Then came a shouting, tittering, and falling
back, as an old boor came forward like a priest with something heavy
and ghastly in his arms, which was thrown on with a tremendous shout,
darkened the glow for a moment, then hissed, cracked, and emitted a
horrible odour.
It was a horse's head, the right owner of which had been carefully
kept for the occasion, though long past work. Christina shuddered,
and felt as if she had fallen upon a Pagan ceremony; as indeed was
true enough, only that the Adlersteiners attached no meaning to the
performance, except a vague notion of securing good luck.
With the same idea the faggots were pulled down, and arranged so as
to form a sort of lane of fire. Young men rushed along it, and then
bounded over the diminished pile, amid loud shouts of laughter and
either admiration or derision; and, in the meantime, a variety of
odd, recusant noises, grunts, squeaks, and lowings proceeding from
the darkness were explained to the startled little bride by her
husband to come from all the cattle of the mountain farms around, who
were to have their weal secured by being driven through the Needfire.
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