The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 11 of 12)

A Samoyed story tells how seven warlocks killed a certain man's mother and carried off his sister, whom they kept to serve them. Every night when they came home the seven warlocks used to take out their hearts and place them in a dish which the woman hung on the tent-poles. But the wife of the man whom they had wronged stole the hearts of the warlocks while they slept, and took them to her husband. By break of day he went with the hearts to the warlocks, and found them at the point of death. They all begged for their hearts; but he threw six of their hearts to the ground, and six of the warlocks died. The seventh and eldest warlock begged hard for his heart and the man said, “You killed my mother. Make her alive again, and I will give you back your heart.” The warlock said to his wife, “Go to the place where the dead woman lies. You will find a bag there. Bring it to me. The woman's spirit is in the bag.” So his wife brought the bag; and the warlock said to the man, “Go to your dead mother, shake the bag and let the spirit breathe over her bones; so she will come to life again.” The man did as he was bid, and his mother was restored to life. Then he hurled the seventh heart to the ground, and the seventh warlock died.[389 - A. Castren, Ethnologische Vorlesungen über die altaischen Völker (St. Petersburg, 1857), pp. 173 sqq.] In a Kalmuck tale we read how a certain khan challenged a wise man to shew his skill by stealing a precious stone on which the khan's life depended. The sage contrived to purloin the talisman while the khan and his guards slept; but not content with this he gave a further proof of his dexterity by bonneting the slumbering potentate with a bladder. This was too much for the khan. Next morning he informed the sage that he could overlook everything else, but that the indignity of being bonneted with a bladder was more than he could stand; and he ordered his facetious friend to instant execution. Pained at this exhibition of royal ingratitude, the sage dashed to the ground the talisman which he still held in his hand; and at the same instant blood flowed from the nostrils of the khan, and he gave up the ghost.[390 - B. Jülg, Kalmückische Märchen (Leipsic, 1866), No. 12, pp. 58 sqq.]

The external soul in Tartar poems.

In a Tartar poem two heroes named Ak Molot and Bulat engage in mortal combat. Ak Molot pierces his foe through and through with an arrow, grapples with him, and dashes him to the ground, but all in vain, Bulat could not die. At last when the combat has lasted three years, a friend of Ak Molot sees a golden casket hanging by a white thread from the sky, and bethinks him that perhaps this casket contains Bulat's soul. So he shot through the white thread with an arrow, and down fell the casket. He opened it, and in the casket sat ten white birds, and one of the birds was Bulat's soul. Bulat wept when he saw that his soul was found in the casket. But one after the other the birds were killed, and then Ak Molot easily slew his foe.[391 - Anton Schiefner, Heldensagen der Minussinschen Tataren (St. Petersburg, 1859), pp. 172-176.] In another Tartar poem, two brothers going to fight two other brothers take out their souls and hide them in the form of a white herb with six stalks in a deep pit. But one of their foes sees them doing so and digs up their souls, which he puts into a golden ram's horn, and then sticks the ram's horn in his quiver. The two warriors whose souls have thus been stolen know that they have no chance of victory, and accordingly make peace with their enemies.[392 - A. Schiefner, op. cit. pp. 108-112.] In another Tartar poem a terrible demon sets all the gods and heroes at defiance. At last a valiant youth fights the demon, binds him hand and foot, and slices him with his sword. But still the demon is not slain. So the youth asked him, “Tell me, where is your soul hidden? For if your soul had been hidden in your body, you must have been dead long ago.” The demon replied, “On the saddle of my horse is a bag. In the bag is a serpent with twelve heads. In the serpent is my soul. When you have killed the serpent, you have killed me also.” So the youth took the saddle-bag from the horse and killed the twelve-headed serpent, whereupon the demon expired.[393 - A. Schiefner, op. cit. pp. 360-364; A. Castren, Vorlesungen über die finnische Mythologie (St. Petersburg, 1857), pp. 186 sq.] In another Tartar poem a hero called Kök Chan deposits with a maiden a golden ring, in which is half his strength. Afterwards when Kök Chan is wrestling long with a hero and cannot kill him, a woman drops into his mouth the ring which contains half his strength. Thus inspired with fresh force he slays his enemy.[394 - A. Schiefner, op. cit. pp. 189-193. In another Tartar poem (Schiefner, op. cit. pp. 390 sq.) a boy's soul is shut up by his enemies in a box. While the soul is in the box, the boy is dead; when it is taken out, he is restored to life. In the same poem (p. 384) the soul of a horse is kept shut up in a box, because it is feared the owner of the horse will become the greatest hero on earth. But these cases are, to some extent, the converse of those in the text.]

The external soul in a Mongolian story and Tartar poems.

In a Mongolian story the hero Joro gets the better of his enemy the lama Tschoridong in the following way. The lama, who is an enchanter, sends out his soul in the form of a wasp to sting Joro's eyes. But Joro catches the wasp in his hand, and by alternately shutting and opening his hand he causes the lama alternately to lose and recover consciousness.[395 - Schott, “Ueber die Sage von Geser-Chan,” Abhandlungen der königlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, 1851, p. 269.] In a Tartar poem two youths cut open the body of an old witch and tear out her bowels, but all to no purpose, she still lives. On being asked where her soul is, she answers that it is in the middle of her shoe-sole in the form of a seven-headed speckled snake. So one of the youths slices her shoe-sole with his sword, takes out the speckled snake, and cuts off its seven heads. Then the witch dies.[396 - W. Radloff, Proben der Volkslitteratur der türkischen Stämme Süd-Sibiriens, ii. (St. Petersburg, 1868), pp. 237 sq.] Another Tartar poem describes how the hero Kartaga grappled with the Swan-woman. Long they wrestled. Moons waxed and waned and still they wrestled; years came and went, and still the struggle went on. But the piebald horse and the black horse knew that the Swan-woman's soul was not in her. Under the black earth flow nine seas; where the seas meet and form one, the sea comes to the surface of the earth. At the mouth of the nine seas rises a rock of copper; it rises to the surface of the ground, it rises up between heaven and earth, this rock of copper. At the foot of the copper rock is a black chest, in the black chest is a golden casket, and in the golden casket is the soul of the Swan-woman. Seven little birds are the soul of the Swan-woman; if the birds are killed the Swan-woman will die straightway. So the horses ran to the foot of the copper rock, opened the black chest, and brought back the golden casket. Then the piebald horse turned himself into a bald-headed man, opened the golden casket, and cut off the heads of the seven birds. So the Swan-woman died.[397 - W. Radloff, op. cit. ii. 531 sqq.] In a Tartar story a chief called Tash Kan is asked where his soul is. He answers that there are seven great poplars, and under the poplars a golden well; seven Maralen (?) come to drink the water of the well, and the belly of one of them trails on the ground; in this Maral is a golden box, in the golden box is a silver box, in the silver box are seven quails, the head of one of the quails is golden and its tail silver; that quail is Tash Kan's soul. The hero of the story gets possession of the seven quails and wrings the necks of six of them. Then Tash Kan comes running and begs the hero to let his soul go free. But the hero wrings the last quail's neck, and Tash Kan drops dead.[398 - W. Radloff, op. cit. iv. (St. Petersburg, 1872) pp. 88 sq.] In another Tartar poem the hero, pursuing his sister who has driven away his cattle, is warned to desist from the pursuit because his sister has carried away his soul in a golden sword and a golden arrow, and if he pursues her she will kill him by throwing the golden sword or shooting the golden arrow at him.[399 - W. Radloff, op. cit. i. (St. Petersburg, 1866) pp. 345 sq.]

The external soul in a Chinese story.

A modern Chinese story tells how an habitual criminal used to take his soul out of his own body for the purpose of evading the righteous punishment of his crimes. This bad man lived in Khien (Kwei-cheu), and the sentences that had been passed on him formed a pile as high as a hill. The mandarins had flogged him to death with sticks and flung his mangled corpse into the river, but three days afterwards the scoundrel got his soul back again, and on the fifth day he resumed his career of villainy as if nothing had happened. The thing occurred again and again, till at last it reached the ears of the Governor of the province, who flew into a violent passion and proposed to the Governor-General to have the rascal beheaded. And beheaded he was; but in three days the wretch was alive again with no trace of decapitation about him except a slender red thread round his neck. And now, like a giant refreshed, he began a fresh series of enormities. He even went so far as to beat his own mother. This was more than she could bear, and she brought the matter before the magistrate. She produced in court a vase and said, “In this vase my refractory son has hidden his soul. Whenever he was conscious of having committed a serious crime, or a misdeed of the most heinous kind, he remained at home, took his soul out of his body, purified it, and put it in the vase. Then the authorities only punished or executed his body of flesh and blood, and not his soul. With his soul, refined by a long process, he then cured his freshly mutilated body, which thus became able in three days to recommence in the old way. Now, however, his crimes have reached a climax, for he has beaten me, an old woman, and I cannot bear it. I pray you, smash this vase, and scatter his soul by fanning it away with a windwheel; and if then you castigate his body anew, it is probable that bad son of mine will really die.” The mandarin took the hint. He had the rogue cudgelled to death, and when they examined the corpse they found that decay had set in within ten days.[400 - J. J. M. de Groot, The Religious System of China, iv. (Leyden, 1901) pp. 105 sq.]

The external soul in a story told by the Khasis of Assam.

The Khasis of Assam tell of a certain Kyllong, king of Madur, who pursued his conquests on a remarkable principle. He needed few or no soldiers, because he himself was a very strong man and nobody could kill him permanently; they could, it is true, put him to death, but then he came to life again immediately. The king of Synteng, who was much afraid of him, once chopped him in pieces and threw the severed hands and feet far away, thinking thus to get rid of him for good and all; but it was to no purpose. The very next morning Kyllong came to life again and stalked about as brisk as ever. So the king of Synteng was very anxious to learn how his rival contrived thus to rise from the dead; and he hit on a plan for worming out the secret. He chose the fairest girl of the whole country, clad her in royal robes, put jewels of gold and silver upon her, and said, “All these will I give thee and more besides, if thou canst obtain for me King Kyllong's secret, and canst inform me how he brings himself to life again after being killed.” So he sent the girl to the slave-market in King Kyllong's country; and the king saw and loved her and took her to wife. So she caressed him and coaxed him to tell her his secret, and in a fatal hour he was beguiled into revealing it. He said, “My life depends upon these things. I must bathe every day and must wash my entrails. After that, I take my food, and there is no one on earth who can kill me unless he obtains possession of my entrails. Thus my life hangs only on my entrails.” His treacherous wife at once sent word to the king of Synteng, who caused men to lie in wait while Kyllong was bathing. As usual, Kyllong had laid his entrails on one side of the bathing-place, while he disported himself in the water, intending afterwards to wash them and replace them in his body. But before he could do so, one of the liers-in-wait had seized the entrails and killed him. The entrails he cut in pieces and gave to the dogs to eat. That was the end of King Kyllong. He was never able to come to life again; his country was conquered, and the members of the royal family were scattered far and wide. Seven generations have passed since then.[401 - Major P. R. T. Gurdon, The Khasis (London, 1907), pp. 181-184.]

The external soul in a Malay poem. Bidasari and the golden fish.

A Malay poem relates how once upon a time in the city of Indrapoora there was a certain merchant who was rich and prosperous, but he had no children. One day as he walked with his wife by the river they found a baby girl, fair as an angel. So they adopted the child and called her Bidasari. The merchant caused a golden fish to be made, and into this fish he transferred the soul of his adopted daughter. Then he put the golden fish in a golden box full of water, and hid it in a pond in the midst of his garden. In time the girl grew to be a lovely woman. Now the King of Indrapoora had a fair young queen, who lived in fear that the king might take to himself a second wife. So, hearing of the charms of Bidasari, the queen resolved to put her out of the way. She lured the girl to the palace and tortured her cruelly; but Bidasari could not die, because her soul was not in her. At last she could stand the torture no longer and said to the queen, “If you wish me to die, you must bring the box which is in the pond in my father's garden.” So the box was brought and opened, and there was the golden fish in the water. The girl said, “My soul is in that fish. In the morning you must take the fish out of the water, and in the evening you must put it back into the water. Do not let the fish lie about, but bind it round your neck. If you do this, I shall soon die.” So the queen took the fish out of the box and fastened it round her neck; and no sooner had she done so, than Bidasari fell into a swoon. But in the evening, when the fish was put back into the water, Bidasari came to herself again. Seeing that she thus had the girl in her power, the queen sent her home to her adopted parents. To save her from further persecution her parents resolved to remove their daughter from the city. So in a lonely and desolate spot they built a house and brought Bidasari thither. There she dwelt alone, undergoing vicissitudes that corresponded with the vicissitudes of the golden fish in which was her soul. All day long, while the fish was out of the water, she remained unconscious; but in the evening, when the fish was put into the water, she revived. One day the king was out hunting, and coming to the house where Bidasari lay unconscious, was smitten with her beauty. He tried to waken her, but in vain. Next day, towards evening, he repeated his visit, but still found her unconscious. However, when darkness fell, she came to herself and told the king the secret of her life. So the king returned to the palace, took the fish from the queen, and put it in water. Immediately Bidasari revived, and the king took her to wife.[402 - G. A. Wilken, “De betrekking tusschen menschen- dieren- en plantenleven naar het volksgeloof,” De Indische Gids, November 1884, pp. 600-602; id., “De Simsonsage,” De Gids, 1888, No. 5, pp. 6 sqq. (of the separate reprint); id., Verspreide Geschriften (The Hague, 1912), iii. 296-298, 559-561. Compare L. de Backer, L'Archipel Indien (Paris, 1874), pp. 144-149. The Malay text of the long poem was published with a Dutch translation and notes by W. R. van Hoëvell (“Sjaïr Bidasari, een oorspronkelijk Maleisch Gedicht, uitgegeven en van eene Vertaling en Aanteekeningen voorzien,” Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschappen, xix. (Batavia, 1843) pp. 1-421).]

The external soul in a story told in Nias.

Another story of an external soul comes from Nias, an island to the west of Sumatra. Once on a time a chief was captured by his enemies, who tried to put him to death but failed. Water would not drown him nor fire burn him nor steel pierce him. At last his wife revealed the secret. On his head he had a hair as hard as a copper wire; and with this wire his life was bound up. So the hair was plucked out, and with it his spirit fled.[403 - J. T. Nieuwenhuisen en H. C. B. von Rosenberg, “Verslag omtrent het eiland Nias,” Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschappen, xxx. (Batavia, 1863) p. 111; H. Sundermann, “Die Insel Nias,” Allgemeine Missions-Zeitschrift, xi. (1884) p. 453; id., Die Insel Nias und die Mission daselbst (Barmen, 1905), p. 71. Compare E. Modigliani, Un Viaggio a Nías (Milan, 1890), p. 339.]

The external soul in a Hausa story. The king whose life was in a box. The helpful animals.

A Hausa story from Northern Nigeria closely resembles some of the European tales which we have noticed; for it contains not only the incident of the external soul, but also the incident of the helpful animals, by whose assistance the hero is able to slay the Soulless King and obtain possession of the kingdom. The story runs thus. A certain man and his wife had four daughters born to them in succession, but every one of the baby girls mysteriously disappeared on the day when she was to be weaned; so the parents fell under the suspicion of having devoured them. Last of all there was born to them a son, who to avoid accidents was left to wean himself. One day, as he grew up, the son received a magic lotion from an old woman, who told him to rub his eyes with it. He did so, and immediately he saw a large house and entering it he found his eldest sister married to a bull. She bade him welcome and so did her husband the bull; and when he went away, the bull very kindly presented him with a lock of his hair as a keepsake. In like manner the lad discovered his other three sisters, who were living in wedlock with a ram, a dog, and a hawk respectively. All of them welcomed him and from the ram, the dog, and the hawk he received tokens of regard in the shape of hair or feathers. Then he returned home and told his parents of his adventure and how he had found his sisters alive and married. Next day he went to a far city, where he made love to the Queen and persuaded her to plot with him against the life of the King her husband. So she coaxed the King to shew his affection for her by “taking his own life, and joining it to hers.” The unsuspecting husband, as usual, fell into the trap set for him by his treacherous wife. He confided to her the secret of his life. “My life,” said he, “is behind the city, behind the city in a thicket. In this thicket there is a lake; in the lake is a rock; in the rock is a gazelle; in the gazelle is a dove; and in the dove is a small box.” The Queen divulged the secret to her lover, who kindled a fire behind the city and threw into it the hair and feathers which he had received from the friendly animals, his brothers-in-law. Immediately the animals themselves appeared and readily gave their help in the enterprise. The bull drank up the lake; the ram broke up the rock; the dog caught the gazelle; the hawk captured the dove. So the youth extracted the precious box from the dove and repaired to the palace, where he found the King already dead. His Majesty had been ailing from the moment when the young man left the city, and he grew steadily worse with every fresh success of the adventurer who was to supplant him. So the hero became King and married the false Queen; and his sisters' husbands were changed from animals into men and received subordinate posts in the government. The hero's parents, too, came to live in the city over which he reigned.[404 - Major A. J. N. Tremearne, Hausa Superstitions and Customs (London, 1913), pp. 131 sq. The original Hausa text of the story appears to be printed in Major Edgar's Litafi na Tatsuniyoyi na Hausa (ii. 27), to which Major Tremearne refers (p. 9).]

The external soul in a South Nigerian story. The external soul in a story told by the Ba-Ronga of South Africa. The Clan of the Cat.

A West African story from Southern Nigeria relates how a king kept his soul in a little brown bird, which perched on a tall tree beside the gate of the palace. The king's life was so bound up with that of the bird that whoever should kill the bird would simultaneously kill the king and succeed to the kingdom. The secret was betrayed by the queen to her lover, who shot the bird with an arrow and thereby slew the king and ascended the vacant throne.[405 - Major A. G. Leonard, The Lower Niger and its Tribes (London, 1906), pp. 319-321.] A tale told by the Ba-Ronga of South Africa sets forth how the lives of a whole family were contained in one cat. When a girl of the family, named Titishan, married a husband, she begged her parents to let her take the precious cat with her to her new home. But they refused, saying, “You know that our life is attached to it”; and they offered to give her an antelope or even an elephant instead of it. But nothing would satisfy her but the cat. So at last she carried it off with her and shut it up in a place where nobody saw it; even her husband knew nothing about it. One day, when she went to work in the fields, the cat escaped from its place of concealment, entered the hut, put on the warlike trappings of the husband, and danced and sang. Some children, attracted by the noise, discovered the cat at its antics, and when they expressed their astonishment, the animal only capered the more and insulted them besides. So they went to the owner and said, “There is somebody dancing in your house, and he insulted us.” “Hold your tongues,” said he, “I'll soon put a stop to your lies.” So he went and hid behind the door and peeped in, and there sure enough was the cat prancing about and singing. He fired at it, and the animal dropped down dead. At the same moment his wife fell to the ground in the field where she was at work; said she, “I have been killed at home.” But she had strength enough left to ask her husband to go with her to her parents' village, taking with him the dead cat wrapt up in a mat. All her relatives assembled, and bitterly they reproached her for having insisted on taking the animal with her to her husband's village. As soon as the mat was unrolled and they saw the dead cat, they all fell down lifeless one after the other. So the Clan of the Cat was destroyed; and the bereaved husband closed the gate of the village with a branch, and returned home, and told his friends how in killing the cat he had killed the whole clan, because their lives depended on the life of the cat. In another Ronga story the lives of a whole clan are attached to a buffalo, which a girl of the clan in like manner insists on taking with her.[406 - Henri A. Junod, Les Chants et les Contes des Ba-ronga (Lausanne, n. d.), pp. 253-256; id., The Life of a South African Tribe (Neuchatel, 1912-1913), i. 338 sq.]

The external soul in stories told by the North American Indians. The ogress whose life was in a hemlock branch.

Ideas of the same sort meet us in stories told by the North American Indians. Thus in one Indian tale the hero pounds his enemy to pieces, but cannot kill him because his heart is not in his body. At last the champion learns that his foe's heart is in the sky, at the western side of the noonday sun; so he reaches up, seizes the heart, and crushes it, and straightway his enemy expires. In another Indian myth there figures a personage Winter whose song brings frost and snow, but his heart is hidden away at a distance. However, his foe finds the heart and burns it, and so the Snow-maker perishes.[407 - J. Curtin, Myths and Folk-tales of the Russians, Western Slavs, and Magyars (London, 1891), p. 551. The writer does not mention his authorities.] A Pawnee story relates how a wounded warrior was carried off by bears, wh o healed him of his hurts. When the Indian was about to return to his village, the old he-bear said to him, “I shall look after you. I shall give you a part of myself. If I am killed, you shall be killed. If I grow old, you shall be old.” And the bear gave him a cap of bearskin, and at parting he put his arms round the Indian and hugged him, and put his mouth against the man's mouth and held the man's hands in his paws. The Indian who told the tale conjectured that when the man died, the old bear died also.[408 - G. B. Grinnell, Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk-tales (New York, 1889), pp. 121 sqq., “The Bear Man.”] The Navajoes tell of a certain mythical being called “the Maiden that becomes a Bear,” who learned the art of turning herself into a bear from the prairie wolf. She was a great warrior and quite invulnerable; for when she went to war she took out her vital organs and hid them, so that no one could kill her; and when the battle was over she put the organs back in their places again.[409 - Washington Matthews, “The Mountain Chant: a Navajo Ceremony,” Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology (Washington, 1887), pp. 406 sq.] The Kwakiutl Indians of British Columbia tell of an ogress, who could not be killed because her life was in a hemlock branch. A brave boy met her in the woods, smashed her head with a stone, scattered her brains, broke her bones, and threw them into the water. Then, thinking he had disposed of the ogress, he went into her house. There he saw a woman rooted to the floor, who warned him, saying, “Now do not stay long. I know that you have tried to kill the ogress. It is the fourth time that somebody has tried to kill her. She never dies; she has nearly come to life. There in that covered hemlock branch is her life. Go there, and as soon as you see her enter, shoot her life. Then she will be dead.” Hardly had she finished speaking when sure enough in came the ogress, singing as she walked: —

“I have the magical treasure,
I have the supernatural power,
I can return to life.”

Such was her song. But the boy shot at her life, and she fell dead to the floor.[410 - Franz Boas, “The Social Organization and the Secret Societies of the Kwakiutl Indians,” Report of the United States National Museum for 1895 (Washington, 1897), p. 373.]

Chapter XI. The External Soul in Folk-Custom

§ 1. The External Soul in Inanimate Things

The external soul in folk-custom.

Thus the idea that the soul may be deposited for a longer or shorter time in some place of security outside the body, or at all events in the hair, is found in the popular tales of many races. It remains to shew that the idea is not a mere figment devised to adorn a tale, but is a real article of primitive faith, which has given rise to a corresponding set of customs.

The soul removed from the body as a precaution in seasons of danger. Souls of people collected in a bag at a house-warming. Soul of a woman put in a chopping-knife at childbirth.

We have seen that in the tales the hero, as a preparation for battle, sometimes removes his soul from his body, in order that his body may be invulnerable and immortal in the combat. With a like intention the savage removes his soul from his body on various occasions of real or imaginary peril. Thus among the people of Minahassa in Celebes, when a family moves into a new house, a priest collects the souls of the whole family in a bag, and afterwards restores them to their owners, because the moment of entering a new house is supposed to be fraught with supernatural danger.[411 - Taboo and the Perils of the Soul, pp. 63 sq.] In Southern Celebes, when a woman is brought to bed, the messenger who fetches the doctor or the midwife always carries with him something made of iron, such as a chopping-knife, which he delivers to the doctor. The doctor must keep the thing in his house till the confinement is over, when he gives it back, receiving a fixed sum of money for doing so. The chopping-knife, or whatever it is, represents the woman's soul, which at this critical time is believed to be safer out of her body than in it. Hence the doctor must take great care of the object; for were it lost, the woman's soul would assuredly, they think, be lost with it.[412 - B. F. Matthes, Bijdragen tot de Ethnologie van Zuid-Celebes (The Hague, 1875), p. 54.] But in Celebes the convenience of occasionally depositing the soul in some external object is apparently not limited to human beings. The Alfoors, or Toradjas, who inhabit the central district of that island, and among whose industries the working of iron occupies a foremost place, attribute to the metal a soul which would be apt to desert its body under the blows of the hammer, if some means were not found to detain it. Accordingly in every smithy of Poso – for that is the name of the country of these people – you may see hanging up a bundle of wooden instruments, such as chopping-knives, swords, spear-heads, and so forth. This bundle goes by the name of lamoa, which is the general word for “gods,” and in it the soul of the iron that is being wrought in the smithy is, according to one account, supposed to reside. “If we did not hang the lamoa over the anvil,” they say, “the iron would flow away and be unworkable,” on account of the absence of the soul.[413 - A. C. Kruijt, “Een en ander aangaande het geestelijk en maatschappelijk leven van den Poso-Alfoer,” Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap, xxxix. (1895) pp. 23 sq.; id., “Van Paloppo naar Posso,” Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap, xlii. (1898) p. 72. As to the lamoa in general, see A. C. Kruijt, op. cit. xl. (1896) pp. 10 sq.] However, according to another interpretation these wooden models are substitutes offered to the gods in room of the iron, whose soul the covetous deities might otherwise abstract for their own use, thus making the metal unmalleable.[414 - A. C. Kruijt, “Het koppensnellen der Toradja's van Midden-Celebes, en zijne beteekenis,” Verslagen en Mededeelingen der koninklijke Akademie der Wetenschappen, Afdeeling Letterkunde, iv. Reeks, iii. (Amsterdam, 1899) pp. 201 sq.; id., “Het ijzer in Midden-Celebes,” Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch- Indië, liii. (1901) pp. 156 sq. Both the interpretations in the text appear to be inferences drawn by Mr. Kruijt from the statement of the natives, that, if they did not hang up these wooden models in the smithy, “the iron would flow away and be unworkable” (“zou het ijzer vervloeien en onbewerkbaar worden”).]

Soul of a child put for safety in an empty coco-nut or a bag. Souls of people in ornaments, horns, a column, and so forth. The souls of Egyptian kings in portrait statues. A man's life bound up with the fire in his lodge.

Among the Dyaks of Pinoeh, a district of South-Eastern Borneo, when a child is born, a medicine-man is sent for, who conjures the soul of the infant into half a coco-nut, which he thereupon covers with a cloth and places on a square platter or charger suspended by cords from the roof. This ceremony he repeats at every new moon for a year.[415 - A. H. B. Agerbeek, “Enkele gebruiken van de Dajaksche bevolking der Pinoehlanden,” Tijdschrift voor Indische Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde, li. (1909) pp. 447 sq.] The intention of the ceremony is not explained by the writer who describes it, but we may conjecture that it is to place the soul of the child in a safer place than its own frail little body. This conjecture is confirmed by the reason assigned for a similar custom observed elsewhere in the Indian Archipelago. In the Kei Islands, when there is a newly-born child in a house, an empty coco-nut, split and spliced together again, may sometimes be seen hanging beside a rough wooden image of an ancestor. The soul of the infant is believed to be temporarily deposited in the coco-nut in order that it may be safe from the attacks of evil spirits; but when the child grows bigger and stronger, the soul will take up its permanent abode in its own body. Similarly among the Esquimaux of Alaska, when a child is sick, the medicine-man will sometimes extract its soul from its body and place it for safe-keeping in an amulet, which for further security he deposits in his own medicine-bag. [416 - J. A. Jacobsen, Reisen in die Inselwelt des Banda-Meeres (Berlin, 1896), p. 199.] It seems probable that many amulets have been similarly regarded as soul-boxes, that is, as safes in which the souls of the owners are kept for greater security.[417 - In a long list of female ornaments the prophet Isaiah mentions (iii. 20) “houses of the soul” (בת הנפש) or (שפנה תב), which modern scholars suppose to have been perfume boxes, as the Revised English Version translates the phrase. The name, literally translated “houses of the soul,” suggests that these trinkets were amulets of the kind mentioned in the text. See my article, “Folk-lore in the Old Testament,” Anthropological Essays presented to E. B. Tylor (Oxford, 1907), pp. 148 sqq. In ancient Egyptian tombs there are often found plaques or palettes of schist bearing traces of paint; some of them are decorated with engravings of animals or historical scenes, others are modelled in the shape of animals of various sorts, such as antelopes, hippopotamuses, birds, tortoises, and fish. As a rule only one such plaque is found in a tomb, and it lies near the hands of the mummy. It has been conjectured by M. Jean Capart that these plaques are amulets or soul-boxes, in which the external souls of the dead were supposed to be preserved. See Jean Capart, Les Palettes en schiste de L'Égypte primitive (Brussels, 1908), pp. 5 sqq., 19 sqq. (separate reprint from the Revue des Questions Scientifiques, avril, 1908). For a full description of these plaques or palettes, see Jean Capart, Les Débuts de l'Art en Égypte (Brussels, 1904), pp. 76 sqq., 221 sqq.] An old Mang'anje woman in the West Shire district of British Central Africa used to wear round her neck an ivory ornament, hollow, and about three inches long, which she called her life or soul (moyo wanga). Naturally, she would not part with it; a planter tried to buy it of her, but in vain.[418 - Miss Alice Werner, in a letter to the author, dated 25th September 1899. Miss Werner knew the old woman. Compare Contemporary Review, lxx. (July-December 1896), p. 389, where Miss Werner describes the ornament as a rounded peg, tapering to a point, with a neck or notch at the top.] When Mr. James Macdonald was one day sitting in the house of a Hlubi chief, awaiting the appearance of that great man, who was busy decorating his person, a native pointed to a pair of magnificent ox-horns, and said, “Ntame has his soul in these horns.” The horns were those of an animal which had been sacrificed, and they were held sacred. A magician had fastened them to the roof to protect the house and its inmates from the thunder-bolt. “The idea,” adds Mr. Macdonald, “is in no way foreign to South African thought. A man's soul there may dwell in the roof of his house, in a tree, by a spring of water, or on some mountain scaur.”[419 - Rev. James Macdonald, Religion and Myth (London, 1893), p. 190. Compare Dudley Kidd, The Essential Kafir (London, 1904), p. 83: “The natives occasionally fix ox-horns in their roofs and say that the spirit of the chief lives in these horns and protects the hut; these horns also protect the hut from lightning, though not in virtue of their spiritual connections. (They are also used simply as ornaments.)” No doubt amulets often degenerate into ornaments.] Among the natives of the Gazelle Peninsula in New Britain there is a secret society which goes by the name of Ingniet or Ingiet. On his entrance into it every man receives a stone in the shape either of a human being or of an animal, and henceforth his soul is believed to be knit up in a manner with the stone. If it breaks, it is an evil omen for him; they say that the thunder has struck the stone and that he who owns it will soon die. If nevertheless the man survives the breaking of his soul-stone, they say that it was not a proper soul-stone and he gets a new one instead.[420 - R. Thurnwald, “Im Bismarckarchipel und auf den Salomo-inseln,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, xlii. (1910) p. 136. As to the Ingniet, Ingiet, or Iniet Society see P. A. Kleintitschen, Die Küstenbewohner der Gazellehalbinsel (Hiltrup bei Münster, n. d.), pp. 354 sqq.; R. Parkinson, Dreissig Jahre in der Südsee (Stuttgart, 1907), pp. 598 sqq.] The emperor Romanus Lecapenus was once informed by an astronomer that the life of Simeon, prince of Bulgaria, was bound up with a certain column in Constantinople, so that if the capital of the column were removed, Simeon would immediately die. The emperor took the hint and removed the capital, and at the same hour, as the emperor learned by enquiry, Simeon died of heart disease in Bulgaria.[421 - G. Cedrenus, Historiarum Compendium, p. 625B, vol. ii. p. 308, ed. Im. Bekker (Bonn, 1838-1839).] The deified kings of ancient Egypt appear to have enjoyed the privilege of depositing their spiritual doubles or souls (ka) during their lifetime in a number of portrait statues, properly fourteen for each king, which stood in the chamber of adoration (pa douaït) of the temple and were revered as the equivalents or representatives of the monarchs themselves.[422 - Alexandre Moret, Du caractère religieux de la Royauté Pharaonique (Paris, 1902), pp. 224 sqq. As to the Egyptian doctrine of the spiritual double or soul (ka), see A. Wiedemann, The Ancient Egyptian Doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul (London, 1895), pp. 10 sqq.; A. Erman, Die ägyptische Religion (Berlin, 1905), p. 88; A. Moret, Mystères Égyptiens (Paris, 1913), pp. 199 sqq.] Among the Karens of Burma “the knife with which the navel string is cut is carefully preserved for the child. The life of the child is supposed to be in some way connected with it, for, if lost or destroyed, it is said the child will not be long lived.”[423 - F. Mason, “Physical Character of the Karens,” Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1866, Part ii. No. 1, p. 9.] Among the Shawnee Indians of North America it once happened that an eminent man was favoured with a special revelation by the Great Spirit. Wisely refusing to hide the sacred light of revelation under a bushel, he generously communicated a few sparks of the illumination to John Tanner, a white man who lived for many years as an Indian among the Indians. “Henceforth,” said the inspired sage, “the fire must never be suffered to go out in your lodge. Summer and winter, day and night, in the storm, or when it is calm, you must remember that the life in your body, and the fire in your lodge, are the same, and of the same date. If you suffer your fire to be extinguished, at that moment your life will be at its end.”[424 - A Narrative of the Captivity and Adventures of John Tanner, during Thirty Years' Residence among the Indians, prepared for the press by Edwin James, M.D. (London, 1830), pp. 155 sq. The passage has been already quoted by Sir John Lubbock (Lord Avebury) in his Origin of Civilisation

(London, 1882), p. 241.]

Strength of people supposed to reside in their hair.

Again, we have seen that in folk-tales a man's soul or strength is sometimes represented as bound up with his hair, and that when his hair is cut off he dies or grows weak. So the natives of Amboyna used to think that their strength was in their hair and would desert them if it were shorn. A criminal under torture in a Dutch Court of that island persisted in denying his guilt till his hair was cut off, when he immediately confessed. One man, who was tried for murder, endured without flinching the utmost ingenuity of his torturers till he saw the surgeon standing with a pair of shears. On asking what this was for, and being told that it was to cut his hair, he begged they would not do it, and made a clean breast. In subsequent cases, when torture failed to wring a confession from a prisoner, the Dutch authorities made a practice of cutting off his hair.[425 - François Valentijn, Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indiën (Dordrecht and Amsterdam, 1724-1726), ii. 143 sq.; G. A. Wilken, “De Simsonsage,” De Gids, 1888, No. 5, pp. 15 sq. (of the separate reprint); id., Verspreide Geschriften (The Hague, 1912), iii. 569 sq.] In Ceram it is still believed that if young people have their hair cut they will be weakened and enervated thereby.[426 - J. G. F. Riedel, De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua (The Hague, 1886), p. 137.]

Witches and wizards shaved to deprive them of their power.

Here in Europe it used to be thought that the maleficent powers of witches and wizards resided in their hair, and that nothing could make any impression on these miscreants so long as they kept their hair on. Hence in France it was customary to shave the whole bodies of persons charged with sorcery before handing them over to the torturer. Millaeus witnessed the torture of some persons at Toulouse, from whom no confession could be wrung until they were stripped and completely shaven, when they readily acknowledged the truth of the charge. A woman also, who apparently led a pious life, was put to the torture on suspicion of witchcraft, and bore her agonies with incredible constancy, until complete depilation drove her to admit her guilt. The noted inquisitor Sprenger contented himself with shaving the head of the suspected witch or wizard; but his more thorough-going colleague Cumanus shaved the whole bodies of forty-one women before committing them all to the flames. He had high authority for this rigorous scrutiny, since Satan himself, in a sermon preached from the pulpit of North Berwick church, comforted his many servants by assuring them that no harm could befall them “sa lang as their hair wes on, and sould newir latt ane teir fall fra thair ene.”[427 - J. G. Dalyell, The darker Superstitions of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1834), pp. 637-639; C. de Mensignac, Recherches ethnographiques sur la Salive et le Crachat (Bordeaux, 1892), p. 49 note.] Similarly in Bastar, a province of India, “if a man is adjudged guilty of witchcraft, he is beaten by the crowd, his hair is shaved, the hair being supposed to constitute his power of mischief, his front teeth are knocked out, in order, it is said, to prevent him from muttering incantations… Women suspected of sorcery have to undergo the same ordeal; if found guilty, the same punishment is awarded, and after being shaved, their hair is attached to a tree in some public place.”[428 - W. Crooke, Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India (Westminster, 1896), ii. 281.] So among the Bhils of India, when a woman was convicted of witchcraft and had been subjected to various forms of persuasion, such as hanging head downwards from a tree and having pepper put into her eyes, a lock of hair was cut from her head and buried in the ground, “that the last link between her and her former powers of mischief might be broken.”[429 - W. Crooke, op. cit. ii. 281 sq.] In like manner among the Aztecs of Mexico, when wizards and witches “had done their evil deeds, and the time came to put an end to their detestable life, some one laid hold of them and cropped the hair on the crown of their heads, which took from them all their power of sorcery and enchantment, and then it was that by death they put an end to their odious existence.”[430 - B. de Sahagun, Histoire des choses de la Nouvelle Espagne, traduite par D. Journdanet et R. Siméon (Paris, 1880), p. 274.]

§ 2. The External Soul in Plants

Life of a person supposed to be bound up with that of a tree or plant. Birth-trees in Africa.

Further it has been shewn that in folk-tales the life of a person is sometimes so bound up with the life of a plant that the withering of the plant will immediately follow or be followed by the death of the person.[431 - Above, pp. 102 (#x_7_i11), 110 (#x_7_i23), 117 (#x_8_i5)sq., 135 (#x_9_i9), 136 (#x_9_i11).] Similarly among the natives of the Pennefather River in Queensland, when a visiter has made himself very agreeable and taken his departure, an effigy of him about three or four feet long is cut on some soft tree, such as the Canarium australasicum, so as to face in the direction taken by the popular stranger. Afterwards from observing the state of the tree the natives infer the corresponding state of their absent friend, whose illness or death are apparently supposed to be portended by the fall of the leaves or of the tree.[432 - Walter E. Roth, North Queensland Ethnography, Bulletin, No. 5, Superstition, Magic, and Medicine (Brisbane, 1903), p. 27.] In Uganda, when a new royal enclosure with its numerous houses was built for a new king, barkcloth trees used to be planted at the main entrance by priests of each principal deity and offerings were laid under each tree for its particular god. Thenceforth “the trees were carefully guarded and tended, because it was believed that as they grew and flourished, so the king's life and power would increase.”[433 - Rev. J. Roscoe, The Baganda (London, 1911), p. 202.] Among the M'Bengas in Western Africa, about the Gaboon, when two children are born on the same day, the people plant two trees of the same kind and dance round them. The life of each of the children is believed to be bound up with the life of one of the trees; and if the tree dies or is thrown down, they are sure that the child will soon die.[434 - G. Duloup, “Huit jours chez les M'Bengas,” Revue d'Ethnographie, ii. (1883), p. 223; compare P. Barret, L'Afrique Occidentale (Paris, 1888), ii. 173.] In Sierra Leone also it is customary at the birth of a child to plant a shoot of a malep-tree, and they think that the tree will grow with the child and be its god. If a tree which has been thus planted withers away, the people consult a sorcerer on the subject.[435 - Fr. Kunstmann, “Valentin Ferdinand's Beschreibung der Serra Leoa,” Abhandlungen der histor. Classe der könig. Bayer. Akad. der Wissenschaften, ix. (1866) pp. 131 sq.] Among the Wajagga of German East Africa, when a child is born, it is usual to plant a cultivated plant of some sort behind the house. The plant is thenceforth carefully tended, for they believe that were it to wither away the child would die. When the navel-string drops from the infant, it is buried under the plant. The species of birth-plant varies with the clan; members of one clan, for example, plant a particular sort of banana, members of another clan plant a sugar-cane, and so on.[436 - Bruno Gutmann, “Feldbausitten und Wachstumsbräuche der Wadschagga,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, xlv. (1913), p. 496.] Among the Swahili of East Africa, when a child is born, the afterbirth and navel-string are buried in the courtyard and a mark is made on the spot. Seven days afterwards, the hair of the child is shaved and deposited, along with the clippings of its nails, in the same place. Then over all these relics of the infant's person a coco-nut is planted. As the tree grows up from the nut, the child likes to point it out to his playfellows and tell them, “This coco-nut palm is my navel.” In planting the coco-nut the parents say, “May God cause our child to grow up, that he or she may one day enjoy the coco-nut milk of the tree which we plant here.”[437 - C. Velten, Sitten und Gebräuche der Suaheli (Göttingen, 1903), pp. 8 sq. In Java it is customary to plant a tree, for example, a coco-nut palm, at the birth of a child, and when he grows up he reckons his age by the age of the tree. See Annales de la Propagation de la Foi, iii. (Lyons and Paris, 1830) pp. 400 sq.] Though it is not expressly affirmed, we may perhaps assume that such a birth-tree is supposed to stand in a sympathetic relation with the life of the person. In the Cameroons, also, the life of a person is believed to be sympathetically bound up with that of a tree.[438 - A. Bastian, Die deutsche Expedition an der Loango-Küste (Jena, 1874-1875), i. 165.] The chief of Old Town in Calabar kept his soul in a sacred grove near a spring of water. When some Europeans, in frolic or ignorance, cut down part of the grove, the spirit was most indignant and threatened the perpetrators of the deed, according to the king, with all manner of evil.[439 - Rev. J. Macdonald, Religion and Myth (London, 1893), p. 178.] Among the Fans of the French Congo, when a chief's son is born, the remains of the navel-string are buried under a sacred fig-tree, and “thenceforth great importance is attached to the growth of the tree; it is strictly forbidden to touch it. Any attempt on the tree would be considered as an attack on the human being himself.”[440 - H. Trilles, Le Totémisme chez les Fân (Münster i. W., 1912), p. 570.] Among the Boloki of the Upper Congo a family has a plant with red leaves (called nkungu) for its totem. When a woman of the family is with child for the first time, one of the totemic plants is planted near the hearth outside the house and is never destroyed, otherwise it is believed that the child would be born thin and weak and would remain puny and sickly. “The healthy life of the children and family is bound up with the healthiness and life of the totem tree as respected and preserved by the family.”[441 - Rev. John H. Weeks, Among Congo Cannibals (London, 1913), p. 295.] Among the Baganda of Central Africa a child's afterbirth was called the second child and was believed to be animated by a spirit, which at once became a ghost. The afterbirth was usually buried at the root of a banana tree, and afterwards the tree was carefully guarded by old women, who prevented any one from going near it; they tied ropes of fibre from tree to tree to isolate it, and all the child's excretions were thrown into this enclosure. When the fruit ripened, it was cut by the old woman in charge. The reason for guarding the tree thus carefully was a belief that if any stranger were to eat of the fruit of the tree or to drink beer brewed from it, he would carry off with him the ghost of the child's afterbirth, which had been buried at the root of the banana-tree, and the living child would then die in order to follow its twin ghost. Whereas a grandparent of the child, by eating the fruit or drinking the beer, averted this catastrophe and ensured the health of the child.[442 - Rev. J. Roscoe, The Baganda (London, 1911), pp. 52, 54 sq. Compare The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings, i. 295 sq.; and for other examples of burying the afterbirth or navel-string at the foot of a tree or planting a young tree over these remains, see id., pp. 182 sqq. In Kiziba, a district to the west of Lake Victoria Nyanza, the afterbirth is similarly regarded as a sort of human being. Hence when twins are born the people speak of four children instead of two, reckoning the two afterbirths as two children. See H. Rehse, Kiziba, Land und Leute (Stuttgart, 1910), p. 117. The conception of the afterbirth and navel-string as spiritual doubles of the child with whom they are born is held very firmly by the Kooboos, a primitive tribe of Sumatra. We are told that among these people “a great vital power is ascribed to the navel-string and afterbirth; because they are looked upon as brother or sister of the infant, and though their bodies have not come to perfection, yet their soul and spirit are just as normal as those of the child and indeed have even reached a much higher stage of development. The navel-string (oeri) and afterbirth (tĕm-boeni) visit the man who was born with them thrice a day and thrice by night till his death, or they hover near him (‘zweven voorbij hem heen’). They are the good spirits, a sort of guardian angels of the man who came into the world with them and who lives on earth; they are said to guard him from all evil. Hence it is that the Kooboo always thinks of his navel-string and afterbirth (oeri-tĕmboeni) before he goes to sleep or to work, or undertakes a journey, and so on. Merely to think of them is enough; there is no need to invoke them, or to ask them anything, or to entreat them. By not thinking of them a man deprives himself of their good care.” Immediately after the birth the navel-string and afterbirth are buried in the ground close by the spot where the birth took place; and a ceremony is performed over it, for were the ceremony omitted, the navel-string and afterbirth, “instead of being a good spirit for the newly born child, might become an evil spirit for him and visit him with all sorts of calamities out of spite for this neglect.” The nature of the ceremony performed over the spot is not described by our authority. The navel-string and afterbirth are often regarded by the Kooboos as one; their names are always mentioned together. See G. J. van Dongen, “De Koeboe in de Onderafdeeling Koeboe-streken der Residentie Palembang,” Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië, lxiii. (1910) pp. 229 sq.] Among the Wakondyo, at the north-western corner of Lake Albert Nyanza, it is customary to bury the afterbirth at the foot of a young banana-tree, and the fruit of this particular tree may be eaten by no one but the woman who assisted at the birth.[443 - Franz Stuhlmann, Mit Emin Pascha ins Herz von Afrika (Berlin, 1894), p. 653.] The reason for the custom is not mentioned, but probably, as among the Baganda, the life of the child is supposed to be bound up with the life of the tree, since the afterbirth, regarded as a spiritual double of the infant, has been buried at the root of the tree.

Birth-trees among the Papuans, Maoris, Fijians, Dyaks, and others.

Some of the Papuans unite the life of a new-born child sympathetically with that of a tree by driving a pebble into the bark of the tree. This is supposed to give them complete mastery over the child's life; if the tree is cut down, the child will die.[444 - A. Bastian, Ein Besuch in San Salvador (Bremen, 1859), pp. 103 sq.; id., Der Mensch in der Geschichte (Leipsic, 1860), iii. 193.] After a birth the Maoris used to bury the navel-string in a sacred place and plant a young sapling over it. As the tree grew, it was a tohu oranga or sign of life for the child; if it flourished, the child would prosper; if it withered and died, the parents augured the worst for their child.[445 - R. Taylor, Te Ika a Maui, or New Zealand and its Inhabitants

(London, 1870), p. 184; Dumont D'Urville, Voyage autour du monde et à la recherche de La Pérouse sur la corvette Astrolabe, ii. 444.] In the Chatham Islands, when the child of a leading man received its name, it was customary to plant a tree, “the growth of which was to be as the growth of the child,” and during the planting priests chanted a spell.[446 - W. T. L. Travers, “Notes of the traditions and manners and customs of the Mori-oris,” Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute, ix. (1876) p. 22.] In some parts of Fiji the navel-string of a male child is planted together with a coco-nut or the slip of a breadfruit-tree, and the child's life is supposed to be intimately connected with that of the tree.[447 - The late Rev. Lorimer Fison, in a letter to me dated May 29th, 1901. Compare The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings, i. 184.] With certain Malayo-Siamese families of the Patani States it is customary to bury the afterbirth under a banana-tree, and the condition of the tree is afterwards regarded as ominous of the child's fate for good or evil.[448 - N. Annandale, “Customs of the Malayo-Siamese,” Fasciculi Malayenses, Anthropology, part ii. (a) (May, 1904), p. 5.] In Southern Celebes, when a child is born, a coco-nut is planted and watered with the water in which the afterbirth and navel-string have been washed. As it grows up, the tree is called the “contemporary” of the child.[449 - B. F. Matthes, Bijdragen tot de Ethnologie van Zuid-Celebes (The Hague, 1875), p. 59.] So in Bali a coco-palm is planted at the birth of a child. It is believed to grow up equally with the child, and is called its “life-plant.”[450 - R. van Eck, “Schetsen van het eiland Bali,” Tijdschrift voor Nederlandsch Indië, N.S., ix. (1880) pp. 417 sq.] On certain occasions the Dyaks of Borneo plant a palm-tree, which is believed to be a complete index of their fate. If it flourishes, they reckon on good fortune; but if it withers or dies, they expect misfortune.[451 - G. A. Wilken, “De Simsonsage,” De Gids, 1888, No. 5, p. 26 (of the separate reprint); id., Verspreide Geschriften (The Hague, 1912), iii. 562.] Amongst the Dyaks of Landak and Tajan, districts of Dutch Borneo, it is customary to plant a fruit-tree for a child, and henceforth in the popular belief the fate of the child is bound up with that of the tree. If the tree shoots up rapidly, it will go well with the child; but if the tree is dwarfed or shrivelled, nothing but misfortune can be expected for its human counterpart.[452 - M. C. Schadee, “Het familieleven en familierecht der Dajaks van Landak en Tajan,” Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië, lxiii. (1910) p. 416.] According to another account, at the naming of children and certain other festivals the Dyaks are wont to set a sawang-plant, roots and all, before a priestess; and when the festival is over, the plant is replaced in the ground. Such a plant becomes thenceforth a sort of prophetic index for the person in whose honour the festival was held. If the plant thrives, the man will be fortunate; if it fades or perishes, some evil will befall him.[453 - F. Grabowsky, “Die Theogenie der Dajaken auf Borneo,” Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie, v. (1892) p. 133.] The Dyaks also believe that at the birth of every person on earth a flower grows up in the spirit world and leads a life parallel to his. If the flower flourishes, the man enjoys good health, but if it droops, so does he. Hence when he has dreamed bad dreams or has felt unwell for several days, he infers that his flower in the other world is neglected or sickly, and accordingly he employs a medicine-man to tend the precious plant, weed the soil, and sweep it up, in order that the earthly and unearthly life may prosper once more.[454 - J. Perham, “Manangism in Borneo,” Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, No. 19 (Singapore, 1887), p. 97; id., in H. Ling Roth, The Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo (London, 1896), i. 278.]

Birth-trees in Europe. Marriage oaks. Trees with which the fate of families or individuals is thought to be bound up. The Edgewell oak. The old tree at Howth Castle. The oak of the Guelphs.

It is said that there are still families in Russia, Germany, England, France, and Italy who are accustomed to plant a tree at the birth of a child. The tree, it is hoped, will grow with the child, and it is tended with special care.[455 - Angelo de Gubernatis, Mythologie des Plantes (Paris, 1878-1882), i. pp. xxviii. sq.] The custom is still pretty general in the canton of Aargau in Switzerland; an apple-tree is planted for a boy and a pear-tree for a girl, and the people think that the child will flourish or dwindle with the tree.[456 - W. Mannhardt, Baumkultus, p. 50; H. Ploss, Das Kind

(Leipsic, 1884), i. 79.] In Mecklenburg the afterbirth is thrown out at the foot of a young tree, and the child is then believed to grow with the tree.[457 - K. Bartsch, Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche aus Mecklenburg (Vienna, 1879-1880), ii. p. 43, § 63.] In Bosnia, when the children of a family have died one after the other, the hair of the next child is cut with some ceremony by a stranger, and the mother carries the shorn tresses into the garden, where she ties them to a fine young tree, in order that her child may grow and flourish like the tree.[458 - F. S. Krauss, “Haarschurgodschaft bei den Südslaven,” Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie, vii. (1894) p. 193.] At Muskau, in Lausitz, it used to be customary for bride and bridegroom on the morning of their wedding-day to plant a pair of young oaks side by side, and as each of the trees flourished or withered, so the good luck of the person who planted it was believed to wax or wane.[459 - Karl Haupt, Sagenbuch der Lausitz (Leipsic, 1862-1863), ii. 129, No. 207.] On a promontory in Lake Keitele, in Finland, there used to stand an old fir-tree, which according to tradition had been planted by the first colonists to serve as a symbol or token of their fortune. First-fruits of the harvest used to be offered to the tree before any one would taste of the new crop; and whenever a branch fell, it was deemed a sign that some one would die. More and more the crown of the tree withered away, and in the same proportion the family whose ancestors had planted the fir dwindled away, till only one old woman was left. At last the tree fell, and soon afterwards the old woman departed this life.[460 - “Heilige Haine und Bäume der Finnen,” Globus, lix. (1891) p. 350. Compare K. Rhamm, “Der heidenische Gottesdienst des finnischen Stammes,” Globus, lxvii. (1891) p. 344.] When Lord Byron first visited his ancestral estate of Newstead “he planted, it seems, a young oak in some part of the grounds, and had an idea that as it flourished so should he.”[461 - Thomas Moore, Life of Lord Byron, i. 101 (i. 148, in the collected edition of Byron's works, London, 1832-1833).] On a day when the cloud that settled on the later years of Sir Walter Scott lifted a little, and he heard that Woodstock had sold for over eight thousand pounds, he wrote in his journal: “I have a curious fancy; I will go set two or three acorns, and judge by their success in growing whether I shall succeed in clearing my way or not.”[462 - J. G. Lockhart, Life of Sir Walter Scott (First Edition), vi. 283 (viii. 317, Second Edition, Edinburgh, 1839).] Near the Castle of Dalhousie, not far from Edinburgh, there grows an oak-tree, called the Edgewell Tree, which is popularly believed to be linked to the fate of the family by a mysterious tie; for they say that when one of the family dies, or is about to die, a branch falls from the Edgewell Tree. Thus, on seeing a great bough drop from the tree on a quiet, still day in July 1874, an old forester exclaimed, “The laird's deid noo!” and soon after news came that Fox Maule, eleventh Earl of Dalhousie, was dead.[463 - Sir Walter Scott's Journal (First Edition, Edinburgh, 1890), ii. 282, with the editor's note.] At Howth Castle in Ireland there is an old tree with which the fortunes of the St. Lawrence family are supposed to be connected. The branches of the tree are propped on strong supports, for tradition runs that when the tree falls the direct line of the Earls of Howth will become extinct.[464 - Letter of Miss A. H. Singleton to me, dated Rathmagle House, Abbey Leix, Ireland, 24th February, 1904.] On the old road from Hanover to Osnabrück, at the village of Oster-Kappeln, there used to stand an ancient oak, which put out its last green shoot in the year 1849. The tree was conjecturally supposed to be contemporary with the Guelphs; and in the year 1866, so fatal for the house of Hanover, on a calm summer afternoon, without any visible cause, the veteran suddenly fell with a crash and lay stretched across the highroad. The peasants regarded its fall as an ill omen for the reigning family, and when King George V. heard of it he gave orders that the giant trunk should be set up again, and it was done with much trouble and at great expense, the stump being supported in position by iron chains clamped to the neighbouring trees. But the king's efforts to prop the falling fortunes of his house were vain; a few months after the fall of the oak Hanover formed part of the Prussian monarchy.[465 - P. Wagler, Die Eiche in alter und neuer Zeit, ii. (Berlin, 1891) pp. 85 sq.]

The Life-tree of the Manchu dynasty.

In the midst of the “Forbidden City” at Peking there is a tiny private garden, where the emperors of the now fallen Manchu dynasty used to take the air and refresh themselves after the cares of state. In accordance with Chinese taste the garden is a labyrinth of artificial rockeries, waterfalls, grottoes, and kiosks, in which everything is as unlike nature as art can make it. The trees in particular (Arbor vitae), the principal ornament of the garden, exhibit the last refinement of the gardener's skill, being clipped and distorted into a variety of grotesque shapes. Only one of the trees remained intact and had been spared these deformations for centuries. Far from being stunted by the axe or the shears, the tree was carefully tended and encouraged to shoot up to its full height. “It was the ‘Life-tree of the Dynasty,’ and according to legend the prosperity or fall of the present dynasty went hand in hand with the welfare or death of the tree. Certainly, if we accept the tradition, the days of the present reigning house must be numbered, for all the care and attention lavished on the tree have been for some years in vain. A glance at our illustration shews the tree as it still surpasses all its fellows in height and size; but it owes its pre-eminence only to the many artificial props which hold it up. In reality the ‘Life-tree of the Dynasty’ is dying, and might fall over night, if one of its artificial props were suddenly to give way. For the superstitious Chinese – and superstitious they certainly are – it is a very, very evil omen.”[466 - Die Woche, Berlin, 31 August, 1901, p. 3, with an illustration shewing the garden and the tree.] Some twelve years have passed since this passage was written, and in the interval the omen has been fulfilled – the Manchu dynasty has fallen. We may conjecture that the old tree in the quaint old garden has fallen too. So vain are all human efforts to arrest the decay of royal houses by underpropping trees on which nature herself has passed a sentence of death.

The myrtle-trees of the patricians and plebeians at Rome. The oak of the Vespasian family.

At Rome in the ancient sanctuary of Quirinus there grew two old myrtle-trees, one named the Patrician and the other the Plebeian. For many years, so long as the patricians were in the ascendant, their myrtle-tree flourished and spread its branches abroad, while the myrtle of the plebeians was shrivelled and shrunken; but from the time of the Marsian war, when the power of the nobles declined, their myrtle in like manner drooped and withered, whereas that of the popular party held up its head and grew strong.[467 - Pliny, Natur. Hist. xv. 120 sq.] Thrice when Vespasia was with child, an old oak in the garden of the Flavian family near Rome suddenly put forth branches. The first branch was puny and soon withered away, and the girl who was born accordingly died within the year; the second branch was long and sturdy; and the third was like a tree. So on the third occasion the happy father reported to his mother that a future emperor was born to her as a grandchild. The old lady only laughed to think that at her age she should keep her wits about her, while her son had lost his; yet the omen of the oak came true, for the grandson was afterwards the emperor Vespasian.[468 - Suetonius, Divus Vespasianus, 5.]

Life of persons supposed to be bound up with that of the cleft trees through which in their youth they were passed as a cure for rupture. In England ruptured children are passed through cleft ash-trees.

In England children are sometimes passed through a cleft ash-tree as a cure for rupture or rickets, and thenceforward a sympathetic connexion is supposed to exist between them and the tree. An ash-tree which had been used for this purpose grew at the edge of Shirley Heath, on the road from Hockly House to Birmingham. “Thomas Chillingworth, son of the owner of an adjoining farm, now about thirty-four, was, when an infant of a year old, passed through a similar tree, now perfectly sound, which he preserves with so much care that he will not suffer a single branch to be touched, for it is believed the life of the patient depends on the life of the tree, and the moment that it is cut down, be the patient ever so distant, the rupture returns, and a mortification ensues, and terminates in death, as was the case in a man driving a waggon on the very road in question.” “It is not uncommon, however,” adds the writer, “for persons to survive for a time the felling of the tree.”[469 - The Gentleman's Magazine, 1804, p. 909; John Brand, Popular Antiquities of Great Britain (London, 1882-1883), iii. 289.] The ordinary mode of effecting the cure is to split a young ash-sapling longitudinally for a few feet and pass the child, naked, either three times or three times three through the fissure at sunrise. In the West of England it is said that the passage should be “against the sun.” As soon as the ceremony has been performed, the tree is bound tightly up and the fissure plastered over with mud or clay. The belief is that just as the cleft in the tree closes up, so the rupture in the child's body will be healed; but that if the rift in the tree remains open, the rupture in the child will remain too, and if the tree were to die, the death of the child would surely follow.[470 - Gilbert White, The Natural History of Selborne, Part II. Letter 28 (Edinburgh, 1829), pp. 239 sq.; Francis Grose, A Provincial Glossary (London, 1811), p. 290; J. Brand, op. cit. iii. 287-292; R. Hunt, Popular Romances of the West of England