[357] Primitive Culture (4th ed.), vol. ii. pp. 148-9. See also Frazer's Golden Bough (2nd ed.), vol. iii. pp. 26 seq., and W. G. Black's Folk Medicine, pp. 34 seq.
[358] Primitive Culture (4th ed.), vol. ii. p. 150.
[359] Quite an interesting chapter might be written about various beliefs connected with cross-roads. See, for example, the superstition referred to in Plato's Laws, quoted by Dr. Frazer in The Golden Bough (2nd ed.), vol. iii. p. 20; and the Bohemian prescription for fever: "Take an empty pot, go with it to a cross-road, throw it down, and run away. The first person who kicks against the pot will catch your fever and you will be cured." (Op. cit., p. 22.) Again, of the Dyaks we are told that they "fasten rags of their clothes on trees at cross-roads, fearing for their health if they neglect the custom." (Tylor's Primitive Culture (4th ed.), vol. ii. p. 223.) Still more remarkable is it to find a similar belief in England. "Lancashire wise men tell us, 'for warts, rub them with a cinder, and this, tied up in paper and dropped where four roads meet, will transfer the warts to whoever opens the parcel.'" (W. G. Black's Folk Medicine, p. 41. This author mentions the existence of the same superstition in Germany.)
[360] For superstitions of the kind in the Shanghai district, see Rev. E. Box's "Shanghai Folk-lore" in J.R.A.S. (China Branch), vol. xxxiv. pp. 124-5. For a Chinese cross-road superstition see the same article, p. 130; and see Dennys's Folk-lore of China, p. 22.
[361] See Mrs. Bishop's Korea and Her Neighbours, vol. ii. pp. 143 seq., and Folk-lore, September 1900, p. 329.
[362] See Frazer's Golden Bough (2nd ed.), vol. iii. p. 21.
[363] See T. R. Glover's Conflict of Religions in the Early Roman Empire (Methuen & Co., 1909), p. 13.
[364] See the Rev. A. W. Oxford's "Ancient Judaism" in Religious Systems of the World (8th ed.), p. 55. He remarks that the sacred trees at these places "were always evergreen trees as being the best symbols of life; 'green' is the constant adjective applied to them by the prophets. The name used for them—ela or elon—shows that they were considered to be divine beings." As regards the choice of evergreen trees, see above, pp. [262]-[4].
[365] See also Mr. A. B. Cook's articles on "Zeus, Apollo and the Oak" in The Classical Review for 1903 and 1904.
[366] Primitive Culture (4th ed.), vol. ii. p. 221. The whole subject is discussed pp. 214-29.