their hens.(959) In these customs the dancing for the express purpose of making the crops grow high,(960) and the use of the straw to make the geese and hens lay more eggs, sufficiently prove that the Shrovetide Bear is conceived to represent the spirit of fertility both animal and vegetable; and we may reasonably conjecture that the dances of the mummer with the women and girls are especially intended to convey to them the fertilising powers of the spirit whom the mummer personates.(961) (M241) In some parts of Bohemia the straw-clad man in these Shrovetide processions is called, not the Bear, but the Oats-goat, and he wears horns on his head to give point to the name.(962) These different names and disguises indicate that in some places the corn-spirit is conceived as a bear and in others as a goat. Many examples of the conception of the corn-spirit as a goat have already been cited;(963) the conception of him as a bear seems to be less common. In the neighbourhood of Gniewkowo, in Prussian Lithuania, the two ideas are combined, for on Twelfth Day a man wrapt in pease-straw to represent a Bear and another wrapt in oats-straw to represent a Goat go together about the village; they imitate the actions of the two animals and perform dances, for which they receive a present in every house.(964) At Marburg in Steiermark the corn-spirit figures now as a wolf and now as a bear. The man who gave the last stroke at threshing is called the Wolf. All the other men flee from the barn, and wait till the Wolf comes forth; whereupon they pounce on him, wrap him in straw to resemble a wolf, and so lead him about the village. He keeps the name of Wolf till Christmas, when he is wrapt in a goat’s skin and led from house to house as a Pease-bear at the end of a rope.(965) In this custom the dressing of the mummer in a goat’s skin seems to mark him out as the representative of a goat; so that here the mythical fancy of the people apparently hesitates between a goat, a bear, and a wolf as the proper embodiment of the corn-spirit. In Scandinavia the conception of the spirit as a goat who appears at Christmas (_Julbuck_) appears to be common. Thus, for example, in Bergslagshärad (Sweden) it used to be customary at Christmas to lead about a man completely wrapt in corn-straw and wearing a goat’s horns on his head: he personated the Yule-goat.(966) In some parts of Sweden a regular feature of the little Christmas drama is a pretence of slaughtering the Yule-goat, who, however, comes to life again. The actor, hidden by a coverlet made of skins and wearing a pair of formidable horns, is led into the room by two men, who make believe to slaughter him, while they sing verses referring to the mantles of various colours, red, blue, white, and yellow, which they laid on him, one after the other. At the conclusion of the song, the Yule-goat, after feigning death, jumps up and skips about to the amusement of the spectators.(967)