This is but a boyish and sportive name given to the month preceding _Lùnasdal_, or first of August, the time of greatest scarcity with the poor. The stores of last harvest are exhausted, and the new supplies are not yet come in. If there is a scarcity of food for the dogs, it is recommended as the best thing that can be done, to hang them. Besides, the excessive heat makes it advisable to get rid of all superfluous dogs. _Latha Martainn Builg_, TRANSLATION OF MARTIN. (Lit. Martin of the Bag’s Day.) July 4-16 received its title of the Translation of Martin from being the day on which the remains of St. Martin, Bishop of Tours, 397, “the apostle of the Gauls” (who also gives his name to the Martinmas term) were transferred to the Cathedral of Tours. In Scotland the day is called St. Martin of Bullions Day, and it was a proverb that if the deer rise dry and lie down dry on it, that is if the morning and evening be dry, it will be a dry season till harvest; and it was a general belief over Europe that rain on this day betokened wet weather for the next twenty days. The Day of St. Martin of the Bag is commonly translated St. Swithin’s day, which is the 15th. St. Swithin was Bishop of Winchester, and no name of an English Bishop is found in the Gaelic calendar. _Lùnasdal_, LAMMAS, AUGUST 1-12TH. This, being a quarter day, formed a great day with old women for saining cattle, and performing those ceremonies by which evil was to be kept away from them for the next three months. Tar was put on their tails and ears, charms (_òradh_) were said at their udders, red and blue threads were put on their tails, and various observances were gone through with balls of hair (_rolag_), plants, fire about the earthenware pipkins (_crogain_) in which milk or butter was to be put, etc. Curds and butter were specially prepared for a great feast held this day, at which it was highly important that everyone got as much as he cared for. On Lammas day, the gad-fly “loses one of its eyes” (_Latha Lùnasdal caillidh chreithleag an leth shùil_). The creature is not so vicious after this date. _Lùnasdal_ is not a word of Gaelic origin, at least no satisfactory Gaelic etymology can be given for it. It is perhaps a contraction of the Latin, _luna augustalis_, the August moon. The Roman month was lunar, and was reckoned from the first appearance of the moon’s slender crescent in the sky. The moon in the harvest months is of more consequence to the husbandman than at any other season, and has always been taken notice of for its splendour. The temperature of the night air has much to do with this. The Gaelic bears its own testimony to it, in giving distinctive names to the autumn moon.