248 Correspondence.
The custom of blessing trees is common. It is done on the eve of the Epiphany (January 5).^
On the other hand, in Courland, apple-trees are struck with a stick on the first day of Christmas, so that there may be a good crop of fruit. 2 Dr. Frazer has collected numerous examples of the beneficial effects of curses and abuse in connection with trees and plants.* The commentator on the Laws of Manu writes: — " Through fear of being cut down and the like immovable things such as trees become fit to be enjoyed by means of their fruit, flowers, and so forth, i.e. they transgress not the law according to which they must give flowers, etc., at the appointed season."^ In English custom the habit of discharging guns at trees may have been partly prophylactic, partly by way of menace. In India, a barren tree will bear if a naked man cuts a piece off it on the day of an eclipse.*' Again, Mr. Denys Bray writes : — " They have a pretty way in Makran of dealing with a mango tree or date palm that fails to give fruit. The owner gets a couple of friends to bear him company, and strides up to it in a threatening manner. "What's all this?", he bawls. "No fruit? D'you think you can make a fool of me ? I'll soon show you're mightily mistaken." And with that he gives it a stroke with his axe. Thereupon his comrades fling themselves upon him and seize his hands : only let him spare the poor thing tlais once and it'll be on its best behaviour in future, they'll be bound. But he wrenches himself loose and gives it another blow before they can. stop him. In time of course they wheedle him into a more forgiving frame of mind, and turn to the tree and say, " Harkee, brother Mango ! We've begged you off this time, or by the Almighty he would have had you down. And now that we have given our word for your good behaviour, you'd best bear fruit next year and plenty of it, or you'll catch it
2 T. F. Thistleton Dyer, British Popular Customs (1876), pp. 20 et seq.', J. Brand, Observations on Popular Antiquities etc. (1848), vol. i., pp. 28 £t seq.; N. <sr Q., 7th S., vol. xi., pp. 103, 2J7, 337; 9th S., vol. ix., pp. 287, 314.
^W. Mannhardt, IVald- und Feld Kulte (1875), 11 ■> Der Baumcultus der Gerntanen, vol. i. , p. 276.
- The Golden Bough, part i., vol. i. , pp. 279 et seq. ; vol. ii., pp. 20 et seq.
- vii., 15, Sacred Books of the East, vol. xxv., p. 218 «.
T. R. Hemingway, Gazetteer Godavari District (1907), vol. i., p. 47.
