evil spirits with whom they had dealings?'

'The evil spirits ate the livers; but they are set on to do so by the
witches, who get them into their power by such accursed sacrifices
and offerings. They will often dig up young children from their
graves, bring them to life, and allow these devils to feed upon their
livers, as falconers allow their hawks to feed on the breasts of
pigeons. You "sâhib lôg" (European gentlemen) will not believe all
this, but it is, nevertheless, all very true.'[4]

The belief in sorcery among these people owes its origin, in a great
measure, to the diseases of the liver and spleen to which the
natives, and particularly the children, are much subject in the
jungly parts of Central India. From these affections children pine
away and die, without showing any external marks of disease. Their
death is attributed to witchcraft, and any querulous old woman, who
has been in the habit of murmuring at slights and ill treatment in
the neighbourhood, is immediately set down as the cause. Men who
practise medicine among them are very commonly supposed to be at the
same time wizards. Seeking to inspire confidence in their
prescriptions by repeating prayers and incantations over the patient,
or over the medicine they give him, they make him believe that they
derive aid from supernatural power; and the patient concludes that
those who can command these powers to cure can, if they will, command
them to destroy. He and his friends believe that the man who can
command these powers to cure one individual can command them to cure
any other; and, if he does not do so, they believe that it arises
from a desire to destroy the patient. I have, in these territories,
known a great many instances of medical practitioners having been put
to death for not curing young people for whom they were required to