Fennel-leaved. Tickseed _Coreopsis ferulifolia_.
Dedicated to _St. Quintin_.
_Seasonable._
Now comes the season when the humble want,
And know the misery of their wretched scant:
Go, ye, and seek their homes, who have the power,
And ease the sorrows of their trying hour.
* * * * *
“There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth
To him who gives, a blessing never ceaseth.”
[365] Life of Harvey, the conjuror, 8vo., 1728.
[366] Owen’s Welsh Dictionary.
[367] Graydon’s Collection of Poems, 8vo., Dublin, 1801.
[368] Eden’s State of the Poor.
[369] Shaw’s Hist. of Moray.
[370] Vallancey, Collect. Hibern.
[371] Sinclair’s Stat. Acc. of Scotland.
[372] Ibid.
[373] Ibid.
[374] Ibid.
[375] Martin’s Western Islands.
[376] Ibid.
[Illustration: NOVEMBER.]
Next was November; he full grown and fat
As fed with lard, and that right well might seeme;
For he had been a fatting hogs of late,
That yet his browes with sweat did reek and steam;
And yet the season was full sharp and breem;
In planting eeke he took no small delight,
Whereon he rode, not easie was to deeme
For it a dreadful centaure was in sight,
The seed of Saturn and fair Nais, Chiron hight.
_Spenser._
This is the eleventh month of the year. The anglo-saxons gave names in
their own tongue to each month, and “November they termed _wint-monat_,
to wit, wind-moneth, whereby wee may see that our ancestors were in this
season of the yeare made acquainted with blustring Boreas; and it was
the antient custome for shipmen then to shrowd themselves at home, and
to give over sea-faring (notwithstanding the littlenesse of their then
used voyages) untill blustring March had bidden them well to fare.”[377]
They likewise called it _blot-monath_. In the saxon, “_blot_” means
_blood_; and in this month they killed great abundance of cattle for
winter-store, or, according to some, for purposes of sacrifice to their
deities.[378]
Bishop Warburton commences a letter to his friend Hurd, with an allusion
to the evil influence which the gloominess of this month is proverbially
supposed to have on the mind. He dates from Bedford-row, October 28th,
1749:--“I am now got hither,” he says, “to spend the month of November:
the dreadful month of November! when the little wretches hang and drown
themselves, and the great ones sell themselves to the court and the
devil.”
“This is the month,” says Mr. Leigh Hunt, “in which we are said by the
Frenchman to hang and drown ourselves. We also agree with him to call it
‘the gloomy month of November;’ and, above all, with our in-door,
money-getting, and unimaginative habits, all the rest of the year, we
contrive to make it so. Not all of us, however: and fewer and fewer, we
trust, every day. It is a fact well known to the medical philosopher,
that, in proportion as people do not like air and exercise, their blood
becomes darker and darker: now what corrupts and thickens the
circulation, and keeps the humours within the pores, darkens and clogs
the mind; and we are then in a state to receive pleasure but
indifferently or confusedly, and pain with tenfold painfulness. If we
add to this a quantity of _unnecessary_ cares and sordid mistakes, it is
so much the worse. A love of nature is the refuge. He who grapples with
March, and has the smiling eyes upon him of June and August, need have
no fear of November.--And as the Italian proverb says, every medal has
its reverse. November, with its loss of verdure, its frequent rains, the
fall of the leaf, and the visible approach of winter, is undoubtedly a
gloomy month to the gloomy but to others, it brings but pensiveness, a
feeling very far from destitute of pleasure; and if the healthiest and
most imaginative of us may feel their spirits pulled down by reflections
connected with earth, its mortalities, and its mistakes, we should but
strengthen ourselves the more to make strong and sweet music with the
changeful but harmonious movements of nature.” This pleasant observer of
the months further remarks, that, “There are many pleasures in November
if we will lift up our matter-of-fact eyes, and find that there are
matters-of-fact we seldom dream of. It is a pleasant thing to meet the
gentle fine days, that come to contradict our sayings for us; it is a
pleasant thing to see the primrose come back again in woods and meadows;
it is a pleasant thing to catch the whistle of the green plover, and to
see the greenfinches congregate; it is a pleasant thing to listen to the
deep amorous note of the wood-pigeons, who now come back again; and it
is a pleasant thing to hear the deeper voice of the stags, making their
triumphant love amidst the falling leaves.
“Besides a quantity of fruit, our gardens retain a number of the flowers
of last month, with the stripped lily in leaf; and, in addition to
several of the flowering trees and shrubs, we have the fertile and
glowing china-roses in flower: and in fruit the pyracantha, with its
lustrous red-berries, that cluster so beautifully on the walls of
cottages. This is the time also for domestic cultivators of flowers to
be very busy in preparing for those spring and winter ornaments, which
used to be thought the work of magic. They may plant hyacinths, dwarf
tulips, polyanthus-narcissus, or any other moderately-growing bulbous
roots, either in water-glasses, or in pots of light dry earth, to flower
early in their apartments. If in glasses, the bulb should be a little in
the water; if in pots, a little in the earth, or but just covered. They
should be kept in a warm light room.
“The trees generally lose their leaves in the following
succession:--walnut, mulberry, horse-chesnut, sycamore, lime, ash, then,
after an interval, elm, then beech and oak, then apple and peach-trees,
sometimes not till the end of November; and lastly, pollard oaks and
young beeches, which retain their withered leaves till pushed off by
their new ones in spring. Oaks that happen to be stripped of their
leaves by chaffers, will often surprise the haunter of nature by being
clothed again soon after midsummer with a beautiful vivid foliage.
“The farmer endeavours to finish his ploughing this month, and then lays
up his instruments for the spring. Cattle are kept in the yard or
stable, sheep turned into the turnip-field, or in bad weather fed with
hay; bees moved under shelter, and pigeons fed in the dove-house.
“Among our autumnal pleasures, we ought not to have omitted the very
falling of the leaves:
To view the leaves, thin dancers upon air,
Go eddying round.
_C. Lamb._
“Towards the end of the month, under the groves and other shady places,
they begin to lie in heaps, and to rustle to the foot of the passenger;
and there they will lie till the young leaves are grown overhead, and
spring comes to look down upon them with their flowers:--
O Spring! of hope, and love, and youth, and gladness,
Wind-winged emblem! brightest, best, and fairest!
Whence comest thou, when, with dark winter’s sadness,
The tears that fade in sunny smiles thou sharest?
Sister of joy, thou art the child who wearest
Thy mother’s dying smile, tender and sweet;
Thy mother Autumn, for whose grave thou bearest
Fresh flowers, and beams like flowers, with gentle feet,
Disturbing not the leaves, which are her winding sheet.”
_Shelley._
[377] Verstegan.
[378] Dr. F. Sayer.
~November 1.~
_All Saints._ _St. Cæsarius_, A. D. 300. _St. Mary._ M. _St.
Marcellus_, Bp. of Paris, 5th Cent. _St. Benignus_, Apostle of
Burgundy, A. D. 272. _St. Austremonius_, 3d Cent. _St. Harold_ VI.,
King of Denmark, A. D. 980.
~All Saints.~
This festival in the almanacs and the church of England calendar is from
the church of Rome, which celebrates it in commemoration of those of its
saints, to whom, on account of their number, particular days could not
be allotted in their individual honour.
On this day, in many parts of England, apples are bobbed for, and nuts
cracked, as upon its vigil, yesterday; and we still retain traces of
other customs that we had in common with Scotland, Ireland, and Wales,
in days of old.
* * * * *
_To the Editor of the Every-Day Book._
Sir,
Should the following excerpt relative to the first of November be of use
to you, it is at your service, extracted from a scarce and valuable work
by Dr. W. Owen Pughe, entitled “Translations of the Heroic Elegies of
Llywarch Hên, London, 1792.”
“The first day of November was considered (among the ancient Welsh) as
the conclusion of summer, and was celebrated with bonfires, accompanied
with ceremonies suitable to the event, and some parts of Wales still
retain these customs. Ireland retains similar ones, and the fire that is
made at these seasons, is called _Beal teinidh_, in the Irish language,
and some antiquaries of that country, in establishing the eras of the
different colonies planted in the island, have been happy enough to
adduce as an argument for their Phœnician origin this term of _Beal
teinidh_.
“The meaning of _tàn_, (in Welsh), like the Irish _teinidh_, is fire,
and _Bal_ is simply a projecting springing out or expanding, and when
applied to vegetation, it means a budding or shooting out of leaves and
blossoms, the same as _balant_, of which it is the root, and it is also
the root of _bala_ and of _blwydd_, _blwyddyn_ and _blynedd_, a year, or
circle of vegetation. So the signification of _bâl dân_, or _tân bâl_,
would be the rejoicing fire for the vegetation, or for the crop of the
year.”
The following seven triplets by Llywarch Hên, who lived to the
surprising age of one hundred and forty years, and wrote in the sixth
century, also relate to the subject. The translations, which are
strictly literal, are also from the pen of Dr. Pughe.
Triplets.
1.
On All Saints day hard is the grain,
The leaves are dropping, the puddle is full,
At setting off in the morning
Woe to him that will trust a stranger.
Tribanau.
1.
Calangauaf caled grawn
Dail ar gychwyn, Uynwyn Uawn:--
Y bore cyn noi fyned,
Gwae a ymddiried i estrawn.
2.
All Saints day, a time of pleasant gossiping,
The gale and the storm keep equal pace,
It is the labour of falsehood to keep a secret.
2.
Calangauaf cain gyfrin,
Cyfred awel a drychin:
Gwaith celwydd yw celu rhin.
3.
On All Saints day the stags are lean,
Yellow are the tops of birch; deserted is the summer dwelling:
Woe to him who for a trifle deserves a curse.
3.
Calangauaf cul hyddod
Melyn blaen bedw, gweddw hafod:
Gwae a haedd mefyl er bychod.
4.
On All Saints day the tops of the branches are bent;
In the mouth of the mischievous, disturbance is congenial:
Where there is no natural gift there will be no learning.
4.
Calangauaf crwm blaen gwrysg:
Gnawd o ben diried derfysg;
Lle ni bo dawn ni bydd dysg.
5.
On All Saints day blustering is the weather,
Very unlike the beginning of the past fair season:
Besides God there is none who knows the future.
5.
Calangauaf garw hin,
Annhebyg i gyntefin:
Namwyn Duw nid oes dewin.
6.
On All Saints day ’tis hard and dry,
Doubly black is the crow, quick is the arrow from the bow,
For the stumbling of the old, the looks of the young wear a smile.
6.
Calangauaf caled cras,
Purddu bran, buan o fras:
Am gwymp hen chwerddid gwèn gwâs.
7.
On All Saints day bare is the place where the heath is burnt,
The plough is in the furrow, the ox at work:
Amongst a hundred ’tis a chance to find a friend.
7.
Calangauaf Uwn goddaith,
Aradyr yn rhych, ych yn ngwaith:
O’r cant odid cydymmaith.
It will be perceived that each triplet, as was customary with the
ancient Britons is accompanied by a moral maxim, without relation to the
subject of the song.