Finns of ancient Europe, though they afterwards became associated with the Druidical worship of the invading Aryans. These are cairns, heaps of stone, or sometimes of earth; menhirs, or upright stones of great size; dolmens, or titanic boxes constructed of three or four huge fragments of rock, and covered as by a lid with a very large flat stone; logan or rocking stones, and sacred stones, such as London Stone in Cannon Street, and Jacob's Pillow, the stone under the Coronation chair in Westminster Abbey. Concerning this last the legend states that the nation owning it will rule the other races of the British islands. It is said to have been brought from Ireland to Scotland by the invading Scots, and Edward the First removed it from Scone to Westminster. The history of this stone shows how the superstitions of the Finns were taken up by the higher races amongst whom they lived; and the fact that Aryans and Kynesians adapted menhirs and dolmens to their own religious and superstitious practices has somewhat confused the evidence that attaches these monuments to the more primitive people. It is, however, practically certain that they are older than any Aryan invasion. They exist in places where the Mediterranean races can hardly have penetrated. They are found everywhere where we find other traces of the Finns. And they have the invariable characteristic of showing no marks of metal work, or effort at building one stone into another, nor is metal ever found buried in their vicinity. One of the most remarkable monuments of the kind is situated between the town of Geneva and Mont Salève. 19 It consists of a great block of stone, standing on a small natural mound, whereon is cut a rough bas-relief representing four figures of squat Mongolian type, each of whom holds with both hands a cylindrical object nine to twelve inches long. Now the Breton legends always name as one of the principal attributes of the korrigans a small linen bag or pouch containing hair, scissors, and other objects used in magic rites. If any mortal can deprive one of the race of her bag, the korrigan will follow him to his house, live with him, work for him, and watch with unceasing vigilance for the opportunity to recover her treasure. The Chamans of the present day have, similarly, a sacred pouch wherein they secrete magical materials. The Geneva stone, therefore, represents an effort to portray the early Finnish magicians of Europe in their habit as they lived. To make certainty more sure it is still connected with superstitious practices whose origin can be traced to the pagan ceremonies of the earliest European ages. Here is lighted the signal-fire for the 'Feux des Brandons,' analogous to the fires of St. John's Eve in Brittany and Ireland. The custom is very ancient and universal over Europe, from Athens to the Highlands of Scotland. Among the Gaels they tecturales des Phéniciens, des Grecs, des Romains, des Celtes, ou même des Slaves n'offrent rien de commun avec les monuments dont il est ici question.' De Gobineau, vol. ii. p. 72. Professor Palgrave and Lord Avebury think differently, however. 1 De Gobineau, vol. ii. p. 104. were called Beltane fires, and until quite recently in Ireland cattle were driven through the flames. One question still remains. What was the ultimate fate of these queer little Finnish or fairy populations of prehistoric Europe? Some were doubtless absorbed into the bulk of the invading nations. A modern professor suspects traces of some Mongoloid, that is Finnish, race in the modern populations of Wales and the West of England.20 Among these traces he cites the oblique or Chinese eye, with almondshaped opening and thick upper eyelid; also the prominent Mongol mouth. In Ireland, Finn, Finnerty, and Finnigan, Kerrigan, i.e. Korrigan, and O'Shee, 'son of the fairy,' are not uncommon surnames. There is a side of the old legends which describes the dwarfs as giving useful help to the farmer both in and out of doors; in the stable, in the kitchen, and in the washhouse.21 Many of the race, however, would retire to districts hard to be subdued, and hardly worth subduing, where they would continue their tribal existence. As upon an Australian sheep run there are sometimes 'tame blacks' and 'wild blacks,' so about the early Aryan or Kynesian homestead there would be tame Finns and wild Finns, i.e. fairies. As the latter died out, unable to stand the pressure of the superior races by which they were surrounded, one may well imagine that the legends concerning their existence would become more and more removed from actuality; their personal peculiarities, especially their small size, would be more and more emphasised, their magical powers exaggerated. 'The old people used to say,' ever a favourite conversational gambit about the peasant's fireside, would frequently introduce some story wherein the speaker would describe how his grandfather had seen on a summer night the Good People' thick as bees upon the side of the mountain, busy with the performance of strange ceremonies or marvellous feats of magic. So, as in a One such tale relates how each fairy seized hold of a piece of ragweed, calling out, 'My horse and saddle and bridle.' The ragweed turned into horses, and the whole crowd rode off to the Court of the King of Spain to visit the King of Spain's daughter. game of Russian Scandal,' the legendary marvels would grow and spread, until a state of mind was produced like that so charmingly written of by Mr. Allingham in his verses : Up the airy mountain, And white owl's feather.22 ARTHUR STEWART HERBERT. 20 Dr. John Beddoes, The Races of Britain, p. 9. 21 De Gobineau, op. cit. vol. ii. p. 9. 22 Lyra Celtica, p. 94. A CHILD'S RECOLLECTIONS IT may not be uninteresting in these days, when life is such a rush and all that happens is so soon forgotten, to retrace the manners, habits, and customs, half a century ago, of a society and a country which then was, as a whole, hardly in the throes of its birth. The Germany of to-day was at that time only the barely conceived ideal of a few elect minds. The great masses never dreamt of such possibilities. My first recollections go back to the early forties, and though I was a very small child then, they are quite clear, and I am certain that they are not second hand, as after the death of my parents, which occurred before I was grown up, the whole tenor of my life was changed, and those I lived with knew nothing of these early associations. I passed the first years of my life in an ancient castle built by Henry the Fowler, Emperor of Germany. It dated back to some time in the ninth century, but I suppose it must have been a strong place even before that, as the Romans called it 'Bicheni,' which the Wends, on whose frontier it was built, changed later on to Puechau.' The Emperor Henry had placed it there to protect the rich bishopric of Wurzen against the incursions of the heathen, whom it was his policy to push more and more eastwards. The part built by the Emperor, and which still bears his name, is almost untouched and stands beyond the mote. The castle itself is a great and picturesque irregular pile, romantic and mysterious, with inner court and many terraces on different levels all around it. It stands on an eminence and looks out far over the land, over great oak-forests, rich pastures, and winding rivers, to a range of blue, once volcanic, hills. Some small towns and many villages with glowing red roofs and shimmering church spires gleam in the distance, and towers built by Romans, Goths, or Markomanns command many of the important places. We were there in the heart of a very old country, which was the centre of Saxony, before some of its best provinces were lost by its rulers' weak and francophile policy during the Napoleonic wars. A deep ravine, spanned by a narrow bridge, almost a viaduct, divided the church from the castle, and I used on Sundays to stand with my nurse under the great horse-chestnuts and watch the castle people walk across, two and two, for there was not room for more abreast. They all carried great black hymn-books and nosegays, and the women were bareheaded. Up the winding road from the village came the peasants with their families. The married women still wore the richly embroidered caps with flowing ribands and the stiff wide Elizabethan ruff. Flowered silk handkerchiefs were crossed over their breasts, and the large satin aprons trimmed with lace nearly covered the whole of their skirts. The girls often wore little wreaths of artificial flowers. All of them, men and women, young and old, brought their posies of bright garden flowers mixed with pungent herbs, to keep themselves awake in the drowsy summer heat during the long hours of the sermon. When first I was admitted to church and seated on a very highbacked leather-covered chair, all my attention was absorbed by the monuments of armoured knights and farthingaled dames below, and the tremendous cheeks of puffing seraphs on the bright blue cassettone ceiling above. Whatever there was left, was devoted to an interminable row of hour-glasses which I longed to turn, and which were ranged on a bracket against the whitewashed wall. Near the church stood the manse, a fine sixteenth-century building, grey and severe, with a tall steep roof and low rounded porch with stone seats. A trellised walk led from the church to this porch, and on each side of it there were great tangles of bright flowers, tall hollyhocks and flaming poppies, lilies and roses, with borders of mignonette and stocks. I remember, as if it was yesterday, seeing for the first time our parson's newly married young wife standing in that garden. She was a lovely English girl, quite young, of the Book of Beauty type. She wore a pale green dress, rather transparent, and a fine long gold chain round her neck, with glittering rings on her fingers. The peasants who lived in the village below were all very happy and well off. They had great well-built houses, cool in summer, warm in winter, under their high-tiled roofs, and many maids and serving men, though they themselves and their sons also laboured in the fields. They had much cattle in their stables, and the wives and daughters and maids looked after that, and cooked, and baked, and washed. During the long winter evenings the women all sat together in the great warm room spinning, whilst the men sang or smoked their pipes, sitting on the bench that ran round the monumental stoves. Behind their houses were great shady orchards with tarns and clear wells and rippling rivulets into which the sun only shone in the early spring before the leaves had come out. I often gazed down from the castle into these mysterious shadows, for out of one of the tarns a cry came at times, so strange, so sad and hopeless that my imagination was enthralled by it and filled by vague and wondrous thoughts, for I was told it was the 'Unke' which. called there, a creature never seen and which never dies. I believed, like every German child, that if undetected at midnight on St. John's Eve I could slip out and spread a blue kerchief on the side of the tarn, I should find a little golden crown upon it in the morning. The castle was, as I have said, very large and rambling, with inner and outer courts and towers, and long passages filled with armour and pictures of my ancestors, which rather frightened me in winter, for houses were neither lit nor warmed in those days, and that is conducive to fear. There was on one side a wide moat without water, in which fruit trees grew. It was carpeted with the greenest turf, and the kennels were there. We were kept, like most children of that time, under strict discipline, and not allowed to roam beyond the sight of nurses or governesses, and when one day my mother, sitting on a terrace close to a court which led to the kitchen, told my brother, aged nine or ten, to deliver a message to the cook, he said ' But where is the kitchen? We children had a wing of the castle set apart for us, and no stranger ever penetrated there. We were never allowed to speak German, except on the rare occasions when we were out of hearing of our governesses, of which we always had one English and one French. Only the babies had German nurses. As we got older the staff of pedagogues was increased by my brothers' tutors, and drawing and music masters, and German was allowed at meals. There were always many guests, especially in summer, and nobody thought it extraordinary that some of them should remain for months together. One of them was Mr. Evelyn, an Irishman and a great fisherman. He lived with us for the best part of the year since I can remember, until my father's death. One day a Prince and Princess Poniatowski arrived for a short visit. She was a very beautiful Irishwoman, née Laura Temple. My parents had known them at Dresden, which was at that time full of exiled Poles. They remained six or seven months, because they had no money to travel with. Mr. Evelyn admired his lovely countrywoman, who used to sit beside him when he was fishing, as she had nothing else in the world to do. I sometimes accom. panied them, and though only four or five, quite took in the situation and was extremely annoyed, as I disliked Princess Poniatowska for always wearing my mother's clothes, and what exasperated me beyond expression was her using a white moire parasol, with a very long fringe and lined with sunset colour, which had come straight from Paris. In my baby mind I docketed the Princess as what I now know to mean an adventuress. My mother had a girl friend, a Countess S, who, married to a |