of nature might have exploded[1]; the Namaquas say they have an old grudge against the animal because he deceived them[2]; the Shiya'ees say "that they act in virtue of certain traditions handed down from their demigods", and adduce a special reason, which is "too stupid by far and too coarse to be recorded" by Mr. Palgrave.[3]
The consequences which ensue among some peoples from breaking this taboo also point to its very ancient and totemistic origin. Thus the Namaqua, if he eats hare's flesh after attaining manhood, "is not unfrequently banished from his werft, though on paying a fine he may again be admitted to the community."[4]
With regard to the British, we have the authority of Cæsar that at the time of his arrival in the country the hare was tabooed. "Leporem et gallinam et anserem gustare, fas non putant; haec tamen alunt animi voluptatisque causa."[5]
Why did the British make it a matter of religious duty not to eat the flesh of hares, while at the same time they kept and fed them? I think, having regard to the facts above-mentioned, that the most probable explanation is this, that the hare was a sacred animal, upon whom rested a taboo derived from a far ruder and more ancient religious system, under which it was worshipped as a tribal totem or god.[6] That the agricultural and comparatively
- ↑ "The hare, because she cheweth the cud but parteth not the hoof, she is unclean unto you" (Leviticus, xi, 6). It is curious that in Albert Dürer's "Smaller Passion" the hare figures as the principal dish in the Last Supper, and the same mistake appears in the chapel at Galton Park. See Notes and Queries, 2nd Series, ii, 490.
- ↑ See post, p. 460.
- ↑ Palgrave, op. cit., p. 360. The reader will perhaps remember the reason given by Lady Answerall in Swift's Polite Conversations, when she quotes the old medical saw, "Hare-flesh engendereth melancholy bloude." Cf. Clodd, Myths and Dreams, London, 1855, p. 166.
- ↑ Lake Ngami, by C. J. Anderson, London, 1856, p. 328.
- ↑ Cæsar, Commentaries, v. 12.
- ↑ A writer in the Edinburgh Review, for April 1892 (p. 331), in an
