Apbji. 1, 1899.] 



KNOWLEDGE 



91 



The favourite joint for the motheriEg is a chire of perk, 

 ■with the stuffing flavoured with a few leaves of the arematic 

 bay ; and the after-dish consists of the famous tig pudding 

 alluded to by Shakespeare. In many an isolated cottage 

 the preparation of these well-known and ancient dishes for 

 the table and the palates of the children returning home 

 once more, is a labour of love and great ceremony to the 

 homely cottage woman. Both married and single children 

 observe the custom of the mothering, and the fourth 

 Sunday in Lent is, indeed, a day of rejoicing under many 

 a thatched roof in " leafy 'Warwickshire." 



No more picturesque or mirth-moving custom could well 

 be imagined than the Eastertide practice of " lifting," 

 which used to be largely in vogue on the village greens of 

 this neighbourhocd, and was, until recently (and may be 

 so even yet), still extant in some of the more secluded 

 places. It may be that the so-called refining influ- 

 ences of modern civilization have been the means of 

 causing this purely Arcadian custom to fall somewhat into 

 disuse. In any case, what was an annual event looked 

 forward to with pleasm-e at the beginning of the century, 

 is, at the end of it, a custom " more honour'd in the breach 

 than the observance " — a picturesque and merry scene 

 being thus lost to English country life. 



The custom in the villages of Warwickshire was to 

 hold two "liftings" — one on Easter Monday and the 

 other on the following day. On the first day of the 

 junketing the rustic youths " lifted " the lasses — that is, 

 took them up lengthwise in their arms and kissed them. 

 All were served alike — the buxom, the slender, the comely, 

 the plain, the saucy, the shy — so that there should be no 

 complaining of more favour shown to one than to another. 

 On the second day the girls returned the compliment and 

 lifted the young men. There seems to have been even 

 more merriment at the second performance of the custom 

 than at the first. 



Certainly one of the prettiest customs still in active 

 practice in the shady lanes and on the village greens of 

 Warwickshire is the Maying custom. The method is 

 probably much the same in all the counties of rural 

 England in which the festival is still observed ; the only 

 difference may be in the wording of the carols which are 

 sung upon the occasion. 



In Shakespeare's greenwood the general rule is to hold 

 the festival upon the twelfth of the month — old May Day. 

 The earlier hours of the previous day are occupied by the 

 children in a perambulation of the parish, calling upon 

 the farm folk and other residents for gifts of flowers and 

 finery with which to decorate their maypoles. In the 

 evening the large maypole is hoisted on the village green, 

 or in some paddock or orchard lent for the purpose, and 

 the election of the queen takes place. Some villages have 

 a king and queen, but the majority elect a queen only. 



On the morrow the queen and her attendants, as richly 

 bedizened as flowers, ground ivy, may blossom, and patch- 

 work can make them, again parade the bounds of the 

 parish, singing their May songs (first at the doors of the 

 squire and the parson, and then at the houses of the lesser 

 people) round a portable maypole, finally returning to 

 their ground or play mead, where the songs are sung over 

 again. 



After the songs dancing begins, and in some villages in 

 the immediate vicinity of Shakespeare's birthplace the 

 festival of the day is concluded in the rectory, where 

 children of a larger growth keep up the dance with un- 

 flagging energy until the small hours of the next morning. 

 In the little border village of Welford (just below 

 the " Hungry Grafton " and adjoining the " Drunken 

 Bidford" of the well-known verse erroneously attributed 



to Shakespeare) there stands in the centre of a raised 

 mound, encircled by a hedge, a maypole which is regarded 

 as the successor to one around which Shakespeare himself 

 must often have danced with his Shottery lass. The 

 existing maypole stands seventy-five feet in height, and 

 bears upon the shaft the faded colours of the red, white, 

 and blue "ribbons" which it was the custom to paint upon 

 the pole in the poet's days. 



Shakespeare alludes to the practice of painting the 

 maypole in "A Midsummer Night's Dream ' (Act III., 

 Scene 2), where Hermia thus addresses Helena — 



" And are tou grown so high in his esteem 

 Because I am so dwarfisli and so low ? 

 How low am I, thou painted mavpole ? " 



The ancient custom of ringing the curfew at eight 

 o'clock every evening is still practised with unfailing 

 regularity in many villages, and without which many of 

 the rustics would not know the time for bed, for " there 

 is no clock in the forest." 



As there are customs that make for joy in lifetime in 

 active use in this historic county, so there are customs 

 of a pathetic and sympathetic nature observed at the close 

 of a person's life. 



For example, there is a well-established custom among 

 the peasant folk of attending their village church 

 on the Sunday morning following the interment of 

 a relative, the female mourners remaining seated and 

 deeply veiled during the singing of the hymns. This 

 emulation of the custom observed at the singing of the 

 / lies li(B is strictly conformed to upon frequent occasions. 



Among the dwellers in this poetic neighbourhood the 

 custom of using sprigs of rosemary, both at weddings and 

 burials, is still observed, much in the same way as men- 

 tioned in " Romeo and Juliet." Rosemary, indeed, is 

 " for remembrance " in many ways. A maiden will give 

 her lover a sprig when the time comes for them to 

 part, and she will receive one from him. The shrub is 

 largely grown in the cottage gardens, and from Shake- 

 speare's days down to the present time it has played an 

 important part in the floral and other customs of this 

 county. 



The festival of the ingathering or harvest home is not 

 restricted to the occupants and workers of the farm, 

 but is extended, by means of an outdoor demonstration, 

 to all the dwellers in the village — so far, at least, as 

 the first portion of the ceremony is concerned. A case I 

 have in mind, which occurred at a village in the historic 

 Vale of the Red Horse (the property of Lord Willoughby 

 de Broke), no longer since than the autumn of 1892, may 

 be regarded as typical of the manner in which it is now 

 customary to observe the celebration in honour of a 

 bountiful harvest. 



On a beautifully fine October day, the celebrants met at 

 four o'clock in the afternoon, at the sign of the Swan. 

 There a procession was formed. Farmer Trab and Master 

 Scoles were mounted on stout horses, representing the 

 farmer of 1792 and 1892. Flags and banners with harvest 

 mottoes ; the village drum and fife band ; serving-man 

 carrying sheaves of wheat, barley and beans ; a gay farm 

 waggon (drawn by the farmer's dandiest team), laden with 

 vegetables ; a rustic bearing a huge loaf of bread upon a 

 pole ; a pony-carriage in which was seated the wife of 

 '•Farmer Trab," in quaint costume of the end of last 

 century, attended by a cockaded flunkey ; these and other 

 items followed behind the farmers of two centuries. 



Having gone a tour of the village the procession halted 

 in front of the house of the lord of the manor, where 

 Farmer Trab doled out bread and cheese to the farm 

 servants from a basket in front of his saddle, and some 



