Note 94 — Chapter I · THE EVIL EYE AND THE SCARING OF GHOSTS.
Reading edition
In ordinary cases most people find it advisable to carry an amulet of some kind as a preservative. An amulet is primarily a portion of a dead man or animal, by which hostile spirits are coerced or their good offices secured.94 The amulet, then, in its original sense, is supposed to concentrate in itself the virtues and powers of the man or animal of which it formed a part. Hence the claws of the tiger, which represent in themselves the innate strength and bravery of the animal, are greatly esteemed for this purpose, and the sportsman, when he shoots a tiger, has to count over the claws carefully to the coolies in charge of the dead animal, or they will certainly misappropriate them. In the same way a portion of the umbilical cord is placed among the clothes of the mother and infant to avert the Evil Eye and scare the demons which are then particularly active.