GHOST WORSHIP AND TREE WORSHIP. 499 



together with red ribbons, and the plates containing them are 

 placed on the sepulchres, which with effigies of the dead Christ 

 are made up in Roman Catholic and Greek churches on Good 

 Friday. In both these cases the plants would seem to be envis- 

 aged as springing from the actual body of the dead god. Indeed, 

 Eustathius speaks of the gardens of Adonis as being placed on 

 the grave of the hero.* 



Furthermore, another connection may be shown to exist be- 

 tween plants or trees and ghosts. We know that it is a frequent 

 practice deliberately to put in herbs, shrubs, or trees on the 

 graves of the dead. How far back in history or in savage life 

 this practice may extend I am unfortunately not in a position to 

 state. In Roman Catholic countries, however, the planting of 

 flowers on the graves of the dead takes place usually on the jour 

 des morts, a custom which would seem to argue for it an immense 

 antiquity ; for though it is usual among Catholics to explain the 

 jour des morts as a fete of comparatively recent origin, definitely 

 introduced by a particular saint at a particular period, its analogy 

 to similar celebrations elsewhere shows that it is really a surviv- 

 ing relic of a very ancient form of Manes worship. In Algeria, 

 again, I observed, the Arab women went on Fridays to plant 

 flowers on the graves of their immediate dead ; and the same 

 point is noted about the same place by Miss Seguin.f The koub- 

 bas, or little dome-shaped tombs of Mohammedan saints, so com- 

 mon throughout North Africa, are almost always inclosed by a 

 low stone wall, which marks off the temenos, and are usually 

 overshadowed by palm trees deliberately planted there. 



All through southern Europe, indeed, the cypress is the com- 

 mon emblem of the grave and the churchyard, as the yew is in 

 our more northern climates. And this connection brings me more 

 directly into closer contact with our proper subject, the pine tree 

 of Attis. I think there is evidence that from a very early age 

 evergreens of one sort or another were planted upon barrows. 

 Those who have read The Golden Bough will not fail to see the 

 significance of this pregnant association. Evergreens are plants 

 which retain their vegetation — show the life of their tree spirit — 

 through the long sleep of winter. The mistletoe, as Mr. Frazer 

 has ably shown, owes its special sanctity to the fact that it holds, 

 as it were, the soul of the tree in itself, while all the branches 

 around it are bare and lifeless. As soon, then, as primitive men 

 had begun definitely to associate the ghost or god with the idea of 

 vegetation, nothing could be more natural for them than to plant 

 such evergreens on graves or barrows. Now all through southern 

 England we find many examples of round barrows planted with 



* The. Golden Bough, vol. i, p. 295. \ Walks in Algiers, p. 280. 



