some" and that she very cleverly anticipated them by going to the Pope to confess all and throw herself on his mercy. Inasmuch as he granted her absolution, one cannot help wondering if he did not read between the lines of this confession the occult truth and recognize her as a lawful Borderland spouse. Most of the accounts state that Magdalen's lover was the Devil, who appeared to her as a black man. Here we come upon the same root idea, doubtless, as that behind the black Madonnas, the black Krishna and the black Quetzalcoot of Mexico, a symbolism due perhaps in part to the darkness of the unknown world whence they emerge, and in part to their folklore and occult aspect as deities of night-time and Borderland nuptials. "I am black, but comely," says one of the lovers in that mystical and passionate Song of Solomon.
I have already referred to the Song of Solomon as being interpreted by Christian comment and said to be a poetical statement of the rapturous union between Christ and his Bride, the Church. A side light is thrown upon the interpretation by a note in Kitto's illustrated Bible, which quotes Lane (Modern Egyptians) as saying that the odes sung by Mohammedans at religious festivals were of a similar nature with the Song of Solomon, generally alluding to the Prophet as the object of love and praise. In the small collection of poems sung at Zikirs it appears is one ending with these lines:
"The phantom of thy form visited me in my slumber; I said: 'O phantom of slumber! who sent thee?' He said: 'He sent me whom thou Knowest: He whose love occupies thee.'
The beloved of my heart visited me in the darkness of night. I stood to show him honor, until he sat down, I said, 'O thou my petition and all my desire! Hast thou come at midnight, and not feared the watchman?' He said to me, 'I feared: but, however, love Had taken from me my soul and my breath.' "
"Finding that songs of this description are exceedingly numerous, and almost the only poems sung at Zikirs; that they are composed for that purpose and intended only to
