contributed to secure for the insurgents the command of the sea. In general, however, it was found that fireships hampered the movements of a fleet, were easily sunk by an enemy’s fire, or towed aside by his boats, while a premature explosion was frequently fatal to the men who had to place them in position. They were made by building “a fire chamber” between the decks from the forecastle to a bulkhead constructed abaft the mainmast. This space was filled with resin, pitch, tallow and tar, together with gunpowder in iron vessels. The gunpowder and combustibles were connected by trains of powder, and by bundles of brushwood called “bavins.” When a fireship was to be used, a body of picked men steered her down on the enemy, and when close enough set her alight, and escaped in a boat which was towed astern. As the service was peculiarly dangerous a reward of £100, or in lieu of it a gold chain with a medal to be worn as a mark of honour, was granted in the British navy to the successful captain of a fireship. A rank of capitaine de brûlot existed in the French navy of Louis XIV., and was next to the full captain—or capitaine de vaisseau.
FIRE-WALKING, a religious ceremony common to many
races. The origin and meaning of the custom is very obscure,
but it is shown to have been widespread in all ages. It still
survives in Bulgaria, Trinidad, Fiji Islands, Tahiti, India, the
Straits Settlements, Mauritius, and it is said Japan. The details
of its ritual and its objects vary in different lands, but the
essential feature of the rite, the passing of priests, fakirs, and
devotees barefoot over heated stones or smouldering ashes is
always the same. Fire-walking was usually associated with
the spring festivals and was believed to ensure a bountiful
harvest. Such was the Chinese vernal festival of fire. In the
time of Kublai Khan the Taoist Buddhists held great festivals
to the “High Emperor of the Sombre Heavens” and walked
through a great fire barefoot, preceded by their priests bearing
images of their gods in their arms. Though they were severely
burned, these devotees held that they would pass unscathed
if they had faith. J. G. Frazer (Golden Bough, vol. iii. p. 307)
describes the ceremony in the Chinese province of Fo-kien.
The chief performers are labourers who must fast for three days
and observe chastity for a week. During this time they are
taught in the temple how they are to perform their task. On
the eve of the festival a huge brazier of charcoal, often twenty
feet wide, is prepared in front of the temple of the great god. At
sunrise the next morning the brazier is lighted. A Taoist priest
throws a mixture of salt and rice into the flames. The two
exorcists, barefooted and followed by two peasants, traverse
the fire again and again till it is somewhat beaten down. The
trained performers then pass through with the image of the god.
Frazer suggests that, as the essential feature of the rite is the
carrying of the deity through the flames, the whole thing is
sympathetic magic designed to give to the coming spring sunshine
(the supposed divine emanation), that degree of heat
which the image experiences. Frazer quotes Indian fire-walks,
notably that of the Dosadhs, a low Indian caste in Behar and
Chota Nagpur. On the fifth, tenth, and full moon days of three
months in the year, the priest walks over a narrow trench
filled with smouldering wood ashes. The Bhuiyas, a Dravidian
tribe of Mirzapur, worship their tribal hero Bir by a like performance,
and they declare that the walker who is really “possessed”
by the hero feels no pain. For fire-walking as observed
in the Madras presidency see Indian Antiquary, vii. (1878)
p. 126; iii. (1874) pp. 6-8; ii. (1873) p. 190 seq. In Fiji the
ceremony is called vilavilarevo, and according to an eyewitness
a number of natives walk unharmed across and among white-hot
stones which form the pavement of a huge native oven.
In Tahiti priests perform the rite. In April 1899 an Englishman
saw a fire-walk in Tokio (see The Field, May 20th, 1899). The
fire was six yards long by six wide. The rite was in honour of a
mountain god. The fire-walkers in Bulgaria are called Nistinares
and the faculty is regarded as hereditary. They dance in the
fire on the 21st of May, the feast of SS. Helena and Constantine.
Huge fires of faggots are made, and when these burn down the
Nistinares (who turn blue in the face) dance on the red-hot
embers and utter prophecies, afterwards placing their feet in the
muddy ground where libations of water have been poured.
The interesting part of fire-walking is the alleged immunity of the performers from burns. On this point authorities and eyewitnesses differ greatly. In a case in Fiji a handkerchief was thrown on to the stones when the first man leapt into the oven, and what remained of it snatched up as the last left the stones. Every fold that touched the stone was charred! In some countries a thick ointment is rubbed on the feet, but this is not usual, and the bulk of the reports certainly leave an impression that there is something still to be explained in the escape of the performers from shocking injuries. S. P. Langley, who witnessed a fire-walk in Tahiti, declares, however, that the whole rite as there practised is a mere symbolic farce (Nature for August 22nd, 1901).
For a full discussion of the subject with many eyewitnesses’ reports in extenso, see A. Lang, Magic and Religion (1901). See also Dr Gustav Oppert, Original Inhabitants of India, p. 480; W. Crooke, Introd. to Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India, p. 10 (1896); Folklore Journal for September 1895 and for 1903, vol. xiv. p. 87.
FIREWORKS. In modern times this term is principally
associated with the art of “pyrotechny” (Gr. πῦρ, fire, and
τέχνη, art), and confined to the production of pleasing scenic
effects by means of fire and inflammable and explosive substances.
But the history of the evolution of such displays is bound up
with that of the use of such substances not only for scenic
display but for exciting fear and for military purposes; and it is
consequently complicated by our lack of exact knowledge as
to the materials at the disposal of the ancients prior to the
invention of gunpowder (see also the article Greek Fire). For
the following historical account the term “fireworks” is therefore
used in a rather general sense.
History.—It is usually stated that from very ancient times fireworks were known in China; it is, however, difficult to assign dates or quote trustworthy authorities. Pyrotechnic displays were certainly given in the Roman circus. While a passage in Manilius,[1] who lived in the days of Augustus, seems to bear this interpretation, there is the definite evidence of Vopiscus[2] that fireworks were performed for the emperor Carinus and later for the emperor Diocletian; and Claudian,[3] writing in the 4th century, gives a poetical description of a set piece, where whirling wheels and dropping fountains of fire were displayed upon the pegma, a species of movable framework employed in the various spectacles presented in the circus. After the fall of the Western empire no mention of fireworks can be traced until the Crusaders carried back with them to Europe a knowledge of the incendiary compounds of the East, and gunpowder had made its appearance. Biringuccio,[4] writing in 1540, says that at an anterior period it had been customary at Florence and Siena to represent a fable or story at the Feast of St John or at the Assumption, and that on these occasions stage properties, including effigies with wooden bodies and plaster limbs, were grouped upon lofty pedestals, and that these figures gave forth flames, whilst round about tubes or pipes were erected for projecting fire-balls into the air: but he adds that these shows were never heard of in his time except at Rome when a pope was elected or crowned. But if relinquished in Italy, fire festivals on the eve of St John were observed both in England and France; the custom was a very old one in the days of Queen Elizabeth,[5] while De Frezier,[6] writing in 1707, says it was commonly adhered to in his time, and that on one occasion the king of France himself set a light to the great Paris bonfire. Survivals of these curious rites have been noted quite recently in Scotland and Ireland.[7] Early use also of fireworks was made in plays and pageants. Hell or hell’s mouth was represented by a
- ↑ Manilius, Astronomica, lib. v., 438–443.
- ↑ Vopiscus, Carus, Numerianus et Carinus, ch. xix.
- ↑ Claudianus, De consulatu Manlii Theodori, 325-330.
- ↑ Vanuzzio Biringuccio, Pyrotechnia.
- ↑ Strutts, Sports and Pastimes of the English People.
- ↑ De Frezier, Traité des feux d’artifice (1707 and 1747).
- ↑ Notes and Queries, series 5, vol. ix. p. 140, and series 8, vol. ii. pp. 145 and 254.
