The Churel is particularly malignant to her own family. She appears in various forms. Sometimes she is fair in front and black behind, but she invariably has her feet turned round, heels in front and toes behind. The same idea prevails in many other places. The Gira, a water-spirit of the Konkan, has his feet turned backwards.[100] In the Teignmouth story of the Devil he leaves his backward footsteps in the snow. Pliny so describes Anthropophagi of Mount Imœus, and Megasthenes speaks of a similar race on Mount Nilo.[101]
She generally, however, assumes the form of a beautiful young woman and seduces youths at night, especially those who are good-looking. She carries them off to some kingdom of her own, and if they venture to eat the food offered to them there, she keeps them till they lose their manly beauty and then sends them back to the world grey-haired old men, who, like Rip Van Winkle, find all their friends dead long ago.
So the Lady of the Lake won Merlin to her arms.[102] The same idea prevails in Italy, but there the absence is only temporary. “Among the wizards and witches are even princes and princesses, who to conceal their debauchery and dishonour take the goat form and carry away partners for the dance, bearing them upon their backs, and so they fly many miles in a few minutes, and go with them to distant cities and other places, where they feast, dance, drink, and make love. But when day approaches they carry their partners home again, and when they wake they think they have had pleasant dreams. But indeed their diversion was more real than they supposed.”[103] So, the Manxmen tell of a man who was absent from his people for four years, which he spent with the fairies. He could not tell how he returned, but it seemed as if, having been unconscious, he woke up at last in this world.[104] I had a smart young butler at Etah, who once described to me vividly the narrow escape he had from the fascinations of a Churel, who lived on a Pîpal tree near the cemetery. He saw her sitting on the wall in the dusk and entered into conversation with her; but he fortunately observed her tell-tale feet and escaped. He would never go again by that road without an escort. So, the fairies of England and Ireland look with envy on the beautiful boys and girls, and carry them off to fairyland, where they keep them till youth and beauty have departed.
Eating Food in Spirit Land.
The consequences of rashly eating the food of the underworld are well known. The reason is that eating together implies kinship with the dwellers in the land of spirits, and he who does so never returns to the land of men.[105]
The Churel superstition appears in other forms. Thus, the Korwas of Mirzapur say that if a woman dies in the delivery-room, she becomes a Churel, but they do not know, or do not care to say, what finally becomes of her. The Patâris and Majhwârs think that if a woman dies within the period of pregnancy or uncleanness, she becomes a Churel. She appears in the form of a pretty little girl in white clothes, and seduces them away to the mountains, until the Baiga is called in to sacrifice a goat and release her victim. The Bhuiyârs go further and say that little baby girls who die before they are twenty days old become Churels. They live in stones in the mountains and cause pain to men. The remedy is for the afflicted one to put some rice and barley on his head, turn round two or three times, and shake off the grain in the direction of the jungle, when she releases her victim. The idea seems to be that with these holy grains, which are scarers of demons, the evil influence is dispersed. But she continues to visit him, and requires propitiation. Among these people the Churel has been very generally enrolled among the regular village godlings and resides with them in the common village shrine, where she receives her share of the periodical offerings. Any one who sees a Churel is liable to be attacked by a wasting disease, and, as in the case of the Dûnd, to answer her night summons brings death.
Modes of Repelling the Churel.
There are fortunately various remedies which are effective in preventing a woman who dies under these circumstances from becoming a Churel. One way is that practised by the Majhwârs of Mirzapur, which resembles that for laying the evil spirit of a sweeper, to which reference has been made already. They do not cremate the body, but bury it, fill the grave with thorns and pile heavy stones above to keep down the ghost.