CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE. 



that the church might the sooner aid the suffering 

 souls; and that the dead might have every benefit 

 from the pious exertions of the living, the remem- 

 brance of this ordinance was kept up by persons 

 dressed in black, who went round the different 

 towns, ringing a loud and dismal-toned bell at the 

 corner of each street, every Sunday evening during 

 the month, and calling upon the inhabitants to 

 remember the deceased suffering the expiatory 

 flames of purgatory, and to join in prayers for the 

 repose of their souls.' Brady's Clavis Calendaria. 



5. The anniversary of the discovery of the Gun- 

 powder Plot in 1605, and of the landing of King 

 William III. in 1688. The special service for 

 this day in the ritual of the Church of England 

 was abolished in 1859, by an ordinance of the 

 Queen in Council, but there is still a popular cele- j 

 bration of Guy Fawkes's day. From an early hour, 

 the boys go about collecting materials for a bon- | 

 fire, or money wherewith to purchase them. In ! 

 some, perhaps most places, they carried with 

 them a frightful figure composed of an old suit 

 of clothes stuffed with straw, to represent Guy 

 Fawkes. They called on the passengers and 

 householders ' to remember Guy,' or shouted some 

 balderdash rhymes. In the evening, the bonfire 

 is lighted, with Guy Fawkes in the middle of it, 

 amidst tumultuous merriment. 



II. St Martiris Day, or Martinmas, in the 

 Church of England calendar. Popularly, this is 

 one of the most remarkable days of the year, 

 especially in Scotland, where Whitsuntide and 

 Martinmas are the two great terms for leases and 

 engagement of servants, the latter being that at 

 which the occupation of farms usually commences. 

 Formerly, it was a quarterly term-day in Eng- 

 land : a payment of corn at Martinmas occurs in 

 the Doomsday Survey. The killing of beeves at 

 Martinmas for winter provision was formerly 

 universal in Northern Europe, in consequence of 

 there being no means of keeping them alive in 

 winter ; since the improvement of husbandry in 

 some countries, the custom has been given up, 

 and fresh meat used all the year round. The 

 feasting upon the entrails was equally universal. 

 So much was all this associated with Martinmas, 

 that in Scotland a beeve killed at that time was 

 called a mart, or mairt. In the old book of laws 

 attributed (erroneously) to David I. of Scotland, 

 it is provided that ' the fleshours sail serve the 

 burgessis all the time of the slauchter of Mairts' 

 In Northumberland, also, a Martinmas bullock is 

 called a mart. It appears that the contents of 

 the puddings, as made in England, were composed 

 of blood, suet, and groats ; and there was an 

 enigmatical proverb thence arising, that ' blood 

 without groats was nothing,' meaning that birth 

 without fortune was of little value. Down to near 

 the end of the last century there was not a family 

 above the poorest condition in the rural districts 

 of Scotland which had not a mart, or a share in 

 one, and salted meat was the only food of the 

 kind used in winter ; now, there is no such prac- 

 tice known. 



Martin, in whose honour this festival was at 

 first instituted, is said to have been born in Lower 

 Hungary about 316, and to have originally been 

 a soldier. After a number of miraculous adven- 

 tures, he settled as a hermit in the hollow of a 

 rock near Tours, in the south of France, where he 

 was greatly venerated. He died bishop of Tours 



462 



in 397. When a few fine days occurred about tl 

 time of the year, they were called St Martin 

 summer. 



23. St Clemen? s Day, in the Church of England 

 calendar. Clement is spoken of by St Paul as 

 one of his fellow-labourers. Monkish imaginatic 

 has supplied him with a history and a martyrdor 

 He is said to have been thrown into the sea wit 

 an anchor fixed about his neck. An anchor 

 therefore assigned to him as an emblem : of this 

 the metropolis presents a conspicuous memori 

 in the anchor which forms the vane of the church 

 of St Clement Danes, in the Strand. St Clement 

 is held as the patron saint of the blacksmiths. 



29. This is one of the days on which Advent 

 may commence. Advent (literally, the Coming) 

 is a term applied from an early period of eccle- 

 siastical history to the four weeks preceding 

 Christmas, which were observed with penance and 

 devotion, in reference to the approaching birth of 

 Christ. There are four Sundays in Advent, the 

 first of which is always the nearest Sunday to St 

 Andrew's Day (November 30). 



30. St Andrew's Day. The festival-day of this 

 saint is retained in the Church of England calen- 

 dar. St Andrew was one of the Apostles. The 

 church legend represents him as martyred in the 

 year 66 at Patras, in Greece, upon a cross of the 

 form of the letter X, which, accordingly, is still 

 recognised as St Andrew's Cross. A supposed 

 relic of this cross, carried to Brussels in the middle 

 ages, caused its figure to be adopted as a badge 

 for the knights of the Golden Fleece. Some relics 

 of the apostle himself were said to have been 

 carried by a Greek devotee, named St Regulus, 

 to Scotland, where they were placed in a church 

 built at a place which subsequently became dis- 

 tinguished by the name of St Andrews. St 

 Andrews became the seat of the Scottish primacy; 

 and from this cause probably it was that St 

 Andrew was in time considered as the patron 

 saint of Scotland. In that country, however, there 

 is scarcely any observance of this day in any man- 

 ner ; it is only when Scotsmen are abroad, and 

 have occasion to select a day for an annual con- 

 vivial meeting, that St Andrew's Day comes into 

 notice. There used to be a procession of Scotsmen 

 on this day in London, with singed sheep's heads 

 borne before them. There is an ancient and 

 widely prevalent custom connected with St 

 Andrew's Day, to which Luther has adverted. 

 Maidens, on the eve of this day, stripped them- 

 selves, and sought to learn what sort of husbands 

 they were to have by praying in these terms : 

 ' Oh, St Andrew, cause that I obtain a good pious 

 husband ; to-night shew me the figure of the man 

 who will take me to wife.' 



Natural History. In this month, vegetatior 

 experiences its death. The trees are no? 

 thoroughly stripped of their foliage. It is repute 

 as a gloomy month ; but the temperature is some 

 times agreeable in the earlier part of it, and its 

 average is 43 degrees. A considerable number 

 of plants remain in flower throughout November. 



DECEMBER. 



So called as being originally the tenth of the 

 Roman year. Our Anglo-Saxon ancestors called 

 December Winter-monath that is, winter-month ; 

 but after becoming acquainted with Christianity, 



