'
After that, they use the same ceremony to the noxious animals: 'This
I give to thee, O fox! spare thou my lambs; this to thee, O hooded
crow! this to thee, O eagle!' When the ceremony is over, they dine
on the caudle; and after the feast is finished, what is left is hid
by two persons deputed for that purpose; but on the next Sunday they
reassemble, and finish the reliques of the first entertainment."
Another writer of the eighteenth century has described the Beltane
festival as it was held in the parish of Logierait in Perthshire. He
says: "On the first of May, O.S., a festival called _Beltan_ is
annually held here. It is chiefly celebrated by the cow-herds, who
assemble by scores in the fields, to dress a dinner for themselves,
of boiled milk and eggs. These dishes they eat with a sort of cakes
baked for the occasion, and having small lumps in the form of
_nipples,_ raised all over the surface." In this last account no
mention is made of bonfires, but they were probably lighted, for a
contemporary writer informs us that in the parish of Kirkmichael,
which adjoins the parish of Logierait on the east, the custom of
lighting a fire in the fields and baking a consecrated cake on the
first of May was not quite obsolete in his time.
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