The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought Part 12

The subject of the human physiognomy and physical characteristics in folk-lore and folk-speech is a very entertaining one, and the practices in vogue for beautifying these are legion and found all over the world (204).

_Face-Games._

Some recollection of such procedure as that of the Songish Indians seems to linger, perhaps, in the game, which Sicilian nurses play on the baby's features. It consists in "lightly touching nose, mouth, eyes, etc., giving a caress or slap to the chin," and repeating at the same time the verses:--

"Varvaruttedu Vucca d'aneddu, Nasu affilatu, Ocehi di stiddi Frunti quatrata E te 'cca 'na timpulata."

In French we have corresponding to this:--

"Beau front Pet.i.ts yeux, Nez can can, Bouche d'argent, Menton fleuri, Chichirichi."

In Scotch:--

"Chin cherry, Moo merry, Nose nappie, Ee winkie, Broo brinkie, c.o.c.k-up jinkie."

In English:--

"Eye winker, Tom Tinker, Nose dropper, Mouth eater.

Chin chopper."

And cognate practices exist all over the globe (204. 21).

_Primitive Weighing._

"Worth his weight in gold" is an expression which has behind it a long history of folk-thought. Professor Gaidoz, in his essay on _Ransom by Weight_ (236), and Haberlandt, in his paper on the _Tulapurusha, Man-Weighing_ (248) of India, have shown to what extent has prevailed in Europe and Asia the giving of one's weight in gold or other precious substances by prisoners to their captors, in order to secure their liberty, by devotees to the church, or to some saint, as a cure for, or a prevent.i.tive of disease, or as an act of charity or of grat.i.tude for favours received.

The expression used of Belshazzar in Daniel v. 27, "Thou art weighed in the balance, and found wanting" (and the a.n.a.logue in Job x.x.xi. 6), has been taken quite literally, and in Brittany, according to the Abbot of Soissons, there was a Chapel of the Balances, "in which persons who came to be cured miraculously, were weighed, to ascertain whether their weight diminished when prayer was made by the monks in their behalf."

Brewer informs us that "Rohese, the mother of Thomas Becket, used to weigh her boy every year on his birthday, against the money, clothes, and provisions which she gave to the poor" (191.41). From Gregory of Tours we learn that Charicus, King of the Suevi, when his son was ill, "hearing of the miraculous power of the bones of St. Martin, had his son weighed against gold and silver, and sent the amount to his sepulchre and sanctuary at Tours" (236. 60).

Weighing of infants is looked upon with favour in some portions of western Europe, and to the same source we may ultimately trace the modern baby's card with the weight of the newcomer properly inscribed upon it,--a fashion which bids fair to be a valuable anthropometric adjunct. "Hefting the baby" has now taken on a more scientific aspect than it had of yore.

The following curious custom of the eastern Eskimo is perhaps to be mentioned here, a practice connected with their treatment of the sick.

"A stone weighing three or four pounds, according to the gravity of the sickness, is placed by a matron under the pillow. Every morning she weighs it, p.r.o.nouncing meanwhile words of mystery. Thus she informs herself of the state of the patient and his chances of recovery. If the stone grows constantly heavier, it is because the sick man cannot escape, and his days are numbered" (523. 39).

It is a far cry from Greenland to England, but there are connecting links in respect of folk-practice. Mr. Dyer informs us that in the parish church of Wingrove, near Ailesbury, as late as 1759, a certain Mrs. Hammokes was accused of witchcraft, and her husband demanded the "trial by the church Bible." So "she was solemnly conducted to the parish church, where she was stript of all her clothes to her shift, and weighed against the great parish Bible in the presence of all her neighbours. The result was that, to the no small mortification of her accuser, she outweighed the Bible, and was triumphantly acquitted of the charge" (436. 307, 308).

How often has not woman, looked upon in the light of a child, been subjected to the same practices and ceremonies!

_Primitive Measurements._

The etymology and original significance of our common English words, _span_, _hand_, _foot_, _cubit_, _fathom_, and their cognates and equivalents in other languages, to say nothing of the self-explanatory _finger's breadth_, _arm's length_, _knee-high_, _ankle-deep_, etc., go back to the same rude anthropometry of prehistoric and primitive times, from which the cla.s.sic peoples of antiquity obtained their canons of proportion and symmetry of the human body and its members. Among not a few primitive races it is the child rather than the man that is measured, and we there meet with a rude sort of anthropometric laboratory. From Ploss, who devotes a single paragraph to "Measurements of the Body," we learn that these crude measurements are of great importance in folk-medicine:--

"In Bohemia, the new-born child is usually measured by an old woman, who measures all the limbs with a ribbon, and compares them with one another; the hand, _e.g._, must be as long as the face. If the right relations do not subsist, prayers and various superst.i.tious practices are resorted to in order to prevent the devil from injuring the child, and the evil spirits are driven out of the house by means of fumigation. In the case of sick children in Bohemia the measuring is resorted to as a sympathetic cure. In other parts of Germany, on the other hand, in Schleswig-Holstein, Thuringia, Oldenburg, it is thought that measuring and weighing the new-born child may interfere with its thriving and growth" (326. I. 302).

Sibree states that in Madagascar, at circ.u.mcision, the child is measured and sprinkled with water (214. 6), and Ellis, in his history of that island, gives the following details of the ceremony (_History of Madagascar_, Vol. I. p. 182):--

"The children on whom the rite is to be performed are next led across the blood of the animal just killed, to which some idea of sacredness is attached. They are then placed on the west side of the house, and, as they stand erect, a man holding a light cane in his hand, measures the first child to the crown of the head, and at one stroke cuts off a piece of the cane measured to that height, having first carefully dipped the knife in the blood of the slaughtered sheep. The knife is again dipped in the blood, and the child measured to the waist, when the cane is cut to that height. He is afterwards measured to the knee with similar results. The same ceremony is performed on all the children successively. The meaning of this, if indeed any meaning can be attached to it, seems to be the symbolical removal of all evils to which the children might be exposed,--first from the head to the waist, then from the waist to the knees, and finally, from the knees to the sole of the foot."

The general question of the measurement of sick persons (not especially children), and of the payment of an image or a rod of precious metal of the height of a given person, or the height of his waist, shoulders, knee, etc., of the person, in recompense for some insult or injury, has been treated of by Grimm, Gaidoz, and Haberlandt. Gaidoz remarks (236.

74): "It is well known that in Catholic countries it is customary to present the saints with votive offerings in wax, which are representative of the sicknesses for which the saints are invoked; a wax limb, or a wax eye, for instance, are representative of a sore limb or of a sore eye, the cure of which is expected from the saint. Wax bodies were offered in the same way, as we learn from a ludicrous story told by Henri Estienne, a French writer of the sixteenth century. The story is about a clever monk who made credulous parents believe he had saved their child by his prayers, and he says to the father, 'Now your son is safe, thanks to G.o.d; one hour ago I should not have thought you would have kept him alive. But do you know what you are to do? You ought to have a wax effigy of his own size made for the glory of G.o.d, and put it before the image of the holy Ambrose, at whose intercession our Lord did this favour to you.'" Even poorer people were in the habit of offering wax candles of the height or of the weight of the sick person.

In 1888, M. Letourneau (299) called attention to the measurement of the neck as a test of p.u.b.erty, and even of the virginity of maidens. In Brittany, "According to popular opinion, there is a close relation between the volume of the neck and p.u.b.erty, sometimes even the virginity of girls. It is a common sight to see three young girls of uncertain age measure in sport the circ.u.mference of the neck of one of them with a thread. The two ends of this thread are placed between the teeth of the subject, and the endeavour is made to make the loop of the thread pa.s.s over the head. If the operation succeeds, the young girl is declared 'bonne a marier.'" MM. Hanoteau and Letourneau state that among the Kabyles of Algeria a similar measurement is made of the male s.e.x. In Kabylia, where the attainment of the virile state brings on the necessity of paying taxes and bearing arms, families not infrequently endeavour to conceal the p.u.b.erty of their young men. If such deceit is suspected, recourse is had to the test of neck-measurement. Here again, as in Brittany, if the loop formed by the thread whose two ends are held in the teeth pa.s.ses over the head, the young man is declared of age, and enrolled among the citizens, whilst his family is punished by a fine. M.

Manouvrier also notes that the same test is also employed to discover whether an adolescent is to be compelled to keep the fast of Rhamadan.

_Measurements of Limbs and Body._

M. Mahoudeau cites from Tillaux's _Anatomie topographique,_ and MM.

Perdrizet and Gaidoz in _Melusine_ for 1893, quote from the _Secrets merveilleux de la magie naturette et cabalistique du Pet.i.t Albert_ (1743) extracts relating to this custom, which is also referred to by the Roman writers C. Valerius, Catullus, Vossius, and Scaliger. The subject is an interesting one, and merits further investigation. Ellis (42. 233) has something to say on the matter from a scientific point of view. Grimm has called attention to the very ancient custom of measuring a patient, "partly by way of cure, partly to ascertain if the malady were growing or abating." This practice is frequently mentioned in the German poems and medical books of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In one case a woman says of her husband, "I measured him till he forgot everything," and another, desirous of persuading hers that he was not of sound mind, took the measure of his length and across his head. In a Zurich Ms. of 1393, "measuring" is included among the unchristian and forbidden things of sorcery. In the region about Treves, a malady known as night-grip (_Nachtgriff_) is ascertained to be present by the following procedure: "Draw the sick man's belt about his naked body lengthwise and breadthwise, then take it off and hang it on a nail with the words 'O G.o.d, I pray thee, by the three virgins, Margarita, Maria Magdalena, and Ursula, be pleased to vouchsafe a sign upon the sick man, if he have the nightgrip or no'; then measure again, and if the belt be shorter than before, it is a sign of the said sickness." In the Liegnitz country, in 1798, we are told there was hardly a village without its _messerin_ (measuress), an old woman, whose _modus operandi_ was this: "When she is asked to say whether a person is in danger from consumption, she takes a thread and measures the patient, first from head to heel, then from tip to tip of the outspread arms; if his length be less than his breadth then he is consumptive; the less the thread will measure his arms, the farther has the disease advanced; if it reaches only to the elbow, there is no hope for him. The measuring is repeated from time to time; if the thread stretches and reaches its due length again, the danger is removed. The wise woman must never ask money for her trouble, but take what is given." In another part of Germany, "a woman is stript naked and measured with a piece of red yarn spun on a Sunday."

Sembrzycki tells us that in the Elbing district, and elsewhere in that portion of Prussia, the country people are firmly possessed by the idea that a decrease in the measure of the body is the source of all sorts of maladies. With an increase of sickness the hands and feet are believed to lose more and more their just proportional relations one with another, and it is believed that one can determine how much measure is yet to be lost, how long the patient has yet to live. This belief has given rise to the proverbial phrase _das Maas verlieren_--"to lose one's measure" (462. III. 1163-5).

Not upon adults alone, however, were these measurements carried out, but upon infants, children, and youths as well. Even in the New World, among the more conservative of the population of Aryan origin, these customs still nourish, as we learn from comparatively recent descriptions of trustworthy investigators. Professor J. Howard Gore, in the course of an interesting article on "The Go-Backs," belief in which is current among the dwellers in the mountain regions of the State of Virginia, tells us that when some one has suggested that "the baby has the 'go-backs,'" the following process is gone through: "The mother then must go alone with the babe to some old lady duly instructed in the art or science of curing this blighting disease. She, taking the infant, divests it of its clothing and places it on its back. Then, with a yarn string, she measures its length or height from the crown of the head to the sole of the heel, cutting off a piece which exactly represents this length. This she applies to the foot, measuring off length by length, to see if the piece of yarn contains the length of the foot an exact number of times.

This operation is watched by the mother with the greatest anxiety, for on this coincidence of measure depends the child's weal or woe. If the length of the string is an exact multiple of the length of the foot, nothing is wrong, but if there is a remainder, however small, the baby has the go-backs, and the extent of the malady is proportional to this remainder. Of course in this measuring, the elasticity of the yarn is not regarded, nor repet.i.tions tried as a test of accuracy" (244. 108).

Moreover, "the string with which the determination was made must be hung on the hinge of a gate on the premises of the infant's parents, and as the string by gradual decay pa.s.ses away, so pa.s.ses away the 'go-backs.'

But if the string should be lost, the ailment will linger until a new test is made and the string once more hung out to decay. Sometimes the cure is hastened by fixing the string so that wear will come upon it."

Professor Gore aptly refers to the Latin proverb _ex pede Herculem_, which arose from the calculation of Pythagoras, who from the _stadium_ of 6000 feet laid out by Hercules for the Olympian games, by using his own foot as the unit, obtained the length of the foot of the mighty hero, whence he also deduced his height. We are not told, however, as the author remarks, whether or not Hercules had the "go-backs."

Among the white settlers of the Alleghanies between southwestern Georgia and the Pennsylvania line, according to Mr. J. Hampden Porter, the following custom is in vogue: "Measuring an infant, whose growth has been arrested, with an elastic cord that requires to be stretched in order to equal the child's length, will set it right again. If the spell be a wasting one, take three strings of similar or unlike colours, tie them to the front door or gate in such a manner that whenever either are opened there is some wear and tear of the cords. As use begins to tell upon them, vigour will recommence" (480. VII. 116). Similar practices are reported from Central Europe by Sartori (392 (1895). 88), whose article deals with the folk-lore of counting, weighing, and measuring.

_Tests of Physical Efficiency._

That certain rude tests of physical efficiency, bodily strength, and power of endurance have been and are in use among primitive peoples, especially at the birth of children, or soon after, or just before, at, or after, p.u.b.erty, is a well-known fact, further testified to by the occurrence of these practices in folk-tales and fairy-stories. Lifting stones, jumping over obstacles, throwing stones, spears, and the like, crawling or creeping through holes in stones, rocks, or trees, have all been in vogue, and some of them survive even to-day in England and in other parts of Europe as popular tests of p.u.b.erty and virginity. Mr.

Dyer, in his _Church Lore Gleanings_, mentions the "louping," or "petting" stone at Belford, in Northumberland (England), a stone "placed in the path outside the church porch, over which the bridal pair with their attendants must leap"--the belief is that "the bride must leave all her pets and humours behind her when she crosses it." At High-Coquetdale, according to Mr. Henderson, in 1868, a bride was made to jump over a stick held by two groomsmen at the church door (436.

125). Another very curious practice is connected with St. Wilfrid's "needle" at Ripon Cathedral--said to be an imitation of the Basilican transenna. Through this pa.s.sage maidens who were accused of unchast.i.ty crept in order to prove their innocence. If they could not pa.s.s through, their guilt was presumed. It is also believed that "poor palsied folk crept through in the expectation of being healed." At Boxley Church in Kent, there was a "small figure of St. Rumbold, which only those could lift who had never sinned in thought or deed" (436. 312, 313).

At a marriage among the Nootka Indians of Vancouver Island, the groom's party essay feats like these: "Heavy weights are lifted; they try who is the best jumper. A blanket with a hole in the centre is hung up, and men walk up to it blindfolded from a distance of about twenty steps. When they get near it they must point with their fingers towards the blanket, and try to hit the hole. They also climb a pole, on top of which an eagle's nest, or something representing an eagle's nest, is placed. The winner of each game receives a number of blankets from the girl's father. When the games are at an end, the groom's father distributes blankets among the other party" (404. 43). This reminds us of the games at picnics and social gatherings of our own people.

In the _Gentleman's Magazine_ for January, 1895, S. O. Addy, in an article ent.i.tled "English Surnames and Heredity," points out how the etymologies give us some indications of the physical characteristics of the persons on whom the names were conferred. In primitive times and among the lower races names are even of more importance in this respect.

Clark says: "I have seen a baby not two days old snugly tied up in one of these little sacks; the rope tied to the pommel of the saddle, the sack hanging down alongside of the pony, and mother and child comfortably jogging along, making a good day's march in bitter cold winter weather, easily keeping up with a column of cavalry which was after hostile Indians. After being carefully and firmly tied in the cradle, the child, as a rule, is only taken out to be cleaned in the morning, and again in the evening just before the inmates of a lodge go to sleep; sometimes also in the middle of the day, but on the march only morning and evening" (420. 57).

In his account of the habits of the Tarahumari Indians, Lumholtz observes: "Heat never seems to trouble them. I have seen young babies sleeping with uncovered heads on the backs of their mothers, exposed to the fierce heat of the summer sun." The same writer tells us that once he pulled six hairs at once from a sleeping child, "without causing the least disturbance," and only when twenty-three had been extracted at once did the child take notice, and then only scratched its head and slept on (107. 297).

Colonel Dodge notes the following practice in vogue among the wild Indians of the West:--

"While the child, either boy or girl, is very young, the mother has entire charge, control, and management of it. It is soon taught not to cry by a very summary process. When it attempts to 'set up a yell,' the mother covers its mouth with the palm of her hand, grasps its nose between her thumb and forefinger, and holds on until the little one is nearly suffocated. It is then let go, to be seized and smothered again at the first attempt to cry. The baby very soon comprehends that silence is the best policy" (432.187).