What Snapdragon Signifies.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1629, 21 December 1912, Page 15

What Snapdragon Signifies.

HIDDEN MEANING OF CHRISTMAS GAMES. Perhaps the most essentially. "Christmassy" of all Christmas games *s snapdragon. It is aiso 6ne : oi tne oiaest, ana has a Hidden ana exceedingly simsr fcer significance. , '.iki oraeai Dy fire of the Middlo Ages,, the Druictical fire-worship, of. a remoter epoch, "tie passing or tho children tiirough tho jtro to ■ Aio.ocli," all tnese, and many other liorrid rites, in wliich lire played the principal part, are comlneznorateil in tms nariuicss amusement. ".Snap" and "dragon." iiiviuo the name into its two component parts, aua one at onco remembers that hainiiig dragon. oi Jiespena whom Hercules siew, ami the eternauy burning fruit in tne enchanted orchard oil' wnich he made his iiery meal. 'mis, ine later Roman legend, was recounted to little Roman children by thoir Roman papas and mammas two thousand years ago, when the game was played just as it is noiv. ■ A thousand, years before, the story varied. lr-waS'S'aid''that Piuto 'invented the sport to entertain, Proserpine. Go. back yet another ten centuries, and olio finds a slightly diflercnt version current among tho children and parents of ancient JSgypt. But tho game was played then—forty centuries ago—precisely as it is at present. There was the samo scramble among the ilaraing fruit, the same crowding around oi haii-atfrignted, halt'-denght-youngsters, the same background of interested adults. This we know irorn ancient frescoes,. Blind mail's buff, again, has been traced up to very ancient ntes connected with the prehistoric worship of Omu, the Siightiess t deity of our old Norse ancestors. It was, however, not much of a "game'' then, at all events so far as rcguttis the individual chielly concerned, lor he was realiy blind, his sight being purposely destroyed prior to tne commencement of the "fcsfcivities." To make sport; of. an unfortunate in this predicament, to buffet and trip him, and to watch his furious but usually futile efforts to lay hold upon- his persecutors, was a source of uniailing delight to thr barbarous and semi-barbarous races who lived in- olden times. . Afterwards, as men became moro civilised, a purposely-blinded animal was substituted for the human victim; and at a later date still, men, their eyes bandaged and their bodies swathed ill ski us, per-sonated-the beasts.

"PU SS-IN -THE-CORNER." In South Germany tho game is still callc-d blinde hock, i.e., "blind goat," and in North Germany blinde nuiio, or "blind cow,", while in Scotland it is "biind harie," iu allusion to the rough or hairy attire once worn by tho principal actor. -In old houses, with many rooms and nooks, and corridors, the games known as hide-and-seek, touch and tag, are fav ourite Yuletide ones. They are taken bodily from an ancient - miracle ; piay, portraying' the story of Diaiia .aiid her riyiiiphs. ' . . . Pusvin-the-cprner, again, is but a variation of the. same old .legc-ud, with the Greek Artemis substituted for the Italian Diana. ' Both Diana and Artemis, of course, stood for .the moon in ancient mythology; and "puss" is indifferent either a cat, a hare, or a rabbit. . . THE CHRISTMAS TREE. All theso threo animals love -to roam abroad on moonlight nights, and when alarmed, oven by a passing, shadow, will scamper at full speed to / the nearest "cumor." . Oranges and lemons, another favonritti Christmas gamo' in- old-fashioned households, represents in crude childish pantomime a mediaeval battle.- The children choose sides, elect a captain, and go through every detail of the fight down to the execution of the prisoners. In here-we-go-round-the-mulberry. bush, wo aro introduced, as in so many other similar games, to a primeval marriage service. Trees were formerly sacred to dancing at tho wedding festival, and tho mulberry had a special significance. The Christens tree is' directly connestcd with| the worship of tho god Woden, a benovolent individual, who was said to shower down gifts from the forest trees on such of his favourite disciples as chanced to wander beneath their brandies. Pantomimes are a direct survival of th* Roman Saturnalia, when slaves wero privileged to .buffet senators, exactly as to-dav the clowns do the policemen, who aro the modern representatives of law and order, as were tho senators tn question twenty centuries ago. ...... u While tho Yuletide log, without which Christmas in Britain would not bo Christmas in" thousands of old-fashioned country houses, is but the degenerate, descendant of those mighty bonfires, each composed of hundreds of whole pine trees, with which our remote Scandinavian ancenters wore wont to honour, during tho winter solstice, their god Thor.