476 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2'>d S. X. Dec. 15. '60. 



form of a tankar J, ■with one handle. If I am not 

 mistaken, all the college cups have the name of the 

 lienor engraved on them, with the date of the gift. 

 And if they are still preserved there will be no 

 difficulty in ascertaining how long the more an- 

 cient fashion prevailed. P. S. Cabey, M.A. 



HARVEST BELL : GLEANERS' BELL. 



(2°'J S. X. 288. 356.) 



A few remarks on the gleaners' bell may not 

 be unacceptable to S. C. Fbkeman. 



This custom was not infrequent, but is now fast 

 falling into disuse. It was observed in the parish 

 of Churchdown and in the neighbouring parish of 

 Sandhurst in Gloucestershire until within the last 

 few years. The use of it was that all the gleaners 

 might have a fair start; similar, in fact, to the 

 signal given to the collectors of " vraick " in the 

 Channel Islands, a custom sanctioned there by 

 old Norman law. In Churchdown, which is a 

 large corn-growing parish, the gleaners' bell be- 

 came mute when the parish was enclosed under 

 the Enclosure Act, about a dozen years ago. 

 This act of parliament was not unlike the Re- 

 form Bill, in giving the death-stroke to many a 

 custom dear to archaeological tastes, but more 

 honoured perhaps in " the breach than the ob- 

 servance." Though not exactly coming under 

 this head, I may mention that before Church- 

 down was enclosed, if a woman was asked the 

 age of a child, she would probably reply after this 

 manner : "Why, our Jahn be dree year old when 

 Farmer Beaman's home piece be o' benns, come 

 Lady-day;" the regular courses, or rotation of 

 crops, giving them a clue to the age. But now it 

 is no longer so. In the case of the gleaners' bell, 

 the " enclosing " was not always its quietus ; for in 

 Sandhurst, which is still unenclosed, the farmers 

 stopped it a few years ago, perhaps from hearing 

 that their neighbours had done so. In Sandhurst 

 the bell was rung at six a.m. and eight p.m., the 

 gleaners themselves paying the clerk for his trou- 

 ble. In Churchdown the same, except that the 

 clerk was paid ten shillings by the parishioners in 

 vestry. 



The old system does not suit these days of scien- 

 tific farming. It was found that in harvest those 

 people gleaned who never turned out to field- 

 work at any other time, whilst now the regular 

 workpeople on a farm have the exclusive right 

 of gleaning or leasing, as it is called here, over 

 their employer's fields. Formerly people with 

 large families had by far the best of it, from the 

 number of hands, and all used greedily to scour 

 ihe fields, not only of their own parish but those 

 of the adjacent country. I have known a man 

 and his family gather up in this part from twenty- 

 four to twenty-five bushels of wheat and other 



grain in one harvest season. A little while ago 

 "leasing" was threatened to extinction, by the 

 use of the horse-rake ; fortunately, however, it 

 proved not to pay the expense of working. Still 

 the golden days of gleaning are gone. Since 

 "bagging" the wheat has been adopted, which is 

 a close shave to the ground (so that each stray 

 ear is seen), both gleaners and "gunners" have 

 found the difference ; birds have no cover, and 

 the reapers' wives and children little corn to pick 

 up : hence the complaint every September, that 

 the birds are too wild, and the regret that all the 

 ears go into the sheaf. So that the custom of 

 ringing the gleaners' bell undoubtedly lingers in 

 some small parishes, but is doomed, and will gra- 

 dually die out before the better plan of each 

 farmer allowing only his own workpeople to lease 

 over his land. 



In tlie parish of Midsomer Norton, near Bath, 

 there is a piece of land that was left as a bequest 

 by an old lady who was once benighted there, the 

 proceeds to go to the clerk on condition that he 

 rings the ^church bell every night at eight or nine 

 o'clock, — a custom still observed. F. S. 



Being on a visit, two years since, to the incumbent 

 of Aldeby, a village in Norfolk, but within three 

 miles of Beccles in Suffolk, I heard for the first 

 time in my life the "gleaners' bell." My friend 

 informed me it was an old custom there, but he 

 thought there was nothing more attached to it 

 than insuring " fair play " to the gleaners, no one 

 being allowed to commence gleaning before the 

 morning ringing, or to remain in the fields after 

 that in the evening. At Tibenham also the custom 

 prevails, or did prevail, but it is not usual in Nor- 

 folk. E. S. Taylor. 



WIFE-BEATERS: ROUGH MUSIC. 

 (2-"^ S. X. 363.) 

 The custom of treating these delinquents with 

 a charivari was common not long ago in Surrey 

 and Sussex. On hearing of the first offence a sort 

 of warning was given by strewing a lot of chafl[' 

 from a threshing-Aoor before the man's door in 

 the dead of the night. If this tacit, but symboli- 

 cal warning had no effect, and the offence was 

 repeated, the hapless man was treated with " the 

 rough music." I remember witnessing such a 

 scene, which forcibly reminded me of the " Sklm- 

 mington " or " Riding " in Hudihras. As soon as it 

 was dark a procession was formed. First came 

 two men with huge cow horns ; then another 

 with a large old fish-kettle round his neck, to re- 

 present the trumpeters and big drum of a serious 

 procession. Then came the orator of the party, 

 and then a motley assembly with hand-bells, 

 gongs, cow horns, whistles, tin kettles, rattles, 



