INTRODUCTION
LORE
[EXLIBRIS
BERTRAM.C.A
W1NDLE
Q.Sc.M.D
St. I 4 rary
Bay and St. Jc3cJ.a St.
Toronto 5, Canada
AN INTRODUCTION TO
FOLK-LORE
All rights reserved
AN INTRODUCTION
TO
FOLK-LORE
MARIAN ROALFE COX
LONDON
DAVID NUTT, 270-71 STRAND
'895
St. Michael's College Library
Bay and St. Jcrcpi St.
Toronto 5, Canada
Printed by BALLANTVNE, HANSON & Co
At the Ballantynt Press
TO MY FRIEND
EDWARD CLODD,
WHO SUGGESTED ITS THEME, THIS BOOK
IS GRATEFULLY DEDICATED.
PREFACE
THIS. little book pretends, without arrogance, to
answer a question, not infrequently heard, namely :
What is Folk - lore ? In rapidly traversing the
wide field which the subject covers, mere glances
can be given at the several points of deep inte-
rest, some, perchance, being wholly overlooked.
As guides, therefore, to the student who desires
to scour the ground with greater thoroughness, or
to investigate at closer range, a list of books is
given at the end. It has proved undesirable to
increase the bulk of the volume by cumbering its
pages with foot-notes ; but none the less would I
gratefully acknowledge indebtedness to all autho-
rities from whom information has been drawn.
In the following pages I have attempted a
general survey of Folk-lore from one point of view
only the anthropological. The theories set forth
are, for the most part, those of Dr. Tylor and Mr.
Herbert Spencer not, in sooth, as affording the
key to the understanding of all mysteries and all
PREFACE
knowledge, for, with regard to much, one must
still "wonder on;" but as being, at this day,
the most easy to sustain. All philosophy, said
Epictetus, lies in two words, " sustain " and " ab-
stain." So the method that I have adopted is at
any rate consistent with his teaching. For, while
following leaders who explain the universal bar-
baric belief in spirits as the result of a misunder-
standing of normal phenomena, such as dreams,
faintings, death, I have chosen to leave aside the
whole question of the actual existence of ghosts,
and the possibility of the savage's personal ac-
quaintance with them. But, perhaps, as Mr. Lang
says in " Myth, Ritual, and Religion " (i. 103) : " It
would scarcely be fair not to add that the kind of
facts investigated by the Pscyhical Society such
facts as the appearance of men at the moment of
death in places remote from the scene of their
decease, with such real or delusive experiences as
the noises and visions in haunted houses are
familiar to savages." Into this let the curious
inquire.
Of Mr. Lang, as the admitted chief, must all
students of Folk-lore learn ; I would, however,
specially acknowledge the large use I have made
of his writings on the subject.
The illustrative examples for these pages have
PREFACE
been selected from riches which embarrass, one
illustration often suggesting " a hundred its like
to treat as you please." Temptation to be pro-
digal overmuch must needs beset the writer on
Folk-lore, drawing from such inexhaustible capital.
" For the structure that we raise,
Time is with materials filled,
Our to-days and yesterdays
Are the blocks with which we build."
M. R. C.
107 EARL'S COURT ROAD, W.
August 1895.
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTORY
PAGE
Antiquity of the human race Primitive savagery of man General
resemblance in the mental character of all savages Definition
of Folk-lore Its value as a science The power of tradition
Traces of savage belief seen in some habitual expressions
and irrational practices of the civilised Examples Super-
stitious observances Butter bewitched Cows bespelled
Counter-charms Luck and ill-luck Sir Thomas Browne
on right and left omens Salt-spilling Various safeguards
Charms Virtue of things stolen Napoleon's talisman
Sympathetic cures Disease transference Principles of leech-
craft : folk-medicine Stone-axes and arrow-heads as amulets
Amber Written charms The lucky horseshoe : potency
of iron against spells Why the peacock's feather is unlucky
Rice-throwing and kindred practices The " loom " cradle
May marriages Relics of sun and moon worship The
moon in weather-lore Lucky and unlucky days Lucky
numbers Telling the bees Various modes of divination
Catoptromancy, augury, dreams, palmistry, &c. The divin-
ing-rod Use of plants in divination Some festival and
ceremonial customs Local customs Duty of the folk-lorist
Nursery tales and children's games as contributions to the
history of man's life . . . . . . . . 1-35
CHAPTER I
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
The beginnings of Folk-lore How the belief in a second self, or
soul, may have originated The soul's means of ingress and
egress Poets' imagery and popular legends in illustration of
CONTENTS
PAGE
this The soul as a bee, a snake, a mouse, &c. The home-
less soul of Hermotimus Death a prolonged absence of the
second self: provisions against its return Hell-shoon A
Chinese funeral The souls of inanimate objects can be of
service to men's souls ; wherefore all kinds of objects are
buried with corpse Sacrifice of wives, friends, slaves
Messages to the dead Food offerings to the dead : survivals
of the practice Soul-cakes Receptacles for food on tombs
Preservation of the corpse Cairns, pyramids Some methods
of preventing a ghost's return when dreaded Ghosts intan-
gible Ghosts as tiny bodies Fear of supernatural powers of
ghost leading to propitiation and worship of ancestral ghosts
A body deserted by its other self may be entered by the
other self of some one else, living or dead Sneezing, yawning,
convulsions as cases of " possession," originating the practice
of exorcism Means of ingress and egress provided for ghost
Pre-historic trepanning Phenomena of shadows and re-
flections confirming belief in a second self Soul identified
with the shade, with the breath Echoes explained Doctrine
of Pythagoras Soul as a bird, butterfly, flower Souls per-
vading all nature Souls of the dead animating trees Speak-
ing, sentient trees Sympathy between man and natural
objects Metamorphosis of human beings into trees Tree
and plant worship Offerings on trees Libations to fruit
trees The Separable Soul in folk-tales .... 36-84
CHAPTER II
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
The savage mind naturally credulous ; treats all nature alike as
personal and animated Observation of changes of form in
the order of nature engenders belief in the transformation of
men into animals Especially sorcerers have this power
Witch stories in illustration Or a man's double may enter
the body of an animal ; or animals may be possessed by the
doubles of dead persons Certain animals thus regarded as
transformed ancestors Resulting confused theories of descent
from and kinship with animals Men named after animals
Regard for animal namesake Totemism Its universal traces
A digression anent the family tie Influence of totemic beliefs
CONTENTS
PAGE
on savage conduct Relics of totemism amongst civilised races
The Easter hare Plants identified with ancestors Vege-
table totems Animal and plant worship Results of the per-
sonification of animals and plants Guiding beasts and birds
The hawk and the Mikado Burying alive under founda-
tions The bell of Peking Animal omens Helpful animals
in folk-tales Animals as dramatis persona Myths of descent
from and marriage with animals Animal children Animal
worship in Egypt Animal gods Shape-shifting gods Greek
and savage myths compared The swallowing trick Why
the savage legends were retained Attempted symbolical ex-
planation of myths The right method of interpretation
The Swan-coat Melusina Cupid and Psyche The Were-
wolf; to be distinguished from the lycanthrope A recent
case of relapse into barbarism ..... 85-129
CHAPTER III
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
Universal animistic belief of the savage Fairies, brownies, &c.
developed out of primitive ghosts Fear of ghosts leading to
propitiation The motive of every sacrifice Rudimentary
conception of deity Origin of incense-burning Polytheism
the outcome of belief in ghosts, friendly and malicious Devil
the same as God Demons originally divine beings Good
and bad spiritual beings developing into elves, dwarfs, &c.
Nature-gods : Sun, Moon, Fire, Sky, and Heaven personified
Savage and Greek Wind-gods Mother Earth Traces in
English custom of Earth-worship Water-gods Rivers de-
manding human victims Offerings at wells, &c. Haunted
mountains Sacrifices to Family Spirits Anses and elves
Vampires the ghosts of primitive cannibals Apotheosised
men Culture - heroes Mortal gods Monotheism Rival
powers Persian system of Dualism Satan's various guises
Stories illustrating the gullibility of the mediaeval devil
Bottled Spirits Fetichism an outcome of animism Relics
and effigies Idolatry Human sacrifices : Substitutes Eat-
ing divine victim Symbolical sacrifices Serpent as fetich :
worshipped ; demonised ...... 130-178
xiii
CONTENTS
CHAPTER IV
THE OTHER-WORLD
PAGE
Abode of spirits associated with place of burial Mountain-burial
and sacred mountain-tops Soul must climb steep hill
Glass-mountains " Terrible crystal " and other solid firma-
ments Cave-burial Sheol, a cave, the original hell ; the
underworld for good and bad alike Subterranean fairy-
halls Heroes in Hades The dead rejoin their ancestors;
must traverse seas, rivers Burial in boats Soul's passage
across water Popular belief anent spirits crossing water
Other-worlds across water : of the Finns, Wickings, Red
Indians, Brahmans, Greeks, Christians Belief in two or
more other-worlds, and its development Great Britain as
the Island of Souls The " Brig of Dread " in many mytho-
logies The psychostasia Some features of Hades Hell
as a cold place The abode of departed souls variously
located 179-195
CHAPTER V
MAGIC
Belief in magic traceable to Animism Power of the sorcerer
Weather-making The special property of any object present
in all its parts : results of this belief Primitive cannibalism
Human blood in Chinese medical prescriptions Human
sacrifice for disease cure Explanation of savage's objection
to being portrayed, and like precautionary conduct The
name-taboo Some unmentionable names Rumpelstiltskin
Lohengrin The principles and practice of sorcery Dis-
ease transference Savage and Elizabethan exorcism The
Sucking cure Sympathetic magic "Doctrine of Signa-
tures " Wax-figure melting, and like magic arts Parallels
in hypnotic practice The Life-token Incantations and spells
Rock-opening The Evil Eye, and some ways of counter-
acting it Changelings : the Clonmel instance . . 196-233
CONTENTS
CHAPTER VI
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
PAGE
Origin of myth Myths of Observation The Dragon's pedigree
Famous Dragon-slayers Nature myths Greek and savage
myths compared Creation myths Myths explaining phy-
sical peculiarities in man and animals, and natural phe-
nomena generally Beast-fables : their first home Animal
foster-parents Grateful beasts The language of beasts and
birds Some "irrational" ideas in European and savage
mdrchen The one-eyed cannibal giant The common pro-
perty of all story-tellers Stories with a purpose A distinc-
tion between mdrchen, sagas, legends, and myths Classifi-
cation of folk- tales Drolls Cumulative stories Folk-songs :
their antiquity Popular ballads Rhymes Traditional
games Folk-drama Nursery-rhymes and riddles Proverbs
The problem of Diffusion The William Tell legend 234-296
SELECTED LIST OF BOOKS 297
INDEX 299-320
AN
INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
INTRODUCTORY
" Homo sum, humani nil a me alienum puto."
TERENCE.
Antiquity of the human race Primitive savagery of man General
resemblance in the mental character of all savages Definition of
Folk-lore Its value as a science The power of tradition Traces
of savage belief seen in some habitual expressions and irrational
practices of the civilised Examples Superstitious observances
Butter bewitched Cows bespelled Counter-charms Luck and ill-
luck Sir Thomas Browne on right and left omens Salt-spilling
Various safeguards Charms Virtue of things stolen Napoleon's
talisman Sympathetic cures Disease transference Principles of
leechcraft : folk-medicine Stone-axes and arrow-heads as amulets
Amber Written charms The lucky horseshoe : potency of iron
against spells Why the peacock's feather is unlucky Rice-
throwing and kindred practices The " toom " cradle May
marriages Relics of sun and moon worship The moon in weather-
lore Lucky and unlucky days Lucky numbers Telling the bees
Various modes of divination Catoptromancy, augury, dreams,
palmistry, &c. The divining-rod Use of plants in divination
Some festival and ceremonial customs Local customs Duty of
the folk-lorist Nursery tales and children's games as contributions
to the history of man's life.
AFTER applying the resources of his noble intellect
to determine the distance and composition of the
stars above him, and the formation of the earth
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
beneath him, man has at length arrived at the dis-
covery that " the proper study of mankind is man ; "
and in the whole universe there is no more interest-
ing subject.
Within the present century, flints bearing marks
of artificial chipping were found in certain strata of
. the earth, the age of which is known to geologists.
The discovery proved to be of inestimable moment,
establishing beyond question the fact of the great
antiquity of the human race. The men who used
these flints as weapons and implements lived upon
the earth during that geological age known as the
Tertiary Epoch, and were the contemporaries of the
mammoth, the mastodon, the cave-bear, the mega-
therium, the wingless birds, and other huge and
extinct creatures. Not alone in Europe, which has
been the principal field of research, have these
traces of the early races of men been found, after
their burial of countless ages in beds of river drift,
but also in India and Japan, Assyria and Palestine,
Egypt, Algeria, and other parts of Africa, through-
out the whole of America, in Australia and in Poly-
nesia; while every year adds to the number of
finds in fresh countries.
The evidence thus gathered is conclusive as to
the primitive savagery of man, a condition which
has its survivals in the black fellows of Australia,
the Bushmen of South Africa, the Veddahs of the
INTRODUCTORY
interior of Ceylon, the Nagas and other hill tribes
of the Indian Peninsula, and in the Andamanese
Islanders, all of whom would, but for the introduc-
tion of metals by white people, be in the Stone age
of culture.
It is reasonable to assume a resemblance between
man of the old Stone age and existing savage races,
for the observations of travellers have proved that,
whether on this side of the world or the other, man
at the same level of culture has everywhere made
shift with the same rough implements, chipped in
much the same way, until his history was revolu-
tionised by the discovery of metal.
But with that remote time, of which we have no
traditions or written records, when man's thought,
as far as any relics prove, was only exercised for
supplying the wants of his body, we have nothing
whatever to do. Folk-lore in other words, the
records of man's beliefs and customs begins only
with the traces or records of his thought. The
term Folk-lore was first suggested by the late Mr.
Thorns, in 1846, to designate "that department of
the study of antiquities and archaeology which em-
braces everything relating to ancient observances
and customs, to the notions, beliefs, traditions,
superstitions, and prejudices of the common people."
It is with these that this little book is concerned.
" In our lower classes are still to be found sedi-
3
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
mentary deposits of the traditions of remotely dis-
tant epochs." It is the task of the folk-lorist to
construct the philosophy of primitive man from these
still surviving relics. The modern savage helps to
supply the key to primitive modes of thought ; for,
just as man at the same level of culture makes use
everywhere of the same tools and weapons, so he
everywhere explains his surroundings in much the
same way. The following pages will illustrate the
substantial uniformity in the working of the human
mind under the same physical conditions every-
where. The most irrational and rudimentary mytho-
logies are substantially identical with those of the
Greeks, Scandinavians, and Hindus, however much
these may be overlaid and adorned by successive
generations of culture. Even the religious rituals
and ceremonial traditions of the most civilised
peoples contain survivals which link them in close
relationship with the beliefs and customs of present-
day savages.
If, therefore, we would inquire
"How our own minds were made,
What springs of thought they use,"
it is clear that we must concern ourselves not only
with the ancestors of the many different races,
sometimes conquerors, sometimes conquered, whose
commingled blood flows in the veins of our English
4
INTRODUCTORY
nation ; but we must acknowledge some ultimate re-
lationship with the first cave men, as well as with
the many forgotten peoples who buried their dead
in those huge funeral mounds, or built the vast stone
dolmens to preserve their bones.
And it is necessary to bear this in mind. We
who have emerged from our original lowly estate,
and by slow steps have raised ourselves to the level
of civilised man, still retain quite sufficient vestiges
of the old barbarous condition, and of the stages
that succeeded it. And unless we admit this fact
in explanation of many a superstitious and wholly
irrational act which civilised persons are wont to
perform,
" One point must still be greatly dark,
The moving Why they do it."
Man clings to tradition. In the Hebrides at this
day he will occupy bee-hive habitations, constructed
of rough, undressed stones, on precisely the model
of those erected by the population of Great Britain
ages before the Romans set foot there. Similar
dome-shaped huts are found in France, in the de-
sert of Beersheba, in Cornwall and in the Pyrenees,
and are very generally associated with megalithic
monuments. Wherever they are found, they are
either the remains of a primitive people, or they have
been erected in later ages, because the traditions of
that race have been continued.
5
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
The most consciously rational mind is ever un-
consciously swayed by impulses and habitudes the
origins of which are unsuspected. We are con-
stantly proving by unconscious actions " how use
doth breed a habit in a man." We are, in truth,
the very slaves of custom ; our minds are biased-
prepossessed, as it were, by the minds of our fore-
fathers and foremothers.
" To tunes we did not call, our being must keep chime."
Much of the lore of our ancestors is turned into
foolishness, the clearest judgment, as Pindar says,
being that of the after days. Yet many expressions
which they originated we still use from force of
habit, though they carry no longer their literal
meaning ; which meaning, like many of our irra-
tional actions, can be explained only in connection
with the beliefs and practices of a far fore-time.
Nowadays a man raises his hat as a simple mark
of courtesy, but the act was originally one of hom-
age ; just as the curtsey was the bowing of the knee
in worship. The wearing of a hat, or covering to
the head, was a symbol of authority and power.
Afterwards the possession of freedom was signified
by covering the head ; the slave was bareheaded till
he obtained the Cap of Liberty.
We talk of self-possession ; we say, " I wonder
what possessed him," without intending to admit
6
INTRODUCTORY
that a fiend may take charge of one's wits. We
say, " God bless you, ! " or " Good luck to you ! "
when a person sneezes, with no intention of help-
ing to cast out a devil, or acknowledging a spiritual
presence. It is simply a very old habit, and a wide-
spread one; for it has been detected in Florida, in
Zululand, in West Africa, in ancient Rome, in
Homeric Greece, and in many countries besides.
The exclamation so often attendant on a sneeze
originated in the belief that a spirit could take
possession of a man ; then, as with some, the act
of sneezing served to " cast him out with monstrous
potency;" or, as with others for example, the Zulus
it was a sign that the ancestral spirit was a bene-
ficent visitant. So when Telemachus, in the iyth
Odyssey, sneezed loudly, Penelope thought it a
lucky sign.
When the housemaid, to induce the fire to burn,
lays the poker across the bars and pointing up the
chimney, she is ignorant of the original motive of
the act namely, to make the form of the cross,
and thus frustrate the thwarting purpose of the
spirits inhabiting the chimney, who are as mis-
chievous as those other sprites " that bootless
make the breathless housewife churn." In our
own country districts, when there is difficulty in
the butter- making, the spell is believed to be the
work of a witch, and the remedy is to plunge a
7
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
red-hot poker into the contents of the churn. The
supposed potency of iron against evil spells will
be presently explained. Another popular means of
preserving dairy operations from the interference
of witches is to bind a branch of the rowan or
mountain-ash round the churn on May Eve.
On a May morning, while the dew is on the
grass, witches are most active in devising their
uncanny deeds. Their favourite amusements are
stealing children and bewitching cattle. An old
woman was once found mixing what looked like
butter, and muttering strange words over it, on a
May morning. This was a charm, and the mixture
was to be stuck on a cow-house door. When an
old woman cuts the tops of watercresses with a
pair of scissors at a spring, and mutters strange
words and the names of certain persons, she is
assuredly working a spell against their cows. Pro-
bably a lump of butter, and other things for work-
ing charms, will be found about her. It is well for
the farmer to sprinkle his cattle with water blessed
on Easter Sunday. This, if anything, is believed to
preserve them from evil influence.
The nursemaid who puts the child's shift on
inside out, and dares not risk ill-luck by correcting
her mistake, is in a like frame of mind to the great
Augustus himself, who would have been grievously
disquieted had he inadvertently squeezed a right-
INTRODUCTORY
hand foot into a left-hand shoe. A fretful child is
said to have got out of bed wrong foot foremost.
In Sussex one is recommended for luck to put on
the right stocking before the left ; but in Shropshire
just the contrary practice is enjoined. Marcellus,
in the fourth century of the Christian era, said that
a person should put on his left shoe first if he
would escape a pain in the stomach. Pliny tells
us that a wasp or beetle caught in the left hand
was used medicinally. You must enter a house
right foot foremost in Madagascar. Dr. Johnson
was so particular about this in our own country,
that if he happened to plant his left foot on the
threshold of a house, he would turn back and re-
enter right foot foremost. In Scotland you must
plait a cord with your left hand to keep out witches.
Saxo Grammaticus, who wrote his history of the
North in the twelfth century A.D., tells us that the
men of Riigen used to take omens by a certain
sacred white horse. After a solemn prayer the
horse was led in harness out of the porch by the
priest. Three rows of spears with points down-
wards had been set out, and if the horse crossed
the rows with the right foot before the left, it was
taken as a lucky omen of warfare ; if he put the
left first, so much as once, the plan of attack was
dropped.
But, as Sir Thomas Browne, writing in 1646,
9
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
says, " What admission we owe unto many con-
ceptions concerning right and left requireth circum-
spection. That is, how far ought we to rely upon
. . . the left eye of an hedgehog fried in oil to
procure sleep, or the right foot of a frog in deer's
skin for the gout, or that to dream of the loss of
right or left tooth presageth the death of male or
female kindred, according to the doctrine of Arte-
midorus." Yet there are those among us who have
not even attained to the guarded scepticism of Sir
Thomas Browne.
Though it is always unlucky to spill salt, it is
thought that calamity may be averted if some of the
salt be thrown over the left shoulder, a precau-
tionary measure which is practised all over Europe.
It may be hoped that the Chinese are not without
resource in the event of the upsetting of the oil-jar,
a contretemps considered quite as unlucky with them
as the spilling of salt with us. Safeguards of all
sorts are remembered and resorted to on occasion.
For instance, if two persons wash their hands in the
same basin, the sign of the cross should be made
in the water. We avoid passing under a ladder,
though spitting between the rungs will avert mis-
chance. Some carry a cramp-bone to ward off
pain the older the bone the greater its virtue;
another tries, as a cure for rheumatism, a new
potato, dishonestly come by, worn in the heel of
INTRODUCTORY
the right boot ; instead of this the Walloons carry
three horse-chestnuts in the pocket ; they are
equally efficacious, and they will also relieve giddi-
ness. The Wiltshire labourer wears, in a bag
round his neck, the forelegs and one of the hind-
legs of a mole to secure immunity from toothache.
Louis Napoleon in his will exhorts his son to keep
as a talisman the seal that he used to wear on his
watch-guard. It is said that when the Empress
Eugenie was escaping from Paris in September
1870, she took special precautions for the safety
of the casket containing this talisman. It is a large
sapphire, and perhaps the secre.t of its virtue as a
talisman was due to the fact that, as in the case of
the potato, it was stolen ! Napoleon I. had cribbed
it from the crown in the coffin of Charlemagne !
Numerous cures are supposed to be effected by
means of amulets and jewel talismans ; for example,
red beads worn round the neck will prevent nose-
bleeding ; the amethyst, as its name implies (from
Greek dfieOvaros, without drunkenness), is a remedy
for the intoxicated. The principle of leechcraft
or folk-medicine herein involved is nearly allied,
as will presently be seen, to the savage's method
of cure by sympathetic magic. Dryden, in his
" Tempest," makes Ariel say, with reference to the
wound which Hippolito received from Ferdinand :
" Anoint the sword which pierced him with this
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
weapon-salve, and wrap it close from air, till I have
time to visit him again." To salve the weapon and
not the wound, to take a hair of the dog that bit
one, to stick a pin into a wart and throw the pin
away, so that the finder of the pin will have the
wart, or to rub it with meat or snails, then burying
the meat or impaling the snail so as to cause its
death such practices as these are amongst the
relics of barbarism found in our own country, and
after all these things do the folk-lorists seek. Martin
Luther, who was very superstitious, believed that
three toads, spitted on a stick, extracted poison from
wounds. The practice of disease-transference is
very ancient, and is met with everywhere, with local
variation. In Devonshire and in Scotland alike,
when a child has hooping-cough, a hair of its head
is put between slices of bread and butter and given
to a dog. The dog will probably cough, but the
child will go free. Transference of disease to inani-
mate objects is also not uncommon. When sacred
wells, such as those in the Isle of Man and else-
where, were visited for the cure of diseases, it was
usual for the patients to drink the water, and to
moisten with it a fragment of their clothing, which
they would then leave hanging to a bush or tree
near the well. It was thought that when the rag
had rotted away, the disease would depart; but if
any one were rash enough to take away this rag, he
INTRODUCTORY
would be certain to catch the disease that had been
communicated to it. The pins, coins, buttons, and
other objects found in wells, and generally con- ,
sidered to be offerings, may formerly have been /-L
vehicles of the diseases which patients have thought
thus to throw off. Another cure for hooping-
cough is to pass the child under a donkey. To crawl
under a bramble which has formed a second root in
the ground is said to cure rheumatism, boils, and other
complaints ; and it is a very common custom to pass
ailing children through cleft trees. The virtues of a
gold wedding-ring for styes are celebrated through-
out Christendom. Rings of various descriptions
are efficacious as amulets, and the mere touch of
the ring finger is believed to have healing power.
The carnelian heart, another of the many lifeless
things to which virtue is ascribed, is a degraded
imitation of a very old charm or " fetich," the heart-
shape being accidentally reached by a process of
evolution. From very early times the stone-axes
and arrow-heads, which are somewhat heart-shaped,
once used by primitive peoples, were regarded as Q
lucky possessions, because they gave one a certain
hold over the ghosts of the people who originally
formed them, and who might be summoned by rub-
bing or anointing them, just as the genius of the
lamp was commanded to appear in the "Arabian
Nights " story. Modern Europeans regard the
13
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
stone arrow-heads as fairy -darts, and for this
reason value them as amulets. Amber was once
used as a charm to protect the wearer from evil
influences, and, as may be inferred from the custom
of burying a bead in graves, to help the dead man
^jt^J, in his journey to the other world. Necklaces of
amber have been frequently found in British tumuli.
Written charms are worn as amulets in various
parts of the world. It is on the same principle
that Chinese physicians direct their patients to
swallow the written prescription when the drug
recommended is not handy. The written command
" Febra fuge," used in a particular way, would cure
the ague. "That blessed word Mesopotamia" has
no doubt proved as efficacious as the mystic Abra-
cadabra and the rest of its class which magicians
use to conjure by. A Scotch mother will leave an
open Bible beside her child to keep the fairies
away. The Chinese scares away the evil spirits
by placing his classics under his pillow. In ancient
Assyria written texts were bound round a sick
man's brains, and the Jews believed that the phylac-
teries would avert all evil and drive away demons.
In Saxo we read how some dreadful spells graven
on wood and put under a dead man's tongue forced
him to utter a strain terrible to hear.
Many persons pick up old horse-shoes and hang
them up for luck, shunning the more decorative
INTRODUCTORY
peacock's feather whose neighbourhood is baleful.
But then a horse-shoe effectually hinders the power
of witches : they cannot step over cold iron. We
have seen before (p. 8) how the use of this metal
was resorted to in order to frustrate their malevo-
lence. Now, the practices of modern witches have
descended from prehistoric times, a curious proof n_ y(/
of this fact being seen in their use of old flint
_ <
implements and arrow-heads as weapons against
persons whom they desired to injure. It was the
entrance of the iron age that prepared the way for
man's emancipation, still only partially effected,
from the tyranny of witchcraft; for his intellect,
ever expanding with his means of wider experience,
submitted no longer to the old cramping thraldom.
A knowledge of the use of iron has everywhere
enabled man to dispossess the rude stone man, and
drive him further afield, or to make him a vassal.
It is easy to see, therefore, whence comes the
witch's dread of iron, and its power to overcome
magic influences. In European folk-lore it destroys
the power of fairies and elves. Barrows and stone
circles are under the special protection of fairies;
stone-implements, celts, arrow-heads, &c., when
found by peasants, are called fairy-darts or elf-
stones : Irish peasants wear them set in silver
round their necks to protect them against elf-shots.
The very name of iron is a charm against the
15
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Oriental jinn. In fine, the iron horse-shoe nailed
to stable doors keeps away the witches, just as the
shades were held at bay when Ulysses brandished
his falchion. We forget, it would seem, that the
virtue is principally in the material of the horse-
shoe, when we wear for luck jewelled imitations of
it in gold. But the form may possibly have some-
thing to do with it. All heathendom, our own
ancestors in common with several Slavic and
Finnish nations, with Persians and Indians, saw .
something sacred and divine in the horse, whose
neigh is an omen of luck. It was a favourite
animal for sacrifice; its flesh was eaten. Omens
were taken from it (see p. 9) ; and all sorts of
magic has been practised by cutting off horses'
heads and sticking them up. The devil is some-
times horse-footed, so is a kobold. Oddly enough,
a horse's hoof hung up in a house has the same
preservative virtue in China as the horse-shoe
amongst ourselves. Belief in the potency of iron
to counteract evil may be further exemplified in the
Roman practice of driving nails into the walls of
cottages as an antidote against the plague. L.
Mantius (A.U.C. 390) was named dictator to drive
the nail. On the other hand, to touch the king of
Korea with a weapon or instrument of metal is the
highest treason. So entirely is the law observed by
king and people that ninety-four years ago Tieng-
16
INTRODUCTORY
tsong-tai-dang allowed an abscess to end his life rather
than that his body should be touched with a knife.
The following story is told to explain why pea- I)-
cocks' feathers bring ill-luck. When God created |U
the peacock, the seven Deadly Sins gazed with envy
at the splendid plumage of the bird, and complained
of the injustice of the Creator. "You are quite
right ; I have been unjust," said the Creator, " for
I have already bestowed too much on you ; the
Deadly Sins ought to be black as Night, who
covers them with her veil." And taking the yellow
eye of Envy, the red eye of Murder, the green eye of
Jealousy, and so on with the rest, he placed them all
on the feathers of the peacock and gave the bird its
liberty. Away went the bird, and the Sins, thus
despoiled, followed close on his track, trying in vain
to recover their lost eyes. This is the reason why,
when a man decks himself with a peacock's feather,
the sins incarnate dog his steps, and assail him each
in its turn.
Why do we throw rice over a bridal pair ? Some
will say it is " for luck," rice being used as an emblem
of plenty, of fruitfulness. The barbarous practice
has doubtless a barbaric origin ; possibly we have
forgotten to perform the rite with due discrimina-
tion, inasmuch as the bride is not exempted from
the bruising shower. They order this matter better
in Celebes, where it is believed that the bridegroom's
17 B
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
soul is especially liable to take flight at marriage,
and rice is therefore scattered over him with the
object of inducing it to stay. With the Wadders,
one of the early races of South India, of the class
Dravidian, it is part of the very long and elaborate
marriage ceremony for the bride and bridegroom
to pour rice over each other, while the elders pour
some over both. This rice is retained for the feast
to follow. The next day the bridal pair swear
eternal fidelity to each other by pouring milk over
each other's head. " The wandering gipsies of
Transylvania are said to throw old shoes and boots
on a newly married pair when they enter their tent,
expressly to enhance the fertility of the union." At
a Turkish wedding the bridegroom " has to run for
his life to the harem under a shower of old shoes ; "
for, according to the Turks, an old slipper thrown
after a man is an infallible charm against the evil
eye. Wheat was cast on the bride's head in some
parts of England, as is done in Sicily. This was
also a Hebrew custom. In Russia, when the priest
has tied the nuptial knot at the altar, his clerk
throws a handful of hops on the head of the bride.
Our North Country goodwives throw a plateful of
short-cakes over her as she goes to her future
home ; and the Chinese perform the same ceremony
with rice, the emblem of abundance. Natives of
the Sulu Islands, north-east of Borneo, always put
18
INTRODUCTORY
a few grains of rice in a packet of gold, or of
precious stones, believing that the rice will cause /f
the gold or stones to increase.
Neither in China nor in our North Countree must
one commit " a crime so inhuman " as the rocking of
a " toom " or empty cradle.
" Oh, rock not the cradle when the baby's not in,
For this by old women is counted a sin."
This belief holds its ground also in Scotland, in
Holland, and in Sweden.
" If you marry in Lent you will live to repent,"
says the old North Country rhyme. Ovid knew
that the month of May was unlucky for marriages ;
and the first column of The Times leads one to
suppose that the idea has survived through eighteen
centuries. The Romans objected on religious
grounds to marriages in May, because the funeral
rites of the Lemuralia were performed in that
month. The Roman Calendar actually forbade
marriages on certain days e.g., February nth,
June 2nd, November 2nd, December ist.
What we call "luck" may often be associated
with a matter of ritual. Superstitious fear of the
consequences of any infraction of established rule
serves to ensure the preservation of many savage
rites and observances, till they come to be followed
as a matter of habit, and quite independently of
19
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
reason. For instance, we are careful at table to
pass the bottle from right to left, for it must travel
the way of the sun. The habit of moving sun-wise,
from east to west, has survived as a vestige of sun-
worship, which is also reflected in the devotions of
the Irish peasant, who crawls three times round the
healing spring, imitating the circuit of the sun.
The crank of a churn must be turned, or eggs
beaten and mixtures stirred, always in the same
direction, usually "with the sun." Evil spells are
wrought " withershins," a word thought to be
analogous to the German ''wider Schein," or con-
trary to the appearance of the sun; and ill-luck
consistently attends all actions performed wither-
shins. Similarly, the various superstitions con-
cerning the moon, the curtseys and the prayers to
the new moon, the money-turning charms, the cures,
&c., may all be connected with moon-worship.
Many educated people persist in associating changes
of weather with the different phases of the moon,
and would be loth to see, in their faith in this fanci-
ful weather-lore, a survival from the doctrines of
the astrologist, which are largely based on sym-
bolism, such as that which connects the sun with
gold, the moon with silver, and the moon's waxing
and waning with growing and declining nature.
The symbolic magic of the Middle Ages, the con-
fusion of ideal analogy with real connection, can
INTRODUCTORY
in its turn be traced back to its deep root in the
imagination of the savage, whose belief that like
affects like will be presently illustrated.
Like Virgil, we incline to the belief that all days
are not equally lucky. " Eschew the fifth day," he
says, in his elaborate almanac of lucky and unlucky
days ; " it is the birthday of the ghastly Orcus and
of the Furies." But the seventeenth day, he assures
us, is lucky ; while the ninth is good for the runaway,
adverse to the thief. Choosing of days prevailed
among the Jews, Greeks, and probably all heathen.
Hesiod distinguishes between mother-days and
stepmother-days; he goes over all the good days
of Zeus, and all the bad. Though our names for
the days of the week were imported from abroad,
yet native superstitions may have been mixed up
with them from very early times. The ill character
of the Friday amongst Christian peoples was gained
through its association with the day of the Cruci-
fixion. Even the nails should not be cut on a
Friday, and no work can be expected to prosper if
begun on that day. A lodging-house keeper in
Macclesfield caught her servant-girl cutting her
finger-nails one Friday, and, snatching the scissors
from her, shouted : "Is that what I had you from
the workhouse for, to cut your nails on a Friday,
and bring bad luck to this house ? " On the other
hand, it is one of the superstitions of the Rio
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Grande that if you cut your finger-nails every
Friday, you will not have toothache.
The belief in " luck in odd numbers " is frequently
expressed and acted upon. Shakespeare makes Fal-
staff say : " This is the third time ; I hope good luck
lies in odd numbers. . . . They say there is divinity in
odd numbers, either in nativity, chance, or death." J
So thought Virgil, who wrote (Eel. viii. 75),
" Numero deus inpare gaudet ;" accordingly three
threads of three hues were used in the thrice re-
peated charm to draw Daphnis home. Three, or
some multiple of three, is the most popular of mystic
numbers in Britain. It enters largely into all pre-
scriptions of leechcraft; thus, three times is the
child passed under the donkey on nine consecutive
mornings for the cure of hooping-cough. Nine
knots on a string hung round a Lancashire child's
neck are to cure the same complaint. Pliny men-
tions the virtues of nine knots being known to the
Magi; knots are frequently used in enchantments.
Nine times should the stye be rubbed with the cat's
tail. " Thrice the brindled cat hath mew'd," says
the witch in " Macbeth."
Seven is not popular in England, in spite of its
1 The people of Riigen, however, according to Saxo, held the
reverse opinion. "Their women," he says, "would sit by the
hearth and draw random lines in the ashes without counting. If
these, when counted, were even, they were thought to bode success ;
if odd, ill-fortune."
22
INTRODUCTORY
mystical associations in Scripture; and but few
examples of it are met with in folk-medicine, and
these chiefly with reference to the personal powers
of a seventh son. But seven was a number sacred
to the Semites, a belief in its magic virtues having
descended to them from their Accadian predecessors.
The Deluge lasted seven days, and after it the first
act of the Chaldean Noah was to build an altar and
to set vessels by sevens. The Sabbath of rest fell
on each seventh day of the week ; the planets and
three groups of stars were each seven in number ;
" the god of the number seven " received peculiar
honour. Seven occurs in Assyrian talismans ; it is
used in exorcisms. " Seven by seven had the magic
knots to be tied by the witch, seven times had the
body of the sick man to be anointed with the puri-
fying oil."
It would be impossible in brief space to catalogue
the various superstitions that are met with even in
this last decade of the nineteenth century, when
burglars invariably carry a small piece of coal " for
luck " in their deeds of darkness ; love philtres are
not wholly out of fashion ; and there are certain who
believe that carrying the bones of a toad from which
the flesh has been eaten by ants will compel the
affections of the opposite sex.
When the bees swarm, and our country .folk !
straightway beat an old kettle or pot, or anything
23
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
that makes a metallic din, they are using the same
means which Virgil recommended to induce the bees
to go back to the hive. " Raise tinkling sounds,"
he said, "and rattle the cymbals." Bees are pro-
verbially busy and intelligent, and it would appear
that they particularly resent a slight of any kind.
Virgil says that some have thought them possessed
of a share of the Divine mind. We know that they
supplied the sacred mead, and so came into direct
contact with the gods ; perhaps it was expected of
them as messengers of the gods to herald the arrival
of a new-comer to the land of spirits. However
this may be, if there is a death in the house the
bees must be told of it, or they will fly away. A
member of the writer's family on one occasion
neglected this little act of courtesy, and lost a hive !
Their supposed sensitiveness upon this point is re-
cognised nearly all over Europe. It is also a Hindu
custom to tell the bees of the death of their owner.
The following lines from a Greek epigram enjoin
the same practice :
" Naiads and chill cattle-pastures, tell to the bees,
when they come on their spring-tide way, that old
Leucippus perished on a winter's night, setting snares
for scampering hares, and no longer is the tending
of the hives dear to him."
The granny who prophesies the weather by ob-
serving the course of the bubbles in her tea-cup, or
24
INTRODUCTORY
who foresees the advent of a stranger, tall or short,
in the floating tea-leaf, is " using divination " no
less than the Babylonian king of whom we read in
Ezekiel xxi. 21 (though his method was certainly
more elaborate) : " He stood at the parting of the
way, at the head of the two ways ; he made his
arrows bright, he consulted with images, he looked
in the liver." Examining the entrails of animals is
a common method of divination; so is casting dif-
ferent objects into water and observing the ripples
that they make. Lobengula, the late Matabele king,
gazed into a dark pool before starting on the war-
path. The Wahuma, another African race, a pastoral
people, who do not cultivate the soil, but live on the
flesh and milk of their cattle, keep fowls for purposes
of divination only. They would on no account eat
them; they use them solely in obtaining auguries
by their entrails, just as the Romans did in the days
of the foundation of their empire, some 2600 years
ago. Saxo Grammaticus tells us that the magicians
of the North were skilled in the same art.
Pausanias explains by what method sick persons
read their fate in a certain spring in front of the
temple of Ceres, at Patras. From of old the Egyp-
tians have seen visions in a drop of ink ; the Maoris
similarly use a drop of blood. Equally portable as
an apparatus is the crystal ball which serves the
modern spiritualist ; so are the beryl and the magic
25
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
mirror. The art of catoptromancy, or divination by
means of a mirror, has been practised by necro-
mancers and clairvoyants of all ages. The Romans
called such persons specularii : perhaps even now-a-
days every speculator is more or less a visionary.
Varro, the contemporary of Cicero, says that the
art originated in Persia. Pythagoras (550 B.C.)
consulted a highly polished steel mirror at the full
of the moon. In a " Book of all Forbidden Arts,"
written in 1455 by the Duke of Bavaria's physician,
a similar use of a " beautiful bright polished sword "
is mentioned. It has been conjectured that the
Urim and Thummim, worn in the breastplate of
the high priest of Israel, were objects used in a
similar way. At any rate, he consulted them, and
they gave oracular responses. The words signify
" lights and perfections." King Saul tried to foresee
the issue of the battle with the Philistines by means
of Urim ; then as a pis alter he consulted the witch
of Endor.
The flight of birds is another means of augury,
a word which is in part derived from Latin avis, a
bird. The Romans called the bird-seer auspex.
We still talk of favourable auspices. The art of
taking omens from birds and animals is familiar to
savages, and extends upwards to the civilised. In
classic writings there are many allusions to the
divining powers of the seer, the feeder of the ora-
26
INTRODUCTORY
cular birds. English people have their curious
superstitions about birds, quite on a par with those
of the Maori, the Tatar, the Dayak, and the Kalmuc.
In North India the crow is a bird of evil omen ; so
are kites and vultures. If a man answers the owl,
he is sure to die. When a wagtail first appears
every one bows to it. The Greeks bowed to the
kite. Aristophanes, in his play of " The Birds," in
which he burlesques the national mythology, makes
Peisthetairus say that when the kite was ruler and
king over the Greeks he first taught the people to
prostrate themselves before kites. The Scholiast
explains that the kites' appearing betokened the
coming of spring, wherefore the Greeks bowed the
knee to them.
These are among "the many modes of the
divining art" which, in the tragedy of ^Eschylus,
Prometheus claims to have taught to men : to dis-
criminate among dreams as to which are destined
to be a true vision ; obscure vocal omens ; the flight
of birds of crooked talons, both the auspicious and
the ill-omened ; the smoothness of the entrails, and
their hue ; the various happy formations of the gall
and liver, and the limbs enveloped in fat. All these
"mqdes" are practised by savages, and survivals
of some may be detected amongst the civilised.
Nine-tenths of Europeans firmly believe still that
dreams are prophetic, just as in ancient times
27
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
dreams were interpreted and their warnings fol-
lowed. Examples of dream-divination, so common
in the classics, might be compared with those
which English mediaeval poems afford, and with
the familiar details and interpretations of Joseph's
dreams (Gen. xxxvii., xl., xli.). In a Northern lay
the poet makes Atli say : " I dreamed that thou,
Gudrun, thrust me through with a poisoned sword."
And Gudrun answered : " To dream of iron means
fire, to dream of a woman's anger means sickness
and sorrow," &c. In another lay, Gudrun, vexed
with unhappy dreams, goes to Brunhild to have
them interpreted. She had dreamt about a fair
hawk with wings of golden hue, and about a great
hart with hide of gold. Animals and birds in
dreams were read as persons then as now; and
the symbolical interpretation of dreams is not un-
known either to the lower races.
Others divine by means of sieve and shears, or
of a shoulder-blade, or a key and Bible. Chiro-
mancy, or palmistry, which once flourished in
ancient Greece and Italy (as it still does in India,
where to say "It is written on the palms of my
hands " is the usual way of expressing a sense of
inevitable fate), has its modern votaries not merely
among gipsy fortune-tellers ; while the divining-rod,
inevitably recalling the rod of Moses, is still in use
for finding springs. When one of the Bacchae
28
INTRODUCTORY
struck the rock with her thyrsus, a dewy stream
of water flowed. According to the Scholiast on
Euripides, Neptune struck his trident in the ground
at Triaena, in Argolis, and immediately water sprung
up. Allat, the queen of the Assyrian Hades, had a
divining-rod ; and the Greek Hermes carried a magic
staff or rod, by means of which he could raise the
dead. The priest in the temple of Demeter, in
Arcadia, smote the earth with rods, calling on the
people under the earth ; and when the Zulus
practise divination they strike the ground and
invoke the spirits. The magic rod is brought into
use in popular tales for opening treasure-rocks, the
idea being no European monopoly. The Zulus, the
Hottentots, the Kaffirs, the Malagasians have all
very similar stories about rocks that open like the
cavern in the " Forty Thieves."
Children sport with divination when they strip
the pinnate leaves from a stem, with lightsome
heart linking their future with " tinker, tailor,
soldier, sailor, gentleman, apothecary, ploughboy,
or thief." More momentous to dreamy maidenhood
is the question which a flower shall decide. One
by one Margarete pulls the petals from the aster,
murmuring
"He loves me, loves me not . . ."
The lovelorn goatherd, in the beautiful idyll of
29
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Theocritus, gently chiding his wayward Amaryllis,
sings how the poppy petal clung not, but withered
on his smooth fore-arm, when he asked, "Loves
she, loves she not ? " Nor did the soothsayer's
divination with the sieve prove more auspicious.
But his right eyelid throbs; haply this is a good
sign, and she will relent and come to him. Two
thousand years and more have not sufficed to stifle
faith in these " strange arts " and portents.
It is unnecessary to multiply instances of the
countless irrational practices which are based upon
the traditional lore of the folk, and are the outcome
of customs and beliefs of great antiquity. They are
not peculiar to any one race or country, being found
in regions very wide apart. This fact, however,
does not prove that all mankind have inherited their
beliefs from a common source. There is no reason
why the savage intellect should differ in its work-
ings in different parts of the globe. Like causes
everywhere produce like effects. Just as at the
same level of culture man all over the world makes
shift with the same rude tools the accidental chip
of flint, which teaches him the use of a cutting or
scraping instrument; the heavier stone, which he
uses as a hammer wherewith to crush or break (the
Scandinavian word liamarr means both rock and
hammer) ; the pebble as a missile ; these being the
natural prototypes of all implements of stone, which
30
INTRODUCTORY
by slow degrees man comes to shape and improve
for himself so the savage intellect, grappling every-
where with the same problems, supplying every-
where the same crude solutions, has laid enduring
foundation for many elaborate structures of beliefs
and ritual observances.
In old Aryan myth the spring-tide sun was typi-
fied by a red or golden egg, which in after-times
was made by the early Christians the emblem of
the Resurrection. Hence the Easter egg, and the Jg Jc
many curious customs connected with it through-
out Europe. In the household accounts of King
Edward I. stands the following item against Easter
Day : " Four hundred and a half of eggs, eighteen-
pence." The Pope gave an Easter egg in a silver
case to Henry VIII. Quite recently Cheshire
children begged (as is still the custom in the Mid-
lands and in Scotland) for pace or pasch eggs (so
called from the Hebrew word Pascha, meaning the
Passover), which are usually boiled hard in water
stained with different dyes, red, blue, or violet, and
otherwise ornamented. These eggs are sometimes
hung up in the cottages till another year. In York-
shire the coloured eggs are hidden out of doors in
little nests, and the children hunt for them. In
Swabia a hare is set on the nest, and the children
find the hare eggs. But you must first catch your
hare. In past years, in our own country, if lads
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
could do this, and bring it to the parson of the
parish of Coleshill, in Warwickshire, before 10 A.M.
on Easter Monday, he was bound to give them " a
calf's head, a hundred eggs, and a groat in money."
In many parts of Germany eggs are made into
cakes in the form of a hare. In England long ago
the clergyman and choristers actually played at
ball with Easter eggs as part of the service in
church. Afterwards they retired for refreshments,
including a gammon of bacon and a tansy pudding.
Amongst other nations, the Parsees used to dis-
tribute eggs, coloured bright red, at their spring
festival.
All festival and ceremonial customs, such as those
observed at harvest, at birth, at death, or at mar-
riage ; all local customs, such as the Dunmow
Flitch, the Lady Godiva procession at Coventry;
the use of the curfew bell, of ducking stools, of
scold bridles all such-like curiosities come under
the notice of the folk-lorist. The original meaning
of many of them is forgotten, customs being ob-
served often as mere matters of habit. We have
seen that the folk that is, the uneducated classes
retain many of the beliefs and ways of savages. It
is the aim of the student of folk-lore to collect and
compare the surviving superstitions and stories of
old races, to treasure the " idle tale and fading legend
of the past ; " for all scraps of folk-lore are of value
32
INTRODUCTORY
as capable of throwing light backwards upon the
history of human civilisation. Certain usages and
myths which seem unintelligible when found among
civilised races, are the relics of a stage of thought
which is dying out in Europe, but which still exists
amongst savages. The European may find among
the Greenlanders or Maoris many a trait for recon-
structing the picture of his own primitive ancestors.
Much information is to be derived from a com-
parative study of nursery tales and children's games,
as contributing to the history of man's life. Indian
hill tribes have many of the same games as Euro-
pean children, including peg-tops, and several games
with a ball ; they have also a kind of cat's cradle.
The Egyptians played at draughts as long ago as
B.C. 1 500, and probably long before that. Children
everywhere play at imitating their elders ; this is
noticeably the case amongst savages. For instance,
amongst tribes whose custom it is to capture their
wives by force from neighbouring tribes, children
play at the game of wife-catching, just as English
children play at catching a "sweetheart." As Mr.
Tylor says, " It is quite a usual thing in the world
for a game to outlive the serious practice of which
it is an imitation ; " and he instances the bow and
arrow, and sling and stone, still deadly weapons
amongst a few savage tribes, but surviving only
as toys or sports amongst the civilised.
33 c
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
The Chinese, the oldest and most populous nation
of the globe, are still in the condition that Europe
was in during the Middle Ages; for, whereas our
ignorant and semi-barbarous usages were but a
step towards a higher civilisation, they have stereo-
typed their low level of civilisation, and strive for
nothing better. Many of the ceremonies of the
Chinese wedding are survivals of the time when a
bride was carried off by force ; and among some of
the tribes of Western China it is customary for the
bride to perch herself on the high branch of a large
tree, while her elderly female relatives station them-
selves on the lower limbs, armed with switches, and
through this protecting force the bridegroom has
to make his way, being merrily attacked by the
dowagers as he scrambles up to his bride. In the
Spartan marriage ceremony also the pretence was
kept up of carrying the bride off by force, although
the bride's guardians had sanctioned the union.
The same custom is found among the Circassians
and in South America. On the large islands of the
Fiji group, a woman is often seized upon by apparent
or actual force in order to be made a wife. If she
does not approve the proceeding, she runs off when
she reaches the man's house ; but if she is satisfied,
she stays. In these cases, says Mr. Tylor, the
abduction is a mere pretence; but it is kept up
seemingly as a relic of a ruder time when, as among
34
INTRODUCTORY
the modern Australians, it was done by no means as
a matter of form, but in grim earnest.
The following pages will exhibit the essential
identities and analogies between European and
savage customs and superstitions, as well as the
affinities between our own village and homestead
customs and those of other lands. It is only in
traversing " the eternal landscape of the past " that
the student of folk-lore will find the source of all
myth and of all superstition, the origin of the count-
less ancient notions which still survive, though
sometimes in strangely altered form.
35
CHAPTER I
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
' ' Who can see the green earth any more
As she was by the sources of Time ?
Who imagines her fields as they lay
In the sunshine, unworn by the plough ?
Who thinks as they thought,
The tribes who then roamed on her breast,
Her vigorous, primitive sons?" MATTHEW ARNOLD.
The beginnings of Folk-lore How the belief in a second self, or soul,
may have originated The soul's means of ingress and egress
Poets' imagery and popular legends in illustration of this The
soul as a bee, a snake, a mouse, &c. The homeless soul of Her-
motimus Death a prolonged absence of the second self : provisions
against its return Hell-shoon A Chinese funeral The souls of
inanimate objects can be of service to men's souls ; wherefore all
kinds of objects are buried with corpse Sacrifice of wives, friends,
slaves Messages to the dead Food offerings to the dead : sur-
vivals of the practice Soul-cakes Receptacles for food on tombs
Preservation of the corpse Cairns, pyramids Some methods of
preventing a ghost's return when dreaded Ghosts intangible
Ghosts as tiny bodies Fear of supernatural powers of ghost lead-
ing to propitiation and worship of ancestral ghosts A body deserted
by its other self may be entered by the other self of some one else,
living or dead Sneezing, yawning, convulsions as cases of " pos-
session," originating the practice of exorcism Means of ingress and
egress provided for ghost Pre-historic trepanning Phenomena of
shadows and reflections confirming belief in a second self Soul
identified with the shade, with the breath Echoes explained
Doctrine of Pythagoras Soul as a bird, butterfly, flower Souls
pervading all nature Souls of the dead animating trees Speak-
ing, sentient trees Sympathy between man and natural objects
Metamorphosis of human beings into trees Tree and plant wor-
ship Offerings on trees Libations to fruit trees The Separable
Soul in folk-tales.
TRAVELLING backwards towards the morning of
Time in our search for the origins of folk-lore, we
36
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
must halt at that stage in the evolution of the
mental life of man when an intelligent curiosity
concerning himself and his surroundings took the
place of mere animal inquisitiveness ; when homo
sapiens thus further manifested his ever-widening
divergence from his prime brethren, the " apes with
foreheads villainous low." Man at his lowest was
naked, toolless, fireless; his endowments had to be
acquired step by step. Ingenuity of the rudest
character necessarily requires a past of many
generations of slow mental progress ; and the lowest
savage who has inherited weapons, or the ability to
devise them, cannot be called "primitive." The
most barbarous and childish of myths, therefore,
were evolved amongst races who had reached a
considerable degree of intellectual activity, though
they were far from having attained to clear rational
thought " they who," as Prometheus describes them
in the play of ^Eschylus, "at first seeing, saw in
vain; hearing, they heard not. But, like to the
forms of dreams, for a long time they used to huddle
together all things at random, and naught knew
they about brick- built and sunward houses, nor
carpentry; but they dwelt in the excavated earth
like tiny emmets in the sunless depths of caverns.
And they had no sure sign either of winter, or of
flowery spring, or of fruitful summer : but they used
to do everything without judgment."
37
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
The brain of the ape-like ancestors of man in
Tertiary times was inferior in weight and in
structural complexity to that of the ape which Mr.
Romanes has succeeded in teaching to count five.
Indeed, this intelligent animal treads closely on the
heels of some of the living races of men, who are
much puzzled to count after five, because they have
no spare hand with which to grasp the fingers which
they use as units or digits, as we still say (from
Latin, digitus, a finger); whose vocabulary is so
limited that they largely depend upon signs and
gestures, and therefore cannot make themselves
wholly understood in the dark ; and who are quite
incapable of abstract ideas. In short, in measuring
the mental capacity of the rudest savage, we must
put him on a plane much more nearly adjacent to
that of the anthropoid ape than to the immeasurably
higher plane of civilised man.
But there comes a time when the savage, having
satisfied the daily wants of his body, finds leisure
to concern himself about the causes of things, his
explanations taking the form of what we call myth
and legend. For most myths may be interpreted as
man's early attempts to solve the riddle of the Uni-
verse. He was no CEdipus at guessing, nevertheless
he was a philosopher in his way a very limited way.
Ignoring for awhile that we ourselves have either
sipped, or largely drunk, of the Pierian Spring, that
38
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
we have ever tasted of the Tree of Knowledge, whose
garnered fruit long ages were required to culti-
vate, let us put ourselves in the place of our savage
progenitors, and, thus bereft of our shrewder wits,
endeavour to " think as they thought." " Know-
ledge is ofttimes nearer when we stoop than when
we soar : " a cruder understanding can better realise
the attitude of our primitive philosopher, who per-
ceives nothing irrational in the notion of beasts
that talk, and of plants as well as lifeless things
with souls.
To the mental faculty, in a low state of its develop-
ment, the events which take place in dreams are in-
distinguishable from actual occurrences. " Dreams
are true while they last, and do we not live in
dreams?" An attempted explanation of dream-
acts results in the belief that they are the perform-
ances of the spirit when away from the body, just
as real acts are performed when the spirit is present
in the body. To make this clear, and to show also
how, in all probability (following the theory gene-
rally set forth in these pages), the notion of a spirit
is primarily conceived, let us suppose that the savage
hunter, fatigued and famished after an adventurous
day with his flint his sole weapon gorges himsell
on the flesh of the animal he has slain, and falls
asleep, to go through once more in his dream some
thrilling incidents of the chase, with variations.
39
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
He secures his prey ; it is wrested from him by
his fellow, whom he slays. He wakes, boasts of
his adventure, and tells his comrade of his bloody
deed. For he cannot explain, like Eugene Aram,
" My little lad, remember, this is nothing but a
dream." The savage, as we have said, cannot dis-
tinguish between dream life and real life. Suppose
that the little lad insists that the sleeper never left
the spot, while his recent vivid experience makes the
latter trust to his own memory. How is he to re-
concile such contradictory facts ? The simple course
is to believe that he has a second self, which has been
away and come back : while weariness was snoring
on the flint, the second self, the soul, the ghost
(armed with the ghost of the flint), was abroad. A
similar event would take place everywhere and
often, with the same resulting impression. When-
ever a man has watched his comrade sleeping, and
afterwards listened to his account of what he sup-
poses he did, while in reality his body never left the
spot, there has seemed only this one explanation
possible namely, that the sleeper's spirit quitted
the body, and went forth on its adventures. A
dream may be either the experience of the soul
when absent from the body of the sleeper, or it
may be a visit from the soul of the person or object
dreamed of, as phantoms visit and converse with
the professional seer. The modern spiritualist be-
40
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
lieves that while a person is in an insensible state
his apparition visits distant parts, and communicates
with the living; and a medium has the power of
summoning also the spirits of the dead. Even if
the savage suspects some distinction between dream
experience and real experience, his language does
not enable him to express it. He cannot say, " I
dreamt that I saw," instead of " I saw ; " therefore
dreams must needs be related as realities, and this
strengthens belief in them as such.
Belief in the other self thus established, the savage
has no trouble to account for the presence in his
dreams of parents, comrades, or enemies known
to be dead or at a distance ; it is a proof that their
souls still exist. For he naturally thinks that the
persons that his spirit meets in dreams, the horse,
the dog, the waving trees, are spirits also, and all
inanimate things used in dreams are ghosts of the
material things. Many persons have a superstitious
objection to waking a sleeper suddenly ; savages are
forbidden to do so, lest the soul just then might be
wandering, and not have time to return to the body,
and then the sleeper would be a dead man.
The common belief is that the soul issues by way
of the mouth. Homer frequently speaks of the soul
passing " the fence of the teeth ; " and other ex-
amples from the Greek may be cited. In Herondas,
iii. 3, "Thrash this boy until his miserable soul is
41
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
at his very lips." (This recalls the common expres-
sion about having one's heart in one's mouth).
From Plato, Frag. I, " Kissing Agathon, I had my
soul upon my lips ; for it rose, poor wretch, as
though to cross over." From the Anthology, v. 14,
" Sweet is Europa's kiss, even if it touch but the
lips. But it is not so her kiss touches : the pres-
sure of her lips draws up the soul from the toes
and finger-tips." " Soul meets soul on lovers'
lips," says our own Shelley ; " And our spirits
rushed together at the touching of the lips," is a
line in " Locksley Hall." The same idea is ex-
pressed in Schiller's " Amalia " : " Seele rann in
Seele." But enough of poets' fancies.
A well-known story may be cited to illustrate the
belief that the mouth is the door by which the spirit
enters and leaves the body. Two shepherds sat
one summer's day in the open air together. Whilst
one of them slept, his comrade saw a bee come forth
from his mouth, and watched it as it crept along a
blade of grass which hung over a tiny trickle of
water, and then flew off amongst the flowers. After
an hour the bee returned by precisely the same
course, and re-entered the mouth of the sleeper.
Thereupon the man awoke, and related how in a
dream he had crossed a magnificent bridge over
a large river, and had visited Paradise. In a parallel
legend, King Gunthram, spent with toil, had gone to
42
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
sleep on the lap of a faithful follower, who sees a
little beast like a snake run out of his lord's mouth
towards a streamlet, which, however, it cannot cross.
The servant lays his sword across the water, and
the creature runs over it, and up into a mountain
on the other side. Presently it returns by the same
way, and re-enters the mouth of the sleeper, who
thereupon wakes, and relates how in a dream he had
crossed an iron bridge and gone into a mountain
filled with gold.
Matthew Paris, the greatest Latin historian of the
thirteenth century, has something to say about the
soul leaving the body during sleep, passing out of
the mouth, generally in the form of a mouse. One
out of a hundred myths to this effect must serve as
illustration of the prevalent belief. " In Thuringia,
at Saalfeld, a servant girl fell asleep whilst her com-
panions were shelling nuts. They observed a little
red mouse creep from her mouth and run out of
the window. One of the fellows present shook the
sleeper, but could not wake her, so he moved her
to another place. Presently the mouse ran back
to the former place and dashed about, seeking the
girl; not finding her, it vanished; at the same
moment the girl died." Many will doubtless recall
the case of the homeless soul of Hermotimus, accord-
ing to the familiar classical story. On one fateful
occasion, when his prophetic soul had flitted, accord-
43
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
ing to wont, to distant regions, his wife inconsider-
ately burnt his lifeless body, and so the poor soul,
on its return, found no dwelling to animate with its
presence. Similarly, when men are in a trance, or
asleep, the soul runs out of them in the shape of a
snake or a weasel.
The insensibility of death is like the unconscious-
ness of sleep or swoon, and the savage intellect
accounts for it as the prolonged, yet possibly only
temporary, absence of the other self. In many cases
of burials, it is certain, from the position given to the
corpse, that the idea of sleep was connected with
death. The Norsemen were buried seated in a
chair or in a boat ; but the builders of the megalithic
or " great stone " monuments, the huge dolmens, or
family tombs, were interred lying on their sides,
with their hands folded as though in sleep. In
early days, the barrow, or burial-place, was modelled
after the house. In the case of Wicking princes,
their warships seemed the most appropriate place
to bury them in. After vain attempts to call back
the errant spirit, the savage leaves food in the grave
with the corpse, and weapons ready for use, in case
the spirit should return to reanimate it. The Tupis
buried the dead person "in a sitting posture with
food before it; for there were some who believed
that the spirit went to sport among the mountains,
and returned there to eat and to take rest." Gar-
44
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
ments are hung on trees near the place of interment,
for the dead man to put on if he chooses to come
out. In the Icelandic saga, the death-shoes are
bound tightly on the feet of the dead man, that he
may walk safely in the ways of Hela ; then the great
cairn is heaped over the body.
In connection with this Hell-shoe, it may be in-
teresting to refer to a Yorkshire superstition which
Sir Walter Scott quotes : " They are of beliefe,
that once in their lives it is good to give a pair of
new shoes to a poor man, forasmuch as after this
life they are to pass barefoote through a great launde
full of thornes and furzen, except by the meryte of
the almes aforesaid they have redeemed the forfeyte ;
for at the edge of the launde an oulde man shall
meet them with the same shoes that were given by
the partie when he was lyving, and after he hath
shodde them, dismisseth them to go through thick
and thin, without scratch or scalle." This land
of thorns is the terrible whinny-moore which the
ghostly traveller must pass in his journey to the
other world. Hear the comfortable words of the
Lyke-Wake Dirge :
" If ever thou gave either hosen or shoon,
Every night and alle ;
Sit thee down and put them on,
And Christe receive thy saule.
45
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
" But if hosen nor shoon thou never gave neean,
Every night and alle ;
The whinnes shall prick thee to the bare beean,
And Christe receive thy saule."
In an Irish folk-tale, the ghost of a woman who
had died in America appears to a friend at her
former home in Ireland, by whom she sends a
message to her mother. " Tell her," said the ghost,
"to buy a pair of shoes and stockings and give
them to some poor person in my name, for God's
sake. I am walking back and forth perishing with
the cold." This request was fulfilled, and so the
ghost was laid. The Hindus say that if you give
water or shoes to a Brahman, you will find water to
refresh you, and shoes to wear, on your journey to
the next world. But there is priestcraft in this
respect of persons as the recipients of charity. In
some of the shops in China specially cheap shoes
and boots are exposed for sale, it being customary
to put them on the feet of the corpse before burial.
The soles of the more expensive shoes (i.e., those
not made of paper, as is the general case), however,
are made, not of leather, but of felt. If you ask the
reason, you are told that the head of one of the
ministering spirits in Hades resembles that of a
cow, and that consequently he is very angry with
any one who passes under his jurisdiction wearing
leather-soled shoes.
46
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
Almost every people in Europe has at some time
observed, as many do still, the custom of keeping
candles burning round the coffin after the body has
been laid out ; and coffins of those lying in state are
surrounded by wax tapers. The original motive for
the practice may have been the same as that actuating
the Chinese at this day namely, to light the spirit
of the dead upon his way. Jews place a light at the
head of their dead ; and in Northumberland, and in
the Isle of Man, a candle used to be set upon the
corpse.
An interesting account was given in New York
papers, towards the close of 1889, of a Chinese
funeral which had recently taken place in that city.
The deceased, Li Ju Doo, had been a general in the
Taeping insurrection, was a Freemason, and had
flourishing business establishments at Boston and
Philadelphia, as well as New York. Nine days
intervened between the death and the funeral. The
body was embalmed and laid in a coffin at an under-
taker's. On a table at the foot of the coffin were
arranged the articles of food with which the Celes-
tials provide their dead for their long journey a
roasted lamb, heaps of sugar confectionery, and
some porcelain saucers filled with rice. On another
table was a roasted sucking-pig, some packets of
tea, flasks of wine, and small heaps of lemons,
oranges, and biscuits. There were also chop-sticks,
47
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
tea-cups, and small baskets of flowers. The corpse
was clad in the robes of a mandarin of the Ming
Dynasty, the pig-tail wound round the head ; on the
breast lay paper money. Some gold pieces were in
the left hand, and some money gold, silver, and
paper was thrown into the coffin, that the deceased
might be able to distribute gifts on his journey, and
bribe the evil spirits that might otherwise hinder his
passage. On the way to the grave, a person sitting
behind the hearse flung down paper money from
time to time to buy off the obstruction of the spirits.
When the grave was filled in after various cere-
monies that there is not space to detail on the top
roasted fowls and cooked rice were placed, and two
flasks of wine were poured on it as a libation.
Jewels and large sums of money are often put in
graves, for the same motive as that which prompted
pious conformity to the Chinese ritual as related
above. Saxo Grammaticus, in his account of the
Swedish war, relates how the victorious Ring had
search made among the carcases for the body of
Harald, that the corpse of the Danish king might
not wrongfully lack its due rights. In order to
make propitiation to the shade of Harald, he har-
nessed to the chariot of the king the horse on
which he rode, and decked it with a golden saddle.
Then he prayed that Harald would ride on this, and
outstrip those who shared his death in their journey
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
to Tartarus. Then, raising a pyre, he bade the
Danes fling on it the golden chariot of their king.
And while the flames were burning he earnestly
charged the mourning nobles that they should freely
give arms, gold, and every precious thing to feed the
pyre in honour of so great a king. Afterwards, the
king's ashes, together with the horse and armour,
received a royal funeral. The civilised Greeks gave
the dead man a honey-cake as a sop for Cerberus,
and an obolus for the payment of Charon, the ferry-
man ; the old Prussians furnished him with money
for refreshments on his weary journey; and the
German peasants at the present day bury a corpse
with money in its hand or mouth. A North Indian
story about a grave-robber shows that silver coins
were buried in the mouth of the dead for travelling
expenses.
The late Crown Prince of Siam is (Feb. 1895)
lying, or rather sitting, in state in a silver urn, in
accordance with Siamese custom, with his knees
drawn up to his chin, and his hands clasped before
his knees. The body is preserved in spirit till the
day of its cremation. A silver ribbon connects the
silver urn with its gold pedestal, around which
prayers and services are held, this ribbon being
touched by the priests to convey the prayer to the
royal remains. The late Crown Prince's toilet sets,
betel boxes, cigarettes, dinner-services, all made of
49 D
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
gold, surround the urn, together with offerings and
food for the departed spirit. The royal symbolic
five-fold umbrellas, too, are not forgotten. The
custom of burying a man's portable property with
him is familiar to all who have studied the funeral
ceremonies of uncultured races. The motive is in-
telligible enough. For if even lifeless objects, such
as the hatchet, bow and arrows, food and drink of
the dead man, possess other-selves, these, too, can
pass with him into the world of ghosts. The dead
savage will have to hunt and to fight, and must
therefore be armed; the spirits of the buried
weapons and implements accompany his spirit. In
the same way, domestic appliances are buried with
women, and toys are laid beside dead children.
Evidence of the wide prevalence of these funeral
rites is afforded by the many interesting survivals
in which they may be traced; many a custom
apparently meaningless having its deep significance
to the student of folk-wont.
Even in the age of the mammoth, men practised
funeral rites, believed in a future, possessed fetiches,
perhaps even idols. The discoveries of the last half-
century in the caverns of France and Belgium, sub-
stantiated by the evidence from Peru, Borneo, and
Patagonia, prove this fact beyond a doubt. The
Eskimo lays a dog's head on his child's grave, to
serve as a guide to the land of souls. Live stock
5
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
are slaughtered, the favourite horse and dog are
killed, that the deceased may miss nothing in the
spirit world ; wives, slaves, and friends are sacrificed,
that he may not lack companionship and service.
Even as late as the seventeenth century Japanese
servants would solemnly pledge their bodies to their
lord, and when he died would put themselves to
death by the "hara kari," or ripping up. As such
practices passed into survivals, clay images took the
place of the faithful servants in the funeral cere-
monies, as paper houses are burnt for the dead
Chinaman to live in, and mock money is placed in
his tomb. At this day, in the Caucasus, the dead
man's widow and his saddle-horse are led thrice
round his grave ; and the widow must not re-marry,
nor the horse ever be ridden again. In our own
country, a survival of the custom of sacrificing the
warrior's horse at his tomb may be seen in that
pathetic incident of a soldier's funeral, his charger,
saddled and bridled, following in the procession. A
Hindu widow will often voluntarily perform the
rite of suttee, that she may be with her husband
in the other world, just as Brunhild threw herself
on the pile by Siegfried, and Trojan captives and
Messenian widows joined their dead lords. In Saxo
Grammaticus we read that when Asmund's body
was buried in solemn state at Upsala and attended
with royal obsequies, "his wife Gunnhild, loth to
Si
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
outlive him, cut off her own life with the sword,
choosing rather to follow her lord in death than to
forsake him by living." Saxo also describes how
the faithful Signe encompassed her own death whilst
her husband was being led to execution. But Her-
mutrude broke her promise to her husband Amleth
not to forsake him in death. Indeed, widow sacrifice
was once prevalent among Scandinavians, Gauls,
Slavs, and other European Aryans. It is a Fiji
custom to strangle all the wives of the deceased at
his funeral.
In the German folk-tale of "The Three Snake
Leaves," the king's beautiful daughter vows to
accept no husband who will not promise to be
buried alive with her if she dies first. Such a
compact also is made between mere friends. Saxo
tells us that Asmund, son of King Alf, and Aswid,
son of King Biorn, swore by every vow, in order
to ratify the friendship which they observed to
one another, that whichever of them lived longest
should be buried with him who died.
The practice of sending messages to the world
beyond the grave has even been met with amongst
savages. It is done in this way : a chief summons
a slave, delivers to him a message, and then cuts off
his head. A Chinese expedient for communicating
with ghosts of the dead may be described in this
connection. In various parts of China there is a
52
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
belief that the souls of very atrocious criminals
who have either been executed or who have died
in prison, are sent back from Hades by Yenlo, the
judge there, to undergo a further term of imprison-
ment, one death not being enough to expiate their
crimes. When the second term of imprisonment
is judged to have expired, the district magistrate
beseeches the tutelary deity of the city to accom-
pany him to the prison in order to acquaint the
ghost with his release. The order is supposed to
reach the imprisoned by burning it, a ceremony
which is solemnly carried out in the jail. On
August 19, 1888, the district magistrate of the city
of Soochow had placards posted up inviting sub-
scriptions of imitation money for the ghosts then
in the city jail. This was all duly burnt, and thus
converted into currency, which would be useful to
the ghosts on the long journey before them.
Enough has been said to show with what care
the departed spirit is provided with every necessary.
Even at the present day the Lithuanians bury or
burn with the dead the claws of a lynx or bear,
because they share the widely prevalent belief that
the soul in its wanderings has to climb a steep
mountain (just as we speak of ascent into heaven),
and would never reach the summit without some
means to prevent its sliding backward. For this
same reason, the nails of a corpse must never be
53
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
pared. The Russians still carry about with them
parings of an owl's claws and of their own nails.
The ascent of a steep mountain, which is often of
glass, is a task frequently met with in popular tales.
In one from Lower Austria, the hero, who keeps
sliding backward in his attempt to scale a glass
mountain, changes himself into a bear, by means of
a hair given him by a grateful bear, and digs steps
with his paws. The expedient is one that would
naturally occur to the story-teller.
In the course of ages the numerous ceremonies
in connection with death have undergone much
transformation ; nevertheless, the barbaric element
in them is still recognisable. Nowadays, instead
of offering food to the dead (the scattering of
flowers over the dead, a beautiful classic rite which
still obtains, is a practice scarcely less irrational
perhaps, though it has come to be a mere memorial
of affection), soul-cakes are made and eaten by the
living upon certain fixed occasions, though all idea
as to. the connection between cakes and the dead
is lost. In Belgium it is said that for every cake
eaten a soul is delivered from purgatory. " In the
Congo district the custom has been described of
making a channel into the tomb to the head or
mouth of the corpse, whereby to send down month
by month the offerings of food and drink." The
cup-like hollows so frequently met with on the
54
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
stone slabs covering the tops of dolmens, were
probably intended as receptacles for the food fur- r ' >
nished to the dead ; and the basins scooped in the
soil of a barrow may have served the same purpose.
The fact that these cup-like markings are found on
Christian tombs shows how a custom can survive
all recollection of the motive for its institution.
In Brittany the touching ceremony is annually
observed at the grave of dead kinsfolk of filling the
hollow of the tombstone with holy water, or of
pouring libations of milk upon it. On that night the
supper is left spread in every household, and the fire
burning, so that the souls of the dead may come from
the graveyard to feed and to warm themselves. For
" Les morts, les pauvres morts, ont de grandes douleurs,"
says the poet Baudelaire; and certainly in France
and in Italy their fete on All Souls' Day is most
religiously observed, and shows no symptom of
dying out. The Feast of Souls is also observed by
Letts and Esthonians, who spread a banquet for
their spirit relatives. Torches are placed on the
graves, to light the ghosts to the repast. Among
the Slavs a yearly feast is held for the dead, and
little bits of food are thrown under the table, that the
departed souls may come and feed on the smell of it-
A Corsican legend thus accounts for the terrible
storm that broke over the house of a poor man on
55
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the eve of the Day of the Dead. The noise was
terrific, cries and curses echoed round : " Cursed
be thou, and cursed thy wife ! Cursed also be thy
children ! " The wretched man grew cold with fear.
" Did you put the water outside the window ? "
asked his wife. " Sangu di Cristu ! " cried he, " I
forgot ! " And he rose and put vessels of water on
the balcony. But this was not the end of the poor
man's alarms and punishments from the resentful
dead, whose vigil it was, and who had found no
water either to drink or to wash and purify their
sins in. But we must leave him alone to his subse-
quent encounters with the Squadra cfArozza, the
Dead Battalion, and return to our savage.
While such elaborate care is bestowed on the
other-self, the ghost, the corpse itself is not for-
gotten. Of course it was above all things necessary
to guard it from injury ; therefore trees were planted
upon the graves with the idea of concealing them,
or masses of earth and stones were piled over the
corpse, that no man or beast could get at it. It was
in consequence of the belief that the soul would at
some period revivify the body that the Egyptians
used to embalm their dead, and build the enormous
pyramids to enshrine the mummy. The elaborate
headstone is the modern counterpart of the rude and
unenscribed menhir, or long stone which marked the
resting-place of the corpse, just as the little turf-
56
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
covered mound now represents the great tumulus or
cairn.
Quite on a par with the primitive notions which
we are now examining is that which actuated an
aged woman who died in North Cornwall nine years
ago, and who preserved all her teeth as she lost
them, firmly believing that they must be buried with
her against the day of Resurrection, otherwise her
resurrection body would not be perfect. She made
the clergyman promise that the teeth should be
placed in her coffin.
If, on the other hand, the return of the dead, in-
stead of being desired, were dreaded, the conduct of
the survivors would be quite different. Measures
would be taken to lay the ghost, and the corpse of an
enemy would be mutilated, that the ghost might be
rendered harmless. Thus murderers take every pre-
caution to lay the ghost of a slain man. " The Greek
cut off the extremities of his victims, the tips of the
hands and feet, and disposed them neatly beneath the
armpits of the slain man. In the same spirit, and for
the same purpose, the Australian black cuts off the
thumbs of his dead enemy, that the ghost too may
be mutilated and prevented from throwing at him
with a ghostly spear."
Burial barrows or howes were not infrequently
broken open for the sake of the sword or the
treasure buried with the dead warrior. When
57
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Grettir the Strong won his famous short sword
from the barrow of Karr the Old, he had a struggle
with the barrow-dweller, and then cut off his head
and laid it by his thigh, to lay the ghost in the
approved way. Or, as in the story told by Saxo,
when Asmund mastered Aswit, the formidable
barrow-ghost, he cut off his head and impaled his
guilty carcase, to prevent him doing further harm.
When a person had to be buried at sea, it used to
be the custom to sew the body up in a hammock,
taking the last stitch through the tip of the nose of
the deceased. "Without this precaution the body
would not stay down, however weighted with shot,
but would shake off the trammels of its sailor
shroud, and reappear as a ghost to its former ship-
mates." Two cannon-balls are generally sewn up
with a body to sink it. Once a negro died at sea,
and his fellow-negroes rowed him a long way,
meaning to commit him to the deep. After a while
they returned to the ship with their burden, because
they had discovered that they had only one cannon-
ball, and it would be disrespectful to cheat their
comrade out of half his due.
" In Russia the Chuwashes fling a red-hot stone
after the corpse is carried out, for an obstacle to bar
the soul from coming back." Savages will either
adopt some means to prevent the soul's return, or
they will abandon the dead man's house, that the
58
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
ghost may reside in it. In civilised times a haunted
house is similarly abandoned to its ghostly tenant.
In Victor Hugo's house in one of the Channel
Islands, there is an armchair with a chain drawn
across it, that no one may sit in it, because it is
still occupied by the ghost of his grandfather !
The incorporeal shade, the ghost, is usually con-
ceived of as the counterpart of the deceased. In
the 23rd Iliad there appeared unto Achilles, in his
deep sleep, the soul of hapless Patroclus in all
things like his living self, in stature and fair eyes
and voice; and the raiment of his body was the
same. He prayed to be buried with all speed, that
he might pass the gates of Hades. But when
Achilles reached forth with his hands, he clasped
him not; for like a vapour the spirit was gone
beneath the earth with a faint shriek. Even so
when Odysseus would fain have embraced the spirit
of his mother dead, she thrice flitted from his hands
as a shadow, or as a dream (Odyssey XL). And it
was the same with vEneas when he attempted to
throw his arms about the neck of his lost wife
Creusa ; thrice the phantom fled from his hands as
unsubstantial as the winds, and in all points like
a fleeting dream. (The noli me tangere attitude
is characteristic of ghosts. The New Testament
affords an example.) The modern spiritualist believes
that he receives a visit from a deceased relative,
59
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
"in his habit as he lived," even as his father's ghost
appeared unto Hamlet, thus admitting, by implication,
that clothes have ghosts. The sculptors and glass-
painters of the Middle Ages constantly represented
the souls of the dead as tiny bodies. In the British
Museum there is a tomb from an ancient cemetery
at Xanthus in Lycia. It is ornamented with mys-
terious winged creatures with human faces, who are
carrying tiny shrouded figures, in all probability
intended to represent the souls of the dead. The
conception of the soul as a small human image is
found in Australia, in Borneo, amongst the Hindus
and the North American Indians ; it is familiar also
in German folk-lore. Dr. Nansen tells us that
amongst the Eskimos a man has many souls. The
largest dwell in the larynx and in the left side, and
are tiny men about the size of a sparrow. Other
souls, dwelling in other parts of the body, are the
size of a finger-joint. It has been thought that the
little image seen in the pupil, called by the Indians
of Guiana " the man in our eyes," which disappears
from the dim eyeballs of the dying, may explain the
conception of smallness in size of the shades of the
dead.
Even if the body remains dead, the other-self,
double or ghost, still mingles among the living, or
departs to the other world, the abode of disembodied
spirits, whence it can visit the haunts of men.
60
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
These spirits of the departed are supposed to be
possessed of more extensive powers than before
their separation from the body, and they can inter-
fere in the affairs of the living, wherefore they must
be cajoled and propitiated. For they may behave
as good spirits or as evil spirits. Santal women
who die before child-birth are believed to be kitchni,
or evil spirits, capable of doing any mischief. It is
a prevalent feeling everywhere that the ghosts of
those who have suffered a violent or untimely death
are specially malignant, so are the wandering ghosts
of the unburied, in Australian belief. The notion
that the spirits of men left unburied are doomed
to walk the night seems to be universal. We can
understand why the Hindu, in his desire for ven-
geance, should slay himself. It is in order that he
may become a demon with power to haunt and
torment his enemy. The dread of the power of
spirits is a first step towards a definite worship of
ghosts: it is fear which maintains throughout the
world sacred temples, lakes, groves, altars, and
images of the divinities. In the play of " Hecuba "
by Euripides, the son of Achilles sacrifices Polyxena,
the young Trojan princess, on the lofty grave-mound
to appease his father's ghost, bidding him drink the
pure purple blood of the virgin ; and then he prays
him to be propitious, " and all the army joined in
the prayer." For the ghost of Achilles had appeared
61
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
above his tomb, and stayed the army of the Grecians
as they were directing homeward their sea-dipt
oars, and had told them that they should not leave
his tomb unhonoured. And Trojan Helen, in the
play of " Orestes," sends her daughter Hermione to
offer libations and Helen's own hair at the grave-
mound of the murdered Clytemnestra, and to pray
her to hold kind intentions towards herself and her
child and her husband. Hermione is told to promise
all fitting offerings to the manes of Helen's sister.
If it were the habit of every savage to propitiate
the ghosts of his own dead relatives, because of
the power for good or ill that they are supposed
to exercise, it would follow that remote ancestral
ghosts, having for generations' been the objects of
veneration, would come to be regarded as deities,
and probably as creators.
Herodotus relates that the Nasamones go to the
tombs of their ancestors and consult with them.
After offering prayers they go to sleep by them, and
any dream that appears to them is considered an
answer. Of the Basutos in modern Africa we read :
" Persons who are pursued in their sleep by the
image of a deceased relation, are often known to
sacrifice a victim on the tomb of the defunct, in
order, as they say, to calm his disquietude." It is
very clear from a mass of evidence that the savage
believes that spirits outlive their bodies; then the
62
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
notion of an enduring future life is reached by a
gradual process of evolution.
Ancestor- worship is widely prevalent at the
present day, and survivals of the primitive prac-
tice are easily traceable amongst civilised peoples.
" Every Chinese household has somewhere within
its doors an ancestral hall, a shrine in which are
deposited the tablets of deceased ancestors. It may
be a separate building, or it may be a mere shelf."
Every clan has its ancestral temple, where the
members rally to join in the ceremonies at the
spring and autumn festivals. In Korea, as in
China, ancestor-worship is the real religion, though
Confucianism is the avowed religion of the country.
In every Korean house burns a perpetual fire sacred
to the dead ancestors of the household ; and to tend
that fire, and never to let it go out, is the Korean
housewife's first and most important duty. The
early races of South India feed the spirits of their
ancestors on all occasions of festivity, and worship
as well as feed them after every death. Cooked
rice and incense are offered to the spirit of the
deceased. The " Anses," the ancestors of the royal
races, were objects of veneration and worship to the
Goths; indeed, habitual and household worship of
ancestors was the main cult of the older religion of
the ancient Northmen. Sacrificial feasts were held in
honour of the dead, who were called Elves, and were
63
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
supposed to dwell in their barrows or burial-places,
or in great hills near the place where they lived in life.
Cormac's Saga supplies an account of one of these
feasts. "She [Thordis] said, There is a knoll a
little way from here where the Elves dwell; thou
shalt take thither the ox that Cormac slew, and
sprinkle the blood of the ox on the outside of the
knoll, and give the Elves a banquet of the meat;
and thou shalt be healed." Belief in the Banshee,
an ancestral spirit, was, until quite recently, generally
current in Scotland and Ireland and in many parts
of England ; and the household fairy to whom offer-
ings of food are made is a survival from the times
of our Aryan-speaking ancestors, whose hearth cult
was connected with the worship of ancestral spirits.
Half of our ideas about fairies are derived from the
heathen beliefs as to the spirits of the dead.
A body deserted by its other-self may be entered
by the other-self, friendly or malicious, of some one
else, living or dead. Sneezing, yawning, or con-
vulsions are regarded as such cases of malevolent
possession (see p. 7) ; hence exorcism is resorted
to for the expulsion of an evil spirit. Out of this
belief grew the whole practice of sorcery. Amongst
savages, the medicine-men, Shamans, or dealers
with familiar spirits, were the only priests. A mad-
man was supposed to be possessed by the manes
or spirit of some dead man, wherefore the Romans
6 4
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
used the word mania (which we borrow from them)
to denote madness, even after they had ceased to
hold the belief which suggested the use.
Cases of swoon and apoplexy, or any loss of
consciousness, would be explained as the result of
a temporary absence of the second self; and here
language preserves the idea in such expressions as
"coming back to himself." This is why in the
Middle Ages it was difficult for a person accused of
witchcraft to prove an alibi, for it was argued that
whilst the body was innocently quiescent, the soul
was abroad working evil.
It used to be a common practice, and it is not
even now an extinct one, to open the window in the
room where a person lay dying, to enable the soul
to take flight ; just as the Hottentots, the Samoyeds,
the Siamese, the Fijians, and the Redskins make a
hole in the hut to allow the passage of the deceased,
but cautiously close it again immediately afterwards
to prevent its return. In some parts of China they
make a hole in the roof for the egress of the dead
man's soul. The Iroquois make a small hole in
every tomb, to allow the soul to go out and come in
at its pleasure ; and it has been conjectured that the
holes frequently found in the pre-historic dolmens
or cromlechs, those rude stone receptacles for the
bones of the dead, have been bored for the purpose
of allowing ingress and egress to the spirit, that, in
65 E
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the belief of the survivors of the deceased, still
tenanted the bones. The same explanation may
serve for the presence of bored holes in many
funeral urns such, for example, as have been
found in the barrows on Salisbury Plain, con-
taining calcined bones.
The natives of Vati Island believe that the souls
of their departed friends and relatives enter certain
stones, which they therefore preserve. Some of
these stones "had a small piece chipped out on
one side, by means of which the indwelling ghost
or spirit was supposed to have ingress or egress."
One is reminded of the story of the Yorkshire
old lady who had two holes cut in the sides of
the coffin which was destined one day to contain
her remains, so that the devil might find his way
out in the event of his happening to get shut in
with her.
More curious still is the evidence afforded by
the skulls of pre-historic man that have turned
up in almost every European country, as well
as in Algeria and in North and South America.
It appears from the witness of these skulls that
the men of the polished stone age were in the
habit of cutting holes in each other's heads during
life. At least in the majority of the European
cases this operation of trepanning, as it is called,
was undoubtedly performed during life. The
66
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
surgeon's only instrument in those neolithic days
was a flint scraper or knife, and yet there is
evidence that the patient in the majority of cases
lived for many years after the operation. Now,
what could be the motive for this trepanning?
We have seen how cases of convulsions, epilepsy,
or any mental derangement, perhaps even of severe
headache, were attributed to the possession of the
patient by an evil spirit ; what expedient therefore
could appear more rational than to provide an out-
let for the demon's escape ? This appears to have
been the principle, as well as the practice, of the
primitive medicine-man. He first cut a hole in
the head of the sufferer and then conjured the
spirit forth. The Kabyles of Algeria practise tre-
panning in cases of epilepsy.
The phenomena of shadows and reflections would
further tend to confirm belief in a second-self. The
fact that a man's shadow is not always beside
him only proves that the second-self can go away.
Similarly would the savage reason with regard to
the reflection which he sees on looking into water.
The Basutos think "that if a man walks on the
river-bank, a crocodile may seize his shadow in
the water and draw him in." In classic languages,
as well as in various barbaric tongues, the word
for shadow expresses also the soul or other-self.
New England tribes called the soul chemung,
67
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
shadow. In the Tasmanian, Quiche, and Eskimo
languages, and in several dialects of Costa Rica,
as among the Zulus and the Abipones, one word
expresses both soul and shade. We ourselves
speak of a " shade " or ghost, and we find a similar
employment of the Greek word (r/aa, and the Latin
umbra. With the O-KLO. and umbra may be com-
pared the khaibit of the ancient Egyptians, which
was supposed to have an entirely independent
existence, and to be able to separate itself from
the body. It was quite distinct from the ka or
double, and the ba or soul.
" Death," says Lucretius, " leaves all things
entire, except vital sense and quickening heat."
It is the cessation of breathing which characterises
death as differing from sleep; it is therefore not
unreasonable to identify the soul with the breath,
which really quits the body at death. Again, the
evidence of language proves the universality of
this idea; for the word used to express breath
also means soul in Hebrew, Sanscrit, Greek, and
Latin, and in several barbaric tongues. Possibly,
too, the German geisl and English ghost have the
meaning of breath. Animal and etre mean the
same thing, breather. Algonkin Indians buried
little children by the wayside, that their souls
might enter into mothers passing by, and so be
born again. In Florida, when a woman dies in
68
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
childbirth, her infant is held over her face to
receive her parting spirit ; similarly, the nearest
kinsman of the ancient Roman would inhale his
latest breath. Quite recently it was said that a
certain Lancashire witch could not die till she
had transferred her familiar spirit. Accordingly
her associate was fetched, and received the witch's
last breath into her mouth, and with it her familiar
spirit.
Echoes are thought to be the voices of departed
souls ; for after vain search for a visible owner
of the mocking voice, uncivilised man can frame
but one explanation of the phenomenon, and, in
so doing, finds support for his belief in a soul
that can be separated from the body and become
invisible.
From the fanciful explanation of natural pheno-
mena poetry has derived much of its immortal
charm. Before philosophy comes in to " conquer
all mysteries by rule and line," and depeople all
echo-haunted spots, "such places," as Lucretius
says, " the neighbouring people pretend that Satyrs
and Nymphs inhabit ; and say that there are Fauns
in them by whose noise and sportive play, re-
echoing through the night, they universally affirm
that the dead silence is broken, and that sounds
of chords and sweet plaintive notes are heard."
It is interesting to recall in this connection that
69
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
" the Anglo-Saxon dictionary preserves the curious
word wood-mare for an echo (wudu-maer=viood.
nymph), a record of the time when Englishmen
believed, as barbarians do still, that the echo is
the voice of an answering spirit; the word mare,
for spirit or demon, appears also in nightmare, the
throttling dream demon who was as real to our fore-
fathers as he is to the natives of Australia now."
Conceiving that the soul can quit the body during
life, the savage supposes that it may temporarily
become embodied in a bird or beast. This is an
approach to the doctrine of transmigration, which
Pythagoras taught, and of which we read in Plato.
Shakespeare makes capital of the notion in " Twelfth
Night " (iv. 2) :
Clown, What is the opinion of Pythagoras con-
cerning wild-fowl ?
Malvolio. That the soul of our grandam might
haply inhabit a bird.
The popular imagination still pictures the soul
as a bird which flies out of the mouth of a
dying person. Grimm says that this is why old
tombstones often have doves carved on them,
and these the Christian faith brings into still
closer proximity to spirit. It will be remem-
bered that in the popular tale of "The Juniper-
Tree," the little brother, when killed, flies out of
the juniper-tree as a bird ; and in a large number
70
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
of folk-tales, notably those belonging to the " Cinder-
ella" group, a little bird sits on the tree growing
out of the grave-mound, and comforts the orphan
child. The Bohemians thought that the soul
hovered about as a bird till the body was buried,
when it found rest Finns and Lithuanians call
the Milky-Way the "path of birds" that is, of
souls. In Woycicki's collection of Polish folk-tales
is one about a robber who confesses his sins under
an apple-tree. As he does so, apple after apple
flies up into the air, converted into a white dove.
They were the souls of those he had murdered. But
one apple remains : it is the soul of his father,
whose murder he has suppressed. When at length
he confesses it, the last apple changes into a gray
dove and flies after the rest. The temptation to
quote other stories in illustration of this graceful
fancy must be resisted.
In Irish mythic belief the souls of the righteous
appear as doves; in County Mayo the souls of
virgins take the form of swans. The night-jar
in Nidderdale is looked upon as the soul of an
unbaptized child; while in Cornwall it is believed
that King Arthur still lives in the form of a raven.
In Greece the soul is pictured as a butterfly,
which is called V^X 1 ?* a l so tne word for soul. In
an Irish parish butterflies are called "the soul
of your grandfather." In the Basque language
7i
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the name for butterfly means literally "ass's soul."
Another popular opinion, based on savage philo-
sophy, and which has already been illustrated
(supra, pp. 43-4), is that the soul runs out of the
sleeper's mouth as a mouse, or a cat, or a weasel,
or a snake.
Or the departing soul may break into blossom
like a flower, of which conception folk-legends
afford numberless pretty illustrations. In a story
from Abyssinia, seven palm-trees grow on the spot
where the girl buries the bones of her seven
brothers; and in the North Indian story, when
the brothers kill and eat their sister, a bamboo
springs from her bones, just as in numerous
stories of the " Cinderella " type, a magic tree springs
from some buried portion of the helpful animal.
The Lay of Runzifal makes a blackthorn shoot up
out of the bodies of slain heathen, a white flower
by the heads of fallen Christians; and the tradi-
tion goes that the red poppies which followed the
ploughing of the field of Waterloo after Napoleon's
defeat, sprung from the blood of the many gallant
men who fell during the battle. So tulips, if we may
credit the legend, had their origin in the Armenian
town of Erzeroum, where they sprung from the
life-blood of despairing Ferdad, who threw himself
from the rocks at the false alarm of the death of
his beloved Shireen. The reader need hardly be
72
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
reminded that the anemone sprung from the blood
of dying Adonis, when the boar he was chasing
turned and rent him. From the mounds of buried
lovers flowering shrubs spring up, whose branches
intertwine. In the ballad of " Fair Margaret and
Sweet William " we read :
" Out of her brest there sprang a rose,
And out of his a briar ;
They grew till they grew unto the church top,
And there they tyed in a true lovers knot."
We have the same fancy in another ballad :
" They buried the ane in Mary's kirk,
The other in Mary's quire,
And out of the ane there grew a birk,
And out of the other a briar."
In an ancient Romansch ballad presenting a simple
episode in Swiss peasant life a camomile plant
grows from the grave-mound of the girl, and from
the grave-mound of her lover a plant of musk.
And, for the great love they bore one another,
the flowers twined together and embraced. In the
Portuguese ballad of Count Nello, a cypress grows
on one grave, and an orange tree on the other.
Their branches join and kiss. The king who had
forbidden the union of these fond lovers, the Count
and the Infanta, now orders their trees to be cut
down. From the cypress flows noble blood, from
the orange tree blood royal; from one flies forth
73
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
a dove, from the other a wood-pigeon. They
perch before the king as he sits at table. " Ill-
luck upon their fondness," he cries, " ill-luck upon
their love ! Neither in life nor in death have I
been able to divide them." So, again, the rose and
the briar of the English ballad are the cypress
and the reed of a Greek folk-song, the thorn and
the olive of the Norman chanson, the vine and the
rose of the " Tristram and Iseult " story.
It is necessary, however, to return from this
fascinating excursion into later times to an examina-
tion of the primitive philosophy in which all these
fanciful notions have their origin. The logic of the
untutored savage is simple but consistent. He
observes that plants and trees, like animals, show
undoubted signs of life, and he reasonably attri-
butes souls to them also. For he can only inter-
pret the actions of nature by putting them on a
level with his own actions. A spirit stirs the
volcano, causing it to belch forth flame. It is a
spirit that rides on the wings of the wind uproot-
ing the forest-trees or swamping the canoe in the
whirlpool. A spirit in the trees causes them to
grow and put forth leaves, and awful spirit eyes
look down on men from the host of the nightly
stars. The state of mind to which these nature-
spirits belong has lingered in the fancies of the
Greeks, creating the Naiads of the flowing rivers
74
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
and springs ; the Nereids that ride the sea-horses ;
Pan, Sylvan us and the woodland Nymphs, the goat-
like Fauns and Satyrs, and the sisterhood of the
Dryads. "The Lorelei is only a modernised ver-
sion of a river demon, who drowns the swimmer
in a whirlpool; the healing water-spirits of the
old sacred wells have only taken saints' names.
The little elves and fairies of the woods are only
dim recollections of the old forest spirits."
It is a very general belief amongst savages that
the souls of the dead animate trees. " The Dieyerie
tribe of South Australia regard as very sacred cer-
tain trees, which are supposed to be their fathers
transformed; hence, they will not cut the trees
down, and protest against the settlers doing so.
Some of the Philippine Islanders believe that the
souls of their forefathers are in certain trees, which
they therefore spare." Many other such instances
of the savage's regard for certain sacred trees might
be adduced. It is probable that all the strange
legends of speaking, sentient trees originated in
the belief that trees and plants were tenanted by
the souls of the dead, thus becoming personified
and endowed with human qualities and faculties.
We may recall in this connection the experience
of ^Eneas with the plants of dogwood and bristling
myrtles which he found growing on a mound.
When he tore the green stems from the ground
75
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
to deck an altar for sacrifice, he saw that blood was
trickling from the roots. This happened a second
time. But when with all his might he strove to
pluck a third stalk, a lamentable groan was heard
from the depths of the mound, and a voice bade
him spare the buried and not tear a wretched being.
It was the murdered Polydorus who spoke, from
the mound which covered his remains. We see
from this story that the plants growing on the
mound, or barrow, come to be identified with the
body underneath. They embody the soul of the
dead person, in the same way as, in primitive belief,
the living bird or butterfly becomes the habitat of
the soul when it quits the dead body.
" In an Annamite story an old fisherman makes
an incision in the trunk of a tree which has drifted
ashore ; but blood flows from the cut, and it appears
that an empress and her three daughters, who had
been cast into the sea, are embodied in the tree."
A Slovac legend is likewise connected with the
belief in the transmigration of souls. Two musi-
cians travelling together noticed a fine plane tree,
which would make so excellent a violin that they
resolved to cut it down for that purpose. At the
first blow the tree sighed; at the second blow out
spurted blood ; at the third blow the tree spake and
said, "Musicians, do not cut me down; I am of
flesh and blood, and no tree. My mother cursed
76
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
me, a lovely girl, and changed me into a broad-
leaved plane tree, even while I drew water, chat-
ting with my friend. Go ye, musicians, and play
before my mother." And they did so, playing a
dirge. " Rend not my heart with your playing,"
said the mother.
In a large class of folk-tales, belonging to the
" Singing Bone " type, a child is robbed by a
brother or sister of an apple, or some other coveted
acquisition, and then murdered, and buried or
hidden away. A plant grows on the spot, and
some time afterwards, when attempt is made to
pluck a flower, the voice of the murdered child
makes known what has been done, exposing the
criminal. Sometimes it is a bone of the victim, or
a reed growing on the grave, which, when blown
through, reveals the crime.
Trees play prominent parts in folk-tales. The
Kaffirs have trees which laugh, and the Zulus tell
about speaking trees. These are common in Indian
as well as in Norse tales, and are believed in by
North American tribes. The green reed spoke to
Psyche in the story told by Apuleius, and the
speaking oaks saluted wandering lo. Jotham's
story in the Book of Judges makes the trees talk
to one another. So in the Izdubar legends of
Babylonia the trees answer Hea-bani. In a North
Indian story a king had a terrible secret, like the
77
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Phrygian king Midas, which only his barber knew.
The Indian king had horns, and the barber whis-
pered the secret to a tamarind tree. Of this tree
a drum was made, and whenever it was beaten
it cried, " There are horns on the king's head ! "
In the Greek story it was a reed that "was garru-
lously given, a babbler in the land." It grew from
a hole in the earth into which the barber had
whispered, and it murmured, " King Midas has
ass's ears." Much the same tale was current in
Wales and Ireland about King Mark, whose Welsh
name March means horse. He used to have every
barber who shaved him killed, lest he should betray
the secret as to his ears. Now, on the spot where
the bodies of the murdered barbers were buried
there grew reeds, from among which a certain of
March's bards chose one to make a pipe. This reed
would discourse of nothing but March ab Meir-
chion's equine ears. The enraged March would
have killed the musician, but was persuaded to
blow the pipe himself, and then discovered that the
instrument and not the musician was at fault.
In our own country, it has been said that " when
an oake is felling, before it falls it gives a kind of
shriekes or groans, that may be heard a mile off,
as if it were tfte genius of the oake lamenting."
John Aubrey (1686-87), from whose writings this
passage is quoted, adds : " It has not unusually
78
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
been observed that to cut oak-wood is unfortunate."
Within fifty years of the present day it was be-
lieved that a certain larch tree at Nauders, in the
Tyrol, bled whenever it was cut. In England the
superstitious think that the creaking of furniture is
an omen of death in a house. The Aztecs have the
same belief, which is probably associated primarily
with the wood of which the furniture was made.
A mysterious sympathy is supposed to exist
between men and natural objects. Thus, when
children have been passed through cleft trees (see
supra, p. 13), the child's life is supposed in a manner
to be bound up with that of the particular tree
through which he has been transmitted ; and should
an attempt be unadvisedly made to cut the tree, no
efforts will be spared by the man to secure the con-
tinued existence of his foster-brother. So was the
Hamadryad's life bound to her tree; when it was
wounded she was hurt, she cried aloud when the
axe threatened, and when the trunk fell she died.
In some districts of Belgium it is still the custom to
plant a tree in the garden on the birth of a child.
It is thought that the fate of the tree is intimately
connected with the fate of the child. On this sub-
ject of the " Life-token " more will be said in the
chapter on Magic. In the ancient Egyptian story
of "The Two Brothers," which was written down
some 3200 years ago by a Theban scribe named
79
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Ennana, the life of the younger brother is bound up
in that of the tree in which he has deposited his
heart. This story, like a number of others, affords
an illustration of the savage belief in a separable
soul. In the reign of Romanus Lacapenus it was
desirable that Simeon, Prince of Bulgaria, should
die. Now, on the arch Xerolophi, in Constantinople,
there stood a column, and an astronomer assured
Romanus that if the head of this column were struck
off, Simeon, whose fate was bound up with it, would
perish. The head was accordingly struck from the
pillar, and at the same hour on the same day the
Prince died in Bulgaria of a disease of the heart.
We have only to turn to Ovid to find stories of
metamorphosis of human beings into trees, just as
in Samoa it is^ told that a man can assume a vege-
table form, or stand erect as a handsome straight tree.
Trees occupy a conspicuous place in all the
classic, Chinese, Finnish, Hindu, Persian, Arabian,
and other religions ; besides, the general worship of
both Celts and Teutons had its seat in the forest.
Amongst the Greeks, trees and flowers were con-
nected with the worship and ritual of Apollo, and
we have various myths explaining the association.
For instance, the nymph Daphne, being pursued by
Apollo, who was enamoured of her, implores the aid
of her father Peneus, and is changed into a laurel.
" Since thou canst not be my wife, at least thou
80
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
shalt be my tree," said the god. The olive and the
oak were sacred to Artemis at Ephesus; at Delos
she had a sacred palm tree. Dionysus also was a
tree-god. Sacred groves like that of Dodona, and
others of which the ancients speak, have likewise
been found among the benighted races of Central
Africa, and among the American Indians. Even in
more recent days the Persians worshipped flowers ;
and an author writes of the Victorian Gardens at
Bombay that " a true Persian, in flowing robe of
blue, and on his head his sheepskin hat, would
saunter in and stand and meditate over every flower
he saw, and always as half in vision. And when
the vision was fulfilled, and the ideal flower he was
seeking found, he would spread his mat and sit
before it until the setting of the sun, and then pray
before it, and fold up his mat again and go home."
Traces of plant-worship are to be found even in
England. Thus, at certain seasons, Devonshire
farmers, on the eve of Twelfth Day, go to their
orchards after supper with a pail of cider with
roasted apples pressed into it. Out of this each
person in the company takes an earthenware cup
full of liquor, and, standing under the more fruitful
apple trees, addresses them thus :
" Health to thee, good apple tree,
Well to bear pocket-fulls, hat-fulls,
Peck-fulls, bushel bag-fulls."
81 F
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
This formula having been repeated, the contents of
the cup are thrown at the tree. In many countries
the white thorn is held sacred, the tradition being
very ancient, although the sanctity of the tree was
enhanced in mediaeval times by the belief that the
Crown of Thorns was formed from it. The Irish
consider it specially unlucky to cut this tree down.
The Poles have the same superstitious fear in con-
nection with hollow willow trees, because the devil
is supposed to reside in them. Split trees are used
for the cure of diseases (see supra, p. 13). At the
Holi festival in North India a sacred tree is burned,
and the people leap over its ashes to get rid of
itch, &c.; and the villagers try to steal one of
the rags tied to this tree in a neighbouring village,
for the act is very propitious. The worship of
the Nim tree is supposed to propitiate the god-
desses of all kinds of epidemics which prevail in
summer.
In short, relics of ancient tree cults have been
found amongst Aryan- and non- Aryan -speaking
tribes, in Europe and in Asia, and are seen in
our own country in the offerings (like those of
the West African negro and of savage tribes else-
where) of rags and other small gifts on bushes
and trees, and also in the May-pole customs and
dances. Memories of holy trees and groves are
recorded also in the names of Holyoake and Holy-
82
THE SEPARABLE SOUL
wood. But the subject of Tree-worship is too vast
for one to do more than touch the borders of it
in this brief survey of the ground which Folk-lore
covers.
This chapter, dealing with the universal savage
belief in a separable soul which sometimes quits
the body, may be concluded with a general refer-
ence to the many illustrations of this belief which
are met with in the folk-tales of all lands. For
example, there is the Indian story of the magician
Punchkin, whose soul is in a little green parrot
in a small cage below a chattee full of water, the
lowest of six chattees piled one above another,
in the centre of a circle of palm trees growing in
the midst of a thick jungle, in a desolate country,
hundreds of thousands of miles away. Upon the
life of that parrot depends the magician's life.
This is how " Koshchei the Deathless," in the
Russian story, hides his soul : " Under an oak is
a casket, in the casket is a hare, in the hare is
a duck, in the duck an egg, in the egg is my
death," says he. A Tatar giant kept his soul in
a twelve-headed snake, which he carried in a bag
as he rode on horseback. The jinn's soul, in the
Arabian story, is in the crop of a sparrow im-
prisoned in a small box inside seven other boxes,
which are enclosed in a marble coffer that is sunk
in the ocean surrounding the world. Every one
83
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
knows the Norse story of "The Giant who had
no heart in his body." Seven robbers, in a Siberian
tale, hang up their hearts on pegs, and they are
stolen by a captive swan-maiden and delivered as
the price of her own liberty to a Samoyed, who
smashes the hearts, thus killing the robbers. Vari-
ants of the foregoing theme are very numerous in
folk-tales. It occurs in the ancient Egyptian story
of the "Two Brothers," one of the oldest fairy-
tales on record, the MS. of which is in the British
Museum. For a classic example of the same notion
we may recall the Greek story of Meleager and the
firebrand. When he was seven days old, the Fates
declared that the boy would die as soon as the piece
of wood then burning on the hearth should be con-
sumed. Upon hearing this Althaea, his mother,
extinguished the firebrand, and concealed it in a
chest. Years afterwards, to revenge the death of
her brothers, she threw the piece of wood into the
fire, whereupon Meleager expired.
CHAPTER II
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
The savage mind naturally credulous ; treats all nature alike as personal
and animated Observation of changes of form in the order of
nature engenders belief in the transformation of men into animals
Especially sorcerers have this power Witch stories in illustra-
tion Or a man's double may enter the body of an animal ; or
animals may be possessed by the doubles of dead persons Certain
animals thus regarded as transformed ancestors Resulting con-
fused theories of descent from and kinship with animals Men
named after animals Regard for animal namesake Totemism
Its universal traces A digression anent the family tie Influence
of totemic beliefs on savage conduct Relics of totemism amongst
civilised races The Easter hare Plants identified with ancestors
Vegetable totems Animal and plant worship Results of the
personification of animals and plants Guiding beasts and birds
The hawk and the Mikado Burying alive under foundations The
bell of Peking Animal omens Helpful animals in folk-tales
Animals as dramatis persona Myths of descent from and mar-
riage with animals Animal children Animal worship in Egypt
Animal gods Shape-shifting gods Greek and savage myths
compared The swallowing trick Why the* savage legends were
retained Attempted symbolical explanation of myths The right
method of interpretation The Swan-coat Melusina Cupid and
Psyche The Werewolf; to be distinguished from the lycanthrope
A recent case of relapse into barbarism.
THERE is a period during the early stages of man's
intellectual development when he is readily able to
believe anything that may be suggested by an un-
disciplined fancy, if it be not contradicted by direct
experience. Savage man treats all nature alike as
85
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
personal and animated ; he transfers to every object
those qualities which he himself possesses, and ex-
pects from every object such actions as he can
himself perform. If injured by a fellow-creature,
he would retaliate with a blow, and seek vengeance
for the injury. In like manner, inanimate objects,
in contact with which he may suffer pain, come
in for his resentment. Of one of the native races
of America we read, " If a savage struck his foot
against a stone, he raged over it, and bit it like a
dog." This is like the conduct of young children,
who, bruised by a fall
" Lend life to the dumb stones
On which to vent their rage,
And bend their little fists
And rate the senseless ground."
And we should not be surprised to find in the
civilised child the psychological representative of
primitive man, when we consider that the period
during which the human species has existed in
any kind of civilisation, making its own conditions,
is but a span compared with its long life of simple
barbarism. Civilisation is but a thin veneer, and
the primeval barbarism is often very near the
surface. By an old English law, repealed only in
the present reign, the beast that killed a man, the
wheel that ran over him, or the tree which fell
and crushed him, was deodand, or given to God ;
86
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
that is to say, it was forfeited and sold for the
poor. According to Pausanias, the Prytaneis at
Athens condemned to capital punishment any life-
less object which had accidentally caused a man's
death.
The savage asks himself questions, and is satis-
fied with the first answer that comes to hand.
Wherever tradition fails to furnish this answer,
invention is his only resource, though he is not
consciously inventing. In a rough - and - ready
manner he is reasoning from such data as his
surroundings afford, and it is in this way that he
comes to evolve those curious myths, which are
destined to be crystallised in the course of genera-
tions into religious traditions. To the savage mind
nothing is improbable, nothing is supernatural. It
sees nothing remarkable in those extreme changes
that are constantly occurring in the order of nature.
They only serve to stimulate the dormant imagina-
tion and to direct its working. The savage sees a
motionless egg suddenly turn itself into a bird, or a
chrysalis into a butterfly, without any external agency.
From the white kernel of a hard brown nut come a
soft shoot and green leaves. He accepts these facts
and many similar ones without surprise, and, with a
mind naturally credulous, is not disposed to limit his
belief in metamorphosis to just those instances of
it that he may chance to witness. Therefore, any
87
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
suggestion of a particular creature having assumed
a different shape is instantly acceptable to him, and
without difficulty he conceives that men can take
the form of animals. The metamorphoses which
actually occur are more marvellous than many that
he wrongly supposes to occur. There is greater
contrast between a maggot and a fly, a tadpole and
a frog, than between a child and a puppy, a man
and a bull. All races show us that the transforma-
tion of men into animals, and animals into men, is a
familiar thought ; and we must bear this in mind, as
the key to the interpretation of much that we shall
have to consider. A few examples must suffice to
illustrate the belief in animal-metamorphosis. The
Thlinkeets of North America will kill a bear only in
cases of great necessity, because the bear is sup-
posed to be a man that has taken the shape of an
animal ; and in Abyssinia, blacksmiths are supposed
to be able to turn themselves into hyaenas and other
animals. It is not every savage who believes that
he himself possesses this magical power. More
generally it is limited to sorcerers, or medicine-men,
who can take the shape of any beast, bird, fish, or
insect. But they can also change the forms of
others besides themselves. This idea is firmly
rooted in the savage mind, and bears fruit in many
directions. It crops up still in certain nursery tales,
where the witch has power to change the heroine's
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
offspring into a cat or a fox. The belief in magic
and in medicine-men has a universal hold on savage
life, and declares itself everywhere in the institutions
of untutored races, the sorcerer having as much
power and influence as in later times has the priest.
For not only can he practise animal-metamorphosis
on himself and others, but he can visit the abodes
of the dead, can move inanimate objects by incanta-
tions, can converse with spirits, and magically cure
or inflict diseases. Marvels of the sort have been
reported from very near home. When that great
explorer, Pytheas of Massilia, who lived in the fourth
century B.C., in the age of Alexander the Great,
made his famous voyage to Britain, he found an
island then known as Axantos, or Uxisana, now
called the Isle of Ushant, where he landed, and came
upon a temple where nine Gaelic priestesses main-
tained a perpetual fire in honour of their god (like
the Vestal virgins). They attended to an oracle,
and they professed to be able to assume at will the
form of any animal, to cure all diseases, and to know
the future's secrets. " Heu vatum ignarce mentes"
said Virgil, as well he might. Alas ! how ignorant
are the minds of priests.
The witch and the Druid priestesses have certain
powers in common. Each claims to be able to
assume animal form, and to rule wind and wave by
spells and incantations. The " magic broth " which
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the witch-doctors brew in Matabeleland is still
sometimes sprinkled on the trees and the king's
kraal and waggons, and even on the royal person of
the king himself in time of war, in order to preserve
them from evil influences, and to make the bullets
of the enemy miss fire. For the Matabele believe
in witchcraft, and fear the spells of their own people ;
while they think that the witchcraft of the white
people is of a wholly beneficial kind, and a sort of
antidote to their own. I quote the following passage
from a correspondent to the Times, Oct. 14, 1893,
during the war in Matabeleland : " The man who
is supposed to bewitch others is believed to go about
by night and ' lay medicine ' about the country and
in the kraals of his victims. He is also supposed to
have dealings with certain wild beasts, such as the
leopard and the hyaena. One of the missionaries
had poisoned a hyaena, or wolf, as it is called in
Matabeleland, which had been troubling his station.
He was standing looking at the dead beast when
one of the Matabele came up. ' Ah ! ' said he, ' that
is an umtagati's wolf.' (Umtagati is Setebele for
wizard.) The missionary asked what made him
say that. The man pointed to a scratch on the
hyaena's ear. 'That is an umtagati's mark,' he
said ; ' every night an umtagati used to get on the
wolf's back and ride him round the kraals.' "
The Khonds believe that witches can transform
90
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
themselves into tigers. Often when a tiger carries
off a child or a goat, it is thought to be no real
beast, but a witch in an assumed form. But enough
has been said to show that the power of meta-
morphosis is especially ascribed to sorcerers and
witches, and that a belief in this power is uni-
versal amongst savages. And further, the belief
in witchcraft has lingered through many centuries
of civilisation. Nowadays the hare is popularly
regarded as the associate of witches, who can
assume its shape. Probably for this cause the
hare is an object of disgust in some parts of
Russia, as well as in Western Brittany. The old
Welsh laws contain several allusions to its magical
character.
In various parts of Scotland there is a tale of
a "witch who was shot at in the guise of a hare.
In this shape she was wounded, and the same
wound was found on her when she resumed her
human appearance." Precisely the same tale has
been met with among the Red Indians, except
that their wizards took the form of birds which
were wounded by the magical arrow of an old
medicine-man, and the arrows were found in the
bodies of the human culprits. In fact, tales of this
kind are to be found all over the globe. The
Japanese version has a fox. "The prince royal
of India had a lovely mistress who had bewitched
91
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
him, and who fell asleep one day in a bed of
chrysanthemums, where her lover shot at and
wounded a fox in the forehead. The bleeding
temple of the girl discovered the evil animal she
really was. For the fox, as in China, is in Japan
a wicked animal capable of everything in the way
of transformation and suggestion." (The above
legend is referred to in all those Japanese draw-
ings which associate the chrysanthemum and the
fox.) The fairy-fox plays an important part in
every native Chinese collection of supernatural
tales, filling somewhat the same role that the
werewolf fills in European folk-lore; only the
latter is usually malicious, while the fairy-fox is
sometimes beneficent, and, when it takes human
shape, assumes the form of a woman like the
charming young fox (disguised, of course, as a
woman) that, in numerous tales, gets married to
some loving Japanese swain and has a family.
Generally some little domestic disagreement in-
duces the charmer to resume her foxhood and
scamper off, followed by her cubs, leaving the
bewildered husband desolate. A story was re-
cently told in Ontario, in a district peopled with
Scotch Highlanders from Glenelg, who carried
their ancestral traditions with them to another
hemisphere. It is a variant of the foregoing, and
testifies also to the belief already referred to
92
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
(supra, p. 7), that when the butter is long in
coming, the devil has a hand in the business.
" Thence, countra wives, wi' toil an' pain,
May plunge an' plunge the kirn in vain ;
For oh ! the yellow treasure's ta'en
By witching skill."
A blue butterfly was seen to flutter over a
certain farm, and was the subject of much notice,
and, subsequently, of suspicion. For some unex-
plained reason, the butter "would not come" on
that farm from the time that the butterfly had
been seen. For three weeks this state of things
continued, and the butterfly fluttered. Then a
man armed himself with a wet towel and felled
the insect single-handed. Shortly afterwards a poor
lonely woman was found dead on the ground near
her own door. Her life, in short, became extinct
simultaneously with the destruction of the blue
butterfly. Next day the butter came ! Here was
circumstantial evidence sufficient to convict that
old woman of witchcraft.
These Highland emigrants tell another tale, about
a black dog which was suspected of being the per-
petrator of all kinds of ridiculous practical jokes.
For this ownerless black dog had long been seen
stalking about the neighbourhood where the vexa-
tions occurred. Some one attempted its life with
a gun, but without producing any visible results.
93
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
The practical jokes were maliciously continued.
Then a sensible man charged his gun with a
silver bit, and fired. The body of the dog was
never found, but a small boy came running up
to say that his grandfather was dead. He had
dragged himself into the house as though hurt,
and had quickly expired. It may be mentioned
that in folk-tales we not infrequently come across
the fancy that creatures that are in league with
the devil, but more especially sea-monsters, when
invulnerable to everything else, can be shot with
a silver bullet. It occurs, for instance, in an Irish
version of "Cinderella," and it is a common incident
in Icelandic tales. " No monster, however fiendish,
can withstand a silver shot." It will be remem-
bered that Sir Walter Scott in his " Old Mortality "
refers to the belief that witches can only be shot
with silver bullets.
The witch sometimes appears as a cat, as in
the German story, when, on the cat's paw being
chopped off, it turned into a pretty female hand,
and the miller next morning found that his wife
had a hand missing. In another story the witch
is ridden as a horse, and is taken to the farrier's
to be shod. Next morning she lies in bed with
horse-shoes on her hands and feet.
In Russia, of all living creatures, magpies are
those whose shapes witches like best to take. The
94
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
wife of the false Demetrius, according to popular
poetry, escaped from Moscow in the guise of a
magpie. The White Russians have a tradition
that once a whole wedding party were transformed
by some hostile magician the bridegroom and the
other men into wolves, the bride into a cuckoo,
and the rest of the women into magpies. Ever
since that time the metamorphosed bride has flown
about seeking and lamenting her lost bridegroom,
and moistening the hedges with the "cuckoo's
tears," which we less poetically style the " cuckoo's
spittle."
The universal belief in animal-metamorphosis, of
which we have been giving illustrations, has, how-
ever, more than one phasis. Sometimes, instead of
a man changing his form, it is his double that
enters the body of an animal ; or animals may be
possessed by the doubles of dead persons. This
is akin to the theory of metempsychosis which we
have already considered. The Apaches, an exist-
ing American race, believe that every rattlesnake
contains the soul of a bad man, or is an emissary
of the Evil Spirit ; and the Californians round San
Diego will not eat the flesh of large game, believ-
ing such animals to be inhabited by the souls of
generations of people who have died ages ago. A
nearly allied belief regards certain animals as trans-
formed ancestors, and this habit of mind accounts
95
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
for all the confused theories of kinship and descent
which we must now examine.
It is necessary to keep ever before us the fact
that to the savage mind no distinction is perceptible
between animate and inanimate nature. Believing
that
" All things the world which fill
Of but one stuff are spun,"
the savage would readily accept the theories, which
we know he holds, of descent from birds, beasts,
plants, stars, sun and moon, wind or rain. The
widely prevalent habit of naming men after animals,
plants, or other natural objects, contributes, by the
inevitable misinterpretation of traditions, to the be-
lief in descent other than human especially as this
belief so conveniently fits in with the idea of metem-
psychosis. The savage shows great regard for his
animal-namesake, or kobong, as the Australians call
it. He would avoid killing an animal of the species
after which he is named, and would on no account
eat of it. In short, this animal, held so sacred by
the tribe who bear its name, does eventually become
identified with the ancestor of the tribe, and is
worshipped as such. The word totemism is usually
applied to cover this belief in the sanctity of certain
plants and animals from which men claim descent,
every tribe having its totem, or crest, or clan-mark,
marking his supposed descent from a beaver, a
96
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
bear, a crocodile, a fish, a wild pig, or an emu,
or a honeysuckle tree or a vegetable, as the case
may be. The word totem (expressing much the
same thing as the Australian word kobong) is the
corruption of an original word which the Red
Indians apply to the plant, animal, or other natural
object representing the ancestor and protector of
the group of persons who share the name and
crest. This institution of totemism has been ob-
served by travellers in North and South America,
in Australia, Samoa, India, Arabia, in Northern
Asia, and in West and South Africa. Moreover,
traces of totemism have been found in the early
history of Germans, Greeks, and Latins, as well as
in the traditions of the Semitic peoples in Arabia
and Palestine. It is a question, too, whether the
religion of the British tribes may not in some early
stages have been connected with totemism. " The
names of several tribes, or the legends of their
origin, show that an animal or some other real
or imaginary object was chosen as a crest or
emblem, and was probably regarded with a super-
stitious veneration. A powerful tribe or family
would feign to be descended from a swan or a
water-maiden, or a ' white lady ' who rose from
the moonbeams on the lake. The moon herself
was claimed as the ancestress of certain families.
The legendary heroes are turned into ' Swan-
97 G
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Knights,' or fly away in the form of wild geese.
. . . We hear of 'Griffins' by the Shannon, of
' Calves ' in the country round Belfast : the men
of Ossory were called by a name which signifies
the 'wild red-deer.' There are similar instances
from Scotland, in such names as 'Clan Chattan,'
or the Wild Cats." Giraldus Cambrensis gravely
relates how Ossory men were in his day seven
hundred years ago periodically turned into wolves ;
and a later writer gives currency to the popular
belief that the descendants of wolves live in that
part of Meath. Early Welsh poems furnish other
examples, and perhaps we may compare such
patronymics as " Bering," " Harting," " Baring,"
and the like. The Merovingian princes traced their
origin to a sea-monster; and the pedigrees of the
Anglo-Saxon kings contain names which seem to be
connected with legends of a descent from animals.
The beliefs, whose unmistakable traces thus survive
in civilised countries, were probably in their origin
the counterparts of savage beliefs as we find them
at the present day. The Santals, an Indian hill-
tribe, believe themselves to have sprung from two
eggs laid by a wild goose. Leda's twins were con-
tained in two eggs. But the goose in her story
was a swan.
Not only does totemism as a form of religion
largely influence savage conduct, but savage society
98
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
also is founded on this belief in kinship with animals
and all manner of natural objects. For instance, a
man may not marry a woman whose totem is the
same as his own, any more than he would eat of the
animal which is his totem. It is tabu, a thing for-
bidden ; for it would be equivalent to eating his own
flesh. Also he is obliged to avenge a murder in his
own stock. In some cases the totem is tattooed into
the flesh; this lessened the risk of infringing the
tabu. It may here be parenthetically mentioned
in order to show how very deeply rooted is the
obligation of the family tie that the family and
blood revenge, which is a binding duty amongst
savages, is one of the strongest links of the family
in archaic Teutonic society, where also we see the
creation of artificial family ties by sworn brother-
hood, resembling the blood-mingling of savages at
the present day. When about to make a league,
says Saxo, the ancients were wont to besprinkle
their footsteps with the blood of one another, so as
to ratify their pledge of friendship by reciprocal
barter of blood. " Dost thou remember how we two
in days of old blended blood together ? " says Loki
to Woden in Loka-senna ; and a line in the Short
Brunhild's Lay, referring to the sworn brotherhood
of Sigurd and Gunnar, shows the way the bond
was entered into : " Ye twain did let your blood
run together in the footprint."
99
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
But to return to the question of animal ancestry.
It is always instructive to note how a particular
belief affects existing races. The Kaffir who has
killed an elephant protests that he did it uninten-
tionally, and in case the elephant's soul should seek
vengeance (for in savage belief, as we have seen, all
animals as well as inanimate things have souls, just
as men have), he cuts off the trunk and buries it, so
that the soul of the elephant will have less power in
the spirit- world. Similarly, the Chippewas, thinking
they will have to encounter in the other world the
spirits of slain animals, apologised to a bear for
killing him, asked forgiveness, and pretended that
an American was to blame. And the Samoyeds,
after shooting a bear, offer excuses to the body, and
lay the blame on the Russians. In the Kalewala,
the epic poem of the Finns, when the people kill a
bear they implore his forgiveness. The Hindu is
taught to respect the flocks and herds, and will on
no account lift his hand against a cow, for there is
no knowing that it is not his own grandmother;
and in New Caledonia a child is warned not to kill
a lizard, lest it should happen to be his own ancestor.
On the west coast of Ireland the same superstitious
regard is paid to the seal, which the people cannot
be bribed to skin. Some members of the Clan
Coneely were said to have been transformed into
seals, wherefore these animals go by their names.
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
For this reason many of the clan have changed their
patronymic to Connolly. But to this day no Coneely
considers that he can kill a seal without afterwards
having bad luck, and in some places the tribesmen
would no more eat a slaughtered one than they would
a human being. A few years ago (says a writer in
1 88 1 ) a Connelly shot a seal, and every one expected
something awful would happen to him. A photo-
graph has just been exhibited before the Folk-lore
Society, of an old Scotch woman who proudly claims
to be the grand-daughter of a seal, and tells the
story of her grandfather's capturing and marrying
the seal maid.
There are several Irish legends which appear to
be based on the notion that a man may not eat of
the animal which is his totem. In the story of the
Death of Cuchulain, contained in the Book of Lein-
ster, some witches offer the hero some cooked dog.
Cuchulain's name signifies "the Hound of Culand,"
and the story turns on the idea that " one of the
things he must not do was eating his namesake's
flesh." In another legend, Conaire the Great, a
mythical king of Ireland, is the son of the Bird King,
and is therefore forbidden to kill birds of any kind.
We read in Caesar that in Southern Britain it was
considered a crime to eat the hare, the goose, and
the domestic fowl ; the prohibition had in all proba-
bility some connection with a belief in the sacred
101
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
character of these animals. The hare, as we have seen
(supra, pp. 31-32), is associated with Easter obser-
vances. Now, the name of this Christian festival is
derived from Eostre, an Anglo-Saxon goddess, whose
worship was celebrated at this season. The hare
may have been sacred to Eostre; at any rate, it
" probably played a very important part at the great
Spring Festival of the prehistoric inhabitants of this
island." The hare may have been worshipped as a
tribal totem or god.
The practice of begging pardon of the slain
animal is in many parts of the world extended
to the case of plants; for they, like animals and
human beings, manifest the phenomena of life :
they are born, they grow, fade away, and die;
wherefore, as we have seen in an earlier chapter,
a soul or spirit is attributed to them also. To
this day, when "the wind blows the long grass
or waving corn, the German peasants will say
that the grass wolf or the corn wolf is abroad,"
and in some districts they leave a sheaf of rye
standing throughout the winter, as a shelter to the
" rye wolf." Or the plant-spirit may be human ;
both because it is believed, as we have seen, that the
soul of a dead person may enter a plant, and also
because the plant may be the ancestor of a certain
tribe. For, as in the parallel case of an animal,
a misinterpreted tradition arising from the habit
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
of naming after a plant, raises the belief that the
race descended from it. At the same time, it must
be borne in mind that quite possibly an animal
or plant may be worshipped directly for itself, as
something superhuman, and apart from any belief
in its being the ancestor or totem of a tribe. A
third motive for the worship may be found in
the doctrine of fetichism, which will be explained
subsequently. Similar reasoning must be extended
to the case of other natural objects which, through
one of these causes, come to be regarded with fear
or veneration. Thus the Wadders, one of the early
races of South India, show special regard for certain
trees after which their gotrams are called. They
will not touch leaf, branch, or fruit, and this fact
seems to suggest that totemism once obtained
amongst them. Among the Frisians a mysterious
virtue attached to water-lilies, and Dutch boys are
said to be extremely careful in plucking or handling
them, for if a boy fall with the flowers in his pos-
session, he immediately becomes subject to fits.
The use of plants in love divination may have
originated in a direct appeal to the plant-spirit.
Reference may also be made to their use in magic.
Very commonly the capture of a wild beast is
followed by a feast in propitiation of its manes.
Now, when we have arrived at sacrifices being
offered to totemic ancestors, we see by what short
103
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
steps this particular regard for a certain animal
or plant leads to a system of animal- worship, or
plant-worship. When an animal is believed to be
a relative, it is also looked upon as a guardian,
and hence arises the faith, so widely diffused, in
omens derived from birds and quadrupeds. The
ancestor, in his animal form, is supposed to be
solicitous for the welfare of his kindred, and there-
fore warns them by certain signs and sounds of
their danger. All ages and countries have had
their superstitions about Guiding beasts. Just as
the escort of wolf or raven augured victory, so
a tribe on its travels was guided by an animal
to its place of settlement, and there founded
colonies, and built towns, castles, and churches.
Greek and Roman story teems with examples. A
raven leads Battus and his emigrants to Cyrene
(named after copa, the raven). The Irpini are
so called from irpus, the wolf that led them. The
raven and wolf in northern latitudes were Woden's
favourites, who presaged victory and weal. Or the
bear may act as a guide, just as the hind (in
Procopius) shows the way to Cimmerian hunters.
A doe showed the Franks the ford of safety over
the Main, and a white hart over the Vienne. In
German legend a flying hen indicates the site of a
future castle. Remus had seen six, and Romulus
twelve vultures fly auspicious at the founding of
104
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
their city. An official document presented in Oc-
tober 1894, to the Mikado, by Mr. Miyoji Ito, the
Secretary-General of the Japanese Imperial Cabinet,
a translation of which appeared in the Times,
January 5, 1895, records the following instances
of sacred birds giving auspicious signs. When the
Emperor Jimmu was marching his troops against
Nagasunehiko, a crow of dazzling brilliance perched
upon the point of his bow, and the imperial host
gained a complete victory over the redoubtable
enemy. In the autumn of 1894, after a great naval
engagement at the Yalu, says Mr. Ito, a hawk de-
scended upon the masthead of one of his Majesty's
ships, the Takachiho. " The commander of the
ship ordered one of the marines to ascend the
mast and seize the bird. The latter, drooping its
head, did not attempt to move, but seemed glad
to be caught. A bird obtained in this singular
manner was naturally welcomed with enthusiasm
as Heaven's messenger." There was a rat hunt
on board to provide it with food, there being no
meat in the ship, and finally the bird was presented
to the Mikado, who named it Takachiho, after the
vessel on which it alighted. " Taka " means hawk
in Japanese. Now, a king of Kudara (the present
Korea) once made a present of a hawk to the
Emperor Nintoku. Again, Takachiho is the name
of a mountain at whose top the Imperial ancestor
105
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Niniginomikoto stayed awhile after his advent to
this nether world, wherefore it is regarded as a
sacred spot. In consideration of these significant
historical associations, it was considered by the
Japanese a remarkable coincidence that the bird
should have alighted on the mast of a war-vessel
bearing the hallowed name of Takachiho, just after
a memorable victory in Korean waters, and the
circumstance could only be interpreted as a sign
of the continued success of the Imperial arms !
At least, so thought Mr. Ito. In connection with
this belief in animal guidance and protection may
be mentioned the inhuman rite of immuring live
animals, possibly as substitutes for human victims,
in the foundation on which a structure was to be
raised, so as to secure immovable stability. Danish
traditions tell of a lamb being built in under the
altar, that the church might stand unshaken ; and
of a live horse being buried in every churchyard,
before any corpse was laid in it ; and this horse
becomes the walking dead horse. Both lamb and
horse occasionally show themselves in church or
churchyard, and the apparition betokens a death.
Even under ordinary houses, swine and fowls are
buried alive. In 1879 tne bones of a boar were
found under the foundation of a church in Suffolk.
It is said that the reason for burying alive a dog
or a boar under the corner-stone of a church was
106
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
that its ghost might haunt the churchyard and
drive away witches and warlocks. Too numerous
to cite are the stories of the walling up of persons,
or the bathing of foundation stones with human
blood, as in our own legend of Vortigern, who
could not finish his tower, till the foundation was
wetted with the blood of a child born of a mother
without a father. When the new bridge at Halle,
finished 1843, was building, the common people
fancied a child was wanted to be walled into the
foundations. To make Liebenstein Castle impreg-
nable, there was walled in a child, whom its mother
basely sold ; and the same story is told in con-
nection with Reichenfels and many other castles.
The tradition is common also in Bosnia and Her-
zegovina, and the custom survives in Africa, in
Polynesia, in Borneo, as well as among the more
cultured nations of Southern Asia. The motive
of the rite seems to be "either to propitiate the
earth-spirits with a victim, or to convert the soul
of the victim himself into a protecting demon."
In Jerusalem a rough representation of a hand
is marked by the natives on the wall of every
house whilst in building. The Moors generally,
and especially the Arabs of Kairwan, employ the
marks on their houses as prophylactics, and similar
hand-prints are found in El Baird, near Petra.
We have an illustration of a similar notion in the
107
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Chinese legend of the Bell Tower of Peking. The
Emperor Yung-lo, having built the tower, ordered
a mandarin named Kuan-yu to cast a bell of the
proper size. Two attempts having failed for in
each case the casting was "honeycombed" the
Emperor was furious, and threatened to behead
the unfortunate official in the event of a third
failure. The mandarin had a beautiful daughter
of sixteen years, who, grieving at her father's
distress, secretly consulted an astrologer to ascer-
tain the cause of these failures. From him she
learned that the casting would never succeed un-
less the blood of a maiden were mixed with the
ingredients. The brave girl kept her counsel, and
obtained her father's permission to be present at
the next casting. Amid dead silence the melted
metal was once more poured out, when with a
shriek and a cry, " For my father," Ko-ai plunged
headlong into the seething, hissing fluid. In an
attempt to seize her, some one grasped one of her
shoes, which came off in his hand. The father was
taken home a raving maniac; but when the bell
was cooled it was found to be perfect. At every
stroke its sonorous boom is ever followed by a low
wailing sound like a woman's voice in agony, dis-
tinctly saying the word hsieh (shoe). So to this
day the people, hearing it, say, " There's poor Ko-ai
calling for her shoe."
108
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
But to return to animal omens. It is a popular
idea that a prosperous day's work depends upon a
favourable encounter at early morning. It is unlucky
for a hare to cross your path ; Indians, Laplanders,
Arabs, and South African tribes would agree with
our own country folk in thinking so. There are
diverse opinions in diverse places as to the nature of
the luck in connection with a black cat. But when
you go a-fishing in Galway it is most unlucky to see
a fox. Often it is not the flight of a wayside fowl,
nor the chance encounter of a quadruped, but their
appearing, their residing in men's dwellings, that
bodes weal or woe. The swallow and the stork are
birds of luck, while a weasel or snake on the roof
has been thought to betoken ill. In Germany, a
spider running towards you early in the morning is
unlucky ; but there are luck-spinners, too, in many
parts of England and Ireland, where the descent of
a spider is a favourable omen, as it is also in Poly-
nesia. The howl of a wolf or jackal in a village, the
bark of a dog and twitching of its ears, a cat cross-
ing the road when one is starting on a journey
all these events are untoward in North India. A
swarm of bees settling on a house betokens fire or
some disaster, as we read over and over again in
the classics. To Leopold of Austria they foretold
the loss of Sempach fight in 1386. The practice
of telling the bees has already been mentioned (see
109
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
supra, p. 24). In Germany, the death of master or
mistress is told not only to the bees, but to every
beast in the stall ; and every sack of corn must be
touched, and everything in the house shaken, that
information of the death may be conveyed to them.
Or we have notice of a death when the raven
caws, when a cock or hen trails straw, when the
mole burrows in a human habitation, when crickets
chirp and woodworms tick, and mice nibble at the
clothes of a sleeper.
All these superstitions and others like them may
be referred in their origin to the personification of
animals, to the savage man's habit of regarding
animals as his kin. Wolves' teeth were used as
amulets by the Irish, who at one time considered
the wolves their grandfathers. Animals were even
supposed to have a speech of their own ; and it is
the specially favoured who understand the language
of beasts or birds. Helenus, whom ^Eneas consulted,
understood the stars and the language of birds. The
actions of animals are interpreted as weather pro-
phecies : a cat washing her face being a sign of rain ;
an ox licking its forefoot, under its dew-claw, a sign
of storm.
It is interesting to trace the influence of savage
beliefs on savage invention of stories. We see why
an animal is so often an important character in a
popular tale, giving protection, advice, or assistance
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
to the hero or heroine. Every country in the world
has its stories of helpful animals, like the ants which
sorted the mixed grain for Psyche and for Cinderella,
or like the cow which in many versions of the latter
story is the girl's mother transformed. Perhaps in
the original barbaric conception of the Cinderella
story, the cow was actually the child's mother ; for
to the savage mind there is nothing irrational in the
notion of animal parentage; and within the last
decade a Gaelic version has been related in which
the heroine's mother is actually a sheep. Usually,
however, the savage element in folk-tales becomes
softened or altered when it ceases to be accep-
table to more rational thought ; thus a helpful beast
comes to be supplanted by a fairy godmother.
" Puss in Boots " is another type of the animal
benefactor, stories of whose nimble wit and ready
resource delight all the world. The mind which
in a confused way has identified men with animals,
and animals with men, would quite naturally con-
ceive of animals talking, and playing active parts
in human affairs. It would be no great effort to
the savage imagination to tell the story of a girl
who married a porcupine, or of the successful suit
of the frog "who would a-wooing go." The de-
nouement of the story may or may not be the
animal's assuming or re-assuming the human form
(as in the German story of the Frog-Prince). That
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
is usually the case in the popular tales that have
filtered down to us through generations of story-
tellers, and then the transformation into a beast has
been the wicked work of some demon, or witch-
craft and sorcery have been introduced to explain
it. Some of the Tsimsheean Indians of British
Columbia believe that they are descended from a
frog ; and the Dog-rib Indians of Great Slave Lake
tell the following story to explain their supposed
descent from dogs : A woman was married to a
dog, and bore six pups. She was deserted by her
tribe, and went out daily procuring food for her
family. When she returned she found tracks of
children around her lodge, but did not see any
one besides her pups. Finally she discovered from
a hiding-place that as soon as she left them the
dogs threw off their skins (just like the swan-
maidens and the werewolves, who will presently
be described). She surprised them, took away the
skins, and the dogs became children a number of
boys and one girl. These became the ancestors
of the Dog-rib Indians. These elements are com-
bined into a story on Vancouver Island, where a
tribe of Indians derives its origin from dogs. The
legend is found in many other places on the Pacific
coast, and there is a somewhat similar one among
the Hare Indians of Great Bear Lake. The Eski-
mos have stories of dog-ancestors; and in Baffin-
112
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
land, the mother of the dogs is their most important
deity. But extremely numerous everywhere are
the myths in which a human ancestress is said to
have given birth to an animal of the totem species.
Thus the Snake clan among the Moquis of Arizona
are descended from a woman who gave birth to
snakes. Similarly, in Western Equatorial Africa,
the Bakalai believe that their women once gave
birth to the totem animals; one woman brought
forth a calf, others a crocodile, hippopotamus,
monkey, boar, and wild pig. In Samoa, the prawn
or cray-fish was the totem of one clan, because
an infant of the clan had been changed at birth
into a number of prawns or cray-fish.
The accusation of bearing animal children is
frequently brought against a woman in folk-tales,
which so accurately reflect the lines of savage
thought, as, in Greek myth, Kronos dines off the
foal which he was assured his wife had just borne,
when in reality the child was Poseidon. But
Pasiphae was the mother of the Minotaur, and
Leda's twins were contained in two eggs ; while
in the Prose Edda, Gefjon's sons were oxen; the
hag's sons were wolves; and before the birth of
Aed Slane, king of Ireland, his mother brought
forth first a lamb, and then a silver trout.
No doubt, many a story is invented to account
for the habitual veneration of a particular animal ;
"3 H
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
for instance, a Bantu legend explains how the
friendly crocodile comes to the aid of a fugitive
heir, and is in consequence held sacred ever after.
When it has become a habit to ask the pardon
of the animal namesake in the event of unwitting
injury, to pray to it for protection, and to make
propitiatory offerings to it, it is not surprising that
by degrees a particular animal should develop into
a deity. Herein we discover the germ of religion
and myth ; it remains but to follow its development
and cult.
There appear to have been various phases of
animal worship in Egypt, and in this place it is
impossible to enter deeply into the subject. Mas-
pero points out that the animals were worshipped
first, and, later on, the gods who were supposed to be
present in the animals. It is thought that the animal-
headed deities so often represented in Egyptian art
after the twelfth dynasty may have been symbo-
lical, the animal personifying certain qualities which
were to be adored ; just as the sacred Scarab is an
emblem of the resurrection, wherefore it was always
placed in the tomb with the mummy. On the other
hand, the beast-gods may have been survivals of
totemic badges, and this explanation would account
for the local character of their worship the croco-
dile, for example, being hated of men in Apollino-
polis and put to death, whereas in Arsinoite the
114
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
sacred creature was served with geese and fish,
decked with necklaces and bracelets, and mummi-
fied at its death.
Pastoral tribes usually regard the herds as sacred,
and this habitual veneration of their cattle may, as
Prof. Robertson Smith has pointed out, explain the
sanctity of the cow in Iranian and Brahmanical
religions, and the worship in Ancient Egypt of the
bull-god Apis, the cow-goddess Isis-Hathor, and
the ram-god Ammon.
But the savage ancestors of all races have had
their animal gods : all the mythologies teem with
them. The Algonkins have their Michabo, or Mani-
bozho, a great hare; Marawa, a spider, is the
miracle worker in Milanesian mythology. And
even in the case of the more refined Greeks Nature
made no leap. They, like all other peoples, must
have passed through the stage of savage intellect.
We may see survivals of totemism in the various
beasts associated in Greek temples with the worship
of Zeus, and Apollo, and Demeter, according with
their several metamorphoses. For gods would have
the power to assume any shape, like Proteus. A
bristly boar, and a fell tiger, a scaly dragon, and a
lioness with tawny neck, were among the manifold
forms which he took.
In Red Indian, in Thlinkeet, and in Australian
mythology the gods can become birds; a tale is
"5
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
told of Apollo, the Sun-god, in the form of a dog ;
and we all know how Zeus, " to gain his private
ends," took the form of a swan, an eagle, a dove,
a serpent, a bull, and an ant, just as the Crow-
god in Australian myth turned himself into a little
grub on occasion. Metis, too, like other gods and
goddesses, had unlimited powers of transformation,
and having been persuaded to assume the form of
a fly, she was swallowed by Zeus, who had married
her, and afterwards feared she might bear a child
more powerful than himself.
This device for getting inconvenient persons out
of the way is commonly introduced in marchen,
or folk-stories. It occurs in the Welsh story of
Taliesin, where Caridwen, in the shape of a high-
crested black hen, swallows Gwion Bach in the form
of a grain of wheat. In the same manner, the prin-
cess swallows the Jinni in the "Arabian Nights."
The idea itself is purely barbaric, and just what
would occur to minds at a very low level of culture.
Accordingly we meet with it in the tales still told by
savages. In a Bushman myth, an important divinity,
a Mantis insect, gets swallowed by a supernatural
character, who in this manner has made away with
a large number of animals in his time. When he
is killed these all come trooping out of him alive,
like the swallowed victims in the German story
of the "Wolf and the Seven Little Kids." The
116
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
Kaffirs tell a very similar tale about a voracious
swallower, whose victims were disgorged alive. In
short, examples of this very myth are found amongst
savages all over the world, and every European
country has it in some form. The Greek myth of
Kronos is on a par with it, and must equally have
been invented before the ancestors of the Greeks
had emerged from the savage stage of mind. Kronos
had been warned to beware of his heirs; conse-
quently he was in the habit of swallowing his
children as soon as they were born. But he was
deluded with a stone wrapped in swaddling-clothes
in the case of his latest born, and he swallowed it
unsuspectingly. The babe who thus escaped was
Zeus, and when he grew up he compelled his father
to disgorge. The stone, being swallowed last, came
up first, and then all the children emerged safe and
sound.
We may be sure, then, that all the savage and
revolting tales about the gods were invented when
men were living after the roving fashion of wild
beasts. In later times, these traditions, albeit dis-
tasteful to the more cultured minds of the Greeks,
were preserved because, as Eusebius said, " none
dared alter the ancient beliefs of his ancestors," or
as Euripides wrote, " In things which touch the
gods it is not good to suffer captious reason to
intrude." Whenever faith forswears inquiry it
117
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
stands confessed as the twin-brother of supersti-
tion. As Tiresias says in the Baafaz, " We do
not show too much wiseness about the gods. Our
ancestral traditions, and those which we have kept
throughout our life, no argument will overturn ;
not if any one were to find out wisdom with the
highest genius."
It is said that when Pythagoras journeyed to
Hades he saw the soul of Hesiod bound to a pillar,
and that of Homer hung in a tree, as a punishment
for speaking unworthily of the gods. Pindar, who
wrote about 480 B.C., felt that it was safer to think
nobly of the gods, for so the blame was less, and
accordingly preferred to give another explanation
of the Pelops affair. According to the legend,
Tantalus boiled his son Pelops, and served him to
his divine guests. Pindar suggests, " It may be
that the bright web of legend, figured in colours of
falsehood, beguiles mortals into reports wide of
the truth." Euhemerus (316 B.C.), who wrote his
" Sacred History " in the time of Alexander the
Great, therein treated the stories of the Greek
mythology as exaggerated narratives of actual fact.
His work was translated into Latin by Ennius.
In short, as civilisation advanced, and religious
thought was shocked by the impiety and rudeness
of many of the divine myths, well-meaning attempts
were made to explain them, many and diverse being
118
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
the theories expounded by the several apologists.
In this way new legends were invented to account
for the irrational elements in the older myths. The
meaning of an original word was supposed to have
become corrupted, thus giving rise to absurd and
gross misconceptions; or a symbolical interpreta-
tion of myths was attempted, just as the modern
mythologist thinks that he traces the personification
of Sun, Moon, and Dawn, Storm, Wind, and Rain,
in the characters that figure in Indian and Greek
divine legends. In this way, according to some, the
myth of Kronos, for example, simply means that
the lord of darkness swallows the power of light
an interpretation not reconcilable, however, with the
theory of others that Kronos is the sun ; or again,
that he is the storm-god who swallows the clouds.
" The Mintiras of Malay have introduced the con-
ception of swallowing and disgorging alive into a
myth, which explains the movements of sun, moon,
and stars."
The safest method of interpreting any myth found
amongst civilised people is to accept the irrational
element in it without gloss. It will be found to
have its parallel in the stories current amongst
existing savage races, for a comparison of the myths
of different nations reveals their striking similarity ;
and thus any barbaric conception that tradition has
preserved may be traced to its origin in that savage
119
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
state of mind through which all civilised races have
passed.
From the foregoing consideration of savage belief
in animal metamorphosis, it will be seen how the
germs of myth in the human intellect may be culti-
vated till they produce the endless series of stories
of swan-maidens who doff their bird forms with
their feather tunic, like the Hindu Apsaras, or
cloud-maidens, and even the Norse Valkyries, who
have their shirts of swan plumage. The giant
Thiazzi, in his eagle-skin, flaps his wings in pur-
suit of Loki, clad in the hawk-skin which he has
borrowed of Freya. Weyland the Smith and his
brothers Egil and Slagfin entrap the three swan-
maidens, Lathgund, Allrune, and Swanwhite, when
they alight to rest on 'the sea-strand, and take
them as wives. Seven winters they stay with
their husbands in peace, but on the eighth they
begin to pine, on the ninth they must needs part,
and betaking them to their wings, they fly away.
The type of the Swan-coat story is as follows.
A man sees a woman bathing, having doffed her
charm-dress on the shore. He steals this dress
of feathers, and she falls into his power. He
marries her; but after some years she succeeds
in recovering the dress, and she flies away. As
a rule, he is unable to recover her. The theme
occurs in the "Arabian Nights," in the tale of
1 20
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
Hasan, who unlocks the forbidden door and sees
ten birds, who are really ten beautiful maidens,
doff their feather suits whilst they bathe. The
tale conforms to the type, and examples of it are
found in Sweden, Russia, Germany, in the Shetland
Islands in short, almost throughout Europe, as well
as in Asia and in Africa. In Finland the maidens
are geese; elsewhere they are more appropriately
described as ducks; or they may be doves, as
in Bohemia, Persia, and the Celebes Islands ; or
pigeons, as amongst the Magyars and in South
Smaland. In the guise of a vulture the bird-
maiden is found in Guiana, and American Indians
tell their version of her widespread story. In the
Shetland Isles maidens assume animal shape, and
doff seal-skins when they want to bathe. In Croatia
she hangs up her wolf- skin before entering the
water.
As some of the many European versions of the
Swan -coat story are probably familiar to all, a
variant may be cited from the Malay Island of
Celebes. It has a double interest, accompanying
the "Swan" motif with the good old nursery theme
of " Jack and the Beanstalk." " Seven heavenly
nymphs came down from the sky to bathe, and
they were seen by Kasimbaha, who thought first
that they were white doves, but in the bath he
saw that they were women. Then he stole one of
121
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the thin robes that gave the nymphs their power
of flying, and so he caught Utahagi, the one whose
robe he had stolen, and took her for his wife, and
she bore him a son. Now, she was called Utahagi
from a single white hair she had, which was en-
dowed with magic power, and this hair her husband
pulled out. As soon as he had done it, there rose
a great storm, and Utahagi went up into heaven.
The child cried for its mother, and Kasimbaha was
in great grief, and cast about how he should follow
Utahagi up into the sky. Then a rat gnawed the
thorns off the rattans, and he clambered up by
them, with his son upon his back, till he came to
heaven. There a little bird showed him the house
of Utahagi, and after various adventures he took up
his abode among the gods."
There is a Siberian story very similar to this.
The lover of folk-tales will doubtless recall in this
connection the German story of the " Six Swans,"
where the little girl's six brothers are turned into
swans when the charmed shirts are thrown over
them.
Or we have the story of Melusina, the lovely
fountain nymph, who married a mortal on condition
that she should pass all her Saturdays in strictest
seclusion. One day her husband broke his promise,
invaded her privacy, and looking through a key-
hole, saw her transformed into a mermaid, and
122
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
disporting herself in the bath. Thereupon she left
him, and ever after haunted her husband's castle,
like a Banshee, when one of its lords was about
to die. Gervase of Tilbury, who wrote about the
beginning of the thirteenth century, is the earliest
writer to mention the legend, and he tells it of
Raymond, lord of a castle near Aix, in Provence.
His wife makes him promise never to see her naked.
After they have been many years married he tears
aside the curtain of her bath, whereupon she in-
stantly changes into a serpent and disappears under
the water for ever. The Maoris and the Japanese
have variants of this tale, which is very widespread.
The well-known story of Undine is similar. It will
be remarked that the Melusina type has to do with
the observance of a taboo ; hence it has parallels in
the immense cycle of stories of " Beauty and the
Beast," or " Cupid and Psyche," where it is, how-
ever, the husband who has ever and anon to resume
his animal form, and the taboo forbids his being
looked upon at night when he appears as a man.
In another direction this ingrained belief in trans-
formation would easily develop into the horrible
superstition of the werewolf, or loup-garou, so com-
mon in the Middle Ages, when it was firmly
believed that men weie in the habit of being trans-
formed into wolves. Werewolf signifies man-wolf,
wehr meaning " man." Garou is a French corrup-
ts
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
tion of wehrwolf, so that the compound loup-garou
is tautological.
Once upon a time Sigmund and Sinfitela went
into a wood, and lit on a house wherein lay two
men sleeping, who were under a spell as were-
wolves, for their wolf-skins were hanging over them.
Every tenth day they were able to come out of
their skins. They were kings' sons. Sigmund and
Sinfitela put on the skins, and could not put them
off again, and fell under the same spell as the others-
had been under, and howled like wolves ; but they
could understand each other's howling. Each of
them slew many men. When the day came when
they could come out of their skins, they took them
and burnt them with fire, that they might do no
more harm to any one. As the Swan-maid can
lay aside the swan-ring or feather-dress, so can the
wolf-skin or wolf-girdle be discarded.
In European legend, however, it is more often
the donning of the girdle made of human skin that
transforms the human being into a werewolf.
According to Slavonic superstition, the Livonian
sorcerers bathe yearly in a river, and turn for twelve
days to wolves, as did the Neuri for a few days
every year in the legend of Herodotus. The were-
wolf is rampant, in popular fancy, in modern Greece
and in modern Germany, where you must not " talk
of the wolf " by name in December, lest . the were-
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ANIMAL ANCESTORS
wolves tear you. They hold no longer place in
English folk-lore, though the idea of metamorphosis
is transferred from the extinct wolf to some other
animals. The familiar episode of the animal being
wounded, and the person who bore its shape being
found with a similar wound, is met with in the
folk-lore of every people (see ante, p. 91). In an
old Norse book written about 1250 A.D., and giving
an account of Ireland, a story is told to the effect
that when the holy Patricius was preaching Chris-
tianity there, one great race was specially hostile
to him, and howled at him like wolves. Patricius
implored God to avenge him for the insult, and
fitting punishment accordingly fell on them and on
their descendants to this day. For " it is said that
all men who come from that race are always wolves
at a certain time, and run into the woods and have
food like wolves. . . . And it is said that some
become so every seventh year, and are men during
the interval. And some have it so long that
they have seven years at once, and are never so
afterwards."
A progenitor of the werewolf was at large in
classic times. Virgil, in the Bucolics, shows the
popular belief; for in speaking of certain herbs and
drugs, the enchantress says (Eel. viii.), "By the
power of these I have seen Mceris oft become a
wolf and hide within the woods." Ovid relates how
"5
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Lycaon, king of Arcadia, invited Zeus to a banquet,
and gave him human flesh to eat. As a punishment
for this impious practical joke, Lycaon was trans-
formed into a wolf. From that time, according to
Pliny, each year on the festival of Zeus Lykaios
(the wolf Zeus) a noble Arcadian was led to the
margin of a certain lake. Hanging his clothes on a
tree, he plunged into the water and became a wolf.
Then for nine years he was doomed to roam the
woods ; but if during the whole time he could abstain
from human flesh, he might don his clothes once
more, and resume his natural form. According to a
later legend, those who ate of the human sacrifice
offered to Zeus Lykaios were transformed into
werewolves, but could resume their original shape
if for ten years they abstained from the flesh of
men.
These sacrifices to Zeus were, in all probability,
developed out of the cannibal feasts of a Wolf tribe.
We have many classical examples of religious ser-
vices in which the worshippers clothe themselves in
the skin of the animal whose feast they celebrate.
Thus the Hirpi, or " wolves," wore the beast's skin
in their wolf-dances ; and in the Attic bear-dance
the young girls used to " make up " as little bears,
connecting Artemis with the worship of the She-
Bear. Similarly, the Maenads wore the dappled
fawn-skins in their frenzied worship of Dionysus.
126
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
The people of North Germany, according to Tacitus,
worshipped the mother of the gods, and wore
images of wild boars as the symbol of their belief.
But to return "to our werewolf. Let us see what
is related of him in South Africa. A certain
Hottentot was once travelling with a Bushwoman
and her child, when they perceived at a distance
a troop of wild horses. The man, being hungry,
asked the woman to turn herself into a lioness and
catch one of these horses, that they might eat of it ;
whereupon the woman set down her child, and
taking off a sort of petticoat made of human skin,
became instantly transformed into a lioness, which
rushed across the plain, struck down a wild horse,
and lapped its blood. The man climbed a tree in
terror, and conjured his companion to resume her
natural shape. Then the lioness came back, and
putting on the skirt made of human skin, re-
appeared as a woman, and took up her child, and
the two friends resumed their journey after making
a meal of horse's flesh. Africa is specially rich in
stories of man-lions, man-leopards, and man-hyaenas.
In Scandinavia there are legends of a man-bear,
and in Hindustan of a man-tiger. The werewolf
also appears in North America, duly furnished with
his wolf-skin sack; and, indeed, his equivalent in
some animal form is believed in everywhere among
savages.
127
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
But the werewolf of the Middle Ages is a far
more terrible and diabolical conception than the
barbaric werewolf, which was merely a transformed
man. In the savage idea of animal-transformation
there was nothing necessarily diabolical ; it was in
the course of its final development that the belief
acquired its most horrible features, when lycan-
thropy in its contact with Christianity came to be
regarded as a species of witchcraft, the werewolf
being supposed to be in league with the devil him-
self. Hundreds of persons were burned alive on
the charge of animal metamorphosis.
It would be out of place to enter here into a
discussion of the nature and causes of lycanthropy
as a diseased mental state, or of the Berserker
insanity characteristic of Scandinavia, in which the
frenzied champions are supposed to tread fire,
swallow live coals, and bite shields without feeling
pain. The fabulous man-wolf (who rightly comes
under the notice of the folk-lorist) must be dis-
tinguished from the lycanthrope, who imagines
himself to be a wolf, and imitates a wolfs actions.
Therefore it is unnecessary to cite the terrible
instances of persons being seized with homicidal
mania, clothing themselves in beasts' skins, and
sallying forth by night to devour the unsuspecting
wayfarer. It is natural that to the unscientific
mind of the Middle Ages these abnormal cases of
128
ANIMAL ANCESTORS
craving for human flesh should be regarded as the
consequences of diabolical metamorphosis. To the
enlightened mind of the modern physiologist, how-
ever, the explanation is to be found in the oblitera-
tion of those qualities which distinguish man from
the brute, by an occasional reversion to a primitive
ancestral type characterised by bestial instincts,
and a mental capacity on a level with that of the
lowest savage. A curious instance of relapse into
barbarism occurred during the recent (March 1895)
native rising on the Niger, when Akassa was
attacked and pillaged by the Brassmen. " One of
the most prominent figures among the assailants,
dressed in the usual waist cloth, was a Brassman
who had been educated at King William's College
in the Isle of Man, and had a high reputation for
piety in British Brass town, where he had been seen
in civilised costume a few days before the outbreak.
When the Brassmen retired with their prisoners to
Nimbo, and proceeded to torture and hack them to
pieces, and boil their limbs with rice in large pots,
this promising convert was seen by a French
missionary to take a leading part in the horrible
orgie of cannibalism, with a human foot tied round
his wrist."
129
CHAPTER III
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
Universal animistic belief of the savage Fairies, brownies, &c. , de-
veloped out of primitive ghosts Fear of ghosts leading to pro-
pitiation The motive of every sacrifice Rudimentary conception
of deity Origin of incense-burning Polytheism the outcome of
belief in ghosts, friendly and malicious Devil the same as God
Demons originally divine beings Good and bad spiritual beings
developing into elves, dwarfs, &c. Nature-gods : Sun, Moon,
Fire, Sky, and Heaven personified Savage and Greek Wind-gods
Mother Earth Traces in English custom of Earth-worship
Water - gods Rivers demanding human victims Offerings at
wells, &c. Haunted mountains Sacrifices to Family Spirits
Anses and elves Vampires the ghosts of primitive cannibals
Apotheosised men Culture-heroes Mortal gods Monotheism
Rival powers Persian system of Dualism Satan's various
guises Stories illustrating the gullibility of the mediaeval devil
Bottled Spirits Fetichism an outcome of animism Relics and
effigies Idolatry Human sacrifices : Substitutes Eating divine
victim Symbolical sacrifices Serpent as fetich : worshipped ;
demonised.
SOMETHING has already been said in these pages
of the theory known as animism that is, the uni-
versal attribution of souls to all things, whether
animate or inanimate. The savage believes that
everything in nature is alike endowed with personal
attributes, and, according as his experience teaches,
is an object of dread or is harmless. Every death
adds a ghost to the number of the spirit-world ;
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ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
these ghosts have power to visit the abode of the
living, and their powers are supernatural either for
good or evil. Every tree and plant, every stock
and stone, every forest and hill, has its indwelling
spirit; the haunted air is crowded with spirits,
visible and invisible. Later on these develop into
the fairies, sprites, gnomes, and giants of popular
fancy, the household spirits, the brownies and
pixies, the Irish pookas and leprachauns, who,
however, are looked upon as more mischievous and
spiteful than really terrible, like the malicious ghost
which haunted the imagination of the savage. He
is not cheered with the visitations of the hob-
goblins and Robin Goodfellows that, in later super-
stitious times, would "grind corn for a mess of
milk, cut wood, or do any manner of drudgery
work draw water, dress meat, or any such thing."
He weaves no pretty fancies about the
"fairy elves,
Whose midnight revels by a forest side
Or fountain, some belated peasant sees,
Or dreams he sees, while overhead the moon
Sits arbitress."
Horror of the unseen fills the mind of the savage,
just as it quickens the imagination of the civilised
child, who therefore fears to be alone in the dark.
The following recent occurrence, brought under the
writer's notice, well illustrates the attitude of the
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
childish mind towards the supernatural. A mother
left her child's bedside with these parting words:
" You need not be afraid to be alone in the dark :
remember, God is in the room; He will take care
of you." Recalled soon after by muffled screams,
she found the little girl with her head under the
clothes, in absolute terror. " Oh, mother ! " she
implored, " please ask God if He would mind going
away : He does frighten me so ! "
This terror of the unseen is an essential element
of primitive religion. Baffled here, conquered there,
the savage everywhere attributes his ill success to
some malignant power, something outside himself.
To propitiate this power is his first endeavour, by
oblation or satisfaction; for the motive prompting
every sacrifice is either bribe or thanksgiving. That
is the obvious explanation of a certain rural sacrifice
which was performed in the eighteenth century,
on the 1st of May, in many Highland villages. A
square trench was cut, a fire lighted on the turf,
and a pot of caudle cooked. After spilling some of
the caudle on the ground as a libation, each person
took up a cake of oatmeal, and turning his face
to the fire, broke off a knob and flung it over his
shoulder, saying: "This I give to thee; preserve
thou my horses : this to thee ; preserve my sheep."
Afterwards they used the same ceremony to the
noxious animals : " This I give to thee, O fox ! spare
132
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
thou my lambs : this to thee, O hooded crow ! this
to thee, O eagle ! "
From the savage's belief in the power of ghosts
grew the rudimentary conception of deity ; and out
of habitual fear grew systematic worship. Man has
his own experience to go by, and nothing else ; hence
he attributes to all things motives like his own.
He can only conceive of a god as a powerful man,
therefore he is influenced by his own predilections
in his dealings with his deity. Fat beasts and the
smell of bullocks and of goats his own soul loveth,
therefore he offers them to his god, in whose sight
also his self-inflicted wounds must be acceptable,
since the wounds which an enemy receives are a
source of satisfaction to the savage himself. Such
crude reasoning as this gives rise to all manner
of ceremonial observances and sacrificial rites, the
modified forms of which are practised amongst the
civilised to this day. Noah must have reasoned in
this way when he offered burnt offerings after the
flood. The sacrifice was accepted, the conciliation
declared: "And the Lord smelled a sweet savour;
and the Lord said in His heart, I will not again
curse the ground any more for man's sake." And
so did the Argives sacrifice each man to one of the
everlasting gods, Agamemnon slaying a fat bull of
five years to mighty Kronion. Throughout the Iliad
like sacrifices are offered, with sprinkled barley and
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
libations of gleaming wine, whensoever prayer is
made to the gods.
The animistic view of sacrifice is that the soul
or essence of the offering is abstracted by the
ancestral or other spirit to be appeased, who is
hardly of a nature to consume material food or
drink. As the negro explained to the traveller who
saw him worshipping a tree and offering it food,
" The tree is not fetich, the fetich is a spirit and
invisible, but he has descended into this tree.
Certainly he cannot devour our bodily food, but
he enjoys its spiritual part, and leaves behind the
bodily, which we see." And the Hindu entreats the
ancestral spirits to quaff the sweet essence of the
hot dish of rice, as he sets it before the Brahman
to eat. So the Chinese, after allowing time for the
ancestral souls to consume the impalpable essence
of their sumptuous offerings, fall to and eat the
material substance themselves. It is the same with
other nations. The same conception underlies the
Homeric sacrifices. It was the thick clouds from
the burning thighs of the slaughtered, oxen that,
ascending to Olympus, cheered the assembled
gods. When once it was conceived that food for
the gods was chiefly acceptable in the form of
smoke or vapour, it would be but a step from the
offering of fumes of burning flesh to the substitu-
tion of fragrant woods and resin for a sweet savour ;
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
and to this practice can be traced the origin of the
use of incense in the service of the gods. In
Revelations, the smoke of the incense went up
before God with the prayers of the Saints ; and the
four-and-twenty elders carried bowls full of incense,
" which are the prayers of the Saints."
Polytheism, or the worship of a plurality of gods,
seems a natural outcome of the belief in friendly or
malicious ghosts, possessing powers of greater or
less degree. The religions of all tribes recognise
higher spirits or gods above the commonalty of
souls, demons, and Nature-spirits, just as the
Olympian Zeus, the personal sky, holds sway over
the lower gods of earth, air, and sea. Savages have
generally the same name for all the powers, whether
good or evil, which they recognise as superior to
man. The word devil is the same as God; it is
a corruption of deva, the Sanscrit name for God.
The Greek 0eo9, the Latin Zeus, French dteu, and
our word deuce, meaning " a little devil," can all be
traced to the same root. Similarly, the word demon,
now applied exclusively to fiends, originally meant
as the Greeks used it, simply a divine or a semi-
divine being possessed of supernatural powers. It
is by slow degrees that the supernatural beings
resolve themselves into opposing hierarchies of
good spirits and evil spirits, into gods and devils,
thus preparing the imagination for the conception
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
of a supreme god and a supreme devil in short,
for the system of dualism.
A Slavonic word for god is Bog; this word,
after a marvellous number of modifications, may at
length be seen in the name of " bogie," or " bogle,"
a hideous spectre of evil influence. Set, the devil
of later Egyptian mythology, was not originally a
god of evil. His worship was as ancient as any ;
it was not till the decline of the Empire that he
came to be regarded as an evil demon, and his
name was effaced from monuments. Horus and
Set were the personifications of Light and Dark-
ness, and their combat was the prototype of the
subsequent legends of Marduk and Tiamat, Bel
and the Dragon, St. George and the Dragon, and
many others.
The jinn of Arabian legend are, in many parti-
culars, like the demons of the rabbinical traditions.
The jinn are not immortal; they live in communi-
ties, and are ruled over by princes ; they have the
power to become invisible, and to assume the form
of various animals. There are good and bad jinn ;
but a spell can bind them, and they become the
slaves of certain talismans.
The Persians have a creation of good and bad
spiritual beings, the peris of surpassing beauty,
" nymphs of a fair but erring line," who wage
perpetual war against the repulsively hideous deevs,
136
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
with their ugly shapes and goggle eyes, their great
fangs and long tails.
Northern races have their white elves, friendly
to men, and their dwarfs or dark elves. These
dwarfs or trolls Jive in hills, mounds, and hillocks.
They can influence the lives and destinies of man-
kind, can foretell future events, and can become
invisible, or assume an animal form. It is usually
their cap that renders them invisible, and if it is
seized they are in the power of its possessor.
The spirit-world of the savage is the foundation
of the primeval Aryan Nature-worship, upon which
are based the religion and philosophy of the ancient
civilised world, whether men's thoughts tended
towards Pantheism (which is the worship of a
plurality of deities, some being subordinate), or
towards Monotheism (that is, the worship of one
god), which characterises the religion of most civi-
lised people at the present day. (Though, "in a
certain sense," as Mr. Lang has said, " probably
any race of men may be called monotheistic, just
as, in another sense, Christians who revere saints
may be called polytheistic.")
Sun and Moon rank high among the Nature-gods,
and to this day have obeisance done to them, even
amongst ourselves (see supra, p. 20). Sun and
Moon are regarded by savages as brother and sister,
or as husband and wife. Survivals of the ancient
137
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
rites of sun-worship may be traced in the custom of
turning to the East, as well as in the bonfires set
ablaze upon the hills on Easter morning, and in the
solar rite of the New Fire on Easter Eve, as still
observed in the Greek Church. The fire festival
at the summer solstice, once celebrated throughout
Europe, was observed in France quite recently the
huge straw wheel, which is lighted with a torch
and set rolling from the hill-top, being an emblem of
the sun, which is called in the Edda " fair wheel."
In Christian times these solar rites at midsummer
attached themselves to St. John's Eve, just as the
yule log and bonfire customs are now associated
with Christmastide, though originating in sun-
worship. The day adopted by the Church as the
anniversary of the birth of Christ was the day of
the winter solstice, December 25, which the Romans
celebrated in connection with the worship of the
Sun-god Mithra, wherefore it is called " Dies
Natalis Solis invicti," the Birthday of the Uncon-
quered Sun. The festival of December 25 is of
solar and not of Christian origin.
Further interesting evidence of the reality of
sun-worship is afforded by the numerous solar
shrines. At Abydos a temple was orientated for
the sun at the summer solstice. The temple of
Amen-Ra at Karnak is directed to sunset at the
summer solstice; the pyramids and the temples at
138
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
Glzeh, Sais, and Tanis were orientated to the sun
at the equinoxes. The Sphinx watched for the
rising sun at an equinox; and the Colossi, those
two great statues at Thebes, watched for the rising
sun at the winter solstice. To pass to Asia, the
solar temple at Peking is orientated to the winter
solstice; and, to come near home, Stonehenge, to
sunrise at the summer solstice. Stellar shrines
are orientated with equal precision. The mention
of one example must suffice the Parthenon, which
was directed to the rising of the Pleiades on April
30, B.C. 1530. All these facts are of interest to
the student of folk-lore, as affording foundation for
the many curious superstitious practices, which are
still to be observed among the folk, in connection
with sun, moon, and stars.
Fire, too, was worshipped as the manifestation
of a personal deity among the Aryan-speaking
nations, this worship being probably a develop-
ment of the rude barbarian's adoration of the actual
flame as a fetich. Bare reference must suffice to
the ancient ordeal of passing through fire or leaping "
over flaming brands, which in all probability gave
rise to the expression " to haul over the coals."
The Parsis, representatives of the religion of
Ancient Persia, are typical fire- worshippers.
Hestia, the divine hearth, was the venerable
virgin fire-goddess of the Greeks, for whom at
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
banquets first and last, men poured the honey -
sweet wine. Like her in name was the Latin
Vesta, in whose sanctuary perpetual fire was
nourished, the sacredness of this perpetual fire
being an article of faith, not alone amongst the
ancient Greeks and Romans, but also of the Jews,
Chaldeans, Tatars, Chinese, and other Mongolian
tribes ; Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Japanese ; Mexi-
cans, Peruvians, and other tribes of the new world ;
so that it may fairly be considered universal in
ancient times. In the course of time there came
to be recognised the two great divisions (as amongst
the Persians) of celestial fire and infernal.
The Fire-god, whose worship, a development of
sun-worship, was so widespread, took many forms.
In the Aryan religion it was Agni, who is entreated
by name in the first hymn of the Rig-veda, the
oldest and most sacred book of the East. In the
Latin word for fire, "ignis," we see the Sanscrit
Agni. Tubal-Cain, according to Mosaic account
the first artificer in brass and iron, was perhaps
as much a fire-god as the Greek Hephaistos, the
Latin Vulcan, the Scandinavian Loki, and the
Circassian fire-god Tleps, who were all skilled
metal-workers. The grim attendants of these sub-
terranean fire-gods, like the hideous Cyclops of
the Greeks, are the ugly black dwarfs of fairy
mythology, who forge the magic swords and the
140
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
impenetrable shirts of mail. The great Phoenician
God, Moloch, although perhaps not strictly a fire-
god, has always been associated with fire, victims
being burned within his hollow brazen image. It
must suffice just to name in this connection the
Persian Asmodeus, who, like the Christian Satan,
was placed on the throne of the burning world.
Among the Nature-spirits are the great gods
who rule the universe, as our Aryan-speaking
ancestors personified Sky and Heaven in their
deity Dyu, who could hurl the thunderbolt and
pelt rain, and whose name remains in the Greek
Zeus, and the Latin Jupiter.
But personification is not necessarily deification.
The Egyptians acknowledge the Nile as a god,
"but not so Storm, Rain, Wind, Thunder, Light-
ning, Cloud, Rainbow, or Eclipse, though some of
these were personified or represented in mytho-
logical form." They recognised divinity only in
those cases "where they perceived the presence
of a fixed Law, either of permanence or change."
The Earth abides, so do the Heavens. Stars in
their courses are constant; but wind and rain
observe no such regularity.
Some peoples have special Rain-gods and Thunder-
gods, like the Scandinavian Thor, the thunderer,
whose memory we keep in our word Thursday, or
Jovis dies, Jeudi, the day of Jove, who was both
141
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the thundering sky and the rainy sky, Jupiter
Tonans and Jupiter Pluvius.
North American Indians and South Sea Islanders
have their Wind-gods, like Boreas and Zephyros
of the Greeks, to whom Achilles sacrificed, praying
them to blow, as in Swabia, the Tyrol, and the
Upper Palatinate they fling meal in the face of
the gale, bidding it cease. Longfellow introduces
the native Indian legends of the Four Winds in
" Hiawatha." In New Zealand the great deity
Maui (who in Tahiti is himself identified with
the East Wind) is said to hold the winds in his
hands, or, like ^Eolus, to imprison them in caves,
save the West Wind, which is almost always blowing,
because he has never been able to catch it. Other
mythologies in like manner personify the winds.
In Revelations (chap, vii.) four angels stand at
the four corners of the earth, holding the four
winds.
In barbaric theology the Earth too is worshipped,
as the mother of all things as when the Ojibwa
Indian leaves an offering for the great-grandmother
Earth, when he is digging up his medicine plants.
A good Algonkin would never dig up a medicine
without depositing an offering in the earth for the
Great Grandmother of all; and some of the native
tribes of India, before eating their food, offer some
to the earth. The Khonds of Orissa even offered
142
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
human sacrifice to their earth-goddess. As Mama-
Pacha, or " Mother-Earth," she is worshipped by
the Peruvians. She is a divinely honoured person-
age in the mythology of North American Indians,
Caribs, Finns, Lapps, Esths ; and, in our own country,
time was when Anglo-Saxons called upon the Earth,
" Hail thou Earth, men's mother." The two great
parents of the Aryan-speaking race are the Earth-
Mother and the Heaven-Father, called in Sanscrit
Dyaushpitar, in Greek Zevs irar^p, in Latin Jupiter.
The divine pair still reign in Finn theology as Ukko,
the Grandfather (Heaven), and Akka, the Grand-
mother (Earth). Demeter, Terra-Mater, is the later
name of the classic earth-goddess Gaia, the " revered
divinity " of the Homeric hymn, the mother of gods,
and wife of starry Heaven.
" O universal mother, who dost keep
From everlasting thy foundations deep,
Eldest of things, Great Earth, I sing of thee."
It is thought that the English custom of leaving
a few ears of corn standing in the field is a trace
of earth-worship, just as in various localities parti-
cular festival customs may be connected with earth-
deities. For example, in many parts of North and
South Germany the last sheaf is made up in
the form of an animal, or is adorned with the
wooden image of an animal. In different districts
143
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
it is a pig, wolf, he-goat, cock, hare, or cow, and
the last sheaf is called accordingly the rye-sow, the
straw-cock, the wolf, the cock, the hare, &c. In
other places (extending from Scotland and England
through the whole of Germany to Slavonic coun-
tries) the last sheaf is made into a doll, representing
sometimes a man, sometimes a woman. In England
it is called the harvest lady, harvest queen, the
maiden, kirn dolly, kirn baby, or kern baby (corn
baby) ; in Germany, the corn-mother, great-mother,
wheat-bride, oats-bride, the old man, the old
woman ; in Poland and in Denmark it is variously
called. Certain ceremonial rites are performed
over this last sheaf, such as drenching it with
water, and then there follows a feast.
Then there are the water-deities and the indwell-
ing spirits of the water, the divine sea, and divine
springs, rivers, and lakes. The Red Indian makes
an offering to the resident spirit of the Mississippi ;
Peruvians prayed to their river - deity. From
800,000 to a million pilgrims go annually to a
religious festival on the Ganges, the divine river
by which the Hindus swear. The annual ceremony
of blessing the waters of the Neva is usually per-
formed in the presence of the Czar of all the
Russias. Multitudes struggle for some of the
newly-blessed water, with which they cross them-
selves and sprinkle their clothes. The Greek
144
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
Skamandros and Spercheios once had temples and
priests of their own, though naught but the memory
of its once sacred character now clings, like the
ghost of Homer, "round Scamander's wasting
springs." The Japanese have their Water-god and
their Sea-god, to whom they throw cloth, and rice,
and bottles of rum, just as the Greek sacrificed a
bull to Poseidon, and the Roman to Neptune before
a voyage. Xerxes threw a golden goblet and a
sword into the Hellespont, which, on a former
occasion, he had punished with branding and
flogging. Cyrus punished the river Gyndes for
drowning a sacred white horse. Achilles fought
with Skamandros ; Pheron speared the Nile, and was
blind for ten years in consequence. The following
interesting case of administering justice to a river
is from the Peking Gazette of November 1878:
"The Governor-General of the Yellow River re-
quests that a tablet may be put up in honour of
the river-god. He states that during the transmis-
sion of relief rice to Honan, whenever difficulties
were encountered through shallows, wind, or rain,
the river-god interposed in the most unmistakable
manner, so that the transport of grain went on
without hindrance. Order : Let the proper office
prepare a tablet for the temple of the river-god."
One more case from China. Some twenty years
ago an edict published in the Peking Gazette
145 K
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
announced that the river Yung-Ting had filled its
channel, and overflowed in several places, a fact
that appeared not only surprising but inexcusable,
seeing that in the preceding year Li Hung-Chang
himself reported that he had caged the dragon !
Goats are thrown into the Sutlej to appease it, and
prevent its wearing away its banks.
All savages show the same reluctance to save a
drowning man, because they fear the water-demon's
vengeance if he be cheated of his prey. Similar
superstitions as to this have been found among the
St. Kilda Islanders, the Danube boatmen, among
French and English sailors, as well as among less
civilised races.
It is said that the unwillingness of the Chinese to
save a man from drowning, or from any peril of
life, is due to the belief that the ghost of the last
person killed must act as watchman in purgatory
until the arrival of a fresh defunct relieves him of
the post. Thus, the person who saves a life will
assuredly be haunted by the "watching spirit,"
whom he has defrauded of a successor to release
him from servitude. A belief similar to this is met
with in many parts of the Scotch Highlands, where
the last person buried is thought to act as sentinel
over the churchyard, until able to deliver his charge
to another. Consequently, if two neighbours die
on the same day, the relatives make every effort to
146
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
be first in closing the grave over their dead, so that
the term of watching may be short. In County
Cork it is said that the last person buried in any
churchyard will have to draw water for all the
others there sleeping, until there is another burial.
If a Solomon Islander falls into the river and
narrowly escapes the jaws of a shark, his fellow-
tribesmen will throw him back as a doomed sacri-
fice to the god of the river. Tradition says that
little children were offered to the sacred river in
Esthonia ; the river-god, sometimes seen by mortal
eye, being a little man in blue and yellow stockings.
The river Tees, the Skerne, and the Ribble have
each a sprite, who, in popular belief, demands at
times human victims. The river Spey is spoken of
as " She," and must have at least one victim yearly.
" Bloodthirsty Dee
Each year needs three."
Peg Powler, the sprite of the Tees, is a sort of
Lorelei, with green tresses, and an insatiable desire
for human life. The foam or froth, which floats in
large masses on the river, is called " Peg Powler's
suds;" the finer, less sponge-like froth, "Peg Powler's
cream." The sprite of the Ribble is called "Peg
O'Nell," and she demands a life every seven years.
Unless a bird, a cat, or a dog is drowned in the
stream on " Peg's night," some human being is
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
certain to fall a victim there. A story is told to
prove the truth of this.
In a Kaffir story, the heroine, who hitherto had
never gone out except at night, is sent by her
father-in-law to fetch water by daylight. The
river draws her in, and she cannot escape from
it. Though her father-in-law sacrifices an ox, the
river will not accept it instead of the woman. Only
at night, when her child is brought down to the
river-side, she comes forth to suckle and pacify it.
The nurse informs the babe's father of this, and
he hides by the river one night, and when his
wife comes out he clasps her and tries to draw
her away. But the river, whose waters turn into
blood, follows her right to the village and takes her
back as it subsides, and only the very powerful
charms of a medicine woman effect Tangalimlibo's
deliverance.
In Germany, millers throw different things into
the water on December 6th, St. Nicolas's Day, as an
offering to the water-deity. In Northern countries,
a certain deity, Neck, is the particular dread of
millers. The nixes, those treacherous sprites who
lure men to a watery grave, are nymphs of ancient
lineage, to whom offerings were systematically made.
Christian authorities, by giving a saint's name to
springs or wells, have sought to transfer the venera-
tion. On Christmas Eve the Bohemians throw a
148
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
portion of their supper into the well, while repeat-
ing an appointed prayer to the water. At the
Roman fontinalia nosegays were thrown into wells
and fountains in honour of their presiding nymphs,
as crooked pins are cast into St. Winifred's Well
in North Wales, and three stones are offered to the
spirit of the stream in Unst (Shetland).
In connection with ancient water-cult, propitiatory
sacrifices had to be offered to water-deities before
throwing a bridge across their habitat ; and so, in
the Middle Ages, the constructor of a bridge was
a sort of consecrated character, half priest and half
engineer. Such was the Roman pontiff, so called
because he made the bridge.
Doubtless some sacrificial rite survives in modi-
fied form in the custom, still observed in Cornwall,
in parts of Ireland and Scotland, and in Brittany,
of leaving small objects, such as pins, buttons,
articles of dress, rags, &c., at sacred wells, pools,
and springs.
Thus it is seen that many observances, customs,
and superstitions of the present day are the out-
come of the primitive barbaric belief that every-
thing in nature is animated ; that every place, every
object, is the dwelling of a particular spirit. What
has already been said (p. 75) must suffice as to
the veneration of certain trees, in accordance with
this animistic theory. The demons of trees, rivers,
149
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
fountains, and seas passed into dryads, nymphs,
syrens, mermaids, as in the ocean caves dwelt those
sister Nereids, children of Nereus, the Old Man of
the Sea. "The Rhine has its Lorelei, and all the
Northern seas their mermaidens, who sing in irre-
sistibly sweet and plaintive tones, and comb their
golden hair." In our own Isles do
" Water-kelpies haunt the foord,"
luring benighted travellers to destruction.
Every hill and mountain in China is the abode
of some dragon-spirit; every house has a niche in
it fitted up as a shrine for the particular dragon
who protects its destinies. All the mountains in
Wales are haunted by female fairies of hideous
aspect, just as in classic times the forests and
fields, the waves and caves, teemed with satyrs,
fauns, fairies, elves, trolls, and dwarfs. In Christian
times fairies have come to be regarded as evil
spirits, and elves have given place to devils in
such connection as devils' dykes, leaps, punch-
bowls, &c. So the ancestral spirits in the course
of ages have suffered change. They assume the
form of Lares, those spirits of the deceased who,
according to Roman belief, watch over the living;
or they become guardian angels and patron saints;
whilst in certain morbid forms they are hobgoblins,
ghosts, brownies, and bogies. For the brownies,
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
too, are family spirits, which receive sacrifice in
the Orkneys. In the North the dead who were
worshipped, the ancestral spirits, were called Anses.
Elf was another name for the spirits of the dead,
and of divine spirits generally; though in later Chris-
tian times it sinks in Scandinavia to the meaning
of fairy. Our ideas about fairies are derived from
heathen beliefs as to the spirits of the dead. The
same thing has happened in the case of the wight,
which was originally a term for unearthly beings,
or spirits of the dead. Manes are the spirits of
deceased ancestors inhabiting Hades, who are
occasionally brought up again by sorcery. Raising
corpses is a universal feat with witches and wizards,
from the Witch of Endor to the modern spiritual-
ist. Deceased persons reappear as ghosts often
to foretell death to the person they visit. Dread
of ghosts is common to savage and civilised alike.
With a pre-established belief in their existence, the
over-wrought brain would be subject to illusions
supporting that belief. Vampires are the souls of
the dead, who at night feed on the blood of the
living. We can trace their pedigree to the buried
barrow-ghost who could rise, slay, and eat, as in
the Danish tale of Asmund and Aswit. All the
hideous vampire legends grow out of facts con-
cerning primitive cannibals. These demon blood-
suckers have their principal abode in Slavonia and
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Hungary, and their name is derived from the Polish
word upior. Or the vampire may appear in the
rdle of poltergeist, or knocker, who upsets the fur-
niture and causes disturbances in houses. Similar
manifestations assure the modern spiritualist of the
visit of some soul of the departed. A Bulgarian
sorcerer, armed with a saint's picture, can entrap a
vampire into a bottle baited with the filthy food that
this gruesome soul loveth, and cork him down.
Besides the Nature-gods that we have been con-
sidering, the polytheism of the lower races acknow-
ledges other deities, with the special attributes that
savage imagination has seen fit to furnish them
withal. Any power transcending his own is re-
garded by the savage as something supernatural;
therefore the higher culture of the superior stranger
entitles him to a place in the savage's spacious
pantheon. Europeans received religious homage
on their first contact with the red men of the
North American continent. Montezuma, supposing
Cort6s to be an incarnation of Quetzalcoatl, sent
human victims to be slaughtered before him. The
natives of Africa call the white man a devil ; and
the natives of Mozambique draw their devil in the
likeness of a white man. The devil can be all one's
fancy paints him. He is not always black as the
sooty Vulcan, nor with horns and hoofs like Pan
nd his Satyrs. Like a deity, he can be developed
'52
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
out of a powerful man, or out of a stranger bring-
ing new arts, or out of any person possessed of
superior power. All sorts of tales would be woven
round this imaginary or real benefactor. Undoubt-
edly there was a very long fireless period in the
earliest stages of man's development, just as there
are fireless people at the present day, such as the
Dokos in Abyssinia. Australians knew nothing
about boiling and roasting food till the advent of
Europeans. Then it comes to be related how some
wise and superior being tamed fire, taught the use
of the bow, and told " the hidden power of herbs
and springs." Iron and gold, gems and poisons,
music, science and the arts, " such, the alleviations
of his state, Prometheus gave to man," according
to Greek legend. Similarly, all peoples who have
attained to even a low degree of civilisation have
their culture-hero, whom they delight to honour,
and sometimes deify. Such a benefactor was
Wainamoinen, whose praises are sung in the
Kalewala, the epic poem of the Finns. Yehl,
the god or hero of the Thlinkeets, could, like
all savage gods, assume the form of a bird, and
he stole fire as Prometheus did. But the fire
dropped from the brand which he carried in his
beak upon stocks and stones, and it is still to be
obtained by striking flints or rubbing dry sticks
together. The Zulus have their Unkulunkulu, "the
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
old, old one," whom they regard both as the first
man and as a creator; he, too, imparted to men a
knowledge of the arts. Brazilian tribes say that
Tamoi, the Grandfather, was the first man ; he
taught them how to till the soil, and then rose to
the sky, where he will receive their souls after death.
Many other races besides those mentioned identify
the Creator with the First Man, or at least explain
a kinship between them. The Hindu Yama was the
first man and a solar god, being himself Son of the
Sun. He is also Judge of the Dead. In Polynesian
mythology, the divine Maui is ancestor of the human
race. He, like Yehl, assumed a bird-form, and gave
to men the art of procuring fire by friction. The
Ahts of Vancouver's Island relate the exploits of a
superior being, one Quawteaht, who could assume
the form of beasts. The theft of fire is not alleged
of him, though he seems to have had it in his pos-
session. It was the cuttle-fish who stole it. Tsui
Goab among the Hottentots is the name to conjure
with. He died several times and rose again, and
has as many burial-places as are claimed for a Chris-
tian saint, worship being paid him at these several
cairns. In his lifetime he seems to have been a
chief and a wizard.
Where ancestor-worship prevails, as for instance
in China, the souls of great chiefs and warriors, or
any celebrated person, are certain to be raised to
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
divine rank in the course of generations. And this
is how it comes to pass that the gods of savage
creation are mortal. Like men, the gods of the
Hindus were only made immortal by drinking soma.
When the young prince Buddha inquired about a
corpse he was told that all flesh, gods and men,
rich and poor, alike must die. The Scandinavian
gods died and were buried ; and Egyptian frescoes
represent the burial of Osiris, one of the chief gods
of Egypt. The Egyptian gods give to the deceased
in heaven " the tree of life, of which they themselves
do eat, that he likewise may live." He eats and
drinks with the gods the " bread of eternity " and
the " beer of everlastingness." In short, the un-
cultured mind everywhere conceives of god in the
likeness of man ; for even the Nature-gods were
anthropomorphic ; and the deeply-rooted idea has
prevailed down to recent centuries. Whenever the
sense of his own incapacity showed the need of
some great artificer, some supernatural miracle-
worker, man created gods in his own image ; in
the image of man created he him, male and female
created he them.
The sacred legends tell how these man-created
deities hunted, feasted, rioted, made love, went to
war, and retired to bed at sunset. All these things
do the Fijian gods of the present day ; nor is this
surprising, seeing that the Fijian gods are simply
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
deified mortals, apotheosised men. It seems, there-
fore, not unreasonable to assume that the Greek
gods, in conception essentially parallel with the
Fijian, were originally devised in like manner, when
the ancestors of the Greeks were in a similar stage
of intellectual development to the Fijians.
As the spirit-world is to some extent the reflex
of the material world, it might happen in the course
of time that one spirit would differ from another
in glory, some gods would become subordinate to
others, till the idea of one supreme power was
reached ; just as, in the evolution of savage society,
man warring against his fellow in the pursuit of his
own advantage would learn that absolute equality
cannot exist, and subordination would mean the
recognition of superior power or rank, culminating
in a head-man, a chief, or king. When a people lost
its independence its gods did not cease to exist,
but became the servants of the conqueror's deities.
Monotheism, however, is not necessarily the re-
flection of kingship in human society, for, as Mr.
Lang points out, we find the conception of a supreme
god, at least in outline, among races who have not
even a chief, while among races with a king (as the
Aztecs) there is no specially supreme deity, and no
centralised divine government.
To attempt description of the religious systems
of the world would be to digress from the plan of
156
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
this little book. We have not to ascertain why
men believe in gods (that being rather the business
of the science of religion), but why they tell such
strange stories about them, and why, moreover,
men all tell the same sort of story, no matter to
what race or clime they belong. But, as good and
evil spirits find their way into the folk-lore of every
people, it is expedient to show that all supernatural
beings, however much in the course of evolution
they have diverged from the primitive type, under
cultivation by this sect or that, yet reveal their
ultimate relationship one with another, being all
alike cradled in savagery.
Some of the lower races show a rudimentary
form of dualism in the opposing attitude of their
good and evil spirits. The Devil as the power of
Evil plays an important role in European folk-lore.
The Poles, whose proverbial belief it is, like our
own, that the devil is not as black as he is painted,
say that he carries a man's soul up the chimney,
that being his usual way of exit. It is related of an
Englishman who died in 1883, and had been for
years an inhabitant of Wrexham, that if in his walks
a magpie crossed his path, he would make with his
stick the sign of a cross upon the ground, and say,
" Devil, I defy thee ! "
In the religion of Ancient Persia, which was the
most impressive of all systems of dualism, the rival
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
powers of good and evil, of light and darkness,
were represented in Ormuzd, Ahura-mazda, the
supreme Good, and Ahriman, the supreme Evil.
Ormuzd created a fair and beautiful world, but
Ahriman came after him, marred and frustrated all
the good, and created all the evil that is in it. Like
his offspring Satan, he is represented under the
form of a serpent. Undoubtedly, in its development,
Christian theology has been much influenced by the
dualism of the ancient Persians. The Jews pos-
sessed no conception of a devil as the author of
evil before their captivity in Babylon, and owe it
to their close contact with Chaldean and Persian
ideas. But this original Satan, the Asmodeus of
the Hebrews, the prince of demons, the "adver-
sary," has suffered great degradation during the
course of centuries, and in mediaeval times we find
him in all sorts of grotesque guises, and with very
various borrowed attributes. He is the black dog
in Dr. Faust's study, or, imitating the classic sylvan
deity Pan, he figures as a goat with horns and
cloven hoofs. As the prince of the powers of the
air, he is attended in his midnight flights by troops
of witches mounted on brooms. He is Wayland
Smith, the cunning worker in metals ; and, like
Hephaistos, he is lame from the effects of a fall
from heaven. From the Scandinavian Thor, god
of thunder, he obtains his red beard and his pitch-
158
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
fork, and his power over thunderbolts ; and probably
he gets his name of Old Nick from his appearing
as a water-imp or nix. Numerous traditions attest
the gullibility of this mediaeval devil, who, like the
trolls, or " night-folk " of Northern mythology, is
frequently foiled by the superior cunning of mortals.
For instance, the devil sees a man moulding buttons,
asks what they are, and is told that they are eyes.
He thinks he will have a new pair himself, and
actually consents to being pinioned while they are
adjusted. When he is tightly bound to a bench he
opens wide his eyes, and receives a blinding stream
of melted lead, and starts up in agony, bearing the
bench away on his back, only to encounter ridicule.
Or, as is related in many a mediaeval legend, he
offers to help an architect to overcome his many
difficulties in constructing a bridge, on condition
that he receives in payment the soul of the first
being to cross the bridge. The architects in these
stories invariably give the promise, but cheat the
poor devil by driving cats, dogs, pigs, hares, or
fowls across the bridge. In many another way the
devil gets cheated of his fee, as when, in " taking
the hindmost," he gets only the shadow of the last
man in the race, who thus gets off free, but lives
shadowless ever after. The Irish on Achill Island
at the present day dress all their boys like girls till
they are about fourteen years old, in order to deceive
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the devil, who is always on the look-out for a boy.
This precaution reminds one of the Chinese custom
of giving a lad a girl's name, so that the gods may
be deceived ; for they fear that the gods will deprive
them of their boys.
It is interesting to see how very widespread is
a particular story qften attaching to this gullible
devil. Frequently the devil, when displaying his
powers, is persuaded to make himself small, and
then gets entrapped. Saemund, the hero of many
an Icelandic story, and especially apt at outwitting
Old Nick, asked him one day to make good his
boast that he could make himself as small as the
smallest midge. Saemund bored a tiny hole in the
door-post, invited the devil to walk into it, and
then stopped it up with a plug of wood. The devil
was not released till he had promised to become
Saemund's servant. But he chafed at his thraldom,
and was for ever trying to revenge himself upon
Saemund, who, however, was always one too many
for him. Once the devil took the form of a fly,
and tried to hide under the film that had gathered
on the milk-jug, hoping that Saemund would swallow
him unawares and so lose his life. But Saemund
instead put fly, film, and all into a bladder and laid
the package on the altar. There the devil had to
bide till after the service, and it is said that he
never found himself in a worse case.
1 60
ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
In a Danish story the devil gets shut up in a
box, and in a Portuguese he takes refuge, after a
severe thrashing, in a log of wood. In very many
fairy tales diabolic spirits are imprisoned in phials
as flies. A ghost that haunted a house in the
west of England was served in this way. The
man who undertook to lay the ghost, and awaited
his midnight visit in a locked room, had a bottle
of brandy, with a tumbler and water, and an empty
bottle, at hand. When the ghost appeared, the man
asked how he got in, and would not believe it was
through the keyhole. "At any rate," he said, "if
you can get through a keyhole you can get into
this bottle, and I won't believe that you can do
either." "Here goes, then," said the ghost, as into
the bottle he went. Then the man popped in the
cork, and took and threw the bottle exactly over
the key-stone of the middle arch into the river,
and the ghost never was heard of after. The
ghost of a child that haunted the "Old Hall" at
Hinckley was exorcised by a number of ministers,
who, after a short religious ceremony, enticed it
into a bottle, which was then securely corked and
thrown into the moat.
The Southern negroes of America say that, to
secure protection from being hag-ridden, you must
hang a bottle half full of water on the bed-post ;
get a new cork, stick into it nine new needles,
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
and hang it over the bottle, an inch above its
mouth. When the hag has finished her nightly
ride on your chest, she will see on departing the
cork and the needles, and, her fatal instinct for
counting seizing her, she will pause. Then is the
moment to cork the bottle, with her semi-fluid
corporeal substance inside. You will never be
troubled with that hag again. It will be seen
that the device of bottling noxious spirits is very
common indeed.
In a Russian story, a soldier comes to the rescue
of a certain princess, who is visited every night
by an evil spirit, which gives her no rest till dawn.
The fiend arrives at midnight, and assumes the
form of a man. The soldier intercepts him, tricks
him in various ways, and finally chastises him till
he takes to flight. Every night for a month a
different devil is sent to the palace, and receives
the same treatment at the hands of the soldier.
Then " Grandfather Satan " himself confronts the
soldier, and retreats howling. Presently the soldier
induces the whole of the fiendish party to enter his
knapsack, imprisons them therein by signing it with
a cross, and then has it thumped on the anvil to his
heart's content. After this he usually carries the
knapsack about on his back, with the fiends inside
it, till one day some inquisitive women open and
let out the unsuspected contents with a crash and
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a roar. The hero of a Bohemian story likewise
"bags" all the demons who had haunted a noble-
man's castle, including Satan himself. Then he
has them well hammered at a smithy, and only
sets them at liberty on their promising never to
return.
The Walloons tell a story called "Misery and
Poverty," in which again the devil suffers much
ignominy. It is very much like the Norse story of
" The Mastersmith," and has besides its parallels
in France, in Rome, in Holland, and elsewhere.
Misery, a blacksmith, and Poverty, his dog, are
companions in privation. One day the blacksmith,
sorely tempted, sells his soul for a large sum of
money to the devil, who will claim his purchase
at the end of ten years. In the meantime the
blacksmith is enabled to live in the enjoyment of
plenty. One day St. Peter and the Lord, passing
his way, halt to have their ass shod. Misery sets
to work at once, and shoes the ass with a silver
shoe. This pleases the travellers, and, as a recom-
pense, they promise to grant any three wishes that
the blacksmith may express. After due reflection,
Misery asks for a purse that will never let its
contents escape, an armchair which will hold its
occupant prisoner, and a cherry-tree from which
no one, having climbed into it, will be able to
descend without his permission. St. Peter, in an
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urgent aside, has been prompting the blacksmith
to ask for Paradise ; but Misery would not hear
him. The travellers go on their way, and the
goodman's three wishes are realised. One evening,
the ten years being now accomplished, the devil
appears to claim Misery's soul. " You seem tired,"
says Misery. " Sit down in the armchair whilst I
get myself ready." The devil acquiesces, and off
goes Misery to make a bar of iron red-hot in the
fire. Back he comes, and proposes starting; but
the devil tries in vain to get up. Misery then lays
into him mercilessly with his red-hot poker, and
will not desist till he is promised a ten years'
respite. When that period has elapsed, a whole
troop of devils come to fetch his soul. It is
summer-time and very hot, so Misery invites them
to climb into the cherry-tree and refresh them-
selves. Thereupon, having them in his power, he
obtains another ten years' reprieve before letting
them go. The ten years pass, and he is invaded
by another troop of devils. This time he sets out
with them. Having gone a stage together, Misery
asks if they are not tired, and offers to carry them
for a while if they can get inside his purse. All
unsuspicious, in they crawl, and are at his mercy
till they promise another ten years. But before
these have elapsed the old fellow dies, and so
does his dog. They arrive together at the gate
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of Paradise, St. Peter opens to them, but instantly
recognising the man who had so offended him by
not taking his hint about Paradise, he shuts the
door in his face. Then Misery, still accompanied
by his dog, presents himself at the gate of hell.
The devil who opens the door happens to be the
very one who had such a bad time of it in the
armchair. In terrible alarm he slips inside again,
bangs the door to, and bolts it. So Misery and
Poverty were not received at either place ; and
that is how it is that they must wander on earth
for ever and ever.
In many variants of this story it is Death that is
put off in some such manner and cheated of his
prey, as when Gambling Hansel, in the German
story, like the hearty old lady of eighty in the
French version, makes Death climb into the im-
prisoning fruit-tree, and leaves him up there for
seven years ; and in the Magyar folk-tale, when the
young farmer corks up Death in the spirit flask ; or
when Bippo Pipetta, in the Italian variant, forces
him to enter his magic sack.
In the Norse tale of "The Lad and the Deil,"
the devil is induced to crawl into a worm-eaten
nut, and the smith finds that a precious hard nut
to crack, even with his sledge-hammer.
Brother Lustig, in the German story, wishes the
nine devils into his magic knapsack, which he then
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takes to a smithy and lays on the anvil, bidding the
smith and his apprentices strike it with all their
strength with their great hammers. In this way
eight of the devils are done to death, and the ninth
only escapes through lying in a fold. Years after-
wards, when Brother Lustig presents himself at the
door of hell, this very devil peeps out, and recog-
nising the man with the knapsack, and recalling his
narrow escape with a black eye from the terrible
hammering, he bolts the door again in a fright, and
rushing to the devil's lieutenant, begs him, as he
values his life, never to let that chap with the knap-
sack in. Then Brother Lustig applies for admission
at the door of heaven ; but St. Peter, who had given
him the knapsack, and who knows something about
him, says he will not have him there. Brother
Lustig begs him to take back his knapsack, and he
pushes it in through the bars. " Now I wish myself
inside the knapsack," says Brother Lustig, and in
a second he was in it, and so in heaven, where St.
Peter was forced to let him bide.
The devil who is released from the bottle by
the woodcutter's son, in another German story in
Grimm's collection, is actually fool enough to be
persuaded to get inside again before strangling his
rescuer, who of course loses no time in thrusting in
the cork, and then keeps him prisoner till he has
promised a reward for his release.
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ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
This last story attaches, in Switzerland, to Para-
celsus, of whom it is told that, wandering one day
in the forest, he heard his name called by the devil,
who was imprisoned in a fir-tree, and promised to
liberate him on condition that he procured him a
medicine which would cure all the sick, and a tinc-
ture that would turn everything to gold. The devil
promises, and the doctor proceeds to cut out of the
tree a little plug with three crosses marked on it,
whereupon the devil crawls out, in the form of a
hideous black spider, and, reaching the ground,
transforms himself into a tall, thin, squinting, red-
eyed man, in a red cloak. He conducts the doctor
to a rock, which he strikes open with a hazel-rod.
Thence he fetches the promised medicine and tinc-
ture. Then they return to the fir-tree, the devil
intending to go thence to Innsbruck to fetch the
man who had imprisoned him. But Paracelsus
craftily compliments him on his power to turn him-
self into a spider, and the devil politely offers to
perform the feat before his eyes. He does so, and
crawls again into the little hole, whereupon Para-
celsus rams in the plug, cuts three fresh crosses on
it, and leaves the devil to his fate. The contents of
the bottles turned out to be quite genuine, and by
means of them Paracelsus became famous.
Or, as in a Russian tale, it is Woe the Woeful
that is so clever at getting into chinks. A merchant
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
invites him to play at hide-and-seek, and induces
him to make good his boast by creeping into the
axle-box of a wheel. Then he drives in a wedge,
and flings the wheel, with Woe in it, into the river.
Misfortune, in the fable, gets shut up in a hollow
oak-tree, much in the same way as the devil gets
wedged in a beech-tree in a German story.
When Donald - Duival M'Kay, the wizard of
Sutherlandshire legend, was exploring the Cave of
Smoo, he came across a large cask. He bored a
hole in it, and out came a little man of an inch and
a half long, who, on gradually assuming gigantic
stature, said, " Donald, did you ever see so great
a wonder ? " " Never, by my troth," replied the
wizard ; " but wert thou to shrink again, that would
be a bigger wonder still." The giant is simple
enough to shrink back into the cask, which Donald
loses no time in closing. The fisherman, in the
" Arabian Nights," who brings up the copper vessel
in his net, and unwittingly liberates the jinni who
had been imprisoned therein by the power of Suley-
mdn's magic signet-ring, induces the threatening
and ungrateful monster to re-enter the vessel by
means of the usual taunting incredulity. The idea
is derived from the Muslim legend adapted from the
Talmud. Solomon performed his many feats by
means of a magic signet-ring. The king of the
demons cajoled him out of possession of this ring,
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and flung it into the sea. Solomon, who was cast
by the demon into a foreign land far from his own,
eventually, after many wanderings, finds the ring
in a fish he is eating, and is enabled by its means
to recover his kingdom, and imprison the demon
in a copper vessel, which he cast into the Lake of
Tiberius.
According to Eastern tradition, Solomon also con-
fined no less than three million demons, with seventy-
two of their kings, in a bottle of black glass, which
he then threw into a deep well near Babylon. The
citizens, however, in the expectation of finding
treasure, broke the bottle and set the demons free.
The tract entitled " The Devil upon Two Sticks,"
printed in 1708, which, like Le Sage's well-known
novel "Le Diable Boiteux," is derived from a
Spanish romance written in 1641, contains the in-
cident of the devil being delivered from imprison-
ment in a glass bottle.
The notion of demons being enclosed in vessels
prevails also in China, where more than one in-
stance of it occurs. In one legend, the prefect of
Shiu-hing, many, many generations ago, dreamed a
dream. It was this. Myriads of devils boasted to
him that they would overthrow the ruling dynasty.
He doubted their power, and obtained their consent
to mark each with a red spot on the forehead, so
that he might recognise them if, to carry out their
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
threat, the devils should assume an altered form.
When he awoke he was troubled at the dream, and
determined to consult wise men about it. Outside
his yamen he found the ground strewn with small
round stones, on every one of which was a red spot.
"These are surely the devils I marked last night,"
thought he, and straightway had the stones col-
lected and secured in earthenware jars, which were
then locked in a strong room in his yamen. The
door was sealed with the prefect's seal, which was
to be renewed by each successive holder of the
office. To shorten a long story, it must suffice to
add that prefect after prefect for many generations
duly re-sealed the door of the devils' prison, till at
length, faith in the necessity of this caution being
shaken, one unlucky prefect, inappropriately sur-
named Luk, neglected to perform the duty, and the
door got opened and a jar of devils broken. They
caused the city to be submerged below the waters
of the river, and it was not until they were recap-
tured and the door re-sealed that the city again rose
above water. After this woeful experience it once
more became the care of each succeeding prefect to
re-seal the door; and so time passed on, till in 1854
there arose a prefect surnamed Ma, who utterly
despised the devil story, and had the red-spotted
stones taken from the strong room and thrown
away ! That very year red-turbaned rebels the
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devils in human form captured the city. Here
endeth the legend, and, as far as is known, the red-
spotted devils are still at large. One thing is cer-
tain (" and the rest is lies "), no man surnamed Luk
or Ma is allowed to be prefect in Shiu-hing to this
day.
In Icelandic folk-lore, the " Sending " which is a
ghost raised by sorcery " is sometimes induced to
assume the form of some small beast or insect,
either by taunts or flattery, and to creep into a
bottle or into an empty marrow bone; and, once
there, he is corked up tight for his folly. . . . Woe
betide him who, unsuspecting, finds the marrow
bone or bottle subsequently, and uncorks it ! The
goblin gains ten times his original force by being
imprisoned, and ten times his old malignity." In
Korea, at the present day, it is the blind who
deal with the evil spirits and exorcise devils. A
gifted blind man can catch a devil in a bottle
and put him in a safe place.
In a story told by gipsies, a dragon gets im-
prisoned in a jar; just as, in the Far East, the
Buddhist devil Schimnu is enticed into a water-
jug, the mouth of which is straightway sealed.
The time-honoured device is met with everywhere
in folk-tales, and recalls how Zeus persuaded his
wife Metis to become a fly, that he might swallow
her. Loki, the Scandinavian giant-demon, could
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
turn himself into a fly, and get through keyholes
(like the ghost) into locked rooms, and could even
slip through the eye of a needle.
The Syrian counterpart of Bel, the supreme deity
of the Assyrians, was Baal, and, in connection with
his credited influence over flies, was known as Baal
Zebul. The Hebrews, punning on this name, called
him Beel-Zebub (dung-god), and afterwards crowned
him " Prince of Devils." But the Septuagint trans-
lates Baalzebub, the name of the god of Ekron, by
BdaX /Av'l'a, fly-god (2 Kings i. 2). Ahriman in
the shape of a fly pervaded all nature.
The devil is outwitted much in the same way in
Italy. In a Basque story we find him in a sack,
as, in the North, Thor himself did crouch in a
glove thumb, wherein from fear and cowardice he
was packed away.
Christian story-tellers have transformed the dull
demons of olden time into Satan and his attendant
fiends, who thus come to figure in these very
antique narratives.
An important outcome of Animism is Fetichism.
In accordance with the general idea that any life-
less object may be the dwelling-place of spirits,
that the souls of the dead have power to quit
the corpse or return to it, and to become em-
bodied in animal, tree, plant, or lifeless stone,
each of these was regarded at an early age as a
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fetich'*- or charm, to which offerings were made
by way of propitiation. A further development
of fetichism is manifested in the faith in relics
and in the worship of idols. If the soul is present
in the corpse, it is present in parts of the corpse;
hence the savage custom of preserving relics of
the dead, such as a finger-nail, a tooth, or a tuft
of hair, and of paying homage to them, under the
belief that the resident spirit will reward and
protect the pious worshipper. When we read of
a savage making offerings to a shapeless stone,
under the belief that the soul of an ancestor has
taken up abode therein, it seems inevitable that he
should presently begin to shape his fetich, making
a rude effigy of a man or an animal, and wor-
shipping it systematically, either as an ancestor,
or as a deity. It is but a step from the worship
of a dead body to the worship of an object repre-
senting that dead body. Into the image of the dead,
the spirit of the dead may enter; so the divine
idol comes to be worshipped as the residence of
the god himself. Thus the whole apparatus, so com-
plex and elaborate, of idols, temples, priests, and
sacrifices may be traced to these crude beginnings
in the animism of the lowest savagery.
1 The Portuguese in West Africa, centuries ago, applied the word
feitifo, meaning charm or talisman, to the various objects venerated
by the negroes.
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In India, the image of Vishnu, set up in his
temple, is washed and dressed by his attendants,
before choice foods are set before him, and an enter-
tainment of music and dancing is given. Saxo gives
a wonderful description of the gigantic statue of the
divine Suanto-Vitus in RUgen, and of the splendour
of his shrine, within which the priest took heed
not to breathe, lest the divine presence should be
tainted. Once every year, after harvest, beasts were
sacrificed before the temple, omens were taken, and a
libation poured at the feet of the image, while prayer
was made for the increase of the coming crops.
Lucretius says that " the brazen statues which
stand near the gates, show their right hands made
smaller by the touch of people frequently saluting
them and passing by." But, as Mr. Grote points out,
speaking of Greek worship, " The primitive memo-
rial erected to a god did not even pretend to be an
image, but was often nothing more than a pillar, a
board, a shapeless stone, or a post." The rites of
stone-worship in India are probably survivals from
low civilisation. There Siva is worshipped as a
stone, as Artemis, represented by a log, was wor-
shipped in Euboea ; and from a passage in Isaiah
(Ivii. 6) we learn that, from the Semitic race, stones
received a drink offering and an oblation. Another
such fetich is the black stone of the Kaaba.
Pilgrimages are yearly made to Continental shrines
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ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
containing relics of a particular saint, just as in
ancient times the devout Greek would visit the
temple of a particular god, perhaps to be the witness
of a human sacrifice at the altar, as a gift to the god
of what is dearest to man. In later times we find
the substitution of an effigy or dummy, as in China,
and as in the rites of Ancient Mexico, the symbolism
of human sacrifice being thus retained ; or the victim
came to be a beast, a particular animal being asso-
ciated with each divinity. Thus in course of time
a doe instead of a virgin was sacrificed in Laodicaea
to Artemis, and elsewhere a bear. Demeter re-
ceived a pig. Similarly, a goat was substituted for
a boy in the sacrifice to Dionysus in Potniae ; just
as, among the early races of South India, goats are
sacrificed by the thousand during certain festivals
to the deities of the lower cult.
A prominent feature in the practice of very many
religions is sacrifice of a mystical or sacramental
character. Usually it is a divine animal that is
slain, and its body and blood are, either actually or
symbolically, partaken of by the worshippers. The
animal may be regarded as the incarnation of a god,
or it is sacred to a god. Or the victim may be
a divine man. But into the subject of "god-eat-
ing," as practised, for example, by the Mexicans,
and symbolically by the Christian Church, it is
impossible to enter. It only concerns us in this
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
place to note that the origin of all observances of
this type is to be sought, not among civilised, but
rather amongst savage races ; not in an advanced,
but in a crude stage of mental development.
It is this recognition of survivals that has given
vital interest to the science of folk-lore. For a
further example : In the custom observed amongst
ourselves of breaking a bottle of wine over the bows
of a ship, may be traced the older practice such as
the Wickings used, and such as Captain Cook found
in the South Seas, of sprinkling the war-galley with
human blood. It is analogous to the custom of
consecrating a building by burying alive. Tradi-
tion affords many traces of human sacrifice in our
own isles (see p. 107). The accounts of Tacitus and
other classic authors show that it was frequent
among Northern tribes in olden times. There is a
Scandinavian tradition about the sacrifice of King
Doomwald by his Swedish subjects in time of famine.
The reader will be reminded of the theme of Tenny-
son's poem " The Victim." In the Heraclidce of
Euripides, Macaria offers herself as a sacrifice to the
daughter of Ceres.
The veneration for the serpent, fed by fear, has
survived many other systems of fetich worship ;
the form of the serpent being handed down from
age to age as the accompaniment of magical power.
In every part of the earth inhabited by the serpent,
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ANIMISM GHOSTS AND GODS
this animal has at one time or other been reverenced
by man. Its strange beauty and spectre-like quie-
tude, its miraculous power over the lower animals,
its deadly venom, and other qualities and faculties
of the serpent, amply account for its being regarded
as supernatural. To its habit of attaching itself to
human habitations may be traced the notion of its
friendliness and guardianship. It was believed to
be a reincarnation of a dead man's soul, a messenger
from the gods; and whilst still worshipped by
Indian tribes, by the Slave Coast negro, by Chinese
and Egyptians, and across the Atlantic, the serpent
is demonised by Zarathustrians, Jews, Muham-
madans, and Christians. The Hebrews, it will be
remembered, were open and undisguised snake-
worshippers until the reign of King Hezekiah. All
sorts of mythologies have women with serpent tails
or serpent hair, who have magical power, from
Lilith the Hebrew sorceress downwards.
When the ancient Egyptians personified the
powers of nature, they gave to evil powers the
shapes of noxious animals and reptiles such as
snakes and scorpions. "The principal enemy of
the natural body was the worm, and from the
earliest times it seems that a huge worm or serpent
was chosen by the Egyptians as the type of the
powers that were hostile to the dead, and also of
the foe against whom the Sun-god fought"
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The veneration of various other creatures, beasts,
birds, as well as plants (see p. 103) is in many in-
stances connected with this fetich theory ; that is to
say, the worship is paid to the incarnation in animal
or plant form of some divine ancestral soul.
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CHAPTER IV
THE OTHER-WORLD
Abode of spirits associated with place of burial Mountain-burial and
sacred mountain-tops Soul must climb steep hill Glass-mountains
"Terrible crystal" and other solid firmaments Cave-burial
Sheol, a cave, the original hell ; the underworld for good and bad
alike Subterranean fairy-halls Heroes in Hades The dead rejoin
their ancestors ; must traverse seas, rivers Burial in boats Soul's
passage across water Popular belief anent spirits crossing water
Other-worlds across water : of the Finns, Wickings, Red Indians,
Brahmans, Greeks, Christians Belief in two or more other-worlds,
and its development Great Britain as the Island of Souls The
" Brig of Dread " in many mythologies The psychostasia Some
features of Hades Hell as a cold place The abode of departed
souls variously located.
THE very general belief in an invisible world, the
abode of invisible spirits, the disembodied souls
of all past generations, as held by the lower races,
is the natural and almost inevitable outcome of the
universal animistic belief which we have been con-
sidering. Primitive ideas of another world, the
abode of spirits, like all other primitive ideas, pass
through stages of development. The abode of the
spirits is associated with the place of the burial
of the dead ; the locale of the other world, therefore,
is in a great measure determined by the mode of
burial. The Caribs buried their chiefs on hills;
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the Comanches and the Patagonians also select
the highest hill as the burial-ground; in Western
Arabia and in Borneo the practice is the same.
Herein is seen sufficient foundation for the belief
that the summits of the highest hills, the places
most difficult of access, are peopled with spirits ;
and the widely prevalent idea that the souls of
the dead resort to a high mountain may also be
reasonably connected with this particular method
of burial. When a European made the ascent of
the Sacred White Mountain, or Paik-tu-San, in
Korea, the native carriers would not go near the
summit, and even as they approached the mountain
were careful to propitiate the spirits by placing
boiled rice on a fallen tree.
The gods of the ancients resided in high moun-
tains. One of the Indian hill-tribes believes that
each mountain peak is the watch-tower of a god.
In popular belief, the soul in its wanderings has
to climb a steep hill-side, sometimes supposed to
be made of iron, sometimes of glass, on the summit
of which is the heavenly paradise. This is why the
nails of a corpse must never be pared (see p. 53);
they would be required for that "climb up into
heaven " of which the angel speaks to Esdras.
Lays and legends tell of the glass-bergs and glass-
burgs, which are the abode of heroes and wise
women. Only the good and valiant youth can
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win the fair princess on the glass-mountain of
popular narrative. By a hero Brunhild, in the
Norse saga, was delivered from her hall of flames.
The transition from a mountain abode to an abode
in the sky which the mountain peak, the " heaven-
kissing hill," seems to touch, is but an easy step.
The Norse glerhiminn, or glass-heaven, a paradise
to which old heroes ride, recalls Ezekiel's firmament
of " terrible crystal " above the heads of the living
creature, and the " sea of glass like unto crystal "
in Revelations, before the throne of heaven. The
notions of solidity and expansion were both con-
tained in the Hebrew conception of the firmament,
which name literally signified something hammered
or beaten out. The blue ethereal sky was regarded
as a solid crystal sphere to which the stars were
fixed, and which was constantly revolving, carrying
them with it. This sphere or firmament divided the
waters which were under the firmament from the
waters which were above the firmament. There
were "windows in heaven" through which, when
opened, the waters that were above the firmament
descended. This was rain. Ilmarinen, in the Fin-
nish epic, forges the firmament of finest steel, and
sets in it the moon and stars. The New Zealander
thinks there is a hole or crack in the solid firma-
ment, through which the rain can be let down from
the reservoir above. The view entertained by the
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Greeks and other early nations was essentially the
same. The Egyptians believed the sky to be like
an iron ceiling, either flat or vaulted, and to corre-
spond in extent and shape with the earth beneath
it. The stars were lamps hung from it. This rec-
tangular ceiling stood on a pillar at each of the four
corners the roof-tree of primitive nations.
Or, on the other hand, the practice of cave-
burial would engender the conception of a sub-
terranean other-world, not necessarily as the abode
of evil spirits, for the barbaric mind does not trouble
itself with the destiny, only with the whereabouts,
of the soul, and has no idea of a devil or a hell,
because the moral nature of the savage has not
so developed as to enable him to form theories of
retribution. To inquire at what barbaric stage of
culture this development takes place, is beyond
the province of this little book, and belongs rather
to the study of religious history. The idea of
bliss is not incompatible with underground abode.
Legends tell of many a blissful sojourn in subter-
ranean fairy-halls. In folk-tales, little children who
are good fall into wells, and pass through green
meadows to the house of friendly Frau Holda. A
well-known Chinese legend relates how two friends,
wandering among the mountains in search of medi-
cinal herbs, come to a fairy-bridge guarded by two
maidens of superhuman loveliness, who invite them
182
THE OTHER-WORLD
to cross into fairyland. The blissful period spent
with the fairy-folk seems but as yesterday when it
is past ; yet when the friends fulfil their desire to
revisit their earthly home, they find that seven gene-
rations have lived and died during their absence,
and they themselves are centenarians. There are
other forms of this Rip Van Winkle story current
in China. Wang Chih, a patriarch of the Taoist
sect, is said to have been wandering about gathering
firewood when he came upon a grotto wherein some
aged men were playing chess. He enters, puts
down his axe, and watches the game. Presently
one old man gives him something resembling a
date-stone, after tasting which he is oblivious of
hunger and thirst. When one of the players sug-
gests that he has been long enough away from
home, Wang Chih proceeds to pick up his axe.
The handle has mouldered into dust. Centuries
have passed since he left his home, and Wang Chih
finds no vestige of his kinsfolk. So, retreating to
the hills, he devotes himself to the rites of Taoism,
and attains to immortality.
Many a renowned hero has been housed in Hades,
where Achilles paced with great strides along the
mead of asphodel, where dwell the souls, the phan-
toms of men outworn. And thither down the dark
ways did Hermes lead the gibbering souls of the
slain wooers. " Sheol," the ancient Hebrew name
183
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
for Hades, and the original of our English " hell,"
was the destination of all the dead, whether good
or bad. Sheol literally means " cave ; " cave-burial
was the primitive Hebrew practice. As the ghost
developed into an everlasting soul, so the cave
developed into an underworld, as the abode of all
disembodied souls.
In savage belief, the dead rejoin their ancestors.
The stationary cave-dwellers, therefore, think they
return to an underground region ; while immigrant
races must journey back after death to the abodes
of their fathers, overland, across rivers, or across
the sea, even as their own journeyings forth have
been.
So the other-world may be in some distant isle
across the seas, or, like hyperborean happiness,
may be found in that land of perpetual sunshine
beyond the north wind. The Fijian abode of bliss
can only be reached in a canoe. The Samoans say
of a chief who has died, " he has sailed." It is not
at all unusual for savages to place a boat beside a
grave ; and many modifications of the practice have
been observed. The Chonos of Western Patagonia
actually bury their dead in canoes near the sea;
many tribes remote from each other either bury
their chief in a boat, or put the corpse adrift in a
boat. In short, numbers of peoples bury their dead
in boats, and our own Scandinavian ancestors had
184
THE OTHER-WORLD
kindred usages. In Norse narrative, when Balder
died, the Ases placed his body on its funeral pyre
on board a vessel, set fire to it, and committed it to
the sea at high water. When bodies were buried
in a boat on land, it must have been so that their
ferry was ready, when, on their journey to the
underworld, they should reach the water. Every-
where similar observances point to a similar mean-
ing, the general belief amongst savages being that
the dead return to their ancestral home.
As the passage or a large river would be the
chief obstacle to overcome in any overland migra-
tion, it would be natural to conceive the notion,
which is found to be so very general, that the
crossing of a river is the chief obstacle on the
journey which the dead must make to the other-
world. One of the North American tribes explains
the inability of the soul to pass the river as the
reason for its return. Some of the Indian tribes
put strings across rivers for the spirits to cross by,
that they may be encouraged to return and re-
animate the corpse. The Kasi Indians, if they pass
a puddle with the funeral cortige, will lay down a
straw for the dead man's soul to use as a bridge.
The popular idea that spirits cannot cross running
water may have arisen from the primitive belief as
to the river-crossing that the deceased has to en-
counter. A familiar application of the notion will
185
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
occur to the reader in the legend of " Tarn o 1
Shanter." It will be remembered that as soon
as Tarn has reached the " key-stane o' the brig "
he is beyond the pursuit of the witches. "A run-
ning stream they darena cross."
The Finns, on their way to Minala, their other-
world, must voyage across nine seas and a half;
the Wickings must cross the Ginnunga-Gap ; and the
Red Indian has his Great Water, like the Vaitarani
of the Brahmans, the Styx of the Greeks, and the
Christian Jordan, across which is the Celestial City.
In Mr. Spencer's opinion, the belief in two or more
other-worlds would in course of time arise from the
notion of different ranks requiring different other-
worlds ; the chiefs would have separate ancestral
homes. Further, societies consisting of conquerors
and conquered, who have separate traditions as to
their original home, necessarily have separate other-
worlds. These would differentiate into superior
and inferior places of abode for the spirits, originat-
ing the conception of places for the good and places
for the bad, and, by endless modifications here and
amplifications there, developing at last into the defi-
nite distinction of the separate abode of good and
evil spirits the Paradise or heaven, and the Hell
or purgatory.
With man's first belief in a future state came his
first idea of Hades, an unseen world, as the abode
1 86
THE OTHER-WORLD
of all the dead, good and bad alike. Hades means
" invisible ; " it is quite probable, however, that the
term Hadi, meaning Eternity, was the original name
brought from the East, as Bit-Hadi, " the house of
Eternity," is found on old Assyrian tablets, and the
name Hades, " invisible," was adopted later. The
translators of the New Testament into Coptic ren-
dered the Greek #8779 by amentt, the name which
the ancient Egyptians gave to the abode of man after
death, and the Copts peopled it with beings whose
prototypes are found on the ancient monuments.
As to the position of Hades, the most general
view is that it is situated below the earth, and the
river of Death must be crossed ere it can be reached.
The Hades of the early Greeks, as systematically
stated by Hesiod, and graphically described by
Homer, was surrounded by the river Styx, across
which Charon ferried the souls in a narrow two-
oared boat. For this he charged a fare ; therefore
the Greeks placed an obolus in the mouth of the
dead (see p. 49).
In the play of Euripides, Alcestis, about to die for
her husband, sees the two-oared boat, and the ferry-
man of the dead holding his hand on the pole, as he
calls to hasten her with vehement words. But the
unburied may he not convey between the dreadful
banks and across the roaring stream, and so when
./Eneas, in the Sibyl's company, visited the deep
187
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
flood of Cocytus, he saw a forlorn crowd entreating
to be taken across; but the surly boatman thrust
them to a distance, and kept them away from the
brink, because their bones had not been laid in their
place of rest. For the same reason the ghost of
Patroclus clamoured for the rites of the dead (see
supra, p. 59).
Procopius, a historian of the sixth century, speak-
ing of the island of Brittia, by which he means
Great Britain, relates a legend which he had often
heard from the lips of the inhabitants. They ima-
gine that the souls of the dead are transported to
that island, and it is the duty of certain fishers and
farmers on the Prankish coast to ferry them over.
Those whose turn it is to perform the duty go to
bed at dusk. At midnight they hear a knocking at
their door, and muffled voices calling. Rising and
going to the shore, they see empty boats, which are
not their own, and board them and seize the oars.
Though they see no one, it is evident when the boat
is under way that she is heavily laden, for her gun-
wales are scarce above water. During the voyage
the boatmen hear a voice loudly asking the name
and country of each invisible passenger. In an hour
they touch land, which their own craft could not
reach under a day and a night. Then the boat
speedily unloads, and becomes so light that she only
dips her keel in the wave.
188
THE OTHER-WORLD
On the river Treguier, in Bretagne, it is still
customary to convey the dead to the churchyard
in a boat, over a small arm of the sea called
passage de renfer, instead of taking the shorter
way by land. British bards sing of the pool of
dread and of dead bones across which souls must
sail to reach the underworld ; and a North English
song names " the bridge of dread, no brader than
a thread," over which the soul must pass. There
is a Muhammadan tradition to the effect that "in
the middle of hell all souls must walk over a bridge
thinner than a hair, sharper than the edge of a
sword, and bordered on both sides by thorns and
prickly shrubs. The Jews also speak of the hell-
bridge narrow as a thread, but only unbelievers
have to cross it." The Muhammadans are said
also to believe that before the judgment day they
must pass over a red-hot iron spanning a bottom-
less pit. The good works of each believer will put
themselves under his feet.
Much the same meaning appears to lie in the
voyage of souls to the underworld, and in their
walking the bridge that spans the river. The
episode of crossing a river or gulf to reach the
land of the dead occurs in North American myth,
frequently without any moral sense attached to it.
The Hurons say that a dog guards the tree-trunk that
bridges the river of death. Some souls are attacked
189
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
by the dog, and fall. The Choctaws say that only
the good can safely walk the long and slippery
barkless pine-log, that stretches from hill to hill
athwart the deep and dreadful river. The wicked
cannot reach the Indian paradise, but fall through
the waters to the dark dread land. A very similar
legend comes from the Woodlarks, a group of
islands off British New Guinea. After death the
spirits of the good go to Turn, a small, very fertile
island. Dikinikan, a terrible goddess, watches over
the beach, and the serpent by her side forms the
bridge across to Turn. The favoured pass over
safely; but when others attempt the passage the
serpent dives, and the deceased fall into the jaws
of a shark. Thorkill had to cross water to reach
the Teutonic Tartarus. On an earlier voyage he
saw a river which could be crossed by a bridge of
gold, like the Giallar-bru, the bridge over the river
Gioll, that parted earth from the lower world. In
the Belgian folk-tale of "The White Wolf," which
is a variant of the Cupid and Psyche theme, the
heroine has to cross a bridge of slippery ivory in
order to regain her lost husband. For this purpose,
in one version, she has to be shod with iron. This
recalls the hell-shoon and the difficulty of scaling
the slippery mountains (see pp. 45, 53).
The ancient Egyptians believed that whilst the
dead body was being ferried over the Nile, the soul
190
THE OTHER-WORLD
in the realms of the underworld was being ferried
over the infernal Nile, to undergo trial in the hall
of the Two Truths, where the good actions of the
deceased are weighed in the balance against the
emblem of Truth, and Osiris pronounces judgment
according to the result, while his son Horus appears
as a mediator. Then the soul may be admitted to
Heaven, returned to earth for a fresh term of life
in the form of some unclean animal, or condemned
to a term of purification in Purgatory.
The psychostasia, or weighing of the conscience,
figured on every Egyptian mummy case, forms the
subject of one of the illustrations embellishing the
funereal papyrus of Ani, which probably dates from
the fourteenth century B.C., and which may be seen
in the British Museum. The centre of the picture is
occupied by the great Balance. The heart of Ani
in the left scale represents his conscience, and is
weighed against a feather, symbolical of the law.
A dog-headed deity sits on the top of the Balance,
while the jackal-headed Anubis examines the indi-
cator. Destiny, as a long-bearded man, stands under
the Balance, with the goddess of Fortune, and
another goddess connected with birth, behind him.
Above these is the soul of the deceased, in the
form of a bird with a human head. Thoth, the
ibis-headed scribe of the gods, notes down the result
of the trial ; while behind him waits the terrible
191
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Amemit the Devourer, with crocodile-head, fore-
parts of a lion, and hind-quarters of a hippopotamus.
The judgment is pronounced. Righteous and just
is Ani ; his case is straight upon the great Balance ;
he is without offence and without rebuke. Amemit
the Devourer may not prevail over him ; he is to
receive cakes, the right of appearance before Osiris,
and a permanent allotment in Sechit-hotepu, an
abode of bliss, like the Elysian fields.
Any attempt to survey and compare the different
religions of the world, with their doctrines of future
life, and systems of rewards and punishment, is of
course beyond the scope of the present volume.
The very striking similarities which they present
-need not be pointed out. The alphabet of every
religion is the same, one key serves to explain
them all namely, the universal animistic belief of
the savage. Whether this belief be itself the result
of a misunderstanding of normal biological pheno-
mena the hypothesis exhibited in these pages
or whether, according to another conceivable hypo-
thesis, it be derived from the savage's acquaintance
with rare, abnormal, and not scientifically accepted
phenomena, does not affect the issue.
The early conception of Hades was much modi-
fied by the constant intercommunication between
Greece and Egypt. The Romans in turn absorbed
much from the Greeks, and Virgil has given minute
192
THE OTHER-WORLD
details of the nether world called Orcus, which is
divided into five regions, the last of which is
Elysium, the place of the blest. Without further
particularising, it must suffice to say that all the
features in the Hell of the Christian fathers, and
of the Christian religion generally, may be traced
in the Amend of Egypt, the Sheol and Gehenna
of the Jews, and the Orcus of Virgil ; and that the
Hells of the Koran and of many other creeds are
offshoots from the same originals ; while the Scandi-
navian Walhalla, with its Purgatory, Niflheim, and
its everlasting Tartarus, Nastrond, are merely vari-
ants of the same idea, except that ice and cutting
wind, as representing the Norseman's idea of misery,
take the place of unquenchable fire in the economy
of punishment. The central core, the innermost
circle of Dante's Inferno is, not fire, but thick-
ribbed ice. The breath of Lucifer freezes ; it does
not burn.
It is to the region of eternal cold, only to be
reached by water, that Thorkill sails with his men,
in the story told by Saxo; and here the same
precautionary abstinence from food must be ob-
served as in the Greek Hades. Persephone tasted
of a pomegranate in Hell, wherefore she is for ever
doomed to stay there; but Wainamoinen, in the
Finnish Kalewala, wisely refuses to drink when
among the dead.
93 N
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
The same Arctic Hell is described in the old
Scottish ballad, " The Ship of the Fiend," in sharp
contrast to the abode of bliss
" ' Oh what are yon, yon pleasant hills,
That the sun shines sweetly on ? '
' Oh yon are the hills of Heaven,' he said,
Where you will never win.'
' Oh whatna mountain is yon,' she said,
' Sae dreary wi' frost and snow ? '
' Oh yon is the mountain o' Hell,' he cried,
' Where you and I maun go ! ' "
But gladly does the traitor Judas quit the pit of
fire once every year, and journey to the healing
snows, to cool himself an hour on his iceberg, reap-
ing reward for his sole act of kindness.
The early and childlike conceptions of the lower
races as to the locality of the land of souls have
had deep-rooted hold on the mind of mankind, even
influencing the formation of civilised opinion. Thus
savages at the present day a study of whose
beliefs and fancies affords us the best clue to
what our own fore-parents thought locate their
underworld in the far-off unknown, the secluded
or inaccessible regions of the earth's surface; or
in Hades, across the waters under the earth ; or
westward over the sea, where the sun goes down
at evening into a fiery abyss. The Mexicans say
he goes to lighten the dead. Or the sun and moon
194
THE OTHER-WORLD
themselves may be conceived of as the abode of
departed souls. Some savages even place their
paradise in the sk}', and sometimes it is reached
by the "Path of the Dead," which we call the
Milky Way. And all the lower races claim to
know of their Heaven by direct revelation. "To
them the land of Souls is a discovered country,
from whose bourne many a traveller returns."
CHAPTER V
MAGIC
Belief in magic traceable to Animism Power of the sorcerer Weather-
making The special property of any object present in all its parts:
results of this belief Primitive cannibalism Human blood in
Chinese medical prescriptions Human sacrifice for disease cure
Explanation of savage's objection to being portrayed, and like
precautionary conduct The name-taboo Some unmentionable
names Rumpelstiltskin Lohengrin The principles and practice
of sorcery Disease transference Savage and Elizabethan exor-
cism The Sucking cure Sympathetic magic " Doctrine of Sig-
natures " Wax-figure melting, and like magic arts Parallels in
hypnotic practice The Life-token Incantations and spells Rock-
opening The Evil Eye, and some ways of counteracting it
Changelings: the Clonmel instance.
WE have seen how the irrational elements in
myths may be traced to the mental condition of
savages. Now, the belief in demons, magic, sor-
cery, and witchcraft, which is a prominent charac-
teristic of the savage condition at the present day, is
distinctly traceable to Animism, the investing of
all things with life ; it is a remnant of that universal
religion of the primeval races of man.
The medicine-man or sorcerer is believed to have
intercourse with and power over supernatural beings.
Not only can he exorcise evil spirits, but he can also
induce them to enter the body of his enemy, causing
196
MAGIC
sickness and death. He thus has power over the
living and over the souls of the dead. Death is
supposed to be caused by this hostile conjurer,
whose powers are practically unlimited, for he can
command even the weather, and, as we have already
seen, can himself assume, or cause others to assume,
the form of any animal. In Ireland it is still be-
lieved by many that certain persons can practise
witchcraft. "By a spell they will bring a person
into an animal or object such as a table, a chair, a
bed-post, or such-like, and then, by torturing or
injuring the animal or object, do the same to the
person they want to injure. Or something belong-
ing to a person may be bewitched." A well-to-do
man in Connemara, who had always been accus-
tomed to sleep on a head of straw, bought a bed-
stead, and the morning after sleeping on it found his
calf dead. Of course the bedstead was bewitched,
and so he chopped it to bits and burned it.
Limited magical power is sometimes ascribed to
the layman. For example, in Matabeleland it was
the late king himself who did what little rain-
doctoring the climate required, and on one occa-
sion ordered the cessation of revolver practice in the
European settlers' camp, lest the sound of the guns
should frighten the rain away, when he was engaged
in his incantations. Saxo tells how the Permlanders,
to hinder the voyaging of the Danes, cast spells
197
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
upon the sky, stirred up the clouds, and drove them
into most furious storms. The Samoan rain-makers
have a sacred stone which they wet when they want
rain, and dry at the fire if they want dry weather.
The Lapland wizards sell winds in a knotted cord,
to be let out by untying it knot by knot ; as it is
written of the women in the Isle of Man, who " selle
to shipmen wynde, as it were closed under three
knotes of threde, so that the more wynde he wold
have, the more knotes he must undo." In the
Odyssey, ^Eolus gave the winds to Ulysses tied up
in a bag; and in 1814 an old woman at Strom ness,
in the Orkneys, sold favourable winds to mariners,
as saint or witch has claimed to do from time
immemorial. Pomponius Mela describes how the
priestesses of Sena roused up the seas and the
winds by their incantations. Mist, wind, and rain
are often produced in folk-tales by magical means.
The notion survives in the slang phrase, "raising
the wind." When a ship is becalmed, sailors will
sometimes whistle for a wind ; but in other weather
they hate whistling at sea, which act, by the same
symbolic magic, raises a whistling gale. By the
power of spells, Swanhwid, the daughter of Hadding,
overshadowed herself with a cloud of mist, and
shrouded her beautiful face in darkness, just as, in
Homer, mist was used to cover and hide persons.
Some insight into the principles of savage sorcery
198
MAGIC
may best be afforded by the citation of a few prac-
tical examples. It must be understood that the
special property of any object is supposed to be
present in all its parts, and to be obtained by
obtaining any of those parts. "The powers of a
conquered antagonist are supposed to be gained by
devouring him : the Dacotah eats the heart of a slain
foe, to increase his own courage ; the New Zealander
swallows his dead enemy's eyes, that he may see the
farther; the Abipone consumes tiger's flesh, thinking
so to gain the tiger's strength and valour." The
Caribs sprinkle a male infant with his father's blood,
to give him his father's courage. Dead relatives
are consumed in pursuance of an allied belief. In
New Zealand, small pebbles are thrust down the
throat of a newly baptized child, to make its heart
callous and incapable of pity. In 1 862 some Chinese
in Yunnan ate the heart of a murdered missionary,
and the heart and brains of a celebrated robber who
had been executed, so as to acquire his valour and
cunning. We learn from Strabo that the early
British were cannibals, and used to eat the bodies
of their deceased parents. One of the most interest-
ing inferences concerning the new race recently
discovered by Professor Petrie is that it was their
custom to eat portions of the bodies of deceased
persons. This fact is proved from observation of the
burials. The head was almost always severed from
199
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the shoulders, and the hands often removed ; bones
had the ends broken off, and the marrow scooped
out; these and other such facts pointing undoubtedly
to ceremonial cannibalism. Yet this remarkably
fine and powerful non-Egyptian race, whose exist-
ence in Egypt was hitherto unsuspected, and who
lived about 3000 B.C., were not ignorant of civilisa-
tion. Their pottery, flint - working, bead - making
prove them the equals or superiors of the Egyptians.
Their drawing and sculpture were very rude, and
no writing was known. But some fine wood-carv-
ings were found, and copper needles show that
they sewed garments ; and in pottery they ex-
celled, though the potter's wheel was completely
unknown.
On the other hand, among the Dayaks, young men
will abstain from the flesh of deer, lest it should
make them timid ; but all savages will eagerly de-
vour a portion of the carcase of particular animals,
in order to acquire courage, strength, fleetness,
ferocity, and so forth.
An illustration of this widespread practice is
afforded by a passage in a Northern lay upon the
favourite subject of the Wolsungs. " Some gave
Gothorm wolfs flesh, some sliced serpents . . .
before they could persuade him to lay hands on the
gentle hero."
Among the Haidahs of the Pacific States, the
MAGIC
inspired medicine-man " springs on the first person
he meets, bites out and swallows one or more
mouthfuls of the man's living flesh, wherever he
can fix his teeth, then rushes to another and
another ; " while, among the neighbouring Nootkas,
the medicine-man " is satisfied with what his teeth
can tear from the corpses in the burial-places."
The horrible European legends of vampires pro-
bably grew out of facts like these concerning
primitive cannibals; for the original vampire was
the supposed other-self of a ferocious savage still
seeking to satisfy his thirst for human blood. The
Polynesians speak of departed souls devouring the
hearts and entrails of sleepers. Cannibalism "is
also found to have a religious significance, on the
supposition which has unsuspected survival among
advanced races, that eating the body and drinking
the blood communicates the spirit of the victim to
the consumer."
The same mode of thought as that illustrated
above is displayed in the medical prescriptions of
past ages ; while the belief in the efficacy of human
blood, and portions of the human body as a cure,
is prevalent in China at the present day. And we
may recall the very numerous instances in folk-tales
of the step-mother demanding the heart or the blood
of the hated child's pet animal as a cure for her
feigned illness. Grimm cites a story from Bornu,
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
which may be briefly told, as apposite in this con-
nection. It is about two faithful friends, a rich
man and a poor man. The rich man feigns illness,
and, at his instigation, the aged man, who is called
in to see him, says that the poor man's son must be
killed, for only the sight of his blood can save the
rich man's life. The poor man fetches his child,
and ungrudgingly gives him to his friend. But a
sheep's blood is sprinkled on the floor, and the rich
man pretends to be cured by the sight. The boy
is kept in concealment. After a time he is restored
to his father, and the rich man reveals that his ill-
ness was feigned for the sake of proving his friend.
A great many instances might be adduced of the
sacrifice of one human .being as a cure for disease
in another. A life for a life is the theme of Long-
fellow's " Golden Legend." There is recent mention
of an alleged sacrifice of a girl near Poona to cure
a disease. A fowl, a sheep, and a girl had to be
sacrificed. In the course of time animal sacrifice
supplanted human sacrifice. In Persia, when any
member of a household is very ill, it is the custom
to kill a sheep, in order to avert danger from the
sick person. Examples of similar practices are re-
corded as obtaining in the British Isles, where also
animals are sacrificed for animal sickness.
The belief that some particular virtue resides in
every part of an object or of a person explains the
MAGIC
dislike universally shown by savages to having their
portraits taken. For they hold that some part of
the life must be drawn into the representation of
the living thing, and that the possession of a por-
trait gives fatal power over the person represented.
With the portrait a portion of the man's self is
carried away, and may fall into the hands of some
enemy, who may injure him by conjuring with it.
Many believe that it contains the soul of the person
portrayed, and refuse to let themselves be drawn
or photographed, fearing that as a consequence
they would die. This has been the experience of
travellers all over the world ; not only amongst the
uncivilised. The savage displays the same caution
with regard to the cuttings of his hair, the parings
of his nails, his saliva anything, in short, that has
been a part of himself to prevent them getting into
hostile hands. In Italy, at this day, a man does not
like to trust a lock of his hair in any one's hands,
lest he be bewitched by its means.
Furthermore, the savage confuses names and
things, thinking of the name as an actual part of
the person or thing bearing it ; wherefore a know-
ledge of the name gives power over the person,
and puts him in danger of being bewitched. Some
people would never dream of revealing the name of
a child before its baptism, this ceremony being a
safeguard ; for if a witch can get hold of the name,
203
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
that is all that she wants to cast a spell over the child.
From all parts of the world we get instances of this
desire to keep a name secret. Sometimes the name
of a reigning chief is most rigidly tabqp'd, even to
the extent of omitting from the language any com-
mon word that may resemble that name in sound.
Curious freaks are played with a language by this
ever-recurring necessity. "No Korean dare utter
his king's name. When the king dies he is given
a name (a kind of name, an apology for a name) by
which his august personality may be distinguished
amid the dense masses of history." But his real
name, the name he bears in life, is never spoken
save by the privileged lips of his favourite wife in
the secrecy of the palace harem. The reader may
recall, in this connection, the Jews' unwillingness to
pronounce the name of Jehovah ; also an occasion
when Moses had to content him with the evasion,
" I am that I am." It is related that Solomon made
heaven and earth to quake by beginning to utter
the incommunicable name. Similarly, Herodotus
uses great reserve in reference to the name of
Osiris. The name of Brahma is a sacred thing in
India, and only to be uttered on solemn occasions ;
while in China it is a statutable offence to pronounce
the real name of Confucius. Such sayings as "Talk
of the devil and you will see his horns " must once
have borne a serious meaning. Especially notice-
204
MAGIC
able is the widely prevalent repugnance to name
the dead ; savages will have recourse to any amount
of circumlocution to avoid uttering the dread name,
lest the shade should feel offended. On no account
will a Chinaman tell you the real name of his de-
ceased father. Sometimes a rich Chinese has dis-
covered that his proper name has been the same
as that of one of his ancestors, and has paid a large
sum to government for permission to take a new
name. This superstition prevails amongst distant
and various races all the world over, but nowhere
more notably than in Shetland, " where it is all but
impossible to get a widow, at any distance of time,
to mention the name of her dead husband, though
she will talk about him by the hour."
The ancient Egyptians believed that the name of
a man existed in heaven. " The whole man con-
sisted of a natural body, a spiritual body, a heart,
a double, a soul, a shadow, an intangible ethereal
casing or spirit, a form, and a name. All these
were, however, bound together inseparably, and the
welfare of any single one of them concerned the
welfare of all."
We find the same secrecy attaching to names
in Northern saga. Sigfred, in the old play of the
Wolsungs, hides his name from the dragon Fafni,
calling himself " Noble deer." Woden himself
never gives his real name. The dislike to mention-
205
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
ing the name of supernatural powers is also very
general, and originates from a similar fear of the
consequences. The Dayak will not speak of the
smallpox by name, but will call it " the chief," or
"jungle leaves;" the Laplander speaks of the bear
as " the old man with the fur coat ; " in Annam the
tiger is called " grandfather " or " lord," in Bengal
" maternal uncle ; " in Siberia also he is not men-
tioned by name ; the Finns call the bear " beautiful
honey-claw." In Canton the name of the porpoise
is taboo'd. It is colloquially known as " the black
and white terror." The words death and coffin are
amongst those rigidly taboo'd in China. Under-
takers advertise " boards of old age " and " clothes
of old age," death and burial being always spoken
of euphemistically if possible. The Jews, being
forbidden swine's flesh, avoid the word pig alto-
gether, and call it "the other thing." Similarly, the
Furies were styled by the Greeks " Eumenides," or
gracious ones ; just as the Irish call fairies Sleagh
Maith, or " Good People." Orestes, in the play of
Euripides, speaks of seeing three virgins like the
night, and Menelaus knows that he is referring
to the Furies, but is himself unwilling to name
them ; and Electra, speaking of her brother's
madness, says she dreads to mention those god-
desses, the Eumenides, who persecute him with
terror.
206
MAGIC
Numerous prohibitions exist among savages in
different parts of the world with regard to the use
of names. A man may not utter his own name ;
husband and wife will not utter one another's name ;
the son or daughter-in-law will not mention the
name of the father or mother-in-law, and vice versd.
In a Kaffir folk-tale, the heroine, conforming to
Kaffir custom, refers to her husband's relatives
as the " people whose names are unmentionable."
Among the Algonkin tribes the real names of chil-
dren which are bestowed upon them by the old
woman of the family are kept mysteriously secret,
and are hardly ever revealed, even at death, the
totem or clan-mark being used on the grave ; they
are known by a mere nickname, such as " Little
Fox " or " Red Head." If a Lapp child falls ill its
name is changed. The same is done in Borneo, so
as to deceive the evil spirit that plagues it with
disease. Finnish wizards consider it of prime im-
portance to know the birth or origin of a disease,
so that they have power over it. Many of their
charms begin, " I know thy birth." Then the names
of the father and mother are pronounced, and the
name of the disease. It is easy to multiply in-
stances of this belief in the name giving power over
the person or thing bearing it. We may recall the
lines in which the poet shows the motive prompting
Asia to inquire of Demogorgon "who made terror,
207
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
madness, crime, remorse . . . and hell, or the
sharp fear of hell ? "
" Utter his name : a world pining in pain
Asks but his name : curses shall drag him down."
To know the name of a god or spirit constitutes
power of evoking him.
In Egyptian myth, Isis, the wife of Osiris and
mother of Horus, "the great goddess" as she is
commonly described " the divine mother, the mis-
tress of charms or enchantments," meditated how
she might make herself mistress of the earth, and
plotted to get possession of the sacred name of Ra,
which she knew was one to conjure by. So Isis
kneaded his spittle with earth and formed a serpent,
which she set in the path of Ra to bite him. Then
in his anguish he was at length induced to give up
his name to Isis, as the price of being delivered from
the pain of the snake's venom. This story illus-
trates the mortality of the gods.
To name an evil spirit brings his power to
naught. Once there was a troll whose name was
Wind-and-Weather, and King Olaf of Norway hired
him to build a church the like of which was nowhere
to be seen. The building was to be completed within
a certain specified time, and the wages agreed
upon were the sun and moon, or St. Olaf himself.
Ere long the marvellous structure was completed, all
208
MAGIC
but the roof and spire. In great consternation Olaf
wandered over hill and dale ; suddenly, inside a
mountain, he heard a child cry, and a giant woman
hush it with these words : " Hush, hush ! to-morrow
comes thy father Wind-and-Weather home, bring-
ing both sun and moon, or saintly Olaf's self." So
the saint ran back to the church and bawled out :
" Hold on, Wind-and-Weather ; you've set the spire
askew ! " Then the giant, with a fearful crash, fell
off the roof and burst into a thousand pieces, which
were nothing but flint stones.
This primitive philosophy may be traced, too, in a
type of mdrchen which is very widely spread, and
the denouement of which hinges on the discovery
of the name of some being of superhuman powers.
It is known as the Rumpelstiltskin type, from the
name of the German version, which may be briefly
related.
A poor miller boasts to the king of having a
daughter who can spin straw into gold. The king
sends for her, and giving her a spinning-wheel
and reel, locks her in a room in the palace, quite
full of straw, telling her that if it is not all spun
into gold during the night, she must die. The
miller's daughter, quite unable to set about the
task, is hopelessly miserable, and begins to weep.
Suddenly the door opens and in comes a little man,
who inquires the cause df her trouble. "What
209 o
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
will you give me," says the manikin, "if I do the
spinning for you ? " " My necklace," says she.
And he takes the necklace, seats himself at the
wheel, and whirrs away till all the straw is spun
and all the reels are full of gold. The king next
morning is delighted, and he craves more gold.
So he takes the miller's daughter into a much larger
room, full of straw which must be converted to
gold before morning. Again she falls a-weeping.
In comes the little man. "What will you give
me ? " asks he. "The ring on my finger," answers
the girl. He takes the ring and performs the task.
Then the greedy king takes her to a still larger
room, and promises to marry her if she spins all
the straw therein into gold. This time the girl
has nothing left to give the manikin, and so is led
to promise her first child if she should become
queen. And the king, finding the task accom-
plished, marries the miller's pretty daughter. A
year after she has a beautiful child. Suddenly the
manikin enters the room and claims it. The horror-
stricken queen offers all the riches of the kingdom
if he will but leave her child. No ; he prefers to
have the child. But he will give her three days'
grace, and if during that time she can find out
his name she may keep her child. All night the
queen is recalling all the names she has ever
heard, and a messenger is posting far and wide
MAGIC
to learn some other names. When the manikin
appears next day, she repeats all the names she
knows, but not the right one; and on the second
day she has no better success. On the third day
the messenger comes back and says, " I have not
heard a single new name ; but as I came to where
the fox and hare bid each other good-night, I
saw a little house, and a fire burned before it, and
round about the fire a ridiculous little man was
jumping : he hopped on one leg, and shouted
' To-day I bake, to-morrow brew,
The next I'll have the young queen's child.
Ha ! glad am I that no one knew
That Rumpelstiltskin I am styled.' "
How the queen rejoiced ! " Now, Mistress Queen,
what is my name ? " said the little man, appearing
as usual. At first she suggests Conrad; "No."
" Harry ? " " No." Then, " Perhaps your name
is Rumpelstiltskin?" "The devil has told you,"
shrieked the little man, and in his anger he plunged
his right foot so deep into the earth that in his
effort to wrench it out he tore himself in two.
In Ruthenia it is believed that a wizard, if he
only knows a man's baptismal name, can transform
him by a mere effort of will; therefore a man
should conceal his real name and answer to a
fictitious one.
The name-taboo enters into the story (which
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
has many variants) of the man who marries a
fairy or supernatural being, but must never know
his wife's name, or she will be forced to leave
him. This calls to mind, on the other hand, the
Teutonic legend of Lohengrin, the Swan Knight,
who forsook his bride because she asked the for-
bidden questions, and insisted on knowing the
name of her champion, and whence he came to
her succour. In other tales it is through the
accidental discovery of her name that a super-
natural being gets into the power of her human
lover and is constrained to marry him.
When, in stress of battle, the chivalrous hero
of the Middle Ages looked upon his love, thought
of her, or named her name, he increased thereby
his strength, and was sure of the victory.
"Above the din her voice is in my ears,
I see her form glide through the crossing spears.
Iseult!"
Similarly, the Roman gambler would invoke a god
or his mistress before throwing his huckle-bone
dice ; and the Greek, using the kottabos in divina-
tion, spoke or thought his mistress's name ere he
essayed to toss the wine, without spilling any, out
of the cup into the metal basin. So much for
" what's in a name."
Beliefs such as those that have been illustrated
MAGIC
furnish the whole equipment of the sorcerer, the
" dealer in magic and spells," and explain his sys-
tematic practice. His method of procedure is to
obtain a part of his victim's body, or a representa-
tion of his body, and to do thereto something which
he thinks is thereby done to his victim. No wonder,
therefore, that the savage is in mortal dread lest his
hair, nails, or anything that is his, should fall into
the hands of a sorcerer; and as to giving himself
away in the counterfeit presentment of a photo-
graph, it would be literally giving up the ghost.
Not only can the sorcerer create disease by the
means described, but he can transfer it from a
patient to an enemy by making an image of the
latter and practising upon it in a harmful way.
For all savages believe in a real connection between
an object and its image. Or the evil spirit of a
disease may be transferred to an image, which is
then destroyed, and so the patient is cured ; as Pliny
informs us that a stomach-ache may be transmitted
to a puppy or a duck, which will probably die of it.
By the same process of reasoning, warts are charmed
away at the present day, and the well-worshippers
think to rid themselves of their ailments (see p. 12).
In the Orkneys, the water in which a sick person
has been washed is thrown down at a gateway, that
the malady may leave the patient and be transferred
to the first passer-by. In the Highlands, a cat is
213
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
washed in the water and then set free. A Scotch
cure for epilepsy is to bury a cock below the
patient's bed. This sacrifice reminds one of the
dying utterance of Socrates ; for the cock was
dedicated to ^Esculapius.
Devils are conjured into puppets in Buddhist
Thibet and in West Africa, or into a live fowl ; as,
in Gadara, they were conjured into swine. Accord-
ing to the usual savage theory, every disease is due
to the direct attack of that particular disease-spirit,
every disease being thus personified. There is a
peculiar custom among the aboriginal tribes of
Ranchi in Bengal, known as the Era Sendra, or
women's hunt, in which only the women take part.
The frenzied performance of these Amazons is sup-
posed to expel the cholera-demon from their villages.
Various practices are resorted to by the lower races
to keep the disease-demons at bay.
In Ruthenia, cholera is personified as an old
woman with a hideous face disfigured by suffering.
The modern Greeks personify smallpox in the guise
of a supernatural female being, and the Servians
call her "goddess." The ancient Greeks knew of
a spectral creature called Alphitd (a\<f>irco, "a
spectre, or bugbear, with which nurses frighten
children " Liddell and Scott). The kindred word
Alphos also meant a skin disease.
It is needless to quote familiar passages in the
214
MAGIC
New Testament which prove the prevalence at that
day of the belief that diseases were caused by de-
moniacal possession. For ages after the doctrine
has prevailed. In Elizabethan England, when devil-
hunting was common, the priests were the exorcists,
and all sorts of prodigies of conjuring were vouched
for by the devout eye-witnesses of these exhibitions
of the power of the priesthood of Satan. The pro-
cess of exorcism was a terrible ordeal to the patient.
Balls of hair, pieces of iron, knives, nails, lumps of
lead, and such-like things were brought up by the
devil from the mouth of a possessed person by
command of the exorcist. The devils expelled from
one woman had such names as the following:
Frateretto, Fliberdigibet, Hoberdicat, Cocabatto,
Hobberdidance, Lusty Dick, Kellico, Hob, Corner-
cap, Puff, Purr, Bonjour, Pourdieu, Motubizanto,
and several others. A German woman, distracted
with toothache, wished the devil might enter into
her teeth, and was possessed by six demons ac-
cordingly, who gave their several names. In the
year 1788, seven devils, which had thrown a man
into fits, were solemnly exorcised by seven clergy-
men at the Temple Church at Bristol. The cere-
mony of casting out devils is retained to this day
in the rituals of the Greek and Roman churches.
The wizards who at this day in the North of Ire-
land extract elf-bolts (stone arrowheads) from the
215
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
bodies of bewitched cattle, are, like the Elizabethan
exorcist, consistent representatives of their fore-
fathers in primitive antiquity. Compare their
practices with savage quackery. The priest among
the Dayaks of Borneo pretends to extract stones,
splinters, rags, &c., which he declares are spirits,
from the afflicted part of his patient. The Fingo
witch in South Africa sucks Indian corn, the alleged
cause of the pain, from the sufferer's side. The
native Australian sorcerer extracts from his own
body, by means of passes, a magical essence, and
makes it enter his victim's body in the form of a
bit of quartz, which causes pain and consumes the
flesh. Here, again, is a case for the "sucking
cure," of which further examples from many distant
regions might easily be cited.
The sorcerer can do this, and more also; the
diseases he can cure he can also inflict, and greatly
is his power feared. Even the burning of rubbish
that had belonged to any one, such as the refuse of
the food that he had eaten, would cause his death.
A savage will run his spear into the footprints of
an enemy, or put broken glass or poison in them,
thinking to lame him thereby. Saxo gives us an
instance of this sort of conjuring. The dauntless
champion Froger, who was king of a Northern
island, and the reputed son of Odin himself, had
received from the immortal gods the boon that no
216
MAGIC
man should conquer him, save he who at the time
of the conflict could catch up in his hand the dust
lying beneath Froger's feet. Frode the Doughty
challenged him to a duel, caught up some dust from
his footprint, and straightway slew him, gaining by
craft what mortal strength could never have effected.
On Tuesdays and Fridays Italian witches gather
earth from people's footprints, and with this can do
great harm.
Briefly, then, the principle of sorcery is, that like
affects like. You injure a man by injuring an image
of him. A stone roughly resembling any part of
the human body will cure a disease of that part.
Amongst the civilised it was once supposed that
the external character of plants and minerals was
an indication of the diseases for which they were
remedies. Thus yellow flowers would be given for
disorders of the liver, and red for those of the blood;
and the bloodstone was supposed to be haemostatic.
This old medical theory, known as the " Doctrine of
Signatures," was nothing more than an elaboration
of the savage's notion of sympathetic magic, the
principle of like curing like, an instance of which,
from Matabeleland, was reported in the Times of
October 14th, 1893: "A native, bitten by a white
man's watch-dog, claimed compensation for the
injury. It was refused, on the ground that the man
was trespassing. ' But at least,' said the would-be
217
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
thief, ' give me a hair of the dog that bit me, to put
in my wound, and all will be well.' " In the Edda
we read, " Dog's hair heals dog's bite." The same
notion obtains in China, where a Hakka woman
begged a missionary for a hair from the tail of the
dog that had slightly bitten her child.
The custom of making a wax figure of one's
enemy, and sticking pins into it, or melting it in the
fire, so that the hated person might waste as his
image wasted, was common in Europe in the Middle
Ages, and still flourishes in India and elsewhere.
" Why did you melt your waxen man,
Sister Helen ?
To-day is the third since you began."
The answer to this every savage knows.
In Egypt, in the period of the later dynasties, a
service was performed daily in the temple of Amen-
Ra at Thebes, to deliver the Sun-god from the
assault of the great serpent Apef or Apep, and on
each occasion it was accompanied by a ceremony
in which a waxen figure of Apep was burnt in the
fire ; as the wax melted, so the power of Apep was
destroyed.
Simsetha, in the idyl of Theocritus, plies her
magic arts to draw home to her the man she loves.
" Delphis troubled me, and I against Delphis am
burning this laurel . . . even thus may the flesh of
Delphis waste in the burning . . . Even as I melt
218
MAGIC
this wax, so speedily may he by love be molten."
By similar magic arts did the enchantress (in the
Bucolics of Virgil) endeavour to draw Daphnis from
the city home. " As this clay hardens, and as this
wax melts, in one and the self-same fire, even so let
Daphnis melt with love for me, to others' love be
hard ... I, to kindle Daphnis, burn this bay."
The Zulu chews a piece of wood in order to soften
the heart of the woman he wants to wed, or of
the man whose oxen he wants to purchase. The
Devonshire peasant hangs in his chimney a pig's
heart stuck full of thorns, that the heart of his
enemy may be pierced in like manner. Negroes
and savages everywhere practise similar magic to
this. Peruvian sorcerers make rag-dolls, and stick
cactus-thorns into them, in order to cripple people.
In Borneo they make a waxen figure of the enemy
to be bewitched, and gradually melt it ; as Margery
Jordane did with the waxen image of Henry VI.,
Jane Shore with that of the Duke of Gloucester, and
the Countess of Soissons with that of Louis XIV.
Royalty has been much subjected to this ill-treat-
ment. One Agnes Sampson confessed to having
tried to compass the death of King James VI. of
Scotland by hanging up a black toad for nine days
and collecting the juice that fell from it. If she had
been able to obtain a piece of linen that the king
had worn, she could have killed him with this
219
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
venom, causing him to suffer as though " lying upon
sharpe thornes or endis of needles." Furthermore,
it is recorded of Queen Caroline, the unloved and
unloving wife of George IV., that " Her Royal
Highness made a wax figure as usual, and gave it
an amiable pair of large horns ; then took three pins
out of her garment, and stuck them through and
through, and put the figure to roast and melt at the
fire." " What a silly piece of spite," adds the re-
corder. " The devil teacheth," remarks King James
in his " Daemonology " (Bk. II., ch. v.), " how to make
pictures of wax or clay, that by roasting thereof,
the persons that they bear the names of may be
continually melted or dried away by continual sick-
ness." The death, in the reign of Elizabeth, of
Ferdinand, Earl of Derby, was popularly attributed
to witchcraft, suspicion being reduced to certainty
when "a waxen image with hair like that of the
unfortunate earl was found in his chamber ! " The
Hindus knead earth with clippings of hair and nails
into little figures, and write the name of the enemy
upon them, and, after pronouncing magical words,
pierce them through. Such a figure, roughly repre-
senting a body with head and limbs, made of clay, by
a woman in Islay, where belief in its power survives,
was recently exhibited before the Folk-lore Society.
It is called a Corp Chre. A long incantation is
used whilst the operator sticks pins into it. In
220
MAGIC
Ceylon the sorcerer requires a small waxen or
wooden image, or a drawing of the person to be
injured by his arts, together with a few hairs from
the victim's head, some clippings of his nails, and
a fragment of his clothing. Beliefs such as these
have been carried very far.
" On All Souls' Eve an old woman went to pray
in the now ruined church of St. Martin, at Bonn.
Priests were performing the service, and there was
a large congregation, but by-and-by the old woman
became convinced that she was the only living
mortal in the church. She wished to get away,
but she could not ; just as Mass was ending, how-
ever, her deceased husband whispered to her that
now was the time to fly for her life. She ran to
the door, but she stopped for one moment at the
spot in the aisle where two of her children were
buried, just to say, 'Peace be unto them.' The
door swung open and closed after her: a bit of
her cloak was shut in, so that she had to leave it
behind. Soon after she sickened and died; the
neighbours said it must be because a piece of her
clothes had remained in the possession of the
dead." The Karens of Burmah model an image
of a person from the earth of his footprints for
malicious purposes ; this is like the ancient practice
in Germany of cutting out the turf whereon the
person to be destroyed has stood, and hanging
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
it in the chimney, that he may perish as his foot-
print dries and shrivels. Horace speaks of the
evil wrought by the charms of the Samnites and
the enchantments of the Marsi. Hanging and
burning in effigy are modified survivals of primi-
tive sorcery. And the hypnotist of the present
day, who thinks that a pin scratch on the photo-
negative of a hypnotised subject causes pain to,
and produces a similar mark upon, the body of
the subject, is not in a position to deride the philo-
sophy of the savage, or to despise the practice of
the sorcerer.
We see much the same process of thought at
work, at the beginning of the present century, in
the mind of the New Hampshire woman who so
carefully preserved a square inch of her boy's
skin which sloughed off from the effects of a
burn. When he left his home in after years, his
mother would frequently examine this piece of skin,
that she might inform herself thereby of his well-
being; for she fully expected that the skin would
decay in the event of his death. This is a modern
instance of the "life-token" (see p. 79), which is
met with so frequently in the marchen of all lands.
In an Argyllshire story, three trees spring up at
the birth of the fisherman's three sons, and serve
in after years as their life-tokens ; for if evil befalls
either of the boys, his tree is seen to wither. In a
MAGIC
Breton story, the life-token is a laurel into whose
trunk a knife is to be struck daily by the twin-
brother left at home. If blood flows, the absent
brother is dead. Or again, in the Egyptian story
of "The Two Brothers," the jug of beer in Anapu's
hand will froth if Bata should die. At this day
one may hear it said by our American brethren
that if friends, on one's leaving home, stick a piece
of live-for-ever in the ground, it will indicate the
fortune of the absent one. If he prospers, it
flourishes ; if not, it will wither or die. The Mag-
yars say that garnets only show their beautiful
red colour while the person wearing them is in
health ; for if the wearer ails, the stones turn pale.
In British Guiana, when young children are be-
trothed, trees are planted by the respective parties,
in witness of the contract ; and if either tree should
happen to wither, the child it belongs to is sure to
die. All these cases are on a par with the sympa-
thetic magic of the savage.
A few words must be said upon another feature of
sorcery namely, that based on belief in the power
of songs of incantation. This also is illustrated
in an interesting manner in numerous mdrchen,
where the repetition of some formula, usually
rhymed, produces magic effect. The Romans
thought that incantations could draw down the
moon; just as all savages believe that they can
223
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
make the weather. " In Scotland, in the seven-
teenth century, a tempest was raised by dipping
a rag in water, and then beating it on a stone
thrice in the name of Satan.
' I knok this rag upone this stane,
To raise the wind in the divellis name,
It sail not lye till I please again.'
Drying the rag, along with another conjuration,
appeased the storm."
" Rain, rain, go away,
Come again another day,"
say our children.
When a drought threatens to injure the crops
in Croatia, a young girl, generally a gipsy, dresses
herself entirely in flowers and grasses, and is then
conducted through the village by her companions,
who sing to the skies for mercy. So also in Greece
there are many songs and ceremonies in connection
with a desire for rain.
In the Odyssey a "song of healing" was sung
over the wounded Odysseus ; and we read of a
similar song in the Finnish epic ; while the Indians
chant texts from the Veda (one of their sacred
books) over the sick. In the Norse saga of Eric
the Red, the witch has the song of the warlocks
chanted, so as to secure the attendance of "many
powerful spirits." Woden hung nine whole nights
224
MAGIC
on the gallows-tree, whose roots no man knoweth,
to learn the nine songs of might by means of which
spells he brought the magic drink out of Hell. In
Brian's saga, the Walkyries weave a Web of War,
chanting first a song which foretells Brian's death,
then a charm a song "such as seeresses know
how to sing" which shall save the young king's
life.
In Kaffir and Bushman tales, incantations open
rocks, like the magic words " Open Sesame " of the
"Arabian Nights." Ali Baba's cave has its mythic
representative in the cave of Kwang-siu-f'oo in
Kiang-si (China). It was accidentally discovered
by one Chang, a poor herdsman, who one day
overheard some one using the words : " Stone
door, open; Mr. Kwei Ku is coming;" whereupon
the cave opened and the speaker entered. Of
course Chang made a point of remembering the
magic words for purposes of his own, and it was
entirely through an accident that he shut his poor
grandmother inside the cave. For, first of all, he
explored it alone; it did not contain treasure, but
was a most romantic and extensive grotto. When
he told his grandmother, with whom he lived, of
this wonderful place, of course the old lady wanted
to see it; so he took her in. Wandering about
and admiring the scenery, Chang lost sight of her,
and thought she must have left; so he passed out
225 P
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
of the door, and ordered it to shut. To his dismay,
his grandmother had not returned home. He rushed
back to the cave, spake the magic words, but alas !
the talisman failed. Just then the genius of the cave
appeared on the scene, and Chang made a clean
breast of the affair, imploring for his grandmother's
release. This, however, could not be. Her dis-
appearance was a matter of fate, the genius said,
for the cave demanded a victim. Chang felt that
he was not entirely responsible for his grand-
mother's death, and it was some compensation to
know that, in consequence of the particular manner
of it, her descendants would ever possess power
over demons.
One of the most widespread superstitions of the
human race is the belief in the power of the Evil
Eye. Things may be acted upon magically without
any bodily contact. The mere look of an elf can
bewitch ; so the sick in Ireland are said to be
"fairy-struck." The bleared, envious, evil eye of
a witch can bewitch a child, dry up the mother's
milk, rot an apple, make the cattle sick, or spoil
a dress; she can kill snakes with a glance, scare
wolves, hatch ostrich eggs, breed leprosy, or spoil
a field's crop. This baleful look is what the Ger-
mans called entsehen; the Italians, gettaregli squardi,
or \hejettatura. Hone, in his " Day Book," speaks
of " the blink o' an ill e'e." The shepherd Menalcas,
226
MAGIC
in Virgil's third Eclogue, sings, " Some evil eye be-
witches my tender lambs."
Within this century, a Yorkshire man was accused
of killing a pear-tree by throwing his glances upon
it; and newspaper cases afford evidence of old
women being accused of "over-looking," and mal-
treated accordingly. Offenbach the composer, who
was of Jewish extraction, was believed by Christians
to have this horrid power, and was often avoided
because of thejettatura. Italians believe that vari-
ous evils result from coming under a glance of a
jettatore, or a person possessed of an evil eye,
and counter-spells of course abound. Within the
present generation, one of the Italian royal family
was said to have the evil eye. At Court, when
the aristocracy came into the presence, they very
carefully protected themselves by holding their hands
behind their backs, with the thumb and middle
finger closed, and the fore and little fingers ex-
tended ; for this is one way of protecting oneself
from the evil influence. To do so openly would of
course be insulting. The wearing of coral keeps
one safe from the effects of the jettatura ; hence
the little coral charm, shaped like a hand in the
position described, so often seen in Italy. For
the same purpose, corals are worn by children in
Nicaragua, with the addition of an alligator's tooth,
also considered efficacious. It is the common belief
227
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
of all the inhabitants of Nicaragua, Indians and
Spaniards, unlettered and educated alike, that after
a person has been exposed in the sun and agitated,
the heat of his body finds vent from his eye, with
fatal effect upon young children and infants who
may be exposed to its influence. The ojo caliente,
or "heated eye," as it is called, is so much feared,
that children are always sent away, or covered
with a cloth, when any person supposed to have
it approaches. The deaths of many children are
attributed to it. In Africa, Cameron found a mother
who carried a baby slung in a goat-skin on her
back, wearing an apron made of innumerable thongs
of hide, with a charm dangling from each, to pre-
serve the infant from the evil eye and other forms
of witchcraft. In Mangalore, one sometimes sees
children with an ornament made of two tiger's
claws, joined together by silver or gold, sus-
pended round the neck, as a charm against the
evil eye; and farmers, to protect their fields, erect
through the middle of them a line of half-burnt
bamboos about six feet high. In India, children
are supposed to be specially liable to it, and it is
a good thing to keep a piece of iron or some cat-
gut in a child's bed. A blue string is tied round
a colt's neck, and cat-gut round a buffalo's leg,
by way of protection. In the north-east of Scot-
land, a small brooch in the shape of a heart is
228
MAGIC
worn to turn off the evil eye, and preserve from
the power of fairies. A Turkish nurse objects,
just as a Sutherlandshire woman does, to your
looking at the baby. For Roumanians think that
if you stare at the baby you spoil it with your
eye. To counteract this, the child must be spat
upon. In fact, you must never say that a baby
is pretty, or that any one looks well, without
spitting on the ground. And a notion very similar
to this obtains in Ireland, and is seen in an
English woman's account of what happened to
herself a few decades ago in Limerick. She was
walking to church with her little girls, who were
nicely dressed in new frocks and hats, when a
respectable-looking woman, meeting them, admired
and praised the children, then suddenly spat on
their new hats. It was afterwards explained that
the woman acted thus out of kindness of heart ;
for, aware that she possessed the evil eye, she
had spat on the children to prevent their falling
sick. Further space cannot here be given to illus-
trations of the world-wide belief in the virtue of
saliva as a charm against evil. It must suffice
to recall the Romans' use of it in lustrating an
infant when it receives its name, to say that the
Mandingoes on that occasion spit thrice in the
child's face, and that money is often spat upon
for luck by all sorts and conditions of men. On
229
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
two occasions Jesus Christ made use of saliva
in the cure of the blind.
In the county of Donegal, a person supposed to
have an evil eye is called Suil Bhallor, or Bailor's
eye, because of a legend of Bailor, a kind of Cy-
clops, who had one eye in the middle of his forehead
and one in the middle of the back of his skull. A
glance from the latter would strike a person dead.
He was called Bailor of the Mighty Blows and of
the Evil Eye. Crinnawn, his son, is a formidable
one-eyed character in an Irish-Gaelic folk-tale, who
boasts of being able to kill with the sight of his eye,
if he chooses.
Sticking an awl into the footprints of one who
has the evil eye is one of the countless ways of
averting bad influences. Enough has been said to
show that belief in this particular form of witchcraft
is practically universal; for the dread of the evil
eye still survives, even in civilised countries. An
ancient reference to the idea may perhaps be seen
in Matthew xx. 15: "Is thine eye evil, because I
am good ? "
The changing of an infant is sometimes supposed
to be effected by the power of the evil eye. It was
at one time a common belief that fairies and other
imaginary beings carry off young children from
their cradles, leaving in their stead a starveling imp
of their own, or an animated stump of wood. Chil-
230
MAGIC
dren so left were called changelings, and were
marked by their peevishness, and their backward-
ness in learning to walk and speak. The supersti-
tion is alluded to by Shakespeare, Spenser, and
other poets, and is an essential part of the doctrine
of fairy-lore almost everywhere. Fairies have no
power to change a child that has been christened,
but it must be most carefully watched until that
ceremony has been performed. In Belgium only
people with a " nice face " are allowed to see it,
special precautions being taken against old women
and cats, who may be emissaries of Satan. A little
heart in red or blue silk is hung round the baby's
neck to protect it from sorcery till baptized. An
open Bible near the child is a safeguard in Scotland ;
a single leaf out of it suffices in Germany; holy
water in Ireland; a rosary, which a priest has blessed,
in Picardy. To keep a fire burning or a lamp in
the chamber was a means which the Romans prac-
tised of preserving the babe against evil spirits.
Iron or steel, in any shape, placed in the cradle,
was equally efficacious. The potency of iron has
already been discussed. The fear of changelings
exists also in China. The Greeks believe that
witches suck the blood of new-born babes ; the
Nereids also lose no opportunity of exchanging one
of their own fractious offspring for a mortal babe.
There are numerous stories about these fairy rob-
231
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
beries of children. Martin Luther, besides describ-
ing the general behaviour of changelings, gives an
account of one which he saw with his own eyes at
Dessau. Prescriptions forgetting rid of the change-
ling agree in the most striking manner, the common
resort being to make the changeling betray itself.
The best way is to brew ale, boil water, or cook food
in an egg-shell, in sight of the cradled child. This is
certain to make a changeling " sit up " and express
wonder at seeing such a laughable sight for the first
time in all its born days. Thus the changeling
betrays its age, which usually runs into three
figures at least; and when a changeling laughs
all is up with it. Hosts of elves, hearing it, bring
the right child back, and carry the changeling
away.
That there still exists in Ireland a firm belief in
fairies and all their works has been lately proved
by the deplorable case of Bridget Cleary, who
was burnt to death at Clonmel for a changeling.
According to the evidence at the trial, this poor
young woman had been ill, and her husband con-
sulted the fairy-doctor, who declared that the real
Bridget had been stolen away by the fairies, and
a changeling left in her place ; that bodily torture
would cause this creature to vanish up the chimney,
and then the real Bridget would return, riding on a
grey horse. Accordingly the tortures were applied.
232
MAGIC
A red-hot poker was used to force the woman to
swallow a horrible decoction made by the herb-
doctor, and she was then held over the fire by a
number of relatives, the husband firmly believing
or so he alleged in his defence that this was not
his wife, and that he was using the only means to
get her back.
233
CHAPTER VI
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
Origin of myth Myths of Observation The Dragon's pedigree-
Famous Dragon-slayersNature myths Greek and savage myths
compared Creation myths Myths explaining physical peculiari-
ties in man and animals, and natural phenomena generally
Beast-fables : their first home Animal foster-parents Grateful
beasts The language of beasts and birds Some "irrational"
ideas in European and savage mdrcAenThe one-eyed cannibal
giant The common property of all story-tellers Stories with
a purpose A distinction between mdrchen, sagas, legends, and
myths Classification of folk-tales Drolls Cumulative stories-
Folk-songs : their antiquity Popular ballads Rhymes Tradi-
tional games Folk-drama Nursery - rhymes and riddles Pro-
verbsThe problem of Diffusion The William Tell legend.
THE foregoing chapters, in attempting a rapid
survey of the beliefs and customs of savage man,
have afforded some insight into the mental condi-
tion of our own fore-parents at a period to which
modern history is but a thing of yesterday. The
human intellect, in the earlier stages of the history
of every people, has employed itself in speculations
giving rise to myths, many of which have been
preserved for countless ages. These myths are as
instructive in their way as all the scriptures that
are written for our learning, for they are "an
attempt to find concrete expressions for those ideas
234
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
and impressions about the relations between man
and the physical world that lie at the basis of
religion." The serious beliefs of our fore-parents
form the staple of our old wives' tales, and linger
on in nursery-lore. Time is a great preserver, but
no reverencer, as we see when the " hoc est corpus "
of the priest elevating the host gets corrupted into
the " hocus pocus " of the prestidigitateur.
Some myths, which have been classed as Myths of
Observation, are the result of roughly putting two
and two together; for instance, "as when a savage
builds, upon the discovery of great bones buried in
the earth, a story of a combat of the giants and
monsters whose remains they are." Siberian tribes,
who are constantly unearthing huge bones of ex-
tinct animals, think earthquakes are due to the
burrowings of mammoths ; scarcely less wild a
theory than that contested, in the fourth century
B.C., by Pytheas namely, that the earth was an
enormous whale, whose breathings and spoutings
caused the tides. Even Kepler, the great astro-
nomer, believed that the world was actually alive, as
the Caribs also believe ; for they say, when there is
an earthquake, it is their Mother Earth dancing.
All countries have their myths in answer to the
question, " Why does the earth quake ? " The
Greeks said it was the movement of imprisoned
cyclops or titans ; while the Norse explain that
235
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
earthquakes are caused by the agonised struggles
of Loki, bound on the sharp stones, and writhing
when the snake's venom drops on his face ; for thus
was he punished by the gods. Or the dragon Fafnir
shakes the earth as he journeys to the water. To
the Indians the earth quakes every time one of the
eight elephants supporting the globe is tired of his
burden and gives his head a shake. The Japanese
say, when the phenomenon occurs, " Another
whale has crept away from under our country."
In many other countries where earthquakes are
felt, the myth of the Earth-bearer is current, the
office of supporting the earth being given to various
creatures, human or animal. In Polynesia it is
Maui who upholds the earth on his prostrate body ;
and when he tries to ease his posture, thereby
causing the earth to quake, the people shout and
beat the ground, to make him lie still. In Celebes
it is thought that the world-supporting Hog rubs
himself against a tree; and the Indians of North
America say, when the earth quakes, that the
world-bearing Tortoise moves. Myths like these
are too numerous to cite.
The fossil footprints of birds and beasts of huge
size, such as are found in many parts of the world,
may have suggested an analogous, though fanciful
explanation of all cavities and depressions in rock
surfaces; and so we have the innumerable myths
236
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
of footprints stamped into rocks by gods or mighty
men. The sacred footprint of Ceylon at the top of
Adam's Peak is a cavity in the rock, measuring
five feet in length and two and a half feet across.
Brahmans, Buddhists, and Moslems still climb the
mountain to do reverence to it. To the Brahman, it
is the footstep of Siva ; to the Buddhist, of Gautama
Buddha ; to the Moslem, it is the spot where Adam
stood when he was driven from Paradise ; while
Christians put in a claim for St. Thomas, or for
the Eunuch of Candace, Queen of Ethiopia. And
St. Thomas left the impression of his foot in
America as well. In Samoa, two hollow places
nearly six feet long in a rock are shown as the
spot where Tiitii stood when he pushed the heavens
up from the earth.
Thus some kernel of truth may be hidden in
many a myth, and some are doubtless based on
historical tradition. The discoveries of geologists
show that the terrifying monsters, the dragons
of popular imagination, were not wholly fabulous
creations ; their pedigree may be traced to tradi-
tional accounts of huge creatures which actually
existed in prehistoric times. Typhaeus, the mon-
ster captured by Zeus, the Python slain by Apollo,
Echidna slain by Argos, the Egyptian Apophis,
Vitra the serpent of Hindu mythology, the Zoro-
astrian Ahi, the Parsee Zohak, and, to pass to
237
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Scandinavian myth, the great Midgard serpent,
whom Thor will slay at the end of the world-
all these may be traced back to gigantic Saurians,
such as the Ichthyosaurus, the Plesiosaurus, the
Atlantosaurus, those ancient inhabitants of the
globe. The dragons of Chinese and Japanese
illustration have doubtless as hoary a pedigree.
Legends of sea monsters are very numerous and
ancient; they are described on Chaldean tablets
giving accounts of the Creation ; they are repro-
duced as "the great whale" in Genesis, and in
the huge Leviathan, the swift serpent of Biblical
notoriety, who is not to be drawn out with a fish-
hook, the typical opponent of Jehovah. There
may be a substantial foundation in fact for every
such legend as that of Bel and the Dragon,
Michael the Archangel and Satan, St. George and
the Dragon, the Egyptian Horus and the Croco-
dile, and of the combats with the several monsters
already named. These are the prototypes of all
the dragons of popular tales which heroes slay to
free a maid, as Perseus freed Andromeda. Such
a story may very well have been founded on fact.
For, in accordance with the custom of offering meat
and drink to the sacred animals, as the Poly-
nesians offer human flesh to the birds believed to
be their deities incarnate, so travellers in Africa
tell of the alligator which is fed with a white fowl,
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
and of "the shark at Bonny that comes to the
river bank every day, to see if a human victim
has been provided for his repast."
Ancient Egyptian art has depicted just such a
combat as that of Perseus. Horus striking the
crocodile is the very prototype of our patron saint,
who is represented on our coinage in the act of
spearing the dragon. According to the Homeric
hymn, there was a spring of pure water guarded
by a she-dragon, a great and terrible monster,
the nurse of Typhon, who devastated the land;
and the Lord Apollo slew her with his sharp
arrows, and left her to rot upon the ground ;
whence the place is now called Pytho, and the
Lord Apollo, the Pythian. Of course we have a
version of the Dragon or Serpent myth from China,
the Land of the Dragon Throne, and in its general
features it is much the same as our own popular
story of St. George; and the stories of the laird
who slew the " worme of Linton ; " of the slayers
of the Lambton worm, and the Laidley Worme
of Spindlestone Heugh ; and of the plucky Scot
named Martin who slew the dragon which had
devoured nine maidens.
In the Chinese story the champion is a girl.
Nine victims have in turn been yielded to the
mighty serpent whose abode is in the mountains
east of Fuhkien, and who lusts every year to
239
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
devour a maiden of the age of twelve or thirteen.
Another victim must be found, and the youngest
daughter of the magistrate of Tsing Lo insists on
offering herself. At the mouth of the serpent's
cavern she places several measures of boiled rice
mixed with honey, and being supplied with a
sword and a dog, the maiden Ki waits till the
serpent comes forth to devour the toothsome mess.
Then the dog seizes the monster in its teeth, and
the maiden hacks from behind, till it withdraws to
the mouth of its cave, and dies. Ki recovers the
skeletons of the nine previous victims, and leisurely
returns home. Hearing of her exploit, the Prince
of Sueh makes her his queen.
Imagination shapes fell beasts and gives them
title roles, like the monster of Errour in Spenser's
" Faerie Queen," and the Apollyon in the " Pilgrim's
Progress." Such as these cannot fairly be asso-
ciated with any actual creatures. Hesiod records
the birth of monstrous beings of various forms,
such as Thaumas, the great deep ; the harpies
winged like birds; Medusa and the Gorgons with
serpent heads ; Echidna, the terrible flesh-devourer,
half lovely nymph, half serpent; Cerberus, the fifty-
headed dog of Hell ; the Lernean Hydra, the fearful
serpent with a number of heads, whom Hercules
slew ; Chimaira, with one head like a lion's, another
like a goat's, and a third like a serpent's, slain by
240
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
Bellerophon ; the Nemaean lion, and the Sphinx, a
scaly sea dragon.
The rainbow is a living monster in New Zealand
as well as with the Karens of Birma, where it is
said to devour men. To the old Greeks the rain-
bow reaching from heaven to earth was the personal
Iris, messenger between gods and men. To the
South Sea Islander the rainbow is a heaven-ladder
for the use of heroes ; to the Scandinavian it is the
bridge Bifrost, as in the German folk-tale. It is
the bow of Jehovah, of the Hindu Rama, and of
the Finnish Tiermes the Thunderer.
The god of thunder in China corresponds to
Vajrapani, a well-known Buddhist deity. In North
American Indian belief the thunder is caused by
a huge bird whose outspread wings darken the
heavens. It lives on the mountain tops. An
Indian once got a feather from the nest of a
thunder-bird, and it measured over 200 feet in
length. A serpent-like fish of immense size, with
head as sharp as a knife, causes the lightning
when he puts out his tongue. The thunder-bird
catches this fish for food. The notion of a flapping
thunder-bird has occurred to many a savage philo-
sopher, for many a legend is told of it by Caribs,
Dacotahs, Brazilians, Hervey Islanders, Basutos,
and many other peoples. In Central America the
bird Voc is the messenger of Hurakan, the Tempest-
241 Q
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
god, whose name has supplied us with the word
hurricane. Some Chinese and Japanese think
waterspouts are caused by the ascent and descent
of a long- tailed dragon ; and the Moslems still think
them caused by gigantic demons. A missionary
received the same explanation of the phenomenon
from the chief of an African tribe.
" The peasant of the New Forest thinks that the
marl he digs is still red with the blood of his ancient
foes the Danes ; " as the ancient Greek saw the red
blood of Adonis in the summer floods of the river
that flowed by Byblos, and " the Maori sees on the
red cliffs of Cook's Straits the blood-stains that Kupe
made, when, mourning for the death of his daughter,
he cut his forehead with pieces of obsidian."
Now we come to what are sometimes classed as
Nature-myths, and, in dealing with them, we must
bear ever in mind the doctrine of animism, the
savage's philosophy of nature. We have seen that
man at a low stage of mental development cannot
distinguish between things animate and inanimate.
Everything is on a level with himself; vegetables
and stones, tools and meat and drink, pots and
canoes, animals and trees, all have immortal souls,
just like man himself, which pass to the world of
spirits. The sun, the moon, and stars are living
beings; ocean, clouds, whirlwind, and tempest are
endowed with will, passion, reason. For the savage
242
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
can only interpret the actions of nature by consider-
ing them on a par with his own actions. There
was occasion to refer to the Four Winds amongst
the Nature-gods (see p. 142). They are personified
in many a fairy-tale, and legend deals with them,
as with other natural phenomena, in every savage
mythology. Only, we, who see naught but a poet's
fancy in the line, " Winds of all the corners kiss
your sails, and make your vessel nimble," must not
omit to trace the savage's philosophy in the Red
Indian fable of the lazy South Wind, Shawondasee,
sighing for the maiden of the prairie with her sunny
hair. What we call poetry was real life to the
savage. With the Persians " all the unnumbered
stars were reckoned ghosts of men ; " the Eskimos
think the sun and moon as well as the stars are
spirits of departed men and animals ; while the
South Australians think them living beings who
once inhabited the earth. In German folk-lore stars
are souls ; when a child dies, God makes a new star.
African Bushmen and North American Indians call
the Milky Way the " Path of Souls." This tallies
with the Lithuanian myth of the " Path of the
Birds," for the souls of the good take the form of
birds at death. The Pythagoreans were familiar
with the thought that souls dwell in the Galaxy.
From such poetic ideas as these it is a fall to our
own prosaic name for the celestial road. In olden
243
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
time the great street of the Waetlingas used to run
from Dover through London into Wales. Heaven
had its Watling Street as well, for this was once
the Englishman's name for the Milky Way.
The identification of Sun, Moon, and Stars with
persons who once lived, may have arisen from a
misinterpretation of names, just as a like misunder-
standing contributed to the belief (see p. 96) in
descent of men from animals and plants. It is pos-
sible that in primitive times the Moon was used,
just as now, as a complimentary name for a woman ;
but, however that may be, it is certain that the
Moon supplies names for children. The Karens,
for example, use the name " Full Moon." In short,
Sun, Moon, and Stars have all been identified with
traditional human beings, and all nations have their
myths in which the heavenly bodies are endowed
with all the attributes and functions of earth-born
persons. The Greeks had traditional stories about
the stars, which in character precisely correspond
with the stories which are current everywhere
amongst modern savages. Sometimes they even
contain the same incident. Australian natives say
that the stars in Orion's belt and scabbard are
young men dancing a corroboree. The Eskimos
call these same stars the Lost Ones ; for they say
that they were once seal-hunters, and they missed
their way home.
244
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
The Nimtira of the Malayan Peninsula have an
elaborate Nature-myth to explain the generation of
the stars. Like most rude tribes, these people have
the conception of a solid firmament, not unlike the
"hammered plate" in the Creation-myth of Genesis.
The sky, they s&y, is a great pot suspended by a
cord ; if the cord broke, everything on earth would
be crushed. "The Moon is a woman, and the Sun
also; the Stars are the Moon's children, and the
Sun had in old times as many. Fearing, however,
that mankind could not bear so much brightness
and heat, they agreed each to devour her children ;
but the Moon, instead of eating up her Stars, hid
them from the Sun's sight, who, believing them all
devoured, ate up her own ; no sooner had she done
it than the Moon brought her family out of their
hiding-place. When the Sun saw them, filled with
rage, she chased the Moon to kill her; the chase
has lasted ever since, and sometimes the Sun even
comes near enough to bite the Moon, and that is an
eclipse ; the Sun, as men may still see, devours her
Stars at dawn, and the Moon hides hers all day
while the Sun is near, and only brings them out at
night when her pursuer is far away."
The following Pawnee Star-myth likewise implies
a solid overhanging firmament. One hot summer
night two girls climbed up on an arbour to sleep in
the cool. As they lay talking of the stars above
245
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
them, one of the girls pointed to a bright particular
star as the one she liked best of all. When this girl
awoke she found herself in the lodge of a stranger
in a strange country, and she cried for her home.
The stranger said he was the star that she had
chosen, and he had taken her for his wife. Finally
she was contented to stay with him. Every night
he went on a journey, after combing his hair and
painting his face red. Every morning he was back
again. After three years the girl had a baby boy.
One day she went out to dig turnips. Her husband
had cautioned her never to dig deep into the ground,
and as a rule she was careful. But this day she
dug deep; she dug right through. Down through
this hole she could see the world ; she could see a
camp, and a party of men playing the stick game ;
they looked very small, like ants. A longing seized
her to revisit her home and her people. She went
to her husband's lodge and asked him to fetch her
a lot of sinews, and for many a night during his
absence she worked to make them into a rope.
Then she took her child on her back, and carried
the rope of sinew to the hole. She drove a strong
stake into the ground to secure the end of the rope,
and then let it down through the hole. It seemed
not quite long enough to reach the earth, but she
would risk that. Having enlarged the hole that her
body might pass through, she let herself down by
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MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
the rope, her child on her back. She reached the
end of the rope, but the ground was far below her.
There was no one to help; she was sore afraid.
Meanwhile her husband, seeking her in vain at the
lodge, at last found the hole, and saw her hanging
to the rope. He felt very angry, and he dropped
a big stone through, which fell on the woman's
head and killed her. But, by the power of the
Star-man, the child was saved for a striking career,
which need not here be recorded.
It is curious that the relic of a mythopceic age
should be everlastingly enshrined in our celestial
globe. Yet so it is. For the savage habit of giving
human or animal names to individual stars, or groups
of stars, is kept up by modern astronomers, who
" map the starry sky ; " though any resemblance to
human or animal forms in the star-groups is only
beheld by a vivid imagination.
Australian aborigines say that Yurree and Wanjil,
the stars which we, deriving their names from the
Greeks, call Castor and Pollux, pursue the Kangaroo
(the star we call Capella), and kill him at the be-
ginning of the great heat ; the mirage is the smoke
of the fire by which they roast him. In a parallel
myth, Orion pursues the Pleiades, who take refuge
from him in the sea.
Every one must know the Greek myth about
Merope, the lost Pleiad. The seven Pleiades were
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
seven maidens, daughters of the giant Atlas. Six
of them were loved by the gods, but the seventh
had only a mortal lover, and she, poor Merope,
when they were all changed into stars, hid her light
for shame.
Now, the aborigines of Australia have likewise
a myth to account for the disappearance of one of
these seven stars, who, according to them, were a
queen and her six attendants. The Crow made
love to the queen, who refused him. But the Crow
knew that the queen and her maidens were wont
to hunt for edible grubs in the bark of trees. So
he changed himself into a grub, and hid in the
bark of a tree. The six maidens failed to pick him
out with their wooden hooks. But he allowed the
queen to succeed with her pretty bone hook, and,
once he was drawn out, he turned into a giant and
carried her off. Since then there have only been
six stars in the group.
In Bushman lore, the stars and sun and moon
are mortals, or even animals, that have been trans-
lated to the skies. Myths to this effect abound
everywhere. It may be remembered, for example,
how the Egyptian priests told Plutarch that the soul
of Isis was translated into the Dog-star.
The Indians of Central Brazil believe the sun to
be a ball made of a feather of the red Arra. It is
stuck in a pot, the lid of which is lifted in the
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MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
morning and closed at night. The moon is a ball
made of the yellow tail-feathers of a weaver-bird.
The night sky is covered with animals and every
conceivable object. The Milky Way is a hollow tree ;
there is a bird-net in it, and an ant-bear embracing
a hunter. A starless space in the Southern sky is a
hole through which a tapir once fell. The question
is, how did these things get up there. Well, they
say that once on a time the whole affair was upside
down; the sky was below, the earth above, and
mankind lived in heaven. But this heaven was no
paradise ; on the contrary, it was a most unhealthy
place, and people died rapidly. So a mighty magi-
cian, to put an end to the state of affairs, overturned
the whole system. The unhealthy heaven was sent
up, while man remained below to inhabit the more
promising earth.
In Australian legend the Moon was a native cat,
who fell in love with some one else's wife, and was
driven away, to wander ever since. A tribe of the
Himalaya say that the Moon falls in love every
month with his mother, who throws ashes in his
face, causing the dark spots that we see. The in-
constant Moon in Slavonic legend is the King of
Night, and his spouse is the Sun. He was severed
in twain, as we see him in the sky, for faithlessly
loving the Morning Star. Among the Mbocobis of
South America also, the Moon is a man, and the Sun
249
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
is his wife. The Algonkin Indians, on the other
hand, say that the Moon is a woman, and eclipses
are caused when she holds her son in her arms, so
preventing one's seeing the light of her countenance.
The Sun is her husband, and when he is eclipsed
or obscured, it is because he is holding their son in
front of him. Another Algonkin legend describes
Sun and Moon as brother and sister. The Peru-
vian's Sun and Moon, Ynti and Quilla, are brother
and sister, and father and mother of the Incas ; just
as the Egyptian Osiris and Isis were at once brother
and sister, and husband and wife. This was a justi-
fication for the sister marriages in Peru and Egypt.
The celebrated queen Hatasu, daughter of Thotmes
I., was married to her younger brother Thotmes II.;
the Inca heir -apparent, by marrying a sister, con-
tinued the pure heaven-born race.
Sun and Moon are thus personified in every savage
mythology, and many are the stories told concern-
ing them.
The Moon was a man, according to an old Mexi-
can text. A god threw a rabbit in his face, and dis-
figured him for life. There seems no end to the.
myths of different races accounting forthe spots on
the Moon. To the Indians and Mongolians they
look like a hare. This is the legend told by the
people of Ceylon : " While Buddha, the great god,
sojourned upon earth as a hermit, he one day lost
250
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
his way in a wood. He had wandered long, when
a hare accosted him : ' Cannot I help thee ? Strike
into the path on thy right ; I will guide thee out of
the wilderness.' Buddha replied, ' Thank thee, but
I am poor and hungry, and unable to repay thy
kindness.' ' If thou art hungry/ said the hare,
'light afire, and kill, roast, and eat me.' Buddha
made a fire, and the hare immediately jumped in.
Then did Buddha manifest his divine power; he
snatched the beast out of the flames, and set him in
the Moon, where he may be seen to this day." The
Eskimos say that the Moon is a girl, whose cruel
brother, the Sun, disfigured her face ; she is always
fleeing from him. An old Norse fable tells us that
Mani, the Moon, translated from the earth two chil-
dren, called Hiuki and Bil, who, like our Jack and
Jill, had gone to fetch a pail of water. They can
now be seen in the Moon carrying the pail on a pole
between them. Teutonic legend sets a man in the
Moon " bering a bush of thornis on his bake," as
Chaucer describes him. According to the Christian
revised version of the story which prevails in Ger-
many and elsewhere, this was a punishment for
theft, trespass, or cutting firewood on a Sunday;
the precedent for punishment of such offence being
found in the case of the man in the Book of Num-
bers, who was stoned to death by the congrega-
tion of Israel, for gathering sticks on the Sabbath.
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Shakespeare alludes more than once to the Man in
the Moon ; for example, in " Midsummer Night's
Dream " : " One must come in with a bush of thorns
and a lanthorn, and say he comes to present the
person of Moonshine." The natives of the Solomon
Islands tell the following legend of the Man in the
Moon. " The actors are, it seems, the usual three."
There was once a girl named Leonivulu, whose
father's name was Tuasakai. She wanted to marry
a good-looking young man called Silitamburara, and
her father made no objection. But a cripple named
Gengoukouka madly loved the girl, and meeting her
walking by the shore one evening after dark, he
personated her accepted lover, and prevailed on
her to accompany him to his house. Here she dis-
covered the deception, and escaping next day, com-
plained to her father. Tuasakai was wroth, and
pursued Gengoukouka with intent to kill; but the
lame youth managed to get for safety to the Moon,
where he has lived ever since, spending his time in
making white shell armlets out of the large clam
shells.
Eclipses are explained by a variety of myths. A
native race of South America "thought the Moon
was hunted across the sky by huge dogs, who
caught and tore her till her light was reddened and
quenched by the blood flowing from her wounds."
The Indians howled and drove off the dogs, and the
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MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
Moon recovered of the bite. Other races likewise
shout, and shoot their arrows into the sky, to drive
the devouring beast from Sun or Moon. Civilised
nations have their myths of the Eclipse-monster.
The Chinese make official announcement of his
coming, and encounter him with gongs and bells
and regularly appointed prayers. Tacitus relates
how the Moon suddenly languished in a clear sky,
and the Roman soldiers, whose intended mutiny
against Tiberius was thus frustrated by the gods,
strove in vain, by clang of brass and trumpet blast,
to drive away the darkness. In the seventeenth
century it was recorded that the Irish and Welsh
ran about, during eclipses, beating kettles and pans,
thinking to assist the heavenly bodies.
Then there are the myths of sunrise and sunset ;
stories of the Day being swallowed up by Night,
and liberated again at dawn; fancies which seem
like mere poetic imagery. With the Egyptians the
Sun is the child of Earth and Heaven, Seb and Nut.
Day and Night are brothers, children of the Sky.
Just as the worship of Nature-gods passes into, or is
combined with, the worship of apotheosised men,
so Nature-myth develops into heroic legend. Per-
seus slays the monster and frees Andromeda, as the
Sun slays the devouring Darkness.
Maui, the hero of New Zealand myth, and the
youngest of five brothers of the same name, took
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
fire in his hands, and, because it burnt him, sprang
with it into the sea. This set a volcano burning.
When he sank in the water, the sun for the first
time set, and darkness covered the earth. When
he found that all was night, Maui pursued the sun,
and brought him back in the morning. Thus the
sun is born from the ocean ; his light is extin-
guished at sunset, and returns at dawn. According
to the Egyptian myth, which the Greek myth of
Uranos resembles, " Nut, the sky-goddess, was wife
of Seb, the earth-god, from whose embrace she
was separated by Shu, the god of the air. When
this separation was effected, earth, air, and sky
came into being."
Further motive for myth-making is supplied by
the desire to account for the parentage of a tribe ;
examples of such have already been cited (see pp.
1 1 2, 1 1 3) ; or to account for the names of places.
The most stupendous of all the insoluble pro-
blems has been lightly disposed of in the Creation-
myths of every savage race. This is the Huron
account of the making of the world: In the be-
ginning there was nothing but water, peopled by
various aquatic animals and birds. A divine woman
fell down through a rift in the sky. It is thought
that her husband perhaps by accident gave her
a push. Two loons were flying over the water,
saw her falling, and saved her from drowning by
254
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
placing themselves beneath her, while they loudly
called for aid. All the creatures of the sea heard
and drew nigh. The tortoise, a mighty animal, con-
sented to relieve the loons of their precious burden.
It was unanimously agreed that this woman must
have earth to live on, and the beaver, the musk-rat,
the diver, and others dived to the bottom of the
sea, and endeavoured, but without success, to bring
some up. Some remained so long below, that when
they rose they were dead. The tortoise searched
their mouths, but found no trace of earth. At last
the toad went down, and came back, after a long
time, terribly exhausted, and nearly dead. But the
tortoise found in its mouth some earth, which he
gave to the woman. She placed it carefully round
the edge of the tortoise's shell, and this was the
beginning of the dry land, which grew and grew,
on every side, till it formed a great country. The
tortoise sustained it all, and has done so ever since.
The woman who fell from heaven bore on earth two
sons of opposite dispositions, one good, the other
evil. The latter, in rebellious obstinacy, by break-
ing through his mother's side, killed her. From
her buried body sprang the various vegetable pro-
ductions which made the new earth fitting habita-
tion for man. The twins could not agree together,
therefore separated. The good brother created the
innocent and useful animals, while the bad brother
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
made all the fierce and monstrous creatures. In
African legend the earth was first peopled by beings
who fell through the sky. The notion is wide-
spread, and is familiar in Polynesian myths, which
account for the appearing of the first settlers.
When white men first appeared in Samoa, it was
thought that they had broken through the heavens ;
and to this day white men are called Papalangi, or
" Heaven-bursters."
But, to return to Creation-myths. By much
the same means was the earth formed according
to Algonkin legend. At first there was nothing
but water, over which floated a raft of wood carry-
ing animals of all species, and with them the Great
Hare himself, chief of all. He, longing to dis-
embark, tried to induce some animals to dive and
bring up some earth from the bottom. The beaver
tried hard to excuse himself, and when finally he
did plunge down, it was only to return nearly dead,
with not a trace of mud on his paws. The otter
had no better success. Then the musk-rat volun-
teered, and after twenty-four hours under water
rose to the surface dead, but with a grain of sand
between its claws. With this the Great Hare
created the earth, which is borne upon a raft. As
to the sea and the firmament, the Algonkins explain
that they have existed from all time.
Many savage tribes have a tradition of the Deluge
256
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
which involves re-making the dry land by means of
the diving device. Thus, the Californian Indians
say that when the whole earth was covered with
water, there were no living creatures save an eagle
and a crow. They held converse, standing on a
stump that projected above the surface of the
watery expanse. Between them they managed to
create a duck to enliven the solitude. One day
the duck dived to the bottom, and came up with
earth on its bill. The eagle and the crow thought
the matter worth looking into. The mud looked
promising, though they had never seen anything
like it. So they agreed to keep the duck con-
stantly employed diving for mud, which they divided
between them, making two heaps, one on either
side of the stump. After an unavoidable absence
the eagle returned, to find that the crow had not
been dividing fairly, haying kept much the larger
portion himself. The eagle's heap, so the Indians
say, was what is known as the coast range of
mountains, while the crow's was the Sierra Nevada
range. But the eagle in his anger reversed the
position of the two heaps, and so the mountains
remain even to this day ; while all men honour
the eagle and despise the crow.
Another legend from North America says that
the coyote and the eagle created our earth. The
coyote scratched it up with his paws out of nothing-
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
ness ; only, the eagle complained that there were
no mountains for him to perch on, and so he fell
to work and scratched up ridges. When he flew
over them his feathers dropped down, took root,
and became trees; and the pin feathers, bushes
and plants. In the creation of animals and man
the coyote and the fox participated, the first being
an evil spirit, the other good. The coyote wanted
to make men mortal : " Let them die," he said.
The fox said, " Let them come back." But nobody
ever did come back, for the coyote's advice pre-
vailed. Last of all, the coyote brought fire into
the world, for the Indians were freezing. He
stole it from a place in the far west, from the two
old hags who guarded it; and this is how he con-
trived to get it safely home. He got together a
great company of animals, from the lion down to
the frog, and stationed them in a line all the way
to the far-distant land where the fire was, the
weakest animal nearest home, and the strongest
near the fire. Watching his opportunity, the
coyote seized a brand in his teeth and well-nigh
flew over the ground, the hags giving chase. He
reached the lion, who ran with the brand to the
next animal, and so on down to the frog. Whilst
the ground-squirrel was carrying it, he ran at
such a pace that his tail got afire, and he curled
it over his back, and so burned the black spot
258
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC,
behind his shoulders which he bears to this day.
He chucked the fire into the frog's open mouth,
and the frog gulped it down. ' He gave a great
jump, but the hags seized him by the tail (he
was a tadpole at the time) and tweaked it off.
Frogs have been tailless ever since. He swam
under water as long as he could hold his breath,
then he came up and spat the fire into a log of
drift-wood, where it has ever remained. When
the Indians rub two pieces of wood together the
fire comes forth.
In another legend of the North American Indians,
the lizard, in his attempt to steal fire, accidentally
set light to the dry grass, and so set all the country
ablaze, and did a lot of mischief.
First of all things existed the moon ; next came
the coyote, says the legend of another tribe. Be-
tween them they created all things. This is how
the coyote made man. Having finished the world
and the inferior creatures, he called a council of
them to deliberate on the creation of man. The
lion was the first to speak. He would like to see
man covered with hair, and with terrible fangs,
strong talons, and a mighty voice like his own.
" Ridiculous to have a voice like yours," said the
bear; "why, you scare away the very prey you
want to capture. No ; man should have prodigious
strength, but he should move silently, and withal
259
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
swiftly." The buck said that in his opinion man
would look foolish without a magnificent pair of
antlers on his head, to fight with ; and he agreed
with the bear that it would be absurd to make him
roar. Good ears and eyes would be more useful to
him than a mighty throat The mountain sheep
protested against the antlers, which would only
be caught in the thicket. If man is to have horns,
let them be rolled up like a stone on each side of
his head; then he could butt hard. "Stuff and
nonsense," said the coyote, whose turn it was to
speak. " Every one of you wants to make man
after his own image." They might just as well
take one of their own cubs and call it man. The
coyote conceded that each of the speakers had
certain good points. Man would have to be like
himself, of course, in having four legs, five fingers,
&c. The lion's voice would do well enough, for
man need not roar all the time ; the bear's feet were
not a bad shape to copy; the grizzly was happy,
too, in having no tail, for, in his (the coyote's) own
experience, that organ was only a harbour for
fleas. The buck's eyes and ears would do. Then
there was the fish, which was naked ; he certainly
favoured a man without hair. His claws should
be long, like the eagle's. But when it comes to the
question of wit, they must all acknowledge that it
would be necessary to make man, in this respect
260
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
also, like the coyote himself cunning and crafty.
The beaver said he had never heard such twaddle
in his life. No tail, indeed ! Why, man should
have a broad, flat tail, so that he could haul mud
on it. The owl said that all the animals seemed
to have lost their senses. How on earth could a
man get on without wings. " Wings ! " sneered
the mole. "Man would be certain to bump his
head against the sky. Besides, if he has wings
and eyes both, he will go flying too near the sun,
and have his eyes burnt out. Now, without eyes,
he could burrow in the cool, soft earth, and be
happy." "A man must have eyes," squeaked the
little mouse, "or how can he see what he is eat-
ing ? " The council broke up quarrelling, some of
the members behaving quite spitefully. Then each
animal took a lump of earth and began moulding
a man after his own idea, but the coyote made the
one he had been describing. It was so late before
they began, that night fell upon them, and they lay
down to sleep, leaving the models unfinished. But
the cunning coyote stayed awake, and finished his
man and gave it life, and spoiled all the other
models. Thus it was that man was made by the
coyote.
The Caribs, in their account of the Creation, say
that the Great Spirit sat on a mora-tree, and picking
off pieces of the bark, threw them into the stream,
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
and they became different animals. Then the Great
Spirit made a large mould, and out of this fresh, clean
clay the white man stepped. After it got a little
dirty the Indian was formed, and, the Spirit being
called away on business for a long period, the mould
became black and unclean, and out of it walked the
negro. All the Indian tribes of Guiana rank them-
selves far higher than the negro race, and the Caribs
consider themselves the first of the tribes.
One European Creation-myth must complete the
series. This version, probably of Tatar origin,
embodies the belief of the Mordvins, a race occupy-
ing Russian territory. It is unlike the versions
hitherto related in containing the dualistic idea of
an evil spirit trying to frustrate the designs of the
good spirit. Formerly, when there was no land,
Cham Pas, the supreme god, was drifting about on
a stone in the open sea, reflecting how to create a
visible world He spat in the sea and drifted on.
Presently, on looking back, he perceived that his
spittle had turned into a great hill, drifting in his
wake. He struck it with his sceptre to destroy it,
when out leapt Shaitan, the Devil. Cham Pas was
glad to have a companion with whom to take counsel
in the creation of the world. "Go to the bottom
and fetch sand," he said ; " only, take care that you
mention my name." Shaitan dived, but, in his pride,
would not mention God's name only his own;
262
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
accordingly, a flame rose at the bottom of the sea
and scorched him, and he could not get a single
grain. Cham Pas sent him down again, saying the
flame would not touch him did he mention God's
name. But this time also he got burnt, because he
would not pronounce the name of Cham Pas. With
renewed warning, God sent him down a third time.
Shaitan mentioned the name of Cham Pas and took
a mouthful of sand, part of which, however, he re-
tained by stealth in his cheek, thinking that he too
would make a world. Cham Pas scattered the sand
upon the sea, and it grew till it became dry land.
At the same rate grew the sand in Shaitan's cheek,
making him howl with pain as his head swelled.
He was obliged to confess what he had done.
Cham Pas struck him on the head, and bade him
spit out the sand. This he did with such violence
that the unconsolidated earth quaked, thus origina-
ting deep places, ravines, and valleys. Shaitan's
sand formed the hills, peaks, and mountains. And
Cham Pas cursed Shaitan and sent him to the
bottom of the sea, to the place of the dead, to the
fire that burned him, there to suffer punishment for
ever and ever.
An inexhaustible theme for the myth-maker is
the fanciful explanation of physical peculiarities in
man and beast, as well as of natural phenomena
generally. It has served for every clime and every
263
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
age, as the following examples, ancient and modern,
will show.
When St Peter took the piece of money for
Caesar's tax out of the fish's mouth, he left the
impress of his finger and thumb on the fish. The
Scotch say that this accounts for the black marks
on the haddock.
Ina, the heroine of a South Sea myth, used to
bathe in a pool, and got on friendly terms with an
eel. " At last the fish took his courage in both fins
and made his declaration. He was Tuna, the chief
of all eels. ' Be mine,' he cried, and Ina was his.
For some mystical reason he was obliged to leave
her, but (like the White Cat in the fairy-tale) re-
quested her to cut off his eel's head and bury it.
Regretfully but firmly did Ina comply with his
request, and from the buried eel's head sprang
two cocoa - trees, one from each half of the
brain of Tuna. As a proof of this, be it re-
marked that when the nut is husked we always
find on it ' the two eyes and mouth of the lover of
Ina.'"
Chinese legend accounts in a similar way for the
two eyes of the cocoa-nut. The Prince Liu Yeh
quarrelled with Prince Yueh, and sent a man to
assassinate him. His head, which the assassin
suspended on a tree, was metamorphosed into a
cocoa-nut, with two eyes on the shell. Thus the
264
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES ETC.
fruit acquired the name of Yueh-wang-t'ou, or
" Prince Yueh's head."
The inquirer may learn from the Icelandic Her-
verar Saga why eagles have short tails. King
Heidrik boasted of his power to solve all riddles.
So Odin himself, disguised as a blind man, visited
him, and asked him hard questions. The king
answered them all, his replies, like the questions,
being given in verse. He bade the blind man
ask another. Then the god asked what Odin
whispered into the ear of Baldur before he was
burned on his funeral pyre. And Heidrik there-
upon drew his sword and struck at his questioner,
saying, "None can answer that but yourself."
Odin had just time to transform himself into an
eagle, but the sword smote off his tail; wherefore
eagles ever since have had short tails.
Where the turkey-buzzard struts, the following
story is told to account for its total baldness. When
the animals were leaving the ark, Noah administered
to each some fitting advice before landing them on
a wicked world. And to the turkey-buzzard he
said, " My children, if you see a man stoop down,
look out for yourselves, lest he be picking up a stone
to heave at you." The turkey-buzzard thanked
him for the hint, then added, "Suppose the man
has a stone ready in his pocket, what then ? "
Noah was taken aback ; the shrewdness of the
265
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
remark bereft him of rejoinder; and he decreed
that the turkey-buzzard must henceforth be born
bald, in token of its great sagacity.
In West Highland folk-lore, the same dialogue
takes place between the hoodie and the shrewd
young one she is catechising ; and in Ireland,
between the old and the young crow. But Noah
was not by to commemorate these cute young
birds.
The crow, by the way, was originally white.
Hesiod has told us why the crow is black. Apollo
was in love with Coronis, but she was unfaithful
to him. The crow was the bearer of this distress-
ing news, and Apollo in his anger cursed it, that
it should ever after be black.
Scripture also teacheth why the partridge flies
low. It was because Daedalus was turned into a
partridge, and he had seen his son Icarus perish
through a lofty flight. This made him cautious.
It is not recorded how Little Bo-Peep's sheep
came to lose their tails ; but take almost any animal
that has a short tail, and folk-lore will tell the reason
why. Now, why has the bear a stumpy tail ?
A fox jumped into a waggon which was laden with
fish, and, as it went along, threw a number out into
the road, and then slipped off himself and fell to feast-
ing. A bear came along and asked him concerning
his remarkable catch of fish, and the fox volunteered
266
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
to show the bear how he could do likewise. So
they went together that night on to the ice, and the
fox told the bear to put his tail down through a
hole, that the fish might bite. " Sit very still," said
the fox. The bear presently shifted a little, and
his tail was slightly pulled, for it was freezing to
the ice. " Don't be in a hurry," said the fox ; " you
are strong, and can get a good haul." So the bear
waited; and the next time he moved, his tail was
pulled a little harder. " Not yet," said the fox ;
" more will take hold." When morning was come,
the fox ran towards a house on the bank and set
the dogs barking. This so alarmed the bear that
he pulled with all his might, and left his tail frozen
hard to the ice. Bears have had short tails ever
since.
This is a Russian and an Onondaga story. A
Norse story is like it, but without the waggon in-
cident. A French story and a Scotch story account
in the same way for the stumpy tail of a wolf.
Brer Rabbit, according to " Uncle Remus," lost his
long bushy tail through this same practical joke,
perpetrated by Brer Fox. In Bornu, a hyaena puts
his tail into the hole, that the weasel may fasten
the meat to it ; but the weasel fastens a stick to it
instead, and the hyaena pulls till his tail breaks.
The common origin of this story of the Tail-Fisher
is unmistakable. The hyrax, according to a Zulu
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
fable, went without a tail, because, on the day when
tails were given out, he sent for his instead of
troubling to apply personally. And a Russian
story tells how the hare lost her tail. It was
thus :
The fox and the hare were sent in quest of a
magic fluid. Their way lay between grinding hills
(like the Symplegades). The fox went and re-
turned in safety; but the hare, on her way back,
was not in time quite to clear the meeting cliffs,
and her tail was jammed between them. Since
that time hares have had no tails to speak of. The
California!! Indians, who claim descent from the
prairie wolf, explain the loss of their tails by say-
ing that the acquired habit of sitting upright has
utterly destroyed that beautiful member.
The following Serbian myth accounts for the
hollow in the sole of man's foot The Devil stole
the sun and stuck it on a lance, which he left
planted in the ground whilst he went bathing with
an Archangel. The Archangel dived and brought
up -some sand. The Devil spat on the ground, and
a magpie arose from his spittle, to mount guard
while the Devil also dived. He was no sooner
under than the Archangel made the sign of the
cross, and the water was frozen over; then off he
flew to heaven with the impaled sun. The magpie
screamed. The Devil could not get out till he had
268
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
sunk again in search of a stone to break the ice.
He managed to overtake the Archangel just as he
had got one foot in heaven, and he caught hold of
the other foot and tore off a large piece of flesh.
The Archangel complained to God, who decreed,
in order to pacify him, that every man should hence-
forth have a hollow on the sole of his foot.
A Hottentot myth gives the origin of the hare's
cleft lip. The moon sent the hare to men to
deliver this message : " Like as I die and rise to
life again, so you also shall die and rise to life
again." But the hare said instead: "Like as I
die and do not rise again, so you shall also die
and not rise to life again," and then returned and
told the moon what he had done. The moon struck
at him with a hatchet, meaning to split his skull ;
but the blow fell short, and the hare escaped with
his life, though the hatchet slit his lip, as it has
remained ever since. But the hare clawed at the
moon's face, and made the scars which we still
see.
The reader may learn from " Uncle Remus "
why the negro is black, the opossum has no hair
on its tail, the guinea-fowl is speckled, and why
chickens are always scratching.
The Prose Edda gives the traditional reason why
the sea is salt. There was once a golden time of
peace and plenty, when every one had whatsoever
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
he wanted. For the Giant Frodi had a mill which
ground out peace and plenty, and withal such an
abundance of gold, that golden armlets lay un-
touched from year's end to year's end on the king's
highway. In Frodi's house were two maidens, a
giant's daughters, whom he had bought as slaves,
and he kept them grinding at that mill until they
lost all patience and ground no longer peace and
plenty, but fire and war. Then came a mighty
sea-rover by night and slew Frodi and all his
men, and carried off the maids and the quern.
When they had got well out to sea he bade them
grind salt, and they ground with a vengeance.
The ship was full and sank, the maids of the
mill and all. So the quern was lost for ever,
and the sea remains salt to this day.
The mysterious "sampo" in the Finnish Kale-
wala is a mill, " for corn one day, for salt the next,
for money the next." Eventually it gets lost in
the sea, and, no doubt, accounts for the saltness.
The reader is doubtless, too, reminded of the quern
in the Norse story, which ground everything, from
a Christmas dinner and a whole larderful of dainties
to the herrings and broth which nearly submerged
an entire parish. Next it ground gold, and, finally,
the salt, which sunk it and the ship to the bottom of
the sea, where it grinds away still.
Certain of the myths related above are obviously
270
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
the result of the exercise of a rudimentary literary
faculty ; they are, that is to say, conscious fictions.
The most important class of these take the widely-
spread and primitive form of fables about beasts,
kinship with whom is everywhere recognised by
early man. How, indeed, can he arrive at thinking
himself a creature quite different from an animal,
when he sees that the latter has the same habits
and ways as himself.
"He sat among the woods, he heard
The sylvan merriment ; he saw
The pranks of butterfly and bird,
The humours of the ape, the daw.
And in the lion or the frog
In all the life of moor and fen,
In ass and peacock, stork and log,
He read similitudes of men."
Thus savage myths tell of the ancestors of mankind
living with animals as near relations ; and we see
survival of this sense of affinity in the unwillingness
of certain tribes to kill particular animals, and in
the exemplary kindness shown towards them which
is a striking trait in the Oriental. No Korean, for
instance, ever kills a snake; however poor and
hungry he may be, he will share his evening meal
with the reptiles that crawl round his dwelling.
There was no moral lesson intended in the
original Beast- Fable, nor has it entered into those
which are told at the present day by Australians,
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Kamchadales, Polynesians, North American Indians,
Basques, and Transylvanian Gipsies. To the irra-
tional mind of the savage, as has been amply
demonstrated in these pages, the beast with human
attributes seems natural enough ; it is no fictitious
creature invented to preach morals. And it is
amongst savages, who ascribe to the lower animals
the power of speech, and a nature resembling their
own, that beast-stories had their first home. Later
on, with progressive culture and a growing moral
sense, these develop into the didactic apologue,
and reach the class of fables proper, which are
due to conscious literary art. It is unnecessary in
this place to trace the literary pedigree of what
are known as -<Esopic fables, the greater number
of the genuine fables of mediaeval times being
associated with the name of ^Esop, whom it is
usual to place in the sixth century B.C. Suffice
it to say that the ultimate source of many of the
fables that have come down to us, whether the
Greek of Babrius, or the Latin of Phaedrus, was
the Jatakas, or Buddhist Birth Stories, and other
Indian tales which have found their way west-
ward. The ancient Persian Fables of Bidpai were
translations of old Indian originals, represented
in the Pantschatontra, the Hitopadesa, and the
Arabic Kalilah wa Dimnah, which the pure fable
of mediaeval times followed so closely.
272
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
Good examples of stories in which animals play
human parts, and which have for their theme the
triumph of cunning over mere strength, are those
stories of the negroes in the Southern States of
America, which " Uncle Remus " tells to the little
boy. Stories similar to these are still told by the
natives of many parts of Africa ; indeed, the beast-
fable is found all over the world. True ^Esopic
humour informs the stories of Zulus and Hottentots.
In Bushman lore the hare, as among American
negroes the rabbit, plays much the same clever part
as the fox in our European examples. " Even in
the advanced civilisation of Ancient Egypt the beast-
fable held an important place. 'The Lion and the
Mouse' is found in a papyrus dating from 1200-
1166 B.C., the days of Rameses III." Four excel-
lent examples of beast-fables, resembling more
particularly the African, have been found in the
cuneiform inscriptions of Babylonia, among the
fragmentary records of Assur-bani-pal's library.
There is no doubt, therefore, as to the venerable
and hoary antiquity of even the written fable. Its
composition depends mainly "upon a sympathetic
and humorous observation of certain animals, whose
adventures conform to their supposed character and
their known habits."
" And lo ! the Beasts no more were dumb,
But answered out of brakes and trees."
273 S
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
A single illustration must suffice. This fable, told
in China, is of Indian origin.
"A tiger having seized a monkey, was about to
devour him; but the monkey, bethinking himself
of some means of escape, suggested that he was
too small to make a good meal for a tiger, and
offered to conduct his captor to a neighbouring hill
where a far more noble prey might be captured.
This was a stag, who, rightly assuming that the
tiger had come for a most unfriendly purpose, con-
cluded that his only chance was to put a bold face
upon the matter, and accordingly addressed the
monkey as follows : ' How is this ? You pro-
mised me ten tiger skins, and you have only brought
one ; you still owe me nine.' The tiger, hearing this,
became alarmed, and instantly decamped, vowing
that he never thought the monkey could be so
treacherous."
Like the beast-fable, the folk- tale also cannot be
profitably examined without such insight, as the
foregoing chapters have afforded, into the beliefs
and customs of our fore-parents. These savage
beliefs are distantly echoed in the irrational ele-
ments of many European tales, and establish their
claim to a very remote antiquity. In all our folk-
tales the relations between heroes and animals are
usually kind and helpful. Every one can recall
legends of children being suckled by animals, or fed
274
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
by birds. The wood-pecker, the bird of Mars, pur-
veyed for his children Romulus and Remus (as
the ravens fed Elijah) when the wolfs milk did
not suffice them. A she-wolf nourished the infant
Dietrich, whence his name Wolfdietrich ; a hind
offered her milk to Sigurd, in the Northern saga.
In Greek legend, Atalanta was suckled by a bear ;
the Ainos of Japan say that their first ancestor
was suckled by a bear, and that is why they are so
hairy. Semiramis was exposed when an infant by
her mother the fish-goddess, and miraculously pre-
served by doves. To be thus protected and reared
by bird or beast is the widely-prevalent fate of the
hero race, according to universal legend and count-
less folk-tales. And not alone to babes and suck-
lings in distress do the "helpful animals" appear.
Whenever a hero is in danger, swans, ravens,
wolves, stags, bears, and lions join him to render
aid. That is how animal-figures in the scutcheons
and helmet-insignia of heroes are in many cases to
be accounted for, while others may be referred to
the hero's power of transforming himself.
Then, again, there is the " Grateful Beast,"
who is cast for a most important role among the
dramatis persona of the folk-tale. Nothing is more
common than for a hero to do some kindness to a suf-
fering animal, who afterwards shows his gratitude by
signal service to his benefactor at a critical moment.
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AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
Beasts in household tales converse, and so do
birds, but in an unknown tongue. Only the speci-
ally favoured can understand them. Frequently a
knowledge of birds' language comes of eating a
white snake, as in the German story. That famous
king had the wisdom of serpents ; nothing was
hidden from him. And no wonder. Every day
after dinner he ate in solitude of a secret dish,
which none but himself might uncover. Curiosity
one day overcame the king's servant ; he lifted the
cover, and saw a white snake on the dish. In a
moment he had tasted it, and as the morsel touched
his tongue he heard the sparrows chattering to-
gether, and knew what they were saying ; for eating
the snake had taught him the language of animals.
According to a Scotch saga, the middle piece of a
white snake, roasted by the fire, gives a knowledge
of supernatural things to any one who shall put
his finger into the fat which drops from it. Sieg-
fried in the Volsunga-Saga, like Sigurd in the
Western Wolsung-Lay, understands the birds' talk
when he has tasted the heart of the dragon Fafni.
In the saga of Seeburg, the serving-man tastes a
piece off a silver-white snake, and immediately
knows what the fowls, ducks, geese, doves, and
sparrows in the yard are saying of the speedy
downfall of the castle. Pliny records the same re-
sult from eating serpent's flesh. In Iceland one
276
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
sufficiently safe way of acquiring a knowledge of
the language of birds is recorded : " Take the tongue
of a hawk, and put it in honey for two days and
three nights ; place it then under your own tongue,
and you will understand the language of birds. It
must not, however, be carried elsewhere than under
the tongue, for the hawk is a poisonous bird." In
other cases the knowledge is acquired by means of
a herb, which one need only put in the mouth to
understand what the cocks crow and the dogs bark.
Or, accidental stepping on the golden herb (possibly
the mistletoe) causes one to fall asleep, and under-
stand the speech of dogs, wolves, and birds. Or
if, on Midsummer Eve, when the fern bursts into
wondrous bloom, you can catch this bloom, you
will be able to make yourself invisible, as well as
to understand animals' language. Arabian and
Persian traditions represent Solomon as acquainted
with the language of beasts and birds. Helenus
the seer, whom ./Eneas consulted, understood the
language of birds and the omens drawn from their
prophetic flight. All the talking birds of the folk-
tales are the direct consequence of savage belief,
but for which we should probably never have heard
the saying, " A little bird told me."
Other of the leading " irrational" or unnatural ideas
in European as well as in savage household tales may
be briefly cited. In each case they are derived from
277
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the beliefs and ideas of savages ; for when they
occur in civilised tales, they must be regarded as a
survival from a past of savagery, or as having been
borrowed in recent times from tales of the uncivi-
lised. A girl marries a frog, afterwards transformed
into a man (the story is told by Zulus, Russians,
Magyars, Scots, Germans); or she marries a man
who is afterwards transformed by sorcery or witch-
craft into an animal (a motif that is employed uni-
versally) ; she is accused of bearing puppies (a very
common incident in European tales; compare the
myths in which a human ancestress is said to have
given birth to an animal of the totem species, ante,
p. 112); she receives counsel from a talking bird or
animal (animals are akin to men) ; finally, her tra-
ducers fail to compass her death, for when thrown
into the lake she is transformed into a turtle ; when
the turtle is eaten, the carapace turns into a plant ;
the peel (which is the life thereof) into a bird ; the
bird into a tree ; and so on, the girl's soul for ever
escaping (compare the savage belief in a separable
soul, and see the stories given in illustration, ante, pp.
83, 84). Cinderella (of whose world-famed, truly
popular story nearly four hundred separate versions
are on record) holds converse with her dead mother
at the grave ; or, according to other accounts, she
talks with the animal into whose shape her mother's
soul passed at death. (Savages believe, as we have
278
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
seen, in the possibility of communion with the dead,
also that the human soul quits the dead body and
passes into animal shapes.) All sorts of inanimate
objects in folk-tales obey incantations. Drops of
blood speak, as in the Finnish Kalewala, in the
Norse story of the Mastermaid, in the German story
of Sweetheart Roland, and in the Biblical story of
the murder of Abel ("The voice of thy brother's
blood crieth unto Me from the ground "). Drops of
spittle speak in stories told in Russia, in Zululand,
in the Scotch Highlands, and among the Basques, as
in the German story where the witch is ready to kill
and cook Hansel because he is fat; but Grethel sets
him free, and with him takes to her heels, after spit-
ting in front of the hearth. " Will the water soon
be ready ? " cries the witch. " I am just fetching
it," answers the spittle, and so on, whilst the chil-
dren are getting away.
That witch was a cannibal ; many such figure in
European as well as in savage marchen. The man-
eating ogre smells human flesh (" Fee, fi, fo, fum ")
wheresoever he stalks that is to say, all over
Europe, from Iceland to Portugal, from Norway to
Italy, from Russia to Greece; he scents the blood
of Hottentots, Zulus, Canadian Indians, Asiatics,
South Americans, and Polynesians, even as the
Eumenides in the Greek tragedy smelt out Orestes,
and Hidimbas, the rakshasa in the Mahabharata
279
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
(the Indian Epic), smelt man's flesh from afar. If
this ogre (whose Italian name uorco is derived from
Orcus, the ancient god of the lower world) is one-
eyed, like the Lapland giant Stalo, the Gaelic Crin-
nawn, the Tatar Depeghoz, and Sindbad's man-eat-
ing giant, he is usually blinded with a red-hot poker,
as Odysseus blinded the Cyclops Polyphemus.
Rhyming charms and mystic formulae are em-
ployed in mdrchen to create mist or darkness or
dazzling light, as the savage medicine-man uses
incantations when he makes the weather. So, magic
words and magic wand open the treasure-filled rocks,
call spirits from the vasty deep, cause food and rai-
ment, chariot and horsemen, to appear, and, in short,
effect all sorts of conjuring. Nothing is impossible :
" The dead return to life,
Rivers are dried, winds stayed."
And so, fertile fancy, wielding the wizard's wand,
gives us all the transformations and enchantment of
delightful fairyland. "All impediments in fancy's
course are motives of more fancy," and with all the
marvellous " properties " ready for use, the wishing-
box, -lamp, -bell, tarn-cap and fairy-purse, the
seven-league boots, the magic swords, all other
talismans, how easy it is to spin yarns.
It would be impossible in this place to catalogue
even a tithe of the several incidents that are met
with in folk-tales. Some of the most familiar have
280
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
been given. They are the common property of all
story-tellers. The same incidents differently com-
bined compose the infinitely various stories, whose
elemental likeness yet links them in an endless chain
that girdles the globe, making kin of all mankind.
Ut ansa trahit ansam, ita fabula fabulam ; as a
chain's link draws a link, so does a story a story.
They are countless : some invented solely for the
gratification of the imagination ; others, again, seem-
ing to have arisen from a few ideas of right and
wrong, of duty or expediency. They are designed
perhaps to serve as awful warnings, like the Biblical
story of the bears that ate the rude little boys for
making game of old age.
" For wisdom dealt with mortal powers
Where truth in closest words shall fail,
When truth embodied in a tale
Shall enter in at lowly doors."
We often meet with marchen exhibiting the reward
of virtue and kindness, the punishment of greed or
avarice ; the disaster following disobedience, as in
the case of opening a forbidden door (witness the
" Blue Beard " set of stories), or of infringing a
marriage-taboo. See, for example, what calamity
befell poor Psyche because she dared to disregard
the prohibition, and lit a lamp and looked upon her
sleeping bridegroom. This is the old-world, im-
mortal story which everybody knows. For, take
281
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
away the names of Cupid, Psyche, and of Aphro-
dite, the jealous mother-in-law, and what is left is
nothing more nor less than a traditional popular
tale.
" The wise reeds talked in the river
When this tale came to be born,"
and the social institutions of the savage imposed
all sorts of restrictions, such as the following :
Husband and wife may not meet by daylight ; the
name of the husband is strictly taboo'd ; husbands
may not see their wives unveiled for three years
after marriage, and so on ; for these are the usages
of savages at the present day. " Beauty and the
Beast" is one of the innumerable stories which
treat of the advancement of the beautiful youngest
daughter, and the revengeful jealousy of the elder
sisters. " Cinderella " is another example. Simi-
larly, it is invariably the elder sons who are jealous
of a fortunate junior. The natural explanation of
this common incident in folk-tales is, that in poly-
gamous countries the youngest child is the heir.
A survival may be seen in the old custom of
Jiingsten Recht, as it is called, or Borough English,
which is of very wide diffusion.
Nursery-tales, or marchen, deal with the ad-
ventures of imaginary heroes and heroines, and
are highly coloured with the supernatural. Among
these may be cited "Jack and the Beanstalk," "Jack
282
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
the Giant-Killer," "Cinderella," "Blue Beard," and
" The Sleeping Beauty," as popular favourites.
When the self-same traditional stories profess to
deal with real occurrences, the adventures being
attributed to supposed ancestral heroes, they are
called Sagas, or heroic epics. By being tacked on
to the gods, they enter the realm of Mythology.
This term is sometimes applied to the collected
myths of a nation, but belongs more especially to
the myths or legends of cosmogony, of gods, and of
heroes. The mythical stories connected with his-
torical personages, or particular places, are usually
called Legends. Folk-tales, V oiks-mar chen } or Contes
populaires have been handed down by oral tradi-
tion from remote antiquity. At various times they
have been lifted into literature, as, for instance,
when we recognise them in the Odyssey and Rig-
veda, in the "Thousand and One Nights," or, again,
under more or less disguise of elaboration, by Boc-
caccio (1348), Straparola (1550), Basile (1637), and
by Perrault (1697), or in old French fabliaux.
The Brothers Grimm, at the beginning of this
century, were the first to collect the stories, for.
scientific purposes, from the lips of people living
in Hesse and Hanau ; since their time, thousands
of stories have been printed from all quarters of
the globe.
Attempts have been made to classify all known
283
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
folk-tales under certain prominent types, so that
each story in a new collection may be at once re-
ferred to the group to which it belongs. This is
possible with a large number of stories, but others
cannot be so simply identified. Seventy such types,
forming a representative list, are given in the Folk-
lore Society's " Handbook."
In a separate class must be placed the Drolls,
or Comic Tales, of which the German " Clever
Elsie" is a well-known example. The Danish " Not
a Pin to Choose between Them " is another. In
this story a man sets out in quest of three greater
fools than his own wife, and easily finds them.
Similar noodles supply the light comedy in stories
told in India and all over Europe. The ludicrous
adventures of "The M 'Andrew Family," most de-
lightful noodles, are recorded in Mr. Jacobs' " More
Celtic Tales."
" Cumulative" stories are piled up by the repeti-
tion of all preceding steps upon the addition of each
new one, as in "The House that Jack Built," and
" The Old Woman and her Pig."
Popular folk-songs, or Volkslieder, play an im-
portant part in the scheme of folk-lore. Their
study really began with Scott's " Minstrelsy of the
Scottish Border" (1802-3).
The folk-song is probably older than the folk-
tale. Stories told in rhyme are much more easily
284
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
remembered, and all things worth remembering
were rhythmically arranged and sung. Thus we
find laws and ceremonial formulae preserved in
verse, as well as traditional narratives. It will be
remembered that in many folk-tales the magic
words which are to effect some miracle, and all
invocations, are repeated in verse, or jiggling
rhyme. The whole of the famous story of "Cat-
skin " is preserved in more than one version of an
English folk-song. But folk-songs or ballads, as a
rule, differ from folk-tales, inasmuch as they lay
claim to credibility. The characters hi folk-tales
whose adventures, disasters, and successes excite
our interest, eventually attain their desires, and live
happy ever after. The story of the popular ballad,
on the contrary, has usually a tragic or a melan-
choly ending. The lovers are united only in death
(see pp. 73-4, supra). Songs tell of the dead mother
coming back to comfort her sorrowing children, and
of the dead lover who rises from the grave to
console his beloved, as in the Swedish ballad of
" Little Christina." She hears a light tapping on
her chamber door ; she lets her dead betrothed come
in, and she washes his feet with pure wine. The
cock crows, and the dead must depart The young
girl follows her lover to the graveyard, and sits on
his tomb. But he bids her go back to her dwelling-
place. " Every time a tear falls from thine eyes,"
285
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
he says, "my shroud is full of blood; every time
thy heart is gay, my shroud is full of rose leaves."
Love and Death are favourite themes of popular
poetry ; others are afforded by Nature, War, and
the Chase. Winter dies and Spring revives; the
time of the singing of birds is come ; the nightingale
sings to the rose, the brooks murmur in cadence,
and the pines are stirred to music by the wind in
their tops ; lovely it is to rest at noontide and
at evening. Popular poetry has a special in-
terest in thus reflecting the emotions and senti-
ments of the folk. Their highest aspirations are
sure to have been committed to their traditionary
songs.
The skalds or bards chanted the praises of the
popular heroes or headmen, till it became a custom
for every fighting chief to have his own particular
bard or bards. They went unarmed into the fight,
and encouraged the combatants with their songs, as
military music heartens the warrior of to-day. As
the profession of bard declined, that of the ballad-
monger took its place. These wandering minstrels
sang for pay to any audience they could find, being
welcome alike to courtly dame and lowly taverner,
in the days when books were few, and newspapers
were not at all. In the East, story-teller and ballad-
monger are just where they were centuries ago.
Like the immortal Homer, most of the wandering
286
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
minstrels who carried the popular songs from
village to village were blind men.
Italy is, par excellence, the land of song, the
Italians being the most poetical people of Europe.
The popular British ballad of Lord Ronald, other-
wise Rowlande, which has been met with in Ger-
many and Sweden, is still sung in Tuscany, Venetia,
and Lombardy. Everywhere the poisoned food is
the same " roasted eel," or " eels boil'd in broo'."
It is thought that the Italian version, sung 250
years ago in Verona, was most likely the original.
But besides the ballad, the love-song, the harvest-
song, and the slogan, all popular rhymes connected
with places (see p. 147), with superstitions, or with
the weather come under the head of folk-poetry, as
well as all lullabies and nursery-songs, and rhymes
for children's amusements generally. Much atten-
tion has been paid to children's rhymes and for-
mulas of play, which have been found to be handed
down from immemorial antiquity, and to reflect the
life, and even the religion, of long-past times. The
games and rhymes of English children of to-day,
and of their American cousins, are identical with
those of Germany, France, Italy, and Sweden. It
must be borne in mind that these are traditional
games, handed down from generation to generation ;
it is only of late years that descriptions of the
games, and their rules, have been published. In
287
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
the singing games, of which the tragic story of
Jenny Jones is a remarkable specimen, we seem to
get an insight into the nature of the earliest acted
tragedy which developed into primitive drama. The
mumming-plays, which may still be witnessed in
certain of our own country districts, are folk-tales
in dramatic verse. The nursery-rhymes and riddles
of the most distant and varied nations present the
same striking identity. In China, as well as all
over Europe, children repeat the well-known invo-
cation beginning
" Snail, snail, put out your horn."
Civilised and savage alike delight in asking riddles ;
obviously they belong to a higher grade of savagery ;
the original kind are old-fashioned problems, with a
real answer, not like the modern verbal conundrum.
Savages propound such as the following Zulu
riddle : "Guess some men who are many and form
a row ; they dance the wedding-dance, adorned in
white hip-dresses." The answer to this is, " The
teeth." The Basutos ask, " What throws itself
from the mountain-top without being broken ? "
Answer, "A waterfall." Of such is the famous
enigma of the Sphinx, and Samson's well-known
riddle, with its matter-of-fact answer.
The folk-lorist has another wide field for explora-
tion in the department of old rhymes and old pro-
288
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
verbs, which have preserved for our enlightenment
much of the wisdom of the folk. History, as well as
philosophy, may frequently underlie " wise saws ; "
as, when one hears that " Tis time to yoke when
the cart comes to the capples," in an English county,
we know that the Celts here, at all events, have
lived beyond the Teutonic Conquest, for capples is
a corruption of a Celtic word for horses. Every
country, whether civilised or savage, has its store
of proverbs, and many collections have been made.
Five thousand proverbs have been collected, orally,
in Ulster ; and other abundant harvest attests the
need of some scientific classification. The Servians
say, as we do, that the Devil is not so black as he
is painted. Saxo, the Dane, quotes many a proverb
which finds an echo with us : A friend is known
at need ; any port in a storm ; the bird is infamous
that fouls its own nest ; if there be a will for the
deed, a way will open ; and, it takes cunning to
catch a fox. "Set a thief to catch a thief" is ever
our advice : " A thief myself, I know a thief s foot-
prints," says an epigram of Callimachus.
The proverbial philosophy of uncivilised races
may also bear comparison with our own. In West
Africa they say, " He fled from the sword and hid
in the scabbard," which is as forcible as our own
" Out of the frying-pan into the fire." Sometimes a
popular saying has its origin in a fable or story, as
289 T
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
when we liken to the old man with his donkey the
person who is anxious to please all and satisfies
none. A favourite Chinese fable affords an example
of this. Pigs in Korea are generally black ; but a
white one having once made its appearance, the
king thought it worth offering to the Chinese Em-
peror, and accordingly sent ambassadors to present
it. When they reached Peking, however, so many
white pigs were to be seen, that the ambassadors
thought it would be ridiculous to carry out their
mission. Hence, " to offer a white pig to the Em-
peror " is equivalent to our " carrying coals to New-
castle," or the Greeks' "owls to Athens." The
Chinaman, by the way, buys " a cat in a bag," not
" a pig in a poke."
In conclusion, something further must be said as
to the problem which has been repeatedly presented
to the reader by the citation of myths and stories
throughout these pages, and that is, the startling
similarity in the substance of these stories, even
when we compare those told by Hottentots, Maoris,
Annamese, Samoans, Red Indians, or Eskimos with
stories told in any European country. It has been
found that certain incidents, plots, and character-
istics occur everywhere "as the ill-treatment of
the youngest son or daughter, who is eventually
successful, and is often the heir ; the substitution of
a false bride for the true ; the abduction of a bride
290
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
by a youthful hero, and the pursuit by her giant (or
supernatural) father, who is outwitted by cunning ;
a supernatural husband or wife, who is for some
cause obliged to abandon a human mate; forbidden
chambers, and the disasters that follow from their
being opened ; descents into the world of gloom,
and the danger of eating there; husband and wife
forbidden to see each other or name each other's
names ; the souls of the dead entering animal forms ;
and the interchange of kindly offices, as if on equal
terms, between men and beasts." Then again, it is
not only the savage tales that contain the unnatural
and irrational elements ; these, as has been shown,
are commonly met with in European tales.
That the irrational elements in myths and tales
have their origin in the uncivilised imagination is a
conclusion that can scarcely be controverted. What
rational being, for example, could conceive of an
attachment (unless "a la Plato") for a bashful
young potato ? whereas a girl, in a Wallachian tale,
actually marries a pumpkin ; and elsewhere, so a
story goes, a girl is the mother of a gourd. Who
would dream of an iron stove for a husband (as
in the German story), except people on the same
mental plane as the Hurons, who habitually married
their girls, with a formal ceremony, to their fishing
nets ? When, therefore, incidents such as these are
related in civilised countries, we may either suppose
291
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
that they have been handed down from the savage
past in which they were conceived, or that they
have been borrowed in recent times from the un-
civilised.
A comparison of the myths and tales of different
peoples throws this light upon their structure.
They are survivals of a primitive stage of culture
through which all races pass, and in which they
much resemble each other, both in the crude work-
ings of their minds and in the rude work of their
hands. The same problems presented themselves
to the aboriginal races in all parts of the world, and
we see in myths their attempted solution. What
was the origin of the world ? How explain the
sun's behaviour ? Why does rain fall ? These are
the eternal questions some, like Tertullian's, still
unanswered. Unde homo etquomodo, et unde Deus ?
(Whence is man and how, and whence is God ?)
How was I born ? said the Greek epigrammatist,
whence am I ? Why did I come ? to go again.
And so we have our Creation-myths, and those
accounting for all natural phenomena; and with
myths have many minds been appeased.
Another class of myth are mere fanciful inven-
tions of the indulged imagination, like the romances
of civilised times. The extraordinary and striking
similarities of fancy displayed on this side of the
globe and on that, call for some explanation. Has
292
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
one nation borrowed its tales from another? Did
all tales start from one centre and spread to all the
corners ? Have they been handed down from the
common ancestors of the separate peoples? Have
identical ideas sprung up independently? These
are the problems which beset the student of folk-lore.
No one theory, standing by itself, affords adequate
explanation, but each may fit some particular case.
Where there is a common language there is a
common stock of legends. We find similar tales in
Greece and Norway, because both peoples have pre-
served them as their common heritage. But when
Eskimos and Zulus tell similar stories, this explana-
tion does not hold. In this case the stories have
either been independently invented, or they have
been carried from one part of the world to another.
Aryan and non-Aryan legends may contain common
mythical elements, and yet not be of common origin.
In fact, nearly every myth which is found in different
forms amongst different Aryan-speaking peoples can
be paralleled by similar tales from the remotest
quarters of the globe. For instance, our "Jack and
the Beanstalk" myth is found among Zulus and
American Indians, the central idea of all its variants
being alike, by virtue of the like nature of the minds
that conceived them. Again, because Australians
have a star-myth resembling the Greek myth of the
Pleiades, it is not necessary to conclude that they
293
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
borrowed it from a European, or that they are a
detached branch of the Indo-European race, who
spread from one centre, bearing their tales with them.
The ancestors of the Greeks and the Australians,
wishing to explain certain phenomena, may both
have hit upon the same idea, men's minds working
alike under like conditions.
On the other hand, we meet with widely-scattered
stories which are unmistakably of common origin.
Such are the Tail-fisher stories given above (see pp.
266-7) ' their only difference is in the local colouring,
the plot serving equally in Europe, Asia, Africa, and
America.
" A wanderer is man from his birth,"
and the migrations of people in prehistoric times
may well have secured the transmission of myth.
Furthermore, the importation of myths is a natural
consequence of traffic in slaves, and of the practice
of obtaining wives from alien tribes, and of taking
captives in war. Also, as a probable channel of
communication, that ubiquitous, wandering, and
specially gifted Oriental race, the Gipsies, must not
be forgotten.
Undoubtedly the appearance of certain stories in
Europe, Egypt, and South Africa tends to prove a
historical connection, near or remote, between those
regions. And it is possible to trace certain stories
294
MYTHS, FOLK-TALES, ETC.
to their original home, just as one may trace the
invention of the hammock to South America and
the West Indies, whence it has spread over the
world, carrying with it its Haitian name, hamac.
But there is not necessarily a historical connection
between distant countries in which similar customs
are found to prevail, or in which, as has been said,
similar myths are told. The likeness in the inven-
tive faculty of remote peoples is traced in their
chipped stone implements, in their pottery, and in
their use of fire, and may equally be exhibited
in their myths. To seek for a common origin of
barbaric conceptions is as vain as to seek for a
common origin of all barbaric culture, or for a
single primitive language. Every savage group, as
we know, has its own dialect, and coins its own
expressions. No language becomes durable until it
is the means of communication between numerous
tribes aggregated into one people ; not till then can
it disseminate story-germs.
The well-known exploit of William Tell, the
wonderful marksman, may be cited as an instance
of a myth which, in its general features, was
known to our Aryan-speaking ancestors before they
left their original cradle wherever that may have
been. Probably there was no such person as
William Tell. At any rate, his existence is no less
hypothetical than that of Mrs. 'Arris herself; and
295
AN INTRODUCTION TO FOLK-LORE
whatever the patriotic Swiss may delight to tell, as
to his shooting the apple from his son's head in
1296, his story has no historical value whatever.
Saxo tells the same story of a Danish hero named
Palnatoki, one of King Harold's body-guard, as
occurring in the year 950. The story appears also
in England, in the Ballad of William of Cloudeslee ;
it appears in Norway, in Finland, and in Russia ;
in Persia it is told by a poet born in 1119; and
there is reason for supposing that it was known in
India. Of one of their own marksmen, Samoyeds,
Turks, and Mongolians have precisely the same tale
to tell ; and probably the explanation lies in the fact
that these have borrowed it in recent times from
the Aryan-speaking nations, who have inherited
their fireside legends, as well as their languages
and their customs, from a common ancestral stock.
An examination of the Welsh story of the faithful
Gellert and its variants leads to the same conclu-
sion as to its Aryan origin.
Those who would contend that the popular tales
were carried to Europe from India within historical
times, and diffused chiefly through literary channels,
such as translations of Eastern story-books and the
like, should be disconcerted by the discovery that
popular tales resembling those of India and Europe
are found on papyri of Ancient Egypt, dating 1400
years before our era
296
SELECTED LIST OF BOOKS
BARING-GOULD. Strange Survivals. 1 892.
BUSK. The Folk-songs of Italy. 1887.
CLODD. Myths and Dreams. 1885.
THISELTON DYER. The Folk-lore of Plants. 1889.
ELTON. Origins of English History. 1 882.
FISKE. Myths and Myth-makers. 1873.
Folk-lore Society's Publications.
FRAZER. The Golden Bough. 1890.
GRIMM. Teutonic Mythology. 4 vols. 1880-1888.
HALL. Pedigree of the Devil. 1883.
Journals of the American Folk-lore Society.
LANG: Custom and Myth. 1884.
Myth Ritual and Religion. 1887.
Cock Lane and Common Sense. 1894.
MARTINENGO-CESARESCO. Essays in the Study of Folk-
songs. 1886.
POWELL and VIGFUSSON. Corpus Poeticum Boreale. 1883.
SPENCER. Principles of Sociology. 1877.
TYLOR : Early History of Mankind. 1865.
Primitive Culture. 3rd edition. 1891.
297
INDEX
ABEL'S blood speaks, 279
Abipones, the shadow-soul, 68 ;
eating tiger's flesh, 199
Abode of the departed, 179^
Abyssinia, folk-tale from, 72 ;
animal-metamorphosis in, 88 ;
fireless people in, 153
Achilles, and the ghost of Patro-
clus, 59 ; ghost of, 61, 145, 183
Adonis, and the anemone, 73 ;
blood of, 242
^Eneas, and the ghost of Creusa,
59 ; and the murdered Polydorus,
75, 76 ; and Helenus, no, 277 ;
and the Sibyl, 187
^Eolus, 142, 198
/Eschylus, 37
^Esculapius, cock dedicated to,
214
^Espp, 272
Africa : sneezesalutation, 7 ; sacred
groves, 8 1 ; totemism, 97 ; bury-
ing alive, 107 ; animal-omens,
109 ; swanmaiden, 121 ; were-
wolf, 127 ; witchcraft, 216 ; Evil
Eye, 228 ; beast-fable, 273 ; pro-
verb, 289
Agamemnon's sacrifice, 133
Agni, 140
Ague charm, 14
Ahi, 237
Ahriman, 158
Ahts of Vancouver, 154
Ahura Mazda, 158
Ainos of Japan, 275
Alcestis, 187
Alexander the Great, 89, 118
Algeria, trepanning in, 67
Algonkin Indians : transference of
soul, 68; animal - god, 115;
earth - worship, 142 ; name
taboo, 207 ; eclipse-myth, 250 ;
creation-myths, 256
Allat, divining-rod of, 29
All Souls' Day, feast of dead, 55 ;
Eve, 221
Amber as a charm, 14
Amemit, 192
Amenti, 187, 193
American Indian, 65, 81, 88, 91,
95> 97i IOO II2 > IZ S' I2I > I2 7>
142, 143, 144, 185, 189, 190,
207, 236, 241, 243, 250, 257,
259. 293
Amethyst, as charm, n
Ammon, ram-god, 115
Amulets, n
Ancestor-worship, 62, 63
Andamanese Islanders, survival of
primitive savagery in, 3
Andromeda, 238, 253
Ani, papyrus of, 191.
Animal, soul of, 41, 51 ; soul in
form of, 42, 43, 44, 70; claws
of, buried with corpse, 53; claws
of, carried by Russians, 54 ;
animal - ancestors, 85^ 113;
animal - metamorphosis, 88 ff,
278 ; another phasis of, 95 ;
animals as transformed ances-
tors, 95 ff\ descent claimed
from, 96, 97 ; animal-namesake,
96, 98 ; animal-worship, 96, 104,
114; totems, 97^; omens, 104,
109, no ; language of, no, 276,
277, 278 ; animals in popular
tales, 110 ff, 273, 275; helpful
animals, ire, 275; animal-
299
INDEX
parentage in "Cinderella,"
in ; marriage with animals,
in, 112, 278; animal-children,
112, 113, 278 ; animal-headed
deities, 114^"; gods take animal
shape, 115 ff\ animal-dress,
126 ; as substitutes in sacrifice,
175 ; on escutcheons, 275
Animism, 130 ff, 242; belief in
magic traceable to, 196
Annamite story, 76
Anses, ancestral spirits, worship
of, 63, 151
Anthology. See Greek epigram
Anthropomorphic gods, 155
Antiquity of the human race, 2
Anubis, 191
Apaches, 95
Apef or Apep, 218
Apes, man's divergence from, 37 ;
taught to count, 38
Apis, bull-god, 115
Apollo, 80, 115, 116, 237, 239
Apophis, 237
Apotheosis, 154^
Apsaras, 120
Apuleius, 77
Arabia, totemism in, 97
Arabian jinn, 16, 83, 136, 168
Nights, 13, 29, 83, 116, 120,
168, 225, 280
religion, place of trees in, 80 ;
traditions about Solomon, 277
Arcadian priest, magic rod of, 29
Argos, 237
Aristophanes and bird-omens, 27
Armenian legend of tulip's origin,
72
Armpitting, 57
Arrow-heads as charms, 13, 14 ;
extracted from bewitched cattle,
215
Art of savages, 295
Artemidorus, 10
Artemis, 81, 126, 174, 275
Arthur, King, as raven, 71
Aryan, myth of spring-tide sun, 31;
worship of ancestral spirits, 64;
tree-cult, 82 ; Nature- worship,
137 ; fire-worship, 139, 140 ;
Dyu, 141 ; earth-worship, 143 ;
comparison of Aryan and non-
Aryan myths, 293^"
Asia, totemism in, 97 ; burying
alive in,io7; swanmaidenin,i2i
Asmodeus, 141, 158
Assyrian, texts as charms, 14 ;
talismans, the number 7 in, 23
Astrologist, doctrines of, 20
Atalanta, 275
Athens, Prytaneis at, 87 ; owls to,
290
Attic bear dance, 126
A.ubrey's " shrieking oake," 78
Augury, 25, 26
Augustus, superstition of, 8
Auspex, 26
Australia, survival of primitive
savagery in, 2 ; marriage cus-
tom in, 35 ; mutilation of corpse
in, 57 ; vengeful ghosts in, 61 ;
sacred trees, 75 ; totemism, 96,
97; gods in bird-form, 115;
witchcraft in, 216 ; star-myths,
244, 247, 248, 293 ; moon-myth,
249
Austria, folk- tale from, 54
Aztecs, 79, 156
BAAL, 172
Babylonian divination, 25 ; le-
gends, 77 ; devil, 158 ; beast-
fables, 273
Bacchse, thyrsus of the, finds
. water, 29
Balder, 185
Ball, game of, 33
Ballad, of buried lovers, variants,
73> 74! "Ship of the Fiend,"
194; "Little Christina," 285;
"Lord Ronald," 287; "Wil-
liam of Cloudeslee," 296. See
Folk-songs
Banshee, an ancestral spirit, 64 ;
in Melusina story, 123
Baptism as a safeguard, 203, 231
Barrow-ghost, robbing the, 57 ;
laying the, 58. See Vampire
Barrows, fairies protect, 15; burial
in, 44 ; robberies from, 57, 58 ;
soul's exit, 66
Basque, name for butterfly, 71, 72 ;
story, 172
Basutos : sacrifice to the dead, 62;
shadow-soul, 67 ; thunder-bird,
241 ; riddle, 288
INDEX
Bear, believed to be a man, 88
Beast-fables, 271 ff
headed gods, 114 ff
Beasts, images of, as totems, 114
Beauty and the Beast, 123, 282
Bee, soul in form of, 42
Beehive habitations, 5
Beersheba. See Beehive habita-
tions
Bees swarming, 23
telling the, 24, 109 ; bees
foretell disaster, 109
Bel and the Dragon, 136, 238 ;
and see Baal
Belgium, soul-cake in, 54 ; life-
token in, 79 ; folk-tale, 190 ;
changeling, 231
Belief in second self, 40
in metamorphosis universal,
88
Bellerophon, 241
Bengal, cholera-demon in, 214
Berserker rage, 128
Beryl for visions, 25
Bible keeps fairies away, 14, 231
and key in divination, 28
Bifrbst, 241
Bird, in divination, 25, 26 ; omens,
26, 104 ; soul as bird, 70, 71
Birds, flight of, in augury, 26 ;
superstitions in connection
with, 27 ; of Aristophanes, 27 ;
wizards in form of, 91 ; as
totems, 97^"; language of, no,
276, 277 ; gods can become,
115 ; children fed by, 275
Births, trees planted at, 79
Blood, visions seen in drop of,
25 ; blood-mingling, 99 ; sprink-
ling on foundation-stones, 107 ;
drops of, speak, 279
Boat, burial in, 44, 184
Bogie, 136, 150
Bohemia : soul in form of bird, 71 ;
swanmaiden, 121 ; well-worship
in, 149; folk-tale from, 163
Bonfires, 138
Book of all Forbidden Arts, 26
Book of the Dead. See Ani
Borneo, 18, 107, 180, 219
Borough English, 282
Bottle, legends of devil in, 161 ff
Bow and arrow, 33
Brahma, sacred name of, 204
Brahmans, Vaitarani of the, 186
Bramble, crawling under, 13
Brazilian culture-hero, 154 ; thun-
der-bird, 241 ; sun, moon, and
stars myth, 248, 249
Breath identified with soul, 68
Brian's saga, 225
Bridge, sacrificial rites on build-
ing, 149; for soul to cross, 185,
189, 190
Brig of Dread, 189
Britain, voyage of souls to, 188 ;
totemism in, 97 ; animal sacri-
fice in, 202
Brittany, libations on graves and
food for dead in, 55 ; sacred
wells in, 149 ; Passage de fenfer,
189
Browne, Sir Thomas, 9
Brownies, 131, 150
Brunhild, 28, 51, 181
Buddha, 155, 250
Buddhist devil, 171 ; conjuring,
214
Bulgarian Prince, legend of, 80
Burial, megalithic, Norse, 44;
of objects with corpse, 50 ; at
sea, 58 ; ghost wanders till, 59,
61 ; mountain - burial, 179 ;
cave-burial, 182 ; in boats, 44,
184
Burying alive, 106^, 176
Bushman, primitive savagery sur-
viving in, 2 ; myth, 116, 248 ;
tales, 225 ; beast-fables, 273
Butter, bewitched, 7, 93 ; for
working charms, 8
Butterfly, soul as, 71 ; witch as, 93
Buttons in wells, 13, 149
CAESAR on eating - taboo in
Britain, 101
Cairns, 5, 45, 56
Cakes, soul-, 54
Californian Indians : belief in
metempsychosis, 95 ; creation-
myth, 257; loss of their tails,
268
Calling back the soul, 44
Candles round corpse, 47
Cannibal, feasts, 126, 129 ; giants,
279, 280; British, 199
301
INDEX
Cannibalism, 199, 200, 201
Cap of liberty, 6 ; invisible cap,
137
Capture of wives, 33, 34, 294
Caribs, 143, 179, 199, 235, 241,
261
Carnelian heart, 13
Castor and Pollux, 247
Cat, sleeper's soul as, 72 ; children
transformed into, 89 ; witch as,
94 ; luck in connection with,
109 ; weather signs from, no
Catoptromancy, 25, 26
Cat's cradle, 33
Catskin, rhymed version of, 285
Cattle, bewitched, 8,216; regarded
as sacred, 115
Caucasus, funeral ceremony in, 51
Causes of things, savage inquiry
into, 38
Cave-burial, 182
Cave-men, condition of, 5, 37
Celebes, rice-throwing in, 17 ;
swanmaidens, 121 ; earthquake-
myth, 236
Cerberus, 49, 240
Ceremonial observances, 32, 144 ;
origin of, 133
Cham Pas, 262
Changelings, 230^; recent Irish
case, 232
Charm, witch's, 8 ; potato, chest-
nut, &c. , toff; written, 14 ; love
charm, 23 ; sung by Walkyries,
225 ; against Evil Eye, 227 ff;
rhyming charms, 280 ; and see
Fetich.
Charon, obolus for, 49, 187
Cheshire, pace eggs in, 31
Children, suckled by wild beasts,
274, 275 ; sacrifice of, 107, 176
Children's games, 33,287; rhymes.
287
Chimaira, 240
China : oil-jar, upsetting of, un-
lucky, 10 ; swallowing prescrip-
tion, 14 ; classics to scare spirits,
14 ; horse-hoof for luck, 16 ;
rice-throwing, 18 ; empty cradle,
19 ; low level of civilisation, 34 ;
marriage custom, 34; hell-shoe,
46 ; cow - headed spirit, 46 ;
funeral ceremony, 47 ; substi-
tutes in sacrifice, 51 ; belief
concerning souls of criminals,
53 ; imprisoned ghosts, 53 ; an-
cestor-worship, 63 ; soul's exit,
65 ; place of trees in religion,
80 ; animal-metamorphosis, 92 ;
legend of Bell Tower, 108 ;
animistic sacrifice, 134 ; river-
god, 145 ; drowning man, 146 ;
dragon-spirit, 150 ; apotheosis,
154-5; cheating the gods, 160;
bottled demons, 169 ; serpent-
worship, 177 ; Rip Van Winkle,
183 ; cannibalism, 199, 201 ;
name -taboo, 204, 205, 206;
sympathetic magic, 218 ; Ali
Baba's cave, 225 ; changelings,
231 ; dragon-myth, 239 ; eclipse-
monster, 253 ; beast-fable, 274 ;
" white pig," 290
Chippewas, 100
Chiromancy, 28
Choctaws, 190
Cholera-demon, 214
Christmas, 138
Cicero, 26
Cinderella story, 71, 72, 94, in,
278, 282, 283
Circassian, marriage custom, 34 ;
fire-god, 140
Civilised nations passed through
savage stage, 4
Clairvoyants, 26
Clashing rocks, myth of, 268
Clay images as substitutes in sac-
rifice, 51
Cleft trees, passing through, 13,
79, 82
Clothing left at sacred wells, 12
Coal, burglars carry, 23
Cock, name for last sheaf, 144 ;
sacrificed in disease, 214
Cocoa-nut, myths of, 264
Coins, in wells, 13 ; in tombs, 48
Comanches, 180
Confucius, 204
Congo, feeding corpse in, 54
Constellations, 247
Contes populaires, 283
Convulsions, by demoniacal pos-
session, 64
Coral, charm against Evil Eye, 227
Cord, knotted, for magic, 9, 23
INDEX
Corn-baby or corn-mother. See
Kirn-baby
Cornwall, beehive habitations in,
5 ; teeth buried with corpse in,
57 ; King Arthur as raven, 71 ;
sacred wells in, 149
Corp chre, 220
Corpse, burial of objects with,
44, 45 ; food, money, &c. , pro-
vided for, 47, 48 ; preservation
of, 56 ; mutilation of, 57, 58,
100
Corsica, Day of the Dead in, 56
Cort6s, 152
Cosmogony myths, 254^"
Coventry. See Lady Godiva
Cow, name for last sheaf, 144
Coyote, as creator, 257 ff; steals
fire, 258
Cradle.empty, must not be rocked,
19
Cramp-bone, 10
Creaking furniture, 79
Creation-myths, 254^
Creator, 154
Crest. See Totem
Croatia, 224
Crocodile, as totem, 97, 113 ; as
helpful animal, 114; sacred,
114-15
Cross, formed by poker across
bars, 7; made in water, 10;
sign of the, freezes water, 268
Crow, bird of ill omen, 27
Crystal, ball for visions, 25 ;
firmament, see Glass moun-
tains
Cuckoo, transformation into, 95 ;
cuckoo's tears, and cuckoo's
spittle, 95
Cult, tree-. See Tree-worship
Culture, low level of, 5
Culture -hero, 153
Cumulative stories, 284
Cupid and Psyche. See Psyche
Cup-like markings on tombs, 54
Curfew bell, 32
Curtsey, origin of, 6 ; to new
moon, 20
Customs, ceremonial, festival,
local, 32 ; marriage, 34
Cyclops, 140, 230, 235, 280
Cyrus, 145
DACOTAH, 199, 241
Dances, May- pole, 82
Dante's Inferno, 193
Daphne, 80
Dawn, supposed personification
of, in divine legends, 119
Day and Night, 253
Dayaks, 27, 200, 206, 216
Dead, Feast of the, 55, 63 ; Day
of the, 56 ; sorrows of the, 55 ;
fear of the, 57, 61, 100; path
of the, 195 ; reluctance to
name the, 205
Death, foretold by dreaming of
teeth, 10 ; by apparition, 106 ;
in animal - omens, no; the
absence of soul, 41 ; connected
with sleep, 44 ; exit of soul at,
65, 68, 70 ; in German, French,
Magyar, Italian folk-story, 165 ;
River of, 189
Dee, river, 147
Deevs, 136
Deity, rudimentary conception of,
133 ; water-deities, 144
Delos, sacred tree at, 81
Deluge-myths, 256^
Demeter, 115, 143, 175
Demons, developed from souls,
61 ; possession by, 7, 64, 67 ;
as divine beings, 135 ; bottled,
tfaff; disease-, 214, 215
Denmark, last sheaf in, 144 ;
gullible devil in, 161 ; Tell
legend in, 296
Deodand, 86
Descent, other than human, 96
Devil, horse-footed, 16 ; Polish,
82, 157 ; the word, 135 ; white,
152 ; as the power of evil, 157 ;
as magpie, 157; numerous
guises of, 158 ; gullibility of,
159^; on Two Sticks, 169 ; as
serpent, 177 ; talk of the, 204
Devils' dykes, punch-bowls, &c. ,
150; devils conjured into ani-
mals, 214 ; exorcised, 215
Devonshire, hooping-cough cure
in, 12 ; libation to fruit-tree in,
81 ; sympathetic magic in, 219
Diffusion of myth, 293
Digits, i.e. fingers, used in count-
ing, 38
303
INDEX
Dikinikan, 190
Dionysus, 81, 126, 175
Dirge, Lyke-Wake, 45
Disease, transference, 12, 213 ;
charm, Martin Luther's, 12 ;
magically cured and inflicted,
89, 213 ; spirit, 214
Divination (24-30), in teacup, 24 ;
Babylonian king's, 25 ; Loben-
gula's, 25 ; the Wahuma's, 25 ;
Romans', 25 ; Northern magi-
cians', 25 ; Pausaniason, 25 ; by
catoptromancy, by Egyptians
and Maoris, 25 ; by mirror, pol-
ished sword, Urim and Thum-
mim, flight of birds, 26; many
modes taught by Prometheus,
27 ; by dreams, sieve and shears,
shoulder-blade, key and Bible,
palmistry, 28 ; by magic-rods,
flowers, 29 ; Theocritus on, 30
Divine sea, rivers, springs, lakes,
144 ff
Diving for land, 255, 256, 257,
262
Divining-rod, 28, 29
Doctrine of Signatures, 217
Dodona, 81
Dog, hair of, for hooping-cough,
12 ; for dog's bite, 12, 218 ;
. dog's head on Eskimo grave,
50 ; wizard as, 93 ; descent
from, 112
Dolmens, cup-like hollows on, 55 ;
soul's exit provided, 65
Donkey, passing child under,
13, 22
Double, man's or dead person's,
enters body of animal, 95
Dragons, 136, 150, 237^
Draughts, game of, 33
Dreams, divination by, 27, 28 ;
experience in, indistinguishable
from reality, 39 ; savage's ex-
planation of, 40
Drift, stone implements from, 2
Drolls, 284
Drowning man, reluctance to
save, 146
Druid priestesses, magical powers
of, 89
Dryads, 75, 150
Dryden, n
Dualism, 136, 157, 158
Ducking-stools, 32
Dunmow Flitch, 32
Dwarfs or dark elves. See Trolls
1 Jyaushpitar, 143
Dyu, 141, 143
EARTH-BEARER, myth of the, 236,
255
Earth- worship, f.ifl.ff
Earthquake-myths, 235^
East. See Orientation
Easter, from Eostre, 102
Easter Sunday, water blessed on,
8 ; eggs, 31, 32 ; hare, 31, 102 ;
festival, 102 ; fires, 138
Eating, animals to get their
qualities, 199, 200 ; savage
antagonist, 199 ; the god, 175,
201
Eating-taboos, 99, 101
Echidna, 237, 240
Echoes, as departed souls, 69 ;
Lucretius on, 69 ; the Anglo-
Saxon wood-mare, 70
Eclipse-myths, 250, 252, 253
Edda, 113, 138, 218, 269
Effigy, hanging and burning in,
222
Egypt : traces of early races, 2 ;
divination, 25 ; game of
draughts, 33 ; embalming and
pyramids, 56 ; khaibit, ka, and
ba, 68 ; story of ' ' Two
Brothers," 79, 84, 223 ; ani-
mal-worship, 114; devil, 136;
Nature-worship, 141 ; mortal
gods, 155 ; serpent - worship,
177 ; firmament, 182 ; infernal
Nile, 190-1 ; psychostasia, 191 ;
Hades, 192; cannibalism, 199;
separate existence of the name,
205 ; myth of I sis, 208, 248 ;
wax - figure melting, 218 ;
dragon-myth, 239 ; star-myth,
248 ; Nature-myth, 253, 254 ;
beast-fables, 273 ; popular tales
in Ancient, 296
Elephant as earth-bearer, 236
Elf, spirit of the dead, called, 151
Elf-shots, protection against, 15
Elf-stones, 15, 215
Elijah, 275
304
INDEX
Elizabethan exorcism, 215
Elves, friendly to men, 137 ;
black, 137, 140, see Trolls ;
ancestral spirits, feasts to, 63 ;
haunting, 150
Elysium, and Elysian fields, 192,
Endor, witch of, 26, 151
England, Easter eggs and Easter
hare in, 31, 32 ; banshee in, 64 ;
plant - worship, 81 ; animal-
omens in, 109, no; exorcism
in, 215 ; Tell legend in, 296
Entrails, divination by, 25, 27
Ephesus, sacred trees at, 81
Epilepsy, Scotch cure for, 214 ;
trepanning for, 67
Eskimos, funeral custom of, 50 ;
descent from dogs, 112;
Nature-myths, 243 ; star-myth,
244 ; moon-myth, 251
Essence of food consumed by
souls, 55
Esthonians : Feast of Souls, 55 ;
earth-worship, 143 ; river-god,
147
Ethereal substance of soul, or
ghost, 59
Euhemerus, 118
Eumenides, 206, 279
Euphemisms, 206
Euripides, 29, 117, 176, 187, 206
European and savage customs,
resemblance between, 35
Eusebius, 117
Evil deity, 135
Evil Eye, 18, 226^"
Exit of soul, ghost, 41, 42, 65,
66, 70
Exogamy, 294
Exorcism, 7, 64, 67, 215
Explanatory myths, 263^
Ezekiel, 25
FABLES. See Beast-fables
Fafni, or Fafnir, 205, 236, 276
Fairy-darts, 14, 15
Fairy-fox in Japan and China, 92
Fairy-godmother, in
Fairy-halls, 182
Fairy robberies, 230^
Fairies, ghosts develop into, 64,
131, 151; haunting, 150
Familiar spirit, 69
Family revenge, 99
Fancy in mythology, 263, 280
Fauns and Satyrs, 75, 150
Faust, devil in, 158
Fear, of the dead, 57, 61 ; of the
unseen, 131, 132
Feasts of the dead, 55, 56, 63
Fern seed, 277
Festival customs, 32, 102, 143
Fetich, carnelian heart as, 13 ; in
tree, 134 ; the word, 173 ; wor-
ship, 178
Fetichism, 103, 172
Fever, cure for, 14
Fiji : marriage custom, 34 ; widow-
sacrifice, 52 ; soul's exit, 65 ;
anthropomorphic gods, 155 ;
abode of bliss, 184
Finns : the " path of birds," 71 ;
trees in religion, 80; Kalewala,
ico, 153 ; swanmaidens, 121 ;
earth-worship, 143 ; voyage to
other-world, 186 ; euphemisms,
206 ; disease-charms, 207 ; Tier-
mcs the Thunderer, 241 ; Tell
legend, 296
Fire, perpetual, in Korea, 63 ; in
Axantos, 89 ; universally sac-
red, 140 ; new, Easter, 138 ;
festival, 138 ; worship, 139 ;
celestial and infernal, 140 ; god,
140 ; fireless period, 153 ; the
gift of, 153^; theft of, 153,
154- 258
Flints, chipped, discovery of, 2
Firmament, 181
First man, 154
Flies, diabolic spirits as, 161 ;
Metis and Loki as, 171 ; god
of, 172
Florida, sneeze salutation in, 7 ;
transference of soul, 68
Flowers, in divination, 29 ; offered
to the dead, 54 ; souls embodied
in, 72 ; prayer to, 81
Folk-lore, definition of, 3 ; origins
of, 36 ; problem of, 290 ff
Folk-lorist, duty of the, 4, 32
Folk-songs, 284
Folk-tales : Juniper-tree, 70 ; Cin-
derella, 71, 72, 94, in, 278, 282
283 ; Polish, 71 ; Abyssinian,
305
U
INDEX
72 ; North Indian, 72 ; Puss in
Boots, in ; Frog Prince, in ;
Wolf and Kids, 116; Jack and
the Beanstalk, 121, 282, 293;
Swanmaiden, izoff; Six Swans,
122 ; Melusina, 122 ; Beauty
and the Beast, 123, 282 ; Cupid
and Psyche, 77, in, 123, 190,
281 ; Misery and Poverty, 163 ;
Gambling Hansel, 165 ; Brother
Lustig, 165 ; Lad and the Deil,
165 ; White Wolf, 190 ; Rum-
pelstiltskin, 209 ; White Snake,
276 ; Mastermaid, 279 ; Sweet-
heart Roland, 279 ; Hansel and
Grethel, 279 ; separable soul
in, 80, 83^ ; animal r6le in,
no, 275 ; barbaric element in,
in, 274, zTjff, 291 ; illustrating
use of human blood, 202 ; classi-
fication of, 283 ; common ele-
ments of, 290, 291 ; borrowing
theory of, 293 ; diffusion of,
293 ; and see Drolls
Fontinalia, 149
Food, offered to dead, 44, 50, 54,
55i 63 ; to deities, 133, 134 ;
how consumed, 55, 134 ; absti-
nence from, in Hades, 193
Foot, right or left, foremost, 9
Footprints, blood-mingling in, 99 ;
injury through, 216, 221, 230;
giants', 236^
Forbidden doors, 121
Forest spirits, 75
Forty Thieves, cavern in, 29
Four Winds, 142, 243
Fox, ill-luck in connection with,
109. See Fairy-fox
Frau Holda, 182
Friday, unlucky, 21
Frog, descent claimed from, 112
Frog-Prince, the, in
Funeral rites, Chinese, 47 ;
Siamese, 49 ; prehistoric, 50
Future state, evolution of belief
concerning, 63, 186
GAELIC priestesses, 89
Gaia, 143
Games, 33, 287
Garments, at sacred wells, 12,
149 ; for dead, 45
Garnets as life-tokens, 223
Gauls, widow-sacrifice by, 52
Gehenna, 193
Gellert myth, 296
Genius, 226 ; and see Jinn
Germany: Easter hare, 32 ; money
placed with corpse, 49 ; folk-
tales, 52, in, 122, 165, 166,
168, 209, 276, 279 ; totemism,
97 ; unlucky spider, 109 ; death
told to bees, beasts, &c. , no;
swanmaiden, 121 ; werewolf,
124 ; wild boar as symbol, 127 ;
last sheaf, 143, 144 ; water
deities, 148 ; sympathetic magic,
221; Evil Eye, 226; changeling,
231 ; souls as stars, 243
George, St., and the Dragon,
136, 238
Gervase of Tilbury, 123
Gesture language, 38
Ghosts, seen in dreams and visions,
40, 41 ; of men, animals, plants,
inanimate objects, 41 ; called up
by necromancer or medium, 41,
151 ; ghosts in jail, 53 ; laying
the ghost, 46, 57, 58, 161 ;
ghost of Victor Hugo's grand-
father, 59 ; of unburied wander,
59, 61, 188 ; the counterpart of
deceased, 59 ; ghosts intangible,
59 ; in miniature, 60 ; as harm-
ful and vengeful demons, 61 ;
propitiation and worship of,
61 ; remain near corpse or
dwelling, 64 ; develop into
fairies, 64, 131 ; friendly and
malicious, 135 ; fear of, 151 ;
ghost stories, 161
Giallar-bru, 190
Giants, 83, 84, 131, 280
Gipsies, shoe-throwing by, 18 ;
palmistry by, 28 ; folk-tale, 171 ;
as tale-bearers, 294
Giraldus Cambrensis, 98
Glass mountains, 54, 180, 181, 190
Gnomes, ghosts develop into, 131
Goats as substitutes in sacrifice,
175
God-eating, 175, 201
Gods, animal - headed, 114^";
change shape, 115, 154; anthro-
pomorphic, 133 ; Nature-gods,
306
INDEX
', rain-<gods, thunder-gods,
141 ; wind-, 142 ; earth-, 142 ;
not immortal, 155
Good and evil spirits, and dualistic
deities, 135, 136
Gorgons, 240
Goths, ancestor- worship by, 63
Granny's divination, 24
Grateful beast, 275
Graves, objects placed in, for use
of the dead, 48
Great Britain as isle of souls, 188
Great Hare, the, 115, 256
Greece : sneeze salutation, 7 ;
chiromancy, 28 ; armpitting,
57 ; the <mc, 68 ; butterfly-
soul, 71 ; sacred animals, 115 ;
barbaric element in myths, 117 ;
werewolf, 124 ; new fire, 138 ;
fire-god, 140 ; legend of gift of
fire, 153 ; anthropomorphic
gods, 156 ; conception of firma-
ment, 182 ; voyage to other-
world, 186, 187 ; Hades, 192 ;
personification of disease, 214 ;
rain-charm, 224 ; changelings,
231 ; earthquake - myth, 235 ;
star-myths, 244, 247, 293 ;
Uranos-myth, 254
Greek epigram, on telling bees,
24 ; on soul's egress, 42
Grimm, 70, 166, 201, 283
Gudrun, 28
Guiding beasts, 104
Gunthram, King, legend of, 42
HADES, 183, 184, 186, 187, 192,
193. i94
Hag-ridden, 161
Haidahs, 200
Hair of dog, 12, 218 ; human
hair, precautions respecting,
203, 213
Hamadryad, 79
Hamlet, ghost in, 60
Hammock, 295
Hand numerals, 38 ; marks as
prophylactics, 107
Hara-kari, 51
Harald, shade of, propitiated, 48
Hare, Easter, 32 ; an object of
disgust, 8 1 ; magical character
of, 8 1 ; witch in form of, 81 ;
as witch's associate, 91 ; eating-
taboo in Britain, 101 ; as totem,
102 ; sacred to Eostre, 102 ;
hare crossing path unlucky,
109 ; name for last sheaf, 144 ;
in the moon, 250 ; cleft lip of,
269
Harpies, 240
Haruspication. See Divination
Harvest, 32, 143; harvest lady or
queen, name for last sheaf, 144
Hat, raising the, 6
Haunted house, 59, 161
Hearth-cult, 64, 139
Heathen apologists, 118
Heaven, personified, 141 ; and
Earth, universal father and
mother, 143
Heaven-bursters, 256
Hebrides, low culture in, 5
Hecuba, play of, 61
He-goat, name for last sheaf, 144
Hela, 45
Helenus, no, 277
Hell, shoes, 45, 190; hell-biidge,
189 ; Arctic, 194 ; Woden visits,
225. See Hades
Helpful animal, in
Hephaistos, 140, 158
Herb-doctor, 233
Hercules, 240
Hermes, 29, 183
Hermotimus, 43
Herodotus on ancestor-worship,
62 ; the Neuri, 124 ; Osiris, 204
Heroic epics, 283
Herondas, 41
* Hesiod on days, 21 ; punished for
impiety, 118 ; on Hades, 187 ;
on monsters, 240 ; on crow's
blackness, 266
Hestia, 139
Hiawatha, Four Winds in, 142
Hill, soul must climb. See Moun-
tain
Hindmost, devil take, 159
Hindu, telling the bees, 24 ; hell-
shoe, 46 ; suttee, 51 ; suicide for
revenge, 61 ; religion, trees in,
80 ; respect for cattle, 100 ;
animistic sacrifice, 134 ; im-
mortality, secret of, 155 ; corp
chre, 220 ; rainbow, 241
307
INDEX
Hirpi, 126
Hobgoblins, 131, 150
Hole to let out soul. See Exit
Holland, empty cradle in, 19
Holyoake and Holy wood, 83
Holy water, to protect cattle, 8 ;
in tomb-hollows, 55
Homer, on sneeze, 7 ; on soul's
egress, 41 ; punished for im-
piety, 118 ; sacrifices, 134 ;
Hades, 187 ; raising mist, 198 ;
dragon-myth, 239 ; blind, 286
Hone's "Day Book," 226
Hooping-cough cures, 12, 13, 22
Hops thrown on bride, 18
Horace, 222
Horse, sacred 9, 16 ; omens from,
9 ; -shoes for luck, 14 ; against
witches and demons, 15 ; -hoof
in China, 16; neigh of, lucky,
16 ; head, magic by, 16 ; horse
and chariot for dead Harald,
48 ; sacrificed, 49, 51 ; led at
funeral, 51
Horse-chestnut as charm, n
Horus, and Set, 136 ; as mediator,
191 ; and the Crocodile, 238
Hottentot, rock-opening charm,
29 ; soul's exit, 65 ; culture-hero,
154 ; beast-fables, 273
House abandoned to ghost, 58
Household spirits, ghosts develop
into, 131
Human blood in medical prescrip-
tions, 201 ; sprinkling with, 176
sacrifice, 51, 52, 106, 107,
176 ; in " Hecuba," 61 ; substi-
tutes for, 51 ; to earth-goddess,
143 ; to rivers, 147 ; for disease
cure, 202
Hurons, 189, 254, 291
Hurricane, 242
Hyaenas, Abyssinian blacksmiths
turn into, 88
Hypnotism, 222
Hyrax, Zulu fable of, 267-8
ICE in hell, 193
Iceland : saga, hell-shoes in, 45 ;
folk-tale, 160; "Sending," 171 ;
language of birds, 277
Idolatry as related to fetichism,
173
Idols. See Images
Iliad, 133
Ilmarinen. See Kalewala
Images, consulting with, in divi-
nation, 25 ; as substitutes for
human sacrifice, 51 ; worship of,
173 ; fed and treated as alive,
174 ; used in sympathetic magic,
213
Immuring. See Burying alive
Implements, fashioning of, 3, 31,
2 95
Inanimate objects, souls of, 50 ;
punishment of, 86, 87 ; moved
by incantations, 89, 279
Inca, sister marriage, 250
Incantation, 89, 197, 198, 223,
224, 225, 279
Incense, origin of, 134
Indo-European, suttee, 51, 52;
myth, 295
India : chiromancy, 28 ; money
buried with corpse, 49; ancestor-
worship, 63 ; folk-tales, 72, 83 ;
King Midas, 78 ; sacred tree,
82 ; totemism, 97 ; animal-
omens, 109 ; man-tiger, 127 ;
idolatry, 174 ; wax-figure melt-
ing, 218 ; Evil Eye, 228 ; earth-
quake-myth, 236 ; moon-myths,
249, 250 ; beast-fables, 274 ;
Indian origins, theory of, 296
Ingenuity slowly acquired, 37
Inside-out garment, 8
Interpretation of myth, 119
Invention, savage, 87
Invisible, power of becoming, 136,
137. 277
lo and the speaking oaks, 77
Ireland : peasant wears fairy dart,
15 ; sunwise-moving, 20 ; hell-
shoes, 46 ; banshee, 64 ; bird-
soul and butterfly - soul, 71 ;
variant of Midas story, 78 ;
superstition concerning white-
thorn, 82; totemism, 98; re-
gard for seal, 100 ; omens, 109 ;
animal-amulets, no ; legend,
113; werewolf, 125; sacred
wells, 149 ; devil-cheating, 159,
160 ; witchcraft, 197, 215, 226 ;
Evil Eye, 229, 230 ; changeling,
231, 232
308
INDEX
Iris, 241
Iron, potency of, against spells,
8, 15, 16, 231
Iroquois, soul's exit, 65
Irrational acts, 5 ; element in
myth, 119 ; in marchen, 274,
277, 291
Isis-Hathor, 115, and Ra, 208 ;
soul of, 248
Island of souls, Great Britain as,
188
Isle of Man : sacred wells, 12 ;
custom, 47 ; selling wind, 198
Italy : chiromancy, 28 ; folk-tale,
165, 172 ; witchcraft, 203 ; Evil
Eye, 226 ; the land of song, 287
JACK AND THE BEANSTALK, 121,
282, 293
Japanese, servants sacrificed, 51 ;
witch as fox, 91 ; bird omens,
105 ; Melusina story, 123 ;
water-god and sea-god, 145 ;
earthquake- myth, 236
Jehovah, 204, 238
Jenny Jones, 288
Jews : use of phylacteries, 14 ; light
on corpse, 47 ; serpent-demon,
177 ; hell-bridge, 189 ; name-
taboo, 204, 206
Jewels in graves, 48
Jinn, 16, 136
John's, St., Eve, 138
Johnson, Dr., superstition of, 9
Jotham's talking trees, 77
Journey to spirit world, 180^
Jiingsten Recht, 282
"Juniper-Tree," folk-tale of the,
70
Jupiter, 141, 143
KAABA, 174
Kaffir : laughing trees,77 ; apology
to and mutilation of slain
animal, 100 ; myth, 117; folk-
tale, 148, 207, 225
Kalewala, 100, 153, 181, 193,
224, 279
Karens, 221, 241, 244
Kepler, 235
Khonds : belief in animal meta-
morphosis, 91 ; earth-worship,
142
King Doomwald's sacrifice, 176
King Gunthram, legend of, 42
Kinship with animals and natural
objects, <fiff, 99, no
Kirn-baby, 144
Knots used in magic, 22, 23,
198
Kobold, horse-footed, 16
Kobong or totem. See Animal
namesake
Korea : King of, 16 ; ancestor-
worship, 63 ; exorcising devils,
171 ; name-taboo, 204 ; regard
for animals, 271 ; white pig,
290
Kottabos, 212
Kronos, 113, 117, 119
LADDER, passing under, 10
Lady Godiva, 32
Lakes, sacred, 144
Lancashire : use of knots for
magic, 22 ; transference of
witch's familiar spirit, 69
Lang, Mr., 137, 156
Language, expressive element in,
6, 65 ; correspondence of this
in different languages, 67, 71 ;
of animals and birds, no, 276,
277 ; relation of, to mythology,
96, 102, 119, 295
Lapps, 143, 198, 206, 207
Lares, 150
Last breath, inhaling, 69
Last sheaf, 143
Laying ghost, 46, 57, 58, 161
Leda, 98, 113
Leechcraft, numbers in, 22 ;
principles of, 11 ff, 199, 217
Left. See Right and left
Legends, savage, why retained,
117; of creation, 254^"; defined,
283
Lemuralia, 19
I ,ent, marriage in, 19
Leprachauns, 131
Lernean Hydra, 240
Letts' Feast of Souls, 55
Leviathan, 238
Li Hung Chang, 146
Libations, on tombs, 55 ; to fruit-
trees, 81 ; spilled on ground,
132 ; Homeric, 134
309
INDEX
Life caused by soul, 41 ; bound
up in tree, 79, 80 ; in a column,
80
Lifeless objects punished, 86, 87
Life-token, 79, 222, 223
Light and Darkness personified,
136
Lightning, 241
Lilith, 177
Lithuanian burial custom, 53 ;
" path of birds," 71, 243
Lizard, as ancestor, 100
Lobengula, 25
Lohengrin, 212
Loki, sworn brotherhood of, 99 ;
in hawk-skin, 120 ; as fire-god,
140 ; as fly, 171-2 ; causing
earthquakes, 236
Longfellow, see Hiawatha; Golden
Legend, 202
Lorelei, 75, 150
Loup-garou. See Werewolf
Love-charms, 23
Lucifer, 193
Luck, and ill-luck, 8-23 ; associ-
ated with ritual, 19
Lucky days, 21 ; numbers, 22
Lucretius, 68, 69, 174
Lustration with saliva, 229
Lycanthropy, 128
Lycaon, 126
Lying in state, 47, 49
Lyke-Wake Dirge, 45-46
MACARIA, 176
Madagascar, superstition in, 9
Madness by possession, 64-65
Maenads, 126
Magic, rods, 29, 280 ; broth, 89 ;
swords, 140 ; traceable to ani-
mism, 196-232 ; in footprint,
217 ; sympathetic, 217 ; drink,
225
Magpie, witch as, 94 ; Demetrius
as, 95 ; as devil's servant, 157,
268
Magyars, 223
Mahabharata, 279
Maiden, a name given to last
handful of corn, 144
Maiming the dead, 57, 58, 100
Malagasian rock-opening charm,
29
Man, primitive, condition of, 4,
37 ; origin of, 255, 259, 261
Man in the moon, 251, 252
" Man in our eyes," 60
Manes, whence mania, 64-65;
manes-worship, 62, 103 ; raised
by sorcery, 151
Manibozho, 115
Maoris : visions in blood-drop, 25 ;
Melusina story, 123 ; explana-
tion of red cliffs, 242
Marawa, the spider, 115
Marcellus, 9
Marchen. See Folk-tales
; Marduk and Tiamat, 136
I Marriage in Lent, May, 19 ; by
capture, 33, 34, 294
j Martin Luther's superstition, 12 ;
changeling, 232
i Matabele magic, 25, 90, 197, 217
I Matthew Paris, 43
! Maui, 142, 154, 236, 253
! May Eve, witches' work on, 8
May, marriage in, 19 ; rural sacri-
fice in, 132
May- pole, 82
Medicine, folk-. See Leechcraft
Medicine-men. See Sorcerers
Medusa, 240
Megalithic monuments, 5 ; buri-
als, 44
Meleager, 84
Melting wax-figure, 218 ff
Melusina, 122
Men eaten to obtain their quali-
ties, 199
Menhir, original of the headstone,
56
Mermaids, 150
Merope, 247
Messages to the other-world, 52
Messenian suttee, 51
Metal, effect of discovery of, 3
Metamorphosis, soul's, 74 ; in
Ovid, 80; savage belief in, 87^?";
natural, observed by savage, 87
Metempsychosis, 70^ 95
Metis, 116, 171
Mexico : god-eating, 175 : sun-
myth, 194 ; moon-myth, 250
Michabo, 115
Michael, St., 238
Midas story, and variants, 78
310
INDEX
Midgard serpent, 238
Midsummer fires, 138
Mikado, 105
Milanesian mythology, 115
Milky Way, myths of, 71, 195,
243. 2 44
Mirrors in catoptromancy, 26
Mithra, 138
Moloch, 141
Money for ~use of corpse, 48, 49
Money-turning, 20
Monotheism, 137, 156
Monster driven off at eclipse, 252,
253
Monstrous footprints, 236, 237
Montezuma, 152
Moon, superstitions connected
with, 20 ; affecting weather,
20 ; claimed as ancestress, 97 ;
as Nature-god, 137, 244 ; as
abode of souls, 195 ; myths,
244^"; spots on the moon, 250,
251
Moral element, absence of, in
lower religions, 182
Mortal gods, 155
Moses, rod of, 28
Mother Earth, 142, 143, 235
Mountain, soul must climb, 53,
180 ; haunted, in Wales, 150;
burial, 179 ff; spirits haunt
sacred, 180 ; gods reside in,
180. See Glass mountains
Mouse, soul as, 43, 72
Mouth, soul leaves by, 42, 43, 69,
70, 72
Muhammadan, serpent - demon,
177 ; bridge of dread, 189
Mumming-plays, 288
Mythology, the term, 283
Myths, as attempted solutions,
38, 87, 234 ; Kronos, 117 ;
swallowing-myths, n6ff; at-
tempted explanations of, 118,
119 ; the true method, 119 ; of
Observation, 235^; Nature-
myths, 242^; creation-myths,
254^"; explanatory - myths,
263^"; comparison of, 292 ;
borrowing theory of, 293
NAGAS, primitive savagery sur-
viving in, 3
Naiads, 74
Nails in walls as plague antidote,
16
of corpse must not be cut,
53 ; cuttings of preserved, 53,
54 ; as relics or fetich, 173 ;
caution respecting, 203, 213
Name, knowledge of, gives power
over owner, 2037?" ; not to be
uttered, 204 ; name - taboo,
204^"
Nansen, Dr., 60
Napoleon's stolen talisman, n
Nature- , spirits, 74, 75, 135 ; gods,
T-Zlff; myths, 242 ff
Nature-worship, 137
Neck, 148
Necromancers, 26
Neptune, 29, 145
Nereids, 75, 150, 231
Nereus, 150
New Caledonia, 100
New England : the shadow-soul,
67
New Guinea, 190
New Zealand, 142, 181, 199, 241,
253
Nicaragua, Evil Eye in, 227, 228
Nick, Old, 159
Nicolas, St. , 148
Night, myth of, 253
Nightmare-demon, 70
Nix, nixe, water-demons, 148, 159
Noah, burnt offering of, 133 ; and
turkey- buzzard, 265
Nootkas, 20 1
Norsemen, burial of, 44, 185
Norse story, external soul in, 84 ;
devil in, 165 ; saga, 181, 224 ;
earthquake-myth, 235-6; moon-
myth, 251 ; Tell legend, 296
North Country, short - cakes
thrown on bride in, 18 ; empty
cradle in, 19
Northumberland custom, 47
Numbers. See Lucky numbers
Nursery tales, 33, 282 ; rhymes,
287
Nut and Seb, 253, 254
Nymphs, 75, 150
OATS-BRIDE, name given to last
sheaf, 144
3"
INDEX
Objects, inanimate, souls of, 50;
buried with corpse, 44, 45 ;
despatched to dead by funeral
sacrifice, 53 ; treated as per-
sonal, 86 ; punishment of, 86
Odin, 265
Odysseus, 59, 198, 224, 280
Odyssey, 7, 198, 224, 283
Offenbach, evil eye of, 227
Offerings, at sacred wells, 13, 149 ;
to manes, 62, 134; to deities,
133, 134, 148
Olaf, St., 208
Old man, or old woman, name
given to last sheaf, 144
Old Man of the Sea, 150
Old Nick, 159
Old, old one, 153-4
Old shoes thrown at weddings, 18
Omens, from sacred horse, 9 ;
from birds, 26, 27, 104, 109,
no; from animals, 104, 109,
no
Oneiromancy. See Dreams
Opening to let out soul. See Exit
Ophiolatry. See Serpent-worship
Oracles, 89
Orcus, 21, 193, 280
Orestes, play of, 62, 206, 279
Oriental jinn, iron a charm
against, 16
Orientation, 138
Orion, 244
Ormuzd, 158
Osiris, 155, 191, 204
Other - self. See Second - self,
Ghost, Spirit, Soul
Other-world, things required in,
50 ; messages sent to, 52 ; in
various mythologies, 179 ff;
associated with place of burial,
179 ; across water, 184^; two
or more other-worlds, 186
Overlooking of children. See Evil
Eye
Ovid, metamorphosis in, 80 ; Ly-
caon's transformation, 126
Owl, bird of ill-omen, 27 ; claws
of, carried by Russians, 54
PACE EGG. See Easter egg
Palestine, totemism in, 97
Palmistry. See Chiromancy
Pan, 75, 152, 158
Pantheism, 137
Paper figures, money, houses, as
substitutes for sacrifice, 51
Paracelsus, 167
Paradise, 180, 186
Parsees, Easter eggs among, 32 ;
as fire-worshippers, 139
Pasch egg. See Easter egg
Pasiphae and Minotaur, 113
Passage de I'enfer, 189
Patagonian burials, 180, 184
Path of souls, 71, 243
Patricius, 125
Patroclus, ghost of, 59, 188
Pausanias, on divination, 25 ;
punishment of lifeless objects,
87
Peacock's feathers unlucky, 15 ;
reason why, 17
Peg Powler and Peg O'Nell, 147
Peg-tops, 33
Pelops, 118
Peris, 136
Perpetual fire, in Korea, 63 ; in
Axantos, 89 ; elsewhere, 140
Persephone, 193
Perseus and Andromeda, 238, 253
Persia: catoptromancers, 26; trees
in religion, 80 ; flower-worship,
81 ; swanmaidens, 121 ; peris
and deevs, 136 ; fire-worship,
139 ; Asmodeus, 141 ; dualism,
158 ; sacrifice for disease-cure,
202 ; star-myths, 243 ; tradition
about Solomon, 277 ; Tell
legend, 296
Personification of animals and
natural objects, no, 141 ; theory
of supposed personification of
Sun, Dawn, Storm, &c. , in
divine legends, 119; of disease,
214. See Nature-spirits, Nature-
worship
Peru, 50, 140; earth-worship, 143 ;
water-deity, 144 ; corp chre,
219 ; sun and moon myth, 250
Pheron, 145
Philippine Isles : sacred trees, 75
Philosophical myths, 87
Philtres, 23
Phylacteries, 14
Pig, name for last sheaf, 144
312
INDEX
Pindar, 6, 118
Pins, in wart-charm, 12 ; in wells,
13, 149 ; in corp chre, 218^"
Pixies, 131
Plants, used in divination, 29, 30,
103 ; souls embodied in, 72, 102 ;
totems, 97 ; as ancestors, 102 ;
worship of, 103 ; use in magic,
103
Plant-spirit, 102, 103. See Tree-
worship
Plato, on soul's egress, 42; metem-
psychosis, 70
Pleiades, 139, 247, 293
Pliny, on right and left, 9; on
magic knots, 22 ; Zeus Lykaios,
126 ; disease-transference, 213 ;
birds' language, 276
Poker, across bars, 7 ; plunged in
churn, 8
Poland : superstition concerning
willow-trees, 82 ; last sheaf, 144 ;
vampire, 152 ; devil, 157
Poltergeist, 152
Polydorus, 76
Polynesians, 107, 201, 236, 238, 256
Polytheism, 135, 152
Polyxena sacrificed, 61
Pomponius Mela, 198
Pontiff, 149
Pookas, 131
Popular tales. See Folk-tales
Portrait, the soul in the, 203, 213
Portuguese, ballad, 73 ; devil, 161
Poseidon, 113, 145
Possession, 7, 64, 67, 215. See
Demons
Pottery, common features of early,
295
Prayers to the dead, 49, 62
Precautions to lay ghost, 57, 58 ;
respecting hair, nails, &c. , 203,
213
Preservation of the corpse, 56
Priestess, 89, 198
Priests, savage, 64, 89 ; consume
sacrifices, 134
Primitive savagery of man, 2 ;
restrictive use of word, 37
Procopius, on guiding beast, 104 ;
voyage of souls to Britain, 188
Prometheus, on divination, 27 ;
his description of a savage, 37 ;
as culture-hero and fire-giver,
153
Propitiation, 61, 62, 103, 132
Proteus, 115
Proverbs, 289
Prussians, old funeral custom of,
49
Psyche, the butterfly-soul, 71 ;
story of, 77, in, 123, 190, 281
Psychostasia, 191
Pupil of eye, related to soul, 60
Purgatory, 186, 191
Puss in Boots, in
Pyramids, 56, 138
Pyre, 49
Pyrenees. See Beehive habita-
tions
Pythagoras, on catoptromancy,
26 ; metempsychosis, 70 ; jour-
ney to Hades, 118
Pythagoreans' myth of souls, 243
Pytheas, 89, 235
Python, 237
QUAWTEAHT, 154
Quetzalcoatl, 152
RA, 208, 218
Rag-bushes, 12, 82
Rags, in disease-transference, 12,
82
Rainbow, myths of, 241
Rain-god, 141
Rain-making, 197, 198, 224
Raven, King Arthur as, 71 ; as
guiding beast, 104 ; Woden's,
104
Red Indian : soul's exit, 65 ;
wizards in form of birds, 91 ;
totem, 97; other- world, 186 ;
fable of the South Wind, 243
Reflection, the soul in the, 67
Relics, 173
Religions, absence of moral ele-
ment in lower, 182
Resemblance between prehistoric
and existing savage races, 3 ;
European and savage custom,
35 ; Aryan and non-Aryan myth,
290, 293
Resurrection, emblem of, 31; body
must not lack teeth, 57
Rheumatism cure, 10, 13
INDEX
Rhymes, 280, 287
Ribble, river, 147
Rice, throwing, 17, 18 ; emblem
of fruitfulness, 17, 19
Riddles, 288
Right and left, in superstition, 9 ;
Sir Thomas Browne on, 10
Rig-veda, 140, 283
Ring, wedding, as cure, 13 ; as
amulet, 13
Rio Grande, superstition in, 22
Rip Van Winkle, 183
Rites, funeral, 47, 49, 50; sacri-
ficial, 133 ; solar, 138 ; cere-
monial, 144
Ritual, luck associated with, 19
River of Death, 189
Rivers, divine, 144, 145
River-spirits, 75, 147
Robertson Smith, Prof., 115
Robin Goodfellow, 131
Rock-opening, 29, 225
Rome : sneeze salutation, 7 ; prac-
tice of nail-driving, 16 ; augury,
25 ; specularii, 26 ; latest breath
inhaling, 69 ; sun-worship, 138 ;
Vestal, 140 ; fire-god, 140 ;
pontiff, 149 ; conception of
Hades, 192-3; invocations,
212 ; incantations, 223 ; pro-
tection against evil spirits, 231
Romanus Lacapenus, 80
Romulus and Remus, 104, 275
Rose, springing from corpse, 73
Roumania, Evil Eye in, 229
Rowan for protecting dairy opera-
tions, 8
Riigen, omens in, 9 ; idolatry in,
174
Rumpelstiltskin, 209
Runzifal, Lay of, 72
Russia : hops thrown on bride, 18 ;
owl's claws carried, 54 ; soul's
return prevented, 58 ; folk-tale,
83, 162, 167 ; witches as mag-
pies, 94 ; " cuckoo's tears," 95 ;
swanmaidens, 121 ; Tell legend,
296
Ruthenia, 211, 214
Rye-sow, name for last sheaf,
144
Rye-wolf, 102
SACRAMENTAL food, 175
Sacred wells, 12, 149, 213 ; trees,
7$ff> 8l ^l names, 204
Sacrifice, to the dead, of horse,
animals, wives, slaves, friends,
49, 51, 52; substitutes for, 51,
175 ; to totemic ancestors, 103 ;
rural, 132 ; to deities, 133, 134,
142, 175 ; animistic view of,
134 ; human sacrifice to earth-
goddess, 143 ; to rivers, 147 ;
to idols, 174, 175 ; for disease
cure, 202
Sacrificial feasts to elves, 63 ;
rites, origin of, 133, 173
Saga, defined, 283
Saliva, charm, 229, 230 ; savage
caution respecting, 203
Salt-spilling, 10
Samoa : metamorphosis into trees,
80; totemism, 97, 113; burial,
184 ; rain-making, 198 ; sacred
footprint, 237 ; Papalangi, 256
Samoyeds, provide soul's exit, 65 ;
apology to slain animal, 100 ;
Tell legend, 296
Sampo, 270
Samson's riddle, 288
Sanscrit Dyu and Dyaushpitar,
141, 143
Santal belief concerning ghosts,
61 ; descent from wild-geese, 98
Satan, 141, 158, 172, 215, 224,
231, 238
Satyrs, 150, 152
Saul consults Urim, 26
Savage, culture as representative
of primitive culture, 3, 4 ; mind
naturally credulous, 85^"; belief
in metamorphosis, 87^; spirit-
ualism, 89 ; animistic theory of
nature, 96 ; theories of descent,
96; legends, why retained, 117 ;
savage myths compared, 119 ;
savage stage, all nations have
passed through, 120 ; invention
of stories, 120 ; customs in
regard to marriage etiquette,
282 ; language, 295
Saxo Grammaticus, on omens, 9,
174 ; spells, 14 ; lucky num-
bers, 22 note ; auguries, 25 ;
funeral rites, 48 ; widow-sacri-
INDEX
fice, 51, 52 ; laying barrow-
ghost, 58 ; blood-mingling, 99 ;
idolatry, 174 ; voyage to Hades,
193 ; on weather-making, 197 ;
witchcraft, 216 ; proverbs, 289 ;
William Tell legend in, 296
Scamander, 145
Scandinavia : widow-sacrifice, 52 ;
swanmaiden, 121 ; man-bear,
127 ; Berserker rage, 128 ;
mortal gods, 155 ; human sacri-
fice, 176 ; burial in boats, 184 ;
Walhalla, 193
Scarab, 114
Schiller, 42
Scold-bridles, 32
Scotland : superstition, 9 ; hoop-
ing-cough cure, 12 ; empty
cradle, 19 ; Easter egg, 31 ;
banshee, 64 ; witch as hare, and
variants, 91, 92, 93 ; totemism,
98 ; descent claimed from seal,
101 ; swanmaiden, 121 ; "watch-
ing spirit," 146 ; sacred wells,
149 ; folk-legend, 168 ; selling
wind, 198 ; name-taboo, 205 ;
disease-transference, 213 ; cure
for epilepsy, 214 ; corp chre,
220 ; life-token, 222 ; incanta-
tions, 224 ; Evil Eye, 228 ;
changeling, 231
Scott, Sir Walter. See Hell-shoe,
Silver bullet, and Folk-songs
Sea, burial at, 58
Sea-god, 145
Sea-monster, shot with silver
bullet, 94 ; descent claimed
from, 98 ; legends of, 238
Seal, Irish regard for, 100, 101 ;
descent claimed from, in Scot-
land, 101 ; sealmaiden, 121
Seb and Nut, 253, 254
Second-self, belief in, established,
40. See Ghost, Soul, Spirit
Seer, powers of the, 26
Self-possession, 6
Semitic totemism, 97 ; fetichism,
174
Separable soul, 36 ff\ in Egyptian,
80; and other folk-tales, 83^ 278
Serpent, as fetich, 176 ; worship,
177 ; devil as, 158 ; flesh, virtue
of, 276
Servia, 214, 289
Set, 136
Seven, the number, 23
Shadow, the soul in the, 67, 68
Shadowless man, 159
Shakespeare, on odd numbers,
22 ; transmigration, 70 ; change-
ling, 231
Shaman, 64
Shark, human victims for, 239
Sheaf, the last, 143
Shelley, 42, 207
Sheol, 184, 193
Shoes, hell-, 45
Shoe-throwing at weddings, 18
Shoulder-blade in divination, 28
Shropshire, superstition in, 9
Siam : Crown Prince of, 49 ;
prayers to the dead, 49 ; soul's
exit, 65
Siberia, folk-tale from, 84, 122 ;
earthquakes, 235
Sicily, wheat cast on bride in, 18
Sieve and shears, 28
Sigfred hides his name, 205
Sigmund as werewolf, 124
Sigurd, 276
Silver bullet, 94
"Singing Bone," folk-tale of the,
77
Singing games, 288
Siva, 174
Six Swans, story of, 122
Skalds, 286
Skamahdros, 145
Skerne, river, 147
Skin, animal's, use of, 126
Skulls bored for ghost's egress, 66
Sky personified, 135, 141
Slaves, sacrifice of, 51
Slavonic, widow - sacrifice, 52 ;
feast of the dead, 55 ; werewolf
superstition, 124 ; word Bog,
136 ; vampire, 151 ; Nature-
myth, 249
Sleep, experience during, 40 ;
connected with death, 44
Sleeper, objection to waking, 41
Sling and stone, 33
Slogan, 287
Slovac legend, 76
Smallness of the ghost, 59, 60
Smallpox personified, 214
315
INDEX
Snail, in wart-charm, 12
Snake, soul as, 44, 72 ; as fetich,
176; descent claimed from, 113
Sneezing, salutation on, 7 , con-
nected with spiritual influence,
7. 64
Socrates, 214
Solar shrines, 138, 139
Soldier's funeral, 51
Solomon, legends about, 168, 169,
204, 277
Solomon Islander, 147, 252
Solstice, 138, 139
Soma, 155
Sorcerers, as medicine-men, 67,
89, 197 ; their power of meta-
morphosis, 88, 91, 197 ; in-
cantations, spiritualism, 89 ; as
exorcists, &c., 196^ 215
Sorcery, origin of, 64, 196 ; prin-
ciples of, 199^: See Exorcism
Soul, of bridegroom, takes flight,
17, 1 8 ; of plants and lifeless
things, 39, 50 ; conception of,
related to dreams and visions,
39 ; absent in sleep, 40, 41 ;
exit of, 41, 42, 65, 66, 70 ; as
bee, 42 ; mouse, 43, 72 ; snake,
44, 72 ; weasel, 44, 72 ; the
cause of life, 41, 43 ; homeless
soul, 43 ; attempted recall of
the, 44 ; food set for, 44, 50,
55 ; must climb mountain, 53,
180, 190 ; continued existence
of, after death of body, 56 ; the
return of, prevented, 58, 65 ;
likeness of, to body, 59, 60 ; a
miniature of the body, 60 ;
plurality of souls, 60; "man
in our eyes," 60; remains on
earth among survivors, 60 ;
region of departed souls, 60,
194 ; manes-worship, 62 ; souls
develop into demons, fairies,
61, 64 ; soul in the shadow, 67,
68 ; in the reflection, 67 ; iden-
tified with breath, 68 ; trans-
ference of the, 68, 69 ; echoes
as departed souls, 69 ; souls
embodied in bird, beast, plant,
object, transmigration or met-
empsychosis, 70 ; " path of
birds," i.e. of souls, 71, 243 ;
butterfly-soul, 71 ; plant-soul,
7 2 . 73. 74 ; nature-souls, 74 ;
souls of the dead animating
trees and plants, 75^; the
Separable Soul in folk-tales,
%3>ff< 2 78 I souls of living and
dead persons entering animals,
95 ; souls in all things, 172 ; in
fetich, 173 ; must cross water,
186 ; voyage of souls to Britain,
1 88 ; trial of the, 191 ; and see
Animism
Soul-cakes, 54
South American marriage custom ,
34 ; sun and moon myths, 249,
252
Spartan marriage custom, 34
Specularii, 26
Spells, against butter-making, 7 ;
for ruling weather, 89 ; Woden
learns, 225
Spencer, Mr., 186
Spercheios, 145
Spey, 147
Sphinx, orientation of, 139 ; a
dragon, 241 ; riddle of, 288
Spirit, conception of, related to
dreams and visions, 39, 41 ;
connected with soul, 40 ; called
up by necromancer or medium,
41, 151 ; remains near corpse
or dwelling, 64, 66 ; possession
by evil spirit, 7, 64, 67 ; exor-
cism, 7, 64, 67 ; transference of
witch's familiar spirit, 69 ; wood-
mare and nightmare, 70 ; Na-
ture-spirits of volcanoes, wind,
whirlpool, stars, 74, 135 ; water-
and tree-spirits, 75 ; spirits,
good and evil, developing into
fairies, sprites, &c., 131; gods
and devils, 135 ; water-spirits,
144^"; " watching spirit," 146 ;
bottled, 161^; cannot cross
water, 185
Spiritualism, modern, its origin
in savage culture, 41
Spiritualist, modern, use of crystal
ball by, 25; belief of the, 41,
59 ; raising the dead, 151
Spirit-world, 179^"
Spitting to avert calamity, 10,
229
INDEX
Spittle, lustration with, 229 ;
speaking, 279
Spring festival, 31, 32, 102
Springs, divine, 144
Sprites, ghosts develop into, 131
Standing stones, objects of wor-
ship, 66
Star-myths, 244^"
Stellar shrines, 139
St. John's Eve fires, 138
Stone, age of culture, 3 ; axes and
arrow-heads as charms, 13, 215 ;
circles, fairies protect, 15 ; im-
plements, 3, 30, 67 ; hole in, for
soul's exit, 65, 66 ; as fetich,
173. 174
Stonehenge, 139
Stories, savage invention of, 120
Storm, myths of, 241
Strabo, 199
Straw-cock, name for last sheaf,
144
Straw- wheel, 138
Styes, cure for, 13
Suanto-Vitus, 174
Substitutes in sacrifice, 51, 175,
176
Subterranean abodes of bliss, 182
Sucking-cure, 216
Suicide, 61
Sulu Islands, rice-charm in, 18
Sun-god, Egyptian, 218
Sun-worship, 20, 137, 138
Sun and Moon, as brother and
sister, 137, 250 ; as husband and
wife, 137, 249, 250 ; as abode of
souls, 195 ; sun and moon
myths, 244 ff
Sunrise and sunset myths, 253
Sunwise-moving, 20
Superstitious observances, Tff
Supreme god, 136, 137
Survival, of man's primitive
savagery, 2 ; savage, in re-
ligious rituals, 4, 176, 201 ; in
funeral rites, 50 ; in sacrificial
rites, 176
Sussex, superstition in, 9
Sutlej, 146
Suttee, 51
Swabia, Easter hare in, 31 ; offer-
ing to the gale in, 142
Swallowing-myths, 116
Swan, soul as a, 71 ; human
descent from, 97, 98
Swan-knights, 97, 212
Swanmaidens, 84, 112, 120 ff
Sweden, empty cradle in, 19 ;
swanmaidens in, 121
Swoon, soul's absence during, 44,
65
Sword, visions seen in, 26
Sworn brotherhood, 99
Sylvanus, 75
Symbolic magic, 20
Symbolism in religious ceremony,
I7S
Sympathetic, magic, u, 217 ; eat-
ing, 199, 200, 201
Symplegades, 268
Syrens, 150
TABOO, eating-, 99^"; marriage-,
99 ; on killing totem animal
or bird, 96, looff; on seeing
bride or bridegroom, 123, 281,
282 ; on names, 204^ 282
Tacitus, 127, 176, 253
Tail-fisher stories, 266, 267, 294
Tales, popular. See Marchen
Taliesin, Welsh story of, 116
Talismans, 10, n ; slaves of talis-
mans, 136
Talking beasts and birds, 39,
no, 273, 276, 277
Talking trees, 75, 76, 77, 78
Tarn o' Shanter, 186
Tamoi, 154
Tantalus, 118
Tartarus, 49, 190
Tatar folk-tale, 83 ; cyclops, 280
Tattoo, 99
Tees, river, 147
Teeth, in coffin, 57 ; dreamed of,
presaging death, 10
Telemachus, lucky sneeze of, 7
Tell, legend of, 295
Temples, 61, 173-5
Tennyson, on soul's egress, 42 ;
human sacrifice, 176
Tertiary epoch, 2
Tertullian, 292
Thaumas, 240
Theocritus, on soothsaying, 30 ;
sympathetic magic, 218
Thlinkeets, 88, 115, 153
317
INDEX
Thorns, Mr., 3
Thor, 141, 158, 172, 238
Thorkill, 190, 193
Thoth, 191
Three, the number, 22
Thunder-bird, 241 ; -god, 141,
241
Tiger, witch in form of, 91 ; flesh
of, eaten, 199
Tleps, Circassian fire-god, 140
Toads used in magic, 12, 23
Tombs, food receptacles on, 55 ;
soul's exit, 65, 66
Tombstone, doves carved on, 70
Tools, man's earliest, 3, 30
Toothache, charm against, n
Tortoise as earth-bearer, 236, 255
Totem, animal-, 96 ; plant-, 97 ;
the word, 97
Totemism, 96 ; traces of, in
Europe, 97 ; influence of, on
savage society, 98
Toys, 33
Traces of early man, 2 ; of savage
beliefs among the civilised, 4,
35. See Survival
Tradition, the power of, 5
Transference of disease, 12, 213
Transformation, soul's, 74;
Daphne's, 81 ; savage belief in,
%7ff\ of gods, ii$ff\ in folk-
tales, 112, 278. See Swan-
maidens and Werewolves
Transmigration, doctrine of, 70 ;
of souls, 70^; in folk-tales,
III, 112
Tree- worship, 80, 81, 149
Trees : cleft trees for cure of
diseases, 13, 79, 82 ; souls
embodied in, 72, 73, 74, 75,
8 1 ; buried lovers as inter-
twining trees, 73, 74 ; sacred
trees, jsff, 8i#, 149; talking,
sentient trees, 75, 76, 77, 78 ;
libations to, 81 ; as life-tokens,
222, 223
Trepanning, 66, 67
Trojan captives, widow-sacrifice
by. S 1
Trolls, dwarfs or dark elves, 137,
150, 159, 208
Tsui Goab, 154
Tubal-Cain as fire-god, 140
Turn, 190
Tupis, burial custom of, 44
Turkish, wedding, shoe-throwing
at, 18 ; nurse, 229 ; Tell legend,
296
Twelfth-Day, 81
Two Brothers, Egyptian story of,
79, 84, 223
Tylor, Professor, 33, 34
Typhasus, 237
Typhon, 239
Tyrol : bleeding tree, 79 ; offering
to the gale, 142
ULYSSES, 16. See Odysseus
Uncle Remus, 269, 273
Undine, 123
Uniformity in workings of the
human mind, 4, 295
Unkulunkulu, 153
Unnatural incidents, 277, 278,
279. See Irrational
Unsubstantial shades, 59
Uranos, 254
Urim and Thummim, 26
VALKYRIES, 120, 225
Vampires, 151, 152, 201
Vancouver Island, story from, 112
Varro on specularii, 26
Vati Island, 66
Veda, 224
Veddahs, primitive savagery sur-
viving in, 2
Vesta, 140
Vestal fire, 89, 140
Victor Hugo's grandfather, ghost
of. 59
Viking. See Wicking
Virgil, on lucky days, 21 ; num-
bers, 22 ; bees, 24 ; priests, 89 ;
werewolf, 125 ; Hades, 192,
193 ; sympathetic magic, 219 ;
Evil Eye, 227 ; and see Poly-
dorus
Vishnu, 174
Visions. See Catoptromancy
Vitra, 237
Volkslieder, 284
Volksmarchen , 283
Volsungs. See Wolsungs
Vortigern, 107
Vulcan, 140, 153
318
INDEX
WADDERS, rice at wedding used
by, 18 ; totemism, 103
Wahuma, divination of the, 25
Wainamoinen. See Kalewala
Walkyries. See Valkyries
Walling-up. See Burying alive
Walloons, charm carried by, n ;
folk-tale, 163
Wart-charms, 12, 213
Warwickshire, Easter hare in, 32
Water, blessed on Easter Sunday,
to protect cattle, 8 ; deities,
spirits, 144^; human sacrifice
to, 146^; worship, 149 ; dead
must cross, 184^; spirits cannot
cross, 185
Water-kelpies, 150
Water-lilies, danger in plucking,
103
Waterloo, poppies on field of, 72
Waterspouts, myth of, 242
Watling Street or Milky Way, 244
Wax-figure melting, 218^
Wayland Smith, 158. See Wey-
land
Weapon-salve, 12
Weapons in tombs, 44, 50, 57
Weasel, soul as, 44, 72
Weather-, lore, 20, no; making,
197, 224 ; prophecies, 24, no
Wedding, throwing rice, hops,
wheat, shoes, &c., at, 17-18
Weighing the soul, 191
Wells, sacred, 12, 149, 213 ;
offerings at, 13, 149
Well-worship, 149, 213
Welsh, variant of Midas story,
78 ; belief in animal ancestry,
98 ; story of Gellert, 296
Werewolves, 112, 123^; of the
Middle Ages, 128
Weyland the Smith, 120. See
Wayland
Wheat cast on bride, 18 ; wheat-
bride, name given to last sheaf,
144
Whinny-moore, the, 45
Whirlpool, spirit of, 74
White Mountain, sacred, 180
Wicking, burials, 44 ; sacrifice,
176 ; voyage to other - world,
186
Widow-sacrifice, 51
Wight, 151
Wiltshire, toothache-charm in, it
" Wind-and- Weather " story, 208
Wind, personified, 142 ; see " Four
Winds ; " buying and selling,
198 ; raising the, 198
Wind-god, 142
Witch of Endor, 26, 151
Witches hinder butter-making, 7,
93 ; steal children, 8 ; bespell
cattle, 8 ; cannot cross iron,
15 ; transform themselves and
others, 88, 90 ; rule weather,
89 ; witch as hare, 91 ; fox, 92 ;
butterfly, 93 ; cat and horse, 94 ;
magpie, 94 ; raise the dead,
151 ; ride brooms, 158
Witchcraft, iron against, 8, 15, 16,
231 ; lycanthropy as a species
of, 128 ; in Ireland, 197, 215 ;
with name, 203^
Withershins, evil spells wrought,
20
Wives, capture of, 33, 34, 294
Wizards. See Sorcerers
Woden, sworn brotherhood of,
99 ; his raven and wolf, 104 ;
hides his name, 205 ; on gallows
tree, 224
Wolf, and Seven Kids, 116 ; name
for last sheaf, 144
Wolsungs, 200, 205, 276
Wolves, descent claimed from, 98,
no
Woman gives birth to animals,
112, 113, 278
Wood-mare, name for echo, 70
World pervaded by spirits, 74
Worship, sun and moon, 20 ;
ancestor-, 62, 63 ; ghost-, 62 ;
tree-, 80, 81, 149; totem-, 96 ff,
103 ; animal-, 104, 114 ; plant-,
103 ; Nature-, 137 ; fire-, 139 ;
earth-, 142 ff\ water-, 148 ff;
fetich-, 173, 178 ; serpent-, 177
Written charms, 14
XERXES, 145
YAM A, 154
Yawning, as case of" possession,"
64
Yehl, 153, 154
319
INDEX
Yorkshire : Easter egg, 31 ; hell-
shoes, 45 ; hole in coffin, 66 ;
Evil Eye, 227
ZEUS, 21, 115, 116, 126, 135, 141,
143, 171, 237
Zohak, 237
Zulu, sneeze salutation, 7 ; divina-
tion, 29 ; rock-opening magic,
29 ; the shadow-soul, 68; talking-
trees, 77 ; culture-hero, 154 ;
sympathetic magic, 219 ; beast-
fables, 273 ; riddles, 288 ; Jack
and the Beanstalk myth, 293
THE END
Printed by BALLANTVNK, HANSON & Co.
Edinburgh and London
St. Michael's ( Library;
.U St.
03
Cox, M. R. 65
*C
Introduction to folk-lore.
St. Mr.
Ba ;
Canada
