V

IT is all very well to compare the present with the

past to the disadvantage of the latter, but when all is said and done there is no doubt but that the populace generally, though they had fewer pleasures, enjoyed them more thoroughly, besides being entirely absorbed by their comparatively simple interests.

In order to enjoy the present, it is necessary to be intent on the present. To be doing one thing, and thinking of another, is a very unsatisfactory mode of spending life.

A great number of people of the present day are always wishing themselves to be somewhere but where they are, or thinking of something else but what they are doing, or of somebody else than to whom they are speaking. This is the way to enjoy nothing, and to please nobody.

Merry England is no more, and many of the sports and pastimes that once obtained for her this enviable appellation have disappeared.

Where are the May-Day revels and the simple festivities of the harvest home? Some vestiges of the latter, I believe, still linger here and there in remote parts of the country, but the old-world rejoicings in question are now only kept up by a few who love the traditions of bygone days.

The morris dances, however, which but a short while back seemed likely to be completely forgotten, are now in a fair way to be preserved, owing to the most praiseworthy movement which, initiated at a working girls' club in the East End of London, is now spreading throughout the length and breadth of the land. The credit for this is entirely due to one lady, Miss Neal, the founder of the Espérance Guild of Morris Dancers, to which the author heartily wishes all success.

Would that the quaint local customs, which not so very long ago flourished in various parts of the country, had also been carefully investigated and preserved for the benefit of those yet to come, who, if the promise of civilisation be fulfilled, will most certainly take the greatest interest in everything connected with the social usages and customs of the peasantry of a bygone and simple age.

In the south of England many curious customs were formerly connected with the close of the harvest. The old Sussex harvest home, as it once existed, has now ceased even to be a memory, for as long as fifty years ago nearly all the quaint usages connected with it had fallen into disuse. Nevertheless, at one time this festival was celebrated with much rustic ceremonial, amongst which " turning the cup over " played a great part.

The labourers of a farm and the men who had assisted in harvesting would assemble in the kitchen of the farmer, where, at the head of the table, one of them occupied the position of chairman. In front

of him stood a pail, as clean as wooden staves and iron hoops could be. On the man's right sat four or five others who led the singing with great gravity. The appearance, indeed, of the whole company was solemn in the extreme, except at moments when some unlucky rustic failed to "turn the cup over," and was compelled to undergo the penalty. "Turning the cup over" was as follows: The chairman, standing behind the pail with a tall horn cup in his hand, filled it with beer from the pail. The man next.to him on the left stood up, and holding a hat with both hands by the brim, crown upwards, received the cup from the chairman, on the crown of the hat, not touching it with either hand. He then lifted the cup to his lips by raising the hat, and slowly drank off the contents. As soon as he began to drink, the chorus would chant

I've bin to Plymouth, and I've bin to Dover,
I have bin rambling, boys, all the wurld over-
Over and over and over and over,

Drink up your liquor and turn your cup over,
Over and over and over and over,

The liquor's drink'd up and the cup is turned over.

The man drinking was expected to time his draught so as to empty his cup at the end of the fourth line of the chant; he then had to return the hat to the perpendicular, still holding it by the brims, then to throw the cup into the air, and, reversing the hat, to catch the cup in it as it fell. If he failed to perform this part of the operation, the fellow-workmen, who were closely watching him, made an important

alteration in the last line of their chant, which in that case ran thus:

The liquor's drink'd up and the cup ain't turned over.

When this occurred, the cup was refilled, and the unfortunate drinker compelled to go through the same ceremony again. Every one at the table took the cup and "turned it over" in succession, the chief shepherd keeping the pail constantly supplied with beer. Visitors who came to see this ceremony generally took part in it, without, however, being subjected to the full penalty in case of failure.

Many old customs prevailed throughout rural England. According to West Country fashion, on Twelfth Night (old style) a band of rustics would join hands round an old apple tree and sing:

Here's to thee,

Ould apple tree,

For to bear and to brew

Apples anew

These year, next year, and the year arter teu;
Hats vull, caps vull, and bushell bag vull;
But if thee want bear neither apple or core
Down wi' thy tap, and up wi' thy mor.

After which there would be much cheering and firing of guns, and a feast in the evening.

Some queer customs which once prevailed would now be considered at best highly indecorous. Such a one was the struggle for the bride's garters, which at one time went on in the church itself, all the young men present striving to obtain the coveted trophies.

The bride was generally gartered with ribbons for the occasion. Whoever were so fortunate as to be victors in this singular species of contest, during which the bride was often obliged to scream out, and was frequently thrown down, bore them about the church in triumph! This custom was similar to one which prevailed in Normandy, where the bride would bestow her garter on some young man as a favour; in some cases it was taken from her.

A number of quaint usages of old England were originally brought from across the Channel, having originated in that Normandy which irresistibly reminds the Englishman of the ancestors of such a number of his race. The country there is yet more like England than is any other part of the Continent. The architecture of the village churches, the greensward, the cut of the woods and old pollards, the gates, the stiles, the footpaths, hedgerows, and orchards, the shape and size of the fields, the cottages with their thatched roofs, the arrangement of the farm homesteads, and the well-tended gardens of the country mansions, all remind one of England, whilst the names of towns, villages, and hamlets read like a leaf out of Domesday Book. In Normandy, with some slight differences of spelling, brought about by eight centuries of time, is to be found the origin of countless English families.

A salient feature of old English country life was the good feeling which prevailed between the upper and lower classes of society, who as children met more frequently than they do to-day.