the body and drinking the blood of the god. In the “hunting of the wren,” and the procession with the man clad in a cow-skin, there is nothing to show that the customs in question have any relation to agriculture. So far as appears, they may date from the pre-agricultural era when animals were revered as divine in themselves, not merely as divine because they embodied the corn-spirit; and the analogy of the Gilyak procession of the bear, and the Indian procession of the snake is in favour of assigning the corresponding European customs to this very early date. On the other hand, there are certain European processions of animals, or of men disguised as animals, which may possibly be purely agricultural in their origin;(439) in other words, the animals which figure in them may have been from the first nothing but representatives of the corn-spirit conceived in animal shape. But it is at least equally possible that these processions originated in the pre-agricultural era, and have only received an agricultural tinge from the environment in which they have so long survived. But the question is an obscure and difficult one, and cannot be here discussed. § 13.—Transference of evil. The custom of killing the god has now been proved to have been practised by peoples in the hunting, pastoral, and agricultural stages of society, and the various reasons for observing the custom have been explained. One aspect of the custom still remains to be noticed. The accumulated misfortunes and sins of the whole people are sometimes laid upon the dying god, who is supposed to bear them away for ever, leaving the people innocent and happy. The notion that we can transfer our pains and griefs to some other being who will bear them in our stead is familiar to the savage mind. It arises from a very obvious confusion between the physical and the mental. Because it is possible to transfer a load of wood, stones, or what not, from our own back to the back of another, the savage fancies that it is equally possible to transfer the burden of his pains and sorrows to another, who will suffer them in his stead. Upon this idea he acts, and the result is an endless number of often very unamiable devices for putting off upon some one else the trouble which a man shrinks from bearing himself. Such devices are amongst the most familiar facts in folk-lore; but for the benefit of readers who are not professed students of folk-lore, a few illustrations may be given.