The plan of
putting puppets in the boat to represent sick persons, in order to
lure the demons after them, is not uncommon. For example, most of
the pagan tribes on the coast of Borneo seek to drive away epidemic
disease as follows. They carve one or more rough human images from
the pith of the sago palm and place them on a small raft or boat or
full-rigged Malay ship together with rice and other food. The boat
is decked with blossoms of the areca palm and with ribbons made from
its leaves, and thus adorned the little craft is allowed to float
out to sea with the ebb-tide, bearing, as the people fondly think or
hope, the sickness away with it.
Often the vehicle which carries away the collected demons or ills of
a whole community is an animal or scapegoat. In the Central
Provinces of India, when cholera breaks out in a village, every one
retires after sunset to his house. The priests then parade the
streets, taking from the roof of each house a straw, which is burnt
with an offering of rice, ghee, and turmeric, at some shrine to the
east of the village.
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