Note 2 — Chapter II · ACROSS EUROPE.

Their worship was thus described: The priest takes in one hand a piece of burning wood, and in the other a branch (such as we saw, and on which the leaves were still green, though dry), and then walks in a circle, the area of which is thus, for the time being, consecrated for worship. Then he fastens round a tree a withe, and sticks therein a branch with the bark peeled something like a whip, which is supposed to represent a fir-tree; on this is hung a piece of lead, previously melted, poured into cold water, and molten so as to form roughly the figure of a head, which is called an eeta. Towards this they afterwards say their prayers. The priest kills the victim, which may be a horse, a cow, a chicken, a duck, etc., and sprinkles the blood on the tree and the withe. (The blood was yet visible on the one we saw.) Then they proceed to peel or chip pieces of wood, making them fly off in the direction of the tree; and according as the chips fall, with the bark or the white side upwards, so they divine an answer to their prayer. The branch we saw was brought away by a friend of our informant just after the offering.