Wends value their church. For all their stubborn paganism in early days,
against which St. Columban, and St. Emmeran, and St. Rupert and St.
Eckbert all contended in vain, the Wends have, since they were
christianized, always been a devoutly religious people, and at
present--barring a little drinking and a little stealing (which latter,
however, is strictly confined to fruit and timber, in respect of which two
commodities they hold communistic opinions)--they are exemplary
Christians. With their parsons they do not always stand on the best of
terms. But that is because some of the parsons, raised from peasant rank,
are, or were--for things have altered by the introduction of fixed
stipends--a little exacting in the matter of tithes and offerings, and the
demand that there should be many sponsors at a christening, for the sake
of the fees. There are some queer characters among that forest-clergy. One
that I knew was a good deal given to second-hand dealing. He attended
every sale within an accessible radius, to bring home a couch, or a whip,
or a pair of pole-chains, or a horse-cloth, for re-sale. His vicarage was
in truth a recognised second-hand goods store, in which every piece of
furniture kept continually changing. Another was greedy enough to claim a
seat at the Squire's table, at the great dinners given in connection with
the annual _battues_, as a matter of "prescription." A third drank so hard
that on one occasion he had to be propped up against the altar to enable
him to go on with the service. The most curious of all was the "chaplain"
of Muskau, who married his couples wholesale, on the Manchester "sort
yourselves" principle. Sometimes, when things went a little slowly, and he
grew impatient, it was _he_ who "sorted" the couples, and then
occasionally it would happen that, giving the word of command like a
Prussian corporal, he would "sort" them wrongly. They were far too well
drilled to discipline not to obey. But when the ceremony was over they
would lag sheepishly behind, scratching their heads and saying: "_Knes
duchowny_, _I_ should have married _that_ girl, and this girl should have
married _him_." However, the Church had spoken, and the cause was
finished. Married they were and married they must remain. Even to this the
patient Wends submitted; and, perhaps, they were all the happier for it.
But all this has nothing to do with the Church proper, as distinct from
the parson. Their religious instinct appears born with the Wends. Religion
seems to be in all their thoughts and most of their acts. The invariable
greeting given is "God be with you." They talk habitually of "God's rain,"
"God's sun," "God's crops," "God's bread"--to them "every good gift and
every perfect gift cometh from above." Worshippers returning from church
are hailed with a "Welcome from God's Word." When the sun goes down, it is
to "God" that it goes to rest. Whenever a bargain is struck, the appeal to
the other party is "God has seen it," or "God has heard it." And although
German jurisdiction, with its partiality for oaths slily extracted _after_
a statement, has imported here and there a little false swearing, in the
main that ancient confirmation of the contract is still respected. In
Wendland the churches are filled as nowhere else in Germany, and however
prosily the parson may preach--as he generally does--nowhere is he more
attentively and devoutly listened to. In Wendland alone of all Germany
have I noticed that Protestants bow at the mention of the name of
"Jesus." Barring some ten thousand Roman Catholics in Saxony, the Wends
are all staunch Protestants of that nondescript Lutheran-Calvinist creed,
which the kings of Prussia have imposed upon their country. But not a few
of their beliefs and superstitions and legends hark back to older days.
They still keep _Corpus Christi_. In their religious legends, which are of
very ancient origin, the Virgin plays a prominent part--leading off, among
other things, a nocturnal dance, in which the angels all join, clad in
silken gowns with green wreaths on their heads, meeting for the purpose,
of all unsuitable places, in the church, and carefully locking the door
against human intruders. The Virgin's flight into Egypt is put into
strongly agricultural language, "Has a woman with a child passed this
way?" ask Herod's ruthless emissaries. "Aye," answers the truthful Wend,
"while I was sowing this barley." "You fool, that must have been three
months ago." In truth, by a miracle the barley has grown to maturity in
one brief hour. By this expedient the Virgin escapes. The Virgin spins;
the Virgin sews shirts; the Virgin does all that Wendish women are taught
to do. In Scripture-lore the Wends have their own localised versions of
the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; of the fight of St. George and the
Dragon; and an even more localised tale of the doings of King David. The
archangel Michael is made to fight for Budyssin against the Germans. Judas
Iscariot, according to their national tradition, comes to grief mainly
through gambling. The Saviour gave him thirty pieces of silver to buy
bread with. These he staked--tempted by Jews whom he saw gambling by the
wayside--on an unlucky card; and to recover them it was that he sold his
Master. To cap all this unorthodoxy, the Wends make the Creator call after
Judas that he is forgiven. But remorse drives him to hang himself,
notwithstanding. He tries a pine and a fir, but finds them too soft, so he
selects an aspen tree--hence the perpetual agitation of its leaves. One of
their peculiar legendary saints is Diter Thomas, who was so holy that he
could hang his clothes when going to bed--which he appears to have done in
the daytime--on a sunbeam. One day, however, at church this devout man
espied the Devil seated behind the altar, engaged in taking down on a
fresh cowhide the names of all whom he saw sleeping in church. There must
have been an unusually large number, for the cowhide proved too small, and
Satan was fain to stretch it by holding one end with his teeth and pulling
at the other with his hands. As it happened, his teeth let go, and back
went his head against the wall, with a bang which woke up all the
sleepers. This aroused in pious Thomas so much mirth that he forgot the
respect due to the holy place, and laughed aloud--in punishment for which
offence his grace departed from him, and he was thenceforth reduced to the
necessity of using pegs. For their regularity in attendance at church I
half suspect that the peculiar fondness of the Wends for singing is, in
not a small degree, accountable; and, it may be, also the attraction of a
little gossip after service, and the excitement of an occasional little
fair.
The Wends would indeed not be Slavs if they were not engrossingly fond of
singing. Singing is, in fact, among young folk reckoned the principal
accomplishment. And they have a rich store of songs, set to exceedingly
melodious airs. They have them of all descriptions--legends and convivial
songs, martial songs, sacred hymns, short _roncka_ and _reje_ for the
dancing-room, and long elegies and ballads for the field, to shorten the
long summer's day out at work. They have their own curious instruments,
too, still in use--a three-stringed fiddle, a peculiar sort of hautboy,
and bagpipes of two different sizes, the larger one invariably ornamented
with a goat's head. To be a _kantorka_ (precentress) in church, or even in
a spinning-room, is a thing for a Wendish girl to be proud of, and to
remember to her old age. What a Wendish village would in winter time be
without those social spinning meetings it is difficult to imagine. To no
race do conviviality, mirth, harmless but boisterous amusement, seem so
much of a necessary of life. And none appears to be so thoroughly devoted
to the practice of homely household virtues. Spinning, poultry-breeding,
bee-keeping, gardening, coupled with singing, and nursing children, and
making model housewives--these are the things which occupy girls'
thoughts. At her very christening the baby-girl, borne back from church
"as a Christian," is made to find a spindle and a broom carefully laid in
the room, to act as charms in setting her infant thoughts in the right
direction. Her "sponsor's letter" is sure to contain some symbolic grains
of flax and millet. And a lover's principal gift to his sweetheart
invariably consists of a carefully turned and brightly-painted
"kriebatsche," an antiquated spindle and distaff that is, which is held
dear as a family Bible. Spinning, indeed, is among Wends a far more
important occupation than elsewhere. For men and women alike wear by
preference linen clothes, made of good, stout, substantial stuff, thick
enough to keep out the cold. In rural Germany a peasant girl is expected
as an indispensable preparative for marriage to knit her "tally" of
stockings. In Wendland the _trousseau_ consists all of spun linen.
Servants invariably receive part of their wages in flax. Spinning
accordingly is about the most important work to be accomplished in a
household. And as it lends itself capitally to sociability and mirth, the
Wendish maidens take to it with peculiar zest. The date for beginning
these gatherings throughout Lusatia is the 11th of October, St. Burkhard's
Day in the Wendish calendar. On that day the young unmarried women tell
themselves off into _psazas_, that is, spinning companies, consisting of
twelve at the outside, all of them girls of unblemished character. Among
no race on earth is purity more valued and insisted upon--in both
sexes--than among these poor forest Wends. Wherever corruption has crept
in, it is wholly due to the evil seductions of Germans, who have taken
advantage of the helplessness of Wendish girls when away on service. In a
Wendish village, to have made a _faux pas_ deprives a young fellow and
girl alike of their character for life. The girl must not sit with the
other girls in church when the young are catechised; she must not walk up
to the altar on high festivals; she must not join in the singing; and the
spinning companies will not have her. In olden time she was not even
allowed to dance. Young men going notoriously astray used to be punished
in their own way.
Some time before the eventful eleventh, the _psazas_ assemble to decide
in whose house the spinning gatherings are to be held. In that house they
meet throughout the winter, spinning industriously with wheel or with
spindle from seven to ten, and requiting the housewife for her hospitality
with welcome assistance in various kinds of domestic work. On the first
evening the company quite expect to be treated to a good supper of roast
goose. How all the spinners, with the resident family, and those young
fellows who, of course, will from time to time pay the lasses a
visit--either in disguise or in their own proper garb--manage to meet, and
work, and lark, and dance, where they do, it is rather a problem to solve.
For many of the rooms are not large. They are plain, of course, in their
equipment, like all Wendish rooms (in which paint is allowed only on
chairs, all the other woodwork being subject to the scrubbing-brush), but
strikingly peculiar. Almost in one corner--but far enough away from the
wall to leave space for a little, cosy nook behind--stands the monster
tile stove, very adequately heated with peat or wood, and showing,
tolerably high up, a little open fireplace, in which burns a bright little
wood fire, rather to give light and look cheerful, than to diffuse warmth.
That is the vestal hearth of the Wendish house, without which there would
be no home. In another corner stands the solid, large deal table, with
painted chairs all round. The walls are all wainscoted with deal boards;
and round the whole room runs a narrow bench, similar to the _murka_, a
seat far more tempting, which encircles the stove. Nearly all the
household implements in use are neatly ranged about the walls, or else
placed on the floor--the _boberzge_, a peculiar plate rack; the _polca_,
to hold pots and spoons; and the _standa_, for water. There are baskets,
cans, tubs disposed about, and a towel hung up for show. This room grows
tolerably lively when the spinning company assemble, telling their tales,
playing their games, gossiping and chatting, but mostly singing. "Shall we
have any new songs?" is the first question invariably asked when the
_psaza_ constitutes itself. And if there is a new girl come into the
village, the inquiry at once passes round, "Does she know any new songs?"
Indeed, the _psazas_ serve as the principal singing classes for the young
women in the village. They are kept up throughout the year as special
choirs and sub-choirs, so to speak, singing together on all sacred and
mundane occasions where singing is required. Whenever "the boys" look in,
there is great fun. Sometimes one will dress up as a "bear," in a "skin"
made up of buckwheat straw; or else he will march in as a "stork," which
causes even greater amusement. Once at least in the season the funny man
of the set makes his appearance transformed into what, by a very wild
flight of imagination, may be taken for a pantomime horseman, with a horse
made up of four big sieves, hung over with a white sheet. Before calling
in a real, formal way, the boys are always careful to ask for leave, which
means that they will bring _piwo_ and _palenza_ (beer and spirits), the
girls revenging themselves by providing cake and coffee; and then the
entertainment will wind up with a merry dance. One very amusing occasion
is the _dopalowak_, or _dolamowak_, that is, the last spinning evening
before Christmas, when the boys sit in judgment upon the girls, and,
should they find one or other to be guilty of idleness, condemn her to
have her flax burnt or else her spindle broken, which penalties are, of
course, in every case commuted into a fine. This sort of thing goes on
till Ash Wednesday, when the "Spinte" is formally executed by stabbing, an
office which gives fresh scope to the facetiousness and agility of the
funny man. The night before is the social evening _par excellence_. It is
called _corny wecor_, "the black evening," because girls and boys alike
amuse themselves with blackening their faces like chimney-sweeps, and with
the very same material. The boys are allowed to take off the girls' caps
and let down their hair--the one occasion on which it is permitted to hang
loose. And there is rare merrymaking throughout the night. Indeed, all
Shrovetide is kept with becoming spirit, perhaps more boisterously than
among any other folk, and in true excitable Slav style. The boys go about
a-"zampering," and collecting contributions; the girls bring out their
little savings; and then the young people dance their fill, keeping it up
throughout Lent. Indeed, they dance pretty well all the year round--
"Njemski rady rejwam,
Serski hisce radsjo;"
which may be rendered thus:
"The German way I love to dance,
But the Wendish dance I dote on."
To witness the _serska reja_--the only truly national dance preserved
among the Wends--at its best, you should see it danced on some festive
occasion, when the blood is up, out in the open air, on the grass plot,
where stands the sacred lime tree. There is plenty of room there. The very
sight of the green--say of the young birches planted around for decoration
at Whitsuntide or Midsummer--seems to fire the susceptible spirits. The
dancers throw themselves into the performance with a degree of vigour and
energy of which we Teutons have no notion. The _serska reja_ is a
pantomimic dance. Each couple has its own turn of leading. The cavalier
places his partner in front of him, facing her, and while the band keeps
playing, and the company singing one of those peculiarly stirring Wendish
dance tunes, he sets about adjuring her to grant him his desire, and dance
with him. She stands stock still, her arms hanging down flop by her side.
The cavalier capers about, shouts, strikes his hands against his thighs,
kneels, touches his heart--with the more dramatic force the better. At
length the lady gives way, and in token of consent raises her hand.
Briskly do the two spin round now for the space of eight bars, after which
for eight more they perform something like a cross between a _chassez
croisez_ and a jig, and so on for a little while, after which the whole
company join in the same performance. As a finish the cavalier "stands"
the band and his partner some liquor, and a merry round dance concludes
his turn of leading, to the accompaniment of a tune and song, _roncka_,
selected by himself.
Lent is a season more particularly consecrated to song. Every Saturday
afternoon, and on some other days, the girls of the various _psazas_
assemble under the village lime tree, the seat around which is
scrupulously reserved for them, to sing, amid the rapt attention of the
whole village, some of their delightful sacred songs peculiar to the
season. This singing reaches its climax on Easter night, when young
fellows and girls march round the village in company, warbling in front of
every door, in return for which they receive some refreshment. For a brief
time only do they suspend their music to fetch "Easter water" from the
brook, which must be done in perfect silence, and accordingly sets every
mischief-maker at work, teasing and splashing, and playing all sorts of
practical jokes, in order to extract a word of protest from the
water-fetching maidens. As the clock strikes midnight the young women form
in procession and march out to the fields, and all round the cultivated
area, singing Easter hymns till sunrise. It produces a peculiarly striking
effect to hear all this solemn singing--maybe, the same tunes ringing
across from an adjoining parish, as if echoed back by the woods--and to
see those tall forms solemnly moving about in the early gloaming, like
ancient priestesses of the Goddess Ostara. While the girls are singing,
the bell-ringers repair to the belfry (which in many villages stands
beside the church) to greet the Easter sun with the traditional
"Dreischlag," the "three-stroke," intended to indicate the Trinity.
Lent sees the Wends perform another curious rite, of peculiar antiquarian
interest. The fourth Sunday in Lent is by established custom set apart for
the ceremony of "driving out Death"--in the shape of a straw figure decked
out with the last bridal veil used, which the bride is expected to give up
for the purpose. This poor figure is stoned to destruction to the cry of
_Lec hore, lec hore_, which may be borrowed from the Lutheran name for
the Sunday in question, _Laetare_. In some places the puppet is seated in
a bower of pine boughs, and so carried about amid much infantine
merriment, to be ultimately burnt or drowned. The interesting feature of
this rite is, that it does not really represent the Teuton "expulsion of
winter" so much as the much older ceremony of piously visiting the site on
which in Pagan times bodies used to be burnt after death. It is a heathen
All Saints' Day.
I have no space here to refer to anything like all the curious Wendish
observances which ought to be of interest to folk-lorists: the lively
_kokot_, or harvest home, so called because under the last sheaf it was
usual to conceal a cock, _kokota lapac_ with legs and wings bound, which
fell to the lot of the reaper who found it; the _lobetanz_; the _kermusa_,
or _kirmess_, great and small, the merry children's feast on May Day; the
joyful observance of Whit Sunday and Midsummer; the peculiar children's
games, and so on. It is all so racy and peculiar, all so merry and yet so
modest in the expenditure made upon it, it all shows the Wends so much to
advantage as a contented, happy, cheerful people--perhaps a little
thoughtless, but in any case making the best of things under all
circumstances, and glad to show off their Slav finery, and throw
themselves into whatever enjoyment Providence has vouchsafed, with a zest
and spirit which is not to be excelled, and which I for one should be
sorry to see replaced by the more decorous, perhaps, but far less
picturesque hilarity of the prosy Prussians. If only the Wends did not
consume such unconscionable quantities of bad liquor! And if in their cups
they did not fall a-quarrelling quite so fiercely! It is all very well to
say, as they do in one of their proverbs, with truthful pithiness, that
"there is not a drop of spirit on which do not hang nine devils." But
their practice accords ill with this proverbial wisdom. The public-house
is to them the centre of social life. Every new-comer is formally
introduced and made to shake hands with the landlord. They have a good
deal of tavern etiquette which is rigidly adhered to, and the object of
which in all cases is, like George the Fourth's "whitewash," to squeeze an
additional glass of liquor into the day's allowance. Thus every guest is
entitled to a help from the landlord's jug, but in return, from every
glass served is the landlord entitled to the first sip. Thus again, after
a night's carousal, the guests always expect to be treated by the host to
a free liquor round, which is styled the _Swaty Jan_--that is, the Saint
John--meaning "the Evangelist," whose name is taken in vain because he is
said to have drunk out of a poisoned cup without hurt. All the invocation
in the world of the Saint will not, however, it is to be feared, make the
wretched _palenza_ of the Wends--raw potato fusel--innocuous. It is true,
their throats will stand a good deal. By way of experiment, I once gave an
old woman a glass of raw spirit as it issued from the still, indicating
about 82 per cent. of alcohol. She made a face certainly, but it did not
hurt her; and she would without much coaxing have taken another glass.
This article has already grown so long that of the many interesting
customs connected with the burial of the dead and the honouring of their
memory I can only refer to one very peculiar and picturesque rite. Having
taken the dying man out of his bed, and placed him (for economy) on straw
(which is afterwards burnt) to die, put him in his coffin, with whatever
he is supposed to love best, to make him comfortable--and in addition a
few bugs, to clear the house of them--the mourners carry him out of the
house, taking care to bump him on the high threshold, and in due course
the coffin is rested for part of the funeral service in front of the
parsonage or the church. In providing for the comfort of the dead the
survivors show themselves remarkably thoughtful. No male Wend is buried
without his pipe, no married female without her bridal dress. Children are
given toys, and eggs, and apples. Money used to be put into the coffin,
but people found that it got stolen. So now the practice is restricted to
the very few Jews who are to be found among the Wends and who, it is
thought, cannot possibly be happy without money; and, with a degree of
consideration which to some people will appear excessive, some stones are
added, in order that they may have them "to throw at the Saviour." In
front of the church or parsonage the coffin is once more opened, and the
mourners, all clad in white--which is the Wendish colour for mourning--are
invited to have a last look at the body. Then follows the _Dobra noc_, a
quaint and strictly racial ceremony. The nearest relative of the dead, a
young person, putting a dense white veil over his or her head and body, is
placed at the back of the coffin, and from that place in brief words
answers on behalf of the dead such questions as affection may prompt near
friends and relatives to put. That done, the whole company join in the
melodious _Dobra noc_--wishing the dead one last "Good-night." After that,
the lid is once more screwed down and the coffin is lowered into the
grave.
There are few things more picturesque, I ought to say, than a funeral
procession in the Spreewald, made up of boats gliding noiselessly along
one of those dark forest canals, having the coffin hung with white, and
all the mourners dressed in the same colour, the women wearing the
regulation white handkerchief across their mouths. The gloom around is not
the half-night of Styx; but the thought of Charon and his boat
instinctively occurs to one. The whole seems rather like a melancholy
vision, or dream, than a reality.