304 OP METEOROLOGICAL CHAP. 10. 1. 



For Oats used to be sown about this time 

 of year in many countries.* 



I have before had occasion to notice the power 

 of sound to disperse clouds : it might be pro- 

 bably owing to this circumstance that bells used 

 to be rung all night long about Allhallowtide, 

 a custom long since gone out of use. 



The Feast of St. Martin, November 11, is, 

 on the Continent, celebrated by a feast of Goose, 

 just as that of St. Michael is in Britain. The 

 killing of beasts at Martinmass is also a popular 

 custom ; and the smoked beef hung up on this 

 day, and preserved all the year, has been often 

 alluded to by poets. f 



St. Catherine, the patroness of spinsters, and 

 also of learned men, has left us some curious 

 superstitious customs, still practised on her 

 feast, November 25th, for an account of which 



* The Author of Honoria says, in allusion to the Bells 

 ringing for the All Souls Holy Mass, at St. Ambrose Church, 

 at Milan : 



" Ye hallowed Bells, whose voices through the aire, 



The awful summons of affliction beare." 

 t " Ligna vehit mactatque boves et laetus ad ignem, 



Ebria Martini festa November agit ; 

 Ad pastum in sylvam porcos compellit, et ipse 

 Pingnibus interea vescitur anseribus." 



Collect, in mensium Opera. 



