[468] In the Vosges it is still customary to kindle bonfires upon
the hill-tops on Midsummer Eve; the people believe that the fires help
to preserve the fruits of the earth and ensure good crops.[469] In the
Jura Mountains the midsummer bonfires went by the name of _ba_ or
_beau_. They were lit on the most conspicuous points of the
landscape.[470] Near St. Jean, in the Jura, it appears that at this
season young people still repair to the cross-roads and heights, and
there wave burning torches so as to present the appearance of fiery
wheels in the darkness.[471] In Franche-Comte, the province of France
which lies immediately to the west of the Jura mountains, the fires of
St. John still shone on the saint's day in several villages down to
recent years. They were generally lit on high ground and the young folks
of both sexes sang and danced round them, and sprang over the dying
flames.[472] In Bresse bonfires used to be kindled on Midsummer Eve (the
twenty-third of June) and the people danced about them in a circle.
Devout persons, particularly old women, circumambulated the fires
fourteen times, telling their beads and mumbling seven _Paters_ and
seven _Aves_ in the hope that thereby they would feel no pains in their
backs when they stooped over the sickle in the harvest field.[473] In
Berry, a district of Central France, the midsummer fire was lit on the
Eve of St. John and went by the name of the _jonee, joannee_, or
_jouannee_.
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