In Germany St. Andrew's Eve is a great occasion for prognostications of the future. Indeed, like Hallowe'en in Great Britain, _Andreasabend_ in Germany seems to have preserved the customs of augury connected with the old November New Year festival.{15} To a large extent the practices are performed by girls anxious to know what sort of husband they will get. Many and various are the methods. Sometimes it suffices to repeat some such rhyme as the following before going to sleep, and the future husband will appear in a dream:-- "St. Andrew's Eve is to-day, Sleep all people, Sleep all children of men, Who are between heaven and earth, Except this only man, Who may be mine in marriage."{16} Again, at nightfall let a girl shut herself up naked in her bedroom, take two beakers, and into one pour clear water, into the other wine. These let her place on the table, which is to be covered with white, and let the following words be said:-- "My dear St. Andrew! Let now appear before me My heart's most dearly beloved. If he shall be rich, He will pour a cup of wine; If he is to be poor, Let him pour a cup of water." This done, the form of the future husband will enter and drink |215| of one of the cups. If he is poor, he will take the water; if rich, the wine.{17} One of the most common practices is to pour molten lead or tin through a key into cold water, and to discover the calling of the future husband by the form it takes, which will represent the tools of his trade. The white of an egg is sometimes used for the same purpose.{18} Another very widespread custom is to put nutshells to float on water with little candles burning in them. There are twice as many shells as there are girls present; each girl has her shell, and to the others the names of possible suitors are given. The man and the girl whose shells come together will marry one another. Sometimes the same method is practised with little cups of silver foil.{19} On the border of Saxony and Bohemia, a maiden who wishes to know the bodily build of her future husband goes in the darkness to a stack of wood and draws out a piece. If the wood is smooth and straight the man will be slim and well built; if it is crooked, or knotted, he will be ill-developed or even a hunchback.{20} These are but a few of the many ways in which girls seek to peer into the future and learn something about the most important event in their lives. Far less numerous, but not altogether absent on this night, are other kinds of prognostication. A person, for instance, who wishes to know whether he will die in the coming year, must on St. Andrew's Eve before going to bed make on the table a little pointed heap of flour. If by the morning it has fallen asunder, the maker will die.{21}