(M116) About Berneck, in Upper Franken, the man who gives the last stroke at threshing runs away. If the others catch him, he gets “the Old Woman,” that is, the largest dumpling, which elsewhere is baked in human shape. The custom of setting a dumpling baked in the form of an old woman before the man who has given the last stroke at threshing is also observed in various parts of Middle Franken. Sometimes the excised genitals of a calf are served up to him at table.(497) At Langenbielau in Silesia the last sheaf, which is called “the Old Man,” is threshed separately and the corn ground into meal and baked into a loaf. This loaf is believed to possess healing virtue and to bring a blessing; hence none but members of the family may partake of it. At Wittichenau, in the district of Hoyerswerda (Silesia), when the threshing is ended, some of the straw of “the Old Man” is carried to a neighbour who has not yet finished his threshing, and the bearer is rewarded with a gratuity.(498) Among the Germans of the Falkenauer district in West Bohemia the man who gives the last stroke at threshing gets “the Old Man,” a hideous scarecrow, tied on his back. If threshing is still proceeding at another farm, he may go thither and rid himself of his burden, but must take care not to be caught. In this way a farmer who is behind-hand with his threshing may receive several such scarecrows, and so become the target for many gibes. Among the Germans of the Planer district in West Bohemia, the man who gives the last stroke at threshing is himself called “the Old Man.” Similarly at flax-dressing in Silberberg (West Bohemia), the woman who is the last to finish her task is said to get the Old Man, and a cake baked in human form is served up to her at supper.(499) The Wends of Saxony say of the man who gives the last stroke at threshing that “he has struck the Old Man” (_wón je stareho bil_), and he is obliged to carry a straw puppet to a neighbour, who has not yet finished his threshing, where he throws the puppet unobserved over the fence.(500) In some parts of Sweden, when a stranger woman appears on the threshing-floor, a flail is put round her body, stalks of corn are wound round her neck, a crown of ears is placed on her head, and the threshers call out, “Behold the Corn-woman.” Here the stranger woman, thus suddenly appearing, is taken to be the corn-spirit who has just been expelled by the flails from the corn-stalks.(501) In other cases the farmer’s wife represents the corn-spirit. Thus in the Commune of Saligné, Canton de Poiret (Vendée), the farmer’s wife, along with the last sheaf, is tied up in a sheet, placed on a litter, and carried to the threshing machine, under which she is shoved. Then the woman is drawn out and the sheaf is threshed by itself, but the woman is tossed in the sheet, as if she were being winnowed.(502) It would be impossible to express more clearly the identification of the woman with the corn than by this graphic