Part 9 (1/2)
”Who pa.s.seth by the rosemarie And careth not to take a spraye, For woman's love no care has he, Nor shall he though he live for aye.”
Of flowers and plants employed as love-charms on certain festivals may be noticed the bay, rosebud, and the hempseed on St. Valentine's Day, nuts on St. Mark's Eve, and the St. John's wort on Midsummer Eve.
In Denmark[1] many an anxious lover places the St. John's wort between the beams under the roof for the purpose of divination, the usual custom being to put one plant for herself and another for her sweetheart.
Should these grow together, it is an omen of an approaching wedding. In Brittany young people prove the good faith of their lovers by a pretty ceremony. On St. John's Eve, the men, wearing bunches of green wheat ears, and the women decorated with flax blossoms, a.s.semble round an old historic stone and place upon it their wreaths. Should these remain fresh for some time after, the lovers represented by them are to be united; but should they wither and die away, it is a certain proof that the love will as rapidly disappear. Again, in Sicily it is customary for young women to throw from their windows an apple into the street, which, should a woman pick up, it is a sign that the girl will not be married during the year. Sometimes it happens that the apple is not touched, a circ.u.mstance which indicates that the young lady, when married, will ere long be a widow. On this festival, too, the orpine or livelong has long been in request, popularly known as ”Midsummer men,” whereas in Italy the house-leek is in demand. The moss-rose, again, in years gone by, was plucked, with sundry formalities, on Midsummer Eve for love-divination, an allusion to which mode of forecasting the future, as practised in our own country, occurs in the poem of ”The Cottage Girl:”
”The moss-rose that, at fall of dew, Ere eve its duskier curtain drew, Was freshly gathered from its stem, She values as the ruby gem; And, guarded from the piercing air, With all an anxious lover's care, She bids it, for her shepherd's sake, Awake the New Year's frolic wake: When faded in its altered hue, She reads--the rustic is untrue!
But if its leaves the crimson paint, Her sick'ning hopes no longer faint; The rose upon her bosom worn, She meets him at the peep of morn.”
On the Continent the rose is still thought to possess mystic virtues in love matters, as in Thuringia, where girls foretell their future by means of rose-leaves.
A ceremony belonging to Hallowe'en is observed in Scotland with some trepidation, and consists in eating an apple before a looking-gla.s.s, when the face of the desired one will be seen. It is thus described by Burns:
”Wee Jenny to her granny says, 'Will ye gae wi' me, granny?
I'll eat the apple at the gla.s.s I gat frae uncle Johnny.'
She fuff't her pipe wi' sic a lunt, In wrath she was sae vap'rin, She notic't na an aizle brunt Her braw new worset ap.r.o.n Out thro' that night.
'Ye little skelpie limmer's face!
I daur you try sic sportin'
As seek the foul thief ony place, For him to spae your fortune; Nae doubt but ye may get a sight!
Great cause ye hae to fear it, For mony a ane has gotten a fright, And lived and died deleeret On sic a night.'”
Hallowe'en also is still a favourite anniversary for all kinds of nut-charms, and St. Thomas was long invoked when the prophetic onion named after him was placed under the pillow. Rosemary and thyme were used on St. Agnes' Eve with this formula:
”St. Agnes, that's to lovers kind, Come, ease the troubles of my mind.”
In Austria, on Christmas Eve, apples are used for divination. According to Mr. Conway, the apple must be cut in two in the dark, without being touched, the left half being placed in the bosom, and the right laid behind the door. If this latter ceremony be carefully carried out, the desired one may be looked for at midnight near the right half. He further tells us that in the Erzgebirge, the maiden, having slept on St.
Andrew's, or Christmas, night with an apple under her pillow, ”takes her stand with it in her hand on the next festival of the Church thereafter; and the first man whom she sees, other than a relative, will become her husband.”
Again, in Bohemia, on Christmas Eve, there is a pretty practice for young people to fix coloured wax-lights in the sh.e.l.ls of the first nuts they have opened that day, and to float them in water, after silently a.s.signing to each the name of some fancied wooer. He whose little barque is the first to approach the girl will be her future husband; but, on the other hand, should an unwelcome suitor seem likely to be the first, she blows against it, and so, by impeding its progress, allows the favoured barque to win.
In very early times flowers were mcuh in request as love-philtres, various allusions to which occur in the literature of most ages. Thus, in ”A Midsummer Night's Dream,” Oberon tells Puck to place a pansy on the eyes of t.i.tania, in order that, on awaking, she may fall in love with the first object she encounters. Gerarde speaks of the carrot as ”serving for love matters,” and adds that the root of the wild species is more effectual than that of the garden. Vervain has long been in repute as a love-philtre, and in Germany now-a-days endive-seed is sold for its supposed power to influence the affections. The root of the male fern was in years gone by used in love-philtres, and hence the following allusion:
”'Twas the maiden's matchless beauty That drew my heart a-nigh; Not the fern-root potion, But the glance of her blue eye.”
Then there is the basil with its mystic virtues, and the c.u.min-see and cyclamen, which from the time of Theophrastus have been coveted for their magic virtues. The purslane, crocus, and periwinkle were thought to inspire love; while the agnus castus and the Saraca Indica (one of the sacred plants of India), a species of the willow, were supposed to drive away all feelings of love. Similarly in Voigtland, the common basil was regarded as a test of chast.i.ty, withering in the hands of the impure. The mandrake, which is still worn in France as a love-charm, was employed by witches in the composition of their philtres; and in Bohemia, it is said that if a maiden can secretly put a sprig of the common clover into her lover's shoe ere he sets out on a journey, he will be faithful to her during his absence. As far back as the time of Pliny, the water-lily was regarded as an antidote to the love-philtre, and the amaranth was used for curbing the affections. On the other hand, Our Lady's bedstraw and the mallow were supposed to have the reverse effect, while the myrtle not only created love, but preserved it. The Sicilians still employ hemp to secure the affections of those they love, and gather it with various formalities,[2] fully believing in its potency. Indeed, charms of this kind are found throughout the world, every country having its own special plants in demand for this purpose.
However whimsical they may seem, they at any rate have the sanction of antiquity, and can claim an antecedent history certainly worthy of a better cause.
Footnotes:
1. Thorpe's ”Northern Mythology.”
2. _Fraser's Magazine_, 1870, p. 720.
CHAPTER IX.