Scorch their plackets, but beware Then bid Christmas-sport good night. To his owne vocation." It may rather seem to belong to religious than popular customs to mention, on the authority of the Gentleman's Magazine for January 1731, that at the Chapel-Royal at St James's, on Twelfth Day that year, “the King and the Prince made the offerings at the altar of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, according to custom. At night their Majesties, &c., played at Hazard, for the benefit of the groom-porter." On Twelfth Night, 1753, it is recorded that George II. played at hazard for the benefit of the same functionary, and that all the members of the Royal Family who played were winners, particularly the Duke of York, who won £3000. ST AGNES DAY, OR EVE. January 21. T AGNES was a Roman virgin and martyr, who suffered in the was condemned to be debauched in the public stews before her execution, but her virginity was miraculously preserved by lightning and thunder from heaven. About eight days after her execution, her parents going to lament and pray at her tomb, they saw a vision of angels, among whom was their daughter, and a lamb standing by her as white as snow; on which account it is that in every graphic representation of her there is a lamb pictured by her side. On the eve of her day many kinds of divination are practised by virgins to discover their future husbands. It is popularly called fasting St Agnes' Fast. Ben Jonson alludes to this "And on sweet St Agnes' night Please you with the promis'd sight, Aubrey, in his Miscellanies, directs that "upon St Agnes' Night you take a row of pins, and pull out every one, one after another, saying a Pater Noster, sticking a pin in your sleeve, and you will dream of him or her you shall marry." Burton, in his Anatomy of Melancholy, speaks of "Maids fasting on St Agnes' Eve, to know who shall be their first husband." Naogeorgus has this account of the festival "SAINT AGNES. "Then commes in place St Agnes' Day, which here in Germanie Is not so much esteemde nor kept with such solemnitie : parts of Germany to drag the images of St Paul and St Urban to the river, if on the day of their feast it happens to be foul weather. Bourne observes: "How it came to have this particular knack of foretelling the good or ill fortune of the following year, is no easy matter to find out. The Monks, who were undoubtedly the first who made this wonderful observation, have taken care it should be handed down to posterity, but why or for what reason this observation was to stand good, they have taken care to conceal. St Paul did indeed labour more abundantly than all the Apostles; but never, that I heard, in the science of Astrology. And why his day should therefore be a standing almanac to the world, rather than the day of any other Saint, will be pretty hard to find out." This festival was first adopted by the English Church in the year 1662, during the reign of Charles II. CANDLEMAS DAY. February 2. THE PURIFICATION OF THE VIRGIN MARY. THIS is called in thedlemas is evidently derived from the lights North of England the Wives' Feast Day. which were then distributed and carried about in procession.* In the ancient Calendar of the Romish Church, we find the subsequent observations on the 2d of February, usually called Candlemas Day "Torches are consecrated. Torches are given away for many days." + Douce's MS. Notes say: "This feast is called by the Greeks væаwаvта, which signifies a Meeting, because Simeon and Anna the prophetess met in the Temple at the presentation of our Saviour." At the celebration of the Feast of Corpus Christi, at Aix in Provence, there is a procession of Saints, among whom St Simeon is represented with a mitre and cap, carrying in his left hand a basket of eggs. "To beare their Candels soberly, and to offer them to the Saintes, not of God's makynge, but the Carvers and Paynters," is mentioned among the Roman Catholic customs censured by John Bale in his Declaration of Bonner's Articles (1554); as also "to conjure Candels." In a Proclamation dated 26th February, 30 Henry VIII., "concernyng Rites and Ceremonies to be used in due fourme in the Churche of England," we read "On Candelmas Daye it shall be declared that the bearynge of Candels is done in the memorie of Christe, the spirituall lyghte, whom Simeon dyd prophecye, as it is redde in the Churche that daye." The same had been declared by a Decree of Convocation. In Herbert's Country Parson (1675), we read: “Another old custom (he had been speaking of PROCESSIONS) there is, of saying, when light is brought in, God send us the light of Heaven; and the parson likes this very well.-Light is a great blessing, and as great as food, for which we give thanks: and those that think this superstitious, neither know superstition nor themselves." Pope Sergius, says Becon in his Reliques of Rome (1563), commanded that all people "shuld go on procession upon Candlemas Day, and carry Candels about with them brenning in their hands in the year of our Lord 684." How this candle-bearing on Candlemas Day came first up, the author of our English Festival explains in this manner: "Somtyme," writes he, "when the Romaines by great myght and royal power, conquered all the world, they were so proude that they forgat God, and made them divers gods after their own lust. And so among all they had a god that they called Mars, that had been tofore a notable knight in battayle; and so they prayed to hym for help, and for that they would speed the better of this knight, the people prayed and did great worship to his mother, that was called Februa, after which woman much people have opinion that the moneth February is called. Wherefore the second daie of thys moneth is Candlemas Day. The Romaines this night went about the city of Rome with torches and candles brenning in worship of this woman Februa, for hope to have the more helpe and succoure of her sonne Mars. Then there was a Pope that was called Sergius; and, when he saw Christian people draw to this false maumetry and untrue belief, he thought to undo this foule use and custom, and turn it unto God's worship and our Lady's, and gave commandment that all Christian people should come to church and offer up a Candle brennyng, in the worship that they did to this woman Februa, and do worship to our Lady and to her sonne our Lord. So that now this Feast is solemnly hallowed thorowe all Christendome. And every Christian man and woman of covenable age is bound to come to church and offer up their Candles, as though they were bodily with our Lady, hopyng for this reverence and worship that they do to our Ladye to have a great rewarde in Heaven." And it is added: "A Candell is made of weke and wexe; so was Crystes soule hyd within the manhode: also the fyre betokeneth the Godhede: also it betokeneth our Ladyes moderhede and maydenhede, lyght with the fyre of love." In Dunstan's Concord of Monastic Rules it is directed that "on the Purification of the Virgin Mary the Monks shall go in surplices to the Church for Candles, which shall be consecrated, sprinkled with holy water, and censed by the Abbot.-Let every Monk take a Candle from the Sacrist, and light it. Let a Procession be made, Thirds and Mass be celebrated, and the Candles, after the offering, be offered to the Priest." A note adds: Candlemas Day. The Candles at the Purification were an exchange for the lustration of the Pagans, and Candles were used "from the parable of the wise virgins." It was anciently a custom for women in England to bear lights when they were churched, as appears from the following royal bonmot. William the Conqueror, by reason of sickness, kept his chamber a long time, whereat the French king, scoffing, said, "The King of England lyeth long in child- bed:" which when it was reported unto King William, he answered: "When I am churched, there shall be a thousand lights in France" (alluding to the lights that women used to bear when they were churched); and that he performed within a few days after, wasting the French territories with fire and sword. In The Burnynge of Paules Church in London, 1561, and the 4 day of June by Lyghtnynge, &c. (1563), we read: "In Flaunders everye Saturdaye betwixt Christmas and Candelmas they eate flesh for joy, and have pardon for it, because our Ladye laye so long in child-bedde say they. We here may not eat so: the Pope is not so good to us; yet surely it were as good reason that we should eat fleshe with them all that while that our Lady lay in child-bed, as that we shuld bear our Candel at her Churchinge at Candlemas with theym as they doe. It is seldome sene that men offer Candels at women's Churchinges, savinge at our Ladies but reason it is that she have some preferement, if the Pope would be so good maister to us as to let us eat fleshe with theym." In Lysons's Environs of London, among his curious Extracts from the Churchwardens' Accounts at Lambeth, occurs the following: "1519. Paid for Smoke Money at Seynt Mary Eves, o. 2. 6." This occurs again in 1521: "Paid by my Lord of Winchester's Scribe for Smoke Money, o. 2. 6." In some of the ancient illuminated Calendars, a woman holding a taper in each hand is represented in the month of February. Naogeorgus, as translated by Googe, has it "Then comes the Day wherein the Virgin offred Christ unto The Father chiefe, as Moyses law commaunded hir to do. Then numbers great of Tapers large, both men and women beare To Church, being halowed there with pomp, and dreadful words to heare. Whose Candell burneth cleare and brighte, a wondrous force and might They sure beleve that neyther storme or tempest dare abide, Nor fearefull sprites that walke by night, nor hurts of frost or haile." We read in Wodde's Dialogue," Wherefore serveth holye Candels? (Nicholas.) To light up in thunder, and to blesse men when they lye a dying." In the Doctrine of the Masse Booke, &c., from Wyttonburge by Nicholas Dorcaster (1554), we find— 66 THE HALOWING OF CANDLES UPON CANDELMAS DAY." The Prayer. "O Lord Jesu Christ, blesse thou this creature of a waxen taper at our humble supplication, and, by the vertue of the holy crosse, poure thou into it an heavenly benediction; that as thou hast graunted it unto man's use for the expelling of darknes, it may receave such a strength and blessing, thorow the token of thy holy crosse, that in what places soever it be lighted or set, the Divel may avoid out of those habitacions, and tremble for feare, and fly away discouraged, and presume no more to unquiete them that serve thee, who with God," &c. There follow other prayers, in which occur these passages: "We humbly beseech thee that thou wilt vouchsafe to blesse and sanctifie these Candels, prepared unto the uses of men, and health of bodies and soules, as wel on the land as in the waters." "Vouchsafe to blesse and sanctifye, and with the Candle of heavenly benediction to lighten these tapers; which we thy servants taking in the honour of thy name (whan they ar lighted) desire to beare," &c. "Here let the Candles be sprinkled with holy water." Concluding with this rubric: "When the halowyng of the Candels is done, let the Candels be lighted and distributed.” In Bishop Bonner's Injunctions (1555), we read "that bearyng of Candels on Candelmasse Daie is doone in the memorie of our Saviour Jesu Christe, the spirituall lyght, of whom Sainct Symeon dyd prophecie, as it is redde in the Churche that daye." This ceremony, however, had been previously forbidden in the metropolis: for in Stow's Chronicle we read: "On the second of February 1547-8, being the Feast of the Purification of our Lady, commonly called Candlemasse Day, the bearing of Candles in the Church was left off throughout the whole citie of London." At the end of a curious sermon entitled The Vanitie and Downefall of superstitious Popish Ceremonies, preached in the Cathedral Church of Durham by one Peter Smart, a Prebend there, July 27, 1628, printed at Edinburgh 1628, we find in "a briefe but true historicall Narration of some notorious Acts and Speeches of Mr John Cosens" (Bishop of Durham), the following: "Fourthly, on Candlemas Day last past, Mr Cozens, in renuing that Popish ceremonie of burning Candles* to the honour of our Ladye, busied himself from two of the clocke in the afternoone till foure, in climbing long ladders to stick up wax candles in the said Cathedral Church: the number of all the Candles burnt that evening was two hundred and twenty, besides sixteen torches; sixty of those burning tapers and torches standing upon and near the high Altar (as he calls it), where no man came nigh." "There is a canon,' says Bourne, "in the Council of Trullus, against those who baked a cake in honour of the Virgin's lying-in, in which it is decreed, that no such ceremony should be observed, because she suffered no pollution, and therefore needed no purification." + At Ripon in Yorkshire, the Sunday before Candlemas Day, the In Nichols's Churchwardens' Accompts in those of St Martin Outwich, London, under the year 1510, is the following article "Paid to Randolf Merchaunt, wex-chandiler, for the Pascall, the Tapers affore the Rode, the Cross Candelles, and Judas Candelles, ixs. iiijd. The purple-flowered Lady's Thistle, the leaves of which are beautifully diversified with numerous white spots, like drops of milk, is by a beautiful poetical fancy supposed to have been originally marked by the falling of some drops of the Virgin Mary's milk on it; whence, no doubt, its name Lady's, i.e, Our Lady's Thistle. Marry, a term of asseveration in common use, was originally a mode of swearing by the Virgin Mary; q.d. by Mary.-So also Marrow-bones, for the knees. I'll bring him down upon his Marrow-bones; i.e., I'll make him bend his knees as he does to the Virgin Mary. |