Mr. Frazer, at all events, sees a connection between Purim and the ride of the beardless. But the latter is popular, not official, in spite of the fact that the king takes most of the goods facetiously robbed. As popular, the ride is more primitive, he thinks, and shows its meaning better than the Sacæa does. So Mr. Frazer says 'if there is any truth in the connection thus traced between Purim and the "Ride of the Beardless One," we are now in a position to finally unmask the leading personages in the Book of Esther,' and show how Marduk and Humman got into the plot. Purim is not only the Sacæa, sacrifice and all, but is also connected with the 'Ride of the Beardless One,' in which there was no sacrifice. How this, if true, enables us 'to finally unmask' the characters in _Esther_, is not at first very clear. Apparently the buffoonery of the beardless one, who complained of the heat while the populace snowballed him in March, was a magical ceremony, to make hot weather by pretending that the weather, in fact, _was_ hot.[17] Therefore, the hypothetical rites of Haman Vashti Mordecai Esther represent, in the first pair, the decaying; in the second pair, the reviving, energies of vegetation, past and present. One pair mates and the male, at least, is slain; the other pair mates and survives, to encourage vegetable life. By the hypothesis the first pair (Haman and Vashti) originally lived as man and wife for a whole year, 'on the conclusion of which the male partner' (Haman) 'was put to death.' Of course, even if Haman was the mock-king slain at the Sacæa (which we do not grant), his mock-kingship was very brief. However, it lasted for a year, Originally, we may conjecture.' The later fortunes of Vashti are wrapped up in mystery. But I cannot refrain from quoting one of my author's most eloquent passages on this obscure subject. We do not hear that Vashti was put to death, in fact we do not hear anything about her at all from our one authority; but I the nature of maternity suggests an obvious reason for sparing her a little longer, till that mysterious law, which links together woman's life with the changing aspects of the nightly sky, had been fulfilled by the birth of an infant god, who should in his turn, reared perhaps by her tender care, grow up to live and die for the world.'[18] As Vashti, except for her profession, was not an habitual criminal, let us hope that she was spared to look after the baby. Her issue, if any, and if male, was apparently an hereditary criminal, for otherwise he would not be hanged: the victims were always condemned criminals. The cruelty of thus deliberately breeding such a criminal class, for the mere purpose of hanging them, is shocking to the modern mind. We wish to know whether the Jewish Hamans were also born and bred up to the business. Mr. Frazer does not tell us that this was the case, or what became of Vashti's female issue.