Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 24, 1913.djvu/251

 Collectanea. 229

spend the livelong night with the stones hung round his neck, lest errant thoughts should disturb iiis holy meditation. It seems almost sacrilege to add the materialistic detail that each stone must be a good five and twenty pounds in weight " (p. 63).

Bethgekrt story. — The famous tale of the sacred dog is given (p. 63 f.). This has been already recorded by Mr. Longworth Dames {Folk-Lore, vol. xiii., p. 266 ; for further examples from India see Crooke, The Popular Religioti and Folk-Lore of Northern India (2nd ed.), vol. ii., pp. 220 et seq.).

Rain magic. — Sometimes the Khan or chief doffs his fine clothes for the woollen overcoat of the peasant, and himself jiloughs a field in time of drought. Another device to cause rain is to have a sham fight, the fall of blood being supposed to induce the falling of the rain. Men of one camp go to another, make a great noise, and are soused with water for their pains. They are then given alms and are sent away (p. 65). Sometimes a boy is dressed up as a little old man, with a hoary beard of cotton-wool on his chin, a felt cap on his head, a felt coat, and bells jingling round his waist. They sing : —

"The buffoon ! The old manikin ! Down fell the grain-bin On top of poor granny ! "

On this the goodman of the house comes out with a gift of money or grain.

The little old man then jingles his bells, and bellows like a camel to the chorus : —

" Good luck to the house of the giver ! And a hole in the bin of the miser !

"And so they move on from house to house. In the end their collections are clubbed together, a pottage is prepared and dis- tributed among the people, and the game is closed with prayers for rain. I suppose the old man's {p'lraka) bellowing and the jingling of bells are imitative of thunder and the swish of rain, but I can volunteer no explanation for his general get-up, unless his snow-white beard is imitative of snow ; the game at any rate is generally played in the uplands in the late autumn " (pp. 65 et seq.).

" There is a similar rain-making game among the girls. Each