CORRESPONDENCE.
MODERN GREEK FOLK-LORE.
To the Editor of Folk-Lore.
Sir,—I may mention, with regard to Mr. Frazer's note on "May Day in Greece" (vol. i, p. 519), a curious custom which exists in Calymnos, and possibly elsewhere. Everyone must eat figs on the 1st of May, otherwise they will be bitten by a donkey. Why a donkey, I cannot tell.
The custom of jumping over fires on St. John's Eve alluded to by Mr. Frazer, is universal in Greece. The reason for so doing is the same as that given in many other countries: it is to protect oneself from fleas.
With regard to the same writer's remarks on "Pythagorean Maxims" (vol. i, p. 148), is it certain that the precept, μὴ ἐσθίειν ἀπὸ δίφρου (this is the MS. reading in Plutarch, p. 290e, ἐπὶ in the other passage, p. 354b), means, "Do not eat in a chariot"? I should suppose that it means, "Do not eat of food placed on a stool": it would thus be closely connected with the other precept, "Do not sit on a bushel," with which Plutarch twice couples it.
{{fine|Grandhome, Aberdeen.}]
Sir,—The Greek May-day song, contributed by Mr. Frazer to the last number of Folk-Lore, is almost identical with one sung in Epirus, and included in my translations of Greek Folk-songs, edited by Mr. Stuart-Glennie (1885 and 1888). The last ten lines of the Corfu song are not given by Aravaudinos, whose version I followed, simply because they are a common form appended
