The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1911-09-21
Among the
Belief of Both Civilized and Uncivilised Men IN All Ages
That Showers Gould Be Produced
(Kansas CITY star.)

(Kansas City Starr
That prayer. sacrifice and song ad
dressed to the deities. lamentations
sacred dances and magical rites, avail
to or prevent rain, has beer
the faith of both civilized and unciv
ilized man as far back into the pas
as there exists any record Of human
act and thought. During the grear
drought of 1901 it will be remembered
that prayers for rain we're offered II
the Christian churches Throughout
the nation.
Among the agricultural Indians o.
the southwest rain ia the 'one great
and perpetual prayer Of the people
of that aird land. Every four years
in the month Of August, and some.
times oftener. the Zuni Indians enact
an elaborate religious'drama, the Hia:
hewe (The Corn Maidens), for rain
and the growth of corn. The descrip.
ton Of this drama occupies twenty.
four pages in Mrs. Stevenson's book
on the Zunis.
BY the dances and songs Of the
choirs Of Corn Maidens. dressed in
fantastic costumes: by the elaborate
and solemn ceremonial Of the Rain
Priests, with its mimetic prayers for
rain, its wonderful color symbolism,
and its use Of the mystical numbers;
by the strange approximations of the
Giant Courier. Gods Of the Rain
Priests, the Zunis supplicate the gods
for raip
The Hopi or Moki Indian snake
dance, celebrated about the same time
of year, Is a rain ceremony, and a
writer in the Craftsman who witness
ed the dance some years ago says
that the dance he witnessed was I'M
mediately followed by a soaking rain.
In primitive rain ceremonial min
licking" is supposed to be %eficacious.
According to sixteenth and seven
teenth century German records, witch
es assembled in crowds by water,
brooks or lakes. and f1ogged the water
with rods till a fog rose and thick
ened into black clouds. On these
clouds the witches were borne up and
guided the clouds to the place where
they meant to make mischief. A le-
gend is told Of a violent storm which
lasted until a huntsman, suspecting
that 1t was the work of a witch, load
ed his gun with q co%nsecrated bullet
and fired into the middle of the dark
est cloud. when out Of 1t an unclad
female fell dead. and the storm blew
over in q moment.
The huntsmen Of the Celts dipped
water with their horns from a certain
fountain and poured it upon the
stones to cause the clouds to rise and
refreshen the lands. The Omaha In
dams filled q large vessel with water
and danced around it, one Of them
drinking 1t and squirting it into the
air to initiate and invite rain. In
the Punjab Qndia) village girls pour
water down the back of an old wo-
man as she passes az a rain charm.
The children of Greece, when 1t has
not rained for several weeks. some
times select n of their number, 8
or 10 years old, usually a poor or
phan, who is stripped from head to
foot and decked with herbs and flow
The other children lead her
around the village and sing hymns;
every housewife throws a pail Of wa
ter over her and gives the children
a small piece of money. On the
Rhine this was n of the rain charms
formerly used: A little unclad girl
was led outside the town, where she
had to dig henbane with the little
fingers of her right hand and tie it to
the little shoe Of her right foot. She
was then conducted by the other
maidens to the nearest river and
splashed with water. Somestimes a
girl called the dodo was stripped and
wrapped with grass, herbs and flow-
ers and escorted from house to house.
At each house a ring was formed,
in the middle Of which the little girl
danced and whirled while the good
wife came out and emptied a bucket
Of water yer her and her compan-
ions sang:
To God doth our dodo call,
That dewy rain may fall,
And drench the diggers all,
The workers, great and small,
Even those in houses and stall.
Sometimes certain stones are pre-
served as rain charms or rain gods,
and in drought are dipped in water
or sprinkled. In Samoa the priest
carried the rain-making stone and
dipped 1t in the river. The Indian
magi. who are to invoke 70 He wah,
and mediate with the supreme holy
fire, that he may give seasonable rains
have a transparent stone Of supposed
great power in assisting to bring
down the rain when it is put in a ba-
sin Of water.
In Navarro the image Of st. Peter
was taken to the river, where some
prayed for rain and some ducked his
image in the water. In the Caucasian
province Of Georgia, manageable
girls r yoked in couples to an OK
yoke. and with the priest holding the
reins, they wade or are driven through
OF puddles and marshes, pray
ing, screaming, weeping and laugh
The Peruvians set a black sheep in
the field, poured chica over 1t and
gave 1t nothing to eat until 1t rained.
The Timorese sacrificed a black pig
for rain. In Sunatra splashing q
black cat in the water was practiced
to darken the sky like rainclouds and
bring rain.
One Of the signs believed trust