Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 20, 1909.djvu/109

Rh all quarters of the wind, and thus preventing it from injuring the person or object looked at." He mentions cases in which it was the habit to bury the dead at the cross-roads, and he asks whether this custom may not have given rise to the belief that such places were haunted (vol. ii., p. 256, note 2), I should like to ask for further information as to the custom of burying the dead at such places, and for some further evidence as to the reason why the cross-roads were used for the removal of disease and the like. In India, at any rate, the reason is well known. A man, in the hope of passing on a disease like smallpox, places the exfoliated skin of the patient at the crossroads, because if he puts it anywhere else, say before the door of a neighbour, he would be accused of special malignity, but, when it is laid at the cross-roads, the charm is aimed at no one in particular. The disease clings to that luckless person who happens to be the first to pass by and touch the charm. Is it possible that suicides were buried at the cross-roads with the same intention? A man might reasonably object to having a dangerous ghost planted upon him, if the corpse of a person dying by violence was buried close to his house. But, when burial was done at the cross-roads, the ghost would attack only those whom it was pleased to select. In short, it would be a matter of kismet. I have heard it suggested that the trafific over the head of the suicide kept down the ghost; or that, with a kindly intention, the unhappy wretch was placed under the protection of the cross which in Christian times usually stood at such places. These explanations seem to be hardly adequate; and I should be glad if any one can suggest a better explanation of the practice than that which I have proposed.

I was at Queensferry twelve years ago, on August 8, but by mischance did not see the Burry-man. His costume is