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ing from London to_Henry Bullinger, Feb. 8, 1567, says: "Her (Mary's) eldest son was baptized in December last, after the popish manner by some mitred pseudobishop; but two only could be found out of the whole nobility of that kingdom, who thought proper to be present at the christening. The rest only accompanied the infant, both in going and returning, as far as the door of the chapel." Zürich Letters, Parker Soc. 1st Series, 182. It appears to have been anciently the custom at christening entertainments, for the guests not only to eat as much as they pleased, but also for the ladies, at least, to carry away as much as they liked in their pockets. In Strype's Stow accounts are given of two great christenings, in 1561 and 1562. After the first was 66 a splendid banquet at home"; and the other, we read, was concluded with a great banquet, consisting of wafers and hypocras, French, Gascoign, and Rhenish wines, with great plenty, and all their servants had a banquet in the hall with divers dishes." Wafers and hippocras wine were the customary refreshment served up after the return from a christening, as appears from the case of Alderman White's child in 1559, when the Marquis of Winchester, Lord Treasurer, stood as one of the sponBors. The same entertainment was also very usual (with other dainties) at weddings about the same period. Compare Wafers. In Brathwaite's "Whimzies," 1631, speaking of a yealous (jealous) neighbour, the author says: "Store of bisket, wafers, and careawayes, hee bestowes at his childs christning, yet are his cares nothing lessned; he is perswaded that he may eate his part of this babe, and never breake his fast." At the christening entertainments of many of the poorer sort of people in the North of England (who are so unfortunate as to provide more mouths than they can with convenience find meat for) great collections are oftentimes made by the guests, such as will far more than defray the expenses of the feast of which they have been partaking. Moresin informs us of a remarkable custom, which he himself was an eye-witness of in Scotland. They take, says he, on their return from church, the newly-baptized infant, and vibrate it three or four times gently over a flame, saying, and repeating it thrice, "Let the flame consume thee now or never." Papatus, i., p. 72. Borlase writes: "The same lustration, by carrying of fire, is performed round about women after child-bearing, and round about children before they are christened, as an effectual means to preserve both the mother and the infant from the power of evil spirits." In the "Autobiography of Sir John Bramston," Sir John relates how after the death of King Edward VI., in

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1553, Rose, a daughter of Sir William Lock, in the time of her first husband, Anthony Hickman, fled ultimately to Antwerp. from the persecution of Mary's government, they being Protestants. Mr. and Mrs. Hickman took two children abroad with them, and while they remained at Antwerp, she had a third, which she caused to be baptized in the house according to the rites of the Reformed Church. "The fashion was,' writes the author of these memoirs," "to hange a peece of lawne out at the window where a child was to be baptised; and her house havinge two dores into two streetes, she hunge lawne out at each doore, soe the neighbours of each side, thinckinge the child was caried out at the other dore, inquired no farther." It is customary in the North also for the midwife, &c. to provide two slices, one of bread and the other of cheese, which are presented to the first person they meet in the procession to church at a christening. The person who receives this homely present must give the child in return three different things wishing it at the same time health and beauty. The gentleman who informed Brand of this, happening once to fall in the way of such a party, and to receive the above present, was at a loss how to make the triple return, till he bethought himself of laying upon the child which was held out to him, a shilling, a halfpenny, and a pinch of snuff. When they meet more than one person together, it is usual to single out the nearest to the woman that carries the child. The same sort of practice was in vogue in Durham and Northumberland in 1886; fruit-cake and cheese were the articles there and then presented. The cake was in fact a currant loaf. Antiquary, February, 1886, p. 84. In the "Statistical Account of Scotland,",, we read that the inhabitants "would consider it as an unhappy omen, were they by any means disappointed in getting themselves married, or their children baptized, on the very day which they had previously fixed in their mind for that purpose. Again, parish of Kilsinan, Argyleshire, we read: "There is one pernicious practice that prevails much in this parish, which took its rise from this source, which is, that of carrying their children out to baptism on the first or second day after birth. Many of them, although they had it in their option to have their children baptized in their own houses, by waiting one day, prefer carrying them seven or eight miles to church in the worst weather in December or January, by which folly they too often sacrifice the lives of their infants to the phantom of superstition." Again, the minister of the parishes of South Ronaldsay and Burray, Orkney, says: "Within these last seven years, (i.e.

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sisse, antiquissimus patrum Tertullianus
meminit in lib. de Persecut. Hildebrandus,
De Diebus Festis, 1735. See Du Cange's
Glossary, v. Natali. Drechler, in his
Treatise De Larvis," p. 30, quotes the
79th Canon of the General Council held
at Constantiople in 690-1, for the apparent
"Quando aliqui
origin of this custom:
post Diem Natalem Christi Dei nostri re-
periuntur coquentes similam et se hanc
mutuó donantes, prætextu scil. honoris
secundinarum impollutæ Virginis Matris,
statuimus ut deinceps nihil tale fiat a fide-

circa 1790), the minister has been twice interrupted in administering baptism to a female child before the male child, who was baptized immediately after. When the service was over, he was gravely told he had done very wrong, for as the female child was first baptized, she would, on her coming to the years of discretion, most certainly have a strong beard, and the boy would have none. Lastly, the minister of Logierait, Perthshire, says: "When a child was baptized privately, it was, not long since, customary to put the child upon a clean basket, having a cloth pre-libus." These cakes, Drechler imagines, viously spread over it, with bread and cheese put into the cloth; and thus to move the basket three times successively round the iron crook, which hangs over the fire, from the roof of the house, for the purpose of supporting the pots when water is boiled, or victuals are prepared. This might be anciently intended to counteract the malignant arts which witches and evil spirits were imagined to practice against new-born infants." Grose tells us there is a superstition that a child who does not cry when sprinkled in baptism will not live. He has added another idea equally well founded, that children prematurely wise are not long-lived, that is, rarely reach maturity; a notion which we find quoted by Shakespear, and put into the mouth of Richard III. That an unbaptized infant cannot die, is a belief still entertaned in I.ancashire; but the authors of "Lancashire Folk-Lore, " 1867, do not appear to have been aware, that the superstiton is a very ancient and wide-spread one, and that this description of spirit was known as the Latewitch. There was formerly a custom of having sermons at christenings. I (says Mr. Brand) had the honour of presenting to the Earl of Leicester one preached at the baptism of Theophilus Earl of Huntingdon.

Christmas Box.-Hutchinson observes on these gifts to servants and mechanics, for their good services in the labouring part of the year, "The Paganalia of the Romans, instituted by Servius Tullius, were celebrated in the beginning of the year: an altar was erected in each village, where all persons gave money. This was a mode originally devised for gaining the number of inhabitants.' Hist. of Northumb., ii., 20. “Denique in nostris Ecclesiis nocte natali Parentes varia munuscula, Crepundia, Cistellas, Vestes Vehicula, Poma, Nuces, &c. liberis suis donant, quibus plerumque Virga additur, ut metu castigationis eo facilius regantur. Dantur hæc munuscula nomine S. Christi, quem per tegulas vel fenestras illabi, vel cum Angelis domos obire fingunt. Mos iste similiter a Saturnalibus Gentilium descendere videtur, in quibus Ethnicos sportulas sive varia Munera ultro citroque mi

were originally given as presents in re-
membrance of the Virgin, and other
aritcles were, in course of time, added or
substituted, the original object being kept
in view. We are told that the Christmas
Box money is derived hence. The Romish
priests had masses said for almost every
thing: if a ship went out to the Indies,
the priests had a box in her, under the
protection of some saint: and for masses,
as their cant was, to be said for them to
that saint, &c. the poor people must put
something into the priest's box, which
was not opened till the ship's return. The
mass at that time was called Christmas:
the box called Christmas Box, or money
gathered against that time, that masses
might be made by the priests to the saints
to forgive the people the debaucheries of
that time: and from this, servants had
the liberty to get box money, that they too
might be enabled to pay the priest for his
masses, knowing well the truth of the pro-
verb: "No Penny, No Pater Noster."
Athenian Oracle, by Dunton, i., 360. In
the illustration of the cut to Blaxton's
"English Usurer," 1634, the author,
speaking of the usurer and swine, says:
deficient in giving; like the Christmas
earthen boxes of apprentices, apt to take
in money, but he restores none till hee be
broken like a potters vessell into many
And in Mason's "Handful of
shares."
Essaies," 1621, signat. c 2, we find a simi-
lar thought "like a swine he never doth
good till his death: as an apprentices box
of earth, apt he is to take all, but to re-
store none till hee be broken." The box
was evidently at one time of earthenware.
Aubrey, in his "Natural History of Wilt-
shire," circa_1670, speaking of a pot in
which some Roman Denarii were found,
says: "it resembles in appearance an ap-
prentices earthen Christmas box.'
asked a fellow, what Westminster Hall was
like. Marry, quoth the other, it is like a
butler's box at Christmas amongst game-
sters: for whosoeuer loseth, the box will
bee sure to be a winner."-Taylor's Wit
and Mirth, 1629.

"One

th'are some fair gamesters use To pay the box well, especially at In and In,

Innes of Court butlers would have but a | in use during the twelev days of Christmas, Bad Christmas of it else.' and stood on the public supper board. It -Cotgrave's Treasury of Wit and Lanwas not, however, peculiar to St. John's. guage, 1655. Gay, in his "Trivia," menIn the "Country Farmers' Catechism," tions this: 1703, occurs this passage: "She ne'er has no fits, nor uses no cold tea, as the 'Ladies Catechism

"Some boys are rich by birth beyond all wants,

Belov'd by uncles, and kind, good, old

aunts;

When time comes round, a Christmas box they bear,

And one day makes them rich for all the year."

In a catalogue of Presbyterian books, I find one, with the following title, "Christmas cordials fit for refreshing the souls and cheering the hearts; and more fit for Christmas-boxes than gold or silver.'

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"The Christmas box," (says the Connoisseur), was formerly the bounty of well-disposed people, who were willing to contribute something towards rewarding the industrious, and supplying them with necessaries. But the gift is now almost demanded as a right, and our journeymen, apprentices, &c., are grown so polite, that instead of reserving their Christmas box for its original use, their ready cash serves them only for pocket-money; and instead of visiting their friends and relations, they commence the fine gentlemen of the week." The bestowing of Christmas boxes indeed, is one of those absurd customs of antiquity which, till within these few years had spread itself almost into a national grievance. The butcher and the baker sent their journeymen and apprentices to lovy contributions on their customers, who were paid back again in fees to the servants of the different families. The tradesman had, in consequence, a pretence to lengthen out his bill, and the master and mistress to lower the wages on account of the vails. Presents were made by bakers to their customers at this time in old days: a baby of paste, or a cake with the figure of a lamb on it; but. although in the formation of cakes all sorts of fantastic shapes are still resorted to, and lambs in sugar and flour are still occasionally to be seen, the good ancient custom of giving such things away has died out. At Wrexham, in Denbighshire, the tradespeople unanimously resolved in 1867 to give no Christmas boxes and to present, instead, £35 to the local charities. Comp. Nares and Halliwell in v. Monsieur de Valois says that the Kings of France gave presents to their soldiers at this season.

Christmas Candle, the, at St. John's College, Oxford. This candle, and the socket, which was still preserved in the Buttery, in 1813, used formerly to be burned at Christmas in an ancient stone socket, upon which was engraved a figure of the Holy Lamb. It was

says, but keeps her body in health with working all the week, and goes to church on Sundays: my daughter don't look with sickly pale looks, like an unfit Christmas candle; they don't eat oatmeal, lime, or ashes, for pain at their stomachs; they don't ride on the fellows backs before they are twelve years old, nor lie on their own before they are fifteen, but look as fresh as new blown roses, with their daily exercise, and stay still they are fit for husbands before they have them."

Christmas Day.-This is observed without any real authority or probability of correctness on the 25th of December. Christmas Day, in the primitive Church, was always observed as the Sabbath Day, and, like that, preceded by an eve or vigil. Hence our present Christmas Eve. Bourne cites an oration of Gregory Nazianzen, which throws light upon the ancient rites of Christmas Day. "Let us not, says he, "celebrate the feast after an earthly, but an heavenly manner; let not our doors be crowned; let not dancing be encouraged; let not the cross-paths be adorned, the eyes fed, nor the ears delighted; let us not feast to excess, nor be drunk with wine." Certain coarse and obscene usages on Christmas Eve seem to be indicated by Barrington, where, speaking of the people, he says: "They were also, by the customs prevailing in particular districts, subject to services not only of the most servile, but the most ludicrous nature: Utpote die Nativitatis Domini coram eo saltare, buccas cum sonitu inflare et ventris crepitum edere." Observ. on the Statutes, p. 306. Upon Wednesday, December 22, 1647, the cryer of Canterbury, by the appointment of Master Mayor, openly proclaimed that Christmas Day, and all other superstitious festivals, should be put down, and that a market should be kept upon Christmas Day. See "Canterbury Christmas; or, a true Relation of the Insurrection in Canterbury on Christmas Day last," 1648. An order of Parliament, December 24, 1652, directed "that no observation shall be had of the five and twentieth day of December, commonly called Christmas Day; nor any solemnity used or exercised in churches upon that day in respect thereof." credible person born and brought up in a village not far from Bury St. Edmunds, informed Mr. Brand that, when he was a boy, there was a rural custom there among the youths, of "hunting owls and squirrels on Christmas Day." Forby alludes to this now obsolete practice in his "Vocabu

A

lary of East Anglia," 1830. A correspon-,
dent of "Notes and Queries" for March
22 and June 21, 1862, points out that in
some parts of the country (he was brought
up in the West Riding of Yorkshire) a
very curious superstition is connected with
Christmas and New Year's mornings. It
is that the first person who should enter
the house on those two occasions ought,
for luck, to have dark hair; and an old
woman in his neighbourhood accounted
for the belief by saying that Judas, the
betrayer of the Saviour, had red hair, a
circumstance which engendered a deep
prejudice against that or any other light
colour ever after. But it may be said
here, as so often in relation to questions
of the kind-causa latet res ipsa notissima.
The writer observes: "All the ill-luck,
that is, the untoward circumstances of the
year, would be ascribed to the accident of
a person of light hair having been the first
to enter a dwelling on the mornings re-
ferred to. I have known instances, where
such persons, innocently presenting them-
selves, have met with anything but a
Christmas welcome. It was anciently be-
lieved that a child born on a Christmas-
day, when that day fell on a Sunday,
would be very fortunate. A MS. in the
Bodleian has this passage:

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"And what chyld on that day boorn be, Of gret worscheyp schall he be.' Mr. Thomas Wright, in his "Essays," 1846, says: "It is still an article of popular faith in Scotland, that persons born at Christmas and on Good Friday, have more power of communicating with spirits and hobgoblins than other people," and quotes Scot's "Marmion for an illustration so far at least as Christmas is concerned.

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Christmas Eve. It is customary on this night with young people in the North of England to dive for apples, or catch at them, when stuck upon one end of a kind of hanging beam, at the other extremity of which is fixed a lighted candle, and that with their mouths only, their hands being tied behind their backs. Nuts and apples chiefly compose the entertainment, and from the custom of flinging the former into the fire, or cracking them with their teeth, it has doubtless had its vulgar name of Nutcrack Night. Little troops of boys and girls still go about at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and other places in the North of England (and in Yorkshire), some few nights before, on Christmas-eve night, and on that of the day itself. The Hagmena is still preserved among them, and they always conclude their begging song with wishing a merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Compare Hagmena. In Goldsmith's time, the country folks religiously observed this nutcracking festival, as he tells us in his "Vicar of Wake

field." Stafford says, they (certain de-
luded men) "make me call to mind an old
Christmas gambole, contrived with a thred
which being fastened to some beame, hath
at the nether end of it a sticke, at the one
end of which is tied a candle, and at the
other end an apple; so that when a man
comes to bite at the apple, the candle
The application is as
burnes his nose.
easy as the trick common.' Niobe, 1611,
p. 107. The catching at the apple and
candle may be called playing at something
like the ancient English game of the quin-
tain, which is now almost totally forgot-
Hutchinson, somewhat fancifully
ten.
perhaps, identified this Christian usage
with the rites anciently observed in honour
of Pomona. Hist. of North., vol. ii.
66
Polwhele describes it in his Old
18.
"" p. 120:
English Gentleman,
Or catch th' elusive apple with a
bound,

As with its taper it flew whizzing
round."

Luther, in his "Colloquia," i. 233, tells us
that "
upon the eve of Christmas Day the
women run about and strike a swinish
hour (pulsant horam suillam): if a great
hog grunts, it denotes the future husband
to be an old man, if a small one, a young

man."

Naogeorgus describes the midmass on Christmas Eve, the night manner in which the priests used to pilfer the offerings laid on the altar, "least other should it have," and the wooden effigy of the Son of God, which used to be placed there likewise, that the children of both sexes might dance round it, the parents looking on, and applauding. Sir Herbert Croft informs us, that the inhabitants of Hamburg were obliged by custom to give their servants carp for supper on Christmas Eve. Letter from Germany, 1797, p. 82.

Christmas Holidays.—“If we our Bacchanacompare," says Prynne, lian Christmasses and New Years Tides with these Saturnalia and Feasts of Janus, we shall finde such near affinitye betweene them both in regard of time (they being both in the end of December and on the first of January) and in their manner of solemnizing (both of them being spent in revelling, epicurisme, wantonesse, idlenesse, dancing, drinking, stage-plaies, masques, and carnall pompe and jollity), that we must needes conclude the one to be but the very ape or issue of the other. Hence Polydor Vírgil affirmes in expresse tearmes that our Christmas Lords of Misrule (which custom, saith he, is chiefly observed in England) together with dancing, masques, mummeries, stage-playes, and such other Christmas disorders now in use with Christians, were derived from these Roman Saturnalia and Bacchanalian festivals; which (concludes he) should

cause all pious Christians eternally to abominate them." Selden was of opinion that from Christmas Day to Epiphany morning no one should fast save of his own option or at the bidding of the priest. Analecton Anglo-Britannicum, lib. ii., p. 208.

The Christmas of 1502 appears to have been kept with some splendour, for in the "Privy Purse Expenses of Elizabeth of York," there is a payment of twenty pounds to the grooms and pages of the Queen's chamber alone against Cristmas." According to his biographer, Sir Thos. More " was, by his father's procurement, received into the house of the right reverend, wise, and learned prelate Cardinall Mourton, where (thoughe hee was yonge of yeares, yet) would he at Christmas tyd sodenly sometymes stepp in among the players, and never studinge for the matter, make a parte of his owne there presently amonge them, which made the lookers-on more sport than all the players besid. In whose witt and towardnesse the Cardinall much delightinge, would often say of him unto the nobles that divers tymes dyned with him: This child here wayting at the table, who soever shall live to see it, will prove a marvelous man.'" Andrews, in his "Hist. of Great Britain," vol. i. pt. 2, 4to. 1795, p. 329, mentions "the humorous Pageant of Christmas, personified by an old man hung round with savory dainties" which, he says, in common with "dancing round the Maypole and riding the hobby-horse," suffered 2 severe check at the Reformation. In the East of London, about Shoreditch and Mile-End, while the district was still open country, there were periodical celebrations of sports in holiday time. In 1577 we observe a licence to print the History of the High and Mighty William, Duke of Shoreditch, a personage named William Barlow, who had obtained the favour of Henry VIII. by his skill as a bowman, and on whom his Majesty had conferred this and other jocular titles. Nothing farther is known of such a publication, and of a later one in 1583 there is only a late print at the end of Wood's Bowman's Glory, 1682. In 1588 Queen Elizabeth attended a grand spectacle at Mile End, called Arthur's Show, q.v. Braithwaite, in his "Rules for the House of an Earle" (circâ 1640) laments the expenditure of money which would have been better laid out in the good old substantial fare, upon confectionery. He says: "I have knowen that the finest confectionary shoppe in Bearbinder Lane and the Blacke Fryers must be sought into for all kindes of conserved, preserved, and candied fruictes, and flowers, the chardge of a banquet arrising to as great a summe of monye as woulde have kept a good house all Christe

masse

mas, wherin should have been great dishes filled with great peeces of beefe, veale, swanne, venison, capons, and such like English meates." The same author, in his Whimzies," 1631, describing a good and hospitable housekeeper, has left the following picture of Christmas festivities: "Suppose Christmas now approaching, the evergreen ivie trimming and adorning the portals and partcloses of so frequented a building; the usual carolls, to observe antiquitie, cheerefully sounding; and that which is the complement of his inferior comforts, his neighbours, whom he tenders as members of his owne family, joyne with him in this consort of mirth and melody." "" an ill In the second part, he calls a piper wind that begins to blow upon ChristSo Eve, and continues, very lowd and blustring, all the twelve dayes: or an airy meteor, composed of flatuous matter, that then appeares, and vanisheth, to the great peace of the whole family, the thirteenth day." Breton, also, in his "Fantasticks," 1626, has much that this subject. is highly interesting on "The cooke Under November, he says: and the comfitmaker make ready for Christmas, and the minstrels in the Countrey beat their boyes for false fingring." Of Christmas Day itself he observes: "It is now Christmas, and not a cup of drinke must passe without a carroll, the beasts, fowle, and fish, come to a general execution, and the corne is ground to dust for the bakehouse and the pantry: Cards and dice purge many a purse, and the youths shew their agility in shooing of the wild mare. The twelve days' rejoicing and merry-making at this season of the year are mentioned in "The Praise of a ballad about 1630: Christmas," "When Christmas-tide comes in like a bride,

With holly and ivy clad, Twelve days in the year, much mirth and good cheer

In every household is had." One of the most curious pictures in little of an old Christmas is that given (glimpselike) in Laurence Price's unique Christmas Book for 1657. He there describes the sea-faring man's Christmas dinner and the tradesman's, and admits us to the interior of an honest cobbler's house, where there was merry-making in an humble way, and music. One of the last pages is occupied with "The Cobbler's Song.' "" In a tract of 1651, Old Christmas is introduced describing the former annual festivities of the season as follows: "After dinner we arose from the boord and sate by the fire, where the harth was embrodered all over with roasted apples, piping hot, expecting a bole of ale for a cooler, which immediately was transformed into Lamb-wool. After which we discoursed merily, without

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