St. John's Day, or Midsummer
Day (June 24th), was chosen because on that day the sun reaches its
highest point in the zodiac. There is, however, another
interpretation of the meaning of the fires on St. John's Day, as
illustrating the verse which speaks of him "as a burning and a
shining light" (St. John v. 35); but this interpretation was
probably invented by some pious divine who endeavoured to attach a
Christian meaning to an ancient heathen custom. The connection of
the ceremony with the old worship of the sun is indisputable. Its
practice was very general in nearly all European nations, and in not
very remote times from Norway to the shores of the Mediterranean the
glow of St. John's fires might have been seen. The Emperor
Charlemagne in the ninth century forbade the custom as a heathen
rite, but the Church endeavoured to win over the custom from its
Pagan associations and to attach to it a Christian signification. In
the island of Jersey the older inhabitants used to light fires under
large iron pots full of water, in which they placed silver
articles--as spoons, mugs, &c., and then knocked the silver against
the iron with the idea of scaring away all evil spirits.[11]
Sometimes bones were burnt in the fire, for we are told in a quaint
homily on the Feast of St. John Baptist, that bones scared away the
evil spirits in the air, since "wise clerks know well that dragons
hate nothing more than the stink of burning bones, and therefore the
country folk gather as many as they might find, and burned them; and
so with the stench thereof they drove away the dragons, and so they
were brought out of great disease."

In some most remote northern parts of England the farmer lights a
wisp of straw, which he carries round his fields to protect them
from the tare and darnel, the devil and witches. In some places they
used to cover a wheel with straw, set it on fire, and roll it down a
hill. A learned writer on antiquities tells us that the people
imagined that all their ill-luck rolled away from them together with
this burning wheel. All these customs are relics of the old fire and
sun worship, to which our forefathers were addicted. Wrestling,
running races, and dancing were afterwards practised by the
villagers. Wrestling is a very ancient sport, and the men of
Cornwall and Devon, of Westmoreland and Cumberland, were famous for
their skill. A "Cornish hug" is by no means a tender embrace.
Sometimes the people bore back to th