A fire is next kindled, by
the light of which the medicine-man sorts out the souls. First he
puts aside the souls of dead people, of which there are usually
several; for if he were to give the soul of a dead person to a
living man, the man would die instantly. Next he picks out the souls
of all the persons present, and making them all to sit down before
him, he takes the soul of each, in the shape of a splinter of bone,
wood, or shell, and placing it on the owner's head, pats it with
many prayers and contortions till it descends into the heart and so
resumes its proper place.
Again, souls may be extracted from their bodies or detained on their
wanderings not only by ghosts and demons but also by men, especially
by sorcerers. In Fiji, if a criminal refused to confess, the chief
sent for a scarf with which "to catch away the soul of the rogue."
At the sight or even at the mention of the scarf the culprit
generally made a clean breast. For if he did not, the scarf would be
waved over his head till his soul was caught in it, when it would be
carefully folded up and nailed to the end of a chief's canoe; and
for want of his soul the criminal would pine and die.
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