The rest of that day is spent much in the same manner as the former one, only this time in the house of the bridegroom's parents. Among the customs attached to this first day of wedded life is that of breaking the distaff. If the young matron can succeed in doing so at one stroke across her knee, then she will be sure to have strong and healthy sons. If the reverse, she has only girls to expect.

The third day is called the finishing-up day, each of the two families assembling its own friends and relations to consume the provisions remaining over from the former banquet, and at the same time to wash up the cooking utensils and the crockery, restoring whatever has been borrowed from neighbours in the shape of plates, wine-jugs, &c.,&c., the new-married couple joining the entertainment, now at the one, now at the other house. This day is the closing of the wedding festivities, which have kept both families in a state of unusual bustle and excitement for fully a week. Everything now returns to everyday order and regularity, the young couple usually taking up their abode in a small back-room in the house of the young man's parents, and putting off till the following spring the important business of setting to build a house of their own. Dancing and feasting are now at an

By-and-by, when a few months have passed over the head of the new-married couple, and the young matron becomes aware that the prophecies pointed at by the doll's cradle and the broken distaff are likely to come true, she is carefully instructed as to the conduct she must observe in order to ensure the wellbeing of herself and her child.

In the first place, she must on no account conceal her state, or deny it when interrogated on the subject for if she do so, her child will never learn to speak; nor may she wear beads on her neck, for that would cause the infant to be strangled at its birth. Carrying peas or beans in her apron will produce malignant eruptions; and sweeping a chimney will make the child narrowbreasted.

On no account should she be allowed to pull off her husband's boots, nor to hand him a glowing coal to light his pipe; for both these actions bring misfortune. In driving to market she may not sit with her back to the horses, nor may she ever drink at the well out of a wooden bucket.

Also, her intercourse with the pig-sty must be very carefully regulated; for if she listen too attentively to the grunting of pigs, her child will have a deep grunting voice; and if she kick the swine or push them away with her foot, the infant will have bristly hair on its back. Hair on the face will be the result of beating a dog or cat, and twins will be the consequence of eating double cherries or sitting at the corner of the table.

During this time she may not

Both mother and child must be carefully watched over during the first few days after the birth, and all evil influences averted. The visit of another woman who has herself a babe at the breast, may deprive the young mother of her milk; and any one who enters the house without sitting down, will assuredly carry off the infant's sleep.

If the child be subject to frequent and apparently groundless fits of crying, that is a sure sign that it has been bewitched, either by some one whose eyebrows are grown together, and may consequently be supposed to have the evil eye, or by one of the invisible evil spirits whose power is great before the child has been taken to church; but even a person with quite commonplace eyebrows may convey evil by unduly praising the child's good looks, unless the mother remembers to spit on the ground as soon as the words are spoken.

I will here quote a few specimens of the various recipes in vogue for undoing such evil spells :

Nine straws, which must be counted backwards from nine till one, should be placed in a jug of water, drawn from the river with the current, not against; into this are thrown parings of wood from off the cradle, the doorstep, and the four corners of the room in which the child was born, also nine pinches of ashes, likewise counted backwards. When all these various ingredients have been boiled up together, the water is poured boiling hot into a large basin, and the pot left in it upsidedown. If the boiling water draws itself into the jug (as of course it will), that is proof positive that

mother should moisten its forehead with the water before it is cold, and give it (still counting backwards) nine drops to drink.

The child that has been bewitched may likewise be held above a red-hot ploughshare on which a glass of wine has been poured; or else a glass of water in which a red-hot horse-shoe has been placed, given to drink.

In almost every village there used, not long ago, to be old women who made a regular trade out of preparing the water which was to undo evil spells.

The Saxon mother is careful not to leave her child alone until it has been baptised, for fear of the malignant spirits, who may steal it away, leaving an uncouth elf in its place. Whenever a child grows up clumsy and heavy, with large head, wide mouth, stump nose, and crooked legs, the gossips are ready to swear that it has been changed in the cradle, more especially if it prove awkward and slow in learning to speak. To guard against such an accident, it is recommended to mothers obliged to leave their infants alone, to place beneath the pillow either a prayer-book, a broom, a loaf of bread, or a knife stuck point upwards.

Very cruel remedies have sometimes been resorted to in order to force the evil spirits to restore the child they have stolen, and take back their own changeling. For instance, the unfortunate little creature suspected of being an elf was placed astride upon a hedge and beaten with a thorny branch till it was quite bloody; it was then supposed that the evil spirits brought back the stolen child.

The infant should not be suffered to look at itself in the glass till

after the baptism, nor should it be held near an open window. A very efficacious preservative against all sorts of evil spells is to hang round the child's neck a little triangular bag stuffed with grains of incense, wormwood, and various aromatic herbs, and with an adder's head embroidered outside; a gold coin sewed into the cap will likewise keep the spirits away.

Two godfathers and two godmothers are generally appointed at Saxon peasant christenings, and it is customary that one couple should be old and the other young; but in no case should a husband and wife figure as god-parents at the same baptism, but each one of the quartet must belong to a different family. This is the general custom ; but in some districts the rule demands two godfathers and one godmother for a boy-two godmothers and one godfather for a girl.

If the parents have lost other children before, then the infant should not be carried out by the door in going to church, but handed out by the window, and brought back in the same way. It should be carried by the broadest street, never by narrow lanes, else it will learn thieving.

The god-parents must not look round on their way to church; and the first person met by the christening procession will decide the sex of the next child to be born -a boy if it be a man.

If two children are baptised out of the same water, one of them will soon die; and if several boys are christened successively in the same church, there will be war in the land as soon as they are grown up. Many girls denote fruitful vintages for the country when they have attained a marriageable age.

If the child sleeps during the

baptismal ceremony, then it will be pious and good-tempered; but if it cries, it will be bad-tempered or unlucky: therefore the first question asked by the parents on the return from church is generally, "Was it a quiet baptism?" and if such has not been the case, the sponsors are apt to conceal the truth.

In some places the christening procession returning to the house of the parents finds the door closed. After knocking for some time in vain, a voice from within summons the godfather to name seven bald men out of the parish. When this has been answered, a further question is asked as to the gospel read in church; and only on receiving the answer, "Let the little children come to me," is the door flung open, saying, “Come in; you have hearkened attentively to the words of the Lord."

The god-parents next inquiring, "Where shall we put the child? receive the following answer :—

"On the bunker let it be,

That it may jump like a flea;
Put it next upon the hearth,
Heavy gold it will be worth.
On the floor then let it sleep,
That it once may help to sweep;
On the table in a dish,

It will grow then like a fish."

After holding it succesively on each of these places, it is finally put back into the cradle, while the guests prepare to enjoy the Tauf Schmaus or christening banquet.

Each person is expected to bring a small contribution in the shape of eggs, bacon, fruit, or cakes; and the god-parents do not fail to come each laden with a bottle of good wine, besides some other small gift for the child.

The banquet is a noisy and merry one, and many are the

games and jokes practised on these occasions. One of these, called the Badspringen (jumping the bath), consists in putting a lighted candle on a washing-trough, which is placed upside-down on the ground. All the young women present are invited to jump over without upsetting or putting out the light. Those who are successful in this evolution will be mothers of healthy boys. If they are bashful, and refuse to jump, or should they be awkward enough to upset the candle, they will be childless, or have only girls.

The Spiesstanz, or spit-dance, is also usual on these occasions. Two roasting-spits are laid on the ground crosswise, as in the sworddance, and the movements executed much in the same manner. Sometimes it is the grandfather of the new-born infant who opens the performance, proud of displaying his agility as he sings:

For full four weeks after the birth of her child must she stay at home, and durst not step over the threshold of her courtyard. even though she has resumed all her daily occupations within the first week of her recovery. "I may not go outside till my time is out; the Herr Vater would be sorely angered if he saw me," is the answer I have often heard from a woman who declined to come out on to the road. Neither may she spin during these four weeks, lest her child should suffer from dizziness.

When the time of this enforced retirement has elapsed, the young mother repairs to church along with her infant to be blessed by the pastor; but before so doing she is careful to seek the nearest well and throw down a piece of bread into its depths, probably as an offering to the Brunnenfrau supposed to reside in each water, and who is said to lure little children down to her.

With these first four weeks the greatest perils of infancy are considered to be at an end; but no careful mother will fail to observe the many little customs and regulations which alone will ensure the further health and wellbeing of her child.

Thus she will always remember that the baby may only be washed between sunrise and sunset, and that the bathing-water may not be poured out into the yard at a place where any one can step over it, which would entail sickness or death, or at the very least deprive the child of its sleep.

Two children which cannot yet speak must not be allowed to kiss each other, or neither of them will ever learn to talk.

A book laid under the child's pillow will make it an apt scholar;