and bless our crops!”​[1015] [Sidenote: Suggested explanation of connexion of frog with rain.] Some of these customs and beliefs may be, at least in part, based on the frog’s habit of storing up water in its body against seasons of drought; when it is caught at such times, it squirts the water out in a jet.​[1016] On seeing a frog emit a gush of water when all around was dry and parched, savages might easily infer that the creature had caused the drought by swallowing all the water, and that in order to restore its moisture to the thirsty ground they had only to make the frog disgorge its secret store of the precious liquid. [Sidenote: Stopping rain by means of rabbits and serpents.] Among some tribes of South Africa, when too much rain falls, the wizard, accompanied by a large crowd, repairs to the house of a family where there has been no death for a very long time, and there he burns the skin of a coney. As it burns he shouts, “The rabbit is burning,” and the cry is taken up by the whole crowd, who continue shouting till they are exhausted.​[1017] This no doubt is supposed to stop the rain. Equally effective is a method adopted by gypsies in Austria. When the rain has continued to pour steadily for a long time, to the great discomfort of these homeless vagrants, the men of the band assemble at a river and divide themselves into two parties. Some of them cut branches with which to make a raft, while the others collect hazel leaves and cover the raft with them. A witch thereupon lays a dried serpent, wrapt {p296} in white rags, on the raft, which is then carried by several men to the river. Women are not allowed to be present at this part of the ceremony. While the procession moves towards the river, the witch marches behind the raft singing a song, of which the burden is a statement that gypsies do not like water, and have no urgent need of serpents’ milk, coupled with the expression of a hope that the serpent may see his way to swallow the water, that he may run to his mother and drink milk from her breasts, and that the sun may shine out, bringing back mirth and jollity to gypsy hearts. Transylvanian gypsies will sometimes expose the dried carcase of a serpent to the pouring rain, “in order that the serpent may convince himself of the inclemency of the weather, and so grant the people’s wish.”​[1018] [Sidenote: Doing violence to the being who controls the weather.]