the Ibo people about Awka, in Southern Nigeria, the priest of the Earth has to observe many taboos; for example, he may not see a corpse, and if he meets one on the road he must hide his eyes with his wristlet.  He must abstain from many foods, such as eggs, birds of all sorts, mutton, dog, bush-buck, and so forth.  He may neither wear nor touch a mask, and no masked man may enter his house.  If a dog enters his house, it is killed and thrown out.  As priest of the Earth he may not sit on the bare ground, nor eat things that have fallen on the ground, nor may earth be thrown at him.[11] According to ancient Brahmanic ritual a king at his inauguration trod on a tiger’s skin and a golden plate; he was shod with shoes of boar’s skin, and so long as he lived thereafter he might not stand on the earth with his bare feet.[12]

[Certain persons on certain occasions forbidden to touch the ground with their feet.]

But besides persons who are permanently sacred or tabooed and are therefore permanently forbidden to touch the ground with their feet, there are others who enjoy the character of sanctity or taboo only on certain occasions, and to whom accordingly the prohibition in question only applies at the definite seasons during which they exhale the odour of sanctity.  Thus among the Kayans or Bahaus of Central Borneo, while the priestesses are engaged in the performance of certain rites they may not step on the ground, and boards are laid for them to tread on.[13] At a funeral ceremony observed by night among the Michemis, a Tibetan tribe near the northern frontier of Assam, a priest fantastically bedecked with tiger’s teeth, many-coloured plumes, bells, and shells, executed a wild dance for the purpose of exorcising the evil spirits; then all fires were extinguished and a new light was struck by a man suspended by his feet from a beam in the ceiling; “he did not touch the ground,” we are told, “in order to indicate that the light came from heaven."[14] Again, newly born infants are strongly tabooed; accordingly in Loango they are not allowed to touch the earth.[15] Among the Iluvans of Malabar the bridegroom on his wedding-day is bathed by seven young men and then carried or walks on planks from the bathing-place to the marriage booth; he may not touch the ground with his feet.[16] With the Dyaks of Landak and Tajan, two districts of Dutch Borneo, it is a custom that for a certain time after marriage neither bride nor bridegroom may tread on the earth.[17] Warriors, again, on the war-path are surrounded, so to say, by an atmosphere of taboo; hence some Indians of North America might not sit on the bare ground the whole time they were out on a warlike expedition.[18] In Laos the hunting of elephants gives rise to many taboos; one of them is that the chief hunter may not touch the earth with his foot.  Accordingly, when he alights from his elephant, the others spread a carpet of leaves for him to step upon.[19] German wiseacres recommended