76]

[The Midsummer fires in Poitou.]

Bonfires were lit in almost all the hamlets of Poitou 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 mullein
(_verbascum_) and nuts across the flames; the nuts were supposed to cure
toothache, and the mullein 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. Stones were also placed round the fire, and it
was believed that the first to lift one of these stones next morning
would find under it the hair of St. John.[477] In Poitou also it used to
be customary on the Eve of St. John to trundle a blazing wheel wrapt in
straw over the fields to fertilize them.[478] This last custom is said
to be now extinct,[479] but it is still usual, or was so down to recent
years, in Poitou to kindle fires on this day at cross-roads or on the
heights. The oldest or youngest person present sets a light to the pile,
which consists of broom, gorse, and heath. A bright and crackling blaze
shoots up, but soon dies down, and over it the young folk leap. They
also throw stones into it, picking the stone according to the size of
the turnips that they wish to have that year. It is said that "the good
Virgin" comes and sits on the prettiest of the stones, and next morning
they see there her beautiful golden tresses. At Lussac, in Poitou, the
lighting of the midsummer bonfire is still an affair of some ceremony. A
pyramid of faggots is piled round a tree or tall pole on the ground
where the fair is held; the priest goes in procession to the spot and
kindles the pile. When prayers have been said and the clergy have
withdrawn, the people continue to march round the fire, telling their
beads, but it is not till the flames have begun to die down that the
youth jump over them. A brand from the midsummer bonfire is supposed to
be a preservative against thunder.[480]

[The Midsummer fires in the departments of Vienne and Deux-Sevres and in
the provinces of Saintonge and Aunis.]

In the department of Vienne the bonfire was kindled by the oldest man,
and before the dance round the flames began it was the custom to pass
across them a great bunch of mullein (_bouillon blanc_) and a branch of
walnut, whi