a tradizione degli antichi Cinesi,"
_Giornale della Societa Asiatica Italiana_, i. (1887) pp. 20-23; J.J.M.
de Groot, _Les Fetes annuellement celebrees a Emoui (Amoy)_ (Paris,
1886), i. 208 _sqq._ The notion that fire can be worn out with age meets
us also in Brahman ritual. See the _Satapatha Brahmana_, translated by
Julius Eggeling, Part i. (Oxford, 1882) p. 230 (_Sacred Books of the
East_, vol. xii.).

[343] W.G. Aston, _Shinto, The Way of the Gods_ (London, 1905), pp. 258
_sq._, compare p. 193. The wands in question are sticks whittled near
the top into a mass of adherent shavings; they go by the name of
_kedzurikake_ ("part-shaved"), and resemble the sacred _inao_ of the
Aino. See W.G. Aston, _op. cit._ p. 191; and as to the _inao_, see
_Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild_, ii. 185, with note 2.

[344] Ovid, _Fasti_, iii. 82; Homer, _Iliad_, i. 590, _sqq._

[345] Philostiatus, _Heroica_, xx. 24.

[346] Ovid, _Fasti_, iii. 143 _sq._; Macrobius, _Saturn_, i. 12. 6.

[347] Festus, ed. C.O. Mueller (Leipsic, 1839), p. 106, _s.v._ "Ignis."
Plutarch describes a method of rekindling the sacred fire by means of
the sun's rays reflected from a hollow mirror (_Numa_, 9); but he seems
to be referring to a Greek rather than to the Roman custom. The rule of
celibacy imposed on the Vestals, whose duty it was to relight the sacred
fire as well as to preserve it when it was once made, is perhaps
explained by a superstition current among French peasants that if a girl
can blow up a smouldering candle into a flame she is a virgin, but that
if she fails to do so, she is not. See Jules Lecoeur, _Esquisses du
Bocage Normand_ (Conde-sur-Noireau, 1883-1887), ii. 27; B. Souche,
_Croyances, Presages et Traditions diverses_ (Niort, 1880), p. 12. At
least it seems more likely that the rule sprang from a superstition of
this sort than from a simple calculation of expediency, as I formerly
suggested (_Journal of Philology_, xiv. (1885) p. 158). Compare _The
Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings>_ ii. 234 _sqq._

[348] Geoffrey Keating, D.D., _The History of Ireland, translated from
the original Gaelic, and copiously annotated_, by John O'Mahony (New
York, 1857), p. 300, with the translator's note. Compare (Sir) John
Rhys, _Celtic Heathendom_ (London, 1888), pp. 514 _sq._

[349] W.R.S. Ralston, _Songs of the Russian People_, Second Edition
(London, 1872), pp. 254 _sq._

[350] A. Kuhn und W. Schwartz, _Norddeutsche Sagen, Maerchen und
G