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CHAPTER IX.

MERRIE ENGLANDE.”

Dress and manners-The Gull's Hornbook-The Kenilworth pageant-The Lord of Misrule-Yule-log and boar's head-Evening games-May-day and Morrice-Vigil of St. John.

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NGLISH society made rapid strides of improvement during the Tudor Period. The Elizabethan houses greatly surpassed those of Henry the Seventh's reign in point both of internal convenience and of outward beauty. The furniture, too, displayed increasing artistic taste. Carved tables and buffets, richly ornamented clocks, and Turkey car pets were not uncommon in the mansions of the great. The beaux and belles of the earlier Tudor reigns loved the dress with which the faithful pencil of Hans Holbein,* a painter from Basle who settled at the court of Henry the Eighth, has made us familiar. The men, gleaming in red or blue velvet crusted with gold, clipped their hair but cultivated their beards, while their excessively broad-toed shoes vied with their doublets in slashes and puffs without end. The ladies, who shared the use of the Milan bonnet with the sterner sex, were more staid and Quakerish than in the gorgeous days of Elizabeth. This perhaps was owing to the fashion of wearing aprons, caps, and high square collars in the street. The accession of Elizabeth

Arriving in England in 1526 with a letter from Erasmus to Sir Thomas More, Holbein started under royal patronage as a court portrait-painter. He died of the plague in 1554.

saw a change. The deforming cambric ruff with its glaze of yellow starch was apt to choke both courtiers and maids of honour. Fair-haired wigs-red being among the favourite hues were perched on the heads of maid and matron; and a sly peep at the little looking-glass which dangled from the belt was often needed to see that this questionable ornament was keeping its place. String on string of pearls hung in long loops from the neck; and when we picture rows of female figures thus bedizened, sitting outside the street doors, munching sweetmeats or smoking tobacco, as they watched the gallants strutting by in trunk-hose and cork shoes, and the recently imported "coaches "-heavy leathern portmanteaus on wheels-rumbling past with their human freight, we have a tolerable idea of lady-life in Elizabethan London. A great novelty of the day was the use of rapier and dagger by the gentlemen in their frequent duels, instead of the old-fashioned sword and buckler. Unequal length of blade causing considerable odds in combat, it became necessary to fix a standard; and by a royal order citizens of weight stood on certain days at the gates to break every blade beyond a yard in length down to the settled size.

The Gull's Hornbook, written by the dramatist Dekker, supplies us with a picture of fast London life in the opening of the seventeenth century. There rise before us in succession, as we read the vivid pages, the morning toilet of the gallanthis lounge in the fashionable walk at St. Paul's Churchyardhis chance visit to the neighbouring book-stalls-his practice in the schools for dancing and fencing-the elaborate apparatus of his smoking-machine, which he kindles in the smoking-ordinary -the eleven o'clock shilling dinner at the fashionable eatinghouse the cards and pipes that followed-the stool upon the stage, where he smokes and makes audible remarks on the actors in the middle of their tenderest or most tremendous parts the revelries of the night, and the perilous homeward

walk, at nine or so, through the dark thief-swarming lanes, lighted only by the rare and feeble glimmer of the watch

lantern.

The guests at an evening or rather an afternoon party amused themselves, as now, chiefly with music, dancing, and games of various kinds. Playing on the cithern or the virginals accompanied by the voice, dancing corantos, lavoltas, or that extremely rigid dance called paro or pavin after the solemn strutting peacock, varied with backgammon, shovel-board, and different games at cards, bearing such obsolete names as maw, lodam, noddy, gleek, sped the hours quickly on. In town, the theatre was a great resort. From one o'clock till four-that is during most of the interval between dinner and supper-the flag fluttering on the roof of the play-house announced that the play was going on. Within, the groundlings roared and drank, and the gallants drawled across the stage to each other the fashionable big talk invented or rather introduced by "Euphues" Lilly. A visit to the bear-garden, the bull-ring, or the cock-pit supplied townsmen with another excitement highly to their taste. The taint of savagery still lingered in the very highest. classes of the nation; and some of the most delicate dames of the court would, for a frolic, cross the bridge to Paris Garden in Southwark, pay their penny at the gate and their twopence for admission to the reserved seats, and there enjoy the leering of the pink-eyed bear, as he hugged the dogs to death, or shook his head all foul with gore and foam in the agonies of the cruel sport.

The pageant still continued to be not merely the delight of the citizens, but also the stated amusement of the court. Of all the variegated shows which the time produced, the displays at Kenilworth in honour of Elizabeth's visit to Dudley bear the palm. Tinselled pasteboard giants with real trumpeters inside greeted her grace as she neared the gate. A porter, dressed as Hercules, presented her with the keys. Then over (875)

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the pool or moat came a mock Lady of the Lake, who, before the queen crossed the bridge, made a little speech in offering classical gifts of the heathen gods-grain in silver bowls from Ceres, wine and grapes from Bacchus, instruments of music from Apollo, and so forth. What with music, fireworks, hunting, bear-baiting, pageants on the water with Arion singing on the dolphin's back, masks, banquets, and plays, it was not Dudley's fault if his royal mistress lacked entertainment in his castle.

The approach of Christmas flung all England into a chaos of unfettered fun and mischief. In every great household, in every country parish, the people, intent on revelry, chose one of their number to be Lord of Misrule. From All-Hallow Eve to the day after the Feast of the Purification, this leader headed a gang of mischief-makers, who abandoned themselves to the full swing of their riotous humours. Clad in green or yellow, with scarfs and ribbons fluttering around them, jewels gleaming on hand and dress, and bright-coloured handkerchiefs tied about their necks, and with hobby-horses and pasteboard dragons capering to the thunder of parchment and the squeaking of shrill fifes, they went right into the churches with hubbub and foolish songs. It mattered not how the parson was then engaged. His prayer or his sermon met with a sudden check; the congregation got up on the seats of the pews to gaze at the annual pageant, which gradually melted out of the church into the churchyard, to turn that quiet place of graves into a scene of drunkenness and turmoil. The leader of these riots often received clerical preferment at court, being there called the Abbot of Misrule. The Scottish Abbot of Unreason, put down by Act of Parliament in 1555, was a doubtful dignitary of the same stamp.

But the Christmas that was kept in old English manor-houses at that time, for all its license and untamed riot, was a picturesque and hearty festival. With shouts of merriment on

Christmas Eve, the huge Yule-log was dragged into the hall, wetting the rushes underfoot with the drip of its half-thawed icicles. Smoking torches flared red in the frosty air outside: within, the wide chimney gaped for its expected load, while on the antlered walls around, decked with the spoils and weapons of the greenwood, glittered the dark green of holly and ivy leaves, the former sprinkled thick with its coral berries. Next day, when the feast time came and the guests were seated, amid a braying of horns a stout cook staggered in, bearing on a silver dish the choicest fare of the Christmas table-a boar's head, garnished, as were many dishes then, with sprigs of rosemary. What wealth of rich meats and delicate confections disappeared before the Christmas roisterers, who washed the solids down with muscadine and sweetened sack! While the squires thus regaled themselves, the nobles and the queen kept more solemn but more splendid state. It was the fashion to wear the hat at table, and to doff it gracefully as each toast was pledged. Meantime the working-men swilled huffcap, a kind of strong coarse ale. At Christmas time many sports, forbidden at other seasons, could be indulged in. Thus, apprentices had then permission to play cards within their masters' houses. Every second house resounded with the noise of Hoodman Blind (now Blind Man's Buff), Hot Cockles,* and the spectral Snap-Dragon. On New-Year's Eve, an interchange of presents among friends was customary; and the wassail-bowl was carried from house to house by young girls, who expected some money from every one that tasted the liquor.

Long before dawn, on the 1st of May, all the young men and girls of the village or parish sallied out into the woods, where they plucked green boughs and twined the spring blossoms into brilliant wreaths and festoons. About sunrise they returned in procession, while many yokes of oxen, gaily dressed with flowers, dragged the May-pole to the centre of the village

*Hot Cockles, from the French Hautes Coquilles, high shells.

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