6i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



particularly to those who have anything to do with the ceremo- 

 nies, pet names by which they are called till the affair is over. A 

 stereotyped name for the bride is Danica (the morning star), and 

 for the groom Sunce (the sun) or Mjesec (the moon). The prin- 

 cipal groomsman is addressed as Saint John ; the god-father as 

 Elias ; the first bridesmaid as Mary ; and the other guests usually 

 receive names of flowers. The three chief personages after the 

 bridal pair have generally the stereotyped name and a newly bor- 

 rowed pet name. Evidently a poetical expression rules in these 

 affairs, by which the figurative characterizations of the higher 

 spheres of the sky have been adapted to the transferred names. 

 Among the more than a hundred songs of this kind we cite one 

 from B. Petranovic's collection of Servian popular songs, which 

 relates how the suitor wakened the passion of his sweetheart : 



" The morning star said angrily to the moon, 

 Where have you tarried, my bright moon, so long? 

 Where have you tarried, where have you idled the time? 

 Where I tarried I idled no time : 

 We were eating for you a supper of sweets ; 

 We saw for you a maid as handsome as pearl ; 

 Her hair was fragrant with sweet-smelling blossoms — 

 Oh, would that the flowers were for me ! 

 Then jealous anger possessed the morning star. 

 And she speeded in rage over the clear sky." 



The poetic imagery is, I think, perfectly comprehensible. It is of 

 common application in popular verse. Let us recollect that every 

 literature of the kind has only a comparatively limited stock of 

 comparisons and figures, and that it is, therefore, obliged to make 

 a narrow means suffice for all occasions. It does not readily waste 

 its poetical material, and it is turned from its course only when 

 the occasion is an extraordinary one. Metaphors drawn from the 

 stars are still in full vigor, but find their complete adaptation 

 only in poetry. But there is not a trace of mythological mys- 

 ticism in it. 



It may be observed, in explanation of the popular faith about 

 the moon, that the people regard its regularly recurring decrease 

 and increase wholly according to the apparently good or ill work- 

 ing of its phases upon the fortunes of man and the world. Of the 

 phenomena themselves they have no settled opinion, although 

 some incline to accept a fable which is peculiar to the Croats on 

 the Steiermark border as a popular myth. I prefer to regard it 

 as a part of the apocryphal folk-lore of the middle ages, or per- 

 haps as of German origin. Saint Elias, as the national saint, lord 

 of the highest mountains, lends it his name only to save the trivial 

 story from ridicule. It runs : 



The holy Elias once had a long leisure-spell, and went out 



