CHAPTER IX

THE WORSHIP OF TREES

§ 1. Tree-spirits

[Sidenote: Great forests of ancient Europe.] In the religious history of the Aryan race in Europe the worship of trees has played an important part. Nothing could be more natural. For at the dawn of history Europe was covered with immense primaeval forests, in which the scattered clearings must have appeared like islets in an ocean of green. Down to the first century before our era the Hercynian forest stretched eastward from the Rhine for a distance at once vast and unknown; Germans whom Caesar questioned had travelled for two months through it without reaching the end.[5] Four centuries later it was visited by the Emperor Julian, and the solitude, the gloom, the silence of the forest appear to have made a deep impression on his sensitive nature. He declared that he knew nothing like it in the Roman empire.[6] In our own country the wealds of Kent, Surrey, and Sussex are remnants of the great forest of Anderida, which once clothed the whole of the south-eastern portion of the island. Westward it seems to have stretched till it joined another forest that extended from Hampshire to Devon. In the reign of Henry II. the citizens of London still hunted the wild bull and the boar in the woods of Hampstead. Even under the later Plantagenets the royal forests were sixty-eight in number. In the forest of Arden it was said that down to modern times a squirrel might leap from tree to tree for nearly the whole length of Warwickshire.[7] The excavation of ancient pile-villages in the valley of the Po has shewn that long before the rise and probably the foundation of Rome the north of Italy was covered with dense woods of elms, chestnuts, and especially of oaks.[8] Archaeology is here confirmed by history; for classical writers contain many references to Italian forests which have now disappeared.[9] As late as the fourth century before our era Rome was divided from central Etruria by the dreaded Ciminian forest, which Livy compares to the woods of Germany. No merchant, if we may trust the Roman historian, had ever penetrated its pathless solitudes: and it was deemed a most daring feat when a Roman general, after sending two scouts to explore its intricacies, led his army into the forest and, making his way to a ridge of the wooded mountains, looked down on the rich Etrurian fields spread out below.[10] In Greece beautiful woods of pine, oak, and other trees still linger on the slopes of the high Arcadian mountains, still adorn with their verdure the deep gorge through which the Ladon hurries to join the sacred Alpheus; and were still, down to a few years ago, mirrored in the dark blue waters of the lonely lake of Pheneus; but they are mere fragments of the forests which clothed great tracts in antiquity, and which at a more remote epoch may have spanned the Greek peninsula from sea to sea.[11]

[Sidenote: Tree-worship practised by all the Aryan races in Europe.] From an examination of the Teutonic words for “temple” Grimm has made it probable that amongst the Germans the oldest sanctuaries were natural woods.[12] However this may be, tree-worship is well attested for all the great European families of the Aryan stock. Amongst the Celts the oak-worship of the Druids is familiar to every one,[13] and their old word for a sanctuary seems to be identical in origin and meaning with the Latin _némus_, a grove or woodland glade, which still survives in the name of Nemi.[14] Sacred groves were common among the ancient Germans, and tree-worship is hardly extinct amongst their descendants at the present day.[15] How serious that worship was in former times may be gathered from the ferocious penalty appointed by the old German laws for such as dared to peel the bark of a standing tree. The culprit’s navel was to be cut out and nailed to the part of the tree which he had peeled, and he was to be driven round and round the tree till all his guts were wound about its trunk.[16] The intention of the punishment clearly was to replace the dead bark by a living substitute taken from the culprit; it was a life for a life, the life of a man for the life of a tree. At Upsala, the old religious capital of Sweden, there was a sacred grove in which every tree was regarded as divine.[17] The heathen Slavs worshipped trees and groves.[18] The Lithuanians were not converted to Christianity till towards the close of the fourteenth century, and amongst them at the date of their conversion the worship of trees was prominent. Some of them revered remarkable oaks and other great shady trees, from which they received oracular responses. Some maintained holy groves about their villages or houses, where even to break a twig would have been a sin. They thought that he who cut a bough in such a grove either died suddenly or was crippled in one of his limbs.[19] Proofs of the prevalence of tree-worship in ancient Greece and Italy are abundant.[20] In the sanctuary of Aesculapius at Cos, for example, it was forbidden to cut down the cypress-trees under a penalty of a thousand drachms.[21] But nowhere, perhaps, in the ancient world was this antique form of religion better preserved than in the heart of the great metropolis itself. In the Forum, the busy centre of Roman life, the sacred fig-tree of Romulus was worshipped down to the days of the empire, and the withering of its trunk was enough to spread consternation through the city.[22] Again, on the slope of the Palatine Hill grew a cornel-tree which was esteemed one of the most sacred objects in Rome. Whenever the tree appeared to a passer-by to be drooping, he set up a hue and cry which was echoed by the people in the street, and soon a crowd might be seen running helter-skelter from all sides with buckets of water, as if (says Plutarch) they were hastening to put out a fire.[23]

[Sidenote: Tree-worship among the Finnish-Ugrian peoples.] Among the tribes of the Finnish-Ugrian stock in Europe the heathen worship was performed for the most part in sacred groves, which were always enclosed with a fence. Such a grove often consisted merely of a glade or clearing with a few trees dotted about, upon which in former times the skins of the sacrificial victims were hung. The central point of the grove, at least among the tribes of the Volga, was the sacred tree, beside which everything else sank into insignificance. Before it the worshippers assembled and the priest offered his prayers, at its roots the victim was sacrificed, and its boughs sometimes served as a pulpit. No wood might be hewn and no branch broken in the grove, and women were generally forbidden to enter it. The Ostyaks and Woguls, two peoples of the Finnish-Ugrian stock in Siberia, had also sacred groves in which nothing might be touched, and where the skins of the sacrificed animals were suspended; but these groves were not enclosed with fences.[24] Near Kuopio, in Finland, there was a famous grove of ancient moss-grown firs, where the people offered sacrifices and practised superstitious customs down to about 1650, when a sturdy veteran of the Thirty Years’ War dared to cut it down at the bidding of the pastor. Sacred groves now hardly exist in Finland, but sacred trees to which offerings are brought are still not very uncommon. On some firs the skulls of bears are nailed, apparently that the hunter may have good luck in the chase.[25] The Ostyaks are said never to have passed a sacred tree without shooting an arrow at it as a mark of respect. In many places they hung furs and skins on the holy trees in the forest; but having observed that these furs were often appropriated and carried off by unscrupulous travellers, they adopted the practice of hewing the trunks into great blocks, which they decked with their offerings and preserved in safe places. The custom marks a transition from the worship of trees to the worship of idols carved out of the sacred wood. Within their sacred groves no grass or wood might be cut, no game hunted, no fish caught, not even a draught of water drunk. When they passed them in their canoes, they were careful not to touch the land with the oar, and if the journey through the hallowed ground was long, they laid in a store of water before entering on it, for they would rather suffer extreme thirst than slake it by drinking of the sacred stream. The Ostyaks also regarded as holy any tree on which an eagle had built its nest for several years, and they spared the bird as well as the tree. No greater injury could be done them than to shoot such an eagle or destroy its nest.[26]

[Sidenote: Trees are regarded by the savage as animate.] But it is necessary to examine in some detail the notions on which the worship of trees and plants is based. To the savage the world in general is animate, and trees and plants are no exception to the rule. He thinks that they have souls like his own, and he treats them accordingly. “They say,” writes the ancient vegetarian Porphyry, “that primitive men led an unhappy life, for their superstition did not stop at animals but extended even to plants. For why should the slaughter of an ox or a sheep be a greater wrong than the felling of a fir or an oak, seeing that a soul is implanted in these trees also?”[27] Similarly, the Hidatsa Indians of North America believe that every natural object has its spirit, or to speak more properly, its shade. To these shades some consideration or respect is due, but not equally to all. For example, the shade of the cottonwood, the greatest tree in the valley of the Upper Missouri, is supposed to possess an intelligence which, if properly approached, may help the Indians in certain undertakings; but the shades of shrubs and grasses are of little account. When the Missouri, swollen by a freshet in spring, carries away part of its banks and sweeps some tall tree into its current, it is said that the spirit of the tree cries while the roots still cling to the land and until the trunk falls with a splash into the stream. Formerly the Indians considered it wrong to fell one of these giants, and when large logs were needed they made use only of trees which had fallen of themselves. Till lately some of the more credulous old men declared that many of the misfortunes of their people were caused by this modern disregard for the rights of the living cottonwood.[28] The Iroquois believed that each species of tree, shrub, plant, and herb had its own spirit, and to these spirits it was their custom to return thanks.[29] The Wanika of Eastern Africa fancy that every tree, and especially every coco-nut tree, has its spirit; “the destruction of a cocoa-nut tree is regarded as equivalent to matricide, because that tree gives them life and nourishment, as a mother does her child.”[30] In the Yasawu islands of Fiji a man will never eat a coco-nut without first asking its leave—“May I eat you, my chief?”[31] Among the Thompson Indians of British Columbia young people addressed the following prayer to the sunflower root before they ate the first roots of the season: “I inform thee that I intend to eat thee. Mayest thou always help me to ascend, so that I may always be able to reach the tops of mountains, and may I never be clumsy! I ask this from thee, Sunflower-Root. Thou art the greatest of all in mystery.” To omit this prayer would have made the eater of the root lazy, and caused him to sleep long in the morning. We are not told, but may conjecture, that these Indians ascribed to the sunflower the sun’s power of climbing above the mountain-tops and of rising betimes in the morning; hence whoever ate of the plant, with all the due formalities, would naturally acquire the same useful properties. It is not so easy to say why women had to observe continence in cooking and digging the root, and why, when they were cooking it, no man might come near the oven.[32] The Dyaks ascribe souls to trees, and do not dare to cut down an old tree. In some places, when an old tree has been blown down, they set it up, smear it with blood, and deck it with flags “to appease the soul of the tree.”[33] Siamese monks, believing that there are souls everywhere, and that to destroy anything whatever is forcibly to dispossess a soul, will not break a branch of a tree, “as they will not break the arm of an innocent person.”[34] These monks, of course, are Buddhists. But Buddhist animism is not a philosophical theory. It is simply a common savage dogma incorporated in the system of an historical religion. To suppose with Benfey and others that the theories of animism and transmigration current among rude peoples of Asia are derived from Buddhism, is to reverse the facts. Buddhism in this respect borrowed from savagery, not savagery from Buddhism.[35] According to Chinese belief, the spirits of plants are never shaped like plants but have commonly the form either of human beings or of animals, for example bulls and serpents. Occasionally at the felling of a tree the tree-spirit has been seen to rush out in the shape of a blue bull.[36] In China “to this day the belief in tree-spirits dangerous to man is obviously strong. In southern Fuhkien it deters people from felling any large trees or chopping off heavy branches, for fear the indwelling spirit may become irritated and visit the aggressor or his neighbours with disease and calamity. Especially respected are the green banyan or _ch’îng_, the biggest trees to be found in that part of China. In Amoy some people even show a strong aversion from planting trees, the planters, as soon as the stems have become as thick as their necks, being sure to be throttled by the indwelling spirits. No explanation of this curious superstition was ever given us. It may account to some extent for the almost total neglect of forestry in that part of China, so that hardly any except spontaneous trees grow there.”[37]

[Sidenote: Particular sorts of trees tenanted by spirits; sacrifices to tree-spirits.] Sometimes it is only particular sorts of trees that are supposed to be tenanted by spirits. At Grbalj in Dalmatia it is said that among great beeches, oaks, and other trees there are some that are endowed with shades or souls, and whoever fells one of them must die on the spot, or at least live an invalid for the rest of his days. If a woodman fears that a tree which he has felled is one of this sort, he must cut off the head of a live hen on the stump of the tree with the very same axe with which he cut down the tree. This will protect him from all harm, even if the tree be one of the animated kind.[38] The silk-cotton trees, which rear their [Sidenote: Silk-cotton trees in West Africa.] enormous trunks to a stupendous height, far out-topping all the other trees of the forest, are regarded with reverence throughout West Africa, from the Senegal to the Niger, and are believed to be the abode of a god or spirit. Among the Ewe-speaking peoples of the Slave Coast the indwelling god of this giant of the forest goes by the name of Huntin. Trees in which he specially dwells—for it is not every silk-cotton tree that he thus honours—are surrounded by a girdle of palm-leaves; and sacrifices of fowls, and occasionally of human beings, are fastened to the trunk or laid against the foot of the tree. A tree distinguished by a girdle of palm-leaves may not be cut down or injured in any way; and even silk-cotton trees which are not supposed to be animated by Huntin may not be felled unless the woodman first offers a sacrifice of fowls and palm-oil to purge himself of the proposed sacrilege. To omit the sacrifice is an offence which may be punished with death.[39] [Sidenote: Sycamores in ancient Egypt.] Everywhere in Egypt on the borders of the cultivated land, and even at some distance from the valley of the Nile, you meet with fine sycamores standing solitary and thriving as by a miracle in the sandy soil; their living green contrasts strongly with the tawny hue of the surrounding landscape, and their thick impenetrable foliage bids defiance even in summer to the noonday sun. The secret of their verdure is that their roots strike down into rills of water that trickle by unseen sluices from the great river. Of old the Egyptians of every rank esteemed these trees divine, and paid them regular homage. They gave them figs, raisins, cucumbers, vegetables, and water in earthenware pitchers, which charitable folk filled afresh every day. Passers-by slaked their thirst at these pitchers in the sultry hours, and paid for the welcome draught by a short prayer. The spirit that animated these beautiful trees generally lurked unseen, but sometimes he would shew his head or even his whole body outside the trunk, but only to retire into it again.[40] People in Congo set calabashes of palm-wine at the foot of certain trees for the trees to drink when they are thirsty.[41] The [Sidenote: Sacred trees in Africa, Syria, and Patagonia.] Wanika of Eastern Africa pay special honour to the spirits of coco-nut palms in return for the many benefits conferred on them by the trees. To cut down a coco-nut palm is an inexpiable offence, equivalent to matricide. They sacrifice to the tree on many occasions. When a man in gathering the coco-nuts has fallen from the palm, they attribute it to the wrath of the tree-spirit, and resort to the oddest means of appeasing him.[42] The Masai particularly reverence the _subugo_ tree, the bark of which has medical properties, and a species of parasitic fig which they call _retete_. The green figs are eaten by boys and girls, and older people propitiate the tree by pouring the blood of a goat at the foot of the trunk and strewing grass on the branches.[43] The natives of the Bissagos Islands, off the west coast of Africa, sacrifice dogs, cocks, and oxen to their sacred trees, but they eat the flesh of the victims and leave only the horns, fastened to the trees, for the spirits.[44] In a Turkish village of Northern Syria there is a very old oak-tree which the people worship, burning incense to it and bringing offerings as they would to a shrine.[45] In Patagonia, between the Rio Negro and the Rio Colorado, there stands solitary an ancient acacia-tree with a gnarled and hollow trunk. The Indians revere it as the abode of a spirit, and hang offerings of blankets, ponchos, ribbons, and coloured threads on it, so that the tree presents the aspect of an old clothes’ shop, the tattered, weather-worn garments drooping sadly from the boughs. No Indian passes it without leaving something, if it be only a little horse-hair which he ties to a branch. The hollow trunk contains offerings of tobacco, beads, and sometimes coins. But the best evidence of the sanctity of the tree are the bleached skeletons of many horses which have been killed in honour of the spirit; for the horse is the most precious sacrifice that these Indians can offer. They slaughter the animal also to propitiate the spirits of the deep and rapid [Sidenote: Sacrifices to trees.] rivers which they have often to ford or swim.[46] The Kayans of Central Borneo ascribe souls to the trees which yield the poison they use to envenom their arrows. They think that the spirit of the _tasem_ tree (_Antiaris toxicaria_) is particularly hard to please; but if the wood has a strong and agreeable scent, they know that the man who felled the tree must have contrived by his offerings to mollify the peevish spirit.[47] In some of the Louisiade Islands there are certain large trees under which the natives hold their feasts. These trees seem to be regarded as endowed with souls; for a portion of the feast is set aside for them, and the bones of pigs and of human beings are everywhere deeply imbedded in their branches.[48] Among the Kangra mountains of the Punjaub a girl used to be annually sacrificed to an old cedar-tree, the families of the village taking it in turn to supply the victim. The tree was cut down not very many years ago.[49] On Christmas Eve it is still customary in some parts of Germany to gird fruit-trees with ropes of straw on which the sausages prepared for the festival have lain. This is supposed to make the trees bear fruit. In the Mark of Brandenburg the person who ties the straw round the trees says, “Little tree, I make you a present, and you will make me one.” The people say that if the trees receive gifts, they will bestow gifts in return. The custom, which is clearly a relic of tree-worship, is often observed on New Year’s night or at any time between Christmas and Twelfth Night.[50]

[Sidenote: Trees supposed to be sensitive and to feel wounds.] If trees are animate, they are necessarily sensitive and the cutting of them down becomes a delicate surgical operation, which must be performed with as tender a regard as possible for the feelings of the sufferers, who otherwise may turn and rend the careless or bungling operator. When an oak is being felled “it gives a kind of shriekes or groanes, that may be heard a mile off, as if it were the genius of the oake lamenting. E. Wyld, Esq., hath heard it severall times.”[51] The Ojebways “very seldom cut down green or living trees, from the idea that it puts them to pain, and some of their medicine-men profess to have heard the wailing of the trees under the axe.”[52] Trees that bleed and utter cries of pain or indignation when they are hacked or burned occur very often in Chinese books, even in Standard Histories.[53] Old peasants in some parts of Austria still believe that forest-trees are animate, and will not allow an incision to be made in the bark without special cause; they have heard from their fathers that the tree feels the cut not [Sidenote: Apologies offered to trees for cutting them down.] less than a wounded man his hurt. In felling a tree they beg its pardon.[54] It is said that in the Upper Palatinate also old woodmen still secretly ask a fine, sound tree to forgive them before they cut it down.[55] So in Jarkino the woodman craves pardon of the tree he fells.[56] Before the Ilocanes of Luzon cut down trees in the virgin forest or on the mountains, they recite some verses to the following effect: “Be not uneasy, my friend, though we fell what we have been ordered to fell.” This they do in order not to draw down on themselves the hatred of the spirits who live in the trees, and who are apt to avenge themselves by visiting with grievous sickness such as injure them wantonly.[57] When the Tagalogs of the Philippines wish to pluck a flower, they ask leave of the genius (_nono_) of the flower to do so; when they are obliged to cut down a tree they beg pardon of the genius of the tree and excuse themselves by saying that it was the priest who bade them fell it.[58] Among the Tigre-speaking tribes in the north of Abyssinia people are afraid to fell a green and fruit-bearing tree lest they incur the curse of God, which is heard in the groaning of the tree as it sinks to the ground. But if a man is bold enough to cut down such a tree, he will say to it, “Thy curse abide in thee,” or he will allege that it was not he but an elephant or a rhinoceros that knocked it down.[59] Amongst the Hos of Togoland, in West Africa, when a man wishes to make palm-wine he hires woodmen to fell the trees. They go into the palm-wood, set some meal on the ground and say to the wood, “That is your food. The old man at home sent us to cut you down. We are still children who know nothing at all. The old man at home has sent us.” They say this because they think that the wood is a spirit and that it is angry with them.[60] Before a Karo Batak cuts down a tree, he will offer it betel and apologies; and if in passing the place afterwards he should see the tree weeping or, as we should say, exuding sap, he hastens to console it by sprinkling the blood of a fowl on the stump.[61] The Basoga of Central Africa think that when a tree is cut down the angry spirit which inhabits it may cause the death of the chief and his family. To prevent this disaster they consult a medicine-man before they fell a tree. If the man of skill gives leave to proceed, the woodman first offers a fowl and a goat to the tree; then as soon as he has given the first blow with the axe, he applies his mouth to the cut and sucks some of the sap. In this way he forms a brotherhood with the tree, just as two men become blood-brothers by sucking each other’s blood. After that he can cut down his tree-brother with impunity.[62] An ancient Indian ritual directs that in preparing to fell a tree the woodman should lay a stalk of grass on the spot where the blow is to fall, with the words, “O plant, shield it!” and that he should say to the axe, “O axe, hurt it not!” When the tree had fallen, he poured melted butter on the stump, saying, “Grow thou out of this, O lord of the forest, grow with a hundred shoots! May we grow with a thousand shoots!” Then he anointed the severed stem and wound a rope of grass round it.[63]

[Sidenote: Bleeding trees.] Again, when a tree or plant is cut it is sometimes thought to bleed. Some Indians dare not cut a certain plant, because there comes out a red juice which they take for the blood of the plant.[64] In Samoa there was a grove of trees which no one dared hew down. Once some strangers tried to do so, but blood flowed from the tree, and the sacrilegious strangers fell ill and died.[65] Down to 1859 there stood a sacred larch-tree at Nauders in the Tyrol which was thought to bleed whenever it was cut; moreover people fancied that the steel pierced the woodman’s body to the same depth that it pierced the tree, and that the wound on his body would not heal until the bark closed over the scar on the trunk. So sacred was the tree that no one would gather fuel or cut timber near it; and to curse, scold, or quarrel in its neighbourhood was regarded as a crying sin which would be supernaturally punished on the spot. Angry disputants were often hushed with the warning whisper, “Don’t, the sacred tree is here.”[66]

[Sidenote: Trees threatened in order to make them bear fruit.] But the spirits of vegetation are not always treated with deference and respect. If fair words and kind treatment do not move them, stronger measures are sometimes resorted to. The durian-tree of the East Indies, whose smooth stem often shoots up to a height of eighty or ninety feet without sending out a branch, bears a fruit of the most delicious flavour and the most disgusting stench. The Malays cultivate the tree for the sake of its fruit, and have been known to resort to a peculiar ceremony for the purpose of stimulating its fertility. Near Jugra in Selangor there is a small grove of durian-trees, and on a specially chosen day the villagers used to assemble in it. Thereupon one of the local sorcerers would take a hatchet and deliver several shrewd blows on the trunk of the most barren of the trees, saying, “Will you now bear fruit or not? If you do not, I shall fell you.” To this the tree replied through the mouth of another man who had climbed a mangostin-tree hard by (the durian-tree being unclimbable), “Yes, I will now bear fruit; I beg you not to fell me.”[67] So in Japan to make trees bear fruit two men go into an orchard. One of them climbs up a tree and the other stands at the foot with an axe. The man with the axe asks the tree whether it will yield a good crop next year and threatens to cut it down if it does not. To this the man among the branches replies on behalf of the tree that it will bear abundantly.[68] Odd as this mode of horticulture may seem to us, it has its exact parallels in Europe. On Christmas Eve many a South Slavonian and Bulgarian peasant swings an axe threateningly against a barren fruit-tree, while another man standing by intercedes for the menaced tree, saying, “Do not cut it down; it will soon bear fruit.” Thrice the axe is swung, and thrice the impending blow is arrested at the entreaty of the intercessor. After that the frightened tree will certainly bear fruit next year.[69] So at the village of Ucria in Sicily, if a tree obstinately refuses to bear fruit, the owner pretends to hew it down. Just as the axe is about to fall, a friend intercedes for the tree, begging him to have patience for one year more, and promising not to interfere again if the culprit has not mended his ways by then. The owner grants his request, and the Sicilians say that a tree seldom remains deaf to such a menace. The ceremony is performed on Easter Saturday.[70] In Armenia the same pantomime is sometimes performed by two men for the same purpose on Good Friday.[71] In the Abruzzi the ceremony takes place before sunrise on the morning of St. John’s Day (Midsummer Day). The owner threatens the trees which are slow to bear fruit. Thrice he walks round each sluggard repeating his threat and striking the trunk with the head of an axe.[72] In Lesbos, when an orange-tree or a lemon-tree does not bear fruit, the owner will sometimes set a looking-glass before the tree; then standing with an axe in his hand over against the tree and gazing at its reflection in the glass he will feign to fall into a passion and will say aloud, “Bear fruit, or I’ll cut you down.”[73] When cabbages merely curl their leaves instead of forming heads as they ought to do, an Esthonian peasant will go out into the garden before sunrise, clad only in his shirt, and armed with a scythe, which he sweeps over the refractory vegetables as if he meant to cut them down. This intimidates the cabbages and brings them to a sense of their duty.[74]

[Sidenote: Attempts to deceive the spirits of trees and plants.] If European peasants thus know how to work on the fears of cabbages and fruit-trees, the subtle Malay has learned how to overreach the simple souls of the plants and trees that grow in his native land. Thus, when a bunch of fruit hangs from an _aren_ palm-tree, and in reaching after it you tread on some of the fallen fruit, the Galelareese say that you ought to grunt like a wild boar in order that your feet may not itch. The chain of reasoning seems weak to a European mind, but the natives find no flaw in it. They have observed that wild boars are fond of the fruit, and run freely about among it as it lies on the ground. From this they infer that the animal’s feet are proof against the itch which men suffer through treading on the fruit; and hence they conclude that if, by grunting in a natural and life-like manner, you can impress the fruit with the belief that you are a pig, it will treat your feet as tenderly as the feet of his friends the real pigs.[75] Again, pregnant women in Java sometimes take a fancy to eat the wild species of a particular plant (_Colocasia antiquorum_), which, on account of its exceedingly pungent taste, is not commonly used as food by human beings, though it is relished by pigs. In such a case it becomes the husband’s duty to go and look for the plant, but before he gathers it he takes care to grunt loudly, in order that the plant may take him for a pig, and so mitigate the pungency of its flavour.[76] Again, in the Madiun district of Java there grows a plant of which the fruit is believed to be injurious for men, but not for apes. The urchins who herd buffaloes, and to whom nothing edible comes amiss, eat this fruit also; but before plucking it they take the precaution of mimicking the voices of apes, in order to persuade the plant that its fruit is destined for the maw of these creatures.[77] Once more, the Javanese scrape the rind of a certain plant (_Sarcolobus narcoticus_) into a powder, with which they poison such dangerous beasts as tigers and wild boars. But the rind is believed not to be a poison for men. Hence the person who gathers the plant has to observe certain precautions in order that its baneful quality may not be lost in passing through his hands. He approaches it naked and creeping on all fours to make the plant think that he is a ravenous beast and not a man, and to strengthen the illusion he bites the stalk. After that the deadly property of the rind is assured. But even when the plant has been gathered and the powder made from it in strict accordance with certain superstitious rules, care is still needed in handling the powder, which is regarded as alive and intelligent. It may not be brought near a corpse, nor may a corpse be carried past the house in which the powder is kept. For if either of these things were to happen, the powder, seeing the corpse, would hastily conclude that it had already done its work, and so all its noxious quality would be gone.[78] The Indians of the Upper Orinoco extract a favourite beverage from certain palm-trees which grow in their forests. In order to make the trees bear abundance of fruit the medicine-men blow sacred trumpets under them; but how this is supposed to produce the desired effect does not appear. The trumpets (_botutos_) are objects of religious veneration; no woman may look on them under pain of death. Candidates for initiation into the mystery of the trumpets must be men of good character and celibate. The initiated members scourge each other, fast, and practise other austerities.[79]

[Sidenote: Trees married to each other.] The conception of trees and plants as animated beings naturally results in treating them as male and female, who can be married to each other in a real, and not merely a figurative or poetical sense of the word. The notion is not purely fanciful, for plants like animals have their sexes and reproduce their kind by the union of the male and female elements. But whereas in all the higher animals the organs of the two sexes are regularly separated between different individuals, in most plants they exist together in every individual of the species. This rule, however, is by no means universal, and in many species the male plant is distinct from the female. The distinction appears to have been observed by some savages, for we are told that the Maoris “are acquainted with the sex of trees, etc., and have distinct names for the male and female of some trees.”[80] The [Sidenote: Artificial fertilisation of the date-palm.] ancients knew the difference between the male and the female date-palm, and fertilised them artificially by shaking the pollen of the male tree over the flowers of the female.[81] The fertilisation took place in spring. Among the heathen of Harran the month during which the palms were fertilised bore the name of the Date Month, and at this time they celebrated the marriage festival of all the gods and goddesses.[82] Different from this true and fruitful marriage of the palm are the false and barren marriages of plants which play a part [Sidenote: Marriages of trees in India.] in Hindoo superstition. For example, if a Hindoo has planted a grove of mangos, neither he nor his wife may taste of the fruit until he has formally married one of the trees, as a bridegroom, to a tree of a different sort, commonly a tamarind-tree, which grows near it in the grove. If there is no tamarind to act as bride, a jasmine will serve the turn. The expenses of such a marriage are often considerable, for the more Brahmans are feasted at it, the greater the glory of the owner of the grove. A family has been known to sell its golden and silver trinkets, and to borrow all the money they could in order to marry a mango-tree to a jasmine with due pomp and ceremony.[83] According to another account of the ceremony, a branch of a _bar_ tree is brought and fixed near one of the mango trees in the grove to represent the _bar_ or bridegroom, and both are wrapt round with the same piece of cloth by the owner of the grove and his wife. To complete the ceremony a bamboo basket containing the bride’s belongings and dowry on a miniature scale is provided; and after the Brahman priest has done his part, vermilion, the emblem of a completed marriage, is applied to the mango as to a bride.[84] Another plant which figures as [Sidenote: Marriage of the holy basil.] a bride in Hindoo rites is the _tulasi_ or Holy Basil (_Ocymum sanctum_). It is a small shrub, not too big to be grown in a large flower-pot, and is often placed in rooms; indeed there is hardly a respectable Hindoo family that does not possess one. In spite of its humble appearance, the shrub is pervaded by the essence of Vishnu and his wife Lakshmi, and is itself worshipped daily as a deity. The following prayer is often addressed to it: “I adore that _tulasi_ in whose roots are all the sacred places of pilgrimage, in whose centre are all the deities, and in whose upper branches are all the Vedas.” The plant is especially a woman’s divinity, being regarded as an embodiment of Vishnu’s wife Lakshmi, or of Rama’s wife Sita, or of Krishna’s wife Rukmini. Women worship it by walking round it and praying or offering flowers and rice to it. Now this sacred plant, as the embodiment of a goddess, is annually married to the god Krishna in every Hindoo family. The ceremony takes place in the month _Karttika_ or November. In Western India they often bring an idol of the youthful Krishna in a gorgeous palanquin, followed by a long train of attendants, to the house of a rich man to be wedded to the basil; and the festivities are celebrated with great pomp.[85] Again, as the wife of Vishnu, the holy basil is married to the _Salagrama_, a black fossil ammonite which is regarded as an embodiment of Vishnu. In North-Western India this marriage of the plant to the fossil has to be performed before it is lawful to taste of the fruit of a new orchard. A man holding the fossil personates the bridegroom, and another holding the basil represents the bride. After burning a sacrificial fire, the officiating Brahman puts the usual questions to the couple about to be united. Bride and bridegroom walk six times round a small spot marked out in the centre of the orchard.[86] Further, no well is considered lucky until the _Salagrama_ has been solemnly wedded to the holy basil, which stands for the garden that the well is intended to water. The relations assemble; the owner of the garden represents the bridegroom, while a kinsman of his wife personates the bride. Gifts are given to the Brahmans, a feast is held in the garden, and after that both garden and well may be used without danger.[87] The same marriage of the sacred fossil to the sacred plant is celebrated annually by the Rajah of Orchha at Ludhaura. A former Rajah used to spend a sum equal to about thirty thousand pounds, being one-fourth of his revenue, upon the ceremony. On one occasion over a hundred thousand people are said to have been present at the rite, and to have been feasted at the expense of the Rajah. The procession consisted of eight elephants, twelve hundred camels, and four thousand horses, all mounted and elegantly caparisoned. The most sumptuously decorated of the elephants carried the fossil god to pay his bridal visit to the little shrub goddess. On such an occasion all the rites of a regular marriage are performed, and afterwards the newly-wedded couple are left to repose together in the temple till the next year.[88] On Christmas Eve German peasants used to tie fruit-trees together with straw ropes to make them bear fruit, saying that the trees were thus married.[89]

[Sidenote: Trees in blossom and rice in bloom treated like pregnant women.] In the Moluccas, when the clove-trees are in blossom, they are treated like pregnant women. No noise may be made near them; no light or fire may be carried past them at night; no one may approach them with his hat on, all must uncover in their presence. These precautions are observed lest the tree should be alarmed and bear no fruit, or should drop its fruit too soon, like the untimely delivery of a woman who has been frightened in her pregnancy.[90] So in the East the growing rice-crop is often treated with the same considerate regard as a breeding woman. Thus in Amboyna, when the rice is in bloom, the people say that it is pregnant and fire no guns and make no other noises near the field, for fear lest, if the rice were thus disturbed, it would miscarry, and the crop would be all straw and no grain.[91] The Javanese also regard the bloom on the rice as a sign that the plant is pregnant; and they treat it accordingly, by mingling in the water that irrigates the fields a certain astringent food prepared from sour fruit, which is believed to be wholesome for women with child.[92] In some districts of Western Borneo there must be no talk of corpses or demons in the fields, else the spirit of the growing rice would be frightened and flee away to Java.[93] The Toboongkoos of Central Celebes will not fire a gun in a ricefield, lest the rice should be frightened away.[94] The Chams of Binh-Thuan, in Cochin-China, do not dare to touch the rice in the granary at mid-day, because the rice is then asleep, and it would be both rude and dangerous to disturb its noonday slumber.[95] In Orissa growing rice is “considered as a pregnant woman, and the same ceremonies are observed with regard to it as in the case of human females.”[96] In Poso, a district of Central Celebes, when the rice-ears are beginning to form, women go through the field feeding the young ears with soft-boiled rice to make them grow fast. They carry the food in calabashes, and grasping the ears in their hands bend them over into the vessels that they may partake of the strengthening pap. The reason for boiling the rice soft is that the ears are regarded as young children who could not digest rice cooked in the usual way.[97] The Tomori of Central Celebes feed the ripening rice by touching it with the contents of a broken egg.[98] When the grain begins to form, the people of Gayo, a district of northern Sumatra, regard the rice as pregnant and feed it with a pap composed of rice-meal, coco-nut, and treacle, which they deposit on leaves in the middle and at the corners of the field. And when the crop is plentiful and the rice has been threshed, they give it water to drink in a pitcher, which they bury to the neck in the heap of grain.[99]

[Sidenote: Trees supposed to be tenanted by the souls of the dead.] Sometimes it is the souls of the dead which are believed to animate trees. The Dieri tribe of South Australia regard as very sacred certain trees which are supposed to be their fathers transformed; hence they speak with reverence of these trees, and are careful that they shall not be cut down or burned. If the settlers require them to hew down the trees, they earnestly protest against it, asserting that were they to do so they would have no luck, and might be punished for not protecting their ancestors.[100] Some of the Philippine Islanders believe that the souls of their ancestors are in certain trees, which they therefore spare. If they are obliged to fell one of these trees, they excuse themselves to it by saying that it was the priest who made them do it. The spirits take up their abode, by preference, in tall and stately trees with great spreading branches. When the wind rustles the leaves, the natives fancy it is the voice of the spirit; and they never pass near one of these trees without bowing respectfully, and asking pardon of the spirit for disturbing his repose. Among the Ignorrotes, in the district of Lepanto, every village has its sacred tree, in which the souls of the dead forefathers of the hamlet reside. Offerings are made to the tree, and any injury done to it is believed to entail some misfortune on the village. Were the tree cut down, the village and all its inhabitants would inevitably perish.[101] The natives of Bontoc, a province in the north of Luzon, cut down the woods near their villages, but leave a few fine trees standing as the abode of the spirits of their ancestors (_anitos_); and they honour the spirits by depositing food under the trees.[102] The Dyaks believe that when a man dies by accident, as by drowning, it is a sign that the gods mean to exclude him from the realms of bliss. Accordingly his body is not buried, but carried into the forest and there laid down. The souls of such unfortunates pass into trees or animals or fish, and are much dreaded by the Dyaks, who abstain from using certain kinds of wood, or eating certain sorts of fish, because they are supposed to contain the souls of the dead.[103] Once, while walking with a Dyak through the jungle, Sir Hugh Low observed that his companion, after raising his sword to strike a great snake, suddenly arrested his arm and suffered the reptile to escape. On asking the reason, he was told by the Dyak that the bush in front of which they were standing had been a man, a kinsman of his own, who, dying some ten years before, had appeared in a dream to his widow and told her that he had become that particular bamboo-tree. Hence the ground and everything on it was sacred, and the serpent might not be interfered with. The Dyak further related that in spite of the warning given to the woman in the vision, a man had been hardy enough to cut a branch of the tree, but that the fool had paid for his temerity with his life, for he died soon afterwards. A little bamboo altar stood in front of the bush, on which the remnants of offerings presented to the spirit of the tree were still visible when Sir Hugh Low passed that way.[104]

In Corea the souls of people who die of the plague or by the roadside, and of women who expire in childbed, invariably take up their abode in trees. To such spirits offerings of cake, wine, and pork are made on heaps of stones piled under the trees.[105] In China it has been customary from time immemorial to plant trees on graves in order thereby to strengthen the soul of the deceased and thus to save his body from corruption; and as the evergreen cypress and pine are deemed to be fuller of vitality than other trees, they have been chosen by preference for this purpose. Hence the trees that grow on graves are sometimes identified with the souls of the departed.[106] Among the Miao-Kia, an aboriginal race of Southern and Western China, a sacred tree stands at the entrance of every village, and the inhabitants believe that it is tenanted by the soul of their first ancestor and that it rules their destiny. Sometimes there is a sacred grove near a village, where the trees are suffered to rot and die on the spot. Their fallen branches cumber the ground, and no one may remove them unless he has first asked leave of the spirit of the tree and offered him a sacrifice.[107] Among the Maraves of Southern Africa the burial-ground is always regarded as a holy place where neither a tree may be felled nor a beast killed, because everything there is supposed to be tenanted by the souls of the dead.[108] Trees supposed to be inhabited by spirits of the dead are reported to be common in Southern Nigeria.[109] Thus in the Indem tribe on the Cross River every village has a big tree into which the souls of the villagers are believed to pass at death. Hence they will not allow these trees to be cut, and they sacrifice to them when people are ill.[110] Other natives of the Cross River say that the big tree of the village is “their Life,” and that anybody who breaks a bough of it will fall sick or die unless he pays a fine to the chief.[111] Some of the mountaineers on the north-west coast of New Guinea think that the spirits of their ancestors live on the branches of trees, on which accordingly they hang rags of red or white cotton, always in the number of seven or a multiple of seven; also, they place food on the trees or hang it in baskets from the boughs.[112] Among the Buryats of Siberia the bones of a deceased shaman are deposited in a hole hewn in the trunk of a great fir, which is then carefully closed up. Thenceforth the tree goes by the name of the shaman’s fir, and is looked upon as his abode. Whoever cuts down such a tree will perish with all his household. Every tribe has its sacred grove of firs in which the bones of the dead shamans are buried. In treeless regions these firs often form isolated clumps on the hills, and are visible from afar.[113] The Lkungen Indians of British Columbia fancy that trees are transformed men, and that the creaking of the branches in the wind is their voice.[114] In Croatia, they say that witches used to be buried under old trees in the forest, and that their souls passed into the trees and left the villagers in peace.[115] A tree that grows on a grave is regarded by the South Slavonian peasant as a sort of fetish. Whoever breaks a twig from it hurts the soul of the dead, but gains thereby a magic wand, since the soul embodied in the twig will be at his service.[116] This reminds us of the story of Polydorus in Virgil,[117] and of the bleeding pomegranate that grew on the grave of the fratricides Eteocles and Polynices at Thebes[118]. Similar stories are told far away from the classic lands of Italy and Greece. In an Annamite tale 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 with her three daughters, who had been cast into the sea, are embodied in the tree.[119] On the Slave Coast of West Africa the negroes tell how from the mouldering bones of a little boy, who had been murdered by his brother in the forest, there sprang up an edible fungus, which spoke and revealed the crime to the child’s mother when she attempted to pluck it.[120]

[Sidenote: Trees sometimes conceived not as the body but merely as the abode of spirits.] In most, if not all, of these cases the spirit is viewed as incorporate in the tree; it animates the tree and must suffer and die with it. But, according to another and probably later opinion, the tree is not the body, but merely the abode of the tree-spirit, which can quit it and return to it at pleasure. The inhabitants of Siaoo, an island of the Sangi group in the East Indies, believe in certain sylvan spirits who dwell in forests or in great solitary trees. At full moon the spirit comes forth from his lurking-place and roams about. He has a big head, very long arms and legs, and a ponderous body. In order to propitiate the wood-spirits people bring offerings of food, fowls, goats, and so forth to the places which they are supposed to haunt.[121] The people of Nias think that, when a tree dies, its liberated spirit becomes a demon, which can kill a coco-nut palm by merely lighting on its branches, and can cause the death of all the children in a house by perching on one of the posts that support it. Further, they are of opinion that certain trees are at all times inhabited by roving demons who, if the trees were damaged, would be set free to go about on errands of mischief. Hence the people respect these trees, and are careful not to cut them down.[122] On the Tanga coast of East Africa mischievous sprites reside in great trees, especially in the fantastically shaped baobabs. Sometimes they appear in the shape of ugly black beings, but as a rule they enter unseen into people’s bodies, from which, after causing much sickness and misery, they have to be cast out by the sorcerer.[123] The Warramunga tribe of Central Australia believe that certain trees are the abode of disembodied human spirits waiting to be born again. No woman will strike one of these trees with an axe, lest the blow might disturb one of the spirits, who might come forth from the tree and enter her body.[124] In the Galla region of East Africa, where the vegetation is magnificent, there are many sacred trees, the haunts of jinn. Most of them belong to the sycamore and maple family, but they do not all exhale an equal odour of sanctity. The _watêsa_, with its edible fruit, is least revered; people climb it to get the fruit, and this disturbs the jinn, who naturally do not care to linger among its boughs. The _gute tubi_, which has no edible fruit, is more sacred. Every Galla tribe has its sacred tree, which is always one individual of a particular species called _lafto_. When a tree has been consecrated by a priest it becomes holy, and no branch of it may be broken. Such trees are loaded with long threads, woollen bands, and bracelets; the blood of animals is poured on their roots and sometimes smeared on their trunks, and pots full of butter, milk, and flesh are placed among the branches or on the ground under them. In many Galla tribes women may not tread on the shadow of sacred trees or even approach the trees.[125]

[Sidenote: Ceremonies at felling trees.] Not a few ceremonies observed at cutting down haunted trees are based on the belief that the spirits have it in their power to quit the trees at pleasure or in case of need. Thus when the Pelew Islanders are felling a tree, they conjure the spirit of the tree to leave it and settle on another.[126] The wily negro of the Slave Coast, who wishes to fell an _ashorin_ tree, but knows that he cannot do it so long as the spirit remains in the tree, places a little palm-oil on the ground as a bait, and then, when the unsuspecting spirit has quitted the tree to partake of this dainty, hastens to cut down its late abode.[127] The Alfoors of Poso, in Central Celebes, believe that great trees are inhabited by demons in human form, and the taller the tree the more powerful the demon. Accordingly they are careful not to fell such trees, and they leave offerings at the foot of them for the spirits. But sometimes, when they are clearing land for cultivation, it becomes necessary to cut down the trees which cumber it. In that case the Alfoor will call to the demon of the tree and beseech him to leave his abode and go elsewhere, and he deposits food under the tree as provision for the spirit on his journey. Then, and not till then, he may fell the tree. Woe to the luckless wight who should turn a tree-spirit out of his house without giving him due notice![128] When the Toboongkoos of Central Celebes are about to clear a piece of forest in order to plant rice, they build a tiny house and furnish it with tiny clothes and some food and gold. Then they call together all the spirits of the wood, offer them the little house with its contents, and beseech them to quit the spot. After that they may safely cut down the wood without fearing to wound themselves in so doing.[129] Before the Tomori of Central Celebes fell a tall tree they lay a quid of betel at its foot, and invite the spirit who dwells in the tree to change his lodging; moreover, they set a little ladder against the trunk to enable him to descend with safety and comfort.[130] The Sundanese of the Eastern Archipelago drive golden or silver nails into the trunk of a sacred tree for the sake of expelling the tree-spirit before they hew down his abode.[131] They seem to think that, though the nails will hurt him, his vanity will be soothed by the reflection that they are of gold or silver. In Rotti, an island to the south of Timor, when they fell a tree to make a coffin, they sacrifice a dog as compensation to the tree-spirit whose property they are thus making free with.[132] Before the Gayos of Northern Sumatra clear a piece of forest for the purpose of planting tobacco or sugar-cane, they offer a quid of betel to the spirit whom they call the Lord of the Wood, and beg his leave to quarter themselves on his domain.[133] The Mandelings of Sumatra endeavour to lay the blame of all such misdeeds at the door of the Dutch authorities. Thus when a man is cutting a road through a forest and has to fell a tall tree which blocks the way, he will not begin to ply his axe until he has said: “Spirit who lodgest in this tree, take it not ill that I cut down thy dwelling, for it is done at no wish of mine but by order of the Controller.” And when he wishes to clear a piece of forest-land for cultivation, it is necessary that he should come to a satisfactory understanding with the woodland spirits who live there before he lays low their leafy dwellings. For this purpose he goes to the middle of the plot of ground, stoops down, and pretends to pick up a letter. Then unfolding a bit of paper he reads aloud an imaginary letter from the Dutch Government, in which he is strictly enjoined to set about clearing the land without delay. Having done so, he says: “You hear that, spirits. I must begin clearing at once, or I shall be hanged.”[134] When the Tagales of the Philippines are about to fell a tree which they believe to be inhabited by a spirit, they excuse themselves to the spirit, saying: “The priest has ordered us to do it; the fault is not ours, nor the will either.”[135] There is a certain tree called _rara_ which the Dyaks believe to be inhabited by a spirit. Before they cut down one of these trees they strike an axe into the trunk, leave it there, and call upon the spirit either to quit his dwelling or to give them a sign that he does not wish it to be meddled with. Then they go home. Next day they visit the tree, and if they find the axe still sticking in the trunk, they can fell the tree without danger; there is no spirit in it, or he would certainly have ejected the axe from his abode. But if they find the axe lying on the ground, they know that the tree is inhabited and they will not fell it; for it must surely have been the spirit of the tree in person who expelled the intrusive axe. Some sceptical Europeans, however, argue that what casts out the axe is strychnine in the sap rather than the tree-spirit. They say that if the sap is running, the axe must necessarily be forced out by the action of heat and the expansion of the exuding gutta; whereas if the axe remains in the trunk, this only shews that the tree is not vigorous but ready to die.[136]

Before they cut down a great tree, the Indians in the neighbourhood of Santiago Tepehuacan hold a festival in order to appease the tree and so prevent it from hurting anybody in its fall.[137] In the Greek island of Siphnos, if woodmen have to fell a tree which they regard as possessed by a spirit, they are most careful, when it falls, to prostrate themselves humbly and in silence lest the spirit should chastise them as it escapes. Sometimes they put a stone on the stump of the tree to prevent the egress of the spirit.[138] In some parts of Sumatra, so soon as a tree is felled, a young tree is planted on the stump, and some betel and a few small coins are also placed on it.[139] The purpose of the ceremony seems plain. The spirit of the tree is offered a new home in the young tree planted on the stump of the old one, and the offering of betel and money is meant to compensate him for the disturbance he has suffered. Similarly, when the Maghs of Bengal were obliged by Europeans to cut down trees which the natives believed to be tenanted by spirits, one of them was always ready with a green sprig, which he ran and placed in the middle of the stump when the tree fell, “as a propitiation to the spirit which had been displaced so roughly, pleading at the same time the orders of the strangers for the work.”[140] In Halmahera, however, the motive for placing a sprig on the stump is said to be to deceive the spirit into thinking that the fallen stem is still growing in its old place.[141] The Gilyaks insert a stick with curled shavings on the stump of the tree which they have felled, believing that in this way they give back to the dispossessed tree-spirit his life and soul.[142] German woodmen make a cross upon the stump while the tree is falling, in the belief that this enables the spirit of the tree to live upon the stump.[143] Before the Katodis fell a forest tree, they choose a tree of the same kind and worship it by presenting a coco-nut, burning incense, applying a red pigment, and begging it to bless the undertaking.[144] The intention, perhaps, is to induce the spirit of the former tree to shift its quarters to the latter. In clearing a wood, a Galelareese must not cut down the last tree till the spirit in it has been induced to go away.[145] When the Dyaks fell the jungle on the hills, they often leave a few trees standing on the hill-tops as a refuge for the dispossessed tree-spirits.[146] Sailing up the Baram river in Sarawak you pass from time to time a clearing in the forest where manioc is cultivated. In the middle of every one of these clearings a solitary tree is always left standing as a home for the ejected spirits of the wood. Its boughs are stripped off, all but the topmost, and just under its leafy crown two cross-pieces are fastened from which rags dangle.[147] Similarly in India, the Gonds allow a grove of typical trees to remain as a home or reserve for the woodland spirits when they are clearing away a jungle.[148] The Mundaris have sacred groves which were left standing when the land was cleared, lest the sylvan gods, disquieted at the felling of the trees, should abandon the place.[149] The Miris in Assam are unwilling to break up new land for cultivation so long as there is fallow land available; for they fear to offend the spirits of the woods by hewing down trees needlessly.[150] On the other hand, when a child has been lost, the Padams of Assam think that it has been stolen by the spirits of the wood; so they retaliate on the spirits by felling trees till they find the child. The spirits, fearing to be left without a tree in which to lodge, give up the child, and it is found in the fork of a tree.[151]

[Sidenote: Propitiating tree-spirits in house-timber.] Even when a tree has been felled, sawn into planks, and used to build a house, it is possible that the woodland spirit may still be lurking in the timber, and accordingly some people seek to propitiate him before or after they occupy the new house. Hence, when a new dwelling is ready the Toradjas of Central Celebes kill a goat, a pig, or a buffalo, and smear all the woodwork with its blood. If the building is a _lobo_ or spirit-house, a fowl or a dog is killed on the ridge of the roof, and its blood allowed to flow down on both sides. The ruder Tonapoo in such a case sacrifice a human being on the roof. This sacrifice on the roof of a _lobo_ or temple serves the same purpose as the smearing of blood on the woodwork of an ordinary house. The intention is to propitiate the forest-spirits who may still be in the timber; they are thus put in good humour and will do the inmates of the house no harm. For a like reason people in Celebes and the Moluccas are much afraid of planting a post upside down at the building of a house; for the forest-spirit, who might still be in the timber, would very naturally resent the indignity and visit the inmates with sickness.[152] The Bahaus or Kayans of central Borneo are of opinion that tree-spirits stand very stiffly on the point of honour and visit men with their displeasure for any injury done to them. Hence after building a house, whereby they have been forced to illtreat many trees, these people observe a period of penance for a year, during which they must abstain from many things, such as the killing of bears, tiger-cats, and serpents. The period of taboo is brought to an end by a ceremony at which head-hunting, or the pretence of it, plays a part. The Ooloo-Ayar Dyaks on the Mandai river are still more punctilious in their observance of taboos after building a house. The length of the penance depends chiefly on the kind of timber used in the construction of the dwelling. If the timber was the valuable ironwood, the inmates of the house must deny themselves various dainties for three years. But the spirits of humbler trees are less exacting.[153] When the Kayans have felled an ironwood tree in order to cut it up into planks for a roof, they will offer a pig to the spirits of the tree, hoping thus to prevent the spirits from molesting the souls of persons assembled under the roof.[154]

[Sidenote: Sacred trees the abode of spirits.] Thus the tree is regarded, sometimes as the body, sometimes as merely the house of the tree-spirit; and when we read of sacred trees which may not be cut down because they are the seat of spirits, it is not always possible to say with certainty in which way the presence of the spirit in the tree is conceived. In the following cases, perhaps, the trees are regarded as the dwelling-place of the spirits rather than as their bodies. The Sea Dyaks point to many a tree as sacred because it is the abode of a spirit or spirits, and to cut one of these down would provoke the spirit’s anger, who might avenge himself by visiting the sacrilegious woodman with sickness.[155] The Battas of Sumatra have been known to refuse to cut down certain trees because they were the abode of mighty spirits who would resent the injury.[156] One of the largest and stateliest of the forest trees in Perak is known as _toallong_; it has a very poisonous sap which produces great irritation when it comes into contact with the skin. Many trees of this species have large hollow knobs on their trunks where branches have been broken off. These knobs are looked upon by the Malays as houses of spirits, and they object strongly to cut down trees that are thus disfigured, believing that the man who fells one of them will die within the year. When clearings are made in the forest these trees are generally left standing to the annoyance and expense of planters.[157] The Siamese fear to cut down any very fine trees lest they should incur the anger of the powerful spirits who inhabit them.[158] The En, a tribe of Upper Burma, worship the spirits of hills and forests, and over great tracts of country they will not lay out fields for fear of offending the spirits. They say that if a tree is felled a man dies.[159] In every Khond village a large grove, generally of _sâl_ trees (_Shorea robusta_), is dedicated to the forest god, whose favour is sought by the sacrifice of birds, hogs, and sheep, together with an offering of rice and an addled egg. This sacred grove is religiously preserved. The young trees are occasionally pruned, but not a twig may be cut for use without the formal consent of the village and the ceremonial propitiation of the god.[160] In some parts of Berar the holy groves are so carefully preserved, that during the annual festivals held in them it is customary to gather and burn solemnly all dead and fallen branches and trees.[161] The Larka Kols of India believe that the tops of trees are the abode of spirits who are disturbed by the felling of the trees and will take vengeance.[162] The Parahiya, a Dravidian tribe of Mirzapur, think that evil spirits live in the _sâl_, _pîpal_, and _mahua_ trees; they make offerings to such trees and will not climb into their branches.[163] In Travancore demons are supposed to reside in certain large old trees, which it would be sacrilegious and dangerous to hew down. A rough stone is generally placed at the foot of one of these trees as an image or emblem, and turmeric powder is rubbed on it.[164] Some of the Western tribes of British New Guinea dread certain female devils who inhabit large trees and are very dangerous. Trees supposed to be the abode of these demons are treated with much respect and never cut down.[165] Near Old Calabar there is a ravine full of the densest and richest vegetation, whence a stream of limpid water flows purling to the river. The spot was considered by a late king to be hallowed ground, the residence of Anansa, the tutelary god of Old Calabar. The people had strict orders to revere the grove, and no branch of it might be cut.[166] Among the Bambaras of the Upper Niger every village has its sacred tree, generally a tamarind, which is supposed to be the abode of the fetish and is carefully preserved. The fetish is consulted on every important occasion, and sacrifices of sheep, dogs, and fowls, accompanied with offerings of millet and fruits, are made under the sacred tree.[167] In the deserts of Arabia a modern traveller found a great solitary acacia-tree which the Bedouins believed to be possessed by a jinnee. Shreds of cotton and horns of goats hung among the boughs and nails were knocked into the trunk. An Arab strongly dissuaded the traveller from cutting a branch of the tree, assuring him that it was death to do so.[168] The Yourouks, who inhabit the southern coasts of Asia Minor and the heights of Mount Taurus, have sacred trees which they never cut down from fear of driving away the spirits that own them.[169] The old Prussians believed that gods inhabited tall trees, such as oaks, from which they gave audible answers to enquirers; hence these trees were not felled, but worshipped as the homes of divinities. Amongst the trees thus venerated by them was the elder-tree.[170] The Samagitians thought that if any one ventured to injure certain groves, or the birds or beasts in them, the spirits would make his hands or feet crooked.[171] Down to the nineteenth century the Esthonians stood in such awe of many trees, which they considered as the seat of mighty spirits, that they would not even pluck a flower or a berry on the ground where the shadow of the trees fell, much less would they dare to break a branch from the tree itself.[172]

[Sidenote: Sacred groves.] Even where no mention is made of wood-spirits, we may generally assume that when trees or groves are sacred and inviolable, it is because they are believed to be either inhabited or animated by sylvan deities. In Central India the _bar_ tree (_Ficus Indica_) and the _pipal_ (_Ficus religiosa_) are sacred, and every child learns the saying that “it is better to die a leper than pluck a leaf of a _pipal_, and he who can wound a _bar_ will kick his little sister.”[173] In Livonia there is a sacred grove in which, if any man fells a tree or breaks a branch, he will die within the year.[174] The Wotyaks have sacred groves. A Russian who ventured to hew a tree in one of them fell sick and died next day.[175] The heathen Cheremiss of South-Eastern Russia have sacred groves, and woe to him who dares to fell one of the holy trees. If the author of the sacrilege is unknown, they take a cock or a goose, torture it to death and then throw it on the fire, while they pray to the gods to punish the sinner and cause him to perish like the bird.[176] Near a chapel of St. Ninian, in the parish of Belly, there stood more than a century and a half ago a row of trees, “all of equal size, thick planted for about the length of a butt,” which were “looked upon by the superstitious papists as sacred trees, from which they reckon it sacrilege to take so much as a branch or any of the fruit.”[177] So in the island of Skye some two hundred and fifty years ago there was a holy lake, “surrounded by a fair wood, which none presumes to cut”; and those who ventured to infringe its sanctity by breaking even a twig either sickened on the spot or were visited afterwards by “some signal inconvenience.”[178] Sacrifices offered at cutting down trees are doubtless meant to appease the wood-spirits. In Gilgit it is usual to sprinkle goat’s blood on a tree of any kind before felling it.[179] The Akikuyu of British East Africa hold the _mugumu_ or _mugomo_ tree, a species of fig, sacred on account of its size and fine appearance; hence they do not ruthlessly cut it down like all other trees which cumber a patch of ground that is to be cleared for tillage. Groves of this tree are sacred. In them no axe may be laid to any tree, no branch broken, no firewood gathered, no grass burnt; and wild animals which have taken refuge there may not be molested. In these sacred groves sheep and goats are sacrificed and prayers are offered for rain or fine weather or in behalf of sick children. The whole meat of the sacrifices is left in the grove for God (_Ngai_) to eat; the fat is placed in a cleft of the trunk or in the branches as a tit-bit for him. He lives up in the boughs but comes down to partake of the food.[180]

§ 2. Beneficent Powers of Tree-Spirits

[Sidenote: Transition of tree-spirit into anthropomorphic deity of the woods.] When a tree comes to be viewed, no longer as the body of the tree-spirit, but simply as its abode which it can quit at pleasure, an important advance has been made in religious thought. Animism is passing into polytheism. In other words, instead of regarding each tree as a living and conscious being, man now sees in it merely a lifeless, inert mass, tenanted for a longer or shorter time by a supernatural being who, as he can pass freely from tree to tree, thereby enjoys a certain right of possession or lordship over the trees, and, ceasing to be a tree-soul, becomes a forest god. As soon as the tree-spirit is thus in a measure disengaged from each particular tree, he begins to change his shape and assume the body of a man, in virtue of a general tendency of early thought to clothe all abstract spiritual beings in concrete human form. Hence in classical art the sylvan deities are depicted in human shape, their woodland character being denoted by a branch or some equally obvious symbol.[181] But this change of shape does not affect the essential character of the tree-spirit. The powers which he exercised as a tree-soul incorporate in a tree, he still continues to wield as a god of trees. This I shall now attempt to prove in detail. I shall shew, first, that trees considered as animate beings are credited with the power of making the rain to fall, the sun to shine, flocks and herds to multiply, and women to bring forth easily; and, second, that the very same powers are attributed to tree-gods conceived as anthropomorphic beings or as actually incarnate in living men.

[Sidenote: Trees supposed to give rain and sunshine.] First, then, trees or tree-spirits are believed to give rain and sunshine. When the missionary Jerome of Prague was persuading the heathen Lithuanians to fell their sacred groves, a multitude of women besought the Prince of Lithuania to stop him, saying that with the woods he was destroying the house of god from which they had been wont to get rain and sunshine.[182] The Mundaris in Assam think that if a tree in the sacred grove is felled the sylvan gods evince their displeasure by withholding rain.[183] In order to procure rain the inhabitants of Monyo, a village in the Sagaing district of Upper Burma, chose the largest tamarind-tree near the village and named it the haunt of the spirit (_nat_) who controls the rain. Then they offered bread, coco-nuts, plantains, and fowls to the guardian spirit of the village and to the spirit who gives rain, and they prayed, “O Lord _nat_ have pity on us poor mortals, and stay not the rain. Inasmuch as our offering is given ungrudgingly, let the rain fall day and night.” Afterwards libations were made in honour of the spirit of the tamarind-tree; and still later three elderly women, dressed in fine clothes and wearing necklaces and earrings, sang the Rain Song.[184] In Cambodia each village or province has its sacred tree, the abode of a spirit. If the rains are late the people sacrifice to the tree.[185] In time of drought the elders of the Wakamba in East Africa assemble and take a calabash of cider and a goat to a baobab-tree, where they kill the goat but do not eat it.[186] When Ovambo women go out to sow corn they take with them in the basket of seed two green branches of a particular kind of tree (_Peltophorum africanum Sond._), one of which they plant in the field along with the first seed sown. The branch is believed to have the power of attracting rain; hence in one of the native dialects the tree goes by the name of the “rain-bush.”[187] To extort rain from the tree-spirit a branch is sometimes dipped in water, as we have seen above.[188] In such cases the spirit is doubtless supposed to be immanent in the branch, and the water thus applied to the spirit produces rain by a sort of sympathetic magic, exactly as we saw that in New Caledonia the rain-makers pour water on a skeleton, believing that the soul of the deceased will convert the water into rain.[189] There is hardly room to doubt that Mannhardt is right in explaining as a rain-charm the European custom of drenching with water the trees which are cut at certain popular festivals, as midsummer, Whitsuntide, and harvest.[190]

[Sidenote: Tree-spirits supposed to make the crops grow.] Again, tree-spirits make the crops to grow. Amongst the Mundaris every village has its sacred grove, and “the grove deities are held responsible for the crops, and are especially honoured at all the great agricultural festivals.”[191] The negroes of the Gold Coast are in the habit of sacrificing at the foot of certain tall trees, and they think that if one of these were felled all the fruits of the earth would perish.[192] Before harvest the Wabondëi of East Africa sacrifice a goat to the spirit that lives in baobab-trees; the blood is poured into a hole at the foot of one of the trees. If the sacrifice were omitted the spirit would send disease and death among the people.[193] The Gallas dance in couples round sacred trees, praying for a good harvest. Every couple consists of a man and woman, who are linked together by a stick, of which each holds one end. Under their arms they carry green corn or grass.[194] Swedish peasants stick a leafy branch in each furrow of their corn-fields, believing that this will [Sidenote: The Harvest-May.] ensure an abundant crop.[195] The same idea comes out in the German and French custom of the Harvest-May. This is a large branch or a whole tree, which is decked with ears of corn, brought home on the last waggon from the harvest-field, and fastened on the roof of the farmhouse or of the barn, where it remains for a year. Mannhardt has proved that this branch or tree embodies the tree-spirit conceived as the spirit of vegetation in general, whose vivifying and fructifying influence is thus brought to bear upon the corn in particular. Hence in Swabia the Harvest-May is fastened amongst the last stalks of corn left standing on the field; in other places it is planted on the corn-field and the last sheaf cut is attached to its trunk.[196] The Harvest-May of Germany has its counterpart in the _eiresione_ of ancient Greece.[197] The _eiresione_ was a branch of olive or laurel, bound about with ribbons and hung with a variety of fruits. This branch was carried in procession at a harvest festival and was fastened over the door of the house, where it remained for a year. The object of preserving the Harvest-May or the _eiresione_ for a year is that the life-giving virtue of the bough may foster the growth of the crops throughout the year. By the end of the year the virtue of the bough is supposed to be exhausted and it is replaced by a new one. Following a similar train of thought some of the Dyaks of Sarawak are careful at the rice harvest to take up the roots of a certain bulbous plant, which bears a beautiful crown of white and fragrant flowers. These roots are preserved with the rice in the granary and are planted again with the seed-rice in the following season; for the Dyaks say that the rice will not grow unless a plant of this sort be in the field.[198]

[Sidenote: Customs like the Harvest-May in India and Africa.] Customs like that of the Harvest-May appear to exist in India and Africa. At a harvest festival of the Lhoosai of South-Eastern India the chief goes with his people into the forest and fells a large tree, which is then carried into the village and set up in the midst. Sacrifice is offered, and spirits and rice are poured over the tree. The ceremony closes with a feast and a dance, at which the unmarried men and girls are the only performers.[199] Among the Bechuanas the hack-thorn is very sacred, and it would be a serious offence to cut a bough from it and carry it into the village during the rainy season. But when the corn is ripe in the ear the people go with axes, and each man brings home a branch of the sacred hack-thorn, with which they repair the village cattle-yard.[200] According to another authority, it is a rule with the Bechuanas that “neither the hook-thorn nor the milk-tree must be cut down while the corn is on the ground, for this, they think, would prevent rain. When I was at Lattakoo, though Mr. Hamilton stood in much need of some milk-tree timber, he durst not supply himself till all the corn was gathered in.”[201] Many tribes of South-Eastern Africa will not cut down timber while the corn is green, fearing that if they did so, the crops would be destroyed by blight, hail, or early frost.[202] The heathen Cheremiss, in the Russian Government of Kasan, will not fell trees, mow grass, or dig the ground while the corn is in bloom.[203] Again, the fructifying power of the tree is put forth at seed-time as well as at harvest. Among the Aryan tribes of Gilgit, on the north-western frontier of India, the sacred tree is the _Chili_, a species of cedar (_Juniperus excelsa_). At the beginning of wheat-sowing the people receive from the rajah’s granary a quantity of wheat, which is placed in a skin mixed with sprigs of the sacred cedar. A large bonfire of the cedar wood is lighted, and the wheat which is to be sown is held over the smoke. The rest is ground and made into a large cake, which is baked on the same fire and given to the ploughman.[204] Here the intention of fertilising the seed by means of the sacred cedar is unmistakable.

[Sidenote: Fertilising virtue attributed to trees.] In all these cases the power of fostering the growth of crops, and, in general, of cultivated plants, is ascribed to trees. The ascription is not unnatural. For the tree is the largest and most powerful member of the vegetable kingdom, and man is familiar with it before he takes to cultivating corn. Hence he naturally places the feebler and, to him, newer plant under the dominion of the older and more powerful.

[Sidenote: Tree-spirits make herds to multiply and women to bring forth.] Again, the tree-spirit makes the herds to multiply and blesses women with offspring. The sacred _Chili_ or cedar of Gilgit was supposed to possess this virtue in addition to that of fertilising the corn. At the commencement of wheat-sowing three chosen unmarried youths, after undergoing daily washing and purification for three days, used to start for the mountain where the cedars grew, taking with them wine, oil, bread, and fruit of every kind. Having found a suitable tree they sprinkled the wine and oil on it, while they ate the bread and fruit as a sacrificial feast. Then they cut off the branch and brought it to the village, where, amid general rejoicing, it was placed on a large stone beside running water. “A goat was then sacrificed, its blood poured over the cedar branch, and a wild dance took place, in which weapons were brandished about, and the head of the slaughtered goat was borne aloft, after which it was set up as a mark for arrows and bullet-practice. Every good shot was rewarded with a gourd full of wine and some of the flesh of the goat. When the flesh was finished the bones were thrown into the stream and a general ablution took place, after which every man went to his house taking with him a spray of the cedar. On arrival at his house he found the door shut in his face, and on his knocking for admission, his wife asked, ‘What have you brought?’ To which he answered, ‘If you want children, I have brought them to you; if you want food, I have brought it; if you want cattle, I have brought them; whatever you want, I have it.’ The door was then opened and he entered with his cedar spray. The wife then took some of the leaves, and pouring wine and water on them placed them on the fire, and the rest were sprinkled with flour and suspended from the ceiling. She then sprinkled flour on her husband’s head and shoulders, and addressed him thus, ‘Ai Shiri Bagerthum, son of the fairies, you have come from far!’ _Shiri Bagerthum_, ‘the dreadful king,’ being the form of address to the cedar when praying for wants to be fulfilled. The next day the wife baked a number of cakes, and taking them with her, drove the family goats to the Chili stone. When they were collected round the stone, she began to pelt them with pebbles, invoking the Chili at the same time. According to the direction in which the goats ran off, omens were drawn as to the number and sex of the kids expected during the ensuing year. Walnuts and pomegranates were then placed on the Chili stone, the cakes were distributed and eaten, and the goats followed to pasture in whatever direction they showed a disposition to go. For five days afterwards this song was sung in all the houses:—

‘_Dread Fairy King, I sacrifice before you, How nobly do you stand! you have filled up my house, You have brought me a wife when I had not one, Instead of daughters you have given me sons. You have shown me the ways of right, You have given me many children._’”[205]

[Sidenote: Fertilising virtue attributed to trees.] Here the driving of the goats to the stone on which the cedar had been placed is clearly meant to impart to them the fertilising influence of the cedar. In Northern India the _Emblica officinalis_ is a sacred tree. On the eleventh of the month Phalgun (February) libations are poured at the foot of the tree, a red or yellow string is bound about the trunk, and prayers are offered to it for the fruitfulness of women, animals, and crops.[206] Again, in Northern India the coco-nut is esteemed one of the most sacred fruits, and is called Sriphala, or the fruit of Sri, the goddess of prosperity. It is the symbol of fertility, and all through Upper India is kept in shrines and presented by the priests to women who desire to become mothers.[207] In the town of Qua, near Old Calabar, there used to grow a palm-tree which ensured conception to any barren woman who ate a nut from its branches.[208] In [Sidenote: Influence of May-trees on cattle.] Europe the May-tree or May-pole is apparently supposed to possess similar powers over both women and cattle. Thus in some parts of Germany on the first of May the peasants set up May-trees or May-bushes at the doors of stables and byres, one for each horse and cow; this is thought to make the cows yield much milk.[209] Of the Irish we are told that “they fancy a green bough of a tree, fastened on May-day against the house, will produce plenty of milk that summer.”[210] In Suffolk there was an old custom, observed in most farm-houses, that any servant who could bring in a branch of hawthorn in blossom on the first of May was entitled to a dish of cream for breakfast.[211] Similarly, “in parts of Cornwall, till certainly ten years ago, any child who brought to a dairy on May morning a piece of hawthorn in bloom, or a piece of fresh bracken, long enough to surround the earthenware bowl in which cream is kept, was given a bowl of cream.”[212] On May Day English milkmaids used to dance with garlands on their pails. One May morning long ago Pepys on his way to Westminster saw many of them dancing thus to the music of a fiddle while pretty Nel Gwynne, in her smock sleeves and bodice, watched them from the door of her lodgings in Drury-lane.[213]

[Sidenote: May-tree or May-bush a protection against witchcraft.] However in these and similar European customs it seems that the influence of the tree, bush, or bough is really protective rather than generative; it does not so much fill the udders of the cows as prevent them from being drained dry by witches, who ride on broomsticks or pitchforks through the air on the Eve of May Day (the famous Walpurgis Night) and make great efforts to steal the milk from the cattle. Hence the many precautions which the prudent herdsman must take to guard his beasts at this season from the raids of these baleful creatures. For example, on May morning the Irish scatter primroses on the threshold, keep a piece of red-hot iron on the hearth, or twine branches of whitethorn and mountain-ash or rowan about the door. To save the milk they cut and peel boughs of mountain-ash (rowan), and bind the twigs round the milk-pails and the churn.[214] According to a writer of the sixteenth century, whose description is quoted by Camden, the Irish “account every woman who fetches fire on May-day a witch, nor will they give it to any but sick persons, and that with an imprecation, believing she will steal all the butter the next summer. On May day they kill all the hares they find among their cattle, supposing them the old women who have designs on the butter. They imagine the butter so stolen may be recovered if they take some of the thatch hanging over the door and burn it.”[215] In the north-east of Scotland pieces of rowan-tree and woodbine, or of rowan alone, used to be placed over the doors of the cow-houses on May Day to keep the witches from the kine; and a still better way of attaining the same object was to tie a cross of rowan-tree wood with a scarlet thread to each animal’s tail.[216] The Highlanders of Scotland believe that on Beltane eve, that is the night before May Day, the witches go about in the shape of hares and suck the milk from the cows. To guard against their depredations tar was put behind the ears of the cattle and at the root of the tail, and the house was hung with rowan-tree.[217] For the same reason the Highlanders say that the peg of the cow-shackle and the handle and cross of the churn-staff should always be made of rowan, because that is the most potent charm against witchcraft.[218] In the Isle of Man on May Day, old style, people carried crosses of rowan in their hats and fastened May-flowers over their doors as a protection against elves and witches, and for the same purpose they tied crosses of rowan to the tails of the cattle. Also women washed their faces in the dew early on May morning in order to secure good luck, a fine complexion, and immunity from witches. Further, the break of day on that morning was the signal for setting the ling or gorse on fire, which was done for the sake of burning out the witches, who are wont to take the shape of hares. In some places, indeed, as in the Lezayre parish, the practice was to burn gorse in the hedge of every field to drive away the witches, who are still feared in the Isle of Man.[219] In Norway and Denmark branches of rowan are [Sidenote: Precautions against witchcraft on May Day and Walpurgis Night.] similarly used to protect houses and cattle-stalls against witches on Walpurgis Night, and there, too, it is thought that the churn-staff should be made of rowan.[220] In Germany a common way of keeping witches from the cattle on Walpurgis Night is to chalk up three crosses on the door of the cowhouse.[221] Branches of buckthorn stuck in the muck-heaps on the eve of May Day answer the same purpose.[222] In Silesia the precautions taken at this season against witches are many and various; for example, pieces of buckthorn are nailed crosswise over the door of the cowhouse; pitchforks and harrows, turned upside down, with the prongs pointing outwards, are placed at the doors; and a sod of fresh turf from a meadow is laid before the threshold and strewed with marsh-marigolds. Before the witches can pass the threshold, they must count every blade of grass in the turf and every petal of the marigolds; and while they are still counting the day breaks and their power is gone. For the same reason little birch-trees are set up at the house-door, because the witches cannot enter the house till they have counted all the leaves; and before they have done the sum it is broad daylight, and they must flee away with the shadows.[223] On Walpurgis Night the Germans of Moravia put knives under the threshold of the cowhouse and twigs of birch at the door and in the muck-heap to keep the witches from the cows.[224] For the same purpose the Bohemians at this season lay branches of gooseberry bushes, hawthorn, and wild rose-trees on the thresholds of the cowhouses, because the witches are caught by the thorns and can get no farther.[225] We now see why thorny trees and bushes, whether hawthorn, buckthorn, or what not, afford protection against witchcraft: they serve as prickly hedges through which the witches cannot force their way. But this explanation clearly does not apply to the mountain-ash and the birch.

[Sidenote: Influence of tree-spirits on cattle among the Wends, Esthonians, and Circassians.] On the second of July some of the Wends used to set up an oak-tree in the middle of the village with an iron cock fastened to its top; then they danced round it, and drove the cattle round it to make them thrive.[226] Some of the Esthonians believe in a mischievous spirit called Metsik, who lives in the forest and has the weal of the cattle in his hands. Every year a new image of him is prepared. On an appointed day all the villagers assemble and make a straw man, dress him in clothes, and take him to the common pasture-land of the village. Here the figure is fastened to a high tree, round which the people dance noisily. On almost every day of the year prayer and sacrifice are offered to him that he may protect the cattle. Sometimes the image of Metsik is made of a corn-sheaf and fastened to a tall tree in the wood. The people perform strange antics before it to induce Metsik to guard the corn and the cattle.[227] The Circassians regard the pear-tree as the protector of cattle. So they cut down a young pear-tree in the forest, branch it, and carry it home, where it is adored as a divinity. Almost every house has one such pear-tree. In autumn, on the day of the festival, the tree is carried into the house with great ceremony to the sound of music and amid the joyous cries of all the inmates, who compliment it on its fortunate arrival. It is covered with candles, and a cheese is fastened to its top. Round about it they eat, drink, and sing. Then they bid the tree good-bye and take it back to the courtyard, where it remains for the rest of the year, set up against the wall, without receiving any mark of respect.[228]

[Sidenote: Tree-spirits grant offspring or an easy delivery to women.] In the Tuhoe tribe of Maoris “the power of making women fruitful is ascribed to trees. These trees are associated with the navel-strings of definite mythical ancestors, as indeed the navel-strings of all children used to be hung upon them down to quite recent times. A barren woman had to embrace such a tree with her arms, and she received a male or a female child according as she embraced the east or the west side.”[229] The common European custom of placing a green bush on May Day before or on the house of a beloved maiden probably originated in the belief of the fertilising power of the tree-spirit.[230] In some parts of Bavaria such bushes are set up also at the houses of newly-married pairs, and the practice is only omitted if the wife is near her confinement; for in that case they say that the husband has “set up a May-bush for himself.”[231] Among the South Slavonians a barren woman, who desires to have a child, places a new chemise upon a fruitful tree on the eve of St. George’s Day. Next morning before sunrise she examines the garment, and if she finds that some living creature has crept on it, she hopes that her wish will be fulfilled within the year. Then she puts on the chemise, confident that she will be as fruitful as the tree on which the garment has passed the night.[232] Among the Kara-Kirghiz barren women roll themselves on the ground under a solitary apple-tree, in order to obtain offspring.[233] Some of the hill-tribes of India have a custom of marrying the bride and bridegroom to two trees before they are married to each other. For example, among the Mundas the bride touches with red lead a _mahwá_-tree, clasps it in her arms, and is tied to it; and the bridegroom goes through a like ceremony with a mango-tree.[234] The intention of the custom may perhaps be to communicate to the newly-wedded pair the vigorous reproductive power of the trees.[235] Lastly, the power of granting to women an easy delivery at child-birth is ascribed to trees both in Sweden and Africa. In some districts of Sweden there was formerly a _bårdträd_ or guardian-tree (lime, ash, or elm) in the neighbourhood of every farm. No one would pluck a single leaf of the sacred tree, any injury to which was punished by ill-luck or sickness. Pregnant women used to clasp the tree in their arms in order to ensure an easy delivery.[236] In some negro tribes of the Congo region pregnant women make themselves garments out of the bark of a certain sacred tree, because they believe that this tree delivers them from the dangers that attend child-bearing.[237] The story that Leto clasped a palm-tree and an olive-tree or two laurel-trees, when she was about to give birth to the divine twins Apollo and Artemis, perhaps points to a similar Greek belief in the efficacy of certain trees to facilitate delivery.[238]

Footnote 5:

Caesar, _Bell. Gall._ vi. 25.

Footnote 6:

Julian, Fragm. 4, ed. Hertlein, pp. 608 _sq._ On the vast woods of Germany, their coolness and shade, see also Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xvi. 5.

Footnote 7:

Ch. Elton, _Origins of English History_ (London, 1882), pp. 3, 106 _sq._, 224.

Footnote 8:

W. Helbig, _Die Italiker in der Poebene_ (Leipsic, 1879), pp. 25 _sq._

Footnote 9:

H. Nissen, _Italische Landeskunde_, i. (Berlin, 1883) pp. 431 _sqq._

Footnote 10:

Livy, ix. 36-38. The Ciminian mountains (_Monte Cimino_) are still clothed with dense woods of majestic oaks and chestnuts. Modern writers suppose that Livy has exaggerated the terrors and difficulties of the forest. See G. Dennis, _Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria_, 3rd Ed., i. 146-149.

Footnote 11:

C. Neumann und J. Partsch, _Physikalische Geographie von Griechenland_ (Breslau, 1885), pp. 357 _sqq._ I am told that the dark blue waters of the lake of Pheneus, which still reflected the sombre pine-forests of the surrounding mountains when I travelled in Arcadia in the bright unforgetable autumn days of 1895, have since disappeared, the subterranean chasms which drain this basin having been, whether accidentally or artificially, cleared so as to allow the pent-up waters to escape. The acres which the peasants have thereby added to their fields will hardly console future travellers for the loss of the watery mirror, which was one of the most beautiful, as it was one of the rarest, scenes in the parched land of Greece.

Footnote 12:

J. Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_, 4th Ed., i. 53 _sqq._; O. Schrader, _Reallexikon der indo-germanischen Altertumskunde_ (Strasburg, 1901), _s.v._ “Tempel,” pp. 855 _sqq._

Footnote 13:

Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xvi. 249 _sqq._; Maximus Tyrius, _Dissert._ viii. 8.

Footnote 14:

O. Schrader, _op. cit._ pp. 857 _sq._

Footnote 15:

Tacitus, _Germania_, 9, 39, 40, 43; _id._, _Annals_, ii. 12, iv. 73; _id._, _Hist._ iv. 14; J. Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_, 4th Ed., pp. 541 _sqq._; _Bavaria Landes- und Volkeskunde des Königreichs Bayern_, iii. 929 _sq._

Footnote 16:

J. Grimm, _Deutsche Rechtsalterthümer_, pp. 519 _sq._; W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_ (Berlin, 1875), pp. 26 _sqq._

Footnote 17:

Adam of Bremen, _Descriptio insularum Aquilonis_, 27 (Migne’s _Patrologia Latina_, vol. cxlvi. col. 644).

Footnote 18:

L. Leger, _La Mythologie slave_ (Paris, 1901), pp. 73-75, 188-190.

Footnote 19:

Mathias Michov, “De Sarmatia Asiana atque Europea,” in Simon Grynaeus’s _Novus Orbis regionum ac insularum veteribus incognitarum_ (Paris, 1532), pp. 455 _sq._ [wrongly numbered 445, 446]; Martin Cromer, _De origine et rebus gestis Polonorum_ (Basel, 1568), p. 241; Fabricius, _Livonicae historiae compendiosa series_ (_Scriptores rerum Livonicarum_, ii. (Riga and Leipsic, 1848) p. 441).

Footnote 20:

See C. Bötticher, _Der Baumkultus der Hellenen_ (Berlin, 1856); L. Preller, _Römische Mythologie_, 3rd. Ed., i. 105-114.

Footnote 21:

_The Classical Review_, xix. (1905) p. 331, referring to an inscription found in Cos some years ago.

Footnote 22:

Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xv. 77; Tacitus, _Ann._ xiii. 58. The fig-tree is represented on Roman coins and on the great marble reliefs which stand in the Forum. See E. Babelon, _Monnaies de la République romaine_, ii. 336 _sq._; R. Lanciani, _Ruins and Excavations of Ancient Rome_ (London, 1897), p. 258; E. Petersen, _Vom alten Rom_ (Leipsic, 1900), pp. 26, 27.

Footnote 23:

Plutarch, _Romulus_, 20.

Footnote 24:

K. Rhamm, “Der heidnische Gottesdienst des finnischen Stammes,” _Globus_, lxvii. (1895) pp. 343, 348. This article is an abstract of a Finnish book _Suomen suvun pakanillinen jumalen palvelus_, by J. Krohn (Helsingfors, 1894).

Footnote 25:

“Heilige Haine und Bäume der Finnen,” _Globus_, lix. (1891) pp. 350 _sq._

Footnote 26:

P. S. Pallas, _Reise durch verschiedene Provinzen des russischen Reichs_ (St. Petersburg, 1771-1776), iii. 60 _sq._

Footnote 27:

Porphyry, _De abstinentia_, i. 6. This was an opinion of the Stoic and Peripatetic philosophy.

Footnote 28:

Washington Matthews, _Ethnography and Philology of the Hidatsa Indians_ (Washington, 1877), pp. 48 _sq._

Footnote 29:

L. H. Morgan, _League of the Iroquois_ (Rochester, 1851), pp. 162, 164.

Footnote 30:

J. L. Krapf, _Travels, Researches, and Missionary Labours during an Eighteen Years’ Residence in Eastern Africa_ (London, 1860), p. 198.

Footnote 31:

Rev. Lorimer Fison, in a letter to the author dated November 3, 1898.

Footnote 32:

J. Teit, “The Thompson Indians of British Columbia,” p. 349 (_Memoir of the American Museum of Natural History, The Jesup North Pacific Expedition_, vol. i. part iv.).

Footnote 33:

C. Hupe, “Over de godsdienst, zeden enz. der Dajakkers,” _Tijdschrift voor Neêrlands Indië_, 1846 (Batavia), dl. iii. p. 158.

Footnote 34:

De la Loubere, _Du royaume de Siam_ (Amsterdam, 1691), i. 382. Compare Mgr. Bruguière, in _Annales de l’Association de la Propagation de la Foi_, v. (1831) p. 127.

Footnote 35:

The Buddhist conception of trees as animated often comes out in the _Jatakas_. For examples see H. Oldenberg, _Die Religion des Veda_, pp. 259 _sqq._; _The Jātaka_, bk. xii. No. 465, vol. iv. pp. 96 _sqq._ (English translation edited by E. B. Cowell).

Footnote 36:

J. J. M. de Groot, _The Religious System of China_, iv. (Leyden, 1901) pp. 272 _sqq._

Footnote 37:

J. J. M. de Groot, _The Religious System of China_, v. (Leyden, 1907) p. 663.

Footnote 38:

F. S. Krauss, _Volksglaube und religiöser Brauch der Südslaven_ (Münster i. W., 1890), p. 33.

Footnote 39:

A. B. Ellis, _The Ewe-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast_ (London, 1890), pp. 49 _sqq._ Compare _id._, _The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast_ (London, 1887), pp. 34 _sqq._; _Missions Catholiques_, ix. (1877) p. 71.

Footnote 40:

G. Maspero, _Histoire ancienne des peuples de l’Orient classique: les origines_ (Paris, 1895), pp. 121 _sq._

Footnote 41:

Merolla, “Voyage to Congo,” in Pinkerton’s _Voyages and Travels_, xvi. 236.

Footnote 42:

C. C. von der Decken, _Reisen in Ost-Afrika_ (Leipsic and Heidelberg, 1869-1871), i. 216. The writer does not describe the mode of appeasing the tree-spirit in the case mentioned. As to the Wanika beliefs, see above, p. 12.

Footnote 43:

Sir Harry Johnston, _The Uganda Protectorate_ (London, 1902), ii. 832.

Footnote 44:

J. B. L. Durand, _Voyage au Sénégal_ (Paris, 1802), p. 119.

Footnote 45:

S. J. Curtiss, _Primitive Semitic Religion To-day_ (Chicago, 1902), p. 94.

Footnote 46:

A. d’Orbigny, _Voyage dans l’Amérique Méridionale_ (Paris and Strasburg, 1839-1843), ii. 157, 159 _sq._

Footnote 47:

A. W. Nieuwenhuis, _In Centraal-Borneo_ (Leyden, 1900), i. 146.

Footnote 48:

H. H. Romilly, _From my Verandah in New Guinea_ (London, 1889), p. 86.

Footnote 49:

D. C. J. Ibbetson, _Outlines of Panjab Ethnography_ (Calcutta, 1883), p. 120.

Footnote 50:

W. von Schulenberg, “Volkskundliche Mittheilungen aus der Mark,” _Verhandlungen der Berliner Gesellschaft für Anthropologie, Ethnologie und Urgeschichte_ (1896), p. 189. Compare A. Kuhn und W. Schwartz, _Nord-deutsche Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche_, p. 407, § 142; E. Meier, _Deutsche Sagen, Sitten und Gebräuche aus Schwaben_, p. 463, § 208; A. Kuhn, _Sagen, Gebräuche und Märchen aus Westfalen_, ii. pp. 108 _sq._, §§ 326, 327, p. 116, §§ 356, 358; A. Birlinger, _Volksthümliches aus Schwaben_, i. pp. 464 _sq._, § 6; K. Bartsch, _Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche aus Meklenburg_, ii. 228 _sq._; W. Kolbe, _Hessische Volks-Sitten und Gebräuche_, 2nd Ed., p. 29; R. Andree, _Braunschweiger Volkskunde_ (Brunswick, 1896), p. 234; R. Wuttke, Sächsische Volkskunde 2nd Ed., (Dresden, 1901), p. 370. The custom has been discussed by U. Jahn, _Die deutschen Opfergebräuche bei Ackerbau und Viehzucht_ (Breslau, 1884), pp. 214-220. He comes to the conclusion, which I cannot but regard as erroneous, that the custom was in origin a rational precaution to keep the caterpillars from the trees. Compare the marriage of trees, below, pp. 24 _sqq._

Footnote 51:

J. Aubrey, _Remaines of Gentilisme and Judaisme_ (London, 1881), p. 247.

Footnote 52:

Peter Jones, _History of the Ojebway Indians_, p. 104.

Footnote 53:

J. J. M. de Groot, _Religious System of China_, iv. 274.

Footnote 54:

A. Peter, _Volksthümliches aus Österreichisch-Schlesien_ (Troppau, 1865-67), ii. 30.

Footnote 55:

P. Wagler, _Die Eiche in alter und neuer Zeit_, ii. (Berlin, 1891) p. 56 note 1.

Footnote 56:

A. Bastian, _Indonesien_, i. 154; compare _id._, _Die Völker des östlichen Asien_, ii. 457 _sq._, iii. 251 _sq._, iv. 42 _sq._

Footnote 57:

J. de los Reyes y Florentino, “Die religiosen Anschauungen der Ilocanen (Luzon),” _Mittheilungen der k. k. Geograph. Gesellschaft in Wien_, xxxi. (1888) p. 556.

Footnote 58:

F. Gardner, “Philippine (Tagalog) Superstitions,” _Journal of American Folk-lore_, xix. (1906) p. 191. These superstitions are translated from an old and rare work _La Pratica del ministerio_, by Padre Tomas Ortiz (Manila, 1713).

Footnote 59:

Th. Nöldeke, “Tigre-Texte,” _Zeitschrift für Assyriologie_, xxiv. (1910) p. 298, referring to E. Littmann, _Publications of the Princeton Expedition to Abyssinia_ (Leyden, 1910).

Footnote 60:

J. Spieth, _Die Ewe-Stämme_ (Berlin, 1906), pp. 394-396.

Footnote 61:

J. H. Neumann, “De _tĕndi_ in verband met Si Dajang,” _Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap_, xlviii. (1904) pp. 124 _sq._

Footnote 62:

From a letter of the Rev. J. Roscoe, written in Busoga, 21st May, 1908.

Footnote 63:

_Satapatha-Brâhmana_, translated by J. Eggeling, Part II. pp. 165 _sq._ (_Sacred Books of the East_, vol. xxvi.); H. Oldenberg, _Die Religion des Veda_, pp. 256 _sq._

Footnote 64:

De la Loubere, _Du royaume de Siam_ (Amsterdam, 1691), i. 383.

Footnote 65:

G. Turner, _Samoa_, p. 63.

Footnote 66:

I. v. Zingerle, “Der heilige Baum bei Nauders,” _Zeitschrift für deutsche Mythologie und Sittenkunde_, iv. (1859), pp. 33 _sqq._ According to Lucan (_Pharsal._ iii. 429-431), the soldiers whom Caesar ordered to cut down the sacred oak-grove of the Druids at Marseilles believed that the axes would rebound from the trees and wound themselves.

Footnote 67:

W. W. Skeat, _Malay Magic_, pp. 198 _sq._ As to the durian-tree and its fruit, see A. R. Wallace, _The Malay Archipelago_ 6th Ed., (London, 1877), pp. 74 _sqq._

Footnote 68:

W. G. Aston, _Shinto_ (London, 1905), p. 165.

Footnote 69:

F. S. Krauss, _Volksglaube und religiöser Brauch der Südslaven_, p. 34; A. Strausz, _Die Bulgaren_ (Leipsic, 1898), p. 352. Compare R. F. Kaindl, “Aus der Volksüberlieferung der Bojken,” _Globus_, lxxix. (1901) p. 152.

Footnote 70:

G. Pitrè, _Spettacoli e feste popolari_ (Palermo, 1881), p. 221; _id._, _Usi e costumi, credenze e pregiudizi del popolo siciliano_, iii. (Palermo, 1889) p. 111; G. Vuillier, “Chez les magiciens et les sorciers de la Corrèze,” _Tour du monde_, N.S. v. (1899) p. 512.

Footnote 71:

M. Tchéraz, “Notes sur la mythologie Arménienne,” _Transactions of the Ninth International Congress of Orientalists_ (London, 1893), ii. 827. Compare M. Abeghian, _Der armenische Volksglaube_ (Leipsic, 1899), p. 60.

Footnote 72:

G. Finamore, _Credenze, usi, e costumi abruzzesi_ (Palermo, 1890), pp. 162 _sq._

Footnote 73:

Georgeakis et Pineau, _Folk-lore de Lesbos_ (Paris, 1894), p. 354.

Footnote 74:

Boecler-Kreutzwald, _Der Ehsten abergläubische Gebräuche, Weisen und Gewohnheiten_ (St. Petersburg, 1854), p. 134.

Footnote 75:

M. J. van Baarda, “Fabelen, Verhalen, en Overleveringen der Galelareezen,” _Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië_, xlv. (1895) p. 511.

Footnote 76:

A. G. Vorderman, “Planten-animisme op Java,” _Teysmannia_, No. 2, 1896, pp. 59 _sq._; _Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie_, ix. (1896) p. 175.

Footnote 77:

A. G. Vorderman, _op. cit._ p. 60; _Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie_, ix. (1896) p. 176.

Footnote 78:

A. G. Vorderman, _op. cit._ pp. 61-63.

Footnote 79:

A. de Humboldt, _Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent_, ii. (Paris, 1819) pp. 369 _sq._, 429 _sq._

Footnote 80:

Elsdon Best, “Maori Nomenclature,” _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxxii. (1902) p. 197.

Footnote 81:

Herodotus, i. 193; Theophrastus, _Historia plantarum_, ii. 8. 4; Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xiii. 31, 34 _sq._ In this passage Pliny states that naturalists distinguished the sexes of all trees and plants. On Assyrian monuments a winged figure is often represented holding an object which looks like a pine-cone to a palm-tree. The scene has been ingeniously and with great probability explained by Professor E. B. Tylor as the artificial fertilisation of the date-palm by means of the male inflorescence. See his paper in _Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology_, xii. (1890) pp. 383-393. On the artificial fertilisation of the date-palm, see C. Ritter, _Vergleichende Erdkunde von Arabien_ (Berlin, 1847), ii. 811, 827 _sq._

Footnote 82:

D. Chwolsohn, _Die Ssabier und der Ssabismus_ (St. Petersburg, 1856), ii. 36, 251. Mohammed forbade the artificial fertilisation of the palm, probably because of the superstitions attaching to the ceremony. But he had to acknowledge his mistake. See D. S. Margoliouth, _Mohammed and the Rise of Islam_, p. 230 (a passage pointed out to me by Dr. A. W. Verrall).

Footnote 83:

Sir W. H. Sleeman, _Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official_ (Westminster, 1893), i. 38 _sq._; compare _Census of India, 1901_, vol. xiii., _Central Provinces_, part i. p. 92.

Footnote 84:

_Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal_, lxxii., part iii. (Calcutta, 1904) p. 42.

Footnote 85:

J. A. Dubois, _Mœurs, institutions et cérémonies des peuples de l’Inde_ (Paris, 1825), ii. 448 _sq._; Monier Williams, _Religious Life and Thought in India_, pp. 333-335; W. Crooke, _Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India_ (Westminster, 1896), ii. 110 _sq._ According to another account, it is Vishnu, not Krishna, to whom the holy plant is annually married in every pious Hindoo family. See _Census of India, 1901_, vol. xviii., _Baroda_, p. 125.

Footnote 86:

Sir Henry M. Elliot, _Memoirs on the History, Folklore, and Distribution of the Races of the North-western Provinces of India_, edited by J. Beames (London, 1869), i. 233 _sq._

Footnote 87:

W. Crooke, _op. cit._ i. 49.

Footnote 88:

Sir W. H. Sleeman, _Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official_ (Westminster, 1893), i. 147-149, 175. The _Salagrama_ is commonly perforated in one or more places by worms or, as the Hindoos believe, by the legendary insect Vajrakita or by Vishnu himself. The value of the fossil shell depends on its colour, and the number of its convolutions and holes. The black are prized as gracious embodiments of Vishnu; the violet are shunned as dangerous avatars of the god. He who possesses a black _Salagrama_ keeps it wrapped in white linen, washes and adores it daily. A draught of the water in which the shell has been washed is supposed to purge away all sin and to secure the temporal and eternal welfare of the drinker. These fossils are found in Nepaul, in the upper course of the river Gandaka, a northern tributary of the Ganges. Hence the district goes by the name of Salagrami, and is highly esteemed for its sanctity; a visit to it confers great merit on a man. See Sonnerat, _Voyage aux Indes Orientales et à la Chine_ (Paris, 1782), i. 173 _sq._; J. A. Dubois, _Mœurs, institutions et cérémonies des peuples de l’Indie_ (Paris, 1825), ii. 446-448; Sir W. H. Sleeman, _op. cit._ i. 148 _sq._, with the editor’s notes; Monier Williams, _Religious Thought and Life in India_, pp. 69 _sq._; G. Watt, _Dictionary of the Economic Products of India_, vi. Part II. (London and Calcutta, 1893) p. 384; W. Crooke, _op. cit._ ii. 164 _sq._; _Indian Antiquary_, xxv. (1896) p. 146; G. Oppert, _On the Original Inhabitants of Bharatavarsa or India_ (Westminster and Leipsic, 1893), pp. 337-359; _id._, “Note sur les Sālagrāmas,” _Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_ (Paris, 1900), pp. 472-485. The shell derives its name of ammonite from its resemblance to a ram’s horn, recalling the ram-god Ammon.

Footnote 89:

_Die gestriegelte Rockenphilosophie_ (Chemnitz, 1759), pp. 239 _sq._; U. Jahn, _Die deutschen Opfergebräuche bei Ackerbau und Viehzucht_, pp. 214 _sqq._ See above, p. 17.

Footnote 90:

Van Schmid, “Aanteekeningen nopens de zeden, gewoonten en gebruiken, etc., der bevolking van de eilanden Saparoea, etc.” _Tijdschrift voor Neêrlands Indië_, 1843 (Batavia), dl. ii. p. 605; A. Bastian, _Indonesien_, i. 156.

Footnote 91:

G. W. W. C. Baron van Hoëvell, _Ambon en meer bepaaldelijk de Oeliasers_ (Dordrecht, 1875), p. 62.

Footnote 92:

G. A. Wilken, “Het animisme bij de volken van het Indischen archipel,” _De Indische Gids_, June 1884, p. 958; _id._, _Handleiding voor de vergelijkende Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch Indië_ (Leyden, 1893), pp. 549 _sq._

Footnote 93:

E. L. M. Kühr, “Schetsen uit Borneo’s Westerafdeeling,” _Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië_, xlvii. (1897) pp. 58 _sq._

Footnote 94:

A. C. Kruijt, “Eenige ethnografische aanteekeningen omtrent de Toboengkoe en de Tomori,” _Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap_, xliv. (1900) p. 221.

Footnote 95:

D. Grangeon, “Les Cham et leur superstitions,” _Missions Catholiques_, xxviii. (1896) p. 83.

Footnote 96:

_Indian Antiquary_, i. (1872) p. 170.

Footnote 97:

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. 22, 138.

Footnote 98:

_Id._, “Eenige ethnografische aanteekeningen omtrent de Toboengkoe en Tomori,” _ib._, xliv. (1900) p. 227.

Footnote 99:

C. Snouck Hurgronje, _Het Gajōland en zijne Bewoners_ (Batavia, 1903), pp. 344, 345.

Footnote 100:

S. Gason, “The Dieyerie Tribe,” _Native Tribes of South Australia_, p. 280; A. W. Howitt, “The Dieri and other kindred Tribes of Central Australia,” _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xx. (1891) p. 89.

Footnote 101:

F. Blumentritt, “Der Ahnencultus und die religiöse Anschauungen der Malaien des Philippinen-Archipels,” _Mittheilungen der Wiener Geogr. Gesellschaft_ (1882), pp. 159 _sq._; _id._, _Versuch einer Ethnographie der Philippinen_ (Gotha, 1882), pp. 13, 29 (_Petermann’s Mittheilungen, Ergänzungsheft_, No. 67); J. Mallat, _Les Philippines_ (Paris, 1846), i. 63 _sq._

Footnote 102:

A. Schadenberg, “Beiträge zur Kenntnis der im Innern Nordluzons lebenden Stämme,” _Verhandlungen der Berliner Gesellschaft für Anthropologie, Ethnologie und Urgeschichte_ (1888), p. 40.

Footnote 103:

F. Grabowsky, “Der Tod, etc., bei den Dajaken,” _Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie_, ii. (1889) p. 181.

Footnote 104:

H. Low, _Sarawak_ (London, 1848), p. 264.

Footnote 105:

Mrs. Bishop, _Korea and her Neighbours_ (London, 1898), i. 106 _sq._

Footnote 106:

J. J. M. de Groot, _Religious System of China_, ii. 462 _sqq._, iv. 277 _sq._

Footnote 107:

_La Mission lyonnaise d’exploration commerciale en Chine 1895-1897_ (Lyons, 1898), p. 361.

Footnote 108:

“Der Muata Cazembe und die Völkerstämme der Maravis, Chevas, Muembas, Lundas und andere von Süd-Afrika,” _Zeitschrift für allgemeine Erdkunde_, vi. (1856) p. 273.

Footnote 109:

Major A. G. Leonard, _The Lower Niger and its Tribes_ (London, 1906), pp. 298 _sqq._

Footnote 110:

Ch. Partridge, _Cross River Natives_ (London, 1905), pp. 272 _sq._

Footnote 111:

Ch. Partridge, _op. cit._ pp. 5, 194, 205 _sq._

Footnote 112:

F. S. A. de Clercq, “De Westen Noordkust van Nederlandsch Nieuw-Guinea,” _Tijdschrift van het kon. Nederlandsch Aardrijkskundig Genootschap_, Tweede Serie, x. (1893) p. 199.

Footnote 113:

“Shamanism in Siberia and European Russia,” _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxiv. (1895) p. 136.

Footnote 114:

Fr. Boas, in _Sixth Report on the North-Western Tribes of Canada_, p. 28 (separate reprint from the _Report of the British Association for 1890_).

Footnote 115:

F. S. Krauss, _Volksglaube und religiöser Brauch der Südslaven_, p. 36.

Footnote 116:

F. S. Krauss, _loc. cit._

Footnote 117:

_Aeneid_, iii. 22 _sqq._

Footnote 118:

Philostratus, _Imagines_, ii. 29.

Footnote 119:

A. Landes, “Contes et légendes annamites,” No. 9, in _Cochinchine française: excursions et reconnaissances_, No. 20 (Saigon, 1885), p. 310.

Footnote 120:

A. B. Ellis, _The Yoruba-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast of West Africa_, pp. 134-136.

Footnote 121:

B. C. A. J. van Dinter, “Eenige geographische en ethnographische aanteekeningen betreffende het eiland Siaoe,” _Tijdschrift voor Indische Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde_, xli. (1899) pp. 379 _sq._

Footnote 122:

E. Modigliani, _Un Viaggio a Nías_ (Milan, 1890), p. 629.

Footnote 123:

O. Baumann, _Usambara und seine Nachbargebiete_ (Berlin, 1891), pp. 57 _sq._

Footnote 124:

Spencer and Gillen, _Northern Tribes of Central Australia_, pp. 162, 330 _sq._

Footnote 125:

Ph. Paulitschke, _Ethnographie Nordost-Afrikas: Die geistige Cultur der Danâkil, Galla und Somâl_ (Berlin, 1896), pp. 34 _sq._ On the Galla worship of trees, see further Mgr. Massaja, in _Annales de la Propagation de la Foi_, xxx. (1858) p. 50; Coulbeaux, “Au pays de Menelik,” _Missions Catholiques_, xxx. (1898) p. 418.

Footnote 126:

J. Kubary, “Die Religion der Pelauer,” in A. Bastian’s _Allerlei aus Volks- und Menschenkunde_, i. 52; _id._, _Beiträge zur Kenntnis des Karolinen Archipels_, iii. (Leyden, 1895) p. 228.

Footnote 127:

A. B. Ellis, _The Yoruba-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast_, p. 115.

Footnote 128:

A. C. Kruijt, “Een en ander aangaande het geestelijk en maatschappelijk leven van den Poso-Alfoer,” _Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap_, xl. (1896) pp. 28 _sq._

Footnote 129:

A. C. Kruijt, “Eenige ethnografische aanteekeningen omtrent de Toboengkoe en de Tomori,” _Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap_, xliv. (1900) pp. 220 _sq._

Footnote 130:

A. C. Kruijt, _op. cit._ p. 242.

Footnote 131:

J. Habbema, “Bijgeloof in de Preanger-Regentschappen,” _Bijdragen tot de Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië_, xli. (1900) pp. 113, 115.

Footnote 132:

G. Heijmering, “Zeden en Gewoonten op het eiland Rottie,” _Tijdschrift voor Neêrlands Indië_ (1844), dl. i. p. 358.

Footnote 133:

C. Snouck Hurgronje, _Het Gajōland en zijne Bewoners_ (Batavia, 1903), p. 351.

Footnote 134:

Th. A. L. Heyting, “Beschrijving der onder-afdeeling Groot-mandeling en Batang-natal,” _Tijdschrift van het Nederlandsch Aardrijkskundig Genootschap_, Tweede Serie, xiv. (1897) pp. 289 _sq._

Footnote 135:

F. Blumentritt, _Versuch einer Ethnographie der Philippinen_ (Gotha, 1882), p. 13 (_Petermanns Mittheilungen, Ergänzungheft_, No. 67). See above, pp. 18 _sq._

Footnote 136:

Crossland, quoted by H. Ling Roth, _The Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo_, i. 286; compare _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxi. (1892) p. 114.

Footnote 137:

“Lettre du curé de Santiago Tepehuacan à son évêque,” _Bulletin de la Société de Géographie_ (Paris), IIme. Série, ii. (1834) pp. 182 _sq._

Footnote 138:

J. T. Bent, _The Cyclades_, p. 37.

Footnote 139:

A. L. Van Hasselt, _Volksbeschrijving van Midden-Sumatra_ (Leyden, 1882), p. 156.

Footnote 140:

W. Crooke, _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_ (Westminster, 1896), ii. 87.

Footnote 141:

I. M. van Baarda, “Île de Halma-heira,” _Bulletins de la Société d’Anthropologie de Paris_, iv. (1893) p. 547.

Footnote 142:

L. Sternberg, “Die Religion der Gilyak,” _Archiv für Religionswissenschaft_, viii. (1905) p. 246.

Footnote 143:

W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, p. 83.

Footnote 144:

_Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, vii. (1843) p. 29.

Footnote 145:

A. Bastian, _Indonesien_, i. 17.

Footnote 146:

J. Perham, “Sea Dyak Religion,” _Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society_, No. 10 (Dec. 1882), p. 217; H. Ling Roth, _The Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo_, i. 184.

Footnote 147:

W. Kükenthal, _Forschungsreise in den Molukken und in Borneo_ (Frankfort, 1896), pp. 265 _sq._

Footnote 148:

_Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxv. (1896) p. 170.

Footnote 149:

E. T. Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, pp. 186, 188; compare A. Bastian, _Völkerstämme am Brahmaputra_, p. 9.

Footnote 150:

E. T. Dalton, _op. cit._ p. 33; A. Bastian, _op. cit._ p. 16. Compare L. A. Waddell, “The Tribes of the Brahmaputra Valley,” _Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal_, lxix. (1901) Part III. p. 16; W. Robertson Smith, _The Religion of the Semites_, 2nd Ed., pp. 132 _sq._

Footnote 151:

E. T. Dalton, _op. cit._ p. 25; A. Bastian, _op. cit._ p. 37.

Footnote 152:

A. C. Kruijt, “Het koppensnellen der Toradja’s van Midden-Celebes en zijne beteekenis,” _Verslagen en Mededeelingen der konink. Akademie van Wetenschappen_, Afdeeling Letterkunde, IV. Reeks, iii. (1899) p. 195.

Footnote 153:

A. W. Niewenhuis, _In Centraal-Borneo_ (Leyden, 1900), i. 146; _id._, _Quer durch Borneo_, i. (Leyden, 1904) p. 107.

Footnote 154:

_Id._, “Tweede Reis van Pontianak naar Samarinda,” _Tijdschrift van het konink. Nederlandsch Aardrijkskundig Genootschap_, II. Serie, xvii. (1900) p. 427.

Footnote 155:

J. Perham, “Sea Dyak Religion,” _Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society_, No. 10 (December 1882), p. 217; H. Ling Roth, _The Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo_, i. 184.

Footnote 156:

B. Hagen, “Beiträge zur Kenntniss der Battareligion,” _Tijdschrift voor Indische Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde_, xxviii. 530, note.

Footnote 157:

W. W. Skeat, _Malay Magic_, p. 202.

Footnote 158:

E. Young, _The Kingdom of the Yellow Robe_ (Westminster, 1898), pp. 192 _sq._

Footnote 159:

J. G. Scott and J. P. Hardiman, _Gazetteer of Upper Burma and the Shan States_, Part I. vol. i. (Rangoon, 1900) pp. 518 _sq._

Footnote 160:

Captain Macpherson, in _North Indian Notes and Queries_, ii. 112 § 428.

Footnote 161:

W. Crooke, _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_ (Westminster, 1896), ii. 91.

Footnote 162:

A. Bastian, _Die Völker des östlichen Asien_, i. 134. The authority quoted by Bastian calls the people Curka Coles. As to the Larka Kols, see E. T. Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, pp. 177 _sqq._

Footnote 163:

W. Crooke, _Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh_, iv. 130.

Footnote 164:

S. Mateer, _The Land of Charity_ (London, 1871), p. 206.

Footnote 165:

B. A. Hely, in _Annual Report on British New Guinea for 1894-95_, p. 57.

Footnote 166:

T. J. Hutchinson, _Impressions of Western Africa_ (London, 1858), pp. 130 _sq._

Footnote 167:

Gallieni, “Mission dans le Haut Niger et à Ségou,” _Bulletin de la Société de Géographie_ (Paris), viiime Série, v. (1883) pp. 577 _sq._

Footnote 168:

Ch. M. Doughty, _Travels in Arabia Deserta_ (Cambridge, 1888), i. 365.

Footnote 169:

Th. Bent, “The Yourouks of Asia Minor,” _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xx. (1891) p. 275.

Footnote 170:

Erasmus Stella, “De Borussiae antiquitatibus,” in Simon Grynaeus’s _Novus Orbis regionum ac insularum veteribus incognitarum_ (Paris, 1532), p. 510; J. Lasicius (Lasiczki), “De diis Samagitarum caeterorumque Sarmatarum,” in _Respublica sive Status regni Poloniae, Lituaniae, Prussiae, Livoniae, etc._ (Leyden, 1627), pp. 299 _sq._; M. C. Hartknoch, _Alt und neues Preussen_ (Frankfort and Leipsic, 1684), p. 120. Lasiczki’s work has been reprinted by W. Mannhardt, in _Magazin herausgegeben von der lettisch-lite-rärischen Gesellschaft_, xiv. 82 _sqq._ (Mitau, 1868).

Footnote 171:

Mathias Michov, in Simon Grynaeus’s _Novus Orbis regionum ac insularum veteribus incognitarum_ (Paris, 1532), p. 457.

Footnote 172:

J. G. Kohl, _Die deutsch-russischen Ostseeprovinzen_ (Dresden and Leipsic, 1841), ii. 277.

Footnote 173:

Capt. E. C. Luard, _in Census of India, 1901_, xix. (Lucknow, 1902) p. 76.

Footnote 174:

J. Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_, 4th ed., i. 497; compare _id._ ii. 540, 541.

Footnote 175:

Max Buch, _Die Wotjäken_ (Stuttgart, 1882), p. 124.

Footnote 176:

P. v. Stenin, “Ein neuer Beitrag zur Ethnographie der Tscheremissen,” _Globus_, lviii. (1890) p. 204.

Footnote 177:

J. G. Dalyell, _Darker Superstitions of Scotland_ (Edinburgh, 1834), p. 400.

Footnote 178:

J. G. Dalyell, _loc. cit._

Footnote 179:

J. Biddulph, _Tribes of the Hindoo Koosh_, p. 116.

Footnote 180:

H. R. Tate, “Further Notes on the Kikuyu Tribe of British East Africa,” _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxxiv. (1904) p. 263; _id._ “The Native Law of the Southern Gikuyu of British East Africa,” _Journal of the African Society_, No. 35 (April 1910), pp. 242 _sq._

Footnote 181:

On the representations of Silvanus, the Roman wood-god, see H. Jordan in L. Preller’s _Römische Mythologie_, 3rd Ed., i. 393 note; A. Baumeister, _Denkmäler des classischen Altertums_, iii. 1665 _sq._ A good representation of Silvanus bearing a pine branch is given in the Sale Catalogue of H. Hoffmann, Paris, 1888, pt. ii.

Footnote 182:

Aeneas Sylvius, _Opera_ (Bâle, 1571), p. 418 [wrongly numbered 420]; compare Erasmus Stella, “De Borussiae antiquitatibus,” in _Novus Orbis regionum ac insularum veteribus incognitarum_, p. 510.

Footnote 183:

E. T. Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 186.

Footnote 184:

J. G. Scott and J. P. Hardiman, _Gazetteer of Upper Burmah and the Shan States_, Part II. vol. iii. (Rangoon, 1901), pp. 63 _sq._

Footnote 185:

E. Aymonier, in _Cochinchine française: excursions et reconnaissances_, No. 16 (Saigon, 1883), pp. 175 _sq._

Footnote 186:

L. Decle, _Three Years in Savage Africa_ (London, 1898), p. 489.

Footnote 187:

H. Schinz, _Deutsch-Südwest-Afrika_, pp. 295 _sq._

Footnote 188:

See above, vol. i. pp. 248, 250, 309.

Footnote 189:

Above, vol. i. p. 284.

Footnote 190:

W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_ (Berlin, 1875), pp. 158, 159, 170, 197, 214, 351, 514.

Footnote 191:

E. T. Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 188.

Footnote 192:

Villault, _Relation des costes appellées Guinée_ (Paris, 1669), pp. 266 _sq._; _Labat, Voyage du chevalier des Marchais en Guinée, isles voisines, et à Cayenne_ (Paris, 1730), i. 338.

Footnote 193:

O. Baumann, _Usambara und seine Nachbargebiete_ (Berlin, 1891), p. 142.

Footnote 194:

C. E. X. Rochet d’Hericourt, _Voyage sur la côte orientale de la Mer Rouge dans le pays d’Adel et le royaume de Choa_ (Paris, 1841), pp. 166 _sq._

Footnote 195:

L. Lloyd, _Peasant Life in Sweden_ (London, 1870), p. 266.

Footnote 196:

W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, pp. 190 _sqq._

Footnote 197:

W. Mannhardt, _Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_ (Berlin, 1877), pp. 212 _sqq._

Footnote 198:

H. Low, Sarawak, p. 274; _id._, in _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxv. (1896) p. 111.

Footnote 199:

T. H. Lewin, _Wild Races of South-Eastern India_ (London, 1870), p. 270.

Footnote 200:

J. Mackenzie, _Ten Years North of the Orange River_ (Edinburgh, 1871), p. 385.

Footnote 201:

J. Campbell, _Travels in South Africa, Second Journey_ (London, 1822), ii. 203.

Footnote 202:

Rev. J. Macdonald, MS. notes; compare _id._, _Light in Africa_, p. 210; _id._, in _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xx. (1891) p. 140. The Nubas will not cut shoots of the _nabac_ (a thorn-tree) during the rainy season (_Missions Catholiques_, xiv. (1882) p. 460). Among some of the hill-tribes of the Punjaub no one is allowed to cut grass or any green thing with an iron sickle till the festival of the ripening grain has been celebrated; otherwise the field-god would be angry and send frost to destroy or injure the harvest (D. C. J. Ibbetson, _Outlines of Panjab Ethnography_, p. 121).

Footnote 203:

“Ueber die Religion der heidnischen Tscheremissen im Gouvernement Kasan,” _Zeitschrift für allgemeine Erdkunde_, N. F. iii. (1857) p. 150.

Footnote 204:

J. Biddulph, _Tribes of the Hindoo Koosh_, pp. 103 _sq._

Footnote 205:

J. Biddulph, _op. cit._ pp. 106 _sq._

Footnote 206:

W. Crooke, _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_ (Westminster, 1896), ii. 102. See also Sir H. M. Elliot, _Memoirs on the History, Folk-lore, and Distribution of the Races of the North-Western Provinces of India_, edited by J. Beames, ii. 217, where, however, the object of the prayers is said to be the fruitfulness of the tree itself, not the fruitfulness of women, animals, and cattle.

Footnote 207:

W. Crooke, _op. cit._ ii. 106.

Footnote 208:

Th. J. Hutchinson, _Impressions of Western Africa_, p. 128.

Footnote 209:

W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, p. 161; E. Meier, _Deutsche Sagen, Sitten und Gebräuche aus Schwaben_, p. 397; A. Peter, _Volksthümliches aus Österreichisch-Schlesien_, ii. 286.

Footnote 210:

W. Camden, _Britannia_, ed. R. Gough (London, 1779), iii. 659. Camden’s authority is Good, a writer of the sixteenth century.

Footnote 211:

_County Folk-lore: Suffolk_, collected and edited by Lady Eveline Camilla Gurdon (London, 1893), p. 117.

Footnote 212:

Mr. E. F. Benson, in a letter to the author dated December 15, 1892.

Footnote 213:

_Memoirs of Samuel Pepys, Esq._, edited by Lord Braybrooke, Second Edition (London, 1828), ii. 209, under May 1st, 1667.

Footnote 214:

Lady Wilde, _Ancient Legends, Mystic Charms, and Superstitions of Ireland_ (London, 1887), i. 196 _sq._ If an Irish housewife puts a ring of rowan-tree or quicken, as it is also called, on the handle of the churn-dash when she is churning, no witch can steal her butter (P. W. Joyce, _Social History of Ancient Ireland_ (London, 1903), i. 236 _sq._).

Footnote 215:

W. Camden, _loc. cit._

Footnote 216:

W. Gregor, _Folk-lore of the North-east of Scotland_ (London, 1881), p. 188.

Footnote 217:

J. G. Campbell, _Witchcraft and Second Sight in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland_, p. 270, compare _ib._, pp. 7 _sqq._

Footnote 218:

J. G. Campbell, _op. cit._ pp. 11 _sq._ In Germany also the rowan-tree is a charm against witchcraft (A. Wuttke, _Der deutsche Volksaberglaube_, 2nd Ed., p. 106, § 145).

Footnote 219:

Sir John Rhys, “The Coligny Calendar,” _Proceedings of the British Academy_, vol. iv. pp. 55 _sq._ of the offprint.

Footnote 220:

A. Kuhn, _Herabkunft des Feuers_ 2nd Ed., (Gütersloh, 1886), pp. 178 _sq._; W. Mannhardt, _Germanische Mythen_ (Berlin, 1858), pp. 17 _sq._

Footnote 221:

J. D. H. Temme, _Die Volkssagen der Altmark_ (Berlin, 1839), p. 85; E. Sommer, _Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche aus Sachsen und Thüringen_ (Halle, 1846), p. 149; A. Kuhn, _Sagen, Gebräuche und Märchen aus Westfalen_, ii. p. 154, § 432, p. 155, § 436; A. Schleicher, _Volkstümliches aus Sonnenberg_ (Weimar, 1858), p. 139; A. Peter, _Volksthümliches aus Österreichisch-Schlesien_ (Troppau, 1865-67), ii. 252; R. Eisel, _Sagenbuch des Voigtlandes_ (Gera, 1871), p. 210; Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, _Fest-Kalender aus Böhmen_, p. 210; P. Drechsler, _Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube in Schlesien_, i. (Leipsic, 1903) p. 109.

Footnote 222:

A. Kuhn, _Herabkunft des Feuers_, 2nd Ed., p. 166.

Footnote 223:

P. Drechsler, _op. cit._ i. 109 _sq._ Compare A. Peter, _loc. cit._

Footnote 224:

W. Müller, _Beiträge zur Volkskunde der Deutschen in Mähren_ (Vienna and Olmütz, 1893), p. 324.

Footnote 225:

Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, _Fest-Kalender aus Böhmen_, p. 210.

Footnote 226:

W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, p. 174.

Footnote 227:

J. B. Holzmayer, “Osiliana,” _Verhandlungen der gelehrten Estnischen Gesellschaft zu Dorpat_, vii. No. 2 (Dorpat, 1872), pp. 10 _sq._; W. Mannhardt, Baumkultus, pp. 407 _sq._

Footnote 228:

Potocki, _Voyage dans les steps d’Astrakhan et du Caucase_ (Paris, 1829), i. 309.

Footnote 229:

W. Foy, in _Archiv für Religionswissenschaft_, x. (1907) p. 551. For details of the evidence see W. H. Goldie, M.D., “Maori Medical Lore,” _Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute_, xxxvii. (1904) pp. 93-95.

Footnote 230:

W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, pp. 163 _sqq._ To his authorities add for France, A. Meyrac, _Traditions, coutumes, légendes et contes des Ardennes_, pp. 84 _sqq._; L. F. Sauvé, _Folk-lore des Hautes-Vosges_, pp. 131 _sq._; Bérenger-Féraud, _Superstitions et survivances_, v. 309 _sq._; Ch. Beauquier, _Les Mois en Franche-Comté_ (Paris, 1900), pp. 69-72; F. Chapiseau, _Le Folk-lore de la Beauce et du Perche_ (Paris, 1902), ii. 109-111; for Silesia, F. Tetzner, “Die Tschechen und Mährer in Schlesien,” _Globus_, lxxviii. (1900) p. 340; P. Drechsler, _Sitte, Brauch und Volksglaube in Schlesien_, i. 112 _sq._; for Moravia, W. Müller, _Beiträge zur Volkskunde der Deutschen in Mähren_, p. 26; for Sardinia, R. Tennant, _Sardinia and its Resources_ (Rome and London, 1885), pp. 185 _sq._ In Brunswick the custom is observed at Whitsuntide (R. Andree, _Braunschweiger Volkskunde_, p. 248).

Footnote 231:

_Bavaria, Landes- und Volkskunde des Königreichs Bayern_, i. 373.

Footnote 232:

F. S. Krauss, _Volksglaube und religiöser Brauch der Südslaven_, p. 35.

Footnote 233:

W. Radloff, _Proben der Volkslitteratur der nördlichen Türkischen Stämme_, v. 2 (St. Petersburg, 1885).

Footnote 234:

E. T. Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 194; a similar custom is practised among the Kurmis, _ibid._, p. 319. Among the Mundas the custom seems now to have fallen into disuse (H. H. Risley, _Tribes and Castes of Bengal: Ethnographic Glossary_, ii. 102).

Footnote 235:

The explanation has been suggested by Mr. W. Crooke (_Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, xxviii. (1899) p. 243). There are other facts, however, which point to a different explanation, namely, that the practice is intended to avert possible evil consequences from bride or bridegroom. For example, “the superstition regarding a man’s third marriage, prevalent in Barār and, I believe in other parts of India, is not despised by the Vēlamās. A third marriage is unlucky. Should a man marry a third wife, it matters not whether his former wives be alive or not, evil will befall either him or that wife. No father would give his girl to a man whose third wife she would be. A man therefore, who has twice entered the married state and wishes to mate yet once again, cannot obtain as a third wife any one who has both the wit and the tongue to say no; a tree has neither, so to a tree he is married. I have not been able to discover why the tree, or rather shrub, called in Marāthī _ru’i_ and in Hindūstānī _madar_ (_Asclepias gigantea_), is invariably the victim selected in Barār, nor do I know whether the shrub is similarly favoured in other parts of India. The ceremony consists in the binding of a _mangal sūtra_ round the selected shrub, by which the bridegroom sits, while turmeric-dyed rice (_akṣata_) is thrown over both him and the shrub. This is the whole of the simple ceremony. He has gone through his unlucky third marriage, and any lady whom he may favour after this will be his fourth wife” (Captain Wolseley Haig, “Notes on the Vēlamā Caste in Bārār,” _Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal_, lxx. part iii. (1901) p. 28). Again, the Vellalas of Southern India “observe a curious custom (derived from Brāhmans) with regard to marriage, which is not unknown in other communities. A man marrying a second wife after the death of his first has to marry a plantain tree, and cut it down before tying the _tāli_, and, in case of a third marriage, a man has to tie a _tāli_ first to the erukkan (arka: _Calotropis gigantea_) plant. The idea is that second and fourth wives do not prosper, and the tree and the plant are accordingly made to take their places.” (Mr. Hemingway, quoted by E. Thurston, _Castes and Tribes of Southern India_, vii. 387). Tying the _tali_ to the bride is the common Hindoo symbol of marriage, like giving the ring with us. As to these Indian marriages to trees see further my _Totemism and Exogamy_, i. 32 _sq._, iv. 210 _sqq._; _Panjab Notes and Queries_, ii. § 252, iii. §§ 12, 90, 562, iv. § 396; _North Indian Notes and Queries_, i. § 110; D. C. J. Ibbetson, _Settlement Report of the Karnal District_, p. 155; H. H. Risley, _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, i. 531; Capt. E. C. Luard, in _Census of India, 1901_, vol. xix. 76; W. Crooke, _Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh_, ii. 363; _id._, _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_ (Westminster, 1896), ii. 115-121. I was formerly disposed to connect the custom with totemism, but of this there seems to be no sufficient evidence.

Footnote 236:

W. Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_, pp. 51 _sq._

Footnote 237:

Merolla, “Voyage to Congo,” in Pinkerton’s _Voyages and Travels_, xvi. 236 _sq._

Footnote 238:

C. Bötticher, _Der Baumkultus der Hellenen_ (Berlin, 1856), pp. 30 _sq._