may be set down here to show that the _thlen_
superstition is by no means dying out. In the course of his married
life he came to know that the mother of his Khasi wife kept in the
house what he called a _bhut_ (devil). He asked his wife many, many
times to allow him to see the _bhut_, but she was obdurate; however,
after a long time, and after extracting many promises from him not
to tell, she confided to him the secret, and took him to the corner
of the house, and showed him a little box in which was coiled a tiny
snake, like the hair spring of a watch. She passed her hands over it,
and it grew in size, till at last it became a huge cobra, with hood
erected. The husband, terrified, begged his wife to lay the spirit. She
passed her hands down its body, and it gradually shrank within its box.

It may be stated that the greater number of the Khasis, especially in
certain Siemships, viz. Cherra, Nongkrem, and Mylliem, still regard
the _thlen_, and the persons who are thought to keep _thlens_, with the
very greatest awe, and that they will not utter even the names of the
latter for fear some ill may befall them. The superstition is probably
of very ancient origin, and it is possible that the Khasi sacrifices
to the _thlen_ demon may be connected with the primaeval serpent-worship
which characterized the Cambodians, which Forbes says was "undoubtedly
the earliest religion of the Mons." But it must be remembered that
snake-worship is of very ancient origin, not only in Further India,
but also in the nearer peninsula, where the serpent race or Nagas,
who may have given their name to the town of Nagpur, were long held
in superstitious reverence. Mr. Gait, in the Journal of the Asiatic
Society of Bengal, vol. i. of 1898, gives some account of the human
sacrifices of the Jaintias or Syntengs. He writes as follows:--

"It appears that human sacrifices were offered annually on the _Sandhi_
day in the month of Ashwin (Sukla paksha) at the sacred _pitha_, in
the Faljur pargana. They were also occasionally offered at the shrine
of Jainteswari, at Nijpat, i.e. at Jaintiapur, the capital of the
country. As stated in the _Haft Iqlim_ to have been the case in Koch
Behar, so also in Jaintia, persons frequently voluntarily came forward
as victims. This they generally did by appearing before the Raja on
the last day of Shravan, and declaring that the goddess had called
them. After due inquiry, if the would-be victim, or _Bhoge khaora_,
wer