Now in the
parallels which have been hitherto adduced from the customs of
peoples outside Europe the spirit of the crops appears only in
vegetable form. It remains, therefore, to prove that other races
besides our European peasantry have conceived the spirit of the
crops as incorporate in or represented by living men and women. Such
a proof, I may remind the reader, is germane to the theme of this
book; for the more instances we discover of human beings
representing in themselves the life or animating spirit of plants,
the less difficulty will be felt at classing amongst them the King
of the Wood at Nemi.
The Mandans and Minnitarees of North America used to hold a festival
in spring which they called the corn-medicine festival of the women.
They thought that a certain Old Woman who Never Dies made the crops
to grow, and that, living somewhere in the south, she sent the
migratory waterfowl in spring as her tokens and representatives.
Each sort of bird represented a special kind of crop cultivated by
the Indians: the wild goose stood for the maize, the wild swan for
the gourds, and the wild duck for the beans.
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