Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 2 1884.djvu/179

Rh "," which were placed at the doors of the house in which there was a deceased person, to be used by those who had touched the body, but with the Cypriotes it is thought to be for the refreshing of the soul that has left the body, or, according to another version, for the washing off the blood from the sword of the Archangel Michael, who is supposed to pass invisible after having taken the soul of the dead. The breaking of the vessel is there held symbolical, and means that thus should evil be broken and done away, and, by not using again a vessel used at a funeral, death removed. When a funeral passes along, people in Cyprus who happen to be at their doors will often hasten to break a vessel in like manner.

In Cyprus they do not cast vases on the graves, which custom seems to be more prevalent in Attica than elsewhere.

There are just a few things which Mrs. Walker in her interesting paper, "Some Greek Folk-Lore," has not touched upon. One in connection with belief in the evil eye, is the dislike to have any possession or belongings praised. The possible harm following such indiscretion is only to be averted by the gift of the article, which is often amusing or inconvenient to the receiver.

Country people still account some men amongst them to be endowed with powers of second-sight upon looking on the shoulder-bone of a black lamb. Black animals are not in favour in many cases. On lonely, hilly places in Crete demons hover about under the form of black donkeys; and, if any unwary or belated traveller is seduced by the apparent readiness of the animal to relieve his weariness and fatigue by offering a ready mount, it is only a pretext by which many people benighted on the hills have been carried off to hell.

All the hills are more fruitful in such like beliefs than the plains. The Nereids are still believed to inhabit the sides of streams among the hills of Crete, and are often said to decoy the shepherds tending