 CHAPTER 62 PART 2 OF THE GOLDEN BOW SECTION V THE MID-SUMMER FIERS But the season at which these fire festivals have been most generally held all over Europe is the summer solstice, that is, Midsummer Eve, or the 23rd of June, or Midsummer Day, or the 24th of June. A faint tinge of Christianity has been given to them by naming Midsummer Day after Saint John the Baptist, but we cannot doubt that the celebration dates from a time long before the beginning of our era. The summer solstice, or Midsummer Day, is the great turning point in the sun's career when, after climbing higher and higher day by day in the sky, the luminary stops and thenceforth retraces his steps down the heavenly road. Such a moment could not but be regarded with anxiety by primitive man so soon as he began to observe and ponder the courses of the great lights across the celestial vault, and having still to learn his own powerlessness in face of the vast cyclic changes of nature, he may have fancied that he could help the sun in his seeming decline, could prop his failing steps, and rekindle the sinking flame of the red lamp in his feeble hand. In some such thoughts as these, the Midsummer festivals of our European peasantry may perhaps have taken their rise. Under their origin, they have prevailed all over this quarter of the globe, from Ireland on the west, to Russia on the east, and from Norway and Sweden on the north, to Spain and Greece on the south. According to a medieval writer, the three great features of the Midsummer celebration were the bonfires, the procession with torches round the fields, and the custom of rolling a wheel. He tells us that boys burned bones and filth of various kinds to make a foul smoke, and that the smoke drove away certain noxious dragons, which at this time, excited by the summer heat, copulated in the air and poisoned the wells and rivers by dropping their seed into them. And he explains the custom of trundling a wheel to mean that the sun, now having reached the highest point in the ecliptic, begins thenceforth to descend. The main features of the Midsummer fire festival resemble those which we have found to characterize the vernal festivals of fire. The similarity of the two sets of ceremonies will plainly appear from the following examples. A writer of the first half of the sixteenth century informs us that in almost every village and town of Germany, public bonfires were kindled on the eve of St. John, and young and old of both sexes gathered about them and passed the time in dancing and singing. People on this occasion wore chaplets of mugwort and vervein, and they looked at the fire through bunches of larkspur which they held in their hands, believing that this would preserve their eyes in a healthy state throughout the year. As each departed, he threw the mugwort and vervein into the fire, saying, May all my ill luck depart and be burnt up with ease. At Lower Cones, a village situated on a hillside overlooking the Moselle, the Midsummer festival used to be celebrated as follows. A quantity of straw was collected on the top of the steep, strawmeric hill. Every inhabitant, or at least every householder, had to contribute his share of straw to the pile. At Nightfall, the whole male population, men and boys, mustered on the top of the hill. The women and girls were not allowed to join them, but had to take up their position at a certain spring halfway down the slope. On the summit stood a huge wheel, completely encased in some of the straw, which had been jointly contributed by the villagers. The rest of the straw was made into torches. From each side of the wheel, the axle tree projected about three feet, thus furnishing handles to the lads who were to guide it in its decent. The mayor of the neighboring town of Syrc, who always received a basket of cherries for his services, gave the signal. A lighted torch was applied to the wheel, and as it burst into flames, two young fellows, strong-limbed and swift of foot, seized the handles and began running with it down the slope. A great shout went up. Every man and boy waved a blazing torch in the air, and took care to keep it alight, so long as the wheel was trundling down the hill. The great object of the young men who guided the wheel was to plunge it blazing into the water of the Mosel, but they rarely succeeded in their efforts, for the vineyards which cover the greater part of the declivity impeded their progress, and the wheel was often burned out before it reached the river. As it rolled past the women and girls at the spring, they raised cries of joy which were answered by the men on the top of the mountain, and the shouts were echoed by the inhabitants of neighboring villages who watched the spectacle from their hills on the opposite bank of the Mosel. If the fiery wheel was successfully conveyed to the bank of the river and extinguished in the water, the people looked for an abundant vintage that year, and the inhabitants of Cones had the right to exact a wagon load of white wine from the surrounding vineyards. On the other hand, they believed that if they neglected to perform the ceremony, the cattle would be attacked by giddiness and convulsions, and would dance in their stalls. Down to at least the middle of the 19th century, the Midsummer fires used to blaze all over Upper Bavaria. They were kindled especially on the mountains, but also far and wide in the lowlands, and we are told that in the darkness and stillness of night, the moving groups, lit up by the flickering glow of the flames, presented an impressive spectacle. Cattle were driven through the fire to cure the sick animals, and to guard such as were sound against plague and harm of every kind throughout the year. Many a householder on that day put out the fire on the domestic hearth and rekindled it by means of a brand taken from the Midsummer bonfire. The people judged of the height to which the flax would grow in the year by the height to which the flames of the bonfire rose, and whoever leapt over the burning pile was sure not to suffer from backache in reaping the corn at harvest. In many parts of Bavaria, it was believed that the flax would grow as high as the young people leapt over the fire. In others, the old folk used to plant three charred sticks from the bonfire in the fields, believing that this would make the flax grow tall. Elsewhere, an extinguished brand was put in the roof of the house to protect it against fire. In the towns about Wersburg, the bonfires used to be kindled in the marketplaces, and the young people who jumped over them were garlands of flowers, especially of mugwort and vervein, and carried sprigs of larkspur in their hands. They thought that such as looked at the fire holding a bit of larkspur before their face would be troubled by nomality of the eyes throughout the year. Further, it was customary at Wersburg in the sixteenth century, for the bishop's followers to throw burning discs of wood into the air from the mountainside which overhangs the town. The discs were discharged by means of flexible rods, and in their flight through the darkness presented the appearance of fiery dragons. Similarly in Swabia, lads and lasses, hand in hand, leap over the midsummer bonfire, praying that the hemp may grow three Ls high, and they set fire to wheels of straw and send them rolling down the hill. Sometimes, as the people sprang over the midsummer bonfire, they cried out, Flax, flax, may the flax this year grow seven Ls high. At Rottenburg, a rude effigy in human form called the Angle Man used to be enveloped in flowers, and then burnt to the midsummer fire by boys, who afterwards leapt over the glowing embers. So in Baden, the children collected fuel from house to house for the midsummer bonfire on St. John's Day, and lads and lasses leaped over the fire in couples. Here as elsewhere, a close connection was traced between these bonfires and the harvest. In some places it was thought that those who leaped over the fires would not suffer from backache at reaping. Sometimes as the young folk sprang over the flames, they cried, Grow, that the hemp may be three Ls high. This notion that the hemp or the corn would grow as high as the flames blazed, or as people jumped over them, seems to have been widespread in Baden. It was held that the parents of the young people who bounded highest over the fire would have the most abundant harvest. And on the other hand, if a man contributed nothing to the bonfire, it was imagined that there would be no blessing on his crops, and that his hemp in particular would never grow. At Ebersleden, near Sangerhausen, a high pole was planted in the ground, and a tar barrel was hung from it by a chain which reached to the ground. The barrel was then set on fire and swung round a pole amid shouts of joy. In Denmark and Norway also, Midsummer fires were kindled on St. John's Eve on roads, open spaces, and hills. People in Norway thought that the fires banished sickness from among the cattle. Even yet, the fires are said to be lighted all over Norway on Midsummer Eve. They are kindled in order to keep off the witches, who are said to be flying from all parts that night to the Blocksberg, where the big witch lives. In Sweden, the eve of St. John, or St. Hans, is the most joyous night of the whole year. Throughout some parts of the country, especially in the provinces of Bohus and Tskania, and in the districts bordering on Norway, it is celebrated by the frequent discharge of firearms and by huge bonfires, formerly called Baldur's Bale Fires, or Baldur's Balar, which are kindled at dusk on hills and eminences and throw a glare of light over the surrounding landscape. The people dance around the fires and leap over or through them. In parts of Norland on St. John's Eve, the bonfires are lit at the crossroads. The fuel consists of nine different sorts of wood, and the spectators cast into the flames a kind of toadstool in order to counteract the power of the trolls and other evil spirits who are believed to be abroad that night. For at that mystic season, the mountains open, and from their cavernous depths, the uncanny crew pours forth to dance and to sport themselves for a time. The peasants believe that should any of the trolls be in the vicinity, they will show themselves. And if an animal, for example a he or she goat, happens to be seen near the blazing, crackling pile, the peasants are firmly persuaded that it is no other than the evil one in person. Further, it deserves to be remarked that in Sweden, St. John's Eve is a festival of water as well as of fire, for certain holy springs are then supposed to be endowed with wonderful medicinal virtues, and many sick people resort to them for the healing of their infirmities. In Austria, the Midsummer customs and superstitions resemble those of Germany. Thus, in some parts of the Tyrol, bonfires are kindled and burning discs hurled into the air. In the lower valley of the Inn, a Tatardamellian effigy is carted about the village on Midsummer Day and then burned. He is called the Lotter, which has been corrupted into Luther. At Ambras, one of the villages where Martin Luther is thus burned in effigy, they say that if you go through the village between 11 and 12 on St. John's night and wash yourself in three wells, you will see all who are to die in the following year. At Gratz, on St. John's Eve, or the 23rd of June, the common people used to make a puppet called the Tatarman, which they dragged to the bleaching ground and pelted with burning besomes till it took fire. At Riot, in the Tyrol, people believed that the flax would grow as high as they leaped over the Midsummer fire, and they took pieces of charred wood from the fire and stuck them in their flax fields the same night, leaving them there till the flax harvest had been got in. In Lower Austria, bonfires are kindled on the heights, and the boys cape around them, brandishing lighted torches drenched in pitch. Whoever jumps thrice across the fire will not suffer from fever within the year. Cartwheels are often smeared with pitch, ignited, and sent rolling and blazing down the hillsides. All over Bohemia, bonfires still burn on Midsummer Eve. In the afternoon, boys go about with handcarts from house to house, collecting fuel, and threatening with evil consequences the curmudgeons who refused them a dole. Sometimes, the young men fell a tall, straight fur in the woods, and set it up on a height, where the girls deck it with nosegaze, wreaths of leaves, and red ribbons. Then brushwood is pallet about it, and at nightfall the hole is set on fire. While the flames break out, the young men climb the tree and fetch down the wreaths which the girls had placed on it. After that, lads and lasses stand on opposite sides of the fire and look at one another through the wreaths to see whether they will be true to each other and marry within the year. Also, the girls throw the wreaths across the flames to the men, and woe to the awkward swain who fails to catch the wreath thrown to him by his sweetheart. When the blaze has died down, each couple takes hands and leaps thrice across the fire. He or she who does so will be free from Agu throughout the year, and the flax will grow as high as the young folks leap. A girl who sees nine bonfires on Midsummer Eve will marry before the year is out. The singed wreaths are carried home and carefully preserved throughout the year. During thunderstorms, a bit of the wreath is burned on the hearth with a prayer. Some of it is given to kind that are sick or calving, and some of it serves to fumigate house and cattle stall that man and beast may keep hail and well. Sometimes an old cartwheel is smeared with resin, ignited, and sent rolling down the hill. Often, the boys collect all the worn-out bessums they can get hold of, dip them in pitch, and having set them on fire, wave them about, or throw them high into the air. Or they rush down the hillside in troops, brandishing the flaming brooms and shouting. The stumps of the brooms and embers from the fire are preserved and stuck in cabbage gardens to protect the cabbages from caterpillars and gnats. Some people insert charred sticks and ashes from the Midsummer bonfire in their sown fields and meadows, in their gardens and the roofs of their houses, as a talisman against lightning and foul weather. Or they fancy that the ashes placed in the roof will prevent any fire from breaking out in the house. In some districts they crown or gird themselves with mugwort while the Midsummer fire is burning, for this is supposed to be a protection against ghosts, witches, and sickness. In particular, a wreath of mugwort is a sure preventative of sore eyes. Sometimes the girls look at the bonfires through garlands of wildflowers, praying the fire to strengthen their eyes and eyelids. She who does this thrice will have no sore eyes all that year. In some parts of Bohemia they used to drive the cows through the Midsummer fire to guard them against witchcraft. In Slabonic countries also, the Midsummer festival is celebrated with similar rights. We have already seen that in Russia on the eve of St. John, young men and maidens jump over a bonfire in couples, carrying a straw effigy of cupolo in their arms. In some parts of Russia, an image of cupolo is burnt or thrown into a stream on St. John's night. Again in some districts of Russia, the young folk wear garlands of flowers and girdles of holy herbs which they spring through the smoke or flames, and sometimes they drive the cattle also through the fire in order to protect the animals against wizards and witches, who are then ravenous after milk. In Little Russia, a stake is driven into the ground on St. John's night, wrapped in straw and set on fire. As the flames rise, the peasant women throw birchen boughs into them, saying, May the flax be as tall as this bough. In Ruthenia, the bonfires are lighted by a flame procured by the friction of wood. While the elders of the party are engaged in thus churning the fire, the rest maintain a respectful silence. But when the flame bursts from the wood, they break forth into joyous songs. As soon as the bonfires are kindled, the young people take hands and leap and pairs through the smoke, if not through the flames, and after that the cattle in their turn are driven through the fire. In many parts of Prussia and Lithuania, great fires are kindled on Midsummer Eve. All the heights are ablaze with them, as far as the eye can see. The fires are supposed to be a protection against witchcraft, thunder, hail, and cattle disease, especially if next morning the cattle are driven over the places where the fire burned. Above all, the bonfires ensure the farmer against the arts of witches who try to steal the milk from his cows by charms and spells. That is why next morning you may see the young fellows who lit the bonfire going from house to house and receiving jugfuls of milk. And for the same reason, they stick burrs and mugwort on the gate or the hedge through which the cows go to pasture, because that is supposed to be a preservative against witchcraft. In Masjoren, a district of eastern Prussia inhabited by a branch of the Polish family, it is the custom on the evening of Midsummer Day to put out all the fires in the village. Then an oak and stake is driven into the ground and a wheel is fixed on it, as on an axle. This wheel, though villagers working by relays, caused to revolve with great rapidity till fire is produced by friction. Everyone takes home a lighted brand from the new fire and with it rekindles the fire on the domestic hearth. In Serbia, on Midsummer Eve, herdsmen like torches of birch bark and march round the sheepfolds and cattle stalls, then they climb the hills and there allow the torches to burn out. Among the Magyars in Hungary, the Midsummer Fire Festival is marked by the same features that meet us in so many parts of Europe. On Midsummer Eve, in many places, it is customary to kindle bonfires on heights and to leap over them, and from the manner in which the young people leap, the bystanders predict whether they will marry soon. On this day also, many Hungarian swine herds make fire by rotating a wheel round a wooden axle wrapped in hemp and through the fire, thus made, they drive their pigs to preserve them from sickness. The Estonians of Russia, who, like the Magyars, belong to the great Toranian family of mankind, also celebrate the summer solstice in the usual way. They think that the St. John's Fire keeps witches from the cattle, and they say that he who does not come to it will have his barley full of thistles and his oats full of weeds. In the Estonian island of Orsel, while they throw fuel into the Midsummer Fire, they call out, weeds to the fire, flax to the field, or they fling three billets into the flames saying, flax, grow long! And they take charred sticks from the bonfire home with them and keep them to make the cattle thrive. In some parts of the island, the bonfire is formed by piling brushwood and other combustibles round a tree, at the top of which a flag flies. Whoever succeeds in knocking down the flag with a pole before it begins to burn will have good luck. Formally, the festivities lasted till daybreak and ended in scenes of debauchery which looked doubly hideous by the glowing light of a summer morning. When we passed from the east to the west of Europe, we still find the summer solstice celebrated with rites of the same general character. Down to about the middle of the 19th century, the custom of lighting bonfires at Midsummer prevailed so commonly in France that there was hardly a town or a village, we are told, where they were not kindled. People danced round and leapt over them and took charred sticks from the bonfire home with them to protect the houses against lightning, conflagrations, and spells. In Brittany, apparently, the custom of the Midsummer bonfires is kept up to this day. When the flames have died down, the whole assembly kneels round about the bonfire and an old man prays aloud. Then they all rise and march thrice round the fire. At the third turn they stop and everyone picks up a pebble and throws it on the burning pile. After that they disperse. In Brittany and Barry, it is believed that a girl who dances round nine Midsummer bonfires will marry within the year. In the Valley of the Orn, the custom was to kindle the bonfire just at the moment when the sun was about to dip below the horizon, and the peasants drove their cattle through the fires to protect them against witchcraft, especially against the spells of witches and wizards who attempted to steal milk and butter. At Jumi Edges in Normandy, down to the first half of the 19th century, the Midsummer Festival was marked by certain singular features which bore the stamp of a very high antiquity. Every year, on the 23rd of June, the eve of Saint John, the brotherhood of the Green Wolf chose a new chief or master who had always to be taken from the Hamlet of Coneyhout. On being elected, the new head of the brotherhood assumed the title of the Green Wolf, and donned a peculiar costume consisting of a long green mantle and a very tall green hat of a conical shape and without a brim. Thus arrayed, he stalked solemnly at the head of the brothers, chanting the hymn of Saint John, the crucifix and holy banner leading the way to the place called Choké. Here, the procession was met by the priest, precentors, and choir who conducted the brotherhood to the parish church. After hearing mass, the company adjourned to the house of the Green Wolf where a simple repast was served up to them. At night, a bonfire was kindled to the sound of handbells by a young man and a young woman both decked with flowers. Then the Green Wolf and his brothers with their hoods down on their shoulders and holding each other by the hand ran round to the fire after the man who had been chosen to be the Green Wolf of the following year. Though only the first and the last man of the chain had a hand free, their business was to surround and seize thrice the future Green Wolf who, in his efforts to escape, belabored the brothers with a long wand which he carried. When at last they succeeded in catching him, they carried him to the burring pile and made as if they would throw him on it. This ceremony over, they returned to the house of the Green Wolf where a supper still of the most meager fare was set before them. Up till midnight, a sort of religious solennity prevailed. But at the stroke of twelve, all this was changed. Constraint gave way to license. Pious hymns were replaced by Bacchanalian ditties and the shrill quavering notes of the village fiddle hardly rose above the roar of voices that went up from the merry brotherhood of the Green Wolf. Next day, the 24th of June, or mid-summer day, was celebrated by the same personages with the same noisy gaiety. One of the ceremonies consisted in parading to the sound of musketry, an enormous loaf of consecrated bread which, rising in tears, was surmounted by a pyramid of verdure adorned with ribbons. After that, the holy hand-bells, deposited on the step of the altar, were entrusted as insignia of office to the man who was to be the Green Wolf next year. At Chateau Thieret, in the department of Eisene, the custom of lighting bonfires and dancing round them at the mid-summer festival of St. John lasted down to about 1850. The fires were kindled, especially when June had been rainy, and the people thought that the lighting of the bonfires would cause the rain to cease. In the Vasquez, it is still customary to kindle bonfires upon the hilltops of mid-summer Eve. The people believed that the fires helped to preserve the fruits of the earth and ensure good crops. Bonfires were lit in almost all the hamlets of Poit-Ciao on the eve of St. John. People marched round them thrice, carrying a branch of walnut in their hand. Shepherdesses and children passed sprigs of mulain, or verbascum, and nuts across the flames. The nuts were supposed to cure too fake, and the mulain to protect the cattle from sickness and sorcery. When the fire died down, people took some of the ashes home with them, either to keep them in the house as a preservative against thunder, or to scatter them on the fields for the purpose of destroying corn cockles and darnel. In Poit-Ciao, also, it is used to be customary on the eve of St. John to trundle a blazing wheel wrapped in straw over the fields to fertilize them. In the mountainous part of Comingues, a province of southern France, the midsummer fire is made by splitting open the trunk of a tall tree, stuffing the crevasse with shavings, and igniting the hole. A garland of flowers is fastened to the top of the tree, and at the moment when the fire is lighted, the man who was last married has to climb up a ladder and bring the flowers down. In the flat parts of the same district, the materials of the midsummer bonfires consist of fuel piled in the usual way, but they must be put together by men who have been married since the last midsummer festival, and each of these benedicts is obliged to lay a wreath of flowers on the top of the pile. In province, the midsummer fires are still popular. Children go from door to door begging for fuel, and they are seldom sent away empty. Formerly, the priest, the mayor and the alderman used to walk in procession to the bonfire, and even dine to light it, after which the assembly marched thrice round the burning pile. At Eich, a nominal king, chosen from among the youth for his skill in shooting at a pop and jay, presided over the midsummer festival. He selected his own officers, and escorted by a brilliant train marched to the bonfire, kindled it, and was the first to do dance round it. Next day, he distributed large assay to his followers. His reign lasted a year, during which he enjoyed certain privileges. He was allowed to attend mass celebrated by the commander of the Knights of Saint John on Saint John's Day. The right of hunting was accorded to him, and soldiers might not be quartered in his house. At Marseille, also on this day, one of the guilds chose a king of the barach, or double axe, but it does not appear that he kindled the bonfire, which is said to have been lighted with great ceremony by the prophet and other authorities. In Belgium, the custom of kindling the midsummer bonfires has long disappeared from the great cities, but it is still kept up in rural districts and small towns. In that country, the eve of Saint Peter's Day, or the 29th of June, is celebrated by bonfires and dances exactly like those which commemorate Saint John's eve. Some people say that the fires of Saint Peter, like those of Saint John, are lighted in order to drive away dragons. In French Flanders, down to 1789, a straw figure representing a man was always burned in the midsummer bonfire, and a figure of a woman was burned on Saint Peter's Day, the 29th of June. In Belgium, people jump over the midsummer bonfires as a preventative of colic, and they keep the ashes at home to hinder fire from breaking out. The custom of lighting bonfires at midsummer has been observed in many parts of our own country, and as usual, people danced round and leapt over them. In Wales, three or nine different kinds of wood and charred faggots carefully preserved from the last midsummer were deemed necessary to build the bonfire, which was generally done on rising ground. In the Vale of Glamorgan, a cartwheel swathed in straw used to be ignited and sent rolling down the hill. If it kept a light all the way down and blazed for a long time, an abundant harvest was expected. On midsummer eve, people in the Isle of Man were wont to light fires to the windward of every field so that the smoke might pass over the corn, and they folded their cattle and carried blazing furs or gorse round them several times. In Ireland, cattle, especially barren cattle, were driven through the midsummer fires and the ashes were thrown on the fields to fertilize them, or live coals were carried into them to prevent blight. In Scotland, the traces of midsummer fires are few, but at that season in the Highlands of Perthshire, cow herds used to go round their folds thrice in the direction of the sun with lighted torches. This they did to purify the flocks and herds and to keep them from falling sick. The practice of lighting bonfires on midsummer eve and dancing or leaping over them is, or was till recently, common all over Spain and in some parts of Italy and Sicily. In Malta, great fires are kindled in the streets and squares of towns and villages on the eve of St. John, or midsummer eve. Formerly the Grand Master of the Order of St. John used on that evening to set fire to a heap of pitch barrels placed in front of the Sacred Hospital. In Greece, too, the custom of kindling fires on St. John's eve and jumping over them is said to be still universal. One reason assigned for it is a wish to escape from the fleas. According to another account, the women cry out as they leap over the fire, I leave my sins behind me. In Lesbos, the fires on St. John's eve are usually lighted by threes and the people spring thrice over them, each with a stone on his head saying, I jump the hair's fire, my head a stone, In Kalimnos, the midsummer fire is supposed to ensure abundance in the coming year, as well as deliverance from fleas. The people dance round the fires singing with stones on their heads and then jump over the blaze or the glowing embers. When the fire is burning low, they throw the stones into it, and when it is nearly out, they make crosses on their legs and go straight away and bathe in the sea. The custom of kindling bonfires on midsummer day or on midsummer eve is widely spread among the Mohammedan peoples of North Africa, particularly in Morocco and Algeria. It is common both to the Berbers and to many of the Arabs and Arabic-speaking tribes. In these countries, midsummer day or the 24th of June old style is called La Ansara. The fires are lit in the courtyards, at crossroads, in the fields, and sometimes on the threshing floors. Plants, which in burning give out a thick smoke and an aromatic smell, are much sought after for fuel on these occasions. Among the plants used for the purpose are giant fennel, thyme, roux, cherval seed, chamomile, germanium, and penny-royal. People expose themselves and especially their children to the smoke and drive it towards the orchards and the crops. They also leap across the fires, in some places everybody ought to repeat the leap seven times. Moreover, they take burning brands from the fires and carry them through the houses in order to fumigate them. They pass things through the fire and bring the sick into contact with it, while they utter prayers for their recovery. The ashes of the bonfires are also reputed to possess beneficial properties, hence in some places people rub their hair or their bodies with them. In some places they think that by leaping over the fires, they rid themselves of all misfortune and that childless couples thereby obtain offspring. Burbers of the Rift Province in northern Morocco make great use of fires at mid-summer for the good of themselves, their cattle, and their fruit trees. They jump over the bonfires in the belief that this will preserve them in good health and they light fires under fruit trees to keep the fruit from falling untimely. And they imagine that by rubbing a paste of the ashes on their hair, they prevent the hair from falling off their heads. In all these Moroccan customs, we are told, the beneficial effect is attributed wholly to the smoke, which is supposed to be imbued with a magical quality that removes misfortune from men, animals, fruit trees, and crops. The celebration of a mid-summer festival by Mohammedan peoples is particularly remarkable because the Mohammedan calendar being purely lunar and uncorrected by intercalation necessarily takes no note to festivals which occupy fixed points in the solar year. All strictly Mohammedan feasts being pinned to the moon slide gradually with that luminary through the whole period of the Earth's revolution about the sun. The fact of itself seems to prove that among the Mohammedan peoples of North Africa, as among the Christian peoples of Europe, the mid-summer festival is quite independent of the religion which the people publicly profess and is a relic of a far older paganism. Section 6 The Halloween Fires From the foregoing survey we may infer that among the heathen forefathers of the European peoples, the most popular and widespread fire festival of the year was the great celebration of mid-summer eve or mid-summer day. The coincidence of the festival with the summer solstice can hardly be accidental. Rather, we must suppose that our pagan ancestors purposely timed the ceremony of fire on Earth to coincide with the arrival of the sun at the highest point of his course in the sky. If that was so, it follows that the old founders of the mid-summer rites had observed the solstices or turning points of the sun's apparent path in the sky and that they accordingly regulated their festival calendar to some extent by astronomical considerations. But while this may be regarded as fairly certain for what we may call the aborigines throughout a large part of the continent, it appears not to have been true of the Celtic peoples who inhabited the lands end of Europe, the islands and prominatories that stretch out into the Atlantic Ocean on the Northwest. The principal fire festivals of the Celts which have survived though in a restricted area and with diminished pomp, to modern times and even to our own day were seemingly timed without any reference to the position of the sun in heaven. They were two in number and fell at an interval of six months, one being celebrated on the eve of Mayday and the other on an hallow even or halloween as it is now commonly called, that is, on the 31st of October the day preceding all saints or all hallows day. These dates coincide with none of the four great hinges on which the solar year revolves, to it the solstices and the equinoxes. Nor do they agree with the principal seasons of the agricultural year, the sowing in spring and the reaping in autumn. For when Mayday comes the seed has long been committed to the earth and when November opens the harvest has long been reaped and garnered the fields lie bare the fruit trees are stripped and even the yellow leaves are fast fluttering to the ground. Yet the first of May and the first of November mark turning points of the year in Europe the one ushers in the genial heat and the rich vegetation of summer the other heralds if it does not share the cold and barrenness of winter. Now these particular points of the year as has been well pointed out by a learned and ingenious writer while they are of comparatively little moment to the European husbandmen do deeply concern the European herdsmen for it is on the approach of summer that he drives his cattle out into the open to crop the fresh grass and it is on the approach of winter that he leads them back to the safety and shelter of the stall. Accordingly it seems not improbable that the Celtic bisection of the year into two halves at the beginning of May and the beginning of November dates from a time when the Celts were mainly a pastoral people dependent for their subsistence on their herds and when accordingly the great epochs of the year for them were the days on which the cattle went forth from the homestead in early summer and returned to it again in early winter. Even in central Europe remote from the region now occupied by the Celts a similar bisection of the year may be clearly traced to the great popularity on the one hand of Mayday and its Eve or Wallpurgis night and on the other hand of the feast of all souls at the beginning of November which under a thin Christian cloak conceals an ancient pagan festival of the dead. Hence we may conjecture that everywhere throughout Europe the celestial division of the year according to the solstices was preceded by what we may call a terrestrial division of the year according to the beginning of summer and the beginning of winter. Be that as it may the two great Celtic festivals of Mayday and the first of November or to be more accurate the eaves of these two days closely resemble each other in the manner of their celebration and in the superstitions associated with them and alike by the antique character impressed upon both betray a remote and purely pagan origin. The festival of Mayday or Beltane as the Celts called it which ushered in summer has already been described. It remains to give some account of the corresponding festival of Halloween which announced the arrival of winter. Of the two feasts Halloween it was perhaps of old the more important since the Celts would seem to have dated the beginning of the year from it rather than from Beltane. In the Isle of Man one of the fortresses in which the Celtic language and lore longest held out against the siege of the Saxon invaders the first of November old style has been regarded as New Year's Day down to recent times. Thus Manx murmurs used to go around on Halloween old style singing in the Manx language a sort of Hagmani song which began. Tonight is New Year's Night Hōgunāa In ancient Ireland a new fire used to be kindled every year on Halloween or the eve of Samhain and from this sacred flame all the fires in Ireland were rekindled. Such a custom points strongly to Samhain or All Saints Day that is the first of November as New Year's Day since the annual kindling of a new fire takes place most naturally at the beginning of the year in order that the blessed influence of the fresh fire may last throughout the whole period of twelve months. Another confirmation of the view that the Celts dated their year from the first of November is furnished by the manifold modes of divination which were commonly resorted to by Celtic peoples on Halloween for the purpose of ascertaining their destiny especially their fortune in the coming year. For when could these devices for prying into the future be more reasonably put in practice than at the beginning of the year? As a season of omens and auguries Halloween seems to have far surpassed Beltane in the imagination of the Celts from which we may with some probability infer that they reckoned their year from Halloween rather than Beltane. Another circumstance of great moment which points to the same conclusion is the association of the dead with Halloween. Not only among the Celts but throughout Europe Halloween the night which marks the transition from autumn to winter seems to have been of old the time of year when the souls of the departed were supposed to revisit their old homes in order to warm themselves by the fire and to comfort themselves with the good cheer provided for them in the kitchen or the parlor by their affectionate kinsfolk. It was perhaps a natural thought that the approach of winter should drive the poor shivering hungry ghosts from the bare fields and the leafless woodlands to the shelter of the cottage with its familiar fireside. Did not the lowing kind then troop back from the summer pastures in the forests and on the hills to be fed and cared for in the stalls while the bleak winds whistled among the swaying boughs and the snow drifts deepened in the hallows and could the good man and the good wife deny to the spirits of their dead the welcome which they gave to the cows but it is not only the souls of the departed who are supposed to be hovering unseen on the day quote when autumn to winter resigns the pale year close quote witches then speed on their errands of mischief some sweeping through the air on besomes others galloping along the roads on tabby cats which for that evening are turned into cold black steeds. The fairies too are all at loose and hobgoblins of every sort roam freely about. Yet while a glamour of mystery and awe has always clung to halloween in the minds of the Celtic peasantry the popular celebration of the festival has been at least in modern times by no means of a prevailing gloomy cast. On the contrary it has been attended by picturesque features and merry pastimes which rendered it the gayest night of all the year. Amongst the things which in the highlands of Scotland contributed to invest the festival with a romantic beauty were the bonfires which used to blaze at frequent intervals on the heights. Quote On the last day of autumn children gathered ferns tar barrels the long thin stalks called gai nizk and everything suitable for a bonfire. These were placed in a heap on some eminence near the house and in the evening set fire to. The fires were called somn again. There was one for each house and it was an object of ambition who should have the biggest. Whole districts were brilliant with bonfires and their glare across the highland lock and from many eminences formed an exceedingly picturesque scene. Close quote Like the Beltane fires on the first of May the Halloween bonfires seemed to have been kindled most commonly in the Perthshire Highlands. In the Parish of Calander they still blazed down to near the end of the 18th century. When the fire had died down the ashes were carefully collected in the form of a circle and a stone was put in near the circumference for every person of the several families interested in the bonfire. Next morning if any of these stones was found to be displaced or injured the people made sure that the person represented by it was fey or devoted and that he could not live 12 months from that day. At Balcoo Hitter down to the latter part of the 19th century each household kindled its bonfire at Halloween but the custom was chiefly observed by children. The fires were lighted on any high knoll near the house there was no dancing round them. Halloween fires were also lighted in some districts of the northeast of Scotland such as Buchan. Villagers and farmers alike must have their fire. In the villages the boys went from house to house and begged a peat from each householder usually with the words gasapita burn the witches. When they had collected enough peats they piled them in a heap together with straw furs and other combustible materials and set the hole on fire. Then each of the youths one after another laid himself down on the ground as near to the fire as he could without being scorched and thus line allowed the smoke to roll over him. The others ran through the smoke and jumped over their prostate comrade. When the heap was burnt down they scattered the ashes fine with each other who would scatter the most. In the northern part of Wales it used to be customary for every family to make a great bonfire called Coel Coeth on Halloween. The fire was kindled on the most conspicuous spot near the house and when it had nearly gone out everyone threw into the ashes a white stone which he had first marked. Then having said their prayers around the fire they went to bed. Next morning as soon as they were up they came to search out the stones and if any one of them was found to be missing they had a notion that the person who threw it would die before he saw another Halloween. According to Sir John Reeves the habit of celebrating Halloween by lighted bonfires on the hills is perhaps not yet extinct in Wales and men still living can remember how the people who assisted at the bonfires would wait till the last spark was out and then would suddenly take to their heels shouting at the top of their voices. The cropped black sow sees the hint most. The saying as Sir John Reeves justly remarks implies that originally one of the company became a victim in dead earnest. Down to the present time the saying is current in Carnarvanshire where allusions to the cutty black sow are still occasionally made to frighten children. We can now understand why in lower Brittany every person throws a pebble into the mid-summer bonfire. Doubtless there as in Wales and the highlands of Scotland omens of life and death have at one time or other been drawn from the position and state of the pebbles on the morning of All Saints Day. The custom thus found among three separate branches of the Celtic stock probably dates from a period before their dispersion or at least from a time when alien races had not yet driven home the wedges of separation between them. In the Isle of Man also another Celtic country Halloween was celebrated down to modern times by the kindling of fires accompanied with all the usual ceremonies designed to prevent the baneful influence of fairies and witches. Section 7 The Mid-Winter Fires If the heathen of ancient Europe celebrated as we have good reason to believe the season of mid-summer with a great festival of fire of which the traces have survived in many places down to our own time. It is natural to suppose that they should have observed with similar rights the corresponding season of mid-winter. For mid-summer and mid-winter or in more technical language the summer solstice and winter solstice are the two great turning points in the sun's apparent course through the sky and from the standpoint of primitive man nothing might seem more appropriate than to kindle fires on earth at the two moments when the fire and heat of the great luminary in heaven begin to wax or to wane. In modern Christendom the ancient fire festival of the winter solstice appears to survive or to have survived down to recent years in the old custom of the eulog clog or block as it was variously called in England. The custom was widespread in Europe but seems to have flourished especially in England France and among the South Slavs at least the fullest accounts of the custom come from these quarters. That the eulog was only the winter counterpart of the mid-summer bonfire kindled within doors instead of in the open air on account of the cold and inclement weather of the season was pointed out long ago by our English antiquary John Brand and the view is supported by the many quaint superstitions attaching to the eulog superstitions which have no apparent connection with Christianity but carry their heathen origin plainly stamped upon them. But while the two solstitial celebrations were both festivals of fire the necessity or desirability of holding the winter celebration within doors lent at the character of a private or domestic festivity which contrasts strongly with the publicity of the summer celebration at which the people gathered on some open space or conspicuous height kindled a huge bonfire in common and danced and made merry round it together. Down to about the middle of the 19th century the old rite of the eulog was kept up in some parts of central Germany. Thus in the valleys of the Seig and Lawn the eulog a heavy block of oak was fitted to the floor of the hearth where though it glowed under the fire it was hardly reduced to ashes within a year. When the new log was laid next year the remains of the old one were ground to powder and strewed over the fields during the twelve nights which was supposed to promote the growth of the crops. In some villages of Westphalia the practice was to withdraw the eulog or Christ brand from the fire so soon as it was slightly charred. It was then kept carefully to be replaced on the fire whenever a thunderstorm broke because the people believed that lightning would not strike a house in which the eulog was smoldering. In other villages of Westphalia the old custom was to tie up the eulog in the last sheaf cut at harvest. In several provinces of France and particularly in Provence the custom of the eulog or Trefois as it was called in many places was long observed. A French writer of the 17th century denounces as superstitious quote the belief that a log called the Trefois or a Christmas brand which you put on the fire for the first time on Christmas Eve and continue to put on the fire for a little while every day till twelfth night can, if kept under the bed protect the house for a whole year from fire and thunder that it can prevent the inmates from having she blends on their heels in winter that it can cure the cattle of many maladies that if a piece of it be steeped in the water which cows drink it helps them to calve and lastly that if the ashes of the log be strewn on the fields it can save the wheat from mildew close quote In some parts of Flanders and France the remains of the eulog were regularly kept in the house under bed as a protection against thunder and lightning In Barrie when thunder was heard a member of the family used to take a piece of the log and throw it on the fire which was believed to avert the lightning Again, in Perigord the charcoal and ashes were carefully collected and kept for healing swollen glands The part of the trunk which has not been burnt in the fire is used by plowmen to make the wedge for their plow because they allege that it causes the seeds to thrive better and the women keep pieces of it till twelfth night for the sake of their chickens Some people imagine that they will have as many chickens as there are sparks that fly out of the brands of the log when they shake them and others place the extinct brands under the bed to drive away vermin In various parts of France the charred log is thought to guard the house against sorcery as well as against lightning In England the customs and beliefs concerning the eulog used to be similar On the night of Christmas Eve says the antiquary John Brand quote Our ancestors were want to light up candles of an uncommon size called Christmas candles and lay a log of wood upon the fire called a eulog or Christmas block to illuminate the house and, as it were, to turn night into day close quote The old custom was to light the eulog with a fragment of its predecessor which had been kept throughout the year for the purpose where it was so kept the fiend could do no mischief The remains of the log were also supposed to guard the house against fire and lightning To this day the ritual of bringing in the eulog is observed with much salinity among the southern Slavs especially the Serbians The log is usually a block of oak but sometimes of olive or beech They seem to think that they will have as many calves, lambs, pigs, and kids as they strike sparks out of the burning log Some people carry a piece of the log out to the fields to protect them against hail In Albania down to recent years it was a common custom to burn a eulog at Christmas and the ashes of the fire were scattered on the fields to make them fertile The hazools a Slavonic people of the Carpathians Kindle fire by the friction of wood on Christmas Eve Old style the 5th of January and keep it burning till twelfth night It is remarkable how common the belief appears to have been that the remains of the eulog if kept throughout the year had power to protect the house against fire and especially against lightning As the eulog was frequently of oak it seems possible that this belief may be a relic of the old Arian creed which associated the oak tree with the god of thunder Whether the curative and fertilizing virtues ascribed to the ashes of the eulog which are supposed to heal cattle as well as men to enable cows to calve and to promote the fruitfulness of the earth may not be derived from the same ancient source is a question which deserves to be considered Section 8 The Need Fire The fire festivals hitherto described are all celebrated periodically at certain stated times of the year But besides these regularly recurring celebrations the peasants in many parts of Europe have been want from time immemorial to resort to a ritual fire at irregular intervals in seasons of distress and calamity Above all when their cattle were attacked by epidemic disease No account of the popular European fire festivals would be complete without some notice of these remarkable rights which have all the greater claim on our attention because they may perhaps be regarded as the source and origin of all the other fire festivals Certainly they must date from a very remote antiquity The general name by which they are known among the Teutonic peoples is Need Fire Sometimes the Need Fire was known as Wild Fire to distinguish it no doubt from the tame fire produced by more ordinary methods Among Slavonic peoples it is called Living Fire The history of the custom can be traced from the early middle ages when it was denounced by the church as a heathen superstition down to the first half of the 19th century when it was still occasionally practiced in various parts of Germany England Scotland and Ireland Among Slavonic peoples it appears to have lingered even longer The usual occasion for performing the right was an outbreak of plague or cattle disease for which the Need Fire was believed to be an infallible remedy The animals which were subjected to it included cows pigs horses and sometimes geese As a necessary preliminary to the kindling of the Need Fire all other fires and lights in the neighborhood were extinguished so that not so much as a spark remained a light For so long as even a night light burned in a house it was imagined that the Need Fire could not kindle Sometimes it was deemed enough to put out all the fires in the village but sometimes the extinction extended to neighboring villages or to a whole parish In some parts of the Highlands of Scotland the rule was that all householders who dwelt within the two nearest running streams should put out their lights and fires on the day appointed Usually the Need Fire was made in the open air but in some parts of Serbia it was kindled in a dark room Sometimes the place was a crossway or a hollow in a road In the Highlands of Scotland the proper places for performing the right seemed to have been knolls or small islands and rivers The regular method of producing the Need Fire was by the friction of two pieces of wood It might not be struck by flint and steel Very exceptionally among some South Slavs we read of a practice of kindling a Need Fire by striking a piece of iron on an anvil When the wood to be employed is specified it is generally said to be oak But on the lower Rhine the fire was kindled by the friction of oak wood or firwood In Slavonic countries we hear of poplar, pear, and cornell wood being used for the purpose Often the material is simply described as two pieces of dry wood Sometimes nine different kinds of wood were deemed necessary but rather perhaps to be burned in the bonfire than to be rubbed together for the production of the Need Fire The particular mode of kindling the Need Fire varied in different districts A very common one was this Two poles were driven into the ground about a foot and a half from each other Each pole had in the side facing the other a socket into which a smooth cross piece or roller was fitted The sockets were stuffed with linen and the two ends of the roller were rammed tightly into the sockets To make it more inflammable the roller was often coated with tar A rope was then wound round the roller and the free ends at both sides were gripped by two or more persons who, by pulling the rope to and fro, caused the roller to revolve rapidly till through the friction the linen in the sockets took fire The sparks were immediately caught in tow or oakum and waved about in a circle until they burst into a bright glow When straw was applied to it and the blazing straw used to kindle the fuel that had been stacked to make the bonfire Often a wheel sometimes a cartwheel or even a spinning wheel formed part of the mechanism In Aberdeenshire it was called the Muckle Wheel In the island of Mole the wheel was turned from east to west over nine spindles of oak wood Sometimes we are merely told that two wooden planks were rubbed together Sometimes it was prescribed that the cartwheel used for the fire making and the axle on which it turned should both be new Similarly it was said that the rope which turned the roller should be new if possible it should be woven of strands taken from a gallows rope with which people had been hanged But this was a council of perfection rather than a strict necessity Various rules were also laid down as to the kind of persons who might or should make the need fire Sometimes it was said that the two persons who pulled the rope which twirled the roller should always be brothers or at least bear the same baptismal name Sometimes it was deemed sufficient if they were both chaste young men In some villages of Brunswick people thought that if everybody who went to hand and kindling the need fire did not bear the same Christian name they would labor in vain In Celesia the tree employed to produce the need fire used to be felled by a pair of twin brothers In the western islands of Scotland the fire was kindled by 81 married men who rubbed two great planks against each other working in relays of nine In North Oyst the nine times nine who made the fire were all first begotten sons But we are not told whether they were married or single Among the Serbians the need fire is sometimes kindled by a boy and girl between 11 and 14 years of age who works dark naked in a dark room Sometimes it is made by an old man and an old woman also in the dark In Bulgaria too the makers of need fire stripped themselves of their clothes In Cathness they divested themselves of all kinds of metal If after long rubbing of the wood no fire was elicited they concluded that some fire must still be burning in the village So a strict search was made from house to house Any fire that might be found was put out and the negligent householder punished or upgraded Indeed a heavy fine might be inflicted on him When the need fire was at last kindled the bond fire was lit from it and as soon as the blaze had somewhat died down the sick animals were driven over the glowing embers sometimes in a regular order of precedence first the pigs next to the cows and last of all the horses Sometimes they were driven twice or thrice through the smoke and flames so that occasionally some of them were scorched to death As soon as all the beasts were through the young folk would rush wildly at the ashes and cinders sprinkling and blackening each other with them Those who were most blackened would march and triumph behind the cattle into the village and would not wash themselves for a long time From the bond fire people carried live embers home and used them to rekindle the fires in their houses These brands after being extinguished in water they sometimes put in the mangers at which the cattle fed and kept them there for a while Ashes from the need fire were also strewed on the fields to protect the crops against vermin Sometimes they were taken home to be employed as remedies and sickness being sprinkled on the ailing part or mixed in water and drunk by the patient In the western islands of Scotland and on the adjoining mainland as soon as the fire on the domestic hearth has been rekindled from the need fire a pot full of water was set on it and the water thus heated was afterwards sprinkled upon the people infected with the plague or upon the cattle that were tainted by the Muraine Special virtue was attributed to the smoke of the bonfire In Sweden fruit trees and nuts were fumigated with it in order that the trees might bear fruit and the nets catch fish In the highlands of Scotland the need fire was accounted a sovereign remedy for witchcraft In the islands of Moll when the fire was kindled as a cure for the Muraine we hear of the right being accompanied by the sacrifice of a sick heifer which was cut in pieces and burnt Slavonian and Bulgarian peasants conceived cattle plague as a foul fiend or vampire which can be kept at bay by interposing a barrier of fire between it and the herds A similar conception may perhaps have originally everywhere underlaying the use of the need fire as a remedy for the Muraine It appears that in some parts of Germany the people did not wait for an outbreak of cattle plague but taking time by the forelock kindled a need fire annually to prevent the calamity Similarly in Poland the peasants are said to kindle fire in the village streets every year on Saint Rokas day and to drive the cattle thrice through them in order to protect the beasts against the Muraine We have seen that in the hebrides the cattle were in like manner driven annually around the bell tamed fires for the same purpose In some cantons of Switzerland children still kindling need fire by the friction of wood for the sake of dispelling a mist and of Chapter 62 Chapter 63 of The Golden Bow This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Joe Dickerson The Golden Bow by Sir James Frazier Chapter 63 The Interpretation of the Fire Festivals Section 1 on the Fire Festivals in general The forgoing survey of the popular fire festivals of Europe suggests some general observations In the first place we can hardly help being struck by the resemblance which the ceremonies bear to each other at whatever time of the year and whatever part of Europe they are celebrated The custom of kindling great bonfires leaping over them and driving cattle through or around them would seem to have been practically universal throughout Europe and the same may be said of the processions or races with blazing torches round fields orchards pastures and cattle stalls Less widespread are the customs of hurling lighted discs into the air and trundling a burning wheel downhill The ceremonial of the eulog is distinguished from that of the other fire festivals by the privacy and domesticity which characterize it but this distinction may well be due simply to the rough weather of midwinter which is apt not only to render a public assembly in the open air disagreeable but also at any moment to defeat the object of the assembly by extinguishing the all important fire under a downpour of rain or a fall of snow Apart from these local or seasonal differences the general resemblance between the fire festivals at all times of the year and in all places is tolerably close and as the ceremonies themselves resemble each other so do the benefits which the people expect to reap from them whether applied in the form of bonfires blazing at fixed points or of torches carried about from place to place or of embers and ashes taken from the smoldering heap of fuel the fire is believed to promote the growth of the crops and the welfare of man and a beast either positively by stimulating them or negatively by averting the dangers and calamities which threaten them from such causes as thunder and lightning conflagration blight mildew vermin sterility disease and not least of all witchcraft but we may naturally ask how did it come about that benefits so great and manifold were supposed to be attained by means so simple in what way did people imagine that they could procure so many goods or avoid so many ills by the application of fire and smoke of embers and ashes two different explanations of the fire festivals have been given by modern inquires on the one hand it has been held that they are sun charms or magical ceremonies intended on the principle of imitative magic to ensure a needful supply of sunshine for men animals and plants by kindling fires which mimic on earth the great source of light and heat in the sky this was the view of Wilhelm Manhardt it may be called the solar theory on the other hand it has been maintained that the ceremonial fires have no necessary reference to the sun but are simply purificatory in intention being designed to burn up and destroy all harmful influences whether these are conceived in a personal form as witches demons and monsters or in an impersonal form as a sort of pervading taint or corruption of the air this is the view of Dr. Edward Westermark and apparently of Professor Eugene Mock it may be called the purificatory theory obviously the two theories postulate two very different conceptions of the fire which plays the principle part in the rites on the one view the fire like sunshine in our latitude is a genial creative power which fosters the growth of plants and the development of all that makes for health and happiness on the other view the fire is a fierce destructive power which blasts and consumes all the noxious elements whether spiritual or material that menace the life of men of animals and of plants according to the one theory the fire is a stimulant according to the other it is a disinfectant on the one view it's a virtuous positive on the other it is negative yet the two explanations different as they are in the character which they attribute to the fire are perhaps not wholly irreconcilable if we assume that the fires kindled at these festivals were primarily intended to imitate the sun's light and heat may we not regard the purificatory and disinfecting qualities which popular opinion certainly appears to have ascribed to them as attributes derived directly from the purificatory and disinfecting qualities of sunshine in this way we might conclude that while the imitation of sunshine in these ceremonies was primary and original the purification attributed to them was secondary and derivative such a conclusion occupying an intermediate position between the two opposing theories and recognizing an element of truth that both of them was adopted by me in earlier editions of this work but in the meantime Dr. Westermark has argued powerfully in favor of the purificatory theory alone and I am bound to say that his arguments carry great weight and that on a full review of the facts the balance of evidence seems to me to incline decidedly in his favor however the case is not so clear as to justify us in dismissing the solar theory without discussion and accordingly I propose to adduce the considerations which tell for it before proceeding to notice those which tell against it a theory which had the support of so learned and sagacious an investigator as W. Monhart is entitled to a respectful hearing section two the solar theory of the fire festivals in an earlier part of this work we saw that savages resort to charms for making sunshine and it would be no wonder if primitive man in Europe did the same indeed when we consider the cold and cloudy climate of Europe during a great part of the year we shall find it natural that sun charms should have played a much more prominent part among the superstitious practices of European peoples then among the savages who live nearer the equator and who consequently are apt to get in the course of nature more sunshine than they want this view of the festivals may be supported by various arguments drawn partly from their dates partly from the nature of the rights and partly from the influence which they are believed to exert upon the weather and on vegetation first in regard to the dates of the festivals it can be no mere accident that two of the most important and widely spread of the festivals are timed to coincide more or less exactly with the summer and winter solstices that is with the two turning points in the sun's apparent course in the sky when he reaches respectively his highest and his lowest elevation at noon indeed with respect to the midwinter celebration of Christmas we are not left to conjecture we know from the express testimony of the ancients that it was instituted by the church to supersede an old heathen festival of the birth of the sun which was apparently conceived to be born again on the shortest day of the year after which his light and heat were seen to grow till they attained their full maturity at midsummer therefore it is no very far fetched conjecture to suppose that the eulog which figures so prominently in the popular celebration of Christmas was originally designed to help the laboring sun of midwinter to rekindle his seemingly expiring light not only the date of some of the festivals but the manner of their celebration suggests a conscious imitation of the sun the custom of rolling a burning wheel down a hill which is often observed at these ceremonies might well pass for an imitation of the sun's course in the sky and the imitation would be especially appropriate on midsummer day when the sun's annual declination begins indeed the custom has been thus interpreted by some of those who have recorded it not less graphic it may be said is the mimicry of his apparent revolution by swinging a burning tar barrel round a pole again the common practice of throwing fiery disks sometimes expressly said to be shaped like sun's into the air at the festivals may well be a piece of imitative magic in these as in so many cases the magic force may be supposed to take effect through mimicry or sympathy by imitating the desired result you actually produce it by counterfeiting the sun's progress through the heavens you really help the luminary to pursue his celestial journey with punctuality and dispatch the name fire of heaven by which the midsummer fire is sometimes popularly known clearly implies a consciousness of a connection between the earthly and the heavenly flame again the manner in which the fire appears to have been originally kindled on these occasions has been alleged in support of the view that it was intended to be a mock sun as some scholars have perceived it is highly probable that at the periodic festivals and former times fire was universally obtained by the friction of two pieces of wood it is still so procured in some places both at the Easter and the midsummer festivals and it is expressly said to have been formerly so procured at the Beltane celebration both in Scotland and Wales but what makes it nearly certain that this was once the invariable mode of kindling the fire at these periodic festivals is the analogy of the need fire which has almost always been produced by the friction of wood and sometimes by the revolution of a wheel it is a plausible conjecture that the wheel employed for this purpose represents the sun and if the fires at the regularly recurring celebrations were formally produced in the same way it might be regarded as a confirmation of the view that they were originally sun charms in point of fact there is as Cune has indicated some evidence to show that the midsummer fire was originally thus produced we have seen that many Hungarian swine herds make fire on midsummer eve by rotating a wheel round a wooden axle wrapped in hemp and that they drive their pigs through the fire thus made at Obermedlingen in Swabia the fire of heaven as it was called was made on St. Vetus's day or 15th of June by igniting a cartwheel which smeared with pitch and plated with straw was fastened on a pole 12 feet high the top of the pole being inserted in the nave of the wheel the fire was made on the summit of a mountain and as the flame ascended the people uttered a set form of words with eyes and arms directed heavenward here the fixing of a wheel on a pole and igniting it suggests that originally the fire was produced as in the case of the need fire by the revolution of a wheel the day on which the ceremony takes place the 15th of June is near mid-summer and we have seen that in Masirene fire is or used to be actually made on mid-summer day by turning a wheel rapidly about an oak and pole though it is not said that the new fire so obtained is used to light a bonfire however we must bear in mind that in all such cases the use of a wheel may be merely a mechanical device to facilitate the operation of fire making by increasing the friction it need not have any symbolical significance further the influence which these fires whether periodic or occasional are supposed to exert on the weather and vegetation may be cited in support of the view that they are sun charms since the effects ascribed to them resemble those of sunshine thus the French belief that in a rainy June the lightning of the mid-summer bonfires will cause the rain to cease appears to assume that they can disperse the dark clouds and make the sun to break out in radiant glory drying the wet earth and dripping trees similarly the use of the need fire by Swiss children on foggy days for the purpose of clearing away the mist may very naturally be interpreted as a sun charm in the Vosges mountains the people believe that the mid-summer fires help to preserve the fruits of the earth and ensure good crops in Sweden the warmth or cold of the coming season is inferred from the direction in which the flames of the May Day bonfire are blown if they blow to the south it will be warm if to the north cold no doubt at present the direction of the flames is regarded merely as an augury of the weather not as a mode of influencing it but we may be pretty sure that this is one of the cases in which magic has dwindled into divination so in the Eiffel mountains when the smoke blows towards the cornfields this is an omen that the harvest will be abundant but the older view may have been not merely that the smoke and flames prognosticated but that they actually produced an abundant harvest the heat of the flames acting like sunshine on the corn perhaps it was with this view that people in the Isle of Man lit fires to windward of their fields in order that the smoke might blow over them so in South Africa about the month of April the Matabeles light huge fires to the windward of their gardens quote their idea being that the smoke by passing over the crops will assist the ripening of them close quote among the Zulus also quote medicine is burned on a fire placed to windward of the garden the fumigation which the plants in consequence receive being held to improve the crop close quote again the idea of our European peasants that the corn will grow well as far as the blaze of the bonfire is visible may be interpreted as a remnant of the belief in the quickening and fertilizing power of the bonfires the same belief it may be argued reappears in the notion that embers taken from the bonfires and inserted in the fields will promote the growth of the crops and it may be thought to underlie the customs of sowing flaxseed in the direction in which the flames blow of mixing the ashes of the bonfire with the seed corn and sowing of scattering the ashes by themselves over the field to fertilize it and of incorporating a piece of the eulog in the plow to make the seeds thrive the opinion that the flax or hemp will grow as high as the flames rise or the people leap over them belongs clearly to the same class of ideas again at Cones on the banks of the Mosley if the blazing wheel which was trundled down the hillside reached the river without being extinguished this was hailed as a proof that the vintage would be abundant so firmly was this belief held that the successful performance of the ceremony entitled the villagers to levy attacks upon the owners of the neighboring vineyards here the unextinguished wheel might be taken to represent an unclouded sun which in turn would portend in a bunded vintage so the wagon load of white wine which the villagers received from the vineyards round about might pass for a payment for the sunshine which they had procured for the grapes similarly in the Vale of Glamorgan a blazing wheel used to be trundled downhill on mid-summer day and if the fire were extinguished before the wheel reached the foot of the hill the people expected a bad harvest whereas if the wheel kept a light all the way down and continued to blaze for a long time the farmers looked forward to heavy crops that summer here again it is natural to suppose that the rustic mind traced a direct connection between the fire of the wheel and the fire of the sun on which the crops are dependent but in popular belief the quickening and fertilizing influence of the bonfires is not limited to the vegetable world it extends also to animals this plainly appears from the irish custom of driving barren cattle through the mid-summer fires from the french belief that the eulogs steeped in water helps cows to calve from the french and serbian ocean that there will be as many chickens cows lambs and kids as there are sparks struck out of the eulog from the french custom of putting the ashes of the bonfires in the fowls nests to make the hens lay eggs and from the german practice of mixing the ashes of the bonfires with the drink of cattle in order to make the animals thrive further there are clear indications that even human fecundity is supposed to be promoted by the genial heat of the fires in morocco the people think that childless couples can obtain offspring by leaping over the mid-summer bonfire it is an irish belief that a girl who jumps thrice over the mid-summer bonfire will soon marry and become the mother of many children in flanders women leap over the mid-summer fires to ensure an easy delivery in various parts of france they think that if a girl dances around nine fires she will be sure to marry within the year and in bohemia they fancy that she will do so if she merely sees nine of the bonfires on the other hand in letcheraine people say that if a young man and woman leaping over the mid-summer fire together escape unsmerched the young woman will not become a mother within 12 months the flames have not touched and fertilized her in parts of switzerland and france the lighting of the eulog is accompanied by a prayer that the women may bear children that she goats bring forth kids and the youths drop lambs the rule observed in some places that the bonfires should be kindled by the person who was last married seems to belong to the same class of ideas whether it be that such a person is supposed to receive from or to impart to the fire a generative and fertilizing influence the common practice of lovers leaping over the fires hand in hand may very well have originated in a notion that thereby their marriage would be blessed with offspring and the like motive would explain the custom which obliges couples married within the year to dance to the light of torches and the scenes of profligacy which appear to have marked the mid-summer celebration among the histonians as they once marked the celebration of mayday among ourselves may have sprung not from the mere license of holiday makers but from a crude notion that such orgies were justified if not required by some mysterious bond which linked the life of man to the courses of the heavens at the turning point of the year at the festivals which we are considering the custom of kindling bonfires is commonly associated with a custom of carrying lighted torches about the fields the orchards the pastures the flocks and the herds and we can hardly doubt that the two customs are only two different ways of attaining the same object namely the benefits which are believed to flow from the fire whether it be stationary or portable accordingly if we accept the solar theory of the bonfires we seem bound to apply it also to the torches we must suppose that the practice of marching or running with blazing torches about the country is simply a means of diffusing far and wide the genial influence of the sunshine of which these flickering flames are a feeble imitation in favor of this view it may be said that sometimes the torches are carried about the fields for the express purpose of fertilizing them and with the same intention live coals from the bonfires are sometimes placed in the field to prevent blight on the eve of 12th day in Normandy men women and children run wildly through the fields and orchards with lighted torches which they wave about the branches and dash against the trunks of the fruit trees for the sake of burning the moss and driving away the moles and field mice quote they believe that the ceremony fulfills the double object of exercising the vermin whose multiplication would be a real calamity and of imparting fecundity to the trees the fields and even the cattle close quote and they imagine that the more the ceremony is prolonged the greater will be the crop of fruit next autumn in Bohemia they say that the corn will grow as high as they fling the blazing bessoms into the air nor are such notions confined to Europe in Korea a few days before the new year festival the eunuchs of the palace swing burning torches chanting invocations the while and this is supposed to ensure bountiful crops for the next season the custom of trundling a burning wheel over the fields which used to be observed in Poichow for the express purpose of fertilizing them may be thought to embody the same idea in a still more graphic form since in this way the moxon itself not merely its light and heat represented by torches is made actually to pass over the ground which is to receive its quickening and kindly influence once more the custom of carrying lighted brands around cattle is plainly equivalent to driving the animals through the bonfire and if the bonfire is a sun charm the torches must be so also section three the purificatory theory of the fire festivals thus far we have considered what may be said for the theory that at the European fire festivals the fire is kindled as a charm to ensure an abundant supply of sunshine for man and beast for corn and fruits it remains to consider what may be said against this theory and in favor of the view that in these rites fire is employed not as a creative but as a cleansing agent which purifies men animals and plants by burning up and consuming the noxious elements whether material or spiritual which menace all living things with disease and death first then it is to be observed that the people who practice the fire customs appear never to allege the solar theory in explanation of them while on the contrary they do frequently and emphatically put forward the purificatory theory this is a strong argument in favor of the purificatory and against the solar theory for the popular explanation of a popular custom is never to be rejected except for grave cause and in the present case there seems to be no adequate reason for rejecting it the conception of fire as a destructive agent which can be turned to account for the consumption of evil things is so simple and obvious that it could hardly escape the minds even of the rude peasantry with whom these festivals originated on the other hand the conception of fire as an emanation of the sun or at all events as linked to it by a bond of physical sympathy is far less simple and obvious and though the use of fire as a charm to reduce sunshine appears to be undeniable nevertheless in attempting to explain popular customs we should never have recourse to a more recondite idea when a simpler one lies to hand and is supported by the explicit testimony of the people themselves now in the case of the fire festivals the destructive aspect of fire is one upon which the people dwell again and again and it is highly significant that the great evil against which the fire is directed appears to be witchcraft again and again we are told that the fires are intended to burn or repel the witches and the intention is sometimes graphically expressed by burning an effigy of a witch in the fire hence when we remember the great hold which the dread of witchcraft has had on the popular european mind in all ages we may suspect that the primary intention of all these fire festivals was simply to destroy or at all events get rid of the witches who are regarded as the causes of nearly all the misfortunes and calamities that befall men their cattle and their crops this suspicion is confirmed when we examine the evils for which the bonfires and torches were supposed to provide a remedy for most perhaps among these evils we may reckon the diseases of cattle and of all the ills that witches are believed to work there is probably none which is so constantly insisted on as the harm they do to the herds particularly the stealing the milk from the cows now it is significant that the need fire which may perhaps be regarded as the parent of the periodic fire festivals is kindled above all as a remedy for a mere rain or other disease of cattle and the circumstance suggests what on general ground seems probable that the custom of kindling the need fire goes back to a time when the ancestors of the european peoples subsisted chiefly on the products of the herds and when agriculture as yet played a subordinate part in their lives witches and wolves are the two great foes still dreaded by the herdsmen in many parts of europe and we need not wonder that he should resort to fire as a powerful means of banning them both among slavonic peoples it appears that the foes whom the need fire is designed to combat are not so much living witches as vampires and other evil spirits and the ceremony aims rather at repelling these baleful beings than at actually consuming them in the flames but for our present purpose the distinctions are immaterial the important thing to observe is that among the slavs the need fire which is probably the original of all the ceremonial fires now under consideration is not a sun charm but clearly and unmistakably nothing but a means of protecting man and beast against the attacks of maleficent creatures whom the peasant thinks to burn or scare by the heat of the fire just as you might burn or scare wild animals again the bonfires are often supposed to protect the fields against hail and the homestead against thunder and lightning both hail and thunderstorm are frequently thought to be caused by witches hence the fire which bans the witches necessarily serves at the same time as a talisman against hail, thunder, and lightning further brands taken from the bonfires are commonly kept in the houses to guard them against conflagration and though this may perhaps be done on the principle of homeopathic magic one fire being thought to act as a preventative of another it is also possible that the intention may be to keep witch incendiaries at bay again people leap over the bonfires as a preventative of colic and look at the flame steadily in order to preserve their eyes and good health and both colic and sore eyes are in Germany and probably elsewhere set down to the machinations of witches once more to leap over the midsummer fires or to circumambulate them is thought to prevent a person from feeling pains in his back at reaping and in Germany such pains are called witch shots and described to witchcraft but if the bonfires and torches of the fire festivals are to be regarded primarily as weapons directed against witches and wizards it becomes probable that the same explanation applies not only to the flaming discs which are hurled into the air but also to the burning wheels which are rolled downhill on these occasions discs and wheels we may suppose are alike intended to burn the witches who hover invisible in the air or haunt unseen the fields the orchards and the vineyards on the hillside certainly witches are constantly thought to ride through the air on broomsticks or other equally convenient vehicles and if they do so how can you get at them so effectually as by hurling lighted missiles whether discs torches or bessems after them as they flit past overhead in the gloom the south slovonian peasant believes that witches ride in the dark hail clouds so he shoots at the clouds to bring down the hags while he curses them saying curse curse Herodias thy mother is a heathen damned of God and fettered through the redeemer's blood also he brings out a pot of glowing charcoal on which he has thrown holy oil laurel leaves and wormwood to make a smoke the fumes are supposed to ascend to the clouds and stupefy the witches so that they tumble down to earth and in order that they may not fall soft but may hurt themselves very much the yokel hastily brings out a chair and tilts it bottom up so that the witch in falling may break her legs on the legs of the chair worse than that he cruelly lays sides bill hooks and other formidable weapons edge upwards so as to cut and mangle the poor wretches when they drop plump upon them from the clouds on this view the fertility supposed to follow the application of fire in the form of bonfires torches discs rolling wheels and so forth is not conceived as resulting directly from an increase of solar heat which the fire has magically generated it is merely an indirect result obtained by freeing the reproductive powers of plants and animals from the fatal obstruction of witchcraft and what is true of the reproduction of plants and animals may hold good also of the fertility of the human sexes the bonfires are supposed to promote marriage and to procure offspring for childless couples this happy effect need not flow directly from any quickening or fertilizing energy in the fire it may follow indirectly from the power of the fire to remove those obstacles which the spells of witches and wizards notoriously present to the union of man and wife on the whole then the theory of the purificatory virtue of the ceremonial fires appears more probable and more in accordance with the evidence than the opposing theory of their connection with the sun end of chapter 63