It was on Halloween, or All Hallows’ Eve—the evening of the 31st of October—that Superstition ran riot, because on that particular evening the supernatural influences of the other world were supposed to be specially prevalent, and the power of divination was likewise believed to be at its height. Spirits then walked about with unusual freedom, and readily responded to the call of those armed with due authority. In the prehistoric past, the Druids at this time celebrated their great autumn Fire-Festival, insisting that all fires, except their own, should be extinguished, so as to compel men to purchase the sacred fire at a certain price. This sacred fire was fed with the peeled wood of a certain tree, and that it might not be polluted, was never blown with human breath.
Needless to say that the sacred fire has vanished with the Druids, but the Halloween customs which still survive may be traced back to a hoar antiquity. For instance, various kinds of divination are practised, and chiefly with apples and nuts. Apples are a relic of the old Celtic fairy lore. They are thrown into a tub of water, and you endeavour to catch one in your mouth as they bob round and round in provoking fashion. When you have caught one, you peel it carefully, and pass the long strip of peel thrice, sunwise, round your head; after which you throw it over your shoulder, and it falls to the ground in the shape of the initial letter of your true love’s name.
As for the nuts, they would naturally suggest themselves to the dwellers in mighty woods, such as covered the land of old. Brand says it is a custom in Iceland, when the maiden would know if her lover be faithful, to put three nuts upon the bar of the grate, naming them after her lover and herself. If a nut crack or jump, the lover will prove faithless; if it begin to blaze or burn, it’s a sign of the fervour of his affection. If the nuts named after the girl and her swain burn together, they will be married.
This lover’s divination is practised in Scotland, as everybody knows who has read Burns’s poem of “Halloween:”—
“The auld guidwife’s weel hoordet nits
Are round and round divided,
An’ monie lads and lasses’ fates
Are there that night decided:
Some kindle, couthie, side by side,
An’ burn thegither trimly;
Some start awa wi’ saucy pride,
And jump out-owre the chimlie
Fu’ high that night.
“Jean slips in twa wi’ tentie e’e;
Wha ’twas, she wadna tell;
But this is Jock, an’ this is me,
She says in to hersel’:
He bleez’d owre her an’ she owre him,
As they wad never mair part;
Till, fuff! he started up the lum,
An’ Jean had e’en a sair heart
To see’t that night.”
In some places, on this mystic night, a stick is suspended horizontally from the ceiling, with a candle at one end, and an apple at the other. While it is made to revolve rapidly, the revellers successively leap up and endeavour to grasp the apple with their teeth—the hands must not be used—if they fail, the candle generally swings round in time to salute them disagreeably. The reader will note the resemblance between this pastime and the game of quintain, to which our forefathers were partial.
Another amusement is to dive for apples in a tub of water.
In Strathspey, a lass will steal away from the kitchen fire, make her way to the kiln where the corn is dried, throw a ball of thread into it, and wind it up slowly, while uttering certain words. The form of her future lover will take hold of the end of the thread, and reveal itself to her. The most arduous part of this charm is, that no speaking is allowed either on the outward journey or the return.
Another mode of lover’s divination is for the young people, after being duly blindfolded, to go forth into the kailyard, or garden, and pull the first stalks they meet with. Returning to the fireside, they determine, according as the stalk is big or little, straight or crooked, what the future wife or husband will be. The quantity of earth adhering to the root is emblematic of the dowry to be expected; and the temper is indicated by the sweet or bitter taste of the motoc or pith. Lastly, the stalks are placed in order, over the door, and the Christian names of persons afterwards entering the house signify in the same order those of the wives and husbands in futuris.