and intermingle the cry, "To-morrow is come!" Afterwards they make
merry with their collections. At Islip, Oxfordshire, England, I have
heard the children sing the following, when collecting pence on this
day--
"Good-morrow, Valentine!
I be thine and thou be'st mine,
So please give me a Valentine."
And likewise the following--
"Good-morrow, Valentine!
God bless you ever!
If you'll be true to me,
I'll be the like to thee;
Old England for ever!"
Schoolboys have a very uncomplimentary way of presenting each other
with these poetical memorials--
"Peep, fool, peep,
What do you think to see?
Every one has a Valentine,
And here's one for thee!"
Far different from these is a stanza which is a great favorite with
young girls on this day, offered indiscriminately, and, of course,
quite innocently, to most of their acquaintances--
"The rose is red,
The violet's blue;
Pinks are sweet,
And so are you!"
The mission of Valentines is one of the very few old customs not on
the wane; and the streets of our metropolis practically bear evidence
of this fact in the distribution of love-messages on our stalls and
shop-windows, varying in price from a sovereign to one halfpenny. Our
readers, no doubt, will ask for its origin, and there we are at fault
to begin with. The events of St. Valentine's life furnish no clue
whatever to the mystery, although Wheatley, in his "Illustration of
the Common Prayer," absurdly disposes of the question in this way:
"St. Valentine was a man of most admirable parts, and so famous for
his love and charity, that the custom of choosing Valentines upon his
festival, which is still practised, took its rise from thence." We see
no explanation here in any way satisfactory, and must be contented with
the hope that some of our antiquaries may hit on something more to the
purpose.
It was anciently the custom to draw lots on this day. The names of an
equal number of each sex were put into a box, in separate partitions,
out of which every one present drew a name, called the Valentine, which
was regarded as a good omen of their future marriage. It would appear
from a curious passage quoted in the "Dictionary of Archaisms," that
any lover was hence termed a Valentine; not necessarily an affianced
lover, as suggested in "Hampson's Calendarium," vol. i. p. 163.
Lydgate, the poet of Bury, in the fifteenth century, thus mentions this
practice--
"St. Valentine, of custom year by year
Men have an usance in this region
To look and search Cupid's calendere,
And choose their choice by great affection:
Such as be prick'd with Cupid's motion,
Taking their choice as their lot doth fall:
But I love one which excelleth all."
The divinations practised on Valentine's day are a curious subject.
Herrick mentions one by rose-buds--
"She must no more a-Maying;
Or by rose-buds divine
Who'll be her Valentine."
Perhaps the poet may here allude to a practice similar to the
following, quoted by Brand: "Last Friday was Valentine day; and the
night before I got five bay-leaves, and pinned four of them to the
four corners of my pillow, and the fifth to the middle; and then, if
I dreamt of my sweetheart, Betty said we should be married before the
year was out. _But, to make it more sure_, I boiled an egg hard, and
took out the yolk, and filled it with salt; and, when I went to bed,
eat it shell and all, without speaking or drinking after it. We also
wrote our lover's names upon bits of paper, and rolled them up in clay,
and put them into water; and the first that rose up was to be our
Valentine. Would you think it? Mr. Blossom was my man. I lay abed, and
shut my eyes all the morning, till he came to our house, for I would
not have seen another man before him for all the world." According
to Mother Bunch, the following lines should be said by the girl on
retiring to rest the previous night--
"Sweet guardian angels, let me have
What I most earnestly do crave,
A Valentine endowed with love,
That will both kind and constant prove."
We believe the old custom of drawing lots on this eventful day is
obsolete, and has given place to the favorite practice of sending
pictures, with poetical legends, to objects of love or ridicule. The
lower classes, however, seldom treat the matter with levity, and many
are the offers of marriage thus made. The clerks at the post-offices
are to be pitied, the immense increase of letters beyond the usual
average adding very inconveniently to their labors. Such is Mr.
Halliwell's account of Valentine's day.
In "Poor Robin's Almanack," 1676, the _drawing_ of Valentines is thus
alluded to--
"Now, Andrew, Antho-
Ny, and William,
For Valentines _draw_
Prue, Kate, Jilian."
Many curious customs are related by different writers in honor of this
day; but, of all the quotations that could be made, none is more quaint
and striking than the following from the Diary of the celebrated Pepys.
On the 14th of February, 1667, is there entered: "This morning came up
to my wife's bedside, I being up dressing myself, little Will Mercer
to her Valentine, and brought her name written upon blue paper in gold
letters, done by myself very pretty; and we were both well pleased
with it. But I am also this year my wife's Valentine, and it will cost
me £5; but that I must have laid out, if we had not been Valentines."
He also adds: "I find that Mrs. Pierce's little girl is my Valentine,
she having drawn me; which I was not sorry for, easing me of something
more than I must have given to others. But here I do first observe the
drawing of mottoes as well as names; so that Pierce, who drew my wife,
did draw also a motto, and this girl drew another for me: what mine was
I forget; but my wife's was most courteous, and most fair, which, as
it may be used on an anagram upon each name, might be very pretty. One
wonder I observed to-day, there was no music in the morning, to call up
our new married friend (Peg Penn), which is very mean, methinks."
That Valentines were not confined to the lower classes in the days
of Pepys, and were sometimes of a very costly description, may be
judged from the following statement: "The Duke of York being once Mrs.
Stuart's Valentine, did give her a jewel of about £800, and my Lord
Mandeville, her Valentine this year, a ring of about £300."
And, in the following year, he notes down: "This evening my wife did
with great pleasure show me her stock of jewels, increased by the ring
she hath made lately, as my Valentine's gift this year, a Turkey stone
set with diamonds; with this, and what she had, she reckons that she
hath above £150 worth of jewels of one kind or other, and I am glad of
it; for it is fit the wretch should have something to content herself
with."
With regard to the origin of this festival in the calendar, there
are many conflicting opinions. St. Valentine, who suffered martyrdom
in the reign of the Emperor Claudius, was eminently distinguished
for his love and charity; and the custom of choosing Valentines, or
special loving friends on this day, is by some supposed to have thence
originated. The following solution is, however, the more probable
one. It was the practice in ancient Rome, during a great part of the
month of February, to celebrate the Lupercalia, which were feasts in
honor of Pan and Juno, whence the latter deity was named Februata, or
Februalis. On this occasion, amidst a variety of ceremonies, the names
of young women were put into a box, from which they were drawn by the
men, as chance directed. The pastors of the early Christian church,
who by every possible means endeavored to eradicate the vestiges of
pagan superstitions, and chiefly by some commutations of their forms,
substituted, in the present instance, the names of particular saints,
instead of those of the women; and, as the festival of the Lupercalia
had commenced about the middle of February, they appear to have chosen
Valentine's day for celebrating the new feast, because it occurred
nearly at the same time.
"MUSTARD TO MIX."
A RECEIPT FOR YOUNG HOUSEKEEPERS.
BY THE AUTHOR OF "MISS BREMER'S VISIT TO COOPER'S LANDING," "GETTING
INTO SOCIETY," "BOARDING-HOUSE POLITICS," ETC.
"And the ice it isn't water, and water isn't free--and I can't say
that anything is what it ought to be."
_Cricket on the Hearth._
"_I feel as if I should fly!_"
No wonder poor Mrs. Bunker longed for the wings of a dove, if they
could bear her to anything like rest. It was Monday--washing-day--and
_blue_ Monday into the bargain. The parlor was in disorder (the Bunkers
always sat in their parlor on Sunday, and held it sacred the rest of
the week); the front hall tracked and littered up with the arrival of
a visitor's baggage--the spare room was not ready--the clothes not
counted out--the girl idling away her time at the pump--the breakfast
dishes unwashed--and the baby screaming, as only a cross child can
scream, in its mother's arms, showing not the least symptom of a
morning nap, or, indeed, of _anything_ but colic.
Mrs. Bunker, as she sat in the midst of this confusion, and expressed
her desire to fly, bore no resemblance whatever to an angel--except
that angels are usually represented with loose robes and unconfined
hair. We question if she had looked at a brush since the day before,
and her morning-dress was of the style denominated "wrapper"--a not
over-clean chintz. The room itself was cheerful enough, so far as
sunshine and comfortable furniture would go; but nothing was in its
place; and this disorder, added to the forlorn appearance of Mrs.
Bunker, holding the baby in its sour, crumpled night-dress and soiled
flannel, was anything but an inviting prospect to a newly arrived guest.
Mrs. Bunker expected her every minute--Aunt Lovey--her husband's
aunt, who had brought him up, and had given him all those particular
ways that were the bane of Mrs. Bunker's wedded life, she having very
little idea of the necessity he attached to method in managing a
household. Mrs. Bunker, only two years from school, had written very
nice letters to this friend of her husband's orphaned childhood. She
loved her Joshua, in spite of his unsentimental name, and was inclined
to adopt all his family in her affectionate little soul. Nor was it
unnatural that she wished them to think well of her in return; she
particularly desired to gain Aunt Lovey's good opinion, and when the
long talked of visit was decided on, had hoped to make a grand first
impression. If it hadn't been Monday morning, and if baby hadn't
been so cross--if the spare room had only been cleared up after her
brother's departure--if the girl was "worth two straws"--in fact, if
everything hadn't been exactly what it shouldn't be, Mrs. Bunker would
have got up herself, her house, and her baby, to the best advantage.
She had a very pretty face and figure, a fact of which she was well
aware, and as a school-girl and young lady in society, had made the
most of. Since her marriage, this was not so apparent to Mr. Bunker,
however, as in the days of their courtship. _Then_, she never allowed
herself to be seen without her hair in the most wonderful French twists
and Grecian braids--or her dress put on to the utmost advantage. Now,
"it wasn't worth while to dress just for Joshua"--or "baby was _so_
troublesome"--or "she hadn't a thing to put on." It _was_ worth while
to dress for Aunt Lovey, and she desired to look her very best--only
baby _wouldn't_ go to sleep. "Rock-a-by baby"--
(Mrs. Bunker had been considered to have the best voice in the
Highville Seminary, but now her music was confined chiefly to that
charming ballad writer, Mother Goose.)
"Rock-a-by baby, father's gone a hunting"--Oh, dear, she will be here
before I can get him down! There--therey--did the drayman say his
Aunty Lovey was a-goin' to walky uppy to the housey? Johnny shall
ride, Johnny shall ride (you provoking little monkey, why _don't_ you
shut your eyes!)--"Wid a white pussy-cat tied to his side!"--sang, and
rocked, and trotted Mrs. Bunker.
"Where _is_ that Jane? Not a dish washed--and I don't believe the hot
water's on for the clothes. Therey, therey, mother's baby, mother's
only little man! Did the naughty colic bother mother's little son?
Send the wind right up, so I would. Ride a cock horse to Banbury
cross--therey, therey, don't cry so, mother's little man--'Had a little
dog, sir, Banger was his name, sir'--Banger, Buffer, Kicker, Cuffer,
_Banger_ was his name, sir! Jane! Jane! Where is that girl? I feel as
if I should fly!"
At which remark--the energy of which we have endeavored to portray in
the most crumpled italics--the door opened to admit, not Jane, but Aunt
Lovey, and our history of Mrs. Bunker's tribulations began.
She gave one glance at her visitor, one to herself, and round the
room. There was no help for it--she was obliged to deposit baby in the
cradle, screaming as he was, and advance to make a "first impression."
Aunt Lovey did not look shocked or disgusted--a little surprised
certainly, for, knowing her nephew's orderly propensities, this
was not what she expected to find his home, and the untidy, tired,
fretted-looking woman who introduced herself as his wife, did not
certainly answer to the lover's descriptions of his betrothed. However,
she had been a housekeeper, and knew what Monday mornings were, with
only one maid of all work, and a young child to see to. So she kissed
her niece very cordially for the warm welcome she offered, and begging
'not to be minded, as she understood these little troubles,' sat down,
laid aside her bonnet and shawl, and asked for the baby.
There it was again--hardest of all! Mrs. Bunker's personal vanity,
in departing from her as a married woman, had rested and centred
itself on the baby. Aunt Lovey had taken the utmost interest in its
advent--knitted all its socks, the very blue pair, soiled and dirty,
which he was kicking out at that moment--and in return, had been
favored by rapturous accounts of his _beauty_ at three days old,
his knowingness at three months. Mrs. Bunker had pictured herself
presenting the baby in grand toilet to his great-aunt, and seeing
her surprise, as the old lady confessed the half had not been told
her--"oh, dear!"
But there was no help for it, and she was obliged to withdraw the
poor little juvenile from its involuntary confinement, ready to cry
with weariness and disappointment, as she tried to coax it into
something like good-humor. Jane, drawn by curiosity where duty failed,
arrived to complete the tableau, slamming the door, and slopping over
the pump-water on her way to the wash-kitchen. She must have been
experimenting on the principle that "the longest way round is the
shortest way home," for there was a door in the work-kitchen leading
directly to the street.
Good Aunt Lovey was no more discomposed by the bold stare the "help"
fixed upon her, than she had been by the rest of the picture. It must
have cost her an inward tremor to lay down her dove-colored cashmere
shawl and split straw bonnet with its white satin ribbons, on the
littered bureau, but she did so without invitation, Mrs. Bunker
having fairly forgotten to offer one in the combined annoyances and
embarrassments of the moment, and then, seated in the rocking-chair,
from which her niece had risen, she spread the cradle blanket in her
lap, and held out her hands for the baby.
It was really a very nice child, as babies go, in spite of its rumpled
costume. Aunt Lovey's first proceeding was to "straighten it out,"
smoothing the uncomfortable folds of cloth and flannel from under its
back, and thus covering its cold little feet. Her handkerchief was
produced to dry the little face from the mingled effects of tears and
teething, and then warmed on the stove--there was very little fire--the
stove never _did_ draw on washing-day--to cover the mottled arms and
hands. Baby thus smoothed, soothed, and comforted, presented a much
more respectable appearance, and received a hearty kiss from its
grand-aunt, by way of an anodyne. It seemed to have the desired effect,
for, after staring with its round blue eyes in the old lady's face, as
if endeavoring to recall the features, it gradually winked and blinked
itself to sleep, certainly contrary to its most determined intentions.
Mrs. Bunker, who had excused herself as if to overlook Jane's
operations, but in reality to take up the crying fit where the baby
left off, returned, with eyes very much swollen in consequence, and
tried to offer an apology for herself and her house, but broke down
again into a little sob, and a clean pocket-handkerchief.
"Come, come, my dear, no excuse is needed," hummed Aunt Lovey, at
the mother and the fast retiring baby, to the old-fashioned melody
of "Banks and braes." "Just warm a pillow--there, that's right; now
shake it up, and make it soft; have every feather smooth and light,"
unconsciously relapsing into rhyme as well as chime, while she
deposited the placid Johnny in his accustomed bed. "And now, my dear,
I see how it all is. Could you lend me a clean check apron?--never
mind, this towel will do, and will wash up these dishes post haste.
What's your girl's name? Jane? Jane, here, come and rake up this fire
a little; there's nothing helps matters along faster than a bright,
cheerful fire; it's like a lively disposition, which I'm sure you have
naturally."
It was wonderful to see Jane's alacrity in obeying these
instructions, given in a quick, inspiriting, and, at the same time,
not-to-be-trifled-with tone. Mrs. Bunker, captain as she was, placed
herself willingly under the orders of so skilful a pilot, and was
steered triumphantly through the household difficulties that had
gathered so thickly around her.
"And now, my dear," resumed that excellent woman, unpinning the towel
that encircled her ample waist, and folding it smoothly before she laid
it down, "what else is there to do this morning?"
The fire was burning cheerfully, the dishes put away, the carpet swept,
the chairs set back, and the baby still sleeping soundly in the bright
warmth that had diffused itself throughout the room. Mrs. Bunker
already felt as if she had known Aunt Lovey for a long time; they had
talked all the while they were busied about household affairs, and
the new niece felt as if she could almost open her heart to the kind
old lady, and consult her about those constantly occurring domestic
drawbacks and trials. Joshua, good husband as he was, did not seem to
understand. It was more effective than a week of formal visiting, and
Mrs. Bunker's face and step brightened with the room. Now came the
clouds again. "There was so much to be done, she didn't know where to
begin."
"But what is it?" urged Aunt Lovey, stooping down admiringly over the
cradle, for the baby looked very lovely in his quiet sleep, one little
round hand pushed under his cheek--he was making as good an impression
as his mother could desire.
"Oh, _everything_!" responded the baby's mother, in a despairing tone.
"Ah, I see, _mustard to mix_," and with these cabalistic words, the
visitor took a deliberate survey of her hostess for the first time.
"Consider me your grandmother, Sophia, and let me advise you to tidy
yourself a little; that will be the first step towards it. A neat
morning-dress and clean apron are next best, or perhaps better, than a
good fire, in any house. I'll see to the baby."
Aunt Lucy certainly made herself at home. She put the tips of her
prunella buskins on the stove hearth, and examined the hem of her
skirts to see if they had contracted any dampness or mud stains in her
recent walk, and then produced her knitting, as if she was settled
down for some time. Mrs. Bunker took the advice, as she had former
prescriptions, and found it to work as well. The morning's duties were
accomplished with an ease and alacrity that astonished herself, even to
making the great chamber as neat as Aunt Lovey's heart could desire,
without the mortification of her knowing it had ever been otherwise.
It was not until Mr. Bunker had come from the store, and been duly
astonished and delighted at his aunt's unexpected arrival, and the
tidy appearance of the whole household--to tell the truth, he wondered
how the last happened to be so--that Mrs. Bunker found time to seek an
explanation of the significant sentence applied by the old lady to her
state of despondency with regard to domestic affairs. Significant she
was convinced, though she could not exactly make out the application,
as her aunt had seen the mutton chops destined for dinner arrive from
the butcher's, and she had never heard of mustard being taken with
them. They had been duly served, praised, and eaten; the dinner dishes
were washed and put away, so was the baby for his second diurnal nap,
and Mrs. Bunker, notwithstanding she had company, found herself seated
to her sewing by three o'clock for the first in a month, while Jane,
like the unfortunate "maid" mentioned in one of the baby's favorite
lullabies, was
"In the garden
Hanging out the clothes."
Aunt Lovey, looking thoughtfully over her spectacles, thought her
nephew's description of his wife not so far out of the way after all,
as she hemmed away industriously at a pile of new towels, the most
fascinating work next to crochet one can undertake; it slips by so fast
and evenly, and there seems to be so much accomplished.
"But, Aunt Lovey," said Mrs. Bunker, looking up suddenly, and finding
those penetrating gray eyes fixed on her, "what did you mean by
'mustard to mix?'"
"Oh, I did not explain, did I? Well, when I was first married and
moved out west--Utica was out west then, from Connecticut--I knew no
more about managing for myself than you do now. I used to find my work
accumulate, and I would get discouraged and go about a whole week,
feeling as if the world rested upon my shoulders; and that made me
mope, and your uncle John got discouraged, because I did, and there was
no end of the snarl things would get into. Our only near neighbor was
a nice tidy body, who always looked like wax-work."
"Something such a person as you," interrupted Mrs. Bunker, playfully.
"Well, perhaps so; but you never saw my house; her house was like a pin
from one end to the other. One day I just ran in to borrow a little
meal--ours had given out unexpectedly--and I found my good neighbor in
a flurry, acting just as I used to feel sometimes."
"'Oh, she had _everything_ to do,' she said, 'and company coming to
dinner.'
"'Everything? Well, what? As far as I could see, everything was done.'
"'Oh, the table's to set;' and up and around the room she went again.
"'But it was two hours to dinner--what else?'
"'Why!--well, then, _mustard to mix_!'
"That was every earthly thing, come to think of it; but she had been
flurried by the sudden arrival, and did not stop to see that it could
not possibly disturb any of her arrangements. So I went home, and
found I generally had _mustard to mix_, when my flurries came on; that
is, if I set myself right to work to clear up the snarl, it wasn't half
so bad as I felt it was. Setting down to fret over matters only snarled
things the more, and then poor John was troubled to see me worried, and
things would go from bad to worse."
"But, aunty," said the young wife, with a half sigh, ending in a smile,
"do you think I shall _ever_ make a housekeeper? I know Joshua is
disappointed."
"Yes, yes, my dear; why not? Only you will have to learn how to _mix
mustard_ to begin with."
INSTANTANEOUS FLOWERING OF PLANTS.