Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1916-02-13
DOVES AND EMBLEMS.
IN HE Lupercalian festival is one of

| II the sea deep pearls of Greek
mystery that chung to the early
swimmers across from Grecian to Ital-
ian isles. The faces of the gods as
they entered newer world were some
what yelled, from the strangeness. and
it is no wonder that their natures. too
became slightly different and theil
names changed.
| To the Italian shepherds Pan soften
ed into their more intimate Lupercus,
losing most of his wild poetic beauty
of meaning as he became a mingler in
the simple affairs of lowly men.
| Hera, yelling her proud aloofness.. be-
came the more amTle-bosomed Juno
willing to be enthroned on the hearth
| stones of the poor. 1t must have been
that. once willing. she became nearer
until under their love she merged into
| the gracious idea of Februaria,
brooding love-goddess:
| Thus Lupercus. petitioning for his
shepherds and their flocks, found a
more approa enable goddess of union.
and together they were worshiped as
the presiding deities of the Luperca-
! lian festival.
! In sunny fountained Rome where
| doves were flying and mating to COO
Z
pies to the old gods. boys and maidens
came to the temples with their en-
blems. each inscribed with the name of
| a maiden or boy beloved. Some stone
libation bowl, carven doubtless with
the symbol or features of their curious
divinities, held the billets impartially-
no chance of choosing now while the
wistful lovers waited and drew strange
ones again.
Curious custom with so little chance
| of right mating, yet fortunate at least
| for those not too hopeful ones to whom
| 1t gave hearts chance to utter the
beloved name in secret. And while
they waited there with the pretty eX-
cuse of the exchanging emblems. under
the benignity of the reigning gods.
perhaps through glances and nearness
to each other, the truth spoke louder
between them and ignored the chance
mingling and separation of their
names among the others.
Slowly the worship of Christ, over
flowing the outer caves of the eternal
city, ensconced itself in the shadowy
temples of the retiring pagan deities.
and. indeed, in the very forms and
customs. those lovely sea-deep shells
brought by the swimmers from early
Greece to the Italian isles.
One cannot easily picture the change.
which must have been gradual, when
the people were wooed from their
pleasurable gods to the acceptance
of a martyr and saint as the patron of
their changed festival But the sever
ity of the fathers must have relaxed
a little, to let them set forth st. VAL
entine, as a lover of mankind.
He, loving them. became the patron
of young hearts and lives. Loving birds
and beasts. too. he encouraged their
mating. and although he died
martyr. his loving heart goes forth on
his saints day, when all things won
der at the first sweet stirring of sap
in the bough. of pulse in the body. OF
love in the heart.
That gathering of boys and maidens
under the caves of the olden temples.
dropping missives in the stone libation
fonts on the feast of the Lupercalia,
continued faithful to the delicate prac-
tice through the shifting of the temple
gods. The attempt made by the faith
ers to draw their children to higher
thoughts by the substitution Of saints
names was futile one. Tanned they
were to the sweet patronage OF the
saint, yet fully human and not to be
shut away from their own share of ex-
perience.
Real names of flesh and blood they
wrote and sought until, overlooking
doubtless the stone fonts of the tenn
pies, with their missives and becoming
fearful, perhaps. Of the dangers Of
chance. the quicker. more direct me-
dunn of messengers became the custom.
The streets were soon a-hutter with the
to-and fro ing of love messengers with
their secret burdens, and the air with
hyins doves, they also bearers Of the
lovers tokens.
flowed the fonts and set the city astir,