Page:Psychology of the Unconscious (1916).djvu/264

 its feathers, just as the courage and strength of the enemy are appropriated in swallowing his heart or taking his scalp. At the same time, the feather crest is a crown which is equivalent to the rays of the sun. The historical importance of the Sun identification has been seen in the first part.[11]

Especial interest attaches to the hand, which is described as "open," and the fingers, which are described as "large." It is significant that it is the hand upon which the distinct emphasis falls. One might rather have expected a description of the facial expression. It is well known that the gesture of the hand is significant; unfortunately, we know nothing about that here. Nevertheless, a parallel phantasy might be mentioned, which also puts the emphasis upon hands. A patient in a hypnagogic condition saw his mother painted on a wall, like a painting in a Byzantine church. She held one hand up, open wide, with fingers spread apart. The fingers were very large, swollen into knobs on the ends, and each surrounded by a small halo. The immediate association with this picture was the fingers of a frog with sucking discs at the ends. Then the similarity to the penis. The ancient setting of this mother picture is also of importance. Evidently the hand had, in this phantasy, a phallic meaning. This interpretation was confirmed by a further very remarkable phantasy of the same patient. He saw something like a "sky-rocket" ascending from his mother's hand, which at a closer survey becomes a shining bird with golden wings, a golden pheasant, as it then occurs to his mind. We have seen in the previous chapter that