of savage mysteries. If we find the bull-roarer used in the
mysteries of the most civilised of ancient peoples, the most probable
explanation is, that the Greeks retained both the mysteries, the
bull-roarer, the habit of bedaubing the initiate, the torturing of
boys, the sacred obscenities, the antics with serpents, the dances,
and the like, from the time when their ancestors were in the savage
condition. That more refined and religious ideas were afterwards
introduced into the mysteries seems certain, but the rites were in
many cases simply savage. Unintelligible (except as survivals) when
found among Hellenes, they become intelligible enough among savages,
because they correspond to the intellectual condition and magical
fancies of the lower barbarism. The same sort of comparison, the same
kind of explanation, will account, as we shall see, for the savage
myths as well as for the savage customs which survived among the
Greeks.

FOOTNOTES:

[16] Pausanias, iii. 15. When the boys were being cruelly scourged,
the priestess of Artemis Orthia held an ancient barbaric wooden image
of the goddess in her hands. If the boys were spared, the image grew
heavy; the more they were tortured, the lighter grew the image. In
Samoa the image (shark's teeth) of the god Taema is consulted before
battle. 'If it felt heavy, that was a bad omen; if light, the sign was
good'--the god was pleased (Turner's _Samoa_, p. 55).

[17] _Kamilaroi and Kurnai_, p. 268.

[18] Fison, _Journal Anthrop. Soc._, Nov., 1883.

[19] Taylor's _New Zealand_, p. 181.

[20] This is not the view of le Pere Lafitau, a learned Jesuit
missionary in North America, who wrote (1724) a work on savage
manners, compared with the manners of heathen antiquity. Lafitau, who
was greatly struck with the resemblances between Greek and Iroquois or
Carib initiations, takes Servius's other explanation of the _mystica
vannus_, 'an osier vessel containing rural offerings of first fruits.'
This exactly answers, says Lafitau, to the Carib _Matoutou_, on which
they offer sacred cassava cakes.

[21] _The Century Magazine_, May, 1883.

[22] A minute account of the mysteries of Pueblo Indians, and their
use of the bull-roarer, will be found in Captain Bourke's _Snake Dance
of the Moquis_.

[23] ~Konos xylarion hou exeptai to spartion kai en tais teletais
edoneito hina rhoize.~ Lobeck, _Aglaophamus_ (i. p. 700).

[24] _De Corona_, p. 313.

[25] _Savage Africa._ Captain Smith,