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INTRODUCTION. pee | 
Hail! image of a primeval time ! 
Hail ! sample of a world to come ! 
LANGHORNE, 
“¢ The flowery month of May,’’says Peacham, 
‘© must be drawn as a youth, with a sweet and 
amiable countenance, clad in a robe of white 
and green, embroidered with daffodils, haw- 
thorns, and blue-bottles ; upon his head a gar- 
land of white, damask, and red roses; in one 
hand alute ; upon the fore-finger of the other 
a nightingale; and the sign Gemini in the 
back-ground.” 
May-day festivities are now falling rapidly 
into disuse ; but in ancient times it was cele- 
brated as was fitting by the young. They rose 
shortly after midnight, and went to some 
neighbouring wood, attended by songs and music, 
there breaking green branches from the trees, 
and making nosegays, wreaths, and crowns of 
flowers. They returned home at the rising of 
the sun, and made their windows and their 
doors gay with garlands. In the villages they 
danced during the day round the May-pole, 
which afterwards remained the whole year 


