Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 3, 1892.djvu/146

138 the Comparative Method, how should he know the scientific value of irrelevancy?

May I put the point briefly, as begging for any information on—

1. Instances of images (or sacred persons, animals, objects, or places) bound with ropes, chains, branches, etc.; at special times; and permanently?

2. Ritual in connection with them?

3. Myth or legend (though these are, of course, far less valuable than actual rite or image) of fettered or imprisoned deities or heroes, other than the volcanic myths?

Peasant custom, as well as cultus ritual (cf. Mannhardt, Mythologische Forschungen, p. 320 et seq., on the roping of the "Korngeist", Last Sheaf in the harvests of Silesia, etc.), should yield evidence, could one find it.

Churn Charm.—The following charm was communicated to me by a gentleman past eighty-five years of age, as having been used by his mother (a Norfolk woman) whilst churning her butter: "St. Peter is standing at the gate. Come, butter, to the gate! Come, butter, come." The family was not a Roman Catholic one.

Sympathetic Bees.—My mother, who passed much of her youth in the village of Bakewell in Northamptonshire, tells me that the belief in the necessity of telling the bees everything was very strong there. At the death of a sister of hers, some of the cake and wine which was served to the mourners after the funeral was placed inside each hive, in addition to the crape put upon each. At her own wedding (in 1849) a small piece of wedding-cake was placed on each hive.