According to the old Latin “Romaunt de Renard,” Herodias loved John the Baptist. The jealous King caused him to be beheaded. His head, by her order, was carried to her, and she wished to kiss it, but the head turned away, and blew with so much violence that Herodias was blown into the air. Since then, St. John, faithful to his antipathy, has made her travel for ever in the deserts of the sky, and become the genius of the storm. Some confound her with “Habunde,” who may have been a white lady, or one of those “genii” whom the Celts call “dusi.” _Chronique de Philippe Mouskés_, Tome II. Introduction p. 139. Some also think that Herodias will, if anyone dances at harvest time, bring shipwreck and disasters at sea.--_From Mr. Isaac Le Patourel._ “LE BARBOUE.”[120] This was a demon used by old Guernsey nurses to frighten their infant charges. “_Le Barboue t’attrappera_” was quite threat enough to make the naughtiest child repent of his misdeeds. According to Mr. Métivier (See Dictionary, p. 51. _Barboue_), this name “Barboue” is a corruption of _bared meleu_, the spectre which personifies the plague among the Cymri. According to the legends, “Barbaou Hervé” was the wolf who accompanied St. Hervé, a sainted hermit of the country of Léon, 560. He was evidently related to the French “Loup-Garou.” [120] May not this be a corruption of _Barbe Bleue_--the Blue Beard who has frightened so many children both in France and England? SPECTRAL APPEARANCES. Many places have the reputation of being haunted by phantoms which make their appearance at the dead of night, not always in a human form, as the spirits of the departed are wont to do when they revisit “the glimpses of the moon,” but in the more fearful shapes of beasts and nondescript monsters. “La Bête de la Tour,” “Le Cheval de St. George,” which has already been spoken of in connection with the well, and “Le Chien Bôdu,” are among these. The “devises,” or boundary stones, which served in olden times to mark the limits of some of the principal “fiefs” or manors, but which have now disappeared, leaving only a name to the locality, appear to have been the particular resort of these spectres; and it is not improbable that the superstition may have arisen from the custom, of which traces are to be found in many nations, of sacrificing a victim and burying it where the stone of demarcation was to be set up. It was not, however, these places only which became the haunt of spectres; other spots came in also for their share of these nocturnal and frightful visitors. A lonely dwelling, especially if uninhabited, a dark lane far from any friendly cottage, cromlechs, or spots where these mysterious erections once stood--all these either had, or were likely to acquire, an evil reputation in this respect, and more especially if tradition pointed to any deed of horror, such as murder or suicide, connected with the place or its neighbourhood.