Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-03-17

ferent Casters by different bands of the
faithful.
So
Just as the name it-elf is pagan rather
than Christian. and recalls the Oster-
monah. April the month of the Ost-end
wind, tine wind from the east, SO Easter
usages and customs in merry England
were largely pagan. 1t is no wonder that
righteous Puritans were not satisfied with
the gradual reduction Of the Easter period
from eight days to four, to three, to two,
but piously desired to do away with the
heather and Romanish feast altogether.
Eastre, herself, was a sort of Teutonic
Proserpine, who, the ola Greek stories tell.
dwelt half the year upon Olympus with
her mother Ceres, the goddess of grain,
and the other half in Hades with her
spouse Pluto. When Proserpine or Eastre
came back to earth, then blossomed the lily
and the daffodils For Proserpine was
plucking lilies when Pluto seized her and
carried her off; and, as she dropped her
lilies in terror, they turned to daffodils.
OF that event Shakespeare says:
20 Proserpina
For the flowers that frighted thou lettedst
From Dis's Wagon! daffodils
That come before the swallow dares and take
The winds OF March with beauty
And Eastre, in like manner, was god
dess of winds and swaying flowers To her
the Easter fires were lighted, mounted to the
skies, and like an aurora, the colors of
spring and the colors Of dawn made happy
her votaries.
The return of spring breaking the icy
grasp Of terrible winter made a profound
impression upon the barbarous imagination,
and for that reason Easter customs are
traceable into the mists of the dawn Of his
tory. Spring seemed to the primitive mind
like birth, and winter, death: Its return
promised recurring resurrection. Every
decay was followed by new creation.
y
With the early Persians. worshpers of
the celestial fire, the vernal equinox was
revered particular blessing. Great re-
joicing followed and every one presented
to his friends eggs gayly decorated in
spring colors. The egg containing the po-
tential bird, In their minds, symbolized the
spring which was breaking forth from the
shell of winter. The eternal war of evil
ended for the time in Ormusd's victory and
naturally many symbolic eggs were broken
as today in excess of joy.
But the Persians, like many other nations,
probably derived their respect for the egg
from Aryan ancestors, for Germans, Anglo
Saxons and Celts all made the egg fea-
ture of the spring festivals. In India the
egg Is even more revered, for there it Is
was once dormant In shell and Matched it
self out to begin its cyclic career.
~
How the rabbits of today became respon-
sible for these cosmic eggs Is another
pleasant confusion. Among all Teutonic
people the hare was sacred to Eastre, as
the young harets are first seen hopping
around about the time of her festival
Very few people have any notion of the
difference between the hare and the rabbit,
and the. latter in popular fancy has come
to supplant his cousin. AS Indian eggs with
Persian dyes made their appearance along
with the hopping hares of Eastre, the scien-
tific mind of the day promptly established a
relationship. Eastre's hares now lays the
egg of Ormusd, and the truly devout of the
medieval type of solemnity accept only the
red egg, as that symbolizes the Savior's
blood.
Singularly enough while northern nations
are celebrating the return of spring. tropi-
cal countries are offering Thanksgiving for
brated with immediate and appropriate
ritual. The Semites of Asia Minor upon
gathering in the grain, without any delay
for the slow process of leavening, grind
some of the newly-cut grain and make it
up into a thank-offering bread This I'M
leavened bread of the fresh grain became
in time the symbol of the solemn observ-
ances of the harvest season, with which
the Pascal lamb after the Pascal fast be-
came associated.
While David danced before the Ark, in
general the Semitic took his religion with
more abasement of spirit. 1t was the fes-
tive Irishman who along with the Greeks
raised the dance into ritual. At the be-
ginning of spring, for the Celtic festival
in honor Of Etain, dancing was special
feature, and it was not necessary to wait
for May day and It's May pole to dance
upon the green. So great was the power Of
Etain that as has been said the sun itself
danced, and by the time that Etain and
Eastre passed away, the sun had con-
tracted such a habit that it dances in the
spring today just the same. Or, as some
say, as a good convert the sun has selected
Easter morning only to dance it's old-time
religious round. One must, however, go to
the Celtic portion of the British islands in
Cornwall and Devonshire, or to Wales
Scotland and Ireland, to see the sun dance
in real religious Easter ecstacy. If any one
doubts it, he has only to ask any man or
maid in the land.
One other feature has been added to the
historic international focus
ing of joyous symbolsms for Easter and
that is a purely Washington affair. In the
minds of the little folks of the District it's
all right for the hare of Eastre to have
laid worldhatching egg with the Tyrian
cOlors of a Persian god, but it is much more
to the point to be able to roll the egg at
the White House or the Zoo and even If II