representing the primitive methods of agriculture, the vintage, weaving, etc. The Basque pelota has, unfortunately, become, of recent years, a game of professionals, and as played, _e.g._, at Madrid, the interest is rather in the betting than in the play. The enthusiasm formerly excited among the Basques by the game is illustrated by the story that several Basque soldiers left the Army of the Rhine, returned to their country to play a game of ball, and, having played and won it, rejoined the army in time to take part in the battle of Austerlitz.[68] A game played in the immense court of a small Basque village is still a splendid sight, though it has lost much of its splendour, and the old Rebot is fast dying out. Pierre Loti has described a game of Blaid, as seen in a French-Basque village, in his novel of the Basque country, “Ramuntcho”; and this form of the game has been played in Paris and London. But old peasants will shake their heads and say it is no longer “as of old.” The expression “of old” is common on the lips of both French and Spanish Basques;[69] they willingly praise the past, and are intensely conservative of all their customs, their immemorial language, their games, privileges, religion. The ox-carts, with wheels of solid wood, to be seen under the vine-trellises of Basque farms, seem as old as the withered trunk of the oak of Guernica, and similarly many ancient customs have been retained. In some parts, at funerals, the men wear long cloaks reaching to the feet, the women also wearing long, full cloaks with hoods, that completely hide the face. The men go first, and then all the women--men and women in single file--the chief mourners coming last. Both at weddings and funerals, feasts were formerly given on such an extensive scale that the family was often nearly ruined, and a law (_fuero_) was passed forbidding to invite any but relations to the third degree. But the wedding-feast is still sufficiently imposing; it continues for many hours, and immediately afterwards the young begin dancing, while the old play cards. As to the offerings at funerals, “none but an eye-witness,” says Larramendi, in the eighteenth century, “could believe the quantity of bread and wax that is offered. Moreover, at these big funerals, in some places a live ox, and in others a sheep, is brought as an offering to the church door, and when the service is over it is taken away, and a fixed sum of money is given to the priest.”[70] This curious custom, a survival of the offerings to the dead and a trace of ancestor-worship, has not yet wholly died out. In one village at least (Arriba, on the borders of Navarre and Guipúzcoa) it is customary at funerals to offer bread and wax, and to bring to the church either a quarter of veal or a live sheep, which is afterwards given to the priest. The Basques are intensely religious, and it is characteristic of them that before they were converted to Christianity