to the centre, the rest of the floor being vacant, and, in order to avoid obstructing this, the posts which support the ridge are placed slanting, passing through the floor in line with the edge of the hearth. Along the wall opposite to the hearth are lashed two or more bamboos, forming convenient shelves, while a platform of the same useful plant is constructed from one cross beam to another. Forked sticks tied to the wall or to the uprights form hooks, and the large bamboos, wherever used, have openings cut in them which convert each joint into a tiny cupboard. At the far end of the house, opposite the front door, is a similar door opening on to a small platform, whence a notched log serves as a means of descending to the garden or the street. Many houses have bamboo platforms adjoining the front verandah, on which the women folk sit and do their weaving, while the young men lie at their ease and flirt with any girls who are good looking.

The houses of the chiefs are very similar to those of their subjects, only a good deal larger. Entering from the front verandah, the visitor finds himself in a passage running along one side of the house, off which open several small rooms inhabited by the married retainers; the other end of the passage opens into a large room with several sleeping platforms and sometimes two or more hearths, but otherwise similar to that above described. Beyond this is the usual closet, while beyond that is a wide verandah partially closed in, which is especially reserved for the chief's family. These verandahs, called "bazah," are forbidden to all except chiefs or wealthy persons who have given certain feasts. A similar prohibition exists regarding windows, which are one of the prerogatives of the "Thangchhuah," as will be described in Chapter IV, para 1. Openings in the side of the house are viewed with suspicion, as likely to bring misfortune, and a most progressive chief told me he had refrained from making any but the authorised ones, in deference to the strong public feeling that the whole village would suffer for such an innovation.

The materials of which all the buildings are constructed are the same--viz., timber for uprights and cross beams, bamboos for the framework of the floor, walls, and roof, split bamboos for the floor, walls, and if cane leaves are used to cover the thatch; the whole being tied together with cane. The uprights consist of sections of hard wood trees, which are split longitudinally and left to season for as long as possible. The cross beams which rest on the wall plates appear to us unduly heavy, while the wall plates seem very weak. The Lushais claim that the weight of the cross beams gives the house stability in high winds. The broad bands of split bamboo laid on top of the cane leaf thatch from eave to eave, secured at intervals by longitudinal bamboos tied down with cane, give the roof a semi-circular appearance from the outside. When cane leaves cannot be obtained, thatching grass is used, but its extreme inflammability makes it unpopular. When cane leaves are used, holes for the passage of cane ties cannot be avoided, and beneath each of these a bamboo split in half is secured as a drain pipe to convey the drippings beyond the walls.

[5. Furniture.] Owing to their nomadic habits the Lushais have not much furniture. Even in the houses of powerful chiefs but little will be found but a few rough and low wooden stools, some wooden platters, some earthenware beer pots, strengthened by plaited cane coverings, some brass pots, and many baskets in which valuable or perishable articles are preserved. Property which can be safely buried is often concealed in this way, a custom which is fast dying out now that raids are things of the past.

[6. Implements.] Agricultural.--The Lushai's cultivation being confined to cutting down the jungle, burning it, and dibbling in the seed among the ashes, he does not require many or elaborate implements and is content with a dao, an axe, and a hoe. The dao is a knife with a triangular blade, about 3 inches wide at the end and 1 inch or so at the handle. It is ground with a chisel edge, the broad end being also sharpened. This is used for clearing the jungle, and the broad end is used for grubbing the holes in which the seeds are placed. The axe heads are of iron only about 1 1/2 inches wide at the edge, and taper almost to a point; the handles are simply pieces of bamboo, the heads being thrust through the tough root portion. The hoes very closely resemble the axes, the heads being a little lighter and broader.

Musical Instruments.--The commonest are gongs and drums, but a kind of mouth-organ known as "rotchem" and a fiddle made out of a piece of bamboo are sometimes used. The gongs are mostly imported from Burma, as much as Rs. 150/- being paid for large ones, but the most prized are sets of three small gongs, each with a separate note, on which three skilled performers can produce something resembling a tune. The drums are sections of trees hollowed out, the ends being covered with metna hide caps laced together. The rotchem, which is found in all Lushai-Kuki clans, consists of a gourd into which nine hollow reeds are inserted, one to serve as a mouthpiece; the others, which are of various lengths, have small holes cut in them. The performer blows into the mouthpiece, and, by closing and opening the holes with his fingers, he can produce various notes, but the music is dull and monotonous. The fiddle is a very rough affair, produced in a few minutes by loosening a strip of the outer skin of a bamboo, without detaching it at its ends, and raising it up and inserting a piece of stick to act as a bridge; the bow is made out of another piece of bamboo. The sound of a bugle is very cleverly imitated by blowing through several lengths of bamboo inserted one into the other.

Household Utensils.--Besides the articles enumerated under furniture, earthenware cooking pots and bamboo spoons complete the utensils used inside the house.

[7. Manufactures.] Basket Work.--This is chiefly carried on by men. The patterns are very numerous, each being adapted to some particular use. The material is generally bamboo. The "thul" is a basket with four short legs, about twelve inches square at the bottom, widening till the mouth is a circle with a diameter of about thirty inches; this basket is supplied with a conical lid and is chiefly used to keep valuables in. The outer layer is of finely split bamboo closely woven, and this is lined with broad leaves well dried, which are held in their place by an inner layer of bamboo more loosely woven. These baskets are quite waterproof.

For carrying goods there are the "deron," a truncated cone 30 to 36 inches long with a diameter at its mouth of about 24 inches, holding about 50 lbs. of paddy; the "em," similar to the deron, but about half the size. The "bomrang," an open-work basket with an oval mouth, 15 inches by 12, is used for carrying goods on long journeys. The "paikawng" similar in shape to the em, but with open-work sides, is for conveyance of wood, water tubes, &c. There are also several sorts of flat baskets for holding grain, each with its particular name. The containing power of these is approximately constant, and they are used as measures of quantity.

Pottery.--The women make clay pots, moulding them by hand. There are only two kinds in use--a small circular pot with a mouth some 6 to 8 inches in diameter, used for cooking, and a large jar, about 24 inches high and 15 inches in diameter, tapering to about 9 inches at the mouth, which is used for brewing beer in.

Brass Work.--Occasionally one comes across rough specimens of moulding in this metal, which show considerable if untrained talent, but they are very rare, and I attribute them to captives taken from the plains of India or Burma, or to persons who have learnt from them. The method followed is to make a model in wax and cover it with successive washes of clay till a sufficient thickness is obtained, the whole then being baked till the clay is hard, and the wax has all run out through a hole left for this purpose. Into this mould the molten brass is then poured. The commonest use of this work is for the semi-circular tube required to connect the two arms of the syphons used in drawing off the rice beer. These tubes are sometimes surmounted by quite elaborate designs, a hunter approaching his quarry, a tree with many hornbills perched among the boughs, and on one which I bought are represented Vutaia and his "kawnbawl," or minister, with leg irons on. The latter carries on his shoulder an elephant's tusk, which formed part of the ransom of his master, who, in the ups and downs of the troublous times in which he lived, had been captured by the Kamhaus.

Iron Work.--The blacksmith is one of the village officials described in