Note 109 — Chapter I · THE EVIL EYE AND THE SCARING OF GHOSTS.

The same idea appears in the magic circle used as an ordeal, or to compel payment of a debt. Thus, we read in Marco Polo:109 “If a debtor have been several times asked by his creditor for payment and shall have put him off day by day with promises, then if the creditor once meet the debtor and succeed in drawing a circle round him, the latter must not pass out of this circle until he shall have satisfied the claim, or given security for its discharge. If he in any other case presume to pass the circle, he is punished with death, as a transgressor against right and justice.” In Northern India this circle is known as a Gururu or Gaurua, and a person who takes an oath stands within it, or takes from inside an article which he claims. In one form of this ceremony the circle is made on the ground with calf’s dung by an unmarried girl, and in the centre is placed a vessel of water. If money is in dispute, the amount claimed is placed in the water vessel by the defendant. The narrator tells a story to prove the efficacy of the rite:—