The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 / Page 124 (Color Image)

0124	The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2

86 MARCO POLO BOOK II.

summer is so impure and bad ; and any foreigners

attempting it would die for certain.? When these people

have any business transactions with one another, they

take a piece of stick, round or square, and split it, each

taking half. And on either half they cut two or three

notches. And when the account is settled the debtor

receives back the other half of the stick from the

creditor.'

And let me tell you that in all those three provinces

that I have been speaking of, to wit Carajan, Vochan,

and Yachi, there is never a leech. But when any one

is ill they send for their magicians, that is to say the

Devil-conjurors and those who are the keepers of the

idols. When these are come the sick man tells

what ails him, and then the conjurors incontinently begin

playing on their instruments and singing and dancing ;

and the conjurors dance to such a pitch that at last one

of them shall fall to the ground lifeless, like a dead man.

And then the devil entereth into his body. And when

his comrades see him in this plight they begin to put

questions to him about the sick man's ailment. And he

will reply : " Such or such a spirit hath been meddling

with the man,' for that he hath angered the spirit and

done it some despite." Then they say : " We pray thee

to pardon him, and to take of his blood or of his goods

what thou wilt in consideration of thus restoring him

to health." And when they have so prayed, the malig-

nant spirit that is in the body of the prostrate man will

(mayhap) answer : " The sick man hath also done great

despite unto such another spirit, and that one is so ill-

disposed that it will not pardon him on any account ; "

this at least is the answer they get, an the patient be like

to die. But if he is to get better the answer will be that

they are to bring two sheep, or may be three ; and to

brew ten or twelve jars of drink, very costly and

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