flowers and to keep all evil things from house and home.[417]

[The Midsummer fires in Denmark and Norway; keeping off the witches; the
Midsummer fires in Sweden.]

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.[418] Even yet the fires
are said to be lighted all over Norway on the night of June the
twenty-third, Midsummer Eve, Old Style. As many as fifty or sixty
bonfires may often be counted burning on the hills round Bergen.
Sometimes fuel is piled on rafts, ignited, and allowed to drift blazing
across the fiords in the darkness of night. The fires are thought to be
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.[419]
In Sweden the Eve of St. John (St. Hans) is the most joyous night of the
whole year. Throughout some parts of the country, especially in the
provinces of Bohus and Scania and in districts bordering on Norway, it
is celebrated by the frequent discharge of firearms and by huge
bonfires, formerly called Balder's Balefires (_Balder's Balar_), which
are kindled at dusk on hills and eminences and throw a glare of light
over the surrounding landscape. The people dance round the fires and
leap over or through them. In parts of Norrland on St. John's Eve the
bonfires are lit at the cross-roads. The fuel consists of nine different
sorts of wood, and the spectators cast into the flames a kind of
toad-stool (_Baeran_) 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 disport themselves for a time.
The peasants believe that should any of the Trolls be in the vicinity
they will shew 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.[420] 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.[421]

[The Midsummer fires in Switzerland and Austria; effig