t marrying his widow. Accordingly he put the
question to the image, and in doing so the compunction of a guilty
conscience caused him to tremble. This trembling he took for an answer
of the image in the affirmative, wherefore he went off and took the
widow to wife and provided for her maintenance.[491]

[Sidenote: Ancestral images consulted as to the cause of death.
Offerings to the images.]

Again, the ancestral images are often consulted to ascertain the cause
of a death; and if the image attributes the death to the evil magic of a
member of another tribe, an expedition will be sent to avenge the wrong
by slaying the supposed culprit. For the souls of the dead take it very
ill and wreak their spite on the survivors, if their death is not
avenged on their enemies. Not uncommonly the consultation of the images
merely furnishes a pretext for satisfying a grudge against an individual
or a tribe.[492] The mere presence of these images appears to be
supposed to benefit the sick; a woman who was seriously ill has been
seen to lie with four or five ancestral figures fastened at the head of
her bed. On enquiry she explained that they did not all belong to her,
but that some of them had been kindly lent to her by relations and
friends.[493] Again, the images are taken by the natives with them to
war, because they hope thereby to secure the help of the spirits whom
the images represent. Also they make offerings from time to time to the
effigies and hold feasts in their honour.[494] They observe, indeed,
that the food which they present to these household idols remains
unconsumed, but they explain this by saying that the spirits are content
to snuff up the savour of the viands, and to leave their gross material
substance alone.[495]

[Sidenote: Images of persons who have died away from home.]

In general, images are only made of persons who have died at home. But
in the island of Ron or Run they are also made of persons who have died
away from home or have fallen in battle. In such cases the difficulty is
to compel the soul to quit its mortal remains far away and come to
animate the image. However, the natives of Ron have found means to
overcome this difficulty. They first carve the wooden image of the dead
person and then call his soul back to the village by setting a great
tree on fire, while the family assemble round it and one of them,
holding the image in his hand, acts the part of a medium, shivering and
shaking and fal