Nos. 1335-1338.--It is quite a general custom among country people on the Eastern Shore of Maryland to decapitate a crowing hen. The same custom is reported from New Hampshire and from Prince Edward Island. Does not this proverb then refer to the common superstition that it presages death or disaster for a hen to crow, in consequence of which such hens are summarily killed?
No. 1415.--There is a somewhat widespread prejudice in the minds of old people against having their pictures taken, particularly if they have never done so. I do not think the objection is a natural conservatism, or dislike of doing something to which one is unaccustomed. The ill omen does not appear to have been feared for the young as well as for the old, even in provincial localities, when for the first time portraiture by daguerreotypy or more recently by photography was introduced. It has long been known that among primitive peoples there is a decided prejudice against portraiture. The notion seems to be that the individual may lose his vigor, if not his life, by allowing a copy of himself to be made in any way. Catlin in his intercourse with the North American Indians found great difficulty in gaining the consent of individuals to his painting them. He says in his work on The Manners, Customs, and Condition of the North American Indians, "The Squaws generally agreed that they had discovered life enough in them [Catlin's portraits] to render my medicine too great for the Mandans; saying that such an operation could not be performed without taking away from the original something of his existence which I put in the picture, and they could see it move, could see it stir." Herbert Spencer, in his Principles of Sociology, vol. i. p. 242, refers to a similar belief among the Chinooks and the Mapuchés. It would seem as if there is in the popular mind an instinctive recognition that the tenure of life is less strong in the aged than in the young. So while the general notion that it is dangerous to have one's person represented has disappeared from the mind of civilized man, a similar psychological condition survives here and there among people leading peculiarly simple lives.
Another evidence of a popular belief in some vital relationship between a portrait and its original is suggested by the quite general superstition that photographs (or other pictures) fade after and in consequence of the decease of the original. I have found this to be a common belief in Ireland, Prince Edward Island, and in various parts of the United States. I remember as a child to have heard persons remark while turning over a family album of photographs, "That looks as if the person were dead." In fact, I think that I thus received the impression that the picture of one dead underwent some change that many persons could perceive and thus become aware of the death of the original. This notion is akin to a superstition of the Irish peasantry that the clothes left by the dead decay with unusual rapidity.
In parts of New Hampshire it is counted unlucky to have a photograph copied while the original lives. Is this because death is thereby suggested, since it is so customary to have enlarged copies of a photograph made after the decease of the original?
FOOTNOTES:
[157-1] Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. iv. No. XIII., "Folk-Lore from Buffalo Valley," J.H. Owens.
[158-1] Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. v. No. XVI. p. 33.
OFFICERS OF THE AMERICAN FOLK-LORE SOCIETY, 1896.
=President.= JOHN G. BOURKE, FORT ETHAN ALLEN, VT.
=First Vice-President.= STEWART CULIN, PHILADELPHIA, PA.
=Second Vice-President.= HENRY WOOD, BALTIMORE, MD.
=Councillors.= W.M. BEAUCHAMP, BALDWINSVILLE, N.Y. FRANZ BOAS, NEW YORK, N.Y. DANIEL G. BRINTON, PHILADELPHIA, PA. HELI CHATELAIN, NEW YORK, N.Y. JOHN H. McCORMICK, WASHINGTON, D.C. OTIS T. MASON, WASHINGTON, D.C. JAMES W. ELLSWORTH, CHICAGO, ILL. ALICE C. FLETCHER, WASHINGTON, D.C. *ALCÉE FORTIER, NEW ORLEANS, LA. *ALFRED C. GARRETT, CAMBRIDGE, MASS. *E. FRANCIS HYDE, NEW YORK, N.Y. *FREDERICK W. PUTNAM, CAMBRIDGE, MASS. GARDNER P. STICKNEY, MILWAUKEE, WIS.
=Permanent Secretary.= W.W. NEWELL, CAMBRIDGE, MASS.
=Treasurer.= JOHN H. HINTON, M.D., No. 41 West 32d Street, NEW YORK, N.Y.
* As Presidents of Local Branches.
SUBSCRIBERS TO THE PUBLICATION FUND OF THE AMERICAN FOLK-LORE SOCIETY, 1895.
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