This is just what happened in the West Indies in the time of Columbus. Friar Roman Paul tells of a native sorcerer who pretended to pull the disease from the legs of his patients, blowing it away, and telling it to begone to the mountain or the sea. He would then pretend to extract by sucking some stone or bit of flesh, which he declared had been put into the patient to cause the disease by a deity in punishment for some religious neglect.[48] The Patagonians believed that sickness was caused by spirits entering the patient’s body; they considered that an evil demon held possession of the sick man’s body, and their doctors always carried a drum which they struck at the bedside to frighten away the demons which caused the disorder.[49] The Zulus and Basutos in Africa teach that ghosts of dead persons are the causes of all diseases. Congo tribes believe also that the souls of the dead cause disease and death amongst men. The art of medicine in these lands therefore is, for the most part, merely an affair of propitiating some offended and disease-causing spirit. In several parts of Africa mentally deranged persons are worshipped. Madness and idiocy are explained by the phrase, “he has fiends.” The Bodo and Dhimal people of North-east India ascribe all diseases to a deity who torments the patient, and who must be appeased by the sacrifice of a hog. With these people naturally the doctor is a sort of priest. As Mr. Tylor says, “Where the world-wide doctrine of disease-demons has held sway, men’s minds, full of spells and ceremonies, have scarce had room for thought of drugs and regimen.”[50] A forest tribe of the Malay Peninsula, called the Original People, are said to have no religion, no idea of any Supreme Being, and no priests; yet their Puyung, who is a sort of general adviser to the tribe, instructs them in sorcery and the doctrine of ghosts and evil spirits. In sickness they use the roots and leaves of trees as medicines. Amongst the Tarawan group of the Coral Islands, Pickering says: “Divination or sorcery was also known, and the natives paid worship to the manes or spirits of their departed ancestors.”[51] Probably on careful investigation we should find that in these cases the doctrine of ghosts and the worship of spirits has some connection with the causation of disease. The Malagasy profess a religion which is chiefly fetishism. They believe in the life of the spirit, which they call “the essential part of me,” apart from the body; and they believe that this spirit exists when the body dies. Such “ghosts” they consider can do harm in various ways, especially by causing diseases; consequently they endeavour, as the chief means of cure, to appease the offended ghost. Witchcraft and belief in charms naturally flourish amongst these people.[52]