Show moravian easter eggs have real rea I 1 artistic worth most intricate designs are painted with patience and skill it would seem on first thought bought that easter birgs are a purely small boy or girl interest yet groups ot of grownups grown ups that gather around cases of moravian easter eggs e exhibited each spring in the childrens museum 01 of f the cleveland museum of art attest the fact that the most childlike thing it if it be well done does not lose its attraction some of the visitors visitor are interested in the gay colors and the beautifully intricate designs some 11 are re especially curious about the process of decoration others question regarding the origin of this particular a application of folk crat the customs cusa cuba and legends surrounding it in each moravian polish and bohemian cemian village in ill fact throughout fill all 01 of f eastern europe there la Is an old woman who colors the he eggs for a number of families in rumania moro more generally 9 ene rally each housewife still prides herself on the preparation of eggs for her own household the designs on the eggs in the childrens museum collection are very ancient their origin la Is found in leaf petals flower outlines bird feathers fen the coll of the small mall shell shelf all long since conventionalized into stars scrolls and other figures there are also innumerable geometric patterns the colors are simple ond nud bright made in the beginning from dyes prepared by the peasants themselves from herbs gall find and vegetable sources blue yellow and red are the principal hues though black is used with distinctive effect the color process the method of putting the color onto the egg Ls Is quite complicated it Is somewhat like the process of batik the old peasant woman first of all washes the eggs in sour milk and warms them by the fire where she has put some wax to melt using an instrument like a wooden pencil with a tiny metal tube at the end she picks up tile the melted wax und carefully draws lines or rows of if points on the egg varying the design on oil each if the eggs are merely ta d be dyed red they tire are left some somi time in ili tle the de and then put in boiling water which takes oft off the aux wi and leaves tile he white background of the egg shelf in its place so that flint we now lune have a red egg with a white pattern if it another nother ii color Is to lie uel u eil the win wax Is left on fitter the egg conits conios out of the first dye de and additional wax Is put on oil over the red to hold whatever pattern Is to appear in ili red ml then the he egg Is hild in the new dye dc black for instance when the black banck ling ams thoroughly overlaid the egg boiling water takes dikes off all the wax and we have hac a lack black it egg with a re red mid and white pattern I 1 by postponing UK the use uc of the boiling water and drawing more patterns pat in wax war the number of colors colora may bo be increased an easter legend there Is a quaint and curiously touching legend in these eastern countries that explains the decoration of eggs at enster it has the same simple directness as the patterns on the egg themselves the story Is told that while je laiq was being tortured on the cross mary enry went through the crowd 0 of persecutors trying to bribe them with a ba bosket baket ket of eggs being unsuccessful in tier lier despair she placed the eggs at the foot of the cross where they were stained with blood irom froin the lie wout noun at ot of jesus when he saw till this nevoid inc to the old story he fie sald said to ti lii postas who were standa stan ii ir from this his lay day forth in memory of my ily ye shall smaill egge eggi red tind nikl aln ring streaked ns as I 1 have to rodn div after tile the resurrection mary nry tit alio 0 mother of jesus vina the first to prepare the red eggs and ia kaster ter buna bull and to every ono site she biot t she calil said ile ho la Is risen joy bo be with you lie Is risen and to each title slip gave tin egg and a bun tin since then thome who celebrate easter have always done this how flow tho thorough lily pea saint to Is the legend I 1 only a simple people close to the soil with whom the necessities of life press close upon the heels beels of death could have imagined buns buna and colored eggs na as having part in the great tragedy gedy it gives the reader a new sense of values quite ns am sane perhaps as much stressed conceptions of darkness and mystery little baskets of woven grasses gr aBBes each holding nn an egg in place add much to alie charm of the museum exhibit K G 1 |