And Ben Jonson says,—

"All the neighbourhood, from old records,

Of antique proverbs, drawn from Whitsun lords,
And their authorities at wakes and ales,

With country precedents, and old wives tales,
We bring you now."

The Whitson Lord is also alluded to by Sir Philip Sidney,

"Strephon, with leavy twigs of laurell tree,

A garlant made, on temples for to weare,
For he then chosen was the dignitie

Of village lord that Whitsuntide to beare."]

Stubbs, in his Anatomie of Abuses, 1585, p. 95, gives the following account of the Manner of Church-Ales in England: "In certaine townes, where dronken Bacchus beares swaie, against Christmas and Easter, Whitsondaie, or some other tyme, the churchewardens of every parishe, with the consent of the whole parishe, provide halfe a score or twentie quarters of mault, whereof some they buy of the churche stocke and some is given them of the parishioners themselves, every one conferring somewhat, according to his abilitie; whiche maulte being made into very strong ale or bere, is sette tc sale, either in the church or some other place assigned to tha purpose. Then when this is set abroche, well is he that can gete the soonest to it, and spend the most at it. In this kinde of practice they continue sixe weekes, a quarter of a year, yea, halfe a yeare together. That money, they say, is to repaire their churches and chappels with, to buy bookes for service, cuppes for the celebration of the Sacrament, surplesses for sir John, and such other necessaries. And they maintaine other extraordinarie charges in their parish besides."

At a vestry held at Brentford, in 1621, several articles were agreed upon with regard to the management of the parish stock by the chapel wardens. The preamble stated, that the inhabitants bad for many years been accustomed to have meetings at Whitsontide, in their church-house and other places there, in friendly manner, to eat and drink together, and liberally to spend their monies, to the end neighbourly society might be maintained; and also a common stock raised for the repairs of the church, maintaining of orphans, placing poor children in service, and defraying other charges. In the

Accompts for the Whitsontide Ale, 1624, the gains are thus discriminated :

:

The hocking occurs almost every year till 1640, when it appears to have been dropped. It was collected at Whitsuntide.

£ 8. d.

"1618. Gained with hocking at Whitsuntide. 16 12 3" The other games were continued two years later. Riffeling is synonymous with raffling. (Lysons's Environs of London, ii. 55.) In p. 54 are the following extracts from the Chapelwardens' Account Books:

The following occur in the Churchwardens' Books, at Chiswick:

At a Court of the Manor of Edgware, in 1555, “it was presented that the butts at Edgware were very ruinous, and that the inhabitants ought to repair them, which was ordered to be done before the ensuing Whitsontide." Sir William

Blackstone says, that it was usual for the lord of this manor to provide a minstrel or piper for the diversion of the tenants while they were employed in his service.

In the Introduction to the Survey and Natural History of the North Division of the County of Wiltshire, by Aubrey, at p. 32, is the following curious account of Whitsun-Ales: "There were no rates for the poor in my grandfather's days; but for Kingston St. Michael (no small parish) the ChurchAle of Whitsuntide did the business. In every parish is (or was) a church-house, to which belonged spits, crocks, &c., utensils for dressing provision. Here the housekeepers met and were merry, and gave their charity. The young people were there too, and had dancing, bowling, shooting at butts, &c., the ancients sitting gravely by, and looking on. All things were civil, and without scandal. The Church-Ale is doubtless derived from the Ayarα, or Love Feasts, mentioned in the New Testament." He adds, "Mr. A. Wood assures that there were no almshouses, at least they were very scarce, before the Reformation; that over against Christchurch, Oxon, is one of the ancientest. In every church was a poor man's box, but I never remembered the use of it; nay, there was one at great inns, as I remember it was before the wars. These were the days when England was famous for the grey goose quills."

The following lines on Whitsunday occur in Barnaby Googe's translation of Naogeorgus:

"On Whitsunday whyte pigeons tame in strings from heaven flie,
And one that framed is of wood still hangeth in the skie.
Thou seest how they with idols play, and teach the people too;
None otherwise than little gyrls with puppets used to do."

Among the ancient annual church disbursements of St. Mary-at-Hill, in the city of London, I find the following entry : "Garlands, Whitsunday, iijd." Sometimes also the subsequent: "Water for the Funt on Whitson Eve, jd." This is explained by the following extract from Strutt's Manners and Customs, iii. 174: "Among many various ceremonies, I find that they had one called the Font hallowing,' which was performed on Easter Even and Whitsunday Eve; and, says the author of a volume of Homilies in Harl. MS. 2371, in the begynnyng of holy chirch, all the children weren kept to be crystened on thys even, at the Font hal

lowyng; but now, for enchesone that in so long abydynge they might dye without crystendome, therefore holi chirch ordeyneth to crysten at all tymes of the yeare; save eyght dayes before these Evenys, the chylde shalle abyde till the Font hallowing, if it may savely for perrill of death, and ells not.'

Collinson, in his History of Somersetshire, iii. 620, speaking of Yatton, says, that "John Lane of this parish, gent. left half an acre of ground, called the Groves, to the poor for ever, reserving a quantity of the grass for the strewing church on Whitsunday."

A superstitious notion appears anciently to have prevailed in England, that "whatsoever one did ask of God upon Whitsunday morning, at the instant when the sun arose and play'd, God would grant it him." See Arise Evans's Echo to the Voice from Heaven; or, a Narration of his Life, 1652, p. 9. He says, "he went up a hill to see the sun rise betimes on Whitsunday morning," and saw it at its rising "skip, play, dance, and turn about like a wheel."

"At Kidlington, in Oxfordshire, the custom is, that on Monday after Whitsun week there is a fat live lamb provided; and the maids of the town, having their thumbs tied behind them, run after it, and she that with her mouth takes and holds the lamb, is declared Lady of the Lamb, which being dressed, with the skin hanging on, is carried on a long pole before the lady and her companions to the Green, attended with music, and a Morisco dance of men, and another of women, where the rest of the day is spent in dancing, mirth, and merry glee. The next day the lamb is part baked, boiled, and roast, for the Lady's Feast, where she sits majestically at the upper end of the table, and her companions with her, with music and other attendants, which ends the solemnity." (Beckwith's edition of Blount's Jocular Tenures, p. 281.)

In Poor Robin's Almanack for 1676, stool-ball and barleybreak are spoken of as Whitsun sports. In the Almanack for the following year, in June, opposite Whitsunday and Holidays, we read:

"At Islington a fair they hold,

Where cakes and ale are to be sold.
At Highgate and at Holloway,
The like is kept here every day;
At Totnam Court and Kentish Town,
And all those places up and down."

[A custom formerly prevailed amongst the people of Burford to hunt deer in Whichwood Forest, on Whitsunday. An original letter is now in the possession of the Corporation, dated 1593, directing the inhabitants to forbear the hunting for that year, on account of the plague that was then raging, and stating that an order should be given to the keepers of the forest, to deliver to the bailiffs two bucks in lieu of the hunting; which privilege, was not, however, to be prejudiced in future by its remittance on that occasion.]

THE BOY'S BAILIFF.

[AN old custom so called formerly prevailed at Wenlock, in Shropshire, in the Whitsun week. It consisted, says Mr. Collins, of a man who wore a hair-cloth gown, and was called the bailiff, a recorder, justices, and other municipal officers. They were a large retinue of men and boys mounted on horseback, begirt with wooden swords, which they carried on their right sides, so that they were obliged to draw their swords out with their left hands. They used to call at the gentlemen's houses in the franchise, where they were regaled with refreshments; and they afterwards assembled at the Guildhall, where the town clerk read some sort of rigmarole which they called their charter, one part of which was—

"We go from Bickbury, and Badger, to Stoke on the Clee,
To Monkhopton, Round Acton, and so return we."

The three first-named places are the extreme points of the franchise; and the other two are on the return to Much Wenlock. Mr. Collins supposes this custom to have originated in going a bannering.]

TRINITY, OR TRINITY SUNDAY, EVEN.

THE observance of Trinity Sunday is said to have been first established in England by Archbishop Becket, soon after his consecration.—"Hic post consecrationem suam instituit festivitatem principalem S. Trinitatis annis singulis in perpetuam