A still more attenuated survival is quoted by Mr. Gomme from another English village. “A Whitsuntide custom in the parish of King’s Teignton, Devonshire, is thus described: A lamb is drawn about the parish on Whitsun Monday in a cart covered with garlands of lilac, laburnum, and other flowers, when persons are requested to give something towards the animal and attendant expenses; on Tuesday it is killed and roasted whole in the middle of the village. The lamb is then sold in slices to the poor at a cheap rate. The origin of the custom is forgotten, but a tradition, supposed to trace back to heathen days, is to this effect: The village suffered from a dearth of water, when the inhabitants were advised by their priests to pray to the gods for water; whereupon the water sprang up spontaneously in a meadow about a third of a mile above the river, in an estate now called Rydon, amply sufficient to supply the wants of the place, and at present adequate, even in a dry summer, to work three mills. A lamb, it is said, has ever since that time been sacrificed as a votive thank-offering at Whitsuntide in the manner before mentioned. The said water appears like a large pond, from which in rainy weather may be seen jets springing up some inches above the surface in many parts. It has ever had the name of ‘Fair Water.’” I mention this curious instance here, because it well illustrates the elusive way in which such divine customs of various origins merge into one another; and also the manner in which different ideas are attached in different places to very similar ceremonies. For Mr. Frazer has shown that the notion of a rain-charm is also closely bound up with {292}the gods of agriculture; the Khond Meriah must weep, or there will be no rain that year; his red blood must flow, or the turmeric will not produce its proper red colour. (Compare the red blood that flowed from Poly-dorus’s cornel, and the Indian’s blood that drops from the Canadian bloodroot.) In this last instance of the King’s Teignton ceremony, it is the rain-charm that has most clearly survived to our days: and there are obvious references to a human sacrifice offered up to make a river-god in times long gone, and now replaced by an animal victim. The garlands of lilac, laburnum, and other flowers are, however, common adornments of the artificial god of cultivation; they occurred in the Dionvsiac rites and the Attis festival, and are still preserved in many European customs.