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" "Another curious
ceremony, of which even the memory is now almost forgotten, was
enacted after the first working of the corn, when the owner or
priest stood in succession at each of the four corners of the field
and wept and wailed loudly. Even the priests are now unable to give
a reason for this performance, which may have been a lament for the
bloody death of Selu," the Old Woman of the Corn. In these Cherokee
practices the lamentations and the invocations of the Old Woman of
the Corn resemble the ancient Egyptian customs of lamenting over the
first corn cut and calling upon Isis, herself probably in one of her
aspects an Old Woman of the Corn. Further, the Cherokee precaution
of leaving a clear path from the field to the house resembles the
Egyptian invitation to Osiris, "Come to thy house." So in the East
Indies to this day people observe elaborate ceremonies for the
purpose of bringing back the Soul of the Rice from the fields to the
barn. The Nandi of East Africa perform a ceremony in September when
the eleusine grain is ripening.


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