MAY.

Also, in calendars, the month of MayIs marked the month of Love—two lovers stray,In the old wood-cuts, in a forest green,Looking their love into each other’s eyesAnd dreaming happiness that never dies;And there they talk unheard, and walk unseen,Save by the birds, who chant a louder layTo welcome such true lovers with the May.*

The month of May was deemed by the Romans to be under the protection of Apollo; and it being the month wherein they made several expiations, they prohibited marrying in May. On the first day of May the Roman ladies sacrificed toBona Dea, the Good Goddess, or the Earth, represented in theFrontispieceto the first volume of theEvery-Day Book, with the zodiacal signs of the celestial system, which influences our sphere to produce its fruits in due order.

It is in May that “Spring is with us once more pacing the earth in all the primal pomp of her beauty, with flowers and soft airs and the song of birds every where about her, and the blue sky and the bright clouds above. But there is one thing wanting, to give that happy completeness to her advent, which belonged to it in the elder times; and without which it is like a beautiful melody without words, or a beautiful flower without scent, or a beautiful face without a soul. The voice of man is no longer heard, hailing her approach as she hastens to bless him; and his choral symphonies no longer meet and blessherin return—bless her by letting her behold and hear the happiness that she comes to create. The soft songs of women are no longer blended with her breath as it whispers among the new leaves; their slender feet no longer traceherfootsteps in the fields and woods and wayside copses, or dance delighted measures round the flowery offerings that she prompted their lovers to place before them on the village green. Even the little children themselves, that have an instinct for the spring, and feel it to the very tips of their fingers, are permitted to let May come upon them, without knowing from whence the impulse of happiness that they feel proceeds, or whither it tends. In short,

‘All the earth is gay;Land and seaGive themselves up to jollity,And with the heart of MayDoth every beast keep holiday:’

while man, man alone, lets the season come without glorying in it; and when it goes he lets it go without regret; as if ‘all seasons and their change’ were alike to him; or rather, as if he were the lord of all seasons, and they were to do homage and honour to him, instead of he to them! How is this? Is it that we have ‘sold our birthright for a mess of pottage?’—that we have bartered ‘our being’s end and aim’ for a purse of gold? Alas! thus it is:

‘The world is too much with us; late and soon,Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:Little we see in nature that is ours;We have given our hearts away—a sordid boon!’

—But be this as it may, we are still able tofeelwhat nature is, though we have in a great measure ceased toknowit; though we have chosen to neglect her ordinances, and absent ourselves from her presence, we still retain some instinctive reminiscences of her beauty and her power; and every now and then the sordid walls of those mud hovels which we have built for ourselves, and choose to dwell in, fall down before the magic touch of our involuntary fancies, and give us glimpses into ‘that imperial palace whence we came,’ and make us yearn to return thither, though it be but in thought.

‘Then sing ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song!And let the young lambs boundAs to the tabor’s sound!Wein thoughtwill join your throng,Ye that pipe and ye that play,Ye that through your hearts to-dayFeel the gladness of theMay!’”[144]

[144]Mirror of the Months.

St. Philip and St.James.[145]

As we had some agreeable intimacies to-day last year, we will seek our country friends in other rural parts, this “May morning,” and see “how theydo.”

To illustrate the custom of going “a Maying,” described in volume i., a song still used on that occasion issubjoined:—

The Mayer’s Call.Come, lads, with your bills,To the wood we’ll away,We’ll gather the boughs,And we’ll celebrate May.We’ll bring our load home,As we’ve oft done before,And leave a green bough,At each good master’sAt eachgood neighbour’sAt eachpretty maid’s}door.We’ll bring our load home,As we’ve oft done before,And leave a green bough,At each good master’s door.At eachgood neighbour’s door.At eachpretty maid’s door.To-morrow, when work’s done,I hold it no wrong,If we go round in ribands,And sing them a song.Come, lads, bring your bills,To the wood we’ll away,We’ll gather the boughs,And we’ll celebrate May.

The Mayer’s Call.

Come, lads, with your bills,To the wood we’ll away,We’ll gather the boughs,And we’ll celebrate May.We’ll bring our load home,As we’ve oft done before,And leave a green bough,At each good master’sAt eachgood neighbour’sAt eachpretty maid’s}door.We’ll bring our load home,As we’ve oft done before,And leave a green bough,At each good master’s door.At eachgood neighbour’s door.At eachpretty maid’s door.To-morrow, when work’s done,I hold it no wrong,If we go round in ribands,And sing them a song.Come, lads, bring your bills,To the wood we’ll away,We’ll gather the boughs,And we’ll celebrate May.

Come, lads, with your bills,To the wood we’ll away,We’ll gather the boughs,And we’ll celebrate May.

We’ll bring our load home,As we’ve oft done before,And leave a green bough,At each good master’sAt eachgood neighbour’sAt eachpretty maid’s}door.

At each good master’sAt eachgood neighbour’sAt eachpretty maid’s}door.

At each good master’sAt eachgood neighbour’sAt eachpretty maid’s

}door.

We’ll bring our load home,As we’ve oft done before,And leave a green bough,At each good master’s door.At eachgood neighbour’s door.At eachpretty maid’s door.

To-morrow, when work’s done,I hold it no wrong,If we go round in ribands,And sing them a song.

Come, lads, bring your bills,To the wood we’ll away,We’ll gather the boughs,And we’ll celebrate May.

There is a rural ditty chanted in villages and country towns, preparatory to gathering theMay:—

The May Eve Song.If we should wake you from your sleep,Good people listen now,Our yearly festival we keep,And bring a Maythorn bough.An emblem of the world it grows,The flowers its pleasures are,But many a thorn bespeaks its woes,Its sorrow and its care.Oh! sleep you then, and take your rest,And, when the day shall dawn,May you awake in all things blest—A May without a thorn.And when, to-morrow we shall comeOh! treat us not with scorn;From out your bounty give us some—Be May without a thorn.May He, who makes the May to blow,On earth his riches sheds,Protect thee against every woe,Shower blessings on thy heads.

The May Eve Song.

If we should wake you from your sleep,Good people listen now,Our yearly festival we keep,And bring a Maythorn bough.An emblem of the world it grows,The flowers its pleasures are,But many a thorn bespeaks its woes,Its sorrow and its care.Oh! sleep you then, and take your rest,And, when the day shall dawn,May you awake in all things blest—A May without a thorn.And when, to-morrow we shall comeOh! treat us not with scorn;From out your bounty give us some—Be May without a thorn.May He, who makes the May to blow,On earth his riches sheds,Protect thee against every woe,Shower blessings on thy heads.

If we should wake you from your sleep,Good people listen now,Our yearly festival we keep,And bring a Maythorn bough.

An emblem of the world it grows,The flowers its pleasures are,But many a thorn bespeaks its woes,Its sorrow and its care.

Oh! sleep you then, and take your rest,And, when the day shall dawn,May you awake in all things blest—A May without a thorn.

And when, to-morrow we shall comeOh! treat us not with scorn;From out your bounty give us some—Be May without a thorn.

May He, who makes the May to blow,On earth his riches sheds,Protect thee against every woe,Shower blessings on thy heads.

After “bringing home the May,” here is anotherlay:—

The Mayer’s Song.On the Mayers deign to smile,Master, mistress, hear our song,Listen but a little while,We will not detain you long.Life with us is in its spring,We enjoy a blooming May,Summer will its labour bring,Winter has its pinching day.Yet the blessing we would useWisely—it is reason’s part—Those who youth and health abuse,Fail not in the end to smart.Mirth we love—the proverb says,Be ye merry but be wise,We will walk in wisdom’s ways,There alone true pleasure lies.May, that now is in its bloom,All so fragrant and so fair,When autumn and when winter come,Shall its useful berries bear.We would taste your home-brew’d beer,—Give not, if we’ve had enough,—May it strengthen, may it cheer,Waste not e’er the precious stuff.We of money something crave,For ourselves we ask no share,John and Jane the whole shall have,They’re the last new married pair.May it comfort to them prove,And a blessing bring to you;Blessings of connubial love,Light on all like morning dew.So shall May, with blessings crown’d,Welcom’d be by old and young,Often as the year comes round,Shall the May-day song be sung.Fare ye well, good people all,Sweet to-night may be your rest,Every blessing you befall,Blessing others you are blest.

The Mayer’s Song.

On the Mayers deign to smile,Master, mistress, hear our song,Listen but a little while,We will not detain you long.Life with us is in its spring,We enjoy a blooming May,Summer will its labour bring,Winter has its pinching day.Yet the blessing we would useWisely—it is reason’s part—Those who youth and health abuse,Fail not in the end to smart.Mirth we love—the proverb says,Be ye merry but be wise,We will walk in wisdom’s ways,There alone true pleasure lies.May, that now is in its bloom,All so fragrant and so fair,When autumn and when winter come,Shall its useful berries bear.We would taste your home-brew’d beer,—Give not, if we’ve had enough,—May it strengthen, may it cheer,Waste not e’er the precious stuff.We of money something crave,For ourselves we ask no share,John and Jane the whole shall have,They’re the last new married pair.May it comfort to them prove,And a blessing bring to you;Blessings of connubial love,Light on all like morning dew.So shall May, with blessings crown’d,Welcom’d be by old and young,Often as the year comes round,Shall the May-day song be sung.Fare ye well, good people all,Sweet to-night may be your rest,Every blessing you befall,Blessing others you are blest.

On the Mayers deign to smile,Master, mistress, hear our song,Listen but a little while,We will not detain you long.

Life with us is in its spring,We enjoy a blooming May,Summer will its labour bring,Winter has its pinching day.

Yet the blessing we would useWisely—it is reason’s part—Those who youth and health abuse,Fail not in the end to smart.

Mirth we love—the proverb says,Be ye merry but be wise,We will walk in wisdom’s ways,There alone true pleasure lies.

May, that now is in its bloom,All so fragrant and so fair,When autumn and when winter come,Shall its useful berries bear.

We would taste your home-brew’d beer,—Give not, if we’ve had enough,—May it strengthen, may it cheer,Waste not e’er the precious stuff.

We of money something crave,For ourselves we ask no share,John and Jane the whole shall have,They’re the last new married pair.

May it comfort to them prove,And a blessing bring to you;Blessings of connubial love,Light on all like morning dew.

So shall May, with blessings crown’d,Welcom’d be by old and young,Often as the year comes round,Shall the May-day song be sung.

Fare ye well, good people all,Sweet to-night may be your rest,Every blessing you befall,Blessing others you are blest.

As the day advances, a ballad suitable to the “village sports” is sung by him who has the honour to crown his lass as the “May-dayqueen.”—

The Wreath of May.This slender rod of leaves and flowers,So fragrant and so gay,Produce of spring’s serener hours,Peculiarly is May.This slender rod, the hawthorn bears,And when its bloom is o’er,Its ruby berries then it wears,The songster’s winter store.Then, though it charm the sight and smell,In spring’s delicious hours,The feather’d choir its praise shall tell,’Gainst winter round us lowers.O then, my love, from me receive,This beauteous hawthorn spray,A garland for thy head I’ll weave,Be thou my queen of May.Love and fragrant as these flowers,Live pure as thou wert born,And ne’er may sin’s destructive powers,Assail thee with its thorn.

The Wreath of May.

This slender rod of leaves and flowers,So fragrant and so gay,Produce of spring’s serener hours,Peculiarly is May.This slender rod, the hawthorn bears,And when its bloom is o’er,Its ruby berries then it wears,The songster’s winter store.Then, though it charm the sight and smell,In spring’s delicious hours,The feather’d choir its praise shall tell,’Gainst winter round us lowers.O then, my love, from me receive,This beauteous hawthorn spray,A garland for thy head I’ll weave,Be thou my queen of May.Love and fragrant as these flowers,Live pure as thou wert born,And ne’er may sin’s destructive powers,Assail thee with its thorn.

This slender rod of leaves and flowers,So fragrant and so gay,Produce of spring’s serener hours,Peculiarly is May.

This slender rod, the hawthorn bears,And when its bloom is o’er,Its ruby berries then it wears,The songster’s winter store.

Then, though it charm the sight and smell,In spring’s delicious hours,The feather’d choir its praise shall tell,’Gainst winter round us lowers.

O then, my love, from me receive,This beauteous hawthorn spray,A garland for thy head I’ll weave,Be thou my queen of May.

Love and fragrant as these flowers,Live pure as thou wert born,And ne’er may sin’s destructive powers,Assail thee with its thorn.

One more ditty, a favourite in many parts of England, is homely, but there is a prettiness in its description that may reconcile it to the admirers of a “countrylife:”—

The May Day Herd.Now at length ’tis May-day morn,And the herdsman blows his horn;Green with grass the common now,Herbage bears for many a cow.Too long in the straw yard fed,Have the cattle hung their head,And the milk did well nigh fail,The milk-maid in her ashen pail.Well the men have done their job,Every horn has got its knob;Nor shall they each other gore,Not a bag, or hide, be tore.Yet they first a fight maintain,Till one cow the mastery gain;They, like man, for mastery strive,They by others’ weakness thrive.Drive them gently o’er the lawn,Keep them from the growing corn;When the common they shall gain,Let them spread wide o’er the plain.Show them to the reedy pool,There at noon their sides they’ll cool,And with a wide whisking tail,Thrash the flies as with a flail.Bring them gently home at eve,That their bags they may relieve,And themselves of care divest,Chew the cud and take their rest.Now the dairy maid will please,To churn her butter, set her cheese;We shall have the clotted cream,The tea-table’s delightful theme.Raise the song, then, let us now,Sing the healthful, useful cow,England well the blessing knows,A land with milk that richly flows.

The May Day Herd.

Now at length ’tis May-day morn,And the herdsman blows his horn;Green with grass the common now,Herbage bears for many a cow.Too long in the straw yard fed,Have the cattle hung their head,And the milk did well nigh fail,The milk-maid in her ashen pail.Well the men have done their job,Every horn has got its knob;Nor shall they each other gore,Not a bag, or hide, be tore.Yet they first a fight maintain,Till one cow the mastery gain;They, like man, for mastery strive,They by others’ weakness thrive.Drive them gently o’er the lawn,Keep them from the growing corn;When the common they shall gain,Let them spread wide o’er the plain.Show them to the reedy pool,There at noon their sides they’ll cool,And with a wide whisking tail,Thrash the flies as with a flail.Bring them gently home at eve,That their bags they may relieve,And themselves of care divest,Chew the cud and take their rest.Now the dairy maid will please,To churn her butter, set her cheese;We shall have the clotted cream,The tea-table’s delightful theme.Raise the song, then, let us now,Sing the healthful, useful cow,England well the blessing knows,A land with milk that richly flows.

Now at length ’tis May-day morn,And the herdsman blows his horn;Green with grass the common now,Herbage bears for many a cow.

Too long in the straw yard fed,Have the cattle hung their head,And the milk did well nigh fail,The milk-maid in her ashen pail.

Well the men have done their job,Every horn has got its knob;Nor shall they each other gore,Not a bag, or hide, be tore.

Yet they first a fight maintain,Till one cow the mastery gain;They, like man, for mastery strive,They by others’ weakness thrive.

Drive them gently o’er the lawn,Keep them from the growing corn;When the common they shall gain,Let them spread wide o’er the plain.

Show them to the reedy pool,There at noon their sides they’ll cool,And with a wide whisking tail,Thrash the flies as with a flail.

Bring them gently home at eve,That their bags they may relieve,And themselves of care divest,Chew the cud and take their rest.

Now the dairy maid will please,To churn her butter, set her cheese;We shall have the clotted cream,The tea-table’s delightful theme.

Raise the song, then, let us now,Sing the healthful, useful cow,England well the blessing knows,A land with milk that richly flows.

Spring—“theinnocentspring,” is the firstling of revolving nature; and in the first volume, is symbolized by an infant. In that engraving there is a sort of appeal to parental feeling; yet an address more touching to the heart is in the following littlepoem:—

A Mother to her First-born.’Tis sweet to watch thee in thy sleep,When thou, my boy, art dreaming;’Tis sweet, o’er thee a watch to keep,To mark the smile that seems to creepO’er thee like daylight gleaming.’Tis sweet to mark thy tranquil breast,Heave like a small wave flowing;To see thee take thy gentle rest,With nothing save fatigue opprest,And health on thy cheek glowing.To see thee now, or when awake,Sad thoughts, alas! steal o’er me;For thou, in time, a part must take,That may thy fortunes mar or make,In the wide world before thee.But I, my child, have hopes of thee,And may they ne’er be blighted!—That I, years hence, may live to seeThy name as dear to all as me,Thy virtues well requited.I’ll watch thy dawn of joys, and mouldThy little mind to duty—I’ll teach thee words, as I beholdThy faculties like flowers unfold,In intellectual beauty.And then, perhaps, when I am dead,And friends around me weeping—Thoul’t see me to my grave, and shedA tear upon my narrow bed,Where I shall then be sleeping!Barton Wilford.

A Mother to her First-born.

’Tis sweet to watch thee in thy sleep,When thou, my boy, art dreaming;’Tis sweet, o’er thee a watch to keep,To mark the smile that seems to creepO’er thee like daylight gleaming.’Tis sweet to mark thy tranquil breast,Heave like a small wave flowing;To see thee take thy gentle rest,With nothing save fatigue opprest,And health on thy cheek glowing.To see thee now, or when awake,Sad thoughts, alas! steal o’er me;For thou, in time, a part must take,That may thy fortunes mar or make,In the wide world before thee.But I, my child, have hopes of thee,And may they ne’er be blighted!—That I, years hence, may live to seeThy name as dear to all as me,Thy virtues well requited.I’ll watch thy dawn of joys, and mouldThy little mind to duty—I’ll teach thee words, as I beholdThy faculties like flowers unfold,In intellectual beauty.And then, perhaps, when I am dead,And friends around me weeping—Thoul’t see me to my grave, and shedA tear upon my narrow bed,Where I shall then be sleeping!

’Tis sweet to watch thee in thy sleep,When thou, my boy, art dreaming;’Tis sweet, o’er thee a watch to keep,To mark the smile that seems to creepO’er thee like daylight gleaming.

’Tis sweet to mark thy tranquil breast,Heave like a small wave flowing;To see thee take thy gentle rest,With nothing save fatigue opprest,And health on thy cheek glowing.

To see thee now, or when awake,Sad thoughts, alas! steal o’er me;For thou, in time, a part must take,That may thy fortunes mar or make,In the wide world before thee.

But I, my child, have hopes of thee,And may they ne’er be blighted!—That I, years hence, may live to seeThy name as dear to all as me,Thy virtues well requited.

I’ll watch thy dawn of joys, and mouldThy little mind to duty—I’ll teach thee words, as I beholdThy faculties like flowers unfold,In intellectual beauty.

And then, perhaps, when I am dead,And friends around me weeping—Thoul’t see me to my grave, and shedA tear upon my narrow bed,Where I shall then be sleeping!

Barton Wilford.

The Maypole nearest to the metropolis, that stood the longest within the recollection of the editor, was near Kennington-green, at the back of the houses, at the south corner of the Workhouse-lane, leading from the Vauxhall-road to Elizabeth-place. The site was then nearly vacant, and the Maypole was in the field on the south side of the Workhouse-lane, and nearly opposite to the Black Prince public-house. It remained till about the year 1795, and was much frequented, particularly by milk maids.

A delightfully pretty print of a merry-making “round about theMaypole,” supplies anengravingon the next page illustrative of the prevailing tendency of this work, and the simplicity of rural manners. It is not so sportive as the dancings about the Maypoles near London formerly; there is nothing of the boisterous rudeness which must be well remembered by many old Londoners on May-day.

The Country Maypole.It is a pleasant sight, to seeA little village companyDrawn out upon the first of MayTo have their annual holiday:—The pole hung round with garlands gay;The young ones footing it away;The aged cheering their old soulsWith recollections and their bowls;Or, on the mirth and dancing failing,Their oft-times-told old tales re-taleing.*

The Country Maypole.

It is a pleasant sight, to seeA little village companyDrawn out upon the first of MayTo have their annual holiday:—The pole hung round with garlands gay;The young ones footing it away;The aged cheering their old soulsWith recollections and their bowls;Or, on the mirth and dancing failing,Their oft-times-told old tales re-taleing.*

The innocent and the unaspiring may always be happy. Their pleasures like their knitting needles, and hedging gloves, are easily purchased, and when bestowed are estimated as distinctions. The late Dr. Parr, the fascinating converser, the skilful controverter, the first Greek scholar, and one of the greatest and most influential men of the age, was a patron of May-day sports. Opposite his parsonage-house at Hatton, near Warwick, on the other side of the road, stood the parish Maypole, which on the annual festival was dressed with garlands, surrounded by a numerous band of villagers. The doctor was “first of the throng,” and danced with his parishioners the gayest of the gay. He kept the large crown of the Maypole in a closet of his house, from whence it was produced every May-day, with fresh flowers and streamers preparatory to its elevation, and to the doctor’s own appearance in the ring. He always spoke of this festivity as one wherein he joined with peculiar delight to himself, and advantageto his neighbours. He was deemed eccentric, and so he was; for he was never proud to the humble, nor humble to the proud. His eloquence and wit elevated humility, and crushed insolence; he was the champion of the oppressed, a foe to the oppressor, a friend to the friendless, and a brother to him who was ready to perish. Though a prebend of the church with university honours, he could afford to make his parishoners happy without derogating from his ecclesiastical dignities, or abatement of self-respect, or lowering himself in the eyes of any who were not inferior in judgment, to the most inferior of the villagers of Hatton.

Formerly a pleasant character dressed out with ribands and flowers, figured in village May-games under the name of

Jack-o’-the-Green.

The Jack-o’-the-Greens would sometimes come into the suburbs of London, and amuse the residents by rustic dancing. The last of them, that I remember, were at the Paddington May-dance, near the “Yorkshire Stingo,” about twenty years ago, from whence, as I heard, they diverged to Bayswater, Kentish-town, and adjoining neighbourhoods. A Jack-o’-the-Green always carried a long walking stick with floral wreaths; he whisked it about in the dance, and afterwards walked with it in high estate like a lord mayor’s footman.

On this first of the month we cannot pass the poets without listening to their carols, as we do, in our walks, to the songs of the spring birds in their thickets.

To May.Welcome! dawn of summer’s day,Youthful, verdant, balmy May!Sunny fields and shady bowers,Spangled meads and blooming flowers,Crystal fountains—limpid streams,Where the sun of nature beams,As the sigh of morn reposes,Sweetly on its bed of roses!Welcome! scenes of fond delight,Welcome! eyes with rapture bright—Maidens’ sighs—and lovers’ vows—Fluttering hearts—and open brows!And welcome all that’s bright and gay,To hail the balmy dawn of May!J. L. Stevens.

To May.

Welcome! dawn of summer’s day,Youthful, verdant, balmy May!Sunny fields and shady bowers,Spangled meads and blooming flowers,Crystal fountains—limpid streams,Where the sun of nature beams,As the sigh of morn reposes,Sweetly on its bed of roses!Welcome! scenes of fond delight,Welcome! eyes with rapture bright—Maidens’ sighs—and lovers’ vows—Fluttering hearts—and open brows!And welcome all that’s bright and gay,To hail the balmy dawn of May!

J. L. Stevens.

The most ancient of our bards makes noble melody in this glorious month. Mr. Leigh Hunt selects a delightful passage from Chaucer, and compares it with Dryden’sparaphrase:—

It is sparkling with young manhood and a gentle freshness. What a burst of radiant joy is in the second couplet; what a vital quickness in the comparison of the horse, “starting as the fire;” and what a native and happy case in the conclusion!

The busy lark, the messenger of day,Saleweth[146]in her song the morrow gray;And fiery Phœbus riseth up so bright,That all the orient laugheth of the sight;And with his stremès drieth in thegreves[147]The silver droppès hanging in the leaves;And Arcite, that is in the courtreal[148]With Theseus the squier principal,Is risen, and looketh on the merry day;And for to do his observance to May,Remembring on the point of his desire,He on the courser, starting as the fire;Is risen to the fieldès him to play,Out of the court, were it a mile or tway.And to the grove, of which that I you told,By àventure his way he gan to hold,To maken him a garland of the greves,Were it of woodbind or of hawthorn leaves,And loud he sung against the sunny sheen:“O May, with all thy flowers and thy green,Right welcome be thou, fairè freshè May:I hope that I some green here getten may.”And from his courser, with a lusty heart,Into the grove full hastily he start,And in a path he roamed up and down.

Dryden falls short in the freshness and feeling of the sentiment. His lines are beautiful; but they do not come home to us with so happy and cordial a face.Here they are. The word morning in the first line, as it is repeated in the second, we are bound to consider as a slip of the pen; perhaps for mounting.

The morning-lark, the messenger of day,Saluteth in her song the morning gray;And soon the sun arose with beams so bright,That all the horizon laughed to see the joyous sightHe with his tepid rays the rose renews,And licks the drooping leaves, and dries the dews;When Arcite left his bed, resolv’d to payObservance to the month of merry May:Forth on his fiery steed betimes he rode,That scarcely prints the turf on which he trod:At ease he seemed, and prancing o’er the plains,Turned only to the grove his horses’ reins,The grove I named before; and, lighted there,A woodbine garland sought to crown his hairThen turned his face against the rising day,And raised his voice to welcome in the May“For thee, sweet month, the groves green liveries wear,If not the first, the fairest of the year:For thee the Graces lead the dancing hours,And Nature’s ready pencil paints the flowers:When thy short reign is past, the feverish sunThe sultry tropic fears, and moves more slowly on.So may thy tender blossoms fear no blight,Nor goats with venom’d teeth thy tendrils bite,As thou shalt guide my wandering steps to findThe fragrant greens I seek, my brows to bind.”His vows address’d, within the grove he stray’d.

“How poor,” says Mr. Hunt, “is this to Arcite’s leaping from his courser ‘with a lusty heart.’ How inferior the common-place of the ‘fiery steed,’ which need not involve any actual notion in the writer’s mind, to the courser ‘starting as the fire;’—how inferior the turning his face to ‘the rising day,’ and ‘raising his voice,’ to the singing ‘loud against the sunny sheen;’ and lastly, the whole learned invocation and adjuration of May, about guiding his ‘wandering steps’ and ‘so may thy tender blossoms’ &c. to the call upon the fair fresh May, ending with that simple, quick-hearted line, in which he hopes he shall get ‘some green here;’ a touch in the happiest taste of the Italian vivacity. Dryden’s genius, for the most part, wanted faith in nature. It was too gross and sophisticate. There was as much difference between him and his original, as between a hot noon in perukes at St. James’s, and one of Chaucer’s lounges on the grass, of a May morning. All this worship of May is over now. There is no issuing forth in glad companies to gather boughs; no adorning of houses with ‘the flowery spoil;’ no songs, no dances, no village sports and coronations, no courtly-poetries, no sense and acknowledgment of the quiet presence of nature, in grove or glade.

O dolce primavera, o fior novelli,O aure o arboscelli, o fresche erbette,O piagge benedette, o colli o monti,O valli o fiumi o fonti o verde rivi,Palme lauri ed olive, edere e mirti;O gloriosi spirti de gli boschi;O Eco, o antri foschi o chiare linfe,O faretrate ninfe o agresti Pani,O Satiri e Silvani, o Fauni e Driadi,Naiadi ed Amadriadi, o Semidee,Oreadi e Napee,—or siete sole.Sannazzar.

Sannazzar.

O thou delicious spring, O ye new flowers,O airs, O youngling bowers; fresh thickening grass,And plains beneath heaven’s face; O hills and mountains,Vallies, and streams, and fountains; banks of green,Myrtles, and palms serene, ivies, and bays;And ye who warmed old lays, spirits o’ the woods,Echoes, and solitudes, and lakes of light;O quivered virgins bright, Pans rustical,Satyrs and Sylvans all, Dryads, and yeThat up the mountains be; and ye beneathIn meadow or flowery heath,—ye are alone.

“This time two hundred years ago, our ancestors were all anticipating their May holidays. Bigotry came in, and frowned them away; then debauchery, and identified all pleasure with the town; then avarice, and we have ever since been mistaking the means for the end.—Fortunately, it does not follow, that we shall continue to do so. Commerce, while it thinks it is only exchanging commodities, is helping to diffuse knowledge. All other gains,—all selfish and extravagant systems of acquisition,—tend to over-do themselves, and to topple down by their own undiffused magnitude. The world, as it learns other things, may learn not to confound the means with the end, or at least,(to speak more philosophically,) a really poor means with a really richer. The veriest cricket-player on a green has as sufficient a quantity of excitement, as a fundholder or a partizan; and health, and spirits, and manliness to boot. Knowledge may go on; must do so, from necessity; and should do so, for the ends we speak of: but knowledge, so far from being incompatible with simplicity of pleasures, is the quickest to perceive its wealth. Chaucer would lie for hours looking at the daisies. Scipio and Lælius could amuse themselves with making ducks and drakes on the water. Epaminondas, the greatest of all the active spirits of Greece, was a flute-player and dancer. Alfred the Great could act the whole part of a minstrel. Epicurus taught the riches of temperance and intellectual pleasure in a garden. The other philosophers of his country walked between heaven and earth in the colloquial bowers of Academus; and ‘the wisest heart of Solomon,’ who found every thing vain because he was a king, has left us panegyrics on the spring and ‘the voice of the turtle,’ because he was a poet, a lover, and a wiseman.”[149]

Aubrey remarks, that he never remembers to have seen a Maypole in France; but he says, “in Holland, they have their May-booms, which are streight young trees, set up; and at Woodstock, in Oxon, they every May-eve goe into the parke, and fetch away a number of hawthorne-trees, which they set before their dores: ’tis pity that they make such a destruction of so fine a tree.”

As the old antiquary takes us to Woodstock, and a novel by the “Great Unknown,” bears that title, we will “inn” there awhile, agreeably to an invitation of a correspondent who signs Ωνωφιλτατος, and who promises entertainment to the readers of theEvery-Day Book, from an account of some out-of-the-way doings at that place, when there were out-of-the-way doings every where. Our friend with the Greek name is critical; for as regards the “new novel,” he says, that “Woodstockwould have been much better if the author had placed the incidents before the battle of Worcester, and supposed that Charles had been drawn over to England to engage in some plot of Dr. Rochecliffes, which had proved unsuccessful. This might have spared him one great anachronism, (placing the pranks of the merry devil of Woodstock in 1651, instead of 1649,) at the same time that it would throw a greater air of probability over the story; for the reader who is at all acquainted with English history, continually feels his pleasure destroyed by the recollection that in Charles’s escapes after the battle of Worcester, he never once visited Woodstock. Nor does the merry devil of Woodstock excite half the interest, or give us half the amusement he would have done, if the author had lately read the narrative I am now about to copy. He seems to have perused it at some distance of time, and then to have written the novel with imperfect recollection of the circumstances.—But let me begin my story; to wit, an article in the ‘British Magazine’ for April, 1747, which will I suppose excite some curiosity, and is in the followingwords:—

“Famous in the world in the year 1649 and never accounted for, or at all understood to this time.”

The teller of this “Genuine History” proceeds as hereafter verbatim.

Some original papers having lately fallen into my hands under the name of “Authentic Memoirs of the Memorable Joseph Collins of Oxford, commonly known by the name of Funny Joe, and now intended for the press,” I was extremely delighted to find in them a circumstantial and unquestionable account of the most famous of all invisible agents, so well known in the year 1649, under the name of the good devil of Woodstock, and even adored by the people of that place for the vexation and distress it occasioned some people they were not much pleased with. As this famous story, though related by a thousand people, and attested in all its circumstances beyond all possibility of doubt by people of rank, learning, and reputation, of Oxford and the adjacent towns, has never yet been accounted for or at all understood, and is perfectly explained in a manner that can admit of no doubt in these papers, I could not refuse my readers their share of the pleasure it gave me in reading.

As the facts themselves were at that time so well known that it would have been tedious to enumerate them, they are not mentioned in these papers; but that our readers may have a perfect account of the whole transaction, as well as the secret history of it, I shall prefix a written account of it, drawn up and signed by the commissioners themselves, who were the people concerned, and which I believe never was published, though it agrees very well with the accounts Dr. Plot and other authors of credit give of the whole affair. This I found affixed to the author’s memorial, with thistitle:—

“A particular account of the strange and surprising apparitions and works of spirits, which happened atWoodstock,inOxfordshire,in the months ofOctoberandNovember,in the year of our Lord Christ 1649, when the honourable the commissioners for surveying the said manor-house, park, woods, and other demesnes belonging to that manor, sat and remained there. Collected and attested by themselves.

“The honourable the commissioners arrived at Woodstock manor-house, October 13th, and took up their residence in the king’s own rooms. His majesty’s bed-chamber they made their kitchen, the council hall their pantry, and the presence chamber was the place where they sat for despatch of business. His majesty’s dining-room they made their wood yard, and stowed it with no other wood but that of the famous royaloak[150]from the high park, which, that nothing might be left with the name of the king about it, they had dug up by the roots, and bundled up into faggots for their firing.

“October 16. This day they first sat for the despatch of business. In the midst of their first debate there entered a large black dog (as they thought) which made a terrible howling, overturned two or three of their chairs, and doing some other damage, went under the bed, and there gnawed the cords. The door this while continued constantly shut, when after some two or three hours, Giles Sharp, their secretary, looking under the bed, perceived that the creature was vanished, and that a plate of meat which one of the servants had hid there was untouched, and showing them to their honours, they were all convinced there could be no real dog concerned in the case; the said Giles also deposed on oath that to his certain knowledge there was not.

“October 17. As they were this day sitting at dinner in a lower room, they heard plainly the noise of persons walking over their heads, though they well knew the doors were all locked, and there could be none there; presently after they heard also all the wood of the king’s oak brought by parcels from the dining-room, and thrown with great violence into the presence chamber, as also the chairs, stools, tables, and other furniture, forcibly hurled about the room, their own papers of the minutes of their transactions torn, and the ink-glass broken. When all this had some time ceased, the said Giles proposed to enter first into these rooms, and in presence of the commissioners of whom he received the key, he opened the door, and entering with their honours following him, he there found the wood strewed about the room, the chairs tossed about and broken, the papers torn, and the ink-glass broken over them, all as they had heard, yet no footsteps appeared of any person whatever being there, nor had the doors ever been opened to admit or let out any persons since their honours were last there. It was thereforevotednem. con.that the person who did this mischief could have entered no other way than at the keyhole of the said doors.

“In the night following this same day, the said Giles and two other of the commissioners’ servants, as they were in bed at the same room with their honours, had their bed’s feet lifted up so much higher than their heads, that they expected to have their necks broken, and then they were let fall at once with such violence as shook them up from the bed to a good distance; and this was repeated many times, their honours being amazed spectators of it. In the morning the bedsteads were found cracked and broken, and the said Giles, and his fellows, declared they were sore to the bones with the tossing and jolting of the beds.

“October 19. As they were all in bed together, the candles were blown out with a sulphurous smell, and instantly many trenchers of wood were hurled about the room, and one of them putting his head above the clothes, had not less than six forcibly thrown at him, which wounded him very grievously. In the morning the trenchers were all found lying about the room, and were observed to be the same they had eaten on the day before, none being found remaining in the pantry.

“October 20. This night the candles were put out as before, the curtains of the bed in which their honours lay, were drawn to and fro many times with great violence; their honours received many cruel blows, and were much bruised beside with eight great pewter dishes, and three dozen wooden trenchers which were thrown on the bed, and afterwards heard rolling about the room.

“Many times also this night they heard the forcible falling of many faggots by their bed side, but in the morning no faggots were found there, no dishes or trenchers were there seen neither, and the aforesaid Giles attests that by their different arranging in the pantry, they had assuredly been taken thence and after put there again.

“October 21. The keeper of their ordinary and his bitch lay with them; this night they had no disturbance.

“October 22. Candles put out as before. They had the said bitch with them again, but were not by that protected; the bitch set up a very piteous cry, the clothes of their beds were all pulled off, and the bricks, without any wind, were thrown off the chimney tops into the midst.

“October 24. The candles put out as before. They thought all the wood of the king’s oak was violently thrown down by their bedsides; they counted sixty-four faggots that fell with great violence, and some hit and shook the bed, but in the morning none were found there, nor the door of the room opened in which the said faggots were.

“October 25. The candles put out as before. The curtains of the bed in the drawing-room were forcibly drawn many times; the wood thrown out as before; a terrible crack like thunder was heard, and one of the servants running to see if his masters were not killed, found at his return three dozen of trenchers laid smoothly upon his bed under the quilt.

“October 26. The beds were shaken as before, the windows seemed all broken to pieces, and the glass fell in vast quantities all about the room. In the morning they found the windows all whole, but the floor strewed with broken glass, which they gathered and laid by.

“October29.[151]At midnight, candles went out as before; something walked majestically through the room and opened and shut the window; great stones were thrown violently into the room, some whereof fell on the beds, others on the floor; and at about a quarter after one a noise was heard as of forty cannon discharged together, and again repeated at about eight minutes distance. This alarmed and raised all the neighbourhood, who coming into their honours’ room gathered up the great stones, fourscore in number, many of them like common pebbles and boulters, and laid them by where they are to be seen to this day at a corner of the adjoining field. This noise, like the discharge of cannon, was heard throughout the country for sixteen miles round. During these noises, which were heard in both rooms together, both the commissioners and their servants gave one another over for lost and cried out for help, and Giles Sharp snatching up a sword had well nigh killed one of their honours, taking him for the spirit as he came in his shirt into the room. While they were together the noise was continued, and part of the tiling of the house and all the windows of an upper room were taken away with it.

“October 30. At midnight, something walked into the chamber treading like a bear: it walked many times about, then threw the warming-pan violently on the floor, and so bruised it that it was spoiled. Vast quantities of glass were now thrown about the room, and vast numbers of great stones and horses’ bones thrown in; these were all found in the morning, and the floor, beds, and walls, were all much damaged by the violence they were thrown in.

“November 1. Candles were placed in all parts of the room, and a great fire made; at midnight, the candles all yet burning, a noise like the burst of a cannon was heard in the room, and the burning billets were tossed all over the room and about the beds, that had not their honours called in Giles and his fellows, the house had been assuredly burnt; an hour after the candles went out as usual, the crack of many cannon was heard, and many pails full of green stinking water were thrown on their honours in bed; great stones were also thrown in as before, the bed curtains and bedsteads torn and broken: the windows were now all really broken, and the whole neighbourhood alarmed with the noises; nay, the very rabbit-stealers that were abroad that night in the warren, were so frightened at the dismal thundering, that they fled for fear, and left their ferrets behind them.

“One of their honours this night spoke, and in the name of God asked what it was and why it disturbed them so. No answer was given to this, but the noise ceased for a while, when the spirit came again, and as they all agreed brought with it seven devils worse than itself. One of the servants now lighted a large candle, and set it in the doorway between the two chambers, to see what passed, and as he watched it he plainly saw a hoof striking the candle and candlestick into the middle of the room, and afterwards making three scrapes over the snuff of the candle to scrape it out. Upon this, the same person was so bold as to draw a sword; but he had scarce got it out when he perceived another invisible hand had hold of it too, and pulled with him for it, and at length prevailing, struck him so violently on the head with the pummel, that he fell down for dead with the blow. At this instant was heard another burst like the discharge of a broadside of a ship of war, and at about a minute or two’s distance each, no less than nineteen more such; these shook the house so violently that they expected every moment it would fall upon their heads. The neighbours on this were all alarmed, and running to the house, they all joined in prayers and psalm-singing, during which the noise still continued in the other rooms, and the discharge of cannon without though no one was there.”

Dr. Plot concludes his relation of this memorable event with observing, that though tricks have been often played in affairs of this kind, many of these things are not reconcileable to juggling; such as—1. The loud noises beyond the power of man to make without such instruments as were not there. 2. The tearing and breaking the beds. 3. The throwing about the fire. 4. The hoof treading out the candle; and, 5. The striving for the sword, and the blow the man received from the pummel of it.

To see, however, how great men are sometimes deceived, we may recur to this one tract, where among other things there is one entitled “The secret history of the good devil of Woodstock,” in which we find it under the author’s own hand, that he, Joseph Collins, commonly called funny Joe, was himself this very devil; that he hired himself as a servant to the commissioners under the feigned name of Giles Sharp, and by the help of two friends, an unknown trap-door in the ceiling of the bedchamber, and a pound of common gunpowder, played all these amazing tricks by himself, and his fellow servants, whom he had introduced on purpose to assist him, had lifted up their own beds.

The candles were contrived by a common trick of gunpowder put in them, to put themselves out by a certain time.

The dog who began the farce was, as he swore, no dog, but truly a bitch who had the day before whelped in that room and made all this disturbance in seeking for her puppies; and which when she had served his purpose, he let out and then looked for. The story of the hoof and sword himself alone was witness to, and was never suspected as to the truth of them though mere fictions. By the trap-door his friends let down stones, faggots, glass, water, &c. which they either left there or drew up again as best suited with him; and by this way let themselves in and out without opening the doors and going through the key-holes; and all the noises he declares he made by placing quantities of white gunpowder over pieces ofburning charcoal on plates of tin, which as they melted went off with that violent explosion.

One thing there was beyond all these he tells us, which was also what drove them from the house in reality, though they never owned it. This was they had formed a reserve of part of the premises to themselves, and hid their mutual agreement, which they had drawn up in writing, under the earth in a pot in a corner of the room in which they usually dined, in which an orange tree grew: when in the midst of their dinner one day this earth of itself took fire and burned violently with a blue flame, filling the room with a strong sulphurous stench; and this he also professes was his own doing, by a secret mixture he had placed there the day before.

I am very happy in having an opportunity of setting history right about these remarkable events; and would not have the reader disbelieve my author’s account of them, from his naming either white gunpowder going off when melted, or his making the earth about the pot take fire of its own accord; since, however improbable these accounts may appear to some readers, and whatever secrets they might be in Joe’s time, they are well known now in chemistry. As to the last, there needs only to mix an equal quantity of iron filings, finely powdered, and powder of pure brimstone, and make them into a paste with fair water. This paste, when it has lain together about twenty-six hours, will of itself take fire, and burn all the sulphur away, with a blue flame and great stink. For the others, what he calls white gunpowder, is plainly the thundering powder calledpulvis fulminansby our chemists. It is made only of three parts of saltpetre, two parts of pearl-ashes, or salt of tartar, and one part of flower of brimstone, mixed together and beat to a fine powder; a small quantity of this held on the point of a knife over a candle will not go off till it melts, and then give a report like a pistol; and this he might easily dispose of in larger quantities, so as to make it go off of itself, while he was with his masters.

From this diversion at Woodstock, wherein if we have exceeded be it remembered that Aubrey carried us thither, we return to the diversions of the month.

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