180 



seasons, and the like ; in some cases, ideas about luck and good 

 fortune, and other matters having nothing particularly to do with 

 weather-lore. And so far they confirm us in the opinion that the 

 wet attributed to St. Swithin has no more to do with him than with 

 any of the other Saints with which it has been associated. 



Of the sayings I now refer to, those perhaps most generally 

 known are such as relate to the Festival of the Conversion of St. 

 Paul, the 25th of January. The weather on this day must be fine, 

 and the sky clear, if the year is to be a prosperous one, according to 

 the following monkish lines : — 



Clara dies Pauli 'bona tempora denotet Anni, 

 Si fuerint Venti, designant proelia genti, 

 Si fueriut nebulaj, pereunt Animalia qu(]eque, 

 Si Nix, si pluvia, designant tempora cara. 

 Ne credas certe nam fallit regula soepe. 

 Or, as in an English translation : — 



If St. Paul's day be faire and cleare, 

 It doth betide a happy yeare ; 

 But if by chance it then should raine, 

 It will make deare all kinds of graine ; 

 And if the clouds make dark the skie 

 Then Neate and Fowles this year shall die ; 

 If blustering winds do blow aloft, 

 Then wars shall trouble the realm full oft. 

 It will be seen that the last line in the Latin version, telling ua 

 not to place implicit confidence in the rule as not always trust- 

 worthy, is omitted in the English. Perhaps it was an addition in 

 after times by some one who had misgivings on the subject ; and it 

 may well remain. 



When I first reflected on the above lines, it being manifest that 

 they admitted of no satisfactory explanation considered in a 

 meteorological point of view, I was led to think, as Forster seems 

 to have thought,* that the importance attached to fine weather on 

 this day might have had reference to the supernatural " light from 

 heaven above the brightness of the sun," which shone round about 

 the great Apostle at the time of his conversion, a light that was 

 ever to be looked for on the return of the festival, "and which 

 reappearing in this manner augured a happy and producti's e season. 

 * Per. Cal., p. 28. 



