Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 6 1888.djvu/85

Rh the welfare of the mother and the child. The last point which he would mention was the practice of placing a crowbar along the threshold of the room of confinement, as a check against the crossing of any evil spirit. This was owing, he believed, to a belief among Hindoos that evil spirits always kept themselves aloof from iron, and even now-a-days pieces of horseshoe could be seen nailed to the bottom sills of doors of native houses. The bar is kept in situ for ten days. On the eleventh day a preparation of milk, sugar and rice, is prepared, and a small quantity of the same is placed near the spot where the umbilical cord is buried, and the rest is partaken of by the members of the family. On the same day the lady worships the sun, as, owing to her being confined for the ten days in almost a dark room, she could not see the sun, and the first time that the sun appears to her after her confinement she considers it her duty to offer prayer and thanksgivings.

NOTES AND QUERIES.

An Old-Frisian Funereal-rite.—The following ancient custom, being hallowed by tradition, and strictly observed still at present by the people of Friesland, may deserve a corner among the Notes of the Folk-Lore Journal:— As long as a corpse is still in a house, the looking-glass is turned round, or covered, and the clock remains stopped. H. K.

Man-in-the-Moon.—The idea conveyed to a Chinese mind by "the man in the moon" may be gathered from the following account, given by The Chinese Times, of one of the great festivals observed in the Middle Kingdom: "The common people soon lose whatever knowledge they may have possessed at one time of the origin of a festival, but the account which was given me by a young Chinese scholar bears a strong resemblance to some of the Buddhist tales of India. It was in the