Nor did the magician hesitate to compel even the gods to perform his wishes, and to threaten them, like the Malay robber, with dire disaster to themselves and the universe as a punishment of their obstinacy. In one papyrus preserved to us, for example, a woman in labour declares herself to be Isis and summons the gods to her help. If they refuse to come, “Then shall ye be destroyed, ye nine gods; the heaven shall no longer exist, the earth shall no longer exist, the five days over and above the year shall cease to be, offerings shall no longer be made to the gods, the lords of Heliopolis. The firmament of the south shall fail, and disaster shall break forth from the sky of the north. Lamentations shall resound from the graves, the midday sun shall no longer shine, the Nile shall not bestow its waters of inundation at the appointed time.”[137.1] Such bombastic menaces as these continued to be part of the practitioner’s stock-in-trade in the Roman Empire to the downfall of paganism. Among the ancient Greeks in Plato’s time there were soothsayers and medicine-men who professed to have power over the gods, so that they could compel them to do their bidding, even though it were to injure another person.[137.2] I am not aware whether any of their spells have been preserved.[137.3] {138} Cases like these display the religion of the community applied to the private advantage of the individual. More interesting is the authority which Mr Hodson attributes to the _khullakpa_, or village priest, of the Naga tribes of Manipur. The khullakpa is to be distinguished from the _maiba_, or medicine-man, who is doctor and magician in one. The maiba is called in to deal with individual cases; the khullakpa plays the leading part when a village _genna_ is held. It is he who offers the sacrifices and performs the rites. The term _genna_ means forbidden. A genna extending to the whole village excludes strangers from entering, and prohibits the inhabitants from going out and from doing any work while the genna lasts; it may also prescribe fasting, continence, and other observances. In short, “the ordinary routine of life is profoundly modified, if not broken off altogether.” A genna may be either periodical, as for the sake of the crops or the hunting; or it may be occasional, as at a death, or against epidemic sickness, or at an earthquake or eclipse. A sacrifice is invariably a part of the ritual. The khullakpa “acts,” says Mr Hodson, “whenever a rite is performed which requires the whole force of the community behind it, and this force finds its operation through him. These village gennas seem in many cases to be inspired by the belief that man, _the man_, the {139} khullakpa, when fortified by the whole strength and will of the village, is able to control and constrain forces which are beyond his control if unaided.”[139.1] If this inference, made by an acute observer, be correct, it is a remarkable example of the corporate