The new
rice is boiled in a new pot on a fire which is kindled at noon on
the day when, according to Hindoo astrologers, the sun enters the
tropic of Capricorn. The boiling of the pot is watched with great
anxiety by the whole family, for as the milk boils, so will the
coming year be. If the milk boils rapidly, the year will be
prosperous; but it will be the reverse if the milk boils slowly.
Some of the new boiled rice is offered to the image of Ganesa; then
every one partakes of it. In some parts of Northern India the
festival of the new crop is known as _Navan,_ that is, "new grain."
When the crop is ripe, the owner takes the omens, goes to the field,
plucks five or six ears of barley in the spring crop and one of the
millets in the autumn harvest. This is brought home, parched, and
mixed with coarse sugar, butter, and curds. Some of it is thrown on
the fire in the name of the village gods and deceased ancestors; the
rest is eaten by the family.
The ceremony of eating the new yams at Onitsha, on the Niger, is
thus described: "Each headman brought out six yams, and cut down
young branches of palm-leaves and placed them before his gate,
roasted three of the yams, and got some kola-nuts and fish.
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