MAY.
"Colin met Sylvia on the green
Once on the charming first of May,
And shepherds ne'er tell false, I ween,
Yet 'twas by chance, the shepherds say.
"Colin he bow'd and blush'd, then said,
'Will you, sweet maid, this first of May,
Begin the dance by Colin led,
To make this quite his holiday?'
"Sylvia replied, 'I ne'er from home
Yet ventur'd, till this first of May;
It is not fit for maids to roam,
And make a shepherd's holiday.'
"'It is most fit,' replied the youth,
'That Sylvia should this first of May
By me be taught that love and truth
Can make of life a holiday.'"--LADY CRAVEN.
May Day Festivities--May-pole--Morris-dancers--The Book of
Sports--Bowling--Beating the Bounds--George Herbert's
description of a Country Parson.
The spring has dawned with all its brightness and beauty; the
nightingale's song is heard, and all nature seems to rejoice in the
sweet spring-time. Our forefathers delighted, too, in the advent of
the bright month of May, which the old poets used to compare to a
maiden clothed in sunshine dancing to the music of birds and brooks;
and May Day was the great rural festival of the year.
Long before the break of day, men and women, old and young, of all
classes, used to assemble and hurry away to the woods and groves to
gather the blooming hawthorn and spring flowers, and laden with
their spoils returned when the sun rose, with merry shouts and
horn-blowings, and adorned every door and window in the village. The
poet Herrick sings of this pleasant beginning to the day's
festivities. Addressing a maiden named Corinna, he says--
"Come, my Corinna, come, and coming mark
How each field turns a street, and each street a park,
Made green and trimmed with trees; see how
Devotion gives each house a bough
Or branch; each porch, each door, ere this
An ark, a tabernacle is
Made up of white-thorn neatly interwove."
The men blew cow-horns to usher in the spring, and the maids carried
garlands to hang them in the churches; while at Oxford the
choristers of Magdalen College assemble at the top of the tower at
early dawn, and sing hymns of thankfulness because spring has come
again. This pleasing custom is still observed every year on the
first of May.
But let us away to the village green, where the May-pole is being
adorned with a few finishing touches, and is covered with flowers
and ribbons. It has been carried here by twenty or thirty yoke of
oxen, their horns decorated with sweet flowers, and then, with
shouts and laughter, and with song, the young men raise the massive
pole with handkerchiefs and flags streaming on the top, and the
rustic feast and dance begin.
"The May-pole is up,
Now give me the cup,
I'll drink to the garlands around it;
But first unto those
Whose hands did compose
The glory of flowers that crown'd it."[9]
A company of morris-dancers approach, and a circle is made round the
May-pole in which they can perform. First comes a man dressed in a
green tunic, with a bow, arrows, and bugle-horn, who represents
Robin Hood, and by his side, attended by some maidens, walks Maid
Marian, the May Queen.[10] Will Stukeley, Little John, and other
companions of the famous outlaw, are represented; and last, but not
least, comes the hobby-horse--a man with a light wooden framework
representing a horse about him, covered with trappings reaching to
the ground, so as to prevent the man's feet from being seen. The
hobby-horse careered about, pranced and curveted, to the great
amusement of the company. The morris-dancers are adorned with bells,
which jingle merrily as they dance. But a formidable-looking dragon
approaches, which hisses and flaps his wings, and looks very fierce,
making the hobby-horse kick and rear frantically. When the animals
have wearied themselves, the maidens dance again, and the archers
set up their targets on the lower end of the green, where a close
contest ensues, and after many shots the victor is crowned with a
laurel wreath.
Such were some of the sights and sounds of May Day in olden times.
But the Puritans, who slew their king, Charles I., were very much
opposed to all joyousness and mirth, and one of their first acts
when they came into power was to put down the May-pole. They ordered
that all May-poles (which they called "a heathenish vanity,
generally abused to superstition and wickedness") shall be taken
down by the constables and churchwardens, and that the said officers
be fined five shillings till the said May-poles be taken down. So
the merry May songs were hushed for many a long year, until Charles
II. was restored to his throne, and then the stately pole was reared
once more, and Robin Hood and his merry crew began their sports
again. But times change, and we change with them: customs pass away,
and with them have long vanished the May-pole and its bright group
of light-hearted rustics. An American writer who visited this
country thus describes his feeling when he saw an old May-pole still
standing at Chester--"I shall never forget my delight. My fancy
adorned it with wreaths of flowers, and peopled the green bank with
all the dancing revelry of May Day. I value every custom that tends
to infuse poetical feeling into the common people, and to sweeten
and soften the rudeness of rustic manners without destroying their
simplicity. Indeed, it is to the decline of this happy simplicity
that the decline of this custom may be traced, and the rural dance
on the green, and the homely May-day pageant, have gradually
disappeared in proportion as the peasantry have become expensive and
artificial in their pleasures, and too knowing for simple enjoyment.
Some attempts, indeed, have been made by men of both taste and
learning to rally back the popular feeling to their standards of
primitive simplicity; but the time has gone by, the feeling has
become chilled by habits of gain and traffic, the country apes the
manners and amusements of the town, and little is heard of May Day
at present, except from the lamentations of authors, who sigh after
it from among the brick walls of the city."
The name of the parish of St. Andrew _Undershaft_ records the place
where the city May-pole, or _shaft,_ was erected, and _Shaft Alley_
the place where it lay when it was not required for use.
The proclamation of James I., called the "Book of Sports," which was
renewed by King Charles I., throws some light upon the sports in
vogue during his reign. It was enacted "for his good people's lawful
recreation, after the end of Divine service, that his good people be
not disturbed, or discouraged, from any lawful recreation, such as
dancing for men and women, archery for men, leaping, vaulting, or
any such harmless recreations; nor from having May games, Whitsun
ales, and morris dances, and the setting up of May-poles, and other
sports therewith used, so as the same be had in due and convenient
time, without impediment or neglect of Divine service. And that
women shall have leave to carry rushes to the church for the
decorating of it, according to their old custom. But withal his
Majesty doth hereby account still as prohibited all unlawful games
to be used on Sundays only, as bear and bull-baiting, interludes,
and at all times in the meaner sort of people by law prohibited,
bowling."
Why his Majesty should have been so very severe on the game of bowls,
which is a very ancient pastime, and innocent enough, is not at first
quite clear; but it appears that the numerous bowling-alleys in
London were, in the sixteenth century, the resorts of very bad
company, and the nests of gambling and vice. Hence the severity of
King James' strictures on bowling.
The people of Lancashire in the time of James I. were as devoted to
sports and amusement as they are now; and when the king was making a
progress through Lancashire, "he received a petition from some
servants, labourers, mechanics, and other vulgar persons,
complaining that they were debarred from dancing, playing,
church-ales--in a word, from all recreations on Sundays after Divine
service." King James hated Puritanism and loved recreation; so he
readily granted the petition of the Lancashire folk, and issued a
proclamation encouraging Sunday pastimes, which is known as the
famous "Book of Sports."
In Ireland on May Day Bale-fires are lighted, and to this day young
men jump through the flames, and children are passed across the
embers, in order to secure them good luck during the coming year. On
this day, too, the Irish kings are supposed to rise from their
graves and gather together a ghostly army of rude warriors to fight
for their country. The wild cries of the shadowy host, the clashing
of shields, and the sound of drums are said to have been heard
during the period of the last rebellion in Ireland.
On one of the Rogation Days, or on Ascension Day, it was the custom
to go in procession round the boundaries of the parish to ask God's
blessing on the fruits of the earth, and as there were few maps and
divisions of land, to call to mind and pass on to the next
generation the boundaries of the township or village. The choir sang
hymns, and under certain trees, which were called Gospel Trees, the
clergyman read the Gospel for the day, with a litany and prayers.
Sometimes boys were whipped, or bumped against trees, or thrown into
a river, in order to impress upon them where the boundaries were.
But they received a substantial recompense afterwards, and the whole
company, when the procession was over, sat down to the perambulation
dinner, and talked about their recollections of former days.
The advantages of this practice are set forth in George Herbert's
description of a country parson. He says, "The country parson is a
lover of old customs, if they be good and harmless. Particularly he
loves procession, and maintains it, because there are contained in
it four manifest advantages, 1. A blessing of God for the fruits of
the earth. 2. Justice in the preservation of bounds. 3. Charity, in
loving, walking, and neighbourly accompanying one another, with
reconciling of differences at that time, if there be any. 4. Mercy,
in relieving the poor by a liberal distribution and largess, which
at that time is, or ought to be, used. Wherefore he exacts of all to
be present at the perambulation, and those that withdraw and sever
themselves from it he mislikes, and rebukes as uncharitable and
unneighbourly; and if they will not reform, presents them" (_i.e._
to the bishop for censure).
This custom is still preserved, or has been revived, in many
parishes, and at Oxford the boys may be seen on Ascension Day
bearing white willow-wands, and beating the bounds of some of the
old city parishes.