Page:Folklore1919.djvu/511

Rh

Author:Robert Ranulph Marett kindly forwards a letter from S. Martin Harvey, Orderly, 27th General Hospital, Cairo, to the following effect. A soldier was sent to the hospital suffering from malaria, a broken leg and gunshot wounds in his body. He brought with him a bag, such as that supplied to every soldier by the Red Cross, from which he could not be prevailed on to part. Finally, he gave it to the Sister on condition that she would keep it safe for him. She asked him what was in the bag, and he pushed his hand in and brought out a tiny grey mouse, saying that he was sure to die if he was ever parted from it. This mouse was a remarkable little animal. While I was in charge of it on some days it seemed inanimate or dead. On such days the soldier seemed always to be a little better, but when the mouse woke up he always had a relapse. Day by day he made no recovery, and seemed to be fading away, but he incessantly called for his mouse. At last, when no one thought he would live, his mouse was given back to him, and in a fortnight he was up and on the high road to recovery. In another fortnight he went back to duty.

newspaper reports that a Kuttichthan has been haunting a house here. He was on good terms with the people, and especially with a Brahman lad, who was informed that the real home of the spirit was in a certain village, and when he was taken home he ceased to visit his friends.

In another village there was a sacred grove into which, owing to the belief regarding it, no one dared to enter or cut the trees. In December last a weaver with some workmen dared to go into the grove. When they began to dig a shrine in the grove a workman heard a metallic sound and some buried treasure came to view. When the weaver ventured to touch it a figure like that of a bull appeared. Then a voice was heard saying, "Do not touch it now, but you can have it in three years."