h the imaginary wizard. Even
the foreign substance, the stick, bone, or whatever it is, which the
good medicine-man pretends to suck from the body of the sufferer "is
often, if not always, regarded not simply as a natural body, but as the
materialised form of a hostile spirit."[15]

[Sidenote: Belief of the Tinneh Indians in sorcery as the cause of
death.]

Beliefs and practices of the same general character are reported to have
formerly prevailed among the Tinneh or Dene Indians of North-west
America. When any beloved or influential person died, nobody, we are
told, would think of attributing the death to natural causes; it was
assumed that the demise was an effect of sorcery, and the only
difficulty was to ascertain the culprit. For that purpose the services
of a shaman were employed. Rigged out in all his finery he would dance
and sing, then suddenly fall down and feign death or sleep. On awaking
from the apparent trance he would denounce the sorcerer who had killed
the deceased by his magic art, and the denunciation generally proved the
death-warrant of the accused.[16]

[Sidenote: Belief of the Australian aborigines in sorcery as the cause
of death.]

Again, similar beliefs and customs in regard to what we should call
natural death appear to have prevailed universally amongst the
aborigines of Australia, and to have contributed very materially to thin
the population. On this subject I will quote the words of an observer.
His remarks apply to the Australian aborigines in general but to the
tribes of Victoria in particular. He says: "The natives are much more
numerous in some parts of Australia than they are in others, but nowhere
is the country thickly peopled; some dire disease occasionally breaks
out among the natives, and carries off large numbers.... But there are
two other causes which, in my opinion, principally account for their
paucity of numbers. The first is that infanticide is universally
practised; the second, that a belief exists that no one can die a
natural death. Thus, if an individual of a certain tribe dies, his
relatives consider that his death has been caused by sorcery on the part
of another tribe. The deceased's sons, or nearest relatives, therefore
start off on a _bucceening_ or murdering expedition. If the deceased is
buried, a fly or a beetle is put into the grave, and the direction in
which the insect wings its way when released is the one the avengers
take. If the body is burnt, the w