"Now carry we Death out of the village,
The new Summer into the village,
Welcome, dear Summer,
Green little corn."

In other parts of Bohemia the song varies; it is not Summer that comes
back but Life.

"We have carried away Death,
And brought back Life."

In both these cases it is interesting to note that though Death is
dramatically carried out, the coming back of Life is only announced, not
enacted.

Often, and it would seem quite naturally, the puppet representing Death
or Winter is reviled and roughly handled, or pelted with stones, and
treated in some way as a sort of scapegoat. But in not a few cases, and
these are of special interest, it seems to be the seat of a sort of
magical potency which can be and is transferred to the figure of Summer
or Life, thus causing, as it were, a sort of Resurrection. In Lusatia
the women only carry out the Death. They are dressed in black themselves
as mourners, but the puppet of straw which they dress up as the Death
wears a white shirt. They carry it to the village boundary, followed by
boys throwing stones, and there tear it to pieces. Then they cut down a
tree and dress it in the white shirt of the Death and carry it home
singing.

So at the Feast of the Ascension in Transylvania. After morning service
the girls of the village dress up the Death; they tie a threshed-out
sheaf of corn into a rough copy of a head and body, and stick a
broomstick through the body for arms. Then they dress the figure up in
the ordinary holiday clothes of a peasant girl--a red hood, silver
brooches, and ribbons galore. They put the Death at an open window that
all the people when they go to vespers may see it. Vespers over, two
girls take the Death by the arms and walk in front; the rest follow.
They sing an ordinary church hymn. Having wound through the village they
go to another house, shut out the boys, strip the Death of its clothes,
and throw the straw body out of the window to the boys, who fling it
into a river. Then one of the girls is dressed in the Death's discarded
clothes, and the procession again winds through the village. The same
hymn is sung. Thus it is clear that the girl is a sort of resuscitated
Death. This resurrection aspect, this passing of the old into the new,
will be seen to be of great ritual importance when we come to Dionysos
and the Dithyramb.

These ceremonies of Death and Life are more complex than the simple
carrying in of green bough