Lent is a season more particularly consecrated to song. Every Saturday afternoon, and on some other days, the girls of the various pšazas assemble under the village lime tree, the seat around which is scrupulously reserved for them, to sing, amid the rapt attention of the whole village, some of their delightful sacred songs peculiar to the season. This singing reaches its climax on Easter night, when young fellows and girls march round the village in company, warbling in front of every door, in return for which they receive some refreshment. For a brief time only do they suspend their music to fetch "Easter water" from the brook, which must be done in perfect silence, and accordingly sets every mischief-maker at work, teasing and splashing, and playing all sorts of practical jokes, in order to extract a word of protest from the water-fetching maidens. As the clock strikes midnight the young women form in procession and march out to the fields, and all round the cultivated area, singing Easter hymns till sunrise. It produces a peculiarly striking effect to hear all this solemn singing—maybe, the same tunes ringing across from an adjoining parish, as if echoed back by the woods—and to see those tall forms solemnly moving about in the early gloaming, like ancient priestesses of the Goddess Ostara. While the girls are singing, the bell-ringers repair to the belfry (which in many villages stands beside the church) to greet the Easter sun with the traditional "Dreischlag," the "three-stroke," intended to indicate the Trinity.
Lent sees the Wends perform another curious rite, of peculiar antiquarian interest. The fourth Sunday in Lent is by established custom set apart for the ceremony of "driving out Death"—in the shape of a straw figure decked out with the last bridal veil used, which the bride is expected to give up for the purpose. This poor figure is stoned to destruction to the cry of Leč hořè, leč hořè, which may be borrowed from the Lutheran name for the Sunday in question, Laetare. In some places the puppet is seated in a bower of pine boughs, and so carried about amid much infantine merriment, to be ultimately burnt or drowned. The interesting feature of this rite is, that it does not really represent the Teuton "expulsion of winter" so much as the much older ceremony of piously visiting the site on which in Pagan times bodies used to be burnt after death. It is a heathen All Saints' Day.
I have no space here to refer to anything like all the curious Wendish observances which ought to be of interest to folk-lorists: the lively kokot, or harvest home, so called because under the last sheaf it was usual to conceal a cock, kokota lapać with legs and wings bound, which fell to the lot of the reaper who found it; the lobetanz; the kermuša, or kirmess, great and small, the merry children's feast on May Day; the joyful observance of Whit Sunday and Midsummer; the peculiar children's games, and so on. It is all so racy and peculiar, all so merry and yet so modest in the expenditure made upon it, it all shows the Wends so much to advantage as a contented, happy, cheerful people—perhaps a little thoughtless, but in any case making the best of things under all circumstances, and glad to show off their Slav finery, and throw themselves into whatever enjoyment Providence has vouchsafed, with a zest and spirit which is not to be excelled, and which I for one should be sorry to see replaced by the more decorous, perhaps, but far less picturesque hilarity of the prosy Prussians. If only the Wends did not consume such unconscionable quantities of bad liquor! And if in their cups they did not fall a-quarrelling quite so fiercely! It is all very well to say, as they do in one of their proverbs, with truthful pithiness, that "there is not a drop of spirit on which do not hang nine devils." But their practice accords ill with this proverbial wisdom. The public-house is to them the centre of social life. Every new-comer is formally introduced and made to shake hands with the landlord. They have a good deal of tavern etiquette which is rigidly adhered to, and the object of which in all cases is, like George the Fourth's "whitewash," to squeeze an additional glass of liquor into the day's allowance. Thus every guest is entitled to a help from the landlord's jug, but in return, from every glass served is the landlord entitled to the first sip. Thus again, after a night's carousal, the guests always expect to be treated by the host to a free liquor round, which is styled the Swaty Jan—that is, the Saint John—meaning "the Evangelist," whose name is taken in vain because he is said to have drunk out of a poisoned cup without hurt. All the invocation in the world of the Saint will not, however, it is to be feared, make the wretched pálenza of the Wends—raw potato fusel—innocuous. It is true, their throats will stand a good deal. By way of experiment, I once gave an old woman a glass of raw spirit as it issued from the still, indicating about 82 per cent. of alcohol. She made a face certainly, but it did not hurt her; and she would without much coaxing have taken another glass.
This article has already grown so long that of the many interesting customs connected with the burial of the dead and the honouring of their memory I can only refer to one very peculiar and picturesque rite. Having taken the dying man out of his bed, and placed him (for economy) on straw (which is afterwards burnt) to die, put him in his coffin, with whatever he is supposed to love best, to make him comfortable—and in addition a few bugs, to clear the house of them—the mourners carry him out of the house, taking care to bump him on the high threshold, and in due course the coffin is rested for part of the funeral service in front of the parsonage or the church. In providing for the comfort of the dead the survivors show themselves remarkably thoughtful. No male Wend is buried without his pipe, no married female without her bridal dress. Children are given toys, and eggs, and apples. Money used to be put into the coffin, but people found that it got stolen. So now the practice is restricted to the very few Jews who are to be found among the Wends and who, it is thought, cannot possibly be happy without money; and, with a degree of consideration which to some people will appear excessive, some stones are added, in order that they may have them "to throw at the Saviour." In front of the church or parsonage the coffin is once more opened, and the mourners, all clad in white—which is the Wendish colour for mourning—are invited to have a last look at the body. Then follows the Dobra noć, a quaint and strictly racial ceremony. The nearest relative of the dead, a young person, putting a dense white veil over his or her head and body, is placed at the back of the coffin, and from that place in brief words answers on behalf of the dead such questions as affection may prompt near friends and relatives to put. That done, the whole company join in the melodious Dobra noć—wishing the dead one last "Good-night." After that, the lid is once more screwed down and the coffin is lowered into the grave.
There are few things more picturesque, I ought to say, than a funeral procession in the Spreewald, made up of boats gliding noiselessly along one of those dark forest canals, having the coffin hung with white, and all the mourners dressed in the same colour, the women wearing the regulation white handkerchief across their mouths. The gloom around is not the half-night of Styx; but the thought of Charon and his boat instinctively occurs to one. The whole seems rather like a melancholy vision, or dream, than a reality.
Hard pressed as I am for space, I must find some to say, at any rate, just a few words about Wendish marriage customs. For its gaiety, and noise, and lavish hospitality, and protracted merriment, its finery and its curious ways, the Wendish wedding has become proverbial throughout Germany. Were I to detail all its quaint little touches, all its peculiar observances, each one pregnant with peculiar mystic meaning, all its humours and all its fun, I should have to give it an article by itself. It is a curious mixture of ancient and modern superstition and Christianity, diplomacy and warfare. The bride is still ostensibly carried off by force. Only a short time ago the bridegroom and his men were required to wear swords in token of warfare and conquest. But all the formal negotiation is done by diplomacy—very cautiously, very carefully, as if one were feeling his way. First comes an old woman, the schotta, to clear the ground. After that the druzba, the best man, appears on the scene—to inquire about pigs, or buckwheat, or millet, or whatever it may be, and incidentally also about the lovely Hilžička, whom his friend Janko is rather thinking of paying his addresses to—the fact being all the while that long since Janko and Hilžička have, on the sly, arranged between themselves that they are to be man and wife. But observe that in Wendland girls may propose as well as men; and that the bridegroom, like the bride, wears his "little wreath of rue"—if he be an honest man, in token of his virtue. The girl and her parents visit the suitor's house quite unexpectedly. And there and then only does the young lady openly decide. If she sits down in the house, that means "Yes." And forthwith preparations are busily set on foot. Custom requires that the bride should give up dancing and gaiety and all that, leave off wearing red, and stitch away at her trousseau, while her parents kill the fatted calf. Starve themselves as they will at other times, at a wedding they must be liberal like parvenus. Towards this hospitality, it is true, their friends and neighbours contribute, sending butter and milk, and the like, just before the wedding, as well as making presents of money and other articles to the young people at the feast itself. But we have not yet got to that by a long way. The young man, too, has his preparations to make. He has to send out the braška, the "bidder," in his gay dress, to deliver invitations. How people would stare in this country, were they to see a braška making his rounds, with a wreath on his hat, one or two coloured handkerchiefs dangling showily from different parts of his coat, besides any quantity of gay ribbons and tinsel, and a herald's staff covered with diminutive bunting! Then there are the banns to be published, and on the Sunday of the second time of asking, the bride and bridegroom alike are expected to attend the Holy Communion, and afterwards to go through a regular examination—in Bible, in Catechism, in reading—at the hands of the parson. By preference the latter makes them read aloud the seventh chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians. At the wedding itself, the ceremonial is so complicated that the braška, the master of ceremonies, has to be specially trained for his duties. There is a little farce first at the bride's house. The family pretend to know nothing of what is coming; their doors and windows are all closely barred, and the braška is made to knock a long time before the door is cautiously opened, with a gruff greeting which bids him go away and not trouble peaceable folk. His demand for "a little shelter" is only granted after much further parleying and incredulous inquiry about the respectability of the intruding persons. When the bride is asked for, an old woman is produced in her stead, next a little girl, then one or two wrong persons more, till at last the true bride is brought forth in all the splendour of a costume to which it is scarcely possible to do justice in writing. As much cloth as will make up four ordinary gowns is folded into one huge skirt. On the bride's neck hangs all conceivable finery of pearls, and ribbons, and necklaces, and strings of silver coins—as much, in fact, as the neck will carry. There is any amount of starched frilling and collar above the shoulders; a close-fitting, blue silk bodice below; and a high cap, something like a conjuror's—the borta, or bride's cap—upon her head. Even her stockings are not of the ordinary make, but knitted particularly large so as to have to be laid in folds. The wedding party, driving off to church, preceded by at least six outriders, make as big a clatter as pistol-firing, singing, shouting, thumping with sticks, and discordant trumpeting will produce. On the road, and in church, a number of little observances are prescribed. At the feast the bride, like the bridegroom, has her male attendants, swats, whose duty it is, above all things, to dance with her, should she want a partner. For this is the last day of her dancing for life, except on Shrove Tuesdays, and, in some Prussian parishes, by express order of the Government, on the Emperor's birthday and the anniversary of Sedan. The bridegroom, on the other hand, must not dance at the wedding, though he may afterwards. Like the bride, he has his own sƚonka—his "old lady," that is—to serve him as guide, philosopher and friend. Hospitality flows in unstinted streams. Sometimes as many as two hundred persons sit down to the meals, and keep it up, eating, drinking and dancing, for three days at least, sometimes for a whole week at a stretch. It would be a gross breach of etiquette to leave anything of the large portions served out on the table. Whatever cannot be eaten must be carried home. Hence those waterproof pockets of phenomenal size which, in olden days, Wendish parsons used to wear under their long coat-tails, and into which, at gentlemen's houses, they used to deposit a goodly store of sundry meats, poultry, pudding and méringues, to be finally christened—surreptitiously, of course—with rather incongruous affusions of gravy or soup, administered by the mischievous young gentlemen of "the House," for the benefit of Frau Pastorin and her children at home. Sunday and Tuesday are favourite days for a wedding. Thursday is rigorously avoided. For two days the company feast at the bride's house. Taking her to bed on the first night is a peculiar ceremony. The young girls crowd around her in a close circle, and refuse to let her go. The young lads do the same by the bridegroom. When, at last, the two force an exit, they are formally received into similar circles of married men and women severally. The bride is bereft of her borta, and receives a čjepc, a married woman's cap, in its place. After some more hocuspocus, the two are accompanied severally by the braška and the bride's sƚonka into the bridal chamber, the bride protesting all the time that she is "not yet her bridegroom's wife." The braška serves as valet to the bridegroom, the sƚonka undresses the bride. Then the braška formally blesses the marriage-bed, and out walk the two attendants to leave the young folk by themselves. Next morning the bride appears as "wife," looking very demure, in a married woman's garb. On that day the presents are given, amid many jokes—especially when it comes to a cradle, or a baby's bath—from the braška and the zwada—the latter a sort of clown specially retained to amuse the bride, who is expected to be terribly sad throughout. The sadder she is at the wedding, the merrier, it is said, will she be in married life. There is any amount of rather rough fun. On the third day, the company adjourn to the house of the bridegroom's parents, where, according to an ancient custom, the bride ought to go at once into the cowhouse, and upset a can of water, "for luck." After that she is made to sit down to a meal, her husband standing by, and waiting upon her. That accomplished, she should carry a portion of meat to the poorest person in the village. A week later, the young couple visit the bride's parents, and have a "young wedding" en famille.
I have said enough, I hope, to shew what an interestingly childlike, happily disposed, curious and contented race those few surviving Wends are. And they are so peaceful and loyal. Russian and Bohemian Pan-slavists have tried all their blandishments upon them, to rouse them up to an anti-German agitation. In 1866 the Czar, besides dispensing decorations, sent 63 cwts. of inflammatory literature among them. It was all to no purpose. Surely these quiet, harmless folk, fathers as they are of the North German race, might have been spared that uncalled-for nagging and worrying which has often been pointed against them from Berlin for purely political purposes! In the day of their power they were more tolerant of Germanism. They fought side by side with the Franks, fought even under Frankish chieftains. Germany owes them a debt, and should at least, as it may be hoped that she now will, let them die in peace. Death no doubt is bound to come. It cannot be averted. But it is a death which one may well view with regret. For with the Wends will die a faithfully preserved specimen of very ancient Slav life, quite unique in its way, as interesting a piece of history, archæology and folk-lore as ever was met with on the face of the globe.