328 



HAUNTS AND HOBBIES 



seen them. But on this point the readers may judge 

 for themselves. Out of several I select the following : — 



The tricks, we may conclude, were exhibited in one 

 of the courts of the palace where, according to custom, 

 there would be in the centre a large stone basin or 

 reservoir of water. Over the face of the reservoir the 

 Jogees drew a sheet. Presently they removed it and 

 displayed the surface of the water frozen, and that so 

 hard and so deep that the ice bore the weight of an 

 elephant which was made to walk across it. 



In another performance the Jogees produced a chain; 

 it was fifty cubits in length. The Jogees raised one 

 end and threw it in the air. The chain went up and up 

 till the lower end just touched the ground, and it thus 

 continued to hang suspended from nothing. Next the 

 Jogees drew forward a sack; the mouth of the sack was 

 fastened: the Jogees opened it. Immediately from out 

 of the sack a dog appeared ; he walked to the chain 

 and commenced to ascend it. A wild boar followed, 

 and did the same, and after them, all likewise issuing 

 from the sack, came a panther, a lion, and then a tiger. 

 These three also, like the dog and the wild boar, went 

 to the chain and proceeded to climb it ; and each of the 

 five animals — the dog, the wild boar, the panther, the 

 lion, and the tiger — so soon as they reached the summit 

 of the chain vanished in succession in the air. 



Marvellous as these two performances were, perhaps 

 the third I have selected is even more amazing. The 

 Jogees brought forward a man ; then they drew their 

 swords and cut him to pieces. This done, they col- 

 lected the pieces, piled them in a heap, and covered 



