At a lunar eclipse the Orinoko Indians seized their hoes and
labored with exemplary vigor on their growing corn, saying the moon was
veiling herself in anger at their habitual laziness;[132-1] and a
description of the New Netherlands, written about 1650, remarks that the
savages of that land "ascribe great influence to the moon over
crops."[132-2] This venerable superstition, common to all races, still
lingers among our own farmers, many of whom continue to observe "the
signs of the moon" in sowing grain, setting out trees, cutting timber,
and other rural avocations.
As representing water, the universal mother, the moon was the
protectress of women in child-birth, the goddess of love and babes, the
patroness of marriage. To her the mother called in travail, whether by
the name of "Diana, diva triformis" in pagan Rome, by that of Mama
Quilla in Peru, or of Meztli in Anahuac. Under the title of
Yohualticitl, the Lady of Night, she was also in this latter country the
guardian of babes, and as Teczistecatl, the cause of generation.
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