"There is a tender hue that tips the first young leaves of spring,
A trembling beauty in their notes when young birds learn to sing
A purer look when first on earth the gushing brook appears,
A liquid depth in infant eyes that fades with summer years."
In the early days of ecumenical councils it was a mooted point when
Easter should be celebrated. The Christian Jews kept the feast on the
same day as their Passover, the fourteenth of Nisan, the month
corresponding to our March or April; but the Gentile church observed
the first Sunday following this, because Christ rose from the dead on
that day. It was not until the fourth century that the Council of Nice
decided upon the first Sunday after the full moon which follows the
twenty-first of March. The contest was waged long and heavily, but the
Western churches were victorious; a vote settled it.
Perhaps this victory decided the later and more splendid religious
ceremonials of Easter, which are much more observed in Rome and in all
Catholic countries than those of Christmas. Constantine gratified his
love of display by causing Easter to be celebrated with unusual pomp
and parade. Vigils and night watches were instituted, people remaining
all night in the churches in Rome, and carrying high wax tapers
through the streets in processions.
People in the North, glad of an escape from four months of darkness,
watch to see the sun dawn on an Easter morning. They have a
superstitious feeling about this observance, which came originally
from Egypt, and is akin to the legend that the statue of Memnon sings
when the first ray of the sun touches it.
It is the queen of feasts in all Catholic churches, the world over. In
early days, the fasting of Lent was restricted to one day, the Friday
of Passion Week, Good Friday; then it extended to forty hours, then to
forty days,--showing how much fashion, even in churchly affairs, has
to do with these matters. One witty author says that, "people who do
not believe in anything will observe Lent, for it is the fashion."
Certainly, the little dinners of Lent, in fashionable society, are
amongst the most agreeable of all entertainments. The _crème
d'écrevisse_, the oyster and clam soups, the newly arrived shad, the
codfish _à la royale_ and other tempting dainties are very good, and
the dinner being small, and at eight o'clock, there is before it a
long twilight for the drive in the Park.
A pope of Rome once offered a prize to the man who would invent one
thousand ways of cooking eggs, for eggs can always be eaten in Lent,
and let us hope that he found them. The greatest coxcomb of all cooks,
Louis Ude, who was prone to demand a carriage and five thousand a
year, was famous for his little Lenten _menus_, and could cook fish
and eggs marvellously. The amusements of Lent have left one joke in
New York. Roller skates were once a very fashionable amusement for
Lenten afternoons, though now gone out, and a club had rented Irving
Hall for their playground and chosen _Festina lente_, "Make haste
slowly," for their motto. It was a very witty motto, but some wise
Malaprop remarked, "What a very happy selection, 'Festivals of Lent!'"
However, Lent once passed, with its sewing circles and small
whist-parties, then comes the brilliant Easter, with its splendid
dinners, its weddings, its christenings and caudle parties, its
ladies' lunches, its Meadow Brook hunt, its asparagus parties, and the
chickens of gayety which are hatched out of Easter eggs. It is a great
day for the confectioner. In Paris, that city full of gold and misery,
the splendour and luxury of the Easter egg _bonbonnière_ is fabulous.
A few years since a Paris house furnished an Easter egg for a Spanish
infanta, which cost eight hundred pounds sterling.
Easter dinners can be made delightful. They are simple, less heavy,
hot, and stuffy, than those of mid-winter. That enemy of the feminine
complexion, the furnace, is put out. It no longer sends up its direful
sirocco behind one's back. Spring lamb and mint sauce, asparagus and
fresh dandelion salad, replace the heavy joint and the canned
vegetables. A foreigner said of us that we have everything canned,
even the canvas-back duck and the American opera. Everything should be
fresh. The ice-cream man devises allegorical allusions in his forms,
and there are white dinners for young brides, and roseate dinners for
_débutantes_.
For a gorgeous ladies' lunch, behold a _menu_. This is for Easter
Monday:--
Little Neck clams.
Chablis. Beef tea or _consommé_ in cups.
_Côtelettes de cervelles à la cardinal._ Cucumbers.
Little ducks with fresh mushrooms.
Champagne. Artichokes.
Sweetbread _à la Richelieu_.
Asparagus, Hollandaise sauce.
Claret. Roman punch.
_Pâté de foie gras._
Roast snipe.
Tomato salad, lettuce.
Liqueur. Ice-creams,
in form of nightingales' nests.
Strawberries, sugared fruit, nougat cakes.
Coffee.
Of course, a season of such rejoicing, when "Christians stand praying,
each in an exalted attitude, with outstretched hands and uplifted
faces, expressing joy and gladness," is thought to be very propitious
for marriage. There is generally a wedding every day, excepting
Friday, during Easter week. A favourite spring travelling-dress for an
Easter bride is fawn coloured cashmere, with a little round hat and
bunch of primroses.
For a number of choir boys to sing an epithalamium, walking up the
aisle before the bride, is a new and very beautiful Easter fashion.
A favourite entertainment for Easter is a christening. Christening
parties are becoming very important functions in the art of
entertaining. Many Roman Catholics are so anxious for the salvation of
the little new soul, that they have their children baptized as soon as
possible, but others put off this important ceremony until mamma can
go to church, when little master is five weeks old. Then friends are
invited to the ceremony very much in this fashion:--
Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton request the pleasure of your company at
the baptism of their infant daughter at the Cathedral, Monday,
March 30, at 12 o'clock. At home, after the ceremony, 14 W.
Ellicott Square.
Many wealthy Roman Catholics have private chapels where the ceremony
may be performed earlier.
Presents are sent to the mamma, of flowers and bonbonnières shaped
like an altar, a cradle, a powder-box; and there may be gold
tea-scoops, pap-spoons and a caudle-cup. Gifts of old Dutch silver and
the inevitable posy or couplet are very favourite gifts for the baby
and mamma on these auspicious occasions.
Caudle is a very succulent porridge made of oatmeal, raisins, spices,
and rum, all boiled together for several days until it becomes a jelly
gruel. It is very much sweetened, and is served hot in cups. The
caudle-cup designed by Albrecht Dürer for some member of the family of
Maximilian is still shown. Caudle cards are very often stamped with a
cameo resemblance of these cups, and the invitation reads:--
MRS. JAMES HAMILTON,
at Home,
Thursday, March 30, from three to six.
Caudle.
These do not require an answer.
Very pretty tea-gowns are worn by mamma and the ladies of her family
for this entertainment, but the guests come in bonnets and street
dresses. There is no objection to having the afternoon tea-table with
its silver tea-kettle, alcohol-lamp, pretty silver tea-set, plates of
bread and butter, and little cakes ready for those ladies who prefer
tea. Caudle is sometimes added to the teas of a winter afternoon, by
the remnants of old Dutch families, even when there is no little
master as a _raison d'être_, and delicious it is.
There is a pretty account of the marriage of Marguerite of Austria
with Philibert, the handsome Duke of Savoy. It is called _Mariage aux
oeufs_. She had come to the Castle of Brae, in the charming district
of Bresse lying on the western slopes of the Alps. Here the rich
princess kept open house, and Philibert, who was hunting in the
neighbourhood, came to pay his court to her. It was Easter Monday, and
high and low danced together on the green. The old men drew their bows
on a barrel filled with wine, and when one succeeded in planting his
arrow firmly in it he was privileged to drink as much as he pleased
_jusqu'à merci_.
A hundred eggs were scattered in a level place, covered with sand, and
a lad and lass, holding each other by the hand, came forward to
execute a dance of the country. According to the ancient custom, if
they succeeded in finishing the _branle_ without breaking a single egg
they became affianced, and even the will of their parents might not
avail to break their union. Three couples had already tried it
unsuccessfully and shouts of laughter derided their attempts, when the
sound of a horn was heard, and Philibert of Savoy, radiant with youth
and happiness, appeared on the scene. He bent his knees before the
noble _châtelaine_ and besought her hospitality. He proposed to her to
try the egg fortune. She accepted. Their grace and beauty charmed the
lookers-on and they succeeded, without a single crash, in treading the
perilous maze.
"Savoy and Austria!" shouted the crowd. And she said, "Let us adopt
the custom of Bresse."
They were married, and enjoyed a few years of exquisite happiness;
then the beloved husband died. Marguerite survived him long, but never
forgot him. She built in his memory a beautiful church. Travellers go
to-day to see their magnificent tomb.
The egg has been in all ages and in all countries the subject of
infinite mystery, legend, and history. The ancient Finns believed that
a mystic bird laid an egg in the lap of Vaimainon, who hatched it in
his bosom. He let it fall in the water, and it broke. The lower
portion of the shell formed the earth, the upper the sky, the liquid
white became the sun, the yolk the moon, while little bits of
egg-shells became the stars.
Old English and Irish nurses instruct the children, when they have
eaten a boiled egg, to push the spoon through the bottom of the shell
to hinder the witches from making a boat of it.
It is difficult to ascertain the precise origin of the custom of
offering eggs at the festival of Easter. The Persians, the Russians,
and the Jews all follow it.
Amongst the Romans the year began at Easter, as it did amongst the
Franks under the Capets. Many presents are exchanged, and as an egg is
the beginning of all things, nothing better could be found as an
offering. Its symbolic meaning is striking. We offer our friends all
the blessings contained under that fragile shell, whose fragility
represents that of happiness here below. The Romans commenced their
repasts with an egg; hence the proverbial phrase, "_ab ovo usque ad
mala_," or, as we still say, "beginning _ab ovo_."
Another reason given for the Easter egg is that, about the fourth
century, the Church forbade the use of eggs in Lent. But as the
heretical hens would go on laying, the eggs accumulated to such a
degree that they were boiled hard and given away. They were given to
the children for playthings, and they dyed them of gay colours. In
certain churches in Belgium the priests, at the beginning of a glad
anthem, threw the eggs at the choristers who threw them back again,
dancing to the music whilst catching the frail eggs that they might
not break.
In Germany, where means are more limited than in France, the Easter
egg _bonbonnière_ is rare. There are none of the eight-hundred-pound
kind, which was made of enamel, and which on its inside had engraved
the gospel for the day, while by an ingenious mechanism a little bird,
lodged in this pretty cage, sang twelve airs from as many operas.
But in Germany, to make up for this poverty, they have transformed the
hare into an oviparous animal, and in the pastry cook's windows one
sees this species of hen sitting upright in a nest surrounded by eggs.
I have often wondered if that inexplicable saying "a mare's nest,"
might not have been "a hare's nest." As a _lucus a non lucendo_ it
would have done as well. When a German child, at any season of the
year, sees a hare run across the field, he says, "Hare, good little
hare, lay plenty of eggs for me on Easter day." It is the custom of
German families, on Easter eve, to place sugar-eggs and real eggs, the
former filled with sugar plums, in a nest, and then to conceal it with
dried leaves in the garden that the joyous children may hunt for them
on Easter morning.
It is a superstition all over the world that we should wear new
clothes on Easter Day. Bad luck will follow if there is not at least
one article which is new.