Asia -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800; Mongols -- History; Polo, Marco, 1254-1323?; Voyages and travels
So they fetch the sheep of the colour prescribed, and slaughter them,
and sprinkle the blood over such places as have been enjoined, in
honour and propitiation of the spirit. And the conjurors come, and the
ladies, in the number that was ordered, and when all are assembled and
everything is ready, they begin to dance and play and sing in honour
of the spirit. And they take flesh-broth and drink and lign-aloes, and
a great number of lights, and go about hither and thither, scattering
the broth and the drink and the meat also. And when they have done this
for a while, again shall one of the conjurors fall flat and wallow
there foaming at the mouth, and then the others will ask if he have
yet pardoned the sick man? And sometimes he shall answer yea! and
sometimes he shall answer no! And if the answer be _no_, they shall be
told that something or other has to be done all over again, and then
he will be pardoned; so this they do. And when all that the spirit has
commanded has been done with great ceremony, then it shall be announced
that the man is pardoned and shall be speedily cured. So when they at
length receive such a reply, they announce that it is all made up with
the spirit, and that he is propitiated, and they fall to eating and
drinking with great joy and mirth, and he who had been lying lifeless
on the ground gets up and takes his share. So when they have all eaten
and drunken, every man departs home. And presently the sick man gets
sound and well.{12}
Now that I have told you of the customs and naughty ways of that
people, we will have done talking of them and their province, and I
will tell you about others, all in regular order and succession.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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