Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/118

86 occasioned by too free indulgence in ardent spirits. It is particularly insisted on as having happened in more than one parish that the cortege set out to the churchyard without the deceased in their custody.

One of my friends lately spoke of attending a burial in a cold spring-time—"just such another as this"—when they were met by pelts of hail every now and again in the long journey from Crathie through the mountains to Tomintoul. He met the company at a cross-road, and, standing aside to let them pass, he saw the nearest relative of the dead person going in front leading the burial party by means of a rope attached to the coffin. Walking alongside the coffin was the master of the ceremony, who, with a great silver watch in his hand, called out every five minutes or so for "other four" to assume the spokes. Then four new bearers came forward, but the leading man's position could be taken only by the nearest relatives "of the corpse."



(From The Creole Boy, a monthly magazine published at 68 Westmoreland Street, Freetown, Sierra Leone. The rationalizing explanations of the "civilized" African writer seem sufficiently curious to be retained.—)

A child should never be taken outside its cradle until, in the case of a boy nine, and in that of a girl seven, days after birth, when they are to be ceremoniously taken out with great rejoicings and feastings.

The explanation of this custom will show that its observance is most essential, as the children are blind—that is to say, they cannot exercise their visionary powers for some time after