Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 11, 1900.djvu/462

 44^ Miscellanea.

power of imparting Seun (a charm for protection) to the Snathainn by repeating an incantation over it. For this Seun-Snathaimi the geasadair (charmer) expects to receive a Sennseal (handsel). My informant saw these things done in South Uist a few years ago, and said they are still practised.^

The First Day of Sotvmg. — I remember distinctly that in some of the districts of the island of Lewis the time of day selected for starting the sowing for the season was during the rising of the tide, and to avoid doing so during its fall, and, if at all convenient, to begin during spring-tide. It was considered more in harmony with the course of nature and more conducive to a rich harvest to begin the sowing during these seasons than at the falling of the tide or during neap-tide.^

A nail and an egg were placed in the Sgeap-a-chuire (sowing- basket) beneath the corn-seed. The bottom of the Sgeap was not to be seen till the sowing season was over. The nail was emble- matical of long, strong, straight stalks of corn ; the egg was symbolical of corn as full of substance as the egg is of meat; and the not seeing of the bottom of the %o\i\x\%- Sgeap during the sowing season was an augury of abundance for the ensuing year.

Z//^-^/«>^ (Sowing-porridge), otherwise Lite-Mhanntan (Manntan's porridge), was porridge made of C/7a^-meal, and made once a year only, of what remained over, after the sowdng, of the grain that had been prepared and set apart for seed-corn. Thick porridge was made of this C/7fl!^-meal. The thicker and richer the porridge the heavier and richer would be the crops in harvest.

This custom came down almost to our own times embodied in the following rhyme : —

" La lite Mhanntain,

La 'us fearr air bith ;

An coire 'us an croucan,

'S a' maide crom air chrith."

" The day of Manntan's porridge, The best day of all ; Kettle-crook, and crooket-stick, Shaking like to fall."

' See Folk-Lore, vi., 154, where a similar charm is figured, and the method of making and using it described. — E. S. H.

^ In some parts of Argyllshire, if a house went on fire during the rising of the tide, it was considered a sure omen of future prosperity ; but if it happened during the fall of the tide it was taken as a sure sign of a future downcome in life.