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Sun Worship 25
assemble there at dawn, in order to watch for the risine
of the Sun, which on this particular day can be seen from
the centre of the circle of Stonehenge coming up exactly
over the centre of a large stone at some distance from
the rest, called the "Pointer" stone, striking its first rays
through the central entrance on to the so-called altar stone.
This custom has been quoted by one writer as an obvious
proof of Sun-worship in the original constructors of the
circles, and he adds the statement that at noon on the same
day, the "pointer" stone appears as though set at an in-
clination similar to that of the gnomon of a sun-dial.
In the province of Connaught and in other parts of the
South of Ireland, it is still the custom to kindle fires on
St John's Eve :
they
are kept up till sunrise. A friend
(since deceased) who, when quartered in Ireland, had fre-
quently been an eye-witness of this scene, told the writer
that on such occasions mothers are in the habit of giving
their young children a kind of baptism of fire. He himself
had had infants thrown to him through the Hames— not
once only, but many times. The people call this ceremony
Baal-tine-glas or Baal-fiire-blue. The term Baltinglass
(now extinct except as an Irish place-name) is a corruption
of these words. The women, this officer added, prefer
asking gentlemen to catch their children, thinking pos-
sibly that they will be more gentle with them than one
of their own class in life. He also said that he had
quite recently made inquiries as to whether this custom
still survived, and was answered in the affirmative. At
Youghal, County Waterford, the inhabitants light numerous
wood fires in different parts of the town every year on St