a man of the Velalla caste in the Trichinopoly district who had been born of Roman Catholic parents and been brought up in the faith. One of his sons was afflicted with epilepsy, and the fits were ascribed to possession by a demon. The father tried various means of curing him, but without success. He employed native doctors, who could do nothing. He next called in the Roman Catholic priest, who endeavoured to exorcise the evil spirit by prayer. It was said that on one occasion the padre placed the Bible on the patient's head, but the power of the demon was so strong that the holy book was thrown high into the air. The man, by the priest's advice, brought his son to live close to one of the churches. Together father and son attended the services of the church constantly, but without any visible improvement in the lad. At the end of three months the Velallan took the boy to Trichinopoly, and they presented themselves at the S.P.G. church, never missing a service. They persevered for three months more, and at the end of the time there was no improvement.
The man was then tempted to go back to the heathen practices of his ancestors. He made sacrifices and oblations to Karmachi, one of the forms of Kali. After a short time the lad seemed better, and the epilepsy gradually left him. The cure was ascribed to the beneficence of Karmachi. The man and all his family forsook their Christian faith and returned to idolatry.
The belief in the power of the priest to exorcise is not confined to the East. I remember a case in 1860, when the parents of an idiot boy came to the incumbent of a parish in Norfolk, and begged him to exorcise the evil spirit from their son. They explained what they had done in their broad Norfolk speech.
'We ha' beat him black and blue; we ha' runned him up and down the roads till he cou'n't stand; we ha' held
