Note 698 — Chapter V · THE DIFFERENCING ELEMENTS OF COMMUNAL POETRY (continued 2)

Zell, Ferienschriften, II. 118, 212; see Plin. Nat. Hist., XXVIII. 2: “qui fruges excantasset.” Standard works for the investigation of these relics of ancient cult are Mannhardt, Wald-und Feldkulte, 2 vols., 1875-1877; the same author’s Mythologische Forschungen, already quoted; Pfannenschmid, Germanische Erntefeste, Hannover, 1878; and, pioneer of them all, Tylor’s admirable work on Primitive Culture. For children’s games, as last refuge of many of these rites, see F. M. Böhme, Deutsches Kinderlied u. Kinderspiel, Leipzig, 1897, which could be enlarged by a judicious use of Firmenich, Germaniens Völkerstimmen, in four volumes. Böhme says the Ringelreihen of these games are “uralte Reste chorischer Aufführungen bei den Jahres-und Gottesfesten unserer heidnischen Vorfahren,” and gives cases which support his statement. Processional songs of the old cult survive in the Ansingelieder, Umzugslieder, and so forth, of the children, now mainly begging-rimes like the wren-song in Ireland and England, parallel to the swallow-song in Rhodes. Again, children have games which imitate sounds and movements of labour; Böhme gives a few. See also G. F. Northall, English Folk-Rhymes, pp. 360 ff. Halliwell, of course, includes some of these in his nursery-rimes. See also W. W. Newell, Games and Songs of American Children, N. Y., 1883. These songs of the children would lead us too far a-field, and we shall cling to the scanty survivals of the songs and refrains of labour itself.