and with it the common life of the people, passed to the slayer,
just as it had previously passed from the domestic animal to the
priest-king who sacrificed it. One or two instances of succession by
killing the king are given in the article on Bhil. Sometimes the view
was that the king should be sacrificed annually, or at other intervals,
like the corn-spirit or domestic animal, for the renewal of the common
life. And this practice, as shown by Sir J.G. Frazer, tended to result
in the substitution of a victim, usually a criminal or slave, who was
identified with the king by being given royal honours for a short time
before his death. Sometimes the king's son or daughter was offered as
a substitute for him, and such a sacrifice was occasionally made in
time of peril, apparently as a means of strengthening or preserving
the common life. When Chitor, the home of the Sesodia clan of Rajputs,
was besieged by the Muhammadans, the tradition is that the goddess
of their house appeared and demanded the sacrifice of twelve chiefs
as a condition of its preservation. Eleven of the chiefs sons were
in turn crowned as king, and each ruled for three days, while on the
fourth he sallied out and fell in battle. Lastly, the Rana offered
himself in order that his favourite son, Ajeysi, might be spared and
might perpetuate the clan. In reality the chief and his sons seem
to have devoted themselves in the hope that the sacrifice of the
king might bring strength and victory to the clan. The sacrifice of
Iphigenia and possibly of Jephthah's daughter appear to be parallel
instances. The story of Alcestis may be an instance of the substitution
of the king's wife. The position of the king in early society and the
peculiar practices and beliefs attaching to it were brought to notice
and fully illustrated by Sir J.G. Frazer. The argument as to the clan
and the veneration of the domestic animal follows that outlined by
the late Professor Robertson Smith in _The Religion of the Semites_.

88. Other instances of the common meal as a sacrificial rite.

Some other instances of the communal eating of grain or other
food as a sacramental rite and bond of union have been given in the
articles. Thus at a Kabirpanthi Chauka or religious service the priest
breaks a cocoanut on a stone, and the flesh is cut up and distributed
to the worshippers with betel-leaf and sugar. Each receives it on his
knees, taking the greatest care that none falls on the grou