This is the roasted, dried out husk of summer -- flowers are drying and withering, their seed-pods rattling. The undergrowth is browned and worn out by the fierce rays of the summer sun. The wheat fields stand bulging; ripe and golden, ready for the scythe, or rather, these days, ready for the combine harvester...

The weather is crucial, for a certain number of dry days are needed to get the harvest in safely. Anxious farmers continually scanned the skies at this time , to judge whether they should start to cut, or whether it would be best to leave it a few days. Wither way means risk, for heavy rains could damage the crop irreparably...

Three hundred years ago the time of harvest was a most joyful occasion, celebrated by a great harvest supper like the one described so vividly in Hardy's Far From the Madding Crowd. For the farm laborers, harvest-time was the most concertrated period of work in the farming year, with all members of the family fully employed around the clock till the work was done. As the last high-piled wagon or "hock-cart" lumbered into the rick-yard, the cry would go up, "Harvest home-Harvest home." The mood was joyful; the young men and girls decked out in straw crowns, full of happy anticipation for the Harvest Supper which would soon follow. A good time was had by all, with the groaning board holding more food than most laboring people would see in a year.

Going back even further, to the time of our Celtic ancestors, August was "Lugnasad," one of the four great festival of the year. The word comes from "Lugh," the Sun god, and "nasad," an assembly. Like all the ancient festivals, this celebration was later "Christianized," becoming Lammas or "loaf mass". Traditionally, small loaves were made from the first fruits of the harvest for eating at the ceremonial meal. In Scotland, the loaves were cooked over a rowan fire. They were then distributed and eaten, after which the celebrants paraded sunwise round the fire. Lammas-tide was an important Quarter Day in the Middle Ages, but this is now only remembered in Scotland, for Celtic remnants survived much longer in the Celtic fringes than in the rest of the British Isles. Lammastide fairs were often held on ancient hilltop forts or earthworks, showing that their origins stretch far back into the ages....

By the end of August, the harvest is completed. The fertility figure, the Corn Dolly, has been made from the last sheaf of corn, and hung up in the house to ensure a good harvest for next year. As the first cut of the plough is made on Plough Monday, she will be ploughed in to bring continuity and fertility to the soil once again. The Corn Spirit, who hid the last sheaf of corn, the White Goddess, Mother Earth, and St Bride all have connections with the Corn Dolly, or "Kern Baby" as she is sometimes called. In Scotland they call her "the maiden" but however she is known, she epitomizes the curious mix of superstition, tradition, and almost forgotten religious cermony which attends our ancient agricultural way of life and its seasonal turning points.

After this climax, all that remains is the apple harvest, and the gathering of every kind of fruit and nut, to build up the winter stores. The glorious summer is at an end and the Earth will sleep until re-awakened by the smile of the returning Sun-god in the spring.