Page:Siamese ghostlore - Irwin - 1907.pdf/3

 pull your toes,. [sic] The following story is related as an example of the power of "pi lawk," and is at all events an instance of how a belief in them may arise. Some years ago an official in the consular service of a foreign power went to stay at a town in the interior of Siam. Here he was lodged in an empty house close to that occupied by the High Commissioner. His servants slept downstairs, and a sentry was posted in front of the house. The top part of the house was capable of being completely closed, except for a door entering from the verandah the room in which he slept. The stair-case was inside the house, and the lower story being completely shut up at night, no one outside the house could then ascend by it. The first night he was there, having carefully closed and fastened the windows of his bed room, leaving only the door unclosed, he retired to bed. In the middle of the night he was rudely awakened by being pulled out of bed on to the floor. On examining the windows they were found to be still fastened, as well as the door downstairs. Next day, suspicions being naturally entertained that some one had been playing a practical joke, complaint was made to the Commissioner, but after investigation nothing could be found out, and the foreign gentleman remained in the house. He, however, was a man of resource, and he determined to detect, if possible, his nocturnal assailant, so before retiring to bed the next night he carefully sprinkled flour all over the floor of his bed room. He then extinguished his lamp, got into bed, and remained awake. About midnight he heard a slight noise, felt what were seemingly human hands seize his ankles and was again pulled on to the floor. He rose and grasped at his assailant, who escaped, probably through the doorway. The servants were called, and lights were brought, and behold the tracks of the intruder were there, but tracks that clearly indicated that they were made by a "pi." They were in the form of an almost perfect circle some two inches in diameter, with small, apparently human toe marks, on one side. The rest of the track showed marks such as would be made by the corrugations in the skin of a human foot. Still no clue whatever to the owner of the feet could be found. The foreign representative and the Commissioner agreed that the only thing to do was to lend the former another residence, where he remained unmolested for the remainder of his stay in the town. The neighbours, especially those who had