The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12) - Mirrors

124 The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12)Thus among theseNew Guinea peoplegames are playedand stories told ascharms to ensuregood crops.[103]unfolded themselves, but when the plants have not yet set anytubers. A single leaf is cut from a number of stems, and theseleaves are brought into the village. The game is played by twopartners, who sit down opposite to each other at a distance ofthree or four paces. A number of taro stalks lie beside each.He who has speared all his adversary's stalks first is victor; thenthey change stalks and the game begins again. By piercing theleaves they think that they incite the plants to set tubers. Almostmore remarkable than the limitation of these games to the timewhen work on the fields is going forward is the custom of theKai people which only permits the tales of the olden time orpopular legends to be told at the time when the newly plantedfruits are budding and sprouting.” 326 At the end of every suchtale the Kai story-teller mentions the names of the various kindsof yams and adds, “Shoots (for the new planting) and fruits (toeat) in abundance!” “From their concluding words we see that theKai legends are only told for a quite definite purpose, namely,to promote the welfare of the yams planted in the field. Byreviving the memory of the ancient beings, to whom the originof the field-fruits is referred, they imagine that they influencethe growth of the fruits for good. When the planting is over, andespecially when the young plants begin to sprout, the telling oflegends comes to an end. In the villages it is always only a fewold men who as good story-tellers can hold the attention of theirhearers.” 327Thus with these New Guinea people the playing of certaingames and the recital of certain legends are alike magical in theirintention; they are charms practised to ensure good crops. Bothsets of charms appear to be based on the principles of sympatheticmagic. In playing the games the players perform acts which aresupposed to mimic or at all events to stimulate the correspondingprocesses in the plants: by swinging high in the air they make326 Ch. Keysser, op. cit. iii. 125 sq.327 Ch. Keysser, op. cit. iii. 161.