Here it is obvious
that fruitfulness is believed to inhere in a stick cut from a
fruitful tree and to be imparted by contact to the young banana
plants. Similarly in New Caledonia a man will beat his taro plants
lightly with a branch, saying as he does so, "I beat this taro that
it may grow," after which he plants the branch in the ground at the
end of the field. Among the Indians of Brazil at the mouth of the
Amazon, when a man wishes to increase the size of his generative
organ, he strikes it with the fruit of a white aquatic plant called
_aninga,_ which grows luxuriantly on the banks of the river. The
fruit, which is inedible, resembles a banana, and is clearly chosen
for this purpose on account of its shape. The ceremony should be
performed three days before or after the new moon. In the county of
Bekes, in Hungary, barren women are fertilised by being struck with
a stick which has first been used to separate pairing dogs. Here a
fertilising virtue is clearly supposed to be inherent in the stick
and to be conveyed by contact to the women.
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