y, it is the
custom to thrust some one into water, be it sea or river, pond or well.
On emerging he has to sprinkle the bystanders.{31} The rite may be
compared with the drenchings of human beings in order to produce rain
described by Dr. Frazer in "The Magic Art."{32}

Another Greek custom combines the purifying powers of Epiphany water with
the fertilizing influences of the Christmas log--round Mount Olympos
ashes are taken from the hearth where a cedar log has been burning since
Christmas, and are baptized in the blessed water of the river. They are
then borne |345| to the vineyards, and thrown at their four corners,
and also at the foot of apple- and fig-trees.{33}

This may remind us that in England fruit-trees used to come in for
special treatment on the Vigil of the Epiphany. In Devonshire the farmer
and his men would go to the orchard with a large jug of cider, and drink
the following toast at the foot of one of the best-bearing apple-trees,
firing guns in conclusion:--

"Here's to thee, old apple-tree,
Whence thou may'st bud, and whence thou may'st blow!
And whence thou may'st bear apples enow!
Hats full! caps full!
Bushel!--bushel--sacks full,
And my pockets full too! Huzza!"{34}

In seventeenth-century Somersetshire, according to Aubrey, a piece of
toast was put upon the roots.{35} According to another account each
person in the company used to take a cupful of cider, with roasted apples
pressed into it, drink part of the contents, and throw the rest at the
tree.{36} The custom is described by Herrick as a Christmas Eve
ceremony:--

"Wassail the trees, that they may bear
You many a plum and many a pear;
For more or less fruits they will bring,
As you do give them wassailing."{37}

In Sussex the wassailing (or "worsling") of fruit-trees took place on
Christmas Eve, and was accompanied by a trumpeter blowing on a cow's
horn.{38}

The wassailing of the trees may be regarded as either originally an
offering to their spirits or--and this seems more probable--as a
sacramental act intended to bring fertilizing influences to bear upon
them. Customs of a similar character are found in Continental countries
during the Christmas season. In Tyrol, for instance, when the Christmas
pies are a-making on St. Thomas's Eve, the maids are told to go
out-of-doors and put their arms, sticky with paste, round the
fruit-trees, in order that they |346|