54 THE APPLE TREE WASSAIL. 



in the middle of the last century has noted that natives 

 belonging to the Mohammedan faith fire off guns at certain 

 religious celebrations. In this case he knows that the object 

 is simply that of making a noise. It seems rather more likely 

 that the idea of noise-making should be predominant in a 

 rustic ceremony such as wassailing, rather than that it should 

 be necessary to prc-suppose a primitive method of pruning, 

 for which not only does no evidence exist, but which is more- 

 over rather insulting to the intelligence of our ancestors. 



3. THE LIBATION. This as it survives scarcely requires 

 any comment. It can best be considered in the next section 

 of the paper. 



4. OFFERING OF TOAST. This is undoubtedly a real 

 offering. Mr. Sharp's informant was clearly of the opinion 

 that it was not eaten by the birds, although twentieth century 

 materialism had made him rather shy of expressing this belief 

 openly. 



None of the participants in the ceremony, however, appear 

 to have any very clear idea as to whom the offering was made. 

 It seems that we have here a case in which folk-memory is 

 rapidly failing. Toast is still placed in the branches because 

 it is remembered that once the offering was made to someone 

 or something. But in a few years, if the ceremony lasts as 

 long, the reason will have been entirely forgotten; and I think 

 this particular part of the rite will disappear entirely or we 

 shall be definitely told that it is intended as an offering to the 

 birds, probably in the hope that they will not attack the crop 

 during the year. 



In considering one or two interesting parallels to the Apple 

 Tree Wassail, I should like to begin with a reminder that tree 

 worship still survives in twentieth century England in other 

 forms. The simplest, and the one which comes most readily 

 to mind, is the Maypole dance. The Maypole is usually a dry 

 pole perhaps with a sprig of green at the top, but was once, as 

 Sir James Frazer has pointed out in the Golden Bough, a living 

 tree freshly cut from the forest. It was also not so long ago 

 that the "Jack in the Green" was a well-known figure in 



