The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1903-11-21
CORNERSTONE TRADITIONS.

Few people understand the terrible s.g
nificance of the coins which are placed
in corner-sto~cs of buildings. There il
an impression that the coins are for the
information of the people who may be
about when the building is razed but the
real significance is the maintenance Of the
ancient heather custom of walling up a
human being in new building. The
money placed in the cornerstone of a
moder nstructure might be accepted as
the ransom paid FOR the soul which in
ancient days would have persisted there
And in not few out-of-the-way parts
of the world. whose inhabitants stand
psychically about where We did twenty
centuries ago. the original custom st.ll
prevails in all its primitive hideousness
Only last year. at MosdoN. IN the eau
casus, three builders were arrested for
kidnapping and numbering a lad, whose
body then afterward built into the foun-
dations of tower they were erectin-
In 1865 two children. a boy and a girl,
were similarly consigned to living grave
by some laborers working on a block
house at puga in Asiatic Turkey.
At Copenhagen q wall sank as fast as it
was built SO they took an innocent little
girl and set her at table with toys and
'.sweeties" Then. While she played and
ate. twelve master masons closed the
walnut over her
4 house that was being built at Scutari
became shaky. \ wise man" whose ad
vice was sought decrecd that the defect
would increase unless a human victim
were walled into the foundations. So the
three brothers who were working at it
agreed among themselves To immo.ate
and immune the first OF the wives who
came to The place to bring them food.
Similar instances might he multiplied
indefinitely. and from every country on
the face of the globe. In 1855. when Hols-
worthy church. in Devonshire. was being
restored. a skeleton. with a mass of NOR
tar rlastered over the mouth, was found
Embedded in an angle OF the building
That the castle OF Iiebenstein might
stand impregnable child was bought
Tor hard cash of its peasan; mother, and
walled To the donjon tower.
roll was given The little one to eat
while the masons We're at work, and the
unnatural parent stood by 10 quiet IL in
case it cried o1t Mother. / can sec
you. laughed the child when the wan
was breast high. Mother. I see a little
OF YOU still Then vaiingly Mother.
see nothing Of YOU now
In the museum at Alsiers i a plaster
cast Of the mold left bv the body OF
one Geronimo. who was built into a block
Of concrete in the angle Of the fort in
the sixteenth century
In the ch0neI wall Of Bird gerule
church half-consumed taiIow dip.
was found immured in a secret recess.
Another was discovered a few years
back. built into one of The buttresses 4
St Osyths Pfiory. IN Essex.
When the old BlackfrisTS bridge obul.t
In 1s6sp WAS pulled down in 1867. Their.
were found within vault-like cavity
beneath tn second arch from the Sarr,v
side. two such candles. together with a
number of bones and a horses head.
This latter is very significant II is
typical OF the pale horse or the death
god Modem. to whom all these death
god Wooden. TO whom all these propiti
stoIy Sacrifices were made Frequently.
In as.s gene by. horses heads were butt