glass, that people used to threaten one another: "Speak the truth, or I'll go to the little man."1 In a Gipsy story from Transylvania a king's daughter possesses a mirror wherein she can see everything in the world.2 Another mirror with somewhat more limited capacity was the gift of a mountain spirit in a German tale; but it had other powers that resulted at last in a curse.3 When Vasco da Gama was sailing towards India, some of the Indian wizards are said to have shown the people at Calicut in basins of water his three ships. The Egyptian and modern Indian practices are ordinarily used for discovering thefts; and this was often the purpose in Europe. In Tahiti and Hawaii the priest. was sent for on similar occasions. After some prayers he caused a hole to be dug in the floor of the house, and filled with water. He continued his incantations with a young plantain in his hand until he observed the image of the thief in the water.5 In the Isle of Man a notorious witch is reported to have made use of a bowl of that this will be done ere long. As to modern practices in India, see also Burton, Sindh, 180; i. N. Ind. N. and Q. 85; iv. 51. 1 Apuleius, Discourse on Magic; Pröhle, Sagen, 232 (Story No. 173); Grimm, Teut. Myth. 1770, 1773, 1774, 1775, quoting Hartlieb's Book of All Forbidden Arts (1455); Kohlrusch, 260, note, quoting the same. See also Scot, 211; ii. Brand, 604, note; Caxton, ii. Recuyell, 414; Ostermann, 151. 2 Von Wlislocki, Transs. Zig., 112 (Story No. 47). 3 Pröhle, Sagen, 32 (Story No. 6). A mirror in a Chinese tale had the property of fixing, or photographing, the face of any woman who looked into it. The image could only be obliterated by another woman, or the same woman in another dress, looking into it. ii. Giles, 32. 4 Lubbock, 253, quoting De Faira. Compare a Swedish tale in which a lover is shown his sweetheart, by a Lapp magician, in a bucket of water. Thorpe, ii. N. Myth., 55, from Afzelius. 5 Ellis, i. Polyn. Res., 378. water in order to divine as to the safety of a herring-fleet.1 The Otando fetish-man of Equatorial Africa also uses a vessel of water; the Mpongwe fetish-man uses a mirror.2 In Borneo the manang, or medicine-man, is frequently provided with a magical stone into which he can look and see what is ailing a sick man, and prescribe for him accordingly. The Cakchiquels of Central America had a sacred obsidian stone, which was their national oracle, and was mysteriously connected with the origin of mankind. A stone, apparently identified with this, is preserved in the church of Tecpan, Guatemala. It was shown to Mr. Stephens, who describes it as "a piece of common slate, fourteen inches by ten, and about as thick as those used by boys at school, without characters of any kind upon it."4 No doubt the eye of faith was required to see anything in it. Crystals are used by the medicine-men of the Apaches for divining.5 The Urim and Thummim of Hebrew antiquity seem to have been objects of the same kind of superstition. The "Mirror of Light" is not unknown even in these days, and has been honoured with the attention of the Society for Psychical Research.6 Lucian, in placing the mirror in a well, was probably 1 A. W. Moore, in v. Folklore, 214, citing N. and Q. (1852). 2 Winwood Reade, 252; Du Chaillu, Ashangoland, 173. 3 H. Ling Roth, in xxi. Journ. Anthr. Inst., 118. 4 Brinton, Cakchiquels, 43, 69, 27. 5 J. G. Bourke, in ix. Rep. Bur. Ethn., 461. 6 v. Am Urquell, 163; H. Carrington Bolton, in vi. Journ. Am. F.L., 25. Mr. Andrew Lang, in Cock Lane and Common Sense (London, 1894), 212, et sqq., has examined the practice of crystalgazing. He brings his wide knowledge of savage and other superstitious purposes to bear upon the evidence, and comes to the conclusion that "we can scarcely push scepticism so far as to deny that the facts VOL. II. B satirising the belief in sacred wells which had properties like those he attributed to the mirror. Such wells and pools are still to be found, both in stories and in fact. A fairy in an Italian tale points out to the hero a fountain which will be a mirror for him, into which he can look, and to which he can give commands, and they will be obeyed.1 It was formerly believed at York that he who flung, on May morning before the Minster clock struck one, five white stones into a certain part of the Ouse near the city, would see in the water, as in a mirror, whatever he might desire, whether past, present, or future.2 On the promontory of Tænarum, now Cape Matapan, Pausanias tells us, was a famous fountain. In his day there was nothing remarkable to be seen in it; but anciently those who pried into its depths might see views of ports and ships. In the Cyaneæ, hard by Lycia, too, there was a spring, into which whoso descended saw whatever he wished to behold.3 And there is a wonderful well in Samoa, wherein a variety of scenes may be perceived by those who will undertake the risk of being enticed into its stony depths.4 So far we have found no Life-token in mirror or well. A mirror or well, however, which reveals to the inquirer only the health of one in whom he has an interest, is obviously nothing more than a special variety of the mirror exist, that hallucinations are actually provoked,” by gazing into a ball of crystal or glass. Indeed, he suggests that something more than hallucination is provoked; but perhaps that is "only his fun." He does not say it. 1 i. Comparetti, 269. 2 ii. Parkinson, 242. The story connected with this belief is, as Mr. Parkinson_reproduces it, anything but traditional, and I lay no stress Pausanias, iii. 25; vii. 21. 4 Turner, Samoa, 101. on it. 3 or well revealing anything or everything. This is the variety mentioned in a Roman variant of Beauty and the Beast, where Beauty, on taking leave of the Beast for a short time, is given a mirror, into which she can look and see how he is.1 In a Swedish märchen already cited, on the two comrades parting at a crossway, one of them dips his knife into the fountain adjacent, and says to the other: "It shall be to thee a sign that I am living so long as the water of this spring is clear; but if it be red and turbid, then I shall be dead, and I certainly expect that thou wilt avenge my death.” 2 This convenient way of obtaining news of absent friends is said to be still in use. The Eskimo of Greenland, when a man has not returned in due time from an expedition in his kayak, hold the head of his nearest relation over a tub of water, and judge from the reflection beneath whether the absent person has been upset, or is still sitting in the boat, rowing. In the island of Tahiti, if one, looking at the water of certain springs, chance to see it tinged with blood, it is a sign that one of the beholder's friends is about to die. Nor is it different in our own country. Gulval Well, in Cornwall, answers inquiries put with the proper formula. If the person asked after be alive and well, the quiet water will instantly boil and bubble clear and pure; if he be sick, the water becomes foul and puddled; if he be dead, it remains calm and lifeless. The legends accounting for these phenomena in Tahiti and Cornwall are unrecorded. In the parish of Kirkmichael, in the county of Banff, there 1 Busk, F.L. Rome, 117. 3 i. Crantz, 214. * Cavallius, 81. 4 iv. Rev. Trad. Pop., 287. • Hunt, 290, note, quoting Gilbert, ii. Parochial Hist. of Cornwall, 121. Montluck Well, Logan, and Saint Mary's Well, Kilmorie, both in is a fountain dedicated to St. Michael, and famous for its healing virtues. The guardian of the well appears in the shape of a fly which, it is believed, never dies. "To the eye of ignorance," we are told, "he might sometimes. appear dead; but agreeably to the Druidic system, it was only a Transmigration into a similar form, which made. little alteration on the real identity." He was, in former days at all events, constantly on duty. "If the sober matron wished to know the issue of her husband's ailment, or the love-sick Nymph that of her languishing Swain, they visited the Well of St. Michael. Every movement of the sympathetic Fly was regarded in silent awe; and as he appeared cheerful or dejected, the anxious votaries drew their presages; their breasts vibrated with correspondent emotions."1 Brand and Ellis quote from an old writer a passage concerning fountains which prognosticate plenty or famine. The writer concludes by saying: "Myselfe know some Gentlemen that confesse, if a certaine Fountaine (being otherwise very cleane and cleare) be suddenly troubled by meanes of a Worme unknowne, that the same is a personall Summons for some of them to depart out of the world."2 These superstitions frequently degenerated into mere divination. Dalyell records that auguries as to the fate of Wigtownshire, are resorted to for water for the sick. The waters of both have the property of appearing in abundance if the augury be favourable; if not, of diminishing. R. C. Hope, in xxviii. Antiquary, 68, quoting Symson's Description of Galloway and iv. Statistical Account of Scotland. Stat. Acc. Scot., 464. The spirits 1 ii. Brand, 263, note, quoting xii. of wells often appear in animal form. Volksgl. Mag., 21. Cf. the water-bull and water-kelpie of Scotland. ii. Brand, 272, note, quoting The Living Librarie, or Historical Meditations (1621), 284. |