The following account in the _Rasmala_ [300] is an instance of suicide
and of the actual haunting by the ghost: A Charan asserted a claim
against the chief of Siela in Kathiawar, which the latter refused to
liquidate. The bard thereupon, taking forty of his caste with him,
went to Siela with the intention of sitting _Dharna_ at the chief's
door and preventing any one from coming out or going in until the
claim should be discharged. However, as they approached the town,
the chief, becoming aware of their intention, caused the gates to
be closed. The bards remained outside and for three days abstained
from food; on the fourth day they proceeded to perform _traga_ as
follows: some hacked their own arms; others decapitated three old
women of the party and hung their heads up at the gate as a garland;
certain of the women cut off their own breasts. The bards also pierced
the throats of four of their old men with spikes, and they took two
young girls by the heels, and dashed out their brains against the
town gate. The Charan to whom the money was due dressed himself in
clothes wadded with cotton which he steeped in oil and then set on
fire. He thus burned himself to death. But as he died he cried out,
"I am now dying; but I will become a headless ghost (_Kuvis_) in the
palace, and will take the chiefs life and cut off his posterity." After
this sacrifice the rest of the bards returned home.
On the third day after the Charan's death his Bhut (ghost) threw the
Rani downstairs so that she was very much injured. Many other persons
also beheld the headless phantom in the palace. At last he entered
the chief's head and set him trembling. At night he would throw stones
at the palace, and he killed a female servant outright. At length, in
consequence of the various acts of oppression which he committed, none
dared to approach the chief's mansion even in broad daylight. In order
to exorcise the Bhut, Jogis, Fakirs and Brahmans were sent for from
many different places; but whoever attempted the cure was immediately
assailed by the Bhut in the chief's body, and that so furiously
that the exorcist's courage failed him. The Bhut would also cause
the chief to tear the flesh off his own arms with his teeth. Besides
this, four or five persons died of injuries received from the Bhut;
but nobody had the power to expel him. At length a foreign Jyotishi
(astrologer) came who had a great reputation for charms and magic,
and the chief sent for him and paid him honour. First he tied all
round the house threads which he had charged with a charm; then he
sprinkled charmed milk and water all round; then he drove a charmed
iron nail into the ground at each corner of the mansion, and two at the
door. He purified the house and continued his charms and incantations
for forty-one days, every day making sacrifices at the cemetery to the
Bhut's spirit. The Joshi lived in a room securely fastened up; but
people say that while he was muttering his charms stones would fall
and strike the windows. Finally the Joshi brought the chief, who had
been living in a separate room, and tried to exorcise the spirit. The
patient began to be very violent, but the Joshi and his people spared
no pains in thrashing him until they had rendered him quite docile. A
sacrificial fire-pit was made and a lemon placed between it and the
chief. The Joshi commanded the Bhut to enter the lime. The possessed,
however, said, 'Who are you; if one of your Deos (gods) were to come,
I would not quit this person.' Thus they went on from morning till
noon. At last they came outside, and, burning various kinds of incense
and sprinkling many charms, the Bhut was got out into the lemon. When
the lemon began to jump about, the whole of the spectators praised
the Joshi, crying out: 'The Bhut has gone into the lemon! The Bhut
has gone into the lemon!' The possessed person himself, when he saw
the lemon hopping about, was perfectly satisfied that the Bhut had
left his body and gone out into the lemon. The Joshi then drove the
lemon outside the city, followed by drummers and trumpeters; if the
lemon left the road, he would touch it with his stick and put it into
the right way again. On the track they sprinkled mustard and salt and
finally buried the lemon in a pit seven cubits deep, throwing into
the hole above it mustard and salt, and over these dust and stones,
and filling in the space between the stones with lead. At each corner,
too, the Joshi drove in an iron nail, two feet long, which he had
previously charmed. The lemon buried, the people returned home, and not
one of them ever saw the Bhut thereafter. According to the recorder
of the tale, the cure was effected by putting quicksilver into the
lemon. When a man is attacked with fever or becomes speechless or
appears to have lockjaw, his friends conclude from these indications
that he is possessed by a Bhut.
In another case some Bhats had been put in charge, by the chief of a
small State, of a village which was coveted by a neighbouring prince,
the Rana of Danta. The latter sent for the Bhats and asked them to
guard one or two of his villages, and having obtained their absence
by this pretext he raided their village, carrying off hostages and
cattle. When the Bhats got back they collected to the number of a
hundred and began to perform _Dharna_ against the Rana. They set
out from their village, and at every two miles as they advanced they
burned a man, so that by the time they got to the Rana's territory
seven or eight men had been burnt. They were then pacified by his
people and induced to go back. The Rana offered them presents, but
they refused to accept them, as they said the guilt of the death of
their fellows who had been burned would thereby be removed from the
Rana. The Rana lost all the seven sons born to him and died childless,
and it was generally held to be on account of this sin. [301]