The Christmas Kalends of Provence | Page 7

to the labourers in other trades.
While the Vidame talked to me of these genial matters we were

returning homeward, moving in a mildly triumphal procession that I
felt to be a little tinctured with ceremonial practices come down from
forgotten times. Old Jan and Marius marching in front, Esperit and the
sturdy Nanoun marching behind, carried between them the yule-log
slung to shoulder-poles. Immediately in their wake, as chief rejoicers,
the Vidame and I walked arm in arm. Behind us came Elizo and
Janetoun and Magali--save that the last (manifesting a most needless
solicitude for Nanoun, who almost could have carried the log alone on
her own strapping shoulders) managed to be frequently near Esperit's
side. The children, waving olive-branches, careered about us; now and
then going through the form of helping to carry the cacho-fiò, and all
the while shouting and singing and dancing--after the fashion of small
dryads who also were partly imps of joy. So we came down through the
sun-swept, terraced olive-orchards in a spirit of rejoicing that had its
beginning very far back in the world's history and yet was freshly new
that day.
Our procession took on grand proportions, I should explain, because
our yule-log was of extraordinary size. But always the yule-log is
brought home in triumph. If it is small, it is carried on the shoulder of
the father or the eldest son; if it is a goodly size, those two carry it
together; or a young husband and wife may bear it between them--as
we actually saw a thick branch of our almond borne away that
afternoon--while the children caracole around them or lend little
helping hands.
Being come to the Mazet, the log was stood on end in the court-yard in
readiness to be taken thence to the fire-place on Christmas Eve. I
fancied that the men handled it with a certain reverence; and the
Vidame assured me that such actually was the case. Already, being
dedicate to the Christmas rite, it had become in a way sacred; and along
with its sanctity, according to the popular belief, it had acquired a
power which enabled it sharply to resent anything that smacked of
sacrilegious affront. The belief was well rooted, he added by way of
instance, that any one who sat on a yule-log would pay in his person for
his temerity either with a dreadful stomach-ache that would not permit
him to eat his Christmas dinner, or would suffer a pest of boils. He

confessed that he always had wished to test practically this superstition,
but that his faith in it had been too strong to suffer him to make the
trial!
On the other hand, when treated reverently and burned with fitting rites,
the yule-log brings upon all the household a blessing; and when it has
been consumed even its ashes are potent for good. Infused into a
much-esteemed country-side medicine, the yule-log ashes add to its
efficacy; sprinkled in the chicken-house and cow-stable, they ward off
disease; and, being set in the linen-closet, they are an infallible
protection against fire. Probably this last property has its genesis in the
belief that live-coals from the yule-log may be placed on the linen cloth
spread for the Great Supper without setting it on fire--a belief which
prudent housewives always are shy of putting to a practical test.
The home-bringing ceremony being thus ended, we walked back to the
Château together--startling Esperit and Magali standing hand in hand,
lover-like, in the archway; and when we were come to the terrace, and
were seated snugly in a sunny corner, the Vidame told me of a very
stately yule-log gift that was made anciently in Aix--and very likely
elsewhere also--in feudal times.
In Aix it was the custom, when the Counts of Provence still lived and
ruled there, for the magistrates of the city each year at Christmas-tide to
carry in solemn procession a huge cacho-fiò to the palace of their
sovereign; and there formally to present to him--or, in his absence, to
the Grand Seneschal on his behalf--this their free-will and good-will
offering. And when the ceremony of presentation was ended the city
fathers were served with a collation at the Count's charges, and were
given the opportunity to pledge him loyally in his own good wine.
Knowing Aix well, I was able to fill in the outlines of the Vidame's
bare statement of fact and also to give it a background. What a joy the
procession must have been to see! The grey-bearded magistrates, in
their velvet caps and robes, wearing their golden chains of office; the
great log, swung to shoulder-poles and borne by leathern-jerkined
henchmen; surely drummers and fifers, for such a ceremonial would
have been impossibly incomplete in Provence without a tambourin and

galoubet; doubtless a brace of ceremonial