§ 9. The Corn-spirit as a Bird.
The corn-spirit as a quail. The rice-spirit as a blue bird. The rice-spirit as a quail.
Sometimes the corn-spirit assumes the form of a bird. Thus among the Saxons of the Bistritz district in Transylvania there is a saying that the quail is sitting in the last standing stalks on the harvest-field, and all the reapers rush at these stalks in order, as they say, to catch the quail.[958] Exactly the same expression is used by reapers in Austrian Silesia when they are about to cut the last standing corn, whatever the kind of grain may be.[959] In the Bocage of Normandy, when the reapers have come to the last ears of the last rig, they surround them for the purpose of catching the quail, which is supposed to have taken refuge there. They run about the corn crying, “Mind the Quail!” and make believe to grab at the bird amid shouts and laughter.[960] Connected with this identification of the corn-spirit with a quail is probably the belief that the cry of the bird in spring is prophetic of the price of corn in the autumn; in Germany they say that corn will sell at as many gulden a bushel as the quail uttered its cry over the fields in spring. Similar prognostications are drawn from the note of the bird in central and western France, in Switzerland and in Tuscany.[961] Perhaps one reason for identifying the quail with the corn-spirit is that the bird lays its eggs on the ground, without making much of a nest.[962] Similarly the Toradjas of Central Celebes think that the soul of the rice is embodied in a pretty little blue bird which builds its nest in the rice-field at the time when the rice is beginning to germinate, and which disappears again after the harvest. Thus both the place and the time of the appearance of the bird suggest to the natives the notion that the blue bird is the rice incarnate. And like the note of the quail in Europe the note of this [pg 296] little bird in Celebes is believed to prognosticate the state of the harvest, foretelling whether the rice will be abundant or scarce. Nobody may drive the bird away; to do so would not merely injure the rice, it would hurt the eyes of the sacrilegious person and might even strike him blind. In Minahassa, a district in the north of Celebes, a similar though less definite belief attaches to a sort of small quail which loves to haunt the rice-fields before the rice is reaped; and when the Galelareeze of Halmahera hear a certain kind of bird, which they call togè, croaking among the rice in ear, they say that the bird is putting the grain into the rice, so they will not kill it.[963]
§ 10. The Corn-spirit as a Fox.
The corn-spirit as a fox running through the corn or sitting in it. The corn-spirit as a fox at reaping the last corn. The corn-spirit as a fox at threshing. The Japanese rice-god associated with the fox.
Another animal whose shape the corn-spirit is sometimes thought to assume is the fox. The conception is recorded at various places in Germany and France. Thus at Nördlingen in Bavaria, when the corn waves to and fro in the wind, they say, “The fox goes through the corn,” and at Usingen in Nassau they say, “The foxes are marching through the corn.” At Ravensberg, in Westphalia, and at Steinau, in Kurhessen, children are warned against straying in the corn, “because the Fox is there.” At Campe, near Stade, when they are about to cut the last corn, they call out to the reaper, “The Fox is sitting there, hold him fast!” In the Department of the Moselle they say, “Watch whether the Fox comes out.” In Bourbonnais the expression is, “You will catch the Fox.” When a reaper wounds himself or is sick at reaping, they say in the Lower Loire that “He has the Fox.” In Côte-d'or they say, “He has killed the Fox.” At Louhans, in Sâone-et-Loire, when the reapers are cutting the last corn they leave a handful standing and throw their sickles at it. He who hits it is called the Fox, and two girls deck his bonnet with flowers. [pg 297] In the evening there is a dance, at which the Fox dances with all the girls. The supper which follows is also called the Fox; they say, “We have eaten the Fox,” meaning that they have partaken of the harvest-supper. In the Canton of Zurich the last sheaf is called the Fox. At Bourgogne, in Ain, they cry out, “The Fox is sitting in the last sheaf,” and having made the figure of an animal out of white cloth and some ears of the last corn, they dub it the Fox and throw it into the house of a neighbour who has not yet got in all his harvest.[964] In Poitou, when the corn is being reaped in a district, all the reapers strive to finish as quickly as possible in order that they may send “the Fox” to the fields of a farmer who has not yet garnered his sheaves. The man who cuts the last handful of standing corn is said to “have the Fox.” This last handful is carried to the farmer's house and occupies a place on the table during the harvest-supper; and the custom is to drench it with water. After that it is set up on the chimney-piece and remains there the whole year.[965] At threshing, also, in Sâone-et-Loire, the last sheaf is called the Fox; in Lot they say, “We are going to beat the Fox”; and at Zabern in Alsace they set a stuffed fox before the door of the threshing-floor of a neighbour who has not finished his threshing.[966] With this conception of the fox as an embodiment of the corn-spirit may possibly be connected an old custom, observed in Holstein and Westphalia, of carrying a dead or living fox from house to house in spring; the intention of the custom was perhaps to diffuse the refreshing and invigorating influence of the reawakened spirit of vegetation.[967] In Japan the rice-god Inari is represented as an elderly man with a long beard riding on a white fox, and the fox is always associated with this deity. In front of his shrines may usually be seen a pair of foxes carved in wood or stone.[968]