Djin who loves the prince informs him that her father can only be slain if he is dealt one single blow—no more—with the sword which is hanging at his head whilst he sleeps.
When the stake has pierced the Vampire he will utter the most terrible shrieks and blood will jet forth in every direction from his convulsed and writhing limbs as he impotently threshes the air with his quivering hands. There is a tradition that when he has been dead for many years and his mysterious life in death is thus ended the corpse has been known immediately to crumble into dust.
In some countries this operation usually takes place soon after dawn, as the Vampire may only leave his grave with the dusk and must return at cock-crow, so he will be caught when he has come back torpid and heavy from his night’s banquet of blood. But, as we have mentioned in another place, this belief that his ravages are confined to the dark hours is by no means universal, for Paul Lucas in his Voyage au Levant, speaking of Corfu says: “Des personnes qui paroissent avoir le bon sens parlent d’un fait assez singulier qui arrive souvent en ce pays, aussi bien que dans l’Isle Santeriny; des gens morts disent-ils, reviennent, se font voir en plein jour, & vont même chez eux, ce qui cause de grandes frayeurs à ceux qui les voyent.”[117] Accordingly the Vampire may walk in full daylight. Yet he may not, so they hold in Epirus, in Crete, and among the Wallachians, leave his tomb on a Saturday. “Many believe that, even in the day-time, it is only once a week, on the Saturday, that he is allowed to occupy his burial-place. When it is discovered that such a Vurvúlukas is about, the people go, on a Saturday, and open his tomb, when they always find his body just as it was buried, and entirely undecomposed.”[118] Tozer, Researches in the Highlands of Turkey (II, p. 91) writes: “Saturday is the day of the week on which the exorcism ought by right to take place, because the spirit then rests in this tomb, and if he is out on his rambles when the ceremony takes place, it is unavailing. In most parts of the country, as the Vampire is regarded as only a night-wanderer, he has to be caught during the night between Friday and Saturday; but in some places when he is believed to roam abroad by day as well, the whole of Saturday is allotted to him for repose, and consequently is suitable for his capture.”
