e goes on
as follows: "Other customs pointing back to the far-off times of
heathendom may still be met with among the old-fashioned peasants of the
mountain regions. Such is in the valleys of the Sieg and Lahn the
practice of laying a new log as a foundation of the hearth. A heavy
block of oak-wood, generally a stump grubbed up from the ground, is
fitted either into the floor of the hearth, or into a niche made for the
purpose in the wall under the hook on which the kettle hangs. When the
fire on the hearth glows, this block of wood glows too, but it is so
placed that it is hardly reduced to ashes within a year. When the new
foundation is laid, the remains of the old block are carefully taken
out, ground to powder, and strewed over the fields during the Twelve
Nights. This, so people fancied, promotes the fruitfulness of the year's
crops."[635] In some parts of the Eifel Mountains, to the west of
Coblentz, a log of wood called the _Christbrand_ used to be placed on
the hearth on Christmas Eve; and the charred remains of it on Twelfth
Night were put in the corn-bin to keep the mice from devouring the
corn.[636] At Weidenhausen and Girkshausen, in Westphalia, the practice
was to withdraw the Yule log (_Christbrand_) from the fire so soon as it
was slightly charred; it was then kept carefully to be replaced on the
fire whenever a thunder-storm broke, because the people believed that
lightning would not strike a house in which the Yule log was
smouldering.[637] In some villages near Berleburg in Westphalia the old
custom was to tie up the Yule log in the last sheaf cut at harvest.[638]
On Christmas Eve the peasantry of the Oberland, in Meiningen, a province
of Central Germany, used to put a great block of wood called the
_Christklots_ on the fire before they went to bed; it should burn all
night, and the charred remains were believed to guard the house for the
whole year against the risk of fire, burglary, and other
misfortunes.[639] The Yule log seems to be known only in the
French-speaking parts of Switzerland, where it goes by the usual French
name of _Buche de Noel_. In the Jura mountains of the canton of Bern,
while the log is burning on the hearth the people sing a blessing over
it as follows:--

"_May the log burn!
May all good come in!
May the women have children
And the sheep lambs!
White bread for every one
And the vat full of wine_!"

The embers of the Yule log were kept carefully, for they were believed
to