Having at length decided upon a suitable line of action, the doctors proceeded to the investigation of the case. The most eminent of the doctors――at least the one who had consumed the most whiskey――took a tiger’s tooth, and, muttering some gibberish, drew it along the side and back of the patient, leaving deep scratches; the patient, unable to speak, of course writhed and struggled. At length, after a deeper incision (which drew the blood), the patient uttered an audible cry; this sound was interpreted by the ferocious, drunken spirit-doctors to indicate the situation of the spirit. With a vigorous thrust in the side, while his assistant, thinking he had discovered the spirit in another region, was equally attentive, the chief inquisitor with foul and abusive language ordered the spirit to leave. The exorcism was a failure, and the spirit refused to make itself known, though pressingly flattered to do so by the persuasive and forcible eloquence of these three drunken, demoniac savages. In these investigations any injury inflicted is directed against the spirit, and any answers to questions asked by the doctor or the friends of the patient are supposed to proceed from the spirit; so the doctor asks the name of the spirit, and the patient, if conscious or partly so, will, in order to escape torture, give the name of some acquaintance, probably some near and intimate neighbor; for usually some suspicion will have been expressed. The name of some one having been mentioned by the patient, various questions concerning the domestic relations of the family of the person named are asked, such as the names of all the members of the family, the number of cattle they own, the amount of money they have, and sundry other questions concerning things supposed to be known only to members of the family. If to all these questions satisfactory answers are given, the person whose name is mentioned is accused of witchcraft, and, together with all his family, all in the house, must leave the neighborhood; everything belonging to them, except such articles as can be easily removed, is committed to the flames; they cannot sell their gardens nor rice-fields nor any other possession, since no one will risk the supposed contamination. The accused cannot settle in any adjoining neighborhood, but must go as strangers into some distant province occupied only by others like themselves driven from their homes upon charges of witchcraft. All the accumulations of a lifetime of thrift and economy may at any time be sacrificed to the whims of this blind credulity. This superstition is one of the greatest social evils; indeed, it entails more serious injury than all other beliefs and practices combined. No one receives any benefit from it; it is purely destructive. Hundreds of families are yearly driven from their homes in obedience to the requirements of this degrading prostitution of the human intellect. MEDICAL MISSIONARY WORK AMONG THE LAOS.