208 Religion &c. among the Karens. [No. 4, 



At evening, the stomach of the hog is roasted, and all taste of it, in 

 the manner described above. 



Next morning at dawn, they take the posts of the table, and throw- 

 ing them away endwise, as they would throw a javelin, into the earth 

 without the village, they say : " Now it is done, it is finished. Gro 

 thy way, return to thy place." 



After it is light, they cook the head of the hog, and eat it with any 

 meat that may be left. On that clay the people do not go away from 

 the house. 



"Witches and Wizards. 



Next in order to the spirits of the departed dead, in Karen mytho- 

 logy are their witches and wizards ; but witches, among the Karens, 

 are not persons who have made a compact with Satan, as European 

 believers in witchcraft suppose, but persons possessed with a demon 

 which they call Nd, and the Red Karens Ne. The name does not 

 correspond to the Burmese Nat, as some have thought, which denotes 

 an entirely different being, but is equivalent to the Burmese Sung. 



According to one myth, the Na is an animal that Grod commanded 

 man to eat at the beginning, with other animals, but neglecting to do 

 so, it became invisible and now eats him. 



According to another legend, it is a human stomach ; those possessed 

 of Nas having stomachs, Avhile others are destitute of that organ. 

 One story represents a woman, who had incontinently married a man 

 possessed of a Na, as saying: "I saw his stomach under his finger 

 nail, but thought it was an insect." 



One man, with a Na, was observed when asleep to be without a 

 head, and to eat and breathe from the top of his neck. These are 

 headless demons in the Hindoo mythology. 



A person possessed of a Na is said to devour people, but it is the 

 La, or vital principle that it devours, not the body. When it eats the 

 eyes of another, the eyes remain, but they are blind ; the matter is 

 left, but the life has gone. 



Sometimes the stomach is represented as going about devouring 

 men, but more often the act is attributed to the person. One possess- 

 ed by a Na sees men as beasts, and their eyes as fruit. 



In one story, a young man had married a woman with a Na, and 



