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this parish, are well-known from having perambulated the Hundred of Guthlaxton many years, during the season of Christmas, with a fine gew-gaw which they call a Wassail, and which they exhibit from house to house, with the accompaniment of a duet. I apprehend that the practice of Wassailing will die with this aged pair. We are by no means so tenacious of old usages and diversions in this country as they are in many other parts of the world."

In the Collection of Ordinances for the Royal Household, published by the Society of Antiquaries, we have an account of the ceremony of Wasselling, as it was practised at Court, on Twelfth Night, in the reign of Henry VII.* From this we learn that the ancient custom of pledging each other out of the same cup had now given place to the more elegant practice of each person having his own cup, and that "when the steward came in at the doore with the Wassel, he was to crie three tymes, Wassel, Wassel, Wassel; and then the chappell (the chaplain) was to answere with a songe."

The following Wassailers' song on New Year's Eve was till lately sung in Gloucestershire. The Wassailers, be it noted, brought with them a great bowl, dressed up with garlands and ribbons :—

"Wassail! Wassail! all over the town,

Our toast it is white, our ale it is brown:
Our bowl it is made of a maplin tree,
We be good fellows all; I drink to thee.
Here's to...t, and to his right ear,
God send our maister a happy New Year;
A happy New Year as e'er he did see-
With my Wassailing Bowl I drink to thee.

Here's to ...‡, and to his right eye,
God send our mistress a good Christmas pye:
A good Christmas pye as e'er I did see-
With my Wassailing Bowl I drink to thee.

Here's to Filpail: § and to her long tail,
God send our measter us never may fail
Of a cup of good beer, I pray you draw near,
And then you shall hear our jolly Wassail.

Be here any maids, I suppose here be some;

Sure they will not let young men stand on the cold stone;
Sing hey O maids, come trole back the pin,

And the fairest maid in the house, let us all in.

Milner on an Ancient Cup, Archæologia, vol. xi. p. 423.

cere.

Under "Twelfth Day" an account will be found of the Wassailing monies peculiar to that season. At these times the fare in other respects was better than usual, and, in particular, a finer kind of bread was provided, which was, on that account, called Wassel-bread. Lowth, in his Life of William o Wykeham, derives this name from the Westellum or Vessel in which h supposes the bread to have been made.

The name of some horse.

§ The name of a cow.

The name of another horse.

Come, butler, come bring us a bowl of the best :
I hope your soul in Heaven will rest:

But if you do bring us a bowl of the small,
Then down fall butler, bowl, and all."

Hutchinson, in his History of Cumberland, speaking of the parish of Muncaster, under the head of Ancient Custom, informs us: "On the eve of the New Year, the children go from house to house, singing a ditty which craves the bounty they were wont to have in old King Edward's days.' There is no tradition whence this custom rose; the donation is twopence, or a pye at every house. We have to lament that so negligent are the people of the morals of youth that great part of this annual salutation is obscene, and offensive to chaste ears. It certainly has been derived from the vile orgies of heathens."

In Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland (1794), the minister of Kirkmichael, in the county of Banff, under the head of Superstitions, &c., writes: "On the first night of January, they observe, with anxious attention, the disposition of the atmosphere. As it is calm or boisterous; as the wind blows from the S. or N.; from the E. or the W.; they prognosticate the nature of the weather till the conclusion of the year. The first night of the New Year, when the wind blows from the West, they call dar-na-coille, the night of the fecundation of the trees; and from this circumstance has been derived the name of that night in the Gaelic language. Their faith in the above signs is couched in verses (thus translated): The wind of the S. will be productive of heat and fertility; the wind of the W. of milk and fish; the wind from the N. of cold and storm; the wind from the E. of fruit on the trees."

In the Dialogue of Dives and Pauper, printed by Richard Pynson in 1493, among the Superstitions then in use at the beginning of the year, the following is mentioned: "Alle that take hede to dysmale dayes, or use nyce observaunces in the newe moone, or in the New Yere, as setting of mete or drynke, by nighte on the benche, to fede Alholde or Gobelyn."

NEW YEAR'S DAY.

"Froze January, leader of the year,

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Minced pies in van, and calf's head in the rear."

CHURCHILL

S the vulgar, says Bourne, are always very careful to end the old year well, so they are no less solicitous of making a good beginning of the new one. The old one is ended with a hearty compotation; the new one is opened with the custom of sending presents, which are termed New Year's gifts, to friends and acquaintance. He resolves both customs into superstitions, as being observed that the succeeding year might be prosperous and successful. In a poem cited in Poole's English Parnassus (1657), voce January, these gifts are tus described—

"The king of light, father of aged Time,
Hath brought about that day which is the prime
To the slow-gliding months, when every eye
Wears symptoms of a sober jollity;
And every hand is ready to present
Some service in a real compliment.

Whilst some in golden letters write their love,
Some speak affection by a ring or glove,

Or pins and points (for ev'n the Peasant may,
After his ruder fashion, be as gay

As the brisk courtly Sir), and thinks that he
Cannot, without gross absurdity,

Be this day frugal, and not spare his friend
Some gift, to show his love finds not an end
With the deceased year."

From the following passage in Bishop Hall's Virgidemiarum (1598), it should seem that the usual New Year's gift of tenantry in the country to their landlords was a capon

"Yet must he haunt his greedy landlord's hall
With often presents at ech festiuall;

With crammed Capons every New Yeare's morne,
Or with greene cheeses when his sheepe are shorne,
Or many maunds-full of his mellow fruite," &c.

And so, in A Lecture to the People, by Abraham Cowley (1678), we read

"Ye used in the former days to fall

Prostrate unto your landlord in his hall,

When with low legs, and in an humble guise,

Ye offered up a Capon sacrifice

Unto his worship at a New Year's Tide."

An orange stuck with cloves appears to have been a New Year's gift. So Ben Jonson, in his Christmas Masque: "He has an Orange and rosemary, but not a clove to stick in it." A gilt nutmeg is mentioned in the same piece, and on the same occasion. The use, however, of the orange stuck with cloves may be ascertained from The Seconde Booke of Notable Things, by Thomas Lupton (1579, b. l.): "Wyne wyll be pleasant in taste and savour, if an orenge or a lymon (stickt round about with cloaves) be hanged within the vessel that it touch not the wyne and so the wyne wyll be preserved from foystiness and evyll savor." The quarto edit. of Love's Labour's Lost (1598), reads "A gift nutmeg."

In Stephens's Characters (1631) we have: "Like an inscription with a fat goose against New Year's Tide."

Stillingfleet observes that among the Saxons of the Northern nations the Feast of the New Year was observed with more than ordinary jollity. Thence, as Olaus Wormius and Scheffer observe, they reckoned their age by so many Iolas (in Gothic signifying merrymakings); and Snorro Sturleson describes this New Year's feast, just

Orig. Brit. p. 343.

as Buchanan sets out the British Saturnalia, as feasting and sending presents or New Year's gifts to one another.

In Westmoreland and Cumberland, says a writer in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1791, "early on the morning of the 1st of January, the Fæx Populi assemble together, carrying stangs and baskets. Any inhabitant, stranger, or whoever joins not this ruffian tribe in sacrificing to their favourite saint-day, if unfortunate enough to be met by any of the band, is immediately mounted across the stang (if a woman, she is basketed), and carried, shoulder height, to the nearest publichouse, where the payment of sixpence immediately liberates the prisoner. None, though ever so industriously inclined, are permitted to follow their respective avocations on that day."

According to Massey, in his Notes on Ovid's Fasti, it was otherwise with the Romans. On New Year's Day all tradesmen worked a little in their business by way of omen; for luck's sake, as we say, that they might have constant business all the year after.

The poet Naogeorgus is cited by Hospinian to the effect that it was usual in his time for friends to present each other with a New Year's gift; for the husband to give one to his wife, parents to their children, and masters to their servants, &c.; a custom derived to the Christian world from the times of Gentilism. This is Barnabe Googe's version of the passage in Naogeorgus, better known under the name of "The Popish Kingdome"

"The next to this is New Yeare's Day, whereon to every frende

They costly presents in do bring, and New Yeare's Giftes do sende.
These gifts the husband gives his wife, and father eke the childe,
And maister on his men bestowes the like, with favour milde;
And good beginning of the yeare they wishe and wishe again,
According to the auncient guise of heathen people vaine.
These eight days no man doth require his dettes of any man,
Their tables do they furnish out with all the meate they can :
With marchpaynes, tartes, and custards great, they drink with staring eyes;
They route and revell, feede and feaste, as merry all as pyes:
As if they should at th' entrance of this New Yeare hap to die,
Yet would they have their bellies full, and auncient friends allie."

The superstition condemned in this by the ancient Fathers lay in the idea of these gifts being considered as omens of success for the ensuing year. In this sense also, and only in this sense, could they have censured the benevolent compliment of wishing each other a happy New Year. The latter has been adopted by the modern Jews, ho, on the first day of the month Tisri (which, according to their civil computation, being their first month, the feast may be termed their New Year's Day), have a splendid entertainment, and wish each other a happy New Year.

The Festival of Fools at Paris, held on this day, continued for two hundred and forty years, when every kind of absurdity and indecency was perpetrated.

According to Pennant, the Highlanders on New Year's Day burn juniper before their cattle, and on the first Monday in every quarter sprinkle them with arine.

In Scotland, on the last day of the old year, the children go from door to door, asking for bread and cheese, which they call Nog-Money, in these words

"Get up, gude wife, and binno sweir (i.e., be not lazy),

And deal your cakes and cheese, while you are here;
For the time will come when ye'll be dead,

And neither need your cheese nor bread."

In a curious MS. relating to the Public Revenue in the fifth year of Edward VI. occurs the entry "Rewards given on New Year's Day, that is to say, to the King's officers and servants of ordinary, £155, 5s., and to their servants that present the King's Ma with New Year's Gifts." The custom, however, is in part of a date considerably older than the time of Edward VI. According to Matthew Paris, Henry III. seems to have extorted New Year's gifts from his subjects.

Honest old Latimer, instead of making the customary present of a purse of gold, put into the hands of Henry VIII. a New Testament, with the leaf conspicuously doubled down at Hebrews xiii. 4, which, though worthy of all acceptation, perhaps did not obtain due recognition. Queen Elizabeth, it is affirmed, relied upon these annual contributions for the replenishing of her royal wardrobe and jewellery. Peers and peeresses of the realm, bishops, the chief officers of State, and several of the Queen's household servants (down to her apothecaries, master cook, and serjeant of the pastry), gave New Year's gifts to her Majesty, which generally took the convenient form either of sums of money, or of jewels, trinkets, or wearing apparel. £20 was the largest sum given by any of the temporal lords; but the Archbishop of Canterbury gave £40, the Archbishop of York £30, and the other spiritual lords £20 and £10. Among the multitudinous offerings were rich gowns, petticoats, shifts, silk stockings, garters, doublets, mantles embroidered with precious stones, furs, bracelets, looking-glasses, and costly caskets. Her physician's gift was a box of foreign confectionery, while another's was a pot of green ginger, and one of orange flowers; and from her apothecaries she received pots of lozenges, ginger candy, and other conserves. Mrs Blanche Parry contributed a little gold comfit-box and spoon, and Mrs Morgan a box of cherries, and one of apricots. A cutler presented a meat-knife having a fan haft of bone, with a conceit in it; and Smyth, the royal dustman, testified his loyalty by two bolts of cambric. Drake adds that, though Elizabeth made returns to the New Year's gifts in plate, and other articles, yet she took sufficient care that the balance of profit should be in her own favour.

Dr

Pins were acceptable New Year's gifts to the ladies, instead of the wooden skewers wherewith they used to fasten their drapery till the end of the fifteenth century. Sometimes they received a composition in money; whence allowances for their separate use are still called "pin-money." Gloves also were customary gifts. They were more expensive than in our times, and occasionally a money present was tendered instead, which was denominated glove-money." Thomas More having, as Lord Chancellor, decreed in favour of Mrs

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