Neglected and uncultivated as this extended country has long been--only _now_, in fact, assuming an aspect of improvement--it is not surprising that superstition has lingered longer amongst its uneducated people than with their more fortunate neighbours. Within ten years new roads have been made, new buildings erected, and a rail-road is projected across the Landes from Bordeaux to Bayonne: it may, therefore, be now expected that the last vestige of idle belief in witches and demons will shortly disappear; but, in the meantime, much of such weakness is lingering still. For instance, the Landais believe that in certain maladies the physician has no power, and that recourse must be had, for relief, to certain gifted persons, who will propitiate the evil spirit who caused the ill. They attribute great virtue to what they call _les Veyrines_, namely, narrow openings in the thickness of the pillars of a church: persons affected with rheumatic diseases, have only to pass through these narrow spaces, repeating at the time certain prayers, having previously made the circuit of the pillar nine times. His head is first inserted, and the rest of his body is pushed through by his friends. These practices are, in spite of the exertions of the clergy, said to be still carried on in secret. In the month of May they strew the street before their houses with reeds, on fête days, and there they frequently pass their evenings, sitting in groups, and telling to each other superstitious stories, which are eagerly listened to, and thus handed down from father to son. The _orfraie_ and the screech-owl are looked upon with terror in the Landes: their approach to any dwelling bodes evil in all forms: the dead quit their tombs at night and flit about in the fens, and covered with their white shrouds come wandering into the villages, nor will they quit them till the prayers and alms of their friends have calmed their perturbed spirits.