MIDNIGHT SUPERSTITIONS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2689, 27 September 1905, Page 71

MIDNIGHT SUPERSTITIONS.

Midsummer Night superstitions have existed, we suppose, since men first took heed of "the tabernacle of the sun." Assyrian maids on Tigris's banks, Greek youths *on /Egean shores, Roman lovers ■« atching their mistresses' s sandals bending down daffodil stalks in the meadows by the Tiber — these, and multitudes beside, marked signs and omens at the summer solstice, and waited for the propitious moment at the turning of the year. It is a mistake to think that such rites and ceremonies have ceased to be practised in England. The simple dwellers in Cornish coves, in West -country dargles, in Derbyshire dalos still '"believe and tremble." Fairies still haunt the green knowes north o" the Tweed, and uncanny

shapes flit through the long June twilight across many a moor and moss. Only a day or two since an old gardener told the present writer of an experience that befell him when herding sheep on Loch Awe-side in the days of his far-away youth. He heard, he saM, "a humming and a drumming, loud and soft by turns. Now in the air, now beneath the earth; a murmuring, a muttering, and a whisking quite extraordinair !" He lifted a. big white stone at his foot, and there, below it, were beetles— green beetle?— all diamond-like arac! gleaming. If there were 10 there were 20,000 of them— a moving, heaving mass of glittering green beetles. ''They were fairies — what elao could they be?' So I laid back the stone gently, atkimg pardon while I did it; and then I jvust fled away across the hill as fast as my pooa- feet could fall i" "What else could they be?"' There is a world of meaning in, that question 1 . Once a year tho fern floweis. Do botanists know that? Onr-e a year the bracken, that grows with so sturdy and crisp a habit on wild waste laaioj? — once a yiar a large goldem bloom com.es in the very heart of its fronds, a. flower gifted with occult powers and influences. On Midsummer Eve, all over tho country, the mystic blossom springs suddenly to its full growth and beauty. The fortunate finder is wealthy for life ; and even the friends to whom he .may show it will reoeive the good gifts of happiness — lovers, laughter, loveliness. No wonder that the whole night through youths and maidens wander far afield, searching with anxious eyes for the fairy flower shining golden in thle green heart of the fern. "Very seldom do they find it — indeed, no instance of success has been actually proved, we believe — fo-r the fairios guard most jealously the flowei which they hold to be quite 'their owm They are rorever on the alert, and manage to throw dust into the eyes of the seekers or to divert attention to something else just at the very instant of discovery. To our personal knowledge, just as a maid, pweet and fair as English maids should be, was stooping over a mass of bracken, hoping to catch eight of the gleaming gold hidden in the fragrant, fronds, a doe with, a fawn at her heels came erashinig through the wood, bounding by with a lightwra and a speed incredible. The startled girl drew back. And when fhe turned to look again, behold the fern was broken and trampled, just where tho deer bad passed. Fairies ! What else could they have been? And the golden bloom was thus snalrfipd 'away at th« very instant it was about to be beheld by the eyes jf a. mortal. Ilia girl consoled herself by gathering '"the mystic .'•even" — tho soven aromatic h-erbs which, plucked on Midsummer Nigh/ and plnred br-neatH the pillow, will bring one's own true love as in a vision to one's dreams.

Then tlioro aie the Midsummer Cups. Did you! ever seek to read their future by the aid of "the Seven Cups of the Eve of St. John"'? The rito is simple, but pcrihaps nil the more potent for that. On Midsummer Night seven cups o-f white porcelain are ranged beneath a snow-

white covering. In one is placed a rmg ; in anothpi 1 a little book; in a third n inorsol of scarlet cloth; a knotted cord; a pi?ce of mon>?y ; a little earth ; a thimble. One cup is chosen at haphazard. Its contents signify the fate which is in stoic for the reverent and crediiloins soul wLo has tared to put the future to the test.