If possible, it was laid hands on and brought back, after
a sojourn of one or perhaps two nights in the regions of the
supernatural. The shamans next replaced the soul in the body
of their patient, who forthwith recovered. Should the soul of

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INTRODUCTION TO MYTHOLOGY

a sick person take the trail to the left, the pursuing shamans
would say, " He will die" ; whereas, if it took a trail toward the
right, they would say, " We shall cure him."

When the spirits of the shamans reached the well in the
Land of the Ghosts where the shades of the departed drink,
their first care was to ascertain if the soul of him they sought
had drunk of these waters ; had it done so, all hope of cure was
past. If they laid hold of a soul that had drunk of the water,
it shrank as they neared home, so that it would not fill the sick
man's body, and he died. The same superstition applied to
the spirit eating ghostly food. Did the sick man's soul eat
on the astral plain, then was he doomed indeed. In this belief
we have a Greek parallel : Persephone, the daughter of Demeter,
the corn-mother, might not return to earth permanently, be-
cause Pluto had given her to eat of the seed of a pomegranate.
