"Missa ad prohibendum ab Idolis." See Maeri Hiero-Lexicon, p. 156. [It is a saying still heard in the North of England,— And, At New Year's tide, The days lengthen a cock's stride. If the grass grows in Janiveer, It grows the worse for't all the year. According to the Shepherd's Kalender, 1709, p. 16, "if New Year's Day in the morning open with duskey red clouds, it denotes strifes and debates among great ones, and many robberies to happen that year." Opening the Bible on this day is a superstitious practice still in common use in some parts of the country, and much credit is attached to it. It is usually set about with some little solemnity on the morning before breakfast, as the ceremony must be performed fasting. The Bible is laid on the table unopened, and the parties who wish to consult it are then to open it in succession. They are not at liberty to choose any particular part of the book, but must open it at random. Wherever this may happen to be, the inquirer is to place his finger on any chapter contained in the two open pages, but without any previous perusal or examination. The chapter is then read aloud, and commented upon by the people assembled. It is believed that the good or ill fortune, the happiness or misery of the consulting party, during the ensuing year, will be in some way or other described and foreshown by the contents of the chapter. Never allow any to take a light out of your house on New Year's Day; a death in the household, before the expiration of the year, is sure to occur if it be allowed. If a female is your first visitant, and be permitted to enter your house on the morning of New Year's Day, it portendeth ill-luck for the whole year. Never throw any ashes, or dirty water, or any article, however worthless, out of your house on this day. It betokens ill-luck; but you may bring in as many honestly gotten goods as you can procure.] TWELFTH DAY. THIS day, which is well known to be called the Twelfth from its being the twelfth in number from the Nativity, is called also the Feast of the Epiphany, from a Greek word signifying manifestation, our Lord having been on that day made manifest to the Gentiles. This, as Bourne observes, is one of the greatest of the twelve, and of more jovial observation for the visiting of friends, and Christmas gambols. "With some," according to this author, "Christmas ends with the twelve days, but with the generality of the vulgar, not till Candlemas." Dugdale, in his Origines Juridiciales, p. 286, speaking of "Orders for Government-Gray's Inne," cites an order of 4 Car. I. (Nov. 17), that "all playing at dice, cards or otherwise, in the hall, buttry, or butler's chamber, should be thenceforth barred and forbidden at all times of the year, the twenty days in Christmas only excepted." The following extract from Collier's Ecclesiastical History, i. 163, seems to account in a satisfactory manner for the name of Twelfth Day. "In the days of King Alfred a law was made with relation to holidays, by virtue of which the twelve days after the Nativity of our Saviour were made Festivals." From the subsequent passage in Bishop Hall's Satires, 1598, p. 67, the whole twelve days appear to have been dedicated to feasting and jollity : "Except the twelve days, or the wake-day feast, What time he needs must be his cosen's guest." The customs of this day vary in different countries, yet agree in the same end, that is to do honour to the Eastern Magi, who are supposed to have been of royal dignity. In France, while that country had a court and king, one of the courtiers was chosen king, and the other nobles attended on this day at an entertainment. "Of these Magi, or Sages (vulgarly called the three Kings of Colen), the first, named, Melchior, an aged man with a long beard, offered gold; the second, Jasper, a beardless youth, offered frankincense; the 1" Atque ab ipso natali Jesu Christi die ad octavam usque ab Epiphania lucem, jejunia nemo observato, nisi quidem judicio ac voluntate fecerit sua, aut id ei fuerit à sacerdote imperatum." Seld. Analecton Anglo-Britannicon, lib. ii. p. 108. third, Balthasar, a black or Moor, with a large spreading beard, offered myrrh, according to this distich "Tres Reges Regi Regum tria dona ferebant ; Myrrham Homini, Uncto Aurum, Thura dedere Deo." The dedication of The Bee-hive of the Romish Church concludes thus: "Datum in our Museo the 5th of January, being the even of the three Kings of Collen, at which time all good Catholiks make merry and crie 'The King drinkes.' In anno 1569. Isaac Rabbolence, of Loven." Selden, in his Table Talk, p. 20, says, "Our chusing Kings and Queens on Twelfth Night has reference to the three Kings." [According to Blount, the inhabitants of Staffordshire made a fire on the eve of Twelfth Day, "in memory of the blazingstar that conducted the three Magi to the manger at Bethlem." See Halliwell's Dictionary, p. 184.] At the end of the year 1792, the Council-general of the Commons at Paris passed an arrêt, in consequence of which "La Fête de Rois" (Twelfth Day) was thenceforth to be called "La Fête de Sans-Culottes." It was called an anti-civic feast, which made every priest that kept it a Royalist. There is a very curious account in Le Roux, Dictionnaire Comique, tome ii. p. 431, of the French ceremony of the "Roi de la Feve," which explains Jordaens' fine picture of "Le Roi boit." See an account of this custom in Busalde de Verville, Palais des Curieux, edit. 1612, p. 90, and also Pasquier, Recherches de la France, p. 375. Among the Cries of Paris, a poem composed by Guillaume de Villeneuve in the thirteenth century, printed at the end of Barbasan's Ordene de Chevalerie, Beans for Twelfth Day are mentioned, 'Gastel a feve orrois crier." To the account given by Le Roux of the French way of choosing King and Queen, may be added that in Normandy they place a child under the table, which is covered in such a manner with the cloth that he cannot see what is doing; and when the cake is divided, one of the company taking up the first piece, cries out, "Fabe Domini pour qui?" The child 66 answers, Pour le bon Dieu:" and in this manner the pieces are allotted to the company. If the bean be found in piece for the "bon Dieu," the king is chosen by drawing long or short straws. Whoever gets the bean chooses the King or Queen, according as it happens to be a man or woman. Sir Thomas Urquhart, of Cromarty, in his curious work, entitled The Discovery of a most exquisite jewel, found in the kennel of Worcester streets, the day after the fight, 1651, says, p. 237, "Verily, I think they make use of Kings-as the French on the Epiphany-day use their Roy de la fehve, or King of the Bean; whom after they have honoured with drinking of his health, and shouting aloud, 'Le Roy boit, Le Roy boit,' they make pay for all the reckoning; not leaving him sometimes one peny, rather than the exorbitancie of their debosh should not be satisfied to the full." In a curious book, entitled A World of Wonders, fol. Lond. 1607, we read, p. 189, of a Curate, "who having taken his preparations over evening, when all men cry (as the manner is) the King drinketh, chanting his Masse the next morning, fell asleep in his memento: and when he awoke, added with a loud voice, the King drinketh.” In Germany they observed nearly the same rites in cities and academies, where the students and citizens chose one of their own number for king, providing a most magnificent banquet on the occasion. The choosing of a person king or queen by a bean found in a piece of a divided cake, was formerly a common Christmas gambol in both the English universities.1 Thomas Randolph, in a curious letter to Dudley, Lord Leicester, dated Edin. 15 Jan. 1563, mentions Lady Flemyng being "Queene of the Bene" on Twelfth Day. Pinkerton's Ancient Scot. Poems, ii. 431. When the King of Spain told the Count Olivarez, that John, Duke of Braganza, had obtained the kingdom of Portugal, he slighted it, saying that he was but Rey de Havas, a bean-cake King (a King made by children on Twelfth Night). Seward's Anecdotes, iii. 317. The bean appears to have made part of the ceremony on 1 Mr Douce's MS. notes say, "Mos inolevit et viget apud plurimas nationes, ut in profesto Epiphaniæ, seu trium Regum, in quaque familia seu alia societate, sorte vel alio fortuito modo eligant sibi Regem, et convivantes una ac genialiter viventes, bibente rege, acclamant, Rex bibit, bibit Rex, indicta multa qui non clamaverit. See the Sylva Sermonum jucundissimorum, 8vo. Bas. 1568, pp. 73, 246." choosing king and queen in England; thus, in Ben Jonson's Masque of Christmas, the character of Baby-Cake is attended by "an usher bearing a great cake with a bean and a pease." Misson, in his Travels in England, translated by Ozell, p. 34, tells us, in a note, "On Twelfth Day they divide the cake, alias choose King and Queen, and the King treats the rest of the company. Anstis, in his Collections relative to the Court of Chivalry, among the Addit. MSS. in the British Museum, i. 93, says, "The practisers of the Parliaments or Courts of Justice in France chose a governor among them, whom they styled Roy de Basoche, which calls to remembrance the custom observed in our Inns of Court, of electing a king on Christmas Day, who assumed the name of some fancied kingdom, and had officers with splendid titles to attend on him. Answerable hereto some of our colleges in Oxford did, from the time of their first foundation, annually choose a Lord at Christmas, styled in their registers Rex Fabarum, and Rex regni Fabarum, which was continued down to the Reformation of Religion, and probably had that appellation because he might be appointed by lot, wherein beans were used, as the Roy de la Febue on the feast of the Three Kings, or Twelfth Day, was the person who had that part of the cake wherein the bean was placed." In the ancient calendar of the Romish church I find an observation on the fifth day of January, the eve or vigil of the Epiphany, "Kings created or elected by beans." The sixth is called "The Festival of Kings," with this additional remark, "that this ceremony of electing kings was continued with feasting for many days." There was a custom similar to this on the festive days of Saturn among the Romans, Grecians, &c. Persons of the same rank drew lots for kingdoms, and, like kings, exercised their temporary authority. (Alex. ab Alexandro, b. ii. ch. 22.) The learned Moresin observes, that our ceremony of choosing a king on the Epiphany, or feast of the Three Kings, is practised about the same time of the year; and that he is called the Bean King, from the lot. This custom is practised nowhere that I know of at present in the north of England, though still very prevalent in the south. I find the following description of it in the Universal Magazine, 1774. |