distant hill were beings of this order, and he was very indignant at the laugh which his observation provoked from his less experienced European disciple. 'If your telescope could see as far as my old eyes,' the veteran said, 'or if you knew the movements of all the animals of this hunting-ground as well as I do, you would see that those must be demons and nothing else. No men nor animals at this time of day would collect on an open space and move about in that way. Besides, the large rock close by them is a noted place for demons; every child in the village knows that.'
I have heard another man of the same class, when asked why he looked so intently at a human footstep in the forest pathway, gravely observe that the footmark looked as if the foot which made it had been walking heel foremost, and must therefore have been made by a Rakshas, 'for they always walked so, when in human form.'
Another expressed particular dread of a human face the eyes of which were placed at an exaggerated angle to each other, like those of a Chinese or Malay, 'because that position of the eyes was the only way in which you could recognise a Rakshas in human shape.'
In the more advanced and populous parts of the country the Rakshas seem giving way to the 'Bhoot,' which nearly resembles the mere ghost of modern European superstition; but even in this diluted form such beings have an influence over Indian imaginations to which it is difficult in these days to find any parallel in Europe.
I found, quite lately, a traditionary order in existence at Government House, Dapoorie, near Poona, which directed the native sentry on guard 'to present arms if a cat or dog, jackal or goat, entered or left the house or crossed near his beat' during certain hours of the night, 'because it was the ghost' of a former Governor, who was still remembered as one of the best and kindest of men.
How or when the custom originated I could not learn, but the order had been verbally handed on from one native sergeant of the guard to another for many years, without any doubts as to its propriety or authority, till it was accidentally overheard by an English officer of the Governor's staff.
In the hills and deserts of Sind the belief in beings of this order, as might be expected in a wild and desolate country, is
