'_When Christmas comes, Every one should rejoice, For it is a New Covenant_.'
"Following the grandmother and joining in the song, the children and the rest of the family marched thrice round the log, which was as fine a log as could be got."[650] We can now, perhaps, understand why in Perigord people who sat on the Yule log suffered from boils,[651] and why in Lorraine young folks used to be warned that if they sat on it they would have the scab.[652] The reason probably was that the Virgin and child were supposed to be seated, invisible, upon the log and to resent the indignity of contact with mortal children.
[The Yule log in the Vosges; the Yule log in Franche-Comté and Burgundy.]
On Christmas Eve the mountaineers of Rupt, in the Vosges, also never fail to put on the hearth the largest log which the hearth can hold; they call it _la galeuche de Noë_, that is, the Yule log. Next morning they rake the ashes for any charred fragments and keep them as valuable talismans to guard them against the stroke of lightning. At Vagney and other places near it in the Vosges it used to be customary on the same evening to grease the hinges and the latches of the doors, that no harsh grating sound should break the slumbers of the infant Christ. In the Vosges Mountains, too, as indeed in many other places, cattle acquired the gift of speech on Christmas Eve and conversed with each other in the language of Christians. Their conversation was, indeed, most instructive; for the future, it seems, had no secret worth mentioning for them. Yet few people cared to be caught eavesdropping at the byre; wise folk contented themselves with setting a good store of fodder in the manger, then shut the door, and left the animals to their ruminations. A farmer of Vecoux once hid in a corner of the byre to overhear the edifying talk of the beasts. But it did him little good; for one ox said to another ox, "What shall we do to-morrow?" and the other replied, "We shall carry our master to the churchyard." Sure enough the farmer died that very night and was buried next morning.[653] In Franche-Comté, the province of France to the west of the Jura mountains, if the Yule log is really to protect a house against thunder and lightning, it is essential that it should burn during the midnight mass, and that the flame should not go out before the divine service is concluded. Otherwise the log is quite useless for the purpose.[654] In Burgundy the log which is placed on the fire on Christmas Eve is called the _suche_. While it is burning, the father of the family, assisted by his wife and children, sings Christmas carols; and when he has finished, he tells the smallest children to go into a corner of the room and pray God that the log may give them sweeties. The prayer is invariably answered.[655]