In West Africa,[1] and among the Nandi,[2] the blood of a slain enemy was drunk, and in New Britain it is believed that if you eat your enemy his friends cannot do you hurt.[3] "About two years ago a coroner's inquest was held at Kirton-in-Lindsey, and it was noticed as very strange that one of the jurors did not touch the corpse. It appears that it is held that everyone who has had occasion to see a dead body, whether it be that of a relative, a friend, or a stranger, should not leave it without laying his hand on the body; if he does not do so he will be haunted by the spirit of the departed, or at least suffer from his presence in evil dreams."[4] Kaffirs rub their eyes with a piece of the lion's skin before they venture to look at his dead body;[5] Africans, "in passing through a country where leopards and lions abound," "carefully provide themselves with the claws, teeth, lips, and whiskers of those animals, and hang them round their necks to secure themselves against being attacked. For the same purpose the point of an elephant's trunk is generally worn by elephant-hunters."[6] The Sinhalese, to protect themselves from snakebite, wear a picture of the king of the cobras tattooed on their arm, recite a mantra which identifies them with the serpent king, or carry a jewel which is supposed to be a serpent stone. Similarly, since smallpox appears in tiger form, parts of tigers are efficient amulets against it.[7] One method of gathering
- ↑ Crawley, op. cit., p. 233.
- ↑ Hollis, The Nandi, p. 27. It is washed off the spears, and drunk by the slayer.
- ↑ Crawley, loc. cit.
- ↑ County Folklore, vol. v. (Lincolnshire), p. 142.
- ↑ Arbousset, 214, (Crawley, loc. cit.)
- ↑ Haddon, Magic and Fetichism, p. 32.
- ↑ Hildburgh, The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute etc., vol. xxxviii., pp. 187-8. Cf. Cornish charms, the milpreve, the snake-stone ring, or the body of a dead snake bruised on the wound. Hunt, Popular Romances of the West of England, 2nd S., p. 215.
