423 



CURFEW CURLING. 



of the Charterhouse school in 17-i-- Hi' became a 

 pupil oi the celebrated surgeons, William and Joint 

 Hunter; was admitted a member of the late cor- 

 poration of surgeons on the 7th May, 1778, and, by 

 acceptance of the charter of 1800, was enrolled a 

 member of the college. He was a capital burgess 

 of St Edmund's Bury, and deputy lieutenant for the 

 county of Suffolk; and held the office of Bath 

 king of arms from the year 1771 to 1800, when he 

 resigned it in favour of his second son, John Pal- 

 mer Cullum, whom he survived. Dying on the 8th 

 Sept. 1831, Sir Thomas Cullum lies buried with 

 his ancestors in Hawsted church. 



CURFEW; the word Curfew is derived from the 

 Norman word, carrefou, or couvrefeu, and is now 

 considered by us to mean the signal for extinguish- 

 ing fires. Pasquier says it is derived from carfou, 

 or garefou, as being intended to advertise the peo- 

 ple to secure themselves from the robbers and re- 

 vellers of the night. One of the laws of William 

 the Conqueror ordered all his subjects to extin- 

 guish their fires and light, and retire to rest, at 

 eight o'clock, at which hour the Curfew was ap- 

 pointed to be rung, but the regulation existed in 

 the monasteries long before his time ; and although 

 it was not, perhaps, obligatory on the inhabitants 

 of the adjoining villages, yet was highly conducive 

 to the general safety, when the cottages were com- 

 posed entirely of timber. Henry, in his History of 

 Great Britain, says there is sufficient evidence that 

 the same custom prevailed in most parts of Europe 

 at this period, and was intended as a precaution 

 against fires, which were then very frequent and 

 very fatal, when so many houses were built of wood ; 

 and Peshall, in his History of the City of Oxford, 

 affirms that the custom of ringing the bell at Car- 

 fax, every night at eight o'clock (called the Curfew 

 bell, or cover-fire bell), was by order of king Al- 

 fred, the restorer of our university, who ordained 

 that all the inhabitants of Oxford should, at the 

 ringing of that bell, cover up their fires and go to 

 bed; which custom is observed to this day: and 

 the bell as constantly rings at eight as Great Tom 

 tolls at nine. 



The custom of ringing the eight o'clock, or Cur- 

 few, bell, is still kept up, or was till lately, in 

 many towns in England, though the obligation it 

 was intended to enforce, viz., the extinguishing the 

 fires, &c., and the pains and penalties consequent 

 upon the transgression of the law, were abolished 

 in the year 1 1 10, by Henry I. 



The obligation to extinguish fires and lights at 

 a certain hour was imposed upon his subjects by 

 David I., king of Scotland, in his Leges Bur- 

 gorum. 



CURLING; a game played with stones upon 

 the ice, at one time peculiar to Scotland, but now 

 practised in some districts of England and North 

 America. It is somewhat similar in its principles 

 to the game of bowls upon a green. 



Two parties, each perhaps composed of about a 

 dozen persons, play against each other. Each per- 

 son is provided with a flattish round granite stone, 

 resembling a small cheese in figure, polished on the 

 bottom, and having a handle stuck into the upper 

 side. The stones are hurled along from one end to 

 the other of a long cleared space of smooth ice, 

 called a rink. Skill in playing not only depends in 

 hurling the stone truly to the goal at either end, 

 but in dislodging the stones of the antagonist party. 

 As one of each side plays alternately, the game is 

 full of vicissitudes; for half a dozen of the best- 



laid .-/ii>f\ may he in an instant scattered over the 

 field of ice by the concussion of a single stone 

 which hus been sent on its errand with a well di- 

 rected arm. 



In frosty weather, throughout the south and 

 west of Scotland, but little, if at all, in the north, 

 the game of curling is eagerly followed by all 

 classes of the people, from the highest dignitary of 

 the land to the humblest artizan. Parish contends 

 against parish, county against county, club against 

 club, in universal mirthful rivalry. Ordinary 

 matches are called spiels : matches betwixt neigh- 

 bouring parishes or towns are called bonspids, and 

 a not uncommon stake is a load or two of oatnu-al 

 to the poor of the parish that gains the victory. A 

 more usual stake, at least in smaller contests, is a 

 dinner, appropriate to the season, of boiled salt 

 beef and greens, given by the losers to the winners. 

 So keenly is the game pursued, that, in many plan s 

 where there are no natural brooks, artificial ponds 

 are formed at the approach of winter, for the pur- 

 pose of being frozen.* At Edinburgh, where there 

 are neither rivers nor ponds, the inhabitants rtsort 

 for the amusement of curling, as well as skating, 

 to the adjacent beautiful small lake at Dudding- 

 stone, lying at the south-eastern base of Arthur a 

 seat. Here a most animated scene is exhibited 

 during the period that the waters of the lake are 

 frozen. Numbers of rinks are cleared, at which 

 may be seen playing together persons in almost 

 every shade of society professors of the univer- 

 sity, clergymen, private gentlemen, merchants, 

 tradesmen, and artizans all meeting on a common 

 level, and engaged in the same spirit-stirring pur- 

 suit. 



Curling is of unknown antiquity in Scotland. 

 When the general assembly at Glasgow in 1638 de- 

 posed the episcopal church government, one of the 

 charges brought against the bishop of Orkney was 

 that he had played at this game on the sabbath day. 

 The charge, whether true or false, proves that 



* The merit of first forming- artificial curling rinks l.dun. , 

 to Mr John Carnie of Largs. who more than ten ycsi: 

 succeeded in making a rink at Largs weeks before ice woujil 

 bear in any other quarter. In forming an artificial curling 

 rink, the first thing to be done is to select a suitable piece of 

 ground, levelling and freeing it from grass and weeds; tin' 

 bottom must then be lined with clay, to prevent any material 

 ab-orption of water. A little lime mixed with the clay has the 

 effect of killing and checking the mining operation;- W WOHM ; 

 and in the absence of lime, a email quantity of coal-tar spread 

 on the surface will serve the very same purpose. The wall:-, 

 so to speak, of the rink, and which need not be above five 

 inches in height, are formed in the same manner as the bot- 

 tom, with this exception, that the clay is sloped and covered 

 with a thick layer of turf, to prevent the sides and ends from 

 being broken. The rink ma v be from forty to sixty yards long 

 by seven yards broad. Little more than a hundred carts of 

 clay completed the pond formed at Largs, and this was the prin- 

 cipal item of expense. To produce ice to the thickness of a 

 quarter of an, inch, on such an area as is described above, about 

 six hundred gallons of water will suffice ; but where haste is 

 required, the fourth part of the quantity will be found suffi- 

 cient, and may be applied by two men in the course of an hour, 

 who sprinkle the surface with the roses of watering pans. 

 The water freezes as fast as it falls, and many coatings of ice 

 will be formed before the men have completed their task, and 

 within the time just specified. 



After two years' experience, Mr Carnie found an objection 

 arising from weeds and worms ; and to obviate this, he employ- 

 ed workmen to stick a number of small stones into the clay : 

 over these a roller was drawn repeatedly, and the mass, when 

 thus consolidated, became nearly as firm and hard as a road 

 thoroughly macadamised. Not contented with this, he spread 

 a mixture of lime and sand over the day to the deptli of an inch 

 and a half or more, levelling the surface with the roller a be- 

 fore ; and if a barrel or t wo of Roman cement were superad'li-'l. 

 or even used as a substitute for the sand, the inventor is of opin- 

 ion that the pond would remain perfect for many years without 

 requiring the slightest repair. But for ordinary purposes, a 

 mass of well-levelled clay, sprinkled with lime, with sides and 

 ends a few inches high is quite sufficient ; and though it may 

 suffer from worms and the vicissitudes of weather, a very little 

 r;tr.-- wiil put every thing to rights on the recurrence of win- 

 ter. 



