662 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



for the edifice to be erected.* Ubicini well defines a stahic as " the 

 ghost of a person who has been immured in the walls of a building 

 in order to make it more solid." f 



It is not houses alone, however, that are thus protected by an 

 artificially made guardian. The vikings used to "redden their 

 rollers " with human blood. That is to say, when a warship was 

 launched, human victims were bound to the rollers over which 

 the galley was run down to the sea, so that the stem was sprinkled 

 with their blood. J The last trace of such consecration among 

 ourselves is the breaking of a wine-bottle over the ship's bows. 

 Captain Cook found the South Sea Islanders similarly christened 

 their war-canoes with the blood of human victims. 



Furthermore, as the position of protecting spirit is rather a 

 dignified and beatified one than otherwise, it is kept reasonably 

 enough in the family of the king, the founder, or the master 

 builder. This is a common trait in all stories of these human 

 sacrifices, and it helps to bring them into line with the similar 

 stories of corn-spirits and self-immolated gods. For it is the 

 dearly beloved son that is especially chosen for such self-immola- 

 tion. Thus, we read in the Book of Kings that when Hiel the 

 Bethelite built Jericho, " he laid the foundation thereof in Abiram 

 his firstborn, and set up the gates thereof in his youngest son 

 Segub." And may we not put down in the same category the case 

 of Remus, represented in legend as brother of Romulus, the founder 

 of Rome ? 



To sum up, then, I would say in one word, while I accept in all 

 their main results Mr. Frazer's remarkable conclusions, I believe 

 that, in order to understand to the very bottom the origin of tree 

 worship, we must directly affiliate it upon primitive ancestor or 

 ghost worship, of which it is an aberrant and highly specialized 

 offshoot. 



[Concluded.] 



According to the English journal Iron, Lieutenant Apostolow, of the Russian 

 navy, has some marvelous plans for expediting ocean navigation. He recently 

 exhibited to some naval officers in Odessa a new style of ship, having no screw or 

 paddle, but instead, "a kind of running electrical gear right round the vessel's 

 hull under the water-line, and a revolving mechanism which will propel the ship 

 from Liverpool to New York in twenty-eight hours." To those who are too 

 timid to undertake this voyage, he offers the alternative of a submarine passage, 

 " without rock, roll, or vibration, and with a good supply of oxygen and hydrogen 

 during the short voyage." 



* See also Grimm, Teutonic Mythology, vol. ii, p. 844, and Folk Lore Record, vol. iii, 

 p. 282. 



f Ballades et Chants Populaires de la Roumanie, p. 198. 



$ Vigfusson and Powell, Corpus Poeticum Boreale, vol. i, p. 410. 



