Nooks and Corners of English Life, Past and Present Part 15

Prof. Michelsen shows that the _cultellum_, which was given by the Franks, Goths, and Germans, in the ninth and tenth centuries, on the transfer of land, with the _signum_ cut on a piece of wood, was originally intended for notching the mark on the wood, in the same manner as the inkstand and pen were lifted up with the chart, as symbols of a transfer of land. Among the archives of Notre Dame, at Paris, is preserved a pointed pocket-knife of the eleventh century, on the ivory handle of which is engraved the record of a gift of land; and at the same place is preserved a piece of wood, of the ninth century, six inches long and one inch square, attached to a diploma, as was then the custom. A similar knife, with an ivory handle, is still preserved, attached to a charter of Trinity College, Cambridge.

The surrender of copyholds by the rod or glove, and occasionally by a straw, or rush (whence the word "stipulation," from _stipula_, straw), is well known in England; and in the manor of Paris Garden, Surrey, an ebony rod is preserved with a silver head, on which are engraved the royal arms, with E. R. and a crown, and an inscription purporting that it is kept for the surrender of copyholds of the manor. The inscribed sticks, mentioned in Ezekiel x.x.xv. 16, appear to relate to this ancient mode of conveyancing.

V. Olden Customs and Ceremonies.

MAY-DAY CAROL ON MAGDALEN COLLEGE TOWER.

May customs are nothing more than a gratulation of the spring, to testify universal joy at the revival of vegetation. Hence the universality of the practice; and its festivities being inspired by the gay face of Nature, they are as old as any we have on record. There is at Oxford a May-day ceremony which has a special claim upon our respect and veneration, for nearly four centuries.

Upon the majestic Perpendicular tower of Magdalen College we have many time and oft looked with reverential feeling: seen from every point, it delights the eye with its stately form, fine proportions, and admirable simplicity; and with its history is a.s.sociated a May-day custom of surpa.s.sing interest. For more than three centuries and a half the choristers of the College have a.s.sembled upon the top of its tower on a May-day morning, and there performed a most harmonious service, the origin of which has been thus traced by the learned Dr. Rimbault.

In the year 1501, the "most Christian" King Henry VII. gave to Magdalen College the advowsons of the churches of Slymbridge, in Gloucesters.h.i.+re, and Fyndon, in Suss.e.x, together with one acre of land in each parish. In grat.i.tude for this benefaction, the College was accustomed, during the lifetime of the royal benefactor, to celebrate a service in honour of the Holy Trinity, with the collect still used on Trinity Sunday; and the prayer, "Almighty and everlasting G.o.d, we are taught by Thy word that the heart of kings," &c.; and, after the death of the King, to commemorate him in the usual manner.

The Commemoration Service ordered in the time of Queen Elizabeth, is still performed on the 1st of May; when is sung on the College-tower a Latin hymn, which has evidently reference to the original service. The produce of the two acres before-mentioned used to be distributed on the same day, between the President and Fellows: it has, however, for many years been given up, to supply the choristers with a festal entertainment in the College-hall.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SINGING THE MAY-DAY CAROL ON MAGDALEN COLLEGE TOWER.]

The arrangement of the ceremony is as follows. At about half-past four o'clock in the morning, the singing boys and men, accompanied by members of Magdalen and different colleges, ascend to the platform of the tower; and the choristers, having put on their surplices, range themselves on the slightly-gabled roof, standing with their faces towards the east.

Magdalen bell having tolled five, the choristers sing from their books the Latin hymn, of which the following is a translation:--

"Father and G.o.d, we wors.h.i.+p Thee, And praise and bless on bended knee: With food Thou'rt to our bodies kind, With heavenly grace dost cheer the mind.

"O, Jesus, only Son of G.o.d!

Thee we adore, and praise, and laud: Thy love did not disdain the gloom Of a pure Virgin's holy womb.

"Nail'd to the cross, a victim made, On Thee the wrath of G.o.d was laid: Our only Saviour, now by Thee Immortal life we hope to see.

"To Thee, Eternal Spirit, rise Unceasing praise, from earth and skies: Thy breath awoke the heavenly Child, And gave Him to His mother mild.

"To Thee, the Triune G.o.d, be paid-- To Thee, who our redemption made-- All honour, thanks, and praise divine, For this great mystery of Thine!"

At the close of the hymn, all heads are covered, and the singers hasten to the belfry, whence the bells ring out a joyful peal. The spectators in the road beneath disperse, the boys blowing tin horns, according to ancient custom, to welcome in sweet May; while others ramble into the fields to gather cowslips and field flowers, which they bring into the town. Occasionally the singing on the tower has been heard, with a favourable wind, at two miles' distance. This being a "gaudy day" for the choristers, they have a dinner of roast lamb and plum-pudding in the College-hall at two o'clock. There is a good representation of the ceremony on the tower, carefully engraved by Joseph Lionel Williams, in the _Ill.u.s.trated London News_, whence the accompanying representation has been reduced.

Dr. Rimbault, whilst making some researches in the library of Christchurch, Oxford, discovered what appeared to him to be the first draft of the above hymn. It has the following note:--"This hymn is sung every day in Magdalen College Hall, Oxon, dinner and supper throughout the year, for the after grace, by the chaplains, clerks, and choristers there. Composed by Benjamin Rogers, Doctor of Musicke of the University of Oxon, 1685." The author of the hymn is unknown.

At Oxford, formerly, boys used to blow cows'-horns and hollow canes all night, to welcome in May-day; and girls carried about garlands of flowers, which afterwards they hung upon the churches.

Before we leave the sacred ground whereon this holy May-day ceremony is, year by year, performed, we present the reader with a very ably-drawn picture of the locality itself, and its many attractions.

"Probably," says a writer in the _Sat.u.r.day Review_, "there is no city in the United Kingdom, with the exception of the metropolis, which possesses such a concentration of interest as Oxford. Its historical a.s.sociations are spread over a long succession of ages. Not to speak of more apocryphal reminiscences, it was a favourite residence of one of our monarchs, and the birthplace of another. It was the scene of important transactions in the troubled reign of Stephen, and witnessed an episode in the equally troubled reign of the third Henry. It beheld the seeds of the Reformation sown by Wycliff, and saw the martyrdom of Cranmer and his fellow-sufferers. It became a confessor for the Church of England as against Puritanism under the second Stuart, and as against Popery under the fourth. It has been, at least since the Reformation, a sort of head-quarters of that Church; and has witnessed, in our own day, the most remarkable theological convulsions which it has experienced since the Reformation. Its outward appearance is in keeping with its history. It bears traces of the architecture of eight centuries--from the rude belfry-tower of St. Michael's, which has been a.s.signed on good authority to the age of the Confessor, to Mr. Scott's exquisite imitation of the Sainte Chapelle, in its immediate neighbourhood. It is true that it contains no building of the first rank; but it exhibits an almost infinite variety, under the influence of accidental yet harmonious grouping, which has a charm more akin to that of nature than that of art. In its aesthetical as well as in its moral aspect, it betrays a strong spirit of Conservatism, and, occasionally, one of studied Revivalism. We see in Oxford the shadow of the Middle Ages projected far into the region of modern life. A College is a strange compound, half club, half convent, and its daily usages are curiously intermingled with the past. For two centuries after the Reformation, Protestant founders cast their inst.i.tutions in the mould of Wykeham and Waynflete: the scholastic system appears to have been a living thing at the beginning of the last century, and its ghost still haunts the academic shades. These facts have their parallel in the architecture of Oxford. The revival of mediaeval art, which we have ourselves witnessed, had its precursors here in the early part of the seventeenth century.

Nowhere in England--we may almost say, nowhere in Europe--shall we find such good and pure Gothic, built at a time when the style was defunct elsewhere, as is presented by the Chapels of Wadham, Lincoln, and Jesus Colleges, and in the staircase of Christchurch Hall; and as was to be seen in the chapel of Exeter College, before its destruction.

"With such attractions, added to that of personal interest, arising out of the past or in direct connexion with the place, it is no wonder that Oxford, at the most pleasant season of the year, draws to itself crowds of visitors from all parts of the country. The only wonder is, that it is not even more popular than it is, when we consider the throngs of English men and women who are to be met with in the dingy and unsavoury Colleges of continental cities from June till October."

At Saffron Wolden, and in the village of Debden, an old May-day song is still sung by the little girls, who go about in parties carrying garlands from door to door. The first stanza is to be repeated after each of the others by way of chorus:--

"I, I been a rambling all this night, And some part of this day, And, now returning back again, I brought you a garland gay.

"A garland gay I brought you here, And at your door I stand; 'Tis nothing but a sprout, but 'tis well budded out, The works of our Lord's hand.

"Why don't you do as I have done The very first day of May?

And from my parents I have come, And could no longer stay.

"So dear, so dear as Christ loved us, And for our sins was slain, Christ bids us turn from wickedness, And turn to the Lord again."

The garlands which the girls carry are sometimes large and handsome, and a doll is usually placed in the middle, dressed in white, according to certain traditional regulations: this doll represents the Virgin Mary, and is a relic of the ages of Romanism.

The May-pole still lingers in the village of St. Briavel's, in the picturesque forest of Dean. In the village of Burley in the New Forest, a May-pole is erected, a fete given to the school children, and a May-queen is chosen by lots; a floral crown surmounts the pole, and garlands of flowers hang about the shaft. Among other late instances are recorded a May-pole, eighty feet high, on the village-green of West Dean, Wilts, in 1836; and in 1844, there was "dancing round the May-pole" in St. James's district, Enfield. William Howitt describes May-poles in the village of Lisby, near Newstead; and in Farnsfield, near Southwell, Derbys.h.i.+re, May-poles are to be seen. Dr. Parr was a great patron of May-day festivities: opposite his parsonage-house at Hatton, near Warwick, stood the parish May-pole, which was annually dressed with garlands, and the doctor danced with his paris.h.i.+oners around the shaft. He kept its large crown in a closet of his house, from whence it was produced every May-day, and decorated with fresh flowers and streamers, preparatory to its elevation to the top of the pole.

On May-day and December 26th, is distributed the fund bequeathed in 1717 and 1736, by Mr. Raine, a wealthy brewer at St. George's-in-the-East, who founded schools and a hospital for girls, and added marriage portions of 100_l_., to be drawn by lots: the winner is married to a young man, of St. John's, Wapping, or St. Paul's, Shadwell; the couple dine with their friends, and in the evening an ode is sung, and the marriage portion of one hundred new sovereigns is presented to the bride.

Miss Baker, in her _Northamptons.h.i.+re Glossary_, tells us that there are very few villages in that county where the May-day Festival is not noticed in some way or other.

BANBURY CAKES.--CONGLETON CAKES, ETC.

That the ancient town of Banbury, lying on the northern verge of the county of Oxford, should have been famed, from time immemorial, for its rich cakes, should not excite our special wonder, seeing that the district has some of the richest pasture land in the kingdom; a single cow being here known to produce 200 pounds of b.u.t.ter in a year! b.u.t.ter, we need scarcely add, is the prime ingredient of the Banbury cake, giving it the richness and lightness of the finest puff-paste; and, to the paper in which the cakes are wrapped, the appearance of their having been packed up by bakers with well-b.u.t.tered fingers.

The cause of this cake-fame must, however, be sought in a higher walk of history than in the annals of pastry-making. It appears that the Banbury folks went on rejoicing in the fatness of their cakes until the reign of Elizabeth; from which time to that of Charles II., the people of the town were so noted for their peculiar religious fervour, as to draw upon themselves most unsparingly the satire of contemporary playwrights, wits, and humorists. By some unlucky turn of time, cakes, which were much valued by the cla.s.sical ancients, and were given away as presents, in the Middle Ages, instead of bread, became looked upon as a superst.i.tious relic by the Puritans, who thereupon abolished the practice. They formed so predominant a party at Banbury, in the reign of Elizabeth, that they pulled down Banbury Cross, so celebrated in our nursery rhymes. In the face of this historical fact, however, the reputed "zeal" of the Banburians has been attributed to an accidental circ.u.mstance, in modern phrase, "an error of the press." In Gough's edition of Camden's _Britannia_, in the MS. supplement, is this note: "Put out the word _zeale_ in Banbury, where some think it a disgrace, when a _zeale_ with knowledge is the greater grace among good Christians; for it was first foysted in by some compositor or press-man, neither is it in my Latin copie, which I desire the reader to hold as authentic." It was, indeed, printed, as a proverb, "Banbury zeal, cheese, and cakes," instead of "Banbury veal, cheese, and cakes."

Gibson, in his edition of Camden, however, gives another version, relating: "There is a credible story--that while Philemon Holland was carrying on his English edition of the _Britannia_, Mr. Camden came accidentally to the press, when this sheet was working off; and looking on, he found, that to his own observation of Banbury being famous for cheese, the translator had added cakes and ale. But Mr. Camden thinking it too light an expression, changed the word _ale_ into _zeal_; and so it pa.s.sed, to the great indignation of the Puritans, who abounded in this town." Barnaby Googe, in his _Strappado for the Divell_, refers to Banbury as

"Famous for tw.a.n.ging ale, zeal, cakes, and cheese."

Better remembered are the lines in his _Journey through England_:

"To Banbury came I, O profane one!

Where I saw a puritane one Hanging of his cat on Monday For killing of a mouse on Sunday."

Early in the seventeenth century, the Puritans were very strong in Banbury. In Ben Jonson's _Bartholomew Fair_, Zeal-of-the-Land Busy, the Puritanical Rabbi, is called a _Banbury man_, and described as one who was a baker--"but he does dream now, and sees visions; he has given over his trade out of a scruple that he took, that it spiced conscience, _those cakes he made_ were served to bridales, May-poles, morrises, and such profane feasts and meetings:" in other words, he had been a baker, but left off that trade to set up for a prophet; and one of the characters in _Bartholomew Fair_ says: "I have known divers of these Banburians when I was at Oxford." And Sir William D'Avenant, in his play of _The Wits_, ill.u.s.trates this Puritanical character, in

"A weaver of Banbury, that hopes To entice heaven by singing, to make him lord of twenty looms."

Old Thomas Fuller personifies the zeal in the Rev. William Whately, who was Vicar of Banbury in the reign of James I., and was called "The Roaring Boy." Fuller adds: "Only let them (the Banbury folks) adde knowledge to their zeal, and then the more zeal the better their condition." The Vicar was a zealous and popular preacher, according to his monument:

"It's William Whately that here lies, Who swam to's tomb in's people's eyes."

In the _Tatler_, No. 220, in describing his "Ecclesiastical Thermometer," to indicate the changes and revolutions in the Church, the Essayist writes, "That facetious divine, Dr. Fuller, speaking of the town of Banbury, near a hundred years ago, tells us, 'it was a place famous for cakes and zeal,' which I find by my gla.s.s is true to this day, as to the latter part of this description, though I must confess it is not in the same reputation for cakes that it was in the time of that learned author."

The Banburians, however, maintained their character for zeal in a grand demonstration made by them in favour of Dr. Sacheverell, whose trial had just terminated in his acquittal; and in the same year, this High Church champion made a triumphal pa.s.sage through Banbury, on his journey to take possession of the living of Salatin, in Shrops.h.i.+re, which was ridiculed in a pamphlet, with a woodcut ill.u.s.trative of the procession; and there appeared another pamphlet on the same lively subject.