and a similar assemblage in the reign of Queen Anne or the first Georges.

One favourite Christmas sport, very generally played on Christmas Eve, has been handed down to us from time immemorial under the name of 'Snapdragon.' To our English readers this amusement is perfectly familiar, but it is almost unknown in Scotland, and it seems therefore desirable here to give a description of the pastime. A quantity of raisins are deposited in a large dish or bowl (the broader and shallower this is, the better), and brandy or some other spirit is poured over the fruit and ignited. The bystanders now endeavour, by turns, to grasp a raisin, by plunging their hands through the flames; and as this is somewhat of an arduous feat, requiring both courage and rapidity of action, a considerable amount of laughter and merriment is evoked at the expense of the unsuccessful competitors. As an appropriate accompaniment we introduce here

The Song of Snapdragon. 'Here he comes with flaming bowl, Don't he mean to take his toll, Snip! Snap! Dragon! Take care you don't take too much, Be not greedy in your clutch, Snip! Snap! Dragon!

With his blue and lapping tongue Many of you will be stung,

Snip! Shap! Dragon!

For he snaps at all that comes Snatching at his feast of plums, Snip! Snap! Dragon!

But Old Christmas makes him come, Though he looks so fee! fa! fum! Snip! Snap! Dragon! Don't 'ee fear him, be but boldOut he goes, his flames are cold,

Snip! Snap! Dragon!'

Whilst the sport of Snapdragon is going on, it is usual to extinguish all the lights in the room, so that the lurid glare from the flaming spirits may exercise to the full its weird-like effect. There seems little doubt that in this amusement we retain a trace of the fiery ordeal of the middle ages, and also of the Druidical fire-worship of a still remoter epoch. A curious reference to it occurs in the quaint old play of Lingua, quoted by Mr Sandys in his work on Christmas.

it 'Memory. Oh, I remember this dish well; was first invented by Pluto to entertain Proserpine withal.

Phantastes. I think not so, Memory; for when Hercules had killed the flaming dragon of Hesperia, with the apples of that orchard he made this fiery meat; in memory whereof he named it Snapdragon.'

Snapdragon, to personify him, has a 'poor rela tion' or country cousin, who bears the name of Flapdragon. This is a favourite amusement among the common people in the western counties of

England, and consists in placing a lighted candle in a can of ale or cider, and drinking up the contents of the vessel. This act entails, of course, considerable risk of having the face singed, and herein lies the essence of the sport, which may be averred to be a somewhat more arduous proceeding in these days of moustaches and long whiskers than it was in the time of our closeshaved grandfathers.

The Mummers.

The mummers, or, as they are styled in Scotland, the guisers or guizards, occupied a prominent place in the Christmas revels of the olden time, and their performances, though falling, like the other old customs of the season, into desuetude, are still kept up in several parts of the country. The passion for masquerade, like that for dramatic representation, seems an inherent one in human nature; and though social progress and fashion may modify and vary the peculiar mode of development, the tendency itself remains unaltered, and only adopts from age to age a new, and, it may be, more intellectual phase. Thus the rude and irreverent mysteries and miracle plays which delighted our ancestors, have been succeeded in the gradual course of improvement by the elaborate stage mechanism and display of our own times; and the coarse drolleries which characterised the old Christmas festivities, have made way for the games and charades, and other refined amusements of modern drawing-rooms. But in all these changes we only find an expression under altered and diversified forms of certain essential feelings and tendencies in the constitution of humanity.

Looking back to the Roman Saturnalia, from which so many of our Christmas usages are derived, we find that the practice of masquerading was greatly in vogue at that season among the people of Rome. Men and women assumed respectively the attire of the opposite sex, and masks of all kinds were worn in abundance. The early Christians, we are informed, used, on the Feast of the Circumcision or New-year's Day, to run about in masks in ridicule of the pagan superstitions; but there can be no doubt that they also frequently shared in the frolics of their heathen neighbours, and the fathers of the church had considerable difficulty in prevailing on their members to refrain from such unedifying pastimes. Afterwards, the clergy endeavoured to metamorphose the heathen revels into amusements, which, if not really more spiritual in character than those which they supplanted, had at least the merit of bearing reference to the observances, and recognising the authority of the church and its ministers. The mysteries or miracle plays in which even the clergy occasionally took part as performers, were the results, amid numerous others, of this policy. These singular dramas continued for many centuries to form a favourite amusement of the populace, both at Christmas and other seasons of the year; and in the first volume of this work (p. 633) will be found an account of the celebration of the Whitsuntide mysteries at Chester. The Christmas mumming was in many respects a kindred diversion, though it appears to have partaken less of the religious element, and resembled more nearly those medieval pageants in which certain subjects and

THE MUMMERS.

characters, taken from pagan mythology or popular legends, were represented. Frequently, also, it assumed very much the nature of a masquerade, when the sole object of the actors is to disguise themselves, and excite alternately laughter and admiration by the splendid or ridiculous costumes in which they are arrayed.

The term mummer is synonymous with masker, and is derived from the Danish, mumme, or Dutch, momme. The custom of mumming at the present day, such as it is, prevails only at the Christmas season, the favourite and commencing night for the pastime being generally Christmas Eve. Formerly, however, it seems to have been practised also at other times throughout the year, and Stow, in his Survey of London, has preserved to us an account of a splendid 'mummerie,' which, in 1377, was performed shortly before Candlemas by the citizens of London, for the amusement of Prince Richard, son of the Black Prince, and afterward the unfortunate monarch Richard II. In the year 1400, we are informed that Henry IV., holding his Christmas at Eltham, was visited by twelve aldermen and their sons as mummers, and that these august personages 'had great thanks' from his majesty for their performance. But shortly afterwards, as Fabyan tells us, a conspiracy to murder the king was organised under the guise of a Twelfth-night mumming. The plot was discovered only a few hours before the time of putting it in execution. Henry VIII., who ruthlessly demolished so many ancient institutions, issued an ordinance against mumming or guising. declaring all persons who went about to great houses arrayed in this fashion, liable to be arrested as vagabonds, committed to jail for three months, and fined at the king's pleasure. The reason assigned for this edict, is the number of murders and other felonies which have arisen from this cause. But we hear of no permanent or serious check sustained by the mummers in consequence.

In the tract, Round about our Coal-fire, or Christmas Entertainments, already quoted, the following passage occurs in reference to the practice of mumming at a comparatively recent period: "Then comes mumming or masquerading, when the squire's wardrobe is ransacked for dresses of all kinds. Corks are burnt to black the faces of the fair, or make deputy-moustaches, and every one in the family, except the squire himself, must be transformed. And in further illustration of an old English pastime, the subjoined verses on mumming, in the characteristic form of the madrigal, from La Musa Madrigalesca, may here be introduced:

"To shorten winter's sadness,
See where the folks with gladness
Disguised all are coming,
Right wantonly a-mumming.
Fa la

Whilst youthful sports are lasting, To feasting turn our fasting; With revels and with wassails, Make grief and care our vassals, Fa la.

For youth it well beseemeth,
That pleasure he esteemeth;
And sullen age is hated,

That mirth would have abated.

Fa la'

No. 2. Here come I, St George, the valiant man,
With naked sword and spear in hand,
Who fought the dragon, and brought him to
the slaughter,

And for this won the king of Egypt's daughter.
What man or mortal will dare to stand
Before me with my sword in hand;

I'll slay him, and cut him as small as flies,

And send him to Jamaica to make mince-pies.' St George's challenge is soon taken up, for says No. 3:

'Here come I, a Turkish knight,

In Turkish land I learned to fight,
I'll fight St George with courage bold,
And if his blood's hot, will make it cold.'

To this rejoins No. 2, who says:

'If thou art a Turkish knight,
Draw out thy sword, and let us fight.'

A battle is the result; the Turk falls, and St
George, struck with remorse, exclaims:

'Ladies and gentlemen,

You've seen what I've done,

I've cut this Turk down

Like the evening sun;

Is there any doctor that can be found,

To cure this knight of his deadly wound?'

No. 1 re-enters, metamorphosed.

'Here come I, a doctor,

A ten-pound doctor;

I've a little bottle in my pocket,

Called hokum, shokum, alicampane;
I'll touch his eyes, nose, mouth, and chin,

And say: "Rise, dead man," and he'll fight again.' After touching the prostrate Turk, the latter leaps up, ready again for the battle. St George, however, thinks this to be a favourable opportunity for sounding his own praises, and rejoins:

'Here am I, St George, with shining armour bright,
I am a famous champion, also a worthy knight;
Seven long years in a close cave was kept,
And out of that into a prison leaped,
From out of that into a rock of stones,
There I laid down my grievous bones.

Many a giant did I subdue,

And ran a fiery dragon through.
I fought the man of Tillotree,
And still will gain the victory.
First, then, I fought in France,
Second, I fought in Spain,
Thirdly, I came to Tenby,
To fight the Turk again.'

A fight ensues, and St George, being again victor, repeats his request for a doctor, who succeeds, as before, in performing a miraculous cure, and at once comes forward as the Protector:

'Here come I, Oliver Cromwell,
As you may suppose,
Many nations I have conquered,
With my copper nose.

I made the French to tremble,
And the Spanish for to quake,
I fought the jolly Dutchmen,

And made their hearts to ache.'

No. 2 then changes his character into that of the gentleman in black.'

'Here come I, Beelzebub,

Under my arm I carry a club, Under my chin I carry a pan, Don't I look a nice young man?

THE LORD OF MISRULE.

Having finished his speech, the main object of the visit is thus delicately hinted by No. 3:

'Ladies and gentlemen,

Our story is ended,

Our money-box is recommended;

Five or six shillings will not do us harm,
Silver, or copper, or gold if you can.'

After this appeal has been responded to, St George, the Turk, Doctor, Oliver Cromwell, and Beelzebub, take their departure, and the 'guising' is at an end.

The Lord of Misrule.

The functionary with the above whimsical title played an important part in the festivities of Christmas in the olden time. His duties were to lead and direct the multifarious revels of the season, or, as we should say at the present day, to act as Master of the Ceremonies. The following account of him is given by Stow: 'In the feast of Christmas, there was in the king's house, wheresoever he lodged, a Lord of Misrule, or Master of Merry Disports, and the like had ye in the house of every nobleman of honour or good worship, were he spiritual or temporal. The Mayor of London, and either of the Sheriffs, had their several Lords of Misrule, ever contending, without quarrel or offence, who should make the rarest pastime to delight the beholders. These lords beginning their rule at Allhallond Eve, continued the same till the morrow after the Feast of the Purification, commonly called Candlemas Day, in which space there were fine and subtle disguisings, masks and mummeries, with playing at cards for counters, nayles and points, in every house, more for pastimes than for gain.'

In the university of Cambridge, the functions of the Lord of Misrule were performed by one of the Masters of Arts, who was regularly elected to superintend the annual representation of Latin plays by the students, besides taking a general charge of their games and diversions during the Christmas season, and was styled the Imperator or Præfectus Ludorum. A similar Master of Revels was chosen at Oxford. But it seems to have been in the Inns of Court in London that the Lord of Misrule reigned with the greatest splendour, being surrounded with all the parade and ceremony of royalty, having his lord-keeper and treasurer, his guard of honour, and even his two chaplains, who preached before him on Sunday in the Temple Church. On Twelfth Day, he abdicated his sovereignty, and we are informed that in the year 1635, this mock-representative of royalty expended in the exercise of his office about two thousand pounds from his own purse, and at the conclusion of his reign was knighted by Charles I. at Whitehall. The office, indeed, seems to have been regarded among the Templars as a highlyhonourable one, and to have been generally conferred on young gentlemen of good family.

The following is an extract from the 'articles' drawn up by the Right Worshipful Richard Evelyn, Esq., father of the author of the Diary, and deputylieutenant of the counties of Surrey and Sussex, for appointing and defining the functions of a Christmas Lord of Misrule over his estate at Wotton'Imprimis, I give free leave to Owen Flood, my trumpeter, gentleman, to be Lord of Misrule of all good orders during the twelve days. And also, I

give free leave to the said Owen Flood to command all and every person or persons whatsoever, as well servants as others, to be at his command whensoever he shall sound his trumpet or music, and to do him good service, as though I were present myself, at their perils.. I give full power and authority to his lordship to break up all locks, bolts, bars, doors, and latches, and to fling up all doors out of hinges, to come at those who presume to disobey his lordship's commands. God save the king!' In the accompanying engraving, one of these Lords of Misrule is shewn with a fool's bauble as his badge of office, and a page, who acts as his assistant or confederate in conducting the jocularities. We are informed that a favourite mode for

THE LORD OF MISRULE.

his lordship to enter on the duties of his office was by explaining to the company that he absolved them of all their wisdom, and that they were to be just wise enough to make fools of themselves. No one was to sit apart in pride or self-sufficiency, to laugh at others. Moreover, he (the Lord of Misrule) came endowed with a magic power to turn all his auditory into children, and that, while his sovereignty lasted, he should take care that they conducted themselves as such. So fealty was sworn to the 'merry monarch,' and the reign of fun and folly forthwith commenced. In the pantomime of the present day, we see in the mischievous pranks of the Clown, who parodies all the ordinary occupations of grave and serious life, a reproduction under a modern form of the extravagances of the Lord of Misrule.

There can be no doubt that scandalous abuses often resulted from the exuberant licence assumed by the Lord of Misrule and his satellites. It need, therefore, occasion no surprise to find their proceedings denounced in no measured terms by

THE WAITS.

Prynne and other zealous Puritans. 'If,' says the author of the Histrio-Mastix, we compare our Bacchanalian Christmasses and New-year's Tides with these Saturnalia and Feasts of Janus, we shall find such near affinitye betweene them both in regard of time (they being both in the end of December and on the first of January) and in their manner of solemnising (both of them being spent in revelling, epicurisme, wantonesse, idlenesse, dancing, drinking, stage-plaies, masques, and carnall pompe and jollity), that we must needes conclude the one to be but the very ape or issue of the other. Hence Polydore Virgil affirmes in express tearmes that our Christmas Lords of Misrule (which custom, saith he, is chiefly observed in England), together with dancing, masques, mummeries, stageplayes, and such other Christmass disorders now in use with Christians, were derived from these Roman Saturnalia and Bacchanalian festivals; which (concludes he),should cause all pious Christians eternally to abominate them.'

In Scotland, previous to the Reformation, the monasteries used to elect a functionary of a similar character, for the superintendence of the Christmas revels, under the designation of the Abbot of Unreason. The readers of the Waverley Novels will recollect the graphic delineation of one of these mock-ecclesiastics in The Abbot. An ordinance for suppressing this annual burlesque, with other festivities of a like kind, was passed by the Scottish legislature in 1555. In France, we find the congener of the Lord of Misrule and the Abbot of Unreason in the Abbas Stultorum-the Abbot or Pope of Fools.

Born.-Galba, Roman emperor, 3 B.C.; John, king of England, 1166, Oxford; William Warburton, bishop of Gloucester, 1698, Newark; George Crabbe, poet, 1754, Aldborough; Eugene Scribe, French dramatist, 1791, Paris.

Died.-George of Cappadocia, noted Arian bishop, slain at Alexandria, 361 A. D.; Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter, 1426, Bury St Edmunds; Vasco de Gama, celebrated Portuguese navigator, 1525, Cochin, in Malabar; Madame de Genlis, popular authoress, 1830, Paris; Davies Gilbert, antiquarian and man of science, 1839, Eastbourne, Sussex; Archdeacon Henry John Todd, editor of Johnson's Dictionary, &c., 1845, Settrington, Yorkshire; Dr John Ayrton Paris, chemist, 1856, London; Hugh Miller, geologist, 1856, Portobello.

The Waits.

It is a curious circumstance, that no one appears clearly to know whether the term Waits denoted originally musical instruments, a particular kind of music, or the persons who played under certain special circumstances. There is evidence in support of all these views. At one time, the name of Waits was given to minstrels attached to the king's court, whose duty it was to guard the streets at night, and proclaim the hour-something in the same manner as the watchmen were wont to do in London before the establishment of the metropolitan police. A regular company of waits was established at Exeter as early as the year 1400, and in relation to the duties and emoluments of such personages in the reign of Edward IV., the following curious account is furnished by Rymer: A wayte, that nightelye from Mychelmas to Shreve Thorsdaye pipethe the watche withen this courte fower tymes;