In the Torres Straits the sorcerer points a spear in the direction of his victim and ‘sings’ similarly, ‘Into body, go, go. Into hands, go, go. Into head, go, go’ (_Cambridge Expedition to Torres Straits_, vi. 228, 229). The ‘singing’ assists, Mr. Haddon says (ib., p. 231), ‘in furthering the injury he wishes to inflict.’ Now, was ‘singing’, of this magical nature, a sort of rhythmical muttering in a low voice, known to the Greeks and Romans? In the first place, we have the Latin words _incantare_, _incantator_, _incantamentum_, all implying a singing which is magical in its intention and effects--incantation or enchantment. Next, we have _carmen_, which means not only song in general but ‘singing’ in the magical sense, in Tibullus (i. 8. 17), Ovid (_Met._ vii. 167, 203, 253; xiv. 57, 20, 34, 44, 366, 387; _Fasti_ iv. 551, 552), Horace (_Ep._ v. 72; xvii. 4, 5, 28; _Sat._ i. 8. 19, 20), Virgil (_Ecl._ viii. 69; _Aen._ iv. 487), Juvenal (_Sat._ vi. 133), Pliny (_Nat. Hist._ xxviii. 10, 18), Tacitus (_Annals_, iv. 22), and in other passages for which I may refer to Adam Abt (_Die Apologie des Apuleius_, 22) and L. Fahz (_De Poetarum Romanorum Doctrina Magica_, 138, 139). In Greek we have the same magical singing expressed by the words ἑπάδειν, ἑπωδνή, ἑπῳδὁς; in Euripides (_Bacchae_ 234, _Hippolytus_ 478, 1038, _Phoenissae_ 1260), Sosiphanes (_Fr._ 1), Aristophanes (_Amphiaraus_, _Fr._ 29), Anaxandrides (_Fr._ 33. 31), Antiphanes (_Fr._ 17. 15), Xenophon (_Mem._ iii. 11. 16, 17), Lucian and Heliodorus, and other passages to be found in Abt (ib., p. 43).