s at the regularly recurring celebrations
were formerly 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 Kuhn has indicated,[815] some evidence to shew that
the midsummer fire was originally thus produced. We have seen that many
Hungarian swineherds make fire on Midsummer Eve by rotating a wheel
round a wooden axle wrapt in hemp, and that they drive their pigs
through the fire thus made.[816] At Obermedlingen, in Swabia, the "fire
of heaven," as it was called, was made on St. Vitus's Day (the fifteenth
of June) by igniting a cartwheel, which, smeared with pitch and plaited
with straw, was fastened on a pole twelve feet high, the top of the pole
being inserted in the nave of the wheel. This 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.[817] 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 fifteenth of
June) is near midsummer; and we have seen that in Masuren fire is, or
used to be, actually made on Midsummer Day by turning a wheel rapidly
about an oaken pole,[818] 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.

[The influence which the fires are supposed to exert on the weather and
vegetation may be thought to be due to an increase of solar heat
produced by the fires.]

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 lighting of the midsummer bonfires will cause
the rain to cease[819] 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[820]
may very naturally be inter