_ The invitation
is considered as an honour by the girl's family, and is gladly
accepted. At the end of May the girl makes a pot of the bark of the
cork-tree, fills it with earth, and sows a handful of wheat and
barley in it. The pot being placed in the sun and often watered, the
corn sprouts rapidly and has a good head by Midsummer Eve (St.
John's Eve, the twenty-third of June). The pot is then called _Erme_
or _Nenneri._ On St. John's Day the young man and the girl, dressed
in their best, accompanied by a long retinue and preceded by
children gambolling and frolicking, move in procession to a church
outside the village. Here they break the pot by throwing it against
the door of the church. Then they sit down in a ring on the grass
and eat eggs and herbs to the music of flutes. Wine is mixed in a
cup and passed round, each one drinking as it passes. Then they join
hands and sing "Sweethearts of St. John" (_Compare e comare di San
Giovanni_) over and over again, the flutes playing the while. When
they tire of singing they stand up and dance gaily in a ring till
evening.
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