,the ,golden ,bough3 a study of magic and religion by ,sir ,james ,george ,frazer ,,contents ,preface ,subject ,index ,chapter #a4 ,the ,king of the ,wood #a4 ,diana and ,virbius #b4 ,artemis and ,hippolytus #c4 ,recapitulation ,chapter #b4 ,priestly ,kings ,chapter #c4 ,sympathetic ,magic #a4 ,the ,principles of ,magic #b4 ,homoeopathic or ,imitative ,magic #c4 ,contagious ,magic #d4 ,the ,magician's ,progress ,chapter #d4 ,magic and ,religion ,chapter #e4 ,the ,magical ,control of the ,weather #a4 ,the ,public ,magician #b4 ,the ,magical ,control of ,rain #c4 ,the ,magical ,control of the ,sun #d4 ,the ,magical ,control of the ,wind ,chapter #f4 ,magicians as ,kings ,chapter #g4 ,incarnate ,human ,gods ,chapter #h4 ,departmental ,kings of ,nature ,chapter #i4 ,the ,worship of ,trees #a4 ,tree-spirits #b4 ,beneficent ,powers of ,tree-,spirits ,chapter #aj4 ,relics of ,tree ,worship in ,modern ,europe ,chapter #aa4 ,the ,influence of the ,sexes on ,vegetation ,chapter #ab4 ,the ,sacred ,marriage #a4 ,diana as a ,goddess of ,fertility #b4 ,the ,marriage of the ,gods ,chapter #ac4 ,the ,kings of ,rome and ,alba #a4 ,numa and ,egeria #b4 ,the ,king as ,jupiter ,chapter #ad4 ,succession to the ,kingdom in ,ancient ,latium ,chapter #ae4 ,the ,worship of the ,oak ,chapter #af4 ,dianus and ,diana ,chapter #ag4 ,the ,burden of ,royalty #a4 ,royal and ,priestly ,taboos #b4 ,divorce of the ,spiritual from the ,temporal ,power ,chapter #ah4 ,the ,perils of the ,soul #a4 ,the ,soul as a ,mannikin #b4 ,absence and ,recall of the ,soul #c4 ,the ,soul as a ,shadow and a ,reflection ,chapter #ai4 ,tabooed ,acts #a4 ,taboos on ,intercourse with ,strangers #b4 ,taboos on ,eating and ,drinking #c4 ,taboos on ,showing the ,face #d4 ,taboos on ,quitting the ,house #e4 ,taboos on ,leaving ,food over ,chapter #bj4 ,tabooed ,persons #a4 ,chiefs and ,kings tabooed #b4 ,mourners tabooed #c4 ,women tabooed at ,menstruation and ,childbirth #d4 ,warriors tabooed #e4 ,manslayers tabooed #f4 ,hunters and ,fishers tabooed ,chapter #ba4 ,tabooed ,things #a4 ,the ,meaning of ,taboo #b4 ,iron tabooed #c4 ,sharp ,weapons tabooed #d4 ,blood tabooed #e4 ,the ,head tabooed #f4 ,hair tabooed #g4 ,ceremonies at ,hair-cutting #h4 ,disposal of ,cut ,hair and ,nails #i4 ,spittle tabooed #aj4 ,foods tabooed #aa4 ,knots and ,rings tabooed ,chapter #bb4 ,tabooed ,words #a4 ,personal ,names tabooed #b4 ,names of ,relations tabooed #c4 ,names of the ,dead tabooed #d4 ,names of ,kings and other ,sacred ,persons tabooed #e4 ,names of ,gods tabooed ,chapter #bc4 ,our ,debt to the ,savage ,chapter #bd4 ,the ,killing of the ,divine ,king #a4 ,the ,mortality of the ,gods #b4 ,kings killed when their ,strength fails #c4 ,kings killed at the ,end of a ,fixed ,term ,chapter #be4 ,temporary ,kings ,chapter #bf4 ,sacrifice of the ,kings ,son ,chapter #bg4 ,succession to the ,soul ,chapter #bh4 ,the ,killing of the ,tree-,spirit #a4 ,the ,whitsuntide ,mummers #b4 ,burying the ,carnival #c4 ,carrying out ,death #d4 ,bringing in ,summer #e4 ,battle of ,summer and ,winter #f4 ,death and ,resurrection of ,kostrubonko #g4 ,death and ,revival of ,vegetation #h4 ,analogous ,rites in ,india #i4 ,the ,magic ,spring ,chapter #bi4 ,the ,myth of ,adonis ,chapter #cj4 ,adonis in ,syria ,chapter #ca4 ,adonis in ,cyprus ,chapter #cb4 ,the ,ritual of ,adonis ,chapter #cc4 ,the ,gardens of ,adonis ,chapter #cd4 ,the ,myth and ,ritual of ,attis ,chapter #ce4 ,attis as a ,god of ,vegetation ,chapter #cf4 ,human ,representatives of ,attis ,chapter #cg4 ,oriental ,religions in the ,west ,chapter #ch4 ,the ,myth of ,osiris ,chapter #ci4 ,the ,ritual of ,osiris #a4 ,the ,popular ,rites #b4 ,the ,official ,rites ,chapter #dj4 ,the ,nature of ,osiris #a4 ,osiris a ,corn-god #b4 ,osiris a ,tree-spirit #c4 ,osiris a ,god of ,fertility #d4 ,osiris a ,god of the ,dead ,chapter #da4 ,isis ,chapter #db4 ,osiris and the ,sun ,chapter #dc4 ,dionysus ,chapter #dd4 ,demeter and ,persephone ,chapter #de4 ,corn-,mother and ,corn-,maiden in ,n4 ,europe ,chapter #df4 ,corn-,mother in ,many ,lands #a4 ,the ,corn-mother in ,america #b4 ,the ,rice-mother in the ,east ,indies #c4 ,the ,spirit of the ,corn embodied in ,human ,beings #d4 ,the ,double ,personification of the ,corn as ,mother and ,daughter ,chapter #dg4 ,lityerses #a4 ,songs of the ,corn ,reapers #b4 ,killing the ,corn-spirit #c4 ,human ,sacrifices for the ,crops #d4 ,the ,corn-spirit slain in his ,human ,representatives ,chapter #dh4 ,the ,corn-,spirit as an ,animal #a4 ,animal ,embodiments of the ,corn-spirit #b4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,wolf or a ,dog #c4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,cock #d4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,hare #e4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,cat #f4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,goat #g4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,bull1 ,cow1 or ,ox #h4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,horse or ,mare #i4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,pig 7,boar or ,sow7 #aj4 ,on the ,animal ,embodiments of the ,corn-spirit ,chapter #di4 ,ancient ,deities of ,vegetation as ,animals #a4 ,dionysus1 the ,goat and the ,bull #b4 ,demeter1 the ,pig and the ,horse #c4 ,attis1 ,adonis1 and the ,pig #d4 ,osiris1 the ,pig and the ,bull #e4 ,virbius and the ,horse ,chapter #ej4 ,eating the ,god #a4 ,the ,sacrament of ,first-,fruits #b4 ,eating the ,god among the ,aztecs #c4 ,many ,manii at ,aricia ,chapter #ea4 ,homeopathic ,magic of a ,flesh ,diet ,chapter #eb4 ,killing the ,divine ,animal #a4 ,killing the ,sacred ,buzzard #b4 ,killing the ,sacred ,ram #c4 ,killing the ,sacred ,serpent #d4 ,killing the ,sacred ,turtles #e4 ,killing the ,sacred ,bear ,chapter #ec4 ,the ,propitiation of ,wild ,animals ,by ,hunters ,chapter #ed4 ,types of ,animal ,sacrament #a4 ,the ,egyptian and the ,aino ,types of ,sacrament #b4 ,processions with ,sacred ,animals ,chapter #ee4 ,the ,transference of ,evil #a4 ,the ,transference to ,inanimate ,objects #b4 ,the ,transference to ,animals #c4 ,the ,transference to ,men #d4 ,the ,transference of ,evil in ,europe ,chapter #ef4 ,the ,public ,expulsion of ,evils #a4 ,the ,omnipresence of ,demons #b4 ,the ,occasional ,expulsion of ,evils #c4 ,the ,periodic ,expulsion of ,evils ,chapter #eg4 ,public ,scapegoats #a4 ,the ,expulsion of ,embodied ,evils #b4 ,the ,occasional ,expulsion of ,evils in a ,material ,vehicle #c4 ,the ,periodic ,expulsion of ,evils in a ,material ,vehicle #d4 ,on ,scapegoats in ,general ,chapter #eh4 ,human ,scapegoats in ,classical ,antiquity #a4 ,the ,human ,scapegoat in ,ancient ,rome #b4 ,the ,human ,scapegoat in ,ancient ,greece #c4 ,the ,roman ,saturnalia ,chapter #ei4 ,killing the ,god in ,mexico ,chapter #fj4 ,between ,heaven and ,earth #a4 ,not to touch the ,earth #b4 ,not to see the ,sun #c4 ,the ,seclusion of ,girls at ,puberty #d4 ,reasons for the ,seclusion of ,girls at ,puberty ,chapter #fa4 ,the ,myth of ,balder ,chapter #fb4 ,the ,fire-,festivals of ,europe #a4 ,the ,fire-festivals in general #b4 ,the ,lenten ,fires #c4 ,the ,easter ,fires #d4 ,the ,beltane ,fires #e4 ,the ,midsummer ,fires #f4 ,the ,halloween ,fires #g4 ,the ,midwinter ,fires #h4 ,the ,need-fire ,chapter #fc4 ,the ,interpretation of the ,fire-,festivals #a4 ,on the ,fire-festivals in general #b4 ,the ,solar ,theory of the ,fire-festivals #c4 ,the ,purificatory ,theory of the ,fire-festivals ,chapter #fd4 ,the ,burning of ,human ,beings in the ,fires #a4 ,the ,burning of ,effigies in the ,fires #b4 ,the ,burning of ,men and ,animals in the ,fires ,chapter #fe4 ,balder and the ,mistletoe ,chapter #ff4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,folk-,tales ,chapter #fg4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,folk-,custom #a4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,inanimate ,things #b4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,plants #c4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,animals #d4 ,the ,ritual of ,death and ,resurrection ,chapter #fh4 ,the ,golden ,bough ,chapter #fi4 ,farewell to ,nemi ,preface ,,the ,,primary aim of this book is to explain the remarkable rule which regulated the succession to the priesthood of ,diana at ,aricia4 ,when ,i first set myself to solve the problem more than thirty years ago1 ,i thought that the solution could be propounded very briefly1 but ,i soon found that to render it probable or even intelligible it was necessary to discuss certain more general questions1 some of which had hardly been broached before4 ,in successive editions the discussion of these and kindred topics has occupied more and more space1 the enquiry has branched out in more and more directions1 until the two volumes of the original work have expanded into twelve4 ,meantime a wish has often been expressed that the book should be issued in a more compendious form4 ,this abridgment is an attempt to meet the wish and thereby to bring the work within the range of a wider circle of readers4 ,while the bulk of the book has been greatly reduced1 ,i have endeavoured to retain its leading principles1 together with an amount of evidence sufficient to illustrate them clearly4 ,the language of the original has also for the most part been preserved1 though here and there the exposition has been somewhat condensed4 ,in order to keep as much of the text as possible ,i have sacrificed all the notes1 and with them all exact references to my authorities4 ,readers who desire to ascertain the source of any particular statement must therefore consult the larger work1 which is fully documented and provided with a complete bibliography4 ,in the abridgment ,i have neither added new matter nor altered the views expressed in the last edition2 for the evidence which has come to my knowledge in the meantime has on the whole served either to confirm my former conclusions or to furnish fresh illustrations of old principles4 ,thus1 for example1 on the crucial question of the practice of putting kings to death either at the end of a fixed period or whenever their health and strength began to fail1 the body of evidence which points to the wide prevalence of such a custom has been considerably augmented in the interval4 ,a striking instance of a limited monarchy of this sort is furnished by the powerful mediaeval kingdom of the ,khazars in ,southern ,russia1 where the kings were liable to be put to death either on the expiry of a set term or whenever some public calamity1 such as drought1 dearth1 or defeat in war1 seemed to indicate a failure of their natural powers4 ,the evidence for the systematic killing of the ,khazar kings1 drawn from the accounts of old ,arab travellers1 has been collected by me elsewhere4#a ,africa1 again1 has supplied several fresh examples of a similar practice of regicide4 ,among them the most notable perhaps is the custom formerly observed in ,bunyoro of choosing every year from a particular clan a mock king1 who was supposed to incarnate the late king1 cohabited with his widows at his temple-tomb1 and after reigning for a week was strangled4#b ,the custom presents a close parallel to the ancient ,babylonian festival of the ,sacaea1 at which a mock king was dressed in the royal robes1 allowed to enjoy the real king's concubines1 and after reigning for five days was stripped1 scourged1 and put to death4 ,that festival in its turn has lately received fresh light from certain ,assyrian inscriptions1#c which seem to confirm the interpretation which ,i formerly gave of the festival as a ,new ,year celebration and the parent of the ,jewish festival of ,purim4#d ,other recently discovered parallels to the priestly kings of ,aricia are ,african priests and kings who used to be put to death at the end of seven or of two years1 after being liable in the interval to be attacked and killed by a strong man1 who thereupon succeeded to the priesthood or the kingdom4#e #a ,j4 ,g4 ,frazer1 ,the ,killing of the ,khazar ,kings1 ,folk-lore1 xxviii4 7#aiag71 pp4 #chb-djg4 #b ,rev4 ,j4 ,roscoe1 ,the ,soul of ,central ,africa 7,london1 #aibb71 p4 #bjj4 ,compare ,j4 ,g4 ,frazer1 #adg2,the ,mackie ,ethnological ,expedition to ,central ,africa1 ,man1 xx4 7#aibj71 p4 #aha4 #c ,h4 ,zimmern1 ,zum babylonischen ,neujahrsfest 7,leipzig1 #aiah74 ,compare ,a4 ,h4 ,sayce1 in ,journal of the ,royal ,asiatic ,society1 ,july #aiba1 pp4 #ddj-ddb4 #d ,the ,golden ,bough1 ,part ,,vi4 ,the ,scapegoat1 pp4 #ced sqq41 #dab sqq4 #e ,p4 ,amaury ,talbot in ,journal of the ,african ,society1 ,july #aiaf1 pp4 #cji sq42 id41 in ,folk-lore1 xxvi4 7#aiaf71 pp4 #gi sq42 ,h4 ,r4 ,palmer1 in ,journal of the ,african ,society1 ,july #aiab1 pp4 #djc1 #djg sq4 ,with these and other instances of like customs before us it is no longer possible to regard the rule of succession to the priesthood of ,diana at ,aricia as exceptional2 it clearly exemplifies a widespread institution1 of which the most numerous and the most similar cases have thus far been found in ,africa4 ,how far the facts point to an early influence of ,africa on ,italy1 or even to the existence of an ,african population in ,southern ,europe1 ,i do not presume to say4 ,the pre-historic historic relations between the two continents are still obscure and still under investigation4 ,whether the explanation which ,i have offered of the institution is correct or not must be left to the future to determine4 ,i shall always be ready to abandon it if a better can be suggested4 ,meantime in committing the book in its new form to the judgment of the public ,i desire to guard against a misapprehension of its scope which appears to be still rife1 though ,i have sought to correct it before now4 ,if in the present work ,i have dwelt at some length on the worship of trees1 it is not1 ,i trust1 because ,i exaggerate its importance in the history of religion1 still less because ,i would deduce from it a whole system of mythology2 it is simply because ,i could not ignore the subject in attempting to explain the significance of a priest who bore the title of ,king of the ,wood1 and one of whose titles to office was the plucking of a bough--the ,golden ,bough--from a tree in the sacred grove4 ,but ,i am so far from regarding the reverence for trees as of supreme importance for the evolution of religion that ,i consider it to have been altogether subordinate to other factors1 and in particular to the fear of the human dead1 which1 on the whole1 ,i believe to have been probably the most powerful force in the making of primitive religion4 ,i hope that after this explicit disclaimer ,i shall no longer be taxed with embracing a system of mythology which ,i look upon not merely as false but as preposterous and absurd4 ,but ,i am too familiar with the hydra of error to expect that by lopping off one of the monster's heads ,i can prevent another1 or even the same1 from sprouting again4 ,i can only trust to the candour and intelligence of my readers to rectify this serious misconception of my views by a comparison with my own express declaration4 ,j4 ,g4 ,,frazer4 #a ,,brick ,,court1 ,,temple1 ,,london1 ,june #aibb4 ,i4 ,the ,king of the ,wood #a4 ,diana and ,virbius ,,who does not know ,turner's picture of the ,golden ,bough8 ,the scene1 suffused with the golden glow of imagination in which the divine mind of ,turner steeped and transfigured even the fairest natural landscape1 is a dream-like vision of the little woodland lake of ,nemi-- ,diana's ,mirror1 as it was called by the ancients4 ,no one who has seen that calm water1 lapped in a green hollow of the ,alban hills1 can ever forget it4 ,the two characteristic ,italian villages which slumber on its banks1 and the equally ,italian palace whose terraced gardens descend steeply to the lake1 hardly break the stillness and even the solitariness of the scene4 ,diana herself might still linger by this lonely shore1 still haunt these woodlands wild4 ,in antiquity this sylvan landscape was the scene of a strange and recurring tragedy4 ,on the northern shore of the lake1 right under the precipitous cliffs on which the modern village of ,nemi is perched1 stood the sacred grove and sanctuary of ,diana ,nemorensis1 or ,diana of the ,wood4 ,the lake and the grove were sometimes known as the lake and grove of ,aricia4 ,but the town of ,aricia 7the modern ,la ,riccia7 was situated about three miles off1 at the foot of the ,alban ,mount1 and separated by a steep descent from the lake1 which lies in a small crater-like hollow on the mountain side4 ,in this sacred grove there grew a certain tree round which at any time of the day1 and probably far into the night1 a grim figure might be seen to prowl4 ,in his hand he carried a drawn sword1 and he kept peering warily about him as if at every instant he expected to be set upon by an enemy4 ,he was a priest and a murderer2 and the man for whom he looked was sooner or later to murder him and hold the priesthood in his stead4 ,such was the rule of the sanctuary4 ,a candidate for the priesthood could only succeed to office by slaying the priest1 and having slain him1 he retained office till he was himself slain by a stronger or a craftier4 ,the post which he held by this precarious tenure carried with it the title of king2 but surely no crowned head ever lay uneasier1 or was visited by more evil dreams1 than his4 ,for year in1 year out1 in summer and winter1 in fair weather and in foul1 he had to keep his lonely watch1 and whenever he snatched a troubled slumber it was at the peril of his life4 ,the least relaxation of his vigilance1 the smallest abatement of his strength of limb or skill of fence1 put him in jeopardy2 grey hairs might seal his death-warrant4 ,to gentle and pious pilgrims at the shrine the sight of him might well seem to darken the fair landscape1 as when a cloud suddenly blots the sun on a bright day4 ,the dreamy blue of ,italian skies1 the dappled shade of summer woods1 and the sparkle of waves in the sun1 can have accorded but ill with that stern and sinister figure4 ,rather we picture to ourselves the scene as it may have been witnessed by a belated wayfarer on one of those wild autumn nights when the dead leaves are falling thick1 and the winds seem to sing the dirge of the dying year4 ,it is a sombre picture1 set to melancholy music--the background of forest showing black and jagged against a lowering and stormy sky1 the sighing of the wind in the branches1 the rustle of the withered leaves under foot1 the lapping of the cold water on the shore1 and in the foreground1 pacing to and fro1 now in twilight and now in gloom1 a dark figure with a glitter of steel at the shoulder whenever the pale moon1 riding clear of the cloud-rack1 peers down at him through the matted boughs4 ,the strange rule of this priesthood has no parallel in classical antiquity1 and cannot be explained from it4 ,to find an explanation we must go farther afield4 ,no one will probably deny that such a custom savours of a barbarous age1 and1 surviving into imperial times1 stands out in striking isolation from the polished ,italian society of the day1 like a primaeval rock rising from a smooth-shaven lawn4 ,it is the very rudeness and barbarity of the custom which allow us a hope of explaining it4 ,for recent researches into the early history of man have revealed the essential similarity with which1 under many superficial differences1 the human mind has elaborated its first crude philosophy of life4 ,accordingly1 if we can show that a barbarous custom1 like that of the priesthood of ,nemi1 has existed elsewhere2 if we can detect the motives which led to its institution2 if we can prove that these motives have operated widely1 perhaps universally1 in human society1 producing in varied circumstances a variety of institutions specifically different but generically alike2 if we can show1 lastly1 that these very motives1 with some of their derivative institutions1 were actually at work in classical antiquity2 then we may fairly infer that at a remoter age the same motives gave birth to the priesthood of ,nemi4 ,such an inference1 in default of direct evidence as to how the priesthood did actually arise1 can never amount to demonstration4 ,but it will be more or less probable according to the degree of completeness with which it fulfils the conditions ,i have indicated4 ,the object of this book is1 by meeting these conditions1 to offer a fairly probable explanation of the priesthood of ,nemi4 ,i begin by setting forth the few facts and legends which have come down to us on the subject4 ,according to one story the worship of ,diana at ,nemi was instituted by ,orestes1 who1 after killing ,thoas1 ,king of the ,tauric ,chersonese 7the ,crimea71 fled with his sister to ,italy1 bringing with him the image of the ,tauric ,diana hidden in a faggot of sticks4 ,after his death his bones were transported from ,aricia to ,rome and buried in front of the temple of ,saturn1 on the ,capitoline slope1 beside the temple of ,concord4 ,the bloody ritual which legend ascribed to the ,tauric ,diana is familiar to classical readers2 it is said that every stranger who landed on the shore was sacrificed on her altar4 ,but transported to ,italy1 the rite assumed a milder form4 ,within the sanctuary at ,nemi grew a certain tree of which no branch might be broken4 ,only a runaway slave was allowed to break off1 if he could1 one of its boughs4 ,success in the attempt entitled him to fight the priest in single combat1 and if he slew him he reigned in his stead with the title of ,king of the ,wood 7,rex ,nemorensis74 ,according to the public opinion of the ancients the fateful branch was that ,golden ,bough which1 at the ,sibyl's bidding1 ,aeneas plucked before he essayed the perilous journey to the world of the dead4 ,the flight of the slave represented1 it was said1 the flight of ,orestes2 his combat with the priest was a reminiscence of the human sacrifices once offered to the ,tauric ,diana4 ,this rule of succession by the sword was observed down to imperial times2 for amongst his other freaks ,caligula1 thinking that the priest of ,nemi had held office too long1 hired a more stalwart ruffian to slay him2 and a ,greek traveller1 who visited ,italy in the age of the ,antonines1 remarks that down to his time the priesthood was still the prize of victory in a single combat4 ,of the worship of ,diana at ,nemi some leading features can still be made out4 ,from the votive offerings which have been found on the site1 it appears that she was conceived of especially as a huntress1 and further as blessing men and women with offspring1 and granting expectant mothers an easy delivery4 ,again1 fire seems to have played a foremost part in her ritual4 ,for during her annual festival1 held on the thirteenth of ,august1 at the hottest time of the year1 her grove shone with a multitude of torches1 whose ruddy glare was reflected by the lake2 and throughout the length and breadth of ,italy the day was kept with holy rites at every domestic hearth4 ,bronze statuettes found in her precinct represent the goddess herself holding a torch in her raised right hand2 and women whose prayers had been heard by her came crowned with wreaths and bearing lighted torches to the sanctuary in fulfilment of their vows4 ,some one unknown dedicated a perpetually burning lamp in a little shrine at ,nemi for the safety of the ,emperor ,claudius and his family4 ,the terra-cotta lamps which have been discovered in the grove may perhaps have served a like purpose for humbler persons4 ,if so1 the analogy of the custom to the ,catholic practice of dedicating holy candles in churches would be obvious4 ,further1 the title of ,vesta borne by ,diana at ,nemi points clearly to the maintenance of a perpetual holy fire in her sanctuary4 ,a large circular basement at the north-east corner of the temple1 raised on three steps and bearing traces of a mosaic pavement1 probably supported a round temple of ,diana in her character of ,vesta1 like the round temple of ,vesta in the ,roman ,forum4 ,here the sacred fire would seem to have been tended by ,vestal ,virgins1 for the head of a ,vestal in terra-cotta was found on the spot1 and the worship of a perpetual fire1 cared for by holy maidens1 appears to have been common in ,latium from the earliest to the latest times4 ,further1 at the annual festival of the goddess1 hunting dogs were crowned and wild beasts were not molested2 young people went through a purificatory ceremony in her honour2 wine was brought forth1 and the feast consisted of a kid cakes served piping hot on plates of leaves1 and apples still hanging in clusters on the boughs4 ,but ,diana did not reign alone in her grove at ,nemi4 ,two lesser divinities shared her forest sanctuary4 ,one was ,egeria1 the nymph of the clear water which1 bubbling from the basaltic rocks1 used to fall in graceful cascades into the lake at the place called ,le ,mole1 because here were established the mills of the modern village of ,nemi4 ,the purling of the stream as it ran over the pebbles is mentioned by ,ovid1 who tells us that he had often drunk of its water4 ,women with child used to sacrifice to ,egeria1 because she was believed1 like ,diana1 to be able to grant them an easy delivery4 ,tradition ran that the nymph had been the wife or mistress of the wise king ,numa1 that he had consorted with her in the secrecy of the sacred grove1 and that the laws which he gave the ,romans had been inspired by communion with her divinity4 ,plutarch compares the legend with other tales of the loves of goddesses for mortal men1 such as the love of ,cybele and the ,moon for the fair youths ,attis and ,endymion4 ,according to some1 the trysting-place of the lovers was not in the woods of ,nemi but in a grove outside the dripping ,porta ,capena at ,rome1 where another sacred spring of ,egeria gushed from a dark cavern4 ,every day the ,roman ,vestals fetched water from this spring to wash the temple of ,vesta1 carrying it in earthenware pitchers on their heads4 ,in ,juvenal's time the natural rock had been encased in marble1 and the hallowed spot was profaned by gangs of poor ,jews1 who were suffered to squat1 like gypsies1 in the grove4 ,we may suppose that the spring which fell into the lake of ,nemi was the true original ,egeria1 and that when the first settlers moved down from the ,alban hills to the banks of the ,tiber they brought the nymph with them and found a new home for her in a grove outside the gates4 ,the remains of baths which have been discovered within the sacred precinct1 together with many terra-cotta models of various parts of the human body1 suggest that the waters of ,egeria were used to heal the sick1 who may have signified their hopes or testified their gratitude by dedicating likenesses of the diseased members to the goddess1 in accordance with a custom which is still observed in many parts of ,europe4 ,to this day it would seem that the spring retains medicinal virtues4 ,the other of the minor deities at ,nemi was ,virbius4 ,legend had it that ,virbius was the young ,greek hero ,hippolytus1 chaste and fair1 who learned the art of venery from the centaur ,chiron1 and spent all his days in the greenwood chasing wild beasts with the virgin huntress ,artemis 7the ,greek counterpart of ,diana7 for his only comrade4 ,proud of her divine society1 he spurned the love of women1 and this proved his bane4 ,for ,aphrodite1 stung by his scorn1 inspired his stepmother ,phaedra with love of him2 and when he disdained her wicked advances she falsely accused him to his father ,theseus4 ,the slander was believed1 and ,theseus prayed to his sire ,poseidon to avenge the imagined wrong4 ,so while ,hippolytus drove in a chariot by the shore of the ,saronic ,gulf1 the sea-god sent a fierce bull forth from the waves4 ,the terrified horses bolted1 threw ,hippolytus from the chariot1 and dragged him at their hoofs to death4 ,but ,diana1 for the love she bore ,hippolytus1 persuaded the leech ,aesculapius to bring her fair young hunter back to life by his simples4 ,jupiter1 indignant that a mortal man should return from the gates of death1 thrust down the meddling leech himself to ,hades4 ,but ,diana hid her favourite from the angry god in a thick cloud1 disguised his features by adding years to his life1 and then bore him far away to the dells of ,nemi1 where she entrusted him to the nymph ,egeria1 to live there1 unknown and solitary1 under the name of ,virbius1 in the depth of the ,italian forest4 ,there he reigned a king1 and there he dedicated a precinct to ,diana4 ,he had a comely son1 ,virbius1 who1 undaunted by his father's fate1 drove a team of fiery steeds to join the ,latins in the war against ,aeneas and the ,trojans4 ,virbius was worshipped as a god not only at ,nemi but elsewhere2 for in ,campania we hear of a special priest devoted to his service4 ,horses were excluded from the ,arician grove and sanctuary because horses had killed ,hippolytus4 ,it was unlawful to touch his image4 ,some thought that he was the sun4 ,but the truth is1 says ,servius1 that he is a deity associated with ,diana1 as ,attis is associated with the ,mother of the ,gods1 and ,erichthonius with ,minerva1 and ,adonis with ,venus4 ,what the nature of that association was we shall enquire presently4 ,here it is worth observing that in his long and chequered career this mythical personage has displayed a remarkable tenacity of life4 ,for we can hardly doubt that the ,saint ,hippolytus of the ,roman calendar1 who was dragged by horses to death on the thirteenth of ,august1 ,diana's own day1 is no other than the ,greek hero of the same name1 who1 after dying twice over as a heathen sinner1 has been happily resuscitated as a ,christian saint4 ,it needs no elaborate demonstration to convince us that the stories told to account for ,diana's worship at ,nemi are unhistorical4 ,clearly they belong to that large class of myths which are made up to explain the origin of a religious ritual and have no other foundation than the resemblance1 real or imaginary1 which may be traced between it and some foreign ritual4 ,the incongruity of these ,nemi myths is indeed transparent1 since the foundation of the worship is traced now to ,orestes and now to ,hippolytus1 according as this or that feature of the ritual has to be accounted for4 ,the real value of such tales is that they serve to illustrate the nature of the worship by providing a standard with which to compare it2 and further1 that they bear witness indirectly to its venerable age by showing that the true origin was lost in the mists of a fabulous antiquity4 ,in the latter respect these ,nemi legends are probably more to be trusted than the apparently historical tradition1 vouched for by ,cato the ,elder1 that the sacred grove was dedicated to ,diana by a certain ,egerius ,baebius or ,laevius of ,tusculum1 a ,latin dictator1 on behalf of the peoples of ,tusculum1 ,aricia1 ,lanuvium1 ,laurentum1 ,cora1 ,tibur1 ,pometia1 and ,ardea4 ,this tradition indeed speaks for the great age of the sanctuary1 since it seems to date its foundation sometime before #die ,b4,c41 the year in which ,pometia was sacked by the ,romans and disappears from history4 ,but we cannot suppose that so barbarous a rule as that of the ,arician priesthood was deliberately instituted by a league of civilised communities1 such as the ,latin cities undoubtedly were4 ,it must have been handed down from a time beyond the memory of man1 when ,italy was still in a far ruder state than any known to us in the historical period4 ,the credit of the tradition is rather shaken than confirmed by another story which ascribes the foundation of the sanctuary to a certain ,manius ,egerius1 who gave rise to the saying1 ,there are many ,manii at ,aricia4 ,this proverb some explained by alleging that ,manius ,egerius was the ancestor of a long and distinguished line1 whereas others thought it meant that there were many ugly and deformed people at ,aricia1 and they derived the name ,manius from ,mania1 a bogey or bugbear to frighten children4 ,a ,roman satirist uses the name ,manius as typical of the beggars who lay in wait for pilgrims on the ,arician slopes4 ,these differences of opinion1 together with the discrepancy between ,manius ,egerius of ,aricia and ,egerius ,laevius of ,tusculum1 as well as the resemblance of both names to the mythical ,egeria1 excite our suspicion4 ,yet the tradition recorded by ,cato seems too circumstantial1 and its sponsor too respectable1 to allow us to dismiss it as an idle fiction4 ,rather we may suppose that it refers to some ancient restoration or reconstruction of the sanctuary1 which was actually carried out by the confederate states4 ,at any rate it testifies to a belief that the grove had been from early times a common place of worship for many of the oldest cities of the country1 if not for the whole ,latin confederacy4 #b4 ,artemis and ,hippolytus ,i ,,have said that the ,arician legends of ,orestes and ,hippolytus1 though worthless as history1 have a certain value in so far as they may help us to understand the worship at ,nemi better by comparing it with the ritual and myths of other sanctuaries4 ,we must ask ourselves1 ,why did the author of these legends pitch upon ,orestes and ,hippolytus in order to explain ,virbius and the ,king of the ,wood8 ,in regard to ,orestes1 the answer is obvious4 ,he and the image of the ,tauric ,diana1 which could only be appeased with human blood1 were dragged in to render intelligible the murderous rule of succession to the ,arician priesthood4 ,in regard to ,hippolytus the case is not so plain4 ,the manner of his death suggests readily enough a reason for the exclusion of horses from the grove2 but this by itself seems hardly enough to account for the identification4 ,we must try to probe deeper by examining the worship as well as the legend or myth of ,hippolytus4 ,he had a famous sanctuary at his ancestral home of ,troezen1 situated on that beautiful1 almost landlocked bay1 where groves of oranges and lemons1 with tall cypresses soaring like dark spires above the garden of ,hesperides1 now clothe the strip of fertile shore at the foot of the rugged mountains4 ,across the blue water of the tranquil bay1 which it shelters from the open sea1 rises ,poseidon's sacred island1 its peaks veiled in the sombre green of the pines4 ,on this fair coast ,hippolytus was worshipped4 ,within his sanctuary stood a temple with an ancient image4 ,his service was performed by a priest who held office for life2 every year a sacrificial festival was held in his honour2 and his untimely fate was yearly mourned1 with weeping and doleful chants1 by unwedded maids4 ,youths and maidens dedicated locks of their hair in his temple before marriage4 ,his grave existed at ,troezen1 though the people would not show it4 ,it has been suggested1 with great plausibility1 that in the handsome ,hippolytus1 beloved of ,artemis1 cut off in his youthful prime1 and yearly mourned by damsels1 we have one of those mortal lovers of a goddess who appear so often in ancient religion1 and of whom ,adonis is the most familiar type4 ,the rivalry of ,artemis and ,phaedra for the affection of ,hippolytus reproduces1 it is said1 under different names1 the rivalry of ,aphrodite and ,proserpine for the love of ,adonis1 for ,phaedra is merely a double of ,aphrodite4 ,the theory probably does no injustice either to ,hippolytus or to ,artemis4 ,for ,artemis was originally a great goddess of fertility1 and1 on the principles of early religion1 she who fertilises nature must herself be fertile1 and to be that she must necessarily have a male consort4 ,on this view1 ,hippolytus was the consort of ,artemis at ,troezen1 and the shorn tresses offered to him by the ,troezenian youths and maidens before marriage were designed to strengthen his union with the goddess1 and so to promote the fruitfulness of the earth1 of cattle1 and of mankind4 ,it is some confirmation of this view that within the precinct of ,hippolytus at ,troezen there were worshipped two female powers named ,damia and ,auxesia1 whose connexion with the fertility of the ground is unquestionable4 ,when ,epidaurus suffered from a dearth1 the people1 in obedience to an oracle1 carved images of ,damia and ,auxesia out of sacred olive wood1 and no sooner had they done so and set them up than the earth bore fruit again4 ,moreover1 at ,troezen itself1 and apparently within the precinct of ,hippolytus1 a curious festival of stone-throwing was held in honour of these maidens1 as the ,troezenians called them2 and it is easy to show that similar customs have been practised in many lands for the express purpose of ensuring good crops4 ,in the story of the tragic death of the youthful ,hippolytus we may discern an analogy with similar tales of other fair but mortal youths who paid with their lives for the brief rapture of the love of an immortal goddess4 ,these hapless lovers were probably not always mere myths1 and the legends which traced their spilt blood in the purple bloom of the violet1 the scarlet stain of the anemone1 or the crimson flush of the rose were no idle poetic emblems of youth and beauty fleeting as the summer flowers4 ,such fables contain a deeper philosophy of the relation of the life of man to the life of nature--a sad philosophy which gave birth to a tragic practice4 ,what that philosophy and that practice were1 we shall learn later on4 #c4 ,recapitulation ,,we can now perhaps understand why the ancients identified ,hippolytus1 the consort of ,artemis1 with ,virbius1 who1 according to ,servius1 stood to ,diana as ,adonis to ,venus1 or ,attis to the ,mother of the ,gods4 ,for ,diana1 like ,artemis1 was a goddess of fertility in general1 and of childbirth in particular4 ,as such she1 like her ,greek counterpart1 needed a male partner4 ,that partner1 if ,servius is right1 was ,virbius4 ,in his character of the founder of the sacred grove and first king of ,nemi1 ,virbius is clearly the mythical predecessor or archetype of the line of priests who served ,diana under the title of ,kings of the ,wood1 and who came1 like him1 one after the other1 to a violent end4 ,it is natural1 therefore1 to conjecture that they stood to the goddess of the grove in the same relation in which ,virbius stood to her2 in short1 that the mortal ,king of the ,wood had for his queen the woodland ,diana herself4 ,if the sacred tree which he guarded with his life was supposed1 as seems probable1 to be her special embodiment1 her priest may not only have worshipped it as his goddess but embraced it as his wife4 ,there is at least nothing absurd in the supposition1 since even in the time of ,pliny a noble ,roman used thus to treat a beautiful beech-tree in another sacred grove of ,diana on the ,alban hills4 ,he embraced it1 he kissed it1 he lay under its shadow1 he poured wine on its trunk4 ,apparently he took the tree for the goddess4 ,the custom of physically marrying men and women to trees is still practised in ,india and other parts of the ,east4 ,why should it not have obtained in ancient ,latium8 ,reviewing the evidence as a whole1 we may conclude that the worship of ,diana in her sacred grove at ,nemi was of great importance and immemorial antiquity2 that she was revered as the goddess of woodlands and of wild creatures1 probably also of domestic cattle and of the fruits of the earth2 that she was believed to bless men and women with offspring and to aid mothers in childbed2 that her holy fire1 tended by chaste virgins1 burned perpetually in a round temple within the precinct2 that associated with her was a water-nymph ,egeria who discharged one of ,diana's own functions by succouring women in travail1 and who was popularly supposed to have mated with an old ,roman king in the sacred grove2 further1 that ,diana of the ,wood herself had a male companion ,virbius by name1 who was to her what ,adonis was to ,venus1 or ,attis to ,cybele2 and1 lastly1 that this mythical ,virbius was represented in historical times by a line of priests known as ,kings of the ,wood1 who regularly perished by the swords of their successors1 and whose lives were in a manner bound up with a certain tree in the grove1 because so long as that tree was uninjured they were safe from attack4 ,clearly these conclusions do not of themselves suffice to explain the peculiar rule of succession to the priesthood4 ,but perhaps the survey of a wider field may lead us to think that they contain in germ the solution of the problem4 ,to that wider survey we must now address ourselves4 ,it will be long and laborious1 but may possess something of the interest and charm of a voyage of discovery1 in which we shall visit many strange foreign lands1 with strange foreign peoples1 and still stranger customs4 ,the wind is in the shrouds3 we shake out our sails to it1 and leave the coast of ,italy behind us for a time4 ,,ii4 ,priestly ,kings ,,the questions which we have set ourselves to answer are mainly two3 first1 why had ,diana's priest at ,nemi1 the ,king of the ,wood1 to slay his predecessor8 second1 why before doing so had he to pluck the branch of a certain tree which the public opinion of the ancients identified with ,virgil's ,golden ,bough8 ,the first point on which we fasten is the priest's title4 ,why was he called the ,king of the ,wood8 ,why was his office spoken of as a kingdom8 ,the union of a royal title with priestly duties was common in ancient ,italy and ,greece4 ,at ,rome and in other cities of ,latium there was a priest called the ,sacrificial ,king or ,king of the ,sacred ,rites1 and his wife bore the title of ,queen of the ,sacred ,rites4 ,in republican ,athens the second annual magistrate of the state was called the ,king1 and his wife the ,queen2 the functions of both were religious4 ,many other ,greek democracies had titular kings1 whose duties1 so far as they are known1 seem to have been priestly1 and to have centered round the ,common ,hearth of the state4 ,some ,greek states had several of these titular kings1 who held office simultaneously4 ,at ,rome the tradition was that the ,sacrificial ,king had been appointed after the abolition of the monarchy in order to offer the sacrifices which before had been offered by the kings4 ,a similar view as to the origin of the priestly kings appears to have prevailed in ,greece4 ,in itself the opinion is not improbable1 and it is borne out by the example of ,sparta1 almost the only purely ,greek state which retained the kingly form of government in historical times4 ,for in ,sparta all state sacrifices were offered by the kings as descendants of the god4 ,one of the two ,spartan kings held the priesthood of ,zeus ,lacedaemon1 the other the priesthood of ,heavenly ,zeus4 ,this combination of priestly functions with royal authority is familiar to every one4 ,asia ,minor1 for example1 was the seat of various great religious capitals peopled by thousands of sacred slaves1 and ruled by pontiffs who wielded at once temporal and spiritual authority1 like the popes of mediaeval ,rome4 ,such priest-ridden cities were ,zela and ,pessinus4 ,teutonic kings1 again1 in the old heathen days seem to have stood in the position1 and to have exercised the powers1 of high priests4 ,the ,emperors of ,china offered public sacrifices1 the details of which were regulated by the ritual books4 ,the ,king of ,madagascar was high-priest of the realm4 ,at the great festival of the new year1 when a bullock was sacrificed for the good of the kingdom1 the king stood over the sacrifice to offer prayer and thanksgiving1 while his attendants slaughtered the animal4 ,in the monarchical states which still maintain their independence among the ,gallas of ,eastern ,africa1 the king sacrifices on the mountain tops and regulates the immolation of human victims2 and the dim light of tradition reveals a similar union of temporal and spiritual power1 of royal and priestly duties1 in the kings of that delightful region of ,central ,america whose ancient capital1 now buried under the rank growth of the tropical forest1 is marked by the stately and mysterious ruins of ,palenque4 ,when we have said that the ancient kings were commonly priests also1 we are far from having exhausted the religious aspect of their office4 ,in those days the divinity that hedges a king was no empty form of speech1 but the expression of a sober belief4 ,kings were revered1 in many cases not merely as priests1 that is1 as intercessors between man and god1 but as themselves gods1 able to bestow upon their subjects and worshippers those blessings which are commonly supposed to be beyond the reach of mortals1 and are sought1 if at all1 only by prayer and sacrifice offered to superhuman and invisible beings4 ,thus kings are often expected to give rain and sunshine in due season1 to make the crops grow1 and so on4 ,strange as this expectation appears to us1 it is quite of a piece with early modes of thought4 ,a savage hardly conceives the distinction commonly drawn by more advanced peoples between the natural and the supernatural4 ,to him the world is to a great extent worked by supernatural agents1 that is1 by personal beings acting on impulses and motives like his own1 liable like him to be moved by appeals to their pity1 their hopes1 and their fears4 ,in a world so conceived he sees no limit to his power of influencing the course of nature to his own advantage4 ,prayers1 promises1 or threats may secure him fine weather and an abundant crop from the gods2 and if a god should happen1 as he sometimes believes1 to become incarnate in his own person1 then he need appeal to no higher being2 he1 the savage1 possesses in himself all the powers necessary to further his own well-being and that of his fellow-men4 ,this is one way in which the idea of a man-god is reached4 ,but there is another4 ,along with the view of the world as pervaded by spiritual forces1 savage man has a different1 and probably still older1 conception in which we may detect a germ of the modern notion of natural law or the view of nature as a series of events occurring in an invariable order without the intervention of personal agency4 ,the germ of which ,i speak is involved in that sympathetic magic1 as it may be called1 which plays a large part in most systems of superstition4 ,in early society the king is frequently a magician as well as a priest2 indeed he appears to have often attained to power by virtue of his supposed proficiency in the black or white art4 ,hence in order to understand the evolution of the kingship and the sacred character with which the office has commonly been invested in the eyes of savage or barbarous peoples1 it is essential to have some acquaintance with the principles of magic and to form some conception of the extraordinary hold which that ancient system of superstition has had on the human mind in all ages and all countries4 ,accordingly ,i propose to consider the subject in some detail4 ,,iii4 ,sympathetic ,magic #a4 ,the ,principles of ,magic ,,if we analyse the principles of thought on which magic is based1 they will probably be found to resolve themselves into two3 first1 that like produces like1 or that an effect resembles its cause2 and1 second1 that things which have once been in contact with each other continue to act on each other at a distance after the physical contact has been severed4 ,the former principle may be called the ,law of ,similarity1 the latter the ,law of ,contact or ,contagion4 ,from the first of these principles1 namely the ,law of ,similarity1 the magician infers that he can produce any effect he desires merely by imitating it3 from the second he infers that whatever he does to a material object will affect equally the person with whom the object was once in contact1 whether it formed part of his body or not4 ,charms based on the ,law of ,similarity may be called ,homoeopathic or ,imitative ,magic4 ,charms based on the ,law of ,contact or ,contagion may be called ,contagious ,magic4 ,to denote the first of these branches of magic the term ,homoeopathic is perhaps preferable1 for the alternative term ,imitative or ,mimetic suggests1 if it does not imply1 a conscious agent who imitates1 thereby limiting the scope of magic too narrowly4 ,for the same principles which the magician applies in the practice of his art are implicitly believed by him to regulate the operations of inanimate nature2 in other words1 he tacitly assumes that the ,laws of ,similarity and ,contact are of universal application and are not limited to human actions4 ,in short1 magic is a spurious system of natural law as well as a fallacious guide of conduct2 it is a false science as well as an abortive art4 ,regarded as a system of natural law1 that is1 as a statement of the rules which determine the sequence of events throughout the world1 it may be called ,theoretical ,magic3 regarded as a set of precepts which human beings observe in order to compass their ends1 it may be called ,practical ,magic4 ,at the same time it is to be borne in mind that the primitive magician knows magic only on its practical side2 he never analyses the mental processes on which his practice is based1 never reflects on the abstract principles involved in his actions4 ,with him1 as with the vast majority of men1 logic is implicit1 not explicit3 he reasons just as he digests his food in complete ignorance of the intellectual and physiological processes which are essential to the one operation and to the other4 ,in short1 to him magic is always an art1 never a science2 the very idea of science is lacking in his undeveloped mind4 ,it is for the philosophic student to trace the train of thought which underlies the magician's practice2 to draw out the few simple threads of which the tangled skein is composed2 to disengage the abstract principles from their concrete applications2 in short1 to discern the spurious science behind the bastard art4 ,if my analysis of the magician's logic is correct1 its two great principles turn out to be merely two different misapplications of the association of ideas4 ,homoeopathic magic is founded on the association of ideas by similarity3 contagious magic is founded on the association of ideas by contiguity4 ,homoeopathic magic commits the mistake of assuming that things which resemble each other are the same3 contagious magic commits the mistake of assuming that things which have once been in contact with each other are always in contact4 ,but in practice the two branches are often combined2 or1 to be more exact1 while homoeopathic or imitative magic may be practised by itself1 contagious magic will generally be found to involve an application of the homoeopathic or imitative principle4 ,thus generally stated the two things may be a little difficult to grasp1 but they will readily become intelligible when they are illustrated by particular examples4 ,both trains of thought are in fact extremely simple and elementary4 ,it could hardly be otherwise1 since they are familiar in the concrete1 though certainly not in the abstract1 to the crude intelligence not only of the savage1 but of ignorant and dull-witted people everywhere4 ,both branches of magic1 the homoeopathic and the contagious1 may conveniently be comprehended under the general name of ,sympathetic ,magic1 since both assume that things act on each other at a distance through a secret sympathy1 the impulse being transmitted from one to the other by means of what we may conceive as a kind of invisible ether1 not unlike that which is postulated by modern science for a precisely similar purpose1 namely1 to explain how things can physically affect each other through a space which appears to be empty4 ,it may be convenient to tabulate as follows the branches of magic according to the laws of thought which underlie them3 ,sympathetic ,magic 7,law of ,sympathy7 ------------------------------- ,homoeopathic ,magic ,contagious ,magic 7,law of ,similarity7 7,law of ,contact7 ,i will now illustrate these two great branches of sympathetic magic by examples1 beginning with homoeopathic magic4 #b4 ,homoeopathic or ,imitative ,magic ,,perhaps the most familiar application of the principle that like produces like is the attempt which has been made by many peoples in many ages to injure or destroy an enemy by injuring or destroying an image of him1 in the belief that1 just as the image suffers1 so does the man1 and that when it perishes he must die4 ,a few instances out of many may be given to prove at once the wide diffusion of the practice over the world and its remarkable persistence through the ages4 ,for thousands of years ago it was known to the sorcerers of ancient ,india1 ,babylon1 and ,egypt1 as well as of ,greece and ,rome1 and at this day it is still resorted to by cunning and malignant savages in ,australia1 ,africa1 and ,scotland4 ,thus the ,north ,american ,indians1 we are told1 believe that by drawing the figure of a person in sand1 ashes1 or clay1 or by considering any object as his body1 and then pricking it with a sharp stick or doing it any other injury1 they inflict a corresponding injury on the person represented4 ,for example1 when an ,ojebway ,indian desires to work evil on any one1 he makes a little wooden image of his enemy and runs a needle into its head or heart1 or he shoots an arrow into it1 believing that wherever the needle pierces or the arrow strikes the image1 his foe will the same instant be seized with a sharp pain in the corresponding part of his body2 but if he intends to kill the person outright1 he burns or buries the puppet1 uttering certain magic words as he does so4 ,the ,peruvian ,indians moulded images of fat mixed with grain to imitate the persons whom they disliked or feared1 and then burned the effigy on the road where the intended victim was to pass4 ,this they called burning his soul4 ,a ,malay charm of the same sort is as follows4 ,take parings of nails1 hair1 eyebrows1 spittle1 and so forth of your intended victim1 enough to represent every part of his person1 and then make them up into his likeness with wax from a deserted bees' comb4 ,scorch the figure slowly by holding it over a lamp every night for seven nights1 and say3 ,it is not wax that ,i am scorching1 ,it is the liver1 heart1 and spleen of ,so-and-so that ,i scorch4 ,after the seventh time burn the figure1 and your victim will die4 ,this charm obviously combines the principles of homoeopathic and contagious magic2 since the image which is made in the likeness of an enemy contains things which once were in contact with him1 namely1 his nails1 hair1 and spittle4 ,another form of the ,malay charm1 which resembles the ,ojebway practice still more closely1 is to make a corpse of wax from an empty bees' comb and of the length of a footstep2 then pierce the eye of the image1 and your enemy is blind2 pierce the stomach1 and he is sick2 pierce the head1 and his head aches2 pierce the breast1 and his breast will suffer4 ,if you would kill him outright1 transfix the image from the head downwards2 enshroud it as you would a corpse2 pray over it as if you were praying over the dead2 then bury it in the middle of a path where your victim will be sure to step over it4 ,in order that his blood may not be on your head1 you should say3 ,it is not ,i who am burying him1 ,it is ,gabriel who is burying him4 ,thus the guilt of the murder will be laid on the shoulders of the archangel ,gabriel1 who is a great deal better able to bear it than you are4 ,if homoeopathic or imitative magic1 working by means of images1 has commonly been practised for the spiteful purpose of putting obnoxious people out of the world1 it has also1 though far more rarely1 been employed with the benevolent intention of helping others into it4 ,in other words1 it has been used to facilitate childbirth and to procure offspring for barren women4 ,thus among the ,bataks of ,sumatra a barren woman1 who would become a mother1 will make a wooden image of a child and hold it in her lap1 believing that this will lead to the fulfilment of her wish4 ,in the ,babar ,archipelago1 when a woman desires to have a child1 she invites a man who is himself the father of a large family to pray on her behalf to ,upulero1 the spirit of the sun4 ,a doll is made of red cotton1 which the woman clasps in her arms1 as if she would suckle it4 ,then the father of many children takes a fowl and holds it by the legs to the woman's head1 saying1 ,o ,upulero1 make use of the fowl2 let fall1 let descend a child1 ,i beseech you1 ,i entreat you1 let a child fall and descend into my hands and on my lap4 ,then he asks the woman1 ,has the child come8 and she answers1 ,yes1 it is sucking already4 ,after that the man holds the fowl on the husband's head1 and mumbles some form of words4 ,lastly1 the bird is killed and laid1 together with some betel1 on the domestic place of sacrifice4 ,when the ceremony is over1 word goes about in the village that the woman has been brought to bed1 and her friends come and congratulate her4 ,here the pretence that a child has been born is a purely magical rite designed to secure1 by means of imitation or mimicry1 that a child really shall be born2 but an attempt is made to add to the efficacy of the rite by means of prayer and sacrifice4 ,to put it otherwise1 magic is here blent with and reinforced by religion4 ,among some of the ,dyaks of ,borneo1 when a woman is in hard labour1 a wizard is called in1 who essays to facilitate the delivery in a rational manner by manipulating the body of the sufferer4 ,meantime another wizard outside the room exerts himself to attain the same end by means which we should regard as wholly irrational4 ,he1 in fact1 pretends to be the expectant mother2 a large stone attached to his stomach by a cloth wrapt round his body represents the child in the womb1 and1 following the directions shouted to him by his colleague on the real scene of operations1 he moves this make-believe baby about on his body in exact imitation of the movements of the real baby till the infant is born4 ,the same principle of make-believe1 so dear to children1 has led other peoples to employ a simulation of birth as a form of adoption1 and even as a mode of restoring a supposed dead person to life4 ,if you pretend to give birth to a boy1 or even to a great bearded man who has not a drop of your blood in his veins1 then1 in the eyes of primitive law and philosophy1 that boy or man is really your son to all intents and purposes4 ,thus ,diodorus tells us that when ,zeus persuaded his jealous wife ,hera to adopt ,hercules1 the goddess got into bed1 and clasping the burly hero to her bosom1 pushed him through her robes and let him fall to the ground in imitation of a real birth2 and the historian adds that in his own day the same mode of adopting children was practised by the barbarians4 ,at the present time it is said to be still in use in ,bulgaria and among the ,bosnian ,turks4 ,a woman will take a boy whom she intends to adopt and push or pull him through her clothes2 ever afterwards he is regarded as her very son1 and inherits the whole property of his adoptive parents4 ,among the ,berawans of ,sarawak1 when a woman desires to adopt a grownup man or woman1 a great many people assemble and have a feast4 ,the adopting mother1 seated in public on a raised and covered seat1 allows the adopted person to crawl from behind between her legs4 ,as soon as he appears in front he is stroked with the sweet-scented blossoms of the areca palm and tied to a woman4 ,then the adopting mother and the adopted son or daughter1 thus bound together1 waddle to the end of the house and back again in front of all the spectators4 ,the tie established between the two by this graphic imitation of childbirth is very strict2 an offence committed against an adopted child is reckoned more heinous than one committed against a real child4 ,in ancient ,greece any man who had been supposed erroneously to be dead1 and for whom in his absence funeral rites had been performed1 was treated as dead to society till he had gone through the form of being born again4 ,he was passed through a woman's lap1 then washed1 dressed in swaddling-clothes1 and put out to nurse4 ,not until this ceremony had been punctually performed might he mix freely with living folk4 ,in ancient ,india1 under similar circumstances1 the supposed dead man had to pass the first night after his return in a tub filled with a mixture of fat and water2 there he sat with doubled-up fists and without uttering a syllable1 like a child in the womb1 while over him were performed all the sacraments that were wont to be celebrated over a pregnant woman4 ,next morning he got out of the tub and went through once more all the other sacraments he had formerly partaken of from his youth up2 in particular1 he married a wife or espoused his old one over again with due solemnity4 ,another beneficent use of homoeopathic magic is to heal or prevent sickness4 ,the ancient ,hindoos performed an elaborate ceremony1 based on homoeopathic magic1 for the cure of jaundice4 ,its main drift was to banish the yellow colour to yellow creatures and yellow things1 such as the sun1 to which it properly belongs1 and to procure for the patient a healthy red colour from a living1 vigorous source1 namely1 a red bull4 ,with this intention1 a priest recited the following spell3 ,up to the sun shall go thy heart-ache and thy jaundice3 in the colour of the red bull do we envelop thee6 ,we envelop thee in red tints1 unto long life4 ,may this person go unscathed and be free of yellow colour6 ,the cows whose divinity is ,rohini1 they who1 moreover1 are themselves red 7rohinih7--in their every form and every strength we do envelop thee4 ,into the parrots1 into the thrush1 do we put thy jaundice1 and1 furthermore1 into the yellow wagtail do we put thy jaundice4 ,while he uttered these words1 the priest1 in order to infuse the rosy hue of health into the sallow patient1 gave him water to sip which was mixed with the hair of a red bull2 he poured water over the animal's back and made the sick man drink it2 he seated him on the skin of a red bull and tied a piece of the skin to him4 ,then in order to improve his colour by thoroughly eradicating the yellow taint1 he proceeded thus4 ,he first daubed him from head to foot with a yellow porridge made of tumeric or curcuma 7a yellow plant71 set him on a bed1 tied three yellow birds1 to wit1 a parrot1 a thrush1 and a yellow wagtail1 by means of a yellow string to the foot of the bed2 then pouring water over the patient1 he washed off the yellow porridge1 and with it no doubt the jaundice1 from him to the birds4 ,after that1 by way of giving a final bloom to his complexion1 he took some hairs of a red bull1 wrapt them in gold leaf1 and glued them to the patient's skin4 ,the ancients held that if a person suffering from jaundice looked sharply at a stone-curlew1 and the bird looked steadily at him1 he was cured of the disease4 ,such is the nature1 says ,plutarch1 and such the temperament of the creature that it draws out and receives the malady which issues1 like a stream1 through the eyesight4 ,so well recognised among birdfanciers was this valuable property of the stone-curlew that when they had one of these birds for sale they kept it carefully covered1 lest a jaundiced person should look at it and be cured for nothing4 ,the virtue of the bird lay not in its colour but in its large golden eye1 which naturally drew out the yellow jaundice4 ,pliny tells of another1 or perhaps the same1 bird1 to which the ,greeks gave their name for jaundice1 because if a jaundiced man saw it1 the disease left him and slew the bird4 ,he mentions also a stone which was supposed to cure jaundice because its hue resembled that of a jaundiced skin4 ,one of the great merits of homoeopathic magic is that it enables the cure to be performed on the person of the doctor instead of on that of his victim1 who is thus relieved of all trouble and inconvenience1 while he sees his medical man writhe in anguish before him4 ,for example1 the peasants of ,perche1 in ,france1 labour under the impression that a prolonged fit of vomiting is brought about by the patient's stomach becoming unhooked1 as they call it1 and so falling down4 ,accordingly1 a practitioner is called in to restore the organ to its proper place4 ,after hearing the symptoms he at once throws himself into the most horrible contortions1 for the purpose of unhooking his own stomach4 ,having succeeded in the effort1 he next hooks it up again in another series of contortions and grimaces1 while the patient experiences a corresponding relief4 ,fee five francs4 ,in like manner a ,dyak medicine-man1 who has been fetched in a case of illness1 will lie down and pretend to be dead4 ,he is accordingly treated like a corpse1 is bound up in mats1 taken out of the house1 and deposited on the ground4 ,after about an hour the other medicine-men loose the pretended dead man and bring him to life2 and as he recovers1 the sick person is supposed to recover too4 ,a cure for a tumour1 based on the principle of homoeopathic magic1 is prescribed by ,marcellus of ,bordeaux1 court physician to ,theodosius the ,first1 in his curious work on medicine4 ,it is as follows4 ,take a root of vervain1 cut it across1 and hang one end of it round the patient's neck1 and the other in the smoke of the fire4 ,as the vervain dries up in the smoke1 so the tumour will also dry up and disappear4 ,if the patient should afterwards prove ungrateful to the good physician1 the man of skill can avenge himself very easily by throwing the vervain into water2 for as the root absorbs the moisture once more1 the tumour will return4 ,the same sapient writer recommends you1 if you are troubled with pimples1 to watch for a falling star1 and then instantly1 while the star is still shooting from the sky1 to wipe the pimples with a cloth or anything that comes to hand4 ,just as the star falls from the sky1 so the pimples will fall from your body2 only you must be very careful not to wipe them with your bare hand1 or the pimples will be transferred to it4 ,further1 homoeopathic and in general sympathetic magic plays a great part in the measures taken by the rude hunter or fisherman to secure an abundant supply of food4 ,on the principle that like produces like1 many things are done by him and his friends in deliberate imitation of the result which he seeks to attain2 and1 on the other hand1 many things are scrupulously avoided because they bear some more or less fanciful resemblance to others which would really be disastrous4 ,nowhere is the theory of sympathetic magic more systematically carried into practice for the maintenance of the food supply than in the barren regions of ,central ,australia4 ,here the tribes are divided into a number of totem clans1 each of which is charged with the duty of multiplying their totem for the good of the community by means of magical ceremonies4 ,most of the totems are edible animals and plants1 and the general result supposed to be accomplished by these ceremonies is that of supplying the tribe with food and other necessaries4 ,often the rites consist of an imitation of the effect which the people desire to produce2 in other words1 their magic is homoeopathic or imitative4 ,thus among the ,warramunga the headman of the white cockatoo totem seeks to multiply white cockatoos by holding an effigy of the bird and mimicking its harsh cry4 ,among the ,arunta the men of the witchetty grub totem perform ceremonies for multiplying the grub which the other members of the tribe use as food4 ,one of the ceremonies is a pantomime representing the fully-developed insect in the act of emerging from the chrysalis4 ,a long narrow structure of branches is set up to imitate the chrysalis case of the grub4 ,in this structure a number of men1 who have the grub for their totem1 sit and sing of the creature in its various stages4 ,then they shuffle out of it in a squatting posture1 and as they do so they sing of the insect emerging from the chrysalis4 ,this is supposed to multiply the numbers of the grubs4 ,again1 in order to multiply emus1 which are an important article of food1 the men of the emu totem paint on the ground the sacred design of their totem1 especially the parts of the emu which they like best to eat1 namely1 the fat and the eggs4 ,round this painting the men sit and sing4 ,afterwards performers1 wearing head-dresses to represent the long neck and small head of the emu1 mimic the appearance of the bird as it stands aimlessly peering about in all directions4 ,the ,indians of ,british ,columbia live largely upon the fish which abound in their seas and rivers4 ,if the fish do not come in due season1 and the ,indians are hungry1 a ,nootka wizard will make an image of a swimming fish and put it into the water in the direction from which the fish generally appear4 ,this ceremony1 accompanied by a prayer to the fish to come1 will cause them to arrive at once4 ,the islanders of ,torres ,straits use models of dugong and turtles to charm dugong and turtle to their destruction4 ,the ,toradjas of ,central ,celebes believe that things of the same sort attract each other by means of their indwelling spirits or vital ether4 ,hence they hang up the jawbones of deer and wild pigs in their houses1 in order that the spirits which animate these bones may draw the living creatures of the same kind into the path of the hunter4 ,in the island of ,nias1 when a wild pig has fallen into the pit prepared for it1 the animal is taken out and its back is rubbed with nine fallen leaves1 in the belief that this will make nine more wild pigs fall into the pit1 just as the nine leaves fell from the tree4 ,in the ,east ,indian islands of ,saparoea1 ,haroekoe1 and ,noessa ,laut1 when a fisherman is about to set a trap for fish in the sea1 he looks out for a tree1 of which the fruit has been much pecked at by birds4 ,from such a tree he cuts a stout branch and makes of it the principal post in his fish-trap2 for he believes that1 just as the tree lured many birds to its fruit1 so the branch cut from that tree will lure many fish to the trap4 ,the western tribes of ,british ,new ,guinea employ a charm to aid the hunter in spearing dugong or turtle4 ,a small beetle1 which haunts coco-nut trees1 is placed in the hole of the spear-haft into which the spear-head fits4 ,this is supposed to make the spear-head stick fast in the dugong or turtle1 just as the beetle sticks fast to a man's skin when it bites him4 ,when a ,cambodian hunter has set his nets and taken nothing1 he strips himself naked1 goes some way off1 then strolls up to the net as if he did not see it1 lets himself be caught in it1 and cries1 ,hillo6 what's this8 ,i'm afraid ,i'm caught4 ,after that the net is sure to catch game4 ,a pantomime of the same sort has been acted within the living memory in our ,scottish ,highlands4 ,the ,rev4 ,james ,macdonald1 now of ,reay in ,caithness1 tells us that in his boyhood when he was fishing with companions about ,loch ,aline and they had had no bites for a long time1 they used to make a pretence of throwing one of their fellows overboard and hauling him out of the water1 as if he were a fish2 after that the trout or silloch would begin to nibble1 according as the boat was on fresh or salt water4 ,before a ,carrier ,indian goes out to snare martens1 he sleeps by himself for about ten nights beside the fire with a little stick pressed down on his neck4 ,this naturally causes the fall-stick of his trap to drop down on the neck of the marten4 ,among the ,galelareese1 who inhabit a district in the northern part of ,halmahera1 a large island to the west of ,new ,guinea1 it is a maxim that when you are loading your gun to go out shooting1 you should always put the bullet in your mouth before you insert it in the gun2 for by so doing you practically eat the game that is to be hit by the bullet1 which therefore cannot possibly miss the mark4 ,a ,malay who has baited a trap for crocodiles1 and is awaiting results1 is careful in eating his curry always to begin by swallowing three lumps of rice successively2 for this helps the bait to slide more easily down the crocodile's throat4 ,he is equally scrupulous not to take any bones out of his curry2 for1 if he did1 it seems clear that the sharp-pointed stick on which the bait is skewered would similarly work itself loose1 and the crocodile would get off with the bait4 ,hence in these circumstances it is prudent for the hunter1 before he begins his meal1 to get somebody else to take the bones out of his curry1 otherwise he may at any moment have to choose between swallowing a bone and losing the crocodile4 ,this last rule is an instance of the things which the hunter abstains from doing lest1 on the principle that like produces like1 they should spoil his luck4 ,for it is to be observed that the system of sympathetic magic is not merely composed of positive precepts2 it comprises a very large number of negative precepts1 that is1 prohibitions4 ,it tells you not merely what to do1 but also what to leave undone4 ,the positive precepts are charms3 the negative precepts are taboos4 ,in fact the whole doctrine of taboo1 or at all events a large part of it1 would seem to be only a special application of sympathetic magic1 with its two great laws of similarity and contact4 ,though these laws are certainly not formulated in so many words nor even conceived in the abstract by the savage1 they are nevertheless implicitly believed by him to regulate the course of nature quite independently of human will4 ,he thinks that if he acts in a certain way1 certain consequences will inevitably follow in virtue of one or other of these laws2 and if the consequences of a particular act appear to him likely to prove disagreeable or dangerous1 he is naturally careful not to act in that way lest he should incur them4 ,in other words1 he abstains from doing that which1 in accordance with his mistaken notions of cause and effect1 he falsely believes would injure him2 in short1 he subjects himself to a taboo4 ,thus taboo is so far a negative application of practical magic4 ,positive magic or sorcery says1 ,do this in order that so and so may happen4 ,negative magic or taboo says1 ,do not do this1 lest so and so should happen4 ,the aim of positive magic or sorcery is to produce a desired event2 the aim of negative magic or taboo is to avoid an undesirable one4 ,but both consequences1 the desirable and the undesirable1 are supposed to be brought about in accordance with the laws of similarity and contact4 ,and just as the desired consequence is not really effected by the observance of a magical ceremony1 so the dreaded consequence does not really result from the violation of a taboo4 ,if the supposed evil necessarily followed a breach of taboo1 the taboo would not be a taboo but a precept of morality or common sense4 ,it is not a taboo to say1 ,do not put your hand in the fire2 it is a rule of common sense1 because the forbidden action entails a real1 not an imaginary evil4 ,in short1 those negative precepts which we call taboo are just as vain and futile as those positive precepts which we call sorcery4 ,the two things are merely opposite sides or poles of one great disastrous fallacy1 a mistaken conception of the association of ideas4 ,of that fallacy1 sorcery is the positive1 and taboo the negative pole4 ,if we give the general name of magic to the whole erroneous system1 both theoretical and practical1 then taboo may be defined as the negative side of practical magic4 ,to put this in tabular form3 ,magic ---------------------- ,theoretical ,practical 7,magic as a 7,magic as a pseudo-science7 pseudo-art7 ----------------- ,positive ,magic ,negative ,magic or ,sorcery or ,taboo ,i have made these remarks on taboo and its relations to magic because ,i am about to give some instances of taboos observed by hunters1 fishermen1 and others1 and ,i wished to show that they fall under the head of ,sympathetic ,magic1 being only particular applications of that general theory4 ,thus1 among the ,esquimaux boys are forbidden to play cat's cradle1 because if they did so their fingers might in later life become entangled in the harpoon-line4 ,here the taboo is obviously an application of the law of similarity1 which is the basis of homoeopathic magic3 as the child's fingers are entangled by the string in playing cat's cradle1 so they will be entangled by the harpoonline when he is a man and hunts whales4 ,again1 among the ,huzuls of the ,carpathian ,mountains the wife of a hunter may not spin while her husband is eating1 or the game will turn and wind like the spindle1 and the hunter will be unable to hit it4 ,here again the taboo is clearly derived from the law of similarity4 ,so1 too1 in most parts of ancient ,italy women were forbidden by law to spin on the highroads as they walked1 or even to carry their spindles openly1 because any such action was believed to injure the crops4 ,probably the notion was that the twirling of the spindle would twirl the corn-stalks and prevent them from growing straight4 ,so1 too1 among the ,ainos of ,saghalien a pregnant woman may not spin nor twist ropes for two months before her delivery1 because they think that if she did so the child's guts might be entangled like the thread4 ,for a like reason in ,bilaspore1 a district of ,india1 when the chief men of a village meet in council1 no one present should twirl a spindle2 for they think that if such a thing were to happen1 the discussion1 like the spindle1 would move in a circle and never be wound up4 ,in some of the ,east ,indian islands any one who comes to the house of a hunter must walk straight in2 he may not loiter at the door1 for were he to do so1 the game would in like manner stop in front of the hunter's snares and then turn back1 instead of being caught in the trap4 ,for a similar reason it is a rule with the ,toradjas of ,central ,celebes that no one may stand or loiter on the ladder of a house where there is a pregnant woman1 for such delay would retard the birth of the child2 and in various parts of ,sumatra the woman herself in these circumstances is forbidden to stand at the door or on the top rung of the house-ladder under pain of suffering hard labour for her imprudence in neglecting so elementary a precaution4 ,malays engaged in the search for camphor eat their food dry and take care not to pound their salt fine4 ,the reason is that the camphor occurs in the form of small grains deposited in the cracks of the trunk of the camphor tree4 ,accordingly it seems plain to the ,malay that if1 while seeking for camphor1 he were to eat his salt finely ground1 the camphor would be found also in fine grains2 whereas by eating his salt coarse he ensures that the grains of the camphor will also be large4 ,camphor hunters in ,borneo use the leathery sheath of the leaf-stalk of the ,penang palm as a plate for food1 and during the whole of the expedition they will never wash the plate1 for fear that the camphor might dissolve and disappear from the crevices of the tree4 ,apparently they think that to wash their plates would be to wash out the camphor crystals from the trees in which they are imbedded4 ,the chief product of some parts of ,laos1 a province of ,siam1 is lac4 ,this is a resinous gum exuded by a red insect on the young branches of trees1 to which the little creatures have to be attached by hand4 ,all who engage in the business of gathering the gum abstain from washing themselves and especially from cleansing their heads1 lest by removing the parasites from their hair they should detach the other insects from the boughs4 ,again1 a ,blackfoot ,indian who has set a trap for eagles1 and is watching it1 would not eat rosebuds on any account2 for he argues that if he did so1 and an eagle alighted near the trap1 the rosebuds in his own stomach would make the bird itch1 with the result that instead of swallowing the bait the eagle would merely sit and scratch himself4 ,following this train of thought the eagle hunter also refrains from using an awl when he is looking after his snares2 for surely if he were to scratch with an awl1 the eagles would scratch him4 ,the same disastrous consequence would follow if his wives and children at home used an awl while he is out after eagles1 and accordingly they are forbidden to handle the tool in his absence for fear of putting him in bodily danger4 ,among the taboos observed by savages none perhaps are more numerous or important than the prohibitions to eat certain foods1 and of such prohibitions many are demonstrably derived from the law of similarity and are accordingly examples of negative magic4 ,just as the savage eats many animals or plants in order to acquire certain desirable qualities with which he believes them to be endowed1 so he avoids eating many other animals and plants lest he should acquire certain undesirable qualities with which he believes them to be infected4 ,in eating the former he practises positive magic2 in abstaining from the latter he practises negative magic4 ,many examples of such positive magic will meet us later on2 here ,i will give a few instances of such negative magic or taboo4 ,for example1 in ,madagascar soldiers are forbidden to eat a number of foods lest on the principle of homoeopathic magic they should be tainted by certain dangerous or undesirable properties which are supposed to inhere in these particular viands4 ,thus they may not taste hedgehog1 as it is feared that this animal1 from its propensity of coiling up into a ball when alarmed1 will impart a timid shrinking disposition to those who partake of it4 ,again1 no soldier should eat an ox's knee1 lest like an ox he should become weak in the knees and unable to march4 ,further1 the warrior should be careful to avoid partaking of a cock that has died fighting or anything that has been speared to death2 and no male animal may on any account be killed in his house while he is away at the wars4 ,for it seems obvious that if he were to eat a cock that had died fighting1 he would himself be slain on the field of battle2 if he were to partake of an animal that had been speared1 he would be speared himself2 if a male animal were killed in his house during his absence1 he would himself be killed in like manner and perhaps at the same instant4 ,further1 the ,malagasy soldier must eschew kidneys1 because in the ,malagasy language the word for kidney is the same as that for shot2 so shot he would certainly be if he ate a kidney4 ,the reader may have observed that in some of the foregoing examples of taboos the magical influence is supposed to operate at considerable distances2 thus among the ,blackfeet ,indians the wives and children of an eagle hunter are forbidden to use an awl during his absence1 lest the eagles should scratch the distant husband and father2 and again no male animal may be killed in the house of a ,malagasy soldier while he is away at the wars1 lest the killing of the animal should entail the killing of the man4 ,this belief in the sympathetic influence exerted on each other by persons or things at a distance is of the essence of magic4 ,whatever doubts science may entertain as to the possibility of action at a distance1 magic has none2 faith in telepathy is one of its first principles4 ,a modern advocate of the influence of mind upon mind at a distance would have no difficulty in convincing a savage2 the savage believed in it long ago1 and what is more1 he acted on his belief with a logical consistency such as his civilised brother in the faith has not yet1 so far as ,i am aware1 exhibited in his conduct4 ,for the savage is convinced not only that magical ceremonies affect persons and things afar off1 but that the simplest acts of daily life may do so too4 ,hence on important occasions the behaviour of friends and relations at a distance is often regulated by a more or less elaborate code of rules1 the neglect of which by the one set of persons would1 it is supposed1 entail misfortune or even death on the absent ones4 ,in particular when a party of men are out hunting or fighting1 their kinsfolk at home are often expected to do certain things or to abstain from doing certain others1 for the sake of ensuring the safety and success of the distant hunters or warriors4 ,i will now give some instances of this magical telepathy both in its positive and in its negative aspect4 ,in ,laos when an elephant hunter is starting for the chase1 he warns his wife not to cut her hair or oil her body in his absence2 for if she cut her hair the elephant would burst the toils1 if she oiled herself it would slip through them4 ,when a ,dyak village has turned out to hunt wild pigs in the jungle1 the people who stay at home may not touch oil or water with their hands during the absence of their friends2 for if they did so1 the hunters would all be butter-fingered and the prey would slip through their hands4 ,elephant-hunters in ,east ,africa believe that1 if their wives prove unfaithful in their absence1 this gives the elephant power over his pursuer1 who will accordingly be killed or severely wounded4 ,hence if a hunter hears of his wife's misconduct1 he abandons the chase and returns home4 ,if a ,wagogo hunter is unsuccessful1 or is attacked by a lion1 he attributes it to his wife's misbehaviour at home1 and returns to her in great wrath4 ,while he is away hunting1 she may not let any one pass behind her or stand in front of her as she sits2 and she must lie on her face in bed4 ,the ,moxos ,indians of ,bolivia thought that if a hunter's wife was unfaithful to him in his absence he would be bitten by a serpent or a jaguar4 ,accordingly1 if such an accident happened to him1 it was sure to entail the punishment1 and often the death1 of the woman1 whether she was innocent or guilty4 ,an ,aleutian hunter of sea-otters thinks that he cannot kill a single animal if during his absence from home his wife should be unfaithful or his sister unchaste4 ,the ,huichol ,indians of ,mexico treat as a demi-god a species of cactus which throws the eater into a state of ecstasy4 ,the plant does not grow in their country1 and has to be fetched every year by men who make a journey of forty-three days for the purpose4 ,meanwhile the wives at home contribute to the safety of their absent husbands by never walking fast1 much less running1 while the men are on the road4 ,they also do their best to ensure the benefits which1 in the shape of rain1 good crops1 and so forth1 are expected to flow from the sacred mission4 ,with this intention they subject themselves to severe restrictions like those imposed upon their husbands4 ,during the whole of the time which elapses till the festival of the cactus is held1 neither party washes except on certain occasions1 and then only with water brought from the distant country where the holy plant grows4 ,they also fast much1 eat no salt1 and are bound to strict continence4 ,any one who breaks this law is punished with illness1 and1 moreover1 jeopardises the result which all are striving for4 ,health1 luck1 and life are to be gained by gathering the cactus1 the gourd of the ,god of ,fire2 but inasmuch as the pure fire cannot benefit the impure1 men and women must not only remain chaste for the time being1 but must also purge themselves from the taint of past sin4 ,hence four days after the men have started the women gather and confess to ,grandfather ,fire with what men they have been in love from childhood till now4 ,they may not omit a single one1 for if they did so the men would not find a single cactus4 ,so to refresh their memories each one prepares a string with as many knots as she has had lovers4 ,this she brings to the temple1 and1 standing before the fire1 she mentions aloud all the men she has scored on her string1 name after name4 ,having ended her confession1 she throws the string into the fire1 and when the god has consumed it in his pure flame1 her sins are forgiven her and she departs in peace4 ,from now on the women are averse even to letting men pass near them4 ,the cactus-seekers themselves make in like manner a clean breast of all their frailties4 ,for every peccadillo they tie a knot on a string1 and after they have talked to all the five winds they deliver the rosary of their sins to the leader1 who burns it in the fire4 ,many of the indigenous tribes of ,sarawak are firmly persuaded that were the wives to commit adultery while their husbands are searching for camphor in the jungle1 the camphor obtained by the men would evaporate4 ,husbands can discover1 by certain knots in the tree1 when the wives are unfaithful2 and it is said that in former days many women were killed by jealous husbands on no better evidence than that of these knots4 ,further1 the wives dare not touch a comb while their husbands are away collecting the camphor2 for if they did so1 the interstices between the fibres of the tree1 instead of being filled with the precious crystals1 would be empty like the spaces between the teeth of a comb4 ,in the ,kei ,islands1 to the southwest of ,new ,guinea1 as soon as a vessel that is about to sail for a distant port has been launched1 the part of the beach on which it lay is covered as speedily as possible with palm branches1 and becomes sacred4 ,no one may thenceforth cross that spot till the ship comes home4 ,to cross it sooner would cause the vessel to perish4 ,moreover1 all the time that the voyage lasts three or four young girls1 specially chosen for the duty1 are supposed to remain in sympathetic connexion with the mariners and to contribute by their behaviour to the safety and success of the voyage4 ,on no account1 except for the most necessary purpose1 may they quit the room that has been assigned to them4 ,more than that1 so long as the vessel is believed to be at sea they must remain absolutely motionless1 crouched on their mats with their hands clasped between their knees4 ,they may not turn their heads to the left or to the right or make any other movement whatsoever4 ,if they did1 it would cause the boat to pitch and toss2 and they may not eat any sticky stuff1 such as rice boiled in coco-nut milk1 for the stickiness of the food would clog the passage of the boat through the water4 ,when the sailors are supposed to have reached their destination1 the strictness of these rules is somewhat relaxed2 but during the whole time that the voyage lasts the girls are forbidden to eat fish which have sharp bones or stings1 such as the sting-ray1 lest their friends at sea should be involved in sharp1 stinging trouble4 ,where beliefs like these prevail as to the sympathetic connexion between friends at a distance1 we need not wonder that above everything else war1 with its stern yet stirring appeal to some of the deepest and tenderest of human emotions1 should quicken in the anxious relations left behind a desire to turn the sympathetic bond to the utmost account for the benefit of the dear ones who may at any moment be fighting and dying far away4 ,hence1 to secure an end so natural and laudable1 friends at home are apt to resort to devices which will strike us as pathetic or ludicrous1 according as we consider their object or the means adopted to effect it4 ,thus in some districts of ,borneo1 when a ,dyak is out head-hunting1 his wife or1 if he is unmarried1 his sister must wear a sword day and night in order that he may always be thinking of his weapons2 and she may not sleep during the day nor go to bed before two in the morning1 lest her husband or brother should thereby be surprised in his sleep by an enemy4 ,among the ,sea ,dyaks of ,banting in ,sarawak the women strictly observe an elaborate code of rules while the men are away fighting4 ,some of the rules are negative and some are positive1 but all alike are based on the principles of magical homoeopathy and telepathy4 ,amongst them are the following4 ,the women must wake very early in the morning and open the windows as soon as it is light2 otherwise their absent husbands will oversleep themselves4 ,the women may not oil their hair1 or the men will slip4 ,the women may neither sleep nor doze by day1 or the men will be drowsy on the march4 ,the women must cook and scatter popcorn on the verandah every morning2 so will the men be agile in their movements4 ,the rooms must be kept very tidy1 all boxes being placed near the walls2 for if any one were to stumble over them1 the absent husbands would fall and be at the mercy of the foe4 ,at every meal a little rice must be left in the pot and put aside2 so will the men far away always have something to eat and need never go hungry4 ,on no account may the women sit at the loom till their legs grow cramped1 otherwise their husbands will likewise be stiff in their joints and unable to rise up quickly or to run away from the foe4 ,so in order to keep their husbands' joints supple the women often vary their labours at the loom by walking up and down the verandah4 ,further1 they may not cover up their faces1 or the men would not to be able to find their way through the tall grass or jungle4 ,again1 the women may not sew with a needle1 or the men will tread on the sharp spikes set by the enemy in the path4 ,should a wife prove unfaithful while her husband is away1 he will lose his life in the enemy's country4 ,some years ago all these rules and more were observed by the women of ,banting1 while their husbands were fighting for the ,english against rebels4 ,but alas6 these tender precautions availed them little2 for many a man1 whose faithful wife was keeping watch and ward for him at home1 found a soldier's grave4 ,in the island of ,timor1 while war is being waged1 the high-priest never quits the temple2 his food is brought to him or cooked inside2 day and night he must keep the fire burning1 for if he were to let it die out1 disaster would be fall the warriors and would continue so long as the hearth was cold4 ,moreover1 he must drink only hot water during the time the army is absent2 for every draught of cold water would damp the spirits of the people1 so that they could not vanquish the enemy4 ,in the ,kei ,islands1 when the warriors have departed1 the women return indoors and bring out certain baskets containing fruits and stones4 ,these fruits and stones they anoint and place on a board1 murmuring as they do so1 ,o lord sun1 moon1 let the bullets rebound from our husbands1 brothers1 betrothed1 and other relations1 just as raindrops rebound from these objects which are smeared with oil4 ,as soon as the first shot is heard1 the baskets are put aside1 and the women1 seizing their fans1 rush out of the houses4 ,then1 waving their fans in the direction of the enemy1 they run through the village1 while they sing1 ,o golden fans6 let our bullets hit1 and those of the enemy miss4 ,in this custom the ceremony of anointing stones1 in order that the bullets may recoil from the men like raindrops from the stones1 is a piece of pure homoeopathic or imitative magic2 but the prayer to the sun1 that he will be pleased to give effect to the charm1 is a religious and perhaps later addition4 ,the waving of the fans seems to be a charm to direct the bullets towards or away from their mark1 according as they are discharged from the guns of friends or foes4 ,an old historian of ,madagascar informs us that while the men are at the wars1 and until their return1 the women and girls cease not day and night to dance1 and neither lie down nor take food in their own houses4 ,and although they are very voluptuously inclined1 they would not for anything in the world have an intrigue with another man while their husband is at the war1 believing firmly that if that happened1 their husband would be either killed or wounded4 ,they believe that by dancing they impart strength1 courage1 and good fortune to their husbands2 accordingly during such times they give themselves no rest1 and this custom they observe very religiously4 ,among the ,tshi-speaking peoples of the ,gold ,coast the wives of men who are away with the army paint themselves white1 and adorn their persons with beads and charms4 ,on the day when a battle is expected to take place1 they run about armed with guns1 or sticks carved to look like guns1 and taking green paw-paws 7fruits shaped somewhat like a melon71 they hack them with knives1 as if they were chopping off the heads of the foe4 ,the pantomime is no doubt merely an imitative charm1 to enable the men to do to the enemy as the women do to the paw-paws4 ,in the ,west ,african town of ,framin1 while the ,ashantee war was raging some years ago1 ,mr4 ,fitzgerald ,marriott saw a dance performed by women whose husbands had gone as carriers to the war4 ,they were painted white and wore nothing but a short petticoat4 ,at their head was a shrivelled old sorceress in a very short white petticoat1 her black hair arranged in a sort of long projecting horn1 and her black face1 breasts1 arms1 and legs profusely adorned with white circles and crescents4 ,all carried long white brushes made of buffalo or horse tails1 and as they danced they sang1 ,our husbands have gone to ,ashanteeland2 may they sweep their enemies off the face of the earth6 ,among the ,thompson ,indians of ,british ,columbia1 when the men were on the war-path1 the women performed dances at frequent intervals4 ,these dances were believed to ensure the success of the expedition4 ,the dancers flourished their knives1 threw long sharp-pointed sticks forward1 or drew sticks with hooked ends repeatedly backward and forward4 ,throwing the sticks forward was symbolic of piercing or warding off the enemy1 and drawing them back was symbolic of drawing their own men from danger4 ,the hook at the end of the stick was particularly well adapted to serve the purpose of a life-saving apparatus4 ,the women always pointed their weapons towards the enemy's country4 ,they painted their faces red and sang as they danced1 and they prayed to the weapons to preserve their husbands and help them to kill many foes4 ,some had eagle-down stuck on the points of their sticks4 ,when the dance was over1 these weapons were hidden4 ,if a woman whose husband was at the war thought she saw hair or a piece of a scalp on the weapon when she took it out1 she knew that her husband had killed an enemy4 ,but if she saw a stain of blood on it1 she knew he was wounded or dead4 ,when the men of the ,yuki tribe in ,california were away fighting1 the women at home did not sleep2 they danced continually in a circle1 chanting and waving leafy wands4 ,for they said that if they danced all the time1 their husbands would not grow tired4 ,among the ,haida ,indians of the ,queen ,charlotte ,islands1 when the men had gone to war1 the women at home would get up very early in the morning and pretend to make war by falling upon their children and feigning to take them for slaves4 ,this was supposed to help their husbands to go and do likewise4 ,if a wife were unfaithful to her husband while he was away on the war-path1 he would probably be killed4 ,for ten nights all the women at home lay with their heads towards the point of the compass to which the war-canoes had paddled away4 ,then they changed about1 for the warriors were supposed to be coming home across the sea4 ,at ,masset the ,haida women danced and sang war-songs all the time their husbands were away at the wars1 and they had to keep everything about them in a certain order4 ,it was thought that a wife might kill her husband by not observing these customs4 ,when a band of ,carib ,indians of the ,orinoco had gone on the war-path1 their friends left in the village used to calculate as nearly as they could the exact moment when the absent warriors would be advancing to attack the enemy4 ,then they took two lads1 laid them down on a bench1 and inflicted a most severe scourging on their bare backs4 ,this the youths submitted to without a murmur1 supported in their sufferings by the firm conviction1 in which they had been bred from childhood1 that on the constancy and fortitude with which they bore the cruel ordeal depended the valour and success of their comrades in the battle4 ,among the many beneficent uses to which a mistaken ingenuity has applied the principle of homoeopathic or imitative magic1 is that of causing trees and plants to bear fruit in due season4 ,in ,thringen the man who sows flax carries the seed in a long bag which reaches from his shoulders to his knees1 and he walks with long strides1 so that the bag sways to and fro on his back4 ,it is believed that this will cause the flax to wave in the wind4 ,in the interior of ,sumatra rice is sown by women who1 in sowing1 let their hair hang loose down their back1 in order that the rice may grow luxuriantly and have long stalks4 ,similarly1 in ancient ,mexico a festival was held in honour of the goddess of maize1 or the long-haired mother1 as she was called4 ,it began at the time when the plant had attained its full growth1 and fibres shooting forth from the top of the green ear indicated that the grain was fully formed4 ,during this festival the women wore their long hair unbound1 shaking and tossing it in the dances which were the chief feature in the ceremonial1 in order that the tassel of the maize might grow in like profusion1 that the grain might be correspondingly large and flat1 and that the people might have abundance4 ,in many parts of ,europe dancing or leaping high in the air are approved homoeopathic modes of making the crops grow high4 ,thus in ,franche-,comt they say that you should dance at the ,carnival in order to make the hemp grow tall4 ,the notion that a person can influence a plant homoeopathically by his act or condition comes out clearly in a remark made by a ,malay woman4 ,being asked why she stripped the upper part of her body naked in reaping the rice1 she explained that she did it to make the rice-husks thinner1 as she was tired of pounding thick-husked rice4 ,clearly1 she thought that the less clothing she wore the less husk there would be on the rice4 ,the magic virtue of a pregnant woman to communicate fertility is known to ,bavarian and ,austrian peasants1 who think that if you give the first fruit of a tree to a woman with child to eat1 the tree will bring forth abundantly next year4 ,on the other hand1 the ,baganda believe that a barren wife infects her husband's garden with her own sterility and prevents the trees from bearing fruit2 hence a childless woman is generally divorced4 ,the ,greeks and ,romans sacrificed pregnant victims to the goddesses of the corn and of the earth1 doubtless in order that the earth might teem and the corn swell in the ear4 ,when a ,catholic priest remonstrated with the ,indians of the ,orinoco on allowing their women to sow the fields in the blazing sun1 with infants at their breasts1 the men answered1 ,father1 you don't understand these things1 and that is why they vex you4 ,you know that women are accustomed to bear children1 and that we men are not4 ,when the women sow1 the stalk of the maize bears two or three ears1 the root of the yucca yields two or three basketfuls1 and everything multiplies in proportion4 ,now why is that8 ,simply because the women know how to bring forth1 and know how to make the seed which they sow bring forth also4 ,let them sow1 then2 we men don't know as much about it as they do4 ,thus on the theory of homoeopathic magic a person can influence vegetation either for good or for evil according to the good or the bad character of his acts or states3 for example1 a fruitful woman makes plants fruitful1 a barren woman makes them barren4 ,hence this belief in the noxious and infectious nature of certain personal qualities or accidents has given rise to a number of prohibitions or rules of avoidance3 people abstain from doing certain things lest they should homoeopathically infect the fruits of the earth with their own undesirable state or condition4 ,all such customs of abstention or rules of avoidance are examples of negative magic or taboo4 ,thus1 for example1 arguing from what may be called the infectiousness of personal acts or states1 the ,galelareese say that you ought not to shoot with a bow and arrows under a fruit-tree1 or the tree will cast its fruit even as the arrows fall to the ground2 and that when you are eating water-melon you ought not to mix the pips which you spit out of your mouth with the pips which you have put aside to serve as seed2 for if you do1 though the pips you spat out may certainly spring up and blossom1 yet the blossoms will keep falling off just as the pips fell from your mouth1 and thus these pips will never bear fruit4 ,precisely the same train of thought leads the ,bavarian peasant to believe that if he allows the graft of a fruit-tree to fall on the ground1 the tree that springs from that graft will let its fruit fall untimely4 ,when the ,chams of ,cochinchina are sowing their dry rice fields and desire that no shower should fall1 they eat their rice dry in order to prevent rain from spoiling the crop4 ,in the foregoing cases a person is supposed to influence vegetation homoeopathically4 ,he infects trees or plants with qualities or accidents1 good or bad1 resembling and derived from his own4 ,but on the principle of homoeopathic magic the influence is mutual3 the plant can infect the man just as much as the man can infect the plant4 ,in magic1 as ,i believe in physics1 action and reaction are equal and opposite4 ,the ,cherokee ,indians are adepts in practical botany of the homoeopathic sort4 ,thus wiry roots of the catgut plant are so tough that they can almost stop a plowshare in the furrow4 ,hence ,cherokee women wash their heads with a decoction of the roots to make the hair strong1 and ,cherokee ball-players wash themselves with it to toughen their muscles4 ,it is a ,galelareese belief that if you eat a fruit which has fallen to the ground1 you will yourself contract a disposition to stumble and fall2 and that if you partake of something which has been forgotten 7such as a sweet potato left in the pot or a banana in the fire71 you will become forgetful4 ,the ,galelareese are also of opinion that if a woman were to consume two bananas growing from a single head she would give birth to twins4 ,the ,guarani ,indians of ,south ,america thought that a woman would become a mother of twins if she ate a double grain of millet4 ,in ,vedic times a curious application of this principle supplied a charm by which a banished prince might be restored to his kingdom4 ,he had to eat food cooked on a fire which was fed with wood which had grown out of the stump of a tree which had been cut down4 ,the recuperative power manifested by such a tree would in due course be communicated through the fire to the food1 and so to the prince1 who ate the food which was cooked on the fire which was fed with the wood which grew out of the tree4 ,the ,sudanese think that if a house is built of the wood of thorny trees1 the life of the people who dwell in that house will likewise be thorny and full of trouble4 ,there is a fruitful branch of homoeopathic magic which works by means of the dead2 for just as the dead can neither see nor hear nor speak1 so you may on homoeopathic principles render people blind1 deaf and dumb by the use of dead men's bones or anything else that is tainted by the infection of death4 ,thus among the ,galelareese1 when a young man goes a-wooing at night1 he takes a little earth from a grave and strews it on the roof of his sweetheart's house just above the place where her parents sleep4 ,this1 he fancies1 will prevent them from waking while he converses with his beloved1 since the earth from the grave will make them sleep as sound as the dead4 ,burglars in all ages and many lands have been patrons of this species of magic1 which is very useful to them in the exercise of their profession4 ,thus a ,south ,slavonian housebreaker sometimes begins operations by throwing a dead man's bone over the house1 saying1 with pungent sarcasm1 ,as this bone may waken1 so may these people waken2 after that not a soul in the house can keep his or her eyes open4 ,similarly1 in ,java the burglar takes earth from a grave and sprinkles it round the house which he intends to rob2 this throws the inmates into a deep sleep4 ,with the same intention a ,hindoo will strew ashes from a pyre at the door of the house2 ,indians of ,peru scatter the dust of dead men's bones2 and ,ruthenian burglars remove the marrow from a human shin-bone1 pour tallow into it1 and having kindled the tallow1 march thrice round the house with this candle burning1 which causes the inmates to sleep a death-like sleep4 ,or the ,ruthenian will make a flute out of a human leg-bone and play upon it2 whereupon all persons within hearing are overcome with drowsiness4 ,the ,indians of ,mexico employed for this maleficent purpose the left fore-arm of a woman who had died in giving birth to her first child2 but the arm had to be stolen4 ,with it they beat the ground before they entered the house which they designed to plunder2 this caused every one in the house to lose all power of speech and motion2 they were as dead1 hearing and seeing everything1 but perfectly powerless2 some of them1 however1 really slept and even snored4 ,in ,europe similar properties were ascribed to the ,hand of ,glory1 which was the dried and pickled hand of a man who had been hanged4 ,if a candle made of the fat of a malefactor who had also died on the gallows was lighted and placed in the ,hand of ,glory as in a candlestick1 it rendered motionless all persons to whom it was presented2 they could not stir a finger any more than if they were dead4 ,sometimes the dead man's hand is itself the candle1 or rather bunch of candles1 all its withered fingers being set on fire2 but should any member of the household be awake1 one of the fingers will not kindle4 ,such nefarious lights can only be extinguished with milk4 ,often it is prescribed that the thief's candle should be made of the finger of a new-born or1 still better1 unborn child2 sometimes it is thought needful that the thief should have one such candle for every person in the house1 for if he has one candle too little somebody in the house will wake and catch him4 ,once these tapers begin to burn1 there is nothing but milk that will put them out4 ,in the seventeenth century robbers used to murder pregnant women in order thus to extract candles from their wombs4 ,an ancient ,greek robber or burglar thought he could silence and put to flight the fiercest watchdogs by carrying with him a brand plucked from a funeral pyre4 ,again1 ,servian and ,bulgarian women who chafe at the restraints of domestic life will take the copper coins from the eyes of a corpse1 wash them in wine or water1 and give the liquid to their husbands to drink4 ,after swallowing it1 the husband will be as blind to his wife's peccadilloes as the dead man was on whose eyes the coins were laid4 ,further1 animals are often conceived to possess qualities of properties which might be useful to man1 and homoeopathic or imitative magic seeks to communicate these properties to human beings in various ways4 ,thus some ,bechuanas wear a ferret as a charm1 because1 being very tenacious of life1 it will make them difficult to kill4 ,others wear a certain insect1 mutilated1 but living1 for a similar purpose4 ,yet other ,bechuana warriors wear the hair of a hornless ox among their own hair1 and the skin of a frog on their mantle1 because a frog is slippery1 and the ox1 having no horns1 is hard to catch2 so the man who is provided with these charms believes that he will be as hard to hold as the ox and the frog4 ,again1 it seems plain that a ,south ,african warrior who twists tufts of rat's hair among his own curly black locks will have just as many chances of avoiding the enemy's spear as the nimble rat has of avoiding things thrown at it2 hence in these regions rats' hair is in great demand when war is expected4 ,one of the ancient books of ,india prescribes that when a sacrifice is offered for victory1 the earth out of which the altar is to be made should be taken from a place where a boar has been wallowing1 since the strength of the boar will be in that earth4 ,when you are playing the one-stringed lute1 and your fingers are stiff1 the thing to do is to catch some long-legged field spiders and roast them1 and then rub your fingers with the ashes2 that will make your fingers as lithe and nimble as the spiders' legs--at least so think the ,galelareese4 ,to bring back a runaway slave an ,arab will trace a magic circle on the ground1 stick a nail in the middle of it1 and attach a beetle by a thread to the nail1 taking care that the sex of the beetle is that of the fugitive4 ,as the beetle crawls round and round1 it will coil the thread about the nail1 thus shortening its tether and drawing nearer to the centre at every circuit4 ,so by virtue of homoeopathic magic the runaway slave will be drawn back to his master4 ,among the western tribes of ,british ,new ,guinea1 a man who has killed a snake will burn it and smear his legs with the ashes when he goes into the forest2 for no snake will bite him for some days afterwards4 ,if a ,south ,slavonian has a mind to pilfer and steal at market1 he has nothing to do but to burn a blind cat1 and then throw a pinch of its ashes over the person with whom he is higgling2 after that he can take what he likes from the booth1 and the owner will not be a bit the wiser1 having become as blind as the deceased cat with whose ashes he has been sprinkled4 ,the thief may even ask boldly1 ,did ,i pay for it8 and the deluded huckster will reply1 ,why1 certainly4 ,equally simple and effectual is the expedient adopted by natives of ,central ,australia who desire to cultivate their beards4 ,they prick the chin all over with a pointed bone1 and then stroke it carefully with a magic stick or stone1 which represents a kind of rat that has very long whiskers4 ,the virtue of these whiskers naturally passes into the representative stick or stone1 and thence by an easy transition to the chin1 which1 consequently1 is soon adorned with a rich growth of beard4 ,the ancient ,greeks thought that to eat the flesh of the wakeful nightingale would prevent a man from sleeping2 that to smear the eyes of a blear-sighted person with the gall of an eagle would give him the eagle's vision2 and that a raven's eggs would restore the blackness of the raven to silvery hair4 ,only the person who adopted this last mode of concealing the ravages of time had to be most careful to keep his mouth full of oil all the time he applied the eggs to his venerable locks1 else his teeth as well as his hair would be dyed raven black1 and no amount of scrubbing and scouring would avail to whiten them again4 ,the hair-restorer was in fact a shade too powerful1 and in applying it you might get more than you bargained for4 ,the ,huichol ,indians admire the beautiful markings on the backs of serpents4 ,hence when a ,huichol woman is about to weave or embroider1 her husband catches a large serpent and holds it in a cleft stick1 while the woman strokes the reptile with one hand down the whole length of its back2 then she passes the same hand over her forehead and eyes1 that she may be able to work as beautiful patterns in the web as the markings on the back of the serpent4 ,on the principle of homoeopathic magic1 inanimate things1 as well as plants and animals1 may diffuse blessing or bane around them1 according to their own intrinsic nature and the skill of the wizard to tap or dam1 as the case may be1 the stream of weal or woe4 ,in ,samaracand women give a baby sugar candy to suck and put glue in the palm of its hand1 in order that1 when the child grows up1 his words may be sweet and precious things may stick to his hands as if they were glued4 ,the ,greeks thought that a garment made from the fleece of a sheep that had been torn by a wolf would hurt the wearer1 setting up an itch or irritation in his skin4 ,they were also of opinion that if a stone which had been bitten by a dog were dropped in wine1 it would make all who drank of that wine to fall out among themselves4 ,among the ,arabs of ,moab a childless woman often borrows the robe of a woman who has had many children1 hoping with the robe to acquire the fruitfulness of its owner4 ,the ,caffres of ,sofala1 in ,east ,africa1 had a great dread of being struck with anything hollow1 such as a reed or a straw1 and greatly preferred being thrashed with a good thick cudgel or an iron bar1 even though it hurt very much4 ,for they thought that if a man were beaten with anything hollow1 his inside would waste away till he died4 ,in eastern seas there is a large shell which the ,buginese of ,celebes call the old man 7kadjwo74 ,on ,fridays they turn these old men upside down and place them on the thresholds of their houses1 believing that whoever then steps over the threshold of the house will live to be old4 ,at initiation a ,brahman boy is made to tread with his right foot on a stone1 while the words are repeated1 ,tread on this stone2 like a stone be firm2 and the same ceremony is performed1 with the same words1 by a ,brahman bride at her marriage4 ,in ,madagascar a mode of counteracting the levity of fortune is to bury a stone at the foot of the heavy house-post4 ,the common custom of swearing upon a stone may be based partly on a belief that the strength and stability of the stone lend confirmation to an oath4 ,thus the old ,danish historian ,saxo ,grammaticus tells us that the ancients1 when they were to choose a king1 were wont to stand on stones planted in the ground1 and to proclaim their votes1 in order to foreshadow from the steadfastness of the stones that the deed would be lasting4 ,but while a general magical efficacy may be supposed to reside in all stones by reason of their common properties of weight and solidity1 special magical virtues are attributed to particular stones1 or kinds of stone1 in accordance with their individual or specific qualities of shape and colour4 ,for example1 the ,indians of ,peru employed certain stones for the increase of maize1 others for the increase of potatoes1 and others again for the increase of cattle4 ,the stones used to make maize grow were fashioned in the likeness of cobs of maize1 and the stones destined to multiply cattle had the shape of sheep4 ,in some parts of ,melanesia a like belief prevails that certain sacred stones are endowed with miraculous powers which correspond in their nature to the shape of the stone4 ,thus a piece of water-worn coral on the beach often bears a surprising likeness to a bread-fruit4 ,hence in the ,banks ,islands a man who finds such a coral will lay it at the root of one of his bread-fruit trees in the expectation that it will make the tree bear well4 ,if the result answers his expectation1 he will then1 for a proper remuneration1 take stones of less-marked character from other men and let them lie near his1 in order to imbue them with the magic virtue which resides in it4 ,similarly1 a stone with little discs upon it is good to bring in money2 and if a man found a large stone with a number of small ones under it1 like a sow among her litter1 he was sure that to offer money upon it would bring him pigs4 ,in these and similar cases the ,melanesians ascribe the marvellous power1 not to the stone itself1 but to its indwelling spirit2 and sometimes1 as we have just seen1 a man endeavours to propitiate the spirit by laying down offerings on the stone4 ,but the conception of spirits that must be propitiated lies outside the sphere of magic1 and within that of religion4 ,where such a conception is found1 as here1 in conjunction with purely magical ideas and practices1 the latter may generally be assumed to be the original stock on which the religious conception has been at some later time engrafted4 ,for there are strong grounds for thinking that1 in the evolution of thought1 magic has preceded religion4 ,but to this point we shall return presently4 ,the ancients set great store on the magical qualities of precious stones2 indeed it has been maintained1 with great show of reason1 that such stones were used as amulets long before they were worn as mere ornaments4 ,thus the ,greeks gave the name of tree-agate to a stone which exhibits tree-like markings1 and they thought that if two of these gems were tied to the horns or necks of oxen at the plough1 the crop would be sure to be plentiful4 ,again1 they recognised a milkstone which produced an abundant supply of milk in women if only they drank it dissolved in honey-mead4 ,milk-stones are used for the same purpose by ,greek women in ,crete and ,melos at the present day2 in ,albania nursing mothers wear the stones in order to ensure an abundant flow of milk4 ,again1 the ,greeks believed in a stone which cured snake-bites1 and hence was named the snake-stone2 to test its efficacy you had only to grind the stone to powder and sprinkle the powder on the wound4 ,the wine-coloured amethyst received its name1 which means not drunken1 because it was supposed to keep the wearer of it sober2 and two brothers who desired to live at unity were advised to carry magnets about with them1 which1 by drawing the twain together1 would clearly prevent them from falling out4 ,the ancient books of the ,hindoos lay down a rule that after sunset on his marriage night a man should sit silent with his wife till the stars begin to twinkle in the sky4 ,when the pole-star appears1 he should point it out to her1 and1 addressing the star1 say1 ,firm art thou2 ,i see thee1 the firm one4 ,firm be thou with me1 ,o thriving one6 ,then1 turning to his wife1 he should say1 ,to me ,brihaspati has given thee2 obtaining offspring through me1 thy husband1 live with me a hundred autumns4 ,the intention of the ceremony is plainly to guard against the fickleness of fortune and the instability of earthly bliss by the steadfast influence of the constant star4 ,it is the wish expressed in ,keats's last sonnet3 ,bright star6 would ,i were steadfast as thou art-- ,not in lone splendour hung aloft the night4 ,dwellers by the sea cannot fail to be impressed by the sight of its ceaseless ebb and flow1 and are apt1 on the principles of that rude philosophy of sympathy and resemblance which here engages our attention1 to trace a subtle relation1 a secret harmony1 between its tides and the life of man1 of animals1 and of plants4 ,in the flowing tide they see not merely a symbol1 but a cause of exuberance1 of prosperity1 and of life1 while in the ebbing tide they discern a real agent as well as a melancholy emblem of failure1 of weakness1 and of death4 ,the ,breton peasant fancies that clover sown when the tide is coming in will grow well1 but that if the plant be sown at low water or when the tide is going out1 it will never reach maturity1 and that the cows which feed on it will burst4 ,his wife believes that the best butter is made when the tide has just turned and is beginning to flow1 that milk which foams in the churn will go on foaming till the hour of high water is past1 and that water drawn from the well or milk extracted from the cow while the tide is rising will boil up in the pot or saucepan and overflow into the fire4 ,according to some of the ancients1 the skins of seals1 even after they had been parted from their bodies1 remained in secret sympathy with the sea1 and were observed to ruffle when the tide was on the ebb4 ,another ancient belief1 attributed to ,aristotle1 was that no creature can die except at ebb tide4 ,the belief1 if we can trust ,pliny1 was confirmed by experience1 so far as regards human beings1 on the coast of ,france4 ,philostratus also assures us that at ,cadiz dying people never yielded up the ghost while the water was high4 ,a like fancy still lingers in some parts of ,europe4 ,on the ,cantabrian coast they think that persons who die of chronic or acute disease expire at the moment when the tide begins to recede4 ,in ,portugal1 all along the coast of ,wales1 and on some parts of the coast of ,brittany1 a belief is said to prevail that people are born when the tide comes in1 and die when it goes out4 ,dickens attests the existence of the same superstition in ,england4 ,people can't die1 along the coast1 said ,mr4 ,pegotty1 except when the tide's pretty nigh out4 ,they can't be born1 unless it's pretty nigh in--not properly born till flood4 ,the belief that most deaths happen at ebb tide is said to be held along the east coast of ,england from ,northumberland to ,kent4 ,shakespeare must have been familiar with it1 for he makes ,falstaff die even just between twelve and one1 e'en at the turning o' the tide4 ,we meet the belief again on the ,pacific coast of ,north ,america among the ,haidas4 ,whenever a good ,haida is about to die he sees a canoe manned by some of his dead friends1 who come with the tide to bid him welcome to the spirit land4 ,come with us now1 they say1 for the tide is about to ebb and we must depart4 ,at ,port ,stephens1 in ,new ,south ,wales1 the natives always buried their dead at flood tide1 never at ebb1 lest the retiring water should bear the soul of the departed to some distant country4 ,to ensure a long life the ,chinese have recourse to certain complicated charms1 which concentrate in themselves the magical essence emanating1 on homoeopathic principles1 from times and seasons1 from persons and from things4 ,the vehicles employed to transmit these happy influences are no other than grave-clothes4 ,these are provided by many ,chinese in their lifetime1 and most people have them cut out and sewn by an unmarried girl or a very young woman1 wisely calculating that1 since such a person is likely to live a great many years to come1 a part of her capacity to live long must surely pass into the clothes1 and thus stave off for many years the time when they shall be put to their proper use4 ,further1 the garments are made by preference in a year which has an intercalary month2 for to the ,chinese mind it seems plain that grave-clothes made in a year which is unusually long will possess the capacity of prolonging life in an unusually high degree4 ,amongst the clothes there is one robe in particular on which special pains have been lavished to imbue it with this priceless quality4 ,it is a long silken gown of the deepest blue colour1 with the word longevity embroidered all over it in thread of gold4 ,to present an aged parent with one of these costly and splendid mantles1 known as longevity garments1 is esteemed by the ,chinese an act of filial piety and a delicate mark of attention4 ,as the garment purports to prolong the life of its owner1 he often wears it1 especially on festive occasions1 in order to allow the influence of longevity1 created by the many golden letters with which it is bespangled1 to work their full effect upon his person4 ,on his birthday1 above all1 he hardly ever fails to don it1 for in ,china common sense bids a man lay in a large stock of vital energy on his birthday1 to be expended in the form of health and vigour during the rest of the year4 ,attired in the gorgeous pall1 and absorbing its blessed influence at every pore1 the happy owner receives complacently the congratulations of friends and relations1 who warmly express their admiration of these magnificent cerements1 and of the filial piety which prompted the children to bestow so beautiful and useful a present on the author of their being4 ,another application of the maxim that like produces like is seen in the ,chinese belief that the fortunes of a town are deeply affected by its shape1 and that they must vary according to the character of the thing which that shape most nearly resembles4 ,thus it is related that long ago the town of ,tsuen-cheu-fu1 the outlines of which are like those of a carp1 frequently fell a prey to the depredations of the neighbouring city of ,yung-chun1 which is shaped like a fishing-net1 until the inhabitants of the former town conceived the plan of erecting two tall pagodas in their midst4 ,these pagodas1 which still tower above the city of ,tsuen-cheu-fu1 have ever since exercised the happiest influence over its destiny by intercepting the imaginary net before it could descend and entangle in its meshes the imaginary carp4 ,some forty years ago the wise men of ,shanghai were much exercised to discover the cause of a local rebellion4 ,on careful enquiry they ascertained that the rebellion was due to the shape of a large new temple which had most unfortunately been built in the shape of a tortoise1 an animal of the very worst character4 ,the difficulty was serious1 the danger was pressing2 for to pull down the temple would have been impious1 and to let it stand as it was would be to court a succession of similar or worse disasters4 ,however1 the genius of the local professors of geomancy1 rising to the occasion1 triumphantly surmounted the difficulty and obviated the danger4 ,by filling up two wells1 which represented the eyes of the tortoise1 they at once blinded that disreputable animal and rendered him incapable of doing further mischief4 ,sometimes homoeopathic or imitative magic is called in to annul an evil omen by accomplishing it in mimicry4 ,the effect is to circumvent destiny by substituting a mock calamity for a real one4 ,in ,madagascar this mode of cheating the fates is reduced to a regular system4 ,here every man's fortune is determined by the day or hour of his birth1 and if that happens to be an unlucky one his fate is sealed1 unless the mischief can be extracted1 as the phrase goes1 by means of a substitute4 ,the ways of extracting the mischief are various4 ,for example1 if a man is born on the first day of the second month 7,february71 his house will be burnt down when he comes of age4 ,to take time by the forelock and avoid this catastrophe1 the friends of the infant will set up a shed in a field or in the cattle-fold and burn it4 ,if the ceremony is to be really effective1 the child and his mother should be placed in the shed and only plucked1 like brands1 from the burning hut before it is too late4 ,again1 dripping ,november is the month of tears1 and he who is born in it is born to sorrow4 ,but in order to disperse the clouds that thus gather over his future1 he has nothing to do but to take the lid off a boiling pot and wave it about4 ,the drops that fall from it will accomplish his destiny and so prevent the tears from trickling from his eyes4 ,again1 if fate has decreed that a young girl1 still unwed1 should see her children1 still unborn1 descend before her with sorrow to the grave1 she can avert the calamity as follows4 ,she kills a grasshopper1 wraps it in a rag to represent a shroud1 and mourns over it like ,rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted4 ,moreover1 she takes a dozen or more other grasshoppers1 and having removed some of their superfluous legs and wings she lays them about their dead and shrouded fellow4 ,the buzz of the tortured insects and the agitated motions of their mutilated limbs represent the shrieks and contortions of the mourners at a funeral4 ,after burying the deceased grasshopper she leaves the rest to continue their mourning till death releases them from their pain2 and having bound up her dishevelled hair she retires from the grave with the step and carriage of a person plunged in grief4 ,thenceforth she looks cheerfully forward to seeing her children survive her2 for it cannot be that she should mourn and bury them twice over4 ,once more1 if fortune has frowned on a man at his birth and penury has marked him for her own1 he can easily erase the mark in question by purchasing a couple of cheap pearls1 price three halfpence1 and burying them4 ,for who but the rich of this world can thus afford to fling pearls away8 #c4 ,contagious ,magic ,,thus far we have been considering chiefly that branch of sympathetic magic which may be called homoeopathic or imitative4 ,its leading principle1 as we have seen1 is that like produces like1 or1 in other words1 that an effect resembles its cause4 ,the other great branch of sympathetic magic1 which ,i have called ,contagious ,magic1 proceeds upon the notion that things which have once been conjoined must remain ever afterwards1 even when quite dissevered from each other1 in such a sympathetic relation that whatever is done to the one must similarly affect the other4 ,thus the logical basis of ,contagious ,magic1 like that of ,homoeopathic ,magic1 is a mistaken association of ideas2 its physical basis1 if we may speak of such a thing1 like the physical basis of ,homoeopathic ,magic1 is a material medium of some sort which1 like the ether of modern physics1 is assumed to unite distant objects and to convey impressions from one to the other4 ,the most familiar example of ,contagious ,magic is the magical sympathy which is supposed to exist between a man and any severed portion of his person1 as his hair or nails2 so that whoever gets possession of human hair or nails may work his will1 at any distance1 upon the person from whom they were cut4 ,this superstition is world-wide2 instances of it in regard to hair and nails will be noticed later on in this work4 ,among the ,australian tribes it was a common practice to knock out one or more of a boy's front teeth at those ceremonies of initiation to which every male member had to submit before he could enjoy the rights and privileges of a full-grown man4 ,the reason of the practice is obscure2 all that concerns us here is the belief that a sympathetic relation continued to exist between the lad and his teeth after the latter had been extracted from his gums4 ,thus among some of the tribes about the river ,darling1 in ,new ,south ,wales1 the extracted tooth was placed under the bark of a tree near a river or water-hole2 if the bark grew over the tooth1 or if the tooth fell into the water1 all was well2 but if it were exposed and the ants ran over it1 the natives believed that the boy would suffer from a disease of the mouth4 ,among the ,murring and other tribes of ,new ,south ,wales the extracted tooth was at first taken care of by an old man1 and then passed from one headman to another1 until it had gone all round the community1 when it came back to the lad's father1 and finally to the lad himself4 ,but however it was thus conveyed from hand to hand1 it might on no account be placed in a bag containing magical substances1 for to do so would1 they believed1 put the owner of the tooth in great danger4 ,the late ,dr4 ,howitt once acted as custodian of the teeth which had been extracted from some novices at a ceremony of initiation1 and the old men earnestly besought him not to carry them in a bag in which they knew that he had some quartz crystals4 ,they declared that if he did so the magic of the crystals would pass into the teeth1 and so injure the boys4 ,nearly a year after ,dr4 ,howitt's return from the ceremony he was visited by one of the principal men of the ,murring tribe1 who had travelled some two hundred and fifty miles from his home to fetch back the teeth4 ,this man explained that he had been sent for them because one of the boys had fallen into ill health1 and it was believed that the teeth had received some injury which had affected him4 ,he was assured that the teeth had been kept in a box apart from any substances1 like quartz crystals1 which could influence them2 and he returned home bearing the teeth with him carefully wrapt up and concealed4 ,the ,basutos are careful to conceal their extracted teeth1 lest these should fall into the hands of certain mythical beings who haunt graves1 and who could harm the owner of the tooth by working magic on it4 ,in ,sussex some fifty years ago a maid-servant remonstrated strongly against the throwing away of children's cast teeth1 affirming that should they be found and gnawed by any animal1 the child's new tooth would be1 for all the world1 like the teeth of the animal that had bitten the old one4 ,in proof of this she named old ,master ,simmons1 who had a very large pig's tooth in his upper jaw1 a personal defect that he always averred was caused by his mother1 who threw away one of his cast teeth by accident into the hog's trough4 ,a similar belief has led to practices intended1 on the principles of homoeopathic magic1 to replace old teeth by new and better ones4 ,thus in many parts of the world it is customary to put extracted teeth in some place where they will be found by a mouse or a rat1 in the hope that1 through the sympathy which continues to subsist between them and their former owner1 his other teeth may acquire the same firmness and excellence as the teeth of these rodents4 ,for example1 in ,germany it is said to be an almost universal maxim among the people that when you have had a tooth taken out you should insert it in a mouse's hole4 ,to do so with a child's milk-tooth which has fallen out will prevent the child from having toothache4 ,or you should go behind the stove and throw your tooth backwards over your head1 saying ,mouse1 give me your iron tooth2 ,i will give you my bone tooth4 ,after that your other teeth will remain good4 ,far away from ,europe1 at ,raratonga1 in the ,pacific1 when a child's tooth was extracted1 the following prayer used to be recited3 ,big rat6 little rat6 ,here is my old tooth4 ,pray give me a new one4 ,then the tooth was thrown on the thatch of the house1 because rats make their nests in the decayed thatch4 ,the reason assigned for invoking the rats on these occasions was that rats' teeth were the strongest known to the natives4 ,other parts which are commonly believed to remain in a sympathetic union with the body1 after the physical connexion has been severed1 are the navel-string and the afterbirth1 including the placenta4 ,so intimate1 indeed1 is the union conceived to be1 that the fortunes of the individual for good or evil throughout life are often supposed to be bound up with one or other of these portions of his person1 so that if his navel-string or afterbirth is preserved and properly treated1 he will be prosperous2 whereas if it be injured or lost1 he will suffer accordingly4 ,thus certain tribes of ,western ,australia believe that a man swims well or ill1 according as his mother at his birth threw the navel-string into water or not4 ,among the natives on the ,pennefather ,river in ,queensland it is believed that a part of the child's spirit 7cho-i7 stays in the afterbirth4 ,hence the grandmother takes the afterbirth away and buries it in the sand4 ,she marks the spot by a number of twigs which she sticks in the ground in a circle1 tying their tops together so that the structure resembles a cone4 ,when ,anjea1 the being who causes conception in women by putting mud babies into their wombs1 comes along and sees the place1 he takes out the spirit and carries it away to one of his haunts1 such as a tree1 a hole in a rock1 or a lagoon where it may remain for years4 ,but sometime or other he will put the spirit again into a baby1 and it will be born once more into the world4 ,in ,ponape1 one of the ,caroline ,islands1 the navel-string is placed in a shell and then disposed of in such a way as shall best adapt the child for the career which the parents have chosen for him2 for example1 if they wish to make him a good climber1 they will hang the navel-string on a tree4 ,the ,kei islanders regard the navel-string as the brother or sister of the child1 according to the sex of the infant4 ,they put it in a pot with ashes1 and set it in the branches of a tree1 that it may keep a watchful eye on the fortunes of its comrade4 ,among the ,bataks of ,sumatra1 as among many other peoples of the ,indian ,archipelago1 the placenta passes for the child's younger brother or sister1 the sex being determined by the sex of the child1 and it is buried under the house4 ,according to the ,bataks it is bound up with the child's welfare1 and seems1 in fact1 to be the seat of the transferable soul1 of which we shall hear something later on4 ,the ,karo ,bataks even affirm that of a man's two souls it is the true soul that lives with the placenta under the house2 that is the soul1 they say1 which begets children4 ,the ,baganda believe that every person is born with a double1 and this double they identify with the afterbirth1 which they regard as a second child4 ,the mother buries the afterbirth at the root of a plantain tree1 which then becomes sacred until the fruit has ripened1 when it is plucked to furnish a sacred feast for the family4 ,among the ,cherokees the navel-string of a girl is buried under a corn-mortar1 in order that the girl may grow up to be a good baker2 but the navel-string of a boy is hung up on a tree in the woods1 in order that he may be a hunter4 ,the ,incas of ,peru preserved the navel-string with the greatest care1 and gave it to the child to suck whenever it fell ill4 ,in ancient ,mexico they used to give a boy's navel-string to soldiers1 to be buried by them on a field of battle1 in order that the boy might thus acquire a passion for war4 ,but the navel-string of a girl was buried beside the domestic hearth1 because this was believed to inspire her with a love of home and taste for cooking and baking4 ,even in ,europe many people still believe that a person's destiny is more or less bound up with that of his navel-string or afterbirth4 ,thus in ,rhenish ,bavaria the navel-string is kept for a while wrapt up in a piece of old linen1 and then cut or pricked to pieces according as the child is a boy or a girl1 in order that he or she may grow up to be a skilful workman or a good sempstress4 ,in ,berlin the midwife commonly delivers the dried navel-string to the father with a strict injunction to preserve it carefully1 for so long as it is kept the child will live and thrive and be free from sickness4 ,in ,beauce and ,perche the people are careful to throw the navel-string neither into water nor into fire1 believing that if that were done the child would be drowned or burned4 ,thus in many parts of the world the navel-string1 or more commonly the afterbirth1 is regarded as a living being1 the brother or sister of the infant1 or as the material object in which the guardian spirit of the child or part of its soul resides4 ,further1 the sympathetic connexion supposed to exist between a person and his afterbirth or navel-string comes out very clearly in the widespread custom of treating the afterbirth or navel-string in ways which are supposed to influence for life the character and career of the person1 making him1 if it is a man1 a nimble climber1 a strong swimmer1 a skilful hunter1 or a brave soldier1 and making her1 if it is a woman1 a cunning sempstress1 a good baker1 and so forth4 ,thus the beliefs and usages concerned with the afterbirth or placenta1 and to a less extent with the navel-string1 present a remarkable parallel to the widespread doctrine of the transferable or external soul and the customs founded on it4 ,hence it is hardly rash to conjecture that the resemblance is no mere chance coincidence1 but that in the afterbirth or placenta we have a physical basis 7not necessarily the only one7 for the theory and practice of the external soul4 ,the consideration of that subject is reserved for a later part of this work4 ,a curious application of the doctrine of contagious magic is the relation commonly believed to exist between a wounded man and the agent of the wound1 so that whatever is subsequently done by or to the agent must correspondingly affect the patient either for good or evil4 ,thus ,pliny tells us that if you have wounded a man and are sorry for it1 you have only to spit on the hand that gave the wound1 and the pain of the sufferer will be instantly alleviated4 ,in ,melanesia1 if a man's friends get possession of the arrow which wounded him1 they keep it in a damp place or in cool leaves1 for then the inflammation will be trifling and will soon subside4 ,meantime the enemy who shot the arrow is hard at work to aggravate the wound by all the means in his power4 ,for this purpose he and his friends drink hot and burning juices and chew irritating leaves1 for this will clearly inflame and irritate the wound4 ,further1 they keep the bow near the fire to make the wound which it has inflicted hot2 and for the same reason they put the arrow-head1 if it has been recovered1 into the fire4 ,moreover1 they are careful to keep the bow-string taut and to twang it occasionally1 for this will cause the wounded man to suffer from tension of the nerves and spasms of tetanus4 ,it is constantly received and avouched1 says ,bacon1 that the anointing of the weapon that maketh the wound will heal the wound itself4 ,in this experiment1 upon the relation of men of credit 7though myself1 as yet1 am not fully inclined to believe it71 you shall note the points following3 first1 the ointment wherewith this is done is made of divers ingredients1 whereof the strangest and hardest to come by are the moss upon the skull of a dead man unburied1 and the fats of a boar and a bear killed in the act of generation4 ,the precious ointment compounded out of these and other ingredients was applied1 as the philosopher explains1 not to the wound but to the weapon1 and that even though the injured man was at a great distance and knew nothing about it4 ,the experiment1 he tells us1 had been tried of wiping the ointment off the weapon without the knowledge of the person hurt1 with the result that he was presently in a great rage of pain until the weapon was anointed again4 ,moreover1 it is affirmed that if you cannot get the weapon1 yet if you put an instrument of iron or wood resembling the weapon into the wound1 whereby it bleedeth1 the anointing of that instrument will serve and work the effect4 ,remedies of the sort which ,bacon deemed worthy of his attention are still in vogue in the eastern counties of ,england4 ,thus in ,suffolk if a man cuts himself with a bill-hook or a scythe he always takes care to keep the weapon bright1 and oils it to prevent the wound from festering4 ,if he runs a thorn or1 as he calls it1 a bush into his hand1 he oils or greases the extracted thorn4 ,a man came to a doctor with an inflamed hand1 having run a thorn into it while he was hedging4 ,on being told that the hand was festering1 he remarked1 ,that didn't ought to1 for ,i greased the bush well after ,i pulled it out4 ,if a horse wounds its foot by treading on a nail1 a ,suffolk groom will invariably preserve the nail1 clean it1 and grease it every day1 to prevent the foot from festering4 ,similarly ,cambridgeshire labourers think that if a horse has run a nail into its foot1 it is necessary to grease the nail with lard or oil and put it away in some safe place1 or the horse will not recover4 ,a few years ago a veterinary surgeon was sent for to attend a horse which had ripped its side open on the hinge of a farm gatepost4 ,on arriving at the farm he found that nothing had been done for the wounded horse1 but that a man was busy trying to pry the hinge out of the gatepost in order that it might be greased and put away1 which1 in the opinion of the ,cambridge wiseacres1 would conduce to the recovery of the animal4 ,similarly ,essex rustics opine that1 if a man has been stabbed with a knife1 it is essential to his recovery that the knife should be greased and laid across the bed on which the sufferer is lying4 ,so in ,bavaria you are directed to anoint a linen rag with grease and tie it on the edge of the axe that cut you1 taking care to keep the sharp edge upwards4 ,as the grease on the axe dries1 your wound heals4 ,similarly in the ,harz ,mountains they say that if you cut yourself1 you ought to smear the knife or the scissors with fat and put the instrument away in a dry place in the name of the ,father1 of the ,son1 and of the ,holy ,ghost4 ,as the knife dries1 the wound heals4 ,other people1 however1 in ,germany say that you should stick the knife in some damp place in the ground1 and that your hurt will heal as the knife rusts4 ,others again1 in ,bavaria1 recommend you to smear the axe or whatever it is with blood and put it under the eaves4 ,the train of reasoning which thus commends itself to ,english and ,german rustics1 in common with the savages of ,melanesia and ,america1 is carried a step further by the aborigines of ,central ,australia1 who conceive that under certain circumstances the near relations of a wounded man must grease themselves1 restrict their diet1 and regulate their behaviour in other ways in order to ensure his recovery4 ,thus when a lad has been circumcised and the wound is not yet healed1 his mother may not eat opossum1 or a certain kind of lizard1 or carpet snake1 or any kind of fat1 for otherwise she would retard the healing of the boy's wound4 ,every day she greases her digging-sticks and never lets them out of her sight2 at night she sleeps with them close to her head4 ,no one is allowed to touch them4 ,every day also she rubs her body all over with grease1 as in some way this is believed to help her son's recovery4 ,another refinement of the same principle is due to the ingenuity of the ,german peasant4 ,it is said that when one of his pigs or sheep breaks its leg1 a farmer of ,rhenish ,bavaria or ,hesse will bind up the leg of a chair with bandages and splints in due form4 ,for some days thereafter no one may sit on that chair1 move it1 or knock up against it2 for to do so would pain the injured pig or sheep and hinder the cure4 ,in this last case it is clear that we have passed wholly out of the region of contagious magic and into the region of homoeopathic or imitative magic2 the chair-leg1 which is treated instead of the beast's leg1 in no sense belongs to the animal1 and the application of bandages to it is a mere simulation of the treatment which a more rational surgery would bestow on the real patient4 ,the sympathetic connexion supposed to exist between a man and the weapon which has wounded him is probably founded on the notion that the blood on the weapon continues to feel with the blood in his body4 ,for a like reason the ,papuans of ,tumleo1 an island off ,new ,guinea1 are careful to throw into the sea the bloody bandages with which their wounds have been dressed1 for they fear that if these rags fell into the hands of an enemy he might injure them magically thereby4 ,once when a man with a wound in his mouth1 which bled constantly1 came to the missionaries to be treated1 his faithful wife took great pains to collect all the blood and cast it into the sea4 ,strained and unnatural as this idea may seem to us1 it is perhaps less so than the belief that magic sympathy is maintained between a person and his clothes1 so that whatever is done to the clothes will be felt by the man himself1 even though he may be far away at the time4 ,in the ,wotjobaluk tribe of ,victoria a wizard would sometimes get hold of a man's opossum rug and roast it slowly in the fire1 and as he did so the owner of the rug would fall sick4 ,if the wizard consented to undo the charm1 he would give the rug back to the sick man's friends1 bidding them put it in water1 so as to wash the fire out4 ,when that happened1 the sufferer would feel a refreshing coolness and probably recover4 ,in ,tanna1 one of the ,new ,hebrides1 a man who had a grudge at another and desired his death would try to get possession of a cloth which had touched the sweat of his enemy's body4 ,if he succeeded1 he rubbed the cloth carefully over with the leaves and twigs of a certain tree1 rolled and bound cloth1 twigs1 and leaves into a long sausage-shaped bundle1 and burned it slowly in the fire4 ,as the bundle was consumed1 the victim fell ill1 and when it was reduced to ashes1 he died4 ,in this last form of enchantment1 however1 the magical sympathy may be supposed to exist not so much between the man and the cloth as between the man and the sweat which issued from his body4 ,but in other cases of the same sort it seems that the garment by itself is enough to give the sorcerer a hold upon his victim4 ,the witch in ,theocritus1 while she melted an image or lump of wax in order that her faithless lover might melt with love of her1 did not forget to throw into the fire a shred of his cloak which he had dropped in her house4 ,in ,prussia they say that if you cannot catch a thief1 the next best thing you can do is to get hold of a garment which he may have shed in his flight2 for if you beat it soundly1 the thief will fall sick4 ,this belief is firmly rooted in the popular mind4 ,some eighty or ninety years ago1 in the neighbourhood of ,berend1 a man was detected trying to steal honey1 and fled1 leaving his coat behind him4 ,when he heard that the enraged owner of the honey was mauling his lost coat1 he was so alarmed that he took to his bed and died4 ,again1 magic may be wrought on a man sympathetically1 not only through his clothes and severed parts of himself1 but also through the impressions left by his body in sand or earth4 ,in particular1 it is a world-wide superstition that by injuring footprints you injure the feet that made them4 ,thus the natives of ,south-eastern ,australia think that they can lame a man by placing sharp pieces of quartz1 glass1 bone1 or charcoal in his footprints4 ,rheumatic pains are often attributed by them to this cause4 ,seeing a ,tatungolung man very lame1 ,mr4 ,howitt asked him what was the matter4 ,he said1 some fellow has put bottle in my foot4 ,he was suffering from rheumatism1 but believed that an enemy had found his foot-track and had buried it in a piece of broken bottle1 the magical influence of which had entered his foot4 ,similar practices prevail in various parts of ,europe4 ,thus in ,mecklenburg it is thought that if you drive a nail into a man's footprint he will fall lame2 sometimes it is required that the nail should be taken from a coffin4 ,a like mode of injuring an enemy is resorted to in some parts of ,france4 ,it is said that there was an old woman who used to frequent ,stow in ,suffolk1 and she was a witch4 ,if1 while she walked1 any one went after her and stuck a nail or a knife into her footprint in the dust1 the dame could not stir a step till it was withdrawn4 ,among the ,south ,slavs a girl will dig up the earth from the footprints of the man she loves and put it in a flower-pot4 ,then she plants in the pot a marigold1 a flower that is thought to be fadeless4 ,and as its golden blossom grows and blooms and never fades1 so shall her sweetheart's love grow and bloom1 and never1 never fade4 ,thus the love-spell acts on the man through the earth he trod on4 ,an old ,danish mode of concluding a treaty was based on the same idea of the sympathetic connexion between a man and his footprints3 the covenanting parties sprinkled each other's footprints with their own blood1 thus giving a pledge of fidelity4 ,in ancient ,greece superstitions of the same sort seem to have been current1 for it was thought that if a horse stepped on the track of a wolf he was seized with numbness2 and a maxim ascribed to ,pythagoras forbade people to pierce a man's footprints with a nail or a knife4 ,the same superstition is turned to account by hunters in many parts of the world for the purpose of running down the game4 ,thus a ,german huntsman will stick a nail taken from a coffin into the fresh spoor of the quarry1 believing that this will hinder the animal from escaping4 ,the aborigines of ,victoria put hot embers in the tracks of the animals they were pursuing4 ,hottentot hunters throw into the air a handful of sand taken from the footprints of the game1 believing that this will bring the animal down4 ,thompson ,indians used to lay charms on the tracks of wounded deer2 after that they deemed it superfluous to pursue the animal any further that day1 for being thus charmed it could not travel far and would soon die4 ,similarly1 ,ojebway ,indians placed medicine on the track of the first deer or bear they met with1 supposing that this would soon bring the animal into sight1 even if it were two or three days' journey off2 for this charm had power to compress a journey of several days into a few hours4 ,ewe hunters of ,west ,africa stab the footprints of game with a sharp-pointed stick in order to maim the quarry and allow them to come up with it4 ,but though the footprint is the most obvious it is not the only impression made by the body through which magic may be wrought on a man4 ,the aborigines of ,south-eastern ,australia believe that a man may be injured by burying sharp fragments of quartz1 glass1 and so forth in the mark made by his reclining body2 the magical virtue of these sharp things enters his body and causes those acute pains which the ignorant ,european puts down to rheumatism4 ,we can now understand why it was a maxim with the ,pythagoreans that in rising from bed you should smooth away the impression left by your body on the bed-clothes4 ,the rule was simply an old precaution against magic1 forming part of a whole code of superstitious maxims which antiquity fathered on ,pythagoras1 though doubtless they were familiar to the barbarous forefathers of the ,greeks long before the time of that philosopher4 #d4 ,the ,magician's ,progress ,,we have now concluded our examination of the general principles of sympathetic magic4 ,the examples by which ,i have illustrated them have been drawn for the most part from what may be called private magic1 that is from magical rites and incantations practised for the benefit or the injury of individuals4 ,but in savage society there is commonly to be found in addition what we may call public magic1 that is1 sorcery practised for the benefit of the whole community4 ,wherever ceremonies of this sort are observed for the common good1 it is obvious that the magician ceases to be merely a private practitioner and becomes to some extent a public functionary4 ,the development of such a class of functionaries is of great importance for the political as well as the religious evolution of society4 ,for when the welfare of the tribe is supposed to depend on the performance of these magical rites1 the magician rises into a position of much influence and repute1 and may readily acquire the rank and authority of a chief or king4 ,the profession accordingly draws into its ranks some of the ablest and most ambitious men of the tribe1 because it holds out to them a prospect of honour1 wealth1 and power such as hardly any other career could offer4 ,the acuter minds perceive how easy it is to dupe their weaker brother and to play on his superstition for their own advantage4 ,not that the sorcerer is always a knave and impostor2 he is often sincerely convinced that he really possesses those wonderful powers which the credulity of his fellows ascribes to him4 ,but the more sagacious he is1 the more likely he is to see through the fallacies which impose on duller wits4 ,thus the ablest members of the profession must tend to be more or less conscious deceivers2 and it is just these men who in virtue of their superior ability will generally come to the top and win for themselves positions of the highest dignity and the most commanding authority4 ,the pitfalls which beset the path of the professional sorcerer are many1 and as a rule only the man of coolest head and sharpest wit will be able to steer his way through them safely4 ,for it must always be remembered that every single profession and claim put forward by the magician as such is false2 not one of them can be maintained without deception1 conscious or unconscious4 ,accordingly the sorcerer who sincerely believes in his own extravagant pretensions is in far greater peril and is much more likely to be cut short in his career than the deliberate impostor4 ,the honest wizard always expects that his charms and incantations will produce their supposed effect2 and when they fail1 not only really1 as they always do1 but conspicuously and disastrously1 as they often do1 he is taken aback3 he is not1 like his knavish colleague1 ready with a plausible excuse to account for the failure1 and before he can find one he may be knocked on the head by his disappointed and angry employers4 ,the general result is that at this stage of social evolution the supreme power tends to fall into the hands of men of the keenest intelligence and the most unscrupulous character4 ,if we could balance the harm they do by their knavery against the benefits they confer by their superior sagacity1 it might well be found that the good greatly outweighed the evil4 ,for more mischief has probably been wrought in the world by honest fools in high places than by intelligent rascals4 ,once your shrewd rogue has attained the height of his ambition1 and has no longer any selfish end to further1 he may1 and often does1 turn his talents1 his experience1 his resources1 to the service of the public4 ,many men who have been least scrupulous in the acquisition of power have been most beneficent in the use of it1 whether the power they aimed at and won was that of wealth1 political authority1 or what not4 ,in the field of politics the wily intriguer1 the ruthless victor1 may end by being a wise and magnanimous ruler1 blessed in his lifetime1 lamented at his death1 admired and applauded by posterity4 ,such men1 to take two of the most conspicuous instances1 were ,julius ,caesar and ,augustus4 ,but once a fool always a fool1 and the greater the power in his hands the more disastrous is likely to be the use he makes of it4 ,the heaviest calamity in ,english history1 the breach with ,america1 might never have occurred if ,george the ,third had not been an honest dullard4 ,thus1 so far as the public profession of magic affected the constitution of savage society1 it tended to place the control of affairs in the hands of the ablest man3 it shifted the balance of power from the many to the one3 it substituted a monarchy for a democracy1 or rather for an oligarchy of old men2 for in general the savage community is ruled1 not by the whole body of adult males1 but by a council of elders4 ,the change1 by whatever causes produced1 and whatever the character of the early rulers1 was on the whole very beneficial4 ,for the rise of monarchy appears to be an essential condition of the emergence of mankind from savagery4 ,no human being is so hide-bound by custom and tradition as your democratic savage2 in no state of society consequently is progress so slow and difficult4 ,the old notion that the savage is the freest of mankind is the reverse of the truth4 ,he is a slave1 not indeed to a visible master1 but to the past1 to the spirits of his dead forefathers1 who haunt his steps from birth to death1 and rule him with a rod of iron4 ,what they did is the pattern of right1 the unwritten law to which he yields a blind unquestioning obedience4 ,the least possible scope is thus afforded to superior talent to change old customs for the better4 ,the ablest man is dragged down by the weakest and dullest1 who necessarily sets the standard1 since he cannot rise1 while the other can fall4 ,the surface of such a society presents a uniform dead level1 so far as it is humanly possible to reduce the natural inequalities1 the immeasurable real differences of inborn capacity and temper1 to a false superficial appearance of equality4 ,from this low and stagnant condition of affairs1 which demagogues and dreamers in later times have lauded as the ideal state1 the ,golden ,age1 of humanity1 everything that helps to raise society by opening a career to talent and proportioning the degrees of authority to men's natural abilities1 deserves to be welcomed by all who have the real good of their fellows at heart4 ,once these elevating influences have begun to operate--and they cannot be for ever suppressed--the progress of civilisation becomes comparatively rapid4 ,the rise of one man to supreme power enables him to carry through changes in a single lifetime which previously many generations might not have sufficed to effect2 and if1 as will often happen1 he is a man of intellect and energy above the common1 he will readily avail himself of the opportunity4 ,even the whims and caprices of a tyrant may be of service in breaking the chain of custom which lies so heavy on the savage4 ,and as soon as the tribe ceases to be swayed by the timid and divided counsels of the elders1 and yields to the direction of a single strong and resolute mind1 it becomes formidable to its neighbours and enters on a career of aggrandisement1 which at an early stage of history is often highly favourable to social1 industrial1 and intellectual progress4 ,for extending its sway1 partly by force of arms1 partly by the voluntary submission of weaker tribes1 the community soon acquires wealth and slaves1 both of which1 by relieving some classes from the perpetual struggle for a bare subsistence1 afford them an opportunity of devoting themselves to that disinterested pursuit of knowledge which is the noblest and most powerful instrument to ameliorate the lot of man4 ,intellectual progress1 which reveals itself in the growth of art and science and the spread of more liberal views1 cannot be dissociated from industrial or economic progress1 and that in its turn receives an immense impulse from conquest and empire4 ,it is no mere accident that the most vehement outbursts of activity of the human mind have followed close on the heels of victory1 and that the great conquering races of the world have commonly done most to advance and spread civilisation1 thus healing in peace the wounds they inflicted in war4 ,the ,babylonians1 the ,greeks1 the ,romans1 the ,arabs are our witnesses in the past3 we may yet live to see a similar outburst in ,japan4 ,nor1 to remount the stream of history to its sources1 is it an accident that all the first great strides towards civilisation have been made under despotic and theocratic governments1 like those of ,egypt1 ,babylon1 and ,peru1 where the supreme ruler claimed and received the servile allegiance of his subjects in the double character of a king and a god4 ,it is hardly too much to say that at this early epoch despotism is the best friend of humanity and1 paradoxical as it may sound1 of liberty4 ,for after all there is more liberty in the best sense--liberty to think our own thoughts and to fashion our own destinies--under the most absolute despotism1 the most grinding tyranny1 than under the apparent freedom of savage life1 where the individual's lot is cast from the cradle to the grave in the iron mould of hereditary custom4 ,so far1 therefore1 as the public profession of magic has been one of the roads by which the ablest men have passed to supreme power1 it has contributed to emancipate mankind from the thraldom of tradition and to elevate them into a larger1 freer life1 with a broader outlook on the world4 ,this is no small service rendered to humanity4 ,and when we remember further that in another direction magic has paved the way for science1 we are forced to admit that if the black art has done much evil1 it has also been the source of much good2 that if it is the child of error1 it has yet been the mother of freedom and truth4 ,,iv4 ,magic and ,religion ,,the examples collected in the last chapter may suffice to illustrate the general principles of sympathetic magic in its two branches1 to which we have given the names of ,homoeopathic and ,contagious respectively4 ,in some cases of magic which have come before us we have seen that the operation of spirits is assumed1 and that an attempt is made to win their favour by prayer and sacrifice4 ,but these cases are on the whole exceptional2 they exhibit magic tinged and alloyed with religion4 ,wherever sympathetic magic occurs in its pure unadulterated form1 it assumes that in nature one event follows another necessarily and invariably without the intervention of any spiritual or personal agency4 ,thus its fundamental conception is identical with that of modern science2 underlying the whole system is a faith1 implicit but real and firm1 in the order and uniformity of nature4 ,the magician does not doubt that the same causes will always produce the same effects1 that the performance of the proper ceremony1 accompanied by the appropriate spell1 will inevitably be attended by the desired result1 unless1 indeed1 his incantations should chance to be thwarted and foiled by the more potent charms of another sorcerer4 ,he supplicates no higher power3 he sues the favour of no fickle and wayward being3 he abases himself before no awful deity4 ,yet his power1 great as he believes it to be1 is by no means arbitrary and unlimited4 ,he can wield it only so long as he strictly conforms to the rules of his art1 or to what may be called the laws of nature as conceived by him4 ,to neglect these rules1 to break these laws in the smallest particular1 is to incur failure1 and may even expose the unskilful practitioner himself to the utmost peril4 ,if he claims a sovereignty over nature1 it is a constitutional sovereignty rigorously limited in its scope and exercised in exact conformity with ancient usage4 ,thus the analogy between the magical and the scientific conceptions of the world is close4 ,in both of them the succession of events is assumed to be perfectly regular and certain1 being determined by immutable laws1 the operation of which can be foreseen and calculated precisely2 the elements of caprice1 of chance1 and of accident are banished from the course of nature4 ,both of them open up a seemingly boundless vista of possibilities to him who knows the causes of things and can touch the secret springs that set in motion the vast and intricate mechanism of the world4 ,hence the strong attraction which magic and science alike have exercised on the human mind2 hence the powerful stimulus that both have given to the pursuit of knowledge4 ,they lure the weary enquirer1 the footsore seeker1 on through the wilderness of disappointment in the present by their endless promises of the future3 they take him up to the top of an exceeding high mountain and show him1 beyond the dark clouds and rolling mists at his feet1 a vision of the celestial city1 far off1 it may be1 but radiant with unearthly splendour1 bathed in the light of dreams4 ,the fatal flaw of magic lies not in its general assumption of a sequence of events determined by law1 but in its total misconception of the nature of the particular laws which govern that sequence4 ,if we analyse the various cases of sympathetic magic which have been passed in review in the preceding pages1 and which may be taken as fair samples of the bulk1 we shall find1 as ,i have already indicated1 that they are all mistaken applications of one or other of two great fundamental laws of thought1 namely1 the association of ideas by similarity and the association of ideas by contiguity in space or time4 ,a mistaken association of similar ideas produces homoeopathic or imitative magic3 a mistaken association of contiguous ideas produces contagious magic4 ,the principles of association are excellent in themselves1 and indeed absolutely essential to the working of the human mind4 ,legitimately applied they yield science2 illegitimately applied they yield magic1 the bastard sister of science4 ,it is therefore a truism1 almost a tautology1 to say that all magic is necessarily false and barren2 for were it ever to become true and fruitful1 it would no longer be magic but science4 ,from the earliest times man has been engaged in a search for general rules whereby to turn the order of natural phenomena to his own advantage1 and in the long search he has scraped together a great hoard of such maxims1 some of them golden and some of them mere dross4 ,the true or golden rules constitute the body of applied science which we call the arts2 the false are magic4 ,if magic is thus next of kin to science1 we have still to enquire how it stands related to religion4 ,but the view we take of that relation will necessarily be coloured by the idea which we have formed of the nature of religion itself2 hence a writer may reasonably be expected to define his conception of religion before he proceeds to investigate its relation to magic4 ,there is probably no subject in the world about which opinions differ so much as the nature of religion1 and to frame a definition of it which would satisfy every one must obviously be impossible4 ,all that a writer can do is1 first1 to say clearly what he means by religion1 and afterwards to employ the word consistently in that sense throughout his work4 ,by religion1 then1 ,i understand a propitiation or conciliation of powers superior to man which are believed to direct and control the course of nature and of human life4 ,thus defined1 religion consists of two elements1 a theoretical and a practical1 namely1 a belief in powers higher than man and an attempt to propitiate or please them4 ,of the two1 belief clearly comes first1 since we must believe in the existence of a divine being before we can attempt to please him4 ,but unless the belief leads to a corresponding practice1 it is not a religion but merely a theology2 in the language of ,st4 ,james1 faith1 if it hath not works1 is dead1 being alone4 ,in other words1 no man is religious who does not govern his conduct in some measure by the fear or love of ,god4 ,on the other hand1 mere practice1 divested of all religious belief1 is also not religion4 ,two men may behave in exactly the same way1 and yet one of them may be religious and the other not4 ,if the one acts from the love or fear of ,god1 he is religious2 if the other acts from the love or fear of man1 he is moral or immoral according as his behaviour comports or conflicts with the general good4 ,hence belief and practice or1 in theological language1 faith and works are equally essential to religion1 which cannot exist without both of them4 ,but it is not necessary that religious practice should always take the form of a ritual2 that is1 it need not consist in the offering of sacrifice1 the recitation of prayers1 and other outward ceremonies4 ,its aim is to please the deity1 and if the deity is one who delights in charity and mercy and purity more than in oblations of blood1 the chanting of hymns1 and the fumes of incense1 his worshippers will best please him1 not by prostrating themselves before him1 by intoning his praises1 and by filling his temples with costly gifts1 but by being pure and merciful and charitable towards men1 for in so doing they will imitate1 so far as human infirmity allows1 the perfections of the divine nature4 ,it was this ethical side of religion which the ,hebrew prophets1 inspired with a noble ideal of ,god's goodness and holiness1 were never weary of inculcating4 ,thus ,micah says3 ,he hath shewed thee1 ,o man1 what is good2 and what doth the ,lord require of thee1 but to do justly1 and to love mercy1 and to walk humbly with thy ,god8 ,and at a later time much of the force by which ,christianity conquered the world was drawn from the same high conception of ,god's moral nature and the duty laid on men of conforming themselves to it4 ,pure religion and undefiled1 says ,st4 ,james1 before ,god and the ,father is this1 ,to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction1 and to keep himself unspotted from the world4 ,but if religion involves1 first1 a belief in superhuman beings who rule the world1 and1 second1 an attempt to win their favour1 it clearly assumes that the course of nature is to some extent elastic or variable1 and that we can persuade or induce the mighty beings who control it to deflect1 for our benefit1 the current of events from the channel in which they would otherwise flow4 ,now this implied elasticity or variability of nature is directly opposed to the principles of magic as well as of science1 both of which assume that the processes of nature are rigid and invariable in their operation1 and that they can as little be turned from their course by persuasion and entreaty as by threats and intimidation4 ,the distinction between the two conflicting views of the universe turns on their answer to the crucial question1 ,are the forces which govern the world conscious and personal1 or unconscious and impersonal8 ,religion1 as a conciliation of the superhuman powers1 assumes the former member of the alternative4 ,for all conciliation implies that the being conciliated is a conscious or personal agent1 that his conduct is in some measure uncertain1 and that he can be prevailed upon to vary it in the desired direction by a judicious appeal to his interests1 his appetites1 or his emotions4 ,conciliation is never employed towards things which are regarded as inanimate1 nor towards persons whose behaviour in the particular circumstances is known to be determined with absolute certainty4 ,thus in so far as religion assumes the world to be directed by conscious agents who may be turned from their purpose by persuasion1 it stands in fundamental antagonism to magic as well as to science1 both of which take for granted that the course of nature is determined1 not by the passions or caprice of personal beings1 but by the operation of immutable laws acting mechanically4 ,in magic1 indeed1 the assumption is only implicit1 but in science it is explicit4 ,it is true that magic often deals with spirits1 which are personal agents of the kind assumed by religion2 but whenever it does so in its proper form1 it treats them exactly in the same fashion as it treats inanimate agents1 that is1 it constrains or coerces instead of conciliating or propitiating them as religion would do4 ,thus it assumes that all personal beings1 whether human or divine1 are in the last resort subject to those impersonal forces which control all things1 but which nevertheless can be turned to account by any one who knows how to manipulate them by the appropriate ceremonies and spells4 ,in ancient ,egypt1 for example1 the magicians claimed the power of compelling even the highest gods to do their bidding1 and actually threatened them with destruction in case of disobedience4 ,sometimes1 without going quite so far as that1 the wizard declared that he would scatter the bones of ,osiris or reveal his sacred legend1 if the god proved contumacious4 ,similarly in ,india at the present day the great ,hindoo trinity itself of ,brahma1 ,vishnu1 and ,siva is subject to the sorcerers1 who1 by means of their spells1 exercise such an ascendency over the mightiest deities1 that these are bound submissively to execute on earth below1 or in heaven above1 whatever commands their masters the magicians may please to issue4 ,there is a saying everywhere current in ,india3 ,the whole universe is subject to the gods2 the gods are subject to the spells 7mantras72 the spells to the ,brahmans2 therefore the ,brahmans are our gods4 ,this radical conflict of principle between magic and religion sufficiently explains the relentless hostility with which in history the priest has often pursued the magician4 ,the haughty self-sufficiency of the magician1 his arrogant demeanour towards the higher powers1 and his unabashed claim to exercise a sway like theirs could not but revolt the priest1 to whom1 with his awful sense of the divine majesty1 and his humble prostration in presence of it1 such claims and such a demeanour must have appeared an impious and blasphemous usurpation of prerogatives that belong to ,god alone4 ,and sometimes1 we may suspect1 lower motives concurred to whet the edge of the priest's hostility4 ,he professed to be the proper medium1 the true intercessor between ,god and man1 and no doubt his interests as well as his feelings were often injured by a rival practitioner1 who preached a surer and smoother road to fortune than the rugged and slippery path of divine favour4 ,yet this antagonism1 familiar as it is to us1 seems to have made its appearance comparatively late in the history of religion4 ,at an earlier stage the functions of priest and sorcerer were often combined or1 to speak perhaps more correctly1 were not yet differentiated from each other4 ,to serve his purpose man wooed the good-will of gods or spirits by prayer and sacrifice1 while at the same time he had recourse to ceremonies and forms of words which he hoped would of themselves bring about the desired result without the help of god or devil4 ,in short1 he performed religious and magical rites simultaneously2 he uttered prayers and incantations almost in the same breath1 knowing or recking little of the theoretical inconsistency of his behaviour1 so long as by hook or crook he contrived to get what he wanted4 ,instances of this fusion or confusion of magic with religion have already met us in the practices of ,melanesians and of other peoples4 ,the same confusion of magic and religion has survived among peoples that have risen to higher levels of culture4 ,it was rife in ancient ,india and ancient ,egypt2 it is by no means extinct among ,european peasantry at the present day4 ,with regard to ancient ,india we are told by an eminent ,sanscrit scholar that the sacrificial ritual at the earliest period of which we have detailed information is pervaded with practices that breathe the spirit of the most primitive magic4 ,speaking of the importance of magic in the ,east1 and especially in ,egypt1 ,professor ,maspero remarks that we ought not to attach to the word magic the degrading idea which it almost inevitably calls up in the mind of a modern4 ,ancient magic was the very foundation of religion4 ,the faithful who desired to obtain some favour from a god had no chance of succeeding except by laying hands on the deity1 and this arrest could only be effected by means of a certain number of rites1 sacrifices1 prayers1 and chants1 which the god himself had revealed1 and which obliged him to do what was demanded of him4 ,among the ignorant classes of modern ,europe the same confusion of ideas1 the same mixture of religion and magic1 crops up in various forms4 ,thus we are told that in ,france the majority of the peasants still believe that the priest possesses a secret and irresistible power over the elements4 ,by reciting certain prayers which he alone knows and has the right to utter1 yet for the utterance of which he must afterwards demand absolution1 he can1 on an occasion of pressing danger1 arrest or reverse for a moment the action of the eternal laws of the physical world4 ,the winds1 the storms1 the hail1 and the rain are at his command and obey his will4 ,the fire also is subject to him1 and the flames of a conflagration are extinguished at his word4 ,for example1 ,french peasants used to be1 perhaps are still1 persuaded that the priests could celebrate1 with certain special rites1 a ,mass of the ,holy ,spirit1 of which the efficacy was so miraculous that it never met with any opposition from the divine will2 ,god was forced to grant whatever was asked of ,him in this form1 however rash and importunate might be the petition4 ,no idea of impiety or irreverence attached to the rite in the minds of those who1 in some of the great extremities of life1 sought by this singular means to take the kingdom of heaven by storm4 ,the secular priests generally refused to say the ,mass of the ,holy ,spirit2 but the monks1 especially the ,capuchin friars1 had the reputation of yielding with less scruple to the entreaties of the anxious and distressed4 ,in the constraint thus supposed by ,catholic peasantry to be laid by the priest upon the deity we seem to have an exact counterpart of the power which the ancient ,egyptians ascribed to their magicians4 ,again1 to take another example1 in many villages of ,provence the priest is still reputed to possess the faculty of averting storms4 ,it is not every priest who enjoys this reputation2 and in some villages1 when a change of pastors takes place1 the parishioners are eager to learn whether the new incumbent has the power 7pouder71 as they call it4 ,at the first sign of a heavy storm they put him to the proof by inviting him to exorcise the threatening clouds2 and if the result answers to their hopes1 the new shepherd is assured of the sympathy and respect of his flock4 ,in some parishes1 where the reputation of the curate in this respect stood higher than that of his rector1 the relations between the two have been so strained in consequence that the bishop has had to translate the rector to another benefice4 ,again1 ,gascon peasants believe that to revenge themselves on their enemies bad men will sometimes induce a priest to say a mass called the ,mass of ,saint ,scaire4 ,very few priests know this mass1 and three-fourths of those who do know it would not say it for love or money4 ,none but wicked priests dare to perform the gruesome ceremony1 and you may be quite sure that they will have a very heavy account to render for it at the last day4 ,no curate or bishop1 not even the archbishop of ,auch1 can pardon them2 that right belongs to the pope of ,rome alone4 ,the ,mass of ,saint ,scaire may be said only in a ruined or deserted church1 where owls mope and hoot1 where bats flit in the gloaming1 where gypsies lodge of nights1 and where toads squat under the desecrated altar4 ,thither the bad priest comes by night with his light o' love1 and at the first stroke of eleven he begins to mumble the mass backwards1 and ends just as the clocks are knelling the midnight hour4 ,his leman acts as clerk4 ,the host he blesses is black and has three points2 he consecrates no wine1 but instead he drinks the water of a well into which the body of an unbaptized infant has been flung4 ,he makes the sign of the cross1 but it is on the ground and with his left foot4 ,and many other things he does which no good ,christian could look upon without being struck blind and deaf and dumb for the rest of his life4 ,but the man for whom the mass is said withers away little by little1 and nobody can say what is the matter with him2 even the doctors can make nothing of it4 ,they do not know that he is slowly dying of the ,mass of ,saint ,scaire4 ,yet though magic is thus found to fuse and amalgamate with religion in many ages and in many lands1 there are some grounds for thinking that this fusion is not primitive1 and that there was a time when man trusted to magic alone for the satisfaction of such wants as transcended his immediate animal cravings4 ,in the first place a consideration of the fundamental notions of magic and religion may incline us to surmise that magic is older than religion in the history of humanity4 ,we have seen that on the one hand magic is nothing but a mistaken application of the very simplest and most elementary processes of the mind1 namely the association of ideas by virtue of resemblance or contiguity2 and that on the other hand religion assumes the operation of conscious or personal agents1 superior to man1 behind the visible screen of nature4 ,obviously the conception of personal agents is more complex than a simple recognition of the similarity or contiguity of ideas2 and a theory which assumes that the course of nature is determined by conscious agents is more abstruse and recondite1 and requires for its apprehension a far higher degree of intelligence and reflection1 than the view that things succeed each other simply by reason of their contiguity or resemblance4 ,the very beasts associate the ideas of things that are like each other or that have been found together in their experience2 and they could hardly survive for a day if they ceased to do so4 ,but who attributes to the animals a belief that the phenomena of nature are worked by a multitude of invisible animals or by one enormous and prodigiously strong animal behind the scenes8 ,it is probably no injustice to the brutes to assume that the honour of devising a theory of this latter sort must be reserved for human reason4 ,thus1 if magic be deduced immediately from elementary processes of reasoning1 and be1 in fact1 an error into which the mind falls almost spontaneously1 while religion rests on conceptions which the merely animal intelligence can hardly be supposed to have yet attained to1 it becomes probable that magic arose before religion in the evolution of our race1 and that man essayed to bend nature to his wishes by the sheer force of spells and enchantments before he strove to coax and mollify a coy1 capricious1 or irascible deity by the soft insinuation of prayer and sacrifice4 ,the conclusion which we have thus reached deductively from a consideration of the fundamental ideas of magic and religion is confirmed inductively by the observation that among the aborigines of ,australia1 the rudest savages as to whom we possess accurate information1 magic is universally practised1 whereas religion in the sense of a propitiation or conciliation of the higher powers seems to be nearly unknown4 ,roughly speaking1 all men in ,australia are magicians1 but not one is a priest2 everybody fancies he can influence his fellows or the course of nature by sympathetic magic1 but nobody dreams of propitiating gods by prayer and sacrifice4 ,but if in the most backward state of human society now known to us we find magic thus conspicuously present and religion conspicuously absent1 may we not reasonably conjecture that the civilised races of the world have also at some period of their history passed through a similar intellectual phase1 that they attempted to force the great powers of nature to do their pleasure before they thought of courting their favour by offerings and prayer--in short that1 just as on the material side of human culture there has everywhere been an ,age of ,stone1 so on the intellectual side there has everywhere been an ,age of ,magic8 ,there are reasons for answering this question in the affirmative4 ,when we survey the existing races of mankind from ,greenland to ,tierra del ,fuego1 or from ,scotland to ,singapore1 we observe that they are distinguished one from the other by a great variety of religions1 and that these distinctions are not1 so to speak1 merely coterminous with the broad distinctions of race1 but descend into the minuter subdivisions of states and commonwealths1 nay1 that they honeycomb the town1 the village1 and even the family1 so that the surface of society all over the world is cracked and seamed1 sapped and mined with rents and fissures and yawning crevasses opened up by the disintegrating influence of religious dissension4 ,yet when we have penetrated through these differences1 which affect mainly the intelligent and thoughtful part of the community1 we shall find underlying them all a solid stratum of intellectual agreement among the dull1 the weak1 the ignorant1 and the superstitious1 who constitute1 unfortunately1 the vast majority of mankind4 ,one of the great achievements of the nineteenth century was to run shafts down into this low mental stratum in many parts of the world1 and thus to discover its substantial identity everywhere4 ,it is beneath our feet--and not very far beneath them--here in ,europe at the present day1 and it crops up on the surface in the heart of the ,australian wilderness and wherever the advent of a higher civilisation has not crushed it under ground4 ,this universal faith1 this truly ,catholic creed1 is a belief in the efficacy of magic4 ,while religious systems differ not only in different countries1 but in the same country in different ages1 the system of sympathetic magic remains everywhere and at all times substantially alike in its principles and practice4 ,among the ignorant and superstitious classes of modern ,europe it is very much what it was thousands of years ago in ,egypt and ,india1 and what it now is among the lowest savages surviving in the remotest corners of the world4 ,if the test of truth lay in a show of hands or a counting of heads1 the system of magic might appeal1 with far more reason than the ,catholic ,church1 to the proud motto1 ,quod semper1 quod ubique1 quod ab omnibus1 as the sure and certain credential of its own infallibility4 ,it is not our business here to consider what bearing the permanent existence of such a solid layer of savagery beneath the surface of society1 and unaffected by the superficial changes of religion and culture1 has upon the future of humanity4 ,the dispassionate observer1 whose studies have led him to plumb its depths1 can hardly regard it otherwise than as a standing menace to civilisation4 ,we seem to move on a thin crust which may at any moment be rent by the subterranean forces slumbering below4 ,from time to time a hollow murmur underground or a sudden spirt of flame into the air tells of what is going on beneath our feet4 ,now and then the polite world is startled by a paragraph in a newspaper which tells how in ,scotland an image has been found stuck full of pins for the purpose of killing an obnoxious laird or minister1 how a woman has been slowly roasted to death as a witch in ,ireland1 or how a girl has been murdered and chopped up in ,russia to make those candles of human tallow by whose light thieves hope to pursue their midnight trade unseen4 ,but whether the influences that make for further progress1 or those that threaten to undo what has already been accomplished1 will ultimately prevail2 whether the impulsive energy of the minority or the dead weight of the majority of mankind will prove the stronger force to carry us up to higher heights or to sink us into lower depths1 are questions rather for the sage1 the moralist1 and the statesman1 whose eagle vision scans the future1 than for the humble student of the present and the past4 ,here we are only concerned to ask how far the uniformity1 the universality1 and the permanence of a belief in magic1 compared with the endless variety and the shifting character of religious creeds1 raises a presumption that the former represents a ruder and earlier phase of the human mind1 through which all the races of mankind have passed or are passing on their way to religion and science4 ,if an ,age of ,religion has thus everywhere1 as ,i venture to surmise1 been preceded by an ,age of ,magic1 it is natural that we should enquire what causes have led mankind1 or rather a portion of them1 to abandon magic as a principle of faith and practice and to betake themselves to religion instead4 ,when we reflect upon the multitude1 the variety1 and the complexity of the facts to be explained1 and the scantiness of our information regarding them1 we shall be ready to acknowledge that a full and satisfactory solution of so profound a problem is hardly to be hoped for1 and that the most we can do in the present state of our knowledge is to hazard a more or less plausible conjecture4 ,with all due diffidence1 then1 ,i would suggest that a tardy recognition of the inherent falsehood and barrenness of magic set the more thoughtful part of mankind to cast about for a truer theory of nature and a more fruitful method of turning her resources to account4 ,the shrewder intelligences must in time have come to perceive that magical ceremonies and incantations did not really effect the results which they were designed to produce1 and which the majority of their simpler fellows still believed that they did actually produce4 ,this great discovery of the inefficacy of magic must have wrought a radical though probably slow revolution in the minds of those who had the sagacity to make it4 ,the discovery amounted to this1 that men for the first time recognised their inability to manipulate at pleasure certain natural forces which hitherto they had believed to be completely within their control4 ,it was a confession of human ignorance and weakness4 ,man saw that he had taken for causes what were no causes1 and that all his efforts to work by means of these imaginary causes had been vain4 ,his painful toil had been wasted1 his curious ingenuity had been squandered to no purpose4 ,he had been pulling at strings to which nothing was attached2 he had been marching1 as he thought1 straight to the goal1 while in reality he had only been treading in a narrow circle4 ,not that the effects which he had striven so hard to produce did not continue to manifest themselves4 ,they were still produced1 but not by him4 ,the rain still fell on the thirsty ground3 the sun still pursued his daily1 and the moon her nightly journey across the sky3 the silent procession of the seasons still moved in light and shadow1 in cloud and sunshine across the earth3 men were still born to labour and sorrow1 and still1 after a brief sojourn here1 were gathered to their fathers in the long home hereafter4 ,all things indeed went on as before1 yet all seemed different to him from whose eyes the old scales had fallen4 ,for he could no longer cherish the pleasing illusion that it was he who guided the earth and the heaven in their courses1 and that they would cease to perform their great revolutions were he to take his feeble hand from the wheel4 ,in the death of his enemies and his friends he no longer saw a proof of the resistless potency of his own or of hostile enchantments2 he now knew that friends and foes alike had succumbed to a force stronger than any that he could wield1 and in obedience to a destiny which he was powerless to control4 ,thus cut adrift from his ancient moorings and left to toss on a troubled sea of doubt and uncertainty1 his old happy confidence in himself and his powers rudely shaken1 our primitive philosopher must have been sadly perplexed and agitated till he came to rest1 as in a quiet haven after a tempestuous voyage1 in a new system of faith and practice1 which seemed to offer a solution of his harassing doubts and a substitute1 however precarious1 for that sovereignty over nature which he had reluctantly abdicated4 ,if the great world went on its way without the help of him or his fellows1 it must surely be because there were other beings1 like himself1 but far stronger1 who1 unseen themselves1 directed its course and brought about all the varied series of events which he had hitherto believed to be dependent on his own magic4 ,it was they1 as he now believed1 and not he himself1 who made the stormy wind to blow1 the lightning to flash1 and the thunder to roll2 who had laid the foundations of the solid earth and set bounds to the restless sea that it might not pass2 who caused all the glorious lights of heaven to shine2 who gave the fowls of the air their meat and the wild beasts of the desert their prey2 who bade the fruitful land to bring forth in abundance1 the high hills to be clothed with forests1 the bubbling springs to rise under the rocks in the valleys1 and green pastures to grow by still waters2 who breathed into man's nostrils and made him live1 or turned him to destruction by famine and pestilence and war4 ,to these mighty beings1 whose handiwork he traced in all the gorgeous and varied pageantry of nature1 man now addressed himself1 humbly confessing his dependence on their invisible power1 and beseeching them of their mercy to furnish him with all good things1 to defend him from the perils and dangers by which our mortal life is compassed about on every hand1 and finally to bring his immortal spirit1 freed from the burden of the body1 to some happier world1 beyond the reach of pain and sorrow1 where he might rest with them and with the spirits of good men in joy and felicity for ever4 ,in this1 or some such way as this1 the deeper minds may be conceived to have made the great transition from magic to religion4 ,but even in them the change can hardly ever have been sudden2 probably it proceeded very slowly1 and required long ages for its more or less perfect accomplishment4 ,for the recognition of man's powerlessness to influence the course of nature on a grand scale must have been gradual2 he cannot have been shorn of the whole of his fancied dominion at a blow4 ,step by step he must have been driven back from his proud position2 foot by foot he must have yielded1 with a sigh1 the ground which he had once viewed as his own4 ,now it would be the wind1 now the rain1 now the sunshine1 now the thunder1 that he confessed himself unable to wield at will2 and as province after province of nature thus fell from his grasp1 till what had once seemed a kingdom threatened to shrink into a prison1 man must have been more and more profoundly impressed with a sense of his own helplessness and the might of the invisible beings by whom he believed himself to be surrounded4 ,thus religion1 beginning as a slight and partial acknowledgment of powers superior to man1 tends with the growth of knowledge to deepen into a confession of man's entire and absolute dependence on the divine2 his old free bearing is exchanged for an attitude of lowliest prostration before the mysterious powers of the unseen1 and his highest virtue is to submit his will to theirs3 ,in la sua volontade nostra pace4 ,but this deepening sense of religion1 this more perfect submission to the divine will in all things1 affects only those higher intelligences who have breadth of view enough to comprehend the vastness of the universe and the littleness of man4 ,small minds cannot grasp great ideas2 to their narrow comprehension1 their purblind vision1 nothing seems really great and important but themselves4 ,such minds hardly rise into religion at all4 ,they are1 indeed1 drilled by their betters into an outward conformity with its precepts and a verbal profession of its tenets2 but at heart they cling to their old magical superstitions1 which may be discountenanced and forbidden1 but cannot be eradicated by religion1 so long as they have their roots deep down in the mental framework and constitution of the great majority of mankind4 ,the reader may well be tempted to ask1 ,how was it that intelligent men did not sooner detect the fallacy of magic8 ,how could they continue to cherish expectations that were invariably doomed to disappointment8 ,with what heart persist in playing venerable antics that led to nothing1 and mumbling solemn balderdash that remained without effect8 ,why cling to beliefs which were so flatly contradicted by experience8 ,how dare to repeat experiments that had failed so often8 ,the answer seems to be that the fallacy was far from easy to detect1 the failure by no means obvious1 since in many1 perhaps in most cases1 the desired event did actually follow1 at a longer or shorter interval1 the performance of the rite which was designed to bring it about2 and a mind of more than common acuteness was needed to perceive that1 even in these cases1 the rite was not necessarily the cause of the event4 ,a ceremony intended to make the wind blow or the rain fall1 or to work the death of an enemy1 will always be followed1 sooner or later1 by the occurrence it is meant to bring to pass2 and primitive man may be excused for regarding the occurrence as a direct result of the ceremony1 and the best possible proof of its efficacy4 ,similarly1 rites observed in the morning to help the sun to rise1 and in spring to wake the dreaming earth from her winter sleep1 will invariably appear to be crowned with success1 at least within the temperate zones2 for in these regions the sun lights his golden lamp in the east every morning1 and year by year the vernal earth decks herself afresh with a rich mantle of green4 ,hence the practical savage1 with his conservative instincts1 might well turn a deaf ear to the subtleties of the theoretical doubter1 the philosophic radical1 who presumed to hint that sunrise and spring might not1 after all1 be direct consequences of the punctual performance of certain daily or yearly ceremonies1 and that the sun might perhaps continue to rise and trees to blossom though the ceremonies were occasionally intermitted1 or even discontinued altogether4 ,these sceptical doubts would naturally be repelled by the other with scorn and indignation as airy reveries subversive of the faith and manifestly contradicted by experience4 ,can anything be plainer1 he might say1 than that ,i light my twopenny candle on earth and that the sun then kindles his great fire in heaven8 ,i should be glad to know whether1 when ,i have put on my green robe in spring1 the trees do not afterwards do the same8 ,these are facts patent to everybody1 and on them ,i take my stand4 ,i am a plain practical man1 not one of your theorists and splitters of hairs and choppers of logic4 ,theories and speculation and all that may be very well in their way1 and ,i have not the least objection to your indulging in them1 provided1 of course1 you do not put them in practice4 ,but give me leave to stick to facts2 then ,i know where ,i am4 ,the fallacy of this reasoning is obvious to us1 because it happens to deal with facts about which we have long made up our minds4 ,but let an argument of precisely the same calibre be applied to matters which are still under debate1 and it may be questioned whether a ,british audience would not applaud it as sound1 and esteem the speaker who used it a safe man--not brilliant or showy1 perhaps1 but thoroughly sensible and hard-headed4 ,if such reasonings could pass muster among ourselves1 need we wonder that they long escaped detection by the savage8 ,v4 ,the ,magical ,control of the ,weather #a4 ,the ,public ,magician ,,the ,,reader may remember that we were led to plunge into the labyrinth of magic by a consideration of two different types of man-god4 ,this is the clue which has guided our devious steps through the maze1 and brought us out at last on higher ground1 whence1 resting a little by the way1 we can look back over the path we have already traversed and forward to the longer and steeper road we have still to climb4 ,as a result of the foregoing discussion1 the two types of human gods may conveniently be distinguished as the religious and the magical man-god respectively4 ,in the former1 a being of an order different from and superior to man is supposed to become incarnate1 for a longer or a shorter time1 in a human body1 manifesting his super-human power and knowledge by miracles wrought and prophecies uttered through the medium of the fleshly tabernacle in which he has deigned to take up his abode4 ,this may also appropriately be called the inspired or incarnate type of man-god4 ,in it the human body is merely a frail earthly vessel filled with a divine and immortal spirit4 ,on the other hand1 a man-god of the magical sort is nothing but a man who possesses in an unusually high degree powers which most of his fellows arrogate to themselves on a smaller scale2 for in rude society there is hardly a person who does not dabble in magic4 ,thus1 whereas a man-god of the former or inspired type derives his divinity from a deity who has stooped to hide his heavenly radiance behind a dull mask of earthly mould1 a man-god of the latter type draws his extraordinary power from a certain physical sympathy with nature4 ,he is not merely the receptacle of a divine spirit4 ,his whole being1 body and soul1 is so delicately attuned to the harmony of the world that a touch of his hand or a turn of his head may send a thrill vibrating through the universal framework of things2 and conversely his divine organism is acutely sensitive to such slight changes of environment as would leave ordinary mortals wholly unaffected4 ,but the line between these two types of man-god1 however sharply we may draw it in theory1 is seldom to be traced with precision in practice1 and in what follows ,i shall not insist on it4 ,we have seen that in practice the magic art may be employed for the benefit either of individuals or of the whole community1 and that according as it is directed to one or other of these two objects it may be called private or public magic4 ,further1 ,i pointed out that the public magician occupies a position of great influence1 from which1 if he is a prudent and able man1 he may advance step by step to the rank of a chief or king4 ,thus an examination of public magic conduces to an understanding of the early kingship1 since in savage and barbarous society many chiefs and kings appear to owe their authority in great measure to their reputation as magicians4 ,among the objects of public utility which magic may be employed to secure1 the most essential is an adequate supply of food4 ,the examples cited in preceding pages prove that the purveyors of food--the hunter1 the fisher1 the farmer--all resort to magical practices in the pursuit of their various callings2 but they do so as private individuals for the benefit of themselves and their families1 rather than as public functionaries acting in the interest of the whole people4 ,it is otherwise when the rites are performed1 not by the hunters1 the fishers1 the farmers themselves1 but by professional magicians on their behalf4 ,in primitive society1 where uniformity of occupation is the rule1 and the distribution of the community into various classes of workers has hardly begun1 every man is more or less his own magician2 he practises charms and incantations for his own good and the injury of his enemies4 ,but a great step in advance has been taken when a special class of magicians has been instituted2 when1 in other words1 a number of men have been set apart for the express purpose of benefiting the whole community by their skill1 whether that skill be directed to the healing of diseases1 the forecasting of the future1 the regulation of the weather1 or any other object of general utility4 ,the impotence of the means adopted by most of these practitioners to accomplish their ends ought not to blind us to the immense importance of the institution itself4 ,here is a body of men relieved1 at least in the higher stages of savagery1 from the need of earning their livelihood by hard manual toil1 and allowed1 nay1 expected and encouraged1 to prosecute researches into the secret ways of nature4 ,it was at once their duty and their interest to know more than their fellows1 to acquaint themselves with everything that could aid man in his arduous struggle with nature1 everything that could mitigate his sufferings and prolong his life4 ,the properties of drugs and minerals1 the causes of rain and drought1 of thunder and lightning1 the changes of the seasons1 the phases of the moon1 the daily and yearly journeys of the sun1 the motions of the stars1 the mystery of life1 and the mystery of death1 all these things must have excited the wonder of these early philosophers1 and stimulated them to find solutions of problems that were doubtless often thrust on their attention in the most practical form by the importunate demands of their clients1 who expected them not merely to understand but to regulate the great processes of nature for the good of man4 ,that their first shots fell very far wide of the mark could hardly be helped4 ,the slow1 the never-ending approach to truth consists in perpetually forming and testing hypotheses1 accepting those which at the time seem to fit the facts and rejecting the others4 ,the views of natural causation embraced by the savage magician no doubt appear to us manifestly false and absurd2 yet in their day they were legitimate hypotheses1 though they have not stood the test of experience4 ,ridicule and blame are the just meed1 not of those who devised these crude theories1 but of those who obstinately adhered to them after better had been propounded4 ,certainly no men ever had stronger incentives in the pursuit of truth than these savage sorcerers4 ,to maintain at least a show of knowledge was absolutely necessary2 a single mistake detected might cost them their life4 ,this no doubt led them to practise imposture for the purpose of concealing their ignorance2 but it also supplied them with the most powerful motive for substituting a real for a sham knowledge1 since1 if you would appear to know anything1 by far the best way is actually to know it4 ,thus1 however justly we may reject the extravagant pretensions of magicians and condemn the deceptions which they have practised on mankind1 the original institution of this class of men has1 take it all in all1 been productive of incalculable good to humanity4 ,they were the direct predecessors1 not merely of our physicians and surgeons1 but of our investigators and discoverers in every branch of natural science4 ,they began the work which has since been carried to such glorious and beneficent issues by their successors in after ages2 and if the beginning was poor and feeble1 this is to be imputed to the inevitable difficulties which beset the path of knowledge rather than to the natural incapacity or wilful fraud of the men themselves4 #b4 ,the ,magical ,control of ,rain ,,of ,,the ,,things which the public magician sets himself to do for the good of the tribe1 one of the chief is to control the weather and especially to ensure an adequate fall of rain4 ,water is an essential of life1 and in most countries the supply of it depends upon showers4 ,without rain vegetation withers1 animals and men languish and die4 ,hence in savage communities the rain-maker is a very important personage2 and often a special class of magicians exists for the purpose of regulating the heavenly water-supply4 ,the methods by which they attempt to discharge the duties of their office are commonly1 though not always1 based on the principle of homoeopathic or imitative magic4 ,if they wish to make rain they simulate it by sprinkling water or mimicking clouds3 if their object is to stop rain and cause drought1 they avoid water and resort to warmth and fire for the sake of drying up the too abundant moisture4 ,such attempts are by no means confined1 as the cultivated reader might imagine1 to the naked inhabitants of those sultry lands like ,central ,australia and some parts of ,eastern and ,southern ,africa1 where often for months together the pitiless sun beats down out of a blue and cloudless sky on the parched and gaping earth4 ,they are1 or used to be1 common enough among outwardly civilised folk in the moister climate of ,europe4 ,i will now illustrate them by instances drawn from the practice both of public and private magic4 ,thus1 for example1 in a village near ,dorpat1 in ,russia1 when rain was much wanted1 three men used to climb up the fir-trees of an old sacred grove4 ,one of them drummed with a hammer on a kettle or small cask to imitate thunder2 the second knocked two fire-brands together and made the sparks fly1 to imitate lightning2 and the third1 who was called the rain-maker1 had a bunch of twigs with which he sprinkled water from a vessel on all sides4 ,to put an end to drought and bring down rain1 women and girls of the village of ,ploska are wont to go naked by night to the boundaries of the village and there pour water on the ground4 ,in ,halmahera1 or ,gilolo1 a large island to the west of ,new ,guinea1 a wizard makes rain by dipping a branch of a particular kind of tree in water and then scattering the moisture from the dripping bough over the ground4 ,in ,new ,britain the rain-maker wraps some leaves of a red and green striped creeper in a banana-leaf1 moistens the bundle with water1 and buries it in the ground2 then he imitates with his mouth the plashing of rain4 ,amongst the ,omaha ,indians of ,north ,america1 when the corn is withering for want of rain1 the members of the sacred ,buffalo ,society fill a large vessel with water and dance four times round it4 ,one of them drinks some of the water and spirts it into the air1 making a fine spray in imitation of a mist or drizzling rain4 ,then he upsets the vessel1 spilling the water on the ground2 whereupon the dancers fall down and drink up the water1 getting mud all over their faces4 ,lastly1 they squirt the water into the air1 making a fine mist4 ,this saves the corn4 ,in spring-time the ,natchez of ,north ,america used to club together to purchase favourable weather for their crops from the wizards4 ,if rain was needed1 the wizards fasted and danced with pipes full of water in their mouths4 ,the pipes were perforated like the nozzle of a watering-can1 and through the holes the rain-maker blew the water towards that part of the sky where the clouds hung heaviest4 ,but if fine weather was wanted1 he mounted the roof of his hut1 and with extended arms1 blowing with all his might1 he beckoned to the clouds to pass by4 ,when the rains do not come in due season the people of ,central ,angoniland repair to what is called the rain-temple4 ,here they clear away the grass1 and the leader pours beer into a pot which is buried in the ground1 while he says1 ,master ,chauta1 you have hardened your heart towards us1 what would you have us do8 ,we must perish indeed4 ,give your children the rains1 there is the beer we have given you4 ,then they all partake of the beer that is left over1 even the children being made to sip it4 ,next they take branches of trees and dance and sing for rain4 ,when they return to the village they find a vessel of water set at the doorway by an old woman2 so they dip their branches in it and wave them aloft1 so as to scatter the drops4 ,after that the rain is sure to come driving up in heavy clouds4 ,in these practices we see a combination of religion with magic2 for while the scattering of the water-drops by means of branches is a purely magical ceremony1 the prayer for rain and the offering of beer are purely religious rites4 ,in the ,mara tribe of ,northern ,australia the rain-maker goes to a pool and sings over it his magic song4 ,then he takes some of the water in his hands1 drinks it1 and spits it out in various directions4 ,after that he throws water all over himself1 scatters it about1 and returns quietly to the camp4 ,rain is supposed to follow4 ,the ,arab historian ,makrizi describes a method of stopping rain which is said to have been resorted to by a tribe of nomads called ,alqamar in ,hadramaut4 ,they cut a branch from a certain tree in the desert1 set it on fire1 and then sprinkled the burning brand with water4 ,after that the vehemence of the rain abated1 just as the water vanished when it fell on the glowing brand4 ,some of the ,eastern ,angamis of ,manipur are said to perform a some-what similar ceremony for the opposite purpose1 in order1 namely1 to produce rain4 ,the head of the village puts a burning brand on the grave of a man who has died of burns1 and quenches the brand with water1 while he prays that rain may fall4 ,here the putting out the fire with water1 which is an imitation of rain1 is reinforced by the influence of the dead man1 who1 having been burnt to death1 will naturally be anxious for the descent of rain to cool his scorched body and assuage his pangs4 ,other people besides the ,arabs have used fire as a means of stopping rain4 ,thus the ,sulka of ,new ,britain heat stones red hot in the fire and then put them out in the rain1 or they throw hot ashes in the air4 ,they think that the rain will soon cease to fall1 for it does not like to be burned by the hot stones or ashes4 ,the ,telugus send a little girl out naked into the rain with a burning piece of wood in her hand1 which she has to show to the rain4 ,that is supposed to stop the downpour4 ,at ,port ,stevens in ,new ,south ,wales the medicine-men used to drive away rain by throwing fire-sticks into the air1 while at the same time they puffed and shouted4 ,any man of the ,anula tribe in ,northern ,australia can stop rain by simply warming a green stick in the fire1 and then striking it against the wind4 ,in time of severe drought the ,dieri of ,central ,australia1 loudly lamenting the impoverished state of the country and their own half-starved condition1 call upon the spirits of their remote predecessors1 whom they call ,mura-muras1 to grant them power to make a heavy rain-fall4 ,for they believe that the clouds are bodies in which rain is generated by their own ceremonies or those of neighbouring tribes1 through the influence of the ,mura-muras4 ,the way in which they set about drawing rain from the clouds is this4 ,a hole is dug about twelve feet long and eight or ten broad1 and over this hole a conical hut of logs and branches is made4 ,two wizards1 supposed to have received a special inspiration from the ,mura-muras1 are bled by an old and influential man with a sharp flint2 and the blood1 drawn from their arms below the elbow1 is made to flow on the other men of the tribe1 who sit huddled together in the hut4 ,at the same time the two bleeding men throw handfuls of down about1 some of which adheres to the blood-stained bodies of their comrades1 while the rest floats in the air4 ,the blood is thought to represent the rain1 and the down the clouds4 ,during the ceremony two large stones are placed in the middle of the hut2 they stand for gathering clouds and presage rain4 ,then the wizards who were bled carry away the two stones for about ten or fifteen miles1 and place them as high as they can in the tallest tree4 ,meanwhile the other men gather gypsum1 pound it fine1 and throw it into a water-hole4 ,this the ,mura-muras see1 and at once they cause clouds to appear in the sky4 ,lastly1 the men1 young and old1 surround the hut1 and1 stooping down1 butt at it with their heads1 like so many rams4 ,thus they force their way through it and reappear on the other side1 repeating the process till the hut is wrecked4 ,in doing this they are forbidden to use their hands or arms2 but when the heavy logs alone remain1 they are allowed to pull them out with their hands4 ,the piercing of the hut with their heads symbolises the piercing of the clouds2 the fall of the hut1 the fall of the rain4 ,obviously1 too1 the act of placing high up in trees the two stones1 which stand for clouds1 is a way of making the real clouds to mount up in the sky4 ,the ,dieri also imagine that the foreskins taken from lads at circumcision have a great power of producing rain4 ,hence the ,great ,council of the tribe always keeps a small stock of foreskins ready for use4 ,they are carefully concealed1 being wrapt up in feathers with the fat of the wild dog and of the carpet snake4 ,a woman may not see such a parcel opened on any account4 ,when the ceremony is over1 the foreskin is buried1 its virtue being exhausted4 ,after the rains have fallen1 some of the tribe always undergo a surgical operation1 which consists in cutting the skin of their chest and arms with a sharp flint4 ,the wound is then tapped with a flat stick to increase the flow of blood1 and red ochre is rubbed into it4 ,raised scars are thus produced4 ,the reason alleged by the natives for this practice is that they are pleased with the rain1 and that there is a connexion between the rain and the scars4 ,apparently the operation is not very painful1 for the patient laughs and jokes while it is going on4 ,indeed1 little children have been seen to crowd round the operator and patiently take their turn2 then after being operated on1 they ran away1 expanding their little chests and singing for the rain to beat upon them4 ,however1 they were not so well pleased next day1 when they felt their wounds stiff and sore4 ,in ,java1 when rain is wanted1 two men will sometimes thrash each other with supple rods till the blood flows down their backs2 the streaming blood represents the rain1 and no doubt is supposed to make it fall on the ground4 ,the people of ,egghiou1 a district of ,abyssinia1 used to engage in sanguinary conflicts with each other1 village against village1 for a week together every ,january for the purpose of procuring rain4 ,some years ago the emperor ,menelik forbade the custom4 ,however1 the following year the rain was deficient1 and the popular outcry so great that the emperor yielded to it1 and allowed the murderous fights to be resumed1 but for two days a year only4 ,the writer who mentions the custom regards the blood shed on these occasions as a propitiatory sacrifice offered to spirits who control the showers2 but perhaps1 as in the ,australian and ,javanese ceremonies1 it is an imitation of rain4 ,the prophets of ,baal1 who sought to procure rain by cutting themselves with knives till the blood gushed out1 may have acted on the same principle4 ,there is a widespread belief that twin children possess magical powers over nature1 especially over rain and the weather4 ,this curious superstition prevails among some of the ,indian tribes of ,british ,columbia1 and has led them often to impose certain singular restrictions or taboos on the parents of twins1 though the exact meaning of these restrictions is generally obscure4 ,thus the ,tsimshian ,indians of ,british ,columbia believe that twins control the weather2 therefore they pray to wind and rain1 ,calm down1 breath of the twins4 ,further1 they think that the wishes of twins are always fulfilled2 hence twins are feared1 because they can harm the man they hate4 ,they can also call the salmon and the olachen or candle-fish1 and so they are known by a name which means making plentiful4 ,in the opinion of the ,kwakiutl ,indians of ,british ,columbia twins are transformed salmon2 hence they may not go near water1 lest they should be changed back again into the fish4 ,in their childhood they can summon any wind by motions of their hands1 and they can make fair or foul weather1 and also cure diseases by swinging a large wooden rattle4 ,the ,nootka ,indians of ,british ,columbia also believe that twins are somehow related to salmon4 ,hence among them twins may not catch salmon1 and they may not eat or even handle the fresh fish4 ,they can make fair or foul weather1 and can cause rain to fall by painting their faces black and then washing them1 which may represent the rain dripping from the dark clouds4 ,the ,shuswap ,indians1 like the ,thompson ,indians1 associate twins with the grizzly bear1 for they call them young grizzly bears4 ,according to them1 twins remain throughout life endowed with supernatural powers4 ,in particular they can make good or bad weather4 ,they produce rain by spilling water from a basket in the air2 they make fine weather by shaking a small flat piece of wood attached to a stick by a string2 they raise storms by strewing down on the ends of spruce branches4 ,the same power of influencing the weather is attributed to twins by the ,baronga1 a tribe of ,bantu negroes who1 inhabit the shores of ,delagoa ,bay in ,south-eastern ,africa4 ,they bestow the name of ,tilo--that is1 the sky--on a woman who has given birth to twins1 and the infants themselves are called the children of the sky4 ,now when the storms which generally burst in the months of ,september and ,october have been looked for in vain1 when a drought with its prospect of famine is threatening1 and all nature1 scorched and burnt up by a sun that has shone for six months from a cloudless sky1 is panting for the beneficent showers of the ,south ,african spring1 the women perform ceremonies to bring down the longed-for rain on the parched earth4 ,stripping themselves of all their garments1 they assume in their stead girdles and head-dresses of grass1 or short petticoats made of the leaves of a particular sort of creeper4 ,thus attired1 uttering peculiar cries and singing ribald songs1 they go about from well to well1 cleansing them of the mud and impurities which have accumulated in them4 ,the wells1 it may be said1 are merely holes in the sand where a little turbid unwholesome water stagnates4 ,further1 the women must repair to the house of one of their gossips who has given birth to twins1 and must drench her with water1 which they carry in little pitchers4 ,having done so they go on their way1 shrieking out their loose songs and dancing immodest dances4 ,no man may see these leaf-clad women going their rounds4 ,if they meet a man1 they maul him and thrust him aside4 ,when they have cleansed the wells1 they must go and pour water on the graves of their ancestors in the sacred grove4 ,it often happens1 too1 that at the bidding of the wizard they go and pour water on the graves of twins4 ,for they think that the grave of a twin ought always to be moist1 for which reason twins are regularly buried near a lake4 ,if all their efforts to procure rain prove abortive1 they will remember that such and such a twin was buried in a dry place on the side of a hill4 ,no wonder1 says the wizard in such a case1 that the sky is fiery4 ,take up his body and dig him a grave on the shore of the lake4 ,his orders are at once obeyed1 for this is supposed to be the only means of bringing down the rain4 ,some of the foregoing facts strongly support an interpretation which ,professor ,oldenberg has given of the rules to be observed by a ,brahman who would learn a particular hymn of the ancient ,indian collection known as the ,samaveda4 ,the hymn1 which bears the name of the ,sakvari song1 was believed to embody the might of ,indra's weapon1 the thunderbolt2 and hence1 on account of the dreadful and dangerous potency with which it was thus charged1 the bold student who essayed to master it had to be isolated from his fellow-men1 and to retire from the village into the forest4 ,here for a space of time1 which might vary1 according to different doctors of the law1 from one to twelve years1 he had to observe certain rules of life1 among which were the following4 ,thrice a day he had to touch water2 he must wear black garments and eat black food2 when it rained1 he might not seek the shelter of a roof1 but had to sit in the rain and say1 ,water is the ,sakvari song2 when the lightning flashed1 he said1 ,that is like the ,sakvari song2 when the thunder pealed1 he said1 ,the ,great ,one is making a great noise4 ,he might never cross a running stream without touching water2 he might never set foot on a ship unless his life were in danger1 and even then he must be sure to touch water when he went on board2 for in water1 so ran the saying1 lies the virtue of the ,sakvari song4 ,when at last he was allowed to learn the song itself1 he had to dip his hands in a vessel of water in which plants of all sorts had been placed4 ,if a man walked in the way of all these precepts1 the rain-god ,parjanya1 it was said1 would send rain at the wish of that man4 ,it is clear1 as ,professor ,oldenberg well points out1 that all these rules are intended to bring the ,brahman into union with water1 to make him1 as it were1 an ally of the water powers1 and to guard him against their hostility4 ,the black garments and the black food have the same significance2 no one will doubt that they refer to the rain-clouds when he remembers that a black victim is sacrificed to procure rain2 'it is black1 for such is the nature of rain4' ,in respect of another rain-charm it is said plainly1 ',he puts on a black garment edged with black1 for such is the nature of rain4' ,we may therefore assume that here in the circle of ideas and ordinances of the ,vedic schools there have been preserved magical practices of the most remote antiquity1 which were intended to prepare the rain-maker for his office and dedicate him to it4 ,it is interesting to observe that where an opposite result is desired1 primitive logic enjoins the weather-doctor to observe precisely opposite rules of conduct4 ,in the tropical island of ,java1 where the rich vegetation attests the abundance of the rainfall1 ceremonies for the making of rain are rare1 but ceremonies for the prevention of it are not uncommon4 ,when a man is about to give a great feast in the rainy season and has invited many people1 he goes to a weather-doctor and asks him to prop up the clouds that may be lowering4 ,if the doctor consents to exert his professional powers1 he begins to regulate his behaviour by certain rules as soon as his customer has departed4 ,he must observe a fast1 and may neither drink nor bathe2 what little he eats must be eaten dry1 and in no case may he touch water4 ,the host1 on his side1 and his servants1 both male and female1 must neither wash clothes nor bathe so long as the feast lasts1 and they have all during its continuance to observe strict chastity4 ,the doctor seats himself on a new mat in his bedroom1 and before a small oil-lamp he murmurs1 shortly before the feast takes place1 the following prayer or incantation3 ,grandfather and ,grandmother ,sroekoel 7the name seems to be taken at random2 others are sometimes used71 return to your country4 ,akkemat is your country4 ,put down your water-cask1 close it properly1 that not a drop may fall out4 ,while he utters this prayer the sorcerer looks upwards1 burning incense the while4 ,so among the ,toradjas the rain-doctor1 whose special business it is to drive away rain1 takes care not to touch water before1 during1 or after the discharge of his professional duties4 ,he does not bathe1 he eats with unwashed hands1 he drinks nothing but palm wine1 and if he has to cross a stream he is careful not to step in the water4 ,having thus prepared himself for his task he has a small hut built for himself outside of the village in a rice-field1 and in this hut he keeps up a little fire1 which on no account may be suffered to go out4 ,in the fire he burns various kinds of wood1 which are supposed to possess the property of driving off rain2 and he puffs in the direction from which the rain threatens to come1 holding in his hand a packet of leaves and bark which derive a similar cloud-compelling virtue1 not from their chemical composition1 but from their names1 which happen to signify something dry or volatile4 ,if clouds should appear in the sky while he is at work1 he takes lime in the hollow of his hand and blows it towards them4 ,the lime1 being so very dry1 is obviously well adapted to disperse the damp clouds4 ,should rain afterwards be wanted1 he has only to pour water on his fire1 and immediately the rain will descend in sheets4 ,the reader will observe how exactly the ,javanese and ,toradja observances1 which are intended to prevent rain1 form the antithesis of the ,indian observances1 which aim at producing it4 ,the ,indian sage is commanded to touch water thrice a day regularly as well as on various special occasions2 the ,javanese and ,toradja wizards may not touch it at all4 ,the ,indian lives out in the forest1 and even when it rains he may not take shelter2 the ,javanese and the ,toradja sit in a house or a hut4 ,the one signifies his sympathy with water by receiving the rain on his person and speaking of it respectfully2 the others light a lamp or a fire and do their best to drive the rain away4 ,yet the principle on which all three act is the same2 each of them1 by a sort of childish make-believe1 identifies himself with the phenomenon which he desires to produce4 ,it is the old fallacy that the effect resembles its cause3 if you would make wet weather1 you must be wet2 if you would make dry weather1 you must be dry4 ,in ,south-eastern ,europe at the present day ceremonies are observed for the purpose of making rain which not only rest on the same general train of thought as the preceding1 but even in their details resemble the ceremonies practised with the same intention by the ,baronga of ,delagoa ,bay4 ,among the ,greeks of ,thessaly and ,macedonia1 when a drought has lasted a long time1 it is customary to send a procession of children round to all the wells and springs of the neighbourhood4 ,at the head of the procession walks a girl adorned with flowers1 whom her companions drench with water at every halting-place1 while they sing an invocation1 of which the following is part3 ,perperia all fresh bedewed1 ,freshen all the neighbourhood2 ,by the woods1 on the highway1 ,as thou goest1 to ,god now pray3 ,o my ,god1 upon the plain1 ,send thou us a still1 small rain2 ,that the fields may fruitful be1 ,and vines in blossom we may see2 ,that the grain be full and sound1 ,and wealthy grow the folks around4 ,in time of drought the ,serbians strip a girl to her skin and clothe her from head to foot in grass1 herbs1 and flowers1 even her face being hidden behind a veil of living green4 ,thus disguised she is called the ,dodola1 and goes through the village with a troop of girls4 ,they stop before every house2 the ,dodola keeps turning herself round and dancing1 while the other girls form a ring about her singing one of the ,dodola songs1 and the housewife pours a pail of water over her4 ,one of the songs they sing runs thus3 ,we go through the village2 ,the clouds go in the sky2 ,we go faster1 ,faster go the clouds2 ,they have overtaken us1 ,and wetted the corn and the vine4 ,at ,poona in ,india1 when rain is needed1 the boys dress up one of their number in nothing but leaves and call him ,king of ,rain4 ,then they go round to every house in the village1 where the house-holder or his wife sprinkles the ,rain ,king with water1 and gives the party food of various kinds4 ,when they have thus visited all the houses1 they strip the ,rain ,king of his leafy robes and feast upon what they have gathered4 ,bathing is practised as a rain-charm in some parts of ,southern and ,western ,russia4 ,sometimes after service in church the priest in his robes has been thrown down on the ground and drenched with water by his parishioners4 ,sometimes it is the women who1 without stripping off their clothes1 bathe in crowds on the day of ,st4 ,john the ,baptist1 while they dip in the water a figure made of branches1 grass1 and herbs1 which is supposed to represent the saint4 ,in ,kursk1 a province of ,southern ,russia1 when rain is much wanted1 the women seize a passing stranger and throw him into the river1 or souse him from head to foot4 ,later on we shall see that a passing stranger is often taken for a deity or the personification of some natural power4 ,it is recorded in official documents that during a drought in #agij the peasants of ,scheroutz and ,werboutz collected all the women and compelled them to bathe1 in order that rain might fall4 ,an ,armenian rain-charm is to throw the wife of a priest into the water and drench her4 ,the ,arabs of ,north ,africa fling a holy man1 willy-nilly1 into a spring as a remedy for drought4 ,in ,minahassa1 a province of ,north ,celebes1 the priest bathes as a rain-charm4 ,in ,central ,celebes when there has been no rain for a long time and the rice-stalks begin to shrivel up1 many of the villagers1 especially the young folk1 go to a neighbouring brook and splash each other with water1 shouting noisily1 or squirt water on one another through bamboo tubes4 ,sometimes they imitate the plump of rain by smacking the surface of the water with their hands1 or by placing an inverted gourd on it and drumming on the gourd with their fingers4 ,women are sometimes supposed to be able to make rain by ploughing1 or pretending to plough4 ,thus the ,pshaws and ,chewsurs of the ,caucasus have a ceremony called ploughing the rain1 which they observe in time of drought4 ,girls yoke themselves to a plough and drag it into a river1 wading in the water up to their girdles4 ,in the same circumstances ,armenian girls and women do the same4 ,the oldest woman1 or the priest's wife1 wears the priest's dress1 while the others1 dressed as men1 drag the plough through the water against the stream4 ,in the ,caucasian province of ,georgia1 when a drought has lasted long1 marriageable girls are yoked in couples with an ox-yoke on their shoulders1 a priest holds the reins1 and thus harnessed they wade through rivers1 puddles1 and marshes1 praying1 screaming1 weeping1 and laughing4 ,in a district of ,transylvania when the ground is parched with drought1 some girls strip themselves naked1 and1 led by an older woman1 who is also naked1 they steal a harrow and carry it across the fields to a brook1 where they set it afloat4 ,next they sit on the harrow and keep a tiny flame burning on each corner of it for an hour4 ,then they leave the harrow in the water and go home4 ,a similar rain-charm is resorted to in some parts of ,india2 naked women drag a plough across a field by night1 while the men keep carefully out of the way1 for their presence would break the spell4 ,sometimes the rain-charm operates through the dead4 ,thus in ,new ,caledonia the rain-makers blackened themselves all over1 dug up a dead body1 took the bones to a cave1 jointed them1 and hung the skeleton over some taro leaves4 ,water was poured over the skeleton to run down on the leaves4 ,they believed that the soul of the deceased took up the water1 converted it into rain1 and showered it down again4 ,in ,russia1 if common report may be believed1 it is not long since the peasants of any district that chanced to be afflicted with drought used to dig up the corpse of some one who had drunk himself to death and sink it in the nearest swamp or lake1 fully persuaded that this would ensure the fall of the needed rain4 ,in #ahfh the prospect of a bad harvest1 caused by a prolonged drought1 induced the inhabitants of a village in the ,tarashchansk district to dig up the body of a ,raskolnik1 or ,dissenter1 who had died in the preceding ,december4 ,some of the party beat the corpse1 or what was left of it1 about the head1 exclaiming1 ,give us rain6 while others poured water on it through a sieve4 ,here the pouring of water through a sieve seems plainly an imitation of a shower1 and reminds us of the manner in which ,strepsiades in ,aristophanes imagined that rain was made by ,zeus4 ,sometimes1 in order to procure rain1 the ,toradjas make an appeal to the pity of the dead4 ,thus1 in the village of ,kalingooa1 there is the grave of a famous chief1 the grandfather of the present ruler4 ,when the land suffers from unseasonable drought1 the people go to this grave1 pour water on it1 and say1 ,o grandfather1 have pity on us2 if it is your will that this year we should eat1 then give rain4 ,after that they hang a bamboo full of water over the grave2 there is a small hole in the lower end of the bamboo1 so that the water drips from it continually4 ,the bamboo is always refilled with water until rain drenches the ground4 ,here1 as in ,new ,caledonia1 we find religion blent with magic1 for the prayer to the dead chief1 which is purely religious1 is eked out with a magical imitation of rain at his grave4 ,we have seen that the ,baronga of ,delagoa ,bay drench the tombs of their ancestors1 especially the tombs of twins1 as a raincharm4 ,among some of the ,indian tribes in the region of the ,orinoco it was customary for the relations of a deceased person to disinter his bones a year after burial1 burn them1 and scatter the ashes to the winds1 because they believed that the ashes were changed into rain1 which the dead man sent in return for his obsequies4 ,the ,chinese are convinced that when human bodies remain unburied1 the souls of their late owners feel the discomfort of rain1 just as living men would do if they were exposed without shelter to the inclemency of the weather4 ,these wretched souls1 therefore1 do all in their power to prevent the rain from falling1 and often their efforts are only too successful4 ,then drought ensues1 the most dreaded of all calamities in ,china1 because bad harvests1 dearth1 and famine follow in its train4 ,hence it has been a common practice of the ,chinese authorities in time of drought to inter the dry bones of the unburied dead for the purpose of putting an end to the scourge and conjuring down the rain4 ,animals1 again1 often play an important part in these weather-charms4 ,the ,anula tribe of ,northern ,australia associate the dollar-bird with rain1 and call it the rain-bird4 ,a man who has the bird for his totem can make rain at a certain pool4 ,he catches a snake1 puts it alive into the pool1 and after holding it under water for a time takes it out1 kills it1 and lays it down by the side of the creek4 ,then he makes an arched bundle of grass stalks in imitation of a rainbow1 and sets it up over the snake4 ,after that all he does is to sing over the snake and the mimic rainbow2 sooner or later the rain will fall4 ,they explain this procedure by saying that long ago the dollar-bird had as a mate at this spot a snake1 who lived in the pool and used to make rain by spitting up into the sky till a rainbow and clouds appeared and rain fell4 ,a common way of making rain in many parts of ,java is to bathe a cat or two cats1 a male and a female2 sometimes the animals are carried in procession with music4 ,even in ,batavia you may from time to time see children going about with a cat for this purpose2 when they have ducked it in a pool1 they let it go4 ,among the ,wambugwe of ,east ,africa1 when the sorcerer desires to make rain1 he takes a black sheep and a black calf in bright sunshine1 and has them placed on the roof of the common hut in which the people live together4 ,then he slits the stomachs of the animals and scatters their contents in all directions4 ,after that he pours water and medicine into a vessel2 if the charm has succeeded1 the water boils up and rain follows4 ,on the other hand1 if the sorcerer wishes to prevent rain from falling1 he withdraws into the interior of the hut1 and there heats a rock-crystal in a calabash4 ,in order to procure rain the ,wagogo sacrifice black fowls1 black sheep1 and black cattle at the graves of dead ancestors1 and the rain-maker wears black clothes during the rainy season4 ,among the ,matabele the rain-charm employed by sorcerers was made from the blood and gall of a black ox4 ,in a district of ,sumatra1 in order to procure rain1 all the women of the village1 scantily clad1 go to the river1 wade into it1 and splash each other with the water4 ,a black cat is thrown into the stream and made to swim about for a while1 then allowed to escape to the bank1 pursued by the splashing of the women4 ,the ,garos of ,assam offer a black goat on the top of a very high mountain in time of drought4 ,in all these cases the colour of the animal is part of the charm2 being black1 it will darken the sky with rain-clouds4 ,so the ,bechuanas burn the stomach of an ox at evening1 because they say1 ,the black smoke will gather the clouds and cause the rain to come4 ,the ,timorese sacrifice a black pig to the ,earth-goddess for rain1 a white or red one to the ,sun-god for sunshine4 ,the ,angoni sacrifice a black ox for rain and a white one for fine weather4 ,among the high mountains of ,japan there is a district in which1 if rain has not fallen for a long time1 a party of villagers goes in procession to the bed of a mountain torrent1 headed by a priest1 who leads a black dog4 ,at the chosen spot they tether the beast to a stone1 and make it a target for their bullets and arrows4 ,when its life-blood bespatters the rocks1 the peasants throw down their weapons and lift up their voices in supplication to the dragon divinity of the stream1 exhorting him to send down forthwith a shower to cleanse the spot from its defilement4 ,custom has prescribed that on these occasions the colour of the victim shall be black1 as an emblem of the wished-for rain-clouds4 ,but if fine weather is wanted1 the victim must be white1 without a spot4 ,the intimate association of frogs and toads with water has earned for these creatures a widespread reputation as custodians of rain2 and hence they often play a part in charms designed to draw needed showers from the sky4 ,some of the ,indians of the ,orinoco held the toad to be the god or lord of the waters1 and for that reason feared to kill the creature4 ,they have been known to keep frogs under a pot and to beat them with rods when there was a drought4 ,it is said that the ,aymara ,indians often make little images of frogs and other aquatic animals and place them on the tops of the hills as a means of bringing down rain4 ,the ,thompson ,indians of ,british ,columbia and some people in ,europe think that to kill a frog will cause rain to fall4 ,in order to procure rain people of low caste in the ,central ,provinces of ,india will tie a frog to a rod covered with green leaves and branches of the nm tree 7,azadirachta ,indica7 and carry it from door to door singing3 ,send soon1 ,o frog1 the jewel of water6 ,and ripen the wheat and millet in the field4 ,the ,kapus or ,reddis are a large caste of cultivators and landowners in the ,madras ,presidency4 ,when rain fails1 women of the caste will catch a frog and tie it alive to a new winnowing fan made of bamboo4 ,on this fan they spread a few margosa leaves and go from door to door singing1 ,lady frog must have her bath4 ,oh6 rain-god1 give a little water for her at least4 ,while the ,kapu women sing this song1 the woman of the house pours water over the frog and gives an alms1 convinced that by so doing she will soon bring rain down in torrents4 ,sometimes1 when a drought has lasted a long time1 people drop the usual hocus-pocus of imitative magic altogether1 and being far too angry to waste their breath in prayer they seek by threats and curses or even downright physical force to extort the waters of heaven from the supernatural being who has1 so to say1 cut them off at the main4 ,in a ,japanese village1 when the guardian divinity had long been deaf to the peasants' prayers for rain1 they at last threw down his image and1 with curses loud and long1 hurled it head foremost into a stinking rice-field4 ,there1 they said1 you may stay yourself for a while1 to see how you will feel after a few days' scorching in this broiling sun that is burning the life from our cracking fields4 ,in the like circumstances the ,feloupes of ,senegambia cast down their fetishes and drag them about the fields1 cursing them till rain falls4 ,the ,chinese are adepts in the art of taking the kingdom of heaven by storm4 ,thus1 when rain is wanted they make a huge dragon of paper or wood to represent the rain-god1 and carry it about in procession2 but if no rain follows1 the mock-dragon is execrated and torn to pieces4 ,at other times they threaten and beat the god if he does not give rain2 sometimes they publicly depose him from the rank of deity4 ,on the other hand1 if the wished-for rain falls1 the god is promoted to a higher rank by an imperial decree4 ,in ,april #ahhh the mandarins of ,canton prayed to the god ,lung-wong to stop the incessant downpour of rain2 and when he turned a deaf ear to their petitions they put him in a lock-up for five days4 ,this had a salutary effect4 ,the rain ceased and the god was restored to liberty4 ,some years before1 in time of drought1 the same deity had been chained and exposed to the sun for days in the courtyard of his temple in order that he might feel for himself the urgent need of rain4 ,so when the ,siamese need rain1 they set out their idols in the blazing sun2 but if they want dry weather1 they unroof the temples and let the rain pour down on the idols4 ,they think that the inconvenience to which the gods are thus subjected will induce them to grant the wishes of their worshippers4 ,the reader may smile at the meteorology of the ,far ,east2 but precisely similar modes of procuring rain have been resorted to in ,christian ,europe within our own lifetime4 ,by the end of ,april #ahic there was great distress in ,sicily for lack of water4 ,the drought had lasted six months4 ,every day the sun rose and set in a sky of cloudless blue4 ,the gardens of the ,conca d',oro1 which surround ,palermo with a magnificent belt of verdure1 were withering4 ,food was becoming scarce4 ,the people were in great alarm4 ,all the most approved methods of procuring rain had been tried without effect4 ,processions had traversed the streets and the fields4 ,men1 women1 and children1 telling their beads1 had lain whole nights before the holy images4 ,consecrated candles had burned day and night in the churches4 ,palm branches1 blessed on ,palm ,sunday1 had been hung on the trees4 ,at ,solaparuta1 in accordance with a very old custom1 the dust swept from the churches on ,palm ,sunday had been spread on the fields4 ,in ordinary years these holy sweepings preserve the crops2 but that year1 if you will believe me1 they had no effect whatever4 ,at ,nicosia the inhabitants1 bare-headed and bare-foot1 carried the crucifixes through all the wards of the town and scourged each other with iron whips4 ,it was all in vain4 ,even the great ,st4 ,francis of ,paolo himself1 who annually performs the miracle of rain and is carried every spring through the market-gardens1 either could not or would not help4 ,masses1 vespers1 concerts1 illuminations1 fire-works--nothing could move him4 ,at last the peasants began to lose patience4 ,most of the saints were banished4 ,at ,palermo they dumped ,st4 ,joseph in a garden to see the state of things for himself1 and they swore to leave him there in the sun till rain fell4 ,other saints were turned1 like naughty children1 with their faces to the wall4 ,others again1 stripped of their beautiful robes1 were exiled far from their parishes1 threatened1 grossly insulted1 ducked in horse-ponds4 ,at ,caltanisetta the golden wings of ,st4 ,michael the ,archangel were torn from his shoulders and replaced with wings of pasteboard2 his purple mantle was taken away and a clout wrapt about him instead4 ,at ,licata the patron saint1 ,st4 ,angelo1 fared even worse1 for he was left without any garments at all2 he was reviled1 he was put in irons1 he was threatened with drowning or hanging4 ,rain or the rope6 roared the angry people at him1 as they shook their fists in his face4 ,sometimes an appeal is made to the pity of the gods4 ,when their corn is being burnt up by the sun1 the ,zulus look out for a heaven bird1 kill it1 and throw it into a pool4 ,then the heaven melts with tenderness for the death of the bird2 it wails for it by raining1 wailing a funeral wail4 ,in ,zululand women sometimes bury their children up to the neck in the ground1 and then retiring to a distance keep up a dismal howl for a long time4 ,the sky is supposed to melt with pity at the sight4 ,then the women dig the children out and feel sure that rain will soon follow4 ,they say that they call to the lord above and ask him to send rain4 ,if it comes they declare that ,usondo rains4 ,in times of drought the ,guanches of ,teneriffe led their sheep to sacred ground1 and there they separated the lambs from their dams1 that their plaintive bleating might touch the heart of the god4 ,in ,kumaon a way of stopping rain is to pour hot oil in the left ear of a dog4 ,the animal howls with pain1 his howls are heard by ,indra1 and out of pity for the beast's sufferings the god stops the rain4 ,sometimes the ,toradjas attempt to procure rain as follows4 ,they place the stalks of certain plants in water1 saying1 ,go and ask for rain1 and so long as no rain falls ,i will not plant you again1 but there shall you die4 ,also they string some fresh-water snails on a cord1 and hang the cord on a tree1 and say to the snails1 ,go and ask for rain1 and so long as no rain comes1 ,i will not take you back to the water4 ,then the snails go and weep1 and the gods take pity and send rain4 ,however1 the foregoing ceremonies are religious rather than magical1 since they involve an appeal to the compassion of higher powers4 ,stones are often supposed to possess the property of bringing on rain1 provided they be dipped in water or sprinkled with it1 or treated in some other appropriate manner4 ,in a ,samoan village a certain stone was carefully housed as the representative of the rain-making god1 and in time of drought his priests carried the stone in procession and dipped it in a stream4 ,among the ,ta-ta-thi tribe of ,new ,south ,wales1 the rain-maker breaks off a piece of quartz-crystal and spits it towards the sky2 the rest of the crystal he wraps in emu feathers1 soaks both crystal and feathers in water1 and carefully hides them4 ,in the ,keramin tribe of ,new ,south ,wales the wizard retires to the bed of a creek1 drops water on a round flat stone1 then covers up and conceals it4 ,among some tribes of ,north-western ,australia the rain-maker repairs to a piece of ground which is set apart for the purpose of rain-making4 ,there he builds a heap of stones or sand1 places on the top of it his magic stone1 and walks or dances round the pile chanting his incantations for hours1 till sheer exhaustion obliges him to desist1 when his place is taken by his assistant4 ,water is sprinkled on the stone and huge fires are kindled4 ,no layman may approach the sacred spot while the mystic ceremony is being performed4 ,when the ,sulka of ,new ,britain wish to procure rain they blacken stones with the ashes of certain fruits and set them out1 along with certain other plants and buds1 in the sun4 ,then a handful of twigs is dipped in water and weighted with stones1 while a spell is chanted4 ,after that rain should follow4 ,in ,manipur1 on a lofty hill to the east of the capital1 there is a stone which the popular imagination likens to an umbrella4 ,when rain is wanted1 the rajah fetches water from a spring below and sprinkles it on the stone4 ,at ,sagami in ,japan there is a stone which draws down rain whenever water is poured on it4 ,when the ,wakondyo1 a tribe of ,central ,africa1 desire rain1 they send to the ,wawamba1 who dwell at the foot of snowy mountains1 and are the happy possessors of a rain-stone4 ,in consideration of a proper payment1 the ,wawamba wash the precious stone1 anoint it with oil1 and put it in a pot full of water4 ,after that the rain cannot fail to come4 ,in the arid wastes of ,arizona and ,new ,mexico the ,apaches sought to make rain by carrying water from a certain spring and throwing it on a particular point high up on a rock2 after that they imagined that the clouds would soon gather1 and that rain would begin to fall4 ,but customs of this sort are not confined to the wilds of ,africa and ,asia or the torrid deserts of ,australia and the ,new ,world4 ,they have been practised in the cool air and under the grey skies of ,europe4 ,there is a fountain called ,barenton1 of romantic fame1 in those wild woods of ,broceliande1 where1 if legend be true1 the wizard ,merlin still sleeps his magic slumber in the hawthorn shade4 ,thither the ,breton peasants used to resort when they needed rain4 ,they caught some of the water in a tankard and threw it on a slab near the spring4 ,on ,snowdon there is a lonely tarn called ,dulyn1 or the ,black ,lake1 lying in a dismal dingle surrounded by high and dangerous rocks4 ,a row of stepping-stones runs out into the lake1 and if any one steps on the stones and throws water so as to wet the farthest stone1 which is called the ,red ,altar1 it is but a chance that you do not get rain before night1 even when it is hot weather4 ,in these cases it appears probable that1 as in ,samoa1 the stone is regarded as more or less divine4 ,this appears from the custom sometimes observed of dipping a cross in the ,fountain of ,barenton to procure rain1 for this is plainly a ,christian substitute for the old pagan way of throwing water on the stone4 ,at various places in ,france it is1 or used till lately to be1 the practice to dip the image of a saint in water as a means of procuring rain4 ,thus1 beside the old priory of ,commagny1 there is a spring of ,st4 ,gervais1 whither the inhabitants go in procession to obtain rain or fine weather according to the needs of the crops4 ,in times of great drought they throw into the basin of the fountain an ancient stone image of the saint that stands in a sort of niche from which the fountain flows4 ,at ,collobrires and ,carpentras a similar practice was observed with the images of ,st4 ,pons and ,st4 ,gens respectively4 ,in several villages of ,navarre prayers for rain used to be offered to ,st4 ,peter1 and by way of enforcing them the villagers carried the image of the saint in procession to the river1 where they thrice invited him to reconsider his resolution and to grant their prayers2 then1 if he was still obstinate1 they plunged him in the water1 despite the remonstrances of the clergy1 who pleaded with as much truth as piety that a simple caution or admonition administered to the image would produce an equally good effect4 ,after this the rain was sure to fall within twenty-four hours4 ,catholic countries do not enjoy a monopoly of making rain by ducking holy images in water4 ,in ,mingrelia1 when the crops are suffering from want of rain1 they take a particularly holy image and dip it in water every day till a shower falls2 and in the ,far ,east the ,shans drench the images of ,buddha with water when the rice is perishing of drought4 ,in all such cases the practice is probably at bottom a sympathetic charm1 however it may be disguised under the appearance of a punishment or a threat4 ,like other peoples1 the ,greeks and ,romans sought to obtain rain by magic1 when prayers and processions had proved ineffectual4 ,for example1 in ,arcadia1 when the corn and trees were parched with drought1 the priest of ,zeus dipped an oak branch into a certain spring on ,mount ,lycaeus4 ,thus troubled1 the water sent up a misty cloud1 from which rain soon fell upon the land4 ,a similar mode of making rain is still practised1 as we have seen1 in ,halmahera near ,new ,guinea4 ,the people of ,crannon in ,thessaly had a bronze chariot which they kept in a temple4 ,when they desired a shower they shook the chariot and the shower fell4 ,probably the rattling of the chariot was meant to imitate thunder2 we have already seen that mock thunder and lightning form part of a rain-charm in ,russia and ,japan4 ,the legendary ,salmoneus1 ,king of ,elis1 made mock thunder by dragging bronze kettles behind his chariot1 or by driving over a bronze bridge1 while he hurled blazing torches in imitation of lightning4 ,it was his impious wish to mimic the thundering car of ,zeus as it rolled across the vault of heaven4 ,indeed he declared that he was actually ,zeus1 and caused sacrifices to be offered to himself as such4 ,near a temple of ,mars1 outside the walls of ,rome1 there was kept a certain stone known as the lapis manalis4 ,in time of drought the stone was dragged into ,rome1 and this was supposed to bring down rain immediately4 #c4 ,the ,magical ,control of the ,sun ,,as ,,the ,,magician thinks he can make rain1 so he fancies he can cause the sun to shine1 and can hasten or stay its going down4 ,at an eclipse the ,ojebways used to imagine that the sun was being extinguished4 ,so they shot fire-tipped arrows in the air1 hoping thus to rekindle his expiring light4 ,the ,sencis of ,peru also shot burning arrows at the sun during an eclipse1 but apparently they did this not so much to relight his lamp as to drive away a savage beast with which they supposed him to be struggling4 ,conversely during an eclipse of the moon some tribes of the ,orinoco used to bury lighted brands in the ground2 because1 said they1 if the moon were to be extinguished1 all fire on earth would be extinguished with her1 except such as was hidden from her sight4 ,during an eclipse of the sun the ,kamtchatkans were wont to bring out fire from their huts and pray the great luminary to shine as before4 ,but the prayer addressed to the sun shows that this ceremony was religious rather than magical4 ,purely magical1 on the other hand1 was the ceremony observed on similar occasions by the ,chilcotin ,indians4 ,men and women tucked up their robes1 as they do in travelling1 and then leaning on staves1 as if they were heavy laden1 they continued to walk in a circle till the eclipse was over4 ,apparently they thought thus to support the failing steps of the sun as he trod his weary round in the sky4 ,similarly in ancient ,egypt the king1 as the representative of the sun1 walked solemnly round the walls of a temple in order to ensure that the sun should perform his daily journey round the sky without the interruption of an eclipse or other mishap4 ,and after the autumnal equinox the ancient ,egyptians held a festival called the nativity of the sun's walking-stick1 because1 as the luminary declined daily in the sky1 and his light and heat diminished1 he was supposed to need a staff on which to lean4 ,in ,new ,caledonia when a wizard desires to make sunshine1 he takes some plants and corals to the burial-ground1 and fashions them into a bundle1 adding two locks of hair cut from a living child of his family1 also two teeth or an entire jawbone from the skeleton of an ancestor4 ,he then climbs a mountain whose top catches the first rays of the morning sun4 ,here he deposits three sorts of plants on a flat stone1 places a branch of dry coral beside them1 and hangs the bundle of charms over the stone4 ,next morning he returns to the spot and sets fire to the bundle at the moment when the sun rises from the sea4 ,as the smoke curls up1 he rubs the stone with the dry coral1 invokes his ancestors and says3 ,sun6 ,i do this that you may be burning hot1 and eat up all the clouds in the sky4 ,the same ceremony is repeated at sunset4 ,the ,new ,caledonians also make a drought by means of a disc-shaped stone with a hole in it4 ,at the moment when the sun rises1 the wizard holds the stone in his hand and passes a burning brand repeatedly into the hole1 while he says3 ,i kindle the sun1 in order that he may eat up the clouds and dry up our land1 so that it may produce nothing4 ,the ,banks ,islanders make sunshine by means of a mock sun4 ,they take a very round stone1 called a vat loa or sunstone1 wind red braid about it1 and stick it with owls' feathers to represent rays1 singing the proper spell in a low voice4 ,then they hang it on some high tree1 such as a banyan or a casuarina1 in a sacred place4 ,the offering made by the ,brahman in the morning is supposed to produce the sun1 and we are told that assuredly it would not rise1 were he not to make that offering4 ,the ancient ,mexicans conceived the sun as the source of all vital force2 hence they named him ,ipalnemohuani1 ,he by whom men live4 ,but if he bestowed life on the world1 he needed also to receive life from it4 ,and as the heart is the seat and symbol of life1 bleeding hearts of men and animals were presented to the sun to maintain him in vigour and enable him to run his course across the sky4 ,thus the ,mexican sacrifices to the sun were magical rather than religious1 being designed1 not so much to please and propitiate him1 as physically to renew his energies of heat1 light1 and motion4 ,the constant demand for human victims to feed the solar fire was met by waging war every year on the neighbouring tribes and bringing back troops of captives to be sacrificed on the altar4 ,thus the ceaseless wars of the ,mexicans and their cruel system of human sacrifices1 the most monstrous on record1 sprang in great measure from a mistaken theory of the solar system4 ,no more striking illustration could be given of the disastrous consequences that may flow in practice from a purely speculative error4 ,the ancient ,greeks believed that the sun drove in a chariot across the sky2 hence the ,rhodians1 who worshipped the sun as their chief deity1 annually dedicated a chariot and four horses to him1 and flung them into the sea for his use4 ,doubtless they thought that after a year's work his old horses and chariot would be worn out4 ,from a like motive1 probably1 the idolatrous kings of ,judah dedicated chariots and horses to the sun1 and the ,spartans1 ,persians1 and ,massagetae sacrificed horses to him4 ,the ,spartans performed the sacrifice on the top of ,mount ,taygetus1 the beautiful range behind which they saw the great luminary set every night4 ,it was as natural for the inhabitants of the valley of ,sparta to do this as it was for the islanders of ,rhodes to throw the chariot and horses into the sea1 into which the sun seemed to them to sink at evening4 ,for thus1 whether on the mountain or in the sea1 the fresh horses stood ready for the weary god where they would be most welcome1 at the end of his day's journey4 ,as some people think they can light up the sun or speed him on his way1 so others fancy they can retard or stop him4 ,in a pass of the ,peruvian ,andes stand two ruined towers on opposite hills4 ,iron hooks are clamped into their walls for the purpose of stretching a net from one tower to the other4 ,the net is intended to catch the sun4 ,stories of men who have caught the sun in a noose are widely spread4 ,when the sun is going southward in the autumn1 and sinking lower and lower in the ,arctic sky1 the ,esquimaux of ,iglulik play the game of cat's cradle in order to catch him in the meshes of the string and so prevent his disappearance4 ,on the contrary1 when the sun is moving northward in the spring1 they play the game of cup-and-ball to hasten his return4 ,when an ,australian blackfellow wishes to stay the sun from going down till he gets home1 he puts a sod in the fork of a tree1 exactly facing the setting sun4 ,on the other hand1 to make it go down faster1 the ,australians throw sand into the air and blow with their mouths towards the sun1 perhaps to waft the lingering orb westward and bury it under the sands into which it appears to sink at night4 ,as some people imagine they can hasten the sun1 so others fancy they can jog the tardy moon4 ,the natives of ,new ,guinea reckon months by the moon1 and some of them have been known to throw stones and spears at the moon1 in order to accelerate its progress and so to hasten the return of their friends1 who were away from home for twelve months working on a tobacco plantation4 ,the ,malays think that a bright glow at sunset may throw a weak person into a fever4 ,hence they attempt to extinguish the glow by spitting out water and throwing ashes at it4 ,the ,shuswap ,indians believe that they can bring on cold weather by burning the wood of a tree that has been struck by lightning4 ,the belief may be based on the observation that in their country cold follows a thunder-storm4 ,hence in spring1 when these ,indians are travelling over the snow on high ground1 they burn splinters of such wood in the fire in order that the crust of the snow may not melt4 #d4 ,the ,magical ,control of the ,wind ,,once more1 the savage thinks he can make the wind to blow or to be still4 ,when the day is hot and a ,yakut has a long way to go1 he takes a stone which he has chanced to find in an animal or fish1 winds a horse-hair several times round it1 and ties it to a stick4 ,he then waves the stick about1 uttering a spell4 ,soon a cool breeze begins to blow4 ,in order to procure a cool wind for nine days the stone should first be dipped in the blood of a bird or beast and then presented to the sun1 while the sorcerer makes three turns contrary to the course of the luminary4 ,if a ,hottentot desires the wind to drop1 he takes one of his fattest skins and hangs it on the end of a pole1 in the belief that by blowing the skin down the wind will lose all its force and must itself fall4 ,fuegian wizards throw shells against the wind to make it drop4 ,the natives of the island of ,bibili1 off ,new ,guinea1 are reputed to make wind by blowing with their mouths4 ,in stormy weather the ,bogadjim people say1 ,the ,bibili folk are at it again1 blowing away4 ,another way of making wind which is practised in ,new ,guinea is to strike a wind-stone lightly with a stick2 to strike it hard would bring on a hurricane4 ,so in ,scotland witches used to raise the wind by dipping a rag in water and beating it thrice on a stone1 saying3 ,i knok this rag upone this stane ,to raise the wind in the divellis name1 ,it sall not lye till ,i please againe4 ,in ,greenland a woman in child-bed and for some time after delivery is supposed to possess the power of laying a storm4 ,she has only to go out of doors1 fill her mouth with air1 and coming back into the house blow it out again4 ,in antiquity there was a family at ,corinth which enjoyed the reputation of being able to still the raging wind2 but we do not know in what manner its members exercised a useful function1 which probably earned for them a more solid recompense than mere repute among the seafaring population of the isthmus4 ,even in ,christian times1 under the reign of ,constantine1 a certain ,sopater suffered death at ,constantinople on a charge of binding the winds by magic1 because it happened that the corn-ships of ,egypt and ,syria were detained afar off by calms or head-winds1 to the rage and disappointment of the hungry ,byzantine rabble4 ,finnish wizards used to sell wind to storm-stayed mariners4 ,the wind was enclosed in three knots2 if they undid the first knot1 a moderate wind sprang up2 if the second1 it blew half a gale2 if the third1 a hurricane4 ,indeed the ,esthonians1 whose country is divided from ,finland only by an arm of the sea1 still believe in the magical powers of their northern neighbours4 ,the bitter winds that blow in spring from the north and north-east1 bringing ague and rheumatic inflammations in their train1 are set down by the simple ,esthonian peasantry to the machinations of the ,finnish wizards and witches4 ,in particular they regard with special dread three days in spring to which they give the name of ,days of the ,cross2 one of them falls on the ,eve of ,ascension ,day4 ,the people in the neighbourhood of ,fellin fear to go out on these days lest the cruel winds from ,lappland should smite them dead4 ,a popular ,esthonian song runs3 ,wind of the ,cross6 rushing and mighty6 ,heavy the blow of thy wings sweeping past6 ,wild wailing wind of misfortune and sorrow1 ,wizards of ,finland ride by on the blast4 ,it is said1 too1 that sailors1 beating up against the wind in the ,gulf of ,finland1 sometimes see a strange sail heave in sight astern and overhaul them hand over hand4 ,on she comes with a cloud of canvas--all her studding-sails out--right in the teeth of the wind1 forging her way through the foaming billows1 dashing back the spray in sheets from her cutwater1 every sail swollen to bursting1 every rope strained to cracking4 ,then the sailors know that she hails from ,finland4 ,the art of tying up the wind in three knots1 so that the more knots are loosed the stronger will blow the wind1 has been attributed to wizards in ,lappland and to witches in ,shetland1 ,lewis1 and the ,isle of ,man4 ,shetland seamen still buy winds in the shape of knotted handkerchiefs or threads from old women who claim to rule the storms4 ,there are said to be ancient crones in ,lerwick now who live by selling wind4 ,ulysses received the winds in a leathern bag from ,aeolus1 ,king of the ,winds4 ,the ,motumotu in ,new ,guinea think that storms are sent by an ,oiabu sorcerer2 for each wind he has a bamboo which he opens at pleasure4 ,on the top of ,mount ,agu in ,togo1 a district of ,west ,africa1 resides a fetish called ,bagba1 who is supposed to control the wind and the rain4 ,his priest is said to keep the winds shut up in great pots4 ,often the stormy wind is regarded as an evil being who may be intimidated1 driven away1 or killed4 ,when storms and bad weather have lasted long and food is scarce with the ,central ,esquimaux1 they endeavour to conjure the tempest by making a long whip of seaweed1 armed with which they go down to the beach and strike out in the direction of the wind1 crying ,taba 7it is enough76 ,once when north-westerly winds had kept the ice long on the coast and food was becoming scarce1 the ,esquimaux performed a ceremony to make a calm4 ,a fire was kindled on the shore1 and the men gathered round it and chanted4 ,an old man then stepped up to the fire and in a coaxing voice invited the demon of the wind to come under the fire and warm himself4 ,when he was supposed to have arrived1 a vessel of water1 to which each man present had contributed1 was thrown on the flames by an old man1 and immediately a flight of arrows sped towards the spot where the fire had been4 ,they thought that the demon would not stay where he had been so badly treated4 ,to complete the effect1 guns were discharged in various directions1 and the captain of a ,european vessel was invited to fire on the wind with cannon4 ,on the twenty-first of ,february #ahhc a similar ceremony was performed by the ,esquimaux of ,point ,barrow1 ,alaska1 with the intention of killing the spirit of the wind4 ,women drove the demon from their houses with clubs and knives1 with which they made passes in the air2 and the men1 gathering round a fire1 shot him with their rifles and crushed him under a heavy stone the moment that steam rose in a cloud from the smouldering embers1 on which a tub of water had just been thrown4 ,the ,lengua ,indians of the ,gran ,chaco ascribe the rush of a whirl-wind to the passage of a spirit and they fling sticks at it to frighten it away4 ,when the wind blows down their huts1 the ,payaguas of ,south ,america snatch up firebrands and run against the wind1 menacing it with the blazing brands1 while others beat the air with their fists to frighten the storm4 ,when the ,guaycurus are threatened by a severe storm1 the men go out armed1 and the women and children scream their loudest to intimidate the demon4 ,during a tempest the inhabitants of a ,batak village in ,sumatra have been seen to rush from their houses armed with sword and lance4 ,the rajah placed himself at their head1 and with shouts and yells they hewed and hacked at the invisible foe4 ,an old woman was observed to be specially active in the defence of her house1 slashing the air right and left with a long sabre4 ,in a violent thunderstorm1 the peals sounding very near1 the ,kayans of ,borneo have been seen to draw their swords threateningly half out of their scabbards1 as if to frighten away the demons of the storm4 ,in ,australia the huge columns of red sand that move rapidly across a desert tract are thought by the natives to be spirits passing along4 ,once an athletic young black ran after one of these moving columns to kill it with boomerangs4 ,he was away two or three hours1 and came back very weary1 saying he had killed ,koochee 7the demon71 but that ,koochee had growled at him and he must die4 ,of the ,bedouins of ,eastern ,africa it is said that no whirl-wind ever sweeps across the path without being pursued by a dozen savages with drawn creeses1 who stab into the centre of the dusty column in order to drive away the evil spirit that is believed to be riding on the blast4 ,in the light of these examples a story told by ,herodotus1 which his modern critics have treated as a fable1 is perfectly credible4 ,he says1 without however vouching for the truth of the tale1 that once in the land of the ,psylli1 the modern ,tripoli1 the wind blowing from the ,sahara had dried up all the water-tanks4 ,so the people took counsel and marched in a body to make war on the south wind4 ,but when they entered the desert the simoon swept down on them and buried them to a man4 ,the story may well have been told by one who watched them disappearing1 in battle array1 with drums and cymbals beating1 into the red cloud of whirling sand4 ,,vi4 ,magicians as ,kings ,,the ,,foregoing evidence may satisfy us that in many lands and many races magic has claimed to control the great forces of nature for the good of man4 ,if that has been so1 the practitioners of the art must necessarily be personages of importance and influence in any society which puts faith in their extravagant pretensions1 and it would be no matter for surprise if1 by virtue of the reputation which they enjoy and of the awe which they inspire1 some of them should attain to the highest position of authority over their credulous fellows4 ,in point of fact magicians appear to have often developed into chiefs and kings4 ,let us begin by looking at the lowest race of men as to whom we possess comparatively full and accurate information1 the aborigines of ,australia4 ,these savages are ruled neither by chiefs nor kings4 ,so far as their tribes can be said to have a political constitution1 it is a democracy or rather an oligarchy of old and influential men1 who meet in council and decide on all measures of importance to the practical exclusion of the younger men4 ,their deliberative assembly answers to the senate of later times3 if we had to coin a word for such a government of elders we might call it a gerontocracy4 ,the elders who in aboriginal ,australia thus meet and direct the affairs of their tribe appear to be for the most part the headmen of their respective totem clans4 ,now in ,central ,australia1 where the desert nature of the country and the almost complete isolation from foreign influences have retarded progress and preserved the natives on the whole in their most primitive state1 the headmen of the various totem clans are charged with the important task of performing magical ceremonies for the multiplication of the totems1 and as the great majority of the totems are edible animals or plants1 it follows that these men are commonly expected to provide the people with food by means of magic4 ,others have to make the rain to fall or to render other services to the community4 ,in short1 among the tribes of ,central ,australia the headmen are public magicians4 ,further1 their most important function is to take charge of the sacred storehouse1 usually a cleft in the rocks or a hole in the ground1 where are kept the holy stones and sticks 7churinga7 with which the souls of all the people1 both living and dead1 are apparently supposed to be in a manner bound up4 ,thus while the headmen have certainly to perform what we should call civil duties1 such as to inflict punishment for breaches of tribal custom1 their principal functions are sacred or magical4 ,when we pass from ,australia to ,new ,guinea we find that1 though the natives stand at a far higher level of culture than the ,australian aborigines1 the constitution of society among them is still essentially democratic or oligarchic1 and chieftainship exists only in embryo4 ,thus ,sir ,william ,mac,gregor tells us that in ,british ,new ,guinea no one has ever arisen wise enough1 bold enough1 and strong enough to become the despot even of a single district4 ,the nearest approach to this has been the very distant one of some person becoming a renowned wizard2 but that has only resulted in levying a certain amount of blackmail4 ,according to a native account1 the origin of the power of ,melanesian chiefs lies entirely in the belief that they have communication with mighty ghosts1 and wield that supernatural power whereby they can bring the influence of the ghosts to bear4 ,if a chief imposed a fine1 it was paid because the people universally dreaded his ghostly power1 and firmly believed that he could inflict calamity and sickness upon such as resisted him4 ,as soon as any considerable number of his people began to disbelieve in his influence with the ghosts1 his power to levy fines was shaken4 ,again1 ,dr4 ,george ,brown tells us that in ,new ,britain a ruling chief was always supposed to exercise priestly functions1 that is1 he professed to be in constant communication with the tebarans 7spirits71 and through their influence he was enabled to bring rain or sunshine1 fair winds or foul ones1 sickness or health1 success or disaster in war1 and generally to procure any blessing or curse for which the applicant was willing to pay a sufficient price4 ,still rising in the scale of culture we come to ,africa1 where both the chieftainship and the kingship are fully developed2 and here the evidence for the evolution of the chief out of the magician1 and especially out of the rain-maker1 is comparatively plentiful4 ,thus among the ,wambugwe1 a ,bantu people of ,east ,africa1 the original form of government was a family republic1 but the enormous power of the sorcerers1 transmitted by inheritance1 soon raised them to the rank of petty lords or chiefs4 ,of the three chiefs living in the country in #ahid two were much dreaded as magicians1 and the wealth of cattle they possessed came to them almost wholly in the shape of presents bestowed for their services in that capacity4 ,their principal art was that of rain-making4 ,the chiefs of the ,wataturu1 another people of ,east ,africa1 are said to be nothing but sorcerers destitute of any direct political influence4 ,again1 among the ,wagogo of ,east ,africa the main power of the chiefs1 we are told1 is derived from their art of rain-making4 ,if a chief cannot make rain himself1 he must procure it from some one who can4 ,again1 among the tribes of the ,upper ,nile the medicine-men are generally the chiefs4 ,their authority rests above all upon their supposed power of making rain1 for rain is the one thing which matters to the people in those districts1 as if it does not come down at the right time it means untold hardships for the community4 ,it is therefore small wonder that men more cunning than their fellows should arrogate to themselves the power of producing it1 or that having gained such a reputation1 they should trade on the credulity of their simpler neighbours4 ,hence most of the chiefs of these tribes are rain-makers1 and enjoy a popularity in proportion to their powers to give rain to their people at the proper season4 4 4 4 ,rain-making chiefs always build their villages on the slopes of a fairly high hill1 as they no doubt know that the hills attract the clouds1 and that they are1 therefore1 fairly safe in their weather forecasts4 ,each of these rain-makers has a number of rain-stones1 such as rock-crystal1 aventurine1 and amethyst1 which he keeps in a pot4 ,when he wishes to produce rain he plunges the stones in water1 and taking in his hand a peeled cane1 which is split at the top1 he beckons with it to the clouds to come or waves them away in the way they should go1 muttering an incantation the while4 ,or he pours water and the entrails of a sheep or goat into a hollow in a stone and then sprinkles the water towards the sky4 ,though the chief acquires wealth by the exercise of his supposed magical powers1 he often1 perhaps generally1 comes to a violent end2 for in time of drought the angry people assemble and kill him1 believing that it is he who prevents the rain from falling4 ,yet the office is usually hereditary and passes from father to son4 ,among the tribes which cherish these beliefs and observe these customs are the ,latuka1 ,bari1 ,laluba1 and ,lokoiya4 ,in ,central ,africa1 again1 the ,lendu tribe1 to the west of ,lake ,albert1 firmly believe that certain people possess the power of making rain4 ,among them the rain-maker either is a chief or almost invariably becomes one4 ,the ,banyoro also have a great respect for the dispensers of rain1 whom they load with a profusion of gifts4 ,the great dispenser1 he who has absolute and uncontrollable power over the rain1 is the king2 but he can depute his power to other persons1 so that the benefit may be distributed and the heavenly water laid on over the various parts of the kingdom4 ,in ,western as well as in ,eastern and ,central ,africa we meet with the same union of chiefly with magical functions4 ,thus in the ,fan tribe the strict distinction between chief and medicine-man does not exist4 ,the chief is also a medicine-man and a smith to boot2 for the ,fans esteem the smith's craft sacred1 and none but chiefs may meddle with it4 ,as to the relation between the offices of chief and rain-maker in ,south ,africa a well-informed writer observes3 ,in very old days the chief was the great ,rain-maker of the tribe4 ,some chiefs allowed no one else to compete with them1 lest a successful ,rain-maker should be chosen as chief4 ,there was also another reason3 the ,rain-maker was sure to become a rich man if he gained a great reputation1 and it would manifestly never do for the chief to allow any one to be too rich4 ,the ,rain-maker exerts tremendous control over the people1 and so it would be most important to keep this function connected with royalty4 ,tradition always places the power of making rain as the fundamental glory of ancient chiefs and heroes1 and it seems probable that it may have been the origin of chieftainship4 ,the man who made the rain would naturally become the chief4 ,in the same way ,chaka the famous ,zulu despot used to declare that he was the only diviner in the country1 for if he allowed rivals his life would be insecure4 ,similarly speaking of the ,south ,african tribes in general1 ,dr4 ,moffat says that the rain-maker is in the estimation of the people no mean personage1 possessing an influence over the minds of the people superior even to that of the king1 who is likewise compelled to yield to the dictates of this arch-official4 ,the foregoing evidence renders it probable that in ,africa the king has often been developed out of the public magician1 and especially out of the rain-maker4 ,the unbounded fear which the magician inspires and the wealth which he amasses in the exercise of his profession may both be supposed to have contributed to his promotion4 ,but if the career of a magician and especially of a rain-maker offers great rewards to the successful practitioner of the art1 it is beset with many pitfalls into which the unskilful or unlucky artist may fall4 ,the position of the public sorcerer is indeed a very precarious one2 for where the people firmly believe that he has it in his power to make the rain to fall1 the sun to shine1 and the fruits of the earth to grow1 they naturally impute drought and dearth to his culpable negligence or wilful obstinacy1 and they punish him accordingly4 ,hence in ,africa the chief who fails to procure rain is often exiled or killed4 ,thus1 in some parts of ,west ,africa1 when prayers and offerings presented to the king have failed to procure rain1 his subjects bind him with ropes and take him by force to the grave of his forefathers that he may obtain from them the needed rain4 ,the ,banjars in ,west ,africa ascribe to their king the power of causing rain or fine weather4 ,so long as the weather is fine they load him with presents of grain and cattle4 ,but if long drought or rain threatens to spoil the crops1 they insult and beat him till the weather changes4 ,when the harvest fails or the surf on the coast is too heavy to allow of fishing1 the people of ,loango accuse their king of a bad heart and depose him4 ,on the ,grain ,coast the high priest or fetish king1 who bears the title of ,bodio1 is responsible for the health of the community1 the fertility of the earth1 and the abundance of fish in the sea and rivers2 and if the country suffers in any of these respects the ,bodio is deposed from his office4 ,in ,ussukuma1 a great district on the southern bank of the ,victoria ,nyanza1 the rain and locust question is part and parcel of the ,sultan's government4 ,he1 too1 must know how to make rain and drive away the locusts4 ,if he and his medicine-men are unable to accomplish this1 his whole existence is at stake in times of distress4 ,on a certain occasion1 when the rain so greatly desired by the people did not come1 the ,sultan was simply driven out 7in ,ututwa1 near ,nassa74 ,the people1 in fact1 hold that rulers must have power over ,nature and her phenomena4 ,again1 we are told of the natives of the ,nyanaza region generally that they are persuaded that rain only falls as a result of magic1 and the important duty of causing it to descend devolves on the chief of the tribe4 ,if rain does not come at the proper time1 everybody complains4 ,more than one petty king has been banished his country because of drought4 ,among the ,latuka of the ,upper ,nile1 when the crops are withering1 and all the efforts of the chief to draw down rain have proved fruitless1 the people commonly attack him by night1 rob him of all he possesses1 and drive him away4 ,but often they kill him4 ,in many other parts of the world kings have been expected to regulate the course of nature for the good of their people and have been punished if they failed to do so4 ,it appears that the ,scythians1 when food was scarce1 used to put their king in bonds4 ,in ancient ,egypt the sacred kings were blamed for the failure of the crops1 but the sacred beasts were also held responsible for the course of nature4 ,when pestilence and other calamities had fallen on the land1 in consequence of a long and severe drought1 the priests took the animals by night and threatened them1 but if the evil did not abate they slew the beasts4 ,on the coral island of ,niue or ,savage ,island1 in the ,south ,pacific1 there formerly reigned a line of kings4 ,but as the kings were also high priests1 and were supposed to make the food grow1 the people became angry with them in times of scarcity and killed them2 till at last1 as one after another was killed1 no one would be king1 and the monarchy came to an end4 ,ancient ,chinese writers inform us that in ,corea the blame was laid on the king whenever too much or too little rain fell and the crops did not ripen4 ,some said that he must be deposed1 others that he must be slain4 ,among the ,american ,indians the furthest advance towards civilisation was made under the monarchical and theocratic governments of ,mexico and ,peru2 but we know too little of the early history of these countries to say whether the predecessors of their deified kings were medicine-men or not4 ,perhaps a trace of such a succession may be detected in the oath which the ,mexican kings1 when they mounted the throne1 swore that they would make the sun to shine1 the clouds to give rain1 the rivers to flow1 and the earth to bring forth fruits in abundance4 ,certainly1 in aboriginal ,america the sorcerer or medicine-man1 surrounded by a halo of mystery and an atmosphere of awe1 was a personage of great influence and importance1 and he may well have developed into a chief or king in many tribes1 though positive evidence of such a development appears to be lacking4 ,thus ,catlin tells us that in ,north ,america the medicine-men are valued as dignitaries in the tribe1 and the greatest respect is paid to them by the whole community2 not only for their skill in their materia medica1 but more especially for their tact in magic and mysteries1 in which they all deal to a very great extent4 4 4 4 ,in all tribes their doctors are conjurers--are magicians--are sooth-sayers1 and ,i had like to have said high-priests1 inasmuch as they superintend and conduct all their religious ceremonies2 they are looked upon by all as oracles of the nation4 ,in all councils of war and peace1 they have a seat with the chiefs1 are regularly consulted before any public step is taken1 and the greatest deference and respect is paid to their opinions4 ,similarly in ,california the shaman was1 and still is1 perhaps the most important individual among the ,maidu4 ,in the absence of any definite system of government1 the word of a shaman has great weight3 as a class they are regarded with much awe1 and as a rule are obeyed much more than the chief4 ,in ,south ,america also the magicians or medicine-men seem to have been on the highroad to chieftainship or kingship4 ,one of the earliest settlers on the coast of ,brazil1 the ,frenchman ,thevet1 reports that the ,indians hold these pages 7or medicine-men7 in such honour and reverence that they adore1 or rather idolise them4 ,you may see the common folk go to meet them1 prostrate themselves1 and pray to them1 saying1 ',grant that ,i be not ill1 that ,i do not die1 neither ,i nor my children1' or some such request4 ,and he answers1 ',you shall not die1 you shall not be ill1' and such like replies4 ,but sometimes if it happens that these pages do not tell the truth1 and things turn out otherwise than they predicted1 the people make no scruple of killing them as unworthy of the title and dignity of pages4 ,among the ,lengua ,indians of the ,gran ,chaco every clan has its cazique or chief1 but he possesses little authority4 ,in virtue of his office he has to make many presents1 so he seldom grows rich and is generally more shabbily clad than any of his subjects4 ,as a matter of fact the magician is the man who has most power in his hands1 and he is accustomed to receive presents instead of to give them4 ,it is the magician's duty to bring down misfortune and plagues on the enemies of his tribe1 and to guard his own people against hostile magic4 ,for these services he is well paid1 and by them he acquires a position of great influence and authority4 ,throughout the ,malay region the rajah or king is commonly regarded with superstitious veneration as the possessor of supernatural powers1 and there are grounds for thinking that he too1 like apparently so many ,african chiefs1 has been developed out of a simple magician4 ,at the present day the ,malays firmly believe that the king possesses a personal influence over the works of nature1 such as the growth of the crops and the bearing of fruit-trees4 ,the same prolific virtue is supposed to reside1 though in a lesser degree1 in his delegates1 and even in the persons of ,europeans who chance to have charge of districts4 ,thus in ,selangor1 one of the native states of the ,malay ,peninsula1 the success or failure of the rice-crops is often attributed to a change of district officers4 ,the ,toorateyas of ,southern ,celebes hold that the prosperity of the rice depends on the behaviour of their princes1 and that bad government1 by which they mean a government which does not conform to ancient custom1 will result in a failure of the crops4 ,the ,dyaks of ,sarawak believed that their famous ,english ruler1 ,rajah ,brooke1 was endowed with a certain magical virtue which1 if properly applied1 could render the rice-crops abundant4 ,hence when he visited a tribe1 they used to bring him the seed which they intended to sow next year1 and he fertilised it by shaking over it the women's necklaces1 which had been previously dipped in a special mixture4 ,and when he entered a village1 the women would wash and bathe his feet1 first with water1 and then with the milk of a young coco-nut1 and lastly with water again1 and all this water which had touched his person they preserved for the purpose of distributing it on their farms1 believing that it ensured an abundant harvest4 ,tribes which were too far off for him to visit used to send him a small piece of white cloth and a little gold or silver1 and when these things had been impregnated by his generative virtue they buried them in their fields1 and confidently expected a heavy crop4 ,once when a ,european remarked that the rice-crops of the ,samban tribe were thin1 the chief immediately replied that they could not be otherwise1 since ,rajah ,brooke had never visited them1 and he begged that ,mr4 ,brooke might be induced to visit his tribe and remove the sterility of their land4 ,the belief that kings possess magical or supernatural powers by virtue of which they can fertilise the earth and confer other benefits on their subjects would seem to have been shared by the ancestors of all the ,aryan races from ,india to ,ireland1 and it has left clear traces of itself in our own country down to modern times4 ,thus the ancient ,hindoo law-book called ,the ,laws of ,manu describes as follows the effects of a good king's reign3 ,in that country where the king avoids taking the property of mortal sinners1 men are born in due time and are long-lived4 ,and the crops of the husbandmen spring up1 each as it was sown1 and the children die not1 and no misshaped offspring is born4 ,in ,homeric ,greece kings and chiefs were spoken of as sacred or divine2 their houses1 too1 were divine and their chariots sacred2 and it was thought that the reign of a good king caused the black earth to bring forth wheat and barley1 the trees to be loaded with fruit1 the flocks to multiply1 and the sea to yield fish4 ,in the ,middle ,ages1 when ,waldemar ,i41 ,king of ,denmark1 travelled in ,germany1 mothers brought their infants and husbandmen their seed for him to lay his hands on1 thinking that children would both thrive the better for the royal touch1 and for a like reason farmers asked him to throw the seed for them4 ,it was the belief of the ancient ,irish that when their kings observed the customs of their ancestors1 the seasons were mild1 the crops plentiful1 the cattle fruitful1 the waters abounded with fish1 and the fruit trees had to be propped up on account of the weight of their produce4 ,a canon attributed to ,st4 ,patrick enumerates among the blessings that attend the reign of a just king fine weather1 calm seas1 crops abundant1 and trees laden with fruit4 ,on the other hand1 dearth1 dryness of cows1 blight of fruit1 and scarcity of corn were regarded as infallible proofs that the reigning king was bad4 ,perhaps the last relic of such superstitions which lingered about our ,english kings was the notion that they could heal scrofula by their touch4 ,the disease was accordingly known as the ,king's ,evil4 ,queen ,elizabeth often exercised this miraculous gift of healing4 ,on ,midsummer ,day #afcc1 ,charles the ,first cured a hundred patients at one swoop in the chapel royal at ,holyrood4 ,but it was under his son ,charles the ,second that the practice seems to have attained its highest vogue4 ,it is said that in the course of his reign ,charles the ,second touched near a hundred thousand persons for scrofula4 ,the press to get near him was sometimes terrific4 ,on one occasion six or seven of those who came to be healed were trampled to death4 ,the cool-headed ,william the ,third contemptuously refused to lend himself to the hocuspocus2 and when his palace was besieged by the usual unsavoury crowd1 he ordered them to be turned away with a dole4 ,on the only occasion when he was importuned into laying his hand on a patient1 he said to him1 ,god give you better health and more sense4 ,however1 the practice was continued1 as might have been expected1 by the dull bigot ,james the ,second and his dull daughter ,queen ,anne4 ,the kings of ,france also claimed to possess the same gift of healing by touch1 which they are said to have derived from ,clovis or from ,st4 ,louis1 while our ,english kings inherited it from ,edward the ,confessor4 ,similarly the savage chiefs of ,tonga were believed to heal scrofula and cases of indurated liver by the touch of their feet2 and the cure was strictly homoeopathic1 for the disease as well as the cure was thought to be caused by contact with the royal person or with anything that belonged to it4 ,on the whole1 then1 we seem to be justified in inferring that in many parts of the world the king is the lineal successor of the old magician or medicine-man4 ,when once a special class of sorcerers has been segregated from the community and entrusted by it with the discharge of duties on which the public safety and welfare are believed to depend1 these men gradually rise to wealth and power1 till their leaders blossom out into sacred kings4 ,but the great social revolution which thus begins with democracy and ends in despotism is attended by an intellectual revolution which affects both the conception and the functions of royalty4 ,for as time goes on1 the fallacy of magic becomes more and more apparent to the acuter minds and is slowly displaced by religion2 in other words1 the magician gives way to the priest1 who1 renouncing the attempt to control directly the processes of nature for the good of man1 seeks to attain the same end indirectly by appealing to the gods to do for him what he no longer fancies he can do for himself4 ,hence the king1 starting as a magician1 tends gradually to exchange the practice of magic for the priestly functions of prayer and sacrifice4 ,and while the distinction between the human and the divine is still imperfectly drawn1 it is often imagined that men may themselves attain to godhead1 not merely after their death1 but in their lifetime1 through the temporary or permanent possession of their whole nature by a great and powerful spirit4 ,no class of the community has benefited so much as kings by this belief in the possible incarnation of a god in human form4 ,the doctrine of that incarnation1 and with it the theory of the divinity of kings in the strict sense of the word1 will form the subject of the following chapter4 ,,vii4 ,incarnate ,human ,gods ,,the ,,instances which in the preceding chapters ,i have drawn from the beliefs and practices of rude peoples all over the world1 may suffice to prove that the savage fails to recognise those limitations to his power over nature which seem so obvious to us4 ,in a society where every man is supposed to be endowed more or less with powers which we should call supernatural1 it is plain that the distinction between gods and men is somewhat blurred1 or rather has scarcely emerged4 ,the conception of gods as superhuman beings endowed with powers to which man possesses nothing comparable in degree and hardly even in kind1 has been slowly evolved in the course of history4 ,by primitive peoples the supernatural agents are not regarded as greatly1 if at all1 superior to man2 for they may be frightened and coerced by him into doing his will4 ,at this stage of thought the world is viewed as a great democracy2 all beings in it1 whether natural or supernatural1 are supposed to stand on a footing of tolerable equality4 ,but with the growth of his knowledge man learns to realise more clearly the vastness of nature and his own littleness and feebleness in presence of it4 ,the recognition of his helplessness does not1 however1 carry with it a corresponding belief in the impotence of those supernatural beings with which his imagination peoples the universe4 ,on the contrary1 it enhances his conception of their power4 ,for the idea of the world as a system of impersonal forces acting in accordance with fixed and invariable laws has not yet fully dawned or darkened upon him4 ,the germ of the idea he certainly has1 and he acts upon it1 not only in magic art1 but in much of the business of daily life4 ,but the idea remains undeveloped1 and so far as he attempts to explain the world he lives in1 he pictures it as the manifestation of conscious will and personal agency4 ,if then he feels himself to be so frail and slight1 how vast and powerful must he deem the beings who control the gigantic machinery of nature6 ,thus as his old sense of equality with the gods slowly vanishes1 he resigns at the same time the hope of directing the course of nature by his own unaided resources1 that is1 by magic1 and looks more and more to the gods as the sole repositories of those supernatural powers which he once claimed to share with them4 ,with the advance of knowledge1 therefore1 prayer and sacrifice assume the leading place in religious ritual2 and magic1 which once ranked with them as a legitimate equal1 is gradually relegated to the background and sinks to the level of a black art4 ,it is not regarded as an encroachment1 at once vain and impious1 on the domain of the gods1 and as such encounters the steady opposition of the priests1 whose reputation and influence rise or fall with those of their gods4 ,hence1 when at a late period the distinction between religion and superstition has emerged1 we find that sacrifice and prayer are the resource of the pious and enlightened portion of the community1 while magic is the refuge of the superstitious and ignorant4 ,but when1 still later1 the conception of the elemental forces as personal agents is giving way to the recognition of natural law2 then magic1 based as it implicitly is on the idea of a necessary and invariable sequence of cause and effect1 independent of personal will1 reappears from the obscurity and discredit into which it had fallen1 and by investigating the causal sequences in nature1 directly prepares the way for science4 ,alchemy leads up to chemistry4 ,the notion of a man-god1 or of a human being endowed with divine or supernatural powers1 belongs essentially to that earlier period of religious history in which gods and men are still viewed as beings of much the same order1 and before they are divided by the impassable gulf which1 to later thought1 opens out between them4 ,strange1 therefore1 as may seem to us the idea of a god incarnate in human form1 it has nothing very startling for early man1 who sees in a man-god or a god-man only a higher degree of the same supernatural powers which he arrogates in perfect good faith to himself4 ,nor does he draw any very sharp distinction between a god and a powerful sorcerer4 ,his gods are often merely invisible magicians who behind the veil of nature work the same sort of charms and incantations which the human magician works in a visible and bodily form among his fellows4 ,and as the gods are commonly believed to exhibit themselves in the likeness of men to their worshippers1 it is easy for the magician1 with his supposed miraculous powers1 to acquire the reputation of being an incarnate deity4 ,thus beginning as little more than a simple conjurer1 the medicine-man or magician tends to blossom out into a full-blown god and king in one4 ,only in speaking of him as a god we must beware of importing into the savage conception of deity those very abstract and complex ideas which we attach to the term4 ,our ideas on this profound subject are the fruit of a long intellectual and moral evolution1 and they are so far from being shared by the savage that he cannot even understand them when they are explained to him4 ,much of the controversy which has raged as to the religion of the lower races has sprung merely from a mutual misunderstanding4 ,the savage does not understand the thoughts of the civilised man1 and few civilised men understand the thoughts of the savage4 ,when the savage uses his word for god1 he has in his mind a being of a certain sort3 when the civilised man uses his word for god1 he has in his mind a being of a very different sort2 and if1 as commonly happens1 the two men are equally unable to place themselves at the other's point of view1 nothing but confusion and mistakes can result from their discussions4 ,if we civilised men insist on limiting the name of ,god to that particular conception of the divine nature which we ourselves have formed1 then we must confess that the savage has no god at all4 ,but we shall adhere more closely to the facts of history if we allow most of the higher savages at least to possess a rudimentary notion of certain supernatural beings who may fittingly be called gods1 though not in the full sense in which we use the word4 ,that rudimentary notion represents in all probability the germ out of which the civilised peoples have gradually evolved their own high conceptions of deity2 and if we could trace the whole course of religious development1 we might find that the chain which links our idea of the ,godhead with that of the savage is one and unbroken4 ,with these explanations and cautions ,i will now adduce some examples of gods who have been believed by their worshippers to be incarnate in living human beings1 whether men or women4 ,the persons in whom a deity is thought to reveal himself are by no means always kings or descendants of kings2 the supposed incarnation may take place even in men of the humblest rank4 ,in ,india1 for example1 one human god started in life as a cotton-bleacher and another as the son of a carpenter4 ,i shall therefore not draw my examples exclusively from royal personages1 as ,i wish to illustrate the general principle of the deification of living men1 in other words1 the incarnation of a deity in human form4 ,such incarnate gods are common in rude society4 ,the incarnation may be temporary or permanent4 ,in the former case1 the incarnation--commonly known as inspiration or possession--reveals itself in supernatural knowledge rather than in supernatural power4 ,in other words1 its usual manifestations are divination and prophecy rather than miracles4 ,on the other hand1 when the incarnation is not merely temporary1 when the divine spirit has permanently taken up its abode in a human body1 the god-man is usually expected to vindicate his character by working miracles4 ,only we have to remember that by men at this stage of thought miracles are not considered as breaches of natural law4 ,not conceiving the existence of natural law1 primitive man cannot conceive a breach of it4 ,a miracle is to him merely an unusually striking manifestation of a common power4 ,the belief in temporary incarnation or inspiration is world-wide4 ,certain persons are supposed to be possessed from time to time by a spirit or deity2 while the possession lasts1 their own personality lies in abeyance1 the presence of the spirit is revealed by convulsive shiverings and shakings of the man's whole body1 by wild gestures and excited looks1 all of which are referred1 not to the man himself1 but to the spirit which has entered into him2 and in this abnormal state all his utterances are accepted as the voice of the god or spirit dwelling in him and speaking through him4 ,thus1 for example1 in the ,sandwich ,islands1 the king1 personating the god1 uttered the responses of the oracle from his concealment in a frame of wicker-work4 ,but in the southern islands of the ,pacific the god frequently entered the priest1 who1 inflated as it were with the divinity1 ceased to act or speak as a voluntary agent1 but moved and spoke as entirely under supernatural influence4 ,in this respect there was a striking resemblance between the rude oracles of the ,polynesians1 and those of the celebrated nations of ancient ,greece4 ,as soon as the god was supposed to have entered the priest1 the latter became violently agitated1 and worked himself up to the highest pitch of apparent frenzy1 the muscles of the limbs seemed convulsed1 the body swelled1 the countenance became terrific1 the features distorted1 and the eyes wild and strained4 ,in this state he often rolled on the earth1 foaming at the mouth1 as if labouring under the influence of the divinity by whom he was possessed1 and1 in shrill cries1 and violent and often indistinct sounds1 revealed the will of the god4 ,the priests1 who were attending1 and versed in the mysteries1 received1 and reported to the people1 the declarations which had been thus received4 ,when the priest had uttered the response of the oracle1 the violent paroxysm gradually subsided1 and comparative composure ensued4 ,the god did not1 however1 always leave him as soon as the communication had been made4 ,sometimes the same taura1 or priest1 continued for two or three days possessed by the spirit or deity2 a piece of a native cloth1 of a peculiar kind1 worn round one arm1 was an indication of inspiration1 or of the indwelling of the god with the individual who wore it4 ,the acts of the man during this period were considered as those of the god1 and hence the greatest attention was paid to his expressions1 and the whole of his deportment4 4 4 4 ,when uruhia 7under the inspiration of the spirit71 the priest was always considered as sacred as the god1 and was called1 during this period1 atua1 god1 though at other times only denominated taura or priest4 ,but examples of such temporary inspiration are so common in every part of the world and are now so familiar through books on ethnology that it is needless to multiply illustrations of the general principle4 ,it may be well1 however1 to refer to two particular modes of producing temporary inspiration1 because they are perhaps less known than some others1 and because we shall have occasion to refer to them later on4 ,one of these modes of producing inspiration is by sucking the fresh blood of a sacrificed victim4 ,in the temple of ,apollo ,diradiotes at ,argos1 a lamb was sacrificed by night once a month2 a woman1 who had to observe a rule of chastity1 tasted the blood of the lamb1 and thus being inspired by the god she prophesied or divined4 ,at ,aegira in ,achaia the priestess of ,earth drank the fresh blood of a bull before she descended into the cave to prophesy4 ,similarly among the ,kuruvikkarans1 a class of bird-catchers and beggars in ,southern ,india1 the goddess ,kali is believed to descend upon the priest1 and he gives oracular replies after sucking the blood which streams from the cut throat of a goat4 ,at a festival of the ,alfoors of ,minahassa1 in ,northern ,celebes1 after a pig has been killed1 the priest rushes furiously at it1 thrusts his head into the carcase1 and drinks of the blood4 ,then he is dragged away from it by force and set on a chair1 whereupon he begins to prophesy how the rice-crop will turn out that year4 ,a second time he runs at the carcase and drinks of the blood2 a second time he is forced into the chair and continues his predictions4 ,it is thought that there is a spirit in him which possesses the power of prophecy4 ,the other mode of producing temporary inspiration1 to which ,i shall here refer1 consists in the use of a sacred tree or plant4 ,thus in the ,hindoo ,koosh a fire is kindled with twigs of the sacred cedar2 and the ,dainyal or sibyl1 with a cloth over her head1 inhales the thick pungent smoke till she is seized with convulsions and falls senseless to the ground4 ,soon she rises and raises a shrill chant1 which is caught up and loudly repeated by her audience4 ,so ,apollo's prophetess ate the sacred laurel and was fumigated with it before she prophesied4 ,the ,bacchanals ate ivy1 and their inspired fury was by some believed to be due to the exciting and intoxicating properties of the plant4 ,in ,uganda the priest1 in order to be inspired by his god1 smokes a pipe of tobacco fiercely till he works himself into a frenzy2 the loud excited tones in which he then talks are recognised as the voice of the god speaking through him4 ,in ,madura1 an island off the north coast of ,java1 each spirit has its regular medium1 who is oftener a woman than a man4 ,to prepare herself for the reception of the spirit she inhales the fumes of incense1 sitting with her head over a smoking censer4 ,gradually she falls into a sort of trance accompanied by shrieks1 grimaces1 and violent spasms4 ,the spirit is now supposed to have entered into her1 and when she grows calmer her words are regarded as oracular1 being the utterances of the indwelling spirit1 while her own soul is temporarily absent4 ,the person temporarily inspired is believed to acquire1 not merely divine knowledge1 but also1 at least occasionally1 divine power4 ,in ,cambodia1 when an epidemic breaks out1 the inhabitants of several villages unite and go with a band of music at their head to look for the man whom the local god is supposed to have chosen for his temporary incarnation4 ,when found1 the man is conducted to the altar of the god1 where the mystery of incarnation takes place4 ,then the man becomes an object of veneration to his fellows1 who implore him to protect the village against the plague4 ,a certain image of ,apollo1 which stood in a sacred cave at ,hylae near ,magnesia1 was thought to impart superhuman strength4 ,sacred men1 inspired by it1 leaped down precipices1 tore up huge trees by the roots1 and carried them on their backs along the narrowest defiles4 ,the feats performed by inspired dervishes belong to the same class4 ,thus far we have seen that the savage1 failing to discern the limits of his ability to control nature1 ascribes to himself and to all men certain powers which we should now call supernatural4 ,further1 we have seen that1 over and above this general supernaturalism1 some persons are supposed to be inspired for short periods by a divine spirit1 and thus temporarily to enjoy the knowledge and power of the indwelling deity4 ,from beliefs like these it is an easy step to the conviction that certain men are permanently possessed by a deity1 or in some other undefined way are endued with so high a degree of supernatural power as to be ranked as gods and to receive the homage of prayer and sacrifice4 ,sometimes these human gods are restricted to purely supernatural or spiritual functions4 ,sometimes they exercise supreme political power in addition4 ,in the latter case they are kings as well as gods1 and the government is a theocracy4 ,thus in the ,marquesas or ,washington ,islands there was a class of men who were deified in their lifetime4 ,they were supposed to wield a supernatural power over the elements3 they could give abundant harvests or smite the ground with barrenness2 and they could inflict disease or death4 ,human sacrifices were offered to them to avert their wrath4 ,there were not many of them1 at the most one or two in each island4 ,they lived in mystic seclusion4 ,their powers were sometimes1 but not always1 hereditary4 ,a missionary has described one of these human gods from personal observation4 ,the god was a very old man who lived in a large house within an enclosure4 ,in the house was a kind of altar1 and on the beams of the house and on the trees round it were hung human skeletons1 head down4 ,no one entered the enclosure except the persons dedicated to the service of the god2 only on days when human victims were sacrificed might ordinary people penetrate into the precinct4 ,this human god received more sacrifices than all the other gods2 often he would sit on a sort of scaffold in front of his house and call for two or three human victims at a time4 ,they were always brought1 for the terror he inspired was extreme4 ,he was invoked all over the island1 and offerings were sent to him from every side4 ,again1 of the ,south ,sea ,islands in general we are told that each island had a man who represented or personified the divinity4 ,such men were called gods1 and their substance was confounded with that of the deity4 ,the man-god was sometimes the king himself2 oftener he was a priest or subordinate chief4 ,the ancient ,egyptians1 far from restricting their adoration to cats and dogs and such small deer1 very liberally extended it to men4 ,one of these human deities resided at the village of ,anabis1 and burnt sacrifices were offered to him on the altars2 after which1 says ,porphyry1 he would eat his dinner just as if he were an ordinary mortal4 ,in classical antiquity the ,sicilian philosopher ,empedocles gave himself out to be not merely a wizard but a god4 ,addressing his fellow-citizens in verse he said3 ,o friends1 in this great city that climbs the yellow slope ,of ,agrigentum's citadel1 who make good works your scope1 ,who offer to the stranger a haven quiet and fair1 ,all hail6 ,among you honoured ,i walk with lofty air4 ,with garlands1 blooming garlands you crown my noble brow1 ,a mortal man no longer1 a deathless godhead now4 ,where e'er ,i go1 the people crowd round and worship pay1 ,and thousands follow seeking to learn the better way4 ,some crave prophetic visions1 some smit with anguish sore ,would fain hear words of comfort and suffer pain no more4 ,he asserted that he could teach his disciples how to make the wind to blow or be still1 the rain to fall and the sun to shine1 how to banish sickness and old age and to raise the dead4 ,when ,demetrius ,poliorcetes restored the ,athenian democracy in #cjg ,b4,c41 the ,athenians decreed divine honours to him and his father ,antigonus1 both of them being then alive1 under the title of the ,saviour ,gods4 ,altars were set up to the ,saviours1 and a priest appointed to attend to their worship4 ,the people went forth to meet their deliverer with hymns and dances1 with garlands and incense and libations2 they lined the streets and sang that he was the only true god1 for the other gods slept1 or dwelt far away1 or were not4 ,in the words of a contemporary poet1 which were chanted in public and sung in private3 ,of all the gods the greatest and the dearest ,to the city are come4 ,for ,demeter and ,demetrius ,together time has brought4 ,she comes to hold the ,maiden's awful rites1 ,and he joyous and fair and laughing1 ,as befits a god4 ,a glorious sight1 with all his friends about him1 ,he in their midst1 ,they like to stars1 and he the sun4 ,son of ,poseidon the mighty1 ,aphrodite's son1 ,all hail6 ,the other gods dwell far away1 ,or have no ears1 ,or are not1 or pay us no heed4 ,but thee we present see1 ,no god of wood or stone1 but godhead true4 ,therefore to thee we pray4 ,the ancient ,germans believed that there was something holy in women1 and accordingly consulted them as oracles4 ,their sacred women1 we are told1 looked on the eddying rivers and listened to the murmur or the roar of the water1 and from the sight and sound foretold what would come to pass4 ,but often the veneration of the men went further1 and they worshipped women as true and living goddesses4 ,for example1 in the reign of ,vespasian a certain ,veleda1 of the tribe of the ,bructeri1 was commonly held to be a deity1 and in that character reigned over her people1 her sway being acknowledged far and wide4 ,she lived in a tower on the river ,lippe1 a tributary of the ,rhine4 ,when the people of ,cologne sent to make a treaty with her1 the ambassadors were not admitted to her presence2 the negotiations were conducted through a minister1 who acted as the mouthpiece of her divinity and reported her oracular utterances4 ,the example shows how easily among our rude forefathers the ideas of divinity and royalty coalesced4 ,it is said that among the ,getae down to the beginning of our era there was always a man who personified a god and was called ,god by the people4 ,he dwelt on a sacred mountain and acted as adviser to the king4 ,according to the early ,portuguese historian1 ,dos ,santos1 the ,zimbas1 or ,muzimbas1 a people of ,south-eastern ,africa1 do not adore idols or recognize any god1 but instead they venerate and honour their king1 whom they regard as a divinity1 and they say he is the greatest and best in the world4 ,and the said king says of himself that he alone is god of the earth1 for which reason if it rains when he does not wish it to do so1 or is too hot1 he shoots arrows at the sky for not obeying him4 ,the ,mashona of ,southern ,africa informed their bishop that they had once had a god1 but that the ,matabeles had driven him away4 ,this last was in reference to a curious custom in some villages of keeping a man they called their god4 ,he seemed to be consulted by the people and had presents given to him4 ,there was one at a village belonging to a chief ,magondi1 in the old days4 ,we were asked not to fire off any guns near the village1 or we should frighten him away4 ,this ,mashona god was formerly bound to render an annual tribute to the king of the ,matabele in the shape of four black oxen and one dance4 ,a missionary has seen and described the deity discharging the latter part of his duty in front of the royal hut4 ,for three mortal hours1 without a break1 to the banging of a tambourine1 the click of castanettes1 and the drone of a monotonous song1 the swarthy god engaged in a frenzied dance1 crouching on his hams like a tailor1 sweating like a pig1 and bounding about with an agility which testified to the strength and elasticity of his divine legs4 ,the ,baganda of ,central ,africa believed in a god of ,lake ,nyanza1 who sometimes took up his abode in a man or woman4 ,the incarnate god was much feared by all the people1 including the king and the chiefs4 ,when the mystery of incarnation had taken place1 the man1 or rather the god1 removed about a mile and a half from the margin of the lake1 and there awaited the appearance of the new moon before he engaged in his sacred duties4 ,from the moment that the crescent moon appeared faintly in the sky1 the king and all his subjects were at the command of the divine man1 or ,lubare 7god71 as he was called1 who reigned supreme not only in matters of faith and ritual1 but also in questions of war and state policy4 ,he was consulted as an oracle2 by his word he could inflict or heal sickness1 withhold rain1 and cause famine4 ,large presents were made him when his advice was sought4 ,the chief of ,urua1 a large region to the west of ,lake ,tanganyika1 arrogates to himself divine honours and power and pretends to abstain from food for days without feeling its necessity2 and1 indeed1 declares that as a god he is altogether above requiring food and only eats1 drinks1 and smokes for the pleasure it affords him4 ,among the ,gallas1 when a woman grows tired of the cares of housekeeping1 she begins to talk incoherently and to demean herself extravagantly4 ,this is a sign of the descent of the holy spirit ,callo upon her4 ,immediately her husband prostrates himself and adores her2 she ceases to bear the humble title of wife and is called ,lord2 domestic duties have no further claim on her1 and her will is a divine law4 ,the king of ,loango is honoured by his people as though he were a god2 and he is called ,sambee and ,pango1 which mean god4 ,they believe that he can let them have rain when he likes2 and once a year1 in ,december1 which is the time they want rain1 the people come to beg of him to grant it to them4 ,on this occasion the king1 standing on his throne1 shoots an arrow into the air1 which is supposed to bring on rain4 ,much the same is said of the king of ,mombasa4 ,down to a few years ago1 when his spiritual reign on earth was brought to an abrupt end by the carnal weapons of ,english marines and bluejackets1 the king of ,benin was the chief object of worship in his dominions4 ,he occupies a higher post here than the ,pope does in ,catholic ,europe2 for he is not only ,god's vicegerent upon earth1 but a god himself1 whose subjects both obey and adore him as such1 although ,i believe their adoration to arise rather from fear than love4 ,the king of ,iddah told the ,english officers of the ,niger ,expedition1 ,god made me after his own image2 ,i am all the same as ,god2 and he appointed me a king4 ,a peculiarly bloodthirsty monarch of ,burma1 by name ,badonsachen1 whose very countenance reflected the inbred ferocity of his nature1 and under whose reign more victims perished by the executioner than by the common enemy1 conceived the notion that he was something more than mortal1 and that this high distinction had been granted him as a reward for his numerous good works4 ,accordingly he laid aside the title of king and aimed at making himself a god4 ,with this view1 and in imitation of ,buddha1 who1 before being advanced to the rank of a divinity1 had quitted his royal palace and seraglio and retired from the world1 ,badonsachen withdrew from his palace to an immense pagoda1 the largest in the empire1 which he had been engaged in constructing for many years4 ,here he held conferences with the most learned monks1 in which he sought to persuade them that the five thousand years assigned for the observance of the law of ,buddha were now elapsed1 and that he himself was the god who was destined to appear after that period1 and to abolish the old law by substituting his own4 ,but to his great mortification many of the monks undertook to demonstrate the contrary2 and this disappointment1 combined with his love of power and his impatience under the restraints of an ascetic life1 quickly disabused him of his imaginary godhead1 and drove him back to his palace and his harem4 ,the king of ,siam is venerated equally with a divinity4 ,his subjects ought not to look him in the face2 they prostrate themselves before him when he passes1 and appear before him on their knees1 their elbows resting on the ground4 ,there is a special language devoted to his sacred person and attributes1 and it must be used by all who speak to or of him4 ,even the natives have difficulty in mastering this peculiar vocabulary4 ,the hairs of the monarch's head1 the soles of his feet1 the breath of his body1 indeed every single detail of his person1 both outward and inward1 have particular names4 ,when he eats or drinks1 sleeps or walks1 a special word indicates that these acts are being performed by the sovereign1 and such words cannot possibly be applied to the acts of any other person whatever4 ,there is no word in the ,siamese language by which any creature of higher rank or greater dignity than a monarch can be described2 and the missionaries1 when they speak of ,god1 are forced to use the native word for king4 ,but perhaps no country in the world has been so prolific of human gods as ,india2 nowhere has the divine grace been poured out in a more liberal measure on all classes of society from kings down to milkmen4 ,thus amongst the ,todas1 a pastoral people of the ,neilgherry ,hills of ,southern ,india1 the dairy is a sanctuary1 and the milkman who attends to it has been described as a god4 ,on being asked whether the ,todas salute the sun1 one of these divine milkmen replied1 ,those poor fellows do so1 but ,i1 tapping his chest1 ,i1 a god6 why should ,i salute the sun8 ,every one1 even his own father1 prostrates himself before the milkman1 and no one would dare to refuse him anything4 ,no human being1 except another milkman1 may touch him2 and he gives oracles to all who consult him1 speaking with the voice of a god4 ,further1 in ,india every king is regarded as little short of a present god4 ,the ,hindoo law-book of ,manu goes farther and says that even an infant king must not be despised from an idea that he is a mere mortal2 for he is a great deity in human form4 ,there is said to have been a sect in ,orissa some years ago who worshipped the late ,queen ,victoria in her lifetime as their chief divinity4 ,and to this day in ,india all living persons remarkable for great strength or valour or for supposed miraculous powers run the risk of being worshipped as gods4 ,thus1 a sect in the ,punjaub worshipped a deity whom they called ,nikkal ,sen4 ,this ,nikkal ,sen was no other than the redoubted ,general ,nicholson1 and nothing that the general could do or say damped the ardour of his adorers4 ,the more he punished them1 the greater grew the religious awe with which they worshipped him4 ,at ,benares not many years ago a celebrated deity was incarnate in the person of a ,hindoo gentleman who rejoiced in the euphonious name of ,swami ,bhaskaranandaji ,saraswati1 and looked uncommonly like the late ,cardinal ,manning1 only more ingenuous4 ,his eyes beamed with kindly human interest1 and he took what is described as an innocent pleasure in the divine honours paid him by his confiding worshippers4 ,at ,chinchvad1 a small town about ten miles from ,poona in ,western ,india1 there lives a family of whom one in each generation is believed by a large proportion of the ,mahrattas to be an incarnation of the elephant-headed god ,gunputty4 ,that celebrated deity was first made flesh about the year #afdj in the person of a ,brahman of ,poona1 by name ,mooraba ,gosseyn1 who sought to work out his salvation by abstinence1 mortification1 and prayer4 ,his piety had its reward4 ,the god himself appeared to him in a vision of the night and promised that a portion of his1 that is1 of ,gunputty's holy spirit should abide with him and with his seed after him even to the seventh generation4 ,the divine promise was fulfilled4 ,seven successive incarnations1 transmitted from father to son1 manifested the light of ,gunputty to a dark world4 ,the last of the direct line1 a heavy-looking god with very weak eyes1 died in the year #ahaj4 ,but the cause of truth was too sacred1 and the value of the church property too considerable1 to allow the ,brahmans to contemplate with equanimity the unspeakable loss that would be sustained by a world which knew not ,gunputty4 ,accordingly they sought and found a holy vessel in whom the divine spirit of the master had revealed itself anew1 and the revelation has been happily continued in an unbroken succession of vessels from that time to this4 ,but a mysterious law of spiritual economy1 whose operation in the history of religion we may deplore though we cannot alter1 has decreed that the miracles wrought by the god-man in these degenerate days cannot compare with those which were wrought by his predecessors in days gone by2 and it is even reported that the only sign vouchsafed by him to the present generation of vipers is the miracle of feeding the multitude whom he annually entertains to dinner at ,chinchvad4 ,a ,hindoo sect1 which has many representatives in ,bombay and ,central ,india1 holds that its spiritual chiefs or ,maharajas1 as they are called1 are representatives or even actual incarnations on earth of the god ,krishna4 ,and as ,krishna looks down from heaven with most favour on such as minister to the wants of his successors and vicars on earth1 a peculiar rite called ,self-devotion has been instituted1 whereby his faithful worshippers make over their bodies1 their souls1 and1 what is perhaps still more important1 their worldly substance to his adorable incarnations2 and women are taught to believe that the highest bliss for themselves and their families is to be attained by yielding themselves to the embraces of those beings in whom the divine nature mysteriously coexists with the form and even the appetites of true humanity4 ,christianity itself has not uniformly escaped the taint of these unhappy delusions2 indeed it has often been sullied by the extravagances of vain pretenders to a divinity equal to or even surpassing that of its great ,founder4 ,in the second century ,montanus the ,phrygian claimed to be the incarnate ,trinity1 uniting in his single person ,god the ,father1 ,god the ,son1 and ,god the ,holy ,ghost4 ,nor is this an isolated case1 the exorbitant pretension of a single ill-balanced mind4 ,from the earliest times down to the present day many sects have believed that ,christ1 nay ,god himself1 is incarnate in every fully initiated ,christian1 and they have carried this belief to its logical conclusion by adoring each other4 ,tertullian records that this was done by his fellow-,christians at ,carthage in the second century2 the disciples of ,st4 ,columba worshipped him as an embodiment of ,christ2 and in the eighth century ,elipandus of ,toledo spoke of ,christ as a god among gods1 meaning that all believers were gods just as truly as ,jesus himself4 ,the adoration of each other was customary among the ,albigenses1 and is noticed hundreds of times in the records of the ,inquisition at ,toulouse in the early part of the fourteenth century4 ,in the thirteenth century there arose a sect called the ,brethren and ,sisters of the ,free ,spirit1 who held that by long and assiduous contemplation any man might be united to the deity in an ineffable manner and become one with the source and parent of all things1 and that he who had thus ascended to ,god and been absorbed in his beatific essence1 actually formed part of the ,godhead1 was the ,son of ,god in the same sense and manner with ,christ himself1 and enjoyed thereby a glorious immunity from the trammels of all laws human and divine4 ,inwardly transported by this blissful persuasion1 though outwardly presenting in their aspect and manners a shocking air of lunacy and distraction1 the sectaries roamed from place to place1 attired in the most fantastic apparel and begging their bread with wild shouts and clamour1 spurning indignantly every kind of honest labour and industry as an obstacle to divine contemplation and to the ascent of the soul towards the ,father of spirits4 ,in all their excursions they were followed by women with whom they lived on terms of the closest familiarity4 ,those of them who conceived they had made the greatest proficiency in the higher spiritual life dispensed with the use of clothes altogether in their assemblies1 looking upon decency and modesty as marks of inward corruption1 characteristics of a soul that still grovelled under the dominion of the flesh and had not yet been elevated into communion with the divine spirit1 its centre and source4 ,sometimes their progress towards this mystic communion was accelerated by the ,inquisition1 and they expired in the flames1 not merely with unclouded serenity1 but with the most triumphant feelings of cheerfulness and joy4 ,about the year #ahcj there appeared1 in one of the ,states of the ,american ,union bordering on ,kentucky1 an impostor who declared that he was the ,son of ,god1 the ,saviour of mankind1 and that he had reappeared on earth to recall the impious1 the unbelieving1 and sinners to their duty4 ,he protested that if they did not mend their ways within a certain time1 he would give the signal1 and in a moment the world would crumble to ruins4 ,these extravagant pretensions were received with favour even by persons of wealth and position in society4 ,at last a ,german humbly besought the new ,messiah to announce the dreadful catastrophe to his fellow-countrymen in the ,german language1 as they did not understand ,english1 and it seemed a pity that they should be damned merely on that account4 ,the would-be ,saviour in reply confessed with great candour that he did not know ,german4 ,what6 retorted the ,german1 you the ,son of ,god1 and don't speak all languages1 and don't even know ,german8 ,come1 come1 you are a knave1 a hypocrite1 and a madman4 ,bedlam is the place for you4 ,the spectators laughed1 and went away ashamed of their credulity4 ,sometimes1 at the death of the human incarnation1 the divine spirit transmigrates into another man4 ,the ,buddhist ,tartars believe in a great number of living ,buddhas1 who officiate as ,grand ,lamas at the head of the most important monasteries4 ,when one of these ,grand ,lamas dies his disciples do not sorrow1 for they know that he will soon reappear1 being born in the form of an infant4 ,their only anxiety is to discover the place of his birth4 ,if at this time they see a rainbow they take it as a sign sent them by the departed ,lama to guide them to his cradle4 ,sometimes the divine infant himself reveals his identity4 ,i am the ,grand ,lama1 he says1 the living ,buddha of such and such a temple4 ,take me to my old monastery4 ,i am its immortal head4 ,in whatever way the birthplace of the ,buddha is revealed1 whether by the ,buddha's own avowal or by the sign in the sky1 tents are struck1 and the joyful pilgrims1 often headed by the king or one of the most illustrious of the royal family1 set forth to find and bring home the infant god4 ,generally he is born in ,tibet1 the holy land1 and to reach him the caravan has often to traverse the most frightful deserts4 ,when at last they find the child they fall down and worship him4 ,before1 however1 he is acknowledged as the ,grand ,lama whom they seek he must satisfy them of his identity4 ,he is asked the name of the monastery of which he claims to be the head1 how far off it is1 and how many monks live in it2 he must also describe the habits of the deceased ,grand ,lama and the manner of his death4 ,then various articles1 as prayer-books1 tea-pots1 and cups1 are placed before him1 and he has to point out those used by himself in his previous life4 ,if he does so without a mistake his claims are admitted1 and he is conducted in triumph to the monastery4 ,at the head of all the ,lamas is the ,dalai ,lama of ,lhasa1 the ,rome of ,tibet4 ,he is regarded as a living god1 and at death his divine and immortal spirit is born again in a child4 ,according to some accounts the mode of discovering the ,dalai ,lama is similar to the method1 already described1 of discovering an ordinary ,grand ,lama4 ,other accounts speak of an election by drawing lots from a golden jar4 ,wherever he is born1 the trees and plants put forth green leaves2 at his bidding flowers bloom and springs of water rise2 and his presence diffuses heavenly blessings4 ,but he is by no means the only man who poses as a god in these regions4 ,a register of all the incarnate gods in the ,chinese empire is kept in the ,li fan yiian or ,colonial ,office at ,peking4 ,the number of gods who have thus taken out a license is one hundred and sixty4 ,tibet is blessed with thirty of them1 ,northern ,mongolia rejoices in nineteen1 and ,southern ,mongolia basks in the sunshine of no less than fifty-seven4 ,the ,chinese government1 with a paternal solicitude for the welfare of its subjects1 forbids the gods on the register to be reborn anywhere but in ,tibet4 ,they fear lest the birth of a god in ,mongolia should have serious political consequences by stirring the dormant patriotism and warlike spirit of the ,mongols1 who might rally round an ambitious native deity of royal lineage and seek to win for him1 at the point of the sword1 a temporal as well as a spiritual kingdom4 ,but besides these public or licensed gods there are a great many little private gods1 or unlicensed practitioners of divinity1 who work miracles and bless their people in holes and corners2 and of late years the ,chinese government has winked at the rebirth of these pettifogging deities outside of ,tibet4 ,however1 once they are born1 the government keeps its eye on them as well as on the regular practitioners1 and if any of them misbehaves he is promptly degraded1 banished to a distant monastery1 and strictly forbidden ever to be born again in the flesh4 ,from our survey of the religious position occupied by the king in rude societies we may infer that the claim to divine and supernatural powers put forward by the monarchs of great historical empires like those of ,egypt1 ,mexico1 and ,peru1 was not the simple outcome of inflated vanity or the empty expression of a grovelling adulation2 it was merely a survival and extension of the old savage apotheosis of living kings4 ,thus1 for example1 as children of the ,sun the ,incas of ,peru were revered like gods2 they could do no wrong1 and no one dreamed of offending against the person1 honour1 or property of the monarch or of any of the royal race4 ,hence1 too1 the ,incas did not1 like most people1 look on sickness as an evil4 ,they considered it a messenger sent from their father the ,sun to call them to come and rest with him in heaven4 ,therefore the usual words in which an ,inca announced his approaching end were these3 ,my father calls me to come and rest with him4 ,they would not oppose their father's will by offering sacrifice for recovery1 but openly declared that he had called them to his rest4 ,issuing from the sultry valleys upon the lofty tableland of the ,colombian ,andes1 the ,spanish conquerors were astonished to find1 in contrast to the savage hordes they had left in the sweltering jungles below1 a people enjoying a fair degree of civilisation1 practising agriculture1 and living under a government which ,humboldt has compared to the theocracies of ,tibet and ,japan4 ,these were the ,chibchas1 ,muyscas1 or ,mozcas1 divided into two kingdoms1 with capitals at ,bogota and ,tunja1 but united apparently in spiritual allegiance to the high pontiff of ,sogamozo or ,iraca4 ,by a long and ascetic novitiate1 this ghostly ruler was reputed to have acquired such sanctity that the waters and the rain obeyed him1 and the weather depended on his will4 ,the ,mexican kings at their accession1 as we have seen1 took an oath that they would make the sun to shine1 the clouds to give rain1 the rivers to flow1 and the earth to bring forth fruits in abundance4 ,we are told that ,montezuma1 the last king of ,mexico1 was worshipped by his people as a god4 ,the early ,babylonian kings1 from the time of ,sargon ,i4 till the fourth dynasty of ,ur or later1 claimed to be gods in their lifetime4 ,the monarchs of the fourth dynasty of ,ur in particular had temples built in their honour2 they set up their statues in various sanctuaries and commanded the people to sacrifice to them2 the eighth month was especially dedicated to the kings1 and sacrifices were offered to them at the new moon and on the fifteenth of each month4 ,again1 the ,parthian monarchs of the ,arsacid house styled themselves brothers of the sun and moon and were worshipped as deities4 ,it was esteemed sacrilege to strike even a private member of the ,arsacid family in a brawl4 ,the kings of ,egypt were deified in their lifetime1 sacrifices were offered to them1 and their worship was celebrated in special temples and by special priests4 ,indeed the worship of the kings sometimes cast that of the gods into the shade4 ,thus in the reign of ,merenra a high official declared that he had built many holy places in order that the spirits of the king1 the ever-living ,merenra1 might be invoked more than all the gods4 ,it has never been doubted that the king claimed actual divinity2 he was the 'great god1' the'golden ,horus1' and son of ,ra4 ,he claimed authority not only over ,egypt1 but over'all lands and nations1''the whole world in its length and its breadth1 the east and the west1''the entire compass of the great circuit of the sun1''the sky and what is in it1 the earth and all that is upon it1''every creature that walks upon two or upon four legs1 all that fly or flutter1 the whole world offers her productions to him4' ,whatever in fact might be asserted of the ,sun-god1 was dogmatically predicable of the king of ,egypt4 ,his titles were directly derived from those of the ,sun-god4 ,in the course of his existence1 we are told1 the king of ,egypt exhausted all the possible conceptions of divinity which the ,egyptians had framed for themselves4 ,a superhuman god by his birth and by his royal office1 he became the deified man after his death4 ,thus all that was known of the divine was summed up in him4 ,we have now completed our sketch1 for it is no more than a sketch1 of the evolution of that sacred kingship which attained its highest form1 its most absolute expression1 in the monarchies of ,peru and ,egypt4 ,historically1 the institution appears to have originated in the order of public magicians or medicine-men2 logically it rests on a mistaken deduction from the association of ideas4 ,men mistook the order of their ideas for the order of nature1 and hence imagined that the control which they have1 or seem to have1 over their thoughts1 permitted them to exercise a corresponding control over things4 ,the men who for one reason or another1 because of the strength or the weakness of their natural parts1 were supposed to possess these magical powers in the highest degree1 were gradually marked off from their fellows and became a separate class1 who were destined to exercise a most far-reaching influence on the political1 religious1 and intellectual evolution of mankind4 ,social progress1 as we know1 consists mainly in a successive differentiation of functions1 or1 in simpler language1 a division of labour4 ,the work which in primitive society is done by all alike and by all equally ill1 or nearly so1 is gradually distributed among different classes of workers and executed more and more perfectly2 and so far as the products1 material or immaterial1 of this specialised labour are shared by all1 the whole community benefits by the increasing specialisation4 ,now magicians or medicine-men appear to constitute the oldest artificial or professional class in the evolution of society4 ,for sorcerers are found in every savage tribe known to us2 and among the lowest savages1 such as the ,australian aborigines1 they are the only professional class that exists4 ,as time goes on1 and the process of differentiation continues1 the order of medicine-men is itself subdivided into such classes as the healers of disease1 the makers of rain1 and so forth2 while the most powerful member of the order wins for himself a position as chief and gradually develops into a sacred king1 his old magical functions falling more and more into the background and being exchanged for priestly or even divine duties1 in proportion as magic is slowly ousted by religion4 ,still later1 a partition is effected between the civil and the religious aspect of the kingship1 the temporal power being committed to one man and the spiritual to another4 ,meanwhile the magicians1 who may be repressed but cannot be extirpated by the predominance of religion1 still addict themselves to their old occult arts in preference to the newer ritual of sacrifice and prayer2 and in time the more sagacious of their number perceive the fallacy of magic and hit upon a more effectual mode of manipulating the forces of nature for the good of man2 in short1 they abandon sorcery for science4 ,i am far from affirming that the course of development has everywhere rigidly followed these lines3 it has doubtless varied greatly in different societies4 ,i merely mean to indicate in the broadest outline what ,i conceive to have been its general trend4 ,regarded from the industrial point of view the evolution has been from uniformity to diversity of function3 regarded from the political point of view1 it has been from democracy to despotism4 ,with the later history of monarchy1 especially with the decay of despotism and its displacement by forms of government better adapted to the higher needs of humanity1 we are not concerned in this enquiry3 our theme is the growth1 not the decay1 of a great and1 in its time1 beneficent institution4 ,,viii4 ,departmental ,kings of ,nature ,,the ,,preceding investigation has proved that the same union of sacred functions with a royal title which meets us in the ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi1 the ,sacrificial ,king at ,rome1 and the magistrate called the ,king at ,athens1 occurs frequently outside the limits of classical antiquity and is a common feature of societies at all stages from barbarism to civilisation4 ,further1 it appears that the royal priest is often a king1 not only in name but in fact1 swaying the sceptre as well as the crosier4 ,all this confirms the traditional view of the origin of the titular and priestly kings in the republics of ancient ,greece and ,italy4 ,at least by showing that the combination of spiritual and temporal power1 of which ,graeco-,italian tradition preserved the memory1 has actually existed in many places1 we have obviated any suspicion of improbability that might have attached to the tradition4 ,therefore we may now fairly ask1 ,may not the ,king of the ,wood have had an origin like that which a probable tradition assigns to the ,sacrificial ,king of ,rome and the titular ,king of ,athens8 ,in other words1 may not his predecessors in office have been a line of kings whom a republican revolution stripped of their political power1 leaving them only their religious functions and the shadow of a crown8 ,there are at least two reasons for answering this question in the negative4 ,one reason is drawn from the abode of the priest of ,nemi2 the other from his title1 the ,king of the ,wood4 ,if his predecessors had been kings in the ordinary sense1 he would surely have been found residing1 like the fallen kings of ,rome and ,athens1 in the city of which the sceptre had passed from him4 ,this city must have been ,aricia1 for there was none nearer4 ,but ,aricia was three miles off from his forest sanctuary by the lake shore4 ,if he reigned1 it was not in the city1 but in the greenwood4 ,again his title1 ,king of the ,wood1 hardly allows us to suppose that he had ever been a king in the common sense of the word4 ,more likely he was a king of nature1 and of a special side of nature1 namely1 the woods from which he took his title4 ,if we could find instances of what we may call departmental kings of nature1 that is of persons supposed to rule over particular elements or aspects of nature1 they would probably present a closer analogy to the ,king of the ,wood than the divine kings we have been hitherto considering1 whose control of nature is general rather than special4 ,instances of such departmental kings are not wanting4 ,on a hill at ,bomma near the mouth of the ,congo dwells ,namvulu ,vumu1 ,king of the ,rain and ,storm4 ,of some of the tribes on the ,upper ,nile we are told that they have no kings in the common sense2 the only persons whom they acknowledge as such are the ,kings of the ,rain1 ,mata ,kodou1 who are credited with the power of giving rain at the proper time1 that is1 the rainy season4 ,before the rains begin to fall at the end of ,march the country is a parched and arid desert2 and the cattle1 which form the people's chief wealth1 perish for lack of grass4 ,so1 when the end of ,march draws on1 each householder betakes himself to the ,king of the ,rain and offers him a cow that he may make the blessed waters of heaven to drip on the brown and withered pastures4 ,if no shower falls1 the people assemble and demand that the king shall give them rain2 and if the sky still continues cloudless1 they rip up his belly1 in which he is believed to keep the storms4 ,amongst the ,bari tribe one of these ,rain ,kings made rain by sprinkling water on the ground out of a handbell4 ,among tribes on the outskirts of ,abyssinia a similar office exists and has been thus described by an observer3 ,the priesthood of the ,alfai1 as he is called by the ,barea and ,kunama1 is a remarkable one2 he is believed to be able to make rain4 ,this office formerly existed among the ,algeds and appears to be still common to the ,nuba negroes4 ,the ,alfai of the ,barea1 who is also consulted by the northern ,kunama1 lives near ,tembadere on a mountain alone with his family4 ,the people bring him tribute in the form of clothes and fruits1 and cultivate for him a large field of his own4 ,he is a kind of king1 and his office passes by inheritance to his brother or sister's son4 ,he is supposed to conjure down rain and to drive away the locusts4 ,but if he disappoints the people's expectation and a great drought arises in the land1 the ,alfai is stoned to death1 and his nearest relations are obliged to cast the first stone at him4 ,when we passed through the country1 the office of ,alfai was still held by an old man2 but ,i heard that rain-making had proved too dangerous for him and that he had renounced his office4 ,in the backwoods of ,cambodia live two mysterious sovereigns known as the ,king of the ,fire and the ,king of the ,water4 ,their fame is spread all over the south of the great ,indo-,chinese peninsula2 but only a faint echo of it has reached the ,west4 ,down to a few years ago no ,european1 so far as is known1 had ever seen either of them2 and their very existence might have passed for a fable1 were it not that till lately communications were regularly maintained between them and the ,king of ,cambodia1 who year by year exchanged presents with them4 ,their royal functions are of a purely mystic or spiritual order2 they have no political authority2 they are simple peasants1 living by the sweat of their brow and the offerings of the faithful4 ,according to one account they live in absolute solitude1 never meeting each other and never seeing a human face4 ,they inhabit successively seven towers perched upon seven mountains1 and every year they pass from one tower to another4 ,people come furtively and cast within their reach what is needful for their subsistence4 ,the kingship lasts seven years1 the time necessary to inhabit all the towers successively2 but many die before their time is out4 ,the offices are hereditary in one or 7according to others7 two royal families1 who enjoy high consideration1 have revenues assigned to them1 and are exempt from the necessity of tilling the ground4 ,but naturally the dignity is not coveted1 and when a vacancy occurs1 all eligible men 7they must be strong and have children7 flee and hide themselves4 ,another account1 admitting the reluctance of the hereditary candidates to accept the crown1 does not countenance the report of their hermit-like seclusion in the seven towers4 ,for it represents the people as prostrating themselves before the mystic kings whenever they appear in public1 it being thought that a terrible hurricane would burst over the country if this mark of homage were omitted4 ,like many other sacred kings1 of whom we shall read in the sequel1 the ,kings of ,fire and ,water are not allowed to die a natural death1 for that would lower their reputation4 ,accordingly when one of them is seriously ill1 the elders hold a consultation and if they think he cannot recover they stab him to death4 ,his body is burned and the ashes are piously collected and publicly honoured for five years4 ,part of them is given to the widow1 and she keeps them in an urn1 which she must carry on her back when she goes to weep on her husband's grave4 ,we are told that the ,fire ,king1 the more important of the two1 whose supernatural powers have never been questioned1 officiates at marriages1 festivals1 and sacrifices in honour of the ,yan or spirit4 ,on these occasions a special place is set apart for him2 and the path by which he approaches is spread with white cotton cloths4 ,a reason for confining the royal dignity to the same family is that this family is in possession of certain famous talismans which would lose their virtue or disappear if they passed out of the family4 ,these talismans are three3 the fruit of a creeper called ,cui1 gathered ages ago at the time of the last deluge1 but still fresh and green2 a rattan1 also very old but bearing flowers that never fade2 and lastly1 a sword containing a ,yan or spirit1 who guards it constantly and works miracles with it4 ,the spirit is said to be that of a slave1 whose blood chanced to fall upon the blade while it was being forged1 and who died a voluntary death to expiate his involuntary offence4 ,by means of the two former talismans the ,water ,king can raise a flood that would drown the whole earth4 ,if the ,fire ,king draws the magic sword a few inches from its sheath1 the sun is hidden and men and beasts fall into a profound sleep2 were he to draw it quite out of the scabbard1 the world would come to an end4 ,to this wondrous brand sacrifices of buffaloes1 pigs1 fowls1 and ducks are offered for rain4 ,it is kept swathed in cotton and silk2 and amongst the annual presents sent by the ,king of ,cambodia were rich stuffs to wrap the sacred sword4 ,contrary to the common usage of the country1 which is to bury the dead1 the bodies of both these mystic monarchs are burnt1 but their nails and some of their teeth and bones are religiously preserved as amulets4 ,it is while the corpse is being consumed on the pyre that the kinsmen of the deceased magician flee to the forest and hide themselves1 for fear of being elevated to the invidious dignity which he has just vacated4 ,the people go and search for them1 and the first whose lurking place they discover is made ,king of ,fire or ,water4 ,these1 then1 are examples of what ,i have called departmental kings of nature4 ,but it is a far cry to ,italy from the forests of ,cambodia and the sources of the ,nile4 ,and though ,kings of ,rain1 ,water1 and ,fire have been found1 we have still to discover a ,king of the ,wood to match the ,arician priest who bore that title4 ,perhaps we shall find him nearer home4 ,,ix4 ,the ,worship of ,trees #a4 ,tree-spirits ,,in ,,the ,,religious history of the ,aryan race in ,europe the worship of trees has played an important part4 ,nothing could be more natural4 ,for at the dawn of history ,europe was covered with immense primaeval forests1 in which the scattered clearings must have appeared like islets in an ocean of green4 ,down to the first century before our era the ,hercynian forest stretched eastward from the ,rhine for a distance at once vast and unknown2 ,germans whom ,caesar questioned had travelled for two months through it without reaching the end4 ,four centuries later it was visited by the ,emperor ,julian1 and the solitude1 the gloom1 the silence of the forest appear to have made a deep impression on his sensitive nature4 ,he declared that he knew nothing like it in the ,roman empire4 ,in our own country the wealds of ,kent1 ,surrey1 and ,sussex are remnants of the great forest of ,anderida1 which once clothed the whole of the south-eastern portion of the island4 ,westward it seems to have stretched till it joined another forest that extended from ,hampshire to ,devon4 ,in the reign of ,henry ,,ii4 the citizens of ,london still hunted the wild bull and the boar in the woods of ,hampstead4 ,even under the later ,plantagenets the royal forests were sixty-eight in number4 ,in the forest of ,arden it was said that down to modern times a squirrel might leap from tree to tree for nearly the whole length of ,warwickshire4 ,the excavation of ancient pile-villages in the valley of the ,po has shown that long before the rise and probably the foundation of ,rome the north of ,italy was covered with dense woods of elms1 chestnuts1 and especially of oaks4 ,archaeology is here confirmed by history2 for classical writers contain many references to ,italian forests which have now disappeared4 ,as late as the fourth century before our era ,rome was divided from central ,etruria by the dreaded ,ciminian forest1 which ,livy compares to the woods of ,germany4 ,no merchant1 if we may trust the ,roman historian1 had ever penetrated its pathless solitudes2 and it was deemed a most daring feat when a ,roman general1 after sending two scouts to explore its intricacies1 led his army into the forest and1 making his way to a ridge of the wooded mountains1 looked down on the rich ,etrurian fields spread out below4 ,in ,greece beautiful woods of pine1 oak1 and other trees still linger on the slopes of the high ,arcadian mountains1 still adorn with their verdure the deep gorge through which the ,ladon hurries to join the sacred ,alpheus1 and were still1 down to a few years ago1 mirrored in the dark blue waters of the lonely lake of ,pheneus2 but they are mere fragments of the forests which clothed great tracts in antiquity1 and which at a more remote epoch may have spanned the ,greek peninsula from sea to sea4 ,from an examination of the ,teutonic words for temple ,grimm has made it probable that amongst the ,germans the oldest sanctuaries were natural woods4 ,however that may be1 tree-worship is well attested for all the great ,european families of the ,aryan stock4 ,amongst the ,celts the oak-worship of the ,druids is familiar to every one1 and their old word for sanctuary seems to be identical in origin and meaning with the ,latin nemus1 a grove or woodland glade1 which still survives in the name of ,nemi4 ,sacred groves were common among the ancient ,germans1 and tree-worship is hardly extinct amongst their descendants at the present day4 ,how serious that worship was in former times may be gathered from the ferocious penalty appointed by the old ,german laws for such as dared to peel the bark of a standing tree4 ,the culprit's navel was to be cut out and nailed to the part of the tree which he had peeled1 and he was to be driven round and round the tree till all his guts were wound about its trunk4 ,the intention of the punishment clearly was to replace the dead bark by a living substitute taken from the culprit2 it was a life for a life1 the life of a man for the life of a tree4 ,at ,upsala1 the old religious capital of ,sweden1 there was a sacred grove in which every tree was regarded as divine4 ,the heathen ,slavs worshipped trees and groves4 ,the ,lithuanians were not converted to ,christianity till towards the close of the fourteenth century1 and amongst them at the date of their conversion the worship of trees was prominent4 ,some of them revered remarkable oaks and other great shady trees1 from which they received oracular responses4 ,some maintained holy groves about their villages or houses1 where even to break a twig would have been a sin4 ,they thought that he who cut a bough in such a grove either died suddenly or was crippled in one of his limbs4 ,proofs of the prevalence of tree-worship in ancient ,greece and ,italy are abundant4 ,in the sanctuary of ,aesculapius at ,cos1 for example1 it was forbidden to cut down the cypress-trees under a penalty of a thousand drachms4 ,but nowhere1 perhaps1 in the ancient world was this antique form of religion better preserved than in the heart of the great metropolis itself4 ,in the ,forum1 the busy centre of ,roman life1 the sacred fig-tree of ,romulus was worshipped down to the days of the empire1 and the withering of its trunk was enough to spread consternation through the city4 ,again1 on the slope of the ,palatine ,hill grew a cornel-tree which was esteemed one of the most sacred objects in ,rome4 ,whenever the tree appeared to a passer-by to be drooping1 he set up a hue and cry which was echoed by the people in the street1 and soon a crowd might be seen running helter-skelter from all sides with buckets of water1 as if 7says ,plutarch7 they were hastening to put out a fire4 ,among the tribes of the ,finnish-,ugrian stock in ,europe the heathen worship was performed for the most part in sacred groves1 which were always enclosed with a fence4 ,such a grove often consisted merely of a glade or clearing with a few trees dotted about1 upon which in former times the skins of the sacrificial victims were hung4 ,the central point of the grove1 at least among the tribes of the ,volga1 was the sacred tree1 beside which everything else sank into insignificance4 ,before it the worshippers assembled and the priest offered his prayers1 at its roots the victim was sacrificed1 and its boughs sometimes served as a pulpit4 ,no wood might be hewn and no branch broken in the grove1 and women were generally forbidden to enter it4 ,but it is necessary to examine in some detail the notions on which the worship of trees and plants is based4 ,to the savage the world in general is animate1 and trees and plants are no exception to the rule4 ,he thinks that they have souls like his own1 and he treats them accordingly4 ,they say1 writes the ancient vegetarian ,porphyry1 that primitive men led an unhappy life1 for their superstition did not stop at animals but extended even to plants4 ,for why should the slaughter of an ox or a sheep be a greater wrong than the felling of a fir or an oak1 seeing that a soul is implanted in these trees also8 ,similarly1 the ,hidatsa ,indians of ,north ,america believe that every natural object has its spirit1 or to speak more properly1 its shade4 ,to these shades some consideration or respect is due1 but not equally to all4 ,for example1 the shade of the cottonwood1 the greatest tree in the valley of the ,upper ,missouri1 is supposed to possess an intelligence which1 if properly approached1 may help the ,indians in certain undertakings2 but the shades of shrubs and grasses are of little account4 ,when the ,missouri1 swollen by a freshet in spring1 carries away part of its banks and sweeps some tall tree into its current1 it is said that the spirit of the tree cries1 while the roots still cling to the land and until the trunk falls with a splash into the stream4 ,formerly the ,indians considered it wrong to fell one of these giants1 and when large logs were needed they made use only of trees which had fallen of themselves4 ,till lately some of the more credulous old men declared that many of the misfortunes of their people were caused by this modern disregard for the rights of the living cottonwood4 ,the ,iroquois believed that each species of tree1 shrub1 plant1 and herb had its own spirit1 and to these spirits it was their custom to return thanks4 ,the ,wanika of ,eastern ,africa fancy that every tree1 and especially every coco-nut tree1 has its spirit2 the destruction of a cocoa-nut tree is regarded as equivalent to matricide1 because that tree gives them life and nourishment1 as a mother does her child4 ,siamese monks1 believing that there are souls everywhere1 and that to destroy anything whatever is forcibly to dispossess a soul1 will not break a branch of a tree1 as they will not break the arm of an innocent person4 ,these monks1 of course1 are ,buddhists4 ,but ,buddhist animism is not a philosophical theory4 ,it is simply a common savage dogma incorporated in the system of an historical religion4 ,to suppose1 with ,benfey and others1 that the theories of animism and transmigration current among rude peoples of ,asia are derived from ,buddhism1 is to reverse the facts4 ,sometimes it is only particular sorts of trees that are supposed to be tenanted by spirits4 ,at ,grbalj in ,dalmatia it is said that among great beeches1 oaks1 and other trees there are some that are endowed with shades or souls1 and whoever fells one of them must die on the spot1 or at least live an invalid for the rest of his days4 ,if a woodman fears that a tree which he has felled is one of this sort1 he must cut off the head of a live hen on the stump of the tree with the very same axe with which he cut down the tree4 ,this will protect him from all harm1 even if the tree be one of the animated kind4 ,the silk-cotton trees1 which rear their enormous trunks to a stupendous height1 far out-topping all the other trees of the forest1 are regarded with reverence throughout ,west ,africa1 from the ,senegal to the ,niger1 and are believed to be the abode of a god or spirit4 ,among the ,ewespeaking peoples of the ,slave ,coast the indwelling god of this giant of the forest goes by the name of ,huntin4 ,trees in which he specially dwells--for it is not every silk-cotton tree that he thus honours--are surrounded by a girdle of palm-leaves2 and sacrifices of fowls1 and occasionally of human beings1 are fastened to the trunk or laid against the foot of the tree4 ,a tree distinguished by a girdle of palm-leaves may not be cut down or injured in any way2 and even silk-cotton trees which are not supposed to be animated by ,huntin may not be felled unless the woodman first offers a sacrifice of fowls and palm-oil to purge himself of the proposed sacrilege4 ,to omit the sacrifice is an offence which may be punished with death4 ,among the ,kangra mountains of the ,punjaub a girl used to be annually sacrificed to an old cedar-tree1 the families of the village taking it in turn to supply the victim4 ,the tree was cut down not very many years ago4 ,if trees are animate1 they are necessarily sensitive and the cutting of them down becomes a delicate surgical operation1 which must be performed with as tender a regard as possible for the feelings of the sufferers1 who otherwise may turn and rend the careless or bungling operator4 ,when an oak is being felled it gives a kind of shriekes or groanes1 that may be heard a mile off1 as if it were the genius of the oake lamenting4 ,e4 ,wyld1 ,esq41 hath heard it severall times4 ,the ,ojebways very seldom cut down green or living trees1 from the idea that it puts them to pain1 and some of their medicine-men profess to have heard the wailing of the trees under the axe4 ,trees that bleed and utter cries of pain or indignation when they are hacked or burned occur very often in ,chinese books1 even in ,standard ,histories4 ,old peasants in some parts of ,austria still believe that forest-trees are animate1 and will not allow an incision to be made in the bark without special cause2 they have heard from their fathers that the tree feels the cut not less than a wounded man his hurt4 ,in felling a tree they beg its pardon4 ,it is said that in the ,upper ,palatinate also old woodmen still secretly ask a fine1 sound tree to forgive them before they cut it down4 ,so in ,jarkino the woodman craves pardon of the tree he fells4 ,before the ,ilocanes of ,luzon cut down trees in the virgin forest or on the mountains1 they recite some verses to the following effect3 ,be not uneasy1 my friend1 though we fell what we have been ordered to fell4 ,this they do in order not to draw down on themselves the hatred of the spirits who live in the trees1 and who are apt to avenge themselves by visiting with grievous sickness such as injure them wantonly4 ,the ,basoga of ,central ,africa think that1 when a tree is cut down1 the angry spirit which inhabits it may cause the death of the chief and his family4 ,to prevent this disaster they consult a medicine-man before they fell a tree4 ,if the man of skill gives leave to proceed1 the woodman first offers a fowl and a goat to the tree2 then as soon as he has given the first blow with the axe1 he applies his mouth to the cut and sucks some of the sap4 ,in this way he forms a brotherhood with the tree1 just as two men become blood-brothers by sucking each other's blood4 ,after that he can cut down his tree-brother with impunity4 ,but the spirits of vegetation are not always treated with deference and respect4 ,if fair words and kind treatment do not move them1 stronger measures are sometimes resorted to4 ,the durian-tree of the ,east ,indies1 whose smooth stem often shoots up to a height of eighty or ninety feet without sending out a branch1 bears a fruit of the most delicious flavour and the most disgusting stench4 ,the ,malays cultivate the tree for the sake of its fruit1 and have been known to resort to a peculiar ceremony for the purpose of stimulating its fertility4 ,near ,jugra in ,selangor there is a small grove of durian-trees1 and on a specially chosen day the villagers used to assemble in it4 ,thereupon one of the local sorcerers would take a hatchet and deliver several shrewd blows on the trunk of the most barren of the trees1 saying1 ,will you now bear fruit or not8 ,if you do not1 ,i shall fell you4 ,to this the tree replied through the mouth of another man who had climbed a mangostin-tree hard by 7the durian-tree being unclimbable71 ,yes1 ,i will now bear fruit2 ,i beg of you not to fell me4 ,so in ,japan to make trees bear fruit two men go into an orchard4 ,one of them climbs up a tree and the other stands at the foot with an axe4 ,the man with the axe asks the tree whether it will yield a good crop next year and threatens to cut it down if it does not4 ,to this the man among the branches replies on behalf of the tree that it will bear abundantly4 ,odd as this mode of horticulture may seem to us1 it has its exact parallels in ,europe4 ,on ,christmas ,eve many a ,south ,slavonian and ,bulgarian peasant swings an axe threateningly against a barren fruit-tree1 while another man standing by intercedes for the menaced tree1 saying1 ,do not cut it down2 it will soon bear fruit4 ,thrice the axe is swung1 and thrice the impending blow is arrested at the entreaty of the intercessor4 ,after that the frightened tree will certainly bear fruit next year4 ,the conception of trees and plants as animated beings naturally results in treating them as male and female1 who can be married to each other in a real1 and not merely a figurative or poetical1 sense of the word4 ,the notion is not purely fanciful1 for plants like animals have their sexes and reproduce their kind by the union of the male and female elements4 ,but whereas in all the higher animals the organs of the two sexes are regularly separated between different individuals1 in most plants they exist together in every individual of the species4 ,this rule1 however1 is by no means universal1 and in many species the male plant is distinct from the female4 ,the distinction appears to have been observed by some savages1 for we are told that the ,maoris are acquainted with the sex of trees1 etc41 and have distinct names for the male and female of some trees4 ,the ancients knew the difference between the male and the female date-palm1 and fertilised them artificially by shaking the pollen of the male tree over the flowers of the female4 ,the fertilisation took place in spring4 ,among the heathen of ,harran the month during which the palms were fertilised bore the name of the ,date ,month1 and at this time they celebrated the marriage festival of all the gods and goddesses4 ,different from this true and fruitful marriage of the palm are the false and barren marriages of plants which play a part in ,hindoo superstition4 ,for example1 if a ,hindoo has planted a grove of mangos1 neither he nor his wife may taste of the fruit until he has formally married one of the trees1 as a bridegroom1 to a tree of a different sort1 commonly a tamarind-tree1 which grows near it in the grove4 ,if there is no tamarind to act as bride1 a jasmine will serve the turn4 ,the expenses of such a marriage are often considerable1 for the more ,brahmans are feasted at it1 the greater the glory of the owner of the grove4 ,a family has been known to sell its golden and silver trinkets1 and to borrow all the money they could in order to marry a mango-tree to a jasmine with due pomp and ceremony4 ,on ,christmas ,eve ,german peasants used to tie fruit-trees together with straw ropes to make them bear fruit1 saying that the trees were thus married4 ,in the ,moluccas1 when the clove-trees are in blossom1 they are treated like pregnant women4 ,no noise may be made near them2 no light or fire may be carried past them at night2 no one may approach them with his hat on1 all must uncover in their presence4 ,these precautions are observed lest the tree should be alarmed and bear no fruit1 or should drop its fruit too soon1 like the untimely delivery of a woman who has been frightened in her pregnancy4 ,so in the ,east the growing rice-crop is often treated with the same considerate regard as a breeding woman4 ,thus in ,amboyna1 when the rice is in bloom1 the people say that it is pregnant and fire no guns and make no other noises near the field1 for fear lest1 if the rice were thus disturbed1 it would miscarry1 and the crop would be all straw and no grain4 ,sometimes it is the souls of the dead which are believed to animate trees4 ,the ,dieri tribe of ,central ,australia regard as very sacred certain trees which are supposed to be their fathers transformed2 hence they speak with reverence of these trees1 and are careful that they shall not be cut down or burned4 ,if the settlers require them to hew down the trees1 they earnestly protest against it1 asserting that were they to do so they would have no luck1 and might be punished for not protecting their ancestors4 ,some of the ,philippine ,islanders believe that the souls of their ancestors are in certain trees1 which they therefore spare4 ,if they are obliged to fell one of these trees1 they excuse themselves to it by saying that it was the priest who made them do it4 ,the spirits take up their abode1 by preference1 in tall and stately trees with great spreading branches4 ,when the wind rustles the leaves1 the natives fancy it is the voice of the spirit2 and they never pass near one of these trees without bowing respectfully1 and asking pardon of the spirit for disturbing his repose4 ,among the ,ignorrotes1 every village has its sacred tree1 in which the souls of the dead forefathers of the hamlet reside4 ,offerings are made to the tree1 and any injury done to it is believed to entail some misfortune on the village4 ,were the tree cut down1 the village and all its inhabitants would inevitably perish4 ,in ,corea the souls of people who die of the plague or by the roadside1 and of women who expire in childbirth1 invariably take up their abode in trees4 ,to such spirits offerings of cake1 wine1 and pork are made on heaps of stones piled under the trees4 ,in ,china it has been customary from time immemorial to plant trees on graves in order thereby to strengthen the soul of the deceased and thus to save his body from corruption2 and as the evergreen cypress and pine are deemed to be fuller of vitality than other trees1 they have been chosen by preference for this purpose4 ,hence the trees that grow on graves are sometimes identified with the souls of the departed4 ,among the ,miao-,kia1 an aboriginal race of ,southern and ,western ,china1 a sacred tree stands at the entrance of every village1 and the inhabitants believe that it is tenanted by the soul of their first ancestor and that it rules their destiny4 ,sometimes there is a sacred grove near a village1 where the trees are suffered to rot and die on the spot4 ,their fallen branches cumber the ground1 and no one may remove them unless he has first asked leave of the spirit of the tree and offered him a sacrifice4 ,among the ,maraves of ,southern ,africa the burial-ground is always regarded as a holy place where neither a tree may be felled nor a beast killed1 because everything there is supposed to be tenanted by the souls of the dead4 ,in most1 if not all1 of these cases the spirit is viewed as incorporate in the tree2 it animates the tree and must suffer and die with it4 ,but1 according to another and probably later opinion1 the tree is not the body1 but merely the abode of the tree-spirit1 which can quit it and return to it at pleasure4 ,the inhabitants of ,siaoo1 an ,east ,indian island1 believe in certain sylvan spirits who dwell in forests or in great solitary trees4 ,at full moon the spirit comes forth from his lurking-place and roams about4 ,he has a big head1 very long arms and legs1 and a ponderous body4 ,in order to propitiate the wood-spirits people bring offerings of food1 fowls1 goats1 and so forth to the places which they are supposed to haunt4 ,the people of ,nias think that1 when a tree dies1 its liberated spirit becomes a demon1 which can kill a coco-nut palm by merely lighting on its branches1 and can cause the death of all the children in a house by perching on one of the posts that support it4 ,further1 they are of opinion that certain trees are at all times inhabited by roving demons who1 if the trees were damaged1 would be set free to go about on errands of mischief4 ,hence the people respect these trees1 and are careful not to cut them down4 ,not a few ceremonies observed at cutting down haunted trees are based on the belief that the spirits have it in their power to quit the trees at pleasure or in case of need4 ,thus when the ,pelew ,islanders are felling a tree1 they conjure the spirit of the tree to leave it and settle on another4 ,the wily negro of the ,slave ,coast1 who wishes to fell an ashorin tree1 but knows that he cannot do it so long as the spirit remains in the tree1 places a little palm-oil on the ground as a bait1 and then1 when the unsuspecting spirit has quitted the tree to partake of this dainty1 hastens to cut down its late abode4 ,when the ,toboongkoos of ,celebes are about to clear a piece of forest in order to plant rice1 they build a tiny house and furnish it with tiny clothes and some food and gold4 ,then they call together all the spirits of the wood1 offer them the little house with its contents1 and beseech them to quit the spot4 ,after that they may safely cut down the wood without fearing to wound themselves in so doing4 ,before the ,tomori1 another tribe of ,celebes1 fell a tall tree they lay a quid of betel at its foot1 and invite the spirit who dwells in the tree to change his lodging2 moreover1 they set a little ladder against the trunk to enable him to descend with safety and comfort4 ,the ,mandelings of ,sumatra endeavour to lay the blame of all such misdeeds at the door of the ,dutch authorities4 ,thus when a man is cutting a road through a forest and has to fell a tall tree which blocks the way1 he will not begin to ply his axe until he has said3 ,spirit who lodgest in this tree1 take it not ill that ,i cut down thy dwelling1 for it is done at no wish of mine but by order of the ,controller4 ,and when he wishes to clear a piece of forest-land for cultivation1 it is necessary that he should come to a satisfactory understanding with the woodland spirits who live there before he lays low their leafy dwellings4 ,for this purpose he goes to the middle of the plot of ground1 stoops down1 and pretends to pick up a letter4 ,then unfolding a bit of paper he reads aloud an imaginary letter from the ,dutch ,government1 in which he is strictly enjoined to set about clearing the land without delay4 ,having done so1 he says3 ,you hear that1 spirits4 ,i must begin clearing at once1 or ,i shall be hanged4 ,even when a tree has been felled1 sawn into planks1 and used to build a house1 it is possible that the woodland spirit may still be lurking in the timber1 and accordingly some people seek to propitiate him before or after they occupy the new house4 ,hence1 when a new dwelling is ready the ,toradjas of ,celebes kill a goat1 a pig1 or a buffalo1 and smear all the woodwork with its blood4 ,if the building is a lobo or spirit-house1 a fowl or a dog is killed on the ridge of the roof1 and its blood allowed to flow down on both sides4 ,the ruder ,tonapoo in such a case sacrifice a human being on the roof4 ,this sacrifice on the roof of a lobo or temple serves the same purpose as the smearing of blood on the woodwork of an ordinary house4 ,the intention is to propitiate the forest-spirits who may still be in the timber2 they are thus put in good humour and will do the inmates of the house no harm4 ,for a like reason people in ,celebes and the ,moluccas are much afraid of planting a post upside down at the building of a house2 for the forest-spirit1 who might still be in the timber1 would very naturally resent the indignity and visit the inmates with sickness4 ,the ,kayans of ,borneo are of opinion that tree-spirits stand very stiffly on the point of honour and visit men with their displeasure for any injury done to them4 ,hence after building a house1 whereby they have been forced to ill-treat many trees1 these people observe a period of penance for a year during which they must abstain from many things1 such as the killing of bears1 tiger-cats1 and serpents4 #b4 ,beneficent ,powers of ,tree-,spirits ,,when a tree comes to be viewed1 no longer as the body of the tree-spirit1 but simply as its abode which it can quit at pleasure1 an important advance has been made in religious thought4 ,animism is passing into polytheism4 ,in other words1 instead of regarding each tree as a living and conscious being1 man now sees in it merely a lifeless1 inert mass1 tenanted for a longer or shorter time by a supernatural being who1 as he can pass freely from tree to tree1 thereby enjoys a certain right of possession or lordship over the trees1 and1 ceasing to be a tree-soul1 becomes a forest god4 ,as soon as the tree-spirit is thus in a measure disengaged from each particular tree1 he begins to change his shape and assume the body of a man1 in virtue of a general tendency of early thought to clothe all abstract spiritual beings in concrete human form4 ,hence in classical art the sylvan deities are depicted in human shape1 their woodland character being denoted by a branch or some equally obvious symbol4 ,but this change of shape does not affect the essential character of the tree-spirit4 ,the powers which he exercised as a tree-soul incorporate in a tree1 he still continues to wield as a god of trees4 ,this ,i shall now attempt to prove in detail4 ,i shall show1 first1 that trees considered as animate beings are credited with the power of making the rain to fall1 the sun to shine1 flocks and herds to multiply1 and women to bring forth easily2 and1 second1 that the very same powers are attributed to tree-gods conceived as anthropomorphic beings or as actually incarnate in living men4 ,first1 then1 trees or tree-spirits are believed to give rain and sunshine4 ,when the missionary ,jerome of ,prague was persuading the heathen ,lithuanians to fell their sacred groves1 a multitude of women besought the ,prince of ,lithuania to stop him1 saying that with the woods he was destroying the house of god from which they had been wont to get rain and sunshine4 ,the ,mundaris in ,assam think that if a tree in the sacred grove is felled the sylvan gods evince their displeasure by withholding rain4 ,in order to procure rain the inhabitants of ,monyo1 a village in the ,sagaing district of ,upper ,burma1 chose the largest tamarind-tree near the village and named it the haunt of the spirit 7nat7 who controls the rain4 ,then they offered bread1 coco-nuts1 plantains1 and fowls to the guardian spirit of the village and to the spirit who gives rain1 and they prayed1 ,o ,lord nat have pity on us poor mortals1 and stay not the rain4 ,inasmuch as our offering is given ungrudgingly1 let the rain fall day and night4 ,afterwards libations were made in honour of the spirit of the tamarind-tree2 and still later three elderly women1 dressed in fine clothes and wearing necklaces and earrings1 sang the ,rain ,song4 ,again1 tree-spirits make the crops to grow4 ,amongst the ,mundaris every village has its sacred grove1 and the grove deities are held responsible for the crops1 and are especially honoured at all the great agricultural festivals4 ,the negroes of the ,gold ,coast are in the habit of sacrificing at the foot of certain tall trees1 and they think that if one of these were felled all the fruits of the earth would perish4 ,the ,gallas dance in couples round sacred trees1 praying for a good harvest4 ,every couple consists of a man and woman1 who are linked together by a stick1 of which each holds one end4 ,under their arms they carry green corn or grass4 ,swedish peasants stick a leafy branch in each furrow of their corn-fields1 believing that this will ensure an abundant crop4 ,the same idea comes out in the ,german and ,french custom of the ,harvest-,may4 ,this is a large branch or a whole tree1 which is decked with ears of corn1 brought home on the last waggon from the harvest-field1 and fastened on the roof of the farmhouse or of the barn1 where it remains for a year4 ,mannhardt has proved that this branch or tree embodies the tree-spirit conceived as the spirit of vegetation in general1 whose vivifying and fructifying influence is thus brought to bear upon the corn in particular4 ,hence in ,swabia the ,harvest-,may is fastened amongst the last stalks of corn left standing on the field2 in other places it is planted on the corn-field and the last sheaf cut is attached to its trunk4 ,again1 the tree-spirit makes the herds to multiply and blesses women with offspring4 ,in ,northern ,india the ,emblica officinalis is a sacred tree4 ,on the eleventh of the month ,phalgun 7,february7 libations are poured at the foot of the tree1 a red or yellow string is bound about the trunk1 and prayers are offered to it for the fruitfulness of women1 animals1 and crops4 ,again1 in ,northern ,india the coco-nut is esteemed one of the most sacred fruits1 and is called ,sriphala1 or the fruit of ,sri1 the goddess of prosperity4 ,it is the symbol of fertility1 and all through ,upper ,india is kept in shrines and presented by the priests to women who desire to become mothers4 ,in the town of ,qua1 near ,old ,calabar1 there used to grow a palm-tree which ensured conception to any barren woman who ate a nut from its branches4 ,in ,europe the ,may-tree or ,may-pole is apparently supposed to possess similar powers over both women and cattle4 ,thus in some parts of ,germany on the first of ,may the peasants set up ,may-trees or ,may-bushes at the doors of stables and byres1 one for each horse and cow2 this is thought to make the cows yield much milk4 ,of the ,irish we are told that they fancy a green bough of a tree1 fastened on ,may-day against the house1 will produce plenty of milk that summer4 ,on the second of ,july some of the ,wends used to set up an oak-tree in the middle of the village with an iron cock fastened to its top2 then they danced round it1 and drove the cattle round it to make them thrive4 ,the ,circassians regard the pear-tree as the protector of cattle4 ,so they cut down a young pear-tree in the forest1 branch it1 and carry it home1 where it is adored as a divinity4 ,almost every house has one such pear-tree4 ,in autumn1 on the day of the festival1 the tree is carried into the house with great ceremony to the sound of music and amid the joyous cries of all the inmates1 who compliment it on its fortunate arrival4 ,it is covered with candles1 and a cheese is fastened to its top4 ,round about it they eat1 drink1 and sing4 ,then they bid the tree good-bye and take it back to the courtyard1 where it remains for the rest of the year1 set up against the wall1 without receiving any mark of respect4 ,in the ,tuhoe tribe of ,maoris the power of making women fruitful is ascribed to trees4 ,these trees are associated with the navel-strings of definite mythical ancestors1 as indeed the navel-strings of all children used to be hung upon them down to quite recent times4 ,a barren woman had to embrace such a tree with her arms1 and she received a male or a female child according as she embraced the east or the west side4 ,the common ,european custom of placing a green bush on ,may ,day before or on the house of a beloved maiden probably originated in the belief of the fertilising power of the tree-spirit4 ,in some parts of ,bavaria such bushes are set up also at the houses of newly-married pairs1 and the practice is only omitted if the wife is near her confinement2 for in that case they say that the husband has set up a ,may-bush for himself4 ,among the ,south ,slavonians a barren woman1 who desires to have a child1 places a new chemise upon a fruitful tree on the eve of ,st4 ,george's ,day4 ,next morning before sunrise she examines the garment1 and if she finds that some living creature has crept on it1 she hopes that her wish will be fulfilled within the year4 ,then she puts on the chemise1 confident that she will be as fruitful as the tree on which the garment has passed the night4 ,among the ,kara-,kirghiz barren women roll themselves on the ground under a solitary apple-tree1 in order to obtain offspring4 ,lastly1 the power of granting to women an easy delivery at child-birth is ascribed to trees both in ,sweden and ,africa4 ,in some districts of ,sweden there was formerly a bardtrd or guardian-tree 7lime1 ash1 or elm7 in the neighbourhood of every farm4 ,no one would pluck a single leaf of the sacred tree1 any injury to which was punished by ill-luck or sickness4 ,pregnant women used to clasp the tree in their arms in order to ensure an easy delivery4 ,in some negro tribes of the ,congo region pregnant women make themselves garments out of the bark of a certain sacred tree1 because they believe that this tree delivers them from the dangers that attend child-bearing4 ,the story that ,leto clasped a palm-tree and an olive-tree or two laurel-trees1 when she was about to give birth to the divine twins ,apollo and ,artemis1 perhaps points to a similar ,greek belief in the efficacy of certain trees to facilitate delivery4 ,x4 ,relics of ,tree ,worship in ,modern ,europe ,,from ,,the ,,foregoing review of the beneficent qualities commonly ascribed to tree-spirits1 it is easy to understand why customs like the ,may-tree or ,may-pole have prevailed so widely and figured so prominently in the popular festivals of ,european peasants4 ,in spring or early summer or even on ,midsummer ,day1 it was and still is in many parts of ,europe the custom to go out to the woods1 cut down a tree and bring it into the village1 where it is set up amid general rejoicings2 or the people cut branches in the woods1 and fasten them on every house4 ,the intention of these customs is to bring home to the village1 and to each house1 the blessings which the tree-spirit has in its power to bestow4 ,hence the custom in some places of planting a ,may-tree before every house1 or of carrying the village ,may-tree from door to door1 that every household may receive its share of the blessing4 ,out of the mass of evidence on this subject a few examples may be selected4 ,sir ,henry ,piers1 in his ,description of ,westmeath1 writing in #afhb says3 ,on ,may-eve1 every family sets up before their door a green bush1 strewed over with yellow flowers1 which the meadows yield plentifully4 ,in countries where timber is plentiful1 they erect tall slender trees1 which stand high1 and they continue almost the whole year2 so as a stranger would go nigh to imagine that they were all signs of ale-sellers1 and that all houses were ale-houses4 ,in ,northamptonshire a young tree ten or twelve feet high used to be planted before each house on ,may ,day so as to appear growing2 flowers were thrown over it and strewn about the door4 ,among ancient customs still retained by the ,cornish1 may be reckoned that of decking their doors and porches on the first of ,may with green boughs of sycamore and hawthorn1 and of planting trees1 or rather stumps of trees1 before their houses4 ,in the north of ,england it was formerly the custom for young people to rise a little after midnight on the morning of the first of ,may1 and go out with music and the blowing of horns into the woods1 where they broke branches and adorned them with nosegays and crowns of flowers4 ,this done1 they returned about sunrise and fastened the flower-decked branches over the doors and windows of their houses4 ,at ,abingdon in ,berkshire young people formerly went about in groups on ,may morning1 singing a carol of which the following are two of the verses3 ,we've been rambling all the night1 ,and sometime of this day2 ,and now returning back again1 ,we bring a garland gay4 ,a garland gay we bring you here2 ,and at your door we stand2 ,it is a sprout well budded out1 ,the work of our ,lord's hand4 ,at the towns of ,saffron ,walden and ,debden in ,essex on the first of ,may little girls go about in parties from door to door singing a song almost identical with the above and carrying garlands2 a doll dressed in white is usually placed in the middle of each garland4 ,similar customs have been and indeed are still observed in various parts of ,england4 ,the garlands are generally in the form of hoops intersecting each other at right angles4 ,it appears that a hoop wreathed with rowan and marsh marigold1 and bearing suspended within it two balls1 is still carried on ,may ,day by villagers in some parts of ,ireland4 ,the balls1 which are sometimes covered with gold and silver paper1 are said to have originally represented the sun and moon4 ,in some villages of the ,vosges ,mountains on the first ,sunday of ,may young girls go in bands from house to house1 singing a song in praise of ,may1 in which mention is made of the bread and meal that come in ,may4 ,if money is given them1 they fasten a green bough to the door2 if it is refused1 they wish the family many children and no bread to feed them4 ,in the ,french department of ,mayenne1 boys who bore the name of ,maillotins used to go about from farm to farm on the first of ,may singing carols1 for which they received money or a drink2 they planted a small tree or a branch of a tree4 ,near ,saverne in ,alsace bands of people go about carrying ,may-trees4 ,amongst them is a man dressed in a white shirt with his face blackened2 in front of him is carried a large ,may-tree1 but each member of the band also carries a smaller one4 ,one of the company bears a huge basket1 in which he collects eggs1 bacon1 and so forth4 ,on the ,thursday before ,whitsunday the ,russian villagers go out into the woods1 sing songs1 weave garlands1 and cut down a young birch-tree1 which they dress up in woman's clothes1 or adorn with many-coloured shreds and ribbons4 ,after that comes a feast1 at the end of which they take the dressed-up birch-tree1 carry it home to their village with joyful dance and song1 and set it up in one of the houses1 where it remains as an honoured guest till ,whitsunday4 ,on the two intervening days they pay visits to the house where their 'guest' is2 but on the third day1 ,whitsunday1 they take her to a stream and fling her into its waters1 throwing their garlands after her4 ,in this ,russian custom the dressing of the birch in woman's clothes shows how clearly the tree is personified2 and the throwing it into a stream is most probably a raincharm4 ,in some parts of ,sweden on the eve of ,may ,day lads go about carrying each a bunch of fresh birch twigs wholly or partly in leaf4 ,with the village fiddler at their head1 they make the round of the houses singing ,may songs2 the burden of their songs is a prayer for fine weather1 a plentiful harvest1 and worldly and spiritual blessings4 ,one of them carries a basket in which he collects gifts of eggs and the like4 ,if they are well received1 they stick a leafy twig in the roof over the cottage door4 ,but in ,sweden midsummer is the season when these ceremonies are chiefly observed4 ,on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john 7the twenty-third of ,june7 the houses are thoroughly cleansed and garnished with green boughs and flowers4 ,young fir-trees are raised at the doorway and elsewhere about the homestead2 and very often small umbrageous arbours are constructed in the garden4 ,in ,stockholm on this day a leaf-market is held at which thousands of ,may-poles 7,maj ,stanger71 from six inches to twelve feet high1 decorated with leaves1 flowers1 slips of coloured paper1 gilt egg-shells strung on reeds1 and so on1 are exposed for sale4 ,bonfires are lit on the hills1 and the people dance round them and jump over them4 ,but the chief event of the day is setting up the ,may-pole4 ,this consists of a straight and tall sprucepine tree1 stripped of its branches4 ,at times hoops and at others pieces of wood1 placed crosswise1 are attached to it at intervals2 whilst at others it is provided with bows1 representing1 so to say1 a man with his arms akimbo4 ,from top to bottom not only the ',maj ,stang' 7,may-pole7 itself1 but the hoops1 bows1 etc41 are ornamented with leaves1 flowers1 slips of various cloth1 gilt egg-shells1 etc42 and on the top of it is a large vane1 or it may be a flag4 ,the raising of the ,may-pole1 the decoration of which is done by the village maidens1 is an affair of much ceremony2 the people flock to it from all quarters1 and dance round it in a great ring4 ,midsummer customs of the same sort used to be observed in some parts of ,germany4 ,thus in the towns of the ,upper ,harz ,mountains tall fir-trees1 with the bark peeled off their lower trunks1 were set up in open places and decked with flowers and eggs1 which were painted yellow and red4 ,round these trees the young folk danced by day and the old folk in the evening4 ,in some parts of ,bohemia also a ,may-pole or midsummer-tree is erected on ,st4 ,john's ,eve4 ,the lads fetch a tall fir or pine from the wood and set it up on a height1 where the girls deck it with nosegays1 garlands1 and red ribbons4 ,it is afterwards burned4 ,it would be needless to illustrate at length the custom1 which has prevailed in various parts of ,europe1 such as ,england1 ,france1 and ,germany1 of setting up a village ,may-tree or ,may-pole on ,may ,day4 ,a few examples will suffice4 ,the puritanical writer ,phillip ,stubbes in his ,anatomie of ,abuses1 first published at ,london in #aehc1 has described with manifest disgust how they used to bring in the ,may-pole in the days of good ,queen ,bess4 ,his description affords us a vivid glimpse of merry ,england in the olden time4 ,against ,may1 ,whitsonday1 or other time1 all the yung men and maides1 olde men and wives1 run gadding over night to the woods1 groves1 hils1 and mountains1 where they spend all the night in plesant pastimes2 and in the morning they return1 bringing with them birch and branches of trees1 to deck their assemblies withall4 ,and no mervaile1 for there is a great ,lord present amongst them1 as superintendent and ,lord over their pastimes and sportes1 namely1 ,sathan1 prince of hel4 ,but the chiefest jewel they bring from thence is their ,may-pole1 which they bring home with great veneration1 as thus4 ,they have twentie or fortie yoke of oxen1 every oxe having a sweet nose-gay of flouers placed on the tip of his hornes1 and these oxen drawe home this ,may-pole 7this stinkyng ydol1 rather71 which is covered all over with floures and hearbs1 bound round about with strings1 from the top to the bottome1 and sometime painted with variable colours1 with two or three hundred men1 women and children following it with great devotion4 ,and thus beeing reared up1 with handkercheefs and flags hovering on the top1 they straw the ground rounde about1 binde green boughes about it1 set up sommer haules1 bowers1 and arbors hard by it4 ,and then fall they to daunce about it1 like as the heathen people did at the dedication of the ,idols1 whereof this is a perfect pattern1 or rather the thing itself4 ,i have heard it credibly reported 7and that viva voce7 by men of great gravitie and reputation1 that of fortie1 threescore1 or a hundred maides going to the wood over night1 there have scaresly the third part of them returned home againe undefiled4 ,in ,swabia on the first of ,may a tall fir-tree used to be fetched into the village1 where it was decked with ribbons and set up2 then the people danced round it merrily to music4 ,the tree stood on the village green the whole year through1 until a fresh tree was brought in next ,may ,day4 ,in ,saxony people were not content with bringing the summer symbolically 7as king or queen7 into the village2 they brought the fresh green itself from the woods even into the houses3 that is the ,may or ,whitsuntide trees1 which are mentioned in documents from the thirteenth century onwards4 ,the fetching in of the ,may-tree was also a festival4 ,the people went out into the woods to seek the ,may 7majum quaerere71 brought young trees1 especially firs and birches1 to the village and set them up before the doors of the houses or of the cattle-stalls or in the rooms4 ,young fellows erected such ,may-trees1 as we have already said1 before the chambers of their sweethearts4 ,besides these household ,mays1 a great ,may-tree or ,may-pole1 which had also been brought in solemn procession to the village1 was set up in the middle of the village or in the market-place of the town4 ,it had been chosen by the whole community1 who watched over it most carefully4 ,generally the tree was stripped of its branches and leaves1 nothing but the crown being left1 on which were displayed1 in addition to many-coloured ribbons and cloths1 a variety of victuals such as sausages1 cakes1 and eggs4 ,the young folk exerted themselves to obtain these prizes4 ,in the greasy poles which are still to be seen at our fairs we have a relic of these old ,may-poles4 ,not uncommonly there was a race on foot or on horseback to the ,may-tree--a ,whitsunday pastime which in course of time has been divested of its goal and survives as a popular custom to this day in many parts of ,germany4 ,at ,bordeaux on the first of ,may the boys of each street used to erect in it a ,may-pole1 which they adorned with garlands and a great crown2 and every evening during the whole of the month the young people of both sexes danced singing about the pole4 ,down to the present day ,may-trees decked with flowers and ribbons are set up on ,may ,day in every village and hamlet of gay ,provence4 ,under them the young folk make merry and the old folk rest4 ,in all these cases1 apparently1 the custom is or was to bring in a new ,may-tree each year4 ,however1 in ,england the village ,may-pole seems as a rule1 at least in later times1 to have been permanent1 not renewed annually4 ,villages of ,upper ,bavaria renew their ,may-pole once every three1 four1 or five years4 ,it is a fir-tree fetched from the forest1 and amid all the wreaths1 flags1 and inscriptions with which it is bedecked1 an essential part is the bunch of dark green foliage left at the top as a memento that in it we have to do1 not with a dead pole1 but with a living tree from the greenwood4 ,we can hardly doubt that originally the practice everywhere was to set up a new ,may-tree every year4 ,as the object of the custom was to bring in the fructifying spirit of vegetation1 newly awakened in spring1 the end would have been defeated if1 instead of a living tree1 green and sappy1 an old withered one had been erected year after year or allowed to stand permanently4 ,when1 however1 the meaning of the custom had been forgotten1 and the ,may-tree was regarded simply as a centre for holiday merry-making1 people saw no reason for felling a fresh tree every year1 and preferred to let the same tree stand permanently1 only decking it with fresh flowers on ,may ,day4 ,but even when the ,may-pole had thus become a fixture1 the need of giving it the appearance of being a green tree1 not a dead pole1 was sometimes felt4 ,thus at ,weverham in ,cheshire are two ,may-poles1 which are decorated on this day 7,may ,day7 with all due attention to the ancient solemnity2 the sides are hung with garlands1 and the top terminated by a birch or other tall slender tree with its leaves on2 the bark being peeled1 and the stem spliced to the pole1 so as to give the appearance of one tree from the summit4 ,thus the renewal of the ,may-tree is like the renewal of the ,harvest-,may2 each is intended to secure a fresh portion of the fertilising spirit of vegetation1 and to preserve it throughout the year4 ,but whereas the efficacy of the ,harvest-,may is restricted to promoting the growth of the crops1 that of the ,may-tree or ,may-branch extends also1 as we have seen1 to women and cattle4 ,lastly1 it is worth noting that the old ,may-tree is sometimes burned at the end of the year4 ,thus in the district of ,prague young people break pieces of the public ,may-tree and place them behind the holy pictures in their rooms1 where they remain till next ,may ,day1 and are then burned on the hearth4 ,in ,wrtemberg the bushes which are set up on the houses on ,palm ,sunday are sometimes left there for a year and then burnt4 ,so much for the tree-spirit conceived as incorporate or immanent in the tree4 ,we have now to show that the tree-spirit is often conceived and represented as detached from the tree and clothed in human form1 and even as embodied in living men or women4 ,the evidence for this anthropomorphic representation of the tree-spirit is largely to be found in the popular customs of ,european peasantry4 ,there is an instructive class of cases in which the tree-spirit is represented simultaneously in vegetable form and in human form1 which are set side by side as if for the express purpose of explaining each other4 ,in these cases the human representative of the tree-spirit is sometimes a doll or puppet1 sometimes a living person1 but whether a puppet or a person1 it is placed beside a tree or bough2 so that together the person or puppet1 and the tree or bough1 form a sort of bilingual inscription1 the one being1 so to speak1 a translation of the other4 ,here1 therefore1 there is no room left for doubt that the spirit of the tree is actually represented in human form4 ,thus in ,bohemia1 on the fourth ,sunday in ,lent1 young people throw a puppet called ,death into the water2 then the girls go into the wood1 cut down a young tree1 and fasten to it a puppet dressed in white clothes to look like a woman2 with this tree and puppet they go from house to house collecting gratuities and singing songs with the refrain3 ,we carry ,death out of the village1 ,we bring ,summer into the village4 ,here1 as we shall see later on1 the ,summer is the spirit of vegetation returning or reviving in spring4 ,in some parts of our own country children go about asking for pence with some small imitations of ,may-poles1 and with a finely-dressed doll which they call the ,lady of the ,may4 ,in these cases the tree and the puppet are obviously regarded as equivalent4 ,at ,thann1 in ,alsace1 a girl called the ,little ,may ,rose1 dressed in white1 carries a small ,may-tree1 which is gay with garlands and ribbons4 ,her companions collect gifts from door to door1 singing a song3 ,little ,may ,rose turn round three times1 ,let us look at you round and round6 ,rose of the ,may1 come to the greenwood away1 ,we will be merry all4 ,so we go from the ,may to the roses4 ,in the course of the song a wish is expressed that those who give nothing may lose their fowls by the marten1 that their vine may bear no clusters1 their tree no nuts1 their field no corn2 the produce of the year is supposed to depend on the gifts offered to these ,may singers4 ,here and in the cases mentioned above1 where children go about with green boughs or garlands on ,may ,day singing and collecting money1 the meaning is that with the spirit of vegetation they bring plenty and good luck to the house1 and they expect to be paid for the service4 ,in ,russian ,lithuania1 on the first of ,may1 they used to set up a green tree before the village4 ,then the rustic swains chose the prettiest girl1 crowned her1 swathed her in birch branches and set her beside the ,may-tree1 where they danced1 sang1 and shouted ,o ,may6 ,o ,may6 ,in ,brie 7,isle de ,france7 a ,may-tree is erected in the midst of the village2 its top is crowned with flowers2 lower down it is twined with leaves and twigs1 still lower with huge green branches4 ,the girls dance round it1 and at the same time a lad wrapt in leaves and called ,father ,may is led about4 ,in the small towns of the ,franken ,wald mountains in ,northern ,bavaria1 on the second of ,may1 a ,walber tree is erected before a tavern1 and a man dances round it1 enveloped in straw from head to foot in such a way that the ears of corn unite above his head to form a crown4 ,he is called the ,walber1 and used to be led in procession through the streets1 which were adorned with sprigs of birch4 ,amongst the ,slavs of ,carinthia1 on ,st4 ,george's ,day 7the twentythird of ,april71 the young people deck with flowers and garlands a tree which has been felled on the eve of the festival4 ,the tree is then carried in procession1 accompanied with music and joyful acclamations1 the chief figure in the procession being the ,green ,george1 a young fellow clad from head to foot in green birch branches4 ,at the close of the ceremonies the ,green ,george1 that is an effigy of him1 is thrown into the water4 ,it is the aim of the lad who acts ,green ,george to step out of his leafy envelope and substitute the effigy so adroitly that no one shall perceive the change4 ,in many places1 however1 the lad himself who plays the part of ,green ,george is ducked in a river or pond1 with the express intention of thus ensuring rain to make the fields and meadows green in summer4 ,in some places the cattle are crowned and driven from their stalls to the accompaniment of a song3 ,green ,george we bring1 ,green ,george we accompany1 ,may he feed our herds well4 ,if not1 to the water with him4 ,here we see that the same powers of making rain and fostering the cattle1 which are ascribed to the tree-spirit regarded as incorporate in the tree1 are also attributed to the tree-spirit represented by a living man4 ,among the gypsies of ,transylvania and ,roumania the festival of ,green ,george is the chief celebration of spring4 ,some of them keep it on ,easter ,monday1 others on ,st4 ,george's ,day 7the twentythird of ,april74 ,on the eve of the festival a young willow tree is cut down1 adorned with garlands and leaves1 and set up in the ground4 ,women with child place one of their garments under the tree1 and leave it there over night2 if next morning they find a leaf of the tree lying on the garment1 they know that their delivery will be easy4 ,sick and old people go to the tree in the evening1 spit on it thrice1 and say1 ,you will soon die1 but let us live4 ,next morning the gypsies gather about the willow4 ,the chief figure of the festival is ,green ,george1 a lad who is concealed from top to toe in green leaves and blossoms4 ,he throws a few handfuls of grass to the beasts of the tribe1 in order that they may have no lack of fodder throughout the year4 ,then he takes three iron nails1 which have lain for three days and nights in water1 and knocks them into the willow2 after which he pulls them out and flings them into a running stream to propitiate the water-spirits4 ,finally1 a pretence is made of throwing ,green ,george into the water1 but in fact it is only a puppet made of branches and leaves which is ducked in the stream4 ,in this version of the custom the powers of granting an easy delivery to women and of communicating vital energy to the sick and old are clearly ascribed to the willow2 while ,green ,george1 the human double of the tree1 bestows food on the cattle1 and further ensures the favour of the water-spirits by putting them in indirect communication with the tree4 ,without citing more examples to the same effect1 we may sum up the results of the preceding pages in the words of ,mannhardt3 ,the customs quoted suffice to establish with certainty the conclusion that in these spring processions the spirit of vegetation is often represented both by the ,may-tree and in addition by a man dressed in green leaves or flowers or by a girl similarly adorned4 ,it is the same spirit which animates the tree and is active in the inferior plants and which we have recognised in the ,may-tree and the ,harvest-,may4 ,quite consistently the spirit is also supposed to manifest his presence in the first flower of spring and reveals himself both in a girl representing a ,may-rose1 and also1 as giver of harvest1 in the person of the ,walber4 ,the procession with this representative of the divinity was supposed to produce the same beneficial effects on the fowls1 the fruit-trees1 and the crops as the presence of the deity himself4 ,in other words the mummer was regarded not as an image but as an actual representative of the spirit of vegetation2 hence the wish expressed by the attendants on the ,may-rose and the ,may-tree that those who refuse them gifts of eggs1 bacon1 and so forth1 may have no share in the blessings which it is in the power of the itinerant spirit to bestow4 ,we may conclude that these begging processions with ,may-trees or ,may-boughs from door to door 7'bringing the ,may or the summer'7 had everywhere originally a serious and1 so to speak1 sacramental significance2 people really believed that the god of growth was present unseen in the bough2 by the procession he was brought to each house to bestow his blessing4 ,the names ,may1 ,father ,may1 ,may ,lady1 ,queen of the ,may1 by which the anthropomorphic spirit of vegetation is often denoted1 show that the idea of the spirit of vegetation is blent with a personification of the season at which his powers are most strikingly manifested4 ,so far we have seen that the tree-spirit or the spirit of vegetation in general is represented either in vegetable form alone1 as by a tree1 bough1 or flower2 or in vegetable and human form simultaneously1 as by a tree1 bough1 or flower in combination with a puppet or a living person4 ,it remains to show that the representation of him by a tree1 bough1 or flower is sometimes entirely dropped1 while the representation of him by a living person remains4 ,in this case the representative character of the person is generally marked by dressing him or her in leaves or flowers2 sometimes1 too1 it is indicated by the name he or she bears4 ,thus in some parts of ,russia on ,st4 ,george's ,day 7the twenty-third of ,april7 a youth is dressed out1 like our ,jack-in-the-,green1 with leaves and flowers4 ,the ,slovenes call him the ,green ,george4 ,holding a lighted torch in one hand and a pie in the other1 he goes out to the corn-fields1 followed by girls singing appropriate songs4 ,a circle of brushwood is next lighted1 in the middle of which is set the pie4 ,all who take part in the ceremony then sit down around the fire and divide the pie among them4 ,in this custom the ,green ,george dressed in leaves and flowers is plainly identical with the similarly disguised ,green ,george who is associated with a tree in the ,carinthian1 ,transylvanian1 and ,roumanian customs observed on the same day4 ,again1 we saw that in ,russia at ,whitsuntide a birch-tree is dressed in woman's clothes and set up in the house4 ,clearly equivalent to this is the custom observed on ,whit-,monday by ,russian girls in the district of ,pinsk4 ,they choose the prettiest of their number1 envelop her in a mass of foliage taken from the birch-trees and maples1 and carry her about through the village4 ,in ,ruhla as soon as the trees begin to grow green in spring1 the children assemble on a ,sunday and go out into the woods1 where they choose one of their playmates to be the ,little ,leaf ,man4 ,they break branches from the trees and twine them about the child till only his shoes peep out from the leafy mantle4 ,holes are made in it for him to see through1 and two of the children lead the ,little ,leaf ,man that he may not stumble or fall4 ,singing and dancing they take him from house to house1 asking for gifts of food such as eggs1 cream1 sausages1 and cakes4 ,lastly1 they sprinkle the ,leaf ,man with water and feast on the food they have collected4 ,in the ,fricktal1 ,switzerland1 at ,whitsuntide boys go out into a wood and swathe one of their number in leafy boughs4 ,he is called the ,whitsuntide-lout1 and being mounted on horseback with a green branch in his hand he is led back into the village4 ,at the village-well a halt is called and the leaf-clad lout is dismounted and ducked in the trough4 ,thereby he acquires the right of sprinkling water on everybody1 and he exercises the right specially on girls and street urchins4 ,the urchins march before him in bands begging him to give them a ,whitsuntide wetting4 ,in ,england the best-known example of these leaf-clad mummers is the ,jack-in-the-,green1 a chimney-sweeper who walks encased in a pyramidal framework of wickerwork1 which is covered with holly and ivy1 and surmounted by a crown of flowers and ribbons4 ,thus arrayed he dances on ,may ,day at the head of a troop of chimney-sweeps1 who collect pence4 ,in ,fricktal a similar frame of basketwork is called the ,whitsuntide ,basket4 ,as soon as the trees begin to bud1 a spot is chosen in the wood1 and here the village lads make the frame with all secrecy1 lest others should forestall them4 ,leafy branches are twined round two hoops1 one of which rests on the shoulders of the wearer1 the other encircles his claves2 holes are made for his eyes and mouth2 and a large nosegay crowns the whole4 ,in this guise he appears suddenly in the village at the hour of vespers1 preceded by three boys blowing on horns made of willow bark4 ,the great object of his supporters is to set up the ,whitsuntide ,basket on the village well1 and to keep it and him there1 despite the efforts of the lads from neighbouring villages1 who seek to carry off the ,whitsuntide ,basket and set it up on their own well4 ,in the class of cases of which the foregoing are specimens it is obvious that the leaf-clad person who is led about is equivalent to the ,may-tree1 ,may-bough1 or ,may-doll1 which is carried from house to house by children begging4 ,both are representatives of the beneficent spirit of vegetation1 whose visit to the house is recompensed by a present of money or food4 ,often the leaf-clad person who represents the spirit of vegetation is known as the king or the queen2 thus1 for example1 he or she is called the ,may ,king1 ,whitsuntide ,king1 ,queen of ,may1 and so on4 ,these titles1 as ,mannhardt observes1 imply that the spirit incorporate in vegetation is a ruler1 whose creative power extends far and wide4 ,in a village near ,salzwedel a ,may-tree is set up at ,whitsuntide and the boys race to it2 he who reaches it first is king2 a garland of flowers is put round his neck and in his hand he carries a ,may-bush1 with which1 as the procession moves along1 he sweeps away the dew4 ,at each house they sing a song1 wishing the inmates good luck1 referring to the black cow in the stall milking white milk1 black hen on the nest laying white eggs1 and begging a gift of eggs1 bacon1 and so on4 ,at the village of ,ellgoth in ,silesia a ceremony called the ,king's ,race is observed at ,whitsuntide4 ,a pole with a cloth tied to it is set up in a meadow1 and the young men ride past it on horseback1 each trying to snatch away the cloth as he gallops by4 ,the one who succeeds in carrying it off and dipping it in the neighbouring ,oder is proclaimed ,king4 ,here the pole is clearly a substitute for a ,may-tree4 ,in some villages of ,brunswick at ,whitsuntide a ,may ,king is completely enveloped in a ,may-bush4 ,in some parts of ,thringen also they have a ,may ,king at ,whitsuntide1 but he is dressed up rather differently4 ,a frame of wood is made in which a man can stand2 it is completely covered with birch boughs and is surmounted by a crown of birch and flowers1 in which a bell is fastened4 ,this frame is placed in the wood and the ,may ,king gets into it4 ,the rest go out and look for him1 and when they have found him they lead him back into the village to the magistrate1 the clergyman1 and others1 who have to guess who is in the verdurous frame4 ,if they guess wrong1 the ,may ,king rings his bell by shaking his head1 and a forfeit of beer or the like must be paid by the unsuccessful guesser4 ,at ,wahrstedt the boys at ,whitsuntide choose by lot a king and a high-steward4 ,the latter is completely concealed in a ,may-bush1 wears a wooden crown wreathen with flowers1 and carries a wooden sword4 ,the king1 on the other hand1 is only distinguished by a nosegay in his cap1 and a reed1 with a red ribbon tied to it1 in his hand4 ,they beg for eggs from house to house1 threatening that1 where none are given1 none will be laid by the hens throughout the year4 ,in this custom the high-steward appears1 for some reason1 to have usurped the insignia of the king4 ,at ,hildesheim five or six young fellows go about on the afternoon of ,whit-,monday cracking long whips in measured time and collecting eggs from the houses4 ,the chief person of the band is the ,leaf ,king1 a lad swathed so completely in birchen twigs that nothing of him can be seen but his feet4 ,a huge head-dress of birchen twigs adds to his apparent stature4 ,in his hand he carries a long crook1 with which he tries to catch stray dogs and children4 ,in some parts of ,bohemia on ,whit-,monday the young fellows disguise themselves in tall caps of birch bark adorned with flowers4 ,one of them is dressed as a king and dragged on a sledge to the village green1 and if on the way they pass a pool the sledge is always overturned into it4 ,arrived at the green they gather round the king2 the crier jumps on a stone or climbs up a tree and recites lampoons about each house and its inmates4 ,afterwards the disguises of bark are stripped off and they go about the village in holiday attire1 carrying a ,may-tree and begging4 ,cakes1 eggs1 and corn are sometimes given them4 ,at ,grossvargula1 near ,langensalza1 in the eighteenth century a ,grass ,king used to be led about in procession at ,whitsuntide4 ,he was encased in a pyramid of poplar branches1 the top of which was adorned with a royal crown of branches and flowers4 ,he rode on horseback with the leafy pyramid over him1 so that its lower end touched the ground1 and an opening was left in it only for his face4 ,surrounded by a cavalcade of young fellows1 he rode in procession to the town hall1 the parsonage1 and so on1 where they all got a drink of beer4 ,then under the seven lindens of the neighbouring ,sommerberg1 the ,grass ,king was stripped of his green casing2 the crown was handed to the ,mayor1 and the branches were stuck in the flax fields in order to make the flax grow tall4 ,in this last trait the fertilising influence ascribed to the representative of the tree-spirit comes out clearly4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,pilsen 7,bohemia7 a conical hut of green branches1 without any door1 is erected at ,whitsuntide in the midst of the village4 ,to this hut rides a troop of village lads with a king at their head4 ,he wears a sword at his side and a sugar-loaf hat of rushes on his head4 ,in his train are a judge1 a crier1 and a personage called the ,frog-flayer or ,hangman4 ,this last is a sort of ragged merryandrew1 wearing a rusty old sword and bestriding a sorry hack4 ,on reaching the hut the crier dismounts and goes round it looking for a door4 ,finding none1 he says1 ,ah1 this is perhaps an enchanted castle2 the witches creep through the leaves and need no door4 ,at last he draws his sword and hews his way into the hut1 where there is a chair1 on which he seats himself and proceeds to criticise in rhyme the girls1 farmers1 and farm-servants of the neighbourhood4 ,when this is over1 the ,frog-flayer steps forward and1 after exhibiting a cage with frogs in it1 sets up a gallows on which he hangs the frogs in a row4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,plas the ceremony differs in some points4 ,the king and his soldiers are completely clad in bark1 adorned with flowers and ribbons2 they all carry swords and ride horses1 which are gay with green branches and flowers4 ,while the village dames and girls are being criticised at the arbour1 a frog is secretly pinched and poked by the crier till it quacks4 ,sentence of death is passed on the frog by the king2 the hangman beheads it and flings the bleeding body among the spectators4 ,lastly1 the king is driven from the hut and pursued by the soldiers4 ,the pinching and beheading of the frog are doubtless1 as ,mannhardt observes1 a rain-charm4 ,we have seen that some ,indians of the ,orinoco beat frogs for the express purpose of producing rain1 and that killing a frog is a ,european rain-charm4 ,often the spirit of vegetation in spring is represented by a queen instead of a king4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,libchowic 7,bohemia71 on the fourth ,sunday in ,lent1 girls dressed in white and wearing the first spring flowers1 as violets and daisies1 in their hair1 lead about the village a girl who is called the ,queen and is crowned with flowers4 ,during the procession1 which is conducted with great solemnity1 none of the girls may stand still1 but must keep whirling round continually and singing4 ,in every house the ,queen announces the arrival of spring and wishes the inmates good luck and blessings1 for which she receives presents4 ,in ,german ,hungary the girls choose the prettiest girl to be their ,whitsuntide ,queen1 fasten a towering wreath on her brow1 and carry her singing through the streets4 ,at every house they stop1 sing old ballads1 and receive presents4 ,in the south-east of ,ireland on ,may ,day the prettiest girl used to be chosen ,queen of the district for twelve months4 ,she was crowned with wild flowers2 feasting1 dancing1 and rustic sports followed1 and were closed by a grand procession in the evening4 ,during her year of office she presided over rural gatherings of young people at dances and merry-makings4 ,if she married before next ,may ,day1 her authority was at an end1 but her successor was not elected till that day came round4 ,the ,may ,queen is common ,in ,france and familiar in ,england4 ,again the spirit of vegetation is sometimes represented by a king and queen1 a lord and lady1 or a bridegroom and bride4 ,here again the parallelism holds between the anthropomorphic and the vegetable representation of the tree-spirit1 for we have seen above that trees are sometimes married to each other4 ,at ,halford in ,south ,warwickshire the children go from house to house on ,may ,day1 walking two and two in procession and headed by a ,king and ,queen4 ,two boys carry a ,may-pole some six or seven feet high1 which is covered with flowers and greenery4 ,fastened to it near the top are two cross-bars at right angles to each other4 ,these are also decked with flowers1 and from the ends of the bars hang hoops similarly adorned4 ,at the houses the children sing ,may songs and receive money1 which is used to provide tea for them at the schoolhouse in the afternoon4 ,in a ,bohemian village near ,kniggrtz on ,whit-,monday the children play the king's game1 at which a king and queen march about under a canopy1 the queen wearing a garland1 and the youngest girl carrying two wreaths on a plate behind them4 ,they are attended by boys and girls called groomsmen and bridesmaids1 and they go from house to house collecting gifts4 ,a regular feature in the popular celebration of ,whitsuntide in ,silesia used to be1 and to some extent still is1 the contest for the kingship4 ,this contest took various forms1 but the mark or goal was generally the ,may-tree or ,may-pole4 ,sometimes the youth who succeeded in climbing the smooth pole and bringing down the prize was proclaimed the ,whitsuntide ,king and his sweetheart the ,whitsuntide ,bride4 ,afterwards the king1 carrying the ,may-bush1 repaired with the rest of the company to the alehouse1 where a dance and a feast ended the merry-making4 ,often the young farmers and labourers raced on horseback to the ,may-pole1 which was adorned with flowers1 ribbons1 and a crown4 ,he who first reached the pole was the ,whitsuntide ,king1 and the rest had to obey his orders for that day4 ,the worst rider became the clown4 ,at the ,may-tree all dismounted and hoisted the king on their shoulders4 ,he nimbly swarmed up the pole and brought down the ,may-bush and the crown1 which had been fastened to the top4 ,meanwhile the clown hurried to the alehouse and proceeded to bolt thirty rolls of bread and to swig four quart bottles of brandy with the utmost possible despatch4 ,he was followed by the king1 who bore the ,may-bush and crown at the head of the company4 ,if on their arrival the clown had already disposed of the rolls and the brandy1 and greeted the king with a speech and a glass of beer1 his score was paid by the king2 otherwise he had to settle it himself4 ,after church time the stately procession wound through the village4 ,at the head of it rode the king1 decked with flowers and carrying the ,may-bush4 ,next came the clown with his clothes turned inside out1 a great flaxen beard on his chain1 and the ,whitsuntide crown on his head4 ,two riders disguised as guards followed4 ,the procession drew up before every farmyard2 the two guards dismounted1 shut the clown into the house1 and claimed a contribution from the housewife to buy soap with which to wash the clown's beard4 ,custom allowed them to carry off any victuals which were not under lock and key4 ,last of all they came to the house in which the king's sweetheart lived4 ,she was greeted as ,whitsuntide ,queen and received suitable presents--to wit1 a many-coloured sash1 a cloth1 and an apron4 ,the king got as a prize1 a vest1 a neck-cloth1 and so forth1 and had the right of setting up the ,may-bush or ,whitsuntide-tree before his master's yard1 where it remained as an honourable token till the same day next year4 ,finally the procession took its way to the tavern1 where the king and queen opened the dance4 ,sometimes the ,whitsuntide ,king and ,queen succeeded to office in a different way4 ,a man of straw1 as large as life and crowned with a red cap1 was conveyed in a cart1 between two men armed and disguised as guards1 to a place where a mock court was waiting to try him4 ,a great crowd followed the cart4 ,after a formal trial the straw man was condemned to death and fastened to a stake on the execution ground4 ,the young men with bandaged eyes tried to stab him with a spear4 ,he who succeeded became king and his sweetheart queen4 ,the straw man was known as the ,goliath4 ,in a parish of ,denmark it used to be the custom at ,whitsuntide to dress up a little girl as the ,whitsun-bride and a little boy as her groom4 ,she was decked in all the finery of a grown-up bride1 and wore a crown of the freshest flowers of spring on her head4 ,her groom was as gay as flowers1 ribbons1 and knots could make him4 ,the other children adorned themselves as best they could with the yellow flowers of the trollius and caltha4 ,then they went in great state from farmhouse to farmhouse1 two little girls walking at the head of the procession as bridesmaids1 and six or eight outriders galloping ahead on hobby-horses to announce their coming4 ,contributions of eggs1 butter1 loaves1 cream1 coffee1 sugar1 and tallow-candles were received and conveyed away in baskets4 ,when they had made the round of the farms1 some of the farmers' wives helped to arrange the wedding feast1 and the children danced merrily in clogs on the stamped clay floor till the sun rose and the birds began to sing4 ,all this is now a thing of the past4 ,only the old folks still remember the little ,whitsun-bride and her mimic pomp4 ,we have seen that in ,sweden the ceremonies associated elsewhere with ,may ,day or ,whitsuntide commonly take place at ,midsummer4 ,accordingly we find that in some parts of the ,swedish province of ,blekinge they still choose a ,midsummer's ,bride1 to whom the church coronet is occasionally lent4 ,the girl selects for herself a ,bridegroom1 and a collection is made for the pair1 who for the time being are looked on as man and wife4 ,the other youths also choose each his bride4 ,a similar ceremony seems to be still kept up in ,norway4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,brianon 7,dauphin7 on ,may ,day the lads wrap up in green leaves a young fellow whose sweetheart has deserted him or married another4 ,he lies down on the ground and feigns to be asleep4 ,then a girl who likes him1 and would marry him1 comes and wakes him1 and raising him up offers him her arm and a flag4 ,so they go to the alehouse1 where the pair lead off the dancing4 ,but they must marry within the year1 or they are treated as old bachelor and old maid1 and are debarred the company of the young folks4 ,the lad is called the ,bridegroom of the month of ,may4 ,in the alehouse he puts off his garment of leaves1 out of which1 mixed with flowers1 his partner in the dance makes a nosegay1 and wears it at her breast next day1 when he leads her again to the alehouse4 ,like this is a ,russian custom observed in the district of ,nerechta on the ,thursday before ,whitsunday4 ,the girls go out into a birch-wood1 wind a girdle or band round a stately birch1 twist its lower branches into a wreath1 and kiss each other in pairs through the wreath4 ,the girls who kiss through the wreath call each other gossips4 ,then one of the girls steps forward1 and mimicking a drunken man1 flings herself on the ground1 rolls on the grass1 and feigns to fall fast asleep4 ,another girl wakens the pretended sleeper and kisses him2 then the whole bevy trips singing through the wood to twine garlands1 which they throw into the water4 ,in the fate of the garlands floating on the stream they read their own4 ,here the part of the sleeper was probably at one time played by a lad4 ,in these ,french and ,russian customs we have a forsaken bridegroom1 in the following a forsaken bride4 ,on ,shrove ,tuesday the ,slovenes of ,oberkrain drag a straw puppet with joyous cries up and down the village2 then they throw it into the water or burn it1 and from the height of the flames they judge of the abundance of the next harvest4 ,the noisy crew is followed by a female masker1 who drags a great board by a string and gives out that she is a forsaken bride4 ,viewed in the light of what has gone before1 the awakening of the forsaken sleeper in these ceremonies probably represents the revival of vegetation in spring4 ,but it is not easy to assign their respective parts to the forsaken bridegroom and to the girl who wakes him from his slumber4 ,is the sleeper the leafless forest or the bare earth of winter8 ,is the girl who awakens him the fresh verdure or the genial sunshine of spring8 ,it is hardly possible1 on the evidence before us1 to answer these questions4 ,in the ,highlands of ,scotland the revival of vegetation in spring used to be graphically represented on ,st4 ,bride's ,day1 the first of ,february4 ,thus in the ,hebrides the mistress and servants of each family take a sheaf of oats1 and dress it up in women's apparel1 put it in a large basket and lay a wooden club by it1 and this they call ,briid's bed2 and then the mistress and servants cry three times1 ',briid is come1 ,briid is welcome4' ,this they do just before going to bed1 and when they rise in the morning they look among the ashes1 expecting to see the impression of ,briid's club there2 which if they do1 they reckon it a true presage of a good crop and prosperous year1 and the contrary they take as an ill omen4 ,the same custom is described by another witness thus3 ,upon the night before ,candlemas it is usual to make a bed with corn and hay1 over which some blankets are laid1 in a part of the house1 near the door4 ,when it is ready1 a person goes out and repeats three times1 4 4 4 ',bridget1 ,bridget1 come in2 thy bed is ready4' ,one or more candles are left burning near it all night4 ,similarly in the ,isle of ,man on the eve of the first of ,february1 a festival was formerly kept1 called1 in the ,manks language1 ,laa'l ,breeshey1 in honour of the ,irish lady who went over to the ,isle of ,man to receive the veil from ,st4 ,maughold4 ,the custom was to gather a bundle of green rushes1 and standing with them in the hand on the threshold of the door1 to invite the holy ,saint ,bridget to come and lodge with them that night4 ,in the ,manks language1 the invitation ran thus3 ',brede1 ,brede1 tar gys my thie tar dyn thie ayms noght ,foshil jee yn dorrys da ,brede1 as lhig da ,brede e heet staigh4' ,in ,english3 ',bridget1 ,bridget1 come to my house1 come to my house to-night4 ,open the door for ,bridget1 and let ,bridget come in4' ,after these words were repeated1 the rushes were strewn on the floor by way of a carpet or bed for ,st4 ,bridget4 ,a custom very similar to this was also observed in some of the ,out-,isles of the ancient ,kingdom of ,man4 ,in these ,manx and ,highland ceremonies it is obvious that ,st4 ,bride1 or ,st4 ,bridget1 is an old heathen goddess of fertility1 disguised in a threadbare ,christian cloak4 ,probably she is no other than ,brigit1 the ,celtic goddess of fire and apparently of the crops4 ,often the marriage of the spirit of vegetation in spring1 though not directly represented1 is implied by naming the human representative of the spirit1 the ,bride1 and dressing her in wedding attire4 ,thus in some villages of ,altmark at ,whitsuntide1 while the boys go about carrying a ,may-tree or leading a boy enveloped in leaves and flowers1 the girls lead about the ,may ,bride1 a girl dressed as a bride with a great nosegay in her hair4 ,they go from house to house1 the ,may ,bride singing a song in which she asks for a present and tells the inmates of each house that if they give her something they will themselves have something the whole year through2 but if they give her nothing they will themselves have nothing4 ,in some parts of ,westphalia two girls lead a flower-crowned girl called the ,whitsuntide ,bride from door to door1 singing a song in which they ask for eggs4 ,,xi4 ,the ,influence of the ,sexes on ,vegetation ,,from ,,the ,,preceding examination of the spring and summer festivals of ,europe we may infer that our rude forefathers personified the powers of vegetation as male and female1 and attempted1 on the principle of homoeopathic or imitative magic1 to quicken the growth of trees and plants by representing the marriage of the sylvan deities in the persons of a ,king and ,queen of ,may1 a ,whitsun ,bridegroom and ,bride1 and so forth4 ,such representations were accordingly no mere symbolic or allegorical dramas1 pastoral plays designed to amuse or instruct a rustic audience4 ,they were charms intended to make the woods to grow green1 the fresh grass to sprout1 the corn to shoot1 and the flowers to blow4 ,and it was natural to suppose that the more closely the mock marriage of the leaf-clad or flower-decked mummers aped the real marriage of the woodland sprites1 the more effective would be the charm4 ,accordingly we may assume with a high degree of probability that the profligacy which notoriously attended these ceremonies was at one time not an accidental excess but an essential part of the rites1 and that in the opinion of those who performed them the marriage of trees and plants could not be fertile without the real union of the human sexes4 ,at the present day it might perhaps be vain to look in civilised ,europe for customs of this sort observed for the explicit purpose of promoting the growth of vegetation4 ,but ruder races in other parts of the world have consciously employed the intercourse of the sexes as a means to ensure the fruitfulness of the earth2 and some rites which are still1 or were till lately1 kept up in ,europe can be reasonably explained only as stunted relics of a similar practice4 ,the following facts will make this plain4 ,for four days before they committed the seed to the earth the ,pipiles of ,central ,america kept apart from their wives in order that on the night before planting they might indulge their passions to the fullest extent2 certain persons are even said to have been appointed to perform the sexual act at the very moment when the first seeds were deposited in the ground4 ,the use of their wives at that time was indeed enjoined upon the people by the priests as a religious duty1 in default of which it was not lawful to sow the seed4 ,the only possible explanation of this custom seems to be that the ,indians confused the process by which human beings reproduce their kind with the process by which plants discharge the same function1 and fancied that by resorting to the former they were simultaneously forwarding the latter4 ,in some parts of ,java1 at the season when the bloom will soon be on the rice1 the husbandman and his wife visit their fields by night and there engage in sexual intercourse for the purpose of promoting the growth of the crop4 ,in the ,leti1 ,sarmata1 and some other groups of islands which lie between the western end of ,new ,guinea and the northern part of ,australia1 the heathen population regard the sun as the male principle by whom the earth or female prnciple is fertilised4 ,they call him ,upu-lera or ,mr4 ,sun1 and represent him under the form of a lamp made of coco-nut leaves1 which may be seen hanging everywhere in their houses and in the sacred fig-tree4 ,under the tree lies a large flat stone1 which serves as a sacrificial table4 ,on it the heads of slain foes were and are still placed in some of the islands4 ,once a year1 at the beginning of the rainy season1 ,mr4 ,sun comes down into the holy fig-tree to fertilise the earth1 and to facilitate his descent a ladder with seven rungs is considerately placed at his disposal4 ,it is set up under the tree and is adorned with carved figures of the birds whose shrill clarion heralds the approach of the sun in the east4 ,on this occasion pigs and dogs are sacrificed in profusion2 men and women alike indulge in a saturnalia2 and the mystic union of the sun and the earth is dramatically represented in public1 amid song and dance1 by the real union of the sexes under the tree4 ,the object of the festival1 we are told1 is to procure rain1 plenty of food and drink1 abundance of cattle and children and riches from ,grandfather ,sun4 ,they pray that he may make every she-goat to cast two or three young1 the people to multiply1 the dead pigs to be replaced by living pigs1 the empty rice-baskets to be filled1 and so on4 ,and to induce him to grant their requests they offer him pork and rice and liquor1 and invite him to fall to4 ,in the ,babar ,islands a special flag is hoisted at this festival as a symbol of the creative energy of the sun2 it is of white cotton1 about nine feet high1 and consists of the figure of a man in an appropriate attitude4 ,it would be unjust to treat these orgies as a mere outburst of unbridled passion2 no doubt they are deliberately and solemnly organised as essential to the fertility of the earth and the welfare of man4 ,the same means which are thus adopted to stimulate the growth of the crops are naturally employed to ensure the fruitfulness of trees4 ,in some parts of ,amboyna1 when the state of the clove plantation indicates that the crop is likely to be scanty1 the men go naked to the plantations by night1 and there seek to fertilise the trees precisely as they would impregnate women1 while at the same time they call out for ,more cloves6 ,this is supposed to make the trees bear fruit more abundantly4 ,the ,baganda of ,central ,africa believe so strongly in the intimate relation between the intercourse of the sexes and the fertility of the ground that among them a barren wife is generally sent away1 because she is supposed to prevent her husband's garden from bearing fruit4 ,on the contrary1 a couple who have given proof of extraordinary fertility by becoming the parents of twins are believed by the ,baganda to be endowed with a corresponding power of increasing the fruitfulness of the plantain-trees1 which furnish them with their staple food4 ,some little time after the birth of the twins a ceremony is performed1 the object of which clearly is to transmit the reproductive virtue of the parents to the plantains4 ,the mother lies down on her back in the thick grass near the house and places a flower of the plantain between her legs2 then her husband comes and knocks the flower away with his genital member4 ,further1 the parents go through the country performing dances in the gardens of favoured friends1 apparently for the purpose of causing the plantain-trees to bear fruit more abundantly4 ,in various parts of ,europe customs have prevailed both at spring and harvest which are clearly based on the same crude notion that the relation of the human sexes to each other can be so used as to quicken the growth of plants4 ,for example1 in the ,ukraine on ,st4 ,george's ,day 7the twenty-third of ,april7 the priest in his robes1 attended by his acolytes1 goes out to the fields of the village1 where the crops are beginning to show green above the ground1 and blesses them4 ,after that the young married people lie down in couples on the sown fields and roll several times over on them1 in the belief that this will promote the growth of the crops4 ,in some parts of ,russia the priest himself is rolled by women over the sprouting crop1 and that without regard to the mud and holes which he may encounter in his beneficent progress4 ,if the shepherd resists or remonstrates1 his flock murmurs1 ,little ,father1 you do not really wish us well1 you do not wish us to have corn1 although you do wish to live on our corn4 ,in some parts of ,germany at harvest the men and women1 who have reaped the corn1 roll together on the field4 ,this again is probably a mitigation of an older and ruder custom designed to impart fertility to the fields by methods like those resorted to by the ,pipiles of ,central ,america long ago and by the cultivators of rice in ,java at the present time4 ,to the student who cares to track the devious course of the human mind in its gropings after truth1 it is of some interest to observe that the same theoretical belief in the sympathetic influence of the sexes on vegetation1 which has led some peoples to indulge their passions as a means of fertilising the earth1 has led others to seek the same end by directly opposite means4 ,from the moment that they sowed the maize till the time that they reaped it1 the ,indians of ,nicaragua lived chastely1 keeping apart from their wives and sleeping in a separate place4 ,they ate no salt1 and drank neither cocoa nor chicha1 the fermented liquor made from maize2 in short the season was for them1 as the ,spanish historian observes1 a time of abstinence4 ,to this day some of the ,indian tribes of ,central ,america practise continence for the purpose of thereby promoting the growth of the crops4 ,thus we are told that before sowing the maize the ,kekchi ,indians sleep apart from their wives1 and eat no flesh for five days1 while among the ,lanquineros and ,cajaboneros the period of abstinence from these carnal pleasures extends to thirteen days4 ,so amongst some of the ,germans of ,transylvania it is a rule that no man may sleep with his wife during the whole of the time that he is engaged in sowing his fields4 ,the same rule is observed at ,kalotaszeg in ,hungary2 the people think that if the custom were not observed the corn would be mildewed4 ,similarly a ,central ,australian headman of the ,kaitish tribe strictly abstains from marital relations with his wife all the time that he is performing magical ceremonies to make the grass grow2 for he believes that a breach of this rule would prevent the grass seed from sprouting properly4 ,in some of the ,melanesian islands1 when the yam vines are being trained1 the men sleep near the gardens and never approach their wives2 should they enter the garden after breaking this rule of continence the fruits of the garden would be spoilt4 ,if we ask why it is that similar beliefs should logically lead1 among different peoples1 to such opposite modes of conduct as strict chastity and more or less open debauchery1 the reason1 as it presents itself to the primitive mind1 is perhaps not very far to seek4 ,if rude man identifies himself1 in a manner1 with nature2 if he fails to distinguish the impulses and processes in himself from the methods which nature adopts to ensure the reproduction of plants and animals1 he may leap to one of two conclusions4 ,either he may infer that by yielding to his appetites he will thereby assist in the multiplication of plants and animals2 or he may imagine that the vigour which he refuses to expend in reproducing his own kind1 will form as it were a store of energy whereby other creatures1 whether vegetable or animal1 will somehow benefit in propagating their species4 ,thus from the same crude philosophy1 the same primitive notions of nature and life1 the savage may derive by different channels a rule either of profligacy or of asceticism4 ,to readers bred in religion which is saturated with the ascetic idealism of the ,east1 the explanation which ,i have given of the rule of continence observed under certain circumstances by rude or savage peoples may seem far-fetched and improbable4 ,they may think that moral purity1 which is so intimately associated in their minds with the observance of such a rule1 furnishes a sufficient explanation of it2 they may hold with ,milton that chastity in itself is a noble virtue1 and that the restraint which it imposes on one of the strongest impulses of our animal nature marks out those who can submit to it as men raised above the common herd1 and therefore worthy to receive the seal of the divine approbation4 ,however natural this mode of thought may seem to us1 it is utterly foreign and indeed incomprehensible to the savage4 ,if he resists on occasion the sexual instinct1 it is from no high idealism1 no ethereal aspiration after moral purity1 but for the sake of some ulterior yet perfectly definite and concrete object1 to gain which he is prepared to sacrifice the immediate gratification of his senses4 ,that this is or may be so1 the examples ,i have cited are amply sufficient to prove4 ,they show that where the instinct of self-preservation1 which manifests itself chiefly in the search for food1 conflicts or appears to conflict with the instinct which conduces to the propagation of the species1 the former instinct1 as the primary and more fundamental1 is capable of overmastering the latter4 ,in short1 the savage is willing to restrain his sexual propensity for the sake of food4 ,another object for the sake of which he consents to exercise the same self-restraint is victory in war4 ,not only the warrior in the field but his friends at home will often bridle their sensual appetites from a belief that by so doing they will the more easily overcome their enemies4 ,the fallacy of such a belief1 like the belief that the chastity of the sower conduces to the growth of the seed1 is plain enough to us2 yet perhaps the self-restraint which these and the like beliefs1 vain and false as they are1 have imposed on mankind1 has not been without its utility in bracing and strengthening the breed4 ,for strength of character in the race as in the individual consists mainly in the power of sacrificing the present to the future1 of disregarding the immediate temptations of ephemeral pleasure for more distant and lasting sources of satisfaction4 ,the more the power is exercised the higher and stronger becomes the character2 till the height of heroism is reached in men who renounce the pleasures of life and even life itself for the sake of keeping or winning for others1 perhaps in distant ages1 the blessings of freedom and truth4 ,,xii4 ,the ,sacred ,marriage #a4 ,diana as a ,goddess of ,fertility ,,we have seen that according to a widespread belief1 which is not without a foundation in fact1 plants reproduce their kinds through the sexual union of male and female elements1 and that on the principle of homoeopathic or imitative magic this reproduction is supposed to be stimulated by the real or mock marriage of men and women1 who masquerade for the time being as spirits of vegetation4 ,such magical dramas have played a great part in the popular festivals of ,europe1 and based as they are on a very crude conception of natural law1 it is clear that they must have been handed down from a remote antiquity4 ,we shall hardly1 therefore1 err in assuming that they date from a time when the forefathers of the civilised nations of ,europe were still barbarians1 herding their cattle and cultivating patches of corn in the clearings of the vast forests1 which then covered the greater part of the continent1 from the ,mediterranean to the ,arctic ,ocean4 ,but if these old spells and enchantments for the growth of leaves and blossoms1 of grass and flowers and fruit1 have lingered down to our own time in the shape of pastoral plays and popular merry-makings1 is it not reasonable to suppose that they survived in less attenuated forms some two thousand years ago among the civilised peoples of antiquity8 ,or1 to put it otherwise1 is it not likely that in certain festivals of the ancients we may be able to detect the equivalents of our ,may ,day1 ,whitsuntide1 and ,midsummer celebrations1 with this difference1 that in those days the ceremonies had not yet dwindled into mere shows and pageants1 but were still religious or magical rites1 in which the actors consciously supported the high parts of gods and goddesses8 ,now in the first chapter of this book we found reason to believe that the priest who bore the title of ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi had for his mate the goddess of the grove1 ,diana herself4 ,may not he and she1 as ,king and ,queen of the ,wood1 have been serious counterparts of the merry mummers who play the ,king and ,queen of ,may1 the ,whitsuntide ,bridegroom and ,bride in modern ,europe8 and may not their union have been yearly celebrated in a theogamy or divine marriage8 ,such dramatic weddings of gods and goddesses1 as we shall see presently1 were carried out as solemn religious rites in many parts of the ancient world2 hence there is no intrinsic improbability in the supposition that the sacred grove at ,nemi may have been the scene of an annual ceremony of this sort4 ,direct evidence that it was so there is none1 but analogy pleads in favour of the view1 as ,i shall now endeavour to show4 ,diana was essentially a goddess of the woodlands1 as ,ceres was a goddess of the corn and ,bacchus a god of the vine4 ,her sanctuaries were commonly in groves1 indeed every grove was sacred to her1 and she is often associated with the forest god ,silvanus in dedications4 ,but whatever her origin may have been1 ,diana was not always a mere goddess of trees4 ,like her ,greek sister ,artemis1 she appears to have developed into a personification of the teeming life of nature1 both animal and vegetable4 ,as mistress of the greenwood she would naturally be thought to own the beasts1 whether wild or tame1 that ranged through it1 lurking for their prey in its gloomy depths1 munching the fresh leaves and shoots among the boughs1 or cropping the herbage in the open glades and dells4 ,thus she might come to be the patron goddess both of hunters and herdsmen1 just as ,silvanus was the god not only of woods1 but of cattle4 ,similarly in ,finland the wild beasts of the forest were regarded as the herds of the woodland god ,tapio and of his stately and beautiful wife4 ,no man might slay one of these animals without the gracious permission of their divine owners4 ,hence the hunter prayed to the sylvan deities1 and vowed rich offerings to them if they would drive the game across his path4 ,and cattle also seem to have enjoyed the protection of those spirits of the woods1 both when they were in their stalls and while they strayed in the forest4 ,before the ,gayos of ,sumatra hunt deer1 wild goats1 or wild pigs with hounds in the woods1 they deem it necessary to obtain the leave of the unseen ,lord of the forest4 ,this is done according to a prescribed form by a man who has special skill in woodcraft4 ,he lays down a quid of betel before a stake which is cut in a particular way to represent the ,lord of the ,wood1 and having done so he prays to the spirit to signify his consent or refusal4 ,in his treatise on hunting1 ,arrian tells us that the ,celts used to offer an annual sacrifice to ,artemis on her birthday1 purchasing the sacrificial victim with the fines which they had paid into her treasury for every fox1 hare1 and roe that they had killed in the course of the year4 ,the custom clearly implied that the wild beasts belonged to the goddess1 and that she must be compensated for their slaughter4 ,but ,diana was not merely a patroness of wild beasts1 a mistress of woods and hills1 of lonely glades and sounding rivers2 conceived as the moon1 and especially1 it would seem1 as the yellow harvest moon1 she filled the farmer's grange with goodly fruits1 and heard the prayers of women in travail4 ,in her sacred grove at ,nemi1 as we have seen1 she was especially worshipped as a goddess of childbirth1 who bestowed offspring on men and women4 ,thus ,diana1 like the ,greek ,artemis1 with whom she was constantly identified1 may be described as a goddess of nature in general and of fertility in particular4 ,we need not wonder1 therefore1 that in her sanctuary on the ,aventine she was represented by an image copied from the many-breasted idol of the ,ephesian ,artemis1 with all its crowded emblems of exuberant fecundity4 ,hence too we can understand why an ancient ,roman law1 attributed to ,king ,tullus ,hostilius1 prescribed that1 when incest had been committed1 an expiatory sacrifice should be offered by the pontiffs in the grove of ,diana4 ,for we know that the crime of incest is commonly supposed to cause a dearth2 hence it would be meet that atonement for the offence should be made to the goddess of fertility4 ,now on the principle that the goddess of fertility must herself be fertile1 it behoved ,diana to have a male partner4 ,her mate1 if the testimony of ,servius may be trusted1 was that ,virbius who had his representative1 or perhaps rather his embodiment1 in the ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi4 ,the aim of their union would be to promote the fruitfulness of the earth1 of animals1 and of mankind2 and it might naturally be thought that this object would be more surely attained if the sacred nuptials were celebrated every year1 the parts of the divine bride and bridegroom being played either by their images or by living persons4 ,no ancient writer mentions that this was done in the grove at ,nemi2 but our knowledge of the ,arician ritual is so scanty that the want of information on this head can hardly count as a fatal objection to the theory4 ,that theory1 in the absence of direct evidence1 must necessarily be based on the analogy of similar customs practised elsewhere4 ,some modern examples of such customs1 more or less degenerate1 were described in the last chapter4 ,here we shall consider their ancient counterparts4 #b4 ,the ,marriage of the ,gods ,,at ,,babylon the imposing sanctuary of ,bel rose like a pyramid above the city in a series of eight towers or stories1 planted one on the top of the other4 ,on the highest tower1 reached by an ascent which wound about all the rest1 there stood a spacious temple1 and in the temple a great bed1 magnificently draped and cushioned1 with a golden table beside it4 ,in the temple no image was to be seen1 and no human being passed the night there1 save a single woman1 whom1 according to the ,chaldean priests1 the god chose from among all the women of ,babylon4 ,they said that the deity himself came into the temple at night and slept in the great bed2 and the woman1 as a consort of the god1 might have no intercourse with mortal man4 ,at ,thebes in ,egypt a woman slept in the temple of ,ammon as the consort of the god1 and1 like the human wife of ,bel at ,babylon1 she was said to have no commerce with a man4 ,in ,egyptian texts she is often mentioned as the divine consort1 and usually she was no less a personage than the ,queen of ,egypt herself4 ,for1 according to the ,egyptians1 their monarchs were actually begotten by the god ,ammon1 who assumed for the time being the form of the reigning king1 and in that disguise had intercourse with the queen4 ,the divine procreation is carved and painted in great detail on the walls of two of the oldest temples in ,egypt1 those of ,deir el ,bahari and ,luxor2 and the inscriptions attached to the paintings leave no doubt as to the meaning of the scenes4 ,at ,athens the god of the vine1 ,dionysus1 was annually married to the ,queen1 and it appears that the consummation of the divine union1 as well as the espousals1 was enacted at the ceremony2 but whether the part of the god was played by a man or an image we do not know4 ,we learn from ,aristotle that the ceremony took place in the old official residence of the ,king1 known as the ,cattle-stall1 which stood near the ,prytaneum or ,town-hall on the north-eastern slope of the ,acropolis4 ,the object of the marriage can hardly have been any other than that of ensuring the fertility of the vines and other fruit-trees of which ,dionysus was the god4 ,thus both in form and in meaning the ceremony would answer to the nuptials of the ,king and ,queen of ,may4 ,in the great mysteries solemnised at ,eleusis in the month of ,september the union of the sky-god ,zeus with the corn-goddess ,demeter appears to have been represented by the union of the hierophant with the priestess of ,demeter1 who acted the parts of god and goddess4 ,but their intercourse was only dramatic or symbolical1 for the hierophant had temporarily deprived himself of his virility by an application of hemlock4 ,the torches having been extinguished1 the pair descended into a murky place1 while the throng of worshippers awaited in anxious suspense the result of the mystic congress1 on which they believed their own salvation to depend4 ,after a time the hierophant reappeared1 and in a blaze of light silently exhibited to the assembly a reaped ear of corn1 the fruit of the divine marriage4 ,then in a loud voice he proclaimed1 ,queen ,brimo has brought forth a sacred boy ,brimos1 by which he meant1 ,the ,mighty ,one has brought forth the ,mighty4 ,the corn-mother in fact had given birth to her child1 the corn1 and her travail-pangs were enacted in the sacred drama4 ,this revelation of the reaped corn appears to have been the crowning act of the mysteries4 ,thus through the glamour shed round these rites by the poetry and philosophy of later ages there still looms1 like a distant landscape through a sunlit haze1 a simple rustic festival designed to cover the wide ,eleusinian plain with a plenteous harvest by wedding the goddess of the corn to the sky-god1 who fertilised the bare earth with genial showers4 ,every few years the people of ,plataea1 in ,boeotia1 held a festival called the ,little ,daedala1 at which they felled an oak-tree in an ancient oak forest4 ,out of the tree they carved an image1 and having dressed it as a bride1 they set it on a bullock-cart with a bridesmaid beside it4 ,the image seems then to have been drawn to the bank of the river ,asopus and back to the town1 attended by a piping and dancing crowd4 ,every sixty years the festival of the ,great ,daedala was celebrated by all the people of ,boeotia2 and at it all the images1 fourteen in number1 which had accumulated at the lesser festivals1 were dragged on wains in procession to the river ,asopus and then to the top of ,mount ,cithaeron1 where they were burnt on a great pyre4 ,the story told to explain the festivals suggests that they celebrated the marriage of ,zeus to ,hera1 represented by the oaken image in bridal array4 ,in ,sweden every year a life-size image of ,frey1 the god of fertility1 both animal and vegetable1 was drawn about the country in a waggon attended by a beautiful girl who was called the god's wife4 ,she acted also as his priestess in his great temple at ,upsala4 ,wherever the waggon came with the image of the god and his blooming young bride1 the people crowded to meet them and offered sacrifices for a fruitful year4 ,thus the custom of marrying gods either to images or to human beings was widespread among the nations of antiquity4 ,the ideas on which such a custom is based are too crude to allow us to doubt that the civilised ,babylonians1 ,egyptians1 and ,greeks inherited it from their barbarous or savage forefathers4 ,this presumption is strengthened when we find rites of a similar kind in vogue among the lower races4 ,thus1 for example1 we are told that once upon a time the ,wotyaks of the ,malmyz district in ,russia were distressed by a series of bad harvests4 ,they did not know what to do1 but at last concluded that their powerful but mischievious god ,keremet must be angry at being unmarried4 ,so a deputation of elders visited the ,wotyaks of ,cura and came to an understanding with them on the subject4 ,then they returned home1 laid in a large stock of brandy1 and having made ready a gaily decked waggon and horses1 they drove in procession with bells ringing1 as they do when they are fetching home a bride1 to the sacred grove at ,cura4 ,there they ate and drank merrily all night1 and next morning they cut a square piece of turf in the grove and took it home with them4 ,after that1 though it fared well with the people of ,malmyz1 it fared ill with the people of ,cura2 for in ,malmyz the bread was good1 but in ,cura it was bad4 ,hence the men of ,cura who had consented to the marriage were blamed and roughly handled by their indignant fellow-villagers4 ,what they meant by this marriage ceremony1 says the writer who reports it1 it is not easy to imagine4 ,perhaps1 as ,bechterew thinks1 they meant to marry ,keremet to the kindly and fruitful ,mukylcin1 the ,earth-wife1 in order that she might influence him for good4 ,when wells are dug in ,bengal1 a wooden image of a god is made and married to the goddess of water4 ,often the bride destined for the god is not a log or a cloud1 but a living woman of flesh and blood4 ,the ,indians of a village in ,peru have been known to marry a beautiful girl1 about fourteen years of age1 to a stone shaped like a human being1 which they regarded as a god 7huaca74 ,all the villagers took part in the marriage ceremony1 which lasted three days1 and was attended with much revelry4 ,the girl thereafter remained a virgin and sacrificed to the idol for the people4 ,they showed her the utmost reverence and deemed her divine4 ,every year about the middle of ,march1 when the season for fishing with the dragnet began1 the ,algonquins and ,hurons married their nets to two young girls1 aged six or seven4 ,at the wedding feast the net was placed between the two maidens1 and was exhorted to take courage and catch many fish4 ,the reason for choosing the brides so young was to make sure that they were virgins4 ,the origin of the custom is said to have been this4 ,one year1 when the fishing season came round1 the ,algonquins cast their nets as usual1 but took nothing4 ,surprised at their want of success1 they did not know what to make of it1 till the soul or genius 7oki7 of the net appeared to them in the likeness of a tall well-built man1 who said to them in a great passion1 ,i have lost my wife and ,i cannot find one who has known no other man but me2 that is why you do not succeed1 and why you never will succeed till you give me satisfaction on this head4 ,so the ,algonquins held a council and resolved to appease the spirit of the net by marrying him to two such very young girls that he could have no ground of complaint on that score for the future4 ,they did so1 and the fishing turned out all that could be wished4 ,the thing got wind among their neighbours the ,hurons1 and they adopted the custom4 ,a share of the catch was always given to the families of the two girls who acted as brides of the net for the year4 ,the ,oraons of ,bengal worship the ,earth as a goddess1 and annually celebrate her marriage with the ,sun-god ,dharme at the time when the sal tree is in blossom4 ,the ceremony is as follows4 ,all bathe1 then the men repair to the sacred grove 7sarna71 while the women assemble at the house of the village priest4 ,after sacrificing some fowls to the ,sun-god and the demon of the grove1 the men eat and drink4 ,the priest is then carried back to the village on the shoulders of a strong man4 ,near the village the women meet the men and wash their feet4 ,with beating of drums and singing1 dancing1 and jumping1 all proceed to the priest's house1 which has been decorated with leaves and flowers4 ,then the usual form of marriage is performed between the priest and his wife1 symbolising the supposed union between ,sun and ,earth4 ,after the ceremony all eat and drink and make merry2 they dance and sing obscene songs1 and finally indulge in the vilest orgies4 ,the object is to move the mother earth to become fruitful4 ,thus the ,sacred ,marriage of the ,sun and ,earth1 personated by the priest and his wife1 is celebrated as a charm to ensure the fertility of the ground2 and for the same purpose1 on the principle of homoeopathic magic1 the people indulge in licentious orgy4 ,it deserves to be remarked that the supernatural being to whom women are married is often a god or spirit of water4 ,thus ,mukasa1 the god of the ,victoria ,nyanza lake1 who was propitiated by the ,baganda every time they undertook a long voyage1 had virgins provided for him to serve as his wives4 ,like the ,vestals they were bound to chastity1 but unlike the ,vestals they seem to have been often unfaithful4 ,the custom lasted until ,mwanga was converted to ,christianity4 ,the ,akikuyu of ,british ,east ,africa worship the snake of a certain river1 and at intervals of several years they marry the snake-god to women1 but especially to young girls4 ,for this purpose huts are built by order of the medicine-men1 who there consummate the sacred marriage with the credulous female devotees4 ,if the girls do not repair to the huts of their own accord in sufficient numbers1 they are seized and dragged thither to the embraces of the deity4 ,the offspring of these mystic unions appears to be fathered on ,god 7ngai72 certainly there are children among the ,akikuyu who pass for children of ,god4 ,it is said that once1 when the inhabitants of ,cayeli in ,buru--an ,east ,indian island--were threatened with destruction by a swarm of crocodiles1 they ascribed the misfortune to a passion which the prince of the crocodiles had conceived for a certain girl4 ,accordingly1 they compelled the damsel's father to dress her in bridal array and deliver her over to the clutches of her crocodile lover4 ,a usage of the same sort is reported to have prevailed in the ,maldive ,islands before the conversion of the inhabitants to ,islam4 ,the famous ,arab traveller ,ibn ,batutah has described the custom and the manner in which it came to an end4 ,he was assured by several trustworthy natives1 whose names he gives1 that when the people of the islands were idolaters there appeared to them every month an evil spirit among the jinn1 who came from across the sea in the likeness of a ship full of burning lamps4 ,the wont of the inhabitants1 as soon as they perceived him1 was to take a young virgin1 and1 having adorned her1 to lead her to a heathen temple that stood on the shore1 with a window looking out to sea4 ,there they left the damsel for the night1 and when they came back in the morning they found her a maid no more1 and dead4 ,every month they drew lots1 and he upon whom the lot fell gave up his daughter to the jinnee of the sea4 ,the last of the maidens thus offered to the demon was rescued by a pious ,berber1 who by reciting the ,koran succeeded in driving the jinnee back into the sea4 ,ibn ,batutah's narrative of the demon lover and his mortal brides closely resembles a well-known type of folk-tale1 of which versions have been found from ,japan and ,annam in the ,east to ,senegambia1 ,scandinavia1 and ,scotland in the ,west4 ,the story varies in details from people to people1 but as commonly told it runs thus4 ,a certain country is infested by a many-headed serpent1 dragon1 or other monster1 which would destroy the whole people if a human victim1 generally a virgin1 were not delivered up to him periodically4 ,many victims have perished1 and at last it has fallen to the lot of the king's own daughter to be sacrificed4 ,she is exposed to the monster1 but the hero of the tale1 generally a young man of humble birth1 interposes in her behalf1 slays the monster1 and receives the hand of the princess as his reward4 ,in many of the tales the monster1 who is sometimes described as a serpent1 inhabits the water of a sea1 a lake1 or a fountain4 ,in other versions he is a serpent or dragon who takes possession of the springs of water1 and only allows the water to flow or the people to make use of it on condition of receiving a human victim4 ,it would probably be a mistake to dismiss all these tales as pure inventions of the story-teller4 ,rather we may suppose that they reflect a real custom of sacrificing girls or women to be the wives of waterspirits1 who are very often conceived as great serpents or dragons4 ,,xiii4 ,the ,kings of ,rome and ,alba #a4 ,numa and ,egeria ,,from ,,the ,,foregoing survey of custom and legend we may infer that the sacred marriage of the powers both of vegetation and of water has been celebrated by many peoples for the sake of promoting the fertility of the earth1 on which the life of animals and men ultimately depends1 and that in such rites the part of the divine bridegroom or bride is often sustained by a man or woman4 ,the evidence may1 therefore1 lend some countenance to the conjecture that in the sacred grove at ,nemi1 where the powers of vegetation and of water manifested themselves in the fair forms of shady woods1 tumbling cascades1 and glassy lake1 a marriage like that of our ,king and ,queen of ,may was annually celebrated between the mortal ,king of the ,wood and the immortal ,queen of the ,wood1 ,diana4 ,in this connexion an important figure in the grove was the water-nymph ,egeria1 who was worshipped by pregnant women because she1 like ,diana1 could grant them an easy delivery4 ,from this it seems fairly safe to conclude that1 like many other springs1 the water of ,egeria was credited with a power of facilitating conception as well as delivery4 ,the votive offerings found on the spot1 which clearly refer to the begetting of children1 may possibly have been dedicated to ,egeria rather than to ,diana1 or perhaps we should rather say that the water-nymph ,egeria is only another form of the great nature-goddess ,diana herself1 the mistress of sounding rivers as well as of umbrageous woods1 who had her home by the lake and her mirror in its calm waters1 and whose ,greek counterpart ,artemis loved to haunt meres and springs4 ,the identification of ,egeria with ,diana is confirmed by a statement of ,plutarch that ,egeria was one of the oak-nymphs whom the ,romans believed to preside over every green oak-grove2 for1 while ,diana was a goddess of the woodlands in general1 she appears to have been intimately associated with oaks in particular1 especially at her sacred grove of ,nemi4 ,perhaps1 then1 ,egeria was the fairy of a spring that flowed from the roots of a sacred oak4 ,such a spring is said to have gushed from the foot of the great oak at ,dodona1 and from its murmurous flow the priestess drew oracles4 ,among the ,greeks a draught of water from certain sacred springs or wells was supposed to confer prophetic powers4 ,this would explain the more than mortal wisdom with which1 according to tradition1 ,egeria inspired her royal husband or lover ,numa4 ,when we remember how very often in early society the king is held responsible for the fall of rain and the fruitfulness of the earth1 it seems hardly rash to conjecture that in the legend of the nuptials of ,numa and ,egeria we have a reminiscence of a sacred marriage which the old ,roman kings regularly contracted with a goddess of vegetation and water for the purpose of enabling him to discharge his divine or magical functions4 ,in such a rite the part of the goddess might be played either by an image or a woman1 and if by a woman1 probably by the ,queen4 ,if there is any truth in this conjecture1 we may suppose that the ,king and ,queen of ,rome masqueraded as god and goddess at their marriage1 exactly as the ,king and ,queen of ,egypt appear to have done4 ,the legend of ,numa and ,egeria points to a sacred grove rather than to a house as the scene of the nuptial union1 which1 like the marriage of the ,king and ,queen of ,may1 or of the vine-god and the ,queen of ,athens1 may have been annually celebrated as a charm to ensure the fertility not only of the earth but of man and beast4 ,now1 according to some accounts1 the scene of the marriage was no other than the sacred grove of ,nemi1 and on quite independent grounds we have been led to suppose that in that same grove the ,king of the ,wood was wedded to ,diana4 ,the convergence of the two distinct lines of enquiry suggests that the legendary union of the ,roman king with ,egeria may have been a reflection or duplicate of the union of the ,king of the ,wood with ,egeria or her double ,diana4 ,this does not imply that the ,roman kings ever served as ,kings of the ,wood in the ,arician grove1 but only that they may originally have been invested with a sacred character of the same general kind1 and may have held office on similar terms4 ,to be more explicit1 it is possible that they reigned1 not by right of birth1 but in virtue of their supposed divinity as representatives or embodiments of a god1 and that as such they mated with a goddess1 and had to prove their fitness from time to time to discharge their divine functions by engaging in a severe bodily struggle1 which may often have proved fatal to them1 leaving the crown to their victorious adversary4 ,our knowledge of the ,roman kingship is far too scanty to allow us to affirm any one of these propositions with confidence2 but at least there are some scattered hints or indications of a similarity in all these respects between the priests of ,nemi and the kings of ,rome1 or perhaps rather between their remote predecessors in the dark ages which preceded the dawn of legend4 #b4 ,the ,king as ,jupiter ,,in ,,the ,,first place1 then1 it would seem that the ,roman king personated no less a deity than ,jupiter himself4 ,for down to imperial times victorious generals celebrating a triumph1 and magistrates presiding at the games in the ,circus1 wore the costume of ,jupiter1 which was borrowed for the occasion from his great temple on the ,capitol2 and it has been held with a high degree of probability both by ancients and moderns that in so doing they copied the traditionary attire and insignia of the ,roman kings4 ,they rode a chariot drawn by four laurel-crowned horses through the city1 where every one else went on foot3 they wore purple robes embroidered or spangled with gold3 in the right hand they bore a branch of laurel1 and in the left hand an ivory sceptre topped with an eagle3 a wreath of laurel crowned their brows3 their face was reddened with vermilion2 and over their head a slave held a heavy crown of massy gold fashioned in the likeness of oak leaves4 ,in this attire the assimilation of the man to the god comes out above all in the eagle-topped sceptre1 the oaken crown1 and the reddened face4 ,for the eagle was the bird of ,jove1 the oak was his sacred tree1 and the face of his image standing in his four-horse chariot on the ,capitol was in like manner regularly dyed red on festivals2 indeed1 so important was it deemed to keep the divine features properly rouged that one of the first duties of the censors was to contract for having this done4 ,as the triumphal procession always ended in the temple of ,jupiter on the ,capitol1 it was peculiarly appropriate that the head of the victor should be graced by a crown of oak leaves1 for not only was every oak consecrated to ,jupiter1 but the ,capitoline temple of the god was said to have been built by ,romulus beside a sacred oak1 venerated by shepherds1 to which the king attached the spoils won by him from the enemy's general in battle4 ,we are expressly told that the oak crown was sacred to ,capitoline ,jupiter2 a passage of ,ovid proves that it was regarded as the god's special emblem4 ,according to a tradition which we have no reason to reject1 ,rome was founded by settlers from ,alba ,longa1 a city situated on the slope of the ,alban hills1 overlooking the lake and the ,campagna4 ,hence if the ,roman kings claimed to be representatives or embodiments of ,jupiter1 the god of the sky1 of the thunder1 and of the oak1 it is natural to suppose that the kings of ,alba1 from whom the founder of ,rome traced his descent1 may have set up the same claim before them4 ,now the ,alban dynasty bore the name of ,silvii or ,wood1 and it can hardly be without significance that in the vision of the historic glories of ,rome revealed to ,aeneas in the underworld1 ,virgil1 an antiquary as well as a poet1 should represent all the line of ,silvii as crowned with oak4 ,a chaplet of oak leaves would thus seem to have been part of the insignia of the old kings of ,alba ,longa as of their successors the kings of ,rome2 in both cases it marked the monarch as the human representative of the oak-god4 ,the ,roman annals record that one of the kings of ,alba1 ,romulus1 ,remulus1 or ,amulius ,silvius by name1 set up for being a god in his own person1 the equal or superior of ,jupiter4 ,to support his pretensions and overawe his subjects1 he constructed machines whereby he mimicked the clap of thunder and the flash of lightning4 ,diodorus relates that in the season of fruitage1 when thunder is loud and frequent1 the king commanded his soldiers to drown the roar of heaven's artillery by clashing their swords against their shields4 ,but he paid the penalty of his impiety1 for he perished1 he and his house1 struck by a thunderbolt in the midst of a dreadful storm4 ,swollen by the rain1 the ,alban lake rose in flood and drowned his palace4 ,but still1 says an ancient historian1 when the water is low and the surface unruffled by a breeze1 you may see the ruins of the palace at the bottom of the clear lake4 ,taken along with the similar story of ,salmoneus1 king of ,elis1 this legend points to a real custom observed by the early kings of ,greece and ,italy1 who1 like their fellows in ,africa down to modern times1 may have been expected to produce rain and thunder for the good of the crops4 ,the priestly king ,numa passed for an adept in the art of drawing down lightning from the sky4 ,mock thunder1 we know1 has been made by various peoples as a rain-charm in modern times2 why should it not have been made by kings in antiquity8 ,thus1 if the kings of ,alba and ,rome imitated ,jupiter as god of the oak by wearing a crown of oak leaves1 they seem also to have copied him in his character of a weather-god by pretending to make thunder and lightning4 ,and if they did so1 it is probable that1 like ,jupiter in heaven and many kings on earth1 they also acted as public rain-makers1 wringing showers from the dark sky by their enchantments whenever the parched earth cried out for the refreshing moisture4 ,at ,rome the sluices of heaven were opened by means of a sacred stone1 and the ceremony appears to have formed part of the ritual of ,jupiter ,elicius1 the god who elicits from the clouds the flashing lightning and the dripping rain4 ,and who so well fitted to perform the ceremony as the king1 the living representative of the sky-god8 ,if the kings of ,rome aped ,capitoline ,jove1 their predecessors the kings of ,alba probably laid themselves out to mimic the great ,latian ,jupiter1 who had his seat above the city on the summit of the ,alban ,mountain4 ,latinus1 the legendary ancestor of the dynasty1 was said to have been changed into ,latian ,jupiter after vanishing from the world in the mysterious fashion characteristic of the old ,latin kings4 ,the sanctuary of the god on the top of the mountain was the religious centre of the ,latin ,league1 as ,alba was its political capital till ,rome wrested the supremacy from its ancient rival4 ,apparently no temple1 in our sense of the word1 was ever erected to ,jupiter on this his holy mountain2 as god of the sky and thunder he appropriately received the homage of his worshippers in the open air4 ,the massive wall1 of which some remains still enclose the old garden of the ,passionist monastery1 seems to have been part of the sacred precinct which ,tarquin the ,proud1 the last king of ,rome1 marked out for the solemn annual assembly of the ,latin ,league4 ,the god's oldest sanctuary on this airy mountain-top was a grove2 and bearing in mind not merely the special consecration of the oak to ,jupiter1 but also the traditional oak crown of the ,alban kings and the analogy of the ,capitoline ,jupiter at ,rome1 we may suppose that the trees in the grove were oaks4 ,we know that in antiquity ,mount ,algidus1 an outlying group of the ,alban hills1 was covered with dark forests of oak2 and among the tribes who belonged to the ,latin ,league in the earliest days1 and were entitled to share the flesh of the white bull sacrificed on the ,alban ,mount1 there was one whose members styled themselves the ,men of the ,oak1 doubtless on account of the woods among which they dwelt4 ,but we should err if we pictured to ourselves the country as covered in historical times with an unbroken forest of oaks4 ,theophrastus has left us a description of the woods of ,latium as they were in the fourth century before ,christ4 ,he says3 ,the land of the ,latins is all moist4 ,the plains produce laurels1 myrtles1 and wonderful beeches2 for they fell trees of such a size that a single stem suffices for the keel of a ,tyrrhenian ship4 ,pines and firs grow in the mountains4 ,what they call the land of ,circe is a lofty headland thickly wooded with oak1 myrtle1 and luxuriant laurels4 ,the natives say that ,circe dwelt there1 and they show the grave of ,elpenor1 from which grow myrtles such as wreaths are made of1 whereas the other myrtle-trees are tall4 ,thus the prospect from the top of the ,alban ,mount in the early days of ,rome must have been very different in some respects from what it is to-day4 ,the purple ,apennines1 indeed1 in their eternal calm on the one hand1 and the shining ,mediterranean in its eternal unrest on the other1 no doubt looked then much as they look now1 whether bathed in sunshine1 or chequered by the fleeting shadows of clouds2 but instead of the desolate brown expanse of the fever-stricken ,campagna1 spanned by its long lines of ruined aqueducts1 like the broken arches of the bridge in the vision of ,mirza1 the eye must have ranged over woodlands that stretched away1 mile after mile1 on all sides1 till their varied hues of green or autumnal scarlet and gold melted insensibly into the blue of the distant mountains and sea4 ,but ,jupiter did not reign alone on the top of his holy mountain4 ,he had his consort with him1 the goddess ,juno1 who was worshipped here under the same title1 ,moneta1 as on the ,capitol at ,rome4 ,as the oak crown was sacred to ,jupiter and ,juno on the ,capitol1 so we may suppose it was on the ,alban ,mount1 from which the ,capitoline worship was derived4 ,thus the oak-god would have his oak-goddess in the sacred oak grove4 ,so at ,dodona the oak-god ,zeus was coupled with ,dione1 whose very name is only a dialectically different form of ,juno2 and so on the top of ,mount ,cithaeron1 as we have seen1 he appears to have been periodically wedded to an oaken image of ,hera4 ,it is probable1 though it cannot be positively proved1 that the sacred marriage of ,jupiter and ,juno was annually celebrated by all the peoples of the ,latin stock in the month which they named after the goddess1 the midsummer month of ,june4 ,if at any time of the year the ,romans celebrated the sacred marriage of ,jupiter and ,juno1 as the ,greeks commonly celebrated the corresponding marriage of ,zeus and ,hera1 we may suppose that under the ,republic the ceremony was either performed over images of the divine pair or acted by the ,flamen ,dialis and his wife the ,flaminica4 ,for the ,flamen ,dialis was the priest of ,jove2 indeed1 ancient and modern writers have regarded him1 with much probability1 as a living image of ,jupiter1 a human embodiment of the sky-god4 ,in earlier times the ,roman king1 as representative of ,jupiter1 would naturally play the part of the heavenly bridegroom at the sacred marriage1 while his queen would figure as the heavenly bride1 just as in ,egypt the king and queen masqueraded in the character of deities1 and as at ,athens the queen annually wedded the vine-god ,dionysus4 ,that the ,roman king and queen should act the parts of ,jupiter and ,juno would seem all the more natural because these deities themselves bore the title of ,king and ,queen4 ,whether that was so or not1 the legend of ,numa and ,egeria appears to embody a reminiscence of a time when the priestly king himself played the part of the divine bridegroom2 and as we have seen reason to suppose that the ,roman kings personated the oak-god1 while ,egeria is expressly said to have been an oak-nymph1 the story of their union in the sacred grove raises a presumption that at ,rome in the regal period a ceremony was periodically performed exactly analogous to that which was annually celebrated at ,athens down to the time of ,aristotle4 ,the marriage of the ,king of ,rome to the oak-goddess1 like the wedding of the vine-god to the ,queen of ,athens1 must have been intended to quicken the growth of vegetation by homoeopathic magic4 ,of the two forms of the rite we can hardly doubt that the ,roman was the older1 and that long before the northern invaders met with the vine on the shores of the ,mediterranean their forefathers had married the tree-god to the tree-goddess in the vast oak forests of ,central and ,northern ,europe4 ,in the ,england of our day the forests have mostly disappeared1 yet still on many a village green and in many a country lane a faded image of the sacred marriage lingers in the rustic pageantry of ,may ,day4 ,,xiv4 ,the ,succession to the ,kingdom in ,ancient ,latium ,,in ,,regard to the ,roman king1 whose priestly functions were inherited by his successor the king of the ,sacred ,rites1 the foregoing discussion has led us to the following conclusions4 ,he represented and indeed personated ,jupiter1 the great god of the sky1 the thunder1 and the oak1 and in that character made rain1 thunder1 and lightning for the good of his subjects1 like many more kings of the weather in other parts of the world4 ,further1 he not only mimicked the oak-god by wearing an oak wreath and other insignia of divinity1 but he was married to an oak-nymph ,egeria1 who appears to have been merely a local form of ,diana in her character of a goddess of woods1 of waters1 and of child-birth4 ,all these conclusions1 which we have reached mainly by a consideration of the ,roman evidence1 may with great probability be applied to the other ,latin communities4 ,they too probably had of old their divine or priestly kings1 who transmitted their religious functions1 without their civil powers1 to their successors the ,kings of the ,sacred ,rites4 ,but we have still to ask1 ,what was the rule of succession to the kingdom among the old ,latin tribes8 ,according to tradition1 there were in all eight kings of ,rome1 and with regard to the five last of them1 at all events1 we can hardly doubt that they actually sat on the throne1 and that the traditional history of their reigns is1 in its main outlines1 correct4 ,now it is very remarkable that though the first king of ,rome1 ,romulus1 is said to have been descended from the royal house of ,alba1 in which the kingship is represented as hereditary in the male line1 not one of the ,roman kings was immediately succeeded by his son on the throne4 ,yet several left sons or grandsons behind them4 ,on the other hand1 one of them was descended from a former king through his mother1 not through his father1 and three of the kings1 namely ,tatius1 the elder ,tarquin1 and ,servius ,tullius1 were succeeded by their sons-in-law1 who were all either foreigners or of foreign descent4 ,this suggests that the right to the kingship was transmitted in the female line1 and was actually exercised by foreigners who married the royal princesses4 ,to put it in technical language1 the succession to the kingship at ,rome and probably in ,latium generally would seem to have been determined by certain rules which have moulded early society in many parts of the world1 namely exogamy1 beena marriage1 and female kinship or mother-kin4 ,exogamy is the rule which obliges a man to marry a woman of a different clan from his own3 beena marriage is the rule that he must leave the home of his birth and live with his wife's people2 and female kinship or mother-kin is the system of tracing relationship and transmitting the family name through women instead of through men4 ,if these principles regulated descent of the kingship among the ancient ,latins1 the state of things in this respect would be somewhat as follows4 ,the political and religious centre of each community would be the perpetual fire on the king's hearth tended by ,vestal ,virgins of the royal clan4 ,the king would be a man of another clan1 perhaps of another town or even of another race1 who had married a daughter of his predecessor and received the kingdom with her4 ,the children whom he had by her would inherit their mother's name1 not his2 the daughters would remain at home2 the sons1 when they grew up1 would go away into the world1 marry1 and settle in their wives' country1 whether as kings or commoners4 ,of the daughters who stayed at home1 some or all would be dedicated as ,vestal ,virgins for a longer or shorter time to the service of the fire on the hearth1 and one of them would in time become the consort of her father's successor4 ,this hypothesis has the advantage of explaining in a simple and natural way some obscure features in the traditional history of the ,latin kingship4 ,thus the legends which tell how ,latin kings were born of virgin mothers and divine fathers become at least more intelligible4 ,for1 stripped of their fabulous element1 tales of this sort mean no more than that a woman has been gotten with child by a man unknown2 and this uncertainty as to fatherhood is more easily compatible with a system of kinship which ignores paternity than with one which makes it all-important4 ,if at the birth of the ,latin kings their fathers were really unknown1 the fact points either to a general looseness of life in the royal family or to a special relaxation of moral rules on certain occasions1 when men and women reverted for a season to the licence of an earlier age4 ,such ,saturnalias are not uncommon at some stages of social evolution4 ,in our own country traces of them long survived in the practices of ,may ,day and ,whitsuntide1 if not of ,christmas4 ,children born of more or less promiscuous intercourse which characterises festivals of this kind would naturally be fathered on the god to whom the particular festival was dedicated4 ,in this connexion it may be significant that a festival of jollity and drunkenness was celebrated by the plebeians and slaves at ,rome on ,midsummer ,day1 and that the festival was specially associated with the fireborn ,king ,servius ,tullius1 being held in honour of ,fortuna1 the goddess who loved ,servius as ,egeria loved ,numa4 ,the popular merrymakings at this season included foot-races and boat-races2 the ,tiber was gay with flower-wreathed boats1 in which young folk sat quaffing wine4 ,the festival appears to have been a sort of ,midsummer ,saturnalia answering to the real ,saturnalia which fell at ,midwinter4 ,in modern ,europe1 as we shall learn later on1 the great ,midsummer festival has been above all a festival of lovers and of fire2 one of its principal features is the pairing of sweethearts1 who leap over the bonfires hand in hand or throw flowers across the flames to each other4 ,and many omens of love and marriage are drawn from the flowers which bloom at this mystic season4 ,it is the time of the roses and of love4 ,yet the innocence and beauty of such festivals in modern times ought not to blind us to the likelihood that in earlier days they were marked by coarser features1 which were probably of the essence of the rites4 ,indeed1 among the rude ,esthonian peasantry these features seem to have lingered down to our own generation1 if not to the present day4 ,one other feature in the ,roman celebration of ,midsummer deserves to be specially noticed4 ,the custom of rowing in flower-decked boats on the river on this day proves that it was to some extent a water festival2 and water has always1 down to modern times1 played a conspicuous part in the rites of ,midsummer ,day1 which explains why the ,church1 in throwing its cloak over the old heathen festival1 chose to dedicate it to ,st4 ,john the ,baptist4 ,the hypothesis that the ,latin kings may have been begotten at an annual festival of love is necessarily a mere conjecture1 though the traditional birth of ,numa at the festival of the ,parilia1 when shepherds leaped across the spring bonfires1 as lovers leap across the ,midsummer fires1 may perhaps be thought to lend it a faint colour of probability4 ,but it is quite possible that the uncertainty as to their fathers may not have arisen till long after the death of the kings1 when their figures began to melt away into the cloudland of fable1 assuming fantastic shapes and gorgeous colouring as they passed from earth to heaven4 ,if they were alien immigrants1 strangers and pilgrims in the land they ruled over1 it would be natural enough that the people should forget their lineage1 and forgetting it should provide them with another1 which made up in lustre what it lacked in truth4 ,the final apotheosis1 which represented the kings not merely as sprung from gods but as themselves deities incarnate1 would be much facilitated if in their lifetime1 as we have seen reason to think1 they had actually laid claim to divinity4 ,if among the ,latins the women of royal blood always stayed at home and received as their consorts men of another stock1 and often of another country1 who reigned as kings in virtue of their marriage with a native princess1 we can understand not only why foreigners wore the crown at ,rome1 but also why foreign names occur in the list of the ,alban kings4 ,in a state of society where nobility is reckoned only through women--in other words1 where descent through the mother is everything1 and descent through the father is nothing--no objection will be felt to uniting girls of the highest rank to men of humble birth1 even to aliens or slaves1 provided that in themselves the men appear to be suitable mates4 ,what really matters is that the royal stock1 on which the prosperity and even the existence of the people is supposed to depend1 should be perpetuated in a vigorous and efficient form1 and for this purpose it is necessary that the women of the royal family should bear children to men who are physically and mentally fit1 according to the standard of early society1 to discharge the important duty of procreation4 ,thus the personal qualities of the kings at this stage of social evolution are deemed of vital importance4 ,if they1 like their consorts1 are of royal and divine descent1 so much the better2 but it is not essential that they should be so4 ,at ,athens1 as at ,rome1 we find traces of succession to the throne by marriage with a royal princess2 for two of the most ancient kings of ,athens1 namely ,cecrops and ,amphictyon1 are said to have married the daughters of their predecessors4 ,this tradition is to a certain extent confirmed by evidence1 pointing to the conclusion that at ,athens male kinship was preceded by female kinship4 ,further1 if ,i am right in supposing that in ancient ,latium the royal families kept their daughters at home and sent forth their sons to marry princesses and reign among their wives' people1 it will follow that the male descendants would reign in successive generations over different kingdoms4 ,now this seems to have happened both in ancient ,greece and in ancient ,sweden2 from which we may legitimately infer that it was a custom practised by more than one branch of the ,aryan stock in ,europe4 ,many ,greek traditions relate how a prince left his native land1 and going to a far country married the king's daughter and succeeded to the kingdom4 ,various reasons are assigned by ancient ,greek writers for these migrations of the princes4 ,a common one is that the king's son had been banished for murder4 ,this would explain very well why he fled his own land1 but it is no reason at all why he should become king of another4 ,we may suspect that such reasons are afterthoughts devised by writers1 who1 accustomed to the rule that a son should succeed to his father's property and kingdom1 were hard put to it to account for so many traditions of kings' sons who quitted the land of their birth to reign over a foreign kingdom4 ,in ,scandinavian tradition we meet with traces of similar customs4 ,for we read of daughters' husbands who received a share of the kingdoms of their royal fathers-in-law1 even when these fathers-in-law had sons of their own2 in particular1 during the five generations which preceded ,harold the ,fair-haired1 male members of the ,ynglingar family1 which is said to have come from ,sweden1 are reported in the ,heimskringla or ,sagas of the ,norwegian ,kings to have obtained at least six provinces in ,norway by marriage with the daughters of the local kings4 ,thus it would seem that among some ,aryan peoples1 at a certain stage of their social evolution1 it has been customary to regard women and not men as the channels in which royal blood flows1 and to bestow the kingdom in each successive generation on a man of another family1 and often of another country1 who marries one of the princesses and reigns over his wife's people4 ,a common type of popular tale1 which relates how an adventurer1 coming to a strange land1 wins the hand of the king's daughter and with her the half or the whole of the kingdom1 may well be a reminiscence of a real custom4 ,where usages and ideas of this sort prevail1 it is obvious that the kingship is merely an appanage of marriage with a woman of the blood royal4 ,the old ,danish historian ,saxo ,grammaticus puts this view of the kingship very clearly in the mouth of ,hermutrude1 a legendary queen of ,scotland4 ,indeed she was a queen1 says ,hermutrude1 and but that her sex gainsaid it1 might be deemed a king2 nay 7and this is yet truer71 whomsoever she thought worthy of her bed was at once a king1 and she yielded her kingdom with herself4 ,thus her sceptre and her hand went together4 ,the statement is all the more significant because it appears to reflect the actual practice of the ,pictish kings4 ,we know from the testimony of ,bede that1 whenever a doubt arose as to the succession1 the ,picts chose their kings from the female rather than the male line4 ,the personal qualities which recommended a man for a royal alliance and succession to the throne would naturally vary according to the popular ideas of the time and the character of the king or his substitute1 but it is reasonable to suppose that among them in early society physical strength and beauty would hold a prominent place4 ,sometimes apparently the right to the hand of the princess and to the throne has been determined by a race4 ,the ,alitemnian ,libyans awarded the kingdom to the fleetest runner4 ,amongst the old ,prussians1 candidates for nobility raced on horseback to the king1 and the one who reached him first was ennobled4 ,according to tradition the earliest games at ,olympia were held by ,endymion1 who set his sons to run a race for the kingdom4 ,his tomb was said to be at the point of the racecourse from which the runners started4 ,the famous story of ,pelops and ,hippodamia is perhaps only another version of the legend that the first races at ,olympia were run for no less a prize than a kingdom4 ,these traditions may very well reflect a real custom of racing for a bride1 for such a custom appears to have prevailed among various peoples1 though in practice it has degenerated into a mere form or pretence4 ,thus there is one race1 called the ',love ,chase1' which may be considered a part of the form of marriage among the ,kirghiz4 ,in this the bride1 armed with a formidable whip1 mounts a fleet horse1 and is pursued by all the young men who make any pretensions to her hand4 ,she will be given as a prize to the one who catches her1 but she has the right1 besides urging on her horse to the utmost1 to use her whip1 often with no mean force1 to keep off those lovers who are unwelcome to her1 and she will probably favour the one whom she has already chosen in her heart4 ,the race for the bride is found also among the ,koryaks of ,north-eastern ,asia4 ,it takes place in a large tent1 round which many separate compartments called pologs are arranged in a continuous circle4 ,the girl gets a start and is clear of the marriage if she can run through all the compartments without being caught by the bridegroom4 ,the women of the encampment place every obstacle in the man's way1 tripping him up1 belabouring him with switches1 and so forth1 so that he has little chance of succeeding unless the girl wishes it and waits for him4 ,similar customs appear to have been practised by all the ,teutonic peoples2 for the ,german1 ,anglo-,saxon1 and ,norse languages possess in common a word for marriage which means simply bride-race4 ,moreover1 traces of the custom survived into modern times4 ,thus it appears that the right to marry a girl1 and especially a princess1 has often been conferred as a prize in an athletic contest4 ,there would be no reason1 therefore1 for surprise if the ,roman kings1 before bestowing their daughters in marriage1 should have resorted to this ancient mode of testing the personal qualities of their future sons-in-law and successors4 ,if my theory is correct1 the ,roman king and queen personated ,jupiter and his divine consort1 and in the character of these divinities went through the annual ceremony of a sacred marriage for the purpose of causing the crops to grow and men and cattle to be fruitful and multiply4 ,thus they did what in more northern lands we may suppose the ,king and ,queen of ,may were believed to do in days of old4 ,now we have seen that the right to play the part of the ,king of ,may and to wed the ,queen of ,may has sometimes been determined by an athletic contest1 particularly by a race4 ,this may have been a relic of an old marriage custom of the sort we have examined1 a custom designed to test the fitness of a candidate for matrimony4 ,such a test might reasonably be applied with peculiar rigour to the king in order to ensure that no personal defect should incapacitate him for the performance of those sacred rites and ceremonies on which1 even more than on the despatch of his civil and military duties1 the safety and prosperity of the community were believed to depend4 ,and it would be natural to require of him that from time to time he should submit himself afresh to the same ordeal for the sake of publicly demonstrating that he was still equal to the discharge of his high calling4 ,a relic of that test perhaps survived in the ceremony known as the ,flight of the ,king 7regifugium71 which continued to be annually observed at ,rome down to imperial times4 ,on the twenty-fourth day of ,february a sacrifice used to be offered in the ,comitium1 and when it was over the ,king of the ,sacred ,rites fled from the ,forum4 ,we may conjecture that the ,flight of the ,king was originally a race for an annual kingship1 which may have been awarded as a prize to the fleetest runner4 ,at the end of the year the king might run again for a second term of office2 and so on1 until he was defeated and deposed or perhaps slain4 ,in this way what had once been a race would tend to assume the character of a flight and a pursuit4 ,the king would be given a start2 he ran and his competitors ran after him1 and if he were overtaken he had to yield the crown and perhaps his life to the lightest of foot among them4 ,in time a man of masterful character might succeed in seating himself permanently on the throne and reducing the annual race or flight to the empty form which it seems always to have been within historical times4 ,the rite was sometimes interpreted as a commemoration of the expulsion of the kings from ,rome2 but this appears to have been a mere afterthought devised to explain a ceremony of which the old meaning was forgotten4 ,it is far more likely that in acting thus the ,king of the ,sacred ,rites was merely keeping up an ancient custom which in the regal period had been annually observed by his predecessors the kings4 ,what the original intention of the rite may have been must probably always remain more or less a matter of conjecture4 ,the present explanation is suggested with a full sense of the difficulty and obscurity in which the subject is involved4 ,thus if my theory is correct1 the yearly flight of the ,roman king was a relic of a time when the kingship was an annual office awarded1 along with the hand of a princess1 to the victorious athlete or gladiator1 who thereafter figured along with his bride as a god and goddess at a sacred marriage designed to ensure the fertility of the earth by homoeopathic magic4 ,if ,i am right in supposing that in very early times the old ,latin kings personated a god and were regularly put to death in that character1 we can better understand the mysterious or violent ends to which so many of them are said to have come4 ,we have seen that1 according to tradition1 one of the kings of ,alba was killed by a thunderbolt for impiously mimicking the thunder of ,jupiter4 ,romulus is said to have vanished mysteriously like ,aeneas1 or to have been cut to pieces by the patricians whom he had offended1 and the seventh of ,july1 the day on which he perished1 was a festival which bore some resemblance to the ,saturnalia4 ,for on that day the female slaves were allowed to take certain remarkable liberties4 ,they dressed up as free women in the attire of matrons and maids1 and in this guise they went forth from the city1 scoffed and jeered at all whom they met1 and engaged among themselves in a fight1 striking and throwing stones at each other4 ,another ,roman king who perished by violence was ,tatius1 the ,sabine colleague of ,romulus4 ,it is said that he was at ,lavinium offering a public sacrifice to the ancestral gods1 when some men1 to whom he had given umbrage1 despatched him with the sacrificial knives and spits which they had snatched from the altar4 ,the occasion and the manner of his death suggest that the slaughter may have been a sacrifice rather than an assassination4 ,again1 ,tullus ,hostilius1 the successor of ,numa1 was commonly said to have been killed by lightning1 but many held that he was murdered at the instigation of ,ancus ,marcius1 who reigned after him4 ,speaking of the more or less mythical ,numa1 the type of the priestly king1 ,plutarch observes that his fame was enhanced by the fortunes of the later kings4 ,for of the five who reigned after him the last was deposed and ended his life in exile1 and of the remaining four not one died a natural death2 for three of them were assassinated and ,tullus ,hostilius was consumed by thunderbolts4 ,these legends of the violent ends of the ,roman kings suggest that the contest by which they gained the throne may sometimes have been a mortal combat rather than a race4 ,if that were so1 the analogy which we have traced between ,rome and ,nemi would be still closer4 ,at both places the sacred kings1 the living representatives of the godhead1 would thus be liable to suffer deposition and death at the hand of any resolute man who could prove his divine right to the holy office by the strong arm and the sharp sword4 ,it would not be surprising if among the early ,latins the claim to the kingdom should often have been settled by single combat2 for down to historical times the ,umbrians regularly submitted their private disputes to the ordeal of battle1 and he who cut his adversary's throat was thought thereby to have proved the justice of his cause beyond the reach of cavil4 ,,xv4 ,the ,worship of the ,oak ,,the ,,worship of the oak tree or of the oak god appears to have been shared by all the branches of the ,aryan stock in ,europe4 ,both ,greeks and ,italians associated the tree with their highest god1 ,zeus or ,jupiter1 the divinity of the sky1 the rain1 and the thunder4 ,perhaps the oldest and certainly one of the most famous sanctuaries in ,greece was that of ,dodona1 where ,zeus was revered in the oracular oak4 ,the thunder-storms which are said to rage at ,dodona more frequently than anywhere else in ,europe1 would render the spot a fitting home for the god whose voice was heard alike in the rustling of the oak leaves and in the crash of thunder4 ,perhaps the bronze gongs which kept up a humming in the wind round the sanctuary were meant to mimick the thunder that might so often be heard rolling and rumbling in the coombs of the stern and barren mountains which shut in the gloomy valley4 ,in ,boeotia1 as we have seen1 the sacred marriage of ,zeus and ,hera1 the oak god and the oak goddess1 appears to have been celebrated with much pomp by a religious federation of states4 ,and on ,mount ,lycaeus in ,arcadia the character of ,zeus as god both of the oak and of the rain comes out clearly in the rain charm practised by the priest of ,zeus1 who dipped an oak branch in a sacred spring4 ,in his latter capacity ,zeus was the god to whom the ,greeks regularly prayed for rain4 ,nothing could be more natural2 for often1 though not always1 he had his seat on the mountains where the clouds gather and the oaks grow4 ,on the ,acropolis at ,athens there was an image of ,earth praying to ,zeus for rain4 ,and in time of drought the ,athenians themselves prayed1 ,rain1 rain1 ,o dear ,zeus1 on the cornland of the ,athenians and on the plains4 ,again1 ,zeus wielded the thunder and lightning as well as the rain4 ,at ,olympia and elsewhere he was worshipped under the surname of ,thunderbolt2 and at ,athens there was a sacrificial hearth of ,lightning ,zeus on the city wall1 where some priestly officials watched for lightning over ,mount ,parnes at certain seasons of the year4 ,further1 spots which had been struck by lightning were regularly fenced in by the ,greeks and consecrated to ,zeus the ,descender1 that is1 to the god who came down in the flash from heaven4 ,altars were set up within these enclosures and sacrifices offered on them4 ,several such places are known from inscriptions to have existed in ,athens4 ,thus when ancient ,greek kings claimed to be descended from ,zeus1 and even to bear his name1 we may reasonably suppose that they also attempted to exercise his divine functions by making thunder and rain for the good of their people or the terror and confusion of their foes4 ,in this respect the legend of ,salmoneus probably reflects the pretensions of a whole class of petty sovereigns who reigned of old1 each over his little canton1 in the oak-clad highlands of ,greece4 ,like their kinsmen the ,irish kings1 they were expected to be a source of fertility to the land and of fecundity to the cattle2 and how could they fulfil these expectations better than by acting the part of their kinsman ,zeus1 the great god of the oak1 the thunder1 and the rain8 ,they personified him1 apparently1 just as the ,italian kings personified ,jupiter4 ,in ancient ,italy every oak was sacred to ,jupiter1 the ,italian counterpart of ,zeus2 and on the ,capitol at ,rome the god was worshipped as the deity not merely of the oak1 but of the rain and the thunder4 ,contrasting the piety of the good old times with the scepticism of an age when nobody thought that heaven was heaven1 or cared a fig for ,jupiter1 a ,roman writer tells us that in former days noble matrons used to go with bare feet1 streaming hair1 and pure minds1 up the long ,capitoline slope1 praying to ,jupiter for rain4 ,and straightway1 he goes on1 it rained bucketsful1 then or never1 and everybody returned dripping like drowned rats4 ,but nowadays1 says he1 we are no longer religious1 so the fields lie baking4 ,when we pass from ,southern to ,central ,europe we still meet with the great god of the oak and the thunder among the barbarous ,aryans who dwelt in the vast primaeval forests4 ,thus among the ,celts of ,gaul the ,druids esteemed nothing more sacred than the mistletoe and the oak on which it grew2 they chose groves of oaks for the scene of their solemn service1 and they performed none of their rites without oak leaves4 ,the ,celts1 says a ,greek writer1 worship ,zeus1 and the ,celtic image of ,zeus is a tall oak4 ,the ,celtic conquerors1 who settled in ,asia in the third century before our era1 appear to have carried the worship of the oak with them to their new home2 for in the heart of ,asia ,minor the ,galatian senate met in a place which bore the pure ,celtic name of ,drynemetum1 the sacred oak grove or the temple of the oak4 ,indeed the very name of ,druids is believed by good authorities to mean no more than oak men4 ,in the religion of the ancient ,germans the veneration for sacred groves seems to have held the foremost place1 and according to ,grimm the chief of their holy trees was the oak4 ,it appears to have been especially dedicated to the god of thunder1 ,donar or ,thunar1 the equivalent of the ,norse ,thor2 for a sacred oak near ,geismar1 in ,hesse1 which ,boniface cut down in the eighth century1 went among the heathen by the name of ,jupiter's oak 7robur ,jovis71 which in old ,german would be ,donares eih1 the oak of ,donar4 ,that the ,teutonic thunder god ,donar1 ,thunar1 ,thor was identified with the ,italian thunder god ,jupiter appears from our word ,thursday1 ,thunar's day1 which is merely a rendering of the ,latin dies ,jovis4 ,thus among the ancient ,teutons1 as among the ,greeks and ,italians1 the god of the oak was also the god of the thunder4 ,moreover1 he was regarded as the great fertilising power1 who sent rain and caused the earth to bear fruit2 for ,adam of ,bremen tells us that ,thor presides in the air2 he it is who rules thunder and lightning1 wind and rains1 fine weather and crops4 ,in these respects1 therefore1 the ,teutonic thunder god again resembled his southern counterparts ,zeus and ,jupiter4 ,amongst the ,slavs also the oak appears to have been the sacred tree of the thunder god ,perun1 the counterpart of ,zeus and ,jupiter4 ,it is said that at ,novgorod there used to stand an image of ,perun in the likeness of a man with a thunder-stone in his hand4 ,a fire of oak wood burned day and night in his honour2 and if ever it went out the attendants paid for their negligence with their lives4 ,perun seems1 like ,zeus and ,jupiter1 to have been the chief god of his people2 for ,procopius tells us that the ,slavs believe that one god1 the maker of lightning1 is alone lord of all things1 and they sacrifice to him oxen and every victim4 ,the chief deity of the ,lithuanians was ,perkunas or ,perkuns1 the god of thunder and lightning1 whose resemblance to ,zeus and ,jupiter has often been pointed out4 ,oaks were sacred to him1 and when they were cut down by the ,christian missionaries1 the people loudly complained that their sylvan deities were destroyed4 ,perpetual fires1 kindled with the wood of certain oak-trees1 were kept up in honour of ,perkunas2 if such a fire went out1 it was lighted again by friction of the sacred wood4 ,men sacrificed to oak-trees for good crops1 while women did the same to lime-trees2 from which we may infer that they regarded oaks as male and lime-trees as female4 ,and in time of drought1 when they wanted rain1 they used to sacrifice a black heifer1 a black he-goat1 and a black cock to the thunder god in the depths of the woods4 ,on such occasions the people assembled in great numbers from the country round about1 ate and drank1 and called upon ,perkunas4 ,they carried a bowl of beer thrice round the fire1 then poured the liquor on the flames1 while they prayed to the god to send showers4 ,thus the chief ,lithuanian deity presents a close resemblance to ,zeus and ,jupiter1 since he was the god of the oak1 the thunder1 and the rain4 ,from the foregoing survey it appears that a god of the oak1 the thunder1 and the rain was worshipped of old by all the main branches of the ,aryan stock in ,europe1 and was indeed the chief deity of their pantheon4 ,,xvi4 ,dianus and ,diana ,,in ,,this ,,chapter ,i propose to recapitulate the conclusions to which the enquiry has thus far led us1 and drawing together the scattered rays of light1 to turn them on the dark figure of the priest of ,nemi4 ,we have found that at an early stage of society men1 ignorant of the secret processes of nature and of the narrow limits within which it is in our power to control and direct them1 have commonly arrogated to themselves functions which in the present state of knowledge we should deem superhuman or divine4 ,the illusion has been fostered and maintained by the same causes which begot it1 namely1 the marvellous order and uniformity with which nature conducts her operations1 the wheels of her great machine revolving with a smoothness and precision which enable the patient observer to anticipate in general the season1 if not the very hour1 when they will bring round the fulfilment of his hopes or the accomplishment of his fears4 ,the regularly recurring events of this great cycle1 or rather series of cycles1 soon stamp themselves even on the dull mind of the savage4 ,he foresees them1 and foreseeing them mistakes the desired recurrence for an effect of his own will1 and the dreaded recurrence for an effect of the will of his enemies4 ,thus the springs which set the vast machine in motion1 though they lie far beyond our ken1 shrouded in a mystery which we can never hope to penetrate1 appear to ignorant man to lie within his reach3 he fancies he can touch them and so work by magic art all manner of good to himself and evil to his foes4 ,in time the fallacy of this belief becomes apparent to him3 he discovers that there are things he cannot do1 pleasures which he is unable of himself to procure1 pains which even the most potent magician is powerless to avoid4 ,the unattainable good1 the inevitable ill1 are now ascribed by him to the action of invisible powers1 whose favour is joy and life1 whose anger is misery and death4 ,thus magic tends to be displaced by religion1 and the sorcerer by the priest4 ,at this stage of thought the ultimate causes of things are conceived to be personal beings1 many in number and often discordant in character1 who partake of the nature and even of the frailty of man1 though their might is greater than his1 and their life far exceeds the span of his ephemeral existence4 ,their sharply-marked individualities1 their clear-cut outlines have not yet begun1 under the powerful solvent of philosophy1 to melt and coalesce into that single unknown substratum of phenomena which1 according to the qualities with which our imagination invests it1 goes by one or other of the high-sounding names which the wit of man has devised to hide his ignorance4 ,accordingly1 so long as men look on their gods as beings akin to themselves and not raised to an unapproachable height above them1 they believe it to be possible for those of their own number who surpass their fellows to attain to the divine rank after death or even in life4 ,incarnate human deities of this latter sort may be said to halt midway between the age of magic and the age of religion4 ,if they bear the names and display the pomp of deities1 the powers which they are supposed to wield are commonly those of their predecessor the magician4 ,like him1 they are expected to guard their people against hostile enchantments1 to heal them in sickness1 to bless them with offspring1 and to provide them with an abundant supply of food by regulating the weather and performing the other ceremonies which are deemed necessary to ensure the fertility of the earth and the multiplication of animals4 ,men who are credited with powers so lofty and far-reaching naturally hold the highest place in the land1 and while the rift between the spiritual and the temporal spheres has not yet widened too far1 they are supreme in civil as well as religious matters3 in a word1 they are kings as well as gods4 ,thus the divinity which hedges a king has its roots deep down in human history1 and long ages pass before these are sapped by a profounder view of nature and man4 ,in the classical period of ,greek and ,latin antiquity the reign of kings was for the most part a thing of the past2 yet the stories of their lineage1 titles1 and pretensions suffice to prove that they too claimed to rule by divine right and to exercise superhuman powers4 ,hence we may without undue temerity assume that the ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi1 though shorn in later times of his glory and fallen on evil days1 represented a long line of sacred kings who had once received not only the homage but the adoration of their subjects in return for the manifold blessings which they were supposed to dispense4 ,what little we know of the functions of ,diana in the ,arician grove seems to prove that she was here conceived as a goddess of fertility1 and particularly as a divinity of childbirth4 ,it is reasonable1 therefore1 to suppose that in the discharge of these important duties she was assisted by her priest1 the two figuring as ,king and ,queen of the ,wood in a solemn marriage1 which was intended to make the earth gay with the blossoms of spring and the fruits of autumn1 and to gladden the hearts of men and women with healthful offspring4 ,if the priest of ,nemi posed not merely as a king1 but as a god of the grove1 we have still to ask1 ,what deity in particular did he personate8 ,the answer of antiquity is that he represented ,virbius1 the consort or lover of ,diana4 ,but this does not help us much1 for of ,virbius we know little more than the name4 ,a clue to the mystery is perhaps supplied by the ,vestal fire which burned in the grove4 ,for the perpetual holy fires of the ,aryans in ,europe appear to have been commonly kindled and fed with oak-wood1 and in ,rome itself1 not many miles from ,nemi1 the fuel of the ,vestal fire consisted of oaken sticks or logs1 as has been proved by a microscopic analysis of the charred embers of the ,vestal fire1 which were discovered by ,commendatore ,g4 ,boni in the course of the memorable excavations which he conducted in the ,roman forum at the end of the nineteenth century4 ,but the ritual of the various ,latin towns seems to have been marked by great uniformity2 hence it is reasonable to conclude that wherever in ,latium a ,vestal fire was maintained1 it was fed1 as at ,rome1 with wood of the sacred oak4 ,if this was so at ,nemi1 it becomes probable that the hallowed grove there consisted of a natural oak-wood1 and that therefore the tree which the ,king of the ,wood had to guard at the peril of his life was itself an oak2 indeed1 it was from an evergreen oak1 according to ,virgil1 that ,aeneas plucked the ,golden ,bough4 ,now the oak was the sacred tree of ,jupiter1 the supreme god of the ,latins4 ,hence it follows that the ,king of the ,wood1 whose life was bound up in a fashion with an oak1 personated no less a deity than ,jupiter himself4 ,at least the evidence1 slight as it is1 seems to point to this conclusion4 ,the old ,alban dynasty of the ,silvii or ,woods1 with their crown of oak leaves1 apparently aped the style and emulated the powers of ,latian ,jupiter1 who dwelt on the top of the ,alban ,mount4 ,it is not impossible that the ,king of the ,wood1 who guarded the sacred oak a little lower down the mountain1 was the lawful successor and representative of this ancient line of the ,silvii or ,woods4 ,at all events1 if ,i am right in supposing that he passed for a human ,jupiter1 it would appear that ,virbius1 with whom legend identified him1 was nothing but a local form of ,jupiter1 considered perhaps in his original aspect as a god of the greenwood4 ,the hypothesis that in later times at all events the ,king of the ,wood played the part of the oak god ,jupiter1 is confirmed by an examination of his divine partner ,diana4 ,for two distinct lines of argument converge to show that if ,diana was a queen of the woods in general1 she was at ,nemi a goddess of the oak in particular4 ,in the first place1 she bore the title of ,vesta1 and as such presided over a perpetual fire1 which we have seen reason to believe was fed with oak wood4 ,but a goddess of fire is not far removed from a goddess of the fuel which burns in the fire2 primitive thought perhaps drew no sharp line of distinction between the blaze and the wood that blazes4 ,in the second place1 the nymph ,egeria at ,nemi appears to have been merely a form of ,diana1 and ,egeria is definitely said to have been a ,dryad1 a nymph of the oak4 ,elsewhere in ,italy the goddess had her home on oak-clad mountains4 ,thus ,mount ,algidus1 a spur of the ,alban hills1 was covered in antiquity with dark forests of oak1 both of the evergreen and the deciduous sort4 ,in winter the snow lay long on these cold hills1 and their gloomy oak-woods were believed to be a favourite haunt of ,diana1 as they have been of brigands in modern times4 ,again1 ,mount ,tifata1 the long abrupt ridge of the ,apennines which looks down on the ,campanian plain behind ,capua1 was wooded of old with evergreen oaks1 among which ,diana had a temple4 ,here ,sulla thanked the goddess for his victory over the ,marians in the plain below1 attesting his gratitude by inscriptions which were long afterwards to be seen in the temple4 ,on the whole1 then1 we conclude that at ,nemi the ,king of the ,wood personated the oak-god ,jupiter and mated with the oak-goddess ,diana in the sacred grove4 ,an echo of their mystic union has come down to us in the legend of the loves of ,numa and ,egeria1 who according to some had their trysting-place in these holy woods4 ,to this theory it may naturally be objected that the divine consort of ,jupiter was not ,diana but ,juno1 and that if ,diana had a mate at all he might be expected to bear the name not of ,jupiter1 but of ,dianus or ,janus1 the latter of these forms being merely a corruption of the former4 ,all this is true1 but the objection may be parried by observing that the two pairs of deities1 ,jupiter and ,juno on the one side1 and ,dianus and ,diana1 or ,janus and ,jana1 on the other side1 are merely duplicates of each other1 their names and their functions being in substance and origin identical4 ,with regard to their names1 all four of them come from the same ,aryan root ,,di1 meaning bright1 which occurs in the names of the corresponding ,greek deities1 ,zeus and his old female consort ,dione4 ,in regard to their functions1 ,juno and ,diana were both goddesses of fecundity and childbirth1 and both were sooner or later identified with the moon4 ,as to the true nature and functions of ,janus the ancients themselves were puzzled2 and where they hesitated1 it is not for us confidently to decide4 ,but the view mentioned by ,varro that ,janus was the god of the sky is supported not only by the etymological identity of his name with that of the sky-god ,jupiter1 but also by the relation in which he appears to have stood to ,jupiter's two mates1 ,juno and ,juturna4 ,for the epithet ,junonian bestowed on ,janus points to a marriage union between the two deities2 and according to one account ,janus was the husband of the water-nymph ,juturna1 who according to others was beloved by ,jupiter4 ,moreover1 ,janus1 like ,jove1 was regularly invoked1 and commonly spoken of under the title of ,father4 ,indeed1 he was identified with ,jupiter not merely by the logic of the learned ,st4 ,augustine1 but by the piety of a pagan worshipper who dedicated an offering to ,jupiter ,dianus4 ,a trace of his relation to the oak may be found in the oakwoods of the ,janiculum1 the hill on the right bank of the ,tiber1 where ,janus is said to have reigned as a king in the remotest ages of ,italian history4 ,thus1 if ,i am right1 the same ancient pair of deities was variously known among the ,greek and ,italian peoples as ,zeus and ,dione1 ,jupiter and ,juno1 or ,dianus 7,janus7 and ,diana 7,jana71 the names of the divinities being identical in substance1 though varying in form with the dialect of the particular tribe which worshipped them4 ,at first1 when the peoples dwelt near each other1 the difference between the deities would be hardly more than one of name2 in other words1 it would be almost purely dialectical4 ,but the gradual dispersion of the tribes1 and their consequent isolation from each other1 would favour the growth of divergent modes of conceiving and worshipping the gods whom they had carried with them from their old home1 so that in time discrepancies of myth and ritual would tend to spring up and thereby to convert a nominal into a real distinction between the divinities4 ,accordingly when1 with the slow progress of culture1 the long period of barbarism and separation was passing away1 and the rising political power of a single strong community had begun to draw or hammer its weaker neighbours into a nation1 the confluent peoples would throw their gods1 like their dialects1 into a common stock2 and thus it might come about that the same ancient deities1 which their forefathers had worshipped together before the dispersion1 would now be so disguised by the accumulated effect of dialectical and religious divergencies that their original identity might fail to be recognised1 and they would take their places side by side as independent divinities in the national pantheon4 ,this duplication of deities1 the result of the final fusion of kindred tribes who had long lived apart1 would account for the appearance of ,janus beside ,jupiter1 and of ,diana or ,jana beside ,juno in the ,roman religion4 ,at least this appears to be a more probable theory than the opinion1 which has found favour with some modern scholars1 that ,janus was originally nothing but the god of doors4 ,that a deity of his dignity and importance1 whom the ,romans revered as a god of gods and the father of his people1 should have started in life as a humble1 though doubtless respectable1 doorkeeper appears very unlikely4 ,so lofty an end hardly consorts with so lowly a beginning4 ,it is more probable that the door 7janua7 got its name from ,janus than that he got his name from it4 ,this view is strengthened by a consideration of the word janua itself4 ,the regular word for door is the same in all the languages of the ,aryan family from ,india to ,ireland4 ,it is dur in ,sanscrit1 thura in ,greek1 tr in ,german1 door in ,english1 dorus in old ,irish1 and foris in ,latin4 ,yet besides this ordinary name for door1 which the ,latins shared with all their ,aryan brethren1 they had also the name janua1 to which there is no corresponding term in any ,indo-,european speech4 ,the word has the appearance of being an adjectival form derived from the noun ,janus4 ,i conjecture that it may have been customary to set up an image or symbol of ,janus at the principal door of the house in order to place the entrance under the protection of the great god4 ,a door thus guarded might be known as a janua foris1 that is1 a ,januan door1 and the phrase might in time be abridged into janua1 the noun foris being understood but not expressed4 ,from this to the use of janua to designate a door in general1 whether guarded by an image of ,janus or not1 would be an easy and natural transition4 ,if there is any truth in this conjecture1 it may explain very simply the origin of the double head of ,janus1 which has so long exercised the ingenuity of mythologists4 ,when it had become customary to guard the entrance of houses and towns by an image of ,janus1 it might well be deemed necessary to make the sentinel god look both ways1 before and behind1 at the same time1 in order that nothing should escape his vigilant eye4 ,for if the divine watchman always faced in one direction1 it is easy to imagine what mischief might have been wrought with impunity behind his back4 ,this explanation of the double-headed ,janus at ,rome is confirmed by the double-headed idol which the ,bush negroes in the interior of ,surinam regularly set up as a guardian at the entrance of a village4 ,the idol consists of a block of wood with a human face rudely carved on each side2 it stands under a gateway composed of two uprights and a cross-bar4 ,beside the idol generally lies a white rag intended to keep off the devil2 and sometimes there is also a stick which seems to represent a bludgeon or weapon of some sort4 ,further1 from the cross-bar hangs a small log which serves the useful purpose of knocking on the head any evil spirit who might attempt to pass through the gateway4 ,clearly this double-headed fetish at the gateway of the negro villages in ,surinam bears a close resemblance to the double-headed images of ,janus which1 grasping a stick in one hand and a key in the other1 stood sentinel at ,roman gates and doorways2 and we can hardly doubt that in both cases the heads facing two ways are to be similarly explained as expressive of the vigilance of the guardian god1 who kept his eye on spiritual foes behind and before1 and stood ready to bludgeon them on the spot4 ,we may1 therefore1 dispense with the tedious and unsatisfactory explanations which1 if we may trust ,ovid1 the wily ,janus himself fobbed off an anxious ,roman enquirer4 ,to apply these conclusions to the priest of ,nemi1 we may suppose that as the mate of ,diana he represented originally ,dianus or ,janus rather than ,jupiter1 but that the difference between these deities was of old merely superficial1 going little deeper than the names1 and leaving practically unaffected the essential functions of the god as a power of the sky1 the thunder1 and the oak4 ,it was fitting1 therefore1 that his human representative at ,nemi should dwell1 as we have seen reason to believe he did1 in an oak grove4 ,his title of ,king of the ,wood clearly indicates the sylvan character of the deity whom he served2 and since he could only be assailed by him who had plucked the bough of a certain tree in the grove1 his own life might be said to be bound up with that of the sacred tree4 ,thus he not only served but embodied the great ,aryan god of the oak2 and as an oak-god he would mate with the oak-goddess1 whether she went by the name of ,egeria or ,diana4 ,their union1 however consummated1 would be deemed essential to the fertility of the earth and the fecundity of man and beast4 ,further1 as the oak-god was also a god of the sky1 the thunder1 and the rain1 so his human representative would be required1 like many other divine kings1 to cause the clouds to gather1 the thunder to peal1 and the rain to descend in due season1 that the fields and orchards might bear fruit and the pastures be covered with luxuriant herbage4 ,the reputed possessor of powers so exalted must have been a very important personage2 and the remains of buildings and of votive offerings which have been found on the site of the sanctuary combine with the testimony of classical writers to prove that in later times it was one of the greatest and most popular shrines in ,italy4 ,even in the old days1 when the champaign country around was still parcelled out among the petty tribes who composed the ,latin ,league1 the sacred grove is known to have been an object of their common reverence and care4 ,and just as the kings of ,cambodia used to send offerings to the mystic kings of ,fire and ,water far in the dim depths of the tropical forest1 so1 we may well believe1 from all sides of the broad ,latian plain the eyes and footsteps of ,italian pilgrims turned to the quarter where1 standing sharply out against the faint blue line of the ,apennines or the deeper blue of the distant sea1 the ,alban ,mountain rose before them1 the home of the mysterious priest of ,nemi1 the ,king of the ,wood4 ,there1 among the green woods and beside the still waters of the lonely hills1 the ancient ,aryan worship of the god of the oak1 the thunder1 and the dripping sky lingered in its early1 almost ,druidical form1 long after a great political and intellectual revolution had shifted the capital of ,latin religion from the forest to the city1 from ,nemi to ,rome4 ,,xvii4 ,the ,burden of ,royalty #a4 ,royal and ,priestly ,taboos ,,at ,a ,,certain stage of early society the king or priest is often thought to be endowed with supernatural powers or to be an incarnation of a deity1 and consistently with this belief the course of nature is supposed to be more or less under his control1 and he is held responsible for bad weather1 failure of the crops1 and similar calamities4 ,to some extent it appears to be assumed that the king's power over nature1 like that over his subjects and slaves1 is exerted through definite acts of will2 and therefore if drought1 famine1 pestilence1 or storms arise1 the people attribute the misfortune to the negligence or guilt of their king1 and punish him accordingly with stripes and bonds1 or1 if he remains obdurate1 with deposition and death4 ,sometimes1 however1 the course of nature1 while regarded as dependent on the king1 is supposed to be partly independent of his will4 ,his person is considered1 if we may express it so1 as the dynamical centre of the universe1 from which lines of force radiate to all quarters of the heaven2 so that any motion of his--the turning of his head1 the lifting of his hand--instantaneously affects and may seriously disturb some part of nature4 ,he is the point of support on which hangs the balance of the world1 and the slightest irregularity on his part may overthrow the delicate equipoise4 ,the greatest care must1 therefore1 be taken both by and of him2 and his whole life1 down to its minutest details1 must be so regulated that no act of his1 voluntary or involuntary1 may disarrange or upset the established order of nature4 ,of this class of monarchs the ,mikado or ,dairi1 the spiritual emperor of ,japan1 is or rather used to be a typical example4 ,he is an incarnation of the sun goddess1 the deity who rules the universe1 gods and men included2 once a year all the gods wait upon him and spend a month at his court4 ,during that month1 the name of which means without gods1 no one frequents the temples1 for they are believed to be deserted4 ,the ,mikado receives from his people and assumes in his official proclamations and decrees the title of manifest or incarnate deity1 and he claims a general authority over the gods of ,japan4 ,for example1 in an official decree of the year #fdf the emperor is described as the incarnate god who governs the universe4 ,the following description of the ,mikado's mode of life was written about two hundred years ago3 ,even to this day the princes descended of this family1 more particularly those who sit on the throne1 are looked upon as persons most holy in themselves1 and as ,popes by birth4 ,and1 in order to preserve these advantageous notions in the minds of their subjects1 they are obliged to take an uncommon care of their sacred persons1 and to do such things1 which1 examined according to the customs of other nations1 would be thought ridiculous and impertinent4 ,it will not be improper to give a few instances of it4 ,he thinks that it would be very prejudicial to his dignity and holiness to touch the ground with his feet2 for this reason1 when he intends to go anywhere1 he must be carried thither on men's shoulders4 ,much less will they suffer that he should expose his sacred person to the open air1 and the sun is not thought worthy to shine on his head4 ,there is such a holiness ascribed to all the parts of his body that he dares to cut off neither his hair1 nor his beard1 nor his nails4 ,however1 lest he should grow too dirty1 they may clean him in the night when he is asleep2 because1 they say1 that which is taken from his body at that time1 hath been stolen from him1 and that such a theft doth not prejudice his holiness or dignity4 ,in ancient times1 he was obliged to sit on the throne for some hours every morning1 with the imperial crown on his head1 but to sit altogether like a statue1 without stirring either hands or feet1 head or eyes1 nor indeed any part of his body1 because1 by this means1 it was thought that he could preserve peace and tranquillity in his empire2 for if1 unfortunately1 he turned himself on one side or the other1 or if he looked a good while towards any part of his dominions1 it was apprehended that war1 famine1 fire1 or some other great misfortune was near at hand to desolate the country4 ,but it having been afterwards discovered1 that the imperial crown was the palladium1 which by its immobility could preserve peace in the empire1 it was thought expedient to deliver his imperial person1 consecrated only to idleness and pleasures1 from this burthensome duty1 and therefore the crown is at present placed on the throne for some hours every morning4 ,his victuals must be dressed every time in new pots1 and served at table in new dishes3 both are very clean and neat1 but made only of common clay2 that without any considerable expense they may be laid aside1 or broke1 after they have served once4 ,they are generally broke1 for fear they should come into the hands of laymen1 for they believe religiously1 that if any layman should presume to eat his food out of these sacred dishes1 it would swell and inflame his mouth and throat4 ,the like ill effect is dreaded from the ,dairi's sacred habits2 for they believe that if a layman should wear them1 without the ,emperor's express leave or command1 they would occasion swellings and pains in all parts of his body4 ,to the same effect an earlier account of the ,mikado says3 ,it was considered as a shameful degradation for him even to touch the ground with his foot4 ,the sun and moon were not even permitted to shine upon his head4 ,none of the superfluities of the body were ever taken from him1 neither his hair1 his beard1 nor his nails were cut4 ,whatever he eat was dressed in new vessels4 ,similar priestly or rather divine kings are found1 at a lower level of barbarism1 on the west coast of ,africa4 ,at ,shark ,point near ,cape ,padron1 in ,lower ,guinea1 lives the priestly king ,kukulu1 alone in a wood4 ,he may not touch a woman nor leave his house2 indeed he may not even quit his chair1 in which he is obliged to sleep sitting1 for if he lay down no wind would arise and navigation would be stopped4 ,he regulates storms1 and in general maintains a wholesome and equable state of the atmosphere4 ,on ,mount ,agu in ,togo there lives a fetish or spirit called ,bagba1 who is of great importance for the whole of the surrounding country4 ,the power of giving or withholding rain is ascribed to him1 and he is lord of the winds1 including the ,harmattan1 the dry1 hot wind which blows from the interior4 ,his priest dwells in a house on the highest peak of the mountain1 where he keeps the winds bottled up in huge jars4 ,applications for rain1 too1 are made to him1 and he does a good business in amulets1 which consist of the teeth and claws of leopards4 ,yet though his power is great and he is indeed the real chief of the land1 the rule of the fetish forbids him ever to leave the mountain1 and he must spend the whole of his life on its summit4 ,only once a year may he come down to make purchases in the market2 but even then he may not set foot in the hut of any mortal man1 and must return to his place of exile the same day4 ,the business of government in the villages is conducted by subordinate chiefs1 who are appointed by him4 ,in the ,west ,african kingdom of ,congo there was a supreme pontiff called ,chitom or ,chitomb1 whom the negroes regarded as a god on earth and all-powerful in heaven4 ,hence before they would taste the new crops they offered him the first-fruits1 fearing that manifold misfortunes would befall them if they broke this rule4 ,when he left his residence to visit other places within his jurisdiction1 all married people had to observe strict continence the whole time he was out2 for it was supposed that any act of incontinence would prove fatal to him4 ,and if he were to die a natural death1 they thought that the world would perish1 and the earth1 which he alone sustained by his power and merit1 would immediately be annihilated4 ,amongst the semi-barbarous nations of the ,new ,world1 at the date of the ,spanish conquest1 there were found hierarchies or theocracies like those of ,japan2 in particular1 the high pontiff of the ,zapotecs appears to have presented a close parallel to the ,mikado4 ,a powerful rival to the king himself1 this spiritual lord governed ,yopaa1 one of the chief cities of the kingdom1 with absolute dominion4 ,it is impossible1 we are told1 to overrate the reverence in which he was held4 ,he was looked on as a god whom the earth was not worthy to hold nor the sun to shine upon4 ,he profaned his sanctity if he even touched the ground with his foot4 ,the officers who bore his palanquin on their shoulders were members of the highest families3 he hardly deigned to look on anything around him2 and all who met him fell with their faces to the earth1 fearing that death would overtake them if they saw even his shadow4 ,a rule of continence was regularly imposed on the ,zapotec priests1 especially upon the high pontiff2 but on certain days in each year1 which were generally celebrated with feasts and dances1 it was customary for the high priest to become drunk4 ,while in this state1 seeming to belong neither to heaven nor to earth1 one of the most beautiful of the virgins consecrated to the service of the gods was brought to him4 ,if the child she bore him was a son1 he was brought up as a prince of the blood1 and the eldest son succeeded his father on the pontifical throne4 ,the supernatural powers attributed to this pontiff are not specified1 but probably they resembled those of the ,mikado and ,chitom4 ,wherever1 as in ,japan and ,west ,africa1 it is supposed that the order of nature1 and even the existence of the world1 is bound up with the life of the king or priest1 it is clear that he must be regarded by his subjects as a source both of infinite blessing and of infinite danger4 ,on the one hand1 the people have to thank him for the rain and sunshine which foster the fruits of the earth1 for the wind which brings ships to their coasts1 and even for the solid ground beneath their feet4 ,but what he gives he can refuse2 and so close is the dependence of nature on his person1 so delicate the balance of the system of forces whereof he is the centre1 that the least irregularity on his part may set up a tremor which shall shake the earth to its foundations4 ,and if nature may be disturbed by the slightest involuntary act of the king1 it is easy to conceive the convulsion which his death might provoke4 ,the natural death of the ,chitom1 as we have seen1 was thought to entail the destruction of all things4 ,clearly1 therefore1 out of a regard for their own safety1 which might be imperilled by any rash act of the king1 and still more by his death1 the people will exact of their king or priest a strict conformity to those rules1 the observance of which is deemed necessary for his own preservation1 and consequently for the preservation of his people and the world4 ,the idea that early kingdoms are despotisms in which the people exist only for the sovereign1 is wholly inapplicable to the monarchies we are considering4 ,on the contrary1 the sovereign in them exists only for his subjects2 his life is only valuable so long as he discharges the duties of his position by ordering the course of nature for his people's benefit4 ,so soon as he fails to do so1 the care1 the devotion1 the religious homage which they had hitherto lavished on him cease and are changed into hatred and contempt2 he is dismissed ignominiously1 and may be thankful if he escapes with his life4 ,worshipped as a god one day1 he is killed as a criminal the next4 ,but in this changed behaviour of the people there is nothing capricious or inconsistent4 ,on the contrary1 their conduct is entirely of a piece4 ,if their king is their god1 he is or should be also their preserver2 and if he will not preserve them1 he must make room for another who will4 ,so long1 however1 as he answers their expectations1 there is no limit to the care which they take of him1 and which they compel him to take of himself4 ,a king of this sort lives hedged in by a ceremonious etiquette1 a network of prohibitions and observances1 of which the intention is not to contribute to his dignity1 much less to his comfort1 but to restrain him from conduct which1 by disturbing the harmony of nature1 might involve himself1 his people1 and the universe in one common catastrophe4 ,far from adding to his comfort1 these observances1 by trammelling his every act1 annihilate his freedom and often render the very life1 which it is their object to preserve1 a burden and sorrow to him4 ,of the supernaturally endowed kings of ,loango it is said that the more powerful a king is1 the more taboos is he bound to observe2 they regulate all his actions1 his walking and his standing1 his eating and drinking1 his sleeping and waking4 ,to these restraints the heir to the throne is subject from infancy2 but as he advances in life the number of abstinences and ceremonies which he must observe increases1 until at the moment that he ascends the throne he is lost in the ocean of rites and taboos4 ,in the crater of an extinct volcano1 enclosed on all sides by grassy slopes1 lie the scattered huts and yam-fields of ,riabba1 the capital of the native king of ,fernando ,po4 ,this mysterious being lives in the lowest depths of the crater1 surrounded by a harem of forty women1 and covered1 it is said1 with old silver coins4 ,naked savage as he is1 he yet exercises far more influence in the island than the ,spanish governor at ,santa ,isabel4 ,in him the conservative spirit of the ,boobies or aboriginal inhabitants of the island is1 as it were1 incorporate4 ,he has never seen a white man and1 according to the firm conviction of all the ,boobies1 the sight of a pale face would cause his instant death4 ,he cannot bear to look upon the sea2 indeed it is said that he may never see it even in the distance1 and that therefore he wears away his life with shackles on his legs in the dim twilight of his hut4 ,certain it is that he has never set foot on the beach4 ,with the exception of his musket and knife1 he uses nothing that comes from the whites2 ,european cloth never touches his person1 and he scorns tobacco1 rum1 and even salt4 ,among the ,ewe-speaking peoples of the ,slave ,coast the king is at the same time high priest4 ,in this quality he was1 particularly in former times1 unapproachable by his subjects4 ,only by night was he allowed to quit his dwelling in order to bathe and so forth4 ,none but his representative1 the so-called 'visible king1' with three chosen elders might converse with him1 and even they had to sit on an ox-hide with their backs turned to him4 ,he might not see any ,european nor any horse1 nor might he look upon the sea1 for which reason he was not allowed to quit his capital even for a few moments4 ,these rules have been disregarded in recent times4 ,the king of ,dahomey himself is subject to the prohibition of beholding the sea1 and so are the kings of ,loango and ,great ,ardra in ,guinea4 ,the sea is the fetish of the ,eyeos1 to the north-west of ,dahomey1 and they and their king are threatened with death by their priests if ever they dare to look on it4 ,it is believed that the king of ,cayor in ,senegal would infallibly die within the year if he were to cross a river or an arm of the sea4 ,in ,mashonaland down to recent times the chiefs would not cross certain rivers1 particularly the ,rurikwi and the ,nyadiri2 and the custom was still strictly observed by at least one chief within recent years4 ,on no account will the chief cross the river4 ,if it is absolutely necessary for him to do so1 he is blindfolded and carried across with shouting and singing4 ,should he walk across1 he will go blind or die and certainly lose the chieftainship4 ,so among the ,mahafalys and ,sakalavas in the south of ,madagascar some kings are forbidden to sail on the sea or to cross certain rivers4 ,among the ,sakalavas the chief is regarded as a sacred being1 but he is held in leash by a crowd of restrictions1 which regulate his behaviour like that of the emperor of ,china4 ,he can undertake nothing whatever unless the sorcerers have declared the omens favourable2 he may not eat warm food3 on certain days he may not quit his hut2 and so on4 ,among some of the hill tribes of ,assam both the headman and his wife have to observe many taboos in respect of food2 thus they may not eat buffalo1 pork1 dog1 fowl1 or tomatoes4 ,the headman must be chaste1 the husband of one wife1 and he must separate himself from her on the eve of a general or public observance of taboo4 ,in one group of tribes the headman is forbidden to eat in a strange village1 and under no provocation whatever may he utter a word of abuse4 ,apparently the people imagine that the violation of any of these taboos by a headman would bring down misfortune on the whole village4 ,the ancient kings of ,ireland1 as well as the kings of the four provinces of ,leinster1 ,munster1 ,connaught1 and ,ulster1 were subject to certain quaint prohibitions or taboos1 on the due observance of which the prosperity of the people of the country1 as well as their own1 was supposed to depend4 ,thus1 for example1 the sun might not rise on the king of ,ireland in his bed at ,tara1 the old capital of ,erin2 he was forbidden to alight on ,wednesday at ,magh ,breagh1 to traverse ,magh ,cuillinn after sunset1 to incite his horse at ,fan-,chomair1 to go in a ship upon the water the ,monday after ,bealltaine 7,may day71 and to leave the track of his army upon ,ath ,maighne the ,tuesday after ,all-,hallows4 ,the king of ,leinster might not go round ,tuath ,laighean left-hand-wise on ,wednesday1 nor sleep between the ,dothair 7,dodder7 and the ,duibhlinn with his head inclining to one side1 nor encamp for nine days on the plains of ,cualann1 nor travel the road of ,duibhlinn on ,monday1 nor ride a dirty black-heeled horse across ,magh ,maistean4 ,the king of ,munster was prohibited from enjoying the feast of ,loch ,lein from one ,monday to another2 from banqueting by night in the beginning of harvest before ,geim at ,leitreacha2 from encamping for nine days upon the ,siuir2 and from holding a border meeting at ,gabhran4 ,the king of ,connaught might not conclude a treaty respecting his ancient palace of ,cruachan after making peace on ,all-,hallows ,day1 nor go in a speckled garment on a grey speckled steed to the heath of ,dal ,chais1 nor repair to an assembly of women at ,seaghais1 nor sit in autumn on the sepulchral mounds of the wife of ,maine1 nor contend in running with the rider of a grey one-eyed horse at ,ath ,gallta between two posts4 ,the king of ,ulster was forbidden to attend the horse fair at ,rath ,line among the youths of ,dal ,araidhe1 to listen to the fluttering of the flocks of birds of ,linn ,saileach after sunset1 to celebrate the feast of the bull of ,daire-mic-,daire1 to go into ,magh ,cobha in the month of ,march1 and to drink of the water of ,bo ,neimhidh between two darknesses4 ,if the kings of ,ireland strictly observed these and many other customs1 which were enjoined by immemorial usage1 it was believed that they would never meet with mischance or misfortune1 and would live for ninety years without experiencing the decay of old age2 that no epidemic or mortality would occur during their reigns2 and that the seasons would be favourable and the earth yield its fruit in abundance2 whereas1 if they set the ancient usages at naught1 the country would be visited with plague1 famine1 and bad weather4 ,the kings of ,egypt were worshipped as gods1 and the routine of their daily life was regulated in every detail by precise and unvarying rules4 ,the life of the kings of ,egypt1 says ,diodorus1 was not like that of other monarchs who are irresponsible and may do just what they choose2 on the contrary1 everything was fixed for them by law1 not only their official duties1 but even the details of their daily life4 4 4 4 ,the hours both of day and night were arranged at which the king had to do1 not what he pleased1 but what was prescribed for him4 4 4 4 ,for not only were the times appointed at which he should transact public business or sit in judgment2 but the very hours for his walking and bathing and sleeping with his wife1 and1 in short1 performing every act of life were all settled4 ,custom enjoined a simple diet2 the only flesh he might eat was veal and goose1 and he might only drink a prescribed quantity of wine4 ,however1 there is reason to think that these rules were observed1 not by the ancient ,pharaohs1 but by the priestly kings who reigned at ,thebes and ,ethiopia at the close of the twentieth dynasty4 ,of the taboos imposed on priests we may see a striking example in the rules of life prescribed for the ,flamen ,dialis at ,rome1 who has been interpreted as a living image of ,jupiter1 or a human embodiment of the sky-spirit4 ,they were such as the following3 ,the ,flamen ,dialis might not ride or even touch a horse1 nor see an army under arms1 nor wear a ring which was not broken1 nor have a knot on any part of his garments2 no fire except a sacred fire might be taken out of his house2 he might not touch wheaten flour or leavened bread2 he might not touch or even name a goat1 a dog1 raw meat1 beans1 and ivy2 he might not walk under a vine2 the feet of his bed had to be daubed with mud2 his hair could be cut only by a free man and with a bronze knife and his hair and nails when cut had to be buried under a lucky tree2 he might not touch a dead body nor enter a place where one was burned2 he might not see work being done on holy days2 he might not be uncovered in the open air2 if a man in bonds were taken into his house1 the captive had to be unbound and the cords had to be drawn up through a hole in the roof and so let down into the street4 ,his wife1 the ,flaminica1 had to observe nearly the same rules1 and others of her own besides4 ,she might not ascend more than three steps of the kind of staircase called ,greek2 at a certain festival she might not comb her hair2 the leather of her shoes might not be made from a beast that had died a natural death1 but only from one that had been slain or sacrificed2 if she heard thunder she was tabooed till she had offered an expiatory sacrifice4 ,among the ,grebo people of ,sierra ,leone there is a pontiff who bears the title of ,bodia and has been compared1 on somewhat slender grounds1 to the high priest of the ,jews4 ,he is appointed in accordance with the behest of an oracle4 ,at an elaborate ceremony of installation he is anointed1 a ring is put on his ankle as a badge of office1 and the door-posts of his house are sprinkled with the blood of a sacrificed goat4 ,he has charge of the public talismans and idols1 which he feeds with rice and oil every new moon2 and he sacrifices on behalf of the town to the dead and to demons4 ,nominally his power is very great1 but in practice it is very limited2 for he dare not defy public opinion1 and he is held responsible1 even with his life1 for any adversity that befalls the country4 ,it is expected of him that he should cause the earth to bring forth abundantly1 the people to be healthy1 war to be driven far away1 and witchcraft to be kept in abeyance4 ,his life is trammelled by the observance of certain restrictions or taboos4 ,thus he may not sleep in any house but his own official residence1 which is called the anointed house with reference to the ceremony of anointing him at inauguration4 ,he may not drink water on the highway4 ,he may not eat while a corpse is in the town1 and he may not mourn for the dead4 ,if he dies while in office1 he must be buried at dead of night2 few may hear of his burial1 and none may mourn for him when his death is made public4 ,should he have fallen a victim to the poison ordeal by drinking a decoction of sassywood1 as it is called1 he must be buried under a running stream of water4 ,among the ,todas of ,southern ,india the holy milkman1 who acts as priest of the sacred dairy1 is subject to a variety of irksome and burdensome restrictions during the whole time of his incumbency1 which may last many years4 ,thus he must live at the sacred dairy and may never visit his home or any ordinary village4 ,he must be celibate2 if he is married he must leave his wife4 ,on no account may any ordinary person touch the holy milkman or the holy dairy2 such a touch would so defile his holiness that he would forfeit his office4 ,it is only on two days a week1 namely ,mondays and ,thursdays1 that a mere layman may even approach the milkman2 on other days if he has any business with him1 he must stand at a distance 7some say a quarter of a mile7 and shout his message across the intervening space4 ,further1 the holy milkman never cuts his hair or pares his nails so long as he holds office2 he never crosses a river by a bridge1 but wades through a ford and only certain fords2 if a death occurs in his clan1 he may not attend any of the funeral ceremonies1 unless he first resigns his office and descends from the exalted rank of milkman to that of a mere common mortal4 ,indeed it appears that in old days he had to resign the seals1 or rather the pails1 of office whenever any member of his clan departed this life4 ,however1 these heavy restraints are laid in their entirety only on milkmen of the very highest class4 #b4 ,divorce of the ,spiritual from the ,temporal ,power ,,the ,,burdensome observances attached to the royal or priestly office produced their natural effect4 ,either men refused to accept the office1 which hence tended to fall into abeyance2 or accepting it1 they sank under its weight into spiritless creatures1 cloistered recluses1 from whose nerveless fingers the reins of government slipped into the firmer grasp of men who were often content to wield the reality of sovereignty without its name4 ,in some countries this rift in the supreme power deepened into a total and permanent separation of the spiritual and temporal powers1 the old royal house retaining their purely religious functions1 while the civil government passed into the hands of a younger and more vigorous race4 ,to take examples4 ,in a previous part of this work we saw that in ,cambodia it is often necessary to force the kingships of ,fire and ,water upon the reluctant successors1 and that in ,savage ,island the monarchy actually came to an end because at last no one could be induced to accept the dangerous distinction4 ,in some parts of ,west ,africa1 when the king dies1 a family council is secretly held to determine his successor4 ,he on whom the choice falls is suddenly seized1 bound1 and thrown into the fetish-house1 where he is kept in durance till he consents to accept the crown4 ,sometimes the heir finds means of evading the honour which it is sought to thrust upon him2 a ferocious chief has been known to go about constantly armed1 resolute to resist by force any attempt to set him on the throne4 ,the savage ,timmes of ,sierra ,leone1 who elect their king1 reserve to themselves the right of beating him on the eve of his coronation2 and they avail themselves of this constitutional privilege with such hearty goodwill that sometimes the unhappy monarch does not long survive his elevation to the throne4 ,hence when the leading chiefs have a spite at a man and wish to rid themselves of him1 they elect him king4 ,formerly1 before a man was proclaimed king of ,sierra ,leone1 it used to be the custom to load him with chains and thrash him4 ,then the fetters were knocked off1 the kingly robe was placed on him1 and he received in his hands the symbol of royal dignity1 which was nothing but the axe of the executioner4 ,it is not therefore surprising to read that in ,sierra ,leone1 where such customs have prevailed1 except among the ,mandingoes and ,suzees1 few kings are natives of the countries they govern4 ,so different are their ideas from ours1 that very few are solicitous of the honour1 and competition is very seldom heard of4 ,the ,mikados of ,japan seem early to have resorted to the expedient of transferring the honours and burdens of supreme power to their infant children2 and the rise of the ,tycoons1 long the temporal sovereigns of the country1 is traced to the abdication of a certain ,mikado in favour of his three-year-old son4 ,the sovereignty having been wrested by a usurper from the infant prince1 the cause of the ,mikado was championed by ,yoritomo1 a man of spirit and conduct1 who overthrew the usurper and restored to the ,mikado the shadow1 while he retained for himself the substance1 of power4 ,he bequeathed to his descendants the dignity he had won1 and thus became the founder of the line of ,tycoons4 ,down to the latter half of the sixteenth century the ,tycoons were active and efficient rulers2 but the same fate overtook them which had befallen the ,mikados4 ,immeshed in the same inextricable web of custom and law1 they degenerated into mere puppets1 hardly stirring from their palaces and occupied in a perpetual round of empty ceremonies1 while the real business of government was managed by the council of state4 ,in ,tonquin the monarchy ran a similar course4 ,living like his predecessors in effeminacy and sloth1 the king was driven from the throne by an ambitious adventurer named ,mack1 who from a fisherman had risen to be ,grand ,mandarin4 ,but the king's brother ,tring put down the usurper and restored the king1 retaining1 however1 for himself and his descendants the dignity of general of all the forces4 ,thenceforward the kings1 though invested with the title and pomp of sovereignty1 ceased to govern4 ,while they lived secluded in their palaces1 all real political power was wielded by the hereditary generals4 ,in ,mangaia1 a ,polynesian island1 religious and civil authority were lodged in separate hands1 spiritual functions being discharged by a line of hereditary kings1 while the temporal government was entrusted from time to time to a victorious war-chief1 whose investiture1 however1 had to be completed by the king4 ,similarly in ,tonga1 besides the civil king whose right to the throne was partly hereditary and partly derived from his warlike reputation and the number of his fighting men1 there was a great divine chief who ranked above the king and the other chiefs in virtue of his supposed descent from one of the chief gods4 ,once a year the first-fruits of the ground were offered to him at a solemn ceremony1 and it was believed that if these offerings were not made the vengeance of the gods would fall in a signal manner on the people4 ,peculiar forms of speech1 such as were applied to no one else1 were used in speaking of him1 and everything that he chanced to touch became sacred or tabooed4 ,when he and the king met1 the monarch had to sit down on the ground in token of respect until his holiness had passed by4 ,yet though he enjoyed the highest veneration by reason of his divine origin1 this sacred personage possessed no political authority1 and if he ventured to meddle with affairs of state it was at the risk of receiving a rebuff from the king1 to whom the real power belonged1 and who finally succeeded in ridding himself of his spiritual rival4 ,in some parts of ,western ,africa two kings reign side by side1 a fetish or religious king and a civil king1 but the fetish king is really supreme4 ,he controls the weather and so forth1 and can put a stop to everything4 ,when he lays his red staff on the ground1 no one may pass that way4 ,this division of power between a sacred and a secular ruler is to be met with wherever the true negro culture has been left unmolested1 but where the negro form of society has been disturbed1 as in ,dahomey and ,ashantee1 there is a tendency to consolidate the two powers in a single king4 ,in some parts of the ,east ,indian island of ,timor we meet with a partition of power like that which is represented by the civil king and the fetish king of ,western ,africa4 ,some of the ,timorese tribes recognise two rajahs1 the ordinary or civil rajah1 who governs the people1 and the fetish or taboo rajah1 who is charged with the control of everything that concerns the earth and its products4 ,this latter ruler has the right of declaring anything taboo2 his permission must be obtained before new land may be brought under cultivation1 and he must perform certain necessary ceremonies when the work is being carried out4 ,if drought or blight threatens the crops1 his help is invoked to save them4 ,though he ranks below the civil rajah1 he exercises a momentous influence on the course of events1 for his secular colleague is bound to consult him in all important matters4 ,in some of the neighbouring islands1 such as ,rotti and eastern ,flores1 a spiritual ruler of the same sort is recognised under various native names1 which all mean lord of the ground4 ,similarly in the ,mekeo district of ,british ,new ,guinea there is a double chieftainship4 ,the people are divided into two groups according to families1 and each of the groups has its chief4 ,one of the two is the war chief1 the other is the taboo chief4 ,the office of the latter is hereditary2 his duty is to impose a taboo on any of the crops1 such as the coco-nuts and areca nuts1 whenever he thinks it desirable to prohibit their use4 ,in his office we may perhaps detect the beginning of a priestly dynasty1 but as yet his functions appear to be more magical than religious1 being concerned with the control of the harvests rather than with the propitiation of higher powers4 ,,xviii4 ,the ,perils of the ,soul #a4 ,the ,soul as a ,mannikin ,,the ,,foregoing examples have taught us that the office of a sacred king or priest is often hedged in by a series of burdensome restrictions or taboos1 of which a principal purpose appears to be to preserve the life of the divine man for the good of his people4 ,but if the object of the taboos is to save his life1 the question arises1 ,how is their observance supposed to effect this end8 ,to understand this we must know the nature of the danger which threatens the king's life1 and which it is the intention of these curious restrictions to guard against4 ,we must1 therefore1 ask3 ,what does early man understand by death8 ,to what causes does he attribute it8 ,and how does he think it may be guarded against8 ,as the savage commonly explains the processes of inanimate nature by supposing that they are produced by living beings working in or behind the phenomena1 so he explains the phenomena of life itself4 ,if an animal lives and moves1 it can only be1 he thinks1 because there is a little animal inside which moves it3 if a man lives and moves1 it can only be because he has a little man or animal inside who moves him4 ,the animal inside the animal1 the man inside the man1 is the soul4 ,and as the activity of an animal or man is explained by the presence of the soul1 so the repose of sleep or death is explained by its absence2 sleep or trance being the temporary1 death being the permanent absence of the soul4 ,hence if death be the permanent absence of the soul1 the way to guard against it is either to prevent the soul from leaving the body1 or1 if it does depart1 to ensure that it shall return4 ,the precautions adopted by savages to secure one or other of these ends take the form of certain prohibitions or taboos1 which are nothing but rules intended to ensure either the continued presence or the return of the soul4 ,in short1 they are life-preservers or life-guards4 ,these general statements will now be illustrated by examples4 ,addressing some ,australian blacks1 a ,european missionary said1 ,i am not one1 as you think1 but two4 ,upon this they laughed4 ,you may laugh as much as you like1 continued the missionary1 ,i tell you that ,i am two in one2 this great body that you see is one2 within that there is another little one which is not visible4 ,the great body dies1 and is buried1 but the little body flies away when the great one dies4 ,to this some of the blacks replied1 ,yes1 yes4 ,we also are two1 we also have a little body within the breast4 ,on being asked where the little body went after death1 some said it went behind the bush1 others said it went into the sea1 and some said they did not know4 ,the ,hurons thought that the soul had a head and body1 arms and legs2 in short1 that it was a complete little model of the man himself4 ,the ,esquimaux believe that the soul exhibits the same shape as the body it belongs to1 but is of a more subtle and ethereal nature4 ,according to the ,nootkas the soul has the shape of a tiny man2 its seat is the crown of the head4 ,so long as it stands erect1 its owner is hale and hearty2 but when from any cause it loses its upright position1 he loses his senses4 ,among the ,indian tribes of the ,lower ,fraser ,river1 man is held to have four souls1 of which the principal one has the form of a mannikin1 while the other three are shadows of it4 ,the ,malays conceive the human soul as a little man1 mostly invisible and of the bigness of a thumb1 who corresponds exactly in shape1 proportion1 and even in complexion to the man in whose body he resides4 ,this mannikin is of a thin1 unsubstantial nature1 though not so impalpable but that it may cause displacement on entering a physical object1 and it can flit quickly from place to place2 it is temporarily absent from the body in sleep1 trance1 and disease1 and permanently absent after death4 ,so exact is the resemblance of the mannikin to the man1 in other words1 of the soul to the body1 that1 as there are fat bodies and thin bodies1 so there are fat souls and thin souls2 as there are heavy bodies and light bodies1 long bodies and short bodies1 so there are heavy souls and light souls1 long souls and short souls4 ,the people of ,nias think that every man1 before he is born1 is asked how long or how heavy a soul he would like1 and a soul of the desired weight or length is measured out to him4 ,the heaviest soul ever given out weighs about ten grammes4 ,the length of a man's life is proportioned to the length of his soul2 children who die young had short souls4 ,the ,fijian conception of the soul as a tiny human being comes clearly out in the customs observed at the death of a chief among the ,nakelo tribe4 ,when a chief dies1 certain men1 who are the hereditary undertakers1 call him1 as he lies1 oiled and ornamented1 on fine mats1 saying1 ,rise1 sir1 the chief1 and let us be going4 ,the day has come over the land4 ,then they conduct him to the river side1 where the ghostly ferryman comes to ferry ,nakelo ghosts across the stream4 ,as they thus attend the chief on his last journey1 they hold their great fans close to the ground to shelter him1 because1 as one of them explained to a missionary1 ,his soul is only a little child4 ,people in the ,punjaub who tattoo themselves believe that at death the soul1 the little entire man or woman inside the mortal frame1 will go to heaven blazoned with the same tattoo patterns which adorned the body in life4 ,sometimes1 however1 as we shall see1 the human soul is conceived not in human but in animal form4 #b4 ,absence and ,recall of the ,soul ,,the ,,soul is commonly supposed to escape by the natural openings of the body1 especially the mouth and nostrils4 ,hence in ,celebes they sometimes fasten fish-hooks to a sick man's nose1 navel1 and feet1 so that if his soul should try to escape it may be hooked and held fast4 ,a ,turik on the ,baram ,river1 in ,borneo1 refused to part with some hook-like stones1 because they1 as it were1 hooked his soul to his body1 and so prevented the spiritual portion of him from becoming detached from the material4 ,when a ,sea ,dyak sorcerer or medicine-man is initiated1 his fingers are supposed to be furnished with fish-hooks1 with which he will thereafter clutch the human soul in the act of flying away1 and restore it to the body of the sufferer4 ,but hooks1 it is plain1 may be used to catch the souls of enemies as well as of friends4 ,acting on this principle head-hunters in ,borneo hang wooden hooks beside the skulls of their slain enemies in the belief that this helps them on their forays to hook in fresh heads4 ,one of the implements of a ,haida medicine-man is a hollow bone1 in which he bottles up departing souls1 and so restores them to their owners4 ,when any one yawns in their presence the ,hindoos always snap their thumbs1 believing that this will hinder the soul from issuing through the open mouth4 ,the ,marquesans used to hold the mouth and nose of a dying man1 in order to keep him in life by preventing his soul from escaping2 the same custom is reported of the ,new ,caledonians2 and with the like intention the ,bagobos of the ,philippine ,islands put rings of brass wire on the wrists or ankles of their sick4 ,on the other hand1 the ,itonamas of ,south ,america seal up the eyes1 nose1 and mouth of a dying person1 in case his ghost should get out and carry off others2 and for a similar reason the people of ,nias1 who fear the spirits of the recently deceased and identify them with the breath1 seek to confine the vagrant soul in its earthly tabernacle by bunging up the nose or tying up the jaws of the corpse4 ,before leaving a corpse the ,wakelbura of ,australia used to place hot coals in its ears in order to keep the ghost in the body1 until they had got such a good start that he could not overtake them4 ,in ,southern ,celebes1 to hinder the escape of a woman's soul in childbed1 the nurse ties a band as tightly as possible round the body of the expectant mother4 ,the ,minangkabauers of ,sumatra observe a similar custom2 a skein of thread or a string is sometimes fastened round the wrist or loins of a woman in childbed1 so that when her soul seeks to depart in her hour of travail it may find the egress barred4 ,and lest the soul of a babe should escape and be lost as soon as it is born1 the ,alfoors of ,celebes1 when a birth is about to take place1 are careful to close every opening in the house1 even the keyhole2 and they stop up every chink and cranny in the walls4 ,also they tie up the mouths of all animals inside and outside the house1 for fear one of them might swallow the child's soul4 ,for a similar reason all persons present in the house1 even the mother herself1 are obliged to keep their mouths shut the whole time the birth is taking place4 ,when the question was put1 ,why they did not hold their noses also1 lest the child's soul should get into one of them8 the answer was that breath being exhaled as well as inhaled through the nostrils1 the soul would be expelled before it could have time to settle down4 ,popular expressions in the language of civilised peoples1 such as to have one's heart in one's mouth1 or the soul on the lips or in the nose1 show how natural is the idea that the life or soul may escape by the mouth or nostrils4 ,often the soul is conceived as a bird ready to take flight4 ,this conception has probably left traces in most languages1 and it lingers as a metaphor in poetry4 ,the ,malays carry out the conception of the bird-soul in a number of odd ways4 ,if the soul is a bird on the wing1 it may be attracted by rice1 and so either prevented from flying away or lured back again from its perilous flight4 ,thus in ,java when a child is placed on the ground for the first time 7a moment which uncultured people seem to regard as especially dangerous71 it is put in a hen-coop and the mother makes a clucking sound1 as if she were calling hens4 ,and in ,sintang1 a district of ,borneo1 when a person1 whether man1 woman1 or child1 has fallen out of a house or off a tree1 and has been brought home1 his wife or other kinswoman goes as speedily as possible to the spot where the accident happened1 and there strews rice1 which has been coloured yellow1 while she utters the words1 ,cluck6 cluck6 soul6 ,so-and-so is in his house again4 ,cluck6 cluck6 soul6 ,then she gathers up the rice in a basket1 carries it to the sufferer1 and drops the grains from her hand on his head1 saying again1 ,cluck6 cluck6 soul6 ,here the intention clearly is to decoy back the loitering bird-soul and replace it in the head of its owner4 ,the soul of a sleeper is supposed to wander away from his body and actually to visit the places1 to see the persons1 and to perform the acts of which he dreams4 ,for example1 when an ,indian of ,brazil or ,guiana wakes up from a sound sleep1 he is firmly convinced that his soul has really been away hunting1 fishing1 felling trees1 or whatever else he has dreamed of doing1 while all the time his body has been lying motionless in his hammock4 ,a whole ,bororo village has been thrown into a panic and nearly deserted because somebody had dreamed that he saw enemies stealthily approaching it4 ,a ,macusi ,indian in weak health1 who dreamed that his employer had made him haul the canoe up a series of difficult cataracts1 bitterly reproached his master next morning for his want of consideration in thus making a poor invalid go out and toil during the night4 ,the ,indians of the ,gran ,chaco are often heard to relate the most incredible stories as things which they have themselves seen and heard2 hence strangers who do not know them intimately say in their haste that these ,indians are liars4 ,in point of fact the ,indians are firmly convinced of the truth of what they relate2 for these wonderful adventures are simply their dreams1 which they do not distinguish from waking realities4 ,now the absence of the soul in sleep has its dangers1 for if from any cause the soul should be permanently detained away from the body1 the person thus deprived of the vital principle must die4 ,there is a ,german belief that the soul escapes from a sleeper's mouth in the form of a white mouse or a little bird1 and that to prevent the return of the bird or animal would be fatal to the sleeper4 ,hence in ,transylvania they say that you should not let a child sleep with its mouth open1 or its soul will slip out in the shape of a mouse1 and the child will never wake4 ,many causes may detain the sleeper's soul4 ,thus1 his soul may meet the soul of another sleeper and the two souls may fight2 if a ,guinea negro wakens with sore bones in the morning1 he thinks that his soul has been thrashed by another soul in sleep4 ,or it may meet the soul of a person just deceased and be carried off by it2 hence in the ,aru ,islands the inmates of a house will not sleep the night after a death has taken place in it1 because the soul of the deceased is supposed to be still in the house and they fear to meet it in a dream4 ,again1 the soul of the sleeper may be prevented by an accident or by physical force from returning to his body4 ,when a ,dyak dreams of falling into the water1 he supposes that this accident has really befallen his spirit1 and he sends for a wizard1 who fishes for the spirit with a hand-net in a basin of water till he catches it and restores it to its owner4 ,the ,santals tell how a man fell asleep1 and growing very thirsty1 his soul1 in the form of a lizard1 left his body and entered a pitcher of water to drink4 ,just then the owner of the pitcher happened to cover it2 so the soul could not return to the body and the man died4 ,while his friends were preparing to burn the body some one uncovered the pitcher to get water4 ,the lizard thus escaped and returned to the body1 which immediately revived2 so the man rose up and asked his friends why they were weeping4 ,they told him they thought he was dead and were about to burn his body4 ,he said he had been down a well to get water1 but had found it hard to get out and had just returned4 ,so they saw it all4 ,it is a common rule with primitive people not to waken a sleeper1 because his soul is away and might not have time to get back2 so if the man wakened without his soul1 he would fall sick4 ,if it is absolutely necessary to rouse a sleeper1 it must be done very gradually1 to allow the soul time to return4 ,a ,fijian in ,matuku1 suddenly wakened from a nap by somebody treading on his foot1 has been heard bawling after his soul and imploring it to return4 ,he had just been dreaming that he was far away in ,tonga1 and great was his alarm on suddenly wakening to find his body in ,matuku4 ,death stared him in the face unless his soul could be induced to speed at once across the sea and reanimate its deserted tenement4 ,the man would probably have died of fright if a missionary had not been at hand to allay his terror4 ,still more dangerous is it in the opinion of primitive man to move a sleeper or alter his appearance1 for if this were done the soul on its return might not be able to find or recognise its body1 and so the person would die4 ,the ,minangkabauers deem it highly improper to blacken or dirty the face of a sleeper1 lest the absent soul should shrink from re-entering a body thus disfigured4 ,patani ,malays fancy that if a person's face be painted while he sleeps1 the soul which has gone out of him will not recognise him1 and he will sleep on till his face is washed4 ,in ,bombay it is thought equivalent to murder to change the aspect of a sleeper1 as by painting his face in fantastic colours or giving moustaches to a sleeping woman4 ,for when the soul returns it will not know its own body1 and the person will die4 ,but in order that a man's soul should quit his body1 it is not necessary that he should be asleep4 ,it may quit him in his waking hours1 and then sickness1 insanity1 or death will be the result4 ,thus a man of the ,wurunjeri tribe in ,australia lay at his last gasp because his spirit had departed from him4 ,a medicine-man went in pursuit and caught the spirit by the middle just as it was about to plunge into the sunset glow1 which is the light cast by the souls of the dead as they pass in and out of the under-world1 where the sun goes to rest4 ,having captured the vagrant spirit1 the doctor brought it back under his opossum rug1 laid himself down on the dying man1 and put the soul back into him1 so that after a time he revived4 ,the ,karens of ,burma are perpetually anxious about their souls1 lest these should go roving from their bodies1 leaving the owners to die4 ,when a man has reason to fear that his soul is about to take this fatal step1 a ceremony is performed to retain or recall it1 in which the whole family must take part4 ,a meal is prepared consisting of a cock and hen1 a special kind of rice1 and a bunch of bananas4 ,then the head of the family takes the bowl which is used to skim rice1 and knocking with it thrice on the top of the houseladder says3 ,prrrroo6 ,come back1 soul1 do not tarry outside6 ,if it rains1 you will be wet4 ,if the sun shines1 you will be hot4 ,the gnats will sting you1 the leeches will bite you1 the tigers will devour you1 the thunder will crush you4 ,prrrroo6 ,come back1 soul6 ,here it will be well with you4 ,you shall want for nothing4 ,come and eat under shelter from the wind and the storm4 ,after that the family partakes of the meal1 and the ceremony ends with everybody tying their right wrist with a string which has been charmed by a sorcerer4 ,similarly the ,lolos of ,south-western ,china believe that the soul leaves the body in chronic illness4 ,in that case they read a sort of elaborate litany1 calling on the soul by name and beseeching it to return from the hills1 the vales1 the rivers1 the forests1 the fields1 or from wherever it may be straying4 ,at the same time cups of water1 wine1 and rice are set at the door for the refreshment of the weary wandering spirit4 ,when the ceremony is over1 they tie a red cord round the arm of the sick man to tether the soul1 and this cord is worn by him until it decays and drops off4 ,some of the ,congo tribes believe that when a man is ill1 his soul has left his body and is wandering at large4 ,the aid of the sorcerer is then called in to capture the vagrant spirit and restore it to the invalid4 ,generally the physician declares that he has successfully chased the soul into the branch of a tree4 ,the whole town thereupon turns out and accompanies the doctor to the tree1 where the strongest men are deputed to break off the branch in which the soul of the sick man is supposed to be lodged4 ,this they do and carry the branch back to the town1 insinuating by their gestures that the burden is heavy and hard to bear4 ,when the branch has been brought to the sick man's hut1 he is placed in an upright position by its side1 and the sorcerer performs the enchantments by which the soul is believed to be restored to its owner4 ,pining1 sickness1 great fright1 and death are ascribed by the ,bataks of ,sumatra to the absence of the soul from the body4 ,at first they try to beckon the wanderer back1 and to lure him1 like a fowl1 by strewing rice4 ,then the following form of words is commonly repeated3 ,come back1 ,o soul1 whether thou art lingering in the wood1 or on the hills1 or in the dale4 ,see1 ,i call thee with a toemba bras1 with an egg of the fowl ,rajah moelija1 with the eleven healing leaves4 ,detain it not1 let it come straight here1 detain it not1 neither in the wood1 nor on the hill1 nor in the dale4 ,that may not be4 ,o come straight home6 ,once when a popular traveller was leaving a ,kayan village1 the mothers1 fearing that their children's souls might follow him on his journey1 brought him the boards on which they carry their infants and begged him to pray that the souls of the little ones would return to the familiar boards and not go away with him into the far country4 ,to each board was fastened a looped string for the purpose of tethering the vagrant spirits1 and through the loop each baby was made to pass a chubby finger to make sure that its tiny soul would not wander away4 ,in an ,indian story a king conveys his soul into the dead body of a ,brahman1 and a hunchback conveys his soul into the deserted body of the king4 ,the hunchback is now king and the king is a ,brahman4 ,however1 the hunchback is induced to show his skill by transferring his soul to the dead body of a parrot1 and the king seizes the opportunity to regain possession of his own body4 ,a tale of the same type1 with variations of detail1 reappears among the ,malays4 ,a king has incautiously transferred his soul to an ape1 upon which the vizier adroitly inserts his own soul into the king's body and so takes possession of the queen and the kingdom1 while the true king languishes at court in the outward semblance of an ape4 ,but one day the false king1 who played for high stakes1 was watching a combat of rams1 and it happened that the animal on which he had laid his money fell down dead4 ,all efforts to restore animation proved unavailing till the false king1 with the instinct of a true sportsman1 transferred his own soul to the body of the deceased ram1 and thus renewed the fray4 ,the real king in the body of the ape saw his chance1 and with great presence of mind darted back into his own body1 which the vizier had rashly vacated4 ,so he came to his own again1 and the usurper in the ram's body met with the fate he richly deserved4 ,similarly the ,greeks told how the soul of ,hermotimus of ,clazomenae used to quit his body and roam far and wide1 bringing back intelligence of what he had seen on his rambles to his friends at home2 until one day1 when his spirit was abroad1 his enemies contrived to seize his deserted body and committed it to the flames4 ,the departure of the soul is not always voluntary4 ,it may be extracted from the body against its will by ghosts1 demons1 or sorcerers4 ,hence1 when a funeral is passing the house1 the ,karens tie their children with a special kind of string to a particular part of the house1 lest the souls of the children should leave their bodies and go into the corpse which is passing4 ,the children are kept tied in this way until the corpse is out of sight4 ,and after the corpse has been laid in the grave1 but before the earth has been shovelled in1 the mourners and friends range themselves round the grave1 each with a bamboo split lengthwise in one hand and a little stick in the other2 each man thrusts his bamboo into the grave1 and drawing the stick along the groove of the bamboo points out to his soul that in this way it may easily climb up out of the tomb4 ,while the earth is being shovelled in1 the bamboos are kept out of the way1 lest the souls should be in them1 and so should be inadvertently buried with the earth as it is being thrown into the grave2 and when the people leave the spot they carry away the bamboos1 begging their souls to come with them4 ,further1 on returning from the grave each ,karen provides himself with three little hooks made of branches of trees1 and calling his spirit to follow him1 at short intervals1 as he returns1 he makes a motion as if hooking it1 and then thrusts the hook into the ground4 ,this is done to prevent the soul of the living from staying behind with the soul of the dead4 ,when the ,karo-,bataks have buried somebody and are filling in the grave1 a sorceress runs about beating the air with a stick4 ,this she does in order to drive away the souls of the survivors1 for if one of these souls happened to slip into the grave and to be covered up with earth1 its owner would die4 ,in ,uea1 one of the ,loyalty ,islands1 the souls of the dead seem to have been credited with the power of stealing the souls of the living4 ,for when a man was sick the soul-doctor would go with a large troop of men and women to the graveyard4 ,here the men played on flutes and the women whistled softly to lure the soul home4 ,after this had gone on for some time they formed in procession and moved homewards1 the flutes playing and the women whistling all the way1 while they led back the wandering soul and drove it gently along with open palms4 ,on entering the patient's dwelling they commanded the soul in a loud voice to enter his body4 ,often the abduction of a man's soul is set down to demons4 ,thus fits and convulsions are generally ascribed by the ,chinese to the agency of certain mischievous spirits who love to draw men's souls out of their bodies4 ,at ,amoy the spirits who serve babies and children in this way rejoice in the high-sounding titles of celestial agencies bestriding galloping horses and literary graduates residing halfway up in the sky4 ,when an infant is writhing in convulsions1 the frightened mother hastens to the roof of the house1 and1 waving about a bamboo pole to which one of the child's garments is attached1 cries out several times ,my child ,so-and-so1 come back1 return home6 ,meantime1 another inmate of the house bangs away at a gong in the hope of attracting the attention of the strayed soul1 which is supposed to recognise the familiar garment and to slip into it4 ,the garment containing the soul is then placed on or beside the child1 and if the child does not die recovery is sure to follow1 sooner or later4 ,similarly some ,indians catch a man's lost soul in his boots and restore it to his body by putting his feet into them4 ,in the ,moluccas when a man is unwell it is thought that some devil has carried away his soul to the tree1 mountain1 or hill where he 7the devil7 resides4 ,a sorcerer having pointed out the devil's abode1 the friends of the patient carry thither cooked rice1 fruit1 fish1 raw eggs1 a hen1 a chicken1 a silken robe1 gold1 armlets1 and so forth4 ,having set out the food in order they pray1 saying3 ,we come to offer to you1 ,o devil1 this offering of food1 clothes1 gold1 and so on2 take it and release the soul of the patient for whom we pray4 ,let it return to his body1 and he who now is sick shall be made whole4 ,then they eat a little and let the hen loose as a ransom for the soul of the patient2 also they put down the raw eggs2 but the silken robe1 the gold1 and the armlets they take home with them4 ,as soon as they are come to the house they place a flat bowl containing the offerings which have been brought back at the sick man's head1 and say to him3 ,now is your soul released1 and you shall fare well and live to grey hairs on the earth4 ,demons are especially feared by persons who have just entered a new house4 ,hence at a house-warming among the ,alfoors of ,minahassa in ,celebes the priest performs a ceremony for the purpose of restoring their souls to the inmates4 ,he hangs up a bag at the place of sacrifice and then goes through a list of the gods4 ,there are so many of them that this takes him the whole night through without stopping4 ,in the morning he offers the gods an egg and some rice4 ,by this time the souls of the household are supposed to be gathered in the bag4 ,so the priest takes the bag1 and holding it on the head of the master of the house1 says1 ,here you have your soul2 go 7soul7 to-morrow away again4 ,he then does the same1 saying the same words1 to the housewife and all the other members of the family4 ,amongst the same ,alfoors one way of recovering a sick man's soul is to let down a bowl by a belt out of a window and fish for the soul till it is caught in the bowl and hauled up4 ,and among the same people1 when a priest is bringing back a sick man's soul which he has caught in a cloth1 he is preceded by a girl holding the large leaf of a certain palm over his head as an umbrella to keep him and the soul from getting wet1 in case it should rain2 and he is followed by a man brandishing a sword to deter other souls from any attempt at rescuing the captured spirit4 ,sometimes the lost soul is brought back in a visible shape4 ,the ,salish or ,flathead ,indians of ,oregon believe that a man's soul may be separated for a time from his body without causing death and without the man being aware of his loss4 ,it is necessary1 however1 that the lost soul should be soon found and restored to its owner or he will die4 ,the name of the man who has lost his soul is revealed in a dream to the medicine-man1 who hastens to inform the sufferer of his loss4 ,generally a number of men have sustained a like loss at the same time2 all their names are revealed to the medicine-man1 and all employ him to recover their souls4 ,the whole night long these soulless men go about the village from lodge to lodge1 dancing and singing4 ,towards daybreak they go into a separate lodge1 which is closed up so as to be totally dark4 ,a small hole is then made in the roof1 through which the medicine-man1 with a bunch of feathers1 brushes in the souls1 in the shape of bits of bone and the like1 which he receives on a piece of matting4 ,a fire is next kindled1 by the light of which the medicine-man sorts out the souls4 ,first he puts aside the souls of dead people1 of which there are usually several2 for if he were to give the soul of a dead person to a living man1 the man would die instantly4 ,next he picks out the souls of all the persons present1 and making them all to sit down before him1 he takes the soul of each1 in the shape of a splinter of bone1 wood1 or shell1 and placing it on the owner's head1 pats it with many prayers and contortions till it descends into the heart and so resumes its proper place4 ,again1 souls may be extracted from their bodies or detained on their wanderings not only by ghosts and demons but also by men1 especially by sorcerers4 ,in ,fiji1 if a criminal refused to confess1 the chief sent for a scarf with which to catch away the soul of the rogue4 ,at the sight or even at the mention of the scarf the culprit generally made a clean breast4 ,for if he did not1 the scarf would be waved over his head till his soul was caught in it1 when it would be carefully folded up and nailed to the end of a chief's canoe2 and for want of his soul the criminal would pine and die4 ,the sorcerers of ,danger ,island used to set snares for souls4 ,the snares were made of stout cinet1 about fifteen to thirty feet long1 with loops on either side of different sizes1 to suit the different sizes of souls2 for fat souls there were large loops1 for thin souls there were small ones4 ,when a man was sick against whom the sorcerers had a grudge1 they set up these soul-snares near his house and watched for the flight of his soul4 ,if in the shape of a bird or an insect it was caught in the snare1 the man would infallibly die4 ,in some parts of ,west ,africa1 indeed1 wizards are continually setting traps to catch souls that wander from their bodies in sleep2 and when they have caught one1 they tie it up over the fire1 and as it shrivels in the heat the owner sickens4 ,this is done1 not out of any grudge towards the sufferer1 but purely as a matter of business4 ,the wizard does not care whose soul he has captured1 and will readily restore it to its owner1 if only he is paid for doing so4 ,some sorcerers keep regular asylums for strayed souls1 and anybody who has lost or mislaid his own soul can always have another one from the asylum on payment of the usual fee4 ,no blame whatever attaches to men who keep these private asylums or set traps for passing souls2 it is their profession1 and in the exercise of it they are actuated by no harsh or unkindly feelings4 ,but there are also wretches who from pure spite or for the sake of lucre set and bait traps with the deliberate purpose of catching the soul of a particular man2 and in the bottom of the pot1 hidden by the bait1 are knives and sharp hooks which tear and rend the poor soul1 either killing it outright or mauling it so as to impair the health of its owner when it succeeds in escaping and returning to him4 ,miss ,kingsley knew a ,kruman who became very anxious about his soul1 because for several nights he had smelt in his dreams the savoury smell of smoked crawfish seasoned with red pepper4 ,clearly some ill-wisher had set a trap baited with this dainty for his dream-soul1 intending to do him grievous bodily1 or rather spiritual1 harm2 and for the next few nights great pains were taken to keep his soul from straying abroad in his sleep4 ,in the sweltering heat of the tropical night he lay sweating and snorting under a blanket1 his nose and mouth tied up with a handkerchief to prevent the escape of his precious soul4 ,in ,hawaii there were sorcerers who caught souls of living people1 shut them up in calabashes1 and gave them to people to eat4 ,by squeezing a captured soul in their hands they discovered the place where people had been secretly buried4 ,nowhere perhaps is the art of abducting human souls more carefully cultivated or carried to higher perfection than in the ,malay ,peninsula4 ,here the methods by which the wizard works his will are various1 and so too are his motives4 ,sometimes he desires to destroy an enemy1 sometimes to win the love of a cold or bashful beauty4 ,thus1 to take an instance of the latter sort of charm1 the following are the directions given for securing the soul of one whom you wish to render distraught4 ,when the moon1 just risen1 looks red above the eastern horizon1 go out1 and standing in the moonlight1 with the big toe of your right foot on the big toe of your left1 make a speaking-trumpet of your right hand and recite through it the following words3 ,,om4 ,i loose my shaft1 ,i loose it and the moon clouds over1 ,i loose it1 and the sun is extinguished4 ,i loose it1 and the stars burn dim4 ,but it is not the sun1 moon1 and stars that ,i shoot at1 ,it is the stalk of the heart of that child of the congregation1 ,so-and-so4 ,cluck6 cluck6 soul of ,so-and-so1 come and walk with me1 ,come and sit with me1 ,come and sleep and share my pillow4 ,cluck6 cluck6 soul4 ,repeat this thrice and after every repetition blow through your hollow fist4 ,or you may catch the soul in your turban1 thus4 ,go out on the night of the full moon and the two succeeding nights2 sit down on an ant-hill facing the moon1 burn incense1 and recite the following incantation3 ,i bring you a betel leaf to chew1 ,dab the lime on to it1 ,prince ,ferocious1 ,for ,somebody1 ,prince ,distraction's daughter1 to chew4 ,somebody at sunrise be distraught for love of me ,somebody at sunset be distraught for love of me4 ,as you remember your parents1 remember me2 ,as you remember your house and houseladder1 remember me2 ,when thunder rumbles1 remember me2 ,when wind whistles1 remember me2 ,when the heavens rain1 remember me2 ,when cocks crow1 remember me2 ,when the dial-bird tells its tales1 remember me2 ,when you look up at the sun1 remember me2 ,when you look up at the moon1 remember me1 ,for in that self-same moon ,i am there4 ,cluck6 cluck6 soul of ,somebody come hither to me4 ,i do not mean to let you have my soul1 ,let your soul come hither to mine4 ,now wave the end of your turban towards the moon seven times each night4 ,go home and put it under your pillow1 and if you want to wear it in the daytime1 burn incense and say1 ,it is not a turban that ,i carry in my girdle1 but the soul of ,somebody4 ,the ,indians of the ,nass ,river1 in ,british ,columbia1 are impressed with a belief that a physician may swallow his patient's soul by mistake4 ,a doctor who is believed to have done so is made by the other members of the faculty to stand over the patient1 while one of them thrusts his fingers down the doctor's throat1 another kneads him in the stomach with his knuckles1 and a third slaps him on the back4 ,if the soul is not in him after all1 and if the same process has been repeated upon all the medical men without success1 it is concluded that the soul must be in the head-doctor's box4 ,a party of doctors1 therefore1 waits upon him at his house and requests him to produce his box4 ,when he has done so and arranged its contents on a new mat1 they take the votary of ,aesculapius and hold him up by the heels with his head in a hole in the floor4 ,in this position they wash his head1 and any water remaining from the ablution is taken and poured upon the sick man's head4 ,no doubt the lost soul is in the water4 #c4 ,the ,soul as a ,shadow and a ,reflection ,,but the spiritual dangers ,i have enumerated are not the only ones which beset the savage4 ,often he regards his shadow or reflection as his soul1 or at all events as a vital part of himself1 and as such it is necessarily a source of danger to him4 ,for if it is trampled upon1 struck1 or stabbed1 he will feel the injury as if it were done to his person2 and if it is detached from him entirely 7as he believes that it may be7 he will die4 ,in the island of ,wetar there are magicians who can make a man ill by stabbing his shadow with a pike or hacking it with a sword4 ,after ,sankara had destroyed the ,buddhists in ,india1 it is said that he journeyed to ,nepaul1 where he had some difference of opinion with the ,grand ,lama4 ,to prove his supernatural powers1 he soared into the air4 ,but as he mounted up the ,grand ,lama1 perceiving his shadow swaying and wavering on the ground1 struck his knife into it and down fell ,sankara and broke his neck4 ,in the ,banks ,islands there are some stones of a remarkably long shape which go by the name of eating ghosts1 because certain powerful and dangerous ghosts are believed to lodge in them4 ,if a man's shadow falls on one of these stones1 the ghost will draw his soul out from him1 so that he will die4 ,such stones1 therefore1 are set in a house to guard it2 and a messenger sent to a house by the absent owner will call out the name of the sender1 lest the watchful ghost in the stone should fancy that he came with evil intent and should do him a mischief4 ,at a funeral in ,china1 when the lid is about to be placed on the coffin1 most of the bystanders1 with the exception of the nearest kin1 retire a few steps or even retreat to another room1 for a person's health is believed to be endangered by allowing his shadow to be enclosed in a coffin4 ,and when the coffin is about to be lowered into the grave most of the spectators recoil to a little distance lest their shadows should fall into the grave and harm should thus be done to their persons4 ,the geomancer and his assistants stand on the side of the grave which is turned away from the sun2 and the grave-diggers and coffin-bearers attach their shadows firmly to their persons by tying a strip of cloth tightly round their waists4 ,nor is it human beings alone who are thus liable to be injured by means of their shadows4 ,animals are to some extent in the same predicament4 ,a small snail1 which frequents the neighbourhood of the limestone hills in ,perak1 is believed to suck the blood of cattle through their shadows2 hence the beasts grow lean and sometimes die from loss of blood4 ,the ancients supposed that in ,arabia1 if a hyaena trod on a man's shadow1 it deprived him of the power of speech and motion2 and that if a dog1 standing on a roof in the moonlight1 cast a shadow on the ground and a hyaena trod on it1 the dog would fall down as if dragged with a rope4 ,clearly in these cases the shadow1 if not equivalent to the soul1 is at least regarded as a living part of the man or the animal1 so that injury done to the shadow is felt by the person or animal as if it were done to his body4 ,conversely1 if the shadow is a vital part of a man or an animal1 it may under certain circumstances be as hazardous to be touched by it as it would be to come into contact with the person or animal4 ,hence the savage makes it a rule to shun the shadow of certain persons whom for various reasons he regards as sources of dangerous influence4 ,amongst the dangerous classes he commonly ranks mourners and women in general1 but especially his mother-in-law4 ,the ,shuswap ,indians think that the shadow of a mourner falling upon a person would make him sick4 ,amongst the ,kurnai of ,victoria novices at initiation were cautioned not to let a woman's shadow fall across them1 as this would make them thin1 lazy1 and stupid4 ,an ,australian native is said to have once nearly died of fright because the shadow of his mother-in-law fell on his legs as he lay asleep under a tree4 ,the awe and dread with which the untutored savage contemplates his mother-in-law are amongst the most familiar facts of anthropology4 ,in the ,yuin tribes of ,new ,south ,wales the rule which forbade a man to hold any communication with his wife's mother was very strict4 ,he might not look at her or even in her direction4 ,it was a ground of divorce if his shadow happened to fall on his mother-in-law3 in that case he had to leave his wife1 and she returned to her parents4 ,in ,new ,britain the native imagination fails to conceive the extent and nature of the calamities which would result from a man's accidentally speaking to his wife's mother2 suicide of one or both would probably be the only course open to them4 ,the most solemn form of oath a ,new ,briton can take is1 ,sir1 if ,i am not telling the truth1 ,i hope ,i may shake hands with my mother-in-law4 ,where the shadow is regarded as so intimately bound up with the life of the man that its loss entails debility or death1 it is natural to expect that its diminution should be regarded with solicitude and apprehension1 as betokening a corresponding decrease in the vital energy of its owner4 ,in ,amboyna and ,uliase1 two islands near the equator1 where necessarily there is little or no shadow cast at noon1 the people make it a rule not to go out of the house at mid-day1 because they fancy that by doing so a man may lose the shadow of his soul4 ,the ,mangaians tell of a mighty warrior1 ,tukaitawa1 whose strength waxed and waned with the length of his shadow4 ,in the morning1 when his shadow fell longest1 his strength was greatest2 but as the shadow shortened towards noon his strength ebbed with it1 till exactly at noon it reached its lowest point2 then1 as the shadow stretched out in the afternoon1 his strength returned4 ,a certain hero discovered the secret of ,tukaitawa's strength and slew him at noon4 ,the savage ,besisis of the ,malay ,peninsula fear to bury their dead at noon1 because they fancy that the shortness of their shadows at that hour would sympathetically shorten their own lives4 ,nowhere1 perhaps1 does the equivalence of the shadow to the life or soul come out more clearly than in some customs practised to this day in ,south-eastern ,europe4 ,in modern ,greece1 when the foundation of a new building is being laid1 it is the custom to kill a cock1 a ram1 or a lamb1 and to let its blood flow on the foundation-stone1 under which the animal is afterwards buried4 ,the object of the sacrifice is to give strength and stability to the building4 ,but sometimes1 instead of killing an animal1 the builder entices a man to the foundation-stone1 secretly measures his body1 or a part of it1 or his shadow1 and buries the measure under the foundation-stone2 or he lays the foundation-stone upon the man's shadow4 ,it is believed that the man will die within the year4 ,the ,roumanians of ,transylvania think that he whose shadow is thus immured will die within forty days2 so persons passing by a building which is in course of erection may hear a warning cry1 ,beware lest they take thy shadow6 ,not long ago there were still shadow-traders whose business it was to provide architects with the shadows necessary for securing their walls4 ,in these cases the measure of the shadow is looked on as equivalent to the shadow itself1 and to bury it is to bury the life or soul of the man1 who1 deprived of it1 must die4 ,thus the custom is a substitute for the old practice of immuring a living person in the walls1 or crushing him under the foundation-stone of a new building1 in order to give strength and durability to the structure1 or more definitely in order that the angry ghost may haunt the place and guard it against the intrusion of enemies4 ,as some peoples believe a man's soul to be in his shadow1 so other 7or the same7 peoples believe it to be in his reflection in water or a mirror4 ,thus the ,andamanese do not regard their shadows but their reflections 7in any mirror7 as their souls4 ,when the ,motumotu of ,new ,guinea first saw their likenesses in a looking-glass1 they thought that their reflections were their souls4 ,in ,new ,caledonia the old men are of opinion that a person's reflection in water or a mirror is his soul2 but the younger men1 taught by the ,catholic priests1 maintain that it is a reflection and nothing more1 just like the reflection of palm-trees in the water4 ,the reflection-soul1 being external to the man1 is exposed to much the same dangers as the shadow-soul4 ,the ,zulus will not look into a dark pool because they think there is a beast in it which will take away their reflections1 so that they die4 ,the ,basutos say that crocodiles have the power of thus killing a man by dragging his reflection under water4 ,when one of them dies suddenly and from no apparent cause1 his relatives will allege that a crocodile must have taken his shadow some time when he crossed a stream4 ,in ,saddle ,island1 ,melanesia1 there is a pool into which if any one looks he dies2 the malignant spirit takes hold upon his life by means of his reflection on the water4 ,we can now understand why it was a maxim both in ancient ,india and ancient ,greece not to look at one's reflection in water1 and why the ,greeks regarded it as an omen of death if a man dreamed of seeing himself so reflected4 ,they feared that the water-spirits would drag the person's reflection or soul under water1 leaving him soulless to perish4 ,this was probably the origin of the classical story of the beautiful ,narcissus1 who languished and died through seeing his reflection in the water4 ,further1 we can now explain the widespread custom of covering up mirrors or turning them to the wall after a death has taken place in the house4 ,it is feared that the soul1 projected out of the person in the shape of his reflection in the mirror1 may be carried off by the ghost of the departed1 which is commonly supposed to linger about the house till the burial4 ,the custom is thus exactly parallel to the ,aru custom of not sleeping in a house after a death for fear that the soul1 projected out of the body in a dream1 may meet the ghost and be carried off by it4 ,the reason why sick people should not see themselves in a mirror1 and why the mirror in a sick-room is therefore covered up1 is also plain2 in time of sickness1 when the soul might take flight so easily1 it is particularly dangerous to project it out of the body by means of the reflection in a mirror4 ,the rule is therefore precisely parallel to the rule observed by some peoples of not allowing sick people to sleep2 for in sleep the soul is projected out of the body1 and there is always a risk that it may not return4 ,as with shadows and reflections1 so with portraits2 they are often believed to contain the soul of the person portrayed4 ,people who hold this belief are naturally loth to have their likenesses taken2 for if the portrait is the soul1 or at least a vital part of the person portrayed1 whoever possesses the portrait will be able to exercise a fatal influence over the original of it4 ,thus the ,esquimaux of ,bering ,strait believe that persons dealing in witchcraft have the power of stealing a person's shade1 so that without it he will pine away and die4 ,once at a village on the lower ,yukon ,river an explorer had set up his camera to get a picture of the people as they were moving about among their houses4 ,while he was focusing the instrument1 the headman of the village came up and insisted on peeping under the cloth4 ,being allowed to do so1 he gazed intently for a minute at the moving figures on the ground glass1 then suddenly withdrew his head and bawled at the top of his voice to the people1 ,he has all of your shades in this box4 ,a panic ensued among the group1 and in an instant they disappeared helterskelter into their houses4 ,the ,tepehuanes of ,mexico stood in mortal terror of the camera1 and five days' persuasion was necessary to induce them to pose for it4 ,when at last they consented1 they looked like criminals about to be executed4 ,they believed that by photographing people the artist could carry off their souls and devour them at his leisure moments4 ,they said that1 when the pictures reached his country1 they would die or some other evil would befall them4 ,when ,dr4 ,catat and some companions were exploring the ,bara country on the west coast of ,madagascar1 the people suddenly became hostile4 ,the day before the travellers1 not without difficulty1 had photographed the royal family1 and now found themselves accused of taking the souls of the natives for the purpose of selling them when they returned to ,france4 ,denial was vain2 in compliance with the custom of the country they were obliged to catch the souls1 which were then put into a basket and ordered by ,dr4 ,catat to return to their respective owners4 ,some villagers in ,sikhim betrayed a lively horror and hid away whenever the lens of a camera1 or the evil eye of the box as they called it1 was turned on them4 ,they thought it took away their souls with their pictures1 and so put it in the power of the owner of the pictures to cast spells on them1 and they alleged that a photograph of the scenery blighted the landscape4 ,until the reign of the late ,king of ,siam no ,siamese coins were ever stamped with the image of the king1 for at that time there was a strong prejudice against the making of portraits in any medium4 ,europeans who travel into the jungle have1 even at the present time1 only to point a camera at a crowd to procure its instant dispersion4 ,when a copy of the face of a person is made and taken away from him1 a portion of his life goes with the picture4 ,unless the sovereign had been blessed with the years of a ,methusaleh he could scarcely have permitted his life to be distributed in small pieces together with the coins of the realm4 ,beliefs of the same sort still linger in various parts of ,europe4 ,not very many years ago some old women in the ,greek island of ,carpathus were very angry at having their likenesses drawn1 thinking that in consequence they would pine and die4 ,there are persons in the ,west of ,scotland who refuse to have their likenesses taken lest it prove unlucky2 and give as instances the cases of several of their friends who never had a day's health after being photographed4 ,,xix4 ,tabooed ,acts #a4 ,taboos on ,intercourse with ,strangers ,,so much for the primitive conceptions of the soul and the dangers to which it is exposed4 ,these conceptions are not limited to one people or country2 with variations of detail they are found all over the world1 and survive1 as we have seen1 in modern ,europe4 ,beliefs so deep-seated and so widespread must necessarily have contributed to shape the mould in which the early kingship was cast4 ,for if every person was at such pains to save his own soul from the perils which threatened it on so many sides1 how much more carefully must he have been guarded upon whose life hung the welfare and even the existence of the whole people1 and whom therefore it was the common interest of all to preserve8 ,therefore we should expect to find the king's life protected by a system of precautions or safeguards still more numerous and minute than those which in primitive society every man adopts for the safety of his own soul4 ,now in point of fact the life of the early kings is regulated1 as we have seen and shall see more fully presently1 by a very exact code of rules4 ,may we not then conjecture that these rules are in fact the very safeguards which we should expect to find adopted for the protection of the king's life8 ,an examination of the rules themselves confirms this conjecture4 ,for from this it appears that some of the rules observed by the kings are identical with those observed by private persons out of regard for the safety of their souls2 and even of those which seem peculiar to the king1 many1 if not all1 are most readily explained on the hypothesis that they are nothing but safeguards or lifeguards of the king4 ,i will now enumerate some of these royal rules or taboos1 offering on each of them such comments and explanations as may serve to set the original intention of the rule in its proper light4 ,as the object of the royal taboos is to isolate the king from all sources of danger1 their general effect is to compel him to live in a state of seclusion1 more or less complete1 according to the number and stringency of the rules he observes4 ,now of all sources of danger none are more dreaded by the savage than magic and witchcraft1 and he suspects all strangers of practising these black arts4 ,to guard against the baneful influence exerted voluntarily or involuntarily by strangers is therefore an elementary dictate of savage prudence4 ,hence before strangers are allowed to enter a district1 or at least before they are permitted to mingle freely with the inhabitants1 certain ceremonies are often performed by the natives of the country for the purpose of disarming the strangers of their magical powers1 of counteracting the baneful influence which is believed to emanate from them1 or of disinfecting1 so to speak1 the tainted atmosphere by which they are supposed to be surrounded4 ,thus1 when the ambassadors sent by ,justin ,,ii41 ,emperor of the ,east1 to conclude a peace with the ,turks had reached their destination1 they were received by shamans1 who subjected them to a ceremonial purification for the purpose of exorcising all harmful influence4 ,having deposited the goods brought by the ambassadors in an open place1 these wizards carried burning branches of incense round them1 while they rang a bell and beat on a tambourine1 snorting and falling into a state of frenzy in their efforts to dispel the powers of evil4 ,afterwards they purified the ambassadors themselves by leading them through the flames4 ,in the island of ,nanumea 7,south ,pacific7 strangers from ships or from other islands were not allowed to communicate with the people until they all1 or a few as representatives of the rest1 had been taken to each of the four temples in the island1 and prayers offered that the god would avert any disease or treachery which these strangers might have brought with them4 ,meat offerings were also laid upon the altars1 accompanied by songs and dances in honour of the god4 ,while these ceremonies were going on1 all the people except the priests and their attendants kept out of sight4 ,amongst the ,ot ,danoms of ,borneo it is the custom that strangers entering the territory should pay to the natives a certain sum1 which is spent in the sacrifice of buffaloes or pigs to the spirits of the land and water1 in order to reconcile them to the presence of the strangers1 and to induce them not to withdraw their favour from the people of the country1 but to bless the rice-harvest1 and so forth4 ,the men of a certain district in ,borneo1 fearing to look upon a ,european traveller lest he should make them ill1 warned their wives and children not to go near him4 ,those who could not restrain their curiosity killed fowls to appease the evil spirits and smeared themselves with the blood4 ,more dreaded1 says a traveller in ,central ,borneo1 than the evil spirits of the neighbourhood are the evil spirits from a distance which accompany travellers4 ,when a company from the middle ,mahakam ,river visited me among the ,blu-u ,kayans in the year #ahig1 no woman showed herself outside her house without a burning bundle of plehiding bark1 the stinking smoke of which drives away evil spirits4 ,when ,crevaux was travelling in ,south ,america he entered a village of the ,apalai ,indians4 ,a few moments after his arrival some of the ,indians brought him a number of large black ants1 of a species whose bite is painful1 fastened on palm leaves4 ,then all the people of the village1 without distinction of age or sex1 presented themselves to him1 and he had to sting them all with the ants on their faces1 thighs1 and other parts of their bodies4 ,sometimes1 when he applied the ants too tenderly1 they called out ,more6 more6 and were not satisfied till their skin was thickly studded with tiny swellings like what might have been produced by whipping them with nettles4 ,the object of this ceremony is made plain by the custom observed in ,amboyna and ,uliase of sprinkling sick people with pungent spices1 such as ginger and cloves1 chewed fine1 in order by the prickling sensation to drive away the demon of disease which may be clinging to their persons4 ,in ,java a popular cure for gout or rheumatism is to rub ,spanish pepper into the nails of the fingers and toes of the sufferer2 the pungency of the pepper is supposed to be too much for the gout or rheumatism1 who accordingly departs in haste4 ,so on the ,slave ,coast the mother of a sick child sometimes believes that an evil spirit has taken possession of the child's body1 and in order to drive him out1 she makes small cuts in the body of the little sufferer and inserts green peppers or spices in the wounds1 believing that she will thereby hurt the evil spirit and force him to be gone4 ,the poor child naturally screams with pain1 but the mother hardens her heart in the belief that the demon is suffering equally4 ,it is probable that the same dread of strangers1 rather than any desire to do them honour1 is the motive of certain ceremonies which are sometimes observed at their reception1 but of which the intention is not directly stated4 ,in the ,ongtong ,java ,islands1 which are inhabited by ,polynesians1 the priests or sorcerers seem to wield great influence4 ,their main business is to summon or exorcise spirits for the purpose of averting or dispelling sickness1 and of procuring favourable winds1 a good catch of fish1 and so on4 ,when strangers land on the islands1 they are first of all received by the sorcerers1 sprinkled with water1 anointed with oil1 and girt with dried pandanus leaves4 ,at the same time sand and water are freely thrown about in all directions1 and the newcomer and his boat are wiped with green leaves4 ,after this ceremony the strangers are introduced by the sorcerers to the chief4 ,in ,afghanistan and in some parts of ,persia the traveller1 before he enters a village1 is frequently received with a sacrifice of animal life or food1 or of fire and incense4 ,the ,afghan ,boundary ,mission1 in passing by villages in ,afghanistan1 was often met with fire and incense4 ,sometimes a tray of lighted embers is thrown under the hoofs of the traveller's horse1 with the words1 ,you are welcome4 ,on entering a village in ,central ,africa ,emin ,pasha was received with the sacrifice of two goats2 their blood was sprinkled on the path and the chief stepped over the blood to greet ,emin4 ,sometimes the dread of strangers and their magic is too great to allow of their reception on any terms4 ,thus when ,speke arrived at a certain village1 the natives shut their doors against him1 because they had never before seen a white man nor the tin boxes that the men were carrying3 ',who knows1' they said1 'but that these very boxes are the plundering ,watuta transformed and come to kill us8 ,you cannot be admitted4' ,no persuasion could avail with them1 and the party had to proceed to the next village4 ,the fear thus entertained of alien visitors is often mutual4 ,entering a strange land the savage feels that he is treading enchanted ground1 and he takes steps to guard against the demons that haunt it and the magical arts of its inhabitants4 ,thus on going to a strange land the ,maoris performed certain ceremonies to make it common1 lest it might have been previously sacred4 ,when ,baron ,miklucho-,maclay was approaching a village on the ,maclay ,coast of ,new ,guinea1 one of the natives who accompanied him broke a branch from a tree and going aside whispered to it for a while2 then stepping up to each member of the party1 one after another1 he spat something upon his back and gave him some blows with the branch4 ,lastly1 he went into the forest and buried the branch under withered leaves in the thickest part of the jungle4 ,this ceremony was believed to protect the party against all treachery and danger in the village they were approaching4 ,the idea probably was that the malignant influences were drawn off from the persons into the branch and buried with it in the depths of the forest4 ,in ,australia1 when a strange tribe has been invited into a district and is approaching the encampment of the tribe which owns the land1 the strangers carry lighted bark or burning sticks in their hands1 for the purpose1 they say1 of clearing and purifying the air4 ,when the ,toradjas are on a head-hunting expedition and have entered the enemy's country1 they may not eat any fruits which the foe has planted nor any animal which he has reared until they have first committed an act of hostility1 as by burning a house or killing a man4 ,they think that if they broke this rule they would receive something of the soul or spiritual essence of the enemy into themselves1 which would destroy the mystic virtue of their talismans4 ,again1 it is believed that a man who has been on a journey may have contracted some magic evil from the strangers with whom he has associated4 ,hence1 on returning home1 before he is readmitted to the society of his tribe and friends1 he has to undergo certain purificatory ceremonies4 ,thus the ,bechuanas cleanse or purify themselves after journeys by shaving their heads1 etc41 lest they should have contracted from strangers some evil by witchcraft or sorcery4 ,in some parts of ,western ,africa1 when a man returns home after a long absence1 before he is allowed to visit his wife1 he must wash his person with a particular fluid1 and receive from the sorcerer a certain mark on his forehead1 in order to counteract any magic spell which a stranger woman may have cast on him in his absence1 and which might be communicated through him to the women of his village4 ,two ,hindoo ambassadors1 who had been sent to ,england by a native prince and had returned to ,india1 were considered to have so polluted themselves by contact with strangers that nothing but being born again could restore them to purity4 ,for the purpose of regeneration it is directed to make an image of pure gold of the female power of nature1 in the shape either of a woman or of a cow4 ,in this statue the person to be regenerated is enclosed1 and dragged through the usual channel4 ,as a statue of pure gold and of proper dimensions would be too expensive1 it is sufficient to make an image of the sacred ,yoni1 through which the person to be regenerated is to pass4 ,such an image of pure gold was made at the prince's command1 and his ambassadors were born again by being dragged through it4 ,when precautions like these are taken on behalf of the people in general against the malignant influence supposed to be exercised by strangers1 it is no wonder that special measures are adopted to protect the king from the same insidious danger4 ,in the middle ages the envoys who visited a ,tartar ,khan were obliged to pass between two fires before they were admitted to his presence1 and the gifts they brought were also carried between the fires4 ,the reason assigned for the custom was that the fire purged away any magic influence which the strangers might mean to exercise over the ,khan4 ,when subject chiefs come with their retinues to visit ,kalamba 7the most powerful chief of the ,bashilange in the ,congo ,basin7 for the first time or after being rebellious1 they have to bathe1 men and women together1 in two brooks on two successive days1 passing the nights under the open sky in the market-place4 ,after the second bath they proceed1 entirely naked1 to the house of ,kalamba1 who makes a long white mark on the breast and forehead of each of them4 ,then they return to the market-place and dress1 after which they undergo the pepper ordeal4 ,pepper is dropped into the eyes of each of them1 and while this is being done the sufferer has to make a confession of all his sins1 to answer all questions that may be put to him1 and to take certain vows4 ,this ends the ceremony1 and the strangers are now free to take up their quarters in the town for as long as they choose to remain4 #b4 ,taboos on ,eating and ,drinking ,,in ,,the ,,opinion of savages the acts of eating and drinking are attended with special danger2 for at these times the soul may escape from the mouth1 or be extracted by the magic arts of an enemy present4 ,among the ,ewe-speaking peoples of the ,slave ,coast the common belief seems to be that the indwelling spirit leaves the body and returns to it through the mouth2 hence1 should it have gone out1 it behoves a man to be careful about opening his mouth1 lest a homeless spirit should take advantage of the opportunity and enter his body4 ,this1 it appears1 is considered most likely to take place while the man is eating4 ,precautions are therefore adopted to guard against these dangers4 ,thus of the ,bataks it is said that since the soul can leave the body1 they always take care to prevent their soul from straying on occasions when they have most need of it4 ,but it is only possible to prevent the soul from straying when one is in the house4 ,at feasts one may find the whole house shut up1 in order that the soul may stay and enjoy the good things set before it4 ,the ,zafimanelo in ,madagascar lock their doors when they eat1 and hardly any one ever sees them eating4 ,the ,warua will not allow any one to see them eating and drinking1 being doubly particular that no person of the opposite sex shall see them doing so4 ,i had to pay a man to let me see him drink2 ,i could not make a man let a woman see him drink4 ,when offered a drink they often ask that a cloth may be held up to hide them whilst drinking4 ,if these are the ordinary precautions taken by common people1 the precautions taken by kings are extraordinary4 ,the king of ,loango may not be seen eating or drinking by man or beast under pain of death4 ,a favourite dog having broken into the room where the king was dining1 the king ordered it to be killed on the spot4 ,once the king's own son1 a boy of twelve years old1 inadvertently saw the king drink4 ,immediately the king ordered him to be finely apparelled and feasted1 after which he commanded him to be cut in quarters1 and carried about the city with a proclamation that he had seen the king drink4 ,when the king has a mind to drink1 he has a cup of wine brought2 he that brings it has a bell in his hand1 and as soon as he has delivered the cup to the king1 he turns his face from him and rings the bell1 on which all present fall down with their faces to the ground1 and continue so till the king has drank4 4 4 4 ,his eating is much in the same style1 for which he has a house on purpose1 where his victuals are set upon a bensa or table3 which he goes to1 and shuts the door3 when he has done1 he knocks and comes out4 ,so that none ever see the king eat or drink4 ,for it is believed that if any one should1 the king shall immediately die4 ,the remnants of his food are buried1 doubtless to prevent them from falling into the hands of sorcerers1 who by means of these fragments might cast a fatal spell over the monarch4 ,the rules observed by the neighbouring king of ,cacongo were similar2 it was thought that the king would die if any of his subjects were to see him drink4 ,it is a capital offence to see the king of ,dahomey at his meals4 ,when he drinks in public1 as he does on extraordinary occasions1 he hides himself behind a curtain1 or handkerchiefs are held up round his head1 and all the people throw themselves with their faces to the earth4 ,when the king of ,bunyoro in ,central ,africa went to drink milk in the dairy1 every man must leave the royal enclosure and all the women had to cover their heads till the king returned4 ,no one might see him drink4 ,one wife accompanied him to the dairy and handed him the milk-pot1 but she turned away her face while he drained it4 #c4 ,taboos on ,showing the ,face ,,in ,,some of the preceding cases the intention of eating and drinking in strict seclusion may perhaps be to hinder evil influences from entering the body rather than to prevent the escape of the soul4 ,this certainly is the motive of some drinking customs observed by natives of the ,congo region4 ,thus we are told of these people that there is hardly a native who would dare to swallow a liquid without first conjuring the spirits4 ,one of them rings a bell all the time he is drinking2 another crouches down and places his left hand on the earth2 another veils his head2 another puts a stalk of grass or a leaf in his hair1 or marks his forehead with a line of clay4 ,this fetish custom assumes very varied forms4 ,to explain them1 the black is satisfied to say that they are an energetic mode of conjuring spirits4 ,in this part of the world a chief will commonly ring a bell at each draught of beer which he swallows1 and at the same moment a lad stationed in front of him brandishes a spear to keep at bay the spirits which might try to sneak into the old chief's body by the same road as the beer4 ,the same motive of warding off evil spirits probably explains the custom observed by some ,african sultans of veiling their faces4 ,the ,sultan of ,darfur wraps up his face with a piece of white muslin1 which goes round his head several times1 covering his mouth and nose first1 and then his forehead1 so that only his eyes are visible4 ,the same custom of veiling the face as a mark of sovereignty is said to be observed in other parts of ,central ,africa4 ,the ,sultan of ,wadai always speaks from behind a curtain2 no one sees his face except his intimates and a few favoured persons4 #d4 ,taboos on ,quitting the ,house ,,by ,,an ,,extension of the like precaution kings are sometimes forbidden ever to leave their palaces2 or1 if they are allowed to do so1 their subjects are forbidden to see them abroad4 ,the fetish king of ,benin1 who was worshipped as a deity by his subjects1 might not quit his palace4 ,after his coronation the king of ,loango is confined to his palace1 which he may not leave4 ,the king of ,onitsha does not step out of his house into the town unless a human sacrifice is made to propitiate the gods3 on this account he never goes out beyond the precincts of his premises4 ,indeed we are told that he may not quit his palace under pain of death or of giving up one or more slaves to be executed in his presence4 ,as the wealth of the country is measured in slaves1 the king takes good care not to infringe the law4 ,yet once a year at the ,feast of ,yams the king is allowed1 and even required by custom1 to dance before his people outside the high mud wall of the palace4 ,in dancing he carries a great weight1 generally a sack of earth1 on his back to prove that he is still able to support the burden and cares of state4 ,were he unable to discharge this duty1 he would be immediately deposed and perhaps stoned4 ,the kings of ,ethiopia were worshipped as gods1 but were mostly kept shut up in their palaces4 ,on the mountainous coast of ,pontus there dwelt in antiquity a rude and warlike people named the ,mosyni or ,mosynoeci1 through whose rugged country the ,ten ,thousand marched on their famous retreat from ,asia to ,europe4 ,these barbarians kept their king in close custody at the top of a high tower1 from which after his election he was never more allowed to descend4 ,here he dispensed justice to his people2 but if he offended them1 they punished him by stopping his rations for a whole day1 or even starving him to death4 ,the kings of ,sabaea or ,sheba1 the spice country of ,arabia1 were not allowed to go out of their palaces2 if they did so1 the mob stoned them to death4 ,but at the top of the palace there was a window with a chain attached to it4 ,if any man deemed he had suffered wrong1 he pulled the chain1 and the king perceived him and called him in and gave judgment4 #e4 ,taboos on ,leaving ,food over ,,again1 magic mischief may be wrought upon a man through the remains of the food he has partaken of1 or the dishes out of which he has eaten4 ,on the principles of sympathetic magic a real connexion continues to subsist between the food which a man has in his stomach and the refuse of it which he has left untouched1 and hence by injuring the refuse you can simultaneously injure the eater4 ,among the ,narrinyeri of ,south ,australia every adult is constantly on the look-out for bones of beasts1 birds1 or fish1 of which the flesh has been eaten by somebody1 in order to construct a deadly charm out of them4 ,every one is therefore careful to burn the bones of the animals which he has eaten1 lest they should fall into the hands of a sorcerer4 ,too often1 however1 the sorcerer succeeds in getting hold of such a bone1 and when he does so he believes that he has the power of life and death over the man1 woman1 or child who ate the flesh of the animal4 ,to put the charm in operation he makes a paste of red ochre and fish oil1 inserts in it the eye of a cod and a small piece of the flesh of a corpse1 and having rolled the compound into a ball sticks it on the top of the bone4 ,after being left for some time in the bosom of a dead body1 in order that it may derive a deadly potency by contact with corruption1 the magical implement is set up in the ground near the fire1 and as the ball melts1 so the person against whom the charm is directed wastes with disease2 if the ball is melted quite away1 the victim will die4 ,when the bewitched man learns of the spell that is being cast upon him1 he endeavours to buy the bone from the sorcerer1 and if he obtains it he breaks the charm by throwing the bone into a river or lake4 ,in ,tana1 one of the ,new ,hebrides1 people bury or throw into the sea the leavings of their food1 lest these should fall into the hands of the disease-makers4 ,for if a disease-maker finds the remnants of a meal1 say the skin of a banana1 he picks it up and burns it slowly in the fire4 ,as it burns1 the person who ate the banana falls ill and sends to the disease-maker1 offering him presents if he will stop burning the banana skin4 ,in ,new ,guinea the natives take the utmost care to destroy or conceal the husks and other remains of their food1 lest these should be found by their enemies and used by them for the injury or destruction of the eaters4 ,hence they burn their leavings1 throw them into the sea1 or otherwise put them out of harm's way4 ,from a like fear1 no doubt1 of sorcery1 no one may touch the food which the king of ,loango leaves upon his plate2 it is buried in a hole in the ground4 ,and no one may drink out of the king's vessel4 ,in antiquity the ,romans used immediately to break the shells of eggs and of snails which they had eaten1 in order to prevent enemies from making magic with them4 ,the common practice1 still observed among us1 of breaking egg-shells after the eggs have been eaten may very well have originated in the same superstition4 ,the superstitious fear of the magic that may be wrought on a man through the leavings of his food has had the beneficial effect of inducing many savages to destroy refuse which1 if left to rot1 might through its corruption have proved a real1 not a merely imaginary1 source of disease and death4 ,nor is it only the sanitary condition of a tribe which has benefited by this superstition2 curiously enough the same baseless dread1 the same false notion of causation1 has indirectly strengthened the moral bonds of hospitality1 honour1 and good faith among men who entertain it4 ,for it is obvious that no one who intends to harm a man by working magic on the refuse of his food will himself partake of that food1 because if he did so he would1 on the principles of sympathetic magic1 suffer equally with his enemy from any injury done to the refuse4 ,this is the idea which in primitive society lends sanctity to the bond produced by eating together2 by participation in the same food two men give1 as it were1 hostages for their good behaviour2 each guarantees the other that he will devise no mischief against him1 since1 being physically united with him by the common food in their stomachs1 any harm he might do to his fellow would recoil on his own head with precisely the same force with which it fell on the head of his victim4 ,in strict logic1 however1 the sympathetic bond lasts only so long as the food is in the stomach of each of the parties4 ,hence the covenant formed by eating together is less solemn and durable than the covenant formed by transfusing the blood of the covenanting parties into each other's veins1 for this transfusion seems to knit them together for life4 ,,xx4 ,tabooed ,persons #a4 ,chiefs and ,kings tabooed ,,we have seen that the ,mikado's food was cooked every day in new pots and served up in new dishes2 both pots and dishes were of common clay1 in order that they might be broken or laid aside after they had been once used4 ,they were generally broken1 for it was believed that if any one else ate his food out of these sacred dishes1 his mouth and throat would become swollen and inflamed4 ,the same ill effect was thought to be experienced by any one who should wear the ,mikado's clothes without his leave2 he would have swellings and pains all over his body4 ,in ,fiji there is a special name 7kana lama7 for the disease supposed to be caused by eating out of a chief's dishes or wearing his clothes4 ,the throat and body swell1 and the impious person dies4 ,i had a fine mat given to me by a man who durst not use it because ,thakombau's eldest son had sat upon it4 ,there was always a family or clan of commoners who were exempt from this danger4 ,i was talking about this once to ,thakombau4 ',oh yes1' said he4 ',here1 ,so-and-so6 come and scratch my back4' ,the man scratched2 he was one of those who could do it with impunity4 ,the name of the men thus highly privileged was ,na nduka ni1 or the dirt of the chief4 ,in the evil effects thus supposed to follow upon the use of the vessels or clothes of the ,mikado and a ,fijian chief we see that other side of the god-man's character to which attention has been already called4 ,the divine person is a source of danger as well as of blessing2 he must not only be guarded1 he must also be guarded against4 ,his sacred organism1 so delicate that a touch may disorder it1 is also1 as it were1 electrically charged with a powerful magical or spiritual force which may discharge itself with fatal effect on whatever comes in contact with it4 ,accordingly the isolation of the man-god is quite as necessary for the safety of others as for his own4 ,his magical virtue is in the strictest sense of the word contagious3 his divinity is a fire1 which1 under proper restraints1 confers endless blessings1 but1 if rashly touched or allowed to break bounds1 burns and destroys what it touches4 ,hence the disastrous effects supposed to attend a breach of taboo2 the offender has thrust his hand into the divine fire1 which shrivels up and consumes him on the spot4 ,the ,nubas1 for example1 who inhabit the wooded and fertile range of ,jebel ,nuba in ,eastern ,africa1 believe that they would die if they entered the house of their priestly king2 however1 they can evade the penalty of their intrusion by baring the left shoulder and getting the king to lay his hand on it4 ,and were any man to sit on a stone which the king has consecrated to his own use1 the transgressor would die within the year4 ,the ,cazembes of ,angola regard their king as so holy that no one can touch him without being killed by the magical power which pervades his sacred person4 ,but since contact with him is sometimes unavoidable1 they have devised a means whereby the sinner can escape with his life4 ,kneeling down before the king he touches the back of the royal hand with the back of his own1 then snaps his fingers2 afterwards he lays the palm of his hand on the palm of the king's hand1 then snaps his fingers again4 ,this ceremony is repeated four or five times1 and averts the imminent danger of death4 ,in ,tonga it was believed that if any one fed himself with his own hands after touching the sacred person of a superior chief or anything that belonged to him1 he would swell up and die2 the sanctity of the chief1 like a virulent poison1 infected the hands of his inferior1 and1 being communicated through them to the food1 proved fatal to the eater4 ,a commoner who had incurred this danger could disinfect himself by performing a certain ceremony1 which consisted in touching the sole of a chief's foot with the palm and back of each of his hands1 and afterwards rinsing his hands in water4 ,if there was no water near1 he rubbed his hands with the juicy stem of a plantain or banana4 ,after that he was free to feed himself with his own hands without danger of being attacked by the malady which would otherwise follow from eating with tabooed or sanctified hands4 ,but until the ceremony of expiation or disinfection had been performed1 if he wished to eat he had either to get some one to feed him1 or else to go down on his knees and pick up the food from the ground with his mouth like a beast4 ,he might not even use a toothpick himself1 but might guide the hand of another person holding the toothpick4 ,the ,tongans were subject to induration of the liver and certain forms of scrofula1 which they often attributed to a failure to perform the requisite expiation after having inadvertently touched a chief or his belongings4 ,hence they often went through the ceremony as a precaution1 without knowing that they had done anything to call for it4 ,the king of ,tonga could not refuse to play his part in the rite by presenting his foot to such as desired to touch it1 even when they applied to him at an inconvenient time4 ,a fat unwieldy king1 who perceived his subjects approaching with this intention1 while he chanced to be taking his walks abroad1 has been sometimes seen to waddle as fast as his legs could carry him out of their way1 in order to escape the importunate and not wholly disinterested expression of their homage4 ,if any one fancied he might have already unwittingly eaten with tabooed hands1 he sat down before the chief1 and1 taking the chief's foot1 pressed it against his own stomach1 that the food in his belly might not injure him1 and that he might not swell up and die4 ,since scrofula was regarded by the ,tongans as a result of eating with tabooed hands1 we may conjecture that persons who suffered from it among them often resorted to the touch or pressure of the king's foot as a cure for their malady4 ,the analogy of the custom with the old ,english practice of bringing scrofulous patients to the king to be healed by his touch is sufficiently obvious1 and suggests1 as ,i have already pointed out elsewhere1 that among our own remote ancestors scrofula may have obtained its name of the ,king's ,evil1 from a belief1 like that of the ,tongans1 that it was caused as well as cured by contact with the divine majesty of kings4 ,in ,new ,zealand the dread of the sanctity of chiefs was at least as great as in ,tonga4 ,their ghostly power1 derived from an ancestral spirit1 diffused itself by contagion over everything they touched1 and could strike dead all who rashly or unwittingly meddled with it4 ,for instance1 it once happened that a ,new ,zealand chief of high rank and great sanctity had left the remains of his dinner by the wayside4 ,a slave1 a stout1 hungry fellow1 coming up after the chief had gone1 saw the unfinished dinner1 and ate it up without asking questions4 ,hardly had he finished when he was informed by a horror-stricken spectator that the food of which he had eaten was the chief's4 ,i knew the unfortunate delinquent well4 ,he was remarkable for courage1 and had signalised himself in the wars of the tribe1 but no sooner did he hear the fatal news than he was seized by the most extraordinary convulsions and cramp in the stomach1 which never ceased till he died1 about sundown the same day4 ,he was a strong man1 in the prime of life1 and if any pakeha ,european freethinker should have said he was not killed by the tapu of the chief1 which had been communicated to the food by contact1 he would have been listened to with feelings of contempt for his ignorance and inability to understand plain and direct evidence4 ,this is not a solitary case4 ,a ,maori woman having eaten of some fruit1 and being afterwards told that the fruit had been taken from a tabooed place1 exclaimed that the spirit of the chief1 whose sanctity had been thus profaned1 would kill her4 ,this was in the afternoon1 and next day by twelve o'clock she was dead4 ,a ,maori chief's tinder-box was once the means of killing several persons2 for1 having been lost by him1 and found by some men who used it to light their pipes1 they died of fright on learning to whom it had belonged4 ,so1 too1 the garments of a high ,new ,zealand chief will kill any one else who wears them4 ,a chief was observed by a missionary to throw down a precipice a blanket which he found too heavy to carry4 ,being asked by the missionary why he did not leave it on a tree for the use of a future traveller1 the chief replied that it was the fear of its being taken by another which caused him to throw it where he did1 for if it were worn1 his tapu 7that is1 his spiritual power communicated by contact to the blanket and through the blanket to the man7 would kill the person4 ,for a similar reason a ,maori chief would not blow a fire with his mouth2 for his sacred breath would communicate its sanctity to the fire1 which would pass it on to the pot on the fire1 which would pass it on to the meat in the pot1 which would pass it on to the man who ate the meat1 which was in the pot1 which stood on the fire1 which was breathed on by the chief2 so that the eater1 infected by the chief's breath conveyed through these intermediaries1 would surely die4 ,thus in the ,polynesian race1 to which the ,maoris belong1 superstition erected round the persons of sacred chiefs a real1 though at the same time purely imaginary barrier1 to transgress which actually entailed the death of the transgressor whenever he became aware of what he had done4 ,this fatal power of the imagination working through superstitious terrors is by no means confined to one race2 it appears to be common among savages4 ,for example1 among the aborigines of ,australia a native will die after the infliction of even the most superficial wound1 if only he believes that the weapon which inflicted the wound had been sung over and thus endowed with magical virtue4 ,he simply lies down1 refuses food1 and pines away4 ,similarly among some of the ,indian tribes of ,brazil1 if the medicine-man predicted the death of any one who had offended him1 the wretch took to his hammock instantly in such full expectation of dying1 that he would neither eat nor drink1 and the prediction was a sentence which faith effectually executed4 #b4 ,mourners tabooed ,,thus regarding his sacred chiefs and kings as charged with a mysterious spiritual force which so to say explodes at contact1 the savage naturally ranks them among the dangerous classes of society1 and imposes upon them the same sort of restraints that he lays on manslayers1 menstruous women1 and other persons whom he looks upon with a certain fear and horror4 ,for example1 sacred kings and priests in ,polynesia were not allowed to touch food with their hands1 and had therefore to be fed by others2 and as we have just seen1 their vessels1 garments1 and other property might not be used by others on pain of disease and death4 ,now precisely the same observances are exacted by some savages from girls at their first menstruation1 women after childbirth1 homicides1 mourners1 and all persons who have come into contact with the dead4 ,thus1 for example1 to begin with the last class of persons1 among the ,maoris any one who had handled a corpse1 helped to convey it to the grave1 or touched a dead man's bones1 was cut off from all intercourse and almost all communication with mankind4 ,he could not enter any house1 or come into contact with any person or thing1 without utterly bedevilling them4 ,he might not even touch food with his hands1 which had become so frightfully tabooed or unclean as to be quite useless4 ,food would be set for him on the ground1 and he would then sit or kneel down1 and1 with his hands carefully held behind his back1 would gnaw at it as best he could4 ,in some cases he would be fed by another person1 who with outstretched arm contrived to do it without touching the tabooed man2 but the feeder was himself subjected to many severe restrictions1 little less onerous than those which were imposed upon the other4 ,in almost every populous village there lived a degraded wretch1 the lowest of the low1 who earned a sorry pittance by thus waiting upon the defiled4 ,clad in rags1 daubed from head to foot with red ochre and stinking shark oil1 always solitary and silent1 generally old1 haggard1 and wizened1 often half crazed1 he might be seen sitting motionless all day apart from the common path or thoroughfare of the village1 gazing with lack-lustre eyes on the busy doings in which he might never take a part4 ,twice a day a dole of food would be thrown on the ground before him to munch as well as he could without the use of his hands2 and at night1 huddling his greasy tatters about him1 he would crawl into some miserable lair of leaves and refuse1 where1 dirty1 cold1 and hungry1 he passed1 in broken ghost-haunted slumbers1 a wretched night as a prelude to another wretched day4 ,such was the only human being deemed fit to associate at arm's length with one who had paid the last offices of respect and friendship to the dead4 ,and when1 the dismal term of his seclusion being over1 the mourner was about to mix with his fellows once more1 all the dishes he had used in his seclusion were diligently smashed1 and all the garments he had worn were carefully thrown away1 lest they should spread the contagion of his defilement among others1 just as the vessels and clothes of sacred kings and chiefs are destroyed or cast away for a similar reason4 ,so complete in these respects is the analogy which the savage traces between the spiritual influences that emanate from divinities and from the dead1 between the odour of sanctity and the stench of corruption4 ,the rule which forbids persons who have been in contact with the dead to touch food with their hands would seem to have been universal in ,polynesia4 ,thus in ,samoa those who attended the deceased were most careful not to handle food1 and for days were fed by others as if they were helpless infants4 ,baldness and the loss of teeth were supposed to be the punishment inflicted by the household god if they violated the rule4 ,again1 in ,tonga1 no person can touch a dead chief without being taboo'd for ten lunar months1 except chiefs1 who are only taboo'd for three1 four1 or five months1 according to the superiority of the dead chief2 except again it be the body of ,tooitonga the great divine chief1 and then even the greatest chief would be taboo'd ten months4 4 4 4 ,during the time a man is taboo'd he must not feed himself with his own hands1 but must be fed by somebody else3 he must not even use a toothpick himself1 but must guide another person's hand holding the toothpick4 ,if he is hungry and there is no one to feed him1 he must go down upon his hands and knees1 and pick up his victuals with his mouth3 and if he infringes upon any of these rules1 it is firmly expected that he will swell up and die4 ,among the ,shuswap of ,british ,columbia widows and widowers in mourning are secluded and forbidden to touch their own head or body2 the cups and cooking-vessels which they use may be used by no one else4 ,they must build a sweat-house beside a creek1 sweat there all night and bathe regularly1 after which they must rub their bodies with branches of spruce4 ,the branches may not be used more than once1 and when they have served their purpose they are stuck into the ground all round the hut4 ,no hunter would come near such mourners1 for their presence is unlucky4 ,if their shadow were to fall on any one1 he would be taken ill at once4 ,they employ thorn bushes for bed and pillow1 in order to keep away the ghost of the deceased2 and thorn bushes are also laid all around their beds4 ,this last precaution shows clearly what the spiritual danger is which leads to the exclusion of such persons from ordinary society2 it is simply a fear of the ghost who is supposed to be hovering near them4 ,in the ,mekeo district of ,british ,new ,guinea a widower loses all his civil rights and becomes a social outcast1 an object of fear and horror1 shunned by all4 ,he may not cultivate a garden1 nor show himself in public1 nor traverse the village1 nor walk on the roads and paths4 ,like a wild beast he must skulk in the long grass and the bushes2 and if he sees or hears any one coming1 especially a woman1 he must hide behind a tree or a thicket4 ,if he wishes to fish or hunt1 he must do it alone and at night4 ,if he would consult any one1 even the missionary1 he does so by stealth and at night2 he seems to have lost his voice and speaks only in whispers4 ,were he to join a party of fishers or hunters1 his presence would bring misfortune on them2 the ghost of his dead wife would frighten away the fish or the game4 ,he goes about everywhere and at all times armed with a tomahawk to defend himself1 not only against wild boars in the jungle1 but against the dreaded spirit of his departed spouse1 who would do him an ill turn if she could2 for all the souls of the dead are malignant and their only delight is to harm the living4 #c4 ,women tabooed at ,menstruation and ,childbirth ,,in ,,general1 we may say that the prohibition to use the vessels1 garments1 and so forth of certain persons1 and the effects supposed to follow an infraction of the rule1 are exactly the same whether the persons to whom the things belong are sacred or what we might call unclean and polluted4 ,as the garments which have been touched by a sacred chief kill those who handle them1 so do the things which have been touched by a menstruous women4 ,an ,australian blackfellow1 who discovered that his wife had lain on his blanket at her menstrual period1 killed her and died of terror himself within a fortnight4 ,hence ,australian women at these times are forbidden under pain of death to touch anything that men use1 or even to walk on a path that any man frequents4 ,they are also secluded at childbirth1 and all vessels used by them during their seclusion are burned4 ,in ,uganda the pots which a woman touches1 while the impurity of childbirth or of menstruation is on her1 should be destroyed2 spears and shields defiled by her touch are not destroyed1 but only purified4 ,among all the ,dn and most other ,american tribes1 hardly any other being was the object of so much dread as a menstruating woman4 ,as soon as signs of that condition made themselves apparent in a young girl she was carefully segregated from all but female company1 and had to live by herself in a small hut away from the gaze of the villagers or of the male members of the roving band4 ,while in that awful state1 she had to abstain from touching anything belonging to man1 or the spoils of any venison or other animal1 lest she would thereby pollute the same1 and condemn the hunters to failure1 owing to the anger of the game thus slighted4 ,dried fish formed her diet1 and cold water1 absorbed through a drinking tube1 was her only beverage4 ,moreover1 as the very sight of her was dangerous to society1 a special skin bonnet1 with fringes falling over her face down to her breast1 hid her from the public gaze1 even some time after she had recovered her normal state4 ,among the ,bribri ,indians of ,costa ,rica a menstruous woman is regarded as unclean4 ,the only plates she may use for her food are banana leaves1 which1 when she has done with them1 she throws away in some sequestered spot2 for were a cow to find them and eat them1 the animal would waste away and perish4 ,and she drinks out of a special vessel for a like reason2 because if any one drank out of the same cup after her1 he would surely die4 ,among many peoples similar restrictions are imposed on women in childbed and apparently for similar reasons2 at such periods women are supposed to be in a dangerous condition which would infect any person or thing they might touch2 hence they are put into quarantine until1 with the recovery of their health and strength1 the imaginary danger has passed away4 ,thus1 in ,tahiti a woman after childbirth was secluded for a fortnight or three weeks in a temporary hut erected on sacred ground2 during the time of her seclusion she was debarred from touching provisions1 and had to be fed by another4 ,further1 if any one else touched the child at this period1 he was subjected to the same restrictions as the mother until the ceremony of her purification had been performed4 ,similarly in the island of ,kadiak1 off ,alaska1 a woman about to be delivered retires to a miserable low hovel built of reeds1 where she must remain for twenty days after the birth of her child1 whatever the season may be1 and she is considered so unclean that no one will touch her1 and food is reached to her on sticks4 ,the ,bribri ,indians regard the pollution of childbed as much more dangerous even than that of menstruation4 ,when a woman feels her time approaching1 she informs her husband1 who makes haste to build a hut for her in a lonely spot4 ,there she must live alone1 holding no converse with anybody save her mother or another woman4 ,after her delivery the medicine-man purifies her by breathing on her and laying an animal1 it matters not what1 upon her4 ,but even this ceremony only mitigates her uncleanness into a state considered to be equivalent to that of a menstruous woman2 and for a full lunar month she must live apart from her housemates1 observing the same rules with regard to eating and drinking as at her monthly periods4 ,the case is still worse1 the pollution is still more deadly1 if she has had a miscarriage or has been delivered of a stillborn child4 ,in that case she may not go near a living soul3 the mere contact with things she has used is exceedingly dangerous3 her food is handed to her at the end of a long stick4 ,this lasts generally for three weeks1 after which she may go home1 subject only to the restrictions incident to an ordinary confinement4 ,some ,bantu tribes entertain even more exaggerated notions of the virulent infection spread by a woman who has had a miscarriage and has concealed it4 ,an experienced observer of these people tells us that the blood of childbirth appears to the eyes of the ,south ,africans to be tainted with a pollution still more dangerous than that of the menstrual fluid4 ,the husband is excluded from the hut for eight days of the lying-in period1 chiefly from fear that he might be contaminated by this secretion4 ,he dare not take his child in his arms for the three first months after the birth4 ,but the secretion of childbed is particularly terrible when it is the product of a miscarriage1 especially a concealed miscarriage4 ,in this case it is not merely the man who is threatened or killed1 it is the whole country1 it is the sky itself which suffers4 ,by a curious association of ideas a physiological fact causes cosmic troubles6 ,as for the disastrous effect which a miscarriage may have on the whole country ,i will quote the words of a medicine-man and rain-maker of the ,ba-,pedi tribe3 ,when a woman has had a miscarriage1 when she has allowed her blood to flow1 and has hidden the child1 it is enough to cause the burning winds to blow and to parch the country with heat4 ,the rain no longer falls1 for the country is no longer in order4 ,when the rain approaches the place where the blood is1 it will not dare to approach4 ,it will fear and remain at a distance4 ,that woman has committed a great fault4 ,she has spoiled the country of the chief1 for she has hidden blood which had not yet been well congealed to fashion a man4 ,that blood is taboo4 ,it should never drip on the road6 ,the chief will assemble his men and say to them1 ',are you in order in your villages8' ,some one will answer1 ',such and such a woman was pregnant and we have not yet seen the child which she has given birth to4' ,then they go and arrest the woman4 ,they say to her1 ',show us where you have hidden it4' ,they go and dig at the spot1 they sprinkle the hole with a decoction of two sorts of roots prepared in a special pot4 ,they take a little of the earth of this grave1 they throw it into the river1 then they bring back water from the river and sprinkle it where she shed her blood4 ,she herself must wash every day with the medicine4 ,then the country will be moistened again 7by rain74 ,further1 we 7medicine-men71 summon the women of the country2 we tell them to prepare a ball of the earth which contains the blood4 ,they bring it to us one morning4 ,if we wish to prepare medicine with which to sprinkle the whole country1 we crumble this earth to powder2 at the end of five days we send little boys and little girls1 girls that yet know nothing of women's affairs and have not yet had relations with men4 ,we put the medicine in the horns of oxen1 and these children go to all the fords1 to all the entrances of the country4 ,a little girl turns up the soil with her mattock1 the others dip a branch in the horn and sprinkle the inside of the hole saying1 ',rain6 rain6' ,so we remove the misfortune which the women have brought on the roads2 the rain will be able to come4 ,the country is purified6 #d4 ,warriors tabooed ,,once more1 warriors are conceived by the savage to move1 so to say1 in an atmosphere of spiritual danger which constrains them to practise a variety of superstitious observances quite different in their nature from those rational precautions which1 as a matter of course1 they adopt against foes of flesh and blood4 ,the general effect of these observances is to place the warrior1 both before and after victory1 in the same state of seclusion or spiritual quarantine in which1 for his own safety1 primitive man puts his human gods and other dangerous characters4 ,thus when the ,maoris went out on the war-path they were sacred or taboo in the highest degree1 and they and their friends at home had to observe strictly many curious customs over and above the numerous taboos of ordinary life4 ,they became1 in the irreverent language of ,europeans who knew them in the old fighting days1 tabooed an inch thick2 and as for the leader of the expedition1 he was quite unapproachable4 ,similarly1 when the ,israelites marched forth to war they were bound by certain rules of ceremonial purity identical with rules observed by ,maoris and ,australian blackfellows on the war-path4 ,the vessels they used were sacred1 and they had to practise continence and a custom of personal cleanliness of which the original motive1 if we may judge from the avowed motive of savages who conform to the same custom1 was a fear lest the enemy should obtain the refuse of their persons1 and thus be enabled to work their destruction by magic4 ,among some ,indian tribes of ,north ,america a young warrior in his first campaign had to conform to certain customs1 of which two were identical with the observances imposed by the same ,indians on girls at their first menstruation3 the vessels he ate and drank out of might be touched by no other person1 and he was forbidden to scratch his head or any other part of his body with his fingers2 if he could not help scratching himself1 he had to do it with a stick4 ,the latter rule1 like the one which forbids a tabooed person to feed himself with his own fingers1 seems to rest on the supposed sanctity or pollution1 whichever we choose to call it1 of the tabooed hands4 ,moreover among these ,indian tribes the men on the war-path had always to sleep at night with their faces turned towards their own country2 however uneasy the posture1 they might not change it4 ,they might not sit upon the bare ground1 nor wet their feet1 nor walk on a beaten path if they could help it2 when they had no choice but to walk on a path1 they sought to counteract the ill effect of doing so by doctoring their legs with certain medicines or charms which they carried with them for the purpose4 ,no member of the party was permitted to step over the legs1 hands1 or body of any other member who chanced to be sitting or lying on the ground2 and it was equally forbidden to step over his blanket1 gun1 tomahawk1 or anything that belonged to him4 ,if this rule was inadvertently broken1 it became the duty of the member whose person or property had been stepped over to knock the other member down1 and it was similarly the duty of that other to be knocked down peaceably and without resistance4 ,the vessels out of which the warriors ate their food were commonly small bowls of wood or birch bark1 with marks to distinguish the two sides2 in marching from home the ,indians invariably drank out of one side of the bowl1 and in returning they drank out of the other4 ,when on their way home they came within a day's march of the village1 they hung up all their bowls on trees1 or threw them away on the prairie1 doubtless to prevent their sanctity or defilement from being communicated with disastrous effects to their friends1 just as we have seen that the vessels and clothes of the sacred ,mikado1 of women at childbirth and menstruation1 and of persons defiled by contact with the dead are destroyed or laid aside for a similar reason4 ,the first four times that an ,apache ,indian goes out on the war-path1 he is bound to refrain from scratching his head with his fingers and from letting water touch his lips4 ,hence he scratches his head with a stick1 and drinks through a hollow reed or cane4 ,stick and reed are attached to the warrior's belt and to each other by a leathern thong4 ,the rule not to scratch their heads with their fingers1 but to use a stick for the purpose instead1 was regularly observed by ,ojebways on the war-path4 ,with regard to the ,creek ,indians and kindred tribes we are told they will not cohabit with women while they are out at war2 they religiously abstain from every kind of intercourse even with their own wives1 for the space of three days and nights before they go to war1 and so after they return home1 because they are to sanctify themselves4 ,among the ,ba-,pedi and ,ba-,thonga tribes of ,south ,africa not only have the warriors to abstain from women1 but the people left behind in the villages are also bound to continence2 they think that any incontinence on their part would cause thorns to grow on the ground traversed by the warriors1 and that success would not attend the expedition4 ,why exactly many savages have made it a rule to refrain from women in time of war1 we cannot say for certain1 but we may conjecture that their motive was a superstitious fear lest1 on the principles of sympathetic magic1 close contact with women should infect them with feminine weakness and cowardice4 ,similarly some savages imagine that contact with a woman in childbed enervates warriors and enfeebles their weapons4 ,indeed the ,kayans of ,central ,borneo go so far as to hold that to touch a loom or women's clothes would so weaken a man that he would have no success in hunting1 fishing1 and war4 ,hence it is not merely sexual intercourse with women that the savage warrior sometimes shuns2 he is careful to avoid the sex altogether4 ,thus among the hill tribes of ,assam1 not only are men forbidden to cohabit with their wives during or after a raid1 but they may not eat food cooked by a woman2 nay1 they should not address a word even to their own wives4 ,once a woman1 who unwittingly broke the rule by speaking to her husband while he was under the war taboo1 sickened and died when she learned the awful crime she had committed4 #e4 ,manslayers tabooed ,,if ,,the ,,reader still doubts whether the rules of conduct which we have just been considering are based on superstitious fears or dictated by a rational prudence1 his doubts will probably be dissipated when he learns that rules of the same sort are often imposed even more stringently on warriors after the victory has been won and when all fear of the living corporeal foe is at an end4 ,in such cases one motive for the inconvenient restrictions laid on the victors in their hour of triumph is probably a dread of the angry ghosts of the slain2 and that the fear of the vengeful ghosts does influence the behaviour of the slayers is often expressly affirmed4 ,the general effect of the taboos laid on sacred chiefs1 mourners1 women at childbirth1 men on the war-path1 and so on1 is to seclude or isolate the tabooed persons from ordinary society1 this effect being attained by a variety of rules1 which oblige the men or women to live in separate huts or in the open air1 to shun the commerce of the sexes1 to avoid the use of vessels employed by others1 and so forth4 ,now the same effect is produced by similar means in the case of victorious warriors1 particularly such as have actually shed the blood of their enemies4 ,in the island of ,timor1 when a warlike expedition has returned in triumph bringing the heads of the vanquished foe1 the leader of the expedition is forbidden by religion and custom to return at once to his own house4 ,a special hut is prepared for him1 in which he has to reside for two months1 undergoing bodily and spiritual purification4 ,during this time he may not go to his wife nor feed himself2 the food must be put into his mouth by another person4 ,that these observances are dictated by fear of the ghosts of the slain seems certain2 for from another account of the ceremonies performed on the return of a successful head-hunter in the same island we learn that sacrifices are offered on this occasion to appease the soul of the man whose head has been taken2 the people think that some misfortune would befall the victor were such offerings omitted4 ,moreover1 a part of the ceremony consists of a dance accompanied by a song1 in which the death of the slain man is lamented and his forgiveness is entreated4 ,be not angry1 they say1 because your head is here with us2 had we been less lucky1 our heads might now have been exposed in your village4 ,we have offered the sacrifice to appease you4 ,your spirit may now rest and leave us at peace4 ,why were you our enemy8 ,would it not have been better that we should remain friends8 ,then your blood would not have been spilt and your head would not have been cut off4 ,the people of ,paloo in ,central ,celebes take the heads of their enemies in war and afterwards propitiate the souls of the slain in the temple4 ,among the tribes at the mouth of the ,wanigela ,river1 in ,new ,guinea1 a man who has taken life is considered to be impure until he has undergone certain ceremonies3 as soon as possible after the deed he cleanses himself and his weapon4 ,this satisfactorily accomplished1 he repairs to his village and seats himself on the logs of sacrificial staging4 ,no one approaches him or takes any notice whatever of him4 ,a house is prepared for him which is put in charge of two or three small boys as servants4 ,he may eat only toasted bananas1 and only the centre portion of them--the ends being thrown away4 ,on the third day of his seclusion a small feast is prepared by his friends1 who also fashion some new perineal bands for him4 ,this is called ivi poro4 ,the next day the man dons all his best ornaments and badges for taking life1 and sallies forth fully armed and parades the village4 ,the next day a hunt is organised1 and a kangaroo selected from the game captured4 ,it is cut open and the spleen and liver rubbed over the back of the man4 ,he then walks solemnly down to the nearest water1 and standing straddle-legs in it washes himself4 ,all the young untried warriors swim between his legs4 ,this is supposed to impart courage and strength to them4 ,the following day1 at early dawn1 he dashes out of his house1 fully armed1 and calls aloud the name of his victim4 ,having satisfied himself that he has thoroughly scared the ghost of the dead man1 he returns to his house4 ,the beating of flooring-boards and the lighting of fires is also a certain method of scaring the ghost4 ,a day later his purification is finished4 ,he can then enter his wife's house4 ,in ,windessi1 ,dutch ,new ,guinea1 when a party of head-hunters has been successful1 and they are nearing home1 they announce their approach and success by blowing on triton shells4 ,their canoes are also decked with branches4 ,the faces of the men who have taken a head are blackened with charcoal4 ,if several have taken part in killing the same victim1 his head is divided among them4 ,they always time their arrival so as to reach home in the early morning4 ,they come rowing to the village with a great noise1 and the women stand ready to dance in the verandahs of the houses4 ,the canoes row past the room sram or house where the young men live2 and as they pass1 the murderers throw as many pointed sticks or bamboos at the wall or the roof as there were enemies killed4 ,the day is spent very quietly4 ,now and then they drum or blow on the conch2 at other times they beat the walls of the houses with loud shouts to drive away the ghosts of the slain4 ,so the ,yabim of ,new ,guinea believe that the spirit of a murdered man pursues his murderer and seeks to do him a mischief4 ,hence they drive away the spirit with shouts and the beating of drums4 ,when the ,fijians had buried a man alive1 as they often did1 they used at nightfall to make a great uproar by means of bamboos1 trumpet-shells1 and so forth1 for the purpose of frightening away his ghost1 lest he should attempt to return to his old home4 ,and to render his house unattractive to him they dismantled it and clothed it with everything that to their ideas seemed most repulsive4 ,on the evening of the day on which they had tortured a prisoner to death1 the ,american ,indians were wont to run through the village with hideous yells1 beating with sticks on the furniture1 the walls1 and the roofs of the huts to prevent the angry ghost of their victim from settling there and taking vengeance for the torments that his body had endured at their hands4 ,once1 says a traveller1 on approaching in the night a village of ,ottawas1 ,i found all the inhabitants in confusion3 they were all busily engaged in raising noises of the loudest and most inharmonious kind4 ,upon inquiry1 ,i found that a battle had been lately fought between the ,ottawas and the ,kickapoos1 and that the object of all this noise was to prevent the ghosts of the departed combatants from entering the village4 ,among the ,basutos ablution is specially performed on return from battle4 ,it is absolutely necessary that the warriors should rid themselves1 as soon as possible1 of the blood they have shed1 or the shades of their victims would pursue them incessantly1 and disturb their slumbers4 ,they go in a procession1 and in full armour1 to the nearest stream4 ,at the moment they enter the water a diviner1 placed higher up1 throws some purifying substances into the current4 ,this is1 however1 not strictly necessary4 ,the javelins and battle-axes also undergo the process of washing4 ,among the ,bageshu of ,east ,africa a man who has killed another may not return to his own house on the same day1 though he may enter the village and spend the night in a friend's house4 ,he kills a sheep and smears his chest1 his right arm1 and his head with the contents of the animal's stomach4 ,his children are brought to him and he smears them in like manner4 ,then he smears each side of the doorway with the tripe and entrails1 and finally throws the rest of the stomach on the roof of his house4 ,for a whole day he may not touch food with his hands1 but picks it up with two sticks and so conveys it to his mouth4 ,his wife is not under any such restrictions4 ,she may even go to mourn for the man whom her husband has killed1 if she wishes to do so4 ,among the ,angoni1 to the north of the ,zambesi1 warriors who have slain foes on an expedition smear their bodies and faces with ashes1 hang garments of their victims on their persons1 and tie bark ropes round their necks1 so that the ends hang down over their shoulders or breasts4 ,this costume they wear for three days after their return1 and rising at break of day they run through the village uttering frightful yells to drive away the ghosts of the slain1 which1 if they were not thus banished from the houses1 might bring sickness and misfortune on the inmates4 ,in some of these accounts nothing is said of an enforced seclusion1 at least after the ceremonial cleansing1 but some ,south ,african tribes certainly require the slayer of a very gallant foe in war to keep apart from his wife and family for ten days after he has washed his body in running water4 ,he also receives from the tribal doctor a medicine which he chews with his food4 ,when a ,nandi of ,east ,africa has killed a member of another tribe1 he paints one side of his body1 spear1 and sword red1 and the other side white4 ,for four days after the slaughter he is considered unclean and may not go home4 ,he has to build a small shelter by a river and live there2 he may not associate with his wife or sweetheart1 and he may eat nothing but porridge1 beef1 and goat's flesh4 ,at the end of the fourth day he must purify himself by taking a strong purge made from the bark of the segetet tree and by drinking goat's milk mixed with blood4 ,among the ,bantu tribes of ,kavirondo1 when a man has killed an enemy in warfare he shaves his head on his return home1 and his friends rub a medicine1 which generally consists of goat's dung1 over his body to prevent the spirit of the slain man from troubling him4 ,exactly the same custom is practised for the same reason by the ,wageia of ,east ,africa4 ,with the ,ja-,luo of ,kavirondo the custom is somewhat different4 ,three days after his return from the fight the warrior shaves his head4 ,but before he may enter his village he has to hang a live fowl1 head uppermost1 round his neck2 then the bird is decapitated and its head left hanging round his neck4 ,soon after his return a feast is made for the slain man1 in order that his ghost may not haunt his slayer4 ,in the ,pelew ,islands1 when the men return from a warlike expedition in which they have taken a life1 the young warriors who have been out fighting for the first time1 and all who handled the slain1 are shut up in the large council-house and become tabooed4 ,they may not quit the edifice1 nor bathe1 nor touch a woman1 nor eat fish2 their food is limited to coco-nuts and syrup4 ,they rub themselves with charmed leaves and chew charmed betel4 ,after three days they go together to bathe as near as possible to the spot where the man was killed4 ,among the ,natchez ,indians of ,north ,america young braves who had taken their first scalps were obliged to observe certain rules of abstinence for six months4 ,they might not sleep with their wives nor eat flesh2 their only food was fish and hasty-pudding4 ,if they broke these rules1 they believed that the soul of the man they had killed would work their death by magic1 that they would gain no more successes over the enemy1 and that the least wound inflicted on them would prove mortal4 ,when a ,choctaw had killed an enemy and taken his scalp1 he went into mourning for a month1 during which he might not comb his hair1 and if his head itched he might not scratch it except with a little stick which he wore fastened to his wrist for the purpose4 ,this ceremonial mourning for the enemies they had slain was not uncommon among the ,north ,american ,indians4 ,thus we see that warriors who have taken the life of a foe in battle are temporarily cut off from free intercourse with their fellows1 and especially with their wives1 and must undergo certain rites of purification before they are readmitted to society4 ,now if the purpose of their seclusion and of the expiatory rites which they have to perform is1 as we have been led to believe1 no other than to shake off1 frighten1 or appease the angry spirit of the slain man1 we may safely conjecture that the similar purification of homicides and murderers1 who have imbrued their hands in the blood of a fellow-tribesman1 had at first the same significance1 and that the idea of a moral or spiritual regeneration symbolised by the washing1 the fasting1 and so on1 was merely a later interpretation put upon the old custom by men who had outgrown the primitive modes of thought in which the custom originated4 ,the conjecture will be confirmed if we can show that savages have actually imposed certain restrictions on the murderer of a fellow-tribesman from a definite fear that he is haunted by the ghost of his victim4 ,this we can do with regard to the ,omahas of ,north ,america4 ,among these ,indians the kinsmen of a murdered man had the right to put the murderer to death1 but sometimes they waived their right in consideration of presents which they consented to accept4 ,when the life of the murderer was spared1 he had to observe certain stringent rules for a period which varied from two to four years4 ,he must walk barefoot1 and he might eat no warm food1 nor raise his voice1 nor look around4 ,he was compelled to pull his robe about him and to have it tied at the neck even in hot weather2 he might not let it hang loose or fly open4 ,he might not move his hands about1 but had to keep them close to his body4 ,he might not comb his hair1 and it might not be blown about by the wind4 ,when the tribe went out hunting1 he was obliged to pitch his tent about a quarter of mile from the rest of the people lest the ghost of his victim should raise a high wind1 which might cause damage4 ,only one of his kindred was allowed to remain with him at his tent4 ,no one wished to eat with him1 for they said1 ,if we eat with him whom ,wakanda hates1 ,wakanda will hate us4 ,sometimes he wandered at night crying and lamenting his offence4 ,at the end of his long isolation the kinsmen of the murdered man heard his crying and said1 ,it is enough4 ,begone1 and walk among the crowd4 ,put on moccasins and wear a good robe4 ,here the reason alleged for keeping the murderer at a considerable distance from the hunters gives the clue to all the other restrictions laid on him3 he was haunted and therefore dangerous4 ,the ancient ,greeks believed that the soul of a man who had just been killed was wroth with his slayer and troubled him2 wherefore it was needful even for the involuntary homicide to depart from his country for a year until the anger of the dead man had cooled down2 nor might the slayer return until sacrifice had been offered and ceremonies of purification performed4 ,if his victim chanced to be a foreigner1 the homicide had to shun the native country of the dead man as well as his own4 ,the legend of the matricide ,orestes1 how he roamed from place to place pursued by the ,furies of his murdered mother1 and none would sit at meat with him1 or take him in1 till he had been purified1 reflects faithfully the real ,greek dread of such as were still haunted by an angry ghost4 #f4 ,hunters and ,fishers tabooed ,,in ,,savage society the hunter and the fisherman have often to observe rules of abstinence and to submit to ceremonies of purification of the same sort as those which are obligatory on the warrior and the manslayer2 and though we cannot in all cases perceive the exact purpose which these rules and ceremonies are supposed to serve1 we may with some probability assume that1 just as the dread of the spirits of his enemies is the main motive for the seclusion and purification of the warrior who hopes to take or has already taken their lives1 so the huntsman or fisherman who complies with similar customs is principally actuated by a fear of the spirits of the beasts1 birds1 or fish which he has killed or intends to kill4 ,for the savage commonly conceives animals to be endowed with souls and intelligences like his own1 and hence he naturally treats them with similar respect4 ,just as he attempts to appease the ghosts of the men he has slain1 so he essays to propitiate the spirits of the animals he has killed4 ,these ceremonies of propitiation will be described later on in this work2 here we have to deal1 first1 with the taboos observed by the hunter and the fisherman before or during the hunting and fishing seasons1 and1 second1 with the ceremonies of purification which have to be practised by these men on returning with their booty from a successful chase4 ,while the savage respects1 more or less1 the souls of all animals1 he treats with particular deference the spirits of such as are either especially useful to him or formidable on account of their size1 strength1 or ferocity4 ,accordingly the hunting and killing of these valuable or dangerous beasts are subject to more elaborate rules and ceremonies than the slaughter of comparatively useless and insignificant creatures4 ,thus the ,indians of ,nootka ,sound prepared themselves for catching whales by observing a fast for a week1 during which they ate very little1 bathed in the water several times a day1 sang1 and rubbed their bodies1 limbs1 and faces with shells and bushes till they looked as if they had been severely torn with briars4 ,they were likewise required to abstain from any commerce with their women for the like period1 this last condition being considered indispensable to their success4 ,a chief who failed to catch a whale has been known to attribute his failure to a breach of chastity on the part of his men4 ,it should be remarked that the conduct thus prescribed as a preparation for whaling is precisely that which in the same tribe of ,indians was required of men about to go on the war-path4 ,rules of the same sort are1 or were formerly1 observed by ,malagasy whalers4 ,for eight days before they went to sea the crew of a whaler used to fast1 abstaining from women and liquor1 and confessing their most secret faults to each other2 and if any man was found to have sinned deeply1 he was forbidden to share in the expedition4 ,in the island of ,mabuiag continence was imposed on the people both before they went to hunt the dugong and while the turtles were pairing4 ,the turtle-season lasts during parts of ,october and ,november2 and if at that time unmarried persons had sexual intercourse with each other1 it was believed that when the canoe approached the floating turtle1 the male would separate from the female and both would dive down in different directions4 ,so at ,mowat in ,new ,guinea men have no relation with women when the turtles are coupling1 though there is considerable laxity of morals at other times4 ,in the island of ,uap1 one of the ,caroline group1 every fisherman plying his craft lies under a most strict taboo during the whole of the fishing season1 which lasts for six or eight weeks4 ,whenever he is on shore he must spend all his time in the men's clubhouse1 and under no pretext whatever may he visit his own house or so much as look upon the faces of his wife and womenkind4 ,were he but to steal a glance at them1 they think that flying fish must inevitably bore out his eyes at night4 ,if his wife1 mother1 or daughter brings any gift for him or wishes to talk with him1 she must stand down towards the shore with her back turned to the men's clubhouse4 ,then the fisherman may go out and speak to her1 or with his back turned to her he may receive what she has brought him2 after which he must return at once to his rigorous confinement4 ,indeed the fishermen may not even join in dance and song with the other men of the clubhouse in the evening2 they must keep to themselves and be silent4 ,in ,mirzapur1 when the seed of the silkworm is brought into the house1 the ,kol or ,bhuiyar puts it in a place which has been carefully plastered with holy cowdung to bring good luck4 ,from that time the owner must be careful to avoid ceremonial impurity4 ,he must give up cohabitation with his wife2 he may not sleep on a bed1 nor shave himself1 nor cut his nails1 nor anoint himself with oil1 nor eat food cooked with butter1 nor tell lies1 nor do anything else that he deems wrong4 ,he vows to ,singarmati ,devi that1 if the worms are duly born1 he will make her an offering4 ,when the cocoons open and the worms appear1 he assembles the women of the house and they sing the same song as at the birth of a baby1 and red lead is smeared on the parting of the hair of all the married women of the neighbourhood4 ,when the worms pair1 rejoicings are made as at a marriage4 ,thus the silkworms are treated as far as possible like human beings4 ,hence the custom which prohibits the commerce of the sexes while the worms are hatching may be only an extension1 by analogy1 of the rule which is observed by many races1 that the husband may not cohabit with his wife during pregnancy and lactation4 ,in the island of ,nias the hunters sometimes dig pits1 cover them lightly over with twigs1 grass1 and leaves1 and then drive the game into them4 ,while they are engaged in digging the pits1 they have to observe a number of taboos4 ,they may not spit1 or the game would turn back in disgust from the pits4 ,they may not laugh1 or the sides of the pit would fall in4 ,they may eat no salt1 prepare no fodder for swine1 and in the pit they may not scratch themselves1 for if they did1 the earth would be loosened and would collapse4 ,and the night after digging the pit they may have no intercourse with a woman1 or all their labour would be in vain4 ,this practice of observing strict chastity as a condition of success in hunting and fishing is very common among rude races2 and the instances of it which have been cited render it probable that the rule is always based on a superstition rather than on a consideration of the temporary weakness which a breach of the custom may entail on the hunter or fisherman4 ,in general it appears to be supposed that the evil effect of incontinence is not so much that it weakens him1 as that1 for some reason or other1 it offends the animals1 who in consequence will not suffer themselves to be caught4 ,a ,carrier ,indian of ,british ,columbia used to separate from his wife for a full month before he set traps for bears1 and during this time he might not drink from the same vessel as his wife1 but had to use a special cup made of birch bark4 ,the neglect of these precautions would cause the game to escape after it had been snared4 ,but when he was about to snare martens1 the period of continence was cut down to ten days4 ,an examination of all the many cases in which the savage bridles his passions and remains chaste from motives of superstition1 would be instructive1 but ,i cannot attempt it now4 ,i will only add a few miscellaneous examples of the custom before passing to the ceremonies of purification which are observed by the hunter and fisherman after the chase and the fishing are over4 ,the workers in the salt-pans near ,siphoum1 in ,laos1 must abstain from all sexual relations at the place where they are at work2 and they may not cover their heads nor shelter themselves under an umbrella from the burning rays of the sun4 ,among the ,kachins of ,burma the ferment used in making beer is prepared by two women1 chosen by lot1 who during the three days that the process lasts may eat nothing acid and may have no conjugal relations with their husbands2 otherwise it is supposed that the beer would be sour4 ,among the ,masai honey-wine is brewed by a man and a woman who live in a hut set apart for them till the wine is ready for drinking4 ,but they are strictly forbidden to have sexual intercourse with each other during this time2 it is deemed essential that they should be chaste for two days before they begin to brew and for the whole of the six days that the brewing lasts4 ,the ,masai believe that were the couple to commit a breach of chastity1 not only would the wine be undrinkable but the bees which made the honey would fly away4 ,similarly they require that a man who is making poison should sleep alone and observe other taboos which render him almost an outcast4 ,the ,wandorobbo1 a tribe of the same region as the ,masai1 believe that the mere presence of a woman in the neighbourhood of a man who is brewing poison would deprive the poison of its venom1 and that the same thing would happen if the wife of the poison-maker were to commit adultery while her husband was brewing the poison4 ,in this last case it is obvious that a rationalistic explanation of the taboo is impossible4 ,how could the loss of virtue in the poison be a physical consequence of the loss of virtue in the poison-maker's wife8 ,clearly the effect which the wife's adultery is supposed to have on the poison is a case of sympathetic magic2 her misconduct sympathetically affects her husband and his work at a distance4 ,we may1 accordingly1 infer with some confidence that the rule of continence imposed on the poison-maker himself is also a simple case of sympathetic magic1 and not1 as a civilised reader might be disposed to conjecture1 a wise precaution designed to prevent him from accidentally poisoning his wife4 ,among the ,ba-,pedi and ,ba-,thonga tribes of ,south ,africa1 when the site of a new village has been chosen and the houses are building1 all the married people are forbidden to have conjugal relations with each other4 ,if it were discovered that any couple had broken this rule1 the work of building would immediately be stopped1 and another site chosen for the village4 ,for they think that a breach of chastity would spoil the village which was growing up1 that the chief would grow lean and perhaps die1 and that the guilty woman would never bear another child4 ,among the ,chams of ,cochin-,china1 when a dam is made or repaired on a river for the sake of irrigation1 the chief who offers the traditional sacrifices and implores the protection of the deities on the work has to stay all the time in a wretched hovel of straw1 taking no part in the labour1 and observing the strictest continence2 for the people believe that a breach of his chastity would entail a breach of the dam4 ,here1 it is plain1 there can be no idea of maintaining the mere bodily vigour of the chief for the accomplishment of a task in which he does not even bear a hand4 ,if the taboos or abstinences observed by hunters and fishermen before and during the chase are dictated1 as we have seen reason to believe1 by superstitious motives1 and chiefly by a dread of offending or frightening the spirits of the creatures whom it is proposed to kill1 we may expect that the restraints imposed after the slaughter has been perpetrated will be at least as stringent1 the slayer and his friends having now the added fear of the angry ghosts of his victims before their eyes4 ,whereas on the hypothesis that the abstinences in question1 including those from food1 drink1 and sleep1 are merely salutary precautions for maintaining the men in health and strength to do their work1 it is obvious that the observance of these abstinences or taboos after the work is done1 that is1 when the game is killed and the fish caught1 must be wholly superfluous1 absurd1 and inexplicable4 ,but as ,i shall now show1 these taboos often continue to be enforced or even increased in stringency after the death of the animals1 in other words1 after the hunter or fisher has accomplished his object by making his bag or landing his fish4 ,the rationalistic theory of them therefore breaks down entirely2 the hypothesis of superstition is clearly the only one open to us4 ,among the ,inuit or ,esquimaux of ,bering ,strait the dead bodies of various animals must be treated very carefully by the hunter who obtains them1 so that their shades may not be offended and bring bad luck or even death upon him or his people4 ,hence the ,unalit hunter who has had a hand in the killing of a white whale1 or even has helped to take one from the net1 is not allowed to do any work for the next four days1 that being the time during which the shade or ghost of the whale is supposed to stay with its body4 ,at the same time no one in the village may use any sharp or pointed instrument for fear of wounding the whale's shade1 which is believed to be hovering invisible in the neighbourhood2 and no loud noise may be made lest it should frighten or offend the ghost4 ,whoever cuts a whale's body with an iron axe will die4 ,indeed the use of all iron instruments is forbidden in the village during these four days4 ,these same ,esquimaux celebrate a great annual festival in ,december when the bladders of all the seals1 whales1 walrus1 and white bears that have been killed in the year are taken into the assembly-house of the village4 ,they remain there for several days1 and so long as they do so the hunters avoid all intercourse with women1 saying that if they failed in that respect the shades of the dead animals would be offended4 ,similarly among the ,aleuts of ,alaska the hunter who had struck a whale with a charmed spear would not throw again1 but returned at once to his home and separated himself from his people in a hut specially constructed for the purpose1 where he stayed for three days without food or drink1 and without touching or looking upon a woman4 ,during this time of seclusion he snorted occasionally in imitation of the wounded and dying whale1 in order to prevent the whale which he had struck from leaving the coast4 ,on the fourth day he emerged from his seclusion and bathed in the sea1 shrieking in a hoarse voice and beating the water with his hands4 ,then1 taking with him a companion1 he repaired to that part of the shore where he expected to find the whale stranded4 ,if the beast was dead1 he at once cut out the place where the death-wound had been inflicted4 ,if the whale was not dead1 he again returned to his home and continued washing himself until the whale died4 ,here the hunter's imitation of the wounded whale is probably intended by means of homoeopathic magic to make the beast die in earnest4 ,once more the soul of the grim polar bear is offended if the taboos which concern him are not observed4 ,his soul tarries for three days near the spot where it left his body1 and during these days the ,esquimaux are particularly careful to conform rigidly to the laws of taboo1 because they believe that punishment overtakes the transgressor who sins against the soul of a bear far more speedily than him who sins against the souls of the sea-beasts4 ,when the ,kayans have shot one of the dreaded ,bornean panthers1 they are very anxious about the safety of their souls1 for they think that the soul of a panther is almost more powerful than their own4 ,hence they step eight times over the carcase of the dead beast reciting the spell1 ,panther1 thy soul under my soul4 ,on returning home they smear themselves1 their dogs1 and their weapons with the blood of fowls in order to calm their souls and hinder them from fleeing away2 for1 being themselves fond of the flesh of fowls1 they ascribe the same taste to their souls4 ,for eight days afterwards they must bathe by day and by night before going out again to the chase4 ,among the ,hottentots1 when a man has killed a lion1 leopard1 elephant1 or rhinoceros1 he is esteemed a great hero1 but he has to remain at home quite idle for three days1 during which his wife may not come near him2 she is also enjoined to restrict herself to a poor diet and to eat no more than is barely necessary to keep her in health4 ,similarly the ,lapps deem it the height of glory to kill a bear1 which they consider the king of beasts4 ,nevertheless1 all the men who take part in the slaughter are regarded as unclean1 and must live by themselves for three days in a hut or tent made specially for them1 where they cut up and cook the bear's carcase4 ,the reindeer which brought in the carcase on a sledge may not be driven by a woman for a whole year2 indeed1 according to one account1 it may not be used by anybody for that period4 ,before the men go into the tent where they are to be secluded1 they strip themselves of the garments they had worn in killing the bear1 and their wives spit the red juice of alder bark in their faces4 ,they enter the tent not by the ordinary door but by an opening at the back4 ,when the bear's flesh has been cooked1 a portion of it is sent by the hands of two men to the women1 who may not approach the men's tent while the cooking is going on4 ,the men who convey the flesh to the women pretend to be strangers bringing presents from a foreign land2 the women keep up the pretence and promise to tie red threads round the legs of the strangers4 ,the bear's flesh may not be passed in to the women through the door of their tent1 but must be thrust in at a special opening made by lifting up the hem of the tent-cover4 ,when the three days' seclusion is over and the men are at liberty to return to their wives1 they run1 one after the other1 round the fire1 holding the chain by which pots are suspended over it4 ,this is regarded as a form of purification2 they may now leave the tent by the ordinary door and rejoin the women4 ,but the leader of the party must still abstain from cohabitation with his wife for two days more4 ,again1 the ,caffres are said to dread greatly the boa-constrictor or an enormous serpent resembling it2 and being influenced by certain superstitious notions they even fear to kill it4 ,the man who happened to put it to death1 whether in self-defence or otherwise1 was formerly required to lie in a running stream of water during the day for several weeks together2 and no beast whatever was allowed to be slaughtered at the hamlet to which he belonged1 until this duty had been fully performed4 ,the body of the snake was then taken and carefully buried in a trench1 dug close to the cattle-fold1 where its remains1 like those of a chief1 were henceforward kept perfectly undisturbed4 ,the period of penance1 as in the case of mourning for the dead1 is now happily reduced to a few days4 ,in ,madras it is considered a great sin to kill a cobra4 ,when this has happened1 the people generally burn the body of the serpent1 just as they burn the bodies of human beings4 ,the murderer deems himself polluted for three days4 ,on the second day milk is poured on the remains of the cobra4 ,on the third day the guilty wretch is free from pollution4 ,in these last cases the animal whose slaughter has to be atoned for is sacred1 that is1 it is one whose life is commonly spared from motives of superstition4 ,yet the treatment of the sacrilegious slayer seems to resemble so closely the treatment of hunters and fishermen who have killed animals for food in the ordinary course of business1 that the ideas on which both sets of customs are based may be assumed to be substantially the same4 ,those ideas1 if ,i am right1 are the respect which the savage feels for the souls of beasts1 especially valuable or formidable beasts1 and the dread which he entertains of their vengeful ghosts4 ,some confirmation of this view may be drawn from the ceremonies observed by fishermen of ,annam when the carcase of a whale is washed ashore4 ,these fisherfolk1 we are told1 worship the whale on account of the benefits they derive from it4 ,there is hardly a village on the sea-shore which has not its small pagoda1 containing the bones1 more or less authentic1 of a whale4 ,when a dead whale is washed ashore1 the people accord it a solemn burial4 ,the man who first caught sight of it acts as chief mourner1 performing the rites which as chief mourner and heir he would perform for a human kinsman4 ,he puts on all the garb of woe1 the straw hat1 the white robe with long sleeves turned inside out1 and the other paraphernalia of full mourning4 ,as next of kin to the deceased he presides over the funeral rites4 ,perfumes are burned1 sticks of incense kindled1 leaves of gold and silver scattered1 crackers let off4 ,when the flesh has been cut off and the oil extracted1 the remains of the carcase are buried in the sand4 ,after wards a shed is set up and offerings are made in it4 ,usually some time after the burial the spirit of the dead whale takes possession of some person in the village and declares by his mouth whether he is a male or a female4 ,,xxi4 ,tabooed ,things #a4 ,the ,meaning of ,taboo ,,thus in primitive society the rules of ceremonial purity observed by divine kings1 chiefs1 and priests agree in many respects with the rules observed by homicides1 mourners1 women in childbed1 girls at puberty1 hunters and fishermen1 and so on4 ,to us these various classes of persons appear to differ totally in character and condition2 some of them we should call holy1 others we might pronounce unclean and polluted4 ,but the savage makes no such moral distinction between them2 the conceptions of holiness and pollution are not yet differentiated in his mind4 ,to him the common feature of all these persons is that they are dangerous and in danger1 and the danger in which they stand and to which they expose others is what we should call spiritual or ghostly1 and therefore imaginary4 ,the danger1 however1 is not less real because it is imaginary2 imagination acts upon man as really as does gravitation1 and may kill him as certainly as a dose of prussic acid4 ,to seclude these persons from the rest of the world so that the dreaded spiritual danger shall neither reach them nor spread from them1 is the object of the taboos which they have to observe4 ,these taboos act1 so to say1 as electrical insulators to preserve the spiritual force with which these persons are charged from suffering or inflicting harm by contact with the outer world4 ,to the illustrations of these general principles which have been already given ,i shall now add some more1 drawing my examples1 first1 from the class of tabooed things1 and1 second1 from the class of tabooed words2 for in the opinion of the savage both things and words may1 like persons1 be charged or electrified1 either temporarily or permanently1 with the mysterious virtue of taboo1 and may therefore require to be banished for a longer or shorter time from the familiar usage of common life4 ,and the examples will be chosen with special reference to those sacred chiefs1 kings and priests1 who1 more than anybody else1 live fenced about by taboo as by a wall4 ,tabooed things will be illustrated in the present chapter1 and tabooed words in the next4 #b4 ,iron tabooed ,,in ,,the ,,first place we may observe that the awful sanctity of kings naturally leads to a prohibition to touch their sacred persons4 ,thus it was unlawful to lay hands on the person of a ,spartan king3 no one might touch the body of the king or queen of ,tahiti3 it is forbidden to touch the person of the king of ,siam under pain of death2 and no one may touch the king of ,cambodia1 for any purpose whatever1 without his express command4 ,in ,july #ahgd the king was thrown from his carriage and lay insensible on the ground1 but not one of his suite dared to touch him2 a ,european coming to the spot carried the injured monarch to his palace4 ,formerly no one might touch the king of ,corea2 and if he deigned to touch a subject1 the spot touched became sacred1 and the person thus honoured had to wear a visible mark 7generally a cord of red silk7 for the rest of his life4 ,above all1 no iron might touch the king's body4 ,in #ahjj ,king ,tieng-tsong-tai-oang died of a tumour in the back1 no one dreaming of employing the lancet1 which would probably have saved his life4 ,it is said that one king suffered terribly from an abscess in the lip1 till his physician called in a jester1 whose pranks made the king laugh heartily1 and so the abscess burst4 ,roman and ,sabine priests might not be shaved with iron but only with bronze razors or shears2 and whenever an iron graving-tool was brought into the sacred grove of the ,arval ,brothers at ,rome for the purpose of cutting an inscription in stone1 an expiatory sacrifice of a lamb and a pig must be offered1 which was repeated when the graving-tool was removed from the grove4 ,as a general rule iron might not be brought into ,greek sanctuaries4 ,in ,crete sacrifices were offered to ,menedemus without the use of iron1 because the legend ran that ,menedemus had been killed by an iron weapon in the ,trojan war4 ,the ,archon of ,plataea might not touch iron2 but once a year1 at the annual commemoration of the men who fell at the battle of ,plataea1 he was allowed to carry a sword wherewith to sacrifice a bull4 ,to this day a ,hottentot priest never uses an iron knife1 but always a sharp splint of quartz1 in sacrificing an animal or circumcising a lad4 ,among the ,ovambo of ,south-west ,africa custom requires that lads should be circumcised with a sharp flint2 if none is to hand1 the operation may be performed with iron1 but the iron must afterwards be buried4 ,amongst the ,moquis of ,arizona stone knives1 hatchets1 and so on have passed out of common use1 but are retained in religious ceremonies4 ,after the ,pawnees had ceased to use stone arrow-heads for ordinary purposes1 they still employed them to slay the sacrifices1 whether human captives or buffalo and deer4 ,amongst the ,jews no iron tool was used in building the ,temple at ,jerusalem or in making an altar4 ,the old wooden bridge 7,pons ,sublicius7 at ,rome1 which was considered sacred1 was made and had to be kept in repair without the use of iron or bronze4 ,it was expressly provided by law that the temple of ,jupiter ,liber at ,furfo might be repaired with iron tools4 ,the council chamber at ,cyzicus was constructed of wood without any iron nails1 the beams being so arranged that they could be taken out and replaced4 ,this superstitious objection to iron perhaps dates from that early time in the history of society when iron was still a novelty1 and as such was viewed by many with suspicion and dislike4 ,for everything new is apt to excite the awe and dread of the savage4 ,it is a curious superstition1 says a pioneer in ,borneo1 this of the ,dusuns1 to attribute anything--whether good or bad1 lucky or unlucky--that happens to them to something novel which has arrived in their country4 ,for instance1 my living in ,kindram has caused the intensely hot weather we have experienced of late4 ,the unusually heavy rains which happened to follow the ,english survey of the ,nicobar ,islands in the winter of #ahhf-ahhg were imputed by the alarmed natives to the wrath of the spirits at the theodolites1 dumpy-levellers1 and other strange instruments which had been set up in so many of their favourite haunts2 and some of them proposed to soothe the anger of the spirits by sacrificing a pig4 ,in the seventeenth century a succession of bad seasons excited a revolt among the ,esthonian peasantry1 who traced the origin of the evil to a watermill1 which put a stream to some inconvenience by checking its flow4 ,the first introduction of iron ploughshares into ,poland having been followed by a succession of bad harvests1 the farmers attributed the badness of the crops to the iron ploughshares1 and discarded them for the old wooden ones4 ,to this day the primitive ,baduwis of ,java1 who live chiefly by husbandry1 will use no iron tools in tilling their fields4 ,the general dislike of innovation1 which always makes itself strongly felt in the sphere of religion1 is sufficient by itself to account for the superstitious aversion to iron entertained by kings and priests and attributed by them to the gods2 possibly this aversion may have been intensified in places by some such accidental cause as the series of bad seasons which cast discredit on iron ploughshares in ,poland4 ,but the disfavour in which iron is held by the gods and their ministers has another side4 ,their antipathy to the metal furnishes men with a weapon which may be turned against the spirits when occasion serves4 ,as their dislike of iron is supposed to be so great that they will not approach persons and things protected by the obnoxious metal1 iron may obviously be employed as a charm for banning ghosts and other dangerous spirits4 ,and often it is so used4 ,thus in the ,highlands of ,scotland the great safeguard against the elfin race is iron1 or1 better yet1 steel4 ,the metal in any form1 whether as a sword1 a knife1 a gun-barrel1 or what not1 is all-powerful for this purpose4 ,whenever you enter a fairy dwelling you should always remember to stick a piece of steel1 such as a knife1 a needle1 or a fish-hook1 in the door2 for then the elves will not be able to shut the door till you come out again4 ,so1 too1 when you have shot a deer and are bringing it home at night1 be sure to thrust a knife into the carcase1 for that keeps the fairies from laying their weight on it4 ,a knife or nail in your pocket is quite enough to prevent the fairies from lifting you up at night4 ,nails in the front of a bed ward off elves from women in the straw and from their babes2 but to make quite sure it is better to put the smoothing-iron under the bed1 and the reaping-hook in the window4 ,if a bull has fallen over a rock and been killed1 a nail stuck into it will preserve the flesh from the fairies4 ,music discoursed on a ,jew's harp keeps the elfin women away from the hunter1 because the tongue of the instrument is of steel4 ,in ,morocco iron is considered a great protection against demons2 hence it is usual to place a knife or dagger under a sick man's pillow4 ,the ,singhalese believe that they are constantly surrounded by evil spirits1 who lie in wait to do them harm4 ,a peasant would not dare to carry good food1 such as cakes or roast meat1 from one place to another without putting an iron nail on it to prevent a demon from taking possession of the viands and so making the eater ill4 ,no sick person1 whether man or woman1 would venture out of the house without a bunch of keys or a knife in his hand1 for without such a talisman he would fear that some devil might take advantage of his weak state to slip into his body4 ,and if a man has a large sore on his body he tries to keep a morsel of iron on it as a protection against demons4 ,on the ,slave ,coast when a mother sees her child gradually wasting away1 she concludes that a demon has entered into the child1 and takes her measures accordingly4 ,to lure the demon out of the body of her offspring1 she offers a sacrifice of food2 and while the devil is bolting it1 she attaches iron rings and small bells to her child's ankles and hangs iron chains round his neck4 ,the jingling of the iron and the tinkling of the bells are supposed to prevent the demon1 when he has concluded his repast1 from entering again into the body of the little sufferer4 ,hence many children may be seen in this part of ,africa weighed down with iron ornaments4 #c4 ,sharp ,weapons tabooed ,,there is a priestly king to the north of ,zengwih in ,burma1 revered by the ,sotih as the highest spiritual and temporal authority1 into whose house no weapon or cutting instrument may be brought4 ,this rule may perhaps be explained by a custom observed by various peoples after a death2 they refrain from the use of sharp instruments so long as the ghost of the deceased is supposed to be near1 lest they should wound it4 ,thus among the ,esquimaux of ,bering ,strait during the day on which a person dies in the village no one is permitted to work1 and the relatives must perform no labour during the three following days4 ,it is especially forbidden during this period to cut with any edged instrument1 such as a knife or an axe2 and the use of pointed instruments1 like needles or bodkins1 is also forbidden4 ,this is said to be done to avoid cutting or injuring the shade1 which may be present at any time during this period1 and1 if accidentally injured by any of these things1 it would become very angry and bring sickness or death to the people4 ,the relatives must also be very careful at this time not to make any loud or harsh noises that may startle or anger the shade4 ,we have seen that in like manner after killing a white whale these ,esquimaux abstain from the use of cutting or pointed instruments for four days1 lest they should unwittingly cut or stab the whale's ghost4 ,the same taboo is sometimes observed by them when there is a sick person in the village1 probably from a fear of injuring his shade which may be hovering outside of his body4 ,after a death the ,roumanians of ,transylvania are careful not to leave a knife lying with the sharp edge uppermost so long as the corpse remains in the house1 or else the soul will be forced to ride on the blade4 ,for seven days after a death1 the corpse being still in the house1 the ,chinese abstain from the use of knives and needles1 and even of chopsticks1 eating their food with their fingers4 ,on the third1 sixth1 ninth1 and fortieth days after the funeral the old ,prussians and ,lithuanians used to prepare a meal1 to which1 standing at the door1 they invited the soul of the deceased4 ,at these meals they sat silent round the table and used no knives and the women who served up the food were also without knives4 ,if any morsels fell from the table they were left lying there for the lonely souls that had no living relations or friends to feed them4 ,when the meal was over the priest took a broom and swept the souls out of the house1 saying1 ,dear souls1 ye have eaten and drunk4 ,go forth1 go forth4 ,we can now understand why no cutting instrument may be taken into the house of the ,burmese pontiff4 ,like so many priestly kings1 he is probably regarded as divine1 and it is therefore right that his sacred spirit should not be exposed to the risk of being cut or wounded whenever it quits his body to hover invisible in the air or to fly on some distant mission4 #d4 ,blood tabooed ,,we have seen that the ,flamen ,dialis was forbidden to touch or even name raw flesh4 ,at certain times a ,brahman teacher is enjoined not to look on raw flesh1 blood1 or persons whose hands have been cut off4 ,in ,uganda the father of twins is in a state of taboo for some time after birth2 among other rules he is forbidden to kill anything or to see blood4 ,in the ,pelew ,islands when a raid has been made on a village and a head carried off1 the relations of the slain man are tabooed and have to submit to certain observances in order to escape the wrath of his ghost4 ,they are shut up in the house1 touch no raw flesh1 and chew betel over which an incantation has been uttered by the exorcist4 ,after this the ghost of the slaughtered man goes away to the enemy's country in pursuit of his murderer4 ,the taboo is probably based on the common belief that the soul or spirit of the animal is in the blood4 ,as tabooed persons are believed to be in a perilous state--for example1 the relations of the slain man are liable to the attacks of his indignant ghost--it is especially necessary to isolate them from contact with spirits2 hence the prohibition to touch raw meat4 ,but as usual the taboo is only the special enforcement of a general precept2 in other words1 its observance is particularly enjoined in circumstances which seem urgently to call for its application1 but apart from such circumstances the prohibition is also observed1 though less strictly1 as a common rule of life4 ,thus some of the ,esthonians will not taste blood because they believe that it contains the animal's soul1 which would enter the body of the person who tasted the blood4 ,some ,indian tribes of ,north ,america1 through a strong principle of religion1 abstain in the strictest manner from eating the blood of any animal1 as it contains the life and spirit of the beast4 ,jewish hunters poured out the blood of the game they had killed and covered it up with dust4 ,they would not taste the blood1 believing that the soul or life of the animal was in the blood1 or actually was the blood4 ,it is a common rule that royal blood may not be shed upon the ground4 ,hence when a king or one of his family is to be put to death a mode of execution is devised by which the royal blood shall not be spilt upon the earth4 ,about the year #afhh the generalissimo of the army rebelled against the king of ,siam and put him to death after the manner of royal criminals1 or as princes of the blood are treated when convicted of capital crimes1 which is by putting them into a large iron caldron1 and pounding them to pieces with wooden pestles1 because none of their royal blood must be spilt on the ground1 it being1 by their religion1 thought great impiety to contaminate the divine blood by mixing it with earth4 ,when ,kublai ,khan defeated and took his uncle ,nayan1 who had rebelled against him1 he caused ,nayan to be put to death by being wrapt in a carpet and tossed to and fro till he died1 because he would not have the blood of his ,line ,imperial spilt upon the ground or exposed in the eye of ,heaven and before the ,sun4 ,friar ,ricold mentions the ,tartar maxim3 ',one ,khan will put another to death to get possession of the throne1 but he takes great care that the blood be not spilt4 ,for they say that it is highly improper that the blood of the ,great ,khan should be spilt upon the ground2 so they cause the victim to be smothered somehow or other4' ,the like feeling prevails at the court of ,burma1 where a peculiar mode of execution without bloodshed is reserved for princes of the blood4 ,the reluctance to spill royal blood seems to be only a particular case of a general unwillingness to shed blood or at least to allow it to fall on the ground4 ,marco ,polo tells us that in his day persons caught in the streets of ,cambaluc 7,peking7 at unseasonable hours were arrested1 and if found guilty of a misdemeanor were beaten with a stick4 ,under this punishment people sometimes die1 but they adopt it in order to eschew bloodshed1 for their ,bacsis say that it is an evil thing to shed man's blood4 ,in ,west ,sussex people believe that the ground on which human blood has been shed is accursed and will remain barren for ever4 ,among some primitive peoples1 when the blood of a tribesman has to be spilt it is not suffered to fall upon the ground1 but is received upon the bodies of his fellow-tribesmen4 ,thus in some ,australian tribes boys who are being circumcised are laid on a platform1 formed by the living bodies of the tribesmen2 and when a boy's tooth is knocked out as an initiatory ceremony1 he is seated on the shoulders of a man1 on whose breast the blood flows and may not be wiped away4 ,also the ,gauls used to drink their enemies' blood and paint themselves therewith4 ,so also they write that the old ,irish were wont2 and so have ,i seen some of the ,irish do1 but not their enemies' but friends' blood1 as1 namely1 at the execution of a notable traitor at ,limerick1 called ,murrogh ,o',brien1 ,i saw an old woman1 which was his foster-mother1 take up his head whilst he was quartered and suck up all the blood that ran thereout1 saying that the earth was not worthy to drink it1 and therewith also steeped her face and breast and tore her hair1 crying out and shrieking most terribly4 ,among the ,latuka of ,central ,africa the earth on which a drop of blood has fallen at childbirth is carefully scraped up with an iron shovel1 put into a pot along with the water used in washing the mother1 and buried tolerably deep outside the house on the left-hand side4 ,in ,west ,africa1 if a drop of your blood has fallen on the ground1 you must carefully cover it up1 rub and stamp it into the soil2 if it has fallen on the side of a canoe or a tree1 the place is cut out and the chip destroyed4 ,one motive of these ,african customs may be a wish to prevent the blood from falling into the hands of magicians1 who might make an evil use of it4 ,that is admittedly the reason why people in ,west ,africa stamp out any blood of theirs which has dropped on the ground or cut out any wood that has been soaked with it4 ,from a like dread of sorcery natives of ,new ,guinea are careful to burn any sticks1 leaves1 or rags which are stained with their blood2 and if the blood has dripped on the ground they turn up the soil and if possible light a fire on the spot4 ,the same fear explains the curious duties discharged by a class of men called ramanga or blue blood among the ,betsileo of ,madagascar4 ,it is their business to eat all the nail-parings and to lick up all the spilt blood of the nobles4 ,when the nobles pare their nails1 the parings are collected to the last scrap and swallowed by these ramanga4 ,if the parings are too large1 they are minced small and so gulped down4 ,again1 should a nobleman wound himself1 say in cutting his nails or treading on something1 the ramanga lick up the blood as fast as possible4 ,nobles of high rank hardly go anywhere without these humble attendants2 but if it should happen that there are none of them present1 the cut nails and the spilt blood are carefully collected to be afterwards swallowed by the ramanga4 ,there is scarcely a nobleman of any pretensions who does not strictly observe this custom1 the intention of which probably is to prevent these parts of his person from falling into the hands of sorcerers1 who on the principles of contagious magic could work him harm thereby4 ,the general explanation of the reluctance to shed blood on the ground is probably to be found in the belief that the soul is in the blood1 and that therefore any ground on which it may fall necessarily becomes taboo or sacred4 ,in ,new ,zealand anything upon which even a drop of a high chief's blood chances to fall becomes taboo or sacred to him4 ,for instance1 a party of natives having come to visit a chief in a fine new canoe1 the chief got into it1 but in doing so a splinter entered his foot1 and the blood trickled on the canoe1 which at once became sacred to him4 ,the owner jumped out1 dragged the canoe ashore opposite the chief's house1 and left it there4 ,again1 a chief in entering a missionary's house knocked his head against a beam1 and the blood flowed4 ,the natives said that in former times the house would have belonged to the chief4 ,as usually happens with taboos of universal application1 the prohibition to spill the blood of a tribesman on the ground applies with peculiar stringency to chiefs and kings1 and is observed in their case long after it has ceased to be observed in the case of others4 #e4 ,the ,head tabooed ,,many peoples regard the head as peculiarly sacred2 the special sanctity attributed to it is sometimes explained by a belief that it contains a spirit which is very sensitive to injury or disrespect4 ,thus the ,yorubas hold that every man has three spiritual inmates1 of whom the first1 called ,olori1 dwells in the head and is the man's protector1 guardian1 and guide4 ,offerings are made to this spirit1 chiefly of fowls1 and some of the blood mixed with palmoil is rubbed on the forehead4 ,the ,karens suppose that a being called the tso resides in the upper part of the head1 and while it retains its seat no harm can befall the person from the efforts of the seven ,kelahs1 or personified passions4 ,but if the tso becomes heedless or weak certain evil to the person is the result4 ,hence the head is carefully attended to1 and all possible pains are taken to provide such dress and attire as will be pleasing to the tso4 ,the ,siamese think that a spirit called khuan or kwun dwells in the human head1 of which it is the guardian spirit4 ,the spirit must be carefully protected from injury of every kind2 hence the act of shaving or cutting the hair is accompanied with many ceremonies4 ,the kwun is very sensitive on points of honour1 and would feel mortally insulted if the head in which he resides were touched by the hand of a stranger4 ,the ,cambodians esteem it a grave offence to touch a man's head2 some of them will not enter a place where anything whatever is suspended over their heads2 and the meanest ,cambodian would never consent to live under an inhabited room4 ,hence the houses are built of one story only2 and even the ,government respects the prejudice by never placing a prisoner in the stocks under the floor of a house1 though the houses are raised high above the ground4 ,the same superstition exists amongst the ,malays2 for an early traveller reports that in ,java people wear nothing on their heads1 and say that nothing must be on their heads 4 4 4 and if any person were to put his hand upon their head they would kill him2 and they do not build houses with storeys1 in order that they may not walk over each other's heads4 ,the same superstition as to the head is found in full force throughout ,polynesia4 ,thus of ,gattanewa1 a ,marquesan chief1 it is said that to touch the top of his head1 or anything which had been on his head1 was sacrilege4 ,to pass over his head was an indignity never to be forgotten4 ,the son of a ,marquesan high priest has been seen to roll on the ground in an agony of rage and despair1 begging for death1 because some one had desecrated his head and deprived him of his divinity by sprinkling a few drops of water on his hair4 ,but it was not the ,marquesan chiefs only whose heads were sacred4 ,the head of every ,marquesan was taboo1 and might neither be touched nor stepped over by another2 even a father might not step over the head of his sleeping child2 women were forbidden to carry or touch anything that had been in contact with1 or had merely hung over1 the head of their husband or father4 ,no one was allowed to be over the head of the king of ,tonga4 ,in ,tahiti any one who stood over the king or queen1 or passed his hand over their heads1 might be put to death4 ,until certain rites were performed over it1 a ,tahitian infant was especially taboo2 whatever touched the child's head1 while it was in this state1 became sacred and was deposited in a consecrated place railed in for the purpose at the child's house4 ,if a branch of a tree touched the child's head1 the tree was cut down2 and if in its fall it injured another tree so as to penetrate the bark1 that tree also was cut down as unclean and unfit for use4 ,after the rites were performed these special taboos ceased2 but the head of a ,tahitian was always sacred1 he never carried anything on it1 and to touch it was an offence4 ,so sacred was the head of a ,maori chief that if he only touched it with his fingers1 he was obliged immediately to apply them to his nose1 and snuff up the sanctity which they had acquired by the touch1 and thus restore it to the part from whence it was taken4 ,on account of the sacredness of his head a ,maori chief could not blow the fire with his mouth1 for the breath being sacred1 communicated his sanctity to it1 and a brand might be taken by a slave1 or a man of another tribe1 or the fire might be used for other purposes1 such as cooking1 and so cause his death4 #f4 ,hair tabooed ,,when the head was considered so sacred that it might not even be touched without grave offence1 it is obvious that the cutting of the hair must have been a delicate and difficult operation4 ,the difficulties and dangers which1 on the primitive view1 beset the operation are of two kinds4 ,there is first the danger of disturbing the spirit of the head1 which may be injured in the process and may revenge itself upon the person who molests him4 ,secondly1 there is the difficulty of disposing of the shorn locks4 ,for the savage believes that the sympathetic connexion which exists between himself and every part of his body continues to exist even after the physical connexion has been broken1 and that therefore he will suffer from any harm that may befall the several parts of his body1 such as the clippings of his hair or the parings of his nails4 ,accordingly he takes care that these severed portions of himself shall not be left in places where they might either be exposed to accidental injury or fall into the hands of malicious persons who might work magic on them to his detriment or death4 ,such dangers are common to all1 but sacred persons have more to fear from them than ordinary people1 so the precautions taken by them are proportionately stringent4 ,the simplest way of evading the peril is not to cut the hair at all2 and this is the expedient adopted where the risk is thought to be more than usually great4 ,the ,frankish kings were never allowed to crop their hair2 from their childhood upwards they had to keep it unshorn4 ,to poll the long locks that floated on their shoulders would have been to renounce their right to the throne4 ,when the wicked brothers ,clotaire and ,childebert coveted the kingdom of their dead brother ,clodomir1 they inveigled into their power their little nephews1 the two sons of ,clodomir2 and having done so1 they sent a messenger bearing scissors and a naked sword to the children's grandmother1 ,queen ,clotilde1 at ,paris4 ,the envoy showed the scissors and the sword to ,clotilde1 and bade her choose whether the children should be shorn and live or remain unshorn and die4 ,the proud queen replied that if her grandchildren were not to come to the throne she would rather see them dead than shorn4 ,and murdered they were by their ruthless uncle ,clotaire with his own hand4 ,the king of ,ponape1 one of the ,caroline ,islands1 must wear his hair long1 and so must his grandees4 ,among the ,hos1 a negro tribe of ,west ,africa1 there are priests on whose head no razor may come during the whole of their lives4 ,the god who dwells in the man forbids the cutting of his hair on pain of death4 ,if the hair is at last too long1 the owner must pray to his god to allow him at least to clip the tips of it4 ,the hair is in fact conceived as the seat and lodging-place of his god1 so that were it shorn the god would lose his abode in the priest4 ,the members of a ,masai clan1 who are believed to possess the art of making rain1 may not pluck out their beards1 because the loss of their beards would1 it is supposed1 entail the loss of their rain-making powers4 ,the head chief and the sorcerers of the ,masai observe the same rule for a like reason3 they think that were they to pull out their beards1 their supernatural gifts would desert them4 ,again1 men who have taken a vow of vengeance sometimes keep their hair unshorn till they have fulfilled their vow4 ,thus of the ,marquesans we are told that occasionally they have their head entirely shaved1 except one lock on the crown1 which is worn loose or put up in a knot4 ,but the latter mode of wearing the hair is only adopted by them when they have a solemn vow1 as to revenge the death of some near relation1 etc4 ,in such case the lock is never cut off until they have fulfilled their promise4 ,a similar custom was sometimes observed by the ancient ,germans2 among the ,chatti the young warriors never clipped their hair or their beard till they had slain an enemy4 ,among the ,toradjas1 when a child's hair is cut to rid it of vermin1 some locks are allowed to remain on the crown of the head as a refuge for one of the child's souls4 ,otherwise the soul would have no place in which to settle1 and the child would sicken4 ,the ,karo-,bataks are much afraid of frightening away the soul of a child2 hence when they cut its hair1 they always leave a patch unshorn1 to which the soul can retreat before the shears4 ,usually this lock remains unshorn all through life1 or at least up till manhood4 #g4 ,ceremonies at ,hair-cutting ,,but when it becomes necessary to crop the hair1 measures are taken to lessen the dangers which are supposed to attend the operation4 ,the chief of ,namosi in ,fiji always ate a man by way of precaution when he had had his hair cut4 ,there was a certain clan that had to provide the victim1 and they used to sit in solemn council among themselves to choose him4 ,it was a sacrificial feast to avert evil from the chief4 ,amongst the ,maoris many spells were uttered at hair-cutting2 one1 for example1 was spoken to consecrate the obsidian knife with which the hair was cut2 another was pronounced to avert the thunder and lightning which hair-cutting was believed to cause4 ,he who has had his hair cut is in immediate charge of the ,atua 7spirit72 he is removed from the contact and society of his family and his tribe2 he dare not touch his food himself2 it is put into his mouth by another person2 nor can he for some days resume his accustomed occupations or associate with his fellow-men4 ,the person who cuts the hair is also tabooed2 his hands having been in contact with a sacred head1 he may not touch food with them or engage in any other employment2 he is fed by another person with food cooked over a sacred fire4 ,he cannot be released from the taboo before the following day1 when he rubs his hands with potato or fern root which has been cooked on a sacred fire2 and this food having been taken to the head of the family in the female line and eaten by her1 his hands are freed from the taboo4 ,in some parts of ,new ,zealand the most sacred day of the year was that appointed for hair-cutting2 the people assembled in large numbers on that day from all the neighbourhood4 #h4 ,disposal of ,cut ,hair and ,nails ,,but even when the hair and nails have been safely cut1 there remains the difficulty of disposing of them1 for their owner believes himself liable to suffer from any harm that may befall them4 ,the notion that a man may be bewitched by means of the clippings of his hair1 the parings of his nails1 or any other severed portion of his person is almost world-wide1 and attested by evidence too ample1 too familiar1 and too tedious in its uniformity to be here analysed at length4 ,the general idea on which the superstition rests is that of the sympathetic connexion supposed to persist between a person and everything that has once been part of his body or in any way closely related to him4 ,a very few examples must suffice4 ,they belong to that branch of sympathetic magic which may be called contagious4 ,dread of sorcery1 we are told1 formed one of the most salient characteristics of the ,marquesan islanders in the old days4 ,the sorcerer took some of the hair1 spittle1 or other bodily refuse of the man he wished to injure1 wrapped it up in a leaf1 and placed the packet in a bag woven of threads or fibres1 which were knotted in an intricate way4 ,the whole was then buried with certain rites1 and thereupon the victim wasted away of a languishing sickness which lasted twenty days4 ,his life1 however1 might be saved by discovering and digging up the buried hair1 spittle1 or what not2 for as soon as this was done the power of the charm ceased4 ,a ,maori sorcerer intent on bewitching somebody sought to get a tress of his victim's hair1 the parings of his nails1 some of his spittle1 or a shred of his garment4 ,having obtained the object1 whatever it was1 he chanted certain spells and curses over it in a falsetto voice and buried it in the ground4 ,as the thing decayed1 the person to whom it had belonged was supposed to waste away4 ,when an ,australian blackfellow wishes to get rid of his wife1 he cuts off a lock of her hair in her sleep1 ties it to his spear-thrower1 and goes with it to a neighbouring tribe1 where he gives it to a friend4 ,his friend sticks the spear-thrower up every night before the camp fire1 and when it falls down it is a sign that the wife is dead4 ,the way in which the charm operates was explained to ,dr4 ,howitt by a ,wirajuri man4 ,you see1 he said1 when a blackfellow doctor gets hold of something belonging to a man and roasts it with things1 and sings over it1 the fire catches hold of the smell of the man1 and that settles the poor fellow4 ,the ,huzuls of the ,carpathians imagine that if mice get a person's shorn hair and make a nest of it1 the person will suffer from headache or even become idiotic4 ,similarly in ,germany it is a common notion that if birds find a person's cut hair1 and build their nests with it1 the person will suffer from headache2 sometimes it is thought that he will have an eruption on the head4 ,the same superstition prevails1 or used to prevail1 in ,west ,sussex4 ,again it is thought that cut or combed-out hair may disturb the weather by producing rain and hail1 thunder and lightning4 ,we have seen that in ,new ,zealand a spell was uttered at hair-cutting to avert thunder and lightning4 ,in the ,tyrol1 witches are supposed to use cut or combed-out hair to make hailstones or thunderstorms with4 ,thlinkeet ,indians have been known to attribute stormy weather to the rash act of a girl who had combed her hair outside of the house4 ,the ,romans seem to have held similar views1 for it was a maxim with them that no one on shipboard should cut his hair or nails except in a storm1 that is1 when the mischief was already done4 ,in the ,highlands of ,scotland it is said that no sister should comb her hair at night if she have a brother at sea4 ,in ,west ,africa1 when the ,mani of ,chitombe or ,jumba died1 the people used to run in crowds to the corpse and tear out his hair1 teeth1 and nails1 which they kept as a rain-charm1 believing that otherwise no rain would fall4 ,the ,makoko of the ,anzikos begged the missionaries to give him half their beards as a rain-charm4 ,if cut hair and nails remain in sympathetic connexion with the person from whose body they have been severed1 it is clear that they can be used as hostages for his good behaviour by any one who may chance to possess them2 for on the principles of contagious magic he has only to injure the hair or nails in order to hurt simultaneously their original owner4 ,hence when the ,nandi have taken a prisoner they shave his head and keep the shorn hair as a surety that he will not attempt to escape2 but when the captive is ransomed1 they return his shorn hair with him to his own people4 ,to preserve the cut hair and nails from injury and from the dangerous uses to which they may be put by sorcerers1 it is necessary to deposit them in some safe place4 ,the shorn locks of a ,maori chief were gathered with much care and placed in an adjoining cemetery4 ,the ,tahitians buried the cuttings of their hair at the temples4 ,in the streets of ,soku a modern traveller observed cairns of large stones piled against walls with tufts of human hair inserted in the crevices4 ,on asking the meaning of this1 he was told that when any native of the place polled his hair he carefully gathered up the clippings and deposited them in one of these cairns1 all of which were sacred to the fetish and therefore inviolable4 ,these cairns of sacred stones1 he further learned1 were simply a precaution against witchcraft1 for if a man were not thus careful in disposing of his hair1 some of it might fall into the hands of his enemies1 who would1 by means of it1 be able to cast spells over him and so compass his destruction4 ,when the top-knot of a ,siamese child has been cut with great ceremony1 the short hairs are put into a little vessel made of plantain leaves and set adrift on the nearest river or canal4 ,as they float away1 all that was wrong or harmful in the child's disposition is believed to depart with them4 ,the long hairs are kept till the child makes a pilgrimage to the holy ,footprint of ,buddha on the sacred hill at ,prabat4 ,they are then presented to the priests1 who are supposed to make them into brushes with which they sweep the ,footprint2 but in fact so much hair is thus offered every year that the priests cannot use it all1 so they quietly burn the superfluity as soon as the pilgrims' backs are turned4 ,the cut hair and nails of the ,flamen ,dialis were buried under a lucky tree4 ,the shorn tresses of the ,vestal ,virgins were hung on an ancient lotus-tree4 ,often the clipped hair and nails are stowed away in any secret place1 not necessarily in a temple or cemetery or at a tree1 as in the cases already mentioned4 ,thus in ,swabia you are recommended to deposit your clipped hair in some spot where neither sun nor moon can shine on it1 for example in the earth or under a stone4 ,in ,danzig it is buried in a bag under the threshold4 ,in ,ugi1 one of the ,solomon ,islands1 men bury their hair lest it should fall into the hands of an enemy1 who would make magic with it and so bring sickness or calamity on them4 ,the same fear seems to be general in ,melanesia1 and has led to a regular practice of hiding cut hair and nails4 ,the same practice prevails among many tribes of ,south ,africa1 from a fear lest wizards should get hold of the severed particles and work evil with them4 ,the ,caffres carry still further this dread of allowing any portion of themselves to fall into the hands of an enemy2 for not only do they bury their cut hair and nails in a secret spot1 but when one of them cleans the head of another he preserves the vermin which he catches1 carefully delivering them to the person to whom they originally appertained1 supposing1 according to their theory1 that as they derived their support from the blood of the man from whom they were taken1 should they be killed by another1 the blood of his neighbour would be in his possession1 thus placing in his hands the power of some superhuman influence4 ,sometimes the severed hair and nails are preserved1 not to prevent them from falling into the hands of a magician1 but that the owner may have them at the resurrection of the body1 to which some races look forward4 ,thus the ,incas of ,peru took extreme care to preserve the nail-parings and the hairs that were shorn off or torn out with a comb2 placing them in holes or niches in the walls2 and if they fell out1 any other ,indian that saw them picked them up and put them in their places again4 ,i very often asked different ,indians1 at various times1 why they did this1 in order to see what they would say1 and they all replied in the same words saying1 ',know that all persons who are born must return to life' 7they have no word to express resurrection71 'and the souls must rise out of their tombs with all that belonged to their bodies4 ,we1 therefore1 in order that we may not have to search for our hair and nails at a time when there will be much hurry and confusion1 place them in one place1 that they may be brought together more conveniently1 and1 whenever it is possible1 we are also careful to spit in one place4' ,similarly the ,turks never throw away the parings of their nails1 but carefully stow them in cracks of the walls or of the boards1 in the belief that they will be needed at the resurrection4 ,the ,armenians do not throw away their cut hair and nails and extracted teeth1 but hide them in places that are esteemed holy1 such as a crack in the church wall1 a pillar of the house1 or a hollow tree4 ,they think that all these severed portions of themselves will be wanted at the resurrection1 and that he who has not stowed them away in a safe place will have to hunt about for them on the great day4 ,in the village of ,drumconrath in ,ireland there used to be some old women who1 having ascertained from ,scripture that the hairs of their heads were all numbered by the ,almighty1 expected to have to account for them at the day of judgment4 ,in order to be able to do so they stuffed the severed hair away in the thatch of their cottages4 ,some people burn their loose hair to save it from falling into the hands of sorcerers4 ,this is done by the ,patagonians and some of the ,victorian tribes4 ,in the ,upper ,vosges they say that you should never leave the clippings of your hair and nails lying about1 but burn them to hinder the sorcerers from using them against you4 ,for the same reason ,italian women either burn their loose hairs or throw them into a place where no one is likely to look for them4 ,the almost universal dread of witchcraft induces the ,west ,african negroes1 the ,makololo of ,south ,africa1 and the ,tahitians to burn or bury their shorn hair4 ,in the ,tyrol many people burn their hair lest the witches should use it to raise thunderstorms2 others burn or bury it to prevent the birds from lining their nests with it1 which would cause the heads from which the hair came to ache4 ,this destruction of the hair and nails plainly involves an inconsistency of thought4 ,the object of the destruction is avowedly to prevent these severed portions of the body from being used by sorcerers4 ,but the possibility of their being so used depends upon the supposed sympathetic connexion between them and the man from whom they were severed4 ,and if this sympathetic connexion still exists1 clearly these severed portions cannot be destroyed without injury to the man4 #i4 ,spittle tabooed ,,the ,,same fear of witchcraft which has led so many people to hide or destroy their loose hair and nails has induced other or the same people to treat their spittle in a like fashion4 ,for on the principles of sympathetic magic the spittle is part of the man1 and whatever is done to it will have a corresponding effect on him4 ,a ,chilote ,indian1 who has gathered up the spittle of an enemy1 will put it in a potato1 and hang the potato in the smoke1 uttering certain spells as he does so in the belief that his foe will waste away as the potato dries in the smoke4 ,or he will put the spittle in a frog and throw the animal into an inaccessible1 unnavigable river1 which will make the victim quake and shake with ague4 ,the natives of ,urewera1 a district of ,new ,zealand1 enjoyed a high reputation for their skill in magic4 ,it was said that they made use of people's spittle to bewitch them4 ,hence visitors were careful to conceal their spittle1 lest they should furnish these wizards with a handle for working them harm4 ,similarly among some tribes of ,south ,africa no man will spit when an enemy is near1 lest his foe should find the spittle and give it to a wizard1 who would then mix it with magical ingredients so as to injure the person from whom it fell4 ,even in a man's own house his saliva is carefully swept away and obliterated for a similar reason4 ,if common folk are thus cautious1 it is natural that kings and chiefs should be doubly so4 ,in the ,sandwich ,islands chiefs were attended by a confidential servant bearing a portable spittoon1 and the deposit was carefully buried every morning to put it out of the reach of sorcerers4 ,on the ,slave ,coast1 for the same reason1 whenever a king or chief expectorates1 the saliva is scrupulously gathered up and hidden or buried4 ,the same precautions are taken for the same reason with the spittle of the chief of ,tabali in ,southern ,nigeria4 ,the magical use to which spittle may be put marks it out1 like blood or nail-parings1 as a suitable material basis for a covenant1 since by exchanging their saliva the covenanting parties give each other a guarantee of good faith4 ,if either of them afterwards foreswears himself1 the other can punish his perfidy by a magical treatment of the purjurer's spittle which he has in his custody4 ,thus when the ,wajagga of ,east ,africa desire to make a covenant1 the two parties will sometimes sit down with a bowl of milk or beer between them1 and after uttering an incantation over the beverage they each take a mouthful of the milk or beer and spit it into the other's mouth4 ,in urgent cases1 when there is no time to spend on ceremony1 the two will simply spit into each other's mouth1 which seals the covenant just as well4 #aj4 ,foods tabooed ,,as ,,might have been expected1 the superstitions of the savage cluster thick about the subject of food2 and he abstains from eating many animals and plants1 wholesome enough in themselves1 which for one reason or another he fancies would prove dangerous or fatal to the eater4 ,examples of such abstinence are too familiar and far too numerous to quote4 ,but if the ordinary man is thus deterred by superstitious fear from partaking of various foods1 the restraints of this kind which are laid upon sacred or tabooed persons1 such as kings and priests1 are still more numerous and stringent4 ,we have already seen that the ,flamen ,dialis was forbidden to eat or even name several plants and animals1 and that the flesh diet of ,egyptian kings was restricted to veal and goose4 ,in antiquity many priests and many kings of barbarous peoples abstained wholly from a flesh diet4 ,the ,gangas or fetish priests of the ,loango ,coast are forbidden to eat or even see a variety of animals and fish1 in consequence of which their flesh diet is extremely limited2 often they live only on herbs and roots1 though they may drink fresh blood4 ,the heir to the throne of ,loango is forbidden from infancy to eat pork2 from early childhood he is interdicted the use of the cola fruit in company2 at puberty he is taught by a priest not to partake of fowls except such as he has himself killed and cooked2 and so the number of taboos goes on increasing with his years4 ,in ,fernando ,po the king after installation is forbidden to eat cocco 7arum acaule71 deer1 and porcupine1 which are the ordinary foods of the people4 ,the head chief of the ,masai may eat nothing but milk1 honey1 and the roasted livers of goats2 for if he partook of any other food he would lose his power of soothsaying and of compounding charms4 #aa4 ,knots and ,rings tabooed ,,we have seen that among the many taboos which the ,flamen ,dialis at ,rome had to observe1 there was one that forbade him to have a knot on any part of his garments1 and another that obliged him to wear no ring unless it were broken4 ,in like manner ,moslem pilgrims to ,mecca are in a state of sanctity or taboo and may wear on their persons neither knots nor rings4 ,these rules are probably of kindred significance1 and may conveniently be considered together4 ,to begin with knots1 many people in different parts of the world entertain a strong objection to having any knot about their person at certain critical seasons1 particularly childbirth1 marriage1 and death4 ,thus among the ,saxons of ,transylvania1 when a woman is in travail all knots on her garments are untied1 because it is believed that this will facilitate her delivery1 and with the same intention all the locks in the house1 whether on doors or boxes1 are unlocked4 ,the ,lapps think that a lying-in woman should have no knot on her garments1 because a knot would have the effect of making the delivery difficult and painful4 ,in the ,east ,indies this superstition is extended to the whole time of pregnancy2 the people believe that if a pregnant woman were to tie knots1 or braid1 or make anything fast1 the child would thereby be constricted or the woman would herself be tied up when her time came4 ,nay1 some of them enforce the observance of the rule on the father as well as the mother of the unborn child4 ,among the ,sea ,dyaks neither of the parents may bind up anything with a string or make anything fast during the wife's pregnancy4 ,in the ,toumbuluh tribe of ,north ,celebes a ceremony is performed in the fourth or fifth month of a woman's pregnancy1 and after it her husband is forbidden1 among many other things1 to tie any fast knots and to sit with his legs crossed over each other4 ,in all these cases the idea seems to be that the tying of a knot would1 as they say in the ,east ,indies1 tie up the woman1 in other words1 impede and perhaps prevent her delivery1 or delay her convalescence after the birth4 ,on the principles of homoeopathic or imitative magic the physical obstacle or impediment of a knot on a cord would create a corresponding obstacle or impediment in the body of the woman4 ,that this is really the explanation of the rule appears from a custom observed by the ,hos of ,west ,africa at a difficult birth4 ,when a woman is in hard labour and cannot bring forth1 they call in a magician to her aid4 ,he looks at her and says1 ,the child is bound in the womb1 that is why she cannot be delivered4 ,on the entreaties of her female relations he then promises to loosen the bond so that she may bring forth4 ,for that purpose he orders them to fetch a tough creeper from the forest1 and with it he binds the hands and feet of the sufferer on her back4 ,then he takes a knife and calls out the woman's name1 and when she answers he cuts through the creeper with a knife1 saying1 ,i cut through to-day thy bonds and thy child's bonds4 ,after that he chops up the creeper small1 puts the bits in a vessel of water1 and bathes the woman with the water4 ,here the cutting of the creeper with which the woman's hands and feet are bound is a simple piece of homoeopathic or imitative magic3 by releasing her limbs from their bonds the magician imagines that he simultaneously releases the child in her womb from the trammels which impede its birth4 ,the same train of thought underlies a practice observed by some peoples of opening all locks1 doors1 and so on1 while a birth is taking place in the house4 ,we have seen that at such a time the ,germans of ,transylvania open all the locks1 and the same thing is done also in ,voigtland and ,mecklenburg4 ,in ,north-western ,argyllshire superstitious people used to open every lock in the house at childbirth4 ,in the island of ,salsette near ,bombay1 when a woman is in hard labour1 all locks of doors or drawers are opened with a key to facilitate her delivery4 ,among the ,mandelings of ,sumatra the lids of all chests1 boxes1 pans1 and so forth are opened2 and if this does not produce the desired effect1 the anxious husband has to strike the projecting ends of some of the house-beams in order to loosen them2 for they think that everything must be open and loose to facilitate the delivery4 ,in ,chittagong1 when a woman cannot bring her child to the birth1 the midwife gives orders to throw all doors and windows wide open1 to uncork all bottles1 to remove the bungs from all casks1 to unloose the cows in the stall1 the horses in the stable1 the watchdog in his kennel1 to set free sheep1 fowls1 ducks1 and so forth4 ,this universal liberty accorded to the animals and even to inanimate things is1 according to the people1 an infallible means of ensuring the woman's delivery and allowing the babe to be born4 ,in the island of ,saghalien1 when a woman is in labour1 her husband undoes everything that can be undone4 ,he loosens the plaits of his hair and the laces of his shoes4 ,then he unties whatever is tied in the house or its vicinity4 ,in the courtyard he takes the axe out of the log in which it is stuck2 he unfastens the boat1 if it is moored to a tree1 he withdraws the cartridges from his gun1 and the arrows from his crossbow4 ,again1 we have seen that a ,toumbuluh man abstains not only from tying knots1 but also from sitting with crossed legs during his wife's pregnancy4 ,the train of thought is the same in both cases4 ,whether you cross threads in tying a knot1 or only cross your legs in sitting at your ease1 you are equally1 on the principles of homoeopathic magic1 crossing or thwarting the free course of things1 and your action cannot but check and impede whatever may be going forward in your neighbourhood4 ,of this important truth the ,romans were fully aware4 ,to sit beside a pregnant woman or a patient under medical treatment with clasped hands1 says the grave ,pliny1 is to cast a malignant spell over the person1 and it is worse still if you nurse your leg or legs with your clasped hands1 or lay one leg over the other4 ,such postures were regarded by the old ,romans as a let and hindrance to business of every sort1 and at a council of war or a meeting of magistrates1 at prayers and sacrifices1 no man was suffered to cross his legs or clasp his hands4 ,the stock instance of the dreadful consequences that might flow from doing one or the other was that of ,alcmena1 who travailed with ,hercules for seven days and seven nights1 because the goddess ,lucina sat in front of the house with clasped hands and crossed legs1 and the child could not be born until the goddess had been beguiled into changing her attitude4 ,it is a ,bulgarian superstition that if a pregnant woman is in the habit of sitting with crossed legs1 she will suffer much in childbed4 ,in some parts of ,bavaria1 when conversation comes to a standstill and silence ensues1 they say1 ,surely somebody has crossed his legs4 ,the magical effect of knots in trammelling and obstructing human activity was believed to be manifested at marriage not less than at birth4 ,during the ,middle ,ages1 and down to the eighteenth century1 it seems to have been commonly held in ,europe that the consummation of marriage could be prevented by any one who1 while the wedding ceremony was taking place1 either locked a lock or tied a knot in a cord1 and then threw the lock or the cord away4 ,the lock or the knotted cord had to be flung into water2 and until it had been found and unlocked1 or untied1 no real union of the married pair was possible4 ,hence it was a grave offence1 not only to cast such a spell1 but also to steal or make away with the material instrument of it1 whether lock or knotted cord4 ,in the year #agah the parliament of ,bordeaux sentenced some one to be burned alive for having spread desolation through a whole family by means of knotted cords2 and in #agje two persons were condemned to death in ,scotland for stealing certain charmed knots which a woman had made1 in order thereby to mar the wedded happiness of ,spalding of ,ashintilly4 ,the belief in the efficacy of these charms appears to have lingered in the ,highlands of ,pertshire down to the end of the eighteenth century1 for at that time it was still customary in the beautiful parish of ,logierait1 between the river ,tummel and the river ,tay1 to unloose carefully every knot in the clothes of the bride and bridegroom before the celebration of the marriage ceremony4 ,we meet with the same superstition and the same custom at the present day in ,syria4 ,the persons who help a ,syrian bridegroom to don his wedding garments take care that no knot is tied on them and no button buttoned1 for they believe that a button buttoned or a knot tied would put it within the power of his enemies to deprive him of his nuptial rights by magical means4 ,the fear of such charms is diffused all over ,north ,africa at the present day4 ,to render a bridegroom impotent the enchanter has only to tie a knot in a handkerchief which he had previously placed quietly on some part of the bridegroom's body when he was mounted on horseback ready to fetch his bride3 so long as the knot in the handkerchief remains tied1 so long will the bridegroom remain powerless to consummate the marriage4 ,the maleficent power of knots may also be manifested in the infliction of sickness1 disease1 and all kinds of misfortune4 ,thus among the ,hos of ,west ,africa a sorcerer will sometimes curse his enemy and tie a knot in a stalk of grass1 saying1 ,i have tied up ,so-and-so in this knot4 ,may all evil light upon him6 ,when he goes into the field1 may a snake sting him6 ,when he goes to the chase1 may a ravening beast attack him6 ,and when he steps into a river1 may the water sweep him away6 ,when it rains1 may the lightning strike him6 ,may evil nights be his6 ,it is believed that in the knot the sorcerer has bound up the life of his enemy4 ,in the ,koran there is an allusion to the mischief of those who puff into the knots1 and an ,arab commentator on the passage explains that the words refer to women who practise magic by tying knots in cords1 and then blowing and spitting upon them4 ,he goes on to relate how1 once upon a time1 a wicked ,jew bewitched the prophet ,mohammed himself by tying nine knots on a string1 which he then hid in a well4 ,so the prophet fell ill1 and nobody knows what might have happened if the archangel ,gabriel had not opportunely revealed to the holy man the place where the knotted cord was concealed4 ,the trusty ,ali soon fetched the baleful thing from the well2 and the prophet recited over it certain charms1 which were specially revealed to him for the purpose4 ,at every verse of the charms a knot untied itself1 and the prophet experienced a certain relief4 ,if knots are supposed to kill1 they are also supposed to cure4 ,this follows from the belief that to undo the knots which are causing sickness will bring the sufferer relief4 ,but apart from this negative virtue of maleficent knots1 there are certain beneficent knots to which a positive power of healing is ascribed4 ,pliny tells us that some folk cured diseases of the groin by taking a thread from a web1 tying seven or nine knots on it1 and then fastening it to the patient's groin2 but to make the cure effectual it was necessary to name some widow as each knot was tied4 ,o',donovan describes a remedy for fever employed among the ,turcomans4 ,the enchanter takes some camel hair and spins it into a stout thread1 droning a spell the while4 ,next he ties seven knots on the thread1 blowing on each knot before he pulls it tight4 ,this knotted thread is then worn as a bracelet on his wrist by the patient4 ,every day one of the knots is untied and blown upon1 and when the seventh knot is undone the whole thread is rolled up into a ball and thrown into a river1 bearing away 7as they imagine7 the fever with it4 ,again knots may be used by an enchantress to win a lover and attach him firmly to herself4 ,thus the love-sick maid in ,virgil seeks to draw ,daphnis to her from the city by spells and by tying three knots on each of three strings of different colours4 ,so an ,arab maiden1 who had lost her heart to a certain man1 tried to gain his love and bind him to herself by tying knots in his whip2 but her jealous rival undid the knots4 ,on the same principle magic knots may be employed to stop a runaway4 ,in ,swazieland you may often see grass tied in knots at the side of the footpaths4 ,every one of these knots tells of a domestic tragedy4 ,a wife has run away from her husband1 and he and his friends have gone in pursuit1 binding up the paths1 as they call it1 in this fashion to prevent the fugitive from doubling back over them4 ,a net1 from its affluence of knots1 has always been considered in ,russia very efficacious against sorcerers2 hence in some places1 when a bride is being dressed in her wedding attire1 a fishing-net is flung over her to keep her out of harm's way4 ,for a similar purpose the bridegroom and his companions are often girt with pieces of net1 or at least with tight-drawn girdles1 for before a wizard can begin to injure them he must undo all the knots in the net1 or take off the girdles4 ,but often a ,russian amulet is merely a knotted thread4 ,a skein of red wool wound about the arms and legs is thought to ward off agues and fevers2 and nine skeins1 fastened round a child's neck1 are deemed a preservative against scarlatina4 ,in the ,tver ,government a bag of a special kind is tied to the neck of the cow which walks before the rest of a herd1 in order to keep off wolves2 its force binds the maw of the ravening beast4 ,on the same principle1 a padlock is carried thrice round a herd of horses before they go afield in the spring1 and the bearer locks and unlocks it as he goes1 saying1 ,i lock from my herd the mouths of the grey wolves with this steel lock4 ,knots and locks may serve to avert not only wizards and wolves but death itself4 ,when they brought a woman to the stake at ,st4 ,andrews in #aegb to burn her alive for a witch1 they found on her a white cloth like a collar1 with strings and many knots on the strings4 ,they took it from her1 sorely against her will1 for she seemed to think that she could not die in the fire1 if only the cloth with the knotted strings was on her4 ,when it was taken away1 she said1 ,now ,i have no hope of myself4 ,in many parts of ,england it is thought that a person cannot die so long as any locks are locked or bolts shot in the house4 ,it is therefore a very common practice to undo all locks and bolts when the sufferer is plainly near his end1 in order that his agony may not be unduly prolonged4 ,for example1 in the year #ahfc1 at ,taunton1 a child lay sick of scarlatina and death seemed inevitable4 ,a jury of matrons was1 as it were1 empanelled1 and to prevent the child 'dying hard' all the doors in the house1 all the drawers1 all the boxes1 all the cupboards were thrown wide open1 the keys taken out1 and the body of the child placed under a beam1 whereby a sure1 certain1 and easy passage into eternity could be secured4 ,strange to say1 the child declined to avail itself of the facilities for dying so obligingly placed at its disposal by the sagacity and experience of the ,british matrons of ,taunton2 it preferred to live rather than give up the ghost just then4 ,the rule which prescribes that at certain magical and religious ceremonies the hair should hang loose and the feet should be bare is probably based on the same fear of trammelling and impeding the action in hand1 whatever it may be1 by the presence of any knot or constriction1 whether on the head or on the feet of the performer4 ,a similar power to bind and hamper spiritual as well as bodily activities is ascribed by some people to rings4 ,thus in the island of ,carpathus people never button the clothes they put upon a dead body and they are careful to remove all rings from it2 for the spirit1 they say1 can even be detained in the little finger1 and cannot rest4 ,here it is plain that even if the soul is not definitely supposed to issue at death from the finger-tips1 yet the ring is conceived to exercise a certain constrictive influence which detains and imprisons the immortal spirit in spite of its efforts to escape from the tabernacle of clay2 in short the ring1 like the knot1 acts as a spiritual fetter4 ,this may have been the reason of an ancient ,greek maxim1 attributed to ,pythagoras1 which forbade people to wear rings4 ,nobody might enter the ancient ,arcadian sanctuary of the ,mistress at ,lycosura with a ring on his or her finger4 ,persons who consulted the oracle of ,faunus had to be chaste1 to eat no flesh1 and to wear no rings4 ,on the other hand1 the same constriction which hinders the egress of the soul may prevent the entrance of evil spirits2 hence we find rings used as amulets against demons1 witches1 and ghosts4 ,in the ,tyrol it is said that a woman in childbed should never take off her wedding-ring1 or spirits and witches will have power over her4 ,among the ,lapps1 the person who is about to place a corpse in the coffin receives from the husband1 wife1 or children of the deceased a brass ring1 which he must wear fastened to his right arm until the corpse is safely deposited in the grave4 ,the ring is believed to serve the person as an amulet against any harm which the ghost might do to him4 ,how far the custom of wearing finger-rings may have been influenced by1 or even have sprung from1 a belief in their efficacy as amulets to keep the soul in the body1 or demons out of it1 is a question which seems worth considering4 ,here we are only concerned with the belief in so far as it seems to throw light on the rule that the ,flamen ,dialis might not wear a ring unless it were broken4 ,taken in conjunction with the rule which forbade him to have a knot on his garments1 it points to a fear that the powerful spirit embodied in him might be trammelled and hampered in its goings-out and comings-in by such corporeal and spiritual fetters as rings and knots4 ,,xxii4 ,tabooed ,words #a4 ,personal ,names tabooed ,,unable to discriminate clearly between words and things1 the savage commonly fancies that the link between a name and the person or thing denominated by it is not a mere arbitrary and ideal association1 but a real and substantial bond which unites the two in such a way that magic may be wrought on a man just as easily through his name as through his hair1 his nails1 or any other material part of his person4 ,in fact1 primitive man regards his name as a vital portion of himself and takes care of it accordingly4 ,thus1 for example1 the ,north ,american ,indian regards his name1 not as a mere label1 but as a distinct part of his personality1 just as much as are his eyes or his teeth1 and believes that injury will result as surely from the malicious handling of his name as from a wound inflicted on any part of his physical organism4 ,this belief was found among the various tribes from the ,atlantic to the ,pacific1 and has occasioned a number of curious regulations in regard to the concealment and change of names4 ,some ,esquimaux take new names when they are old1 hoping thereby to get a new lease of life4 ,the ,tolampoos of ,celebes believe that if you write a man's name down you can carry off his soul along with it4 ,many savages at the present day regard their names as vital parts of themselves1 and therefore take great pains to conceal their real names1 lest these should give to evil-disposed persons a handle by which to injure their owners4 ,thus1 to begin with the savages who rank at the bottom of the social scale1 we are told that the secrecy with which among the ,australian aborigines personal names are often kept from general knowledge arises in great measure from the belief that an enemy1 who knows your name1 has in it something which he can use magically to your detriment4 ,an ,australian black1 says another writer1 is always very unwilling to tell his real name1 and there is no doubt that this reluctance is due to the fear that through his name he may be injured by sorcerers4 ,amongst the tribes of ,central ,australia every man1 woman1 and child has1 besides a personal name which is in common use1 a secret or sacred name which is bestowed by the older men upon him or her soon after birth1 and which is known to none but the fully initiated members of the group4 ,this secret name is never mentioned except upon the most solemn occasions2 to utter it in the hearing of women or of men of another group would be a most serious breach of tribal custom1 as serious as the most flagrant case of sacrilege among ourselves4 ,when mentioned at all1 the name is spoken only in a whisper1 and not until the most elaborate precautions have been taken that it shall be heard by no one but members of the group4 ,the native thinks that a stranger knowing his secret name would have special power to work him ill by means of magic4 ,the same fear seems to have led to a custom of the same sort amongst the ancient ,egyptians1 whose comparatively high civilisation was strangely dashed and chequered with relics of the lowest savagery4 ,every ,egyptian received two names1 which were known respectively as the true name and the good name1 or the great name and the little name2 and while the good or little name was made public1 the true or great name appears to have been carefully concealed4 ,a ,brahman child receives two names1 one for common use1 the other a secret name which none but his father and mother should know4 ,the latter is only used at ceremonies such as marriage4 ,the custom is intended to protect the person against magic1 since a charm only becomes effectual in combination with the real name4 ,similarly1 the natives of ,nias believe that harm may be done to a person by the demons who hear his name pronounced4 ,hence the names of infants1 who are especially exposed to the assaults of evil sprits1 are never spoken2 and often in haunted spots1 such as the gloomy depths of the forest1 the banks of a river1 or beside a bubbling spring1 men will abstain from calling each other by their names for a like reason4 ,the ,indians of ,chiloe keep their names secret and do not like to have them uttered aloud2 for they say that there are fairies or imps on the mainland or neighbouring islands who1 if they knew folk's names1 would do them an injury2 but so long as they do not know the names1 these mischievous sprites are powerless4 ,the ,araucanians will hardly ever tell a stranger their names because they fear that he would thereby acquire some supernatural power over themselves4 ,asked his name by a stranger1 who is ignorant of their superstitions1 an ,araucanian will answer1 ,i have none4 ,when an ,ojebway is asked his name1 he will look at some bystander and ask him to answer4 ,this reluctance arises from an impression they receive when young1 that if they repeat their own names it will prevent their growth1 and they will be small in stature4 ,on account of this unwillingness to tell their names1 many strangers have fancied that they either have no names or have forgotten them4 ,in this last case no scruple seems to be felt about communicating a man's name to strangers1 and no ill effects appear to be dreaded as a consequence of divulging it2 harm is only done when a name is spoken by its owner4 ,why is this8 and why in particular should a man be thought to stunt his growth by uttering his own name8 ,we may conjecture that to savages who act and think thus a person's name only seems to be a part of himself when it is uttered with his own breath2 uttered by the breath of others it has no vital connexion with him1 and no harm can come to him through it4 ,whereas1 so these primitive philosophers may have argued1 when a man lets his own name pass his lips1 he is parting with a living piece of himself1 and if he persists in so reckless a course he must certainly end by dissipating his energy and shattering his constitution4 ,many a broken-down debauchee1 many a feeble frame wasted with disease1 may have been pointed out by these simple moralists to their awe-struck disciples as a fearful example of the fate that must sooner or later overtake the profligate who indulges immoderately in the seductive habit of mentioning his own name4 ,however we may explain it1 the fact is certain that many a savage evinces the strongest reluctance to pronounce his own name1 while at the same time he makes no objection at all to other people pronouncing it1 and will even invite them to do so for him in order to satisfy the curiosity of an inquisitive stranger4 ,thus in some parts of ,madagascar it is taboo for a person to tell his own name1 but a slave or attendant will answer for him4 ,the same curious inconsistency1 as it may seem to us1 is recorded of some tribes of ,american ,indians4 ,thus we are told that the name of an ,american ,indian is a sacred thing1 not to be divulged by the owner himself without due consideration4 ,one may ask a warrior of any tribe to give his name1 and the question will be met with either a point-blank refusal or the more diplomatic evasion that he cannot understand what is wanted of him4 ,the moment a friend approaches1 the warrior first interrogated will whisper what is wanted1 and the friend can tell the name1 receiving a reciprocation of the courtesy from the other4 ,this general statement applies1 for example1 to the ,indian tribes of ,british ,columbia1 as to whom it is said that one of their strangest prejudices1 which appears to pervade all tribes alike1 is a dislike to telling their names--thus you never get a man's right name from himself2 but they will tell each other's names without hesitation4 ,in the whole of the ,east ,indian ,archipelago the etiquette is the same4 ,as a general rule no one will utter his own name4 ,to enquire1 ,what is your name8 is a very indelicate question in native society4 ,when in the course of administrative or judicial business a native is asked his name1 instead of replying he will look at his comrade to indicate that he is to answer for him1 or he will say straight out1 ,ask him4 ,the superstition is current all over the ,east ,indies without exception1 and it is found also among the ,motu and ,motumotu tribes1 the ,papuans of ,finsch ,haven in ,north ,new ,guinea1 the ,nufoors of ,dutch ,new ,guinea1 and the ,melanesians of the ,bismarck ,archipelago4 ,among many tribes of ,south ,africa men and women never mention their names if they can get any one else to do it for them1 but they do not absolutely refuse when it cannot be avoided4 ,sometimes the embargo laid on personal names is not permanent2 it is conditional on circumstances1 and when these change it ceases to operate4 ,thus when the ,nandi men are away on a foray1 nobody at home may pronounce the names of the absent warriors2 they must be referred to as birds4 ,should a child so far forget itself as to mention one of the distant ones by name1 the mother would rebuke it1 saying1 ,don't talk of the birds who are in the heavens4 ,among the ,bangala of the ,upper ,congo1 while a man is fishing and when he returns with his catch1 his proper name is in abeyance and nobody may mention it4 ,whatever the fisherman's real name may be1 he is called mwele without distinction4 ,the reason is that the river is full of spirits1 who1 if they heard the fisherman's real name1 might so work against him that he would catch little or nothing4 ,even when he has caught his fish and landed with them1 the buyer must still not address him by his proper name1 but must only call him mwele2 for even then1 if the spirits were to hear his proper name1 they would either bear it in mind and serve him out another day1 or they might so mar the fish he had caught that he would get very little for them4 ,hence the fisherman can extract heavy damages from anybody who mentions his name1 or can compel the thoughtless speaker to relieve him of the fish at a good price so as to restore his luck4 ,when the ,sulka of ,new ,britain are near the territory of their enemies the ,gaktei1 they take care not to mention them by their proper name1 believing that were they to do so1 their foes would attack and slay them4 ,hence in these circumstances they speak of the ,gaktei as o lapsiek1 that is1 the rotten tree-trunks1 and they imagine that by calling them that they make the limbs of their dreaded enemies ponderous and clumsy like logs4 ,this example illustrates the extremely materialistic view which these savages take of the nature of words2 they suppose that the mere utterance of an expression signifying clumsiness will homoeopathically affect with clumsiness the limbs of their distant foemen4 ,another illustration of this curious misconception is furnished by a ,caffre superstition that the character of a young thief can be reformed by shouting his name over a boiling kettle of medicated water1 then clapping a lid on the kettle and leaving the name to steep in the water for several days4 ,it is not in the least necessary that the thief should be aware of the use that is being made of his name behind his back2 the moral reformation will be effected without his knowledge4 ,when it is deemed necessary that a man's real name should be kept secret1 it is often customary1 as we have seen1 to call him by a surname or nickname4 ,as distinguished from the real or primary names1 these secondary names are apparently held to be no part of the man himself1 so that they may be freely used and divulged to everybody without endangering his safety thereby4 ,sometimes in order to avoid the use of his own name a man will be called after his child4 ,thus we are informed that the ,gippsland blacks objected strongly to let any one outside the tribe know their names1 lest their enemies1 learning them1 should make them vehicles of incantation1 and so charm their lives away4 ,as children were not thought to have enemies1 they used to speak of a man as 'the father1 uncle1 or cousin of ,so-and-so1' naming a child2 but on all occasions abstained from mentioning the name of a grown-up person4 ,the ,alfoors of ,poso in ,celebes will not pronounce their own names4 ,among them1 accordingly1 if you wish to ascertain a person's name1 you ought not to ask the man himself1 but should enquire of others4 ,but if this is impossible1 for example1 when there is no one else near1 you should ask him his child's name1 and then address him as the ,father of ,so-and-so4 ,nay1 these ,alfoors are shy of uttering the names even of children2 so when a boy or girl has a nephew or niece1 he or she is addressed as ,uncle of ,so-and-so1 or ,aunt of ,so-and-so4 ,in pure ,malay society1 we are told1 a man is never asked his name1 and the custom of naming parents after their children is adopted only as a means of avoiding the use of the parents' own names4 ,the writer who makes this statement adds in confirmation of it that childless persons are named after their younger brothers4 ,among the ,land ,dyaks children as they grow up are called1 according to their sex1 the father or mother of a child of their father's or mother's younger brother or sister1 that is1 they are called the father or mother of what we should call their first cousin4 ,the ,caffres used to think it discourteous to call a bride by her own name1 so they would call her the ,mother of ,so-and-so1 even when she was only betrothed1 far less a wife and a mother4 ,among the ,kukis and ,zemis or ,kacha ,nagas of ,assam parents drop their names after the birth of a child and are named ,father and ,mother of ,so-and-so4 ,childless couples go by the name of the childless father1 the childless mother1 the father of no child1 the mother of no child4 ,the widespread custom of naming a father after his child has sometimes been supposed to spring from a desire on the father's part to assert his paternity1 apparently as a means of obtaining those rights over his children which had previously1 under a system of mother-kin1 been possessed by the mother4 ,but this explanation does not account for the parallel custom of naming the mother after her child1 which seems commonly to co-exist with the practice of naming the father after the child4 ,still less1 if possible1 does it apply to the customs of calling childless couples the father and mother of children which do not exist1 of naming people after their younger brothers1 and of designating children as the uncles and aunts of ,so-and-so1 or as the fathers and mothers of their first cousins4 ,but all these practices are explained in a simple and natural way if we suppose that they originate in a reluctance to utter the real names of persons addressed or directly referred to4 ,that reluctance is probably based partly on a fear of attracting the notice of evil spirits1 partly on a dread of revealing the name to sorcerers1 who would thereby obtain a handle for injuring the owner of the name4 #b4 ,names of ,relations tabooed ,,it might naturally be expected that the reserve so commonly maintained with regard to personal names would be dropped or at least relaxed among relations and friends4 ,but the reverse of this is often the case4 ,it is precisely the persons most intimately connected by blood and especially by marriage to whom the rule applies with the greatest stringency4 ,such people are often forbidden1 not only to pronounce each other's names1 but even to utter ordinary words which resemble or have a single syllable in common with these names4 ,the persons who are thus mutually debarred from mentioning each other's names are especially husbands and wives1 a man and his wife's parents1 and a woman and her husband's father4 ,for example1 among the ,caffres a woman may not publicly pronounce the birth-name of her husband or of any of his brothers1 nor may she use the interdicted word in its ordinary sense4 ,if her husband1 for instance1 be called u-,mpaka1 from impaka1 a small feline animal1 she must speak of that beast by some other name4 ,further1 a ,caffre wife is forbidden to pronounce even mentally the names of her father-in-law and of all her husband's male relations in the ascending line2 and whenever the emphatic syllable of any of their names occurs in another word1 she must avoid it by substituting either an entirely new word1 or1 at least1 another syllable in its place4 ,hence this custom has given rise to an almost distinct language among the women1 which the ,caffres call women's speech4 ,the interpretation of this women's speech is naturally very difficult1 for no definite rules can be given for the formation of these substituted words1 nor is it possible to form a dictionary of them1 their number being so great--since there may be many women1 even in the same tribe1 who would be no more at liberty to use the substitutes employed by some others1 than they are to use the original words themselves4 ,a ,caffre man1 on his side1 may not mention the name of his mother-in-law1 nor may she pronounce his2 but he is free to utter words in which the emphatic syllable of her name occurs4 ,a ,kirghiz woman dares not pronounce the names of the older relations of her husband1 nor even use words which resemble them in sound4 ,for example1 if one of these relations is called ,shepherd1 she may not speak of sheep1 but must call them the bleating ones2 if his name is ,lamb1 she must refer to lambs as the young bleating ones4 ,in ,southern ,india wives believe that to tell their husband's name or to pronounce it even in a dream would bring him to an untimely end4 ,among the ,sea ,dyaks a man may not pronounce the name of his father-in-law or mother-in-law without incurring the wrath of the spirits4 ,and since he reckons as his father-in-law and mother-in-law not only the father and mother of his own wife1 but also the fathers and mothers of his brothers' wives and sisters' husbands1 and likewise the fathers and mothers of all his cousins1 the number of tabooed names may be very considerable and the opportunities of error correspondingly numerous4 ,to make confusion worse confounded1 the names of persons are often the names of common things1 such as moon1 bridge1 barley1 cobra1 leopard2 so that when any of a man's many fathers-in-law and mothers-in-law are called by such names1 these common words may not pass his lips4 ,among the ,alfoors of ,minahassa1 in ,celebes1 the custom is carried still further so as to forbid the use even of words which merely resemble the personal names in sound4 ,it is especially the name of a father-in-law which is thus laid under an interdict4 ,if he1 for example1 is called ,kalala1 his son-in-law may not speak of a horse by its common name kawalo2 he must call it a riding-beast 7sasakajan74 ,so among the ,alfoors of the island of ,buru it is taboo to mention the names of parents and parents-in-law1 or even to speak of common objects by words which resemble these names in sound4 ,thus1 if your mother-in-law is called ,dalu1 which means betel1 you may not ask for betel by its ordinary name1 you must ask for red mouth2 if you want betel-leaf1 you may not say betel-leaf 7dalu 'mun71 you must say karon fenna4 ,in the same island it is also taboo to mention the name of an elder brother in his presence4 ,transgressions of these rules are punished with fines4 ,in ,sunda it is thought that a particular crop would be spoilt if a man were to mention the names of his father and mother4 ,among the ,nufoors of ,dutch ,new ,guinea persons who are related to each other by marriage are forbidden to mention each other's names4 ,among the connexions whose names are thus tabooed are wife1 mother-in-law1 father-in-law1 your wife's uncles and aunts and also her grand-uncles and grand-aunts1 and the whole of your wife's or your husband's family in the same generation as yourself1 except that men may mention the names of their brothers-in-law1 though women may not4 ,the taboo comes into operation as soon as the betrothal has taken place and before the marriage has been celebrated4 ,families thus connected by the betrothal of two of their members are not only forbidden to pronounce each other's names2 they may not even look at each other1 and the rule gives rise to the most comical scenes when they happen to meet unexpectedly4 ,and not merely the names themselves1 but any words that sound like them are scrupulously avoided and other words used in their place4 ,if it should chance that a person has inadvertently uttered a forbidden name1 he must at once throw himself on the floor and say1 ,i have mentioned a wrong name4 ,i throw it through the chinks of the floor in order that ,i may eat well4 ,in the western islands of ,torres ,straits a man never mentioned the personal names of his father-in-law1 mother-in-law1 brother-in-law1 and sister-in-law2 and a woman was subject to the same restrictions4 ,a brother-in-law might be spoken of as the husband or brother of some one whose name it was lawful to mention2 and similarly a sister-in-law might be called the wife of ,so-and-so4 ,if a man by chance used the personal name of his brother-in-law1 he was ashamed and hung his head4 ,his shame was only relieved when he had made a present as compensation to the man whose name he had taken in vain4 ,the same compensation was made to a sister-in-law1 a father-in-law1 and a mother-in-law for the accidental mention of their names4 ,among the natives who inhabit the coast of the ,gazelle ,peninsula in ,new ,britain to mention the name of a brother-in-law is the grossest possible affront you can offer to him2 it is a crime punishable with death4 ,in the ,banks' ,islands1 ,melanesia1 the taboos laid on the names of persons connected by marriage are very strict4 ,a man will not mention the name of his father-in-law1 much less the name of his mother-in-law1 nor may he name his wife's brother2 but he may name his wife's sister--she is nothing to him4 ,a woman may not name her father-in-law1 nor on any account her son-in-law4 ,two people whose children have intermarried are also debarred from mentioning each other's names4 ,and not only are all these persons forbidden to utter each other's names2 they may not even pronounce ordinary words which chance to be either identical with these names or to have any syllables in common with them4 ,thus we hear of a native of these islands who might not use the common words for pig and to die1 because these words occurred in the polysyllabic name of his son-in-law2 and we are told of another unfortunate who might not pronounce the everyday words for hand and hot on account of his wife's brother's name1 and who was even debarred from mentioning the number one1 because the word for one formed part of the name of his wife's cousin4 ,the reluctance to mention the names or even syllables of the names of persons connected with the speaker by marriage can hardly be separated from the reluctance evinced by so many people to utter their own names or the names of the dead or of the dead or of chiefs and kings2 and if the reticence as to these latter names springs mainly from superstition1 we may infer that the reticence as to the former has no better foundation4 ,that the savage's unwillingness to mention his own name is based1 at least in part1 on a superstitious fear of the ill use that might be made of it by his foes1 whether human or spiritual1 has already been shown4 ,it remains to examine the similar usage in regard to the names of the dead and of royal personages4 #c4 ,names of the ,dead tabooed ,,the ,,custom of abstaining from all mention of the names of the dead was observed in antiquity by the ,albanians of the ,caucasus1 and at the present day it is in full force among many savage tribes4 ,thus we are told that one of the customs most rigidly observed and enforced amongst the ,australian aborigines is never to mention the name of a deceased person1 whether male or female2 to name aloud one who has departed this life would be a gross violation of their most sacred prejudices1 and they carefully abstain from it4 ,the chief motive for this abstinence appears to be a fear of evoking the ghost1 although the natural unwillingness to revive past sorrows undoubtedly operates also to draw the veil of oblivion over the names of the dead4 ,once ,mr4 ,oldfield so terrified a native by shouting out the name of a deceased person1 that the man fairly took to his heels and did not venture to show himself again for several days4 ,at their next meeting he bitterly reproached the rash white man for his indiscretion2 nor could ,i1 adds ,mr4 ,oldfield1 induce him by any means to utter the awful sound of a dead man's name1 for by so doing he would have placed himself in the power of the malign spirits4 ,among the aborigines of ,victoria the dead were very rarely spoken of1 and then never by their names2 they were referred to in a subdued voice as the lost one or the poor fellow that is no more4 ,to speak of them by name would1 it was supposed1 excite the malignity of ,couit-gil1 the spirit of the departed1 which hovers on earth for a time before it departs for ever towards the setting sun4 ,of the tribes on the ,lower ,murray ,river we are told that when a person dies they carefully avoid mentioning his name2 but if compelled to do so1 they pronounce it in a very low whisper1 so faint that they imagine the spirit cannot hear their voice4 ,amongst the tribes of ,central ,australia no one may utter the name of the deceased during the period of mourning1 unless it is absolutely necessary to do so1 and then it is only done in a whisper for fear of disturbing and annoying the man's spirit which is walking about in ghostly form4 ,if the ghost hears his name mentioned he concludes that his kinsfolk are not mourning for him properly2 if their grief were genuine they could not bear to bandy his name about4 ,touched to the quick by their hard-hearted indifference the indignant ghost will come and trouble them in dreams4 ,the same reluctance to utter the names of the dead appears to prevail among all the ,indian tribes of ,america from ,hudson's ,bay ,territory to ,patagonia4 ,among the ,goajiros of ,colombia to mention the dead before his kinsmen is a dreadful offence1 which is often punished with death2 for if it happens on the rancho of the deceased1 in presence of his nephew or uncle1 they will assuredly kill the offender on the spot if they can4 ,but if he escapes1 the penalty resolves itself into a heavy fine1 usually of two or more oxen4 ,a similar reluctance to mention the names of the dead is reported of peoples so widely separated from each other as the ,samoyeds of ,siberia and the ,todas of ,southern ,india2 the ,mongols of ,tartary and the ,tuaregs of the ,sahara2 the ,ainos of ,japan and the ,akamba and ,nandi of ,eastern ,africa2 the ,tinguianes of the ,philippines and the inhabitants of the ,nicobar ,islands1 of ,borneo1 of ,madagascar1 and of ,tasmania4 ,in all cases1 even where it is not expressly stated1 the fundamental reason for this avoidance is probably the fear of the ghost4 ,that this is the real motive with the ,tuaregs we are positively informed4 ,they dread the return of the dead man's spirit1 and do all they can to avoid it by shifting their camp after a death1 ceasing for ever to pronounce the name of the departed1 and eschewing everything that might be regarded as an evocation or recall of his soul4 ,hence they do not1 like the ,arabs1 designate individuals by adding to their personal names the names of their fathers2 they never speak of ,so-and-so1 son of ,so-and-so2 they give to every man a name which will live and die with him4 ,so among some of the ,victorian tribes in ,australia personal names were rarely perpetuated1 because the natives believed that any one who adopted the name of a deceased person would not live long2 probably his ghostly namesake was supposed to come and fetch him away to the spirit-land4 ,the same fear of the ghost1 which moves people to suppress his old name1 naturally leads all persons who bear a similar name to exchange it for another1 lest its utterance should attract the attention of the ghost1 who cannot reasonably be expected to discriminate between all the different applications of the same name4 ,thus we are told that in the ,adelaide and ,encounter ,bay tribes of ,south ,australia the repugnance to mentioning the names of those who have died lately is carried so far1 that persons who bear the same name as the deceased abandon it1 and either adopt temporary names or are known by any others that happen to belong to them4 ,a similar custom prevails among some of the ,queensland tribes2 but the prohibition to use the names of the dead is not permanent1 though it may last for many years4 ,in some ,australian tribes the change of name thus brought about is permanent2 the old name is laid aside for ever1 and the man is known by his new name for the rest of his life1 or at least until he is obliged to change it again for a like reason4 ,among the ,north ,american ,indians all persons1 whether men or women1 who bore the name of one who had just died were obliged to abandon it and to adopt other names1 which was formally done at the first ceremony of mourning for the dead4 ,in some tribes to the east of the ,rocky ,mountains this change of name lasted only during the season of mourning1 but in other tribes on the ,pacific ,coast of ,north ,america it seems to have been permanent4 ,sometimes by an extension of the same reasoning all the near relations of the deceased change their names1 whatever they may happen to be1 doubtless from a fear that the sound of the familiar names might lure back the vagrant spirit to its old home4 ,thus in some ,victorian tribes the ordinary names of all the next of kin were disused during the period of mourning1 and certain general terms1 prescribed by custom1 were substituted for them4 ,to call a mourner by his own name was considered an insult to the departed1 and often led to fighting and bloodshed4 ,among ,indian tribes of ,north-western ,america near relations of the deceased often change their names under an impression that spirits will be attracted back to earth if they hear familiar names often repeated4 ,among the ,kiowa ,indians the name of the dead is never spoken in the presence of the relatives1 and on the death of any member of a family all the others take new names4 ,this custom was noted by ,raleigh's colonists on ,roanoke ,island more than three centuries ago4 ,among the ,lengua ,indians not only is a dead man's name never mentioned1 but all the survivors change their names also4 ,they say that ,death has been among them and has carried off a list of the living1 and that he will soon come back for more victims2 hence in order to defeat his fell purpose they change their names1 believing that on his return ,death1 though he has got them all on his list1 will not be able to identify them under their new names1 and will depart to pursue the search elsewhere4 ,nicobarese mourners take new names in order to escape the unwelcome attentions of the ghost2 and for the same purpose they disguise themselves by shaving their heads so that the ghost is unable to recognise them4 ,further1 when the name of the deceased happens to be that of some common object1 such as an animal1 or plant1 or fire1 or water1 it is sometimes considered necessary to drop that word in ordinary speech and replace it by another4 ,a custom of this sort1 it is plain1 may easily be a potent agent of change in language2 for where it prevails to any considerable extent many words must constantly become obsolete and new ones spring up4 ,and this tendency has been remarked by observers who have recorded the custom in ,australia1 ,america1 and elsewhere4 ,for example1 with regard to the ,australian aborigines it has been noted that the dialects change with almost every tribe4 ,some tribes name their children after natural objects2 and when the person so named dies1 the word is never again mentioned2 another word has therefore to be invented for the object after which the child was called4 ,the writer gives as an instance the case of a man whose name ,karla signified fire2 when ,karla died1 a new word for fire had to be introduced4 ,hence1 adds the writer1 the language is always changing4 ,again1 in the ,encounter ,bay tribe of ,south ,australia1 if a man of the name of ,ngnke1 which means water1 were to die1 the whole tribe would be obliged to use some other word to express water for a considerable time after his decease4 ,the writer who records this custom surmises that it may explain the presence of a number of synonyms in the language of the tribe4 ,this conjecture is confirmed by what we know of some ,victorian tribes whose speech comprised a regular set of synonyms to be used instead of the common terms by all members of a tribe in times of mourning4 ,for instance1 if a man called ,waa 7 crow7 departed this life1 during the period of mourning for him nobody might call a crow a waa2 everybody had to speak of the bird as a narrapart4 ,when a person who rejoiced in the title of ,ringtail ,opossum 7weearn7 had gone the way of all flesh1 his sorrowing relations and the tribe at large were bound for a time to refer to ringtail opossums by the more sonorous name of manuungkuurt4 ,if the community were plunged in grief for the loss of a respected female who bore the honourable name of ,turkey ,bustard1 the proper name for turkey bustards1 which was barrim barrim1 went out1 and tillit tilliitsh came in4 ,and so mutatis mutandis with the names of ,black ,cockatoo1 ,grey ,duck1 ,gigantic ,crane1 ,kangaroo1 ,eagle1 ,dingo1 and the rest4 ,a similar custom used to be constantly transforming the language of the ,abipones of ,paraguay1 amongst whom1 however1 a word once abolished seems never to have been revived4 ,new words1 says the missionary ,dobrizhoffer1 sprang up every year like mushrooms in a night1 because all words that resembled the names of the dead were abolished by proclamation and others coined in their place4 ,the mint of words was in the hands of the old women of the tribe1 and whatever term they stamped with their approval and put in circulation was immediately accepted without a murmur by high and low alike1 and spread like wildfire through every camp and settlement of the tribe4 ,you would be astonished1 says the same missionary1 to see how meekly the whole nation acquiesces in the decision of a withered old hag1 and how completely the old familiar words fall instantly out of use and are never repeated either through force of habit or forgetfulness4 ,in the seven years that ,dobrizhoffer spent among these ,indians the native word for jaguar was changed thrice1 and the words for crocodile1 thorn1 and the slaughter of cattle underwent similar though less varied vicissitudes4 ,as a result of this habit1 the vocabularies of the missionaries teemed with erasures1 old words having constantly to be struck out as obsolete and new ones inserted in their place4 ,in many tribes of ,british ,new ,guinea the names of persons are also the names of common things4 ,the people believe that if the name of a deceased person is pronounced1 his spirit will return1 and as they have no wish to see it back among them the mention of his name is tabooed and a new word is created to take its place1 whenever the name happens to be a common term of the language4 ,consequently many words are permanently lost or revived with modified or new meanings4 ,in the ,nicobar ,islands a similar practice has similarly affected the speech of the natives4 ,a most singular custom1 says ,mr4 de ,roepstorff1 prevails among them which one would suppose must most effectually hinder the 'making of history1' or1 at any rate1 the transmission of historical narrative4 ,by a strict rule1 which has all the sanction of ,nicobar superstition1 no man's name may be mentioned after his death6 ,to such a length is this carried that when1 as very frequently happens1 the man rejoiced in the name of ',fowl1' ',hat'1 ',fire1' ',road1' etc41 in its ,nicobarese equivalent1 the use of these words is carefully eschewed for the future1 not only as being the personal designation of the deceased1 but even as the names of the common things they represent2 the words die out of the language1 and either new vocables are coined to express the thing intended1 or a substitute for the disused word is found in other ,nicobarese dialects or in some foreign tongue4 ,this extraordinary custom not only adds an element of instability to the language1 but destroys the continuity of political life1 and renders the record of past events precarious and vague1 if not impossible4 ,that a superstition which suppresses the names of the dead must cut at the very root of historical tradition has been remarked by other workers in this field4 ,the ,klamath people1 observes ,mr4 ,a4 ,s4 ,gatschet1 possess no historic traditions going further back in time than a century1 for the simple reason that there was a strict law prohibiting the mention of the person or acts of a deceased individual by using his name4 ,this law was rigidly observed among the ,californians no less than among the ,oregonians1 and on its transgression the death penalty could be inflicted4 ,this is certainly enough to suppress all historical knowledge within a people4 ,how can history be written without names8 ,in many tribes1 however1 the power of this superstition to blot out the memory of the past is to some extent weakened and impaired by a natural tendency of the human mind4 ,time1 which wears out the deepest impressions1 inevitably dulls1 if it does not wholly efface1 the print left on the savage mind by the mystery and horror of death4 ,sooner or later1 as the memory of his loved ones fades slowly away1 he becomes more willing to speak of them1 and thus their rude names may sometimes be rescued by the philosophic enquirer before they have vanished1 like autumn leaves or winter snows1 into the vast undistinguished limbo of the past4 ,in some of the ,victorian tribes the prohibition to mention the names of the dead remained in force only during the period of mourning2 in the ,port ,lincoln tribe of ,south ,australia it lasted many years4 ,among the ,chinook ,indians of ,north ,america custom forbids the mention of a dead man's name1 at least till many years have elapsed after the bereavement4 ,among the ,puyallup ,indians the observance of the taboo is relaxed after several years1 when the mourners have forgotten their grief2 and if the deceased was a famous warrior1 one of his descendants1 for instance a great-grandson1 may be named after him4 ,in this tribe the taboo is not much observed at any time except by the relations of the dead4 ,similarly the ,jesuit missionary ,lafitau tells us that the name of the departed and the similar names of the survivors were1 so to say1 buried with the corpse until1 the poignancy of their grief being abated1 it pleased the relations to lift up the tree and raise the dead4 ,by raising the dead they meant bestowing the name of the departed upon some one else1 who thus became to all intents and purposes a reincarnation of the deceased1 since on the principles of savage philosophy the name is a vital part1 if not the soul1 of the man4 ,among the ,lapps1 when a woman was with child and near the time of her delivery1 a deceased ancestor or relation used to appear to her in a dream and inform her what dead person was to be born again in her infant1 and whose name the child was therefore to bear4 ,if the woman had no such dream1 it fell to the father or the relatives to determine the name by divination or by consulting a wizard4 ,among the ,khonds a birth is celebrated on the seventh day after the event by a feast given to the priest and to the whole village4 ,to determine the child's name the priest drops grains of rice into a cup of water1 naming with each grain a deceased ancestor4 ,from the movements of the seed in the water1 and from observations made on the person of the infant1 he pronounces which of his progenitors has reappeared in him1 and the child generally1 at least among the northern tribes1 receives the name of that ancestor4 ,among the ,yorubas1 soon after a child has been born1 a priest of ,ifa1 the god of divination1 appears on the scene to ascertain what ancestral soul has been reborn in the infant4 ,as soon as this has been decided1 the parents are told that the child must conform in all respects to the manner of life of the ancestor who now animates him or her1 and if1 as often happens1 they profess ignorance1 the priest supplies the necessary information4 ,the child usually receives the name of the ancestor who has been born again in him4 #d4 ,names of ,kings and other ,sacred ,persons tabooed ,,when we see that in primitive society the names of mere commoners1 whether alive or dead1 are matters of such anxious care1 we need not be surprised that great precautions should be taken to guard from harm the names of sacred kings and priests4 ,thus the name of the king of ,dahomey is always kept secret1 lest the knowledge of it should enable some evil-minded person to do him a mischief4 ,the appellations by which the different kings of ,dahomey have been known to ,europeans are not their true names1 but mere titles1 or what the natives call strong names4 ,the natives seem to think that no harm comes of such titles being known1 since they are not1 like the birth-names1 vitally connected with their owners4 ,in the ,galla kingdom of ,ghera the birth-name of the sovereign may not be pronounced by a subject under pain of death1 and common words which resemble it in sound are changed for others4 ,among the ,bahima of ,central ,africa1 when the king dies1 his name is abolished from the language1 and if his name was that of an animal1 a new appellation must be found for the creature at once4 ,for example1 the king is often called a lion2 hence at the death of a king named ,lion a new name for lions in general has to be coined4 ,in ,siam it used to be difficult to ascertain the king's real name1 since it was carefully kept secret from fear of sorcery2 any one who mentioned it was clapped into gaol4 ,the king might only be referred to under certain high-sounding titles1 such as the august1 the perfect1 the supreme1 the great emperor1 descendant of the angels1 and so on4 ,in ,burma it was accounted an impiety of the deepest dye to mention the name of the reigning sovereign2 ,burmese subjects1 even when they were far from their country1 could not be prevailed upon to do so2 after his accession to the throne the king was known by his royal titles only4 ,among the ,zulus no man will mention the name of the chief of his tribe or the names of the progenitors of the chief1 so far as he can remember them2 nor will he utter common words which coincide with or merely resemble in sound tabooed names4 ,in the tribe of the ,dwandwes there was a chief called ,langa1 which means the sun2 hence the name of the sun was changed from langa to gala1 and so remains to this day1 though ,langa died more than a hundred years ago4 ,again1 in the ,xnumayo tribe the word meaning to herd cattle was changed from alusa or ayusa to kagesa1 because u-,mayusi was the name of the chief4 ,besides these taboos1 which were observed by each tribe separately1 all the ,zulu tribes united in tabooing the name of the king who reigned over the whole nation4 ,hence1 for example1 when ,panda was king of ,zululand1 the word for a root of a tree1 which is impando1 was changed to nxabo4 ,again1 the word for lies or slander was altered from amacebo to amakwata1 because amacebo contains a syllable of the name of the famous ,king ,cetchwayo4 ,these substitutions are not1 however1 carried so far by the men as by the women1 who omit every sound even remotely resembling one that occurs in a tabooed name4 ,at the king's kraal1 indeed1 it is sometimes difficult to understand the speech of the royal wives1 as they treat in this fashion the names not only of the king and his forefathers1 but even of his and their brothers back for generations4 ,when to these tribal and national taboos we add those family taboos on the names of connexions by marriage which have been already described1 we can easily understand how it comes about that in ,zululand every tribe has words peculiar to itself1 and that the women have a considerable vocabulary of their own4 ,members1 too1 of one family may be debarred from using words employed by those of another4 ,the women of one kraal1 for instance1 may call a hyaena by its ordinary name2 those of the next may use the common substitute2 while in a third the substitute may also be unlawful and another term may have to be invented to supply its place4 ,hence the ,zulu language at the present day almost presents the appearance of being a double one2 indeed1 for multitudes of things it possesses three or four synonyms1 which through the blending of tribes are known all over ,zululand4 ,in ,madagascar a similar custom everywhere prevails and has resulted1 as among the ,zulus1 in producing certain dialectic differences in the speech of the various tribes4 ,there are no family names in ,madagascar1 and almost every personal name is drawn from the language of daily life and signifies some common object or action or quality1 such as a bird1 a beast1 a tree1 a plant1 a colour1 and so on4 ,now1 whenever one of these common words forms the name or part of the name of the chief of the tribe1 it becomes sacred and may no longer be used in its ordinary signification as the name of a tree1 an insect1 or what not4 ,hence a new name for the object must be invented to replace the one which has been discarded4 ,it is easy to conceive what confusion and uncertainty may thus be introduced into a language when it is spoken by many little local tribes each ruled by a petty chief with his own sacred name4 ,yet there are tribes and people who submit to this tyranny of words as their fathers did before them from time immemorial4 ,the inconvenient results of the custom are especially marked on the western coast of the island1 where1 on account of the large number of independent chieftains1 the names of things1 places1 and rivers have suffered so many changes that confusion often arises1 for when once common words have been banned by the chiefs the natives will not acknowledge to have ever known them in their old sense4 ,but it is not merely the names of living kings and chiefs which are tabooed in ,madagascar2 the names of dead sovereigns are equally under a ban1 at least in some parts of the island4 ,thus among the ,sakalavas1 when a king has died1 the nobles and people meet in council round the dead body and solemnly choose a new name by which the deceased monarch shall be henceforth known4 ,after the new name has been adopted1 the old name by which the king was known during his life becomes sacred and may not be pronounced under pain of death4 ,further1 words in the common language which bear any resemblance to the forbidden name also become sacred and have to be replaced by others4 ,persons who uttered these forbidden words were looked on not only as grossly rude1 but even as felons2 they had committed a capital crime4 ,however1 these changes of vocabulary are confined to the district over which the deceased king reigned2 in the neighbouring districts the old words continue to be employed in the old sense4 ,the sanctity attributed to the persons of chiefs in ,polynesia naturally extended also to their names1 which on the primitive view are hardly separable from the personality of their owners4 ,hence in ,polynesia we find the same systematic prohibition to utter the names of chiefs or of common words resembling them which we have already met with in ,zululand and ,madagascar4 ,thus in ,new ,zealand the name of a chief is held so sacred that1 when it happens to be a common word1 it may not be used in the language1 and another has to be found to replace it4 ,for example1 a chief of the southward of ,east ,cape bore the name of ,maripi1 which signified a knife1 hence a new word 7nekra7 for knife was introduced1 and the old one became obsolete4 ,elsewhere the word for water 7wai7 had to be changed1 because it chanced to be the name of the chief1 and would have been desecrated by being applied to the vulgar fluid as well as to his sacred person4 ,this taboo naturally produced a plentiful crop of synonyms in the ,maori language1 and travellers newly arrived in the country were sometimes puzzled at finding the same things called by quite different names in neighbouring tribes4 ,when a king comes to the throne in ,tahiti1 any words in the language that resemble his name in sound must be changed for others4 ,in former times1 if any man were so rash as to disregard this custom and to use the forbidden words1 not only he but all his relations were immediately put to death4 ,but the changes thus introduced were only temporary2 on the death of the king the new words fell into disuse1 and the original ones were revived4 ,in ancient ,greece the names of the priests and other high officials who had to do with the performance of the ,eleusinian mysteries might not be uttered in their lifetime4 ,to pronounce them was a legal offence ,the pedant in ,lucian tells how he fell in with these august personages haling along to the police court a ribald fellow who had dared to name them1 though well he knew that ever since their consecration it was unlawful to do so1 because they had become anonymous1 having lost their old names and acquired new and sacred titles4 ,from two inscriptions found at ,eleusis it appears that the names of the priests were committed to the depths of the sea2 probably they were engraved on tablets of bronze or lead1 which were then thrown into deep water in the ,gulf of ,salamis4 ,the intention doubtless was to keep the names a profound secret2 and how could that be done more surely than by sinking them in the sea8 what human vision could spy them glimmering far down in the dim depths of the green water8 ,a clearer illustration of the confusion between the incorporeal and the corporeal1 between the name and its material embodiment1 could hardly be found than in this practice of civilised ,greece4 #e4 ,names of ,gods tabooed ,,primitive man creates his gods in his own image4 ,xenophanes remarked long ago that the complexion of negro gods was black and their noses flat2 that ,thracian gods were ruddy and blue-eyed2 and that if horses1 oxen1 and lions only believed in gods and had hands wherewith to portray them1 they would doubtless fashion their deities in the form of horses1 and oxen1 and lions4 ,hence just as the furtive savage conceals his real name because he fears that sorcerers might make an evil use of it1 so he fancies that his gods must likewise keep their true name secret1 lest other gods or even men should learn the mystic sounds and thus be able to conjure with them4 ,nowhere was this crude conception of the secrecy and magical virtue of the divine name more firmly held or more fully developed than in ancient ,egypt1 where the superstitions of a dateless past were embalmed in the hearts of the people hardly less effectually than the bodies of cats and crocodiles and the rest of the divine menagerie in their rock-cut tombs4 ,the conception is well illustrated by a story which tells how the subtle ,isis wormed his secret name from ,ra1 the great ,egyptian god of the sun4 ,isis1 so runs the tale1 was a woman mighty in words1 and she was weary of the world of men1 and yearned after the world of the gods4 ,and she meditated in her heart1 saying1 ,cannot ,i by virtue of the great name of ,ra make myself a goddess and reign like him in heaven and earth8 ,for ,ra had many names1 but the great name which gave him all power over gods and men was known to none but himself4 ,now the god was by this time grown old2 he slobbered at the mouth and his spittle fell upon the ground4 ,so ,isis gathered up the spittle and the earth with it1 and kneaded thereof a serpent and laid it in the path where the great god passed every day to his double kingdom after his heart's desire4 ,and when he came forth according to his wont1 attended by all his company of gods1 the sacred serpent stung him1 and the god opened his mouth and cried1 and his cry went up to heaven4 ,and the company of gods cried1 ,what aileth thee8 and the gods shouted1 ,lo and behold6 ,but he could not answer2 his jaws rattled1 his limbs shook1 the poison ran through his flesh as the ,nile floweth over the land4 ,when the great god had stilled his heart1 he cried to his followers1 ,come to me1 ,o my children1 offspring of my body4 ,i am a prince1 the son of a prince1 the divine seed of a god4 ,my father devised my name2 my father and my mother gave me my name1 and it remained hidden in my body since my birth1 that no magician might have magic power over me4 ,i went out to behold that which ,i have made1 ,i walked in the two lands which ,i have created1 and lo6 something stung me4 ,what it was1 ,i know not4 ,was it fire8 was it water8 ,my heart is on fire1 my flesh trembleth1 all my limbs do quake4 ,bring me the children of the gods with healing words and understanding lips1 whose power reacheth to heaven4 ,then came to him the children of the gods1 and they were very sorrowful4 ,and ,isis came with her craft1 whose mouth is full of the breath of life1 whose spells chase pain away1 whose word maketh the dead to live4 ,she said1 ,what is it1 divine ,father8 what is it8 ,the holy god opened his mouth1 he spake and said1 ,i went upon my way1 ,i walked after my heart's desire in the two regions which ,i have made to behold that which ,i have created1 and lo6 a serpent that ,i saw not stung me4 ,is it fire8 is it water8 ,i am colder than water1 ,i am hotter than fire1 all my limbs sweat1 ,i tremble1 mine eye is not steadfast1 ,i behold not the sky1 the moisture bedeweth my face as in summer-time4 ,then spake ,isis1 ,tell me thy name1 divine ,father1 for the man shall live who is called by his name4 ,then answered ,ra1 ,i created the heavens and the earth1 ,i ordered the mountains1 ,i made the great and wide sea1 ,i stretched out the two horizons like a curtain4 ,i am he who openeth his eyes and it is light1 and who shutteth them and it is dark4 ,at his command the ,nile riseth1 but the gods know not his name4 ,i am ,khepera in the morning1 ,i am ,ra at noon1 ,i am ,tum at eve4 ,but the poison was not taken away from him2 it pierced deeper1 and the great god could no longer walk4 ,then said ,isis to him1 ,that was not thy name that thou spakest unto me4 ,oh tell it me1 that the poison may depart2 for he shall live whose name is named4 ,now the poison burned like fire1 it was hotter than the flame of fire4 ,the god said1 ,i consent that ,isis shall search into me1 and that my name shall pass from my breast into hers4 ,then the god hid himself from the gods1 and his place in the ship of eternity was empty4 ,thus was the name of the great god taken from him1 and ,isis1 the witch1 spake1 ,flow away1 poison1 depart from ,ra4 ,it is ,i1 even ,i1 who overcome the poison and cast it to the earth2 for the name of the great god hath been taken away from him4 ,let ,ra live and let the poison die4 ,thus spake great ,isis1 the queen of the gods1 she who knows ,ra and his true name4 ,from this story it appears that the real name of the god1 with which his power was inextricably bound up1 was supposed to be lodged1 in an almost physical sense1 somewhere in his breast1 from which ,isis extracted it by a sort of surgical operation and transferred it with all its supernatural powers to herself4 ,in ,egypt attempts like that of ,isis to appropriate the power of a high god by possessing herself of his name were not mere legends told of the mythical beings of a remote past2 every ,egyptian magician aspired to wield like powers by similar means4 ,for it was believed that he who possessed the true name possessed the very being of god or man1 and could force even a deity to obey him as a slave obeys his master4 ,thus the art of the magician consisted in obtaining from the gods a revelation of their sacred names1 and he left no stone unturned to accomplish his end4 ,when once a god in a moment of weakness or forgetfulness had imparted to the wizard the wondrous lore1 the deity had no choice but to submit humbly to the man or pay the penalty of his contumacy4 ,the belief in the magic virtue of divine names was shared by the ,romans4 ,when they sat down before a city1 the priests addressed the guardian deity of the place in a set form of prayer or incantation1 inviting him to abandon the beleaguered city and come over to the ,romans1 who would treat him as well as or better than he had ever been treated in his old home4 ,hence the name of the guardian deity of ,rome was kept a profound secret1 lest the enemies of the republic might lure him away1 even as the ,romans themselves had induced many gods to desert1 like rats1 the falling fortunes of cities that had sheltered them in happier days4 ,nay1 the real name1 not merely of its guardian deity1 but of the city itself1 was wrapt in mystery and might never be uttered1 not even in the sacred rites4 ,a certain ,valerius ,soranus1 who dared to divulge the priceless secret1 was put to death or came to a bad end4 ,in like manner1 it seems1 the ancient ,assyrians were forbidden to mention the mystic names of their cities2 and down to modern times the ,cheremiss of the ,caucasus keep the names of their communal villages secret from motives of superstition4 ,if the reader has had the patience to follow this examination of the superstitions attaching to personal names1 he will probably agree that the mystery in which the names of royal personages are so often shrouded is no isolated phenomenon1 no arbitrary expression of courtly servility and adulation1 but merely the particular application of a general law of primitive thought1 which includes within its scope common folk and gods as well as kings and priests4 ,,xxiii4 ,our ,debt to the ,savage ,,it would be easy to extend the list of royal and priestly taboos1 but the instances collected in the preceding pages may suffice as specimens4 ,to conclude this part of our subject it only remains to state summarily the general conclusions to which our enquiries have thus far conducted us4 ,we have seen that in savage or barbarous society there are often found men to whom the superstition of their fellows ascribes a controlling influence over the general course of nature4 ,such men are accordingly adored and treated as gods4 ,whether these human divinities also hold temporal sway over the lives and fortunes of their adorers1 or whether their functions are purely spiritual and supernatural1 in other words1 whether they are kings as well as gods or only the latter1 is a distinction which hardly concerns us here4 ,their supposed divinity is the essential fact with which we have to deal4 ,in virtue of it they are a pledge and guarantee to their worshippers of the continuance and orderly succession of those physical phenomena upon which mankind depends for subsistence4 ,naturally1 therefore1 the life and health of such a god-man are matters of anxious concern to the people whose welfare and even existence are bound up with his2 naturally he is constrained by them to conform to such rules as the wit of early man has devised for averting the ills to which flesh is heir1 including the last ill1 death4 ,these rules1 as an examination of them has shown1 are nothing but the maxims with which1 on the primitive view1 every man of common prudence must comply if he would live long in the land4 ,but while in the case of ordinary men the observance of the rules is left to the choice of the individual1 in the case of the god-man it is enforced under penalty of dismissal from his high station1 or even of death4 ,for his worshippers have far too great a stake in his life to allow him to play fast and loose with it4 ,therefore all the quaint superstitions1 the old-world maxims1 the venerable saws which the ingenuity of savage philosophers elaborated long ago1 and which old women at chimney corners still impart as treasures of great price to their descendants gathered round the cottage fire on winter evenings--all these antique fancies clustered1 all these cobwebs of the brain were spun about the path of the old king1 the human god1 who1 immeshed in them like a fly in the toils of a spider1 could hardly stir a limb for the threads of custom1 light as air but strong as links of iron1 that crossing and recrossing each other in an endless maze bound him fast within a network of observances from which death or deposition alone could release him4 ,thus to students of the past the life of the old kings and priests teems with instruction4 ,in it was summed up all that passed for wisdom when the world was young4 ,it was the perfect pattern after which every man strove to shape his life2 a faultless model constructed with rigorous accuracy upon the lines laid down by a barbarous philosophy4 ,crude and false as that philosophy may seem to us1 it would be unjust to deny it the merit of logical consistency4 ,starting from a conception of the vital principle as a tiny being or soul existing in1 but distinct and separable from1 the living being1 it deduces for the practical guidance of life a system of rules which in general hangs well together and forms a fairly complete and harmonious whole4 ,the flaw--and it is a fatal one--of the system lies not in its reasoning1 but in its premises2 in its conception of the nature of life1 not in any irrelevancy of the conclusions which it draws from that conception4 ,but to stigmatise these premises as ridiculous because we can easily detect their falseness1 would be ungrateful as well as unphilosophical4 ,we stand upon the foundation reared by the generations that have gone before1 and we can but dimly realise the painful and prolonged efforts which it has cost humanity to struggle up to the point1 no very exalted one after all1 which we have reached4 ,our gratitude is due to the nameless and forgotten toilers1 whose patient thought and active exertions have largely made us what we are4 ,the amount of new knowledge which one age1 certainly which one man1 can add to the common store is small1 and it argues stupidity or dishonesty1 besides ingratitude1 to ignore the heap while vaunting the few grains which it may have been our privilege to add to it4 ,there is indeed little danger at present of undervaluing the contributions which modern times and even classical antiquity have made to the general advancement of our race4 ,but when we pass these limits1 the case is different4 ,contempt and ridicule or abhorrence and denunciation are too often the only recognition vouchsafed to the savage and his ways4 ,yet of the benefactors whom we are bound thankfully to commemorate1 many1 perhaps most1 were savages4 ,for when all is said and done our resemblances to the savage are still far more numerous than our differences from him2 and what we have in common with him1 and deliberately retain as true and useful1 we owe to our savage forefathers who slowly acquired by experience and transmitted to us by inheritance those seemingly fundamental ideas which we are apt to regard as original and intuitive4 ,we are like heirs to a fortune which has been handed down for so many ages that the memory of those who built it up is lost1 and its possessors for the time being regard it as having been an original and unalterable possession of their race since the beginning of the world4 ,but reflection and enquiry should satisfy us that to our predecessors we are indebted for much of what we thought most our own1 and that their errors were not wilful extravagances or the ravings of insanity1 but simply hypotheses1 justifiable as such at the time when they were propounded1 but which a fuller experience has proved to be inadequate4 ,it is only by the successive testing of hypotheses and rejection of the false that truth is at last elicited4 ,after all1 what we call truth is only the hypothesis which is found to work best4 ,therefore in reviewing the opinions and practices of ruder ages and races we shall do well to look with leniency upon their errors as inevitable slips made in the search for truth1 and to give them the benefit of that indulgence which we ourselves may one day stand in need of3 cum excusatione itaque veteres audiendi sunt4 ,,xxiv4 ,the ,killing of the ,divine ,king #a4 ,the ,mortality of the ,gods ,,man has created gods in his own likeness and being himself mortal he has naturally supposed his creatures to be in the same sad predicament4 ,thus the ,greenlanders believed that a wind could kill their most powerful god1 and that he would certainly die if he touched a dog4 ,when they heard of the ,christian ,god1 they kept asking if he never died1 and being informed that he did not1 they were much surprised1 and said that he must be a very great god indeed4 ,in answer to the enquiries of ,colonel ,dodge1 a ,north ,american ,indian stated that the world was made by the ,great ,spirit4 ,being asked which ,great ,spirit he meant1 the good one or the bad one1 ,oh1 neither of them1 replied he1 the ,great ,spirit that made the world is dead long ago4 ,he could not possibly have lived as long as this4 ,a tribe in the ,philippine ,islands told the ,spanish conquerors that the grave of the ,creator was upon the top of ,mount ,cabunian4 ,heitsi-eibib1 a god or divine hero of the ,hottentots1 died several times and came to life again4 ,his graves are generally to be met with in narrow defiles between mountains4 ,when the ,hottentots pass one of them1 they throw a stone on it for good luck1 sometimes muttering1 ,give us plenty of cattle4 ,the grave of ,zeus1 the great god of ,greece1 was shown to visitors in ,crete as late as about the beginning of our era4 ,the body of ,dionysus was buried at ,delphi beside the golden statue of ,apollo1 and his tomb bore the inscription1 ,here lies ,dionysus dead1 the son of ,semele4 ,according to one account1 ,apollo himself was buried at ,delphi2 for ,pythagoras is said to have carved an inscription on his tomb1 setting forth how the god had been killed by the python and buried under the tripod4 ,the great gods of ,egypt themselves were not exempt from the common lot4 ,they too grew old and died4 ,but when at a later time the discovery of the art of embalming gave a new lease of life to the souls of the dead by preserving their bodies for an indefinite time from corruption1 the deities were permitted to share the benefit of an invention which held out to gods as well as to men a reasonable hope of immortality4 ,every province then had the tomb and mummy of its dead god4 ,the mummy of ,osiris was to be seen at ,mendes2 ,thinis boasted of the mummy of ,anhouri2 and ,heliopolis rejoiced in the possession of that of ,toumou4 ,the high gods of ,babylon also1 though they appeared to their worshippers only in dreams and visions1 were conceived to be human in their bodily shape1 human in their passions1 and human in their fate2 for like men they were born into the world1 and like men they loved and fought and died4 #b4 ,kings killed when their ,strength fails ,,if ,,the ,,high gods1 who dwell remote from the fret and fever of this earthly life1 are yet believed to die at last1 it is not to be expected that a god who lodges in a frail tabernacle of flesh should escape the same fate1 though we hear of ,african kings who have imagined themselves immortal by virtue of their sorceries4 ,now primitive peoples1 as we have seen1 sometimes believe that their safety and even that of the world is bound up with the life of one of these god-men or human incarnations of the divinity4 ,naturally1 therefore1 they take the utmost care of his life1 out of a regard for their own4 ,but no amount of care and precaution will prevent the man-god from growing old and feeble and at last dying4 ,his worshippers have to lay their account with this sad necessity and to meet it as best they can4 ,the danger is a formidable one2 for if the course of nature is dependent on the man-god's life1 what catastrophes may not be expected from the gradual enfeeblement of his powers and their final extinction in death8 ,there is only one way of averting these dangers4 ,the man-god must be killed as soon as he shows symptoms that his powers are beginning to fail1 and his soul must be transferred to a vigorous successor before it has been seriously impaired by the threatened decay4 ,the advantages of thus putting the man-god to death instead of allowing him to die of old age and disease are1 to the savage1 obvious enough4 ,for if the man-god dies what we call a natural death1 it means1 according to the savage1 that his soul has either voluntarily departed from his body and refuses to return1 or more commonly that it has been extracted1 or at least detained in its wanderings1 by a demon or sorcerer4 ,in any of these cases the soul of the man-god is lost to his worshippers1 and with it their prosperity is gone and their very existence endangered4 ,even if they could arrange to catch the soul of the dying god as it left his lips or his nostrils and so transfer it to a successor1 this would not effect their purpose2 for1 dying of disease1 his soul would necessarily leave his body in the last stage of weakness and exhaustion1 and so enfeebled it would continue to drag out a languid1 inert existence in any body to which it might be transferred4 ,whereas by slaying him his worshippers could1 in the first place1 make sure of catching his soul as it escaped and transferring it to a suitable successor2 and1 in the second place1 by putting him to death before his natural force was abated1 they would secure that the world should not fall into decay with the decay of the man-god4 ,every purpose1 therefore1 was answered1 and all dangers averted by thus killing the man-god and transferring his soul1 while yet at its prime1 to a vigorous successor4 ,the mystic kings of ,fire and ,water in ,cambodia are not allowed to die a natural death4 ,hence when one of them is seriously ill and the elders think that he cannot recover1 they stab him to death4 ,the people of ,congo believed1 as we have seen1 that if their pontiff the ,chitom were to die a natural death1 the world would perish1 and the earth1 which he alone sustained by his power and merit1 would immediately be annihilated4 ,accordingly when he fell ill and seemed likely to die1 the man who was destined to be his successor entered the pontiff's house with a rope or a club and strangled or clubbed him to death4 ,the ,ethiopian kings of ,meroe were worshipped as gods2 but whenever the priests chose1 they sent a messenger to the king1 ordering him to die1 and alleging an oracle of the gods as their authority for the command4 ,this command the kings always obeyed down to the reign of ,ergamenes1 a contemporary of ,ptolemy ,,ii41 ,king of ,egypt4 ,having received a ,greek education which emancipated him from the superstitions of his countrymen1 ,ergamenes ventured to disregard the command of the priests1 and1 entering the ,golden ,temple with a body of soldiers1 put the priests to the sword4 ,customs of the same sort appear to have prevailed in this part of ,africa down to modern times4 ,in some tribes of ,fazoql the king had to administer justice daily under a certain tree4 ,if from sickness or any other cause he was unable to discharge this duty for three whole days1 he was hanged on the tree in a noose1 which contained two razors so arranged that when the noose was drawn tight by the weight of the king's body they cut his throat4 ,a custom of putting their divine kings to death at the first symptoms of infirmity or old age prevailed until lately1 if indeed it is even now extinct and not merely dormant1 among the ,shilluk of the ,white ,nile1 and in recent years it has been carefully investigated by ,dr4 ,c4 ,g4 ,seligman4 ,the reverence which the ,shilluk pay to their king appears to arise chiefly from the conviction that he is a reincarnation of the spirit of ,nyakang1 the semi-divine hero who founded the dynasty and settled the tribe in their present territory4 ,it is a fundamental article of the ,shilluk creed that the spirit of the divine or semi-divine ,nyakang is incarnate in the reigning king1 who is accordingly himself invested to some extent with the character of a divinity4 ,but while the ,shilluk hold their kings in high1 indeed religious reverence and take every precaution against their accidental death1 nevertheless they cherish the conviction that the king must not be allowed to become ill or senile1 lest with his diminishing vigour the cattle should sicken and fail to bear their increase1 the crops should rot in the fields1 and man1 stricken with disease1 should die in ever-increasing numbers4 ,to prevent these calamities it used to be the regular custom with the ,shilluk to put the king to death whenever he showed signs of ill-health or failing strength4 ,one of the fatal symptoms of decay was taken to be an incapacity to satisfy the sexual passions of his wives1 of whom he has very many1 distributed in a large number of houses at ,fashoda4 ,when this ominous weakness manifested itself1 the wives reported it to the chiefs1 who are popularly said to have intimated to the king his doom by spreading a white cloth over his face and knees as he lay slumbering in the heat of the sultry afternoon4 ,execution soon followed the sentence of death4 ,a hut was specially built for the occasion3 the king was led into it and lay down with his head resting on the lap of a nubile virgin3 the door of the hut was then walled up2 and the couple were left without food1 water1 or fire to die of hunger and suffocation4 ,this was the old custom1 but it was abolished some five generations ago on account of the excessive sufferings of one of the kings who perished in this way4 ,it is said that the chiefs announce his fate to the king1 and that afterwards he is strangled in a hut which has been specially built for the occasion4 ,from ,dr4 ,seligman's enquiries it appears that not only was the ,shilluk king liable to be killed with due ceremony at the first symptoms of incipient decay1 but even while he was yet in the prime of health and strength he might be attacked at any time by a rival and have to defend his crown in a combat to the death4 ,according to the common ,shilluk tradition any son of a king had the right thus to fight the king in possession and1 if he succeeded in killing him1 to reign in his stead4 ,as every king had a large harem and many sons1 the number of possible candidates for the throne at any time may well have been not inconsiderable1 and the reigning monarch must have carried his life in his hand4 ,but the attack on him could only take place with any prospect of success at night2 for during the day the king surrounded himself with his friends and bodyguards1 and an aspirant to the throne could hardly hope to cut his way through them and strike home4 ,it was otherwise at night4 ,for then the guards were dismissed and the king was alone in his enclosure with his favourite wives1 and there was no man near to defend him except a few herdsmen1 whose huts stood a little way off4 ,the hours of darkness were therefore the season of peril for the king4 ,it is said that he used to pass them in constant watchfulness1 prowling round his huts fully armed1 peering into the blackest shadows1 or himself standing silent and alert1 like a sentinel on duty1 in some dark corner4 ,when at last his rival appeared1 the fight would take place in grim silence1 broken only by the clash of spears and shields1 for it was a point of honour with the king not to call the herdsmen to his assistance4 ,like ,nyakang himself1 their founder1 each of the ,shilluk kings after death is worshipped at a shrine1 which is erected over his grave1 and the grave of a king is always in the village where he was born4 ,the tomb-shrine of a king resembles the shrine of ,nyakang1 consisting of a few huts enclosed by a fence2 one of the huts is built over the king's grave1 the others are occupied by the guardians of the shrine4 ,indeed the shrines of ,nyakang and the shrines of the kings are scarcely to be distinguished from each other1 and the religious rituals observed at all of them are identical in form and vary only in matters of detail1 the variations being due apparently to the far greater sanctity attributed to the shrines of ,nyakang4 ,the grave-shrines of the kings are tended by certain old men or women1 who correspond to the guardians of the shrines of ,nyakang4 ,they are usually widows or old men-servants of the deceased king1 and when they die they are succeeded in their office by their descendants4 ,moreover1 cattle are dedicated to the grave-shrines of the kings and sacrifices are offered at them just as at the shrines of ,nyakang4 ,in general the principal element in the religion of the ,shilluk would seem to be the worship which they pay to their sacred or divine kings1 whether dead or alive4 ,these are believed to be animated by a single divine spirit1 which has been transmitted from the semi-mythical1 but probably in substance historical1 founder of the dynasty through all his successors to the present day4 ,hence1 regarding their kings as incarnate divinities on whom the welfare of men1 of cattle1 and of the corn implicitly depends1 the ,shilluk naturally pay them the greatest respect and take every care of them2 and however strange it may seem to us1 their custom of putting the divine king to death as soon as he shows signs of ill-health or failing strength springs directly from their profound veneration for him and from their anxiety to preserve him1 or rather the divine spirit by which he is animated1 in the most perfect state of efficiency3 nay1 we may go further and say that their practice of regicide is the best proof they can give of the high regard in which they hold their kings4 ,for they believe1 as we have seen1 that the king's life or spirit is so sympathetically bound up with the prosperity of the whole country1 that if he fell ill or grew senile the cattle would sicken and cease to multiply1 the crops would rot in the fields1 and men would perish of widespread disease4 ,hence1 in their opinion1 the only way of averting these calamities is to put the king to death while he is still hale and hearty1 in order that the divine spirit which he has inherited from his predecessors may be transmitted in turn by him to his successor while it is still in full vigour and has not yet been impaired by the weakness of disease and old age4 ,in this connexion the particular symptom which is commonly said to seal the king's death-warrant is highly significant2 when he can no longer satisfy the passions of his numerous wives1 in other words1 when he has ceased1 whether partially or wholly1 to be able to reproduce his kind1 it is time for him to die and to make room for a more vigorous successor4 ,taken along with the other reasons which are alleged for putting the king to death1 this one suggests that the fertility of men1 of cattle1 and of the crops is believed to depend sympathetically on the generative power of the king1 so that the complete failure of that power in him would involve a corresponding failure in men1 animals1 and plants1 and would thereby entail at no distant date the entire extinction of all life1 whether human1 animal1 or vegetable4 ,no wonder1 that with such a danger before their eyes the ,shilluk should be most careful not to let the king die what we should call a natural death of sickness or old age4 ,it is characteristic of their attitude towards the death of the kings that they refrain from speaking of it as death3 they do not say that a king has died but simply that he has gone away like his divine ancestors ,nyakang and ,dag1 the two first kings of the dynasty1 both of whom are reported not to have died but to have disappeared4 ,the similar legends of the mysterious disappearance of early kings in other lands1 for example at ,rome and in ,uganda1 may well point to a similar custom of putting them to death for the purpose of preserving their life4 ,on the whole the theory and practice of the divine kings of the ,shilluk correspond very nearly to the theory and practice of the priests of ,nemi1 the ,kings of the ,wood1 if my view of the latter is correct4 ,in both we see a series of divine kings on whose life the fertility of men1 of cattle1 and of vegetation is believed to depend1 and who are put to death1 whether in single combat or otherwise1 in order that their divine spirit may be transmitted to their successors in full vigour1 uncontaminated by the weakness and decay of sickness or old age1 because any such degeneration on the part of the king would1 in the opinion of his worshippers1 entail a corresponding degeneration on manking1 on cattle1 and on the crops4 ,some points in this explanation of the custom of putting divine kings to death1 particularly the method of transmitting their divine souls to their successors1 will be dealt with more fully in the sequel4 ,meantime we pass to other examples of the general practice4 ,the ,dinka are a congeries of independent tribes in the valley of the ,white ,nile4 ,they are essentially a pastoral people1 passionately devoted to the care of their numerous herds of oxen1 though they also keep sheep and goats1 and the women cultivate small quantities of millet and sesame4 ,for their crops and above all for their pastures they depend on the regularity of the rains3 in seasons of prolonged drought they are said to be reduced to great extremities4 ,hence the rain-maker is a very important personage among them to this day2 indeed the men in authority whom travellers dub chiefs or sheikhs are in fact the actual or potential rain-makers of the tribe or community4 ,each of them is believed to be animated by the spirit of a great rain-maker1 which has come down to him through a succession of rain-makers2 and in virtue of this inspiration a successful rain-maker enjoys very great power and is consulted on all important matters4 ,yet in spite1 or rather in virtue1 of the high honour in which he is held1 no ,dinka rain-maker is allowed to die a natural death of sickness or old age2 for the ,dinka believe that if such an untoward event were to happen1 the tribe would suffer from disease and famine1 and the herds would not yield their increase4 ,so when a rain-maker feels that he is growing old and infirm1 he tells his children that he wishes to die4 ,among the ,agar ,dinka a large grave is dug and the rain-maker lies down in it1 surrounded by his friends and relatives4 ,from time to time he speaks to the people1 recalling the past history of the tribe1 reminding them how he has ruled and advised them1 and instructing them how they are to act in the future4 ,then1 when he has concluded his admonition1 he bids them cover him up4 ,so the earth is thrown down on him as he lies in the grave1 and he soon dies of suffocation4 ,such1 with minor variations1 appears to be the regular end of the honourable career of a rain-maker in all the ,dinka tribes4 ,the ,khor-,adar ,dinka told ,dr4 ,seligman that when they have dug the grave for their rain-maker they strangle him in his house4 ,the father and paternal uncle of one of ,dr4 ,seligman's informants had both been rain-makers and both had been killed in the most regular and orthodox fashion4 ,even if a rain-maker is quite young he will be put to death should he seem likely to perish of disease4 ,further1 every precaution is taken to prevent a rain-maker from dying an accidental death1 for such an end1 though not nearly so serious a matter as death from illness or old age1 would be sure to entail sickness on the tribe4 ,as soon as a rain-maker is killed1 his valuable spirit is supposed to pass to a suitable successor1 whether a son or other near blood relation4 ,in the ,central ,african kingdom of ,bunyoro down to recent years custom required that as soon as the king fell seriously ill or began to break up from age1 he should die by his own hand2 for1 according to an old prophecy1 the throne would pass away from the dynasty if ever the king were to die a natural death4 ,he killed himself by draining a poisoned cup4 ,if he faltered or were too ill to ask for the cup1 it was his wife's duty to administer the poison4 ,when the king of ,kibanga1 on the ,upper ,congo1 seems near his end1 the sorcerers put a rope round his neck1 which they draw gradually tighter till he dies4 ,if the king of ,gingiro happens to be wounded in war1 he is put to death by his comrades1 or1 if they fail to kill him1 by his kinsfolk1 however hard he may beg for mercy4 ,they say they do it that he may not die by the hands of his enemies4 ,the ,jukos are a heathen tribe of the ,benue ,river1 a great tributary of the ,niger4 ,in their country the town of ,gatri is ruled by a king who is elected by the big men of the town as follows4 ,when in the opinion of the big men the king has reigned long enough1 they give out that 'the king is sick'--a formula understood by all to mean that they are going to kill him1 though the intention is never put more plainly4 ,they then decide who is to be the next king4 ,how long he is to reign is settled by the influential men at a meeting2 the question is put and answered by each man throwing on the ground a little piece of stick for each year he thinks the new king should rule4 ,the king is then told1 and a great feast prepared1 at which the king gets drunk on guinea-corn beer4 ,after that he is speared1 and the man who was chosen becomes king4 ,thus each ,juko king knows that he cannot have very many more years to live1 and that he is certain of his predecessor's fate4 ,this1 however1 does not seem to frighten candidates4 ,the same custom of king-killing is said to prevail at ,quonde and ,wukari as well as at ,gatri4 ,in the three ,hausa kingdoms of ,gobir1 ,katsina1 and ,daura1 in ,northern ,nigeria1 as soon as a king showed signs of failing health or growing infirmity1 an official who bore the title of ,killer of the ,elephant appeared and throttled him4 ,the ,matiamvo is a great king or emperor in the interior of ,angola4 ,one of the inferior kings of the country1 by name ,challa1 gave to a ,portuguese expedition the following account of the manner in which the ,matiamvo comes by his end4 ,it has been customary1 he said1 for our ,matiamvos to die either in war or by a violent death1 and the present ,matiamvo must meet this last fate1 as1 in consequence of his great exactions1 he has lived long enough4 ,when we come to this understanding1 and decide that he should be killed1 we invite him to make war with our enemies1 on which occasion we all accompany him and his family to the war1 when we lose some of our people4 ,if he escapes unhurt1 we return to the war again and fight for three or four days4 ,we then suddenly abandon him and his family to their fate1 leaving him in the enemy's hands4 ,seeing himself thus deserted1 he causes his throne to be erected1 and1 sitting down1 calls his family around him4 ,he then orders his mother to approach2 she kneels at his feet2 he first cuts off her head1 then decapitates his sons in succession1 next his wives and relatives1 and1 last of all1 his most beloved wife1 called ,anacullo4 ,this slaughter being accomplished1 the ,matiamvo1 dressed in all his pomp1 awaits his own death1 which immediately follows1 by an officer sent by the powerful neighbouring chiefs1 ,caniquinha and ,canica4 ,this officer first cuts off his legs and arms at the joints1 and lastly he cuts off his head2 after which the head of the officer is struck off4 ,all the potentates retire from the encampment1 in order not to witness his death4 ,it is my duty to remain and witness his death1 and to mark the place where the head and arms have been deposited by the two great chiefs1 the enemies of the ,matiamvo4 ,they also take possession of all the property belonging to the deceased monarch and his family1 which they convey to their own residence4 ,i then provide for the funeral of the mutilated remains of the late ,matiamvo1 after which ,i retire to his capital and proclaim the new government4 ,i then return to where the head1 legs1 and arms have been deposited1 and1 for forty slaves1 ,i ransom them1 together with the merchandise and other property belonging to the deceased1 which ,i give up to the new ,matiamvo1 who has been proclaimed4 ,this is what has happened to many ,matiamvos1 and what must happen to the present one4 ,it appears to have been a ,zulu custom to put the king to death as soon as he began to have wrinkles or grey hairs4 ,at least this seems implied in the following passage written by one who resided for some time at the court of the notorious ,zulu tyrant ,chaka1 in the early part of the nineteenth century3 ,the extraordinary violence of the king's rage with me was mainly occasioned by that absurd nostrum1 the hair oil1 with the notion of which ,mr4 ,farewell had impressed him as being a specific for removing all indications of age4 ,from the first moment of his having heard that such a preparation was attainable1 he evinced a solicitude to procure it1 and on every occasion never forgot to remind us of his anxiety respecting it2 more especially on our departure on the mission his injunctions were particularly directed to this object4 ,it will be seen that it is one of the barbarous customs of the ,zoolas in their choice or election of their kings that he must neither have wrinkles nor grey hairs1 as they are both distinguishing marks of disqualification for becoming a monarch of a warlike people4 ,it is also equally indispensable that their king should never exhibit those proofs of having become unfit and incompetent to reign2 it is therefore important that they should conceal these indications so long as they possibly can4 ,chaka had become greatly apprehensive of the approach of grey hairs2 which would at once be the signal for him to prepare to make his exit from this sublunary world1 it being always followed by the death of the monarch4 ,the writer to whom we are indebted for this instructive anecdote of the hair oil omits to specify the mode in which a grey-haired and wrinkled ,zulu chief used to make his exit from this sublunary world2 but on analogy we may conjecture that he was killed4 ,the custom of putting kings to death as soon as they suffered from any personal defect prevailed two centuries ago in the ,caffre kingdom of ,sofala4 ,we have seen that these kings of ,sofala were regarded as gods by their people1 being entreated to give rain or sunshine1 according as each might be wanted4 ,nevertheless a slight bodily blemish1 such as the loss of a tooth1 was considered a sufficient cause for putting one of these god-men to death1 as we learn from the following passage of an old ,portuguese historian3 ,it was formerly the custom of the kings of this land to commit suicide by taking poison when any disaster or natural physical defect fell upon them1 such as impotence1 infectious disease1 the loss of their front teeth1 by which they were disfigured1 or any other deformity or affliction4 ,to put an end to such defects they killed themselves1 saying that the king should be free from any blemish1 and if not1 it was better for his honour that he should die and seek another life where he would be made whole1 for there everything was perfect4 ,but the ,quiteve 7king7 who reigned when ,i was in those parts would not imitate his predecessors in this1 being discreet and dreaded as he was2 for having lost a front tooth he caused it to be proclaimed throughout the kingdom that all should be aware that he had lost a tooth and should recognise him when they saw him without it1 and if his predecessors killed themselves for such things they were very foolish1 and he would not do so2 on the contrary1 he would be very sorry when the time came for him to die a natural death1 for his life was very necessary to preserve his kingdom and defend it from his enemies2 and he recommended his successors to follow his example4 ,the king of ,sofala who dared to survive the loss of his front tooth was thus a bold reformer like ,ergamenes1 king of ,ethiopia4 ,we may conjecture that the ground for putting the ,ethiopian kings to death was1 as in the case of the ,zulu and ,sofala kings1 the appearance on their person of any bodily defect or sign of decay2 and that the oracle which the priests alleged as the authority for the royal execution was to the effect that great calamities would result from the reign of a king who had any blemish on his body2 just as an oracle warned ,sparta against a lame reign1 that is1 the reign of a lame king4 ,it is some confirmation of this conjecture that the kings of ,ethiopia were chosen for their size1 strength1 and beauty long before the custom of killing them was abolished4 ,to this day the ,sultan of ,wadai must have no obvious bodily defect1 and the king of ,angoy cannot be crowned if he has a single blemish1 such as a broken or a filed tooth or the scar of an old wound4 ,according to the ,book of ,acaill and many other authorities no king who was afflicted with a personal blemish might reign over ,ireland at ,tara4 ,hence1 when the great ,king ,cormac ,mac ,art lost one eye by an accident1 he at once abdicated4 ,many days' journey to the north-east of ,abomey1 the old capital of ,dahomey1 lies the kingdom of ,eyeo4 ,the ,eyeos are governed by a king1 no less absolute than the king of ,dahomey1 yet subject to a regulation of state1 at once humiliating and extraordinary4 ,when the people have conceived an opinion of his ill-government1 which is sometimes insidiously infused into them by the artifice of his discontented ministers1 they send a deputation to him with a present of parrots' eggs1 as a mark of its authenticity1 to represent to him that the burden of government must have so far fatigued him that they consider it full time for him to repose from his cares and indulge himself with a little sleep4 ,he thanks his subjects for their attention to his ease1 retires to his own apartment as if to sleep1 and there gives directions to his women to strangle him4 ,this is immediately executed1 and his son quietly ascends the throne upon the usual terms of holding the reins of government no longer than whilst he merits the approbation of the people4 ,about the year #aggd1 a king of ,eyeo1 whom his ministers attempted to remove in the customary manner1 positively refused to accept the proffered parrots' eggs at their hands1 telling them that he had no mind to take a nap1 but on the contrary was resolved to watch for the benefit of his subjects4 ,the ministers1 surprised and indignant at his recalcitrancy1 raised a rebellion1 but were defeated with great slaughter1 and thus by his spirited conduct the king freed himself from the tyranny of his councillors and established a new precedent for the guidance of his successors4 ,however1 the old custom seems to have revived and persisted until late in the nineteenth century1 for a ,catholic missionary1 writing in #ahhd1 speaks of the practice as if it were still in vogue4 ,another missionary1 writing in #ahha1 thus describes the usage of the ,egbas and the ,yorubas of ,west ,africa3 ,among the customs of the country one of the most curious is unquestionably that of judging1 and punishing the king4 ,should he have earned the hatred of his people by exceeding his rights1 one of his councillors1 on whom the heavy duty is laid1 requires of the prince that he shall 'go to sleep1' which means simply 'take poison and die4' ,if his courage fails him at the supreme moment1 a friend renders him this last service1 and quietly1 without betraying the secret1 they prepare the people for the news of the king's death4 ,in ,yoruba the thing is managed a little differently4 ,when a son is born to the king of ,oyo1 they make a model of the infant's right foot in clay and keep it in the house of the elders 7ogboni74 ,if the king fails to observe the customs of the country1 a messenger1 without speaking a word1 shows him his child's foot4 ,the king knows what that means4 ,he takes poison and goes to sleep4 ,the old ,prussians acknowledged as their supreme lord a ruler who governed them in the name of the gods1 and was known as ,god's ,mouth4 ,when he felt himself weak and ill1 if he wished to leave a good name behind him1 he had a great heap made of thorn-bushes and straw1 on which he mounted and delivered a long sermon to the people1 exhorting them to serve the gods and promising to go to the gods and speak for the people4 ,then he took some of the perpetual fire which burned in front of the holy oak-tree1 and lighting the pile with it burned himself to death4 #c4 ,kings killed at the ,end of a ,fixed ,term ,,in ,,the ,,cases hitherto described1 the divine king or priest is suffered by his people to retain office until some outward defect1 some visible symptom of failing health or advancing age1 warns them that he is no longer equal to the discharge of his divine duties2 but not until such symptoms have made their appearance is he put to death4 ,some peoples1 however1 appear to have thought it unsafe to wait for even the slightest symptom of decay and have preferred to kill the king while he was still in the full vigour of life4 ,accordingly1 they have fixed a term beyond which he might not reign1 and at the close of which he must die1 the term fixed upon being short enough to exclude the probability of his degenerating physically in the interval4 ,in some parts of ,southern ,india the period fixed was twelve years4 ,thus1 according to an old traveller1 in the province of ,quilacare1 there is a ,gentile house of prayer1 in which there is an idol which they hold in great account1 and every twelve years they celebrate a great feast to it1 whither all the ,gentiles go as to a jubilee4 ,this temple possesses many lands and much revenue3 it is a very great affair4 ,this province has a king over it1 who has not more than twelve years to reign from jubilee to jubilee4 ,his manner of living is in this wise1 that is to say3 when the twelve years are completed1 on the day of this feast there assemble together innumerable people1 and much money is spent in giving food to ,bramans4 ,the king has a wooden scaffolding made1 spread over with silken hangings3 and on that day he goes to bathe at a tank with great ceremonies and sound of music1 after that he comes to the idol and prays to it1 and mounts on to the scaffolding1 and there before all the people he takes some very sharp knives1 and begins to cut off his nose1 and then his ears1 and his lips1 and all his members1 and as much flesh off himself as he can2 and he throws it away very hurriedly until so much of his blood is spilled that he begins to faint1 and then he cuts his throat himself4 ,and he performs this sacrifice to the idol1 and whoever desires to reign another twelve years and undertake this martyrdom for love of the idol1 has to be present looking on at this3 and from that place they raise him up as king4 ,the king of ,calicut1 on the ,malabar coast1 bears the title of ,samorin or ,samory4 ,he pretends to be of a higher rank than the ,brahmans1 and to be inferior only to the invisible gods2 a pretention that was acknowledged by his subjects1 but which is held as absurd and abominable by the ,brahmans1 by whom he is only treated as a ,sudra4 ,formerly the ,samorin had to cut his throat in public at the end of a twelve years' reign4 ,but towards the end of the seventeenth century the rule had been modified as follows3 ,many strange customs were observed in this country in former times1 and some very odd ones are still continued4 ,it was an ancient custom for the ,samorin to reign but twelve years1 and no longer4 ,if he died before his term was expired1 it saved him a troublesome ceremony of cutting his own throat1 on a publick scaffold erected for the purpose4 ,he first made a feast for all his nobility and gentry1 who are very numerous4 ,after the feast he saluted his guests1 and went on the scaffold1 and very decently cut his own throat in the view of the assembly1 and his body was1 a little while after1 burned with great pomp and ceremony1 and the grandees elected a new ,samorin4 ,whether that custom was a religious or a civil ceremony1 ,i know not1 but it is now laid aside4 ,and a new custom is followed by the modern ,samorins1 that jubilee is proclaimed throughout his dominions1 at the end of twelve years1 and a tent is pitched for him in a spacious plain1 and a great feast is celebrated for ten or twelve days1 with mirth and jollity1 guns firing night and day1 so at the end of the feast any four of the guests that have a mind to gain a crown by a desperate action1 in fighting their way through #cj or #dj1jjj of his guards1 and kill the ,samorin in his tent1 he that kills him succeeds him in his empire4 ,in anno #afie1 one of those jubilees happened1 and the tent pitched near ,pennany1 a seaport of his1 about fifteen leagues to the southward of ,calicut4 ,there were but three men that would venture on that desperate action1 who fell in1 with sword and target1 among the guard1 and1 after they had killed and wounded many1 were themselves killed4 ,one of the desperados had a nephew of fifteen or sixteen years of age1 that kept close by his uncle in the attack on the guards1 and1 when he saw him fall1 the youth got through the guards into the tent1 and made a stroke at his ,majesty's head1 and had certainly despatched him if a large brass lamp which was burning over his head had not marred the blow2 but1 before he could make another1 he was killed by the guards2 and1 ,i believe1 the same ,samorin reigns yet4 ,i chanced to come that time along the coast and heard the guns for two or three days and nights successively4 ,the ,english traveller1 whose account ,i have quoted1 did not himself witness the festival he describes1 though he heard the sound of the firing in the distance4 ,fortunately1 exact records of these festivals and of the number of men who perished at them have been preserved in the archives of the royal family at ,calicut4 ,in the latter part of the nineteenth century they were examined by ,mr4 ,w4 ,logan1 with the personal assistance of the reigning king1 and from his work it is possible to gain an accurate conception both of the tragedy and of the scene where it was periodically enacted down to #agdc1 when the ceremony took place for the last time4 ,the festival at which the king of ,calicut staked his crown and his life on the issue of battle was known as the ,great ,sacrifice4 ,it fell every twelfth year1 when the planet ,jupiter was in retrograde motion in the sign of the ,crab1 and it lasted twenty-eight days1 culminating at the time of the eighth lunar asterism in the month of ,makaram4 ,as the date of the festival was determined by the position of ,jupiter in the sky1 and the interval between two festivals was twelve years1 which is roughly ,jupiter's period of revolution round the sun1 we may conjecture that the splendid planet was supposed to be in a special sense the king's star and to rule his destiny1 the period of its revolution in heaven corresponding to the period of his reign on earth4 ,however that may be1 the ceremony was observed with great pomp at the ,tirunavayi temple1 on the north bank of the ,ponnani ,river4 ,the spot is close to the present railway line4 ,as the train rushes by1 you can just catch a glimpse of the temple1 almost hidden behind a clump of trees on the river bank4 ,from the western gateway of the temple a perfectly straight road1 hardly raised above the level of the surrounding rice-fields and shaded by a fine avenue1 runs for half a mile to a high ridge with a precipitous bank1 on which the outlines of three or four terraces can still be traced4 ,on the topmost of these terraces the king took his stand on the eventful day4 ,the view which it commands is a fine one4 ,across the flat expanse of the rice-fields1 with the broad placid river winding through them1 the eye ranges eastward to high tablelands1 their lower slopes embowered in woods1 while afar off looms the great chain of the western ,ghauts1 and in the furthest distance the ,neilgherries or ,blue ,mountains1 hardly distinguishable from the azure of the sky above4 ,but it was not to the distant prospect that the king's eyes naturally turned at this crisis of his fate4 ,his attention was arrested by a spectacle nearer at hand4 ,for all the plain below was alive with troops1 their banners waving gaily in the sun1 the white tents of their many camps standing sharply out against the green and gold of the ricefields4 ,forty thousand fighting men or more were gathered there to defend the king4 ,but if the plain swarmed with soldiers1 the road that cuts across it from the temple to the king's stand was clear of them4 ,not a soul was stirring on it4 ,each side of the way was barred by palisades1 and from the palisades on either hand a long hedge of spears1 held by strong arms1 projected into the empty road1 their blades meeting in the middle and forming a glittering arch of steel4 ,all was now ready4 ,the king waved his sword4 ,at the same moment a great chain of massy gold1 enriched with bosses1 was placed on an elephant at his side4 ,that was the signal4 ,on the instant a stir might be seen half a mile away at the gate of the temple4 ,a group of swordsmen1 decked with flowers and smeared with ashes1 has stepped out from the crowd4 ,they have just partaken of their last meal on earth1 and they now receive the last blessings and farewells of their friends4 ,a moment more and they are coming down the lane of spears1 hewing and stabbing right and left at the spearmen1 winding and turning and writhing among the blades as if they had no bones in their bodies4 ,it is all in vain4 ,one after the other they fall1 some nearer the king1 some farther off1 content to die1 not for the shadow of a crown1 but for the mere sake of approving their dauntless valour and swordsmanship to the world4 ,on the last days of the festival the same magnificent display of gallantry1 the same useless sacrifice of life was repeated again and again4 ,yet perhaps no sacrifice is wholly useless which proves that there are men who prefer honour to life4 ,it is a singular custom in ,bengal1 says an old native historian of ,india1 that there is little of hereditary descent in succession to the sovereignty4 4 4 4 ,whoever kills the king1 and succeeds in placing himself on that throne1 is immediately acknowledged as king2 all the amirs1 wazirs1 soldiers1 and peasants instantly obey and submit to him1 and consider him as being as much their sovereign as they did their former prince1 and obey his orders implicitly4 ,the people of ,bengal say1 ',we are faithful to the throne2 whoever fills the throne we are obedient and true to it4' ,a custom of the same sort formerly prevailed in the little kingdom of ,passier1 on the northern coast of ,sumatra4 ,the old ,portuguese historian ,de ,barros1 who informs us of it1 remarks with surprise that no wise man would wish to be king of ,passier1 since the monarch was not allowed by his subjects to live long4 ,from time to time a sort of fury seized the people1 and they marched through the streets of the city chanting with loud voices the fatal words1 ,the king must die6 ,when the king heard that song of death he knew that his hour had come4 ,the man who struck the fatal blow was of the royal lineage1 and as soon as he had done the deed of blood and seated himself on the throne he was regarded as the legitimate king1 provided that he contrived to maintain his seat peaceably for a single day4 ,this1 however1 the regicide did not always succeed in doing4 ,when ,ferno ,peres d',andrade1 on a voyage to ,china1 put in at ,passier for a cargo of spices1 two kings were massacred1 and that in the most peaceable and orderly manner1 without the smallest sign of tumult or sedition in the city1 where everything went on in its usual course1 as if the murder or execution of a king were a matter of everyday occurrence4 ,indeed1 on one occasion three kings were raised to the dangerous elevation and followed each other in the dusty road of death in a single day4 ,the people defended the custom1 which they esteemed very laudable and even of divine institution1 by saying that ,god would never allow so high and mighty a being as a king1 who reigned as his vicegerent on earth1 to perish by violence unless for his sins he thoroughly deserved it4 ,far away from the tropical island of ,sumatra a rule of the same sort appears to have obtained among the old ,slavs4 ,when the captives ,gunn and ,jarmerik contrived to slay the king and queen of the ,slavs and made their escape1 they were pursued by the barbarians1 who shouted after them that if they would only come back they would reign instead of the murdered monarch1 since by a public statute of the ancients the succession to the throne fell to the king's assassin4 ,but the flying regicides turned a deaf ear to promises which they regarded as mere baits to lure them back to destruction2 they continued their flight1 and the shouts and clamour of the barbarians gradually died away in the distance4 ,when kings were bound to suffer death1 whether at their own hands or at the hands of others1 on the expiration of a fixed term of years1 it was natural that they should seek to delegate the painful duty1 along with some of the privileges of sovereignty1 to a substitute who should suffer vicariously in their stead4 ,this expedient appears to have been resorted to by some of the princes of ,malabar4 ,thus we are informed by a native authority on that country that in some places all powers both executive and judicial were delegated for a fixed period to natives by the sovereign4 ,this institution was styled ,thalavettiparothiam or authority obtained by decapitation4 4 4 4 ,it was an office tenable for five years during which its bearer was invested with supreme despotic powers within his jurisdiction4 ,on the expiry of the five years the man's head was cut off and thrown up in the air amongst a large concourse of villagers1 each of whom vied with the other in trying to catch it in its course down4 ,he who succeeded was nominated to the post for the next five years4 ,when once kings1 who had hitherto been bound to die a violent death at the end of a term of years1 conceived the happy thought of dying by deputy in the persons of others1 they would very naturally put it in practice2 and accordingly we need not wonder at finding so popular an expedient1 or traces of it1 in many lands4 ,scandinavian traditions contain some hints that of old the ,swedish kings reigned only for periods of nine years1 after which they were put to death or had to find a substitute to die in their stead4 ,thus ,aun or ,on1 king of ,sweden1 is said to have sacrificed to ,odin for length of days and to have been answered by the god that he should live so long as he sacrificed one of his sons every ninth year4 ,he sacrificed nine of them in this manner1 and would have sacrificed the tenth and last1 but the ,swedes would not allow him4 ,so he died and was buried in a mound at ,upsala4 ,another indication of a similar tenure of the crown occurs in a curious legend of the deposition and banishment of ,odin4 ,offended at his misdeeds1 the other gods outlawed and exiled him1 but set up in his place a substitute1 ,oller by name1 a cunning wizard1 to whom they accorded the symbols both of royalty and of godhead4 ,the deputy bore the name of ,odin1 and reigned for nearly ten years1 when he was driven from the throne1 while the real ,odin came to his own again4 ,his discomfited rival retired to ,sweden and was afterwards slain in an attempt to repair his shattered fortunes4 ,as gods are often merely men who loom large through the mists of tradition1 we may conjecture that this ,norse legend preserves a confused reminiscence of ancient ,swedish kings who reigned for nine or ten years together1 then abdicated1 delegating to others the privilege of dying for their country4 ,the great festival which was held at ,upsala every nine years may have been the occasion on which the king or his deputy was put to death4 ,we know that human sacrifices formed part of the rites4 ,there are some grounds for believing that the reign of many ancient ,greek kings was limited to eight years1 or at least that at the end of every period of eight years a new consecration1 a fresh outpouring of the divine grace1 was regarded as necessary in order to enable them to discharge their civil and religious duties4 ,thus it was a rule of the ,spartan constitution that every eighth year the ephors should choose a clear and moonless night and sitting down observe the sky in silence4 ,if during their vigil they saw a meteor or shooting star1 they inferred that the king had sinned against the deity1 and they suspended him from his functions until the ,delphic or ,olympic oracle should reinstate him in them4 ,this custom1 which has all the air of great antiquity1 was not suffered to remain a dead letter even in the last period of the ,spartan monarchy2 for in the third century before our era a king1 who had rendered himself obnoxious to the reforming party1 was actually deposed on various trumped-up charges1 among which the allegation that the ominous sign had been seen in the sky took a prominent place4 ,if the tenure of the regal office was formerly limited among the ,spartans to eight years1 we may naturally ask1 why was that precise period selected as the measure of a king's reign8 ,the reason is probably to be found in those astronomical considerations which determined the early ,greek calendar4 ,the difficulty of reconciling lunar with solar time is one of the standing puzzles which has taxed the ingenuity of men who are emerging from barbarism4 ,now an octennial cycle is the shortest period at the end of which sun and moon really mark time together after overlapping1 so to say1 throughout the whole of the interval4 ,thus1 for example1 it is only once in every eight years that the full moon coincides with the longest or shortest day2 and as this coincidence can be observed with the aid of a simple dial1 the observation is naturally one of the first to furnish a base for a calendar which shall bring lunar and solar times into tolerable1 though not exact1 harmony4 ,but in early days the proper adjustment of the calendar is a matter of religious concern1 since on it depends a knowledge of the right seasons for propitiating the deities whose favour is indispensable to the welfare of the community4 ,no wonder1 therefore1 that the king1 as the chief priest of the state1 or as himself a god1 should be liable to deposition or death at the end of an astronomical period4 ,when the great luminaries had run their course on high1 and were about to renew the heavenly race1 it might well be thought that the king should renew his divine energies1 or prove them unabated1 under pain of making room for a more vigorous successor4 ,in ,southern ,india1 as we have seen1 the king's reign and life terminated with the revolution of the planet ,jupiter round the sun4 ,in ,greece1 on the other hand1 the king's fate seems to have hung in the balance at the end of every eight years1 ready to fly up and kick the beam as soon as the opposite scale was loaded with a falling star4 ,whatever its origin may have been1 the cycle of eight years appears to have coincided with the normal length of the king's reign in other parts of ,greece besides ,sparta4 ,thus ,minos1 king of ,cnossus in ,crete1 whose great palace has been unearthed in recent years1 is said to have held office for periods of eight years together4 ,at the end of each period he retired for a season to the oracular cave on ,mount ,ida1 and there communed with his divine father ,zeus1 giving him an account of his kingship in the years that were past1 and receiving from him instructions for his guidance in those which were to come4 ,the tradition plainly implies that at the end of every eight years the king's sacred powers needed to be renewed by intercourse with the godhead1 and that without such a renewal he would have forfeited his right to the throne4 ,without being unduly rash we may surmise that the tribute of seven youths and seven maidens whom the ,athenians were bound to send to ,minos every eight years had some connexion with the renewal of the king's power for another octennial cycle4 ,traditions varied as to the fate which awaited the lads and damsels on their arrival in ,crete2 but the common view appears to have been that they were shut up in the labyrinth1 there to be devoured by the ,minotaur1 or at least to be imprisoned for life4 ,perhaps they were sacrificed by being roasted alive in a bronze image of a bull1 or of a bull-headed man1 in order to renew the strength of the king and of the sun1 whom he personated4 ,this at all events is suggested by the legend of ,talos1 a bronze man who clutched people to his breast and leaped with them into the fire1 so that they were roasted alive4 ,he is said to have been given by ,zeus to ,europa1 or by ,hephaestus to ,minos1 to guard the island of ,crete1 which he patrolled thrice daily4 ,according to one account he was a bull1 according to another he was the sun4 ,probably he was identical with the ,minotaur1 and stripped of his mythical features was nothing but a bronze image of the sun represented as a man with a bull's head4 ,in order to renew the solar fires1 human victims may have been sacrificed to the idol by being roasted in its hollow body or placed on its sloping hands and allowed to roll into a pit of fire4 ,it was in the latter fashion that the ,carthaginians sacrificed their offspring to ,moloch4 ,the children were laid on the hands of a calf-headed image of bronze1 from which they slid into a fiery oven1 while the people danced to the music of flutes and timbrels to drown the shrieks of the burning victims4 ,the resemblance which the ,cretan traditions bear to the ,carthaginian practice suggests that the worship associated with the names of ,minos and the ,minotaur may have been powerfully influenced by that of a ,semitic ,baal4 ,in the tradition of ,phalaris1 tyrant of ,agrigentum1 and his brazen bull we may have an echo of similar rites in ,sicily1 where the ,carthaginian power struck deep roots4 ,in the province of ,lagos1 the ,ijebu tribe of the ,yoruba race is divided into two branches1 which are known respectively as the ,ijebu ,ode and the ,ijebu ,remon4 ,the ,ode branch of the tribe is ruled by a chief who bears the title of ,awujale and is surrounded by a great deal of mystery4 ,down to recent times his face might not be seen even by his own subjects1 and if circumstances obliged him to communicate with them he did so through a screen which hid him from view4 ,the other or ,remon branch of the ,ijebu tribe is governed by a chief1 who ranks below the ,awujale4 ,mr4 ,john ,parkinson was informed that in former times this subordinate chief used to be killed with ceremony after a rule of three years4 ,as the country is now under ,british protection the custom of putting the chief to death at the end of a three years' reign has long been abolished1 and ,mr4 ,parkinson was unable to ascertain any particulars on the subject4 ,at ,babylon1 within historical times1 the tenure of the kingly office was in practice lifelong1 yet in theory it would seem to have been merely annual4 ,for every year at the festival of ,zagmuk the king had to renew his power by seizing the hands of the image of ,marduk in his great temple of ,esagil at ,babylon4 ,even when ,babylon passed under the power of ,assyria1 the monarchs of that country were expected to legalise their claim to the throne every year by coming to ,babylon and performing the ancient ceremony at the ,new ,year festival1 and some of them found the obligation so burdensome that rather than discharge it they renounced the title of king altogether and contented themselves with the humbler one of ,governor4 ,further1 it would appear that in remote times1 though not within the historical period1 the kings of ,babylon or their barbarous predecessors forfeited not merely their crown but their life at the end of a year's tenure of office4 ,at least this is the conclusion to which the following evidence seems to point4 ,according to the historian ,berosus1 who as a ,babylonian priest spoke with ample knowledge1 there was annually celebrated in ,babylon a festival called the ,sacaea4 ,it began on the sixteenth day of the month ,lous1 and lasted for five days1 during which masters and servants changed places1 the servants giving orders and the masters obeying them4 ,a prisoner condemned to death was dressed in the king's robes1 seated on the king's throne1 allowed to issue whatever commands he pleased1 to eat1 drink1 and enjoy himself1 and to lie with the king's concubines4 ,but at the end of the five days he was stripped of his royal robes1 scourged1 and hanged or impaled4 ,during his brief term of office he bore the title of ,zoganes4 ,this custom might perhaps have been explained as merely a grim jest perpetrated in a season of jollity at the expense of an unhappy criminal4 ,but one circumstance--the leave given to the mock king to enjoy the king's concubines--is decisive against this interpretation4 ,considering the jealous seclusion of an oriental despot's harem we may be quite certain that permission to invade it would never have been granted by the despot1 least of all to a condemned criminal1 except for the very gravest cause4 ,this cause could hardly be other than that the condemned man was about to die in the king's stead1 and that to make the substitution perfect it was necessary he should enjoy the full rights of royalty during his brief reign4 ,there is nothing surprising in this substitution4 ,the rule that the king must be put to death either on the appearance of any symptom of bodily decay or at the end of a fixed period is certainly one which1 sooner or later1 the kings would seek to abolish or modify4 ,we have seen that in ,ethiopia1 ,sofala1 and ,eyeo the rule was boldly set aside by enlightened monarchs2 and that in ,calicut the old custom of killing the king at the end of twelve years was changed into a permission granted to any one at the end of the twelve years' period to attack the king1 and1 in the event of killing him1 to reign in his stead2 though1 as the king took care at these times to be surrounded by his guards1 the permission was little more than a form4 ,another way of modifying the stern old rule is seen in the ,babylonian custom just described4 ,when the time drew near for the king to be put to death 7in ,babylon this appears to have been at the end of a single year's reign7 he abdicated for a few days1 during which a temporary king reigned and suffered in his stead4 ,at first the temporary king may have been an innocent person1 possibly a member of the king's own family2 but with the growth of civilisation the sacrifice of an innocent person would be revolting to the public sentiment1 and accordingly a condemned criminal would be invested with the brief and fatal sovereignty4 ,in the sequel we shall find other examples of a dying criminal representing a dying god4 ,for we must not forget that1 as the case of the ,shilluk kings clearly shows1 the king is slain in his character of a god or a demigod1 his death and resurrection1 as the only means of perpetuating the divine life unimpaired1 being deemed necessary for the salvation of his people and the world4 ,a vestige of a practice of putting the king to death at the end of a year's reign appears to have survived in the festival called ,macahity1 which used to be celebrated in ,hawaii during the last month of the year4 ,about a hundred years ago a ,russian voyager described the custom as follows3 ,the taboo ,macahity is not unlike to our festival of ,christmas4 ,it continues a whole month1 during which the people amuse themselves with dances1 plays1 and sham-fights of every kind4 ,the king must open this festival wherever he is4 ,on this occasion his majesty dresses himself in his richest cloak and helmet1 and is paddled in a canoe along the shore1 followed sometimes by many of his subjects4 ,he embarks early1 and must finish his excursion at sunrise4 ,the strongest and most expert of the warriors is chosen to receive him on his landing4 ,this warrior watches the canoe along the beach2 and as soon as the king lands1 and has thrown off his cloak1 he darts his spear at him1 from a distance of about thirty paces1 and the king must either catch the spear in his hand1 or suffer from it3 there is no jesting in the business4 ,having caught it1 he carries it under his arm1 with the sharp end downwards1 into the temple or heavoo4 ,on his entrance1 the assembled multitude begin their sham-fights1 and immediately the air is obscured by clouds of spears1 made for the occasion with blunted ends4 ,hamamea the king has been frequently advised to abolish this ridiculous ceremony1 in which he risks his life every year2 but to no effect4 ,his answer always is1 that he is as able to catch a spear as any one on the island is to throw it at him4 ,during the ,macahity1 all punishments are remitted throughout the country2 and no person can leave the place in which he commences these holidays1 let the affair be ever so important4 ,that a king should regularly have been put to death at the close of a year's reign will hardly appear improbable when we learn that to this day there is still a kingdom in which the reign and the life of the sovereign are limited to a single day4 ,in ,ngoio1 a province of the ancient kingdom of ,congo1 the rule obtains that the chief who assumes the cap of sovereignty is always killed on the night after his coronation4 ,the right of succession lies with the chief of the ,musurongo2 but we need not wonder that he does not exercise it1 and that the throne stands vacant4 ,no one likes to lose his life for a few hours' glory on the ,ngoio throne4 ,,xxv4 ,temporary ,kings ,,in ,,some places the modified form of the old custom of regicide which appears to have prevailed at ,babylon has been further softened down4 ,the king still abdicates annually for a short time and his place is filled by a more or less nominal sovereign2 but at the close of his short reign the latter is no longer killed1 though sometimes a mock execution still survives as a memorial of the time when he was actually put to death4 ,to take examples4 ,in the month of ,mac 7,february7 the king of ,cambodia annually abdicated for three days4 ,during this time he performed no act of authority1 he did not touch the seals1 he did not even receive the revenues which fell due4 ,in his stead there reigned a temporary king called ,sdach ,mac1 that is1 ,king ,february4 ,the office of temporary king was hereditary in a family distantly connected with the royal house1 the sons succeeding the fathers and the younger brothers the elder brothers just as in the succession to the real sovereignty4 ,on a favourable day fixed by the astrologers the temporary king was conducted by the mandarins in triumphal procession4 ,he rode one of the royal elephants1 seated in the royal palanquin1 and escorted by soldiers who1 dressed in appropriate costumes1 represented the neighbouring peoples of ,siam1 ,annam1 ,laos1 and so on4 ,in place of the golden crown he wore a peaked white cap1 and his regalia1 instead of being of gold encrusted with diamonds1 were of rough wood4 ,after paying homage to the real king1 from whom he received the sovereignty for three days1 together with all the revenues accruing during that time 7though this last custom has been omitted for some time71 he moved in procession round the palace and through the streets of the capital4 ,on the third day1 after the usual procession1 the temporary king gave orders that the elephants should trample under foot the mountain of rice1 which was a scaffold of bamboo surrounded by sheaves of rice4 ,the people gathered up the rice1 each man taking home a little with him to secure a good harvest4 ,some of it was also taken to the king1 who had it cooked and presented to the monks4 ,in ,siam on the sixth day of the moon in the sixth month 7the end of ,april7 a temporary king is appointed1 who for three days enjoys the royal prerogatives1 the real king remaining shut up in his palace4 ,this temporary king sends his numerous satellites in all directions to seize and confiscate whatever they can find in the bazaar and open shops2 even the ships and junks which arrive in harbour during the three days are forfeited to him and must be redeemed4 ,he goes to a field in the middle of the city1 whither they bring a gilded plough drawn by gaily-decked oxen4 ,after the plough has been anointed and the oxen rubbed with incense1 the mock king traces nine furrows with the plough1 followed by aged dames of the palace scattering the first seed of the season4 ,as soon as the nine furrows are drawn1 the crowd of spectators rushes in and scrambles for the seed which has just been sown1 believing that1 mixed with the seed-rice1 it will ensure a plentiful crop4 ,then the oxen are unyoked1 and rice1 maize1 sesame1 sago1 bananas1 sugar-cane1 melons1 and so on1 are set before them2 whatever they eat first will1 it is thought1 be dear in the year following1 though some people interpret the omen in the opposite sense4 ,during this time the temporary king stands leaning against a tree with his right foot resting on his left knee4 ,from standing thus on one foot he is popularly known as ,king ,hop2 but his official title is ,phaya ,phollathep ,lord of the ,heavenly ,hosts4 ,he is a sort of ,minister of ,agriculture2 all disputes about fields1 rice1 and so forth1 are referred to him4 ,there is moreover another ceremony in which he personates the king4 ,it takes place in the second month 7which falls in the cold season7 and lasts three days4 ,he is conducted in procession to an open place opposite the ,temple of the ,brahmans1 where there are a number of poles dressed like ,may-poles1 upon which the ,brahmans swing4 ,all the while that they swing and dance1 the ,lord of the ,heavenly ,hosts has to stand on one foot upon a seat which is made of bricks plastered over1 covered with a white cloth1 and hung with tapestry4 ,he is supported by a wooden frame with a gilt canopy1 and two ,brahmans stand one on each side of him4 ,the dancing ,brahmans carry buffalo horns with which they draw water from a large copper caldron and sprinkle it on the spectators2 this is supposed to bring good luck1 causing the people to dwell in peace and quiet1 health and prosperity4 ,the time during which the ,lord of the ,heavenly ,hosts has to stand on one foot is about three hours4 ,this is thought to prove the dispositions of the ,devattas and spirits4 ,if he lets his foot down he is liable to forfeit his property and have his family enslaved by the king1 as it is believed to be a bad omen1 portending destruction to the state1 and instability to the throne4 ,but if he stand firm he is believed to have gained a victory over evil spirits1 and he has moreover the privilege1 ostensibly at least1 of seizing any ship which may enter the harbour during these three days1 and taking its contents1 and also of entering any open shop in the town and carrying away what he chooses4 ,such were the duties and privileges of the ,siamese ,king ,hop down to about the middle of the nineteenth century or later4 ,under the reign of the late enlightened monarch this quaint personage was to some extent both shorn of the glories and relieved of the burden of his office4 ,he still watches1 as of old1 the ,brahmans rushing through the air in a swing suspended between two tall masts1 each some ninety feet high2 but he is allowed to sit instead of stand1 and1 although public opinion still expects him to keep his right foot on his left knee during the whole of the ceremony1 he would incur no legal penalty were he1 to the great chagrin of the people1 to put his weary foot to the ground4 ,other signs1 too1 tell of the invasion of the ,east by the ideas and civilisation of the ,west4 ,the thoroughfares that lead to the scene of the performance are blocked with carriages3 lamp-posts and telegraph posts1 to which eager spectators cling like monkeys1 rise above the dense crowd2 and1 while a tatterdemalion band of the old style1 in gaudy garb of vermilion and yellow1 bangs and tootles away on drums and trumpets of an antique pattern1 the procession of barefooted soldiers in brilliant uniforms steps briskly along to the lively strains of a modern military band playing ,marching through ,georgia4 ,on the first day of the sixth month1 which was regarded as the beginning of the year1 the king and people of ,samarcand used to put on new clothes and cut their hair and beards4 ,then they repaired to a forest near the capital where they shot arrows on horseback for seven days4 ,on the last day the target was a gold coin1 and he who hit it had the right to be king for one day4 ,in ,upper ,egypt on the first day of the solar year by ,coptic reckoning1 that is1 on the tenth of ,september1 when the ,nile has generally reached its highest point1 the regular government is suspended for three days and every town chooses its own ruler4 ,this temporary lord wears a sort of tall fool's cap and a long flaxen beard1 and is enveloped in a strange mantle4 ,with a wand of office in his hand and attended by men disguised as scribes1 executioners1 and so forth1 he proceeds to the ,governor's house4 ,the latter allows himself to be deposed2 and the mock king1 mounting the throne1 holds a tribunal1 to the decisions of which even the governor and his officials must bow4 ,after three days the mock king is condemned to death2 the envelope or shell in which he was encased is committed to the flames1 and from its ashes the ,fellah creeps forth4 ,the custom perhaps points to an old practice of burning a real king in grim earnest4 ,in ,uganda the brothers of the king used to be burned1 because it was not lawful to shed the royal blood4 ,the ,mohammedan students of ,fez1 in ,morocco1 are allowed to appoint a sultan of their own1 who reigns for a few weeks1 and is known as ,sultan t-tulba1 the ,sultan of the ,scribes4 ,this brief authority is put up for auction and knocked down to the highest bidder4 ,it brings some substantial privileges with it1 for the holder is freed from taxes thenceforward1 and he has the right of asking a favour from the real sultan4 ,that favour is seldom refused2 it usually consists in the release of a prisoner4 ,moreover1 the agents of the student-sultan levy fines on the shopkeepers and householders1 against whom they trump up various humorous charges4 ,the temporary sultan is surrounded with the pomp of a real court1 and parades the streets in state with music and shouting1 while a royal umbrella is held over his head4 ,with the so-called fines and free-will offerings1 to which the real sultan adds a liberal supply of provisions1 the students have enough to furnish forth a magnificent banquet2 and altogether they enjoy themselves thoroughly1 indulging in all kinds of games and amusements4 ,for the first seven days the mock sultan remains in the college2 then he goes about a mile out of the town and encamps on the bank of the river1 attended by the students and not a few of the citizens4 ,on the seventh day of his stay outside the town he is visited by the real sultan1 who grants him his request and gives him seven more days to reign1 so that the reign of the ,sultan of the ,scribes nominally lasts three weeks4 ,but when six days of the last week have passed the mock sultan runs back to the town by night4 ,this temporary sultanship always falls in spring1 about the beginning of ,april4 ,its origin is said to have been as follows4 ,when ,mulai ,rasheed ,,ii4 was fighting for the throne in #affd or #affe1 a certain ,jew usurped the royal authority at ,taza4 ,but the rebellion was soon suppressed through the loyalty and devotion of the students4 ,to effect their purpose they resorted to an ingenious stratagem4 ,forty of them caused themselves to be packed in chests which were sent as a present to the usurper4 ,in the dead of night1 while the unsuspecting ,jew was slumbering peacefully among the packing-cases1 the lids were stealthily raised1 the brave forty crept forth1 slew the usurper1 and took possession of the city in the name of the real sultan1 who1 to mark his gratitude for the help thus rendered him in time of need1 conferred on the students the right of annually appointing a sultan of their own4 ,the narrative has all the air of a fiction devised to explain an old custom1 of which the real meaning and origin had been forgotten4 ,a custom of annually appointing a mock king for a single day was observed at ,lostwithiel in ,cornwall down to the sixteenth century4 ,on little ,easter ,sunday the freeholders of the town and manor assembled together1 either in person or by their deputies1 and one among them1 as it fell to his lot by turn1 gaily attired and gallantly mounted1 with a crown on his head1 a sceptre in his hand1 and a sword borne before him1 rode through the principal street to the church1 dutifully attended by all the rest on horseback4 ,the clergyman in his best robes received him at the churchyard stile and conducted him to hear divine service4 ,on leaving the church he repaired1 with the same pomp1 to a house provided for his reception4 ,here a feast awaited him and his suite1 and being set at the head of the table he was served on bended knees1 with all the rites due to the estate of a prince4 ,the ceremony ended with the dinner1 and every man returned home4 ,sometimes the temporary king occupies the throne1 not annually1 but once for all at the beginning of each reign4 ,thus in the kingdom of ,jambi in ,sumatra it is the custom that at the beginning of a new reign a man of the people should occupy the throne and exercise the royal prerogatives for a single day4 ,the origin of the custom is explained by a tradition that there were once five royal brothers1 the four elder of whom all declined the throne on the ground of various bodily defects1 leaving it to their youngest brother4 ,but the eldest occupied the throne for one day1 and reserved for his descendants a similar privilege at the beginning of every reign4 ,thus the office of temporary king is hereditary in a family akin to the royal house4 ,in ,bilaspur it seems to be the custom1 after the death of a ,rajah1 for a ,brahman to eat rice out of the dead ,rajah's hand1 and then to occupy the throne for a year4 ,at the end of the year the ,brahman receives presents and is dismissed from the territory1 being forbidden apparently to return4 ,the idea seems to be that the spirit of the ,rj enters into the ,brhman who eats the khir 7rice and milk7 out of his hand when he is dead1 as the ,brahman is apparently carefully watched during the whole year1 and not allowed to go away4 ,the same or a similar custom is believed to obtain among the hill states about ,kangra4 ,the custom of banishing the ,brahman who represents the king may be a substitute for putting him to death4 ,at the installation of a prince of ,carinthia a peasant1 in whose family the office was hereditary1 ascended a marble stone which stood surrounded by meadows in a spacious valley2 on his right stood a black mother-cow1 on his left a lean ugly mare4 ,a rustic crowd gathered about him4 ,then the future prince1 dressed as a peasant and carrying a shepherd's staff1 drew near1 attended by courtiers and magistrates4 ,on perceiving him the peasant called out1 ,who is this whom ,i see coming so proudly along8 ,the people answered1 ,the prince of the land4 ,the peasant was then prevailed on to surrender the marble seat to the prince on condition of receiving sixty pence1 the cow and mare1 and exemption from taxes4 ,but before yielding his place he gave the prince a light blow on the cheek4 ,some points about these temporary kings deserve to be specially noticed before we pass to the next branch of the evidence4 ,in the first place1 the ,cambodian and ,siamese examples show clearly that it is especially the divine or magical functions of the king which are transferred to his temporary substitute4 ,this appears from the belief that by keeping up his foot the temporary king of ,siam gained a victory over the evil spirits1 whereas by letting it down he imperilled the existence of the state4 ,again1 the ,cambodian ceremony of trampling down the mountain of rice1 and the ,siamese ceremony of opening the ploughing and sowing1 are charms to produce a plentiful harvest1 as appears from the belief that those who carry home some of the trampled rice1 or of the seed sown1 will thereby secure a good crop4 ,moreover1 when the ,siamese representative of the king is guiding the plough1 the people watch him anxiously1 not to see whether he drives a straight furrow1 but to mark the exact point on his leg to which the skirt of his silken robe reaches2 for on that is supposed to hang the state of the weather and the crops during the ensuing season4 ,if the ,lord of the ,heavenly ,hosts hitches up his garment above his knee1 the weather will be wet and heavy rains will spoil the harvest4 ,if he lets it trail to his ankle1 a drought will be the consequence4 ,but fine weather and heavy crops will follow if the hem of his robe hangs exactly half-way down the calf of his leg4 ,so closely is the course of nature1 and with it the weal or woe of the people1 dependent on the minutest act or gesture of the king's representative4 ,but the task of making the crops grow1 thus deputed to the temporary kings1 is one of the magical functions regularly supposed to be discharged by kings in primitive society4 ,the rule that the mock king must stand on one foot upon a raised seat in the rice-field was perhaps originally meant as a charm to make the crop grow high2 at least this was the object of a similar ceremony observed by the old ,prussians4 ,the tallest girl1 standing on one foot upon a seat1 with her lap full of cakes1 a cup of brandy in her right hand and a piece of elm-bark or linden-bark in her left1 prayed to the god ,waizganthos that the flax might grow as high as she was standing4 ,then1 after draining the cup1 she had it refilled1 and poured the brandy on the ground as an offering to ,waizganthos1 and threw down the cakes for his attendant sprites4 ,if she remained steady on one foot throughout the ceremony1 it was an omen that the flax crop would be good2 but if she let her foot down1 it was feared that the crop might fail4 ,the same significance perhaps attaches to the swinging of the ,brahmans1 which the ,lord of the ,heavenly ,hosts had formerly to witness standing on one foot4 ,on the principles of homoeopathic or imitative magic it might be thought that the higher the priests swing the higher will grow the rice4 ,for the ceremony is described as a harvest festival1 and swinging is practised by the ,letts of ,russia with the avowed intention of influencing the growth of the crops4 ,in the spring and early summer1 between ,easter and ,st4 ,john's ,day 7the summer solstice71 every ,lettish peasant is said to devote his leisure hours to swinging diligently2 for the higher he rises in the air the higher will his flax grow that season4 ,in the foregoing cases the temporary king is appointed annually in accordance with a regular custom4 ,but in other cases the appointment is made only to meet a special emergency1 such as to relieve the real king from some actual or threatened evil by diverting it to a substitute1 who takes his place on the throne for a short time4 ,the history of ,persia furnishes instances of such occasional substitutes for the ,shah4 ,thus ,shah ,abbas the ,great1 being warned by his astrologers in the year #aeia that a serious danger impended over him1 attempted to avert the omen by abdicating the throne and appointing a certain unbeliever named ,yusoofee1 probably a ,christian1 to reign in his stead4 ,the substitute was accordingly crowned1 and for three days1 if we may trust the ,persian historians1 he enjoyed not only the name and the state but the power of the king4 ,at the end of his brief reign he was put to death3 the decree of the stars was fulfilled by this sacrifice2 and ,abbas1 who reascended his throne in a most propitious hour1 was promised by his astrologers a long and glorious reign4 ,,xxvi4 ,sacrifice of the ,king's ,son ,a ,,point to notice about the temporary kings described in the foregoing chapter is that in two places 7,cambodia and ,jambi7 they come of a stock which is believed to be akin to the royal family4 ,if the view here taken of the origin of these temporary kingships is correct1 we can easily understand why the king's substitute should sometimes be of the same race as the king4 ,when the king first succeeded in getting the life of another accepted as a sacrifice instead of his own1 he would have to show that the death of that other would serve the purpose quite as well as his own would have done4 ,now it was as a god or demigod that the king had to die2 therefore the substitute who died for him had to be invested1 at least for the occasion1 with the divine attributes of the king4 ,this1 as we have just seen1 was certainly the case with the temporary kings of ,siam and ,cambodia2 they were invested with the supernatural functions1 which in an earlier stage of society were the special attributes of the king4 ,but no one could so well represent the king in his divine character as his son1 who might be supposed to share the divine afflatus of his father4 ,no one1 therefore1 could so appropriately die for the king and1 through him1 for the whole people1 as the king's son4 ,we have seen that according to tradition1 ,aun or ,on1 ,king of ,sweden1 sacrificed nine of his sons to ,odin at ,upsala in order that his own life might be spared4 ,after he had sacrificed his second son he received from the god an answer that he should live so long as he gave him one of his sons every ninth year4 ,when he had sacrificed his seventh son1 he still lived1 but was so feeble that he could not walk but had to be carried in a chair4 ,then he offered up his eighth son1 and lived nine years more1 lying in his bed4 ,after that he sacrificed his ninth son1 and lived another nine years1 but so that he drank out of a horn like a weaned child4 ,he now wished to sacrifice his only remaining son to ,odin1 but the ,swedes would not allow him4 ,so he died and was buried in a mound at ,upsala4 ,in ancient ,greece there seems to have been at least one kingly house of great antiquity of which the eldest sons were always liable to be sacrificed in room of their royal sires4 ,when ,xerxes was marching through ,thessaly at the head of his mighty host to attack the ,spartans at ,thermopylae1 he came to the town of ,alus4 ,here he was shown the sanctuary of ,laphystian ,zeus1 about which his guides told him a strange tale4 ,it ran somewhat as follows4 ,once upon a time the king of the country1 by name ,athamas1 married a wife ,nephele1 and had by her a son called ,phrixus and a daughter named ,helle4 ,afterwards he took to himself a second wife called ,ino1 by whom he had two sons1 ,learchus and ,melicertes4 ,but his second wife was jealous of her stepchildren1 ,phrixus and ,helle1 and plotted their death4 ,she went about very cunningly to compass her bad end4 ,first of all she persuaded the women of the country to roast the seed corn secretly before it was committed to the ground4 ,so next year no crops came up and the people died of famine4 ,then the king sent messengers to the oracle at ,delphi to enquire the cause of the dearth4 ,but the wicked stepmother bribed the messenger to give out as the answer of the god that the dearth would never cease till the children of ,athamas by his first wife had been sacrificed to ,zeus4 ,when ,athamas heard that1 he sent for the children1 who were with the sheep4 ,but a ram with a fleece of gold opened his lips1 and speaking with the voice of a man warned the children of their danger4 ,so they mounted the ram and fled with him over land and sea4 ,as they flew over the sea1 the girl slipped from the animal's back1 and falling into water was drowned4 ,but her brother ,phrixus was brought safe to the land of ,colchis1 where reigned a child of the sun4 ,phrixus married the king's daughter1 and she bore him a son ,cytisorus4 ,and there he sacrificed the ram with the golden fleece to ,zeus the ,god of ,flight2 but some will have it that he sacrificed the animal to ,laphystian ,zeus4 ,the golden fleece itself he gave to his wife's father1 who nailed it to an oak tree1 guarded by a sleepless dragon in a sacred grove of ,ares4 ,meanwhile at home an oracle had commanded that ,king ,athamas himself should be sacrificed as an expiatory offering for the whole country4 ,so the people decked him with garlands like a victim and led him to the altar1 where they were just about to sacrifice him when he was rescued either by his grandson ,cytisorus1 who arrived in the nick of time from ,colchis1 or by ,hercules1 who brought tidings that the king's son ,phrixus was yet alive4 ,thus ,athamas was saved1 but afterward he went mad1 and mistaking his son ,learchus for a wild beast1 shot him dead4 ,next he attempted the life of his remaining son ,melicertes1 but the child was rescued by his mother ,ino1 who ran and threw herself and him from a high rock into the sea4 ,mother and son were changed into marine divinities1 and the son received special homage in the isle of ,tenedos1 where babes were sacrificed to him4 ,thus bereft of wife and children the unhappy ,athamas quitted his country1 and on enquiring of the oracle where he should dwell was told to take up his abode wherever he should be entertained by wild beasts4 ,he fell in with a pack of wolves devouring sheep1 and when they saw him they fled and left him the bleeding remnants of their prey4 ,in this way the oracle was fulfilled4 ,but because ,king ,athamas had not been sacrificed as a sin-offering for the whole country1 it was divinely decreed that the eldest male scion of his family in each generation should be sacrificed without fail1 if ever he set foot in the town-hall1 where the offerings were made to ,laphystian ,zeus by one of the house of ,athamas4 ,many of the family1 ,xerxes was informed1 had fled to foreign lands to escape this doom2 but some of them had returned long afterwards1 and being caught by the sentinels in the act of entering the town-hall were wreathed as victims1 led forth in procession1 and sacrificed4 ,these instances appear to have been notorious1 if not frequent2 for the writer of a dialogue attributed to ,plato1 after speaking of the immolation of human victims by the ,carthaginians1 adds that such practices were not unknown among the ,greeks1 and he refers with horror to the sacrifices offered on ,mount ,lycaeus and by the descendants of ,athamas4 ,the suspicion that this barbarous custom by no means fell into disuse even in later days is strengthened by a case of human sacrifice which occurred in ,plutarch's time at ,orchomenus1 a very ancient city of ,boeotia1 distant only a few miles across the plain from the historian's birthplace4 ,here dwelt a family of which the men went by the name of ,psoloeis or ,sooty1 and the women by the name of ,oleae or ,destructive4 ,every year at the festival of the ,agrionia the priest of ,dionysus pursued these women with a drawn sword1 and if he overtook one of them he had the right to slay her4 ,in ,plutarch's lifetime the right was actually exercised by a priest ,zoilus4 ,the family thus liable to furnish at least one human victim every year was of royal descent1 for they traced their lineage to ,minyas1 the famous old king of ,orchomenus1 the monarch of fabulous wealth1 whose stately treasury1 as it is called1 still stands in ruins at the point where the long rocky hill of ,orchomenus melts into the vast level expanse of the ,copaic plain4 ,tradition ran that the king's three daughters long despised the other women of the country for yielding to the ,bacchic frenzy1 and sat at home in the king's house scornfully plying the distaff and the loom1 while the rest1 wreathed with flowers1 their dishevelled locks streaming to the wind1 roamed in ecstasy the barren mountains that rise above ,orchomenus1 making the solitude of the hills to echo to the wild music of cymbals and tambourines4 ,but in time the divine fury infected even the royal damsels in their quiet chamber2 they were seized with a fierce longing to partake of human flesh1 and cast lots among themselves which should give up her child to furnish a cannibal feast4 ,the lot fell on ,leucippe1 and she surrendered her son ,hippasus1 who was torn limb from limb by the three4 ,from these misguided women sprang the ,oleae and the ,psoloeis1 of whom the men were said to be so called because they wore sad-coloured raiment in token of their mourning and grief4 ,now this practice of taking human victims from a family of royal descent at ,orchomenus is all the more significant because ,athamas himself is said to have reigned in the land of ,orchomenus even before the time of ,minyas1 and because over against the city there rises ,mount ,laphystius1 on which1 as at ,alus in ,thessaly1 there was a sanctuary of ,laphystian ,zeus1 where1 according to tradition1 ,athamas purposed to sacrifice his two children ,phrixus and ,helle4 ,on the whole1 comparing the traditions about ,athamas with the custom that obtained with regard to his descendants in historical times1 we may fairly infer that in ,thessaly and probably in ,boeotia there reigned of old a dynasty of which the kings were liable to be sacrificed for the good of the country to the god called ,laphystian ,zeus1 but that they contrived to shift the fatal responsibility to their offspring1 of whom the eldest son was regularly destined to the altar4 ,as time went on1 the cruel custom was so far mitigated that a ram was accepted as a vicarious sacrifice in room of the royal victim1 provided always that the prince abstained from setting foot in the town-hall where the sacrifices were offered to ,laphystian ,zeus by one of his kinsmen4 ,but if he were rash enough to enter the place of doom1 to thrust himself wilfully1 as it were1 on the notice of the god who had good-naturedly winked at the substitution of a ram1 the ancient obligation which had been suffered to lie in abeyance recovered all its force1 and there was no help for it but he must die4 ,the tradition which associated the sacrifice of the king or his children with a great dearth points clearly to the belief1 so common among primitive folk1 that the king is responsible for the weather and the crops1 and that he may justly pay with his life for the inclemency of the one or the failure of the other4 ,athamas and his line1 in short1 appear to have united divine or magical with royal functions2 and this view is strongly supported by the claims to divinity which ,salmoneus1 the brother of ,athamas1 is said to have set up4 ,we have seen that this presumptuous mortal professed to be no other than ,zeus himself1 and to wield the thunder and lightning1 of which he made a trumpery imitation by the help of tinkling kettles and blazing torches4 ,if we may judge from analogy1 his mock thunder and lightning were no mere scenic exhibition designed to deceive and impress the beholders2 they were enchantments practised by the royal magician for the purpose of bringing about the celestial phenomena which they feebly mimicked4 ,among the ,semites of ,western ,asia the king1 in a time of national danger1 sometimes gave his own son to die as a sacrifice for the people4 ,thus ,philo of ,byblus1 in his work on the ,jews1 says3 ,it was an ancient custom in a crisis of great danger that the ruler of a city or nation should give his beloved son to die for the whole people1 as a ransom offered to the avenging demons2 and the children thus offered were slain with mystic rites4 ,so ,cronus1 whom the ,phoenicians call ,israel1 being king of the land and having an only-begotten son called ,jeoud 7for in the ,phoenician tongue ,jeoud signifies 'only begotten'71 dressed him in royal robes and sacrificed him upon an altar in a time of war1 when the country was in great danger from the enemy4 ,when the king of ,moab was besieged by the ,israelites and hard beset1 he took his eldest son1 who should have reigned in his stead1 and offered him for a burnt offering on the wall4 ,,xxvii4 ,succession to the ,soul ,,to ,,the ,,view that in early times1 and among barbarous races1 kings have frequently been put to death at the end of a short reign1 it may be objected that such a custom would tend to the extinction of the royal family4 ,the objection may be met by observing1 first1 that the kingship is often not confined to one family1 but may be shared in turn by several2 second1 that the office is frequently not hereditary1 but is open to men of any family1 even to foreigners1 who may fulfil the requisite conditions1 such as marrying a princess or vanquishing the king in battle2 and1 third1 that even if the custom did tend to the extinction of a dynasty1 that is not a consideration which would prevent its observance among people less provident of the future and less heedful of human life than ourselves4 ,many races1 like many individuals1 have indulged in practices which must in the end destroy them4 ,the ,polynesians seem regularly to have killed two-thirds of their children4 ,in some parts of ,east ,africa the proportion of infants massacred at birth is said to be the same4 ,only children born in certain presentations are allowed to live4 ,the ,jagas1 a conquering tribe in ,angola1 are reported to have put to death all their children1 without exception1 in order that the women might not be cumbered with babies on the march4 ,they recruited their numbers by adopting boys and girls of thirteen or fourteen years of age1 whose parents they had killed and eaten4 ,among the ,mbaya ,indians of ,south ,america the women used to murder all their children except the last1 or the one they believed to be the last4 ,if one of them had another child afterwards1 she killed it4 ,we need not wonder that this practice entirely destroyed a branch of the ,mbaya nation1 who had been for many years the most formidable enemies of the ,spaniards4 ,among the ,lengua ,indians of the ,gran ,chaco1 the missionaries discovered what they describe as a carefully planned system of racial suicide1 by the practice of infanticide by abortion1 and other methods4 ,nor is infanticide the only mode in which a savage tribe commits suicide4 ,a lavish use of the poison ordeal may be equally effective4 ,some time ago a small tribe named ,uwet came down from the hill country1 and settled on the left branch of the ,calabar ,river in ,west ,africa4 ,when the missionaries first visited the place1 they found the population considerable1 distributed into three villages4 ,since then the constant use of the poison ordeal has almost extinguished the tribe4 ,on one occasion the whole population took poison to prove their innocence4 ,about half perished on the spot1 and the remnant1 we are told1 still continuing their superstitious practice1 must soon become extinct4 ,with such examples before us we need not hesitate to believe that many tribes have felt no scruple or delicacy in observing a custom which tends to wipe out a single family4 ,to attribute such scruples to them is to commit the common1 the perpetually repeated mistake of judging the savage by the standard of ,european civilisation4 ,if any of my readers set out with the notion that all races of men think and act much in the same way as educated ,englishmen1 the evidence of superstitious belief and custom collected in this work should suffice to disabuse him of so erroneous a prepossession4 ,the explanation here given of the custom of killing divine persons assumes1 or at least is readily combined with1 the idea that the soul of the slain divinity is transmitted to his successor4 ,of this transmission ,i have no direct proof except in the case of the ,shilluk1 among whom the practice of killing the divine king prevails in a typical form1 and with whom it is a fundamental article of faith that the soul of the divine founder of the dynasty is immanent in every one of his slain successors4 ,but if this is the only actual example of such a belief which ,i can adduce1 analogy seems to render it probable that a similar succession to the soul of the slain god has been supposed to take place in other instances1 though direct evidence of it is wanting4 ,for it has been already shown that the soul of the incarnate deity is often supposed to transmigrate at death into another incarnation2 and if this takes place when the death is a natural one1 there seems no reason why it should not take place when the death has been brought about by violence4 ,certainly the idea that the soul of a dying person may be transmitted to his successor is perfectly familiar to primitive peoples4 ,in ,nias the eldest son usually succeeds his father in the chieftainship4 ,but if from any bodily or mental defect the eldest son is disqualified for ruling1 the father determines in his lifetime which of his sons shall succeed him4 ,in order1 however1 to establish his right of succession1 it is necessary that the son upon whom his father's choice falls shall catch in his mouth or in a bag the last breath1 and with it the soul1 of the dying chief4 ,for whoever catches his last breath is chief equally with the appointed successor4 ,hence the other brothers1 and sometimes also strangers1 crowd round the dying man to catch his soul as it passes4 ,the houses in ,nias are raised above the ground on posts1 and it has happened that when the dying man lay with his face on the floor1 one of the candidates has bored a hole in the floor and sucked in the chief's last breath through a bamboo tube4 ,when the chief has no son1 his soul is caught in a bag1 which is fastened to an image made to represent the deceased2 the soul is then believed to pass into the image4 ,sometimes it would appear that the spiritual link between a king and the souls of his predecessors is formed by the possession of some part of their persons4 ,in southern ,celebes the regalia often consist of corporeal portions of deceased rajahs1 which are treasured as sacred relics and confer the right to the throne4 ,similarly among the ,sakalavas of southern ,madagascar a vertebra of the neck1 a nail1 and a lock of hair of a deceased king are placed in a crocodile's tooth and carefully kept along with the similar relics of his predecessors in a house set apart for the purpose4 ,the possession of these relics constitutes the right to the throne4 ,a legitimate heir who should be deprived of them would lose all his authority over the people1 and on the contrary a usurper who should make himself master of the relics would be acknowledged king without dispute4 ,when the ,alake or king of ,abeokuta in ,west ,africa dies1 the principal men decapitate his body1 and placing the head in a large earthen vessel deliver it to the new sovereign2 it becomes his fetish and he is bound to pay it honours4 ,sometimes1 in order apparently that the new sovereign may inherit more surely the magical and other virtues of the royal line1 he is required to eat a piece of his dead predecessor4 ,thus at ,abeokuta not only was the head of the late king presented to his successor1 but the tongue was cut out and given him to eat4 ,hence1 when the natives wish to signify that the sovereign reigns1 they say1 ,he has eaten the king4 ,a custom of the same sort is still practised at ,ibadan1 a large town in the interior of ,lagos1 ,west ,africa4 ,when the king dies his head is cut off and sent to his nominal suzerain1 the ,alafin of ,oyo1 the paramount king of ,yoruba land2 but his heart is eaten by his successor4 ,this ceremony was performed not very many years ago at the accession of a new king of ,ibadan4 ,taking the whole of the preceding evidence into account1 we may fairly suppose that when the divine king or priest is put to death his spirit is believed to pass into his successor4 ,in point of fact1 among the ,shilluk of the ,white ,nile1 who regularly kill their divine kings1 every king on his accession has to perform a ceremony which appears designed to convey to him the same sacred and worshipful spirit which animated all his predecessors1 one after the other1 on the throne4 ,,xxviii4 ,the ,killing of the ,tree-,spirit #a4 ,the ,whitsuntide ,mummers ,,it remains to ask what light the custom of killing the divine king or priest sheds upon the special subject to our enquiry4 ,in an earlier part of this work we saw reason to suppose that the ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi was regarded as an incarnation of a tree-spirit or of the spirit of vegetation1 and that as such he would be endowed1 in the belief of his worshippers1 with a magical power of making the trees to bear fruit1 the crops to grow1 and so on4 ,his life must therefore have been held very precious by his worshippers1 and was probably hedged in by a system of elaborate precautions or taboos like those by which1 in so many places1 the life of the man-god has been guarded against the malignant influence of demons and sorcerers4 ,but we have seen that the very value attached to the life of the man-god necessitates his violent death as the only means of preserving it from the inevitable decay of age4 ,the same reasoning would apply to the ,king of the ,wood2 he1 too1 had to be killed in order that the divine spirit1 incarnate in him1 might be transferred in its integrity to his successor4 ,the rule that he held office till a stronger should slay him might be supposed to secure both the preservation of his divine life in full vigour and its transference to a suitable successor as soon as that vigour began to be impaired4 ,for so long as he could maintain his position by the strong hand1 it might be inferred that his natural force was not abated2 whereas his defeat and death at the hands of another proved that his strength was beginning to fail and that it was time his divine life should be lodged in a less dilapidated tabernacle4 ,this explanation of the rule that the ,king of the ,wood had to be slain by his successor at least renders that rule perfectly intelligible4 ,it is strongly supported by the theory and practice of the ,shilluk1 who put their divine king to death at the first signs of failing health1 lest his decrepitude should entail a corresponding failure of vital energy on the corn1 the cattle1 and men4 ,moreover1 it is countenanced by the analogy of the ,chitom1 upon whose life the existence of the world was supposed to hang1 and who was therefore slain by his successor as soon as he showed signs of breaking up4 ,again1 the terms on which in later times the ,king of ,calicut held office are identical with those attached to the office of ,king of the ,wood1 except that whereas the former might be assailed by a candidate at any time1 the ,king of ,calicut might only be attacked once every twelve years4 ,but as the leave granted to the ,king of ,calicut to reign so long as he could defend himself against all comers was a mitigation of the old rule which set a fixed term to his life1 so we may conjecture that the similar permission granted to the ,king of the ,wood was a mitigation of an older custom of putting him to death at the end of a definite period4 ,in both cases the new rule gave to the god-man at least a chance for his life1 which under the old rule was denied him2 and people probably reconciled themselves to the change by reflecting that so long as the god-man could maintain himself by the sword against all assaults1 there was no reason to apprehend that the fatal decay had set in4 ,the conjecture that the ,king of the ,wood was formerly put to death at the expiry of a fixed term1 without being allowed a chance for his life1 will be confirmed if evidence can be adduced of a custom of periodically killing his counterparts1 the human representatives of the tree-spirit1 in ,northern ,europe4 ,now in point of fact such a custom has left unmistakable traces of itself in the rural festivals of the peasantry4 ,to take examples4 ,at ,niederpring1 in ,lower ,bavaria1 the ,whitsuntide representative of the tree-spirit--the ,pfingstl as he was called--was clad from top to toe in leaves and flowers4 ,on his head he wore a high pointed cap1 the ends of which rested on his shoulders1 only two holes being left in it for his eyes4 ,the cap was covered with water-flowers and surmounted with a nosegay of peonies4 ,the sleeves of his coat were also made of water-plants1 and the rest of his body was enveloped in alder and hazel leaves4 ,on each side of him marched a boy holding up one of the ,pfingstl's arms4 ,these two boys carried drawn swords1 and so did most of the others who formed the procession4 ,they stopped at every house where they hoped to receive a present2 and the people1 in hiding1 soused the leaf-clad boy with water4 ,all rejoiced when he was well drenched4 ,finally he waded into the brook up to his middle2 whereupon one of the boys1 standing on the bridge1 pretended to cut off his head4 ,at ,wurmlingen1 in ,swabia1 a score of young fellows dress themselves on ,whit-,monday in white shirts and white trousers1 with red scarves round their waists and swords hanging from the scarves4 ,they ride on horseback into the wood1 led by two trumpeters blowing their trumpets4 ,in the wood they cut down leafy oak branches1 in which they envelop from head to foot him who was the last of their number to ride out of the village4 ,his legs1 however1 are encased separately1 so that he may be able to mount his horse again4 ,further1 they give him a long artificial neck1 with an artificial head and a false face on the top of it4 ,then a ,may-tree is cut1 generally an aspen or beech about ten feet high2 and being decked with coloured handkerchiefs and ribbons it is entrusted to a special ,may-bearer4 ,the cavalcade then returns with music and song to the village4 ,amongst the personages who figure in the procession are a ,moorish king with a sooty face and a crown on his head1 a ,dr4 ,iron-,beard1 a corporal1 and an executioner4 ,they halt on the village green1 and each of the characters makes a speech in rhyme4 ,the executioner announces that the leaf-clad man has been condemned to death1 and cuts off his false head4 ,then the riders race to the ,may-tree1 which has been set up a little way off4 ,the first man who succeeds in wrenching it from the ground as he gallops past keeps it with all its decorations4 ,the ceremony is observed every second or third year4 ,in ,saxony and ,thringen there is a ,whitsuntide ceremony called chasing the ,wild ,man out of the bush1 or fetching the ,wild ,man out of the wood4 ,a young fellow is enveloped in leaves or moss and called the ,wild ,man4 ,he hides in the wood and the other lads of the village go out to seek him4 ,they find him1 lead him captive out of the wood1 and fire at him with blank muskets4 ,he falls like dead to the ground1 but a lad dressed as a doctor bleeds him1 and he comes to life again4 ,at this they rejoice1 and1 binding him fast on a waggon1 take him to the village1 where they tell all the people how they have caught the ,wild ,man4 ,at every house they receive a gift4 ,in the ,erzgebirge the following custom was annually observed at ,shrovetide about the beginning of the seventeenth century4 ,two men disguised as ,wild ,men1 the one in brushwood and moss1 the other in straw1 were led about the streets1 and at last taken to the market-place1 where they were chased up and down1 shot and stabbed4 ,before falling they reeled about with strange gestures and spirted blood on the people from bladders which they carried4 ,when they were down1 the huntsmen placed them on boards and carried them to the ale-house1 the miners marching beside them and winding blasts on their mining tools as if they had taken a noble head of game4 ,a very similar ,shrovetide custom is still observed near ,schluckenau in ,bohemia4 ,a man dressed up as a ,wild ,man is chased through several streets till he comes to a narrow lane across which a cord is stretched4 ,he stumbles over the cord and1 falling to the ground1 is overtaken and caught by his pursuers4 ,the executioner runs up and stabs with his sword a bladder filled with blood which the ,wild ,man wears round his body2 so the ,wild ,man dies1 while a stream of blood reddens the ground4 ,next day a straw-man1 made up to look like the ,wild ,man1 is placed on a litter1 and1 accompanied by a great crowd1 is taken to a pool into which it is thrown by the executioner4 ,the ceremony is called burying the ,carnival4 ,in ,semic 7,bohemia7 the custom of beheading the ,king is observed on ,whit-,monday4 ,a troop of young people disguise themselves2 each is girt with a girdle of bark and carries a wooden sword and a trumpet of willow-bark4 ,the ,king wears a robe of tree-bark adorned with flowers1 on his head is a crown of bark decked with flowers and branches1 his feet are wound about with ferns1 a mask hides his face1 and for a sceptre he has a hawthorn switch in his hand4 ,a lad leads him through the village by a rope fastened to his foot1 while the rest dance about1 blow their trumpets1 and whistle4 ,in every farmhouse the ,king is chased round the room1 and one of the troop1 amid much noise and outcry1 strikes with his sword a blow on the ,king's robe of bark till it rings again4 ,then a gratuity is demanded4 ,the ceremony of decapitation1 which is here somewhat slurred over1 is carried out with a greater semblance of reality in other parts of ,bohemia4 ,thus in some villages of the ,kniggrtz district on ,whit-,monday the girls assemble under one lime-tree and the young men under another1 all dressed in their best and tricked out with ribbons4 ,the young men twine a garland for the ,queen1 and the girls another for the ,king4 ,when they have chosen the ,king and ,queen they all go in procession two and two1 to the ale-house1 from the balcony of which the crier proclaims the names of the ,king and ,queen4 ,both are then invested with the insignia of their office and are crowned with the garlands1 while the music plays up4 ,then some one gets on a bench and accuses the ,king of various offences1 such as ill-treating the cattle4 ,the ,king appeals to witnesses and a trial ensues1 at the close of which the judge1 who carries a white wand as his badge of office1 pronounces a verdict of ,guilty1 or ,not guilty4 ,if the verdict is ,guilty1 the judge breaks his wand1 the ,king kneels on a white cloth1 all heads are bared1 and a soldier sets three or four hats1 one above the other1 on his ,majesty's head4 ,the judge then pronounces the word ,guilty thrice in a loud voice1 and orders the crier to behead the ,king4 ,the crier obeys by striking off the ,king's hats with the wooden sword4 ,but perhaps1 for our purpose1 the most instructive of these mimic executions is the following ,bohemian one4 ,in some places of the ,pilsen district 7,bohemia7 on ,whit-,monday the ,king is dressed in bark1 ornamented with flowers and ribbons2 he wears a crown of gilt paper and rides a horse1 which is also decked with flowers4 ,attended by a judge1 an executioner1 and other characters1 and followed by a train of soldiers1 all mounted1 he rides to the village square1 where a hut or arbour of green boughs has been erected under the ,may-trees1 which are firs1 freshly cut1 peeled to the top1 and dressed with flowers and ribbons4 ,after the dames and maidens of the village have been criticised and a frog beheaded1 the cavalcade rides to a place previously determined upon1 in a straight1 broad street4 ,here they draw up in two lines and the ,king takes to flight4 ,he is given a short start and rides off at full speed1 pursued by the whole troop4 ,if they fail to catch him he remains ,king for another year1 and his companions must pay his score at the ale-house in the evening4 ,but if they overtake and catch him he is scourged with hazel rods or beaten with the wooden swords and compelled to dismount4 ,then the executioner asks1 ,shall ,i behead this ,king8 ,the answer is given1 ,behead him2 the executioner brandishes his axe1 and with the words1 ,one1 two1 three1 let the ,king headless be6 he strikes off the ,king's crown4 ,amid the loud cries of the bystanders the ,king sinks to the ground2 then he is laid on a bier and carried to the nearest farmhouse4 ,in most of the personages who are thus slain in mimicry it is impossible not to recognise representatives of the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation1 as he is supposed to manifest himself in spring4 ,the bark1 leaves1 and flowers in which the actors are dressed1 and the season of the year at which they appear1 show that they belong to the same class as the ,grass ,king1 ,king of the ,may1 ,jack-in-the-,green1 and other representatives of the vernal spirit of vegetation which we examined in an earlier part of this work4 ,as if to remove any possible doubt on this head1 we find that in two cases these slain men are brought into direct connexion with ,may-trees1 which are the impersonal1 as the ,may ,king1 ,grass ,king1 and so forth1 are the personal representatives of the tree-spirit4 ,the drenching of the ,pfingstl with water and his wading up to the middle into the brook are1 therefore1 no doubt rain-charms like those which have been already described4 ,but if these personages represent1 as they certainly do1 the spirit of vegetation in spring1 the question arises1 ,why kill them8 ,what is the object of slaying the spirit of vegetation at any time and above all in spring1 when his services are most wanted8 ,the only probable answer to this question seems to be given in the explanation already proposed of the custom of killing the divine king or priest4 ,the divine life1 incarnate in a material and mortal body1 is liable to be tainted and corrupted by the weakness of the frail medium in which it is for a time enshrined2 and if it is to be saved from the increasing enfeeblement which it must necessarily share with its human incarnation as he advances in years1 it must be detached from him before1 or at least as soon as1 he exhibits signs of decay1 in order to be transferred to a vigorous successor4 ,this is done by killing the old representative of the god and conveying the divine spirit from him to a new incarnation4 ,the killing of the god1 that is1 of his human incarnation1 is therefore merely a necessary step to his revival or resurrection in a better form4 ,far from being an extinction of the divine spirit1 it is only the beginning of a purer and stronger manifestation of it4 ,if this explanation holds good of the custom of killing divine kings and priests in general1 it is still more obviously applicable to the custom of annually killing the representative of the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation in spring4 ,for the decay of plant life in winter is readily interpreted by primitive man as an enfeeblement of the spirit of vegetation2 the spirit has1 he thinks1 grown old and weak and must therefore be renovated by being slain and brought to life in a younger and fresher form4 ,thus the killing of the representative of the tree-spirit in spring is regarded as a means to promote and quicken the growth of vegetation4 ,for the killing of the tree-spirit is associated always 7we must suppose7 implicitly1 and sometimes explicitly also1 with a revival or resurrection of him in a more youthful and vigorous form4 ,so in the ,saxon and ,thringen custom1 after the ,wild ,man has been shot he is brought to life again by a doctor2 and in the ,wurmlingen ceremony there figures a ,dr4 ,iron-,beard1 who probably once played a similar part2 certainly in another spring ceremony1 which will be described presently1 ,dr4 ,iron-,beard pretends to restore a dead man to life4 ,but of this revival or resurrection of the god we shall have more to say anon4 ,the points of similarity between these ,north ,european personages and the subject of our enquiry--the ,king of the ,wood or priest of ,nemi--are sufficiently striking4 ,in these northern maskers we see kings1 whose dress of bark and leaves along with the hut of green boughs and the fir-trees1 under which they hold their court1 proclaim them unmistakably as1 like their ,italian counterpart1 ,kings of the ,wood4 ,like him they die a violent death1 but like him they may escape from it for a time by their bodily strength and agility2 for in several of these northern customs the flight and pursuit of the king is a prominent part of the ceremony1 and in one case at least if the king can outrun his pursuers he retains his life and his office for another year4 ,in this last case the king in fact holds office on condition of running for his life once a year1 just as the ,king of ,calicut in later times held office on condition of defending his life against all comers once every twelve years1 and just as the priest of ,nemi held office on condition of defending himself against any assault at any time4 ,in every one of these instances the life of the god-man is prolonged on condition of his showing1 in a severe physical contest of fight or flight1 that his bodily strength is not decayed1 and that1 therefore1 the violent death1 which sooner or later is inevitable1 may for the present be postponed4 ,with regard to flight it is noticeable that flight figured conspicuously both in the legend and in the practice of the ,king of the ,wood4 ,he had to be a runaway slave in memory of the flight of ,orestes1 the traditional founder of the worship2 hence the ,kings of the ,wood are described by an ancient writer as both strong of hand and fleet of foot4 ,perhaps if we knew the ritual of the ,arician grove fully we might find that the king was allowed a chance for his life by flight1 like his ,bohemian brother4 ,i have already conjectured that the annual flight of the priestly king at ,rome 7regifugium7 was at first a flight of the same kind2 in other words1 that he was originally one of those divine kings who are either put to death after a fixed period or allowed to prove by the strong hand or the fleet foot that their divinity is vigorous and unimpaired4 ,one more point of resemblance may be noted between the ,italian ,king of the ,wood and his northern counterparts4 ,in ,saxony and ,thringen the representative of the tree-spirit1 after being killed1 is brought to life again by a doctor4 ,this is exactly what legend affirmed to have happened to the first ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi1 ,hippolytus or ,virbius1 who after he had been killed by his horses was restored to life by the physician ,aesculapius4 ,such a legend tallies well with the theory that the slaying of the ,king of the ,wood was only a step to his revival or resurrection in his successor4 #b4 ,burying the ,carnival ,,thus far ,i have offered an explanation of the rule which required that the priest of ,nemi should be slain by his successor4 ,the explanation claims to be no more than probable2 our scanty knowledge of the custom and of its history forbids it to be more4 ,but its probability will be augmented in proportion to the extent to which the motives and modes of thought which it assumes can be proved to have operated in primitive society4 ,hitherto the god with whose death and resurrection we have been chiefly concerned has been the tree-god4 ,but if ,i can show that the custom of killing the god and the belief in his resurrection originated1 or at least existed1 in the hunting and pastoral stage of society1 when the slain god was an animal1 and that it survived into the agricultural stage1 when the slain god was the corn or a human being representing the corn1 the probability of my explanation will have been considerably increased4 ,this ,i shall attempt to do in the sequel1 and in the course of the discussion ,i hope to clear up some obscurities which still remain1 and to answer some objections which may have suggested themselves to the reader4 ,we start from the point at which we left off--the spring customs of ,european peasantry4 ,besides the ceremonies already described there are two kindred sets of observances in which the simulated death of a divine or supernatural being is a conspicuous feature4 ,in one of them the being whose death is dramatically represented is a personification of the ,carnival2 in the other it is ,death himself4 ,the former ceremony falls naturally at the end of the ,carnival1 either on the last day of that merry season1 namely ,shrove ,tuesday1 or on the first day of ,lent1 namely ,ash ,wednesday4 ,the date of the other ceremony--the ,carrying or ,driving out of ,death1 as it is commonly called--is not so uniformly fixed4 ,generally it is the fourth ,sunday in ,lent1 which hence goes by the name of ,dead ,sunday2 but in some places the celebration falls a week earlier1 in others1 as among the ,czechs of ,bohemia1 a week later1 while in certain ,german villages of ,moravia it is held on the first ,sunday after ,easter4 ,perhaps1 as has been suggested1 the date may originally have been variable1 depending on the appearance of the first swallow or some other herald of the spring4 ,some writers regard the ceremony as ,slavonic in its origin4 ,grimm thought it was a festival of the ,new ,year with the old ,slavs1 who began their year in ,march4 ,we shall first take examples1 of the mimic death of the ,carnival1 which always falls before the other in the calendar4 ,at ,frosinone1 in ,latium1 about half-way between ,rome and ,naples1 the dull monotony of life in a provincial ,italian town is agreeably broken on the last day of the ,carnival by the ancient festival known as the ,radica4 ,about four o'clock in the afternoon the town band1 playing lively tunes and followed by a great crowd1 proceeds to the ,piazza del ,plebiscito1 where is the ,sub-,prefecture as well as the rest of the ,government buildings4 ,here1 in the middle of the square1 the eyes of the expectant multitude are greeted by the sight of an immense car decked with many-coloured festoons and drawn by four horses4 ,mounted on the car is a huge chair1 on which sits enthroned the majestic figure of the ,carnival1 a man of stucco about nine feet high with a rubicund and smiling countenance4 ,enormous boots1 a tin helmet like those which grace the heads of officers of the ,italian marine1 and a coat of many colours embellished with strange devices1 adorn the outward man of this stately personage4 ,his left hand rests on the arm of the chair1 while with his right he gracefully salutes the crowd1 being moved to this act of civility by a string which is pulled by a man who modestly shrinks from publicity under the mercy-seat4 ,and now the crowd1 surging excitedly round the car1 gives vent to its feelings in wild cries of joy1 gentle and simple being mixed up together and all dancing furiously the ,saltarello4 ,a special feature of the festival is that every one must carry in his hand what is called a radica 7 root71 by which is meant a huge leaf of the aloe or rather the agave4 ,any one who ventured into the crowd without such a leaf would be unceremoniously hustled out of it1 unless indeed he bore as a substitute a large cabbage at the end of a long stick or a bunch of grass curiously plaited4 ,when the multitude1 after a short turn1 has escorted the slow-moving car to the gate of the ,sub-,prefecture1 they halt1 and the car1 jolting over the uneven ground1 rumbles into the courtyard4 ,a hush now falls on the crowd1 their subdued voices sounding1 according to the description of one who has heard them1 like the murmur of a troubled sea4 ,all eyes are turned anxiously to the door from which the ,sub-,prefect himself and the other representatives of the majesty of the law are expected to issue and pay their homage to the hero of the hour4 ,a few moments of suspense and then a storm of cheers and hand-clapping salutes the appearance of the dignitaries1 as they file out and1 descending the staircase1 take their place in the procession4 ,the hymn of the ,carnival is now thundered out1 after which1 amid a deafening roar1 aloe leaves and cabbages are whirled aloft and descend impartially on the heads of the just and the unjust1 who lend fresh zest to the proceedings by engaging in a free fight4 ,when these preliminaries have been concluded to the satisfaction of all concerned1 the procession gets under weigh4 ,the rear is brought up by a cart laden with barrels of wine and policemen1 the latter engaged in the congenial task of serving out wine to all who ask for it1 while a most internecine struggle1 accompanied by a copious discharge of yells1 blows1 and blasphemy1 goes on among the surging crowd at the cart's tail in their anxiety not to miss the glorious opportunity of intoxicating themselves at the public expense4 ,finally1 after the procession has paraded the principal streets in this majestic manner1 the effigy of ,carnival is taken to the middle of a public square1 stripped of his finery1 laid on a pile of wood1 and burnt amid the cries of the multitude1 who thundering out once more the song of the ,carnival fling their so-called roots on the pyre and give themselves up without restraint to the pleasures of the dance4 ,in the ,abruzzi a pasteboard figure of the ,carnival is carried by four grave-diggers with pipes in their mouths and bottles of wine slung at their shoulder-belts4 ,in front walks the wife of the ,carnival1 dressed in mourning and dissolved in tears4 ,from time to time the company halts1 and while the wife addresses the sympathising public1 the grave-diggers refresh the inner man with a pull at the bottle4 ,in the open square the mimic corpse is laid on a pyre1 and to the roll of drums1 the shrill screams of the women1 and the gruffer cries of the men a light is set to it4 ,while the figure burns1 chestnuts are thrown about among the crowd4 ,sometimes the ,carnival is represented by a straw-man at the top of a pole which is borne through the town by a troop of mummers in the course of the afternoon4 ,when evening comes on1 four of the mummers hold out a quilt or sheet by the corners1 and the figure of the ,carnival is made to tumble into it4 ,the procession is then resumed1 the performers weeping crocodile tears and emphasising the poignancy of their grief by the help of saucepans and dinner bells4 ,sometimes1 again1 in the ,abruzzi the dead ,carnival is personified by a living man who lies in a coffin1 attended by another who acts the priest and dispenses holy water in great profusion from a bathing tub4 ,at ,lerida1 in ,catalonia1 the funeral of the ,carnival was witnessed by an ,english traveller in #ahgg4 ,on the last ,sunday of the ,carnival a grand procession of infantry1 cavalry1 and maskers of many sorts1 some on horseback and some in carriages1 escorted the grand car of ,his ,grace ,pau ,pi1 as the effigy was called1 in triumph through the principal streets4 ,for three days the revelry ran high1 and then at midnight on the last day of the ,carnival the same procession again wound through the streets1 but under a different aspect and for a different end4 ,the triumphal car was exchanged for a hearse1 in which reposed the effigy of his dead ,grace3 a troop of maskers1 who in the first procession had played the part of ,students of ,folly with many a merry quip and jest1 now1 robed as priests and bishops1 paced slowly along holding aloft huge lighted tapers and singing a dirge4 ,all the mummers wore crape1 and all the horsemen carried blazing flambeaux4 ,down the high street1 between the lofty1 many-storeyed and balconied houses1 where every window1 every balcony1 every housetop was crammed with a dense mass of spectators1 all dressed and masked in fantastic gorgeousness1 the procession took its melancholy way4 ,over the scene flashed and played the shifting cross-lights and shadows from the moving torches3 red and blue ,bengal lights flared up and died out again2 and above the trampling of the horses and the measured tread of the marching multitude rose the voices of the priests chanting the requiem1 while the military bands struck in with the solemn roll of the muffled drums4 ,on reaching the principal square the procession halted1 a burlesque funeral oration was pronounced over the defunct ,pau ,pi1 and the lights were extinguished4 ,immediately the devil and his angels darted from the crowd1 seized the body and fled away with it1 hotly pursued by the whole multitude1 yelling1 screaming1 and cheering4 ,naturally the fiends were overtaken and dispersed2 and the sham corpse1 rescued from their clutches1 was laid in a grave that had been made ready for its reception4 ,thus the ,carnival of #ahgg at ,lerida died and was buried4 ,a ceremony of the same sort is observed in ,provence on ,ash ,wednesday4 ,an effigy called ,caramantran1 whimsically attired1 is drawn in a chariot or borne on a litter1 accompanied by the populace in grotesque costumes1 who carry gourds full of wine and drain them with all the marks1 real or affected1 of intoxication4 ,at the head of the procession are some men disguised as judges and barristers1 and a tall gaunt personage who masquerades as ,lent2 behind them follow young people mounted on miserable hacks and attired as mourners who pretend to bewail the fate that is in store for ,caramantran4 ,in the principal square the procession halts1 the tribunal is constituted1 and ,caramantran placed at the bar4 ,after a formal trial he is sentenced to death amid the groans of the mob3 the barrister who defended him embraces his client for the last time3 the officers of justice do their duty3 the condemned is set with his back to a wall and hurried into eternity under a shower of stones4 ,the sea or a river receives his mangled remains4 ,throughout nearly the whole of the ,ardennes it was and still is customary on ,ash ,wednesday to burn an effigy which is supposed to represent the ,carnival1 while appropriate verses are sung round about the blazing figure4 ,very often an attempt is made to fashion the effigy in the likeness of the husband who is reputed to be least faithful to his wife of any in the village4 ,as might perhaps have been anticipated1 the distinction of being selected for portraiture under these painful circumstances has a slight tendency to breed domestic jars1 especially when the portrait is burnt in front of the house of the gay deceiver whom it represents1 while a powerful chorus of caterwauls1 groans1 and other melodious sounds bears public testimony to the opinion which his friends and neighbours entertain of his private virtues4 ,in some villages of the ,ardennes a young man of flesh and blood1 dressed up in hay and straw1 used to act the part of ,shrove ,tuesday 7,mardi ,gras71 as the personification of the ,carnival is often called in ,france after the last day of the period which he personates4 ,he was brought before a mock tribunal1 and being condemned to death was placed with his back to a wall1 like a soldier at a military execution1 and fired at with blank cartridges4 ,at ,vrigne-aux-,bois one of these harmless buffoons1 named ,thierry1 was accidentally killed by a wad that had been left in a musket of the firing-party4 ,when poor ,shrove ,tuesday dropped under the fire1 the applause was loud and long1 he did it so naturally2 but when he did not get up again1 they ran to him and found him a corpse4 ,since then there have been no more of these mock executions in the ,ardennes4 ,in ,normandy on the evening of ,ash ,wednesday it used to be the custom to hold a celebration called the ,burial of ,shrove ,tuesday4 ,a squalid effigy scantily clothed in rags1 a battered old hat crushed down on his dirty face1 his great round paunch stuffed with straw1 represented the disreputable old rake who1 after a long course of dissipation1 was now about to suffer for his sins4 ,hoisted on the shoulders of a sturdy fellow1 who pretended to stagger under the burden1 this popular personification of the ,carnival promenaded the streets for the last time in a manner the reverse of triumphal4 ,preceded by a drummer and accompanied by a jeering rabble1 among whom the urchins and all the tag-rag and bobtail of the town mustered in great force1 the figure was carried about by the flickering light of torches to the discordant din of shovels and tongs1 pots and pans1 horns and kettles1 mingled with hootings1 groans1 and hisses4 ,from time to time the procession halted1 and a champion of morality accused the broken-down old sinner of all the excesses he had committed and for which he was now about to be burned alive4 ,the culprit1 having nothing to urge in his own defence1 was thrown on a heap of straw1 a torch was put to it1 and a great blaze shot up1 to the delight of the children who frisked round it screaming out some old popular verses about the death of the ,carnival4 ,sometimes the effigy was rolled down the slope of a hill before being burnt4 ,at ,saint-,l the ragged effigy of ,shrove ,tuesday was followed by his widow1 a big burly lout dressed as a woman with a crape veil1 who emitted sounds of lamentation and woe in a stentorian voice4 ,after being carried about the streets on a litter attended by a crowd of maskers1 the figure was thrown into the ,river ,vire4 ,the final scene has been graphically described by ,madame ,octave ,feuillet as she witnessed it in her childhood some sixty years ago4 ,my parents invited friends to see1 from the top of the tower of ,jeanne ,couillard1 the funeral procession passing4 ,it was there that1 quaffing lemonade--the only refreshment allowed because of the fast--we witnessed at nightfall a spectacle of which ,i shall always preserve a lively recollection4 ,at our feet flowed the ,vire under its old stone bridge4 ,on the middle of the bridge lay the figure of ,shrove ,tuesday on a litter of leaves1 surrounded by scores of maskers dancing1 singing1 and carrying torches4 ,some of them in their motley costumes ran along the parapet like fiends4 ,the rest1 worn out with their revels1 sat on the posts and dozed4 ,soon the dancing stopped1 and some of the troop1 seizing a torch1 set fire to the effigy1 after which they flung it into the river with redoubled shouts and clamour4 ,the man of straw1 soaked with resin1 floated away burning down the stream of the ,vire1 lighting up with its funeral fires the woods on the bank and the battlements of the old castle in which ,louis ,,xi4 and ,francis ,i4 had slept4 ,when the last glimmer of the blazing phantom had vanished1 like a falling star1 at the end of the valley1 every one withdrew1 crowd and maskers alike1 and we quitted the ramparts with our guests4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,tbingen on ,shrove ,tuesday a straw-man1 called the ,shrovetide ,bear1 is made up2 he is dressed in a pair of old trousers1 and a fresh black-pudding or two squirts filled with blood are inserted in his neck4 ,after a formal condemnation he is beheaded1 laid in a coffin1 and on ,ash ,wednesday is buried in the churchyard4 ,this is called ,burying the ,carnival4 ,amongst some of the ,saxons of ,transylvania the ,carnival is hanged4 ,thus at ,braller on ,ash ,wednesday or ,shrove ,tuesday two white and two chestnut horses draw a sledge on which is placed a straw-man swathed in a white cloth2 beside him is a cart-wheel which is kept turning round4 ,two lads disguised as old men follow the sledge lamenting4 ,the rest of the village lads1 mounted on horseback and decked with ribbons1 accompany the procession1 which is headed by two girls crowned with evergreen and drawn in a waggon or sledge4 ,a trial is held under a tree1 at which lads disguised as soldiers pronounce sentence of death4 ,the two old men try to rescue the straw-man and to fly with him1 but to no purpose2 he is caught by the two girls and handed over to the executioner1 who hangs him on a tree4 ,in vain the old men try to climb up the tree and take him down2 they always tumble down1 and at last in despair they throw themselves on the ground and weep and howl for the hanged man4 ,an official then makes a speech in which he declares that the ,carnival was condemned to death because he had done them harm1 by wearing out their shoes and making them tired and sleepy4 ,at the ,burial of ,carnival in ,lechrain1 a man dressed as a woman in black clothes is carried on a litter or bier by four men2 he is lamented over by men disguised as women in black clothes1 then thrown down before the village dung-heap1 drenched with water1 buried in the dung-heap1 and covered with straw4 ,on the evening of ,shrove ,tuesday the ,esthonians make a straw figure called metsik or wood-spirit2 one year it is dressed with a man's coat and hat1 next year with a hood and a petticoat4 ,this figure is stuck on a long pole1 carried across the boundary of the village with loud cries of joy1 and fastened to the top of a tree in the wood4 ,the ceremony is believed to be a protection against all kinds of misfortune4 ,sometimes at these ,shrovetide or ,lenten ceremonies the resurrection of the pretended dead person is enacted4 ,thus1 in some parts of ,swabia on ,shrove ,tuesday ,dr4 ,iron-,beard professes to bleed a sick man1 who thereupon falls as dead to the ground2 but the doctor at last restores him to life by blowing air into him through a tube4 ,in the ,harz ,mountains1 when ,carnival is over1 a man is laid on a baking-trough and carried with dirges to the grave2 but in the grave a glass of brandy is buried instead of the man4 ,a speech is delivered and then the people return to the village-green or meeting-place1 where they smoke the long clay pipes which are distributed at funerals4 ,on the morning of ,shrove ,tuesday in the following year the brandy is dug up and the festival begins by every one tasting the spirit which1 as the phrase goes1 has come to life again4 #c4 ,carrying out ,death ,,the ,,ceremony of ,carrying out ,death presents much the same features as ,burying the ,carnival2 except that the carrying out of ,death is generally followed by a ceremony1 or at least accompanied by a profession1 of bringing in ,summer1 ,spring1 or ,life4 ,thus in ,middle ,franken1 a province of ,bavaria1 on the fourth ,sunday in ,lent1 the village urchins used to make a straw effigy of ,death1 which they carried about with burlesque pomp through the streets1 and afterwards burned with loud cries beyond the bounds4 ,the ,frankish custom is thus described by a writer of the sixteenth century3 ,at ,mid-,lent1 the season when the church bids us rejoice1 the young people of my native country make a straw image of ,death1 and fastening it to a pole carry it with shouts to the neighbouring villages4 ,by some they are kindly received1 and after being refreshed with milk1 peas1 and dried pears1 the usual food of that season1 are sent home again4 ,others1 however1 treat them with anything but hospitality2 for1 looking on them as harbingers of misfortune1 to wit of death1 they drive them from their boundaries with weapons and insults4 ,in the villages near ,erlangen1 when the fourth ,sunday in ,lent came around1 the peasant girls used to dress themselves in all their finery with flowers in their hair4 ,thus attired they repaired to the neighbouring town1 carrying puppets which were adorned with leaves and covered with white cloths4 ,these they took from house to house in pairs1 stopping at every door where they expected to receive something1 and singing a few lines in which they announced that it was ,mid-,lent and that they were about to throw ,death into the water4 ,when they had collected some trifling gratuities they went to the river ,regnitz and flung the puppets representing ,death into the stream4 ,this was done to ensure a fruitful and prosperous year2 further1 it was considered a safeguard against pestilence and sudden death4 ,at ,nuremberg girls of seven to eighteen years of age go through the streets bearing a little open coffin1 in which is a doll hidden under a shroud4 ,others carry a beech branch1 with an apple fastened to it for a head1 in an open box4 ,they sing1 ,we carry ,death into the water1 it is well1 or ,we carry ,death into the water1 carry him in and out again4 ,in some parts of ,bavaria down to #aghj it was believed that a fatal epidemic would ensue if the custom of ,carrying out ,death were not observed4 ,in some villages of ,thringen1 on the fourth ,sunday of ,lent1 the children used to carry a puppet of birchen twigs through the village1 and then threw it into a pool1 while they sang1 ,we carry the old ,death out behind the herdman's old house2 we have got ,summer1 and ,kroden's 787 power is destroyed4 ,at ,debschwitz or ,dobschwitz1 near ,gera1 the ceremony of ,driving out ,death is or was annually observed on the first of ,march4 ,the young people make up a figure of straw or the like materials1 dress it in old clothes1 which they have begged from houses in the village1 and carry it out and throw it into the river4 ,on returning to the village they break the good news to the people1 and receive eggs and other victuals as a reward4 ,the ceremony is or was supposed to purify the village and to protect the inhabitants from sickness and plague4 ,in other villages of ,thringen1 in which the population was originally ,slavonic1 the carrying out of the puppet is accompanied with the singing of a song1 which begins1 ,now we carry ,death out of the village and ,spring into the village4 ,at the end of the seventeenth and beginning of the eighteenth century the custom was observed in ,thringen as follows4 ,the boys and girls made an effigy of straw or the like materials1 but the shape of the figure varied from year to year4 ,in one year it would represent an old man1 in the next an old woman1 in the third a young man1 and in the fourth a maiden1 and the dress of the figure varied with the character it personated4 ,there used to be a sharp contest as to where the effigy was to be made1 for the people thought that the house from which it was carried forth would not be visited with death that year4 ,having been made1 the puppet was fastened to a pole and carried by a girl if it represented an old man1 but by a boy if it represented an old woman4 ,thus it was borne in procession1 the young people holding sticks in their hands and singing that they were driving out ,death4 ,when they came to water they threw the effigy into it and ran hastily back1 fearing that it might jump on their shoulders and wring their necks4 ,they also took care not to touch it1 lest it should dry them up4 ,on their return they beat the cattle with the sticks1 believing that this would make the animals fat or fruitful4 ,afterwards they visited the house or houses from which they had carried the image of ,death2 where they received a dole of half-boiled peas4 ,the custom of ,carrying out ,death was practised also in ,saxony4 ,at ,leipsic the bastards and public women used to make a straw effigy of ,death every year at ,mid-,lent4 ,this they carried through all the streets with songs and showed it to the young married women4 ,finally they threw it into the river ,parthe4 ,by this ceremony they professed to make the young wives fruitful1 to purify the city1 and to protect the inhabitants for that year from plague and other epidemics4 ,ceremonies of the same sort are observed at ,mid-,lent in ,silesia4 ,thus in many places the grown girls with the help of the young men dress up a straw figure with women's clothes and carry it out of the village towards the setting sun4 ,at the boundary they strip it of its clothes1 tear it in pieces1 and scatter the fragments about the fields4 ,this is called ,burying ,death4 ,as they carry the image out1 they sing that they are about to bury ,death under an oak1 that he may depart from the people4 ,sometimes the song runs that they are bearing ,death over hill and dale to return no more4 ,in the ,polish neighbourhood of ,gross-,strehlitz the puppet is called ,goik4 ,it is carried on horseback and thrown into the nearest water4 ,the people think that the ceremony protects them from sickness of every sort in the coming year4 ,in the districts of ,wohlau and ,guhrau the image of ,death used to be thrown over the boundary of the next village4 ,but as the neighbours feared to receive the ill-omened figure1 they were on the look-out to repel it1 and hard knocks were often exchanged between the two parties4 ,in some ,polish parts of ,upper ,silesia the effigy1 representing an old woman1 goes by the name of ,marzana1 the goddess of death4 ,it is made in the house where the last death occurred1 and is carried on a pole to the boundary of the village1 where it is thrown into a pond or burnt4 ,at ,polkwitz the custom of ,carrying out ,death fell into abeyance2 but an outbreak of fatal sickness which followed the intermission of the ceremony induced the people to resume it4 ,in ,bohemia the children go out with a straw-man1 representing ,death1 to the end of the village1 where they burn it1 singing-- ,now carry we ,death out of the village1 ,the new ,summer into the village1 ,welcome1 dear ,summer1 ,green little corn4 ,at ,tabor in ,bohemia the figure of ,death is carried out of the town and flung from a high rock into the water1 while they sing-- ,death swims on the water1 ,summer will soon be here1 ,we carried ,death away for you ,we brought the ,summer4 ,and do thou1 ,o holy ,marketa1 ,give us a good year ,for wheat and for rye4 ,in other parts of ,bohemia they carry ,death to the end of the village1 singing-- ,we carry ,death out of the village1 ,and the ,new ,year into the village4 ,dear ,spring1 we bid you welcome1 ,green grass1 we bid you welcome4 ,behind the village they erect a pyre1 on which they burn the straw figure1 reviling and scoffing at it the while4 ,then they return1 singing-- ,we have carried away ,death1 ,and brought ,life back4 ,he has taken up his quarters in the village1 ,therefore sing joyous songs4 ,in some ,german villages of ,moravia1 as in ,jassnitz and ,seitendorf1 the young folk assemble on the third ,sunday in ,lent and fashion a straw-man1 who is generally adorned with a fur cap and a pair of old leathern hose1 if such are to be had4 ,the effigy is then hoisted on a pole and carried by the lads and lasses out into the open fields4 ,on the way they sing a song1 in which it is said that they are carrying ,death away and bringing dear ,summer into the house1 and with ,summer the ,may and the flowers4 ,on reaching an appointed place they dance in a circle round the effigy with loud shouts and screams1 then suddenly rush at it and tear it to pieces with their hands4 ,lastly1 the pieces are thrown together in a heap1 the pole is broken1 and fire is set to the whole4 ,while it burns the troop dances merrily round it1 rejoicing at the victory won by ,spring2 and when the fire has nearly died out they go to the householders to beg for a present of eggs wherewith to hold a feast1 taking care to give as a reason for the request that they have carried ,death out and away4 ,the preceding evidence shows that the effigy of ,death is often regarded with fear and treated with marks of hatred and abhorrence4 ,thus the anxiety of the villagers to transfer the figure from their own to their neighbours' land1 and the reluctance of the latter to receive the ominous guest1 are proof enough of the dread which it inspires4 ,further1 in ,lusatia and ,silesia the puppet is sometimes made to look in at the window of a house1 and it is believed that some one in the house will die within the year unless his life is redeemed by the payment of money4 ,again1 after throwing the effigy away1 the bearers sometimes run home lest ,death should follow them1 and if one of them falls in running1 it is believed that he will die within the year4 ,at ,chrudim1 in ,bohemia1 the figure of ,death is made out of a cross1 with a head and mask stuck at the top1 and a shirt stretched out on it4 ,on the fifth ,sunday in ,lent the boys take this effigy to the nearest brook or pool1 and standing in a line throw it into the water4 ,then they all plunge in after it2 but as soon as it is caught no one more may enter the water4 ,the boy who did not enter the water or entered it last will die within the year1 and he is obliged to carry the ,death back to the village4 ,the effigy is then burned4 ,on the other hand1 it is believed that no one will die within the year in the house out of which the figure of ,death has been carried2 and the village out of which ,death has been driven is sometimes supposed to be protected against sickness and plague4 ,in some villages of ,austrian ,silesia on the ,saturday before ,dead ,sunday an effigy is made of old clothes1 hay1 and straw1 for the purpose of driving ,death out of the village4 ,on ,sunday the people1 armed with sticks and straps1 assemble before the house where the figure is lodged4 ,four lads then draw the effigy by cords through the village amid exultant shouts1 while all the others beat it with their sticks and straps4 ,on reaching a field which belongs to a neighbouring village they lay down the figure1 cudgel it soundly1 and scatter the fragments over the field4 ,the people believe that the village from which ,death has been thus carried out will be safe from any infectious disease for the whole year4 #d4 ,bringing in ,summer ,,in ,,the ,,preceding ceremonies the return of ,spring1 ,summer1 or ,life1 as a sequel to the expulsion of ,death1 is only implied or at most announced4 ,in the following ceremonies it is plainly enacted4 ,thus in some parts of ,bohemia the effigy of ,death is drowned by being thrown into the water at sunset2 then the girls go out into the wood and cut down a young tree with a green crown1 hang a doll dressed as a woman on it1 deck the whole with green1 red1 and white ribbons1 and march in procession with their ,lto 7,summer7 into the village1 collecting gifts and singing-- ,death swims in the water1 ,spring comes to visit us1 ,with eggs that are red1 ,with yellow pancakes4 ,we carried ,death out of the village1 ,we are carrying ,summer into the village4 ,in many ,silesian villages the figure of ,death1 after being treated with respect1 is stript of its clothes and flung with curses into the water1 or torn to pieces in a field4 ,then the young folk repair to a wood1 cut down a small fir-tree1 peel the trunk1 and deck it with festoons of evergreens1 paper roses1 painted egg-shells1 motley bits of cloth1 and so forth4 ,the tree thus adorned is called ,summer or ,may4 ,boys carry it from house to house singing appropriate songs and begging for presents4 ,among their songs is the following3 ,we have carried ,death out1 ,we are bringing the dear ,summer back1 ,the ,summer and the ,may ,and all the flowers gay4 ,sometimes they also bring back from the wood a prettily adorned figure1 which goes by the name of ,summer1 ,may1 or the ,bride2 in the ,polish districts it is called ,dziewanna1 the goddess of spring4 ,at ,eisenach on the fourth ,sunday in ,lent young people used to fasten a straw-man1 representing ,death1 to a wheel1 which they trundled to the top of a hill4 ,then setting fire to the figure they allowed it and the wheel to roll down the slope4 ,next day they cut a tall fir-tree1 tricked it out with ribbons1 and set it up in the plain4 ,the men then climbed the tree to fetch down the ribbons4 ,in ,upper ,lusatia the figure of ,death1 made of straw and rags1 is dressed in a veil furnished by the last bride and a shirt provided by the house in which the last death took place4 ,thus arrayed the figure is stuck on the end of a long pole and carried at full speed by the tallest and strongest girl1 while the rest pelt the effigy with sticks and stones4 ,whoever hits it will be sure to live through the year4 ,in this way ,death is carried out of the village and thrown into the water or over the boundary of the next village4 ,on their way home each one breaks a green branch and carries it gaily with him till he reaches the village1 when he throws it away4 ,sometimes the young people of the next village1 upon whose land the figure has been thrown1 run after them and hurl it back1 not wishing to have ,death among them4 ,hence the two parties occasionally come to blows4 ,in these cases ,death is represented by the puppet which is thrown away1 ,summer or ,life by the branches or trees which are brought back4 ,but sometimes a new potency of life seems to be attributed to the image of ,death itself1 and by a kind of resurrection it becomes the instrument of the general revival4 ,thus in some parts of ,lusatia women alone are concerned in carrying out ,death1 and suffer no male to meddle with it4 ,attired in mourning1 which they wear the whole day1 they make a puppet of straw1 clothe it in a white shirt1 and give it a broom in one hand and a scythe in the other4 ,singing songs and pursued by urchins throwing stones1 they carry the puppet to the village boundary1 where they tear it in pieces4 ,then they cut down a fine tree1 hang the shirt on it1 and carry it home singing4 ,on the ,feast of ,ascension the ,saxons of ,braller1 a village of ,transylvania1 not far from ,hermannstadt1 observe the ceremony of ,carrying out ,death in the following manner4 ,after morning service all the school-girls repair to the house of one of their number1 and there dress up the ,death4 ,this is done by tying a threshed-out sheaf of corn into a rough semblance of a head and body1 while the arms are simulated by a broomstick thrust through it horizontally4 ,the figure is dressed in the holiday attire of a young peasant woman1 with a red hood1 silver brooches1 and a profusion of ribbons at the arms and breast4 ,the girls bustle at their work1 for soon the bells will be ringing to vespers1 and the ,death must be ready in time to be placed at the open window1 that all the people may see it on their way to church4 ,when vespers are over1 the longed-for moment has come for the first procession with the ,death to begin2 it is a privilege that belongs to the school-girls alone4 ,two of the older girls seize the figure by the arms and walk in front3 all the rest follow two and two4 ,boys may take no part in the procession1 but they troop after it gazing with open-mouthed admiration at the beautiful ,death4 ,so the procession goes through all the streets of the village1 the girls singing the old hymn that begins-- ,gott mein ,vater1 deine ,liebe ,reicht so weit der ,himmel ist1 to a tune that differs from the ordinary one4 ,when the procession has wound its way through every street1 the girls go to another house1 and having shut the door against the eager prying crowd of boys who follow at their heels1 they strip the ,death and pass the naked truss of straw out of the window to the boys1 who pounce on it1 run out of the village with it without singing1 and fling the dilapidated effigy into the neighbouring brook4 ,this done1 the second scene of the little drama begins4 ,while the boys were carrying away the ,death out of the village1 the girls remained in the house1 and one of them is now dressed in all the finery which had been worn by the effigy4 ,thus arrayed she is led in procession through all the streets to the singing of the same hymn as before4 ,when the procession is over they all betake themselves to the house of the girl who played the leading part4 ,here a feast awaits them from which also the boys are excluded4 ,it is a popular belief that the children may safely begin to eat gooseberries and other fruit after the day on which ,death has thus been carried out2 for ,death1 which up to that time lurked especially in gooseberries1 is now destroyed4 ,further1 they may now bathe with impunity out of doors4 ,very similar is the ceremony which1 down to recent years1 was observed in some of the ,german villages of ,moravia4 ,boys and girls met on the afternoon of the first ,sunday after ,easter1 and together fashioned a puppet of straw to represent ,death4 ,decked with bright-coloured ribbons and cloths1 and fastened to the top of a long pole1 the effigy was then borne with singing and clamour to the nearest height1 where it was stript of its gay attire and thrown or rolled down the slope4 ,one of the girls was next dressed in the gauds taken from the effigy of ,death1 and with her at its head the procession moved back to the village4 ,in some villages the practice is to bury the effigy in the place that has the most evil reputation of all the country-side3 others throw it into running water4 ,in the ,lusatian ceremony described above1 the tree which is brought home after the destruction of the figure of ,death is plainly equivalent to the trees or branches which1 in the preceding customs1 were brought back as representatives of ,summer or ,life1 after ,death had been thrown away or destroyed4 ,but the transference of the shirt worn by the effigy of ,death to the tree clearly indicates that the tree is a kind of revivification1 in a new form1 of the destroyed effigy4 ,this comes out also in the ,transylvanian and ,moravian customs3 the dressing of a girl in the clothes worn by the ,death1 and the leading her about the village to the same song which had been sung when the ,death was being carried about1 show that she is intended to be a kind of resuscitation of the being whose effigy has just been destroyed4 ,these examples therefore suggest that the ,death whose demolition is represented in these ceremonies cannot be regarded as the purely destructive agent which we understand by ,death4 ,if the tree which is brought back as an embodiment of the reviving vegetation of spring is clothed in the shirt worn by the ,death which has just been destroyed1 the object certainly cannot be to check and counteract the revival of vegetation3 it can only be to foster and promote it4 ,therefore the being which has just been destroyed--the so-called ,death--must be supposed to be endowed with a vivifying and quickening influence1 which it can communicate to the vegetable and even the animal world4 ,this ascription of a life-giving virtue to the figure of ,death is put beyond a doubt by the custom1 observed in some places1 of taking pieces of the straw effigy of ,death and placing them in the fields to make the crops grow1 or in the manger to make the cattle thrive4 ,thus in ,spachendorf1 a village of ,austrian ,silesia1 the figure of ,death1 made of straw1 brushwood1 and rags1 is carried with wild songs to an open place outside the village and there burned1 and while it is burning a general struggle takes place for the pieces1 which are pulled out of the flames with bare hands4 ,each one who secures a fragment of the effigy ties it to a branch of the largest tree in his garden1 or buries it in his field1 in the belief that this causes the crops to grow better4 ,in the ,troppau district of ,austrian ,silesia the straw figure which the boys make on the fourth ,sunday in ,lent is dressed by the girls in woman's clothes and hung with ribbons1 necklace1 and garlands4 ,attached to a long pole it is carried out of the village1 followed by a troop of young people of both sexes1 who alternately frolic1 lament1 and sing songs4 ,arrived at its destination--a field outside the village--the figure is stripped of its clothes and ornaments2 then the crowd rushes at it and tears it to bits1 scuffling for the fragments4 ,every one tries to get a wisp of the straw of which the effigy was made1 because such a wisp1 placed in the manger1 is believed to make the cattle thrive4 ,or the straw is put in the hens' nest1 it being supposed that this prevents the hens from carrying away their eggs1 and makes them brood much better4 ,the same attribution of a fertilising power to the figure of ,death appears in the belief that if the bearers of the figure1 after throwing it away1 beat cattle with their sticks1 this will render the beasts fat or prolific4 ,perhaps the sticks had been previously used to beat the ,death1 and so had acquired the fertilising power ascribed to the effigy4 ,we have seen1 too1 that at ,leipsic a straw effigy of ,death was shown to young wives to make them fruitful4 ,it seems hardly possible to separate from the ,may-trees the trees or branches which are brought into the village after the destruction of the ,death4 ,the bearers who bring them in profess to be bringing in the ,summer1 therefore the trees obviously represent the ,summer2 indeed in ,silesia they are commonly called the ,summer or the ,may1 and the doll which is sometimes attached to the ,summer-tree is a duplicate representative of the ,summer1 just as the ,may is sometimes represented at the same time by a ,may-tree and a ,may ,lady4 ,further1 the ,summer-trees are adorned like ,may-trees with ribbons and so on2 like ,may-trees1 when large1 they are planted in the ground and climbed up2 and like ,may-trees1 when small1 they are carried from door to door by boys or girls singing songs and collecting money4 ,and as if to demonstrate the identity of the two sets of customs the bearers of the ,summer-tree sometimes announce that they are bringing in the ,summer and the ,may4 ,the customs1 therefore1 of bringing in the ,may and bringing in the ,summer are essentially the same2 and the ,summer-tree is merely another form of the ,may-tree1 the only distinction 7besides that of name7 being in the time at which they are respectively brought in2 for while the ,may-tree is usually fetched in on the first of ,may or at ,whitsuntide1 the ,summer-tree is fetched in on the fourth ,sunday in ,lent4 ,therefore1 if the ,may-tree is an embodiment of the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation1 the ,summer-tree must likewise be an embodiment of the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation4 ,but we have seen that the ,summer-tree is in some cases a revivification of the effigy of ,death4 ,it follows1 therefore1 that in these cases the effigy called ,death must be an embodiment of the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation4 ,this inference is confirmed1 first1 by the vivifying and fertilising influence which the fragments of the effigy of ,death are believed to exercise both on vegetable and on animal life2 for this influence1 as we saw in an earlier part of this work1 is supposed to be a special attribute of the tree-spirit4 ,it is confirmed1 secondly1 by observing that the effigy of ,death is sometimes decked with leaves or made of twigs1 branches1 hemp1 or a threshed-out sheaf of corn2 and that sometimes it is hung on a little tree and so carried about by girls collecting money1 just as is done with the ,may-tree and the ,may ,lady1 and with the ,summer-tree and the doll attached to it4 ,in short we are driven to regard the expulsion of ,death and the bringing in of ,summer as1 in some cases at least1 merely another form of that death and revival of the spirit of vegetation in spring which we saw enacted in the killing and resurrection of the ,wild ,man4 ,the burial and resurrection of the ,carnival is probably another way of expressing the same idea4 ,the interment of the representative of the ,carnival under a dung-heap is natural1 if he is supposed to possess a quickening and fertilising influence like that ascribed to the effigy of ,death4 ,the ,esthonians1 indeed1 who carry the straw figure out of the village in the usual way on ,shrove ,tuesday1 do not call it the ,carnival1 but the ,wood-spirit 7,metsik71 and they clearly indicate the identity of the effigy with the wood-spirit by fixing it to the top of a tree in the wood1 where it remains for a year1 and is besought almost daily with prayers and offerings to protect the herds2 for like a true wood-spirit the ,metsik is a patron of cattle4 ,sometimes the ,metsik is made of sheaves of corn4 ,thus we may fairly conjecture that the names ,carnival1 ,death1 and ,summer are comparatively late and inadequate expressions for the beings personified or embodied in the customs with which we have been dealing4 ,the very abstractness of the names bespeaks a modern origin2 for the personification of times and seasons like the ,carnival and ,summer1 or of an abstract notion like death1 is not primitive4 ,but the ceremonies themselves bear the stamp of a dateless antiquity2 therefore we can hardly help supposing that in their origin the ideas which they embodied were of a more simple and concrete order4 ,the notion of a tree1 perhaps of a particular kind of tree 7for some savages have no word for tree in general71 or even of an individual tree1 is sufficiently concrete to supply a basis from which by a gradual process of generalisation the wider idea of a spirit of vegetation might be reached4 ,but this general idea of vegetation would readily be confounded with the season in which it manifests itself2 hence the substitution of ,spring1 ,summer1 or ,may for the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation would be easy and natural4 ,again1 the concrete notion of the dying tree or dying vegetation would by a similar process of generalisation glide into a notion of death in general2 so that the practice of carrying out the dying or dead vegetation in spring1 as a preliminary to its revival1 would in time widen out into an attempt to banish ,death in general from the village or district4 ,the view that in these spring ceremonies ,death meant originally the dying or dead vegetation of winter has the high support of ,w4 ,mannhardt2 and he confirms it by the analogy of the name ,death as applied to the spirit of the ripe corn4 ,commonly the spirit of the ripe corn is conceived1 not as dead1 but as old1 and hence it goes by the name of the ,old ,man or the ,old ,woman4 ,but in some places the last sheaf cut at harvest1 which is generally believed to be the seat of the corn spirit1 is called the ,dead ,one3 children are warned against entering the corn-fields because ,death sits in the corn2 and1 in a game played by ,saxon children in ,transylvania at the maize harvest1 ,death is represented by a child completely covered with maize leaves4 #e4 ,battle of ,summer and ,winter ,,sometimes in the popular customs of the peasantry the contrast between the dormant powers of vegetation in winter and their awakening vitality in spring takes the form of a dramatic contest between actors who play the parts respectively of ,winter and ,summer4 ,thus in the towns of ,sweden on ,may ,day two troops of young men on horseback used to meet as if for mortal combat4 ,one of them was led by a representative of ,winter clad in furs1 who threw snowballs and ice in order to prolong the cold weather4 ,the other troop was commanded by a representative of ,summer covered with fresh leaves and flowers4 ,in the sham fight which followed the party of ,summer came off victorious1 and the ceremony ended with a feast4 ,again1 in the region of the middle ,rhine1 a representative of ,summer clad in ivy combats a representative of ,winter clad in straw or moss and finally gains a victory over him4 ,the vanquished foe is thrown to the ground and stripped of his casing of straw1 which is torn to pieces and scattered about1 while the youthful comrades of the two champions sing a song to commemorate the defeat of ,winter by ,summer4 ,afterwards they carry about a summer garland or branch and collect gifts of eggs and bacon from house to house4 ,sometimes the champion who acts the part of ,summer is dressed in leaves and flowers and wears a chaplet of flowers on his head4 ,in the ,palatinate this mimic conflict takes place on the fourth ,sunday in ,lent4 ,all over ,bavaria the same drama used to be acted on the same day1 and it was still kept up in some places down to the middle of the nineteenth century or later4 ,while ,summer appeared clad all in green1 decked with fluttering ribbons1 and carrying a branch in blossom or a little tree hung with apples and pears1 ,winter was muffled up in cap and mantle of fur and bore in his hand a snow-shovel or a flail4 ,accompanied by their respective retinues dressed in corresponding attire1 they went through all the streets of the village1 halting before the houses and singing staves of old songs1 for which they received presents of bread1 eggs1 and fruit4 ,finally1 after a short struggle1 ,winter was beaten by ,summer and ducked in the village well or driven out of the village with shouts and laughter into the forest4 ,at ,goepfritz in ,lower ,austria1 two men personating ,summer and ,winter used to go from house to house on ,shrove ,tuesday1 and were everywhere welcomed by the children with great delight4 ,the representative of ,summer was clad in white and bore a sickle2 his comrade1 who played the part of ,winter1 had a fur-cap on his head1 his arms and legs were swathed in straw1 and he carried a flail4 ,in every house they sang verses alternately4 ,at ,drmling in ,brunswick1 down to the present time1 the contest between ,summer and ,winter is acted every year at ,whitsuntide by a troop of boys and a troop of girls4 ,the boys rush singing1 shouting1 and ringing bells from house to house to drive ,winter away2 after them come the girls singing softly and led by a ,may ,bride1 all in bright dresses and decked with flowers and garlands to represent the genial advent of spring4 ,formerly the part of ,winter was played by a straw-man which the boys carried with them2 now it is acted by a real man in disguise4 ,among the ,central ,esquimaux of ,north ,america the contest between representatives of summer and winter1 which in ,europe has long degenerated into a mere dramatic performance1 is still kept up as a magical ceremony of which the avowed intention is to influence the weather4 ,in autumn1 when storms announce the approach of the dismal ,arctic winter1 the ,esquimaux divide themselves into two parties called respectively the ptarmigans and the ducks1 the ptarmigans comprising all persons born in winter1 and the ducks all persons born in summer4 ,a long rope of sealskin is then stretched out1 and each party laying hold of one end of it seeks by tugging with might and main to drag the other party over to its side4 ,if the ptarmigans get the worst of it1 then summer has won the game and fine weather may be expected to prevail through the winter4 #f4 ,death and ,resurrection of ,kostrubonko ,i ,,russia funeral ceremonies like those of ,burying the ,carnival and ,carrying out ,death are celebrated under the names1 not of ,death or the ,carnival1 but of certain mythic figures1 ,kostrubonko1 ,kostroma1 ,kupalo1 ,lada1 and ,yarilo4 ,these ,russian ceremonies are observed both in spring and at midsummer4 ,thus in ,little ,russia it used to be the custom at ,eastertide to celebrate the funeral of a being called ,kostrubonko1 the deity of the spring4 ,a circle was formed of singers who moved slowly around a girl who lay on the ground as if dead1 and as they went they sang3 ',dead1 dead is our ,kostrubonko6 ,dead1 dead is our dear one6' until the girl suddenly sprang up1 on which the chorus joyfully exclaimed3 ',come to life1 come to life has our ,kostrubonko6 ,come to life1 come to life has our dear one6' ,on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john 7,midsummer ,eve7 a figure of ,kupalo is made of straw and is dressed in woman's clothes1 with a necklace and a floral crown4 ,then a tree is felled1 and1 after being decked with ribbons1 is set up on some chosen spot4 ,near this tree1 to which they give the name of ,marena ,winter or ,death1 the straw figure is placed1 together with a table1 on which stand spirits and viands4 ,afterwards a bonfire is lit1 and the young men and maidens jump over it in couples1 carrying the figure with them4 ,on the next day they strip the tree and the figure of their ornaments1 and throw them both into a stream4 ,on ,st4 ,peter's ,day1 the twenty-ninth of ,june1 or on the following ,sunday1 the ,funeral of ,kostroma or of ,lada or of ,yarilo is celebrated in ,russia4 ,in the ,governments of ,penza and ,simbirsk the funeral used to be represented as follows4 ,a bonfire was kindled on the twenty-eighth of ,june1 and on the next day the maidens chose one of their number to play the part of ,kostroma4 ,her companions saluted her with deep obeisances1 placed her on a board1 and carried her to the bank of a stream4 ,there they bathed her in the water1 while the oldest girl made a basket of lime-tree bark and beat it like a drum4 ,then they returned to the village and ended the day with processions1 games1 and dances4 ,in the ,murom district ,kostroma was represented by a straw figure dressed in woman's clothes and flowers4 ,this was laid in a trough and carried with songs to the bank of a lake or river4 ,here the crowd divided into two sides1 of which the one attacked and the other defended the figure4 ,at last the assailants gained the day1 stripped the figure of its dress and ornaments1 tore it in pieces1 trod the straw of which it was made under foot1 and flung it into the stream2 while the defenders of the figure hid their faces in their hands and pretended to bewail the death of ,kostroma4 ,in the district of ,kostroma the burial of ,yarilo was celebrated on the twenty-ninth or thirtieth of ,june4 ,the people chose an old man and gave him a small coffin containing a ,priapus-like figure representing ,yarilo4 ,this he carried out of the town1 followed by women chanting dirges and expressing by their gestures grief and despair4 ,in the open fields a grave was dug1 and into it the figure was lowered amid weeping and wailing1 after which games and dances were begun1 calling to mind the funeral games celebrated in old times by the pagan ,slavonians4 ,in ,little ,russia the figure of ,yarilo was laid in a coffin and carried through the streets after sunset surrounded by drunken women1 who kept repeating mournfully1 ,he is dead6 he is dead6 ,the men lifted and shook the figure as if they were trying to recall the dead man to life4 ,then they said to the women1 ,women1 weep not4 ,i know what is sweeter than honey4 ,but the women continued to lament and chant1 as they do at funerals4 ,of what was he guilty8 ,he was so good4 ,he will arise no more4 ,o how shall we part from thee8 ,what is life without thee8 ,arise1 if only for a brief hour4 ,but he rises not1 he not4 ,at last the ,yarilo was buried in a grave4 #g4 ,death and ,revival of ,vegetation ,,these ,russian customs are plainly of the same nature as those which in ,austria and ,germany are known as ,carrying out ,death4 ,therefore if the interpretation here adopted of the latter is right1 the ,russian ,kostrubonko1 ,yarilo1 and the rest must also have been originally embodiments of the spirit of vegetation1 and their death must have been regarded as a necessary preliminary to their revival4 ,the revival as a sequel to the death is enacted in the first of the ceremonies described1 the death and resurrection of ,kostrubonko4 ,the reason why in some of these ,russian ceremonies the death of the spirit of vegetation is celebrated at midsummer may be that the decline of summer is dated from ,midsummer ,day1 after which the days begin to shorten1 and the sun sets out on his downward journey3 ,to the darksome hollows ,where the frosts of winter lie4 ,such a turning-point of the year1 when vegetation might be thought to share the incipient though still almost imperceptible decay of summer1 might very well be chosen by primitive man as a fit moment for resorting to those magic rites by which he hopes to stay the decline1 or at least to ensure the revival1 of plant life4 ,but while the death of vegetation appears to have been represented in all1 and its revival in some1 of these spring and midsummer ceremonies1 there are features in some of them which can hardly be explained on this hypothesis alone4 ,the solemn funeral1 the lamentations1 and the mourning attire1 which often characterise these rites1 are indeed appropriate at the death of the beneficent spirit of vegetation4 ,but what shall we say of the glee with which the effigy is often carried out1 of the sticks and stones with which it is assailed1 and the taunts and curses which are hurled at it8 ,what shall we say of the dread of the effigy evinced by the haste with which the bearers scamper home as soon as they have thrown it away1 and by the belief that some one must soon die in any house into which it has looked8 ,this dread might perhaps be explained by a belief that there is a certain infectiousness in the dead spirit of vegetation which renders its approach dangerous4 ,but this explanation1 besides being rather strained1 does not cover the rejoicings which often attend the carrying out of ,death4 ,we must therefore recognise two distinct and seemingly opposite features in these ceremonies3 on the one hand1 sorrow for the death1 and affection and respect for the dead2 on the other hand1 fear and hatred of the dead1 and rejoicings at his death4 ,how the former of these features is to be explained ,i have attempted to show3 how the latter came to be so closely associated with the former is a question which ,i shall try to answer in the sequel4 #h4 ,analogous ,rites in ,india ,,in ,,the ,,kanagra district of ,india there is a custom observed by young girls in spring which closely resembles some of the ,european spring ceremonies just described4 ,it is called the ,ral ,ka mel1 or fair of ,ral1 the ,ral being a small painted earthen image of ,siva or ,prvat4 ,the custom is in vogue all over the ,kanagra district1 and its celebration1 which is entirely confined to young girls1 lasts through most of ,chet 7,march-,april7 up to the ,sankrnt of ,baiskh 7,april74 ,on a morning in ,march all the young girls of the village take small baskets of db grass and flowers to an appointed place1 where they throw them in a heap4 ,round this heap they stand in a circle and sing4 ,this goes on every day for ten days1 till the heap of grass and flowers has reached a fair height4 ,then they cut in the jungle two branches1 each with three prongs at one end1 and place them1 prongs downwards1 over the heap of flowers1 so as to make two tripods or pyramids4 ,on the single uppermost points of these branches they get an image-maker to construct two clay images1 one to represent ,siva1 and the other ,prvat4 ,the girls then divide themselves into two parties1 one for ,siva and one for ,prvat1 and marry the images in the usual way1 leaving out no part of the ceremony4 ,after the marriage they have a feast1 the cost of which is defrayed by contributions solicited from their parents4 ,then at the next ,sankrnt 7,baiskh7 they all go together to the river-side1 throw the images into a deep pool1 and weep over the place1 as though they were performing funeral obsequies4 ,the boys of the neighbourhood often tease them by diving after the images1 bringing them up1 and waving them about while the girls are crying over them4 ,the object of the fair is said to be to secure a good husband4 ,that in this ,indian ceremony the deities ,siva and ,prvat are conceived as spirits of vegetation seems to be proved by the placing of their images on branches over a heap of grass and flowers4 ,here1 as often in ,european folk-custom1 the divinities of vegetation are represented in duplicate1 by plants and by puppets4 ,the marriage of these ,indian deities in spring corresponds to the ,european ceremonies in which the marriage of the vernal spirits of vegetation is represented by the ,king and ,queen of ,may1 the ,may ,bride1 ,bridegroom of the ,may1 and so forth4 ,the throwing of the images into the water1 and the mourning for them1 are the equivalents of the ,european customs of throwing the dead spirit of vegetation under the name of ,death1 ,yarilo1 ,kostroma1 and the rest1 into the water and lamenting over it4 ,again1 in ,india1 as often in ,europe1 the rite is performed exclusively by females4 ,the notion that the ceremony helps to procure husbands for the girls can be explained by the quickening and fertilising influence which the spirit of vegetation is believed to exert upon the life of man as well as of plants4 #i4 ,the ,magic ,spring ,,the ,,general explanation which we have been led to adopt of these and many similar ceremonies is that they are1 or were in their origin1 magical rites intended to ensure the revival of nature in spring4 ,the means by which they were supposed to effect this end were imitation and sympathy4 ,led astray by his ignorance of the true causes of things1 primitive man believed that in order to produce the great phenomena of nature on which his life depended he had only to imitate them1 and that immediately by a secret sympathy or mystic influence the little drama which he acted in forest glade or mountain dell1 on desert plain or wind-swept shore1 would be taken up and repeated by mightier actors on a vaster stage4 ,he fancied that by masquerading in leaves and flowers he helped the bare earth to clothe herself with verdure1 and that by playing the death and burial of winter he drove that gloomy season away1 and made smooth the path for the footsteps of returning spring4 ,if we find it hard to throw ourselves even in fancy into a mental condition in which such things seem possible1 we can more easily picture to ourselves the anxiety which the savage1 when he first began to lift his thoughts above the satisfaction of his merely animal wants1 and to meditate on the causes of things1 may have felt as to the continued operation of what we now call the laws of nature4 ,to us1 familiar as we are with the conception of the uniformity and regularity with which the great cosmic phenomena succeed each other1 there seems little ground for apprehension that the causes which produce these effects will cease to operate1 at least within the near future4 ,but this confidence in the stability of nature is bred only by the experience which comes of wide observation and long tradition2 and the savage1 with his narrow sphere of observation and his short-lived tradition1 lacks the very elements of that experience which alone could set his mind at rest in face of the ever-changing and often menacing aspects of nature4 ,no wonder1 therefore1 that he is thrown into a panic by an eclipse1 and thinks that the sun or the moon would surely perish1 if he did not raise a clamour and shoot his puny shafts into the air to defend the luminaries from the monster who threatens to devour them4 ,no wonder he is terrified when in the darkness of night a streak of sky is suddenly illumined by the flash of a meteor1 or the whole expanse of the celestial arch glows with the fitful light of the ,northern ,streamers4 ,even phenomena which recur at fixed and uniform intervals may be viewed by him with apprehension1 before he has come to recognise the orderliness of their recurrence4 ,the speed or slowness of his recognition of such periodic or cyclic changes in nature will depend largely on the length of the particular cycle4 ,the cycle1 for example1 of day and night is everywhere1 except in the polar regions1 so short and hence so frequent that men probably soon ceased to discompose themselves seriously as to the chance of its failing to recur1 though the ancient ,egyptians1 as we have seen1 daily wrought enchantments to bring back to the east in the morning the fiery orb which had sunk at evening in the crimson west4 ,but it was far otherwise with the annual cycle of the seasons4 ,to any man a year is a considerable period1 seeing that the number of our years is but few at the best4 ,to the primitive savage1 with his short memory and imperfect means of marking the flight of time1 a year may well have been so long that he failed to recognise it as a cycle at all1 and watched the changing aspects of earth and heaven with a perpetual wonder1 alternately delighted and alarmed1 elated and cast down1 according as the vicissitudes of light and heat1 of plant and animal life1 ministered to his comfort or threatened his existence4 ,in autumn when the withered leaves were whirled about the forest by the nipping blast1 and he looked up at the bare boughs1 could he feel sure that they would ever be green again8 ,as day by day the sun sank lower and lower in the sky1 could he be certain that the luminary would ever retrace his heavenly road8 ,even the waning moon1 whose pale sickle rose thinner and thinner every night over the rim of the eastern horizon1 may have excited in his mind a fear lest1 when it had wholly vanished1 there should be moons no more4 ,these and a thousand such misgivings may have thronged the fancy and troubled the peace of the man who first began to reflect on the mysteries of the world he lived in1 and to take thought for a more distant future than the morrow4 ,it was natural1 therefore1 that with such thoughts and fears he should have done all that in him lay to bring back the faded blossom to the bough1 to swing the low sun of winter up to his old place in the summer sky1 and to restore its orbed fulness to the silver lamp of the waning moon4 ,we may smile at his vain endeavours if we please1 but it was only by making a long series of experiments1 of which some were almost inevitably doomed to failure1 that man learned from experience the futility of some of his attempted methods and the fruitfulness of others4 ,after all1 magical ceremonies are nothing but experiments which have failed and which continue to be repeated merely because1 for reasons which have already been indicated1 the operator is unaware of their failure4 ,with the advance of knowledge these ceremonies either cease to be performed altogether or are kept up from force of habit long after the intention with which they were instituted has been forgotten4 ,thus fallen from their high estate1 no longer regarded as solemn rites on the punctual performance of which the welfare and even the life of the community depend1 they sink gradually to the level of simple pageants1 mummeries1 and pastimes1 till in the final stage of degeneration they are wholly abandoned by older people1 and1 from having once been the most serious occupation of the sage1 become at last the idle sport of children4 ,it is in this final stage of decay that most of the old magical rites of our ,european forefathers linger on at the present day1 and even from this their last retreat they are fast being swept away by the rising tide of those multitudinous forces1 moral1 intellectual1 and social1 which are bearing mankind onward to a new and unknown goal4 ,we may feel some natural regret at the disappearance of quaint customs and picturesque ceremonies1 which have preserved to an age often deemed dull and prosaic something of the flavour and freshness of the olden time1 some breath of the springtime of the world2 yet our regret will be lessened when we remember that these pretty pageants1 these now innocent diversions1 had their origin in ignorance and superstition2 that if they are a record of human endeavour1 they are also a monument of fruitless ingenuity1 of wasted labour1 and of blighted hopes2 and that for all their gay trappings--their flowers1 their ribbons1 and their music--they partake far more of tragedy than of farce4 ,the interpretation which1 following in the footsteps of ,w4 ,mannhardt1 ,i have attempted to give of these ceremonies has been not a little confirmed by the discovery1 made since this book was first written1 that the natives of ,central ,australia regularly practise magical ceremonies for the purpose of awakening the dormant energies of nature at the approach of what may be called the ,australian spring4 ,nowhere apparently are the alternations of the seasons more sudden and the contrasts between them more striking than in the deserts of ,central ,australia1 where at the end of a long period of drought the sandy and stony wilderness1 over which the silence and desolation of death appear to brood1 is suddenly1 after a few days of torrential rain1 transformed into a landscape smiling with verdure and peopled with teeming multitudes of insects and lizards1 of frogs and birds4 ,the marvellous change which passes over the face of nature at such times has been compared even by ,european observers to the effect of magic2 no wonder1 then1 that the savage should regard it as such in very deed4 ,now it is just when there is promise of the approach of a good season that the natives of ,central ,australia are wont especially to perform those magical ceremonies of which the avowed intention is to multiply the plants and animals they use as food4 ,these ceremonies1 therefore1 present a close analogy to the spring customs of our ,european peasantry not only in the time of their celebration1 but also in their aim2 for we can hardly doubt that in instituting rites designed to assist the revival of plant life in spring our primitive forefathers were moved1 not by any sentimental wish to smell at early violets1 or pluck the rathe primrose1 or watch yellow daffodils dancing in the breeze1 but by the very practical consideration1 certainly not formulated in abstract terms1 that the life of man is inextricably bound up with that of plants1 and that if they were to perish he could not survive4 ,and as the faith of the ,australian savage in the efficacy of his magic rites is confirmed by observing that their performance is invariably followed1 sooner or later1 by that increase of vegetable and animal life which it is their object to produce1 so1 we may suppose1 it was with ,european savages in the olden time4 ,the sight of the fresh green in brake and thicket1 of vernal flowers blowing on mossy banks1 of swallows arriving from the south1 and of the sun mounting daily higher in the sky1 would be welcomed by them as so many visible signs that their enchantments were indeed taking effect1 and would inspire them with a cheerful confidence that all was well with a world which they could thus mould to suit their wishes4 ,only in autumn days1 as summer slowly faded1 would their confidence again be dashed by doubts and misgivings at symptoms of decay1 which told how vain were all their efforts to stave off for ever the approach of winter and of death4 ,,xxix4 ,the ,myth of ,adonis ,,the ,,spectacle of the great changes which annually pass over the face of the earth has powerfully impressed the minds of men in all ages1 and stirred them to meditate on the causes of transformations so vast and wonderful4 ,their curiosity has not been purely disinterested2 for even the savage cannot fail to perceive how intimately his own life is bound up with the life of nature1 and how the same processes which freeze the stream and strip the earth of vegetation menace him with extinction4 ,at a certain stage of development men seem to have imagined that the means of averting the threatened calamity were in their own hands1 and that they could hasten or retard the flight of the seasons by magic art4 ,accordingly they performed ceremonies and recited spells to make the rain to fall1 the sun to shine1 animals to multiply1 and the fruits of the earth to grow4 ,in course of time the slow advance of knowledge1 which has dispelled so many cherished illusions1 convinced at least the more thoughtful portion of mankind that the alternations of summer and winter1 of spring and autumn1 were not merely the result of their own magical rites1 but that some deeper cause1 some mightier power1 was at work behind the shifting scenes of nature4 ,they now pictured to themselves the growth and decay of vegetation1 the birth and death of living creatures1 as effects of the waxing or waning strength of divine beings1 of gods and goddesses1 who were born and died1 who married and begot children1 on the pattern of human life4 ,thus the old magical theory of the seasons was displaced1 or rather supplemented1 by a religious theory4 ,for although men now attributed the annual cycle of change primarily to corresponding changes in their deities1 they still thought that by performing certain magical rites they could aid the god who was the principle of life1 in his struggle with the opposing principle of death4 ,they imagined that they could recruit his failing energies and even raise him from the dead4 ,the ceremonies which they observed for this purpose were in substance a dramatic representation of the natural processes which they wished to facilitate2 for it is a familiar tenet of magic that you can produce any desired effect by merely imitating it4 ,and as they now explained the fluctuations of growth and decay1 of reproduction and dissolution1 by the marriage1 the death1 and the rebirth or revival of the gods1 their religious or rather magical dramas turned in great measure on these themes4 ,they set forth the fruitful union of the powers of fertility1 the sad death of one at least of the divine partners1 and his joyful resurrection4 ,thus a religious theory was blended with a magical practice4 ,the combination is familiar in history4 ,indeed1 few religions have ever succeeded in wholly extricating themselves from the old trammels of magic4 ,the inconsistency of acting on two opposite principles1 however it may vex the soul of the philosopher1 rarely troubles the common man2 indeed he is seldom even aware of it4 ,his affair is to act1 not to analyse the motives of his action4 ,if mankind had always been logical and wise1 history would not be a long chronicle of folly and crime4 ,of the changes which the seasons bring with them1 the most striking within the temperate zone are those which affect vegetation4 ,the influence of the seasons on animals1 though great1 is not nearly so manifest4 ,hence it is natural that in the magical dramas designed to dispel winter and bring back spring the emphasis should be laid on vegetation1 and that trees and plants should figure in them more prominently than beasts and birds4 ,yet the two sides of life1 the vegetable and the animal1 were not dissociated in the minds of those who observed the ceremonies4 ,indeed they commonly believed that the tie between the animal and the vegetable world was even closer than it really is2 hence they often combined the dramatic representation of reviving plants with a real or a dramatic union of the sexes for the purpose of furthering at the same time and by the same act the multiplication of fruits1 of animals1 and of men4 ,to them the principle of life and fertility1 whether animal or vegetable1 was one and indivisible4 ,to live and to cause to live1 to eat food and to beget children1 these were the primary wants of men in the past1 and they will be the primary wants of men in the future so long as the world lasts4 ,other things may be added to enrich and beautify human life1 but unless these wants are first satisfied1 humanity itself must cease to exist4 ,these two things1 therefore1 food and children1 were what men chiefly sought to procure by the performance of magical rites for the regulation of the seasons4 ,nowhere1 apparently1 have these rites been more widely and solemnly celebrated than in the lands which border the ,eastern ,mediterranean4 ,under the names of ,osiris1 ,tammuz1 ,adonis1 and ,attis1 the peoples of ,egypt and ,western ,asia represented the yearly decay and revival of life1 especially of vegetable life1 which they personified as a god who annually died and rose again from the dead4 ,in name and detail the rites varied from place to place3 in substance they were the same4 ,the supposed death and resurrection of this oriental deity1 a god of many names but of essentially one nature1 is now to be examined4 ,we begin with ,tammuz or ,adonis4 ,the worship of ,adonis was practised by the ,semitic peoples of ,babylonia and ,syria1 and the ,greeks borrowed it from them as early as the seventh century before ,christ4 ,the true name of the deity was ,tammuz3 the appellation of ,adonis is merely the ,semitic ,adon1 lord1 a title of honour by which his worshippers addressed him4 ,but the ,greeks through a misunderstanding converted the title of honour into a proper name4 ,in the religious literature of ,babylonia ,tammuz appears as the youthful spouse or lover of ,ishtar1 the great mother goddess1 the embodiment of the reproductive energies of nature4 ,the references to their connexion with each other in myth and ritual are both fragmentary and obscure1 but we gather from them that every year ,tammuz was believed to die1 passing away from the cheerful earth to the gloomy subterranean world1 and that every year his divine mistress journeyed in quest of him to the land from which there is no returning1 to the house of darkness1 where dust lies on door and bolt4 ,during her absence the passion of love ceased to operate3 men and beasts alike forgot to reproduce their kinds3 all life was threatened with extinction4 ,so intimately bound up with the goddess were the sexual functions of the whole animal kingdom that without her presence they could not be discharged4 ,a messenger of the great god ,ea was accordingly despatched to rescue the goddess on whom so much depended4 ,the stern queen of the infernal regions1 ,allatu or ,eresh-,kigal by name1 reluctantly allowed ,ishtar to be sprinkled with the ,water of ,life and to depart1 in company probably with her lover ,tammuz1 that the two might return together to the upper world1 and that with their return all nature might revive4 ,laments for the departed ,tammuz are contained in several ,babylonian hymns1 which liken him to plants that quickly fade4 ,he is ,a tamarisk that in the garden has drunk no water1 ,whose crown in the field has brought forth no blossom4 ,a willow that rejoiced not by the watercourse1 ,a willow whose roots were torn up4 ,a herb that in the garden had drunk no water4 ,his death appears to have been annually mourned1 to the shrill music of flutes1 by men and women about midsummer in the month named after him1 the month of ,tammuz4 ,the dirges were seemingly chanted over an effigy of the dead god1 which was washed with pure water1 anointed with oil1 and clad in a red robe1 while the fumes of incense rose into the air1 as if to stir his dormant senses by their pungent fragrance and wake him from the sleep of death4 ,in one of these dirges1 inscribed ,lament of the ,flutes for ,tammuz1 we seem still to hear the voices of the singers chanting the sad refrain and to catch1 like far-away music1 the wailing notes of the flutes3 ,at his vanishing away she lifts up a lament1 ',oh my child6' at his vanishing away she lifts up a lament2 ',my ,damu6' at his vanishing away she lifts up a lament4 ',my enchanter and priest6' at his vanishing away she lifts up a lament1 ,at the shining cedar1 rooted in a spacious place1 ,in ,eanna1 above and below1 she lifts up a lament4 ,like the lament that a house lifts up for its master1 lifts she up a lament1 ,like the lament that a city lifts up for its lord1 lifts she up a lament4 ,her lament is the lament for a herb that grows not in the bed1 ,her lament is the lament for the corn that grows not in the ear4 ,her chamber is a possession that brings not forth a possession1 ,a weary woman1 a weary child1 forspent4 ,her lament is for a great river1 where no willows grow1 ,her lament is for a field1 where corn and herbs grow not4 ,her lament is for a pool1 where fishes grow not4 ,her lament is for a thickest of reeds1 where no reeds grow4 ,her lament is for woods1 where tamarisks grow not4 ,her lament is for a wilderness where no cypresses 787 grow4 ,her lament is for the depth of a garden of trees1 where honey and wine grow not4 ,her lament is for meadows1 where no plants grow4 ,her lament is for a palace1 where length of life grows not4 ,the tragical story and the melancholy rites of ,adonis are better known to us from the descriptions of ,greek writers than from the fragments of ,babylonian literature or the brief reference of the prophet ,ezekiel1 who saw the women of ,jerusalem weeping for ,tammuz at the north gate of the temple4 ,mirrored in the glass of ,greek mythology1 the oriental deity appears as a comely youth beloved by ,aphrodite4 ,in his infancy the goddess hid him in a chest1 which she gave in charge to ,persephone1 queen of the nether world4 ,but when ,persephone opened the chest and beheld the beauty of the babe1 she refused to give him back to ,aphrodite1 though the goddess of love went down herself to hell to ransom her dear one from the power of the grave4 ,the dispute between the two goddesses of love and death was settled by ,zeus1 who decreed that ,adonis should abide with ,persephone in the under world for one part of the year1 and with ,aphrodite in the upper world for another part4 ,at last the fair youth was killed in hunting by a wild boar1 or by the jealous ,ares1 who turned himself into the likeness of a boar in order to compass the death of his rival4 ,bitterly did ,aphrodite lament her loved and lost ,adonis4 ,in this form of the myth1 the contest between ,aphrodite and ,persephone for the possession of ,adonis clearly reflects the struggle between ,ishtar and ,allatu in the land of the dead1 while the decision of ,zeus that ,adonis is to spend one part of the year under ground and another part above ground is merely a ,greek version of the annual disappearance and reappearance of ,tammuz4 ,,xxx4 ,adonis in ,syria ,,the ,,myth of ,adonis was localised and his rites celebrated with much solemnity at two places in ,western ,asia4 ,one of these was ,byblus on the coast of ,syria1 the other was ,paphos in ,cyprus4 ,both were great seats of the worship of ,aphrodite1 or rather of her ,semitic counterpart1 ,astarte2 and of both1 if we accept the legends1 ,cinyras1 the father of ,adonis1 was king4 ,of the two cities ,byblus was the more ancient2 indeed it claimed to be the oldest city in ,phoenicia1 and to have been founded in the early ages of the world by the great god ,el1 whom ,greeks and ,romans identified with ,cronus and ,saturn respectively4 ,however that may have been1 in historical times it ranked as a holy place1 the religious capital of the country1 the ,mecca or ,jerusalem of the ,phoenicians4 ,the city stood on a height beside the sea1 and contained a great sanctuary of ,astarte1 where in the midst of a spacious open court1 surrounded by cloisters and approached from below by staircases1 rose a tall cone or obelisk1 the holy image of the goddess4 ,in this sanctuary the rites of ,adonis were celebrated4 ,indeed the whole city was sacred to him1 and the river ,nahr ,ibrahim1 which falls into the sea a little to the south of ,byblus1 bore in antiquity the name of ,adonis4 ,this was the kingdom of ,cinyras4 ,from the earliest to the latest times the city appears to have been ruled by kings1 assisted perhaps by a senate or council of elders4 ,the last king of ,byblus bore the ancient name of ,cinyras1 and was beheaded by ,pompey the ,great for his tyrannous excesses4 ,his legendary namesake ,cinyras is said to have founded a sanctuary of ,aphrodite1 that is1 of ,astarte1 at a place on ,mount ,lebanon1 distant a day's journey from the capital4 ,the spot was probably ,aphaca1 at the source of the river ,adonis1 half-way between ,byblus and ,baalbec2 for at ,aphaca there was a famous grove and sanctuary of ,astarte which ,constantine destroyed on account of the flagitious character of the worship4 ,the site of the temple has been discovered by modern travellers near the miserable village which still bears the name of ,afka at the head of the wild1 romantic1 wooded gorge of the ,adonis4 ,the hamlet stands among groves of noble walnut-trees on the brink of the lyn4 ,a little way off the river rushes from a cavern at the foot of a mighty amphitheatre of towering cliffs to plunge in a series of cascades into the awful depths of the glen4 ,the deeper it descends1 the ranker and denser grows the vegetation1 which1 sprouting from the crannies and fissures of the rocks1 spreads a green veil over the roaring or murmuring stream in the tremendous chasm below4 ,there is something delicious1 almost intoxicating1 in the freshness of these tumbling waters1 in the sweetness and purity of the mountain air1 in the vivid green of the vegetation4 ,the temple1 of which some massive hewn blocks and a fine column of ,syenite granite still mark the site1 occupied a terrace facing the source of the river and commanding a magnificent prospect4 ,across the foam and the roar of the waterfalls you look up to the cavern and away to the top of the sublime precipices above4 ,so lofty is the cliff that the goats which creep along its ledges to browse on the bushes appear like ants to the spectator hundreds of feet below4 ,seaward the view is especially impressive when the sun floods the profound gorge with golden light1 revealing all the fantastic buttresses and rounded towers of its mountain rampart1 and falling softly on the varied green of the woods which clothe its depths4 ,it was here that1 according to the legend1 ,adonis met ,aphrodite for the first or the last time1 and here his mangled body was buried4 ,a fairer scene could hardly be imagined for a story of tragic love and death4 ,yet1 sequestered as the valley is and must always have been1 it is not wholly deserted4 ,a convent or a village may be observed here and there standing out against the sky on the top of some beetling crag1 or clinging to the face of a nearly perpendicular cliff high above the foam and the din of the river2 and at evening the lights that twinkle through the gloom betray the presence of human habitations on slopes which might seem inaccessible to man4 ,in antiquity the whole of the lovely vale appears to have been dedicated to ,adonis1 and to this day it is haunted by his memory2 for the heights which shut it in are crested at various points by ruined monuments of his worship1 some of them overhanging dreadful abysses1 down which it turns the head dizzy to look and see the eagles wheeling about their nests far below4 ,one such monument exists at ,ghineh4 ,the face of a great rock1 above a roughly hewn recess1 is here carved with figures of ,adonis and ,aphrodite4 ,he is portrayed with spear in rest1 awaiting the attack of a bear1 while she is seated in an attitude of sorrow4 ,her grief-stricken figure may well be the mourning ,aphrodite of the ,lebanon described by ,macrobius1 and the recess in the rock is perhaps her lover's tomb4 ,every year1 in the belief of his worshippers1 ,adonis was wounded to death on the mountains1 and every year the face of nature itself was dyed with his sacred blood4 ,so year by year the ,syrian damsels lamented his untimely fate1 while the red anemone1 his flower1 bloomed among the cedars of ,lebanon1 and the river ran red to the sea1 fringing the winding shores of the blue ,mediterranean1 whenever the wind set inshore1 with a sinuous band of crimson4 ,,xxxi4 ,adonis in ,cyprus ,,the ,,island of ,cyprus lies but one day's sail from the coast of ,syria4 ,indeed1 on fine summer evenings its mountains may be descried looming low and dark against the red fires of sunset4 ,with its rich mines of copper and its forests of firs and stately cedars1 the island naturally attracted a commercial and maritime people like the ,phoenicians2 while the abundance of its corn1 its wine1 and its oil must have rendered it in their eyes a ,land of ,promise by comparison with the niggardly nature of their own rugged coast1 hemmed in between the mountains and the sea4 ,accordingly they settled in ,cyprus at a very early date and remained there long after the ,greeks had also established themselves on its shores2 for we know from inscriptions and coins that ,phoenician kings reigned at ,citium1 the ,chittim of the ,hebrews1 down to the time of ,alexander the ,great4 ,naturally the ,semitic colonists brought their gods with them from the mother-land4 ,they worshipped ,baal of the ,lebanon1 who may well have been ,adonis1 and at ,amathus on the south coast they instituted the rites of ,adonis and ,aphrodite1 or rather ,astarte4 ,here1 as at ,byblus1 these rites resembled the ,egyptian worship of ,osiris so closely that some people even identified the ,adonis of ,amathus with ,osiris4 ,but the great seat of the worship of ,aphrodite and ,adonis in ,cyprus was ,paphos on the south-western side of the island4 ,among the petty kingdoms into which ,cyprus was divided from the earliest times until the end of the fourth century before our era ,paphos must have ranked with the best4 ,it is a land of hills and billowy ridges1 diversified by fields and vineyards and intersected by rivers1 which in the course of ages have carved for themselves beds of such tremendous depth that travelling in the interior is difficult and tedious4 ,the lofty range of ,mount ,olympus 7the modern ,troodos71 capped with snow the greater part of the year1 screens ,paphos from the northerly and easterly winds and cuts it off from the rest of the island4 ,on the slopes of the range the last pine-woods of ,cyprus linger1 sheltering here and there monasteries in scenery not unworthy of the ,apennines4 ,the old city of ,paphos occupied the summit of a hill about a mile from the sea2 the newer city sprang up at the harbour some ten miles off4 ,the sanctuary of ,aphrodite at ,old ,paphos 7the modern ,kuklia7 was one of the most celebrated shrines in the ancient world4 ,according to ,herodotus1 it was founded by ,phoenician colonists from ,ascalon2 but it is possible that a native goddess of fertility was worshipped on the spot before the arrival of the ,phoenicians1 and that the newcomers identified her with their own ,baalath or ,astarte1 whom she may have closely resembled4 ,if two deities were thus fused in one1 we may suppose that they were both varieties of that great goddess of motherhood and fertility whose worship appears to have been spread all over ,western ,asia from a very early time4 ,the supposition is confirmed as well by the archaic shape of her image as by the licentious character of her rites2 for both that shape and those rites were shared by her with other ,asiatic deities4 ,her image was simply a white cone or pyramid4 ,in like manner1 a cone was the emblem of ,astarte at ,byblus1 of the native goddess whom the ,greeks called ,artemis at ,perga in ,pamphylia1 and of the sun-god ,heliogabalus at ,emesa in ,syria4 ,conical stones1 which apparently served as idols1 have also been found at ,golgi in ,cyprus1 and in the ,phoenician temples of ,malta2 and cones of sandstone came to light at the shrine of the ,mistress of ,torquoise among the barren hills and frowning precipices of ,sinai4 ,in ,cyprus it appears that before marriage all women were formerly obliged by custom to prostitute themselves to strangers at the sanctuary of the goddess1 whether she went by the name of ,aphrodite1 ,astarte1 or what not4 ,similar customs prevailed in many parts of ,western ,asia4 ,whatever its motive1 the practice was clearly regarded1 not as an orgy of lust1 but as a solemn religious duty performed in the service of that great ,mother ,goddess of ,western ,asia whose name varied1 while her type remained constant1 from place to place4 ,thus at ,babylon every woman1 whether rich or poor1 had once in her life to submit to the embraces of a stranger at the temple of ,mylitta1 that is1 of ,ishtar or ,astarte1 and to dedicate to the goddess the wages earned by this sanctified harlotry4 ,the sacred precinct was crowded with women waiting to observe the custom4 ,some of them had to wait there for years4 ,at ,heliopolis or ,baalbec in ,syria1 famous for the imposing grandeur of its ruined temples1 the custom of the country required that every maiden should prostitute herself to a stranger at the temple of ,astarte1 and matrons as well as maids testified their devotion to the goddess in the same manner4 ,the emperor ,constantine abolished the custom1 destroyed the temple1 and built a church in its stead4 ,in ,phoenician temples women prostituted themselves for hire in the service of religion1 believing that by this conduct they propitiated the goddess and won her favour4 ,it was a law of the ,amorites1 that she who was about to marry should sit in fornication seven days by the gate4 ,at ,byblus the people shaved their heads in the annual mourning for ,adonis4 ,women who refused to sacrifice their hair had to give themselves up to strangers on a certain day of the festival1 and the money which they thus earned was devoted to the goddess4 ,a ,greek inscription found at ,tralles in ,lydia proves that the practice of religious prostitution survived in that country as late as the second century of our era4 ,it records of a certain woman1 ,aurelia ,aemilia by name1 not only that she herself served the god in the capacity of a harlot at his express command1 but that her mother and other female ancestors had done the same before her2 and the publicity of the record1 engraved on a marble column which supported a votive offering1 shows that no stain attached to such a life and such a parentage4 ,in ,armenia the noblest families dedicated their daughters to the service of the goddess ,anaitis in her temple of ,acilisena1 where the damsels acted as prostitutes for a long time before they were given in marriage4 ,nobody scrupled to take one of these girls to wife when her period of service was over4 ,again1 the goddess ,ma was served by a multitude of sacred harlots at ,comana in ,pontus1 and crowds of men and women flocked to her sanctuary from the neighbouring cities and country to attend the biennial festivals or to pay their vows to the goddess4 ,if we survey the whole of the evidence on this subject1 some of which has still to be laid before the reader1 we may conclude that a great ,mother ,goddess1 the personification of all the reproductive energies of nature1 was worshipped under different names but with a substantial similarity of myth and ritual by many peoples of ,western ,asia2 that associated with her was a lover1 or rather series of lovers1 divine yet mortal1 with whom she mated year by year1 their commerce being deemed essential to the propagation of animals and plants1 each in their several kind2 and further1 that the fabulous union of the divine pair was simulated and1 as it were1 multiplied on earth by the real1 though temporary1 union of the human sexes at the sanctuary of the goddess for the sake of thereby ensuring the fruitfulness of the ground and the increase of man and beast4 ,at ,paphos the custom of religious prostitution is said to have been instituted by ,king ,cinyras1 and to have been practised by his daughters1 the sisters of ,adonis1 who1 having incurred the wrath of ,aphrodite1 mated with strangers and ended their days in ,egypt4 ,in this form of the tradition the wrath of ,aphrodite is probably a feature added by a later authority1 who could only regard conduct which shocked his own moral sense as a punishment inflicted by the goddess instead of as a sacrifice regularly enjoined by her on all her devotees4 ,at all events the story indicates that the princesses of ,paphos had to conform to the custom as well as women of humble birth4 ,among the stories which were told of ,cinyras1 the ancestor of the priestly kings of ,paphos and the father of ,adonis1 there are some that deserve our attention4 ,in the first place1 he is said to have begotten his son ,adonis in incestuous intercourse with his daughter ,myrrha at a festival of the corn-goddess1 at which women robed in white were wont to offer corn-wreaths as first-fruits of the harvest and to observe strict chastity for nine days4 ,similar cases of incest with a daughter are reported of many ancient kings4 ,it seems unlikely that such reports are without foundation1 and perhaps equally improbable that they refer to mere fortuitous outbursts of unnatural lust4 ,we may suspect that they are based on a practice actually observed for a definite reason in certain special circumstances4 ,now in countries where the royal blood was traced through women only1 and where consequently the king held office merely in virtue of his marriage with an hereditary princess1 who was the real sovereign1 it appears to have often happened that a prince married his own sister1 the princess royal1 in order to obtain with her hand the crown which otherwise would have gone to another man1 perhaps to a stranger4 ,may not the same rule of descent have furnished a motive for incest with a daughter8 ,for it seems a natural corollary from such a rule that the king was bound to vacate the throne on the death of his wife1 the queen1 since he occupied it only by virtue of his marriage with her4 ,when that marriage terminated1 his right to the throne terminated with it and passed at once to his daughter's husband4 ,hence if the king desired to reign after his wife's death1 the only way in which he could legitimately continue to do so was by marrying his daughter1 and thus prolonging through her the title which had formerly been his through her mother4 ,cinyras is said to have been famed for his exquisite beauty and to have been wooed by ,aphrodite herself4 ,thus it would appear1 as scholars have already observed1 that ,cinyras was in a sense a duplicate of his handsome son ,adonis1 to whom the inflammable goddess also lost her heart4 ,further1 these stories of the love of ,aphrodite for two members of the royal house of ,paphos can hardly be dissociated from the corresponding legend told of ,pygmalion1 a ,phoenician king of ,cyprus1 who is said to have fallen in love with an image of ,aphrodite and taken it to his bed4 ,when we consider that ,pygmalion was the father-in-law of ,cinyras1 that the son of ,cinyras was ,adonis1 and that all three1 in successive generations1 are said to have been concerned in a love-intrigue with ,aphrodite1 we can hardly help concluding that the early ,phoenician kings of ,paphos1 or their sons1 regularly claimed to be not merely the priests of the goddess but also her lovers1 in other words1 that in their official capacity they personated ,adonis4 ,at all events ,adonis is said to have reigned in ,cyprus1 and it appears to be certain that the title of ,adonis was regularly borne by the sons of all the ,phoenician kings of the island4 ,it is true that the title strictly signified no more than lord2 yet the legends which connect these ,cyprian princes with the goddess of love make it probable that they claimed the divine nature as well as the human dignity of ,adonis4 ,the story of ,pygmalion points to a ceremony of a sacred marriage in which the king wedded the image of ,aphrodite1 or rather of ,astarte4 ,if that was so1 the tale was in a sense true1 not of a single man only1 but of a whole series of men1 and it would be all the more likely to be told of ,pygmalion1 if that was a common name of ,semitic kings in general1 and of ,cyprian kings in particular4 ,pygmalion1 at all events1 is known as the name of the king of ,tyre from whom his sister ,dido fled2 and a king of ,citium and ,idalium in ,cyprus1 who reigned in the time of ,alexander the ,great1 was also called ,pygmalion1 or rather ,pumiyathon1 the ,phoenician name which the ,greeks corrupted into ,pygmalion4 ,further1 it deserves to be noted that the names ,pygmalion and ,astarte occur together in a ,punic inscription on a gold medallion which was found in a grave at ,carthage2 the characters of the inscription are of the earliest type4 ,as the custom of religious prostitution at ,paphos is said to have been founded by king ,cinyras and observed by his daughters1 we may surmise that the kings of ,paphos played the part of the divine bridegroom in a less innocent rite than the form of marriage with a statue2 in fact1 that at certain festivals each of them had to mate with one or more of the sacred harlots of the temple1 who played ,astarte to his ,adonis4 ,if that was so1 there is more truth than has commonly been supposed in the reproach cast by the ,christian fathers that the ,aphrodite worshipped by ,cinyras was a common whore4 ,the fruit of their union would rank as sons and daughters of the deity1 and would in time become the parents of gods and goddesses1 like their fathers and mothers before them4 ,in this manner ,paphos1 and perhaps all sanctuaries of the great ,asiatic goddess where sacred prostitution was practised1 might be well stocked with human deities1 the offspring of the divine king by his wives1 concubines1 and temple harlots4 ,any one of these might probably succeed his father on the throne or be sacrificed in his stead whenever stress of war or other grave junctures called1 as they sometimes did1 for the death of a royal victim4 ,such a tax1 levied occasionally on the king's numerous progeny for the good of the country1 would neither extinguish the divine stock nor break the father's heart1 who divided his paternal affection among so many4 ,at all events1 if1 as there seems reason to believe1 ,semitic kings were often regarded at the same time as hereditary deities1 it is easy to understand the frequency of ,semitic personal names which imply that the bearers of them were the sons or daughters1 the brothers or sisters1 the fathers or mothers of a god1 and we need not resort to the shifts employed by some scholars to evade the plain sense of the words4 ,this interpretation is confirmed by a parallel ,egyptian usage2 for in ,egypt1 where the kings were worshipped as divine1 the queen was called the wife of the god or the mother of the god1 and the title father of the god was borne not only by the king's real father but also by his father-in-law4 ,similarly1 perhaps1 among the ,semites any man who sent his daughter to swell the royal harem may have been allowed to call himself the father of the god4 ,if we may judge by his name1 the ,semitic king who bore the name of ,cinyras was1 like ,king ,david1 a harper2 for the name of ,cinyras is clearly connected with the ,greek cinyra1 a lyre1 which in its turn comes from the ,semitic kinnor1 a lyre1 the very word applied to the instrument on which ,david played before ,saul4 ,we shall probably not err in assuming that at ,paphos as at ,jerusalem the music of the lyre or harp was not a mere pastime designed to while away an idle hour1 but formed part of the service of religion1 the moving influence of its melodies being perhaps set down1 like the effect of wine1 to the direct inspiration of a deity4 ,certainly at ,jerusalem the regular clergy of the temple prophesied to the music of harps1 of psalteries1 and of cymbals2 and it appears that the irregular clergy also1 as we may call the prophets1 depended on some such stimulus for inducing the ecstatic state which they took for immediate converse with the divinity4 ,thus we read of a band of prophets coming down from a high place with a psaltery1 a timbrel1 a pipe1 and a harp before them1 and prophesying as they went4 ,again1 when the united forces of ,judah and ,ephraim were traversing the wilderness of ,moab in pursuit of the enemy1 they could find no water for three days1 and were like to die of thirst1 they and the beasts of burden4 ,in this emergency the prophet ,elisha1 who was with the army1 called for a minstrel and bade him play4 ,under the influence of the music he ordered the soldiers to dig trenches in the sandy bed of the waterless waddy through which lay the line of march4 ,they did so1 and next morning the trenches were full of the water that had drained down into them underground from the desolate1 forbidding mountains on either hand4 ,the prophet's success in striking water in the wilderness resembles the reported success of modern dowsers1 though his mode of procedure was different4 ,incidentally he rendered another service to his countrymen4 ,for the skulking ,moabites from their lairs among the rocks saw the red sun of the desert reflected in the water1 and taking it for the blood1 or perhaps rather for an omen of the blood1 of their enemies1 they plucked up heart to attack the camp and were defeated with great slaughter4 ,again1 just as the cloud of melancholy which from time to time darkened the moody mind of ,saul was viewed as an evil spirit from the ,lord vexing him1 so on the other hand the solemn strains of the harp1 which soothed and composed his troubled thoughts1 may well have seemed to the hag-ridden king the very voice of ,god or of his good angel whispering peace4 ,even in our own day a great religious writer1 himself deeply sensitive to the witchery of music1 has said that musical notes1 with all their power to fire the blood and melt the heart1 cannot be mere empty sounds and nothing more2 no1 they have escaped from some higher sphere1 they are outpourings of eternal harmony1 the voice of angels1 the ,magnificat of saints4 ,it is thus that the rude imaginings of primitive man are transfigured and his feeble lispings echoed with a rolling reverberation in the musical prose of ,newman4 ,indeed the influence of music on the development of religion is a subject which would repay a sympathetic study4 ,for we cannot doubt that this1 the most intimate and affecting of all the arts1 has done much to create as well as to express the religious emotions1 thus modifying more or less deeply the fabric of belief to which at first sight it seems only to minister4 ,the musician has done his part as well as the prophet and the thinker in the making of religion4 ,every faith has its appropriate music1 and the difference between the creeds might almost be expressed in musical notation4 ,the interval1 for example1 which divides the wild revels of ,cybele from the stately ritual of the ,catholic ,church is measured by the gulf which severs the dissonant clash of cymbals and tambourines from the grave harmonies of ,palestrina and ,handel4 ,a different spirit breathes in the difference of the music4 ,,xxxii4 ,the ,ritual of ,adonis ,,at ,,the ,,festivals of ,adonis1 which were held in ,western ,asia and in ,greek lands1 the death of the god was annually mourned1 with a bitter wailing1 chiefly by women2 images of him1 dressed to resemble corpses1 were carried out as to burial and then thrown into the sea or into springs2 and in some places his revival was celebrated on the following day4 ,but at different places the ceremonies varied somewhat in the manner and apparently also in the season of their celebration4 ,at ,alexandria images of ,aphrodite and ,adonis were displayed on two couches2 beside them were set ripe fruits of all kinds1 cakes1 plants growing in flower-pots1 and green bowers twined with anise4 ,the marriage of the lovers was celebrated one day1 and on the morrow women attired as mourners1 with streaming hair and bared breasts1 bore the image of the dead ,adonis to the sea-shore and committed it to the waves4 ,yet they sorrowed not without hope1 for they sang that the lost one would come back again4 ,the date at which this ,alexandrian ceremony was observed is not expressly stated2 but from the mention of the ripe fruits it has been inferred that it took place in late summer4 ,in the great ,phoenician sanctuary of ,astarte at ,byblus the death of ,adonis was annually mourned1 to the shrill wailing notes of the flute1 with weeping1 lamentation1 and beating of the breast2 but next day he was believed to come to life again and ascend up to heaven in the presence of his worshippers4 ,the disconsolate believers1 left behind on earth1 shaved their heads as the ,egyptians did on the death of the divine bull ,apis2 women who could not bring themselves to sacrifice their beautiful tresses had to give themselves up to strangers on a certain day of the festival1 and to dedicate to ,astarte the wages of their shame4 ,this ,phoenician festival appears to have been a vernal one1 for its date was determined by the discoloration of the river ,adonis1 and this has been observed by modern travellers to occur in spring4 ,at that season the red earth washed down from the mountains by the rain tinges the water of the river1 and even the sea1 for a great way with a blood-red hue1 and the crimson stain was believed to be the blood of ,adonis1 annually wounded to death by the boar on ,mount ,lebanon4 ,again1 the scarlet anemone is said to have sprung from the blood of ,adonis1 or to have been stained by it2 and as the anemone blooms in ,syria about ,easter1 this may be thought to show that the festival of ,adonis1 or at least one of his festivals1 was held in spring4 ,the name of the flower is probably derived from ,naaman 7darling71 which seems to have been an epithet of ,adonis4 ,the ,arabs still call the anemone wounds of the ,naaman4 ,the red rose also was said to owe its hue to the same sad occasion2 for ,aphrodite1 hastening to her wounded lover1 trod on a bush of white roses2 the cruel thorns tore her tender flesh1 and her sacred blood dyed the white roses for ever red4 ,it would be idle1 perhaps1 to lay much weight on evidence drawn from the calendar of flowers1 and in particular to press an argument so fragile as the bloom of the rose4 ,yet so far as it counts at all1 the tale which links the damask rose with the death of ,adonis points to a summer rather than to a spring celebration of his passion4 ,in ,attica1 certainly1 the festival fell at the height of summer4 ,for the fleet which ,athens fitted out against ,syracuse1 and by the destruction of which her power was permanently crippled1 sailed at midsummer1 and by an ominous coincidence the sombre rites of ,adonis were being celebrated at the very time4 ,as the troops marched down to the harbour to embark1 the streets through which they passed were lined with coffins and corpse-like effigies1 and the air was rent with the noise of women wailing for the dead ,adonis4 ,the circumstance cast a gloom over the sailing of the most splendid armament that ,athens ever sent to sea4 ,many ages afterwards1 when the ,emperor ,julian made his first entry into ,antioch1 he found in like manner the gay1 the luxurious capital of the ,east plunged in mimic grief for the annual death of ,adonis2 and if he had any presentiment of coming evil1 the voices of lamentation which struck upon his ear must have seemed to sound his knell4 ,the resemblance of these ceremonies to the ,indian and ,european ceremonies which ,i have described elsewhere is obvious4 ,in particular1 apart from the somewhat doubtful date of its celebration1 the ,alexandrian ceremony is almost identical with the ,indian4 ,in both of them the marriage of two divine beings1 whose affinity with vegetation seems indicated by the fresh plants with which they are surrounded1 is celebrated in effigy1 and the effigies are afterwards mourned over and thrown into the water4 ,from the similarity of these customs to each other and to the spring and midsummer customs of modern ,europe we should naturally expect that they all admit of a common explanation4 ,hence1 if the explanation which ,i have adopted of the latter is correct1 the ceremony of the death and resurrection of ,adonis must also have been a dramatic representation of the decay and revival of plant life4 ,the inference thus based on the resemblance of the customs is confirmed by the following features in the legend and ritual of ,adonis4 ,his affinity with vegetation comes out at once in the common story of his birth4 ,he was said to have been born from a myrrh-tree1 the bark of which bursting1 after a ten months' gestation1 allowed the lovely infant to come forth4 ,according to some1 a boar rent the bark with his tusk and so opened a passage for the babe4 ,a faint rationalistic colour was given to the legend by saying that his mother was a woman named ,myrrh1 who had been turned into a myrrh-tree soon after she had conceived the child4 ,the use of myrrh as incense at the festival of ,adonis may have given rise to the fable4 ,we have seen that incense was burnt at the corresponding ,babylonian rites1 just as it was burnt by the idolatrous ,hebrews in honour of the ,queen of ,heaven1 who was no other than ,astarte4 ,again1 the story that ,adonis spent half1 or according to others a third1 of the year in the lower world and the rest of it in the upper world1 is explained most simply and naturally by supposing that he represented vegetation1 especially the corn1 which lies buried in the earth half the year and reappears above ground the other half4 ,certainly of the annual phenomena of nature there is none which suggests so obviously the idea of death and resurrection as the disappearance and reappearance of vegetation in autumn and spring4 ,adonis has been taken for the sun2 but there is nothing in the sun's annual course within the temperate and tropical zones to suggest that he is dead for half or a third of the year and alive for the other half or two-thirds4 ,he might1 indeed1 be conceived as weakened in winter1 but dead he could not be thought to be2 his daily reappearance contradicts the supposition4 ,within the ,arctic ,circle1 where the sun annually disappears for a continuous period which varies from twenty-four hours to six months according to the latitude1 his yearly death and resurrection would certainly be an obvious idea2 but no one except the unfortunate astronomer ,bailly has maintained that the ,adonis worship came from the ,arctic regions4 ,on the other hand1 the annual death and revival of vegetation is a conception which readily presents itself to men in every stage of savagery and civilisation2 and the vastness of the scale on which this ever-recurring decay and regeneration takes place1 together with man's intimate dependence on it for subsistence1 combine to render it the most impressive annual occurrence in nature1 at least within the temperate zones4 ,it is no wonder that a phenomenon so important1 so striking1 and so universal should1 by suggesting similar ideas1 have given rise to similar rites in many lands4 ,we may1 therefore1 accept as probable an explanation of the ,adonis worship which accords so well with the facts of nature and with the analogy of similar rites in other lands4 ,moreover1 the explanation is countenanced by a considerable body of opinion amongst the ancients themselves1 who again and again interpreted the dying and reviving god as the reaped and sprouting grain4 ,the character of ,tammuz or ,adonis as a corn-spirit comes out plainly in an account of his festival given by an ,arabic writer of the tenth century4 ,in describing the rites and sacrifices observed at the different seasons of the year by the heathen ,syrians of ,harran1 he says3 ,tammuz 7,july74 ,in the middle of this month is the festival of el-,bgt1 that is1 of the weeping women1 and this is the ,t-uz festival1 which is celebrated in honour of the god ,t-uz4 ,the women bewail him1 because his lord slew him so cruelly1 ground his bones in a mill1 and then scattered them to the wind4 ,the women 7during this festival7 eat nothing which has been ground in a mill1 but limit their diet to steeped wheat1 sweet vetches1 dates1 raisins1 and the like4 ,t-uz1 who is no other than ,tammuz1 is here like ,burns's ,john ,barleycorn3 ,they wasted o'er a scorching flame ,the marrow of his bones2 ,but a miller us'd him worst of all-- ,for he crush'd him between two stones4 ,this concentration1 so to say1 of the nature of ,adonis upon the cereal crops is characteristic of the stage of culture reached by his worshippers in historical times4 ,they had left the nomadic life of the wandering hunter and herdsman far behind them2 for ages they had been settled on the land1 and had depended for their subsistence mainly on the products of tillage4 ,the berries and roots of the wilderness1 the grass of the pastures1 which had been matters of vital importance to their ruder forefathers1 were now of little moment to them3 more and more their thoughts and energies were engrossed by the staple of their life1 the corn2 more and more accordingly the propitiation of the deities of fertility in general and of the corn-spirit in particular tended to become the central feature of their religion4 ,the aim they set before themselves in celebrating the rites was thoroughly practical4 ,it was no vague poetical sentiment which prompted them to hail with joy the rebirth of vegetation and to mourn its decline4 ,hunger1 felt or feared1 was the mainspring of the worship of ,adonis4 ,it has been suggested by ,father ,lagrange that the mourning for ,adonis was essentially a harvest rite designed to propitiate the corngod1 who was then either perishing under the sickles of the reapers1 or being trodden to death under the hoofs of the oxen on the threshing-floor4 ,while the men slew him1 the women wept crocodile tears at home to appease his natural indignation by a show of grief for his death4 ,the theory fits in well with the dates of the festivals1 which fell in spring or summer2 for spring and summer1 not autumn1 are the seasons of the barley and wheat harvests in the lands which worshipped ,adonis4 ,further1 the hypothesis is confirmed by the practice of the ,egyptian reapers1 who lamented1 calling upon ,isis1 when they cut the first corn2 and it is recommended by the analogous customs of many hunting tribes1 who testify great respect for the animals which they kill and eat4 ,thus interpreted the death of ,adonis is not the natural decay of vegetation in general under the summer heat or the winter cold2 it is the violent destruction of the corn by man1 who cuts it down on the field1 stamps it to pieces on the threshing-floor1 and grinds it to powder in the mill4 ,that this was indeed the principal aspect in which ,adonis presented himself in later times to the agricultural peoples of the ,levant1 may be admitted2 but whether from the beginning he had been the corn and nothing but the corn1 may be doubted4 ,at an earlier period he may have been to the herdsman1 above all1 the tender herbage which sprouts after rain1 offering rich pasture to the lean and hungry cattle4 ,earlier still he may have embodied the spirit of the nuts and berries which the autumn woods yield to the savage hunter and his squaw4 ,and just as the husband-man must propitiate the spirit of the corn which he consumes1 so the herdsman must appease the spirit of the grass and leaves which his cattle munch1 and the hunter must soothe the spirit of the roots which he digs1 and of the fruits which he gathers from the bough4 ,in all cases the propitiation of the injured and angry1 sprite would naturally comprise elaborate excuses and apologies1 accompanied by loud lamentations at his decease whenever1 through some deplorable accident or necessity1 he happened to be murdered as well as robbed4 ,only we must bear in mind that the savage hunter and herdsman of those early days had probably not yet attained to the abstract idea of vegetation in general2 and that accordingly1 so far as ,adonis existed for them at all1 he must have been the ,adon or lord of each individual tree and plant rather than a personification of vegetable life as a whole4 ,thus there would be as many ,adonises as there were trees and shrubs1 and each of them might expect to receive satisfaction for any damage done to his person or property4 ,and year by year1 when the trees were deciduous1 every ,adonis would seem to bleed to death with the red leaves of autumn and to come to life again with the fresh green of spring4 ,there is some reason to think that in early times ,adonis was sometimes personated by a living man who died a violent death in the character of the god4 ,further1 there is evidence which goes to show that among the agricultural peoples of the ,eastern ,mediterranean1 the corn-spirit1 by whatever name he was known1 was often represented1 year by year1 by human victims slain on the harvest-field4 ,if that was so1 it seems likely that the propitiation of the corn-spirit would tend to fuse to some extent with the worship of the dead4 ,for the spirits of these victims might be thought to return to life in the ears which they had fattened with their blood1 and to die a second death at the reaping of the corn4 ,now the ghosts of those who have perished by violence are surly and apt to wreak their vengeance on their slayers whenever an opportunity offers4 ,hence the attempt to appease the souls of the slaughtered victims would naturally blend1 at least in the popular conception1 with the attempt to pacify the slain corn-spirit4 ,and as the dead came back in the sprouting corn1 so they might be thought to return in the spring flowers1 waked from their long sleep by the soft vernal airs4 ,they had been laid to their rest under the sod4 ,what more natural than to imagine that the violets and the hyacinths1 the roses and the anemones1 sprang from their dust1 were empurpled or incarnadined by their blood1 and contained some portion of their spirit8 ,i sometimes think that never blows so red ,the ,rose as where some buried ,caesar bled2 ,that every ,hyacinth the ,garden wears ,dropt in her ,lap from some once lovely ,head4 ,and this reviving ,herb whose tender ,green ,fledges the ,river-,lip on which we lean-- ,ah1 lean upon it lightly1 for who knows ,from what once lovely ,lip it springs unseen8 ,in the summer after the battle of ,landen1 the most sanguinary battle of the seventeenth century in ,europe1 the earth1 saturated with the blood of twenty thousand slain1 broke forth into millions of poppies1 and the traveller who passed that vast sheet of scarlet might well fancy that the earth had indeed given up her dead4 ,at ,athens the great ,commemoration of the ,dead fell in spring about the middle of ,march1 when the early flowers are in bloom4 ,then the dead were believed to rise from their graves and go about the streets1 vainly endeavouring to enter the temples and dwellings1 which were barred against these perturbed spirits with ropes1 buckthorn1 and pitch4 ,the name of the festival1 according to the most obvious and natural interpretation1 means the ,festival of ,flowers1 and the title would fit well with the substance of the ceremonies if at that season the poor ghosts were indeed thought to creep from the narrow house with the opening flowers4 ,there may therefore be a measure of truth in the theory of ,renan1 who saw in the ,adonis worship a dreamy voluptuous cult of death1 conceived not as the ,king of ,terrors1 but as an insidious enchanter who lures his victims to himself and lulls them into an eternal sleep4 ,the infinite charm of nature in the ,lebanon1 he thought1 lends itself to religious emotions of this sensuous1 visionary sort1 hovering vaguely between pain and pleasure1 between slumber and tears4 ,it would doubtless be a mistake to attribute to ,syrian peasants the worship of a conception so purely abstract as that of death in general4 ,yet it may be true that in their simple minds the thought of the reviving spirit of vegetation was blent with the very concrete notion of the ghosts of the dead1 who come to life again in spring days with the early flowers1 with the tender green of the corn and the many-tinted blossoms of the trees4 ,thus their views of the death and resurrection of nature would be coloured by their views of the death and resurrection of man1 by their personal sorrows and hopes and fears4 ,in like manner we cannot doubt that ,renan's theory of ,adonis was itself deeply tinged by passionate memories1 memories of the slumber akin to death which sealed his own eyes on the slopes of the ,lebanon1 memories of the sister who sleeps in the land of ,adonis never again to wake with the anemones and the roses4 ,,xxxiii4 ,the ,gardens of ,adonis ,,perhaps the best proof that ,adonis was a deity of vegetation1 and especially of the corn1 is furnished by the gardens of ,adonis1 as they were called4 ,these were baskets or pots filled with earth1 in which wheat1 barley1 lettuces1 fennel1 and various kinds of flowers were sown and tended for eight days1 chiefly or exclusively by women4 ,fostered by the sun's heat1 the plants shot up rapidly1 but having no root they withered as rapidly away1 and at the end of eight days were carried out with the images of the dead ,adonis1 and flung with them into the sea or into springs4 ,these gardens of ,adonis are most naturally interpreted as representatives of ,adonis or manifestations of his power2 they represented him1 true to his original nature1 in vegetable form1 while the images of him1 with which they were carried out and cast into the water1 portrayed him in his later human shape4 ,all these ,adonis ceremonies1 if ,i am right1 were originally intended as charms to promote the growth or revival of vegetation2 and the principle by which they were supposed to produce this effect was homoeopathic or imitative magic4 ,for ignorant people suppose that by mimicking the effect which they desire to produce they actually help to produce it2 thus by sprinkling water they make rain1 by lighting a fire they make sunshine1 and so on4 ,similarly1 by mimicking the growth of crops they hope to ensure a good harvest4 ,the rapid growth of the wheat and barley in the gardens of ,adonis was intended to make the corn shoot up2 and the throwing of the gardens and of the images into the water was a charm to secure a due supply of fertilising rain4 ,the same1 ,i take it1 was the object of throwing the effigies of ,death and the ,carnival into water in the corresponding ceremonies of modern ,europe4 ,certainly the custom of drenching with water a leaf-clad person1 who undoubtedly personifies vegetation1 is still resorted to in ,europe for the express purpose of producing rain4 ,similarly the custom of throwing water on the last corn cut at harvest1 or on the person who brings it home 7a custom observed in ,germany and ,france1 and till lately in ,england and ,scotland71 is in some places practised with the avowed intent to procure rain for the next year's crops4 ,thus in ,wallachia and amongst the ,roumanians in ,transylvania1 when a girl is bringing home a crown made of the last ears of corn cut at harvest1 all who meet her hasten to throw water on her1 and two farm-servants are placed at the door for the purpose2 for they believe that if this were not done1 the crops next year would perish from drought4 ,at the spring ploughing in ,prussia1 when the ploughmen and sowers returned in the evening from their work in the fields1 the farmer's wife and the servants used to splash water over them4 ,the ploughmen and sowers retorted by seizing every one1 throwing them into the pond1 and ducking them under the water4 ,the farmer's wife might claim exemption on payment of a forfeit1 but every one else had to be ducked4 ,by observing this custom they hoped to ensure a due supply of rain for the seed4 ,the opinion that the gardens of ,adonis are essentially charms to promote the growth of vegetation1 especially of the crops1 and that they belong to the same class of customs as those spring and mid-summer folk-customs of modern ,europe which ,i have described else-where1 does not rest for its evidence merely on the intrinsic probability of the case4 ,fortunately we are able to show that gardens of ,adonis 7if we may use the expression in a general sense7 are still planted1 first1 by a primitive race at their sowing season1 and1 second1 by ,european peasants at midsummer4 ,amongst the ,oraons and ,mundas of ,bengal1 when the time comes for planting out the rice which has been grown in seed-beds1 a party of young people of both sexes go to the forest and cut a young ,karma-tree1 or the branch of one4 ,bearing it in triumph they return dancing1 singing1 and beating drums1 and plant it in the middle of the village dancing-ground4 ,a sacrifice is offered to the tree2 and next morning the youth of both sexes1 linked arm-in-arm1 dance in a great circle round the ,karma-tree1 which is decked with strips of coloured cloth and sham bracelets and necklets of plaited straw4 ,as a preparation for the festival1 the daughters of the headman of the village cultivate blades of barley in a peculiar way4 ,the seed is sown in moist1 sandy soil1 mixed with turmeric1 and the blades sprout and unfold of a pale-yellow or primrose colour4 ,on the day of the festival the girls take up these blades and carry them in baskets to the dancing-ground1 where1 prostrating themselves reverentially1 they place some of the plants before the ,karma-tree4 ,finally1 the ,karma-tree is taken away and thrown into a stream or tank4 ,the meaning of planting these barley blades and then presenting them to the ,karma-tree is hardly open to question4 ,trees are supposed to exercise a quickening influence upon the growth of crops1 and amongst the very people in question--the ,mundas or ,mundaris--the grove deities are held responsible for the crops4 ,therefore1 when at the season for planting out the rice the ,mundas bring in a tree and treat it with so much respect1 their object can only be to foster thereby the growth of the rice which is about to be planted out2 and the custom of causing barley blades to sprout rapidly and then presenting them to the tree must be intended to subserve the same purpose1 perhaps by reminding the tree-spirit of his duty towards the crops1 and stimulating his activity by this visible example of rapid vegetable growth4 ,the throwing of the ,karma-tree into the water is to be interpreted as a rain-charm4 ,whether the barley blades are also thrown into the water is not said2 but if my interpretation of the custom is right1 probably they are so4 ,a distinction between this ,bengal custom and the ,greek rites of ,adonis is that in the former the tree-spirit appears in his original form as a tree2 whereas in the ,adonis worship he appears in human form1 represented as a dead man1 though his vegetable nature is indicated by the gardens of ,adonis1 which are1 so to say1 a secondary manifestation of his original power as a tree-spirit4 ,gardens of ,adonis are cultivated also by the ,hindoos1 with the intention apparently of ensuring the fertility both of the earth and of mankind4 ,thus at ,oodeypoor in ,rajputana a festival is held in honour of ,gouri1 or ,isani1 the goddess of abundance4 ,the rites begin when the sun enters the sign of the ,ram1 the opening of the ,hindoo year4 ,an image of the goddess ,gouri is made of earth1 and a smaller one of her husband ,iswara1 and the two are placed together4 ,a small trench is next dug1 barley is sown in it1 and the ground watered and heated artificially till the grain sprouts1 when the women dance round it hand in hand1 invoking the blessing of ,gouri on their husbands4 ,after that the young corn is taken up and distributed by the women to the men1 who wear it in their turbans4 ,in these rites the distribution of the barley shoots to the men1 and the invocation of a blessing on their husbands by the wives1 point clearly to the desire of offspring as one motive for observing the custom4 ,the same motive probably explains the use of gardens of ,adonis at the marriage of ,brahmans in the ,madras ,presidency4 ,seeds of five or nine sorts are mixed and sown in earthen pots1 which are made specially for the purpose and are filled with earth4 ,bride and bridegroom water the seeds both morning and evening for four days2 and on the fifth day the seedlings are thrown1 like the real gardens of ,adonis1 into a tank or river4 ,in ,sardinia the gardens of ,adonis are still planted in connexion with the great midsummer festival which bears the name of ,st4 ,john4 ,at the end of ,march or on the first of ,april a young man of the village presents himself to a girl1 and asks her to be his comare 7gossip or sweetheart71 offering to be her compare4 ,the invitation is considered as an honour by the girl's family1 and is gladly accepted4 ,at the end of ,may the girl makes a pot of the bark of the cork-tree1 fills it with earth1 and sows a handful of wheat and barley in it4 ,the pot being placed in the sun and often watered1 the corn sprouts rapidly and has a good head by ,midsummer ,eve 7,st4 ,john's ,eve1 the twenty-third of ,june74 ,the pot is then called ,erme or ,nenneri4 ,on ,st4 ,john's ,day the young man and the girl1 dressed in their best1 accompanied by a long retinue and preceded by children gambolling and frolicking1 move in procession to a church outside the village4 ,here they break the pot by throwing it against the door of the church4 ,then they sit down in a ring on the grass and eat eggs and herbs to the music of flutes4 ,wine is mixed in a cup and passed round1 each one drinking as it passes4 ,then they join hands and sing ,sweethearts of ,st4 ,john 7,compare e comare di ,san ,giovanni7 over and over again1 the flutes playing the while4 ,when they tire of singing they stand up and dance gaily in a ring till evening4 ,this is the general ,sardinian custom4 ,as practised at ,ozieri it has some special features4 ,in ,may the pots are made of cork-bark and planted with corn1 as already described4 ,then on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john the window-sills are draped with rich cloths1 on which the pots are placed1 adorned with crimson and blue silk and ribbons of various colours4 ,on each of the pots they used formerly to place a statuette or cloth doll dressed as a woman1 or a ,priapus-like figure made of paste2 but this custom1 rigorously forbidden by the ,church1 has fallen into disuse4 ,the village swains go about in a troop to look at the pots and their decorations and to wait for the girls1 who assemble on the public square to celebrate the festival4 ,here a great bonfire is kindled1 round which they dance and make merry4 ,those who wish to be ,sweethearts of ,st4 ,john act as follows4 ,the young man stands on one side of the bonfire and the girl on the other1 and they1 in a manner1 join hands by each grasping one end of a long stick1 which they pass three times backwards and forwards across the fire1 thus thrusting their hands thrice rapidly into the flames4 ,this seals their relationship to each other4 ,dancing and music go on till late at night4 ,the correspondence of these ,sardinian pots of grain to the gardens of ,adonis seems complete1 and the images formerly placed in them answer to the images of ,adonis which accompanied his gardens4 ,customs of the same sort are observed at the same season in ,sicily4 ,pairs of boys and girls become gossips of ,st4 ,john on ,st4 ,john's ,day by drawing each a hair from his or her head and performing various ceremonies over them4 ,thus they tie the hairs together and throw them up in the air1 or exchange them over a potsherd1 which they afterwards break in two1 preserving each a fragment with pious care4 ,the tie formed in the latter way is supposed to last for life4 ,in some parts of ,sicily the gossips of ,st4 ,john present each other with plates of sprouting corn1 lentils1 and canary seed1 which have been planted forty days before the festival4 ,the one who receives the plate pulls a stalk of the young plants1 binds it with a ribbon1 and preserves it among his or her greatest treasures1 restoring the platter to the giver4 ,at ,catania the gossips exchange pots of basil and great cucumbers2 the girls tend the basil1 and the thicker it grows the more it is prized4 ,in these midsummer customs of ,sardinia and ,sicily it is possible that1 as ,mr4 ,r4 ,wnsch supposes1 ,st4 ,john has replaced ,adonis4 ,we have seen that the rites of ,tammuz or ,adonis were commonly celebrated about midsummer2 according to ,jerome1 their date was ,june4 ,in ,sicily gardens of ,adonis are still sown in spring as well as in summer1 from which we may perhaps infer that ,sicily as well as ,syria celebrated of old a vernal festival of the dead and risen god4 ,at the approach of ,easter1 ,sicilian women sow wheat1 lentils1 and canaryseed in plates1 which they keep in the dark and water every two days4 ,the plants soon shoot up2 the stalks are tied together with red ribbons1 and the plates containing them are placed on the sepulchres which1 with the effigies of the dead ,christ1 are made up in ,catholic and ,greek churches on ,good ,friday1 just as the gardens of ,adonis were placed on the grave of the dead ,adonis4 ,the practice is not confined to ,sicily1 for it is observed also at ,cosenza in ,calabria1 and perhaps in other places4 ,the whole custom--sepulchres as well as plates of sprouting grain--may be nothing but a continuation1 under a different name1 of the worship of ,adonis4 ,nor are these ,sicilian and ,calabrian customs the only ,easter ceremonies which resemble the rites of ,adonis4 ,during the whole of ,good ,friday a waxen effigy of the dead ,christ is exposed to view in the middle of the ,greek churches and is covered with fervent kisses by the thronging crowd1 while the whole church rings with melancholy1 monotonous dirges4 ,late in the evening1 when it has grown quite dark1 this waxen image is carried by the priests into the street on a bier adorned with lemons1 roses1 jessamine1 and other flowers1 and there begins a grand procession of the multitude1 who move in serried ranks1 with slow and solemn step1 through the whole town4 ,every man carries his taper and breaks out into doleful lamentation4 ,at all the houses which the procession passes there are seated women with censers to fumigate the marching host4 ,thus the community solemnly buries its ,christ as if he had just died4 ,at last the waxen image is again deposited in the church1 and the same lugubrious chants echo anew4 ,these lamentations1 accompanied by a strict fast1 continue till midnight on ,saturday4 ,as the clock strikes twelve1 the bishop appears and announces the glad tidings that ',christ is risen1' to which the crowd replies1 ',he is risen indeed1' and at once the whole city bursts into an uproar of joy1 which finds vent in shrieks and shouts1 in the endless discharge of carronades and muskets1 and the explosion of fire-works of every sort4 ,in the very same hour people plunge from the extremity of the fast into the enjoyment of the ,easter lamb and neat wine4 ,in like manner the ,catholic ,church has been accustomed to bring before its followers in a visible form the death and resurrection of the ,redeemer4 ,such sacred dramas are well fitted to impress the lively imagination and to stir the warm feelings of a susceptible southern race1 to whom the pomp and pageantry of ,catholicism are more congenial than to the colder temperament of the ,teutonic peoples4 ,when we reflect how often the ,church has skilfully contrived to plant the seeds of the new faith on the old stock of paganism1 we may surmise that the ,easter celebration of the dead and risen ,christ was grafted upon a similar celebration of the dead and risen ,adonis1 which1 as we have seen reason to believe1 was celebrated in ,syria at the same season4 ,the type1 created by ,greek artists1 of the sorrowful goddess with her dying lover in her arms1 resembles and may have been the model of the ,piet of ,christian art1 the ,virgin with the dead body of her divine ,son in her lap1 of which the most celebrated example is the one by ,michael ,angelo in ,st4 ,peters4 ,that noble group1 in which the living sorrow of the mother contrasts so wonderfully with the languor of death in the son1 is one of the finest compositions in marble4 ,ancient ,greek art has bequeathed to us few works so beautiful1 and none so pathetic4 ,in this connexion a well-known statement of ,jerome may not be without significance4 ,he tells us that ,bethlehem1 the traditionary birthplace of the ,lord1 was shaded by a grove of that still older ,syrian ,lord1 ,adonis1 and that where the infant ,jesus had wept1 the lover of ,venus was bewailed4 ,though he does not expressly say so1 ,jerome seems to have thought that the grove of ,adonis had been planted by the heathen after the birth of ,christ for the purpose of defiling the sacred spot4 ,in this he may have been mistaken4 ,if ,adonis was indeed1 as ,i have argued1 the spirit of the corn1 a more suitable name for his dwelling-place could hardly be found than ,bethlehem1 the ,house of ,bread1 and he may well have been worshipped there at his ,house of ,bread long ages before the birth of ,him who said1 ,i am the bread of life4 ,even on the hypothesis that ,adonis followed rather than preceded ,christ at ,bethlehem1 the choice of his sad figure to divert the allegiance of ,christians from their ,lord cannot but strike us as eminently appropriate when we remember the similarity of the rites which commemorated the death and resurrection of the two4 ,one of the earliest seats of the worship of the new god was ,antioch1 and at ,antioch1 as we have seen1 the death of the old god was annually celebrated with great solemnity4 ,a circumstance which attended the entrance of ,julian into the city at the time of the ,adonis festival may perhaps throw some light on the date of its celebration4 ,when the emperor drew near to the city he was received with public prayers as if he had been a god1 and he marvelled at the voices of a great multitude who cried that the ,star of ,salvation had dawned upon them in the ,east4 ,this may doubtless have been no more than a fulsome compliment paid by an obsequious ,oriental crowd to the ,roman emperor4 ,but it is also possible that the rising of a bright star regularly gave the signal for the festival1 and that as chance would have it the star emerged above the rim of the eastern horizon at the very moment of the emperor's approach4 ,the coincidence1 if it happened1 could hardly fail to strike the imagination of a superstitious and excited multitude1 who might thereupon hail the great man as the deity whose coming was announced by the sign in the heavens4 ,or the emperor may have mistaken for a greeting to himself the shouts which were addressed to the star4 ,now ,astarte1 the divine mistress of ,adonis1 was identified with the planet ,venus1 and her changes from a morning to an evening star were carefully noted by the ,babylonian astronomers1 who drew omens from her alternate appearance and disappearance4 ,hence we may conjecture that the festival of ,adonis was regularly timed to coincide with the appearance of ,venus as the ,morning or ,evening ,star4 ,but the star which the people of ,antioch saluted at the festival was seen in the ,east2 therefore1 if it was indeed ,venus1 it can only have been the ,morning ,star4 ,at ,aphaca in ,syria1 where there was a famous temple of ,astarte1 the signal for the celebration of the rites was apparently given by the flashing of a meteor1 which on a certain day fell like a star from the top of ,mount ,lebanon into the river ,adonis4 ,the meteor was thought to be ,astarte herself1 and its flight through the air might naturally be interpreted as the descent of the amorous goddess to the arms of her lover4 ,at ,antioch and elsewhere the appearance of the ,morning ,star on the day of the festival may in like manner have been hailed as the coming of the goddess of love to wake her dead leman from his earthy bed4 ,if that were so1 we may surmise that it was the ,morning ,star which guided the wise men of the ,east to ,bethlehem1 the hallowed spot which heard1 in the language of ,jerome1 the weeping of the infant ,christ and the lament for ,adonis4 ,,xxxiv4 ,the ,myth and ,ritual of ,attis ,,another of those gods whose supposed death and resurrection struck such deep roots into the faith and ritual of ,western ,asia is ,attis4 ,he was to ,phrygia what ,adonis was to ,syria4 ,like ,adonis1 he appears to have been a god of vegetation1 and his death and resurrection were annually mourned and rejoiced over at a festival in spring4 ,the legends and rites of the two gods were so much alike that the ancients themselves sometimes identified them4 ,attis was said to have been a fair young shepherd or herdsman beloved by ,cybele1 the ,mother of the ,gods1 a great ,asiatic goddess of fertility1 who had her chief home in ,phrygia4 ,some held that ,attis was her son4 ,his birth1 like that of many other heroes1 is said to have been miraculous4 ,his mother1 ,nana1 was a virgin1 who conceived by putting a ripe almond or a pomegranate in her bosom4 ,indeed in the ,phrygian cosmogony an almond figured as the father of all things1 perhaps because its delicate lilac blossom is one of the first heralds of the spring1 appearing on the bare boughs before the leaves have opened4 ,such tales of virgin mothers are relics of an age of childish ignorance when men had not yet recognized the intercourse of the sexes as the true cause of offspring4 ,two different accounts of the death of ,attis were current4 ,according to the one he was killed by a boar1 like ,adonis4 ,according to the other he unmanned himself under a pine-tree1 and bled to death on the spot4 ,the latter is said to have been the local story told by the people of ,pessinus1 a great seat of the worship of ,cybele1 and the whole legend of which the story forms a part is stamped with a character of rudeness and savagery that speaks strongly for its antiquity4 ,both tales might claim the support of custom1 or rather both were probably invented to explain certain customs observed by the worshippers4 ,the story of the self-mutilation of ,attis is clearly an attempt to account for the self-mutilation of his priests1 who regularly castrated themselves on entering the service of the goddess4 ,the story of his death by the boar may have been told to explain why his worshippers1 especially the people of ,pessinus1 abstained from eating swine4 ,in like manner the worshippers of ,adonis abstained from pork1 because a boar had killed their god4 ,after his death ,attis is said to have been changed into a pine-tree4 ,the worship of the ,phrygian ,mother of the ,gods was adopted by the ,romans in #bjd ,b4,c4 towards the close of their long struggle with ,hannibal4 ,for their drooping spirits had been opportunely cheered by a prophecy1 alleged to be drawn from that convenient farrago of nonsense1 the ,sibylline ,books1 that the foreign invader would be driven from ,italy if the great ,oriental goddess were brought to ,rome4 ,accordingly ambassadors were despatched to her sacred city ,pessinus in ,phrygia4 ,the small black stone which embodied the mighty divinity was entrusted to them and conveyed to ,rome1 where it was received with great respect and installed in the temple of ,victory on the ,palatine ,hill4 ,it was the middle of ,april when the goddess arrived1 and she went to work at once4 ,for the harvest that year was such as had not been seen for many a long day1 and in the very next year ,hannibal and his veterans embarked for ,africa4 ,as he looked his last on the coast of ,italy1 fading behind him in the distance1 he could not foresee that ,europe1 which had repelled the arms1 would yet yield to the gods1 of the ,orient4 ,the vanguard of the conquerors had already encamped in the heart of ,italy before the rearguard of the beaten army fell sullenly back from its shores4 ,we may conjecture1 though we are not told1 that the ,mother of the ,gods brought with her the worship of her youthful lover or son to her new home in the ,west4 ,certainly the ,romans were familiar with the ,galli1 the emasculated priests of ,attis1 before the close of the ,republic4 ,these unsexed beings1 in their ,oriental costume1 with little images suspended on their breasts1 appear to have been a familiar sight in the streets of ,rome1 which they traversed in procession1 carrying the image of the goddess and chanting their hymns to the music of cymbals and tambourines1 flutes and horns1 while the people1 impressed by the fantastic show and moved by the wild strains1 flung alms to them in abundance1 and buried the image and its bearers under showers of roses4 ,a further step was taken by the ,emperor ,claudius when he incorporated the ,phrygian worship of the sacred tree1 and with it probably the orgiastic rites of ,attis1 in the established religion of ,rome4 ,the great spring festival of ,cybele and ,attis is best known to us in the form in which it was celebrated at ,rome2 but as we are informed that the ,roman ceremonies were also ,phrygian1 we may assume that they differed hardly1 if at all1 from their ,asiatic original4 ,the order of the festival seems to have been as follows4 ,on the twenty-second day of ,march1 a pine-tree was cut in the woods and brought into the sanctuary of ,cybele1 where it was treated as a great divinity4 ,the duty of carrying the sacred tree was entrusted to a guild of ,tree-bearers4 ,the trunk was swathed like a corpse with woollen bands and decked with wreaths of violets1 for violets were said to have sprung from the blood of ,attis1 as roses and anemones from the blood of ,adonis2 and the effigy of a young man1 doubtless ,attis himself1 was tied to the middle of the stem4 ,on the second day of the festival1 the twenty-third of ,march1 the chief ceremony seems to have been a blowing of trumpets4 ,the third day1 the twenty-fourth of ,march1 was known as the ,day of ,blood3 the ,archigallus or highpriest drew blood from his arms and presented it as an offering4 ,nor was he alone in making this bloody sacrifice4 ,stirred by the wild barbaric music of clashing cymbals1 rumbling drums1 droning horns1 and screaming flutes1 the inferior clergy whirled about in the dance with waggling heads and streaming hair1 until1 rapt into a frenzy of excitement and insensible to pain1 they gashed their bodies with potsherds or slashed them with knives in order to bespatter the altar and the sacred tree with their flowing blood4 ,the ghastly rite probably formed part of the mourning for ,attis and may have been intended to strengthen him for the resurrection4 ,the ,australian aborigines cut themselves in like manner over the graves of their friends for the purpose1 perhaps1 of enabling them to be born again4 ,further1 we may conjecture1 though we are not expressly told1 that it was on the same ,day of ,blood and for the same purpose that the novices sacrificed their virility4 ,wrought up to the highest pitch of religious excitement they dashed the severed portions of themselves against the image of the cruel goddess4 ,these broken instruments of fertility were afterwards reverently wrapt up and buried in the earth or in subterranean chambers sacred to ,cybele1 where1 like the offering of blood1 they may have been deemed instrumental in recalling ,attis to life and hastening the general resurrection of nature1 which was then bursting into leaf and blossom in the vernal sunshine4 ,some confirmation of this conjecture is furnished by the savage story that the mother of ,attis conceived by putting in her bosom a pomegranate sprung from the severed genitals of a man-monster named ,agdestis1 a sort of double of ,attis4 ,if there is any truth in this conjectural explanation of the custom1 we can readily understand why other ,asiatic goddesses of fertility were served in like manner by eunuch priests4 ,these feminine deities required to receive from their male ministers1 who personated the divine lovers1 the means of discharging their beneficent functions3 they had themselves to be impregnated by the life-giving energy before they could transmit it to the world4 ,goddesses thus ministered to by eunuch priests were the great ,artemis of ,ephesus and the great ,syrian ,astarte of ,hierapolis1 whose sanctuary1 frequented by swarms of pilgrims and enriched by the offerings of ,assyria and ,babylonia1 of ,arabia and ,phoenicia1 was perhaps in the days of its glory the most popular in the ,east4 ,now the unsexed priests of this ,syrian goddess resembled those of ,cybele so closely that some people took them to be the same4 ,and the mode in which they dedicated themselves to the religious life was similar4 ,the greatest festival of the year at ,hierapolis fell at the beginning of spring1 when multitudes thronged to the sanctuary from ,syria and the regions round about4 ,while the flutes played1 the drums beat1 and the eunuch priests slashed themselves with knives1 the religious excitement gradually spread like a wave among the crowd of onlookers1 and many a one did that which he little thought to do when he came as a holiday spectator to the festival4 ,for man after man1 his veins throbbing with the music1 his eyes fascinated by the sight of the streaming blood1 flung his garments from him1 leaped forth with a shout1 and seizing one of the swords which stood ready for the purpose1 castrated himself on the spot4 ,then he ran through the city1 holding the bloody pieces in his hand1 till he threw them into one of the houses which he passed in his mad career4 ,the household thus honoured had to furnish him with a suit of female attire and female ornaments1 which he wore for the rest of his life4 ,when the tumult of emotion had subsided1 and the man had come to himself again1 the irrevocable sacrifice must often have been followed by passionate sorrow and lifelong regret4 ,this revulsion of natural human feeling after the frenzies of a fanatical religion is powerfully depicted by ,catullus in a celebrated poem4 ,the parallel of these ,syrian devotees confirms the view that in the similar worship of ,cybele the sacrifice of virility took place on the ,day of ,blood at the vernal rites of the goddess1 when the violets1 supposed to spring from the red drops of her wounded lover1 were in bloom among the pines4 ,indeed the story that ,attis unmanned himself under a pine-tree was clearly devised to explain why his priests did the same beside the sacred violet-wreathed tree at his festival4 ,at all events1 we can hardly doubt that the ,day of ,blood witnessed the mourning for ,attis over an effigy of him which was afterwards buried4 ,the image thus laid in the sepulchre was probably the same which had hung upon the tree4 ,throughout the period of mourning the worshippers fasted from bread1 nominally because ,cybele had done so in her grief for the death of ,attis1 but really perhaps for the same reason which induced the women of ,harran to abstain from eating anything ground in a mill while they wept for ,tammuz4 ,to partake of bread or flour at such a season might have been deemed a wanton profanation of the bruised and broken body of the god4 ,or the fast may possibly have been a preparation for a sacramental meal4 ,but when night had fallen1 the sorrow of the worshippers was turned to joy4 ,for suddenly a light shone in the darkness3 the tomb was opened3 the god had risen from the dead2 and as the priest touched the lips of the weeping mourners with balm1 he softly whispered in their ears the glad tidings of salvation4 ,the resurrection of the god was hailed by his disciples as a promise that they too would issue triumphant from the corruption of the grave4 ,on the morrow1 the twenty-fifth day of ,march1 which was reckoned the vernal equinox1 the divine resurrection was celebrated with a wild outburst of glee4 ,at ,rome1 and probably elsewhere1 the celebration took the form of a carnival4 ,it was the ,festival of ,joy 7,hilaria74 ,a universal licence prevailed4 ,every man might say and do what he pleased4 ,people went about the streets in disguise4 ,no dignity was too high or too sacred for the humblest citizen to assume with impunity4 ,in the reign of ,commodus a band of conspirators thought to take advantage of the masquerade by dressing in the uniform of the ,imperial ,guard1 and so1 mingling with the crowd of merrymakers1 to get within stabbing distance of the emperor4 ,but the plot miscarried4 ,even the stern ,alexander ,severus used to relax so far on the joyous day as to admit a pheasant to his frugal board4 ,the next day1 the twenty-sixth of ,march1 was given to repose1 which must have been much needed after the varied excitements and fatigues of the preceding days4 ,finally1 the ,roman festival closed on the twenty-seventh of ,march with a procession to the brook ,almo4 ,the silver image of the goddess1 with its face of jagged black stone1 sat in a waggon drawn by oxen4 ,preceded by the nobles walking barefoot1 it moved slowly1 to the loud music of pipes and tambourines1 out by the ,porta ,capena1 and so down to the banks of the ,almo1 which flows into the ,tiber just below the walls of ,rome4 ,there the high-priest1 robed in purple1 washed the waggon1 the image1 and the other sacred objects in the water of the stream4 ,on returning from their bath1 the wain and the oxen were strewn with fresh spring flowers4 ,all was mirth and gaiety4 ,no one thought of the blood that had flowed so lately4 ,even the eunuch priests forgot their wounds4 ,such1 then1 appears to have been the annual solemnisation of the death and resurrection of ,attis in spring4 ,but besides these public rites1 his worship is known to have comprised certain secret or mystic ceremonies1 which probably aimed at bringing the worshipper1 and especially the novice1 into closer communication with his god4 ,our information as to the nature of these mysteries and the date of their celebration is unfortunately very scanty1 but they seem to have included a sacramental meal and a baptism of blood4 ,in the sacrament the novice became a partaker of the mysteries by eating out of a drum and drinking out of a cymbal1 two instruments of music which figured prominently in the thrilling orchestra of ,attis4 ,the fast which accompanied the mourning for the dead god may perhaps have been designed to prepare the body of the communicant for the reception of the blessed sacrament by purging it of all that could defile by contact the sacred elements4 ,in the baptism the devotee1 crowned with gold and wreathed with fillets1 descended into a pit1 the mouth of which was covered with a wooden grating4 ,a bull1 adorned with garlands of flowers1 its forehead glittering with gold leaf1 was then driven on to the grating and there stabbed to death with a consecrated spear4 ,its hot reeking blood poured in torrents through the apertures1 and was received with devout eagerness by the worshipper on every part of his person and garments1 till he emerged from the pit1 drenched1 dripping1 and scarlet from head to foot1 to receive the homage1 nay the adoration1 of his fellows as one who had been born again to eternal life and had washed away his sins in the blood of the bull4 ,for some time afterwards the fiction of a new birth was kept up by dieting him on milk like a new-born babe4 ,the regeneration of the worshipper took place at the same time as the regeneration of his god1 namely at the vernal equinox4 ,at ,rome the new birth and the remission of sins by the shedding of bull's blood appear to have been carried out above all at the sanctuary of the ,phrygian goddess on the ,vatican ,hill1 at or near the spot where the great basilica of ,st4 ,peter's now stands2 for many inscriptions relating to the rites were found when the church was being enlarged in #afjh or #afji4 ,from the ,vatican as a centre this barbarous system of superstition seems to have spread to other parts of the ,roman empire4 ,inscriptions found in ,gaul and ,germany prove that provincial sanctuaries modelled their ritual on that of the ,vatican4 ,from the same source we learn that the testicles as well as the blood of the bull played an important part in the ceremonies4 ,probably they were regarded as a powerful charm to promote fertility and hasten the new birth4 ,,xxxv4 ,attis as a ,god of ,vegetation ,,the ,,original character of ,attis as a tree-spirit is brought out plainly by the part which the pine-tree plays in his legend1 his ritual1 and his monuments4 ,the story that he was a human being transformed into a pine-tree is only one of those transparent attempts at rationalising old beliefs which meet us so frequently in mythology4 ,the bringing in of the pine-tree from the woods1 decked with violets and woollen bands1 is like bringing in the ,may-tree or ,summer-tree in modern folk-custom2 and the effigy which was attached to the pine-tree was only a duplicate representative of the tree-spirit ,attis4 ,after being fastened to the tree1 the effigy was kept for a year and then burned4 ,the same thing appears to have been sometimes done with the ,may-pole2 and in like manner the effigy of the corn-spirit1 made at harvest1 is often preserved till it is replaced by a new effigy at next year's harvest4 ,the original intention of such customs was no doubt to maintain the spirit of vegetation in life throughout the year4 ,why the ,phrygians should have worshipped the pine above other trees we can only guess4 ,perhaps the sight of its changeless1 though sombre1 green cresting the ridges of the high hills above the fading splendour of the autumn woods in the valleys may have seemed to their eyes to mark it out as the seat of a diviner life1 of something exempt from the sad vicissitudes of the seasons1 constant and eternal as the sky which stooped to meet it4 ,for the same reason1 perhaps1 ivy was sacred to ,attis2 at all events1 we read that his eunuch priests were tattooed with a pattern of ivy leaves4 ,another reason for the sanctity of the pine may have been its usefulness4 ,the cones of the stone-pine contain edible nut-like seeds1 which have been used as food since antiquity1 and are still eaten1 for example1 by the poorer classes in ,rome4 ,moreover1 a wine was brewed from these seeds1 and this may partly account for the orgiastic nature of the rites of ,cybele1 which the ancients compared to those of ,dionysus4 ,further1 pine-cones were regarded as symbols or rather instruments of fertility4 ,hence at the festival of the ,thesmophoria they were thrown1 along with pigs and other agents or emblems of fecundity1 into the sacred vaults of ,demeter for the purpose of quickening the ground and the wombs of women4 ,like tree-spirits in general1 ,attis was apparently thought to wield power over the fruits of the earth or even to be identical with the corn4 ,one of his epithets was very fruitful3 he was addressed as the reaped green 7or yellow7 ear of corn2 and the story of his sufferings1 death1 and resurrection was interpreted as the ripe grain wounded by the reaper1 buried in the granary1 and coming to life again when it is sown in the ground4 ,a statue of him in the ,lateran ,museum at ,rome clearly indicates his relation to the fruits of the earth1 and particularly to the corn2 for it represents him with a bunch of ears of corn and fruit in his hand1 and a wreath of pine-cones1 pomegranates1 and other fruits on his head1 while from the top of his ,phrygian cap ears of corn are sprouting4 ,on a stone urn1 which contained the ashes of an ,archigallus or high-priest of ,attis1 the same idea is expressed in a slightly different way4 ,the top of the urn is adorned with ears of corn carved in relief1 and it is surmounted by the figure of a cock1 whose tail consists of ears of corn4 ,cybele in like manner was conceived as a goddess of fertility who could make or mar the fruits of the earth2 for the people of ,augustodunum 7,autun7 in ,gaul used to cart her image about in a waggon for the good of the fields and vineyards1 while they danced and sang before it1 and we have seen that in ,italy an unusually fine harvest was attributed to the recent arrival of the ,great ,mother4 ,the bathing of the image of the goddess in a river may well have been a rain-charm to ensure an abundant supply of moisture for the crops4 ,,xxxvi4 ,human ,representatives of ,attis ,,from ,,inscriptions it appears that both at ,pessinus and ,rome the high-priest of ,cybele regularly bore the name of ,attis4 ,it is therefore a reasonable conjecture that he played the part of his namesake1 the legendary ,attis1 at the annual festival4 ,we have seen that on the ,day of ,blood he drew blood from his arms1 and this may have been an imitation of the self-inflicted death of ,attis under the pine-tree4 ,it is not inconsistent with this supposition that ,attis was also represented at these ceremonies by an effigy2 for instances can be shown in which the divine being is first represented by a living person and afterwards by an effigy1 which is then burned or otherwise destroyed4 ,perhaps we may go a step farther and conjecture that this mimic killing of the priest1 accompanied by a real effusion of his blood1 was in ,phrygia1 as it has been elsewhere1 a substitute for a human sacrifice which in earlier times was actually offered4 ,a reminiscence of the manner in which these old representatives of the deity were put to death is perhaps preserved in the famous story of ,marsyas4 ,he was said to be a ,phrygian satyr or ,silenus1 according to others a shepherd or herdsman1 who played sweetly on the flute4 ,a friend of ,cybele1 he roamed the country with the disconsolate goddess to soothe her grief for the death of ,attis4 ,the composition of the ,mother's ,air1 a tune played on the flute in honour of the ,great ,mother ,goddess1 was attributed to him by the people of ,celaenae in ,phrygia4 ,vain of his skill1 he challenged ,apollo to a musical contest1 he to play on the flute and ,apollo on the lyre4 ,being vanquished1 ,marsyas was tied up to a pine-tree and flayed or cut limb from limb either by the victorious ,apollo or by a ,scythian slave4 ,his skin was shown at ,celaenae in historical times4 ,it hung at the foot of the citadel in a cave from which the river ,marsyas rushed with an impetuous and noisy tide to join the ,maeander4 ,so the ,adonis bursts full-born from the precipices of the ,lebanon2 so the blue river of ,ibreez leaps in a crystal jet from the red rocks of the ,taurus2 so the stream1 which now rumbles deep underground1 used to gleam for a moment on its passage from darkness to darkness in the dim light of the ,corycian cave4 ,in all these copious fountains1 with their glad promise of fertility and life1 men of old saw the hand of ,god and worshipped him beside the rushing river with the music of its tumbling waters in their ears4 ,at ,celaenae1 if we can trust tradition1 the piper ,marsyas1 hanging in his cave1 had a soul for harmony even in death2 for it is said that at the sound of his native ,phrygian melodies the skin of the dead satyr used to thrill1 but that if the musician struck up an air in praise of ,apollo it remained deaf and motionless4 ,in this ,phrygian satyr1 shepherd1 or herdsman who enjoyed the friendship of ,cybele1 practised the music so characteristic of her rites1 and died a violent death on her sacred tree1 the pine1 may we not detect a close resemblance to ,attis1 the favourite shepherd or herdsman of the goddess1 who is himself described as a piper1 is said to have perished under a pine-tree1 and was annually represented by an effigy hung1 like ,marsyas1 upon a pine8 ,we may conjecture that in old days the priest who bore the name and played the part of ,attis at the spring festival of ,cybele was regularly hanged or otherwise slain upon the sacred tree1 and that this barbarous custom was afterwards mitigated into the form in which it is known to us in later times1 when the priest merely drew blood from his body under the tree and attached an effigy instead of himself to its trunk4 ,in the holy grove at ,upsala men and animals were sacrificed by being hanged upon the sacred trees4 ,the human victims dedicated to ,odin were regularly put to death by hanging or by a combination of hanging and stabbing1 the man being strung up to a tree or a gallows and then wounded with a spear4 ,hence ,odin was called the ,lord of the ,gallows or the ,god of the ,hanged1 and he is represented sitting under a gallows tree4 ,indeed he is said to have been sacrificed to himself in the ordinary way1 as we learn from the weird verses of the ,havamal1 in which the god describes how he acquired his divine power by learning the magic runes3 ,i know that ,i hung on the windy tree ,for nine whole nights1 ,wounded with the spear1 dedicated to ,odin1 ,myself to myself4 ,the ,bagobos of ,mindanao1 one of the ,philippine ,islands1 used annually to sacrifice human victims for the good of the crops in a similar way4 ,early in ,december1 when the constellation ,orion appeared at seven o'clock in the evening1 the people knew that the time had come to clear their fields for sowing and to sacrifice a slave4 ,the sacrifice was presented to certain powerful spirits as payment for the good year which the people had enjoyed1 and to ensure the favour of the spirits for the coming season4 ,the victim was led to a great tree in the forest2 there he was tied with his back to the tree and his arms stretched high above his head1 in the attitude in which ancient artists portrayed ,marsyas hanging on the fatal tree4 ,while he thus hung by the arms1 he was slain by a spear thrust through his body at the level of the armpits4 ,afterwards the body was cut clean through the middle at the waist1 and the upper part was apparently allowed to dangle for a little from the tree1 while the under part wallowed in blood on the ground4 ,the two portions were finally cast into a shallow trench beside the tree4 ,before this was done1 anybody who wished might cut off a piece of flesh or a lock of hair from the corpse and carry it to the grave of some relation whose body was being consumed by a ghoul4 ,attracted by the fresh corpse1 the ghoul would leave the mouldering old body in peace4 ,these sacrifices have been offered by men now living4 ,in ,greece the great goddess ,artemis herself appears to have been annually hanged in effigy in her sacred grove of ,condylea among the ,arcadian hills1 and there accordingly she went by the name of the ,hanged ,one4 ,indeed a trace of a similar rite may perhaps be detected even at ,ephesus1 the most famous of her sanctuaries1 in the legend of a woman who hanged herself and was thereupon dressed by the compassionate goddess in her own divine garb and called by the name of ,hecate4 ,similarly1 at ,melite in ,phthia1 a story was told of a girl named ,aspalis who hanged herself1 but who appears to have been merely a form of ,artemis4 ,for after her death her body could not be found1 but an image of her was discovered standing beside the image of ,artemis1 and the people bestowed on it the title of ,hecaerge or ,far-shooter1 one of the regular epithets of the goddess4 ,every year the virgins sacrificed a young goat to the image by hanging it1 because ,aspalis was said to have hanged herself4 ,the sacrifice may have been a substitute for hanging an image or a human representative of ,artemis4 ,again1 in ,rhodes the fair ,helen was worshipped under the title of ,helen of the ,tree1 because the queen of the island had caused her handmaids1 disguised as ,furies1 to string her up to a bough4 ,that the ,asiatic ,greeks sacrificed animals in this fashion is proved by coins of ,ilium1 which represent an ox or cow hanging on a tree and stabbed with a knife by a man1 who sits among the branches or on the animal's back4 ,at ,hierapolis also the victims were hung on trees before they were burnt4 ,with these ,greek and ,scandinavian parallels before us we can hardly dismiss as wholly improbable the conjecture that in ,phrygia a man-god may have hung year by year on the sacred but fatal tree4 ,,xxxvii4 ,oriental ,religions in the ,west ,,the ,,worship of the ,great ,mother of the ,gods and her lover or son was very popular under the ,roman ,empire4 ,inscriptions prove that the two received divine honours1 separately or conjointly1 not only in ,italy1 and especially at ,rome1 but also in the provinces1 particularly in ,africa1 ,spain1 ,portugal1 ,france1 ,germany1 and ,bulgaria4 ,their worship survived the establishment of ,christianity by ,constantine2 for ,symmachus records the recurrence of the festival of the ,great ,mother1 and in the days of ,augustine her effeminate priests still paraded the streets and squares of ,carthage with whitened faces1 scented hair1 and mincing gait1 while1 like the mendicant friars of the ,middle ,ages1 they begged alms from the passers-by4 ,in ,greece1 on the other hand1 the bloody orgies of the ,asiatic goddess and her consort appear to have found little favour4 ,the barbarous and cruel character of the worship1 with its frantic excesses1 was doubtless repugnant to the good taste and humanity of the ,greeks1 who seem to have preferred the kindred but gentler rites of ,adonis4 ,yet the same features which shocked and repelled the ,greeks may have positively attracted the less refined ,romans and barbarians of the ,west4 ,the ecstatic frenzies1 which were mistaken for divine inspiration1 the mangling of the body1 the theory of a new birth and the remission of sins through the shedding of blood1 have all their origin in savagery1 and they naturally appealed to peoples in whom the savage instincts were still strong4 ,their true character was indeed often disguised under a decent veil of allegorical or philosophical interpretation1 which probably sufficed to impose upon the rapt and enthusiastic worshippers1 reconciling even the more cultivated of them to things which otherwise must have filled them with horror and disgust4 ,the religion of the ,great ,mother1 with its curious blending of crude savagery with spiritual aspirations1 was only one of a multitude of similar ,oriental faiths which in the later days of paganism spread over the ,roman ,empire1 and by saturating the ,european peoples with alien ideals of life gradually undermined the whole fabric of ancient civilisation4 ,greek and ,roman society was built on the conception of the subordination of the individual to the community1 of the citizen to the state2 it set the safety of the commonwealth1 as the supreme aim of conduct1 above the safety of the individual whether in this world or in the world to come4 ,trained from infancy in this unselfish ideal1 the citizens devoted their lives to the public service and were ready to lay them down for the common good2 or if they shrank from the supreme sacrifice1 it never occurred to them that they acted otherwise than basely in preferring their personal existence to the interests of their country4 ,all this was changed by the spread of ,oriental religions which inculcated the communion of the soul with ,god and its eternal salvation as the only objects worth living for1 objects in comparison with which the prosperity and even the existence of the state sank into insignificance4 ,the inevitable result of this selfish and immoral doctrine was to withdraw the devotee more and more from the public service1 to concentrate his thoughts on his own spiritual emotions1 and to breed in him a contempt for the present life which he regarded merely as a probation for a better and an eternal4 ,the saint and the recluse1 disdainful of earth and rapt in ecstatic contemplation of heaven1 became in popular opinion the highest ideal of humanity1 displacing the old ideal of the patriot and hero who1 forgetful of self1 lives and is ready to die for the good of his country4 ,the earthly city seemed poor and contemptible to men whose eyes beheld the ,city of ,god coming in the clouds of heaven4 ,thus the centre of gravity1 so to say1 was shifted from the present to a future life1 and however much the other world may have gained1 there can be little doubt that this one lost heavily by the change4 ,a general disintegration of the body politic set in4 ,the ties of the state and the family were loosened3 the structure of society tended to resolve itself into its individual elements and thereby to relapse into barbarism2 for civilisation is only possible through the active co-operation of the citizens and their willingness to subordinate their private interests to the common good4 ,men refused to defend their country and even to continue their kind4 ,in their anxiety to save their own souls and the souls of others1 they were content to leave the material world1 which they identified with the principle of evil1 to perish around them4 ,this obsession lasted for a thousand years4 ,the revival of ,roman law1 of the ,aristotelian philosophy1 of ancient art and literature at the close of the ,middle ,ages1 marked the return of ,europe to native ideals of life and conduct1 to saner1 manlier views of the world4 ,the long halt in the march of civilisation was over4 ,the tide of ,oriental invasion had turned at last4 ,it is ebbing still4 ,among the gods of eastern origin who in the decline of the ancient world competed against each other for the allegiance of the ,west was the old ,persian deity ,mithra4 ,the immense popularity of his worship is attested by the monuments illustrative of it which have been found scattered in profusion all over the ,roman ,empire4 ,in respect both of doctrines and of rites the cult of ,mithra appears to have presented many points of resemblance not only to the religion of the ,mother of the ,gods but also to ,christianity4 ,the similarity struck the ,christian doctors themselves and was explained by them as a work of the devil1 who sought to seduce the souls of men from the true faith by a false and insidious imitation of it4 ,so to the ,spanish conquerors of ,mexico and ,peru many of the native heathen rites appeared to be diabolical counterfeits of the ,christian sacraments4 ,with more probability the modern student of comparative religion traces such resemblances to the similar and independent workings of the mind of man in his sincere1 if crude1 attempts to fathom the secret of the universe1 and to adjust his little life to its awful mysteries4 ,however that may be1 there can be no doubt that the ,mithraic religion proved a formidable rival to ,christianity1 combining as it did a solemn ritual with aspirations after moral purity and a hope of immortality4 ,indeed the issue of the conflict between the two faiths appears for a time to have hung in the balance4 ,an instructive relic of the long struggle is preserved in our festival of ,christmas1 which the ,church seems to have borrowed directly from its heathen rival4 ,in the ,julian calendar the twenty-fifth of ,december was reckoned the winter solstice1 and it was regarded as the ,nativity of the ,sun1 because the day begins to lengthen and the power of the sun to increase from that turning-point of the year4 ,the ritual of the nativity1 as it appears to have been celebrated in ,syria and ,egypt1 was remarkable4 ,the celebrants retired into certain inner shrines1 from which at midnight they issued with a loud cry1 ,the ,virgin has brought forth6 ,the light is waxing6 ,the ,egyptians even represented the new-born sun by the image of an infant which on his birthday1 the winter solstice1 they brought forth and exhibited to his worshippers4 ,no doubt the ,virgin who thus conceived and bore a son on the twenty-fifth of ,december was the great ,oriental goddess whom the ,semites called the ,heavenly ,virgin or simply the ,heavenly ,goddess2 in ,semitic lands she was a form of ,astarte4 ,now ,mithra was regularly identified by his worshippers with the ,sun1 the ,unconquered ,sun1 as they called him2 hence his nativity also fell on the twenty-fifth of ,december4 ,the ,gospels say nothing as to the day of ,christ's birth1 and accordingly the early ,church did not celebrate it4 ,in time1 however1 the ,christians of ,egypt came to regard the sixth of ,january as the date of the ,nativity1 and the custom of commemorating the birth of the ,saviour on that day gradually spread until by the fourth century it was universally established in the ,east4 ,but at the end of the third or the beginning of the fourth century the ,western ,church1 which had never recognised the sixth of ,january as the day of the ,nativity1 adopted the twenty-fifth of ,december as the true date1 and in time its decision was accepted also by the ,eastern ,church4 ,at ,antioch the change was not introduced till about the year #cge ,a4,d4 ,what considerations led the ecclesiastical authorities to institute the festival of ,christmas8 ,the motives for the innovation are stated with great frankness by a ,syrian writer1 himself a ,christian4 ,the reason1 he tells us1 why the fathers transferred the celebration of the sixth of ,january to the twenty-fifth of ,december was this4 ,it was a custom of the heathen to celebrate on the same twenty-fifth of ,december the birthday of the ,sun1 at which they kindled lights in token of festivity4 ,in these solemnities and festivities the ,christians also took part4 ,accordingly when the doctors of the ,church perceived that the ,christians had a leaning to this festival1 they took counsel and resolved that the true ,nativity should be solemnised on that day and the festival of the ,epiphany on the sixth of ,january4 ,accordingly1 along with this custom1 the practice has prevailed of kindling fires till the sixth4 ,the heathen origin of ,christmas is plainly hinted at1 if not tacitly admitted1 by ,augustine when he exhorts his ,christian brethren not to celebrate that solemn day like the heathen on account of the sun1 but on account of him who made the sun4 ,in like manner ,leo the ,great rebuked the pestilent belief that ,christmas was solemnised because of the birth of the new sun1 as it was called1 and not because of the nativity of ,christ4 ,thus it appears that the ,christian ,church chose to celebrate the birthday of its ,founder on the twenty-fifth of ,december in order to transfer the devotion of the heathen from the ,sun to him who was called the ,sun of ,righteousness4 ,if that was so1 there can be no intrinsic improbability in the conjecture that motives of the same sort may have led the ecclesiastical authorities to assimilate the ,easter festival of the death and resurrection of their ,lord to the festival of the death and resurrection of another ,asiatic god which fell at the same season4 ,now the ,easter rites still observed in ,greece1 ,sicily1 and ,southern ,italy bear in some respects a striking resemblance to the rites of ,adonis1 and ,i have suggested that the ,church may have consciously adapted the new festival to its heathen predecessor for the sake of winning souls to ,christ4 ,but this adaptation probably took place in the ,greek-speaking rather than in the ,latin-speaking parts of the ancient world2 for the worship of ,adonis1 while it flourished among the ,greeks1 appears to have made little impression on ,rome and the ,west4 ,certainly it never formed part of the official ,roman religion4 ,the place which it might have taken in the affections of the vulgar was already occupied by the similar but more barbarous worship of ,attis and the ,great ,mother4 ,now the death and resurrection of ,attis were officially celebrated at ,rome on the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth of ,march1 the latter being regarded as the spring equinox1 and therefore as the most appropriate day for the revival of a god of vegetation who had been dead or sleeping throughout the winter4 ,but according to an ancient and widespread tradition ,christ suffered on the twenty-fifth of ,march1 and accordingly some ,christians regularly celebrated the ,crucifixion on that day without any regard to the state of the moon4 ,this custom was certainly observed in ,phrygia1 ,cappadocia1 and ,gaul1 and there seem to be grounds for thinking that at one time it was followed also in ,rome4 ,thus the tradition which placed the death of ,christ on the twenty-fifth of ,march was ancient and deeply rooted4 ,it is all the more remarkable because astronomical considerations prove that it can have had no historical foundation4 ,the inference appears to be inevitable that the passion of ,christ must have been arbitrarily referred to that date in order to harmonise with an older festival of the spring equinox4 ,this is the view of the learned ecclesiastical historian ,mgr4 ,duchesne1 who points out that the death of the ,saviour was thus made to fall upon the very day on which1 according to a widespread belief1 the world had been created4 ,but the resurrection of ,attis1 who combined in himself the characters of the divine ,father and the divine ,son1 was officially celebrated at ,rome on the same day4 ,when we remember that the festival of ,st4 ,george in ,april has replaced the ancient pagan festival of the ,parilia2 that the festival of ,st4 ,john the ,baptist in ,june has succeeded to a heathen midsummer festival of water3 that the festival of the ,assumption of the ,virgin in ,august has ousted the festival of ,diana2 that the feast of ,all ,souls in ,november is a continuation of an old heathen feast of the dead2 and that the ,nativity of ,christ himself was assigned to the winter solstice in ,december because that day was deemed the ,nativity of the ,sun2 we can hardly be thought rash or unreasonable in conjecturing that the other cardinal festival of the ,christian church--the solemnisation of ,easter--may have been in like manner1 and from like motives of edification1 adapted to a similar celebration of the ,phrygian god ,attis at the vernal equinox4 ,at least it is a remarkable coincidence1 if it is nothing more1 that the ,christian and the heathen festivals of the divine death and resurrection should have been solemnised at the same season and in the same places4 ,for the places which celebrated the death of ,christ at the spring equinox were ,phrygia1 ,gaul1 and apparently ,rome1 that is1 the very regions in which the worship of ,attis either originated or struck deepest root4 ,it is difficult to regard the coincidence as purely accidental4 ,if the vernal equinox1 the season at which in the temperate regions the whole face of nature testifies to a fresh outburst of vital energy1 had been viewed from of old as the time when the world was annually created afresh in the resurrection of a god1 nothing could be more natural than to place the resurrection of the new deity at the same cardinal point of the year4 ,only it is to be observed that if the death of ,christ was dated on the twenty-fifth of ,march1 his resurrection1 according to ,christian tradition1 must have happened on the twenty-seventh of ,march1 which is just two days later than the vernal equinox of the ,julian calendar and the resurrection of ,attis4 ,a similar displacement of two days in the adjustment of ,christian to heathen celebrations occurs in the festivals of ,st4 ,george and the ,assumption of the ,virgin4 ,however1 another ,christian tradition1 followed by ,lactantius and perhaps by the practice of the ,church in ,gaul1 placed the death of ,christ on the twenty-third and his resurrection on the twenty-fifth of ,march4 ,if that was so1 his resurrection coincided exactly with the resurrection of ,attis4 ,in point of fact it appears from the testimony of an anonymous ,christian1 who wrote in the fourth century of our era1 that ,christians and pagans alike were struck by the remarkable coincidence between the death and resurrection of their respective deities1 and that the coincidence formed a theme of bitter controversy between the adherents of the rival religions1 the pagans contending that the resurrection of ,christ was a spurious imitation of the resurrection of ,attis1 and the ,christians asserting with equal warmth that the resurrection of ,attis was a diabolical counterfeit of the resurrection of ,christ4 ,in these unseemly bickerings the heathen took what to a superficial observer might seem strong ground by arguing that their god was the older and therefore presumably the original1 not the counterfeit1 since as a general rule an original is older than its copy4 ,this feeble argument the ,christians easily rebutted4 ,they admitted1 indeed1 that in point of time ,christ was the junior deity1 but they triumphantly demonstrated his real seniority by falling back on the subtlety of ,satan1 who on so important an occasion had surpassed himself by inverting the usual order of nature4 ,taken altogether1 the coincidences of the ,christian with the heathen festivals are too close and too numerous to be accidental4 ,they mark the compromise which the ,church in the hour of its triumph was compelled to make with its vanquished yet still dangerous rivals4 ,the inflexible ,protestantism of the primitive missionaries1 with their fiery denunciations of heathendom1 had been exchanged for the supple policy1 the easy tolerance1 the comprehensive charity of shrewd ecclesiastics1 who clearly perceived that if ,christianity was to conquer the world it could do so only by relaxing the too rigid principles of its ,founder1 by widening a little the narrow gate which leads to salvation4 ,in this respect an instructive parallel might be drawn between the history of ,christianity and the history of ,buddhism4 ,both systems were in their origin essentially ethical reforms born of the generous ardour1 the lofty aspirations1 the tender compassion of their noble ,founders1 two of those beautiful spirits who appear at rare intervals on earth like beings come from a better world to support and guide our weak and erring nature4 ,both preached moral virtue as the means of accomplishing what they regarded as the supreme object of life1 the eternal salvation of the individual soul1 though by a curious antithesis the one sought that salvation in a blissful eternity1 the other in a final release from suffering1 in annihilation4 ,but the austere ideals of sanctity which they inculcated were too deeply opposed not only to the frailties but to the natural instincts of humanity ever to be carried out in practice by more than a small number of disciples1 who consistently renounced the ties of the family and the state in order to work out their own salvation in the still seclusion of the cloister4 ,if such faiths were to be nominally accepted by whole nations or even by the world1 it was essential that they should first be modified or transformed so as to accord in some measure with the prejudices1 the passions1 the superstitions of the vulgar4 ,this process of accommodation was carried out in after ages by followers who1 made of less ethereal stuff than their masters1 were for that reason the better fitted to mediate between them and the common herd4 ,thus as time went on1 the two religions1 in exact proportion to their growing popularity1 absorbed more and more of those baser elements which they had been instituted for the very purpose of suppressing4 ,such spiritual decadences are inevitable4 ,the world cannot live at the level of its great men4 ,yet it would be unfair to the generality of our kind to ascribe wholly to their intellectual and moral weakness the gradual divergence of ,buddhism and ,christianity from their primitive patterns4 ,for it should never be forgotten that by their glorification of poverty and celibacy both these religions struck straight at the root not merely of civil society but of human existence4 ,the blow was parried by the wisdom or the folly of the vast majority of mankind1 who refused to purchase a chance of saving their souls with the certainty of extinguishing the species4 ,,xxxviii4 ,the ,myth of ,osiris ,,in ,,ancient ,,egypt the god whose death and resurrection were annually celebrated with alternate sorrow and joy was ,osiris1 the most popular of all ,egyptian deities2 and there are good grounds for classing him in one of his aspects with ,adonis and ,attis as a personification of the great yearly vicissitudes of nature1 especially of the corn4 ,but the immense vogue which he enjoyed for many ages induced his devoted worshippers to heap upon him the attributes and powers of many other gods2 so that it is not always easy to strip him1 so to say1 of his borrowed plumes and to restore them to their proper owners4 ,the story of ,osiris is told in a connected form only by ,plutarch1 whose narrative has been confirmed and to some extent amplified in modern times by the evidence of the monuments4 ,osiris was the offspring of an intrigue between the earth-god ,seb 7,keb or ,geb1 as the name is sometimes transliterated7 and the sky-goddess ,nut4 ,the ,greeks identified his parents with their own deities ,cronus and ,rhea4 ,when the sun-god ,ra perceived that his wife ,nut had been unfaithful to him1 he declared with a curse that she should be delivered of the child in no month and no year4 ,but the goddess had another lover1 the god ,thoth or ,hermes1 as the ,greeks called him1 and he playing at draughts with the moon won from her a seventy-second part of every day1 and having compounded five whole days out of these parts he added them to the ,egyptian year of three hundred and sixty days4 ,this was the mythical origin of the five supplementary days which the ,egyptians annually inserted at the end of every year in order to establish a harmony between lunar and solar time4 ,on these five days1 regarded as outside the year of twelve months1 the curse of the sun-god did not rest1 and accordingly ,osiris was born on the first of them4 ,at his nativity a voice rang out proclaiming that the ,lord of ,all had come into the world4 ,some say that a certain ,pamyles heard a voice from the temple at ,thebes bidding him announce with a shout that a great king1 the beneficent ,osiris1 was born4 ,but ,osiris was not the only child of his mother4 ,on the second of the supplementary days she gave birth to the elder ,horus1 on the third to the god ,set1 whom the ,greeks called ,typhon1 on the fourth to the goddess ,isis1 and on the fifth to the goddess ,nephthys4 ,afterwards ,set married his sister ,nephthys1 and ,osiris married his sister ,isis4 ,reigning as a king on earth1 ,osiris reclaimed the ,egyptians from savagery1 gave them laws1 and taught them to worship the gods4 ,before his time the ,egyptians had been cannibals4 ,but ,isis1 the sister and wife of ,osiris1 discovered wheat and barley growing wild1 and ,osiris introduced the cultivation of these grains amongst his people1 who forthwith abandoned cannibalism and took kindly to a corn diet4 ,moreover1 ,osiris is said to have been the first to gather fruit from trees1 to train the vine to poles1 and to tread the grapes4 ,eager to communicate these beneficent discoveries to all mankind1 he committed the whole government of ,egypt to his wife ,isis1 and travelled over the world1 diffusing the blessings of civilisation and agriculture wherever he went4 ,in countries where a harsh climate or niggardly soil forbade the cultivation of the vine1 he taught the inhabitants to console themselves for the want of wine by brewing beer from barley4 ,loaded with the wealth that had been showered upon him by grateful nations1 he returned to ,egypt1 and on account of the benefits he had conferred on mankind he was unanimously hailed and worshipped as a deity4 ,but his brother ,set 7whom the ,greeks called ,typhon7 with seventy-two others plotted against him4 ,having taken the measure of his good brother's body by stealth1 the bad brother ,typhon fashioned and highly decorated a coffer of the same size1 and once when they were all drinking and making merry he brought in the coffer and jestingly promised to give it to the one whom it should fit exactly4 ,well1 they all tried one after the other1 but it fitted none of them4 ,last of all ,osiris stepped into it and lay down4 ,on that the conspirators ran and slammed the lid down on him1 nailed it fast1 soldered it with molten lead1 and flung the coffer into the ,nile4 ,this happened on the seventeenth day of the month ,athyr1 when the sun is in the sign of the ,scorpion1 and in the eight-and-twentieth year of the reign or the life of ,osiris4 ,when ,isis heard of it she sheared off a lock of her hair1 put on a mourning attire1 and wandered disconsolately up and down1 seeking the body4 ,by the advice of the god of wisdom she took refuge in the papyrus swamps of the ,delta4 ,seven scorpions accompanied her in her flight4 ,one evening when she was weary she came to the house of a woman1 who1 alarmed at the sight of the scorpions1 shut the door in her face4 ,then one of the scorpions crept under the door and stung the child of the woman that he died4 ,but when ,isis heard the mother's lamentation1 her heart was touched1 and she laid her hands on the child and uttered her powerful spells2 so the poison was driven out of the child and he lived4 ,afterwards ,isis herself gave birth to a son in the swamps4 ,she had conceived him while she fluttered in the form of a hawk over the corpse of her dead husband4 ,the infant was the younger ,horus1 who in his youth bore the name of ,harpocrates1 that is1 the child ,horus4 ,him ,buto1 the goddess of the north1 hid from the wrath of his wicked uncle ,set4 ,yet she could not guard him from all mishap2 for one day when ,isis came to her little son's hiding-place she found him stretched lifeless and rigid on the ground3 a scorpion had stung him4 ,then ,isis prayed to the sun-god ,ra for help4 ,the god hearkened to her and staid his bark in the sky1 and sent down ,thoth to teach her the spell by which she might restore her son to life4 ,she uttered the words of power1 and straightway the poison flowed from the body of ,horus1 air passed into him1 and he lived4 ,then ,thoth ascended up into the sky and took his place once more in the bark of the sun1 and the bright pomp passed onward jubilant4 ,meantime the coffer containing the body of ,osiris had floated down the river and away out to sea1 till at last it drifted ashore at ,byblus1 on the coast of ,syria4 ,here a fine erica-tree shot up suddenly and enclosed the chest in its trunk4 ,the king of the country1 admiring the growth of the tree1 had it cut down and made into a pillar of his house2 but he did not know that the coffer with the dead ,osiris was in it4 ,word of this came to ,isis and she journeyed to ,byblus1 and sat down by the well1 in humble guise1 her face wet with tears4 ,to none would she speak till the king's handmaidens came1 and them she greeted kindly1 and braided their hair1 and breathed on them from her own divine body a wondrous perfume4 ,but when the queen beheld the braids of her handmaidens' hair and smelt the sweet smell that emanated from them1 she sent for the stranger woman and took her into her house and made her the nurse of her child4 ,but ,isis gave the babe her finger instead of her breast to suck1 and at night she began to burn all that was mortal of him away1 while she herself in the likeness of a swallow fluttered round the pillar that contained her dead brother1 twittering mournfully4 ,but the queen spied what she was doing and shrieked out when she saw her child in flames1 and thereby she hindered him from becoming immortal4 ,then the goddess revealed herself and begged for the pillar of the roof1 and they gave it her1 and she cut the coffer out of it1 and fell upon it and embraced it and lamented so loud that the younger of the king's children died of fright on the spot4 ,but the trunk of the tree she wrapped in fine linen1 and poured ointment on it1 and gave it to the king and queen1 and the wood stands in a temple of ,isis and is worshipped by the people of ,byblus to this day4 ,and ,isis put the coffer in a boat and took the eldest of the king's children with her and sailed away4 ,as soon as they were alone1 she opened the chest1 and laying her face on the face of her brother she kissed him and wept4 ,but the child came behind her softly and saw what she was about1 and she turned and looked at him in anger1 and the child could not bear her look and died2 but some say that it was not so1 but that he fell into the sea and was drowned4 ,it is he whom the ,egyptians sing of at their banquets under the name of ,maneros4 ,but ,isis put the coffer by and went to see her son ,horus at the city of ,buto1 and ,typhon found the coffer as he was hunting a boar one night by the light of a full moon4 ,and he knew the body1 and rent it into fourteen pieces1 and scattered them abroad4 ,but ,isis sailed up and down the marshes in a shallop made of papyrus1 looking for the pieces2 and that is why when people sail in shallops made of papyrus1 the crocodiles do not hurt them1 for they fear or respect the goddess4 ,and that is the reason1 too1 why there are many graves of ,osiris in ,egypt1 for she buried each limb as she found it4 ,but others will have it that she buried an image of him in every city1 pretending it was his body1 in order that ,osiris might be worshipped in many places1 and that if ,typhon searched for the real grave he might not be able to find it4 ,however1 the genital member of ,osiris had been eaten by the fishes1 so ,isis made an image of it instead1 and the image is used by the ,egyptians at their festivals to this day4 ,isis1 writes the historian ,diodorus ,siculus1 recovered all the parts of the body except the genitals2 and because she wished that her husband's grave should be unknown and honoured by all who dwell in the land of ,egypt1 she resorted to the following device4 ,she moulded human images out of wax and spices1 corresponding to the stature of ,osiris1 round each one of the parts of his body4 ,then she called in the priests according to their families and took an oath of them all that they would reveal to no man the trust she was about to repose in them4 ,so to each of them privately she said that to them alone she entrusted the burial of the body1 and reminding them of the benefits they had received she exhorted them to bury the body in their own land and to honour ,osiris as a god4 ,she also besought them to dedicate one of the animals of their country1 whichever they chose1 and to honour it in life as they had formerly honoured ,osiris1 and when it died to grant it obsequies like his4 ,and because she would encourage the priests in their own interest to bestow the aforesaid honours1 she gave them a third part of the land to be used by them in the service and worship of the gods4 ,accordingly it is said that the priests1 mindful of the benefits of ,osiris1 desirous of gratifying the queen1 and moved by the prospect of gain1 carried out all the injunctions of ,isis4 ,wherefore to this day each of the priests imagines that ,osiris is buried in his country1 and they honour the beasts that were consecrated in the beginning1 and when the animals die the priests renew at their burial the mourning for ,osiris4 ,but the sacred bulls1 the one called ,apis and the other ,mnevis1 were dedicated to ,osiris1 and it was ordained that they should be worshipped as gods in common by all the ,egyptians1 since these animals above all others had helped the discoverers of corn in sowing the seed and procuring the universal benefits of agriculture4 ,such is the myth or legend of ,osiris1 as told by ,greek writers and eked out by more or less fragmentary notices or allusions in native ,egyptian literature4 ,a long inscription in the temple at ,denderah has preserved a list of the god's graves1 and other texts mention the parts of his body which were treasured as holy relics in each of the sanctuaries4 ,thus his heart was at ,athribis1 his backbone at ,busiris1 his neck at ,letopolis1 and his head at ,memphis4 ,as often happens in such cases1 some of his divine limbs were miraculously multiplied4 ,his head1 for example1 was at ,abydos as well as at ,memphis1 and his legs1 which were remarkably numerous1 would have sufficed for several ordinary mortals4 ,in this respect1 however1 ,osiris was nothing to ,st4 ,denys1 of whom no less than seven heads1 all equally genuine1 are extant4 ,according to native ,egyptian accounts1 which supplement that of ,plutarch1 when ,isis had found the corpse of her husband ,osiris1 she and her sister ,nephthys sat down beside it and uttered a lament which in after ages became the type of all ,egyptian lamentations for the dead4 ,come to thy house1 they wailed4 ,come to thy house4 ,o god ,on6 come to thy house1 thou who hast no foes4 ,o fair youth1 come to thy house1 that thou mayest see me4 ,i am thy sister1 whom thou lovest2 thou shalt not part from me4 ,o fair boy1 come to thy house4 4 4 4 ,i see thee not1 yet doth my heart yearn after thee and mine eyes desire thee4 ,come to her who loves thee1 who loves thee1 ,unnefer1 thou blessed one6 ,come to thy sister1 come to thy wife1 to thy wife1 thou whose heart stands still4 ,come to thy housewife4 ,i am thy sister by the same mother1 thou shalt not be far from me4 ,gods and men have turned their faces towards thee and weep for thee together4 4 4 4 ,i call after thee and weep1 so that my cry is heard to heaven1 but thou hearest not my voice2 yet am ,i thy sister1 whom thou didst love on earth2 thou didst love none but me1 my brother6 my brother6 ,this lament for the fair youth cut off in his prime reminds us of the laments for ,adonis4 ,the title of ,unnefer or the ,good ,being bestowed on him marks the beneficence which tradition universally ascribed to ,osiris2 it was at once his commonest title and one of his names as king4 ,the lamentations of the two sad sisters were not in vain4 ,in pity for her sorrow the sun-god ,ra sent down from heaven the jackal-headed god ,anubis1 who1 with the aid of ,isis and ,nephthys1 of ,thoth and ,horus1 pieced together the broken body of the murdered god1 swathed it in linen bandages1 and observed all the other rites which the ,egyptians were wont to perform over the bodies of the departed4 ,then ,isis fanned the cold clay with her wings3 ,osiris revived1 and thenceforth reigned as king over the dead in the other world4 ,there he bore the titles of ,lord of the ,underworld1 ,lord of ,eternity1 ,ruler of the ,dead4 ,there1 too1 in the great ,hall of the ,two ,truths1 assisted by forty-two assessors1 one from each of the principal districts of ,egypt1 he presided as judge at the trial of the souls of the departed1 who made their solemn confession before him1 and1 their heart having been weighed in the balance of justice1 received the reward of virtue in a life eternal or the appropriate punishment of their sins4 ,in the resurrection of ,osiris the ,egyptians saw the pledge of a life everlasting for themselves beyond the grave4 ,they believed that every man would live eternally in the other world if only his surviving friends did for his body what the gods had done for the body of ,osiris4 ,hence the ceremonies observed by the ,egyptians over the human dead were an exact copy of those which ,anubis1 ,horus1 and the rest had performed over the dead god4 ,at every burial there was enacted a representation of the divine mystery which had been performed of old over ,osiris1 when his son1 his sisters1 his friends were gathered round his mangled remains and succeeded by their spells and manipulations in converting his broken body into the first mummy1 which they afterwards reanimated and furnished with the means of entering on a new individual life beyond the grave4 ,the mummy of the deceased was ,osiris2 the professional female mourners were his two sisters ,isis and ,nephthys2 ,anubis1 ,horus1 all the gods of the ,osirian legend gathered about the corpse4 ,in this way every dead ,egyptian was identified with ,osiris and bore his name4 ,from the ,middle ,kingdom onwards it was the regular practice to address the deceased as ,osiris ,so-and-,so1 as if he were the god himself1 and to add the standing epithet true of speech1 because true speech was characteristic of ,osiris4 ,the thousands of inscribed and pictured tombs that have been opened in the valley of the ,nile prove that the mystery of the resurrection was performed for the benefit of every dead ,egyptian2 as ,osiris died and rose again from the dead1 so all men hoped to arise like him from death to life eternal4 ,thus according to what seems to have been the general native tradition ,osiris was a good and beloved king of ,egypt1 who suffered a violent death but rose from the dead and was henceforth worshipped as a deity4 ,in harmony with this tradition he was regularly represented by sculptors and painters in human and regal form as a dead king1 swathed in the wrappings of a mummy1 but wearing on his head a kingly crown and grasping in one of his hands1 which were left free from the bandages1 a kingly sceptre4 ,two cities above all others were associated with his myth or memory4 ,one of them was ,busiris in ,lower ,egypt1 which claimed to possess his backbone2 the other was ,abydos in ,upper ,egypt1 which gloried in the possession of his head4 ,encircled by the nimbus of the dead yet living god1 ,abydos1 originally an obscure place1 became from the end of the ,old ,kingdom the holiest spot in ,egypt2 his tomb there would seem to have been to the ,egyptians what the ,church of the ,holy ,sepulchre at ,jerusalem is to ,christians4 ,it was the wish of every pious man that his dead body should rest in hallowed earth near the grave of the glorified ,osiris4 ,few indeed were rich enough to enjoy this inestimable privilege2 for1 apart from the cost of a tomb in the sacred city1 the mere transport of mummies from great distances was both difficult and expensive4 ,yet so eager were many to absorb in death the blessed influence which radiated from the holy sepulchre that they caused their surviving friends to convey their mortal remains to ,abydos1 there to tarry for a short time1 and then to be brought back by river and interred in the tombs which had been made ready for them in their native land4 ,others had cenotaphs built or memorial tablets erected for themselves near the tomb of their dead and risen ,lord1 that they might share with him the bliss of a joyful resurrection4 ,,xxxix4 ,the ,ritual of ,osiris #a4 ,the ,popular ,rites ,a ,,useful clue to the original nature of a god or goddess is often furnished by the season at which his or her festival is celebrated4 ,thus1 if the festival falls at the new or the full moon1 there is a certain presumption that the deity thus honoured either is the moon or at least has lunar affinities4 ,if the festival is held at the winter or summer solstice1 we naturally surmise that the god is the sun1 or at all events that he stands in some close relation to that luminary4 ,again1 if the festival coincides with the time of sowing or harvest1 we are inclined to infer that the divinity is an embodiment of the earth or of the corn4 ,these presumptions or inferences1 taken by themselves1 are by no means conclusive2 but if they happen to be confirmed by other indications1 the evidence may be regarded as fairly strong4 ,unfortunately1 in dealing with the ,egyptian gods we are in a great measure precluded from making use of this clue4 ,the reason is not that the dates of the festivals are always unknown1 but that they shifted from year to year1 until after a long interval they had revolved through the whole course of the seasons4 ,this gradual revolution of the festal ,egyptian cycle resulted from the employment of a calendar year which neither corresponded exactly to the solar year nor was periodically corrected by intercalation4 ,if the ,egyptian farmer of the olden time could get no help1 except at the rarest intervals1 from the official or sacerdotal calendar1 he must have been compelled to observe for himself those natural signals which marked the times for the various operations of husbandry4 ,in all ages of which we possess any records the ,egyptians have been an agricultural people1 dependent for their subsistence on the growth of the corn4 ,the cereals which they cultivated were wheat1 barley1 and apparently sorghum 7,holcus sorghum1 ,linnaeus71 the doora of the modern fellaheen4 ,then as now the whole country1 with the exception of a fringe on the coast of the ,mediterranean1 was almost rainless1 and owed its immense fertility entirely to the annual inundation of the ,nile1 which1 regulated by an elaborate system of dams and canals1 was distributed over the fields1 renewing the soil year by year with a fresh deposit of mud washed down from the great equatorial lakes and the mountains of ,abyssinia4 ,hence the rise of the river has always been watched by the inhabitants with the utmost anxiety2 for if it either falls short of or exceeds a certain height1 dearth and famine are the inevitable consequences4 ,the water begins to rise early in ,june1 but it is not until the latter half of ,july that it swells to a mighty tide4 ,by the end of ,september the inundation is at its greatest height4 ,the country is now submerged1 and presents the appearance of a sea of turbid water1 from which the towns and villages1 built on higher ground1 rise like islands4 ,for about a month the flood remains nearly stationary1 then sinks more and more rapidly1 till by ,december or ,january the river has returned to its ordinary bed4 ,with the approach of summer the level of the water continues to fall4 ,in the early days of ,june the ,nile is reduced to half its ordinary breadth2 and ,egypt1 scorched by the sun1 blasted by the wind that has blown from the ,sahara for many days1 seems a mere continuation of the desert4 ,the trees are choked with a thick layer of grey dust4 ,a few meagre patches of vegetables1 watered with difficulty1 struggle painfully for existence in the immediate neighbourhood of the villages4 ,some appearance of verdure lingers beside the canals and in the hollows from which the moisture has not wholly evaporated4 ,the plain appears to pant in the pitiless sunshine1 bare1 dusty1 ash-coloured1 cracked and seamed as far as the eye can see with a network of fissures4 ,from the middle of ,april till the middle of ,june the land of ,egypt is but half alive1 waiting for the new ,nile4 ,for countless ages this cycle of natural events has determined the annual labours of the ,egyptian husbandman4 ,the first work of the agricultural year is the cutting of the dams which have hitherto prevented the swollen river from flooding the canals and the fields4 ,this is done1 and the pent-up waters released on their beneficent mission1 in the first half of ,august4 ,in ,november1 when the inundation has subsided1 wheat1 barley1 and sorghum are sown4 ,the time of harvest varies with the district1 falling about a month later in the north than in the south4 ,in ,upper or ,southern ,egypt barley is reaped at the beginning of ,march1 wheat at the beginning of ,april1 and sorghum about the end of that month4 ,it is natural to suppose that the various events of the agricultural year were celebrated by the ,egyptian farmer with some simple religious rites designed to secure the blessing of the gods upon his labours4 ,these rustic ceremonies he would continue to perform year after year at the same season1 while the solemn festivals of the priests continued to shift1 with the shifting calendar1 from summer through spring to winter1 and so backward through autumn to summer4 ,the rites of the husbandman were stable because they rested on direct observation of nature3 the rites of the priest were unstable because they were based on a false calculation4 ,yet many of the priestly festivals may have been nothing but the old rural festivals disguised in the course of ages by the pomp of sacerdotalism and severed1 by the error of the calendar1 from their roots in the natural cycle of the seasons4 ,these conjectures are confirmed by the little we know both of the popular and of the official ,egyptian religion4 ,thus we are told that the ,egyptians held a festival of ,isis at the time when the ,nile began to rise4 ,they believed that the goddess was then mourning for the lost ,osiris1 and that the tears which dropped from her eyes swelled the impetuous tide of the river4 ,now if ,osiris was in one of his aspects a god of the corn1 nothing could be more natural than that he should be mourned at midsummer4 ,for by that time the harvest was past1 the fields were bare1 the river ran low1 life seemed to be suspended1 the corn-god was dead4 ,at such a moment people who saw the handiwork of divine beings in all the operations of nature might well trace the swelling of the sacred stream to the tears shed by the goddess at the death of the beneficent corn-god her husband4 ,and the sign of the rising waters on earth was accompanied by a sign in heaven4 ,for in the early days of ,egyptian history1 some three or four thousand years before the beginning of our era1 the splendid star of ,sirius1 the brightest of all the fixed stars1 appeared at dawn in the east just before sunrise about the time of the summer solstice1 when the ,nile begins to rise4 ,the ,egyptians called it ,sothis1 and regarded it as the star of ,isis1 just as the ,babylonians deemed the planet ,venus the star of ,astarte4 ,to both peoples apparently the brilliant luminary in the morning sky seemed the goddess of life and love come to mourn her departed lover or spouse and to wake him from the dead4 ,hence the rising of ,sirius marked the beginning of the sacred ,egyptian year1 and was regularly celebrated by a festival which did not shift with the shifting official year4 ,the cutting of the dams and the admission of the water into the canals and fields is a great event in the ,egyptian year4 ,at ,cairo the operation generally takes place between the sixth and the sixteenth of ,august1 and till lately was attended by ceremonies which deserve to be noticed1 because they were probably handed down from antiquity4 ,an ancient canal1 known by the name of the ,khalj1 formerly passed through the native town of ,cairo4 ,near its entrance the canal was crossed by a dam of earth1 very broad at the bottom and diminishing in breadth upwards1 which used to be constructed before or soon after the ,nile began to rise4 ,in front of the dam1 on the side of the river1 was reared a truncated cone of earth called the 'arooseh or bride1 on the top of which a little maize or millet was generally sown4 ,this bride was commonly washed down by the rising tide a week or a fortnight before the cutting of the dam4 ,tradition runs that the old custom was to deck a young virgin in gay apparel and throw her into the river as a sacrifice to obtain a plentiful inundation4 ,whether that was so or not1 the intention of the practice appears to have been to marry the river1 conceived as a male power1 to his bride the cornland1 which was so soon to be fertilised by his water4 ,the ceremony was therefore a charm to ensure the growth of the crops4 ,in modern times money used to be thrown into the canal on this occasion1 and the populace dived into the water after it4 ,this practice also would seem to have been ancient1 for ,seneca tells us that at a place called the ,veins of the ,nile1 not far from ,philae1 the priests used to cast money and offerings of gold into the river at a festival which apparently took place at the rising of the water4 ,the next great operation of the agricultural year in ,egypt is the sowing of the seed in ,november1 when the water of the inundation has retreated from the fields4 ,with the ,egyptians1 as with many peoples of antiquity1 the committing of the seed to the earth assumed the character of a solemn and mournful rite4 ,on this subject ,i will let ,plutarch speak for himself4 ,what1 he asks1 are we to make of the gloomy1 joyless1 and mournful sacrifices1 if it is wrong either to omit the established rites or to confuse and disturb our conceptions of the gods by absurd suspicions8 ,for the ,greeks also perform many rites which resemble those of the ,egyptians and are observed about the same time4 ,thus at the festival of the ,thesmophoria in ,athens women sit on the ground and fast4 ,and the ,boeotians open the vaults of the ,sorrowful ,one1 naming that festival sorrowful because ,demeter is sorrowing for the descent of the ,maiden4 ,the month is the month of sowing about the setting of the ,pleiades4 ,the ,egyptians call it ,athyr1 the ,athenians ,pyanepsion1 the ,boeotians the month of ,demeter4 4 4 4 ,for it was that time of year when they saw some of the fruits vanishing and failing from the trees1 while they sowed others grudgingly and with difficulty1 scraping the earth with their hands and huddling it up again1 on the uncertain chance that what they deposited in the ground would ever ripen and come to maturity4 ,thus they did in many respects like those who bury and mourn their dead4 ,the ,egyptian harvest1 as we have seen1 falls not in autumn but in spring1 in the months of ,march1 ,april1 and ,may4 ,to the husbandman the time of harvest1 at least in a good year1 must necessarily be a season of joy3 in bringing home his sheaves he is requited for his long and anxious labours4 ,yet if the old ,egyptian farmer felt a secret joy at reaping and garnering the grain1 it was essential that he should conceal the natural emotion under an air of profound dejection4 ,for was he not severing the body of the corn-god with his sickle and trampling it to pieces under the hoofs of his cattle on the threshing-floor8 ,accordingly we are told that it was an ancient custom of the ,egyptian corn-reapers to beat their breasts and lament over the first sheaf cut1 while at the same time they called upon ,isis4 ,the invocation seems to have taken the form of a melancholy chant1 to which the ,greeks gave the name of ,maneros4 ,similar plaintive strains were chanted by corn-reapers in ,phoenicia and other parts of ,western ,asia4 ,probably all these doleful ditties were lamentations for the corn-god killed by the sickles of the reapers4 ,in ,egypt the slain deity was ,osiris1 and the name ,maneros1 applied to the dirge1 appears to be derived from certain words meaning ,come to thy house1 which often occur in the lamentations for the dead god4 ,ceremonies of the same sort have been observed by other peoples1 probably for the same purpose4 ,thus we are told that among all vegetables corn1 by which is apparently meant maize1 holds the first place in the household economy and the ceremonial observance of the ,cherokee ,indians1 who invoke it under the name of the ,old ,woman in allusion to a myth that it sprang from the blood of an old woman killed by her disobedient sons4 ,after the last working of the crop a priest and his assistant went into the field and sang songs of invocation to the spirit of the corn4 ,after that a loud rustling would be heard1 which was thought to be caused by the ,old ,woman bringing the corn into the field4 ,a clean trail was always kept from the field to the house1 so that the corn might be encouraged to stay at home and not go wandering elsewhere4 ,another curious ceremony1 of which even the memory is now almost forgotten1 was enacted after the first working of the corn1 when the owner or priest stood in succession at each of the four corners of the field and wept and wailed loudly4 ,even the priests are now unable to give a reason for this performance1 which may have been a lament for the bloody death of ,selu1 the ,old ,woman of the ,corn4 ,in these ,cherokee practices the lamentations and the invocations of the ,old ,woman of the ,corn resemble the ancient ,egyptian customs of lamenting over the first corn cut and calling upon ,isis1 herself probably in one of her aspects an ,old ,woman of the ,corn4 ,further1 the ,cherokee precaution of leaving a clear path from the field to the house resembles the ,egyptian invitation to ,osiris1 ,come to thy house4 ,so in the ,east ,indies to this day people observe elaborate ceremonies for the purpose of bringing back the ,soul of the ,rice from the fields to the barn4 ,the ,nandi of ,east ,africa perform a ceremony in ,september when the eleusine grain is ripening4 ,every woman who owns a plantation goes out with her daughters into the cornfields and makes a bonfire of the branches and leaves of certain trees4 ,after that they pluck some of the eleusine1 and each of them puts one grain in her necklace1 chews another and rubs it on her forehead1 throat1 and breast4 ,no joy is shown by the womenfolk on this occasion1 and they sorrowfully cut a basketful of the corn which they take home with them and place in the loft to dry4 ,the conception of the corn-spirit as old and dead at harvest is very clearly embodied in a custom observed by the ,arabs of ,moab4 ,when the harvesters have nearly finished their task and only a small corner of the field remains to be reaped1 the owner takes a handful of wheat tied up in a sheaf4 ,a hole is dug in the form of a grave1 and two stones are set upright1 one at the head and the other at the foot1 just as in an ordinary burial4 ,then the sheaf of wheat is laid at the bottom of the grave1 and the sheikh pronounces these words1 ,the old man is dead4 ,earth is afterwards thrown in to cover the sheaf1 with a prayer1 ,may ,allah bring us back the wheat of the dead4 #b4 ,the ,official ,rites ,,such1 then1 were the principal events of the farmer's calendar in ancient ,egypt1 and such the simple religious rites by which he celebrated them4 ,but we have still to consider the ,osirian festivals of the official calendar1 so far as these are described by ,greek writers or recorded on the monuments4 ,in examining them it is necessary to bear in mind that on account of the movable year of the old ,egyptian calendar the true or astronomical dates of the official festivals must have varied from year to year1 at least until the adoption of the fixed ,alexandrian year in #cj ,b4,c4 ,from that time onward1 apparently1 the dates of the festivals were determined by the new calendar1 and so ceased to rotate throughout the length of the solar year4 ,at all events ,plutarch1 writing about the end of the first century1 implies that they were then fixed1 not movable2 for though he does not mention the ,alexandrian calendar1 he clearly dates the festivals by it4 ,moreover1 the long festal calendar of ,esne1 an important document of the ,imperial age1 is obviously based on the fixed ,alexandrian year2 for it assigns the mark for ,new ,year's ,day to the day which corresponds to the twenty-ninth of ,august1 which was the first day of the ,alexandrian year1 and its references to the rising of the ,nile1 the position of the sun1 and the operations of agriculture are all in harmony with this supposition4 ,thus we may take it as fairly certain that from #cj ,b4,c4 onwards the ,egyptian festivals were stationary in the solar year4 ,herodotus tells us that the grave of ,osiris was at ,sais in ,lower ,egypt1 and that there was a lake there upon which the sufferings of the god were displayed as a mystery by night4 ,this commemoration of the divine passion was held once a year3 the people mourned and beat their breasts at it to testify their sorrow for the death of the god2 and an image of a cow1 made of gilt wood with a golden sun between its horns1 was carried out of the chamber in which it stood the rest of the year4 ,the cow no doubt represented ,isis herself1 for cows were sacred to her1 and she was regularly depicted with the horns of a cow on her head1 or even as a woman with the head of a cow4 ,it is probable that the carrying out of her cow-shaped image symbolised the goddess searching for the dead body of ,osiris2 for this was the native ,egyptian interpretation of a similar ceremony observed in ,plutarch's time about the winter solstice1 when the gilt cow was carried seven times round the temple4 ,a great feature of the festival was the nocturnal illumination4 ,people fastened rows of oil-lamps to the outside of their houses1 and the lamps burned all night long4 ,the custom was not confined to ,sais1 but was observed throughout the whole of ,egypt4 ,this universal illumination of the houses on one night of the year suggests that the festival may have been a commemoration not merely of the dead ,osiris but of the dead in general1 in other words1 that it may have been a night of ,all ,souls4 ,for it is a widespread belief that the souls of the dead revisit their old homes on one night of the year2 and on that solemn occasion people prepare for the reception of the ghosts by laying out food for them to eat1 and lighting lamps to guide them on their dark road from and to the grave4 ,herodotus1 who briefly describes the festival1 omits to mention its date1 but we can determine it with some probability from other sources4 ,thus ,plutarch tells us that ,osiris was murdered on the seventeenth of the month ,athyr1 and that the ,egyptians accordingly observed mournful rites for four days from the seventeenth of ,athyr4 ,now in the ,alexandrian calendar1 which ,plutarch used1 these four days corresponded to the thirteenth1 fourteenth1 fifteenth1 and sixteenth of ,november1 and this date answers exactly to the other indications given by ,plutarch1 who says that at the time of the festival the ,nile was sinking1 the north winds dying away1 the nights lengthening1 and the leaves falling from the trees4 ,during these four days a gilt cow swathed in a black pall was exhibited as an image of ,isis4 ,this1 no doubt1 was the image mentioned by ,herodotus in his account of the festival4 ,on the nineteenth day of the month the people went down to the sea1 the priests carrying a shrine which contained a golden casket4 ,into this casket they poured fresh water1 and thereupon the spectators raised a shout that ,osiris was found4 ,after that they took some vegetable mould1 moistened it with water1 mixed it with precious spices and incense1 and moulded the paste into a small moon-shaped image1 which was then robed and ornamented4 ,thus it appears that the purpose of the ceremonies described by ,plutarch was to represent dramatically1 first1 the search for the dead body of ,osiris1 and1 second1 its joyful discovery1 followed by the resurrection of the dead god who came to life again in the new image of vegetable mould and spices4 ,lactantius tells us how on these occasions the priests1 with their shaven bodies1 beat their breasts and lamented1 imitating the sorrowful search of ,isis for her lost son ,osiris1 and how afterwards their sorrow was turned to joy when the jackal-headed god ,anubis1 or rather a mummer in his stead1 produced a small boy1 the living representative of the god who was lost and was found4 ,thus ,lactantius regarded ,osiris as the son instead of the husband of ,isis1 and he makes no mention of the image of vegetable mould4 ,it is probable that the boy who figured in the sacred drama played the part1 not of ,osiris1 but of his son ,horus2 but as the death and resurrection of the god were celebrated in many cities of ,egypt1 it is also possible that in some places the part of the god come to life was played by a living actor instead of by an image4 ,another ,christian writer describes how the ,egyptians1 with shorn heads1 annually lamented over a buried idol of ,osiris1 smiting their breasts1 slashing their shoulders1 ripping open their old wounds1 until1 after several days of mourning1 they professed to find the mangled remains of the god1 at which they rejoiced4 ,however the details of the ceremony may have varied in different places1 the pretence of finding the god's body1 and probably of restoring it to life1 was a great event in the festal year of the ,egyptians4 ,the shouts of joy which greeted it are described or alluded to by many ancient writers4 ,the funeral rites of ,osiris1 as they were observed at his great festival in the sixteen provinces of ,egypt1 are described in a long inscription of the ,ptolemaic period1 which is engraved on the walls of the god's temple at ,denderah1 the ,tentyra of the ,greeks1 a town of ,upper ,egypt situated on the western bank of the ,nile about forty miles north of ,thebes4 ,unfortunately1 while the information thus furnished is remarkably full and minute on many points1 the arrangement adopted in the inscription is so confused and the expression often so obscure that a clear and consistent account of the ceremonies as a whole can hardly be extracted from it4 ,moreover1 we learn from the document that the ceremonies varied somewhat in the several cities1 the ritual of ,abydos1 for example1 differing from that of ,busiris4 ,without attempting to trace all the particularities of local usage ,i shall briefly indicate what seem to have been the leading features of the festival1 so far as these can be ascertained with tolerable certainty4 ,the rites lasted eighteen days1 from the twelfth to the thirtieth of the month ,khoiak1 and set forth the nature of ,osiris in his triple aspect as dead1 dismembered1 and finally reconstituted by the union of his scattered limbs4 ,in the first of these aspects he was called ,chent-,ament 7,khenti-,amenti71 in the second ,osiris-,sep1 and in the third ,sokari 7,seker74 ,small images of the god were moulded of sand or vegetable earth and corn1 to which incense was sometimes added2 his face was painted yellow and his cheek-bones green4 ,these images were cast in a mould of pure gold1 which represented the god in the form of a mummy1 with the white crown of ,egypt on his head4 ,the festival opened on the twelfth day of ,khoiak with a ceremony of ploughing and sowing4 ,two black cows were yoked to the plough1 which was made of tamarisk wood1 while the share was of black copper4 ,a boy scattered the seed4 ,one end of the field was sown with barley1 the other with spelt1 and the middle with flax4 ,during the operation the chief celebrant recited the ritual chapter of the sowing of the fields4 ,at ,busiris on the twentieth of ,khoiak sand and barley were put in the god's garden1 which appears to have been a sort of large flower-pot4 ,this was done in the presence of the cow-goddess ,shenty1 represented seemingly by the image of a cow made of gilt sycamore wood with a headless human image in its inside4 ,then fresh inundation water was poured out of a golden vase over both the goddess and the 'garden1' and the barley was allowed to grow as the emblem of the resurrection of the god after his burial in the earth1 'for the growth of the garden is the growth of the divine substance4' ,on the twenty-second of ,khoiak1 at the eighth hour1 the images of ,osiris1 attended by thirty-four images of deities1 performed a mysterious voyage in thirty-four tiny boats made of papyrus1 which were illuminated by three hundred and sixty-five lights4 ,on the twenty-fourth of ,khoiak1 after sunset1 the effigy of ,osiris in a coffin of mulberry wood was laid in the grave1 and at the ninth hour of the night the effigy which had been made and deposited the year before was removed and placed upon boughs of sycamore4 ,lastly1 on the thirtieth day of ,khoiak they repaired to the holy sepulchre1 a subterranean chamber over which appears to have grown a clump of ,persea-trees4 ,entering the vault by the western door1 they laid the coffined effigy of the dead god reverently on a bed of sand in the chamber4 ,so they left him to his rest1 and departed from the sepulchre by the eastern door4 ,thus ended the ceremonies in the month of ,khoiak4 ,in the foregoing account of the festival1 drawn from the great inscription of ,denderah1 the burial of ,osiris figures prominently1 while his resurrection is implied rather than expressed4 ,this defect of the document1 however1 is amply compensated by a remarkable series of bas-reliefs which accompany and illustrate the inscription4 ,these exhibit in a series of scenes the dead god lying swathed as a mummy on his bier1 then gradually raising himself up higher and higher1 until at last he has entirely quitted the bier and is seen erect between the guardian wings of the faithful ,isis1 who stands behind him1 while a male figure holds up before his eyes the crux ansata1 the ,egyptian symbol of life4 ,the resurrection of the god could hardly be portrayed more graphically4 ,even more instructive1 however1 is another representation of the same event in a chamber dedicated to ,osiris in the great temple of ,isis at ,philae4 ,here we see the dead body of ,osiris with stalks of corn springing from it1 while a priest waters the stalks from a pitcher which he holds in his hand4 ,the accompanying inscription sets forth that this is the form of him whom one may not name1 ,osiris of the mysteries1 who springs from the returning waters4 ,taken together1 the picture and the words seem to leave no doubt that ,osiris was here conceived and represented as a personification of the corn which springs from the fields after they have been fertilised by the inundation4 ,this1 according to the inscription1 was the kernel of the mysteries1 the innermost secret revealed to the initiated4 ,so in the rites of ,demeter at ,eleusis a reaped ear of corn was exhibited to the worshippers as the central mystery of their religion4 ,we can now fully understand why at the great festival of sowing in the month of ,khoiak the priests used to bury effigies of ,osiris made of earth and corn4 ,when these effigies were taken up again at the end of a year or of a shorter interval1 the corn would be found to have sprouted from the body of ,osiris1 and this sprouting of the grain would be hailed as an omen1 or rather as the cause1 of the growth of the crops4 ,the corn-god produced the corn from himself3 he gave his own body to feed the people3 he died that they might live4 ,and from the death and resurrection of their great god the ,egyptians drew not only their support and sustenance in this life1 but also their hope of a life eternal beyond the grave4 ,this hope is indicated in the clearest manner by the very remarkable effigies of ,osiris which have come to light in ,egyptian cemeteries4 ,thus in the ,valley of the ,kings at ,thebes there was found the tomb of a royal fan-bearer who lived about #aejj ,b4,c4 ,among the rich contents of the tomb there was a bier on which rested a mattress of reeds covered with three layers of linen4 ,on the upper side of the linen was painted a life-size figure of ,osiris2 and the interior of the figure1 which was waterproof1 contained a mixture of vegetable mould1 barley1 and a sticky fluid4 ,the barley had sprouted and sent out shoots two or three inches long4 ,again1 in the cemetery at ,cynopolis were numerous burials of ,osiris figures4 ,these were made of grain wrapped up in cloth and roughly shaped like an ,osiris1 and placed inside a bricked-up recess at the side of the tomb1 sometimes in small pottery coffins1 sometimes in wooden coffins in the form of a hawkmummy1 sometimes without any coffins at all4 ,these corn-stuffed figures were bandaged like mummies with patches of gilding here and there1 as if in imitation of the golden mould in which the similar figures of ,osiris were cast at the festival of sowing4 ,again1 effigies of ,osiris1 with faces of green wax and their interior full of grain1 were found buried near the necropolis of ,thebes4 ,finally1 we are told by ,professor ,erman that between the legs of mummies there sometimes lies a figure of ,osiris made of slime2 it is filled with grains of corn1 the sprouting of which is intended to signify the resurrection of the god4 ,we cannot doubt that1 just as the burial of corn-stuffed images of ,osiris in the earth at the festival of sowing was designed to quicken the seed1 so the burial of similar images in the grave was meant to quicken the dead1 in other words1 to ensure their spiritual immortality4 ,,xl4 ,the ,nature of ,osiris #a4 ,osiris a ,corn-god ,,the ,,foregoing survey of the myth and ritual of ,osiris may suffice to prove that in one of his aspects the god was a personification of the corn1 which may be said to die and come to life again every year4 ,through all the pomp and glamour with which in later times the priests had invested his worship1 the conception of him as the corn-god comes clearly out in the festival of his death and resurrection1 which was celebrated in the month of ,khoiak and at a later period in the month of ,athyr4 ,that festival appears to have been essentially a festival of sowing1 which properly fell at the time when the husbandman actually committed the seed to the earth4 ,on that occasion an effigy of the corn-god1 moulded of earth and corn1 was buried with funeral rites in the ground in order that1 dying there1 he might come to life again with the new crops4 ,the ceremony was1 in fact1 a charm to ensure the growth of the corn by sympathetic magic1 and we may conjecture that as such it was practised in a simple form by every ,egyptian farmer on his fields long before it was adopted and transfigured by the priests in the stately ritual of the temple4 ,in the modern1 but doubtless ancient1 ,arab custom of burying the ,old ,man1 namely1 a sheaf of wheat1 in the harvest-field and praying that he may return from the dead1 we see the germ out of which the worship of the corn-god ,osiris was probably developed4 ,the details of his myth fit in well with this interpretation of the god4 ,he was said to be the offspring of ,sky and ,earth4 ,what more appropriate parentage could be invented for the corn which springs from the ground that has been fertilised by the water of heaven8 ,it is true that the land of ,egypt owed its fertility directly to the ,nile and not to showers2 but the inhabitants must have known or guessed that the great river in its turn was fed by the rains which fell in the far interior4 ,again1 the legend that ,osiris was the first to teach men the use of corn would be most naturally told of the corn-god himself4 ,further1 the story that his mangled remains were scattered up and down the land and buried in different places may be a mythical way of expressing either the sowing or the winnowing of the grain4 ,the latter interpretation is supported by the tale that ,isis placed the severed limbs of ,osiris on a corn-sieve4 ,or more probably the legend may be a reminiscence of a custom of slaying a human victim1 perhaps a representative of the corn-spirit1 and distributing his flesh or scattering his ashes over the fields to fertilise them4 ,in modern ,europe the figure of ,death is sometimes torn in pieces1 and the fragments are then buried in the ground to make the crops grow well1 and in other parts of the world human victims are treated in the same way4 ,with regard to the ancient ,egyptians we have it on the authority of ,manetho that they used to burn red-haired men and scatter their ashes with winnowing fans1 and it is highly significant that this barbarous sacrifice was offered by the kings at the grave of ,osiris4 ,we may conjecture that the victims represented ,osiris himself1 who was annually slain1 dismembered1 and buried in their persons that he might quicken the seed in the earth4 ,possibly in prehistoric times the kings themselves played the part of the god and were slain and dismembered in that character4 ,set as well as ,osiris is said to have been torn in pieces after a reign of eighteen days1 which was commemorated by an annual festival of the same length4 ,according to one story ,romulus1 the first king of ,rome1 was cut in pieces by the senators1 who buried the fragments of him in the ground2 and the traditional day of his death1 the seventh of ,july1 was celebrated with certain curious rites1 which were apparently connected with the artificial fertilisation of the fig4 ,again1 ,greek legend told how ,pentheus1 king of ,thebes1 and ,lycurgus1 king of the ,thracian ,edonians1 opposed the vine-god ,dionysus1 and how the impious monarchs were rent in pieces1 the one by the frenzied ,bacchanals1 the other by horses4 ,the ,greek traditions may well be distorted reminiscences of a custom of sacrificing human beings1 and especially divine kings1 in the character of ,dionysus1 a god who resembled ,osiris in many points and was said like him to have been torn limb from limb4 ,we are told that in ,chios men were rent in pieces as a sacrifice to ,dionysus2 and since they died the same death as their god1 it is reasonable to suppose that they personated him4 ,the story that the ,thracian ,orpheus was similarly torn limb from limb by the ,bacchanals seems to indicate that he too perished in the character of the god whose death he died4 ,it is significant that the ,thracian ,lycurgus1 king of the ,edonians1 is said to have been put to death in order that the ground1 which had ceased to be fruitful1 might regain its fertility4 ,further1 we read of a ,norwegian king1 ,halfdan the ,black1 whose body was cut up and buried in different parts of his kingdom for the sake of ensuring the fruitfulness of the earth4 ,he is said to have been drowned at the age of forty through the breaking of the ice in spring4 ,what followed his death is thus related by the old ,norse historian ,snorri ,sturluson3 ,he had been the most prosperous 7literally1 blessed with abundance7 of all kings4 ,so greatly did men value him that when the news came that he was dead and his body removed to ,hringariki and intended for burial there1 the chief men from ,raumariki and ,westfold and ,heithmrk came and all requested that they might take his body with them and bury it in their various provinces2 they thought that it would bring abundance to those who obtained it4 ,eventually it was settled that the body was distributed in four places4 ,the head was laid in a barrow at ,steinn in ,hringariki1 and each party took away their own share and buried it4 ,all these barrows are called ,halfdan's barrows4 ,it should be remembered that this ,halfdan belonged to the family of the ,ynglings1 who traced their descent from ,frey1 the great ,scandinavian god of fertility4 ,the natives of ,kiwai1 an island lying off the mouth of the ,fly ,river in ,british ,new ,guinea1 tell of a certain magician named ,segera1 who had sago for his totem4 ,when ,segera was old and ill1 he told the people that he would soon die1 but that1 nevertheless1 he would cause their gardens to thrive4 ,accordingly1 he instructed them that when he was dead they should cut him up and place pieces of his flesh in their gardens1 but his head was to be buried in his own garden4 ,of him it is said that he outlived the ordinary age1 and that no man knew his father1 but that he made the sago good and no one was hungry any more4 ,old men who were alive some years ago affirmed that they had known ,segera in their youth1 and the general opinion of the ,kiwai people seems to be that ,segera died not more than two generations ago4 ,taken all together1 these legends point to a widespread practice of dismembering the body of a king or magician and burying the pieces in different parts of the country in order to ensure the fertility of the ground and probably also the fecundity of man and beast4 ,to return to the human victims whose ashes the ,egyptians scattered with winnowing-fans1 the red hair of these unfortunates was probably significant4 ,for in ,egypt the oxen which were sacrificed had also to be red2 a single black or white hair found on the beast would have disqualified it for the sacrifice4 ,if1 as ,i conjecture1 these human sacrifices were intended to promote the growth of the crops--and the winnowing of their ashes seems to support this view--redhaired victims were perhaps selected as best fitted to personate the spirit of the ruddy grain4 ,for when a god is represented by a living person1 it is natural that the human representative should be chosen on the ground of his supposed resemblance to the divine original4 ,hence the ancient ,mexicans1 conceiving the maize as a personal being who went through the whole course of life between seed-time and harvest1 sacrificed new-born babes when the maize was sown1 older children when it had sprouted1 and so on till it was fully ripe1 when they sacrificed old men4 ,a name for ,osiris was the crop or harvest2 and the ancients sometimes explained him as a personification of the corn4 #b4 ,osiris a ,tree-spirit ,,but ,osiris was more than a spirit of the corn2 he was also a tree-spirit1 and this may perhaps have been his primitive character1 since the worship of trees is naturally older in the history of religion than the worship of the cereals4 ,the character of ,osiris as a tree-spirit was represented very graphically in a ceremony described by ,firmicus ,maternus4 ,a pine-tree having been cut down1 the centre was hollowed out1 and with the wood thus excavated an image of ,osiris was made1 which was then buried like a corpse in the hollow of the tree4 ,it is hard to imagine how the conception of a tree as tenanted by a personal being could be more plainly expressed4 ,the image of ,osiris thus made was kept for a year and then burned1 exactly as was done with the image of ,attis which was attached to the pine-tree4 ,the ceremony of cutting the tree1 as described by ,firmicus ,maternus1 appears to be alluded to by ,plutarch4 ,it was probably the ritual counterpart of the mythical discovery of the body of ,osiris enclosed in the erica-tree4 ,in the hall of ,osiris at ,denderah the coffin containing the hawk-headed mummy of the god is clearly depicted as enclosed within a tree1 apparently a conifer1 the trunk and branches of which are seen above and below the coffin4 ,the scene thus corresponds closely both to the myth and to the ceremony described by ,firmicus ,maternus4 ,it accords with the character of ,osiris as a tree-spirit that his worshippers were forbidden to injure fruit-trees1 and with his character as a god of vegetation in general that they were not allowed to stop up wells of water1 which are so important for the irrigation of hot southern lands4 ,according to one legend1 he taught men to train the vine to poles1 to prune its superfluous foliage1 and to extract the juice of the grape4 ,in the papyrus of ,nebseni1 written about #aeej ,b4,c41 ,osiris is depicted sitting in a shrine1 from the roof of which hang clusters of grapes2 and in the papyrus of the royal scribe ,nekht we see the god enthroned in front of a pool1 from the banks of which a luxuriant vine1 with many bunches of grapes1 grows towards the green face of the seated deity4 ,the ivy was sacred to him1 and was called his plant because it is always green4 #c4 ,osiris a ,god of ,fertility ,,as ,a ,,god of vegetation ,osiris was naturally conceived as a god of creative energy in general1 since men at a certain stage of evolution fail to distinguish between the reproductive powers of animals and of plants4 ,hence a striking feature in his worship was the coarse but expressive symbolism by which this aspect of his nature was presented to the eye not merely of the initiated but of the multitude4 ,at his festival women used to go about the villages singing songs in his praise and carrying obscene images of him which they set in motion by means of strings4 ,the custom was probably a charm to ensure the growth of the crops4 ,a similar image of him1 decked with all the fruits of the earth1 is said to have stood in a temple before a figure of ,isis1 and in the chambers dedicated to him at ,philae the dead god is portrayed lying on his bier in an attitude which indicates in the plainest way that even in death his generative virtue was not extinct but only suspended1 ready to prove a source of life and fertility to the world when the opportunity should offer4 ,hymns addressed to ,osiris contain allusions to this important side of his nature4 ,in one of them it is said that the world waxes green in triumph through him2 and another declares1 ,thou art the father and mother of mankind1 they live on thy breath1 they subsist on the flesh of thy body4 ,we may conjecture that in this paternal aspect he was supposed1 like other gods of fertility1 to bless men and women with offspring1 and that the processions at his festival were intended to promote this object as well as to quicken the seed in the ground4 ,it would be to misjudge ancient religion to denounce as lewd and profligate the emblems and the ceremonies which the ,egyptians employed for the purpose of giving effect to this conception of the divine power4 ,the ends which they proposed to themselves in these rites were natural and laudable2 only the means they adopted to compass them were mistaken4 ,a similar fallacy induced the ,greeks to adopt a like symbolism in their ,dionysiac festivals1 and the superficial but striking resemblance thus produced between the two religions has perhaps more than anything else misled enquirers1 both ancient and modern1 into identifying worships which1 though certainly akin in nature1 are perfectly distinct and independent in origin4 #d4 ,osiris a ,god of the ,dead ,,we have seen that in one of his aspects ,osiris was the ruler and judge of the dead4 ,to a people like the ,egyptians1 who not only believed in a life beyond the grave but actually spent much of their time1 labour1 and money in preparing for it1 this office of the god must have appeared hardly1 if at all1 less important than his function of making the earth to bring forth its fruits in due season4 ,we may assume that in the faith of his worshippers the two provinces of the god were intimately connected4 ,in laying their dead in the grave they committed them to his keeping who could raise them from the dust to life eternal1 even as he caused the seed to spring from the ground4 ,of that faith the corn-stuffed effigies of ,osiris found in ,egyptian tombs furnish an eloquent and un-equivocal testimony4 ,they were at once an emblem and an instrument of resurrection4 ,thus from the sprouting of the grain the ancient ,egyptians drew an augury of human immortality4 ,they are not the only people who have built the same lofty hopes on the same slender foundation4 ,a god who thus fed his people with his own broken body in this life1 and who held out to them a promise of a blissful eternity in a better world hereafter1 naturally reigned supreme in their affections4 ,we need not wonder1 therefore1 that in ,egypt the worship of the other gods was overshadowed by that of ,osiris1 and that while they were revered each in his own district1 he and his divine partner ,isis were adored in all4 ,,xli4 ,isis ,,the ,,original meaning of the goddess ,isis is still more difficult to determine than that of her brother and husband ,osiris4 ,her attributes and epithets were so numerous that in the hieroglyphics she is called the many-named1 the thousand-named1 and in ,greek inscriptions the myriad-named4 ,yet in her complex nature it is perhaps still possible to detect the original nucleus round which by a slow process of accretion the other elements gathered4 ,for if her brother and husband ,osiris was in one of his aspects the corn-god1 as we have seen reason to believe1 she must surely have been the corn-goddess4 ,there are at least some grounds for thinking so4 ,for if we may trust ,diodorus ,siculus1 whose authority appears to have been the ,egyptian historian ,manetho1 the discovery of wheat and barley was attributed to ,isis1 and at her festivals stalks of these grains were carried in procession to commemorate the boon she had conferred on men4 ,a further detail is added by ,augustine4 ,he says that ,isis made the discovery of barley at the moment when she was sacrificing to the common ancestors of her husband and herself1 all of whom had been kings1 and that she showed the newly discovered ears of barley to ,osiris and his councillor ,thoth or ,mercury1 as ,roman writers called him4 ,that is why1 adds ,augustine1 they identify ,isis with ,ceres4 ,further1 at harvest-time1 when the ,egyptian reapers had cut the first stalks1 they laid them down and beat their breasts1 wailing and calling upon ,isis4 ,the custom has been already explained as a lamen for the corn-spirit slain under the sickle4 ,amongst the epithets by which ,isis is designated in the inscriptions are ,creatress of green things1 ,green goddess1 whose green colour is like unto the greenness of the earth1 ,lady of ,bread1 ,lady of ,beer1 ,lady of ,abundance4 ,according to ,brugsch she is not only the creatress of the fresh verdure of vegetation which covers the earth1 but is actually the green corn-field itself1 which is personified as a goddess4 ,this is confirmed by her epithet ,sochit or ,sochet1 meaning a corn-field1 a sense which the word still retains in ,coptic4 ,the ,greeks conceived of ,isis as a corn-goddess1 for they identified her with ,demeter4 ,in a ,greek epigram she is described as she who has given birth to the fruits of the earth1 and the mother of the ears of corn2 and in a hymn composed in her honour she speaks of herself as queen of the wheat-field1 and is described as charged with the care of the fruitful furrow's wheat-rich path4 ,accordingly1 ,greek or ,roman artists often represented her with ears of corn on her head or in her hand4 ,such1 we may suppose1 was ,isis in the olden time1 a rustic ,corn-,mother adored with uncouth rites by ,egyptian swains4 ,but the homely features of the clownish goddess could hardly be traced in the refined1 the saintly form which1 spiritualised by ages of religious evolution1 she presented to her worshippers of after days as the true wife1 the tender mother1 the beneficent queen of nature1 encircled with the nimbus of moral purity1 of immemorial and mysterious sanctity4 ,thus chastened and transfigured she won many hearts far beyond the boundaries of her native land4 ,in that welter of religions which accompanied the decline of national life in antiquity her worship was one of the most popular at ,rome and throughout the empire4 ,some of the ,roman emperors themselves were openly addicted to it4 ,and however the religion of ,isis may1 like any other1 have been often worn as a cloak by men and women of loose life1 her rites appear on the whole to have been honourably distinguished by a dignity and composure1 a solemnity and decorum1 well fitted to soothe the troubled mind1 to ease the burdened heart4 ,they appealed therefore to gentle spirits1 and above all to women1 whom the bloody and licentious rites of other ,oriental goddesses only shocked and repelled4 ,we need not wonder1 then1 that in a period of decadence1 when traditional faiths were shaken1 when systems clashed1 when men's minds were disquieted1 when the fabric of empire itself1 once deemed eternal1 began to show ominous rents and fissures1 the serene figure of ,isis with her spiritual calm1 her gracious promise of immortality1 should have appeared to many like a star in a stormy sky1 and should have roused in their breasts a rapture of devotion not unlike that which was paid in the ,middle ,ages to the ,virgin ,mary4 ,indeed her stately ritual1 with its shaven and tonsured priests1 its matins and vespers1 its tinkling music1 its baptism and aspersions of holy water1 its solemn processions1 its jewelled images of the ,mother of ,god1 presented many points of similarity to the pomps and ceremonies of ,catholicism4 ,the resemblance need not be purely accidental4 ,ancient ,egypt may have contributed its share to the gorgeous symbolism of the ,catholic ,church as well as to the pale abstractions of her theology4 ,certainly in art the figure of ,isis suckling the infant ,horus is so like that of the ,madonna and child that it has sometimes received the adoration of ignorant ,christians4 ,and to ,isis in her later character of patroness of mariners the ,virgin ,mary perhaps owes her beautiful epithet of ,stella ,maris1 ,star of the ,sea1 under which she is adored by tempest-tossed sailors4 ,the attributes of a marine deity may have been bestowed on ,isis by the sea-faring ,greeks of ,alexandria4 ,they are quite foreign to her original character and to the habits of the ,egyptians1 who had no love of the sea4 ,on this hypothesis ,sirius1 the bright star of ,isis1 which on ,july mornings rises from the glassy waves of the eastern ,mediterranean1 a harbinger of halcyon weather to mariners1 was the true ,stella ,maris1 the ,star of the ,sea4 ,,xlii4 ,osiris and the ,sun ,,osiris has been sometimes interpreted as the sun-god1 and in modern times this view has been held by so many distinguished writers that it deserves a brief examination4 ,if we enquire on what evidence ,osiris has been identified with the sun or the sun-god1 it will be found on analysis to be minute in quantity and dubious1 where it is not absolutely worthless1 in quality4 ,the diligent ,jablonski1 the first modern scholar to collect and sift the testimony of classical writers on ,egyptian religion1 says that it can be shown in many ways that ,osiris is the sun1 and that he could produce a cloud of witnesses to prove it1 but that it is needless to do so1 since no learned man is ignorant of the fact4 ,of the ancient writers whom he condescends to quote1 the only two who expressly identify ,osiris with the sun are ,diodorus and ,macrobius4 ,but little weight can be attached to their evidence2 for the statement of ,diodorus is vague and rhetorical1 and the reasons which ,macrobius1 one of the fathers of solar mythology1 assigns for the identification are exceedingly slight4 ,the ground upon which some modern writers seem chiefly to rely for the identification of ,osiris with the sun is that the story of his death fits better with the solar phenomena than with any other in nature4 ,it may readily be admitted that the daily appearance and disappearance of the sun might very naturally be expressed by a myth of his death and resurrection2 and writers who regard ,osiris as the sun are careful to indicate that it is the diurnal1 and not the annual1 course of the sun to which they understand the myth to apply4 ,thus ,renouf1 who identified ,osiris with the sun1 admitted that the ,egyptian sun could not with any show of reason be described as dead in winter4 ,but if his daily death was the theme of the legend1 why was it celebrated by an annual ceremony8 ,this fact alone seems fatal to the interpretation of the myth as descriptive of sunset and sunrise4 ,again1 though the sun may be said to die daily1 in what sense can he be said to be torn in pieces8 ,in the course of our enquiry it has1 ,i trust1 been made clear that there is another natural phenomenon to which the conception of death and resurrection is as applicable as to sunset and sunrise1 and which1 as a matter of fact1 has been so conceived and represented in folk-custom4 ,that phenomenon is the annual growth and decay of vegetation4 ,a strong reason for interpreting the death of ,osiris as the decay of vegetation rather than as the sunset is to be found in the general1 though not unanimous1 voice of antiquity1 which classed together the worship and myths of ,osiris1 ,adonis1 ,attis1 ,dionysus1 and ,demeter1 as religions of essentially the same type4 ,the consensus of ancient opinion on this subject seems too great to be rejected as a mere fancy4 ,so closely did the rites of ,osiris resemble those of ,adonis at ,byblus that some of the people of ,byblus themselves maintained that it was ,osiris and not ,adonis whose death was mourned by them4 ,such a view could certainly not have been held if the rituals of the two gods had not been so alike as to be almost indistinguishable4 ,herodotus found the similarity between the rites of ,osiris and ,dionysus so great1 that he thought it impossible the latter could have arisen independently2 they must1 he supposed1 have been recently borrowed1 with slight alterations1 by the ,greeks from the ,egyptians4 ,again1 ,plutarch1 a very keen student of comparative religion1 insists upon the detailed resemblance of the rites of ,osiris to those of ,dionysus4 ,we cannot reject the evidence of such intelligent and trustworthy witnesses on plain matters of fact which fell under their own cognizance4 ,their explanations of the worships it is indeed possible to reject1 for the meaning of religious cults is often open to question2 but resemblances of ritual are matters of observation4 ,therefore1 those who explain ,osiris as the sun are driven to the alternative of either dismissing as mistaken the testimony of antiquity to the similarity of the rites of ,osiris1 ,adonis1 ,attis1 ,dionysus1 and ,demeter1 or of interpreting all these rites as sun-worship4 ,no modern scholar has fairly faced and accepted either side of this alternative4 ,to accept the former would be to affirm that we know the rites of these deities better than the men who practised1 or at least who witnessed them4 ,to accept the latter would involve a wrenching1 clipping1 mangling1 and distorting of myth and ritual from which even ,macrobius shrank4 ,on the other hand1 the view that the essence of all these rites was the mimic death and revival of vegetation1 explains them separately and collectively in an easy and natural way1 and harmonises with the general testimony borne by the ancients to their substantial similarity4 ,,xliii4 ,dionysus ,,in ,,the ,,preceding chapters we saw that in antiquity the civilised nations of ,western ,asia and ,egypt pictured to themselves the changes of the seasons1 and particularly the annual growth and decay of vegetation1 as episodes in the life of gods1 whose mournful death and happy resurrection they celebrated with dramatic rites of alternate lamentation and rejoicing4 ,but if the celebration was in form dramatic1 it was in substance magical2 that is to say1 it was intended1 on the principles of sympathetic magic1 to ensure the vernal regeneration of plants and the multiplication of animals1 which had seemed to be menaced by the inroads of winter4 ,in the ancient world1 however1 such ideas and such rites were by no means confined to the ,oriental peoples of ,babylon and ,syria1 of ,phrygia and ,egypt2 they were not a product peculiar to the religious mysticism of the dreamy ,east1 but were shared by the races of livelier fancy and more mercurial temperament who inhabited the shores and islands of the ,aegean4 ,we need not1 with some enquirers in ancient and modern times1 suppose that these ,western peoples borrowed from the older civilisation of the ,orient the conception of the ,dying and ,reviving ,god1 together with the solemn ritual1 in which that conception was dramatically set forth before the eyes of the worshippers4 ,more probably the resemblance which may be traced in this respect between the religions of the ,east and ,west is no more than what we commonly1 though incorrectly1 call a fortuitous coincidence1 the effect of similar causes acting alike on the similar constitution of the human mind in different countries and under different skies4 ,the ,greek had no need to journey into far countries to learn the vicissitudes of the seasons1 to mark the fleeting beauty of the damask rose1 the transient glory of the golden corn1 the passing splendour of the purple grapes4 ,year by year in his own beautiful land he beheld1 with natural regret1 the bright pomp of summer fading into the gloom and stagnation of winter1 and year by year he hailed with natural delight the outburst of fresh life in spring4 ,accustomed to personify the forces of nature1 to tinge her cold abstractions with the warm hues of imagination1 to clothe her naked realities with the gorgeous drapery of a mythic fancy1 he fashioned for himself a train of gods and goddesses1 of spirits and elves1 out of the shifting panorama of the seasons1 and followed the annual fluctuations of their fortunes with alternate emotions of cheerfulness and dejection1 of gladness and sorrow1 which found their natural expression in alternate rites of rejoicing and lamentation1 of revelry and mourning4 ,a consideration of some of the ,greek divinities who thus died and rose again from the dead may furnish us with a series of companion pictures to set side by side with the sad figures of ,adonis1 ,attis1 and ,osiris4 ,we begin with ,dionysus4 ,the god ,dionysus or ,bacchus is best known to us as a personification of the vine and of the exhilaration produced by the juice of the grape4 ,his ecstatic worship1 characterised by wild dances1 thrilling music1 and tipsy excess1 appears to have originated among the rude tribes of ,thrace1 who were notoriously addicted to drunkenness4 ,its mystic doctrines and extravagant rites were essentially foreign to the clear intelligence and sober temperament of the ,greek race4 ,yet appealing as it did to that love of mystery and that proneness to revert to savagery which seem to be innate in most men1 the religion spread like wildfire through ,greece until the god whom ,homer hardly deigned to notice had become the most popular figure of the pantheon4 ,the resemblance which his story and his ceremonies present to those of ,osiris have led some enquirers both in ancient and modern times to hold that ,dionysus was merely a disguised ,osiris1 imported directly from ,egypt into ,greece4 ,but the great preponderance of evidence points to his ,thracian origin1 and the similarity of the two worships is sufficiently explained by the similarity of the ideas and customs on which they were founded4 ,while the vine with its clusters was the most characteristic manifestation of ,dionysus1 he was also a god of trees in general4 ,thus we are told that almost all the ,greeks sacrificed to ,dionysus of the tree4 ,in ,boeotia one of his titles was ,dionysus in the tree4 ,his image was often merely an upright post1 without arms1 but draped in a mantle1 with a bearded mask to represent the head1 and with leafy boughs projecting from the head or body to show the nature of the deity4 ,on a vase his rude effigy is depicted appearing out of a low tree or bush4 ,at ,magnesia on the ,maeander an image of ,dionysus is said to have been found in a plane-tree1 which had been broken by the wind4 ,he was the patron of cultivated trees3 prayers were offered to him that he would make the trees grow2 and he was especially honoured by husbandmen1 chiefly fruit-growers1 who set up an image of him1 in the shape of a natural tree-stump1 in their orchards4 ,he was said to have discovered all tree-fruits1 amongst which apples and figs are particularly mentioned2 and he was referred to as well-fruited1 he of the green fruit1 and making the fruit to grow4 ,one of his titles was teeming or bursting 7as of sap or blossoms72 and there was a ,flowery ,dionysus in ,attica and at ,patrae in ,achaia4 ,the ,athenians sacrificed to him for the prosperity of the fruits of the land4 ,amongst the trees particularly sacred to him1 in addition to the vine1 was the pine-tree4 ,the ,delphic oracle commanded the ,corinthians to worship a particular pine-tree equally with the god1 so they made two images of ,dionysus out of it1 with red faces and gilt bodies4 ,in art a wand1 tipped with a pine-cone1 is commonly carried by the god or his worshippers4 ,again1 the ivy and the fig-tree were especially associated with him4 ,in the ,attic township of ,acharnae there was a ,dionysus ,ivy2 at ,lacedaemon there was a ,fig ,dionysus2 and in ,naxos1 where figs were called meilicha1 there was a ,dionysus ,meilichios1 the face of whose image was made of fig-wood4 ,further1 there are indications1 few but significant1 that ,dionysus was conceived as a deity of agriculture and the corn4 ,he is spoken of as himself doing the work of a husbandman3 he is reported to have been the first to yoke oxen to the plough1 which before had been dragged by hand alone2 and some people found in this tradition the clue to the bovine shape in which1 as we shall see1 the god was often supposed to present himself to his worshippers4 ,thus guiding the ploughshare and scattering the seed as he went1 ,dionysus is said to have eased the labour of the husbandman4 ,further1 we are told that in the land of the ,bisaltae1 a ,thracian tribe1 there was a great and fair sanctuary of ,dionysus1 where at his festival a bright light shone forth at night as a token of an abundant harvest vouchsafed by the diety2 but if the crops were to fail that year1 the mystic light was not seen1 darkness brooded over the sanctuary as at other times4 ,moreover1 among the emblems of ,dionysus was the winnowing-fan1 that is the large open shovel-shaped basket1 which down to modern times has been used by farmers to separate the grain from the chaff by tossing the corn in the air4 ,this simple agricultural instrument figured in the mystic rites of ,dionysus2 indeed the god is traditionally said to have been placed at birth in a winnowing-fan as in a cradle3 in art he is represented as an infant so cradled2 and from these traditions and representations he derived the epithet of ,liknites1 that is1 ,he of the ,winnowing-fan4 ,like other gods of vegetation ,dionysus was believed to have died a violent death1 but to have been brought to life again2 and his sufferings1 death1 and resurrection were enacted in his sacred rites4 ,his tragic story is thus told by the poet ,nonnus4 ,zeus in the form of a serpent visited ,persephone1 and she bore him ,zagreus1 that is1 ,dionysus1 a horned infant4 ,scarcely was he born1 when the babe mounted the throne of his father ,zeus and mimicked the great god by brandishing the lightning in his tiny hand4 ,but he did not occupy the throne long2 for the treacherous ,titans1 their faces whitened with chalk1 attacked him with knives while he was looking at himself in a mirror4 ,for a time he evaded their assaults by turning himself into various shapes1 assuming the likeness successively of ,zeus and ,cronus1 of a young man1 of a lion1 a horse1 and a serpent4 ,finally1 in the form of a bull1 he was cut to pieces by the murderous knives of his enemies4 ,his ,cretan myth1 as related by ,firmicus ,maternus1 ran thus4 ,he was said to have been the bastard son of ,jupiter1 a ,cretan king4 ,going abroad1 ,jupiter transferred the throne and sceptre to the youthful ,dionysus1 but1 knowing that his wife ,juno cherished a jealous dislike of the child1 he entrusted ,dionysus to the care of guards upon whose fidelity he believed he could rely4 ,juno1 however1 bribed the guards1 and amusing the child with rattles and a cunningly-wrought looking glass lured him into an ambush1 where her satellites1 the ,titans1 rushed upon him1 cut him limb from limb1 boiled his body with various herbs1 and ate it4 ,but his sister ,minerva1 who had shared in the deed1 kept his heart and gave it to ,jupiter on his return1 revealing to him the whole history of the crime4 ,in his rage1 ,jupiter put the ,titans to death by torture1 and1 to soothe his grief for the loss of his son1 made an image in which he enclosed the child's heart1 and then built a temple in his honour4 ,in this version a ,euhemeristic turn has been given to the myth by representing ,jupiter and ,juno 7,zeus and ,hera7 as a king and queen of ,crete4 ,the guards referred to are the mythical ,curetes who danced a war-dance round the infant ,dionysus1 as they are said to have done round the infant ,zeus4 ,very noteworthy is the legend1 recorded both by ,nonnus and ,firmicus1 that in his infancy ,dionysus occupied for a short time the throne of his father ,zeus4 ,so ,proclus tells us that ,dionysus was the last king of the gods appointed by ,zeus4 ,for his father set him on the kingly throne1 and placed in his hand the sceptre1 and made him king of all the gods of the world4 ,such traditions point to a custom of temporarily investing the king's son with the royal dignity as a preliminary to sacrificing him instead of his father4 ,pomegranates were supposed to have sprung from the blood of ,dionysus1 as anemones from the blood of ,adonis and violets from the blood of ,attis3 hence women refrained from eating seeds of pomegranates at the festival of the ,thesmophoria4 ,according to some1 the severed limbs of ,dionysus were pieced together1 at the command of ,zeus1 by ,apollo1 who buried them on ,parnassus4 ,the grave of ,dionysus was shown in the ,delphic temple beside a golden statue of ,apollo4 ,however1 according to another account1 the grave of ,dionysus was at ,thebes1 where he is said to have been torn in pieces4 ,thus far the resurrection of the slain god is not mentioned1 but in other versions of the myth it is variously related4 ,according to one version1 which represented ,dionysus as a son of ,zeus and ,demeter1 his mother pieced together his mangled limbs and made him young again4 ,in others it is simply said that shortly after his burial he rose from the dead and ascended up to heaven2 or that ,zeus raised him up as he lay mortally wounded2 or that ,zeus swallowed the heart of ,dionysus and then begat him afresh by ,semele1 who in the common legend figures as mother of ,dionysus4 ,or1 again1 the heart was pounded up and given in a potion to ,semele1 who thereby conceived him4 ,turning from the myth to the ritual1 we find that the ,cretans celebrated a biennial festival at which the passion of ,dionysus was represented in every detail4 ,all that he had done or suffered in his last moments was enacted before the eyes of his worshippers1 who tore a live bull to pieces with their teeth and roamed the woods with frantic shouts4 ,in front of them was carried a casket supposed to contain the sacred heart of ,dionysus1 and to the wild music of flutes and cymbals they mimicked the rattles by which the infant god had been lured to his doom4 ,where the resurrection formed part of the myth1 it also was acted at the rites1 and it even appears that a general doctrine of resurrection1 or at least of immortality1 was inculcated on the worshippers2 for ,plutarch1 writing to console his wife on the death of their infant daughter1 comforts her with the thought of the immortality of the soul as taught by tradition and revealed in the mysteries of ,dionysus4 ,a different form of the myth of the death and resurrection of ,dionysus is that he descended into ,hades to bring up his mother ,semele from the dead4 ,the local ,argive tradition was that he went down through the ,alcyonian lake2 and his return from the lower world1 in other words his resurrection1 was annually celebrated on the spot by the ,argives1 who summoned him from the water by trumpet blasts1 while they threw a lamb into the lake as an offering to the warder of the dead4 ,whether this was a spring festival does not appear1 but the ,lydians certainly celebrated the advent of ,dionysus in spring2 the god was supposed to bring the season with him4 ,deities of vegetation1 who are believed to pass a certain portion of each year underground1 naturally come to be regarded as gods of the lower world or of the dead4 ,both ,dionysus and ,osiris were so conceived4 ,a feature in the mythical character of ,dionysus1 which at first sight appears inconsistent with his nature as a deity of vegetation1 is that he was often conceived and represented in animal shape1 especially in the form1 or at least with the horns1 of a bull4 ,thus he is spoken of as cow-born1 bull1 bull-shaped1 bull-faced1 bull-browed1 bull-horned1 horn-bearing1 two-horned1 horned4 ,he was believed to appear1 at least occasionally1 as a bull4 ,his images were often1 as at ,cyzicus1 made in bull shape1 or with bull horns2 and he was painted with horns4 ,types of the horned ,dionysus are found amongst the surviving monuments of antiquity4 ,on one statuette he appears clad in a bull's hide1 the head1 horns1 and hoofs hanging down behind4 ,again1 he is represented as a child with clusters of grapes round his brow1 and a calf's head1 with sprouting horns1 attached to the back of his head4 ,on a red-figured vase the god is portrayed as a calf-headed child seated on a woman's lap4 ,the people of ,cynaetha held a festival of ,dionysus in winter1 when men1 who had greased their bodies with oil for the occasion1 used to pick out a bull from the herd and carry it to the sanctuary of the god4 ,dionysus was supposed to inspire their choice of the particular bull1 which probably represented the deity himself2 for at his festivals he was believed to appear in bull form4 ,the women of ,elis hailed him as a bull1 and prayed him to come with his bull's foot4 ,they sang1 ,come hither1 ,dionysus1 to thy holy temple by the sea2 come with the ,graces to thy temple1 rushing with thy bull's foot1 ,o goodly bull1 ,o goodly bull6 ,the ,bacchanals of ,thrace wore horns in imitation of their god4 ,according to the myth1 it was in the shape of a bull that he was torn to pieces by the ,titans2 and the ,cretans1 when they acted the sufferings and death of ,dionysus1 tore a live bull to pieces with their teeth4 ,indeed1 the rending and devouring of live bulls and calves appear to have been a regular feature of the ,dionysiac rites4 ,when we consider the practice of portraying the god as a bull or with some of the features of the animal1 the belief that he appeared in bull form to his worshippers at the sacred rites1 and the legend that in bull form he had been torn in pieces1 we cannot doubt that in rending and devouring a live bull at his festival the worshippers of ,dionysus believed themselves to be killing the god1 eating his flesh1 and drinking his blood4 ,another animal whose form ,dionysus assumed was the goat4 ,one of his names was ,kid4 ,at ,athens and at ,hermion he was worshipped under the title of the one of the ,black ,goatskin1 and a legend ran that on a certain occasion he had appeared clad in the skin from which he took the title4 ,in the wine-growing district of ,phlius1 where in autumn the plain is still thickly mantled with the red and golden foliage of the fading vines1 there stood of old a bronze image of a goat1 which the husbandmen plastered with gold-leaf as a means of protecting their vines against blight4 ,the image probably represented the vine-god himself4 ,to save him from the wrath of ,hera1 his father ,zeus changed the youthful ,dionysus into a kid2 and when the gods fled to ,egypt to escape the fury of ,typhon1 ,dionysus was turned into a goat4 ,hence when his worshippers rent in pieces a live goat and devoured it raw1 they must have believed that they were eating the body and blood of the god4 ,the custom of tearing in pieces the bodies of animals and of men and then devouring them raw has been practised as a religious rite by savages in modern times4 ,we need not therefore dismiss as a fable the testimony of antiquity to the observance of similar rites among the frenzied worshippers of ,bacchus4 ,the custom of killing a god in animal form1 which we shall examine more in detail further on1 belongs to a very early stage of human culture1 and is apt in later times to be misunderstood4 ,the advance of thought tends to strip the old animal and plant gods of their bestial and vegetable husk1 and to leave their human attributes 7which are always the kernel of the conception7 as the final and sole residuum4 ,in other words1 animal and plant gods tend to become purely anthropomorphic4 ,when they have become wholly or nearly so1 the animals and plants which were at first the deities themselves1 still retain a vague and ill-understood connexion with the anthropomorphic gods who have developed out of them4 ,the origin of the relationship between the deity and the animal or plant having been forgotten1 various stories are invented to explain it4 ,these explanations may follow one of two lines according as they are based on the habitual or on the exceptional treatment of the sacred animal or plant4 ,the sacred animal was habitually spared1 and only exceptionally slain2 and accordingly the myth might be devised to explain either why it was spared or why it was killed4 ,devised for the former purpose1 the myth would tell of some service rendered to the deity by the animal2 devised for the latter purpose1 the myth would tell of some injury inflicted by the animal on the god4 ,the reason given for sacrificing goats to ,dionysus exemplifies a myth of the latter sort4 ,they were sacrificed to him1 it was said1 because they injured the vine4 ,now the goat1 as we have seen1 was originally an embodiment of the god himself4 ,but when the god had divested himself of his animal character and had become essentially anthropomorphic1 the killing of the goat in his worship came to be regarded no longer as a slaying of the deity himself1 but as a sacrifice offered to him2 and since some reason had to be assigned why the goat in particular should be sacrificed1 it was alleged that this was a punishment inflicted on the goat for injuring the vine1 the object of the god's especial care4 ,thus we have the strange spectacle of a god sacrificed to himself on the ground that he is his own enemy4 ,and as the deity is supposed to partake of the victim offered to him1 it follows that1 when the victim is the god's old self1 the god eats of his own flesh4 ,hence the goat-god ,dionysus is represented as eating raw goat's blood2 and the bull-god ,dionysus is called eater of bulls4 ,on the analogy of these instances we may conjecture that wherever a deity is described as the eater of a particular animal1 the animal in question was originally nothing but the deity himself4 ,later on we shall find that some savages propitiate dead bears and whales by offering them portions of their own bodies4 ,all this1 however1 does not explain why a deity of vegetation should appear in animal form4 ,but the consideration of that point had better be deferred till we have discussed the character and attributes of ,demeter4 ,meantime it remains to mention that in some places1 instead of an animal1 a human being was torn in pieces at the rites of ,dionysus4 ,this was the practice in ,chios and ,tenedos2 and at ,potniae in ,boeotia the tradition ran that it had been formerly the custom to sacrifice to the goat-smiting ,dionysus a child1 for whom a goat was afterwards substituted4 ,at ,orchomenus1 as we have seen1 the human victim was taken from the women of an old royal family4 ,as the slain bull or goat represented the slain god1 so1 we may suppose1 the human victim also represented him4 ,the legends of the deaths of ,pentheus and ,lycurgus1 two kings who are said to have been torn to pieces1 the one by ,bacchanals1 the other by horses1 for their opposition to the rites of ,dionysus1 may be1 as ,i have already suggested1 distorted reminiscences of a custom of sacrificing divine kings in the character of ,dionysus and of dispersing the fragments of their broken bodies over the fields for the purpose of fertilising them4 ,it is probably no mere coincidence that ,dionysus himself is said to have been torn in pieces at ,thebes1 the very place where according to legend the same fate befell king ,pentheus at the hands of the frenzied votaries of the vine-god4 ,however1 a tradition of human sacrifice may sometimes have been a mere misinterpretation of a sacrificial ritual in which an animal victim was treated as a human being4 ,for example1 at ,tenedos the new-born calf sacrificed to ,dionysus was shod in buskins1 and the mother cow was tended like a woman in child-bed4 ,at ,rome a shegoat was sacrificed to ,vedijovis as if it were a human victim4 ,yet on the other hand it is equally possible1 and perhaps more probable1 that these curious rites were themselves mitigations of an older and ruder custom of sacrificing human beings1 and that the later pretence of treating the sacrificial victims as if they were human beings was merely part of a pious and merciful fraud1 which palmed off on the deity less precious victims than living men and women4 ,this interpretation is supported by many undoubted cases in which animals have been substituted for human victims4 ,,xliv4 ,demeter and ,persephone ,,dionysus was not the only ,greek deity whose tragic story and ritual appear to reflect the decay and revival of vegetation4 ,in another form and with a different application the old tale reappears in the myth of ,demeter and ,persephone4 ,substantially their myth is identical with the ,syrian one of ,aphrodite 7,astarte7 and ,adonis1 the ,phrygian one of ,cybele and ,attis1 and the ,egyptian one of ,isis and ,osiris4 ,in the ,greek fable1 as in its ,asiatic and ,egyptian counterparts1 a goddess mourns the loss of a loved one1 who personifies the vegetation1 more especially the corn1 which dies in winter to revive in spring2 only whereas the ,oriental imagination figured the loved and lost one as a dead lover or a dead husband lamented by his leman or his wife1 ,greek fancy embodied the same idea in the tenderer and purer form of a dead daughter bewailed by her sorrowing mother4 ,the oldest literary document which narrates the myth of ,demeter and ,persephone is the beautiful ,homeric ,hymn to ,demeter1 which critics assign to the seventh century before our era4 ,the object of the poem is to explain the origin of the ,eleusinian mysteries1 and the complete silence of the poet as to ,athens and the ,athenians1 who in after ages took conspicuous part in the festival1 renders it probable that the hymn was composed in the far off time when ,eleusis was still a petty independent state1 and before the stately procession of the ,mysteries had begun to defile1 in bright ,september days1 over the low chain of barren rocky hills which divides the flat ,eleusinian cornland from the more spacious olive-clad expanse of the ,athenian plain4 ,be that as it may1 the hymn reveals to us the conception which the writer entertained of the character and functions of the two goddesses2 their natural shapes stand out sharply enough under the thin veil of poetical imagery4 ,the youthful ,persephone1 so runs the tale1 was gathering roses and lilies1 crocuses and violets1 hyacinths and narcissuses in a lush meadow1 when the earth gaped and ,pluto1 lord of the ,dead1 issuing from the abyss carried her off on his golden car to be his bride and queen in the gloomy subterranean world4 ,her sorrowing mother ,demeter1 with her yellow tresses veiled in a dark mourning mantle1 sought her over land and sea1 and learning from the ,sun her daughter's fate she withdrew in high dudgeon from the gods and took up her abode at ,eleusis1 where she presented herself to the king's daughters in the guise of an old woman1 sitting sadly under the shadow of an olive tree beside the ,maiden's ,well1 to which the damsels had come to draw water in bronze pitchers for their father's house4 ,in her wrath at her bereavement the goddess suffered not the seed to grow in the earth but kept it hidden under ground1 and she vowed that never would she set foot on ,olympus and never would she let the corn sprout till her lost daughter should be restored to her4 ,vainly the oxen dragged the ploughs to and fro in the fields2 vainly the sower dropped the barley seed in the brown furrows2 nothing came up from the parched and crumbling soil4 ,even the ,rarian plain near ,eleusis1 which was wont to wave with yellow harvests1 lay bare and fallow4 ,mankind would have perished of hunger and the gods would have been robbed of the sacrifices which were their due1 if ,zeus in alarm had not commanded ,pluto to disgorge his prey1 to restore his bride ,persephone to her mother ,demeter4 ,the grim lord of the ,dead smiled and obeyed1 but before he sent back his queen to the upper air on a golden car1 he gave her the seed of a pomegranate to eat1 which ensured that she would return to him4 ,but ,zeus stipulated that henceforth ,persephone should spend two thirds of every year with her mother and the gods in the upper world and one third of the year with her husband in the nether world1 from which she was to return year by year when the earth was gay with spring flowers4 ,gladly the daughter then returned to the sunshine1 gladly her mother received her and fell upon her neck2 and in her joy at recovering the lost one ,demeter made the corn to sprout from the clods of the ploughed fields and all the broad earth to be heavy with leaves and blossoms4 ,and straightway she went and showed this happy sight to the princes of ,eleusis1 to ,triptolemus1 ,eumolpus1 ,diocles1 and to the king ,celeus himself1 and moreover she revealed to them her sacred rites and mysteries4 ,blessed1 says the poet1 is the mortal man who has seen these things1 but he who has had no share of them in life will never be happy in death when he has descended into the darkness of the grave4 ,so the two goddesses departed to dwell in bliss with the gods on ,olympus2 and the bard ends the hymn with a pious prayer to ,demeter and ,persephone that they would be pleased to grant him a livelihood in return for his song4 ,it has been generally recognised1 and indeed it seems scarcely open to doubt1 that the main theme which the poet set before himself in composing this hymn was to describe the traditional foundation of the ,eleusinian mysteries by the goddess ,demeter4 ,the whole poem leads up to the transformation scene in which the bare leafless expanse of the ,eleusinian plain is suddenly turned1 at the will of the goddess1 into a vast sheet of ruddy corn2 the beneficent deity takes the princes of ,eleusis1 shows them what she has done1 teaches them her mystic rites1 and vanishes with her daughter to heaven4 ,the revelation of the mysteries is the triumphal close of the piece4 ,this conclusion is confirmed by a more minute examination of the poem1 which proves that the poet has given1 not merely a general account of the foundation of the mysteries1 but also in more or less veiled language mythical explanations of the origin of particular rites which we have good reason to believe formed essential features of the festival4 ,amongst the rites as to which the poet thus drops significant hints are the preliminary fast of the candidates for initiation1 the torchlight procession1 the all-night vigil1 the sitting of the candidates1 veiled and in silence1 on stools covered with sheepskins1 the use of scurrilous language1 the breaking of ribald jests1 and the solemn communion with the divinity by participation in a draught of barley-water from a holy chalice4 ,but there is yet another and a deeper secret of the mysteries which the author of the poem appears to have divulged under cover of his narrative4 ,he tells us how1 as soon as she had transformed the barren brown expanse of the ,eleusinian plain into a field of golden grain1 she gladdened the eyes of ,triptolemus and the other ,eleusinian princes by showing them the growing or standing corn4 ,when we compare this part of the story with the statement of a ,christian writer of the second century1 ,hippolytus1 that the very heart of the mysteries consisted in showing to the initiated a reaped ear of corn1 we can hardly doubt that the poet of the hymn was well acquainted with this solemn rite1 and that he deliberately intended to explain its origin in precisely the same way as he explained other rites of the mysteries1 namely by representing ,demeter as having set the example of performing the ceremony in her own person4 ,thus myth and ritual mutually explain and confirm each other4 ,the poet of the seventh century before our era gives us the myth--he could not without sacrilege have revealed the ritual3 the ,christian father reveals the ritual1 and his revelation accords perfectly with the veiled hint of the old poet4 ,on the whole1 then1 we may1 with many modern scholars1 confidently accept the statement of the learned ,christian father ,clement of ,alexandria1 that the myth of ,demeter and ,persephone was acted as a sacred drama in the mysteries of ,eleusis4 ,but if the myth was acted as a part1 perhaps as the principal part1 of the most famous and solemn religious rites of ancient ,greece1 we have still to enquire1 ,what was1 after all1 stripped of later accretions1 the original kernel of the myth which appears to later ages surrounded and transfigured by an aureole of awe and mystery1 lit up by some of the most brilliant rays of ,grecian literature and art8 ,if we follow the indications given by our oldest literary authority on the subject1 the author of the ,homeric hymn to ,demeter1 the riddle is not hard to read2 the figures of the two goddesses1 the mother and the daughter1 resolve themselves into personifications of the corn4 ,at least this appears to be fairly certain for the daughter ,persephone4 ,the goddess who spends three or1 according to another version of the myth1 six months of every year with the dead under ground and the remainder of the year with the living above ground2 in whose absence the barley seed is hidden in the earth and the fields lie bare and fallow2 on whose return in spring to the upper world the corn shoots up from the clods and the earth is heavy with leaves and blossoms--this goddess can surely be nothing else than a mythical embodiment of the vegetation1 and particularly of the corn1 which is buried under the soil for some months of every winter and comes to life again1 as from the grave1 in the sprouting cornstalks and the opening flowers and foliage of every spring4 ,no other reasonable and probable explanation of ,persephone seems possible4 ,and if the daughter goddess was a personification of the young corn of the present year1 may not the mother goddess be a personification of the old corn of last year1 which has given birth to the new crops8 ,the only alternative to this view of ,demeter would seem to be to suppose that she is a personification of the earth1 from whose broad bosom the corn and all other plants spring up1 and of which accordingly they may appropriately enough be regarded as the daughters4 ,this view of the original nature of ,demeter has indeed been taken by some writers1 both ancient and modern1 and it is one which can be reasonably maintained4 ,but it appears to have been rejected by the author of the ,homeric hymn to ,demeter1 for he not only distinguishes ,demeter from the personified ,earth but places the two in the sharpest opposition to each other4 ,he tells us that it was ,earth who1 in accordance with the will of ,zeus and to please ,pluto1 lured ,persephone to her doom by causing the narcissuses to grow which tempted the young goddess to stray far beyond the reach of help in the lush meadow4 ,thus ,demeter of the hymn1 far from being identical with the ,earth-goddess1 must have regarded that divinity as her worst enemy1 since it was to her insidious wiles that she owed the loss of her daughter4 ,but if the ,demeter of the hymn cannot have been a personification of the earth1 the only alternative apparently is to conclude that she was a personification of the corn4 ,the conclusion is confirmed by the monuments2 for in ancient art ,demeter and ,persephone are alike characterised as goddesses of the corn by the crowns of corn which they wear on their heads and by the stalks of corn which they hold in their hands4 ,again1 it was ,demeter who first revealed to the ,athenians the secret of the corn and diffused the beneficent discovery far and wide through the agency of ,triptolemus1 whom she sent forth as an itinerant missionary to communicate the boon to all mankind4 ,on monuments of art1 especially in vase-paintings1 he is constantly represented along with ,demeter in this capacity1 holding corn-stalks in his hand and sitting in his car1 which is sometimes winged and sometimes drawn by dragons1 and from which he is said to have sowed the seed down on the whole world as he sped through the air4 ,in gratitude for the priceless boon many ,greek cities long continued to send the first-fruits of their barley and wheat harvests as thank-offerings to the ,two ,goddesses1 ,demeter and ,persephone1 at ,eleusis1 where subterranean granaries were built to store the overflowing contributions4 ,theocritus tells how in the island of ,cos1 in the sweet-scented summer time1 the farmer brought the first-fruits of the harvest to ,demeter who had filled his threshingfloor with barley1 and whose rustic image held sheaves and poppies in her hands4 ,many of the epithets bestowed by the ancients on ,demeter mark her intimate association with the corn in the clearest manner4 ,how deeply implanted in the mind of the ancient ,greeks was this faith in ,demeter as goddess of the corn may be judged by the circumstance that the faith actually persisted among their ,christian descendants at her old sanctuary of ,eleusis down to the beginning of the nineteenth century4 ,for when the ,english traveller ,dodwell revisited ,eleusis1 the inhabitants lamented to him the loss of a colossal image of ,demeter1 which was carried off by ,clarke in #ahjb and presented to the ,university of ,cambridge1 where it still remains4 ,in my first journey to ,greece1 says ,dodwell1 this protecting deity was in its full glory1 situated in the centre of a threshing-floor1 amongst the ruins of her temple4 ,the villagers were impressed with a persuasion that their rich harvests were the effect of her bounty1 and since her removal1 their abundance1 as they assured me1 has disappeared4 ,thus we see the ,corn ,goddess ,demeter standing on the threshing-floor of ,eleusis and dispensing corn to her worshippers in the nineteenth century of the ,christian era1 precisely as her image stood and dispensed corn to her worshippers on the threshing-floor of ,cos in the days of ,theocritus4 ,and just as the people of ,eleusis in the nineteenth century attributed the diminution of their harvests to the loss of the image of ,demeter1 so in antiquity the ,sicilians1 a corn-growing people devoted to the worship of the two ,corn ,goddesses1 lamented that the crops of many towns had perished because the unscrupulous ,roman governor ,verres had impiously carried off the image of ,demeter from her famous temple at ,henna4 ,could we ask for a clearer proof that ,demeter was indeed the goddess of the corn than this belief1 held by the ,greeks down to modern times1 that the corn-crops depended on her presence and bounty and perished when her image was removed8 ,on the whole1 then1 if1 ignoring theories1 we adhere to the evidence of the ancients themselves in regard to the rites of ,eleusis1 we shall probably incline to agree with the most learned of ancient antiquaries1 the ,roman ,varro1 who1 to quote ,augustine's report of his opinion1 interpreted the whole of the ,eleusinian mysteries as relating to the corn which ,ceres 7,demeter7 had discovered1 and to ,proserpine 7,persephone71 whom ,pluto had carried off from her4 ,and ,proserpine herself he said1 signifies the fecundity of the seeds1 the failure of which at a certain time had caused the earth to mourn for barrenness1 and therefore had given rise to the opinion that the daughter of ,ceres1 that is1 fecundity itself1 had been ravished by ,pluto and detained in the nether world2 and when the dearth had been publicly mourned and fecundity had returned once more1 there was gladness at the return of ,proserpine and solemn rites were instituted accordingly4 ,after that he says1 continues ,augustine1 reporting ,varro1 that many things were taught in her mysteries which had no reference but to the discovery of the corn4 ,thus far ,i have for the most part assumed an identity of nature between ,demeter and ,persephone1 the divine mother and daughter personifying the corn in its double aspect of the seed-corn of last year and the ripe ears of this1 and this view of the substantial unity of mother and daughter is borne out by their portraits in ,greek art1 which are often so alike as to be indistinguishable4 ,such a close resemblance between the artistic types of ,demeter and ,persephone militates decidedly against the view that the two goddesses are mythical embodiments of two things so different and so easily distinguishable from each other as the earth and the vegetation which springs from it4 ,had ,greek artists accepted that view of ,demeter and ,persephone1 they could surely have devised types of them which would have brought out the deep distinction between the goddesses4 ,and if ,demeter did not personify the earth1 can there be any reasonable doubt that1 like her daughter1 she personified the corn which was so commonly called by her name from the time of ,homer downwards8 ,the essential identity of mother and daughter is suggested1 not only by the close resemblance of their artistic types1 but also by the official title of the ,two ,goddesses which was regularly applied to them in the great sanctuary at ,eleusis without any specification of their individual attributes and titles1 as if their separate individualities had almost merged in a single divine substance4 ,surveying the evidence as a whole1 we are fairly entitled to conclude that in the mind of the ordinary ,greek the two goddesses were essentially personifications of the corn1 and that in this germ the whole efflorescence of their religion finds implicitly its explanation4 ,but to maintain this is not to deny that in the long course of religious evolution high moral and spiritual conceptions were grafted on this simple original stock and blossomed out into fairer flowers than the bloom of the barley and the wheat4 ,above all1 the thought of the seed buried in the earth in order to spring up to new and higher life readily suggested a comparison with human destiny1 and strengthened the hope that for man too the grave may be but the beginning of a better and happier existence in some brighter world unknown4 ,this simple and natural reflection seems perfectly sufficient to explain the association of the ,corn ,goddess at ,eleusis with the mystery of death and the hope of a blissful immortality4 ,for that the ancients regarded initiation in the ,eleusinian mysteries as a key to unlock the gates of ,paradise appears to be proved by the allusions which well-informed writers among them drop to the happiness in store for the initiated hereafter4 ,no doubt it is easy for us to discern the flimsiness of the logical foundation on which such high hopes were built4 ,but drowning men clutch at straws1 and we need not wonder that the ,greeks1 like ourselves1 with death before them and a great love of life in their hearts1 should not have stopped to weigh with too nice a hand the arguments that told for and against the prospect of human immortality4 ,the reasoning that satisfied ,saint ,paul and has brought comfort to untold thousands of sorrowing ,christians1 standing by the deathbed or the open grave of their loved ones1 was good enough to pass muster with ancient pagans1 when they too bowed their heads under the burden of grief1 and1 with the taper of life burning low in the socket1 looked forward into the darkness of the unknown4 ,therefore we do no indignity to the myth of ,demeter and ,persephone--one of the few myths in which the sunshine and clarity of the ,greek genius are crossed by the shadow and mystery of death--when we trace its origin to some of the most familiar1 yet eternally affecting aspects of nature1 to the melancholy gloom and decay of autumn and to the freshness1 the brightness1 and the verdure of spring4 ,,xlv4 ,the ,corn-,mother and the ,corn-,maiden in ,northern ,europe ,,it has been argued by ,w4 ,mannhardt that the first part of ,demeter's name is derived from an alleged ,cretan word deai1 barley1 and that accordingly ,demeter means neither more nor less than ,barley-mother or ,corn-mother2 for the root of the word seems to have been applied to different kinds of grain by different branches of the ,aryans4 ,as ,crete appears to have been one of the most ancient seats of the worship of ,demeter1 it would not be surprising if her name were of ,cretan origin4 ,but the etymology is open to serious objections1 and it is safer therefore to lay no stress on it4 ,be that as it may1 we have found independent reasons for identifying ,demeter as the ,corn-mother1 and of the two species of corn associated with her in ,greek religion1 namely barley and wheat1 the barley has perhaps the better claim to be her original element2 for not only would it seem to have been the staple food of the ,greeks in the ,homeric age1 but there are grounds for believing that it is one of the oldest1 if not the very oldest1 cereal cultivated by the ,aryan race4 ,certainly the use of barley in the religious ritual of the ancient ,hindoos as well as of the ancient ,greeks furnishes a strong argument in favour of the great antiquity of its cultivation1 which is known to have been practised by the lake-dwellers of the ,stone ,age in ,europe4 ,analogies to the ,corn-mother or ,barley-mother of ancient ,greece have been collected in great abundance by ,w4 ,mannhardt from the folk-lore of modern ,europe4 ,the following may serve as specimens4 ,in ,germany the corn is very commonly personified under the name of the ,corn-mother4 ,thus in spring1 when the corn waves in the wind1 the peasants say1 ,there comes the ,corn-mother1 or ,the ,corn-mother is running over the field1 or ,the ,corn-mother is going through the corn4 ,when children wish to go into the fields to pull the blue corn-flowers or the red poppies1 they are told not to do so1 because the ,corn-mother is sitting in the corn and will catch them4 ,or again she is called1 according to the crop1 the ,rye-mother or the ,pea-mother1 and children are warned against straying in the rye or among the peas by threats of the ,rye-mother or the ,pea-mother4 ,again the ,corn-mother is believed to make the crop grow4 ,thus in the neighbourhood of ,magdeburg it is sometimes said1 ,it will be a good year for flax2 the ,flax-mother has been seen4 ,in a village of ,styria it is said that the ,corn-mother1 in the shape of a female puppet made out of the last sheaf of corn and dressed in white1 may be seen at mid-night in the corn-fields1 which she fertilises by passing through them2 but if she is angry with a farmer1 she withers up all his corn4 ,further1 the ,corn-mother plays an important part in harvest customs4 ,she is believed to be present in the handful of corn which is left standing last on the field2 and with the cutting of this last handful she is caught1 or driven away1 or killed4 ,in the first of these cases1 the last sheaf is carried joyfully home and honoured as a divine being4 ,it is placed in the barn1 and at threshing the corn-spirit appears again4 ,in the ,hanoverian district of ,hadeln the reapers stand round the last sheaf and beat it with sticks in order to drive the ,corn-mother out of it4 ,they call to each other1 ,there she is6 hit her6 ,take care she doesn't catch you6 ,the beating goes on till the grain is completely threshed out2 then the ,corn-mother is believed to be driven away4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,danzig the person who cuts the last ears of corn makes them into a doll1 which is called the ,corn-mother or the ,old ,woman and is brought home on the last waggon4 ,in some parts of ,holstein the last sheaf is dressed in woman's clothes and called the ,corn-mother4 ,it is carried home on the last waggon1 and then thoroughly drenched with water4 ,the drenching with water is doubtless a rain-charm4 ,in the district of ,bruck in ,styria the last sheaf1 called the ,corn-mother1 is made up into the shape of a woman by the oldest married woman in the village1 of an age from fifty to fifty-five years4 ,the finest ears are plucked out of it and made into a wreath1 which1 twined with flowers1 is carried on her head by the prettiest girl of the village to the farmer or squire1 while the ,corn-mother is laid down in the barn to keep off the mice4 ,in other villages of the same district the ,corn-mother1 at the close of harvest1 is carried by two lads at the top of a pole4 ,they march behind the girl who wears the wreath to the squire's house1 and while he receives the wreath and hangs it up in the hall1 the ,corn-mother is placed on the top of a pile of wood1 where she is the centre of the harvest supper and dance4 ,afterwards she is hung up in the barn and remains there till the threshing is over4 ,the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is called the son of the ,corn-mother2 he is tied up in the ,corn-mother1 beaten1 and carried through the village4 ,the wreath is dedicated in church on the following ,sunday2 and on ,easter ,eve the grain is rubbed out of it by a seven-year-old girl and scattered amongst the young corn4 ,at ,christmas the straw of the wreath is placed in the manger to make the cattle thrive4 ,here the fertilising power of the ,corn-mother is plainly brought out by scattering the seed taken from her body 7for the wreath is made out of the ,corn-mother7 among the new corn2 and her influence over animal life is indicated by placing the straw in the manger4 ,amongst the ,slavs also the last sheaf is known as the ,rye-mother1 the ,wheat-mother1 the ,oats-mother1 the ,barley-mother1 and so on1 according to the crop4 ,in the district of ,tarnow1 ,galicia1 the wreath made out of the last stalks is called the ,wheat-mother1 ,rye-mother1 or ,pea-mother4 ,it is placed on a girl's head and kept till spring1 when some of the grain is mixed with the seed-corn4 ,here again the fertilising power of the ,corn-mother is indicated4 ,in ,france1 also1 in the neighbourhood of ,auxerre1 the last sheaf goes by the name of the ,mother of the ,wheat1 ,mother of the ,barley1 ,mother of the ,rye1 or ,mother of the ,oats4 ,they leave it standing in the field till the last waggon is about to wend homewards4 ,then they make a puppet out of it1 dress it with clothes belonging to the farmer1 and adorn it with a crown and a blue or white scarf4 ,a branch of a tree is stuck in the breast of the puppet1 which is now called the ,ceres4 ,at the dance in the evening the ,ceres is set in the middle of the floor1 and the reaper who reaped fastest dances round it with the prettiest girl for his partner4 ,after the dance a pyre is made4 ,all the girls1 each wearing a wreath1 strip the puppet1 pull it to pieces1 and place it on the pyre1 along with the flowers with which it was adorned4 ,then the girl who was the first to finish reaping sets fire to the pile1 and all pray that ,ceres may give a fruitful year4 ,here1 as ,mannhardt observes1 the old custom has remained intact1 though the name ,ceres is a bit of schoolmaster's learning4 ,in ,upper ,brittany the last sheaf is always made into human shape2 but if the farmer is a married man1 it is made double and consists of a little corn-puppet placed inside of a large one4 ,this is called the ,mother-sheaf4 ,it is delivered to the farmer's wife1 who unties it and gives drink-money in return4 ,sometimes the last sheaf is called1 not the ,corn-mother1 but the ,harvest-mother or the ,great ,mother4 ,in the province of ,osnabrck1 ,hanover1 it is called the ,harvest-mother2 it is made up in female form1 and then the reapers dance about with it4 ,in some parts of ,westphalia the last sheaf at the rye-harvest is made especially heavy by fastening stones in it4 ,they bring it home on the last waggon and call it the ,great ,mother1 though they do not fashion it into any special shape4 ,in the district of ,erfurt a very heavy sheaf1 not necessarily the last1 is called the ,great ,mother1 and is carried on the last waggon to the barn1 where all hands lift it down amid a fire of jokes4 ,sometimes again the last sheaf is called the ,grandmother1 and is adorned with flowers1 ribbons1 and a woman's apron4 ,in ,east ,prussia1 at the rye or wheat harvest1 the reapers call out to the woman who binds the last sheaf1 ,you are getting the ,old ,grandmother4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,magdeburg the men and women servants strive who shall get the last sheaf1 called the ,grandmother4 ,whoever gets it will be married in the next year1 but his or her spouse will be old2 if a girl gets it1 she will marry a widower2 if a man gets it1 he will marry an old crone4 ,in ,silesia the ,grandmother--a huge bundle made up of three or four sheaves by the person who tied the last sheaf--was formerly fashioned into a rude likeness of the human form4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,belfast the last sheaf sometimes goes by the name of the ,granny4 ,it is not cut in the usual way1 but all the reapers throw their sickles at it and try to bring it down4 ,it is plaited and kept till the 7next87 autumn4 ,whoever gets it will marry in the course of the year4 ,often the last sheaf is called the ,old ,woman or the ,old ,man4 ,in ,germany it is frequently shaped and dressed as a woman1 and the person who cuts it or binds it is said to get the ,old ,woman4 ,at ,altisheim1 in ,swabia1 when all the corn of a farm has been cut except a single strip1 all the reapers stand in a row before the strip2 each cuts his share rapidly1 and he who gives the last cut has the ,old ,woman4 ,when the sheaves are being set up in heaps1 the person who gets hold of the ,old ,woman1 which is the largest and thickest of all the sheaves1 is jeered at by the rest1 who call out to him1 ,he has the ,old ,woman and must keep her4 ,the woman who binds the last sheaf is sometimes herself called the ,old ,woman1 and it is said that she will be married in the next year4 ,in ,neusaass1 ,west ,prussia1 both the last sheaf--which is dressed up in jacket1 hat1 and ribbons--and the woman who binds it are called the ,old ,woman4 ,together they are brought home on the last waggon and are drenched with water4 ,in various parts of ,north ,germany the last sheaf at harvest is made up into a human effigy and called the ,old ,man2 and the woman who bound it is said to have the ,old ,man4 ,in ,west ,prussia1 when the last rye is being raked together1 the women and girls hurry with the work1 for none of them likes to be the last and to get the ,old ,man1 that is1 a puppet made out of the last sheaf1 which must be carried before the other reapers by the person who was the last to finish4 ,in ,silesia the last sheaf is called the ,old ,woman or the ,old ,man and is the theme of many jests2 it is made unusually large and is sometimes weighted with a stone4 ,among the ,wends the man or woman who binds the last sheaf at wheat harvest is said to have the ,old ,man4 ,a puppet is made out of the wheaten straw and ears in the likeness of a man and decked with flowers4 ,the person who bound the last sheaf must carry the ,old ,man home1 while the rest laugh and jeer at him4 ,the puppet is hung up in the farmhouse and remains till a new ,old ,man is made at the next harvest4 ,in some of these customs1 as ,mannhardt has remarked1 the person who is called by the same name as the last sheaf and sits beside it on the last waggon is obviously identified with it2 he or she represents the corn-spirit which has been caught in the last sheaf2 in other words1 the corn-spirit is represented in duplicate1 by a human being and by a sheaf4 ,the identification of the person with the sheaf is made still clearer by the custom of wrapping up in the last sheaf the person who cuts or binds it4 ,thus at ,hermsdorf in ,silesia it used to be the regular practice to tie up in the last sheaf the woman who had bound it4 ,at ,weiden1 in ,bavaria1 it is the cutter1 not the binder1 of the last sheaf who is tied up in it4 ,here the person wrapt up in the corn represents the corn-spirit1 exactly as a person wrapt in branches or leaves represents the tree-spirit4 ,the last sheaf1 designated as the ,old ,woman1 is often distinguished from the other sheaves by its size and weight4 ,thus in some villages of ,west ,prussia the ,old ,woman is made twice as long and thick as a common sheaf1 and a stone is fastened in the middle of it4 ,sometimes it is made so heavy that a man can barely lift it4 ,at ,alt-,pillau1 in ,samland1 eight or nine sheaves are often tied together to make the ,old ,woman1 and the man who sets it up grumbles at its weight4 ,at ,itzgrund1 in ,saxe-,coburg1 the last sheaf1 called the ,old ,woman1 is made large with the express intention of thereby securing a good crop next year4 ,thus the custom of making the last sheaf unusually large or heavy is a charm1 working by sympathetic magic1 to ensure a large and heavy crop at the following harvest4 ,in ,scotland1 when the last corn was cut after ,hallowmas1 the female figure made out of it was sometimes called the ,carlin or ,carline1 that is1 the ,old ,woman4 ,but if cut before ,hallowmas1 it was called the ,maiden2 if cut after sunset1 it was called the ,witch1 being supposed to bring bad luck4 ,among the ,highlanders of ,scotland the last corn cut at harvest is known either as the ,old ,wife 7,cailleach7 or as the ,maiden2 on the whole the former name seems to prevail in the western and the latter in the central and eastern districts4 ,of the ,maiden we shall speak presently2 here we are dealing with the ,old ,wife4 ,the following general account of the custom is given by a careful and well-informed enquirer1 the ,rev4 ,j4 ,g4 ,campbell1 minister of the remote ,hebridean island of ,tiree3 ,the ,harvest ,old ,wife 7a ,cailleach74--,in harvest1 there was a struggle to escape from being the last done with the shearing1 and when tillage in common existed1 instances were known of a ridge being left unshorn 7no person would claim it7 because of it being behind the rest4 ,the fear entertained was that of having the 'famine of the farm' 7gort a bhaile71 in the shape of an imaginary old woman 7cailleach71 to feed till next harvest4 ,much emulation and amusement arose from the fear of this old woman4 4 4 4 ,the first done made a doll of some blades of corn1 which was called the 'old wife1' and sent it to his nearest neighbour4 ,he in turn1 when ready1 passed it to another still less expeditious1 and the person it last remained with had 'the old woman' to keep for that year4 ,in the island of ,islay the last corn cut goes by the name of the ,old ,wife 7,cailleach71 and when she has done her duty at harvest she is hung up on the wall and stays there till the time comes to plough the fields for the next year's crop4 ,then she is taken down1 and on the first day when the men go to plough she is divided among them by the mistress of the house4 ,they take her in their pockets and give her to the horses to eat when they reach the field4 ,this is supposed to secure good luck for the next harvest1 and is understood to be the proper end of the ,old ,wife4 ,usages of the same sort are reported from ,wales4 ,thus in ,north ,pembrokeshire a tuft of the last corn cut1 from six to twelve inches long1 is plaited and goes by the name of the ,hag 7wrach72 and quaint old customs used to be practised with it within the memory of many persons still alive4 ,great was the excitement among the reapers when the last patch of standing corn was reached4 ,all in turn threw their sickles at it1 and the one who succeeded in cutting it received a jug of home-brewed ale4 ,the ,hag 7wrach7 was then hurriedly made and taken to a neighbouring farm1 where the reapers were still busy at their work4 ,this was generally done by the ploughman2 but he had to be very careful not to be observed by his neighbours1 for if they saw him coming and had the least suspicion of his errand they would soon make him retrace his steps4 ,creeping stealthily up behind a fence he waited till the foreman of his neighbour's reapers was just opposite him and within easy reach4 ,then he suddenly threw the ,hag over the fence and1 if possible1 upon the foreman's sickle4 ,on that he took to his heels and made off as fast as he could run1 and he was a lucky man if he escaped without being caught or cut by the flying sickles which the infuriated reapers hurled after him4 ,in other cases the ,hag was brought home to the farmhouse by one of the reapers4 ,he did his best to bring it home dry and without being observed2 but he was apt to be roughly handled by the people of the house1 if they suspected his errand4 ,sometimes they stripped him of most of his clothes1 sometimes they would drench him with water which had been carefully stored in buckets and pans for the purpose4 ,if1 however1 he succeeded in bringing the ,hag in dry and unobserved1 the master of the house had to pay him a small fine2 or sometimes a jug of beer from the cask next to the wall1 which seems to have commonly held the best beer1 would be demanded by the bearer4 ,the ,hag was then carefully hung on a nail in the hall or elsewhere and kept there all the year4 ,the custom of bringing in the ,hag 7wrach7 into the house and hanging it up still exists in some farms of ,north ,pembrokeshire1 but the ancient ceremonies which have just been described are now discontinued4 ,in ,county ,antrim1 down to some years ago1 when the sickle was finally expelled by the reaping machine1 the few stalks of corn left standing last on the field were plaited together2 then the reapers1 blindfolded1 threw their sickles at the plaited corn1 and whoever happened to cut it through took it home with him and put it over his door4 ,this bunch of corn was called the ,carley--probably the same word as ,carlin4 ,similar customs are observed by ,slavonic peoples4 ,thus in ,poland the last sheaf is commonly called the ,baba1 that is1 the ,old ,woman4 ,in the last sheaf1 it is said1 sits the ,baba4 ,the sheaf itself is also called the ,baba1 and is sometimes composed of twelve smaller sheaves lashed together4 ,in some parts of ,bohemia the ,baba1 made out of the last sheaf1 has the figure of a woman with a great straw hat4 ,it is carried home on the last harvest-waggon and delivered1 along with a garland1 to the farmer by two girls4 ,in binding the sheaves the women strive not to be last1 for she who binds the last sheaf will have a child next year4 ,sometimes the harvesters call out to the woman who binds the last sheaf1 ,she has the ,baba1 or ,she is the ,baba4 ,in the district of ,cracow1 when a man binds the last sheaf1 they say1 ,the ,grandfather is sitting in it2 when a woman binds it1 they say1 ,the ,baba is sitting in it1 and the woman herself is wrapt up in the sheaf1 so that only her head projects out of it4 ,thus encased in the sheaf1 she is carried on the last harvest-waggon to the house1 where she is drenched with water by the whole family4 ,she remains in the sheaf till the dance is over1 and for a year she retains the name of ,baba4 ,in ,lithuania the name for the last sheaf is ,boba 7,old ,woman71 answering to the ,polish name ,baba4 ,the ,boba is said to sit in the corn which is left standing last4 ,the person who binds the last sheaf or digs the last potato is the subject of much banter1 and receives and long retains the name of the ,old ,rye-woman or the ,old ,potato-woman4 ,the last sheaf--the ,boba--is made into the form of a woman1 carried solemnly through the village on the last harvest-waggon1 and drenched with water at the farmer's house2 then every one dances with it4 ,in ,russia also the last sheaf is often shaped and dressed as a woman1 and carried with dance and song to the farmhouse4 ,out of the last sheaf the ,bulgarians make a doll which they call the ,corn-queen or ,corn-mother2 it is dressed in a woman's shirt1 carried round the village1 and then thrown into the river in order to secure plenty of rain and dew for the next year's crop4 ,or it is burned and the ashes strew on the fields1 doubtless to fertilise them4 ,the name ,queen1 as applied to the last sheaf1 has its analogies in ,central and ,northern ,europe4 ,thus1 in the ,salzburg district of ,austria1 at the end of the harvest a great procession takes place1 in which a ,queen of the ,corn-ears 7hrenknigin7 is drawn along in a little carriage by young fellows4 ,the custom of the ,harvest ,queen appears to have been common in ,england4 ,milton must have been familiar with it1 for in ,paradise ,lost he says3 ,adam the while ,waiting desirous her return1 had wove ,of choicest flow'rs a garland to adorn ,her tresses1 and her rural labours crown1 ,as reapers oft are wont their harvest-queen4 ,often customs of this sort are practised1 not on the harvest-field but on the threshing-floor4 ,the spirit of the corn1 fleeing before the reapers as they cut down the ripe grain1 quits the reaped corn and takes refuge in the barn1 where it appears in the last sheaf threshed1 either to perish under the blows of the flail or to flee thence to the still unthreshed corn of a neighbouring farm4 ,thus the last corn to be threshed is called the ,mother-,corn or the ,old ,woman4 ,sometimes the person who gives the last stroke with the flail is called the ,old ,woman1 and is wrapt in the straw of the last sheaf1 or has a bundle of straw fastened on his back4 ,whether wrapt in the straw or carrying it on his back1 he is carted through the village amid general laughter4 ,in some districts of ,bavaria1 ,thringen1 and elsewhere1 the man who threshes the last sheaf is said to have the ,old ,woman or the ,old ,corn-woman2 he is tied up in straw1 carried or carted about the village1 and set down at last on the dunghill1 or taken to the threshing-floor of a neighbouring farmer who has not finished his threshing4 ,in ,poland the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is called ,baba 7,old ,woman72 he is wrapt in corn and wheeled through the village4 ,sometimes in ,lithuania the last sheaf is not threshed1 but is fashioned into female shape and carried to the barn of a neighbour who has not finished his threshing4 ,in some parts of ,sweden1 when a stranger woman appears on the threshing-floor1 a flail is put round her body1 stalks of corn are wound round her neck1 a crown of ears is placed on her head1 and the threshers call out1 ,behold the ,corn-woman4 ,here the stranger woman1 thus suddenly appearing1 is taken to be the corn-spirit who has just been expelled by the flails from the corn-stalks4 ,in other cases the farmer's wife represents the corn-spirit4 ,thus in the ,commune of ,salign 7,vende71 the farmer's wife1 along with the last sheaf1 is tied up in a sheet1 placed on a litter1 and carried to the threshing machine1 under which she is shoved4 ,then the woman is drawn out and the sheaf is threshed by itself1 but the woman is tossed in the sheet1 as if she were being winnowed4 ,it would be impossible to express more clearly the identification of the woman with the corn than by this graphic imitation of threshing and winnowing her4 ,in these customs the spirit of the ripe corn is regarded as old1 or at least as of mature age4 ,hence the names of ,mother1 ,grandmother1 ,old ,woman1 and so forth4 ,but in other cases the corn-spirit is conceived as young4 ,thus at ,saldern1 near ,wolfenbuttel1 when the rye has been reaped1 three sheaves are tied together with a rope so as to make a puppet with the corn ears for a head4 ,this puppet is called the ,maiden or the ,corn-maiden4 ,sometimes the corn-spirit is conceived as a child who is separated from its mother by the stroke of the sickle4 ,this last view appears in the ,polish custom of calling out to the man who cuts the last handful of corn1 ,you have cut the navel-string4 ,in some districts of ,west ,prussia the figure made out of the last sheaf is called the ,bastard1 and a boy is wrapt up in it4 ,the woman who binds the last sheaf and represents the ,corn-mother is told that she is about to be brought to bed2 she cries like a woman in travail1 and an old woman in the character of grandmother acts as midwife4 ,at last a cry is raised that the child is born2 whereupon the boy who is tied up in the sheaf whimpers and squalls like an infant4 ,the grandmother wraps a sack1 in imitation of swaddling bands1 round the pretended baby1 who is carried joyfully to the barn1 lest he should catch cold in the open air4 ,in other parts of ,north ,germany the last sheaf1 or the puppet made out of it1 is called the ,child1 the ,harvest-,child1 and so on1 and they call out to the woman who binds the last sheaf1 you are getting the child4 ,in some parts of ,scotland1 as well as in the north of ,england1 the last handful of corn cut on the harvest-field was called the kirn1 and the person who carried it off was said to win the kirn4 ,it was then dressed up like a child's doll and went by the name of the kirn-baby1 the kirn-doll1 or the ,maiden4 ,in ,berwickshire down to about the middle of the nineteenth century there was an eager competition among the reapers to cut the last bunch of standing corn4 ,they gathered round it at a little distance and threw their sickles in turn at it1 and the man who succeeded in cutting it through gave it to the girl he preferred4 ,she made the corn so cut into a kirn-dolly and dressed it1 and the doll was then taken to the farmhouse and hung up there till the next harvest1 when its place was taken by the new kirn-dolly4 ,at ,spottiswoode in ,berwickshire the reaping of the last corn at harvest was called cutting the ,queen almost as often as cutting the kirn4 ,the mode of cutting it was not by throwing sickles4 ,one of the reapers consented to be blindfolded1 and having been given a sickle in his hand and turned twice or thrice about by his fellows1 he was bidden to go and cut the kirn4 ,his groping about and making wild strokes in the air with his sickle excited much hilarity4 ,when he had tired himself out in vain and given up the task as hopeless1 another reaper was blindfolded and pursued the quest1 and so on1 one after the other1 till at last the kirn was cut4 ,the successful reaper was tossed up in the air with three cheers by his brother harvesters4 ,to decorate the room in which the kirn-supper was held at ,spottiswoode as well as the granary1 where the dancing took place1 two women made kirn-dollies or ,queens every year2 and many of these rustic effigies of the corn-spirit might be seen hanging up together4 ,in some parts of the ,highlands of ,scotland the last handful of corn that is cut by the reapers on any particular farm is called the ,maiden1 or in ,gaelic ,maidhdeanbuain1 literally1 the shorn ,maiden4 ,superstitions attach to the winning of the ,maiden4 ,if it is got by a young person1 they think it an omen that he or she will be married before another harvest4 ,for that or other reasons there is a strife between the reapers as to who shall get the ,maiden1 and they resort to various stratagems for the purpose of securing it4 ,one of them1 for example1 will often leave a handful of corn uncut and cover it up with earth to hide it from the other reapers1 till all the rest of the corn on the field is cut down4 ,several may try to play the same trick1 and the one who is coolest and holds out longest obtains the coveted distinction4 ,when it has been cut1 the ,maiden is dressed with ribbons into a sort of doll and affixed to a wall of the farmhouse4 ,in the north of ,scotland the ,maiden is carefully preserved till ,yule morning1 when it is divided among the cattle to make them thrive all the year round4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,balquhidder1 ,perthshire1 the last handful of corn is cut by the youngest girl on the field1 and is made into the rude form of a female doll1 clad in a paper dress1 and decked with ribbons4 ,it is called the ,maiden1 and is kept in the farmhouse1 generally above the chimney1 for a good while1 sometimes till the ,maiden of the next year is brought in4 ,the writer of this book witnessed the ceremony of cutting the ,maiden at ,balquhidder in ,september #ahhh4 ,a lady friend informed me that as a young girl she cut the ,maiden several times at the request of the reapers in the neighbourhood of ,perth4 ,the name of the ,maiden was given to the last handful of standing corn2 a reaper held the top of the bunch while she cut it4 ,afterwards the bunch was plaited1 decked with ribbons1 and hung up in a conspicuous place on the wall of the kitchen till the next ,maiden was brought in4 ,the harvest-supper in this neighbourhood was also called the ,maiden2 the reapers danced at it4 ,on some farms on the ,gareloch1 in ,dumbartonshire1 about the year #ahcj1 the last handful of standing corn was called the ,maiden4 ,it was divided in two1 plaited1 and then cut with the sickle by a girl1 who1 it was thought1 would be lucky and would soon be married4 ,when it was cut the reapers gathered together and threw their sickles in the air4 ,the ,maiden was dressed with ribbons and hung in the kitchen near the roof1 where it was kept for several years with the date attached4 ,sometimes five or six ,maidens might be seen hanging at once on hooks4 ,the harvest-supper was called the ,kirn4 ,in other farms on the ,gareloch the last handful of corn was called the ,maidenhead or the ,head2 it was neatly plaited1 sometimes decked with ribbons1 and hung in the kitchen for a year1 when the grain was given to the poultry4 ,in ,aberdeenshire the last sheaf cut1 or ',maiden1' is carried home in merry procession by the harvesters4 ,it is then presented to the mistress of the house1 who dresses it up to be preserved till the first mare foals4 ,the ,maiden is then taken down and presented to the mare as its first food4 ,the neglect of this would have untoward effects upon the foal1 and disastrous consequences upon farm operations generally for the season4 ,in the north-east of ,aberdeenshire the last sheaf is commonly called the clyack sheaf4 ,it used to be cut by the youngest girl present and was dressed as a woman4 ,being brought home in triumph1 it was kept till ,christmas morning1 and then given to a mare in foal1 if there was one on the farm1 or1 if there was not1 to the oldest cow in calf4 ,elsewhere the sheaf was divided between all the cows and their calves or between all the horses and the cattle of the farm4 ,in ,fifeshire the last handful of corn1 known as the ,maiden1 is cut by a young girl and made into the rude figure of a doll1 tied with ribbons1 by which it is hung on the wall of the farm-kitchen till the next spring4 ,the custom of cutting the ,maiden at harvest was also observed in ,inverness-shire and ,sutherlandshire4 ,a somewhat maturer but still youthful age is assigned to the corn-spirit by the appellations of ,bride1 ,oats-bride1 and ,wheat-bride1 which in ,germany are sometimes bestowed both on the last sheaf and on the woman who binds it4 ,at wheat-harvest near ,mglitz1 in ,moravia1 a small portion of the wheat is left standing after all the rest has been reaped4 ,this remnant is then cut1 amid the rejoicing of the reapers1 by a young girl who wears a wreath of wheaten ears on her head and goes by the name of the ,wheat-bride4 ,it is supposed that she will be a real bride that same year4 ,near ,roslin and ,stonehaven1 in ,scotland1 the last handful of corn cut got the name of 'the bride1' and she was placed over the bress or chimney-piece2 she had a ribbon tied below her numerous ears1 and another round her waist4 ,sometimes the idea implied by the name of ,bride is worked out more fully by representing the productive powers of vegetation as bride and bridegroom4 ,thus in the ,vorharz an ,oats-man and an ,oats-woman1 swathed in straw1 dance at the harvest feast4 ,in ,south ,saxony an ,oats-bridegroom and an ,oats-bride figure together at the harvest celebration4 ,the ,oats-bridegroom is a man completely wrapt in oats-straw2 the ,oats-bride is a man dressed in woman's clothes1 but not wrapt in straw4 ,they are drawn in a waggon to the ale-house1 where the dance takes place4 ,at the beginning of the dance the dancers pluck the bunches of oats one by one from the ,oats-bridegroom1 while he struggles to keep them1 till at last he is completely stript of them and stands bare1 exposed to the laughter and jests of the company4 ,in ,austrian ,silesia the ceremony of the ,wheat-bride is celebrated by the young people at the end of the harvest4 ,the woman who bound the last sheaf plays the part of the ,wheat-bride1 wearing the harvest-crown of wheat ears and flowers on her head4 ,thus adorned1 standing beside her ,bridegroom in a waggon and attended by bridesmaids1 she is drawn by a pair of oxen1 in full imitation of a marriage procession1 to the tavern1 where the dancing is kept up till morning4 ,somewhat later in the season the wedding of the ,oats-bride is celebrated with the like rustic pomp4 ,about ,neisse1 in ,silesia1 an ,oats-king and an ,oats-queen1 dressed up quaintly as a bridal pair1 are seated on a harrow and drawn by oxen into the village4 ,in these last instances the corn-spirit is personified in double form as male and female4 ,but sometimes the spirit appears in a double female form as both old and young1 corresponding exactly to the ,greek ,demeter and ,persephone1 if my interpretation of these goddesses is right4 ,we have seen that in ,scotland1 especially among the ,gaelic-speaking population1 the last corn cut is sometimes called the ,old ,wife and sometimes the ,maiden4 ,now there are parts of ,scotland in which both an ,old ,wife 7,cailleach7 and a ,maiden are cut at harvest4 ,the accounts of this custom are not quite clear and consistent1 but the general rule seems to be that1 where both a ,maiden and an ,old ,wife 7,cailleach7 are fashioned out of the reaped corn at harvest1 the ,maiden is made out of the last stalks left standing1 and is kept by the farmer on whose land it was cut2 while the ,old ,wife is made out of other stalks1 sometimes out of the first stalks cut1 and is regularly passed on to a laggard farmer who happens to be still reaping after his brisker neighbour has cut all his corn4 ,thus while each farmer keeps his own ,maiden1 as the embodiment of the young and fruitful spirit of the corn1 he passes on the ,old ,wife as soon as he can to a neighbour1 and so the old lady may make the round of all the farms in the district before she finds a place in which to lay her venerable head4 ,the farmer with whom she finally takes up her abode is of course the one who has been the last of all the countryside to finish reaping his crops1 and thus the distinction of entertaining her is rather an invidious one4 ,he is thought to be doomed to poverty or to be under the obligation of providing for the dearth of the township in the ensuing season4 ,similarly we saw that in ,pembrokeshire1 where the last corn cut is called1 not the ,maiden1 but the ,hag1 she is passed on hastily to a neighbour who is still at work in his fields and who receives his aged visitor with anything but a transport of joy4 ,if the ,old ,wife represents the corn-spirit of the past year1 as she probably does wherever she is contrasted with and opposed to a ,maiden1 it is natural enough that her faded charms should have less attractions for the husbandman than the buxom form of her daughter1 who may be expected to become in her turn the mother of the golden grain when the revolving year has brought round another autumn4 ,the same desire to get rid of the effete ,mother of the ,corn by palming her off on other people comes out clearly in some of the customs observed at the close of threshing1 particularly in the practice of passing on a hideous straw puppet to a neighbour farmer who is still threshing his corn4 ,the harvest customs just described are strikingly analogous to the spring customs which we reviewed in an earlier part of this work4 7#a7 ,as in the spring customs the tree-spirit is represented both by a tree and by a person1 so in the harvest customs the corn-spirit is represented both by the last sheaf and by the person who cuts or binds or threshes it4 ,the equivalence of the person to the sheaf is shown by giving him or her the same name as the sheaf2 by wrapping him or her in it2 and by the rule observed in some places1 that when the sheaf is called the ,mother1 it must be made up into human shape by the oldest married woman1 but that when it is called the ,maiden1 it must be cut by the youngest girl4 ,here the age of the personal representative of the corn-spirit corresponds with that of the supposed age of the corn-spirit1 just as the human victims offered by the ,mexicans to promote the growth of the maize varied with the age of the maize4 ,for in the ,mexican1 as in the ,european1 custom the human beings were probably representatives of the corn-spirit rather than victims offered to it4 7#b7 ,again the same fertilising influence which the tree-spirit is supposed to exert over vegetation1 cattle1 and even women is ascribed to the corn-spirit4 ,thus1 its supposed influence on vegetation is shown by the practice of taking some of the grain of the last sheaf 7in which the corn-spirit is regularly supposed to be present71 and scattering it among the young corn in spring or mixing it with the seed-corn4 ,its influence on animals is shown by giving the last sheaf to a mare in foal1 to a cow in calf1 and to horses at the first ploughing4 ,lastly1 its influence on women is indicated by the custom of delivering the ,mother-sheaf1 made into the likeness of a pregnant woman1 to the farmer's wife2 by the belief that the woman who binds the last sheaf will have a child next year2 perhaps1 too1 by the idea that the person who gets it will soon be married4 ,plainly1 therefore1 these spring and harvest customs are based on the same ancient modes of thought1 and form parts of the same primitive heathendom1 which was doubtless practised by our forefathers long before the dawn of history4 ,amongst the marks of a primitive ritual we may note the following3 #a4 ,no special class of persons is set apart for the performance of the rites2 in other words1 there are no priests4 ,the rites may be performed by any one1 as occasion demands4 #b4 ,no special places are set apart for the performance of the rites2 in other words1 there are no temples4 ,the rites may be performed anywhere1 as occasion demands4 #c4 ,spirits1 not gods1 are recognised4 7a7 ,as distinguished from gods1 spirits are restricted in their operations to definite departments of nature4 ,their names are general1 not proper4 ,their attributes are generic1 rather than individual2 in other words1 there is an indefinite number of spirits of each class1 and the individuals of a class are all much alike2 they have no definitely marked individuality2 no accepted traditions are current as to their origin1 life1 adventures1 and character4 7b7 ,on the other hand gods1 as distinguished from spirits1 are not restricted to definite departments of nature4 ,it is true that there is generally some one department over which they preside as their special province2 but they are not rigorously confined to it2 they can exert their power for good or evil in many other spheres of nature and life4 ,again1 they bear individual or proper names1 such as ,demeter1 ,persephone1 ,dionysus2 and their individual characters and histories are fixed by current myths and the representations of art4 #d4 ,the rites are magical rather than propitiatory4 ,in other words1 the desired objects are attained1 not by propitiating the favour of divine beings through sacrifice1 prayer1 and praise1 but by ceremonies which1 as ,i have already explained1 are believed to influence the course of nature directly through a physical sympathy or resemblance between the rite and the effect which it is the intention of the rite to produce4 ,judged by these tests1 the spring and harvest customs of our ,european peasantry deserve to rank as primitive4 ,for no special class of persons and no special places are set exclusively apart for their performance2 they may be performed by any one1 master or man1 mistress or maid1 boy or girl2 they are practised1 not in temples or churches1 but in the woods and meadows1 beside brooks1 in barns1 on harvest fields and cottage floors4 ,the supernatural beings whose existence is taken for granted in them are spirits rather than deities3 their functions are limited to certain well-defined departments of nature3 their names are general like the ,barley-mother1 the ,old ,woman1 the ,maiden1 not proper names like ,demeter1 ,persephone1 ,dionysus4 ,their generic attributes are known1 but their individual histories and characters are not the subject of myths4 ,for they exist in classes rather than as individuals1 and the members of each class are indistinguishable4 ,for example1 every farm has its ,corn-mother1 or its ,old ,woman1 or its ,maiden2 but every ,corn-mother is much like every other ,corn-mother1 and so with the ,old ,women and ,maidens4 ,lastly1 in these harvests1 as in the spring customs1 the ritual is magical rather than propitiatory4 ,this is shown by throwing the ,corn-mother into the river in order to secure rain and dew for the crops2 by making the ,old ,woman heavy in order to get a heavy crop next year2 by strewing grain from the last sheaf amongst the young crops in spring2 and by giving the last sheaf to the cattle to make them thrive4 ,,xlvi4 ,the ,corn-,mother in ,many ,lands #a4 ,the ,corn-mother in ,america ,,european peoples1 ancient and modern1 have not been singular in personifying the corn as a mother goddess4 ,the same simple idea has suggested itself to other agricultural races in distant parts of the world1 and has been applied by them to other indigenous cereals than barley and wheat4 ,if ,europe has its ,wheat-mother and its ,barley-mother1 ,america has its ,maize-mother and the ,east ,indies their ,rice-mother4 ,these personifications ,i will now illustrate1 beginning with the ,american personification of the maize4 ,we have seen that among ,european peoples it is a common custom to keep the plaited corn-stalks of the last sheaf1 or the puppet which is formed out of them1 in the farm-house from harvest to harvest4 ,the intention no doubt is1 or rather originally was1 by preserving the representative of the corn-spirit to maintain the spirit itself in life and activity throughout the year1 in order that the corn may grow and the crops be good4 ,this interpretation of the custom is at all events rendered highly probable by a similar custom observed by the ancient ,peruvians1 and thus described by the old ,spanish historian ,acosta3 ,they take a certain portion of the most fruitful of the maize that grows in their farms1 the which they put in a certain granary which they do call ,pirua1 with certain ceremonies1 watching three nights2 they put this maize in the richest garments they have1 and being thus wrapped and dressed1 they worship this ,pirua1 and hold it in great veneration1 saying it is the mother of the maize of their inheritances1 and that by this means the maize augments and is preserved4 ,in this month the sixth month1 answering to ,may they make a particular sacrifice1 and the witches demand of this ,pirua if it hath strength sufficient to continue until the next year2 and if it answers no1 then they carry this maize to the farm to burn1 whence they brought it1 according to every man's power2 then they make another ,pirua1 with the same ceremonies1 saying that they renew it1 to the end the seed of maize may not perish1 and if it answers that it hath force sufficient to last longer1 they leave it until the next year4 ,this foolish vanity continueth to this day1 and it is very common amongst the ,indians to have these ,piruas4 ,in this description of the custom there seems to be some error4 ,probably it was the dressed-up bunch of maize1 not the granary 7,pirua71 which was worshipped by the ,peruvians and regarded as the ,mother of the ,maize4 ,this is confirmed by what we know of the ,peruvian custom from another source4 ,the ,peruvians1 we are told1 believed all useful plants to be animated by a divine being who causes their growth4 ,according to the particular plant1 these divine beings were called the ,maize-mother 7,zara-mama71 the ,quinoa-mother 7,quinoa-mama71 the ,coca-mother 7,coca-mama71 and the ,potato-mother 7,axo-mama74 ,figures of these divine mothers were made respectively of ears of maize and leaves of the quinoa and coca plants2 they were dressed in women's clothes and worshipped4 ,thus the ,maize-mother was represented by a puppet made of stalks of maize dressed in full female attire2 and the ,indians believed that as mother1 it had the power of producing and giving birth to much maize4 ,probably1 therefore1 ,acosta misunderstood his informant1 and the ,mother of the ,maize which he describes was not the granary 7,pirua71 but the bunch of maize dressed in rich vestments4 ,the ,peruvian ,mother of the ,maize1 like the harvest-,maiden at ,balquhidder1 was kept for a year in order that by her means the corn might grow and multiply4 ,but lest her strength might not suffice to last till the next harvest1 she was asked in the course of the year how she felt1 and if she answered that she felt weak1 she was burned and a fresh ,mother of the ,maize made1 to the end the seed of maize may not perish4 ,here1 it may be observed1 we have a strong confirmation of the explanation already given of the custom of killing the god1 both periodically and occasionally4 ,the ,mother of the maize was allowed1 as a rule1 to live through a year1 that being the period during which her strength might reasonably be supposed to last unimpaired2 but on any symptom of her strength failing she was put to death1 and a fresh and vigorous ,mother of the ,maize took her place1 lest the maize which depended on her for its existence should languish and decay4 #b4 ,the ,rice-mother in the ,east ,indies ,,if ,,the ,,reader still feels any doubts as to the meaning of the harvest customs which have been practised within living memory by ,european peasants1 these doubts may perhaps be dispelled by comparing the customs observed at the rice-harvest by the ,malays and ,dyaks of the ,east ,indies4 ,for these ,eastern peoples have not1 like our peasantry1 advanced beyond the intellectual stage at which the customs originated2 their theory and their practice are still in unison2 for them the quaint rites which in ,europe have long dwindled into mere fossils1 the pastime of clowns and the puzzle of the learned1 are still living realities of which they can render an intelligible and truthful account4 ,hence a study of their beliefs and usages concerning the rice may throw some light on the true meaning of the ritual of the corn in ancient ,greece and modern ,europe4 ,now the whole of the ritual which the ,malays and ,dyaks observe in connexion with the rice is founded on the simple conception of the rice as animated by a soul like that which these people attribute to mankind4 ,they explain the phenomena of reproduction1 growth1 decay1 and death in the rice on the same principles on which they explain the corresponding phenomena in human beings4 ,they imagine that in the fibres of the plant1 as in the body of a man1 there is a certain vital element1 which is so far independent of the plant that it may for a time be completely separated from it without fatal effects1 though if its absence be prolonged beyond certain limits the plant will wither and die4 ,this vital yet separable element is what1 for the want of a better word1 we must call the soul of a plant1 just as a similar vital and separable element is commonly supposed to constitute the soul of man2 and on this theory or myth of the plant-soul is built the whole worship of the cereals1 just as on the theory or myth of the human soul is built the whole worship of the dead1--a towering superstructure reared on a slender and precarious foundation4 ,believing the rice to be animated by a soul like that of a man1 the ,indonesians naturally treat it with the deference and the consideration which they show to their fellows4 ,thus they behave towards the rice in bloom as they behave towards a pregnant woman2 they abstain from firing guns or making loud noises in the field1 lest they should so frighten the soul of the rice that it would miscarry and bear no grain2 and for the same reason they will not talk of corpses or demons in the rice-fields4 ,moreover1 they feed the blooming rice with foods of various kinds which are believed to be wholesome for women with child2 but when the rice-ears are just beginning to form1 they are looked upon as infants1 and women go through the fields feeding them with rice-pap as if they were human babes4 ,in such natural and obvious comparisons of the breeding plant to a breeding woman1 and of the young grain to a young child1 is to be sought the origin of the kindred ,greek conception of the ,corn-mother and the ,corn-daughter1 ,demeter and ,persephone4 ,but if the timorous feminine soul of the rice can be frightened into a miscarriage even by loud noises1 it is easy to imagine what her feelings must be at harvest1 when people are under the sad necessity of cutting down the rice with the knife4 ,at so critical a season every precaution must be used to render the necessary surgical operation of reaping as inconspicuous and as painless as possible4 ,for that reason the reaping of the seed-rice is done with knives of a peculiar pattern1 such that the blades are hidden in the reapers' hands and do not frighten the rice-spirit till the very last moment1 when her head is swept off almost before she is aware2 and from a like delicate motive the reapers at work in the fields employ a special form of speech1 which the rice-spirit cannot be expected to understand1 so that she has no warning or inkling of what is going forward till the heads of rice are safely deposited in the basket4 ,among the ,indonesian peoples who thus personify the rice we may take the ,kayans or ,bahaus of ,central ,borneo as typical4 ,in order to secure and detain the volatile soul of the rice the ,kayans resort to a number of devices4 ,among the instruments employed for this purpose are a miniature ladder1 a spatula1 and a basket containing hooks1 thorns1 and cords4 ,with the spatula the priestess strokes the soul of the rice down the little ladder into the basket1 where it is naturally held fast by the hooks1 the thorn1 and the cord2 and having thus captured and imprisoned the soul she conveys it into the rice-granary4 ,sometimes a bamboo box and a net are used for the same purpose4 ,and in order to ensure a good harvest for the following year it is necessary not only to detain the soul of all the grains of rice which are safely stored in the granary1 but also to attract and recover the soul of all the rice that has been lost through falling to the earth or being eaten by deer1 apes1 and pigs4 ,for this purpose instruments of various sorts have been invented by the priests4 ,one1 for example1 is a bamboo vessel provided with four hooks made from the wood of a fruit-tree1 by means of which the absent rice-soul may be hooked and drawn back into the vessel1 which is then hung up in the house4 ,sometimes two hands carved out of the wood of a fruit-tree are used for the same purpose4 ,and every time that a ,kayan housewife fetches rice from the granary for the use of her household1 she must propitiate the souls of the rice in the granary1 lest they should be angry at being robbed of their substance4 ,the same need of securing the soul of the rice1 if the crop is to thrive1 is keenly felt by the ,karens of ,burma4 ,when a rice-field does not flourish1 they suppose that the soul 7kelah7 of the rice is in some way detained from the rice4 ,if the soul cannot be called back1 the crop will fail4 ,the following formula is used in recalling the kelah 7soul7 of the rice3 ,o come1 rice-kelah1 come6 ,come to the field4 ,come to the rice4 ,with seed of each gender1 come4 ,come from the river ,kho1 come from the river ,kaw2 from the place where they meet1 come4 ,come from the ,west1 come from the ,east4 ,from the throat of the bird1 from the maw of the ape1 from the throat of the elephant4 ,come from the sources of rivers and their mouths4 ,come from the country of the ,shan and ,burman4 ,from the distant kingdoms come4 ,from all granaries come4 ,o rice-kelah1 come to the rice4 ,the ,corn-mother of our ,european peasants has her match in the ,rice-mother of the ,minangkabauers of ,sumatra4 ,the ,minangkabauers definitely attribute a soul to rice1 and will sometimes assert that rice pounded in the usual way tastes better than rice ground in a mill1 because in the mill the body of the rice was so bruised and battered that the soul has fled from it4 ,like the ,javanese they think that the rice is under the special guardianship of a female spirit called ,saning ,sari1 who is conceived as so closely knit up with the plant that the rice often goes by her name1 as with the ,romans the corn might be called ,ceres4 ,in particular ,saning ,sari is represented by certain stalks or grains called indoea padi1 that is1 literally1 ,mother of ,rice1 a name that is often given to the guardian spirit herself4 ,this so-called ,mother of ,rice is the occasion of a number of ceremonies observed at the planting and harvesting of the rice as well as during its preservation in the barn4 ,when the seed of the rice is about to be sown in the nursery or bedding-out ground1 where under the wet system of cultivation it is regularly allowed to sprout before being transplanted to the fields1 the best grains are picked out to form the ,rice-mother4 ,these are then sown in the middle of the bed1 and the common seed is planted round about them4 ,the state of the ,rice-mother is supposed to exert the greatest influence on the growth of the rice2 if she droops or pines away1 the harvest will be bad in consequence4 ,the woman who sows the ,rice-mother in the nursery lets her hair hang loose and afterwards bathes1 as a means of ensuring an abundant harvest4 ,when the time comes to transplant the rice from the nursery to the field1 the ,rice-mother receives a special place either in the middle or in a corner of the field1 and a prayer or charm is uttered as follows3 ,saning ,sari1 may a measure of rice come from a stalk of rice and a basketful from a root2 may you be frightened neither by lightning nor by passers-by6 ,sunshine make you glad2 with the storm may you be at peace2 and may rain serve to wash your face6 ,while the rice is growing1 the particular plant which was thus treated as the ,rice-mother is lost sight of2 but before harvest another ,rice-mother is found4 ,when the crop is ripe for cutting1 the oldest woman of the family or a sorcerer goes out to look for her4 ,the first stalks seen to bend under a passing breeze are the ,rice-mother1 and they are tied together but not cut until the first-fruits of the field have been carried home to serve as a festal meal for the family and their friends1 nay even for the domestic animals2 since it is ,saning ,sari's pleasure that the beasts also should partake of her good gifts4 ,after the meal has been eaten1 the ,rice-mother is fetched home by persons in gay attire1 who carry her very carefully under an umbrella in a neatly worked bag to the barn1 where a place in the middle is assigned to her4 ,every one believes that she takes care of the rice in the barn and even multiplies it not uncommonly4 ,when the ,tomori of ,central ,celebes are about to plant the rice1 they bury in the field some betel as an offering to the spirits who cause the rice to grow4 ,the rice that is planted round this spot is the last to be reaped at harvest4 ,at the commencement of the reaping the stalks of this patch of rice are tied together into a sheaf1 which is called the ,mother of the ,rice 7ineno pae71 and offerings in the shape of rice1 fowl's liver1 eggs1 and other things are laid down before it4 ,when all the rest of the rice in the field has been reaped1 the ,mother of the ,rice is cut down and carried with due honour to the rice-barn1 where it is laid on the floor1 and all the other sheaves are piled upon it4 ,the ,tomori1 we are told1 regard the ,mother of the ,rice as a special offering made to the rice-spirit ,omonga1 who dwells in the moon4 ,if that spirit is not treated with proper respect1 for example if the people who fetch rice from the barn are not decently clad1 he is angry and punishes the offenders by eating up twice as much rice in the barn as they have taken out of it2 some people have heard him smacking his lips in the barn1 as he devoured the rice4 ,on the other hand the ,toradjas of ,central ,celebes1 who also practice the custom of the ,rice-mother at harvest1 regard her as the actual mother of the whole harvest1 and therefore keep her carefully1 lest in her absence the garnered store of rice should all melt away and disappear4 ,again1 just as in ,scotland the old and the young spirit of the corn are represented as an ,old ,wife 7,cailleach7 and a ,maiden respectively1 so in the ,malay ,peninsula we find both the ,rice-mother and her child represented by different sheaves or bundles of ears on the harvest-field4 ,the ceremony of cutting and bringing home the ,soul of the ,rice was witnessed by ,mr4 ,w4 ,w4 ,skeat at ,chodoi in ,selangor on the twenty-eighth of ,january #ahig4 ,the particular bunch or sheaf which was to serve as the ,mother of the ,rice-soul had previously been sought and identified by means of the markings or shape of the ears4 ,from this sheaf an aged sorceress1 with much solemnity1 cut a little bundle of seven ears1 anointed them with oil1 tied them round with parti-coloured thread1 fumigated them with incense1 and having wrapt them in a white cloth deposited them in a little oval-shaped basket4 ,these seven ears were the infant ,soul of the ,rice and the little basket was its cradle4 ,it was carried home to the farmer's house by another woman1 who held up an umbrella to screen the tender infant from the hot rays of the sun4 ,arrived at the house the ,rice-child was welcomed by the women of the family1 and laid1 cradle and all1 on a new sleepingmat with pillows at the head4 ,after that the farmer's wife was instructed to observe certain rules of taboo for three days1 the rules being in many respects identical with those which have to be observed for three days after the birth of a real child4 ,something of the same tender care which is thus bestowed on the newly-born ,rice-child is naturally extended also to its parent1 the sheaf from whose body it was taken4 ,this sheaf1 which remains standing in the field after the ,rice-soul has been carried home and put to bed1 is treated as a newly-made mother2 that is to say1 young shoots of trees are pounded together and scattered broadcast every evening for three successive days1 and when the three days are up you take the pulp of a coco-nut and what are called goat-flowers1 mix them up1 eat them with a little sugar1 and spit some of the mixture out among the rice4 ,so after a real birth the young shoots of the jack-fruit1 the rose-apple1 certain kinds of banana1 and the thin pulp of young coco-nuts are mixed with dried fish1 salt1 acid1 prawn-condiment1 and the like dainties to form a sort of salad1 which is administered to mother and child for three successive days4 ,the last sheaf is reaped by the farmer's wife1 who carries it back to the house1 where it is threshed and mixed with the ,rice-soul4 ,the farmer then takes the ,rice-soul and its basket and deposits it1 together with the product of the last sheaf1 in the big circular rice-bin used by the ,malays4 ,some grains from the ,rice-soul are mixed with the seed which is to be sown in the following year4 ,in this ,rice-mother and ,rice-child of the ,malay ,peninsula we may see the counterpart and in a sense the prototype of the ,demeter and ,persephone of ancient ,greece4 ,once more1 the ,european custom of representing the corn-spirit in the double form of bride and bridegroom has its parallel in a ceremony observed at the rice-harvest in ,java4 ,before the reapers begin to cut the rice1 the priest or sorcerer picks out a number of ears of rice1 which are tied together1 smeared with ointment1 and adorned with flowers4 ,thus decked out1 the ears are called the padi-peengantn1 that is1 the ,rice-bride and the ,rice-bridegroom2 their wedding feast is celebrated1 and the cutting of the rice begins immediately afterwards4 ,later on1 when the rice is being got in1 a bridal chamber is partitioned off in the barn1 and furnished with a new mat1 a lamp1 and all kinds of toilet articles4 ,sheaves of rice1 to represent the wedding guests1 are placed beside the ,rice-bride and the ,rice-bridegroom4 ,not till this has been done may the whole harvest be housed in the barn4 ,and for the first forty days after the rice has been housed1 no one may enter the barn1 for fear of disturbing the newly-wedded pair4 ,in the islands of ,bali and ,lombok1 when the time of harvest has come1 the owner of the field himself makes a beginning by cutting the principal rice with his own hands and binding it into two sheaves1 each composed of one hundred and eight stalks with their leaves attached to them4 ,one of the sheaves represents a man and the other a woman1 and they are called husband and wife4 ,the male sheaf is wound about with thread so that none of the leaves are visible1 whereas the female sheaf has its leaves bent over and tied so as to resemble the roll of a woman's hair4 ,sometimes1 for further distinction1 a necklace of rice-straw is tied round the female sheaf4 ,when the rice is brought home from the field1 the two sheaves representing the husband and wife are carried by a woman on her head1 and are the last of all to be deposited in the barn4 ,there they are laid to rest on a small erection or on a cushion of rice-straw4 ,the whole arrangement1 we are informed1 has for its object to induce the rice to increase and multiply in the granary1 so that the owner may get more out of it than he put in4 ,hence when the people of ,bali bring the two sheaves1 the husband and wife1 into the barn1 they say1 ,increase ye and multiply without ceasing4 ,when all the rice in the barn has been used up1 the two sheaves representing the husband and wife remain in the empty building till they have gradually disappeared or been devoured by mice4 ,the pinch of hunger sometimes drives individuals to eat up the rice of these two sheaves1 but the wretches who do so are viewed with disgust by their fellows and branded as pigs and dogs4 ,nobody would ever sell these holy sheaves with the rest of their profane brethren4 ,the same notion of the propagation of the rice by a male and female power finds expression amongst the ,szis of ,upper ,burma4 ,when the paddy1 that is1 the rice with the husks still on it1 has been dried and piled in a heap for threshing1 all the friends of the household are invited to the threshing-floor1 and food and drink are brought out4 ,the heap of paddy is divided and one half spread out for threshing1 while the other half is left piled up4 ,on the pile food and spirits are set1 and one of the elders1 addressing the father and mother of the paddy-plant1 prays for plenteous harvests in future1 and begs that the seed may bear many fold4 ,then the whole party eat1 drink1 and make merry4 ,this ceremony at the threshing-floor is the only occasion when these people invoke the father and mother of the paddy4 #c4 ,the ,spirit of the ,corn embodied in ,human ,beings ,,thus the theory which recognises in the ,european ,corn-mother1 ,corn-maiden1 and so forth1 the embodiment in vegetable form of the animating spirit of the crops is amply confirmed by the evidence of peoples in other parts of the world1 who1 because they have lagged behind the ,european races in mental development1 retain for that very reason a keener sense of the original motives for observing those rustic rites which among ourselves have sunk to the level of meaningless survivals4 ,the reader may1 however1 remember that according to ,mannhardt1 whose theory ,i am expounding1 the spirit of the corn manifests itself not merely in vegetable but also in human form2 the person who cuts the last sheaf or gives the last stroke at threshing passes for a temporary embodiment of the corn-spirit1 just as much as the bunch of corn which he reaps or threshes4 ,now in the parallels which have been hitherto adduced from the customs of peoples outside ,europe the spirit of the crops appears only in vegetable form4 ,it remains1 therefore1 to prove that other races besides our ,european peasantry have conceived the spirit of the crops as incorporate in or represented by living men and women4 ,such a proof1 ,i may remind the reader1 is germane to the theme of this book2 for the more instances we discover of human beings representing in themselves the life or animating spirit of plants1 the less difficulty will be felt at classing amongst them the ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi4 ,the ,mandans and ,minnitarees of ,north ,america used to hold a festival in spring which they called the corn-medicine festival of the women4 ,they thought that a certain ,old ,woman who ,never ,dies made the crops to grow1 and that1 living somewhere in the south1 she sent the migratory waterfowl in spring as her tokens and representatives4 ,each sort of bird represented a special kind of crop cultivated by the ,indians3 the wild goose stood for the maize1 the wild swan for the gourds1 and the wild duck for the beans4 ,so when the feathered messengers of the ,old ,woman began to arrive in spring the ,indians celebrated the corn-medicine festival of the women4 ,scaffolds were set up1 on which the people hung dried meat and other things by way of offerings to the ,old ,woman2 and on a certain day the old women of the tribe1 as representatives of the ,old ,woman who ,never ,dies1 assembled at the scaffolds each bearing in her hand an ear of maize fastened to a stick4 ,they first planted these sticks in the ground1 then danced round the scaffolds1 and finally took up the sticks again in their arms4 ,meanwhile old men beat drums and shook rattles as a musical accompaniment to the performance of the old women4 ,further1 young women came and put dried flesh into the mouths of the old women1 for which they received in return a grain of the consecrated maize to eat4 ,three or four grains of the holy corn were also placed in the dishes of the young women1 to be afterwards carefully mixed with the seed-corn1 which they were supposed to fertilise4 ,the dried flesh hung on the scaffold belonged to the old women1 because they represented the ,old ,woman who ,never ,dies4 ,a similar corn-medicine festival was held in autumn for the purpose of attracting the herds of buffaloes and securing a supply of meat4 ,at that time every woman carried in her arms an uprooted plant of maize4 ,they gave the name of the ,old ,woman who ,never ,dies both to the maize and to those birds which they regarded as symbols of the fruits of the earth1 and they prayed to them in autumn saying1 ,mother1 have pity on us6 send us not the bitter cold too soon1 lest we have not meat enough6 let not all the game depart1 that we may have something for the winter6 ,in autumn1 when the birds were flying south1 the ,indians thought that they were going home to the ,old ,woman and taking to her the offerings that had been hung up on the scaffolds1 especially the dried meat1 which she ate4 ,here then we have the spirit or divinity of the corn conceived as an ,old ,woman and represented in bodily form by old women1 who in their capacity of representatives receive some at least of the offerings which are intended for her4 ,in some parts of ,india the harvest-goddess ,gauri is represented at once by an unmarried girl and by a bundle of wild balsam plants1 which is made up into the figure of a woman and dressed as such with mask1 garments1 and ornaments4 ,both the human and the vegetable representative of the goddess are worshipped1 and the intention of the whole ceremony appears to be to ensure a good crop of rice4 #d4 ,the ,double ,personification of the ,corn as ,mother and ,daughter ,,compared with the ,corn-mother of ,germany and the ,harvest-maiden of ,scotland1 the ,demeter and ,persephone of ,greece are late products of religious growth4 ,yet as members of the ,aryan family the ,greeks must at one time or another have observed harvest customs like those which are still practised by ,celts1 ,teutons1 and ,slavs1 and which1 far beyond the limits of the ,aryan world1 have been practised by the ,indians of ,peru and many peoples of the ,east ,indies--a sufficient proof that the ideas on which these customs rest are not confined to any one race1 but naturally suggest themselves to all untutored peoples engaged in agriculture4 ,it is probable1 therefore1 that ,demeter and ,persephone1 those stately and beautiful figures of ,greek mythology1 grew out of the same simple beliefs and practices which still prevail among our modern peasantry1 and that they were represented by rude dolls made out of the yellow sheaves on many a harvest-field long before their breathing images were wrought in bronze and marble by the master hands of ,phidias and ,praxiteles4 ,a reminiscence of that olden time--a scent1 so to say1 of the harvest-field--lingered to the last in the title of the ,maiden 7,kore7 by which ,persephone was commonly known4 ,thus if the prototype of ,demeter is the ,corn-mother of ,germany1 the prototype of ,persephone is the ,harvest-maiden which1 autumn after autumn1 is still made from the last sheaf on the ,braes of ,balquhidder4 ,indeed1 if we knew more about the peasant-farmers of ancient ,greece1 we should probably find that even in classical times they continued annually to fashion their ,corn-mothers 7,demeters7 and ,maidens 7,persephones7 out of the ripe corn on the harvest-fields4 ,but unfortunately the ,demeter and ,persephone whom we know were the denizens of towns1 the majestic inhabitants of lordly temples2 it was for such divinities alone that the refined writers of antiquity had eyes2 the uncouth rites performed by rustics amongst the corn were beneath their notice4 ,even if they noticed them1 they probably never dreamed of any connexion between the puppet of corn-stalks on the sunny stubble-field and the marble divinity in the shady coolness of the temple4 ,still the writings even of these town-bred and cultured persons afford us an occasional glimpse of a ,demeter as rude as the rudest that a remote ,german village can show4 ,thus the story that ,iasion begat a child ,plutus 7 wealth1 abundance7 by ,demeter on a thrice-ploughed field1 may be compared with the ,west ,prussian custom of the mock birth of a child on the harvest-field4 ,in this ,prussian custom the pretended mother represents the ,corn-mother 7,zytniamatka72 the pretended child represents the ,corn-baby1 and the whole ceremony is a charm to ensure a crop next year4 ,the custom and the legend alike point to an older practice of performing1 among the sprouting crops in spring or the stubble in autumn1 one of those real or mimic acts of procreation by which1 as we have seen1 primitive man often seeks to infuse his own vigorous life into the languid or decaying energies of nature4 ,another glimpse of the savage under the civilised ,demeter will be afforded farther on1 when we come to deal with another aspect of those agricultural divinities4 ,the reader may have observed that in modern folk-customs the corn-spirit is generally represented either by a ,corn-mother 7,old ,woman1 etc47 or by a ,maiden 7,harvest-child1 etc471 not both by a ,corn-mother and by a ,maiden4 ,why then did the ,greeks represent the corn both as a mother and a daughter8 ,in the ,breton custom the mother-sheaf--a large figure made out of the last sheaf with a small corn-doll inside of it--clearly represents both the ,corn-mother and the ,corn-daughter1 the latter still unborn4 ,again1 in the ,prussian custom just referred to1 the woman who plays the part of ,corn-mother represents the ripe grain2 the child appears to represent next year's corn1 which may be regarded1 naturally enough1 as the child of this year's corn1 since it is from the seed of this year's harvest that next year's crop will spring4 ,further1 we have seen that among the ,malays of the ,peninsula and sometimes among the ,highlanders of ,scotland the spirit of the grain is represented in double female form1 both as old and young1 by means of ears taken alike from the ripe crop3 in ,scotland the old spirit of the corn appears as the ,carline or ,cailleach1 the young spirit as the ,maiden2 while among the ,malays of the ,peninsula the two spirits of the rice are definitely related to each other as mother and child4 ,judged by these analogies ,demeter would be the ripe crop of this year2 ,persephone would be the seed-corn taken from it and sown in autumn1 to reappear in spring4 ,the descent of ,persephone into the lower world would thus be a mythical expression for the sowing of the seed2 her reappearance in spring would signify the sprouting of the young corn4 ,in this way the ,persephone of one year becomes the ,demeter of the next1 and this may very well have been the original form of the myth4 ,but when with the advance of religious thought the corn came to be personified no longer as a being that went through the whole cycle of birth1 growth1 reproduction1 and death within a year1 but as an immortal goddess1 consistency required that one of the two personifications1 the mother or the daughter1 should be sacrificed4 ,however1 the double conception of the corn as mother and daughter may have been too old and too deeply rooted in the popular mind to be eradicated by logic1 and so room had to be found in the reformed myth both for mother and daughter4 ,this was done by assigning to ,persephone the character of the corn sown in autumn and sprouting in spring1 while ,demeter was left to play the somewhat vague part of the heavy mother of the corn1 who laments its annual disappearance underground1 and rejoices over its reappearance in spring4 ,thus instead of a regular succession of divine beings1 each living a year and then giving birth to her successor1 the reformed myth exhibits the conception of two divine and immortal beings1 one of whom annually disappears into and reappears from the ground1 while the other has little to do but to weep and rejoice at the appropriate seasons4 ,this theory of the double personification of the corn in ,greek myth assumes that both personifications 7,demeter and ,persephone7 are original4 ,but if we suppose that the ,greek myth started with a single personification1 the aftergrowth of a second personification may perhaps be explained as follows4 ,on looking over the harvest customs which have been passed under review1 it may be noticed that they involve two distinct conceptions of the corn-spirit4 ,for whereas in some of the customs the corn-spirit is treated as immanent in the corn1 in others it is regarded as external to it4 ,thus when a particular sheaf is called by the name of the corn-spirit1 and is dressed in clothes and handled with reverence1 the spirit is clearly regarded as immanent in the corn4 ,but when the spirit is said to make the crops grow by passing through them1 or to blight the grain of those against whom she has a grudge1 she is apparently conceived as distinct from1 though exercising power over1 the corn4 ,conceived in the latter mode the corn-spirit is in a fair way to become a deity of the corn1 if she has not become so already4 ,of these two conceptions1 that of the cornspirit as immanent in the corn is doubtless the older1 since the view of nature as animated by indwelling spirits appears to have generally preceded the view of it as controlled by external deities2 to put it shortly1 animism precedes deism4 ,in the harvest customs of our ,european peasantry the corn-spirit seems to be conceived now as immanent in the corn and now as external to it4 ,in ,greek mythology1 on the other hand1 ,demeter is viewed rather as the deity of the corn than as the spirit immanent in it4 ,the process of thought which leads to the change from the one mode of conception to the other is anthropomorphism1 or the gradual investment of the immanent spirits with more and more of the attributes of humanity4 ,as men emerge from savagery the tendency to humanise their divinities gains strength2 and the more human these become the wider is the breach which severs them from the natural objects of which they were at first merely the animating spirits or souls4 ,but in the progress upwards from savagery men of the same generation do not march abreast2 and though the new anthropomorphic gods may satisfy the religious wants of the more developed intelligences1 the backward members of the community will cling by preference to the old animistic notions4 ,now when the spirit of any natural object such as the corn has been invested with human qualities1 detached from the object1 and converted into a deity controlling it1 the object itself is1 by the withdrawal of its spirit1 left inanimate2 it becomes1 so to say1 a spiritual vacuum4 ,but the popular fancy1 intolerant of such a vacuum1 in other words1 unable to conceive anything as inanimate1 immediately creates a fresh mythical being1 with which it peoples the vacant object4 ,thus the same natural object comes to be represented in mythology by two distinct beings3 first by the old spirit now separated from it and raised to the rank of a deity2 second1 by the new spirit1 freshly created by the popular fancy to supply the place vacated by the old spirit on its elevation to a higher sphere4 ,in such cases the problem for mythology is1 having got two distinct personifications of the same object1 what to do with them8 ,how are their relations to each other to be adjusted1 and room found for both in the mythological system8 ,when the old spirit or new deity is conceived as creating or producing the object in question1 the problem is easily solved4 ,since the object is believed to be produced by the old spirit1 and animated by the new one1 the latter1 as the soul of the object1 must also owe its existence to the former2 thus the old spirit will stand to the new one as producer to produced1 that is1 in mythology1 as parent to child1 and if both spirits are conceived as female1 their relation will be that of mother and daughter4 ,in this way1 starting from a single personification of the corn as female1 mythic fancy might in time reach a double personification of it as mother and daughter4 ,it would be very rash to affirm that this was the way in which the myth of ,demeter and ,persephone actually took shape2 but it seems a legitimate conjecture that the reduplication of deities1 of which ,demeter and ,persephone furnish an example1 may sometimes have arisen in the way indicated4 ,for example1 among the pairs of deities dealt with in a former part of this work1 it has been shown that there are grounds for regarding both ,isis and her companion god ,osiris as personifications of the corn4 ,on the hypothesis just suggested1 ,isis would be the old corn-spirit1 and ,osiris would be the newer one1 whose relationship to the old spirit was variously explained as that of brother1 husband1 and son2 for of course mythology would always be free to account for the coexistence of the two divinities in more ways than one4 ,it must not1 however1 be forgotten that this proposed explanation of such pairs of deities as ,demeter and ,persephone or ,isis and ,osiris is purely conjectural1 and is only given for what it is worth4 ,,xlvii4 ,lityerses #a4 ,songs of the ,corn ,reapers ,,in ,,the ,,preceding pages an attempt has been made to show that in the ,corn-mother and ,harvest-maiden of ,northern ,europe we have the prototypes of ,demeter and ,persephone4 ,but an essential feature is still wanting to complete the resemblance4 ,a leading incident in the ,greek myth is the death and resurrection of ,persephone2 it is this incident which1 coupled with the nature of the goddess as a deity of vegetation1 links the myth with the cults of ,adonis1 ,attis1 ,osiris1 and ,dionysus2 and it is in virtue of this incident that the myth finds a place in our discussion of the ,dying ,god4 ,it remains1 therefore1 to see whether the conception of the annual death and resurrection of a god1 which figures so prominently in these great ,greek and ,oriental worships1 has not also its origin or its analogy in the rustic rites observed by reapers and vine-dressers amongst the corn-shocks and the vines4 ,our general ignorance of the popular superstitions and customs of the ancients has already been confessed4 ,but the obscurity which thus hangs over the first beginnings of ancient religion is fortunately dissipated to some extent in the present case4 ,the worships of ,osiris1 ,adonis1 and ,attis had their respective seats1 as we have seen1 in ,egypt1 ,syria1 and ,phrygia2 and in each of these countries certain harvest and vintage customs are known to have been observed1 the resemblance of which to each other and to the national rites struck the ancients themselves1 and1 compared with the harvest customs of modern peasants and barbarians1 seems to throw some light on the origin of the rites in question4 ,it has been already mentioned1 on the authority of ,diodorus1 that in ancient ,egypt the reapers were wont to lament over the first sheaf cut1 invoking ,isis as the goddess to whom they owed the discovery of corn4 ,to the plaintive song or cry sung or uttered by ,egyptian reapers the ,greeks gave the name of ,maneros1 and explained the name by a story that ,maneros1 the only son of the first ,egyptian king1 invented agriculture1 and1 dying an untimely death1 was thus lamented by the people4 ,it appears1 however1 that the name ,maneros is due to a misunderstanding of the formula maa-ne-hra1 ,come to the house1 which has been discovered in various ,egyptian writings1 for example in the dirge of ,isis in the ,book of the ,dead4 ,hence we may suppose that the cry maa-ne-hra was chanted by the reapers over the cut corn as a dirge for the death of the corn-spirit 7,isis or ,osiris7 and a prayer for its return4 ,as the cry was raised over the first ears reaped1 it would seem that the corn-spirit was believed by the ,egyptians to be present in the first corn cut and to die under the sickle4 ,we have seen that in the ,malay ,peninsula and ,java the first ears of rice are taken to represent either the ,soul of the ,rice or the ,rice-bride and the ,rice-bridegroom4 ,in parts of ,russia the first sheaf is treated much in the same way that the last sheaf is treated elsewhere4 ,it is reaped by the mistress herself1 taken home and set in the place of honour near the holy pictures2 afterwards it is threshed separately1 and some of its grain is mixed with the next year's seed-corn4 ,in ,aberdeenshire1 while the last corn cut was generally used to make the clyack sheaf1 it was sometimes1 though rarely1 the first corn cut that was dressed up as a woman and carried home with ceremony4 ,in ,phoenicia and ,western ,asia a plaintive song1 like that chanted by the ,egyptian corn-reapers1 was sung at the vintage and probably 7to judge by analogy7 also at harvest4 ,this ,phoenician song was called by the ,greeks ,linus or ,ailinus and explained1 like ,maneros1 as a lament for the death of a youth named ,linus4 ,according to one story ,linus was brought up by a shepherd1 but torn to pieces by his dogs4 ,but1 like ,maneros1 the name ,linus or ,ailinus appears to have originated in a verbal misunderstanding1 and to be nothing more than the cry ai lanu1 that is ,woe to us1 which the ,phoenicians probably uttered in mourning for ,adonis2 at least ,sappho seems to have regarded ,adonis and ,linus as equivalent4 ,in ,bithynia a like mournful ditty1 called ,bormus or ,borimus1 was chanted by ,mariandynian reapers4 ,bormus was said to have been a handsome youth1 the son of ,king ,upias or of a wealthy and distinguished man4 ,one summer day1 watching the reapers at work in his fields1 he went to fetch them a drink of water and was never heard of more4 ,so the reapers sought for him1 calling him in plaintive strains1 which they continued to chant at harvest ever afterwards4 #b4 ,killing the ,corn-spirit ,,in ,,phrygia the corresponding song1 sung by harvesters both at reaping and at threshing1 was called ,lityerses4 ,according to one story1 ,lityerses was a bastard son of ,midas1 ,king of ,phrygia1 and dwelt at ,celaenae4 ,he used to reap the corn1 and had an enormous appetite4 ,when a stranger happened to enter the corn-field or to pass by it1 ,lityerses gave him plenty to eat and drink1 then took him to the corn-fields on the banks of the ,maeander and compelled him to reap along with him4 ,lastly1 it was his custom to wrap the stranger in a sheaf1 cut off his head with a sickle1 and carry away his body1 swathed in the corn-stalks4 ,but at last ,hercules undertook to reap with him1 cut off his head with the sickle1 and threw his body into the river4 ,as ,hercules is reported to have slain ,lityerses in the same way that ,lityerses slew others1 we may infer that ,lityerses used to throw the bodies of his victims into the river4 ,according to another version of the story1 ,lityerses1 a son of ,midas1 was wont to challenge people to a reaping match with him1 and if he vanquished them he used to thrash them2 but one day he met with a stronger reaper1 who slew him4 ,there are some grounds for supposing that in these stories of ,lityerses we have the description of a ,phrygian harvest custom in accordance with which certain persons1 especially strangers passing the harvest field1 were regularly regarded as embodiments of the corn-spirit1 and as such were seized by the reapers1 wrapt in sheaves1 and beheaded1 their bodies1 bound up in the corn-stalks1 being after-wards thrown into water as a rain-charm4 ,the grounds for this supposition are1 first1 the resemblance of the ,lityerses story to the harvest customs of ,european peasantry1 and1 second1 the frequency of human sacrifices offered by savage races to promote the fertility of the fields4 ,we will examine these grounds successively1 beginning with the former4 ,in comparing the story with the harvest customs of ,europe1 three points deserve special attention1 namely3 ,i4 the reaping match and the binding of persons in the sheaves2 ,,ii4 the killing of the corn-spirit or his representatives2 ,,iii4 the treatment of visitors to the harvest field or of strangers passing it4 ,i4 ,in regard to the first head1 we have seen that in modern ,europe the person who cuts or binds or threshes the last sheaf is often exposed to rough treatment at the hands of his fellow-labourers4 ,for example1 he is bound up in the last sheaf1 and1 thus encased1 is carried or carted about1 beaten1 drenched with water1 thrown on a dunghill1 and so forth4 ,or1 if he is spared this horse-play1 he is at least the subject of ridicule or is thought to be destined to suffer some misfortune in the course of the year4 ,hence the harvesters are naturally reluctant to give the last cut at reaping or the last stroke at threshing or to bind the last sheaf1 and towards the close of the work this reluctance produces an emulation among the labourers1 each striving to finish his task as fast as possible1 in order that he may escape the invidious distinction of being last4 ,for example1 in the ,mittelmark district of ,prussia1 when the rye has been reaped1 and the last sheaves are about to be tied up1 the binders stand in two rows facing each other1 every woman with her sheaf and her straw rope before her4 ,at a given signal they all tie up their sheaves1 and the one who is the last to finish is ridiculed by the rest4 ,not only so1 but her sheaf is made up into human shape and called the ,old ,man1 and she must carry it home to the farmyard1 where the harvesters dance in a circle round her and it4 ,then they take the ,old ,man to the farmer and deliver it to him with the words1 ,we bring the ,old ,man to the ,master4 ,he may keep him till he gets a new one4 ,after that the ,old ,man is set up against a tree1 where he remains for a long time1 the butt of many jests4 ,at ,aschbach in ,bavaria1 when the reaping is nearly finished1 the reapers say1 ,now1 we will drive out the ,old ,man4 ,each of them sets himself to reap a patch of corn as fast as he can2 he who cuts the last handful or the last stalk is greeted by the rest with an exulting cry1 ,you have the ,old ,man4 ,sometimes a black mask is fastened on the reaper's face and he is dressed in woman's clothes2 or if the reaper is a woman1 she is dressed in man's clothes4 ,a dance follows4 ,at the supper the ,old ,man gets twice as large a portion of the food as the others4 ,the proceedings are similar at threshing2 the person who gives the last stroke is said to have the ,old ,man4 ,at the supper given to the threshers he has to eat out of the cream-ladle and to drink a great deal4 ,moreover1 he is quizzed and teased in all sorts of ways till he frees himself from further annoyance by treating the others to brandy or beer4 ,these examples illustrate the contests in reaping1 threshing1 and binding which take place amongst the harvesters1 from their unwillingness to suffer the ridicule and discomfort incurred by the one who happens to finish his work last4 ,it will be remembered that the person who is last at reaping1 binding1 or threshing1 is regarded as the representative of the corn-spirit1 and this idea is more fully expressed by binding him or her in corn-stalks4 ,the latter custom has been already illustrated1 but a few more instances may be added4 ,at ,kloxin1 near ,stettin1 the harvesters call out to the woman who binds the last sheaf1 ,you have the ,old ,man1 and must keep him4 ,as late as the first half of the nineteenth century the custom was to tie up the woman herself in pease-straw1 and bring her with music to the farmhouse1 where the harvesters danced with her till the pease-straw fell off4 ,in other villages round ,stettin1 when the last harvest-waggon is being loaded1 there is a regular race amongst the women1 each striving not to be last4 ,for she who places the last sheaf on the waggon is called the ,old ,man1 and is completely swathed in corn-stalks2 she is also decked with flowers1 and flowers and a helmet of straw are placed on her head4 ,in solemn procession she carries the harvest-crown to the squire1 over whose head she holds it while she utters a string of good wishes4 ,at the dance which follows1 the ,old ,man has the right to choose his1 or rather her1 partner2 it is an honour to dance with him4 ,at ,gommern1 near ,magdeburg1 the reaper who cuts the last ears of corn is often wrapt up in corn-stalks so completely that it is hard to see whether there is a man in the bundle or not4 ,thus wrapt up he is taken by another stalwart reaper on his back1 and carried round the field amidst the joyous cries of the harvesters4 ,at ,neuhausen1 near ,merseburg1 the person who binds the last sheaf is wrapt in ears of oats and saluted as the ,oatsman1 whereupon the others dance round him4 ,at ,brie1 ,isle de ,france1 the farmer himself is tied up in the first sheaf4 ,at ,dingelstedt1 in the district of ,erfurt1 down to the first half of the nineteenth century it was the custom to tie up a man in the last sheaf4 ,he was called the ,old ,man1 and was brought home on the last waggon1 amid huzzas and music4 ,on reaching the farmyard he was rolled round the barn and drenched with water4 ,at ,nrdlingen in ,bavaria the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is wrapt in straw and rolled on the threshing-floor4 ,in some parts of ,oberpfalz1 ,bavaria1 he is said to get the ,old ,man1 is wrapt in straw1 and carried to a neighbour who has not yet finished his threshing4 ,in ,silesia the woman who binds the last sheaf has to submit to a good deal of horse-play4 ,she is pushed1 knocked down1 and tied up in the sheaf1 after which she is called the corn-puppet 7,kornpopel74 ,in all these cases the idea is that the spirit of the corn--the ,old ,man of vegetation--is driven out of the corn last cut or last threshed1 and lives in the barn during the winter4 ,at sowing-time he goes out again to the fields to resume his activity as animating force among the sprouting corn4 ,,ii4 ,passing to the second point of comparison between the ,lityerses story and ,european harvest customs1 we have now to see that in the latter the corn-spirit is often believed to be killed at reaping or threshing4 ,in the ,romsdal and other parts of ,norway1 when the haymaking is over1 the people say that the ,old ,hay-man has been killed4 ,in some parts of ,bavaria the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is said to have killed the ,corn-man1 the ,oats-man1 or the ,wheat-man1 according to the crop4 ,in the ,canton of ,tillot1 in ,lorraine1 at threshing the last corn the men keep time with their flails1 calling out as they thresh1 ,we are killing the ,old ,woman6 ,we are killing the ,old ,woman6 ,if there is an old woman in the house she is warned to save herself1 or she will be struck dead4 ,near ,ragnit1 in ,lithuania1 the last handful of corn is left standing by itself1 with the words1 ,the ,old ,woman 7,boba7 is sitting in there4 ,then a young reaper whets his scythe and1 with a strong sweep1 cuts down the handful4 ,it is now said of him that he has cut off the ,boba's head2 and he receives a gratuity from the farmer and a jugful of water over his head from the farmer's wife4 ,according to another account1 every ,lithuanian reaper makes haste to finish his task2 for the ,old ,rye-woman lives in the last stalks1 and whoever cuts the last stalks kills the ,old ,rye-woman1 and by killing her he brings trouble on himself4 ,in ,wilkischken1 in the district of ,tilsit1 the man who cuts the last corn goes by the name of the killer of the ,rye-woman4 ,in ,lithuania1 again1 the corn-spirit is believed to be killed at threshing as well as at reaping4 ,when only a single pile of corn remains to be threshed1 all the threshers suddenly step back a few paces1 as if at the word of command4 ,then they fall to work1 plying their flails with the utmost rapidity and vehemence1 till they come to the last bundle4 ,upon this they fling themselves with almost frantic fury1 straining every nerve1 and raining blows on it till the word ,halt6 rings out sharply from the leader4 ,the man whose flail is the last to fall after the command to stop has been given is immediately surrounded by all the rest1 crying out that he has struck the ,old ,rye-woman dead4 ,he has to expiate the deed by treating them to brandy2 and1 like the man who cuts the last corn1 he is known as the killer of the ,old ,rye-woman4 ,sometimes in ,lithuania the slain corn-spirit was represented by a puppet4 ,thus a female figure was made out of corn-stalks1 dressed in clothes1 and placed on the threshing-floor1 under the heap of corn which was to be threshed last4 ,whoever thereafter gave the last stroke at threshing struck the ,old ,woman dead4 ,we have already met with examples of burning the figure which represents the corn-spirit4 ,in the ,east ,riding of ,yorkshire a custom called burning the ,old ,witch is observed on the last day of harvest4 ,a small sheaf of corn is burnt on the field in a fire of stubble2 peas are parched at the fire and eaten with a liberal allowance of ale2 and the lads and lasses romp about the flames and amuse themselves by blackening each other's faces4 ,sometimes1 again1 the corn-spirit is represented by a man1 who lies down under the last corn2 it is threshed upon his body1 and the people say that the ,old ,man is being beaten to death4 ,we saw that sometimes the farmer's wife is thrust1 together with the last sheaf1 under the threshing-machine1 as if to thresh her1 and that afterwards a pretence is made of winnowing her4 ,at ,volders1 in the ,tyrol1 husks of corn are stuck behind the neck of the man who gives the last stroke at threshing1 and he is throttled with a straw garland4 ,if he is tall1 it is believed that the corn will be tall next year4 ,then he is tied on a bundle and flung into the river4 ,in ,carinthia1 the thresher who gave the last stroke1 and the person who untied the last sheaf on the threshing-floor1 are bound hand and foot with straw bands1 and crowns of straw are placed on their heads4 ,then they are tied1 face to face1 on a sledge1 dragged through the village1 and flung into a brook4 ,the custom of throwing the representative of the corn-spirit into a stream1 like that of drenching him with water1 is1 as usual1 a rain-charm4 ,,iii4 ,thus far the representatives of the corn-spirit have generally been the man or woman who cuts1 binds1 or threshes the last corn4 ,we now come to the cases in which the corn-spirit is represented either by a stranger passing the harvest-field 7as in the ,lityerses tale71 or by a visitor entering it for the first time4 ,all over ,germany it is customary for the reapers or threshers to lay hold of passing strangers and bind them with a rope made of corn-stalks1 till they pay a forfeit2 and when the farmer himself or one of his guests enters the field or the threshing-floor for the first time1 he is treated in the same way4 ,sometimes the rope is only tied round his arm or his feet or his neck4 ,but sometimes he is regularly swathed in corn4 ,thus at ,solr in ,norway1 whoever enters the field1 be he the master or a stranger1 is tied up in a sheaf and must pay a ransom4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,soest1 when the farmer visits the flax-pullers for the first time1 he is completely enveloped in flax4 ,passers-by are also surrounded by the women1 tied up in flax1 and compelled to stand brandy4 ,at ,nrdlingen strangers are caught with straw ropes and tied up in a sheaf till they pay a forfeit4 ,among the ,germans of ,haselberg1 in ,west ,bohemia1 as soon as a farmer had given the last corn to be threshed on the threshing-floor1 he was swathed in it and had to redeem himself by a present of cakes4 ,in the canton of ,putanges1 in ,normandy1 a pretence of tying up the owner of the land in the last sheaf of wheat is still practised1 or at least was still practised some quarter of a century ago4 ,the task falls to the women alone4 ,they throw themselves on the proprietor1 seize him by the arms1 the legs1 and the body1 throw him to the ground1 and stretch him on the last sheaf4 ,then a show is made of binding him1 and the conditions to be observed at the harvest-supper are dictated to him4 ,when he has accepted them1 he is released and allowed to get up4 ,at ,brie1 ,isle de ,france1 when any one who does not belong to the farm passes by the harvest-field1 the reapers give chase4 ,if they catch him1 they bind him in a sheaf and bite him1 one after the other1 in the forehead1 crying1 ,you shall carry the key of the field4 ,to have the key is an expression used by harvesters elsewhere in the sense of to cut or bind or thresh the last sheaf2 hence1 it is equivalent to the phrases ,you have the ,old ,man1 ,you are the ,old ,man1 which are addressed to the cutter1 binder1 or thresher of the last sheaf4 ,therefore1 when a stranger1 as at ,brie1 is tied up in a sheaf and told that he will carry the key of the field1 it is as much as to say that he is the ,old ,man1 that is1 an embodiment of the corn-spirit4 ,in hop-picking1 if a well-dressed stranger passes the hop-yard1 he is seized by the women1 tumbled into the bin1 covered with leaves1 and not released till he has paid a fine4 ,thus1 like the ancient ,lityerses1 modern ,european reapers have been wont to lay hold of a passing stranger and tie him up in a sheaf4 ,it is not to be expected that they should complete the parallel by cutting off his head2 but if they do not take such a strong step1 their language and gestures are at least indicative of a desire to do so4 ,for instance1 in ,mecklenburg on the first day of reaping1 if the master or mistress or a stranger enters the field1 or merely passes by it1 all the mowers face towards him and sharpen their scythes1 clashing their whet-stones against them in unison1 as if they were making ready to mow4 ,then the woman who leads the mowers steps up to him and ties a band round his left arm4 ,he must ransom himself by payment of a forfeit4 ,near ,ratzeburg1 when the master or other person of mark enters the field or passes by it1 all the harvesters stop work and march towards him in a body1 the men with their scythes in front4 ,on meeting him they form up in line1 men and women4 ,the men stick the poles of their scythes in the ground1 as they do in whetting them2 then they take off their caps and hang them on the scythes1 while their leader stands forward and makes a speech4 ,when he has done1 they all whet their scythes in measured time very loudly1 after which they put on their caps4 ,two of the women binders then come forward2 one of them ties the master or stranger 7as the case may be7 with corn-ears or with a silken band2 the other delivers a rhyming address4 ,the following are specimens of the speeches made by the reaper on these occasions4 ,in some parts of ,pomerania every passer-by is stopped1 his way being barred with a corn-rope4 ,the reapers form a circle round him and sharpen their scythes1 while their leader says3 ,the men are ready1 ,the scythes are bent1 ,the corn is great and small1 ,the gentleman must be mowed4 ,then the process of whetting the scythes is repeated4 ,at ,ramin1 in the district of ,stettin1 the stranger1 standing encircled by the reapers1 is thus addressed3 ,we'll stroke the gentleman ,with our naked sword1 ,wherewith we shear meadows and fields4 ,we shear princes and lords4 ,labourers are often athirst2 ,if the gentleman will stand beer and brandy ,the joke will soon be over4 ,but1 if our prayer he does not like1 ,the sword has a right to strike4 ,on the threshing-floor strangers are also regarded as embodiments of the corn-spirit1 and are treated accordingly4 ,at ,wiedingharde in ,schleswig when a stranger comes to the threshing-floor he is asked1 ,shall ,i teach you the flail-dance8 ,if he says yes1 they put the arms of the threshing-flail round his neck as if he were a sheaf of corn1 and press them together so tight that he is nearly choked4 ,in some parishes of ,wermland 7,sweden71 when a stranger enters the threshing-floor where the threshers are at work1 they say that they will teach him the threshing-song4 ,then they put a flail round his neck and a straw rope about his body4 ,also1 as we have seen1 if a stranger woman enters the threshing-floor1 the threshers put a flail round her body and a wreath of corn-stalks round her neck1 and call out1 ,see the ,corn-woman6 ,see6 that is how the ,corn-maiden looks6 ,thus in these harvest-customs of modern ,europe the person who cuts1 binds1 or threshes the last corn is treated as an embodiment of the corn-spirit by being wrapt up in sheaves1 killed in mimicry by agricultural implements1 and thrown into the water4 ,these coincidences with the ,lityerses story seem to prove that the latter is a genuine description of an old ,phrygian harvest-custom4 ,but since in the modern parallels the killing of the personal representative of the corn-spirit is necessarily omitted or at most enacted only in mimicry1 it is desirable to show that in rude society human beings have been commonly killed as an agricultural ceremony to promote the fertility of the fields4 ,the following examples will make this plain4 #c4 ,human ,sacrifices for the ,crops ,,the ,,indians of ,guayaquil1 in ,ecuador1 used to sacrifice human blood and the hearts of men when they sowed their fields4 ,the people of ,caar 7now ,cuenca in ,ecuador7 used to sacrifice a hundred children annually at harvest4 ,the kings of ,quito1 the ,incas of ,peru1 and for a long time the ,spaniards were unable to suppress the bloody rite4 ,at a ,mexican harvest-festival1 when the first-fruits of the season were offered to the sun1 a criminal was placed between two immense stones1 balanced opposite each other1 and was crushed by them as they fell together4 ,his remains were buried1 and a feast and dance followed4 ,this sacrifice was known as the meeting of the stones4 ,we have seen that the ancient ,mexicans also sacrificed human beings at all the various stages in the growth of the maize1 the age of the victims corresponding to the age of the corn2 for they sacrificed new-born babes at sowing1 older children when the grain had sprouted1 and so on till it was fully ripe1 when they sacrificed old men4 ,no doubt the correspondence between the ages of the victims and the state of the corn was supposed to enhance the efficacy of the sacrifice4 ,the ,pawnees annually sacrificed a human victim in spring when they sowed their fields4 ,the sacrifice was believed to have been enjoined on them by the ,morning ,star1 or by a certain bird which the ,morning ,star had sent to them as its messenger4 ,the bird was stuffed and preserved as a powerful talisman4 ,they thought that an omission of this sacrifice would be followed by the total failure of the crops of maize1 beans1 and pumpkins4 ,the victim was a captive of either sex4 ,he was clad in the gayest and most costly attire1 was fattened on the choicest food1 and carefully kept in ignorance of his doom4 ,when he was fat enough1 they bound him to a cross in the presence of the multitude1 danced a solemn dance1 then cleft his head with a tomahawk and shot him with arrows4 ,according to one trader1 the squaws then cut pieces of flesh from the victim's body1 with which they greased their hoes2 but this was denied by another trader who had been present at the ceremony4 ,immediately after the sacrifice the people proceeded to plant their fields4 ,a particular account has been preserved of the sacrifice of a ,sioux girl by the ,pawnees in ,april #ahcg or #ahch4 ,the girl was fourteen or fifteen years old and had been kept for six months and well treated4 ,two days before the sacrifice she was led from wigwam to wigwam1 accompanied by the whole council of chiefs and warriors4 ,at each lodge she received a small billet of wood and a little paint1 which she handed to the warrior next to her4 ,in this way she called at every wigwam1 receiving at each the same present of wood and paint4 ,on the twenty-second of ,april she was taken out to be sacrificed1 attended by the warriors1 each of whom carried two pieces of wood which he had received from her hands4 ,her body having been painted half red and half black1 she was attached to a sort of gibbet and roasted for some time over a slow fire1 then shot to death with arrows4 ,the chief sacrificer next tore out her heart and devoured it4 ,while her flesh was still warm it was cut in small pieces from the bones1 put in little baskets1 and taken to a neighbouring corn-field4 ,there the head chief took a piece of the flesh from a basket and squeezed a drop of blood upon the newly-deposited grains of corn4 ,his example was followed by the rest1 till all the seed had been sprinkled with the blood2 it was then covered up with earth4 ,according to one account the body of the victim was reduced to a kind of paste1 which was rubbed or sprinkled not only on the maize but also on the potatoes1 the beans1 and other seeds to fertilise them4 ,by this sacrifice they hoped to obtain plentiful crops4 ,a ,west ,african queen used to sacrifice a man and woman in the month of ,march4 ,they were killed with spades and hoes1 and their bodies buried in the middle of a field which had just been tilled4 ,at ,lagos in ,guinea it was the custom annually to impale a young girl alive soon after the spring equinox in order to secure good crops4 ,along with her were sacrificed sheep and goats1 which1 with yams1 heads of maize1 and plantains1 were hung on stakes on each side of her4 ,the victims were bred up for the purpose in the king's seraglio1 and their minds had been so powerfully wrought upon by the fetish men that they went cheerfully to their fate4 ,a similar sacrifice used to be annually offered at ,benin1 in ,guinea4 ,the ,marimos1 a ,bechuana tribe1 sacrifice a human being for the crops4 ,the victim chosen is generally a short1 stout man4 ,he is seized by violence or intoxicated and taken to the fields1 where he is killed amongst the wheat to serve as seed 7so they phrase it74 ,after his blood has coagulated in the sun1 it is burned along with the frontal bone1 the flesh attached to it1 and the brain2 the ashes are then scattered over the ground to fertilise it4 ,the rest of the body is eaten4 ,the ,bagobos of ,mindanao1 one of the ,philippine ,islands1 offer a human sacrifice before they sow their rice4 ,the victim is a slave1 who is hewn to pieces in the forest4 ,the natives of ,bontoc in the interior of ,luzon1 one of the ,philippine ,islands1 are passionate head-hunters4 ,their principal seasons for head-hunting are the times of planting and reaping the rice4 ,in order that the crop may turn out well1 every farm must get at least one human head at planting and one at sowing4 ,the head-hunters go out in twos or threes1 lie in wait for the victim1 whether man or woman1 cut off his or her head1 hands1 and feet1 and bring them back in haste to the village1 where they are received with great rejoicings4 ,the skulls are at first exposed on the branches of two or three dead trees which stand in an open space of every village surrounded by large stones which serve as seats4 ,the people then dance round them and feast and get drunk4 ,when the flesh has decayed from the head1 the man who cut it off takes it home and preserves it as a relic1 while his companions do the same with the hands and the feet4 ,similar customs are observed by the ,apoyaos1 another tribe in the interior of ,luzon4 ,among the ,lhota ,naga1 one of the many savage tribes who inhabit the deep rugged labyrinthine glens which wind into the mountains from the rich valley of ,brahmapootra1 it used to be a common custom to chop off the heads1 hands1 and feet of people they met with1 and then to stick up the severed extremities in their fields to ensure a good crop of grain4 ,they bore no ill-will whatever to the persons upon whom they operated in this unceremonious fashion4 ,once they flayed a boy alive1 carved him in pieces1 and distributed the flesh among all the villagers1 who put it into their corn-bins to avert bad luck and ensure plentiful crops of grain4 ,the ,gonds of ,india1 a ,dravidian race1 kidnapped ,brahman boys1 and kept them as victims to be sacrificed on various occasions4 ,at sowing and reaping1 after a triumphal procession1 one of the lads was slain by being punctured with a poisoned arrow4 ,his blood was then sprinkled over the ploughed field or the ripe crop1 and his flesh was devoured4 ,the ,oraons or ,uraons of ,chota ,nagpur worship a goddess called ,anna ,kuari1 who can give good crops and make a man rich1 but to induce her to do so it is necessary to offer human sacrifices4 ,in spite of the vigilance of the ,british ,government these sacrifices are said to be still secretly perpetrated4 ,the victims are poor waifs and strays whose disappearance attracts no notice4 ,april and ,may are the months when the catchpoles are out on the prowl4 ,at that time strangers will not go about the country alone1 and parents will not let their children enter the jungle or herd the cattle4 ,when a catchpole has found a victim1 he cuts his throat and carries away the upper part of the ring finger and the nose4 ,the goddess takes up her abode in the house of any man who has offered her a sacrifice1 and from that time his fields yield a double harvest4 ,the form she assumes in the house is that of a small child4 ,when the householder brings in his unhusked rice1 he takes the goddess and rolls her over the heap to double its size4 ,but she soon grows restless and can only be pacified with the blood of fresh human victims4 ,but the best known case of human sacrifices1 systematically offered to ensure good crops1 is supplied by the ,khonds or ,kandhs1 another ,dravidian race in ,bengal4 ,our knowledge of them is derived from the accounts written by ,british officers who1 about the middle of the nineteenth century1 were engaged in putting them down4 ,the sacrifices were offered to the ,earth ,goddess1 ,tari ,pennu or ,bera ,pennu1 and were believed to ensure good crops and immunity from all disease and accidents4 ,in particular1 they were considered necessary in the cultivation of turmeric1 the ,khonds arguing that the turmeric could not have a deep red colour without the shedding of blood4 ,the victim or ,meriah1 as he was called1 was acceptable to the goddess only if he had been purchased1 or had been born a victim--that is1 the son of a victim father1 or had been devoted as a child by his father or guardian4 ,khonds in distress often sold their children for victims1 considering the beatification of their souls certain1 and their death1 for the benefit of mankind1 the most honourable possible4 ,a man of the ,panua tribe was once seen to load a ,khond with curses1 and finally to spit in his face1 because the ,khond had sold for a victim his own child1 whom the ,panua had wished to marry4 ,a party of ,khonds1 who saw this1 immediately pressed forward to comfort the seller of his child1 saying1 ,your child has died that all the world may live1 and the ,earth ,goddess herself will wipe that spittle from your face4 ,the victims were often kept for years before they were sacrificed4 ,being regarded as consecrated beings1 they were treated with extreme affection1 mingled with deference1 and were welcomed wherever they went4 ,a ,meriah youth1 on attaining maturity1 was generally given a wife1 who was herself usually a ,meriah or victim2 and with her he received a portion of land and farm-stock4 ,their offspring were also victims4 ,human sacrifices were offered to the ,earth ,goddess by tribes1 branches of tribes1 or villages1 both at periodical festivals and on extraordinary occasions4 ,the periodical sacrifices were generally so arranged by tribes and divisions of tribes that each head of a family was enabled1 at least once a year1 to procure a shred of flesh for his fields1 generally about the time when his chief crop was laid down4 ,the mode of performing these tribal sacrifices was as follows4 ,ten or twelve days before the sacrifice1 the victim was devoted by cutting off his hair1 which1 until then1 had been kept unshorn4 ,crowds of men and women assembled to witness the sacrifice2 none might be excluded1 since the sacrifice was declared to be for all mankind4 ,it was preceded by several days of wild revelry and gross debauchery4 ,on the day before the sacrifice the victim1 dressed in a new garment1 was led forth from the village in solemn procession1 with music and dancing1 to the ,meriah grove1 a clump of high forest trees standing a little way from the village and untouched by the axe4 ,there they tied him to a post1 which was sometimes placed between two plants of the sankissar shrub4 ,he was then anointed with oil1 ghee1 and turmeric1 and adorned with flowers2 and a species of reverence1 which it is not easy to distinguish from adoration1 was paid to him throughout the day4 ,a great struggle now arose to obtain the smallest relic from his person2 a particle of the turmeric paste with which he was smeared1 or a drop of his spittle1 was esteemed of sovereign virtue1 especially by the women4 ,the crowd danced round the post to music1 and addressing the earth1 said1 ,o ,god1 we offer this sacrifice to you2 give us good crops1 seasons1 and health2 then speaking to the victim they said1 ,we bought you with a price1 and did not seize you2 now we sacrifice you according to custom1 and no sin rests with us4 ,on the last morning the orgies1 which had been scarcely interrupted during the night1 were resumed1 and continued till noon1 when they ceased1 and the assembly proceeded to consummate the sacrifice4 ,the victim was again anointed with oil1 and each person touched the anointed part1 and wiped the oil on his own head4 ,in some places they took the victim in procession round the village1 from door to door1 where some plucked hair from his head1 and others begged for a drop of his spittle1 with which they anointed their heads4 ,as the victim might not be bound nor make any show of resistance1 the bones of his arms and1 if necessary1 his legs were broken2 but often this precaution was rendered unnecessary by stupefying him with opium4 ,the mode of putting him to death varied in different places4 ,one of the commonest modes seems to have been strangulation1 or squeezing to death4 ,the branch of a green tree was cleft several feet down the middle2 the victim's neck 7in other places1 his chest7 was inserted in the cleft1 which the priest1 aided by his assistants1 strove with all his force to close4 ,then he wounded the victim slightly with his axe1 whereupon the crowd rushed at the wretch and hewed the flesh from the bones1 leaving the head and bowels untouched4 ,sometimes he was cut up alive4 ,in ,chinna ,kimedy he was dragged along the fields1 surrounded by the crowd1 who1 avoiding his head and intestines1 hacked the flesh from his body with their knives till he died4 ,another very common mode of sacrifice in the same district was to fasten the victim to the proboscis of a wooden elephant1 which revolved on a stout post1 and1 as it whirled round1 the crowd cut the flesh from the victim while life remained4 ,in some villages ,major ,campbell found as many as fourteen of these wooden elephants1 which had been used at sacrifices4 ,in one district the victim was put to death slowly by fire4 ,a low stage was formed1 sloping on either side like a roof2 upon it they laid the victim1 his limbs wound round with cords to confine his struggles4 ,fires were then lighted and hot brands applied1 to make him roll up and down the slopes of the stage as long as possible2 for the more tears he shed the more abundant would be the supply of rain4 ,next day the body was cut to pieces4 ,the flesh cut from the victim was instantly taken home by the persons who had been deputed by each village to bring it4 ,to secure its rapid arrival1 it was sometimes forwarded by relays of men1 and conveyed with postal fleetness fifty or sixty miles4 ,in each village all who stayed at home fasted rigidly until the flesh arrived4 ,the bearer deposited it in the place of public assembly1 where it was received by the priest and the heads of families4 ,the priest divided it into two portions1 one of which he offered to the ,earth ,goddess by burying it in a hole in the ground with his back turned1 and without looking4 ,then each man added a little earth to bury it1 and the priest poured water on the spot from a hill gourd4 ,the other portion of flesh he divided into as many shares as there were heads of houses present4 ,each head of a house rolled his shred of flesh in leaves1 and buried it in his favourite field1 placing it in the earth behind his back without looking4 ,in some places each man carried his portion of flesh to the stream which watered his fields1 and there hung it on a pole4 ,for three days thereafter no house was swept2 and1 in one district1 strict silence was observed1 no fire might be given out1 no wood cut1 and no strangers received4 ,the remains of the human victim 7namely1 the head1 bowels1 and bones7 were watched by strong parties the night after the sacrifice2 and next morning they were burned1 along with a whole sheep1 on a funeral pile4 ,the ashes were scattered over the fields1 laid as paste over the houses and granaries1 or mixed with the new corn to preserve it from insects4 ,sometimes1 however1 the head and bones were buried1 not burnt4 ,after the suppression of the human sacrifices1 inferior victims were substituted in some places2 for instance1 in the capital of ,chinna ,kimedy a goat took the place of the human victim4 ,others sacrifice a buffalo4 ,they tie it to a wooden post in a sacred grove1 dance wildly round it with brandished knives1 then1 falling on the living animal1 hack it to shreds and tatters in a few minutes1 fighting and struggling with each other for every particle of flesh4 ,as soon as a man has secured a piece he makes off with it at full speed to bury it in his fields1 according to ancient custom1 before the sun has set1 and as some of them have far to go they must run very fast4 ,all the women throw clods of earth at the rapidly retreating figures of the men1 some of them taking very good aim4 ,soon the sacred grove1 so lately a scene of tumult1 is silent and deserted except for a few people who remain to guard all that is left of the buffalo1 to wit1 the head1 the bones1 and the stomach1 which are burned with ceremony at the foot of the stake4 ,in these ,khond sacrifices the ,meriahs are represented by our authorities as victims offered to propitiate the ,earth ,goddess4 ,but from the treatment of the victims both before and after death it appears that the custom cannot be explained as merely a propitiatory sacrifice4 ,a part of the flesh certainly was offered to the ,earth ,goddess1 but the rest was buried by each householder in his fields1 and the ashes of the other parts of the body were scattered over the fields1 laid as paste on the granaries1 or mixed with the new corn4 ,these latter customs imply that to the body of the ,meriah there was ascribed a direct or intrinsic power of making the crops to grow1 quite independent of the indirect efficacy which it might have as an offering to secure the good-will of the deity4 ,in other words1 the flesh and ashes of the victim were believed to be endowed with a magical or physical power of fertilising the land4 ,the same intrinsic power was ascribed to the blood and tears of the ,meriah1 his blood causing the redness of the turmeric and his tears producing rain2 for it can hardly be doubted that1 originally at least1 the tears were supposed to bring down the rain1 not merely to prognosticate it4 ,similarly the custom of pouring water on the buried flesh of the ,meriah was no doubt a rain-charm4 ,again1 magical power as an attribute of the ,meriah appears in the sovereign virtue believed to reside in anything that came from his person1 as his hair or spittle4 ,the ascription of such power to the ,meriah indicates that he was much more than a mere man sacrificed to propitiate a deity4 ,once more1 the extreme reverence paid him points to the same conclusion4 ,major ,campbell speaks of the ,meriah as being regarded as something more than mortal1 and ,major ,macpherson says1 ,a species of reverence1 which it is not easy to distinguish from adoration1 is paid to him4 ,in short1 the ,meriah seems to have been regarded as divine4 ,as such1 he may originally have represented the ,earth ,goddess or1 perhaps1 a deity of vegetation2 though in later times he came to be regarded rather as a victim offered to a deity than as himself an incarnate god4 ,this later view of the ,meriah as a victim rather than a divinity may perhaps have received undue emphasis from the ,european writers who have described the ,khond religion4 ,habituated to the later idea of sacrifice as an offering made to a god for the purpose of conciliating his favour1 ,european observers are apt to interpret all religious slaughter in this sense1 and to suppose that wherever such slaughter takes place1 there must necessarily be a deity to whom the carnage is believed by the slayers to be acceptable4 ,thus their preconceived ideas may unconsciously colour and warp their descriptions of savage rites4 ,the same custom of killing the representative of a god1 of which strong traces appear in the ,khond sacrifices1 may perhaps be detected in some of the other human sacrifices described above4 ,thus the ashes of the slaughtered ,marimo were scattered over the fields2 the blood of the ,brahman lad was put on the crop and field2 the flesh of the slain ,naga was stowed in the corn-bin2 and the blood of the ,sioux girl was allowed to trickle on the seed4 ,again1 the identification of the victim with the corn1 in other words1 the view that he is an embodiment or spirit of the corn1 is brought out in the pains which seem to be taken to secure a physical correspondence between him and the natural object which he embodies or represents4 ,thus the ,mexicans killed young victims for the young corn and old ones for the ripe corn2 the ,marimos sacrifice1 as seed1 a short1 fat man1 the shortness of his stature corresponding to that of the young corn1 his fatness to the condition which it is desired that the crops may attain2 and the ,pawnees fattened their victims probably with the same view4 ,again1 the identification of the victim with the corn comes out in the ,african custom of killing him with spades and hoes1 and the ,mexican custom of grinding him1 like corn1 between two stones4 ,one more point in these savage customs deserves to be noted4 ,the ,pawnee chief devoured the heart of the ,sioux girl1 and the ,marimos and ,gonds ate the victim's flesh4 ,if1 as we suppose1 the victim was regarded as divine1 it follows that in eating his flesh his worshippers believed themselves to be partaking of the body of their god4 #d4 ,the ,corn-spirit slain in his ,human ,representatives ,,the ,,barbarous rites just described offer analogies to the harvest customs of ,europe4 ,thus the fertilising virtue ascribed to the corn-spirit is shown equally in the savage custom of mixing the victim's blood or ashes with the seed-corn and the ,european custom of mixing the grain from the last sheaf with the young corn in spring4 ,again1 the identification of the person with the corn appears alike in the savage custom of adapting the age and stature of the victim to the age and stature1 whether actual or expected1 of the crop2 in the ,scotch and ,styrian rules that when the corn-spirit is conceived as the ,maiden the last corn shall be cut by a young maiden1 but when it is conceived as the ,corn-mother it shall be cut by an old woman2 in the warning given to old women in ,lorraine to save themselves when the ,old ,woman is being killed1 that is1 when the last corn is being threshed2 and in the ,tyrolese expectation that if the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is tall1 the next year's corn will be tall also4 ,further1 the same identification is implied in the savage custom of killing the representative of the corn-spirit with hoes or spades or by grinding him between stones1 and in the ,european custom of pretending to kill him with the scythe or the flail4 ,once more the ,khond custom of pouring water on the buried flesh of the victim is parallel to the ,european customs of pouring water on the personal representative of the corn-spirit or plunging him into a stream4 ,both the ,khond and the ,european customs are rain-charms4 ,to return now to the ,lityerses story4 ,it has been shown that in rude society human beings have been commonly killed to promote the growth of the crops4 ,there is therefore no improbability in the supposition that they may once have been killed for a like purpose in ,phrygia and ,europe2 and when ,phrygian legend and ,european folk-custom1 closely agreeing with each other1 point to the conclusion that men were so slain1 we are bound1 provisionally at least1 to accept the conclusion4 ,further1 both the ,lityerses story and ,european harvest-customs agree in indicating that the victim was put to death as a representative of the corn-spirit1 and this indication is in harmony with the view which some savages appear to take of the victim slain to make the crops flourish4 ,on the whole1 then1 we may fairly suppose that both in ,phrygia and in ,europe the representative of the corn-spirit was annually killed upon the harvest-field4 ,grounds have been already shown for believing that similarly in ,europe the representative of the tree-spirit was annually slain4 ,the proofs of these two remarkable and closely analogous customs are entirely independent of each other4 ,their coincidence seems to furnish fresh presumption in favour of both4 ,to the question1 ,how was the representative of the corn-spirit chosen8 one answer has been already given4 ,both the ,lityerses story and ,european folk-custom show that passing strangers were regarded as manifestations of the corn-spirit escaping from the cut or threshed corn1 and as such were seized and slain4 ,but this is not the only answer which the evidence suggests4 ,according to the ,phrygian legend the victims of ,lityerses were not simply passing strangers1 but persons whom he had vanquished in a reaping contest and afterwards wrapt up in corn-sheaves and beheaded4 ,this suggests that the representative of the corn-spirit may have been selected by means of a competition on the harvest-field1 in which the vanquished competitor was compelled to accept the fatal honour4 ,the supposition is countenanced by ,european harvest-customs4 ,we have seen that in ,europe there is sometimes a contest amongst the reapers to avoid being last1 and that the person who is vanquished in this competition1 that is1 who cuts the last corn1 is often roughly handled4 ,it is true we have not found that a pretence is made of killing him2 but on the other hand we have found that a pretence is made of killing the man who gives the last stroke at threshing1 that is1 who is vanquished in the threshing contest4 ,now1 since it is in the character of representative of the corn-spirit that the thresher of the last corn is slain in mimicry1 and since the same representative character attaches 7as we have seen7 to the cutter and binder as well as to the thresher of the last corn1 and since the same repugnance is evinced by harvesters to be last in any one of these labours1 we may conjecture that a pretence has been commonly made of killing the reaper and binder as well as the thresher of the last corn1 and that in ancient times this killing was actually carried out4 ,this conjecture is corroborated by the common superstition that whoever cuts the last corn must die soon4 ,sometimes it is thought that the person who binds the last sheaf on the field will die in the course of next year4 ,the reason for fixing on the reaper1 binder1 or thresher of the last corn as the representative of the corn-spirit may be this4 ,the corn-spirit is supposed to lurk as long as he can in the corn1 retreating before the reapers1 the binders1 and the threshers at their work4 ,but when he is forcibly expelled from his refuge in the last corn cut or the last sheaf bound or the last grain threshed1 he necessarily assumes some other form than that of the corn-stalks1 which had hitherto been his garment or body4 ,and what form can the expelled corn-spirit assume more naturally than that of the person who stands nearest to the corn from which he 7the corn-spirit7 has just been expelled8 ,but the person in question is necessarily the reaper1 binder1 or thresher of the last corn4 ,he or she1 therefore1 is seized and treated as the corn-spirit himself4 ,thus the person who was killed on the harvest-field as the representative of the corn-spirit may have been either a passing stranger or the harvester who was last at reaping1 binding1 or threshing4 ,but there is a third possibility1 to which ancient legend and modern folk-custom alike point4 ,lityerses not only put strangers to death2 he was himself slain1 and apparently in the same way as he had slain others1 namely1 by being wrapt in a corn-sheaf1 beheaded1 and cast into the river2 and it is implied that this happened to ,lityerses on his own land4 ,similarly in modern harvest-customs the pretence of killing appears to be carried out quite as often on the person of the master 7farmer or squire7 as on that of strangers4 ,now when we remember that ,lityerses was said to have been a son of the ,king of ,phrygia1 and that in one account he is himself called a king1 and when we combine with this the tradition that he was put to death1 apparently as a representative of the corn-spirit1 we are led to conjecture that we have here another trace of the custom of annually slaying one of those divine or priestly kings who are known to have held ghostly sway in many parts of ,western ,asia and particularly in ,phrygia4 ,the custom appears1 as we have seen1 to have been so far modified in places that the king's son was slain in the king's stead4 ,of the custom thus modified the story of ,lityerses would be1 in one version at least1 a reminiscence4 ,turning now to the relation of the ,phrygian ,lityerses to the ,phrygian ,attis1 it may be remembered that at ,pessinus--the seat of a priestly kingship--the high-priest appears to have been annually slain in the character of ,attis1 a god of vegetation1 and that ,attis was described by an ancient authority as a reaped ear of corn4 ,thus ,attis1 as an embodiment of the corn-spirit1 annually slain in the person of his representative1 might be thought to be ultimately identical with ,lityerses1 the latter being simply the rustic prototype out of which the state religion of ,attis was developed4 ,it may have been so2 but1 on the other hand1 the analogy of ,european folk-custom warns us that amongst the same people two distinct deities of vegetation may have their separate personal representatives1 both of whom are slain in the character of gods at different times of the year4 ,for in ,europe1 as we have seen1 it appears that one man was commonly slain in the character of the tree-spirit in spring1 and another in the character of the corn-spirit in autumn4 ,it may have been so in ,phrygia also4 ,attis was especially a tree-god1 and his connexion with corn may have been only such an extension of the power of a tree-spirit as is indicated in customs like the ,harvest-,may4 ,again1 the representative of ,attis appears to have been slain in spring2 whereas ,lityerses must have been slain in summer or autumn1 according to the time of the harvest in ,phrygia4 ,on the whole1 then1 while we are not justified in regarding ,lityerses as the prototype of ,attis1 the two may be regarded as parallel products of the same religious idea1 and may have stood to each other as in ,europe the ,old ,man of harvest stands to the ,wild ,man1 the ,leaf ,man1 and so forth1 of spring4 ,both were spirits or deities of vegetation1 and the personal representatives of both were annually slain4 ,but whereas the ,attis worship became elevated into the dignity of a state religion and spread to ,italy1 the rites of ,lityerses seem never to have passed the limits of their native ,phrygia1 and always retained their character of rustic ceremonies performed by peasants on the harvest-field4 ,at most a few villages may have clubbed together1 as amongst the ,khonds1 to procure a human victim to be slain as representative of the corn-spirit for their common benefit4 ,such victims may have been drawn from the families of priestly kings or kinglets1 which would account for the legendary character of ,lityerses as the son of a ,phrygian king or as himself a king4 ,when villages did not so club together1 each village or farm may have procured its own representative of the corn-spirit by dooming to death either a passing stranger or the harvester who cut1 bound1 or threshed the last sheaf4 ,perhaps in the olden time the practice of head-hunting as a means of promoting the growth of the corn may have been as common among the rude inhabitants of ,europe and ,western ,asia as it still is1 or was till lately1 among the primitive agricultural tribes of ,assam1 ,burma1 the ,philippine ,islands1 and the ,indian ,archipelago4 ,it is hardly necessary to add that in ,phrygia1 as in ,europe1 the old barbarous custom of killing a man on the harvest-field or the threshing-floor had doubtless passed into a mere pretence long before the classical era1 and was probably regarded by the reapers and threshers themselves as no more than a rough jest which the license of a harvest-home permitted them to play off on a passing stranger1 a comrade1 or even on their master himself4 ,i have dwelt on the ,lityerses song at length because it affords so many points of comparison with ,european and savage folk-custom4 ,the other harvest songs of ,western ,asia and ,egypt1 to which attention has been called above1 may now be dismissed much more briefly4 ,the similarity of the ,bithynian ,bormus to the ,phrygian ,lityerses helps to bear out the interpretation which has been given of the latter4 ,bormus1 whose death or rather disappearance was annually mourned by the reapers in a plaintive song1 was1 like ,lityerses1 a king's son or at least the son of a wealthy and distinguished man4 ,the reapers whom he watched were at work on his own fields1 and he disappeared in going to fetch water for them2 according to one version of the story he was carried off by the nymphs1 doubtless the nymphs of the spring or pool or river whither he went to draw water4 ,viewed in the light of the ,lityerses story and of ,european folk-custom1 this disappearance of ,bormus may be a reminiscence of the custom of binding the farmer himself in a corn-sheaf and throwing him into the water4 ,the mournful strain which the reapers sang was probably a lamentation over the death of the corn-spirit1 slain either in the cut corn or in the person of a human representative2 and the call which they addressed to him may have been a prayer that he might return in fresh vigour next year4 ,the ,phoenician ,linus song was sung at the vintage1 at least in the west of ,asia ,minor1 as we learn from ,homer2 and this1 combined with the legend of ,syleus1 suggests that in ancient times passing strangers were handled by vintagers and vine-diggers in much the same way as they are said to have been handled by the reaper ,lityerses4 ,the ,lydian ,syleus1 so ran the legend1 compelled passers-by to dig for him in his vineyard1 till ,hercules came and killed him and dug up his vines by the roots4 ,this seems to be the outline of a legend like that of ,lityerses2 but neither ancient writers nor modern folk-custom enable us to fill in the details4 ,but1 further1 the ,linus song was probably sung also by ,phoenician reapers1 for ,herodotus compares it to the ,maneros song1 which1 as we have seen1 was a lament raised by ,egyptian reapers over the cut corn4 ,further1 ,linus was identified with ,adonis1 and ,adonis has some claims to be regarded as especially a corn-deity4 ,thus the ,linus lament1 as sung at harvest1 would be identical with the ,adonis lament2 each would be the lamentation raised by reapers over the dead spirit of the corn4 ,but whereas ,adonis1 like ,attis1 grew into a stately figure of mythology1 adored and mourned in splendid cities far beyond the limits of his ,phoenician home1 ,linus appears to have remained a simple ditty sung by reapers and vintagers among the corn-sheaves and the vines4 ,the analogy of ,lityerses and of folk-custom1 both ,european and savage1 suggests that in ,phoenicia the slain corn-spirit--the dead ,adonis--may formerly have been represented by a human victim2 and this suggestion is possibly supported by the ,harran legend that ,tammuz 7,adonis7 was slain by his cruel lord1 who ground his bones in a mill and scattered them to the wind4 ,for in ,mexico1 as we have seen1 the human victim at harvest was crushed between two stones2 and both in ,africa and ,india the ashes or other remains of the victim were scattered over the fields4 ,but the ,harran legend may be only a mythical way of expressing the grinding of corn in the mill and the scattering of the seed4 ,it seems worth suggesting that the mock king who was annually killed at the ,babylonian festival of the ,sacaea on the sixteenth day of the month ,lous may have represented ,tammuz himself4 ,for the historian ,berosus1 who records the festival and its date1 probably used the ,macedonian calendar1 since he dedicated his history to ,antiochus ,soter2 and in his day the ,macedonian month ,lous appears to have corresponded to the ,babylonian month ,tammuz4 ,if this conjecture is right1 the view that the mock king at the ,sacaea was slain in the character of a god would be established4 ,there is a good deal more evidence that in ,egypt the slain corn-spirit--the dead ,osiris--was represented by a human victim1 whom the reapers slew on the harvest-field1 mourning his death in a dirge1 to which the ,greeks1 through a verbal misunderstanding1 gave the name of ,maneros4 ,for the legend of ,busiris seems to preserve a reminiscence of human sacrifices once offered by the ,egyptians in connexion with the worship of ,osiris4 ,busiris was said to have been an ,egyptian king who sacrificed all strangers on the altar of ,zeus4 ,the origin of the custom was traced to a dearth which afflicted the land of ,egypt for nine years4 ,a ,cyprian seer informed ,busiris that the dearth would cease if a man were annually sacrificed to ,zeus4 ,so ,busiris instituted the sacrifice4 ,but when ,hercules came to ,egypt1 and was being dragged to the altar to be sacrificed1 he burst his bonds and slew ,busiris and his son4 ,here then is a legend that in ,egypt a human victim was annually sacrificed to prevent the failure of the crops1 and a belief is implied that an omission of the sacrifice would have entailed a recurrence of that infertility which it was the object of the sacrifice to prevent4 ,so the ,pawnees1 as we have seen1 believed that an omission of the human sacrifice at planting would have been followed by a total failure of their crops4 ,the name ,busiris was in reality the name of a city1 pe-,asar1 the house of ,osiris1 the city being so called because it contained the grave of ,osiris4 ,indeed some high modern authorities believe that ,busiris was the original home of ,osiris1 from which his worship spread to other parts of ,egypt4 ,the human sacrifices were said to have been offered at his grave1 and the victims were red-haired men1 whose ashes were scattered abroad by means of winnowing-fans4 ,this tradition of human sacrifices offered at the tomb of ,osiris is confirmed by the evidence of the monuments4 ,in the light of the foregoing discussion the ,egyptian tradition of ,busiris admits of a consistent and fairly probable explanation4 ,osiris1 the corn-spirit1 was annually represented at harvest by a stranger1 whose red hair made him a suitable representative of the ripe corn4 ,this man1 in his representative character1 was slain on the harvest-field1 and mourned by the reapers1 who prayed at the same time that the corn-spirit might revive and return 7m-ne-rha1 ,maneros7 with renewed vigour in the following year4 ,finally1 the victim1 or some part of him1 was burned1 and the ashes scattered by winnowing-fans over the fields to fertilise them4 ,here the choice of the victim on the ground of his resemblance to the corn which he was to represent agrees with the ,mexican and ,african customs already described4 ,similarly the woman who died in the character of the ,corn-mother at the ,mexican midsummer sacrifice had her face painted red and yellow in token of the colours of the corn1 and she wore a pasteboard mitre surmounted by waving plumes in imitation of the tassel of the maize4 ,on the other hand1 at the festival of the ,goddess of the ,white ,maize the ,mexicans sacrificed lepers4 ,the ,romans sacrificed red-haired puppies in spring to avert the supposed blighting influence of the ,dog-star1 believing that the crops would thus grow ripe and ruddy4 ,the heathen of ,harran offered to the sun1 moon1 and planets human victims who were chosen on the ground of their supposed resemblance to the heavenly bodies to which they were sacrificed2 for example1 the priests1 clothed in red and smeared with blood1 offered a red-haired1 red-cheeked man to the red planet ,mars in a temple which was painted red and draped with red hangings4 ,these and the like cases of assimilating the victim to the god1 or to the natural phenomenon which he represents1 are based ultimately on the principle of homoeopathic or imitative magic1 the notion being that the object aimed at will be most readily attained by means of a sacrifice which resembles the effect that it is designed to bring about4 ,the story that the fragments of ,osiris's body were scattered up and down the land1 and buried by ,isis on the spots where they lay1 may very well be a reminiscence of a custom1 like that observed by the ,khonds1 of dividing the human victim in pieces and burying the pieces1 often at intervals of many miles from each other1 in the fields4 ,thus1 if ,i am right1 the key to the mysteries of ,osiris is furnished by the melancholy cry of the ,egyptian reapers1 which down to ,roman times could be heard year after year sounding across the fields1 announcing the death of the corn-spirit1 the rustic prototype of ,osiris4 ,similar cries1 as we have seen1 were also heard on all the harvest-fields of ,western ,asia4 ,by the ancients they are spoken of as songs2 but to judge from the analysis of the names ,linus and ,maneros1 they probably consisted only of a few words uttered in a prolonged musical note which could be heard at a great distance4 ,such sonorous and long-drawn cries1 raised by a number of strong voices in concert1 must have had a striking effect1 and could hardly fail to arrest the attention of any wayfarer who happened to be within hearing4 ,the sounds1 repeated again and again1 could probably be distinguished with tolerable ease even at a distance2 but to a ,greek traveller in ,asia or ,egypt the foreign words would commonly convey no meaning1 and he might take them1 not unnaturally1 for the name of some one 7,maneros1 ,linus1 ,lityerses1 ,bormus7 upon whom the reapers were calling4 ,and if his journey led him through more countries than one1 as ,bithynia and ,phrygia1 or ,phoenicia and ,egypt1 while the corn was being reaped1 he would have an opportunity of comparing the various harvest cries of the different peoples4 ,thus we can readily understand why these harvest cries were so often noted and compared with each other by the ,greeks4 ,whereas1 if they had been regular songs1 they could not have been heard at such distances1 and therefore could not have attracted the attention of so many travellers2 and1 moreover1 even if the wayfarer were within hearing of them1 he could not so easily have picked out the words4 ,down to recent times ,devonshire reapers uttered cries of the same sort1 and performed on the field a ceremony exactly analogous to that in which1 if ,i am not mistaken1 the rites of ,osiris originated4 ,the cry and the ceremony are thus described by an observer who wrote in the first half of the nineteenth century4 ,after the wheat is all cut1 on most farms in the north of ,devon1 the harvest people have a custom of 'crying the neck4' ,i believe that this practice is seldom omitted on any large farm in that part of the country4 ,it is done in this way4 ,an old man1 or some one else well acquainted with the ceremonies used on the occasion 7when the labourers are reaping the last field of wheat71 goes round to the shocks and sheaves1 and picks out a little bundle of all the best ears he can find2 this bundle he ties up very neat and trim1 and plats and arranges the straws very tastefully4 ,this is called 'the neck' of wheat1 or wheaten-ears4 ,after the field is cut out1 and the pitcher once more circulated1 the reapers1 binders1 and the women stand round in a circle4 ,the person with 'the neck' stands in the centre1 grasping it with both hands4 ,he first stoops and holds it near the ground1 and all the men forming the ring take off their hats1 stooping and holding them with both hands towards the ground4 ,they then all begin at once in a very prolonged and harmonious tone to cry ',the neck6' at the same time slowly raising themselves upright1 and elevating their arms and hats above their heads2 the person with 'the neck' also raising it on high4 ,this is done three times4 ,they then change their cry to ',wee yen6'--',way yen6'--which they sound in the same prolonged and slow manner as before1 with singular harmony and effect1 three times4 ,this last cry is accompanied by the same movements of the body and arms as in crying 'the neck4' 4 4 4 ,after having thus repeated 'the neck' three times1 and 'wee yen1' or 'way yen' as often1 they all burst out into a kind of loud and joyous laugh1 flinging up their hats and caps into the air1 capering about and perhaps kissing the girls4 ,one of them then gets 'the neck' and runs as hard as he can down to the farmhouse1 where the dairymaid1 or one of the young female domestics1 stands at the door prepared with a pail of water4 ,if he who holds 'the neck' can manage to get into the house1 in any way unseen1 or openly1 by any other way than the door at which the girl stands with the pail of water1 then he may lawfully kiss her2 but1 if otherwise1 he is regularly soused with the contents of the bucket4 ,on a fine still autumn evening the 'crying of the neck' has a wonderful effect at a distance1 far finer than that of the ,turkish muezzin1 which ,lord ,byron eulogises so much1 and which he says is preferable to all the bells of ,christendom4 ,i have once or twice heard upwards of twenty men cry it1 and sometimes joined by an equal number of female voices4 ,about three years back1 on some high grounds1 where our people were harvesting1 ,i heard six or seven 'necks' cried in one night1 although ,i know that some of them were four miles off4 ,they are heard through the quiet evening air at a considerable distance sometimes4 ,again1 ,mrs4 ,bray tells how1 travelling in ,devonshire1 she saw a party of reapers standing in a circle on a rising ground1 holding their sickles aloft4 ,one in the middle held up some ears of corn tied together with flowers1 and the party shouted three times 7what she writes as7 ',arnack1 arnack1 arnack1 we haven1 we haven1 we haven4' ,they went home1 accompanied by women and children carrying boughs of flowers1 shouting and singing4 ,the manservant who attended ,mrs4 ,bray said 'it was only the people making their games1 as they always did1 to the spirit of harvest4' ,here1 as ,miss ,burne remarks1 'arnack1 we haven6' is obviously in the ,devon dialect1 'a neck 7or nack76 we have un6' ,another account of this old custom1 written at ,truro in #ahci1 runs thus3 ,now1 when all the corn was cut at ,heligan1 the farming men and maidens come in front of the house1 and bring with them a small sheaf of corn1 the last that has been cut1 and this is adorned with ribbons and flowers1 and one part is tied quite tight1 so as to look like a neck4 ,then they cry out ',our 7my7 side1 my side1' as loud as they can2 then the dairymaid gives the neck to the head farming-man4 ,he takes it1 and says1 very loudly three times1 ',i have him1 ,i have him1 ,i have him4' ,then another farming-man shouts very loudly1 ',what have ye8 what have ye8 what have ye8' ,then the first says1 ',a neck1 a neck1 a neck4' ,and when he has said this1 all the people make a very great shouting4 ,this they do three times1 and after one famous shout go away and eat supper1 and dance1 and sing songs4 ,according to another account1 all went out to the field when the last corn was cut1 the 'neck' was tied with ribbons and plaited1 and they danced round it1 and carried it to the great kitchen1 where by-and-by the supper was4 ,the words were as given in the previous account1 and ',hip1 hip1 hack1 heck1 ,i have 'ee1 ,i have 'ee1 ,i have 'ee4' ,it was hung up in the hall4 ,another account relates that one of the men rushed from the field with the last sheaf1 while the rest pursued him with vessels of water1 which they tried to throw over the sheaf before it could be brought into the barn4 ,in the foregoing customs a particular bunch of ears1 generally the last left standing1 is conceived as the neck of the corn-spirit1 who is consequently beheaded when the bunch is cut down4 ,similarly in ,shropshire the name neck1 or the gander's neck1 used to be commonly given to the last handful of ears left standing in the middle of the field when all the rest of the corn was cut4 ,it was plaited together1 and the reapers1 standing ten or twenty paces off1 threw their sickles at it4 ,whoever cut it through was said to have cut off the gander's neck4 ,the neck was taken to the farmer's wife1 who was supposed to keep it in the house for good luck till the next harvest came round4 ,near ,trves1 the man who reaps the last standing corn cuts the goat's neck off4 ,at ,faslane1 on the ,gareloch 7,dumbartonshire71 the last handful of standing corn was sometimes called the head4 ,at ,aurich1 in ,east ,friesland1 the man who reaps the last corn cuts the hare's tail off4 ,in mowing down the last corner of a field ,french reapers sometimes call out1 ,we have the cat by the tail4 ,in ,bresse 7,bourgogne7 the last sheaf represented the fox4 ,beside it a score of ears were left standing to form the tail1 and each reaper1 going back some paces1 threw his sickle at it4 ,he who succeeded in severing it cut off the fox's tail1 and a cry of ,you cou cou6 was raised in his honour4 ,these examples leave no room to doubt the meaning of the ,devonshire and ,cornish expression the neck1 as applied to the last sheaf4 ,the corn-spirit is conceived in human or animal form1 and the last standing corn is part of its body--its neck1 its head1 or its tail4 ,sometimes1 as we have seen1 the last corn is regarded as the navel-string4 ,lastly1 the ,devonshire custom of drenching with water the person who brings in the neck is a raincharm1 such as we have had many examples of4 ,its parallel in the mysteries of ,osiris was the custom of pouring water on the image of ,osiris or on the person who represented him4 ,,xlviii4 ,the ,corn-,spirit as an ,animal #a4 ,animal ,embodiments of the ,corn-spirit ,,in ,,some of the examples which ,i have cited to establish the meaning of the term neck as applied to the last sheaf1 the corn-spirit appears in animal form as a gander1 a goat1 a hare1 a cat1 and a fox4 ,this introduces us to a new aspect of the corn-spirit1 which we must now examine4 ,by doing so we shall not only have fresh examples of killing the god1 but may hope also to clear up some points which remain obscure in the myths and worship of ,adonis1 ,attis1 ,osiris1 ,dionysus1 ,demeter1 and ,virbius4 ,amongst the many animals whose forms the corn-spirit is supposed to take are the wolf1 dog1 hare1 fox1 cock1 goose1 quail1 cat1 goat1 cow 7ox1 bull71 pig1 and horse4 ,in one or other of these shapes the corn-spirit is often believed to be present in the corn1 and to be caught or killed in the last sheaf4 ,as the corn is being cut the animal flees before the reapers1 and if a reaper is taken ill on the field1 he is supposed to have stumbled unwittingly on the corn-spirit1 who has thus punished the profane intruder4 ,it is said the ,rye-wolf has got hold of him1 the ,harvest-goat has given him a push4 ,the person who cuts the last corn or binds the last sheaf gets the name of the animal1 as the ,rye-wolf1 the ,rye-sow1 the ,oats-goat1 and so forth1 and retains the name sometimes for a year4 ,also the animal is frequently represented by a puppet made out of the last sheaf or of wood1 flowers1 and so on1 which is carried home amid rejoicings on the last harvest-waggon4 ,even where the last sheaf is not made up in animal shape1 it is often called the ,rye-wolf1 the ,hare1 ,goat1 and so forth4 ,generally each kind of crop is supposed to have its special animal1 which is caught in the last sheaf1 and called the ,rye-wolf1 the ,barley-wolf1 the ,oats-wolf1 the ,pea-wolf1 or the ,potato-wolf1 according to the crop2 but sometimes the figure of the animal is only made up once for all at getting in the last crop of the whole harvest4 ,sometimes the creature is believed to be killed by the last stroke of the sickle or scythe4 ,but oftener it is thought to live so long as there is corn still unthreshed1 and to be caught in the last sheaf threshed4 ,hence the man who gives the last stroke with the flail is told that he has got the ,corn-sow1 the ,threshing-dog1 or the like4 ,when the threshing is finished1 a puppet is made in the form of the animal1 and this is carried by the thresher of the last sheaf to a neighbouring farm1 where the threshing is still going on4 ,this again shows that the corn-spirit is believed to live wherever the corn is still being threshed4 ,sometimes the thresher of the last sheaf himself represents the animal2 and if the people of the next farm1 who are still threshing1 catch him1 they treat him like the animal he represents1 by shutting him up in the pig-sty1 calling him with the cries commonly addressed to pigs1 and so forth4 ,these general statements will now be illustrated by examples4 #b4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,wolf or a ,dog ,,we begin with the corn-spirit conceived as a wolf or a dog4 ,this conception is common in ,france1 ,germany1 and ,slavonic countries4 ,thus1 when the wind sets the corn in wave-like motion the peasants often say1 ,the ,wolf is going over1 or through1 the corn1 the ,rye-wolf is rushing over the field1 the ,wolf is in the corn1 the mad ,dog is in the corn1 the big ,dog is there4 ,when children wish to go into the corn-fields to pluck ears or gather the blue corn-flowers1 they are warned not to do so1 for the big ,dog sits in the corn1 or the ,wolf sits in the corn1 and will tear you in pieces1 the ,wolf will eat you4 ,the wolf against whom the children are warned is not a common wolf1 for he is often spoken of as the ,corn-wolf1 ,rye-wolf1 or the like2 thus they say1 ,the ,rye-wolf will come and eat you up1 children1 the ,rye-wolf will carry you off1 and so forth4 ,still he has all the outward appearance of a wolf4 ,for in the neighbourhood of ,feilenhof 7,east ,prussia71 when a wolf was seen running through a field1 the peasants used to watch whether he carried his tail in the air or dragged it on the ground4 ,if he dragged it on the ground1 they went after him1 and thanked him for bringing them a blessing1 and even set tit-bits before him4 ,but if he carried his tail high1 they cursed him and tried to kill him4 ,here the wolf is the corn-spirit whose fertilising power is in his tail4 ,both dog and wolf appear as embodiments of the corn-spirit in harvest-customs4 ,thus in some parts of ,silesia the person who cuts or binds the last sheaf is called the ,wheat-dog or the ,peas-pug4 ,but it is in the harvest-customs of the north-east of ,france that the idea of the ,corn-dog comes out most clearly4 ,thus when a harvester1 through sickness1 weariness1 or laziness1 cannot or will not keep up with the reaper in front of him1 they say1 ,the ,white ,dog passed near him1 he has the ,white ,bitch1 or the ,white ,bitch has bitten him4 ,in the ,vosges the ,harvest-,may is called the ,dog of the harvest1 and the person who cuts the last handful of hay or wheat is said to kill the ,dog4 ,about ,lons-le-,saulnier1 in the ,jura1 the last sheaf is called the ,bitch4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,verdun the regular expression for finishing the reaping is1 ,they are going to kill the ,dog2 and at ,epinal they say1 according to the crop1 ,we will kill the ,wheat-dog1 or the ,rye-dog1 or the ,potato-dog4 ,in ,lorraine it is said of the man who cuts the last corn1 ,he is killing the ,dog of the harvest4 ,at ,dux1 in the ,tyrol1 the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is said to strike down the ,dog2 and at ,ahnebergen1 near ,stade1 he is called1 according to the crop1 ,corn-pug1 ,rye-pug1 ,wheat-pug4 ,so with the wolf4 ,in ,silesia1 when the reapers gather round the last patch of standing corn to reap it they are said to be about to catch the ,wolf4 ,in various parts of ,mecklenburg1 where the belief in the ,corn-wolf is particularly prevalent1 every one fears to cut the last corn1 because they say that the ,wolf is sitting in it2 hence every reaper exerts himself to the utmost in order not to be the last1 and every woman similarly fears to bind the last sheaf because the ,wolf is in it4 ,so both among the reapers and the binders there is a competition not to be the last to finish4 ,and in ,germany generally it appears to be a common saying that the ,wolf sits in the last sheaf4 ,in some places they call out to the reaper1 ,beware of the ,wolf2 or they say1 ,he is chasing the ,wolf out of the corn4 ,in ,mecklenburg the last bunch of standing corn is itself commonly called the ,wolf1 and the man who reaps it has the ,wolf1 the animal being described as the ,rye-wolf1 the ,wheat-wolf1 the ,barley-wolf1 and so on according to the particular crop4 ,the reaper of the last corn is himself called ,wolf or the ,rye-wolf1 if the crop is rye1 and in many parts of ,mecklenburg he has to support the character by pretending to bite the other harvesters or by howling like a wolf4 ,the last sheaf of corn is also called the ,wolf or the ,rye-wolf or the ,oats-wolf according to the crop1 and of the woman who binds it they say1 ,the ,wolf is biting her1 ,she has the ,wolf1 ,she must fetch the ,wolf 7out of the corn74 ,moreover1 she herself is called ,wolf2 they cry out to her1 ,thou art the ,wolf1 and she has to bear the name for a whole year2 sometimes1 according to the crop1 she is called the ,rye-wolf or the ,potato-wolf4 ,in the island of ,rgen not only is the woman who binds the last sheaf called ,wolf1 but when she comes home she bites the lady of the house and the stewardess1 for which she receives a large piece of meat4 ,yet nobody likes to be the ,wolf4 ,the same woman may be ,rye-wolf1 ,wheat-wolf1 and ,oats-wolf1 if she happens to bind the last sheaf of rye1 wheat1 and oats4 ,at ,buir1 in the district of ,cologne1 it was formerly the custom to give to the last sheaf the shape of a wolf4 ,it was kept in the barn till all the corn was threshed4 ,then it was brought to the farmer and he had to sprinkle it with beer or brandy4 ,at ,brunshaupten in ,mecklenburg the young woman who bound the last sheaf of wheat used to take a handful of stalks out of it and make the ,wheat-wolf with them2 it was the figure of a wolf about two feet long and half a foot high1 the legs of the animal being represented by stiff stalks and its tail and mane by wheat-ears4 ,this ,wheat-wolf she carried back at the head of the harvesters to the village1 where it was set up on a high place in the parlour of the farm and remained there for a long time4 ,in many places the sheaf called the ,wolf is made up in human form and dressed in clothes4 ,this indicates a confusion of ideas between the corn-spirit conceived in human and in animal form4 ,generally the ,wolf is brought home on the last waggon with joyful cries4 ,hence the last waggon-load itself receives the name of the ,wolf4 ,again1 the ,wolf is supposed to hide himself amongst the cut corn in the granary1 until he is driven out of the last bundle by the strokes of the flail4 ,hence at ,wanzleben1 near ,magdeburg1 after the threshing the peasants go in procession1 leading by a chain a man who is enveloped in the threshed-out straw and is called the ,wolf4 ,he represents the corn-spirit who has been caught escaping from the threshed corn4 ,in the district of ,treves it is believed that the ,corn-wolf is killed at threshing4 ,the men thresh the last sheaf till it is reduced to chopped straw4 ,in this way they think that the ,corn-wolf1 who was lurking in the last sheaf1 has been certainly killed4 ,in ,france also the ,corn-wolf appears at harvest4 ,thus they call out to the reaper of the last corn1 ,you will catch the ,wolf4 ,near ,chambry they form a ring round the last standing corn1 and cry1 ,the ,wolf is in there4 ,in ,finisterre1 when the reaping draws near an end1 the harvesters cry1 ,there is the ,wolf2 we will catch him4 ,each takes a swath to reap1 and he who finishes first calls out1 ,i've caught the ,wolf4 ,in ,guyenne1 when the last corn has been reaped1 they lead a wether all round the field4 ,it is called the ,wolf of the field4 ,its horns are decked with a wreath of flowers and corn-ears1 and its neck and body are also encircled with garlands and ribbons4 ,all the reapers march1 singing1 behind it4 ,then it is killed on the field4 ,in this part of ,france the last sheaf is called the coujoulage1 which1 in the patois1 means a wether4 ,hence the killing of the wether represents the death of the corn-spirit1 considered as present in the last sheaf2 but two different conceptions of the corn-spirit--as a wolf and as a wether--are mixed up together4 ,sometimes it appears to be thought that the ,wolf1 caught in the last corn1 lives during the winter in the farmhouse1 ready to renew his activity as corn-spirit in the spring4 ,hence at midwinter1 when the lengthening days begin to herald the approach of spring1 the ,wolf makes his appearance once more4 ,in ,poland a man1 with a wolf's skin thrown over his head1 is led about at ,christmas2 or a stuffed wolf is carried about by persons who collect money4 ,there are facts which point to an old custom of leading about a man enveloped in leaves and called the ,wolf1 while his conductors collected money4 #c4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,cock ,,another form which the corn-spirit often assumes is that of a cock4 ,in ,austria children are warned against straying in the corn-fields1 because the ,corn-cock sits there1 and will peck their eyes out4 ,in ,north ,germany they say that the ,cock sits in the last sheaf2 and at cutting the last corn the reapers cry1 ,now we will chase out the ,cock4 ,when it is cut they say1 ,we have caught the ,cock4 ,at ,braller1 in ,transylvania1 when the reapers come to the last patch of corn1 they cry1 ,here we shall catch the ,cock4 ,at ,frstenwalde1 when the last sheaf is about to be bound1 the master releases a cock1 which he has brought in a basket1 and lets it run over the field4 ,all the harvesters chase it till they catch it4 ,elsewhere the harvesters all try to seize the last corn cut2 he who succeeds in grasping it must crow1 and is called ,cock4 ,among the ,wends it is or used to be customary for the farmer to hide a live cock under the last sheaf as it lay on the field2 and when the corn was being gathered up1 the harvester who lighted upon this sheaf had a right to keep the cock1 provided he could catch it4 ,this formed the close of the harvest-festival and was known as the ,cock-catching1 and the beer which was served out to the reapers at this time went by the name of ,cock-beer4 ,the last sheaf is called ,cock1 ,cock-sheaf1 ,harvest-cock1 ,harvest-hen1 ,autumn-hen4 ,a distinction is made between a ,wheat-cock1 ,bean-cock1 and so on1 according to the crop4 ,at ,wnschensuhl1 in ,thringen1 the last sheaf is made into the shape of a cock1 and called the ,harvest-cock4 ,a figure of a cock1 made of wood1 pasteboard1 ears of corn1 or flowers1 is borne in front of the harvest-waggon1 especially in ,westphalia1 where the cock carries in his beak fruits of the earth of all kinds4 ,sometimes the image of the cock is fastened to the top of a ,may-tree on the last harvest-waggon4 ,elsewhere a live cock1 or a figure of one1 is attached to a harvest-crown and carried on a pole4 ,in ,galicia and elsewhere this live cock is fastened to the garland of corn-ears or flowers1 which the leader of the women-reapers carries on her head as she marches in front of the harvest procession4 ,in ,silesia a live cock is presented to the master on a plate4 ,the harvest-supper is called ,harvest-cock1 ,stubble-cock1 etc41 and a chief dish at it1 at least in some places1 is a cock4 ,if a waggoner upsets a harvest-waggon1 it is said that he has spilt the ,harvest-cock1 and he loses the cock1 that is1 the harvest-supper4 ,the harvest-waggon1 with the figure of the cock on it1 is driven round the farmhouse before it is taken to the barn4 ,then the cock is nailed over or at the side of the house-door1 or on the gable1 and remains there till next harvest4 ,in ,east ,friesland the person who gives the last stroke at threshing is called the ,clucking-hen1 and grain is strewed before him as if he were a hen4 ,again1 the corn-spirit is killed in the form of a cock4 ,in parts of ,germany1 ,hungary1 ,poland1 and ,picardy the reapers place a live cock in the corn which is to be cut last1 and chase it over the field1 or bury it up to the neck in the ground2 afterwards they strike off its head with a sickle or scythe4 ,in many parts of ,westphalia1 when the harvesters bring the wooden cock to the farmer1 he gives them a live cock1 which they kill with whips or sticks1 or behead with an old sword1 or throw into the barn to the girls1 or give to the mistress to cook4 ,it the ,harvest-cock has not been spilt--that is1 if no waggon has been upset--the harvesters have the right to kill the farmyard cock by throwing stones at it or beheading it4 ,where this custom has fallen into disuse1 it is still common for the farmer's wife to make cockie-leekie for the harvesters1 and to show them the head of the cock which has been killed for the soup4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,klausenburg1 ,transylvania1 a cock is buried on the harvest-field in the earth1 so that only its head appears4 ,a young man then takes a scythe and cuts off the cock's head at a single sweep4 ,if he fails to do this1 he is called the ,red ,cock for a whole year1 and people fear that next year's crop will be bad4 ,near ,udvarhely1 in ,transylvania1 a live cock is bound up in the last sheaf and killed with a spit4 ,it is then skinned4 ,the flesh is thrown away1 but the skin and feathers are kept till next year2 and in spring the grain from the last sheaf is mixed with the feathers of the cock and scattered on the field which is to be tilled4 ,nothing could set in a clearer light the identification of the cock with the spirit of the corn4 ,by being tied up in the last sheaf and killed1 the cock is identified with the corn1 and its death with the cutting of the corn4 ,by keeping its feathers till spring1 then mixing them with the seed-corn taken from the very sheaf in which the bird had been bound1 and scattering the feathers together with the seed over the field1 the identity of the bird with the corn is again emphasised1 and its quickening and fertilising power1 as an embodiment of the corn-spirit1 is intimated in the plainest manner4 ,thus the corn-spirit1 in the form of a cock1 is killed at harvest1 but rises to fresh life and activity in spring4 ,again1 the equivalence of the cock to the corn is expressed1 hardly less plainly1 in the custom of burying the bird in the ground1 and cutting off its head 7like the ears of corn7 with the scythe4 #d4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,hare ,,another common embodiment of the corn-spirit is the hare4 ,in ,galloway the reaping of the last standing corn is called cutting the ,hare4 ,the mode of cutting it is as follows4 ,when the rest of the corn has been reaped1 a handful is left standing to form the ,hare4 ,it is divided into three parts and plaited1 and the ears are tied in a knot4 ,the reapers then retire a few yards and each throws his or her sickle in turn at the ,hare to cut it down4 ,it must be cut below the knot1 and the reapers continue to throw their sickles at it1 one after the other1 until one of them succeeds in severing the stalks below the knot4 ,the ,hare is then carried home and given to a maidservant in the kitchen1 who places it over the kitchen-door on the inside4 ,sometimes the ,hare used to be thus kept till the next harvest4 ,in the parish of ,minnigaff1 when the ,hare was cut1 the unmarried reapers ran home with all speed1 and the one who arrived first was the first to be married4 ,in ,germany also one of the names for the last sheaf is the ,hare4 ,thus in some parts of ,anhalt1 when the corn has been reaped and only a few stalks are left standing1 they say1 ,the ,hare will soon come1 or the reapers cry to each other1 ,look how the ,hare comes jumping out4 ,in ,east ,prussia they say that the ,hare sits in the last patch of standing corn1 and must be chased out by the last reaper4 ,the reapers hurry with their work1 each being anxious not to have to chase out the ,hare2 for the man who does so1 that is1 who cuts the last corn1 is much laughed at4 ,at ,aurich1 as we have seen1 an expression for cutting the last corn is to cut off the ,hare's tail4 ,he is killing the ,hare is commonly said of the man who cuts the last corn in ,germany1 ,sweden1 ,holland1 ,france1 and ,italy4 ,in ,norway the man who is thus said to kill the ,hare must give hare's blood1 in the form of brandy1 to his fellows to drink4 ,in ,lesbos1 when the reapers are at work in two neighbouring fields1 each party tries to finish first in order to drive the ,hare into their neighbour's field2 the reapers who succeed in doing so believe that next year the crop will be better4 ,a small sheaf of corn is made up and kept beside the holy picture till next harvest4 #e4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,cat ,,again1 the corn-spirit sometimes takes the form of a cat4 ,near ,kiel children are warned not to go into the corn-fields because the ,cat sits there4 ,in the ,eisenach ,oberland they are told the ,corn-cat will come and fetch you1 the ,corn-cat goes in the corn4 ,in some parts of ,silesia at mowing the last corn they say1 ,the ,cat is caught2 and at threshing1 the man who gives the last stroke is called the ,cat4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,lyons the last sheaf and the harvest-supper are both called the ,cat4 ,about ,vesoul when they cut the last corn they say1 ,we have the ,cat by the tail4 ,at ,brianon1 in ,dauphin1 at the beginning of reaping1 a cat is decked out with ribbons1 flowers1 and ears of corn4 ,it is called the ,cat of the ball-skin 7le chat de peau de balle74 ,if a reaper is wounded at his work1 they make the cat lick the wound4 ,at the close of the reaping the cat is again decked out with ribbons and ears of corn2 then they dance and make merry4 ,when the dance is over the girls solemnly strip the cat of its finery4 ,at ,grneberg1 in ,silesia1 the reaper who cuts the last corn goes by the name of the ,tom-cat4 ,he is enveloped in rye-stalks and green withes1 and is furnished with a long plaited tail4 ,sometimes as a companion he has a man similarly dressed1 who is called the 7female7 ,cat4 ,their duty is to run after people whom they see and to beat them with a long stick4 ,near ,amiens the expression for finishing the harvest is1 ,they are going to kill the ,cat2 and when the last corn is cut they kill a cat in the farmyard4 ,at threshing1 in some parts of ,france1 a live cat is placed under the last bundle of corn to be threshed1 and is struck dead with the flails4 ,then on ,sunday it is roasted and eaten as a holiday dish4 ,in the ,vosges ,mountains the close of haymaking or harvest is called catching the cat1 killing the dog1 or more rarely catching the hare4 ,the cat1 the dog1 or the hare is said to be fat or lean according as the crop is good or bad4 ,the man who cuts the last handful of hay or of wheat is said to catch the cat or the hare or to kill the dog4 #f4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,goat ,,further1 the corn-spirit often appears in the form of a goat4 ,in some parts of ,prussia1 when the corn bends before the wind1 they say1 ,the ,goats are chasing each other1 the wind is driving the ,goats through the corn1 the ,goats are browsing there1 and they expect a very good harvest4 ,again they say1 ,the ,oats-goat is sitting in the oats-field1 the ,corn-goat is sitting in the rye-field4 ,children are warned not to go into the corn-fields to pluck the blue corn-flowers1 or amongst the beans to pluck pods1 because the ,rye-goat1 the ,corn-goat1 the ,oats-goat1 or the ,bean-goat is sitting or lying there1 and will carry them away or kill them4 ,when a harvester is taken sick or lags behind his fellows at their work1 they call out1 ,the ,harvest-goat has pushed him1 he has been pushed by the ,corn-goat4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,braunsberg 7,east ,prussia7 at binding the oats every harvester makes haste lest the ,corn-goat push him4 ,at ,oefoten1 in ,norway1 each reaper has his allotted patch to reap4 ,when a reaper in the middle has not finished reaping his piece after his neighbours have finished theirs1 they say of him1 ,he remains on the island4 ,and if the laggard is a man1 they imitate the cry with which they call a he-goat2 if a woman1 the cry with which they call a she-goat4 ,near ,straubing1 in ,lower ,bavaria1 it is said of the man who cuts the last corn that he has the ,corn-goat1 or the ,wheat-goat1 or the ,oats-goat1 according to the crop4 ,moreover1 two horns are set up on the last heap of corn1 and it is called the horned ,goat4 ,at ,kreutzburg1 ,east ,prussia1 they call out to the woman who is binding the last sheaf1 ,the ,goat is sitting in the sheaf4 ,at ,gablingen1 in ,swabia1 when the last field of oats upon a farm is being reaped1 the reapers carve a goat out of wood4 ,ears of oats are inserted in its nostrils and mouth1 and it is adorned with garlands of flowers4 ,it is set up on the field and called the ,oats-goat4 ,when the reaping approaches an end1 each reaper hastens to finish his piece first2 he who is the last to finish gets the ,oats-goat4 ,again1 the last sheaf is itself called the ,goat4 ,thus1 in the valley of the ,wiesent1 ,bavaria1 the last sheaf bound on the field is called the ,goat1 and they have a proverb1 ,the field must bear a goat4 ,at ,spachbrcken1 in ,hesse1 the last handful of corn which is cut is called the ,goat1 and the man who cuts it is much ridiculed4 ,at ,drrenbchig and about ,mosbach in ,baden the last sheaf is also called the ,goat4 ,sometimes the last sheaf is made up in the form of a goat1 and they say1 ,the ,goat is sitting in it4 ,again1 the person who cuts or binds the last sheaf is called the ,goat4 ,thus1 in parts of ,mecklenburg they call out to the woman who binds the last sheaf1 ,you are the ,harvest-goat4 ,near ,uelzen1 in ,hanover1 the harvest festival begins with the bringing of the ,harvest-goat2 that is1 the woman who bound the last sheaf is wrapt in straw1 crowned with a harvest-wreath1 and brought in a wheel-barrow to the village1 where a round dance takes place4 ,about ,luneburg1 also1 the woman who binds the last corn is decked with a crown of corn-ears and is called the ,corn-goat4 ,at ,mnzesheim in ,baden the reaper who cuts the last handful of corn or oats is called the ,corn-goat or the ,oats-goat4 ,in the ,canton ,st4 ,gall1 ,switzerland1 the person who cuts the last handful of corn on the field1 or drives the last harvest-waggon to the barn1 is called the ,corn-goat or the ,rye-goat1 or simply the ,goat4 ,in the ,canton ,thurgau he is called ,corn-goat2 like a goat he has a bell hung round his neck1 is led in triumph1 and drenched with liquor4 ,in parts of ,styria1 also1 the man who cuts the last corn is called ,corn-goat1 ,oats-goat1 or the like4 ,as a rule1 the man who thus gets the name of ,corn-goat has to bear it a whole year till the next harvest4 ,according to one view1 the corn-spirit1 who has been caught in the form of a goat or otherwise1 lives in the farmhouse or barn over winter4 ,thus1 each farm has its own embodiment of the corn-spirit4 ,but1 according to another view1 the corn-spirit is the genius or deity1 not of the corn of one farm only1 but of all the corn4 ,hence when the corn on one farm is all cut1 he flees to another where there is still corn left standing4 ,this idea is brought out in a harvest-custom which was formerly observed in ,skye4 ,the farmer who first finished reaping sent a man or woman with a sheaf to a neighbouring farmer who had not finished2 the latter in his turn1 when he had finished1 sent on the sheaf to his neighbour who was still reaping2 and so the sheaf made the round of the farms till all the corn was cut4 ,the sheaf was called the goabbir bhacagh1 that is1 the ,cripple ,goat4 ,the custom appears not to be extinct at the present day1 for it was reported from ,skye not very many years ago4 ,the corn-spirit was probably thus represented as lame because he had been crippled by the cutting of the corn4 ,sometimes the old woman who brings home the last sheaf must limp on one foot4 ,but sometimes the corn-spirit1 in the form of a goat1 is believed to be slain on the harvest-field by the sickle or scythe4 ,thus1 in the neighbourhood of ,bernkastel1 on the ,moselle1 the reapers determine by lot the order in which they shall follow each other4 ,the first is called the fore-reaper1 the last the tail-bearer4 ,if a reaper overtakes the man in front he reaps past him1 bending round so as to leave the slower reaper in a patch by himself4 ,this patch is called the ,goat2 and the man for whom the ,goat is cut in this way1 is laughed and jeered at by his fellows for the rest of the day4 ,when the tail-bearer cuts the last ears of corn1 it is said1 ,he is cutting the ,goat's neck off4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,grenoble1 before the end of the reaping1 a live goat is adorned with flowers and ribbons and allowed to run about the field4 ,the reapers chase it and try to catch it4 ,when it is caught1 the farmer's wife holds it fast while the farmer cuts off its head4 ,the goat's flesh serves to furnish the harvest-supper4 ,a piece of the flesh is pickled and kept till the next harvest1 when another goat is killed4 ,then all the harvesters eat of the flesh4 ,on the same day the skin of the goat is made into a cloak1 which the farmer1 who works with his men1 must always wear at harvest-time if rain or bad weather sets in4 ,but if a reaper gets pains in his back1 the farmer gives him the goat-skin to wear4 ,the reason for this seems to be that the pains in the back1 being inflicted by the corn-spirit1 can also be healed by it4 ,similarly1 we saw that elsewhere1 when a reaper is wounded at reaping1 a cat1 as the representative of the corn-spirit1 is made to lick the wound4 ,esthonian reapers of the island of ,mon think that the man who cuts the first ears of corn at harvest will get pains in his back1 probably because the corn-spirit is believed to resent especially the first wound2 and1 in order to escape pains in the back1 ,saxon reapers in ,transylvania gird their loins with the first handful of ears which they cut4 ,here1 again1 the corn-spirit is applied to for healing or protection1 but in his original vegetable form1 not in the form of a goat or a cat4 ,further1 the corn-spirit under the form of a goat is sometimes conceived as lurking among the cut corn in the barn1 till he is driven from it by the threshing-flail4 ,thus in ,baden the last sheaf to be threshed is called the ,corn-goat1 the ,spelt-goat1 or the ,oats-goat according to the kind of grain4 ,again1 near ,marktl1 in ,upper ,bavaria1 the sheaves are called ,straw-goats or simply ,goats4 ,they are laid in a great heap on the open field and threshed by two rows of men standing opposite each other1 who1 as they ply their flails1 sing a song in which they say that they see the ,straw-goat amongst the corn-stalks4 ,the last ,goat1 that is1 the last sheaf1 is adorned with a wreath of violets and other flowers and with cakes strung together4 ,it is placed right in the middle of the heap4 ,some of the threshers rush at it and tear the best of it out2 others lay on with their flails so recklessly that heads are sometimes broken4 ,at ,oberinntal1 in the ,tyrol1 the last thresher is called ,goat4 ,so at ,haselberg1 in ,west ,bohemia1 the man who gives the last stroke at threshing oats is called the ,oats-goat4 ,at ,tettnang1 in ,wrtemburg1 the thresher who gives the last stroke to the last bundle of corn before it is turned goes by the name of the ,he-goat1 and it is said1 ,he has driven the ,he-goat away4 ,the person who1 after the bundle has been turned1 gives the last stroke of all1 is called the ,she-goat4 ,in this custom it is implied that the corn is inhabited by a pair of corn-spirits1 male and female4 ,further1 the corn-spirit1 captured in the form of a goat at threshing1 is passed on to a neighbour whose threshing is not yet finished4 ,in ,franche ,comt1 as soon as the threshing is over1 the young people set up a straw figure of a goat on the farmyard of a neighbour who is still threshing4 ,he must give them wine or money in return4 ,at ,ellwangen1 in ,wrtemburg1 the effigy of a goat is made out of the last bundle of corn at threshing2 four sticks form its legs1 and two its horns4 ,the man who gives the last stroke with the flail must carry the ,goat to the barn of a neighbour who is still threshing and throw it down on the floor2 if he is caught in the act1 they tie the ,goat on his back4 ,a similar custom is observed at ,indersdorf1 in ,upper ,bavaria2 the man who throws the straw ,goat into the neighbour's barn imitates the bleating of a goat2 if they catch him1 they blacken his face and tie the ,goat on his back4 ,at ,saverne1 in ,alsace1 when a farmer is a week or more behind his neighbours with his threshing1 they set a real stuffed goat or fox before his door4 ,sometimes the spirit of the corn in goat form is believed to be killed at threshing4 ,in the district of ,traunstein1 ,upper ,bavaria1 they think that the ,oats-goat is in the last sheaf of oats4 ,he is represented by an old rake set up on end1 with an old pot for a head4 ,the children are then told to kill the ,oats-goat4 #g4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,bull1 ,cow1 or ,ox ,,another form which the corn-spirit often assumes is that of a bull1 cow1 or ox4 ,when the wind sweeps over the corn they say at ,conitz1 in ,west ,prussia1 ,the ,steer is running in the corn2 when the corn is thick and strong in one spot1 they say in some parts of ,east ,prussia1 ,the ,bull is lying in the corn4 ,when a harvester has overstrained and lamed himself1 they say in the ,graudenz district of ,west ,prussia1 ,the ,bull pushed him2 in ,lorraine they say1 ,he has the ,bull4 ,the meaning of both expressions is that he has unwittingly lighted upon the divine corn-spirit1 who has punished the profane intruder with lameness4 ,so near ,chambry when a reaper wounds himself with his sickle1 it is said that he has the wound of the ,ox4 ,in the district of ,bunzlau 7,silesia7 the last sheaf is sometimes made into the shape of a horned ox1 stuffed with tow and wrapt in corn-ears4 ,this figure is called the ,old ,man4 ,in some parts of ,bohemia the last sheaf is made up in human form and called the ,buffalo-bull4 ,these cases show a confusion of the human with the animal shape of the corn-spirit4 ,the confusion is like that of killing a wether under the name of a wolf4 ,all over ,swabia the last bundle of corn on the field is called the ,cow2 the man who cuts the last ears has the ,cow1 and is himself called ,cow or ,barley-cow or ,oats-cow1 according to the crop2 at the harvest-supper he gets a nosegay of flowers and corn-ears and a more liberal allowance of drink than the rest4 ,but he is teased and laughed at2 so no one likes to be the ,cow4 ,the ,cow was sometimes represented by the figure of a woman made out of ears of corn and corn-flowers4 ,it was carried to the farmhouse by the man who had cut the last handful of corn4 ,the children ran after him and the neighbours turned out to laugh at him1 till the farmer took the ,cow from him4 ,here again the confusion between the human and the animal form of the corn-spirit is apparent4 ,in various parts of ,switzerland the reaper who cuts the last ears of corn is called ,wheat-cow1 ,corn-cow1 ,oats-cow1 or ,corn-steer1 and is the butt of many a joke4 ,on the other hand1 in the district of ,rosenheim1 ,upper ,bavaria1 when a farmer is later of getting in his harvest than his neighbours1 they set up on his land a ,straw-bull1 as it is called4 ,this is a gigantic figure of a bull made of stubble on a framework of wood and adorned with flowers and leaves4 ,attached to it is a label on which are scrawled doggerel verses in ridicule of the man on whose land the ,straw-bull is set up4 ,again1 the corn-spirit in the form of a bull or ox is killed on the harvest-field at the close of the reaping4 ,at ,pouilly1 near ,dijon1 when the last ears of corn are about to be cut1 an ox adorned with ribbons1 flowers1 and ears of corn is led all round the field1 followed by the whole troop of reapers dancing4 ,then a man disguised as the ,devil cuts the last ears of corn and immediately slaughters the ox4 ,part of the flesh of the animal is eaten at the harvest-supper2 part is pickled and kept till the first day of sowing in spring4 ,at ,pont ,mousson and elsewhere on the evening of the last day of reaping1 a calf adorned with flowers and ears of corn is led thrice round the farmyard1 being allured by a bait or driven by men with sticks1 or conducted by the farmer's wife with a rope4 ,the calf chosen for this ceremony is the calf which was born first on the farm in the spring of the year4 ,it is followed by all the reapers with their tools4 ,then it is allowed to run free2 the reapers chase it1 and whoever catches it is called ,king of the ,calf4 ,lastly1 it is solemnly killed2 at ,lunville the man who acts as butcher is the ,jewish merchant of the village4 ,sometimes again the corn-spirit hides himself amongst the cut corn in the barn to reappear in bull or cow form at threshing4 ,thus at ,wurmlingen1 in ,thringen1 the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is called the ,cow1 or rather the ,barley-cow1 ,oats-cow1 ,peas-cow1 or the like1 according to the crop4 ,he is entirely enveloped in straw2 his head is surmounted by sticks in imitation of horns1 and two lads lead him by ropes to the well to drink4 ,on the way thither he must low like a cow1 and for a long time afterwards he goes by the name of the ,cow4 ,at ,obermedlingen1 in ,swabia1 when the threshing draws near an end1 each man is careful to avoid giving the last stroke4 ,he who does give it gets the ,cow1 which is a straw figure dressed in an old ragged petticoat1 hood1 and stockings4 ,it is tied on his back with a straw-rope2 his face is blackened1 and being bound with straw-ropes to a wheelbarrow he is wheeled round the village4 ,here1 again1 we meet with that confusion between the human and animal shape of the corn-spirit which we have noted in other customs4 ,in ,canton ,schaffhausen the man who threshes the last corn is called the ,cow2 in ,canton ,thurgau1 the ,corn-bull2 in ,canton ,zurich1 the ,thresher-cow4 ,in the last-mentioned district he is wrapt in straw and bound to one of the trees in the orchard4 ,at ,arad1 in ,hungary1 the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is enveloped in straw and a cow's hide with the horns attached to it4 ,at ,pessnitz1 in the district of ,dresden1 the man who gives the last stroke with the flail is called ,bull4 ,he must make a straw-man and set it up before a neighbour's window4 ,here1 apparently1 as in so many cases1 the corn-spirit is passed on to a neighbour who has not finished threshing4 ,so at ,herbrechtingen1 in ,thringen1 the effigy of a ragged old woman is flung into the barn of the farmer who is last with his threshing4 ,the man who throws it in cries1 ,there is the ,cow for you4 ,if the threshers catch him they detain him over night and punish him by keeping him from the harvest-supper4 ,in these latter customs the confusion between the human and the animal shape of the corn-spirit meets us again4 ,further1 the corn-spirit in bull form is sometimes believed to be killed at threshing4 ,at ,auxerre1 in threshing the last bundle of corn1 they call out twelve times1 ,we are killing the ,bull4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,bordeaux1 where a butcher kills an ox on the field immediately after the close of the reaping1 it is said of the man who gives the last stroke at threshing that he has killed the ,bull4 ,at ,chambry the last sheaf is called the sheaf of the ,young ,ox1 and a race takes place to it in which all the reapers join4 ,when the last stroke is given at threshing they say that the ,ox is killed2 and immediately thereupon a real ox is slaughtered by the reaper who cut the last corn4 ,the flesh of the ox is eaten by the threshers at supper4 ,we have seen that sometimes the young corn-spirit1 whose task it is to quicken the corn of the coming year1 is believed to be born as a ,corn-baby on the harvest-field4 ,similarly in ,berry the young corn-spirit is sometimes supposed to be born on the field in calf form2 for when a binder has not rope enough to bind all the corn in sheaves1 he puts aside the wheat that remains over and imitates the lowing of a cow4 ,the meaning is that the sheaf has given birth to a calf4 ,in ,puy-de-,dme when a binder cannot keep up with the reaper whom he or she follows1 they say ,he 7or she7 is giving birth to the ,calf4 ,in some parts of ,prussia1 in similar circumstances1 they call out to the woman1 ,the ,bull is coming1 and imitate the bellowing of a bull4 ,in these cases the woman is conceived as the ,corn-cow or old corn-spirit1 while the supposed calf is the ,corn-calf or young corn-spirit4 ,in some parts of ,austria a mythical calf 7,muhklbchen7 is believed to be seen amongst the sprouting corn in spring and to push the children2 when the corn waves in the wind they say1 ,the ,calf is going about4 ,clearly1 as ,mannhardt observes1 this calf of the spring-time is the same animal which is afterwards believed to be killed at reaping4 #h4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,horse or ,mare ,,sometimes the corn-spirit appears in the shape of a horse or mare4 ,between ,kalw and ,stuttgart1 when the corn bends before the wind1 they say1 ,there runs the ,horse4 ,at ,bohlingen1 near ,radolfzell in ,baden1 the last sheaf of oats is called the ,oats-stallion4 ,in ,hertfordshire1 at the end of the reaping1 there is or used to be observed a ceremony called crying the ,mare4 ,the last blades of corn left standing on the field are tied together and called the ,mare4 ,the reapers stand at a distance and throw their sickles at it2 he who cuts it through has the prize1 with acclamations and good cheer4 ,after it is cut the reapers cry thrice with a loud voice1 ,i have her6 ,others answer thrice1 ,what have you8--,a ,mare6 a ,mare6 a ,mare6--,whose is she8 is next asked thrice4 ,a4 ,b4's1 naming the owner thrice4 ,whither will you send her8--,to ,c4 ,d41 naming some neighbour who has not reaped all his corn4 ,in this custom the corn-spirit in the form of a mare is passed on from a farm where the corn is all cut to another farm where it is still standing1 and where therefore the corn-spirit may be supposed naturally to take refuge4 ,in ,shropshire the custom is similar4 ,the farmer who finishes his harvest last1 and who therefore cannot send the ,mare to any one else1 is said to keep her all winter4 ,the mocking offer of the ,mare to a laggard neighbour was sometimes responded to by a mocking acceptance of her help4 ,thus an old man told an inquirer1 ,while we wun at supper1 a mon cumm'd wi' a autar halter to fatch her away4 ,at one place a real mare used to be sent1 but the man who rode her was subjected to some rough treatment at the farmhouse to which he paid his unwelcome visit4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,lille the idea of the corn-spirit in horse form is clearly preserved4 ,when a harvester grows weary at his work1 it is said1 ,he has the fatigue of the ,horse4 ,the first sheaf1 called the ,cross of the ,horse1 is placed on a cross of boxwood in the barn1 and the youngest horse on the farm must tread on it4 ,the reapers dance round the last blades of corn1 crying1 ,see the remains of the ,horse4 ,the sheaf made out of these last blades is given to the youngest horse of the parish 7commune7 to eat4 ,this youngest horse of the parish clearly represents1 as ,mannhardt says1 the corn-spirit of the following year1 the ,corn-foal1 which absorbs the spirit of the old ,corn-horse by eating the last corn cut2 for1 as usual1 the old corn-spirit takes his final refuge in the last sheaf4 ,the thresher of the last sheaf is said to beat the ,horse4 #i4 ,the ,corn-spirit as a ,pig 7,boar or ,sow7 ,,the ,,last animal embodiment of the corn-spirit which we shall notice is the pig 7boar or sow74 ,in ,thringen1 when the wind sets the young corn in motion1 they sometimes say1 ,the ,boar is rushing through the corn4 ,amongst the ,esthonians of the island of ,oesel the last sheaf is called the ,ryeboar1 and the man who gets it is saluted with a cry of ,you have the ,rye-boar on your back6 ,in reply he strikes up a song1 in which he prays for plenty4 ,at ,kohlerwinkel1 near ,augsburg1 at the close of the harvest1 the last bunch of standing corn is cut down1 stalk by stalk1 by all the reapers in turn4 ,he who cuts the last stalk gets the ,sow1 and is laughed at4 ,in other ,swabian villages also the man who cuts the last corn has the ,sow1 or has the ,rye-sow4 ,at ,bohlingen1 near ,radolfzell in ,baden1 the last sheaf is called the ,rye-sow or the ,wheat-sow1 according to the crop2 and at ,rhrenbach in ,baden the person who brings the last armful for the last sheaf is called the ,corn-sow or the ,oats-sow4 ,at ,friedingen1 in ,swabia1 the thresher who gives the last stroke is called ,sow--,barley-sow1 ,corn-sow1 or the like1 according to the crop4 ,at ,onstmettingen the man who gives the last stroke at threshing has the ,sow2 he is often bound up in a sheaf and dragged by a rope along the ground4 ,and1 generally1 in ,swabia the man who gives the last stroke with the flail is called ,sow4 ,he may1 however1 rid himself of this invidious distinction by passing on to a neighbour the straw-rope1 which is the badge of his position as ,sow4 ,so he goes to a house and throws the straw-rope into it1 crying1 ,there1 ,i bring you the ,sow4 ,all the inmates give chase2 and if they catch him they beat him1 shut him up for several hours in the pig-sty1 and oblige him to take the ,sow away again4 ,in various parts of ,upper ,bavaria the man who gives the last stroke at threshing must carry the ,pig--that is1 either a straw effigy of a pig or merely a bundle of straw-ropes4 ,this he carries to a neighbouring farm where the threshing is not finished1 and throws it into the barn4 ,if the threshers catch him they handle him roughly1 beating him1 blackening or dirtying his face1 throwing him into filth1 binding the ,sow on his back1 and so on2 if the bearer of the ,sow is a woman they cut off her hair4 ,at the harvest supper or dinner the man who carried the ,pig gets one or more dumplings made in the form of pigs4 ,when the dumplings are served up by the maidservant1 all the people at table cry ,sz1 sz1 sz 6 that being the cry used in calling pigs4 ,sometimes after dinner the man who carried the ,pig has his face blackened1 and is set on a cart and drawn round the village by his fellows1 followed by a crowd crying ,sz1 sz1 sz 6 as if they were calling swine4 ,sometimes1 after being wheeled round the village1 he is flung on the dunghill4 ,again1 the corn-spirit in the form of a pig plays his part at sowing-time as well as at harvest4 ,at ,neuautz1 in ,courland1 when barley is sown for the first time in the year1 the farmer's wife boils the chine of a pig along with the tail1 and brings it to the sower on the field4 ,he eats of it1 but cuts off the tail and sticks it in the field2 it is believed that the ears of corn will then grow as long as the tail4 ,here the pig is the corn-spirit1 whose fertilising power is sometimes supposed to lie especially in his tail4 ,as a pig he is put in the ground at sowing-time1 and as a pig he reappears amongst the ripe corn at harvest4 ,for amongst the neighbouring ,esthonians1 as we have seen1 the last sheaf is called the ,rye-boar4 ,somewhat similar customs are observed in ,germany4 ,in the ,salza district1 near ,meiningen1 a certain bone in the pig is called the ,jew on the winnowing-fan4 ,the flesh of this bone is boiled on ,shrove ,tuesday1 but the bone is put amongst the ashes which the neighbours exchange as presents on ,st4 ,peter's ,day 7the twenty-second of ,february71 and then mix with the seedcorn4 ,in the whole of ,hesse1 ,meiningen1 and other districts1 people eat pea-soup with dried pig-ribs on ,ash ,wednesday or ,candlemas4 ,the ribs are then collected and hung in the room till sowing-time1 when they are inserted in the sown field or in the seed-bag amongst the flax seed4 ,this is thought to be an infallible specific against earth-fleas and moles1 and to cause the flax to grow well and tall4 ,but the idea of the corn-spirit as embodied in pig form is nowhere more clearly expressed than in the ,scandinavian custom of the ,yule ,boar4 ,in ,sweden and ,denmark at ,yule 7,christmas7 it is the custom to bake a loaf in the form of a boar-pig4 ,this is called the ,yule ,boar4 ,the corn of the last sheaf is often used to make it4 ,all through ,yule the ,yule ,boar stands on the table4 ,often it is kept till the sowing-time in spring1 when part of it is mixed with the seed-corn and part given to the ploughman and plough-horses or ploughoxen to eat1 in the expectation of a good harvest4 ,in this custom the corn-spirit1 immanent in the last sheaf1 appears at midwinter in the form of a boar made from the corn of the last sheaf2 and his quickening influence on the corn is shown by mixing part of the ,yule ,boar with the seed-corn1 and giving part of it to the ploughman and his cattle to eat4 ,similarly we saw that the ,corn-wolf makes his appearance at mid-winter1 the time when the year begins to verge towards spring4 ,formerly a real boar was sacrificed at ,christmas1 and apparently also a man in the character of the ,yule ,boar4 ,this1 at least1 may perhaps be inferred from a ,christmas custom still observed in ,sweden4 ,a man is wrapt up in a skin1 and carries a wisp of straw in his mouth1 so that the projecting straws look like the bristles of a boar4 ,a knife is brought1 and an old woman1 with her face blackened1 pretends to sacrifice him4 ,on ,christmas ,eve in some parts of the ,esthonian island of ,oesel they bake a long cake with the two ends turned up4 ,it is called the ,christmas ,boar1 and stands on the table till the morning of ,new ,year's ,day1 when it is distributed among the cattle4 ,in other parts of the island the ,christmas ,boar is not a cake but a little pig born in ,march1 which the housewife fattens secretly1 often without the knowledge of the other members of the family4 ,on ,christmas ,eve the little pig is secretly killed1 then roasted in the oven1 and set on the table standing on all fours1 where it remains in this posture for several days4 ,in other parts of the island1 again1 though the ,christmas cake has neither the name nor the shape of a boar1 it is kept till the ,new ,year1 when half of it is divided among all the members and all the quadrupeds of the family4 ,the other half of the cake is kept till sowing-time comes round1 when it is similarly distributed in the morning among human beings and beasts4 ,in other parts of ,esthonia1 again1 the ,christmas ,boar1 as it is called1 is baked of the first rye cut at harvest2 it has a conical shape and a cross is impressed on it with a pig's bone or a key1 or three dints are made in it with a buckle or a piece of charcoal4 ,it stands with a light beside it on the table all through the festal season4 ,on ,new ,year's ,day and ,epiphany1 before sunrise1 a little of the cake is crumbled with salt and given to the cattle4 ,the rest is kept till the day when the cattle are driven out to pasture for the first time in spring4 ,it is then put in the herdsman's bag1 and at evening is divided among the cattle to guard them from magic and harm4 ,in some places the ,christmas ,boar is partaken of by farm-servants and cattle at the time of the barley sowing1 for the purpose of thereby producing a heavier crop4 #aj4 ,on the ,animal ,embodiments of the ,corn-spirit ,,so much for the animal embodiments of the corn-spirit as they are presented to us in the folk-customs of ,northern ,europe4 ,these customs bring out clearly the sacramental character of the harvest-supper4 ,the corn-spirit is conceived as embodied in an animal2 this divine animal is slain1 and its flesh and blood are partaken of by the harvesters4 ,thus the cock1 the hare1 the cat1 the goat1 and the ,,ox are eaten sacramentally by the harvester1 and the pig is eaten sacramentally by ploughmen in spring4 ,again1 as a substitute for the real flesh of the divine being1 bread or dumplings are made in his image and eaten sacramentally2 thus1 pig-shaped dumplings are eaten by the harvesters1 and loaves made in boar-shape 7the ,yule ,boar7 are eaten in spring by the ploughman and his cattle4 ,the reader has probably remarked the complete parallelism between the conceptions of the corn-spirit in human and in animal form4 ,the parallel may be here briefly resumed4 ,when the corn waves in the wind it is said either that the ,corn-mother or that the ,corn-wolf1 etc41 is passing through the corn4 ,children are warned against straying in corn-fields either because the ,corn-mother or because the ,corn-wolf1 etc41 is there4 ,in the last corn cut or the last sheaf threshed either the ,corn-mother or the ,corn-wolf1 etc41 is supposed to be present4 ,the last sheaf is itself called either the ,corn-mother or the ,corn-wolf1 etc41 and is made up in the shape either of a woman or of a wolf1 etc4 ,the person who cuts1 binds1 or threshes the last sheaf is called either the ,old ,woman or the ,wolf1 etc41 according to the name bestowed on the sheaf itself4 ,as in some places a sheaf made in human form and called the ,maiden1 the ,mother of the ,maize1 etc41 is kept from one harvest to the next in order to secure a continuance of the corn-spirit's blessing1 so in some places the ,harvest-cock and in others the flesh of the goat is kept for a similar purpose from one harvest to the next4 ,as in some places the grain taken from the ,corn-mother is mixed with the seed-corn in spring to make the crop abundant1 so in some places the feathers of the cock1 and in ,sweden the ,yule ,boar1 are kept till spring and mixed with the seed-corn for a like purpose4 ,as part of the ,corn-mother or ,maiden is given to the cattle at ,christmas or to the horses at the first ploughing1 so part of the ,yule ,boar is given to the ploughing horses or oxen in spring4 ,lastly1 the death of the corn-spirit is represented by killing or pretending to kill either his human or his animal representative2 and the worshippers partake sacramentally either of the actual body and blood of the representative of the divinity1 or of bread made in his likeness4 ,other animal forms assumed by the corn-spirit are the fox1 stag1 roe1 sheep1 bear1 ass1 mouse1 quail1 stork1 swan1 and kite4 ,if it is asked why the corn-spirit should be thought to appear in the form of an animal and of so many different animals1 we may reply that to primitive man the simple appearance of an animal or bird among the corn is probably enough to suggest a mysterious link between the creature and the corn2 and when we remember that in the old days1 before fields were fenced in1 all kinds of animals must have been free to roam over them1 we need not wonder that the corn-spirit should have been identified even with large animals like the horse and cow1 which nowadays could not1 except by a rare accident1 be found straying in an ,english corn-field4 ,this explanation applies with peculiar force to the very common case in which the animal embodiment of the corn-spirit is believed to lurk in the last standing corn4 ,for at harvest a number of wild animals1 such as hares1 rabbits1 and partridges1 are commonly driven by the progress of the reaping into the last patch of standing corn1 and make their escape from it as it is being cut down4 ,so regularly does this happen that reapers and others often stand round the last patch of corn armed with sticks or guns1 with which they kill the animals as they dart out of their last refuge among the stalks4 ,now1 primitive man1 to whom magical changes of shape seem perfectly credible1 finds it most natural that the spirit of the corn1 driven from his home in the ripe grain1 should make his escape in the form of the animal which is seen to rush out of the last patch of corn as it falls under the scythe of the reaper4 ,thus the identification of the corn-spirit with an animal is analogous to the identification of him with a passing stranger4 ,as the sudden appearance of a stranger near the harvest-field or threshing-floor is1 to the primitive mind1 enough to identify him as the spirit of the corn escaping from the cut or threshed corn1 so the sudden appearance of an animal issuing from the cut corn is enough to identify it with the corn-spirit escaping from his ruined home4 ,the two identifications are so analogous that they can hardly be dissociated in any attempt to explain them4 ,those who look to some other principle than the one here suggested for the explanation of the latter identification are bound to show that their theory covers the former identification also4 ,,xlix4 ,ancient ,deities of ,vegetation as ,animals #a4 ,dionysus1 the ,goat and the ,bull ,,however we may explain it1 the fact remains that in peasant folk-lore the corn-spirit is very commonly conceived and represented in animal form4 ,may not this fact explain the relation in which certain animals stood to the ancient deities of vegetation1 ,dionysus1 ,demeter1 ,adonis1 ,attis1 and ,osiris8 ,to begin with ,dionysus4 ,we have seen that he was represented sometimes as a goat and sometimes as a bull4 ,as a goat he can hardly be separated from the minor divinities1 the ,pans1 ,satyrs1 and ,silenuses1 all of whom are closely associated with him and are represented more or less completely in the form of goats4 ,thus1 ,pan was regularly portrayed in sculpture and painting with the face and legs of a goat4 ,the ,satyrs were depicted with pointed goat-ears1 and sometimes with sprouting horns and short tails4 ,they were sometimes spoken of simply as goats2 and in the drama their parts were played by men dressed in goatskins4 ,silenus is represented in art clad in a goatskin4 ,further1 the ,fauns1 the ,italian counterpart of the ,greek ,pans and ,satyrs1 are described as being half goats1 with goat-feet and goat-horns4 ,again1 all these minor goat-formed divinities partake more or less clearly of the character of woodland deities4 ,thus1 ,pan was called by the ,arcadians the ,lord of the ,wood4 ,the ,silenuses kept company with the tree-nymphs4 ,the ,fauns are expressly designated as woodland deities2 and their character as such is still further brought out by their association1 or even identification1 with ,silvanus and the ,silvanuses1 who1 as their name of itself indicates1 are spirits of the woods4 ,lastly1 the association of the ,satyrs with the ,silenuses1 ,fauns1 and ,silvanuses1 proves that the ,satyrs also were woodland deities4 ,these goat-formed spirits of the woods have their counterparts in the folk-lore of ,northern ,europe4 ,thus1 the ,russian wood-spirits1 called ,ljeschie 7from ljes1 wood71 are believed to appear partly in human shape1 but with the horns1 ears1 and legs of goats4 ,the ,ljeschi can alter his stature at pleasure2 when he walks in the wood he is as tall as the trees2 when he walks in the meadows he is no higher than the grass4 ,some of the ,ljeschie are spirits of the corn as well as of the wood2 before harvest they are as tall as the corn-stalks1 but after it they shrink to the height of the stubble4 ,this brings out--what we have remarked before--the close connexion between tree-spirits and corn-spirits1 and shows how easily the former may melt into the latter4 ,similarly the ,fauns1 though wood-spirits1 were believed to foster the growth of the crops4 ,we have already seen how often the corn-spirit is represented in folk-custom as a goat4 ,on the whole1 then1 as ,mannhardt argues1 the ,pans1 ,satyrs1 and ,fauns perhaps belong to a widely diffused class of wood-spirits conceived in goat-form4 ,the fondness of goats for straying in woods and nibbling the bark of trees1 to which indeed they are most destructive1 is an obvious and perhaps sufficient reason why wood-spirits should so often be supposed to take the form of goats4 ,the inconsistency of a god of vegetation subsisting upon the vegetation which he personifies is not one to strike the primitive mind4 ,such inconsistencies arise when the deity1 ceasing to be immanent in the vegetation1 comes to be regarded as its owner or lord2 for the idea of owning the vegetation naturally leads to that of subsisting on it4 ,sometimes the corn-spirit1 originally conceived as immanent in the corn1 afterwards comes to be regarded as its owner1 who lives on it and is reduced to poverty and want by being deprived of it4 ,hence he is often known as the ,poor ,man or the ,poor ,woman4 ,occasionally the last sheaf is left standing on the field for the ,poor ,old ,woman or for the ,old ,rye-woman4 ,thus the representation of wood-spirits in the form of goats appears to be both widespread and1 to the primitive mind1 natural4 ,therefore when we find1 as we have done1 that ,dionysus--a tree-god--is sometimes represented in goat-form1 we can hardly avoid concluding that this representation is simply a part of his proper character as a tree-god and is not to be explained by the fusion of two distinct and independent worships1 in one of which he originally appeared as a tree-god and in the other as a goat4 ,dionysus was also figured1 as we have seen1 in the shape of a bull4 ,after what has gone before we are naturally led to expect that his bull form must have been only another expression for his character as a deity of vegetation1 especially as the bull is a common embodiment of the corn-spirit in ,northern ,europe2 and the close association of ,dionysus with ,demeter and ,persephone in the mysteries of ,eleusis shows that he had at least strong agricultural affinities4 ,the probability of this view will be somewhat increased if it can be shown that in other rites than those of ,dionysus the ancients slew an ,,ox as a representative of the spirit of vegetation4 ,this they appear to have done in the ,athenian sacrifice known as the murder of the ,,ox 7bouphonia74 ,it took place about the end of ,june or beginning of ,july1 that is1 about the time when the threshing is nearly over in ,attica4 ,according to tradition the sacrifice was instituted to procure a cessation of drought and dearth which had afflicted the land4 ,the ritual was as follows4 ,barley mixed with wheat1 or cakes made of them1 were laid upon the bronze altar of ,zeus ,polieus on the ,acropolis4 ,oxen were driven round the altar1 and the ,,ox which went up to the altar and ate the offering on it was sacrificed4 ,the axe and knife with which the beast was slain had been previously wetted with water brought by maidens called water-carriers4 ,the weapons were then sharpened and handed to the butchers1 one of whom felled the ,,ox with the axe and another cut its throat with the knife4 ,as soon as he had felled the ,,ox1 the former threw the axe from him and fled2 and the man who cut the beast's throat apparently imitated his example4 ,meantime the ,,ox was skinned and all present partook of its flesh4 ,then the hide was stuffed with straw and sewed up2 next the stuffed animal was set on its feet and yoked to a plough as if it were ploughing4 ,a trial then took place in an ancient law-court presided over by the ,king 7as he was called7 to determine who had murdered the ,,ox4 ,the maidens who had brought the water accused the men who had sharpened the axe and knife2 the men who had sharpened the axe and knife blamed the men who had handed these implements to the butchers2 the men who had handed the implements to the butchers blamed the butchers2 and the butchers laid the blame on the axe and knife1 which were accordingly found guilty1 condemned1 and cast into the sea4 ,the name of this sacrifice1-- the murder of the ,,ox1--the pains taken by each person who had a hand in the slaughter to lay the blame on some one else1 together with the formal trial and punishment of the axe or knife or both1 prove that the ,,ox was here regarded not merely as a victim offered to a god1 but as itself a sacred creature1 the slaughter of which was sacrilege or murder4 ,this is borne out by a statement of ,varro that to kill an ,,ox was formerly a capital crime in ,attica4 ,the mode of selecting the victim suggests that the ,,ox which tasted the corn was viewed as the corn-deity taking possession of his own4 ,this interpretation is supported by the following custom4 ,in ,beauce1 in the district of ,orleans1 on the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth of ,april they make a straw man called the great mondard4 ,for they say that the old mondard is now dead and it is necessary to make a new one4 ,the straw man is carried in solemn procession up and down the village and at last is placed upon the oldest apple-tree4 ,there he remains till the apples are gathered1 when he is taken down and thrown into the water1 or he is burned and his ashes cast into water4 ,but the person who plucks the first fruit from the tree succeeds to the title of the great mondard4 ,here the straw figure1 called the great mondard and placed on the oldest apple-tree in spring1 represents the spirit of the tree1 who1 dead in winter1 revives when the apple-blossoms appear on the boughs4 ,thus the person who plucks the first fruit from the tree and thereby receives the name of the great mondard must be regarded as a representative of the tree-spirit4 ,primitive peoples are usually reluctant to taste the annual first-fruits of any crop1 until some ceremony has been performed which makes it safe and pious for them to do so4 ,the reason of this reluctance appears to be a belief that the first-fruits either belong to or actually contain a divinity4 ,therefore when a man or animal is seen boldly to appropriate the sacred first-fruits1 he or it is naturally regarded as the divinity himself in human or animal form taking possession of his own4 ,the time of the ,athenian sacrifice1 which fell about the close of the threshing1 suggests that the wheat and barley laid upon the altar were a harvest offering2 and the sacramental character of the subsequent repast--all partaking of the flesh of the divine animal--would make it parallel to the harvest-suppers of modern ,europe1 in which1 as we have seen1 the flesh of the animal which stands for the corn-spirit is eaten by the harvesters4 ,again1 the tradition that the sacrifice was instituted in order to put an end to drought and famine is in favour of taking it as a harvest festival4 ,the resurrection of the corn-spirit1 enacted by setting up the stuffed ,,ox and yoking it to the plough1 may be compared with the resurrection of the tree-spirit in the person of his representative1 the ,wild ,man4 ,the ,,ox appears as a representative of the corn-spirit in other parts of the world4 ,at ,great ,bassam1 in ,guinea1 two oxen are slain annually to procure a good harvest4 ,if the sacrifice is to be effectual1 it is necessary that the oxen should weep4 ,so all the women of the village sit in front of the beasts1 chanting1 ,the ,,ox will weep2 yes1 he will weep6 ,from time to time one of the women walks round the beasts1 throwing manioc meal or palm wine upon them1 especially into their eyes4 ,when tears roll down from the eyes of the oxen1 the people dance1 singing1 ,the ,,ox weeps6 the ,,ox weeps6 ,then two men seize the tails of the beasts and cut them off at one blow4 ,it is believed that a great misfortune will happen in the course of the year if the tails are not severed at one blow4 ,the oxen are afterwards killed1 and their flesh is eaten by the chiefs4 ,here the tears of the oxen1 like those of the human victims amongst the ,khonds and the ,aztecs1 are probably a rain-charm4 ,we have already seen that the virtue of the corn-spirit1 embodied in animal form1 is sometimes supposed to reside in the tail1 and that the last handful of corn is sometimes conceived as the tail of the corn-spirit4 ,in the ,mithraic religion this conception is graphically set forth in some of the numerous sculptures which represent ,mithras kneeling on the back of a bull and plunging a knife into its flank2 for on certain of these monuments the tail of the bull ends in three stalks of corn1 and in one of them corn-stalks instead of blood are seen issuing from the wound inflicted by the knife4 ,such representations certainly suggest that the bull1 whose sacrifice appears to have formed a leading feature in the ,mithraic ritual1 was conceived1 in one at least of its aspects1 as an incarnation of the corn-spirit4 ,still more clearly does the ox appear as a personification of the corn-spirit in a ceremony which is observed in all the provinces and districts of ,china to welcome the approach of spring4 ,on the first day of spring1 usually on the third or fourth of ,february1 which is also the beginning of the ,chinese ,new ,year1 the governor or prefect of the city goes in procession to the east gate of the city1 and sacrifices to the ,divine ,husbandman1 who is represented with a bull's head on the body of a man4 ,a large effigy of an ox1 cow1 or buffalo has been prepared for the occasion1 and stands outside of the east gate1 with agricultural implements beside it4 ,the figure is made of differently-coloured pieces of paper pasted on a framework either by a blind man or according to the directions of a necromancer4 ,the colours of the paper prognosticate the character of the coming year2 if red prevails1 there will be many fires2 if white1 there will be floods and rain2 and so with the other colours4 ,the mandarins walk slowly round the ox1 beating it severely at each step with rods of various hues4 ,it is filled with five kinds of grain1 which pour forth when the effigy is broken by the blows of the rods4 ,the paper fragments are then set on fire1 and a scramble takes place for the burning fragments1 because the people believe that whoever gets one of them is sure to be fortunate throughout the year4 ,a live buffalo is next killed1 and its flesh is divided among the mandarins4 ,according to one account1 the effigy of the ox is made of clay1 and1 after being beaten by the governor1 is stoned by the people till they break it in pieces1 from which they expect an abundant year4 ,here the corn-spirit appears to be plainly represented by the corn-filled ox1 whose fragments may therefore be supposed to bring fertility with them4 ,on the whole we may perhaps conclude that both as a goat and as a bull ,dionysus was essentially a god of vegetation4 ,the ,chinese and ,european customs which ,i have cited may perhaps shed light on the custom of rending a live bull or goat at the rites of ,dionysus4 ,the animal was torn in fragments1 as the ,khond victim was cut in pieces1 in order that the worshippers might each secure a portion of the life-giving and fertilising influence of the god4 ,the flesh was eaten raw as a sacrament1 and we may conjecture that some of it was taken home to be buried in the fields1 or otherwise employed so as to convey to the fruits of the earth the quickening influence of the god of vegetation4 ,the resurrection of ,dionysus1 related in his myth1 may have been enacted in his rites by stuffing and setting up the slain ox1 as was done at the ,athenian bouphonia4 #b4 ,demeter1 the ,pig and the ,horse ,,passing next to the corn-goddess ,demeter1 and remembering that in ,european folk-lore the pig is a common embodiment of the corn-spirit1 we may now ask whether the pig1 which was so closely associated with ,demeter1 may not have been originally the goddess herself in animal form4 ,the pig was sacred to her2 in art she was portrayed carrying or accompanied by a pig2 and the pig was regularly sacrificed in her mysteries1 the reason assigned being that the pig injures the corn and is therefore an enemy of the goddess4 ,but after an animal has been conceived as a god1 or a god as an animal1 it sometimes happens1 as we have seen1 that the god sloughs off his animal form and becomes purely anthropomorphic2 and that then the animal1 which at first had been slain in the character of the god1 comes to be viewed as a victim offered to the god on the ground of its hostility to the deity2 in short1 the god is sacrificed to himself on the ground that he is his own enemy4 ,this happened to ,dionysus1 and it may have happened to ,demeter also4 ,and in fact the rites of one of her festivals1 the ,thesmophoria1 bear out the view that originally the pig was an embodiment of the corn-goddess herself1 either ,demeter or her daughter and double ,persephone4 ,the ,attic ,thesmophoria was an autumn festival1 celebrated by women alone in ,october1 and appears to have represented with mourning rites the descent of ,persephone 7or ,demeter7 into the lower world1 and with joy her return from the dead4 ,hence the name ,descent or ,ascent variously applied to the first1 and the name ,kalligeneia 7fair-born7 applied to the third day of the festival4 ,now it was customary at the ,thesmophoria to throw pigs1 cakes of dough1 and branches of pine-trees into the chasms of ,demeter and ,persephone1 which appear to have been sacred caverns or vaults4 ,in these caverns or vaults there were said to be serpents1 which guarded the caverns and consumed most of the flesh of the pigs and dough-cakes which were thrown in4 ,afterwards--apparently at the next annual festival--the decayed remains of the pigs1 the cakes1 and the pine-branches were fetched by women called drawers1 who1 after observing rules of ceremonial purity for three days1 descended into the caverns1 and1 frightening away the serpents by clapping their hands1 brought up the remains and placed them on the altar4 ,whoever got a piece of the decayed flesh and cakes1 and sowed it with the seed-corn in his field1 was believed to be sure of a good crop4 ,to explain the rude and ancient ritual of the ,thesmophoria the following legend was told4 ,at the moment when ,pluto carried off ,persephone1 a swineherd called ,eubuleus chanced to be herding his swine on the spot1 and his herd was engulfed in the chasm down which ,pluto vanished with ,persephone4 ,accordingly at the ,thesmophoria pigs were annually thrown into caverns to commemorate the disappearance of the swine of ,eubuleus4 ,it follows from this that the casting of the pigs into the vaults at the ,thesmophoria formed part of the dramatic representation of ,persephone's descent into the lower world2 and as no image of ,persephone appears to have been thrown in1 we may infer that the descent of the pigs was not so much an accompaniment of her descent as the descent itself1 in short1 that the pigs were ,persephone4 ,afterwards when ,persephone or ,demeter 7for the two are equivalent7 took on human form1 a reason had to be found for the custom of throwing pigs into caverns at her festival2 and this was done by saying that when ,pluto carried off ,persephone there happened to be some swine browsing near1 which were swallowed up along with her4 ,the story is obviously a forced and awkward attempt to bridge over the gulf between the old conception of the corn-spirit as a pig and the new conception of her as an anthropomorphic goddess4 ,a trace of the older conception survived in the legend that when the sad mother was searching for traces of the vanished ,persephone1 the footprints of the lost one were obliterated by the footprints of a pig2 originally1 we may conjecture1 the footprints of the pig were the footprints of ,persephone and of ,demeter herself4 ,a consciousness of the intimate connexion of the pig with the corn lurks in the legend that the swineherd ,eubuleus was a brother of ,triptolemus1 to whom ,demeter first imparted the secret of the corn4 ,indeed1 according to one version of the story1 ,eubuleus himself received1 jointly with his brother ,triptolemus1 the gift of the corn from ,demeter as a reward for revealing to her the fate of ,persephone4 ,further1 it is to be noted that at the ,thesmophoria the women appear to have eaten swine's flesh4 ,the meal1 if ,i am right1 must have been a solemn sacrament or communion1 the worshippers partaking of the body of the god4 ,as thus explained1 the ,thesmophoria has its analogies in the folk-customs of ,northern ,europe which have been already described4 ,just as at the ,thesmophoria--an autumn festival in honour of the corn-goddess--swine's flesh was partly eaten1 partly kept in caverns till the following year1 when it was taken up to be sown with the seed-corn in the fields for the purpose of securing a good crop2 so in the neighbourhood of ,grenoble the goat killed on the harvest-field is partly eaten at the harvest-supper1 partly pickled and kept till the next harvest2 so at ,pouilly the ox killed on the harvest-field is partly eaten by the harvesters1 partly pickled and kept till the first day of sowing in spring1 probably to be then mixed with the seed1 or eaten by the ploughmen1 or both2 so at ,udvarhely the feathers of the cock which is killed in the last sheaf at harvest are kept till spring1 and then sown with the seed on the field2 so in ,hesse and ,meiningen the flesh of pigs is eaten on ,ash ,wednesday or ,candlemas1 and the bones are kept till sowing-time1 when they are put into the field sown or mixed with the seed in the bag2 so1 lastly1 the corn from the last sheaf is kept till ,christmas1 made into the ,yule ,boar1 and afterwards broken and mixed with the seed-corn at sowing in spring4 ,thus1 to put it generally1 the corn-spirit is killed in animal form in autumn2 part of his flesh is eaten as a sacrament by his worshippers2 and part of it is kept till next sowing-time or harvest as a pledge and security for the continuance or renewal of the corn-spirit's energies4 ,if persons of fastidious taste should object that the ,greeks never could have conceived ,demeter and ,persephone to be embodied in the form of pigs1 it may be answered that in the cave of ,phigalia in ,arcadia the ,black ,demeter was portrayed with the head and mane of a horse on the body of a woman4 ,between the portraits of a goddess as a pig1 and the portrait of her as a woman with a horse's head1 there is little to choose in respect of barbarism4 ,the legend told of the ,phigalian ,demeter indicates that the horse was one of the animal forms assumed in ancient ,greece1 as in modern ,europe1 by the cornspirit4 ,it was said that in her search for her daughter1 ,demeter assumed the form of a mare to escape the addresses of ,poseidon1 and that1 offended at his importunity1 she withdrew in dudgeon to a cave not far from ,phigalia in the highlands of ,western ,arcadia4 ,there1 robed in black1 she tarried so long that the fruits of the earth were perishing1 and mankind would have died of famine if ,pan had not soothed the angry goddess and persuaded her to quit the cave4 ,in memory of this event1 the ,phigalians set up an image of the ,black ,demeter in the cave2 it represented a woman dressed in a long robe1 with the head and mane of a horse4 ,the ,black ,demeter1 in whose absence the fruits of the earth perish1 is plainly a mythical expression for the bare wintry earth stripped of its summer mantle of green4 #c4 ,attis1 ,adonis1 and the ,pig ,,passing now to ,attis and ,adonis1 we may note a few facts which seem to show that these deities of vegetation had also1 like other deities of the same class1 their animal embodiments4 ,the worshippers of ,attis abstained from eating the flesh of swine4 ,this appears to indicate that the pig was regarded as an embodiment of ,attis4 ,and the legend that ,attis was killed by a boar points in the same direction4 ,for after the examples of the goat ,dionysus and the pig ,demeter it may almost be laid down as a rule that an animal which is said to have injured a god was originally the god himself4 ,perhaps the cry of ,hyes ,attes6 ,hyes ,attes6 which was raised by the worshippers of ,attis1 may be neither more nor less than ,pig ,attis6 ,pig ,attis6--hyes being possibly a ,phrygian form of the ,greek hys1 a pig4 ,in regard to ,adonis1 his connexion with the boar was not always explained by the story that he had been killed by the animal4 ,according to another story1 a boar rent with his tusk the bark of the tree in which the infant ,adonis was born4 ,according to yet another story1 he perished at the hands of ,hephaestus on ,mount ,lebanon while he was hunting wild boars4 ,these variations in the legend serve to show that1 while the connexion of the boar with ,adonis was certain1 the reason of the connexion was not understood1 and that consequently different stories were devised to explain it4 ,certainly the pig ranked as a sacred animal among the ,syrians4 ,at the great religious metropolis of ,hierapolis on the ,euphrates pigs were neither sacrificed nor eaten1 and if a man touched a pig he was unclean for the rest of the day4 ,some people said this was because the pigs were unclean2 others said it was because the pigs were sacred4 ,this difference of opinion points to a hazy state of religious thought in which the ideas of sanctity and uncleanness are not yet sharply distinguished1 both being blent in a sort of vaporous solution to which we give the name of taboo4 ,it is quite consistent with this that the pig should have been held to be an embodiment of the divine ,adonis1 and the analogies of ,dionysus and ,demeter make it probable that the story of the hostility of the animal to the god was only a late misapprehension of the old view of the god as embodied in a pig4 ,the rule that pigs were not sacrificed or eaten by worshippers of ,attis and presumably of ,adonis1 does not exclude the possibility that in these rituals the pig was slain on solemn occasions as a representative of the god and consumed sacramentally by the worshippers4 ,indeed1 the sacramental killing and eating of an animal implies that the animal is sacred1 and that1 as a general rule1 it is spared4 ,the attitude of the ,jews to the pig was as ambiguous as that of the heathen ,syrians towards the same animal4 ,the ,greeks could not decide whether the ,jews worshipped swine or abominated them4 ,on the one hand they might not eat swine2 but on the other hand they might not kill them4 ,and if the former rule speaks for the uncleanness1 the latter speaks still more strongly for the sanctity of the animal4 ,for whereas both rules may1 and one rule must1 be explained on the supposition that the pig was sacred2 neither rule must1 and one rule cannot1 be explained on the supposition that the pig was unclean4 ,if1 therefore1 we prefer the former supposition1 we must conclude that1 originally at least1 the pig was revered rather than abhorred by the ,israelites4 ,we are confirmed in this opinion by observing that down to the time of ,isaiah some of the ,jews used to meet secretly in gardens to eat the flesh of swine and mice as a religious rite4 ,doubtless this was a very ancient ceremony1 dating from a time when both the pig and the mouse were venerated as divine1 and when their flesh was partaken of sacramentally on rare and solemn occasions as the body and blood of gods4 ,and in general it may perhaps be said that all so-called unclean animals were originally sacred2 the reason for not eating them was that they were divine4 #d4 ,osiris1 the ,pig and the ,bull ,,in ,,ancient ,egypt1 within historical times1 the pig occupied the same dubious position as in ,syria and ,palestine1 though at first sight its uncleanness is more prominent than its sanctity4 ,the ,egyptians are generally said by ,greek writers to have abhorred the pig as a foul and loathsome animal4 ,if a man so much as touched a pig in passing1 he stepped into the river with all his clothes on1 to wash off the taint4 ,to drink pig's milk was believed to cause leprosy to the drinker4 ,swineherds1 though natives of ,egypt1 were forbidden to enter any temple1 and they were the only men who were thus excluded4 ,no one would give his daughter in marriage to a swineherd1 or marry a swineherd's daughter2 the swineherds married among themselves4 ,yet once a year the ,egyptians sacrificed pigs to the moon and to ,osiris1 and not only sacrificed them1 but ate of their flesh1 though on any other day of the year they would neither sacrifice them nor taste of their flesh4 ,those who were too poor to offer a pig on this day baked cakes of dough1 and offered them instead4 ,this can hardly be explained except by the supposition that the pig was a sacred animal which was eaten sacramentally by his worshippers once a year4 ,the view that in ,egypt the pig was sacred is borne out by the very facts which1 to moderns1 might seem to prove the contrary4 ,thus the ,egyptians thought1 as we have seen1 that to drink pig's milk produced leprosy4 ,but exactly analogous views are held by savages about the animals and plants which they deem most sacred4 ,thus in the island of ,wetar 7between ,new ,guinea and ,celebes7 people believe themselves to be variously descended from wild pigs1 serpents1 crocodiles1 turtles1 dogs1 and eels2 a man may not eat an animal of the kind from which he is descended2 if he does so1 he will become a leper1 and go mad4 ,amongst the ,omaha ,indians of ,north ,america men whose totem is the elk1 believe that if they ate the flesh of the male elk they would break out in boils and white spots in different parts of their bodies4 ,in the same tribe men whose totem is the red maize1 think that if they ate red maize they would have running sores all round their mouths4 ,the ,bush negroes of ,surinam1 who practise totemism1 believe that if they ate the capia 7an animal like a pig7 it would give them leprosy2 perhaps the capia is one of their totems4 ,the ,syrians1 in antiquity1 who esteemed fish sacred1 thought that if they ate fish their bodies would break out in ulcers1 and their feet and stomach would swell up4 ,the ,chasas of ,orissa believe that if they were to injure their totemic animal they would be attacked by leprosy and their line would die out4 ,these examples prove that the eating of a sacred animal is often believed to produce leprosy or other skin-diseases2 so far1 therefore1 they support the view that the pig must have been sacred in ,egypt1 since the effect of drinking its milk was believed to be leprosy4 ,again1 the rule that1 after touching a pig1 a man had to wash himself and his clothes1 also favours the view of the sanctity of the pig4 ,for it is a common belief that the effect of contact with a sacred object must be removed1 by washing or otherwise1 before a man is free to mingle with his fellows4 ,thus the ,jews wash their hands after reading the sacred scriptures4 ,before coming forth from the tabernacle after the sin-offering1 the high priest had to wash himself1 and put off the garments which he had worn in the holy place4 ,it was a rule of ,greek ritual that1 in offering an expiatory sacrifice1 the sacrificer should not touch the sacrifice1 and that1 after the offering was made1 he must wash his body and his clothes in a river or spring before he could enter a city or his own house4 ,the ,polynesians felt strongly the need of ridding themselves of the sacred contagion1 if it may be so called1 which they caught by touching sacred objects4 ,various ceremonies were performed for the purpose of removing this contagion4 ,we have seen1 for example1 how in ,tonga a man who happened to touch a sacred chief1 or anything personally belonging to him1 had to perform a certain ceremony before he could feed himself with his hands2 otherwise it was believed that he would swell up and die1 or at least be afflicted with scrofula or some other disease4 ,we have seen1 too1 what fatal effects are supposed to follow1 and do actually follow1 from contact with a sacred object in ,new ,zealand4 ,in short1 primitive man believes that what is sacred is dangerous2 it is pervaded by a sort of electrical sanctity which communicates a shock to1 even if it does not kill1 whatever comes in contact with it4 ,hence the savage is unwilling to touch or even to see that which he deems peculiarly holy4 ,thus ,bechuanas1 of the ,crocodile clan1 think it hateful and unlucky to meet or see a crocodile2 the sight is thought to cause inflammation of the eyes4 ,yet the crocodile is their most sacred object2 they call it their father1 swear by it1 and celebrate it in their festivals4 ,the goat is the sacred animal of the ,madenassana ,bushmen2 yet to look upon it would be to render the man for the time impure1 as well as to cause him undefined uneasiness4 ,the ,elk clan1 among the ,omaha ,indians1 believe that even to touch the male elk would be followed by an eruption of boils and white spots on the body4 ,members of the ,reptile clan in the same tribe think that if one of them touches or smells a snake1 it will make his hair white4 ,in ,samoa people whose god was a butterfly believed that if they caught a butterfly it would strike them dead4 ,again1 in ,samoa the reddish-seared leaves of the banana-tree were commonly used as plates for handing food2 but if any member of the ,wild ,pigeon family had used banana leaves for this purpose1 it was supposed that he would suffer from rheumatic swellings or an eruption all over the body like chicken-pox4 ,the ,mori clan of the ,bhils in ,central ,india worship the peacock as their totem and make offerings of grain to it2 yet members of the clan believe that were they even to set foot on the tracks of a peacock they would afterwards suffer from some disease1 and if a woman sees a peacock she must veil her face and look away4 ,thus the primitive mind seems to conceive of holiness as a sort of dangerous virus1 which a prudent man will shun as far as possible1 and of which1 if he should chance to be infected by it1 he will carefully disinfect himself by some form of ceremonial purification4 ,in the light of these parallels the beliefs and customs of the ,egyptians touching the pig are probably to be explained as based upon an opinion of the extreme sanctity rather than of the extreme uncleanness of the animal2 or rather1 to put it more correctly1 they imply that the animal was looked on1 not simply as a filthy and disgusting creature1 but as a being endowed with high supernatural powers1 and that as such it was regarded with that primitive sentiment of religious awe and fear in which the feelings of reverence and abhorrence are almost equally blended4 ,the ancients themselves seem to have been aware that there was another side to the horror with which swine seemed to inspire the ,egyptians4 ,for the ,greek astronomer and mathematician ,eudoxus1 who resided fourteen months in ,egypt and conversed with the priests1 was of opinion that the ,egyptians spared the pig1 not out of abhorrence1 but from a regard to its utility in agriculture2 for1 according to him1 when the ,nile had subsided1 herds of swine were turned loose over the fields to tread the seed down into the moist earth4 ,but when a being is thus the object of mixed and implicitly contradictory feelings1 he may be said to occupy a position of unstable equilibrium4 ,in course of time one of the contradictory feelings is likely to prevail over the other1 and according as the feeling which finally predominates is that of reverence or abhorrence1 the being who is the object of it will rise into a god or sink into a devil4 ,the latter1 on the whole1 was the fate of the pig in ,egypt4 ,for in historical times the fear and horror of the pig seem certainly to have outweighed the reverence and worship of which he may once have been the object1 and of which1 even in his fallen state1 he never quite lost trace4 ,he came to be looked on as an embodiment of ,set or ,typhon1 the ,egyptian devil and enemy of ,osiris4 ,for it was in the shape of a black pig that ,typhon injured the eye of the god ,horus1 who burned him and instituted the sacrifice of the pig1 the sun-god ,ra having declared the beast abominable4 ,again1 the story that ,typhon was hunting a boar when he discovered and mangled the body of ,osiris1 and that this was the reason why pigs were sacrificed once a year1 is clearly a modernised version of an older story that ,osiris1 like ,adonis and ,attis1 was slain or mangled by a boar1 or by ,typhon in the form of a boar4 ,thus1 the annual sacrifice of a pig to ,osiris might naturally be interpreted as vengeance inflicted on the hostile animal that had slain or mangled the god4 ,but1 in the first place1 when an animal is thus killed as a solemn sacrifice once and once only in the year1 it generally or always means that the animal is divine1 that he is spared and respected the rest of the year as a god and slain1 when he is slain1 also in the character of a god4 ,in the second place1 the examples of ,dionysus and ,demeter1 if not of ,attis and ,adonis1 have taught us that the animal which is sacrificed to a god on the ground that he is the god's enemy may have been1 and probably was1 originally the god himself4 ,therefore1 the annual sacrifice of a pig to ,osiris1 coupled with the alleged hostility of the animal to the god1 tends to show1 first1 that originally the pig was a god1 and1 second1 that he was ,osiris4 ,at a later age1 when ,osiris became anthropomorphic and his original relation to the pig had been forgotten1 the animal was first distinguished from him1 and afterwards opposed as an enemy to him by mythologists who could think of no reason for killing a beast in connexion with the worship of a god except that the beast was the god's enemy2 or1 as ,plutarch puts it1 not that which is dear to the gods1 but that which is the contrary1 is fit to be sacrificed4 ,at this later stage the havoc which a wild boar notoriously makes amongst the corn would supply a plausible reason for regarding him as the foe of the corn-spirit1 though originally1 if ,i am right1 the very freedom with which the boar ranged at will through the corn led people to identify him with the corn-spirit1 to whom he was afterwards opposed as an enemy4 ,the view which identifies the pig with ,osiris derives not a little support from the sacrifice of pigs to him on the very day on which1 according to tradition1 ,osiris himself was killed2 for thus the killing of the pig was the annual representation of the killing of ,osiris1 just as the throwing of the pigs into the caverns at the ,thesmophoria was an annual representation of the descent of ,persephone into the lower world2 and both customs are parallel to the ,european practice of killing a goat1 cock1 and so forth1 at harvest as a representative of the corn-spirit4 ,again1 the theory that the pig1 originally ,osiris himself1 afterwards came to be regarded as an embodiment of his enemy ,typhon1 is supported by the similar relation of red-haired men and red oxen to ,typhon4 ,for in regard to the red-haired men who were burned and whose ashes were scattered with winnowing-fans1 we have seen fair grounds for believing that originally1 like the red-haired puppies killed at ,rome in spring1 they were representatives of the corn-spirit himself that is1 of ,osiris1 and were slain for the express purpose of making the corn turn red or golden4 ,yet at a later time these men were explained to be representatives1 not of ,osiris1 but of his enemy ,typhon1 and the killing of them was regarded as an act of vengeance inflicted on the enemy of the god4 ,similarly1 the red oxen sacrificed by the ,egyptians were said to be offered on the ground of their resemblance to ,typhon2 though it is more likely that originally they were slain on the ground of their resemblance to the corn-spirit ,osiris4 ,we have seen that the ox is a common representative of the corn-spirit and is slain as such on the harvest-field4 ,osiris was regularly identified with the bull ,apis of ,memphis and the bull ,mnevis of ,heliopolis4 ,but it is hard to say whether these bulls were embodiments of him as the corn-spirit1 as the red oxen appear to have been1 or whether they were not in origin entirely distinct deities who came to be fused with ,osiris at a later time4 ,the universality of the worship of these two bulls seems to put them on a different footing from the ordinary sacred animals whose worships were purely local4 ,but whatever the original relation of ,apis to ,osiris may have been1 there is one fact about the former which ought not to be passed over in a disquisition on the custom of killing a god4 ,although the bull ,apis was worshipped as a god with much pomp and profound reverence1 he was not suffered to live beyond a certain length of time which was prescribed by the sacred books1 and on the expiry of which he was drowned in a holy spring4 ,the limit1 according to ,plutarch1 was twenty-five years2 but it cannot always have been enforced1 for the tombs of the ,apis bulls have been discovered in modern times1 and from the inscriptions on them it appears that in the twenty-second dynasty two of the holy steers lived more than twenty-six years4 #e4 ,virbius and the ,horse ,,we are now in a position to hazard a conjecture as to the meaning of the tradition that ,virbius1 the first of the divine ,kings of the ,wood at ,aricia1 had been killed in the character of ,hippolytus by horses4 ,having found1 first1 that spirits of the corn are not infrequently represented in the form of horses2 and1 second1 that the animal which in later legends is said to have injured the god was sometimes originally the god himself1 we may conjecture that the horses by which ,virbius or ,hippolytus was said to have been slain were really embodiments of him as a deity of vegetation4 ,the myth that he had been killed by horses was probably invented to explain certain features in his worship1 amongst others the custom of excluding horses from his sacred grove4 ,for myth changes while custom remains constant2 men continue to do what their fathers did before them1 though the reasons on which their fathers acted have been long forgotten4 ,the history of religion is a long attempt to reconcile old custom with new reason1 to find a sound theory for an absurd practice4 ,in the case before us we may be sure that the myth is more modern than the custom and by no means represents the original reason for excluding horses from the grove4 ,from their exclusion it might be inferred that horses could not be the sacred animals or embodiments of the god of the grove4 ,but the inference would be rash4 ,the goat was at one time a sacred animal or embodiment of ,athena1 as may be inferred from the practice of representing the goddess clad in a goat-skin 7aegis74 ,yet the goat was neither sacrificed to her as a rule1 nor allowed to enter her great sanctuary1 the ,acropolis at ,athens4 ,the reason alleged for this was that the goat injured the olive1 the sacred tree of ,athena4 ,so far1 therefore1 the relation of the goat to ,athena is parallel to the relation of the horse to ,virbius1 both animals being excluded from the sanctuary on the ground of injury done by them to the god4 ,but from ,varro we learn that there was an exception to the rule which excluded the goat from the ,acropolis4 ,once a year1 he says1 the goat was driven on to the ,acropolis for a necessary sacrifice4 ,now1 as has been remarked before1 when an animal is sacrificed once and once only in the year1 it is probably slain1 not as a victim offered to the god1 but as a representative of the god himself4 ,therefore we may infer that if a goat was sacrificed on the ,acropolis once a year1 it was sacrificed in the character of ,athena herself2 and it may be conjectured that the skin of the sacrificed animal was placed on the statue of the goddess and formed the aegis1 which would thus be renewed annually4 ,similarly at ,thebes in ,egypt rams were sacred and were not sacrificed4 ,but on one day in the year a ram was killed1 and its skin was placed on the statue of the god ,ammon4 ,now1 if we knew the ritual of the ,arician grove better1 we might find that the rule of excluding horses from it1 like the rule of excluding goats from the ,acropolis at ,athens1 was subject to an annual exception1 a horse being once a year taken into the grove and sacrificed as an embodiment of the god ,virbius4 ,by the usual misunderstanding the horse thus killed would come in time to be regarded as an enemy offered up in sacrifice to the god whom he had injured1 like the pig which was sacrificed to ,demeter and ,osiris or the goat which was sacrificed to ,dionysus1 and possibly to ,athena4 ,it is so easy for a writer to record a rule without noticing an exception that we need not wonder at finding the rule of the ,arician grove recorded without any mention of an exception such as ,i suppose4 ,if we had had only the statements of ,athenaeus and ,pliny1 we should have known only the rule which forbade the sacrifice of goats to ,athena and excluded them from the ,acropolis1 without being aware of the important exception which the fortunate preservation of ,varro's work has revealed to us4 ,the conjecture that once a year a horse may have been sacrificed in the ,arician grove as a representative of the deity of the grove derives some support from the similar sacrifice of a horse which took place once a year at ,rome4 ,on the fifteenth of ,october in each year a chariot-race was run on the ,field of ,mars4 ,stabbed with a spear1 the right-hand horse of the victorious team was then sacrificed to ,mars for the purpose of ensuring good crops1 and its head was cut off and adorned with a string of loaves4 ,thereupon the inhabitants of two wards--the ,sacred ,way and the ,subura--contended with each other who should get the head4 ,if the people of the ,sacred ,way got it1 they fastened it to a wall of the king's house2 if the people of the ,subura got it1 they fastened it to the ,mamilian tower4 ,the horse's tail was cut off and carried to the king's house with such speed that the blood dripped on the hearth of the house4 ,further1 it appears that the blood of the horse was caught and preserved till the twenty-first of ,april1 when the ,vestal ,virgins mixed it with the blood of the unborn calves which had been sacrificed six days before4 ,the mixture was then distributed to shepherds1 and used by them for fumigating their flocks4 ,in this ceremony the decoration of the horse's head with a string of loaves1 and the alleged object of the sacrifice1 namely1 to procure a good harvest1 seem to indicate that the horse was killed as one of those animal representatives of the corn-spirit of which we have found so many examples4 ,the custom of cutting off the horse's tail is like the ,african custom of cutting off the tails of the oxen and sacrificing them to obtain a good crop4 ,in both the ,roman and the ,african custom the animal apparently stands for the corn-spirit1 and its fructifying power is supposed to reside especially in its tail4 ,the latter idea occurs1 as we have seen1 in ,european folk-lore4 ,again1 the practice of fumigating the cattle in spring with the blood of the horse may be compared with the practice of giving the ,old ,wife1 the ,maiden1 or the clyack sheaf as fodder to the horses in spring or the cattle at ,christmas1 and giving the ,yule ,boar to the ploughing oxen or horses to eat in spring4 ,all these usages aim at ensuring the blessing of the corn-spirit on the homestead and its inmates and storing it up for another year4 ,the ,roman sacrifice of the ,october horse1 as it was called1 carries us back to the early days when the ,subura1 afterwards a low and squalid quarter of the great metropolis1 was still a separate village1 whose inhabitants engaged in a friendly contest on the harvest-field with their neighbours of ,rome1 then a little rural town4 ,the ,field of ,mars on which the ceremony took place lay beside the ,tiber1 and formed part of the king's domain down to the abolition of the monarchy4 ,for tradition ran that at the time when the last of the kings was driven from ,rome1 the corn stood ripe for the sickle on the crown lands beside the river2 but no one would eat the accursed grain and it was flung into the river in such heaps that1 the water being low with the summer heat1 it formed the nucleus of an island4 ,the horse sacrifice was thus an old autumn custom observed upon the king's corn-fields at the end of the harvest4 ,the tail and blood of the horse1 as the chief parts of the corn-spirit's representative1 were taken to the king's house and kept there2 just as in ,germany the harvest-cock is nailed on the gable or over the door of the farmhouse2 and as the last sheaf1 in the form of the ,maiden1 is carried home and kept over the fireplace in the ,highlands of ,scotland4 ,thus the blessing of the corn-spirit was brought to the king's house and hearth and1 through them1 to the community of which he was the head4 ,similarly in the spring and autumn customs of ,northern ,europe the ,may-pole is sometimes set up in front of the house of the mayor or burgomaster1 and the last sheaf at harvest is brought to him as the head of the village4 ,but while the tail and blood fell to the king1 the neighbouring village of the ,subura1 which no doubt once had a similar ceremony of its own1 was gratified by being allowed to compete for the prize of the horse's head4 ,the ,mamilian tower1 to which the ,suburans nailed the horse's head when they succeeded in carrying it off1 appears to have been a peel-tower or keep of the old ,mamilian family1 the magnates of the village4 ,the ceremony thus performed on the king's fields and at his house on behalf of the whole town and of the neighbouring village presupposes a time when each township performed a similar ceremony on its own fields4 ,in the rural districts of ,latium the villages may have continued to observe the custom1 each on its own land1 long after the ,roman hamlets had merged their separate harvest-homes in the common celebration on the king's lands4 ,there is no intrinsic improbability in the supposition that the sacred grove of ,aricia1 like the ,field of ,mars at ,rome1 may have been the scene of a common harvest celebration1 at which a horse was sacrificed with the same rude rites on behalf of the neighbouring villages4 ,the horse would represent the fructifying spirit both of the tree and of the corn1 for the two ideas melt into each other1 as we see in customs like the ,harvest-,may4 ,l4 ,eating the ,god #a4 ,the ,sacrament of ,first-,fruits ,,we have now seen that the corn-spirit is represented sometimes in human1 sometimes in animal form1 and that in both cases he is killed in the person of his representative and eaten sacramentally4 ,to find examples of actually killing the human representative of the corn-spirit we had naturally to go to savage races2 but the harvest-suppers of our ,european peasants have furnished unmistakable examples of the sacramental eating of animals as representatives of the corn-spirit4 ,but further1 as might have been anticipated1 the new corn is itself eaten sacramentally1 that is1 as the body of the corn-spirit4 ,in ,wermland1 ,sweden1 the farmer's wife uses the grain of the last sheaf to bake a loaf in the shape of a little girl2 this loaf is divided amongst the whole household and eaten by them4 ,here the loaf represents the corn-spirit conceived as a maiden2 just as in ,scotland the corn-spirit is similarly conceived and represented by the last sheaf made up in the form of a woman and bearing the name of the ,maiden4 ,as usual1 the corn-spirit is believed to reside in the last sheaf2 and to eat a loaf made from the last sheaf is1 therefore1 to eat the corn-spirit itself4 ,similarly at ,la ,palisse1 in ,france1 a man made of dough is hung upon the fir-tree which is carried on the last harvest-waggon4 ,the tree and the dough-man are taken to the mayor's house and kept there till the vintage is over4 ,then the close of the harvest is celebrated by a feast at which the mayor breaks the dough-man in pieces and gives the pieces to the people to eat4 ,in these examples the corn-spirit is represented and eaten in human shape4 ,in other cases1 though the new corn is not baked in loaves of human shape1 still the solemn ceremonies with which it is eaten suffice to indicate that it is partaken of sacramentally1 that is1 as the body of the corn-spirit4 ,for example1 the following ceremonies used to be observed by ,lithuanian peasants at eating the new corn4 ,about the time of the autumn sowing1 when all the corn had been got in and the threshing had begun1 each farmer held a festival called ,sabarios1 that is1 the mixing or throwing together4 ,he took nine good handfuls of each kind of crop--wheat1 barley1 oats1 flax1 beans1 lentils1 and the rest2 and each handful he divided into three parts4 ,the twentyseven portions of each grain were then thrown on a heap and all mixed up together4 ,the grain used had to be that which was first threshed and winnowed and which had been set aside and kept for this purpose4 ,a part of the grain thus mixed was employed to bake little loaves1 one for each of the household2 the rest was mixed with more barley or oats and made into beer4 ,the first beer brewed from this mixture was for the drinking of the farmer1 his wife1 and children2 the second brew was for the servants4 ,the beer being ready1 the farmer chose an evening when no stranger was expected4 ,then he knelt down before the barrel of beer1 drew a jugful of the liquor and poured it on the bung of the barrel1 saying1 ,o fruitful earth1 make rye and barley and all kinds of corn to flourish4 ,next he took the jug to the parlour1 where his wife and children awaited him4 ,on the floor of the parlour lay bound a black or white or speckled 7not a red7 cock and a hen of the same colour and of the same brood1 which must have been hatched within the year4 ,then the farmer knelt down1 with the jug in his hand1 and thanked ,god for the harvest and prayed for a good crop next year4 ,next all lifted up their hands and said1 ,o ,god1 and thou1 ,o earth1 we give you this cock and hen as a free-will offering4 ,with that the farmer killed the fowls with the blows of a wooden spoon1 for he might not cut their heads off4 ,after the first prayer and after killing each of the birds he poured out a third of the beer4 ,then his wife boiled the fowls in a new pot which had never been used before4 ,after that1 a bushel was set1 bottom upwards1 on the floor1 and on it were placed the little loaves mentioned above and the boiled fowls4 ,next the new beer was fetched1 together with a ladle and three mugs1 none of which was used except on this occasion4 ,when the farmer had ladled the beer into the mugs1 the family knelt down round the bushel4 ,the father then uttered a prayer and drank off the three mugs of beer4 ,the rest followed his example4 ,then the loaves and the flesh of the fowls were eaten1 after which the beer went round again1 till every one had emptied each of the three mugs nine times4 ,none of the food should remain over2 but if anything did happen to be left1 it was consumed next morning with the same ceremonies4 ,the bones were given to the dog to eat2 if he did not eat them all up1 the remains were buried under the dung in the cattle-stall4 ,this ceremony was observed at the beginning of ,december4 ,on the day on which it took place no bad word might be spoken4 ,such was the custom about two hundred years or more ago4 ,at the present day in ,lithuania1 when new potatoes or loaves made from the new corn are being eaten1 all the people at table pull each other's hair4 ,the meaning of this last custom is obscure1 but a similar custom was certainly observed by the heathen ,lithuanians at their solemn sacrifices4 ,many of the ,esthonians of the island of ,oesel will not eat bread baked of the new corn till they have first taken a bite at a piece of iron4 ,the iron is here plainly a charm1 intended to render harmless the spirit that is in the corn4 ,in ,sutherlandshire at the present day1 when the new potatoes are dug all the family must taste them1 otherwise the spirits in them the potatoes take offence1 and the potatoes would not keep4 ,in one part of ,yorkshire it is still customary for the clergyman to cut the first corn2 and my informant believes that the corn so cut is used to make the communion bread4 ,if the latter part of the custom is correctly reported 7and analogy is all in its favour71 it shows how the ,christian communion has absorbed within itself a sacrament which is doubtless far older than ,christianity4 ,the ,aino or ,ainu of ,japan are said to distinguish various kinds of millet as male and female respectively1 and these kinds1 taken together1 are called the divine husband and wife cereal 7,umurek haru kamui74 ,therefore before millet is pounded and made into cakes for general eating1 the old men have a few made for themselves first to worship4 ,when they are ready they pray to them very earnestly and say3 ',o thou cereal deity1 we worship thee4 ,thou hast grown very well this year1 and thy flavour will be sweet4 ,thou art good4 ,the goddess of fire will be glad1 and we also shall rejoice greatly4 ,o thou god1 ,o thou divine cereal1 do thou nourish the people4 ,i now partake of thee4 ,i worship thee and give thee thanks4' ,after having thus prayed1 they1 the worshippers1 take a cake and eat it1 and from this time the people may all partake of the new millet4 ,and so with many gestures of homage and words of prayer this kind of food is dedicated to the well-being of the ,ainu4 ,no doubt the cereal offering is regarded as a tribute paid to a god1 but that god is no other than the seed itself2 and it is only a god in so far as it is beneficial to the human body4 ,at the close of the rice harvest in the ,east ,indian island of ,buru1 each clan meets at a common sacramental meal1 to which every member of the clan is bound to contribute a little of the new rice4 ,this meal is called eating the soul of the rice1 a name which clearly indicates the sacramental character of the repast4 ,some of the rice is also set apart and offered to the spirits4 ,amongst the ,alfoors of ,minahassa1 in ,celebes1 the priest sows the first rice-seed and plucks the first ripe rice in each field4 ,this rice he roasts and grinds into meal1 and gives some of it to each of the household4 ,shortly before the rice-harvest in ,boland ,mongondo1 another district of ,celebes1 an offering is made of a small pig or a fowl4 ,then the priest plucks a little rice1 first on his own field and next on those of his neighbours4 ,all the rice thus plucked by him he dries along with his own1 and then gives it back to the respective owners1 who have it ground and boiled4 ,when it is boiled the women take it back1 with an egg1 to the priest1 who offers the egg in sacrifice and returns the rice to the women4 ,of this rice every member of the family1 down to the youngest child1 must partake4 ,after this ceremony every one is free to get in his rice4 ,amongst the ,burghers or ,badagas1 a tribe of the ,neilgherry ,hills in ,southern ,india1 the first handful of seed is sown and the first sheaf reaped by a ,curumbar1 a man of a different tribe1 the members of which the ,burghers regard as sorcerers4 ,the grain contained in the first sheaf is that day reduced to meal1 made into cakes1 and1 being offered as a first-fruit oblation1 is1 together with the remainder of the sacrificed animal1 partaken of by the ,burgher and the whole of his family1 as the meat of a federal offering and sacrifice4 ,among the ,hindoos of ,southern ,india the eating of the new rice is the occasion of a family festival called ,pongol4 ,the new rice is boiled in a new pot on a fire which is kindled at noon on the day when1 according to ,hindoo astrologers1 the sun enters the tropic of ,capricorn4 ,the boiling of the pot is watched with great anxiety by the whole family1 for as the milk boils1 so will the coming year be4 ,if the milk boils rapidly1 the year will be prosperous2 but it will be the reverse if the milk boils slowly4 ,some of the new boiled rice is offered to the image of ,ganesa2 then every one partakes of it4 ,in some parts of ,northern ,india the festival of the new crop is known as ,navan1 that is1 new grain4 ,when the crop is ripe1 the owner takes the omens1 goes to the field1 plucks five or six ears of barley in the spring crop and one of the millets in the autumn harvest4 ,this is brought home1 parched1 and mixed with coarse sugar1 butter1 and curds4 ,some of it is thrown on the fire in the name of the village gods and deceased ancestors2 the rest is eaten by the family4 ,the ceremony of eating the new yams at ,onitsha1 on the ,niger1 is thus described3 ,each headman brought out six yams1 and cut down young branches of palm-leaves and placed them before his gate1 roasted three of the yams1 and got some kola-nuts and fish4 ,after the yam is roasted1 the ,libia1 or country doctor1 takes the yam1 scrapes it into a sort of meal1 and divides it into halves2 he then takes one piece1 and places it on the lips of the person who is going to eat the new yam4 ,the eater then blows up the steam from the hot yam1 and afterwards pokes the whole into his mouth1 and says1 ',i thank ,god for being permitted to eat the new yam'2 he then begins to chew it heartily1 with fish likewise4 ,among the ,nandi of ,british ,east ,africa1 when the eleusine grain is ripening in autumn1 every woman who owns a corn-field goes out into it with her daughters1 and they all pluck some of the ripe grain4 ,each of the women then fixes one grain in her necklace and chews another1 which she rubs on her forehead1 throat1 and breast4 ,no mark of joy escapes them2 sorrowfully they cut a basketful of the new corn1 and carrying it home place it in the loft to dry4 ,as the ceiling is of wickerwork1 a good deal of the grain drops through the crevices and falls into the fire1 where it explodes with a crackling noise4 ,the people make no attempt to prevent this waste2 for they regard the crackling of the grain in the fire as a sign that the souls of the dead are partaking of it4 ,a few days later porridge is made from the new grain and served up with milk at the evening meal4 ,all the members of the family take some of the porridge and dab it on the walls and roofs of the huts2 also they put a little in their mouths and spit it out towards the east and on the outside of the huts4 ,then1 holding up some of the grain in his hand1 the head of the family prays to ,god for health and strength1 and likewise for milk1 and everybody present repeats the words of the prayer after him4 ,amongst the ,caffres of ,natal and ,zululand1 no one may eat of the new fruits till after a festival which marks the beginning of the ,caffre year and falls at the end of ,december or the beginning of ,january4 ,all the people assemble at the king's kraal1 where they feast and dance4 ,before they separate the dedication of the people takes place4 ,various fruits of the earth1 as corn1 mealies1 and pumpkins1 mixed with the flesh of a sacrificed animal and with medicine1 are boiled in great pots1 and a little of this food is placed in each man's mouth by the king himself4 ,after thus partaking of the sanctified fruits1 a man is himself sanctified for the whole year1 and may immediately get in his crops4 ,it is believed that if any man were to partake of the new fruits before the festival1 he would die2 if he were detected1 he would be put to death1 or at least all his cattle would be taken from him4 ,the holiness of the new fruits is well marked by the rule that they must be cooked in a special pot which is used only for this purpose1 and on a new fire kindled by a magician through the friction of two sticks which are called husband and wife4 ,among the ,bechuanas it is a rule that before they partake of the new crops they must purify themselves4 ,the purification takes place at the commencement of the new year on a day in ,january which is fixed by the chief4 ,it begins in the great kraal of the tribe1 where all the adult males assemble4 ,each of them takes in his hand leaves of a gourd called by the natives lerotse 7described as something between a pumpkin and a vegetable marrow72 and having crushed the leaves he anoints with the expressed juice his big toes and his navel2 many people indeed apply the juice to all the joints of their body1 but the better-informed say that this is a vulgar departure from ancient custom4 ,after this ceremony in the great kraal every man goes home to his own kraal1 assembles all the members of his family1 men1 women1 and children1 and smears them all with the juice of the lerotse leaves4 ,some of the leaves are also pounded1 mixed with milk in a large wooden dish1 and given to the dogs to lap up4 ,then the porridge plate of each member of the family is rubbed with the lerotse leaves4 ,when this purification has been completed1 but not before1 the people are free to eat of the new crops4 ,the ,bororo ,indians of ,brazil think that it would be certain death to eat the new maize before it has been blessed by the medicine-man4 ,the ceremony of blessing it is as follows4 ,the half-ripe husk is washed and placed before the medicine-man1 who by dancing and singing for several hours1 and by incessant smoking1 works himself up into a state of ecstasy1 whereupon he bites into the husk1 trembling in every limb and uttering shrieks from time to time4 ,a similar ceremony is performed whenever a large animal or a large fish is killed4 ,the ,bororo are firmly persuaded that were any man to touch unconsecrated maize or meat1 before the ceremony had been completed1 he and his whole tribe would perish4 ,amongst the ,creek ,indians of ,north ,america1 the busk or festival of first-fruits was the chief ceremony of the year4 ,it was held in ,july or ,august1 when the corn was ripe1 and marked the end of the old year and the beginning of the new one4 ,before it took place1 none of the ,indians would eat or even handle any part of the new harvest4 ,sometimes each town had its own busk2 sometimes several towns united to hold one in common4 ,before celebrating the busk1 the people provided themselves with new clothes and new household utensils and furniture2 they collected their old clothes and rubbish1 together with all the remaining grain and other old provisions1 cast them together in one common heap1 and consumed them with fire4 ,as a preparation for the ceremony1 all the fires in the village were extinguished1 and the ashes swept clean away4 ,in particular1 the hearth or altar of the temple was dug up and the ashes carried out4 ,then the chief priest put some roots of the button-snake plant1 with some green tobacco leaves and a little of the new fruits1 at the bottom of the fireplace1 which he afterwards commanded to be covered up with white clay1 and wetted over with clean water4 ,a thick arbour of green branches of young trees was then made over the altar4 ,meanwhile the women at home were cleaning out their houses1 renewing the old hearths1 and scouring all the cooking vessels that they might be ready to receive the new fire and the new fruits4 ,the public or sacred square was carefully swept of even the smallest crumbs of previous feasts1 for fear of polluting the first-fruit offerings4 ,also every vessel that had contained or had been used about any food during the expiring year was removed from the temple before sunset4 ,then all the men who were not known to have violated the law of the first-fruit offering and that of marriage during the year were summoned by a crier to enter the holy square and observe a solemn fast4 ,but the women 7except six old ones71 the children1 and all who had not attained the rank of warriors were forbidden to enter the square4 ,sentinels were also posted at the corners of the square to keep out all persons deemed impure and all animals4 ,a strict fast was then observed for two nights and a day1 the devotees drinking a bitter decoction of button-snake root in order to vomit and purge their sinful bodies4 ,that the people outside the square might also be purified1 one of the old men laid down a quantity of green tobacco at a corner of the square2 this was carried off by an old woman and distributed to the people without1 who chewed and swallowed it in order to afflict their souls4 ,during this general fast1 the women1 children1 and men of weak constitution were allowed to eat after mid-day1 but not before4 ,on the morning when the fast ended1 the women brought a quantity of the old year's food to the outside of the sacred square4 ,these provisions were then fetched in and set before the famished multitude1 but all traces of them had to be removed before noon4 ,when the sun was declining from the meridian1 all the people were commanded by the voice of a crier to stay within doors1 to do no bad act1 and to be sure to extinguish and throw away every spark of the old fire4 ,universal silence now reigned4 ,then the high priest made the new fire by the friction of two pieces of wood1 and placed it on the altar under the green arbour4 ,this new fire was believed to atone for all past crimes except murder4 ,next a basket of new fruits was brought2 the high priest took out a little of each sort of fruit1 rubbed it with bear's oil1 and offered it1 together with some flesh1 to the bountiful holy spirit of fire1 as a first-fruit offering1 and an annual oblation for sin4 ,he also consecrated the sacred emetics 7the button-snake root and the cassina or black-drink7 by pouring a little of them into the fire4 ,the persons who had remained outside now approached1 without entering1 the sacred square2 and the chief priest thereupon made a speech1 exhorting the people to observe their old rites and customs1 announcing that the new divine fire had purged away the sins of the past year1 and earnestly warning the women that1 if any of them had not extinguished the old fire1 or had contracted any impurity1 they must forthwith depart1 lest the divine fire should spoil both them and the people4 ,some of the new fire was then set down outside the holy square2 the women carried it home joyfully1 and laid it on their unpolluted hearths4 ,when several towns had united to celebrate the festival1 the new fire might thus be carried for several miles4 ,the new fruits were then dressed on the new fires and eaten with bear's oil1 which was deemed indispensable4 ,at one point of the festival the men rubbed the new corn between their hands1 then on their faces and breasts4 ,during the festival which followed1 the warriors1 dressed in their wild martial array1 their heads covered with white down and carrying white feathers in their hands1 danced round the sacred arbour1 under which burned the new fire4 ,the ceremonies lasted eight days1 during which the strictest continence was practised4 ,towards the conclusion of the festival the warriors fought a mock battle2 then the men and women together1 in three circles1 danced round the sacred fire4 ,lastly1 all the people smeared themselves with white clay and bathed in running water4 ,they came out of the water believing that no evil could now befall them for what they had done amiss in the past4 ,so they departed in joy and peace4 ,to this day1 also1 the remnant of the ,seminole ,indians of ,florida1 a people of the same stock as the ,creeks1 hold an annual purification and festival called the ,green ,corn ,dance1 at which the new corn is eaten4 ,on the evening of the first day of the festival they quaff a nauseous ,black ,drink1 as it is called1 which acts both as an emetic and a purgative2 they believe that he who does not drink of this liquor cannot safely eat the new green corn1 and besides that he will be sick at some time in the year4 ,while the liquor is being drunk1 the dancing begins1 and the medicine-men join in it4 ,next day they eat of the green corn2 the following day they fast1 probably from fear of polluting the sacred food in their stomachs by contact with common food2 but the third day they hold a great feast4 ,even tribes which do not till the ground sometimes observe analogous ceremonies when they gather the first wild fruits or dig the first roots of the season4 ,thus among the ,salish and ,tinneh ,indians of ,north-,west ,america1 before the young people eat the first berries or roots of the season1 they always addressed the fruit or plant1 and begged for its favour and aid4 ,in some tribes regular ,first-fruit ceremonies were annually held at the time of picking the wild fruit or gathering the roots1 and also among the salmon-eating tribes when the run of the 'sockeye' salmon began4 ,these ceremonies were not so much thanksgivings1 as performances to ensure a plentiful crop or supply of the particular object desired1 for if they were not properly and reverently carried out there was danger of giving offence to the 'spirits' of the objects1 and being deprived of them4 ,for example1 these ,indians are fond of the young shoots or suckers of the wild raspberry1 and they observe a solemn ceremony at eating the first of them in season4 ,the shoots are cooked in a new pot3 the people assemble and stand in a great circle with closed eyes1 while the presiding chief or medicine-man invokes the spirit of the plant1 begging that it will be propitious to them and grant them a good supply of suckers4 ,after this part of the ceremony is over the cooked suckers are handed to the presiding officer in a newly carved dish1 and a small portion is given to each person present1 who reverently and decorously eats it4 ,the ,thompson ,indians of ,british ,columbia cook and eat the sunflower root 7,balsamorrhiza sagittata1 ,nutt471 but they used to regard it as a mysterious being1 and observed a number of taboos in connexion with it2 for example1 women who were engaged in digging or cooking the root must practice continence1 and no man might come near the oven where the women were baking the root4 ,when young people ate the first berries1 roots1 or other products of the season1 they addressed a prayer to the ,sunflower-,root as follows3 ,i inform thee that ,i intend to eat thee4 ,mayest thou always help me to ascend1 so that ,i may always be able to reach the tops of mountains1 and may ,i never be clumsy6 ,i ask this from thee1 ,sunflower-,root4 ,thou art the greatest of all in mystery4 ,to omit this prayer would make the eater lazy and cause him to sleep long in the morning4 ,these customs of the ,thompson and other ,indian tribes of ,north-,west ,america are instructive1 because they clearly indicate the motive1 or at least one of the motives1 which underlies the ceremonies observed at eating the first fruits of the season4 ,that motive in the case of these ,indians is simply a belief that the plant itself is animated by a conscious and more or less powerful spirit1 who must be propitiated before the people can safely partake of the fruits or roots which are supposed to be part of his body4 ,now if this is true of wild fruits and roots1 we may infer with some probability that it is also true of cultivated fruits and roots1 such as yams1 and in particular that it holds good of the cereals1 such as wheat1 barley1 oats1 rice1 and maize4 ,in all cases it seems reasonable to infer that the scruples which savages manifest at eating the first fruits of any crop1 and the ceremonies which they observe before they overcome their scruples1 are due at least in large measure to a notion that the plant or tree is animated by a spirit or even a deity1 whose leave must be obtained1 or whose favour must be sought1 before it is possible to partake with safety of the new crop4 ,this indeed is plainly affirmed of the ,aino3 they call the millet the divine cereal1 the cereal deity1 and they pray to and worship him before they will eat of the cakes made from the new millet4 ,and even where the indwelling divinity of the first fruits is not expressly affirmed1 it appears to be implied both by the solemn preparations made for eating them and by the danger supposed to be incurred by persons who venture to partake of them without observing the prescribed ritual4 ,in all such cases1 accordingly1 we may not improperly describe the eating of the new fruits as a sacrament or communion with a deity1 or at all events with a powerful spirit4 ,among the usages which point to this conclusion are the custom of employing either new or specially reserved vessels to hold the new fruits1 and the practice of purifying the persons of the communicants before it is lawful to engage in the solemn act of communion with the divinity4 ,of all the modes of purification adopted on these occasions none perhaps brings out the sacramental virtue of the rite so clearly as the ,creek and ,seminole practice of taking a purgative before swallowing the new corn4 ,the intention is thereby to prevent the sacred food from being polluted by contact with common food in the stomach of the eater4 ,for the same reason ,catholics partake of the ,eucharist fasting2 and among the pastoral ,masai of ,eastern ,africa the young warriors1 who live on meat and milk exclusively1 are obliged to eat nothing but milk for so many days and then nothing but meat for so many more1 and before they pass from the one food to the other they must make sure that none of the old food remains in their stomachs2 this they do by swallowing a very powerful purgative and emetic4 ,in some of the festivals which we have examined1 the sacrament of first-fruits is combined with a sacrifice or presentation of them to gods or spirits1 and in course of time the sacrifice of first-fruits tends to throw the sacrament into the shade1 if not to supersede it4 ,the mere fact of offering the first-fruits to the gods or spirits comes now to be thought a sufficient preparation for eating the new corn2 the higher powers having received their share1 man is free to enjoy the rest4 ,this mode of viewing the new fruits implies that they are regarded no longer as themselves instinct with divine life1 but merely as a gift bestowed by the gods upon man1 who is bound to express his gratitude and homage to his divine benefactors by returning to them a portion of their bounty4 #b4 ,eating the ,god among the ,aztecs ,,the ,,custom of eating bread sacramentally as the body of a god was practised by the ,aztecs before the discovery and conquest of ,mexico by the ,spaniards4 ,twice a year1 in ,may and ,december1 an image of the great ,mexican god ,huitzilopochtli or ,vitzilipuztli was made of dough1 then broken in pieces1 and solemnly eaten by his worshippers4 ,the ,may ceremony is thus described by the historian ,acosta3 ,the ,mexicans in the month of ,may made their principal feast to their god ,vitzilipuztli1 and two days before this feast1 the virgins whereof ,i have spoken 7the which were shut up and secluded in the same temple and were as it were religious women7 did mingle a quantity of the seed of beets with roasted maize1 and then they did mould it with honey1 making an idol of that paste in bigness like to that of wood1 putting instead of eyes grains of green glass1 of blue or white2 and for teeth grains of maize set forth with all the ornament and furniture that ,i have said4 ,this being finished1 all the noblemen came and brought it an exquisite and rich garment1 like unto that of the idol1 wherewith they did attire it4 ,being thus clad and deckt1 they did set it in an azured chair and in a litter to carry it on their shoulders4 ,the morning of this feast being come1 an hour before day all the maidens came forth attired in white1 with new ornaments1 the which that day were called the ,sisters of their god ,vitzilipuztli1 they came crowned with garlands of maize roasted and parched1 being like unto azahar or the flower of orange2 and about their necks they had great chains of the same1 which went bauldrick-wise under their left arm4 ,their cheeks were dyed with vermilion1 their arms from the elbow to the wrist were covered with red parrots' feathers4 ,young men1 dressed in red robes and crowned like the virgins with maize1 then carried the idol in its litter to the foot of the great pyramid-shaped temple1 up the steep and narrow steps of which it was drawn to the music of flutes1 trumpets1 cornets1 and drums4 ,while they mounted up the idol all the people stood in the court with much reverence and fear4 ,being mounted to the top1 and that they had placed it in a little lodge of roses which they held ready1 presently came the young men1 which strewed many flowers of sundry kinds1 wherewith they filled the temple both within and without4 ,this done1 all the virgins came out of their convent1 bringing pieces of paste compounded of beets and roasted maize1 which was of the same paste whereof their idol was made and compounded1 and they were of the fashion of great bones4 ,they delivered them to the young men1 who carried them up and laid them at the idol's feet1 wherewith they filled the whole place that it could receive no more4 ,they called these morsels of paste the flesh and bones of ,vitzilipuztli4 ,having laid abroad these bones1 presently came all the ancients of the temple1 priests1 ,levites1 and all the rest of the ministers1 according to their dignities and antiquities 7for herein there was a strict order amongst them7 one after another1 with their veils of diverse colours and works1 every one according to his dignity and office1 having garlands upon their heads and chains of flowers about their necks2 after them came their gods and goddesses whom they worshipped1 of diverse figures1 attired in the same livery2 then putting themselves in order about those morsels and pieces of paste1 they used certain ceremonies with singing and dancing4 ,by means whereof they were blessed and consecrated for the flesh and bones of this idol4 ,this ceremony and blessing 7whereby they were taken for the flesh and bones of the idol7 being ended1 they honoured those pieces in the same sort as their god4 4 4 4 ,all the city came to this goodly spectacle1 and there was a commandment very strictly observed throughout all the land1 that the day of the feast of the idol of ,vitzilipuztli they should eat no other meat but this paste1 with honey1 whereof the idol was made4 ,and this should be eaten at the point of day1 and they should drink no water nor any other thing till after noon3 they held it for an ill sign1 yea1 for sacrilege to do the contrary3 but after the ceremonies ended1 it was lawful for them to eat anything4 ,during the time of this ceremony they hid the water from their little children1 admonishing all such as had the use of reason not to drink any water2 which1 if they did1 the anger of ,god would come upon them1 and they should die1 which they did observe very carefully and strictly4 ,the ceremonies1 dancing1 and sacrifice ended1 the went to unclothe themselves1 and the priests and superiors of the temple took the idol of paste1 which they spoiled of all the ornaments it had1 and made many pieces1 as well of the idol itself as of the truncheons which they consecrated1 and then they gave them to the people in manner of a communion1 beginning with the greater1 and continuing unto the rest1 both men1 women1 and little children1 who received it with such tears1 fear1 and reverence as it was an admirable thing1 saying that they did eat the flesh and bones of ,god1 where-with they were grieved4 ,such as had any sick folks demanded thereof for them1 and carried it with great reverence and veneration4 ,from this interesting passage we learn that the ancient ,mexicans1 even before the arrival of ,christian missionaries1 were fully acquainted with the doctrine of transubstantiation and acted upon it in the solemn rites of their religion4 ,they believed that by consecrating bread their priests could turn it into the very body of their god1 so that all who thereupon partook of the consecrated bread entered into a mystic communion with the deity by receiving a portion of his divine substance into themselves4 ,the doctrine of transubstantiation1 or the magical conversion of bread into flesh1 was also familiar to the ,aryans of ancient ,india long before the spread and even the rise of ,christianity4 ,the ,brahmans taught that the rice-cakes offered in sacrifice were substitutes for human beings1 and that they were actually converted into the real bodies of men by the manipulation of the priest4 ,we read that when it 7the rice-cake7 still consists of rice-meal1 it is the hair4 ,when he pours water on it1 it becomes skin4 ,when he mixes it1 it becomes flesh3 for then it becomes consistent2 and consistent also is the flesh4 ,when it is baked1 it becomes bone3 for then it becomes somewhat hard2 and hard is the bone4 ,and when he is about to take it off 7the fire7 and sprinkles it with butter1 he changes it into marrow4 ,this is the completeness which they call the fivefold animal sacrifice4 ,now1 too1 we can perfectly understand why on the day of their solemn communion with the deity the ,mexicans refused to eat any other food than the consecrated bread which they revered as the very flesh and bones of their ,god1 and why up till noon they might drink nothing at all1 not even water4 ,they feared no doubt to defile the portion of ,god in their stomachs by contact with common things4 ,a similar pious fear led the ,creek and ,seminole ,indians1 as we saw1 to adopt the more thoroughgoing expedient of rinsing out their bodies by a strong purgative before they dared to partake of the sacrament of first-fruits4 ,at the festival of the winter solstice in ,december the ,aztecs killed their god ,huitzilopochtli in effigy first and ate him afterwards4 ,as a preparation for this solemn ceremony an image of the deity in the likeness of a man was fashioned out of seeds of various sorts1 which were kneaded into a dough with the blood of children4 ,the bones of the god were represented by pieces of acacia wood4 ,this image was placed on the chief altar of the temple1 and on the day of the festival the king offered incense to it4 ,early next day it was taken down and set on its feet in a great hall4 ,then a priest1 who bore the name and acted the part of the god ,quetzalcoatl1 took a flint-tipped dart and hurled it into the breast of the dough-image1 piercing it through and through4 ,this was called killing the god ,huitzilopochtli so that his body might be eaten4 ,one of the priests cut out the heart of the image and gave it to the king to eat4 ,the rest of the image was divided into minute pieces1 of which every man great and small1 down to the male children in the cradle1 receive one to eat4 ,but no woman might taste a morsel4 ,the ceremony was called teoqualo1 that is1 god is eaten4 ,at another festival the ,mexicans made little images like men1 which stood for the cloud-capped mountains4 ,these images were moulded of a paste of various seeds and were dressed in paper ornaments4 ,some people fashioned five1 others ten1 others as many as fifteen of them4 ,having been made1 they were placed in the oratory of each house and worshipped4 ,four times in the course of the night offerings of food were brought to them in tiny vessels2 and people sang and played the flute before them through all the hours of darkness4 ,at break of day the priests stabbed the images with a weaver's instrument1 cut off their heads1 and tore out their hearts1 which they presented to the master of the house on a green saucer4 ,the bodies of the images were then eaten by all the family1 especially by the servants1 in order that by eating them they might be preserved from certain distempers1 to which those persons who were negligent of worship to those deities conceived themselves to be subject4 #c4 ,many ,manii at ,aricia ,,we are now able to suggest an explanation of the proverb ,there are many ,manii at ,aricia4 ,certain loaves made in the shape of men were called by the ,romans maniae1 and it appears that this kind of loaf was especially made at ,aricia4 ,now1 ,mania1 the name of one of these loaves1 was also the name of the ,mother or ,grandmother of ,ghosts1 to whom woollen effigies of men and women were dedicated at the festival of the ,compitalia4 ,these effigies were hung at the doors of all the houses in ,rome2 one effigy was hung up for every free person in the house1 and one effigy1 of a different kind1 for every slave4 ,the reason was that on this day the ghosts of the dead were believed to be going about1 and it was hoped that1 either out of good nature or through simple inadvertence1 they would carry off the effigies at the door instead of the living people in the house4 ,according to tradition1 these woollen figures were substitutes for a former custom of sacrificing human beings4 ,upon data so fragmentary and uncertain1 it is impossible to build with confidence2 but it seems worth suggesting that the loaves in human form1 which appear to have been baked at ,aricia1 were sacramental bread1 and that in the old days1 when the divine ,king of the ,wood was annually slain1 loaves were made in his image1 like the paste figures of the gods in ,mexico1 and were eaten sacramentally by his worshippers4 ,the ,mexican sacraments in honour of ,huitzilopochtli were also accompanied by the sacrifice of human victims4 ,the tradition that the founder of the sacred grove at ,aricia was a man named ,manius1 from whom many ,manii were descended1 would thus be an etymological myth invented to explain the name maniae as applied to these sacramental loaves4 ,a dim recollection of the original connexion of the loaves with human sacrifices may perhaps be traced in the story that the effigies dedicated to ,mania at the ,compitalia were substitutes for human victims4 ,the story itself1 however1 is probably devoid of foundation1 since the practice of putting up dummies to divert the attention of ghosts or demons from living people is not uncommon4 ,for example1 the ,tibetans stand in fear of innumerable earth-demons1 all of whom are under the authority of ,old ,mother ,khn-ma4 ,this goddess1 who may be compared to the ,roman ,mania1 the ,mother or ,grandmother of ,ghosts1 is dressed in golden-yellow robes1 holds a golden noose in her hand1 and rides on a ram4 ,in order to bar the dwelling-house against the foul fiends1 of whom ,old ,mother ,khn-ma is mistress1 an elaborate structure somewhat resembling a chandelier is fixed above the door on the outside of the house4 ,it contains a ram's skull1 a variety of precious objects such as gold-leaf1 silver1 and turquoise1 also some dry food1 such as rice1 wheat1 and pulse1 and finally images or pictures of a man1 a woman1 and a house4 ,the object of these figures of a man1 wife1 and house is to deceive the demons should they still come in spite of this offering1 and to mislead them into the belief that the foregoing pictures are the inmates of the house1 so that they may wreak their wrath on these bits of wood and to save the real human occupants4 ,when all is ready1 a priest prays to ,old ,mother ,khn-ma that she would be pleased to accept these dainty offerings and to close the open doors of the earth1 in order that the demons may not come forth to infest and injure the household4 ,again1 effigies are often employed as a means of preventing or curing sickness2 the demons of disease either mistake the effigies for living people or are persuaded or compelled to enter them1 leaving the real men and women well and whole4 ,thus the ,alfoors of ,minahassa1 in ,celebes1 will sometimes transport a sick man to another house1 while they leave on his bed a dummy made up of a pillow and clothes4 ,this dummy the demon is supposed to mistake for the sick man1 who consequently recovers4 ,cure or prevention of this sort seems to find especial favour with the natives of ,borneo4 ,thus1 when an epidemic is raging among them1 the ,dyaks of the ,katoengouw ,river set up wooden images at their doors in the hope that the demons of the plague may be deluded into carrying off the effigies instead of the people4 ,among the ,oloh ,ngadju of ,borneo1 when a sick man is supposed to be suffering from the assaults of a ghost1 puppets of dough or rice-meal are made and thrown under the house as substitutes for the patient1 who thus rids himself of the ghost4 ,in certain of the western districts of ,borneo if a man is taken suddenly and violently sick1 the physician1 who in this part of the world is generally an old woman1 fashions a wooden image and brings it seven times into contact with the sufferer's head1 while she says3 ,this image serves to take the place of the sick man2 sickness1 pass over into the image4 ,then1 with some rice1 salt1 and tobacco in a little basket1 the substitute is carried to the spot where the evil spirit is supposed to have entered into the man4 ,there it is set upright on the ground1 after the physician has invoked the spirit as follows3 ,o devil1 here is an image which stands instead of the sick man4 ,release the soul of the sick man and plague the image1 for it is indeed prettier and better than he4 ,batak magicians can conjure the demon of disease out of the patient's body into an image made out of a banana-tree with a human face and wrapt up in magic herbs2 the image is then hurriedly removed and thrown away or buried beyond the boundaries of the village4 ,sometimes the image1 dressed as a man or a woman according to the sex of the patient1 is deposited at a cross-road or other thoroughfare1 in the hope that some passer-by1 seeing it1 may start and cry out1 ,ah6 ,so-and-,so is dead2 for such an exclamation is supposed to delude the demon of disease into a belief that he has accomplished his fell purpose1 so he takes himself off and leaves the sufferer to get well4 ,the ,mai ,darat1 a ,sakai tribe of the ,malay ,peninsula1 attribute all kinds of diseases to the agency of spirits which they call nyani2 fortunately1 however1 the magician can induce these maleficent beings to come out of the sick person and take up their abode in rude figures of grass1 which are hung up outside the houses in little bell-shaped shrines decorated with peeled sticks4 ,during an epidemic of small-pox the ,ewe negroes will sometimes clear a space outside of the town1 where they erect a number of low mounds and cover them with as many little clay figures as there are people in the place4 ,pots of food and water are also set out for the refreshment of the spirit of small-pox who1 it is hoped1 will take the clay figures and spare the living folk2 and to make assurance doubly sure the road into the town is barricaded against him4 ,with these examples before us we may surmise that the woollen effigies1 which at the festival of the ,compitalia might be seen hanging at the doors of all the houses in ancient ,rome1 were not substitutes for human victims who had formerly been sacrificed at this season1 but rather vicarious offerings presented to the ,mother or ,grandmother of ,ghosts1 in the hope that on her rounds through the city she would accept or mistake the effigies for the inmates of the house and so spare the living for another year4 ,it is possible that the puppets made of rushes1 which in the month of ,may the pontiffs and ,vestal ,virgins annually threw into the ,tiber from the old ,sublician bridge at ,rome1 had originally the same significance2 that is1 they may have been designed to purge the city from demoniac influence by diverting the attention of the demons from human beings to the puppets and then toppling the whole uncanny crew1 neck and crop1 into the river1 which would soon sweep them far out to sea4 ,in precisely the same way the natives of ,old ,calabar used periodically to rid their town of the devils which infested it by luring the unwary demons into a number of lamentable scarecrows1 which they afterwards flung into the river4 ,this interpretation of the ,roman custom is supported to some extent by the evidence of ,plutarch1 who speaks of the ceremony as the greatest of purifications4 ,,li4 ,homeopathic ,magic of a ,flesh ,diet ,,the ,,practice of killing a god has now been traced amongst peoples who have reached the agricultural stage of society4 ,we have seen that the spirit of the corn1 or of other cultivated plants1 is commonly represented either in human or in animal form1 and that in some places a custom has prevailed of killing annually either the human or the animal representative of the god4 ,one reason for thus killing the corn-spirit in the person of his representative has been given implicitly in an earlier part of this work3 we may suppose that the intention was to guard him or her 7for the corn-spirit is often feminine7 from the enfeeblement of old age by transferring the spirit1 while still hale and hearty1 to the person of a youthful and vigorous successor4 ,apart from the desirability of renewing his divine energies1 the death of the corn-spirit may have been deemed inevitable under the sickles or the knives of the reapers1 and his worshippers may accordingly have felt bound to acquiesce in the sad necessity4 ,but1 further1 we have found a widespread custom of eating the god sacramentally1 either in the shape of the man or animal who represents the god1 or in the shape of bread made in human or animal form4 ,the reasons for thus partaking of the body of the god are1 from the primitive standpoint1 simple enough4 ,the savage commonly believes that by eating the flesh of an animal or man he acquires not only the physical1 but even the moral and intellectual qualities which were characteristic of that animal or man2 so when the creature is deemed divine1 our simple savage naturally expects to absorb a portion of its divinity along with its material substance4 ,it may be well to illustrate by instances this common faith in the acquisition of virtues or vices of many kinds through the medium of animal food1 even when there is no pretence that the viands consist of the body or blood of a god4 ,the doctrine forms part of the widely ramified system of sympathetic or homoeopathic magic4 ,thus1 for example1 the ,creeks1 ,cherokee1 and kindred tribes of ,north ,american ,indians believe that nature is possest of such a property as to transfuse into men and animals the qualities1 either of the food they use1 or of those objects that are presented to their senses2 he who feeds on venison is1 according to their physical system1 swifter and more sagacious than the man who lives on the flesh of the clumsy bear1 or helpless dunghill fowls1 the slow-footed tame cattle1 or the heavy wallowing swine4 ,this is the reason that several of their old men recommend1 and say1 that formerly their greatest chieftains observed a constant rule in their diet1 and seldom ate of any animal of a gross quality1 or heavy motion of body1 fancying it conveyed a dullness through the whole system1 and disabled them from exerting themselves with proper vigour in their martial1 civil1 and religious duties4 ,the ,zaparo ,indians of ,ecuador will1 unless from necessity1 in most cases not eat any heavy meats1 such as tapir and peccary1 but confine themselves to birds1 monkeys1 deer1 fish1 etc41 principally because they argue that the heavier meats make them unwieldy1 like the animals who supply the flesh1 impeding their agility1 and unfitting them for the chase4 ,similarly some of the ,brazilian ,indians would eat no beast1 bird1 or fish that ran1 flew1 or swam slowly1 lest by partaking of its flesh they should lose their ability and be unable to escape from their enemies4 ,the ,caribs abstained from the flesh of pigs lest it should cause them to have small eyes like pigs2 and they refused to partake of tortoises from a fear that if they did so they would become heavy and stupid like the animal4 ,among the ,fans of ,west ,africa men in the prime of life never eat tortoises for a similar reason2 they imagine that if they did so1 their vigour and fleetness of foot would be gone4 ,but old men may eat tortoises freely1 because having already lost the power of running they can take no harm from the flesh of the slow-footed creature4 ,while many savages thus fear to eat the flesh of slow-footed animals lest they should themselves become slow-footed1 the ,bushmen of ,south ,africa purposely ate the flesh of such creatures1 and the reason which they gave for doing so exhibits a curious refinement of savage philosophy4 ,they imagined that the game which they pursued would be influenced sympathetically by the food in the body of the hunter1 so that if he had eaten of swift-footed animals1 the quarry would be swift-footed also and would escape him2 whereas if he had eaten of slow-footed animals1 the quarry would also be slow-footed1 and he would be able to overtake and kill it4 ,for that reason hunters of gemsbok particularly avoided eating the flesh of the swift and agile springbok2 indeed they would not even touch it with their hands1 because they believed the springbok to be a very lively creature which did not go to sleep at night1 and they thought that if they ate springbok1 the gemsbok which they hunted would likewise not be willing to go to sleep1 even at night4 ,how1 then1 could they catch it8 ,the ,namaquas abstain from eating the flesh of hares1 because they think it would make them faint-hearted as a hare4 ,but they eat the flesh of the lion1 or drink the blood of the leopard or lion1 to get the courage and strength of these beasts4 ,the ,bushmen will not give their children a jackal's heart to eat1 lest it should make them timid like the jackal2 but they give them a leopard's heart to eat to make them brave like the leopard4 ,when a ,wagogo man of ,east ,africa kills a lion1 he eats the heart in order to become brave like a lion2 but he thinks that to eat the heart of a hen would make him timid4 ,when a serious disease has attacked a ,zulu kraal1 the medicine-man takes the bone of a very old dog1 or the bone of an old cow1 bull1 or other very old animal1 and administers it to the healthy as well as to the sick people1 in order that they may live to be as old as the animal of whose bone they have partaken4 ,so to restore the aged ,aeson to youth1 the witch ,medea infused into his veins a decoction of the liver of the long-lived deer and the head of a crow that had outlived nine generations of men4 ,among the ,dyaks of ,north-,west ,borneo young men and warriors may not eat venison1 because it would make them as timid as deer2 but the women and very old men are free to eat it4 ,however1 among the ,kayans of the same region1 who share the same view as to the ill effect of eating venison1 men will partake of the dangerous viand provided it is cooked in the open air1 for then the timid spirit of the animal is supposed to escape at once into the jungle and not to enter into the eater4 ,the ,aino believe that the heart of the water-ousel is exceedingly wise1 and that in speech the bird is most eloquent4 ,therefore whenever he is killed1 he should be at once torn open and his heart wrenched out and swallowed before it has time to grow cold or suffer damage of any kind4 ,if a man swallows it thus1 he will become very fluent and wise1 and will be able to argue down all his adversaries4 ,in ,northern ,india people fancy that if you eat the eyeballs of an owl you will be able like an owl to see in the dark4 ,when the ,kansas ,indians were going to war1 a feast used to be held in the chief's hut1 and the principal dish was dog's flesh1 because1 said the ,indians1 the animal who is so brave that he will let himself be cut in pieces in defence of his master1 must needs inspire valour4 ,men of the ,buru and ,aru ,islands1 ,east ,indies1 eat the flesh of dogs in order to be bold and nimble in war4 ,amongst the ,papuans of the ,port ,moresby and ,motumotu districts1 ,new ,guinea1 young lads eat strong pig1 wallaby1 and large fish1 in order to acquire the strength of the animal or fish4 ,some of the natives of ,northern ,australia fancy that by eating the flesh of the kangaroo or emu they are enabled to jump or run faster than before4 ,the ,miris of ,assam prize tiger's flesh as food for men2 it gives them strength and courage4 ,but it is not suited for women2 it would make them too strong-minded4 ,in ,corea the bones of tigers fetch a higher price than those of leopards as a means of inspiring courage4 ,a ,chinaman in ,seoul bought and ate a whole tiger to make himself brave and fierce4 ,in ,norse legend1 ,ingiald1 son of ,king ,aunund1 was timid in his youth1 but after eating the heart of a wolf he became very bold2 ,hialto gained strength and courage by eating the heart of a bear and drinking its blood4 ,in ,morocco lethargic patients are given ants to swallow1 and to eat lion's flesh will make a coward brave2 but people abstain from eating the hearts of fowls1 lest thereby they should be rendered timid4 ,when a child is late in learning to speak1 the ,turks of ,central ,asia will give it the tongues of certain birds to eat4 ,a ,north ,american ,indian thought that brandy must be a decoction of hearts and tongues1 because1 said he1 after drinking it ,i fear nothing1 and ,i talk wonderfully4 ,in ,java there is a tiny earthworm which now and then utters a shrill sound like that of the alarum of a small clock4 ,hence when a public dancing girl has screamed herself hoarse in the exercise of her calling1 the leader of the troop makes her eat some of these worms1 in the belief that thus she will regain her voice and will1 after swallowing them1 be able to scream as shrilly as ever4 ,the people of ,darfur1 in ,central ,africa1 think that the liver is the seat of the soul1 and that a man may enlarge his soul by eating the liver of an animal4 ,whenever an animal is killed its liver is taken out and eaten1 but the people are most careful not to touch it with their hands1 as it is considered sacred2 it is cut up in small pieces and eaten raw1 the bits being conveyed to the mouth on the point of a knife1 or the sharp point of a stick4 ,any one who may accidentally touch the liver is strictly forbidden to partake of it1 which prohibition is regarded as a great misfortune for him4 ,women are not allowed to eat liver1 because they have no soul4 ,again1 the flesh and blood of dead men are commonly eaten and drunk to inspire bravery1 wisdom1 or other qualities for which the men themselves were remarkable1 or which are supposed to have their special seat in the particular part eaten4 ,thus among the mountain tribes of ,south-,eastern ,africa there are ceremonies by which the youths are formed into guilds or lodges1 and among the rites of initiation there is one which is intended to infuse courage1 intelligence1 and other qualities into the novices4 ,whenever an enemy who has behaved with conspicuous bravery is killed1 his liver1 which is considered the seat of valour2 his ears1 which are supposed to be the seat of intelligence2 the skin of his forehead1 which is regarded as the seat of perseverance2 his testicles1 which are held to be the seat of strength2 and other members1 which are viewed as the seat of other virtues1 are cut from his body and baked to cinders4 ,the ashes are carefully kept in the horn of a bull1 and1 during the ceremonies observed at circumcision1 are mixed with other ingredients into a kind of paste1 which is administered by the tribal priest to the youths4 ,by this means the strength1 valour1 intelligence1 and other virtues of the slain are believed to be imparted to the eaters4 ,when ,basutos of the mountains have killed a very brave foe1 they immediately cut out his heart and eat it1 because this is supposed to give them his courage and strength in battle4 ,when ,sir ,charles ,m',carthy was killed by the ,ashantees in #ahbd1 it is said that his heart was devoured by the chiefs of the ,ashantee army1 who hoped by this means to imbibe his courage4 ,his flesh was dried and parcelled out among the lower officers for the same purpose1 and his bones were long kept at ,coomassie as national fetishes4 ,the ,nauras ,indians of ,new ,granada ate the hearts of ,spaniards when they had the opportunity1 hoping thereby to make themselves as dauntless as the dreaded ,castilian chivalry4 ,the ,sioux ,indians used to reduce to powder the heart of a valiant enemy and swallow the powder1 hoping thus to appropriate the dead man's valour4 ,but while the human heart is thus commonly eaten for the sake of imbuing the eater with the qualities of its original owner1 it is not1 as we have already seen1 the only part of the body which is consumed for this purpose4 ,thus warriors of the ,theddora and ,ngarigo tribes of ,south-,eastern ,australia used to eat the hands and feet of their slain enemies1 believing that in this way they acquired some of the qualities and courage of the dead4 ,the ,kamilaroi of ,new ,south ,wales ate the liver as well as the heart of a brave man to get his courage4 ,in ,tonquin also there is a popular superstition that the liver of a brave man makes brave any who partake of it4 ,with a like intent the ,chinese swallow the bile of notorious bandits who have been executed4 ,the ,dyaks of ,sarawak used to eat the palms of the hands and the flesh of the knees of the slain in order to steady their own hands and strengthen their own knees4 ,the ,tolalaki1 notorious head-hunters of ,central ,celebes1 drink the blood and eat the brains of their victims that they may become brave4 ,the ,italones of the ,philippine ,islands drink the blood of their slain enemies1 and eat part of the back of their heads and of their entrails raw to acquire their courage4 ,for the same reason the ,efugaos1 another tribe of the ,philippines1 suck the brains of their foes4 ,in like manner the ,kai of ,german ,new ,guinea eat the brains of the enemies they kill in order to acquire their strength4 ,among the ,kimbunda of ,western ,africa1 when a new king succeeds to the throne1 a brave prisoner of war is killed in order that the king and nobles may eat his flesh1 and so acquire his strength and courage4 ,the notorious ,zulu chief ,matuana drank the gall of thirty chiefs1 whose people he had destroyed1 in the belief that it would make him strong4 ,it is a ,zulu fancy that by eating the centre of the forehead and the eyebrow of an enemy they acquire the power of looking steadfastly at a foe4 ,before every warlike expedition the people of ,minahassa in ,celebes used to take the locks of hair of a slain foe and dabble them in boiling water to extract the courage2 this infusion of bravery was then drunk by the warriors4 ,in ,new ,zealand the chief was an atua god1 but there were powerful and powerless gods2 each naturally sought to make himself one of the former2 the plan therefore adopted was to incorporate the spirits of others with their own2 thus1 when a warrior slew a chief1 he immediately gouged out his eyes and swallowed them1 the atua tonga1 or divinity1 being supposed to reside in that organ2 thus he not only killed the body1 but also possessed himself of the soul of his enemy1 and consequently the more chiefs he slew the greater did his divinity become4 ,it is now easy to understand why a savage should desire to partake of the flesh of an animal or man whom he regards as divine4 ,by eating the body of the god he shares in the god's attributes and powers4 ,and when the god is a corn-god1 the corn is his proper body2 when he is a vine-god1 the juice of the grape is his blood2 and so by eating the bread and drinking the wine the worshipper partakes of the real body and blood of his god4 ,thus the drinking of wine in the rites of a vine-god like ,dionysus is not an act of revelry1 it is a solemn sacrament4 ,yet a time comes when reasonable men find it hard to understand how any one in his senses can suppose that by eating bread or drinking wine he consumes the body or blood of a deity4 ,when we call corn ,ceres and wine ,bacchus1 says ,cicero1 we use a common figure of speech2 but do you imagine that anybody is so insane as to believe that the thing he feeds upon is a god8 ,,lii4 ,killing the ,divine ,animal #a4 ,killing the ,sacred ,buzzard ,,in ,,the ,,preceding chapters we saw that many communities which have progressed so far as to subsist mainly by agriculture have been in the habit of killing and eating their farinaceous deities either in their proper form of corn1 rice1 and so forth1 or in the borrowed shapes of animals and men4 ,it remains to show that hunting and pastoral tribes1 as well as agricultural peoples1 have been in the habit of killing the beings whom they worship4 ,among the worshipful beings or gods1 if indeed they deserve to be dignified by that name1 whom hunters and shepherds adore and kill are animals pure and simple1 not animals regarded as embodiments of other supernatural beings4 ,our first example is drawn from the ,indians of ,california1 who living in a fertile country under a serene and temperate sky1 nevertheless rank near the bottom of the savage scale4 ,the ,acagchemem tribe adored the great buzzard1 and once a year they celebrated a great festival called ,panes or bird-feast in its honour4 ,the day selected for the festival was made known to the public on the evening before its celebration and preparations were at once made for the erection of a special temple 7vanquech71 which seems to have been a circular or oval enclosure of stakes with the stuffed skin of a coyote or prairie-wolf set up on a hurdle to represent the god ,chinigchinich4 ,when the temple was ready1 the bird was carried into it in solemn procession and laid on an altar erected for the purpose4 ,then all the young women1 whether married or single1 began to run to and fro1 as if distracted1 some in one direction and some in another1 while the elders of both sexes remained silent spectators of the scene1 and the captains1 tricked out in paint and feathers1 danced round their adored bird4 ,these ceremonies being concluded1 they seized upon the bird and carried it to the principal temple1 all the assembly uniting in the grand display1 and the captains dancing and singing at the head of the procession4 ,arrived at the temple1 they killed the bird without losing a drop of its blood4 ,the skin was removed entire and preserved with the feathers as a relic or for the purpose of making the festal garment or paelt4 ,the carcase was buried in a hole in the temple1 and the old women gathered round the grave weeping and moaning bitterly1 while they threw various kinds of seeds or pieces of food on it1 crying out1 ,why did you run away8 ,would you not have been better with us8 you would have made pinole 7a kind of gruel7 as we do1 and if you had not run away1 you would not have become a ,panes1 and so on4 ,when this ceremony was concluded1 the dancing was resumed and kept up for three days and nights4 ,they said that the ,panes was a woman who had run off to the mountains and there been changed into a bird by the god ,chinigchinich4 ,they believed that though they sacrificed the bird annually1 she came to life again and returned to her home in the mountains4 ,moreover1 they thought that as often as the bird was killed1 it became multiplied2 because every year all the different ,capitanes celebrated the same feast of ,panes1 and were firm in the opinion that the birds sacrificed were but one and the same female4 ,the unity in multiplicity thus postulated by the ,californians is very noticeable and helps to explain their motive for killing the divine bird4 ,the notion of the life of a species as distinct from that of an individual1 easy and obvious as it seems to us1 appears to be one which the ,californian savage cannot grasp4 ,he is unable to conceive the life of the species otherwise than as an individual life1 and therefore as exposed to the same dangers and calamities which menace and finally destroy the life of the individual4 ,apparently he imagines that a species left to itself will grow old and die like an individual1 and that therefore some step must be taken to save from extinction the particular species which he regards as divine4 ,the only means he can think of to avert the catastrophe is to kill a member of the species in whose veins the tide of life is still running strong and has not yet stagnated among the fens of old age4 ,the life thus diverted from one channel will flow1 he fancies1 more freshly and freely in a new one2 in other words1 the slain animal will revive and enter on a new term of life with all the spring and energy of youth4 ,to us this reasoning is transparently absurd1 but so too is the custom4 ,a similar confusion1 it may be noted1 between the individual life and the life of the species was made by the ,samoans4 ,each family had for its god a particular species of animal2 yet the death of one of these animals1 for example an owl1 was not the death of the god1 he was supposed to be yet alive1 and incarnate in all the owls in existence4 #b4 ,killing the ,sacred ,ram ,,the ,,rude ,californian rite which we have just considered has a close parallel in the religion of ancient ,egypt4 ,the ,thebans and all other ,egyptians who worshipped the ,theban god ,ammon held rams to be sacred1 and would not sacrifice them4 ,but once a year at the festival of ,ammon they killed a ram1 skinned it1 and clothed the image of the god in the skin4 ,then they mourned over the ram and buried it in a sacred tomb4 ,the custom was explained by a story that ,zeus had once exhibited himself to ,hercules clad in the fleece and wearing the head of a ram4 ,of course the ram in this case was simply the beast-god of ,thebes1 as the wolf was the beast-god of ,lycopolis1 and the goat was the beast-god of ,mendes4 ,in other words1 the ram was ,ammon himself4 ,on the monuments1 it is true1 ,ammon appears in semi-human form with the body of a man and the head of a ram4 ,but this only shows that he was in the usual chrysalis state through which beast-gods regularly pass before they emerge as full-blown anthropomorphic gods4 ,the ram1 therefore1 was killed1 not as a sacrifice to ,ammon1 but as the god himself1 whose identity with the beast is plainly shown by the custom of clothing his image in the skin of the slain ram4 ,the reason for thus killing the ram-god annually may have been that which ,i have assigned for the general custom of killing a god and for the special ,californian custom of killing the divine buzzard4 ,as applied to ,egypt1 this explanation is supported by the analogy of the bull-god ,apis1 who was not suffered to outlive a certain term of years4 ,the intention of thus putting a limit to the life of the human god was1 as ,i have argued1 to secure him from the weakness and frailty of age4 ,the same reasoning would explain the custom--probably an older one--of putting the beast-god to death annually1 as was done with the ram of ,thebes4 ,one point in the ,theban ritual--the application of the skin to the image of the god--deserves particular attention4 ,if the god was at first the living ram1 his representation by an image must have originated later4 ,but how did it originate8 ,one answer to this question is perhaps furnished by the practice of preserving the skin of the animal which is slain as divine4 ,the ,californians1 as we have seen1 preserved the skin of the buzzard2 and the skin of the goat1 which is killed on the harvest-field as a representative of the corn-spirit1 is kept for various superstitious purposes4 ,the skin in fact was kept as a token or memorial of the god1 or rather as containing in it a part of the divine life1 and it had only to be stuffed or stretched upon a frame to become a regular image of him4 ,at first an image of this kind would be renewed annually1 the new image being provided by the skin of the slain animal4 ,but from annual images to permanent images the transition is easy4 ,we have seen that the older custom of cutting a new ,may-tree every year was superseded by the practice of maintaining a permanent ,may-pole1 which was1 however1 annually decked with fresh leaves and flowers1 and even surmounted each year by a fresh young tree4 ,similarly when the stuffed skin1 as a representative of the god1 was replaced by a permanent image of him in wood1 stone1 or metal1 the permanent image was annually clad in the fresh skin of the slain animal4 ,when this stage had been reached1 the custom of killing the ram came naturally to be interpreted as a sacrifice offered to the image1 and was explained by a story like that of ,ammon and ,hercules4 #c4 ,killing the ,sacred ,serpent ,,west ,,africa appears to furnish another example of the annual killing of a sacred animal and the preservation of its skin4 ,the negroes of ,issapoo1 in the island of ,fernando ,po1 regard the cobra-capella as their guardian deity1 who can do them good or ill1 bestow riches or inflict disease and death4 ,the skin of one of these reptiles is hung tail downwards from a branch of the highest tree in the public square1 and the placing of it on the tree is an annual ceremony4 ,as soon as the ceremony is over1 all children born within the past year are carried out and their hands made to touch the tail of the serpent's skin4 ,the latter custom is clearly a way of placing the infants under the protection of the tribal god4 ,similarly in ,senegambia a python is expected to visit every child of the ,python clan within eight days after birth2 and the ,psylli1 a ,snake clan of ancient ,africa1 used to expose their infants to snakes in the belief that the snakes would not harm true-born children of the clan4 #d4 ,killing the ,sacred ,turtles ,,in ,,the ,,californian1 ,egyptian1 and ,fernando ,po customs the worship of the animal seems to have no relation to agriculture1 and may therefore be presumed to date from the hunting or pastoral stage of society4 ,the same may be said of the following custom1 though the ,zuni ,indians of ,new ,mexico1 who practise it1 are now settled in walled villages or towns of a peculiar type1 and practise agriculture and the arts of pottery and weaving4 ,but the ,zuni custom is marked by certain features which appear to place it in a somewhat different class from the preceding cases4 ,it may be well therefore to describe it at full length in the words of an eye-witness4 ,with midsummer the heat became intense4 ,my brother i4e4 adopted ,indian brother and ,i sat1 day after day1 in the cool under-rooms of our house1--the latter sic busy with his quaint forge and crude appliances1 working ,mexican coins over into bangles1 girdles1 ear-rings1 buttons1 and what not1 for savage ornament4 ,though his tools were wonderfully rude1 the work he turned out by dint of combined patience and ingenuity was remarkably beautiful4 ,one day as ,i sat watching him1 a procession of fifty men went hastily down the hill1 and off westward over the plain4 ,they were solemnly led by a painted and shell-bedecked priest1 and followed by the torch-bearing ,shu-lu-wit-si or ,god of ,fire4 ,after they had vanished1 ,i asked old brother what it all meant4 ',they are going1' said he1 'to the city of ,ka-ka and the home of our others4' ,four days after1 towards sunset1 costumed and masked in the beautiful paraphernalia of the ,ka-k'ok-shi1 or ',good ,dance1' they returned in file up the same pathway1 each bearing in his arms a basket filled with living1 squirming turtles1 which he regarded and carried as tenderly as a mother would her infant4 ,some of the wretched reptiles were carefully wrapped in soft blankets1 their heads and forefeet protruding1--and1 mounted on the backs of the plume-bedecked pilgrims1 made ludicrous but solemn caricatures of little children in the same position4 ,while ,i was at supper upstairs that evening1 the governor's brother-in-law came in4 ,he was welcomed by the family as if a messenger from heaven4 ,he bore in his tremulous fingers one of the much abused and rebellious turtles4 ,paint still adhered to his hands and bare feet1 which led me to infer that he had formed one of the sacred embassy4 ',so you went to ,ka-thlu-el-lon1 did you8' ,i asked4 ',e'e1' replied the weary man1 in a voice husky with long chanting1 as he sank1 almost exhausted1 on a roll of skins which had been placed for him1 and tenderly laid the turtle on the floor4 ,no sooner did the creature find itself at liberty than it made off as fast as its lame legs would take it4 ,of one accord1 the family forsook dish1 spoon1 and drinking-cup1 and grabbing from a sacred meal-bowl whole handfuls of the contents1 hurriedly followed the turtle about the room1 into dark corners1 around water-jars1 behind the grinding-troughs1 and out into the middle of the floor again1 praying and scattering meal on its back as they went4 ,at last1 strange to say1 it approached the foot-sore man who had brought it4 ',ha6' he exclaimed with emotion2 'see it comes to me again2 ah1 what great favours the fathers of all grant me this day1' and1 passing his hand gently over the sprawling animal1 he inhaled from his palm deeply and long1 at the same time invoking the favour of the gods4 ,then he leaned his chin upon his hand1 and with large1 wistful eyes regarded his ugly captive as it sprawled about1 blinking its meal-bedimmed eyes1 and clawing the smooth floor in memory of its native element4 ,at this juncture ,i ventured a question3 ',why do you not let him go1 or give him some water8' ,slowly the man turned his eyes toward me1 an odd mixture of pain1 indignation1 and pity on his face1 while the worshipful family stared at me with holy horror4 ',poor younger brother6' he said at last1 'know you not how precious it is8 ,it die8 ,it will not die2 ,i tell you1 it cannot die4' ',but it will die if you don't feed it and give it water4' ',i tell you it cannot die2 it will only change houses to-morrow1 and go back to the home of its brothers4 ,ah1 well6 ,how should you know8' he mused4 ,turning to the blinded turtle again3 ',ah6 my poor dear lost child or parent1 my sister or brother to have been6 ,who knows which8 ,maybe my own great-grandfather or mother6' ,and with this he fell to weeping most pathetically1 and1 tremulous with sobs1 which were echoed by the women and children1 he buried his face in his hands4 ,filled with sympathy for his grief1 however mistaken1 ,i raised the turtle to my lips and kissed its cold shell2 then depositing it on the floor1 hastily left the grief-stricken family to their sorrows4 ,next day1 with prayers and tender beseechings1 plumes1 and offerings1 the poor turtle was killed1 and its flesh and bones were removed and deposited in the little river1 that it might 'return once more to eternal life among its comrades in the dark waters of the lake of the dead4' ,the shell1 carefully scraped and dried1 was made into a dance-rattle1 and1 covered by a piece of buckskin1 it still hangs from the smoke-stained rafters of my brother's house4 ,once a ,navajo tried to buy it for a ladle2 loaded with indignant reproaches1 he was turned out of the house4 ,were any one to venture the suggestion that the turtle no longer lived1 his remark would cause a flood of tears1 and he would be reminded that it had only 'changed houses and gone to live for ever in the home of our lost others4' ,in this custom we find expressed in the clearest way a belief in the transmigration of human souls into the bodies of turtles4 ,the theory of transmigration is held by the ,moqui ,indians1 who belong to the same race as the ,zunis4 ,the ,moquis are divided into totem clans--the ,bear clan1 ,deer clan1 ,wolf clan1 ,hare clan1 and so on2 they believe that the ancestors of the clans were bears1 deer1 wolves1 hares1 and so forth2 and that at death the members of each clan become bears1 deer1 and so on according to the particular clan to which they belonged4 ,the ,zuni are also divided into clans1 the totems of which agree closely with those of the ,moquis1 and one of their totems is the turtle4 ,thus their belief in transmigration into the turtle is probably one of the regular articles of their totem faith4 ,what then is the meaning of killing a turtle in which the soul of a kinsman is believed to be present8 ,apparently the object is to keep up a communication with the other world in which the souls of the departed are believed to be assembled in the form of turtles4 ,it is a common belief that the spirits of the dead return occasionally to their old homes2 and accordingly the unseen visitors are welcomed and feasted by the living1 and then sent upon their way4 ,in the ,zuni ceremony the dead are fetched home in the form of turtles1 and the killing of the turtles is the way of sending back the souls to the spirit-land4 ,thus the general explanation given above of the custom of killing a god seems inapplicable to the ,zuni custom1 the true meaning of which is somewhat obscure4 ,nor is the obscurity which hangs over the subject entirely dissipated by a later and fuller account which we possess of the ceremony4 ,from it we learn that the ceremony forms part of the elaborate ritual which these ,indians observe at the midsummer solstice for the purpose of ensuring an abundant supply of rain for the crops4 ,envoys are despatched to bring their otherselves1 the tortoises1 from the sacred lake ,kothluwalawa1 to which the souls of the dead are believed to repair4 ,when the creatures have thus been solemnly brought to ,zuni1 they are placed in a bowl of water and dances are performed beside them by men in costume1 who personate gods and goddesses4 ,after the ceremonial the tortoises are taken home by those who caught them and are hung by their necks to the rafters till morning1 when they are thrown into pots of boiling water4 ,the eggs are considered a great delicacy4 ,the meat is seldom touched except as a medicine1 which is curative for cutaneous diseases4 ,part of the meat is deposited in the river with khakwa 7white shell beads7 and turquoise beads as offerings to ,council of the ,gods4 ,this account at all events confirms the inference that the tortoises are supposed to be reincarnations of the human dead1 for they are called the otherselves of the ,zuni2 indeed1 what else should they be than the souls of the dead in the bodies of tortoises seeing that they come from the haunted lake8 ,as the principal object of the prayers uttered and of the dances performed at these midsummer ceremonies appears to be to procure rain for the crops1 it may be that the intention of bringing the tortoises to ,zuni and dancing before them is to intercede with the ancestral spirit1 incarnate in the animals1 that they may be pleased to exert their power over the waters of heaven for the benefit of their living descendants4 #e4 ,killing the ,sacred ,bear ,,doubt also hangs at first sight over the meaning of the bear-sacrifice offered by the ,aino or ,ainu1 a primitive people who are found in the ,japanese island of ,yezo or ,yesso1 as well as in ,saghalien and the southern of the ,kurile ,islands4 ,it is not quite easy to define the attitude of the ,aino towards the bear4 ,on the one hand they give it the name of kamui or god2 but as they apply the same word to strangers1 it may mean no more than a being supposed to be endowed with superhuman1 or at all events extraordinary1 powers4 ,again1 it is said that the bear is their chief divinity2 in the religion of the ,aino the bear plays a chief part2 amongst the animals it is especially the bear which receives an idolatrous veneration2 they worship it after their fashion2 there is no doubt that this wild beast inspires more of the feeling which prompts worship than the inanimate forces of nature1 and the ,aino may be distinguished as bear-worshippers4 ,yet1 on the other hand1 they kill the bear whenever they can2 in bygone years the ,ainu considered bear-hunting the most manly and useful way in which a person could possibly spend his time2 the men spend the autumn1 winter1 and spring in hunting deer and bears4 ,part of their tribute or taxes is paid in skins1 and they subsist on the dried meat2 bear's flesh is indeed one of their staple foods2 they eat it both fresh and salted2 and the skins of bears furnish them with clothing4 ,in fact1 the worship of which writers on this subject speak appears to be paid chiefly to the dead animal4 ,thus1 although they kill a bear whenever they can1 in the process of dissecting the carcass they endeavor to conciliate the deity1 whose representative they have slain1 by making elaborate obeisances and deprecatory salutations2 when a bear has been killed the ,ainu sit down and admire it1 make their salaams to it1 worship it1 and offer presents of inao2 when a bear is trapped or wounded by an arrow1 the hunters go through an apologetic or propitiatory ceremony4 ,the skulls of slain bears receive a place of honour in their huts1 or are set up on sacred posts outside the huts1 and are treated with much respect3 libations of millet beer1 and of sake1 an intoxicating liquor1 are offered to them2 and they are addressed as divine preservers or precious divinities4 ,the skulls of foxes are also fastened to the sacred posts outside the huts2 they are regarded as charms against evil spirits1 and are consulted as oracles4 ,yet it is expressly said1 ,the live fox is revered just as little as the bear2 rather they avoid it as much as possible1 considering it a wily animal4 ,the bear can hardly1 therefore1 be described as a sacred animal of the ,aino1 nor yet as a totem2 for they do not call themselves bears1 and they kill and eat the animal freely4 ,however1 they have a legend of a woman who had a son by a bear2 and many of them who dwell in the mountains pride themselves on being descended from a bear4 ,such people are called ,descendants of the bear 7,kimun ,kamui sanikiri71 and in the pride of their heart they will say1 ,as for me1 ,i am a child of the god of the mountains2 ,i am descended from the divine one who rules in the mountains1 meaning by the god of the mountains no other than the bear4 ,it is therefore possible that1 as our principal authority1 the ,rev4 ,j4 ,batchelor1 believes1 the bear may have been the totem of an ,aino clan2 but even if that were so it would not explain the respect shown for the animal by the whole ,aino people4 ,but it is the bear-festival of the ,aino which concerns us here4 ,towards the end of winter a bear cub is caught and brought into the village4 ,if it is very small1 it is suckled by an ,aino woman1 but should there be no woman able to suckle it1 the little animal is fed from the hand or the mouth4 ,during the day it plays about in the hut with the children and is treated with great affection4 ,but when the cub grows big enough to pain people by hugging or scratching them1 he is shut up in a strong wooden cage1 where he stays generally for two or three years1 fed on fish and millet porridge1 till it is time for him to be killed and eaten4 ,but it is a peculiarly striking fact that the young bear is not kept merely to furnish a good meal2 rather he is regarded and honoured as a fetish1 or even as a sort of higher being4 ,in ,yezo the festival is generally celebrated in ,september or ,october4 ,before it takes place the ,aino apologise to their gods1 alleging that they have treated the bear kindly as long as they could1 now they can feed him no longer1 and are obliged to kill him4 ,a man who gives a bear-feast invites his relations and friends2 in a small village nearly the whole community takes part in the feast2 indeed1 guests from distant villages are invited and generally come1 allured by the prospect of getting drunk for nothing4 ,the form of invitation runs somewhat as follows3 ,i1 so and so1 am about to sacrifice the dear little divine thing who resides among the mountains4 ,my friends and masters1 come ye to the feast2 we will then unite in the great pleasure of sending the god away4 ,come4 ,when all the people are assembled in front of the cage1 an orator chosen for the purpose addresses the bear and tells it that they are about to send it forth to its ancestors4 ,he craves pardon for what they are about to do to it1 hopes it will not be angry1 and comforts it by assuring the animal that many of the sacred whittled sticks 7inao7 and plenty of cakes and wine will be sent with it on the long journey4 ,one speech of this sort which ,mr4 ,batchelor heard ran as follows3 ,o thou divine one1 thou wast sent into the world for us to hunt4 ,o thou precious little divinity1 we worship thee2 pray hear our prayer4 ,we have nourished thee and brought thee up with a deal of pains and trouble1 all because we love thee so4 ,now1 as thou hast grown big1 we are about to send thee to thy father and mother4 ,when thou comest to them please speak well of us1 and tell them how kind we have been2 please come to us again and we will sacrifice thee4 ,having been secured with ropes1 the bear is then let out of the cage and assailed with a shower of blunt arrows in order to arouse it to fury4 ,when it has spent itself in vain struggles1 it is tied up to a stake1 gagged and strangled1 its neck being placed between two poles1 which are then violently compressed1 all the people eagerly helping to squeeze the animal to death4 ,an arrow is also discharged into the beast's heart by a good marksman1 but so as not to shed blood1 for they think that it would be very unlucky if any of the blood were to drip on the ground4 ,however1 the men sometimes drink the warm blood of the bear that the courage and other virtues it possesses may pass into them2 and sometimes they besmear themselves and their clothes with the blood in order to ensure success in hunting4 ,when the animal has been strangled to death1 it is skinned and its head is cut off and set in the east window of the house1 where a piece of its own flesh is placed under its snout1 together with a cup of its own meat boiled1 some millet dumplings1 and dried fish4 ,prayers are then addressed to the dead animal2 amongst other things it is sometimes invited1 after going away to its father and mother1 to return into the world in order that it may again be reared for sacrifice4 ,when the bear is supposed to have finished eating its own flesh1 the man who presides at the feast takes the cup containing the boiled meat1 salutes it1 and divides the contents between all the company present3 every person1 young and old alike1 must taste a little4 ,the cup is called the cup of offering because it has just been offered to the dead bear4 ,when the rest of the flesh has been cooked1 it is shared out in like manner among all the people1 everybody partaking of at least a morsel2 not to partake of the feast would be equivalent to excommunication1 it would be to place the recreant outside the pale of ,aino fellowship4 ,formerly every particle of the bear1 except the bones1 had to be eaten up at the banquet1 but this rule is now relaxed4 ,the head1 on being detached from the skin1 is set up on a long pole beside the sacred wands 7inao7 outside of the house1 where it remains till nothing but the bare white skull is left4 ,skulls so set up are worshipped not only at the time of the festival1 but very often as long as they last4 ,the ,aino assured ,mr4 ,batchelor that they really do believe the spirits of the worshipful animals to reside in the skulls2 that is why they address them as divine preservers and precious divinities4 ,the ceremony of killing the bear was witnessed by ,dr4 ,b4 ,scheube on the tenth of ,august at ,kunnui1 which is a village on ,volcano ,bay in the island of ,yezo or ,yesso4 ,as his description of the rite contains some interesting particulars not mentioned in the foregoing account1 it may be worth while to summarize it4 ,on entering the hut he found about thirty ,aino present1 men1 women1 and children1 all dressed in their best4 ,the master of the house first offered a libation on the fireplace to the god of the fire1 and the guests followed his example4 ,then a libation was offered to the house-god in his sacred corner of the hut4 ,meanwhile the housewife1 who had nursed the bear1 sat by herself1 silent and sad1 bursting now and then into tears4 ,her grief was obviously unaffected1 and it deepened as the festival went on4 ,next1 the master of the house and some of the guests went out of the hut and offered libations before the bear's cage4 ,a few drops were presented to the bear in a saucer1 which he at once upset4 ,then the women and girls danced round the cage1 their faces turned towards it1 their knees slightly bent1 rising and hopping on their toes4 ,as they danced they clapped their hands and sang a monotonous song4 ,the housewife and a few old women1 who might have nursed many bears1 danced tearfully1 stretching out their arms to the bear1 and addressing it in terms of endearment4 ,the young folks were less affected2 they laughed as well as sang4 ,disturbed by the noise1 the bear began to rush about his cage and howl lamentably4 ,next libations were offered at the inao 7inabos7 or sacred wands which stand outside of an ,aino hut4 ,these wands are about a couple of feet high1 and are whittled at the top into spiral shavings4 ,five new wands with bamboo leaves attached to them had been set up for the festival4 ,this is regularly done when a bear is killed2 the leaves mean that the animal may come to life again4 ,then the bear was let out of his cage1 a rope was thrown round his neck1 and he was led about in the neighbourhood of the hut4 ,while this was being done the men1 headed by a chief1 shot at the beast with arrows tipped with wooden buttons4 ,dr4 ,scheube had to do so also4 ,then the bear was taken before the sacred wands1 a stick was put in his mouth1 nine men knelt on him and pressed his neck against a beam4 ,in five minutes the animal had expired without uttering a sound4 ,meantime the women and girls had taken post behind the men1 where they danced1 lamenting1 and beating the men who were killing the bear4 ,the bear's carcase was next placed on the mat before the sacred wands2 and a sword and quiver1 taken from the wands1 were hung round the beast's neck4 ,being a she-bear1 it was also adorned with a necklace and ear-rings4 ,then food and drink were offered to it1 in the shape of millet-broth1 millet-cakes1 and a pot of sake4 ,the men now sat down on mats before the dead bear1 offered libations to it1 and drank deep4 ,meanwhile the women and girls had laid aside all marks of sorrow1 and danced merrily1 none more merrily than the old women4 ,when the mirth was at its height two young ,aino1 who had let the bear out of his cage1 mounted the roof of the hut and threw cakes of millet among the company1 who all scrambled for them without distinction of age or sex4 ,the bear was next skinned and disembowelled1 and the trunk severed from the head1 to which the skin was left hanging4 ,the blood1 caught in cups1 was eagerly swallowed by the men4 ,none of the women or children appeared to drink the blood1 though custom did not forbid them to do so4 ,the liver was cut in small pieces and eaten raw1 with salt1 the women and children getting their share4 ,the flesh and the rest of the vitals were taken into the house to be kept till the next day but one1 and then to be divided among the persons who had been present at the feast4 ,blood and liver were offered to ,dr4 ,scheube4 ,while the bear was being disembowelled1 the women and girls danced the same dance which they had danced at the beginning--not1 however1 round the cage1 but in front of the sacred wands4 ,at this dance the old women1 who had been merry a moment before1 again shed tears freely4 ,after the brain had been extracted from the bear's head and swallowed with salt1 the skull1 detached from the skin1 was hung on a pole beside the sacred wands4 ,the stick with which the bear had been gagged was also fastened to the pole1 and so were the sword and quiver which had been hung on the carcase4 ,the latter were removed in about an hour1 but the rest remained standing4 ,the whole company1 men and women1 danced noisily before the pole2 and another drinking-bout1 in which the women joined1 closed the festival4 ,perhaps the first published account of the bear-feast of the ,aino is one which was given to the world by a ,japanese writer in #afeb4 ,it has been translated into ,french and runs thus3 ,when they find a young bear1 they bring it home1 and the wife suckles it4 ,when it is grown they feed it with fish and fowl and kill it in winter for the sake of the liver1 which they esteem an antidote to poison1 the worms1 colic1 and disorders of the stomach4 ,it is of a very bitter taste1 and is good for nothing if the bear has been killed in summer4 ,this butchery begins in the first ,japanese month4 ,for this purpose they put the animal's head between two long poles1 which are squeezed together by fifty or sixty people1 both men and women4 ,when the bear is dead they eat his flesh1 keep the liver as a medicine1 and sell the skin1 which is black and commonly six feet long1 but the longest measure twelve feet4 ,as soon as he is skinned1 the persons who nourished the beast begin to bewail him2 afterwards they make little cakes to regale those who helped them4 ,the ,aino of ,saghalien rear bear cubs and kill them with similar ceremonies4 ,we are told that they do not look upon the bear as a god but only as a messenger whom they despatch with various commissions to the god of the forest4 ,the animal is kept for about two years in a cage1 and then killed at a festival1 which always takes place in winter and at night4 ,the day before the sacrifice is devoted to lamentation1 old women relieving each other in the duty of weeping and groaning in front of the bear's cage4 ,then about the middle of the night or very early in the morning an orator makes a long speech to the beast1 reminding him how they have taken care of him1 and fed him well1 and bathed him in the river1 and made him warm and comfortable4 ,now1 he proceeds1 we are holding a great festival in your honour4 ,be not afraid4 ,we will not hurt you4 ,we will only kill you and send you to the god of the forest who loves you4 ,we are about to offer you a good dinner1 the best you have ever eaten among us1 and we will all weep for you together4 ,the ,aino who will kill you is the best shot among us4 ,there he is1 he weeps and asks your forgiveness2 you will feel almost nothing1 it will be done so quickly4 ,we cannot feed you always1 as you will understand4 ,we have done enough for you2 it is now your turn to sacrifice yourself for us4 ,you will ask ,god to send us1 for the winter1 plenty of otters and sables1 and for the summer1 seals and fish in abundance4 ,do not forget our messages1 we love you much1 and our children will never forget you4 ,when the bear has partaken of his last meal amid the general emotion of the spectators1 the old women weeping afresh and the men uttering stifled cries1 he is strapped1 not without difficulty and danger1 and being let out of the cage is led on leash or dragged1 according to the state of his temper1 thrice round his cage1 then round his master's house1 and lastly round the house of the orator4 ,thereupon he is tied up to a tree1 which is decked with sacred whittled sticks 7inao7 of the usual sort2 and the orator again addresses him in a long harangue1 which sometimes lasts till the day is beginning to break4 ,remember1 he cries1 remember6 ,i remind you of your whole life and of the services we have rendered you4 ,it is now for you to do your duty4 ,do not forget what ,i have asked of you4 ,you will tell the gods to give us riches1 that our hunters may return from the forest laden with rare furs and animals good to eat2 that our fishers may find troops of seals on the shore and in the sea1 and that their nets may crack under the weight of the fish4 ,we have no hope but in you4 ,the evil spirits laugh at us1 and too often they are unfavourable and malignant to us1 but they will bow before you4 ,we have given you food and joy and health2 now we kill you in order that you may in return send riches to us and to our children4 ,to this discourse the bear1 more and more surly and agitated1 listens without conviction2 round and round the tree he paces and howls lamentably1 till1 just as the first beams of the rising sun light up the scene1 an archer speeds an arrow to his heart4 ,no sooner has he done so1 than the marksman throws away his bow and flings himself on the ground1 and the old men and women do the same1 weeping and sobbing4 ,then they offer the dead beast a repast of rice and wild potatoes1 and having spoken to him in terms of pity and thanked him for what he has done and suffered1 they cut off his head and paws and keep them as sacred things4 ,a banquet on the flesh and blood of the bear follows4 ,women were formerly excluded from it1 but now they share with the men4 ,the blood is drunk warm by all present2 the flesh is boiled1 custom forbids it to be roasted4 ,and as the relics of the bear may not enter the house by the door1 and ,aino houses in ,saghalien have no windows1 a man gets up on the roof and lets the flesh1 the head1 and the skin down through the smoke-hole4 ,rice and wild potatoes are then offered to the head1 and a pipe1 tobacco1 and matches are considerately placed beside it4 ,custom requires that the guests should eat up the whole animal before they depart2 the use of salt and pepper at the meal is forbidden2 and no morsel of the flesh may be given to the dogs4 ,when the banquet is over1 the head is carried away into the depth of the forest and deposited on a heap of bears' skulls1 the bleached and mouldering relics of similar festivals in the past4 ,the ,gilyaks1 a ,tunguzian people of ,eastern ,siberia1 hold a bear-festival of the same sort once a year in ,january4 ,the bear is the object of the most refined solicitude of an entire village and plays the chief part in their religious ceremonies4 ,an old she-bear is shot and her cub is reared1 but not suckled1 in the village4 ,when the bear is big enough he is taken from his cage and dragged through the village4 ,but first they lead him to the bank of the river1 for this is believed to ensure abundance of fish to each family4 ,he is then taken into every house in the village1 where fish1 brandy1 and so forth are offered to him4 ,some people prostrate themselves before the beast4 ,his entrance into a house is supposed to bring a blessing2 and if he snuffs at the food offered to him1 this also is a blessing4 ,nevertheless they tease and worry1 poke and tickle the animal continually1 so that he is surly and snappish4 ,after being thus taken to every house1 he is tied to a peg and shot dead with arrows4 ,his head is then cut off1 decked with shavings1 and placed on the table where the feast is set out4 ,here they beg pardon of the beast and worship him4 ,then his flesh is roasted and eaten in special vessels of wood finely carved4 ,they do not eat the flesh raw nor drink the blood1 as the ,aino do4 ,the brain and entrails are eaten last2 and the skull1 still decked with shavings1 is placed on a tree near the house4 ,then the people sing and both sexes dance in ranks1 as bears4 ,one of these bear-festivals was witnessed by the ,russian traveller ,l4 von ,schrenck and his companions at the ,gilyak village of ,tebach in ,january #ahef4 ,from his detailed report of the ceremony we may gather some particulars which are not noticed in the briefer accounts which ,i have just summarised4 ,the bear1 he tells us1 plays a great part in the life of all the peoples inhabiting the region of the ,amoor and ,siberia as far as ,kamtchatka1 but among none of them is his importance greater than among the ,gilyaks4 ,the immense size which the animal attains in the valley of the ,amoor1 his ferocity whetted by hunger1 and the frequency of his appearance1 all combine to make him the most dreaded beast of prey in the country4 ,no wonder1 therefore1 that the fancy of the ,gilyaks is busied with him and surrounds him1 both in life and in death1 with a sort of halo of superstitious fear4 ,thus1 for example1 it is thought that if a ,gilyak falls in combat with a bear1 his soul transmigrates into the body of the beast4 ,nevertheless his flesh has an irresistible attraction for the ,gilyak palate1 especially when the animal has been kept in captivity for some time and fattened on fish1 which gives the flesh1 in the opinion of the ,gilyaks1 a peculiarly delicious flavour4 ,but in order to enjoy this dainty with impunity they deem it needful to perform a long series of ceremonies1 of which the intention is to delude the living bear by a show of respect1 and to appease the anger of the dead animal by the homage paid to his departed spirit4 ,the marks of respect begin as soon as the beast is captured4 ,he is brought home in triumph and kept in a cage1 where all the villagers take it in turns to feed him4 ,for although he may have been captured or purchased by one man1 he belongs in a manner to the whole village4 ,his flesh will furnish a common feast1 and hence all must contribute to support him in his life4 ,the length of time he is kept in captivity depends on his age4 ,old bears are kept only a few months2 cubs are kept till they are full-grown4 ,a thick layer of fat on the captive bear gives the signal for the festival1 which is always held in winter1 generally in ,december but sometimes in ,january or ,february4 ,at the festival witnessed by the ,russian travellers1 which lasted a good many days1 three bears were killed and eaten4 ,more than once the animals were led about in procession and compelled to enter every house in the village1 where they were fed as a mark of honour1 and to show that they were welcome guests4 ,but before the beasts set out on this round of visits1 the ,gilyaks played at skipping-rope in presence1 and perhaps1 as ,l4 von ,schrenck inclined to believe1 in honour of the animals4 ,the night before they were killed1 the three bears were led by moonlight a long way on the ice of the frozen river4 ,that night no one in the village might sleep4 ,next day1 after the animals had been again led down the steep bank to the river1 and conducted thrice round the hole in the ice from which the women of the village drew their water1 they were taken to an appointed place not far from the village1 and shot to death with arrows4 ,the place of sacrifice or execution was marked as holy by being surrounded with whittled sticks1 from the tops of which shavings hung in curls4 ,such sticks are with the ,gilyaks1 as with the ,aino1 the regular symbols that accompany all religious ceremonies4 ,when the house has been arranged and decorated for their reception1 the skins of the bears1 with their heads attached to them1 are brought into it1 not1 however1 by the door1 but through a window1 and then hung on a sort of scaffold opposite the hearth on which the flesh is to be cooked4 ,the boiling of the bears' flesh among the ,gilyaks is done only by the oldest men1 whose high privilege it is2 women and children1 young men and boys have no part in it4 ,the task is performed slowly and deliberately1 with a certain solemnity4 ,on the occasion described by the ,russian travellers the kettle was first of all surrounded with a thick wreath of shavings1 and then filled with snow1 for the use of water to cook bear's flesh is forbidden4 ,meanwhile a large wooden trough1 richly adorned with arabesques and carvings of all sorts1 was hung immediately under the snouts of the bears2 on one side of the trough was carved in relief a bear1 on the other side a toad4 ,when the carcases were being cut up1 each leg was laid on the ground in front of the bears1 as if to ask their leave1 before being placed in the kettle2 and the boiled flesh was fished out of the kettle with an iron hook1 and set in the trough before the bears1 in order that they might be the first to taste of their own flesh4 ,as fast1 too1 as the fat was cut in strips it was hung up in front of the bears1 and afterwards laid in a small wooden trough on the ground before them4 ,last of all the inner organs of the beasts were cut up and placed in small vessels4 ,at the same time the women made bandages out of parti-coloured rags1 and after sunset these bandages were tied round the bears' snouts just below the eyes in order to dry the tears that flowed from them4 ,as soon as the ceremony of wiping away poor bruin's tears had been performed1 the assembled ,gilyaks set to work in earnest to devour his flesh4 ,the broth obtained by boiling the meat had already been partaken of4 ,the wooden bowls1 platters1 and spoons out of which the ,gilyaks eat the broth and flesh of the bears on these occasions are always made specially for the purpose at the festival and only then2 they are elaborately ornamented with carved figures of bears and other devices that refer to the animal or the festival1 and the people have a strong superstitious scruple against parting with them4 ,after the bones had been picked clean they were put back in the kettle in which the flesh had been boiled4 ,and when the festal meal was over1 an old man took his stand at the door of the house with a branch of fir in his hand1 with which1 as the people passed out1 he gave a light blow to every one who had eaten of the bear's flesh or fat1 perhaps as a punishment for their treatment of the worshipful animal4 ,in the afternoon the women performed a strange dance4 ,only one woman danced at a time1 throwing the upper part of her body into the oddest postures1 while she held in her hands a branch of fir or a kind of wooden castanets4 ,the other women meanwhile played an accompaniment by drumming on the beams of the house with clubs4 ,von ,schrenk believed that after the flesh of the bear has been eaten the bones and the skull are solemnly carried out by the oldest people to a place in the forest not far from the village4 ,there all the bones except the skull are buried4 ,after that a young tree is felled a few inches above the ground1 its stump cleft1 and the skull wedged into the cleft4 ,when the grass grows over the spot1 the skull disappears from view1 and that is the end of the bear4 ,another description of the bear-festivals of the ,gilyaks has been given us by ,mr4 ,leo ,sternberg4 ,it agrees substantially with the foregoing accounts1 but a few particulars in it may be noted4 ,according to ,mr4 ,sternberg1 the festival is usually held in honour of a deceased relation3 the next of kin either buys or catches a bear cub and nurtures it for two or three years till it is ready for the sacrifice4 ,only certain distinguished guests 7,narch-en7 are privileged to partake of the bear's flesh1 but the host and members of his clan eat a broth made from the flesh2 great quantities of this broth are prepared and consumed on the occasion4 ,the guests of honour 7,narch-en7 must belong to the clan into which the host's daughters and the other women of his clan are married3 one of these guests1 usually the host's son-in-law1 is entrusted with the duty of shooting the bear dead with an arrow4 ,the skin1 head1 and flesh of the slain bear are brought into the house not through the door but through the smoke-hole2 a quiver full of arrows is laid under the head and beside it are deposited tobacco1 sugar1 and other food4 ,the soul of the bear is supposed to carry off the souls of these things with it on the far journey4 ,a special vessel is used for cooking the bear's flesh1 and the fire must be kindled by a sacred apparatus of flint and steel1 which belongs to the clan and is handed down from generation to generation1 but which is never used to light fires except on these solemn occasions4 ,of all the many viands cooked for the consumption of the assembled people a portion is placed in a special vessel and set before the bear's head3 this is called feeding the head4 ,after the bear has been killed1 dogs are sacrificed in couples of male and female4 ,before being throttled1 they are fed and invited to go to their lord on the highest mountain1 to change their skins1 and to return next year in the form of bears4 ,the soul of the dead bear departs to the same lord1 who is also lord of the primaeval forest2 it goes away laden with the offerings that have been made to it1 and attended by the souls of the dogs and also by the souls of the sacred whittled sticks1 which figure prominently at the festival4 ,the ,goldi1 neighbours of the ,gilyaks1 treat the bear in much the same way4 ,they hunt and kill it2 but sometimes they capture a live bear and keep him in a cage1 feeding him well and calling him their son and brother4 ,then at a great festival he is taken from his cage1 paraded about with marked consideration1 and afterwards killed and eaten4 ,the skull1 jaw-bones1 and ears are then suspended on a tree1 as an antidote against evil spirits2 but the flesh is eaten and much relished1 for they believe that all who partake of it acquire a zest for the chase1 and become courageous4 ,the ,orotchis1 another ,tunguzian people of the region of the ,amoor1 hold bear-festivals of the same general character4 ,any one who catches a bear cub considers it his bounden duty to rear it in a cage for about three years1 in order at the end of that time to kill it publicly and eat the flesh with his friends4 ,the feasts being public1 though organised by individuals1 the people try to have one in each ,orotchi village every year in turn4 ,when the bear is taken out of his cage1 he is led about by means of ropes to all the huts1 accompanied by people armed with lances1 bows1 and arrows4 ,at each hut the bear and bear-leaders are treated to something good to eat and drink4 ,this goes on for several days until all the huts1 not only in that village but also in the next1 have been visited4 ,the days are given up to sport and noisy jollity4 ,then the bear is tied to a tree or wooden pillar and shot to death by the arrows of the crowd1 after which its flesh is roasted and eaten4 ,among the ,orotchis of the ,tundja ,river women take part in the bear-feasts1 while among the ,orotchis of the ,river ,vi the women will not even touch bear's flesh4 ,in the treatment of the captive bear by these tribes there are features which can hardly be distinguished from worship4 ,such1 for example1 are the prayers offered to it both alive and dead2 the offerings of food1 including portions of its own flesh1 laid before the animal's skull2 and the ,gilyak custom of leading the living beast to the river in order to ensure a supply of fish1 and of conducting him from house to house in order that every family may receive his blessing1 just as in ,europe a ,may-tree or a personal representative of the tree-spirit used to be taken from door to door in spring for the sake of diffusing among all and sundry the fresh energies of reviving nature4 ,again1 the solemn participation in his flesh and blood1 and particularly the ,aino custom of sharing the contents of the cup which had been consecrated by being set before the dead beast1 are strongly suggestive of a sacrament1 and the suggestion is confirmed by the ,gilyak practice of reserving special vessels to hold the flesh and cooking it on a fire kindled by a sacred apparatus which is never employed except on these religious occasions4 ,indeed our principal authority on ,aino religion1 the ,rev4 ,john ,batchelor1 frankly describes as worship the ceremonious respect which the ,aino pay to the bear1 and he affirms that the animal is undoubtedly one of their gods4 ,certainly the ,aino appear to apply their name for god 7kamui7 freely to the bear2 but1 as ,mr4 ,batchelor himself points out1 that word is used with many different shades of meaning and is applied to a great variety of objects1 so that from its application to the bear we cannot safely argue that the animal is actually regarded as a deity4 ,indeed we are expressly told that the ,aino of ,saghalien do not consider the bear to be a god but only a messenger to the gods1 and the message with which they charge the animal at its death bears out the statement4 ,apparently the ,gilyaks also look on the bear in the light of an envoy despatched with presents to the ,lord of the ,mountain1 on whom the welfare of the people depends4 ,at the same time they treat the animal as a being of a higher order than man1 in fact as a minor deity1 whose presence in the village1 so long as he is kept and fed1 diffuses blessings1 especially by keeping at bay the swarms of evil spirits who are constantly lying in wait for people1 stealing their goods and destroying their bodies by sickness and disease4 ,moreover1 by partaking of the flesh1 blood1 or broth of the bear1 the ,gilyaks1 the ,aino1 and the ,goldi are all of opinion that they acquire some portion of the animal's mighty powers1 particularly his courage and strength4 ,no wonder1 therefore1 that they should treat so great a benefactor with marks of the highest respect and affection4 ,some light may be thrown on the ambiguous attitude of the ,aino to bears by comparing the similar treatment which they accord to other creatures4 ,for example1 they regard the eagle-owl as a good deity who by his hooting warns men of threatened evil and defends them against it2 hence he is loved1 trusted1 and devoutly worshipped as a divine mediator between men and the ,creator4 ,the various names applied to him are significant both of his divinity and of his mediatorship4 ,whenever an opportunity offers1 one of these divine birds is captured and kept in a cage1 where he is greeted with the endearing titles of ,beloved god and ,dear little divinity4 ,nevertheless the time comes when the dear little divinity is throttled and sent away in his capacity of mediator to take a message to the superior gods or to the ,creator himself4 ,the following is the form of prayer addressed to the eagle-owl when it is about to be sacrificed3 ,beloved deity1 we have brought you up because we loved you1 and now we are about to send you to your father4 ,we herewith offer you food1 inao1 wine1 and cakes2 take them to your parent1 and he will be very pleased4 ,when you come to him say1 ',i have lived a long time among the ,ainu1 where an ,ainu father and an ,ainu mother reared me4 ,i now come to thee4 ,i have brought a variety of good things4 ,i saw while living in ,ainuland a great deal of distress4 ,i observed that some of the people were possessed by demons1 some were wounded by wild animals1 some were hurt by landslides1 others suffered shipwreck1 and many were attacked by disease4 ,the people are in great straits4 ,my father1 hear me1 and hasten to look upon the ,ainu and help them4' ,if you do this1 your father will help us4 ,again1 the ,aino keep eagles in cages1 worship them as divinities1 and ask them to defend the people from evil4 ,yet they offer the bird in sacrifice1 and when they are about to do so they pray to him1 saying3 ,o precious divinity1 ,o thou divine bird1 pray listen to my words4 ,thou dost not belong to this world1 for thy home is with the ,creator and his golden eagles4 ,this being so1 ,i present thee with these inao and cakes and other precious things4 ,do thou ride upon the inao and ascend to thy home in the glorious heavens4 ,when thou arrivest1 assemble the deities of thy own kind together and thank them for us for having governed the world4 ,do thou come again1 ,i beseech thee1 and rule over us4 ,o my precious one1 go thou quietly4 ,once more1 the ,aino revere hawks1 keep them in cages1 and offer them in sacrifice4 ,at the time of killing one of them the following prayer should be addressed to the bird3 ,o divine hawk1 thou art an expert hunter1 please cause thy cleverness to descend on me4 ,if a hawk is well treated in captivity and prayed to after this fashion when he is about to be killed1 he will surely send help to the hunter4 ,thus the ,aino hopes to profit in various ways by slaughtering the creatures1 which1 nevertheless1 he treats as divine4 ,he expects them to carry messages for him to their kindred or to the gods in the upper world2 he hopes to partake of their virtues by swallowing parts of their bodies or in other ways2 and apparently he looks forward to their bodily resurrection in this world1 which will enable him again to catch and kill them1 and again to reap all the benefits which he has already derived from their slaughter4 ,for in the prayers addressed to the worshipful bear and the worshipful eagle before they are knocked on the head the creatures are invited to come again1 which seems clearly to point to a faith in their future resurrection4 ,if any doubt could exist on this head1 it would be dispelled by the evidence of ,mr4 ,batchelor1 who tells us that the ,aino are firmly convinced that the spirits of birds and animals killed in hunting or offered in sacrifice come and live again upon the earth clothed with a body2 and they believe1 further1 that they appear here for the special benefit of men1 particularly ,ainu hunters4 ,the ,aino1 ,mr4 ,batchelor tells us1 confessedly slays and eats the beast that another may come in its place and be treated in like manner2 and at the time of sacrificing the creatures prayers are said to them which form a request that they will come again and furnish viands for another feast1 as if it were an honour to them to be thus killed and eaten1 and a pleasure as well4 ,indeed such is the people's idea4 ,these last observations1 as the context shows1 refer especially to the sacrifice of bears4 ,thus among the benefits which the ,aino anticipates from the slaughter of the worshipful animals not the least substantial is that of gorging himself on their flesh and blood1 both on the present and on many a similar occasion hereafter2 and that pleasing prospect again is derived from his firm faith in the spiritual immortality and bodily resurrection of the dead animals4 ,a like faith is shared by many savage hunters in many parts of the world and has given rise to a variety of quaint customs1 some of which will be described presently4 ,meantime it is not unimportant to observe that the solemn festivals at which the ,aino1 the ,gilyaks1 and other tribes slaughter the tame caged bears with demonstrations of respect and sorrow1 are probably nothing but an extension or glorification of similar rites which the hunter performs over any wild bear which he chances to kill in the forest4 ,indeed with regard to the ,gilyaks we are expressly informed that this is the case4 ,if we would understand the meaning of the ,gilyak ritual1 says ,mr4 ,sternberg1 we must above all remember that the bear-festivals are not1 as is usually but falsely assumed1 celebrated only at the killing of a house-bear but are held on every occasion when a ,gilyak succeeds in slaughtering a bear in the chase4 ,it is true that in such cases the festival assumes less imposing dimensions1 but in its essence it remains the same4 ,when the head and skin of a bear killed in the forest are brought into the village1 they are accorded a triumphal reception with music and solemn ceremonial4 ,the head is laid on a consecrated scaffold1 fed1 and treated with offerings1 just as at the killing of a house-bear2 and the guests of honour 7,narch-en7 are also assembled4 ,so1 too1 dogs are sacrificed1 and the bones of the bear are preserved in the same place and with the same marks of respect as the bones of a house-bear4 ,hence the great winter festival is only an extension of the rite which is observed at the slaughter of every bear4 ,thus the apparent contradiction in the practice of these tribes1 who venerate and almost deify the animals which they habitually hunt1 kill1 and eat1 is not so flagrant as at first sight it appears to us3 the people have reasons1 and some very practical reasons1 for acting as they do4 ,for the savage is by no means so illogical and unpractical as to superficial observers he is apt to seem2 he has thought deeply on the questions which immediately concern him1 he reasons about them1 and though his conclusions often diverge very widely from ours1 we ought not to deny him the credit of patient and prolonged meditation on some fundamental problems of human existence4 ,in the present case1 if he treats bears in general as creatures wholly subservient to human needs and yet singles out certain individuals of the species for homage which almost amounts to deification1 we must not hastily set him down as irrational and inconsistent1 but must endeavour to place ourselves at his point of view1 to see things as he sees them1 and to divest ourselves of the prepossessions which tinge so deeply our own views of the world4 ,if we do so1 we shall probably discover that1 however absurd his conduct may appear to us1 the savage nevertheless generally acts on a train of reasoning which seems to him in harmony with the facts of his limited experience4 ,this ,i propose to illustrate in the following chapter1 where ,i shall attempt to show that the solemn ceremonial of the bear-festival among the ,ainos and other tribes of ,north-eastern ,asia is only a particularly striking example of the respect which on the principles of his rude philosophy the savage habitually pays to the animals which he kills and eats4 ,,liii4 ,the ,propitiation of ,wild ,animals ,by ,hunters ,,the ,,explanation of life by the theory of an indwelling and practically immortal soul is one which the savage does not confine to human beings but extends to the animate creation in general4 ,in so doing he is more liberal and perhaps more logical than the civilised man1 who commonly denies to animals that privilege of immortality which he claims for himself4 ,the savage is not so proud2 he commonly believes that animals are endowed with feelings and intelligence like those of men1 and that1 like men1 they possess souls which survive the death of their bodies either to wander about as disembodied spirits or to be born again in animal form4 ,thus to the savage1 who regards all living creatures as practically on a footing of equality with man1 the act of killing and eating an animal must wear a very different aspect from that which the same act presents to us1 who regard the intelligence of animals as far inferior to our own and deny them the possession of immortal souls4 ,hence on the principles of his rude philosophy the primitive hunter who slays an animal believes himself exposed to the vengeance either of its disembodied spirit or of all the other animals of the same species1 whom he considers as knit together1 like men1 by the ties of kin and the obligations of the blood feud1 and therefore as bound to resent the injury done to one of their number4 ,accordingly the savage makes it a rule to spare the life of those animals which he has no pressing motive for killing1 at least such fierce and dangerous animals as are likely to exact a bloody vengeance for the slaughter of one of their kind4 ,crocodiles are animals of this sort4 ,they are only found in hot countries1 where1 as a rule1 food is abundant and primitive man has therefore little reason to kill them for the sake of their tough and unpalatable flesh4 ,hence it is a custom with some savages to spare crocodiles1 or rather only to kill them in obedience to the law of blood feud1 that is1 as a retaliation for the slaughter of men by crocodiles4 ,for example1 the ,dyaks of ,borneo will not kill a crocodile unless a crocodile has first killed a man4 ,for why1 say they1 should they commit an act of aggression1 when he and his kindred can so easily repay them8 ,but should the alligator take a human life1 revenge becomes a sacred duty of the living relatives1 who will trap the man-eater in the spirit of an officer of justice pursuing a criminal4 ,others1 even then1 hang back1 reluctant to embroil themselves in a quarrel which does not concern them4 ,the man-eating alligator is supposed to be pursued by a righteous ,nemesis2 and whenever one is caught they have a profound conviction that it must be the guilty one1 or his accomplice4 ,like the ,dyaks1 the natives of ,madagascar never kill a crocodile except in retaliation for one of their friends who has been destroyed by a crocodile4 ,they believe that the wanton destruction of one of these reptiles will be followed by the loss of human life1 in accordance with the principle of lex talionis4 ,the people who live near the lake ,itasy in ,madagascar make a yearly proclamation to the crocodiles1 announcing that they will revenge the death of some of their friends by killing as many crocodiles in return1 and warning all well-disposed crocodiles to keep out of the way1 as they have no quarrel with them1 but only with their evil-minded relations who have taken human life4 ,various tribes of ,madagascar believe themselves to be descended from crocodiles1 and accordingly they view the scaly reptile as1 to all intents and purposes1 a man and a brother4 ,if one of the animals should so far forget himself as to devour one of his human kinsfolk1 the chief of the tribe1 or in his absence an old man familiar with the tribal customs1 repairs at the head of the people to the edge of the water1 and summons the family of the culprit to deliver him up to the arm of justice4 ,a hook is then baited and cast into the river or lake4 ,next day the guilty brother1 or one of his family1 is dragged ashore1 and after his crime has been clearly brought home to him by a strict interrogation1 he is sentenced to death and executed4 ,the claims of justice being thus satisfied and the majesty of the law fully vindicated1 the deceased crocodile is lamented and buried like a kinsman2 a mound is raised over his relics and a stone marks the place of his head4 ,again1 the tiger is another of those dangerous beasts whom the savage prefers to leave alone1 lest by killing one of the species he should excite the hostility of the rest4 ,no consideration will induce a ,sumatran to catch or wound a tiger except in self-defence or immediately after a tiger has destroyed a friend or relation4 ,when a ,european has set traps for tigers1 the people of the neighbourhood have been known to go by night to the place and explain to the animals that the traps are not set by them nor with their consent4 ,the inhabitants of the hills near ,rajamahall1 in ,bengal1 are very averse to killing a tiger1 unless one of their kinsfolk has been carried off by one of the beasts4 ,in that case they go out for the purpose of hunting and slaying a tiger2 and when they have succeeded they lay their bows and arrows on the carcase and invoke ,god1 declaring that they slew the animal in retaliation for the loss of a kinsman4 ,vengeance having been thus taken1 they swear not to attack another tiger except under similar provocation4 ,the ,indians of ,carolina would not molest snakes when they came upon them1 but would pass by on the other side of the path1 believing that if they were to kill a serpent1 the reptile's kindred would destroy some of their brethren1 friends1 or relations in return4 ,so the ,seminole ,indians spared the rattlesnake1 because they feared that the soul of the dead rattlesnake would incite its kinsfolk to take vengeance4 ,the ,cherokee regard the rattlesnake as the chief of the snake tribe and fear and respect him accordingly4 ,few ,cherokee will venture to kill a rattlesnake1 unless they cannot help it1 and even then they must atone for the crime by craving pardon of the snake's ghost either in their own person or through the mediation of a priest1 according to a set formula4 ,if these precautions are neglected1 the kinsfolk of the dead snake will send one of their number as an avenger of blood1 who will track down the murderer and sting him to death4 ,no ordinary ,cherokee dares to kill a wolf1 if he can possibly help it2 for he believes that the kindred of the slain beast would surely avenge its death1 and that the weapon with which the deed had been done would be quite useless for the future1 unless it were cleaned and exorcised by a medicine-man4 ,however1 certain persons who know the proper rites of atonement for such a crime can kill wolves with impunity1 and they are sometimes hired to do so by people who have suffered from the raids of the wolves on their cattle or fish-traps4 ,in ,jebel-,nuba1 a district of the ,eastern ,sudan1 it is forbidden to touch the nests or remove the young of a species of black birds1 resembling our blackbirds1 because the people believe that the parent birds would avenge the wrong by causing a stormy wind to blow1 which would destroy the harvest4 ,but the savage clearly cannot afford to spare all animals4 ,he must either eat some of them or starve1 and when the question thus comes to be whether he or the animal must perish1 he is forced to overcome his superstitious scruples and take the life of the beast4 ,at the same time he does all he can to appease his victims and their kinsfolk4 ,even in the act of killing them he testifies his respect for them1 endeavours to excuse or even conceal his share in procuring their death1 and promises that their remains will be honourably treated4 ,by thus robbing death of its terrors1 he hopes to reconcile his victims to their fate and to induce their fellows to come and be killed also4 ,for example1 it was a principle with the ,kamtchatkans never to kill a land or sea animal without first making excuses to it and begging that the animal would not take it ill4 ,also they offered it cedarnuts and so forth1 to make it think that it was not a victim but a guest at a feast4 ,they believed that this hindered other animals of the same species from growing shy4 ,for instance1 after they had killed a bear and feasted on its flesh1 the host would bring the bear's head before the company1 wrap it in grass1 and present it with a variety of trifles4 ,then he would lay the blame of the bear's death on the ,russians1 and bid the beast wreak his wrath upon them4 ,also he would ask the bear to inform the other bears how well he had been treated1 that they too might come without fear4 ,seals1 sea-lions1 and other animals were treated by the ,kamtchatkans with the same ceremonious respect4 ,moreover1 they used to insert sprigs of a plant resembling bear's wort in the mouths of the animals they killed2 after which they would exhort the grinning skulls to have no fear but to go and tell it to their fellows1 that they also might come and be caught and so partake of this splendid hospitality4 ,when the ,ostiaks have hunted and killed a bear1 they cut off its head and hang it on a tree4 ,then they gather round in a circle and pay it divine honours4 ,next they run towards the carcase uttering lamentations and saying1 ,who killed you8 ,it was the ,russians4 ,who cut off your head8 ,it was a ,russian axe4 ,who skinned you8 ,it was a knife made by a ,russian4 ,they explain1 too1 that the feathers which sped the arrow on its flight came from the wing of a strange bird1 and that they did nothing but let the arrow go4 ,they do all this because they believe that the wandering ghost of the slain bear would attack them on the first opportunity1 if they did not thus appease it4 ,or they stuff the skin of the slain bear with hay2 and after celebrating their victory with songs of mockery and insult1 after spitting on and kicking it1 they set it up on its hind legs1 and then1 for a considerable time1 they bestow on it all the veneration due to a guardian god4 ,when a party of ,koryak have killed a bear or a wolf1 they skin the beast and dress one of themselves in the skin4 ,then they dance round the skin-clad man1 saying that it was not they who killed the animal1 but some one else1 generally a ,russian4 ,when they kill a fox they skin it1 wrap the body in grass1 and bid him go tell his companions how hospitably he has been received1 and how he has received a new cloak instead of his old one4 ,a fuller account of the ,koryak ceremonies is given by a more recent writer4 ,he tells us that when a dead bear is brought to the house1 the women come out to meet it1 dancing with firebrands4 ,the bear-skin is taken off along with the head2 and one of the women puts on the skin1 dances in it1 and entreats the bear not to be angry1 but to be kind to the people4 ,at the same time they offer meat on a wooden platter to the dead beast1 saying1 ,eat1 friend4 ,afterwards a ceremony is performed for the purpose of sending the dead bear1 or rather his spirit1 away back to his home4 ,he is provided with provisions for the journey in the shape of puddings or reindeer-flesh packed in a grass bag4 ,his skin is stuffed with grass and carried round the house1 after which he is supposed to depart towards the rising sun4 ,the intention of the ceremonies is to protect the people from the wrath of the slain bear and his kinsfolk1 and so to ensure success in future bear-hunts4 ,the ,finns used to try to persuade a slain bear that he had not been killed by them1 but had fallen from a tree1 or met his death in some other way2 moreover1 they held a funeral festival in his honour1 at the close of which bards expatiated on the homage that had been paid to him1 urging him to report to the other bears the high consideration with which he had been treated1 in order that they also1 following his example1 might come and be slain4 ,when the ,lapps had succeeded in killing a bear with impunity1 they thanked him for not hurting them and for not breaking the clubs and spears which had given him his death wounds2 and they prayed that he would not visit his death upon them by sending storms or in any other way4 ,his flesh then furnished a feast4 ,the reverence of hunters for the bear whom they regularly kill and eat may thus be traced all along the northern region of the ,old ,world from ,bering's ,straits to ,lappland4 ,it reappears in similar forms in ,north ,america4 ,with the ,american ,indians a bear hunt was an important event for which they prepared by long fasts and purgations4 ,before setting out they offered expiatory sacrifices to the souls of bears slain in previous hunts1 and besought them to be favourable to the hunters4 ,when a bear was killed the hunter lit his pipe1 and putting the mouth of it between the bear's lips1 blew into the bowl1 filling the beast's mouth with smoke4 ,then he begged the bear not to be angry at having been killed1 and not to thwart him afterwards in the chase4 ,the carcase was roasted whole and eaten2 not a morsel of the flesh might be left over4 ,the head1 painted red and blue1 was hung on a post and addressed by orators1 who heaped praise on the dead beast4 ,when men of the ,bear clan in the ,ottawa tribe killed a bear1 they made him a feast of his own flesh1 and addressed him thus3 ,cherish us no grudge because we have killed you4 ,you have sense2 you see that our children are hungry4 ,they love you and wish to take you into their bodies4 ,is it not glorious to be eaten by the children of a chief8 ,amongst the ,nootka ,indians of ,british ,columbia1 when a bear had been killed1 it was brought in and seated before the head chief in an upright posture1 with a chief's bonnet1 wrought in figures1 on its head1 and its fur powdered over with white down4 ,a tray of provisions was then set before it1 and it was invited by words and gestures to eat4 ,after that the animal was skinned1 boiled1 and eaten4 ,a like respect is testified for other dangerous creatures by the hunters who regularly trap and kill them4 ,when ,caffre hunters are in the act of showering spears on an elephant1 they call out1 ,don't kill us1 great captain2 don't strike or tread upon us1 mighty chief4 ,when he is dead they make their excuses to him1 pretending that his death was a pure accident4 ,as a mark of respect they bury his trunk with much solemn ceremony2 for they say that the elephant is a great lord2 his trunk is his hand4 ,before the ,amaxosa ,caffres attack an elephant they shout to the animal and beg him to pardon them for the slaughter they are about to perpetrate1 professing great submission to his person and explaining clearly the need they have of his tusks to enable them to procure beads and supply their wants4 ,when they have killed him they bury in the ground1 along with the end of his trunk1 a few of the articles they have obtained for the ivory1 thus hoping to avert some mishap that would otherwise befall them4 ,amongst some tribes of ,eastern ,africa1 when a lion is killed1 the carcase is brought before the king1 who does homage to it by prostrating himself on the ground and rubbing his face on the muzzle of the beast4 ,in some parts of ,western ,africa if a negro kills a leopard he is bound fast and brought before the chiefs for having killed one of their peers4 ,the man defends himself on the plea that the leopard is chief of the forest and therefore a stranger4 ,he is then set at liberty and rewarded4 ,but the dead leopard1 adorned with a chief's bonnet1 is set up in the village1 where nightly dances are held in its honour4 ,the ,baganda greatly fear the ghosts of buffaloes which they have killed1 and they always appease these dangerous spirits4 ,on no account will they bring the head of a slain buffalo into a village or into a garden of plantains3 they always eat the flesh of the head in the open country4 ,afterwards they place the skull in a small hut built for the purpose1 where they pour out beer as an offering and pray to the ghost to stay where he is and not to harm them4 ,another formidable beast whose life the savage hunter takes with joy1 yet with fear and trembling1 is the whale4 ,after the slaughter of a whale the maritime ,koryak of ,north-eastern ,siberia hold a communal festival1 the essential part of which is based on the conception that the whale killed has come on a visit to the village2 that it is staying for some time1 during which it is treated with great respect2 that it then returns to the sea to repeat its visit the following year2 that it will induce its relatives to come along1 telling them of the hospitable reception that has been accorded to it4 ,according to the ,koryak ideas1 the whales1 like all other animals1 constitute one tribe1 or rather family1 of related individuals1 who live in villages like the ,koryak4 ,they avenge the murder of one of their number1 and are grateful for kindnesses that they may have received4 ,when the inhabitants of the ,isle of ,st4 ,mary1 to the north of ,madagascar1 go a-whaling1 they single out the young whales for attack and humbly beg the mother's pardon1 stating the necessity that drives them to kill her progeny1 and requesting that she will be pleased to go below while the deed is doing1 that her maternal feelings may not be outraged by witnessing what must cause her so much uneasiness4 ,an ,ajumba hunter having killed a female hippopotamus on ,lake ,azyingo in ,west ,africa1 the animal was decapitated and its quarters and bowels removed4 ,then the hunter1 naked1 stepped into the hollow of the ribs1 and kneeling down in the bloody pool washed his whole body with the blood and excretions of the animal1 while he prayed to the soul of the hippopotamus not to bear him a grudge for having killed her and so blighted her hopes of future maternity2 and he further entreated the ghost not to stir up other hippopotamuses to avenge her death by butting at and capsizing his canoe4 ,the ounce1 a leopard-like creature1 is dreaded for its depredations by the ,indians of ,brazil4 ,when they have caught one of these animals in a snare1 they kill it and carry the body home to the village4 ,there the women deck the carcase with feathers of many colours1 put bracelets on its legs1 and weep over it1 saying1 ,i pray thee not to take vengeance on our little ones for having been caught and killed through thine own ignorance4 ,for it was not we who deceived thee1 it was thyself4 ,our husbands only set the trap to catch animals that are good to eat2 they never thought to take thee in it4 ,therefore1 let not thy soul counsel thy fellows to avenge thy death on our little ones6 ,when a ,blackfoot ,indian has caught eagles in a trap and killed them1 he takes them home to a special lodge1 called the eagles' lodge1 which has been prepared for their reception outside of the camp4 ,here he sets the birds in a row on the ground1 and propping up their heads on a stick1 puts a piece of dried meat in each of their mouths in order that the spirits of the dead eagles may go and tell the other eagles how well they are being treated by the ,indians4 ,so when ,indian hunters of the ,orinoco region have killed an animal1 they open its mouth and pour into it a few drops of the liquor they generally carry with them1 in order that the soul of the dead beast may inform its fellows of the welcome it has met with1 and that they too1 cheered by the prospect of the same kind reception1 may come with alacrity to be killed4 ,when a ,teton ,indian is on a journey1 and he meets a grey spider or a spider with yellow legs1 he kills it1 because some evil would befall him if he did not4 ,but he is very careful not to let the spider know that he kills it1 for if the spider knew1 his soul would go and tell the other spiders1 and one of them would be sure to avenge the death of his relation4 ,so in crushing the insect1 the ,indian says1 ,o ,grandfather ,spider1 the ,thunder-beings kill you4 ,and the spider is crushed at once and believes what is told him4 ,his soul probably runs and tells the other spiders that the ,thunder-beings have killed him2 but no harm comes of that4 ,for what can grey or yellow-legged spiders do to the ,thunder-beings8 ,but it is not merely dangerous creatures with whom the savage desires to keep on good terms4 ,it is true that the respect which he pays to wild beasts is in some measure proportioned to their strength and ferocity4 ,thus the savage ,stiens of ,cambodia1 believing that all animals have souls which roam about after their death1 beg an animal's pardon when they kill it1 lest its soul should come and torment them4 ,also they offer it sacrifices1 but these sacrifices are proportioned to the size and strength of the animal4 ,the ceremonies which they observe at the death of an elephant are conducted with much pomp and last seven days4 ,similar distinctions are drawn by ,north ,american ,indians4 ,the bear1 the buffalo1 and the beaver are manidos divinities which furnish food4 ,the bear is formidable1 and good to eat4 ,they render ceremonies to him1 begging him to allow himself to be eaten1 although they know he has no fancy for it4 ,we kill you1 but you are not annihilated4 ,his head and paws are objects of homage4 4 4 4 ,other animals are treated similarly from similar reasons4 4 4 4 ,many of the animal manidos1 not being dangerous1 are often treated with contempt--the terrapin1 the weasel1 polecat1 etc4 ,the distinction is instructive4 ,animals which are feared1 or are good to eat1 or both1 are treated with ceremonious respect2 those which are neither formidable nor good to eat are despised4 ,we have had examples of reverence paid to animals which are both feared and eaten4 ,it remains to prove that similar respect is shown to animals which1 without being feared1 are either eaten or valued for their skins4 ,when ,siberian sable-hunters have caught a sable1 no one is allowed to see it1 and they think that if good or evil be spoken of the captured sable no more sables will be caught4 ,a hunter has been known to express his belief that the sables could hear what was said of them as far off as ,moscow4 ,he said that the chief reason why the sable hunt was now so unproductive was that some live sables had been sent to ,moscow4 ,there they had been viewed with astonishment as strange animals1 and the sables cannot abide that4 ,another1 though minor1 cause of the diminished take of sables was1 he alleged1 that the world is now much worse than it used to be1 so that nowadays a hunter will sometimes hide the sable which he has got instead of putting it into the common stock4 ,this also1 said he1 the sables cannot abide4 ,alaskan hunters preserve the bones of sables and beavers out of reach of the dogs for a year and then bury them carefully1 lest the spirits who look after the beavers and sables should consider that they are regarded with contempt1 and hence no more should be killed or trapped4 ,the ,canadian ,indians were equally particular not to let their dogs gnaw the bones1 or at least certain of the bones1 of beavers4 ,they took the greatest pains to collect and preserve these bones1 and1 when the beaver had been caught in a net1 they threw them into the river4 ,to a ,jesuit who argued that the beavers could not possibly know what became of their bones1 the ,indians replied1 ,you know nothing about catching beavers and yet you will be prating about it4 ,before the beaver is stone dead1 his soul takes a turn in the hut of the man who is killing him and makes a careful note of what is done with his bones4 ,if the bones are given to the dogs1 the other beavers would get word of it and would not let themselves be caught4 ,whereas1 if their bones are thrown into the fire or a river1 they are quite satisfied2 and it is particularly gratifying to the net which caught them4 ,before hunting the beaver they offered a solemn prayer to the ,great ,beaver1 and presented him with tobacco2 and when the chase was over1 an orator pronounced a funeral oration over the dead beavers4 ,he praised their spirit and wisdom4 ,you will hear no more1 said he1 the voice of the chieftains who commanded you and whom you chose from among all the warrior beavers to give you laws4 ,your language1 which the medicine-men understand perfectly1 will be heard no more at the bottom of the lake4 ,you will fight no more battles with the otters1 your cruel foes4 ,no1 beavers6 ,but your skins shall serve to buy arms2 we will carry your smoked hams to our children2 we will keep the dogs from eating your bones1 which are so hard4 ,the elan1 deer1 and elk were treated by the ,american ,indians with the same punctilious respect1 and for the same reason4 ,their bones might not be given to the dogs nor thrown into the fire1 nor might their fat be dropped upon the fire1 because the souls of the dead animals were believed to see what was done to their bodies and to tell it to the other beasts1 living and dead4 ,hence1 if their bodies were illused1 the animals of that species would not allow themselves to be taken1 neither in this world nor in the world to come4 ,among the ,chiquites of ,paraguay a sick man would be asked by the medicine-man whether he had not thrown away some of the flesh of the deer or turtle1 and if he answered yes1 the medicine-man would say1 ,that is what is killing you4 ,the soul of the deer or turtle has entered into your body to avenge the wrong you did it4 ,the ,canadian ,indians would not eat the embryos of the elk1 unless at the close of the hunting season2 otherwise the mother-elks would be shy and refuse to be caught4 ,in the ,timor-laut islands of the ,indian ,archipelago the skulls of all the turtles which a fisherman has caught are hung up under his house4 ,before he goes out to catch another1 he addresses himself to the skull of the last turtle that he killed1 and having inserted betel between its jaws1 he prays the spirit of the dead animal to entice its kinsfolk in the sea to come and be caught4 ,in the ,poso district of ,central ,celebes hunters keep the jawbones of deer and wild pigs which they have killed and hang them up in their houses near the fire4 ,then they say to the jawbones1 ,ye cry after your comrades1 that your grandfathers1 or nephews1 or children may not go away4 ,their notion is that the souls of the dead deer and pigs tarry near their jawbones and attract the souls of living deer and pigs1 which are thus drawn into the toils of the hunter4 ,thus the wily savage employs dead animals as decoys to lure living animals to their doom4 ,the ,lengua ,indians of the ,gran ,chaco love to hunt the ostrich1 but when they have killed one of these birds and are bringing home the carcase to the village1 they take steps to outwit the resentful ghost of their victim4 ,they think that when the first natural shock of death is passed1 the ghost of the ostrich pulls himself together and makes after his body4 ,acting on this sage calculation1 the ,indians pluck feathers from the breast of the bird and strew them at intervals along the track4 ,at every bunch of feathers the ghost stops to consider1 ,is this the whole of my body or only a part of it8 ,the doubt gives him pause1 and when at last he has made up his mind fully at all the bunches1 and has further wasted valuable time by the zigzag course which he invariably pursues in going from one to another1 the hunters are safe at home1 and the bilked ghost may stalk in vain round about the village1 which he is too timid to enter4 ,the ,esquimaux about ,bering ,strait believe that the souls of dead sea-beasts1 such as seals1 walrus1 and whales1 remain attached to their bladders1 and that by returning the bladders to the sea they can cause the souls to be reincarnated in fresh bodies and so multiply the game which the hunters pursue and kill4 ,acting on this belief every hunter carefully removes and preserves the bladders of all the sea-beasts that he kills2 and at a solemn festival held once a year in winter these bladders1 containing the souls of all the sea-beasts that have been killed throughout the year1 are honoured with dances and offerings of food in the public assembly-room1 after which they are taken out on the ice and thrust through holes into the water2 for the simple ,esquimaux imagine that the souls of the animals1 in high good humour at the kind treatment they have experienced1 will thereafter be born again as seals1 walrus1 and whales1 and in that form will flock willingly to be again speared1 harpooned1 or otherwise done to death by the hunters4 ,for like reasons1 a tribe which depends for its subsistence1 chiefly or in part1 upon fishing is careful to treat the fish with every mark of honour and respect4 ,the ,indians of ,peru adored the fish that they caught in greatest abundance2 for they said that the first fish that was made in the world above 7for so they named ,heaven7 gave birth to all other fish of that species1 and took care to send them plenty of its children to sustain their tribe4 ,for this reason they worshipped sardines in one region1 where they killed more of them than of any other fish2 in others1 the skate2 in others1 the dogfish2 in others1 the golden fish for its beauty2 in others1 the crawfish2 in others1 for want of larger gods1 the crabs1 where they had no other fish1 or where they knew not how to catch and kill them4 ,in short1 they had whatever fish was most serviceable to them as their gods4 ,the ,kwakiutl ,indians of ,british ,columbia think that when a salmon is killed its soul returns to the salmon country4 ,hence they take care to throw the bones and offal into the sea1 in order that the soul may reanimate them at the resurrection of the salmon4 ,whereas if they burned the bones the soul would be lost1 and so it would be quite impossible for that salmon to rise from the dead4 ,in like manner the ,ottawa ,indians of ,canada1 believing that the souls of dead fish passed into other bodies of fish1 never burned fish bones1 for fear of displeasing the souls of the fish1 who would come no more to the nets4 ,the ,hurons also refrained from throwing fish bones into the fire1 lest the souls of the fish should go and warn the other fish not to let themselves be caught1 since the ,hurons would burn their bones4 ,moreover1 they had men who preached to the fish and persuaded them to come and be caught4 ,a good preacher was much sought after1 for they thought that the exhortations of a clever man had a great effect in drawing the fish to the nets4 ,in the ,huron fishing village where the ,french missionary ,sagard stayed1 the preacher to the fish prided himself very much on his eloquence1 which was of a florid order4 ,every evening after supper1 having seen that all the people were in their places and that a strict silence was observed1 he preached to the fish4 ,his text was that the ,hurons did not burn fish bones4 ,then enlarging on this theme with extraordinary unction1 he exhorted and conjured and invited and implored the fish to come and be caught and to be of good courage and to fear nothing1 for it was all to serve their friends who honoured them and did not burn their bones4 ,the natives of the ,duke of ,york ,island annually decorate a canoe with flowers and ferns1 lade it1 or are supposed to lade it1 with shell-money1 and set it adrift to compensate the fish for their fellows who have been caught and eaten4 ,it is especially necessary to treat the first fish caught with consideration in order to conciliate the rest of the fish1 whose conduct may be supposed to be influenced by the reception given to those of their kind which were the first to be taken4 ,accordingly the ,maoris always put back into the sea the first fish caught1 with a prayer that it may tempt other fish to come and be caught4 ,still more stringent are the precautions taken when the fish are the first of the season4 ,on salmon rivers1 when the fish begin to run up the stream in spring1 they are received with much deference by tribes who1 like the ,indians of the ,pacific ,coast of ,north ,america1 subsist largely upon a fish diet4 ,in ,british ,columbia the ,indians used to go out to meet the first fish as they came up the river3 ,they paid court to them1 and would address them thus3 ',you fish1 you fish2 you are all chiefs1 you are2 you are all chiefs4' ,amongst the ,tlingit of ,alaska the first halibut of the season is carefully handled and addressed as a chief1 and a festival is given in his honour1 after which the fishing goes on4 ,in spring1 when the winds blow soft from the south and the salmon begin to run up the ,klamath river1 the ,karoks of ,california dance for salmon1 to ensure a good catch4 ,one of the ,indians1 called the ,kareya or ,god-man1 retires to the mountains and fasts for ten days4 ,on his return the people flee1 while he goes to the river1 takes the first salmon of the catch1 eats some of it1 and with the rest kindles the sacred fire in the sweating house4 ,no ,indian may take a salmon before this dance is held1 nor for ten days after it1 even if his family are starving4 ,the ,karoks also believe that a fisherman will take no salmon if the poles of which his spearing-booth is made were gathered on the river-side1 where the salmon might have seen them4 ,the poles must be brought from the top of the highest mountain4 ,the fisherman will also labour in vain if he uses the same poles a second year in booths or weirs1 because the old salmon will have told the young ones about them4 ,there is a favourite fish of the ,aino which appears in their rivers about ,may and ,june4 ,they prepare for the fishing by observing rules of ceremonial purity1 and when they have gone out to fish1 the women at home must keep strict silence or the fish would hear them and disappear4 ,when the first fish is caught he is brought home and passed through a small opening at the end of the hut1 but not through the door2 for if he were passed through the door1 the other fish would certainly see him and disappear4 ,this may partly explain the custom observed by other savages of bringing game in certain cases into their huts1 not by the door1 but by the window1 the smoke-hole1 or by a special opening at the back of the hut4 ,with some savages a special reason for respecting the bones of game1 and generally of the animals which they eat1 is a belief that1 if the bones are preserved1 they will in course of time be reclothed with flesh1 and thus the animal will come to life again4 ,it is1 therefore1 clearly for the interest of the hunter to leave the bones intact since to destroy them would be to diminish the future supply of game4 ,many of the ,minnetaree ,indians believe that the bones of those bisons which they have slain and divested of flesh rise again clothed with renewed flesh1 and quickened with life1 and become fat1 and fit for slaughter the succeeding ,june4 ,hence on the western prairies of ,america1 the skulls of buffaloes may be seen arranged in circles and symmetrical piles1 awaiting the resurrection4 ,after feasting on a dog1 the ,dacotas carefully collect the bones1 scrape1 wash1 and bury them1 partly1 as it is said1 to testify to the dog-species1 that in feasting upon one of their number no disrespect was meant to the species itself1 and partly also from a belief that the bones of the animal will rise and reproduce another4 ,in sacrificing an animal the ,lapps regularly put aside the bones1 eyes1 ears1 heart1 lungs1 sexual parts 7if the animal was a male71 and a morsel of flesh from each limb4 ,then1 after eating the remainder of the flesh1 they laid the bones and the rest in anatomical order in a coffin and buried them with the usual rites1 believing that the god to whom the animal was sacrificed would reclothe the bones with flesh and restore the animal to life in ,jabme-,aimo1 the subterranean world of the dead4 ,sometimes1 as after feasting on a bear1 they seem to have contented themselves with thus burying the bones4 ,thus the ,lapps expected the resurrection of the slain animal to take place in another world1 resembling in this respect the ,kamtchatkans1 who believed that every creature1 down to the smallest fly1 would rise from the dead and live underground4 ,on the other hand1 the ,north ,american ,indians looked for the resurrection of the animals in the present world4 ,the habit1 observed especially by ,mongolian peoples1 of stuffing the skin of a sacrificed animal1 or stretching it on a framework1 points rather to a belief in a resurrection of the latter sort4 ,the objection commonly entertained by primitive peoples to break the bones of the animals which they have eaten or sacrificed may be based either on a belief in the resurrection of the animals1 or on a fear of intimidating other creatures of the same species and offending the ghosts of the slain animals4 ,the reluctance of ,north ,american ,indians and ,esquimaux to let dogs gnaw the bones of animals is perhaps only a precaution to prevent the bones from being broken4 ,but after all the resurrection of dead game may have its inconveniences1 and accordingly some hunters take steps to prevent it by hamstringing the animal so as to prevent it or its ghost from getting up and running away4 ,this is the motive alleged for the practice by ,koui hunters in ,laos2 they think that the spells which they utter in the chase may lose their magical virtue1 and that the slaughtered animal may consequently come to life again and escape4 ,to prevent that catastrophe they therefore hamstring the beast as soon as they have butchered it4 ,when an ,esquimau of ,alaska has killed a fox1 he carefully cuts the tendons of all the animal's legs in order to prevent the ghost from reanimating the body and walking about4 ,but hamstringing the carcase is not the only measure which the prudent savage adopts for the sake of disabling the ghost of his victim4 ,in old days1 when the ,aino went out hunting and killed a fox first1 they took care to tie its mouth up tightly in order to prevent the ghost of the animal from sallying forth and warning its fellows against the approach of the hunter4 ,the ,gilyaks of the ,amoor ,river put out the eyes of the seals they have killed1 lest the ghosts of the slain animals should know their slayers and avenge their death by spoiling the seal-hunt4 ,besides the animals which primitive man dreads for their strength and ferocity1 and those which he reveres on account of the benefits which he expects from them1 there is another class of creatures which he sometimes deems it necessary to conciliate by worship and sacrifice4 ,these are the vermin that infest his crops and his cattle4 ,to rid himself of these deadly foes the farmer has recourse to many superstitious devices1 of which1 though some are meant to destroy or intimidate the vermin1 others aim at propitiating them and persuading them by fair means to spare the fruits of the earth and the herds4 ,thus ,esthonian peasants1 in the island of ,oesel1 stand in great awe of the weevil1 an insect which is exceedingly destructive to the grain4 ,they give it a fine name1 and if a child is about to kill a weevil they say1 ,don't do it2 the more we hurt him1 the more he hurts us4 ,if they find a weevil they bury it in the earth instead of killing it4 ,some even put the weevil under a stone in the field and offer corn to it4 ,they think that thus it is appeased and does less harm4 ,amongst the ,saxons of ,transylvania1 in order to keep sparrows from the corn1 the sower begins by throwing the first handful of seed backwards over his head1 saying1 ,that is for you1 sparrows4 ,to guard the corn against the attacks of leaf-flies he shuts his eyes and scatters three handfuls of oats in different directions4 ,having made this offering to the leaf-flies he feels sure that they will spare the corn4 ,a ,transylvanian way of securing the crops against all birds1 beasts1 and insects1 is this3 after he has finished sowing1 the sower goes once more from end to end of the field imitating the gesture of sowing1 but with an empty hand4 ,as he does so he says1 ,i sow this for the animals2 ,i sow it for every thing that flies and creeps1 that walks and stands1 that sings and springs1 in the name of ,god the ,father1 etc4 ,the following is a ,german way of freeing a garden from caterpillars4 ,after sunset or at midnight the mistress of the house1 or another female member of the family1 walks all round the garden dragging a broom after her4 ,she may not look behind her1 and must keep murmuring1 ,good evening1 ,mother ,caterpillar1 you shall come with your husband to church4 ,the garden gate is left open till the following morning4 ,sometimes in dealing with vermin the farmer aims at hitting a happy mean between excessive rigour on the one hand and weak indulgence on the other2 kind but firm1 he tempers severity with mercy4 ,an ancient ,greek treatise on farming advises the husbandman who would rid his lands of mice to act thus3 ,take a sheet of paper and write on it as follows3 ',i adjure you1 ye mice here present1 that ye neither injure me nor suffer another mouse to do so4 ,i give you yonder field' 7here you specify the field72 'but if ever ,i catch you here again1 by the ,mother of the ,gods ,i will rend you in seven pieces4' ,write this1 and stick the paper on an unhewn stone in the field before sunrise1 taking care to keep the written side up4 ,in the ,ardennes they say that to get rid of rats you should repeat the following words3 ,erat verbum1 apud ,deum vestrum4 ,male rats and female rats1 ,i conjure you1 by the great ,god1 to go out of my house1 out of all my habitations1 and to betake yourselves to such and such a place1 there to end your days4 ,decretis1 reversis et desembarassis virgo potens1 clemens1 justitiae4 ,then write the same words on pieces of paper1 fold them up1 and place one of them under the door by which the rats are to go forth1 and the other on the road which they are to take4 ,this exorcism should be performed at sunrise4 ,some years ago an ,american farmer was reported to have written a civil letter to the rats1 telling them that his crops were short1 that he could not afford to keep them through the winter1 that he had been very kind to them1 and that for their own good he thought they had better leave him and go to some of his neighbours who had more grain4 ,this document he pinned to a post in his barn for the rats to read4 ,sometimes the desired object is supposed to be attained by treating with high distinction one or two chosen individuals of the obnoxious species1 while the rest are pursued with relentless rigour4 ,in the ,east ,indian island of ,bali1 the mice which ravage the rice-fields are caught in great numbers1 and burned in the same way that corpses are burned4 ,but two of the captured mice are allowed to live1 and receive a little packet of white linen4 ,then the people bow down before them1 as before gods1 and let them go4 ,when the farms of the ,sea ,dyaks or ,ibans of ,sarawak are much pestered by birds and insects1 they catch a specimen of each kind of vermin 7one sparrow1 one grasshopper1 and so on71 put them in a tiny boat of bark well-stocked with provisions1 and then allow the little vessel with its obnoxious passengers to float down the river4 ,if that does not drive the pests away1 the ,dyaks resort to what they deem a more effectual mode of accomplishing the same purpose4 ,they make a clay crocodile as large as life and set it up in the fields1 where they offer it food1 rice-spirit1 and cloth1 and sacrifice a fowl and a pig before it4 ,mollified by these attentions1 the ferocious animal very soon gobbles up all the creatures that devour the crops4 ,in ,albania1 if the fields or vineyards are ravaged by locusts or beetles1 some of the women will assemble with dishevelled hair1 catch a few of the insects1 and march with them in a funeral procession to a spring or stream1 in which they drown the creatures4 ,then one of the women sings1 ,o locusts and beetles who have left us bereaved1 and the dirge is taken up and repeated by all the women in chorus4 ,thus by celebrating the obsequies of a few locusts and beetles1 they hope to bring about the death of them all4 ,when caterpillars invaded a vineyard or field in ,syria1 the virgins were gathered1 and one of the caterpillars was taken and a girl made its mother4 ,then they bewailed and buried it4 ,thereafter they conducted the mother to the place where the caterpillars were1 consoling her1 in order that all the caterpillars might leave the garden4 ,,liv4 ,types of ,animal ,sacrament #a4 ,the ,egyptian and the ,aino ,types of ,sacrament ,,we are now perhaps in a position to understand the ambiguous behaviour of the ,aino and ,gilyaks towards the bear4 ,it has been shown that the sharp line of demarcation which we draw between mankind and the lower animals does not exist for the savage4 ,to him many of the other animals appear as his equals or even his superiors1 not merely in brute force but in intelligence2 and if choice or necessity leads him to take their lives1 he feels bound1 out of regard to his own safety1 to do it in a way which will be as inoffensive as possible not merely to the living animal1 but to its departed spirit and to all the other animals of the same species1 which would resent an affront put upon one of their kind much as a tribe of savages would revenge an injury or insult offered to a tribesman4 ,we have seen that among the many devices by which the savage seeks to atone for the wrong done by him to his animal victims one is to show marked deference to a few chosen individuals of the species1 for such behaviour is apparently regarded as entitling him to exterminate with impunity all the rest of the species upon which he can lay hands4 ,this principle perhaps explains the attitude1 at first sight puzzling and contradictory1 of the ,aino towards the bear4 ,the flesh and skin of the bear regularly afford them food and clothing2 but since the bear is an intelligent and powerful animal1 it is necessary to offer some satisfaction or atonement to the bear species for the loss which it sustains in the death of so many of its members4 ,this satisfaction or atonement is made by rearing young bears1 treating them1 so long as they live1 with respect1 and killing them with extraordinary marks of sorrow and devotion4 ,so the other bears are appeased1 and do not resent the slaughter of their kind by attacking the slayers or deserting the country1 which would deprive the ,aino of one of their means of subsistence4 ,thus the primitive worship of animals conforms to two types1 which are in some respects the converse of each other4 ,on the one hand1 animals are worshipped1 and are therefore neither killed nor eaten4 ,on the other hand1 animals are worshipped because they are habitually killed and eaten4 ,in both types of worship the animal is revered on account of some benefit1 positive or negative1 which the savage hopes to receive from it4 ,in the former worship the benefit comes either in the positive shape of protection1 advice1 and help which the animal affords the man1 or in the negative shape of abstinence from injuries which it is in the power of the animal to inflict4 ,in the latter worship the benefit takes the material form of the animal's flesh and skin4 ,the two types of worship are in some measure antithetical3 in the one1 the animal is not eaten because it is revered2 in the other1 it is revered because it is eaten4 ,but both may be practised by the same people1 as we see in the case of the ,north ,american ,indians1 who1 while they apparently revere and spare their totem animals1 also revere the animals and fish upon which they subsist4 ,the aborigines of ,australia have totemism in the most primitive form known to us2 but there is no clear evidence that they attempt1 like the ,north ,american ,indians1 to conciliate the animals which they kill and eat4 ,the means which the ,australians adopt to secure a plentiful supply of game appear to be primarily based1 not on conciliation1 but on sympathetic magic1 a principle to which the ,north ,american ,indians also resort for the same purpose4 ,hence1 as the ,australians undoubtedly represent a ruder and earlier stage of human progress than the ,american ,indians1 it would seem that before hunters think of worshipping the game as a means of ensuring an abundant supply of it1 they seek to attain the same end by sympathetic magic4 ,this1 again1 would show--what there is good reason for believing--that sympathetic magic is one of the earliest means by which man endeavours to adapt the agencies of nature to his needs4 ,corresponding to the two distinct types of animal worship1 there are two distinct types of the custom of killing the animal god4 ,on the one hand1 when the revered animal is habitually spared1 it is nevertheless killed--and sometimes eaten--on rare and solemn occasions4 ,examples of this custom have been already given and an explanation of them offered4 ,on the other hand1 when the revered animal is habitually killed1 the slaughter of any one of the species involves the killing of the god1 and is atoned for on the spot by apologies and sacrifices1 especially when the animal is a powerful and dangerous one2 and1 in addition to this ordinary and everyday atonement1 there is a special annual atonement1 at which a select individual of the species is slain with extraordinary marks of respect and devotion4 ,clearly the two types of sacramental killing--the ,egyptian and the ,aino types1 as we may call them for distinction--are liable to be confounded by an observer2 and1 before we can say to which type any particular example belongs1 it is necessary to ascertain whether the animal sacramentally slain belongs to a species which is habitually spared1 or to one which is habitually killed by the tribe4 ,in the former case the example belongs to the ,egyptian type of sacrament1 in the latter to the ,aino type4 ,the practice of pastoral tribes appears to furnish examples of both types of sacrament4 ,pastoral tribes1 says ,adolf ,bastian1 being sometimes obliged to sell their herds to strangers who may handle the bones disrespectfully1 seek to avert the danger which such a sacrilege would entail by consecrating one of the herd as an object of worship1 eating it sacramentally in the family circle with closed doors1 and afterwards treating the bones with all the ceremonious respect which1 strictly speaking1 should be accorded to every head of cattle1 but which1 being punctually paid to the representative animal1 is deemed to be paid to all4 ,such family meals are found among various peoples1 especially those of the ,caucasus4 ,when amongst the ,abchases the shepherds in spring eat their common meal with their loins girt and their staves in their hands1 this may be looked upon both as a sacrament and as an oath of mutual help and support4 ,for the strongest of all oaths is that which is accompanied with the eating of a sacred substance1 since the perjured person cannot possibly escape the avenging god whom he has taken into his body and assimilated4 ,this kind of sacrament is of the ,aino or expiatory type1 since it is meant to atone to the species for the possible ill-usage of individuals4 ,an expiation1 similar in principle but different in details1 is offered by the ,kalmucks to the sheep1 whose flesh is one of their staple foods4 ,rich ,kalmucks are in the habit of consecrating a white ram under the title of the ram of heaven or the ram of the spirit4 ,the animal is never shorn and never sold2 but when it grows old and its owner wishes to consecrate a new one1 the old ram must be killed and eaten at a feast to which the neighbours are invited4 ,on a lucky day1 generally in autumn when the sheep are fat1 a sorcerer kills the old ram1 after sprinkling it with milk4 ,its flesh is eaten2 the skeleton1 with a portion of the fat1 is burned on a turf altar2 and the skin1 with the head and feet1 is hung up4 ,an example of a sacrament of the ,egyptian type is furnished by the ,todas1 a pastoral people of ,southern ,india1 who subsist largely upon the milk of their buffaloes4 ,amongst them the buffalo is to a certain degree held sacred and is treated with great kindness1 even with a degree of adoration1 by the people4 ,they never eat the flesh of the cow buffalo1 and as a rule abstain from the flesh of the male4 ,but to the latter rule there is a single exception4 ,once a year all the adult males of the village join in the ceremony of killing and eating a very young male calf--seemingly under a month old4 ,they take the animal into the dark recesses of the village wood1 where it is killed with a club made from the sacred tree of the ,todas 7the ,millingtonia74 ,a sacred fire having been made by the rubbing of sticks1 the flesh of the calf is roasted on the embers of certain trees1 and is eaten by the men alone1 women being excluded from the assembly4 ,this is the only occasion on which the ,todas eat buffalo flesh4 ,the ,madi or ,moru tribe of ,central ,africa1 whose chief wealth is their cattle1 though they also practise agriculture1 appear to kill a lamb sacramentally on certain solemn occasions4 ,the custom is thus described by ,dr4 ,felkin3 ,a remarkable custom is observed at stated times--once a year1 ,i am led to believe4 ,i have not been able to ascertain what exact meaning is attached to it4 ,it appears1 however1 to relieve the people's minds1 for beforehand they evince much sadness1 and seem very joyful when the ceremony is duly accomplished4 ,the following is what takes place3 ,a large concourse of people of all ages assemble1 and sit down round a circle of stones1 which is erected by the side of a road 7really a narrow path74 ,a very choice lamb is then fetched by a boy1 who leads it four times round the assembled people4 ,as it passes they pluck off little bits of its fleece and place them in their hair1 or on to some other part of their body4 ,the lamb is then led up to the stones1 and there killed by a man belonging to a kind of priestly order1 who takes some of the blood and sprinkles it four times over the people4 ,he then applies it individually4 ,on the children he makes a small ring of blood over the lower end of the breast bone1 on women and girls he makes a mark above the breasts1 and the men he touches on each shoulder4 ,he then proceeds to explain the ceremony1 and to exhort the people to show kindness4 4 4 4 ,when this discourse1 which is at times of great length1 is over1 the people rise1 each places a leaf on or by the circle of stones1 and then they depart with signs of great joy4 ,the lamb's skull is hung on a tree near the stones1 and its flesh is eaten by the poor4 ,this ceremony is observed on a small scale at other times4 ,if a family is in any great trouble1 through illness or bereavement1 their friends and neighbours come together and a lamb is killed2 this is thought to avert further evil4 ,the same custom prevails at the grave of departed friends1 and also on joyful occasions1 such as the return of a son home after a very prolonged absence4 ,the sorrow thus manifested by the people at the annual slaughter of the lamb seems to show that the lamb slain is a sacred or divine animal1 whose death is mourned by his worshippers1 just as the death of the sacred buzzard was mourned by the ,californians and the death of the ,theban ram by the ,egyptians4 ,the smearing each of the worshippers with the blood of the lamb is a form of communion with the divinity2 the vehicle of the divine life is applied externally instead of being taken internally1 as when the blood is drunk or the flesh eaten4 #b4 ,processions with ,sacred ,animals ,,the ,,form of communion in which the sacred animal is taken from house to house1 that all may enjoy a share of its divine influence1 has been exemplified by the ,gilyak custom of promenading the bear through the village before it is slain4 ,a similar form of communion with the sacred snake is observed by a ,snake tribe in the ,punjaub4 ,once a year in the month of ,september the snake is worshipped by all castes and religions for nine days only4 ,at the end of ,august the ,mirasans1 especially those of the ,snake tribe1 make a snake of dough which they paint black and red1 and place on a winnowing basket4 ,this basket they carry round the village1 and on entering any house they say3 ,god be with you all6 ,may every ill be far6 ,may our patron's 7,gugga's7 word thrive6 ,then they present the basket with the snake1 saying3 ,a small cake of flour3 a little bit of butter3 if you obey the snake1 you and yours shall thrive6 ,strictly speaking1 a cake and butter should be given1 but it is seldom done4 ,every one1 however1 gives something1 generally a handful of dough or some corn4 ,in houses where there is a new bride or whence a bride has gone1 or where a son has been born1 it is usual to give a rupee and a quarter1 or some cloth4 ,sometimes the bearers of the snake also sing3 ,give the snake a piece of cloth1 and he will send a lively bride6 ,when every house has been thus visited1 the dough snake is buried and a small grave is erected over it4 ,thither during the nine days of ,september the women come to worship4 ,they bring a basin of curds1 a small portion of which they offer at the snake's grave1 kneeling on the ground and touching the earth with their foreheads4 ,then they go home and divide the rest of the curds among the children4 ,here the dough snake is clearly a substitute for a real snake4 ,indeed1 in districts where snakes abound the worship is offered1 not at the grave of the dough snake1 but in the jungles where snakes are known to be4 ,besides this yearly worship1 performed by all the people1 the members of the ,snake tribe worship in the same way every morning after a new moon4 ,the ,snake tribe is not uncommon in the ,punjaub4 ,members of it will not kill a snake1 and they say that its bite does not hurt them4 ,if they find a dead snake1 they put clothes on it and give it a regular funeral4 ,ceremonies closely analogous to this ,indian worship of the snake have survived in ,europe into recent times1 and doubtless date from a very primitive paganism4 ,the best-known example is the hunting of the wren4 ,by many ,european peoples--the ancient ,greeks and ,romans1 the modern ,italians1 ,spaniards1 ,french1 ,germans1 ,dutch1 ,danes1 ,swedes1 ,english1 and ,welsh--the wren has been designated the king1 the little king1 the king of birds1 the hedge king1 and so forth1 and has been reckoned amongst those birds which it is extremely unlucky to kill4 ,in ,england it is supposed that if any one kills a wren or harries its nest1 he will infallibly break a bone or meet with some dreadful misfortune within the year2 sometimes it is thought that the cows will give bloody milk4 ,in ,scotland the wren is called the ,lady of ,heaven's hen1 and boys say3 ,malisons1 malisons1 mair than ten1 ,that harry the ,ladye of ,heaven's hen6 ,at ,saint ,donan1 in ,brittany1 people believe that if children touch the young wrens in the nest1 they will suffer from the fire of ,st4 ,lawrence1 that is1 from pimples on the face1 legs1 and so on4 ,in other parts of ,france it is thought that if a person kills a wren or harries its nest1 his house will be struck by lightning1 or that the fingers with which he did the deed will shrivel up and drop off1 or at least be maimed1 or that his cattle will suffer in their feet4 ,notwithstanding such beliefs1 the custom of annually killing the wren has prevailed widely both in this country and in ,france4 ,in the ,isle of ,man down to the eighteenth century the custom was observed on ,christmas ,eve1 or rather ,christmas morning4 ,on the twenty-fourth of ,december1 towards evening1 all the servants got a holiday2 they did not go to bed all night1 but rambled about till the bells rang in all the churches at midnight4 ,when prayers were over1 they went to hunt the wren1 and having found one of these birds they killed it and fastened it to the top of a long pole with its wings extended4 ,thus they carried it in procession to every house chanting the following rhyme3 ,we hunted the wren for ,robin the ,bobbin1 ,we hunted the wren for ,jack of the ,can1 ,we hunted the wren for ,robin the ,bobbin1 ,we hunted the wren for every one4 ,when they had gone from house to house and collected all the money they could1 they laid the wren on a bier and carried it in procession to the parish churchyard1 where they made a grave and buried it with the utmost solemnity1 singing dirges over her in the ,manks language1 which they call her knell2 after which ,christmas begins4 ,the burial over1 the company outside the churchyard formed a circle and danced to music4 ,a writer of the eighteenth century says that in ,ireland the wren is still hunted and killed by the peasants on ,christmas ,day1 and on the following 7,st4 ,stephen's ,day7 he is carried about1 hung by the leg1 in the centre of two hoops1 crossing each other at right angles1 and a procession made in every village1 of men1 women1 and children1 singing an ,irish catch1 importing him to be the king of all birds4 ,down to the present time the hunting of the wren still takes place in parts of ,leinster and ,connaught4 ,on ,christmas ,day or ,st4 ,stephen's ,day the boys hunt and kill the wren1 fasten it in the middle of a mass of holly and ivy on the top of a broomstick1 and on ,st4 ,stephen's ,day go about with it from house to house1 singing3 ,the wren1 the wren1 the king of all birds1 ,st4 ,stephen's ,day was caught in the furze2 ,although he is little1 his family's great1 ,i pray you1 good landlady1 give us a treat4 ,money or food 7bread1 butter1 eggs1 etc47 were given them1 upon which they feasted in the evening4 ,in the first half of the nineteenth century similar customs were still observed in various parts of the south of ,france4 ,thus at ,carcassone1 every year on the first ,sunday of ,december the young people of the street ,saint ,jean used to go out of the town armed with sticks1 with which they beat the bushes1 looking for wrens4 ,the first to strike down one of these birds was proclaimed ,king4 ,then they returned to the town in procession1 headed by the ,king1 who carried the wren on a pole4 ,on the evening of the last day of the year the ,king and all who had hunted the wren marched through the streets of the town to the light of torches1 with drums beating and fifes playing in front of them4 ,at the door of every house they stopped1 and one of them wrote with chalk on the door vive le roi6 with the number of the year which was about to begin4 ,on the morning of ,twelfth ,day the ,king again marched in procession with great pomp1 wearing a crown and a blue mantle and carrying a sceptre4 ,in front of him was borne the wren fastened to the top of a pole1 which was adorned with a verdant wreath of olive1 of oak1 and sometimes of mistletoe grown on an oak4 ,after hearing high mass in the parish church of ,st4 ,vincent1 surrounded by his officers and guards1 the ,king visited the bishop1 the mayor1 the magistrates1 and the chief inhabitants1 collecting money to defray the expenses of the royal banquet which took place in the evening and wound up with a dance4 ,the parallelism between this custom of hunting the wren and some of those which we have considered1 especially the ,gilyak procession with the bear1 and the ,indian one with the snake1 seems too close to allow us to doubt that they all belong to the same circle of ideas4 ,the worshipful animal is killed with special solemnity once a year2 and before or immediately after death he is promenaded from door to door1 that each of his worshippers may receive a portion of the divine virtues that are supposed to emanate from the dead or dying god4 ,religious processions of this sort must have had a great place in the ritual of ,european peoples in prehistoric times1 if we may judge from the numerous traces of them which have survived in folk-custom4 ,for example1 on the last day of the year1 or ,hogmanay as it was called1 it used to be customary in the ,highlands of ,scotland for a man to dress himself up in a cow's hide and thus attired to go from house to house1 attended by young fellows1 each of them armed with a staff1 to which a bit of raw hide was tied4 ,round every house the hide-clad man used to run thrice deiseal1 that is1 according to the course of the sun1 so as to keep the house on his right hand2 while the others pursued him1 beating the hide with their staves and thereby making a loud noise like the beating of a drum4 ,in this disorderly procession they also struck the walls of the house4 ,on being admitted1 one of the party1 standing within the threshold1 pronounced a blessing on the family in these words3 ,may ,god bless the house and all that belongs to it1 cattle1 stones1 and timber6 ,in plenty of meat1 of bed and body clothes1 and health of men may it ever abound6 ,then each of the party singed in the fire a little bit of the hide which was tied to his staff2 and having done so he applied the singed hide to the nose of every person and of every domestic animal belonging to the house4 ,this was imagined to secure them from diseases and other misfortunes1 particularly from witchcraft1 throughout the ensuing year4 ,the whole ceremony was called calluinn because of the great noise made in beating the hide4 ,it was observed in the ,hebrides1 including ,st4 ,kilda1 down to the second half of the eighteenth century at least1 and it seems to have survived well into the nineteenth century4 ,,lv4 ,the ,transference of ,evil #a4 ,the ,transference to ,inanimate ,objects ,,we have now traced the practice of killing a god among peoples in the hunting1 pastoral1 and agricultural stages of society2 and ,i have attempted to explain the motives which led men to adopt so curious a custom4 ,one aspect of the custom still remains to be noticed4 ,the accumulated misfortunes and sins of the whole people are sometimes laid upon the dying god1 who is supposed to bear them away for ever1 leaving the people innocent and happy4 ,the notion that we can transfer our guilt and sufferings to some other being who will bear them for us is familiar to the savage mind4 ,it arises from a very obvious confusion between the physical and the mental1 between the material and the immaterial4 ,because it is possible to shift a load of wood1 stones1 or what not1 from our own back to the back of another1 the savage fancies that it is equally possible to shift the burden of his pains and sorrows to another1 who will suffer them in his stead4 ,upon this idea he acts1 and the result is an endless number of very unamiable devices for palming off upon some one else the trouble which a man shrinks from bearing himself4 ,in short1 the principle of vicarious suffering is commonly understood and practised by races who stand on a low level of social and intellectual culture4 ,in the following pages ,i shall illustrate the theory and the practice as they are found among savages in all their naked simplicity1 undisguised by the refinements of metaphysics and the subtleties of theology4 ,the devices to which the cunning and selfish savage resorts for the sake of easing himself at the expense of his neighbour are manifold2 only a few typical examples out of a multitude can be cited4 ,at the outset it is to be observed that the evil of which a man seeks to rid himself need not be transferred to a person2 it may equally well be transferred to an animal or a thing1 though in the last case the thing is often only a vehicle to convey the trouble to the first person who touches it4 ,in some of the ,east ,indian islands they think that epilepsy can be cured by striking the patient on the face with the leaves of certain trees and then throwing them away4 ,the disease is believed to have passed into the leaves1 and to have been thrown away with them4 ,to cure toothache some of the ,australian blacks apply a heated spear-thrower to the cheek4 ,the spear-thrower is then cast away1 and the toothache goes with it in the shape of a black stone called karriitch4 ,stones of this kind are found in old mounds and sandhills4 ,they are carefully collected and thrown in the direction of enemies in order to give them toothache4 ,the ,bahima1 a pastoral people of ,uganda1 often suffer from deep-seated abscesses3 their cure for this is to transfer the disease to some other person by obtaining herbs from the medicine-man1 rubbing them over the place where the swelling is1 and burying them in the road where people continually pass2 the first person who steps over these buried herbs contracts the disease1 and the original patient recovers4 ,sometimes in case of sickness the malady is transferred to an effigy as a preliminary to passing it on to a human being4 ,thus among the ,baganda the medicine-man would sometimes make a model of his patient in clay2 then a relative of the sick man would rub the image over the sufferer's body and either bury it in the road or hide it in the grass by the wayside4 ,the first person who stepped over the image or passed by it would catch the disease4 ,sometimes the effigy was made out of a plantain-flower tied up so as to look like a person2 it was used in the same way as the clay figure4 ,but the use of images for this maleficent purpose was a capital crime2 any person caught in the act of burying one of them in the public road would surely have been put to death4 ,in the western district of the island of ,timor1 when men or women are making long and tiring journeys1 they fan themselves with leafy branches1 which they afterwards throw away on particular spots where their forefathers did the same before them4 ,the fatigue which they felt is thus supposed to have passed into the leaves and to be left behind4 ,others use stones instead of leaves4 ,similarly in the ,babar ,archipelago tired people will strike themselves with stones1 believing that they thus transfer to the stones the weariness which they felt in their own bodies4 ,they then throw away the stones in places which are specially set apart for the purpose4 ,a like belief and practice in many distant parts of the world have given rise to those cairns or heaps of sticks and leaves which travellers often observe beside the path1 and to which every passing native adds his contribution in the shape of a stone1 or stick1 or leaf4 ,thus in the ,solomon and ,banks' ,islands the natives are wont to throw sticks1 stones1 or leaves upon a heap at a place of steep descent1 or where a difficult path begins1 saying1 ,there goes my fatigue4 ,the act is not a religious rite1 for the thing thrown on the heap is not an offering to spiritual powers1 and the words which accompany the act are not a prayer4 ,it is nothing but a magical ceremony for getting rid of fatigue1 which the simple savage fancies he can embody in a stick1 leaf1 or stone1 and so cast it from him4 #b4 ,the ,transference to ,animals ,,animals are often employed as a vehicle for carrying away or transferring the evil4 ,when a ,moor has a headache he will sometimes take a lamb or a goat and beat it till it falls down1 believing that the headache will thus be transferred to the animal4 ,in ,morocco most wealthy ,moors keep a wild boar in their stables1 in order that the jinn and evil spirits may be diverted from the horses and enter into the boar4 ,amongst the ,caffres of ,south ,africa1 when other remedies have failed1 natives sometimes adopt the custom of taking a goat into the presence of a sick man1 and confess the sins of the kraal over the animal4 ,sometimes a few drops of blood from the sick man are allowed to fall on the head of the goat1 which is turned out into an uninhabited part of the veldt4 ,the sickness is supposed to be transferred to the animal1 and to become lost in the desert4 ,in ,arabia1 when the plague is raging1 the people will sometimes lead a camel through all the quarters of the town in order that the animal may take the pestilence on itself4 ,then they strangle it in a sacred place and imagine that they have rid themselves of the camel and of the plague at one blow4 ,it is said that when smallpox is raging the savages of ,formosa will drive the demon of disease into a sow1 then cut off the animal's ears and burn them or it1 believing that in this way they rid themselves of the plague4 ,amongst the ,malagasy the vehicle for carrying away evils is called a faditra4 ,the faditra is anything selected by the sikidy divining board for the purpose of taking away any hurtful evils or diseases that might prove injurious to an individual's happiness1 peace1 or prosperity4 ,the faditra may be either ashes1 cut money1 a sheep1 a pumpkin1 or anything else the sikidy may choose to direct4 ,after the particular article is appointed1 the priest counts upon it all the evils that may prove injurious to the person for whom it is made1 and which he then charges the faditra to take away for ever4 ,if the faditra be ashes1 it is blown1 to be carried away by the wind4 ,if it be cut money1 it is thrown to the bottom of deep water1 or where it can never be found4 ,if it be a sheep1 it is carried away to a distance on the shoulders of a man1 who runs with all his might1 mumbling as he goes1 as if in the greatest rage against the faditra1 for the evils it is bearing away4 ,if it be a pumpkin1 it is carried on the shoulders to a little distance1 and there dashed upon the ground with every appearance of fury and indignation4 ,a ,malagasy was informed by a diviner that he was doomed to a bloody death1 but that possibly he might avert his fate by performing a certain rite4 ,carrying a small vessel full of blood upon his head1 he was to mount upon the back of a bullock2 while thus mounted1 he was to spill the blood upon the bullock's head1 and then send the animal away into the wilderness1 whence it might never return4 ,the ,bataks of ,sumatra have a ceremony which they call making the curse to fly away4 ,when a woman is childless1 a sacrifice is offered to the gods of three grasshoppers1 representing a head of cattle1 a buffalo1 and a horse4 ,then a swallow is set free1 with a prayer that the curse may fall upon the bird and fly away with it4 ,the entrance into a house of an animal which does not generally seek to share the abode of man is regarded by the ,malays as ominous of misfortune4 ,if a wild bird flies into a house1 it must be carefully caught and smeared with oil1 and must then be released in the open air1 a formula being recited in which it is bidden to fly away with all the ill-luck and misfortunes of the occupier4 ,in antiquity ,greek women seem to have done the same with swallows which they caught in the house3 they poured oil on them and let them fly away1 apparently for the purpose of removing ill-luck from the household4 ,the ,huzuls of the ,carpathians imagine that they can transfer freckles to the first swallow they see in spring by washing their face in flowing water and saying1 ,swallow1 swallow1 take my freckles1 and give me rosy cheeks4 ,among the ,badagas of the ,neilgherry ,hills in ,southern ,india1 when a death has taken place1 the sins of the deceased are laid upon a buffalo calf4 ,for this purpose the people gather round the corpse and carry it outside of the village4 ,there an elder of the tribe1 standing at the head of the corpse1 recites or chants a long list of sins such as any ,badaga may commit1 and the people repeat the last word of each line after him4 ,the confession of sins is thrice repeated4 ,by a conventional mode of expression1 the sum total of sins a man may do is said to be thirteen hundred4 ,admitting that the deceased has committed them all1 the performer cries aloud1 ',stay not their flight to ,god's pure feet4' ,as he closes1 the whole assembly chants aloud ',stay not their flight4' ,again the performer enters into details1 and cries1 ',he killed the crawling snake4 ,it is a sin4' ,in a moment the last word is caught up1 and all the people cry ',it is a sin4' ,as they shout1 the performer lays his hand upon the calf4 ,the sin is transferred to the calf4 ,thus the whole catalogue is gone through in this impressive way4 ,but this is not enough4 ,as the last shout ',let all be well' dies away1 the performer gives place to another1 and again confession is made1 and all the people shout ',it is a sin4' ,a third time it is done4 ,then1 still in solemn silence1 the calf is let loose4 ,like the ,jewish scapegoat1 it may never be used for secular work4 ,at a ,badaga funeral witnessed by the ,rev4 ,a4 ,c4 ,clayton the buffalo calf was led thrice round the bier1 and the dead man's hand was laid on its head4 ,by this act1 the calf was supposed to receive all the sins of the deceased4 ,it was then driven away to a great distance1 that it might contaminate no one1 and it was said that it would never be sold1 but looked on as a dedicated sacred animal4 ,the idea of this ceremony is1 that the sins of the deceased enter the calf1 or that the task of his absolution is laid on it4 ,they say that the calf very soon disappears1 and that it is never heard of4 #c4 ,the ,transference to ,men ,,again1 men sometimes play the part of scapegoat by diverting to themselves the evils that threaten others4 ,when a ,cingalese is dangerously ill1 and the physicians can do nothing1 a devil-dancer is called in1 who by making offerings to the devils1 and dancing in the masks appropriate to them1 conjures these demons of disease1 one after the other1 out of the sick man's body and into his own4 ,having thus successfully extracted the cause of the malady1 the artful dancer lies down on a bier1 and shamming death is carried to an open place outside the village4 ,here1 being left to himself1 he soon comes to life again1 and hastens back to claim his reward4 ,in #aeij a ,scotch which of the name of ,agnes ,sampson was convicted of curing a certain ,robert ,kers of a disease laid upon him by a westland warlock when he was at ,dumfries1 whilk sickness she took upon herself1 and kept the same with great groaning and torment till the morn1 at whilk time there was a great din heard in the house4 ,the noise was made by the witch in her efforts to shift the disease1 by means of clothes1 from herself to a cat or dog4 ,unfortunately the attempt partly miscarried4 ,the disease missed the animal and hit ,alexander ,douglas of ,dalkeith1 who dwined and died of it1 while the original patient1 ,robert ,kers1 was made whole4 ,in one part of ,new ,zealand an expiation for sin was felt to be necessary2 a service was performed over an individual1 by which all the sins of the tribe were supposed to be transferred to him1 a fern stalk was previously tied to his person1 with which he jumped into the river1 and there unbinding1 allowed it to float away to the sea1 bearing their sins with it4 ,in great emergencies the sins of the ,rajah of ,manipur used to be transferred to somebody else1 usually to a criminal1 who earned his pardon by his vicarious sufferings4 ,to effect the transference the ,rajah and his wife1 clad in fine robes1 bathed on a scaffold erected in the bazaar1 while the criminal crouched beneath it4 ,with the water which dripped from them on him their sins also were washed away and fell on the human scapegoat4 ,to complete the transference the ,rajah and his wife made over their fine robes to their substitute1 while they themselves1 clad in new raiment1 mixed with the people till evening4 ,in ,travancore1 when a ,rajah is near his end1 they seek out a holy ,brahman1 who consents to take upon himself the sins of the dying man in consideration of the sum of ten thousand rupees4 ,thus prepared to immolate himself on the altar of duty1 the saint is introduced into the chamber of death1 and closely embraces the dying ,rajah1 saying to him1 ,o ,king1 ,i undertake to bear all your sins and diseases4 ,may your ,highness live long and reign happily4 ,having thus taken to himself the sins of the sufferer1 he is sent away from the country and never more allowed to return4 ,at ,utch ,kurgan in ,turkestan ,mr4 ,schuyler saw an old man who was said to get his living by taking on himself the sins of the dead1 and thenceforth devoting his life to prayer for their souls4 ,in ,uganda1 when an army had returned from war1 and the gods warned the king by their oracles that some evil had attached itself to the soldiers1 it was customary to pick out a woman slave from the captives1 together with a cow1 a goat1 a fowl1 and a dog from the booty1 and to send them back under a strong guard to the borders of the country from which they had come4 ,there their limbs were broken and they were left to die2 for they were too crippled to crawl back to ,uganda4 ,in order to ensure the transference of the evil to these substitutes1 bunches of grass were rubbed over the people and cattle and then tied to the victims4 ,after that the army was pronounced clean and was allowed to return to the capital4 ,so on his accession a new king of ,uganda used to wound a man and send him away as a scapegoat to ,bunyoro to carry away any uncleanliness that might attach to the king or queen4 #d4 ,the ,transference of ,evil in ,europe ,,the ,,examples of the transference of evil hitherto adduced have been mostly drawn from the customs of savage or barbarous peoples4 ,but similar attempts to shift the burden of disease1 misfortune1 and sin from one's self to another person1 or to an animal or thing1 have been common also among the civilised nations of ,europe1 both in ancient and modern times4 ,a ,roman cure for fever was to pare the patient's nails1 and stick the parings with wax on a neighbour's door before sunrise2 the fever then passed from the sick man to his neighbour4 ,similar devices must have been resorted to by the ,greeks2 for in laying down laws for his ideal state1 ,plato thinks it too much to expect that men should not be alarmed at finding certain wax figures adhering to their doors or to the tombstones of their parents1 or lying at cross-roads4 ,in the fourth century of our era ,marcellus of ,bordeaux prescribed a cure for warts1 which has still a great vogue among the superstitious in various parts of ,europe4 ,you are to touch your warts with as many little stones as you have warts2 then wrap the stones in an ivy leaf1 and throw them away in a thoroughfare4 ,whoever picks them up will get the warts1 and you will be rid of them4 ,people in the ,orkney ,islands will sometimes wash a sick man1 and then throw the water down at a gateway1 in the belief that the sickness will leave the patient and be transferred to the first person who passes through the gate4 ,a ,bavarian cure for fever is to write upon a piece of paper1 ,fever1 stay away1 ,i am not at home1 and to put the paper in somebody's pocket4 ,the latter then catches the fever1 and the patient is rid of it4 ,a ,bohemian prescription for the same malady is this4 ,take an empty pot1 go with it to a cross-road1 throw it down1 and run away4 ,the first person who kicks against the pot will catch your fever1 and you will be cured4 ,often in ,europe1 as among savages1 an attempt is made to transfer a pain or malady from a man to an animal4 ,grave writers of antiquity recommended that1 if a man be stung by a scorpion1 he should sit upon an ass with his face to the tail1 or whisper in the animal's ear1 ,a scorpion has stung me2 in either case1 they thought1 the pain would be transferred from the man to the ass4 ,many cures of this sort are recorded by ,marcellus4 ,for example1 he tells us that the following is a remedy for toothache4 ,standing booted under the open sky on the ground1 you catch a frog by the head1 spit into its mouth1 ask it to carry away the ache1 and then let it go4 ,but the ceremony must be performed on a lucky day and at a lucky hour4 ,in ,cheshire the ailment known as aphtha or thrush1 which affects the mouth or throat of infants1 is not uncommonly treated in much the same manner4 ,a young frog is held for a few moments with its head inside the mouth of the sufferer1 whom it is supposed to relieve by taking the malady to itself4 ,i assure you1 said an old woman who had often superintended such a cure1 we used to hear the poor frog whooping and coughing1 mortal bad1 for days after2 it would have made your heart ache to hear the poor creature coughing as it did about the garden4 ,a ,northamptonshire1 ,devonshire1 and ,welsh cure for a cough is to put a hair of the patient's head between two slices of buttered bread and give the sandwich to a dog4 ,the animal will thereupon catch the cough and the patient will lose it4 ,sometimes an ailment is transferred to an animal by sharing food with it4 ,thus in ,oldenburg1 if you are sick of a fever you set a bowl of sweet milk before a dog and say1 ,good luck1 you hound6 may you be sick and ,i be sound6 ,then when the dog has lapped some of the milk1 you take a swig at the bowl2 and then the dog must lap again1 and then you must swig again2 and when you and the dog have done it the third time1 he will have the fever and you will be quit of it4 ,a ,bohemian cure for fever is to go out into the forest before the sun is up and look for a snipe's nest4 ,when you have found it1 take out one of the young birds and keep it beside you for three days4 ,then go back into the wood and set the snipe free4 ,the fever will leave you at once4 ,the snipe has taken it away4 ,so in ,vedic times the ,hindoos of old sent consumption away with a blue jay4 ,they said1 ,o consumption1 fly away1 fly away with the blue jay6 ,with the wild rush of the storm and the whirlwind1 oh1 vanish away6 ,in the village of ,llandegla in ,wales there is a church dedicated to the virgin martyr ,st4 ,tecla1 where the falling sickness is1 or used to be1 cured by being transferred to a fowl4 ,the patient first washed his limbs in a sacred well hard by1 dropped fourpence into it as an offering1 walked thrice round the well1 and thrice repeated the ,lord's prayer4 ,then the fowl1 which was a cock or a hen according as the patient was a man or a woman1 was put into a basket and carried round first the well and afterwards the church4 ,next the sufferer entered the church and lay down under the communion table till break of day4 ,after that he offered sixpence and departed1 leaving the fowl in the church4 ,if the bird died1 the sickness was supposed to have been transferred to it from the man or woman1 who was now rid of the disorder4 ,as late as #ahee the old parish clerk of the village remembered quite well to have seen the birds staggering about from the effects of the fits which had been transferred to them4 ,often the sufferer seeks to shift his burden of sickness or ill-luck to some inanimate object4 ,in ,athens there is a little chapel of ,st4 ,john the ,baptist built against an ancient column4 ,fever patients resort thither1 and by attaching a waxed thread to the inner side of the column believe that they transfer the fever from themselves to the pillar4 ,in the ,mark of ,brandenburg they say that if you suffer from giddiness you should strip yourself naked and run thrice round a flax-field after sunset2 in that way the flax will get the giddiness and you will be rid of it4 ,but perhaps the thing most commonly employed in ,europe as a receptacle for sickness and trouble of all sorts is a tree or bush4 ,a ,bulgarian cure for fever is to run thrice around a willow-tree at sunrise1 crying1 ,the fever shall shake thee1 and the sun shall warm me4 ,in the ,greek island of ,karpathos the priest ties a red thread round the neck of a sick person4 ,next morning the friends of the patient remove the thread and go out to the hillside1 where they tie the thread to a tree1 thinking that they thus transfer the sickness to the tree4 ,italians attempt to cure fever in like manner by tethering it to a tree ,the sufferer ties a thread round his left wrist at night1 and hangs the thread on a tree next morning4 ,the fever is thus believed to be tied up to the tree1 and the patient to be rid of it2 but he must be careful not to pass by that tree again1 otherwise the fever would break loose from its bonds and attack him afresh4 ,a ,flemish cure for the ague is to go early in the morning to an old willow1 tie three knots in one of its branches1 say1 ,good-morrow1 ,old ,one1 ,i give thee the cold2 good-morrow1 ,old ,one1 then turn and run away without looking round4 ,in ,sonnenberg1 if you would rid yourself of gout you should go to a young fir-tree and tie a knot in one of its twigs1 saying1 ,god greet thee1 noble fir4 ,i bring thee my gout4 ,here will ,i tie a knot and bind my gout into it4 ,in the name1 etc4 ,another way of transferring gout from a man to a tree is this4 ,pare the nails of the sufferer's fingers and clip some hairs from his legs4 ,bore a hole in an oak1 stuff the nails and hair in the hole1 stop up the hole again1 and smear it with cow's dung4 ,if1 for three months thereafter1 the patient is free of gout1 you may be sure the oak has it in his stead4 ,in ,cheshire if you would be rid of warts1 you have only to rub them with a piece of bacon1 cut a slit in the bark of an ash-tree1 and slip the bacon under the bark4 ,soon the warts will disappear from your hand1 only however to reappear in the shape of rough excrescences or knobs on the bark of the tree4 ,at ,berkhampstead1 in ,hertfordshire1 there used to be certain oak-trees which were long celebrated for the cure of ague4 ,the transference of the malady to the tree was simple but painful4 ,a lock of the sufferer's hair was pegged into an oak2 then by a sudden wrench he left his hair and his ague behind him in the tree4 ,,lvi4 ,the ,public ,expulsion of ,evils #a4 ,the ,omnipresence of ,demons ,,in ,,the ,,foregoing chapter the primitive principle of the transference of ills to another person1 animal1 or thing was explained and illustrated4 ,but similar means have been adopted to free a whole community from diverse evils that afflict it4 ,such attempts to dismiss at once the accumulated sorrows of a people are by no means rare or exceptional2 on the contrary they have been made in many lands1 and from being occasional they tend to become periodic and annual4 ,it needs some effort on our part to realise the frame of mind which prompts these attempts4 ,bred in a philosophy which strips nature of personality and reduces it to the unknown cause of an orderly series of impressions on our senses1 we find it hard to put ourselves in the place of the savage1 to whom the same impressions appear in the guise of spirits or the handiwork of spirits4 ,for ages the army of spirits1 once so near1 has been receding farther and farther from us1 banished by the magic wand of science from hearth and home1 from ruined cell and ivied tower1 from haunted glade and lonely mere1 from the riven murky cloud that belches forth the lightning1 and from those fairer clouds that pillow the silvery moon or fret with flakes of burning red the golden eve4 ,the spirits are gone even from their last stronghold in the sky1 whose blue arch no longer passes1 except with children1 for the screen that hides from mortal eyes the glories of the celestial world4 ,only in poets' dreams or impassioned flights of oratory is it given to catch a glimpse of the last flutter of the standards of the retreating host1 to hear the beat of their invisible wings1 the sound of their mocking laughter1 or the swell of angel music dying away in the distance4 ,far otherwise is it with the savage4 ,to his imagination the world still teems with those motley beings whom a more sober philosophy has discarded4 ,fairies and goblins1 ghosts and demons1 still hover about him both waking and sleeping4 ,they dog his footsteps1 dazzle his senses1 enter into him1 harass and deceive and torment him in a thousand freakish and mischievous ways4 ,the mishaps that befall him1 the losses he sustains1 the pains he has to endure1 he commonly sets down1 if not to the magic of his enemies1 to the spite or anger or caprice of the spirits4 ,their constant presence wearies him1 their sleepless malignity exasperates him2 he longs with an unspeakable longing to be rid of them altogether1 and from time to time1 driven to bay1 his patience utterly exhausted1 he turns fiercely on his persecutors and makes a desperate effort to chase the whole pack of them from the land1 to clear the air of their swarming multitudes1 that he may breathe more freely and go on his way unmolested1 at least for a time4 ,thus it comes about that the endeavour of primitive people to make a clean sweep of all their troubles generally takes the form of a grand hunting out and expulsion of devils or ghosts4 ,they think that if they can only shake off these their accursed tormentors1 they will make a fresh start in life1 happy and innocent2 the tales of ,eden and the old poetic golden age will come true again4 #b4 ,the ,occasional ,expulsion of ,evils ,,we can therefore understand why those general clearances of evil1 to which from time to time the savage resorts1 should commonly take the form of a forcible expulsion of devils4 ,in these evil spirits primitive man sees the cause of many if not of most of his troubles1 and he fancies that if he can only deliver himself from them1 things will go better with him4 ,the public attempts to expel the accumulated ills of a whole community may be divided into two classes1 according as the expelled evils are immaterial and invisible or are embodied in a material vehicle or scape-goat4 ,the former may be called the direct or immediate expulsion of evils2 the latter the indirect or mediate expulsion1 or the expulsion by scapegoat4 ,we begin with examples of the former4 ,in the island of ,rook1 between ,new ,guinea and ,new ,britain1 when any misfortune has happened1 all the people run together1 scream1 curse1 howl1 and beat the air with sticks to drive away the devil1 who is supposed to be the author of the mishap4 ,from the spot where the mishap took place they drive him step by step to the sea1 and on reaching the shore they redouble their shouts and blows in order to expel him from the island4 ,he generally retires to the sea or to the island of ,lottin4 ,the natives of ,new ,britain ascribe sickness1 drought1 the failure of crops1 and in short all misfortunes1 to the influence of wicked spirits4 ,so at times when many people sicken and die1 as at the beginning of the rainy season1 all the inhabitants of a district1 armed with branches and clubs1 go out by moonlight to the fields1 where they beat and stamp on the ground with wild howls till morning1 believing that this drives away the devils2 and for the same purpose they rush through the village with burning torches4 ,the natives of ,new ,caledonia are said to believe that all evils are caused by a powerful and malignant spirit2 hence in order to rid themselves of him they will from time to time dig a great pit1 round which the whole tribe gathers4 ,after cursing the demon1 they fill up the pit with earth1 and trample on the top with loud shouts4 ,this they call burying the evil spirit4 ,among the ,dieri tribe of ,central ,australia1 when a serious illness occurs1 the medicine-men expel ,cootchie or the devil by beating the ground in and outside of the camp with the stuffed tail of a kangaroo1 until they have chased the demon away to some distance from the camp4 ,when a village has been visited by a series of disasters or a severe epidemic1 the inhabitants of ,minahassa in ,celebes lay the blame upon the devils who are infesting the village and who must be expelled from it4 ,accordingly1 early one morning all the people1 men1 women1 and children1 quit their homes1 carrying their household goods with them1 and take up their quarters in temporary huts which have been erected outside the village4 ,here they spend several days1 offering sacrifices and preparing for the final ceremony4 ,at last the men1 some wearing masks1 others with their faces blackened1 and so on1 but all armed with swords1 guns1 pikes1 or brooms1 steal cautiously and silently back to the deserted village4 ,then1 at a signal from the priest1 they rush furiously up and down the streets and into and under the houses 7which are raised on piles above the ground71 yelling and striking on walls1 doors1 and windows1 to drive away the devils4 ,next1 the priests and the rest of the people come with the holy fire and march nine times round each house and thrice round the ladder that leads up to it1 carrying the fire with them4 ,then they take the fire into the kitchen1 where it must burn for three days continuously4 ,the devils are now driven away1 and great and general is the joy4 ,the ,alfoors of ,halmahera attribute epidemics to the devil who comes from other villages to carry them off4 ,so1 in order to rid the village of the disease1 the sorcerer drives away the devil4 ,from all the villagers he receives a costly garment and places it on four vessels1 which he takes to the forest and leaves at the spot where the devil is supposed to be4 ,then with mocking words he bids the demon abandon the place4 ,in the ,kei ,islands to the south-west of ,new ,guinea1 the evil spirits1 who are quite distinct from the souls of the dead1 form a mighty host4 ,almost every tree and every cave is the lodging-place of one of these fiends1 who are moreover extremely irascible and apt to fly out on the smallest provocation4 ,they manifest their displeasure by sending sickness and other calamities4 ,hence in times of public misfortune1 as when an epidemic is raging1 and all other remedies have failed1 the whole population go forth with the priest at their head to a place at some distance from the village4 ,here at sunset they erect a couple of poles with a cross-bar between them1 to which they attach bags of rice1 wooden models of pivot-guns1 gongs1 bracelets1 and so on4 ,then1 when everybody has taken his place at the poles and a death-like silence reigns1 the priest lifts up his voice and addresses the spirits in their own language as follows3 ,ho6 ho6 ho6 ye evil spirits who dwell in the trees1 ye evil spirits who live in the grottoes1 ye evil spirits who lodge in the earth1 we give you these pivot-guns1 these gongs1 etc4 ,let the sickness cease and not so many people die of it4 ,then everybody runs home as fast as their legs can carry them4 ,in the island of ,nias1 when a man is seriously ill and other remedies have been tried in vain1 the sorcerer proceeds to exorcise the devil who is causing the illness4 ,a pole is set up in front of the house1 and from the top of the pole a rope of palm-leaves is stretched to the roof of the house4 ,then the sorcerer mounts the roof with a pig1 which he kills and allows to roll from the roof to the ground4 ,the devil1 anxious to get the pig1 lets himself down hastily from the roof by the rope of palm-leaves1 and a good spirit1 invoked by the sorcerer1 prevents him from climbing up again4 ,if this remedy fails1 it is believed that other devils must still be lurking in the house4 ,so a general hunt is made after them4 ,all the doors and windows in the house are closed1 except a single dormer-window in the roof4 ,the men1 shut up in the house1 hew and slash with their swords right and left to the clash of gongs and the rub-a-dub of drums4 ,terrified at this onslaught1 the devils escape by the dormer-window1 and sliding down the rope of palm-leaves take themselves off4 ,as all the doors and windows1 except the one in the roof1 are shut1 the devils cannot get into the house again4 ,in the case of an epidemic1 the proceedings are similar4 ,all the gates of the village1 except one1 are closed2 every voice is raised1 every gong and drum beaten1 every sword brandished4 ,thus the devils are driven out and the last gate is shut behind them4 ,for eight days thereafter the village is in a state of siege1 no one being allowed to enter it4 ,when cholera has broken out in a ,burmese village the able-bodied men scramble on the roofs and lay about them with bamboos and billets of wood1 while all the rest of the population1 old and young1 stand below and thump drums1 blow trumpets1 yell1 scream1 beat floors1 walls1 tin pans1 everything to make a din4 ,this uproar1 repeated on three successive nights1 is thought to be very effective in driving away the cholera demons4 ,when smallpox first appeared amongst the ,kumis of ,south-,eastern ,india1 they thought it was a devil come from ,aracan4 ,the villages were placed in a state of siege1 no one being allowed to leave or enter them4 ,a monkey was killed by being dashed on the ground1 and its body was hung at the village gate4 ,its blood1 mixed with small river pebbles1 was sprinkled on the houses1 the threshold of every house was swept with the monkey's tail1 and the fiend was adjured to depart4 ,when an epidemic is raging on the ,gold ,coast of ,west ,africa1 the people will sometimes turn out1 armed with clubs and torches1 to drive the evil spirits away4 ,at a given signal the whole population begin with frightful yells to beat in every corner of the houses1 then rush like mad into the streets waving torches and striking frantically in the empty air4 ,the uproar goes on till somebody reports that the cowed and daunted demons have made good their escape by a gate of the town or village2 the people stream out after them1 pursue them for some distance into the forest1 and warn them never to return4 ,the expulsion of the devils is followed by a general massacre of all the cocks in the village or town1 lest by their unseasonable crowing they should betray to the banished demons the direction they must take to return to their old homes4 ,when sickness was prevalent in a ,huron village1 and all other remedies had been tried in vain1 the ,indians had recourse to the ceremony called ,lonouyroya1 which is the principal invention and most proper means1 so they say1 to expel from the town or village the devils and evil spirits which cause1 induce1 and import all the maladies and infirmities which they suffer in body and mind4 ,accordingly1 one evening the men would begin to rush like madmen about the village1 breaking and upsetting whatever they came across in the wigwams4 ,they threw fire and burning brands about the streets1 and all night long they ran howling and singing without cessation4 ,then they all dreamed of something1 a knife1 dog1 skin1 or whatever it might be1 and when morning came they went from wigwam to wigwam asking for presents4 ,these they received silently1 till the particular thing was given them which they had dreamed about4 ,on receiving it they uttered a cry of joy and rushed from the hut1 amid the congratulations of all present4 ,the health of those who received what they had dreamed of was believed to be assured2 whereas those who did not get what they had set their hearts upon regarded their fate as sealed4 ,sometimes1 instead of chasing the demon of disease from their homes1 savages prefer to leave him in peaceable possession1 while they themselves take to flight and attempt to prevent him from following in their tracks4 ,thus when the ,patagonians were attacked by small-pox1 which they attributed to the machinations of an evil spirit1 they used to abandon their sick and flee1 slashing the air with their weapons and throwing water about in order to keep off the dreadful pursuer2 and when after several days' march they reached a place where they hoped to be beyond his reach1 they used by way of precaution to plant all their cutting weapons with the sharp edges turned towards the quarter from which they had come1 as if they were repelling a charge of cavalry4 ,similarly1 when the ,lules or ,tonocotes ,indians of the ,gran ,chaco were attacked by an epidemic1 they regularly sought to evade it by flight1 but in so doing they always followed a sinuous1 not a straight1 course2 because they said that when the disease made after them he would be so exhausted by the turnings and windings of the route that he would never be able to come up with them4 ,when the ,indians of ,new ,mexico were decimated by smallpox or other infectious disease1 they used to shift their quarters every day1 retreating into the most sequestered parts of the mountains and choosing the thorniest thickets they could find1 in the hope that the smallpox would be too afraid of scratching himself on the thorns to follow them4 ,when some ,chins on a visit to ,rangoon were attacked by cholera1 they went about with drawn swords to scare away the demon1 and they spent the day hiding under bushes so that he might not be able to find them4 #c4 ,the ,periodic ,expulsion of ,evils ,,the ,,expulsion of evils1 from being occasional1 tends to become periodic4 ,it comes to be thought desirable to have a general riddance of evil spirits at fixed times1 usually once a year1 in order that the people may make a fresh start in life1 freed from all the malignant influences which have been long accumulating about them4 ,some of the ,australian blacks annually expelled the ghosts of the dead from their territory4 ,the ceremony was witnessed by the ,rev4 ,w4 ,ridley on the banks of the ,river ,barwan4 ,a chorus of twenty1 old and young1 were singing and beating time with boomerangs4 4 4 4 ,suddenly1 from under a sheet of bark darted a man with his body whitened by pipeclay1 his head and face coloured with lines of red and yellow1 and a tuft of feathers fixed by means of a stick two feet above the crown of his head4 ,he stood twenty minutes perfectly still1 gazing upwards4 ,an aboriginal who stood by told me he was looking for the ghosts of dead men4 ,at last he began to move very slowly1 and soon rushed to and fro at full speed1 flourishing a branch as if to drive away some foes invisible to us4 ,when ,i thought this pantomime must be almost over1 ten more1 similarly adorned1 suddenly appeared from behind the trees1 and the whole party joined in a brisk conflict with their mysterious assailants4 4 4 4 ,at last1 after some rapid evolutions in which they put forth all their strength1 they rested from the exciting toil which they had kept up all night and for some hours after sunrise2 they seemed satisfied that the ghosts were driven away for twelve months4 ,they were performing the same ceremony at every station along the river1 and ,i am told it is an annual custom4 ,certain seasons of the year mark themselves naturally out as appropriate moments for a general expulsion of devils4 ,such a moment occurs towards the close of an ,arctic winter1 when the sun reappears on the horizon after an absence of weeks or months4 ,accordingly1 at ,point ,barrow1 the most northerly extremity of ,alaska1 and nearly of ,america1 the ,esquimaux choose the moment of the sun's reappearance to hunt the mischievous spirit ,tua from every house4 ,the ceremony was witnessed by the members of the ,united ,states ,polar ,expedition1 who wintered at ,point ,barrow4 ,a fire was built in front of the council-house1 and an old woman was posted at the entrance to every house4 ,the men gathered round the council-house while the young women and girls drove the spirit out of every house with their knives1 stabbing viciously under the bunk and deer-skins1 and calling upon ,tua to be gone4 ,when they thought he had been driven out of every hole and corner1 they thrust him down through the hole in the floor and chased him into the open air with loud cries and frantic gestures4 ,meanwhile the old woman at the entrance of the house made passes with a long knife in the air to keep him from returning4 ,each party drove the spirit towards the fire and invited him to go into it4 ,all were by this time drawn up in a semicircle round the fire1 when several of the leading men made specific charges against the spirit2 and each after his speech brushed his clothes violently1 calling on the spirit to leave him and go into the fire4 ,two men now stepped forward with rifles loaded with blank cartridges1 while a third brought a vessel of urine and flung it on the flames4 ,at the same time one of the men fired a shot into the fire2 and as the cloud of steam rose it received the other shot1 which was supposed to finish ,tuna for the time being4 ,in late autumn1 when storms rage over the land and break the icy fetters by which the frozen sea is as yet but slightly bound1 when the loosened floes are driven against each other and break with loud crashes1 and when the cakes of ice are piled in wild disorder one upon another1 the ,esquimaux of ,baffin ,land fancy they hear the voices of the spirits who people the mischief-laden air4 ,then the ghosts of the dead knock wildly at the huts1 which they cannot enter1 and woe to the hapless wight whom they catch2 he soon sickens and dies4 ,then the phantom of a huge hairless dog pursues the real dogs1 which expire in convulsions and cramps at sight of him4 ,all the countless spirits of evil are abroad striving to bring sickness and death1 foul weather and failure in hunting on the ,esquimaux4 ,most dreaded of all these spectral visitants are ,sedna1 mistress of the nether world1 and her father1 to whose share dead ,esquimaux fall4 ,while the other spirits fill the air and the water1 she rises from under ground4 ,it is then a busy season for the wizards4 ,in every house you may hear them singing and praying1 while they conjure the spirits1 seated in a mystic gloom at the back of the hut1 which is dimly lit by a lamp burning low4 ,the hardest task of all is to drive away ,sedna1 and this is reserved for the most powerful enchanter4 ,a rope is coiled on the floor of a large hut in such a way as to leave a small opening at the top1 which represents the breathing hole of a seal4 ,two enchanters stand beside it1 one of them grasping a spear as if he were watching a seal-hole in winter1 the other holding the harpoon-line4 ,a third sorcerer sits at the back of the hut chanting a magic song to lure ,sedna to the spot4 ,now she is heard approaching under the floor of the hut1 breathing heavily2 now she emerges at the hole2 now she is harpooned and sinks away in angry haste1 dragging the harpoon with her1 while the two men hold on to the line with all their might4 ,the struggle is severe1 but at last by a desperate wrench she tears herself away and returns to her dwelling in ,adlivun4 ,when the harpoon is drawn up out of the hole it is found to be splashed with blood1 which the enchanters proudly exhibit as a proof of their prowess4 ,thus ,sedna and the other evil spirits are at last driven away1 and next day a great festival is celebrated by old and young in honour of the event4 ,but they must still be cautious1 for the wounded ,sedna is furious and will seize any one she may find outside of his hut2 so they all wear amulets on the top of their hoods to protect themselves against her4 ,these amulets consist of pieces of the first garments that they wore after birth4 ,the ,iroquois inaugurated the new year in ,january1 ,february1 or ,march 7the time varied7 with a festival of dreams like that which the ,hurons observed on special occasions4 ,the whole ceremonies lasted several days1 or even weeks1 and formed a kind of saturnalia4 ,men and women1 variously disguised1 went from wigwam to wigwam smashing and throwing down whatever they came across4 ,it was a time of general license2 the people were supposed to be out of their senses1 and therefore not to be responsible for what they did4 ,accordingly1 many seized the opportunity of paying off old scores by belabouring obnoxious persons1 drenching them with ice-cold water1 and covering them with filth or hot ashes4 ,others seized burning brands or coals and flung them at the heads of the first persons they met4 ,the only way of escaping from these persecutors was to guess what they had dreamed of4 ,on one day of the festival the ceremony of driving away evil spirits from the village took place4 ,men clothed in the skins of wild beasts1 their faces covered with hideous masks1 and their hands with the shell of the tortoise1 went from hut to hut making frightful noises2 in every hut they took the fuel from the fire and scattered the embers and ashes about the floor with their hands4 ,the general confession of sins which preceded the festival was probably a preparation for the public expulsion of evil influences2 it was a way of stripping the people of their moral burdens1 that these might be collected and cast out4 ,in ,september the ,incas of ,peru celebrated a festival called ,situa1 the object of which was to banish from the capital and its vicinity all disease and trouble4 ,the festival fell in ,september because the rains begin about this time1 and with the first rains there was generally much sickness4 ,as a preparation for the festival the people fasted on the first day of the moon after the autumnal equinox4 ,having fasted during the day1 and the night being come1 they baked a coarse paste of maize4 ,this paste was made of two sorts4 ,one was kneaded with the blood of children aged from five to ten years1 the blood being obtained by bleeding the children between the eyebrows4 ,these two kinds of paste were baked separately1 because they were for different uses4 ,each family assembled at the house of the eldest brother to celebrate the feast2 and those who had no elder brother went to the house of their next relation of greater age4 ,on the same night all who had fasted during the day washed their bodies1 and taking a little of the blood-kneaded paste1 rubbed it over their head1 face1 breast1 shoulders1 arms and legs4 ,they did this in order that the paste might take away all their infirmities4 ,after this the head of the family anointed the threshold with the same paste1 and left it there as a token that the inmates of the house had performed their ablutions and cleansed their bodies4 ,meantime the ,high ,priest performed the same ceremonies in the temple of the ,sun4 ,as soon as the ,sun rose1 all the people worshipped and besought him to drive all evils out of the city1 and then they broke their fast with the paste that had been kneaded without blood4 ,when they had paid their worship and broken their fast1 which they did at a stated hour1 in order that all might adore the ,sun as one man1 an ,inca of the blood royal came forth from the fortress1 as a messenger of the ,sun1 richly dressed1 with his mantle girded round his body1 and a lance in his hand4 ,the lance was decked with feathers of many hues1 extending from the blade to the socket1 and fastened with rings of gold4 ,he ran down the hill from the fortress brandishing his lance1 till he reached the centre of the great square1 where stood the golden urn1 like a fountain1 that was used for the sacrifice of the fermented juice of the maize4 ,here four other ,incas of the blood royal awaited him1 each with a lance in his hand1 and his mantle girded up to run4 ,the messenger touched their four lances with his lance1 and told them that the ,sun bade them1 as his messengers1 drive the evils out of the city4 ,the four ,incas then separated and ran down the four royal roads which led out of the city to the four quarters of the world4 ,while they ran1 all the people1 great and small1 came to the doors of their houses1 and with great shouts of joy and gladness shook their clothes1 as if they were shaking off dust1 while they cried1 ,let the evils be gone4 ,how greatly desired has this festival been by us4 ,o ,creator of all things1 permit us to reach another year1 that we may see another feast like this4 ,after they had shaken their clothes1 they passed their hands over their heads1 faces1 arms1 and legs1 as if in the act of washing4 ,all this was done to drive the evils out of their houses1 that the messengers of the ,sun might banish them from the city2 and it was done not only in the streets through which the ,incas ran1 but generally in all quarters of the city4 ,moreover1 they all danced1 the ,inca himself amongst them1 and bathed in the rivers and fountains1 saying that their maladies would come out of them4 ,then they took great torches of straw1 bound round with cords4 ,these they lighted1 and passed from one to the other1 striking each other with them1 and saying1 ,let all harm go away4 ,meanwhile the runners ran with their lances for a quarter of a league outside the city1 where they found four other ,incas ready1 who received the lances from their hands and ran with them4 ,thus the lances were carried by relays of runners for a distance of five or six leagues1 at the end of which the runners washed themselves and their weapons in rivers1 and set up the lances1 in sign of a boundary within which the banished evils might not return4 ,the negroes of ,guinea annually banish the devil from all their towns with much ceremony at a time set apart for the purpose4 ,at ,axim1 on the ,gold ,coast1 this annual expulsion is preceded by a feast of eight days1 during which mirth and jollity1 skipping1 dancing1 and singing prevail1 and a perfect lampooning liberty is allowed1 and scandal so highly exalted1 that they may freely sing of all the faults1 villanies1 and frauds of their superiors as well as inferiors1 without punishment1 or so much as the least interruption4 ,on the eighth day they hunt out the devil with a dismal cry1 running after him and pelting him with sticks1 stones1 and whatever comes to hand4 ,when they have driven him far enough out of the town1 they all return4 ,in this way he is expelled from more than a hundred towns at the same time4 ,to make sure that he does not return to their houses1 the women wash and scour all their wooden and earthen vessels1 to free them from all uncleanness and the devil4 ,at ,cape ,coast ,castle1 on the ,gold ,coast1 the ceremony was witnessed on the ninth of ,october1 #ahdd1 by an ,englishman1 who has described it as follows3 ,to-night the annual custom of driving the evil spirit1 ,abonsam1 out of the town has taken place4 ,as soon as the eight o'clock gun fired in the fort the people began firing muskets in their houses1 turning all their furniture out of doors1 beating about in every corner of the rooms with sticks1 etc41 and screaming as loudly as possible1 in order to frighten the devil4 ,being driven out of the houses1 as they imagine1 they sallied forth into the streets1 throwing lighted torches about1 shouting1 screaming1 beating sticks together1 rattling old pans1 making the most horrid noise1 in order to drive him out of the town into the sea4 ,the custom is preceded by four weeks' dead silence2 no gun is allowed to be fired1 no drum to be beaten1 no palaver to be made between man and man4 ,if1 during these weeks1 two natives should disagree and make a noise in the town1 they are immediately taken before the king and fined heavily4 ,if a dog or pig1 sheep or goat be found at large in the street1 it may be killed1 or taken by anyone1 the former owner not being allowed to demand any compensation4 ,this silence is designed to deceive ,abonsam1 that1 being off his guard1 he may be taken by surprise1 and frightened out of the place4 ,if anyone die during the silence1 his relatives are not allowed to weep until the four weeks have been completed4 ,sometimes the date of the annual expulsion of devils is fixed with reference to the agricultural seasons4 ,thus among the ,hos of ,togoland1 in ,west ,africa1 the expulsion is performed annually before the people partake of the new yams4 ,the chiefs summon the priests and magicians and tell them that the people are now to eat the new yams and be merry1 therefore they must cleanse the town and remove the evils4 ,accordingly the evil spirits1 witches1 and all the ills that infest the people are conjured into bundles of leaves and creepers1 fastened to poles1 which are carried away and set up in the earth on various roads outside the town4 ,during the following night no fire may be lit and no food eaten4 ,next morning the women sweep out their hearths and houses1 and deposit the sweepings on broken wooden plates4 ,then the people pray1 saying1 ,all ye sicknesses that are in our body and plague us1 we are come to-day to throw you out4 ,thereupon they run as fast as they can in the direction of ,mount ,adaklu1 smiting their mouths and screaming1 ,out to-day6 ,out to-day6 ,that which kills anybody1 out to-day6 ,ye evil spirits1 out to-day6 and all that causes our heads to ache1 out to-day6 ,anlo and ,adaklu are the places whither all ill shall betake itself6 ,when they have come to a certain tree on ,mount ,adaklu1 they throw everything away and return home4 ,at ,kiriwina1 in ,south-,eastern ,new ,guinea1 when the new yams had been harvested1 the people feasted and danced for many days1 and a great deal of property1 such as armlets1 native money1 and so forth1 was displayed conspicuously on a platform erected for the purpose4 ,when the festivities were over1 all the people gathered together and expelled the spirits from the village by shouting1 beating the posts of the houses1 and overturning everything under which a wily spirit might be supposed to lurk4 ,the explanation which the people gave to a missionary was that they had entertained and feasted the spirits and provided them with riches1 and it was now time for them to take their departure4 ,had they not seen the dances1 and heard the songs1 and gorged themselves on the souls of the yams1 and appropriated the souls of the money and all the other fine things set out on the platform8 ,what more could the spirits want8 ,so out they must go4 ,among the ,hos of ,north-,eastern ,india the great festival of the year is the harvest home1 held in ,january1 when the granaries are full of grain1 and the people1 to use their own expression1 are full of devilry4 ,they have a strange notion that at this period1 men and women are so overcharged with vicious propensities1 that it is absolutely necessary for the safety of the person to let off steam by allowing for a time full vent to the passions4 ,the ceremonies open with a sacrifice to the village god of three fowls1 a cock and two hens1 one of which must be black4 ,along with them are offered flowers of the palas tree 7,butea frondosa71 bread made from rice-flour1 and sesamum seeds4 ,these offerings are presented by the village priest1 who prays that during the year about to begin they and their children may be preserved from all misfortune and sickness1 and that they may have seasonable rain and good crops4 ,prayer is also made in some places for the souls of the dead4 ,at this time an evil spirit is supposed to infest the place1 and to get rid of it men1 women1 and children go in procession round and through every part of the village with sticks in their hands1 as if beating for game1 singing a wild chant1 and shouting vociferously1 till they feel assured that the evil spirit must have fled4 ,then they give themselves up to feasting and drinking rice-beer1 till they are in a fit state for the wild debauch which follows4 ,the festival now becomes a saturnale1 during which servants forget their duty to their masters1 children their reverence for parents1 men their respect for women1 and women all notions of modesty1 delicacy1 and gentleness2 they become raging bacchantes4 ,usually the ,hos are quiet and reserved in manner1 decorous and gentle to women4 ,but during this festival their natures appear to undergo a temporary change4 ,sons and daughters revile their parents in gross language1 and parents their children2 men and women become almost like animals in the indulgence of their amorous propensities4 ,the ,mundaris1 kinsmen and neighbours of the ,hos1 keep the festival in much the same manner4 ,the resemblance to a ,saturnale is very complete1 as at this festival the farm labourers are feasted by their masters1 and allowed the utmost freedom of speech in addressing them4 ,it is the festival of the harvest home2 the termination of one year's toil1 and a slight respite from it before they commence again4 ,amongst some of the ,hindoo ,koosh tribes1 as among the ,hos and ,mundaris1 the expulsion of devils takes place after harvest4 ,when the last crop of autumn has been got in1 it is thought necessary to drive away evil spirits from the granaries4 ,a kind of porridge is eaten1 and the head of the family takes his matchlock and fires it into the floor4 ,then1 going outside1 he sets to work loading and firing till his powder-horn is exhausted1 while all his neighbours are similarly employed4 ,the next day is spent in rejoicings4 ,in ,chitral this festival is called devil-driving4 ,on the other hand the ,khonds of ,india expel the devils at seed-time instead of at harvest4 ,at this time they worship ,pitteri ,pennu1 the god of increase and of gain in every shape4 ,on the first day of the festival a rude car is made of a basket set upon a few sticks1 tied upon the bamboo rollers for wheels4 ,the priest takes this car first to the house of the lineal head of the tribe1 to whom precedence is given in all ceremonies connected with agriculture4 ,here he receives a little of each kind of seed and some feathers4 ,he then takes the car to all the other houses in the village1 each of which contributes the same things4 ,lastly1 the car is conducted to a field without the village1 attended by all the young men1 who beat each other and strike the air violently with long sticks4 ,the seed thus carried out is called the share of the evil spirits1 spoilers of the seed4 ,these are considered to be driven out with the car2 and when it and its contents are abandoned to them1 they are held to have no excuse for interfering with the rest of the seed-corn4 ,the people of ,bali1 an island to the east of ,java1 have periodical expulsions of devils upon a great scale4 ,generally the time chosen for the expulsion is the day of the dark moon in the ninth month4 ,when the demons have been long unmolested the country is said to be warm1 and the priest issues orders to expel them by force1 lest the whole of ,bali should be rendered uninhabitable4 ,on the day appointed the people of the village or district assemble at the principal temple4 ,here at a cross-road offerings are set out for the devils4 ,after prayers have been recited by the priests1 the blast of a horn summons the devils to partake of the meal which has been prepared for them4 ,at the same time a number of men step forward and light their torches at the holy lamp which burns before the chief priest4 ,immediately afterwards1 followed by the bystanders1 they spread in all directions and march through the streets and lanes crying1 ,depart6 go away6 ,wherever they pass1 the people who have stayed at home hasten1 by a deafening clatter on doors1 beams1 rice-blocks1 and so forth1 to take their share in the expulsion of devils4 ,thus chased from the houses1 the fiends flee to the banquet which has been set out for them2 but here the priest receives them with curses which finally drive them from the district4 ,when the last devil has taken his departure1 the uproar is succeeded by a dead silence1 which lasts during the next day also4 ,the devils1 it is thought1 are anxious to return to their old homes1 and in order to make them think that ,bali is not ,bali but some desert island1 no one may stir from his own abode for twenty-four hours4 ,even ordinary household work1 including cooking1 is discontinued4 ,only the watchmen may show themselves in the streets4 ,wreaths of thorns and leaves are hung at all the entrances to warn strangers from entering4 ,not till the third day is this state of siege raised1 and even then it is forbidden to work at the rice-fields or to buy and sell in the market4 ,most people still stay at home1 whiling away the time with cards and dice4 ,in ,tonquin a theckydaw or general expulsion of malevolent spirits commonly took place once a year1 especially if there was a great mortality amongst men1 the elephants or horses of the general's stable1 or the cattle of the country1 the cause of which they attribute to the malicious spirits of such men as have been put to death for treason1 rebellion1 and conspiring the death of the king1 general1 or princes1 and that in revenge of the punishment they have suffered1 they are bent to destroy everything and commit horrible violence4 ,to prevent which their superstition has suggested to them the institution of this theckydaw1 as a proper means to drive the devil away1 and purge the country of evil spirits4 ,the day appointed for the ceremony was generally the twenty-fifth of ,february1 one month after the beginning of the new year1 which fell on the twenty-fifth of ,january4 ,the intermediate month was a season of feasting1 merry-making of all kinds1 and general licence4 ,during the whole month the great seal was kept shut up in a box1 face downwards1 and the law was1 as it were1 laid asleep4 ,all courts of justice were closed2 debtors could not be seized2 small crimes1 such as petty larceny1 fighting1 and assault1 escaped with impunity2 only treason and murder were taken account of and the malefactors detained till the great seal should come into operation again4 ,at the close of the saturnalia the wicked spirits were driven away4 ,great masses of troops and artillery having been drawn up with flying colours and all the pomp of war1 the general beginneth then to offer meat offerings to the criminal devils and malevolent spirits 7for it is usual and customary likewise amongst them to feast the condemned before their execution71 inviting them to eat and drink1 when presently he accuses them in a strange language1 by characters and figures1 etc41 of many offences and crimes committed by them1 as to their having disquieted the land1 killed his elephants and horses1 etc41 for all which they justly deserve to be chastised and banished the country4 ,whereupon three great guns are fired as the last signal2 upon which all the artillery and musquets are discharged1 that1 by their most terrible noise the devils may be driven away2 and they are so blind as to believe for certain1 that they really and effectually put them to flight4 ,in ,cambodia the expulsion of evil spirits took place in ,march4 ,bits of broken statues and stones1 considered as the abode of the demons1 were collected and brought to the capital4 ,here as many elephants were collected as could be got together4 ,on the evening of the full moon volleys of musketry were fired and the elephants charged furiously to put the devils to flight4 ,the ceremony was performed on three successive days4 ,in ,siam the banishment of demons is annually carried into effect on the last day of the old year4 ,a signal gun is fired from the palace2 it is answered from the next station1 and so on from station to station1 till the firing has reached the outer gate of the city4 ,thus the demons are driven out step by step4 ,as soon as this is done a consecrated rope is fastened round the circuit of the city walls to prevent the banished demons from returning4 ,the rope is made of tough couch-grass and is painted in alternate stripes of red1 yellow1 and blue4 ,annual expulsions of demons1 witches1 or evil influences appear to have been common among the heathen of ,europe1 if we may judge from the relics of such customs among their descendants at the present day4 ,thus among the heathen ,wotyaks1 a ,finnish people of ,eastern ,russia1 all the young girls of the village assemble on the last day of the year or on ,new ,year's ,day1 armed with sticks1 the ends of which are split in nine places4 ,with these they beat every corner of the house and yard1 saying1 ,we are driving ,satan out of the village4 ,afterwards the sticks are thrown into the river below the village1 and as they float down stream ,satan goes with them to the next village1 from which he must be driven out in turn4 ,in some villages the expulsion is managed otherwise4 ,the unmarried men receive from every house in the village groats1 flesh1 and brandy4 ,these they take to the fields1 light a fire under a fir-tree1 boil the groats1 and eat of the food they have brought with them1 after pronouncing the words1 ,go away into the wilderness1 come not into the house4 ,then they return to the village and enter every house where there are young women4 ,they take hold of the young women and throw them into the snow1 saying1 ,may the spirits of disease leave you4 ,the remains of the groats and the other food are then distributed among all the houses in proportion to the amount that each contributed1 and each family consumes its share4 ,according to a ,wotyak of the ,malmyz district the young men throw into the snow whomever they find in the houses1 and this is called driving out ,satan2 moreover1 some of the boiled groats are cast into the fire with the words1 ,o god1 afflict us not with sickness and pestilence1 give us not up as a prey to the spirits of the wood4 ,but the most antique form of the ceremony is that observed by the ,wotyaks of the ,kasan ,government4 ,first of all a sacrifice is offered to the ,devil at noon4 ,then all the men assemble on horseback in the centre of the village1 and decide with which house they shall begin4 ,when this question1 which often gives rise to hot disputes1 is settled1 they tether their horses to the paling1 and arm themselves with whips1 clubs of lime-wood and bundles of lighted twigs4 ,the lighted twigs are believed to have the greatest terrors for ,satan4 ,thus armed1 they proceed with frightful cries to beat every corner of the house and yard1 then shut the door1 and spit at the ejected fiend4 ,so they go from house to house1 till the ,devil has been driven from every one4 ,then they mount their horses and ride out of the village1 yelling wildly and brandishing their clubs in every direction4 ,outside of the village they fling away the clubs and spit once more at the ,devil4 ,the ,cheremiss1 another ,finnish people of ,eastern ,russia1 chase ,satan from their dwellings by beating the walls with cudgels of lime-wood4 ,for the same purpose they fire guns1 stab the ground with knives1 and insert burning chips of wood in the crevices4 ,also they leap over bonfires1 shaking out their garments as they do so2 and in some districts they blow on long trumpets of lime-tree bark to frighten him away4 ,when he has fled to the wood1 they pelt the trees with some of the cheese-cakes and eggs which furnished the feast4 ,in ,christian ,europe the old heathen custom of expelling the powers of evil at certain times of the year has survived to modern times4 ,thus in some villages of ,calabria the month of ,march is inaugurated with the expulsion of the witches4 ,it takes place at night to the sound of the church bells1 the people running about the streets and crying1 ,march is come4 ,they say that the witches roam about in ,march1 and the ceremony is repeated every ,friday evening during the month4 ,often1 as might have been anticipated1 the ancient pagan rite has attached itself to church festivals4 ,in ,albania on ,easter ,eve the young people light torches of resinous wood and march in procession1 swinging them1 through the village4 ,at last they throw the torches into the river1 crying1 ,ha1 ,kore6 we throw you into the river1 like these torches1 that you may never return4 ,silesian peasants believe that on ,good ,friday the witches go their rounds and have great power for mischief4 ,hence about ,oels1 near ,strehlitz1 the people on that day arm themselves with old brooms and drive the witches from house and home1 from farmyard and cattle-stall1 making a great uproar and clatter as they do so4 ,in ,central ,europe the favourite time for expelling the witches is1 or was1 ,walpurgis ,night1 the ,eve of ,may ,day1 when the baleful powers of these mischievous beings were supposed to be at their height4 ,in the ,tyrol1 for example1 as in other places1 the expulsion of the powers of evil at this season goes by the name of ,burning out the ,witches4 ,it takes place on ,may ,day1 but people have been busy with their preparations for days before4 ,on a ,thursday at midnight bundles are made up of resinous splinters1 black and red spotted hemlock1 caperspurge1 rosemary1 and twigs of the sloe4 ,these are kept and burned on ,may ,day by men who must first have received plenary absolution from the ,church4 ,on the last three days of ,april all the houses are cleansed and fumigated with juniper berries and rue4 ,on ,may ,day1 when the evening bell has rung and the twilight is falling1 the ceremony of ,burning out the ,witches begins4 ,men and boys make a racket with whips1 bells1 pots1 and pans2 the women carry censers2 the dogs are unchained and run barking and yelping about4 ,as soon as the church bells begin to ring1 the bundles of twigs1 fastened on poles1 are set on fire and the incense is ignited4 ,then all the house-bells and dinner-bells are rung1 pots and pans are clashed1 dogs bark1 every one must make a noise4 ,and amid this hubbub all scream at the pitch of their voices3 ,witch flee1 flee from here1 or it will go ill with thee4 ,then they run seven times round the houses1 the yards1 and the village4 ,so the witches are smoked out of their lurking-places and driven away4 ,the custom of expelling the witches on ,walpurgis ,night is still1 or was down to recent years1 observed in many parts of ,bavaria and among the ,germans of ,bohemia4 ,thus in the ,bhmer-wald ,mountains all the young fellows of the village assemble after sunset on some height1 especially at a cross-road1 and crack whips for a while in unison with all their strength4 ,this drives away the witches2 for so far as the sound of the whips is heard1 these maleficent beings can do no harm4 ,in some places1 while the young men are cracking their whips1 the herdsmen wind their horns1 and the long-drawn notes1 heard far off in the silence of night1 are very effectual for banning the witches4 ,another witching time is the period of twelve days between ,christmas and ,epiphany4 ,hence in some parts of ,silesia the people burn pine-resin all night long between ,christmas and the ,new ,year in order that the pungent smoke may drive witches and evil spirits far away from house and homestead2 and on ,christmas ,eve and ,new ,year's ,eve they fire shots over fields and meadows1 into shrubs and trees1 and wrap straw round the fruit-trees1 to prevent the spirits from doing them harm4 ,on ,new ,year's ,eve1 which is ,saint ,sylvester's ,day1 ,bohemian lads1 armed with guns1 form themselves into circles and fire thrice into the air4 ,this is called ,shooting the ,witches and is supposed to frighten the witches away4 ,the last of the mystic twelve days is ,epiphany or ,twelfth ,night1 and it has been selected as a proper season for the expulsion of the powers of evil in various parts of ,europe4 ,thus at ,brunnen1 on the ,lake of ,lucerne1 boys go about in procession on ,twelfth ,night carrying torches and making a great noise with horns1 bells1 whips1 and so forth to frighten away two female spirits of the wood1 ,strudeli and ,strtteli4 ,the people think that if they do not make enough noise1 there will be little fruit that year4 ,again1 in ,labruguire1 a canton of ,southern ,france1 on the eve of ,twelfth ,day the people run through the streets1 jangling bells1 clattering kettles1 and doing everything to make a discordant noise4 ,then by the light of torches and blazing faggots they set up a prodigious hue and cry1 an ear-splitting uproar1 hoping thereby to chase all the wandering ghosts and devils from the town4 ,,lvii4 ,public ,scapegoats #a4 ,the ,expulsion of ,embodied ,evils ,,thus far we have dealt with that class of the general expulsion of evils which ,i have called direct or immediate4 ,in this class the evils are invisible1 at least to common eyes1 and the mode of deliverance consists for the most part in beating the empty air and raising such a hubbub as may scare the mischievous spirits and put them to flight4 ,it remains to illustrate the second class of expulsions1 in which the evil influences are embodied in a visible form or are at least supposed to be loaded upon a material medium1 which acts as a vehicle to draw them off from the people1 village1 or town4 ,the ,pomos of ,california celebrate an expulsion of devils every seven years1 at which the devils are represented by disguised men4 ,twenty or thirty men array themselves in harlequin rig and barbaric paint1 and put vessels of pitch on their heads2 then they secretly go out into the surrounding mountains4 ,these are to personify the devils4 ,a herald goes up to the top of the assembly-house1 and makes a speech to the multitude4 ,at a signal agreed upon in the evening the masqueraders come in from the mountains1 with the vessels of pitch flaming on their heads1 and with all the frightful accessories of noise1 motion1 and costume which the savage mind can devise in representation of demons4 ,the terrified women and children flee for life1 the men huddle them inside a circle1 and1 on the principle of fighting the devil with fire1 they swing blazing firebrands in the air1 yell1 whoop1 and make frantic dashes at the marauding and bloodthirsty devils1 so creating a terrific spectacle1 and striking great fear into the hearts of the assembled hundreds of women1 who are screaming and fainting and clinging to their valorous protectors4 ,finally the devils succeed in getting into the assembly-house1 and the bravest of the men enter and hold a parley with them4 ,as a conclusion of the whole farce1 the men summon courage1 the devils are expelled from the assembly-house1 and with a prodigious row and racket of sham fighting are chased away into the mountains4 ,in spring1 as soon as the willow-leaves were full grown on the banks of the river1 the ,mandan ,indians celebrated their great annual festival1 one of the features of which was the expulsion of the devil4 ,a man1 painted black to represent the devil1 entered the village from the prairie1 chased and frightened the women1 and acted the part of a buffalo bull in the buffalo dance1 the object of which was to ensure a plentiful supply of buffaloes during the ensuing year4 ,finally he was chased from the village1 the women pursuing him with hisses and gibes1 beating him with sticks1 and pelting him with dirt4 ,some of the native tribes of ,central ,queensland believe in a noxious being called ,molonga1 who prowls unseen and would kill men and violate women if certain ceremonies were not performed4 ,these ceremonies last for five nights and consist of dances1 in which only men1 fantastically painted and adorned1 take part4 ,on the fifth night ,molonga himself1 personified by a man tricked out with red ochre and feathers and carrying a long feather-tipped spear1 rushes forth from the darkness at the spectators and makes as if he would run them through4 ,great is the excitement1 loud are the shrieks and shouts1 but after another feigned attack the demon vanishes in the gloom4 ,on the last night of the year the palace of the ,kings of ,cambodia is purged of devils4 ,men painted as fiends are chased by elephants about the palace courts4 ,when they have been expelled1 a consecrated thread of cotton is stretched round the palace to keep them out4 ,in ,munzerabad1 a district of ,mysore in ,southern ,india1 when cholera or smallpox has broken out in a parish1 the inhabitants assemble and conjure the demon of the disease into a wooden image1 which they carry1 generally at midnight1 into the next parish4 ,the inhabitants of that parish in like manner pass the image on to their neighbours1 and thus the demon is expelled from one village after another1 until he comes to the bank of a river into which he is finally thrown4 ,oftener1 however1 the expelled demons are not represented at all1 but are understood to be present invisibly in the material and visible vehicle which conveys them away4 ,here1 again1 it will be convenient to distinguish between occasional and periodical expulsions4 ,we begin with the former4 #b4 ,the ,occasional ,expulsion of ,evils in a ,material ,vehicle ,,the ,,vehicle which conveys away the demons may be of various kinds4 ,a common one is a little ship or boat4 ,thus1 in the southern district of the island of ,ceram1 when a whole village suffers from sickness1 a small ship is made and filled with rice1 tobacco1 eggs1 and so forth1 which have been contributed by all the people4 ,a little sail is hoisted on the ship4 ,when all is ready1 a man calls out in a very loud voice1 ,o all ye sicknesses1 ye smallpoxes1 agues1 measles1 etc41 who have visited us so long and wasted us so sorely1 but who now cease to plague us1 we have made ready this ship for you1 and we have furnished you with provender sufficient for the voyage4 ,ye shall have no lack of food nor of betel-leaves nor of areca nuts nor of tobacco4 ,depart1 and sail away from us directly2 never come near us again2 but go to a land which is far from here4 ,let all the tides and winds waft you speedily thither1 and so convey you thither that for the time to come we may live sound and well1 and that we may never see the sun rise on you again4 ,then ten or twelve men carry the vessel to the shore1 and let it drift away with the land-breeze1 feeling convinced that they are free from sickness for ever1 or at least till the next time4 ,if sickness attacks them again1 they are sure it is not the same sickness1 but a different one1 which in due time they dismiss in the same manner4 ,when the demon-laden bark is lost to sight1 the bearers return to the village1 whereupon a man cries out1 ,the sicknesses are now gone1 vanished1 expelled1 and sailed away4 ,at this all the people come running out of their houses1 passing the word from one to the other with great joy1 beating on gongs and on tinkling instruments4 ,similar ceremonies are commonly resorted to in other ,east ,indian islands4 ,thus in ,timor-laut1 to mislead the demons who are causing sickness1 a small proa1 containing the image of a man and provisioned for a long voyage1 is allowed to drift away with wind and tide4 ,as it is being launched1 the people cry1 ,o sickness1 go from here2 turn back2 what do you here in this poor land8 ,three days after this ceremony a pig is killed1 and part of the flesh is offered to ,dudilaa1 who lives in the sun4 ,one of the oldest men says1 ,old sir1 ,i beseech you make well the grand-children1 children1 women1 and men1 that we may be able to eat pork and rice and to drink palmwine4 ,i will keep my promise4 ,eat your share1 and make all the people in the village well4 ,if the proa is stranded at any inhabited spot1 the sickness will break out there4 ,hence a stranded proa excites much alarm amongst the coast population1 and they immediately burn it1 because demons fly from fire4 ,in the island of ,buru the proa which carries away the demons of disease is about twenty feet long1 rigged out with sails1 oars1 anchor1 and so on1 and well stocked with provisions4 ,for a day and a night the people beat gongs and drums1 and rush about to frighten the demons4 ,next morning ten stalwart young men strike the people with branches1 which have been previously dipped in an earthen pot of water4 ,as soon as they have done so1 they run down to the beach1 put the branches on board the proa1 launch another boat in great haste1 and tow the disease-burdened bark far out to sea4 ,there they cast it off1 and one of them calls out1 ,grandfather ,smallpox1 go away--go willingly away--go visit another land2 we have made you food ready for the voyage1 we have now nothing more to give4 ,when they have landed1 all the people bathe together in the sea4 ,in this ceremony the reason for striking the people with the branches is clearly to rid them of the disease-demons1 which are then supposed to be transferred to the branches4 ,hence the haste with which the branches are deposited in the proa and towed away to sea4 ,so in the inland districts of ,ceram1 when smallpox or other sickness is raging1 the priest strikes all the houses with consecrated branches1 which are then thrown into the river1 to be carried down to the sea2 exactly as amongst the ,wotyaks of ,russia the sticks which have been used for expelling the devils from the village are thrown into the river1 that the current may sweep the baleful burden away4 ,the plan of putting puppets in the boat to represent sick persons1 in order to lure the demons after them1 is not uncommon4 ,for example1 most of the pagan tribes on the coast of ,borneo seek to drive away epidemic disease as follows4 ,they carve one or more rough human images from the pith of the sago palm and place them on a small raft or boat or full-rigged ,malay ship together with rice and other food4 ,the boat is decked with blossoms of the areca palm and with ribbons made from its leaves1 and thus adorned the little craft is allowed to float out to sea with the ebb-tide1 bearing1 as the people fondly think or hope1 the sickness away with it4 ,often the vehicle which carries away the collected demons or ills of a whole community is an animal or scapegoat4 ,in the ,central ,provinces of ,india1 when cholera breaks out in a village1 every one retires after sunset to his house4 ,the priests then parade the streets1 taking from the roof of each house a straw1 which is burnt with an offering of rice1 ghee1 and turmeric1 at some shrine to the east of the village4 ,chickens daubed with vermilion are driven away in the direction of the smoke1 and are believed to carry the disease with them4 ,if they fail1 goats are tried1 and last of all pigs4 ,when cholera rages among the ,bhars1 ,mallans1 and ,kurmis of ,india1 they take a goat or a buffalo--in either case the animal must be a female1 and as black as possible--then having tied some grain1 cloves1 and red lead in a yellow cloth on its back they turn it out of the village4 ,the animal is conducted beyond the boundary and not allowed to return4 ,sometimes the buffalo is marked with a red pigment and driven to the next village1 where he carries the plague with him4 ,amongst the ,dinkas1 a pastoral people of the ,white ,nile1 each family possesses a sacred cow4 ,when the country is threatened with war1 famine1 or any other public calamity1 the chiefs of the village require a particular family to surrender their sacred cow to serve as a scapegoat4 ,the animal is driven by the women to the brink of the river and across it to the other bank1 there to wander in the wilderness and fall a prey to ravening beasts4 ,then the women return in silence and without looking behind them2 were they to cast a backward glance1 they imagine that the ceremony would have no effect4 ,in #aheg1 when the ,aymara ,indians of ,bolivia and ,peru were suffering from a plague1 they loaded a black llama with the clothes of the plague-stricken people1 sprinkled brandy on the clothes1 and then turned the animal loose on the mountains1 hoping that it would carry the pest away with it4 ,occasionally the scapegoat is a man4 ,for example1 from time to time the gods used to warn the ,king of ,uganda that his foes the ,banyoro were working magic against him and his people to make them die of disease4 ,to avert such a catastrophe the king would send a scapegoat to the frontier of ,bunyoro1 the land of the enemy4 ,the scapegoat consisted of either a man and a boy or a woman and her child1 chosen because of some mark or bodily defect1 which the gods had noted and by which the victims were to be recognised4 ,with the human victims were sent a cow1 a goat1 a fowl1 and a dog2 and a strong guard escorted them to the land which the god had indicated4 ,there the limbs of the victims were broken and they were left to die a lingering death in the enemy's country1 being too crippled to crawl back to ,uganda4 ,the disease or plague was thought to have been thus transferred to the victims and to have been conveyed back in their persons to the land from which it came4 ,some of the aboriginal tribes of ,china1 as a protection against pestilence1 select a man of great muscular strength to act the part of scapegoat4 ,having besmeared his face with paint1 he performs many antics with the view of enticing all pestilential and noxious influences to attach themselves to him only4 ,he is assisted by a priest4 ,finally the scapegoat1 hotly pursued by men and women beating gongs and tom-toms1 is driven with great haste out of the town or village4 ,in the ,punjaub a cure for the murrain is to hire a man of the ,chamar caste1 turn his face away from the village1 brand him with a red-hot sickle1 and let him go out into the jungle taking the murrain with him4 ,he must not look back4 #c4 ,the ,periodic ,expulsion of ,evils in a ,material ,vehicle ,,the ,,mediate expulsion of evils by means of a scapegoat or other material vehicle1 like the immediate expulsion of them in invisible form1 tends to become periodic1 and for a like reason4 ,thus every year1 generally in ,march1 the people of ,leti1 ,moa1 and ,lakor1 islands of the ,indian ,archipelago1 send away all their diseases to sea4 ,they make a proa about six feet long1 rig it with sails1 oars1 rudder1 and other gear1 and every family deposits in its some rice1 fruit1 a fowl1 two eggs1 insects that ravage the fields1 and so on4 ,then they let it drift away to sea1 saying1 ,take away from here all kinds of sickness1 take them to other islands1 to other lands1 distribute them in places that lie eastward1 where the sun rises4 ,the ,biajas of ,borneo annually send to sea a little bark laden with the sins and misfortunes of the people4 ,the crew of any ship that falls in with the ill-omened bark at sea will suffer all the sorrows with which it is laden4 ,a like custom is annually observed by the ,dusuns of the ,tuaran district in ,british ,north ,borneo4 ,the ceremony is the most important of the whole year4 ,its aim is to bring good luck to the village during the ensuing year by solemnly expelling all the evil spirits that may have collected in or about the houses throughout the last twelve months4 ,the task of routing out the demons and banishing them devolves chiefly on women4 ,dressed in their finest array1 they go in procession through the village4 ,one of them carries a small sucking pig in a basket on her back2 and all of them bear wands1 with which they belabour the little pig at the appropriate moment2 its squeals help to attract the vagrant spirits4 ,at every house the women dance and sing1 clashing castanets or cymbals of brass and jingling bunches of little brass bells in both hands4 ,when the performance has been repeated at every house in the village1 the procession defiles down to the river1 and all the evil spirits1 which the performers have chased from the houses1 follow them to the edge of the water4 ,there a raft has been made ready and moored to the bank4 ,it contains offerings of food1 cloth1 cooking-pots1 and swords2 and the deck is crowded with figures of men1 women1 animals1 and birds1 all made out of the leaves of the sago palm4 ,the evil spirits now embark on the raft1 and when they are all aboard1 it is pushed off and allowed to float down with the current1 carrying the demons with it4 ,should the raft run aground near the village1 it is shoved off with all speed1 lest the invisible passengers should seize the opportunity of landing and returning to the village4 ,finally1 the sufferings of the little pig1 whose squeals served to decoy the demons from their lurking-places1 are terminated by death1 for it is killed and its carcase thrown away4 ,every year1 at the beginning of the dry season1 the ,nicobar ,islanders carry the model of a ship through their villages4 ,the devils are chased out of the huts1 and driven on board the little ship1 which is then launched and suffered to sail away with the wind4 ,the ceremony has been described by a catechist1 who witnessed it at ,car ,nicobar in ,july #ahig4 ,for three days the people were busy preparing two very large floating cars1 shaped like canoes1 fitted with sails1 and loaded with certain leaves1 which possessed the valuable property of expelling devils4 ,while the young people were thus engaged1 the exorcists and the elders sat in a house singing songs by turns2 but often they would come forth1 pace the beach armed with rods1 and forbid the devil to enter the village4 ,the fourth day of the solemnity bore a name which means ,expelling the ,devil by ,sails4 ,in the evening all the villagers assembled1 the women bringing baskets of ashes and bunches of devil-expelling leaves4 ,these leaves were then distributed to everybody1 old and young4 ,when all was ready1 a band of robust men1 attended by a guard of exorcists1 carried one of the cars down to the sea on the right side of the village graveyard1 and set it floating in the water4 ,as soon as they had returned1 another band of men carried the other car to the beach and floated it similarly in the sea to the left of the graveyard4 ,the demon-laden barks being now launched1 the women threw ashes from the shore1 and the whole crowd shouted1 saying1 ,fly away1 devil1 fly away1 never come again6 ,the wind and the tide being favourable1 the canoes sailed quickly away2 and that night all the people feasted together with great joy1 because the devil had departed in the direction of ,chowra4 ,a similar expulsion of devils takes place once a year in other ,nicobar villages2 but the ceremonies are held at different times in different places4 ,amongst many of the aboriginal tribes of ,china1 a great festival is celebrated in the third month of every year4 ,it is held by way of a general rejoicing over what the people believe to be a total annihilation of the ills of the past twelve months4 ,the destruction is supposed to be effected in the following way4 ,a large earthenware jar filled with gunpowder1 stones1 and bits of iron is buried in the earth4 ,a train of gunpowder1 communicating with the jar1 is then laid2 and a match being applied1 the jar and its contents are blown up4 ,the stones and bits of iron represent the ills and disasters of the past year1 and the dispersion of them by the explosion is believed to remove the ills and disasters themselves4 ,the festival is attended with much revelling and drunkenness4 ,at ,old ,calabar on the coast of ,guinea1 the devils and ghosts are1 or used to be1 publicly expelled once in two years4 ,among the spirits thus driven from their haunts are the souls of all the people who died since the last lustration of the town4 ,about three weeks or a month before the expulsion1 which according to one account takes place in the month of ,november1 rude effigies representing men and animals1 such as crocodiles1 leopards1 elephants1 bullocks1 and birds1 are made of wicker-work or wood1 and being hung with strips of cloth and bedizened with gew-gaws1 are set before the door of every house4 ,about three o'clock in the morning of the day appointed for the ceremony the whole population turns out into the streets1 and proceeds with a deafening uproar and in a state of the wildest excitement to drive all lurking devils and ghosts into the effigies1 in order that they may be banished with them from the abodes of men4 ,for this purpose bands of people roam through the streets knocking on doors1 firing guns1 beating drums1 blowing on horns1 ringing bells1 clattering pots and pans1 shouting and hallooing with might and main1 in short making all the noise it is possible for them to raise4 ,the hubbub goes on till the approach of dawn1 when it gradually subsides and ceases altogether at sunrise4 ,by this time the houses have been thoroughly swept1 and all the frightened spirits are supposed to have huddled into the effigies or their fluttering drapery4 ,in these wicker figures are also deposited the sweepings of the houses and the ashes of yesterday's fires4 ,then the demon-laden images are hastily snatched up1 carried in tumultuous procession down to the brink of the river1 and thrown into the water to the tuck of drums4 ,the ebb-tide bears them away seaward1 and thus the town is swept clean of ghosts and devils for another two years4 ,similar annual expulsions of embodied evils are not unknown in ,europe4 ,on the evening of ,easter ,sunday the gypsies of ,southern ,europe take a wooden vessel like a band-box1 which rests cradle-wise on two cross pieces of wood4 ,in this they place herbs and simples1 together with the dried carcase of a snake1 or lizard1 which every person present must first have touched with his fingers4 ,the vessel is then wrapt in white and red wool1 carried by the oldest man from tent to tent1 and finally thrown into running water1 not1 however1 before every member of the band has spat into it once1 and the sorceress has uttered some spells over it4 ,they believe that by performing this ceremony they dispel all the illnesses that would otherwise have afflicted them in the course of the year2 and that if any one finds the vessel and opens it out of curiosity1 he and his will be visited by all the maladies which the others have escaped4 ,the scapegoat by means of which the accumulated ills of a whole year are publicly expelled is sometimes an animal4 ,for example1 among the ,garos of ,assam1 besides the sacrifices for individual cases of illness1 there are certain ceremonies which are observed once a year by a whole community or village1 and are intended to safeguard its members from dangers of the forest1 and from sickness and mishap during the coming twelve months4 ,the principal of these is the ,asongtata ceremony4 ,close to the outskirts of every big village a number of stones may be noticed stuck into the ground1 apparently without order or method4 ,these are known by the name of asong1 and on them is offered the sacrifice which the ,asongtata demands4 ,the sacrifice of a goat takes place1 and a month later1 that of a langur 7,entellus monkey7 or a bamboo-rat is considered necessary4 ,the animal chosen has a rope fastened round its neck and is led by two men1 one on each side of it1 to every house in the village4 ,it is taken inside each house in turn1 the assembled villagers1 meanwhile1 beating the walls from the outside1 to frighten and drive out any evil spirits which may have taken up their residence within4 ,the round of the village having been made in this manner1 the monkey or rat is led to the outskirts of the village1 killed by a blow of a dao1 which disembowels it1 and then crucified on bamboos set up in the ground4 ,round the crucified animal long1 sharp bamboo stakes are placed1 which form chevaux de frise round about it4 ,these commemorate the days when such defences surrounded the villages on all sides to keep off human enemies1 and they are now a symbol to ward off sickness and dangers to life from the wild animals of the forest4 ,the langur required for the purpose is hunted down some days before1 but should it be found impossible to catch one1 a brown monkey may take its place2 a hulock may not be used4 ,here the crucified ape or rat is the public scapegoat1 which by its vicarious sufferings and death relieves the people from all sickness and mishap in the coming year4 ,again1 on one day of the year the ,bhotiyas of ,juhar1 in the ,western ,himalayas1 take a dog1 intoxicate him with spirits and bhang or hemp1 and having fed him with sweetmeats1 lead him round the village and let him loose4 ,they then chase and kill him with sticks and stones1 and believe that1 when they have done so1 no disease or misfortune will visit the village during the year4 ,in some parts of ,breadalbane it was formerly the custom on ,new ,year's ,day to take a dog to the door1 give him a bit of bread1 and drive him out1 saying1 ,get away1 you dog6 ,whatever death of men or loss of cattle would happen in this house to the end of the present year1 may it all light on your head6 ,on the ,day of ,atonement1 which was the tenth day of the seventh month1 the ,jewish high-priest laid both his hands on the head of a live goat1 confessed over it all the iniquities of the ,children of ,israel1 and1 having thereby transferred the sins of the people to the beast1 sent it away into the wilderness4 ,the scapegoat upon whom the sins of the people are periodically laid1 may also be a human being4 ,at ,onitsha1 on the ,niger1 two human beings used to be annually sacrificed to take away the sins of the land4 ,the victims were purchased by public subscription4 ,all persons who1 during the past year1 had fallen into gross sins1 such as incendiarism1 theft1 adultery1 witchcraft1 and so forth1 were expected to contribute #bh ngugas1 or a little over #b4 ,the money thus collected was taken into the interior of the country and expended in the purchase of two sickly persons to be offered as a sacrifice for all these abominable crimes--one for the land and one for the river4 ,a man from a neighbouring town was hired to put them to death4 ,on the twenty-seventh of ,february #aheh the ,rev4 ,j4 ,c4 ,taylor witnessed the sacrifice of one of these victims4 ,the sufferer was a woman1 about nineteen or twenty years of age4 ,they dragged her alive along the ground1 face downwards1 from the king's house to the river1 a distance of two miles1 the crowds who accompanied her crying1 ,wickedness6 wickedness6 ,the intention was to take away the iniquities of the land4 ,the body was dragged along in a merciless manner1 as if the weight of all their wickedness was thus carried away4 ,similar customs are said to be still secretly practised every year by many tribes in the delta of the ,niger in spite of the vigilance of the ,british ,government4 ,among the ,yoruba negroes of ,west ,africa the human victim chosen for sacrifice1 and who may be either a freeborn or a slave1 a person of noble or wealthy parentage1 or one of humble birth1 is1 after he has been chosen and marked out for the purpose1 called an ,oluwo4 ,he is always well fed and nourished and supplied with whatever he should desire during the period of his confinement4 ,when the occasion arrives for him to be sacrificed and offered up1 he is commonly led about and paraded through the streets of the town or city of the ,sovereign who would sacrifice him for the well-being of his government and of every family and individual under it1 in order that he might carry off the sin1 guilt1 misfortune and death of all without exception4 ,ashes and chalk would be employed to hide his identity by the one being freely thrown over his head1 and his face painted with the latter1 whilst individuals would often rush out of their houses to lay their hands upon him that they might thus transfer to him their sin1 guilt1 trouble1 and death4 ,this parade over1 he is taken to an inner sanctuary and beheaded4 ,his last words or dying groans are the signal for an outburst of joy among the people assembled outside1 who believe that the sacrifice has been accepted and the divine wrath appeased4 ,in ,siam it used to be the custom on one day of the year to single out a woman broken down by debauchery1 and carry her on a litter through all the streets to the music of drums and hautboys4 ,the mob insulted her and pelted her with dirt2 and after having carried her through the whole city1 they threw her on a dunghill or a hedge of thorns outside the ramparts1 forbidding her ever to enter the walls again4 ,they believed that the woman thus drew upon herself all the malign influences of the air and of evil spirits4 ,the ,bataks of ,sumatra offer either a red horse or a buffalo as a public sacrifice to purify the land and obtain the favour of the gods4 ,formerly1 it is said1 a man was bound to the same stake as the buffalo1 and when they killed the animal1 the man was driven away2 no one might receive him1 converse with him1 or give him food4 ,doubtless he was supposed to carry away the sins and misfortunes of the people4 ,sometimes the scapegoat is a divine animal4 ,the people of ,malabar share the ,hindoo reverence for the cow1 to kill and eat which they esteem to be a crime as heinous as homicide or wilful murder4 ,nevertheless the ,bramans transfer the sins of the people into one or more ,cows1 which are then carry'd away1 both the ,cows and the ,sins wherewith these ,beasts are charged1 to what place the ,braman shall appoint4 ,when the ancient ,egyptians sacrificed a bull1 they invoked upon its head all the evils that might otherwise befall themselves and the land of ,egypt1 and thereupon they either sold the bull's head to the ,greeks or cast it into the river4 ,now1 it cannot be said that in the times known to us the ,egyptians worshipped bulls in general1 for they seem to have commonly killed and eaten them4 ,but a good many circumstances point to the conclusion that originally all cattle1 bulls as well as cows1 were held sacred by the ,egyptians4 ,for not only were all cows esteemed holy by them and never sacrificed1 but even bulls might not be sacrificed unless they had certain natural marks2 a priest examined every bull before it was sacrificed2 if it had the proper marks1 he put his seal on the animal in token that it might be sacrificed2 and if a man sacrificed a bull which had not been sealed1 he was put to death4 ,moreover1 the worship of the black bulls ,apis and ,mnevis1 especially the former1 played an important part in ,egyptian religion2 all bulls that died a natural death were carefully buried in the suburbs of the cities1 and their bones were afterwards collected from all parts of ,egypt and interred in a single spot2 and at the sacrifice of a bull in the great rites of ,isis all the worshippers beat their breasts and mourned4 ,on the whole1 then1 we are perhaps entitled to infer that bulls were originally1 as cows were always1 esteemed sacred by the ,egyptians1 and that the slain bull upon whose head they laid the misfortunes of the people was once a divine scapegoat4 ,it seems not improbable that the lamb annually slain by the ,madis of ,central ,africa is a divine scapegoat1 and the same supposition may partly explain the ,zuni sacrifice of the turtle4 ,lastly1 the scapegoat may be a divine man4 ,thus1 in ,november the ,gonds of ,india worship ,ghansyam ,deo1 the protector of the crops1 and at the festival the god himself is said to descend on the head of one of the worshippers1 who is suddenly seized with a kind of fit and1 after staggering about1 rushes off into the jungle1 where it is believed that1 if left to himself1 he would die mad4 ,however1 they bring him back1 but he does not recover his senses for one or two days4 ,the people think that one man is thus singled out as a scapegoat for the sins of the rest of the village4 ,in the temple of the ,moon the ,albanians of the ,eastern ,caucasus kept a number of sacred slaves1 of whom many were inspired and prophesied4 ,when one of these men exhibited more than usual symptoms of inspiration or insanity1 and wandered solitary up and down the woods1 like the ,gond in the jungle1 the high priest had him bound with a sacred chain and maintained him in luxury for a year4 ,at the end of the year he was anointed with unguents and led forth to be sacrificed4 ,a man whose business it was to slay these human victims and to whom practice had given dexterity1 advanced from the crowd and thrust a sacred spear into the victim's side1 piercing his heart4 ,from the manner in which the slain man fell1 omens were drawn as to the welfare of the commonwealth4 ,then the body was carried to a certain spot where all the people stood upon it as a purificatory ceremony4 ,this last circumstance clearly indicates that the sins of the people were transferred to the victim1 just as the ,jewish priest transferred the sins of the people to the scapegoat by laying his hands on the animal's head2 and since the man was believed to be possessed by the divine spirit1 we have here an undoubted example of a man-god slain to take away the sins and misfortunes of the people4 ,in ,tibet the ceremony of the scapegoat presents some remarkable features4 ,the ,tibetan new year begins with the new moon which appears about the fifteenth of ,february4 ,for twenty-three days afterwards the government of ,lhasa1 the capital1 is taken out of the hands of the ordinary rulers and entrusted to the monk of the ,debang monastery who offers to pay the highest sum for the privilege4 ,the successful bidder is called the ,jalno1 and he announces his accession to power in person1 going through the streets of ,lhasa with a silver stick in his hand4 ,monks from all the neighbouring monasteries and temples assemble to pay him homage4 ,the ,jalno exercises his authority in the most arbitrary manner for his own benefit1 as all the fines which he exacts are his by purchase4 ,the profit he makes is about ten times the amount of the purchase money4 ,his men go about the streets in order to discover any conduct on the part of the inhabitants that can be found fault with4 ,every house in ,lhasa is taxed at this time1 and the slightest offence is punished with unsparing rigour by fines4 ,this severity of the ,jalno drives all working classes out of the city till the twenty-three days are over4 ,but if the laity go out1 the clergy come in4 ,all the ,buddhist monasteries of the country for miles round about open their gates and disgorge their inmates4 ,all the roads that lead down into ,lhasa from the neighbouring mountains are full of monks hurrying to the capital1 some on foot1 some on horseback1 some riding asses or lowing oxen1 all carrying their prayer-books and culinary utensils4 ,in such multitudes do they come that the streets and squares of the city are encumbered with their swarms1 and incarnadined with their red cloaks4 ,the disorder and confusion are indescribable4 ,bands of the holy men traverse the streets chanting prayers1 or uttering wild cries4 ,they meet1 they jostle1 they quarrel1 they fight2 bloody noses1 black eyes1 and broken heads are freely given and received4 ,all day long1 too1 from before the peep of dawn till after darkness has fallen1 these red-cloaked monks hold services in the dim incense-laden air of the great ,machindranath temple1 the cathedral of ,lhasa2 and thither they crowd thrice a day to receive their doles of tea and soup and money4 ,the cathedral is a vast building1 standing in the centre of the city1 and surrounded by bazaars and shops4 ,the idols in it are richly inlaid with gold and precious stones4 ,twenty-four days after the ,jalno has ceased to have authority1 he assumes it again1 and for ten days acts in the same arbitrary manner as before4 ,on the first of the ten days the priests again assemble at the cathedral1 pray to the gods to prevent sickness and other evils among the people1 and1 as a peace-offering1 sacrifice one man4 ,the man is not killed purposely1 but the ceremony he undergoes often proves fatal4 ,grain is thrown against his head1 and his face is painted half white1 half black4 ,thus grotesquely disguised1 and carrying a coat of skin on his arm1 he is called the ,king of the ,years1 and sits daily in the market-place1 where he helps himself to whatever he likes and goes about shaking a black yak's tail over the people1 who thus transfer their bad luck to him4 ,on the tenth day1 all the troops in ,lhasa march to the great temple and form in line before it4 ,the ,king of the ,years is brought forth from the temple and receives small donations from the assembled multitude4 ,he then ridicules the ,jalno1 saying to him1 ,what we perceive through the five senses is no illusion4 ,all you teach is untrue1 and the like4 ,the ,jalno1 who represents the ,grand ,lama for the time being1 contests these heretical opinions2 the dispute waxes warm1 and at last both agree to decide the questions at issue by a cast of the dice1 the ,jalno offering to change places with the scapegoat should the throw be against him4 ,if the ,king of the ,years wins1 much evil is prognosticated2 but if the ,jalno wins1 there is great rejoicing1 for it proves that his adversary has been accepted by the gods as a victim to bear all the sins of the people of ,lhasa4 ,fortune1 however1 always favours the ,jalno1 who throws sixes with unvarying success1 while his opponent turns up only ones4 ,nor is this so extraordinary as at first sight it might appear2 for the ,jalno's dice are marked with nothing but sixes and his adversary's with nothing but ones4 ,when he sees the finger of ,providence thus plainly pointed against him1 the ,king of the ,years is terrified and flees away upon a white horse1 with a white dog1 a white bird1 salt1 and so forth1 which have all been provided for him by the government4 ,his face is still painted half white and half black1 and he still wears his leathern coat4 ,the whole populace pursues him1 hooting1 yelling1 and firing blank shots in volleys after him4 ,thus driven out of the city1 he is detained for seven days in the great chamber of horrors at the ,samyas monastery1 surrounded by monstrous and terrific images of devils and skins of huge serpents and wild beasts4 ,thence he goes away into the mountains of ,chetang1 where he has to remain an outcast for several months or a year in a narrow den4 ,if he dies before the time is out1 the people say it is an auspicious omen2 but if he survives1 he may return to ,lhasa and play the part of scapegoat over again the following year4 ,this quaint ceremonial1 still annually observed in the secluded capital of ,buddhism--the ,rome of ,asia--is interesting because it exhibits1 in a clearly marked religious stratification1 a series of divine redeemers themselves redeemed1 of vicarious sacrifices vicariously atoned for1 of gods undergoing a process of fossilisation1 who1 while they retain the privileges1 have disburdened themselves of the pains and penalties of divinity4 ,in the ,jalno we may without undue straining discern a successor of those temporary kings1 those mortal gods1 who purchase a short lease of power and glory at the price of their lives4 ,that he is the temporary substitute of the ,grand ,lama is certain2 that he is1 or was once1 liable to act as scapegoat for the people is made nearly certain by his offer to change places with the real scapegoat--the ,king of the ,years--if the arbitrament of the dice should go against him4 ,it is true that the conditions under which the question is now put to the hazard have reduced the offer to an idle form4 ,but such forms are no mere mushroom growths1 springing up of themselves in a night4 ,if they are now lifeless formalities1 empty husks devoid of significance1 we may be sure that they once had a life and a meaning2 if at the present day they are blind alleys leading nowhere1 we may be certain that in former days they were paths that led somewhere1 if only to death4 ,that death was the goal to which of old the ,tibetan scapegoat passed after his brief period of licence in the market-place1 is a conjecture that has much to commend it4 ,analogy suggests it2 the blank shots fired after him1 the statement that the ceremony often proves fatal1 the belief that his death is a happy omen1 all confirm it4 ,we need not wonder then that the ,jalno1 after paying so dear to act as deputy-deity for a few weeks1 should have preferred to die by deputy rather than in his own person when his time was up4 ,the painful but necessary duty was accordingly laid on some poor devil1 some social outcast1 some wretch with whom the world had gone hard1 who readily agreed to throw away his life at the end of a few days if only he might have his fling in the meantime4 ,for observe that while the time allowed to the original deputy--the ,jalno--was measured by weeks1 the time allowed to the deputy's deputy was cut down to days1 ten days according to one authority1 seven days according to another4 ,so short a rope was doubtless thought a long enough tether for so black or sickly a sheep2 so few sands in the hour-glass1 slipping so fast away1 sufficed for one who had wasted so many precious years4 ,hence in the jack-pudding who now masquerades with motley countenance in the market-place of ,lhasa1 sweeping up misfortune with a black yak's tail1 we may fairly see the substitute of a substitute1 the vicar of a vicar1 the proxy on whose back the heavy burden was laid when it had been lifted from nobler shoulders4 ,but the clue1 if we have followed it aright1 does not stop at the ,jalno2 it leads straight back to the pope of ,lhasa himself1 the ,grand ,lama1 of whom the ,jalno is merely the temporary vicar4 ,the analogy of many customs in many lands points to the conclusion that1 if this human divinity stoops to resign his ghostly power for a time into the hands of a substitute1 it is1 or rather was once1 for no other reason than that the substitute might die in his stead4 ,thus through the mist of ages unillumined by the lamp of history1 the tragic figure of the pope of ,buddhism--,god's vicar on earth for ,asia--looms dim and sad as the man-god who bore his people's sorrows1 the ,good ,shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep4 #d4 ,on ,scapegoats in ,general ,,the ,,foregoing survey of the custom of publicly expelling the accumulated evils of a village or town or country suggests a few general observations4 ,in the first place1 it will not be disputed that what ,i have called the immediate and the mediate expulsions of evil are identical in intention2 in other words1 that whether the evils are conceived of as invisible or as embodied in a material form1 is a circumstance entirely subordinate to the main object of the ceremony1 which is simply to effect a total clearance of all the ills that have been infesting a people4 ,if any link were wanting to connect the two kinds of expulsion1 it would be furnished by such a practice as that of sending the evils away in a litter or a boat4 ,for here1 on the one hand1 the evils are invisible and intangible2 and1 on the other hand1 there is a visible and tangible vehicle to convey them away4 ,and a scapegoat is nothing more than such a vehicle4 ,in the second place1 when a general clearance of evils is resorted to periodically1 the interval between the celebrations of the ceremony is commonly a year1 and the time of year when the ceremony takes place usually coincides with some well-marked change of season1 such as the beginning or end of winter in the arctic and temperate zones1 and the beginning or end of the rainy season in the tropics4 ,the increased mortality which such climatic changes are apt to produce1 especially amongst ill-fed1 ill-clothed1 and ill-housed savages1 is set down by primitive man to the agency of demons1 who must accordingly be expelled4 ,hence1 in the tropical regions of ,new ,britain and ,peru1 the devils are or were driven out at the beginning of the rainy season2 hence1 on the dreary coasts of ,baffin ,land1 they are banished at the approach of the bitter ,arctic winter4 ,when a tribe has taken to husbandry1 the time for the general expulsion of devils is naturally made to agree with one of the great epochs of the agricultural year1 as sowing1 or harvest2 but1 as these epochs themselves naturally coincide with changes of season1 it does not follow that the transition from the hunting or pastoral to the agricultural life involves any alteration in the time of celebrating this great annual rite4 ,some of the agricultural communities of ,india and the ,hindoo ,koosh1 as we have seen1 hold their general clearance of demons at harvest1 others at sowing-time4 ,but1 at whatever season of the year it is held1 the general expulsion of devils commonly marks the beginning of the new year4 ,for1 before entering on a new year1 people are anxious to rid themselves of the troubles that have harassed them in the past2 hence it comes about that in so many communities the beginning of the new year is inaugurated with a solemn and public banishment of evil spirits4 ,in the third place1 it is to be observed that this public and periodic expulsion of devils is commonly preceded or followed by a period of general license1 during which the ordinary restraints of society are thrown aside1 and all offences1 short of the gravest1 are allowed to pass unpunished4 ,in ,guinea and ,tonquin the period of license precedes the public expulsion of demons2 and the suspension of the ordinary government in ,lhasa previous to the expulsion of the scapegoat is perhaps a relic of a similar period of universal license4 ,amongst the ,hos of ,india the period of license follows the expulsion of the devil4 ,amongst the ,iroquois it hardly appears whether it preceded or followed the banishment of evils4 ,in any case1 the extraordinary relaxation of all ordinary rules of conduct on such occasions is doubtless to be explained by the general clearance of evils which precedes or follows it4 ,on the one hand1 when a general riddance of evil and absolution from all sin is in immediate prospect1 men are encouraged to give the rein to their passions1 trusting that the coming ceremony will wipe out the score which they are running up so fast4 ,on the other hand1 when the ceremony has just taken place1 men's minds are freed from the oppressive sense1 under which they generally labour1 of an atmosphere surcharged with devils2 and in the first revulsion of joy they overleap the limits commonly imposed by custom and morality4 ,when the ceremony takes place at harvest-time1 the elation of feeling which it excites is further stimulated by the state of physical wellbeing produced by an abundant supply of food4 ,fourthly1 the employment of a divine man or animal as a scapegoat is especially to be noted2 indeed1 we are here directly concerned with the custom of banishing evils only in so far as these evils are believed to be transferred to a god who is afterwards slain4 ,it may be suspected that the custom of employing a divine man or animal as a public scapegoat is much more widely diffused than appears from the examples cited4 ,for1 as has already been pointed out1 the custom of killing a god dates from so early a period of human history that in later ages1 even when the custom continues to be practised1 it is liable to be misinterpreted4 ,the divine character of the animal or man is forgotten1 and he comes to be regarded merely as an ordinary victim4 ,this is especially likely to be the case when it is a divine man who is killed4 ,for when a nation becomes civilised1 if it does not drop human sacrifices altogether1 it at least selects as victims only such wretches as would be put to death at any rate4 ,thus the killing of a god may sometimes come to be confounded with the execution of a criminal4 ,if we ask why a dying god should be chosen to take upon himself and carry away the sins and sorrows of the people1 it may be suggested that in the practice of using the divinity as a scapegoat we have a combination of two customs which were at one time distinct and independent4 ,on the one hand we have seen that it has been customary to kill the human or animal god in order to save his divine life from being weakened by the inroads of age4 ,on the other hand we have seen that it has been customary to have a general expulsion of evils and sins once a year4 ,now1 if it occurred to people to combine these two customs1 the result would be the employment of the dying god as a scapegoat4 ,he was killed1 not originally to take away sin1 but to save the divine life from the degeneracy of old age2 but1 since he had to be killed at any rate1 people may have thought that they might as well seize the opportunity to lay upon him the burden of their sufferings and sins1 in order that he might bear it away with him to the unknown world beyond the grave4 ,the use of the divinity as a scapegoat clears up the ambiguity which1 as we saw1 appears to hang about the ,european folk-custom of carrying out ,death4 ,grounds have been shown for believing that in this ceremony the so-called ,death was originally the spirit of vegetation1 who was annually slain in spring1 in order that he might come to life again with all the vigour of youth4 ,but1 as ,i pointed out1 there are certain features in the ceremony which are not explicable on this hypothesis alone4 ,such are the marks of joy with which the effigy of ,death is carried out to be buried or burnt1 and the fear and abhorrence of it manifested by the bearers4 ,but these features become at once intelligible if we suppose that the ,death was not merely the dying god of vegetation1 but also a public scapegoat1 upon whom were laid all the evils that had afflicted the people during the past year4 ,joy on such an occasion is natural and appropriate2 and if the dying god appears to be the object of that fear and abhorrence which are properly due not to himself1 but to the sins and misfortunes with which he is laden1 this arises merely from the difficulty of distinguishing1 or at least of marking the distinction1 between the bearer and the burden4 ,when the burden is of a baleful character1 the bearer of it will be feared and shunned just as much as if he were himself instinct with those dangerous properties of which1 as it happens1 he is only the vehicle4 ,similarly we have seen that disease-laden and sin-laden boats are dreaded and shunned by ,east ,indian peoples4 ,again1 the view that in these popular customs the ,death is a scapegoat as well as a representative of the divine spirit of vegetation derives some support from the circumstance that its expulsion is always celebrated in spring and chiefly by ,slavonic peoples4 ,for the ,slavonic year began in spring2 and thus1 in one of its aspects1 the ceremony of carrying out ,death would be an example of the widespread custom of expelling the accumulated evils of the old year before entering on a new one4 ,,lviii4 ,human ,scapegoats in ,classical ,antiquity #a4 ,the ,human ,scapegoat in ,ancient ,rome ,,we are now prepared to notice the use of the human scapegoat in classical antiquity4 ,every year on the fourteenth of ,march a man clad in skins was led in procession through the streets of ,rome1 beaten with long white rods1 and driven out of the city4 ,he was called ,mamurius ,veturius1 that is1 the old ,mars1 and as the ceremony took place on the day preceding the first full moon of the old ,roman year 7which began on the first of ,march71 the skin-clad man must have represented the ,mars of the past year1 who was driven out at the beginning of a new one4 ,now ,mars was originally not a god of war but of vegetation4 ,for it was to ,mars that the ,roman husbandman prayed for the prosperity of his corn and his vines1 his fruit-trees and his copses2 it was to ,mars that the priestly college of the ,arval ,brothers1 whose business it was to sacrifice for the growth of the crops1 addressed their petitions almost exclusively2 and it was to ,mars1 as we saw1 that a horse was sacrificed in ,october to secure an abundant harvest4 ,moreover1 it was to ,mars1 under his title of ,mars of the woods 7,mars ,silvanus71 that farmers offered sacrifice for the welfare of their cattle4 ,we have already seen that cattle are commonly supposed to be under the special patronage of tree-gods4 ,once more1 the consecration of the vernal month of ,march to ,mars seems to point him out as the deity of the sprouting vegetation4 ,thus the ,roman custom of expelling the old ,mars at the beginning of the new year in spring is identical with the ,slavonic custom of carrying out ,death1 if the view here taken of the latter custom is correct4 ,the similarity of the ,roman and ,slavonic customs has been already remarked by scholars1 who appear1 however1 to have taken ,mamurius ,veturius and the corresponding figures in the ,slavonic ceremonies to be representatives of the old year rather than of the old god of vegetation4 ,it is possible that ceremonies of this kind may have come to be thus interpreted in later times even by the people who practised them4 ,but the personification of a period of time is too abstract an idea to be primitive4 ,however1 in the ,roman1 as in the ,slavonic1 ceremony1 the representative of the god appears to have been treated not only as a deity of vegetation but also as a scapegoat4 ,his expulsion implies this2 for there is no reason why the god of vegetation1 as such1 should be expelled from the city4 ,but it is otherwise if he is also a scapegoat2 it then becomes necessary to drive him beyond the boundaries1 that he may carry his sorrowful burden away to other lands4 ,and1 in fact1 ,mamurius ,veturius appears to have been driven away to the land of the ,oscans1 the enemies of ,rome4 #b4 ,the ,human ,scapegoat in ,ancient ,greece ,,the ,,ancient ,greeks were also familiar with the use of a human scapegoat4 ,in ,plutarch's native town of ,chaeronea a ceremony of this kind was performed by the chief magistrate at the ,town ,hall1 and by each householder at his own home4 ,it was called the expulsion of hunger4 ,a slave was beaten with rods of the agnus castus1 and turned out of doors with the words1 ,out with hunger1 and in with wealth and health4 ,when ,plutarch held the office of chief magistrate of his native town he performed this ceremony at the ,town ,hall1 and he has recorded the discussion to which the custom afterwards gave rise4 ,but in civilised ,greece the custom of the scapegoat took darker forms than the innocent rite over which the amiable and pious ,plutarch presided4 ,whenever ,marseilles1 one of the busiest and most brilliant of ,greek colonies1 was ravaged by a plague1 a man of the poorer classes used to offer himself as a scapegoat4 ,for a whole year he was maintained at the public expense1 being fed on choice and pure food4 ,at the expiry of the year he was dressed in sacred garments1 decked with holy branches1 and led through the whole city1 while prayers were uttered that all the evils of the people might fall on his head4 ,he was then cast out of the city or stoned to death by the people outside of the walls4 ,the ,athenians regularly maintained a number of degraded and useless beings at the public expense2 and when any calamity1 such as plague1 drought1 or famine1 befell the city1 they sacrificed two of these outcast scapegoats4 ,one of the victims was sacrificed for the men and the other for the women4 ,the former wore round his neck a string of black1 the latter a string of white figs4 ,sometimes1 it seems1 the victim slain on behalf of the women was a woman4 ,they were led about the city and then sacrificed1 apparently by being stoned to death outside the city4 ,but such sacrifices were not confined to extraordinary occasions of public calamity2 it appears that every year1 at the festival of the ,thargelia in ,may1 two victims1 one for the men and one for the women1 were led out of ,athens and stoned to death4 ,the city of ,abdera in ,thrace was publicly purified once a year1 and one of the burghers1 set apart for the purpose1 was stoned to death as a scapegoat or vicarious sacrifice for the life of all the others2 six days before his execution he was excommunicated1 in order that he alone might bear the sins of all the people4 ,from the ,lover's ,leap1 a white bluff at the southern end of their island1 the ,leucadians used annually to hurl a criminal into the sea as a scapegoat4 ,but to lighten his fall they fastened live birds and feathers to him1 and a flotilla of small boats waited below to catch him and convey him beyond the boundary4 ,probably these humane precautions were a mitigation of an earlier custom of flinging the scapegoat into the sea to drown4 ,the ,leucadian ceremony took place at the time of a sacrifice to ,apollo1 who had a temple or sanctuary on the spot4 ,elsewhere it was customary to cast a young man every year into the sea1 with the prayer1 ,be thou our offscouring4 ,this ceremony was supposed to rid the people of the evils by which they were beset1 or according to a somewhat different interpretation it redeemed them by paying the debt they owed to the sea-god4 ,as practised by the ,greeks of ,asia ,minor in the sixth century before our era1 the custom of the scapegoat was as follows4 ,when a city suffered from plague1 famine1 or other public calamity1 an ugly or deformed person was chosen to take upon himself all the evils which afflicted the community4 ,he was brought to a suitable place1 where dried figs1 a barley loaf1 and cheese were put into his hand4 ,these he ate4 ,then he was beaten seven times upon his genital organs with squills and branches of the wild fig and other wild trees1 while the flutes played a particular tune4 ,afterwards he was burned on a pyre built of the wood of forest trees2 and his ashes were cast into the sea4 ,a similar custom appears to have been annually celebrated by the ,asiatic ,greeks at the harvest festival of the ,thargelia4 ,in the ritual just described the scourging of the victim with squills1 branches of the wild fig1 and so forth1 cannot have been intended to aggravate his sufferings1 otherwise any stick would have been good enough to beat him with4 ,the true meaning of this part of the ceremony has been explained by ,w4 ,mannhardt4 ,he points out that the ancients attributed to squills a magical power of averting evil influences1 and that accordingly they hung them up at the doors of their houses and made use of them in purificatory rites4 ,hence the ,arcadian custom of whipping the image of ,pan with squills at a festival1 or whenever the hunters returned empty-handed1 must have been meant1 not to punish the god1 but to purify him from the harmful influences which were impeding him in the exercise of his divine functions as a god who should supply the hunter with game4 ,similarly the object of beating the human scapegoat on the genital organs with squills and so on1 must have been to release his reproductive energies from any restraint or spell under which they might be laid by demoniacal or other malignant agency2 and as the ,thargelia at which he was annually sacrificed was an early harvest festival celebrated in ,may1 we must recognise in him a representative of the creative and fertilising god of vegetation4 ,the representative of the god was annually slain for the purpose ,i have indicated1 that of maintaining the divine life in perpetual vigour1 untainted by the weakness of age2 and before he was put to death it was not unnatural to stimulate his reproductive powers in order that these might be transmitted in full activity to his successor1 the new god or new embodiment of the old god1 who was doubtless supposed immediately to take the place of the one slain4 ,similar reasoning would lead to a similar treatment of the scapegoat on special occasions1 such as drought or famine4 ,if the crops did not answer to the expectation of the husbandman1 this would be attributed to some failure in the generative powers of the god whose function it was to produce the fruits of the earth4 ,it might be thought that he was under a spell or was growing old and feeble4 ,accordingly he was slain in the person of his representative1 with all the ceremonies already described1 in order that1 born young again1 he might infuse his own youthful vigour into the stagnant energies of nature4 ,on the same principle we can understand why ,mamurius ,veturius was beaten with rods1 why the slave at the ,chaeronean ceremony was beaten with the agnus castus 7a tree to which magical properties were ascribed71 why the effigy of ,death in some parts of ,europe is assailed with sticks and stones1 and why at ,babylon the criminal who played the god scourged before he was crucified4 ,the purpose of the scourging was not to intensify the agony of the divine sufferer1 but on the contrary to dispel any malignant influences by which at the supreme moment he might conceivably be beset4 ,thus far ,i have assumed that the human victims at the ,thargelia represented the spirits of vegetation in general1 but it has been well remarked by ,mr4 ,w4 ,r4 ,paton that these poor wretches seem to have masqueraded as the spirits of fig-trees in particular4 ,he points out that the process of caprification1 as it is called1 that is1 the artificial fertilisation of the cultivated fig-trees by hanging strings of wild figs among the boughs1 takes place in ,greece and ,asia ,minor in ,june about a month after the date of the ,thargelia1 and he suggests that the hanging of the black and white figs round the necks of the two human victims1 one of whom represented the men and the other the women1 may have been a direct imitation of the process of caprification designed1 on the principle of imitative magic1 to assist the fertilisation of the fig-trees4 ,and since caprification is in fact a marriage of the male fig-tree with the female fig-tree1 ,mr4 ,paton further supposes that the loves of the trees may1 on the same principle of imitative magic1 have been simulated by a mock or even a real marriage between the two human victims1 one of whom appears sometimes to have been a woman4 ,on this view the practice of beating the human victims on their genitals with branches of wild fig-trees and with squills was a charm intended to stimulate the generative powers of the man and woman who for the time being personated the male and the female fig-trees respectively1 and who by their union in marriage1 whether real or pretended1 were believed to help the trees to bear fruit4 ,the interpretation which ,i have adopted of the custom of beating the human scapegoat with certain plants is supported by many analogies4 ,thus among the ,kai of ,german ,new ,guinea1 when a man wishes to make his banana shoots bear fruit quickly1 he beats them with a stick cut from a banana-tree which has already borne fruit4 ,here it is obvious that fruitfulness is believed to inhere in a stick cut from a fruitful tree and to be imparted by contact to the young banana plants4 ,similarly in ,new ,caledonia a man will beat his taro plants lightly with a branch1 saying as he does so1 ,i beat this taro that it may grow1 after which he plants the branch in the ground at the end of the field4 ,among the ,indians of ,brazil at the mouth of the ,amazon1 when a man wishes to increase the size of his generative organ1 he strikes it with the fruit of a white aquatic plant called aninga1 which grows luxuriantly on the banks of the river4 ,the fruit1 which is inedible1 resembles a banana1 and is clearly chosen for this purpose on account of its shape4 ,the ceremony should be performed three days before or after the new moon4 ,in the county of ,bekes1 in ,hungary1 barren women are fertilised by being struck with a stick which has first been used to separate pairing dogs4 ,here a fertilising virtue is clearly supposed to be inherent in the stick and to be conveyed by contact to the women4 ,the ,toradjas of ,central ,celebes think that the plant ,dracaena terminalis has a strong soul1 because when it is lopped1 it soon grows up again4 ,hence when a man is ill1 his friends will sometimes beat him on the crown of the head with ,dracaena leaves in order to strengthen his weak soul with the strong soul of the plant4 ,these analogies1 accordingly1 support the interpretation which1 following my predecessors ,w4 ,mannhardt and ,mr4 ,w4 ,r4 ,paton1 ,i have given of the beating inflicted on the human victims at the ,greek harvest festival of the ,thargelia4 ,that beating1 being administered to the generative organs of the victims by fresh green plants and branches1 is most naturally explained as a charm to increase the reproductive energies of the men or women either by communicating to them the fruitfulness of the plants and branches1 or by ridding them of the maleficent influences2 and this interpretation is confirmed by the observation that the two victims represented the two sexes1 one of them standing for the men in general and the other for the women4 ,the season of the year when the ceremony was performed1 namely the time of the corn harvest1 tallies well with the theory that the rite had an agricultural significance4 ,further1 that it was above all intended to fertilise the fig-trees is strongly suggested by the strings of black and white figs which were hung round the necks of the victims1 as well as by the blows which were given their genital organs with the branches of a wild fig-tree2 since this procedure closely resembles the procedure which ancient and modern husbandmen in ,greek lands have regularly resorted to for the purpose of actually fertilising their fig-trees4 ,when we remember what an important part the artificial fertilisation of the date palm-tree appears to have played of old not only in the husbandry but in the religion of ,mesopotamia1 there seems no reason to doubt that the artificial fertilisation of the fig-tree may in like manner have vindicated for itself a place in the solemn ritual of ,greek religion4 ,if these considerations are just1 we must apparently conclude that while the human victims at the ,thargelia certainly appear in later classical times to have figured chiefly as public scapegoats1 who carried away with them the sins1 misfortunes1 and sorrows of the whole people1 at an earlier time they may have been looked on as embodiments of vegetation1 perhaps of the corn but particularly of the fig-trees2 and that the beating which they received and the death which they died were intended primarily to brace and refresh the powers of vegetation then beginning to droop and languish under the torrid heat of the ,greek summer4 ,the view here taken of the ,greek scapegoat1 if it is correct1 obviates an objection which might otherwise be brought against the main argument of this book4 ,to the theory that the priest of ,aricia was slain as a representative of the spirit of the grove1 it might have been objected that such a custom has no analogy in classical antiquity4 ,but reasons have now been given for believing that the human being periodically and occasionally slain by the ,asiatic ,greeks was regularly treated as an embodiment of a divinity of vegetation4 ,probably the persons whom the ,athenians kept to be sacrificed were similarly treated as divine4 ,that they were social outcasts did not matter4 ,on the primitive view a man is not chosen to be the mouth-piece or embodiment of a god on account of his high moral qualities or social rank4 ,the divine afflatus descends equally on the good and the bad1 the lofty and the lowly4 ,if then the civilised ,greeks of ,asia and ,athens habitually sacrificed men whom they regarded as incarnate gods1 there can be no inherent improbability in the supposition that at the dawn of history a similar custom was observed by the semibarbarous ,latins in the ,arician ,grove4 ,but to clinch the argument1 it is clearly desirable to prove that the custom of putting to death a human representative of a god was known and practised in ancient ,italy elsewhere than in the ,arician ,grove4 ,this proof ,i now propose to adduce4 #c4 ,the ,roman ,saturnalia ,,we have seen that many peoples have been used to observe an annual period of license1 when the customary restraints of law and morality are thrown aside1 when the whole population give themselves up to extravagant mirth and jollity1 and when the darker passions find a vent which would never be allowed them in the more staid and sober course of ordinary life4 ,such outbursts of the pent-up forces of human nature1 too often degenerating into wild orgies of lust and crime1 occur most commonly at the end of the year1 and are frequently associated1 as ,i have had occasion to point out1 with one or other of the agricultural seasons1 especially with the time of sowing or of harvest4 ,now1 of all these periods of license the one which is best known and which in modern language has given its name to the rest1 is the ,saturnalia4 ,this famous festival fell in ,december1 the last month of the ,roman year1 and was popularly supposed to commemorate the merry reign of ,saturn1 the god of sowing and of husbandry1 who lived on earth long ago as a righteous and beneficent king of ,italy1 drew the rude and scattered dwellers on the mountains together1 taught them to till the ground1 gave them laws1 and ruled in peace4 ,his reign was the fabled ,golden ,age3 the earth brought forth abundantly3 no sound of war or discord troubled the happy world3 no baleful love of lucre worked like poison in the blood of the industrious and contented peasantry4 ,slavery and private property were alike unknown3 all men had all things in common4 ,at last the good god1 the kindly king1 vanished suddenly2 but his memory was cherished to distant ages1 shrines were reared in his honour1 and many hills and high places in ,italy bore his name4 ,yet the bright tradition of his reign was crossed by a dark shadow3 his altars are said to have been stained with the blood of human victims1 for whom a more merciful age afterwards substituted effigies4 ,of this gloomy side of the god's religion there is little or no trace in the descriptions which ancient writers have left us of the ,saturnalia4 ,feasting and revelry and all the mad pursuit of pleasure are the features that seem to have especially marked this carnival of antiquity1 as it went on for seven days in the streets and public squares and houses of ancient ,rome from the seventeenth to the twenty-third of ,december4 ,but no feature of the festival is more remarkable1 nothing in it seems to have struck the ancients themselves more than the license granted to slaves at this time4 ,the distinction between the free and the servile classes was temporarily abolished4 ,the slave might rail at his master1 intoxicate himself like his betters1 sit down at table with them1 and not even a word of reproof would be administered to him for conduct which at any other season might have been punished with stripes1 imprisonment1 or death4 ,nay1 more1 masters actually changed places with their slaves and waited on them at table2 and not till the serf had done eating and drinking was the board cleared and dinner set for his master4 ,so far was this inversion of ranks carried1 that each household became for a time a mimic republic in which the high offices of state were discharged by the slaves1 who gave their orders and laid down the law as if they were indeed invested with all the dignity of the consulship1 the praetorship1 and the bench4 ,like the pale reflection of power thus accorded to bondsmen at the ,saturnalia was the mock kingship for which freemen cast lots at the same season4 ,the person on whom the lot fell enjoyed the title of king1 and issued commands of a playful and ludicrous nature to his temporary subjects4 ,one of them he might order to mix the wine1 another to drink1 another to sing1 another to dance1 another to speak in his own dispraise1 another to carry a flute-girl on his back round the house4 ,now1 when we remember that the liberty allowed to slaves at this festive season was supposed to be an imitation of the state of society in ,saturn's time1 and that in general the ,saturnalia passed for nothing more or less than a temporary revival or restoration of the reign of that merry monarch1 we are tempted to surmise that the mock king who presided over the revels may have originally represented ,saturn himself4 ,the conjecture is strongly confirmed1 if not established1 by a very curious and interesting account of the way in which the ,saturnalia was celebrated by the ,roman soldiers stationed on the ,danube in the reign of ,maximian and ,diocletian4 ,the account is preserved in a narrative of the martyrdom of ,st4 ,dasius1 which was unearthed from a ,greek manuscript in the ,paris library1 and published by ,professor ,franz ,cumont of ,ghent4 ,two briefer descriptions of the event and of the custom are contained in manuscripts at ,milan and ,berlin2 one of them had already seen the light in an obscure volume printed at ,urbino in #agbg1 but its importance for the history of the ,roman religion1 both ancient and modern1 appears to have been overlooked until ,professor ,cumont drew the attention of scholars to all three narratives by publishing them together some years ago4 ,according to these narratives1 which have all the appearance of being authentic1 and of which the longest is probably based on official documents1 the ,roman soldiers at ,durostorum in ,lower ,moesia celebrated the ,saturnalia year by year in the following manner4 ,thirty days before the festival they chose by lot from amongst themselves a young and handsome man1 who was then clothed in royal attire to resemble ,saturn4 ,thus arrayed and attended by a multitude of soldiers he went about in public with full license to indulge his passions and to taste of every pleasure1 however base and shameful4 ,but if his reign was merry1 it was short and ended tragically2 for when the thirty days were up and the festival of ,saturn had come1 he cut his own throat on the altar of the god whom he personated4 ,in the year ,a4,d4 #cjc the lot fell upon the ,christian soldier ,dasius1 but he refused to play the part of the heathen god and soil his last days by debauchery4 ,the threats and arguments of his commanding officer ,bassus failed to shake his constancy1 and accordingly he was beheaded1 as the ,christian martyrologist records with minute accuracy1 at ,durostorum by the soldier ,john on ,friday the twentieth day of ,november1 being the twenty-fourth day of the moon1 at the fourth hour4 ,since this narrative was published by ,professor ,cumont1 its historical character1 which had been doubted or denied1 has received strong confirmation from an interesting discovery4 ,in the crypt of the cathedral which crowns the promontory of ,ancona there is preserved1 among other remarkable antiquities1 a white marble sarcophagus bearing a ,greek inscription1 in characters of the age of ,justinian1 to the following effect3 ,here lies the holy martyr ,dasius1 brought from ,durostorum4 ,the sarcophagus was transferred to the crypt of the cathedral in #ahdh from the church of ,san ,pellegrino1 under the high altar of which1 as we learn from a ,latin inscription let into the masonry1 the martyr's bones still repose with those of two other saints4 ,how long the sarcophagus was deposited in the church of ,san ,pellegrino1 we do not know2 but it is recorded to have been there in the year #afej4 ,we may suppose that the saint's relics were transferred for safety to ,ancona at some time in the troubled centuries which followed his martyrdom1 when ,moesia was occupied and ravaged by successive hordes of barbarian invaders4 ,at all events it appears certain from the independent and mutually confirmatory evidence of the martyrology and the monuments that ,dasius was no mythical saint1 but a real man1 who suffered death for his faith at ,durostorum in one of the early centuries of the ,christian era4 ,finding the narrative of the nameless martyrologist thus established as to the principal fact recorded1 namely1 the martyrdom of ,st4 ,dasius1 we may reasonably accept his testimony as to the manner and cause of the martyrdom1 all the more because his narrative is precise1 circumstantial1 and entirely free from the miraculous element4 ,accordingly ,i conclude that the account which he gives of the celebration of the ,saturnalia among the ,roman soldiers is trustworthy4 ,this account sets in a new and lurid light the office of the ,king of the ,saturnalia1 the ancient ,lord of ,misrule1 who presided over the winter revels at ,rome in the time of ,horace and ,tacitus4 ,it seems to prove that his business had not always been that of a mere harlequin or merry-andrew whose only care was that the revelry should run high and the fun grow fast and furious1 while the fire blazed and crackled on the hearth1 while the streets swarmed with festive crowds1 and through the clear frosty air1 far away to the north1 ,soracte showed his coronal of snow4 ,when we compare this comic monarch of the gay1 the civilised metropolis with his grim counterpart of the rude camp on the ,danube1 and when we remember the long array of similar figures1 ludicrous yet tragic1 who in other ages and in other lands1 wearing mock crowns and wrapped in sceptred palls1 have played their little pranks for a few brief hours or days1 then passed before their time to a violent death1 we can hardly doubt that in the ,king of the ,saturnalia at ,rome1 as he is depicted by classical writers1 we see only a feeble emasculated copy of that original1 whose strong features have been fortunately preserved for us by the obscure author of the ,martyrdom of ,st4 ,dasius4 ,in other words1 the martyrologist's account of the ,saturnalia agrees so closely with the accounts of similar rites elsewhere which could not possibly have been known to him1 that the substantial accuracy of his description may be regarded as established2 and further1 since the custom of putting a mock king to death as a representative of a god cannot have grown out of a practice of appointing him to preside over a holiday revel1 whereas the reverse may very well have happened1 we are justified in assuming that in an earlier and more barbarous age it was the universal practice in ancient ,italy1 wherever the worship of ,saturn prevailed1 to choose a man who played the part and enjoyed all the traditionary privileges of ,saturn for a season1 and then died1 whether by his own or another's hand1 whether by the knife or the fire or on the gallows-tree1 in the character of the good god who gave his life for the world4 ,in ,rome itself and other great towns the growth of civilisation had probably mitigated this cruel custom long before the ,augustan age1 and transformed it into the innocent shape it wears in the writings of the few classical writers who bestow a passing notice on the holiday ,king of the ,saturnalia4 ,but in remoter districts the older and sterner practice may long have survived2 and even if after the unification of ,italy the barbarous usage was suppressed by the ,roman government1 the memory of it would be handed down by the peasants and would tend from time to time1 as still happens with the lowest forms of superstition among ourselves1 to lead to a recrudescence of the practice1 especially among the rude soldiery on the outskirts of the empire over whom the once iron hand of ,rome was beginning to relax its grasp4 ,the resemblance between the ,saturnalia of ancient and the ,carnival of modern ,italy has often been remarked2 but in the light of all the facts that have come before us1 we may well ask whether the resemblance does not amount to identity4 ,we have seen that in ,italy1 ,spain1 and ,france1 that is1 in the countries where the influence of ,rome has been deepest and most lasting1 a conspicuous feature of the ,carnival is a burlesque figure personifying the festive season1 which after a short career of glory and dissipation is publicly shot1 burnt1 or otherwise destroyed1 to the feigned grief or genuine delight of the populace4 ,if the view here suggested of the ,carnival is correct1 this grotesque personage is no other than a direct successor of the old ,king of the ,saturnalia1 the master of the revels1 the real man who personated ,saturn and1 when the revels were over1 suffered a real death in his assumed character4 ,the ,king of the ,bean on ,twelfth ,night and the mediaeval ,bishop of ,fools1 ,abbot of ,unreason1 or ,lord of ,misrule are figures of the same sort and may perhaps have had a similar origin4 ,whether that was so or not1 we may conclude with a fair degree of probability that if the ,king of the ,wood at ,aricia lived and died as an incarnation of a sylvan deity1 he had of old a parallel at ,rome in the men who1 year by year1 were slain in the character of ,king ,saturn1 the god of the sown and sprouting seed4 ,,lix4 ,killing the ,god in ,mexico ,,by ,,no ,,people does the custom of sacrificing the human representative of a god appear to have been observed so commonly and with so much solemnity as by the ,aztecs of ancient ,mexico4 ,with the ritual of these remarkable sacrifices we are well acquainted1 for it has been fully described by the ,spaniards who conquered ,mexico in the sixteenth century1 and whose curiosity was naturally excited by the discovery in this distant region of a barbarous and cruel religion which presented many curious points of analogy to the doctrine and ritual of their own church4 ,they took a captive1 says the ,jesuit ,acosta1 such as they thought good2 and afore they did sacrifice him unto their idols1 they gave him the name of the idol1 to whom he should be sacrificed1 and apparelled him with the same ornaments like their idol1 saying1 that he did represent the same idol4 ,and during the time that this representation lasted1 which was for a year in some feasts1 in others six months1 and in others less1 they reverenced and worshipped him in the same manner as the proper idol2 and in the meantime he did eat1 drink1 and was merry4 ,when he went through the streets1 the people came forth to worship him1 and every one brought him an alms1 with children and sick folks1 that he might cure them1 and bless them1 suffering him to do all things at his pleasure1 only he was accompanied with ten or twelve men lest he should fly4 ,and he 7to the end he might be reverenced as he passed7 sometimes sounded upon a small flute1 that the people might prepare to worship him4 ,the feast being come1 and he grown fat1 they killed him1 opened him1 and ate him1 making a solemn sacrifice of him4 ,this general description of the custom may now be illustrated by particular examples4 ,thus at the festival called ,toxcatl1 the greatest festival of the ,mexican year1 a young man was annually sacrificed in the character of ,tezcatlipoca1 the god of gods1 after having been maintained and worshipped as that great deity in person for a whole year4 ,according to the old ,franciscan monk ,sahagun1 our best authority on the ,aztec religion1 the sacrifice of the human god fell at ,easter or a few days later1 so that1 if he is right1 it would correspond in date as well as in character to the ,christian festival of the death and resurrection of the ,redeemer4 ,more exactly he tells us that the sacrifice took place on the first day of the fifth ,aztec month1 which according to him began on the twenty-third or twenty-seventh day of ,april4 ,at this festival the great god died in the person of one human representative and came to life again in the person of another1 who was destined to enjoy the fatal honour of divinity for a year and to perish1 like all his predecessors1 at the end of it4 ,the young man singled out for this high dignity was carefully chosen from among the captives on the ground of his personal beauty4 ,he had to be of unblemished body1 slim as a reed and straight as a pillar1 neither too tall nor too short4 ,if through high living he grew too fat1 he was obliged to reduce himself by drinking salt water4 ,and in order that he might behave in his lofty station with becoming grace and dignity he was carefully trained to comport himself like a gentleman of the first quality1 to speak correctly and elegantly1 to play the flute1 to smoke cigars and to snuff at flowers with a dandified air4 ,he was honourably lodged in the temple1 where the nobles waited on him and paid him homage1 bringing him meat and serving him like a prince4 ,the king himself saw to it that he was apparelled in gorgeous attire1 for already he esteemed him as a god4 ,eagle down was gummed to his head and white cock's feathers were stuck in his hair1 which drooped to his girdle4 ,a wreath of flowers like roasted maize crowned his brows1 and a garland of the same flowers passed over his shoulders and under his armpits4 ,golden ornaments hung from his nose1 golden armlets adorned his arms1 golden bells jingled on his legs at every step he took2 earrings of turquoise dangled from his ears1 bracelets of turquoise bedecked his wrists2 necklaces of shells encircled his neck and depended on his breast2 he wore a mantle of network1 and round his middle a rich waistcloth4 ,when this bejewelled exquisite lounged through the streets playing on his flute1 puffing at a cigar1 and smelling at a nosegay1 the people whom he met threw themselves on the earth before him and prayed to him with sighs and tears1 taking up the dust in their hands and putting it in their mouths in token of the deepest humiliation and subjection4 ,women came forth with children in their arms and presented them to him1 saluting him as a god4 ,for he passed for our ,lord ,god2 the people acknowledged him as the ,lord4 ,all who thus worshipped him on his passage he saluted gravely and courteously4 ,lest he should flee1 he was everywhere attended by a guard of eight pages in the royal livery1 four of them with shaven crowns like the palace-slaves1 and four of them with the flowing locks of warriors2 and if he contrived to escape1 the captain of the guard had to take his place as the representative of the god and to die in his stead4 ,twenty days before he was to die1 his costume was changed1 and four damsels delicately nurtured and bearing the names of four goddesses--the ,goddess of ,flowers1 the ,goddess of the ,young ,maize1 the ,goddess ,our ,mother among the ,water1 and the ,goddess of ,salt--were given him to be his brides1 and with them he consorted4 ,during the last five days divine honours were showered on the destined victim4 ,the king remained in his palace while the whole court went after the human god4 ,solemn banquets and dances followed each other in regular succession and at appointed places4 ,on the last day the young man1 attended by his wives and pages1 embarked in a canoe covered with a royal canopy and was ferried across the lake to a spot where a little hill rose from the edge of the water4 ,it was called the ,mountain of ,parting1 because there his wives bade him a last farewell4 ,then1 accompanied only by his pages1 he repaired to a small and lonely temple by the wayside4 ,like the ,mexican temples in general1 it was built in the form of a pyramid2 and as the young man ascended the stairs he broke at every step one of the flutes on which he had played in the days of his glory4 ,on reaching the summit he was seized and held down by the priests on his back upon a block of stone1 while one of them cut open his breast1 thrust his hand into the wound1 and wrenching out his heart held it up in sacrifice to the sun4 ,the body of the dead god was not1 like the bodies of common victims1 sent rolling down the steps of the temple1 but was carried down to the foot1 where the head was cut off and spitted on a pike4 ,such was the regular end of the man who personated the greatest god of the ,mexican pantheon4 ,the honour of living for a short time in the character of a god and dying a violent death in the same capacity was not restricted to men in ,mexico2 women were allowed1 or rather compelled1 to enjoy the glory and to share the doom as representatives of goddesses4 ,thus at a great festival in ,september1 which was preceded by a strict fast of seven days1 they sanctified a young slave girl of twelve or thirteen years1 the prettiest they could find1 to represent the ,maize ,goddess ,chicomecohuatl4 ,they invested her with the ornaments of the goddess1 putting a mitre on her head and maize-cobs round her neck and in her hands1 and fastening a green feather upright on the crown of her head to imitate an ear of maize4 ,this they did1 we are told1 in order to signify that the maize was almost ripe at the time of the festival1 but because it was still tender they chose a girl of tender years to play the part of the ,maize ,goddess4 ,the whole long day they led the poor child in all her finery1 with the green plume nodding on her head1 from house to house dancing merrily to cheer people after the dulness and privations of the fast4 ,in the evening all the people assembled at the temple1 the courts of which they lit up by a multitude of lanterns and candles4 ,there they passed the night without sleeping1 and at midnight1 while the trumpets1 flutes1 and horns discoursed solemn music1 a portable framework or palanquin was brought forth1 bedecked with festoons of maize-cobs and peppers and filled with seeds of all sorts4 ,this the bearers set down at the door of the chamber in which the wooden image of the goddess stood4 ,now the chamber was adorned and wreathed1 both outside and inside1 with wreaths of maize-cobs1 peppers1 pumpkins1 roses1 and seeds of every kind1 a wonder to behold2 the whole floor was covered deep with these verdant offerings of the pious4 ,when the music ceased1 a solemn procession came forth of priests and dignitaries1 with flaring lights and smoking censers1 leading in their midst the girl who played the part of the goddess4 ,then they made her mount the framework1 where she stood upright on the maize and peppers and pumpkins with which it was strewed1 her hands resting on two bannisters to keep her from falling4 ,then the priests swung the smoking censers round her2 the music struck up again1 and while it played1 a great dignitary of the temple suddenly stepped up to her with a razor in his hand and adroitly shore off the green feather she wore on her head1 together with the hair in which it was fastened1 snipping the lock off by the root4 ,the feather and the hair he then presented to the wooden image of the goddess with great solemnity and elaborate ceremonies1 weeping and giving her thanks for the fruits of the earth and the abundant crops which she had bestowed on the people that year2 and as he wept and prayed1 all the people1 standing in the courts of the temple1 wept and prayed with him4 ,when that ceremony was over1 the girl descended from the framework and was escorted to the place where she was to spend the rest of the night4 ,but all the people kept watch in the courts of the temple by the light of torches till break of day4 ,the morning being come1 and the courts of the temple being still crowded by the multitude1 who would have deemed it sacrilege to quit the precincts1 the priests again brought forth the damsel attired in the costume of the goddess1 with the mitre on her head and the cobs of maize about her neck4 ,again she mounted the portable framework or palanquin and stood on it1 supporting herself by her hands on the bannisters4 ,then the elders of the temple lifted it on their shoulders1 and while some swung burning censers and others played on instruments or sang1 they carried it in procession through the great courtyard to the hall of the god ,huitzilopochtli and then back to the chamber1 where stood the wooden image of the ,maize ,goddess1 whom the girl personated4 ,there they caused the damsel to descend from the palanquin and to stand on the heaps of corn and vegetables that had been spread in profusion on the floor of the sacred chamber4 ,while she stood there all the elders and nobles came in a line1 one behind the other1 carrying saucers full of dry and clotted blood which they had drawn from their ears by way of penance during the seven days' fast4 ,one by one they squatted on their haunches before her1 which was the equivalent of falling on their knees with us1 and scraping the crust of blood from the saucer cast it down before her as an offering in return for the benefits which she1 as the embodiment of the ,maize ,goddess1 had conferred upon them4 ,when the men had thus humbly offered their blood to the human representative of the goddess1 the women1 forming a long line1 did so likewise1 each of them dropping on her hams before the girl and scraping her blood from the saucer4 ,the ceremony lasted a long time1 for great and small1 young and old1 all without exception had to pass before the incarnate deity and make their offering4 ,when it was over1 the people returned home with glad hearts to feast on flesh and viands of every sort as merrily1 we are told1 as good ,christians at ,easter partake of meat and other carnal mercies after the long abstinence of ,lent4 ,and when they had eaten and drunk their fill and rested after the night watch1 they returned quite refreshed to the temple to see the end of the festival4 ,and the end of the festival was this4 ,the multitude being assembled1 the priests solemnly incensed the girl who personated the goddess2 then they threw her on her back on the heap of corn and seeds1 cut off her head1 caught the gushing blood in a tub1 and sprinkled the blood on the wooden image of the goddess1 the walls of the chamber1 and the offerings of corn1 peppers1 pumpkins1 seeds1 and vegetables which cumbered the floor4 ,after that they flayed the headless trunk1 and one of the priests made shift to squeeze himself into the bloody skin4 ,having done so they clad him in all the robes which the girl had worn2 they put the mitre on his head1 the necklace of golden maize-cobs about his neck1 the maize-cobs of feathers and gold in his hands2 and thus arrayed they led him forth in public1 all of them dancing to the tuck of drum1 while he acted as fugleman1 skipping and posturing at the head of the procession as briskly as he could be expected to do1 incommoded as he was by the tight and clammy skin of the girl and by her clothes1 which must have been much too small for a grown man4 ,in the foregoing custom the identification of the young girl with the ,maize ,goddess appears to be complete4 ,the golden maize-cobs which she wore round her neck1 the artificial maize-cobs which she carried in her hands1 the green feather which was stuck in her hair in imitation 7we are told7 of a green ear of maize1 all set her forth as a personification of the corn-spirit2 and we are expressly informed that she was specially chosen as a young girl to represent the young maize1 which at the time of the festival had not yet fully ripened4 ,further1 her identification with the corn and the corn-goddess was clearly announced by making her stand on the heaps of maize and there receive the homage and blood-offerings of the whole people1 who thereby returned her thanks for the benefits which in her character of a divinity she was supposed to have conferred upon them4 ,once more1 the practice of beheading her on a heap of corn and seeds and sprinkling her blood1 not only on the image of the ,maize ,goddess1 but on the piles of maize1 peppers1 pumpkins1 seeds1 and vegetables1 can seemingly have had no other object but to quicken and strengthen the crops of corn and the fruits of the earth in general by infusing into their representatives the blood of the ,corn ,goddess herself4 ,the analogy of this ,mexican sacrifice1 the meaning of which appears to be indisputable1 may be allowed to strengthen the interpretation which ,i have given of other human sacrifices offered for the crops4 ,if the ,mexican girl1 whose blood was sprinkled on the maize1 indeed personated the ,maize ,goddess1 it becomes more than ever probable that the girl whose blood the ,pawnees similarly sprinkled on the seed corn personated in like manner the female ,spirit of the ,corn2 and so with the other human beings whom other races have slaughtered for the sake of promoting the growth of the crops4 ,lastly1 the concluding act of the sacred drama1 in which the body of the dead ,maize ,goddess was flayed and her skin worn1 together with all her sacred insignia1 by a man who danced before the people in this grim attire1 seems to be best explained on the hypothesis that it was intended to ensure that the divine death should be immediately followed by the divine resurrection4 ,if that was so1 we may infer with some degree of probability that the practice of killing a human representative of a deity has commonly1 perhaps always1 been regarded merely as a means of perpetuating the divine energies in the fulness of youthful vigour1 untainted by the weakness and frailty of age1 from which they must have suffered if the deity had been allowed to die a natural death4 ,these ,mexican rites suffice to prove that human sacrifices of the sort ,i suppose to have prevailed at ,aricia were1 as a matter of fact1 regularly offered by a people whose level of culture was probably not inferior1 if indeed it was not distinctly superior1 to that occupied by the ,italian races at the early period to which the origin of the ,arician priesthood must be referred4 ,the positive and indubitable evidence of the prevalence of such sacrifices in one part of the world may reasonably be allowed to strengthen the probability of their prevalence in places for which the evidence is less full and trustworthy4 ,taken all together1 the facts which we have passed in review seem to show that the custom of killing men whom their worshippers regard as divine has prevailed in many parts of the world4 ,,lx4 ,between ,heaven and ,earth #a4 ,not to touch the ,earth ,,at ,,the ,,outset of this book two questions were proposed for answer3 ,why had the priest of ,aricia to slay his predecessor8 ,and why1 before doing so1 had he to pluck the ,golden ,bough8 ,of these two questions the first has now been answered4 ,the priest of ,aricia1 if ,i am right1 was one of those sacred kings or human divinities on whose life the welfare of the community and even the course of nature in general are believed to be intimately dependent4 ,it does not appear that the subjects or worshippers of such a spiritual potentate form to themselves any very clear notion of the exact relationship in which they stand to him2 probably their ideas on the point are vague and fluctuating1 and we should err if we attempted to define the relationship with logical precision4 ,all that the people know1 or rather imagine1 is that somehow they themselves1 their cattle1 and their crops are mysteriously bound up with their divine king1 so that according as he is well or ill the community is healthy or sickly1 the flocks and herds thrive or languish with disease1 and the fields yield an abundant or a scanty harvest4 ,the worst evil which they can conceive of is the natural death of their ruler1 whether he succumb to sickness or old age1 for in the opinion of his followers such a death would entail the most disastrous consequences on themselves and their possessions2 fatal epidemics would sweep away man and beast1 the earth would refuse her increase1 nay1 the very frame of nature itself might be dissolved4 ,to guard against these catastrophes it is necessary to put the king to death while he is still in the full bloom of his divine manhood1 in order that his sacred life1 transmitted in unabated force to his successor1 may renew its youth1 and thus by successive transmissions through a perpetual line of vigorous incarnations may remain eternally fresh and young1 a pledge and security that men and animals shall in like manner renew their youth by a perpetual succession of generations1 and that seedtime and harvest1 and summer and winter1 and rain and sunshine shall never fail4 ,that1 if my conjecture is right1 was why the priest of ,aricia1 the ,king of the ,wood at ,nemi1 had regularly to perish by the sword of his successor4 ,but we have still to ask1 ,what was the ,golden ,bough8 and why had each candidate for the ,arician priesthood to pluck it before he could slay the priest8 ,these questions ,i will now try to answer4 ,it will be well to begin by noticing two of those rules or taboos by which1 as we have seen1 the life of divine kings or priests is regulated4 ,the first of the rules to which ,i would call the reader's attention is that the divine personage may not touch the ground with his foot4 ,this rule was observed by the supreme pontiff of the ,zapotecs in ,mexico2 he profaned his sanctity if he so much as touched the ground with his foot4 ,montezuma1 emperor of ,mexico1 never set foot on the ground2 he was always carried on the shoulders of noblemen1 and if he lighted anywhere they laid rich tapestry for him to walk upon4 ,for the ,mikado of ,japan to touch the ground with his foot was a shameful degradation2 indeed1 in the sixteenth century1 it was enough to deprive him of his office4 ,outside his palace he was carried on men's shoulders2 within it he walked on exquisitely wrought mats4 ,the king and queen of ,tahiti might not touch the ground anywhere but within their hereditary domains2 for the ground on which they trod became sacred4 ,in travelling from place to place they were carried on the shoulders of sacred men4 ,they were always accompanied by several pairs of these sanctified attendants2 and when it became necessary to change their bearers1 the king and queen vaulted on to the shoulders of their new bearers without letting their feet touch the ground4 ,it was an evil omen if the king of ,dosuma touched the ground1 and he had to perform an expiatory ceremony4 ,within his palace the king of ,persia walked on carpets on which no one else might tread2 outside of it he was never seen on foot but only in a chariot or on horseback4 ,in old days the king of ,siam never set foot upon the earth1 but was carried on a throne of gold from place to place4 ,formerly neither the kings of ,uganda1 nor their mothers1 nor their queens might walk on foot outside of the spacious enclosures in which they lived4 ,whenever they went forth they were carried on the shoulders of men of the ,buffalo clan1 several of whom accompanied any of these royal personages on a journey and took it in turn to bear the burden4 ,the king sat astride the bearer's neck with a leg over each shoulder and his feet tucked under the bearer's arms4 ,when one of these royal carriers grew tired he shot the king onto the shoulders of a second man without allowing the royal feet to touch the ground4 ,in this way they went at a great pace and travelled long distances in a day1 when the king was on a journey4 ,the bearers had a special hut in the king's enclosure in order to be at hand the moment they were wanted4 ,among the ,bakuba1 or rather ,bushongo1 a nation in the southern region of the ,congo1 down to a few years ago persons of the royal blood were forbidden to touch the ground2 they must sit on a hide1 a chair1 or the back of a slave1 who crouched on hands and feet2 their feet rested on the feet of others4 ,when they travelled they were carried on the backs of men2 but the king journeyed in a litter supported on shafts4 ,among the ,ibo people about ,awka1 in ,southern ,nigeria1 the priest of the ,earth has to observe many taboos2 for example1 he may not see a corpse1 and if he meets one on the road he must hide his eyes with his wristlet4 ,he must abstain from many foods1 such as eggs1 birds of all sorts1 mutton1 dog1 bush-buck1 and so forth4 ,he may neither wear nor touch a mask1 and no masked man may enter his house4 ,if a dog enters his house1 it is killed and thrown out4 ,as priest of the ,earth he may not sit on the bare ground1 nor eat things that have fallen on the ground1 nor may earth be thrown at him4 ,according to ancient ,brahmanic ritual a king at his inauguration trod on a tiger's skin and a golden plate2 he was shod with shoes of boar's skin1 and so long as he lived thereafter he might not stand on the earth with his bare feet4 ,but besides persons who are permanently sacred or tabooed and are therefore permanently forbidden to touch the ground with their feet1 there are others who enjoy the character of sanctity or taboo only on certain occasions1 and to whom accordingly the prohibition in question only applies at the definite seasons during which they exhale the odour of sanctity4 ,thus among the ,kayans or ,bahaus of ,central ,borneo1 while the priestesses are engaged in the performance of certain rites they may not step on the ground1 and boards are laid for them to tread on4 ,warriors1 again1 on the war-path are surrounded1 so to say1 by an atmosphere of taboo2 hence some ,indians of ,north ,america might not sit on the bare ground the whole time they were out on a warlike expedition4 ,in ,laos the hunting of elephants gives rise to many taboos2 one of them is that the chief hunter may not touch the earth with his foot4 ,accordingly1 when he alights from his elephant1 the others spread a carpet of leaves for him to step upon4 ,apparently holiness1 magical virtue1 taboo1 or whatever we may call that mysterious quality which is supposed to pervade sacred or tabooed persons1 is conceived by the primitive philosopher as a physical substance or fluid1 with which the sacred man is charged just as a ,leyden jar is charged with electricity2 and exactly as the electricity in the jar can be discharged by contact with a good conductor1 so the holiness or magical virtue in the man can be discharged and drained away by contact with the earth1 which on this theory serves as an excellent conductor for the magical fluid4 ,hence in order to preserve the charge from running to waste1 the sacred or tabooed personage must be carefully prevented from touching the ground2 in electrical language he must be insulated1 if he is not to be emptied of the precious substance or fluid with which he1 as a vial1 is filled to the brim4 ,and in many cases apparently the insulation of the tabooed person is recommended as a precaution not merely for his own sake but for the sake of others2 for since the virtue of holiness or taboo is1 so to say1 a powerful explosive which the smallest touch may detonate1 it is necessary in the interest of the general safety to keep it within narrow bounds1 lest breaking out it should blast1 blight1 and destroy whatever it comes into contact with4 #b4 ,not to see the ,sun ,,the ,,second rule to be here noted is that the sun may not shine upon the divine person4 ,this rule was observed both by the ,mikado and by the pontiff of the ,zapotecs4 ,the latter was looked upon as a god whom the earth was not worthy to hold1 nor the sun to shine upon4 ,the ,japanese would not allow that the ,mikado should expose his sacred person to the open air1 and the sun was not thought worthy to shine on his head4 ,the ,indians of ,granada1 in ,south ,america1 kept those who were to be rulers or commanders1 whether men or women1 locked up for several years when they were children1 some of them seven years1 and this so close that they were not to see the sun1 for if they should happen to see it they forfeited their lordship1 eating certain sorts of food appointed2 and those who were their keepers at certain times went into their retreat or prison and scourged them severely4 ,thus1 for example1 the heir to the throne of ,bogota1 who was not the son but the sister's son of the king1 had to undergo a rigorous training from his infancy2 he lived in complete retirement in a temple1 where he might not see the sun nor eat salt nor converse with a woman2 he was surrounded by guards who observed his conduct and noted all his actions2 if he broke a single one of the rules laid down for him1 he was deemed infamous and forfeited all his rights to the throne4 ,so1 too1 the heir to the kingdom of ,sogamoso1 before succeeding to the crown1 had to fast for seven years in the temple1 being shut up in the dark and not allowed to see the sun or light4 ,the prince who was to become ,inca of ,peru had to fast for a month without seeing light4 #c4 ,the ,seclusion of ,girls at ,puberty ,,now it is remarkable that the foregoing two rules--not to touch the ground and not to see the sun--are observed either separately or conjointly by girls at puberty in many parts of the world4 ,thus amongst the negroes of ,loango girls at puberty are confined in separate huts1 and they may not touch the ground with any part of their bare body4 ,among the ,zulus and kindred tribes of ,south ,africa1 when the first signs of puberty show themselves while a girl is walking1 gathering wood1 or working in the field1 she runs to the river and hides herself among the reeds for the day1 so as not to be seen by men4 ,she covers her head carefully with her blanket that the sun may not shine on it and shrivel her up into a withered skeleton1 as would result from exposure to the sun's beams4 ,after dark she returns to her home and is secluded in a hut for some time4 ,with the ,awa-nkonde1 a tribe at the northern end of ,lake ,nyassa1 it is a rule that after her first menstruation a girl must be kept apart1 with a few companions of her own sex1 in a darkened house4 ,the floor is covered with dry banana leaves1 but no fire may be lit in the house1 which is called the house of the ,awasungu1 that is1 of maidens who have no hearts4 ,in ,new ,ireland girls are confined for four or five years in small cages1 being kept in the dark and not allowed to set foot on the ground4 ,the custom has been thus described by an eye-witness4 ,i heard from a teacher about some strange custom connected with some of the young girls here1 so ,i asked the chief to take me to the house where they were4 ,the house was about twenty-five feet in length1 and stood in a reed and bamboo enclosure1 across the entrance to which a bundle of dried grass was suspended to show that it was strictly 'tabu4' ,inside the house were three conical structures about seven or eight feet in height1 and about ten or twelve feet in circumference at the bottom1 and for about four feet from the ground1 at which point they tapered off to a point at the top4 ,these cages were made of the broad leaves of the pandanus-tree1 sewn quite close together so that no light and little or no air could enter4 ,on one side of each is an opening which is closed by a double door of plaited cocoa-nut tree and pandanus-tree leaves4 ,about three feet from the ground there is a stage of bamboos which forms the floor4 ,in each of these cages we were told there was a young woman confined1 each of whom had to remain for at least four or five years1 without ever being allowed to go outside the house4 ,i could scarcely credit the story when ,i heard it2 the whole thing seemed too horrible to be true4 ,i spoke to the chief1 and told him that ,i wished to see the inside of the cages1 and also to see the girls that ,i might make them a present of a few beads4 ,he told me that it was 'tabu1' forbidden for any men but their own relations to look at them2 but ,i suppose the promised beads acted as an inducement1 and so he sent away for some old lady who had charge1 and who alone is allowed to open the doors4 ,while we were waiting we could hear the girls talking to the chief in a querulous way as if objecting to something or expressing their fears4 ,the old woman came at length and certainly she did not seem a very pleasant jailor or guardian2 nor did she seem to favour the request of the chief to allow us to see the girls1 as she regarded us with anything but pleasant looks4 ,however1 she had to undo the door when the chief told her to do so1 and then the girls peeped out at us1 and1 when told to do so1 they held out their hands for the beads4 ,i1 however1 purposely sat at some distance away and merely held out the beads to them1 as ,i wished to draw them quite outside1 that ,i might inspect the inside of the cages4 ,this desire of mine gave rise to another difficulty1 as these girls were not allowed to put their feet to the ground all the time they were confined in these places4 ,however1 they wished to get the beads1 and so the old lady had to go outside and collect a lot of pieces of wood and bamboo1 which she placed on the ground1 and then going to one of the girls1 she helped her down and held her hand as she stepped from one piece of wood to another until she came near enough to get the beads ,i held out to her4 ,i then went to inspect the inside of the cage out of which she had come1 but could scarely put my head inside of it1 the atmosphere was so hot and stifling4 ,it was clean and contained nothing but a few short lengths of bamboo for holding water4 ,there was only room for the girl to sit or lie down in a crouched position on the bamboo platform1 and when the doors are shut it must be nearly or quite dark inside4 ,the girls are never allowed to come out except once a day to bathe in a dish or wooden bowl placed close to each cage4 ,they say that they perspire profusely4 ,they are placed in these stifling cages when quite young1 and must remain there until they are young women1 when they are taken out and have each a great marriage feast provided for them4 ,one of them was about fourteen or fifteen years old1 and the chief told us that she had been there for five years1 but would soon be taken out now4 ,the other two were about eight and ten years old1 and they have to stay there for several years longer4 ,in ,kabadi1 a district of ,british ,new ,guinea1 daughters of chiefs1 when they are about twelve or thirteen years of age1 are kept indoors for two or three years1 never being allowed1 under any pretence1 to descend from the house1 and the house is so shaded that the sun cannot shine on them4 ,among the ,yabim and ,bukaua1 two neighbouring and kindred tribes on the coast of ,northern ,new ,guinea1 a girl at puberty is secluded for some five or six weeks in an inner part of the house2 but she may not sit on the floor1 lest her uncleanliness should cleave to it1 so a log of wood is placed for her to squat on4 ,moreover1 she may not touch the ground with her feet2 hence if she is obliged to quit the house for a short time1 she is muffled up in mats and walks on two halves of a coco-nut shell1 which are fastened like sandals to her feet by creeping plants4 ,among the ,ot ,danoms of ,borneo girls at the age of eight or ten years are shut up in a little room or cell of the house1 and cut off from all intercourse with the world for a long time4 ,the cell1 like the rest of the house1 is raised on piles above the ground1 and is lit by a single small window opening on a lonely place1 so that the girl is in almost total darkness4 ,she may not leave the room on any pretext whatever1 not even for the most necessary purposes4 ,none of her family may see her all the time she is shut up1 but a single slave woman is appointed to wait on her4 ,during her lonely confinement1 which often lasts seven years1 the girl occupies herself in weaving mats or with other handiwork4 ,her bodily growth is stunted by the long want of exercise1 and when1 on attaining womanhood1 she is brought out1 her complexion is pale and wax-like4 ,she is now shown the sun1 the earth1 the water1 the trees1 and the flowers1 as if she were newly born4 ,then a great feast is made1 a slave is killed1 and the girl is smeared with his blood4 ,in ,ceram girls at puberty were formerly shut up by themselves in a hut which was kept dark4 ,in ,yap1 one of the ,caroline ,islands1 should a girl be overtaken by her first menstruation on the public road1 she may not sit down on the earth1 but must beg for a coco-nut shell to put under her4 ,she is shut up for several days in a small hut at a distance from her parents' house1 and afterwards she is bound to sleep for a hundred days in one of the special houses which are provided for the use of menstruous women4 ,in the island of ,mabuiag1 ,torres ,straits1 when the signs of puberty appear on a girl1 a circle of bushes is made in a dark corner of the house4 ,here1 decked with shoulder-belts1 armlets1 leglets just below the knees1 and anklets1 wearing a chaplet on her head1 and shell ornaments in her ears1 on her chest1 and on her back1 she squats in the midst of the bushes1 which are piled so high round about her that only her head is visible4 ,in this state of seclusion she must remain for three months4 ,all this time the sun may not shine upon her1 but at night she is allowed to slip out of the hut1 and the bushes that hedge her in are then changed4 ,she may not feed herself or handle food1 but is fed by one or two old women1 her maternal aunts1 who are especially appointed to look after her4 ,one of these women cooks food for her at a special fire in the forest4 ,the girl is forbidden to eat turtle or turtle eggs during the season when the turtles are breeding2 but no vegetable food is refused her4 ,no man1 not even her own father1 may come into the house while her seclusion lasts2 for if her father saw her at this time he would certainly have bad luck in his fishing1 and would probably smash his canoe the very next time he went out in it4 ,at the end of the three months she is carried down to a freshwater creek by her attendants1 hanging on to their shoulders in such a way that her feet do not touch the ground1 while the women of the tribe form a ring round her1 and thus escort her to the beach4 ,arrived at the shore1 she is stripped of her ornaments1 and the bearers stagger with her into the creek1 where they immerse her1 and all the other women join in splashing water over both the girl and her bearers4 ,when they come out of the water one of the two attendants makes a heap of grass for her charge to squat upon4 ,the other runs to the reef1 catches a small crab1 tears off its claws1 and hastens back with them to the creek4 ,here in the meantime a fire has been kindled1 and the claws are roasted at it4 ,the girl is then fed by her attendants with the roasted claws4 ,after that she is freshly decorated1 and the whole party marches back to the village in a single rank1 the girl walking in the centre between her two old aunts1 who hold her by the wrists4 ,the husbands of her aunts now receive her and lead her into the house of one of them1 where all partake of food1 and the girl is allowed once more to feed herself in the usual manner4 ,a dance follows1 in which the girl takes a prominent part1 dancing between the husbands of the two aunts who had charge of her in her retirement4 ,among the ,yaraikanna tribe of ,cape ,york ,peninsula1 in ,northern ,queensland1 a girl at puberty is said to live by herself for a month or six weeks2 no man may see her1 though any woman may4 ,she stays in a hut or shelter specially made for her1 on the floor of which she lies supine4 ,she may not see the sun1 and towards sunset she must keep her eyes shut until the sun has gone down1 otherwise it is thought that her nose will be diseased4 ,during her seclusion she may eat nothing that lives in salt water1 or a snake would kill her4 ,an old woman waits upon her and supplies her with roots1 yams1 and water4 ,some ,australian tribes are wont to bury their girls at such seasons more or less deeply in the ground1 perhaps in order to hide them from the light of the sun4 ,among the ,indians of ,california a girl at her first menstruation was thought to be possessed of a particular degree of supernatural power1 and this was not always regarded as entirely defiling or malevolent4 ,often1 however1 there was a strong feeling of the power of evil inherent in her condition4 ,not only was she secluded from her family and the community1 but an attempt was made to seclude the world from her4 ,one of the injunctions most strongly laid upon her was not to look about her4 ,she kept her head bowed and was forbidden to see the world and the sun4 ,some tribes covered her with a blanket4 ,many of the customs in this connection resembled those of the ,north ,pacific ,coast most strongly1 such as the prohibition to the girl to touch or scratch her head with her hand1 a special implement being furnished her for the purpose4 ,sometimes she could eat only when fed and in other cases fasted altogether4 ,among the ,chinook ,indians who inhabited the coast of ,washington ,state1 when a chief's daughter attained to puberty1 she was hidden for five days from the view of the people2 she might not look at them nor at the sky1 nor might she pick berries4 ,it was believed that if she were to look at the sky1 the weather would be bad2 that if she picked berries1 it would rain2 and that when she hung her towel of cedar-bark on a spruce-tree1 the tree withered up at once4 ,she went out of the house by a separate door and bathed in a creek far from the village4 ,she fasted for some days1 and for many days more she might not eat fresh food4 ,amongst the ,aht or ,nootka ,indians of ,vancouver ,island1 when girls reach puberty they are placed in a sort of gallery in the house and are there surrounded completely with mats1 so that neither the sun nor any fire can be seen4 ,in this cage they remain for several days4 ,water is given them1 but no food4 ,the longer a girl remains in this retirement the greater honour is it to the parents2 but she is disgraced for life if it is known that she has seen fire or the sun during this initiatory ordeal4 ,pictures of the mythical thunder-bird are painted on the screens behind which she hides4 ,during her seclusion she may neither move nor lie down1 but must always sit in a squatting posture4 ,she may not touch her hair with her hands1 but is allowed to scratch her head with a comb or a piece of bone provided for the purpose4 ,to scratch her body is also forbidden1 as it is believed that every scratch would leave a scar4 ,for eight months after reaching maturity she may not eat any fresh food1 particularly salmon2 moreover1 she must eat by herself1 and use a cup and dish of her own4 ,in the ,tsetsaut tribe of ,british ,columbia a girl at puberty wears a large hat of skin which comes down over her face and screens it from the sun4 ,it is believed that if she were to expose her face to the sun or to the sky1 rain would fall4 ,the hat protects her face also against the fire1 which ought not to strike her skin2 to shield her hands she wears mittens4 ,in her mouth she carries the tooth of an animal to prevent her own teeth from becoming hollow4 ,for a whole year she may not see blood unless her face is blackened2 otherwise she would grow blind4 ,for two years she wears the hat and lives in a hut by herself1 although she is allowed to see other people4 ,at the end of two years a man takes the hat from her head and throws it away4 ,in the ,bilqula or ,bella ,coola tribe of ,british ,columbia1 when a girl attains puberty she must stay in the shed which serves as her bedroom1 where she has a separate fireplace4 ,she is not allowed to descend to the main part of the house1 and may not sit by the fire of the family4 ,for four days she is bound to remain motionless in a sitting posture4 ,she fasts during the day1 but is allowed a little food and drink very early in the morning4 ,after the four days' seclusion she may leave her room1 but only through a separate opening cut in the floor1 for the houses are raised on piles4 ,she may not yet come into the chief room4 ,in leaving the house she wears a large hat which protects her face against the rays of the sun4 ,it is believed that if the sun were to shine on her face her eyes would suffer4 ,she may pick berries on the hills1 but may not come near the river or sea for a whole year4 ,were she to eat fresh salmon she would lose her senses1 or her mouth would be changed into a long beak4 ,amongst the ,tlingit 7,thlinkeet7 or ,kolosh ,indians of ,alaska1 when a girl showed signs of womanhood she used to be confined to a little hut or cage1 which was completely blocked up with the exception of a small air-hole4 ,in this dark and filthy abode she had to remain a year1 without fire1 exercise1 or associates4 ,only her mother and a female slave might supply her with nourishment4 ,her food was put in at the little window2 she had to drink out of the wing-bone of a white-headed eagle4 ,the time of her seclusion was afterwards reduced in some places to six or three months or even less4 ,she had to wear a sort of hat with long flaps1 that her gaze might not pollute the sky2 for she was thought unfit for the sun to shine upon1 and it was imagined that her look would destroy the luck of a hunter1 fisher1 or gambler1 turn things to stone1 and do other mischief4 ,at the end of her confinement her old clothes were burnt1 new ones were made1 and a feast was given1 at which a slit was cut in her under lip parallel to the mouth1 and a piece of wood or shell was inserted to keep the aperture open4 ,among the ,koniags1 an ,esquimau people of ,alaska1 a girl at puberty was placed in a small hut in which she had to remain on her hands and feet for six months2 then the hut was enlarged a little so as to allow her to straighten her back1 but in this posture she had to remain for six months more4 ,all this time she was regarded as an unclean being with whom no one might hold intercourse4 ,when symptoms of puberty appeared on a girl for the first time1 the ,guaranis of ,southern ,brazil1 on the borders of ,paraguay1 used to sew her up in her hammock1 leaving only a small opening in it to allow her to breathe4 ,in this condition1 wrapt up and shrouded like a corpse1 she was kept for two or three days or so long as the symptoms lasted1 and during this time she had to observe a most rigorous fast4 ,after that she was entrusted to a matron1 who cut the girl's hair and enjoined her to abstain most strictly from eating flesh of any kind until her hair should be grown long enough to hide her ears4 ,in similar circumstances the ,chiriguanos of ,south-eastern ,bolivia hoisted the girl in her hammock to the roof1 where she stayed for a month3 the second month the hammock was let half-way down from the roof2 and in the third month old women1 armed with sticks1 entered the hut and ran about striking everything they met1 saying they were hunting the snake that had wounded the girl4 ,among the ,matacos or ,mataguayos1 an ,indian tribe of the ,gran ,chaco1 a girl at puberty has to remain in seclusion for some time4 ,she lies covered up with branches or other things in a corner of the hut1 seeing no one and speaking to no one1 and during this time she may eat neither flesh nor fish4 ,meantime a man beats a drum in front of the house4 ,among the ,yuracares1 an ,indian tribe of ,eastern ,bolivia1 when a girl perceives the signs of puberty1 her father constructs a little hut of palm leaves near the house4 ,in this cabin he shuts up his daughter so that she cannot see the light1 and there she remains fasting rigorously for four days4 ,amongst the ,macusis of ,british ,guiana1 when a girl shows the first signs of puberty1 she is hung in a hammock at the highest point of the hut4 ,for the first few days she may not leave the hammock by day1 but at night she must come down1 light a fire1 and spend the night beside it1 else she would break out in sores on her neck1 throat1 and other parts of her body4 ,so long as the symptoms are at their height1 she must fast rigorously4 ,when they have abated1 she may come down and take up her abode in a little compartment that is made for her in the darkest corner of the hut4 ,in the morning she may cook her food1 but it must be at a separate fire and in a vessel of her own4 ,after about ten days the magician comes and undoes the spell by muttering charms and breathing on her and on the more valuable of the things with which she has come in contact4 ,the pots and drinking-vessels which she used are broken and the fragments buried4 ,after her first bath1 the girl must submit to be beaten by her mother with thin rods without uttering a cry4 ,at the end of the second period she is again beaten1 but not afterwards4 ,she is now clean1 and can mix again with people4 ,other ,indians of ,guiana1 after keeping the girl in her hammock at the top of the hut for a month1 expose her to certain large ants1 whose bite is very painful4 ,sometimes1 in addition to being stung with ants1 the sufferer has to fast day and night so long as she remains slung up on high in her hammock1 so that when she comes down she is reduced to a skeleton4 ,when a ,hindoo maiden reaches maturity she is kept in a dark room for four days1 and is forbidden to see the sun4 ,she is regarded as unclean2 no one may touch her4 ,her diet is restricted to boiled rice1 milk1 sugar1 curd1 and tamarind without salt4 ,on the morning of the fifth day she goes to a neighbouring tank1 accompanied by five women whose husbands are alive4 ,smeared with turmeric water1 they all bathe and return home1 throwing away the mat and other things that were in the room4 ,the ,rarhi ,brahmans of ,bengal compel a girl at puberty to live alone1 and do not allow her to see the face of any male4 ,for three days she remains shut up in a dark room1 and has to undergo certain penances4 ,fish1 flesh1 and sweetmeats are forbidden her2 she must live upon rice and ghee4 ,among the ,tiyans of ,malabar a girl is thought to be polluted for four days from the beginning of her first menstruation4 ,during this time she must keep to the north side of the house1 where she sleeps on a grass mat of a particular kind1 in a room festooned with garlands of young coco-nut leaves4 ,another girl keeps her company and sleeps with her1 but she may not touch any other person1 tree or plant4 ,further1 she may not see the sky1 and woe betide her if she catches sight of a crow or a cat6 ,her diet must be strictly vegetarian1 without salt1 tamarinds1 or chillies4 ,she is armed against evil spirits by a knife1 which is placed on the mat or carried on her person4 ,in ,cambodia a girl at puberty is put to bed under a mosquito curtain1 where she should stay a hundred days4 ,usually1 however1 four1 five1 ten1 or twenty days are thought enough2 and even this1 in a hot climate and under the close meshes of the curtain1 is sufficiently trying4 ,according to another account1 a ,cambodian maiden at puberty is said to enter into the shade4 ,during her retirement1 which1 according to the rank and position of her family1 may last any time from a few days to several years1 she has to observe a number of rules1 such as not to be seen by a strange man1 not to eat flesh or fish1 and so on4 ,she goes nowhere1 not even to the pagoda4 ,but this state of seclusion is discontinued during eclipses2 at such times she goes forth and pays her devotions to the monster who is supposed to cause eclipses by catching the heavenly bodies between his teeth4 ,this permission to break her rule of retirement and appear abroad during an eclipse seems to show how literally the injunction is interpreted which forbids maidens entering on womanhood to look upon the sun4 ,a superstition so widely diffused as this might be expected to leave traces in legends and folk-tales4 ,and it has done so4 ,the old ,greek story of ,danae1 who was confined by her father in a subterranean chamber or a brazen tower1 but impregnated by ,zeus1 who reached her in the shape of a shower of gold1 perhaps belongs to this class of tales4 ,it has its counterpart in the legend which the ,kirghiz of ,siberia tell of their ancestry4 ,a certain ,khan had a fair daughter1 whom he kept in a dark iron house1 that no man might see her4 ,an old woman tended her2 and when the girl was grown to maidenhood she asked the old woman1 ,where do you go so often8 ,my child1 said the old dame1 there is a bright world4 ,in that bright world your father and mother live1 and all sorts of people live there4 ,that is where ,i go4 ,the maiden said1 ,good mother1 ,i will tell nobody1 but show me that bright world4 ,so the old woman took the girl out of the iron house4 ,but when she saw the bright world1 the girl tottered and fainted2 and the eye of ,god fell upon her1 and she conceived4 ,her angry father put her in a golden chest and sent her floating away 7fairy gold can float in fairyland7 over the wide sea4 ,the shower of gold in the ,greek story1 and the eye of ,god in the ,kirghiz legend1 probably stand for sunlight and the sun4 ,the idea that women may be impregnated by the sun is not uncommon in legends1 and there are even traces of it in marriage customs4 #d4 ,reasons for the ,seclusion of ,girls at ,puberty ,,the ,,motive for the restraints so commonly imposed on girls at puberty is the deeply engrained dread which primitive man universally entertains of menstruous blood4 ,he fears it at all times but especially on its first appearance2 hence the restrictions under which women lie at their first menstruation are usually more stringent than those which they have to observe at any subsequent recurrence of the mysterious flow4 ,some evidence of the fear and of the customs based on it has been cited in an earlier part of this work2 but as the terror1 for it is nothing less1 which the phenomenon periodically strikes into the mind of the savage has deeply influenced his life and institutions1 it may be well to illustrate the subject with some further examples4 ,thus in the ,encounter ,bay tribe of ,south ,australia there is1 or used to be1 a superstition which obliges a woman to separate herself from the camp at the time of her monthly illness1 when if a young man or boy should approach1 she calls out1 and he immediately makes a circuit to avoid her4 ,if she is neglectful upon this point1 she exposes herself to scolding1 and sometimes to severe beating by her husband or nearest relation1 because the boys are told from their infancy1 that if they see the blood they will early become grey-headed1 and their strength will fail prematurely4 ,the ,dieri of ,central ,australia believe that if women at these times were to eat fish or bathe in a river1 the fish would all die and the water would dry up4 ,the ,arunta of the same region forbid menstruous women to gather the irriakura bulbs1 which form a staple article of diet for both men and women4 ,they think that were a woman to break this rule1 the supply of bulbs would fail4 ,in some ,australian tribes the seclusion of menstruous women was even more rigid1 and was enforced by severer penalties than a scolding or a beating4 ,thus there is a regulation relating to camps in the ,wakelbura tribe which forbids the women coming into the encampment by the same path as the men4 ,any violation of this rule would in a large camp be punished with death4 ,the reason for this is the dread with which they regard the menstrual period of women4 ,during such a time1 a woman is kept entirely away from the camp1 half a mile at least4 ,a woman in such a condition has boughs of some tree of her totem tied round her loins1 and is constantly watched and guarded1 for it is thought that should any male be so unfortunate as to see a woman in such a condition1 he would die4 ,if such a woman were to let herself be seen by a man1 she would probably be put to death4 ,when the woman has recovered1 she is painted red and white1 her head covered with feathers1 and returns to the camp4 ,in ,muralug1 one of the ,torres ,straits ,islands1 a menstruous woman may not eat anything that lives in the sea1 else the natives believe that the fisheries would fail4 ,in ,galela1 to the west of ,new ,guinea1 women at their monthly periods may not enter a tobacco-field1 or the plants would be attacked by disease4 ,the ,minangkabauers of ,sumatra are persuaded that if a woman in her unclean state were to go near a rice-field1 the crop would be spoiled4 ,the ,bushmen of ,south ,africa think that1 by a glance of a girl's eye at the time when she ought to be kept in strict retirement1 men become fixed in whatever positions they happen to occupy1 with whatever they were holding in their hands1 and are changed into trees that talk4 ,cattle-rearing tribes of ,south ,africa hold that their cattle would die if the milk were drunk by a menstruous woman2 and they fear the same disaster if a drop of her blood were to fall on the ground and the oxen were to pass over it4 ,to prevent such a calamity women in general1 not menstruous women only1 are forbidden to enter the cattle enclosure2 and more than that1 they may not use the ordinary paths in entering the village or in passing from one hut to another4 ,they are obliged to make circuitous tracks at the back of the huts in order to avoid the ground in the middle of the village where the cattle stand or lie down4 ,these women's tracks may be seen at every ,caffre village4 ,among the ,baganda1 in like manner1 no menstruous woman might drink milk or come into contact with any milk-vessel2 and she might not touch anything that belonged to her husband1 nor sit on his mat1 nor cook his food4 ,if she touched anything of his at such a time it was deemed equivalent to wishing him dead or to actually working magic for his destruction4 ,were she to handle any article of his1 he would surely fall ill2 were she to touch his weapons1 he would certainly be killed in the next battle4 ,further1 the ,baganda would not suffer a menstruous woman to visit a well2 if she did so1 they feared that the water would dry up1 and that she herself would fall sick and die1 unless she confessed her fault and the medicine-man made atonement for her4 ,among the ,akikuyu of ,british ,east ,africa1 if a new hut is built in a village and the wife chances to menstruate in it on the day she lights the first fire there1 the hut must be broken down and demolished the very next day4 ,the woman may on no account sleep a second night in it2 there is a curse both on her and on it4 ,according to the ,talmud1 if a woman at the beginning of her period passes between two men1 she thereby kills one of them4 ,peasants of the ,lebanon think that menstruous women are the cause of many misfortunes2 their shadow causes flowers to wither and trees to perish1 it even arrests the movements of serpents2 if one of them mounts a horse1 the animal might die or at least be disabled for a long time4 ,the ,guayquiries of the ,orinoco believe that when a woman has her courses1 everything upon which she steps will die1 and that if a man treads on the place where she has passed1 his legs will immediately swell up4 ,among the ,bri-bri ,indians of ,costa ,rica a married woman at her periods uses for plates only banana leaves1 which1 when she has done with them1 she throws away in a sequestered spot2 for should a cow find and eat them1 the animal would waste away and perish4 ,also she drinks only out of a special vessel1 because any person who should afterwards drink out of the same vessel would infallibly pine away and die4 ,among most tribes of ,north ,american ,indians the custom was that women in their courses retired from the camp or the village and lived during the time of their uncleanness in special huts or shelters which were appropriated to their use4 ,there they dwelt apart1 eating and sleeping by themselves1 warming themselves at their own fires1 and strictly abstaining from all communications with men1 who shunned them just as if they were stricken with the plague4 ,thus1 to take examples1 the ,creek and kindred ,indians of the ,united ,states compelled women at menstruation to live in separate huts at some distance from the village4 ,there the women had to stay1 at the risk of being surprised and cut off by enemies4 ,it was thought a most horrid and dangerous pollution to go near the women at such times2 and the danger extended to enemies who1 if they slew the women1 had to cleanse themselves from the pollution by means of certain sacred herbs and roots4 ,the ,stseelis ,indians of ,british ,columbia imagined that if a menstruous woman were to step over a bundle of arrows1 the arrows would thereby be rendered useless and might even cause the death of their owner2 and similarly that if she passed in front of a hunter who carried a gun1 the weapon would never shoot straight again4 ,among the ,chippeways and other ,indians of the ,hudson ,bay ,territory1 menstruous women are excluded from the camp1 and take up their abode in huts of branches4 ,they wear long hoods1 which effectually conceal the head and breast4 ,they may not touch the household furniture nor any objects used by men2 for their touch is supposed to defile them1 so that their subsequent use would be followed by certain mischief or misfortune1 such as disease or death4 ,they must drink out of a swan's bone4 ,they may not walk on the common paths nor cross the tracks of animals4 ,they are never permitted to walk on the ice of rivers or lakes1 or near the part where the men are hunting beaver1 or where a fishing-net is set1 for fear of averting their success4 ,they are also prohibited at those times from partaking of the head of any animal1 and even from walking in or crossing the track where the head of a deer1 moose1 beaver1 and many other animals have lately been carried1 either on a sledge or on the back4 ,to be guilty of a violation of this custom is considered as of the greatest importance2 because they firmly believe that it would be a means of preventing the hunter from having an equal success in his future excursions4 ,so the ,lapps forbid women at menstruation to walk on that part of the shore where the fishers are in the habit of setting out their fish2 and the ,esquimaux of ,bering ,strait believe that if hunters were to come near women in their courses they would catch no game4 ,for a like reason the ,carrier ,indians will not suffer a menstruous woman to cross the tracks of animals2 if need be1 she is carried over them4 ,they think that if she waded in a stream or a lake1 the fish would die4 ,amongst the civilised nations of ,europe the superstitions which cluster round this mysterious aspect of woman's nature are not less extravagant than those which prevail among savages4 ,in the oldest existing cyclopaedia--the ,natural ,history of ,pliny--the list of dangers apprehended from menstruation is longer than any furnished by mere barbarians4 ,according to ,pliny1 the touch of a menstruous woman turned wine to vinegar1 blighted crops1 killed seedlings1 blasted gardens1 brought down the fruit from trees1 dimmed mirrors1 blunted razors1 rusted iron and brass 7especially at the waning of the moon71 killed bees1 or at least drove them from their hives1 caused mares to miscarry1 and so forth4 ,similarly1 in various parts of ,europe1 it is still believed that if a woman in her courses enters a brewery the beer will turn sour2 if she touches beer1 wine1 vinegar1 or milk1 it will go bad2 if she makes jam1 it will not keep2 if she mounts a mare1 it will miscarry2 if she touches buds1 they will wither2 if she climbs a cherry tree1 it will die4 ,in ,brunswick people think that if a menstruous woman assists at the killing of a pig1 the pork will putrefy4 ,in the ,greek island of ,calymnos a woman at such times may not go to the well to draw water1 nor cross a running stream1 nor enter the sea4 ,her presence in a boat is said to raise storms4 ,thus the object of secluding women at menstruation is to neutralise the dangerous influences which are supposed to emanate from them at such times4 ,that the danger is believed to be especially great at the first menstruation appears from the unusual precautions taken to isolate girls at this crisis4 ,two of these precautions have been illustrated above1 namely1 the rules that the girls may not touch the ground nor see the sun4 ,the general effect of these rules is to keep her suspended1 so to say1 between heaven and earth4 ,whether enveloped in her hammock and slung up to the roof1 as in ,south ,america1 or raised above the ground in a dark and narrow cage1 as in ,new ,ireland1 she may be considered to be out of the way of doing mischief1 since1 being shut off both from the earth and from the sun1 she can poison neither of these great sources of life by her deadly contagion4 ,in short1 she is rendered harmless by being1 in electrical language1 insulated4 ,but the precautions thus taken to isolate or insulate the girl are dictated by a regard for her own safety as well as for the safety of others4 ,for it is thought that she herself would suffer if she were to neglect the prescribed regimen4 ,thus ,zulu girls1 as we have seen1 believe that they would shrivel to skeletons if the sun were to shine on them at puberty1 and the ,macusis imagine that1 if a young woman were to transgress the rules1 she would suffer from sores on various parts of her body4 ,in short1 the girl is viewed as charged with a powerful force which1 if not kept within bounds1 may prove destructive both to herself and to all with whom she comes in contact4 ,to repress this force within the limits necessary for the safety of all concerned is the object of the taboos in question4 ,the same explanation applies to the observance of the same rules by divine kings and priests4 ,the uncleanness1 as it is called1 of girls at puberty and the sanctity of holy men do not1 to the primitive mind1 differ materially from each other4 ,they are only different manifestations of the same mysterious energy which1 like energy in general1 is in itself neither good nor bad1 but becomes beneficent or maleficent according to its application4 ,accordingly1 if1 like girls at puberty1 divine personages may neither touch the ground nor see the sun1 the reason is1 on the one hand1 a fear lest their divinity might1 at contact with earth or heaven1 discharge itself with fatal violence on either2 and1 on the other hand1 an apprehension that the divine being1 thus drained of his ethereal virtue1 might thereby be incapacitated for the future performance of those magical functions1 upon the proper discharge of which the safety of the people and even of the world is believed to hang4 ,thus the rules in question fall under the head of the taboos which we examined in an earlier part of this book2 they are intended to preserve the life of the divine person and with it the life of his subjects and worshippers4 ,nowhere1 it is thought1 can his precious yet dangerous life be at once so safe and so harmless as when it is neither in heaven nor in earth1 but1 as far as possible1 suspended between the two4 ,,lxi4 ,the ,myth of ,balder ,a ,,deity whose life might in a sense be said to be neither in heaven nor on earth but between the two1 was the ,norse ,balder1 the good and beautiful god1 the son of the great god ,odin1 and himself the wisest1 mildest1 best beloved of all the immortals4 ,the story of his death1 as it is told in the younger or prose ,edda1 runs thus4 ,once on a time ,balder dreamed heavy dreams which seemed to forebode his death4 ,thereupon the gods held a council and resolved to make him secure against every danger4 ,so the goddess ,frigg took an oath from fire and water1 iron and all metals1 stones and earth1 from trees1 sicknesses and poisons1 and from all four-footed beasts1 birds1 and creeping things1 that they would not hurt ,balder4 ,when this was done ,balder was deemed invulnerable2 so the gods amused themselves by setting him in their midst1 while some shot at him1 others hewed at him1 and others threw stones at him4 ,but whatever they did1 nothing could hurt him2 and at this they were all glad4 ,only ,loki1 the mischief-maker1 was displeased1 and he went in the guise of an old woman to ,frigg1 who told him that the weapons of the gods could not wound ,balder1 since she had made them all swear not to hurt him4 ,then ,loki asked1 ,have all things sworn to spare ,balder8 ,she answered1 ,east of ,walhalla grows a plant called mistletoe2 it seemed to me too young to swear4 ,so ,loki went and pulled the mistletoe and took it to the assembly of the gods4 ,there he found the blind god ,hother standing at the outside of the circle4 ,loki asked him1 ,why do you not shoot at ,balder8 ,hother answered1 ,because ,i do not see where he stands2 besides ,i have no weapon4 ,then said ,loki1 ,do like the rest and show ,balder honour1 as they all do4 ,i will show you where he stands1 and do you shoot at him with this twig4 ,hother took the mistletoe and threw it at ,balder1 as ,loki directed him4 ,the mistletoe struck ,balder and pierced him through and through1 and he fell down dead4 ,and that was the greatest misfortune that ever befell gods and men4 ,for a while the gods stood speechless1 then they lifted up their voices and wept bitterly4 ,they took ,balder's body and brought it to the sea-shore4 ,there stood ,balder's ship2 it was called ,ringhorn1 and was the hugest of all ships4 ,the gods wished to launch the ship and to burn ,balder's body on it1 but the ship would not stir4 ,so they sent for a giantess called ,hyrrockin4 ,she came riding on a wolf and gave the ship such a push that fire flashed from the rollers and all the earth shook4 ,then ,balder's body was taken and placed on the funeral pile upon his ship4 ,when his wife ,nanna saw that1 her heart burst for sorrow and she died4 ,so she was laid on the funeral pile with her husband1 and fire was put to it4 ,balder's horse1 too1 with all its trappings1 was burned on the pile4 ,whether he was a real or merely a mythical personage1 ,balder was worshipped in ,norway4 ,on one of the bays of the beautiful ,sogne ,fiord1 which penetrates far into the depths of the solemn ,norwegian mountains1 with their sombre pine-forests and their lofty cascades dissolving into spray before they reach the dark water of the fiord far below1 ,balder had a great sanctuary4 ,it was called ,balder's ,grove4 ,a palisade enclosed the hallowed ground1 and within it stood a spacious temple with the images of many gods1 but none of them was worshipped with such devotion as ,balder4 ,so great was the awe with which the heathen regarded the place that no man might harm another there1 nor steal his cattle1 nor defile himself with women4 ,but women cared for the images of the gods in the temple2 they warmed them at the fire1 anointed them with oil1 and dried them with cloths4 ,whatever may be thought of an historical kernel underlying a mythical husk in the legend of ,balder1 the details of the story suggest that it belongs to that class of myths which have been dramatised as ritual1 or1 to put it otherwise1 which have been performed as magical ceremonies for the sake of producing those natural effects which they describe in figurative language4 ,a myth is never so graphic and precise in its details as when it is1 so to speak1 the book of the words which are spoken and acted by the performers of the sacred rite4 ,that the ,norse story of ,balder was a myth of this sort will become probable if we can prove that ceremonies resembling the incidents in the tale have been performed by ,norsemen and other ,european peoples4 ,now the main incidents in the tale are two--first1 the pulling of the mistletoe1 and second1 the death and burning of the god2 and both of them may perhaps be found to have had their counterparts in yearly rites observed1 whether separately or conjointly1 by people in various parts of ,europe4 ,these rites will be described and discussed in the following chapters4 ,we shall begin with the annual festivals of fire and shall reserve the pulling of the mistletoe for consideration later on4 ,,lxii4 ,the ,fire-,festivals of ,europe #a4 ,the ,fire-festivals in general ,,all over ,europe the peasants have been accustomed from time immemorial to kindle bonfires on certain days of the year1 and to dance round or leap over them4 ,customs of this kind can be traced back on historical evidence to the ,middle ,ages1 and their analogy to similar customs observed in antiquity goes with strong internal evidence to prove that their origin must be sought in a period long prior to the spread of ,christianity4 ,indeed the earliest proof of their observance in ,northern ,europe is furnished by the attempts made by ,christian synods in the eighth century to put them down as heathenish rites4 ,not uncommonly effigies are burned in these fires1 or a pretence is made of burning a living person in them2 and there are grounds for believing that anciently human beings were actually burned on these occasions4 ,a brief view of the customs in question will bring out the traces of human sacrifice1 and will serve at the same time to throw light on their meaning4 ,the seasons of the year when these bonfires are most commonly lit are spring and midsummer2 but in some places they are kindled also at the end of autumn or during the course of the winter1 particularly on ,hallow ,e'en 7the thirty-first of ,october71 ,christmas ,day1 and the ,eve of ,twelfth ,day4 ,space forbids me to describe all these festivals at length2 a few specimens must serve to illustrate their general character4 ,we shall begin with the fire-festivals of spring1 which usually fall on the first ,sunday of ,lent 7,quadragesima or ,invocavit71 ,easter ,eve1 and ,may ,day4 #b4 ,the ,lenten ,fires ,,the ,,custom of kindling bonfires on the first ,sunday in ,lent has prevailed in ,belgium1 the north of ,france1 and many parts of ,germany4 ,thus in the ,belgian ,ardennes for a week or a fortnight before the day of the great fire1 as it is called1 children go about from farm to farm collecting fuel4 ,at ,grand ,halleux any one who refuses their request is pursued next day by the children1 who try to blacken his face with the ashes of the extinct fire4 ,when the day has come1 they cut down bushes1 especially juniper and broom1 and in the evening great bonfires blaze on all the heights4 ,it is a common saying that seven bonfires should be seen if the village is to be safe from conflagrations4 ,if the ,meuse happens to be frozen hard at the time1 bonfires are lit also on the ice4 ,at ,grand ,halleux they set up a pole called makral1 or the witch1 in the midst of the pile1 and the fire is kindled by the man who was last married in the village4 ,in the neighbourhood of ,morlanwelz a straw man is burnt in the fire4 ,young people and children dance and sing round the bonfires1 and leap over the embers to secure good crops or a happy marriage within the year1 or as a means of guarding themselves against colic4 ,in ,brabant on the same ,sunday1 down to the beginning of the nineteenth century1 women and men disguised in female attire used to go with burning torches to the fields1 where they danced and sang comic songs for the purpose1 as they alleged1 of driving away the wicked sower1 who is mentioned in the ,gospel for the day4 ,at ,pturages1 in the province of ,hainaut1 down to about #ahdj the custom was observed under the name of ,escouvion or ,scouvion4 ,every year on the first ,sunday of ,lent1 which was called the ,day of the ,little ,scouvion1 young folks and children used to run with lighted torches through the gardens and orchards4 ,as they ran they cried at the pitch of their voices3 ,bear apples1 bear pears1 and cherries all black ,to ,scouvion6 ,at these words the torch-bearer whirled his blazing brand and hurled it among the branches of the apple-trees1 the pear-trees1 and the cherry-trees4 ,the next ,sunday was called the ,day of the ,great ,scouvion1 and the same race with lighted torches among the trees of the orchards was repeated in the afternoon till darkness fell4 ,in the ,french department of the ,ardennes the whole village used to dance and sing around the bonfires which were lighted on the first ,sunday in ,lent4 ,here1 too1 it was the person last married1 sometimes a man and sometimes a woman1 who put the match to the fire4 ,the custom is still kept up very commonly in the district4 ,cats used to be burnt in the fire or roasted to death by being held over it2 and while they were burning the shepherds drove their flocks through the smoke and flames as a sure means of guarding them against sickness and witchcraft4 ,in some communes it was believed that the livelier the dance round the fire1 the better would be the crops that year4 ,in the ,french province of ,franche-,comt1 to the west of the ,jura ,mountains1 the first ,sunday of ,lent is known as the ,sunday of the ,firebrands 7,brandons71 on account of the fires which it is customary to kindle on that day4 ,on the ,saturday or the ,sunday the village lads harness themselves to a cart and drag it about the streets1 stopping at the doors of the houses where there are girls and begging for a faggot4 ,when they have got enough1 they cart the fuel to a spot at some little distance from the village1 pile it up1 and set it on fire4 ,all the people of the parish come out to see the bonfire4 ,in some villages1 when the bells have rung the ,angelus1 the signal for the observance is given by cries of1 ,to the fire6 to the fire6 ,lads1 lasses1 and children dance round the blaze1 and when the flames have died down they vie with each other in leaping over the red embers4 ,he or she who does so without singeing his or her garments will be married within the year4 ,young folk also carry lighted torches about the streets or the fields1 and when they pass an orchard they cry out1 ,more fruit than leaves6 ,down to recent years at ,laviron1 in the department of ,doubs1 it was the young married couples of the year who had charge of the bonfires4 ,in the midst of the bonfire a pole was planted with a wooden figure of a cock fastened to the top4 ,then there were races1 and the winner received the cock as a prize4 ,in ,auvergne fires are everywhere kindled on the evening of the first ,sunday in ,lent4 ,every village1 every hamlet1 even every ward1 every isolated farm has its bonfire or figo1 as it is called1 which blazes up as the shades of night are falling4 ,the fires may be seen flaring on the heights and in the plains2 the people dance and sing round about them and leap through the flames4 ,then they proceed to the ceremony of the ,grannas-mias4 ,a granno-mio is a torch of straw fastened to the top of a pole4 ,when the pyre is half consumed1 the bystanders kindle the torches at the expiring flames and carry them into the neighbouring orchards1 fields1 and gardens1 wherever there are fruit-trees4 ,as they march they sing at the top of their voices1 ,granno my friend1 ,granno my father1 ,granno my mother4 ,then they pass the burning torches under the branches of every tree1 singing4 ,brando1 brandounci tsaque brantso1 in plan panei6 that is1 ,firebrand burn2 every branch a basketful6 ,in some villages the people also run across the sown fields and shake the ashes of the torches on the ground2 also they put some of the ashes in the fowls' nests1 in order that the hens may lay plenty of eggs throughout the year4 ,when all these ceremonies have been performed1 everybody goes home and feasts2 the special dishes of the evening are fritters and pancakes4 ,here the application of the fire to the fruit-trees1 to the sown fields1 and to the nests of the poultry is clearly a charm intended to ensure fertility2 and the ,granno to whom the invocations are addressed1 and who gives his name to the torches1 may possibly be1 as ,dr4 ,pommerol suggests1 no other than the ancient ,celtic god ,grannus1 whom the ,romans identified with ,apollo1 and whose worship is attested by inscriptions found not only in ,france but in ,scotland and on the ,danube4 ,the custom of carrying lighted torches of straw 7brandons7 about the orchards and fields to fertilise them on the first ,sunday of ,lent seems to have been common in ,france1 whether it was accompanied with the practice of kindling bonfires or not4 ,thus in the province of ,picardy on the first ,sunday of ,lent people carried torches through the fields1 exorcising the field-mice1 the darnel1 and the smut4 ,they imagined that they did much good to the gardens and caused the onions to grow large4 ,children ran about the fields1 torch in hand1 to make the land more fertile4 ,at ,verges1 a village between the ,jura and the ,combe d',ain1 the torches at this season were kindled on the top of a mountain1 and the bearers went to every house in the village1 demanding roasted peas and obliging all couples who had been married within the year to dance4 ,in ,berry1 a district of ,central ,france1 it appears that bonfires are not lighted on this day1 but when the sun has set the whole population of the villages1 armed with blazing torches of straw1 disperse over the country and scour the fields1 the vineyards1 and the orchards4 ,seen from afar1 the multitude of moving lights1 twinkling in the darkness1 appear like will-o'-the-wisps chasing each other across the plains1 along the hillsides1 and down the valleys4 ,while the men wave their flambeaus about the branches of the fruit-trees1 the women and children tie bands of wheaten-straw round the tree-trunks4 ,the effect of the ceremony is supposed to be to avert the various plagues from which the fruits of the earth are apt to suffer2 and the bands of straw fastened round the stems of the trees are believed to render them fruitful4 ,in ,germany1 ,austria1 and ,switzerland at the same season similar customs have prevailed4 ,thus in the ,eifel ,mountains1 ,rhenish ,prussia1 on the first ,sunday in ,lent young people used to collect straw and brushwood from house to house4 ,these they carried to an eminence and piled up round a tall1 slim beech-tree1 to which a piece of wood was fastened at right angles to form a cross4 ,the structure was known as the hut or castle4 ,fire was set to it and the young people marched round the blazing castle bareheaded1 each carrying a lighted torch and praying aloud4 ,sometimes a straw-man was burned in the hut4 ,people observed the direction in which the smoke blew from the fire4 ,if it blew towards the corn-fields1 it was a sign that the harvest would be abundant4 ,on the same day1 in some parts of the ,eifel1 a great wheel was made of straw and dragged by three horses to the top of the hill4 ,thither the village boys marched at nightfall1 set fire to the wheel1 and sent it rolling down the slope4 ,at ,oberstattfeld the wheel had to be provided by the young man who was last married4 ,about ,echternach in ,luxemburg the same ceremony is called burning the witch4 ,at ,voralberg in the ,tyrol1 on the first ,sunday in ,lent1 a slender young fir-tree is surrounded with a pile of straw and firewood4 ,to the top of the tree is fastened a human figure called the witch1 made of old clothes and stuffed with gunpowder4 ,at night the whole is set on fire and boys and girls dance round it1 swinging torches and singing rhymes in which the words corn in the winnowing-basket1 the plough in the earth may be distinguished4 ,in ,swabia on the first ,sunday in ,lent a figure called the witch or the old wife or winter's grandmother is made up of clothes and fastened to a pole4 ,this is stuck in the middle of a pile of wood1 to which fire is applied4 ,while the witch is burning1 the young people throw blazing discs into the air4 ,the discs are thin round pieces of wood1 a few inches in diameter1 with notched edges to imitate the rays of the sun or stars4 ,they have a hole in the middle1 by which they are attached to the end of a wand4 ,before the disc is thrown it is set on fire1 the wand is swung to and fro1 and the impetus thus communicated to the disc is augmented by dashing the rod sharply against a sloping board4 ,the burning disc is thus thrown off1 and mounting high into the air1 describes a long fiery curve before it reaches the ground4 ,the charred embers of the burned witch and discs are taken home and planted in the flax-fields the same night1 in the belief that they will keep vermin from the fields4 ,in the ,rhn ,mountains1 situated on the borders of ,hesse and ,bavaria1 the people used to march to the top of a hill or eminence on the first ,sunday in ,lent4 ,children and lads carried torches1 brooms daubed with tar1 and poles swathed in straw4 ,a wheel1 wrapt in combustibles1 was kindled and rolled down the hill2 and the young people rushed about the fields with their burning torches and brooms1 till at last they flung them in a heap1 and standing round them1 struck up a hymn or a popular song4 ,the object of running about the fields with the blazing torches was to drive away the wicked sower4 ,or it was done in honour of the ,virgin1 that she might preserve the fruits of the earth throughout the year and bless them4 ,in neighbouring villages of ,hesse1 between the ,rhn and the ,vogel ,mountains1 it is thought that wherever the burning wheels roll1 the fields will be safe from hail and storm4 ,in ,switzerland1 also1 it is or used to be customary to kindle bonfires on high places on the evening of the first ,sunday in ,lent1 and the day is therefore popularly known as ,spark ,sunday4 ,the custom prevailed1 for example1 throughout the canton of ,lucerne4 ,boys went about from house to house begging for wood and straw1 then piled the fuel on a conspicuous mountain or hill round about a pole1 which bore a straw effigy called the witch4 ,at nightfall the pile was set on fire1 and the young folks danced wildly round it1 some of them cracking whips or ringing bells2 and when the fire burned low enough1 they leaped over it4 ,this was called burning the witch4 ,in some parts of the canton also they used to wrap old wheels in straw and thorns1 put a light to them1 and send them rolling and blazing down hill4 ,the more bonfires could be seen sparkling and flaring in the darkness1 the more fruitful was the year expected to be2 and the higher the dancers leaped beside or over the fire1 the higher1 it was thought1 would grow the flax4 ,in some districts it was the last married man or woman who must kindle the bonfire4 ,it seems hardly possible to separate from these bonfires1 kindled on the first ,sunday in ,lent1 the fires in which1 about the same season1 the effigy called ,death is burned as part of the ceremony of carrying out ,death4 ,we have seen that at ,spachendorf1 in ,austrian ,silesia1 on the morning of ,rupert's ,day 7,shrove ,tuesday871 a straw-man1 dressed in a fur coat and a fur cap1 is laid in a hole outside the village and there burned1 and that while it is blazing every one seeks to snatch a fragment of it1 which he fastens to a branch of the highest tree in his garden or buries in his field1 believing that this will make the crops to grow better4 ,the ceremony is known as the burying of ,death4 ,even when the straw-man is not designated as ,death1 the meaning of the observance is probably the same2 for the name ,death1 as ,i have tried to show1 does not express the original intention of the ceremony4 ,at ,cobern in the ,eifel ,mountains the lads make up a straw-man on ,shrove ,tuesday4 ,the effigy is formally tried and accused of having perpetrated all the thefts that have been committed in the neighbourhood throughout the year4 ,being condemned to death1 the straw-man is led through the village1 shot1 and burned upon a pyre4 ,they dance round the blazing pile1 and the last bride must leap over it4 ,in ,oldenburg on the evening of ,shrove ,tuesday people used to make long bundles of straw1 which they set on fire1 and then ran about the fields waving them1 shrieking1 and singing wild songs4 ,finally they burned a straw-man on the field4 ,in the district of ,dsseldorf the straw-man burned on ,shrove ,tuesday was made of an unthreshed sheaf of corn4 ,on the first ,monday after the spring equinox the urchins of ,zurich drag a straw-man on a little cart through the streets1 while at the same time the girls carry about a ,may-tree4 ,when vespers ring1 the straw-man is burned4 ,in the district of ,aachen on ,ash ,wednesday1 a man used to be encased in peas-straw and taken to an appointed place4 ,here he slipped quietly out of his straw casing1 which was then burned1 the children thinking that it was the man who was being burned4 ,in the ,val di ,ledro 7,tyrol7 on the last day of the ,carnival a figure is made up of straw and brushwood and then burned4 ,the figure is called the ,old ,woman1 and the ceremony burning the ,old ,woman4 #c4 ,the ,easter ,fires ,,another occasion on which these fire-festivals are held is ,easter ,eve1 the ,saturday before ,easter ,sunday4 ,on that day it has been customary in ,catholic countries to extinguish all the lights in the churches1 and then to make a new fire1 sometimes with flint and steel1 sometimes with a burning-glass4 ,at this fire is lit the great ,paschal or ,easter candle1 which is then used to rekindle all the extinguished lights in the church4 ,in many parts of ,germany a bonfire is also kindled1 by means of the new fire1 on some open space near the church4 ,it is consecrated1 and the people bring sticks of oak1 walnut1 and beech1 which they char in the fire1 and then take home with them4 ,some of these charred sticks are thereupon burned at home in a newly-kindled fire1 with a prayer that ,god will preserve the homestead from fire1 lightning1 and hail4 ,thus every house receives new fire4 ,some of the sticks are kept throughout the year and laid on the hearth-fire during heavy thunder-storms to prevent the house from being struck by lightning1 or they are inserted in the roof with the like intention4 ,others are placed in the fields1 gardens1 and meadows1 with a prayer that ,god will keep them from blight and hail4 ,such fields and gardens are thought to thrive more than others2 the corn and the plants that grow in them are not beaten down by hail1 nor devoured by mice1 vermin1 and beetles2 no witch harms them1 and the ears of corn stand close and full4 ,the charred sticks are also applied to the plough4 ,the ashes of the ,easter bonfire1 together with the ashes of the consecrated palm-branches1 are mixed with the seed at sowing4 ,a wooden figure called ,judas is sometimes burned in the consecrated bonfire1 and even where this custom has been abolished the bonfire itself in some places goes by the name of the burning of ,judas4 ,the essentially pagan character of the ,easter fire festival appears plainly both from the mode in which it is celebrated by the peasants and from the superstitious beliefs which they associate with it4 ,all over ,northern and ,central ,germany1 from ,altmark and ,anhalt on the east1 through ,brunswick1 ,hanover1 ,oldenburg1 the ,harz district1 and ,hesse to ,westphalia the ,easter bonfires still blaze simultaneously on the hill-tops4 ,as many as forty may sometimes be counted within sight at once4 ,long before ,easter the young people have been busy collecting firewood2 every farmer contributes1 and tar-barrels1 petroleum cases1 and so forth go to swell the pile4 ,neighbouring villages vie with each other as to which shall send up the greatest blaze4 ,the fires are always kindled1 year after year1 on the same hill1 which accordingly often takes the name of ,easter ,mountain4 ,it is a fine spectacle to watch from some eminence the bonfires flaring up one after another on the neighbouring heights4 ,as far as their light reaches1 so far1 in the belief of the peasants1 the fields will be fruitful1 and the houses on which they shine will be safe from conflagration or sickness4 ,at ,volkmarsen and other places in ,hesse the people used to observe which way the wind blew the flames1 and then they sowed flax seed in that direction1 confident that it would grow well4 ,brands taken from the bonfires preserve houses from being struck by lightning2 and the ashes increase the fertility of the fields1 protect them from mice1 and mixed with the drinking-water of cattle make the animals thrive and ensure them against plague4 ,as the flames die down1 young and old leap over them1 and cattle are sometimes driven through the smouldering embers4 ,in some places tar-barrels or wheels wrapt in straw used to be set on fire1 and then sent rolling down the hillside4 ,in others the boys light torches and wisps of straw at the bonfires and rush about brandishing them in their hands4 ,in ,mnsterland these ,easter fires are always kindled upon certain definite hills1 which are hence known as ,easter or ,paschal ,mountains4 ,the whole community assembles about the fire4 ,the young men and maidens1 singing ,easter hymns1 march round and round the fire1 till the blaze dies down4 ,then the girls jump over the fire in a line1 one after the other1 each supported by two young men who hold her hands and run beside her4 ,in the twilight boys with blazing bundles of straw run over the fields to make them fruitful4 ,at ,delmenhorst1 in ,oldenburg1 it used to be the custom to cut down two trees1 plant them in the ground side by side1 and pile twelve tar-barrels against each4 ,brush-wood was then heaped about the trees1 and on the evening of ,easter ,saturday the boys1 after rushing about with blazing bean-poles in their hands1 set fire to the whole4 ,at the end of the ceremony the urchins tried to blacken each other and the clothes of grown-up people4 ,in the ,altmark it is believed that as far as the blaze of the ,easter bonfire is visible1 the corn will grow well throughout the year1 and no conflagration will break out4 ,at ,braunrde1 in the ,harz ,mountains1 it was the custom to burn squirrels in the ,easter bonfire4 ,in the ,altmark1 bones were burned in it4 ,near ,forchheim1 in ,upper ,franken1 a straw-man called the ,judas used to be burned in the churchyards on ,easter ,saturday4 ,the whole village contributed wood to the pyre on which he perished1 and the charred sticks were afterwards kept and planted in the fields on ,walpurgis ,day 7the first of ,may7 to preserve the wheat from blight and mildew4 ,about a hundred years ago or more the custom at ,althenneberg1 in ,upper ,bavaria1 used to be as follows4 ,on the afternoon of ,easter ,saturday the lads collected wood1 which they piled in a cornfield1 while in the middle of the pile they set up a tall wooden cross all swathed in straw4 ,after the evening service they lighted their lanterns at the consecrated candle in the church1 and ran with them at full speed to the pyre1 each striving to get there first4 ,the first to arrive set fire to the heap4 ,no woman or girl might come near the bonfire1 but they were allowed to watch it from a distance4 ,as the flames rose the men and lads rejoiced and made merry1 shouting1 ,we are burning the ,judas6 ,the man who had been the first to reach the pyre and to kindle it was rewarded on ,easter ,sunday by the women1 who gave him coloured eggs at the church door4 ,the object of the whole ceremony was to keep off the hail4 ,at other villages of ,upper ,bavaria the ceremony1 which took place between nine and ten at night on ,easter ,saturday1 was called burning the ,easter ,man4 ,on a height about a mile from the village the young fellows set up a tall cross enveloped in straw1 so that it looked like a man with his arms stretched out4 ,this was the ,easter ,man4 ,no lad under eighteen years of age might take part in the ceremony4 ,one of the young men stationed himself beside the ,easter ,man1 holding in his hand a consecrated taper which he had brought from the church and lighted4 ,the rest stood at equal intervals in a great circle round the cross4 ,at a given signal they raced thrice round the circle1 and then at a second signal ran straight at the cross and at the lad with the lighted taper beside it2 the one who reached the goal first had the right of setting fire to the ,easter ,man4 ,great was the jubilation while he was burning4 ,when he had been consumed in the flames1 three lads were chosen from among the rest1 and each of the three drew a circle on the ground with a stick thrice round the ashes4 ,then they all left the spot4 ,on ,easter ,monday the villagers gathered the ashes and strewed them on their fields2 also they planted in the fields palmbranches which had been consecrated on ,palm ,sunday1 and sticks which had been charred and hallowed on ,good ,friday1 all for the purpose of protecting their fields against showers of hail4 ,in some parts of ,swabia the ,easter fires might not be kindled with iron or steel or flint1 but only by the friction of wood4 ,the custom of the ,easter fires appears to have prevailed all over ,central and ,western ,germany from north to south4 ,we find it also in ,holland1 where the fires were kindled on the highest eminences1 and the people danced round them and leaped through the flames or over the glowing embers4 ,here too1 as often in ,germany1 the materials for the bonfire were collected by the young folk from door to door4 ,in many parts of ,sweden firearms are discharged in all directions on ,easter ,eve1 and huge bonfires are lighted on hills and eminences4 ,some people think that the intention is to keep off the ,troll and other evil spirits who are especially active at this season4 #d4 ,the ,beltane ,fires ,,in ,,the ,,central ,highlands of ,scotland bonfires1 known as the ,beltane fires1 were formerly kindled with great ceremony on the first of ,may1 and the traces of human sacrifices at them were particularly clear and unequivocal4 ,the custom of lighting the bonfires lasted in various places far into the eighteenth century1 and the descriptions of the ceremony by writers of that period present such a curious and interesting picture of ancient heathendom surviving in our own country that ,i will reproduce them in the words of their authors4 ,the fullest of the descriptions is the one bequeathed to us by ,john ,ramsay1 laird of ,ochtertyre1 near ,crieff1 the patron of ,burns and the friend of ,sir ,walter ,scott4 ,he says3 ,but the most considerable of the ,druidical festivals is that of ,beltane1 or ,may-day1 which was lately observed in some parts of the ,highlands with extraordinary ceremonies4 4 4 4 ,like the other public worship of the ,druids1 the ,beltane feast seems to have been performed on hills or eminences4 ,they thought it degrading to him whose temple is the universe1 to suppose that he would dwell in any house made with hands4 ,their sacrifices were therefore offered in the open air1 frequently upon the tops of hills1 where they were presented with the grandest views of nature1 and were nearest the seat of warmth and order4 ,and1 according to tradition1 such was the manner of celebrating this festival in the ,highlands within the last hundred years4 ,but since the decline of superstition1 it has been celebrated by the people of each hamlet on some hill or rising ground around which their cattle were pasturing4 ,thither the young folks repaired in the morning1 and cut a trench1 on the summit of which a seat of turf was formed for the company4 ,and in the middle a pile of wood or other fuel was placed1 which of old they kindled with tein-eigin--i4e41 forced-fire or need-fire4 ,although1 for many years past1 they have been contented with common fire1 yet we shall now describe the process1 because it will hereafter appear that recourse is still had to the tein-eigin upon extraordinary emergencies4 ,the night before1 all the fires in the country were carefully extinguished1 and next morning the materials for exciting this sacred fire were prepared4 ,the most primitive method seems to be that which was used in the islands of ,skye1 ,mull1 and ,tiree4 ,a well-seasoned plank of oak was procured1 in the midst of which a hole was bored4 ,a wimble of the same timber was then applied1 the end of which they fitted to the hole4 ,but in some parts of the mainland the machinery was different4 ,they used a frame of green wood1 of a square form1 in the centre of which was an axle-tree4 ,in some places three times three persons1 in others three times nine1 were required for turning round by turns the axle-tree or wimble4 ,if any of them had been guilty of murder1 adultery1 theft1 or other atrocious crime1 it was imagined either that the fire would not kindle1 or that it would be devoid of its usual virtue4 ,so soon as any sparks were emitted by means of the violent friction1 they applied a species of agaric which grows on old birch-trees1 and is very combustible4 ,this fire had the appearance of being immediately derived from heaven1 and manifold were the virtues ascribed to it4 ,they esteemed it a preservative against witch-craft1 and a sovereign remedy against malignant diseases1 both in the human species and in cattle2 and by it the strongest poisons were supposed to have their nature changed4 ,after kindling the bonfire with the tein-eigin the company prepared their victuals4 ,and as soon as they had finished their meal1 they amused themselves a while in singing and dancing round the fire4 ,towards the close of the entertainment1 the person who officiated as master of the feast produced a large cake baked with eggs and scalloped round the edge1 called am bonnach bea-tine--i4e41 the ,beltane cake4 ,it was divided into a number of pieces1 and distributed in great form to the company4 ,there was one particular piece which whoever got was called cailleach beal-tine--i4e41 the ,beltane carline1 a term of great reproach4 ,upon his being known1 part of the company laid hold of him and made a show of putting him into the fire2 but the majority interposing1 he was rescued4 ,and in some places they laid him flat on the ground1 making as if they would quarter him4 ,afterwards1 he was pelted with egg-shells1 and retained the odious appellation during the whole year4 ,and while the feast was fresh in people's memory1 they affected to speak of the cailleach beal-tine as dead4 ,in the parish of ,callander1 a beautiful district of ,western ,perthshire1 the ,beltane custom was still in vogue towards the end of the eighteenth century4 ,it has been described as follows by the parish minister of the time3 ,upon the first day of ,may1 which is called ,beltan1 or ,baltein day1 all the boys in a township or hamlet1 meet in the moors4 ,they cut a table in the green sod1 of a round figure1 by casting a trench in the ground1 of such circumference as to hold the whole company4 ,they kindle a fire1 and dress a repast of eggs and milk in the consistence of a custard4 ,they knead a cake of oatmeal1 which is toasted at the embers against a stone4 ,after the custard is eaten up1 they divide the cake into so many portions1 as similar as possible to one another in size and shape1 as there are persons in the company4 ,they daub one of these portions all over with charcoal1 until it be perfectly black4 ,they put all the bits of the cake into a bonnet4 ,every one1 blindfold1 draws out a portion4 ,he who holds the bonnet1 is entitled to the last bit4 ,whoever draws the black bit1 is the devoted person who is to be sacrificed to ,baal1 whose favour they mean to implore1 in rendering the year productive of the sustenance of man and beast4 ,there is little doubt of these inhuman sacrifices having been once offered in this country1 as well as in the east1 although they now pass from the act of sacrificing1 and only compel the devoted person to leap three times through the flames2 with which the ceremonies of this festival are closed4 ,thomas ,pennant1 who travelled in ,perthshire in the year #agfi1 tells us that on the first of ,may1 the herdsmen of every village hold their ,bel-tien1 a rural sacrifice4 ,they cut a square trench on the ground1 leaving the turf in the middle2 on that they make a fire of wood1 on which they dress a large caudle of eggs1 butter1 oatmeal and milk2 and bring besides the ingredients of the caudle1 plenty of beer and whisky2 for each of the company must contribute something4 ,the rites begin with spilling some of the caudle on the ground1 by way of libation3 on that every one takes a cake of oatmeal1 upon which are raised nine square knobs1 each dedicated to some particular being1 the supposed preserver of their flocks and herds1 or to some particular animal1 the real destroyer of them3 each person then turns his face to the fire1 breaks off a knob1 and flinging it over his shoulders1 says1 ',this ,i give to thee1 preserve thou my horses2 this to thee1 preserve thou my sheep2 and so on4' ,after that1 they use the same ceremony to the noxious animals3 ',this ,i give to thee1 ,o fox6 spare thou my lambs2 this to thee1 ,o hooded crow6 this to thee1 ,o eagle6' ,when the ceremony is over1 they dine on the caudle2 and after the feast is finished1 what is left is hid by two persons deputed for that purpose2 but on the next ,sunday they reassemble1 and finish the reliques of the first entertainment4 ,another writer of the eighteenth century has described the ,beltane festival as it was held in the parish of ,logierait in ,perthshire4 ,he says3 ,on the first of ,may1 ,o4,s41 a festival called ,beltan is annually held here4 ,it is chiefly celebrated by the cow-herds1 who assemble by scores in the fields1 to dress a dinner for themselves1 of boiled milk and eggs4 ,these dishes they eat with a sort of cakes baked for the occasion1 and having small lumps in the form of nipples1 raised all over the surface4 ,in this last account no mention is made of bonfires1 but they were probably lighted1 for a contemporary writer informs us that in the parish of ,kirkmichael1 which adjoins the parish of ,logierait on the east1 the custom of lighting a fire in the fields and baking a consecrated cake on the first of ,may was not quite obsolete in his time4 ,we may conjecture that the cake with knobs was formerly used for the purpose of determining who should be the ,beltane carline or victim doomed to the flames4 ,a trace of this custom survived1 perhaps1 in the custom of baking oatmeal cakes of a special kind and rolling them down hill about noon on the first of ,may2 for it was thought that the person whose cake broke as it rolled would die or be unfortunate within the year4 ,these cakes1 or bannocks as we call them in ,scotland1 were baked in the usual way1 but they were washed over with a thin batter composed of whipped egg1 milk or cream1 and a little oatmeal4 ,this custom appears to have prevailed at or near ,kingussie in ,inverness-shire4 ,in the north-east of ,scotland the ,beltane fires were still kindled in the latter half of the eighteenth century2 the herdsmen of several farms used to gather dry wood1 kindle it1 and dance three times southways about the burning pile4 ,but in this region1 according to a later authority1 the ,beltane fires were lit not on the first but on the second of ,may1 ,old ,style4 ,they were called bone-fires4 ,the people believed that on that evening and night the witches were abroad and busy casting spells on cattle and stealing cows' milk4 ,to counteract their machinations1 pieces of rowan-tree and woodbine1 but especially of rowan-tree1 were placed over the doors of the cow-houses1 and fires were kindled by every farmer and cottar4 ,old thatch1 straw1 furze1 or broom was piled in a heap and set on fire a little after sunset4 ,while some of the bystanders kept tossing the blazing mass1 others hoisted portions of it on pitchforks or poles and ran hither and thither1 holding them as high as they could4 ,meantime the young people danced round the fire or ran through the smoke shouting1 ,fire6 blaze and burn the witches2 fire6 fire6 burn the witches4 ,in some districts a large round cake of oat or barley meal was rolled through the ashes4 ,when all the fuel was consumed1 the people scattered the ashes far and wide1 and till the night grew quite dark they continued to run through them1 crying1 ,fire6 burn the witches4 ,in the ,hebrides the ,beltane bannock is smaller than that made at ,st4 ,michael's1 but is made in the same way2 it is no longer made in ,uist1 but ,father ,allan remembers seeing his grandmother make one about twenty-five years ago4 ,there was also a cheese made1 generally on the first of ,may1 which was kept to the next ,beltane as a sort of charm against the bewitching of milk-produce4 ,the ,beltane customs seem to have been the same as elsewhere4 ,every fire was put out and a large one lit on the top of the hill1 and the cattle driven round it sunwards 7dessil71 to keep off murrain all the year4 ,each man would take home fire wherewith to kindle his own4 ,in ,wales also the custom of lighting ,beltane fires at the beginning of ,may used to be observed1 but the day on which they were kindled varied from the eve of ,may ,day to the third of ,may4 ,the flame was sometimes elicited by the friction of two pieces of oak1 as appears from the following description4 ,the fire was done in this way4 ,nine men would turn their pockets inside out1 and see that every piece of money and all metals were off their persons4 ,then the men went into the nearest woods1 and collected sticks of nine different kinds of trees4 ,these were carried to the spot where the fire had to be built4 ,there a circle was cut in the sod1 and the sticks were set crosswise4 ,all around the circle the people stood and watched the proceedings4 ,one of the men would then take two bits of oak1 and rub them together until a flame was kindled4 ,this was applied to the sticks1 and soon a large fire was made4 ,sometimes two fires were set up side by side4 ,these fires1 whether one or two1 were called coelcerth or bonfire4 ,round cakes of oatmeal and brown meal were split in four1 and placed in a small flour-bag1 and everybody present had to pick out a portion4 ,the last bit in the bag fell to the lot of the bag-holder4 ,each person who chanced to pick up a piece of brown-meal cake was compelled to leap three times over the flames1 or to run thrice between the two fires1 by which means the people thought they were sure of a plentiful harvest4 ,shouts and screams of those who had to face the ordeal could be heard ever so far1 and those who chanced to pick the oatmeal portions sang and danced and clapped their hands in approval1 as the holders of the brown bits leaped three times over the flames1 or ran three times between the two fires4 ,the belief of the people that by leaping thrice over the bonfires or running thrice between them they ensured a plentiful harvest is worthy of note4 ,the mode in which this result was supposed to be brought about is indicated by another writer on ,welsh folk-lore1 according to whom it used to be held that the bonfires lighted in ,may or ,midsummer protected the lands from sorcery1 so that good crops would follow4 ,the ashes were also considered valuable as charms4 ,hence it appears that the heat of the fires was thought to fertilise the fields1 not directly by quickening the seeds in the ground1 but indirectly by counteracting the baleful influence of witchcraft or perhaps by burning up the persons of the witches4 ,the ,beltane fires seem to have been kindled also in ,ireland1 for ,cormac1 or somebody in his name1 says that belltaine1 ,may-day1 was so called from the 'lucky fire1' or the 'two fires1' which the druids of ,erin used to make on that day with great incantations2 and cattle1 he adds1 used to be brought to those fires1 or to be driven between them1 as a safeguard against the diseases of the year4 ,the custom of driving cattle through or between fires on ,may ,day or the eve of ,may ,day persisted in ,ireland down to a time within living memory4 ,the first of ,may is a great popular festival in the more midland and southern parts of ,sweden4 ,on the eve of the festival huge bonfires1 which should be lighted by striking two flints together1 blaze on all the hills and knolls4 ,every large hamlet has its own fire1 round which the young people dance in a ring4 ,the old folk notice whether the flames incline to the north or to the south4 ,in the former case1 the spring will be cold and backward2 in the latter1 it will be mild and genial4 ,in ,bohemia1 on the eve of ,may ,day1 young people kindle fires on hills and eminences1 at crossways1 and in pastures1 and dance round them4 ,they leap over the glowing embers or even through the flames4 ,the ceremony is called burning the witches4 ,in some places an effigy representing a witch used to be burnt in the bonfire4 ,we have to remember that the eve of ,may ,day is the notorious ,walpurgis ,night1 when the witches are everywhere speeding unseen through the air on their hellish errands4 ,on this witching night children in ,voigtland also light bonfires on the heights and leap over them4 ,moreover1 they wave burning brooms or toss them into the air4 ,so far as the light of the bonfire reaches1 so far will a blessing rest on the fields4 ,the kindling of the fires on ,walpurgis ,night is called driving away the witches4 ,the custom of kindling fires on the eve of ,may ,day 7,walpurgis ,night7 for the purpose of burning the witches is1 or used to be1 widespread in the ,tyrol1 ,moravia1 ,saxony and ,silesia4 #e4 ,the ,midsummer ,fires ,,but ,,the ,,season at which these firefestivals have been most generally held all over ,europe is the summer solstice1 that is ,midsummer ,eve 7the twenty-third of ,june7 or ,midsummer day 7the twenty-fourth of ,june74 ,a faint tinge of ,christianity has been given to them by naming ,midsummer ,day after ,st4 ,john the ,baptist1 but we cannot doubt that the celebration dates from a time long before the beginning of our era4 ,the summer solstice1 or ,midsummer ,day1 is the great turning-point in the sun's career1 when1 after climbing higher and higher day by day in the sky1 the luminary stops and thenceforth retraces his steps down the heavenly road4 ,such a moment could not but be regarded with anxiety by primitive man so soon as he began to observe and ponder the courses of the great lights across the celestial vault2 and having still to learn his own powerlessness in face of the vast cyclic changes of nature1 he may have fancied that he could help the sun in his seeming decline--could prop his failing steps and rekindle the sinking flame of the red lamp in his feeble hand4 ,in some such thoughts as these the midsummer festivals of our ,european peasantry may perhaps have taken their rise4 ,whatever their origin1 they have prevailed all over this quarter of the globe1 from ,ireland on the west to ,russia on the east1 and from ,norway and ,sweden on the north to ,spain and ,greece on the south4 ,according to a mediaeval writer1 the three great features of the midsummer celebration were the bonfires1 the procession with torches round the fields1 and the custom of rolling a wheel4 ,he tells us that boys burned bones and filth of various kinds to make a foul smoke1 and that the smoke drove away certain noxious dragons which at this time1 excited by the summer heat1 copulated in the air and poisoned the wells and rivers by dropping their seed into them2 and he explains the custom of trundling a wheel to mean that the sun1 having now reached the highest point in the ecliptic1 begins thenceforward to descend4 ,the main features of the midsummer fire-festival resemble those which we have found to characterise the vernal festivals of fire4 ,the similarity of the two sets of ceremonies will plainly appear from the following examples4 ,a writer of the first half of the sixteenth century informs us that in almost every village and town of ,germany public bonfires were kindled on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john1 and young and old1 of both sexes1 gathered about them and passed the time in dancing and singing4 ,people on this occasion wore chaplets of mugwort and vervain1 and they looked at the fire through bunches of larkspur which they held in their hands1 believing that this would preserve their eyes in a healthy state throughout the year4 ,as each departed1 he threw the mugwort and vervain into the fire1 saying1 ,may all my ill-luck depart and be burnt up with these4 ,at ,lower ,konz1 a village situated on a hillside overlooking the ,moselle1 the midsummer festival used to be celebrated as follows4 ,a quantity of straw was collected on the top of the steep ,stromberg ,hill4 ,every inhabitant1 or at least every householder1 had to contribute his share of straw to the pile4 ,at nightfall the whole male population1 men and boys1 mustered on the top of the hill2 the women and girls were not allowed to join them1 but had to take up their position at a certain spring half-way down the slope4 ,on the summit stood a huge wheel completely encased in some of the straw which had been jointly contributed by the villagers2 the rest of the straw was made into torches4 ,from each side of the wheel the axle-tree projected about three feet1 thus furnishing handles to the lads who were to guide it in its descent4 ,the mayor of the neighbouring town of ,sierck1 who always received a basket of cherries for his services1 gave the signal2 a lighted torch was applied to the wheel1 and as it burst into flame1 two young fellows1 strong-limbed and swift of foot1 seized the handles and began running with it down the slope4 ,a great shout went up4 ,every man and boy waved a blazing torch in the air1 and took care to keep it alight so long as the wheel was trundling down the hill4 ,the great object of the young men who guided the wheel was to plunge it blazing into the water of the ,moselle2 but they rarely succeeded in their efforts1 for the vineyards which cover the greater part of the declivity impeded their progress1 and the wheel was often burned out before it reached the river4 ,as it rolled past the women and girls at the spring1 they raised cries of joy which were answered by the men on the top of the mountain2 and the shouts were echoed by the inhabitants of neighbouring villages who watched the spectacle from their hills on the opposite bank of the ,moselle4 ,if the fiery wheel was successfully conveyed to the bank of the river and extinguished in the water1 the people looked for an abundant vintage that year1 and the inhabitants of ,konz had the right to exact a waggon-load of white wine from the surrounding vineyards4 ,on the other hand1 they believed that1 if they neglected to perform the ceremony1 the cattle would be attacked by giddiness and convulsions and would dance in their stalls4 ,down at least to the middle of the nineteenth century the midsummer fires used to blaze all over ,upper ,bavaria4 ,they were kindled especially on the mountains1 but also far and wide in the lowlands1 and we are told that in the darkness and stillness of night the moving groups1 lit up by the flickering glow of the flames1 presented an impressive spectacle4 ,cattle were driven through the fire to cure the sick animals and to guard such as were sound against plague and harm of every kind throughout the year4 ,many a householder on that day put out the fire on the domestic hearth and rekindled it by means of a brand taken from the midsummer bonfire4 ,the people judged of the height to which the flax would grow in the year by the height to which the flames of the bonfire rose2 and whoever leaped over the burning pile was sure not to suffer from backache in reaping the corn at harvest4 ,in many parts of ,bavaria it was believed that the flax would grow as high as the young people leaped over the fire4 ,in others the old folk used to plant three charred sticks from the bonfire in the fields1 believing that this would make the flax grow tall4 ,elsewhere an extinguished brand was put in the roof of the house to protect it against fire4 ,in the towns about ,wrzburg the bonfires used to be kindled in the market-places1 and the young people who jumped over them wore garlands of flowers1 especially of mugwort and vervain1 and carried sprigs of larkspur in their hands4 ,they thought that such as looked at the fire holding a bit of larkspur before their face would be troubled by no malady of the eyes throughout the year4 ,further1 it was customary at ,wrzburg1 in the sixteenth century1 for the bishop's followers to throw burning discs of wood into the air from a mountain which overhangs the town4 ,the discs were discharged by means of flexible rods1 and in their flight through the darkness presented the appearance of fiery dragons4 ,similarly in ,swabia1 lads and lasses1 hand in hand1 leap over the midsummer bonfire1 praying that the hemp may grow three ells high1 and they set fire to wheels of straw and send them rolling down the hill4 ,sometimes1 as the people sprang over the midsummer bonfire they cried out1 ,flax1 flax6 may the flax this year grow seven ells high6 ,at ,rottenburg a rude effigy in human form1 called the ,angelman1 used to be enveloped in flowers and then burnt in the midsummer fire by boys1 who afterwards leaped over the glowing embers4 ,so in ,baden the children collected fuel from house to house for the midsummer bonfire on ,st4 ,john's ,day2 and lads and lasses leaped over the fire in couples4 ,here1 as elsewhere1 a close connexion was traced between these bonfires and the harvest4 ,in some places it was thought that those who leaped over the fires would not suffer from backache at reaping4 ,sometimes1 as the young folk sprang over the flames1 they cried1 ,grow1 that the hemp may be three ells high6 ,this notion that the hemp or the corn would grow as high as the flames blazed or as the people jumped over them1 seems to have been widespread in ,baden4 ,it was held that the parents of the young people who bounded highest over the fire would have the most abundant harvest2 and on the other hand1 if a man contributed nothing to the bonfire1 it was imagined that there would be no blessing on his crops1 and that his hemp in particular would never grow4 ,at ,edersleben1 near ,sangerhausen1 a high pole was planted in the ground and a tarbarrel was hung from it by a chain which reached to the ground4 ,the barrel was then set on fire and swung round the pole amid shouts of joy4 ,in ,denmark and ,norway also midsummer fires were kindled on ,st4 ,john's ,eve on roads1 open spaces1 and hills4 ,people in ,norway thought that the fires banished sickness from among the cattle4 ,even yet the fires are said to be lighted all over ,norway on ,midsummer ,eve4 ,they are kindled in order to keep off the witches1 who are said to be flying from all parts that night to the ,blocksberg1 where the big witch lives4 ,in ,sweden the ,eve of ,st4 ,john 7,st4 ,hans7 is the most joyous night of the whole year4 ,throughout some parts of the country1 especially in the provinces of ,bohus and ,scania and in districts bordering on ,norway1 it is celebrated by the frequent discharge of firearms and by huge bonfires1 formerly called ,balder's ,balefires 7,balder's ,balar71 which are kindled at dusk on hills and eminences and throw a glare of light over the surrounding landscape4 ,the people dance round the fires and leap over or through them4 ,in parts of ,norrland on ,st4 ,john's ,eve the bonfires are lit at the cross-roads4 ,the fuel consists of nine different sorts of wood1 and the spectators cast into the flames a kind of toad-stool 7,bran7 in order to counteract the power of the ,trolls and other evil spirits1 who are believed to be abroad that night2 for at that mystic season the mountains open and from their cavernous depths the uncanny crew pours forth to dance and disport themselves for a time4 ,the peasants believe that should any of the ,trolls be in the vicinity they will show themselves2 and if an animal1 for example a he or she goat1 happens to be seen near the blazing1 crackling pile1 the peasants are firmly persuaded that it is no other than the ,evil ,one in person4 ,further1 it deserves to be remarked that in ,sweden ,st4 ,john's ,eve is a festival of water as well as of fire2 for certain holy springs are then supposed to be endowed with wonderful medicinal virtues1 and many sick people resort to them for the healing of their infirmities4 ,in ,austria the midsummer customs and superstitions resemble those of ,germany4 ,thus in some parts of the ,tyrol bonfires are kindled and burning discs hurled into the air4 ,in the lower valley of the ,inn a tatterdemalion effigy is carted about the village on ,midsummer ,day and then burned4 ,he is called the ,lotter1 which has been corrupted into ,luther4 ,at ,ambras1 one of the villages where ,martin ,luther is thus burned in effigy1 they say that if you go through the village between eleven and twelve on ,st4 ,john's ,night and wash yourself in three wells1 you will see all who are to die in the following year4 ,at ,gratz on ,st4 ,john's ,eve 7the twenty-third of ,june7 the common people used to make a puppet called the ,tatermann1 which they dragged to the bleaching ground1 and pelted with burning besoms till it took fire4 ,at ,reutte1 in the ,tyrol1 people believed that the flax would grow as high as they leaped over the midsummer bonfire1 and they took pieces of charred wood from the fire and stuck them in their flax-fields the same night1 leaving them there till the flax harvest had been got in4 ,in ,lower ,austria bonfires are kindled on the heights1 and the boys caper round them1 brandishing lighted torches drenched in pitch4 ,whoever jumps thrice across the fire will not suffer from fever within the year4 ,cart-wheels are often smeared with pitch1 ignited1 and sent rolling and blazing down the hillsides4 ,all over ,bohemia bonfires still burn on ,midsummer ,eve4 ,in the afternoon boys go about with handcarts from house to house collecting fuel and threatening with evil consequences the curmudgeons who refuse them a dole4 ,sometimes the young men fell a tall straight fir in the woods and set it up on a height1 where the girls deck it with nosegays1 wreaths of leaves1 and red ribbons4 ,then brushwood is piled about it1 and at nightfall the whole is set on fire4 ,while the flames break out1 the young men climb the tree and fetch down the wreaths which the girls had placed on it4 ,after that lads and lasses stand on opposite sides of the fire and look at one another through the wreaths to see whether they will be true to each other and marry within the year4 ,also the girls throw the wreaths across the flames to the men1 and woe to the awkward swain who fails to catch the wreath thrown him by his sweetheart4 ,when the blaze has died down1 each couple takes hands and leaps thrice across the fire4 ,he or she who does so will be free from ague throughout the year1 and the flax will grow as high as the young folks leap4 ,a girl who sees nine bonfires on ,midsummer ,eve will marry before the year is out4 ,the singed wreaths are carried home and carefully preserved throughout the year4 ,during thunderstorms a bit of the wreath is burned on the hearth with a prayer2 some of it is given to kine that are sick or calving1 and some of it serves to fumigate house and cattle-stall1 that man and beast may keep hale and well4 ,sometimes an old cart-wheel is smeared with resin1 ignited1 and sent rolling down the hill4 ,often the boys collect all the worn-out besoms they can get hold of1 dip them in pitch1 and having set them on fire wave them about or throw them high into the air4 ,or they rush down the hillside in troops1 brandishing the flaming brooms and shouting4 ,the stumps of the brooms and embers from the fire are preserved and stuck in cabbage gardens to protect the cabbages from caterpillars and gnats4 ,some people insert charred sticks and ashes from the midsummer bonfire in their sown fields and meadows1 in their gardens and the roofs of their houses1 as a talisman against lightning and foul weather2 or they fancy that the ashes placed in the roof will prevent any fire from breaking out in the house4 ,in some districts they crown or gird themselves with mugwort while the midsummer fire is burning1 for this is supposed to be a protection against ghosts1 witches1 and sickness2 in particular1 a wreath of mugwort is a sure preventive of sore eyes4 ,sometimes the girls look at the bonfires through garlands of wild flowers1 praying the fire to strengthen their eyes and eyelids4 ,she who does this thrice will have no sore eyes all that year4 ,in some parts of ,bohemia they used to drive the cows through the midsummer fire to guard them against witchcraft4 ,in ,slavonic countries1 also1 the midsummer festival is celebrated with similar rites4 ,we have already seen that in ,russia on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john young men and maidens jump over a bonfire in couples carrying a straw effigy of ,kupalo in their arms4 ,in some parts of ,russia an image of ,kupalo is burnt or thrown into a stream on ,st4 ,john's ,night4 ,again1 in some districts of ,russia the young folk wear garlands of flowers and girdles of holy herbs when they spring through the smoke or flames2 and sometimes they drive the cattle also through the fire in order to protect the animals against wizards and witches1 who are then ravenous after milk4 ,in ,little ,russia a stake is driven into the ground on ,st4 ,john's ,night1 wrapt in straw1 and set on fire4 ,as the flames rise the peasant women throw birchen boughs into them1 saying1 ,may my flax be as tall as this bough6 ,in ,ruthenia the bonfires are lighted by a flame procured by the friction of wood4 ,while the elders of the party are engaged in thus churning the fire1 the rest maintain a respectful silence2 but when the flame bursts from the wood1 they break forth into joyous songs4 ,as soon as the bonfires are kindled1 the young people take hands and leap in pairs through the smoke1 if not through the flames2 and after that the cattle in their turn are driven through the fire4 ,in many parts of ,prussia and ,lithuania great fires are kindled on ,midsummer ,eve4 ,all the heights are ablaze with them1 as far as the eye can see4 ,the fires are supposed to be a protection against witchcraft1 thunder1 hail1 and cattle disease1 especially if next morning the cattle are driven over the places where the fires burned4 ,above all1 the bonfires ensure the farmer against the arts of witches1 who try to steal the milk from his cows by charms and spells4 ,that is why next morning you may see the young fellows who lit the bonfire going from house to house and receiving jugfuls of milk4 ,and for the same reason they stick burs and mugwort on the gate or the hedge through which the cows go to pasture1 because that is supposed to be a preservative against witchcraft4 ,in ,masuren1 a district of ,eastern ,prussia inhabited by a branch of the ,polish family1 it is the custom on the evening of ,midsummer ,day to put out all the fires in the village4 ,then an oaken stake is driven into the ground and a wheel is fixed on it as on an axle4 ,this wheel the villagers1 working by relays1 cause to revolve with great rapidity till fire is produced by friction4 ,every one takes home a lighted brand from the new fire and with it rekindles the fire on the domestic hearth4 ,in ,serbia on ,midsummer ,eve herdsmen light torches of birch bark and march round the sheepfolds and cattle-stalls2 then they climb the hills and there allow the torches to burn out4 ,among the ,magyars in ,hungary the midsummer fire-festival is marked by the same features that meet us in so many parts of ,europe4 ,on ,midsummer ,eve in many places it is customary to kindle bonfires on heights and to leap over them1 and from the manner in which the young people leap the bystanders predict whether they will marry soon4 ,on this day also many ,hungarian swineherds make fire by rotating a wheel round a wooden axle wrapt in hemp1 and through the fire thus made they drive their pigs to preserve them from sickness4 ,the ,esthonians of ,russia1 who1 like the ,magyars1 belong to the great ,turanian family of mankind1 also celebrate the summer solstice in the usual way4 ,they think that the ,st4 ,john's fire keeps witches from the cattle1 and they say that he who does not come to it will have his barley full of thistles and his oats full of weeds4 ,in the ,esthonian island of ,oesel1 while they throw fuel into the midsummer fire1 they call out1 ,weeds to the fire1 flax to the field1 or they fling three billets into the flames1 saying1 ,flax grow long6 ,and they take charred sticks from the bonfire home with them and keep them to make the cattle thrive4 ,in some parts of the island the bonfire is formed by piling brushwood and other combustibles round a tree1 at the top of which a flag flies4 ,whoever succeeds in knocking down the flag with a pole before it begins to burn will have good luck4 ,formerly the festivities lasted till daybreak1 and ended in scenes of debauchery which looked doubly hideous by the growing light of a summer morning4 ,when we pass from the east to the west of ,europe we still find the summer solstice celebrated with rites of the same general character4 ,down to about the middle of the nineteenth century the custom of lighting bonfires at midsummer prevailed so commonly in ,france that there was hardly a town or a village1 we are told1 where they were not kindled4 ,people danced round and leaped over them1 and took charred sticks from the bonfire home with them to protect the houses against lightning1 conflagrations1 and spells4 ,in ,brittany1 apparently1 the custom of the midsummer bonfires is kept up to this day4 ,when the flames have died down1 the whole assembly kneels round about the bonfire and an old man prays aloud4 ,then they all rise and march thrice round the fire2 at the third turn they stop and every one picks up a pebble and throws it on the burning pile4 ,after that they disperse4 ,in ,brittany and ,berry it is believed that a girl who dances round nine midsummer bonfires will marry within the year4 ,in the valley of the ,orne the custom was to kindle the bonfire just at the moment when the sun was about to dip below the horizon2 and the peasants drove their cattle through the fires to protect them against witchcraft1 especially against the spells of witches and wizards who attempted to steal the milk and butter4 ,at ,jumiges in ,normandy1 down to the first half of the nineteenth century1 the midsummer festival was marked by certain singular features which bore the stamp of a very high antiquity4 ,every year1 on the twenty-third of ,june1 the ,eve of ,st4 ,john1 the ,brotherhood of the ,green ,wolf chose a new chief or master1 who had always to be taken from the hamlet of ,conihout4 ,on being elected1 the new head of the brotherhood assumed the title of the ,green ,wolf1 and donned a peculiar costume consisting of a long green mantle and a very tall green hat of a conical shape and without a brim4 ,thus arrayed he stalked solemnly at the head of the brothers1 chanting the hymn of ,st4 ,john1 the crucifix and holy banner leading the way1 to a place called ,chouquet4 ,here the procession was met by the priest1 precentors1 and choir1 who conducted the brotherhood to the parish church4 ,after hearing mass the company adjourned to the house of the ,green ,wolf1 where a simple repast was served up to them4 ,at night a bonfire was kindled to the sound of hand-bells by a young man and a young woman1 both decked with flowers4 ,then the ,green ,wolf and his brothers1 with their hoods down on their shoulders and holding each other by the hand1 ran round the fire after the man who had been chosen to be the ,green ,wolf of the following year4 ,though only the first and the last man of the chain had a hand free1 their business was to surround and seize thrice the future ,green ,wolf1 who in his efforts to escape belaboured the brothers with a long wand which he carried4 ,when at last they succeeded in catching him they carried him to the burning pile and made as if they would throw him on it4 ,this ceremony over1 they returned to the house of the ,green ,wolf1 where a supper1 still of the most meagre fare1 was set before them4 ,up till midnight a sort of religious solemnity prevailed4 ,but at the stroke of twelve all this was changed4 ,constraint gave way to license2 pious hymns were replaced by ,bacchanalian ditties1 and the shrill quavering notes of the village fiddle hardly rose above the roar of voices that went up from the merry brotherhood of the ,green ,wolf4 ,next day1 the twenty-fourth of ,june or ,midsummer ,day1 was celebrated by the same personages with the same noisy gaiety4 ,one of the ceremonies consisted in parading1 to the sound of musketry1 an enormous loaf of consecrated bread1 which1 rising in tiers1 was surmounted by a pyramid of verdure adorned with ribbons4 ,after that the holy hand-bells1 deposited on the step of the altar1 were entrusted as insignia of office to the man who was to be the ,green ,wolf next year4 ,at ,chteau-,thierry1 in the department of ,aisne1 the custom of lighting bonfires and dancing round them at the midsummer festival of ,st4 ,john lasted down to about #ahej2 the fires were kindled especially when ,june had been rainy1 and the people thought that the lighting of the bonfires would cause the rain to cease4 ,in the ,vosges it is still customary to kindle bonfires upon the hill-tops on ,midsummer ,eve2 the people believe that the fires help to preserve the fruits of the earth and ensure good crops4 ,bonfires were lit in almost all the hamlets of ,poitou on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john4 ,people marched round them thrice1 carrying a branch of walnut in their hand4 ,shepherdesses and children passed sprigs of mullein 7verbascum7 and nuts across the flames2 the nuts were supposed to cure toothache1 and the mullein to protect the cattle from sickness and sorcery4 ,when the fire died down people took some of the ashes home with them1 either to keep them in the house as a preservative against thunder or to scatter them on the fields for the purpose of destroying corn-cockles and darnel4 ,in ,poitou also it used to be customary on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john to trundle a blazing wheel wrapt in straw over the fields to fertilise them4 ,in the mountainous part of ,comminges1 a province of ,southern ,france1 the midsummer fire is made by splitting open the trunk of a tall tree1 stuffing the crevice with shavings1 and igniting the whole4 ,a garland of flowers is fastened to the top of the tree1 and at the moment when the fire is lighted the man who was last married has to climb up a ladder and bring the flowers down4 ,in the flat parts of the same district the materials of the midsummer bonfires consist of fuel piled in the usual way2 but they must be put together by men who have been married since the last midsummer festival1 and each of these benedicts is obliged to lay a wreath of flowers on the top of the pile4 ,in ,provence the midsummer fires are still popular4 ,children go from door to door begging for fuel1 and they are seldom sent empty away4 ,formerly the priest1 the mayor1 and the aldermen used to walk in procession to the bonfire1 and even deigned to light it2 after which the assembly marched thrice round the burning pile4 ,at ,aix a nominal king1 chosen from among the youth for his skill in shooting at a popinjay1 presided over the midsummer festival4 ,he selected his own officers1 and escorted by a brilliant train marched to the bonfire1 kindled it1 and was the first to dance round it4 ,next day he distributed largesse to his followers4 ,his reign lasted a year1 during which he enjoyed certain privileges4 ,he was allowed to attend the mass celebrated by the commander of the ,knights of ,st4 ,john on ,st4 ,john's ,day2 the right of hunting was accorded to him1 and soldiers might not be quartered in his house4 ,at ,marseilles also on this day one of the guilds chose a king of the badache or double axe2 but it does not appear that he kindled the bonfire1 which is said to have been lighted with great ceremony by the prfet and other authorities4 ,in ,belgium the custom of kindling the midsummer bonfires has long disappeared from the great cities1 but it is still kept up in rural districts and small towns4 ,in that country the ,eve of ,st4 ,peter's ,day 7the twenty-ninth of ,june7 is celebrated by bonfires and dances exactly like those which commemorate ,st4 ,john's ,eve4 ,some people say that the fires of ,st4 ,peter1 like those of ,st4 ,john1 are lighted in order to drive away dragons4 ,in ,french ,flanders down to #aghi a straw figure representing a man was always burned in the midsummer bonfire1 and the figure of a woman was burned on ,st4 ,peter's ,day1 the twenty-ninth of ,june4 ,in ,belgium people jump over the midsummer bonfires as a preventive of colic1 and they keep the ashes at home to hinder fire from breaking out4 ,the custom of lighting bonfires at midsummer has been observed in many parts of our own country1 and as usual people danced round and leaped over them4 ,in ,wales three or nine different kinds of wood and charred faggots carefully preserved from the last midsummer were deemed necessary to build the bonfire1 which was generally done on rising ground4 ,in the ,vale of ,glamorgan a cart-wheel swathed in straw used to be ignited and sent rolling down the hill4 ,if it kept alight all the way down and blazed for a long time1 an abundant harvest was expected4 ,on ,midsummer ,eve people in the ,isle of ,man were wont to light fires to the windward of every field1 so that the smoke might pass over the corn2 and they folded their cattle and carried blazing furze or gorse round them several times4 ,in ,ireland cattle1 especially barren cattle1 were driven through the midsummer fires1 and the ashes were thrown on the fields to fertilise them1 or live coals were carried into them to prevent blight4 ,in ,scotland the traces of midsummer fires are few2 but at that season in the highlands of ,perthshire cowherds used to go round their folds thrice1 in the direction of the sun1 with lighted torches4 ,this they did to purify the flocks and herds and to keep them from falling sick4 ,the practice of lighting bonfires on ,midsummer ,eve and dancing or leaping over them is1 or was till recently1 common all over ,spain and in some parts of ,italy and ,sicily4 ,in ,malta great fires are kindled in the streets and squares of the towns and villages on the ,eve of ,st4 ,john 7,midsummer ,eve72 formerly the ,grand ,master of the ,order of ,st4 ,john used on that evening to set fire to a heap of pitch barrels placed in front of the sacred ,hospital4 ,in ,greece1 too1 the custom of kindling fires on ,st4 ,john's ,eve and jumping over them is said to be still universal4 ,one reason assigned for it is a wish to escape from the fleas4 ,according to another account1 the women cry out1 as they leap over the fire1 ,i leave my sins behind me4 ,in ,lesbos the fires on ,st4 ,john's ,eve are usually lighted by threes1 and the people spring thrice over them1 each with a stone on his head1 saying1 ,i jump the hare's fire1 my head a stone6 ,in ,calymnos the midsummer fire is supposed to ensure abundance in the coming year as well as deliverance from fleas4 ,the people dance round the fires singing1 with stones on their heads1 and then jump over the blaze or the glowing embers4 ,when the fire is burning low1 they throw the stones into it2 and when it is nearly out1 they make crosses on their legs and then go straightway and bathe in the sea4 ,the custom of kindling bonfires on ,midsummer ,day or on ,midsummer ,eve is widely spread among the ,mohammedan peoples of ,north ,africa1 particularly in ,morocco and ,algeria2 it is common both to the ,berbers and to many of the ,arabs or ,arabic-speaking tribes4 ,in these countries ,midsummer ,day 7the twenty-fourth of ,june1 ,old ,style7 is called l'nsara4 ,the fires are lit in the courtyards1 at cross-roads1 in the fields1 and sometimes on the threshing-floors4 ,plants which in burning give out a thick smoke and an aromatic smell are much sought after for fuel on these occasions2 among the plants used for the purpose are giant-fennel1 thyme1 rue1 chervil-seed1 camomile1 geranium1 and penny-royal4 ,people expose themselves1 and especially their children1 to the smoke1 and drive it towards the orchards and the crops4 ,also they leap across the fires2 in some places everybody ought to repeat the leap seven times4 ,moreover they take burning brands from the fires and carry them through the houses in order to fumigate them4 ,they pass things through the fire1 and bring the sick into contact with it1 while they utter prayers for their recovery4 ,the ashes of the bonfires are also reputed to possess beneficial properties2 hence in some places people rub their hair or their bodies with them4 ,in some places they think that by leaping over the fires they rid themselves of all misfortune1 and that childless couples thereby obtain offspring4 ,berbers of the ,rif province1 in ,northern ,morocco1 make great use of fires at midsummer for the good of themselves1 their cattle1 and their fruit-trees4 ,they jump over the bonfires in the belief that this will preserve them in good health1 and they light fires under fruit-trees to keep the fruit from falling untimely4 ,and they imagine that by rubbing a paste of the ashes on their hair they prevent the hair from falling off their heads4 ,in all these ,moroccan customs1 we are told1 the beneficial effect is attributed wholly to the smoke1 which is supposed to be endued with a magical quality that removes misfortune from men1 animals1 fruit-trees and crops4 ,the celebration of a midsummer festival by ,mohammedan peoples is particularly remarkable1 because the ,mohammedan calendar1 being purely lunar and uncorrected by intercalation1 necessarily takes no note of festivals which occupy fixed points in the solar year2 all strictly ,mohammedan feasts1 being pinned to the moon1 slide gradually with that luminary through the whole period of the earth's revolution about the sun4 ,this fact of itself seems to prove that among the ,mohammedan peoples of ,northern ,africa1 as among the ,christian peoples of ,europe1 the midsummer festival is quite independent of the religion which the people publicly profess1 and is a relic of a far older paganism4 #f4 ,the ,hallowe'en ,fires ,,from ,,the ,,foregoing survey we may infer that among the heathen forefathers of the ,european peoples the most popular and widespread fire-festival of the year was the great celebration of ,midsummer ,eve or ,midsummer ,day4 ,the coincidence of the festival with the summer solstice can hardly be accidental4 ,rather we must suppose that our pagan ancestors purposely timed the ceremony of fire on earth to coincide with the arrival of the sun at the highest point of his course in the sky4 ,if that was so1 it follows that the old founders of the midsummer rites had observed the solstices or turning-points of the sun's apparent path in the sky1 and that they accordingly regulated their festal calendar to some extent by astronomical considerations4 ,but while this may be regarded as fairly certain for what we may call the aborigines throughout a large part of the continent1 it appears not to have been true of the ,celtic peoples who inhabited the ,land's ,end of ,europe1 the islands and promontories that stretch out into the ,atlantic ,ocean on the ,north-,west4 ,the principal fire-festivals of the ,celts1 which have survived1 though in a restricted area and with diminished pomp1 to modern times and even to our own day1 were seemingly timed without any reference to the position of the sun in the heaven4 ,they were two in number1 and fell at an interval of six months1 one being celebrated on the eve of ,may ,day and the other on ,allhallow ,even or ,hallowe'en1 as it is now commonly called1 that is1 on the thirty-first of ,october1 the day preceding ,all ,saints' or ,allhallows' ,day4 ,these dates coincide with none of the four great hinges on which the solar year revolves1 to wit1 the solstices and the equinoxes4 ,nor do they agree with the principal seasons of the agricultural year1 the sowing in spring and the reaping in autumn4 ,for when ,may ,day comes1 the seed has long been committed to the earth2 and when ,november opens1 the harvest has long been reaped and garnered1 the fields lie bare1 the fruit-trees are stripped1 and even the yellow leaves are fast fluttering to the ground4 ,yet the first of ,may and the first of ,november mark turning-points of the year in ,europe2 the one ushers in the genial heat and the rich vegetation of summer1 the other heralds1 if it does not share1 the cold and barrenness of winter4 ,now these particular points of the year1 as has been well pointed out by a learned and ingenious writer1 while they are of comparatively little moment to the ,european husbandman1 do deeply concern the ,european herdsman2 for it is on the approach of summer that he drives his cattle out into the open to crop the fresh grass1 and it is on the approach of winter that he leads them back to the safety and shelter of the stall4 ,accordingly it seems not improbable that the ,celtic bisection of the year into two halves at the beginning of ,may and the beginning of ,november dates from a time when the ,celts were mainly a pastoral people1 dependent for their subsistence on their herds1 and when accordingly the great epochs of the year for them were the days on which the cattle went forth from the homestead in early summer and returned to it again in early winter4 ,even in ,central ,europe1 remote from the region now occupied by the ,celts1 a similar bisection of the year may be clearly traced in the great popularity1 on the one hand1 of ,may ,day and its ,eve 7,walpurgis ,night71 and1 on the other hand1 of the ,feast of ,all ,souls at the beginning of ,november1 which under a thin ,christian cloak conceals an ancient pagan festival of the dead4 ,hence we may conjecture that everywhere throughout ,europe the celestial division of the year according to the solstices was preceded by what we may call a terrestrial division of the year according to the beginning of summer and the beginning of winter4 ,be that as it may1 the two great ,celtic festivals of ,may ,day and the first of ,november or1 to be more accurate1 the ,eves of these two days1 closely resemble each other in the manner of their celebration and in the superstitions associated with them1 and alike1 by the antique character impressed upon both1 betray a remote and purely pagan origin4 ,the festival of ,may ,day or ,beltane1 as the ,celts called it1 which ushered in summer1 has already been described2 it remains to give some account of the corresponding festival of ,hallowe'en1 which announced the arrival of winter4 ,of the two feasts ,hallowe'en was perhaps of old the more important1 since the ,celts would seem to have dated the beginning of the year from it rather than from ,beltane4 ,in the ,isle of ,man1 one of the fortresses in which the ,celtic language and lore longest held out against the siege of the ,saxon invaders1 the first of ,november1 ,old ,style1 has been regarded as ,new ,year's day down to recent times4 ,thus ,manx mummers used to go round on ,hallowe'en 7,old ,style71 singing1 in the ,manx language1 a sort of ,hogmanay song which began ,to-night is ,new ,year's ,night1 ,hogunnaa6 ,in ancient ,ireland1 a new fire used to be kindled every year on ,hallowe'en or the ,eve of ,samhain1 and from this sacred flame all the fires in ,ireland were rekindled4 ,such a custom points strongly to ,samhain or ,all ,saints' ,day 7the first of ,november7 as ,new ,year's ,day2 since the annual kindling of a new fire takes place most naturally at the beginning of the year1 in order that the blessed influence of the fresh fire may last throughout the whole period of twelve months4 ,another confirmation of the view that the ,celts dated their year from the first of ,november is furnished by the manifold modes of divination which were commonly resorted to by ,celtic peoples on ,hallowe'en for the purpose of ascertaining their destiny1 especially their fortune in the coming year2 for when could these devices for prying into the future be more reasonably put in practice than at the beginning of the year8 ,as a season of omens and auguries ,hallowe'en seems to have far surpassed ,beltane in the imagination of the ,celts2 from which we may with some probability infer that they reckoned their year from ,hallowe'en rather than ,beltane4 ,another circumstance of great moment which points to the same conclusion is the association of the dead with ,hallowe'en4 ,not only among the ,celts but throughout ,europe1 ,hallowe'en1 the night which marks the transition from autumn to winter1 seems to have been of old the time of year when the souls of the departed were supposed to revisit their old homes in order to warm themselves by the fire and to comfort themselves with the good cheer provided for them in the kitchen or the parlour by their affectionate kinsfolk4 ,it was1 perhaps1 a natural thought that the approach of winter should drive the poor shivering hungry ghosts from the bare fields and the leafless woodlands to the shelter of the cottage with its familiar fireside4 ,did not the lowing kine then troop back from the summer pastures in the forests and on the hills to be fed and cared for in the stalls1 while the bleak winds whistled among the swaying boughs and the snow-drifts deepened in the hollows8 and could the good-man and the good-wife deny to the spirits of their dead the welcome which they gave to the cows8 ,but it is not only the souls of the departed who are supposed to be hovering unseen on the day when autumn to winter resigns the pale year4 ,witches then speed on their errands of mischief1 some sweeping through the air on besoms1 others galloping along the roads on tabby-cats1 which for that evening are turned into coal-black steeds4 ,the fairies1 too1 are all let loose1 and hobgoblins of every sort roam freely about4 ,yet while a glamour of mystery and awe has always clung to ,hallowe'en in the minds of the ,celtic peasantry1 the popular celebration of the festival has been1 at least in modern times1 by no means of a prevailing gloomy cast2 on the contrary it has been attended by picturesque features and merry pastimes1 which rendered it the gayest night of all the year4 ,amongst the things which in the ,highlands of ,scotland contributed to invest the festival with a romantic beauty were the bonfires which used to blaze at frequent intervals on the heights4 ,on the last day of autumn children gathered ferns1 tar-barrels1 the long thin stalks called ginisg1 and everything suitable for a bonfire4 ,these were placed in a heap on some eminence near the house1 and in the evening set fire to4 ,the fires were called ,samhnagan4 ,there was one for each house1 and it was an object of ambition who should have the biggest4 ,whole districts were brilliant with bonfires1 and their glare across a ,highland loch1 and from many eminences1 formed an exceedingly picturesque scene4 ,like the ,beltane fires on the first of ,may1 the ,hallowe'en bonfires seem to have been kindled most commonly in the ,perthshire ,highlands4 ,in the parish of ,callander they still blazed down to near the end of the eighteenth century4 ,when the fire had died down1 the ashes were carefully collected in the form of a circle1 and a stone was put in1 near the circumference1 for every person of the several families interested in the bonfire4 ,next morning1 if any of these stones was found to be displaced or injured1 the people made sure that the person represented by it was fey or devoted1 and that he could not live twelve months from that day4 ,at ,balquhidder down to the latter part of the nineteenth century each household kindled its bonfire at ,hallowe'en1 but the custom was chiefly observed by children4 ,the fires were lighted on any high knoll near the house2 there was no dancing round them4 ,hallowe'en fires were also lighted in some districts of the north-east of ,scotland1 such as ,buchan4 ,villagers and farmers alike must have their fire4 ,in the villages the boys went from house to house and begged a peat from each householder1 usually with the words1 ,ge's a peat t' burn the witches4 ,when they had collected enough peats1 they piled them in a heap1 together with straw1 furze1 and other combustible materials1 and set the whole on fire4 ,then each of the youths1 one after another1 laid himself down on the ground as near to the fire as he could without being scorched1 and thus lying allowed the smoke to roll over him4 ,the others ran through the smoke and jumped over their prostrate comrade4 ,when the heap was burned down1 they scattered the ashes1 vying with each other who should scatter them most4 ,in the northern part of ,wales it used to be customary for every family to make a great bonfire called ,coel ,coeth on ,hallowe'en4 ,the fire was kindled on the most conspicuous spot near the house2 and when it had nearly gone out every one threw into the ashes a white stone1 which he had first marked4 ,then having said their prayers round the fire1 they went to bed4 ,next morning1 as soon as they were up1 they came to search out the stones1 and if any one of them was found to be missing1 they had a notion that the person who threw it would die before he saw another ,hallowe'en4 ,according to ,sir ,john ,rhys1 the habit of celebrating ,hallowe'en by lighting bonfires on the hills is perhaps not yet extinct in ,wales1 and men still living can remember how the people who assisted at the bonfires would wait till the last spark was out and then would suddenly take to their heels1 shouting at the top of their voices1 ,the cropped black sow seize the hindmost6 ,the saying1 as ,sir ,john ,rhys justly remarks1 implies that originally one of the company became a victim in dead earnest4 ,down to the present time the saying is current in ,carnarvonshire1 where allusions to the cutty black sow are still occasionally made to frighten children4 ,we can now understand why in ,lower ,brittany every person throws a pebble into the midsummer bonfire4 ,doubtless there1 as in ,wales and the ,highlands of ,scotland1 omens of life and death have at one time or other been drawn from the position and state of the pebbles on the morning of ,all ,saints' ,day4 ,the custom1 thus found among three separate branches of the ,celtic stock1 probably dates from a period before their dispersion1 or at least from a time when alien races had not yet driven home the wedges of separation between them4 ,in the ,isle of ,man also1 another ,celtic country1 ,hallowe'en was celebrated down to modern times by the kindling of fires1 accompanied with all the usual ceremonies designed to prevent the baneful influence of fairies and witches4 #g4 ,the ,midwinter ,fires ,,if ,,the ,,heathen of ancient ,europe celebrated1 as we have good reason to believe1 the season of ,midsummer with a great festival of fire1 of which the traces have survived in many places down to our own time1 it is natural to suppose that they should have observed with similar rites the corresponding season of ,midwinter2 for ,midsummer and ,midwinter1 or1 in more technical language1 the summer solstice and the winter solstice1 are the two great turningpoints in the sun's apparent course through the sky1 and from the standpoint of primitive man nothing might seem more appropriate than to kindle fires on earth at the two moments when the fire and heat of the great luminary in heaven begin to wane or to wax4 ,in modern ,christendom the ancient fire-festival of the winter solstice appears to survive1 or to have survived down to recent years1 in the old custom of the ,yule log1 clog1 or block1 as it was variously called in ,england4 ,the custom was widespread in ,europe1 but seems to have flourished especially in ,england1 ,france1 and among the ,south ,slavs2 at least the fullest accounts of the custom come from these quarters4 ,that the ,yule log was only the winter counterpart of the midsummer bonfire1 kindled within doors instead of in the open air on account of the cold and inclement weather of the season1 was pointed out long ago by our ,english antiquary ,john ,brand2 and the view is supported by the many quaint superstitions attaching to the ,yule log1 superstitions which have no apparent connexion with ,christianity but carry their heathen origin plainly stamped upon them4 ,but while the two solstitial celebrations were both festivals of fire1 the necessity or desirability of holding the winter celebration within doors lent it the character of a private or domestic festivity1 which contrasts strongly with the publicity of the summer celebration1 at which the people gathered on some open space or conspicuous height1 kindled a huge bonfire in common1 and danced and made merry round it together4 ,down to about the middle of the nineteenth century the old rite of the ,yule log was kept up in some parts of ,central ,germany4 ,thus in the valleys of the ,sieg and ,lahn the ,yule log1 a heavy block of oak1 was fitted into the floor of the hearth1 where1 though it glowed under the fire1 it was hardly reduced to ashes within a year4 ,when the new log was laid next year1 the remains of the old one were ground to powder and strewed over the fields during the ,twelve ,nights1 which was supposed to promote the growth of the crops4 ,in some villages of ,westphalia1 the practice was to withdraw the ,yule log 7,christbrand7 from the fire so soon as it was slightly charred2 it was then kept carefully to be replaced on the fire whenever a thunderstorm broke1 because the people believed that lightning would not strike a house in which the ,yule log was smouldering4 ,in other villages of ,westphalia the old custom was to tie up the ,yule log in the last sheaf cut at harvest4 ,in several provinces of ,france1 and particularly in ,provence1 the custom of the ,yule log or trfoir1 as it was called in many places1 was long observed4 ,a ,french writer of the seventeenth century denounces as superstitious the belief that a log called the trfoir or ,christmas brand1 which you put on the fire for the first time on ,christmas ,eve and continue to put on the fire for a little while every day till ,twelfth ,night1 can1 if kept under the bed1 protect the house for a whole year from fire and thunder2 that it can prevent the inmates from having chilblains on their heels in winter2 that it can cure the cattle of many maladies2 that if a piece of it be steeped in the water which cows drink it helps them to calve2 and lastly that if the ashes of the log be strewn on the fields it can save the wheat from mildew4 ,in some parts of ,flanders and ,france the remains of the ,yule log were regularly kept in the house under a bed as a protection against thunder and lightning2 in ,berry1 when thunder was heard1 a member of the family used to take a piece of the log and throw it on the fire1 which was believed to avert the lightning4 ,again1 in ,perigord1 the charcoal and ashes are carefully collected and kept for healing swollen glands2 the part of the trunk which has not been burnt in the fire is used by ploughmen to make the wedge for their plough1 because they allege that it causes the seeds to thrive better2 and the women keep pieces of it till ,twelfth ,night for the sake of their chickens4 ,some people imagine that they will have as many chickens as there are sparks that fly out of the brands of the log when they shake them2 and others place the extinct brands under the bed to drive away vermin4 ,in various parts of ,france the charred log is thought to guard the house against sorcery as well as against lightning4 ,in ,england the customs and beliefs concerning the ,yule log used to be similar4 ,on the night of ,christmas ,eve1 says the antiquary ,john ,brand1 our ancestors were wont to light up candles of an uncommon size1 called ,christmas ,candles1 and lay a log of wood upon the fire1 called a ,yule-clog or ,christmas-block1 to illuminate the house1 and1 as it were1 to turn night into day4 ,the old custom was to light the ,yule log with a fragment of its predecessor1 which had been kept throughout the year for the purpose2 where it was so kept1 the fiend could do no mischief4 ,the remains of the log were also supposed to guard the house against fire and lightning4 ,to this day the ritual of bringing in the ,yule log is observed with much solemnity among the ,southern ,slavs1 especially the ,serbians4 ,the log is usually a block of oak1 but sometimes of olive or beech4 ,they seem to think that they will have as many calves1 lambs1 pigs1 and kids as they strike sparks out of the burning log4 ,some people carry a piece of the log out to the fields to protect them against hail4 ,in ,albania down to recent years it was a common custom to burn a ,yule log at ,christmas1 and the ashes of the fire were scattered on the fields to make them fertile4 ,the ,huzuls1 a ,slavonic people of the ,carpathians1 kindle fire by the friction of wood on ,christmas ,eve 7,old ,style1 the fifth of ,january7 and keep it burning till ,twelfth ,night4 ,it is remarkable how common the belief appears to have been that the remains of the ,yule log1 if kept throughout the year1 had power to protect the house against fire and especially against lightning4 ,as the ,yule log was frequently of oak1 it seems possible that this belief may be a relic of the old ,aryan creed which associated the oak-tree with the god of thunder4 ,whether the curative and fertilising virtues ascribed to the ashes of the ,yule log1 which are supposed to heal cattle as well as men1 to enable cows to calve1 and to promote the fruitfulness of the earth1 may not be derived from the same ancient source1 is a question which deserves to be considered4 #h4 ,the ,need-fire ,,the ,,fire-,,festivals hitherto described are all celebrated periodically at certain stated times of the year4 ,but besides these regularly recurring celebrations the peasants in many parts of ,europe have been wont from time immemorial to resort to a ritual of fire at irregular intervals in seasons of distress and calamity1 above all when their cattle were attacked by epidemic disease4 ,no account of the popular ,european fire-festivals would be complete without some notice of these remarkable rites1 which have all the greater claim on our attention because they may perhaps be regarded as the source and origin of all the other fire-festivals2 certainly they must date from a very remote antiquity4 ,the general name by which they are known among the ,teutonic peoples is need-fire4 ,sometimes the need-fire was known as wild fire1 to distinguish it no doubt from the tame fire produced by more ordinary methods4 ,among ,slavonic peoples it is called living fire4 ,the history of the custom can be traced from the early ,middle ,ages1 when it was denounced by the ,church as a heathen superstition1 down to the first half of the nineteenth century1 when it was still occasionally practised in various parts of ,germany1 ,england1 ,scotland1 and ,ireland4 ,among ,slavonic peoples it appears to have lingered even longer4 ,the usual occasion for performing the rite was an outbreak of plague or cattle-disease1 for which the need-fire was believed to be an infallible remedy4 ,the animals which were subjected to it included cows1 pigs1 horses1 and sometimes geese4 ,as a necessary preliminary to the kindling of the need-fire all other fires and lights in the neighbourhood were extinguished1 so that not so much as a spark remained alight2 for so long as even a night-light burned in a house1 it was imagined that the need-fire could not kindle4 ,sometimes it was deemed enough to put out all the fires in the village2 but sometimes the extinction extended to neighbouring villages or to a whole parish4 ,in some parts of the ,highlands of ,scotland the rule was that all householders who dwelt within the two nearest running streams should put out their lights and fires on the day appointed4 ,usually the need-fire was made in the open air1 but in some parts of ,serbia it was kindled in a dark room2 sometimes the place was a cross-way or a hollow in a road4 ,in the ,highlands of ,scotland the proper places for performing the rite seem to have been knolls or small islands in rivers4 ,the regular method of producing the need-fire was by the friction of two pieces of wood2 it might not be struck by flint and steel4 ,very exceptionally among some ,south ,slavs we read of a practice of kindling a need-fire by striking a piece of iron on an anvil4 ,where the wood to be employed is specified1 it is generally said to be oak2 but on the ,lower ,rhine the fire was kindled by the friction of oak-wood or fir-wood4 ,in ,slavonic countries we hear of poplar1 pear1 and cornel wood being used for the purpose4 ,often the material is simply described as two pieces of dry wood4 ,sometimes nine different kinds of wood were deemed necessary1 but rather perhaps to be burned in the bonfire than to be rubbed together for the production of the need-fire4 ,the particular mode of kindling the need-fire varied in different districts2 a very common one was this4 ,two poles were driven into the ground about a foot and a half from each other4 ,each pole had in the side facing the other a socket into which a smooth cross-piece or roller was fitted4 ,the sockets were stuffed with linen1 and the two ends of the roller were rammed tightly into the sockets4 ,to make it more inflammable the roller was often coated with tar4 ,a rope was then wound round the roller1 and the free ends at both sides were gripped by two or more persons1 who by pulling the rope to and fro caused the roller to revolve rapidly1 till through the friction the linen in the sockets took fire4 ,the sparks were immediately caught in tow or oakum and waved about in a circle until they burst into a bright glow1 when straw was applied to it1 and the blazing straw used to kindle the fuel that had been stacked to make the bonfire4 ,often a wheel1 sometimes a cart-wheel or even a spinning-wheel1 formed part of the mechanism2 in ,aberdeenshire it was called the muckle wheel2 in the island of ,mull the wheel was turned from east to west over nine spindles of oak-wood4 ,sometimes we are merely told that two wooden planks were rubbed together4 ,sometimes it was prescribed that the cart-wheel used for fire-making and the axle on which it turned should both be new4 ,similarly it was said that the rope which turned the roller should be new2 if possible it should be woven of strands taken from a gallows rope with which people had been hanged1 but this was a counsel of perfection rather than a strict necessity4 ,various rules were also laid down as to the kind of persons who might or should make the need-fire4 ,sometimes it was said that the two persons who pulled the rope which twirled the roller should always be brothers or at least bear the same baptismal name2 sometimes it was deemed sufficient if they were both chaste young men4 ,in some villages of ,brunswick people thought that if everybody who lent a hand in kindling the need-fire did not bear the same ,christian name1 they would labour in vain4 ,in ,silesia the tree employed to produce the need-fire used to be felled by a pair of twin brothers4 ,in the western islands of ,scotland the fire was kindled by eighty-one married men1 who rubbed two great planks against each other1 working in relays of nine2 in ,north ,uist the nine times nine who made the fire were all first-begotten sons1 but we are not told whether they were married or single4 ,among the ,serbians the need-fire is sometimes kindled by a boy and girl between eleven and fourteen years of age1 who work stark naked in a dark room2 sometimes it is made by an old man and an old woman also in the dark4 ,in ,bulgaria1 too1 the makers of need-fire strip themselves of their clothes2 in ,caithness they divested themselves of all kinds of metal4 ,if after long rubbing of the wood no fire was elicited they concluded that some fire must still be burning in the village2 so a strict search was made from house to house1 any fire that might be found was put out1 and the negligent householder punished or upbraided2 indeed a heavy fine might be inflicted on him4 ,when the need-fire was at last kindled1 the bonfire was lit from it1 and as soon as the blaze had somewhat died down1 the sick animals were driven over the glowing embers1 sometimes in a regular order of precedence1 first the pigs1 next the cows1 and last of all the horses4 ,sometimes they were driven twice or thrice through the smoke and flames1 so that occasionally some of them were scorched to death4 ,as soon as all the beasts were through1 the young folk would rush wildly at the ashes and cinders1 sprinkling and blackening each other with them2 those who were most blackened would march in triumph behind the cattle into the village and would not wash themselves for a long time4 ,from the bonfire people carried live embers home and used them to rekindle the fires in their houses4 ,these brands1 after being extinguished in water1 they sometimes put in the mangers at which the cattle fed1 and kept them there for a while4 ,ashes from the need-fire were also strewed on the fields to protect the crops against vermin2 sometimes they were taken home to be employed as remedies in sickness1 being sprinkled on the ailing part or mixed in water and drunk by the patient4 ,in the western islands of ,scotland and on the adjoining mainland1 as soon as the fire on the domestic hearth had been rekindled from the need-fire a pot full of water was set on it1 and the water thus heated was afterwards sprinkled upon the people infected with the plague or upon the cattle that were tainted by the murrain4 ,special virtue was attributed to the smoke of the bonfire2 in ,sweden fruit-trees and nets were fumigated with it1 in order that the trees might bear fruit and the nets catch fish4 ,in the ,highlands of ,scotland the need-fire was accounted a sovereign remedy for witchcraft4 ,in the island of ,mull1 when the fire was kindled as a cure for the murrain1 we hear of the rite being accompanied by the sacrifice of a sick heifer1 which was cut in pieces and burnt4 ,slavonian and ,bulgarian peasants conceive cattle-plague as a foul fiend or vampyre which can be kept at bay by interposing a barrier of fire between it and the herds4 ,a similar conception may perhaps have originally everywhere underlain the use of the need-fire as a remedy for the murrain4 ,it appears that in some parts of ,germany the people did not wait for an outbreak of cattleplague1 but1 taking time by the forelock1 kindled a need-fire annually to prevent the calamity4 ,similarly in ,poland the peasants are said to kindle fires in the village streets every year on ,st4 ,rochus's day and to drive the cattle thrice through them in order to protect the beasts against the murrain4 ,we have seen that in the ,hebrides the cattle were in like manner driven annually round the ,beltane fires for the same purpose4 ,in some cantons of ,switzerland children still kindle a need-fire by the friction of wood for the sake of dispelling a mist4 ,,lxiii4 ,the ,interpretation of the ,fire-,festivals #a4 ,on the ,fire-festivals in general ,,the ,,foregoing survey of the popular fire-festivals of ,europe suggests some general observations4 ,in the first place we can hardly help being struck by the resemblance which the ceremonies bear to each other1 at whatever time of the year and in whatever part of ,europe they are celebrated4 ,the custom of kindling great bonfires1 leaping over them1 and driving cattle through or round them would seem to have been practically universal throughout ,europe1 and the same may be said of the processions or races with blazing torches round fields1 orchards1 pastures1 or cattle-stalls4 ,less widespread are the customs of hurling lighted discs into the air and trundling a burning wheel down hill4 ,the ceremonial of the ,yule log is distinguished from that of the other fire-festivals by the privacy and domesticity which characterise it2 but this distinction may well be due simply to the rough weather of midwinter1 which is apt not only to render a public assembly in the open air disagreeable1 but also at any moment to defeat the object of the assembly by extinguishing the all-important fire under a downpour of rain or a fall of snow4 ,apart from these local or seasonal differences1 the general resemblance between the fire-festivals at all times of the year and in all places is tolerably close4 ,and as the ceremonies themselves resemble each other1 so do the benefits which the people expect to reap from them4 ,whether applied in the form of bonfires blazing at fixed points1 or of torches carried about from place to place1 or of embers and ashes taken from the smouldering heap of fuel1 the fire is believed to promote the growth of the crops and the welfare of man and beast1 either positively by stimulating them1 or negatively by averting the dangers and calamities which threaten them from such causes as thunder and lightning1 conflagration1 blight1 mildew1 vermin1 sterility1 disease1 and not least of all witchcraft4 ,but we naturally ask1 ,how did it come about that benefits so great and manifold were supposed to be attained by means so simple8 ,in what way did people imagine that they could procure so many goods or avoid so many ills by the application of fire and smoke1 of embers and ashes8 ,two different explanations of the fire-festivals have been given by modern enquirers4 ,on the one hand it has been held that they are sun-charms or magical ceremonies intended1 on the principle of imitative magic1 to ensure a needful supply of sunshine for men1 animals1 and plants by kindling fires which mimic on earth the great source of light and heat in the sky4 ,this was the view of ,wilhelm ,mannhardt4 ,it may be called the solar theory4 ,on the other hand it has been maintained that the ceremonial fires have no necessary reference to the sun but are simply purificatory in intention1 being designed to burn up and destroy all harmful influences1 whether these are conceived in a personal form as witches1 demons1 and monsters1 or in an impersonal form as a sort of pervading taint or corruption of the air4 ,this is the view of ,dr4 ,edward ,westermarck and apparently of ,professor ,eugen ,mogk4 ,it may be called the purificatory theory4 ,obviously the two theories postulate two very different conceptions of the fire which plays the principal part in the rites4 ,on the one view1 the fire1 like sunshine in our latitude1 is a genial creative power which fosters the growth of plants and the development of all that makes for health and happiness2 on the other view1 the fire is a fierce destructive power which blasts and consumes all the noxious elements1 whether spiritual or material1 that menace the life of men1 of animals1 and of plants4 ,according to the one theory the fire is a stimulant1 according to the other it is a disinfectant2 on the one view its virtue is positive1 on the other it is negative4 ,yet the two explanations1 different as they are in the character which they attribute to the fire1 are perhaps not wholly irreconcilable4 ,if we assume that the fires kindled at these festivals were primarily intended to imitate the sun's light and heat1 may we not regard the purificatory and disinfecting qualities1 which popular opinion certainly appears to have ascribed to them1 as attributes derived directly from the purificatory and disinfecting qualities of sunshine8 ,in this way we might conclude that1 while the imitation of sunshine in these ceremonies was primary and original1 the purification attributed to them was secondary and derivative4 ,such a conclusion1 occupying an intermediate position between the two opposing theories and recognising an element of truth in both of them1 was adopted by me in earlier editions of this work2 but in the meantime ,dr4 ,westermarck has argued powerfully in favour of the purificatory theory alone1 and ,i am bound to say that his arguments carry great weight1 and that on a fuller review of the facts the balance of evidence seems to me to incline decidedly in his favour4 ,however1 the case is not so clear as to justify us in dismissing the solar theory without discussion1 and accordingly ,i propose to adduce the considerations which tell for it before proceeding to notice those which tell against it4 ,a theory which had the support of so learned and sagacious an investigator as ,w4 ,mannhardt is entitled to a respectful hearing4 #b4 ,the ,solar ,theory of the ,fire-festivals ,,in ,,an ,,earlier part of this work we saw that savages resort to charms for making sunshine1 and it would be no wonder if primitive man in ,europe did the same4 ,indeed1 when we consider the cold and cloudy climate of ,europe during a great part of the year1 we shall find it natural that sun-charms should have played a much more prominent part among the superstitious practices of ,european peoples than among those of savages who live nearer the equator and who consequently are apt to get in the course of nature more sunshine than they want4 ,this view of the festivals may be supported by various arguments drawn partly from their dates1 partly from the nature of the rites1 and partly from the influence which they are believed to exert upon the weather and on vegetation4 ,first1 in regard to the dates of the festivals it can be no mere accident that two of the most important and widely spread of the festivals are timed to coincide more or less exactly with the summer and winter solstices1 that is1 with the two turning-points in the sun's apparent course in the sky when he reaches respectively his highest and his lowest elevation at noon4 ,indeed with respect to the midwinter celebration of ,christmas we are not left to conjecture2 we know from the express testimony of the ancients that it was instituted by the church to supersede an old heathen festival of the birth of the sun1 which was apparently conceived to be born again on the shortest day of the year1 after which his light and heat were seen to grow till they attained their full maturity at midsummer4 ,therefore it is no very far-fetched conjecture to suppose that the ,yule log1 which figures so prominently in the popular celebration of ,christmas1 was originally designed to help the labouring sun of midwinter to rekindle his seemingly expiring light4 ,not only the date of some of the festivals but the manner of their celebration suggests a conscious imitation of the sun4 ,the custom of rolling a burning wheel down a hill1 which is often observed at these ceremonies1 might well pass for an imitation of the sun's course in the sky1 and the imitation would be especially appropriate on ,midsummer ,day when the sun's annual declension begins4 ,indeed the custom has been thus interpreted by some of those who have recorded it4 ,not less graphic1 it may be said1 is the mimicry of his apparent revolution by swinging a burning tar-barrel round a pole4 ,again1 the common practice of throwing fiery discs1 sometimes expressly said to be shaped like suns1 into the air at the festivals may well be a piece of imitative magic4 ,in these1 as in so many cases1 the magic force may be supposed to take effect through mimicry or sympathy3 by imitating the desired result you actually produce it3 by counterfeiting the sun's progress through the heavens you really help the luminary to pursue his celestial journey with punctuality and despatch4 ,the name fire of heaven1 by which the midsummer fire is sometimes popularly known1 clearly implies a consciousness of a connexion between the earthly and the heavenly flame4 ,again1 the manner in which the fire appears to have been originally kindled on these occasions has been alleged in support of the view that it was intended to be a mock-sun4 ,as some scholars have perceived1 it is highly probable that at the periodic festivals in former times fire was universally obtained by the friction of two pieces of wood4 ,it is still so procured in some places both at the ,easter and the ,midsummer festivals1 and it is expressly said to have been formerly so procured at the ,beltane celebration both in ,scotland and ,wales4 ,but what makes it nearly certain that this was once the invariable mode of kindling the fire at these periodic festivals is the analogy of the needfire1 which has almost always been produced by the friction of wood1 and sometimes by the revolution of a wheel4 ,it is a plausible conjecture that the wheel employed for this purpose represents the sun1 and if the fires at the regularly recurring celebrations were formerly produced in the same way1 it might be regarded as a confirmation of the view that they were originally sun-charms4 ,in point of fact there is1 as ,kuhn has indicated1 some evidence to show that the midsummer fire was originally thus produced4 ,we have seen that many ,hungarian swine-herds make fire on ,midsummer ,eve by rotating a wheel round a wooden axle wrapt in hemp1 and that they drive their pigs through the fire thus made4 ,at ,obermedlingen1 in ,swabia1 the fire of heaven1 as it was called1 was made on ,st4 ,vitus's ,day 7the fifteenth of ,june7 by igniting a cart-wheel1 which1 smeared with pitch and plaited with straw1 was fastened on a pole twelve feet high1 the top of the pole being inserted in the nave of the wheel4 ,this fire was made on the summit of a mountain1 and as the flame ascended1 the people uttered a set form of words1 with eyes and arms directed heavenward4 ,here the fixing of a wheel on a pole and igniting it suggests that originally the fire was produced1 as in the case of the need-fire1 by the revolution of a wheel4 ,the day on which the ceremony takes place 7the fifteenth of ,june7 is near midsummer2 and we have seen that in ,masuren fire is1 or used to be1 actually made on ,midsummer ,day by turning a wheel rapidly about an oaken pole1 though it is not said that the new fire so obtained is used to light a bonfire4 ,however1 we must bear in mind that in all such cases the use of a wheel may be merely a mechanical device to facilitate the operation of fire-making by increasing the friction2 it need not have any symbolical significance4 ,further1 the influence which these fires1 whether periodic or occasional1 are supposed to exert on the weather and vegetation may be cited in support of the view that they are sun-charms1 since the effects ascribed to them resemble those of sunshine4 ,thus1 the ,french belief that in a rainy ,june the lighting of the midsummer bonfires will cause the rain to cease appears to assume that they can disperse the dark clouds and make the sun to break out in radiant glory1 drying the wet earth and dripping trees4 ,similarly the use of the need-fire by ,swiss children on foggy days for the purpose of clearing away the mist may very naturally be interpreted as a sun-charm4 ,in the ,vosges ,mountains the people believe that the midsummer fires help to preserve the fruits of the earth and ensure good crops4 ,in ,sweden the warmth or cold of the coming season is inferred from the direction in which the flames of the ,may ,day bonfire are blown2 if they blow to the south1 it will be warm1 if to the north1 cold4 ,no doubt at present the direction of the flames is regarded merely as an augury of the weather1 not as a mode of influencing it4 ,but we may be pretty sure that this is one of the cases in which magic has dwindled into divination4 ,so in the ,eifel ,mountains1 when the smoke blows towards the corn-fields1 this is an omen that the harvest will be abundant4 ,but the older view may have been not merely that the smoke and flames prognosticated1 but that they actually produced an abundant harvest1 the heat of the flames acting like sunshine on the corn4 ,perhaps it was with this view that people in the ,isle of ,man lit fires to windward of their fields in order that the smoke might blow over them4 ,so in ,south ,africa1 about the month of ,april1 the ,matabeles light huge fires to the windward of their gardens1 their idea being that the smoke1 by passing over the crops1 will assist the ripening of them4 ,among the ,zulus also medicine is burned on a fire placed to windward of the garden1 the fumigation which the plants in consequence receive being held to improve the crop4 ,again1 the idea of our ,european peasants that the corn will grow well as far as the blaze of the bonfire is visible1 may be interpreted as a remnant of the belief in the quickening and fertilising power of the bonfires4 ,the same belief1 it may be argued1 reappears in the notion that embers taken from the bonfires and inserted in the fields will promote the growth of the crops1 and it may be thought to underlie the customs of sowing flax-seed in the direction in which the flames blow1 of mixing the ashes of the bonfire with the seed-corn at sowing1 of scattering the ashes by themselves over the field to fertilise it1 and of incorporating a piece of the ,yule log in the plough to make the seeds thrive4 ,the opinion that the flax or hemp will grow as high as the flames rise or the people leap over them belongs clearly to the same class of ideas4 ,again1 at ,konz1 on the banks of the ,moselle1 if the blazing wheel which was trundled down the hillside reached the river without being extinguished1 this was hailed as a proof that the vintage would be abundant4 ,so firmly was this belief held that the successful performance of the ceremony entitled the villagers to levy a tax upon the owners of the neighbouring vineyards4 ,here the unextinguished wheel might be taken to represent an unclouded sun1 which in turn would portend an abundant vintage4 ,so the waggon-load of white wine which the villagers received from the vineyards round about might pass for a payment for the sunshine which they had procured for the grapes4 ,similarly in the ,vale of ,glamorgan a blazing wheel used to be trundled down hill on ,midsummer ,day1 and if the fire were extinguished before the wheel reached the foot of the hill1 the people expected a bad harvest2 whereas if the wheel kept alight all the way down and continued to blaze for a long time1 the farmers looked forward to heavy crops that summer4 ,here1 again1 it is natural to suppose that the rustic mind traced a direct connexion between the fire of the wheel and the fire of the sun1 on which the crops are dependent4 ,but in popular belief the quickening and fertilising influence of the bonfires is not limited to the vegetable world2 it extends also to animals4 ,this plainly appears from the ,irish custom of driving barren cattle through the midsummer fires1 from the ,french belief that the ,yule log steeped in water helps cows to calve1 from the ,french and ,serbian notion that there will be as many chickens1 calves1 lambs1 and kids as there are sparks struck out of the ,yule log1 from the ,french custom of putting the ashes of the bonfires in the fowls' nests to make the hens lay eggs1 and from the ,german practice of mixing the ashes of the bonfires with the drink of cattle in order to make the animals thrive4 ,further1 there are clear indications that even human fecundity is supposed to be promoted by the genial heat of the fires4 ,in ,morocco the people think that childless couples can obtain offspring by leaping over the midsummer bonfire4 ,it is an ,irish belief that a girl who jumps thrice over the midsummer bonfire will soon marry and become the mother of many children2 in ,flanders women leap over the midsummer fires to ensure an easy delivery2 in various parts of ,france they think that if a girl dances round nine fires she will be sure to marry within the year1 and in ,bohemia they fancy that she will do so if she merely sees nine of the bonfires4 ,on the other hand1 in ,lechrain people say that if a young man and woman1 leaping over the midsummer fire together1 escape unsmirched1 the young woman will not become a mother within twelve months2 the flames have not touched and fertilised her4 ,in parts of ,switzerland and ,france the lighting of the ,yule log is accompanied by a prayer that the women may bear children1 the she-goats bring forth kids1 and the ewes drop lambs4 ,the rule observed in some places that the bonfires should be kindled by the person who was last married seems to belong to the same class of ideas1 whether it be that such a person is supposed to receive from1 or to impart to1 the fire a generative and fertilising influence4 ,the common practice of lovers leaping over the fires hand in hand may very well have originated in a notion that thereby their marriage would be blessed with offspring2 and the like motive would explain the custom which obliges couples married within the year to dance to the light of torches4 ,and the scenes of profligacy which appear to have marked the midsummer celebration among the ,esthonians1 as they once marked the celebration of ,may ,day among ourselves1 may have sprung1 not from the mere licence of holiday-makers1 but from a crude notion that such orgies were justified1 if not required1 by some mysterious bond which linked the life of man to the courses of the heavens at this turning-point of the year4 ,at the festivals which we are considering the custom of kindling bonfires is commonly associated with a custom of carrying lighted torches about the fields1 the orchards1 the pastures1 the flocks and the herds2 and we can hardly doubt that the two customs are only two different ways of attaining the same object1 namely1 the benefits which are believed to flow from the fire1 whether it be stationary or portable4 ,accordingly if we accept the solar theory of the bonfires1 we seem bound to apply it also to the torches2 we must suppose that the practice of marching or running with blazing torches about the country is simply a means of diffusing far and wide the genial influence of the sunshine of which these flickering flames are a feeble imitation4 ,in favour of this view it may be said that sometimes the torches are carried about the fields for the express purpose of fertilising them1 and with the same intention live coals from the bonfires are sometimes placed in the fields to prevent blight4 ,on the eve of ,twelfth ,day in ,normandy men1 women1 and children run wildly through the fields and orchards with lighted torches1 which they wave about the branches and dash against the trunks of the fruit-trees for the sake of burning the moss and driving away the moles and field-mice4 ,they believe that the ceremony fulfills the double object of exorcising the vermin whose multiplication would be a real calamity1 and of imparting fecundity to the trees1 the fields1 and even the cattle2 and they imagine that the more the ceremony is prolonged1 the greater will be the crop of fruit next autumn4 ,in ,bohemia they say that the corn will grow as high as they fling the blazing besoms into the air4 ,nor are such notions confined to ,europe4 ,in ,corea1 a few days before the ,new ,year festival1 the eunuchs of the palace swing burning torches1 chanting invocations the while1 and this is supposed to ensure bountiful crops for the next season4 ,the custom of trundling a burning wheel over the fields1 which used to be observed in ,poitou for the express purpose of fertilising them1 may be thought to embody the same idea in a still more graphic form2 since in this way the mock-sun itself1 not merely its light and heat represented by torches1 is made actually to pass over the ground which is to receive its quickening and kindly influence4 ,once more1 the custom of carrying lighted brands round cattle is plainly equivalent to driving the animals through the bonfire2 and if the bonfire is a suncharm1 the torches must be so also4 #c4 ,the ,purificatory ,theory of the ,fire-festivals ,,thus far we have considered what may be said for the theory that at the ,european fire-festivals the fire is kindled as a charm to ensure an abundant supply of sunshine for man and beast1 for corn and fruits4 ,it remains to consider what may be said against this theory and in favour of the view that in these rites fire is employed not as a creative but as a cleansing agent1 which purifies men1 animals1 and plants by burning up and consuming the noxious elements1 whether material or spiritual1 which menace all living things with disease and death4 ,first1 then1 it is to be observed that the people who practise the fire-customs appear never to allege the solar theory in explanation of them1 while on the contrary they do frequently and emphatically put forward the purificatory theory4 ,this is a strong argument in favour of the purificatory and against the solar theory2 for the popular explanation of a popular custom is never to be rejected except for grave cause4 ,and in the present case there seems to be no adequate reason for rejecting it4 ,the conception of fire as a destructive agent1 which can be turned to account for the consumption of evil things1 is so simple and obvious that it could hardly escape the minds even of the rude peasantry with whom these festivals originated4 ,on the other hand the conception of fire as an emanation of the sun1 or at all events as linked to it by a bond of physical sympathy1 is far less simple and obvious2 and though the use of fire as a charm to produce sunshine appears to be undeniable1 nevertheless in attempting to explain popular customs we should never have recourse to a more recondite idea when a simpler one lies to hand and is supported by the explicit testimony of the people themselves4 ,now in the case of the fire-festivals the destructive aspect of fire is one upon which the people dwell again and again2 and it is highly significant that the great evil against which the fire is directed appears to be witchcraft4 ,again and again we are told that the fires are intended to burn or repel the witches2 and the intention is sometimes graphically expressed by burning an effigy of a witch in the fire4 ,hence1 when we remember the great hold which the dread of witchcraft has had on the popular ,european mind in all ages1 we may suspect that the primary intention of all these fire-festivals was simply to destroy or at all events get rid of the witches1 who were regarded as the causes of nearly all the misfortunes and calamities that befall men1 their cattle1 and their crops4 ,this suspicion is confirmed when we examine the evils for which the bonfires and torches were supposed to provide a remedy4 ,foremost1 perhaps1 among these evils we may reckon the diseases of cattle2 and of all the ills that witches are believed to work there is probably none which is so constantly insisted on as the harm they do to the herds1 particularly by stealing the milk from the cows4 ,now it is significant that the need-fire1 which may perhaps be regarded as the parent of the periodic fire-festivals1 is kindled above all as a remedy for a murrain or other disease of cattle2 and the circumstance suggests1 what on general grounds seems probable1 that the custom of kindling the need-fire goes back to a time when the ancestors of the ,european peoples subsisted chiefly on the products of their herds1 and when agriculture as yet played a subordinate part in their lives4 ,witches and wolves are the two great foes still dreaded by the herdsman in many parts of ,europe2 and we need not wonder that he should resort to fire as a powerful means of banning them both4 ,among ,slavonic peoples it appears that the foes whom the need-fire is designed to combat are not so much living witches as vampyres and other evil spirits1 and the ceremony aims rather at repelling these baleful beings than at actually consuming them in the flames4 ,but for our present purpose these distinctions are immaterial4 ,the important thing to observe is that among the ,slavs the need-fire1 which is probably the original of all the ceremonial fires now under consideration1 is not a sun-charm1 but clearly and unmistakably nothing but a means of protecting man and beast against the attacks of maleficent creatures1 whom the peasant thinks to burn or scare by the heat of the fire1 just as he might burn or scare wild animals4 ,again1 the bonfires are often supposed to protect the fields against hail and the homestead against thunder and lightning4 ,but both hail and thunderstorms are frequently thought to be caused by witches2 hence the fire which bans the witches necessarily serves at the same time as a talisman against hail1 thunder1 and lightning4 ,further1 brands taken from the bonfires are commonly kept in the houses to guard them against conflagration2 and though this may perhaps be done on the principle of homoeopathic magic1 one fire being thought to act as a preventive of another1 it is also possible that the intention may be to keep witch-incendiaries at bay4 ,again1 people leap over the bonfires as a preventive of colic1 and look at the flames steadily in order to preserve their eyes in good health2 and both colic and sore eyes are in ,germany1 and probably elsewhere1 set down to the machinations of witches4 ,once more1 to leap over the midsummer fires or to circumambulate them is thought to prevent a person from feeling pains in his back at reaping2 and in ,germany such pains are called witch-shots and ascribed to witchcraft4 ,but if the bonfires and torches of the fire-festivals are to be regarded primarily as weapons directed against witches and wizards1 it becomes probable that the same explanation applies not only to the flaming discs which are hurled into the air1 but also to the burning wheels which are rolled down hill on these occasions2 discs and wheels1 we may suppose1 are alike intended to burn the witches who hover invisible in the air or haunt unseen the fields1 the orchards1 and the vineyards on the hillside4 ,certainly witches are constantly thought to ride through the air on broomsticks or other equally convenient vehicles2 and if they do so1 how can you get at them so effectually as by hurling lighted missiles1 whether discs1 torches1 or besoms1 after them as they flit past overhead in the gloom8 ,the ,south ,slavonian peasant believes that witches ride in the dark hail-clouds2 so he shoots at the clouds to bring down the hags1 while he curses them1 saying1 ,curse1 curse ,herodias1 thy mother is a heathen1 damned of ,god and fettered through the ,redeemer's blood4 ,also he brings out a pot of glowing charcoal on which he has thrown holy oil1 laurel leaves1 and wormwood to make a smoke4 ,the fumes are supposed to ascend to the clouds and stupefy the witches1 so that they tumble down to earth4 ,and in order that they may not fall soft1 but may hurt themselves very much1 the yokel hastily brings out a chair and tilts it bottom up so that the witch in falling may break her legs on the legs of the chair4 ,worse than that1 he cruelly lays scythes1 bill-hooks1 and other formidable weapons edge upwards so as to cut and mangle the poor wretches when they drop plump upon them from the clouds4 ,on this view the fertility supposed to follow the application of fire in the form of bonfires1 torches1 discs1 rolling wheels1 and so forth1 is not conceived as resulting directly from an increase of solar heat which the fire has magically generated2 it is merely an indirect result obtained by freeing the reproductive powers of plants and animals from the fatal obstruction of witchcraft4 ,and what is true of the reproduction of plants and animals may hold good also of the fertility of the human sexes4 ,the bonfires are supposed to promote marriage and to procure offspring for childless couples4 ,this happy effect need not flow directly from any quickening or fertilising energy in the fire2 it may follow indirectly from the power of the fire to remove those obstacles which the spells of witches and wizards notoriously present to the union of man and wife4 ,on the whole1 then1 the theory of the purificatory virtue of the ceremonial fires appears more probable and more in accordance with the evidence than the opposing theory of their connexion with the sun4 ,,lxiv4 ,the ,burning of ,human ,beings in the ,fires #a4 ,the ,burning of ,effigies in the ,fires ,,we have still to ask1 ,what is the meaning of burning effigies in the fire at these festivals8 ,after the preceding investigation the answer to the question seems obvious4 ,as the fires are often alleged to be kindled for the purpose of burning the witches1 and as the effigy burnt in them is sometimes called the ,witch1 we might naturally be disposed to conclude that all the effigies consumed in the flames on these occasions represent witches or warlocks1 and that the custom of burning them is merely a substitute for burning the wicked men and women themselves1 since on the principle of homoeopathic or imitative magic you practically destroy the witch herself in destroying her effigy4 ,on the whole this explanation of the burning of straw figures in human shape at the festivals is perhaps the most probable4 ,yet it may be that this explanation does not apply to all the cases1 and that certain of them may admit and even require another interpretation4 ,for the effigies so burned1 as ,i have already remarked1 can hardly be separated from the effigies of ,death which are burned or otherwise destroyed in spring2 and grounds have been already given for regarding the so-called effigies of ,death as really representatives of the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation4 ,are the other effigies1 which are burned in the spring and midsummer bonfires1 susceptible of the same explanation8 ,it would seem so4 ,for just as the fragments of the so-called ,death are stuck in the fields to make the crops grow1 so the charred embers of the figure burned in the spring bonfires are sometimes laid on the fields in the belief that they will keep vermin from the crop4 ,again1 the rule that the last married bride must leap over the fire in which the straw-man is burned on ,shrove ,tuesday1 is probably intended to make her fruitful4 ,but1 as we have seen1 the power of blessing women with offspring is a special attribute of tree-spirits2 it is therefore a fair presumption that the burning effigy over which the bride must leap is a representative of the fertilising tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation4 ,this character of the effigy1 as representative of the spirit of vegetation1 is almost unmistakable when the figure is composed of an unthreshed sheaf of corn or is covered from head to foot with flowers4 ,again1 it is to be noted that1 instead of a puppet1 trees1 either living or felled1 are sometimes burned both in the spring and midsummer bonfires4 ,now1 considering the frequency with which the tree-spirit is represented in human shape1 it is hardly rash to suppose that when sometimes a tree and sometimes an effigy is burned in these fires1 the effigy and the tree are regarded as equivalent to each other1 each being a representative of the tree-spirit4 ,this1 again1 is confirmed by observing1 first1 that sometimes the effigy which is to be burned is carried about simultaneously with a ,may-tree1 the former being carried by the boys1 the latter by the girls2 and1 second1 that the effigy is sometimes tied to a living tree and burned with it4 ,in these cases1 we can scarcely doubt1 the tree-spirit is represented1 as we have found it represented before1 in duplicate1 both by the tree and by the effigy4 ,that the true character of the effigy as a representative of the beneficent spirit of vegetation should sometimes be forgotten1 is natural4 ,the custom of burning a beneficent god is too foreign to later modes of thought to escape misinterpretation4 ,naturally enough the people who continued to burn his image came in time to identify it as the effigy of persons1 whom1 on various grounds1 they regarded with aversion1 such as ,judas ,iscariot1 ,luther1 and a witch4 ,the general reasons for killing a god or his representative have been examined in a preceding chapter4 ,but when the god happens to be a deity of vegetation1 there are special reasons why he should die by fire4 ,for light and heat are necessary to vegetable growth2 and1 on the principle of sympathetic magic1 by subjecting the personal representative of vegetation to their influence1 you secure a supply of these necessaries for trees and crops4 ,in other words1 by burning the spirit of vegetation in a fire which represents the sun1 you make sure that1 for a time at least1 vegetation shall have plenty of sun4 ,it may be objected that1 if the intention is simply to secure enough sunshine for vegetation1 this end would be better attained1 on the principles of sympathetic magic1 by merely passing the representative of vegetation through the fire instead of burning him4 ,in point of fact this is sometimes done4 ,in ,russia1 as we have seen1 the straw figure of ,kupalo is not burned in the midsummer fire1 but merely carried backwards and forwards across it4 ,but1 for the reasons already given1 it is necessary that the god should die2 so next day ,kupalo is stripped of her ornaments and thrown into a stream4 ,in this ,russian custom the passage of the image through the fire1 if it is not simply a purification1 may possibly be a sun-charm2 the killing of the god is a separate act1 and the mode of killing him--by drowning--is probably a rain-charm4 ,but usually people have not thought it necessary to draw this fine distinction2 for the various reasons already assigned1 it is advantageous1 they think1 to expose the god of vegetation to a considerable degree of heat1 and it is also advantageous to kill him1 and they combine these advantages in a rough-and-ready way by burning him4 #b4 ,the ,burning of ,men and ,animals in the ,fires ,,in ,,the ,,popular customs connected with the fire-festivals of ,europe there are certain features which appear to point to a former practice of human sacrifice4 ,we have seen reasons for believing that in ,europe living persons have often acted as representatives of the tree-spirit and corn-spirit and have suffered death as such4 ,there is no reason1 therefore1 why they should not have been burned1 if any special advantages were likely to be attained by putting them to death in that way4 ,the consideration of human suffering is not one which enters into the calculations of primitive man4 ,now1 in the fire-festivals which we are discussing1 the pretence of burning people is sometimes carried so far that it seems reasonable to regard it as a mitigated survival of an older custom of actually burning them4 ,thus in ,aachen1 as we saw1 the man clad in peas-straw acts so cleverly that the children really believe he is being burned4 ,at ,jumiges in ,normandy the man clad all in green1 who bore the title of the ,green ,wolf1 was pursued by his comrades1 and when they caught him they feigned to fling him upon the midsummer bonfire4 ,similarly at the ,beltane fires in ,scotland the pretended victim was seized1 and a show made of throwing him into the flames1 and for some time afterwards people affected to speak of him as dead4 ,again1 in the ,hallowe'en bonfires of ,northeastern ,scotland we may perhaps detect a similar pretence in the custom observed by a lad of lying down as close to the fire as possible and allowing the other lads to leap over him4 ,the titular king at ,aix1 who reigned for a year and danced the first dance round the midsummer bonfire1 may perhaps in days of old have discharged the less agreeable duty of serving as fuel for that fire which in later times he only kindled4 ,in the following customs ,mannhardt is probably right in recognising traces of an old custom of burning a leaf-clad representative of the spirit of vegetation4 ,at ,wolfeck1 in ,austria1 on ,midsummer ,day1 a boy completely clad in green fir branches goes from house to house1 accompanied by a noisy crew1 collecting wood for the bonfire4 ,as he gets the wood he sings3 ,forest trees ,i want1 ,no sour milk for me1 ,but beer and wine1 ,so can the wood-man be jolly and gay4 ,in some parts of ,bavaria1 also1 the boys who go from house to house collecting fuel for the midsummer bonfire envelop one of their number from head to foot in green branches of firs1 and lead him by a rope through the whole village4 ,at ,moosheim1 in ,wurtemberg1 the festival of ,st4 ,john's ,fire usually lasted for fourteen days1 ending on the second ,sunday after ,midsummer ,day4 ,on this last day the bonfire was left in charge of the children1 while the older people retired to a wood4 ,here they encased a young fellow in leaves and twigs1 who1 thus disguised1 went to the fire1 scattered it1 and trod it out4 ,all the people present fled at the sight of him4 ,but it seems possible to go farther than this4 ,of human sacrifices offered on these occasions the most unequivocal traces1 as we have seen1 are those which1 about a hundred years ago1 still lingered at the ,beltane fires in the ,highlands of ,scotland1 that is1 among a ,celtic people who1 situated in a remote corner of ,europe and almost completely isolated from foreign influence1 had till then conserved their old heathenism better perhaps than any other people in the ,west of ,europe4 ,it is significant1 therefore1 that human sacrifices by fire are known1 on unquestionable evidence1 to have been systematically practised by the ,celts4 ,the earliest description of these sacrifices has been bequeathed to us by ,julius ,caesar4 ,as conqueror of the hitherto independent ,celts of ,gaul1 ,caesar had ample opportunity of observing the national ,celtic religion and manners1 while these were still fresh and crisp from the native mint and had not yet been fused in the melting-pot of ,roman civilisation4 ,with his own notes ,caesar appears to have incorporated the observations of a ,greek explorer1 by name ,posidonius1 who travelled in ,gaul about fifty years before ,caesar carried the ,roman arms to the ,english ,channel4 ,the ,greek geographer ,strabo and the historian ,diodorus seem also to have derived their descriptions of the ,celtic sacrifices from the work of ,posidonius1 but independently of each other1 and of ,caesar1 for each of the three derivative accounts contain some details which are not to be found in either of the others4 ,by combining them1 therefore1 we can restore the original account of ,posidonius with some probability1 and thus obtain a picture of the sacrifices offered by the ,celts of ,gaul at the close of the second century before our era4 ,the following seem to have been the main outlines of the custom4 ,condemned criminals were reserved by the ,celts in order to be sacrificed to the gods at a great festival which took place once in every five years4 ,the more there were of such victims1 the greater was believed to be the fertility of the land4 ,if there were not enough criminals to furnish victims1 captives taken in war were immolated to supply the deficiency4 ,when the time came the victims were sacrificed by the ,druids or priests4 ,some they shot down with arrows1 some they impaled1 and some they burned alive in the following manner4 ,colossal images of wicker-work or of wood and grass were constructed2 these were filled with live men1 cattle1 and animals of other kinds2 fire was then applied to the images1 and they were burned with their living contents4 ,such were the great festivals held once every five years4 ,but besides these quinquennial festivals1 celebrated on so grand a scale1 and with1 apparently1 so large an expenditure of human life1 it seems reasonable to suppose that festivals of the same sort1 only on a lesser scale1 were held annually1 and that from these annual festivals are lineally descended some at least of the fire-festivals which1 with their traces of human sacrifices1 are still celebrated year by year in many parts of ,europe4 ,the gigantic images constructed of osiers or covered with grass in which the ,druids enclosed their victims remind us of the leafy framework in which the human representative of the tree-spirit is still so often encased4 ,hence1 seeing that the fertility of the land was apparently supposed to depend upon the due performance of these sacrifices1 ,mannhardt interpreted the ,celtic victims1 cased in osiers and grass1 as representatives of the tree-spirit or spirit of vegetation4 ,these wicker giants of the ,druids seem to have had till lately1 if not down to the present time1 their representatives at the spring and midsummer festivals of modern ,europe4 ,at ,douay1 down at least to the early part of the nineteenth century1 a procession took place annually on the ,sunday nearest to the seventh of ,july4 ,the great feature of the procession was a colossal figure1 some twenty or thirty feet high1 made of osiers1 and called the giant1 which was moved through the streets by means of rollers and ropes worked by men who were enclosed within the effigy4 ,the figure was armed as a knight with lance and sword1 helmet and shield4 ,behind him marched his wife and his three children1 all constructed of osiers on the same principle1 but on a smaller scale4 ,at ,dunkirk the procession of the giants took place on ,midsummer ,day1 the twenty-fourth of ,june4 ,the festival1 which was known as the ,follies of ,dunkirk1 attracted multitudes of spectators4 ,the giant was a huge figure of wicker-work1 occasionally as much as forty-five feet high1 dressed in a long blue robe with gold stripes1 which reached to his feet1 concealing the dozen or more men who made it dance and bob its head to the spectators4 ,this colossal effigy went by the name of ,papa ,reuss1 and carried in its pocket a bouncing infant of ,brobdingnagian proportions4 ,the rear was brought up by the daughter of the giant1 constructed1 like her sire1 of wicker-work1 and little1 if at all1 inferior to him in size4 ,most towns and even villages of ,brabant and ,flanders have1 or used to have1 similar wicker giants which were annually led about to the delight of the populace1 who loved these grotesque figures1 spoke of them with patriotic enthusiasm1 and never wearied of gazing at them4 ,at ,antwerp the giant was so big that no gate in the city was large enough to let him go through2 hence he could not visit his brother giants in neighbouring towns1 as the other ,belgian giants used to do on solemn occasions4 ,in ,england artificial giants seem to have been a standing feature of the midsummer festival4 ,a writer of the sixteenth century speaks of ,midsommer pageants in ,london1 where to make the people wonder1 are set forth great and uglie gyants marching as if they were alive1 and armed at all points1 but within they are stuffed full of browne paper and tow1 which the shrewd boyes1 underpeering1 do guilefully discover1 and turne to a greate derision4 ,at ,chester the annual pageant on ,midsummer ,eve included the effigies of four giants1 with animals1 hobby-horses1 and other figures4 ,at ,coventry it appears that the giant's wife figured beside the giant4 ,at ,burford1 in ,oxfordshire1 ,midsummer ,eve used to be celebrated with great jollity by the carrying of a giant and a dragon up and down the town4 ,the last survivor of these perambulating ,english giants lingered at ,salisbury1 where an antiquary found him mouldering to decay in the neglected hall of the ,tailors' ,company about the year #ahdd4 ,his bodily framework was a lath and hoop1 like the one which used to be worn by ,jack-in-the-,green on ,may ,day4 ,in these cases the giants merely figured in the processions4 ,but sometimes they were burned in the summer bonfires4 ,thus the people of the ,rue aux ,ours in ,paris used annually to make a great wicker-work figure1 dressed as a soldier1 which they promenaded up and down the streets for several days1 and solemnly burned on the third of ,july1 the crowd of spectators singing ,salve ,regina4 ,a personage who bore the title of king presided over the ceremony with a lighted torch in his hand4 ,the burning fragments of the image were scattered among the people1 who eagerly scrambled for them4 ,the custom was abolished in #agdc4 ,in ,brie1 ,isle de ,france1 a wicker-work giant1 eighteen feet high1 was annually burned on ,midsummer ,eve4 ,again1 the ,druidical custom of burning live animals1 enclosed in wicker-work1 has its counterpart at the spring and midsummer festivals4 ,at ,luchon in the ,pyrenees on ,midsummer ,eve a hollow column1 composed of strong wicker-work1 is raised to the height of about sixty feet in the centre of the principal suburb1 and interlaced with green foliage up to the very top2 while the most beautiful flowers and shrubs procurable are artistically arranged in groups below1 so as to form a sort of background to the scene4 ,the column is then filled with combustible materials1 ready for ignition4 ,at an appointed hour--about #h ,p4,m4--a grand procession1 composed of the clergy1 followed by young men and maidens in holiday attire1 pour forth from the town chanting hymns1 and take up their position around the column4 ,meanwhile1 bonfires are lit1 with beautiful effect1 in the surrounding hills4 ,as many living serpents as could be collected are now thrown into the column1 which is set on fire at the base by means of torches1 armed with which about fifty boys and men dance around with frantic gestures4 ,the serpents1 to avoid the flames1 wriggle their way to the top1 whence they are seen lashing out laterally until finally obliged to drop1 their struggles for life giving rise to enthusiastic delight among the surrounding spectators4 ,this is a favourite annual ceremony for the inhabitants of ,luchon and its neighbourhood1 and local tradition assigns it to a heathen origin4 ,in the midsummer fires formerly kindled on the ,place de ,grve at ,paris it was the custom to burn a basket1 barrel1 or sack full of live cats1 which was hung from a tall mast in the midst of the bonfire2 sometimes a fox was burned4 ,the people collected the embers and ashes of the fire and took them home1 believing that they brought good luck4 ,the ,french kings often witnessed these spectacles and even lit the bonfire with their own hands4 ,in #afdh ,louis the ,fourteenth1 crowned with a wreath of roses and carrying a bunch of roses in his hand1 kindled the fire1 danced at it and partook of the banquet afterwards in the town hall4 ,but this was the last occasion when a monarch presided at the midsummer bonfire in ,paris4 ,at ,metz midsummer fires were lighted with great pomp on the esplanade1 and a dozen cats1 enclosed in wicker cages1 were burned alive in them1 to the amusement of the people4 ,similarly at ,gap1 in the department of the ,high ,alps1 cats used to be roasted over the midsummer bonfire4 ,in ,russia a white cock was sometimes burned in the midsummer bonfire2 in ,meissen or ,thuringia a horse's head used to be thrown into it4 ,sometimes animals are burned in the spring bonfires4 ,in the ,vosges cats were burned on ,shrove ,tuesday2 in ,alsace they were thrown into the ,easter bonfire4 ,in the department of the ,ardennes cats were flung into the bonfires kindled on the first ,sunday in ,lent2 sometimes1 by a refinement of cruelty1 they were hung over the fire from the end of a pole and roasted alive4 ,the cat1 which represented the devil1 could never suffer enough4 ,while the creatures were perishing in the flames1 the shepherds guarded their flocks and forced them to leap over the fire1 esteeming this an infallible means of preserving them from disease and witchcraft4 ,we have seen that squirrels were sometimes burned in the ,easter fire4 ,thus it appears that the sacrificial rites of the ,celts of ancient ,gaul can be traced in the popular festivals of modern ,europe4 ,naturally it is in ,france1 or rather in the wider area comprised within the limits of ancient ,gaul1 that these rites have left the clearest traces in the customs of burning giants of wicker-work and animals enclosed in wicker-work or baskets4 ,these customs1 it will have been remarked1 are generally observed at or about midsummer4 ,from this we may infer that the original rites of which these are the degenerate successors were solemnised at midsummer4 ,this inference harmonises with the conclusion suggested by a general survey of ,european folk-custom1 that the midsummer festival must on the whole have been the most widely diffused and the most solemn of all the yearly festivals celebrated by the primitive ,aryans in ,europe4 ,at the same time we must bear in mind that among the ,british ,celts the chief fire-festivals of the year appear certainly to have been those of ,beltane 7,may ,day7 and ,hallowe'en 7the last day of ,october72 and this suggests a doubt whether the ,celts of ,gaul also may not have celebrated their principal rites of fire1 including their burnt sacrifices of men and animals1 at the beginning of ,may or the beginning of ,november rather than at ,midsummer4 ,we have still to ask1 ,what is the meaning of such sacrifices8 ,why were men and animals burnt to death at these festivals8 ,if we are right in interpreting the modern ,european fire-festivals as attempts to break the power of witchcraft by burning or banning the witches and warlocks1 it seems to follow that we must explain the human sacrifices of the ,celts in the same manner2 that is1 we must suppose that the men whom the ,druids burnt in wicker-work images were condemned to death on the ground that they were witches or wizards1 and that the mode of execution by fire was chosen because burning alive is deemed the surest mode of getting rid of these noxious and dangerous beings4 ,the same explanation would apply to the cattle and wild animals of many kinds which the ,celts burned along with the men4 ,they1 too1 we may conjecture1 were supposed to be either under the spell of witchcraft or actually to be the witches and wizards1 who had transformed themselves into animals for the purpose of prosecuting their infernal plots against the welfare of their fellow-creatures4 ,this conjecture is confirmed by the observation that the victims most commonly burned in modern bonfires have been cats1 and that cats are precisely the animals into which1 with the possible exception of hares1 witches were most usually supposed to transform themselves4 ,again1 we have seen that serpents and foxes used sometimes to be burnt in the midsummer fires2 and ,welsh and ,german witches are reported to have assumed the form both of foxes and serpents4 ,in short1 when we remember the great variety of animals whose forms witches can assume at pleasure1 it seems easy on this hypothesis to account for the variety of living creatures that have been burnt at festivals both in ancient ,gaul and modern ,europe2 all these victims1 we may surmise1 were doomed to the flames1 not because they were animals1 but because they were believed to be witches who had taken the shape of animals for their nefarious purposes4 ,one advantage of explaining the ancient ,celtic sacrifices in this way is that it introduces1 as it were1 a harmony and consistency into the treatment which ,europe has meted out to witches from the earliest times down to about two centuries ago1 when the growing influence of rationalism discredited the belief in witchcraft and put a stop to the custom of burning witches4 ,be that as it may1 we can now perhaps understand why the ,druids believed that the more persons they sentenced to death1 the greater would be the fertility of the land4 ,to a modern reader the connexion at first sight may not be obvious between the activity of the hangman and the productivity of the earth4 ,but a little reflection may satisfy him that when the criminals who perish at the stake or on the gallows are witches1 whose delight it is to blight the crops of the farmer or to lay them low under storms of hail1 the execution of these wretches is really calculated to ensure an abundant harvest by removing one of the principal causes which paralyse the efforts and blast the hopes of the husbandman4 ,the ,druidical sacrifices which we are considering were explained in a different way by ,w4 ,mannhardt4 ,he supposed that the men whom the ,druids burned in wicker-work images represented the spirits of vegetation1 and accordingly that the custom of burning them was a magical ceremony intended to secure the necessary sunshine for the crops4 ,similarly1 he seems to have inclined to the view that the animals which used to be burnt in the bonfires represented the cornspirit1 which1 as we saw in an earlier part of this work1 is often supposed to assume the shape of an animal4 ,this theory is no doubt tenable1 and the great authority of ,w4 ,mannhardt entitles it to careful consideration4 ,i adopted it in former editions of this book2 but on reconsideration it seems to me on the whole to be less probable than the theory that the men and animals burnt in the fires perished in the character of witches4 ,this latter view is strongly supported by the testimony of the people who celebrate the fire-festivals1 since a popular name for the custom of kindling the fires is burning the witches1 effigies of witches are sometimes consumed in the flames1 and the fires1 their embers1 or their ashes are supposed to furnish protection against witchcraft4 ,on the other hand there is little to show that the effigies or the animals burnt in the fires are regarded by the people as representatives of the vegetation-spirit1 and that the bonfires are sun-charms4 ,with regard to serpents in particular1 which used to be burnt in the midsummer fire at ,luchon1 ,i am not aware of any certain evidence that in ,europe snakes have been regarded as embodiments of the tree-spirit or corn-spirit1 though in other parts of the world the conception appears to be not unknown4 ,whereas the popular faith in the transformation of witches into animals is so general and deeply rooted1 and the fear of these uncanny beings is so strong1 that it seems safer to suppose that the cats and other animals which were burnt in the fire suffered death as embodiments of witches than that they perished as representatives of vegetation-spirits4 ,,lxv4 ,balder and the ,mistletoe ,,the ,,reader may remember that the preceding account of the popular fire-festivals of ,europe was suggested by the myth of the ,norse god ,balder1 who is said to have been slain by a branch of mistletoe and burnt in a great fire4 ,we have now to enquire how far the customs which have been passed in review help to shed light on the myth4 ,in this enquiry it may be convenient to begin with the mistletoe1 the instrument of ,balder's death4 ,from time immemorial the mistletoe has been the object of superstitious veneration in ,europe4 ,it was worshipped by the ,druids1 as we learn from a famous passage of ,pliny4 ,after enumerating the different kinds of mistletoe1 he proceeds3 ,in treating of this subject1 the admiration in which the mistletoe is held throughout ,gaul ought not to pass unnoticed4 ,the ,druids1 for so they call their wizards1 esteem nothing more sacred than the mistletoe and the tree on which it grows1 provided only that the tree is an oak4 ,but apart from this they choose oak-woods for their sacred groves and perform no sacred rites without oak-leaves2 so that the very name of ,druids may be regarded as a ,greek appellation derived from their worship of the oak4 ,for they believe that whatever grows on these trees is sent from heaven1 and is a sign that the tree has been chosen by the god himself4 ,the mistletoe is very rarely to be met with2 but when it is found1 they gather it with solemn ceremony4 ,this they do above all on the sixth day of the moon1 from whence they date the beginnings of their months1 of their years1 and of their thirty years' cycle1 because by the sixth day the moon has plenty of vigour and has not run half its course4 ,after due preparations have been made for a sacrifice and a feast under the tree1 they hail it as the universal healer and bring to the spot two white bulls1 whose horns have never been bound before4 ,a priest clad in a white robe climbs the tree and with a golden sickle cuts the mistletoe1 which is caught in a white cloth4 ,then they sacrifice the victims1 praying that ,god may make his own gift to prosper with those upon whom he has bestowed it4 ,they believe that a potion prepared from mistletoe will make barren animals to bring forth1 and that the plant is a remedy against all poison4 ,in another passage ,pliny tells us that in medicine the mistletoe which grows on an oak was esteemed the most efficacious1 and that its efficacy was by some superstitious people supposed to be increased if the plant was gathered on the first day of the moon without the use of iron1 and if when gathered it was not allowed to touch the earth2 oak-mistletoe thus obtained was deemed a cure for epilepsy2 carried about by women it assisted them to conceive2 and it healed ulcers most effectually1 if only the sufferer chewed a piece of the plant and laid another piece on the sore4 ,yet1 again1 he says that mistletoe was supposed1 like vinegar and an egg1 to be an excellent means of extinguishing a fire4 ,if in these latter passages ,pliny refers1 as he apparently does1 to the beliefs current among his contemporaries in ,italy1 it will follow that the ,druids and the ,italians were to some extent agreed as to the valuable properties possessed by mistletoe which grows on an oak2 both of them deemed it an effectual remedy for a number of ailments1 and both of them ascribed to it a quickening virtue1 the ,druids believing that a potion prepared from mistletoe would fertilise barren cattle1 and the ,italians holding that a piece of mistletoe carried about by a woman would help her to conceive a child4 ,further1 both peoples thought that if the plant were to exert its medicinal properties it must be gathered in a certain way and at a certain time4 ,it might not be cut with iron1 hence the ,druids cut it with gold2 and it might not touch the earth1 hence the ,druids caught it in a white cloth4 ,in choosing the time for gathering the plant1 both peoples were determined by observation of the moon2 only they differed as to the particular day of the moon1 the ,italians preferring the first1 and the ,druids the sixth4 ,with these beliefs of the ancient ,gauls and ,italians as to the wonderful medicinal properties of mistletoe we may compare the similar beliefs of the modern ,aino of ,japan4 ,we read that they1 like many nations of the ,northern origin1 hold the mistletoe in peculiar veneration4 ,they look upon it as a medicine1 good in almost every disease1 and it is sometimes taken in food and at others separately as a decoction4 ,the leaves are used in preference to the berries1 the latter being of too sticky a nature for general purposes4 4 4 4 ,but many1 too1 suppose this plant to have the power of making the gardens bear plentifully4 ,when used for this purpose1 the leaves are cut up into fine pieces1 and1 after having been prayed over1 are sown with the millet and other seeds1 a little also being eaten with the food4 ,barren women have also been known to eat the mistletoe1 in order to be made to bear children4 ,that mistletoe which grows upon the willow is supposed to have the greatest efficacy4 ,this is because the willow is looked upon by them as being an especially sacred tree4 ,thus the ,aino agree with the ,druids in regarding mistletoe as a cure for almost every disease1 and they agree with the ancient ,italians that applied to women it helps them to bear children4 ,again1 the ,druidical notion that the mistletoe was an all-healer or panacea may be compared with a notion entertained by the ,walos of ,senegambia4 ,these people have much veneration for a sort of mistletoe1 which they call tob2 they carry leaves of it on their persons when they go to war as a preservative against wounds1 just as if the leaves were real talismans 7gris-gris74 ,the ,french writer who records this practice adds3 ,is it not very curious that the mistletoe should be in this part of ,africa what it was in the superstitions of the ,gauls8 ,this prejudice1 common to the two countries1 may have the same origin2 blacks and whites will doubtless have seen1 each of them for themselves1 something supernatural in a plant which grows and flourishes without having roots in the earth4 ,may they not have believed1 in fact1 that it was a plant fallen from the sky1 a gift of the divinity8 ,this suggestion as to the origin of the superstition is strongly confirmed by the ,druidical belief1 reported by ,pliny1 that whatever grew on an oak was sent from heaven and was a sign that the tree had been chosen by the god himself4 ,such a belief explains why the ,druids cut the mistletoe1 not with a common knife1 but with a golden sickle1 and why1 when cut1 it was not suffered to touch the earth2 probably they thought that the celestial plant would have been profaned and its marvellous virtue lost by contact with the ground4 ,with the ritual observed by the ,druids in cutting the mistletoe we may compare the ritual which in ,cambodia is prescribed in a similar case4 ,they say that when you see an orchid growing as a parasite on a tamarind tree1 you should dress in white1 take a new earthenware pot1 then climb the tree at noon1 break off the plant1 put it in the pot and let the pot fall to the ground4 ,after that you make in the pot a decoction which confers the gift of invulnerability4 ,thus just as in ,africa the leaves of one parasitic plant are supposed to render the wearer invulnerable1 so in ,cambodia a decoction made from another parasitic plant is considered to render the same service to such as make use of it1 whether by drinking or washing4 ,we may conjecture that in both places the notion of invulnerability is suggested by the position of the plant1 which1 occupying a place of comparative security above the ground1 appears to promise to its fortunate possessor a similar security from some of the ills that beset the life of man on earth4 ,we have already met with examples of the store which the primitive mind sets on such vantage grounds4 ,whatever may be the origin of these beliefs and practices concerning the mistletoe1 certain it is that some of them have their analogies in the folk-lore of modern ,european peasants4 ,for example1 it is laid down as a rule in various parts of ,europe that mistletoe may not be cut in the ordinary way but must be shot or knocked down with stones from the tree on which it is growing4 ,thus1 in the ,swiss canton of ,aargau all parasitic plants are esteemed in a certain sense holy by the country folk1 but most particularly so the mistletoe growing on an oak4 ,they ascribe great powers to it1 but shrink from cutting it off in the usual manner4 ,instead of that they procure it in the following manner4 ,when the sun is in ,sagittarius and the moon is on the wane1 on the first1 third1 or fourth day before the new moon1 one ought to shoot down with an arrow the mistletoe of an oak and to catch it with the left hand as it falls4 ,such mistletoe is a remedy for every ailment of children4 ,here among the ,swiss peasants1 as among the ,druids of old1 special virtue is ascribed to mistletoe which grows on an oak3 it may not be cut in the usual way3 it must be caught as it falls to the ground2 and it is esteemed a panacea for all diseases1 at least of children4 ,in ,sweden1 also1 it is a popular superstition that if mistletoe is to possess its peculiar virtue1 it must either be shot down out of the oak or knocked down with stones4 ,similarly1 so late as the early part of the nineteenth century1 people in ,wales believed that for the mistletoe to have any power1 it must be shot or struck down with stones off the tree where it grew4 ,again1 in respect of the healing virtues of mistletoe the opinion of modern peasants1 and even of the learned1 has to some extent agreed with that of the ancients4 ,the ,druids appear to have called the plant1 or perhaps the oak on which it grew1 the all-healer2 and all-healer is said to be still a name of the mistletoe in the modern ,celtic speech of ,brittany1 ,wales1 ,ireland1 and ,scotland4 ,on ,st4 ,john's morning 7,midsummer morning7 peasants of ,piedmont and ,lombardy go out to search the oak-leaves for the oil of ,st4 ,john1 which is supposed to heal all wounds made with cutting instruments4 ,originally1 perhaps1 the oil of ,st4 ,john was simply the mistletoe1 or a decoction made from it4 ,for in ,holstein the mistletoe1 especially oak-mistletoe1 is still regarded as a panacea for green wounds and as a sure charm to secure success in hunting2 and at ,lacaune1 in the south of ,france1 the old ,druidical belief in the mistletoe as an antidote to all poisons still survives among the peasantry2 they apply the plant to the stomach of the sufferer or give him a decoction of it to drink4 ,again1 the ancient belief that mistletoe is a cure for epilepsy has survived in modern times not only among the ignorant but among the learned4 ,thus in ,sweden persons afflicted with the falling sickness think they can ward off attacks of the malady by carrying about with them a knife which has a handle of oak mistletoe2 and in ,germany for a similar purpose pieces of mistletoe used to be hung round the necks of children4 ,in the ,french province of ,bourbonnais a popular remedy for epilepsy is a decoction of mistletoe which has been gathered on an oak on ,st4 ,john's ,day and boiled with rye-flour4 ,so at ,bottesford in ,lincolnshire a decoction of mistletoe is supposed to be a palliative for this terrible disease4 ,indeed mistletoe was recommended as a remedy for the falling sickness by high medical authorities in ,england and ,holland down to the eighteenth century4 ,however1 the opinion of the medical profession as to the curative virtues of mistletoe has undergone a radical alteration4 ,whereas the ,druids thought that mistletoe cured everything1 modern doctors appear to think that it cures nothing4 ,if they are right1 we must conclude that the ancient and widespread faith in the medicinal virtue of mistletoe is a pure superstition based on nothing better than the fanciful inferences which ignorance has drawn from the parasitic nature of the plant1 its position high up on the branch of a tree seeming to protect it from the dangers to which plants and animals are subject on the surface of the ground4 ,from this point of view we can perhaps understand why mistletoe has so long and so persistently been prescribed as a cure for the falling sickness4 ,as mistletoe cannot fall to the ground because it is rooted on the branch of a tree high above the earth1 it seems to follow as a necessary consequence that an epileptic patient cannot possibly fall down in a fit so long as he carries a piece of mistletoe in his pocket or a decoction of mistletoe in his stomach4 ,such a train of reasoning would probably be regarded even now as cogent by a large portion of the human species4 ,again the ancient ,italian opinion that mistletoe extinguishes fire appears to be shared by ,swedish peasants1 who hang up bunches of oak-mistletoe on the ceilings of their rooms as a protection against harm in general and conflagration in particular4 ,a hint as to the way in which mistletoe comes to be possessed of this property is furnished by the epithet thunder-bosom1 which people of the ,aargau canton in ,switzerland apply to the plant4 ,for a thunder-besom is a shaggy1 bushy excrescence on branches of trees1 which is popularly believed to be produced by a flash of lightning2 hence in ,bohemia a thunder-besom burnt in the fire protects the house against being struck by a thunder-bolt4 ,being itself a product of lightning it naturally serves1 on homoeopathic principles1 as a protection against lightning1 in fact as a kind of lightning-conductor4 ,hence the fire which mistletoe in ,sweden is designed especially to avert from houses may be fire kindled by lightning2 though no doubt the plant is equally effective against conflagration in general4 ,again1 mistletoe acts as a master-key as well as a lightning-conductor2 for it is said to open all locks4 ,but perhaps the most precious of all the virtues of mistletoe is that it affords efficient protection against sorcery and witchcraft4 ,that1 no doubt1 is the reason why in ,austria a twig of mistletoe is laid on the threshold as a preventive of nightmare2 and it may be the reason why in the north of ,england they say that if you wish your dairy to thrive you should give your bunch of mistletoe to the first cow that calves after ,new ,year's ,day1 for it is well known that nothing is so fatal to milk and butter as witchcraft4 ,similarly in ,wales1 for the sake of ensuring good luck to the dairy1 people used to give a branch of mistletoe to the first cow that gave birth to a calf after the first hour of the ,new ,year2 and in rural districts of ,wales1 where mistletoe abounded1 there was always a profusion of it in the farmhouses4 ,when mistletoe was scarce1 ,welsh farmers used to say1 ,no mistletoe1 no luck2 but if there was a fine crop of mistletoe1 they expected a fine crop of corn4 ,in ,sweden mistletoe is diligently sought after on ,st4 ,john's ,eve1 the people believing it to be1 in a high degree1 possessed of mystic qualities2 and that if a sprig of it be attached to the ceiling of the dwelling-house1 the horse's stall1 or the cow's crib1 the ,troll will then be powerless to injure either man or beast4 ,with regard to the time when the mistletoe should be gathered opinions have varied4 ,the ,druids gathered it above all on the sixth day of the moon1 the ancient ,italians apparently on the first day of the moon4 ,in modern times some have preferred the full moon of ,march and others the waning moon of winter when the sun is in ,sagittarius4 ,but the favourite time would seem to be ,midsummer ,eve or ,midsummer ,day4 ,we have seen that both in ,france and ,sweden special virtues are ascribed to mistletoe gathered at ,midsummer4 ,the rule in ,sweden is that mistletoe must be cut on the night of ,midsummer ,eve when sun and moon stand in the sign of their might4 ,again1 in ,wales it was believed that a sprig of mistletoe gathered on ,st4 ,john's ,eve 7,midsummer ,eve71 or at any time before the berries appeared1 would induce dreams of omen1 both good and bad1 if it were placed under the pillow of the sleeper4 ,thus mistletoe is one of the many plants whose magical or medicinal virtues are believed to culminate with the culmination of the sun on the longest day of the year4 ,hence it seems reasonable to conjecture that in the eyes of the ,druids1 also1 who revered the plant so highly1 the sacred mistletoe may have acquired a double portion of its mystic qualities at the solstice in ,june1 and that accordingly they may have regularly cut it with solemn ceremony on ,midsummer ,eve4 ,be that as it may1 certain it is that the mistletoe1 the instrument of ,balder's death1 has been regularly gathered for the sake of its mystic qualities on ,midsummer ,eve in ,scandinavia1 ,balder's home4 ,the plant is found commonly growing on pear-trees1 oaks1 and other trees in thick damp woods throughout the more temperate parts of ,sweden4 ,thus one of the two main incidents of ,balder's myth is reproduced in the great midsummer festival of ,scandinavia4 ,but the other main incident of the myth1 the burning of ,balder's body on a pyre1 has also its counterpart in the bonfires which still blaze1 or blazed till lately1 in ,denmark1 ,norway1 and ,sweden on ,midsummer ,eve4 ,it does not appear1 indeed1 that any effigy is burned in these bonfires2 but the burning of an effigy is a feature which might easily drop out after its meaning was forgotten4 ,and the name of ,balder's balefires 7,balder's ,balar71 by which these midsummer fires were formerly known in ,sweden1 puts their connexion with ,balder beyond the reach of doubt1 and makes it probable that in former times either a living representative or an effigy of ,balder was annually burned in them4 ,midsummer was the season sacred to ,balder1 and the ,swedish poet ,tegner1 in placing the burning of ,balder at midsummer1 may very well have followed an old tradition that the summer solstice was the time when the good god came to his untimely end4 ,thus it has been shown that the leading incidents of the ,balder myth have their counterparts in those fire-festivals of our ,european peasantry which undoubtedly date from a time long prior to the introduction of ,christianity4 ,the pretence of throwing the victim chosen by lot into the ,beltane fire1 and the similar treatment of the man1 the future ,green ,wolf1 at the midsummer bonfire in ,normandy1 may naturally be interpreted as traces of an older custom of actually burning human beings on these occasions2 and the green dress of the ,green ,wolf1 coupled with the leafy envelope of the young fellow who trod out the midsummer fire at ,moosheim1 seems to hint that the persons who perished at these festivals did so in the character of tree-spirits or deities of vegetation4 ,from all this we may reasonably infer that in the ,balder myth on the one hand1 and the fire-festivals and custom of gathering mistletoe on the other hand1 we have1 as it were1 the two broken and dissevered halves of an original whole4 ,in other words1 we may assume with some degree of probability that the myth of ,balder's death was not merely a myth1 that is1 a description of physical phenomena in imagery borrowed from human life1 but that it was at the same time the story which people told to explain why they annually burned a human representative of the god and cut the mistletoe with solemn ceremony4 ,if ,i am right1 the story of ,balder's tragic end formed1 so to say1 the text of the sacred drama which was acted year by year as a magical rite to cause the sun to shine1 trees to grow1 crops to thrive1 and to guard man and beast from the baleful arts of fairies and trolls1 of witches and warlocks4 ,the tale belonged1 in short1 to that class of nature myths which are meant to be supplemented by ritual2 here1 as so often1 myth stood to magic in the relation of theory to practice4 ,but if the victims--the human ,balders--who died by fire1 whether in spring or at midsummer1 were put to death as living embodiments of tree-spirits or deities of vegetation1 it would seem that ,balder himself must have been a tree-spirit or deity of vegetation4 ,it becomes desirable1 therefore1 to determine1 if we can1 the particular kind of tree or trees1 of which a personal representative was burned at the fire-festivals4 ,for we may be quite sure that it was not as a representative of vegetation in general that the victim suffered death4 ,the idea of vegetation in general is too abstract to be primitive4 ,most probably the victim at first represented a particular kind of sacred tree4 ,but of all ,european trees none has such claims as the oak to be considered as pre-eminently the sacred tree of the ,aryans4 ,we have seen that its worship is attested for all the great branches of the ,aryan stock in ,europe2 hence we may certainly conclude that the tree was venerated by the ,aryans in common before the dispersion1 and that their primitive home must have lain in a land which was clothed with forests of oak4 ,now1 considering the primitive character and remarkable similarity of the fire-festivals observed by all the branches of the ,aryan race in ,europe1 we may infer that these festivals form part of the common stock of religious observances which the various peoples carried with them in their wanderings from their old home4 ,but1 if ,i am right1 an essential feature of those primitive fire-festivals was the burning of a man who represented the tree-spirit4 ,in view1 then1 of the place occupied by the oak in the religion of the ,aryans1 the presumption is that the tree so represented at the fire-festivals must originally have been the oak4 ,so far as the ,celts and ,lithuanians are concerned1 this conclusion will perhaps hardly be contested4 ,but both for them and for the ,germans it is confirmed by a remarkable piece of religious conservatism4 ,the most primitive method known to man of producing fire is by rubbing two pieces of wood against each other till they ignite2 and we have seen that this method is still used in ,europe for kindling sacred fires such as the need-fire1 and that most probably it was formerly resorted to at all the fire-festivals under discussion4 ,now it is sometimes required that the need-fire1 or other sacred fire1 should be made by the friction of a particular kind of wood2 and when the kind of wood is prescribed1 whether among ,celts1 ,germans1 or ,slavs1 that wood appears to be generally the oak4 ,but if the sacred fire was regularly kindled by the friction of oak-wood1 we may infer that originally the fire was also fed with the same material4 ,in point of fact1 it appears that the perpetual fire of ,vesta at ,rome was fed with oak-wood1 and that oak-wood was the fuel consumed in the perpetual fire which burned under the sacred oak at the great ,lithuanian sanctuary of ,romove4 ,further1 that oak-wood was formerly the fuel burned in the midsummer fires may perhaps be inferred from the custom1 said to be still observed by peasants in many mountain districts of ,germany1 of making up the cottage fire on ,midsummer ,day with a heavy block of oak-wood4 ,the block is so arranged that it smoulders slowly and is not finally reduced to charcoal till the expiry of a year4 ,then upon next ,midsummer ,day the charred embers of the old log are removed to make room for the new one1 and are mixed with the seed-corn or scattered about the garden4 ,this is believed to guard the food cooked on the hearth from witchcraft1 to preserve the luck of the house1 to promote the growth of the crops1 and to keep them from blight and vermin4 ,thus the custom is almost exactly parallel to that of the ,yule-log1 which in parts of ,germany1 ,france1 ,england1 ,serbia1 and other ,slavonic lands was commonly of oak-wood4 ,the general conclusion is1 that at those periodic or occasional ceremonies the ancient ,aryans both kindled and fed the fire with the sacred oak-wood4 ,but if at these solemn rites the fire was regularly made of oakwood1 it follows that any man who was burned in it as a personification of the tree-spirit could have represented no tree but the oak4 ,the sacred oak was thus burned in duplicate2 the wood of the tree was consumed in the fire1 and along with it was consumed a living man as a personification of the oak-spirit4 ,the conclusion thus drawn for the ,european ,aryans in general is confirmed in its special application to the ,scandinavians by the relation in which amongst them the mistletoe appears to have stood to the burning of the victim in the midsummer fire4 ,we have seen that among ,scandinavians it has been customary to gather the mistletoe at midsummer4 ,but so far as appears on the face of this custom1 there is nothing to connect it with the midsummer fires in which human victims or effigies of them were burned4 ,even if the fire1 as seems probable1 was originally always made with oak-wood1 why should it have been necessary to pull the mistletoe8 ,the last link between the midsummer customs of gathering the mistletoe and lighting the bonfires is supplied by ,balder's myth1 which can hardly be disjoined from the customs in question4 ,the myth suggests that a vital connexion may once have been believed to subsist between the mistletoe and the human representative of the oak who was burned in the fire4 ,according to the myth1 ,balder could be killed by nothing in heaven or earth except the mistletoe2 and so long as the mistletoe remained on the oak1 he was not only immortal but invulnerable4 ,now1 if we suppose that ,balder was the oak1 the origin of the myth becomes intelligible4 ,the mistletoe was viewed as the seat of life of the oak1 and so long as it was uninjured nothing could kill or even wound the oak4 ,the conception of the mistletoe as the seat of life of the oak would naturally be suggested to primitive people by the observation that while the oak is deciduous1 the mistletoe which grows on it is evergreen4 ,in winter the sight of its fresh foliage among the bare branches must have been hailed by the worshippers of the tree as a sign that the divine life which had ceased to animate the branches yet survived in the mistletoe1 as the heart of a sleeper still beats when his body is motionless4 ,hence when the god had to be killed--when the sacred tree had to be burnt--it was necessary to begin by breaking off the mistletoe4 ,for so long as the mistletoe remained intact1 the oak 7so people might think7 was invulnerable2 all the blows of their knives and axes would glance harmless from its surface4 ,but once tear from the oak its sacred heart--the mistletoe--and the tree nodded to its fall4 ,and when in later times the spirit of the oak came to be represented by a living man1 it was logically necessary to suppose that1 like the tree he personated1 he could neither be killed nor wounded so long as the mistletoe remained uninjured4 ,the pulling of the mistletoe was thus at once the signal and the cause of his death4 ,on this view the invulnerable ,balder is neither more nor less than a personification of a mistletoe-bearing oak4 ,the interpretation is confirmed by what seems to have been an ancient ,italian belief1 that the mistletoe can be destroyed neither by fire nor water2 for if the parasite is thus deemed indestructible1 it might easily be supposed to communicate its own indestructibility to the tree on which it grows1 so long as the two remain in conjunction4 ,or1 to put the same idea in mythical form1 we might tell how the kindly god of the oak had his life securely deposited in the imperishable mistletoe which grew among the branches2 how accordingly so long as the mistletoe kept its place there1 the deity himself remained invulnerable2 and how at last a cunning foe1 let into the secret of the god's invulnerability1 tore the mistletoe from the oak1 thereby killing the oak-god and afterwards burning his body in a fire which could have made no impression on him so long as the incombustible parasite retained its seat among the boughs4 ,but since the idea of a being whose life is thus1 in a sense1 outside himself1 must be strange to many readers1 and has1 indeed1 not yet been recognised in its full bearing on primitive superstition1 it will be worth while to illustrate it by examples drawn both from story and custom4 ,the result will be to show that1 in assuming this idea as the explanation of ,balder's relation to the mistletoe1 ,i assume a principle which is deeply engraved on the mind of primitive man4 ,,lxvi4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,folk-,tales ,,in ,a ,,former part of this work we saw that1 in the opinion of primitive people1 the soul may temporarily absent itself from the body without causing death4 ,such temporary absences of the soul are often believed to involve considerable risk1 since the wandering soul is liable to a variety of mishaps at the hands of enemies1 and so forth4 ,but there is another aspect to this power of disengaging the soul from the body4 ,if only the safety of the soul can be ensured during its absence1 there is no reason why the soul should not continue absent for an indefinite time2 indeed a man may1 on a pure calculation of personal safety1 desire that his soul should never return to his body4 ,unable to conceive of life abstractly as a permanent possibility of sensation or a continuous adjustment of internal arrangements to external relations1 the savage thinks of it as a concrete material thing of a definite bulk1 capable of being seen and handled1 kept in a box or jar1 and liable to be bruised1 fractured1 or smashed in pieces4 ,it is not needful that the life1 so conceived1 should be in the man2 it may be absent from his body and still continue to animate him by virtue of a sort of sympathy or action at a distance4 ,so long as this object which he calls his life or soul remains unharmed1 the man is well2 if it is injured1 he suffers2 if it is destroyed1 he dies4 ,or1 to put it otherwise1 when a man is ill or dies1 the fact is explained by saying that the material object called his life or soul1 whether it be in his body or out of it1 has either sustained injury or been destroyed4 ,but there may be circumstances in which1 if the life or soul remains in the man1 it stands a greater chance of sustaining injury than if it were stowed away in some safe and secret place4 ,accordingly1 in such circumstances1 primitive man takes his soul out of his body and deposits it for security in some snug spot1 intending to replace it in his body when the danger is past4 ,or if he should discover some place of absolute security1 he may be content to leave his soul there permanently4 ,the advantage of this is that1 so long as the soul remains unharmed in the place where he has deposited it1 the man himself is immortal2 nothing can kill his body1 since his life is not in it4 ,evidence of this primitive belief is furnished by a class of folk-tales of which the ,norse story of ,the giant who had no heart in his body is perhaps the best-known example4 ,stories of this kind are widely diffused over the world1 and from their number and the variety of incident and of details in which the leading idea is embodied1 we may infer that the conception of an external soul is one which has had a powerful hold on the minds of men at an early stage of history4 ,for folk-tales are a faithful reflection of the world as it appeared to the primitive mind2 and we may be sure that any idea which commonly occurs in them1 however absurd it may seem to us1 must once have been an ordinary article of belief4 ,this assurance1 so far as it concerns the supposed power of disengaging the soul from the body for a longer or shorter time1 is amply corroborated by a comparison of the folk-tales in question with the actual beliefs and practices of savages4 ,to this we shall return after some specimens of the tales have been given4 ,the specimens will be selected with a view of illustrating both the characteristic features and the wide diffusion of this class of tales4 ,in the first place1 the story of the external soul is told1 in various forms1 by all ,aryan peoples from ,hindoostan to the ,hebrides4 ,a very common form of it is this3 ,a warlock1 giant1 or other fairyland being is invulnerable and immortal because he keeps his soul hidden far away in some secret place2 but a fair princess1 whom he holds enthralled in his enchanted castle1 wiles his secret from him and reveals it to the hero1 who seeks out the warlock's soul1 heart1 life1 or death 7as it is variously called71 and by destroying it1 simultaneously kills the warlock4 ,thus a ,hindoo story tells how a magician called ,punchkin held a queen captive for twelve years1 and would fain marry her1 but she would not have him4 ,at last the queen's son came to rescue her1 and the two plotted together to kill ,punchkin4 ,so the queen spoke the magician fair1 and pretended that she had at last made up her mind to marry him4 ,and do tell me1 she said1 are you quite immortal8 ,can death never touch you8 ,and are you too great an enchanter ever to feel human suffering8 ,it is true1 he said1 that ,i am not as others4 ,far1 far away1 hundreds of thousands of miles from this1 there lies a desolate country covered with thick jungle4 ,in the midst of the jungle grows a circle of palm trees1 and in the centre of the circle stand six chattees full of water1 piled one above another3 below the sixth chattee is a small cage1 which contains a little green parrot2--on the life of the parrot depends my life2--and if the parrot is killed ,i must die4 ,it is1 however1 he added1 impossible that the parrot should sustain any injury1 both on account of the inaccessibility of the country1 and because1 by my appointment1 many thousand genii surround the palm trees1 and kill all who approach the place4 ,but the queen's young son overcame all difficulties1 and got possession of the parrot4 ,he brought it to the door of the magician's palace1 and began playing with it4 ,punchkin1 the magician1 saw him1 and1 coming out1 tried to persuade the boy to give him the parrot4 ,give me my parrot6 cried ,punchkin4 ,then the boy took hold of the parrot and tore off one of his wings2 and as he did so the magician's right arm fell off4 ,punchkin then stretched out his left arm1 crying1 ,give me my parrot6 ,the prince pulled off the parrot's second wing1 and the magician's left arm tumbled off4 ,give me my parrot6 cried he1 and fell on his knees4 ,the prince pulled off the parrot's right leg1 the magician's right leg fell off2 the prince pulled off the parrot's left leg1 down fell the magician's left4 ,nothing remained of him except the trunk and the head2 but still he rolled his eyes1 and cried1 ,give me my parrot6 ,take your parrot1 then1 cried the boy2 and with that he wrung the bird's neck1 and threw it at the magician2 and1 as he did so1 ,punchkin's head twisted round1 and1 with a fearful groan1 he died6 ,in another ,hindoo tale an ogre is asked by his daughter1 ,papa1 where do you keep your soul8 ,sixteen miles away from this place1 he said1 is a tree4 ,round the tree are tigers1 and bears1 and scorpions1 and snakes2 on the top of the tree is a very great fat snake2 on his head is a little cage2 in the cage is a bird2 and my soul is in that bird4 ,the end of the ogre is like that of the magician in the previous tale4 ,as the bird's wings and legs are torn off1 the ogre's arms and legs drop off2 and when its neck is wrung he falls down dead4 ,in a ,bengalee story it is said that all the ogres dwell in ,ceylon1 and that all their lives are in a single lemon4 ,a boy cuts the lemon in pieces1 and all the ogres die4 ,in a ,siamese or ,cambodian story1 probably derived from ,india1 we are told that ,thossakan or ,ravana1 the ,king of ,ceylon1 was able by magic art to take his soul out of his body and leave it in a box at home1 while he went to the wars4 ,thus he was invulnerable in battle4 ,when he was about to give battle to ,rama1 he deposited his soul with a hermit called ,fire-eye1 who was to keep it safe for him4 ,so in the fight ,rama was astounded to see that his arrows struck the king without wounding him4 ,but one of ,rama's allies1 knowing the secret of the king's invulnerability1 transformed himself by magic into the likeness of the king1 and going to the hermit asked back his soul4 ,on receiving it he soared up into the air and flew to ,rama1 brandishing the box and squeezing it so hard that all the breath left the ,king of ,ceylon's body1 and he died4 ,in a ,bengalee story a prince going into a far country planted with his own hands a tree in the courtyard of his father's palace1 and said to his parents1 ,this tree is my life4 ,when you see the tree green and fresh1 then know that it is well with me2 when you see the tree fade in some parts1 then know that ,i am in an ill case2 and when you see the whole tree fade1 then know that ,i am dead and gone4 ,in another ,indian tale a prince1 setting forth on his travels1 left behind him a barley plant1 with instructions that it should be carefully tended and watched2 for if it flourished1 he would be alive and well1 but if it drooped1 then some mischance was about to happen to him4 ,and so it fell out4 ,for the prince was beheaded1 and as his head rolled off1 the barley plant snapped in two and the ear of barley fell to the ground4 ,in ,greek tales1 ancient and modern1 the idea of an external soul is not uncommon4 ,when ,meleager was seven days old1 the ,fates appeared to his mother and told her that ,meleager would die when the brand which was blazing on the hearth had burnt down4 ,so his mother snatched the brand from the fire and kept it in a box4 ,but in after-years1 being enraged at her son for slaying her brothers1 she burnt the brand in the fire and ,meleager expired in agonies1 as if flames were preying on his vitals4 ,again1 ,nisus ,king of ,megara had a purple or golden hair on the middle of his head1 and it was fated that whenever the hair was pulled out the king should die4 ,when ,megara was besieged by the ,cretans1 the king's daughter ,scylla fell in love with ,minos1 their king1 and pulled out the fatal hair from her father's head4 ,so he died4 ,in a modern ,greek folk-tale a man's strength lies in three golden hairs on his head4 ,when his mother pulls them out1 he grows weak and timid and is slain by his enemies4 ,in another modern ,greek story the life of an enchanter is bound up with three doves which are in the belly of a wild boar4 ,when the first dove is killed1 the magician grows sick2 when the second is killed1 he grows very sick2 and when the third is killed1 he dies4 ,in another ,greek story of the same sort an ogre's strength is in three singing birds which are in a wild boar4 ,the hero kills two of the birds1 and then coming to the ogre's house finds him lying on the ground in great pain4 ,he shows the third bird to the ogre1 who begs that the hero will either let it fly away or give it to him to eat4 ,but the hero wrings the bird's neck1 and the ogre dies on the spot4 ,in a modern ,roman version of ,aladdin and the ,wonderful ,lamp1 the magician tells the princess1 whom he holds captive in a floating rock in mid-ocean1 that he will never die4 ,the princess reports this to the prince her husband1 who has come to rescue her4 ,the prince replies1 ,it is impossible but that there should be some one thing or other that is fatal to him2 ask him what that one fatal thing is4 ,so the princess asked the magician1 and he told her that in the wood was a hydra with seven heads2 in the middle head of the hydra was a leveret1 in the head of the leveret was a bird1 in the bird's head was a precious stone1 and if this stone were put under his pillow he would die4 ,the prince procured the stone1 and the princess laid it under the magician's pillow4 ,no sooner did the enchanter lay his head on the pillow than he gave three terrible yells1 turned himself round and round three times1 and died4 ,stories of the same sort are current among ,slavonic peoples4 ,thus a ,russian story tells how a warlock called ,koshchei the ,deathless carried off a princess and kept her prisoner in his golden castle4 ,however1 a prince made up to her one day as she was walking alone and disconsolate in the castle garden1 and cheered by the prospect of escaping with him she went to the warlock and coaxed him with false and flattering words1 saying1 ,my dearest friend1 tell me1 ,i pray you1 will you never die8 ,certainly not1 says he4 ,well1 says she1 and where is your death8 is it in your dwelling8 ,to be sure it is1 says he1 it is in the broom under the threshold4 ,thereupon the princess seized the broom and threw it on the fire1 but although the broom burned1 the deathless ,koshchei remained alive2 indeed not so much as a hair of him was singed4 ,balked in her first attempt1 the artful hussy pouted and said1 ,you do not love me true1 for you have not told me where your death is2 yet ,i am not angry1 but love you with all my heart4 ,with these fawning words she besought the warlock to tell her truly where his death was4 ,so he laughed and said1 ,why do you wish to know8 ,well then1 out of love ,i will tell you where it lies4 ,in a certain field there stand three green oaks1 and under the roots of the largest oak is a worm1 and if ever this worm is found and crushed1 that instant ,i shall die4 ,when the princess heard these words1 she went straight to her lover and told him all2 and he searched till he found the oaks and dug up the worm and crushed it4 ,then he hurried to the warlock's castle1 but only to learn from the princess that the warlock was still alive4 ,then she fell to wheedling and coaxing ,koshchei once more1 and this time1 overcome by her wiles1 he opened his heart to her and told her the truth4 ,my death1 said he1 is far from here and hard to find1 on the wide ocean4 ,in that sea is an island1 and on the island there grows a green oak1 and beneath the oak is an iron chest1 and in the chest is a small basket1 and in the basket is a hare1 and in the hare is a duck1 and in the duck is an egg2 and he who finds the egg and breaks it1 kills me at the same time4 ,the prince naturally procured the fateful egg and with it in his hands he confronted the deathless warlock4 ,the monster would have killed him1 but the prince began to squeeze the egg4 ,at that the warlock shrieked with pain1 and turning to the false princess1 who stood by smirking and smiling1 ,was it not out of love for you1 said he1 that ,i told you where my death was8 ,and is this the return you make to me8 ,with that he grabbed at his sword1 which hung from a peg on the wall2 but before he could reach it1 the prince had crushed the egg1 and sure enough the deathless warlock found his death at the same moment4 ,in one of the descriptions of ,koshchei's death1 he is said to be killed by a blow on the forehead inflicted by the mysterious egg--that last link in the magic chain by which his life is darkly bound4 ,in another version of the same story1 but told of a snake1 the fatal blow is struck by a small stone found in the yolk of an egg1 which is inside a duck1 which is inside a hare1 which is inside a stone1 which is on an island4 ,amongst peoples of the ,teutonic stock stories of the external soul are not wanting4 ,in a tale told by the ,saxons of ,transylvania it is said that a young man shot at a witch again and again4 ,the bullets went clean through her but did her no harm1 and she only laughed and mocked at him4 ,silly earthworm1 she cried1 shoot as much as you like4 ,it does me no harm4 ,for know that my life resides not in me but far1 far away4 ,in a mountain is a pond1 on the pond swims a duck1 in the duck is an egg1 in the egg burns a light1 that light is my life4 ,if you could put out that light1 my life would be at an end4 ,but that can never1 never be4 ,however1 the young man got hold of the egg1 smashed it1 and put out the light1 and with it the witch's life went out also4 ,in a ,german story a cannibal called ,body without ,soul or ,soulless keeps his soul in a box1 which stands on a rock in the middle of the ,red ,sea4 ,a soldier gets possession of the box and goes with it to ,soulless1 who begs the soldier to give him back his soul4 ,but the soldier opens the box1 takes out the soul1 and flings it backward over his head4 ,at the same moment the cannibal drops dead to the ground4 ,in another ,german story and old warlock lives with a damsel all alone in the midst of a vast and gloomy wood4 ,she fears that being old he may die and leave her alone in the forest4 ,but he reassures her4 ,dear child1 he said1 ,i cannot die1 and ,i have no heart in my breast4 ,but she importuned him to tell her where his heart was4 ,so he said1 ,far1 far from here in an unknown and lonesome land stands a great church4 ,the church is well secured with iron doors1 and round about it flows a broad deep moat4 ,in the church flies a bird and in the bird is my heart4 ,so long as the bird lives1 ,i live4 ,it cannot die of itself1 and no one can catch it2 therefore ,i cannot die1 and you need have no anxiety4 ,however the young man1 whose bride the damsel was to have been before the warlock spirited her away1 contrived to reach the church and catch the bird4 ,he brought it to the damsel1 who stowed him and it away under the warlock's bed4 ,soon the old warlock came home4 ,he was ailing1 and said so4 ,the girl wept and said1 ,alas1 daddy is dying2 he has a heart in his breast after all4 ,child1 replied the warlock1 hold your tongue4 ,i can't die4 ,it will soon pass over4 ,at that the young man under the bed gave the bird a gentle squeeze2 and as he did so1 the old warlock felt very unwell and sat down4 ,then the young man gripped the bird tighter1 and the warlock fell senseless from his chair4 ,now squeeze him dead1 cried the damsel4 ,her lover obeyed1 and when the bird was dead1 the old warlock also lay dead on the floor4 ,in the ,norse tale of the giant who had no heart in his body1 the giant tells the captive princess1 ,far1 far away in a lake lies an island1 on that island stands a church1 in that church is a well1 in that well swims a duck1 in that duck there is an egg1 and in that egg there lies my heart4 ,the hero of the tale1 with the help of some animals to whom he had been kind1 obtains the egg and squeezes it1 at which the giant screams piteously and begs for his life4 ,but the hero breaks the egg in pieces and the giant at once bursts4 ,in another ,norse story a hill-ogre tells the captive princess that she will never be able to return home unless she finds the grain of sand which lies under the ninth tongue of the ninth head of a certain dragon2 but if that grain of sand were to come over the rock in which the ogres live1 they would all burst and the rock itself would become a gilded palace1 and the lake green meadows4 ,the hero finds the grain of sand and takes it to the top of the high rock in which the ogres live4 ,so all the ogres burst and the rest falls out as one of the ogres had foretold4 ,in a ,celtic tale1 recorded in the ,west ,highlands of ,scotland1 a giant is questioned by a captive queen as to where he keeps his soul4 ,at last1 after deceiving her several times1 he confides to her the fatal secret3 ,there is a great flagstone under the threshold4 ,there is a wether under the flag4 ,there is a duck in the wether's belly1 and an egg in the belly of the duck1 and it is in the egg that my soul is4 ,on the morrow when the giant was gone1 the queen contrived to get possession of the egg and crushed it in her hands1 and at that very moment the giant1 who was coming home in the dusk1 fell down dead4 ,in another ,celtic tale1 a sea beast has carried off a king's daughter1 and an old smith declares that there is no way of killing the beast but one4 ,in the island that is in the midst of the loch is ,eillid ,chaisfhion--the white-footed hind1 of the slenderest legs1 and the swiftest step1 and though she should be caught1 there would spring a hoodie out of her1 and though the hoodie should be caught1 there would spring a trout out of her1 but there is an egg in the mouth of the trout1 and the soul of the beast is in the egg1 and if the egg breaks1 the beast is dead4 ,as usual the egg is broken and the beast dies4 ,in an ,irish story we read how a giant kept a beautiful damsel a prisoner in his castle on the top of a hill1 which was white with the bones of the champions who had tried in vain to rescue the fair captive4 ,at last the hero1 after hewing and slashing at the giant all to no purpose1 discovered that the only way to kill him was to rub a mole on the giant's right breast with a certain egg1 which was in a duck1 which was in a chest1 which lay locked and bound at the bottom of the sea4 ,with the help of some obliging animals1 the hero made himself master of the precious egg and slew the giant by merely striking it against the mole on his right breast4 ,similarly in a ,breton story there figures a giant whom neither fire nor water nor steel can harm4 ,he tells his seventh wife1 whom he has just married after murdering all her predecessors1 ,i am immortal1 and no one can hurt me unless he crushes on my breast an egg1 which is in a pigeon1 which is in the belly of a hare2 this hare is in the belly of a wolf1 and this wolf is in the belly of my brother1 who dwells a thousand leagues from here4 ,so ,i am quite easy on that score4 ,a soldier contrived to obtain the egg and crush it on the breast of the giant1 who immediately expired4 ,in another ,breton tale the life of a giant resides in an old box-tree which grows in his castle garden2 and to kill him it is necessary to sever the tap-root of the tree at a single blow of an axe without injuring any of the lesser roots4 ,this task the hero1 as usual1 successfully accomplishes1 and at the same moment the giant drops dead4 ,the notion of an external soul has now been traced in folk-tales told by ,aryan peoples from ,india to ,ireland4 ,we have still to show that the same idea occurs commonly in the popular stories of peoples who do not belong to the ,aryan stock4 ,in the ancient ,egyptian tale of ,the ,two ,brothers1 which was written down in the reign of ,rameses ,,ii41 about #acjj ,b4,c41 we read how one of the brothers enchanted his heart and placed it in the flower of an acacia tree1 and how1 when the flower was cut at the instigation of his wife1 he immediately fell down dead1 but revived when his brother found the lost heart in the berry of the acacia and threw it into a cup of fresh water4 ,in the story of ,seyf el-,mulook in the ,arabian ,nights the jinnee tells the captive daughter of the ,king of ,india1 ,when ,i was born1 the astrologers declared that the destruction of my soul would be effected by the hand of one of the sons of the human kings4 ,i therefore took my soul1 and put it into the crop of a sparrow1 and ,i imprisoned the sparrow in a little box1 and put this into another small box1 and this ,i put within seven other small boxes1 and ,i put these within seven chests1 and the chests ,i put into a coffer of marble within the verge of this circumambient ocean2 for this part is remote from the countries of mankind1 and none of mankind can gain access to it4 ,but ,seyf el-,mulook got possession of the sparrow and strangled it1 and the jinnee fell upon the ground a heap of black ashes4 ,in a ,kabyle story an ogre declares that his fate is far away in an egg1 which is in a pigeon1 which is in a camel1 which is in the sea4 ,the hero procures the egg and crushes it between his hands1 and the ogre dies4 ,in a ,magyar folk-tale1 an old witch detains a young prince called ,ambrose in the bowels of the earth4 ,at last she confided to him that she kept a wild boar in a silken meadow1 and if it were killed1 they would find a hare inside1 and inside the hare a pigeon1 and inside the pigeon a small box1 and inside the box one black and one shining beetle3 the shining beetle held her life1 and the black one held her power2 if these two beetles died1 then her life would come to an end also4 ,when the old hag went out1 ,ambrose killed the wild boar1 and took out the hare2 from the hare he took the pigeon1 from the pigeon the box1 and from the box the two beetles2 he killed the black beetle1 but kept the shining one alive4 ,so the witch's power left her immediately1 and when she came home1 she had to take to her bed4 ,having learned from her how to escape from his prison to the upper air1 ,ambrose killed the shining beetle1 and the old hag's spirit left her at once4 ,in a ,kalmuck tale we read how a certain khan challenged a wise man to show his skill by stealing a precious stone on which the khan's life depended4 ,the sage contrived to purloin the talisman while the khan and his guards slept2 but not content with this he gave a further proof of his dexterity by bonneting the slumbering potentate with a bladder4 ,this was too much for the khan4 ,next morning he informed the sage that he could overlook everything else1 but that the indignity of being bonneted with a bladder was more than he could bear2 and he ordered his facetious friend to instant execution4 ,pained at this exhibition of royal ingratitude1 the sage dashed to the ground the talisman which he still held in his hand2 and at the same instant blood flowed from the nostrils of the khan1 and he gave up the ghost4 ,in a ,tartar poem two heroes named ,ak ,molot and ,bulat engage in mortal combat4 ,ak ,molot pierces his foe through and through with an arrow1 grapples with him1 and dashes him to the ground1 but all in vain1 ,bulat could not die4 ,at last when the combat has lasted three years1 a friend of ,ak ,molot sees a golden casket hanging by a white thread from the sky1 and bethinks him that perhaps this casket contains ,bulat's soul4 ,so he shot through the white thread with an arrow1 and down fell the casket4 ,he opened it1 and in the casket sat ten white birds1 and one of the birds was ,bulat's soul4 ,bulat wept when he saw that his soul was found in the casket4 ,but one after the other the birds were killed1 and then ,ak ,molot easily slew his foe4 ,in another ,tartar poem1 two brothers going to fight two other brothers take out their souls and hide them in the form of a white herb with six stalks in a deep pit4 ,but one of their foes sees them doing so and digs up their souls1 which he puts into a golden ram's horn1 and then sticks the ram's horn in his quiver4 ,the two warriors whose souls have thus been stolen know that they have no chance of victory1 and accordingly make peace with their enemies4 ,in another ,tartar poem a terrible demon sets all the gods and heroes at defiance4 ,at last a valiant youth fights the demon1 binds him hand and foot1 and slices him with his sword4 ,but still the demon is not slain4 ,so the youth asked him1 ,tell me1 where is your soul hidden8 ,for if your soul had been hidden in your body1 you must have been dead long ago4 ,the demon replied1 ,on the saddle of my horse is a bag4 ,in the bag is a serpent with twelve heads4 ,in the serpent is my soul4 ,when you have killed the serpent1 you have killed me also4 ,so the youth took the saddle-bag from the horse and killed the twelve-headed serpent1 whereupon the demon expired4 ,in another ,tartar poem a hero called ,kk ,chan deposits with a maiden a golden ring1 in which is half his strength4 ,afterwards when ,kk ,chan is wrestling long with a hero and cannot kill him1 a woman drops into his mouth the ring which contains half his strength4 ,thus inspired with fresh force he slays his enemy4 ,in a ,mongolian story the hero ,joro gets the better of his enemy the lama ,tschoridong in the following way4 ,the lama1 who is an enchanter1 sends out his soul in the form of a wasp to sting ,joro's eyes4 ,but ,joro catches the wasp in his hand1 and by alternately shutting and opening his hand he causes the lama alternately to lose and recover consciousness4 ,in a ,tartar poem two youths cut open the body of an old witch and tear out her bowels1 but all to no purpose1 she still lives4 ,on being asked where her soul is1 she answers that it is in the middle of her shoe-sole in the form of a seven-headed speckled snake4 ,so one of the youths slices her shoe-sole with his sword1 takes out the speckled snake1 and cuts off its seven heads4 ,then the witch dies4 ,another ,tartar poem describes how the hero ,kartaga grappled with the ,swan-woman4 ,long they wrestled4 ,moons waxed and waned and still they wrestled2 years came and went1 and still the struggle went on4 ,but the piebald horse and the black horse knew that the ,swan-woman's soul was not in her4 ,under the black earth flow nine seas2 where the seas meet and form one1 the sea comes to the surface of the earth4 ,at the mouth of the nine seas rises a rock of copper2 it rises to the surface of the ground1 it rises up between heaven and earth1 this rock of copper4 ,at the foot of the copper rock is a black chest1 in the black chest is a golden casket1 and in the golden casket is the soul of the ,swan-woman4 ,seven little birds are the soul of the ,swan-woman2 if the birds are killed the ,swan-woman will die straightway4 ,so the horses ran to the foot of the copper rock1 opened the black chest1 and brought back the golden casket4 ,then the piebald horse turned himself into a bald-headed man1 opened the golden casket1 and cut off the heads of the seven birds4 ,so the ,swan-woman died4 ,in another ,tartar poem the hero1 pursuing his sister who has driven away his cattle1 is warned to desist from the pursuit because his sister has carried away his soul in a golden sword and a golden arrow1 and if he pursues her she will kill him by throwing the golden sword or shooting the golden arrow at him4 ,a ,malay poem relates how once upon a time in the city of ,indrapoora there was a certain merchant who was rich and prosperous1 but he had no children4 ,one day as he walked with his wife by the river they found a baby girl1 fair as an angel4 ,so they adopted the child and called her ,bidasari4 ,the merchant caused a golden fish to be made1 and into this fish he transferred the soul of his adopted daughter4 ,then he put the golden fish in a golden box full of water1 and hid it in a pond in the midst of his garden4 ,in time the girl grew to be a lovely woman4 ,now the ,king of ,indrapoora had a fair young queen1 who lived in fear that the king might take to himself a second wife4 ,so1 hearing of the charms of ,bidasari1 the queen resolved to put her out of the way4 ,she lured the girl to the palace and tortured her cruelly2 but ,bidasari could not die1 because her soul was not in her4 ,at last she could stand the torture no longer and said to the queen1 ,if you wish me to die1 you must bring the box which is in the pond in my father's garden4 ,so the box was brought and opened1 and there was the golden fish in the water4 ,the girl said1 ,my soul is in that fish4 ,in the morning you must take the fish out of the water1 and in the evening you must put it back into the water4 ,do not let the fish lie about1 but bind it round your neck4 ,if you do this1 ,i shall soon die4 ,so the queen took the fish out of the box and fastened it round her neck2 and no sooner had she done so than ,bidasari fell into a swoon4 ,but in the evening1 when the fish was put back into the water1 ,bidasari came to herself again4 ,seeing that she thus had the girl in her power1 the queen sent her home to her adopted parents4 ,to save her from further persecution her parents resolved to remove their daughter from the city4 ,so in a lonely and desolate spot they built a house and brought ,bidasari thither4 ,there she dwelt alone1 undergoing vicissitudes that corresponded with the vicissitudes of the golden fish in which was her soul4 ,all day long1 while the fish was out of the water1 she remained unconscious2 but in the evening1 when the fish was put into the water1 she revived4 ,one day the king was out hunting1 and coming to the house where ,bidasari lay unconscious1 was smitten with her beauty4 ,he tried to waken her1 but in vain4 ,next day1 towards evening1 he repeated his visit1 but still found her unconscious4 ,however1 when darkness fell1 she came to herself and told the king the secret of her life4 ,so the king returned to the palace1 took the fish from the queen1 and put it in water4 ,immediately ,bidasari revived1 and the king took her to wife4 ,another story of an external soul comes from ,nias1 an island to the west of ,sumatra4 ,once on a time a chief was captured by his enemies1 who tried to put him to death but failed4 ,water would not drown him nor fire burn him nor steel pierce him4 ,at last his wife revealed the secret4 ,on his head he had a hair as hard as a copper wire2 and with this wire his life was bound up4 ,so the hair was plucked out1 and with it his spirit fled4 ,a ,west ,african story from ,southern ,nigeria relates how a king kept his soul in a little brown bird1 which perched on a tall tree beside the gate of the palace4 ,the king's life was so bound up with that of the bird that whoever should kill the bird would simultaneously kill the king and succeed to the kingdom4 ,the secret was betrayed by the queen to her lover1 who shot the bird with an arrow and thereby slew the king and ascended the vacant throne4 ,a tale told by the ,ba-,ronga of ,south ,africa sets forth how the lives of a whole family were contained in one cat4 ,when a girl of the family1 named ,titishan1 married a husband1 she begged her parents to let her take the precious cat with her to her new home4 ,but they refused1 saying1 ,you know that our life is attached to it2 and they offered to give her an antelope or even an elephant instead of it4 ,but nothing would satisfy her but the cat4 ,so at last she carried it off with her and shut it up in a place where nobody saw it2 even her husband knew nothing about it4 ,one day1 when she went to work in the fields1 the cat escaped from its place of concealment1 entered the hut1 put on the warlike trappings of the husband1 and danced and sang4 ,some children1 attracted by the noise1 discovered the cat at its antics1 and when they expressed their astonishment1 the animal only capered the more and insulted them besides4 ,so they went to the owner and said1 ,there is somebody dancing in your house1 and he insulted us4 ,hold your tongues1 said he1 ,i'll soon put a stop to your lies4 ,so he went and hid behind the door and peeped in1 and there sure enough was the cat prancing about and singing4 ,he fired at it1 and the animal dropped down dead4 ,at the same moment his wife fell to the ground in the field where she was at work2 said she1 ,i have been killed at home4 ,but she had strength enough left to ask her husband to go with her to her parents' village1 taking with him the dead cat wrapt up in a mat4 ,all her relatives assembled1 and bitterly they reproached her for having insisted on taking the animal with her to her husband's village4 ,as soon as the mat was unrolled and they saw the dead cat1 they all fell down lifeless one after the other4 ,so the ,clan of the ,cat was destroyed2 and the bereaved husband closed the gate of the village with a branch1 and returned home1 and told his friends how in killing the cat he had killed the whole clan1 because their lives depended on the life of the cat4 ,ideas of the same sort meet us in stories told by the ,north ,american ,indians4 ,thus the ,navajoes tell of a certain mythical being called the ,maiden that becomes a ,bear1 who learned the art of turning herself into a bear from the prairie wolf4 ,she was a great warrior and quite invulnerable2 for when she went to war she took out her vital organs and hid them1 so that no one could kill her2 and when the battle was over she put the organs back in their places again4 ,the ,kwakiutl ,indians of ,british ,columbia tell of an ogress1 who could not be killed because her life was in a hemlock branch4 ,a brave boy met her in the woods1 smashed her head with a stone1 scattered her brains1 broke her bones1 and threw them into the water4 ,then1 thinking he had disposed of the ogress1 he went into her house4 ,there he saw a woman rooted to the floor1 who warned him1 saying1 ,now do not stay long4 ,i know that you have tried to kill the ogress4 ,it is the fourth time that somebody has tried to kill her4 ,she never dies2 she has nearly come to life4 ,there in that covered hemlock branch is her life4 ,go there1 and as soon as you see her enter1 shoot her life4 ,then she will be dead4 ,hardly had she finished speaking when sure enough in came the ogress1 singing as she walked4 ,but the boy shot at her life1 and she fell dead to the floor4 ,,lxvii4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,folk-,custom #a4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,inanimate ,things ,,thus the idea that the soul may be deposited for a longer or shorter time in some place of security outside the body1 or at all events in the hair1 is found in the popular tales of many races4 ,it remains to show that the idea is not a mere figment devised to adorn a tale1 but is a real article of primitive faith1 which has given rise to a corresponding set of customs4 ,we have seen that in the tales the hero1 as a preparation for battle1 sometimes removes his soul from his body1 in order that his body may be invulnerable and immortal in the combat4 ,with a like intention the savage removes his soul from his body on various occasions of real or imaginary peril4 ,thus among the people of ,minahassa in ,celebes1 when a family moves into a new house1 a priest collects the souls of the whole family in a bag1 and afterwards restores them to their owners1 because the moment of entering a new house is supposed to be fraught with supernatural danger4 ,in ,southern ,celebes1 when a woman is brought to bed1 the messenger who fetches the doctor or the midwife always carries with him something made of iron1 such as a chopping-knife1 which he delivers to the doctor4 ,the doctor must keep the thing in his house till the confinement is over1 when he gives it back1 receiving a fixed sum of money for doing so4 ,the chopping-knife1 or whatever it is1 represents the woman's soul1 which at this critical time is believed to be safer out of her body than in it4 ,hence the doctor must take great care of the object2 for were it lost1 the woman's soul would assuredly1 they think1 be lost with it4 ,among the ,dyaks of ,pinoeh1 a district of ,south-eastern ,borneo1 when a child is born1 a medicine-man is sent for1 who conjures the soul of the infant into half a coco-nut1 which he thereupon covers with a cloth and places on a square platter or charger suspended by cords from the roof4 ,this ceremony he repeats at every new moon for a year4 ,the intention of the ceremony is not explained by the writer who describes it1 but we may conjecture that it is to place the soul of the child in a safer place than its own frail little body4 ,this conjecture is confirmed by the reason assigned for a similar custom observed elsewhere in the ,indian ,archipelago4 ,in the ,kei ,islands1 when there is a newly-born child in a house1 an empty coco-nut1 split and spliced together again1 may sometimes be seen hanging beside a rough wooden image of an ancestor4 ,the soul of the infant is believed to be temporarily deposited in the coco-nut in order that it may be safe from the attacks of evil spirits2 but when the child grows bigger and stronger1 the soul will take up its permanent abode in its own body4 ,similarly among the ,esquimaux of ,alaska1 when a child is sick1 the medicine-man will sometimes extract its soul from its body and place it for safe-keeping in an amulet1 which for further security he deposits in his own medicine-bag4 ,it seems probable that many amulets have been similarly regarded as soul-boxes1 that is1 as safes in which the souls of the owners are kept for greater security4 ,an old ,mang'anje woman in the ,west ,shire district of ,british ,central ,africa used to wear round her neck an ivory ornament1 hollow1 and about three inches long1 which she called her life or soul4 ,naturally1 she would not part with it2 a planter tried to buy it of her1 but in vain4 ,when ,mr4 ,james ,macdonald was one day sitting in the house of a ,hlubi chief1 awaiting the appearance of that great man1 who was busy decorating his person1 a native pointed to a pair of magnificent ox-horns1 and said1 ,ntame has his soul in these horns4 ,the horns were those of an animal which had been sacrificed1 and they were held sacred4 ,a magician had fastened them to the roof to protect the house and its inmates from the thunder-bolt4 ,the idea1 adds ,mr4 ,macdonald1 is in no way foreign to ,south ,african thought4 ,a man's soul there may dwell in the roof of his house1 in a tree1 by a spring of water1 or on some mountain scaur4 ,among the natives of the ,gazelle ,peninsula in ,new ,britain there is a secret society which goes by the name of ,ingniet or ,ingiet4 ,on his entrance into it every man receives a stone in the shape either of a human being or of an animal1 and henceforth his soul is believed to be knit up in a manner with the stone4 ,if it breaks1 it is an evil omen for him2 they say that the thunder has struck the stone and that he who owns it will soon die4 ,if nevertheless the man survives the breaking of his soul-stone1 they say that it was not a proper soul-stone and he gets a new one instead4 ,the emperor ,romanus ,lecapenus was once informed by an astronomer that the life of ,simeon1 prince of ,bulgaria1 was bound up with a certain column in ,constantinople1 so that if the capital of the column were removed1 ,simeon would immediately die4 ,the emperor took the hint and removed the capital1 and at the same hour1 as the emperor learned by enquiry1 ,simeon died of heart disease in ,bulgaria4 ,again1 we have seen that in folk-tales a man's soul or strength is sometimes represented as bound up with his hair1 and that when his hair is cut off he dies or grows weak4 ,so the natives of ,amboyna used to think that their strength was in their hair and would desert them if it were shorn4 ,a criminal under torture in a ,dutch ,court of that island persisted in denying his guilt till his hair was cut off1 when he immediately confessed4 ,one man1 who was tried for murder1 endured without flinching the utmost ingenuity of his torturers till he saw the surgeon standing with a pair of shears4 ,on asking what this was for1 and being told that it was to cut his hair1 he begged they would not do it1 and made a clean breast4 ,in subsequent cases1 when torture failed to wring a confession from a prisoner1 the ,dutch authorities made a practice of cutting off his hair4 ,here in ,europe it used to be thought that the maleficent powers of witches and wizards resided in their hair1 and that nothing could make any impression on the miscreants so long as they kept their hair on4 ,hence in ,france it was customary to shave the whole bodies of persons charged with sorcery before handing them over to the torturer4 ,millaeus witnessed the torture of some persons at ,toulouse1 from whom no confession could be wrung until they were stripped and completely shaven1 when they readily acknowledged the truth of the charge4 ,a woman also1 who apparently led a pious life1 was put to the torture on suspicion of witchcraft1 and bore her agonies with incredible constancy1 until complete depilation drove her to admit her guilt4 ,the noted inquisitor ,sprenger contented himself with shaving the head of the suspected witch or wizard2 but his more thoroughgoing colleague ,cumanus shaved the whole bodies of forty-seven women before committing them all to the flames4 ,he had high authority for this rigorous scrutiny1 since ,satan himself1 in a sermon preached from the pulpit of ,north ,berwick church1 comforted his many servants by assuring them that no harm could befall them sa lang as their hair wes on1 and sould newir latt ane teir fall fra thair ene4 ,similarly in ,bastar1 a province of ,india1 if a man is adjudged guilty of witchcraft1 he is beaten by the crowd1 his hair is shaved1 the hair being supposed to constitute his power of mischief1 his front teeth are knocked out1 in order1 it is said1 to prevent him from muttering incantations4 4 4 4 ,women suspected of sorcery have to undergo the same ordeal2 if found guilty1 the same punishment is awarded1 and after being shaved1 their hair is attached to a tree in some public place4 ,so among the ,bhils of ,india1 when a woman was convicted of witchcraft and had been subjected to various forms of persuasion1 such as hanging head downwards from a tree and having pepper put into her eyes1 a lock of hair was cut from her head and buried in the ground1 that the last link between her and her former powers of mischief might be broken4 ,in like manner among the ,aztecs of ,mexico1 when wizards and witches had done their evil deeds1 and the time came to put an end to their detestable life1 some one laid hold of them and cropped the hair on the crown of their heads1 which took from them all their power of sorcery and enchantment1 and then it was that by death they put an end to their odious existence4 #b4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,plants ,,further it has been shown that in folk-tales the life of a person is sometimes so bound up with the life of a plant that the withering of the plant will immediately follow or be followed by the death of the person4 ,among the ,m',bengas in ,western ,africa1 about the ,gaboon1 when two children are born on the same day1 the people plant two trees of the same kind and dance round them4 ,the life of each of the children is believed to be bound up with the life of one of the trees2 and if the tree dies or is thrown down1 they are sure that the child will soon die4 ,in the ,cameroons1 also1 the life of a person is believed to be sympathetically bound up with that of a tree4 ,the chief of ,old ,town in ,calabar kept his soul in a sacred grove near a spring of water4 ,when some ,europeans1 in frolic or ignorance1 cut down part of the grove1 the spirit was most indignant and threatened the perpetrators of the deed1 according to the king1 with all manner of evil4 ,some of the ,papuans unite the life of a new-born babe sympathetically with that of a tree by driving a pebble into the bark of the tree4 ,this is supposed to give them complete mastery over the child's life2 if the tree is cut down1 the child will die4 ,after a birth the ,maoris used to bury the navel-string in a sacred place and plant a young sapling over it4 ,as the tree grew1 it was a tohu oranga or sign of life for the child2 if it flourished1 the child would prosper2 if it withered and died1 the parents augured the worst for the little one4 ,in some parts of ,fiji the navel-string of a male infant is planted together with a coco-nut or the slip of a breadfruit-tree1 and the child's life is supposed to be intimately connected with that of the tree4 ,amongst the ,dyaks of ,landak and ,tajan1 districts of ,dutch ,borneo1 it is customary to plant a fruit-tree for a baby1 and henceforth in the popular belief the fate of the child is bound up with that of the tree4 ,if the tree shoots up rapidly1 it will go well with the child2 but if the tree is dwarfed or shrivelled1 nothing but misfortune can be expected for its human counterpart4 ,it is said that there are still families in ,russia1 ,germany1 ,england1 ,france1 and ,italy who are accustomed to plant a tree at the birth of a child4 ,the tree1 it is hoped1 will grow with the child1 and it is tended with special care4 ,the custom is still pretty general in the canton of ,aargau in ,switzerland2 an apple-tree is planted for a boy and a pear-tree for a girl1 and the people think that the child will flourish or dwindle with the tree4 ,in ,mecklenburg the afterbirth is thrown out at the foot of a young tree1 and the child is then believed to grow with the tree4 ,near the ,castle of ,dalhousie1 not far from ,edinburgh1 there grows an oak-tree1 called the ,edgewell ,tree1 which is popularly believed to be linked to the fate of the family by a mysterious tie2 for they say that when one of the family dies1 or is about to die1 a branch falls from the ,edgewell ,tree4 ,thus1 on seeing a great bough drop from the tree on a quiet1 still day in ,july #ahgd1 an old forester exclaimed1 ,the laird's deid noo6 and soon after news came that ,fox ,maule1 eleventh ,earl of ,dalhousie1 was dead4 ,in ,england children are sometimes passed through a cleft ash-tree as a cure for rupture or rickets1 and thenceforward a sympathetic connexion is supposed to exist between them and the tree4 ,an ash-tree which had been used for this purpose grew at the edge of ,shirley ,heath1 on the road from ,hockly ,house to ,birmingham4 ,thomas ,chillingworth1 son of the owner of an adjoining farm1 now about thirty-four1 was1 when an infant of a year old1 passed through a similar tree1 now perfectly sound1 which he preserves with so much care that he will not suffer a single branch to be touched1 for it is believed the life of the patient depends on the life of the tree1 and the moment that is cut down1 be the patient ever so distant1 the rupture returns1 and a mortification ensues1 and terminates in death1 as was the case in a man driving a waggon on the very road in question4 ,it is not uncommon1 however1 adds the writer1 for persons to survive for a time the felling of the tree4 ,the ordinary mode of effecting the cure is to split a young ash-sapling longitudinally for a few feet and pass the child1 naked1 either three times or three times three through the fissure at sunrise4 ,in the ,west of ,england it is said that the passage should be against the sun4 ,as soon as the ceremony has been performed1 the tree is bound tightly up and the fissure plastered over with mud or clay4 ,the belief is that just as the cleft in the tree closes up1 so the rupture in the child's body will be healed2 but that if the rift in the tree remains open1 the rupture in the child will remain too1 and if the tree were to die1 the death of the child would surely follow4 ,a similar cure for various diseases1 but especially for rupture and rickets1 has been commonly practised in other parts of ,europe1 as ,germany1 ,france1 ,denmark1 and ,sweden2 but in these countries the tree employed for the purpose is usually not an ash but an oak2 sometimes a willow-tree is allowed or even prescribed instead4 ,in ,mecklenburg1 as in ,england1 the sympathetic relation thus established between the tree and the child is believed to be so close that if the tree is cut down the child will die4 #c4 ,the ,external ,soul in ,animals ,,but in practice1 as in folk-tales1 it is not merely with inanimate objects and plants that a person is occasionally believed to be united by a bond of physical sympathy4 ,the same bond1 it is supposed1 may exist between a man and an animal1 so that the welfare of the one depends on the welfare of the other1 and when the animal dies the man dies also4 ,the analogy between the custom and the tales is all the closer because in both of them the power of thus removing the soul from the body and stowing it away in an animal is often a special privilege of wizards and witches4 ,thus the ,yakuts of ,siberia believe that every shaman or wizard keeps his soul1 or one of his souls1 incarnate in an animal which is carefully concealed from all the world4 ,nobody can find my external soul1 said one famous wizard1 it lies hidden far away in the stony mountains of ,edzhigansk4 ,only once a year1 when the last snows melt and the earth turns black1 do these external souls of wizards appear in the shape of animals among the dwellings of men4 ,they wander everywhere1 yet none but wizards can see them4 ,the strong ones sweep roaring and noisily along1 the weak steal about quietly and furtively4 ,often they fight1 and then the wizard whose external soul is beaten1 falls ill or dies4 ,the weakest and most cowardly wizards are they whose souls are incarnate in the shape of dogs1 for the dog gives his human double no peace1 but gnaws his heart and tears his body4 ,the most powerful wizards are they whose external souls have the shape of stallions1 elks1 black bears1 eagles1 or boars4 ,again1 the ,samoyeds of the ,turukhinsk region hold that every shaman has a familiar spirit in the shape of a boar1 which he leads about by a magic belt4 ,on the death of the boar the shaman himself dies2 and stories are told of battles between wizards1 who send their spirits to fight before they encounter each other in person4 ,the ,malays believe that the soul of a person may pass into another person or into an animal1 or rather that such a mysterious relation can arise between the two that the fate of the one is wholly dependent on that of the other4 ,among the ,melanesians of ,mota1 one of the ,new ,hebrides islands1 the conception of an external soul is carried out in the practice of daily life4 ,in the ,mota language the word tamaniu signifies something animate or inanimate which a man has come to believe to have an existence intimately connected with his own4 4 4 4 ,it was not every one in ,mota who had his tamaniu2 only some men fancied that they had this relation to a lizard1 a snake1 or it might be a stone2 sometimes the thing was sought for and found by drinking the infusion of certain leaves and heaping together the dregs2 then whatever living thing was first seen in or upon the heap was the tamaniu4 ,it was watched but not fed or worshipped2 the natives believed that it came at call1 and that the life of the man was bound up with the life of his tamaniu1 if a living thing1 or with its safety2 should it die1 or if not living get broken or be lost1 the man would die4 ,hence in case of sickness they would send to see if the tamaniu was safe and well4 ,the theory of an external soul deposited in an animal appears to be very prevalent in ,west ,africa1 particularly in ,nigeria1 the ,cameroons1 and the ,gaboon4 ,among the ,fans of the ,gaboon every wizard is believed at initiation to unite his life with that of some particular wild animal by a rite of blood-brotherhood2 he draws blood from the ear of the animal and from his own arm1 and inoculates the animal with his own blood1 and himself with the blood of the beast4 ,henceforth such an intimate union is established between the two that the death of the one entails the death of the other4 ,the alliance is thought to bring to the wizard or sorcerer a great accession of power1 which he can turn to his advantage in various ways4 ,in the first place1 like the warlock in the fairy tales who has deposited his life outside of himself in some safe place1 the ,fan wizard now deems himself invulnerable4 ,moreover1 the animal with which he has exchanged blood has become his familiar1 and will obey any orders he may choose to give it2 so he makes use of it to injure and kill his enemies4 ,for that reason the creature with whom he establishes the relation of blood-brotherhood is never a tame or domestic animal1 but always a ferocious and dangerous wild beast1 such as a leopard1 a black serpent1 a crocodile1 a hippopotamus1 a wild boar1 or a vulture4 ,of all these creatures the leopard is by far the commonest familiar of ,fan wizards1 and next to it comes the black serpent2 the vulture is the rarest4 ,witches as well as wizards have their familiars2 but the animals with which the lives of women are thus bound up generally differ from those to which men commit their external souls4 ,a witch never has a panther for her familiar1 but often a venomous species of serpent1 sometimes a horned viper1 sometimes a black serpent1 sometimes a green one that lives in banana-trees2 or it may be a vulture1 an owl1 or other bird of night4 ,in every case the beast or bird with which the witch or wizard has contracted this mystic alliance is an individual1 never a species2 and when the individual animal dies the alliance is naturally at an end1 since the death of the animal is supposed to entail the death of the man4 ,similar beliefs are held by the natives of the ,cross ,river valley within the provinces of the ,cameroons4 ,groups of people1 generally the inhabitants of a village1 have chosen various animals1 with which they believe themselves to stand on a footing of intimate friendship or relationship4 ,amongst such animals are hippopotamuses1 elephants1 leopards1 crocodiles1 gorillas1 fish1 and serpents1 all of them creatures which are either very strong or can easily hide themselves in the water or a thicket4 ,this power of concealing themselves is said to be an indispensable condition of the choice of animal familiars1 since the animal friend or helper is expected to injure his owner's enemy by stealth2 for example1 if he is a hippopotamus1 he will bob up suddenly out of the water and capsize the enemy's canoe4 ,between the animals and their human friends or kinsfolk such a sympathetic relation is supposed to exist that the moment the animal dies the man dies also1 and similarly the instant the man perishes so does the beast4 ,from this it follows that the animal kinsfolk may never be shot at or molested for fear of injuring or killing the persons whose lives are knit up with the lives of the brutes4 ,this does not1 however1 prevent the people of a village1 who have elephants for their animal friends1 from hunting elephants4 ,for they do not respect the whole species but merely certain individuals of it1 which stand in an intimate relation to certain individual men and women2 and they imagine that they can always distinguish these brother elephants from the common herd of elephants which are mere elephants and nothing more4 ,the recognition indeed is said to be mutual4 ,when a hunter1 who has an elephant for his friend1 meets a human elephant1 as we may call it1 the noble animal lifts up a paw and holds it before his face1 as much as to say1 ,don't shoot4 ,were the hunter so inhuman as to fire on and wound such an elephant1 the person whose life was bound up with the elephant would fall ill4 ,the ,balong of the ,cameroons think that every man has several souls1 of which one is in his body and another in an animal1 such as an elephant1 a wild pig1 a leopard1 and so forth4 ,when a man comes home1 feeling ill1 and says1 ,i shall soon die1 and dies accordingly1 the people aver that one of his souls has been killed in a wild pig or a leopard and that the death of the external soul has caused the death of the soul in his body4 ,a similar belief in the external souls of living people is entertained by the ,ibos1 an important tribe of the ,niger delta4 ,they think that a man's spirit can quit his body for a time during life and take up its abode in an animal4 ,a man who wishes to acquire this power procures a certain drug from a wise man and mixes it with his food4 ,after that his soul goes out and enters into an animal4 ,if it should happen that the animal is killed while the man's soul is lodged in it1 the man dies2 and if the animal be wounded1 the man's body will presently be covered with boils4 ,this belief instigates to many deeds of darkness2 for a sly rogue will sometimes surreptitiously administer the magical drug to his enemy in his food1 and having thus smuggled the other's soul into an animal will destroy the creature1 and with it the man whose soul is lodged in it4 ,the negroes of ,calabar1 at the mouth of the ,niger1 believe that every person has four souls1 one of which always lives outside of his or her body in the form of a wild beast in the forest4 ,this external soul1 or bush soul1 as ,miss ,kingsley calls it1 may be almost any animal1 for example1 a leopard1 a fish1 or a tortoise2 but it is never a domestic animal and never a plant4 ,unless he is gifted with second sight1 a man cannot see his own bush soul1 but a diviner will often tell him what sort of creature his bush soul is1 and after that the man will be careful not to kill any animal of that species1 and will strongly object to any one else doing so4 ,a man and his sons have usually the same sort of animals for their bush souls1 and so with a mother and her daughters4 ,but sometimes all the children of a family take after the bush soul of their father2 for example1 if his external soul is a leopard1 all his sons and daughters will have leopards for their external souls4 ,and on the other hand1 sometimes they all take after their mother2 for instance1 if her external soul is a tortoise1 all the external souls of her sons and daughters will be tortoises too4 ,so intimately bound up is the life of the man with that of the animal which he regards as his external or bush soul1 that the death or injury of the animal necessarily entails the death or injury of the man4 ,and1 conversely1 when the man dies1 his bush soul can no longer find a place of rest1 but goes mad and rushes into the fire or charges people and is knocked on the head1 and that is an end of it4 ,near ,eket in ,north ,calabar there is a sacred lake1 the fish of which are carefully preserved because the people believe that their own souls are lodged in the fish1 and that with every fish killed a human life would be simultaneously extinguished4 ,in the ,calabar ,river not very many years ago there used to be a huge old crocodile1 popularly supposed to contain the external soul of a chief who resided in the flesh at ,duke ,town4 ,sporting vice-consuls used from time to time to hunt the animal1 and once an officer contrived to hit it4 ,forthwith the chief was laid up with a wound in his leg4 ,he gave out that a dog had bitten him1 but no doubt the wise shook their heads and refused to be put off with so flimsy a pretext4 ,again1 among several tribes on the banks of the ,niger between ,lokoja and the delta there prevails a belief in the possibility of a man possessing an alter ego in the form of some animal such as a crocodile or a hippopotamus4 ,it is believed that such a person's life is bound up with that of the animal to such an extent that1 whatever affects the one produces a corresponding impression upon the other1 and that if one dies the other must speedily do so too4 ,it happened not very long ago that an ,englishman shot a hippopotamus close to a native village2 the friends of a woman who died the same night in the village demanded and eventually obtained five pounds as compensation for the murder of the woman4 ,amongst the ,zapotecs of ,central ,america1 when a woman was about to be confined1 her relations assembled in the hut1 and began to draw on the floor figures of different animals1 rubbing each one out as soon as it was completed4 ,this went on till the moment of birth1 and the figure that then remained sketched upon the ground was called the child's tona or second self4 ,when the child grew old enough1 he procured the animal that represented him and took care of it1 as it was believed that health and existence were bound up with that of the animal's1 in fact that the death of both would occur simultaneously1 or rather that when the animal died the man would die too4 ,among the ,indians of ,guatemala and ,honduras the nagual or naual is that animate or inanimate object1 generally an animal1 which stands in a parallel relation to a particular man1 so that the weal and woe of the man depend on the fate of the nagual4 ,according to an old writer1 many ,indians of ,guatemala are deluded by the devil to believe that their life dependeth upon the life of such and such a beast 7which they take unto them as their familiar spirit71 and think that when that beast dieth they must die2 when he is chased1 their hearts pant2 when he is faint1 they are faint2 nay1 it happeneth that by the devil's delusion they appear in the shape of that beast 7which commonly by their choice is a buck1 or doe1 a lion1 or tigre1 or dog1 or eagle7 and in that shape have been shot at and wounded4 ,the ,indians were persuaded that the death of their nagual would entail their own4 ,legend affirms that in the first battles with the ,spaniards on the plateau of ,quetzaltenango the naguals of the ,indian chiefs fought in the form of serpents4 ,the nagual of the highest chief was especially conspicuous1 because it had the form of a great bird1 resplendent in green plumage4 ,the ,spanish general ,pedro de ,alvarado killed the bird with his lance1 and at the same moment the ,indian chief fell dead to the ground4 ,in many tribes of ,south-,eastern ,australia each sex used to regard a particular species of animals in the same way that a ,central ,american ,indian regarded his nagual1 but with this difference1 that whereas the ,indian apparently knew the individual animal with which his life was bound up1 the ,australians only knew that each of their lives was bound up with some one animal of the species1 but they could not say with which4 ,the result naturally was that every man spared and protected all the animals of the species with which the lives of the men were bound up2 and every woman spared and protected all the animals of the species with which the lives of the women were bound up2 because no one knew but that the death of any animal of the respective species might entail his or her own2 just as the killing of the green bird was immediately followed by the death of the ,indian chief1 and the killing of the parrot by the death of ,punchkin in the fairy tale4 ,thus1 for example1 the ,wotjobaluk tribe of ,south-,eastern ,australia held that 'the life of ,ngunungunut 7the ,bat7 is the life of a man1 and the life of ,yrtatgurk 7the ,nightjar7 is the life of a woman1' and that when either of these creatures is killed the life of some man or of some woman is shortened4 ,in such a case every man or every woman in the camp feared that he or she might be the victim1 and from this cause great fights arose in this tribe4 ,i learn that in these fights1 men on one side and women on the other1 it was not at all certain which would be victorious1 for at times the women gave the men a severe drubbing with their yamsticks1 while often women were injured or killed by spears4 ,the ,wotjobaluk said that the bat was the man's brother and that the nightjar was his wife4 ,the particular species of animals with which the lives of the sexes were believed to be respectively bound up varied somewhat from tribe to tribe4 ,thus whereas among the ,wotjobaluk the bat was the animal of the men1 at ,gunbower ,creek on the ,lower ,murray the bat seems to have been the animal of the women1 for the natives would not kill it for the reason that if it was killed1 one of their lubras women would be sure to die in consequence4 ,but whatever the particular sorts of creature with which the lives of men and women were believed to be bound up1 the belief itself and the fights to which it gave rise are known to have prevailed over a large part of ,south-,eastern ,australia1 and probably they extended much farther4 ,the belief was a very serious one1 and so consequently were the fights which sprang from it4 ,thus among some tribes of ,victoria the common bat belongs to the men1 who protect it against injury1 even to the half-killing of their wives for its sake4 ,the fern owl1 or large goatsucker1 belongs to the women1 and1 although a bird of evil omen1 creating terror at night by its cry1 it is jealously protected by them4 ,if a man kills one1 they are as much enraged as if it was one of their children1 and will strike him with their long poles4 ,the jealous protection thus afforded by ,australian men and women to bats and owls respectively 7for bats and owls seem to be the creatures usually allotted to the two sexes7 is not based upon purely selfish considerations4 ,for each man believes that not only his own life but the lives of his father1 brothers1 sons1 and so on are bound up with the lives of particular bats1 and that therefore in protecting the bat species he is protecting the lives of all his male relations as well as his own4 ,similarly1 each woman believes that the lives of her mother1 sisters1 daughters1 and so forth1 equally with her own1 are bound up with the lives of particular owls1 and that in guarding the owl species she is guarding the lives of all her female relations besides her own4 ,now1 when men's lives are thus supposed to be contained in certain animals1 it is obvious that the animals can hardly be distinguished from the men1 or the men from the animals4 ,if my brother ,john's life is in a bat1 then1 on the one hand1 the bat is my brother as well as ,john2 and1 on the other hand1 ,john is in a sense a bat1 since his life is in a bat4 ,similarly1 if my sister ,mary's life is in an owl1 then the owl is my sister and ,mary is an owl4 ,this is a natural enough conclusion1 and the ,australians have not failed to draw it4 ,when the bat is the man's animal1 it is called his brother2 and when the owl is the woman's animal1 it is called her sister4 ,and conversely a man addresses a woman as an owl1 and she addresses him as a bat4 ,so with the other animals allotted to the sexes respectively in other tribes4 ,for example1 among the ,kurnai all emu-wrens were brothers of the men1 and all the men were emu-wrens2 all superb warblers were sisters of the women1 and all the women were superb warblers4 ,but when a savage names himself after an animal1 calls it his brother1 and refuses to kill it1 the animal is said to be his totem4 ,accordingly in the tribes of ,south-,eastern ,australia which we have been considering the bat and the owl1 the emu-wren and the superb warbler1 may properly be described as totems of the sexes4 ,but the assignation of a totem to a sex is comparatively rare1 and has hitherto been discovered nowhere but in ,australia4 ,far more commonly the totem is appropriated not to a sex1 but to a clan1 and is hereditary either in the male or female line4 ,the relation of an individual to the clan totem does not differ in kind from his relation to the sex totem2 he will not kill it1 he speaks of it as his brother1 and he calls himself by its name4 ,now if the relations are similar1 the explanation which holds good of the one ought equally to hold good of the other4 ,therefore1 the reason why a clan revere a particular species of animals or plants 7for the clan totem may be a plant7 and call themselves after it1 would seem to be a belief that the life of each individual of the clan is bound up with some one animal or plant of the species1 and that his or her death would be the consequence of killing that particular animal1 or destroying that particular plant4 ,this explanation of totemism squares very well with ,sir ,george ,grey's definition of a totem or kobong in ,western ,australia4 ,he says3 ,a certain mysterious connexion exists between a family and its kobong1 so that a member of the family will never kill an animal of the species to which his kobong belongs1 should he find it asleep2 indeed he always kills it reluctantly1 and never without affording it a chance to escape4 ,this arises from the family belief that some one individual of the species is their nearest friend1 to kill whom would be a great crime1 and to be carefully avoided4 ,similarly1 a native who has a vegetable for his kobong may not gather it under certain circumstances1 and at a particular period of the year4 ,here it will be observed that though each man spares all the animals or plants of the species1 they are not all equally precious to him2 far from it1 out of the whole species there is only one which is specially dear to him2 but as he does not know which the dear one is1 he is obliged to spare them all from fear of injuring the one4 ,again1 this explanation of the clan totem harmonises with the supposed effect of killing one of the totem species4 ,one day one of the blacks killed a crow4 ,three or four days afterwards a ,boortwa 7crow7 i4e4 a man of the ,crow clan named ,larry died4 ,he had been ailing for some days1 but the killing of his wingong totem hastened his death4 ,here the killing of the crow caused the death of a man of the ,crow clan1 exactly as1 in the case of the sex-totems1 the killing of a bat causes the death of a ,bat-man or the killing of an owl causes the death of an ,owl-woman4 ,similarly1 the killing of his nagual causes the death of a ,central ,american ,indian1 the killing of his bush soul causes the death of a ,calabar negro1 the killing of his tamaniu causes the death of a ,banks ,islander1 and the killing of the animal in which his life is stowed away causes the death of the giant or warlock in the fairy tale4 ,thus it appears that the story of ,the giant who had no heart in his body may perhaps furnish the key to the relation which is supposed to subsist between a man and his totem4 ,the totem1 on this theory1 is simply the receptacle in which a man keeps his life1 as ,punchkin kept his life in a parrot1 and ,bidasari kept her soul in a golden fish4 ,it is no valid objection to this view that when a savage has both a sex totem and a clan totem his life must be bound up with two different animals1 the death of either of which would entail his own4 ,if a man has more vital places than one in his body1 why1 the savage may think1 should he not have more vital places than one outside it8 ,why1 since he can put his life outside himself1 should he not transfer one portion of it to one animal and another to another8 ,the divisibility of life1 or1 to put it otherwise1 the plurality of souls1 is an idea suggested by many familiar facts1 and has commended itself to philosophers like ,plato1 as well as to savages4 ,it is only when the notion of a soul1 from being a quasi-scientific hypothesis1 becomes a theological dogma that its unity and indivisibility are insisted upon as essential4 ,the savage1 unshackled by dogma1 is free to explain the facts of life by the assumption of as many souls as he thinks necessary4 ,hence1 for example1 the ,caribs supposed that there was one soul in the head1 another in the heart1 and other souls at all the places where an artery is felt pulsating4 ,some of the ,hidatsa ,indians explain the phenomena of gradual death1 when the extremities appear dead first1 by supposing that man has four souls1 and that they quit the body1 not simultaneously1 but one after the other1 dissolution being only complete when all four have departed4 ,some of the ,dyaks of ,borneo and the ,malays of the ,peninsula believe that every man has seven souls4 ,the ,alfoors of ,poso in ,celebes are of opinion that he has three4 ,the natives of ,laos suppose that the body is the seat of thirty spirits1 which reside in the hands1 the feet1 the mouth1 the eyes1 and so on4 ,hence1 from the primitive point of view1 it is perfectly possible that a savage should have one soul in his sex totem and another in his clan totem4 ,however1 as ,i have observed1 sex totems have been found nowhere but in ,australia2 so that as a rule the savage who practises totemism need not have more than one soul out of his body at a time4 ,if this explanation of the totem as a receptacle in which a man keeps his soul or one of his souls is correct1 we should expect to find some totemic people of whom it is expressly said that every man amongst them is believed to keep at least one soul permanently out of his body1 and that the destruction of this external soul is supposed to entail the death of its owner4 ,such a people are the ,bataks of ,sumatra4 ,the ,bataks are divided into exogamous clans 7margas7 with descent in the male line2 and each clan is forbidden to eat the flesh of a particular animal4 ,one clan may not eat the tiger1 another the ape1 another the crocodile1 another the dog1 another the cat1 another the dove1 another the white buffalo1 and another the locust4 ,the reason given by members of a clan for abstaining from the flesh of the particular animal is either that they are descended from animals of that species1 and that their souls after death may transmigrate into the animals1 or that they or their forefathers have been under certain obligations to the creatures4 ,sometimes1 but not always1 the clan bears the name of the animal4 ,thus the ,bataks have totemism in full4 ,but1 further1 each ,batak believes that he has seven or1 on a more moderate computation1 three souls4 ,one of these souls is always outside the body1 but nevertheless whenever it dies1 however far away it may be at the time1 that same moment the man dies also4 ,the writer who mentions this belief says nothing about the ,batak totems2 but on the analogy of the ,australian1 ,central ,american1 and ,african evidence we may conjecture that the external soul1 whose death entails the death of the man1 is housed in the totemic animal or plant4 ,against this view it can hardly be thought to militate that the ,batak does not in set terms affirm his external soul to be in his totem1 but alleges other grounds for respecting the sacred animal or plant of his clan4 ,for if a savage seriously believes that his life is bound up with an external object1 it is in the last degree unlikely that he will let any stranger into the secret4 ,in all that touches his inmost life and beliefs the savage is exceedingly suspicious and reserved2 ,europeans have resided among savages for years without discovering some of their capital articles of faith1 and in the end the discovery has often been the result of accident4 ,above all1 the savage lives in an intense and perpetual dread of assassination by sorcery2 the most trifling relics of his person--the clippings of his hair and nails1 his spittle1 the remnants of his food1 his very name--all these may1 he fancies1 be turned by the sorcerer to his destruction1 and he is therefore anxiously careful to conceal or destroy them4 ,but if in matters such as these1 which are but the outposts and outworks of his life1 he is so shy and secretive1 how close must be the concealment1 how impenetrable the reserve in which he enshrouds the inner keep and citadel of his being6 ,when the princess in the fairy tale asks the giant where he keeps his soul1 he often gives false or evasive answers1 and it is only after much coaxing and wheedling that the secret is at last wrung from him4 ,in his jealous reticence the giant resembles the timid and furtive savage2 but whereas the exigencies of the story demand that the giant should at last reveal his secret1 no such obligation is laid on the savage2 and no inducement that can be offered is likely to tempt him to imperil his soul by revealing its hiding-place to a stranger4 ,it is therefore no matter for surprise that the central mystery of the savage's life should so long have remained a secret1 and that we should be left to piece it together from scattered hints and fragments and from the recollections of it which linger in fairy tales4 #d4 ,the ,ritual of ,death and ,resurrection ,,this view of totemism throws light on a class of religious rites of which no adequate explanation1 so far as ,i am aware1 has yet been offered4 ,amongst many savage tribes1 especially such as are known to practice totemism1 it is customary for lads at puberty to undergo certain initiatory rites1 of which one of the commonest is a pretence of killing the lad and bringing him to life again4 ,such rites become intelligible if we suppose that their substance consists in extracting the youth's soul in order to transfer it to his totem4 ,for the extraction of his soul would naturally be supposed to kill the youth or at least to throw him into a death-like trance1 which the savage hardly distinguishes from death4 ,his recovery would then be attributed either to the gradual recovery of his system from the violent shock which it had received1 or1 more probably1 to the infusion into him of fresh life drawn from the totem4 ,thus the essence of these initiatory rites1 so far as they consist in a simulation of death and resurrection1 would be an exchange of life or souls between the man and his totem4 ,the primitive belief in the possibility of such an exchange of souls comes clearly out in a story of a ,basque hunter who affirmed that he had been killed by a bear1 but that the bear had1 after killing him1 breathed its own soul into him1 so that the bear's body was now dead1 but he himself was a bear1 being animated by the bear's soul4 ,this revival of the dead hunter as a bear is exactly analogous to what1 on the theory here suggested1 is supposed to take place in the ceremony of killing a lad at puberty and bringing him to life again4 ,the lad dies as a man and comes to life again as an animal2 the animal's soul is now in him1 and his human soul is in the animal4 ,with good right1 therefore1 does he call himself a ,bear or a ,wolf1 etc41 according to his totem2 and with good right does he treat the bears or the wolves1 etc41 as his brethren1 since in these animals are lodged the souls of himself and his kindred4 ,examples of this supposed death and resurrection at initiation are as follows4 ,in the ,wonghi or ,wonghibon tribe of ,new ,south ,wales the youths on approaching manhood are initiated at a secret ceremony1 which none but initiated men may witness4 ,part of the proceedings consists in knocking out a tooth and giving a new name to the novice1 indicative of the change from youth to manhood4 ,while the teeth are being knocked out an instrument known as a bull-roarer1 which consists of a flat piece of wood with serrated edges tied to the end of a string1 is swung round so as to produce a loud humming noise4 ,the uninitiated are not allowed to see this instrument4 ,women are forbidden to witness the ceremonies under pain of death4 ,it is given out that the youths are each met in turn by a mythical being1 called ,thuremlin 7more commonly known as ,daramulun7 who takes the youth to a distance1 kills him1 and in some instances cuts him up1 after which he restores him to life and knocks out a tooth4 ,their belief in the power of ,thuremlin is said to be undoubted4 ,the ,ualaroi of the ,upper ,darling ,river said that at initiation the boy met a ghost1 who killed him and brought him to life again as a young man4 ,among the natives on the ,lower ,lachlan and ,murray ,rivers it was ,thrumalun 7,daramulun7 who was thought to slay and resuscitate the novices4 ,in the ,unmatjera tribe of ,central ,australia women and children believe that a spirit called ,twanyirika kills the youth and afterwards brings him to life again during the period of initiation4 ,the rites of initiation in this tribe1 as in the other ,central tribes1 comprise the operations of circumcision and subincision2 and as soon as the second of these has been performed on him1 the young man receives from his father a sacred stick 7churinga71 with which1 he is told1 his spirit was associated in the remotest past4 ,while he is out in the bush recovering from his wounds1 he must swing the bull-roarer1 or a being who lives up in the sky will swoop down and carry him off4 ,in the ,binbinga tribe1 on the western coast of the ,gulf of ,carpentaria1 the women and children believe that the noise of the bull-roarer at initiation is made by a spirit named ,katajalina1 who lives in an ant-hill and comes out and eats up the boy1 afterwards restoring him to life4 ,similarly among their neighbours the ,anula the women imagine that the droning sound of the bull-roarer is produced by a spirit called ,gnabaia1 who swallows the lads at initiation and afterwards disgorges them in the form of initiated men4 ,among the tribes settled on the southern coast of ,new ,south ,wales1 of which the ,coast ,murring tribe may be regarded as typical1 the drama of resurrection from the dead was exhibited in a graphic form to the novices at initiation4 ,the ceremony has been described for us by an eye-witness4 ,a man1 disguised with stringy bark fibre1 lay down in a grave and was lightly covered up with sticks and earth4 ,in his hand he held a small bush1 which appeared to be growing in the soil1 and other bushes were stuck in the ground to heighten the effect4 ,then the novices were brought and placed beside the grave4 ,next1 a procession of men1 disguised in stringy bark fibre1 drew near4 ,they represented a party of medicine-men1 guided by two reverend seniors1 who had come on pilgrimage to the grave of a brother medicine-man1 who lay buried there4 ,when the little procession1 chanting an invocation to ,daramulun1 had defiled from among the rocks and trees into the open1 it drew up on the side of the grave opposite to the novices1 the two old men taking up a position in the rear of the dancers4 ,for some time the dance and song went on till the tree that seemed to grow from the grave began to quiver4 ,look there6 cried the men to the novices1 pointing to the trembling leaves4 ,as they looked1 the tree quivered more and more1 then was violently agitated and fell to the ground1 while amid the excited dancing of the dancers and the chanting of the choir the supposed dead man spurned from him the superincumbent mass of sticks and leaves1 and springing to his feet danced his magic dance in the grave itself1 and exhibited in his mouth the magic substances which he was supposed to have received from ,daramulun in person4 ,some tribes of ,northern ,new ,guinea--the ,yabim1 ,bukaua1 ,kai1 and ,tami--like many ,australian tribes1 require every male member of the tribe to be circumcised before he ranks as a full-grown man2 and the tribal initiation1 of which circumcision is the central feature1 is conceived by them1 as by some ,australian tribes1 as a process of being swallowed and disgorged by a mythical monster1 whose voice is heard in the humming sound of the bull-roarer4 ,indeed the ,new ,guinea tribes not only impress this belief on the minds of women and children1 but enact it in a dramatic form at the actual rites of initiation1 at which no woman or uninitiated person may be present4 ,for this purpose a hut about a hundred feet long is erected either in the village or in a lonely part of the forest4 ,it is modelled in the shape of the mythical monster2 at the end which represents his head it is high1 and it tapers away at the other end4 ,a betel-palm1 grubbed up with the roots1 stands for the backbone of the great being and its clustering fibres for his hair2 and to complete the resemblance the butt end of the building is adorned by a native artist with a pair of goggle eyes and a gaping mouth4 ,when after a tearful parting from their mothers and women folk1 who believe or pretend to believe in the monster that swallows their dear ones1 the awe-struck novices are brought face to face with this imposing structure1 the huge creature emits a sullen growl1 which is in fact no other than the humming note of bull-roarers swung by men concealed in the monster's belly4 ,the actual process of deglutition is variously enacted4 ,among the ,tami it is represented by causing the candidates to defile past a row of men who hold bull-roarers over their heads2 among the ,kai it is more graphically set forth by making them pass under a scaffold on which stands a man1 who makes a gesture of swallowing and takes in fact a gulp of water as each trembling novice passes beneath him4 ,but the present of a pig1 opportunely offered for the redemption of the youth1 induces the monster to relent and disgorge his victim2 the man who represents the monster accepts the gift vicariously1 a gurgling sound is heard1 and the water which had just been swallowed descends in a jet on the novice4 ,this signifies that the young man has been released from the monster's belly4 ,however1 he has now to undergo the more painful and dangerous operation of circumcision4 ,it follows immediately1 and the cut made by the knife of the operator is explained to be a bite or scratch which the monster inflicted on the novice in spewing him out of his capacious maw4 ,while the operation is proceeding1 a prodigious noise is made by the swinging of bull-roarers to represent the roar of the dreadful being who is in the act of swallowing the young man4 ,when1 as sometimes happens1 a lad dies from the effect of the operation1 he is buried secretly in the forest1 and his sorrowing mother is told that the monster has a pig's stomach as well as a human stomach1 and that unfortunately her son slipped into the wrong stomach1 from which it was impossible to extricate him4 ,after they have been circumcised the lads must remain for some months in seclusion1 shunning all contact with women and even the sight of them4 ,they live in the long hut which represents the monster's belly4 ,when at last the lads1 now ranking as initiated men1 are brought back with great pomp and ceremony to the village1 they are received with sobs and tears of joy by the women1 as if the grave had given up its dead4 ,at first the young men keep their eyes rigidly closed or even sealed with a plaster of chalk1 and they appear not to understand the words of command which are given them by an elder4 ,gradually1 however1 they come to themselves as if awakening from a stupor1 and next day they bathe and wash off the crust of white chalk with which their bodies had been coated4 ,it is highly significant that all these tribes of ,new ,guinea apply the same word to the bull-roarer and to the monster1 who is supposed to swallow the novices at circumcision1 and whose fearful roar is represented by the hum of the harmless wooden instruments4 ,further1 it deserves to be noted that in three languages out of the four the same word which is applied to the bull-roarer and to the monster means also a ghost or spirit of the dead1 while in the fourth language 7the ,kai7 it signifies grandfather4 ,from this it seems to follow that the being who swallows and disgorges the novices at initiation is believed to be a powerful ghost or ancestral spirit1 and that the bull-roarer1 which bears his name1 is his material representative4 ,that would explain the jealous secrecy with which the sacred implement is kept from the sight of women4 ,while they are not in use1 the bull-roarers are stowed away in the men's club-houses1 which no woman may enter2 indeed no woman or uninitiated person may set eyes on a bull-roarer under pain of death4 ,similarly among the ,tugeri or ,kaya-,kaya1 a large ,papuan tribe on the south coast of ,dutch ,new ,guinea1 the name of the bull-roarer1 which they call sosom1 is given to a mythical giant1 who is supposed to appear every year with the south-east monsoon4 ,when he comes1 a festival is held in his honour and bull-roarers are swung4 ,boys are presented to the giant1 and he kills them1 but considerately brings them to life again4 ,in certain districts of ,viti ,levu1 the largest of the ,fijian ,islands1 the drama of death and resurrection used to be acted with much solemnity before the eyes of young men at initiation4 ,in a sacred enclosure they were shown a row of dead or seemingly dead men lying on the ground1 their bodies cut open and covered with blood1 their entrails protruding4 ,but at a yell from the high priest the counterfeit dead men started to their feet and ran down to the river to cleanse themselves from the blood and guts of pigs with which they were beslobbered4 ,soon they marched back to the sacred enclosure as if come to life1 clean1 fresh1 and garlanded1 swaying their bodies in time to the music of a solemn hymn1 and took their places in front of the novices4 ,such was the drama of death and resurrection4 ,the people of ,rook1 an island between ,new ,guinea and ,new ,britain1 hold festivals at which one or two disguised men1 their heads covered with wooden masks1 go dancing through the village1 followed by all the other men4 ,they demand that the circumcised boys who have not yet been swallowed by ,marsaba 7the devil7 shall be given up to them4 ,the boys1 trembling and shrieking1 are delivered to them1 and must creep between the legs of the disguised men4 ,then the procession moves through the village again1 and announces that ,marsaba has eaten up the boys1 and will not disgorge them till he receives a present of pigs1 taro1 and so forth4 ,so all the villagers1 according to their means1 contribute provisions1 which are then consumed in the name of ,marsaba4 ,in the west of ,ceram boys at puberty are admitted to the ,kakian association4 ,modern writers have commonly regarded this association as primarily a political league instituted to resist foreign domination4 ,in reality its objects are purely religious and social1 though it is possible that the priests may have occasionally used their powerful influence for political ends4 ,the society is in fact merely one of those widely-diffused primitive institutions1 of which a chief object is the initiation of young men4 ,in recent years the true nature of the association has been duly recognised by the distinguished ,dutch ethnologist1 ,j4 ,g4 ,f4 ,riedel4 ,the ,kakian house is an oblong wooden shed1 situated under the darkest trees in the depth of the forest1 and is built to admit so little light that it is impossible to see what goes on in it4 ,every village has such a house4 ,thither the boys who are to be initiated are conducted blindfold1 followed by their parents and relations4 ,each boy is led by the hand of two men1 who act as his sponsors or guardians1 looking after him during the period of initiation4 ,when all are assembled before the shed1 the high priest calls aloud upon the devils4 ,immediately a hideous uproar is heard to proceed from the shed4 ,it is made by men with bamboo trumpets1 who have been secretly introduced into the building by a back door1 but the women and children think it is made by the devils1 and are much terrified4 ,then the priests enter the shed1 followed by the boys1 one at a time4 ,as soon as each boy has disappeared within the precincts1 a dull chopping sound is heard1 a fearful cry rings out1 and a sword or spear1 dripping with blood1 is thrust through the roof of the shed4 ,this is a token that the boy's head has been cut off1 and that the devil has carried him away to the other world1 there to regenerate and transform him4 ,so at sight of the bloody sword the mothers weep and wail1 crying that the devil has murdered their children4 ,in some places1 it would seem1 the boys are pushed through an opening made in the shape of a crocodile's jaws or a cassowary's beak1 and it is then said that the devil has swallowed them4 ,the boys remain in the shed for five or nine days4 ,sitting in the dark1 they hear the blast of the bamboo trumpets1 and from time to time the sound of musket shots and the clash of swords4 ,every day they bathe1 and their faces and bodies are smeared with a yellow dye1 to give them the appearance of having been swallowed by the devil4 ,during his stay in the ,kakian house each boy has one or two crosses tattooed with thorns on his breast or arm4 ,when they are not sleeping1 the lads must sit in a crouching posture without moving a muscle4 ,as they sit in a row cross-legged1 with their hands stretched out1 the chief takes his trumpet1 and placing the mouth of it on the hands of each lad1 speaks through it in strange tones1 imitating the voice of the spirits4 ,he warns the lads1 under pain of death1 to observe the rules of the ,kakian society1 and never to reveal what has passed in the ,kakian house4 ,the novices are also told by the priests to behave well to their blood relations1 and are taught the traditions and secrets of the tribe4 ,meantime the mothers and sisters of the lads have gone home to weep and mourn4 ,but in a day or two the men who acted as guardians or sponsors to the novices return to the village with the glad tidings that the devil1 at the intercession of the priests1 has restored the lads to life4 ,the men who bring this news come in a fainting state and daubed with mud1 like messengers freshly arrived from the nether world4 ,before leaving the ,kakian house1 each lad receives from the priest a stick adorned at both ends with a cock's or cassowary's feathers4 ,the sticks are supposed to have been given to the lads by the devil at the time when he restored them to life1 and they serve as a token that the youths have been in the spirit land4 ,when they return to their homes they totter in their walk1 and enter the house backward1 as if they had forgotten how to walk properly2 or they enter the house by the back door4 ,if a plate of food is given to them1 they hold it upside down4 ,they remain dumb1 indicating their wants by signs only4 ,all this is to show that they are still under the influence of the devil or the spirits4 ,their sponsors have to teach them all the common acts of life1 as if they were newborn children4 ,further1 upon leaving the ,kakian house the boys are strictly forbidden to eat of certain fruits until the next celebration of the rites has taken place4 ,and for twenty or thirty days their hair may not be combed by their mothers or sisters4 ,at the end of that time the high priest takes them to a lonely place in the forest1 and cuts off a lock of hair from the crown of each of their heads4 ,after these initiatory rites the lads are deemed men1 and may marry2 it would be a scandal if they married before4 ,in the region of the ,lower ,congo a simulation of death and resurrection is1 or rather used to be1 practised by the members of a guild or secret society called ndembo4 ,in the practice of ,ndembo the initiating doctors get some one to fall down in a pretended fit1 and in that state he is carried away to an enclosed place outside the town4 ,this is called 'dying ,ndembo4' ,others follow suit1 generally boys and girls1 but often young men and women4 4 4 4 ,they are supposed to have died4 ,but the parents and friends supply food1 and after a period varying1 according to custom1 from three months to three years1 it is arranged that the doctor shall bring them to life again4 4 4 4 ,when the doctor's fee has been paid1 and money 7goods7 saved for a feast1 the ,ndembo people are brought to life4 ,at first they pretend to know no one and nothing2 they do not even know how to masticate food1 and friends have to perform that office for them4 ,they want everything nice that any one uninitiated may have1 and beat them if it is not granted1 or even strangle and kill people4 ,they do not get into trouble for this1 because it is thought that they do not know better4 ,sometimes they carry on the pretence of talking gibberish1 and behaving as if they had returned from the spirit-world4 ,after this they are known by another name1 peculiar to those who have 'died ,ndembo4' 4 4 4 ,we hear of the custom far along on the upper river1 as well as in the cataract region4 ,among some of the ,indian tribes of ,north ,america there exist certain religious associations which are only open to candidates who have gone through a pretence of being killed and brought to life again4 ,in #agff or #agfg ,captain ,jonathan ,carver witnessed the admission of a candidate to an association called the friendly society of the ,spirit 7,wakon-,kitchewah7 among the ,naudowessies1 a ,siouan or ,dacotan tribe in the region of the great lakes4 ,the candidate knelt before the chief1 who told him that he himself was now agitated by the same spirit which he should in a few moments communicate to him2 that it would strike him dead1 but that he would instantly be restored again to life2 to this he added1 that the communication1 however terrifying1 was a necessary introduction to the advantages enjoyed by the community into which he was on the point of being admitted4 ,as he spoke this1 he appeared to be greatly agitated2 till at last his emotions became so violent1 that his countenance was distorted1 and his whole frame convulsed4 ,at this juncture he threw something that appeared both in shape and colour like a small bean1 at the young man1 which seemed to enter his mouth1 and he instantly fell as motionless as if he had been shot4 ,for a time the man lay like dead1 but under a shower of blows he showed signs of consciousness1 and finally1 discharging from his mouth the bean1 or whatever it was that the chief had thrown at him1 he came to life4 ,in other tribes1 for example1 the ,ojebways1 ,winnebagoes1 and ,dacotas or ,sioux1 the instrument by which the candidate is apparently slain is the medicine-bag4 ,the bag is made of the skin of an animal 7such as the otter1 wild cat1 serpent1 bear1 raccoon1 wolf1 owl1 weasel71 of which it roughly preserves the shape4 ,each member of the society has one of these bags1 in which he keeps the odds and ends that make up his medicine or charms4 ,they believe that from the miscellaneous contents in the belly of the skin bag or animal there issues a spirit or breath1 which has the power1 not only to knock down and kill a man1 but also to set him up and restore him to life4 ,the mode of killing a man with one of these medicine-bags is to thrust it at him2 he falls like dead1 but a second thrust of the bag restores him to life4 ,a ceremony witnessed by the castaway ,john ,r4 ,jewitt during his captivity among the ,indians of ,nootka ,sound doubtless belongs to this class of customs4 ,the ,indian king or chief discharged a pistol close to his son's ear1 who immediately fell down as if killed1 upon which all the women of the house set up a most lamentable cry1 tearing handfuls of hair from their heads1 and exclaiming that the prince was dead2 at the same time a great number of the inhabitants rushed into the house armed with their daggers1 muskets1 etc41 enquiring the cause of their outcry4 ,these were immediately followed by two others dressed in wolf-skins1 with masks over their faces representing the head of that animal4 ,the latter came in on their hands and feet in the manner of a beast1 and taking up the prince1 carried him off upon their backs1 retiring in the same manner they entered4 ,in another place ,jewitt mentions that the young prince--a lad of about eleven years of age--wore a mask in imitation of a wolf's head4 ,now1 as the ,indians of this part of ,america are divided into totem clans1 of which the ,wolf clan is one of the principal1 and as the members of each clan are in the habit of wearing some portion of the totem animal about their person1 it is probable that the prince belonged to the ,wolf clan1 and that the ceremony described by ,jewitt represented the killing of the lad in order that he might be born anew as a wolf1 much in the same way that the ,basque hunter supposed himself to have been killed and to have come to life again as a bear4 ,this conjectural explanation of the ceremony has1 since it was first put forward1 been to some extent confirmed by the researches of ,dr4 ,franz ,boas among these ,indians2 though it would seem that the community to which the chief's son thus obtained admission was not so much a totem clan as a secret society called ,tlokoala1 whose members imitated wolves4 ,every new member of the society must be initiated by the wolves4 ,at night a pack of wolves1 personated by ,indians dressed in wolf-skins and wearing wolf-masks1 make their appearance1 seize the novice1 and carry him into the woods4 ,when the wolves are heard outside the village1 coming to fetch away the novice1 all the members of the society blacken their faces and sing1 ,among all the tribes is great excitement1 because ,i am ,tlokoala4 ,next day the wolves bring back the novice dead1 and the members of the society have to revive him4 ,the wolves are supposed to have put a magic stone into his body1 which must be removed before he can come to life4 ,till this is done the pretended corpse is left lying outside the house4 ,two wizards go and remove the stone1 which appears to be quartz1 and then the novice is resuscitated4 ,among the ,niska ,indians of ,british ,columbia1 who are divided into four principal clans with the raven1 the wolf1 the eagle1 and the bear for their respective totems1 the novice at initiation is always brought back by an artificial totem animal4 ,thus when a man was about to be initiated into a secret society called ,olala1 his friends drew their knives and pretended to kill him4 ,in reality they let him slip away1 while they cut off the head of a dummy which had been adroitly substituted for him4 ,then they laid the decapitated dummy down and covered it over1 and the women began to mourn and wail4 ,his relations gave a funeral banquet and solemnly burnt the effigy4 ,in short1 they held a regular funeral4 ,for a whole year the novice remained absent and was seen by none but members of the secret society4 ,but at the end of that time he came back alive1 carried by an artificial animal which represented his totem4 ,in these ceremonies the essence of the rite appears to be the killing of the novice in his character of a man and his restoration to life in the form of the animal which is thenceforward to be1 if not his guardian spirit1 at least linked to him in a peculiarly intimate relation4 ,it is to be remembered that the ,indians of ,guatemala1 whose life was bound up with an animal1 were supposed to have the power of appearing in the shape of the particular creature with which they were thus sympathetically united4 ,hence it seems not unreasonable to conjecture that in like manner the ,indians of ,british ,columbia may imagine that their life depends on the life of some one of that species of creature to which they assimilate themselves by their costume4 ,at least if that is not an article of belief with the ,columbian ,indians of the present day1 it may very well have been so with their ancestors in the past1 and thus may have helped to mould the rites and ceremonies both of the totem clans and of the secret societies4 ,for though these two sorts of communities differ in respect of the mode in which membership of them is obtained--a man being born into his totem clan but admitted into a secret society later in life--we can hardly doubt that they are near akin and have their root in the same mode of thought4 ,that thought1 if ,i am right1 is the possibility of establishing a sympathetic relation with an animal1 a spirit1 or other mighty being1 with whom a man deposits for safe-keeping his soul or some part of it1 and from whom he receives in return a gift of magical powers4 ,thus1 on the theory here suggested1 wherever totemism is found1 and wherever a pretence is made of killing and bringing to life again the novice at initiation1 there may exist or have existed not only a belief in the possibility of permanently depositing the soul in some external object--animal1 plant1 or what not--but an actual intention of so doing4 ,if the question is put1 why do men desire to deposit their life outside their bodies8 the answer can only be that1 like the giant in the fairy tale1 they think it safer to do so than to carry it about with them1 just as people deposit their money with a banker rather than carry it on their persons4 ,we have seen that at critical periods the life or soul is sometimes temporarily stowed away in a safe place till the danger is past4 ,but institutions like totemism are not resorted to merely on special occasions of danger2 they are systems into which every one1 or at least every male1 is obliged to be initiated at a certain period of life4 ,now the period of life at which initiation takes place is regularly puberty2 and this fact suggests that the special danger which totemism and systems like it are intended to obviate is supposed not to arise till sexual maturity has been attained1 in fact1 that the danger apprehended is believed to attend the relation of the sexes to each other4 ,it would be easy to prove by a long array of facts that the sexual relation is associated in the primitive mind with many serious perils2 but the exact nature of the danger apprehended is still obscure4 ,we may hope that a more exact acquaintance with savage modes of thought will in time disclose this central mystery of primitive society1 and will thereby furnish the clue1 not only to totemism1 but to the origin of the marriage system4 ,,lxviii4 ,the ,golden ,bough ,,thus the view that ,balder's life was in the mistletoe is entirely in harmony with primitive modes of thought4 ,it may indeed sound like a contradiction that1 if his life was in the mistletoe1 he should nevertheless have been killed by a blow from the plant4 ,but when a person's life is conceived as embodied in a particular object1 with the existence of which his own existence is inseparably bound up1 and the destruction of which involves his own1 the object in question may be regarded and spoken of indifferently as his life or his death1 as happens in the fairy tales4 ,hence if a man's death is in an object1 it is perfectly natural that he should be killed by a blow from it4 ,in the fairy tales ,koshchei the ,deathless is killed by a blow from the egg or the stone in which his life or death is secreted2 the ogres burst when a certain grain of sand--doubtless containing their life or death--is carried over their heads2 the magician dies when the stone in which his life or death is contained is put under his pillow2 and the ,tartar hero is warned that he may be killed by the golden arrow or golden sword in which his soul has been stowed away4 ,the idea that the life of the oak was in the mistletoe was probably suggested1 as ,i have said1 by the observation that in winter the mistletoe growing on the oak remains green while the oak itself is leafless4 ,but the position of the plant--growing not from the ground but from the trunk or branches of the tree--might confirm this idea4 ,primitive man might think that1 like himself1 the oak-spirit had sought to deposit his life in some safe place1 and for this purpose had pitched on the mistletoe1 which1 being in a sense neither on earth nor in heaven1 might be supposed to be fairly out of harm's way4 ,in a former chapter we saw that primitive man seeks to preserve the life of his human divinities by keeping them poised between earth and heaven1 as the place where they are least likely to be assailed by the dangers that encompass the life of man on earth4 ,we can therefore understand why it has been a rule both of ancient and of modern folk-medicine that the mistletoe should not be allowed to touch the ground2 were it to touch the ground1 its healing virtue would be gone4 ,this may be a survival of the old superstition that the plant in which the life of the sacred tree was concentrated should not be exposed to the risk incurred by contact with the earth4 ,in an ,indian legend1 which offers a parallel to the ,balder myth1 ,indra swore to the demon ,namuci that he would slay him neither by day nor by night1 neither with staff nor with bow1 neither with the palm of the hand nor with the fist1 neither with the wet nor with the dry4 ,but he killed him in the morning twilight by sprinkling over him the foam of the sea4 ,the foam of the sea is just such an object as a savage might choose to put his life in1 because it occupies that sort of intermediate or nondescript position between earth and sky or sea and sky in which primitive man sees safety4 ,it is therefore not surprising that the foam of the river should be the totem of a clan in ,india4 ,again1 the view that the mistletoe owes its mystic character partly to its not growing on the ground is confirmed by a parallel superstition about the mountain-ash or rowan-tree4 ,in ,jutland a rowan that is found growing out of the top of another tree is esteemed exceedingly effective against witchcraft3 since it does not grow on the ground witches have no power over it2 if it is to have its full effect it must be cut on ,ascension ,day4 ,hence it is placed over doors to prevent the ingress of witches4 ,in ,sweden and ,norway1 also1 magical properties are ascribed to a flying-rowan 7flgrnn71 that is to a rowan which is found growing not in the ordinary fashion on the ground but on another tree1 or on a roof1 or in a cleft of the rock1 where it has sprouted from seed scattered by birds4 ,they say that a man who is out in the dark should have a bit of flying-rowan with him to chew2 else he runs a risk of being bewitched and of being unable to stir from the spot4 ,just as in ,scandinavia the parasitic rowan is deemed a countercharm to sorcery1 so in ,germany the parasitic mistletoe is still commonly considered a protection against witch-craft1 and in ,sweden1 as we saw1 the mistletoe which is gathered on ,midsummer ,eve is attached to the ceiling of the house1 the horse's stall or the cow's crib1 in the belief that this renders the ,troll powerless to injure man or beast4 ,the view that the mistletoe was not merely the instrument of ,balder's death1 but that it contained his life1 is countenanced by the analogy of a ,scottish superstition4 ,tradition ran that the fate of the ,hays of ,errol1 an estate in ,perthshire1 near the ,firth of ,tay1 was bound up with the mistletoe that grew on a certain great oak4 ,a member of the ,hay family has recorded the old belief as follows3 ,among the low country families the badges are now almost generally forgotten2 but it appears by an ancient ,,ms41 and the tradition of a few old people in ,perthshire1 that the badge of the ,hays was the mistletoe4 ,there was formerly in the neighbourhood of ,errol1 and not far from the ,falcon stone1 a vast oak of an unknown age1 and upon which grew a profusion of the plant3 many charms and legends were considered to be connected with the tree1 and the duration of the family of ,hay was said to be united with its existence4 ,it was believed that a sprig of the mistletoe cut by a ,hay on ,allhallowmas eve1 with a new dirk1 and after surrounding the tree three times sunwise1 and pronouncing a certain spell1 was a sure charm against all glamour or witchery1 and an infallible guard in the day of battle4 ,a spray gathered in the same manner was placed in the cradle of infants1 and thought to defend them from being changed for elfbairns by the fairies4 ,finally1 it was affirmed1 that when the root of the oak had perished1 'the grass should grow in the hearth of ,errol1 and a raven should sit in the falcon's nest4' ,the two most unlucky deeds which could be done by one of the name of ,hay was1 to kill a white falcon1 and to cut down a limb from the oak of ,errol4 ,when the old tree was destroyed ,i could never learn4 ,the estate has been sold out of the family of ,hay1 and of course it is said that the fatal oak was cut down a short time before4 ,the old superstition is recorded in verses which are traditionally ascribed to ,thomas the ,rhymer3 ,while the mistletoe bats on ,errol's aik1 ,and that aik stands fast1 ,the ,hays shall flourish1 and their good grey hawk ,shall nocht flinch before the blast4 ,but when the root of the aik decays1 ,and the mistletoe dwines on its withered breast1 ,the grass shall grow on ,errol's hearthstane1 ,and the corbie roup in the falcon's nest4 ,it is not a new opinion that the ,golden ,bough was the mistletoe4 ,true1 ,virgil does not identify but only compares it with mistletoe4 ,but this may be only a poetical device to cast a mystic glamour over the humble plant4 ,or1 more probably1 his description was based on a popular superstition that at certain times the mistletoe blazed out into a supernatural golden glory4 ,the poet tells how two doves1 guiding ,aeneas to the gloomy vale in whose depth grew the ,golden ,bough1 alighted upon a tree1 whence shone a flickering gleam of gold4 ,as in the woods in winter cold the mistletoe--a plant not native to its tree--is green with fresh leaves and twines its yellow berries about the boles2 such seemed upon the shady holm-oak the leafy gold1 so rustled in the gentle breeze the golden leaf4 ,here ,virgil definitely describes the ,golden ,bough as growing on a holm-oak1 and compares it with the mistletoe4 ,the inference is almost inevitable that the ,golden ,bough was nothing but the mistletoe seen through the haze of poetry or of popular superstition4 ,now grounds have been shown for believing that the priest of the ,arician grove--the ,king of the ,wood--personified the tree on which grew the ,golden ,bough4 ,hence if that tree was the oak1 the ,king of the ,wood must have been a personification of the oakspirit4 ,it is1 therefore1 easy to understand why1 before he could be slain1 it was necessary to break the ,golden ,bough4 ,as an oak-spirit1 his life or death was in the mistletoe on the oak1 and so long as the mistletoe remained intact1 he1 like ,balder1 could not die4 ,to slay him1 therefore1 it was necessary to break the mistletoe1 and probably1 as in the case of ,balder1 to throw it at him4 ,and to complete the parallel1 it is only necessary to suppose that the ,king of the ,wood was formerly burned1 dead or alive1 at the midsummer fire festival which1 as we have seen1 was annually celebrated in the ,arician grove4 ,the perpetual fire which burned in the grove1 like the perpetual fire which burned in the temple of ,vesta at ,rome and under the oak at ,romove1 was probably fed with the sacred oak-wood2 and thus it would be in a great fire of oak that the ,king of the ,wood formerly met his end4 ,at a later time1 as ,i have suggested1 his annual tenure of office was lengthened or shortened1 as the case might be1 by the rule which allowed him to live so long as he could prove his divine right by the strong hand4 ,but he only escaped the fire to fall by the sword4 ,thus it seems that at a remote age in the heart of ,italy1 beside the sweet ,lake of ,nemi1 the same fiery tragedy was annually enacted which ,italian merchants and soldiers were afterwards to witness among their rude kindred1 the ,celts of ,gaul1 and which1 if the ,roman eagles had ever swooped on ,norway1 might have been found repeated with little difference among the barbarous ,aryans of the ,north4 ,the rite was probably an essential feature in the ancient ,aryan worship of the oak4 ,it only remains to ask1 ,why was the mistletoe called the ,golden ,bough8 ,the whitish-yellow of the mistletoe berries is hardly enough to account for the name1 for ,virgil says that the bough was altogether golden1 stems as well as leaves4 ,perhaps the name may be derived from the rich golden yellow which a bough of mistletoe assumes when it has been cut and kept for some months2 the bright tint is not confined to the leaves1 but spreads to the stalks as well1 so that the whole branch appears to be indeed a ,golden ,bough4 ,breton peasants hang up great bunches of mistletoe in front of their cottages1 and in the month of ,june these bunches are conspicuous for the bright golden tinge of their foliage4 ,in some parts of ,brittany1 especially about ,morbihan1 branches of mistletoe are hung over the doors of stables and byres to protect the horses and cattle1 probably against witchcraft4 ,the yellow colour of the withered bough may partly explain why the mistletoe has been sometimes supposed to possess the property of disclosing treasures in the earth2 for on the principles of homoeopathic magic there is a natural affinity between a yellow bough and yellow gold4 ,this suggestion is confirmed by the analogy of the marvellous properties popularly ascribed to the mythical fern-seed1 which is popularly supposed to bloom like gold or fire on ,midsummer ,eve4 ,thus in ,bohemia it is said that on ,st4 ,john's ,day fern-seed blooms with golden blossoms that gleam like fire4 ,now it is a property of this mythical fern-seed that whoever has it1 or will ascend a mountain holding it in his hand on ,midsummer ,eve1 will discover a vein of gold or will see the treasures of the earth shining with a bluish flame4 ,in ,russia they say that if you succeed in catching the wondrous bloom of the fern at midnight on ,midsummer ,eve1 you have only to throw it up into the air1 and it will fall like a star on the very spot where a treasure lies hidden4 ,in ,brittany treasure-seekers gather fern-seed at midnight on ,midsummer ,eve1 and keep it till ,palm ,sunday of the following year2 then they strew the seed on the ground where they think a treasure is concealed4 ,tyrolese peasants imagine that hidden treasures can be seen glowing like flame on ,midsummer ,eve1 and that fern-seed1 gathered at this mystic season1 with the usual precautions1 will help to bring the buried gold to the surface4 ,in the ,swiss canton of ,freiburg people used to watch beside a fern on ,st4 ,john's night in the hope of winning a treasure1 which the devil himself sometimes brought to them4 ,in ,bohemia they say that he who procures the golden bloom of the fern at this season has thereby the key to all hidden treasures2 and that if maidens will spread a cloth under the fast-fading bloom1 red gold will drop into it4 ,and in the ,tryol and ,bohemia if you place fern-seed among money1 the money will never decrease1 however much of it you spend4 ,sometimes the fern-seed is supposed to bloom on ,christmas night1 and whoever catches it will become very rich4 ,in ,styria they say that by gathering fern-seed on ,christmas night you can force the devil to bring you a bag of money4 ,thus1 on the principle of like by like1 fern-seed is supposed to discover gold because it is itself golden2 and for a similar reason it enriches its possessor with an unfailing supply of gold4 ,but while the fern-seed is described as golden1 it is equally described as glowing and fiery4 ,hence1 when we consider that two great days for gathering the fabulous seed are ,midsummer ,eve and ,christmas--that is1 the two solstices 7for ,christmas is nothing but an old heathen celebration of the winter solstice7--we are led to regard the fiery aspect of the fern-seed as primary1 and its golden aspect as secondary and derivative4 ,fern-seed1 in fact1 would seem to be an emanation of the sun's fire at the two turning-points of its course1 the summer and winter solstices4 ,this view is confirmed by a ,german story in which a hunter is said to have procured fern-seed by shooting at the sun on ,midsummer ,day at noon2 three drops of blood fell down1 which he caught in a white cloth1 and these blood-drops were the fern-seed4 ,here the blood is clearly the blood of the sun1 from which the fern-seed is thus directly derived4 ,thus it may be taken as probable that fern-seed is golden1 because it is believed to be an emanation of the sun's golden fire4 ,now1 like fern-seed1 the mistletoe is gathered either at ,midsummer or at ,christmas--that is1 either at the summer or at the winter solstice--and1 like fern-seed1 it is supposed to possess the power of revealing treasures in the earth4 ,on ,midsummer ,eve people in ,sweden make divining-rods of mistletoe1 or of four different kinds of wood one of which must be mistletoe4 ,the treasure-seeker places the rod on the ground after sundown1 and when it rests directly over treasure1 the rod begins to move as if it were alive4 ,now1 if the mistletoe discovers gold1 it must be in its character of the ,golden ,bough2 and if it is gathered at the solstices1 must not the ,golden ,bough1 like the golden fern-seed1 be an emanation of the sun's fire8 ,the question cannot be answered with a simple affirmative4 ,we have seen that the old ,aryans perhaps kindled the solstitial and other ceremonial fires in part as sun-charms1 that is1 with the intention of supplying the sun with fresh fire2 and as these fires were usually made by the friction or combustion of oak-wood1 it may have appeared to the ancient ,aryan that the sun was periodically recruited from the fire which resided in the sacred oak4 ,in other words1 the oak may have seemed to him the original storehouse or reservoir of the fire which was from time to time drawn out to feed the sun4 ,but if the life of the oak was conceived to be in the mistletoe1 the mistletoe must on that view have contained the seed or germ of the fire which was elicited by friction from the wood of the oak4 ,thus1 instead of saying that the mistletoe was an emanation of the sun's fire1 it might be more correct to say that the sun's fire was regarded as an emanation of the mistletoe4 ,no wonder1 then1 that the mistletoe shone with a golden splendour1 and was called the ,golden ,bough4 ,probably1 however1 like fern-seed1 it was thought to assume its golden aspect only at those stated times1 especially midsummer1 when fire was drawn from the oak to light up the sun4 ,at ,pulverbatch1 in ,shropshire1 it was believed within living memory that the oak-tree blooms on ,midsummer ,eve and the blossom withers before daylight4 ,a maiden who wishes to know her lot in marriage should spread a white cloth under the tree at night1 and in the morning she will find a little dust1 which is all that remains of the flower4 ,she should place the pinch of dust under her pillow1 and then her future husband will appear to her in her dreams4 ,this fleeting bloom of the oak1 if ,i am right1 was probably the mistletoe in its character of the ,golden ,bough4 ,the conjecture is confirmed by the observation that in ,wales a real sprig of mistletoe gathered on ,midsummer ,eve is similarly placed under the pillow to induce prophetic dreams2 and further the mode of catching the imaginary bloom of the oak in a white cloth is exactly that which was employed by the ,druids to catch the real mistletoe when it dropped from the bough of the oak1 severed by the golden sickle4 ,as ,shropshire borders on ,wales1 the belief that the oak blooms on ,midsummer ,eve may be ,welsh in its immediate origin1 though probably the belief is a fragment of the primitive ,aryan creed4 ,in some parts of ,italy1 as we saw1 peasants still go out on ,midsummer morning to search the oak-trees for the oil of ,st4 ,john1 which1 like the mistletoe1 heals all wounds1 and is1 perhaps1 the mistletoe itself in its glorified aspect4 ,thus it is easy to understand how a title like the ,golden ,bough1 so little descriptive of its usual appearance on the tree1 should have been applied to the seemingly insignificant parasite4 ,further1 we can perhaps see why in antiquity mistletoe was believed to possess the remarkable property of extinguishing fire1 and why in ,sweden it is still kept in houses as a safeguard against conflagration4 ,its fiery nature marks it out1 on homoeopathic principles1 as the best possible cure or preventive of injury by fire4 ,these considerations may partially explain why ,virgil makes ,aeneas carry a glorified bough of mistletoe with him on his descent into the gloomy subterranean world4 ,the poet describes how at the very gates of hell there stretched a vast and gloomy wood1 and how the hero1 following the flight of two doves that lured him on1 wandered into the depths of the immemorial forest till he saw afar off through the shadows of the trees the flickering light of the ,golden ,bough illuminating the matted boughs overhead4 ,if the mistletoe1 as a yellow withered bough in the sad autumn woods1 was conceived to contain the seed of fire1 what better companion could a forlorn wanderer in the nether shades take with him than a bough that would be a lamp to his feet as well as a rod and staff to his hands8 ,armed with it he might boldly confront the dreadful spectres that would cross his path on his adventurous journey4 ,hence when ,aeneas1 emerging from the forest1 comes to the banks of ,styx1 winding slow with sluggish stream through the infernal marsh1 and the surly ferryman refuses him passage in his boat1 he has but to draw the ,golden ,bough from his bosom and hold it up1 and straightway the blusterer quails at the sight and meekly receives the hero into his crazy bark1 which sinks deep in the water under the unusual weight of the living man4 ,even in recent times1 as we have seen1 mistletoe has been deemed a protection against witches and trolls1 and the ancients may well have credited it with the same magical virtue4 ,and if the parasite can1 as some of our peasants believe1 open all locks1 why should it not have served as an open ,sesame in the hands of ,aeneas to unlock the gates of death8 ,now1 too1 we can conjecture why ,virbius at ,nemi came to be confounded with the sun4 ,if ,virbius was1 as ,i have tried to show1 a tree-spirit1 he must have been the spirit of the oak on which grew the ,golden ,bough2 for tradition represented him as the first of the ,kings of the ,wood4 ,as an oak-spirit he must have been supposed periodically to rekindle the sun's fire1 and might therefore easily be confounded with the sun itself4 ,similarly we can explain why ,balder1 an oak-spirit1 was described as so fair of face and so shining that a light went forth from him1 and why he should have been so often taken to be the sun4 ,and in general we may say that in primitive society1 when the only known way of making fire is by the friction of wood1 the savage must necessarily conceive of fire as a property stored away1 like sap or juice1 in trees1 from which he has laboriously to extract it4 ,the ,senal ,indians of ,california profess to believe that the whole world was once a globe of fire1 whence that element passed up into the trees1 and now comes out whenever two pieces of wood are rubbed together4 ,similarly the ,maidu ,indians of ,california hold that the earth was primarily a globe of molten matter1 and from that the principle of fire ascended through the roots into the trunk and branches of trees1 whence the ,indians can extract it by means of their drill4 ,in ,namoluk1 one of the ,caroline ,islands1 they say that the art of making fire was taught men by the gods4 ,olofaet1 the cunning master of flames1 gave fire to the bird mwi and bade him carry it to earth in his bill4 ,so the bird flew from tree to tree and stored away the slumbering force of the fire in the wood1 from which men can elicit it by friction4 ,in the ancient ,vedic hymns of ,india the fire-god ,agni is spoken of as born in wood1 as the embryo of plants1 or as distributed in plants4 ,he is also said to have entered into all plants or to strive after them4 ,when he is called the embryo of trees or of trees as well as plants1 there may be a side-glance at the fire produced in forests by the friction of the boughs of trees4 ,a tree which has been struck by lightning is naturally regarded by the savage as charged with a double or triple portion of fire2 for has he not seen the mighty flash enter into the trunk with his own eyes8 ,hence perhaps we may explain some of the many superstitious beliefs concerning trees that have been struck by lightning4 ,when the ,thompson ,indians of ,british ,columbia wished to set fire to the houses of their enemies1 they shot at them arrows which were either made from a tree that had been struck by lightning or had splinters of such wood attached to them4 ,wendish peasants of ,saxony refuse to burn in their stoves the wood of trees that have been struck by lightning2 they say that with such fuel the house would be burnt down4 ,in like manner the ,thonga of ,south ,africa will not use such wood as fuel nor warm themselves at a fire which has been kindled with it4 ,on the contrary1 when lightning sets fire to a tree1 the ,winamwanga of ,northern ,rhodesia put out all the fires in the village and plaster the fireplaces afresh1 while the head men convey the lightning-kindled fire to the chief1 who prays over it4 ,the chief then sends out the new fire to all his villages1 and the villagers reward his messengers for the boon4 ,this shows that they look upon fire kindled by lightning with reverence1 and the reverence is intelligible1 for they speak of thunder and lightning as ,god himself coming down to earth4 ,similarly the ,maidu ,indians of ,california believe that a ,great ,man created the world and all its inhabitants1 and that lightning is nothing but the ,great ,man himself descending swiftly out of heaven and rending the trees with his flaming arms4 ,it is a plausible theory that the reverence which the ancient peoples of ,europe paid to the oak1 and the connexion which they traced between the tree and their sky-god1 were derived from the much greater frequency with which the oak appears to be struck by lightning than any other tree of our ,european forests4 ,this peculiarity of the tree has seemingly been established by a series of observations instituted within recent years by scientific enquirers who have no mythological theory to maintain4 ,however we may explain it1 whether by the easier passage of electricity through oak-wood than through any other timber1 or in some other way1 the fact itself may well have attracted the notice of our rude forefathers1 who dwelt in the vast forests which then covered a large part of ,europe2 and they might naturally account for it in their simple religious way by supposing that the great sky-god1 whom they worshipped and whose awful voice they heard in the roll of thunder1 loved the oak above all the trees of the wood and often descended into it from the murky cloud in a flash of lightning1 leaving a token of his presence or of his passage in the riven and blackened trunk and the blasted foliage4 ,such trees would thenceforth be encircled by a nimbus of glory as the visible seats of the thundering sky-god4 ,certain it is that1 like some savages1 both ,greeks and ,romans identified their great god of the sky and of the oak with the lightning flash which struck the ground2 and they regularly enclosed such a stricken spot and treated it thereafter as sacred4 ,it is not rash to suppose that the ancestors of the ,celts and ,germans in the forests of ,central ,europe paid a like respect for like reasons to a blasted oak4 ,this explanation of the ,aryan reverence for the oak and of the association of the tree with the great god of the thunder and the sky1 was suggested or implied long ago by ,jacob ,grimm1 and has been in recent years powerfully reinforced by ,mr4 ,w4 ,warde ,fowler4 ,it appears to be simpler and more probable than the explanation which ,i formerly adopted1 namely1 that the oak was worshipped primarily for the many benefits which our rude forefathers derived from the tree1 particularly for the fire which they drew by friction from its wood2 and that the connexion of the oak with the sky was an after-thought based on the belief that the flash of lightning was nothing but the spark which the sky-god up aloft elicited by rubbing two pieces of oak-wood against each other1 just as his savage worshipper kindled fire in the forest on earth4 ,on that theory the god of the thunder and the sky was derived from the original god of the oak2 on the present theory1 which ,i now prefer1 the god of the sky and the thunder was the great original deity of our ,aryan ancestors1 and his association with the oak was merely an inference based on the frequency with which the oak was seen to be struck by lightning4 ,if the ,aryans1 as some think1 roamed the wide steppes of ,russia or ,central ,asia with their flocks and herds before they plunged into the gloom of the ,european forests1 they may have worshipped the god of the blue or cloudy firmament and the flashing thunderbolt long before they thought of associating him with the blasted oaks in their new home4 ,perhaps the new theory has the further advantage of throwing light on the special sanctity ascribed to mistletoe which grows on an oak4 ,the mere rarity of such a growth on an oak hardly suffices to explain the extent and the persistence of the superstition4 ,a hint of its real origin is possibly furnished by the statement of ,pliny that the ,druids worshipped the plant because they believed it to have fallen from heaven and to be a token that the tree on which it grew was chosen by the god himself4 ,can they have thought that the mistletoe dropped on the oak in a flash of lightning8 ,the conjecture is confirmed by the name thunder-besom which is applied to mistletoe in the ,swiss canton of ,aargau1 for the epithet clearly implies a close connexion between the parasite and the thunder2 indeed thunder-besom is a popular name in ,germany for any bushy nest-like excrescence growing on a branch1 because such a parasitic growth is actually believed by the ignorant to be a product of lightning4 ,if there is any truth in this conjecture1 the real reason why the ,druids worshipped a mistletoe-bearing oak above all other trees of the forest was a belief that every such oak had not only been struck by lightning but bore among its branches a visible emanation of the celestial fire2 so that in cutting the mistletoe with mystic rites they were securing for themselves all the magical properties of a thunder-bolt4 ,if that was so1 we must apparently conclude that the mistletoe was deemed an emanation of the lightning rather than1 as ,i have thus far argued1 of the midsummer sun4 ,perhaps1 indeed1 we might combine the two seemingly divergent views by supposing that in the old ,aryan creed the mistletoe descended from the sun on ,midsummer ,day in a flash of lightning4 ,but such a combination is artificial and unsupported1 so far as ,i know1 by any positive evidence4 ,whether on mythical principles the two interpretations can really be reconciled with each other or not1 ,i will not presume to say2 but even should they prove to be discrepant1 the inconsistency need not have prevented our rude forefathers from embracing both of them at the same time with an equal fervour of conviction2 for like the great majority of mankind the savage is above being hidebound by the trammels of a pedantic logic4 ,in attempting to track his devious thought through the jungle of crass ignorance and blind fear1 we must always remember that we are treading enchanted ground1 and must beware of taking for solid realities the cloudy shapes that cross our path or hover and gibber at us through the gloom4 ,we can never completely replace ourselves at the standpoint of primitive man1 see things with his eyes1 and feel our hearts beat with the emotions that stirred his4 ,all our theories concerning him and his ways must therefore fall far short of certainty2 the utmost we can aspire to in such matters is a reasonable degree of probability4 ,to conclude these enquiries we may say that if ,balder was indeed1 as ,i have conjectured1 a personification of a mistletoe-bearing oak1 his death by a blow of the mistletoe might on the new theory be explained as a death by a stroke of lightning4 ,so long as the mistletoe1 in which the flame of the lightning smouldered1 was suffered to remain among the boughs1 so long no harm could befall the good and kindly god of the oak1 who kept his life stowed away for safety between earth and heaven in the mysterious parasite2 but when once that seat of his life1 or of his death1 was torn from the branch and hurled at the trunk1 the tree fell--the god died--smitten by a thunderbolt4 ,and what we have said of ,balder in the oak forests of ,scandinavia may perhaps1 with all due diffidence in a question so obscure and uncertain1 be applied to the priest of ,diana1 the ,king of the ,wood1 at ,aricia in the oak forests of ,italy4 ,he may have personated in flesh and blood the great ,italian god of the sky1 ,jupiter1 who had kindly come down from heaven in the lightning flash to dwell among men in the mistletoe--the thunder-besom--the ,golden ,bough--growing on the sacred oak in the dells of ,nemi4 ,if that was so1 we need not wonder that the priest guarded with drawn sword the mystic bough which contained the god's life and his own4 ,the goddess whom he served and married was herself1 if ,i am right1 no other than the ,queen of ,heaven1 the true wife of the sky-god4 ,for she1 too1 loved the solitude of the woods and the lonely hills1 and sailing overhead on clear nights in the likeness of the silver moon looked down with pleasure on her own fair image reflected on the calm1 the burnished surface of the lake1 ,diana's ,mirror4 ,,lxix4 ,farewell to ,nemi ,,we are at the end of our enquiry1 but as often happens in the search after truth1 if we have answered one question1 we have raised many more2 if we have followed one track home1 we have had to pass by others that opened off it and led1 or seemed to lead1 to far other goals than the sacred grove at ,nemi4 ,some of these paths we have followed a little way2 others1 if fortune should be kind1 the writer and the reader may one day pursue together4 ,for the present we have journeyed far enough together1 and it is time to part4 ,yet before we do so1 we may well ask ourselves whether there is not some more general conclusion1 some lesson1 if possible1 of hope and encouragement1 to be drawn from the melancholy record of human error and folly which has engaged our attention in this book4 ,if then we consider1 on the one hand1 the essential similarity of man's chief wants everywhere and at all times1 and on the other hand1 the wide difference between the means he has adopted to satisfy them in different ages1 we shall perhaps be disposed to conclude that the movement of the higher thought1 so far as we can trace it1 has on the whole been from magic through religion to science4 ,in magic man depends on his own strength to meet the difficulties and dangers that beset him on every side4 ,he believes in a certain established order of nature on which he can surely count1 and which he can manipulate for his own ends4 ,when he discovers his mistake1 when he recognises sadly that both the order of nature which he had assumed and the control which he had believed himself to exercise over it were purely imaginary1 he ceases to rely on his own intelligence and his own unaided efforts1 and throws himself humbly on the mercy of certain great invisible beings behind the veil of nature1 to whom he now ascribes all those far-reaching powers which he once arrogated to himself4 ,thus in the acuter minds magic is gradually superseded by religion1 which explains the succession of natural phenomena as regulated by the will1 the passion1 or the caprice of spiritual beings like man in kind1 though vastly superior to him in power4 ,but as time goes on this explanation in its turn proves to be unsatisfactory4 ,for it assumes that the succession of natural events is not determined by immutable laws1 but is to some extent variable and irregular1 and this assumption is not borne out by closer observation4 ,on the contrary1 the more we scrutinise that succession the more we are struck by the rigid uniformity1 the punctual precision with which1 wherever we can follow them1 the operations of nature are carried on4 ,every great advance in knowledge has extended the sphere of order and correspondingly restricted the sphere of apparent disorder in the world1 till now we are ready to anticipate that even in regions where chance and confusion appear still to reign1 a fuller knowledge would everywhere reduce the seeming chaos to cosmos4 ,thus the keener minds1 still pressing forward to a deeper solution of the mysteries of the universe1 come to reject the religious theory of nature as inadequate1 and to revert in a measure to the older standpoint of magic by postulating explicitly1 what in magic had only been implicitly assumed1 to wit1 an inflexible regularity in the order of natural events1 which1 if carefully observed1 enables us to foresee their course with certainty and to act accordingly4 ,in short1 religion1 regarded as an explanation of nature1 is displaced by science4 ,but while science has this much in common with magic that both rest on a faith in order as the underlying principle of all things1 readers of this work will hardly need to be reminded that the order presupposed by magic differs widely from that which forms the basis of science4 ,the difference flows naturally from the different modes in which the two orders have been reached4 ,for whereas the order on which magic reckons is merely an extension1 by false analogy1 of the order in which ideas present themselves to our minds1 the order laid down by science is derived from patient and exact observation of the phenomena themselves4 ,the abundance1 the solidity1 and the splendour of the results already achieved by science are well fitted to inspire us with a cheerful confidence in the soundness of its method4 ,here at last1 after groping about in the dark for countless ages1 man has hit upon a clue to the labyrinth1 a golden key that opens many locks in the treasury of nature4 ,it is probably not too much to say that the hope of progress--moral and intellectual as well as material--in the future is bound up with the fortunes of science1 and that every obstacle placed in the way of scientific discovery is a wrong to humanity4 ,yet the history of thought should warn us against concluding that because the scientific theory of the world is the best that has yet been formulated1 it is necessarily complete and final4 ,we must remember that at bottom the generalisations of science or1 in common parlance1 the laws of nature are merely hypotheses devised to explain that ever-shifting phantasmagoria of thought which we dignify with the high-sounding names of the world and the universe4 ,in the last analysis magic1 religion1 and science are nothing but theories of thought2 and as science has supplanted its predecessors1 so it may hereafter be itself superseded by some more perfect hypothesis1 perhaps by some totally different way of looking at the phenomena--of registering the shadows on the screen--of which we in this generation can form no idea4 ,the advance of knowledge is an infinite progression towards a goal that for ever recedes4 ,we need not murmur at the endless pursuit3 ,fatti non foste a viver come bruti ,ma per seguir virtute e conoscenza4 ,great things will come of that pursuit1 though we may not enjoy them4 ,brighter stars will rise on some voyager of the future--some great ,ulysses of the realms of thought--than shine on us4 ,the dreams of magic may one day be the waking realities of science4 ,but a dark shadow lies athwart the far end of this fair prospect4 ,for however vast the increase of knowledge and of power which the future may have in store for man1 he can scarcely hope to stay the sweep of those great forces which seem to be making silently but relentlessly for the destruction of all this starry universe in which our earth swims as a speck or mote4 ,in the ages to come man may be able to predict1 perhaps even to control1 the wayward courses of the winds and clouds1 but hardly will his puny hands have strength to speed afresh our slackening planet in its orbit or rekindle the dying fire of the sun4 ,yet the philosopher who trembles at the idea of such distant catastrophes may console himself by reflecting that these gloomy apprehensions1 like the earth and the sun themselves1 are only parts of that unsubstantial world which thought has conjured up out of the void1 and that the phantoms which the subtle enchantress has evoked to-day she may ban to-morrow4 ,they too1 like so much that to common eyes seems solid1 may melt into air1 into thin air4 ,without dipping so far into the future1 we may illustrate the course which thought has hitherto run by likening it to a web woven of three different threads--the black thread of magic1 the red thread of religion1 and the white thread of science1 if under science we may include those simple truths1 drawn from observation of nature1 of which men in all ages have possessed a store4 ,could we then survey the web of thought from the beginning1 we should probably perceive it to be at first a chequer of black and white1 a patchwork of true and false notions1 hardly tinged as yet by the red thread of religion4 ,but carry your eye farther along the fabric and you will remark that1 while the black and white chequer still runs through it1 there rests on the middle portion of the web1 where religion has entered most deeply into its texture1 a dark crimson stain1 which shades off insensibly into a lighter tint as the white thread of science is woven more and more into the tissue4 ,to a web thus chequered and stained1 thus shot with threads of diverse hues1 but gradually changing colour the farther it is unrolled1 the state of modern thought1 with all its divergent aims and conflicting tendencies1 may be compared4 ,will the great movement which for centuries has been slowly altering the complexion of thought be continued in the near future8 or will a reaction set in which may arrest progress and even undo much that has been done8 ,to keep up our parable1 what will be the colour of the web which the ,fates are now weaving on the humming loom of time8 will it be white or red8 ,we cannot tell4 ,a faint glimmering light illumines the backward portion of the web4 ,clouds and thick darkness hide the other end4 ,our long voyage of discovery is over and our bark has drooped her weary sails in port at last4 ,once more we take the road to ,nemi4 ,it is evening1 and as we climb the long slope of the ,appian ,way up to the ,alban ,hills1 we look back and see the sky aflame with sunset1 its golden glory resting like the aureole of a dying saint over ,rome and touching with a crest of fire the dome of ,st4 ,peter's4 ,the sight once seen can never be forgotten1 but we turn from it and pursue our way darkling along the mountain side1 till we come to ,nemi and look down on the lake in its deep hollow1 now fast disappearing in the evening shadows4 ,the place has changed but little since ,diana received the homage of her worshippers in the sacred grove4 ,the temple of the sylvan goddess1 indeed1 has vanished and the ,king of the ,wood no longer stands sentinel over the ,golden ,bough4 ,but ,nemi's woods are still green1 and as the sunset fades above them in the west1 there comes to us1 borne on the swell of the wind1 the sound of the church bells of ,aricia ringing the ,angelus4 ,ave ,maria6 ,sweet and solemn they chime out from the distant town and die lingeringly away across the wide ,campagnan marshes4 ,le roi est mort1 vive le roi6 ,ave ,maria6