them mainly when he notes that they bring the seasons, and he cares for
the seasons mainly because they bring him food. A season is to him as a
_Hora_ was at first to the Greeks, _the fruits of a season_, what our
farmers would call "a good _year_."

* * * * *

The sun, then, had no ritual till it was seen that he led in the
seasons; but long before that was known, it was seen that the seasons
were annual, that they went round in a _ring_; and because that annual
ring was long in revolving, great was man's hope and fear in the winter,
great his relief and joy in the spring. It was literally a matter of
death and life, and it was as death and life that he sometimes
represented it, as we have seen in the figures of Adonis and Osiris.

Adonis and Osiris have their modern parallels, who leave us in no doubt
as to the meaning of their figures. Thus on the 1st of March in
Thüringen a ceremony is performed called "Driving out the Death." The
young people make up a figure of straw, dress it in old clothes, carry
it out and throw it into the river. Then they come back, tell the good
news to the village, and are given eggs and food as a reward. In Bohemia
the children carry out a straw puppet and burn it. While they are
burning it they sing--

"Now carry we Death out of the village,
The new Summer into the village,
Welcome, dear Summer,
Green little corn."

In other parts of Bohemia the song varies; it is not Summer that comes