htfall let a girl shut herself up naked in her bedroom, take
two beakers, and into one pour clear water, into the other wine. These
let her place on the table, which is to be covered with white, and let
the following words be said:--

"My dear St. Andrew!
Let now appear before me
My heart's most dearly beloved.
If he shall be rich,
He will pour a cup of wine;
If he is to be poor,
Let him pour a cup of water."

This done, the form of the future husband will enter and drink |215| of
one of the cups. If he is poor, he will take the water; if rich, the
wine.{17}

One of the most common practices is to pour molten lead or tin through a
key into cold water, and to discover the calling of the future husband by
the form it takes, which will represent the tools of his trade. The white
of an egg is sometimes used for the same purpose.{18} Another very
widespread custom is to put nutshells to float on water with little
candles burning in them. There are twice as many shells as there are
girls present; each girl has her shell, and to the others the names of
possible suitors are given. The man and the girl whose shells come
together will marry one another. Sometimes the same method is practised
with little cups of silver foil.{19}

On the border of Saxony and Bohemia, a maiden who wishes to know the
bodily build of her future husband goes in the darkness to a stack of
wood and draws out a piece. If the wood is smooth and straight the man
will be slim and well built; if it is crooked, or knotted, he will be
ill-developed or even a hunchback.{20}

These are but a few of the many ways in which girls seek to peer into the
future and learn something about the most important event in their lives.
Far less numerous, but not altogether absent on this night, are other
kinds of prognostication. A person, for instance, who wishes to know
whether he will die in the coming year, must on St. Andrew's Eve before
going to bed make on the table a little pointed heap of flour. If by the
morning it has fallen asunder, the maker will die.{21}

The association of St. Andrew's Eve with the foreseeing of the future is
not confined to the German race; it is found also on Slavonic and
Roumanian ground. In Croatia he who fasts then will behold his future
wife in a dream,{22} and among the Roumanians mothers anxious about
their children's luck break small sprays from fruit-trees, bind them
together in bunches, one for each