Coach loaded with birds and packages with a man blowing a horn riding on the backNorfolk Coach at Christmas.—Page 170.
In making the annexed sketch we presume that Mr. Seymour must have had in mind, and intended to illustrate by "modern instances," that class of "wise saws" such as "Birds of a feather flock together," "Tell me the company, and I will tell you the man," and others which tend generally to show that men are apt to catch the hues of surrounding objects, and take the features of their associates. If this was not his design, we have only the alternative conclusion, that he had drawn turkeys till he could draw nothing else, and till his best efforts at representing "the human face divine" resulted in what the Scotch call a "bubbly-jock." Some poet, in describing the perfections of his mistress's countenance, speaks of it as conveying the impression that she "had looked on heaven, and caught its beauty." Our friend the guard of this coachseems to have looked on those turkeys of which he has charge till he has "caught their beauty." It is impossible to conceive that the breath which he is pouring into that horn of his should issue in any other form of sound than that of a gobble. The coachman is clearly a turkey in disguise; and the old-looking figure that sits behind him, with something like a sausage round its neck, is probably his father. As for the swan with two necks that floats on the panel of the coach-door, it is a strange-looking bird at any time, but looks considerably more strange in its present situation. It is unquestionably out of place, and forms no fitting cognizance for a Norfolk coach at Christmas time.
Norfolk must be a noisy county. There must be a "pretty considerable deal" of gabble towards the month of November in that English Turkistan. But what a silence must have fallen upon its farmyards since Christmas has come round! Turkeys are indisputably born to be killed. That is an axiom. It is the end of their training, as it ought to be (and, in one sense, certainlyis) of their desires. And such being the destiny of this bird, it may probably be an object of ambition with a respectable turkey to fulfil its fate at the period of this high festival. Certain it is that at no other time can it attain to such dignities as belong to the turkey who smokes on the well-stored table of a Christmas dinner,—the most honored dish of all the feast. Something like an anxiety for this promotionis to be inferred from the breathless haste of the turkey of which our artist has here given us a sketch, in its pursuit of the coach which has started for London without it. The picture is evidently a portrait. There is an air of verisimilitude in the eager features, and about the action altogether, of the bird, which stamps it genuine. In its anxiety it has come off without even waiting to be killed; and at the rate after which it appears to be travelling, is, we think, likely enough to come up with a heavily laden coach. We hope, however, that it is not in pursuit of the particular coach which we have seen on its way to the "Swan with two Necks," because we verily believe there is no room onthatconveyance for a single additional turkey, even if it should succeed in overtaking it.
turkey runningTOO LATE FOR THE COACH.
One of the most striking signs of the season, andwhich meets the eye in all directions, is that which arises out of the ancient and still familiar practice of adorning our houses and churches with evergreens during the continuance of this festival. The decorations of our mantel-pieces, and in many places of our windows, the wreaths which ornament our lamps and Christmas candles, the garniture of our tables, are alike gathered from the hedges and winter gardens; and in the neighborhood of every town and village the traveller may meet with some such sylvan procession as is here represented, or some group of boys returning from the woods laden with their winter greenery, and like the sturdy ambassador in the plate, engaged in what we have heard technically called "bringing home Christmas" This symptom of the approaching festivity is mentioned by Gay in his "Trivia":—
"When Rosemary and Bays, the poet's crown,Are bawl'd in frequent cries through all the town,Then judge the festival of Christmass near,—Christmass, the joyous period of the year!Now with bright holly all the temples strow;With Lawrel green, and sacred Misletoe."
man leading a donkey cart with tree and branches on itBringing Home Christmas.—Page 173.
The practice of these decorations, which is recommended to modern times by its own pleasantness and natural beauty, is of very high antiquity, and has been ascribed by various writers to various sources. They who are desirous of tracing a Christian observance to a Christian cause remind us of those figurative expressions in the prophets whichspeak of the Messiah as the "Branch of righteousness," etc., and describe by natural allusions the fertility which should attend his coming. "The Lord shall comfort Zion," says Isaiah: "he will comfort all her waste places; and he will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord." Again, "The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree, and the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious." And Nehemiah, on an occasion of rejoicing, orders the people, after the law of Moses, to "go forth unto the mount and fetch olive branches, and pine branches, and myrtle branches, and palm branches, and branches of thick trees," and to make booths thereof, "every one upon the roof of his house, and in their courts, and in the courts of the house of God," and in the streets; "and all the congregation of them that were come again out of the captivity" sat under these booths, "and there was very great gladness." A writer in the "Gentleman's Magazine" asks if this custom may not be referred, as well as that of the palms on Palm Sunday, to that passage in the Scripture account of Christ's entry into Jerusalem which states that the multitude "cut down branches from the trees, and strawed them in the way."
The practice, however, of introducing flowers and branches amongst the tokens of festivity seems, and very naturally, to have existed universally and at all times. It was, as we know, a pagan manifestationof rejoicing and worship, and is forbidden on that express ground in early councils of the Christian Church. Hone, in his "Every-Day Book," quotes Polydore Virgil to the effect that "trymming of the temples with hangynges, flowres, boughes, and garlondes, was taken of the heathen people, whiche decked their idols and houses with suche array;" and it came under the list of abominations denounced by the Puritans for the same reason. The practice was also in use amongst the nations both of Gothic and Celtic origin; and Brand quotes from Dr. Chandler's "Travels in Greece" a very beautiful superstition, mentioned as the reason of this practice, amongst the votaries of Druidism. "The houses," he says, "were decked with evergreens in December, that the sylvan spirits might repair to them and remain unnipped with frost and cold winds until a milder season had renewed the foliage of their darling abodes."
In England the practice, whencesoever derived, has existed from the very earliest days, and, in spite of outcry and prohibition, has come down in full vigor to our own. In former times, as we learn from Stow, in his "Survey of London," not only were our houses and churches decorated with evergreens, but also the conduits, standards, and crosses in the streets; and in our own day they continue to form a garniture not only of our temples and our houses, but constitute a portion of the striking display made at this festive season in our markets and from the windows of our shops. Holly formsa decoration of the shambles, and every tub of butter has a sprig of rosemary in its breast.
The plants most commonly in use for this purpose appear to have generally been the holly, the ivy, the laurel, the rosemary, and the mistletoe; although the decorations were by no means limited to these materials. Brand expresses some surprise at finding cypress included in the list, as mentioned in the tract called "Round about our Coal-Fire," and observes that he "should as soon have expected to have seen theyewas the cypress used on this joyful occasion." The fact, however, is that yewisfrequently mentioned amongst the Christmas decorations, as well as box, pine, fir, and indeed the larger part of the Christmas plants which we have enumerated in a former chapter. The greater number of these appear to have been so used, not on account of any mystic meanings supposed to reside therein, but simply for the sake of their greenery or of their rich berries. Stow speaks of the houses being decked with "whatsoever the year afforded to be green;" and Sandys observes that "at present great variety is observed in decorating our houses and buildings, and many flowers are introduced that were unknown to our ancestors, but whose varied colors add to the cheerful effect; as the chrysanthemum, satin-flower, etc., mingling with the red berry of the holly and the mystic mistletoe. In the West of England," he adds, "the myrtle and laurustinum form a pleasing addition."There is a very beautiful custom which we find mentioned in connection with the subject of evergreens as existing at this season of the year in some parts of Germany and Sicily. A large bough is set up in the principal room, the smaller branches of which are hung with little presents suitable to the different members of the household. "A good deal of innocent mirth and spirit of courtesy," it is observed, "is produced by this custom."
Herrick, however (a poet amid whose absurd conceits and intolerable affectation there are samples of the sweetest versification and touches of the deepest pathos, and who amongst a great deal that is liable to heavier objections still, has preserved many curious particulars of old ceremonies and obsolete superstitions), carries this custom of adorning our houses with evergreens over the entire year, and assigns to each plant its peculiar and appropriate season. To Christmas he appoints those which we have stated to be most commonly used on that occasion, but insists upon a change of decoration on the eve of Candlemas Day:—
"Down with the rosemary, and soDown with the baies and misletoe;Down with the holly, ivie, allWherewith you drest the Christmas hall;That so the superstitious findNot one least branch there left behind;"
and he urges the maids to the careful performance of this charge by the following threat:—
"For look! how many leaves there beNeglected there, maids, trust to me,So many goblins you shall see."
The plant by which he orders these to be replaced for Candlemas Day is box, whose turn is to continue—
"Until the dancing Easter DayOr Easter's Eve appeare."
Then the box is to make way for "the crisped yew;" which is to be succeeded at Whitsuntide by birch and the flowers of the season; and these again are to yield to the—
"Green rushes, then, and sweetest bents,With cooler oken boughs;"
whose reign continues till the period again comes round of preparation for Christmas. We believe that it is still usual in many parts of England to suffer the Christmas greens to remain in the windows of our churches, and sometimes of our houses, until Candlemas Eve.
Of those plants, then, which are considered as containing meanings that make them appropriate decorations for the Christmas-tide, or which have for any reason been peculiarly devoted to that season, the laurel, or bay, may be dismissed in a few words. Since the days of the ancient Romans this tree has been at all times dedicated to all purposes of joyous commemoration, and its branches have been used as the emblems of peace and victoryand joy. Of course its application is obvious to a festival which includes them all, which celebrates "peace on earth," "glad tidings of great joy," and a triumph achieved over the powers of evil and the original curse by the coming of the Saviour.
We may add that, besides forming a portion of the household decorations, it is usual in some places to fling branches and sprigs of laurel on the Christmas fire, and seek for omens amid the curling and crackling of its leaves:—
"When laurell spirts i' th' fire, and when the hearthSmiles to itselfe and guilds the roofe with mirth;When up the Thyrse is rais'd, and when the soundOf sacred orgies flyes around, around,"
says Herrick. At the two English universities the windows of the college chapels are still carefully decked with laurel at the season of Christmas.
The holly is a plant of peculiar veneration at this period of the year,—so much so as to have acquired to itself by a popular metonymy the name of the season itself, being vulgarly called "Christmas." It is no doubt recommended to the general estimation in which it is held by the picturesque forms of its dark, glossy leaves and the brilliant clusters of its rich red berries. There is in the Harleian Manuscripts a very striking carol of so remote a date as the reign of Henry VI., which is quoted by most of the writers on this subject, and gives a very poetical statement of the respective claims of this plant and of the ivy to popular regard. Theinference from the second and fourth verses (taken in connection with the authorities which place it amongst the plants used for the Christmas ornaments) would seem to be, that while the former was employed in the decorations within doors, the latter was confined to the exteriors of buildings. Mr. Brand, however, considers those passages to allude to its being used as a vintner's sign and infers from others of the verses that it was also amongst the evergreens employed at funerals. It runs thus:—
"Nay, Ivy! nay, it shall not be, I wys;Let Holy hafe the maystry, as the manner ys."Holy stond in the halle, fayre to behold;Ivy stond without the dore: she ys ful sore a cold.Nay, Ivy! etc."Holy and hys mery men they dawnsyn and they syng.Ivy and hur maydenys they wepyn and they wryng.Nay, Ivy! etc."Ivy hath a lyve; she laghtyt with the cold:So mot they all hafe that wyth Ivy hold.Nay, Ivy! etc."Holy hat berys as rede as any rose,The foster the hunters kepe hem from the doos.Nay, Ivy! etc."Ivy hath berys as blake as any slo;Ther com the oule and ete hym as she goo.Nay, Ivy! etc."Holy hath byrdys a ful fayre flok,The Nyghtyngale, the Poppingy, the gayntyl Lavyrok.Nay, Ivy! etc."Good Ivy, what byrdys ast thou?Non but the howlet that kreye 'How, how!'Nay, Ivy! nay, hyt shal not, etc."
We had some thoughts of modernizing the orthography, and very slightly the diction, of this curious old ballad; but it reads best in its own quaint garb, and even those of our friends who are not in the habit of perusing ancient writings will find scarcely any difficulty in making it out.
The rosemary, besides its rich fragrance, and probablybecausethereof, was supposed to possess many occult virtues, and was used for the sake of one or other of them on occasions both of rejoicing and of mourning. It was believed to clear the head, to strengthen the memory, and to make touching appeals to the heart. For these reasons it was borne both at weddings and at funerals. Herrick says:—
"Grow for two ends, it matters not at all,Be 't for my bridal or my burial."
"There's rosemary," says Ophelia; "that's for remembrance: pray you, love, remember;" and the custom of decking the corpse with this flower, as well as that of flinging its sprigs into the grave, would naturally spring out of this touching superstition. Its presence at bridals would seem tosuggest that it was dedicated to hope as well as to memory. We have in Shakspeare's play of "Romeo and Juliet" allusions to the use of this herb on both of these important but very different occasions, which allusions are affecting from the application of both to the same young girl. The first, which refers to the joyous celebration, occurs in an interview between Romeo and the Nurse of Juliet, in which arrangements are making for the secret marriage, where the garrulous old woman observes, as hinting at Juliet's willingness, "She hath the prettiest sententious of it, of you and rosemary, that it would do you good to hear it." The second is in that scene in which Juliet is supposed to be dead:
"Friar.Come, is the bride ready to go to church?Capulet.Ready to go, but never to return!"
And is inserted amongst the holy father's exhortations to resignation:—
"Dry up your tears, and stick your rosemaryOn this fair corse; and, as the custom is,In all her best array bear her to church."
Independently of the beautiful suggestion to remembrance which is made by its enduring perfume, that precious perfume itself would recommend this herb, for reasons less fine, as "strewings fitt'st for graves." The fact of its being in bloom at this season would naturally introduce the rosemary, with all its fine morals, into the Christmas celebrations;and such customs as that which prescribed that the wassail-bowl should be stirred with a sprig of this plant before it went round amongst friends, seem to have a very elegant reference to its secret virtues ("that's for remembrance," perhaps), and suggest that the revellings of the season in those old times were mingled with the best and most refined feelings of our nature.
But the mistletoe, the mystic mistletoe, where is the man whose school-boy days are gone by, in whom that word conjures up no merry memories?
"Oh, the mistletoe-bough!" who hath not, at the name, thronging visions of sweet faces that looked sweetest in those moments of their startled beauty beneath the pendent bough! If the old spells with which superstition has invested the mistletoe have lost some of their power over me, it hath now another, which in earlier days I knew not of,—the power to restore the distant and to raise the dead. I am to laugh no more as I have laughed of old beneath the influence of that mystic cognizance of the gay Christmas-tide; but even now as I write thereof, look in upon my heart bright portraits, traced with a skill which no mortal pencil shall achieve,—faces on which the earth hath long lain, and others from whom the wide spaces of the world have separated me for many a weary year; and, heavier far, some to whomunkindnesshath made me too long a stranger!There they rise and stand, one by one, beneath the merry snare, each with the heightened beauty on her cheek, which is the transient gift of the sacred bough!
O M——! how very fair is thine image in the eye of memory, and how has thy going away changed all things for me! The bright and the beautiful lie still about,—still bright and beautiful even to me,—but in another manner than when thou wert here. All things are tinged with thy loss. All fair things have a look, and all sweet sounds a tone, of mourning since thou leftest me. How long it seems, as if ages, instead of years, of the grave had grown between us, as if, indeed, I had known thee in some former and far-removed state of being! I do not love to think of thee as dead, I strive to think of thee rather as of one whom I have left behind in the quiet valley of our youth and our love,—from whom I have wandered forth and lost my way amid the mazes of the world. But where is the clew that should lead me back to thee? There may have been fairer (sweeter never) things than thou in this fair world, but my heart could never be made to believe or understand it. Had I known thee only in that world, I might not so have marked thy beauty; but thou wert with me when the world left me. In the flood of the sunshine, when a thousand birds are about us, we go upon our way with a sense that there is melody around, but singling perhapsno one note to take home to the heart and make a worship of. But the one bird that sings to us in the dim and silent night—oh! none but they on whom the night has fallen can know how dear its song becomes, filling with its music all the deserted mansions of the lonely soul. But the bird is dead, the song is hushed, and the houses of my spirit are empty and silent and desolate!
And thou whom the grave hath not hidden, nor far distance removed, from whom I parted as if it were but yesterday, and yet of whom I have already learned to think as of one separated from me by long years of absence and death, as if it were very long since I had beheld thee,—as if I gazed upon thee from a far distance across the lengthened and dreary alleys of the valley of the dead! Physically speaking, thou art still within my reach; and yet art thou to me as if the tomb or the cloister had received thee, and made of thee (what the world or the grave makes of all things we have loved) a dream of the night, a phantom of the imagination, an angel of the memory, a creation of the hour of shadows! Whatever may be thy future fortunes, however thy name may hereafter be borne to my mortal ear, my heart will ever refuse to picturetheebut as one who died in her youth!
Andthou!—thou too art there, with thy long fair hair and that harp of thine which was so long an ark of harmony for me. "Alas! we had beenfriends in youth." Butallthings bringtheeback, and I am haunted yet, and shall be through the world, by the airs which thou wert wont to sing me long ago. I remember that even in those days, at times, in the silent night, when broken snatches of melodies imperfectly remembered stole through the chambers of my heart,—ever in the sweet tones in which it had learned to love them,—I have asked myself if the ties that bound us might ever be like those passing and half-forgotten melodies; if the time could ever come when they should be like an old song learned in life's happier day, and whose memory has been treasured, to make us weep in the years when the heart has need to be soothed by weeping; if there would ever be a day when thy name might be sounded in mine ear as the name of a stranger! And that day has long since come,—
"For whispering tongues will poison truth."
How truly may we be said to live but in the past and in the future,—to have our hearts made up of memory and of hope, for which the present becomes, hour after hour, more and more of a void! And alas! is it not true, as a consequence, that the more they are occupied with memory, the less room have they for hope? And thus the one is ever gaining upon the other, and the dark waters of memory are hourly spreading upon that shore where hope had room to build her edifices and toplay about them, till at length they cover all, and hope, having "no rest for the sole of her foot," flies forward to a higher and a better shore!
And such are my visions of the mistletoe; these are amongst the spirits that rise up to wait upon my memory,—"they and the other spirits" of the mystic bough! But brighter fancies has that charmed branch for many of our readers, and merrier spirits hide amid its leaves. Many a pleasant tale could we tell of the mistletoe-bough which might amuse our readers more than the descriptions to which we are confined, if the limits of our volume would permit. But already our space is scarcely sufficient for our purpose. We think we can promise our readers in another volume a series of tales connected with the traditions and superstitions which are detailed in the present, and which may serve as illustrations of the customs of the Christmas-tide.
Some of the names by which this remarkable plant were formerly called are, "misselden," "misseldine," and, more commonly, "missel." Old Tusser tells us that,—
"If snow do continue, sheep hardly that fare,Crave mistle and ivy;"
and Archdeacon Nares says "the missel-thrush" is so designated "from feeding on its berries." From the generality of the examples in which this plant is mentioned by the name of "missel," it is suggested to us, by Mr. Crofton Croker that the additionalsyllable given to the name now in common use is a corruption of the oldtod, and that mistletoe, or mistletod, implies abush, or bunch, of missel, such as is commonly hung up at Christmas. He quotes in support of this suggestion the corresponding phrase of "ivy-tod," which occurs frequently in the writings of the Elizabethan age. If this be so, the expression "the mistletoe-bough" includes a tautology; but as it is popularly used, we retain it for the instruction of such antiquarians of remote future times as may consult our pages for some account of the good old customs which are disappearing so fast, and may fail to reach their day.
That this plant was held in veneration by the pagans, has been inferred from a passage in Virgil's description of the descent into the infernal regions. That passage is considered to have an allegorical reference to some of the religious ceremonies practised amongst the Greeks and Romans, and a comparison is therein drawn between the golden bough of the infernal regions, and what is obviously the misletoe:—
"Quale solet silvis brumali frigoreviscumFronde virere nova, quod non sua seminat arbos,Et croceo fetu teretis circumdare truncos," etc.
The reference is given by Mr. Christie in his "Enquiry into the Ancient Greek Game" of Palamedes; and he mentions likewise the respect in which this plant was held by the Gothic as well asthe Celtic nations. Sandys furnishes a legend from the Edda in proof of the extraordinary qualities ascribed to it by the former. Amongst the Celtic nations it is well known to have been an object of great veneration, and the ceremony of collecting it by the Druids against the festival of the winter solstice was one of high solemnity. It was cut by the prince of the Druids himself, and with a golden sickle. It was said that those only of the oaks were sacred to the Druids which had the mistletoe upon them, and that the reverence of the people towards the priests, as well as their estimation of the mistletoe, proceeded in a great measure from the cures which the former effected by means of that plant. Medicinal properties, we believe, are still ascribed to it, and it was not very long ago deemed efficacious in the subduing of convulsive disorders. Sir John Colbatch, in his dissertation concerning it, observes that this beautiful plant must have been designed by the Almighty "for further and more noble purposes than barely to feed thrushes, or to be hung up surreptitiously in houses to drive away evil spirits." Against the latter it appears to have been used as a charm up to the last century.
Its introduction into the Christian festival might therefore be considered appropriate as emblematic of the conquest obtained over the spirits of darkness by the event of the Nativity; and perhaps its supposed healing properties might be deemed torecommend it further, as a symbol of the moral health to which man was restored from the original corruption of his nature, and a fitting demonstration of the joy which hailed the "Sun of Righteousness" that had arisen, "withhealingin his wings."
Notwithstanding all this, however, Brand is of opinion that its heathen origin should exclude it at all events from the decorations of our churches, and quotes a story told him by an old sexton at Teddington, in Middlesex, of the clergyman of that place having observed this profane plant intermingled with the holly and ivy which adorned the church, and ordered its immediate removal. Washington Irving, who has studied old English customs and manners with sincere regard, introduces a similar rebuke from the learned parson to his unlearned clerk, in his account of the Christmas spent by him at Bracebridge Hall.
man holding door for couple about to enter with mistletoe above the doorThe Mistletoe Bough.—Page 191.
The reverence of the mistletoe among the Ancient Britons appears, however, to have been limited to that which grew upon the oak; whereas theViscum album, or common mistletoe,—the sight of whose pearly berries brings the flush into the cheek of the maiden of modern days,—may be gathered besides from the old apple-tree, the hawthorn, the lime-tree, and the Scotch or the silver fir. Whether there remain any traces of the old superstitions which elevated it into a moral or a medical amulet,—beyond that which is connected with the customalluded to in the opening of our remarks upon this plant, and represented, by our artist here,—we know not. We should, however, be very sorry to see any light let in amongst us which should fairly rout a belief connected with so agreeable a privilege as this. That privilege, as all our readers know, consists in the right to kiss any female who may be caught under the mistletoe-bough,—and, we may hope, will continue, for its own pleasantness, even if the superstition from which it springs should be finally lost. This superstition arose, clearly enough, out of the old mystic character of the plant in question, and erects it into a charm, the neglect of which exposes to the imminent danger of all the evils of old-maidenism. For, according to Archdeacon Nares, the tradition is, "that the maid who was not kissed under it, at Christmas, would not be married in that year,"—by which, we presume, the Archdeacon means in the following year. Accordingly, a branch of this parasitical plant was hung (formerly with great state, but now it is generally suspended with much secrecy) either from the centre of the roof, or over the door,—and we recommend this latter situation to our readers, both as less exposed to untimely observation, and because every maiden who joins the party must of necessity do so by passing under it. We learn from Brand that the ceremony was not duly performed unless a berry was plucked off with each kiss. This berry, it is stated by other authorities,was to be presented for good luck to the maiden kissed; and Washington Irving adds that "when the berries are all plucked, the privilege ceases." If this be so, it behooves the maidens of a household to take good care that the branch provided for the occasion shall be as well furnished with these pearly tokens as the feast is likely to be with candidates for the holy state of matrimony. The practice is still of very common observance in kitchens and servants' halls, particularly in the country. But, as we have hinted, we have met with it (and so, we dare say, have most of our readers) in higher scenes; and many a merry laugh have we heard ring from beneath the mistletoe-bough. There are lips in the world that we would gladly meet there in this coming season.
Another of the symptoms of the approaching season which has, at least to us, a very pleasing effect, consists in the bursts of solemn minstrelsy by which we are aroused from our slumbers in the still hour of the winter nights, or which, failing to break our sleep, mingle with our dreams, leading us into scenes of enchantment, and filling them with unearthly music. This midnight minstrelsy, whether it comes in the shape of human voices, hallowing the night by the chanting of the Christmas carol, or breaks upon the silence of the mid-watches from the mingling instruments of those wandering spirits of harmony, the waits, has in each case its origin in theGloria in Excelsis,—thesong with which the angels hailed the birth of the Redeemer in the fields near Bethlehem. "As soon," says Jeremy Taylor, "as these blessed choristers had sung their Christmas carol, and taught the Church a hymn to put into her offices forever on the anniversary of this festivity, the angels returned into heaven." Accordingly, these nocturnal hymns, although they spread over the entire period of Advent, grow more and more fervent and frequent as the season approaches, and the night which ushers in the great day itself is filled throughout all its watches with the continued sounds of sacred harmony. How beautiful is the effect given to this music by this consideration of its meaning and its cause! Many and many a time have we been awakened by the melody of the waits when
"The floor of heavenWasthick inlaid with patines of bright gold,"—
and have lain and listened to their wild minstrelsy, its solemn swells and "dying falls" kept musical by the distance and made holy by the time, till we have felt amid all those influences as if it were
"No mortal business, nor no soundThat the earth owes,"
and could have fancied that the "morning stars" were again singing, as of old they "sang together for joy," and that the sounds of their far anthem came floating to the earth. This sort of fancy hasoccurred over and over again to him who has looked out from his bed upon a sky full of stars, and listened at the same time to invisible and distant music, under the holy impressions of the season. Shakspeare has helped us to this feeling, perhaps, as we can trace his influence uponallour feelings, and upon none more than the most sacred or the most solemn:—
"There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st,But in his motion like an angel sings,Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubims;Such harmony is in immortal souls."
To the rudest carol that ever flung its notes upon the still air of these solemn hours we have hearkened with a hush of pleasure which recognized how well—
"Soft stillness, and the night,Become the touches of sweet harmony!"
And the wildest music that ever broke upon that solemn calm from the instruments of the most unskilful waits,—if it were but remote enough to keep its asperities out of the ear, and send us only its floating tones,—has brought Shakspeare into our hearts again:—
"Portia.Methinks it sounds much sweeter than by day.Nerissa.Silence bestows that virtue on it, madam."
The waits of to-day are the remote and degenerated successors of those ancient bards who filled an important place in the establishments of princesand nobles, as also of those wandering members of the fraternity who, having no fixed position, carried their gift of music from place to place as the tournament or the festival invited. Those of our readers who have much acquaintance with the old chroniclers have not to be told by us that these latter were frequently drawn together in considerable numbers by the Christmas celebrations. The name "wait," or "wayte," itself is of great antiquity amongst us, and appears to have been the title given to some member of the band of minstrels who either replaced the ancient minstrel-chronicler in the royal establishments, or was probably under his direction, the duty of which particular member it was to pass at night from door to door of the chambers and pipe the watches upon some species of instrument. As early as the reign of Edward III. we have mention of this individual minstrel by his title of "wayte," and in the subsequent ordinances for royal households the name frequently occurs. Dr. Burney, in his "History of Music," quotes from the "Liber niger domus regis," of Edward IV.'s time, a full description of the duties, privileges, and perquisites of this ancient officer. It is probably from this member of the royal household and his office that the corporations for towns borrowed their earliest appointment of watchmen; and the ancestors of those ancient gentlemen whose most sweet voices are amongst the lost sounds of the metropolis, and whose mysteriouscries will soon, we fear, be a dead language, were no doubt in their original institution minstrels or waits. The sworn waits are, we believe, still attached to many corporations (although some of their duties have been alienated, and some of their prerogatives usurped), and amongst others to that of the City of London. The bellman and those "wandering voices," the watchmen, where they still exist, have, however, a title to the same high and far descent, and have succeeded to most of the offices of the ancient waits. It would seem, too, that both these latter important personages have at all times had it in view to assert their claim to a minstrel origin, their announcements being generally chanted in a species of music quite peculiar to themselves, and such as the world can never hope to hear again when these gentry shall be extinct. "Oh, what a voice is silent!" wrote Barry Cornwall long before the introduction of the new police into our streets; and the passionate exclamation must surely have originated in a prophetic vision of the extinction of the Dogberry who piped the night-watches in Bedford Square. As for those wandering musicians who charm the long nights of the Christmas time withunofficialmusic, and are waits by courtesy, they bear the same relation to the corporation minstrels of modern times as did the travelling bards of former days to the ancient minstrels who were established in the households of nobles or of kings. The waits still on some occasions close their performance by calling thehour, and by certain other announcements descriptive of the weather or characteristic of the season.
small band playing outside under a lamp post at night with man shouting out of window aboveWaits.—Page 197.
The sacred origin and meaning of this practice have, however, in modern days been a good deal lost sight of by these uncertificated harmonists in their selection of tunes. In London, particularly, the appropriate music of religious celebration, which in awaking the sleeper should bring the lessons of the season directly to his heart, are (excepting perhaps on the eve of the Nativity itself) most frequently supplanted by the airs of the theatre; and the waits for the most part favor us by night with repetitions of the melodies with which the barrel-organists have labored to make us familiarly acquainted during the day. It is with some such strain that the group of instrumentalists, by whom our artist has here represented these peripatetic musicians, appear to be regaling their neighborhood, in so far as we may venture to judge of the character of the music, by the accompaniment which it is receiving from the lady in the distance. Not that we could by any means have conjectured from the appearance of the performers themselves that the air, however profane, had been at all of the lively, unless what poor Matthews called the "deadly lively," kind,—and, in fact, the vicinity in which the lady appears may perhaps suggest that her joyous inspiration is not derivedwholly from the music. She appears to be dancing "unto her own heart's song." If we may presume to argue from the aspects and attitudes of the gentlemen of the bass-viol and flute, he of the trombone (who is evidently performing with considerable energy) appears to have got a good way before his companions without being at all conscious of it; and indeed there is something about his accoutrements, if carefully inspected, which seems to hint that the source of his vigor, and perhaps of his unconsciousness, is of the same kind with that of the lady's liveliness. We have in the case of each a sort of insinuation as to the cause of thespiritedcharacter of the performances, and in that of our friend with the trombone it seems a good deal more clear that his pocket has contributed to the supply of his instrument than that his instrument will ever do much for the supply of his pocket. As for the violin, it is clearly in the enjoyment of a sinecure at this late hour, the sensitive performer having apparently lulled himself to sleep with his own music. "Poor knave, I blame thee not; thou art o'er watched!"
"O murd'rous slumber,Lay'st thou thy leaden mace upon my boyThat plays thee music? Gentle knave, good night;I will not do thee so much wrong to wake thee."
But we will not answer for the old gentleman with the water-jug, who looks down so benignantly fromthat window overhead. He seems about to furnish an illustration of the assertion that—
"The heart that music cannot melt,Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;"
and appears to have conceived a stratagem against the group below which, if carried into successful execution on this winter night, will probablyspoilmore than the music. It bids fair at once to waken the violin-player and to silence the trombone.
The practice of hailing the Nativity with music, in commemoration of the song of the angels, is in full observance in Roman Catholic countries as well as in our own. There are, we fancy, few of our readers who have not had opportunities of listening to the divine strains which mingle in the Roman services that usher in the blessed morning itself. Thenoëlsof France are of the same character as the Christmas carols of England; and the visits of our street musicians at this season are closely resembled by the wanderings of the Italianpifferari. Thesepifferariare Calabrian shepherds who come down from the mountains at the season of Advent, and enter the Italian cities, saluting with their hill music the shrines of the Virgin and Child which adorn the streets. Of these rude minstrels Lady Morgan, in her "Italy," gives some account, and states that having frequently observed them stopping to play before the shop of a carpenterin Rome, her inquiries on the subject were answered by the information that the intention of this part of their performance, was to give his due share of honor to Saint Joseph. Our friend Mr. Hone, in his "Every-Day Book," has given, from an old print in his possession, a representation of this practice, in which two of these mountaineers are playing before the shrine of the Virgin. The practice is continued till the anniversary day of the Nativity.
With modern carol-singing there are few of our readers, in town or in country (for the practice, like that of which we have just spoken, is still very general), who are not well acquainted. For some curious antiquarian information on the subject we must refer them to Mr. Sandys's Introduction, and to a paper in Mr. Hone's book of "Ancient Mysteries." The word itself is derived by Brand, after Bourne, fromcantare, to sing, androla, an interjection of joy; and although in vulgar acceptance it has come to be understood as implying particularly those anthems by which the Christmas-tide is distinguished, it has at all times been properly applied to all songs which are sung upon any occasion of festival or rejoicing. In strictness, therefore, even in its application to the musical celebrations of Advent, a distinction should be drawn between those carols which are of a joyous or festive character, and those more solemn ones which would be better described by the title of Christmas hymns.
The practice itself, as applied to religious commemoration, is drawn from the very first ages of the Church. It is frequently referred to in the Apostolic writings, and the celebrated letter of the younger Pliny to the Emperor Trajan, in the seventh year of the second Christian century, mentions, amongst the habits of the primitive Christians, their assembling at stated times "to sing among themselves alternately a hymn to Christ, as to God." Such a practice, however, constitutes no peculiarity of the new worship, hymns of praise to their deities having made a portion of the rites of most religions. Indeed, in the more severe times of the Early Church there are prohibitions against this form of worship, as against several other practices to which we have alluded, on the express ground of its resemblance to one of the customs of the pagan celebration.
The custom of celebrating the festivities of the season by the singing of carols in these islands, appears to have mingled with the Christmas observances from the earliest period. We have specimens of the carols themselves of a remote date, and have already given an extract from one, the manuscript of which, in the British Museum, is dated as far back as the thirteenth century. There are evidences of the universality of the practice in the fifteenth century; and the great popularity of these songs about this time is proved by the fact of a collection thereof having been printed in the earlypart of the following century by Wynkyn de Worde. It is to the Puritans that we appear to have been indebted for the introduction of the religious carol. Those enemies of all mirth, even in its most innocent or valuable forms, finding the practice of carol-singing at this festive time too general and rooted to be dealt with by interdiction, appear to have endeavored to effect their objects by directing it into a channel of their own, and probably retaining the ancient airs, to have adapted them to the strange religious ballads, of which we must give our readers a few specimens. The entire version of the Psalms of David made by Sternhold and Hopkins was published about the middle of the sixteenth century; and some time before the middle of the seventeenth a duodecimo volume appeared, under the title of "Psalmes or Songs of Zion, turned into the language and set to the tunes of a strange land, by W. S. [William Slatyr], intended for Christmas Carols and fitted to divers of the most noted and common but solemne tunes everywhere in this land familiarly used and knowne."
Of these old ballads of both kinds, many (and snatches of more) have survived to the present day, and may be heard, particularly in the Northern counties of England, ringing through the frosty air of the long winter nights, in the shrill voices of children, for several weeks before Christmas, probably, too, to the old traditional tunes. They are,however, as might be expected of compositions which have no more substantial depositary than the memories of the humble classes of the young, full of corruptions, which render some of them nearly unintelligible. The difficulty of restoring these old carols in their original forms is becoming yearly greater, in consequence of the modern carols, which are fast replacing them by a sort of authority. In country places many of the more polished carols, of modern composition, find their way into the Church services of this season; and amongst the singers who practise this manner of appealing to the charities of the season with most success are the children of the Sunday-schools and the choristers of the village church. These, with their often sweet voices, bring to our doors the more select hymns and the musical training which they have gathered for more sacred places; and from a group like that which stands at the parsonage door in our plate, we are more likely to hear some carol of Heber's, some such beautiful anthem as that beginning, "Hark! the herald angels sing," than the strange, rambling old Christmas songs which we well remember when we were boys. These latter, however, occasionally are not without a wild beauty of their own. We quote a fragment of one of them from memory. We think it begins:—