Note 170.1 — RITUAL AND BELIEF

Water-spirits are not the only supernatural beings with whom men are represented in story as matching themselves. The Lushei clans of Assam believe in various demons that inhabit hills, streams and trees. They are called Huai, those inhabiting the water being known as Tui-huai, and those residing on the land as Rām-huai. A certain sacrifice, generally of a big sow, is offered to the Rām-huai. It is called Sakhua. One night, towards morning, it is related, a Rām-huai appeared to a man who had unwittingly neglected his Sakhua sacrifice. It came into the straw where he was sleeping and wrestled with him until daylight. Even then it followed him and wrestled with him again; nor does the man seem to have been loth. At last he conquered the Rām-huai, who then told him that his Sakhua sacrifice was over-due; and he performed it at once. Sometimes the Rām-huai appears as a tiger and sometimes as a man. On this occasion he seems to have been in human form.170.1