Five-year-old Zachary Khalil concentrated as hard as he could. He sniffed, bit his lip and, with a determined expression, plastered his cookie with a glob of chocolate icing.

Now, Zachary prepared for the final touch.

As he reached into the tub of icing to grab one last spoonful, Zachary momentarily forgot about the cookie, letting it drop face-down onto the floor of Leverett House's Old Library.

Without missing a beat, he picked it up, licked his fingers and ran back to his mom to show her his handi-work.

Zachary was one of hundreds of kids who helped keep the Halloween spirit alive this week by participating in some of the celebrations sponsored by the House and Neighborhood Development (HAND) program.

Students from Cambridge elementary schools toured haunted houses, trick-or-treated, had their fortunes told and enjoyed Halloween parties at many of the undergraduate houses.

At yesterday's party in Leverett House, roughly 20 third graders--including Zachary and his older brother--enjoyed face painting, storytelling and cookie-decorating.

Though only a few of the kids were in costume (there were several princesses, Power Rangers, and witches), they were all caught up in the sugary sweet spirit of the Halloween season.

Halloween is the celebration of the Celtic New Year festival, formerly known as Samhain. But the meaning of the holiday, now most often associated with carnival-like costumes and candies, is best captured by childhood memories.

Halloween Pranks

On Halloween night, goblins, witches and warlocks reportedly roamed the earth. But savvy young lads would seize the opportunity to pull pranks and scapegoat the mystical monsters.

Kenan Professor of Government Harvey C. Mansfield '53 and Dean of Students Archie C. Epps III say prank-filled Halloweens are some of their fondest memories.

"I remember putting a little bit of soap on cars of disagreeable neighbors," says Mansfield. "We had our enemies and we got them--got them good on Halloween."

Mansfield says he pulled these pranks when he was nine or 10 years old.

"I got away scot free," he says, adding that he was a tough kid not to be trifled with. "Hopefully no Washington, D.C. residents read this article and remember back to Halloweens in the 1940s."

Epps says he recalls pulling pranks on neighborhood pets.

"I remember tying cans to the tail of the neighbor's cat," he says. "It was extremely unsociable...and imperious."

Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory Seamus Heaney, who grew up in rural Ireland, says kids from his generation did not play pranks.

But the Nobel laureate says he fondly remembers "a sense of misrule" among members of the generation before him.

"[They told of] throwing bags over chimneys to keep in the smoke, yoking a horse and cart inside the house, of people finding a horse and cart in the kitchen," he says.

But Heaney and his friends were not so devious.

"Our [pranks were] confined to knocking on doors and running away," he says.

Turnip-Lanterns and S&M

On Saturday night, students at the College will celebrate their own version of Halloween in the famed Adams House masquerade, which has a history of attracting an eccentric crowd.

Last year, for example, Adams House students paid tribute to randomization by holding an S&M ceremony.

And surely this year, many students will come dressed as transvestites or appareled with goods from Hubba Hubba.

Arnold St. Pierre, owner of the Broadway Costume Company in Boston, says this year's hottest costumes include the lead charters from the "I Dream of Jeannie" television show, Scarlet O'Hara and Braveheart costumes.

Adams House committee co-chair Nicholas Stavropoulos 97 refused to release the theme of this year's masquerade but promised that it will feature motifs ranging from "punishment" to "remorse."

Halloween has a very different meaning for Heaney.

"My sense of Halloween was that sense of darkness of the year and spirits about," Heaney says. "This season is the old Celtic season of the winter, of the dark."

"[We] lived in a world where talk of ghosts was more common than today, in a ghost ridden culture," he says.

Heaney, who says he has never worn a Halloween costume, recalls many of Halloween's customs which originated in his native land.

Traditional American Jack-o-Lanterns, for instance, began in Ire-land as carved turnips.

"Turnips are more exactly the size of a skull," Heaney says.

Children would hollow out the turnips and insert colored glass to serve as the imaginary head's eyes.

"My defining memory of Halloween is gazing out at a turnip skull with its blazing blue bottle eyes," he says. "I was terrified by my own creation."

Heaney says at the time he was growing up, the darkness of the streets and the lack of electrical lighting intensified Halloween's mystique.

"Halloween had a higher voltage," he says.

And Playing Right Field...

Like most American children, Mansfield's Halloweens included dressing up and trick-or-treating

Mansfield, who says he dressed up as a "dead, white male" last year, recalls his favorite childhood Halloween costume.

"I was a baseball player for the Washington Senators," he says. "And I'm not going to tell you how old that makes me."

Epps says that during his high school years, he would wear a three-piece suit with a top hat.

Epps did not comment on whether he wore a bow tie.

"I was representing the ghost of Halloweens past," he says, while chuckling.

Mansfield, for one, says he enjoyed trick-or-treating much more as a kid than he did watching his children trick-or-treat.

"I was envious of my kids," he says. "I sneaked their candy--for their own good of course."

Good thing for the young revelers at the HAND parties that Mansfield was not on their guest list.

Nine-year-old Hamilton Morris would almost certainly have been annoyed by Mansfield's candy thievery.

Hamilton took part in the Cabot HAND party where children competed in an egg race across the Quad for sweets.

While most children seemed perfectly content to race across the Quad, Hamilton stood pat, asking what the winner's booty would be.

"Well, you get one piece of candy if you lose, and two pieces if you win," Christopher K. SueLing '97, the Cabot HAND coordinator, told the skinny, brown-haired fourth grader from the Peabody School.

But Hamilton was still skeptical

"One per person or one per team? he asked, squinting his bulb-shaped eyes suspiciously at Sue-Ling.

Hamilton's team won the race, so he was the lucky winner of two pieces of candy--which he ate all by himself.

HAND and Halloween

Kids like Zachary and Hamilton formed their own memories of Halloween this week.

At Leverett House, children ran into the library screaming, "Party! Party!"

They were herded by Harvard HAND volunteers to the mask-making department, which featured colored construction paper, nifty Halloween stickers and safety scissors.

But the kids' demands were more specific.

"When are we gonna get our faces painted?" they yelled. "Can we make anything?"

Kayleen Kulaszewicz, a tall, sandy-haired eight-year-old described her plans to go trick-or-treating last night, dressed as "Cinderella with Rapunzel hair."

"I looked for Cinderella hair, but couldn't find it," she says.

"[The Rapunzel wig] goes down to here," Kayleen says, pointing to here," ankles, "and it has two silver streaks."

Kayleen, Zachary and the rest of the kids, however, seemed most enthralled by Madame Zelda.

The kids entered the dark chamber of the resident fortune teller, played by Michelle M. Snuffer '97.

While Snuffer may not be a trained psychic, she certainly looked the part yesterday afternoon.

She was clad in a long, dark skirt and sweater and wore a blue paisley scarf that was wrapped tightly around her head.

Her silver and blue hanging earrings sparkled as she moved her head while meditating on the imagined future of her third-grade clients.

Some kids ran eagerly to Madame Zelda, while many others were more tentative.

"I see something furry," Snuffer intoned as Kayleen entered her stall. Madame Zelda took a deep breath and continued. "Something warm. What is it? Maybe a dog...

Kayleen interrupted fearlessly. "I like puppies. I have a chocolate lab [rador] at home."

When Madame Zelda said she thought Kayleen had a dog made out of chocolate, the third-grader set her straight.

"No, he doesn't melt. He's just a real puppy. He's not made out of chocolate," Kayleen told Snuffer.

Madame Zelda's fortune-telling powers may have not pleased Kayleen. But the kids surely left the party with Halloween memories to last a lifetime.

Even if you are not a fortune-teller, the future from here can only seem bright.CrimsonHector U. VelazquezSYDNIE LOBODA and KIARA PIRES (right) are told their fortune by MADAME ZELDA (bottom), played by MICHELLE M. SNUFFER '97.