and that
for this crime he was transferred to the moon, there to remain till the
end of all things. The passage cited in support of this tale is
_Numbers_ xv. 32-36. Upon referring to the sacred text, we
certainly find a man gathering sticks upon the Sabbath day, and the
congregation gathering stones for his merciless punishment, but we
look in vain for any mention of the moon. _Non est inventus_. Of
many an ancient story-teller we may say, as Sheridan said of
Dundas, "the right honourable gentleman is indebted to his memory
for his jests and to his imagination for his facts."

Mr. Proctor reminds us that "according to German nurses, the day
was not the Sabbath, but Sunday. Their tale runs as follows: Ages
ago there went one Sunday an old man into the woods to hew sticks.
He cut a faggot and slung it on a stout staff, cast it over his shoulder,
and began to trudge home with his burthen. On his way he met a
handsome man in Sunday suit, walking towards the church. The
man stopped, and asked the faggot-bearer, 'Do you know that this is
Sunday on earth, when all must rest from their labours?' 'Sunday on
earth, or Monday in heaven, it's all one to me!' laughed the
woodcutter. 'Then bear your bundle for ever!' answered the stranger.
'And as you value not Sunday on earth, yours shall

[Illustration: moon05]

be a perpetual moon-day in heaven; you shall stand for eternity in
the moon, a warning to all Sabbath-breakers.' Thereupon the
stranger vanished, and the man was caught up with his staff and
faggot into the moon, where he stands yet." [16]

In Tobler's account the man was given the choice of burning in the
sun, or of freezing in the moon; and preferring a lunar frost to a
solar furnace, he is to be seen at full moon seated with his bundle of
sticks on his back. If "the cold in clime are cold in blood," we may
be thankful that we do not hibernate eternally in the moon and in the
nights of winter, when the cold north winds blow, "we may look up
through the casement and "pity the sorrows of this poor old man."

Mr. Baring-Gould finds that "in Schaumberg-lippe, the story goes,
that a man and a woman stand in the moon: the man because he
strewed brambles and thorns on the church path, so as to hinder
people from attending mass on Sunday morning; the woman
because she made butter on that day. The man carries his bundle of
thorns, the woman her butter tub. A similar tale is told in Swabia
and in Marken. Fischart says that