Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 1, 1890.djvu/526

520 19. With his golden, his silver, his (all) golden comb. 20. Milady, if it please you, go to the church, 21. Everybody is rejoicing, and (as for) your little children, 22. Milady, your little ones, may God bless them, 23. And the great Athanasius prolong their years, 24. And may we who have sung here now sing also next year, 25. And on Easter-day with (the song) "Christ is risen.”

On the foregoing song Mr. Weale’s informant adds the following notes:—

(1) “The festival of the first of May originated in Corcyra during the time of the Venetian domination. It was then splendidly celebrated by the vassals (see ), who brought a tree with flowers, red eggs, birds, fruit, etc.; and to the sound of drums and fifes and joyous cries set it up on the square, opposite the house of some Baron, while they sang the above song, and there they feasted all day long at the expense of the Baron.

(2) “Saint Athanasius is here mentioned, because on the second of May the Greek Church celebrates the recovery of the body of this saint.”

I may here add a few jottings on some other Greek popular customs. In the room of the house where I slept at Tsipiana, in Arcadia, a laurel branch was fastened to a rafter. I was told that it had been placed there on Palm Sunday, and would be kept there for a year. In a corner of the room, before the two holy pictures, was another laurel branch, which also had been placed there on Palm Sunday. Moreover, from the little shrine hung the wedding crown of the woman of the house. I observed similar crowns similarly attached in other parts of Greece, and was informed that the custom is universal. The crown is left hanging as long as the woman lives.

I was told that on St. John’s Eve the people light bonfires and jump over them; and that the custom, in time of drought, of dressing a girl in leaves and drenching her with water, is still practised as a rain-charm in the country districts of Greece.