Dances of masked men in India, Borneo, and South America to promote the growth of the crops.
Again, an old traveller in southern India tells us that “the men of Calicut, when they wish to sow rice, observe this practice. First, they plough the land with oxen as we do, and when they sow the rice in the field they have all the instruments of the city continually sounding and making merry. They also have ten or twelve men clothed like devils, and these unite in making great rejoicing with the players on the instruments, in order that the devil may make that rice very productive.”[574] We may suspect that the [pg 236] noisy music is played and the mummers cut their capers for the purpose rather of repelling demons than of inducing them to favour the growth of the rice. However, where our information is so scanty it would be rash to dogmatize. Perhaps the old traveller was right in thinking that the mummers personated devils. Among the Kayans of Central Borneo men disguised in wooden masks and great masses of green foliage certainly play the part of demons for the purpose of promoting the growth of the rice just before the seed is committed to the ground; and it is notable that among the performances which they give on this occasion are war dances.[575] Again, among the Kaua and Kobeua Indians of North-Western Brazil masked men who represent spirits or demons of fertility perform dances or rather pantomimes for the purpose of stimulating the growth of plants, quickening the wombs of women, and promoting the multiplication of animals.[576]
Dances in Aracan for the sake of the crops. Dances of the Tarahumare Indians of Mexico to procure rain for their crops.
Further, we are told that “the natives of Aracan dance in order to render propitious the spirits whom they believe to preside over the sowing and over the harvest. There are definite times for doing it, and we may say that in their eyes it is, as it were, an act of religion.”[577] Another people who dance diligently to obtain good crops are the Tarahumare Indians of Mexico. They subsist by agriculture and their thoughts accordingly turn much on the supply of rain, which is needed for their fields. According to them, “the favour of the gods may be won by what for want of a better term may be called dancing, but what in reality is a series of monotonous movements, a kind of rhythmical exercise, kept up sometimes for two nights. By dint of such hard work they think to prevail upon the gods to grant their prayers. The dancing is accompanied by the song of the shaman, in which he communicates his wishes to the unseen world, describing the beautiful effect of the rain, the fog, and the mist on the vegetable world. He invokes the aid of all the animals, mentioning each by name, and also calls on them, especially the deer and the rabbit, to multiply that the people [pg 237] may have plenty to eat. As a matter of fact, the Tarahumares assert that the dances have been taught them by the animals. Like all primitive people, they are close observers of nature. To them the animals are by no means inferior creatures; they understand magic and are possessed of much knowledge, and may assist the Tarahumares in making rain. In spring, the singing of the birds, the cooing of the dove, the croaking of the frog, the chirping of the cricket, all the sounds uttered by the denizens of the greensward, are to the Indian appeals to the deities for rain. For what other reason should they sing or call? For the strange behaviour of many animals in the early spring the Tarahumares can find no other explanation but that these creatures, too, are interested in rain. And as the gods grant the prayers of the deer expressed in its antics and dances, and of the turkey in its curious playing, by sending the rain, they easily infer that to please the gods they, too, must dance as the deer and play as the turkey. From this it will be understood that dance with these people is a very serious and ceremonious matter, a kind of worship and incantation rather than amusement.”[578]
Dances of the Tarahumare Indians to cause rain to fall, corn to sprout, grass to grow, and animals to multiply.
The two principal dances of these Indians, the rutuburi and the yumari, are supposed to have been taught them by the turkey and the deer respectively. They are danced by numbers of men and women, the two sexes keeping apart from each other in the dance, while the shaman sings and shakes his rattle. But “a large gathering is not necessary in order to pray to the gods by dancing. Sometimes the family dances alone, the father teaching the boys. While doing agricultural work, the Indians often depute one man to dance yumari near the house, while the others attend to the work in the fields. It is a curious sight to see a lone man taking his devotional exercise to the tune of his rattle in front of an apparently deserted dwelling. The lonely worshipper is doing his share of the general work by bringing down the fructifying rain and by warding off disaster, while the rest of the family and their friends plant, hoe, weed, or harvest. In the evening, when they return from the field, they may join him for a little while; but often he goes on alone, dancing [pg 238] all night, and singing himself hoarse, and the Indians told me that this is the very hardest kind of work, and exhausting even to them. Solitary worship is also observed by men who go out hunting deer or squirrels for a communal feast. Every one of them dances yumari alone in front of his house for two hours to insure success on the hunt; and when putting corn to sprout for the making of tesvino the owner of the house dances for a while, that the corn may sprout well.” Another dance is thought to cause the grass and funguses to grow, and the deer and rabbits to multiply; and another is supposed to draw the clouds together from the north and south, so that they clash and descend in rain.[579]
Dance of the Cora Indians at the sowing festival.
The Cora Indians of Mexico celebrate a festival of sowing shortly before they commit the seed of the maize to the ground. The festival falls in June, because that is the month when the rainy season sets in, supplying the moisture needed for the growth of the maize. At the festival two old women, who represent the goddesses of sowing, dance side by side and imitate the process of sowing by digging holes in the earth with long sticks and inserting the seed of the maize in the holes; whereupon a man who represents the Morning Star pours water on the buried seeds. This solemn dance is accompanied by the singing of an appropriate hymn, which may be compared to the song of the Arval Brothers in ancient Rome.[580]
Dances and leaps of European peasants to make the corn grow tall.
We have seen that in many parts of Germany, Austria, and France the peasants are still, or were till lately, accustomed to dance and leap high in order that the crops may grow tall. Such leaps and dances are sometimes performed by the sower immediately before or after he sows the seed; but often they are executed by the people on a fixed day of the year, which in some places is Twelfth Night (the sixth of January), or Candlemas (the second of February) or Walpurgis Night, that is, the Eve of May Day; but apparently the favourite season for these performances [pg 239] is the last day of the Carnival, namely Shrove Tuesday.[581] In such cases the leaps and dances are performed by every man for his own behoof; he skips and jumps merely in order that his own corn, or flax, or hemp may spring up and thrive. But sometimes in modern Europe, as (if I am right) in ancient Rome, the duty of dancing for the crops was committed to bands or troops of men, who cut their capers for the benefit of the whole community. For example, at Grub, in the Swiss canton of the Grisons (Graubünden), the practice used to be as follows. “The peasants of Grub,” we are informed, “have still some hereditary customs, in that they assembled in some years, mostly at the time of the summer solstice, disguised themselves as maskers so as to be unrecognizable, armed themselves with weapons defensive and offensive, took every man a great club or cudgel, marched in a troop together from one village to another, and executed high leaps and strange antics. They ran full tilt at each other, struck every man his fellow with all his might, so that the blow resounded, and clashed their great staves and cudgels. Hence they were called by the country folk the Stopfer. These foolish pranks they played from a superstitious notion that their corn would thrive the better; but now they have left off, and these Stopfer are no longer in any repute.” Another authority, after describing the custom, remarks: “With this custom was formerly connected the belief that its observance brought a fruitful year.”[582]