It stands, too, as one of the horrible ingredients of the witches' cauldron in "Macbeth Toad that, under coldest stone, Days and nights hast thirty-one ; Among the tales also told of witches assuming the form of a toad we may quote the following. Towards the close of the sixteenth century, a peasant residing in West Flanders had a quarrel with the landlady of the ale-house in which he had been drinking, when at last she uttered this threat: "For this thou shalt not reach home to-night, or I'll never come back." Accordingly, when he went down to the canal and got into his boat, he could not, in spite of all his exertions, move it from the shore. In his difficulties he called to three soldiers who chanced to be passing, and asked them to come and help him. They did so, but to no purpose, until one of them proposed to throw out some things which were lying at the bottom of the boat. As soon as these had been removed, they discovered an enormous toad, with eyes like glowing coals, which one of the soldiers lost no time in stabbing through the body and flinging into the water. They now tried again to remove the boat, and as it glided off without any further trouble the peasant was so pleased that he took the soldiers back to the ale-house for some refreshment. On asking, however, for the landlady, they were told that she was at the point of death, from wounds which could not be accounted for, as she had not left the house. The peasant then hastened to the magistrate, to whom he related the whole affair, from which it was clearly evident that the toad was no other than the hostess, who had assumed the form of that reptile for the purpose of preventing the man from returning home. 3 Sometimes, too, the nightmare appears as a mouse or a weasel, yet never as a horse or a mare.2 Curious to say, an absurd blunder has been perpetrated by Fuseli, the Royal Academician, in his celebrated picture of the "Nightmare," in which he represents the fiend in equine form bestriding his unhappy victim. But one, however, of the most popular notions is that it is a demon or fiend, who takes advantage of the hours of darkness, when special licence is supposed to be given to beings of the ghostly world to take their walks abroad-to ride through benighted districts, in order either to throttle some snoring peasant, or to make itself actually present in 1 Thorpe's Northern Mythology, iii. 278. 2 Kelly's Indo-European Folk-Lore, 240. Hardwick's Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore, 1872, 185. 1 his dreams, and thereby intensify their grim reality. Indeed, this idea is found even among savage tribes, and may be traced back to a very remote period. Thus, by way of example, we are told how the North American Indians, after a night of debauchery and excessive feasting, are said to be visited by nocturnal visitors of a not very agreeable kind, who with threatening gestures scare their sleeping victims. Again, the Caribs, when subjected to hideous dreams, often on awakening have declared that the demon Maboya has ill-treated and beaten them in their sleep, affirming that they could even still feel the effects of his rough treatment. Hence, in the early days of Christianity, the idea found favour in many eyes that the demon of nightmare was one of the means which Satan employed for molesting and seducing human souls.2 Persons, therefore, whose slumbers had been broken by impure and unholy dreams were believed to have been unconsciously under the influence of Satan's sway, and to have indulged in sinful desires and inclinations. Among the many tales which illustrate the theory of the nightmare as being a demon, we may briefly relate a Netherlandish one which is a fair example of others of a similar kind. Two young men were in love with the same lady. One of them being tormented every night by a nightmare, sought advice from his rival, who took advantage of his act of confidence, and gave him the subjoined piece of treacherous advice: "Hold a sharp knife with the point towards your breast, and you'll never see the Mara again." His comrade thanked him, but on retiring to rest he thought it as well to be on Consethe safe side, and so held the knife handle downwards. quently, when at midnight the Mara made her accustomed visit, instead of forcing the knife into his breast she cut herself badly, and escaped from the room making a terrible noise. The legend unfor. tunately does not tell us the issue of this tragic affair, but we can only hope that the young man revenged himself on his false and malicious rival by promptly marrying the young lady. 3 Again, closely associated with the nightmare may be noticed another variety of this nocturnal demon known as the vampire. Inasmuch as certain patients, remarks Mr. Tylor, are seen becoming day by day thin, weak, and bloodless, without any apparent cause, it has been suggested that there are a certain class of demons which eat out the souls or hearts or suck the blood of their victims. These cruel beings, according to certain primitive theories, "come by night to men, sit upon their breasts, and suck their blood; while others affirm it is only children's blood they suck, they being to grown people mere nightmares." The Polynesians, it would seem, had a similar idea, believing that departed souls quitted their graves to creep by night into neighbouring houses, where they devoured the heart and entrails of the sleepers, who were supposed to die from the effects. Another explanation, whereby the mysterious nature of the nightmare has been accounted for, is that given in Germany. Thus, when seven boys or girls are born in succession, one among them is said to be a nightmare, who visits those sleeping and in various ways oppresses and torments them. Mr. Thorpe 2 relates a German tradition which tells how a man chose such a nightmare for his wife without knowing it. He soon, however, discovered that, when he was asleep, she was in the habit of disappearing from his room. One night, therefore, he kept awake for some time in order to watch her movements having previously taken the precaution of bolting the door. His patience was at last rewarded, for he saw her rise from the bed, and, making her way to the door, slip through the hole for the strap by which the latch was lifted up. After being absent some time she returned by the way she went. On the following day he stopped up the opening in the door, and thus, as he thought, had succeeded in breaking his wife of going on these midnight wanderings, seeing that she did not leave him again. When a considerable time had elapsed, the man drew out the peg, in order to use the latch again; but on the following morning his wife was missing, and, much to his distress, she never returned. again. In the same way, too, the nightmare in the form of a beautiful damsel occasionally becomes the wife of some one to whom she takes a violent fancy-vanishing on being recognised. There is a well-known monkish tale of a pious knight who, whilst journeying one day through the forest, found a charming lady tied to a tree, her back covered with gashes, the result of a severe flogging which she had received from some bandits. Of course, says Mr. Fiske,3 who relates this romantic tale, he took her home to his castle and married her. For a time they were exceedingly happy, and nothing marred the serenity of their home. In accordance with his accustomed rule, the knight went to mass every Sunday, and was greatly annoyed when he found that his wife J. R. Forster, Observations during Voyage round World, 543. See Hardwick's Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore, 1872, 232. Myths and Myth-makers, 94. Northern Mythology, iii. 29. would never stay to assist in the Credo, but walked out of the church just as the choir struck up. This conduct went on for some time, when one Sunday he was so angry at what he considered his wife's irreverence that, just as she was rising to leave the church, he seized her by the arm and demanded an explanation. In an instant a change came over her, and her dark eyes gleamed with weird, unearthly beauty. All eyes were quickly on the knight and his lady; and, on the former shouting, "In God's name, tell me what thou art," the bodily form of the latter "melted away, and was seen no more, whilst, with a cry of anguish and of terror, an evil spirit of monstrous form rose from the ground, clave the chapel roof asunder, and disappeared in the air." On the Continent we find numerous stories of the same kind, but the one just quoted is a fair specimen, containing a good illustration of the supernatural element. These, then, are some of the principal myths and traditions which, in the course of years, have gradually interwoven themselves round the Mara or nightmare-the leading idea being that of a fiend who, clothed in various forms, sits upon the sleeper's bosom and hinders respiration. Many of these legends, too, have evidently come down to us from a very early period, and may be considered as indisputable relics of Aryan mythology, having taken their rise at a time when our primitive ancestors were accustomed to attribute the then inexplicable phenomena of life that surrounded them to supernatural causes. Although, indeed, happily we no longer labour under the disadvantages of undeveloped knowledge, nor live in an age when we can barely catch glimpses of those truths which science, after long and patient research, has evolved for us from the twilight of the world's dark ignorance and made palpable to all, yet the records of primitive culture still survive in our midst, and only too often we find superstition peeping up where we should least expect to find it. Thus, at the present day in Germany it is difficult to persuade the peasant that the imaginary phantom which disturbs his rest is almost purely the result of indigestion, and not, as he fancies, in any way attributable to supernatural causes. Before speaking of some of the charms practised for counteracting the nightmare, we may just note in passing that it has been suggested that the term nightmare" in some instances may have been applied to a witch transformed into a mare by means of a magic bridle, and ridden, says Mr. Hardwick,' with great violence by the very party at whose bedside she had previously metamorphosed into a steed, on the back of which she had galloped to the witches' revel. If the man ▾ Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore, 185. horse contrived to slip off the bridle, and throw it over the witch's head, she immediately became transformed into a mare, and was frequently, according to popular belief, subjected to much harsh usage. Referring, also, to the origin of the nightmare, it is supposed to be descended from the Aryan "Maruts," the "Couriers of the Air," who rode the winds in the "wild hunt," "headed by Odin or the renowned spectre horseman of medieval legends." Mr. Kelly' remarks:-"These riders, in all other respects identical with the Mahrts, are in some parts of Germany called Walriderske, i.e. Valkyrs. In some of the tales told of them, they still retain their old divine nature; in others they are brought down to the common level of mere earthly witches. If they ride now in stables, without locomotion, it is because they swept of old through the air on their divine coursers. Now they steal by night to the beds of hinds and churls, but there was a time when they descended from Valhalla to conceive, in the embrace of a mortal, the demi-god whom they afterwards accompanied to the battlefield, to bear him thence to the hall of Odin." Among the charms in use as a preservative against nightmare. may be mentioned the coal-rake. Not very long ago, at the West Riding Court, at Bradford, in a case of a husband and wife having quarrelled, the woman stated that the reason why she kept a coalrake in her bedroom was that she suffered from nightmare, and had been informed that the rake would keep it away. Lluellin (1679), referring to the power of coral over the nightmare, has the following: Some the nightmare hath prest, With that weight on their breast, No returnes of their breath can passe; But to us the tale is addle, We can take off our saddle, And turn out the nightmare to grasse. Hence, it has been suggested, arose the popularity for children to wear coral beads, a practice which extensively prevails even at the present day. Aubrey, in his " Miscellanies," mentions a charm which is perhaps nowadays as popular as in his time. He says: "To hinder the nightmare, they hang in a string a flint with a hole in it by the manger, but best of all, they say, hung about their necks, and a flint will do that hath not a hole in it. It is to prevent the nightmare, viz. the hag, from riding their horses, who will sometimes sweat at night. The flint thus hung does hinder it." In Lancashire the peasantry fancy that the nightmare appears in the form of a dog, and in order to frustrate its influence they place their shoes under 'Kelly's Indo-European Folk-Lore, 241. |