Correspondence. 5 1 5
" Cross Trees."
Can any reader give information about the " Cross Trees " in Wexford? It is, I am told, locally believed that, if a funeral party omits to leave a cross by the tree in passing it on their way to the churchyard, ill will befall " the corp."
M. Eyre.
Religious Dancing.
Th. Trede, in the fourth part of Das Heidentum in der romischen Kirche, Bilder aus dem religiosen und sittlichen Leben Suditaliens, 189 1, states that cultus-dances still go on in Chris- tian lands in spite of all the prohibitions which Popes, Councils, and Synods have issued. Wild, bacchic performances in con- nection with the Madonna are still to be watched in the Posili-grotto near Naples during the night between the 7th and 8th of September. Trede also mentions a similar dance near Salerno, in connection with " the feast of the forty martyrs." In many parts of Calabria dances always accompany the pro- cession in which the image of a saint is carried. Religious dancing of a serious and dignified order also occurs in modern Greece.^ The Sprifigprozession at Echternach is described in T. H. Passmore's In Further Ardenne, p. 217, and the frontis- piece of the book represents "this skipful Pilgrim's Progress." Tille, in his Geschichte der deutschen Weihnacht, makes several allusions to the custom of dancing in and round churches.
I should be grateful for information as to religious dancing in European countries, and particularly as to the ecclesiastical dancing-customs of Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica?
Kirton-in-Lindsey. Mabel Peacock.
^ The authorities quoted are B. Schmidt, Volksleben der Neugriechen, S. 88 Hettner, Griechische, Eeisen, S. 73.
