In Vol. 2 of Hyatt (pp 1373-74), there is a description of a working to ask St. Expedite to send someone out of your life. This informant came from Algiers, and the description sheds some light on the uses of differing candle colors to use with St. Expedite (click the tag “St. Expedite” for previous posts).
According to Nahnee, the “Boss of Algiers,” St. Expedite is a “saint of many colors.” In this working, one burns a different color candle every day for nine days. In the midst of Hyatt’s rather arrogant commentary about getting a “logical answer” when he repeats the question (he appears to think that the “logical answer” involves the sort of clothing the saint was used to wearing), you can pick out the idea that St. Expedite is a multifaceted saint who isn’t one to be pigeonholed too readily as only doing one certain kind of work. Thus with his candles, at least for the driving away type of work, “today yo’ll burn a red light, tomorrah yo’ll burn a green light, tomorrah a yellah light.”
I’m not sure the order of the lights is important — later, Hyatt “repeats” [oh the irony in the way this word is used in this transcription] the directions: “Well, now, I begin and I light a red light today. I just let it burn.
Tomorrow I will light a green light and let it burn. Then tomorrow a blue. You light a different color candle every day for nine days.”
The informant replies with a “yes.” So either the informant was sick of him, or else it didn’t matter what order the colors went. In any case, I find this interesting in light of previous posts and commentary about colors used with St. Expedite, and it makes a certain sort of sense that the color will vary depending on the nature of the work.
In a previous post, dayglow_pirate remarked that he had spoken with some women, “Catholic spiritualists of African/Haitian descent” in the area of Charleston, South Carolina, who used primarily yellow candles for St. Expedite. So the regional variations appear to be at wprk, still. (Thanks for the info!)
Big Lucky Hoodoo 