text:  The religion of fetisses of charms and spells and talismans was in the hands not of a learned caste the twice-born sons of Brama but of shamans or sorcerers who by feigning swoons and convulsions by horrible cries and yells by cutting themselves with knives by whirling and contortions assumed the appearance of something preternatural and portentous and impressed the multitude with the belief that they were possessed by demons