And all the lusty yonkers, in a rout,
With merry lasses daunc'd the rod about,
Then Friendship to their banquets bid the guests,
And poore men far'd the better for their feasts.

The lords of castles, mannors, townes, and towers,
Rejoic'd when they beheld the farmers flourish,
And would come downe unto the summer bowers
To see the country gallants dance the morrice.

But since the summer poles were overthrown,

And all good sports and merriment decay'd, How times and men are changed, so well is knowne, It were but labour lost if more were said.

Alas, poore May-poles! what should be the cause
That you were almost banish't from the earth?
Who never were rebellious to the lawes;

Your greatest crime was harmlesse honest mirth:
What fell malignant spirit was there found,
To cast your tall pyramides to ground?
To be some envious nature it appeares,
That men might fall together by the eares.

Some fiery, zealous brother, full of spleene,

That all the world in his deepe wisdom scornes,
Could not endure the May-pole should be seene
To weare a coxe-combe higher than his hornes :
He took it for an idoll, and the feast
For sacrifice unto that painted beast;
Or for the wooden Trojan asse of sinne,

By which the wicked merry Greeks came in.

But I doe hope once more the day will come,

That you shall mount and pearch your cocks as high As e'er you did, and that the pipe and drum Shall bid defiance to your enemy;

And that all fidlers, which in corners lurke,

And have been almost starved for want of worke,
Shall draw their crowds, and at your exaltation,
Play many a fit of merry recreation,

And you, my native town (Leeds), which was of old,
Whenas thy bon-fires burn'd and May-poles stood,
And when thy wassall-cups were uncontrol'd

The summer bower of peace and neighbourhood;
Although since these went down, thou lyst forlorn,
By factious schismes and humours overborne,
Some able hand I hope thy rod will raise,
That thou mayst see once more thy happy daies."

Douce observes that, "during the reign of Elizabeth, the Puritans made considerable havoc among the May-games by their preachings and invectives. Poor Maid Marian was assimilated to the whore of Babylon; Friar Tuck was deemed a remnant of Popery; and the Hobby-horse as an impious and Pagan superstition: and they were at length most completely put to the rout, as the bitterest enemies of religion. King James's Book of Sports restored the Lady and the Hobby-horse but during the Commonwealth, they were again attacked by a new set of fanatics; and, together with the whole of the May festivities, the Whitsun-ales, &c., in many parts of England, degraded." (Illustr. of Shakespeare, ii. 463.) In a curious tract, entitled the Lord's loud Call to England, published by H. Jessey, 1660, there is given part of a letter from one of the Puritan party in the North, dated Newcastle, 7th of May, 1660: "Sir, the countrey, as well as the town, abounds with vanities; now the reins of liberty and licentiousness are let loose: May-poles, and playes, and juglers, and all things else, now pass current. Sin now appears with a brazen face," &c.1

In Rich's Honestie of this Age, 1615, p. 5, is the following passage: "The country swaine, that will sweare more on Sundaies, dancing about a May-pole, then he will doe all the week after at his worke, will have a cast at me."

In Small Poems of divers Sorts, written by Sir Aston Cokain, 1658, p. 209, is the following, of Wakes and Maypoles:

"The zealots here are grown so ignorant,

That they mistake wakes for some ancient saint,
They else would keep that feast; for though they all
Would be cal'd saints here, none in heaven they call:
Besides they May-poles hate with all their soul,
I think, because a Cardinal was a Pole."

1 Dr. Stukeley, in his Itinerarium Curiosum, 1724, p. 29, says: There is a May-pole hill near Horn Castle, Lincolnshire, "where probably stood an Hermes in Roman times. The boys annually keep up the festival of the Floralia on May Day, making a procession to this hill with May gads (as they call them) in their hands. This is a white willow wand, the bark peel'd off, ty'd round with cowslips, a thyrsus of the Bacchinals. At night they have a bonefire, and other merriment, which is really a sacrifice or religious festival."

Stevenson, in the Twelve Moneths, p. 25, has these observations at the end of May :

"Why should the priest against the May-pole preach?
Alas! it is a thing out of his reach;

How he the errour of the time condoles,

And sayes, 'tis none of the cælestial poles;

Whilst he (fond man!) at May-poles thus perplext,

Forgets he makes a May-game of his text.

But May shall tryumph at a higher rate,

Having trees for poles, and boughs to celebrate;

And the green regiment, in brave array,

Like Kent's great walking grove, shall bring in May.”

After the Restoration, as has been already noticed, Maypoles were permitted to be erected again. Thomas Hall, however, another of the puritanical writers, published his Funebriæ Floræ, the Downfall of May Games, so late as 1660. At the end is a copy of verses,1 from which the subsequent selection has been made :—

"I am Sir May-pole, that's my name;

Men, May, and Mirth give me the same.
And thus hath Flora, May, and Mirth,
Begun and cherished my birth,

Till time and means so favour'd mee,
That of a twig I waxt a tree :
Then all the people, less and more,
My height and tallness did adore.

under Heaven's cope,

There's none as I so near the Pope;
Whereof the Papists give to mee,
Next papal, second dignity.
Hath holy father much adoe

When he is chosen? so have I too :
Doth he upon men's shoulders ride?
That honour doth to mee betide:
There is joy at my plantation,
As is at his coronation;

Men, women, children, on an heap,
Do sing, and dance, and frisk and leap;
Yea, drumms and drunkards, on a rout,
Before mee make a hideous shout;
Whose loud alarum and blowing cries

Do fright the earth and pierce the skies.

[A copy of these lines may be seen in MS. Harl. 1221, where they

are entitled, "A May-pooles speech to a traveller."]

Hath holy Pope his holy guard,
So have I to do it watch and ward.

For, where 'tis nois'd that I am come,
My followers summoned are by drum.
I have a mighty retinue,

The scum of all the raskall crew
Of fidlers, pedlers, jayle-scap't slaves,
Of tinkers, turn-coats, tospot-knaves,
Of theeves and scape-thrifts many a one,
With bouncing Besse, and jolly Jone,
With idle boyes, and journey-men,
And vagrants that their country run:
Yea, Hobby-horse doth hither prance,
Maid-Marrian and the Morrice-dance.
My summons fetcheth, far and near,
All that can swagger, roar and swear,
All that can dance, and drab and drink,
They run to mee as to a sink.
These mee for their commander take,
And I do them my black-guard make.

I tell them 'tis a time to laugh,
To give themselves free leave to quaff,
To drink their healths upon their knee,
To mix their talk with ribaldry

Old crones, that scarce have tooth or eye,
But crooked back and lamed thigh,
Must have a frisk, and shake their heel,
As if no stitch nor ache they feel.

I bid the servant disobey,
The childe to say his parents nay.
The poorer sort, that have no coin,
I can command them to purloin.
All this, and more, I warrant good,
For 'tis to maintain neighbourhood.

The honour of the Sabbath-day
My dancing-greens have ta'en away
Let preachers prate till they grow wood:
Where I am they can do no good."

At page 10, he says: "The most of these May-poles are stollen, yet they give out that the poles are given them.There were two May-poles set up in my parish [King's Norton]; the one was stollen, and the other was given by a profest papist. That which was stolen was said to bee given, when 'twas proved to their faces that 'twas stollen, and they

were made to acknowledge their offence. This poll that was stollen was rated at five shillings: if all the poles one with another were so rated, which was stollen this May, what a considerable sum would it amount to! Fightings and bloodshed are usual at such meetings, insomuch that 'tis a common saying, that 'tis no festival unless there bee some fightings." "If Moses were angry," he says in another page, "when he saw the people dance about a golden calf, well may we be angry to see people dancing the morrice about a post in honour of a whore, as you shall see anon.' "Had this rudeness," he adds, "been acted only in some ignorant and obscure parts of the land, I had been silent; but when I perceived that the complaints were general from all parts of the land, and that even in Cheapside itself the rude rabble had set up this ensign of profaneness, and had put the lordmayor to the trouble of seeing it pulled down, I could not, out of my dearest respects and tender compassion to the land of my nativity, and for the prevention of the like disorders (if possible) for the future, but put pen to paper, and discover the sinful rise, and vile profaneness that attend such misrule."

So, again, in Randolph's Poems, 1646,

"These teach that dancing is a Jezabel,

And Barley-Break the ready way to Hell;
The Morice idols, Whitsun-Ales, can be
But prophane reliques of a jubilee :

There is a zeal t' expresse how much they do
The organs hate, have silenc'd bagpipes too;
And harmless May-poles all are rail'd upon,
As if they were the tow'rs of Babylon."

So in the Welsh Levite tossed in a Blanket, 1691: "I remember the blessed times, when every thing in the world that was displeasing and offensive to the brethren went under the name of horrid abominable Popish superstition. Organs and May-poles, Bishop's Courts and the Bear Garden, surplices and long hair, cathedrals and play-houses, set-forms and painted glass, fonts and Apostle spoons, church musick and bull-baiting, altar rails and rosemary on brawn, nay fiddles, Whitson ale, pig at Bartholomew Fair, plum porrige, puppet shows, carriers bells, figures in gingerbread, and at last Moses and Aaron, the Decalogue, the Creeds, and the Lord's Prayer,