Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 1 1883.djvu/368

360 the cause of much astonishment and speculation. A well-known augur being appealed to, examined the egg and said that "the new born infant would one day become the emperor." The mother, in order to protect the child from persecution, kept the secret until 224, during which year Marcus Aurelius was nominated emperor. From this date it became the custom among the Romans to send eggs to each other which were dyed different colours, and were accepted as signs of congratulation.

The Christians adopted this custom, sanctified it, and attached great importance to it, sending coloured eggs to each other with the understanding that they wished each other increased spiritual power, in order to conquer their passions, and to be victorious over the world and sin by their holy life, thus imitating the example of Christ. The object henceforward of Easter Eggs was to remind the recipients that they, like Marcus Aurelius, were destined to be emperors, and so must prepare themselves for that time.—Concord Journal, March 23, 1883.

A correspondent of the Világosság (Light), a paper published in Kaposvár, writes: "There is a great upstir among the population of Falu-Szemes, for every night during the last fortnight, between the hours of 7 and 9, there is a violent knocking at one of the windows of the house where the engine-man lives, not far from the Manor House. Sometimes the knocking is at the kitchen door, and sounds as if some one was banging it with their fist. This comes so repeatedly, that the engine-man's family dare not stay in the house. At first, the man himself was not. alarmed, but contented himself with firing a revolver five or six times in the direction of the noise whenever, he heard it; and, as he discharged, on an average, twenty and thirty shots every night, his windows were naturally riddled; yet no one was to be seen, nor, in spite of all his expenditure of powder and ball, was any one wounded. The news soon spread, and now there are five or six people keeping watch over the haunted house every night; they all hear the noise, but cannot see any one. Crowds are flocking in from the neighbouring villages to see and hear: all hear, but none see.

"The belief is, that some disturbed ghost is haunting the place, and that there must be a skeleton in the house somewhere which belongs to the disturber, and which must be returned to the place from