Thursday is in many places the luckiest day for marriages, also for markets. On Friday the weather is apt to change. It is a good day for sowing and for making vinegar, but a bad one for baking, or for starting on a journey. In some places it is considered unsafe to comb the hair on a Friday—therefore the village school on that day presents a somewhat rough and unkempt appearance. Rain upon Good Friday is a favorable omen. On Easter Monday the lads run about the towns and villages sprinkling with water all the girls and women they meet. This is supposed to insure the flax growing well. On the following day the girls return the attention by watering the boys.[60] On Easter Monday the cruel sport of cock-shooting is still kept up in many Saxon villages. The cock is tied to a post and shot at till it dies a horrible lingering death. Sometimes the sport is diversified by blindfolding the actors, who strike at their victim with wooden clubs. Between Easter and Pentecost none should either marry or change their domicile. On Pentecost Monday it is sometimes customary to elect three of the girls as queens, who, dressed up in their finest clothes, preside at church and at the afternoon dance. In one village it is usual on Pentecost Sunday at mid-day, when the bells are ringing, to encircle each fruit-tree with a rope made of twisted straw. The fires on St. John’s Day, and the belief that hidden treasures are to be found, are also prevalent among the Saxons. No one should bathe or wade into a river on the 29th of June, Feast of SS. Peter and Paul, for fear of drowning, it being supposed that this day requires the sacrifice of a human victim. Before the 24th of August no corn should be garnered, because only after that date do the thunder-storms cease, or as the people say, “the thunder-clouds go home.” The night of St. Thomas (December 21st), popularly considered to be the longest night in the year, is the date consecrated by Saxon superstition to the celebration of the games which elsewhere are usual on All-Halloween. Every girl puts her fate to the test on that evening, and there are various ways of so doing, with onions, flowers, shoes, etc. One way of interrogating Fate is with a sharp knife to cut an apple in two. If in doing so no seed has been split, then the wish of your heart will be fulfilled. Similar games are also practised on Sylvester night (December 31st), which night is also otherwise prophetic of what is to happen during the coming year. If it be clear, then the fowls will lay many eggs that year, and bright moonlight means full granaries. A red dawn on New-year’s Day means war, and wind is significant of the pest or cholera. FOOTNOTES: