Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 20, 1909.djvu/342

298 dead." Scarcely had he uttered these words when, by the power of The Lord, all the eggs at once turned red, and the cock rose up and, flapping its wings, began to crow, and sprinkled the Jews with the sauce. When the Jews saw this, they were seized with a great fear, and, springing up from the table, took to flight. The sprinkling with sauce gave rise to the skin diseases which the Jews often have on their faces, and, ever after this miracle, the Roumanians have always made red eggs at Easter time.

The legend which explains the redness of the eggs as due to the blood of Christ runs as follows:—

Though plain red eggs are common both in the kingdom and elsewhere, eggs with a red ground and a design in white upon it are more characteristic.

The method of making the designs upon the eggs is essentially the same for all Roumanians except those from Macedonia. It consists in protecting certain lines and points by wax, colouring the egg by boiling it in a red solution, and finally removing the wax, leaving white lines and points. The eggs are in the first place well washed, sometimes with sour whey, so that they may take the