- other, better informed, they may convey important intimations
of the future. Tacitus mentions, for example, the favorable augury that was granted to the Romans on the eve of a battle with the Germans by the flight of eight eagles who sought the woods (Tac. Ann., ii. 17. 2). The same author informs us of a melancholy omen which occurred to Paetus when he and his army were crossing the Euphrates. Without apparent cause, the horse which bore the consular insignia turned backwards (Ibid., xv. 7. 3). Each of these signs was of course followed by its appropriate exents. A belief which is thus found in a civilized nation naturally has its prototype among the uncivilized. The Kafirs believe that the spirits send them omens. Thus a wild animal entering a kraal is "regarded as a messenger from the spirit to remind the people that they have done something wrong." Another omen which is considered very terrible is the bleating of a sheep while it is being slaughtered. A councilor, to whom it occurred to hear this sign, was told by a prophet that it "foreboded his death." Strange to say, his chief soon after sent soldiers to kill him, and the man only averted his threatened fate by escaping to Natal. Among other natural events which are omens to the Kafirs are, "a child born dead; a woman two days in parturition; a man burnt while sitting by the fire, unless he were asleep or drunk" (K. N. pp. 162, 163). "An unexpected whirlwind will suggest to" the Chinese "the contest of evil spirits; and the flying of a crow in a peculiar direction fill them with consternation. In such a deplorable state," gravely observes the missionary who records these facts, "is the heathen mind" (C. O., vol. ii. p. 208). Perhaps he did not consider that there were many in more enlightened countries who would be alarmed at the omen implied by a dinner-party of thirteen, and who would regard it as of evil augury to begin a journey on Friday. In such a deplorable state is the Christian mind.
Ceylon appears to be remarkable for the faith placed by its inhabitants in omens, which are even said to regulate their whole conduct and to intimate their destiny from birth onwards. Children, of whose future the astrologers predict evil, are sometimes destroyed in order to avoid their pre-determined misery. On going out in the morning, the Singhalese anxiously remark
