Though
only the first and the last man of the chain had a hand free, their
business was to surround and seize thrice the future Green Wolf, who
in his efforts to escape belaboured the brothers with a long wand
which he carried. When at last they succeeded in catching him they
carried him to the burning pile and made as if they would throw him
on it. This ceremony over, they returned to the house of the Green
Wolf, where a supper, still of the most meagre fare, was set before
them. Up till midnight a sort of religious solemnity prevailed. But
at the stroke of twelve all this was changed. Constraint gave way to
license; pious hymns were replaced by Bacchanalian ditties, and the
shrill quavering notes of the village fiddle hardly rose above the
roar of voices that went up from the merry brotherhood of the Green
Wolf. Next day, the twenty-fourth of June or Midsummer Day, was
celebrated by the same personages with the same noisy gaiety. One of
the ceremonies consisted in parading, to the sound of musketry, an
enormous loaf of consecrated bread, which, rising in tiers, was
surmounted by a pyramid of verdure adorned with ribbons.
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