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2 however, that at all events they fully appreciated other worldly
3 pleasures. They did not like to hear this statement, implying
4 that the faqueer was a debauchee. Several complaints had, how-
5 ever, been made of him, on which account Runjeet Sing intended
6 to banish him from Lahore, fie anticipated the intention, by
7 eloping with a Katrany (woman of a Hindoo caste) to the
8 mountains, where he died, and was burned according to the
9 custom of the country. His elopement with this woman may
10 serve as a proof (in contradiction to other statements) that
11 he was neither an eunuch nor a hermaphrodite.
12 Doubtless, it is a difficult task, and not within the power of
13 every one to acquire the skill necessary for the performance of
14 this experiment, and those who do succeed must undergo a long
15 and continual practice of preparatory measures. I was informed
16 that such people have their frcenulum linguae cut and entirely
17 loosened, and that they get their tongue prominent, drawing and
18 lengthening it by means of rubbing it with butter mixed with
19 some pellitory of Spain, in order that they may be able to lav
20 back the tongue at the time they are about to stop respiration,
21 so as to cover the orifice of the hinder part of the fosses nasales ,
22 and thus (with other means for the same purpose, which I
23 shall mention) keep the air shut up in the body and head*.
24 Novices, in trying the experiment, shut their eyes, and press
25 them with their fingers, as also the cavities of the ears and
26 nostrils, because the natural warmth of the body might cause
27 such an expansion of the enclosed gas as otherwise to produce,
28 by the violence of its pressure, a rupture of some of those delicate
29 organs not yet accustomed by practice to endure it. This, I
30 am told, is especially the case with the eyes and the tympan
31 of the ear. For the better acquisition of this power, they are
32 accustomed to practice the holding of the breath for a long
33 period. They swallow a small strip of linen, in order to
34 cleanse the stomach, and by a tube draw a quantity of water
35 through the anus into the intestines to rinse them. This is
36 * A similar process is explained in some of the Encyclopaedias, in the
37 article on “ Engastrimythe,’’ or the mechanism of the ventriloquists.