186 Tlie " Koh" of Chota-Nagpore. 



who should be destroyed. The fear of punishment and, I may add 

 for some of them, the respect they bear to the orders of their rulers, 

 restrain their hands, and witch murders are now very rare, but a 

 village is soon made too hot to hold one who is supposed to be 

 a witch. 



When a belief is entertained that sickness in a family, or mortality 

 amongst cattle, or other misfortune has been brought about by sorcery, 

 a Sokha or witch-finder is employed to find out who has cast the 

 spell. By the Sokhas various methods of divination are employed. 

 One of the most common is the test by the stone and " poila." The 

 latter is a large wooden cup shaped like a half cocoanut, used as a ] 

 measure for grain. It is placed under a flat stone, and becomes a 

 pivot for the stone to turn on. A boy is then placed in a sitting 

 position on the stone, supporting himself by his hands, and the names 

 of all the people in the neighbourhood are slowly pronounced, and as I 

 each name is uttered, a few grains of rice are thrown at the boy ; I 

 when they come to the name of the witch or wizard, the stone turns 

 and the boy rolls off ! 



There is no necessary collusion between the Sokha and the boy ; 

 the motion of the hand throwing the rice produces coma, and the 

 Sokha is, I suppose, sufficiently a mesmerist to bring about the required 

 result when he pleases. 



The Singbhoom Kols or Hos, left to themselves, not only considered 

 it necessary to put to death a witch thus denounced, but if she had 

 children or other blood relations, they must all perish, as all of the 

 same blood were supposed to be tainted. 



In 1857, when, in consequence of the mutinies, Singbhoom was 

 temporarily without officers, the Ho tribes of the southern parts of 

 the district, always the most turbulent, released from a restraint they 

 had never been very patient under, set to work to search out the 

 witches and sorcerers who, it was supposed, from the long spell of 

 protection they had enjoyed, had increased and multiplied to a danger- 

 ous extent. In a report on this subject from the district officer, in 

 1860, it is stated that " the destruction of human life that ensued 

 is too terrible to contemplate ; whole families were put an end to. In 

 some instances the destroyers, issuing forth in the dusk and commen- 

 cing with the denounced wizard and his household, went from house 



