288 Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters . 
Frazer 1 states that in this explanation he is following in the 
footsteps of Wannhardt, and notes that Mannhardt’s conclu¬ 
sions have been not a little confirmed by magical ceremonies 
which are practiced in Central Australia for the purpose of 
awakening the dormant energies of nature at the approach of 
spring. We can say more than this, that not only in Australia, 
but in America, Africa and Oceania magical ceremonies are 
employed which point to beliefs similar to those which seem 
to lie at the basis of the European spring ceremony. The 
death and resurrection are not associated with the magic spring 
ceremony alone. They occur in a totally different class, 
namely, in the initiation rites of various peoples. In these 
rites, the end is not favorable weather, but a new person, and, 
to meet this end, the novice dies and is revived, receives a new 
name, and is a new person. To be sure, death is not always 
simulated; but where it is not, some act symbolical of the new 
birth is performed. 
In this paper we shall consider: (1) The European cere¬ 
monies; (2) the Australian magic food ceremonies; (3) the 
Australian and Oceanic initiation ceremonies ; (4) the Ameri¬ 
can initiation ceremonies, and (5) the American agricultural 
and related ceremonies. 
I. 
EUROPEAN CEREMONIES. 
As might be expected, the accounts of ceremonies in Ancient 
Europe are meagre, but Grimm 2 has gathered many references 
to them from classical writers, poems 1 , and various other 
sources. When a people has endured “the drums and tramp¬ 
ling of three conquests!,” and lias been exposed 1x> centuries 
of time,—that “grim wolf,” who' “with privy paw daily de¬ 
vours apace, and nothing said,” it is a marvel that anything 
like ceremonies and traditions should remain; and the fact 
that so much does remain is an eloquent testimony to the 
tenacity of custom and tradition. 
1 “The Golden Bough,” vol. 1, p. 113. 
2 “Deutsche Mythologie.” Unfortunately, the very suggestive book 
by Professor Albrecht Dieterich, “Mutter Erde: ein Versuch tiber 
Volksreligion,” 1905, came to hand too late for adequate mention. 
