_Easter Eggs_.--The custom of presenting eggs at Easter is too well
known to need description; but perhaps few are aware that, like many
other customs of the early Church, it had its origin in paganism.
Sir R.K. Porter (_Travels_, vol. i. p. 316.) mentions that at a period
of the year corresponding to Easter, "the Feast of nooroose, or of the
waters," is held, and seems to have had its origin prior to
Mahometanism. It lasts for _six_ days, and is supposed to be kept in
commemoration of the Creation and the Deluge--events constantly
synchronised and confounded in pagan cosmogonies. At this feast eggs are
presented to friends, in obvious allusion to the Mundane egg, for which
Ormuzd and Ahriman were to contend till the consummation of all things.
When the many identities which existed between Druidism and Magianism
are considered, we can hardly doubt that this Persian commemoration of
the Creation originated our Easter-eggs.