On the occasion of a wedding, a pūjā, or any other festival, it is quite a customary thing for a well-to-do man in Bengal to engage a kaihak or a pañchāli or yātrā party to give a performance or a series of performances in the courtyard of his house, where a considerable portion of the population of the village assembles as an audience, and sits, often right through the night, listening to song and speech, dialogue and story. It is for the most part by means of such performances that a knowledge of the myths and traditions of Hinduism is preserved in the minds of the illiterate mass of the population of Bengal.