M'i I' zm' S4. f«MM«S)j»x)ji>:'WMCC'y>?j)>> : ^ -- V Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/countyfolklore05folkuoft Wxt ^oik-'§ott (Samtg FOR COLLECTING AND PRINTING RELICS OF POPULAR ANTIQUITIES, &c. ESTABLISHED IN THE YEAR MDCCCLXXVIII. Alter et Idem PUBLICATIONS OF THE FOLK-LORE SOCIETY [LXIII.] [1908] \ I COUNTY FOLK-LORE VOL. V. PRINTED EXTRACTS No, VIL EXAMPLES OF PRINTED FOLK-LORE CONCERNING LINCOLNSHIRE COLLECTED BY MRS. GUTCH AND MABEL PEACOCK ^ttbliaheb tat the ^aW-'gaxt ^otxzi'^ bj DAVID NUTT, 57-59 LONG ACRE LONDON 1908 140 V.S PREFACE. Judging by the sheaf of extracts contained in the following pages, and by my own gleanings in Lindsey during the past twenty years, it seems to me that the only striking characteristic of Lincolnshire folk-lore is its lack of originality. Nearly every superstition and custom of the county appears to be a local variant of something already familiarly known in other parts of the British Islands, or beyond their limits. The curious Haxey game, known as ' Throwing the Hood,' has, for instance, an evident relationship with Cornish * Hurling ' and East Anglian * Camping,' not to speak of several archaic forms of foot-ball, or of those foreign sports, European, Asiatic, and American, to which it bears a close resemblance. Even the mediaeval traditions relating to the saints once famous between the H umber and the Welland have close affinity with other pious legends. St. Guthlac and St. Botulph were not the only hermits harassed by evil spirits ; though it is likely that fen- demons may have been particularly trying to holy ascetics, whose nerves were already disordered by the agues of a watery country, and the weird clamour of innumerable wild-fowl. vi Preface, It has been thought that the traditions connecting the devil with Lincoln are peculiar to that city, but the story of the wind waiting outside the minster for the Prince of Darkness is also told of the Frue Kirke in Copenhagen ; and, after giving a French version in his Litterature Orale de V Auvergne^ Monsieur S6billot informs us that the legend is * extremement r^pandue.' The sayings that the devil looks over Lincoln, and that the city brings ill-luck to a crowned king, find their parallel in a belief mentioned by Keightley in The Fairy Mythology, 1850, pp. 91, 92. * According to Danish tradition, the Elle-kings, under the denomina- tion of Promontory-kings, (Klinte-Konger), keep watch and ward over the country. . . . * It was once believed that no mortal monarch dare come to Stevns ; for the EUe-king would not permit him to cross the stream that bounds it. But Christian IV passed it without opposition, and since his time several Danish monarchs have been there. * At Skjelskor, in Zealand, reigns another of these jealous promontorial sovereigns, named king Tolv (Twelve). He will not suffer a mortal prince to pass the bridge of Kjelskor.' Two sources of information have been left almost untouched in bringing together the contents of this volume. Neither of the collectors was able to go through the files of the Stamford Mercury, and other local newspapers of less ancient foundation, or to consult the almanacks published by the booksellers of our small market-towns. These would certainly yield valuable information. One or two of the extracts given from Robert of Preface. vii Brunne's Handlyng Synne are included as probably, but not quite certainly, of Lincolnshire origin. Thanks are owing to many authors, editors, and publishers. Certain volumes of the Gentleman's Magazine Library^ and of the Antiquary ^ afforded a satisfactory harvest : Mr. R. W. Goulding's books relating to Louth were also of service in affording instances of popular customs. The Lincolnshire Notes and Queries^ the Fenland Notes and Queries, Mr. Addy's Household Tales, and Canon Rawnsley's Memories of the Tennysons, must be mentioned, too, with the Rev. R. M. Heanley's Vikings, the Life of Saint Hugh of Lincoln, by the Rev. H. Thurston, S.J., and the popular publications on by- gone customs and manners edited by Mr. W. Andrews. Among other authors whose works have been quoted may be mentioned the Right Rev. W. P. Swaby, bishop of Barbados, the Rev. R. E. G. Cole, the Rev. G. S. Streatfield, the Rev. J. E. Vaux, the Rev. W. N. Usher, the Rev. M. G. Watkins, the Rev. C. E. Watson, the Rev. D. Woodroffe, the Rev. B. Street, the late Rev. C. Nevinson, the author of Murray's Handbook for Lincolnshire, the Rev. J. Wild, the late Sir Charles Anderson, of Lea, the late J. L. Brogden, Mr. A. Bates, Mr. G. J. Wilkinson, Mr. J. G. Hall, Mr. A. F. Kendrick, Mr. M. E. C. Walcott, and the compiler of White's Gazetteer. In addition to these, other authorities are referred to as giving information with regard to the traditions, beliefs, and customs of Lincolnshire. The collectors are also indebted to Mr. Northcote W. Thomas for editing and arranging the material which they had brought together. M. P. CONTENTS. Preface - List of Authorities PAGE V PART I. SECTION I. NATURAL OR INORGANIC OBJECTS. Hills, Stones, Sites, Treasure, Wells, Rivers, Sea, Atmos- pheric Effects, Weather, Sun, Moon, and Stars - - i \ SECTION IL % TREES AND PLANTS. t Trees and Plants, Garlands, May-poles, Dozzils or Stack- staves i8 SECTION in. ANIMALS. Beasts, Birds, Reptiles, Fishes, and Invertebrates - - 28 SECTION IV. GOBLINDOM. Wraiths, Ghosts, Manifestations, Boggards, Shagfoals, Devil, Fairies, Hobthrust, Dragons . - . - 48 X Contents. SECTION V. WITCHCRAFT. PAGE Witchcraft and Evil-Eye 67 SECTION VI. LEECHCRAFT. Charms, Materia Medica, Spells 106 SECTION VII. MAGIC AND DIVINATION. Wise-men (Diviners), Divination, Prophecies, Portents, Judgments, Dreams, Charms, Omens, Weather- forecasts * 126 SECTION VIII. SUPERSTITIONS GENERALLY- - 144 PART IL SECTION I. THE YEAR. FESTIVALS OF THE SEASONS 168 SECTION II. CEREMONIAL. Birth, Infancy, Baptism, Courtship, Marriage, Death, Burial of Suicides, Immuring 226 SECTION in. GAMES AND SPORTS. Children's Games, Mystery- Plays, Bull-baiting, Bull-running, Throwing the Hood, Church-yard Games, Cock-fighting 250 SECTION IV. LOCAL CUSTOMS ... 277 Contents, xi PART IIL SECTION I. TRADITIONAL NARRATIVES. PAGE Sagas, Marchen _...-. 320 SECTION II. PLACE LEGENDS - - - 328 SECTION IIL BALLADS AND SONGS. Drama — Mystery Plays 366 SECTION IV. JINGLES AND RIDDLES. Jingles, Nursery-rhymes, Riddles 391 SECTION V. PROVERBS ... - 404 SECTION VI. SAYINGS ABOUT PLACES - - 417 SECTION VII. FOLK ETYMOLOGY - - - 435 I LIST OF AUTHORITIES QUOTED AND CONSULTED. AccoMPTS OF Churchwardens. Illustrations of the Manners and Expences of Antient Times in England. . . . from the Accompts of Churchwardens . . . MDCCXCVII. [J. Nichols.] Accounts of St. Mary's, Sutterton. Churchwarderi s Accounts of Saint Mary^s^ Sutterton. By E. Peacock. Addy. Household Tales. By S. O. Addy. 1895. [Certain omissions made at the suggestion of the author.] A. I. Memoirs Illustrative of the History and Antiquities of the County and City of Lincoln communicated to the Annual Meeting of the Archaeological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, held at Lincoln, July, 1848, with a General Report of the Proceedings of the Meeting and a Cata- logue of the Museum formed on that occasion. London MDCCCL. Anderson. The Lincoln Pocket Guide. By Sir C. H. J. Anderson, Bart. i88o. Antiq. Linc. Antiquities of Lincolnshire^ being the third volume of the Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica, MDCCXC. [Nichols.] Antiquary. The Antiquary. Certain volumes quoted, which were known to contain Lincolnshire folklore. Antiquities and Curiosities. Antiquities and Curiosities of the Church. Edited by W. Andrews. 1897. Archeology. The Gentleman's Magazine Library : Archceology. xiv List of Authorities, A. S. Chron. Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Edited with a translation by B. Thorpe. Vol. II. 1861. AvELAND. Collections for a Topographical . . . Account of Ave- land. By J. Moore. 1809. Banks. History of the ancient noble Family of Marmyun^ their singular office of King^s Champion by the Tenure of the Baronial Manor of Scrivelsby, in the County of Lincoln. By T. C. Banks. 181 7. Barnabee's Journal. Barnabee Itinerarium or Barnabeis Journal. By Richard Brathwait, A.M. Edited from the first Edition by Joseph Haslewood. A new Edition care- fully revised by W. Carew Hazlitt. London 1876. Bates. Gossip about Old Grimsby. By A. Bates. 1893. Beauties. The Beauties of England and IVales, Vol IX. [1807 — This Vol. by John Britton.] Beda. The Church Historians of England. The Historical Works of the Venerable Beda. 1853. Boston in the Olden Times. Traditions of Lincolnshire. (First Series.) Boston in the Olden Times. By Roger Quaint. Bottesford. Notes on the Records of the Manor of Bottesford, Lincolnshire. By E. Peacock. 1887. From the Archseo- logia, Vol. L. British Traveller. Walpoole's New British Traveller^ n.d. [1784.] Brogden. Provincial words . . . current in Lincolnshire. By J. L. Brogden. 1866. Brome. Bromis Travels over England^ Scotland and Wales. 1700. Brunne. Roberd of Brunne^s Handlyng Synne [1303]. Edited by F. J. Furnival. 1862. Burton, Stamford. Guide to Stamford and Neighbourhood, By Geo. Burton. Second Edition. 1896. List of Authorities. xv Butcher. The Survey and Antiquity of the Town of Stamford in the County of Lincoln. By Richard Butcher Gent, some- times \sic\ Town Clerk of this same Town. London 1717. Bygone England. Bygone England. By W. Andrews. 1892. Bygone Lincolnshire L Bygone Lincolnshire. Edited by W. Andrews. 1891. Bygone Lincolnshire IL Bygone Lincolnshire. Edited by W. Andrews. 1891. [The second volume has nothing on the title-page to indicate that it is the second.] Bygone Punishments. Bygone Punishments. By W. Andrews. 1899. Camden. Camdeiis Britannia . . . enlarged ... by Richard Gough. Second Edition. Vol. II. 1806. Capgrave. The Chronicle of England. By John Capgrave. Edited by the Rev. F. C. Hingeston. 1858. Castle Bytham. The History of Castle Bytham. By the Rev. John Wild. 187 1. Castle Bytham, A short account of. A short account of the Churchy Castle and Village of Castle Bytham. 1900 [By H. C. Smith, vicar]. Church Customs. Curious Church Customs. Edited by W. Andrews. 1895. Church Furniture. English Church Furniture . . . at the Period of the Reformation. . . . Edited by Edward Peacock. 1866. Church Gleanings. Curious Church Gleanings. Edited by W. Andrews. 1896. Church Lore. Old Church Lore. By W. Andrews. 1891. Cole. A Glossary of Words used in South-West Lincolnshire {Wapentake of Graffoe). By the Rev. R. E. G. Cole, M.A., Rector of Doddington, Lincoln. 1886. II. Croyland. a Second Continuation of the History of Croy- land. Bohn's Antiquarian Library [in the vol. containing Ingulph's Chronicle]. 1854. xvi List of Authorities, III. Croyland. a Third Continuation of the History of Cray- land. Bohn's Antiquarian Library [in the vol. containing Ingulph's Chronicle]. 1854. [The fourth continuation contains no folklore.] Curiosities. Admirable Curiosities^ Rarieties and Wonders in England, Scotland and Ireland. By R. B. The Sixth Edition. 1702. Curiosities of the Church. Curiosities of the Church, By W. Andrews. 1891. Defoe. Tour Through Great Britain. By a Gentleman. Second Edition. MDCCXXXVIII. [Defoe.] DiMOCK. Metrical Life of St. Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln. Edited by the Rev. J. F. Dimock. i860. II. Dimock. Magna Vita S. Hugonis Episcopi Lincolniensis. Edited by the Rev. J. F. Dimock. 1864. Disney. Some Remarkable Passages in the Holy Life and Death of Gervase Disney, Esq. 1696. Drayton. Drayton^s Polyolbion. The Works of Michael Drayton [with annotations by Selden] 1753. Dugdale. History of Imbanking and Draining. By Sir William Dugdale. MDCCLXXII. Ecclesiastical Curiosities. Ecclesiastical Curiosities. Edited by W. Andrews. 1899. Eli Twigg. Lincolnshire Tales : The Recollections of Eli Twigg, By Mabel Peacock. 1897. Eng. Trad. Lore. The Gentleman^ s Magazine Library : English Traditional Lore. Esberger. Christian Frederick Esberger, his Relations and his Journal. By R. W. Goulding. Louth. 1902. Fenland. The Fenland, Past and Present. By S. H. Miller, and S. B. J. Skertchly. 1879. Fenland N. & Q. Fenland Notes and Queries. A Quarterly Antiquarian Journal for the Counties of Huntingdon, Cambridge, Lincoln, Northampton, Norfolk and Suffolk. April, 1889 — April, 1906 (Peterborough). List of Authorities. xvii Florence of Worcester. The Church Historians of England. Vol. 11. Part I. MDCCCLIII. Folk-Lore Record and Journal. Fuller. The History of the Worthies of England^ endeavoured by Thomas Fuller, D.D. ; first printed in 1632. A new Edition with a few explanatory notes by John Nichols, F.S.A. Lond., Edinb. and Perth. 2 vols. 181 1. G. J. The Grantham Journal {Gr2inih2ivc\, v.d.). GoMME, The Traditional Games of England^ Scotland and Ireland^ with Tunes, Singing Rhymes, and methods of Playing according to the Variants extant and recorded in different parts of the Kingdom, collected and annotated by Alice Bertha Gomme. London, Vol. I. 1894; Vol. II. 1898. Good. A Glossary of Words^ Phrases, etc. current in East Lincolnshire. By Jabez Good. n.d. GouLDiNG. Louth Old Corporation Records. . . . Compiled by R. W. Goulding. 1891. Grosseteste. Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln. By F. S. Stevenson. 1899. Hall. Notices of Lincolnshire, being an Historical and Topo- graphical Account of some Villages in the Division of Lindsey. By John George Hall. Hull 1890. Halliwell. The Nursery Rhymes of England. By James Orchardson Halliwell. MDCCCXLII. Havelok. The Lay of Havelok the Dane, re-edited from MS. Laud Misc. 108 in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. By the Rev. Walter W. Skeat. 1902. He AN LEY. The Vikings: Traces of their Folklore in Marshland. By the Rev. R. M. Heanley. [A paper read before the Viking Club, London, and printed in its Saga-Book. Vol. III. Part I. Jan. 1902.] HisSEY. Over Fen and Wold. By J. J. Hissey. 1 898. Hist, and Antiq. of Croyland Abbey. Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica, No. XL, containing the Hist, and Antiq. of Croyland Abbey. MDCCLXXXIII. [Nichols]. With Appendix and other additions. b xviii List of Authorities, Hone Table Book. The Table Book, by William Hone. [Hone's Popular Works. Four volumes, cloth, n.d.] Humanitarian. The Humanitarian, Vol. IX., No. 4, Oct. 1896. [The article on village love-spells relates to Lincolnshire, though the fact is not stated in it.] Hume. Sir Hugh of Lincoln : or an examination of a curious tradition respecting the Jews. By the Rev. A. Hume. 1849. Hunter. South Yorkshire. The History and Topography of the Deanery of Doncaster in the Division and County of York, by the Rev. Joseph Hunter, F.S.A., of London and Newcastle, and an Honorary Member of the Yorkshire Philosophical Association. London 1828. Illingworth. a Topographical Account of the Parish of Scampton. By the Rev. Cayley Illingworth. 1810. Ingulf. The Church Historians of England. Vol. II., Part. II. The History of Ingulf Journ. Brit. Arch. Ass. Journal of the British Archaeological Association. Vol. XXXV. Kendrick. The Cathedral Church of Lincoln. A History and Description of its Fabric and a list of the Bishops. By A. F. Kendrick, B.A. London 1898. Kent. Lindum Lays and Legends. By E. G. Kent. 1861. Leland. Itinerary of John Leland [edited by Hearne]. Second Edition. MDCCXLIV. Le Roux de Lincy. Le Livre des Proverbes Franfais. Par Le Roux de Lincy. Tome premier. Paris 1842. Leverton. Extracts from the Churchwardens^ Accounts of Lever- ton [Lincolnshire]. By E. Peacock. 1868. From the Archceologia, Vol. XLI. LiNCS. Folk Names. Lincolnshire Folk Names for Plants. Edited by the Rev. E. A. Woodruffe-Peacock. Pubhshed at the end of some of the numbers of the Lincolnshire Notes and Queries, Vols. IV. and V. Lincolnshire N. & Q. Lincolnshire Notes and Queries. 1888 — 190$. List of Authorities, XIX LiNCS. Arch. Soc. ; Yorks. Arch. Soc. Reports and Papers read at the Meetings of the Architectural Societies of the Counties of Lincoln and Nottingham, County of York, Archdeaconries of Northampton and Oakham, County of Bedford, Diocese of Worcester and County of Leicester. Vols. L— XXVI. Lincoln 185 1— 1902. LiNCS. 1836. Lincolnshire in 1836. [Published by John Saunders, Jun.] Literary Byways. Literary Byways. By W. Andrews. 1898. Louth Park Abbey, Chron. The Chronicle of Louth Park Abbey. Edited by the Rev. Edmund Venables. With a translation by the Rev. A. R. Maddison. 1891. MACKINNON. Account of Messingham in the County of Lincoln. By John Mackinnon [written in 1825]. Edited by E. Peacock. 1881. Man. and Cus. The Gentleman^s Magazine Library. Manners and Customs. Marrat. The History of Lincolnshire. By W. Marrat. Boston 1814. B. w. V3 are pp. 1-84 of a v 4, and pp. 1-144 of a V 6 of the same work. Mother Goose. Mother Gooseys Nursery Rhymes, Tales and Jingles [F. Wame and Co.] n.d. Murray. Murray's Handbook for Lincolnshire. 1890. N. & Q. Notes and Queries. 1849 — 1905. Nevinson. History of Stamford. By the Rev. C. Nevinson, M.A., Warden of Browne's Hospital. Stamford MDCCCLXXIX. North. The Church Bells of the County and City of Lincoln. By Thomas North. 1882. Northall. English Folk-Rhymes. By G. F. Northall. 1892. NoTiTiiE LuDiE. NotiticE Ludce or Notices of Louth [Lincoln- shire] MDCCCXXXIV. [By the Rev. R. S. Bayley, pastor of the Independent Chapel, Louth, from 1830 to 1836. See N. and Q., 4th S., II., pp. 179, 234. The extracts from the Churchwarden's Accounts are not spelt accurately, and the dates given are too indefinite to be worth copying.] XX List of Authorities. Oldfield. a Topographical and Historical Account of Wainfleet. ... By Edmund Oldfield, 1829. Old Lincolnshire. Old Lincolnshire-^ an Antiquarian Magazine. Edited by G. Burton. Stamford. 1883—5. Oliver (i). Monumental Antiq. of Great Grimsby. By the Rev. Geo. Oliver. 1825. Oliver (2). Hist, and Antiquities of the Conventual Church of S.JameSi Grimsby. By the Rev. Geo. Oliver. 1829. Oliver (3). Hist, of the Holy Trinity Guild at Sleaford. By the Rev. Geo. Oliver. 1837. Oliver (4). Ye Byrde of Gryme\ an Apologue. By the Rev. G. Oliver, D.D., Rector of South Hykeham, Vicar of Scopwick ; late Rector of Wolverhampton and Prebendary in the Collegiate Church there, and Honorary Member of many Learned Societies at Home and Abroad. Grimsby. 1866. E. Peacock, L A Glossary of Words used in the Wapentakes of Manley and Corringham, Lincolnshire. By Edward Peacock, F.S.A. MDCCCLXXVIL [First Edition. Published by the Dialect Society.] E. Peacock, IL The Second Edition of the above Glossary. Peck, Axholme. A Topographical Account of the Isle of Axholme, in Two Volumes. Vol. I. By W. Peck. 18 15. [No more published.] Peck, Bull-Runnings. [From a MS. copy of the very rare pamphlet] The History of the Stamford Bull- Runnings. Stamford. Printed by T. Baily and W. Thompson. [Peck.] Peter of Blois. Continuation of IngulpKs Hist, of Croyland. By Peter of Blois. Bohn's Antiquarian Library [in the vol. containing Ingulph's Chronicle] 1854. Pop. Sup. The Gentleman's Magazine Library. Popular Super- stitions. Pryme. The Diary of Abraham de la Pryme. [Edited by Mr. Charles Jackson, 1870.] Published by the Surtees Society. List of Authorities. xxl Rawnsley. Memories of the Tennysons. By the Rev. H. D. Rawnsley. 1900. Reliquary. The Reliquary. Vol. IV. 1863 — 4. Roger of Wendover. Roger of Wendovers Flowers of History. By J. A. Giles. In two volumes. 1849. Rox. Ball. The Roxburghe Ballads. Successively edited by William Chappell, Esq., F.S.A. and J. Woodfall Ebsworth, M.A., F.S.A., Vols. I.— VII. Printed for the Ballad Society, v.d. 187 1 — 1890. Sempringham. St. Gilbert of Sempringham and the Gilbertines. By Rose Graham. 1901. Sleaford. Sketches . . . of New and Old Sleaford. 1825. Smith. A Hist, of Spilsby in Lincolnshire. By the Rev. H. Colton Smith. Stark. The History and Antiquities of Gainsburgh. By Adam Stark. Second Edition. 1843. Streatfeild. Lincolnshire and the Danes. By the Rev. G. S. Streatfeild, M.A. 1884, Street. Historical Notes on Grantham and Grantham Church. By the Rev. B. Street, B.A., Curate of Grantham. 1857. Stonehouse. Hist, and Topography of the L. of Axholme. By the Rev. W. B. Stonehouse. MDCCCXXXIX. Stukeley. Stukeley's Lntinerarium Curiosum. Second Edition. London. MDCC.LXXVI. Stukeley Corr. The Family Memoirs of the Rev. Will. Stukeley. 1883. [Ed W. C. Lukis, Surtees Society.] Taales fra Linkisheere. North Lincolnshire Dialect. Taales fra Linkisheere. By Mabel Peacock. 1889. Tales and Rhymes. Tales and Rhymes in the Lindsey Folk-Speech. By Mabel Peacock. 1886. Thompson. The History and Antiquities of Boston. . . . in the County of Lincoln. By Pishey Thompson. Boston 1856. xxii List of Authorities, Thurston. The Life of Saint Hugh of Lincoln. By Herbert Thurston, SJ. 1898. Topography. The Gentleman's Magazine Library. English Topography. Part VIII. Topographical Society. A Selection of Papers relative to the County of Lincoln^ read before the Lincolnshire Topo- graphical Society. 1841 — 2. Tracts. Tracts and Miscellanies relating to Lincoln Cathedral, the City, Palace Ruins, etc., with some original Letters and curious Documents hitherto unpublished. Lincoln 1864. [Paging not continuous.] TURNOR. Collections for the History of the Town and Soke of Grantham. By Edmund Turner, F.R.S., S.S.A. London. 1806. Ulceby. Notes on Ulceby, North Lincolnshire. By the Rev. W. G. Dimock Fletcher. 1885. Usher. A Handbook to Stow Church Near Lincoln. By the Rev. W. N. Usher, M.A. Lincoln. 1890. Vaux. Church Folklore. By the Rev. J. E. Vaux. 1894. Walcott. Memorials of Stamford. By M. E. C. Walcott. 1867. Watkins. Ln the Country : Essays by the Rev. M. G. Watkins, M.A., Rector of Barnoldby-le-Beck. London 1883. Watson. A History of Clee and the Thorpes of Clee\ being a brief account of the Townships of Clee, Hoole, Itterby, Thrunscoe, Weelsby, Holm, Cleethorpes, New Clee, Beaconthorpe and New Cleethorpes. ... By C. Ernest Watson (Pastor of the Congregational Church of Lymm, Cheshire. Great Grimsby. 1901). Weir. Historical and Descriptive Sketches of the Toivn and Soke of Horncastle. By George Weir. 1820. Weld. Glimpses of Tennyson. By Agnes Grace Weld. 1893. Wesley, Life of. Life of Wesley. By R. Southey. 1863. Vol. I., pp. 319—339- List of Authorities. xxiii Wheeler. Hist, of Fens of South Lincolnshire. By W. H. Wheeler. Second Edition. White. W. Whiti s Hist. ^ Gazetteer and Directory of Lincolnshire. 1882. William of Malmesbury. The Church Historians of England. Vol. III., Part I. MDCCCLIV. Wild. Tetney^ Lincolnshire, A History by the Rev. J. Wild, Vicar of Tetney. Printed for the Author. Grimsby. 1901. Wilkinson. Lllustrated Guide to Lincolnshire. By G. J. Wilkinson. Lincoln. 1900. WooDROFFE. Halfa7i-hour in Grantham Church. By the Rev. Duncan Woodroffe, M.A., Rector of Stroxton and some- time Curate of Grantham. (Grantham, n.d.) Word-Lore. The Gentleman s Magazine Library. Dialect^ Proverbs and Word-lore. PART L SECTION I. NATURAL OR INORGANIC OBJECTS. HILLS AND MOUNDS. Baxnoldby-le-Beck. Along the High Street, above Adam's Head,^ runs a long detached mound called the Giant's Grave. After lying for generations in neglect a neighbouring farmer ploughed and sowed wheat upon it ; but nothing came up. Not to be beaten he next year planted potatoes on it; not one ever grew. In despair it is now abandoned to the grass and moss with which it has for centuries been clothed by boon nature. — W ATKINS, p. 197. STONES. Ewerby Wath. On the common near that place are several large coffin stones lying near each other, but without any kind of regularity. They have occupied their present situation far beyond the time of human memory or tradition, and the people have a legend still existing in doggerel rhyme, which attributes them to some magical transformation. The lines are as follow : The Kings of England and France and Spain, All fell down in a shower of rain ; The shower of rain made dirty weather, And here they all lie down together. Oliver (3), p. 121. [^ The source of a certain beck is so called.] A 2 Natural or Inorganic Objects, Fonaby. At Fonaby, near to Pelham's Pillar, stands a stone peculiarly like a petrified sack of corn. Legend says that St. Paul (some say Christ) was walking on the road, and asked the man with the sack what he had in it He replied, ' Nothing.' * Nothing it shall remain,' was the answer, and it was at once turned into stone. A succeeding owner of the land is said to have attempted to drag the stone to his house, and it took twelve horses to take it down the hill. He had a run of bad luck, put down to the influence of the stone, and it was returned, one horse being able to draw it up the hill. The stone is known for many miles as the 'Fonaby stone sack.' — WILKINSON, p. 286. See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 163. Cf Roger of Wendover, Flowers of History, trans- lated by J. A. Giles, 1 849, vol. i., p. 64. South Hykeham. There is a tradition in South Hyke- ham that these lands formerly possessed the privilege of Sanctuary. Within the memory of persons still living the parish constables were set at defiance by a man, against whom they held a warrant of arrest, seating himself on what was called the ' Jerusalem Stones ' (per- haps the ruins of the old Sanctuary Cross) on these lands, and being fed by sympathising neighbours, the constables believing that they could not execute the warrant on this once privileged spot. — Lines. Arch. Soc.^ vol. XXV., p. J ^^ footnote. Louth. Blue Stone. — There is a tradition that it was once in use as a Druidical altar stone on Julian Bower, a locality not far distant from its present position. — L. N. & Q., vol. v., Nat. Hist. Section, pp. 31, 32 ; but cf. Notitiae Ludae^ p. 244. Crowle. Black Stone. — There is a big stone in a farm- yard called ' the black stone.' If this stone be removed the farmer's cattle will die within a year afterwards. It Stones, 3 is said that upon one occasion the stone was removed, when the farmer lost all his cattle and suffered great loss. It was, however, mysteriously brought back. — Addy, p. 57. The DeviVs Ditch. [From Nottinghamshire.] — Near * Byard's Leap ' in Lincolnshire is a place called the Devil's Ditch, which was made in this manner a very long time ago. There was a man who wanted to make a road, and whilst he was considering what to do, one came to him and said, ' Take thy horse and ride quickly from the place where thou wouldst have the road begin to the place where thou wouldst have it end. But beware that thou dost not turn round or look back.' So one night the man took his horse and rode quickly over the ground where he wished the road to be, and as he went the road was made behind him. But just before he reached the end he turned round and looked back. Now in this place where he turned round is a ditch called the Devil's Ditch, which can never be filled up, for as often as they try to fill it during the day so often is it dug out again at night. — Addy, pp. 26, 27. A part of a road leading out of Crowle, in Lincolnshire, is unfinished, and never will be finished. A farmer once met a mysterious person, who inquired of him why the road was not finished, and told the farmer that he would finish it if he would turn his back and not watch how it was done. But when the farmer heard the tinkering and hammering on the road he could not resist the tempta- tion of looking round. He then saw a number of little men working at the road. But they vanished in an instant, and the road returned to its former condition and never can be mended. — Addy, p. 135. Epworth. Grave Stone. — John Wesley's foot-marks are still shown on his father's tombstone at Epworth, in the Isle of Axholme. They are sections of two ferruginous 4 Natural or Inorganic Objects, concretions in the slab. The local tradition respecting them is, that John Wesley caused them miraculously when on a certain occasion he stood there to preach, being refused the use of the pulpit. Cf. also The Sacristy, vol. i., pp. 289-292. A very similar tale to the Wesley legend was told some years ago about another Lincolnshire grave-stone. A farmer of drunken habits cut his throat, and died from the effects of the wound. He was buried in the church- yard of the neighbouring village, and an altar-tomb put over his grave. In the slab at the top, near the upper end, were some red marks, caused, I imagine, by iron in the stone. Several of the rustics told me that these were not natural marks, that they had not been there at first, but were sent by God to mark His detestation of the crime of self-murder. — N. & Q.*, vol. ix., p. 190. Cf. p. 289 and vol. x., pp. 189, 190. Winceby. There was the large stone in Winceby field, where soldiers had sharpened their swords before the battle. This was a stone of fearful interest, for much treasure was supposed to have been buried under it. Numerous attempts have been made to get at this treasure, but they were always defeated by some accident or piece of bad luck. On the last occasion, by ' yokkin ' several horses to chains fastened round the stone, they nearly succeeded in pulling it over, when, in his excite- ment, one of the men uttered an oath, and the devil instantly appeared, and stamped on it with his foot. * Tha cheans all brok, tha osses fell, an' tha stoan went back t' its owd place solidder nur ivver ; an' if ya doan't believe ya ma goa an' look fur yer sen, an' ya'U see tha divvill's fut mark like three kraws' claws, a-top o' tha stoan.' It was firmly believed the lane was haunted, and that loud groans were often heard there. — N. & Q.^, vol. ix., p. 466. Stones, 5 This stone cannot be moved, at least all attempts have so far failed, especially on one occasion, when it was with much difficulty reared up by ropes pulled by men and dragged by horses, for on a man saying, ' Let God or devil come now, we have it,' the stone fell back, dragging over the men and horses who were hauling at the ropes, and something appeared standing on the stone, doubtless Samwell the Old Lad, that is the Devil, who had been so rashly defied. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 235. Cf. Smith, 139. Beelsby. In an adjoining field lingers one of the few legends of this prosaic district. A treasure is supposed to be hid in it, and at times two little men wearing red caps, something like the Irish leprechauns, may be seen intently digging for it. — WatkinS, p. 203. SPRINGS AND WATER-LORE. There is a Lincolnshire saying, that whenever water is drawn from a well a little should be thrown back into it. And only a few years ago a woman, who was born about 1 8 1 2 in a parish lying within three or four miles of the southern bank of the Humber, presented one of her care- fully-hoarded bottles of 'June- water' to a friend, with the assurance that it was a household remedy of the greatest value for bad eyes and other ailments, and that it had been caught as it had fallen direct from the clouds — ' None of your eaves'-drip nor tree-drip, but straight from the sky.' In Lancashire such * June-water' has also an established reputation ; but in the wapentake of Walsh- croft, in Lincolnshire, another version of the belief has currency. It is there thought by some people that 'July-water' possesses health-restoring qualities. — Ant, xxxi., 366. Lower Bumliam. ' This spring was dedicated to the ever-blessed Redeemer, and on the festival of His 6 Natural or Inorganic Objects, Ascension was supposed to possess the power of healing all sorts of deformities, weaknesses, and cutaneous diseases in children, numbers of which were brought from all parts to be dipped in it on that day.' — Stonehouse, History, 311. Near Stamford. Tradition recounts that a religious house inhabited by pious women once stood near this holy well, and that its waters then had the power of restoring sight to the blind.' Utterby. Formerly a rag-well of great repute for its medicinal qualities. The surrounding bushes used to be tufted over with tatters left by people who visited it to benefit by its waters. Three or four years ago, if not later, remnants of clothing might still be seen on the shrubs. Persons yet living [in 1895] have taken their children to this well, and, after sprinkling them with water, have dropped a penny into it for good luck. Halliwell Dale, Winterton. A medicinal and petri- fying water, near which rags used to be left on the bushes. The late Mr. Joseph Fowler, of Winterton, who was born in the year 1791, remembered people who had seen rags on the bushes near, but whether he had observed them himself is not quite certain. Denton. St. Christopher (otherwise Sancaster) Well, is believed to have been a holy well, and it is still held in honour for its curative virtues. Manton. Eye George, or High George, is yet resorted to for the alleviation of certain ailments, and the water is considered so beneficial that, within a few years of the present time, people have taken the trouble to come from Sheffield for the purpose of carrying some of it away in bottles. Louth. St. Helen's Well, which furnished Louth Park Abbey with water by means of a cut called Monks' Dyke, ^ It is still a wishing well. You wish a wish, and drop a pin into it. springs and Water- Lore, 7 was formerly ornamented with flowers and branches on Holy Thursday. . . . Aswell, at Louth, was also similarly adorned on that day. Lincoln. There is a valuable chalybeate spring apparently connected with what was once * Monk's Abbey/ which is dedicated to St. Mary Magdalen. It is popularly esteemed for its cures of ' bad legs ' and other physical troubles. Among the many other named-wells he [Abraham de la Pry me] mentions is Jenny Stanny Well, near Hibbald- stow Fields, which at the present day is reported to be haunted by a ghost, sometimes described as a woman carrying her head under her arm. This spectre is sup- posed to be Jenny Stannywell, who once upon a time drowned herself in the water. At least two other well or pond ghosts of the feminine sex are known in Lincoln- shire, but so far as is recorded they carry their heads in orthodox fashion. Kirton. Ashwell at Kirton-in-Lindsey has, like the Halliwell at Scotter, the By- Well at North Kelsey, the holy well at Mavis-Enderby, and many other springs beyond the limits of the county, the quality of giving those who drink of it an irresistible desire to live in its neighbourhood. Caistor, among its many wells, possesses an outflow of water supposed to cure diseased eyes ; while the rag-wells at Kingerby and Nettleton-Top have, or till lately had, special virtues. Some fifty or sixty years since, or a little earlier, another rag-well was to be seen in one of the parishes near Burton-upon-Stather in the north of the county. In the neighbourhood of Kirton-in-Lindsey another water superstition may be recognised in the opinion some- times expressed that no washing ought to be done on Ascension Day, since, if clothes are hung out to dry on Holy Thursday, some member of the family concerned will die. 8 Natural or Inorganic Objects, Healing. Two of the most frequently patronized springs in the county rise within a few feet of each other in a narrow plantation by the roadside on Healing Wells Farm, in the parish of Healing, near Great Grimsby. Between the two springs grows a large thorn, and the bushes around them are hung with rags. Mr. Cordeaux visited them not long since for the purpose of discovering whether pins are ever dropped into them, 'but the bottom of the water in both cases was too muddy and full of leaves to allow accurate examination. It is said, however, that large numbers of > pins have been found near the curative waters at Kingerby. The twin wells at Healing are popularly credited with influencing totally different maladies. According to one account, the iron spring is chiefly of benefit in diseases of the eye, and the other in skin diseases. F S , a middle-aged man, who grew up in an adjoining parish, states that when he was a lad, one spring was used for bathing, and the second for drinking. The latter was considered good against consumption, among other forms of sickness. . . . What the special gift of the bathing well was F S cannot say. He often plunged his feet into it when a boy, but he does not venture to assert that it had any great power in reality, although ' folks used to come for miles,' and the gipsies, who called the place Ragged Spring or Ragged Well, frequently visited it. A gentleman who hunts with the Yarborough pack every winter, says that he notices the rags fluttering on the shrubs and briars each season as he rides past. There is always a supply of these tatters, whether used super- stitiously or not, and always has been since his father first knew the district some seventy years ago. Bottesford. Among the other health-giving waters of the county, Craikell-Spring, a now-vanished rag-well at springs and Water-Lore. 9 Bottesford, was once greatly esteemed. Nearly a hundred and fifty years since, according to the tradition transmitted by a woman who died lately in her ninth decade, ' folks used to come in their carriages to it,' and people yet living have heard how Mrs. H 's mother, ' who had gone stone blind,' received her sight by bathing in it. Less than fifty years ago a sickly child was dipped in the water between the mirk and the dawn on midsummer morning, ' and niver looked back'ards efter,' immersion at that mystic hour removing the nameless weakness which had crippled him in health. Within the last fifteen years a palsied man went to obtain a supply of the water, only to find, to his intense disappointment, that it was drained away through an underground channel which rendered it unattainable. Kelsey. The Maiden-Well at North Kelsey should be visited by unmarried women on St. Mark's Eve, St. Mark's being a holy-day as inseparably linked with the practice of amorous spells and other superstitions of pre- Christian origin as Hallow E'en itself A young servant, who was a native of Kelsey, informed W F , not many years ago, that girls coming to the spring with the view of divination must walk towards it back- wards, and go round it three times in the same manner, each girl, meanwhile, wishing the wish that she may see her destined sweetheart. After the third circle is com- plete, the inquirer must kneel down and gaze into the spring, in which she will see her lover looking up out of the depths. Burnham. A spring at Burnham, near Barton-upon- Humber, was, till the middle of this century if not still more recently, regarded as efficacious in removing the curse of sterility from married women. A letter addressed to Mr. Hesleden in the year 1 8 5 i testifies that the water then maintained its reputation. The writer, a gentleman- farmer at Burnham, informs the antiquary in answer to lO Natural or Inorganic Objects. his inquiries * relating to the character of the Burnham Spring/ that ' so far as report goes there is no doubt, and there are instances where many a one has given the fountain devoutly her blessing.' He afterwards pro- ceeds to relate, with some degree of raillery, that in two cases which occurred within his own knowledge, drinking water carried from the spring was supposed to have had the happiest effect, although in the second instance four- teen years of married life had been passed in a childless condition. — Antiquary^ vol. xxxi., pp. 366-374. Bametby-le-Wold. Near this Church is a spring called the Holy Wells. I have known of persons resorting to the spring, and applying the water to the diseased eyes of children for sanitary purposes ; but not resorting to any other spring, however similarly situated in the parish for such purposes. — Hall, p. 61. Burnham (Nether). A spring was dedicated to the ever- blessed Redeemer, and on the festival of His Ascension was supposed to possess the power of healing all sorts of deformities, weaknesses, and cutaneous diseases in children, numbers of which were brought from all parts to be dipped in it on that day. — Stonehouse, pp. 31 1-3 13. N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 98. Caistor. The hill on which Castor is situated is very fruitful in springs of excellent water ; but the most remarkable is in an obscure situation adjoining the churchyard at the end of Duck Street, and is known by the name of the Cypher Spring, from syfer (Sax.) pure, as descriptive of the quality of the water. It bursts out with some degree of violence through cavities of the rock at a distance from the ground, and falls like a small cascade. Near this another spring issues silently from under the churchyard, and is reputed, how truly I know not, to possess the virtue of healing diseased eyes. — [Geo. Oliver], Topography, p. 112. springs and Water-Lore. 1 1 Denton. On the Denton estate is a spring of very pure water, similar to that at Malvern Wells, in Wor- cestershire. The spring is much frequented, and many medical properties are ascribed to its waters. — Marrat, vol. iii., p. 298 ; Beauties, vol. ix., p. 773. Holywell. [There is a] ' holy well ' encased with stone of a polygonal form, shaded by yew trees and within the precincts of the burial-ground, close to the south-west angle of the church. . . . The tradition respecting this well is that its water was highly successful in relieving persons afflicted with ophthalmic affections, and that pilgrims from a large district visited it. — S. M., n. d. Kirton. Esh-well, i.e. Ash-well, a well at Kirton-in- Lindsey ; it is mentioned in the manor records early in the sixteenth century. The present belief is that whoso- ever drinks of the water of this well will ever after desire to live at Kirton. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 99. Louth. Even less than a century since. As well was regularly dressed in preparation for the ancient honours of perambulation and the prayers of Holy Thursday. At such a time also, 'the small wells,' a cluster of little springs on the north of the town, shared in the honours of green boughs and popular huzzas. Nettleton. There is a notable well in the parish, com- monly called ' The Wishing Well/ upon land belonging to Miss Dixon, of Holton Park, about one mile and a half from the parish church, and in an easterly direction from the Grange. It was famous for its curative virtues, and thither many of the afflicted, until very recently, if not now, were wont to make a pilgrimage. A thorn tree grew over the well, which used to be covered with votive offerings, chiefly bits of rag, the understood condition to any benefit being that whoever partook of the water should * leave something.' The thorn tree, however, is now cut down. There is another well in the parish 12 Natural or Inorganic Objects. which may prove yet more interesting. It is situated upon the glebe, and is said to rise and fall with the tide. — White, p. 614. Rowston. A Holy Well is traditionally said to have been used in times beyond memory for its medicinal properties, and was much frequented by persons afflicted with the scrofula and other complaints, which are said to have been uniformly relieved if the water was applied at the proper time of the morn, for then the spirit of the well was most propitious. — Oliver (3), pp. 131, 132, 133. See Kent's Lindum Lays and Legends, 1861, pp. 244-247. Utterby. Holy Well, on the east side of the parish, was formerly in repute for its medicinal virtues among the lower classes, who, after using it, tied rags on the surrounding bushes, to propitiate the genius of the spring. — White, p. 787 ; N. & Q.^ vol. vi., p. 424. Winterton. There is a spring at Holy Well Dale, near Winterton, in North Lincolnshire, formerly celebrated for healing properties, and the bushes around used to be hung with rags. — N. and Q.^ vol. vii., p. 37 ; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 128 ; Vaux, p. 279. Ponds. — ' In the north-eastern corner of the county are many circular ponds. . . . Sir I. Banks sounded some, but found (so says tradition) no bottom. . . . They are popularly said to run through to the Antipodes. . . . In one of these ponds a legend relates that a great lady, together with her coach and four, was swallowed bodily, and never seen again. It is yet called " Madame's Blow- well.'" — Wild, pp. 5, 6. THE SUN, MOON, AND STARS. Sun. — There is a belief that this luminary dances with joy when it rises on Easter-day, and that the beams The Sun, Moon, and Stars, 13 which pierce through a cloud and stretch in long rays down to the horizon, form the ladder on which Jacob saw the Angels ascending and descending. There is a saying, too, that mill-stones ought to be set to 'turn with the sun,' since the miller will never thrive while their course is against it. If the sun shines on the apple-trees on Christmas-day, there will be a heavy crop of fruit in the ensuing season. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 2 1 ; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 144 ; Heanley, p. 9. Old folks remembered getting up early to see the sun dance on Easter morning [in a village five miles from Great Grimsby].— The Rev. W. G. Watkins. See Section VII. under Divination. Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. ii ; L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 44, note. Sun, moon, stars and rainbow ought not to be pointed at. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 166. I was under the impression that my nurse, a Lincoln- shire woman, warned me that some people said it was not right to stare at the stars ; I now think that the impro- priety I was cautioned against may have been that of pointing at them. — N. & Q.^, vol. v., p. 15. Sun-lore, sunset and ill-luck. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 167. Moon. — Lasses used to try how many years it would be before they were married, thus : at the first new moon of the year their eyes were bound with a new silk handker- chief, which had never been washed. Then they were led out into the garden, and told to look up and count how many moons they could see. If they saw two, three, five, or whatever the number might be, so many years they were told would elapse before marriage. This ceremony always gave an occasion for lovers, farm -servants, and the like, it may be noted, to swing lanterns and lamps before 14 Natural or Inorganic Objects, the girls' eyes, and could not fail to create much fun. — Antiquary^ vol. xiv., p. 12. The following invocation, to be adressed to the first new moon of the year, is known in North Lincolnshire : New moon, new moon, I pray thee This night my true love for to see. Neither in his riches nor array, But in his clothes that he wears every day. Another version of the third line is : Neither in his rich nor in his ray, ^ which if correct, may refer to * ray ' in the sense of striped cloth.— N. & Q.io, i., p. 125. Cf. loth S., i., p. 252. Everyone should bow or curtsey at the first sight of the new moon, to make sure of good luck in the ensuing moon-time, and no one should neglect to turn over the money he has in his pocket when he sees the first new moon of the year. By this action he will gain an abun- dance of money during the following twelve months. The first new moon of the year is also consulted in love- divinations. A girl who wishes to learn when she will marry should tie a new silk handkerchief over her eyes, and look up at the Queen of Night through it, when she will see as many moons as years will elapse before she becomes a wife. Lincolnshire sayings in regard to the moon are : ' Seed sown during a moon that came in on a Sunday and went out on a Sunday, will never come to much.' ' A moon-light Christmas, a light-harvest.' — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 22. It is a sign of storm when the moon ' ligs on her back,* and of rain when the horns of the moon are turned down towards the earth . . . A Setterday's moon Come it once in seven year, it comes too soon, The Sun, Moon^ and Stars, 15 because it is believed that a Saturday moon is sure to be the precursor of a rainy week. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 173. To see the moon reflected in a mirror is a sign that something will arise before the day is out to make you angry. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 91. See Section VIII., under Omens. Grantham. Poor B had some curious ' they says' to relate. She had heard that the man in the moon was put up there for sticking on a Sunday, and that it was not right to stare up into the starry sky. She had been told that a drowned woman always floated face downwards, whilst a man always lay upon his back. She had a most curious bit of legal folk-lore, namely, that we might honestly gather from a neighbour's garden any flowers which we could reach from our own ground by putting our hands through the hedge. — G. J., June 22, 1878. A South Lincolnshire man referring to the moon of February, 1885, said: * It's no use putting in more seed this moon, and what seed is in won't come up, because the moon came in on a Sunday and goes out on a Sunday.' — N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 265. It is not many years since I was warned by a neigh- bour not to buy a side of bacon from a certain man because he had killed his pig in the wane of the moon, and consequently the bacon would never ' set ' properly. — N. & Q.9, vol. vi., p. 426. I have understood in Lincolnshire, from a great authority in such matters, still living and hearty, that if pigs be killed in the wane of the moon, the bacon will always shrink in the boiling a great deal more nor what it will if they're killed at other times. — N. & Q.^, vol. vi., p. 516. Turning first to the folk-lore connected with animals, the pig bears off the palm in Lincolnshire estimation. Old folk in our village [about five miles from Great 1 6 Natural or Inorganic Objects, Grimsby] never kill a pig when the moon is waning, or the bacon will waste when put into the pot. The creature should always be killed as the moon is increasing, then the bacon is sure to swell. It is but neighbourly to send a dish of pig's fry (' pig-fare,' as the term is) to a friend ; but the dish must on no account be washed when it is returned. It must be left soiled, else the bacon will not cure. — Antiquary^ vol. xiv., p. lO. Woe to any man . . . who killed the pig that was to furnish my grandmother's bacon at any other than a full- moon. — G. J., June 29, 1878. Moon-lore. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 166. Star-shot. — A gelatinous substance often found in the fields after rain, and vulgarly supposed to be the remains of a meteor shot from the stars. It is, however, of vegetable origin, and joined to the earth by a central root, being the Tremella Mostoc of Linnaeus. — THOMPSON, p. 725. WEATHER AND WIND. Old Woman s Luck. — Wind blowing in the face both when going to and coming from a place. — Brogden, p. 141 ; E. Peacock, p. 185. Lincoln. Stormy weather and ' hanging assize.' — See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., pp. 165, 166; Folk-Lore Record, vol. iv., p. 127. Wind. — A high wind is a sign of death, especially of the death of some distinguished person. Cf. Pepys' Diary, 19 Oct., 1663. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 276. See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 1 66. Can anybody say why in North Lincolnshire the south- west quarter of the heavens is frequently termed Marnum Hole ? A Trent-sider said to me the other day : * We Weather and Wind/ ly hev'nt done wi' down-fall yet, th' wind's gotten into Marnum Hole agin.' — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 341. Probably Lower Marnham, near Tuxford, lying south- west of its vilifiers, gets the credit of originating all the rain a south-west wind brings. . . . Hole seems to be added in a kind of revenge for the bad weather. — lb., p. 432. Weather. — Marnum- Hole . . . People at Brigg speak of Ketton Hole {i.e. Kirton-in-Lindsey), and at West Halton of Wrawby Hole, in a similar manner. . . . — E. Peacock, i., p. 166. Weather- Holes. — See Folk-Lore, vol. x., pp. 249, 250. See Section VHI. for Weather-omens and Weather-forecasts. See Section HI. for the behaviour of animals indi- cating the approach of unsettled weather. THE CLOUDS. Noah's Ark = c\oMds elliptically parted into small wave-like forms. If the end points to the sun, it is a sign of rain ; if contrary to the sun, of fine weather. This phenomenon is known as Noe ship in Cleveland. — Streatfield, p. 346; Brogden, p. 137; E. Peacock, i., p. 180. THUNDER. Thunder-bolt, a belemnite. — It is still the common opinion that these fossils have fallen from the heavens during thunder. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 255; Brogden, p. 208. Thunder. — In a thunderstorm it was needful that all doors should be opened. — Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. 12. Devil showing his wrath in a thunderstorm. — See Folk- Lore, vol. xii., p. 166. SECTION II. TREES, PLANTS, MAYPOLES. [See Section VI. for traditional medicines.] Brampton. Ash-Tree. — In 1606 at Brampton, near Gainsbourough, an Ash-Tree shook both in the Body and Boughs, and there proceeded from thence Sighs and Groans, h'ke those of a man troubled in his Sleep, as if he felt some sensible Torments. Many climbed to the Top, where they heard the groans more plainly than below. One being a-top spoke to the Tree, but presently came down astonished, and lay groveling on the Earth Speech- less three Hours, and then reviving said, Brampton, Brampton, thou art much bound to Pray. The Author of this News was Mr. Vaughan, a Minister there present, who heard and saw these Passages, and told Mr. Hildersham of them. The Earl of Lincoln caused one of the arms of the Ash to be lopped off, and a Hole to be bored into the Body, and then was the sound or hollow Voice heard more audibly than before, but in a kind of Speech they could not understand. — Curiosities^ p. 117. Scotton. Horseshoes under Ash Trees. — In grubbing up old stumps of ash trees, from which many successive trees have sprung, in the parish of Scotton, there was found in many instances an iron horseshoe. The one showed to me measured 4J in. by 4J in. The workmen seemed to be familiar with this fact, and gave me the following account : The shoe is so placed to ' charm * the tree, so 1 Trees, Plant Sy Maypoles. 19 that a twig of it might be used in curing cattle over which a shrew mouse had run, or which had been ' over- looked.' If they were stroked by one of these twigs, the disease would be charmed away. — N. & Q.^, vol. ix., p. 65. I was informed yesterday that in felling a wood in the parish of Scotton, near Kirton-in-Lindsey, several horse- shoes had been found buried under the roots of ash trees. — Cf vol. vii., p. 368. The failure of the crop of ash-keys portends a death in the Royal family. — THOMPSON, p. 735. Esh. — An ash tree . . . Oak before Esh — a deal of wet. — COLE, p. 43. Legend of St. Etheldreda's staff. — Cf. p. 355. Alford. Blackthorn {Prunus spinosa, L. General.) — ' At Alford I have heard it said that if you bring Blackthorn into the house, someone is sure to break their arm or leg.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 4. Borage. — ABRAHAM, ISAAC, AND Jacob. I, Borago orientalisy L. ; 2, Symphytum officinale, L. ; 3, Echium vulgare, L.; 4, Pulmonaria officinalis, L. i, 3, and 4, Bottesford, L. ; 2, Boultham, K. So called from the three shades in the faded, freshly-opened flowers and buds. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 2. Bracken. — Robin-HoOD-AND-HIS-Sheep or ROBIN- Hood-and-HIS-Men. The Bracken stalk or root just level with the ground, cut slanting so as to show its dark centre.— E. P.; F. P.; M. E. W. P., Lines. Folk Names, Additions, p. 29. Bracken and St. Mark's Eve. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xiv., p. 94. Red-berried Briony. Mandrake {Bryonia dioica, L.) — Lindsey and Kesteven. ' Used in working charms to this day.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 121. 20 Trees y Plants, Maypoles, Bottesford. Black Briony. Womandrake {Tamus com- munis, L.) — in contradistinction to mandrake. — ' Used in working charms to this day.' — Lines. Folk Names ^ p. 24. Buttercup. — i. The general name for many species of Ranunculus ; 2. More rarely Potentilla anserina^ L. At Bottesford, L., they say the yellow of the buttercups colours the butter in the month of June. Children in Lindsey hold the flowers under each other's chins, and if there happens to be bright sunlight and the colour is reflected upon their skin, they are said to * like butter.' — Lines. Folk Names ^ p. 5. Cowslip. — When I was a child, Lincolnshire elders used to tell me that if I set a cowslip root wrong end upwards a primrose would be the result. — N. & Q.^ vol. iii., p. 348. Cf. Lines. Folk Names ^ p. 3. Daisy. — The common name for Bellis perennis, L. — When the under side of the rays are tinged with purple they are said to be stained with Abel's blood. — Lines, Folk Names, p. 7. Dandelion. — Clock: the seed of the dandelion. Children have a notion that the hour of the day, or the number of years we have to live, may be told by the number of pufls it takes to blow all the seeds away. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 62 ; Lines. Folk Names, p. 6. Stixwould. Spotted Dead-Nettie. Jerusalem Nettle {Lamium maculatum, L.). — ' From a drop of the Blessed Virgin's milk having fallen on it as she nursed our Saviour.' — Lines. Folk Names, Additions, p. 27. Elder-tree. — Hearing one day that a baby in a cottage close to my own house was ill, I went across to see what was the matter. Baby appeared right enough, and I said so ; but its mother promptly explained. * It were all I 4& Trees, Plants y Maypoles. 21 along of my maister's thick 'ed ; it were in this how : T' rocker cummed off t' cradle, an' he hedn't no more gumption than to mak' a new 'un out on illerwood without axing the Old Lady's leave, an' in coorse she didn't like that, an' she came and pinched t' wean that outrageous he were a' most black i' t' face ; but I bashed 'un off, an' putten an' esh 'un on, an' t' wean is as gallus as owt agin.' This was something quite new to me, and the clue seemed worth following up. So going home I went straight down to my backyard, where old Johnny Holmes was cutting up firewood — * chopping kindling,' as he would have said. Watching the opportunity, I put a knot of elder- wood in the way and said, ' You are not feared of chopping that, are you ? ' ' Nay,' he replied at once, ' I bain't feared of choppin' him, he bain't wick (alive) ; but if he were wick I dussn't, not without axin' the Old Gal's leave, not if it were ever so.' . . . [The words to be used are] : ' Oh, them's slape enuff. You just says, " Owd Gal, give me of thy wood, an Oi will give some of moine, when I graws inter a tree!' ' — Heanley, pp. 21-23 ; L. N. & Q., i., p. 56. Evergreens. — I have recently been reminded that it is ' very bad luck ' to burn the evergreens that have been used for Christmas decorations. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 264. Barrow-on-Humber. Thorn-tree. — On the opposite hill, within the lordship of Barrow [-on-Humber], a thorn-tree some years ago stood (denominated St. Trunnion's Tree). — Archceology, Part II., p. 232. Cf Pryme, p. 132. Fishtoft. — [A] picturesque thorn-tree called ' Hawthorn Tree' is mentioned in the Fishtoft Acre Books for 1662, 1709 and 1733, and in Brazier's Map, 1724. It is in Fishtoft parish, at the point of intersection of the Tower 22 Trees y Plants, Maypoles, Lane and the road to Fishtoft Church, with the Low- Road to Freiston. The tree is, traditionally, stated to have been originally a stake driven into the grave of a suicide who was buried at the cross roads, as was the custom very generally at one period, and we believe is not altogether discontinued at the present time. We have heard the name of the female said to have been ignominiously interred here, and many traditional par- ticulars respecting her, more than half a century ago ; but do not recollect them. — THOMPSON, pp. 493, 494. Hawthorn, — One other old custom, which may have travelled down from the far past, used to prevail in the extreme east of the county, and which may do so still. An old shepherd we knew used always, after parturition, to throw the ' cleansing ' upon a hawthorn bush. ' It brought luck ' he used to say.* In Lincolnshire it is considered unlucky to take haw- thorn blossom indoors. I believe it is suspected of being the precursor of death. — N. & Q.^ vol. ii., p. 215. See G. J., June 29, 1878 ; Lines. Folk Names, p. 14. Haws.—S^t: Section VIII., under Omens. Grantham. Hazel. — We observed a ceremony on cracking a double nut. . . . Nobody who cared for ' what was what ' ever thought of eating both kernels : the owner would pass one on to a friend, and each would munch his share in solemn silence, wishing a wish which had to be kept secret in order to be realized. We also fell to wishing when we had our initiatory taste of straw- berries or of any other delicacy for the year, and above all when we first heard the cuckoo, on which occasion we were careful to turn our money — when we had any — in our pockets. — G. J., June 22, 1878. * In North-west Lincolnshire the * cleansing ' should be hung on a hedge : otherwise dogs will eat it and thus learn to worry lambs. So said an experienced shepherd. — M. P. Trees, Plants, Maypoles, 23 Hazel- or Willow-twigs. — I have seen bunches of hazel and willow twigs gathered [on Palm Sunday] preserved in constant verdure the year round by placing them in pots of water in cottage windows, and was once told by an aged grand-dame in South Lincolnshire that they were good against thunder and lightning. — Stamford Mercury of April 15, 1870. Boston. The devil goes a nutting on Holy-rood day. — Thompson, p. 735. Owmby. William Bowskin, an old man resident at Owmby, near Spital, Lincolnshire, about half a century ago used to say that nutters on ' Hally Loo Day ' (Sep- tember 14) were certain to come to grief of some kind. — N. & Q.*, vol. ix., p. 225. Kelsey (South), L. House-Leek {Sempervivum tectorum, L. General). — ' Houseleek upon your thack keeps thunder off.' — Lines. Folk Names, Additions, p. 27. Fulbeck. Mare's-tail {Equisetum arvense, L.) ; Lindsey and Kesteven. — * Formerly used for scouring tin vessels.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 14. Winterton. Marsh-Pennywort. Sheep-rot {Hydrocotyle vulgaris, L.). — Said to give sheep * the rot,' probably because it grows in wet carr pastures, where they are most susceptible to it. — Lines. Folk Names, Additions, p. 29. See Section VI., Leechcraft, under Christmas, and Part II., Section I. Mountain-Ash, see under Wicken-Tree. Nettles. — It is a common belief that nettles grow spon- taneously where human urine has been deposited. — E. Peacock, i. p. 178. Dorrington. The Three Grained Oak was a most remarkable tree, and existed near the Playgarth to the 24 Trees, Plant Sy Maypoles. conclusion of the last century, when it was finally re- moved, to the great regret of the inhabitants, who appear to have entertained something of an hereditary feeling of respect for its venerable shade. — Oliver (3), pp. 95, 96. Oak,—^^^ Section VIII., under Omens. Winberingham. Mistletoe. An old Lincolnshire peasant woman told me a few years ago that when she was a girl in service at Wintringham, sometime between 1820 and 1835, it was the custom to 'dress the lugs of milk-kits with leaves on May-morning.' ' In the evening,' she said, ' we danced and played kiss-in-the-ring and such like games round a May garland set up in the cattle pasture. The garland was first dressed with a piece of mistletoe, sprigs of royal oak, and ribbons, and then fixed up on an old stump there was in the open field. It was fixed flat- way-on, not lying on its rim.' This account of a bygone May-tide observance is re- markable for two reasons. In the first place, the use of mistletoe in a part of the country where the plant is rarely, if ever found in a wild condition, strikes one as noteworthy ; and secondly, the mention of royal oak suggests a confusion between Old May Day and Royal Oak Day. In a description of ' Village Life in Lincoln- shire a Hundred Years Ago,' written by Mr. C. H. Crowder for 'Jackson's Brigg Annual,' 1889, it is stated^ on the authority of the author's grandfather, that a milking feast was formerly held on May 29, when dances round the maypole, and old games, such as ' nine peg,' ' merry holes,' ' Jack in the green,' and ' blind man's buff,' were favourite pastimes. On this day when the milkmaids came home from milking they would ornament their kits with flowers and deck themselves with garlands, and the young men and lads would run after the lasses to steal a May Day kiss, a show of gallantry which caused dire disaster to many a ' meal ' of milk, and worked the ruin of many a ' better-day ' coat. — N. & Q.^, vol. i.> p. 172. Trees, Plant Sy Maypoles. 25 Oats. ' If you cut oats green You get both king and queen ' : i.e. if oats be not cut before they seem fully ripe, the largest grains which are at the top of the head will probably fall out. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 182. Bottesford, Alford, and Winterton. Drake' s-feet {Orchis mascula, L.) — ' Drake, perhaps, is short for dragon here. It is a " wicked plant " in Lincolnshire.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 8. Parsley. — An old woman lately broke off and gave to my wife a quantity of parsley which had sown itself in a lettuce bed, but refused to take up any of it by the roots, saying, * it was most unlucky to transplant parsley.' — N. & Q.*, vol. xii., p. 397. Here children of inquiring mind are commonly told, when a baby arrives, that the doctor dug it up with a golden spade under a gooseberry bush. Sometimes it is stated that some one, not necessarily the doctor, has dug it up in a parsley bed. — N. & Q.^, xii., p. 413. I do believe he would have taken it in if a body had reckoned to him as babies was duggen up with a golden spade on a parsley-bed, same-like as they tell bairns, or anearly. — Eli TwiGG, p. 63. Plum. — See SECTION VIII., under Omens. Bottesford. Primrose. — John Dent, my father's gar- dener, told me when I was a very little boy that if primroses were planted the wrong way up, the flowers would come red. — [So too Primula hybrida ; see Lines. Folk Names, p. 3] ; N. & Q.^ vol. xii., pp. 234, 235. Winterton. Spotted Persiearia. Pig-grass {Polygonum Persicaria, L.). — ' So named because it grows near pig sties. It is said to have grown in the Garden of Geth- semane, and that the red marks on the leaves and stem are where the drops of blood fell on it from our Lord's 26 Trees, Plants, Maypoles. face during the agony.' — Lines. Folk Names, Additions, p. 28. Rush-strewing. — See PART II., SECTION III., Games and Sports, under Sites for Playing Games. Germander Speedwell. God's Eye ( Veronica officinalis^ [A mistake for V. Ckamoedrys.'] — If any one plucks it, his eyes will be eaten. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 120. Wicken-tree. — The mountain ash. The Pyrus aucuparia. I had a little wicken-tree, nothing would it bear. But a silver apple, and a golden pear. The king of France's daughter came to visit me, All for the sake of my little wicken-tree. Nursery Rhyme. Brogden, p. 224. The mountain ash, or rowan tree. Small twigs of this tree are carried in the pockets as a charm against witch- craft, are put in stacks and thatched buildings as a charm against fire, and also placed on the top of the churn for the same purpose, when ' th' butter wean't come.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 275. The Mountain Ash. — A spell against witchcraft. I've cutten out a mount (an amount) of wicken at Thorney for stakes and binders — witch-wicken we used to call it. We used to put a bit of wicken-tree in our bo-sum to keep off the witch. There's heder wicken, and there's sheder wicken [i.e. male wicken and female wicken\ one has berries, and the tother has none ; when you thought you were overlooked, if the person was he, you got a piece of sheder wicken ; if it was she, you got a heder wicken, and made a T with it on the hob, and then they could do nowt at you. — Cole, p. 167. Doddington. You make a garland of the branches and hang them round your pig's neck, more especially when it I Trees, Plants, Maypoles, 27 is first put up to fatten. Then it cannot possibly be bewitched. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 23. Tothill. Nose- Bleed {Achillea Millefolium, L.). — ' Smell- ing the flower is supposed to cause the nose to bleed.' — S. A., Lines. Folk Names, p. 15. Stixwould. Yew, or Yew-tree. — The general name for Taxus baccata, L. — ' " The oak, the ash, the elm, and yew, are the only trees that ever grew " ; that is, that are worth calling trees, because making useful wood.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 24. Christmas-bough, Kissing-bough, or Mistletoe-bough. — See Part II., Section I., under CHRISTMAS. It was formerly the custom in most Lincolnshire churches for a garland to be suspended from the roof, the screen, or some other conspicuous place when a young unmarried woman died. Several of these existed in Bottesford Church until the screen was destroyed in 1826. There is one in Springthorpe Church (near Gainsburgh). — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 115. Cf N. & Q.*, vol. xii., p. 480; Wilkinson, p. 158 ; North, p. 663. Dozzle, a staff or pole, stuck into the top of a stack to which the thatch is bound. It is usually gaudily painted, and surmounted with a weather-cock in the form of a fish, bird, fox, or man. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 91. Dozzils, or stack-staves, with heads carved to repre- sent men, animals, etc. — See Folk-Lore, vol. viii., p. 75- Cf N. &Q.9, xi., p. 53. Toppin, a ball, fish, bird, or other ornament put on the top of a stack.— E. PEACOCK, i., p. 258. Yule-log.—SQQ Part II., Section I., under Christmas. See also Festivals, under Harvest. SECTION III. ANIMALS. Ass. — When an ass brays the saying is, ' There's another tinker dead at Lincoln.' Though now naturalized, I believe this to be an importation from Leicestershire or Nottinghamshire. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 8. When bricklayers dees they to'ns to asses. — Messing- HAM, 1865 ; E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 15. Bamoldby-le-Beck. Badger. — The badger has its legs on one side shorter than those on the other : hence it runs fastest in a ploughed field, where it can have one set of legs on a higher level than the others by running along a furrow. — Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. 10. Bat. — The children sing when a bat appears : Black bat, bear away, Fly ower 'ere away, And come agean another day, Black bat, bear away. E. Peacock, i., p. 25. Bottesford. If a swarm of bees alight on a dead tree, or on the dead bough of a living tree, there will be death in the family of the owner during the year. — N. &. Q.\ vol. viii., p. 382. Stamford. The custom of informing bees of death is prevalent here. — N. & Q.\ vol. vi., p. 288 ; Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. 10 ; Bygone Lincolnshire, i., p. 82 ; E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 20. Animals, 29 Stallingborongh. Bees. — Whilst staying a short time at Stallingboro' (a Marsh village) some thirty years ago [I was] present at a full observance of the superstition. . . . It was a few days after the death of a cottager, when a woman staying with the bereaved family asked the widow, * Have the bees been told ? ' The reply being no, she at once took some spice cake and some sugar in a dish, and proceeding to the hives, placed the sweets before them ; then, rattling a bunch of small keys (I suppose to attract the attention of the indwellers), she repeated this formula : Honey bees ! honey bees ! hear what I say ! Your master, J. A., has passed away. But his wife now begs you will freely stay, And still gather honey for many a day. Bonny bees, bonny bees, hear what I say. Stamford Mercury, April 15, 1870. Being at a neighbour's house about a month ago, the conversation turned upon the death of a mutual acquaint- ance a short time prior to my visit. A venerable old lady present asked, with great earnestness of manner, ' Whether Mr. R.'s bees had been informed of his death ? ' (Our friend R. had been a great bee-keeper.) No one appeared to be able to answer the old lady's question satisfactorily, whereat she was much concerned, and said : ' Well, if the bees were not told of Mr. R.'s death they would leave their hives, and never return. Some people give them a piece of the funeral cake ; I don't think that is absolutely necessary, but certainly it is better to tell them of the death.' Being shortly afterwards in the neighbourhood of my deceased friend's residence, I went a little out of my way to inquire after the bees. Upon walking up the garden I saw the industrious little colony at full work. I learned, upon inquiring of the house- keeper, that the bees had been properly informed of Mr, R.'s death. 30 Animals, I found that in my own family, upon the death of my mother, some five-and-twenty years ago, the bees were duly informed of the event. A lady friend also told me that, twenty years ago, when she was at school, the father of her school-mistress died, and on that occasion the bees were made acquainted with his death, and regaled with some of the funeral cake. — N. & Q."*, vol. iv., p. 270. Holland. Bittern. — Here we had the uncouth musick of the Bittern, a Bird formerly counted ominous and presaging, and who, as Fame tells us, thrusts its Bill into a Reed, and then gives the dull, heavy Groan or Sound, like a Sigh ; which it does so loud, that with a deep Base, like the Sound of a Gun at a great Distance, 'tis heard two or three Miles, say the People. — Defoe, vol. ii., p. 341. Bull. — ' Th' black bull's trodden on him ' ; that is, he is in a very bad temper. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 25. See Part II., Section III., Games and Sports, for Bull-baiting. Butterfly. — During the long war with France, children used to kill all the white butterflies they could find, look- ing on them as symbols of the French. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 192. First Butterfly. — Making a call lately, I remembered I had seen a butterfly ; a lady present asked me if I had crushed it with my foot ; for if I had I should have crushed all my enemies for the year. This is quite new to me. — E. Seaton Blenkinsopp ; N. & Q.^ vol. vii., p. 306. Heapham. Cat. — I find that when the people here move to fresh houses, they almost always leave their cats behind them, because, they say, ' it is unlucky to flit a cat' — N. & Q.8, vol. v., p. 485. See Cole, p. 48 ; Peacock, i., p. 50. Animals. 31 Bamoldby-le-Beck. It is very unlucky to ' flit ' a cat (i.e. take it with you when you move in the general turn- out of Lincolnshire on old May Day, 1 3th May) ; but if you must take it with you, rub its paws with butter in the new house, and it will surely stay. Better still, keep it a night in the kitchen oven (cold, of course), and then it will never think of quitting its new home. — Antiquary ^ vol. xiv., p. 1 1. Cat-jingles, Herpes Zoster, the shingles, a disease with which elderly persons threaten children who are fond of nursing cats. The symptoms are said to be large red spots which grow around the waist, one fresh one growing on each side every day. When they meet at the back the sufferer dies. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 51. See Section VII., Leechcraft, under Shingles. Bottesford. Cat washing the dishes. — The sunlight re- flected from a pail [or other vessel] of water, upon a wall, or the floor. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol i., p. 100. Cockerel. — I had an opportunity of calling upon a farmer whom I had not seen for twelve months, and whom I never expected to see again. I was told they knew they should see a stranger, because a cockerel had come that morning and crowed at the front door. — N. and Q.^ vol. ii., p. 165. Cf. Good, p. 107. Cock's Q%^, a small yolkless Qg'g, which ignorant people believe is laid by a cock. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 65. Cormorant. — ^See SECTION VIII., under Death-birds. Cow. — Howd \i.e. hold]. To conceive. After a cow is taken to the bull, a slight cut is made in her ear to draw blood ; this is thought to make her howd. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 139. Beastlings. — The first milk from a cow after calving. . . . It is rarely made use of, from a belief that it is 32 Animals, unwholesome to every stomach but that of the young calf. — Brogden, pp. 20, 21. Beslings, Bislings, Beast, Beastings, the first milk of a cow after calving. Puddings are commonly made of it, and it is the custom when a cow calves to send small quantities of it to the neighbours as presents. It is very unlucky not to distribute gifts of beastings, or to wash out the vessels in which they have been sent. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 18. Bamoldby-le-Beck. So with * beestlings ' (the milk of the first three milkings after a cow has calved), the pail must never be washed, or the cow will 'go dry.' — Antiquary ^ vol. xiv., p. 10. Crow. — * Thou weant he' noa luck to daay, I knaw,* says the goodwife to her husband as he sets out from home, ' cos I heard that owd craw croakin' ower my left showder this morning, and I knaw it dussent croak like that for nowt.' — Bygone Lincolnshire. Cuckoo. — Tennyson learnt in Lincolnshire as a boy : In April he opens his bill, In May he sings all day. In June he changes his tune, In July away he does fly. In August go he must. Ward, Problems, p. 200. If you have money in your pocket the first time you hear the cuckoo, you will never be without all the year. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 293. Money must be turned in the pocket, when the note of the cuckoo is first heard, if you would have things go well with you. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., p. 92. * The first cuckoo you hear carries with it a similar fatality. Should you have money in your pocket, it is an indication of plenty ; but woe to the unhappy wretch who Animals, 33 hears this ill-omened bird for the first time with an empty purse!' — Gentleman's Magazine ^ 1832, Part II. Curlew. A curlew lean, or a curlew fat, Carries twelve pence upon her back, as they say in North Lincolnshire. — N. & Q.^, x., p. 235. More than once it has happened to me, when out trawling in the Boston deeps, that the cry of the ' Seven Whistlers * (which are the curlew) has made the fishermen take up the trawl and go straight home, sure that, if they neglected the friendly warning of their drowned brethren, some dire calamity would come upon them before the morrow morn. — Heanley, p. 7. Dog. — ' He's gotten th' black dog on his back this mornin' ' ; that is, he is in a bad temper. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 25. Used as a form of comparison : As tired as a dog. As hungry as a dog. As stalled as a dog. As laame as a dog. As fierce as a dog. As mad as a dog. As mucky as a dog. As howerly as a dog. As sick as a dog. E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 169. See Section VIII., under Omens. Dragon. — Perhaps there are in no part of England so many legends about dragons and dragon-slayers as in Lincolnshire. . . . Instances of traditions of dragon- slayers occur at Ludford, Middle Raisin, Walmsgate, Buslingthorpe, etc. — THOMPSON, p. 639. 34 Animals. Bufllingthorpe. The ancestor of the Buslingthorpes is said by a local tradition to have slain a dragon here, and to have had for this service a royal grant of Lissington Pasture, now a common of 400 acres, partly belonging to this parish. — White, p. 220. To the church of St. Peter, called Tupholme, in Middle Rasin, Gilbert de Bland, of that place, gave, among other donations, one part of his meadow in Lissingley. This, which contains between five and six hundred acres of very wet land, was once, according to tradition, a park belonging to Sir John Buslingthorpe, and granted him by royal favour. This is said to have been conferred as a reward for his courage and prowess, in attacking and slaying a dragon which infested the neighbourhood. A similar story is related of Sir Hugh Bardolph, who is said to have slain another at Walmsgate. — Beauties ^ vol. ix., p. 694. Wahnsgate. Ormr, the old Norse form of Anglo-Saxon wyrnty was amongst the commonest of Scandinavian names. ... A tradition, which probably took its rise at an early period, tells of a huge serpent that devastated the village of South Ormsby and was slain at the adjacent hamlet of Walmsgate. The same tradition appears in a somewhat different form in the history of Sir Hugh Bardolph, temp. Henry the First. Sir Hugh lived at Castle Carlton, then a town of some importance, and had a large estate comprising the lordships of Burwell, Tothill, Gayton, and Stewton. According to a very ancient court-roll, in the first year that Sir Hugh was lord of Castle Carlton, there reigned, at a town called Wormesgay, * a dragon in a lane in the field that venomed men and bestes with his aire.' Sir Hugh encountered and slew this monster. Its head was conveyed to the king, who changed Sir Hugh's name from Barde to Bardolph. — Streatfeild, p. 75; cf. White, p. 132; Wilkinson, p. 292. Animals, 35 Castle Carleton. — Sir Hugh Bardolfe . . . lived here in the time of Henry I. . . . It is said in a very old court roll, that in the first year that Sir Hugh was lord of this place, ' ther reigned at a toune called Wormesgay a dragon in a lane in the field that venomed men and bestes with his air ; sir Hugh uppon a weddings day did fyght with thys dragon, and slew hym, and toke hys heade, and bayre it to the kynge, and gave it hym, and the kynge for slaying of the dragon put to his name this word dolfe, and did call hym afterwards Bardolfe ; for it was before sir Hughe Barde, and also the kynge gave hym in his armes then a dragon in sygne.' — Camden, p. 384, cols. I., H., additions. Ingoldsby. — Two closes lying at Ingoldsby, called worm sikes. — Marrat, vol. iii., p. 275. I. of Axholme. Dragon-fly. Hobby-herse. — A dragon- fly. ... A neighbour of the author's affirms that when he lived in the * Isle ' [of Axholme], a hobby-herse stung a horse of his so badly that it caused its death. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 273. Eel. — Folk-Lore Record, vol. i., p. 245 ; reference to Mirror, Nov., 1828. Baroldby-le-Beck. Fox. — If bitten by a fox, you will certainly die within seven years. — Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. II. Winterton. Frog. — ' She's a deal better than what she was, but there's somethink illive what rises up in her throat. I know what it is, but I don't like to tell her. It's a live frog.' On some doubt being expressed as to this being the true explanation of his wife's sensations, he went on to say : ' O, but there's a woman at Ferriby 'at hed one for years, just the same, an' it al'us started croakin' every spring at generin' time. — N. & Q.^, vol. i., p. 311 ; cf. p. 392. ^6 Animals. Scotter. Gad-fly. — * You may knaw it's Scotter Shaw day (July 6), th' clegs hes come' [gad-flies being supposed to arrive on the day of the Show, which is a horse-fair]. — E. Peacock, i., p. 60. * Stoned-hoss-men when they dee ton into clegs ' \i.e. the men who take charge of stallions when they go their rounds through the villages turn after death into gad-flies]. — E. Peacock, i., p. 60. Goat. — A Lincolnshire woman remarked to me a few days ago : ' Yes, we keep a goat. They say it is healthy for cattle, and our beasts generally do well.' — N. & Q.*, vol. v., p. 248. See Smith, p. 130. Goldfinch,— \\. is a common belief in Lincolnshire that redcaps, i.e. goldfinches, frequently poison their captive young. I remember as a child hearing a great lamenta- tion made in a cottage-garden, when it was discovered that the nestlings confined in a cage hanging in an apple- tree had all been * poisoned by the old birds,' who had visited them with food. — N. & Q.^, vol. viii., p. 154. See Notes from a Lincolnshire Garden^ by A. L. H. A., p. 55. Springthorpe. Hedgehog. — Thirty years ago the greater part of this parish was open common. On it the cows were fed, and in summer lay out all night. My tenant's wife, since deceased, told me that when she used to go down with others to milk the cows in the morning it was frequently discovered that they had been sucked by a hedgehog. The scarcity of milk and the marks of prickles on the cow's udder showed that the hedgehog had been at work. It is accused of sucking eggs also. — N. & Q.^, vol. viii., pp. 32, 33. * You've yer back up to-day like a peggy otchen goin' a crabbin',' is a contemptuous expression used to an ill- Animals. ^y natured person, because hedgehogs are believed to carry- crabs to their haunts by rolling on them and causing the fruit to stick upon their spines. — E. PEACOCK, i., 1 2. Bamoldby-le-Beck. Shrews and Hedgehogs are always to be killed, if possible. Vague, unknown powers of mis- chief are theirs. — Antiquary ^ vol. xiv., pp. lo, ii. Hell-cat. — A very small and troublesome black insect, a midge, a ' little man of wroot' — E. Peacock, ii., p. 263. Hen. — When a hen cackles she is believed to say : Cuca, cuca, cayit, I've laid an tgg, cum ta' it. E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 2>%. It is very unlucky to have a hen that crows like a cock, or whose feathers resemble the male bird. Such a hen should always be killed. A whistling wife and a crowing hen, Is neither good for God nor men. E. Peacock, i., p. 133. A hen must have thirteen [eggs to sit on], otherwise it will be unlucky. She will then have twelve chickens and one bad &gg. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 224. It is unlucky to set a hen upon an even number of eggs, or to bring eggs into the house, or to sell them after sunset. A woman, on being requested to sell some after that time, replied, * I durstn't sell 'em i' th' hoose, as it's efter sun-down, but Til gie 'em to thee outside o' th' door.* If eggs are carried over running water, they will have no chicks in them. It is also the common opinion that if egg-shells are thrown into the fire it hinders the hens from laying ; but at Kirton-in-Lindsey there was an opinion twenty years ago that egg-shells ought always to be burnt, to hinder them from being used as boats by witches to cross the sea in. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 98. 38 Animals. Wind-egg, a small, yolkless ^^g. It is unlucky to bring wind-eggs into the house. — E. Peacock, i., p. 276. A few hours before his death, my grandfather several times insisted on getting out of bed for a short time. His nurse, not superstitious on other matters, firmly believed that this could only be caused by hen's feathers being mixed up with goose feathers in the bed. This was a common belief in Lincolnshire about that time (1858). — N. & Q.'^, vol. iii., p. 410. White Horse. — ' Oh, come and spit for a white horse ; we 're sure to have summas g'en us.' * We shouldn't ha' gotten this orange, if we had not spit for the white horse.' In allusion to the custom, among children, of spitting on the ground and crossing the feet over it, when a white horse passes, in the belief that whoso does so will shortly have a present. — COLE, p. 167. See also Mare. Knot, the bird. — See Canute in Part III., Section I. Lady -bird. Cow-lady. — A lady-bird. Coo-laady, coo-laady, flee awaay hoam, Yer hoose is o' fire an' yer childer '11 bo'n. E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 138. The children here have a rhyme, ' Cow-lady, cay, Fly away.' — Cole, p. 32. Orantham. Magpie. — A cuckoo made us blithe, but a single magpie filled us with forebodings. Need I repeat the old verse ? One, for sorrow ; Two, for mirth ; Three, for a wedding ; Four, for a birth ; Five, for a fiddler ; Six, for a dance ; Seven, for Old England ; Eight, for France. To tumble upstairs had a prophetic value equal to three of the birds. To find a cavity called a * coffin ' Animals. 39 in a bread-loaf was ominous indeed, but not quite as much so as the solitary magpie. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Verses on seeing the magpie : One for sorrow, Two for mirth, Three for a wedding. Four for a birth. Five for England, Six for France, Seven for Scotland, Eight for a dance. The four last lines are sometimes varied : Five for laughter, Six for joy. Seven for a girl. Eight for a boy. And another version runs : Four for a death, Five for a fiddle. And six for a dance. Seven for Spain, And eight for France. E. Peacock, i., p. 163 ; see Thompson, p. 732. The magpie is a well-known bird of omen. The following lines were familiar when I was a boy : One for sorrow, two for mirth, Three for a wedding, four for death, Five for a fiddle, six for a dance. Seven for England, eight for France. N. & Q.\ vol. v., p. 293. Bottesford Moors. When you see a magpie you should cross yourself; if you do not you will be unlucky. — N. & Q.\ vol. viii., p. 382. Mare Bridle Tooth. — A tooth of a horse which grows out of the side of the gum. There is a silly superstition 40 Animals. that when this malformation occurs in mares the animals will be barren. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 74. To know whether a mare be with foal or not. ' Take a mouthful of water and spit it violently into the mare's ear ; if she be with foal, she will shake her head only ; if she be not, she will shake her whole body.' — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 166. Fishtofb. Mouse. — For wonders, at Fishtoft no mice or rats are found, insomuch that barns built party per pale in this and the next parish, one side are annoyed, on the other side (being Fishtoft moiety) are secured from this vermin. — Anglorum SpeculuntyOr The Worthies of England in Church and State^ by G. S., late Incumbent of Broad Windsor, published in London, 1 864; quoted in L. N. & Q., vol. iv., p. 179. The west front has a small door . . . above is a per- pendicular window of four lights . . . The label rises from a string-course . . . immediately above this is a niche containing a figure of the patron saint [St. Guthlac]. The tradition connected with this statue was, that as long as the whip — the usual insignia of the saint — remained in his hand, the parish of Fishtoft should not be infested with rats or mice . . . The hand bearing the whip, and of course the whip, have long been broken away. — Thompson, p. 484, and footnote. Bamoldby-le-Beck. Mole. — As a specimen of popular natural history [in a village five miles from Great Grimsby], we may note that the caterpillar of a death's- head moth was brought to us with the information volunteered that it would turn into a mole. The mole itself is firmly believed to throw up its hills every three hours. — Antiquary^ vol. xiv., p. 10. Winterton. Ox. — I remember being told when a child that the spinal cord (miscalled ' marrow ') out of the Animals, 41 backbone of a piece of beef would ' make you deaf — N. & Q.7, vol. xi., p. 51. Peacock. — It was direfuUy unlucky to keep peacock feathers in a house.* — Antiquary^ vol. xiv., p. 1 1. The superstition that peacock's feathers are unlucky if worn on the person does not appear to find faith in Lincolnshire. Nearly all the agricultural labourers at the statute fairs wore a peacock's feather with rosette and ribbons in their hats, and they are sold by hawkers in the streets at fair times. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., pp. 75, 'j6. Pig. — Pigs can ' see the wind.' When pigs toss their bedding about, or carry straw in their mouths, it is a sign of wind. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 191. My clerk informed me when leaving church on a recent Sunday that the weather was going to change : ' the pigs were tossing up straw in the yard, the turnip- sheep rushing about, and the beasts {Anglice bullocks) fighting with each other.' — N. & Q.*, xx., vol. ix., p. 174. See Section I. as to Moon and Pig. If a child has any small inflamed spot or lump on the face it is customary to cause it terror by telling it that there is a pig's foot coming. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 405. Pigeon as Death-Omen. — See SECTION VIII. Pigeon's Feathers. — It is a belief commonly enter- tained among country people in Lincolnshire, that the presence of pigeons' feathers in a bed or bolster will prevent a dying person from drawing his last breath whilst he remains on them. — N. & Q.*, viii., p. 223. A person cannot die in a bed which contains pigeons' feathers, or, as some persons hold, the feathers of any wild bird. — THOMPSON, p. 736. Raven. — ' There's nowt soa unlucky as to hear a *The peacock itself is not spoken of as unlucky. — M.P. 42 Animals. raven croak, specially if it is ower the left showder.' — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., p. 87. Robin. — To kill a robin wantonly forbodes a broken limb. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., p. 91. It is unlucky to hurt a robin redbreast or wren, or to shoot a swallow or a cuckoo. — THOMPSON, p. 735. See Folk-Lore Record, vol. i., p. 185. Robin as Omen. — See Section VIII. ' You mustn't kill a robin,' says the villager, * because you know he covered the children in the wood.' — Bygone Lincolnshire^ i., p. 82. The robin redbreast and the wren Are God Almighty's cock and hen. Thompson, p. 732. The Robin and the Giller-wren Are God Almighty's cock and hen. E. Peacock, i., p. 118. Linwood. Rooks. — A singular circumstance is reported in connection with the recent suicide of Mr. Graves, of Linwood Grange. Near the house a colony of rooks had established themselves, and on the day of the funeral, immediately on the appearance of the hearse, the birds left the locality in a body, deserting their nests, all of which contained young. A few only have returned.' It is a common belief here that it is a sure sign of im- pending ill-luck for rooks to desert a rookery near a house. — N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 506. Craw. — A rook, not a carrion crow. When the latter is spoken of it is always called a * ket-craw.' ... * When th' craws plaays foot-ball it's a sign o' bad weather.' That is, when the rooks are restless, gather together in large bodies and circle round each other. ' My bairns 'all niver do th' saame like for me. It isn't ofifens yung craws sarves [feed] ohd uns,' said by a parent who had made great sacrifices for his children. I Animals, 43 When a child asks a question that it is difficult or unwise to answer, the mother replies, * How should I knaw, bairn ; why does craws pick lambs' eyes oot ? ' — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 142. Sheep. — A flock of sheep will not be lucky unless it has one black one in it. ' Most of the inhabitants kept a few sheep in the common. In every man's flock was a black one, which not to possess, was reckoned bad luck.' — MacKinnon, Acc. of Messingham, MS., 1825, p. 9; E. Peacock, i., p. 26. Lamb. — It is lucky to see the first lamb of the season with his head towards you ; of course the reverse is a bad omen. — THOMPSON, p. 735. * You notice which way the first lamb you see looks and that-a-way you'll go to live ' ; said to farm-servants, with reference to their yearly change of service at May-day. — Cole, p. 47. Good luck is believed to follow if money be turned in the pocket, on seeing the first lamb of the season. — GoOD, p. 107. In these parts, also, it is commonly believed that the first lamb you see ought to have its head turned towards you. I believe the superstition is pretty general. We also say that you ought to have money in your pocket on these occasions, silver at least, but gold is better still, and that it is very unlucky to be without it, which undoubtedly is so, and on many other occasions also. — N. & Q.^ vol. ii., p. 35. Lamb. — See Section VI., under Omens. One for sorrow ; Two for mirth, Three for a wedding, Four for a birth, Five for heaven, Six for hell. Seven you'll see the de'il himsel. Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., pp. 93, 94. 44 Animals, Sheep as Omens and Indications of Luck — See Section VIII., under Omens. Snail. — Granny-sneel, a snail having a large grey shell [Helix aspersd]. We believe here that all snails are born without shells, but that as they grow up they find shells and creep into them. The theory is, that the shells have been made empty, ready for the snails to find. — E. Peacock, i., p. 123. Sneel-gated, Sneel-shelly. Trees are thus spoken of when they are preyed upon by the larvae of the Cossus Ligniperda. [The idea is that the holes made by the caterpillars have been eaten out by snails.] . . . — E. Peacock, i., p. 230. During the great war with France boys used to wage relentless war upon all white butterflies and light-coloured snails [called by schoolboys ' French ' butterflies and * French ' snails, while the darker ones are known as * English'].— E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 220. Snakes. — Snakes find it impossible to quit existence while the sun is above the horizon. If you encounter one you should hack it into inch-pieces or into fragments smaller still lest it should unite again. The longer time the reptile has to take in sorting itself out and in putting itself into decent order, the greater the chance that the sun will go down before the operation is successfully accomplished. This is a consideration of importance^ for the snake expires if its wounds are still unhealed when the luminary disappears. — N. & Q.^ vol. vii., p. 211; 10, i., p. 254. * If you like snakes, miss, you should 'er been wi' me one time at B. when I was a girl. There was a great muck heap 'at men was to'nin' ower, an' in th' middle they caame upo' a nest o' snaaks. Well a'most all snaaks swallers one another if men tuches 'em, same as them Animals. 45 pel-li-cans — they's a big bod wi' a gret bag under nean the'r necks for th' y'ung uns to flai to. Well but theas snaaks, they went jumpin' on their head an' taals all ower th' yard efter th' chickens, what screamed like onything, while the men hed to bat the things to dead wi' forks. Well, next neet when I'd dun milkin' an' th' lad was shakin' up th' straw for th' coos, oot crawled a great snaak 'at hed gotten awaay day afore — an' I'd bin settin' on it ! ! ! Th' lads bat it to dead an' all an' took a great long string oot on it' throat, as long as my finger, wi' a sharp black point to it — an' then they cut a ring roond it neck an' skinned it like a heel, an' a hold man on th' plaace, he tied th' dried skin roond his leg for to cure rewmatic same as frogs' legs — you know, miss, frogs' front legs kep in t'waastcoat pocket cures it an all.' — N. & Q.^ vol. X., p. 454- At this season when persons, at inns in Lincolnshire, ask for ' eel-pie,' they are presently provided with ' bush eels,' namely, snakes^ caught for that purpose in the bushes, and sold to the landlords cheaply, which are made into stews, pies, and fries. — HoNE, Table Book, p. 526. Sparrows and Magician. — See PART III., SECTION I., under William of Lindholme, and Folk-Lore, vol. xii., pp. 171, 172. Spider. — It is thought that to swallow a spider is dangerous to health, if not absolutely fatal. At Lincoln assizes, in July, 1872, I heard a witness, whose home was at Flixborough or the immediate neighbourhood, depose that she had said to a young woman who appeared to be very ill, " Thoo looks straange an' badly, lass ; thoo must hev swalla'd a spider. ' Spiders are said to have been taken here as a cure for ague, but that form of suffering has ceased to occur in these parts for many years, so I never knew an instance of the remedy ' being applied. — N. & Q.^, vol. viii., 410. 46 Animals, Money Spider. — A small spider which sometimes drops from the ceiling on the heads of those below. When such an event happens, it is held to be a sign that money- will shortly be left to the person on whose head the spider falls.— E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 356. Spiders and Hell. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. viii., p. 377. Louth. Swallow. — Some few years ago, a gentleman well known in this neighbourhood was afflicted by the loss of a beloved wife ; and, after her death, the apartment in which she died was shut up, in the state in which she left it. It was customary to open one of the windows a little in the summer, and close it again in the autumn. This last duty was once omitted, and when the servant, sometime in the winter, entered this room, he found the bed, furniture, and walls well tenanted, and, if I remember rightly, the floor, with several layers of swallows in a dormant state. As soon as the gentleman himself knew, care was taken to continue them, but in vain ; for, as if afraid of settling the great dispute about emigration, they quickly disappeared. — Notitiae Ludae, p. 284. Swallow. — The common swallow is a bird of blessing. No house that is protected by its nest will ever be struck by lightning ; but if you should shoot one which has built its nest in your cowshed, your cows will forthwith give their milk tinged with blood. — Heanley, p. 7. Swallow and St. Guthlac. — See Part III., Section I. Swallows as Indicating Luck. — See SECTION VIII. Swift. — The long- winged black swift, which may fre- quently be seen in the summer, flying and shrieking around the church tower, represents to the popular mind the souls of the lost vainly bewailing the opportunities of grace which during their lifetime they had neglected. — Heanley, p. 7. Animals. 47 Toad. — Toads, frogs, and newts are not much better ; they will 'venom' a man if possible. — Antiquary^ vol. xiv., p. 1 1. Toad used in Spells. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., pp. 168, 169. Worm. — Toothache is believed to be caused by a worm gnawing at the root of the tooth ; the author has met with many persons who profess to have seen one or more of these worms. — E. Peacock, i., p. 258. Tail worm. — A disease to which cows that have recently calved are subject ; believed to be caused by a worm in the marrow of the tail. It is really paralysis following milk fever. Ignorant farriers not uncommonly make large cuts in the tail for the purpose of pulling out the worm, which they profess to show. The object extracted is a sinew. — See Leonard Towne, Farmer and Graziers Guide ^ 1 8 1 6, p. 67 ; Dictionarium Rusticum^ 1726, under Worm in the Tail] E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 548. Wood-louse, Sow, Sow-beetle, Old Sow. The Armadillo wood-louse {Armadillo vulgaris), which curls itself up into a little black ball, like a pill. — When the author's father was a little boy he had these creatures, alive, administered to him as pills for whooping-cough. They are still taken for the same purpose. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 508. Worm. — Cut a worm in half with a spade ; it makes no difference to the creature, after a few days the bits will have joined again. — Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. 1 1. Monstrosities. — Any monstrosity — e.g. a foal with four eyes — must have its throat cut and be put underground at once, or it will bring bad luck (North Lincolnshire). — N. & Q.8, vol. xii., p. 446. Witches in Animal Form. — See SECTION V., WITCH- CRAFT. SECTION IV. GOBLINDOM. Lincoln. The legend runs that at Tinghurst, in Buck- inghamshire, Bishop Henry Burghersh, * by mere might against all right and reason,' enclosed the land of many poor people, without recompense, in order to complete his park. The ghost of the bishop could not rest after his death, but appeared to the canons of Lincoln in hunting dress, telling them he was appointed keeper of the park, and beseeching them to throw it open. The canons, thus warned, restored the land to its rightful possessors. — Kendrick, p. 131. Epworth. People who come to a violent end, and especially those who commit suicide, certainly * walk till their time comes.' By this she meant until such time as they would have died in the course of nature. — N. & Q.®, vol. v., p. 288. Tom Boggle, the almost universal name for a ghost. — N. & Q.^ vol. iii., p. 416. Ghosts, laying them under iron pots. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 170. Bottesford Moors. A person who is born on Christmas Day will be able to see spirits. — Edward Peacock, N. & Q.\ vol. viii., p. 382. * Midnight children.' — See Folk-Lore, vol. x., p. 115. Broughton neighbourhood [March] 20 [1695-6]. 'Com- ing,' says he, ' home from Gainsburrow, not being at all in Goblindom. 49 drink, by moonlight, being about ten a clock at night, I chanc'd to look on my left hand, and I saw walking hard by me the appearancys of six men carrying a corps, uppon which, being somewhat frighted, I held my horse fast, and set forward, but saw it following of me yet as oft as I look'd back. Then, having got pretty far, I look'd behind me once more, and instead of the corps and men following of me, I saw a bear with a great huge uggly thing sitting thereon, which thing I saw as oft as I look'd. Then of a suddain it disappear'd in a flash of fire, which made my horse leap out of the way, and through (threw) me just when I had got to . . . town end.' — Pryme, p. 84. Dunsby. Gibson in his additions to Camden (Col. 476) mentions a hall at Durlsby ' three miles north of Slea- ford ' ; but all tradition of such a building is lost among the inhabitants of this district, except that the site had the reputation of being haunted, and the ghost was designated by the familiar soubriquet \sic'\ of ' Dicky Dunsby' — OLIVER (3), p. 20, footnote. Grimsby. Nuns of St. Leonards. — There are, indeed, some curious anecdotes afloat about these ladies and their ghostly visitant, but I had not room for them. — Oliver, iv., p. 279. Kirton-in-Lindsey. Bob-garth, a grass field at Kirton- in-Lindsey, where a ghost is said to be visible at times. — E. Peacock, i., p. 30. Messingham. ' I tho\yt it was a ghoast at fost, for I'd been tell'd ther was a woman wi'oot her head to be seen there, but when I'd consither'd mysen a bit, I fun' out it was nout but th' moon shinin' on a flodge o' watter e' Tommy Wakefield dykein' boddum.' — Robert Lockwood. [The spot here alluded to was a little to the south of the present bridge over Bottesford Beck, on the road between Bottesford and Messingham. In former days there was a 50 Goblindom. rough bit of land by the highway, partly covered with bushes, and here the headless ghost was supposed to show herself.] — E. Peacock, i., p. 68. Northorpe. Mrs. Slarum, the ghost of a woman in a stiff silk dress, said to inhabit the old hall at Northorpe. — E. Peacock, i., p. 174. The legends concerning hell and purgatory owe at least as much to the Teutonic mythology as to Chris- tianity. They are yet far from extinct among our rural poor. An old woman once told the editor that she had known a man who, when he walked abroad at night, could see the souls of the dead departing to the spirit- world. He declared that they passed him like little points of fire, and that sometimes they flew about so thickly that it was like being in a stubble field all ablaze. — Church Furniture^ p. 22, note. Orgarth Hill. This hill, a few miles south of Louth, some forty years ago was haunted by a man riding on a shag or shaggy horse, which suddenly appeared without any warning, and kept up with persons until they were terrified, but usually it appeared to people riding or driving, who did not notice the horse and its rider, until they looked to see what had terrified their horses, which stood trembling with fear until they bolted down the hill. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 235. Ravendale. The belated traveller may see in the winter nights a headless man leave the ruin of the little church of Ravendale, and walk down into the valley. After a little he returns happy, with his head under his arm, sits upon the ruined walls, and utters loud cries of joy. On one occasion a labourer hard by held the gate open for him to pass through, and nothing happened. — W ATKINS, p. 205. Thorpe Hall, 'Green Lady' of. — See PART III., SECTION I., for the story of SiR JOHN BOLLE. Goblindom, 5 1 Tupholme. Formerly a white calf was to be seen near Tupholme Priory, and the person who told me said she had seen it, though the people with her did not, and accounted for the fact by saying she was born at twilight, and therefore could see what others could not, and so avoided going out at twilight, as she had seen things which terrified her. A woman who died from neglect, and whose husband married the woman who ought to have attended to her, haunted the cottage until her spirit was laid in a box and buried in the cottage by a clergyman ; but when the man died in 1840 and the cottage was taken down, the workmen broke open the box in which the woman's spirit had been laid for thirty years, but it then burst forth, with such a sound as if all the trees in the neighbouring wood were falling, so that the workmen ran away in terror. I have heard of a similar case where the spirit can only be kept quiet by a light being burnt in the room where the person died. Probably this accounts for the lights often seen burning all night in villages, though other reasons may be given by poor people for the expensive and apparently useless luxury of always having a light burning through the night. I have heard that if a person sees a dead body, but does not touch it, the spirit will haunt that person for some time. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 144. Winteringliam. * Me an my muther was so scar'd when we seed her (a boggard) that we run'd hoam, an' went at door as if we was ready for th' 'sylum ; an' my faather, as didn't knaw what was up, holla's oot, " Hohd hard, while I get her oppen, or you'll be rammin' in." ' — Account of a Spectre seen at Winteringham, circa 1835 ; E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 429. Winterton. Ghostly Powder-puff and Box. — See Folk- Lore^ vol. xii., p. 169. 52 Goblindom. Girsby. About lOO years ago there was a page boy at Girsby Hall, who was met by some men, who took hold of him, and said if he did not swear to let them in to rob the Hall, or, if he ever split on them, they would skin him alive, so having sworn to let them in, and after being threatened again, they let him go, and he kept his promise to let the men into the Hall, but having split on them, they were all secured after they had entered the Hall, tried and punished, and it was supposed that nothing more would happen, though for a time the page boy was guarded, or at least he was not allowed to go anywhere, lest the men should get hold of him ; but at last they did, and skinned him alive, and for many years after a big ball of fire rushed scretting-screaming across the road where his body was found completely skinned. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 234, 235. Wrangle. We had been informed by a Lincolnshire antiquary, whom by chance we had become acquainted with during the journey, that the rectory at Wrangle was haunted by a ghost in the shape of a green lady, and that this ghost had upon one occasion left behind her a memento in the shape of a peculiar ring — surely a singular, if not a very irregular thing for a spirit to do. — HiSSEY, p. 262. Yaddlethorpe. Tradition points out in almost every neighbourhood numerous unregarded spots where suicides are buried. Even when the popular voice is silent as to the cause, such places often have an evil name for being haunted by a ghost or barguest. Such a tradition had long clung to a place on the top of Yaddlethorpe-hill, in this parish [Bottesford]. The reason for it was made plain in the year 1854, when the hill was lowered, by the discovery of a human skeleton buried at the south side of the highway, about a foot under the surface. An oak stake had been driven through the chest. The remains were carefully gathered together and re-interred in Goblindom, 53 Bottesford churchyard. — Church Furniture, p. 201, note; E. Peacock, i., p. 257. Wraiths. — See PART II., SECTION I., under St. Mark'S-Eve and other ' Eves.* For poltergeist and similar phenomena, see Saducismus TriumphatuSy pp. 508-9 ; Sankey's Life of Wesley , i., 319-339- Tatterfoal, or Shagfoal, the rough-coated goblin-horse, who has deluded travellers with his tricks in nearly every country of Europe, has not withdrawn his presence entirely from Lincolnshire, although he is only rarely heard of at the present time. Spectre-dogs with coal-black hides and glaring saucer-eyes are also to be counted among the boggards actually or till recently inhabiting the county. A dog of this description, spoken of as ' Bargest/ which, like the Norfolk and Cambridgeshire ' Shuck,' had an affection for burial-grounds, used to haunt the graveyard at Northorpe, near Kirton-in-Lindsey, in the first half of the present century. A canine apparition named * Hairy Jack ' was to be met with in the parish of Grayingham some years ago,"^ and phantoms of the same breed are said to prowl about lonely plantations, by-ways, and waste places to attack anyone passing, although it must be confessed that proof of injury actually inflicted by them is hard to obtain. Some ' boggards ' appear in bovine form. The Lackey Causey ghost, which is reported to have come out from under a ' tunnel ' over an insignificant streamlet into the road between Wrawby and Brigg, with the purpose of enticing people into the water, is a white calf, sometimes said to be without a head. Another white calf, as Mr. Penny has recorded in the L. N. & Q., ii., p. 144, was to be seen near Tupholme Priory some years ago. . . . Apparitions in the likeness of hares and rabbits are not * Grayingha??i may be a mistake. Properly speaking, I am told, it should haunt an old barn on Willoughton ClifF, some distance further south. — M. P. 54 Goblindom. infrequent in Lincolnshire. White rabbits or hares of ghostly nature seem to be even more especially connected with misfortune than other phantoms, both in England and elsewhere. — L. N. & Q., vol. iv., pp. 146-149. Animal boggards. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 172. Ghostly Cat as Death-warning. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. viii., p. 377. Northorpe. A black dog was said to haunt the church- yard, which went by the well-known name of the Bargest. I have conversed with several trustworthy persons, who said that they had seen this creature. At another village somewhat further off, there was an old lame man, who was reputed to be a wizard, and who, it was affirmed, was in the habit of turning himself into a dog and biting cattle. I know a man still alive who is quite sure that he has seen old in a canine form, but never witnessed the transformation. A neighbour of his is reported to have been more fortunate. He saw, on one occasion, a black dog biting his cattle, and, running to the rescue, beheld it turned into the old wizard. I have heard this story from more than one person to whom he has narrated it. — N. & Q.^ vol. ii., 336. Bolingbroke Castle. ' One thinge is not to be passed by, affirmed as a certaine trueth by the inhabitants of the town upon their owne knowledge, which is that the Castle is haunted by a certaine spirit in the likenesse of a hare ; which att the meeting of the auditors doeth usually runne betweene theire legs, and sometymes over throws them, and so passes away. They have pursued it downe into the castle yard, and seene it take in att a grate into a lower celler, and have followed it thither with a light ; where notwithstanding that they did most narrowly observe it, (and that there was noe other passage out, but by the doore, or windowe, the roome being all close framed of stones within, not having the least chink or Goblindom, 55 crevice) yet they could never fynd it. And all other tymes it hath been seen run in at iron grates below into other of the grotto's (as their be many of them) and they have watched the place, and sent for houndes, and put them in after it ; but after a while they have come crying out' — G. HOLLES, Coll. for Line, 1660. Bamoldby-le-Beck. Shag-foal. — An old lady used to talk of a mysterious phantom like an animal of deep black colour, which appeared before belated travellers. On hear- ing that we had been attacked at midnight by a large dog, she eagerly inquired : ' Had it any white about it ? ' and when we assured her that it had a white chest, she exclaimed in thankfulness : * Ah ! then it was not the shag- foal ! ' — Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. 1 1. Tatter-foal — Why, he is a shagg'd-looking hoss, and given to all manner of goings-on, fra cluzzening hold of a body what is riding home half-screwed with bargain- drink, and pulling him out of the saddle, to scaring a old woman three parts out of her skin, and making her drop her shop-things in the blatter and blash, and run for it. — Eli Twigg, p. 255 ; Streatfeild, p. 357. Shag-foal — A Hobgoblin. She lit of a shagfoal with eyes like tea saucers. — COLE, p. 127. Barton-upon-Humber. The devil appears to persons there in the shape of a ragged colt called ' tatter- foal.' — Thompson, p. 736. Freiston. There is a curious superstition relative to a place in the parish of Freiston called Spittal Hill (from a hospital which was formerly there), that a hobgoblin or sprite frequents the spot at midnight in the shape of a small rough horse. This sprite has been named the * Spittal Hill tut ' and sometimes the * shag-foal.' It is said to have frequently followed a traveller, mounted his 56 Goblindom, horse behind him, and almost hugged him to death with its forelegs. It accompanies him to a certain distance and then vanishes. Different causes are assigned for this appearance by those who believe in it. One is, that a murder was committed near the spot where the ' shag- foal ' appears. Another, that a treasure is secreted there, and that this hobgoblin is appointed to watch over and protect it. — THOMPSON, p. 736. Kirton-in-Lindsey. A manifestation supposed to be a shagged-foal was seen near Kirton-in-Lindsey in a donkey- like form some fifty or fifty-five years ago \i.e. about 1842-7]; and Goosey Lane, or Boggart Lane, near Roxby, in Lincolnshire, has also a spectre of the same species, or had as late as the third decade of this century. — Antiquary, vol. xxxiii., p. 75. Shag-foal, — See L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 146-25 i ; Folk- Lore^ vol. xii., p. 172. Trent. The supernatural steeds which once haunted the Trent near its junction with the H umber may perhaps have sprung from a mythological strain only distantly allied to Puck and Tatter-foal. Less than a hundred years ago, the dusky forms of these creatures were still supposed to be discernible by moonlight, walking on the surface of the water. James Egar, a thorough * Trent- sider' by descent and bringing-up, told Edward Shaw Peacock, of Bottesford Moors, in one of the early years of the present [the 19th] century, that he himself had observed them on the river. — Antiquary, vo\. xxxiii., p. 75. FAIBIES. Fairy-ring, a circle in the grass, believed to be made by fairies dancing thereon. Eliza B , a young woman once in the compiler's service, knew a woman, now dead, who said she had seen fairies dancing on Brumby Fairies, 57 Common. Eliza fully believed the story. — E. PEACOCK^ i., p. 100. The ' oldest inhabitant ' has his * gospel ' of beliefs and village traditions, to which he clings tenaciously. . . . The power of the ' evil eye/ witches who turn themselves into hares, fairies who frequent the fields and dance their mid- night rounds, ghosts who walk the earth till cock crow, are as real to him, and perhaps more so, than the fact of the Reformation or the Battle of Waterloo. — Bygone Lin- colnshire, ii., pp. 83, 84. Harrington. Half-way betwixt Harrington and Somersby lies Fairy Wood. — Rawnsley, p. 28. When a child usually good-tempered becomes suddenly and unaccountably irritable, it is common to say, * Bless th' bairn, he must ha' been changed.' — E. Peacock, i., P- 53. See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., pp. 169, 170. Fairy-purses, a kind of fungus which grows on sand- land in autumn, and is something like a cup, or old- fashioned purse, with small objects inside. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 100. Probably Nidularia Campanulata. — See Britten and Holland's Eng. Plant Names. — E. PEACOCK, H., vol. i., p. 195. Hookeys. — ' By the hookeys ' : an unmeaning adjuration,, supposed to have reference to the fairies. — THOMPSON, p. 710. aOBLIN NAMES. Bogie, Boggle-bo. — A bugbear, a hideous form. — Brogden, p. 27. Bugaboo. — A bugbear with which to frighten children. — Brogden, p. 32. 58 Goblindom, Hob-goblin. — A supposed bogie to frighten children. — Brogden, p. 98. Rawhead. — A kind of ghost that haunts wells. — E. Peacock, i., 203. Tod-lowery = a hob-goblin (Brogden and Halliwell). Although tod^ fox, is obsolete in Lincolnshire, it still exists in this compound word, which is exactly identical with a Scotch provincialism, meaning fox. See Tod^ lowery (Jam.). Tod and lowery both alike mean fox^ but are often used together as a compound word. The Lin- colnshire tod-lowery is a curious but very natural departure from the original sense, as preserved in Scotland. Tod- lowery has assumed in Holderness the strange form of Tom-loudy, a goblin conjured up to frighten children. — Streatfeild, p. 373. Tut, Tut-gut, Tom-tit.— K hob-goblin.— BROGDEN, p. 214. Jack with a lantern. — The ignis fatuus. — THOMPSON, p. 711. As for ' ghoasts,' old A. * knew nowt about them things'; Jenny-wisps he had seen and heard tell of. — Rawnsley, p. 33. ' Folks sometimes call that thing on low land by rivers, that always leads you into water if you follow it, a " witch." It looks like somebody carrying a light. " Peggy-lantern " is another name they give it.' — N. & Q.^ vol. X., p. 483. [Some old people still regard the Ignis fatuus as a spirit. It is also called Billy-of-the-Wisp and Jack with the Lantern.— M. P.] Will-d-the-wisp.—SQQ N. & Q.^ xi., 192. Robin-run-rake. — The shimmering vapour that rises from and floats over the ground in hot weather is called, Goblin Names, 59 in some parts of Lincolnshire, Robin-run-rake. This is probably a corruption of Robin-run-rig — the rig and slack being the rise and fall in the surface of a field. — Streat- FEILD, p. 349, note I. East Halton. A household goblin resembling the Scotch Brownie, the Yorkshire Robin-Round-Cap, and the Danish Niss used to live at a homestead in, or near Goxhill.* He was a solitary specimen of the race. An old friend of mine tells me that ' better than sixty-five year sin' ' she heard her grandmother relate several stories about these little fellows who haunted farms and helped in the out- door and in-door work, but she forgets their names. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 146. See Folk-Lore^ vol. viii., pp. 68, 69 ; vol. xii., p. 170. Hob-Thrush (meaning of). — Cf Reliquary, 1898, p. 134. THE DEVIL. Lincoln. ' He looks as the Devil over Lincoln' Some fetch the original of this Proverb from a stone picture of the Devil, which doth (or lately did) over-look Lincoln Colledge. Surely the Architect intended it no farther than for an ordinary Antick, though beholders have since applied those ugly looks to envious persons, repining at the prosperity of their neighbours, and jealous to be over- topt by their vicinity. The Latines have many Proverbs parallel hereunto. . . . To return to our English Proverb, it is conceived of more antiquity than either of the fore- named Colledges, though the secundary sense thereof lighted not unhappily, and that it related originally to the Cathedral Church in Lincoln. — Fuller, vol. ii., p. 220. The Devil, overlooking Lincoln. — In the Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, Elizabeth, Addenda, p. 551, under the date of 1578, is the following allusion to this * He inhabited a house in the parish of East Halton, near Goxhill. — M. P. 6o Goblindom. saying : * If any one came to the Bishop without a present she (Mrs. Freke, the Bishop of Norwich's wife) will look on him as the Divell lookes over Lincoln! From this it would appear that his Satanic majesty did not look with favour on the citizens of Lincoln. A version of the proverb familiar to me puts quite another colouring on the question. It runs : ' This is all my own, as the Devil said when he flew over Lincoln.' — N. & Q.^, vol. v., p. 275. The following is an extract from Edwards's Words, FaclSy and Phrases : ' Lincoln. An old proverb says, " The devil looks over Lincoln." The tower of Lincoln Cathedral is the highest in England, and when the spire was standing on it it must, if in proportion, have exceeded that of old St. Paul's, which was 325 feet. The monks are said to have been so proud of this structure that they thought the devil looked upon it with an envious eye, whence the proverb, of a man who looks insidious and malignant, " He looks as the devil did over Lincoln " (Pari Gazetteer, vol. iii., p. 118). A more probable theory is that the proverb originated in the circumstance that a small figure of the devil stands on the top of Lincoln College at Oxford.' — N. & Q.^, vol. ii., pp. 210, 211. The Lincoln Imp, — A friend of mine informs me that, according to a ladies' fashion paper which she was reading not long ago, a trinket in the form of * the Lincoln Imp * will prevent its wearer losing things. I am anxious to know whether this superstition has been made to order. It does not seem probable that it is veritable folk-lore, as no evidence is yet forthcoming that the quaint figure in the Minster which is known as * the Imp' was originally intended to represent the devil, or till recent days had any connexion with the devil-legend of the city or other traditionary beliefs. — N. & Q.^^*, iv., p. 530. The Devil, 6i Lincoln Minster. — The Angel Choir though so full of beauty, has one queer little object, typical of the love of the early sculptors for the grotesque. This is the celebrated Lincoln Imp. It is a curious little ^^^y. One leg is bent over the other thigh, the body is dwarfed and hairy, the head is hideous, and with large ears, a grinning, ugly, little monstrosity. A legend runs that the devil wanted to get into the Cathedral and was out with the wind. He slipped inside leaving the wind for ever blowing outside, and The devil hopped up without a limp, And at once took shape as the * Lincoln Imp,' And there he sits a top of the column, And grins at the people who gaze so solemn. This is taken from Arnold Trost's ' The Wind, the Devil, and Lincoln Minster,' and other legends lately published. It is certain that the wind is always blowing round some part of the Minster, but that is, of course, only natural. — WILKINSON, p. 45. The south porch [of the cathedral], or bishop's door, supposed to have been erected about 1256. . . . The adjoining buttress is surmounted by a witch on the back of a devil — popularly noted to represent the tra- dition of the devil looking over Lincoln. The monks supposed that the devil, who could not but take notice of such a stately structure for divine worship in his ranges, did look upon it with a sour and malicious countenance, from whence they deduced a proverb to express the ill aspect of envious and malicious men at such good things they don't like : *He looks as the devil over Lincoln.' The exposed situation of the Cathedral and the rather dissolute life of some of the clergy some centuries ago, gave rise to the following legend. The wind and the devil being on a friendly tour arrived at Lincoln Minster, when the latter addressed his friend thus : * Just wait 62 Goblindom, outside here whilst I go in and have a chat with the Dean and Chapter.' * All right/ says the wind, and he has been waiting there ever since. Most certainly the wind, on the calmest and sultriest day may always there be felt, if not seen, but what can be the inference from the devil's long stay with his friends inside, eh? — White^ p. 491. The most curious legend is that which describes the devil as still inside the minster, and afraid to come out for fear of being blown away. — Kendrick, p. 57. Devil looking over Lincoln. — The buttress adjoining the porch has a singular group near the cap or summit, which by many is thought to impersonate the popular tradition of the * Devil looking over Lincoln.' It re- presents, says Mr. Wild, a witch on the back of the devil ; and may be considered, he thinks, as well as other grotesques near it, as mere whims of the masons employed on the works. — Tracts, The Cathedral^ p. 14^ [woodcut given]. Lincoln Imp. — Modern jingles relating to the Lincoln Imp and the wind are mentioned under the heading ' Lincoln Imp ' Designs in a Supplementary List of New Embroideries^ etc., issued by Miss S. A. Strawson, at * Ye signe of Ye Spindle,' Boston, Lincolnshire, 1903-4. The Devil and St. Botolph. — In ' Boston in the Olden Times ' by Roger Quaint, there is a story of St. Botolph which appears to be a traditional legend. It runs, in brief, as follows : The saint's chapel is supposed to have occupied a site at the south-western corner of the existing parish church. When he was strolling near it one evening he found before him the devil, on whom he promptly laid hands. In the struggle between them the devil had much the worst of it, and panted and gasped with such distress that he raised a whirlwind. This wind has The Devil. 63. never yet quite died away. Hence the current of air still felt at that particular spot. A legend akin to this also accounts for the wind constantly felt near Lincoln Cathedral. Do similar traditions attach to other English churches? Variants of the story are known on the continent. — N. & q}\ vol. iv., p. 328; cf. p. 435. See Part III., Section II. — Place Legends — under Traditions connected with Ecclesiastical Build- ings.— Grantham. Devil and Lincoln. — Cf. N. & Q.*, vol. ii., p. 298; ib!', vol. v., p. 510; vi., pp. 77, 275, 415; British Traveller^ p. 41 1, col. ii.; Folk-Lore, vol. ix., pp. 272-276, 364. DEVILS. Crowland. From the wall of the south side, within the old church, projects horizontally a wooden angel or figure, called the devil with a dark lanthorn. — Marrat,. vol. ii., p. 19; Hist, and Antiq. of Cr oy land Abbey ^ p. 82. Melton Ross. ' In a field there stands a curious gallows which must be kept in repair by the owner of the estate (Earl of Yarborough), and if they fall into decay must be replaced ; how they came there is a queer story. Some hundred years ago or so, three or four boys were playing at hanging, and seeing who could hang the longest on a tree. One of them got up and hanged himself, when^ lo ! at the very moment a three-legged hare (the devil) came limping past ; off ran the rest of the lads after him, in order to catch him, and in their ardour forgot their companion who was found dead upon their return. The gallows was erected in remembrance of this. — Bygone Lincolnshire, i., p. 85. Michaelmas Day. — No marshman will touch a bramble- berry after Michaelmas Day, and, if you ask the reason •64 Goblindom, why, you are gravely referred to the 1 2 th chapter of the Revelation of St. John : ' There was war in Heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon ; and the dragon fought and his angels. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent called the Devil and Satan, he was cast out into the earth ' ; and it is added that he fell headlong into a bramble-bush, and was so torn he has never forgotten it, but each year spoils all the bramble- berries on the 29th of September, and if you will only look you may often see for yourself where he has scorched them by his touch. Scorched indeed they often are. — Heanley, p. 12. * As black as the devil's nutting bag ' is, I believe, common in North Lincolnshire. * As hard as the devil's forehead ' is another expressive phrase I have heard on more than one occasion. — N. & Q.^, vol. iv., p. 478. A clergyman I met on the journey and who confided in me said, ' To get on in Lincolnshire, before all things it is necessary to believe in game, and not to trouble too much about the Catholic faith. . . . He further assured me as a positive fact that both devil-worship and a belief in witchcraft existed in the county. He said, " I could tell you many strange things of my rural experiences," and he did — how the devil is supposed to haunt the churchyards in the shape of a toad, and how witchcraft is practiced, etc. " You may well look astonished," he exclaimed, " at what I tell you, but these things are so ; they have come under my notice, and I speak advisedly from personal knowledge."' — HiSSEY, p. 223. Then our host [the rector of Wispington] related to us a curious story that had been told to him as true history. According to this, a certain Lincolnshire miser died (I withhold name, date, and place), and was duly placed in his coffin overnight ; but then a strange thing happened, Devils, 65 next morning the body had disappeared and its place was taken up with stones ; it being presumed that the Devil had made off with his body and had placed the stones in the coffin in exchange. But one would have imagined that it was the man's spirit not his body that his Satanic Majesty desired. . . . By the way this reminds me we were told, that the Lincolnshire folk never call the Devil openly by that familiar designation, but speak of him in an under-tone, as either * Samuel,' * Old Lad ' or ' Bargus.' Then we gleaned some particulars of old Lincolnshire folk-lore. Here, for example, is an infallible charm to get power over the Devil, I mean ' Samuel' On St. Mark's Eve, precisely at twelve o'clock, hold two pewter platters one over the other, take these to where bracken grows, hold the platters under the plants for the seeds to drop in, then you will find that the seeds will go right through the top platter and be caught in the one below ;* upon this * Samuel ' will appear riding on a pig and tell you anything you want to know. Here is another charm. Kill a hedge-hog and smear two thorn-sticks with his blood, place these in a hedge-bottom and leave them there for fourteen days, if not moved meanwhile you will have your wish. — HiSSEY, pp. 398, 399. If a person sells his soul to the devil, to be delivered at a certain specified time, the vendor, if wary, may avoid payment by putting in the contract * be it in the house or out of the house,' and then when the time arrives, sitting astride on a window sill or standing in a door- way.— E. Peacock, i., p. 84. Old-fashioned people, at the end of the last century \i.e. the i8th] used to make it a matter of conscience when they read Holy Scripture, or talked on religious *The idea that the bracken flowers and seeds on St. Mark's Eve is also known at Kirton-in-Lindsey, in North Lincolnshire. Even allowing for the difference between old and new style, the theory is a strange one. £ 66 Goblindom, subjects, to speak of the devil ; but when they had occasion to use the word in oaths, or in talk of a lighter sort, they were careful to say Divil. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 86. The tale of the Devil's Disappointment with the jangling woman. — Brunne, p. 287, lis. 9263-9307. Fishtoft. Cow-Parsley. Satan's BREAD. Anthriscus sylvestris^ Hoffm. ; Fishtoft and Frieston, H. — * It is now well known under this name at Wyberton, H.' — Lines. Folk Names y Additions, p. 28. SECTION V. WITCHCRAFT. Bechatted. — Bewitched. — Brogden, p. 21. Witch, Drawing Blood of, — L. N. & Q., vol. L, p. 56. Witch, appearing as an Animal. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 172 ; Smith, p. 158 ; Weld, p. 7. In Lincolnshire some people, after eating boiled eggs, will break the shells to prevent the witches from con- verting them into boats, because an ancient superstition gave to those unhappy beings the power of crossing the sea in egg-shells. — N. & Q.*, vol. v., p. 516. The Tale of the Witch and her Cow-sucking Bag. Pere was a wycche, and made a bagge, A bely of lejjer, a grete swagge. She sygaldryde so \ys> bagge bely Pat hyt 3ede and soke mennys ky, At euene, and at morw tyde, Yn here pasture, ojjer ellys be syde. Long hyt 3ede aboute past Tyl hyt was parceyuede at J)e last: pan al ])e godemen of ])e toune Byfore )}e bysshop dyden here somoune ; Pey dyden ])e bag wyj) here here To wete what she shulde answere. Hyt was shewyde byfore ])e bysshope. 68 WitchcrafL pat she dyde to goo swych a melk slope, Purghe wycchecraft and mysauenture, To sugke here keyn yn here pasture. Pe bysshop merueylede, and oJ)er mo, How \dX she my^t do hyt go. ' Dame,' seyd ))e bysshope, * do \y quentyse And late vs see how hyt shal ryse.' Pys wycche here charme began to sey, Pe slope rose vp and 3ede J)e weye. Pe bysshope seyd, * ))ys haue we seyn, Do hyt now to lygge a3eyn.' Pe wycche dede al at hys wylle ; She made ]>e slope a3en lygge stylle. Pe bysshope made a clerk ))an wryte All J)at she seyde, mochel and lyte, And alle how she made here went ; Pe bysshope J>arto 3af gode entent. * Pan,' seyde J)e bysshop, ' now shal y, As ))ou hast do, do J)y maystry.' Pe bysshope bygan ^e charme to rede, And as she dyde, he dyde ynn dede ; He seyde and dede euery deyl, Ry3t as she dede, he dede as weyl pe sloppe lay stylle, as hyt dede wore, For hym ne ros hyt neuere J)e more. * Why,* seyde he, * wyl hyt nat ryse, And y haue do ])e same wyse. And seyde J)e wurdys lesse ne mo. And for my seyyng wyl hyt nat go?' ' Nay,' she seyde, ' Why shulde hyt so ? 3e beleue nat, as y do : Wide 36 beleue my wrdys as y, Hyt shulde a go and sokun ky.' He seyde, ' Pan jaylej) noghte but beleuyng ; * She seyde, * Pat helpej) al my ))yng ; And so hyt ys for owre lawe, Beleue ys more Jjan J)e sawe ; 4 Witchcraft, 69 For, ))ou mayst seye what Jjou wylt, But ^ou beleue hyt, ellys ys alle spylt ; Alle J)at y seyde, y beleue hyt weyl, My beleue ha]) do ])e dede euery deyl.' Pe bysshope comaundyde ])at she shulde no^t Beleue ne wurche as she had wro3t. Here mow we wyte, beleue wyl make Pere J)e wurde no my3t may take. Pe bysshop seyde J)e wurdys echoun, But, beleue J)eryn hadde he noun. Nomore shall hyt auayle Jje Pat beleuest not ])ere beleue shulde be. Brunne, pp. 17-19, lis. 501-562. In the reign of Henry VHI., the church goods of the parish of Holbeach were stolen, and the parish authorities consulted Edmond Nasche and John Lamkyn, soothsayers of repute ; and their divinations indicated that John Partriche, one of the inhabitants, knew more than he should do about the sacrilege. His friends shrank from him, and his house was mobbed. To clear himself from this horrible, damnable, and damageable slander, he resorted to the Court of Star Chamber, which supervised such matters. The petition and answer are taken ver- batim from the Star Chamber records, B. 17, No. 64. To the Kyng ower Sovregn lord. Showeth unto yor hightness yor treu and faithful subject John Patriche that wher abowte the vi**" day of September last past the parishe Churche of Holbeche in the countie of Lyncolne was robbyd and spoyled of money and of divrse juells, as it is supposyd abowte the valeu of CCC markys and above And to thentente to have knowlege of the namys of the theflfys and to know wher the sayd mony and goods was bycom dyvrse of the parsheners of Holbech parishe resortyd to on Edmond Nasche dwellyng at Cicestre towne beyng a wheler and occupying the craft of inchauntment and wichecraft And also to on John Lamkyn of the seyd towne of Holbeche in the said countie of Lyncolne wiche occupyeth also inchauntment and wichecraft and sorcery and name themselfe to be sothe seyers and to have knowlege of negramanse : 70 Witchcraft, And the same Lamkyn and Nasche unlawfully confederyd them selfe togyther at Cicestre aforesaid so that the same inchauntors for a c'teyn reward to them promysed toke upon them to geve that seyd parisheners knowlege of the namys of the theffys and wher the said mony and goods were conveyed And then and ther falsly and untrewly the same inchauntors namyd your sayd subject to be on of the theves that robbed the said Churche And made divrse byllys therof to the seyd parisheners conteynying dyvrse tokyns and marks devysed by the seyd inchauntors wherby as the seid inchauntors affermyd the seyd parisheners should know the seyd thevys by reson wherof the seyd parisheners of Holbeche afore seyd a gen all laws of God and of yor hightness gevyng faith e and credens to the seyd inchauntors have now of late published and reported untrewly in the seyd parishe of Holbeche and in dyvrse other placys w'hin the schere of Lincolne that yor seyd subject shuld be on of the thevys and of thoys that shuld be the robbers of the seyd churche by reson wherot yor seid subject having in his possession and to his own use landys and tenements to the clere yerely valew of xl marks and goods convenient to his degre and more then many other have And beyng afore that tyme always reputyd takyn of good name fame honeste credens and conversacon in the seyd county he ys now brought into infamy slander and oute of credens so that such as afore this tyme have ben conversant w' him withdraw hys company and such as afore this have ben his ffrendys have hym now in mystrust w*out cause and withdraw ther frendshippe and favor from hym to hys utter undoying in this world for ever and to the perillus comforte and ensampuU of other suche enchauntors and whichis and to the encrease of the mysbeleve of yor hightness subjects in the same wichcraftys onless yor hightness favor and dew punyshment be the soner atteyned and had in this byhalfe And forasmuch as it ys agen the law of God and of yor hightness that any person shall use and exercise any inchauntments sorcery or wiche crafte or in any man' wise practise nygramansi. Plesyth it yor seyd hightness to grante sevrall writts of subpene to be directyd unto the seyd Edmonde Nasche and John Lamkyn comandyng them by the same to answer byfore yor hightness and the lords of yor most honorable Councelt in the Ster Chamber at a certen dey and upon a certayn payne by yor hightnesse to be lymyted ther to answer to the premises and to abyd and obey such order direcon and jugement in the premises as may stand w* right and good conscience and yor seyd subject shall dayly pray to God for yor most royall estate in honor long to contynew to the plesure of God. Witchcraft. 7 1 The answere of John Lamkyn to the bill of Compleynt of John Partriche. The seyd John Lamkyn seyth that he havyng resonable knowleg in the sciens of gramer long afore the seyd robbery specyfyed in the seyd bill of compleynt comyttyd and at the tyme of the same was resident and abyding in the said towne of Holbeche there techyng and instructyng chyldren in the sciens of gramer and havyng his lyvyng by the same. And after the said robbery done there was a fame and report made to the churchwardens and other the most honest and substanciall persons inhabitants in the same towne that the seyd Nasche specyfyed in the said bill of compleynt should be an expert man in knowleg of thyngs stolen by reson whereof this defendaunt havyng gret part of hys lyvyng by the comfort and relefe of the said Inhabitats and beyng moche desirous to have knowlege of suche persons as comyttyed the seyd robbery to the extent that punyshment for the same myght ensue accordyng to justice after ther demeryts at the request and desier of onn Henry Elman and Richarde Gibson then beyng Churchwardens of the said churche and of dyvrs other honest inhabitats of the seyd parysh repayred to Cicester to the same Nasche demandyng of hym what knowleg he cowde tell of the sayd robbery shewyng to hym a payer of gloves of lether whiche were ffounde in the re vestry of the seyd churche imedeatly after the said robbery was knowen to be done. Wher upon the said Nasche caused an instrucion to be made in wrytyng of such circumstances as he cowd tell in the seyd robbery and delyvryd the same to this defendaunt whiche he brought home and delyvryd and shewyd to the seyd ch-wardens and to divrs other honest inhabitants of the seyd parish. Without that the seyd def* ever occupied any enchantment wyche craft or sorcery or hath any knowleg of nygromancy in man' and forme as in the seyd bill of compleynt ys surmytted and w^hout that the same def* at any tyme confederat hymself w* the seyd Nasche or that he and the same Nasche toke upon them to gif eny knowleg of the theves that robbed the seyd churche and where the seyd goods and money were conveyed or that the seyd defendant named the sayd partryche to be oon of the seyd theves that robbed the said churche or devysed eny tokens or marks for eny suche cause in man' and forme as in the sayd bill of compleynt ys surmytted otherwise or in eny other forme then to hym was shewid notyfyd and declaryed by the seyd Nasche by his instrucions in wrytinge wch he browt from the seyd Nasche and delyvred to the churchewardens and parisheners as ys aforesaid. And this defendant seyth that the 72 Witchcraft, Inhabytants of the seyd parishe sythens the same robbery hath taken gret paynes in diligent serches for knowlege to be had of the same robbery and of presumpcons and liklyhods per catesium of them have suspected the seyd Partriche but whether they or eny of them have determyned or precysely seyd that he was one of the theves this deP knoweth not nor yet perceyveth that the sayd Partriche by occasion of eny suspect hath lost eny ffrend in his medlyng but hath good help and assistens and what he may spende this def. knowyth not certenly but supposyth that yt ys a gret dele lesse than ys surmytted in the bill w'out that that eny other thing specyfied in the said bill of compleynt material to be answeryd unto and not before trav'syd or confessyd and avoyded ys true all whiche mater the seyd defendant ys redy to profe as this court shall awarde and prayeth to be dysmyssed w* his resonable costs for hys wrongfull vexacon by him susteyned in this behalf. — L. G. ; Fenland N. & Q., vol. v., pp. 29-31. Lincolnshire Marsh. Witchcraft. — This reminds me of a case of witchcraft I came across one May time. My father farmed very largely in Marshland, and going into the stables one morning in 1867, when the lads had left, I found on the bin of one of them a small doll gaily dressed to represent a girl, but stuck through, about the heart, with tin tacks. On his return I questioned him not only about this, but also the pair of lovely black eyes he had gained in the interval. It appeared that he had had his doubts of the constancy of his lass, who was in service a good way off", and had taken this course, under the advice of a ' wiseman,' to compel her to meet him at Alford Fair. Sure enough no sooner had he got there than up she came, but with another ' gurt chap ' along of her, and only to reproach him bitterly, for ' she knawed he'd been after some devilmen-t along of her/ She 'hedn't been able to sleep for a week thinking of him and were draawed to him agin hersen, an' she threeaped up all mander things agin me, an' the gurt chap set on an' all and jacketed me outrageous. I reckun I must 'ed leff summat out. I draawed her proper enuff, but I cudn't uphold it right thruff, an' now I doubt she's gotten a i Witchcraft, 73 scunner* agin mea, I wean't hardlins overset' — Heanley, p. 10. Old Mary Atkin, to whom I shall have to refer again, was one of these ' wise women.' She was the wife of a most respectable farm bailiff, who did not hold with her goings on, although he dared not check them. Several waggoners boarded in their house, and one morning, their breakfast bread and milk being sadly burnt, a lad threw his portion in her face. Quietly wiping it off she merely said, ' Thou art very bug now, my lad ; but jest thou wait till thee and thy team gets to top of Cowbank : thou'lt be main sorry then, I'll go bail ! See if thou ardn't' All went well enough till they reached the place indicated, when suddenly the horses stopped short, shivered and sweated and shook, and not a step would they move one way or the other till, having called a man from a cottage near at hand, he went back and on bended knees besought Mary to lift the spell. When he returned the horses promptly moved on without further hitch. . . . For this was told me by the man himself years after, as he lay dying, and he added his regret that he had not remembered the counter-spell. * Ef I hed nobbut takken t' collar off t' fust boss, and looked thruff it backwards, I hedn't need trapsed all yon way whoam agin in a muck sweat ; but I were that 'mazed I clean disremembered mysen. Howsomdever, I alius kep' a bit o' wicken in moi jacket whilst I stayed waggoner thear, and she nivver hit me nor my horses no more.' Curiously enough, too, it fell to my lot in 1885 to attend old Mary on her deathbed ; in fact, she sent for me from another parish 'to lay the devil,' whom she believed to have come for her. If nothing else had come, the hour of an evil conscience had undoubtedly arrived. She, at all events, firmly believed in her own powers, and, had it not been for the greater presence which she asserted * Scunner = violent dislike. 74 Witchcraft, was in the room, would, I fear, as little have regretted the use she had made of them. Her last words to me were : * Thou hast fixed him, Master Robert, for a bit, as firm as ivver I fixed anny ; bud he'll hev' me sartain sewer when thou art gone/ And she died that night shrieking out that he had got her. A few months before this last occurrence I was in a part of my parish named Wainfleet Bank, and passing the house of a respectable wheelwright, was called in, and, after a short conversation on the subjects of the day, taken solemnly down to his pigstye, and requested to %\\t, my opinion on the state of his best sow. The pig certainly looked in a bad way, and I suggested whiskey gruel. * Nay,* said he, * thou knaws better nor that ; I du varily believe she hev been overrluked, and thou and me knaws the party that hes dun it (one should never mention a witch by name, of course). Ef I nobbut could draa blud of she it 'ud be aal reight, but then shea hev the law on me, and they magistraates up to Spilsby be that iggnerant they 'ud mak' mea paay ; so I tho't as maybe you 'ud saay a few wuds o'er the sow an' set her free.' When I declined, he begged hard for a bit of the wicken- tree that stood at my garden gate, and, although I did not give it, I firmly believe he came and helped himself, for next time I passed that way the wicken cross was on the stye and the pig was well and happy. * You must understand that there is " heder " wicken and there is " sheder " wicken — one has berries and t'other has none ; if the person overlooked was he you got a piece of " sheder " wicken, if it was she you got " heder" and so made a " T " with it on the hob. Then they could do nowt at you.' Perhaps it may be as well to explain to non-Marshmen that * heder ' and ' sheder,' terms usually applied to lambs (hogs), are used simply to express ' male ' and ' female.* Talking of the wicken cross, which is properly the mountain ash or rowan tree, but in Marshland the Witchcraft 75 common ash will do as well, and I have often supposed that the abundance of ashes in Lincolnshire (it is called the weed of Lincolnshire) is a relic of the Norsemen's faith . . ., when the cattle plague was so prevalent in 1866 there was, I believe, not a single cowshed in Marsh- land but had its wicken cross over the door ; and other charms more powerful than this were in some cases resorted to. I never heard of the use of the needfire in the Marsh, though it was, I believe, used on the wolds not many miles off. But I knew of at least one case in which a calf was killed and solemnly buried feet pointing upwards at the threshold of the cowshed. When our garthman told me of this, I pointed out to him that the charm had failed, for the disease had not spared that shed. But he promptly replied, ' Yis, but owd Edwards were a soight too cliver ; he were that mean he slew nobbutt a wankling cauf as were bound to deny anny road ; if he had nobbutt tekken his best cauf it wud hev worked reight enuff ; 'tain't in reason that owd skrat 'ud be hanselled wi' wankling draffle.' It was some years before the cattle plague that the garthman whom I have just mentioned came to me one morning * in a great doment,' as we say in Marshland. * Master Robert, hast thee a crooked sixpence ? * He took me to the pump, which stood just outside the cowshed, in which about half-a-dozen milch cows were stalled, and showed me a straw or two, apparently twisted around the handle by the action of the wind. ' Thear,' said he, ' I've fund 'er oot ; yon's a witch straw, an' along of t' pump hannel shea's milking aal oor coows ; bud I'll put a stopper on 'er ef thou'll nobbutt len' mea yon crookled sixpence I see' 'er run thruff t' yard las' noight as a black bitch, an' shea canna' stan' agin silver.' So I produced the coin, he had his shot at the black bitch, and now comes the pathos of the tale. That very night a dear old woman, wife of our own gardener, in getting up on a stool to reach some crockery from a high shelf, fell and broke her leg. 76 Witchcraft, But the garthman and many another held to their last breath that they had 'fund t' witch.' — Heanley, pp. 13-17. Bottesford. Witch. — ' If you wish the butter to " come " properly, you must first get a pinch of salt, and drop some into the churn to drive the witch out ; the rest must be thrown into the fire to burn the witch.' — Bottesford, Sep. 6, 1875. Eirton-in-Lindsey. See Folklore Journal^ vol. i., p. 354. Laceby. 1546. — A witch was devoured in the Bounds of the feilds of Lacebye, and buried there the same day. — N. & Q.^ vol. ii., p. 322. Lincoln. Margaret and Philippa Flower were burnt at Lincoln in 161 8 for practising witchcraft at Belvoir. — N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 515. Cf. Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., pp. 127-135. Luddington. The Rev. William Harris, B.A., was pre- sented by Thomas Pindar, Esq., to the vicarage of Luddington, Lincolnshire, on the 7th August, 1722. Mr. Harris died here in June 1748, aged eighty-two. ... A tradition of his being a wizard still lingers in the village. — N. & Q.\ vol. vii., p. 572. Messingham. Every misfortune and calamity that took place in the parish, such as ill-health, the death of friends, the loss of stock, and the failure of crops ; yea to such a length did they carry their superstition, that even the inclemency of the seasons, were attributed to the influence of certain old women who were supposed to be in league, and had dealings with the Devil. These the common people thought had the power and too often the in- clination to injure their property, and torment their persons. In early times it is much to be feared that many who were thought to possess the art of witchcraft, and lived in these retired villages, suffered greatly from Witchcraft. J J the persecution of their ignorant neighbours. In the register book of the parish of Normanby, near Spital, there is an entry of the burial of an old woman, stated to have been a witch who was hunted down, and worried to death by dogs. It is to be hoped that the Messing- hamites never carried their animosity against these feeble and defenceless parts of the creation to such cruel and unwarrantable lengths, though at times it must be con- fessed they showed no great regard for them. The following happened to Nanny Moody, a supposed witch, who lived here within the recollection of some of the old people now alive. Some young persons invited Nanny to go with them to the public house, and like most old girls of her day, though a witch, she made no objection to taking a drop of the creature. She accordingly went with the party, but no sooner had she passed the thres- hold of the house, than they compelled her to sit down on a chair, the seat of which had been previously prepared and stuck full of pins with the points upwards, nor was she suffered to rise from this seat of purgatory till those who brought her had drawn blood, and were perfectly satisfied she had undergone a sufficient degree of pain. This treatment must have subjected her to great in- convenience for some time after, as she could not sit down without feeling the effect of her rough treatment. Thatch had oft and privately been taken from the roof of her dwelling, and burned by those over whom she was supposed to exercise her magic art ; straws were frequently placed across the path, where she had to pass, in hopes to render ineffectual her mystic power, but what the united efforts of the parishioners could not do, by burning her thatch, placing straws across her path or wearing about their persons, as a charm, a small piece of the Wickin tree, Death at length accomplished, for he most effectually laid poor Nanny, at once depriving her of life and all the witchery she was imagined to possess. — MACKINNON. 7S Witchcraft Mumby. So far, I have never found a district, nay scarcely a parish, that has not its stories of witches and wizards who dwelt there. Generally, it is some old woman, who, according to the stories, was filled with malice and hatred. In my own parish, a man tells me he knew * t' owd witch well,' and he knows cases where pigs couldn't get up till she came, and how one day when he was driving his horses they would not pass her house, but went right up to her door, and wouldn't budge an inch till she came out. Another day she offered to come and help them to thrash, and they refused. That day there was nothing but trouble, and they could not get on with their work, until at last they went for her, and then all went on well. The same old witch caused no end of trouble in the parish by stopping butter coming. In the next parish, it is said a man could not keep his pigs, so one day in despair he took a red hot poker, and scored a pig's back with it, not long after a woman in the parish died of a sore back ! — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 1 70. * When Maud was a young 'un, she was amazin' badly,' said one of my parishioners, not long ago, * the doctors could do nowt for her ; she was all skin and bone. Doctors said it was a decline ; but I didn't believe it, for she did squeal amazin'. It was all an owd woman that used to sell pins and needles.' It appears that a certain old woman was in the habit of coming round selling little things, and she always insisted upon giving Maud something, and thus suspicion pointed her out as having 'witched' the child, and the next time she came she was ordered off *in quick sticks,' and then the witched one recovered; the same old woman is said to have witched another child in the parish about the same time. I have come across a few other cases of a like sort in the neighbourhood. Maud is now a fine healthy girl, and vows vengeance on the witch if ever she comes across her. . . . Witches are said to be able to assume all sorts of Witchcraft. 79 forms, the hare being the favourite one. A parishioner of mine tells me that one night in our churchyard she saw a white rabbit, which she chased round the church till it ran into the south porch, where she thought it was 'safe to be caught,' but when she looked for it, lo! it was gone. In Hogsthorpe, there was a hare no dogs ever could catch ; they could get hold of her down, but never any more; and one day when passing a house where a reputed witch lived, they heard a great noise, and it was the old woman being chased about the house by dogs. 'One night,' said one of our servants, from Kirton Lindsey, *my father and brother saw a cat in front of them. Father knew it was a witch, and took a stone and hammered it. Next day the witch had her face all tied up, and shortly afterwards died.' I have heard several examples of hares being hurt and next day the witch appeared hurt in a like manner. The following I took down in Goxhill: 'An old witch had a cow, a haystack, and a servant girl, and she witched an old woman (my informant's grandmother), so that she was bedridden for seven years. Now this old woman had also a cow and a haystack, and one night the witch said to her servant, "Go and get me a bit of hay from Mrs. W 's stack, and tie it to a broom." The girl went and got some hay, tied it to a broom, and on it rode round the house crying, "Proo! Proo!" (the word still used by some old folks to drive the cattle along). Next morning, behold the witch's cow was dead! "Where did you get the hay from," cried the old witch. "Out of our own stack," replied the girl. "Great heavens, then," exclaimed the witch, "we've killed our own cow." A little later on the old bedridden woman got some wicken tree, and had it boiled, where- upon the old witch was so tormented that she came to see what was the matter. The old woman then got up and recovered her health.' It is said that once upon a time a witch lived at Grasby who had a lover, and he 8o Witchcraft. married another woman, so out of revenge, the witch * witched' her old lover's cattle. The crowning act was when a fine cow was found with its horns stuck in a dyke side, drowned, although there was scarcely any water there. The man then got some wicken tree and boiled it, whereupon in walked a cat. Knowing that it was the witch, the man began to chase it round the house, till at last in desperation the cat flew up the copper chimney. The man would not be done, so he lighted a fire, which scorched the cat terribly. The narrator of this story told me that the old woman who laid the witch out at her death said that she was marked, etc., in the very places where the cat had been injured. A resident in Hogsthorpe told me that he remembered an old man who kept a cow, which cow was seized with sudden illness, so bad that no doctor could cure it. One day, as the old man was leaving his house, he saw old Sally standing at the stable door, so he whipped up a fork and hit the old woman in the leg. She at once vanished, but the old woman was laid up for weeks with a bad leg. A Bardney man related how that a witch who lived in that neighbourhood could take all sorts of shapes. One night a man shot a hare, and when he went to the witch's house he found her plastering a wound just where he had shot the hare! The same man told me that one day he was standing by a lad, who was unloading a cart of potatoes, the old witch came up and touched one saying, * That's a fine potato, my lad!* When she was gone the lad wouldn't touch that potato, but threw it away with his scoop. Another tale is told here as to how a man was threshing, and that there was nothing but trouble and bother all day, till he went and got a certain old woman to come, when the machine went perfectly. I have been told this by more than one person now living, and who witnessed either that or some similar prank. There was once a wizard named Witchcraft, 8 1 C , and one day he sent a man to mend a road that led across a field to his house. The man was told to fill his cart with stones and to put a rake in it and drive along the road, but on no account was he to look behind him. So off the man set. ^s he drove on he heard a terrible noise behind. At last he got so frightened, he looked round, and lo! there were hundreds of little devils at work, which vanished in a moment, and so that piece of road was unmended. A labourer told me next, 'My grandfather and another man were at Goxhill, and there was an old witch there. The men teased her till she shouted out, "I'll make you repent of this." Off the two went and got their cart loaded with hay, and they got on first-class till they got past her cottage, when over went the cart. After a good deal of bother they got it all up again, but over it went a few yards further on, and that happened three or four times. So they half filled the cart next time, but it was all no good, they couldn't get on that day, and the old woman had her revenge.' — L. N. & Q., i., 244-249. Witch at Market- Rasen. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 177. North Rauceby. Bayards Leap, — A witch who, accord- ing to some accounts, was said to eat human flesh, once lived near North Rauceby, on Ancaster Heath. Her dwelling was a cave, or den, in a wood, near the spot where the Newark road crosses the Ermine Street. Now, it was child's-play to this hag to raise high winds, to bring rain-storms and floods, or to smite cattle and crops with pestilence and blight. The dread of her, which weighed on the whole country-side, was so great that at last no one dared to resist her. It was thought that no weapon could wound her, and every attempt to withstand her spells had failed. Yet, a deliverer appeared. 82 Witchcraft, A nameless champion was bold enough to try what a brave heart and a good sword could do against this thing of darkness. The knight had the choice of a dozen horses, which he watered at a pond near the witch's abode before under- taking the strife, and he threw a heavy stone into the pool, that he might learn from the behaviour of the animals which was to help him in his work. It was a horse named Bayard (sometimes called the blind Bayard) who threw up his head as the water spurted into the air, and the knight accepted this movement as a token. He mounted Bayard, armed with a naked sword, and turned to seek the witch. When before her dwelling, he hailed her, and she answered him with mocking words : 'I must suckle ray cubs, I must buckle my shoes, And then I will give you your supper.' and in a little while she started out of her den, armed on hands and feet with cruel, ripping claws, to throw herself on the man who had dared to confront her. At the first stroke of his blade the knight sheared off her left breast, but she slipped away from the second blow, and sprang up behind him, driving the talons of her fingers into his chest and neck, while she clutched his horse with the claws of her feet. This action availed little, however. When Bayard felt himself thus wounded, he reared, and dislodged the hag from her hold by the astounding leap that has made him famous. Flung from his back, she came headlong to the ground, where she was slain by her antagonist's sword, before she could gather her wits together and make a further stand. The hoof-dints where Bayard struck the earth after his maddened bound are now marked by a stone, it is said, and by large horse- shoes, though formerly, according to tradition, the tenant of Bayard's Leap Farm was obliged I Witchcraft, 83 by contract to keep open the holes made by the horse's hoofs. As for the witch, she was buried under a large stone at a cross-road with a stake through her heart. The drawing blood notion came in too, but in a wrong form. — L. N. & Q., vii., 21 1-2 14. The Legend of By ard's Leap. — On the old Roman road, called ' Ermine Street,' or ' The High Dyke,' . . . — and at a distance of some three miles from Ancaster, a Roman station . . . — and in the angle formed by the Sleaford and Newark road, which there crosses the Roman road — stands a solitary farm-house ; its solitude only relieved by two cottages distant about one hundred yards, on the same side of the great highway, and, more recently erected, a small school building on its opposite side. Solitary in its position, its civil status also was formerly isolated, since it belongs to what was an extra-parochial farm, at the north-west corner of Rauceby, sometimes returned with the parish of Cranwell, sometimes with that of Leadenham ; but latterly (under the Act, 20 Victoria, cap. 16) constituted a separate parish in its own right. Close by the entrance gateway to this farm-house, on the road side, is a block of stone, such as not uncommonly may be seen near old houses of the kind, forming two steps, from which a rider mounted his horse. This stone is inscribed with the words ' Byard's Leap.' Not less singular are the circumstances which are said to have given rise to the name of ' Byard's (or * Bayard's ') Leap,' or the Leap of the horse ' Bayard.' ... It [the Leap] is situated in the midst of what was once a lonely tract of high land, almost a waste, extending for many miles, and called Ancaster Heath. . . . The pedestrian who follows the footpath which runs along the Eastern side of the great Roman highway will observe, at a distance of some fifty yards northwards from the farmhouse of Byard's Leap, and near a pond by the 84 Witchcraft, roadside, four very large iron horse shoes, embedded in the soil. If he measures the distance of these shoes from the pond he will find that it is twenty paces, or sixty feet, and sixty feet was the length of Byard's Leap. . . . Opposite the farm of ' Bayard's Leap ' is a plantation . . . consisting chiefly of trees of recent growth ; but probably there formerly existed an older growth, whose pristine shades were more adapted to harbour weird spirits. Within that wood, inhabiting, as it is said, a cave, but more likely a deserted quarry of the famed Ancaster stone of the district (such places of abode being still used), there lived the pest and terror of the country side in the person of an old woman, known far and wide as, par excellence, the witch ... a dangerous character was the old beldame to anyone who ventured to thwart her, or cross her path. . . . If the old woman was denied anything which she craved of her better-to-do neighbours they were certain speedily to suffer for it. . . . Neither man nor beast is secure from her spells. ... At length, a child having been still- born in a cottage from which the old woman had been turned away without receiving what she asked for, the indignation ripens, and a plan is proposed, by which it is hoped that the witch's power may be put an end to, while the act shall seem to be of her own originating. The shepherd of the farm has been on something like intimate terms with the old woman, ... as is surmised . . . having had illicit dealings with her, the result, however, being that closer acquaintance with her has in no wise enkindled affection : and although afraid to * break ' with her . . , he would yet greatly rejoice ... if he could terminate the unpleasant thraldom of her influence. . . . By a sort of lottery, the shepherd is selected for the enterprise. He is to lead out the farm horses to water in the evening, at the pond by the road-side, opposite to which is the hag's den. He is to throw a stone into the water as the horses are drinking, and whichever horse then raises its head first, he Witchcraft. 85 is to mount. He is to be armed with a two-edged knife. He is to call to the old woman to come out and mount behind him. He is to stab her when she has done so, as if in self-defence on her springing up behind him ; and it is hoped that in the struggle she will be drowned ; the not unfrequent end of witches. At the appointed time he proceeds to carry out these instructions. The horses are led to the water, the stone is thrown into the pond. The first horse that raises his head on hearing the splash is the blind Bayard ; a providential circumstance, since it is likely that any horse which could see would shrink from contact with the witch. He mounts the horse Bayard. He calls out to the old woman, asking her to come and ride behind him. Her reply (which has been preserved) is, * Wait till I've buckled my shoes and suckled the cubs, and I'll be with you.' He waits, and in due time she comes forth. At his bidding she mounts behind him. He at once plunges his knife into her breast. The old hag, in her agony, clutches at the horse's back with the long sharp nails of her fingers. The horse in alarm makes one wild, sudden bound, which lands him full sixty feet from the spot. The witch falls back into the pond, and is drowned ; and so her career is ended. Tradition says that the horse made a second bound, equal in length to the first, and which brought him to the corner of the cottages which stand further on by the side of the road ; but only the first is marked by the four huge horse-shoes, which are carefully preserved, in situ, as described above, as standing evidence and memorial of * Bayard's Leap.' ... It should here be stated that considerable variations from the foregoing version of the legend exist, as is usually the case with such narratives, in the form of oral tradition still floating in the neighbourhood. For instance, the personality of the hero himself varies from that of a knight-errant of the age of chivalry to that of an ordinary cavalry soldier of a more recent period. . . , 86 Witchcraft. The version which ascribes the feat to a cavalry soldier . . . [represents that he] encounters the witch, cutting off her left breast with his sword ; whereat she springs upon his charger, which incontinently, gives * three great jumps.' . . . The ' three jumps,' are an instance of the occurrence of the by no means uncommon mystic number three . . . which occur again in another variation, where the hero (whoever he was), not content with throwing the stone once into the pond, on finding that the blind horse is the one to raise its head, made the experiment thrice, and each time the same blind horse responded by tossing its head. Other various \sic'\ are : {a) (As in White's History of Lincolnshire, Ed. 1856), that the witch herself occupied the solitary (now farm) house on the heath, and that she took a prodigious leap, on her horse Bayard, into a ravine, and so gave rise to the name. (J}) It is said that the witch, when attacking the rider, assumed the form of a lion. {c) The horse is, by one authority, called ' Byron,' but this is evidently only a corruption of Byard, id) It is said that the holes, otherwise supposed to have been the marks of Bayard's feet, were originally nothing more than the boundary marks of four parishes ; while {e) some have supposed that the spot was thus marked out, as a place where jousts and tilting matches were held. The two latter ideas, however, would seem to be merely conjectural, and are really somewhat beside the purpose ; since certain holes may have formerly served either or both of these ends without in any way affecting the legend. In a letter to the writer, the present owner of * Bayard's Leap,' Colonel Reeve of Leadenham House, states that in his * father's time, Bayard's jump was denoted by eight holes in the ground, but at length they got worn out ; and finding this to be the case, he himself had the present large horse-shoes made and Witchcraft 87 put into large blocks of stone, to prevent their being easily removed.' He adds that ' the shoes weighed sixty- eight pounds/ or close upon seven stone. On the whole, the version here given, and based on information gathered on the spot, seems the most con- gruous, so far indeed as congruity can be expected to exist, in a matter of such hypothetical authenticity. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., pp. 96- 1 1 6. Another account of * Byard's Leap ' states that if any- one fills the footprints up they are always empty next morning, that the horse was black, and that the footprints are kept clean by one particular person. — Addy, pp. 25, 26, notes. Biard's Leap. — Cf OLIVER (3), pp. 1 06, 107, 1 08. The Rev. E. Trollope also published a version of Bayard's Leap, in the Reliquary, vol. iv., p. 7, 1863-4. Still another form is given in A Legendary Romance. Bayard's Leap, by S. O. W. Sleaford, corrected edition, 1896. The legend is versified in Kent's Lindum Lays and Legends, 1861, pp. 238-241. Cf. Sleaford, 1825, pp. 316, 317; Oliver (2), 48, footnote. Legend. — See Kent's Lindum Lays and Legends, 1861, p. 221, for Billy Shuffler and the Lincolnshire Witches, [The story as given by the above authority is prolix and modernized. It tells of a child who ' two hundred years ago ' was carried off by witches, to be boiled in their cauldrons for the purpose of making charms of his bones. The scene of the story is the Longwood, which used to lie southeast of Lincoln. The child is found dropped near the mouth of the witches' cave, and it, with the horses also stolen, are rescued. But Billy Shuffler, the gardener [who had guessed that the hags were the kidnappers], mounted on ' old Simon,' is chased by the witches. One 88 Witchcraft of them, whom he fells with his club as she springs up behind him, cries out that her cubs shall lick his blood. He is, however, saved by leaping Dunston beck, though the horse fails to clear the water and is seized by the pursuer, who rides him away through the wood to be boiled at the mouth of the den.] Scamblesby. They [witches] was all gone now ; but theer was one, the Scamblesby witch as lived at Scam- blesby mountain-side, and he had heard of one in his father's days, at Tetford. He could tell of ' three coach waggins going past the Scamblesby witch's door, and she had crossed the road wi' her stick, and the two first horses went clean over i' the road, and the third waggin went straight on reightlins, and th' owd witch shakked her fist at the man as druv the team ; " The divvil git tha," she said, and she skriked out, " Theer goes the man wi' the wicken gad," for you know he had a bit of a wicken tree in his whip stock, and theer's nowt like a bit of wicken agean the witches ; when I was a boy we alius put a bit o' wicken i' the churn to mek the butter coom. . . .' I soon found out that wicken was the rowan or mountain ash. — Rawnsley, p. 34. Tetford. Thirty or forty years ago, a woman named E , the daughter of a man named F , of Wood- hall, lived in a cottage near Tetford Church, which had a hole in it, called ' the cat hole,' through which she went in the form of a hare or cat ; she bewitched to death her son and daughter, and also a sister living at Scamblesby, who had been warned, by the wiseman of Louth, named S , that provided she saw no strangers, she would recover, but if the person who had overlooked her, was able to do so again, she would die, which happened ; for when she was almost well enough to come downstairs, her sister Mrs. E called, having walked over from Tetford, and though all others had been prevented from seeing her, yet her sister Mrs. E was allowed, though Witchcraft, 89 of course she was the only person to be feared, and as soon as Mrs. E saw her sister, she got rapidly worse, and died soon after she left the cottage to return to Tetford. Mrs. E required to have some victim, whom she bewitched to death gradually, or else tortured for years, thus, while she bewitched her son, daughter, and sister to death, she only succeeded in making a man, named U H , so ill that he could do no work though he could walk about, and one day he had a gun in his hand, and was walking with a friend, named T H , when a hare sat up in front of him, and T H said, ' Shoot it,' but U H said, ' I cannot,' so T H took the gun from him and fired, knocking over the hare, but, before he could get up to it, the hare struggled on to its legs, and got away, though badly wounded ; the next day Mrs. E was found very ill, covered with breaders (very bad spreading boils), which nearly ended her, though she gradually recovered, and lived for several years. U H recovered his strength, and went to America, where he did well. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 233, 234. Trusthorpe. At Trusthorpe, about fifty years ago \i.e. 1835], there was living one Mrs. Gray, the wife of a cottager, who had a firm belief that her cows were being plagued by a witch of the village. The witch was Dame T , an old woman of seventy or more, who lived in what were then known as the Poor Houses — a building afterwards occupied by the labourers on the estate of the late Mr. Wm. Loft. She was believed to have practised her charm on the cows, compassing their deaths. To try and counteract the evil influence a piece of ' wicken tree ' — a tree which bears red berries — was taken and tied round the neck of the affected animal. Whether the branch so used was shaped into the form of a cross my informant, at that time a girl, is not able to remember. — Old Lincolnshire, vol. i., p. 224. 90 Witchcraft, EVIL-EYE. Overlook. — To bewitch : used in the same sense as by Shakspere, Merchant of Venice, iii. 2 ; Merry W. of JV., V. 4. If they were badly or owt, they reckoned folks had overlooked them. When you thought you were overlooked, you got a piece of wicken tree. There was a strange do-ment about being overlooked when I was a gell ; folks would have bits of wicken in their bo-sum or over the door-stead. — COLE, p. 104. Child cured of disease caused by being ' overlooked.* — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 178. Evil-eye and Witchcraft. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., pp. 173, 174. * Oh well, the evil eye was quite common i' them days,' meaning in the days when he and the Tenny- sons were young. * Fwoak's cows and pigs was hover- looked, and the wust was, one nivver could tell who had done it, and babbies was hover-looked, and went wrong, and fwoaks' bairns was hover-looked and the poor things withered away.' * But what did people do who had been over-looked, or whose pigs had been over-looked ? ' I said. * Doa ; why, they went to the wise men, to be sewer. Theer was one they called Stainton, at Louth, and if fwoaks had lost owt, or gotten owt stolen, they would goa hoff and he'd soon tell 'em who'd done it, but er-course they had to paay. I've heard tell that a horse's shoe hinged up hover the door is a good thing ageanst the hevil eye. Theer is a queer un, a solidly great un we dug up cloase by, a solid plaate of metal, not a herse's nor hass's as I can mek out, but belonging some queer thing, you know, from past times, and we nailed it oop over the \ Evil- Eye, 9 1 blacksmith's door, but for the hevil eye, mind tha', theer's nowt better then a horse's shoe.' — Rawnsley, p. 35. Bottesford. Owerlooked = overlooked, bewitched, affected by the influence of the evil eye. ' I've hed a strange pain i' my face ; missis ses it's tick, but I think nowt better then that I've been owerlooked by Billy . . .' [This Billy . . . had the evil-eye by inheritance. He was at times credited with trying to nullify its power. — M. P.] Boston. One person has power to look on another with an evil eye, ' to overlook him,' as it is called, and thereby blight him, and afflict him with sickness and other calamities. An instance of the belief in this power, and the exercise of it, has occurred near Boston during the present year 1856. — THOMPSON, p. 736. COUNTER-CHARMS TO USE AGAINST WITCHES. Mumby. Charms. — As a natural consequence of the belief in witches and wizards being so widely spread, there is a mass of charms still to be found amongst the people. ' A girl I knew,' said one of my people a few weeks ago. ' took a pigeon's inside out while it was alive and put it over the house- door. Before very long her lover, who lived some distance away, walked in and asked what she wanted. The young fellow said he felt he must come, and he knew she'd been up 'te summat' . . . Another curious charm was given to me a short time ago. It is written in an old copy book, and is a strange medley of religion and superstition. The following is an exact copy, so far as I can make it so. ' Gods Message from heaven. A copy of a letter found under a stone as it is said, written by the hand of God in a village named euerkall (?), near to the town of jasardy in the year 1603, this letter by the commandment of Jesus Crist, was found under a stone broad large, it was at the side of a cross, 1 8 miles 92 Witchcraft, from jasardy, in the said village upon the wich was graven the words, Blessed is he that turneth me, the people that saw this writing endeavoured to turn the stone but in vain they laboured, for it was immovable, and when they could not turn it they prayed. And they desired of god that they should understand the meaning of this writing, and there came a child between six and seven years old turned the stone to the great admiration of the beholders, and when it was turned, there was found under it a letter written in golden letters by the verry hand of Jesus Crist wich letter was carried to jasardy to be read wich town belongeth bethsaida and there was the commandments of Jesus Crist sent by the angel Gabriel in the year 1603 it was as folio weth you say that they that work on the Sabbath day shall be excommunicated and cursed of Jesus Crist but I say and command you to go to Church and keep that day holy and that you earnestly desire me to forgive you your sins and offences my commandments you shall faithfully keep and serve me steadfastly believe that this was written by my own hand you shall go to church and take your children with you and keep my commandments and leave off working on Saturday at five o'clok in the evening and so continue till Monday morning and I wish you to fast five fridays in the year in remembrance of the five wounds that I received for your sins you shall take no gold nor silver unadvisedly but keep my commandments you shall cause them that are not baptized to go to church and repent and in so doing I will bless you and give you manifold gifts and long life and your cattle shall be replenished and fruitfuU to bring abundance and my blessing shall be upon you but he that doth contrariwise shall be accursed and not blessed their goods and cattle shall be unfruitfull and I will send upon them lightning and thunder and whant of food untill I have distroied them especially that witness against this writing and believe not that it was written with my own hand and Counter -Charms to use against Witches, 93 that I have not spoken it with my own mouth they shall be accursed and shall be the confusion of hell. Remem- ber that you keep holy the Sabbath day without any occupation for I have given six days to labour in and have taken the seventh to myself and as many do write a copy of this writing and cause it to be published he shall be blessed and if he have sinned as oft as there are stars in the sky if he heartily sorry for them asking forgiveness of me contrariwise if a man do write a copy of this writing without published to others he shall be accursed and again if he doth not things and keep my commandments I shall upon black storms and showers wich shall both destroy you and your cattle your goods and whatsoever you have also if a man do write of this writing and keep it in his house no evil spirit shall hurt him and if a Womman be with child and have a copy of this writing about her she shall be delivered of her burden and now you shall know no more till the day of judgment all good shall be to that house were a copy of this writing shall be found in the name of Jesus Crist this place is called bethsaida south west by East 2 36y* miles from London. Of this strange medley, for our present purpose, there is no interest saving at the end, where the charm is stated. Even to the present day the feeling that others may harm you still exists in this parish, e.g. a resident told me that if a woman she suspects to be a witch comes to the door selling hemp she will not take anything from her as then she has no power. If by any chance the old woman says, * Mrs. X. is born under a lucky star,' she at once gets very frightened and gives the old woman a copper * to get shot of 'er.' Black books and written charms are rare in our county, if not unknown ; still we have remains, such as the horse shoe over the stable door, the wicken tree carried in the pocket to keep off the witches, the chestnut or potato carried by some to ward off * rheumatiz.' I know two people in this parish who still * This y may be 7. 94 Witchcraft, wear a mole's foot round their necks to cure fits to which they are subject. A young friend in this parish told me that when she was confirmed and went to her first communion she was told that if she kept half of the consecrated bread in her pocket she would become a witch and have marvellous powers. I am glad to say she never dreamt of doing so. — Heanley, p. 17. Mumby. There is another class of superstition, still very common, connected with the church, and these charms only act on certain days, e.g., if you fast on S. Mark's eve you will dream of your lover when you go to bed. Mrs. H. and another girl made a dumb cake. Both of them had to do each part of the performance ; both went to the dairy to get the materials ; both took hold of the bowl ; both helped to get the flour ; both got some water and rinsed the bowl ; both helped to make the cake and roll it. A line was then drawn across the cake and the initials of each girl placed on the cake on opposite sides of the line. During the whole time strict silence was maintained (a well-known rule in all incanta- tions), and while the cake was being made the two girls stood upon something never stood on before.* Just when they had done a sudden gust of wind swirled round the house and put the two to an ignominous flight. One of them feels sure if they had but held out her future husband would have appeared at the open door. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 41-45. Grass from newly made grave to counteract witchcraft. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 176. Iron is efficacious in nullifying evil influences, and it possesses increased potency if in the form of a horse-shoe. When Winterton boys exchange their various treasures the bargain is not considered irrevocable until each lad * In an unprinted version of this story from North- West Lincolnshire, every- thing used in making the cake was never thus used before. — M. P. I Counter -Charms to use against Witches. 95 has * touched cold iron.' According to information lately received ' It is no uncommon thing to see two boys barter birds'-eggs, etc., and then lift up a foot and touch a nail in the heel of their boots to ratify the agreement' — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p, 21 ; Heanley, p. 21. Iron, or pins, to counteract witchcraft. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 176, Horses' shoes are nailed on doors and on the out and inside of houses to ward off witchcraft. The practice is becoming obsolete. — E. Peacock, ii., vol. i., p. 279. To neutralize the evil influence of witchcraft, we still find seamen, stable boys, and others, using the efficacious horse-shoe ; and when good housewives put their cream into the churn, they sometimes cast a handful of salt into the fire for the same purpose. Some people, after eating boiled eggs, will break the shells to prevent the witches from converting them into boats, because an ancient super- stition gave to these unhappy beings the power of crossing the sea in egg-shells. — (GEO. Oliver), Man. and Cus., p. 33. Horse-shoe to counteract witchcraft. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 175. Knife-strokes. — When paste is put before the fire to lighten, it is customary to make three cuts in it * to keep the witch off.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 188. Cake stuck full of pins to counteract witchcraft. — See Folk-Lore , vol. xii., p. 176. It is still a common belief that, if you are bewitched, and you get some human hair, urine, and pins, and put them into a bottle and bury them under the eaves of your house, the witch will cease to have power over you. If an animal has been killed by witchcraft, you must take out its heart and stick it full of pins, and either bury the heart in a box or earthen pot under the eaves of the house, or boil it in a pot over the fire ; the witch will then have no further power. At a place on the west side of 96 Witchcraft, Hardwick hill, on Scotton common, I have been informed there was, sixty years ago \i.e. about 1817], *a great heap ' of pins and old-fashioned tobacco-pipe heads ; they were believed to have been put there for magical purposes. — E. Peacock, i., p. 193. Heart of animal stuck full of pins to counteract witch- craft.— See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 176. [Messingham ?] A few years ago, in pulling down an old house in a neighbouring village, a wide-mouthed bottle was found under the foundation, containing the heart of some small animal (it was conjectured a hare), pierced as closely as possible with pins. The elders said it had been put there to ' withstand witching.' Some time after, a man digging in his garden in the village of Yaddlethorpe came upon the skeleton of a horse or ox, buried about three feet beneath the surface, and near to it two bottles containing pins, needles, human hair, and a stinking fluid, probably urine. The bottles, pins, etc., came into my possession. There was nothing to indicate the date of their interment except one of the bottles, which was of the kind employed to contain Daffy's elixir^ a once popular patent medicine. The other bottle was an ordinary wine pint. At the time when these things were found, I mentioned the circumstance to many persons among our peasantry ; they all said that it had * summut to do with witching ' ; and many of them had long stories to tell, setting forth how pins and needles are a protection against the malice of the servants of Satan. One anecdote is worth recording. About thirty years ago, there lived in this village an inoffensive old man, who was feared and hated by all his neighbours because he had what is called * an evil eye.' If the east wind caused rheumatism, if cattle died, or pigs would not fatten, poor Thomas K was sure to be at the bottom of it. It chanced once that there had been an unusual run of bad luck in the parish,* most of the farmers had had serious losses among their 4 . St • Counter- Charms to use against Witches. 97 cattle ; and, as a consequence, the hatred against K i was more active than ordinary. The clinnax came, by his next-door neighbour who had two young horses making up for Lincoln April fair, finding them both dead the very morning he was about to set out with them. The obvious suspicion of poison, wilful or accidental, never entered his mind ; he was sure K had accomplished the deed with that evil eye of his. So he went to a person learned in forbidden lore, popularly called a * wise man,' who told him that if he cut out the heart of one of the dead animals, stuck it full of pins, and boiled it in a pot, the man who had the evil eye would present himself at the door, and knock loudly for admittance ; but was on no account to be let in, for if he once crossed the threshold the charm would fail. The man did as he was ordered, and used to assert that K loudly knocked at the door, and tried every means to effect an entrance ; but in vain, all means of ingress had been securely fastened. The result was that the wizard was so badly scalded, that he could not work for several months. The squire hinted that the east wind had given him rheumatism, but the people knew far better. Those who are not in daily intercourse with the peasantry can hardly be made to believe or comprehend the hold that charms, witchcraft, wise-men, and other like relics of heathendom have upon the people. — N. & Q.^, vol. i., p. 415. Bottesford. Churning. — If you do not throw salt into the fire before you begin to churn, the butter will not come.— N. & Q.\ vol. viii., p. 382. Witch. — Butter is said to come at the moment when the cream begins to clot. The following is the charm used when the butter does not come as soon as is desired : Churn, butter, dash, Cow's gone to th' marsh, Peter stands at th' toll-gate, Beggin' butter for his cake ; Come, butter, come. O 98 Witchcraft, Three white hairs from a black cat's tail, put into the churn at churning-time, is another means of insuring that butter will come ; the most common method, however, is to take a pinch of salt and put one half in the churn and throw the other half into the fire. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 6t , Covenham. A woman living not one hundred miles from Covenham complains that she has with the greatest difficulty been enabled to procure butter from her cream since Christmas last, and that it is in consequence of her being what is technically called overlooked. She says that having been seriously unwell for some length of time, and confined to her room, she vowed she would send for the Louth wizard to set matters right, if the old gentleman in the village who overlooked her did not loose his spells. Singularly enough she was enabled that self-same day to leave her bed — proof positive to her mind that the over- looker knew her resolve and feared the consequences of her disclosure. — S. M., June 5th, 1863. Counter-spell in which the halves of a stolen sheep and scarlet cloth are used. — Weld, p. 7. Straws laid in the form of a cross on the path which a witch has to travel, are held to hinder witchcraft. — E. Peacock, i., p. 241. If you are bewitched [go] and steal some thatch ofif the roof of the house of the person who bewitches you, it is almost certain that his or her power will cease from that moment. — E. Peacock, i., p. 252 ; cf ii., p. 172. * Vervein and Dill Hinder witches of their will.' * Trefoil, Vervein, John's wort, Dill, Hinder witches of their will.' E. Peacock, i., p. 85. Nightmare. — An old woman said * My grandmother was troubled with nightmare, and her husband rose at 1 Counter-Charms to use against Witches. 99 sunrise on Midsummer day and went out to get some " wicken." On the way he met a woman belonging to the village, who said " Mr W , what time is it ? " but he would not reply because he knew it was the witch who was the cause of the mischief. In due course he got the " wicken/' took it home, and put it under the patient's pillow, and so cured her.' — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 169. Witch, branches of rowan-tree waved at. — Weld, p. 7. * Wicken-treel to counteract witchcraft. — See Folk- Lore, vol. xii., p. 175 ; see Section II. Plants. Witch-stones, or Holy-stones. — Some months ago I noticed a reel on the same string with the church keys of a Lincolnshire village, and learnt on inquiry that ' it is a way folks have to fasten spools to bunches of keys.' I could not discover, however, whether holed stones were similarly employed. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 308. I venture to think there is no folk-lore in the matter, but various things, especially cows' horns, are fastened to keys to prevent their being lost. . . . Sea- shells are sometimes used for the purpose, but not perforated stones that I am aware of They do not seem very suitable ; they are heavy, and might break with a fall. I have in my possession two witch stones, one of which was in actual use by an old woman, who gave it me from her door, by which it was hanging from a nail. She said it was her grandmother's, and that no witch could enter a house thus protected by a witch-stone. Such a stone must have a hole through it, and be found without being looked for, and, of course, the longer it is used the more esteemed it becomes. This stone is simply a three- cornered flint with a hole through it. The other is an oblong stone with a hole near one end, apparently bored out by some iron implement, much in shape like a bone label for a bunch of keys. I have never heard of a cotton-reel being used as a substitute for a witch-stone, ICXD Witchcraft, and unless it was made of ' wicken ' — that is, mountain ash wood — it would be considered of no good about here against witches. — lb. p. 397. Wispington. Then the rector brought out a ' witch- stone ' from his treasure store to show us ; this he found hanging on a cottage door and serving as a charm against all evil. It is merely a small flint with a hole in the centre, through which hole was strung a piece of cord to hang it up with. A ' witch-stone ' hung up on, or over the entrance door of a house is supposed to protect the inhabitants from all harm ; in the same way do not some enlightened people nail a horse-shoe over their door ' for good luck ' ? To ensure this ' good luck ' I understand you must find a horse-shoe ' accidentally on the road ' without looking for it ; to procure a ' witch-stone ' you must in like manner come upon a stone (of any kind) with a hole through the centre, when you are not thinking about any such thing. — HiSSEY, pp. 397, 398. ' Witch-stone^ to counteract witchcraft. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 175. Door-stone, the large stone commonly placed at the entrance of an outer door ; it is often formed of the whole or a part of an old mill-stone. It was the custom to leave hollow spaces under these stones, which were filled with broken bits of iron, for the purpose of keeping off witches.— E. PEACOCK, i., p. 89. Wise-man. — A quack, or conjuror. — Brogden, p. 225. Wise-man. — The seventh child in a family, whether a boy or a girl, if no child of the other sex has intervened, is sure to turn out wise. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 55. Wise-man. — A man who practises astrology, or who is reputed to have magical power, so as to be able to tell where stolen goods are, the paternity or sex of unborn infants, how to make foals suck, and many other such things.— E. PEACOCK, i., p. 275. Counter-Charms to use against Witches. loi White Witch. — A woman who uses her incantations only for good ends. A woman who, by magic, helps others who are suffering from malignant witchcraft. [Those who practise beneficial magic are, however, generally called wise-women, or wise-men.] — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 6io. Fenton. Wise-man. — A Lincolnshire Superstition. — It happens now and again that a foal, when it is born, refuses to suck, and, as may be imagined, there is great difficulty in feeding it so as to preserve its life. On such occasions it was the custom for farmers in this parish (Doddington), to have recourse to an old woman at Fenton, between Lincoln and Gainsborough, for aid. Her way was to ask the date of the foal's birth, whether in the day or night, and then to tell the applicant to return home, and that he would find that the foal would suck ; and such, is said, was invariably the case. The old woman now is dead ; but a similar case has happened here this very week. A foal was born and would not suck, and after attempting in vain to feed it, it was suggested that recourse should be had to the son of the woman above-mentioned, as likely to possess his mother's powers. Accordingly the foreman (the tenant of the farm and owner of the foal being a widow) was sent to seek out the son. He, however, represented that he was not scholar enough to work the charm, and referred the applicant to his cousin, the old woman's sister's son, as carrying on the business. He in turn was sought out, and professed himself able, under certain conditions, to work the cure. The fee, five shillings, was paid ; but too much time had been lost, and the foal was in a dying state, and died soon after the foreman's return. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 131. Lincoln, Wise-man at. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 177. Messingham. Should any individual amongst them know a little more than his neighbours, he was called the Wise- man, . . . and supposed to know their destiny, and also to I02 Witchcraft be well acquainted with every event that took place in the village, and the neighbourhood, however cautiously concealed or secretly transacted. In all cases of doubt or difficulty, and in all cases of distress, he was invariably consulted. He dealt out his wisdom in proportion only to the kindness with which he was treated, and the remuneration he was to receive. In consequence of which he was generally respected, and at all times hospitably entertained, and considered a welcome guest by his superstitious neighbours. — MACKINNON, p. 13. Kirkby-cum-Osgodby. — Visitation of Walshcroft Deanery, 12 June, I 594, at East Rasen Church, by Thomas Randes, deputed by John Belley, Vicar General. William Mounson did not receive the Holy Communion last Easter, and takes upon himself to be a magitian, a sorcerer, a Southsayer, and dothe make folkes beleve that he can by his magicall arte and other dissemblynge coniuration that he can do (as he saith) helpe to procure to bring manye thinges to passe which theie have lost or by anie other meanes is conveyed away from them. — iiij die Julii apud Lincoln ; L. N. & Q., vol. v., p. 6. Somersby. As for faery stories and hob-goblins, he [old J. C. the bellringer and sexton at Somersby] could say little. Nay, at first he was inclined to be a bit con- temptuous of all ' the whoale lot of sich rubbishment,' but, seeing that I was solemnly and seriously inquisitive, he said, ' Well, i' my young daays theer wur a deal of hover-looking, you know, by the hevil eye, and fwoaks had to go to the wise men. Theer was two, one Cossit, and one Stainton, was a deal considered hereabouts, and I member a man went to Cossit about three sheep as was stoalen, and he showed him the man's faace i' a glass. Sich a hurly burly theer was in the chimley, time as the man was theer. And I mind a man as wur kidding furze up on Harrington Hill and he felt hissel wished, and away he had to goa whether or noa, and noa time for Counter- Charms to use against Witches, 103 his mittens or bill-hook, and couldn't help hissel not no moor nor a babby he couldn't, and he found hissen down at the public-house, " Black Bull," mebbe, naay I weant saay for sartin' sewerness which it wur at Tetford, and set theer fixed, you know, reight i' front of the fire, and the wise man as had wished him i' a cheer i' the kitchen a-waiting for him, and the fire burnt his faace and scorched his knees, but by goy, he couldn't move, for sartin sewerness, not a hinch he couldn't, and the wise man said, " You'd better move fra the fire a bit," and the man said, "If you please I will." Ay that's what he said, if you please for he knawed the wise man had him fixed, fast as a rat i' a trap. But about the witches, well you know witches is clean gone by. I doant beleev i' them — doa you, sir ? ' I was obstinately silent, and seeing a certain faith in me that my silence seemed to assure him of, the old fellow continued : ' There was a witch at Scamblesby did a deal o' harm i' her daay, jumped on a man's herse as he was riding from market, but he hed a hook i' his hand and he hout at her, and drew blood. You know if you could scrawm a witch and draw blood, she was done. But they was ower-eardlins bad to git at. They chaanged so sudden. There was a witch as overset waggins a deal, and she changed into a hare and back agean into a woman, quick as owt. But, however, theer was a man at Tetford had gitten a splayed bitch and watched and set on her, and she caught th' owd thing just as it went into the cat-hole, and tore a great piece outen her, it did, and when they oppened the cottage door, she was sitten at her taable before the fire, saeme as if nowt hed happened, but they found the blood on the floor, and dog set on her and tore her to pieces. But why, you know, it was Satan's work as was back of the whole business, and when Cossit coomed to die, and a laady went to see him, his groaning was terrible, and I suppose he said, " I've lived I04 Witchcraft. a wise man, but I shall die a fool." Well, times is straangen haltered howiver sin' them daays.' — Rawnsley, pp. 45-47. Cf. Folk-Lore^ vol. xi., p. 438 ; xii., pp. 176, 177. Mid-Lincolnshire Folk-Lore, Sixty Years Ago. Wizards and Witches. — A robbery having been committed at a farm, and no clue being found, though several persons were suspected, the farmer's wife persuaded her husband to send for the wizard of Lincoln, named Wosdel, who came with his familiar spirit in the form of a blackbird, and soon found out who had committed the robbery, and how it was done ; but in doing so the fluttering about in the crewyard, under Wosdel's direction, so terrified the cattle that a labourer had the greatest difficulty in keeping them out of the barn where he was threshing. Then the wizard asked the farmer and his wife whether he should make the two thieves come into the room at once or show them on the wall, and on their saying he might do which he pleased, a labourer hurried into the room to ask what he was to do, though he had been told his work just before. When he was gone, Wosdel said, ' That is one of them, and that ' (pointing to the figure of one of their farm lads, which appeared on the wall) ' is the other.' Soon after, the man and lad were arrested^ and the man turning king's evidence, and the money being found concealed at the lad's home, he was convicted and transported. A woman who was supposed to be a witch, and to have a familiar spirit in the shape of a magpie, when near death, said, * Is the pig in the stye and the door shut ? ' (this is an apology for bad singing, implying it would drive even a pig mad), * then I will sing you the witches' death ^ ' When the Lord takes old women's senses, He takes them over dykes and fences, Straight away to heaven. When the Lord gives old women graces, They wear no more witches' faces, For the Lord takes them straight to heaven. I Counter-Charms to use against Witches. 105 She sang nearly twenty more verses, but only these two are now remembered by one of the persons who heard them sung. The same person said that her mother used to cut the corns of another witch, who died in 1830, and in doing so contrived to make her bleed, so that she could not do anything at her. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 143, 144 ; Addy, PP- 36, 37- Stamford. I was visiting in a cottage last February, in the parish of B , in the diocese of Peterborough ; and in casual conversation heard the inmates speak of ' the Wise Man.' Upon inquiry I discovered they meant ' a sort of witch ' living at Stamford, who is supposed to have supernatural powers, both in the way of foretelling future events, and also of inflicting evil on persons and things. Two cases were related to me of the exercise of these powers which my informants (one an old, the other a young, woman), positively believed. 1. Some years ago a flitch of bacon was stolen. The owner of the lost property went to the ' Wise Man,' and was told his bacon should be restored on a certain day in a certain place, which happened. ' The Wise Man ' also drew an exact likeness of the thief, by which he was recognised. Of course I only relate as I was told. 2. A servant girl stole some money from a fellow- servant's coffer. The latter went off (nearly twenty miles) to ' the Wise Man,' and the thief was afflicted until her death with a most painful disease. My informants fully believed this to have been caused by ' the Wise Man.' — N. & Q.i, vol. vi., p. 145. SECTION VI. LEECHCRAFT. (a) CHARMS. Ass. Whooping Cough. — A boy thus afflicted should ride for a quarter of a mile upon a female donkey, a jackass being substituted when the patient is a girl. — N. & Q.*, vol. X., p. 24. Beetle^ Spider^ Frog. — A member of my family called at a cottage a few days ago. While there, a little girl came in with a small paper box in her hand and said to the mistress of the cottage that her mother had sent her to request that if she happened to find a black clock {i.e. a beetle) she would save it for her and send it, at once, in the little box. The child said that she was to be careful that the clock was found by chance — not sought for. The mistress asked her what her mother wanted to do with the insect ? Her reply was : * to hing round sister Madelina's neck, who has got king cough, that as the clock decays away, her cough may go away too.' On this being related before one of the servants here, she told me she had not heard of clocks being used as a remedy before, but that she knew it was very common in this neighbourhood to hang spiders in little bags around the necks of children who suffered from king cough. The same informant also added, that it is the custom here for mothers who have children suffering from thrush or frog, to give them a live frog to suck. — N. & Q.^ vol. ix., p. 319 ; E. Peacock, i., p. 234. Charms. 107 The tip of a boiled cow's tongue. — It used to be an article in the domestic faith of Lincolnshire that to carry such a tip in your pocket was to ensure yourself from toothache. — N. & Q.®, vol. ix., p. 232. The end of a boiled tongue worn in the pocket was potent against toothache, and a double nut had like virtue. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Frog. — In the north of Lincolnshire the sore mouth with which babies are often troubled is called the frog. And it is a common practice with mothers to hold a real live frog by one of its hind legs, and to allow it to sprawl about within the mouth of a child so afflicted. . . . The disease is properly called the thrush and bears some resemblance to the disorder of the same name which affects the frog of the horse's foot. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 393. Thrush or ' frog.' — Put a frog in a bag and let the child suck it to death. A servant said she had done this, and a doctor told me he knew of a case. In some parts it is said this disease occurs either at the beginning or end of a life. I remember some few years ago the terror of an old woman who had it, as she quite believed it was the forerunner of death. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 168. Hedgehog. — Jaw of a female hedgehog used to cure rheumatism. — See Weld, p. 10. Snake. — The skin of a snake worn round the hat as a hat-band is a sure cure for the head-ache. — John Dent, Yaddlethorpe, 1850; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 131 ; N. & Q.\ vol. viii., p. 382. Communion Money. Fits. — A silver ring made of money which has been offered at the altar is reputed to be a cure for fits ; and it is well known that the kings of England were formerly in the habit of consecrating rings with solemn ceremonies on Good Friday for this purpose. — Man. and Cus., pp. 31, 32. io8 Leechcraft, Bamoldby-le-Beck. Communion-money, — One woman in a fairly respectable position begged seriously for a piece of Communion money, to be made into a ring to keep off fits. — Antiquary y vol. xiv., p. 1 1. The vicar of a parish has told me that he was once asked by a woman, who was a Primitive Methodist, to give her a shilling of ' Sacrament Money,' (as she called it) in exchange for another shilling, because her son had epileptic fits, and she had heard that if a ' Sacrament piece of silver ' were hung round his neck it would cure him. — Vaux, p. 300. See also Gold Ring. Confirmation. — I am told that in the villages near here confirmation is considered a safe cure for rheumatism, and that, consequently, old persons are in the habit of presenting themselves to the bishop from time to time, as often as they can get an opportunity to receive the rite. The following story was told me lately as a fact, though I cannot be responsible for its actual truth. The present Bishop of Lincoln, knowing this belief, was on one occasion almost convinced that he had already lately confirmed a certain old man who presented himself among the candidates, and therefore he sent Archdeacon K. to ask him. The Archdeacon went up to him saying, * Have you been confirmed before ? ' but the man was deaf, so he had to repeat his question, adding, 'The bishop thinks he has confirmed you before.' But the old man was, or pretended to be, still unable to hear, so the archdeacon spoke again in a louder tone, ' The bishop feels sure he has confirmed you before.' Then the old man hearing at least [last?] and being perhaps a little nettled, replied gruffly, * Tell 'un he's a lee'er,' with which unique answer the archdeacon was forced to be content. — N. & Q.«, vol. ix., pp. 346, 347. Cork, — It is believed pretty generally in some parts of Lincolnshire that cork has the power of keeping off Charms, 109 cramp. It is placed between the bed and the mattress, or even between the sheets ; or cork garters are made by sewing together a series of thin discs of cork between two silk ribbons. In connection with this it would be interesting to know when and how cork was first intro- duced into this country. — N. & Q.*, vol. v., p. 380. Corpses in Folk-medicine. — See Folk-Lore, vol. vii., p. 268. Lincoln. Dead Man's Hand. — Wens are believed to be cured by being rubbed by the hand of a criminal who has been hanged. ' The execution at Lincoln of the three men who were condemned to death at the late assizes drew an immense concourse of people. . . . Two foolish women came forward to rub the dead men's hands over some wens or diseased parts of their bodies, and one of them brought a child for the same purpose.' — Stamford Mercury, March 26, 1830, p. 3. Sleaford. Goitre. — At a sewing meeting held at Slea- ford on Feb. 2nd, a woman present mentioned a certain cure for a full throat, as she called it, and stated that her own mother and also an acquaintance had both been cured by it. This somewhat ghastly remedy was : * drawing a dead man's hand nine times across the throat.'— L. N. & Q., vol. i. Huttofb neighbourhood. ... I have recently met with an incident of similar character. A man, in this neigh- bourhood, was suffering from a swelling behind the ear, and it was suggested to his wife that medical advice should be sought. She replied that they had been much to blame, for they had been told that the touch of a dead hand would have effected a cure ; there had recently been a death in the village, and they had neglected to try the supposed remedy. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., pp. 59, 60. Wen and Goitre, Cure for. — See Folk-Lore, vol. vii., p. 268. no Leechcraft. Kirton. Gold, — There is a belief regarding the efficacy of gold which is common here. Inflamed spots or gatherings on the eyelids often occur, especially among children and young people, and they are sometimes acutely painful. They are known here as styes or stynes and to rub them with gold is regarded as a certain cure. I had this remedy applied to me when I was a little boy, and it was gravely recommended when in mature age — about thirty — I suffered from a painful visitation of this nature. A lady has just told me that in or about the year 1866 a gold ring was rubbed upon a stye on her eyelid by her mother, who was a well- educated woman, and by no means under the influence of what is commonly regarded as superstition. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., pp. 212, 213. Nine strokes with a wedding-ring would, it was said, cure a stye, or 'styne' as we were wont to call it, in the eye. In order to have its due effect, the ring must be taken off the finger of its owner, and as our good mother could not be persuaded to part with the precious token in such a cause, our relief had to be wrought in some more legitimate manner. I am reminded by this that we knew a servant who wore a silver ring as unadorned as the nuptial link for fits. — G. J., June, 22, 1878. A stye on the eye can be cured by rubbing seven times with a gold wedding-ring; wens are removed by the touch of a drowned man's hand seven times repeated; three hairs from the cross on a donkey's back will cure the whooping cough; warts are cured by cutting a notch in a stick and burying it. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 91. Wainfleet. Holed Stone. — A year or so before I left Wainfleet, one of the trees that stood on the summit of the round barrow outside my garden was blown down in a gale, and from amongst the upturned rubbish I poked out a small round stone with a hole in it, self- bored — 'a holy stone,' as you doubtless know. Whose Charms, 1 1 1 treasure it had been in the remote past I cannot pretend to say, but the use to which it had been put is less doubtful, for the moment I showed it to an elderly neighbour he exclaimed, *Thoo beest in luck for sartain; hing 'him up over thy bed an' thou'll nivver hev no rewmatiz.' — Heanley, pp. 17, 18. Rheumatism. — Carry a potato in your pocket, some say a horse chestnut. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 169. H ether d-stone, i.e. adder-stone; an ancient spindle- whorl. — It is still believed that these objects are produced by adders, and that if they be suspended around the neck they cure whooping-cough, ague, and adder-bites. — E. Peacock, i., p. 134. I. of Axeholm. Horse-shoe. — That this cure was at one time common to the whole shire is probable from an Axeholm cure for delirium tremens, communicated to me by Miss Mabel Peacock. Two women were lately discussing the failings of their employer, when one re- marked, 'Bud he might drink as hard as he duz now, an' aail nowt, if he naail'd three hoss shoes to his bedhead; then he'd niver be troubled wi' talkin'-ower an* seein' things.' — Heanley, p. 20. See also LiNCS. N. & Q., ii., 134; Folk-Lore, ix., 185. Potato. — And me never within four yards of you, and with nowt but a clean handkercher and a 'tater for rheumatism on me. — Eli Twigg, p. 121. Ring. — Cramp-ring, a ring worn to keep off the cramp. Robert Lockwood of Yaddlethrope found an old copper wedding-ring which had become fastened upon the point of a harrow-tooth, with which he was working his land; he gave it to his wife to wear, and she assured the editor that it had quite cured her of cramp. 'She used to hev it bad afore, but it had never been near her sin.* — E. Peacock, i., p. 72. 112 Leechcraft, Cramp. — The knuckle bone of a beast cures this, but I have heard that a more certain way is to place one's shoes in the form of a "j" ^^ ^^ ^^ot of the bed before going to rest. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 169. Eel-skin garters were spoken of as being preventives of cramp. — G. J., June, 22, 1878. Sympathy, — Perhaps the most extraordinary notion in connection with iron is the firm belief that when it has inflicted any wound there is some kind of sympathy between the injury and its cause. Only a very short time before I left the Marsh a man was badly cut by the knives of a reaper, and in spite of all that medical skill could do he died the next day. But the true reason of his death was thus accounted for by a Marshman, *You see, he were nobbutt one of them iggnerent Irish- men and they knaws nowt; if they hed but tekken the knife off and seen to that, mebbe he wudn't hev' died.' And when I myself had got a nasty cut in the face from a bolt which flew out of a bit of old shipwood I was chopping up, my own gardener, a particularly intelligent man, asked anxiously where the bolt was, and suggested that the wound would heal the quicker if all dirt and rust were carefully taken off its edges. — Heanley, p. 21. Feet. — When a horse or ox has any ailment in the feet or legs, the first sod on which the animal puts his feet in the morning should be dug up and turned over. If this be done it is believed that the animal will certainly get well. — E. Peacock, i., p. 232. Touching. — In the reign of Charles II. a proclamation was issued (9th January, 1683), 'appointing the times at which the touch should be administered,' and all persons * repairing to court for this purpose were required to bring with them certificates, under the hands and seals of the officiating minister and churchwardens, testifying that they have not, at any time before, been touched by his Charms, 113 Majesty for the cure of their disease.' — THOMPSON, p. 758. Yaddlethorpe. Transference of Warts. — * The best o' all cures for warts is to get a black sneel \i.e. slug] an' rub th' warts wi' it, an' then to stick th' sneel on a black- thorn twig in a hedge, an' as th' sneel dees an' rots away, so will th' warts.' Althorpe. If at the time you have your stockings on you rub your warts against them, they will go away. If you sell them to some one it has a like effect. Bottesford. If you steal a piece of raw meat or a bit of bread, rub your warts with it, and then bury it, as the meat or bread decays, so will the warts go away. Scawby. If you rub warts with the soft white matter within the pod of a broad bean, they will go away. Lea. If you count the warts, and put an equal number of stones in a bag and bury it, the warts will go away. — E. Peacock, i., pp. 268, 269. Grantham. Warts would disappear from the hands of a person who stole a bit of meat and buried it. An uncle of ours was, as a boy, greatly annoyed by these excrescences, so he counted them carefully, put as many stones in a bag as he had warts, went out for a walk, and threw the bag behind him without looking to see who picked it up. In a short time his plagues vanished, all but one which he had neglected to number. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Warts are a nuisance, and the other day I heard a little girl in my parish gravely selling them for a ha'- penny, and she got better. To rub them with dandelion juice is said by others to be a certain cure. In the north of the county it is said they must be rubbed six times with a snail, and then the snail is to be buried. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 168. H 1 14 Materia Medica, Belton. A woman from Belton, near here, tells me that warts may be driven away by rubbing them with a piece of fat bacon, and then throwing the bacon over the right shoulder at the first four cross roads you come to. I have frequently heard of rubbing them with beef, and then burying the beef, but the bacon cure is new to me. — N. & Q.^ vol. iv., p. 475. {b) MATERIA MEDICA. ANIMALS. Adder. Consumption. — Hetherd-broth, a broth made of the flesh of an adder boiled with a chicken. A specific for consumption. It was till about fifty years ago \i.e. 1839] the custom for certain wanderers to come yearly during the hot weather of summer from the west country [that is, the West Riding of Yorkshire and the counties beyond] to search on the sand-hills for hetherds, which, they said, they sold to the doctors for the purpose of making hetherd-broth. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 269. Cat-shingles. Cat-jingles. — There is a popular belief that this disease may be cured by cutting off the tail of a living cat, and painting a zone of warm blood therewith around the waist of the sufferer. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 247. Cow, — 27th [August] Mally sick of a fever and a St. Anthonie's fire in her right arm, and had a poultice of cow's dung and swine's grease and took . . . every night, and was well in 5 or 6 days. — Farming notes by George Langton in an almanack for 1690: L. N. & Q., vol. vii., p. 86. Fish. — April, 10, 1696. I was with an old ex- perienced fellow to-day, and I was showing him several great stones, as we walked, full of petrified shell-fish, such Animals, 115 as are common at Brumbe, etc. He sayd he believed that they grew i' th' stone, and that they were never fish. Then I ask'd him what they call'd 'em : he answer'd millner's thumbs, and adds that they are the excellentest things in the whole world, being burnt and beat into powder, for a horse's sore back : it cures them in two or three days. He says that there has carryers' men come out of Yorkshire to fetch the fish thither for the sayd purpose. So I have heard that some midwives will give anything to get these sorts of shell-fish that (are) found here about this town of Broughton, especially muscles, coclites, etc., which they beat into powder, and give to their sick women, as an exceeding great medicine ad constrin gendas partes post partem. — Pryme, pp. 89, 90. Goose, Jaundice. — The green end of goose dung was and is a popular remedy [for jaundice] here. . . . The dung of sheep boiled in milk is also used. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 26. Goose-tod, Goose-dung. — The dung of the goose was, and is, used here and elsewhere as a medicine for men and animals. . . . Richard Symonds, in 1645, mentions it as forming part of a compound ' for a blow in a horse's eye.' — Diary, 226 ; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 121. Horse's Spurs. — The callosities on the inner sides of both the fore and hind legs of a horse. ' A cancer in the breast. . . . Take horse-spurs and dry them by the fire till they will beat to a powder, sift and infuse two drams in two quarts of ale, drink half a pint every six hours, new milk warm. It has cured many.' — Primitive Physick, 1755, 38 ; E. Peacock, i., p. 138. Mouse. — Fried mice are believed to be a cure for whooping-cough. The editor has known this reputed specific tried by a person in a respectable social position, within the last few years. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 170. ii6 Materia Medica, Pig. — There's nowt better for a gathered hand than fresh pig-muck ; it fetches out the fire and pain at wonst —Cole, p. 93. I. of Azholme. I have no personal knowledge of a very recent instance, but I have it on evidence which I cannot doubt that, some forty years ago, a farmer living in the Isle of Axholme who possessed a flock of tame pigeons was asked by a woman who lived near him to give her one of the birds. He had a suspicion of the purpose for which it was wanted, and therefore made inquiries. The reply, given with some hesitation, was that her husband was ill, and that she desired the bird that she might cut it open alive and put it on his breast to cure him. I do not remember what ailment the man suffered from. It need not, I trust, be said that the farmer disregarded the woman's petition and used strong language at being thought capable of lending countenance to such a horrible rite.— N. & Q.^ vol. vi., pp. 306, 307. Sheep. — Small Pox may be cured by drinking a mixture of sheep's dung and cream. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 1 69. Whooping-cough. Trottles^ the dung of sheep, lambs, or rabbits. — * Lamb-trottle Tea taen in'ardly is a very fine thing for the whoopin'-cough.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 261. Cobweb Pills. — . . . The web of a spider is in Lincolnshire a sure cure for ague. — Hardwicke's Science Gossips first series, ii., p. 83. Spider. — Spiders are a common remedy for whooping- cough. A living spider is put into a bag and worn round the neck of the patient. As it dies and * cainges * away, the cough departs also. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 234. Wood Louse. — Sow, Sow-beetle, Armadillo wood-louse Armadillo vulgaris, which shuts itself up into a little black ball like a pill. When the author's father was a little boy, he had these creatures alive, administered to him Animals, 117 as pills for whooping-cough. They are still taken for the same purpose. — E. Peacock, i., p. 233. Worm. Ague. — Chief among the ailments of Marsh- land in olden days was ague, and some of the many remedies prescribed were so horribly filthy that I am inclined to think most people must have preferred the ague, or the race could hardly have survived. It will, perhaps, be enough to say that the chief ingredient in one such decoction consisted of nine worms taken at midnight from a churchyard sod and chopped up small! — Heanley, p. 18. PLANTS. Hatton. Adder's Tongue. — The wheelwright inherits from his old friend a strong faith in herbs, as remedies, and when through an accident he lacerated one of his fingers badly, he applied a plaster of adder's tongue chopped up, until the wound was healed. — L. N. & Q., vol. v., Nat. Hist. Section^ p. 82. Apple. — A poultice made of rotten apple is applied in Lincolnshire to cure eyes affected by rheumatism or weak- ness ; it is in the commonest possible use. — BLACK, Folk- Medicine, 1883, p. 201. Bottesford. BARBERRY {Bergeris vulgaris, L.) ; Bottes- ford, L. — ' A tea made from the twigs or bark of this bush is used locally in cases of gall-stone and jaundice.' — F. P. ; Lines. Folk Names, p. 3. Bramble-vinegar. — That is Vinegar made of black- berries : as ' There's nothing afore Bramble vinegar for a cough.' — Cole, p. 20. Broom {Cytistcs scoparius). — 'There is said to be a male and female Broom in the township of Holme, in the parish of Bottesford, L. The male plant never flowers, and is said to be found in a small plantation near the Hall.' 'At Doddington, K., the Broom is also called ii8 Materia Medica, " Heder and Sheder ," male and female.' The flowers are used to make wine in the latter place, and the green shoots boiled as a remedy for dropsy. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 4. Bryony, Mandrake, white bryony. — Quacks profess to sell something they call 'the true mandrake.' They tell their dupes that it is a specific for causing women to conceive. Similar stories are told by them of its nature and properties to those recorded by the old writers on Herb-lore. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 165. Miimby. Burdock {Arctium Lappa, L. General). — * The grated dried stems, administered in pills or in water, are used as a local medicine, and are said to be most useful.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 5. Blister- Plant. — ' Buttercups, especially Ranunculus acris, L., are used by the " herb women " for blisters.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 4. Celandine. Ring-worm. — ' For a teter or ringe worme, stampe chelendine and apply it to the grife and it will quickly cure you.* — MS. Note-book of Anne Nevill of Ashby, drea 1680 ; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 251. Alford. Corn Sow-Thistle {Sonchus arvensis, L.) — * Used medicinally, according to a labourer.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 6. Louth. Dock. — A name applied to all our native Rumex. ... * Children used to apply Docken leaves to their hands after having been stung by nettles, saying. " Docken go in, nettle come out." ' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 8. Eyeseeds {Salvia verbenaea, L. (?)).. . * A decoction of this plant is locally used for sprains.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 9. Eyeseeds, a plant whose seeds, if blown into the eye, are said to remove bits of dust, cinders, or insects that may be lodged there. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 100. Plants, 119 Bransby. Gout-weed^ Helen {/Egopodium podagraria^ L.) — ' Used in making a salve.' — Lines. Folk Names^ p. 1 1 . Flixborough. Ground-Ivy, Creeping Jenny {Nepeta Glechoma, Benth.), Flixborough, L. — * Used in cases of deafness, and in making Herb-beer.' — J. B. D. ; Lines. Folk Names, p. 7. Alford. Horse Mint {\, Mentha hirsutd). — . . . 'The leaves, either green or dried, make a wholesome tea, especially useful in heart complaints.' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 12. Snitterby. Horse-radish. — J. H., a girl brought up on Snitterby Carr, related the following story some years ago : * Once, when I had toothache very bad, a woman told me to get some scraped horse-radish and put it on my wrist below my thumb here. She said it was to go on the left- side wrist for a left-side tooth, and on the right-side wrist for a right-side tooth, then it would draw the pain. My word ! I had an arm with it ! But it did not do the tooth any good at all.' Onion — About the year 1865, or rather earlier, a nurse at Bottesford, in North Lincolnshire, proposed to put the outer layers of an onion cooked in the kitchen fire on the great toe of one of her charges, such an onion, worn thimblewise on that member, being good for toothache. While she was seeking the remedy higher authorities intervened and carried off the patient, who is therefore unable to testify by personal experience to the merits of the onion-cure. — N. & Q.^^, ii., p. 447. Bottesford. Lily. — Our Lady's Lily {Lilium eandidum, L.), of our gardens . . . Bottesford, L. — E. A. W.-P. * The pulped root is used for a poultice for boils, car- buncles, gatherings, etc' — Lines. Folk Names, p. 16. Stixwould. Common Mallow. — Maul, Mawl, Mall, and Maule {Malva sylvestris, L.), and its seeds, Lindsey and I20 Materia Medica, Kesteven. * Used to cure dropsy/ North-west Lindsey. — M. G. W. P. * Good when boiled to foment bruised * [bruises ?]. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 1 4. Liverwort {Marchantia polymorpka, L., General). — ' A sure cure for all complaints relating to the liver.' — Lines, Folk Names ^ Additions, p. 28. Kirton-in-Lindsey. Mistletoe. — S. Vitus' Dance may be cured by the water in which mistletoe berries have been boiled.— L. N. & Q., vol. i.. p. 168. Bottesford. The general name for Viscum album, L. A decoction made from the twigs of this parasitical shrub is believed at Bottesford, L., to be a palliative for epilepsy. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 14. Onion. — Hetherd-stung, bitten by an adder. When a swelling suddenly rises upon any animal it is said to be hetherd-stung, and the remedy is a poultice compounded of boiled onions and rotten eggs. Hedgehogs and shrews have also the character for biting animals and producing all the symptoms of the ' sting ' of the hetherd. A similar remedy is used. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 134. Onions. — See also under HORSE-RADISH. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 19. Graffoe. Penny- Winkle and Periwinkle ( Vinca major ^ L., and V. minor). — ' It is considered good for sore breasts, the leaves being crushed and applied to the part ; also as a remedy for cramp, the piece being placed between the bed and the mattress. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 16. Cadney. Petty Spurge. — Wart-grass and Wart-weed {Euphorbia peplus, L., and E. Helioscopia, L.). — From the milky juice being used to remove warts from the hands. — Lines. Folk Names, p. 22. Stixwould. Pilewort {Ranunculus ficaria, L.) ; Stix- would, L. — ' Miraculous cures affected by [it].' — Lines. Folk Names, Additions, p. 28. Plants, 121 Primrose. — The following story points to a belief said to be common in Lincolnshire. A cottager near Gains- borough, commenting a few days since on the failing memory of her spouse, said she could cure him in the spring by giving him a decoction made from primrose leaves. Cowslip flowers {Primula veris) are said to be sedative, but the above virtue of the primrose is new to me. — N. & Q.^ vol. vii., p. 86. Cathorpe. Rue. — I copy the following from an old MS. receipt-book, dated 1752 : ' For the Bite of a Mad Dog. — Take the leaves of Rue, picked from the Stalks and bruised. Six ounces of Gar- lick picked from the Stalks and bruised. Venice Treacle, or Mithridate, and the Scrapings of Pewter, of each four ounces ; boil all together over a slow fire in 2 Quarts of Strong Ale till one pint be consumed ; then keep it in a bottle close stop'd and give of it 9 Spoonfuls to a man or woman warm, seven mornings together fasting, and six to a Dog. N.B. — This the Author believes will not, God willing, fail if it be taken within 9 days after the Biting of the Dog, applying some of the Ingredients from which the Liquor was strained to the bitten place. This R' was taken out of Cathorpe Church in Lincolnshire, the whole Tov/n being bitten with a Mad Dog, all those who took the medicine did well, the Rest died mad.' — N. & Q.^^, ii., p. 428 ; ib, p. 538. Winterton. — Herbe-Grass, Herbi-Grass, and Herby Grass, — A general name for the garden herb Ruta graveolens, L. Chopped fine and made into pills with butter, it is considered a good thing for sick fowls. At Winterton, L., they say : ' It must only be given in the morning, as in the afternoon it becomes poisonous, " You know, Herby-grass is Herby-grass in the morning, but Rue in t' afternoon."' — W. F. ; Lines. Folk Names, p. 1 1. Herbigrass. — The plant Rue, Shakespeare's Herb of 122 Leechcraft, Grace. That's herbigrass ; it's good for fits ; we offens make tea on it. — COLE, p. 64. Abortion. Savin-tree. — The savin ; Juniperus sabina. A * tea ' is sometimes made of savin which is taken by women for the purpose indicated in the following passages : And when I look, To gather fruit, find nothing but the savin-tree^ Too frequent in nuns' orchards, and there planted, By all conjecture, to destroy fruit rather. Tho. Middleton, a Game at Chess, act i., sc. i., Dyce's ed., iv., 321. * The leaues of sauine boyled in wine . . . draw away the after-birth, expell the dead childe, and kill the quicke.' — Gy.^AKD, Herball, 1636, 1378. Savin is sometimes given by farm servants to their master's horses for the purpose of making their coats shine. It is highly injurious to the health of the animals. — E. Peacock. 1L, vol. ii., p. 459. S tony -on-the-w all. — A plant, Shepherd's Purse ? con- sidered to be good for the gravel. — COLE, p. 143. MISCELLANEOUS. Deeping St. James. Ague cure, Candle-snuff. — I re- member a few years ago, there lived near Deeping St. James, Lincolnshire, an old woman who stood in great repute with the fen people for her cure, which consisted of a small glass of gin with a pinch of candle-snuff in it, for which she levied contributions on the snuffers of her neighbours. — N. & Q.^, vol. i., p. 386. * Cinder-tea ' used medicinally. — Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 472. Iron. — Water warmed by putting hot iron in it used to cure a * bad leg.' — Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 472. Saliva, — I remember when I lived in Lincolnshire that much virtue was supposed by the common people to spells, 123 attend the application of spittle to skin diseases ; but it was to be applied when fasting. — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 2 1 3. Urine. — ' Why, m'm, my bairns was niver bother'd long wi' th' frog, for I alus wipt the'r mooths oot wi' the'r piss- cloths, an' thaay scarcelins iver aail'd ony moore. It's a pity 'at people duz n't knaw o' such things, but I've tell'd a many, a many I hev.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 221. It [human urine] was formerly in constant use ... as a drink for horses, * to make them look well in their skins.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 54. Water. Eyes. — According to an old Lincolnshire belief, June water is an excellent remedy for weak eyes, and for several other ailments, if it be caught in its uncontami- nated condition ' as it comes down straight from the sky,' but no drip-water from roofs or trees possesses medicinal value. — N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 438. Pure rain water is said to be an infallible cure for sore eyes, and cases are reported to the writer by persons who have tried and fancy they have proved its efficacy. The rain water must be collected in a clean open vessel, in the month of June, and must not be contaminated by being previously collected by any other means ; it will then remain pure for any length of time, if preserved in a bottle. — N. & Q.^, vol. v., p. 223. (c) SPELLS. Ague. — This curious charm, which is copied from an old diary of 1 7 5 i , still, preserves its traditional vitality. In April 1871 it was recited in similar words to a friend by a postboy near Spalding : — ' When Jesus came near Pilate, He trembled like a leaf, and the judge asked Him if He had the ague. He answered. He neither had the ague nor was He afraid ; and whosoever bears these words in mind shall never fear ague or anything else.' 124 Leechcraft, The same postboy presented my friend with another valuable cure for ague, which at all events is not lacking in simplicity : — * Go to an alder tree, cut off a lock of your hair, bury it under the tree, and then go into your house by another door than that through which you came.' — N. & Q.*, vol. vii., p. 443- If you have the * shakes ' you must cut off a lock of hair and wrap it around a bough of the ' Shivver-tree,' which, by the bye, in Marshland is not the aspen, but the black poplar, and as you do so you must say — When Christ our Lord was on the Cross, Then thou didst sadly shivver and toss ; My aches and pains thou now must take : Instead of me I bid thee shake. And it will surely come to pass that you will never have * the shakes ' again, if only you go straight home and are careful not to speak a word, good or bad, to anyone by the way. Some add, however, that a twelve hours' fast is also needed. — Heanley, p. i8. The cures for this pest of the undrained marshes are wide spread. One well-known way is to cut a lock of your hair off and tie it on to an aspen tree, and say : I tie my hair to the aspen tree, Dither and shake instead of me. According to others, the best thing to do is to take a sprig of wicken tree with you over a stile or through a gate-way, and then to return home by another way. In this way the disease will leave the patient, and the next person that passes over the stile or through the gate will take the disease. The wicken tree is a favourite charm against all manner of witchcraft . . . and as most diseases were ascribed to the malice of some old hag, the wicken is a most powerful charm. It is still put in houses, and carried in the pocket, to ward off evil. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 1 68, 169. spells. 125 A relation of my own, in the days of old, was said to be able to cure ague, and this was done by taking a lock of the afflicted one's hair to a thorn and hanging it there, at the same time shaking the tree and exclaiming ' Shake, good tree, shake for So-and-So.' — lb., 245. It [the following charm] was communicated to me by that ' wise woman,' Mary Atkin, already referred to : In the autumn of 1858 or 1859, I forget which, the ague was particularly prevalent in the Marshes and my mother's stock of quinine — a thing really wise Marshfolk were never without in those days — was heavily drawn upon by the cottagers. But on taking a second bottle to Mary's grandson the old dame scornfully refused it, saying she ' knawed on a soight better cure then yon mucky bitter stuff.' And with that she took me into his room and to the foot of the old four poster on which he lay. There, in the centre of the footboard, were nailed three horseshoes, points upwards, with a hammer fixed cross- wise upon them. ' Thear lad,' she said, ' when the Old 'Un comes to shaake 'im yon ull fix 'im as fast as t' chu'ch steeaple, he weant nivver pars yon.' And when I showed signs of incredulity she added, * Nay, but it's a chawm. Oi teks the mell i' my left hand, and Oi taps they shoes an' Oi saays — Feyther, Son and Holy Ghoast, Naale the divil to this poast. Throice I smoites with Holy Crok, With this mell Oi throice dew knock, One for God An' one for Wod, An' one for Lok. See also Folk-Lore^ vol. ix., p. 185. Hiccup. — Hecup we called it, — was expected to yield to Hecup, hecup, Three drops in a tea-cup Uttered nine times in the same breath. — G. J., June 22, 1878. SECTION VII. MAGIC AND DIVINATION. MAGIC. Saltfleetby. A Word Charm. — Copy made by a Lin- colnshire clergyman, from one in the possession of an honest farmer's wife at Saltfleetby St. Clements : * In the year 1603. — A copy of a letter written by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and left by the Angel Gabriel, found under a stone at the foot of a cross eighteen miles from Indiconia. On the top of the stone was written : " Blessed be thee that turneth ye." Then they endeavoured to turn it over, but all in vain ; they prayed to God to know the meaning of it. In the same time came a child about the age of six or seven years, and turned it over, to the great admiration of the people that stood by, where under it they found this letter ; to have it read they carried it to the aforesaid town, where it begins : '"Whosoever worketh on the Sabbath day shall be accursed. I command you to go to church. Keep that day holy and do no work thereon ; for if you keep the Sabbath day holy, and incline your hearts to keep My laws, your sins shall be forgiven you ; but you must believe that this was written by My hand, and spoken with My mouth. You also take your children and servants to church with you to hear and observe My word, and teach them My commandments. You must fast five Fridays in the year in memory of five wounds taken and received for all mankind. You must neither take gold m I Magic, 127 nor silver from any person unjustly, nor mock nor scorn My commandments. You shall love one another with brotherly love, and with a tender heart, that your days may be prolonged. You shall also charge them that are not baptized to come to church and receive the same, and be made a member of My church, and in so doing I will heap My blessings upon you, and give you long life, and the land shall be fruitful and bring forth abundantly ; but he that is contrary to those things shall be accursed. I will send famine, lightning, and thunder, and scant of all those things, till I have consumed you. Especially on those that will not believe that this was spoken with My mouth and written with My hand. Also he that hath shall give to the poor ; and he that hath and doth not shall be accursed, and be a companion of hell. Remember, I say, to keep the Sabbath day holy, for on it I have taken rest Myself Also he that hath a copy of this letter and doth not publish it abroad to others, shall be accursed ; but he that sheweth it abroad shall be blessed ; and though he sin as often as there are stars in the skies, he shall be pardoned if he truly repent ; and he that believeth not this writing, My plague shall be upon him, his children and cattle, and all that appertainth unto him. Whoso hath a copy of this in his house, no evil spirit nor evil shall vex him, no hunger nor ague, nor any evil spirit shall annoy ; but all goodness shall be where a copy of this shall be found. Also if any woman be in great trouble in her travel and have but a copy of this above her, she shall be safely delivered of her child. You shall hear no more of Me till the day of judgement. In the name of God, amen." * This is copied from one that Elizabeth Darnell had copied in October 6, 1793.' — Pop. Sup., pp. 180, 181. Charm. — See also Section VI. Magic. — Edward Smyth is paid ij^ for 'a loke to ye funte.' From an early period fonts in this country were 128 Magic and Divination. ordered to be kept under lock and key lest superstitious persons should take away the baptismal water for use in magical rites. — Accounts of St. Mary's^ Sutterton^ pp. 5, 6. DIVINATION. To obtain a sight of her future husband, when a young girl sleeps in a strange bed, she observes the ceremony of tying her garter round the bed-post in nine distinct knots, carefully repeating some potent incantation. Divination by cards or tea-grounds is merely used for amusement ; but the following process of preparing a magical amulet called * the Dumb Cake,' which equals any diabolical incantation of ancient times, is still practised by many an anxious female with strong assurance of success. Three unmarried girls are necessary for the due perform- mance of this rite, who must be pure unspotted virgins ; because three is a number sacred in such ceremonies. Terque senem flamma, ter aqua, ter sulphure lustrat — and the charm was expected to fail if any levity was displayed during the process. This trio search for a virgin ^^'g^ and having found one, they take flour, salt, water, and all other ingredients to form a cake ; which they unitedly mix with the same spoon, unitedly place in the oven, and when baked unitedly take it thence. It is then divided into three equal portions, and each taking one, they proceed in solemn silence to occupy the same bed ; and placing each part under their respective pillows, they disrobe themselves and walk backwards into bed. Should either of the parties laugh, or utter a single syllable during the whole process, the charm is broken. This cake is intended to produce pleasant dreams, in which the future husband of each damsel will manifest himself to her enraptured view, arrayed in all the manly charms of a youthful bridegroom. — Man, and Cus., p. 32. Bottesford. ' If you peel an apple wi'out breakin' the peelin', and fling it with your right hand over your left Divination, 129 shoulder, it will fall to the ground in th' shape of th' first letter of the name of her you will marry. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 189. Northorpe. A sure means how to know whether your lover be faithful. Take as many beans as you are years old, put them on a fire-shovel, and place the shovel over a hot fire. Then say these words : If you love me, crack and fly ; If you hate me, burn and die. If the greater number of the beans ' crack and fly,' without doubt he, or she, if it be a woman, is faithful ; if the greater part burn without cracking, then he, or she, is unfaithful. Or if beans may not be come by, drop an apple-pip into the fire and say the above charm, and by its cracking, or being * snerrupped ' up by the heat without noise, you shall equally well know of your lover's state. — E. Peacock, i., p. 162. Easter Day. — We certainly get back to unmitigated paganism in the ' Wading of the Sun ' on Easter Day, still occasionally practised by a few Marshmen. This is a divination of the weather of the coming season. As the sun rises on Easter Day, a bucket of water is so placed as to catch the earliest reflection of his rays. If the sun * waps and wades,' i.e. trembles and glimmers in the water, the season will be wet ; but if the light is steady a fine summer is sure. Probably this old custom is the real origin of the later Christian notion that the sun danced at his rising on Easter morn ; and of the getting up early to see him do it, which T have heard of enthusiastic persons doing in quite late years. — Heanley, p. 8. St. Agnes' Day. — I was also told by an old woman that she tried to fast all day on St. Agnes' Day in the hope of seeing her future husband in a dream the next night. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 209. I 130 Magic and Divination. One approved method of securing a glimpse into the days to come, and of discovering the identity of the appointed lover, is to take a handful of barley on the Eve of St. Agnes, or Hallowmas, and sow it under an apple- tree, repeating meanwhile : Barley, barley, I sow thee That my true-love I may see ; Take thy rake and follow me : or other words of similar import. After which, urged to visibility by the force of the enchantment spoken at the appropriate time, the figure of the future husband appears following the spell worker, and raking up the corn she has scattered. On St. Mark's Eve a girl who gathers red sage between eleven and twelve o'clock at night — or, according to another version of the story, while the clock is striking twelve — will see the semblance of the man who is bound to marry her. And another formulary bids anyone desirous of a vision of his or her future mate to walk round the church at midnight on St. Mark's Eve, looking in at each window ; for anyone having courage enough to accomplish this deed will see the face of the destined partner of weal and woe in the last window. Then, again, an unmarried girl who sets out supper, with proper precautions, and watches it on St. Mark's Eve, will see the spirit of her fore-ordained husband enter the room at midnight and partake of the meal. While 'dumb-cake' may be made on either St. Mark's Eve or Hallow E'en — and probably also on St. Agnes' Eve and Midsummer Eve — for the purpose of inducing a lover's sprite to appear in a dream of the night. Yet another method of securing the longed for appari- tion is for a girl to hang her chemise to air at the fire on St. Mark's Eve, in order that the wraith of the young man she is to wed may come in and turn it round. There is also a candle-and-pin charm, and a spell which is worked with a lamb's shoulder-blade, the former being employed Divination. 131 to conjure the actual sweetheart, or his wraith, in waking hours, and the latter to bring about his appearance in a dream. K. S., a woman between twenty and thirty, who was educated at an excellent village school, says that one of the most successful modes of discovering the identity of the man you are to marry is to make use of the first bunch of may-flower you find in the spring, especially if you can discover it on May Eve. The procedure to be observed is as follows : You ' crag ' the spray of blossom on the bush, that is, you break it partially, but not entirely, from the bough, and leave it hanging. Then you go home, and during the night you ought to see your future husband in your dreams. In the morning you go out to fetch the hawthorn, and in case you have not already dreamed of the man, you are sure to see him, or his spirit, before you enter the house again. ' My grandmother,' avers the authority for this belief, ' was just going in at the back- door after fetching the may when she saw a man cross over the yard, who, she knew, was ill in bed, and believed to be dying. But he got better and married her. Mother, she tried it too, and dreamed of father, but she dared not go for the may in the morning.' According to information derived from an elderly woman, ' If you want to marry a young man, but he is set against marrying you, you can compel him in this manner : go to an eight o'clock Holy Communion, and when you take the bread do not swallow it, but keep it in your mouth until the service is over. When you come out of church you will see a toad in the churchyard, before which you must spit out the bread, and it will eat it at once. Then your young man will be ready enough to marry you the next time you meet him.' * Take the breast-bone of a toad,' says A. G., a girl born about 1874, and brought up in the principal town of her county, * and bury it in an ant-hill till the ants have eaten 132 Magic and Divination, all the flesh from it. Then throw it into a running stream. Whichever way the water goes it will float up against it, and you will find that however often you fling that bonci away it will always return into your pocket, and give you power over horses, cattle, and people. My uncle told me of a young man who had a toad's breast- bone, and the queerest tempered horses and beasts would just do as he liked and kneel to him. And if he went along the road, and willed it so, all the women and the men passing by had to come to him and follow him.' These toads'-bones are understood to be usually prepared by men of depraved character to win the temporary affections of women. — Humanitarian, ix., 274-8 ; see Folk-Lore, ix., 183 : xii., 168. St. Mark's Eve. — Because it was him she had seed passing close to her on the St. Mark's E'en of the year before, when she lived at Belcroft, and had slipped out to gather sage for to see her true love, like as lasses does ; and dream-books, and everything, they had always pointed to him and her being man and wife ; so what could we say, you know. Being she had folla'd 'em so far, it was not for me and my missis to warn her over late agen trusting to fore-token ings and his given word. — Eli TwiGG, p. 49. The following (illustrating, as it does, a superstition still very prevalent in Lincolnshire) may interest some of your readers. I transcribed it a few days ago in the British Museum from Holly's Lincolnshire Notes, fol. 358: * Haxey. The other I receaued from Mr. Thomas Codd, minister of Laceby in Line, wch he gave under his owne hand ; he himself being a native of ye place where this same happened, and it was thus : At Axholme, alias Haxey in ye Isle, one Mr. Edward Vicars (curate to Mr. Wm. Dalby, vicar) together with one Robert Hallywell a taylor, intending on St. Marke's even at night to watch in ye church porch to see who shoud die in ye yeare Divination. 133 following (to this purpose using divers ceremonies), they addressing themselves to the business, Vicars (being then in his chamber) wished Hallywell to be going before and he would pssently follow him. Vicars fell asleep, and Hallywell (attending his coming in ye church porch) forthwith sees certaine shapes psnting themselves to his view, resemblances (as he thought) of diuers of his neigh- bours, who he did nominate, and all of them died the yeare following ; and Vicars himselfe (being asleep) his phantome was seen of him also and dyed with ye rest. This sight made Hallywell so agast that he looks like a Ghoast ever since. The lord Sheffield (hearing this relation) sent for Hallywell to receive account of it. The fellow fearing my Lord would cause him to watch the church porch againe he hid himselfe in the Carrs till he was almost starued. The number of those that died (whose phantasmes Hallywell saw) was as I take it about fower score. Tho. Cod, Rector Ecclie de Laceby.' — N. & Q.\ vol. iv., p. 470. Burton-by-Lincoln. * Here I shall set down a story or two, very strange ones, but of undoubted truth. The first of them I received from that worthy divine and excellent preacher, Mr. Lemewell Rampaine, Minister of God's word at Great Grimsby in Lincolnshire who was household Chaplaine to Sir Thomas Munson of Burton, in Lincolnshire, at the same time when this passage hap- pened ; which was thus: "In the year 1634, two men, inhabitants of Burton aforesaid, agreed betwixt themselves upon St. Mark's eve at night, to watch in the church porch at Burton, to try whether or noe (according to ordinary belief amongst the common people) they should see the spectres or phantasmes of those persons which should dye in that parish the year following. To this intent, having first performed the usual ceremonies and superstitions, late in the night, the moon then shining- very bright, they repaired to the church porch, and there 134 Magic and Divination. seated themselves, continuing there till twelve of the clocke. About which time growing weary with expecta- tion and partly with feare, they resolved to depart, but were held fast by a kind of insensible violence, not being able to move a foot. About midnight on a suddaine (as if the moon had been eclipsed) they were environed with a black darkness ; immediately after a kinde of light as if it had been a resultancy from torches. Then appears coming towards the church porch, the minister of the place, with a book in his hand, and after him one in a winding sheet, whome they both knew to resemble one of their neebours. The church doors immediately fly open, and through pass the apparitions, and then the doores close again. Then they seem to heare a muttering as it were of the burial service with a rattling of bones and noise of earth as in the filling up of a grave. Suddenly a still silence, and immediately after the apparition of the curate againe, with another of their neighbours following in a winding sheet, and so a third, a fourth, and fifth every one attended with the same circumstances as the first These all passed away. There ensued a serenity of sky, the moon shining bright as at the first; they themselves being restored to their former liberty to walk away, which they did sufficiently affrighted. The next day they kept within dores and met not together being both of them exceedingly ill by reason of their affright- ment. When they conferred their notes, both of them could very well remember the circumstances of every passage. Three of the apparitions they well knew to resemble three of their neighbours, but the fourth which seemed an infant and the fifth like an old man they could not conceive any resemblance of After this they con- fidently reported to every one what they had done and seen, and in order designed to death those three of their neighbours, which came to pass accordingly. Shortly after their deaths, a woman in the town was delivered of a child, which died likewise. So that now there wanted i Divination, 135 but one (the olde man) to accomplish their predictions, which likewise came to passe after this manner. In that winter about mid January began a sharp and long frost, during the continuance of which some of Sir John Mun- son's friends in Cheshire having some occasion of inter- course with him, dispatcht away a foot-messenger (an ancient man) with letters to him. This man travelling this bitter weather over the mountains in Derbyshire, was near perisht with cold yet at last he arrived at Burton with his letters, where within a day or two, he died. And these men, so soon as ever they see him, said peremptorily that he was the man whose apparition they see, and that doubtless he would die before he returned, which accord- ingly he did." ' (The above is from Gervase Holies' collection, and has the flavour of the marvellous so prevalent in his time). — Tracts, 'Cathedral Described,' pp. 39, 40. Northorpe. St. Mark's Eve. — A person born on St. Mark's Eve is able to see ' things,' that is, he has the power of seeing both evil and good spirits ; he also can see the stars at noon-day. — Henry Richard, 1850. If on Mark's Eve a girl sits up with supper set out upon the table, and all the doors open, at twelve o'clock at night the person she will marry will walk in and partake of supper. If on St. Mark's Eve you go into the barn and riddle beans, or if you riddle the ashes fine on the hearth, in the morning there will be the impression of the foot of the person you are to marry, [in the beans or ashes]. Owston. The late Venerable William Brocklehurst Stonehouse, Archbishop of Stowe and Vicar of Owston, in the Isle of Axholme, furnished the author with the following piece of folk-lore which he had picked up in his own parish. * Repair to the nearest church-yard as the clock strikes 12, and take from a grave on the south side 136 Magic and Divination, of the church three tufts of grass, the longer and ranker the better, and on going to bed place them under your pillow, repeating earnestly three several times : " The Eve of St. Mark by prediction is blest, Set therefore my hopes and my fears all to rest. Let me know my fate, whether weal or woe, Whether my rank is to be high or low : Whether to live single or to be a bride. And the destiny my star doth provide." Should you have no dream that night you will be single and miserable all your life. If you dream of thunder and lightning your life will be one of great difficulty and sorrow.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 212. Old Saints' Day Superstitions in Lincolnshire. — On St. Mark's Eve at midnight the spirits of all go to church, and those who are to die within the year do not come out, while those who are to be married come out arm-in-arm. Those who watched church doors were called church- watchers, and one of them, a man, told the person (who gave me this information) that her brother would die, is still living. I was also told by another person that her mother lived more than a year after she was told by a church-watcher, a woman in the next parish, that she would die within the year. Also, if a person once began to church watch they were forced to continue to do so until their time came, when on that St. Mark's Eve they would be unable to keep awake. Another person told me his aunt, with three other girls, set a supper on St. Mark's Eve, with a chair and plate, etc., between each, for the spirit of their future husbands. But though they had kept silence (a most important condition) just before 1 2 p.m., they heard such a terrible noise that they rushed up to bed in terror. If a girl picks 12 sage leaves one by one as the clock strikes 1 2 a.m. on St. Mark's day she will see her future husband, and I was told a servant girl once did this while Divination. 137 her mistress looked on, and then said, * Do you see him ?* and the servant said, * O no ! only the master riding up to the door,' at which her mistress fell down in a dead faint, for she could not see her husband who was miles away, and did not return for several hours, and though she lived a few weeks the shock killed her, and her husband married the servant within the year. ... Martin. At Martin in Timberland, over the river, I was told that many years ago there was an old clerk who church watched, and once when a farmer grumbled at the rates he said : ' You need not trouble, for you'll not have to pay them,' nor had he, for he went home and died within three months of the shock. St. Mark's Eve is called the ' Devil's harvest,' because exactly at midnight ferns bud, blossom, flower, and seed, all in an hour, and the devil harvests the seed ; therefore, if anyone can catch any of the seed between two pewter plates at the same time, he or she will become as wise as the devil. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 209. Perhaps a surer, though a bolder way is for the adven- turous youth or maid to walk round the church, at dead of night, on St. Mark's Eve, looking into each window as they pass, and in the last there will appear the face of the one they are to wed. Looking at the first new moon of the year reflected by a looking-glass will give the number of years before the wedding takes place. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 90. Several curious Lincolnshire legends are connected with St. Mark's Eve. On that night, says a dying tradition, horses and cattle converse in their stalls, and foretell future events, as they do at Christmas. And it is believed that the spirits of living people become so far disem- bodied that the ghosts of both men and women may be forced to appear before their future husbands or wives. It is also said that those who watch the church porch 138 Magic and Divination, on St. Mark's Eve see the spirits of all the parishioners enter the building, and judge from their subsequent behaviour whether they will die, marry, or remain single during the twelve following months. — N. & Q.'*^, vol. viii., p. 388. Burgh in the Marsh. If anyone will run ' withers kins' (contrary to the course of the sun) around a church after dark, three times, and then look in at the porch, he will see the Devil looking out. — Heanley, p. 8. Bible and Key. — A mode of divination once common, and not yet obsolete. It is most frequently used by female servants for the purpose of ascertaining the names of their future husbands. The house-door key is fastened into the middle of a Bible, and the questioner supports the volume by holding the rim of the key upon one finger while certain words are said and all the male Christian names that she can remember are repeated in succession. When the right name occurs, it is averred that the Bible, which was before immovable, will turn round. A similar device is sometimes practised for ascer- taining what has become of stolen goods, and in what direction lost cattle have strayed. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 23. Grantham. After dreams, we perhaps trusted most to divination by means of tea-jeaves. The emptied tea-cup was turned downwards in the saucer and left to drain : this done, we scanned the dust and fragments of the Chinese leaf, which were stranded on the side of the cup, with intense interest, and were fooled to the top of our bent by our nurse, or any other person equally inspired, who undertook to decipher the mystic signs. Polonius was not more ready to see the camel, weasel, and whale in the cloud than we were to discern the shapes that another professed to find in an irregular patch of black specks. He who spied a bit of tea-leaf stalk floating in the cup that cheers would joyfully announce a coming stranger ; Divination. 139 and, having fished it out, would bite it with a view of ascertaining the sex. If hard to the teeth, a gentleman was heralded ; if soft, a lady. The enquirer next placed the fragment on the ball of his left thumb and endeavoured to dislodge it by striking the muscle just below with the edge of his right hand, repeating meanwhile the names of the days of the week in due order, one for each tap, beginning with the day then current. If the 'stranger' jumped when Monday was uttered, on Monday his arrival was to be looked for ; if Tuesday, on Tuesday, and so on. A ' black ' hanging on the bar of a grate was also symptomatic of somebody coming. Specks, ' gifts,* as they were called, on the nails, gave much pleasure to the juvenile mind. We used to say : ' A gift on the thumb's sure to come, A gift on the finger's sure to linger.' and in addition to this each digit told us its own tale. A white mark on the thumb-nail promised a present, and a like blemish on those of the rest of the fingers spoke respectively of friendship, enmity, love, and travel. ' Gift, friend, foe, beau, journey to go ' was the formula in which we summed up the prognostications of the five. To the little finger was ascribed the credit of possessing a special predicative power, and we often consulted it. ' Little finger,' said the inquisitive one, touching it at the time as if to rouse its attention, and passing on to the thumb and the rest of the brotherhood, with each succeeding syllable or word, ' Little finger, tell me true, shall I have a letter to-morrow or no? If I shall say yes, if I shall not say no,' and then, ' Yes, no ; yes, no,' was repeated until the oracle was again reached, when the answer to the question was given by the affirmative or the negative, which fell to its share. Other than postal information might be obtained in the same way. It made us rather uneasy to be told that if anyone pinched our little finger when we were asleep we should involuntarily reveal all our secrets. I am not aware that we had any to reveal ; but the 140 Magic and Divination, thought of enforced confidence was not a pleasant one, and it was some comfort to suspect that the preliminary nip would most likely awake us and enable us to maintain our reticence. The girls of our party were fond of prying into their matrimonial prospects by means of the stalk- leaves of a wayside flower, whose name I cannot recall. They used to utter one of a catalogue of trades and professions as they plucked off each leaf, and whatever they mentioned in connection with the last was to be the vocation of the future husband. The list ran somewhat as follows, but I doubt if I can set it down quite cor- rectly : * Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor, clergyman, plough- boy, gentleman, thief Other professions were added or substituted as circumstances suggested, but the above, or something very similar, was the authorized form. By like method maidens got information concerning the period when the desiderated tinkers and tailors, etc., would make them their own. ' This year ? next year ? some time ? never ? ' being the times submitted to the floral test. Seeding dandelions we used to call * clocks.' We gathered one, and blew at it with all our might, as long as any down remained in situ ; a puff counted for an hour. It was not until table and hat-turning, and other phenomena of that kind, came to be discussed, that I heard anything of divination by Bible and key, an experiment I tried with my nurse, substituting, if I do not mistake, a cookery book or some other secular work for the sacred volume. A large key was secured in the middle of the book, with its bow projecting at the top. Nurse and I supported the load by each placing one of our middle fingers under the lower curve of the bow, and then stood opposite to each other awaiting results. The one for whose benefit the charm was being worked wished which way the book should turn, and repeated the alphabet ; when it did turn the letter uttered at the moment was accepted as being the initial of the best beloved. A long orange peeling thrown with the right Divination. 141 hand over the left shoulder was expected to fall on the floor in a literal form of the same import. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Of course as far as iron is concerned the belief in its powers is common enough. . . . And amongst iron implements, keys, probably because of the cross generally to be found in their wards — are the most potent form. To this day most Marsh folk will propose to arrest bleeding at the nose by slipping the cellar-key down your back ; and it is not so long ago that the key played an important part in the divinations of all sorts, from the case of an undetected thief up to the discovery of your future partner for life. The key would be placed within the Bible and securely fastened by a garter, and the whole either hung from a beam or placed upon a table. The questioner and the others present in the room either stood or sat around, touching the protruding end of the key with the first finger. The names of the likely people being then called out in order, the key would turn on the right one being mentioned. — Heanley, p. 20. On New Years' Eve, by the light of the Yule log, the family Bible, with the front door key and a young maid's garter, are requisitioned. The key is placed within the leaves of the Bible, with the wards resting upon the words of the seventh verse of the eighth chapter of the Song of Solomon, ' Many waters cannot quench love/ etc. It is bound loosely round with the garter, and gently turned with the wedding-ring finger, and while the bystanders name slowly the letters of the alphabet in order, the holder reciting meanwhile the verse on which the key rests. The Bible is nearly sure to fall before the alphabet has been gone through, and the letter named last is the initial letter of the future husband's or wife's name. If it should not fall, there is no hope but that of life-long celibacy for the holder. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 90. 142 Magic and Divination. Boston. The latest instance we have found of this belief [that blood flows from the corpse of the murdered at the touch of the murderer] coming into prominence occurred seventy years ago. It is recorded in the Boston (Lincolnshire) Herald for July 17, 1832. About five years before that time a lad named James Urie, about fifteen years of age, * son of an industrious couple living near the railway, was found drowned in what seems from the description to have been a canal. There were sus- picious circumstances, and a belief was prevalent that he had met his death by violence. When the body was taken out of the water a number of persons were desired to touch the face, an opinion prevailing in the minds of some that it is a certain method of discovering the murderer, should any blood issue from any part of it' Among those who went through this ordeal was a young fellow bearing the name of Taylor. It was stated that when he laid his hand on the dead boy's cheek blood issued from the nostrils, * which immediately caused great suspicions in the minds of the superstitious.' In 1832 a man drinking in a public-house declared that * he could hang young Taylor,' who was then about twenty-three years of age, and bore a good character. This public- house talk, taken in connection with what had gone before, was regarded as sufficiently important to call for investigation by the magistrates. About two years ago a coroner's inquest was held at Kirton, in Lindsey, and it was noticed as very strange that one of the jurors did not touch the corpse. It appears that it is held that everyone who has occasion to see a dead body, whether it be that of a relative, a friend, or a stranger, should not leave it without laying his hand on the body ; if he does not do so he will be haunted by the spirit of the departed, or at least suffer from his presence in evil dreams. — Antiquary ^ xxxviii., 208. * It's seventy years sin' a gell broke a blood-vessel in ■ Divination. 143 Ketton [Kirton-in-Lindsey] court-house, an' they 've nivver been able to do out th' marks fra that day to this.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 89. Sometimes owing to a bad harvest time, and the premature garnering of the corn before the ears have time to harden, the bread when baked becomes fibrous or ropy. It is usual with the good dame, when such is the case, to run a stick through a loaf of it, and to suspend it in a cupboard to prevent the repetition of ' ropy ' bread in future bakings. — N. & Q.^, vol. viii., p. 324. Ropy. — Stringy, glutinous, or viscous. A condition of beer or bread, badly made or kept too long — seldom occurring now that home-made bread and beer are so commonly superseded by fresh-bought articles. It was a belief in these parts that hanging up a piece of ropy bread behind the door would keep further ropiness out of the house. — COLE, p. 122. The following is from Thomas Miller's Gideon Giles the Roper^ a Lincolnshire tale published about forty years ago : * " Well I declare ! locky-daisy me," exclaimed Mrs. Cawthry, taking up the sovereign, and turning it all ways, " and good gowd too ! I'll hev a lucky rub at any rate " ; and she rubbed both her eyes with the sovereign, then handed it to her gossip, who did the same, saying, when she had done, " I've never rubbed my ^y^s with one before for above seven years ; the last time I did was in the month of May, and the mart after that I fun sixpence as I was going to Gainsbro' ; so you see that proves it's lucky." As this happened six months after, we must suppose the spell, or whatever it was, to have had power a long time ; be this as it may, we have many a time seen a sovereign handed round a room, where of course such things are scarce, and each one in turn rub the eyes with it, believing it to be " lucky." ' Chap, xxiii., p. 292. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 104. SECTION VIII. SUPERSTITIONS GENERALLY. The systems of divination, and the tokens of good and evil fortune, which are still observed, are numerous and curious. If the tail of the first lamb you see in the spring be towards you, it denotes misfortune ; if other- wise, good luck may be expected throughout the year. The first cuckoo you hear carries with it a similar fatality. Should you have money in your pocket, it is an indication of plenty ; but woe to the unhappy wretch who hears this ill-omened bird for the first time with an empty purse ! The same thing is observed of the New Moon. . . . The species of divination called Rhabdomancy , or setting up a stick to determine which of two paths you shall pursue, I have often witnessed. . . . I have seen many young ladies, and some old ones, turn their chairs three times round, or sit cross-legged, as a charm to ensure good luck at cards ; and the ad- vantage of having the choice of chairs at whist is a universally received opinion. — Man. and Cus.y pp. 31, 32. Many are the signs of misfortune with which our species contrive to make themselves miserable. If a stocking or petticoat be drawn on in a reversed position, and the error be rectified, it is a prognostic of ill-luck ; but the omen may be averted by allowing it to remain. It is esteemed unlucky to walk under an erected ladder, or to break the small end of an Qgg ; or to suffer the cat t Superstitions Generally, 145 to sit with her back to the fire ; but it is exceedingly fortunate to find a piece of money, or a broken horse shoe, particularly if it be studded full of nails. A knife or a pair of scissors is considered an unpropitious present ; for thus the tie of friendship or affection is supposed to be severed. If anyone would invoke success on another's undertaking, he will silently propitiate the goddess For- tuna by the offering of an old shoe, cast over the threshold of the door as his friend leaves the house. On a market- day it is not uncommon to see the stall-man spit on the first money he takes, to ensure a prolific market. The right side of the body is accounted lucky, and the left unlucky. Thus, if the left ear or cheek burn or tingle, it is an intimation that some one is speaking evil of you ; but if the sensation be felt on the right side of the face, you may enjoy the pleasing reflection that some one is speaking in your praise. . . . If the left hand itches, you are about to pay ; but if the right, you will receive money. . . . There exist many methods of averting an evil omen. If salt be accidentally overturned, it is unlucky for the person towards whom it falls. But if that person, without hesitation or remark, take up a single pinch of the salt between the finger and thumb of his right hand, and cast it over his left shoulder, the threatened misfortune will be averted by the efficacy of the atoning sacrifice. . . . It is unlucky to meet a funeral procession ; but the omen may be counteracted by taking off your hat, which is intended as a mark of respect to the evil spirits who may be hovering about the corpse. Seamen whistling for a wind, which I have repeatedly seen practised on board the passage boats plying between Grimsby and Hull, before the introduction of steam packets rendered the wind, as an agent, of little value, was a direct invocation to ' the prince of the power of the air ' to exert himself on their behalf . . . K 146 Superstitions Gene7^ally, A single magpie crossing your path is esteemed an evil omen, and I once saw a person actually tremble and dissolve into a copious perspiration, when one of these birds flitted chattering before him. But the evil influence may be averted by laying two straws across, or by describing the figure of the cross on the ground. . . . The magpie is not always an ill-omened bird, but conveys good or bad luck by numbers. The doggerel proverb is : One for sorrow, two for mirth. Three for a wedding, four for death. This superstition is evidently a remnant of the system of augury, or divination by birds. — Pop. Sup.^ pp. 1 1 7- 1 1 9. MABRIAGE. Boston. * To tumble upstairs (that is to stumble in going upstairs) is a sign the person will soon be married,' is a common saying with us. — N. & Q.^ vol. iii., p. 156. In a South Lincolnshire village, the Banns of Marriage were 'asked up ' on a Sunday in October, 1887, and, on the same day, the death-bell went out for a married woman in the same parish, thereupon the superstitious people said that the bride of that week would not live through a twelvemonth. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 118. It is unlucky to be married on a Friday, or to be married in green, and it forebodes death to some one of the party if the ring be dropped during the ceremony. The piece of bride cake passed through the bride's wedding-ring and placed under a maid's pillow, will bring to her, in her dreams, the sight of her future lord ; and an old shoe flung after the bride will bring her offspring and good luck through her married life. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 91. No woman at a wedding ought to have a bit of black about her. — Antiquary, xiv., p. 12. Death Omens, 147 DEATH OMENS. The death-omen, with all its appalling methods of conveying intelligence ' of fearful import,' still possesses the power of communicating alarm. A winding-sheet in the candle, that well-known messenger of fate, retains its accustomed influence ; as does also the coffin when it explodes from the fire, though it requires some experience in the interpretation of omens to determine the exact form of this equivocal cinder ; for the coffin and the purse are so nearly allied, that it would puzzle a common observer to pronounce accurately whether it were a sign of death, or some accession of wealth. The howling of a dog at midnight has given many an unfortunate family the vapours for a month. — Pop. Sup,, p. 116. The hooting of owls at any time, and the crowing of cocks before midnight, are death-boding omens to some member of the household of the person who is unfortunate enough to hear them. — Antiquary, xxxi., 330-335. Sleaford. At Sleaford, in Lincolnshire, a man's wife being suddenly taken ill, he borrowed a horse and rode off for the doctor. As he rode he noticed that on one side of his horse he could see the ground with wonderful clearness ; it was so bright that he could have seen a pin. But on the other side of the horse it was so dark that he could not even see his own foot. By this he knew that his wife would die. — Addy, 139. It is a sure sign, if the limbs of a corpse remain flexible, that another death will come to the house before the year is out. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., p. 94 ; E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 69. Clocks. — Little black insects, like beetles, which make a ticking noise, often considered a token of death. But used for any beetle-Hke insect. — COLE, p. 30. 148 Superstitions Generally. The following instance I heard told many times when young : — In Denton Church, the older Welby vault was not in the north aisle like the latter, but in the nave before the chancel screen ; its entrance was marked by a stone to which an iron ring was fastened by a staple. Tradition said that this ring was seen to raise itself before the head of the family died. In 1815, a new governess, an entire stranger to the neighbourhood, came to be with my great-half-aunts. For a first walk, she was taken to see the Church. On coming away from it, she remarked to her pupils that she had seen a most strange sight — the ring in the floor of the Church had appeared to raise itself three times. They begged her not to mention it, as it was the family warning. Within about a month their father, the first Sir William, died. When the vault was closed after he, or his second wife, was laid within it, the stone holding the ring was removed, and I remember being shown it lying in the paddock near the carpenter's shop of the Hall. Recollection makes it about eighteen inches long by twelve broad, with an ordinary ring and staple, No ring was put to the entrance of the new vault : possibly the warning was dreaded. . . . — Grantham Journal^ Aug. 25th, 1906. Weather and wind in connection with death. — See Folklore Record, vol. iv., p. 127; Folklore, vol. xii., pp. 165, 166. Caistor neighbourliood. Death-bird. — Two or more birds, of a species quite unknown to anyone who saw them, remained in the neighbourhood of a house not many miles from Caistor, in Lincolnshire, when its owner was dying in the year 1893 ; and it was then remembered that they had already visited the place as precursors of death on two former occasions. — Antiquary, xxxi., 114. Boston. On Sunday, Sept. 29th, i860, a strange por- tent occurred. A cormorant took up its position on the steeple of Boston Church, much to the alarm of the Death Omens, 149 superstitious among the townspeople. There it remained with the exception of two hours' absence till early the following morning, when it was shot by the caretaker of the church. The fears of the credulous were singularly confirmed when the news arrived of the loss of the * Lady Elgin ' at sea, with three hundred passengers, among whom were Mr, Ingram, member for Boston, with his son, on the very morning when the bird was first seen. — Fenland N. & Q., vol. i., p. 206. Bottesford. Death-dove. — People of an older generation could relate, too, how the doves from the cote at the old Hall at Northorpe [North Lincolnshire] had settled round the feet of my great grandfather Thomas Peacock, as he sat in the garden. No one knew that his condition was less satisfactory than it had been for some time past, but the pigeons had clearer insight than his own people, and their loss of timidity was soon explained by his death. — Antiquary^ xxxi., 114. The belief that Death makes his presence known by knocking at the door of the relatives or friends of those he is about to strike is a good deal prevalent in Lincolnshire. — N. & Q.^ vol. x., p. 433. Dead Cart. — People in Lincolnshire say that a * Dead Cart' comes round in the middle of the night without horses or any visible means of locomotion. If you look out of the window when you hear the noise of its wheels passing by you will see yourself in the cart amongst those who are doomed to die in the coming year. A death will happen in the house on or before the third day after the cart has been heard. — Addy, p. 137 ; N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 382. If a pigeon flew to a window where a sick person lay, it was a certain omen of death. — Antiquary^ xiv., 1 1. In Lincolnshire and the adjacent counties, the window of a room where a person lies in extremis is opened during 150 Superstitions Generally, the final agony, and the other windows of the house are, or ought to be, unclosed when the blinds are drawn down after the death has taken place ; but it is not necessary to open the doors. Death-knocks and death-raps are not uncommon. A doctor told me, some months since, that when he was sitting by the death bed of a North Lincoln- shire vicar, he and a woman from the village, who was acting as nurse, both became aware of a curious tapping, coming from the dressing-table. They could find nothing to account for the noise, though they examined the table carefully. The nurse however felt convinced that what they heard was a warning, and afterwards described it to her cronies as a * beautiful sound,' foretelling the future happiness of her patient. Sometimes the death-knock is heralded by the death-cart, which is heard to roll up to the door of the house where any one is dying, to pause for one noiseless moment, and then to shoot out its contents against the wall of the dwelling. An awesome silence follows, broken at last by the exclamations of the sufferer's attendants, who now know that all hope of recovery is gone. A less terrible but equally certain presage is the appearance of a death-bird, usually a white dove. — N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 154. Swineshead. — In a copy of the Horncastle News, dated 9th June, 1894, . . . our eyes fell upon this paragraph ... 'A strange legend is current in Swineshead that, " If a corpse lies in a house on Sunday there will be three within the week." '— HisSEY, p. 237. The booming sound of the church bell foretells death to someone in the parish, within the week, and the cold shudder, which at times runs through you, is a sign that someone is treading upon your grave. — Bygone Lincoln- shire, ii., p. 93 ; Antiquary, vol. xxxi., 330-335. If the church clock strikes during the time a hymn is being sung in church, some one will die before the next Sunday.— E. PEACOCK, i., p. 58. Death Omens. 151 Lea. Death-omen^ Church-clock^ and Death, — See Notes from a Lincolnshire Garden^ by A. L. H. A., p. 36. Spade as Death Omen, — Cf. Smith, p. 130. Look what a mess of beautiful flowers there is ! They say it's a sign of death in the house (when they flower out of season), mebbe it's me. — COLE, p. 90. TeUin' on won anuther aboot all warnings thaay've iver heard speak on : an' saayin' as how sum'ats bad is saafe to ha' happened, becos oud hezzel-pear i' frunt gardin bloomed i' back-end ; an' that's a knawn sign o' death afoore a year's oot. — Taales fra Linkisheere^ p. 10 1. ThQ guttering of a candle is indicative of a shroud ; but a spark in the wick signifies a letter. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., p. 92. Winding-sheet, a little projection of wax or tallow, which, as a candle burns, gradually lengthens and winds round upon itself. It is a sign of the death of the person sitting opposite it. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 276. Shroud, a small fungus-like concretion of soot in the wick of a candle which, when burned, becomes enlarged and red ; or a small piece of wax or tallow which curls up at the side of a burning candle. Both these objects are signs of death to the person who is opposite it. — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 222. The candle must never be allowed to die out, or it brings death to some sailor out at sea ; and for the cook to throw Qgg shells, whole, behind the fire will raise a storm at sea. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 92. If when a candle is burning beside a dead body, it falls out of the stick, it is a sign of another death within the twelvemonth. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 46. Coffin, a small oblong cinder which flies out of the fire accompanied by a report. The appearance of such a thing presages death. When the cinder is round it is 152 Superstitions Generally, called a purse . . . and presages good luck. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 66, A loose soot-flake hanging from the bar of the firegrate is * a winding-sheet ' when it is not * a stranger ' ; by the latter term is meant anyone who is not expected calling at the house. — Antiquary, xxxi., 330. If the bees in a hive be not told of a death another is sure to happen in the same house soon. If a fire remain alight all night. If a dog howl at midnight. If a pigeon settle upon the window-sill of a house. If a tallow candle, while alight, flicker and form upon the side a mass called a ' winding sheet.' If an insect, called the * death watch,' is heard ticking during the night. — GOOD, p. 108. Mid-Lincolnsliire. The following are signs of death : — 1. If a cock crows at midnight. 2. If in ringing the church bells the passing bell is tolled by mistake, as if for a funeral. 3. If a cart is heard to stop at the door but nothing can be seen, hence its name ' the death cart.' 4. If a lamp-glass breaks, without being struck, and when the lamp is not lit.' — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 144. Death. — Diamond-shaped creases, formed in a table- cloth by careless folding, are a sign of death. A mare in foal must never assist in drawing a corpse to the grave. If she be permitted to do so, she and her foal, or a member of her owner's family, will die within the ensuing twelvemonth. If you slaughter a diseased horse, its death will be followed by that of one of its companions. For this reason, however much pain the animal may be enduring, you should never put an end to its sufferings. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 49. Other Omens, 153 To break a looking-glass is held to show that, without doubt, some one dwelling in the house will shortly pass away. — Antiquary^ xxxi., 330. OTHEB OMENS. Name. — Persons called Agnes always go mad. — N. & Q.i, vol. viii., p. 382. Number. — Four believed to be an unlucky number. — Cf. Smith, p. 130. Third Day. — If a person be taken suddenly ill, or be injured by an accident, if he survive until the third day, it is believed that he will recover. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 82. * Help me to salt, help me to sorrow,' was an adage often quoted to check the officiousness referred to and our childish curiosity as to what was coming next at table was effectually baffled by the irritating reply, * Shim- shams for meddlers and spectacles for sparrows.' — G. J., June 29, 1878. Grantham. We felt sure that somebody was speaking well of us when our right cheek or ear was burning, and that evil things were said when the tingling came on the other side. In folk-lore, as in ethics, the right is always best. The present good Bishop of Lincoln (Wordsworth) does something which may cause our superstitious belief to be forgotten, he places both hands on the head of each person he confirms. When I was young the episcopal practice was different, and those candidates who received the benedictory touch of a bishop's left hand were, shocking to relate, not considered so fortunate, might I not say, so blessed, as those who came in for that of the right. When anybody's nose tickled, he was told that he was vexed, which he very likely was, and that it was a sign 154 Superstitions Generally, he would have plum-pudding for supper, a delicacy which if cold was said to have the effect of settling the love of the eater. — G. J., June 22, 1878. The idea that when the cheek burns, or the ear tingles, some one is talking about us, is as old as the time of Pliny. . . . Ear-tingling is now sometimes regarded as an omen of bad news. — Thompson, p. 735. Gifts. — White spots on the finger and thumb nails. Ex, A gift on the finger Is sure to linger ; A gift on the thumb Is sure to come. Old Rhyme. Brogden, p. 81. Christmas Weather-Lore. — If Christmas Day falls on a Thursday a windy year will follow. A farmer here told me this the other day, in explanation of the almost con- stant gales we have had lately. — N. & Q.^, xi., 285. Standing under the bright moon and stars on the night of last Christmas Day, an old South Lincolnshire bell- ringer, who had just finished his peal in the church belfry, said to me, ' There's an old saying, " Light Christmas, light harvest." I've known it come true a-many times. Last Christmas was a dark Christmas ; and, accordingly, we had a good harvest. If we live to see the next harvest, you'll see that it'll be a poor one.' — N. & Q.^, vol. xi., pp. 46, 47. ' A Green Christmas ' foretells a sickly season and a *fat churchyard.' — THOMPSON, p. 735. In making a bed you must be careful not to turn over the bed or mattress on Sunday, as is done at other times ; you will have bad luck all the week if you do. If you sew on a Sunday you will prick your finger and die of the wound. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 245. Other Omens. 155 No luck can come to the business you have in hand if the first person you meet on setting out is a woman. The evil can be averted, however, if you return to the house, sit down, and start afresh. It equally presages failure if you have to return for anything forgotten. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., pp. 92, 93. A writer in the Lincolnshire Chronicle^ July 3rd, speak- ing of the crop of hay, refers the cause to the dry spring, and quotes the following local saying : If it neither rains nor snows on Candlemas Day, You may striddle your horse and go and buy hay. N. & Q.^ vol. iv., p. 82. A weet Maay Brings plenty o' corn An' plenty o' haay. E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 345. Easter. — Bad luck throughout the year will attend any one who does not wear some new article of dress on Easter Sunday. — THOMPSON, p. 735. A curious piece of folk-lore has lately reached me from the fen district lying near Sleaford, Lincolnshire. There is an observant individual living in that favoured region who can any autumn tell his neighbours whether the weather of the next spring will be good or bad for farming operations. An experience of thirty years teaches him that when the breast-bones of his geese are dark- coloured a genial spring is not to be looked for, but that when the bones are of light complexion, a favourable season may be expected. — N. & Q.^, vol. xii., p. 478. Sun. — * Happy is the bride the sun shines on, and the corpse the rain falls on,' is yet quoted as an omen. — Thompson, p. 735. Evening red and morning gray Are sure signs of a fine day. A mackerel-sky foretells rain. 156 Superstitions Generally. If a cat washes over her ear, it is a sign of fine weather. When a dog or cat eats grass, it betokens approaching rain. When a number of black snails are out on an evening, it will rain during the night. When swallows fly low, rain is at hand. When it rains with the wind in the east, It will rain for twenty-four hours at least. Thompson, p. 735. It's a sunshiny shower, It won't last half-an-hour. Thompson, p. 732. Breast bone of geese, dark coloured after cooking, no genial spring, and vice-versa. — Folk-lore Record, vol. iv., p. 127. Grantham. Meteorological doggerels of which folk-lore has so great a store were not often heard, but of course, everybody said : Evening red and morning gray, A sure sign of a fine day ; Evening grey and morning red, Will send the shepherd home wet to his bed. * Enough blue in the sky to make a cat a pair of trowsers,' inspired us with confidence that rain would not come to spoil our fun. — G. J., June, 1878. Friday. — It is unlucky to begin any piece of work, or to commence a journey, or a voyage, on a Friday. — Thompson, p. 735 ; E. Peacock, i., p. 1 1 1. A wet Friday, a wet Sunday ; a wet Sunday, a wet week. — G. J., June 29, 1878. We followed the rest of folk in accounting the fifth day of the week unlucky for beginnings. — G. J., June 29, 1878. * Friday flit, short sit.'— COLE, p. 48. Other Omens, 157 Weather and Heavenly Bodies. — Several ridiculous super- stitions respecting the weather, receive implicit credence from some ignorant persons whom I have met with, although founded on proverbs equally groundless and untenable, which experience has falsified over and over again. Such as, Rainy Friday, Rainy Sunday; A sunshiny shower, bodes rain again to-morrow; St. Swithin's rain continues forty days, etc., etc., etc. At the change of the moon, if she appear with sharp horns, or assume the form of the heraldic crescent, commonly called lying on her back, it is accounted a certain prognostic of bad weather. We have an old saw which says, 'Friday's moon, come when it will, it comes too soon.' Shooting stars are a sign of wind. Some persons will prognosticate a change of weather from certain aches and pains in their joints, or any diseased part of the body. — Pop. Sup., p. 120. Moon. — It is lucky to have money in the pocket when the new moon is first seen and also to see it over the left shoulder. — THOMPSON, p. 735. See Section I., under Moon and SUN. Sunset and Ill-luck. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 167. Omen. — The cinder which leaps out of the fire should be taken up, spit upon, and held loosely in the palm. If it crackles, it means your purse will be replenished, but if not it indicates a shroud. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 92. Luck. Purse. — A hollow bit of coal which flies out of the fire, and is believed to portend a purse of money, coming to him in whose direction it comes. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 199. Omen. — The advent of a stranger can be known by the soot-flake which hangs upon the bar, by the dreg in the teacup, by the peeping into the window of a robin, and by several other signs. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 92. 158 Superstitions Generally. If a fire be lighted in the morning and be afterwards forgotten or neglected, it will occasionally forbode 'death or news of death' by continuing to burn till late in the evening, instead of dying out for want of fuel. — N. & Q7, vol. X., p. 114. Winding sheets in the candles, Strangers, in the black film, often found on the bars of the fire-grate, and purses and coffins, in the small hollow pieces of coal which are thrown from the fire, form part of the minor omens yet slightly believed in. — THOMPSON, p. 734. Stranger. — (i) A small knot on the wick of a candle, which, when burned, becomes enlarged and red. It is a sign that a stranger will come to-morrow. (2) A small bit of tea leaf, or stick which floats on the surface of tea. If you stir the tea and it sinks, it counts for nothing; but if it swims, it is a certain sign that a stranger will arrive. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 241. Grantham. Grantham Oak. — The amount of rain-fall to be looked for was predicted from the order in which the oak and ash put forth their leaves. If the oak before the ash, Then we may expect a splash, If the ash before the oak, Then we may expect a soak. G. J., June 29, 1878. The severity or mildness of [a coming winter] might be predicted from the abundance or the scarcity of the haws which Providence had stored up for the birds. — G. J., June 29, 1878; E. Peacock, i., p. 50. Boston. I heard, the other day, some of the people in this parish saying that 'there would not be much lightning, but a great deal of cholera this year, for it would be a heavy plum year.' — N. & Q.'^, vol. ii., p. 158. Day. 'February fill dyke, Be it black, or be it white:' Other Omens, 159 i.e. there will be much downfall in February, either of rain or snow. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 102. * February fill dyke, March muck it out again:' i.e. in February the dykes are filled with snow, rain comes in March and 'mucks them out' — E. PEACOCK, i., ^' ' Monday for health. Tuesday for wealth. Wednesday best day of all. Thursday for losses. Friday for crosses. Saturday no luck at all. Good, p. 107. It is common to address a person who is not attending to what is being said, or who is staring vacantly about, *What are you standing there for, looking all ways for Sunday.' [A similar phrase is 'I stood looking both ways for Sunday' = I was utterly confused, taken aback.] This probably alludes to a belief whi(;h is prevalent elsewhere, but not here, so far as the compiler is aware, that a child born on Thursday 'is sure to squint, because it must look both ways for Sunday.' — Monthly Packet^ Jan., 1875, p. 10; cf Craven Gloss., ii., 180; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 245. Saint Monday, Saint's day, the idle day at the be- ginning of the week. Called 'Saints day,' or 'Saint Monday' because drunkards, having received their wages on Saturday evening, spend that day in consuming them at the beer-shop. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 212. Storm. — A remark by a labouring man of this town (Grantham) which is new to me, is to the following effect. In March and all seasons when the judges are on circuit, and when there are any criminals to be hanged, there are always winds and storms, and roaring tempests. — N. & Q.\ vol. ix., 494. i6o Superstitions Generally, It is commonly believed that if a dog which is not mad bites a person, if the dog afterwards go mad, however long afterwards, the person bitten will die of hydrophobia. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 163. Sunday, — The well-heated oven of a woman in Lincolnshire refused to bake, and on the Monday morning she found nothing but raw paste therein. An- other woman in the same county wisely waited till Monday morning, when, going to see whether her paste had risen so as to run over, she found her bread baked without material fire. — Roger de Houeden^ Rolls Series, iv., 169, concerning 1201. Telling one's age unlucky. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 179. Counting too closely unlucky. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 179. Luck and ill-luck connected with actions and objects. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., pp. 178, 179. * An' I'd a vast deal sooner see 'em i' the'r graaves, then carin' fer one o' th' wrong soort,' she answers back. Them was just her very wo'ds, an* I mind thinkin' it was n't very lucky to talk o' graaves that how ; but I did n't think o' what was cumin'. — Taales fra Linkisheere, pp. 17, 18. Singing. — * If you sing before breakfast, you will cry before night,' is a very common saying in almost every part of Lincolnshire. — N. & Q.^ vol. ix., p. 51. [* If you laugh before breakfast ' is another version. This was quoted to me as a child by C, who also reproved me for laughing before I had said my prayers in the morning, or after I had said them in the evening. — M. P.] Sweeping. — A Lincolnshire maidservant explained to me some years ago that it was wrong * to sweep out at Other Omens, i6i the door, for fear of sweeping luck away/ — N. & Q.^, vol. vi., p. 393- Salt. — It is unlucky to spill salt. The bad luck will fall on the person in whose direction the salt falls. — E. Peacock, i., p. 212. Spitting for luck. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 179. Luck. — It was formerly the habit, when stock was sold at a market or fair, for the vendor to spit in confirmation of the bargain. This practice, though going out, is not obsolete. — E. Peacock, i., p. 234. Turn again. — To'n agean. — Money returned on payment for corn, stock, or other farm produce. At whatever price an article is sold a small sum is always given back by the seller to the purchaser, as luck or tdn-agedn. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 570. Iron. — In this neighbourhood I know ladies who con- sider it ' lucky ' to find old iron ; a horse shoe or a rusty nail is carefully conveyed home and hoarded up. — N. & Q., vol. v., p. 293. It is unlucky to give away a knife, because * knives cut love.' If a person wishes to make a present of one, he sells it for a pin, a farthing, or some such trifle. — E. Peacock, i., p. 151 ; N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 357. Grantham. Ill-luck might be expected if, in our walks abroad, we were so heedless, or so headstrong, as to walk underneath a ladder, and I can testify to spots of colour- wash on a garment being the direct results of disregard of this precept. To pick up a piece of old iron, particularly in the form of a horse-shoe, was a very propitious act, and for some mystic reason a horse-shoe was deemed a very desirable appendage to a stable-door. It was bad enough to have a sore spot at the end of one's tongue without suffering the moral pain of being told that it was a proof that one had been telling * stories.' A cold shiver L 1 62 Superstitions Generally. depressed us more than it might have done had we not been persuaded that it came of somebody walking over our grave — the site of our grave that is to be ; but the blessing evoked by a sneeze was a pleasant reward for such a startling performance, and when chilly after a meal how comforting was it to be assured If you eat to be cold, You'll live to be old. A servant was not likely to settle in a new place if she did any duty before that of eating at her master's expense. — G. J., June 29, 1878. Omen. — If anything be accidentally broken, it is believed that other similar accidents will occur during the day. — Good, p. 107. The wife of a Lincolnshire vicar told me a short time ago that one of her husband's parishioners had been greatly troubled in her mind because a tumbler had * gone off' of itself when standing on a table. She thought that the occurrence ' meant something,' probably ill-luck. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 355. Luck. — We've hed noht bud bad luck sin that theare seein'-glass [looking-glass] was brok ; fo'st th' oat-stack got afire, an' noo the lambs hes started a-deein' like mice. — Bottesford, June, 1887. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 468. In Kesteven it was not considered at all the thing to ^\v^ oneself the pleasure of introducing a baby to itself in the looking-glass. ... A woman who ties her nightcap before the looking-glass will be an old maid. — N. & Q.^, vol. vii., p. 398. Horse-shoe. — A horse-shoe suspended somewhere upon the premises is held to bring good luck. — GoOD, p. 107. Friends who had known each other seven years might poke each other's fires, but it was hardly safe to do so on Other Omens, 163 a shorter term of acquaintanceship. No length of friend- ship, however, could make it safe for two people to wash their hands in the same water, unless they took the pre- caution of tracing a cross upon it with the finger or of spitting into it, as otherwise a quarrel must inevitably result. — G. J., June 22, 1878. To put on your stocking inside outwards is a sign of good luck. — Thompson, p. 735. Grantham. If our boots creaked we were suspected of walking about in boots that were not paid for. — G. J., June 29, 1878. It is held to be a bad omen to put the left-foot shoe on first. — Thompson, 374. To throw an old shoe after a person, as he starts upon a new undertaking, may conduce to his success. — Thompson, p. 735. The annoyance of finding a knot in a lace was counter- acted by the assurance that it was a token of good luck, and for the same reason we were pleased when a garment was unwittingly put on wrong side outwards ; we wore it with expectant thankfulness, as any tidy turning of it would have ' turned good luck away.' — G. J., June 22, 1878. At confirmation the candidate must not receive the left hand of the bishop, for the same reason that the maid must not take the last piece* of cake — the certainty of remaining a maid unto the end of her life. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., p. 89. Luck. — If in getting up in the morning you put on your stockings, shirt, or other garment, wrong side out, you must on no account change them ; if you do your good luck will be turned into bad. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 63. It is as unlucky to laugh while crossing a fairy ring, as it is to hear the cock crow before midnight, or to possess a crowing hen. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 93. 164 Superstitions Generally, Cat, Cock, Crow, Cuckoo, Egg. — See Section III., Animals. The howling of dogs precedes bad luck. — THOMPSON, p. 735. Good fortune was predicted for one of my sisters, because a strange dog followed her when she was a babe in arms. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Bamoldby-le-Beck. Among the miscellaneous supersti- tions and folklore of our village it may be noted that no eggs must on any account be brought into a house after sunset. An old lady, lately dead, would ' call her boys ' (forty years old) * finely,' if she heard them sharpening a knife or the like after that time of the day. She always put a pinch of salt into the churn to keep the witches out. — Antiquary^ vol. xiv., p. 12. Bottesford. If eggs are brought over running water they will have no chicks in them. Never burn egg-shells ; if you do, the hens cease to lay. — N. & Q.\ vol. viii., p. 382. Signs of Ill-luck. — Thirteen to sit down at one table. To allow knives to be crossed upon the dinner-table. To give a knife to anyone without its being acknow- ledged by a payment of a halfpenny. To take anything out of the house on New Year's morning before first bringing something in. To spill salt upon the table cloth. To return to the house after having set out on a journey ; the evil spell, however, may be broken by sitting down in the house, before setting out a second time. To see the new moon first through glass, say a window. Good, p. 108. It is wrong to laugh before saying one's prayers in the morning, or after saying them at night. Other Omens, 165 Curly hair is a sign of pride. Nurse-maids teach their charges to draw a hair sharply between the nails of the fore-finger and thumb, to discover by its ' crinkling ' or the reverse, whether the owner is of haughty tempera- ment ; and the writer of this note has more than once been saluted by unmannerly children with the cry * Co'ly locks, my wo'd is n't she prood.' To dream of losing one's teeth is unlucky. To put a lighted lantern on a table is most unlucky. To put boots, especially new ones, on a table, is unlucky. If a knife be left on the table during the night, it will be needed to flay a dead animal in the morning. To open an umbrella in the house, before going out into the rain, is unlucky. Black pins should never be used by a dressmaker in fitting on a dress, lest its wearer should die an old maid. L. N. & Q., vol. iii., pp. 20, 21. [Mumby?] The other day a poor fellow on the line met with a sad accident which caused his death. I happened to mention this to one of my parishioners who said, ' Ah, yes ; and warn't it strange sir ; the very morn- ing he was killed, the carrier stopped at his house for a duck, which he asked the railway man to hold whilst he (the carrier) killed it. This he did ; and you know it's very unlucky to hold anything while it is dying.' — N. & Q.6, vol. X., p. 186. To sharpen a knife after supper, is to make the way easy to the burglar and cut-throat, and to leave knives crossed is to court calamity. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., P- 93- To seat a hen upon thirteen eggs ensures a healthy brood ; but to dine with thirteen at table is unlucky, and death or sickness will come to those of the party who first rise from the table. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., p. 92. 1 66 Superstitions Generally, It is dangerous to be let blood in the Dog-days. — Thompson, p. 735. It is supposed that eating the spinal marrow out of a chine of beef will make one deaf. — E. Peacock, i., p. 82. Sighing is supposed to have a very depleting effect upon the heart. My nurse used to warn me that every sigh took a drop of blood from it. — N. & Q.^, vol. iii., p. 352. Thornton. Ferriby. At the north side is the fragments of the chappel. . . . The drainers that drained these levels of Ank, vulgo Ankham, fetch'd all the stone from this chappel that they built Ferry Sluce with, in and, by a just judgment of God upon (them), for applying that to profane uses that had been given to God, the drainers were all undon, and the sluce, which cost many thousands of pounds building is now coming down. Ferry Sluice should be Ferriby Sluice. — Pryme, p. i 3 i and his editor's footnote. See De LA Pryme's History of Winter ton, p. 17, from ArchcEologia, vol. xl. DREAMS. When infants smile in their sleep they are said to see angels. — E. Peacock, i., p. 6. I was lately looking at an infant which was just three weeks old, when its mother remarked : ' I have heard tell that in their first month babies dream all that is to happen to them in their lives.' ' But do very little babies dream ? * I asked. * O, yes,' was the reply, ' my baby here smiles in its dreams, or moves its hands and makes a fretting noise.' The mother, I may add, is a native of Nottinghamshire, long resident in Lincolnshire. — N. & Q.^ vol. X., p. 269. Other Omens, 167 Grantham. The gift of peeping into futurity seemed one to be much desired, and like Watts's Sluggard, we * told ' our dreams which seemed the channel by which we were most likely to attain our wish. Our canons for the interpretation of them were few and simple. Our nurse taught us that ' dreams go by contraries,' so we were comforted when our young night thoughts were not *of pure digestion bred/ and were not too much elated when the visions were of a pleasant character. To dream of a death was the sign of a birth : to dream of a wedding the sign of a death. I do not remember that to dream of a birth pointed at a wedding, but it ought to do, and I dare say did. Visionary loss of teeth betokened actual loss of friends. That ' Sunday morning dreams came true' was our pious postulate, whilst those of Friday night were of an unusually portentous nature, for A Friday night's dream on Saturday told, Is sure to come true if it's ever so old. A piece of bride-cake that had been passed through the lately conferred wedding-ring was valued by those who had outgrown the nursery, and who expected to dream of a lover if they slept with the plummy morsel under their pillow. — G. J., June 22nd, 1878. PART IL SECTION I. FESTIVALS. New Year. — If the first person who enters a house on New-year's morning bring bad news, it is a sign of ill-luck for the whole of the year. As soon as the clock strikes twelve on New-year's morning bring something indoors, for it is lucky to have some incoming before there is any outgoing. — E. Peacock, i., 179. Bring a bit of green into the house on New-year's day> and you won't want bread all the year ; or, if you do, some one will bring you some. You must not bring in anything dead, or you bring a coffin into the house. Whatever you bring in first on New Year's Day, you will never want all the year through, so the custom is to bring in coals or something useful. — COLE, p. 98. The New Year will be marked by death or ill-luck if fire be taken out of the house, or if nothing green be taken in, or if the first-foot be a woman or a fair man instead of a dark man. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., 94. The * first-foot ' belief of the Scotch on New Year's Day does not come down so far as Lincolnshire, but we knew an old farmer and his niece who always took care on that day to be the first to leave the house, and to return with something in their hands — an Q^'gy a flower, or piece of holly. — Antiquary^ xiv., 12. Festivals, 169 Bottesford. Mr. Watkins is in error when he says that ' the " first-foot " belief of the Scotch on New Year's Day does not come down so far as Lincolnshire.' An old friend of mine tells me that she would not on any account let a woman or girl enter her house before a man or boy had crossed the threshold on that day. ' I alus keap door lock'd till reight soort cums, an' then I saay, " Hev' ye owt to bring in ? If ye hevn't goa get a bit o' stick or sum'ats, ye sea it's straange an' unlucky to tak things oot afore owt's browt in, an' foaks is careful. I mind th' time when lads cum'd roond reg'lar wi' bits o' stick aboot as long as a knittin' needle.'" — Antiquary^ xiv., 86. Lincolnshire Marsh. There is still many a house in Marshland where much is thought of the first-foot which crosses the threshold on the New Year's morning ; that first-foot must be a light-haired, fair-complexioned man. First-foot must bring something in with him, and on no account may anything be taken out of the house till something has been brought in : Take out, then take in ; bad luck will begin. Take in, then take out, good luck comes about. Heanley, p. 7. Mumby. ' We reckon to have a log on New Year's Eve,' remarked a parishioner, and my aunt at Lincoln, when I was staying there, said, ' You must see first of all on a New Year's morning, one of the opposite sex (not a member of your own family).' Boys go round and wish the women a Happy New Year, adding * and I've brought you a bit of stick.' Girls do the same to the men, and both expect rewards, in the shape of current coin. Many people are most particular to open a Bible first of all, saying that the verse the eye first rests on (or thumb touches) foretells what the new year will be. A piece of green is also to be brought in and placed in the Bible. It is very unlucky to see the new moon for the first time through glass. Whatever you do on New 1 70 Festivals. Year's Day you 11 be doing all the year. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 139. New Year Ringings. — NORTH, pp. 226-232. Kyme. It is a trait of character which had not expired in the middle of the last century, that the lower classes pertinaciously retained the custom of converting most of the old festivals into a holiday. Thus William Hall, the Kyme water poet, who was born about that period says — *■ 1 perfectly remember, old Mr. Anthony Peacock, uncle to the late Anthony Peacock, Esq. threatening to horse- whip Frank Pears, the tailor, because he would not go to mend the great mill (Engiven) sail-cloths on old Christmas day.' In the present age it is scarcely known by the same class of people when old Christmas day arrives. — OLIVER (3), p. 4, footnote. Grantham. There was generally gaiety astir on Twelfth Night, the parting hour of Christmastide. We youngsters were once (perhaps twice) asked to a party where some of the amusement provided consisted in ' drawing for characters.' A bag filled with folded papers was handed round and each of us was invited to take one, which on being opened was found to be a roughly coloured print of Sir Tilbury Nogo, Miss Fanny Fanciful, or some such personage whose character we might assume, and to whose name we were called upon to answer for the rest of the evening, during which we ought to have paid especial respect to the boy or girl whose luck had made them King and Queen. I do not believe this was at all a Grantham custom at the time [in the Fifties] of which I speak, though it may have been so when our hostess (who had grand-children about her) was in her prime. G. J., June 29, 1878. Epiphany.— ^^Q HaXEY HooD-GamE, ParT II., Section III., Games. Festivals, , 171 f'f^Addlethorpe. "L; Itm. reseuyd apo ploughe day - - u]s. \\]d. Addlethorpe Churchwarden's Accounts, a.d. 1542. — Oldfield, p. no. Holbeach. It. to Wm. Davy the sygne whereon the plowghe did stond ------ xvj. A Boake of the Stuffe in the Cheyrche of Holbeach [1547]. — Church Furniture^ p. 237. Leverton. Plough Light. — 1498. Resseuyd of y* plowth lyth of leuton xb. Leverton, p. 6. 1 526. Of Thomas Sledman of benyngton for debt of Robert warner to y^ plough lyght _ . - xx^. Leverton, p. 17. I 5 3 1 [?]• C)f Thomas burton for debt of y^ plow- lyght ---_-- xx<3?. Leverton, p. 2 i . 1557. 5f of John Bushe and adlard Greyne for the sopper light ----- x.?. 1558. Bt vpon plugh muday for sopperes light \]s wd. 1559. Resaued Of willyam Wastlare jun & John pullw'tofte of the plowygh lyght mone - xvijV. Leverton, pp. 29-30. Plough Monday [?] — 1577. Rec"^ of the Plowe maysters - xxij.y viijV. Leverton, p. 33. 161 1. For ayle on plowmunday - - xijV Leverton, p. 36. Louth. Item, for xxiiij*// wax to Robert Bayly for iiij tapers to here abowt the sacrament bowght with mony gatherd on plowghe monday and syns - xiji". Excerpts from the Parish Books. — Notitice Ludce^ p. 48. 172 Festivals, Plough-Light. — Frequent are the allusions in the Parish Registers to the plowlight, a word which, after much inquiry, I think may mean a tribute gathered by, or for the plowmen, and is synonymous with plowalms, as the following sentence intimates : — * de qualibet caruca juncta inter Pascha et Pentecostem unum denarium qui dicitur Plowalmes,' apud Sanctum Ivonem. Or the word plow- light may signify a taper kept at the expense, and in behalf of the plowmen near the holy sepulchre, a custom by no means uncommon. . . . I have nothing to add, further than quoting some of the passages where the word plowlight occurs in the Register : ' Memd. that there was gather d of the plowelighte mony _ _ _ . . viijj. xflf. Whereof paid to the ploughe men - - - ijj. Item. Payde to Thomas WoUarby for the plowe lyght --._.- iijj. * Also paid to the ploo lyght - . - xvjV. Mem. That William Glew hathe gyven this yeare a reede to the lightyng of the sepulchre light, and other lyghts in the chirche, conteynyng v yardes of the lengthe/ After the destruction of the altars, guilds, processions, and many of the festivals of the papal church, there was no station or trimmer for the plowlight, and the custom died of . . . neglect. — NotiticB LudcB^ pp. 220, 221. Sutterton. 1490. Among the receipts this year occurs a sum of xj paid by ' Thomas Raffyn of ye plowlyth.' This plough-light was no doubt the lamp of one of the parish gilds. There was a plough-light at Lever- ton, near Boston, and another at Louth. There was a plough gild at Kirton in Lindsey and in many other places. The following entry was to be seen in the church accounts of Holbeach ; it occurs in a list of church goods disposed of by the wardens in 1549: * To Wm. Davy, the i Festivals. 173 sygne whereon the plowyghe did stand.' * It would seem from this that a plough was one of the ornaments with which that church was decorated. Probably it hung on the wall in some conspicuous place near to the gild-altar. — E. Peacock, Churchwardens' Accounts of Saint Mary's^ Sutterton, p. 3. The receipts for this year [1525] shew that there were five lights in the church exclusive of that before the high altar. They were called the May-light, the ' Hognar's '- light, the Plough-light, the Sepulchre-light, and All Soul's- light. — lb. p. 10. Waddington. In the old Churchwarden's Book of Wad- dington there is under the date 1642, the appointment of four persons as ' Plowmeisters.' These appointments con- tinue to be entered annually for about a hundred years. It further appears that these plough masters had in their hands certain monies called plough money, which they undertook to produce on plough-day {i.e. first Monday after Twelfth Day). The form of undertaking is as follows : ' Andrew Newcome hath in his hands the sum of xx"' and hath promised to bringe the Stocke upon plow-daye next, and hath hereto sett his hande' (1642). And ninety-six years later : * Memorandum that John Foxe hath in his hands £2 10 of the Plow-money which sum I acknowledge myself indebted to the town of Waddington ' (1738). Occasionally there are undertakings to bring in the rent or interest of it as well as the * stock ' or principal, and it would seem that some of it at least was spent in a festal manner, as on Jan. 7th, 1 706, there is an entry : ' On plow-day y^ 7 January paid to the Ringers and Minstrels .----14 Spent at the same time _ . . 19 L. N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 86, 2>7. *Marrat, ^ Hist. Linc.y' ii., 104. 1 74 Festivals, I should be thankful if some one more learned than myself in Ecclesiology would explain when and where the * Ploweth ' light was usually lit. Was it at Rogation-tide, when the coming crops were prayed for, or was it on what we still call Plough Monday ? — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 47. Wainfleet. Item to the Ploweth lyght there vi^. [The there referring to the church of our Lady, Wainfleet] The Will of Robert Barret, of Wainfleet made April 2%th, 1527.— L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 48. Wigtoft [1532]. fy rst recevid of fohn atkynson and Robt Shepperd, for the plowght lyght - - - -168 Accompts of Churchwardens, p. 219. Wigtoft [1535]. Itm. recevyd of y^ plowght lyght - -168 Accompts of Churchwardens, p. 226. Wigtoft. Plough-gathering [1575 ]. — Receid of Wyllm clarke & fohn Waytt, of y® plou- gadrin - - - - - -100 Accompts of Churchwardens, p. 240. Bully-buck. — A fool in the game of Plough-bullocks. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 47. Besom Bet — A plough-boy who at ' plough-jagging ' time impersonates an old woman with a besom. — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 22. Blether-Dick. — A character among mummers. — E. PEA- COCK, II., vol. i., p. 56. Plough-jags. — Hobby-herse. — One of the ' plough-jags ' dressed so as to look like a horse. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 273. I. of Axholme. Largus, i.e. largesse. — The cry of the plough-jags, when they go from house to house to perform and beg. — Cf PECK, Ace. of Isle of Axholme, 278 ; E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 153. Festivals, 175 One of the mummers in the Lincolnshire Plough Monday Procession usually wears a fox's skin, in the form of a hood, and ' Bessy ' a bullock's tail under her gown, which he holds in his hand when dancing. — P. H. DiTCHFIELD, Old English Customs ^ 1896, p. 49. Axholme. The plough-jacks on Plough Monday come round dressed like morris-dancers with the fool as * Billy Buck/ a boy as the maiden, two rival suitors, and another as the old witch in a red cloak with a besom, with which she sweeps them all out, after the play is ended. Some- times they come with horse-cloths over their heads and ride * hobby-horse,' and this often leads to horse-play, and fights used to take place between the rival parties of villages on the opposite sides of the Trent. — Anderson, P- 79. Plough-boys. — Country-men, who go about dressed in ribbon, etc., as 'Morris (Moorish) dancers on Plough Monday, perform the sword-dance, etc. One is dressed as ' Maid Marion,' and is called the witch, another in rags, and is called the fool, etc., etc. — Thompson, p. 718. Plough-boys^ Plough-bullocks^ Plough-jags. — Morris Dancers. Plough Bullocks are characters now almost unknown, but there are persons living who well remember these itinerant Thespians, about the period of Plough Monday (Jan. 8th), exhibiting their performance wherever they found people's doors not barred against them. Like the mummers of the ' olden tyme,' they had the wild man and the jester combined in one character, who, with his conical cap, and in a dress entirely covered with shreds of various coloured cloth, seemed to be the qS\\^{ persona dramatis. Another character designated * Sweet Sis,' was undertaken by one of the more juvenile of the company, and a third 176 Festivals, named * old Joan/ both habited in female costume, the former to represent an attractive young lady, and the latter a repulsive, brazen-faced vtroman, were the most conspicuous performers. The others, some half-dozen youths, having their rustic attire covered with bunches of gaudy-coloured ribbons,being merelysupernumeraries. The blundering manner in which each performed his part, made the plot or theme almost unintelligible, except that the former of the two lady characters, by her fastidiousness, lost her lover (he in shreds with a conical cap) whom the coarse homeliness of ' old Joan ' won. The amount col- lected by these plough-bullocks was often considerable, and was expended in giving a treat to their friends, male and female. These rustic balls gave rise to results that caused their suppression, and the custom of maurice dancing or plough-jagging (another name it had) ceased. — Brogden, pp. 151,152. Plough-jags. — The following dialogue [is] used by plough-jags in some parts of the country. The principal characters are Beelzebub, a fool, a doctor, a woman and baby, a soldier, a collector, etc. They commence by singing outside a house : ' Good master and good mistress. As you sit by the fire, Remember us poor plough-boys Who travel through muck and mire. The mire is so deep : we travel far and near To wish you a happy and prosperous New Year.' The fool knocks and asks permission to show their play as follows : * In comes I, Tom Fool, The biggest fool you've ever seen ; There's five more little boys out here, By your consent they shall come in.' Leave having been obtained he bids them ' step up.' The soldier enters first and sings a song which appears Festivals, 1 77 to be ad lib. ; I can hear o^ no particular words. Next enters one of the company dressed as a woman. Woman. In comes I, old Dame Jane, With a neck as long as a crane, Long have I sought thee, now I've found thee : Tommy, bring the baby in. \Lad hands her a sham baby. Enter Beelzebub. Beelzebub. In comes I, old Beelzebub, In my hand I carry my club, Under my arm a whit-leather dripping pan, Don't you think me a funny old man ? Is there any old woman in this company who dare stand before me? Woman. Yes, me. [Beelzebub knocks her down. Fool. Beelzebub, Beelzebub, what hast thou done ! Killed poor old dame Jane and lamed her son. Five pounds for a doctor ! Beelzebub. Ten to stop away. Fool. Fifteen to come in in a case like this. Enter DOCTOR. Doctor. In comes I, the Doctor. Fool. How became you a doctor? Doctor. I travelled for it. Fool. Where did you travel ? Doctor. England, France, Ireland, Spain, Now I've come to doctor England again. Fool. What diseases can you cure? Doctor. Hipsy, pipsy, palsy, and gout. Pains within and pains without, Heal the sick, and cure the lame. Raise the dead to life again. Fool. Now try your skill. {Doctor takes hold of Woman^s ankle. Fool. Is that where her pulse lies? Doctor. Yes, the finest and most delicate part about a lady. Her pulse beats nineteen times to the tick of my watch once. This woman is not dead, but in a trance, If she can't dance we can't sing. So raise her up and let's begin, \^The Collector here takes the hat round while the others dance about. M 178 Festivals, The fool leaves first, when the others sing as follows : Good master and good mistress, You see our fool is gone, We make it up in business To follow him along. We thank you for civility And all you gave us here. We wish you all, good night. And a prosperous new year. \Exeunt omnes. The soldier is always introduced decked with streaming ribbons. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 88, 89. Hibaldstow. The hundred years which have just con- cluded witnessed the disappearance of several ancient customs, but the Plough Monday pageant has survived into the twentieth century, though not without modifica- tion. The North Lincolnshire ' plough-jags,' for instance, have gone from house to house this season fantastically attired ; and if they no longer drag the plough of olden times with them, they are still sometimes accompanied by a fiery and curveting hobby-horse. It may perhaps be worth while to enshrine the following version of the * ditties ' recited by the mummers in the pages of * N. & Q.,' for who knows how long or how short a time may elapse before they are discarded and forgotten ? The following dialogue is printed as written down for Miss Fowler of Winterton, by W. A., from the dictation of his father, who lives in the parish of Hibaldstow. It contains one interesting idiom, ' War out ! ' which Miss Fowler herself takes down in another version as ' Where out ! ' The words appear to mean * Be wary ! ' * Pay attention ! ' * Look out ! ' or, as Lincolnshire people fre- quently exclaim, * Mind yersens ! * Otherwise the only noteworthy thing about the rime is that the combat which should occur is omitted, and consequently no doctor appears to bring the fallen champion to life. Festivals, 179 Ploughboys. Clown^ {ist actor). Good evening, ladys and Gentlemen, I am making rather a bole call ; But Christmas time is a merry time, I have come to see you all. I hope you will not be ofended For what I have got to say : Here is a few more jolly fellows Will step in this way. Soldier^ No. 2nd. I am a Recruited seagent Arriving here just now : My orders is to enlist all Who follow the cart and plough. Foreign Traveller, 3rd. 0 endeed, mr seagant, As I suppose you are, You want us bold malishal lads To face the Boer war. Will (We'll) boldly face the enemy And do the best we can, And if they dont prove civil We will slay them every one. 1 am a Foreign traveller, I have travelled land and sea. And nothing do I want but a wife To please me the rest part of my life. Lady, 4th. I am a lady bright and gay, The fortune of my charm, And scornfully I'm thrown away Into my lover arms. 3rd {i.e. the Foreign Traveller). I have meet my dearest jewel ; She is the comforts of my life. And if she proves true to me I entend her been my wife. 1 80 Festivals. Farmer^ ^th. Madam, it is my desire, If I should be the man All for to gain your fancy, love, I will do the best I can. I have got both corn and cattle, And everything you know. Besides a team of horses To draw along the plough. Lady. Young man you are deceitful. As any of the rest ; So for for {sic) that reason I will have Them I love best. Soilder (sic). Come me lads, who is bound for listing, And gan along with me ; You shall have all kinds of liquor While you are in our company. Indian King, No. 6. War out ! me lads, and let me come in ! For I am the old chap called Indian King. They all have been trying me to slay ; But you see I am alive to this very day. Hoby Horse, No. y. In comes a four year old cout, A fine as ever was bought : He can hotch and he can trot 14 miles in 15 hours just like nought. Lady Jane No. 8. In comes Jane with a long leg crayn Rambling over the midow : Once I was a blouming young girl, But now I am a down old widow. No 2 {i.e. the Soldier). Gentlemen, and ladies. You seen our fool is gone ; We'll make it our business To follow him along ; Festivals, 1 8 1 We thank you for civility That you have shown us here ; We wish you a merry Christmas And a happy new year. The introductory speech of the clown given below differs from that in the above dialogue. It was copied by Miss Mina Fowler from the version of a village boy in Winterton, but the rest of the ' ditties ' have still to be collected. In comes I, ohs (IVe?) never been before, With my big head and my little wit. If my head be big and my wit be small I'll act Tomfool among you all. Ah, Ah, Ah, you and me, Little brown juden (jug?), I love thee. If I had a cow that gave such milk I'll clothe her in the richest silk. I'll feed her on the best of hay, And milk her forty times a day. In comes I, hungry and dry. Please will you give us a bit of pork-pie. The request which concludes this speech smacks of the soil, for pork-pie is a favourite dish among high and low in the county of Tennyson and Newton, where ' pig-meat ' is held in great esteem. N. Lincolnshire Wolds. The next dialogue was repeated to Miss Fowler at Winterton by Mrs. I., who gave it as used on * the hillside ' (the western slope of the wolds in North Lincolnshire) some twenty-five years ago. It is to be noticed that in this version, as in the one from Hibald- stow, the hobby-horse can ^hotch,* whatever pace that word may mean, while a long-legged crane is again referred to in 'Jane's' speech. It may be that the heron, not the true crane, has suggested the line. The latter bird is now only a chance visitor, while the former is, or was till lately, sometimes called the crane, its more common name being heronsew. The 'Doctor's' part includes an allusion to bagpipes (here possibly a comic name for the lungs), 1 82 Festivals, which were once well-known instruments of music in the county. An old man who could play the Lincolnshire pipes was still living in the neighbourhood of Kirton-in- Lindsey in the earlier half of the nineteenth century, but both the player and his pipes have now vanished. Plough-jags' Ditties. The Hobby-Horse. Here comes a four-year-old colt (cowt) As fine a filly as ever was bought (bowt) He can 'otch an' he can trot, An' he can carry a butter-pot Nine miles high wi'out touching the sky. Jane^ or Besom Betty, In comes Jane with a long-legged crane, Creeping over the meadow ; Once I was a blooming maid, But now a down owd widow. (She sweeps about with her broom.) The Soldier. I'm a recruiting serjeant Arrived 'ere just now ; My orders are to 'list all That follow cart and plough, / Likewise fiddlers, tinkers, ( And all that can advance. V I should like to see our fool dance. Ah! but I can sing. Come all you lads, that's a mind for listin' Come with me and be not afraid : You shall have all kinds of liquor. Likewise dance with a pretty maid. The Fool is supposed to kill one of the men, and then they shout, ' Dead I and Where's the doctor?' The Doctor. Here I am, the doctor ; I can cure the itch, the stitch The blind, the lame. And raise the dead to life again. Festivals. 183 I once cured a man that had been in his grave nine years. Take hold of my bottle till I feel his pulse — And every time he stirr'd his bagpipes played — Cheer up, Sam, and let's have a dance. The Indian King. (He appears as a black man with a white dress.) Where out ! my lads, let me come in, I'm the chap they call 'the Indian King.' The Lady. I'm a lady bright and gay, The truth to you I'll tell. What did the Fool say? Kirton-in-Lindsey. The following variant of the play, which was written down for me by J. H., a Kirton-in- Lindsey man, who before his marriage used to be one of the performers, contains the word ' sieve ' in connexion with a hat : And not much sieve left in the lining, * Sleave-silk ' or * sleave ' formerly meant the soft floss-silk used for weaving. ... In the plough -jag's play it would seem to signify either silken fabric, or the nap on such a fabric when woven with a satin-like surface. Part i. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen all, Xmas being a merry time We thought we would give you a call : And if you will listen To what I've got to say. For in a short time there will be Some more pretty boys and girls this way. Some can dance and some can sing ; By your consent they shall come in. Part ii. In comes a recruiting seargant, As I suppose you are. You want some bold malitia men, To face the rageing war. 1 84 Festivals, We will bravely face the enemy, And do the best we can, And if they don't prove civil, We will slay them every man. Part hi. {Lady sings.) In comes a lady bright and gay. Good fortunes and sweet charms ; I've scornfully being thrown away Out of some lover's arms. He swears if I don't wed with him, As you all understand. He'll list all for a soldier, And go to some foreign land. First Man says, Pray madam if them be his thoughts let him go, He never meanes to wed with you, But prove your overthrow. When poverty once begins to pinch, In which it will some day, He'll have another sweetheart And with her he'll run away. Lady. Thank you, kind sir, for your advice Which you have given to me. I never meant to wed with him, But have him for to know I'll have another sweetheart And along with him I'll go. 4tk Man. In comes I, King George, With courage stout and bold : With this bright sword I won Ten thousand pounds in gold. I fought a fiery dragon. And brought him to the slaughter, And by that means I won The queen's eldest daughter. I 'ashed him and smashed him as small as flies, And sent him to jamacia to make mince-pies. Festivals. 185 2nd Man says. Thou 'ashed me and smashed me as small as flies, And sent me to jamacia to make mince-pies. Hold thy lies or my blood will rise ! If thou art the King I dare face the. Then arises a duel between the 2nd man and the King. The King knocks the 2nd man down. King, Dr. King. Dr. Five pounds for a Dr. No Dr. under ten. Ten pounds for a Dr. In comes I, the Dr. King. How comes you to be the Dr. ? Dr. By my travels. King. Where have you travelled from? Dr. From the fireside to the bedside, and from the bedside to the old corner cupboard, where there I have had many a nice bit of pork-pie and mince-pie, that makes me such a bold fellow as I am. King, What can you cure? Dr. Almost anything. The itch, the pitch, tlie palsy, gout, Pains within, and aches without. If this man 'as got 19 diseases within him I will fetch 21 out. Take hold of this bottle while I feel on this mans pulse. King. Where do you feel on his pulse? Dr. Where it beats the strongest. This man's not dead he his only in a trance Rise up my good man and have a dance. (The lady and the 2nd man dances.) 1 86 Festivals, 6th Man, In comes poor old lame Jane Leaping over the meadow ; Once I was a blooming girl, But now I am a down old widow. You see my old hat his boath greacey and fat, And that you can tell by the shineing ; There his holes in the crown, and holes all round, And not much sieve left in the lineing. Then all sing. Good master, and good mistress, As you sit round the fire. Remember us poor plough-boys That go through mud and mire : The mire is so deep. And the water runs so clear : We wish you a merry Xmas, And a happy New Year. When a portion of this play was acted by very young lads a few years ago, * the Doctor,' who then found the patient's pulse in his shin, wore a top hat that was much too large. This imposing headgear lent him an appear- ance which was all that could be desired when it was held up by his ears, but at certain disastrous moments these supports would fail, and sudden eclipse overtake the actor. It must be owned, however, that while wrestling with the difficulties thus caused, and throughout the whole scene, he like his companions succeeded in preserving a funereal gravity of deportment. It was only from the sense of the words uttered, not from intonation or gesture, the spectators could gather that they were witnessing a drama which had been conceived in a certain spirit of levity. Even the allusion to pork-pie failed to evoke a gleam of animation. The wife of J. H., who supplied this dialogue, was once much alarmed when she was a girl living as servant at Walton-le-Dale, near Tattershall, for a man disguised as Festivals. 187 a sheep (see Christmas Tup, 9th S., ii., 511) opened the outer door of the house, in which she happened to be alone. He was one of a set of plough-jags ; but she could not describe his mates and their costumes, for, startled and afraid she ' banged the door to,' to keep the gang from entering. Usually ' the lady,' ' lame Jane,' who represents a rough old woman with a besom, ' the soldier,' and ' the king ' are dressed with some regard to character. The plough-jags with no spoken parts, who used to be the bullocks drawing the plough, or some- times sword players, it may be, should, properly speaking, wear very tall beribboned hats, with white shirts over their other clothes. These shirts should also be trimmed with ribbons and other ornaments ; but the garments are seldom seen now — perhaps because white linen shirts are at present rarely kept for wearing on high days and holi- days by the men themselves, or by the friends from whom they can borrow. The fool should be dressed in skins, or in snippets of brightly coloured rags, and should be armed with a bladder at the end of a whip, or some such weapon. — N. & Q.^, vol. vii., pp. 322, 323, 324, 363, 364. St, Agnes' -Eve [Jan. 20].— See Section VII. Candlemas Day [Feb. 2]. — Any goose falls to lay by Old Candlemas Day — in allusion to the saying : — New Candlemas Day, good goose will lay : Old Candlemas Day, any goose will lay. Cole, p. 44. Valentine's Day. — On the 14th of February we duly sent and received * vollantines ' — •z/<3:/entines we set down as an alien affectation. One verse which we were fond of scrawling to each other is too universally known for me to venture to quote : it refers to the redness of the rose, the blueness of the violet [etc.]. . . . But there was another favourite which I will not withhold, as it refers 1 88 Festivals. to the significance of colours, a subject of no small interest : " If you love me, love me true ; Send me a ribbon, and let it be blue. If you hate me let it be seen ; Send me a ribbon, and let it be green." G.. J., June 29, 1878. Valentine's Day is dead and gone. The modern Christ- mas cards have all but supplied the place of the missives, some of them very coarse and vulgar, which were common enough twenty years ago, i.e. 1879, ^"d I do not think that at any time Valentine's Day had in Marshland the importance it had further north. — Heanley, p. 7. Brusting Saturday. — The Saturday before Shrove Tues- day, on which day frying-pan pudding is eaten. This is made of the same material as pancake, but is thicker, and of a crumbling character. — Brogden, p. 3 i. Pharson's Tuesday is given as a synonym for Shrove Tuesday in an article, * From the Heart of the Wolds * (Lincolnshire), in the Cornhill Magazine for August, 1882.— N. & Q.«, vol. vi., p. 166. [' Pharson's ' said to be a mistake for Fastens. — lb. p. 334.] Pan-cake Bell, — C. North, pp. 214-219, 282, 519, 658. Fritters. — Puffs or pancakes made with apples (cut up) or fruit in them. Ex. We'll have fritters on Shrove Tuesday.— Brogden, p. 74. Flap-jack. — A very large pan- cake. Ex. I'll have a flap-jack on Fasten Tuesday. — Brogden, p. 70. In Lincolnshire the first pancake which the farmer's wife fries on Shrove Tuesday is given to the cock in the crewyard. Old wives cannot be persuaded to fry another cake until one has been given to the cock. The Festivals. 189 daughter of the house watches the ceremony, and as many hens as come to help the cock to eat the pancake so many years she will remain unwed. — Addy, p. 65. Grantham. Shrove Tuesday was the orthodox day for beginning top-whipping and battledore and shuttlecock- playing ; these toys might be practised upon a week or so in advance, but that, I presume, was only like hunting in October, and did not count. To most of us pancakes were the raison d'etre of the day, and we eagerly listened for a bell which sounded from the church steeple some- time during the morning, and was, we were told, a signal specially designed to warn house-wives to prepare their batter. This so-called ' pancake-bell ' was, if I do not mistake, independent of the daily call to Matins. — G. J., June 29, 1878. [See Part II., Section III., for Games played on Shrove-Tuesday, including Cock-fighting.] Shrove- Tuesday. — See PART 11., Section I. for 'Saint Rattle Doll Fair, Crowland. Ash Wednesday was a festival in our esteem, for we feasted on apple-fritters. — G. J., June 29, 1878. Huttoft neighbourhood. ' Clerk Thursday.' — The name is given to the day following * Ash Wednesday,' and the school children consider themselves entitled to trick (or even force) the teacher into leaving the schoolroom, when they bolt the door and refuse admittance untit a holiday has been granted for the rest of the day. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 122. Grantham. — Allen's History of the County of Lincoln^ vol. ii., p. 308, states that the fair held at Grantham on the Monday before Palm Sunday for horses, horned cattle and sheep is called ' caring fair.' The appellation is derived from the old name by which the Sunday before Palm Sunday was popularly known, viz., Care Sunday. — N. & Q.8, vol. iv., p. 168. 190 Festivals, Crowland. Knives given away on St. Bartholomew's day. — Hist, and Antiq, of Croyland Abbey ^ pp. 73, J J. Palm- Sunday. — Palms, the flowers of a kind of willow, so called because they were formerly used instead of palms on Palm-Sunday. — E. Peacock, i., p. 187. Pussy-Paums. — The Catkins of the Sallow ; the so- called Palm or Paum ; sometimes called Goslings. — Cole, p. 114. Lent. — In Lincolnshire it is supposed that the catkins ought always to be in bloom by the fifth Sunday in Lent, and children search for them in places where the willow grows ; but when Easter falls early, and the season has been a cold and backward one, they are often almost impossible to find in the eastern and northern counties. — Dublin Review^ 1898, p. 145. Lincolnshire Marshland. Good Friday. — It is worth while noting that, whereas throughout most northern counties it is still deemed most impious to disturb the earth in any way then, and seeds sown on that day will never thrive ; yet, in Marshland, Good Friday is the day of all days in the year on which to plant potatoes and sow peas, inasmuch as on that day the soil was redeemed from the power of the Evil one.* But, on the other hand, I have a distinct recollection of a Good Friday afternoon when one of our horses had cast a shoe in driving to Skegness Church, and the blacksmith there flatly refused to put another on, for ' owd Scrat 'ud hev' him sartain sewer, if 'e put hand to hammer or nails the whole blessed daa' — a distinct influence from the terrible purpose to which they had been put on the first Good Friday. — Heanley, p. 8. * In North West Lincolnshire, too, potatoes are often set on Good Friday, and other gardening is readily done. I never heard a theological reason given for the practice, however. Festivals, 191 At Kirton-in-Lindsey it [the cross] seems to be formed by merely drawing a knife twice across the top of the bun ; in some places stamps are used, and in my child- hood at Bottesford, I can remember seeing them made by pricking out a cross with a three pronged fork, thus : Dublin Review^ 1898, p. 148. Good Friday we usually called Hot Cross Bun Day. ... I used to wonder how the buns got their name, for I never saw a cross upon them : their shape was always triangular, and that, I believe, was their only peculiar characteristic. — G. J., June 29, 1878. When a boy at home, as regularly as pancakes on Shrove Tuesday we expected fish for dinner on Good Friday, and veal, with lemon, followed by a custard, for dinner on Easter Sunday ; but I never heard any reason assigned. . . . Many people yet have veal at Easter ; but whether because it is then in season or not I cannot say. I do it merely from long habit, and because it reminds me of home and boyish days. — N. & Q.^, vol. vii., p. 238. I was informed at the Easter of 1895 that in two villages in North Lincolnshire it was the custom to have for breakfast on Good Friday some of the liver of the calf, which is always killed the day before to provide veal for Easter Sunday. I never heard of this before and do not believe that the practice is at all a common one. — Dublin Review, 1898, p. 149. Kirton-in-Lindsey. A laundress here refused to do any washing upon the day before Good Friday in this year [1897]. She said that 'if any one hangs out clothes to dry on Holy Thursday they will have bad luck all the rest 192 Festivals, of the year.' By ' year ' was meant until the following Holy Thursday, not merely until the end of 1897. I have heard another woman here say it was unlucky to wash upon this day. Can some one give a reason for this belief? It does not apply to any other form of work ; and so far as I can make out no other day in Holy Week has any similar superstition attached to it. Good Friday is, of course, observed as a holiday ; that is, the shops are not open and the labouring men do not go to work ; but it has always been the custom for them to set the potatoes in their own gardens upon this day. — N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 406. The following story illustrative of the Lincolnshire superstition that persons born on Good Friday night cannot be frightened, was told me by a fellow-servant of its hero and its victim. There was a lad living on the farm who had been born on Good Friday night, and who, therefore, could not be frightened, One of his mates determined to test his immunity, and, covering himself with a white sheet, waylaid him on a dark night in the churchyard. The lad coolly asked what he was ' fooling at ' and knocked him down with a stick he was carrying. When he got home he was asked by some who were in the plot whether he had met anything. He replied that Jim had tried to frighten him, but that he had * larned ' him a lesson. As ' Jim ' did not return to the house, he was sought for, and found dead. The ' lesson ' had been effectual. This happened some forty or fifty years ago, I believe. — N. & Q.^ vol x., p. 92. Good Friday^ Shooting on. — See under FIFTH OF November. On the ' Queen of Festivals ' as also on Whitsunday we made a great point of appearing in Church in some new article of dress, being fully persuaded that Festivals, 193 the little birds would mute their scorn upon us if we were not careful thus to mark the occasion. — • G. J., June 29, 1878. Clee. The parishioners present the Vicar, every Easter, with a quantity of eggs collected in the parish ; which was anciently considered as a peace offering, but now as a sort of commutation for the tithe of that article throughout the year. — Man. and Cus., p. 39. Cheesecakes were held to be in season at Eastertide. — G. J., June 29, 1878. Hoik Tuesday was the Tuesday fortnight after Easter- day. . . . The men and women with great glee, on this day, stopped the streets with long ropes, and entangling the passengers, kept them in durance until they pur- chased their redemption by a small fine ; and the stock thus acquired was expended in a supper. In the above feat the girls were the most active, and always produced the greatest share of the booty. — OLIVER (3), p. iii. In [Flete] street was celebrated annually the public game of the Hoik or Hock, which was derived from the German Hocken^ in reference to the custom of bindings which was practised by the women upon the men on Hock Tuesday, a fortnight after Easter. It was a merry festival at which the female part of the commuuity reigned absolute. The young men and women amused themselves on this day by stopping the streets round the market-place, and seizing on the passengers, kept them in durance until they purchased their emancipation with a small fine. The stock of money thus acquired, was expended in a feast at the close of the day. In the execution of this feast the women were the most active and always produced the greatest share of the booty. — Oliver, iv., pp. 197, 198. All Fools' Day. — The buffoonery of April and Valen- tine days is so well known all over England, as to 1 94 Festivals, render it unnecessary for me to say more than that it is not omitted in the county of Lincoln. — Pop. Sup., p. 119. On ' All-Fool's-Day/ April i st, boys are sent to some ill-natured person for a * penno'th of stirrup-oil,' which they sometimes get in the form of a beating with a stirrup leather. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 525. Grantham. — During the morning the fun was fast and furious, but tricksters calmed down in the afternoon as their victims had a right of reply in : 'Twelve o'clock is past and gone, And you're a fool for making me one.' G. J., June 29, 1878. St. MarMs'Eve, Divination on. — See SECTION VII. Cf. also Folk-Lore^ vol. xiv., p. 97. Cattle kneeling on St. Mark's Eve. — See Folk-Lorey vol. xiv., p. 94. Holy Thursday, or Ascension Day. — Thursday but one before Whit-Sunday; cannot fall before April 30, nor after June 2. This is the season when circuits of parishes are performed, in order to preserve and maintain their respective boundaries. — Lincolnshire Cabinet, 1829, p. 14. Grimsby. The Church House, where the spits, crocks, and other utensils were deposited, that they might be ready for use at the Whitsuntide festival, when the young people met together for sports peculiar to the season, including boating, dancing, shooting at butts, etc., while the elders sat with their cans of ale before them to watch the games and settle disputes. A green arbour, called Robin Hood's bower, was put up in the churchyard opposite, where maidens gathered contributions. The Churchwardens brewed whitsun ales, and sold them in the church, distributing the profits to the poor inhabitants. This festival was kept in great state at Grimsby, and Festivals. 195 it is thus described by an eye-witness. An individual of each sex was previously chosen to be lord and lady of the feast, who dressed themselves in character; and the great tithe-barn was fitted up with seats for the company, decorated with garlands, ribbons, and other showy ornaments. Here they assembled towards the evening to dance and regale themselves, and each young man was expected to treat his girl with a ribbon or favour. The lord and lady were attended by the proper officers, and a jester dressed in a party coloured jacket^ whose jokes and uncouth motions contributed to the entertainment of the company. The borough waits were also bound to attend with their instruments of music. — Oliver, iv., pp. 151, 152. Whitsun Ale. — An ale-feast at Whitsuntide. — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 277. Whitsun Cake. — A kind of cake eaten at Whitsuntide, made of layers of paste, sugar and spices. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 610. Messingham. May-tide. — On May even, the lads and lasses of the village, this being the concluding evening of their year's servitude, assembled at Perestow Hills and amused themselves with all sorts of gambols, such as pat aback, dip-o'-the-kit and blind man's buff; they then, preceded by twangling Jack the fiddler, danced their way to the town, when every one dispersed to their respective parents or friends, for a few days' mirth and relaxation, before they again resumed the labours of another year's servitude. . . . — MACKINNON, pp. 11, 12. May-Eve. — See also Section VII. We watched for village children with their 'garlands/ pretty, fragrant, beflowered structures of the bower-type, which they carried about covered with a cloth and were proud to show at a half-penny a peep. — G. J., June 29, 1878. 196 Festivals. Somerby, near Grantham. The first of May was ob- served in a very joyous manner by the young folks of this village. A number of children, sixteen in all, joined together in the collection of flowers, etc., and on Thursday morning they paraded the village, carrying on a pole, a large and handsome garland, which contained (in addition to the tasteful arrangement of flowers) a collection of fourteen dolls, the one representing the May Queen standing in the centre of the group. The proceedings were further enlivened by the children singing some favourite songs at the doors of the houses at which they asked to be remembered. In the afternoon, they sat down to a plentiful tea, which some kind friends had undertaken the trouble of arranging. The cost of the tea was defrayed out of the funds collected, and the balance was afterwards equally divided amongst the children. Another garland also deserves praise; this was accom- panied by a missionary-box, and coppers were solicited on behalf of the missionary cause. — G. J., May 3, 1890. Barnoldby-le-Beck. May Day was the village satur- nalia; not May i, but May Day by old style, May 13. Within the last twenty years we have heard in the village public shot after shot being fired behind the house for a kettle as a prize, while peals of laughter resounded through the still spring evening. Much fighting, drinking, and dancing went on at these village feasts thirty years ago; the 'lasses' ran races down the road for 'gown -pieces,' and donkey-racing was popular. The regular prizes for a donkey-race were: ist, a bridle; 2nd, a pair of spurs; 3rd, a jockey's whip. A powerful farmer of the parish stopped these varied entertainments because in a wet hay-time the men would not work, and always stayed off their ordinary labour for two or three days' drinking; *and a gude thing, too!' said a village wife, who told us of this suppression of the gaieties. [In a village five miles from Great Grimsby.] — Antiquary^ vol. xiv., p. 1 1. I Festivals. 197 Old May 'day. — The week after old May-day, is a feast held in the larger villages, the servants being at home with their friends. — Lincolnshire Cabinet^ 1829, p. 14. Lincolnshire Marsh. The first of May with all its old Maypole associations has no place left in Marshland now.* But when old Mayday comes then comes Carnival. It is the yearly hiring of farm servants. All those engaged at a yearly wage, and the maidservants in all but the best houses, take a week's holiday and rush from town to town in a constant whirl of amusement, which too often degenerates into debauchery. Out of many customs I may mention one connected with the hiring. No engagement holds till the hirer has handed over the fasten-penny, or earnest of the coming year's wage, and on this the recipient spits gravely ere he pockets it. Nowadays they spit for mere luck's sake, not knowing what they do. But it was, I believe, originally a charm against witches, who were supposed to 'eyespell' the first money paid away, but lost all power to do so after it had been placed in the mouth. — Heanley, p. 10. South Kyme. There used to be a Queen of the May and great festivities on May Day. — Fenland N. & Q., vol. iv., p. 325. Lenton. May -day Song. — In May 1865, I gave in these pages a May-day song, as sung by children in Huntingdonshire (3rd S., vii., 373), Subsequently I was able to give a more extended version of the song (3rd S., ix., 388). Since then I have frequently heard the May- day children sing this song, with more or less of omission and variation. This last May-day I again heard it sung at Lenton, near Folkingham, South Lincolnshire, and I again took down the words. But they were very nearly * Light, portable Maypoles are now carried round by bands of school- children at Kirton-in-Lindsey : but the modern May-Day observances have no connection with ancient tradition. — M.P. 198 Festivals. the same as those given at my second reference. There was, however, this verse: Good morning, lords and ladies, It is the first of May; We hope you'll view our garland, It is so smart and gay. The nightingale and cuckoo verse went thus: The cuckoo sings in April, The cuckoo sings in May, The cuckoo sings in June, In July she flies away. This was succeeded by two verses which are quite new to me, and it is for the purpose of quoting them that I make this note: The cuckoo sucks the bird's eggs To make her sing so clear; And then she sings 'Cuckoo' Three months in the year. In the third line the children imitated the cuckoo's double note: I love my little brother And sister every day; But I seem to love them better In the merry month of May. The children told me that they were taught this song four years since by the daughter of the late master of the Board School. — N. & Q.^ vol. i., p. 406. The Huntingdonshire song was imparted to the children by a person who had learnt it from her mother 40 years before. Here come us poor Mayers all, And thus we do begin — To lead our lives in righteousness For fear we should die in sin. To die in sin is a fearful thing. To die in sin for mourn; It would have been better for our poor souls If we had never been bom. ■Festivals. 199 We have been rambling through the night. And part of the next day, And, now we have returned back again, We have brought you a branch of May. A branch of May it looks so gay, Before your door does stand. It's only a sprout, but it's well budded out By the work of th' Almighty hand. Awake, awake, my pretty fair maids, And take your May-bush in. Or it will be gone ere to-morrow morn, And you'll say that we brought you none. Awake, awake, my pretty fair maids. Out of your drowsy dream. And step into your dairies all. And fetch us a cup of cream, If it's only a cup of your sweet cream, And a mug of your brown beer ; If we should live to tarry in the town. We'll call another year. Repent, repent you wicked men. Repent before you die. There's no repentance to be had When in the grave you lie. The life of man it is but a span, It flourishes like a flower; To-day we are, to-morrow we're gone, We're gone all in one hour. Now take a Bible in your hand, And read a chapter through ; And when the day of judgment comes, The Lord will think of you. The nightingale she sings by night. The cuckoo she sings by day; So fare ye well, we must be gone, And wish you a happy May. Ropsley. The above song is also printed in the Grantham Journal, May 9, 1903, after the following lines 200 Festivals, relating to the parish of Ropsley, five miles east of Grantham. Going a Maying. — This old custom was observed by the children on the ist of May. The garlands were made in the traditional oval shape, and were composed of cowslips^ wood anemones, crab-blossom, wall-flowers, primroses, and daisies. Dolls were placed on the garland, the chief doll (though the children did not know it) being the represen- tative of the goddess Flora, in the festival of the Roman Floralia. From the bases of some of the garlands, which were carried by means of a stick thrust through them, were hung ribbons and other gay-coloured material. The children took their garlands to the houses of the various residents, and sang their May-day song — a curious medley, in which religion figures after the manner of old times. The verses as at present rendered are given below : they have been handed down from mother to children, and have doubtless undergone considerable variation in the course of time : An Old May Song of Sixty Years Ago. In reply to an enquiry in our columns for the words of an old May song, a ccft-respondent sends the following,, which, he says, ' we used to sing sixty years ago ' : Remember us poor Mayers all, For here we do begin To lead our lives in righteousness, For fear we should die in sin. For to die in sin what a sad thing is that — To go where sinners mourn ; It would have been better for our poor souls If we never had been born. Oh, take a Bible in your hand, And go to Church and pray ; And when the Day of Judgment comes The Lord will think of you. Festivals. 201 For the life of a man it's no more than a span, It flourishes like a flower; We are here to-day, to-morrow we are gone — We are all gone in one hour. And when we are dead and in our graves. Our bodies to dust and clay, The nightingale shall sit and sing To pass our time away. Rise up, rise up, you pretty maids all, And out of your drowsy dream. And step into your dairy-house And fetch us a cup of cream. A cup of cream I do not mean, A bowl of your brown beer ; And if we should live to tarry in this town. We will call on you another year. I have a purse, a pretty little purse. It draws with a silken string ; And all we want is a little silver To line it well within. My song's begun and almost done, No longer can we stay ; So Heaven bless you all, both great and small. And send you a joyful May ! G. J., Apl. 22, 1905. Grimsby. May-Pole. — Here [in the Bull-Ring] stood the shaft or Maypole, . . . and May-day was always kept as a public holiday. ... It formed, I assure you, a very gay scene ; the pole decorated with garlands of flowers, various coloured ribbons and streamers, green boughs and festoons of painted ^^'g shells ; while both lads and lasses appeared in fancy costumes ; the queen of May outshining them all ; being dressed very gaily and attended by several other girls who were called her maids of honour ; she had also a young man called the captain, and under his command other inferior officers. And there was also Robin Hood, the friar, the fool, the dragon, and the. 202 Festivals, hobby-horse, all robed in character. The body corporate enjoyed the privilege of cutting down a tree in Bradley Wood, for the May-pole, whence it was fetched betimes in the morning by the whole party, and brought into Grimsby with great rejoicing and much ceremony. After it was reared in the Bull-ring, and decorated from top to bottom, the whole youthful population fell to dancing round it as if they were mad, while the seniors enjoyed themselves with substantial eatables and drinkables that had been provided in the old tithe-barn for the occasion. — Oliver, iv., pp. 189-190. Hemswell May -pole. — On a recent visit to the neigh- bourhood of Gainsborough, I went to Hemswell, a village at the foot of what is termed ' The Cliff,' in the northern division of the county of Lincoln. In the centre of the village I was surprised to see a /-pole. The pole proper stands between two stout posts about fifteen feet high. Near the top of them a strong iron bolt is passed through the whole. The posts are fixed firmly in the ground, while the pole between is loose at the bottom, but kept in place by a second transverse bolt near the ground, which is drawn out when the pole is wanted to be lowered ; which is done by getting a ladder and fixing a rope high up on the pole, by which it is pulled down, swinging on the top transverse bolt as on a pivot. It is steadied by another rope at the bottom. When decorated it is raised to its place again by pulling the bottom rope, and it is fixed by reinserting the lower transverse bolt. — N. & Q.®, vol. viii., pp. 184-185 ; WILKINSON, p. 167. Homcastle. It is dubious whether Bowbridge has its name from the arch of the bridge, or from its being the entrance into the town from Lindum, through the gate formerly called a Bow. This way is the may-pole-hill. . . . 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 Festivals, 203 wand, the bark peeled off, tied round with cowslips, a thyrsus of the Bacchanals : at night they have a bonfire and other merriment ; which is really a sacrifice, or religious festival. — Stukeley, i., p. 31 ; HiSSEY, pp. 354-355 ; cf. British Traveller^ p. 414, col. i. A peculiar rustic ceremony, which used annually to be observed at this place, doubtless derived its origin from the Floral games of antiquity. On the morning of May-day, when the young of the neighbourhood assembled to partake in the amusements which ushered in the festivals of the month of flowers, a train of youths collected themselves at a place to this day called the May Bank. From thence, with wands enwreathed with cowslips, they walked in procession to the may-pole, situated at the west end of the town, and adorned on that morning with every variety in the gifts Flora. Here . . . they struck together their wands, and scattering around the cowslips, testified their thankfulness for that bounty, which . . . enabled them to return home rejoicing at the promises of the opening year. That innovation in the manners and customs of the county, which has swept away the ancient pastimes of rustic simplicity, obliterated about forty years ago \i.e, 1780] this peculiar vestige of the Roman Floralia. — Weir, pp. 26-27. The other evening I was walking in a lane and observed a number of children with linked hands form a revolving circle round an imaginary May-pole, all singing : All around the May-pole, trit, trit, trot ; See what a May-pole I have got ; One at the bottom and two at the top ; All around the May-pole, trip, trip, trop. N. & Q.^ vol. X., p. 106. Kirton-in-Lindsey. Stuffed Chine. — At Kirton-in-Lindsey stuffed chine is eaten specially when the lads and lasses come home for a holiday at May-day, and also at the summer fair. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 243. 204 Festivals, May-Garlands. — See Folk-Lore, vol. ix., pp. 276, 365. May-Poles, — See Part I., Section II. Wigtofb. May 'light [1505 ]. — Itm. recevyd of y^ may lygthe of Estthorppe, 033 Accompts of Churchwardens^ p. 199. May-Day Peals. — NORTH, 236. Lincoln. [May] 16 F. May-day market, is a great hiring of servants. — Lincolnshire Cabinet, 1828, p. 120. May-hirings. — Between New and Old May day (some- times earlier) high constables hold statues for hiring servants. — Lincolnshire Cabinet^ 1828, p. 122. May Day. — That is Old May Day, 13th May, from which the annual hiring of farm servants is reckoned. — Cole, p. 89. [May-hirings are mentioned in E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 345 ; Lincolnshire Cabinet, 1828, pp. 120, 122. May-day. — The month before May-day, when scrubbing, whitewashing, and such like work, is done, before the old servants leave. In the Isle of Axholme, where the servants follow the Yorkshire custom of leaving their places at Martinmas, this work is frequently done in the Autumn, and is called * the back-end cleaning up.' — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 118. Pag-rag Day. — The day when servants change their places at May-day or Martinmas. — THOMPSON, p. 717. An old name for the day after May Day, that is. May 1 4th, when the farm-servants leave their places ; so-called from their ' pagging ' or carrying away their bundles of clothes on their backs. — COLE, p. 106. See E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 393 ; Wheeler, Appen- dix IV., p. 1 1. Festivals. 205 Pack-rag-day. — The 14th of May, the time when the servants in Lincolnshire pack up their clothes and change their places. — Brogden, p. 144. Hatton. Bank Holidays pass almost unnoticed, but May 1 4th, or Pag-rag day, is a great event, when the single farm servants, male and fen^ale, leave their places, or at least take a week's holiday, and spend the time in visiting their friends and going round to the different markets. The married men decide whether they will remain with their masters at Candlemas ; they have the privilege of attending what is called the labourer's market soon after that date, when they hire themselves again and leave their old places April 6th.— L. N. & Q., vol. v. : Nat. Hist. Section, p. 50. Oak Day. — The 29th of May is Royal Oak Day all England over, and I only refer to it here because there is another custom also attached to that day in Marshland. It marks the close of the birds'-nesting season, the boys considering it most unlucky to take eggs later, and mostly abstaining from so doing. — Heanley, p. ii. Grantliain. On the 29th of May, ' Nettle Day,' we hardly dared to venture out if we lacked the protection of a sprig of oak, as we then incurred the risk of being stung by nettles as a punishment for not manifesting a loyal memory of King Charles the Second's well-known adventure. Some few cottages were made gay by oak branches being fixed to the hasps that fastened the shutters back against the wall. — G. J., June 29, 1878. The 29th May, when school children wear oak leaves, and nettle those who have none ; they have a rhyme. ' Royal Oak Day, Twenty-ninth of May, If you won't gie us a haliday. We'll all run away.' — COLE, p. 1 01. Gainsborough. For some days previously the boys collect all the birds' eggs they can find or purchase, and early in the morning of the 29th, they may be seen 2o6 Festivals. returning from the woods in crowds, with an ample supply of oak. They next procure a large quantity of flowers, with which they construct a garland in the form of a crown, the apples of the oak being all gilded, surrounded by flowers and festoons of birds' eggs. The garland is then suspended across the street, and every little urchin being provided with a horn, some the natural horn of the cow, others of tin, similar to those formerly used by the guard of the mail coaches, they keep up throughout the day a most terrible blowing of horns, the doleful noise being ill in accordance with the festivity and rejoicing which the garlands are presumed to indicate. I have been unable to learn the origin or import of this singular custom. — N. & Q.\ vol. v., p. 307. Swineshead. * Oak-apple Day ' ... is yet celebrated by the bells of Swineshead . . . and also by sprays of oak leaves being worn. . . . Some six or seven years ago many of the engines of trains running upon the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway [after- wards the Great Central Railway] were decked with branches of oak on that day ; and it is no uncommon thing to see the plough boy adorn the heads of his horses with sprays of oak leaves in memory of King Charles's escape. — Church Customs^ p. 34. Clee. Trinity Sunday. — He who loves old forms and would keep the feast aright must dine upon stuffed chine and plate cheese-cakes at this season. . . . This village was famous in days of yore for its Mead. — Watson, pp. 58, 59. [Stuffed chine should also be eaten at the summer-fair, Kirton-in-Lindsey, and at Old May-day.] Corpus-Christi. — See PART II., SECTION III., Games. Winterton. A pleasure fair called ' Winterton Mid- summer' is held at Winterton, in Lincolnshire, on 6th Festivals, 207 July, and another * Midsummer ' is held on the same day at Haxey, in the same county ; these feasts having nothing to do with the dedication of the parish churches, they are simply festivals held about the summer solstice (Old Style).— N. & Q.^ vol. ix., p. 48. Sheep-clipping. — On the Wolds of Lincolnshire, the farmers always provided ' frummaty ' for breakfast at the * clippins ' (sheep shearings) ; but I never heard of its being eaten at Christmas. ... It was usual to give it, in almost unlimited quantities, to the families of all the labourers on the farm, to all the poor old women in the village, also to the ' young ladies ' at the Vicarage, in fact, to almost every one within reach. — N. & Q.^, vol. iv., p. 295. See Wheeler, Appendix IV., p. 7. Frumity, Frumenty. — A pottage made of previously boiled wheat, with milk, currants, raisins, spices, etc., once commonly made by the farmers to be given away to their neighbours on the sheep-shearing day. — Brogden, p. 74. Lammas-day^ which falls on the first of this month [August], is one of the four cross Quarter-days of the year, as they are denominated. Whitsuntide was formerly the first of these quarters, Lammas the second, Martinmas the third, and Candlemas the last ; and such partitions of the year were once equally common as the present divisions of Lady-day, Midsummer, Michaelmas, and Christmas. Some rents are yet payable at these ancient quarterly days in England, and they continue generally in Scotland. — Lincolnshire Cabinet, 1828, p. 135. Grimsby. — A bye-law of the Corporation provided that upon St. Bartholomew's day [Aug. 24], when the mayor went on his circuit, the Corporation and burgesses should assemble with him in the chapel of St. Mary Magdalene, and accompany him in his circuit about the town and fields, and not be absent or depart from him without licence under a penalty of fourpence. The day was 2o8 Festivals. ushered in, . . . with ringing of bells and other solemnities. The mayor and his brethren, in their robes, met at the Hospitium where divine service was performed in the above chapel belonging to that house by the chaplain thereof, in which service the 103rd and 104th Psalms were always used. They then perambulated the parish, or beat the bounds as it was technically phrased ; that is to say, they proceeded round the utmost extremity of the parish, attended by a considerable number of the inhabi- tants, and claimed the whole as belonging to the lordship of Grimsby, to the exclusion of all other claimants. They scourged little boys at the holes where the soil had been thrown out to mark the boundary line, and then gave them a penny each to sharpen their memory of the several termini. — Oliver, iv., pp. 142, 143. Harvest Supper. — In portions of Lincolnshire ... it is the custom for a farmer to give his men a supper at the end of the harvest, and this supper is locally termed 'horkey.'* — N. & Q.^ vol. vi., p. 387. Frumerty, a preparation of creed-wheat [wheat simmered till tender] with milk, currants, raisins, and spices in it. Given to the servants at harvest suppers. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. III. Cf. Folk-Lore, xiii., 92. Harvest-home, — In Lincolnshire hand bells are carried on the waggon ; and the rhyme runs : The boughs do shake and the bells do ring, So merrily comes our harvest in. Our harvest in, our harvest in, So merrily, etc. NORTH ALL, p. 262. Harvest-lord. — The chief reaper. Harvest-lady. — The second reaper, who, supplies the Mord's' place in his absence. — Brogden, p. 93. *This word is, so far as I know, never used in North Lincolnshire, and Mrs. Gutch has never heard it near Grantham. \ Festivals. 209 Lincolnshire Marsh. Harvest thanksgiving services have, I think, entirely supplanted the mell-supper in Marshland. When I was a boy every farmer held one, but now I do not know of a single survival. And old Dan Gunby, fowler and poacher, prince of scamps, but prince also of fiddlers, has been dead these twenty years, and with him have died the best traditions of the * melL' But no further back than last September [1899], I saw a veritable ' kern baby ' — a largish doll cunningly twisted out of barley straw, and perched up on a sheaf exactly facing the gate of the grand wheat-field in which it stood. I missed seeing the owner, a small freeholder, but men- tioning the matter to an old dame (of whom a Marshman would say, ' them as knaws aal she knaws hezn't no need to go to no schule '). She made a reply which proves that, whatever else the Marshman has learnt of late to doubt, he still firmly believes in the Devil and his angels : * Yis, she be thear to fey away t' thoon'er an' lightnin' an' sich-loike. Prayers be good enufif ez fur as they goas, but t' Awmoighty mun be strange an' throng wi' soa much corn to look efter, an' in these here bad toimes we moan't fergit owd Providence. Happen, it's best to keep in wi' both parties.' — Heanley, pp. 11, 12. A lady who is a native of Lincolnshire tells me that in the first quarter of the present century ' the old sow ' used to appear in th^t county at harvest suppers. To the critical eye this curious animal was nothing more or less than two men dressed up in sacks to personate a traditional visitor to the feast. Its head was filled with cuttings from a furze bush and its habit was to prick every one whom it honoured with its attentions. ' I used to be very much afraid of it when I was a child ' says my informant. ' That was part of the harvest supper which I never could like.' — N. & Q.^, vol. ix., p. 128. 'Last Sheaf Rites. — . . . This * nodding sheaf, the symbol of the god,' also assumes animal shapes. In Lincoln, for o 2IO Festivals, instance, it is figured as an old sow or * paiky.' — Daily Chronicle, 12 Sep., 1904. Michaelmas-Day. — Mr. Wynne invited me on * Minkle- day,' Friday, September 29, 1876. — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 487. Goose-feast. — Michaelmas. From the custom of eating geese on that day. — Brogden, p. 84. Michaelmas- Day. — See SECTION IV., GOBLINDOM, under Devil. Hopper-Cake Night. — Hopper, a large oblong basket, pendant from the shoulders of the husbandman, from which he scatters the seed when he sows the land. It was anciently a custom with farmers to give a supper called ' hopper-cakes ' (in which spiced cakes steeped in ale formed one of the chief viands, or deli- cacies), at the end of seed time, when the grain was finished being sown. — Brogden, p. 99. Scotter. Cakes given to farm-servants and labourers when seed time is over. . . . Green, of Scotter, informs me that when he was a boy and young man, that is, between sixty and seventy years ago, hopper-cakes, or offer cakes, as they were sometimes called, were given away accompanied by spiced beer, at Scotter, by the farmers when the last seed was sown. It is to be feared that the custom and the name are alike obsolete. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 277. Hot plum cakes, or seed cakes, given in former days with hot beer to the labourers on a farm on the com- pletion of the wheat sowing. It was the custom to place them, and hand them round, in the empty Hopper or seed box, whence the name. So ' Hopper-cake Night,' the night when this was done. — CoLE, p. 67. Bottesford. Nov. ^th. — ' A parishioner of mine was tell- ing me last night — November 5th — that something like I Festivals, 2 1 1 fifty or sixty years ago it was the traditional belief in this county and the neighbouring county of York that any farmer's son was at liberty to shoot on that day on his neighbour's farm, or in the preserves of his esquire, to his heart's content, and that, being November the 5 th, there was no process of law by which he could be touched for so doing.' Such a belief was certainly current, only it extended further than my informant states. It was held that everyone — not farmers only — might shoot where they would on that day. I have heard my father say that when he was a lad and a young man — that is from 1805 to 1825 — everyone who could procure a gun used to turn out, and that landowners and game preservers never thought of hindering them. The belief lasted much later. Somewhere about fifty years ago my father was riding to church on November 5 th, when he met on the highway a notorious poacher, Jack Jackson, with his gun in his hand. My father, who had a liking for the man, pointed out to him the risk he was running. The man replied, 'No squire, I'm safe to-day. Don't you remember it's the 5th of November?' The same notion prevailed as to Good Friday ; but as it falls at a time when there is little game to be had, and what birds there are have become very wild, the people did not turn out in the same multitudinous fashion. — N. & Q.^, vi., pp. 404, 405. * Shooting the Guy! — On the evening of November 5 the church bells were rung at Lenton and Ingoldsby, two adjacent villages in South Lincolnshire, and two or three sets of lads came to my door with their cry, ' Please to remember the fifth of November' as an excuse for begging. It was dark and raining heavily or the Lenton hand-bell ringers would have gone their rounds ; as it was, they kept in the belfry, where they were ringing and 'shooting' the bells. Children in the two villages explained that the bells were rung ' for shooting the guy.' No guys were brought round. — N. & Q.^, vol. x., p. 426. 212 Festivals. Fifth of November Customs. — See Folk- Lore, vol. xiv., p. 89. All-Hallows. — An object called 'the idol of All-hallows' existed in the church of Belton in the Isle of Axholme in the early part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It was probably a representation of All Saints. — PEACOCK'S Eng, Ch. Furniture, 45 ; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 4. Horsington. All Saints' Eve, — On the eve of All Saints Day, at i 2 p.m., twelve lights rise from the mound in All Hallows Churchyard where the ancient church of Horsing- ton stood (they are blue and rise slowly and do not jump about like jenny wisps), and then slowly proceed in threes towards the following neighbouring villages — 3 to Horsington, 3 to Stixwould, 3 to Bucknall, and 3 to Wadingworth. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 209. I. of Axholme. Martlemas.' — Martinmas ; the feast of St. Martin, Nov. 1 1. Old Martinmas Day, the 23rd of November, is the time commonly observed by the people, and is the day on which new servants come to their places in the Isle of Axholme. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 342. Nov. II. — . . . In former times May-day and Martlemas were periods like Lady-day and Michaelmas, Christmas and Midsummer, for the settling and auditing of biennial accounts. Martlemas-day, in old records, is generally called Saint Martin in Yeme, or St. Martin in the Winter. It is said that in whatever direction the wind may be on Martlemas eve, it is sure to continue in the same quarter for many weeks. — Brogden, p. 124. Stirrup- Sunday. — That is Stir-up Sunday. The last Sunday after the feast of Holy Trinity, so called, it is said, on account of the first words of the collect in the Book of Common Prayer for that day : ' Stir up, we beseech Thee, O Lord/ which is a translation of a collect in the Salisbury use. On this day, or on the one following, the mince-meat for the Christmas pies, and the Christmas plum-pudding Festivals. 213 should be stirred by all members of the household. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 525. St. Thomas' Day. Gooding. — The custom of women going round to beg for corn or money on St. Thomas' Day against the Christmas Feast ; called also Mumping or Thomasing. — COLE, p. 56. Cf. Cole, pp. 94, 152; Brogden, p. i 3 i ; E. Peacock, i., p. 175 ; II., vol. ii., p. 560 ; Watson, p. 59. St. Thomas s Day Custom. — It is customary in the Isle of Axholme, and I believe in the North generally for old women and others to ' go a-Thomasing on St. Thomas's Day, that is, asking for small doles of money or goods. In this neighbourhood they usually ask for and receive a candle apiece from the tradesmen who deal in such things. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 497. South Lincolnshire. Old women called Mumpers, collect money, on St. Thomas'-day, when not on a Sunday. — Lincolnshire Cabinet, 1828, p. 152; 1829, p. 36. Grimsby neighbourhood. Almost the only relaxation now comes from the lasses going home to see their mothers for a fortnight in May, and from going a-begging on St. Thomas's Day. Then all the old (and many of the young) women parade through the village, and call at all the substantial houses. The village shop perhaps gives them a candle apiece; one farmer gives each family a stone of flour ; another a piece of meat ; yet a third brews a quantity of hot elder-wine, and each woman has a glass and a piece of plum-cake. All well-to-do people give the widows a shilling each ; many are badgered into sending out five shillings, or even more, for the troop to divide as they choose. Then ensues, as may be expected, many a quarrel. The masterful obtain portions, the weak and poor get none. Yet this annual * sportula ' of Lincoln- shire villages is much looked forward to and enjoyed. — Antiquary, xiv., 12. 214 Festivals. In some counties corn used for furmety is given away, and this is called in Lincolnshire ' mumping wheat' — Old English Customs y 1896, p. 29. Christmas-tide. Christmas-Eve. — There was formerly a general custom, which I believe is still by no means extinct, of giving all animals better food on this day than that to which they were commonly accustomed. It is believed that at midnight on Christmas Eve all dumb animals kneel in reverence for the birth of our Lord. Many persons have assured me they have watched and seen the oxen in the ' crew yard ' do this. — E. Peacock, i., p. 57. ... In a letter written by a Lincolnshire lady, 12 December, 1827, she refers to the management of a 'pig' to be bought ready killed, to provide ' pig-cheer ' (as it is called) for Christmas (fry, sausages, pork pies, mince-pies etc. . . .— N. & Q.^^ iv., p. 449. Our holy festival of Christmas retains in some parts of this island, particularly in Lincolnshire, the Saxon appel- lation of Yule. . . . — Pop. Sup., p. 63. Grimsby. Even at [Great] Grimsby, unlikely as it would seem among its multiform varieties of dissent, every Christmas produces a genuine survival of pre- Reformation belief Children parade the streets and neighbouring villages bearing a wax-doll, laid in cotton- wool inside a box, and singing carols. They drop pence into the oyster-shell held out by the children. — Antiquary ^ vol. xiv., p. 10. * Vessel-cup' or ' CribJ — See Folk-Lore, vol. ix., p. 365. Hagworthingliam. It. sometimes with the receipt of the Dancers gathering also of the young men calld the Wessell.— L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 7. In certain districts of the county of Lincoln, many of the old Christmas customs still prevail. At this season Festivals, 2 1 5 the poor and indigent solicit the charitable aid of their more wealthy neighbours towards furnishing a few neces- sary comforts to cheer their hearts at this holy but inclement season. Some present them with coals, others with candles, or corn or bread, or money. ... In the day-time our ears are saluted with the dissonant screaming of Christmas Carols, which the miserable creatures sing who travel from house to house with the vessel-cup. This is a name given to a small chest, which encloses an image, intended to represent the sacred person of our Saviour Jesus Christ. Some of these vessels contain two figures of different dimensions, to portray the Virgin and the infant Saviour. In either case an apple is introduced covered with gold leaf. It is reputed unlucky to dismiss the singer without a present. The custom is rapidly falling into disuse. But Christmas Eve is the time of gaiety and good cheer. The yule-clog blazes on the fire : the yule-candle burns brightly on the hospitable board, which is amply replenished with an abundance oi yule-cake cut in slices, toasted and soaked in spicy ale, and mince-pies, decorated with stripes of paste disposed crossways over the upper surface, to represent the rack of the stable in which Christ was born ; and the evening usually concludes with some innocent and inspiring game. A portion of the yule-cake must necessarily be reserved for Christmas Day ; other- wise, says the superstition, the succeeding year will be unlucky. A similar fatality hangs over the plum-cake provided for this occasion, unless a portion of it be kept till New Year's Day. — Man. and Cus.^ pp. 28, 29. Messingham. The seasons of festivity seldom occurred. Christmas, Shrove Tuesday, Easter and the Feast were the stated times. Then young and old came forth to play. . . . Christmas, being a season of the year when days are short and evenings long, and the wetness of the low lands prevented the husbandman from following his 2 1 6 Festivals. usual avocation, was kept for three weeks, and spent in social meetings at each other's houses. The yule log was now heaped round with peat-bags* and cassans,t and seen to sparkle on the cottage hearth, while the children listened with attention to their parents reciting the fun of former times, and the guests singing in their turns the carols of the season. — MACKINNON, pp. 9, 10. Burning the yule-clog on Christmas Eve, giving Christmas boxes to children and to tradesmen's appren- tices, etc., adorning the windows with holly and evergreenSy and many other old customs, are still practised here. — Axholme, p. 280. Yule-block, Yule-clog. — A great log or block of wood formerly placed with some ceremony upon the hall fire on Christmas Eve. In former times (and the custom is perhaps still con- tinued in some parts) the unconsumed part of the Yule- block was carefully preserved and re-placed on the fire to burn with the new one. — Brogden, p. 228. Yule-clog, a log of wood put on the fire on Christmas Eve. Some portion of it should be preserved until New- Year's-Day, or evil luck will follow. My servant tells me, * Father always saves a great block of wood to put on the fire at Christmas, and, isn't it curious, whatever sort of tree it comes from, he always calls it a Yew-log.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 279. Mistletoe, Mistletoe-bough. — A bunch of evergreens, generally formed on a hoop. It is suspended from the ceiling at Christmas-tide, decked with oranges and trinkets, and is used for the same purpose as the real mistletoe in * When peat was cut for fuel, the upper part, consisting of peat intermixed with roots of grass, was called bags ; the lower portion, which was peat only, went by the name of turves. t Cow-dung dried for burning. Until the time of the great enclosures, cow- cassons supplied the poor with much of their fuel. Festivals. 217 those parts of England where it can be readily procured. It is sometimes called a ' kissing-bough.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 354. Christmas- Bough, and Christmas House-decorations. — See Folk-Lore, vol. ix., p. 364 ; vol. xiii., pp. 202, 203. Christmas-Bough. — Cf. The Christmas Bush, N. & Q.^^, vol. iv., p. 502. Christmas-Bough [For the use of ' an holy bush before the roode/ see Church Gleanings, p. 60]. I have recently been reminded that it is ' very bad luck ' to burn the evergreens that have been used for Christmas decorations. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 264. Yule-caakes, Christmas cakes. — GoOD, p. 104. Mince-pie. — It is said that 7nince-pie and minch-pie are not quite the same thing. Minch-pies, we are told, have meat in their composition ; mince-pies have not. It is commonly believed that if you eat twelve mince-pies before Christmas Day, you will enjoy twelve happy months in the coming year ; but if you eat fewer, you will have only as many as the number of mince-pies you have eaten. — E. Peacock, i., p. 171. Goodying. — The practice of begging at Christmas. — Brogden, p. 84. Clee. It is not necessary to place upon record that wait-singing by the younger folk . . . still heralds the approach of Christmas in this parish. Cleethorpes is especially blest in this respect. — Watson, p. 59. Christmas was celebrated ... in a Church stuck about with little green bushes. . . . Our houses were decked with holly, box, fir, and laurel, and in some convenient spot the mystic mistletoe hung temptingly. In bed- chambers no ' Christmas ' (evergreens) was permitted : it would have brought ill-luck, and to burn any of the 2 1 8 Festivals. refuse leaves was accounted a most dangerous provocation of — must I say? — the Fates. We had Waits who sang outside the house and School-children who entered in and refreshed themselves befittingly during the performance of their programme. I remember the time when Morris- dancers came from Belton. . . . On Christmas Eve a bowl was passed round, charged with a nauseous prepara- tion of spiced ale, in which a round of toasted cake was floating. It was required of us to drink and to give utterance to a sentiment, not necessarily our opinion of the draught but something in the way of good wishes for the company. The elders played a rubber, and every now and then we were edified by hearing some of them threatening to turn their chairs in order to turn their luck, and if an unmarried person had bad * hands ' he would undoubtedly be consoled by the assurance that to be unlucky at cards is to be lucky in love ... A large piece of wood called a yule-log was put on the fire on Christmas-eve and allowed to burn for a time, after which it was taken off and laid aside until New-Year's-eve when it might be utterly consumed. [I think it would be made to burn until after 12.0.] On that night many would remain up to sit the Old Year out and the New Year in. . . . The bells told us. when the fateful moment came. — G. J., June 29, 1878. Evergreens are placed in churches, etc., on Christmas- day. — Lincolnshire Cabinet^ 1828, p. 153; Brogden, p. 41 ; E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 113 ; also referred to p. 182, and vol. ii., pp. 417, 523, 587. Lincolnshire Marsh. — The most vigorous survival of <;ustom ... is at Yuletide. . . . Preparations begin betimes, and everyone in the house down to the infant in arms must stir the pudding and the mincemeat, and though the mistletoe itself grows not in marshland, a bunch of evergreens that is called * The mistletoe,' and has the same functions and privileges attached to it, is Festivals. 2 1 9 hung up in every farm kitchen. When Christmas Eve has come the Yule cake is duly cut and the Yule log lit, and I know of some even middle-class houses where the new log must always rest upon and be lighted by the old one, a small portion of which has been carefully stored away to preserve a continuity of light and heat. And, whilst the widows of the place have received their Yuletide gifts on St. Thomas's Day, going a Thomassing from farm to farm, go where you may between Christmas Day and Twelfth Night, into farm house or cottage, you will be pressed to taste a bit o' cake and cheese ; and whilst it is dire offence to refuse, your self-martyrdom is encouraged by the remembrance that for every bit you taste one more happy month is added to your life ! — Heanley, p. 6. Mumby. Christmas Eve. — In former times a Yule block was to be found on every fire : whilst on the table the Yule candle (a big candle, shopkeepers used to give to their customers at this time) burned with, what was in the days of rushlights and farthing dips, a wondrous light. Cakes and hot spiced beer were served, the plum cake being cut into long strips and dipped into the beer. This is still done in some public houses. The churches were decorated with box and other evergreens stuck into holes in the pew tops. Several old people here remember this church being so decorated, and call it ' sticking the church.' Our bells still ring on Christmas Eve ; years ago they commenced at 5 a.m. on Christmas Day, now it is 8 a.m. Frumerty lingers as a recollection, but seems to have been more connected with sheep clipping time. The •carol singer is unknown ; the only trace I can find so far is the following, taken down from the lips of a very old man in the neighbourhood : All ye that are to mirth inclined. Consider well, and bear in mind What our good Lord for us has done, In sending His beloved Son. 220 Festivals, The night before the happy tide, Our spotless Virgin and her guide Were long time seeking up and down To find some lodging in the town. But mark how all things came to pass. No resting-place for them there was ; Nor could they rest themselves at all, But in a hungry oxen stall. That night the Virgin Mary mild Was safe delivered of a Child, According to Heaven's decree Man's sweet salvation for to be. There were three kings all in the East, Were tempted by a cheery star. Came bearing down and made no stay Until they came where Jesus lay. This clearly needs revision, but that is the business of the folk-lore collector, and therefore I give exactly as reported to me. The week before Christmas the morris dancers used to come round. There were several actors : ist Tom Fool, dressed in imitation rags and tatters, with big yellow letters T. and F. on his back ; 2nd, the lady (or witch) a man dressed in hat and veil and gaudy sash round the waist ; 3rd, a fiddler, generally dressed in a red coat ; 4th, the farmer's son, a bit of a dandy ; and two others, dressed ' a bit comical.' When the party came to a house they proposed visiting, Tom Fool went in and said : ' Here comes I that's niver been yet, With my great head and little wit. A noa what my wife en me likes best, En we'll hev it, too : a leg ev a lark, en the limb of a loose, En cut a great thumpin' toast offen a farden loaf.' If Tom Fool saw he was welcome, they all came in and sat down, Tom Fool taking care to be near the lady, whom he courted with much palaver and ' dittiment ' ; their Festivals. 221 sweet converse was then stopped by the farmer's son, who began to court the fair dame, telling her * she mun nivver tek up wi' a critter like that,' as he could never keep her, etc. So poor Tom Fool got the sack, and went and stood in a corner and openly bewailed his hard fate. After a bit the farmer's son moved off, and Tom Fool came back and declared if she would only have him she * sud ha' bacon fliks, and flour i' th' bin, en ivverything, if she wain't tek notice a' that chap wi' his ruffles en dangle- ments.' At last they agreed to marry, which ceremony was performed in a corner, one of the actors being parson. The wedding was then celebrated in dance and song ; after that bread, cheese, beer, etc., was given to the players, who then retired and went elsewhere to ' say their piece.' The songs I have not been able to get hold of, but [they] appear to have been variable and dependent on the original actor's taste. ' A young man went to see his sweetheart, en wen 'e got there 'e says : " A've cum t' cum t' the', t' see the', to tell the' t' ask the' t' hem'ma? What saays th', sweetheart? Wilt th' hem'ma?" " Noa, not I." " Nor I, neyther ; bud oor foaks wud hem'ma t' cum t' the' t' see the', t' tell the', to ask the' t' hem'ma?'" After this, another friend favoured as follows : ' Es aw sat i' mi' titterty tatterty, lukking oot i' mi hazy-gazy. Aw sah a rueri run away wi' randy pipes. If aw'd had mi striddlestripes on, aw'd ha maade rueri put randy pipes doon ; ' * or, according to another variant : ' Es aw looked out i' my asey-casey, On a moonlight night, Aw sah th' dead carrying the live. Wasn't that a wunderful sight ? ' Of the rest I can select but one. ' In olden days they used to fetch their servants home on horseback. * That is ; when I got up and looked out of the window, I saw a fox running away with a goose, and if I had my trousers on, I'd have made him put goose down. 222 Festivals, One master, on the way thus begins a chat with his new maid : — " What de ye caal me, Mary ? " " Meyster, sor." " Ye shuddn't caal me meyster, ye shud caal me Domine Sceptre." Soa, as they was goin' home the' came to th* pit, soa he saays, " What de ye caal that, Mary?" "Water, sor." "Ye shuddn't caal it watter, ye shud caal it absolution." Soa when the' got home, he says, " What de ye caal that, Mary ? " " Hoose, sor." "Ye shuddn't caal it hoose, ye shud caal it high top o' th' mountain." Soa wen th' got inte th' hoose he saays, " What de ye caal that, Mary ? " " Cat, sor." "Ye shuddn't caal it cat, ye shud caal it white-faaced Timothy." Soa he saays, "What de ye caal that, Mary?" "Fire, sor." "Ye shuddn't caal it fire, ye shud caal it Hococogloriam." Es they wes goin' up- stairs, he saays, "What de ye caal these, Mary?" " Steps, sor." " Ye shuddn't caal them steps, ye shud caal them wudden upps." Soa wen they got upstairs, he says, " What de ye caal this, Mary ? " " Bed, sor." "Ye shuddn't caal it bed, ye shud caal it Ashedecree." Soa he took off his slippers, en says, " What de ye caal these, Mary ? " " Slippers, sor." " Ye shuddn't caal them slippers, ye shud caal them groond tredders. What are these, Mary ? " " Trousers, sor." " Ye shuddn't caal them trousers, ye shud caal them small clothes." Soa next mornin' she goas agen th' steps en saays \pr beals oot or squeals] " A', Domine Sceptre, get oot i' yer ashedecree, en put on yer smaal clothes en groond tredders, en cum down th' wudden upps te me ; for white-faaced Timothy hes got sum hococogloriam on his back, en withoot th' help of absolution, th' high top o' th' mountain will soon be one mass of hococo- gloriam." ' Them's real owd isrums,' quoth one of my Lincoln- shire friends, when I read them over to him to see if they were correct. The rest of the ' isrums ' must find place another day. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 23. Festivals, 225 Grimsby. [Temp. Hen. VI.] Sir Richard Tunstall . . . kept Christmas eve with great hospitality, surrounded by his friends and retainers. The Yule log blazed on the hearth ; the boar's head was introduced with the sound of trumpets ; and above all, at the proper season, he patronised the sport of the Plough Ship ; which was formally authorized by an especial edict of the Corporation ; which provided that all manner of actions shall be made in this borough upon these days following, that is to say, the Saturday from sun- rise to the Sunday at two o'clock in the afternoon ; to endure from Yule, beginning at noon, to the morning after Plough Ship, which shall be led about the town, etc. This Plough Ship . . . was a combination of the ancient pageant and the morris dance ; and Maid Marian and the Fool were considered indispensable appendages to the dramatis persons^. . . . The young fellows dressed themselves in fantastic habits, dragging after them a plough, and solicited the benevolence of the inhabitants that they might enjoy a feast at the commencement of the new year. . . . The procession started from the Hall -garth. . . . The performers repeated a kind of dialogue, and were accompanied by the Corporation waits. The custom was continued down to a very recent period; and in the year 1724 an earthquake, accompanied by a storm of wind and rain, occurred between the villages of Laceby and Aylesby^ which so frightened the Grimsby morris dancers that they took to their heels, and scampered away home with the utmost precipitation, under an apprehension that evil spirits were about to punish them for mockery in their sports. It [the Plough Ship] was accompanied by the sword dance. — OLIVER, iv., pp. 177, 178, 179. Morris-dance at Revesby. — Folk-Lore Journal, vol. vii., pp. 331-353. Sleaford. Morris dances . . . are still practised in this 2 24 Festivals, neighbourhood, though not with the zest of fornier times. This pastime is a combination of the ancient pageants and the morisco dance ; and Maid Marian and the Fool are considered as indispensable appendages to the party. It is an antique piece of mummery, performed at Christmas, as a garbled vestige of the sports which distinguished the Scandinavian festival of Yule. The performers repeat a kind of dialogue in verse and prose which is intended to create mirth, and ends in a comic sword dance, and a plentiful libation of ale. — Oliver (3), p. 117. In the Christmas sports still used in this county, St. George thus introduces himself : ' Here comes I, St. George, That worthy champion bold, And with my crown and spear I won three crowns of gold. I fought the dragon bold, And brought him to the slaughter. By that I gained fair Sabra The King of Egypt's daughter.' Oliver (3), pp. 83, 84. Wainfleet. Sword Dancers. — The * guisers,' or sword dancers, still come round. We had one family in Wainfleet Flats who were especially skilled in the intricacies of the dance, although they flatly refused to let me take down the verses they used, as * some harm would happen them if they committed them to writing.' But whilst the words and the subject of the song have plainly varied with the times, the dance is as clearly a relic of the Norsemen and their war dances. For instance, the last time they visited me at Wain- fleet, just ten years ago, one of the company was dressed in skin with a wisp of straw in his mouth so cut as to represent a pig's bristles, thus recalling the hog sacrificed of old to Odin ; but for many years Festivals, 225 the * Plough bullocks ' that are due on Plough Monday have ceased to carry with them the horse's skull that used to represent the white steed Gleipnir of the ancient god. Indeed, I do not think I have seen that since 1857, when the general rejoicings at the close of the Crimean war gave a temporary fillip to the winter's sports. It is, I suppose, generally allowed that the Plough bullocks represent the Wild Huntsman and his rout. Be that as it may, at this season of the year great numbers of wild geese daily cross Marshland, flying inland at early dawn to feed, and returning at night. No one who has heard their weird cry in the dusk can feel surprised that the older labourers still speak with bated breath of the * Gabblerout ' of the Wild Huntsman, and the wandering souls of children who have died without baptism whom he chases, and whom you may see for yourselves as ' willy wisps ' flitting across the low grounds most nights of the year. — Heanley, pp. 6, 7. Morris- Dancing, — The ceremony of dancing the morris^ has but recently been discontinued. — PECK, Axholme^ p. 278. Morris-dancers, persons who perform rude plays ; now much the same as ' plough-boys,' though formerly there was a clear distinction. [See under PLOUGH Monday.] — E. Peacock, i., p. 173. Christmas. See PART II., SECTION III., Games, under Cabsow. A person who is born on Christmas Day will be able to see spirits. — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 382. SECTION II. CEREMONIAL. BIRTH AND INFANCY. The navel cord ought to be carefully kept by the child's mother. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 169. ' The afterburden [after-birth] should owt to be alus putten upo' th' kitchen fire-back at neet when folks hes gone to bed.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 2. Caul, or ' sillyhood/ this prevents the owner from drown- ing. Some say that you can tell by its condition the state of the owner's (one who was born with it) health. Never matter how far distant he or she may be. So long as it keeps he is well, but if it ' snickles ' up he is dead. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 169. A child born with a caul was supposed to be very lucky. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 88. A middle-aged domestic in Lincolnshire, lately told a lady of somebody ' who had web feet, she had seen them, and it was all to do with when he was born he was born with a silly hood, a sort of veil over his head. And if they don't take care of it, the child will grow up a wanderer. They stretch it out, real thin it is, like tissue paper, and they put it on paper. And they always know by it if the person is ill. My aunt at K said it, and showed it to me, like the thin part of a pig's apron, midgin some folks calls it, when it's finest, and she said it'll go damp always if he ails anything (see Grose, quoted Birth and Infancy. 227 in Brand, 115). And I says one day to my mother, about a son, brother of mine, that was always upon the wander about and never settled, I says, I wonder what makes him do that a-way. Why, she says, it's all along of his being born in a silly-hood. He can't help it, for we never kept it as we ought to have done.' * Happy is the man that's born between Trent and Ancholme, and there abides.' Questioned as to ship- wreck our informant said, ' Oh, yes, I know they are a fine thing against storms, they say,' — N. & Q.^, vol. xi., pp. 144, 145. When a baby is born with a caul, the caul should always be carefully preserved. It ensures luck to the person who has possession of it as well as to the child. No one who carries a caul with him can die by drowning. Moreover a caul will show the state of health of its original owner, for while he is well it exhibits no change from its ordinary condition, but let him fall ill, and then it shrivels and shrinks together, ' wizenin' awaay to o'must nowt,' an assertion quite in opposition to * It'll go damp always if he ails anything.' Since writing the above note I have learnt the following from M. H., a well-educated woman of about thirty, who says she does not believe in any superstition : ' I was born with a caul over my face, like a veil ; but it was lost and could not be found again. They thought that very likely the doctor took it to sell. Cauls are sold, or used to be, especially to sea-captains. People say that no ship will ever sink which has one on board. When I mentioned to an old woman at home that I had been born with one, but that it was not kept, she told me I should always be unlucky for the want of it — not that I believe in such things myself, though I have had a good many illnesses, so it is no wonder I am delicate. They say, too, I shall be a wanderer, but I don't know that I have gone about more than other people.' The old woman declared she 2 28 Ceremonial should always make her son take his caul about with him, to be safe, even if he was only going out visiting. It could be kept in the leaves of a book. She did say some- thing about cauls withering up, but I forget what it was, because I was laughing at her.' — N. & Q.^ xi., 234; E. Peacock, i., p. 51. Caul.—Zl N. & Q.io, i., p. 26 ; ib. i., p. 430. Legboume. Churching. — * At Legbourne,' writes the Rev. J. H. Overton, ' and I think at other Lincolnshire villages, women look upon their churching with an almost superstitious regard. I had a curious instance when I first came here, in i860. I at once tried to knock on the head the custom of having baptisms after the service, and on one occasion when I told a woman who came to be churched and to have her child baptised, that the baptism would take place after the second lesson, she replied, * That is impossible, for I cannot walk down the church until I am churched.' The churching service used to be read just before the general thanksgiving, so I overcame the scruple by having the churching service before the general service began. — Vaux, p. 88. A woman, after she has been churched, is said to be clean ; before that time it is held, among old-fashioned people, that it is sinful for her to go out of doors beyond the eaves-dropping. — E. P., i. p. 60. An old woman in North Lincolnshire said not long ago, speaking of a child who had recovered from a serious illness, * I aways knew it would get better, it was baptized at night.' — N. & Q.^ vol. iv., p. 207. Child. — The hands of a child must not be washed until it has been christened — the dirt which accumulates is supposed to be a sign of future wealth ; nor must its nails be cut with scissors or knife, as that would bring ill luck. If its ears are large, it will be certain to have success in Birth and Infancy. 229 life, unless the luck is marred by its clothes being put on over its head instead of being drawn upwards over its feet ; and if the mother wishes to ward off evil from the sleeping babe, she must never allow her hands to be idle while she rocks the cradle. At the christening it is necessary that a boy should first be placed in the arms of the priest, otherwise the girl will be blessed with a beard and hairy face, which should have been the boy's chief adornment. For the child to sneeze during the ceremony is unlucky, but to cry is good, inasmuch as it is a sure sign that the old Adam is being driven out. — Bygone Lincolnshire^ ii., pp. 88, 89 ; N. & Q.7, vol. viii., pp. 85, 86. Head- Washing. — Drinking a newly-born infant's health. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 263. Birth. — At the birth of a child, the father receives the congratulations of his friends, and the phrase ' I wish you joy,' is the first salutation he hears after the event takes place. ... It is vulgarly believed that if a child be born with its hands open, it is an indication of liberality and benevolence, but if its hands be closed, the future individual will assuredly prove a churl. When it is first taken to a neighbour's house, it is presented with eggs, the emblem of abundance, and salt, the symbol of friendship. The christening is a season of rejoicing. It is the belief that, unless the child cry during the ceremony, it will not live, — Man. and Cus., pp. 30, 31. When an infant is taken for the first time into a strange house, the mistress thereof ought to give it an ^^%, some salt, and a bunch of matches, to ensure good luck to the child. — E. Peacock, i., p. 142. The presentation of an ^'g^, with salt, bread, a coin, etc., to an infant on its visit to the first house it is taken to is scarcely yet obsolete in North Lincolnshire. — N. & Q.^ vol. iii., p. 73 ; cf G. J., June 22, 1878. 2 30 Ceremonial. Qrimsby neighbourhood. Whenever a baby made its first visit, it was necessary to give it something at every house it entered, either a penny, an ^gg^ a piece of cake, or the like. — Antiquary, xiv., 12. Little One-year old might be held up to a looking-glass, but it was not considered the thing to let the child be thus introduced to itself at an earlier age. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Let a child in the nursery where I graduated scratch itself and others never so much during the first twelve months of its life, the easy remedy of cutting its nails was rarely if ever resorted to : skilful biting or breaking was the treatment employed, for ill-luck might be incurred by the use of scissors, either to the nails or to the hair of any innocent who had not seen the anniversary of its birth. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Bottesford. It is a general belief among the common people in this neighbourhood that if a child's finger nails are cut before it is a year old it will be a thief Before that time they must be bitten off when they require shortening. — N. & Q.\ vol. vi., p. 71 ; cf GOOD, p. 107. When we begin to shed our first set of teeth — when they were ' kissed out ' as we were told — the right ritual to be observed was to throw each cast-off friend into the fire with a little salt. — G. J., June 22, 1878. MARRIAGE. Spurring. — The publication of banns of marriage. When a person has been once ' asked in church ' the friends say, * Why, thoo's gotten one spur on thee ' ; when twice asked, it is called * a pair of spurs.' (This is a pun. The word really means an asking ; from the verb to spur^ or speer. — W. W. S.) — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 216, Break a rib, Broken-ribbed. — ' He's gotten broken-ribbed to-day,' said of a man having his Banns of Marriage Marriage. 231 published. So ' He's gotten one rib broke/ or ' He broke one rib of Sunday,' when they are published for the first time ; 'He's gotten two, or three ribs broke,' for the second, or third Sunday. — CoLE, p. 21. Claxby. [There] is a custom in vogue in the parish of Claxby, Market Rasen (and in others in the locality), of saying ' God speed them well ' (by the clerk) after the third time of publishing the banns. — N. & Q.^, vol. xii., p. 125. The bride cake is composed of many rich and aromatic ingredients, and crowned with an icing made of white sugar and bitter almonds, emblematical of the fluctuations of pleasure and pain which are incidental to the marriage ■state. On this day the important ceremony of passing small portions of bride cake through the wedding ring is ritually performed. The just execution of this idolatrous ceremony is attended to with the most scrupulous exact- ness. The bride holds the ring between the forefinger and thumb of her right hand, through which the groom passes each portion of the cake nine times, previously cut by other individuals of the party into disposable pieces for the purpose. These he delivers in succession to the bride- maids, who seal them up carefully, each in an envelope of fair writing-paper. As amulets of inestimable value, they are distributed amongst the friends of the bride, who seldom neglect to make a trial of their virtues. Various are the methods of augury to which they are applied, one only of which shall be mentioned here. If the fair idolatress deposit one of these amulets in the foot of her left stocking, when she goes to bed, and place it under her pillow, she will dream of the person who is destined by fate to be her partner for life. — Man. and Cus.^ p. 30. Great Grimsby. Sailors' weddings are often conducted with much parade and show. A spirited tar will frequently be attended to the altar by eight or ten couples of young people, gaily attired in their best bibs and tuckers ; and in 232 Ceremonial. the afternoon of the wedding day the bridal train will parade through the town in pairs with processional pomp^ the bride and groom taking precedence, all decorated with bride favours, consisting of white ribbons curiously disposed in the form of a true lover's knot. The ship to which the happy bridegroom belongs is decorated with numerous flags of different colours and bearings, surmounted by a garland of ribbons suspended from the topmast. This garland is mystical, having been composed by the bride- maids with many significant ceremonies. — Oliver (2), p. 45, footnote. A short time since I was at a wedding in Lincolnshire. On the important morning the bridegroom had an inter- view with his mother-in-law to be in the garden of her house, it not being considered right that he should come indoors until after the marriage ceremony. I believe he had dined with the bride and her family the night before. — N. & Q.8, vol. ix., p. 5. Little Grimsby. Tuesday, June the 26th [1764] . . . Mr. Stephenson walked along with us to give his Daughter away, else we had no other attendance. — ESBERGER, p. 1 3. When I was young I heard folk say with smiles that Miss Blank or Miss Dash must knit herself a pair of green garters. — N. 8z: Q.'^, vol. xi,, p. 276. An old woman lately told me that the first of the contracting parties at a wedding who knelt down at the altar always dies first. — N. & Q.*, vol. xii., p. 44. Barnoldby-le-Beck. When a couple was being married, it was firmly believed that the first one who knelt when being blessed would die first. Others said the first who should eat on reaching home would assuredly meet this fate. — Antiquary, xiv., 11. Helpringham. It has been the custom for the wedding party to accompany the bride and bridegroom in a i Marriage. 233 walk round the village in the evening after tea on the wedding day. This is still done, but it is not so common as it once was. — Vaux, p. 107. Great Grimsby. In 1826 a navvy took his wife, having a halter round her neck, into the open market, on a market day, and offered her for sale. She was purchased by another navvy for a small sum and a quart of ale ; the parties retiring to the ' Black Swan ' to settle the purchase. — Bates, p. 68. The vicar had the privilege, not always exercised, of saluting a bride immediately after tying the knot. ' Three times a bridesmaid never a bride,' was the wisdom of their elders. She who helped herself to the last piece of bread and butter, toast, etc., on a plate was threatened with single blessedness ; but the beatitude of a hand- some husband was promised to one who took the relic when handed to her. Of course, the ' happy couple ' were saluted with old shoes. Miss E. Blank was married before her elder sister. My impression is that our nurse told me people said Miss Blank ought to be made to dance in red-hot slippers for allowing her junior to go off first . . . [but] I think sometimes that the suggested penal chaussure must have been green, and that my memory has erred. — G. J., June 29, 1878. Crowle. As the bride and bridegroom were alighting from the carriage after their return from church a woman ran out of the house and flung a plate containing cake over their heads into the road. The plate was smashed and the cake scrambled for and torn to pieces by the children waiting round. Since the above was written I have been told that the same ceremony was performed in a neighbouring village a few weeks since. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 144. Bride. — On this same bride being brought by her husband to his home in Lincolnshire, at the end of 234 Ceremonial, the honeymoon, the custom of lifting the bride over the threshold was observed ; the bride and bridegroom got out of the carriage a few yards from the house, and he carried her up the steps, and into the hall. — Church Customs^ pp. 123, 124. Lincolnsliire (?). Wedding Superstition. — At a recent wedding, on the return from church the bridesmaid (there was but one) walked with the bridegroom's ' best man ' to whom she was engaged to be married. This was noticed by the villagers, who pronounced it to be bad luck ; for they said, * as they have walked back from church together before they are married, they will never walk back from church together as man and wife.' — N. & Q.^, vol. xii., p. 144. Gedney. Marriage in a Sheet. — At Gedney, in Lin- colnshire, David Wilkinson to Widow Farran. The latter went to church covered with nothing but a sheet, stitched up like a bag, with slits at the sides for her bare arms ; and in that way she was betrothed standing with bare feet at the altar. It appears that during the struggles of her widowhood to support four children, she had accumulated a variety of debts, but had been told, if she married with only a sheet to cover her, she would be discharged for ever from all pecuniary incumbrances contracted prior to the wedding day, and this formed the motive for her extraordinary conduct. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 146 ; cf. ib}^, vi., 127, 199. Kirton-in-Lindsey. If a woman, who has contracted debts previous to her marriage, leave her residence in a state of nudity, and go to that of her future husband, he the husband will not be liable for any such debts. A case of this kind actually occurred in that highly civilized town within my informant's memory ; the woman leaving her house from a bed-room window, and putting on some clothes as she stood on the top Marriage. 235 of the ladder by which she accomplished her descent. — N. & Q.\ vol. vii., p. 1 7. St. Thomas s Day. — That it afforded ' less time ' for repentance than any other caused it to be favourably regarded as a wedding day. — G. J., June 29, 1878. DEATH. The idea that * blest is the corpse that the rain raineth on/ is a general one all over the county. It is a general custom to open the window of the room in which a death has just taken place, and to draw down the blinds of all the windows of the house. The blinds are always kept down until the funeral procession has left the house on the way to the church ; then they are drawn up by some friend, neighbour, nurse, or servant, who has remained behind for the purpose. In some villages it is usual for the relations of the deceased to keep their blinds lowered from the time they hear of the death until after the funeral, even if the death took place at a distance. In 1 89 1 the blinds were not pulled down at a house in Bottesford until the day of the funeral of a member of a family who had died at a distance, but who was brought thither for burial ; and it was considered a mark of inexplicable carelessness that they had not been lowered from the time that the death was known of. In many places box is thrown into the grave upon the coffin, as a symbol of the eternity of the life ever- lasting, because it is an evergreen. Small sprigs of box are sometimes found when old graves are disturbed. They are usually quite green, though dry and brittle. Rosemary is sometimes placed on the breast of the departed, and buried with them. 236 CeremoniaL It is considered proper that the horses used for a funeral should be black, or, if they are not to be obtained, then any dark colour will do ; and there is a general belief that if a mare has a foal soon after being used to draw a corpse, the foal will die at its birth. Seed-cake and narrow oblong sponge biscuits are served to the assembled guests at a funeral, accompanied by wine, generally sherry, though sometimes port is used instead. This is before the burial. After the return from church it is customary for the whole party to sit down to tea, at which hot-buttered cakes are always served. It is usual in Lincolnshire to carry the coffin, followed by the mourners, into the church at the north door ; and at christenings and marriages to use the western or southern entrance. Epworth. Until lately it was not usual to bury on the north side of the churchyard unless absolutely obliged to do so by want of space, there being a strong prejudice against so doing. Those buried there will, at the Day of Judgment, rise from their graves later than those who were laid to rest in more favoured portions of the sacred ground. It is con- sidered to be the duty of the mistress of the house to go out and receive all the guests who attend a funeral, whether relations or friends, before they enter the door. Springthorpe. Funeral wreaths were sometimes made of metal, sometimes out of white paper, and sometimes were merely fashioned out of flowers. They generally were accompanied by white gloves, and were only carried at the funerals of young unmarried women of good character. Bottesford. There was formerly a widely-spread custom of throwing a white sheet, as a pall, over the coffin of a woman who had died at the birth of her child. At Bottesford this was done as recently as i860, after the Death. 237 coffin had been carried to the eastern end of the nave of the church. It was also customary in some villages for a woman who had thus died to be carried to her last resting-place by matrons wearing white hoods, but I have not heard of this being done during the last twenty years \ix. since 1875]. Maidens, however, are still, in certain parishes, carried to the grave by young girls thus attired ; and in some cases the girl ' bearers,' as well as wearing the white hood, have long white scarves made either of silk or cotton, and white gloves, and so likewise have all relatives and friends who attend the funeral. Formerly everyone attending a funeral wore these long scarves, made either of black silk or crepe, and they were given along with black gloves by the family of the deceased ; but during the last few years this custom has declined, though it is often done. Women, especially relations, at a funeral used to wear a hood of black material ; but I believe this to be obsolete, though it was done between i860 and 1865. If any garments that have been worn by the dead are put away, as the body decays in the grave, so will its earthly vesture rot ; this is not a very widely-spread or general belief. ' One funeral makes three,' that is, should there have been an interval of some duration without any burial taking place, and then a death occurs, two more will speedily follow after. » The utterly false notion that ' a green Christmas makes a full churchyard ' is a generally received one, and in consequence a ' white Christmas ' is accounted lucky. You should never, under any circumstances, walk upon a grave, or in any way tread upon it ; it brings bad luck to do so, and is considered not only as a mark of dis- respect to the person buried beneath your feet, but to all the dead that lie around. 238 Ceremonial. Ooates. When half of the graveyard of the chapel of Coates was ploughed up, it was sown with turnips, and the sexton told the late Sir Charles Anderson, of Lea, that it was * a singular thing, they all cam oop fingers and toes,* evidently believing it to be the result of the sacrilege. By ' fingers and toes ' it is meant that the turnip, instead of being of a globular shape, grows split up into long carrot or finger-shaped fangs, and is thus quite useless. Messingham. Somewhere about 1843 ^ skull was dug^ up in Messingham Churchyard with a nail through it. Another instance of the belief of \sic\ the efficacy of burying iron with the dead is illustrated by the fact that the key of Bishop Norton Church is said to have been found under the head of Matthew Lidgett, who was parish clerk, and who died in 1742. If you see a dead body you must on no account neglect to touch it, for if this is not done the spirit of the departed will haunt you. It is a common practice to make a show of the dead. . . . Whether they have seen the deceased after death or not, it is considered necessary for all the members of a family to touch the dead, in order to prevent him from troubling them, or other ill-luck ensuing. . . . In some places, when a corpse is brought by rail from a distance, the bell is tolled in the parish where it is taken out of the train, as well as at the church in which the funeral service is read ; this was done at Kirton-in-Lindsey in 1895. This is also done when a corpse is carried from a house to be interred beyond the limits of the parish where the death took place. If any bell rings in a house by itself, it is held to be a sure death-sign. . . . Burton-on-Stather. On the Burton hills [near the con- fluence of the Trent and the Yorkshire Ouse] is a spot Death, 239 said to be the burial-place of a woman who committed suicide, but her name and history are alike forgotten ; yet people who pass that way still fling stones upon the place where she lies. Swineshead. There is an ancient practice at Swineshead of cutting a large cross in the turf where anyone has met with a violent death. Bottesford. If the ghost or spirit of a person does not leave the grave and 'walk' before he has been dead and buried twenty-five years, it can never do so afterwards. This was said at Bottesford between the years 1876 and 1882. Grimsby. Telling the bees of a death in the family, especially of the master of the house, is a very old and general custom, the belief being that if they are not informed of it they will either all go away, or else die. A cottager at a village near Grimsby told the bees of her husband's death, and asked them *to be trig and work for her.' On being required to explain what 'trig' meant, she said 'wist,' wist being understood to mean quiet and orderly. Should bees swarm on dead wood it is a very bad sign, and means the speedy death of someone. . . . — Antiquary, xxxi., 3 30" 3 3 5- [1895]. Lincolnsliire Marsh. . . . Should one show signs of 'not getting on wi' his dyin/ you may be sure there are pigeons' feathers in the mattrass, and it is not at all improbable that the invalid will be taken quite out of bed and laid upon the bare floor; whilst, on the other hand, if he seems likely to pass away before the arrival of some distant son or daughter a small bag of feathers may be placed under his pillow to ' hold 'un back' till the last farewell can be said . . . the glass must be turned face to the wall or covered over, else you may see the dead man looking at you from it. For, although the window has been opened wide to let the spirit out. 240 Ceremonial, the looking glass may hold un back. The old grand- father clock must be stopped and veiled, and the passing bell must be rung with all speed. When the corpse is placed in the coffin you must never forget to tie the feet, else the dead may return, or some other spirit may take possession of the body for his own purposes. Old Will Richardson, of Croft, my own native parish, died in the early seventies, and was buried; but they forgot to tie his feet. About a fortnight after, a cousin of mine going around her district, called at the house, and was most effusively welcomed by his grand- daughter. 'Cum' thee in, Miss, right away; mother's in a rare doment; she clean fergot to tie grandfether's feet, and he's cummed agin, and set hisself in his owd corner, and we daredn't shift him wersens, not if it were ever so.' And there, sure enough, in the inglenook on the bricks beneath the old man's chair, squatted an enormous toad. *He wer' alius mighty tekken up wi' you, Miss,' said the woman, 'and mebbe you 'ud insense him thet he's hed his turn and it's ourn now, and he moan't come awming an' messing aboot no more, and mebbe you 'ud tie his legs and hap him up at t' fut of t' owd apple-tree.' Widow Mary Woodville kept the little village shop at Croft, just across the road from Richardson's, and one of her boys got his hand into a chaff-cutter and two fingers were cut off. So she had a pretty little coffin made, and put them in, and went off to see the vicar to beg that they might be buried in the churchyard. "Tain't but what t' Awmoighty cud put un together again, whearsoiver the bits be laid; bud I'd loike 'em to be so as He moan't hev to clat about an' seek 'em. 'E'll be strange and throng, A reckun, yon daa, a' putting foalks teggither; an' it doan't become the likes of me to mak' 'Im breffet all over t' place an' tew Hisself, if so bees we can put 'em handyloike i' His awn aacre.' . . . Death, 241 I never heard the term 'arvel' or 'averil' applied to the biscuits produced at the funeral feast, but the ideas both of the 'heir-ale' and the biscuits still linger on. [It is a] great offence for a mourner to refuse to partake of the biscuits, which are long, narrow, finger-shaped ones. . . . Not only must the bees be told of the death and their hives put in mourning, but the new head of the house must take down to the hives a dish from the funeral feast and say to the bees, 'I have brought you a bit and a sup of all that's on the table, and I hope you will be pleased.' Whilst upon the subject of the bees I may add that particular attention should be paid to the first swarm after a death. If it is easily taken you may be sure they are satisfied with their new master, but if by chance they settle on the dead branch of a tree he will not be likely to live long to benefit by their service. If they fly away and are lost, their old master has called them, and you had best consult the wise man to prevent a repetition of the loss. . . . Wainfleet. We had had considerable trouble with the Wainfleet lads about stone-throwing in the churchyard, and one day my church-wardens called my attention to a newly-made grave on which lay a mug and jug evidently quite freshly broken, and said, 'The boys have been at it again, and, what's more, have also stolen the flowers that Widow Davy had put upon her husband's grave. I at once saw that no chance stone had caused the fractures. So, putting off my officials with some excuse, I went to see the widow, and said to her, 'Well, Mrs. Davy, how came you to forget to give your old man his mug and his jug.' 'Ah, sir,' she replied, 'I knew you would understand all about it. I was that moidered wi' crying that I clean forgot to put 'em along of him in t' coffin. I put's t' Q 242 Ceremonial, groat in his mouth to pay his footing, but blame me if I doesn't leave out 't owd mug and jug. An' whativver he'd do wi'out 'em I can't think. So I goes and does t' next best; I deads 'em both over his grave, an', says I to mysen, "My old man, he set a vast o' store, he did, by yon mug and jug, he'd knaw 'em out o' a thousand, and when their ghoastesses gets over on yon side, he'll holler out, 'Yon's mine, han' 'em over to me'; and I'd jest like to see them as would stop him a' having of 'em an' all,, for 'e were rare an' handy wi' his fistesses, so be 'e were crossed above a bit, 'e were."' — Heanley, pp. 23-28. Clee. The funerals are conducted with great formality. At the death of an individual, a messenger is despatched to every householder in the village, with an invitation to join in procession to the Church ; and it happens, not unfrequently, that the corpse is attended to its final resting- place by a concourse of three or four hundred persons. In early times it was customary in this family to crown such young females as died in their virginity with a triumphant chaplet composed of fillagree work, as a testi- mony of their conquest over the lusts of the flesh. This token of respect merged, in process of time, into the practice of gracing the procession of young unmarried women, with children of their own sex, habited in white, and arranged in pairs, and bearing garlands cut in white paper, emblematical of their incorrupted innocence, variously disposed according to the rank or situation of the deceased, together with long slips of white paper to represent ribbons, and other pieces cut in the form of gloves, all of which were solemnly suspended when the funeral was over, in some conspicuous part of the Church, where they remained as a perpetual trophy or memento of the virginity of the deceased. . . . This pretty custom prevailed at Clee down to a very recent period, and I regret that in the year 18 19, when the Church underwent a thorough repair, these emblems of . Death, 243 innocence and friendship were finally removed. — G. M., May, 1829, pp. 416, 417. Great Grimsby. A funeral had generally a long train of mourners, preceded by a company of singers, singing hymns on the way to the church ; the coffin was borne by bearers with white towels, old Mary Grassam carrying the resting stools. A hearse or a cab was not then known. — Bates, p. 40. The * layer out ' in some places ties the feet of the dead, but it is necessary that they who bind, should, before burial, unloose, otherwise the dead will not rise at the first resurrection. Feet first, the body must be carried to its last resting- place, and that the dead may rest in peace and be ready to rise at the judgment signal, we lay them reverently with feet towards the dawn. — Bygone Lincolnshire, ii., p. 94. [During a funeral the house-door of the deceased was left] open so that ... if the spirit should wish to return to the old home it might not find itself shut out. — G. J., June 29, 1878. The belief that blood shed by the dying will not wash out from the floor or garments on which it has flowed, is widely spread. — N. & Q.^ vol. i., p. 461. Stamford. When a search was being made to recover the body of a young woman who committed suicide an attempt was made to bring the labours of those engaged in the search to a speedy termination by throwing into the water several loaves of bread, the belief being that the bread will not float beyond where the body of the drowned person lies, but that it will remain above it. — Stamford Mercury. The well-known custom of setting a loaf of bread, with quicksilver in it, to float on water in which someone who 244 Ceremonial. has been drowned remains undiscovered, is practised in the county ; but the corpse must be left for three days before the plan is tried, and then the loaf will float to the spot where the body is, and remain stationary above it. I understand in some parts of Lincolnshire it is not con- sidered necessary to place quicksilver in the bread. — Antiquary, vol. xxxi., pp. 330-335- Coffin. — In Lincolnshire, as I am informed, the same practice [bearing the coffin by napkins] is, or has been, followed. — Vaux, p. 127. Last year I found, for the first time, that many villages in different parts of Lincolnshire cherish a rooted supersti- tion that there is something sacrilegious in burying two corpses in one grave, one above the other, even if they be husband and wife. Here a son of an aged widow would not have her buried in the same grave with a husband who had been dead more than forty years. The people have no objection to disturb the skulls and other bones of persons not related to them to make room for a fresh corpse. Two persons died last December, and the nearest relative in each case begged to bury close to the nearest previous relation. The result was that two skulls in the one grave and three in the other were thrown out (and subsequently reinterred) to make room for the newcomer. There is plenty of new ground available. — N. & Q.^, vol. ii., p. 386. Messingham. It is a common custom to drop thyme upon the coffins of the dead at funerals. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 255. Great Grimsby. About twelve years ago, during the con- struction of the new docks, I was present at the exhumation of some human remains on the banks of the Humber. They were found a short distance above the high water line, beneath six feet of sand, and one or two feet of clay, which appeared to have been the original surface before \ Death. 245 the deposition of the sand. They consisted of the perfect skeleton of a figure of small stature, and were placed east and west. There was no remains of any metallic or other substances in connection with them, but under the left arm were the bones of a fowl, a cock apparently, from the long spurs on the legs. — N. & Q.^, vol. v., p. 55. Frampton. Stone Coffins filled with Cockle Shells. — In excavating the soil which has been brought in to heighten the floor of the transitional portion of Frampton Church, several stone coffins were discovered, which must originally have had their lids level with the floor. The lids are all gone, but the bones remain in the coffins, each has been filled with cockle and other shells and sand. It is evident from their being filled up to the top, and shells not being found elsewhere, that this was done by design and not by accident. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 250, 251. Scrivelsby. — Body buried with a lump of clay in place of the head. — Cf Hissey, pp. 361, 362. Coffinless Burial. — From the earliest ages to within about one hundred years ago, it appears to have been customary to bury either with or without a coffin. The following is an extract from a Terrier of lands, fees, etc., belonging to Caistor Vicarage, Lincolnshire, dated 1 7 1 7 : * For every grave in the churchyard and without coffin, four pence, if with coffin one shilling. — ENGLAND How- LETT, Church Customs^ p. 134. Parish Coffins. — Cf. Church Furniture, note on pp. 176, 177. Barton. Upon a great black stone is the image of a monk in brass, treading on two barrels. He was not a monk, as appears from the inscription, but it was common for people that would be buried in monks' habits, believing there was such divine power therein the divels durst not touch them. — Pryme, p. 132. 246 CeremoniaL Heapham. The people of the parish objected to bury their friends on the north side, or, in their own words, * out in the dark and cold.' However, this feeling does not seem to be shared by the people of the surrounding parishes ; at any rate not to the same extent, for the graves are scattered pretty equally all round. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., pp. 484, 485. Lindsey. The feeling against burial on the north side of the churchyard exists in many of the parishes of Lindsey. — N. & Q.^, vol. vi., p. 75. Springthorpe. There were no burials on the north side, because suicides were buried there. — N. & Q."*", vol. viii., p. 497. Swinhope. In 1889 a small vestry was built against the north wall of Swinhope Church, and traces of seven or eight very old interments were found in digging the three short trenches for the foundations, the bodies lying very closely packed, about three feet from the surface. In one case two persons had been buried, one above the other, in the same grave, in a coffin made of loose slabs of chalk roughly fitted together. This part of the ground, lying in the shadow of the church, has been wholly unused for burial in modern times ; further to the west there have been many interments, but only within the last forty-five years, and I believe no traces have been found of any old graves in that part. — N. & Q.^, vol. vi., p. 132. The south side of the churchyard is found to contain the greatest number of interments, for individuals had a solemn dread of being buried in the north, where there was no Cross, — Oliver (2), p. 42, footnote. Death. — * They bury them as kills their sens wi' hard work o' th' no'th side o' th' che'ch.' This saying has reference to the superstition prevalent in many parishes Death, , 247 against burial on the north side of the church-yard. — E. Peacock, i., 58. Grimsby. The Churchyard is accessible by gates at all the four quarters.* — Oliver (2), p. 50 and footnote. Funeral. — In Lincolnshire the north [door] is generally reserved entirely for funerals, the south and west doors being reserved for christenings and weddings. — ENGLAND HOWLETT, Church Customs^ p. 137. Death. Ghost Candle. — Candles which are kept burning around a dead body, before burial, now said to be used for the sake of warding off Ghosts, in former times used also as an act of worship. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 234. When there is a dead body in the house a candle should always be burnt in the room [in which it lies] to keep away evil spirits. Wax candles are much more efficacious for this purpose than those made of tallow. If when a candle is burning beside a dead body, it falls out of the stick, it is a sign of another death within the twelvemonth. — E. Peacock, i., p. 46. Funeral Cakes. — In Lincolnshire sponge finger biscuits are used. — ENGLAND HowLETT, Church Customs, p. 146. Gainsborough. Funeral Custom. — ' A singular custom prevails at Gainsborough of giving away penny loaves on the morning of a funeral to whoever demands them. This custom has prevailed for so long a period that the poorer inhabitants look upon it as a right. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., pp. 25, 26. North Kelsey. About twelve years ago a tramp, who was a stranger, killed himself by placing his neck on the railway line near Howsham, to be run over by a train. The verdict brought in by the coroner's jury at the inquest *It is accounted both indecent and unlucky for a corpse to enter the ■Churchyard by any avenue except the East Gate. 248 Ceremonial, which followed was felo de se. The dead man was there- fore buried at midnight, coffinless, and without any religious service, his head being carried to the churchyard wrapped in a newspaper. The body was placed in the grave in a standing position, so that it was only about two feet below the surface of the ground, and a large stone was then laid above it. ' I have heard,' says my informant, ' that it is . the general thing to lay suicides in the grave with their feet to the west : but an " upright burial " of such recent date as this Lincolnshire instance seems unusual.' — N. & Q.^, vol. viii., p. 502. Broughton. ' She made an end on hersen, and was buried at Broughton lane-ends.' — COLE, p. 79. [Holbeach] Ashwensday 1708. We took up old Hoyes that hangd himself and was buryed in the highway. — Stukeley Corr.^ i., p. 43. Wispington. Leaving Wispington, we came in about half a mile to a spot where four roads meet, a burial-place for suicides in times past, and reputed to be the centre of Lincolnshire. — HiSSEY, p. 399. Burial of Suicide.— Sqq. Part I., SECTION II., PLANTS, Hawthorn-tree. Saltfleetby. Paved Church ways in the Marsh. — Ancient flagged causeways exist at Saltfleetby All Saints, from the high road to the Church, and from Saltfleet to Skidbrooke . . . the peculiar long oval shape of the stones used . . . is evidently not accidental as it occurs too frequently, a large proportion of the stones being of that shape, which approximates to that of the ordinary stone * celt,' or the * celt ' shaped monoliths of Stonehenge, or to seek a nearer comparison, more or less to * coffin shape.' The shape is not such as would well adapt itself to paving a causeway. — L. N. & Q. vol. iii., p. 57. Death. 249 Burial. — It is unlucky to tread on graves. — Antiquities and Curiosities, p. 2 1 9. Grantham. B told us that when she was a child she used to go with others to peer through the window of that part of the crypt of the Parish Church which was called the * scaup-house,' and that on each occasion she and her companions observed the custom of dropping a pin upon the bones below. — G. J., June 22, 1878. Corpse-candle. — A light which is said to be seen at times over graves. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 69. How solemn and sad the ' Passing-bell ' with its final three times three for a brother departed, and three times two for a sister. — G. J., June 29, 1878. Funeral, Chiming Bells at — NORTH, pp. 188, 189, 190. Funeral, Passing-bell, Death-knell, etc. — NORTH, pp. 170-195, 202, 525, 543, 545, 658, 681, 696. I. of Axholme. [That of sitting through the service the Sunday after a funeral.] This custom is common. The attendance at church is not confined to ' the near relatives of the departed,' but includes the * bearers ' as well. — N. & Q.^vol. xi., pp. 353-354. Crosses and other Death- Marks cut in Turf- — Cf Antiquary, vol. xxxii., pp. 94-95. Death-Garland. — See PART I., SECTION II., PLANTS. SECTION III. GAMES AND SPORTS. Games. — L. N. & Q., vol. iii., p. 24. Brigg. Auntieloomie. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 9. Epworth. Ball of Primrose. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 15. Bandy-ball. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 16. Biddy-base. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 28. Metheringham. Bingo. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 30, 32. Bob-cherry. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 42. Buttons. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 54. Anderby and Bottesford. Carrying the Queen a Letter. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 59. Cat-gallows. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 63. Chuck-hole^ Chuck-penny. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 69. Crab-soul, Crab-sow. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 81. East Kirkby. Cushion Dance. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 9 1 . Anderby. Draw a Pail of Water. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 102, 103. Winterton. Drop Handkerchief — GOMME, vol. i., pp. no, II I. Ducks and Drakes. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 115. Duckstone. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 116. Anderby. The Wonderful Tree. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 148. Games and Sports, 251 Frodingham. Green Grass. — GOMME, vol. 1., pp. 157. 158, 162. Lincoln and Winterton. Green Gravel. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 172, 176. Green Grow the Leaves. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 183, 184. Winterton. Pins and Needles. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 201, 202. Haxey. Hood. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 221-3. Stixwould. Hop-frog. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 223. Hop-bed. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 226. Huckle-bones. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 239. Homcastle, North Kelsey, Lincoln. Hunting. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 243, 244, 245. Winterton. Isabella. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 253-255. [The action described by Mrs. Gomme does not fit this Lincolnshire version.] Jenny Jones. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 283. Jolly Miller. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 290, 291, 292. Keppy Ball — GOMME, vol. i., p. 297. Kibel and Nerspel. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 298. North Kelsey. Knocked at the Rapper. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 312, 313- Stixwould. Setting the Buck out. — GOMME, vol. i., P- 329- East Kirkby. Long Terrace. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 351. Anderby. Minister's Cat. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 388. N. W. Lincolnshire. Muffin Man. — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 402, 403. Epworth. Mulberry Bush. — GOMME, vol. i., p. 405. Nur and Spel. — GoMME, vol. i., p. 421. 252 Games and Sports, Winterton. Nuts in May or Nuts and May, — GOMME, vol. i., pp. 426, 428, 429. East Kirkby. Oats and Beans and Barley, — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10. Odd or Even. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 1 4. Odd-man. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 14. Brigg. Old Roger is Dead, — GoMME, vol. ii., pp. 18, 22. Oranges and Lemons. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 27, 29, 32. [I think that when we were asked to choose between Orange and Lemon we never knew which girl was which. — E. G.] Winterton and Lincoln. Poor Mary sits a-weeping, — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 51, 61. Winterton. Pretty Miss Pink. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 77, 78. Push the Business On. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 86, 87, 88. North Kelsey. Queen Anne. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 92. [A line of children is formed before which one player stands or sits. This child, ' Queen Anne,' and the line repeat the words alternately. The line sings ' Queen Anne, etc' Queen Anne says ' Turn all.' The others secretly passing a ball from hand to hand repeat, * The more we turn, etc' Queen Anne now points to the player she believes to have the ball. If she has guessed correctly she changes places with the hider, if wrongly, the children begin turning and concealing the ball again, till she discovers who has it] Anderby. Queen of Sheba. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 1 04. Relievo. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 107. Winterton, Lincoln, Leadenham. — Ring a Ring d Roses, — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 108, 1 10. Games and Sports. 253 Lincoln. Robbing the Parson's Hen-roost — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 114, 115. Brigg. Round and Round the Village. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 124, 130, 131, 132, 133. East Kirkby. Round Tag. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 144. Stixwould. Sally Water. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 157, 160, 167. Lincoln, Scawby, Stixwould. Lady's Thimble. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 226, 227 ; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 152. Lincoln. Thread the Needle. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 229. East Kirkby. Three Dukes. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 238, 248, 249, 250. Tip-Cat. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 295. Tit-tat-toe. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 296. Turn Trencher. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 313. Wallflowers. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 333, 340. Frodingham. When I was a Young Girl. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 369, 370. Lincoln, Kelsey, Winterton. The Old Oak Tree. — GOMME, vol. ii., p. 386. Winterton, Anderby. Who goes round my Stone Wall? — GoMME, vol. ii., pp. 375, 378, 379, 380. Anderby. Wolf. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 397, 398. Frodingham, Lincoln. Would you Know how Doth the Peasant. — GOMME, vol. ii., pp. 400, 401. Boston. The Wolds. Children's Singing Games. — ' A short time ago, walking on the bank of the Witham, here, I heard a little boy, as he rowed in a boat, singing * Fm a-waitin' fur a pardner, I'm a-waitin' fur a pardner.' I had not heard these words for many years, but all at once again I saw the children in the Lincolnshire wold 254 Games and Sports. village playing in the green lane in the summer evening, and dancing round as they sang the following words : A-waitin' fur a pardner, A-waitin' fur a pardner. You an' I an' iv'ryone knows How whoats an' beans an' barley grows. Fost tha farmer saws 'is seed, Then he stans an' teks 'is ease, Stamps 'is feet an' claps 'is 'ands, And turns him rounds to view tha lands. A-waitin' fur a pardner, A-waitin' fur a pardner, etc. Now you're married you must obaa, You must be true to all you saa, You must be kind and very good, And help y'er wife to chop tha wood. A-waitin' fur a pardner, etc. Homcastle. In the dance the boys and girls form a ring. A boy stands in the centre, singing with the rest, as they dance around. There is no particular order, but generally at the second singing of the chorus (or refrain) the ' gentleman chooses a ' lady ' partner, and both stand in the centre singing with those composing the ring, ' Now you're married,' etc. Sometimes ' gentle- man ' kisses partner. When the whole song is finished, sometimes the gentleman makes one of the ring, and the lady remains in the centre and chooses a partner ; some- times both join the ring, and a fresh boy goes into the centre and waits for a partner, and the song goes on as before till they are tired. I write this in the present tense, because I was pleased to find that children in the neighbourhood of Horncastle yet play at this game. It is probably common to other parts of the country ; but I have never heard of it, nor have I seen the words in print. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 493. Grimsby. One party [on a general holiday] would be engaged in bucklerplay, another in wrestling, others in Games and Sports, 255 archery, prison bars, football, barley-break, or ninepins. — Oliver, iv., pp. 145, 146. Bandy. — (i) The stick with which the game of hockey is played ; and hence (2) the game itself. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 27. The game of knot and spell. — Brogden, p. 1 8. A game called fives in Scotland, and rackets in the south of England. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 27. Biddy-base. — A game, prisoner's base. — Brogden, p. 23. Blether Dick. — A boy armed with a blown bladder, attached to the end of a long stick by about half a yard of string, with which he pursues his playmates in a game. — E. Peacock, i., p. 28. Bunting. — A boy's game, played with sticks and a small piece of wood sharpened off at the ends — Tip-cat. — Cole, p. 23 ; Brogden, p. 33. Bullroarer ; Friction Drum. — When I was a boy I never heard this thing or ' implement ' called anything but a ' buzzer.' It was less popular than another plaything called a 'jackdaw,' which was made of about an inch of the top part of the neck of a wine bottle. Over this was stretched a bit of parchment, which was tightly tied under the projecting rim of it. A long horse-hair, with a knot at the end, was then put through the parchment, the knot being inside the neck. By wetting the fore- finger and thumb, and drawing the horse-hair between them you could produce sounds * jack,' ' j-a-a-c-k ' or ' jak, jak,' as you moved quickly or slowly or in a jerky way. I have seen neither ' buzzers ' nor ' jackdaws ' for many many years. — N. & Q.^ vol. vii., p. 457. Cat-cradle. A game children play with their fingers and a piece of string. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 99. 256 Games and Sports, Cat-gallows. — Two sticks stuck upright in the ground, having notches on which another stick is placed hori- zontally to leap over. — Brogden, p. 37 ; E. Peacock, i., p. 50. Chin-up. — A game somewhat resembling hockey. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. no. Chuck-hole. — A game much played among the male population of agricultural districts. A number of youths, seldom less than three, or more than eight or ten, each having supplied himself with a piece of money, generally a halfpenny, mark out a certain distance from a hole, of a diameter of a penny, scooped out in the ground, and from this mark, each ' chucks ' his halfpenny in such a manner as to hit the hole ; but, though this is not unfrequently done, the coin, without great practice, reverberates and rolls to some distance. These distances are then taken, and he whose piece remains in the hole, or the nearest distance from it, has what is called the ' first go ' in the next round or repeti- tion, and so many of the coins now taken into his hands altogether, as remain in the hole after he has made this second throw, from the marked distance, he takes as his winnings. An unskilful first throw rarely gives the thrower of a second trial. Marbles are sometimes used for economy's sake instead of halfpence. — Brogden, p. 41. Chuck-hole, Chuck-penny, a game played by boys. A circle is marked on the ground, in the centre of which is a small hole. Each person in the game throws a coin at this hole. He whose penny hits the hole (or in case none hit the hole, he whose penny remains nearest to it) wins the game. If all the pennies roll outside the ring it is a ' dead heat,' and each boy reclaims his penny. — E. Peacock, i., p. 58. Chuck-stones. — Stones used by children in playing a game. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 113. Games and Sports, 257 Cockelty 'bread. — A game played by children : This is the waay you maake cockelty-bread ; This is the waay you maake cockelty-bread ; Up with yer heals an' doon wi' yer head, This is the waay you maake cockelty-bread. The children turn head-over-heels after repeating the third line. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 128. Cob-Nut. — The Lindsey and Kesteven name for Corylus avellana^ L., variety grandis. ' It is the name of an old game among the children played with nuts.' — Wrights Dictionary ; L. Folk Names, p. 6. ' Boys in the parish of Cadney-cum-Howsham, L., call the game " Conqueror," and play it with the fruit of the horse chestnut {^sculus hippocastanum^ L.)' — L. Folk Names, Additions, p. 26. Counting-out Rhyme : My mother told me To pick that very same one, You are in and she is out With a rotten dish clout On her back. (possibly incomplete). — NORTHALL, p. 348. Crab-sowl, Crab-sow. — A game played with a bung or ball struck with sticks. — Brogden, p. 47. To draw Cuts. — To cast lots by means of straws cut of unequal length. These straws are held in the closed hand and the person who draws the longest straw wins. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 153. Dip d the Kit, a rustic game. — E. Peacock, 1., p. 85. Duck and Drake. — Throwing a small flat stone, tile, slate, or shell, over water, so as to make it skim along the surface. Ex. : A duck-and-a-drake, And a penny oat cake. Old Rhyme. — Brogden, p. 59. 258 Games and Sports, To play at ducks and drakes is to throw a flat stone and any such-like thing over the water so as to make it glance -along the surface. When this is done the follow- ing jingle is said : 'A duck and a drake, And a penny white cake And a skew-ball.' E. Peacock, i., p. 94. Duck-stone. — A game played by ' lads.' A small stone is placed upon a larger one, and other stones are thrown from a given point, to upset the top-most stone. The game is played, generally, by a party of half-a- dozen lads, one of whom is stationed not only to take care that the lesser is not knocked off the larger stone by any of the throwers, but he has to prevent each from recovering or even touching the object thrown without being himself touched, which it requires an alert activity to achieve, unless the ' duck,' or upper stone, be knocked off the lower, by the dexterity of a thrower, and the watcher be unable to replace it before all the party recovers their point of distance. — Brogden, p. 59. Holland Fen. Foot-ball. — July ist, the insurgents [who were rioting in opposition to the enclosure of Holland Fen], consisting of about two hundred men, threw up a foot-ball in the fen, and played for about two hours, when a troop of dragoons, some gentlemen from Boston, and four constables, having seized four or five of the rioters, committed them to Spalding gaol. . . . On the 15th, another ball was thrown up, and no person opposed them ; and on the 1 6th, five men were sent by Sir C. Frederick to guard Brothertoft. On the 29th, another ball was thrown up without opposition. — Marrat, vol. i., pp. 140, 141. Handy-Dandy. — In North Lincolnshire, in my young days, this game was played with marbles. Putting our hands behind us, we placed, either in the right hand or Games and Sports, 259 the left, according to our own pleasure, one or more marbles. Closing the hands, and putting one fist on the top of the other, we said : 'Handy dandy, Picady pandy, High Church or Low.' Should the marbles have been placed in the upper hand and our opponent should say ' High,' he got the marbles ; should he say ' Low/ of course he lost, and had to pay his opponent the number of marbles disclosed, and so vice versa. — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., pp. 355, 356. Huckle-bone. — The astragalus, a small bone of a sheep, used by children for playing a game called in some parts of England 'dibs.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 140. Kep-ball. — (i) The game of catch-ball. (2) The ball with which it is played. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 300. Kibble-and-Knor, — A game popularly known as ' spell and knor.' — Brogden, p. no. King-Cruise. — A stoppage in any game played by school children. — GoOD, p. 59. Kiss V th! ring. — Kissing-ring, a children's game. — E. Peacock, i., p. 150. Knur. — A round ball of hard wood, a boy's plaything, used at the game called knur-spell. — Thompson, p. 712. Spang-wen. — To force into the air from a knur-spell. Brogden, p. 191. Luggery-bite, Lug-at-a-bite. — A game with fruit amongst boys ; one bites the fruit and another pulls his hair, until he throws the fruit away. — BROGDEN, p. 120. Meg Merry legs. — Nine men's morrice. — Lines. Arch. Soc, vol. xi., p. 130. In one of the pavement slabs in ... [a chapel of the West Transept in Lincoln Minster] nine holes are pointed 26o Gaines and Sports, out. . . . They are said to have been used for games by- some of the officials (choir-boys one would suppose) con- nected with the minster. — Kendrick, p. 96. Odd-man. — A game played with coins. If a man be cheated, it is a common expression to say we * odd-man'd him.' — Brogden, p. 140. Odd-or-even. — A boy's game, played with coins, buttons, marbles, or anything which may be conveniently held in the hands. — Brogden, p. 140 ; E. PEACOCK, i., p. 183. Rusty Bum. — A rough game played by boys. At York it is called ' Ships and sailors.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 210. Shinny, Shinty. — A boy's out-door game played with sticks and a knurr. — BROGDEN, p. 180. Terzy. — A game in which any number of players form in a double circle, except two, one of whom runs in front of any two. The other outside the circle runs round and touches the back of one of the three, who in his turn becomes the catcher, and the one who had been catching goes into the middle of the circle to take the place of the first. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 556. Ticky-touch-wood. — A game played by children, who are free from all penalties when touching wood. — Brogden, p. 208. Tip, tap, toe, — A child's game. A square is drawn having nine smaller squares or houses within it. Two persons play. They alternately make the one a square [or circle] and the other a cross in any one of the houses. He that first gets three in a line wins the game. — E. Peacock, i., p. 256. Turn-Trencher. — A game, generally played in Lincoln- shire at Christmas time. — Brogden, p. 214 ; E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 571. Games and Sports, 261 Dorrington. Sites for Playing Games. — The principal solemnity which was practised on this playgarth, and it was continued down to a very recent period, was dancing the solar deiseal. The villagers were arranged in ranks and moved round the playgarth in circles, from east to west by the south ; proceeding at first ' with solemn step and slow,' amidst an awful and deathlike silence, to inspire a sacred feeling. The dance increased in speed by imperceptible degrees, until the party were impelled into a rapid and furious motion by the tumultuous clang of musical instruments, and the screams of harsh and dissonant voices, reciting in verse the praise of those heroes who had been brave in war, courteous in peace, and the devoted friends and patrons of religion. These dances were frequently performed in masks and disguisements. The minor games practised here are such as the super- stitious portion of the peasantry still regard with reverence. The autumnal fires are still kindled, except that the fifth is substituted for the first of November ; and it is attended by many of the ancient ceremonies, such as running through the fire and smoke, each casting a stone into the fire, and all running off at the conclusion to escape from the black short -tailed sow. On the following morning the stones are searched for among the ashes, and if any are missing they betide ill to those who threw them in. The ceremonies of gathering the mistletoe at Christmas, and the sports of May-day were also practised here ; and the old people of the village well remember hearing their aged parents say that when they were children it was customary to have periodical sports in the same place. The young people of both sexes danced on the green in the presence of the assembled villagers, who were seated under the Three Grained Oak [see SECTION II., p. 23] which grew near the spot, to behold the sports. . . . May Games [were] celebrated on this spot, for the pole decorated with garlands was annually elevated on Chapel hill, down to the last century. — Oliver (3), pp. 94, 95. 262 Games and Sports, On the above day [St. Bartholomew's, Aug. 24] the following custom prevailed at Dorrington, in the county of Lincoln. In the morning a number of maidens, clad in their best attire, went in procession to a small chapel, then standing in the parish, and strewed its floor with rushes, from whence they proceeded to a piece of land called the ' Play Garths,* where they were joined by most of the inhabitants of the place, who passed the remainder of the day in rural sports, such as foot-ball, wrestling, and other athletic exercises, with dancing, etc. The pastimes, how- ever, are not confined to St. Bartholomew's day, but occur at other times in the year ; as the * Garths ' was left by an inhabitant for the young men and women of the village to play in. . . . — Hone's Year Book, p. 492. Bull-baiting. — This cruel pastime was formerly enjoyed in almost every village. ... A superstition yet lingers that bull beef is not good for food if the animal have not been baited. — E. Peacock, i., 40. Grimsby. ' Magnaque taurorum fracturi colla Britanni.' The county of Lincoln is eulogized by Fuller as producing superior dogs for the sport ; and in Grimsby bull-baiting was pursued with such avidity, that to increase its impor- tance, and prevent the possibility of its falling into disuse, it was made the subject of an official regulation of the magistracy. It had been practised within the borough from time immemorial, but about the beginning of the reign of Hen. VII. the butchers, finding it both trouble- some and inconvenient to provide animals for the public amusement, endeavoured to evade the requisition ; but it was made imperative upon them by edict of the mayor and burgesses, which was incorporated into a code of ordinances that were made and agreed to on the 23rd of October, 1499, for the better government of the borough. Man. and Cus., pp. 211, 212. Stamford. This town is famous for an annual bull- running on St. Brice's day. — Topography, p. 66. Games and Sports, 263 Bull-running has, we believe, been mentioned in connection with only three towns in England — Stamford in Lincolnshire, Tutbury in Staffordshire, and Tetbury in Gloucestershire ; whereas bull-baiting was common enough all over the country. . . . From time immemorial, on the I 3th of November (the second day after St. Martin's day), be it noted, an animal — a bull — was publicly hunted, and slaughtered, and eaten amid much glee [at Stamford]. — Old Lincolnshire^ i., pp. 90, 92. Song of the Stamford Bullards. Words and Music Anonymous. Arranged for Piano by Allan Rippon. j— ^ .1 t P i st^ ^S r=?= ga3.U~24;najEg^4^'^=ri i=l ■^ •!^'T^ P ^ ^^g Come, all youbon-ny boys Who love to bait the bon-ny bull, Who ^^ i ^■ r=^ :64 Games and Sports, take de-light in noise, And you shall have your bel-ly full. I t=^ F^ ^ ^ i :i=p: rgg :^: i'^,' ^2=^ On Stamford's Town Bull running day, We'll show you such right gallant play, You g#W#^ ^m tes D.C. ^—m- 7=^ 5 SB -^"-i-# never saw the like you' 11 say, As you have seen at Stam - flUTffl^y^-n^^f ford. 1 ^ ^ II. Earl Warren was the man, That first began this gallant sport ; In the Castle he did stand, And saw the bonny bulls that fought ; t Games and Sports, 265 The butchers with their bull-dogs came, These sturdy stubborn bulls to tame, But more with madness did inflame, Enrag'd they ran through Stamford. III. Delighted with the sport, The meadows there he freely gave, Where these bonny bulls had fought. The butchers now do hold and have ; By Charter they are strictly bound. That ev'ry year a bull be found : Come daub your face your dirty clown And stump away to Stamford. IV. Come, take him by the tail boys, — Bridge, bridge him if you can ; Prog him with a nail boys ; Never let him quiet stand : Through every street and lane in town We'll chevy chase him up and down ; You sturdy strawyards ten miles round, Come stump away to Stamford. Bring with you a prog stick, — Boldly mount then on his back : Bring with you a dog Dick, Who will also help to bark. This is the rebel's riot feast. Humanity must be debas'd. And every man must do his best To bait the bull in Stamford. Old Lincolnshire^ i., p. 134. Bull-Running. — The Streets are filled with Heroes who bandy the Dirt about their own Dublets, and take care that every Body who appears with a clean Face shall not want a dirty one ; for He that gets no Buu-Dirt, gets no Christmas. Peck, Bull Runnings^ chap. iii. 266 Games and Sports, Bull-Running. — When they put the Brute to Death, they gather his Ordure and present the Pomatum to those clean Faces that venture abroad in the Dusk of the Evening. The Body is shared by the Heroes, and in old time, he who first rode upon the Bull's Back, had the Head and all other Appurtenances thereunto belonging. — Peck, Bull- Runnings^ chap. iii. The Speech of a Notable Bullard about Forty Moons ago. . . . On this Day there is no King in Stamford ; we are every one of us High and Mighty. Lords of the united Parishes in a General Bull-running. ... we are every one of us a Lord Paramount, a Lord of Rule and Misrule, a King in Stamford, . . . We are punishable for no Crime but Murder, and that only of our own, and no other Species. If you will suffer me to direct your Excellencies during this short Administration, I most humbly advise : . . . 6. That no Man act this Day as a common Subject of any Power or Potentate whatsoever ; Foreign or Domestick. 7. That there be a friendly Participation of the Flesh and Puddings of the deceased Beast, and that the Great Gut or Pudding, commonly known by the Name of Tom Hodge, be given to the most Worthy Adventurer. 8. That a Wheel-barrow be provided for St. Andrew to ride in, and meet the Bull. . . . He was answered with a general Applause, and immed- iately the whole Company, broke up and divided, some to fetch St. Andrew, and others to let out the Bull. — PECK, Bull-Runnings y chap. iv. Of the Private Bull- Runnings. These are performed in one single Street^ as the other was all over the town. Games and Sports, 267 The Bull is let out about One a Clock, and if he ben't very brisk, St. Andrew is let down with a Rope about his neck in order to divert him. St. Andrew is a Machine compos'd by the unlucky [?] Mobb, representing the Form of that Saint upon a Piece of Timber ; indeed the Tailors say that it is Crispin, but the Shoemakers are very well satisfy'd that it is St. Andrew's n'own self. When the Machine is compleated, the Rope-ends are handed to two opposite Windows, and the Saint turns Bravo to bully old Roger, who is resolved to swinge him, and let the Mobb see what he would do to them in the like Case ; but St. Andrew, by the Help of good neighbours, is clearly too cunning for him : He whips into the Air, whilst poor Roger is fit to break his Neck, because he is not able to stop his Career. Sometimes they brod him with Needles, sometimes they pepper him, sometimes they shoot at him, till the poor Brute is fit to sink under his Sufferings ; when they perceive he is quite spent, they put him to Death. — Peck, Bull-Runnings, chap. v. ; cf Butcher, pp. 76-80 ; ANDER- SON, pp. 47, 48. Eaxey. Throwing the Hood. — The old twelfth-day is devoted to throwing the hood-, an amusement, tradition reports, to have been instituted by one of the Mowbrays. A roll of canvas, tight corded together, weighing from four to six pounds, is taken to an open field and con- tended for by the rustics, who assemble together to the number of many hundreds ; an individual appointed, casts it from him, and the first person that can convey it into the cellar of any public-house receives a reward of one shilling, paid by the plough-bullocks or hoggins. A new hood being furnished when the others are carried off, the contest usually continues until dark. Many of the candidates for athletic fame, receives \sic\ great injuries by falls, bruises, etc. The evening is 268 Gaines and Sports, usually commenced with mirth and glee, at the place where the victor has deposited his prize, and concluded, in general, with quarrelling and drunkenness. This rustic amusement is only observed at Epworth and Haxey : at the latter place, the day is kept as a feast by the inhabitants, who have their friends and acquaintance to visit them. The next day the plough-bullocks^ or hoggins^ go round the town to receive alms at each house, where they cry * Largus.' They are habited similar to the morris-dancers, are yoked to, and drag, a small plough ; they have their farmer and a fool, called Billy Buck, dressed like a harlequin, with whom the boys make sport. The day is concluded by the bullocks running with the plough round the cross in the market-place, and the man that can throw the others down, and convey their plough into the cellar of a public-house, receives one shilling for his agility. — Peck, Axholme, pp. 277, 278. This place, though at one time the most considerable in the Isle [of Axholme], never had the privilege of a market or fair. It has, however, two feasts, one on the 6th day of July, called Haxey Midsummer, and the other on the 6th of January, called Haxey Hood. The Midsummer festival has nothing to distinguish it from other similar meetings ; but that held on the 6th of January has a sport or game peculiar to the place. The hood is a piece of sacking, rolled tightly up and well corded, and which weighs about six pounds. This is taken into an open field, on the north side of the Church, about two o'clock in the afternoon, to be contended for by the youths assembled for that purpose. When the hood is about to be thrown up, the plough bullocks, or boggins, as they are called, dressed in scarlet jackets, are placed amongst the crowd at certain distances. Their persons are sacred ; and if amidst the general row the hood falls into the hands of one of them the sport begins again. The Games and Sports, 269 object of the person who seizes the hood is to carry off the prize to some public-house in the town, where he is rewarded with such liquor as he chooses to call for. This pastime is said to have been instituted by the Mowbrays ; and that the person who furnished the hood did so as a tenure by which he held some land under the Lord. How far this tradition may be founded on fact I am not able to say ; but no person now acknowledges to hold any land by that tenure. — Stonehouse, p. 291. I having been present at the throwing of the hood at Haxey, Lincolnshire, several times, have pleasure in giving your querist A. E. what information I gathered from time to time on the spot. The custom arose from the follow- ing circumstance ; Anciently the Mowbrays had great possessions in and about the Isle of Axholme, and a seat at which they principally resided, and were considered the greatest folk in that part of the country. It so happened that on old Christmas Day a young lady (the daughter of the then Mowbray) was riding across the Meeres (an old road, at that time the principal one across the village) to the church, a gale of wind blew off her hood. Twelve farming men who were working in the field saw the occurrence, and ran to gather up the hood. And in such earnest were they that the lady took so much amusement at the scene, she forbade her own attendants joining in the pursuit. The hood being captured, returned, and replaced on the lady's head, she expressed her obligations to the men, giving them each some money, and promised a piece of land (to be vested in certain persons in trust) to throw up a hood annually on old Christmas Day ; she also ordered that the twelve men engaged to contest the race for the hood should be clothed {pro tern.) in scarlet jerkins and velvet caps : the hood to be thrown up in the same place as the one where she lost her's. The custom is yet fol- lowed ; and though the Meeres on which she was riding has long ago been brought into a state of cultivation, and 270 Games and Sports, the road through it been diverted, yet an old mill stands in the field where the old road passed through, and is pointed out as the place where the original scene took place, and the hood is usually thrown up from this mill. There is usually a great concourse of people from the neighbouring villages, who also take part in the proceed- ings ; and when the hood is thrown up by the chief of the Boggons or by the officials, it becomes the object of the villagers to get the hood to their own village by throwing or kicking it, similar to the football — the other eleven men, called Boggons, being stationed at the corners and sides of the field to prevent, if possible, its being thrown out of the field ; and should it chance to fall into any of their hands it is * boggoned ' and forthwith returned to the chief, who again throws it up from the mill as before. Whoever is fortunate enough to get it out of the field tries to get it to his village, and usually takes it to the public-house he is accustomed to frequent, and the land- lord regales them with hot ale and rum. The game usually continues until dusk, and is frequently attended by broken shins and broken heads. I have known a man's leg broken. The next day is occupied by the boggons going round the villages singing as waits, and are regaled with hot furmenty ; from some they get coppers given them, and from others a small measure of wheat, according to the means of the donors. The day after that they assume the character of plough-bullocks, and at a certain part of Westwoodside they ' smoke the fool,* that is, straw is brought by those who like and piled on a heap, the rope being tied or slung over the branches of the tree next the pile of straw, the other end of the rope is fastened round the waist of the * fool,' and he is drawn up, and fire is put to the straw, the ' fool ' being swung to and fro through the smoke until he is well nigh choked ; after which he goes round with his cap and collects whatever the spectators think proper to give. After which the performance is at an end until the following I Games and Sports. 271 year. ... I forgot to say that the quantity of land left by Lady Mowbray was forty acres, which are known by the name of the Hoodlands, and that the Boggons' dresses and the hood are made from its proceeds. — N. & Q.2, vol. v., pp. 94, 95. There is an interesting account of this custom, evidently written by an eye-witness, in the current number of Once- a-Week^ p. 88. I call attention to this article because it differs in some respects from the account given by W. H. WOOLHOUSE. The number of *boggons' are stated at thirteen, not twelve, and the land left is said to be only thirteen acres instead of forty. An additional fact is stated that the ' boggons ' do not allow the hood to leave the ground in which it is first thrown up till four o'clock, and the story of the origin of the sport is rather different, and less probable than that given by your correspondent. The ' smoking ' seems not to be confined to the fool, but is the first step in the initiation into the * Honourable Company of Boggans ' : the second step, probably intended to counteract the evil effects of the first, consists in what is technically called * cobbing ' the new member at the nearest gate. — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 137. In the contiguous parish of Epworth a similar game is played under the same name but with some variations. The hood is not here carried away from the field, but to certain goals, against which it is struck three times and then declared free. This is called * wyking ' the hood, which is afterwards thrown up again for a fresh game. — N. & Q.6, vol. vii., p. 148. The Throwing of the Hood. — This annual custom took place at Haxey, Lincolnshire, on Saturday, Jan. 6, 1872. I extract the following particulars from the Gainsburgh News of the 1 3 th : At two o'clock in the afternoon the 272 Games and Sports, ceremony was commenced by a man called * the fool/ who read, standing in a cart a * riot act ' ; after which he and the crowd ran into the fields and the game began. The fool's face is painted in colours, and his clothes are hung about with various coloured rags. Men called * boggans ' are the masters of the ceremonies. These men all wear red jackets, and one of their number is called * the captain of all the boggans.' The captain throws a hood (one of a bundle which he carries) into the air. This is caught by one of the crowd who calls out ' My hood * and then attempts to run off with it. ' He ran with it as far as he could and then gave it a throw towards Haxey ; it was caught by three or four more, who would not let go — consequently, a regular scuffle took place, but in a good-humoured manner. The crowd pushed to and fro, some trying for Haxey, some for Westwoodside, some for Burnham,' etc. If the hood can be touched by one of the * boggans ' during the struggle for possession, it is at once given up to him, taken back to the starting-point, and again thrown up by the captain. The same, I suppose, with the whole of the hoods. A young man caught a hood which he brought to Haxey, to the Duke William inn, where he received for it half-a- gallon of ale — for which the 'boggans' pay. Another reached Burnham, and received a similar refresher. Some innkeepers will give ten shillings for a hood, it being con- sidered ' a great deed to get away with a hood.' There are thirteen * boggans,' but only seven were present on this occasion. — N. & Q.^ vol. ix., pp. 158, 159. Three men (mummers) have just left our door. They came from Haxey, in Lincolnshire. This is what I gathered from them — that they stand on a stoon (stone), and invite men to a big dinner, on January 6. One man, clothed in scarlet jacket and hat adorned with artificial flowers, was a * lord.' He carried on his back a large leather roll called a 'hood'; in his hand 13 willows Games and Sports. 273 bound into a ' rod.' He repeated these words to me carefully : jjoos upon Hoos, Stoon upon Stoon, If you meet a mon Knock a mon doon. The ' lord ' was accompanied by a ' fool ' — his clothes were very grotesque, coarse crash with shreds of bright cloth drawn through. He carried a ' mop.' The third man, an attendant, carried a long staff ' to keep dogs off with.' On January 6 the church bells ring, and a ceremony of * swaying the hood ' takes place. It lasts three hours about. It is carried by the victor to a public-house, and is restored to the ' lord ' on payment of 2s. The dinner takes place at that public-house. At one time these mummers used to come in the evening and perform some play, or make a speech ; this was not done to-day. If the lady who wrote on the subject cares for further informa- tion I shall be pleased to hunt up from these men all that they can add to this. A village woman tells me the ' hood ' is supposed to represent a lady's hood that was lost, and a reward was offered for it. — The Standard, Tuesday, 5 th January, 1904. Several officers are appointed to rule the revels, in- cluding ' Bunkus,' ' My Lord,' ' The Fool,' ' Michael,' and * Webby,' and the Fool, to initiate the proceedings, mounts a stone near Haxey Church, and repeats the following 'Oose agean 'oose, toon agean toon, Fost man yo meet knock him doon. G. P., Jan. 9, 1890. lines : Haxey Hood and the King of the Boggans. — NORTH, pp. 244-246. Haxey Hood-game. — See Folk-Lore, vol. vii., p. 330; vol. viii., pp. 72-75. s 274 Games and Sports, Revival of Belton Hood. — On Friday this old-fashioned contest was revived at Belton, after a lapse of twenty- years. A gallant band of promoters brought the sport into prominence ; and a large company assembled in the field, the goals being Churchtown and Westgate. There would be about 150 on each side. The struggle was well maintained, but eventually the * hood ' was carried amid loud cheers to the Wheat Sheaf Inn in Westgate, where there was an ample supply of bread and cheese, tobacco, and ' nut brown,' supplied by * mine host and hostess,* Mr. and Mrs. Braithwaite. A very pleasant and social evening was passed by the company in song and senti- ment.— Retford News, ]d.n. 18, 1895. Grimsby. Cabsow. — Many years ago * cabsow ' was the most popular game in the parish. On Christmas Day every man was supposed to play it. The game some- what resembled hockey, more so than golf All that was needed was a good ground ash stick, well turned up at the end, and a wooden ball. With more or less well- defined rules the ball was sent by the sticks from one side to another, like a football from player to player, and many a hard knock was received in the struggle for supremacy by the two sides, hence the alternative local name * Shin-up.' — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 446. CHUSCH-TABD GAMES. Scawby. Bonn Ball. — At Scawby, in Lincolnshire, up to the early part of the present \i.e. nineteenth] century, a game was played in the church-yard by girls only, called Bonn Ball. The church did not come into the game at all, and it was played nearer the porch than the tower. — Antiquities and Curiosities, p. 225. Lincoln Cathedral, Feast of Fools celebrated in, con- demned by Grossteste. — Cf Grossteste, p. 128. Church-Yard Games. 275 Ball-play in Church. — Hone Every-Day Book^ vol. i., p. 436. Semperingham. The step of the north door was an inverted coffin stone, which on being removed was found to have scratched on it a rough diagram, which I presume represents the game ' Peg Meryll ' . . . The game does not appear to be known in this neighbourhood. — Lines. Arch. Soc, vol. xi., p. 131. COCK-FIGHTING. Messingham. On Shrove Tuesday cock fights were held at the public house in the morning. In the afternoon foot-ball was played, and the day was concluded with dancing and cards. — MACKINNON, p. 10. Bamoldby-le-Beck. Fifty years ago the ' Feast ' of this little village was kept up with customs which at present seems [sic'] relics of prehistoric barbarism, though Barnoldby on the Beck was probably no worse herein than its neigh- bours. ' Lasses ' ran races down the road for ' gown- pieces,' and every ' Pharson's Tuesday ' (Shrove Tuesday) cock-fighting went on in the pinfold from morning to night, all the population sitting round it with their feet inside, the ' bairns ' doing their best to get an occasional peep. * I mind,' said an old inhabitant, ' a farmer's wife in particular who used, early every Pharson's Tuesday, to put on her red cloak and take her seat upon the wall to watch the mains. She would cry out — I seem to hear her now — " A guinea on the black 'un ! A guinea on the black 'un!'" — W ATKINS, pp. 205, 206. Ten years before that time [not later than 1856, apparently] the cock-pit was a recognised institution in the village. Worse still, the pit was dug in the parson's garden, for of course in those days he was non-resident. * Pan-cake Tuesday ' only ranked second to May Day in 276 Games and Sports, feasting and revelry. A * pancake bell ' sounded from some churches. Now all these jollities have disappeared, and life has become very sombre. — Antiquary ^ xiv., 1 1. Grimsby. The old inhabitants were very much addicted to sports, pastimes, and amusements, some of which con- stituted their pride and boast. None were so disloyal as to question the propriety of fighting cocks and quails, baiting bulls and bears, throwing at cocks on Shrove Tuesday, and thrashing the fat hen, for they were amuse- ments patronized by royalty. — OLIVER, iv., pp. 9, 10. Years ago, in South Lincolnshire, Shrove Tuesday was the day for beginning the battledoor-and-shuttlecock and top-whipping season. Some impatient spirits anticipated the festival, no doubt, but the nuisance was not full-blown or orthodox until the time consecrated to batter was fully come. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 155. Grantham. A great Screen ... at that time [before 1863] cut the Church into two parts. In the eastern half the services were held. In the western, or ante-Church, as it was called, people walked about freely ; and here too, on Shrove Tuesday, it was the custom for children to play Shuttlecock. — WOODROFFE, p. 7. SECTION IV. LOCAL CUSTOMS. Wapentake. — * The union of a number of townships for the purpose of judicial administration, peace, and defence, formed what is known as the hundred or wapentake. The Wapentakes in Lincolnshire, as at present re- cognized, are : LiNDSEY : Aslacoe Gartree Walshcroft Bradley Haverstoe Lawress Well Candleshoe Ludborough Wraggoe Corringham Manley Yarborough Kesteven : Ashwardhurn Flaxwell Ness Aveland Langoe Winnibriggs and Beltisloe Loveden Holland : Threo Elloe Kirton Skirbeck The Wapentakes given, in the Domesday Survey are : Aswardetierne Calsuad Waneb Ludes Bolinbroc Walecros Winegebrige Welle Manelinde Avelunt Aslacheshou Langehou Trehos Lovedune Gereburg Flaxewelle Beltoslawe Lagulris Bradelai Chircheton Epeurde Harwardeshou Ulmerestig Nesse Waragehou Elleho Laxewelle Calnodeshou Hille 278 Local Customs. The term hundred is sometimes applied to Manley, Corringham, and the other Lincolnshire Wapentakes. This designation has, I believe, occasionally been used in legal and official documents, but is none the less an error. Boothby Graffho Hill Louth Eske Calesworth Lincoln, the Liberty of are rightly called Hundreds. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 596. For Lincolnshire Hundreds occurring in the Domesday Survey, see Bawdwin's Dom. Boc, second paging 52, 53. Boston. In 1573, Edward Astell, of Boston, musician, with his several apprentices were appointed ' waytes ' of the borough — to play every morning throughout the borough, from Michaelmas until Christmas, and from the twelfth day until Easter (certain holidays and Fridays excepted), unless reasonable cause be to the contrary. It was therefore agreed by the Mayor and burgesses, that for and towards their pains and travail in this behalf, every alderman shall pay to the said Edward yearly, so long as he shall continue to be wayte of this borough, 45. by equal payments at Christmas and Easter, and each of the common council 2s. annually in like manner. All other inhabitants to pay yearly to the said Edward in like manner, such sums as they shall be taxed by the Mayor, recorder, and alderman. Grantham. A person has just [1876] told me that she remembers going, when a school girl, 'to see the old alderman knocked down.' On the occasion of a new alderman taking the place of an old one, the old alderman and his council went in procession to Grantham Church, and in the ante-church the robes and chain were taken ofif the old alderman and put on the new alderman, when some official giving the old alderman a few gentle taps on the head with a small wooden hammer, the ceremony was called * knocking the old alderman down.' — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 226. Local Customs, 279 Grimsby. In passing through the village of Scartho, near Grimsby, on Sunday last, I met a sort of motley procession, which very much excited my surprise. First came two fellows with white clubs in their hands, and a loose kind of black tunic of shining fabric over their shoulders, which hung down to their heels ; then followed ten or a dozen men, apparently in great disorder, talking loudly ; and the array closed by a posse of dirty boys with marks of glee in their faces, shouting and huzzaing as if they were in expectation of some entertaining exhibition. When I arrived at Grimsby, I enquired the cause of the extraordinary assemblage, and received the following in- formation, which is too curious to be lost. It is an ancient custom at Grimsby when any doubt exists about the choice of a Mayor, to proceed in a body to Scartho on some previous Sunday, and there in a particular farm -yard, to assemble the Aldermen and bind a truss of hay to each of their tails ; then putting them in motion, a hungry calf is turned amongst them, which guided by the sight of the hay bandages, runs with loud bleatings and open mouth, and seizes by instinct on the first bundle he can lay hold of ; and the fortunate Alderman who is thus challenged by the calf is believed to be selected by a supernatural decision, as the Mayor and Justice for the succeeding year. It is long since the necessity of practising this ceremony existed ; but in the present year, so says my informant, the number of votes for the choice of Mayor having been equal, a new election was determined on, which is to take place on the loth of November, and the friends of Mr. Alderman Harrison in their anxiety for success, have had recourse to this obselete stratagem, which, I take it, is a kind of sortes vitulanae^ to influence the minds of some superstitious freemen, and induce them to vote for their favourite candidate. The unseemly procession, which I witnessed, were on their route to perform this magical ceremony, with Mayor, Justices, Sergeants, Mace-bearers at their head, and I regret I did 28o Local Customs, not remain to witness the mysterious rites. My informant adds, that none of Mr. Alderman Moody's friends were present, as they are not generally impressed with faith in the potency of the charm. [The story is denied.] — Bates, pp. 45, 46. Great Grimsby. That part of the town built on the Freemen's lots, was called the Marsh, and the facetious spirits resident there thought they were entitled to a * Marsh Mayor,' and so elected one. At one of those mock elections, a hustings was erected in front of the * Rose and Crown ' public house, which was decorated with holly, to give eclat to the proceedings. All persons passing were eligible to vote, and solicited to exercise the Marsh Franchise. A mock Town Clerk sat on the hustings, and took the poll. The Candidates were a little fat man known as * Baggy Andrews ' and a spare man, named Speed, both of whom were on the hustings, urging the voters to mount the hustings and record their votes. Andrews was the favoured candidate of the unregistered constituency, and after his election he was chaired and carried through the town on the shoulders of half-a-dozen of his jovial constituents. — Bates, p. 48. Grimsby. The female part of the population of Grimsby are under great obligations to this [de Wele] family; for about the latter end of the fourteenth century, during the mayoralty of William de Wele . . . and at his instigation, the body corporate were induced to take into consideration the natural rights of females. The commonalty of that day seem to have thought it unkind to refuse the female child of a burgess a participation in the privilege of the franchise. They considered that although custom excluded unmarried females from attending popular assemblies, and debating or voting on public questions, yet when placed under the protection of a husband, it became a duty as they conceived, to invest him, and consequently their children with those rights to which she appeared to have Local Customs, 281 a prima facie claim. After due deliberation in full court, it was unanimously determined that hereafter, all men who have married, or in future shall marry, the daughters of any burgesses of the town of Grimsby, and shall have lived with their wives for one entire year within the liberty of the said town, shall be admitted to their freedom on paying to the commonalty for holding their burgage, the sum of twenty shillings, and not more, according to the ancient custom of the said town. This is the first ordinance on record which enables a freeman's daughter to convey the privilege of birthright to her husband. It was followed some years later by a law extending the same to the widow of a freeman; the court agreeing that if a burgess die, which before time was bailiff of this burgh, and his widow be wedded to a foreigner, that he shall be made free for a fine of 6s. 8d. This privilege was ultimately extended to the widows of all freemen without exception, and the fine was increased to twenty shillings. And yet . . . this privilege, so highly flattering to the weaker sex, was not entirely unproductive of evil consequences, for in the eighteenth century we find it the subject of enquiry and limitation. The following extracts from the records will best show the nature of the irregu- larities here referred to, and the prudent and very laudable remedy applied by the Corporation. * Whereas by the courtesy of this borough, any person marrying a freeman's daughter, she having been born within its limits, hath been admitted to its freedom. And whereas it is found by experience that this indulgence hath been a means to induce the freeman's daughter to marry very young to their prejudice; therefore it is unanimously agreed that no person marrying a freeman's daughter in future, shall be admitted to his freedom until such time as his wife shall have attained the age of twenty-one years, and he hath been resident a full year after marriage, according to ancient custom.' This latter proviso, however, was subsequently rescinded; and a man now marrying a freeman's daughter 282 Local Customs, or widow, may, if necessary, be sworn and vote on the wedding-day. — Oliver, iv., pp. 173, 174, 175. The ancient seal of the Mayor of Grimsby represented a boar closely pursued by a dog, while in the rear a huntsman winds his horn. This device refers to the privilege possessed by the mayor and burgesses of Grimsby of hunting in the woods of the adjacent manor of Bradley, the lord of which was bound once a year to provide a wild boar for their diversion. — Line, Arch. S, Report, p. 6, 1859. Bradley. The lord of the manor of Bradley, by his tenure, was obliged to provide yearly, a wild boar, to be hunted in his woods [for the peculiar diversion of * the good men of Grimsby']. . . . The mayor's feast was usually held after the diversion was over and the principal dish was the boar's head. — OLIVER (i), p. 82. Lincoln. This city had no mayor till i 384, its principal civil governor being a port reeve, an officer whose business it was to guard the gates of cities and walled towns. Edward II. however, perhaps with a view to facilitate the obtaining supplies for his Scottish wars, granted Lincoln the privilege of being governed by a mayor. — ALLEN, vol. i., p. 118. |it The Mayor of Lincoln was in those days [in the 14th century] elected on the day of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (14th September) and entered into his office on the following Old Michaelmas day. — L. N. & Q., vol. vii., p. 6^. At Lincoln the burgess who denied a debt brought into court with him two parties of five men each, between whom a pointed knife was thrown to decide, by its fall, which should be his compurgators. — Athenxum, April 15, 1905, P- 462, col. ii. Local Customs, 283 Beaumont Fee. ... It is exempt from the city's juris- diction, and the bailiff is called at the assizes next after the sheriffs of the city. — Camden, p. 374, col ii., Additions. The Mayof^s Ring. — . . . By ancient custom the Mayor is entitled, by sending the Ring to the various schools in the city, to claim a holiday for the scholars. Up to a few years ago it was the practice at the Grammar School on the Mayor's officer entering the class-room and holding up the Ring for the boys at once to throw aside their books and rush out of School. A more orderly pro- cedure is now, however, adopted. — L. N. & Q., vol. vi., pp. 97, 98. According to the Lincoln Consuetudinarium (MS. in Bishop's Registry), it was the custom for the new bishop to sleep at St. Catherine's Priory, without Lincoln, the night before his installation, and from thence, in the morning, to walk barefoot to the cathedral. — DiMOCK, p. 28, note. Louth. When they [the inhabitants of Louth] re- member . . . how long their forefathers in this town were annually obliged to buy, from former corporations the liberty to trade and labour. . . . Some have concluded, that this annual purchase of their freedom, to which the tradesmen of Louth were obliged to submit, is a proof of the town once having sent members to parliament, I rather think it to have been one of the old manorial customs of Louth. — Notitics Ludce, pp. 70, 71. In the time of Henry the Sixth, Carlton, then a con- siderable town, was annually in the habit of taking out the freedom of some of its inhabitants, at the court of Louth. — NotiticB Ludce, p. 71. Waits. — They were among the worthies on a Corpus Christi and a Muster Day, at the Butts, and in all-night 284 Local Custo7ns. watches. While, on great occasions, they stood next to the vicar. — Notiticz LudcB^ pp. 236, 237. Stamford. The Government of this Town is not, it seems, as most Towns of such Note are, . . . but by an Alderman, who is chief Magistrate, and twelve Com- burgesses, and twenty-four capital Burgesses. — Defoe^ vol. ii., P- 354- They boast in this Town of very great Privileges, especially to their Alderman . . . , and his Comburgesses \ such as being freed from the Sheriff's jurisdiction, and from being empanelled on juries out of the Town ; to have the Return of all Writs, to be freed from all Lords Lieutenants, and from their Musters, and for having the Militia of the Town commanded by their own officers, the Alderman being the King's Lord Lieu- tenant, and immediately under his Majesty's Command, and to be esteem'd (within the Liberties and Jurisdiction of the Town) the second Man in the Kingdom ; and the Grant of those Privileges conclud^es thus ; Ut ab antiquo usu fuerunt, as of antient Time they had been accustomed : So that this Charter, which was granted by Edward IV. Anno 1 46 1 seems to be only a Confirmation of former Privileges, not a Grant of new ones. — Defoe, vol. ii., pp. 354, 355. From time immemorial Stamford had its bellman. Forty years ago he went on his rounds three times a week, clanging the bell and bawling ' Good morning, worthy masters and mistresses all — past one — fine morning.' These sallies he began at St. Simon and St. Jude's fair, and continued until Christmas, when he serenaded the servants : Arise ! arise, fair maids arise, Pick your plums and make your pies. On Boxing-day the bellman received gifts, and in return presented his * copy of verses,' humbly addressed to his Local Customs. 285 worthy masters and mistresses. This custom dropped with the declining strength of the late functionary. The crier is still retained as a sort of body-guard, and bauble of the Corporation. At the last State ceremonial this officer, armed with the halberd, appeared in a ' transitional ' suit — a combination of the fashions of the 17th and 19th centuries. — G. J., March 30, 1889; BURTON, Stamford^ p. 89. Market Bell. — Henry II. granted to the town right to take market tolls, which were paid at sound of bell. Fifty years ago it was customary for farmers and factors to begin bargaining at the tinkling of a hand-bell. — BURTON, Stamford^ p. 79. Waits. — The * town music ' consisted of four minstrels wearing cocked hats and scarlet cloaks trimmed with gold lace. They were also provided with a solid metallic badge, bearing the borough arms. It was the duty of these musicians to play before the Mayor on public occasions. From St. Simon and St. Jude's-day until Christmas, on the three nights a-week when the bellman was not on his beat, the waits went merrily round. Each received from the Corporation a salary of 2/ \os. a year, and also offerings from the public. The office was abolished in 1835 by the Municipal Reform Act. — Burton, Stamford, p. 89. Winteringham. Burgage. — The High and the Low. Two streets in Winteringham, the householders in which used to elect a mayor. However it may have been in former days, in latter times this official had no authority or duties. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 247. The present Wintringham is a poor dirty place, but still a corporation ; and the mayor is chosen only out of one street, next the old town. — Stukeley, i., p. 95. 286 Local Customs, Lincolnshire, Boston, Boston, Burgh-le-Marsh, Gosberton, - Grantham, - Holbeach, - Homcastle, - Leverton, Lincoln, Louth, Stamford, Sleaford, Thorpe, GILDS. Lincolnshire N. & Q., vol, i., pp. 69-71. Byegone Lincolnshire^ i., pp, 160-180. Marrat, vol. i., pp. 72, 66, 69. Boston in the Olden Time, p. 62. [Engravings of seals of gilds] Boston in the Olden Time, pp. 60, 90, 112, 12$, 132, 137, 180. Lincolnshire N. & Q., vol. iv., pp. 51-54. Marrat, vol. iii., Additions and Cor- rections. Gosberton. Church Gleanings, p. 127. Marrat, vol. ii., pp. 93, 107. Lincolnshire N. & Q., vol. v., p. 1 3. Leverton, pp. 6, ii, 13, 21, 21. Church Gleanings, pp. 118, 129, 131. Notitice Ludce, pp. 163, 205, 297. Lincolnshire N. & Q., vol. i., p. 1 1 o. GOULDING, pp. 8, 15, 34, 35, 113, 144, 156, 159, 175. Marrat, vol. ii., p. 363. Burton, Stamford, p. 87. Walcott, p. I 8. Church Gleanings, p. 131. See G. Oliver's Hist, of the Holy Trinity Guild at Sleaford, 1837. MoORE, The Family of Carre of Sleaford, p. 5. Oldfield, p. 299. TeniLre. 287 TENURE. Barton-on-Huxnber. The field of this town is reckoned the biggest in all England but Godmanchester. It is a custom here, as it is at Godmanchester also, whenever a king comes by, all the husbandmen wait upon him or go's to meet him with their plows. — Pryme, p. 133. Brigg. The same .Gilbert de Nevil has at Glanford Bridge a market on Thursday [still the market day], and fairs on the feast of S. James for six days, he has also there toll of all merchandise (mercimoniis) bought or sold. Also he has toll from the feast of the Apostles Philip and James until the feast of S. Peter ad Vincula of carts passing over the said bridge and likewise of all animals passing to or from fairs bought or sold, and it is unknown by what warrant. — Roll of the Wapentake of Y arbor ough [Temp. Edw. I.] — L. N. & Q., vol. vi., p. 248. Broughton. The lord or steward of this mannour of Broughton formerly had every year over and above their rents, is. of every one for their swine going into the woods to feed, tho' there be no acorns. He had also a capon of every husbandry, and a hen of a whole cottagry, and a chicken of a half cottagry, and in hay time every one that had a cottagry went a whole day to make hay for him in Grime cloas, and those that had half cottagrys went onely one day, and the husbandry went with their draughts to fetch it home and load it ; and in lieu of this they all had a great dinner at Christmas at the lord or steward's house. This is plain villanage, and was but lately left off. Yet to this day some of the chief husbandry fetches their coals and wood. — PRYME, p. 159. GAD-WHIP TENURE. Caistor. Mr. Young, in his view of the agriculture of the county of Lincoln, p. 2 1 , has this story : 288 Local Customs. * At Thong Castor, on Whitsuntide, the lord of the manor has a right to whip the parson in the pulpit. I was told of this strange tenure, but do not vouch for the truth of it.' The authors of the British Critic for September last, p. 269, have these sensible strictures on Mr. Young and account of this custom : * A custom so singular as that here alluded to deserved a little further enquiry. We have obtained some infor- mation concerning it, for which the Secretary, in galloping through the county, could not be expected to wait. The manor of Broughton is held of the lord of the manor of Castor, or of Harden, a hamlet in the parish of Castor, by the following service. On Palm-Sunday, a person from Broughton attends with a new cart-whip, or whip-gad (as they call it in Lincolnshire), made in a particular manner, and after cracking it three times in the church- porch, marches with it upon his shoulder through the middle aisle into the choir, where he takes his place in the lord of the manor's seat. There he remains till the minister comes to the second lesson : he then quits the seat with his gad^ having a purse that ought to contain 30 silver pennies (for which, however, of late years, half-a- crown has been substituted) fixed to the end of its lash, and kneeling down on a cushion, or mat, before the reading-desk, he holds the purse suspended over the minister's head all the time he is reading this second lesson ; after which he returns to his seat. The whip and purse are left at the manor-house.' — Man. and Cus.^ p. 195. The old and singular custom of cracking the gad, or whip, in Castor Church, on Palm-Sunday, has been again performed. An estate at Broughton, near Brigg, is held by this custom. On the morning of Palm-Sunday, the gamekeeper, some servant on the estate, brings with him a large gad or whip, with a long thong ; the stock is Gad- Whip Tenure. 289 made of the mountain ash, or wickin-tree, and tied to the end of it is a leather purse, containing 30 pence (said to have in it formerly 30 pieces of silver) ; while the Clergy- man is reading the first lesson (Exodus ix.) the man having the whip cracks it three times in the church-porch, and then wraps the thong round the stock, and brings it on to his shoulder through the church, to a seat in the chancel, where he continues till the second lesson is read (Matthew xxvi.) ; he then brings the gad, and kneeling upon a mat before the pulpit, he waves it three times over the Clergyman's head (the thong is fastened as before observed), and continues to hold it till the whole of the second lesson is read, when he again returns to his seat, and remains till the service is over. He then delivers the gad to the occupier of a farm, called Hundon,* half a mile from Castor. — Man. and Cus., p. 196. Caistor. — The tenant presents himself in the porch, furnished with a huge whip having a heavy thong of white leather, called a gad, from its length, probably, the ancient gad in this county being a measure of ten feet. When the officiating minister commences reading the first lesson, the man deliberately cracks his giant whip three times, till he makes the fabric ring with the sound ; and then wrapping the thong round the handle, together with some twigs of the quicken tree or mountain-ash {sorbus aucuparia), and fixing a purse containing a small sum of money (twenty-four silver pennies, according to the tenure) to the upper end of it, he proceeds into the church, and places himself in front of the reading-desk until the commencement of the second lesson, when he kneels upon a cushion and waves the purse backwards and forwards over the clergyman's head, until the lesson is concluded ; after which he retires to the chancel during the remainder of the service. The whip and its appen- dages are then deposited in a farmhouse at Hundon ; * This is the correct name of the place. T 290 Local Customs, and as a new one is furnished every year, most of the neighbouring gentlemen are possessed of specimens of this curious instrument. — Topography, p. in. The handle was ash, bound round with white leather to within 8 J in. of the butt ; and the whip, which tapered off somewhat obtusely at the lower end, was 5 ft. 8 in. long. The lash was of white leather, probably cow-hide, and was 7 ft. 9 in. long, the upper part for 30 in. not being braided. — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 286. Clixby. A curious tenure occurs at Clixby, in the soke of Castor \i,e. Caistor], which is thus recorded by Blount : ' John de Clyxby, parson of the church of Symondesburne, acknowledged himself to hold a messuage and three oxgangs and a half of land, with the appurtenances, in Clyxby, in the county of Lincoln, of the King in capite, by the service of one knightcap or hood, and one falcon, to be paid to the King yearly at Michaelmas, for all services ; which said nightcap was appraised at one half- penny.' (De termino Trin. a° 33 Edw. III., Rot. i.) — Topography, p. 1 1 o. Ferriby. At Ferraby, Sir John Nelthorpe has a right to turn in horses on the common meadows saved for hay ; and it is preserved to the present time. — YoUNG, p. 21. Gainsborough. The government of the township next calls for some observation . . . the only public officer being a burgess and deputy constable. . . . [Then follows an account of the Court Leet and Court Baron, pp. 525-553].— Stark, p. 524. ' A burgess is the owner of an ancient messuage or toft in Ganesburgh, which is held of the manor of Ganes- burgh, by burgage tenure, paying an annual rent to the Lord, called the burgh rent, swearing fealty to him, and doing suit and service at his courts held for the said manor. . . . Gad' Whip Tenure, 291 ' But to this general description of a burgess, there are a few exceptions, for there are some burgesses who pay no burgh rent to the Lord, and are yet entitled to all the privileges of other burgesses. . . .' — STARK, p. 542. Privileges of Burgesses, — See STARK, pp. 542-553. Immingham. Philip de Kyme takes amends of ale, and toll of salt, wool, ships and all other merchandise passing there, but it is unknown by what warrant. — Roll of the Waptentake of Yarborough. — L. N. & Q., vol. vii., p. 19. Lincolnshire. Lord Exeter has property on the Lincoln side of Stamford, that seems held by some tenure of ancient custom among the farmers, resembling the rundale of Ireland. The tenants divide and plough up the commons, and then lay them down to become common again ; and shift the open fields from hand to hand in such a manner, that no man has the same land two years together ; which has made such confusion, that were it not for ancient surveys it would now be impossible to ascertain the property. — YoUNG, p. 21. Spalding. Spalding parish was antiently divided into twelve vyntyns, which Maurice Johnson described, — Camden, p. 346, col. i.. Additions. The commons contain several thousand acres, and belong to antient commonable messuages or tenements for all manner of cattle,, asses, swine, goats, and geese sans number. They are Spalding, Pinchbeck, and Deep- ing fens lying undivided. All the towns whose lands lie next adjoining are intitled to this right, and some more distant, comprehended in this old distich : Ufifington, Tallyngton, Barham, and Stow ; One house in Gretford, and ne'er an ene moe. Camden, p. 346, col. i., Additions. Torksey. This was formerly a very considerable place, and enjoyed many privileges, which were granted on 292 Local Customs, condition that the inhabitants should, whenever the king's ambassadors came that way, carry them down the Trent, in their own barges, into the Humber, and afterwards conduct them as far as York. — British Traveller, p. 415, col. i. Wellebum. For a certain custom, called Svintack, yX\)d ... for a certain custom, called Hestgelt, xiijV ... for a certain custom, called Schirebon. Survey of the Barony of Bayeux, A.D. 1288. — L. N. & Q., vol. viii., p. 59. Wrawby. Richard de Boslingthorp and the said Robert de Arches take there toll of carts passing laddened with fishes and other merchandise (emercimoniis), but it is unknown by what warrant. — Roll of the Wapentake of Yarborough. — L. N. & Q., vol. vi., p. 247. North Wyme. Tenure of riding as messenger within and without the county of Lincoln, and of appearing ' with all his family, except his wife and his eldest daughter . . . every autumn at the great boonday.' North Wyme. 34 Henry III. — Lincolnshire 'Final Concords! — L. N. & Q., vol. viii., pp. 28, 29. Yaddlethorpe. Tenure. — Lightfoot House, a cottage on the common between Ashby and Yaddlethorpe, which is said to have been held by the tenure of burning a light, for the guidance of travellers. A family of the name of Lightfoot is believed to have taken the name from having had the charge of this light. — E. Peacock, i., p. 157. BOROUGH ENGLISH. Borough English is the succession of the youngest son instead of the eldest, which is the ordinary provision of the common law, but the custom is not always the same. In some it is confined to sons only, and if there be no son the estate is shared equally among all the daughters. This is the case at Kirton-in-Lindsey. In my own Borough English. 293 county — Lincolnshire — there are seven places where Borough English is still the custom — Hibaldstow, Keadby, Kirton-in-Lindsey, Long Bennington, Norton (Bishops), Thoresby, and Wathall. All these are Teutonic. — Archseological Journal, vol. xlix., p. 274. Kirton-in-Lindsey. The custom of Borough-English prevails in this manor, and Gavelkind in such parts of the Hundred of Manley as formed portions of the soke. — White, p. 461. Stamford. In this town exists the singular custom of * Borough English,' by which the youngest son, if his father dies without having made a will, inherits the lands and tenements, to the exclusion of the elder brother. — Line, 1836, p. 115. Waltham. The manor, in which the custom of Borough- English prevails — the youngest son inheriting the copy- hold, instead of the eldest. — White, p. 796. VARIOUS MANORIAL AND PAROCHLA.L CUSTOMS. Unknown Land, — Where lands are unenclosed, if a person has a right to a certain number of acres, but has not any merestone or other mark to show where they are, his property is called unknown land, and he is required by the manorial and parochial authorities to take his crop, from year to year, in such part of the field as is allotted to him. — E. Peacock, i., p. 264. Whales. — From a Record in the Public Record Office, A.D. 1226-7. * The jury came to recognise . . . what may pertain to the Lord the king of a whale taken or found in the county of Lincoln, etc. . . . and they have heard that wherever such kind of fish shall land, the Lord the king ought to have the head, and the Queen the tail. . . . — L. N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 82, 83. 294 Local Customs, Burton Pedwardine. Formerly the inhabitants of Burton Pedwardine had a right to turn all their yoked (or working) cattle into the common fen of Heckington, but the lord of the manor of Heckington agreed to give the Lord of the manor of Burton, 30I. a year instead of that privilege. — Marrat, vol. iii., p. 226. Clee. In the succeeding year [1532] an information was preferred against him [Sir Christopher Ayscoghe], and a suit commenced in the Duchy Court of Lancester, in the king's name, for taking a sturgeon in the lordship of Clee, and converting it to his own use ; for all fish of this kind, wheresoever taken, belonged of right to the Crown, and a sturgeon was of more value than an ox. — Topography^ p. 155. Eagle. [At one time a holding of the Knights Tem- plars, and afterwards of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem.] It appears, according to the Church Times, that the Manor of Eagle anciently boasted three dignities — Commander, Preceptor, and Bailiff. The first two offices have lapsed, but that of Bailiff survives, and the present Bailiff is the Duke of Connaught. — N. & Q.^^, ii., p. 46 ; see also p. 134. Fiskerton. The Manor-house, close by the church, is a plain Farmhouse. In the Court-Baron, annually held in this town, the ancient ceremony of the Steward and the Tenant holding each end of the Bailiffs Staff, in all conveyances of Land, is still in use ; from hence comes the vulgar proverb of * a man getting hold of the wrong end of the staff' when he makes a bad bargain. — Marrat, vol. vi., p. 17. Hacconby [or Hackonby]. Here was once a small Priory, which stood at a little distance nearly west of the church. A farm house is built out of the ruins, on the scite of the priory, and is that now occupied by Mrs. Va^nous Manorial and Parochial Customs. 295 Grummit. There is a very fine large arch in the wall of a dove cot, standing against the gateway, and into a hole in a stone, in this gateway, the Crier used formerly to put his finger, when he cried stray cattle. — Marrat, vol. iii., p. 177. Kirton-in-HoUand. Goose-court, — It is about fifteen years since a court called goose-court was held here [Kirton-in-Holland] ; this court extended to the whole hundred of Kirton, but is now lost. — Marrat, vol. i., p. 132. Common-rights enjoyed by the holder of the Malandry estate [Hospital of the Holy Innocents, Lincoln]. — Topo- graphical Society^ p. 48. Scampton. An ancient custom prevailed in this manor, as it did in many parts of the north, called Inham, but more properly Intoky or Intake which signifies any corner or part of a field fenced out from the fallow, and sown with beans, peas, oats, or tares. — Beauties, vol. ix., p. 659. Winteringham. ' Stipulation! — The origin of the ex- pression is a custom dead for centuries of giving a straw (stipula) in sign of a completed bargain. Perhaps it may interest some readers of the Academy to know that in the manor of Winteringham, North Lincolnshire, this custom, far from being dead, obtains at the present time. A straw is always inserted, ' according to the custom of the manor,' in the top of every surrender (a paper document) of copyhold lands there ; and the absence of this straw would render the whole transaction null and void. — Old Lincolnshire, vol. i., p. 51. Stamford. The Stamford Corporation had power of life and death over criminals. In the north-east corner of St. Michael's church-yard lie the remains of Cassandra King, who in 1704 was condemned to die for burglary. She was the last who suffered capital punishment at 296 Local Customs, Stamford. . . . The gallows was on the lings, not far from the Cemetery. — Burton, pp. 60, 61. East Butterwick. Perainbulation, beating the Bounds of a Parish. — Since the time of the enclosures this practice has been, for the most part, discontinued. About thirty years ago \i.e. about 1847] the boundary between East Butter- wick and Burringham was perambulated, and stones set down to mark it. At that time, according to the old custom, certain boys were compelled to stand on their heads on the boundary stones and afterwards whipped, to make them remember the circumstance. — E. Peacock, i., p. 190. Grimsby. The annual perambulation of the boundaries was a ceremony of great antiquity and importance in the Borough of Grimsby, and in an old document amongst the Corporation records, it is stated to be a custom of ancient usage. The day was ushered in with appropriate solemnity. The Mayor and his brethren, in their robes of state, attended by the commonalty of the town, assembled at the hospital of St. John of Jerusalem, and heard Divine Service in the chapel of that house, performed by the chaplain thereof. After which they ' beat the boundaries * by perambulation ; that is, they proceeded round the extremities of the parish in every direction, pausing at certain points to mark them by peculiar ceremonies. At some they offered up prayers ; at others they threw money for the people to scramble for ; and at a few they scourged sundry little boys, to imprint upon their minds a memory of particular places by means of painful associa- tions. The perambulation concluded, the Mayor formally claimed the whole space as belonging to the lordship of Grimsby ; and by this practice, annually performed, litigation was prevented, and the rights of every adjoining parish, as far as they related to that of Grimsby, were accurately defined. In these perambulations the jury levied fines for nuisances. Various Manorial and Parochial Customs. 297 ' Grimesbie Magna, 1 1 Car. I. The perambulation of Richard Fotherbie Major taken the 2 i st day of Ap. anno sup' dic't. It is pained that the frontigers on both sides the fresh water haven from the Salt Ings bridge to the Milne, shall scower the haven, and make a sufficient drain, every man against his own ground. That the occupiers of Goule Garthes shall sufficiently ditch and scower the ditches under the hedge before Whitsuntide, sub poen. 103.'* These duties performed, the Mayor and his brethren adjourned to the preceptory, to partake of the procurator's good cheer; for it was one of the articles of his tenure to provide ample refreshment for his visitors on this occasion. The particulars of the progress were then recorded in the Boundary book, and the party dispersed. — Man. and Cus., p. 52. Saxelby. A plan exists showing a boundary-hole, in which the heads of boys were placed when the perambula- tion of the limits between Saxelby (Lincolnshire) and Thorney (Nottinghamshire) were \sic\ undertaken. This plan was made in 183 I to show a road in dispute between Saxelby and Thorney. — Antiquary^ vol. xxxiii., pp. 214, 215. Scopwick. The annual perambulations formerly ob- served here for the purpose of preserving the boundaries of the parish have been discontinued from the period of the inclosure ; and the subject is only introduced to place on record a custom which I have not elsewhere noticed. At different points there were small holes made in the ground, which were re-opened on this occasion, and the boys who accompanied the procession were made to stand on their heads in these holes, as a method of assisting the memory ; and several persons are now living, who, by this expedient, can distinctly remember where every hole was placed. — Man. and Cus.^ p. 37. *Corp. Rec. ii Car. I. 298 Local Customs, Bottesford. Ducking Stool. — 1565, 26 June. An order was issued, under a penalty of ten shillings, that ' le kuckstowle ' should be made for this manor for * le scolders ' before the feast of Saint Michael the Archangel. — Bottesford^ p. 5. Item we lye in payne that euery woman that is a scould shall eyther be sett vpon the cuckstoll & and be thrise ducked in the water or else ther husbandes to be amercied vj^ viij^ as well the one partie as the others. — Bottesford, p. 8. Gainsborough. It is not more than fifty years since this formerly well-known vehicle of punishment [the ducking stool] was abandoned here. It stood at the Chapel Staith. The cucking or ducking stool is still in existence under the charge of the constable (1837). — Stark, p. 528, note. RIDING THE STANG. In the north of Lincolnshire the custom of riding the stang, in the case of a man and wife quarrelling, is not uncommon. The farming lads assemble, one is placed on a pole astride, and they go with tongs and kettles to the door of the unlucky couple and recite some verses, of which one will suffice as a specimen : He banged her wi' stick, He banged her wi' steean, He teeak op his neeaf. An' he knocked her doon. With a ran, tan, tan, etc. He beat her with stick. He beat her with stone. He took up his fist, And knocked her down. The word neaf, for fist, is pure Danish, and the stang is probably a relic of the nid-stang, or pole of infamy, of the Scandinavians. — ANDERSON, p. 19. ' With a ran dan dan.' This is the jingle which I have often heard many years ago in Lincolnshire . . . applied I Various Manorial and Parochial Customs. 299 to delinquents who had behaved badly to their wives. The sound is, of course, essentially connected with a noise — raising a din, attracting attention, before, as it were, reading the indictment. — N. & Q.^, vol. iv., p. 189. ... In common with other parts of N.E., riding the stang is, or was, a form of punishment inflicted upon a wife-beater in Lincolnshire. Formerly the offending party was forcibly mounted across a stang or pole^ and was accompanied by rough music, i.e. the beating of cans, the blowing of horns, etc. Later, a proxy has done duty for the offender. — SXREATFEILD, p. 364. Isle of Axholme. The ceremony of riding the stange varies in different places, the following is the outline of it as practised in the Isle of Axholme : The actors in the procession procures {sicl old kettles, pans, and horns, with which they make a most hideous noise, preceding the person who is carried on the ladder ; they then proceed to the house of the offender, and the man who rides the stange, after silence is called, repeats the following doggerel rhymes : With a ran a dan-dan, at the sign of the old tin can For neither your case nor my case do I ride the stange, Soft Billy Charcoal has been banging his wife Ann ; He bang'd her, he bang'd her, he bang'd her indeed. He bang'd her, poor creature, before she stood need, etc. The conclusion is too indelicate for insertion here. They afterwards proceed round the town, reciting the above at the corners of the streets. This ceremony is usually repeated on three successive days. — PECK, Axholme^ pp. 278-280. Grimsby. I have seen it done in Grimsby more than once. On [one] . . . occasion it was thus performed [on a shrewish wife]. ... A few young men, of the lowest class of society you may be sure, procured a short scaffold pole, and mounting one of their number astride thereon, it was carried by two others, attended by the whole party. 300 Local Customs. who publicly announced their intentions by hallooing, whistling, blowing cow's horns, beating tin kettles, and other uncouth noises, and thus proceeded to the poor man's dwelling, with all the rabble of the town at their heels. Here they halted, and the stang rider, having obtained silence, made the following proclamation, which was called a nominey : With a ran, dan, tan, On my old tin can, Mrs. Thingsby and her good man. She bang'd him, she bang'd him, For spending a penny when he stood in need. She up with a three legged stool ; She struck him so hard. And she cut so deep. Till the blood ran down like a new stuck sheep. And the uproar recommenced with additional fury. . . . The ceremony was repeated for three successive nights, and at the close of the performance several voices cried out, ' Beware of the Trebucket ! Beware of the Trebucket I . . . She broke the truce, and they were not backward in applying the remedy ; for the cuckstule was kept in the Town Hall for that very purpose. . . . She was seized with shouts of * away with her to the Duckingshire Haven 1 ' and incontinently hurried to the Stone Bridge, and placed by main force in the vehicle, which was a rude arm chair, with a sliding panel in front to prevent her from falling out, and fixed on a central upright pole over the Haven or Pipe Creek, which was deep and not over clean. . . . Here she was put regularly through her ablutions. ... In 1646 the Ducking-stool was repaired ... by an order of the Corporation. . . . The last scold who occupied the Trebucket was one Poll Welldale about the year 1780. A few years later, when the dock was constructed, the trebucket was finally removed, and the custom very properly fell into desuetude. — OLIVER, iv., pp. 207, 208, 209, 210. Various Manorial and Parochial Customs. 301 Eagle. Rantan. — To serenade with rough music, beat- ing of pots and pans, etc., persons who are suspected of beating their wives. . . . They've rantanned two or three at Eagle in my days. If they rantan 'em once, they're bound to do it three nights, so I've heard say. A great disturbance was caused by a mob who were rantanning a young man named H . The front windows of his house were broken, and all kinds of old tins, kettles, etc., were beaten to make a great noise.' — Line, Chronicle^ 13th April, 1883. — COLE, p. 117. Gainsborough. On Thursday, the 25th of August, 1836, ... in consequence of a very general, but unfounded report, that a person named Barnet, who resided in a house on the hill in Spring Gardens, had sold his daughter to a person going to America for ten guineas, and some foolish person parading an effigy of the sup- posed unnatural father through the streets, a considerable crowd was collected at the spot, the house broken into, the windows demolished, and whatever the mob could lay hands on was broken and destroyed. — Stark, p. 244. Crowle. * Falling Out' — A strange custom is practised in the neighbourhood of Crowle (Isle of Axholme). If a couple who have ' kept company ' for some time happen to fall out, and the man afterwards marries another woman (or vice versa) the neighbours tie to the deserted one's door, on the eve of the wedding, a cabbage or some other kind of vegetable. I am told that at New Holland it is usual to hang a bundle of straw at the door of a man who ill-treats his wife. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 84. Donington and Bicker, and the locality. As the news spreads, ' So-and-so threshed his wife yesterday mornin',' it is accompanied by the comment, ' We must " ran-tan " him to-night' In the evening, say, seven to eight o'clock, 302 Local Customs. a crowd of young men and boys — bricklayer's and other handicrafts-men's apprentices, young farm labourers, idlers, and nondescripts — proceed to the dwelling of the delin- quent, armed with old trays, buckets, pots, etc., of tin, iron, and other metals — anything in fact that will give forth a loud and harsh sound. These they beat in front of the house, jeering, hooting, and shouting, and making a most hideous din. This is kept up for an hour to two hours, till in fact they have made themselves hoarse and tired. Then they go away home. It occasionally happens that, if the offender is hot-tempered or of a resolute character, he attempts to wage war against his tormentors by throwing dirty water upon them, should they in- cautiously approach too near the house. Instances have been known of the man thus held up to ridicule dis- charging a gun over the heads of the crowd. But this act, or any attempted act of retaliation on his part, is apt to provoke a shower of stones, etc., from the crowd upon his windows. If the man has an enemy, the latter some- times makes it his business to entertain the crowd with beer, to make the ' fun ' the faster and merrier. In such cases, and in those in which the offender is particularly obnoxious, the ' rantanning ' is kept up for two or three nights. This custom is probably due less to the moral indignation of the self-constituted champions of the beaten wife than to the love of excitement and mischief, and the delight in mere noise and action which characterise young folk, especially boys. This custom was practised twenty years ago when I was a schoolboy at Donington, and it still survives. Rantanning was resorted to in Gosberton in the autumn of 1890 in the case of a person who habitually ill-treated a member of the household. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 186, 187. Riding the Stang ; Ran-dan ; Rough-Music. — Brog- DEN, i., pp. 163, 169 ; E. Peacock, i., pp. 208, 237 ; II., vol. ii., p. 447 ; Smith, p. 158. Various Manorial and Parochial Customs, 303 Homcastle. Cattle-brands. — A horn is the brand for the town cattle. — Stukeley, i., p. 31 ; cf. WHEELER, p. 36, for Fen cattle-brands. Sheep-mark. — An order was made by the Bottesford Manor Court, in 1550, that no one should turn his sheep into the Marsh without their being distinguished by the mark of their owner. A similar regulation was made in many other manors. When the commons were unenclosed it was necessary for everyone who had a right of pasture to have a sheep-mark that could be easily distinguished from those of his neighbours. . . . — Cf Cranmer, Mis- cellaneous Writings (Parker Soc), p. 291. Some of the cattle-marks of the towns in the neigh- bourhood of Boston are engraved in Thompson's Hist.^ Boston, 1856, 642. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., pp. 475, 476. Sheep-shearing Numerals. — Numerals used in Lincoln- shire for sheep-shearing. They were employed in this part of the county at the beginning of the present \i.e. nineteenth] century. This particular list was got from an old shepherd at Winteringham, who ran through the numbers very rapidly, making a slight pause at every fifth word. There is evidence that they were known at Appleby and several other places. Yan I Yan a dik 11 Tan 2 Tan a dik 12 Tethera 3 ^ Tethera dik 13 Pethera 4 Pethera dik 14 Pimp 5 Bumfit 15 . Sethera 6 Yan-a-bumfit 16 Lethera 7 Tan-a-bunifit 17 Ho vera 8 Tethera-bumfit 18 Covera 9 Pethera-bumfit 19 Dik 10 Figgit (or jixit) 20 E. Pi :acock, II., vol. ii., p. 636 Sheep sheared in Boat. — Cf. Wheeler, p. 34. 304 Local Customs, Wool-gathering. — No person [according to the code of fen laws] was allowed to gather wool who was above twelve years of age, except impotent persons. — Wheeler, PP- 36, 37. Burton Goggles. Swan-marks. — Sir Henry Cholmeley, K"*., of Burton Goggles, leaves the following swan-marks in his will dated 24 July, 16 19, proved 30 Nov., 1620; * my swan-marks known by the name of the Crowefoote and the Penny crosse with a gapp at the bill end, lately bought of Thomas Wicke, of Crowland,' also * my swan- mark known as the Harte bought of William Lacy, Esq.' — L. N. & Q., vol. vii., p. 214. Little Carlton. Swan-marks of Cooke of Little Carlton, and swan-marks of Copledike of Harrington. — See the ArchsRological Journal, vol. xlii., p. 17. Swan-marks^ Lincolnshire. — See Archxologia^ vol. xvi., 1810 ; Proceedings^ Archaeological Institute^ 1848. Goose-marks. — Geese pinioned and foot-marked. — Cf. Wheeler, p. 36. Horses Names. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 114, 115. Hibbaldstow. Ale Wisp. — 3 Elizabeth. . . . The jury further present that the wife of the aforesaid Richard Oldman ' deposuit virgam suam que fuit signum bracinae,' and would not permit the ale taster to taste her ale. Scotter. In the Court Roll of the manor of Scotter, near Kirton-in-Lindsey, for the year 1562, we find an order that Thomas Yong was either to immediately give up * the domum hospicii ' which he held or take out recognizance and licence for keeping an ale-house, and hang up * signum aut unum le ale wyspe ad hostium domus.' — Archceological Journal^ vol. Ixiv., p. 288. Aries-money. Luck-money. — Cash given to bind a bar- gain.—Brogden, p. 15 ; E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 13. Various Manorial and Parochial Customs, 305 Fasten^ or Fastening Penny. — Earnest money, money given to fasten or confirm a bargain or hiring. — COLE, p. 45 ; Brogden, pp. ^6, 68 ; Thompson, p. 705. In many of the mediaeval contracts concerning land, published in the Lincolnshire Notes and Queries^ one party to the bargain gives the other ' a sore sparrow-hawk,' or some other gift. A Lincolnshire Farmers Note Book, 175 4- 1768. — £ s. d. Mary Huson, wages for the year 1768 — Standing Wage, - - - -2150 and Fastening Penny, - - - 30 * William Belluman — Wages for a year £/\.. os. od. with his fastening Penny if he stands his health, but if he proves to have ill health returns again in a Reasonable way.' — W. Morton. — L. N. & Q., vol. v., pp. 69, 71. Hansel = Luck Money. — ... In Lincolnshire the striking of hands is still regarded as the conclusion of a bargain ; hence the phrase to strike a bargain. — Streat- FEILD, p. 335. Hansel, Hanselling. — The first use of anything ; or the first purchase made ; or the first part of the price of any- thing paid as earnest money. Hansel. — To take first possession of, or make first use of anything. So a ' hanselling supper,' given on occupying a new house. — CoLE, p. 61 ; GOOD, p. 49. Luck-money. — Money given to bind a bargain. — Brogden, p. 120. Luck-money. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., pp. 179, 180. A small sum of money returned * for luck ' on a pur- chase, a custom so general that its amount is a matter of bargain. — COLE, p. 85. u 3o6 Local Customs, Footing. — Money paid on first entering a new company, or shop of workmen. — Brogden, p. 73 ; Good, p. 43. • Shoeing-Supper. — A supper given on appointment to an office, or entering on a tenancy, by way of paying one's footing. * Shoeing the colt,' as it were. — COLE, p. 129. Colt. — A person newly introduced into an office, who pays his * footing on promotion ' in liquor or beer, is termed a colt. — Brogden, p. 46. House-rearing [or roof-rearing]. — A feast given when the roof of a new house was put on. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 281. Rearing- Feast. — A supper given to the workmen, when the roof is reared on a new house : as, * They reckon on having their rearing-feast next week.' — COLE, p. 118. House-row. — A custom . . . was prevalent in North Lincolnshire some years ago. I do not think it is en- tirely discontinued yet. It was called going by house row. When there were persons belonging to a parish or township, who could not get work, the farmers would in vestry agree to find them work at a rate of wages con- siderably below that of their regular labourers, on condi- tion that the time they should work for each man should be in proportion to the land he occupied, or to the sum at which he was assessed to the poor's rate. — N. & Q.^ vol. X., p. 138. Sale by Candle. — An auction where a short piece of candle was burnt, and the last bidder before the candle went out became the purchaser. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 91. Lincoln. Cake Ball — [Jan.] 7 M. City of Lincoln Cake Ball, if the sixth falls on a Saturday or Sunday, the Ball is on Monday. — Lincolnshire Cabinet^ 1828, p. loi. Various Manorial and Parochial Customs. 307 Messingham. Most of the inhabitants kept a few sheep on the . . . common. In every man's flock was a black one, which not to possess was reckoned bad luck ; these were tended with no small care, as their fleeces were the only material the natives had for clothing to keep them warm by day and night. Every article of their dress was the produce of their flock : coats, waistcoat, hose and hat all were composed of wool. . . . The females used to spin it, it was then woven and made up in the village. The wives and daughters of the cottagers wore dresses composed of the same material ; the stockings of both men and women were of knitted yarn. The hat, which had a very low and round crown, with Quaker-like brim, was the only article not made in the place. — MACKINNON, pp. 12, 13. Doddington. Binge — The large pocket or open bag, made of sacking, into which hops were gathered. . . . Binge. — To throw into the binge or pocket, a custom practised by the women on any man who came into the hop-yard on the last day of hop-picking. . . . Both the word and the practice have gone out of use with the destruction of the Hop-garden in this parish (Doddington), said to have been the only one in Lincolnshire. — COLE, p. 15. Copper Kettle, * Baptism ' of. — Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 473. An old Lincolnshire Toast. — The menu card of the Yorkshiremen's dinner in London in July last had for its motto a variant of what I had always known as an old Lincolnshire toast ; and it may perhaps be worth while to find a place in Lines. N. & Q. for the version that was familiar to me in my childhood as given at shearing and harvest suppers. It runs as follows : ' Here's tew we 'ersen's, tew us a'al, a'al on us, May we nivver want for nowt, noan on us, Nor me naythur.' 3o8 Local Customs, The canniness of the personal touch at the end is delightfully characteristic of the old Lincolnshire Marsh- man. — L. N. & Q., vol. vi., p. 115. FAIRS AND FEASTS. Comassing. — Begging at fair times. — Scatter \ E. PEA- COCK, II., vol, i., p. 131. Stattis, — The Statutes, or Statute Fair, such as at May Day, at which farm-servants are hired for the year. — Cole, p. 141. Boston. Here is held one of those annual Fairs, which preserve the antient Title of a Mart, whereof I remember only four in England of any considerable note, viz. Lynn, Gainsborough, Beverly, and Boston. Its trade of late years has not increased — Defoe, vol. ii., p. 342. Bourn. Here are also three fairs, but they are only nominal ones ; — one is on the 7. March, another on the 6. of May, and the other on the 29. of October. This last is a great Wake. — Marrat, vol. iii., 83. Dyke is a hamlet to Bourn. It consists of about 30 houses, and has an annual Feast or Wake in July. — Marrat, vol. iii., p. 84 [misprinted 81]. Brothertoft. So long as the Common continued open, it was the annual custom for the Fen reeves to assemble on the 8th of July O.S. and drive to Brothertoft such sheep as were found in their wool, and to levy a fee of four pence per head on such as belonged to persons having no Common-right, at which time commenced, and con- tinued for a week, the feast, or festival called Toft Drift. On this occasion Brothertoft was the resort of thousands of Persons from Boston and the surrounding Villages, for whose accommodation about 30 large Booths were erected Fairs and Feasts, 309 where Ale, and Provisions were vended, while many- hundreds were entertained, during the week, by the open door hospitality of the Inhabitants. Anciently the Booths were erected on the West of Brothertoft, but, from about the year 170 \sic\ they were fixed on the East. — Marrat, vol. ii.. Addition? and Corrections. Clee. It was, within my remembrance, celebrated with great merriment for three or four days ; and the evenings were spent in dancing and other rational amuse- ments. . . . Thus the Feast of Dedication at Clee was held on Trinity Sunday, and the week following, in the Churchyard, for many centuries after the prohibitory statute of 13 Edw. I. had made the custom penal ; and a singular practice still prevails, which has been continued by prescription from a remote period of antiquity ; probably from the time when the Church was dedicated, as it is a usage which was commonly practised on such occasions. On the feast Sunday the Church is gaily strewed with fresh mown grass, the fragrance of which is extremely grateful ; and on that day the congregation is generally very numerous. — Man. and Cus.^ p- 37- In the Clee-cum-Cleethorpes Parish Magazine for July [1897] I find the notice 'Parish Church Trinity Sunday was marked by the ancient ceremony of strewing the Church with grass.' The rector Canon Hutchison ex- plains : * The Clerk says that about four acres of land were left as glebe, on condition that the Church was strewed with rushes (the field produced little else) on Trinity Sunday. This land was exchanged for other acres by the Enclosure Act, but the custom is still kept up, owing I suspect from the clerkship having descended from father to son for many years. The present clerk's grandfather was born about 1750. My informant seemed to think that the strewing the rushes was in virtue of 3IO Local Customs. the acknowledgment of a rent ; but, of course, it is quite possible that the benevolent individual who left the land may have wished the old mud floor of the Church to be made decent for * Feast ' Sunday. — N. & Q.^ vol. xii., p. 274; E. Peacock, i., p. 242; Sleaford, 1825, p. 196. See Part II., Section III., Games, under Play-garth. Cf. White, p. 278 ; Curiosities of the Church, p. 61. Rush-strewing in Churches. — Cf. The Antiquary, vol. XXXV., p. 177. Crowland. * Saint Rattle Doll Fair! — The annual Shrove Tuesday Fair at Crowland, Lincolnshire, has gone by the singular name of 'Saint Rattle Doll.' I do not know in what way the word * doll ' was imported into the title ; but the * rattle ' was the rattling of dice for nuts and oranges, and this species of gambling was very popular, and formed the chief attraction of the fair. * Saint Rattle Doll,' however, now exists more in name than in fact ; and on the past Shrove Tuesday, 1877, the fair was only represented by one stall. — N. & Q.^ vol. vii., p. 166. Grantham. Fairs. — 1. Fair, and the most ancient, is that of Oct. 15 (by change of style, the 26th), in memory of St. Wulfran. 2. On the Monday before Palm Sunday in Lent, com- monly called Caring Fair. 3. On Ascension day, commonly called Holy Thursday Fair. 4. On St. Peter's day, June 29 (now July 10), granted by King Charles at the renewing the charter. — Marrat, vol. iv., p. 64. The [principal] Fair . . . began on the Monday after the Fifth Sunday [in Lent] (popularly known as Fair Sunday). . . . Most of the caravans were fresh from Fairs and Feasts, 3 1 1 Stamford where the children had had their pleasure the week before. We used to say * Fine at Stamford (fair) wet at Grantham/ and vice versa. — G. J., June, 29, 1878. Forty Feast Sunday, always falls on the Sunday after the loth of July, and is so called, it is said, because forty feasts occur on that day. — G. J., July 13, 1889. Haxey. A feast, or pleasure fair, is held on July 6th. On Twelfth Day (January 6th), the rustics amuse them- selves with an ancient game, called ' throwing the hood.' — White, p. 405. Heckington. We were not a little surprised at finding in the customs of this place, a departure from the general and almost universal usage of holding the feast-day on the day of the dedication of the church. Here we have four entire calendar months intervening between the annual feast — the Sunday after Magdalen (twenty-second of July) — and St. Andrew (thirtieth of November). — Sleaford, 1825, p. 252. Homcastle. Horse Fair. — Now held on the second Monday in August and four days following. — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 86. The second [fair], which terminates on the twenty-first of August, has long been celebrated as the largest fair for horses in the kingdom, perhaps it may be said in the world ; it continues about ten days, being three days more than the time expressed in the charter. — Weir, p. 40. For these strangers were many of them, accomplished horsemen . . . and it has been pointed out as a significant fact that the greatest horse-fairs in England are still held at Horncastle and Howden — one in Lincolnshire, the other in Yorkshire, but both alike in the very heart of Danish England. — Streatfeild, p. 52. Kirton-in-Lindsey. T Andra' Fair^ the fair held at Kirton-in-Lindsey on the feast of St. Andrew, old style. 312 Local Customs. The Parish Church is dedicated to Saint Andrew. — E. Peacock, i., p. 249. Little Fair Day. — The pleasure fair, or second day of the fair at Kirton-in-Lindsey and Brigg. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 326. Lincoln. The September fair was chartered for three days, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, but is now only held on the latter day. It is sometimes called All Fools' Fair, from a tradition that William III., when he granted it to the Corporation after they had given him a sumptuous entertainment, styled them * all fools ' for not asking him for something better. The November fair is sometimes called Hugh fair, from its being formerly held in a close called St. Hugh's croft* — White, p. 500. Messingham. A few days before the feast, the outside of the houses are washed over with stone-colour wash ; this gives an uniform appearance, and contentment ; com- fort and cleanliness reign throughout the village. — MACKINNON, pp. 25, 26. Navenby. Fair, for wooden and brazier's ware [12th April]. — Lincolnshire Cabinet, 1827, p. 78. Nettleham. About three miles north-east from the city of Lincoln is a populous village called Nettleham, which, like most others, has its annual wake, or feast. This is held at Easter, and called the Flaun, from the custom, as I should conceive, of eating flauns.f — Man. and Cus., p. 225. There is no doubt . . . that the euphonious name of that celebrated rural festivity [Nettleham Flawn], is derived from the circumstance of it being held at Easter, just when the severities of Lent might be supposed to *St. Hugh's day is Nov. 17th, New Style, and the fair is on the 28th, St. Hugh's eve, Old Style. t Cheesecakes are a favourite dish at many village feasts. Fairs and Feasts, 313 have rendered a return to more savory diet a very agreeable thing. The Flavonis penni^ or Flaun's-penny, given formerly at Easter, was probably expended in some such cates as the above-mentioned Porken Flaunpeynes. — Topographical Society^ p. 64, note. Scopwick. The village feast, which is celebrated in the week after Old Holy Rood, still retains some vestiges of ancient hospitality ; and the most ample preparations are made in the preceding week for the important solemnity. Every cottage undergoes a thorough scarification. Mops, brooms, and whitewash, are in high request and such scrubbing and scouring are not witnessed at any other season of the year ; no, not at the formidable May- day. Each plaister floor is washed white, and decorated with a running pattern in black, produced from a composition of soot and water, to imitate a carpet or floorcloth. The visitors are expected with an eager anxiety ; nothing else is talked of amongst the housewives of the village ; every other consideration is absorbed in anticipation of the approaching week ; and on the Saturday evening, a general delivery of game, provided by the liberality of Mr. Chaplin, the proprietor of the lordship, takes place, and every cottage is furnished with a hare for the solace of its inmates. . . . — Man, and Cus., p. 36. Stamford. According to a charter of King Edgar in 972 Stamford then enjoyed a market; and Henry H. granted to the town right to take market tolls, which were paid at sound of bell. Fifty years ago it was customary for farmers and factors to begin bargaining at the tinkling of a hand-bell. — BuRTON, p. 79. Corpus Christi Fair^ Monday after that day. — Lincoln- shire Cabinet^ 1828, p. 124. Stow Green. Stow Green fair, which is upon the Roman highway accompanying the Carsdike. — Stukeley Corr.y ii., P- 343. 314 Local Customs, Stow, a hamlet in the parish of Threckingham con- sisting of but three or four houses, is situate about half a mile south-west of it, and adjoins the old road or Hermen Street. ... A fair is annually held here, on a remark- able piece of ground called Stow Green Hill, for cattle and all kinds of tradesmen's goods, on the fourth of July, besides another on the fifteenth and sixteenth of June for horses only. These fairs, it is conjectured, were both as one, and formerly held the whole time of the intermediate days, for a toll is still paid for all carriages that pass over the hill between the fifteenth day of June and the fourth of July in each year. This fair is said to have originated in commemoration of the beforementioned battle with the Danes on or near the above piece of land ; however, be that as it may, it is certain that a fair has been held here now near eight hundred years, as one of the extracts from the Conqueror's Survey, introduced in our account of Threckingham, says, * There is a fair yielding forty shillings.' — Sleaford, 1825, p. 356. A fair, said to have arisen from the above circumstance [the killing of three Danish kings at Threckingham], is annually held at Three-king-ham on a remarkable piece of ground, called Stow Green Hill, reported to be the spot whereon the battle was principally contested, and Domes- day-book in some degree corroborates the statement ; for in the Conqueror's time, A.D. 1080, when that survey was taken, we find that there was then a fair held here. , . . This fair, however, is not held now in the month of September [when the battle was fought], but commences on the 15 th of June, and continues till the fourth of July, and was very probably changed in the fifty-second year of the reign of King Henry HI., who according to Tanner's Notitia Monastica, granted a charter for a fair at this place to the monastery of Sempringham. — HONE, Every -Day Book, vol. ii., p. 624. Fairs and Feasts, 315 At Stow Green Hill, near Treckingham by the founda- tion of an old chapel, a great fair is annually held for cattle and all kinds of tradesmen's goods on July 4, besides another on June 1 5 and 1 6 for horses only. These fairs, it is thought, were both as one, and formerly held the whole time of the intermediate days ; and a toll is still paid for all carriages which happen to pass over the hill between the above days, June 15, and July 4, in each year. A fair was granted to the monastery of Sempringham, to be held at this place, by charter 52 Henry UL* — Topography, p. 180. Kirton-in-Lindsey. Church Ale. — Something in the nature of a church ale . . . at Kirton-in-Lindsey, existed until within my own memory. The church-house had long been swept away, and no money for the fabric was raised by the ale, but the salary of the sexton was in part paid by a feast given at his house, to which all persons could go who were willing to pay for what they consumed. How the licensing laws were evaded or suspended I do not know. — E. PEACOCK, Church Ales, p. 14. Barley and Malt, — Extracts from the Churchwarden* s Accompts of Wigtoft. — Marrat, vol. i., pp. 198, 199. Bardney. Bread Doles. — Money or bread distributed to the poor, formerly at funerals, and now through the bequests of deceased persons. . . . There are doles for the parish of Bardney, Lincolnshire. — Brogden, p. 55; Marrat, vol. vi., pp. 127, 128. Bourne. On Friday evening week Mr. W. E. Lawrence let by auction the piece of land termed the ' White Bread Meadow,' containing about five roods, and situate in the Meadow Drove in Bourn North Fen. On this occasion Samuel Nixon was the highest bidder at £^ 15s. A * Tanner's Notitia. 3i6 Local Customs, novel custom exists in connection with the management and administration of this charity. On the evening of the letting, which takes place annually, the auctioneer proceeds to the Queen's Bridge, in the Eastgate, where the Company meet him, and the auction commences : a boy, who is called a ' runner,' is sent about fifty yards down the Eastgate, and returns to the starting point ; if during his run any further bid is made, another boy is started, and so on ; but if the * runner ' returns before any advance is made upon the previous bid, the auction is declared to be at an end. The parishioners of the East- gate appoint two stewards, who on the day of the letting purchase between ;^4 and £^ worth of penny and two- penny loaves, and distribute them in quantities of from a pennyworth to fivepennyworth at each house in what is considered the Eastgate ward. Until this year it has been the custom to leave the bread at these houses only which were said to be old houses ; this year a portion was left at every house in the Eastgate district. At the close of the auction the company proceed to one of the Eastgate inns to ' take a leetle refreshment' Bread and cheese and onions, ale in abundance and of excellent quality, is brought in, and ample justice is done thereto by the company ; who by this time have become rather numerous, and each one on good terms with himself, if not with everyone else. Then follows the business of the evening : the stewards receive the rent, pay the' expenses incurred, and then favour the meeting with the following ' state of affairs,' namely, balance in hand from the last year, is. 5d, this year's rent £^ 15s; total, £^ 1 6s. 5d. On the other side there was — paid for bread, £\ 5s. ; the two stewards, 2s. 6d. each ; auctioneer, 5s. ; crier, is. ; bottle of gin, 2s. 6d. (to stimulate the bidding at the auction); and 17s. 6d. for cheese, onions, and ale, to balance the account. This left 5d. in hand, which it was suggested should be spent in tobacco ; to this, however, the stewards objected, being in favour of Fairs and Feasts, 317 retaining this balance in hand until the next letting.^ — N. & Q.3, vol. i., p. 482 ; iby^, vol. iii., p. 365. CHURCH BELLS. Barton-on-Huinber. Barley-Bell. — There is a curious custom observed ; a bell is rung from 7 to 8 every even- ing, from the getting in of the first load of barley in August till Shrove Tuesday. The origin of the custom is vulgarly said to be this : An old lady lost herself in the fields or fens around, and found her way back to Barton by the sound of this evening bell ; — so she gave property to keep up the practice. We may just observe that similar traditions exist in Gainsborough, and in Leeds in Yorkshire. — Linc.^ 1836, p. 42. Appleby. Fylfot on Church Bells. — At Appleby in Lincolnshire, is a bell with the inscription sea maria ops. In the situation usually occupied by a cross is a fylfot within a Lombardic D standing on its straight side, and at the end a mutilated shield with the Lombardic letters T. B., and the upper part of a cross between them. At Scotherne the same fylfot in D, standing as usual, is on a bell with two fleurs-de-lys and ihe, but no trade-mark. . . . — N. & Q.^, vol. viii., p. 415. Blankney. MURRAY, p. 93. Barkwith (West). The Church (All Saints) is a small fabric . . . containing two bells. One bears the ancient mark of Thor upon it, which was supposed to prevent danger during a thunder-storm. — White, p. 125. Burton-Stather. N. & Q.<*, vol. iii., p. 175 ; cf. North, p. 575. *The usage referred to in this paragraph, cited from *a local paper,' is attributed by the contributor to N. & Q. to Grantham, but the custom belongs to Bourne, as the name of the town is now spelt. 3i8 Local Customs, Edenham. MURRAY, p. lOO; cf. NORTH, p. 391. Elsham, Searby. Church Customs^ P- 47- Holdingham. The Church has a ring of eight bells and two smaller ones of which the * Butter-bell' is interesting as the only survival of market-bells in the county. The curfew is rung here. — MURRAY, p. 1 1 1. Kirton-in-Lindsey. In some parts of the county the bells were rung on the fifth of August to celebrate the escape of James I. from the Gowrie plot; there are charges for ringing on this day to be found in the churchwardens' accounts of Kirton-in-Lindsey at various times during the I seventeenth centurj''. In the same parish there was also the custom of ringing what is in some parts of the country known as the 'Market Bell,' but here it was, and we believe is still, called the 'Winter Ringing,' because it was only done during the months of November, December, and January, from seven until eight o'clock, on Tuesday and Thursday evenings — on the former night to guide people home who had attended the Gainsborough market, and upon the latter to aid those who had been to Brigg market. This was a useful precaution when the country was unenclosed. . . . The same was done in the neigh- bouring parish of Scotton on the Tuesday night. The custom is still kept up at Kirton-in-Lindsey during November and December . . . the modern idea being that the ringers are practising for [Christmas]. — Church Cus- toms, pp. 37, 38. Navenby. Pancake Bell. — At Navenby it used to be rung by the eldest apprentice in the place, but this part of the custom is now obsolete. — Church Customs, p. 37. Sleaford. Market-Bell, or Butter-Bell, Sleaford, etc. — Cf. North, pp. 250, 252, 324, 649, 650. Local Customs. 319 Sea Walls: Punishment for neglecting their Repair. — * such as, having walls or banks near the sea, do suffer the same to decay, after convenient admonition, whereby the water entereth and drowneth up the country, are by a certain ancient custom apprehended, condemned and staked in the breach, where they remain for ever a parcel of the new wall that is to be made upon them, as I have heard reported.' — History of the Fens of South Lincolnshire, p. 40; N. &Q.^Vv., p. 187. PART TIL SECTION I. TRADITIONAL NARRATIVES. SAGAS. Grimsby. Havelok the Dane. — Then Grimsby^ which our wiseheads who dream what they please will have to be so called from one Grim^ a merchant, who educating Haveloc, a royal Danish infant that had been exposed, has furnished matter for fable, together with Haveloc his pupil, who was first scullion in the king's kitchen, and afterwards for his heroism was honoured with the king's daughter's hand, and performed I know not what exploits fit for those old women who love to pass a winter's evening in telling old wives' tales. — Camden, p. 338, col. ii. There exists a tradition that the town [Grimsby] was founded by a merchant, named Ghrime, or Gryem, originally a scullion in the kitchen of the King of Den- mark, who, whilst in that humble situation, having found an exposed child and brought it up, afterwards discovered the foundling to be of the Danish blood royal. The con- sequence of the discovery was his having riches and honours heaped upon him, and his obtaining the king's daughter in marriage. Camden alludes to this tradition in terms of ridicule ; but one of the ancient seals of the corporation seems to bear out, in some respects, its truth. Sagas. 321 The seal represents the gigantic figure of a man holding a drawn sword in his right hand, and bearing a circular shield on his left. The word Gryem, near him, indicates that the figure represents the reputed founder of the town. On his right is a youth with a crown on his head, and near him the word ' Habloc,' and on his left is represented a female, over whose head is a royal diadem, and circling above the word 'Goldeburgh.' — Line, 1836, pp. 143, 144; White, pp. 35 5, 356. Great Grimsby. — The boundary line between Grimsby and Wellow was marked by a blue stone known as Haveloc's Stone, placed in the road opposite the end of the passage to the house No. 8 Wellowgate, and what remains of it may now be seen near the kerbstone, so that part of the house was in Wellow, and part in Grimsby. A tradition attaches to this stone, which is given by Gervase Holies, the Grimsby Antiquarian and Historian, who relates that Grime, a poor fisher, discovered Haveloc, a child, wrapped in swaddling clothes, floating in an otherwise empty boat upon the Humber. He took the foundling home, and attempted to bring him up to his own occupation. The natural bent of the lad's mind, however, was to arms, and he obtained such renown by his valour, that he married the King of England's daughter, and subsequently, he was heir to the Danish Throne. All legends agree that Grime founded Grimsby and that Havelock granted it many immunities when he became Sovereign. Holies further states that the boundary stone at the East end of Brighowgate bears the name of Havelock's Stone, and calls attention to the common seal of the town, which represents Grim, Havelock and Goldeburgh. Tradition says that Grim threw down three of the turrets of the church in his endeavours to stop a hostile fleet. The first fell among the advancing foemen, the second in Wellowgate, where it became Havelock's Stone ; while the third crashed down into the churchyard, and the 32 2 Traditional Narratives, fourth remained on the tower. Another tradition says that the stone, composed of imperishable materials, was brought by the Danes out of their own country, and received the appellation of Haveloc's Stone. — Bates,. pp. 32, 33. Grimsby. — The present tradition, adopted and believed in by the people of Grimsby itself, as to the origin of their town ... is as follows : A fisherman of the name of Grim, Grime, or Ghrime, found a boat at sea in which a young child was exposed. This child he fostered and brought up, until his excellence in manly games and other accomplishments betrayed a royal origin. He threw a heavy stone further than any competitor, which stone is now to be seen near Grimsby and named Havelok's stone. But there was another such stone at Lincoln. Eventually the thrower turns out to be the son of the King of Denmark, who, grown to man's estate, requites Grim for his kindness by obtaining advantages for Grimsby. According to some accounts Grim was no fisherman. According to others, he was neither merchant nor fisherman, nor pirate. Upon the whole, however, the previous narrative is the one generally current — one in which there are only two names — Havelock and Grim ; the latter perhaps the more conspicuous of the two. The story is unwritten, i.e. it is a Grimsby tradition or legend. — Lines. Arch. Soc, vol. v., p. xv. [See Robert of Brunne's reference to the story, and other local traditions as to Havelok quoted in The Lay of Havelok the Dane^ by the Rev. Walter W. Skeat, 1902, pp. xliv., lii.] Lindholme. In former times the country people believed that this place was the residence of a giant, to whom they have given the name of William of Lindholme. He is supposed, also, to have been a wizard, magician, or enchanter, in league with infernal spirits or demons. His first exploit was performed when a boy. His parents Sagas, 323 went to Wroot Feast, and left him to keep the sparrows from the corn, at which he was so enraged, that he took up an enormous stone, and threw it at the house to which they were gone, but from throwing it too high it fell on the other side. After he had done this, William went to Wroot ; and when scolded for so doing, said he had fastened up all the sparrows in the barn, where they found them on their return in the evening, all dead, except a few which were turned white. One of this breed of white sparrows is fabled to have been seen a few years ago. A farmer, on whose land this stone fell which William threw to Wroot, fastened six horses to it, but their united strength was unable to move it, and as they all died soon after, the inhabitants of Wroot consider it as extremely unlucky to meddle with this or any large stones in the neighbourhood. Two immense boulder stones, called the Thumb Stone and the Little Finger Stone, are said to have been brought here by him ; and an antient unfinished causeway is also said to have been the work of this necromancer. ' He undertook,' says the legend, ' to do it as fast as a man could gallop a horse, on condition that the rider should not look behind him.' When the person had proceeded a few yards he heard such a noise and confusion that his fears got the better of his resolution ; he looked back, and saw stones and gravel flying in all directions, and William in the midst of hundreds of little demons, not in blue but in red jackets, macadamising as fast as possible. The terrified horseman exclaimed, ' God speed your work,' which, as is usual in all these stories, put a stop to the whole business, and left the good people who had to pass and repass from Lindholme to Hatfield, to wade through the bog for two hundred years longer. When the time had arrived for the fulfilment of his contract with Satan, he dug a grave in his cell, and lay down in it ; and then, by taking away the prop which supported a large flag stone just over it, buried himself — Stonehouse, pp. 393-395. 324 Traditional Narratives, Hence the common saying, * There are no sparrows at Lindholme' [referring to the story of William of Lind- holme]. — Lines. Arch. Soc, vol. xviii., p. 30. William of Lindholme and the Stack of Straw. — See Folk-Lore^ vol. xii., p. 171. Scawby. Bloody Hand. — The badge of a baronet of Great Britain. Argent, a sinister hand, erect, open, couped at the wrist gules ; the arms of the province of Ulster. ' Ye see, sir, thaay've been steady foaks enif iver sin' we knew oht aboot 'em, which goas a good long waay back, ye knaw, bud one o' the'r forelders committed a cruel mo'der a many years sin. As he was a great man, thaay did n't hing him as thaay'd hed a reight to ha' dun. He was letten off upo' condition 'at he put a bloody hand on his shield, an' at him an' all as caame efter him should alus keap it theare, an' you maay see it noo upo' th' carriage door th' very next time as it cums past.' The above narrative was told to me by a Scawby woman, circa 1854. — E. PEACOCK, H., vol. i., p. 255. Skegness. Tradition says that a village or town, Wile- gripe, lies buried in the sea four miles out. — WILKINSON, p. 211. On Sir John Bolle's departure from Cadiz, the Spanish lady sent as presents to his wife a profusion of jewels and other valuables, amongst which was her portrait drawn in green, a beautiful tapestry bed, wrought in gold by her own hands, and several casks full of plate, money, and other treasure. Some articles are still in possession of the family, though her picture was unfortunately, and by accident, disposed of about half a century since. This portrait being drawn in green, gave occasion to her being called in the neighbourhood of Thorpe Hall 'the Green Lady,' where to this day there is a traditionary superstition among the vulgar, that Thorpe Hall was haunted by the Sagas. 325 green lady, who used nightly to take her seat in a par- ticular tree near the mansion, and that during the life of his son. Sir Charles Bolle, a knife and fork were always laid for her at table, if she chose to make her appearance. Such was the unaccountable superstition of those times, and such is the folly which traditionary tales produce. — ILLINGWORTH, pp. 64-6. MARCHEN. Orange and Lemon. — The story which Mr. Baring- Gould relates [N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. 82] under the title of 'The Rose Tree,' is evidently a variety of the fiction called 'Orange and Lemon,' which is I believe, very popular in Lincolnshire nurseries. The version which my fickle memory best retains gives a daughter named Orange to the cruel step- mother of little Lemon, and the boy her brother. The dreadful supper having been served up to the father, the boy buries his sister's remains, and the song of the bird is as follows: My mother killed me, My father picked my bones, And my little brother buried me Under the cold marble stones. N. & Q.^ vol. viii., pp. 135, 136. Legend of the man who wished that the Lord would go to sleep until the harvest was well in. — See Folk-Lore, vol. xii., p. 163. Legend. — A variant of 'The Bull o' Norroway.* — See Folk-Lore, vol. iv., p. 322. The Lass ^at seed her awn Graave dug. — A paraphrase of this widely-known story is given in Tales and Rhymes^ P- 72. I know of no other Lincolnshire version in print. 326 Traditional Narratives, There was also another version extant in parts of Lincolnshire about the same period \i,e. 1810-20], which ran thus: Riddle me, riddle me right, Where was I last Saturday night? The winds blew, The cocks crew, The leaves did shake, My heart did ache, To see the hole The 'fox' did make. N. & QA vi., p. 123. Here is yet another that made my young blood curdle in Kesteven a long time ago: Where was I last Saturday night? The wind blew, the tree shook and I quake To see what a hole the Fox did make. Too little for horse, too big for Bee, (a dog) Just fitted the man, and was made for me. N. & Q.^ vol. iii., p. 230. Mmnby, near Alford. The Farmer and the Boggart. — 'T' boggart, a squat hairy man, strong as a six-year-old horse, and with arms almost as long as tackle poles, comes to a farmer who has just taken a bit of land, and declares that he is the proper owner, and the farmer must quit. The farmer proposes an appeal to the law, but boggart will have naught to do wi' law, which has never yet done him justice, and suggests that they should share the produce equally. "Very well," says the farmer, "wilt thou tek what grows above ground, or what grows beneath ground? Only, moind, thou mun stick to what thou sattles; oi doant want no back-reckunnings after." He arranges to take what grows above ground, and the farmer promptly sets potatoes. Of course, when the boggart comes at harvest time to claim his share he gets nothing but the haulms and twitch, and is in a sore taking. At last, however, he agrees to take all that Marc ken. 327 grows beneath ground for next season, whereupon the farmer sows wheat, and when boggart comes round at f backend, the man gets corn and straw, and naught is left for boggart but the stubble. Boggart then insists that next year wheat should be sown again, and that they should mow together, each taking what he mows. The farmer consults the local wise man, and studs boggart's * falls' with thin iron rods, which wear down boggart's strength in cutting and take all the edge of his scythe. So boggart stops to whet, and boggart stops to rest, but the farmer mows steadily on till at last the boggart throws down his scythe in despair and says, "Ye may tek t' mucky owd land an' all 'ats on it; I wean't hev no more to do wi' it." And off he goes and nivver comes back no more, leastways not after no land, but awms aboot t' delves, an' skears loane foaks o' noights; an' if thou leaves thy dinner or thy tools about, ofttimes he meks off wi' 'em.' — Heanley, p. 4. SECTION II. PLACE LEGENDS. Sheep-stealer hanged by a Sheep. — Forty or more years ago I was told by a Lincolnshire gentleman that, many years since, when sheep-stealing was a common ofifence, a thief of this sort stole * a fat hog,' and, fastening it on his shoulders by a cord, made off with it. On his way he had to get over a high stile in a stone wall. During the climb the sheep slipped from off the felon's shoulders, and fell over the stile ; the consequence being that the next morning, when the shepherd went in search of the lost sheep, he found the man hanged by his prey and quite dead. I have an impression that my informant said that this happened on a farm in one of the parishes between Kirton-in-Lindsey and Lincoln. — N. & Q.^ vol. viii., p. io6. Connected with the memory of Miss Drury [whose monument is in the Church] there is a sad but interesting tradition as to the cause of her death. It is affirmed that the young lady, being on a visit to her sister at Ashby during the hunting season (so runs the legend) felt an inclination to witness the sport, but not having been instructed in the art of horsemanship, she submitted to have her person fastened to the saddle by straps to prevent the consequences of being dismounted. The animal, however, was spirited, and perceiving his superiority over the lovely burthen which he bore, from her want of dexterity in the management of the reins, he became restive, and ultimately run off with fury, across the Place Legends. 329 country, outstripping all his pursuers, and regardless of the impediments which were opposed to his progress, till at length, coming in contact with the branches of a tree, the brains of the young lady were dashed out, and the promised enjoyments of the day were changed into mourning and lamentation. This tradition, like many others of a similar kind, has, however, little foundation to rest upon. In the parish is what is called the Nymph's walk, and the fact of her monument being supported by greyhounds (the arms of her father's family) may have given birth to the above tradition. From another account she is said to have died of consumption, a much more likely theory than the above. — Hall, pp. 88, 89. Sea Banks. — Tradition has given the Romans credit for the construction of the banks which run along the sea coast and which protect the Fens from inundation of the sea. — Lines, Arch. Soc.^ vol. xx., p. 26. Julius Ccesar, — We must imagine their next care was to render it safe from the flux of the ocean, by making a great bank all along upon the sea coasts : this was done as to the wapentake of Elho by what we call the Old Sea- dike, which by the people at this day is said to be made by Julius Caesar and his soldiers : as if they had know- ledge of its being a Roman work. — Stukeley, i., p. 13. King Johns Hole. — King John's Treasure. Mr. Sansom asks if there is any tradition as to the precise spot where King John's treasures were lost. As a boy I often went from Norwich to Leicester by the Yarmouth and Birming- ham mail, and have had a spot pointed out to me as the exact place by the coachman and guards with whom I travelled. It is on the left side of the road from Lynn to Long Sutton, and about halfway between the two places. It is a dark-looking stagnant pool of water, and I always knew it by the name of * King John's Hole.' I can also very well remember that it was said that some of the 330 Traditional Narratives, treasure had been dug up while draining the land on the banks of the pool. — N. & Q.^, vol. v., p. 268. Addlethorpe. Springing from these [church buttresses] on the north side, a little below the parapet, are curiously- carved, projecting, half-length, winged figures. . . . The second figure from the east end is crowned ; and the tradition still remains in the parish that it was intended for an ^^^y of King John, a tradition which may contain some truth, as that king gave by charter, in the first year of his reign, the advowson to the Priory of Spalding. — White, p. 10 1. Anwick. There was a running tradition that it [a large oval stone] was placed there to indicate the presence of treasure which had been buried on the spot. Like all other hidden treasure, this secret hoard was reputed to be under the especial protection of the devil ; that a subterranean cave had been constructed by incan- tations beneath the stone for his residence, and there the guardian demon was always to be found, if wanted. But none were willing to subscribe to his terms for possession of the treasure, although many were the endeavours of individuals to come at it furtively. ... A determined fellow of the name of Roberts, was resolved to accomplish that by force which art was insufficient to attain. He collected together a numerous yoke of oxen to draw the stone from its place ; and they strained so hard at the task that the chains snapped, and the attempt proved abortive ; although the guardian spirit of the stone appears to have taken alarm at the project, for at the moment when the chains broke, a fearful noise was heard to issue from the foundation of the stone, and the demon suddenly made his appearance in the shape of a drake, to the great consternation of the persons present, and flying over the champagne country, he disappeared in a cloud of smoke. — Oliver (3), pp. loi, 102. Cf. Denham Tracts^ vol. ii., p. 256. Place Legends, 331 Ashby-Pueromm. Holbeck Lodge. — ... It is some- times called Clapgate House, from a tradition that the troops assembled in the night on How hill, before the battle of Winceby, were alarmed by the clapping to of the lodge gate. — White, p. 117. Aslackby. On the left, as we enter the village from the high road, we find this tower, which is now all that remains of a preceptory of the Knights Templars. The interior consists of two stories. The upper one has been roofed and fitted up as a chamber by the occupant of the farm adjoining. . . . Near this spot, according to tra- dition, a round tower formerly stood, which was pulled down, and the materials used to construct the farm-house above alluded to. This edifice still bears the name that for centuries has been attached to the spot, viz. the Temple. On one of the eminences which rise south of the village, is said to be the site of the ancient church of the Templars. . . . There is a tradition among the villagers of a subterraneous passage from this church to the Temple before mentioned. — Line, 1836, p. 15; White, p. 118; Wilkinson, p. 114. Bardney. Near the abbey is a large barrow, in which tradition says that King Ethelred* was buried, and a most sumptuous cross erected on the top of it to his memory. Koenig garth, (Koenig in the Saxon language signifying King) takes its name from his residence at the abbey ; it is now called Coney garth and contains 22 acres of land. — Marrat, vol. vi!, pp. 132, 133. Baston. Tradition of bells of Baston and Langtoft being exchanged by the founder, and so missent. — Cf. North, p. 305. Blankney. A tradition exists in the family at Blankney, that in 1745, the news arrived whilst at supper, that the rebels were at Derby, and were coming to Lincoln. They *Ethelred, King of Mercia. 332 Traditional Narratives, took counsel, and agreed to retreat to the Fen in which was a kind of island, with a house upon it, to which they could get by jumping from hassock to hassock of quaking bog as the gosherds did after their gabbling charge. The old butler at the same time suggested the treacherous expedient of poisoning the cellar, deeming that the attention of the intruders would be first turned to the beer barrel. — ANDERSON, p. 33. An old tradition existed at Blankney, that when Lord Widdrington was attainted, he endeavoured to secure all his moveable property, on the event of confiscation, which he truly anticipated, by directing it to be concealed in secret places ; and among the rest it was believed that he had deposited a large chest of plate in a vault beneath the great staircase in the Hall. The legend remained unheeded till the time when the late Mr. Chaplin had the workmen employed about his repairs ; when he ordered them to open the vault and investigate the spot. They discovered a great oak chest under an arch of brick-work ; but unfortunately it was empty, and the only articles found with it were a salt cellar of white metal and an iron ladle. — Oliver (3), pp. 38, 39, footnote. Bourne. The inhabitants have a tradition, that it [Bourne castle], was destroyed by the parliamentary forces under Cromwell, for adhering to Charles I. It is how- ever certain, that, from this period, no mention is made of it ; neither are there any records of the time of its demolition. — AvELAND, p. 16 ; Marrat, vol. iii., p. 68. Altogether they [irregular earthworks near Bourn castle] look like a piece of ground drained, and are said to have supported Oliver Cromwell's batteries against the town. — AvELAND, p. 17. In the cellar of the present building [occupying the site of Bourn Abbey] is a subterraneous passage under Place Legends, 333 the bed of the river, which is supposed to have communi- cated with the castle. — Topography, p. 105. Boston Neighbourhood. [There is] belief in the exist- ence of a person called the Wandering Jew. — THOMPSON, Lincolnshire Dummy. — The story is much more terrible than as narrated by GEO. White. Four reprobates play- ing at whist, one of them was seized with apoplexy and died. The corpse subsequently arriving at the church too late for burial, the surviving companions of the deceased removed the body from the coffin during the night and placed it at the communion table to represent Dummy, whilst they finished their interrupted game. The affair occurred near Boston, and I have more than once heard the names of the players, but not having made a ' note ' of them they have escaped my memory. — N. & Q.^ vol. ix., p. 149. Caistor. An old castle, now called Castor by the Saxons Duan3ceaJ?2:eJ) and Thong, Caster, by the Britans Caer Egarry, in both languages taking its name from the circumstance of cutting a hide into thongs, like Byrsa the famous citadel of Carthage. Our chronologists pretend that Hengist the Saxon, after defeating the Scots and Picts, obtained of Vortigern very extensive possessions in other parts of the kingdom, but here could obtain only as much land as he could incompass with a bull's hide cut into small shreds, or, as we call them. Thongs, on which he built this castle, whence one who wrote an epitome of British history in verse has thus applied those lines of Virgil : Accepitque solum fadi de nomine Thongum, Taurino quantum poterat circundere tergo. He had the spot call'd from the story Thong, What a bull's hide inclos'd when laid along. Camden, p. 338, col. ii. 334 Traditional Narratives. Castle Bytham. Piper Hole, — The other day I came across an old newspaper cutting which said ' Let too adventurous youth be warned by the story of the Swallow Hole, an underground passage supposed to connect Park House and Castle Hill at Castle Bytham. The Bythamites, though keenly inquisitive, had not the courage of their inquisitiveness, but a Scotchman not restrained by any fear became their catspaw. It was arranged that he should play his bagpipes as he pro- ceeded in the tunnel so that those of the upper world could trace his whereabouts in the lower regions. On a sudden the harmony ceased. Neither Scotchman nor bagpipes were ever seen or heard of afterwards : yet in honour of both the passage was henceforward called Piper Hole.' — G. J., April 20, 1901. Cf. Castle Bytham^ p. 80. Cleethorpes, a generation ago, shared with a hundred other sea-board places the dimly traditional claim to have been the landing place of the Apostle Paul when he made his shadowy visit to Britain. Another and better defined tradition was that the Pilgrim Fathers when they sailed for Holland, encamped on the Sea Bank and embarked thence. The story is now almost forgotten, and as the written records of these Puritans favours rather some spot between Grimsby and New Holland it is likely to disappear absolutely. — Watson, p. 60. Church Well. — The place is planted round with a quickset hedge of about 150 yards in circumference^ inside which and round about are a number of ash trees, one large willow and several fine thorn bushes. These were planted at the time of the Inclosure (i 841-3) ta perpetuate the tradition that a church had once stood there and that it had sunk out of sight into the earth. The boys of two and three generations ago were wont to- come and listen at this spot for the sound of bells under- ground.— Watson, pp. 61, 62. Place Legends, 335 Corby. Near the church is a moated mound, supposed to have been the site of a castellated mansion ; and near it is Cumberland field, where tradition says a battle was fought : warlike instruments have been found in it. The Cliffords, who held the manor from an early period, were Earls of Cumberland from 1525 till 1641. — WHITE, p. 252. Crowland. [A statue on the bridge] is popularly said to be Oliver Cromwell with a penny loaf. — Line. Arch. Soc, vol. iii., p. 282. Crowle. A local tradition says that the stone for building the two churches of S. Oswald at Crowle and at Althorpe (3 J miles distant, on the bank of the Trent), was floated down the Trent, and landed at the latter place, but that, owing to the difficulty of transport, the small stones only were forwarded to Crowle, while with the large ones the church at Althorpe was reared. It is a fact that the stones of the two churches fit in fairly well with this account. — Bygone Lincolnshire, i., p. 76, note. Dorrington. The church [was] placed at its present distance from the village by the agency, according to popular tradition, of the devil. This primitive edifice was constructed but slightly and fell before the Danish ravages in Kesteven, but superstition had consecrated the spot, and the people of a succeeding age, warned by ideal terrors of the danger of interfering with a locality thus preternaturally selected, built a more permanent structure on the same holy site ; and the distant villagers were called to prayer by means of a bell, which was suspended from the branch of a tree that grew near to the mound where Tochti first laid the foundations of his projected church. Generation after generation were swept away, but still the iron-tongued monitor kept its place, . . . and was ultimately removed only a few years ago. The site of Tochti's building is now marked by a conical mound of 336 Traditional Narratives. earth surrounded by the shaft of a cross, but it retains the significant appellation of Chapel Hill.— Oliver (3), p. 1 01. [Tochti a Saxon thane tried to build a chapel on a site now known as Chapel Hill, with the stones of a pagan temple that stood adjacent to the village. Three times the work of a day was destroyed in a night and the materials carried back to their original station : Tochti took the hint and raised his chapel there.] — Summarized from Oliver (2), pp. 96-100. Dirrington (otherwise Dorrington). When Cromwell's troopers were employed in the delectable amusement of hunting the cavaliers, several of them sought refuge in a barn of Mr. Todkill's, still standing at Dorrington ; and were concealed in a barley-mow, according to tradition, at the time when some of the soldiers entered ; and although they got upon the very mow where the fugitives lay hid, and stuck their swords up to the hilt in several places, yet the royalists remained undiscovered. — Oliver (3), p. 9, footnote. Fleet Church. — A local tradition affirms that it was built by three maiden sisters, viz. : the chancel by one, the nave by another, and the tower and steeple by a third. — Fenland N. & Q., vol. ii., p. II. Folkingham. The castle stood at the east end of the town, and the inhabitants say that it was knocked down by Oliver Cromwell ; but in this they are probably not right, for it appears to have been in a ruinous state in Leland's time, and Leland lived in the time of Henry Vni. — Marrat, vol. iii., p. 196; Sleaford, 1825, p. 219. Gainsborough. On the point of the hill, immediately above the General School, the foundations of a square building of considerable extent, are still to be traced, and Place Legends, 337 which is generally believed to have been erected by Cromwell, when he attacked the town during the civil war. — Stark, p. 496. According to local tradition [Swegen] was buried in the large barrow adjoining Castle Hills, but his body was really taken to Roskild, the royal place of burial in Dennaark. — MURRAY, p. 177. Alfred the Great. — Among the celebrated names associ- ated with the original Palace, are those of Alfred the Great and his bride Ethelswitha, whose marriage feast is said to have been celebrated here [Gainsborough] — though another tradition says it was at Torksey, in the neighbourhood. Sweyne, whom we have before mentioned, is supposed to have kept his court here : and an enclosure is also shown, a few yards from the palace, in which tradition says he was killed in a drunken brawl with his pirate chieftains. . . . The royal Canute also kept court here occasionally. — Line, 1836, p. 37. This moat is supposed to have anciently extended nearly alongst [sic] the whole of the northern and eastern side of the town, and to have also encircled the Old Hall. How far this circumstance is consistent with the notion that a subterraneous passage leading from the Old Hall towards the Church is in existence, I must leave others to determine, even though this passage is said to have been explored by a Mr. John Dawson, a plumber, formerly resident of the town, who was only deterred from pursuing it to the end by the number of vermin with which it was infested. — Stark, p. 421, note. In 1745, however, during the progress of the Pretender into England, a curious circumstance is alleged to have occurred, namely, the stoppage at a wharf here, said to be that occupied by Messrs. Furley, of a casket of money designed to be forwarded to meet the Pretender at Derby, the loss of which is traditionally alleged to have caused Y 338 Traditional Narratives, the retreat of himself and his unfortunate followers.^ . . . There is no memorandum in the books of the wharfinger ... at whose wharf it is supposed to have taken place. — Stark, pp. 184, 185. Gainstrop. [1697 April] 21 This day I took my horse and went to see a place called Gainstrop, which lys in a hollow on the right hand, and about the middle way, as you come from Kirton, formerly called Chirietown, to Scawby. Tradition says that the aforesayd Gainstrop was once a pretty large town, tho' now there is nothing of it standing but some of the foundations. Being upon the place I easily counted the foundations of about two hundred buildings, and beheld three streets very fare. About half a quarter of a mile from the sayd ruind town, and the left side of the way as you come to the aforesayd town of Kirton, just in the road, is a place called the Church Garth, and they say that the church which belonged to Gainstrop stood there, with several houses about the same, all which are now ruind and gone. Tradition says that the place was, in times of yore, exceed- ing infamous for robberys, and that nobody inhabited there but thieves ; and that the country haveing, for a long while endur'd all their villanys, they at last, when they could suffer them no longer, rise with one consent, and pulld the same down about their ears. — Pryme, pp. 127, 128. Gainsthorpe. It is very singular that five-and-forty years ago [i.e. 1840] I met with a traditional corrobora- tion of De La Pryme's account of the demolition of Gainstrop, otherwise Gainsthorpe, and many years before I had heard of either De La Pryme or his Diary. At *Oulton's Itinerary, Art. 'Gainsburgh.' The Rev. George Dealtry assured the author that his father had repeatedly told him that the circumstance above narrated was well known and generally believed to be true ; and that it was the father or grandfather of Mr. Luke Manuel Martin, who was the party concerned in the business. . . . Place Legends. 339 the period above stated I used to visit at the house of an old lady resident at Manton, a parish adjoining to Hibald- stowe, in which latter parish Gainsthorpe was situate, and she told me the tale of the destruction of Gainsthorpe. Her family had been resident at Manton for many genera- tions, and she was upwards of seventy when I knew her. Her description of how the men of Kirton, Cleatham, Manton, Hibaldstowe, and Scawby rose against the thieves and utterly pulled down their houses about their ears was very graphic indeed. She, no doubt, * told the tale as it was told to her.' — Old Lincolnshire^ vol. i., p. 201. Gonerby (Great). According to tradition here was a religious house, but not mentioned in the Monasticon. The house alluded to is the estate of the Duke of Rutland, and given, it is said, to the family by King Henry VHI. It is now occupied by a farmer ; is a very ancient build- ing ; the arched doorways and windows and construction of the roof are quite remarkable ; it seems fast falling to decay. — T. C, Topography, p. 128. Grainsby. Tradition of accidental change of bells with Waith. — Cf North, p. 418. Grantham. I heard a curious legend about Grantham spire many years ago. A man was engaged to be married to a lady of unusual attractions. To test the sincerity of his affections, she set him a dangerous task, viz., ' to climb St. Wulfram's Spire and eat his dinner on the ball.' On a given day he ascended the magnificent steeple, ate his dinner, and after saying grace, threw down his plate, which alighted in the Market-place, and was broken into atoms near the Market Cross. It is said that she ' loved him for the dangers he had passed,' and that immediately he had descended from his perilous journey a priest was summoned, who joined them in the bonds of matrimony. — G. J., n.d. 340 Traditional Narratives. Great Grimsby. I went to a great spot of ground called the old church-yard, where tradition says that the town's church stood, which is reported to have been bigger than the monastery church, tho' now there is not so much as a stone to be seen. — Pryme, p. 154. Harlaxton. About 50 yards to the S.W. of the mansion- house are two stones about 7 yards apart. On one of them is engraved, ' Bill's Leap, 1633.' Tradition says that King Charles I., when on a visit to Belvoir, passed by Harlaxton, and that the person whose name is recorded on the stone, made this astonishing leap for joy. — TURNER, p. 112. In the park adjoining the remains of the Manor House, are two large stones : one of these bears an inscription, * A.D.N.— J.H.J.S.L.L.N.', and is dated 1633. William Gregory, Esq., M.P. for Nottingham, . . . resided at Har- laxton Manor from 1601. . . . In 1633 he had a maid- servant of unusual beauty : unfortunately, however, two of his footmen fell desperately in love with her. ... It was decided that the lover who could jump the furthest should possess her for life. . . . The first man jumped 7 yds. 6 in. . . . The second man came, passing the first, jumping 9 yards, the distance marked by the stones : the poor fellow, however, immediately expired. The legend says that the fair maid was so overcome by the result of the competition that she made a vow in the park on her bended knees to keep her virginity — a vow she well and faithfully adhered to. The letters engraved on the stone are supposed to be the initial letters in the names of the persons who took part in this melancholy afifair. — G. J., June 15, 1889. Heydom: and Culverthorpe. In the N. chantry-chapel, now the vestry [at Heydour] . . . are a marble monument of the last countess of Coningsby, . . . and a slab to the last Viscount, 1733, son of this Countess and Sir Michael Place Legends. 341 Newton of Culverthorpe, who is traditionally said to have been taken at Culverthorpe by a pet monkey from his cradle and dropped in the terror of pursuit from the roof on to the steps. The parish register, however, expressly states that his body was brought from London to Hey- dour, so that if the story is true (it is told of other houses) it must have occurred in London. — MURRAY, pp. 108, 109. Hogsthorpe. Earthworks and camps abound in this neighbourhood, and are by local tradition ascribed to the Danes, though this may have arisen from the fact that they were last occupied by that race. — SXREATFEILD, p. 116, note I. Horncastle. ' There is a tradition,' said Mr. Baker, ' th^t Sir Hopton \i.e. Sir Ingram Hopton, slain ' in the Bloody skirmish near Winceby ; Octr. ye 6th, A.D. 1643.'] was killed by having his head struck off at a blow, where- upon his horse rushed away with his headless body, and did not stop till he came to the knight's front door at Horncastle.' — HiSSEY, p. 347. The body of Sir Ingram Hopton was brought to Horn- castle [after Winceby fight] and buried in the church : for Cromwell . . . experienced some sympathy for the individual whose ardour in attempting his destruction, for what was deemed the welfare of his country, had cost the sacrifice of his own life ; he therefore, upon his arrival in the town, commanded the inhabitants to fetch the body of Sir Ingram Hopton, and inter it with the honors due to his rank ; observing that though an enemy, he was a gentleman and a soldier. — Weir, p. 23. Ingoldmells and Addlethorpe. [There] are two fine Churches close together, at Ingoldmells and Addlethorpe. Their neighbourhood had created the usual legend about two sisters building them in jealous rivalry, though Addle- thorpe is at least 200 years later than the main portion of its neighbour. — MURRAY, p. 169. 342 Traditional Narratives. Eyme. At a cottage in this parish I was shown a well- glazed brown earthen jar, which the women assured me was taken from the family vault of . . . lord Tailbois, that had been exposed during the process of renewing the church ; and she further said that according to tradition, it originally contained the bowels of that nobleman. It appeared, however, of too modern a structure to have been appropriated to any such purpose. — Oliver (3), p. 17, footnote. Leake. ' Bellwater Drain ' in Lincolnshire is believed to commemorate, by its name, the disappearance of the bell belonging to Leake Church, which was dropped into the Fen during its transit from the foundry. Another story from the same county relates that the people of Sibsey got possession of the Stickford bells after they had been lost in a wide drain or ' dyke ' when sent to be recast. — Antiquary^ vol. xxx., p. 158 ; cf. NORTH, p. 503. Leasingham. Tradition says that Leasingham mill house was formerly the rendezvous of a desperate gang of robbers who were connected with the celebrated Turpin ; and it is also asserted that their trade of rapine and robbery was aided by several young men, the sons of respectable farmers in the neighbourhood. — OLIVER (3), p. 8, footnote. Lincoln. High Bridge. — A singularly absurd error prevails more generally than could be supposed, respecting this bridge, viz., that it has formerly had eight arches. Popular ignorance ever feeds largely on the marvellous. . . . How it first crept in is not easy to discover, but it may be seen in ' A Copy of the Charter of the City of Lincoln, granted by King Charles the First, in the year of our Lord 1628. Lincoln, printed by John Drury opposite the Bank 1793.' After the usual 'Charles by the grace of God,' etc., etc., it proceeds. . . . Whereas through the middle of the city runs the river Witham^ which from thence doth run into the ocean^ and the bridge thereof Place Legends, 343 is graced with eight several stone arches^ etc., etc. . . . The Charter itself, however, if correctly read, disposes readily of all . . . speculations as no mention what- ever of a ' bridge graced with eight ' arches is there to be found. The passage we have printed above in italics is in the original as follows : * Whereas through the middle of the City the River of Witham, which from thence doth run into the Ocean, is graced, being built over with Eight several stone arches,' etc., etc., the word bridge not occurring at all in the original, while by the word several it is especially indicated that the eight arches were separate and distinct from each other — not united in one bridge. — Tracts, ' High Bridge and Chapel,' pp. 4, 5- Boat. — At Dernstal, or as it is vulgarly called. Dancing Lock [Lincoln], a boat is said to have been found chained to a post in the cellar of a house, from which it is supposed that the Witham once reached this spot. — Linc.^ 1836, p. 63. A similar story to the one mentioned in page 63, is attached to these stairs [the Grecian stairs, Lincoln], of a boat being found in a house at their foot, from whence it is supposed they were stairs leading to water, but this seems very improbable, for the east wall of the Romans extended ... to a spot much lower than the bottom of the Grecian stairs. — Line, 1836, p. 70. The remains of a fort, called Lucy Tower, whence, by a subterraneous passage, a communication is traditionally said to have been formed with the castle. Near the remains of a chapel, called St. Giles's, on the top of the hill, in an adjoining close, is an entrance to a subterraneous passage, vulgarly called St. Giles's Hole ; how far it extends has not been ascertained. In and about the city are several of these passages through the rocks. — Beauties, vol. ix., p. 649. 344 Traditional Narratives, There is a tradition concerning Fleming, Bishop of Lincoln, who is buried on the north side of the choir of Lincoln cathedral in a chapel of his own foundation [that he died in a vain attempt to imitate Our Lord in fasting, forty successive days and nights]. On the floor is an image of a decayed skeleton-like body ; on the tomb above, his t.^gy arrayed in his episcopal robes. — N. & Q.^, vol. v., p. 301. At the north and south ends of this Transept are the beautiful circular windows known as the Rose Windows. The more popular name is for the south th^' Bishop's Eye* and for the north the ' Dean's Eye' A legend runs that the * Bishop's Eye ' was the work of one of the apprentices during the absence of his master. The general design of the tracery was of course decided upon, but the boy is said to have inserted the glass. It will be noticed that no design or figures have been used in the glass, but that it is simply a mass of gorgeous colouring, but none the less a work of art. The legend has it that the master committed suicide on seeing the marvellous success of his pupil. The ' Dean's Eye ' at the other end of the Transept is a beautiful window, but it is not so well lighted as the other and so does not appear so rich.- — Wilkinson, p. 40. In Lincoln Cathedral there are two fine rose windows, one of which, it is said, was made by a master workman, and the other by his apprentice, out of pieces of stained glass the former had thrown aside. These two windows were uncovered on a certain day, and that of the apprentice's construction was declared to be the most magnificent. In a fit of jealousy and chagrin the master threw himself from the gallery beneath his boasted chef d'ceuvre, and was killed upon the spot. The blood stains upon the floor are declared to be indelible, and are still pointed out to the admiring visitor by the verger in attendance. It is but right to add that I have heard a Place Legends. 345 similar story at another cathedral : I cannot remember which. — N. & Q.2, vol. i., p. 501. A native of the city of Lincoln has just mentioned to me that two of the circular windows in the cathedral have the legend of the master mason and the apprentice attached to them. The elder man designed and built a window of great beauty, but his subordinate's work proved to be so much finer in conception and execution that, beside himself with jealousy, the master flung himself from the scaffold on which he was standing and perished on the floor below. Certain dark stains are still pointed out as the traces of his blood. On being cross-questioned, the person narrating the story adds that she is not quite clear as to its tragic conclusion. The master either committed suicide or murdered the apprentice in his rage. Anyway, there was death by violence, and the marks of a man's life-blood, which will never wash out^ are visible, although it is said they ' look a deal liker furniture polish than real blood.' — N. & Q.^, vol. v.^ p. 85. Prentice Pillar at Roslyn and allied legends. — Cf. S. Baring-Gould, Strange Survivals, 1892, pp. 31, 32. The castle itself was much improved by John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, who made it his summer residence ; having, according to the vulgar tradition of the place^ built himself a winter one below the hill . . . but this was more probably a part of some religious house. — CAMDEN, p. 365, col. ii., Additions. Adjoining to it the other [house] called John of Gaunfs . . . Opposite to this is another antient building called Jokn of Gaunfs stables, but more likely to have been his palace than the other. Both more probably belonged to some of the many religious houses or foundations in this city and county. — Camden, p. 374, col. ii.. Additions. 34^ Traditional Narratives, The fine Norman building which was really the Hall of St. Mary's Guild, but which is popularly known as John of Gaunt's Stable. — L. N. & Q., vol. viii., p. i ; MURRAY, p. 60 ; Beauties^ vol. ix., p. 652. The image-hating-and-breaking troops of Cromwell and Manchester held this city, and according to tradition, stabled their cavalry in the Minster. — TV^^/j, * Cathedral Described,' p. 1 2. A ring on one of the pillars near the organ is thought by some to be where Cromwell tied his horse. It was used for a bell rope when the rood tower had some bells. — Wilkinson, p. 43. The floor of a large portion of Lincoln minster was anciently of brass, says popular belief ; ' but when Oliver Cromwell drove out the Roman Catholics (who are generally confounded with the Romans) he had the building made into a market and most of the metal was taken up.' Such is the accuracy of oral tradition. — N. & Q.8, vol. v., p. 85. The destruction of the [Bishop's] Palace is generally laid to the charge of Cromwell's soldiers, and is said to have occurred on the occasion of the siege of the city by the Parliament's Forces, in May, 1644. The charge is proved to be without foundation from the Survey of the buildings made in August and September, 1647, by order of the Trustees appointed by Parliament, for the Sale of Archbishops' and Bishops' lands, a copy whereof is in the Bishop's Registry. — L. N. & Q., vol. viii., p. 166. The Cathedral had also been spoiled. . . . This spolia- tion is generally considered to have taken place on the storming of the Close during the siege of 1644, and the sacrilege is attributed to Cromwell and his soldiers . . . but I venture to submit the following considerations Place Legends. 347 as indicating that it was not done under the excitement of the assault . . . but ... to carry out the orders of Parliament. — L. N. & Q., vol. viii., p. 173. Oliver Cromwell. — The houses next this passage on each side have walls of immense thickness. In one on the north side, Oliver Cromwell is by some traditionally said to have lodged ... in Lincoln. — Line, 1836, p. 60. On the heath are many vestiges of vast trenches, some in pairs running in parallel lines within half a mile of each other ; several of which are obliterated by the plough ; others remain wide and deep, and protected by high banks ; but the old warreners remember them all much more capacious than any of the remains ; and they say from the report of their predecessors, that these excava- tions were traditionally called Oliver's trenches — intimating that they had been thrown up during the civil wars of Charles I. Now, men at present living, of eighty years old, having heard their grandfathers repeat as a current tradition of their youth that such was the name of these singular remains, affords a degree of credit to the story which appears perfectly satisfactory ; for two or three generations will carry us back to the time when Cromwell flourished ; and hence the tradition is fully entitled to our belief But however it may be true that many of these ditches were cut for the protection of hostile armies lying contiguous to each other at that period ; I still think that some of them are entitled to claim a much higher antiquity. History informs us that the Danes encamped on this ground after their battle with the Mercians in Lindsey, and the destruction of Bardney Abbey, and remained there to recruit their strength before they pro- ceeded to further devastations in the south ; and it is highly probable that one of the chiefs died on the heath, and was buried perhaps in one of the existing tumuli ; for a deep ravine which runs across this part of the heath, still bears the Danish appellation of Asketel, and this 34^ Traditional Narratives. might have been the name of the chief whose remains were here interred. — Oliver (3), pp. 10, 11, footnote. Tradition says that the child Hugh was crucified here in the house now or lately leased to Mr. John Harvey. — Camden, p. 373, col. ii., Additions. In later times some have thought they could occasion- ally detect the voice of the little innocent one again faintly joining in evensong, but in far sweeter tone than that produced by any living choir boys. — Lines, Arch. Soc, vol. XV., p. 131. Standing back a little way from the street is the church of St. Paul, which, according to tradition, stands upon the site of the first church built in this part of the county, built at the time Blecca, the Roman governor, was con- verted by St. Paulinus. — Linc^ 1836, p. 68. Louth. The Plague, 163 1. — I remember a very old man telling me that his grandfather used to narrate . . . the transactions at this place on the Saturday. So feared was the infection, that the country people would not approach nearer their customers than was necessary to hear their shout, nor receive their money before it had undergone a plentiful ablution in vinegar, and had per- formed over it every spell and flourish of exorcism. . . . — NotiticB Lud(E, p. 42. Louth Park Abbey. I will not trouble the reader with the various wars which the abbot made on his neighbours . . . nor break out into a grave episode about a subter- raneous passage from the park to the veiled ladies at Legbourne, who are said to have been so naughty as to love some of the young monks. — Notitice Ludce, p. 136. After this game of war [a skirmish at Louth in 1643] the soldiers moved off to Winceby. . . . On one of the previous evenings, tradition informs us . . . Cromwell, who Place Legends, 349 was then only colonel, slept in a house on the south side of the market-place, in Louth. — Notitice LudcB^ p. 78. Louth, where the house was long shown in which Cromwell had slept, as was that at Horncastle where he slept after Winceby fight. . . . We have a tradition that one body of troopers passed some nights on a hill in the parish of Ormsby, and that Cromwell slept at Ormsby Hall, where the fathers and the grandsires of the parish remembered to have heard how the nights were spent in casting bullets in the servants' hall. — Lines. Arch. Soc.^ vol. viii., p. 38. Mablethorpe. An ancient farmhouse, sometimes called the Old Hall, was a seat of the Fitzwilliam family in the 15th and 1 6th centuries; and a tradition says a French ship landed a body of armed men, who carried off the heir of this family, and exacted such a large ransom that they were obliged to sell their estates in this neighbour- hood. ... St. Mary's Church has a nave with aisles, a chancel, and a low tower. It contains a broken helmet, said to have belonged to one of two earls, who were both killed in a duel, as tradition says, upon Earl's Bridge, and ■one was buried here and the other at Maltby. — White, p. 592 ; see Camden, p. 384, col. i., Additions. Melton Ross. Some years ago, when driving past a gallows standing in a field at Melton Ross, an old man told me a curious tale. He said ' some hundreds of years ago, three or four boys were playing at hanging, and seeing who could hang the longest in a tree. Just as one of them got up and put the noose on, a three-legged hare (the devil, sir) came limping past, and off the other lads ran after him, and forgot their comrade. They very nearly caught the hare several times, but he got away ; and when they came back the lad in the tree was dead. That's what the gallows was put up for.' — L. N. & Q., vol. i., p. 166. 350 Traditional Narratives. Melwood. It is popularly supposed that there is an underground passage from an old house at Melwood (on the site of an ancient Cistercian priory) to some point at Epworth, about a mile and a half away. — N. & Q.^ vol. xi., p. 510. Nettleham. A remarkable excavation is said to have been discovered . . . some years ago, by the breaking in of a loaded wagon, which people at the time imagined to be a continuation of the passage from St Giles' hole. See the plan annexed, PI. x. — Camden, p. 366, col. i., Additions. Mmnby-cum-Chapel. Quaker's Hill was, according to local tradition, the site of a Quaker's village, and evidences of a burial-ground still remain. — White, p. 610. Great Ponton. Many years ago lived at Great Ponton, near Grantham, a poor labouring man, who increased his scanty earnings by playing his fiddle at fairs and feasts and other places. He was a most careful man, saving every penny he could ... to enable him to emigrate to America. After much pinching sufficient money was obtained to pay his passage. . . . Hard work and sound judgment soon enabled him to become a rich man. . . . He provided money for the erection of a handsome church at Great Ponton, and in doing this he made one condition, that a model, in copper, of his favourite fiddle be placed on the summit of the sacred pile [Engraving given in text]. — Antiquities and Curiosities, pp. 181, 182. Great Paunton. The arms of Ellys and the motto Thynke and Thanke God of all, are carved in various parts of it.* — TURNER, p. 127, and footnote, pp. 127, 128 ; Marrat, vol. iii., p. 310. * Mr. Ellys the builder, is reported to have sent his wife a cask, inscribed Calais Sand, without any further mention of its contents. At his return to Paunton, he asked what she had done with it, and found she had put it in the cellar ; he then acquainted her that it contained the bulk of his riches, with Place Legends. 351 Eaventhorpe. I was shewed a place which the constant tradition of the inhabitants says was a chappel, and the place is called Chappel cloase unto this day. — Pryme, p. 80. Eigbolt. Rigbolt or Wrigbolt, a farm . . . situated in a very obscure place by the side of Gosberton fen. . . , The old part of the house is built of stone, and some of the windows have stone mullions arched over. . . . The people in the neighbourhood say it was once a monastery, and the old part now remaining was the chapel. In Saxton's map of this county affixed to Holland's edition of Camden, this place is spelt ' Wrightbold.' — Topography^ p. 148. Risby [a hamlet of Roxby]. In a field belonging to the Sawcliff farm is a mass of stone, called Sunken Church. According to tradition, it was a church attached to one of the monasteries in this neighbourhood, and was buried by a landslip. But it seems to be more probably a natural altar used for Druidical or Saxon worship. — White, p. 649. Roman Bank. — I was once told a story about the bank, but whether the * Roman Bank ' or the Welland Bank, I do not now remember ; at all events it is immaterial, for the bank in question was one that kept in the water of the river. * Once when there was a very high tide, the river rose so high that it broke the bank (on the Surfleet side close to the spot where the two banks unite) and a girl was milking a cow just on the other side. Well, the flood burst the bank, and carried her and the cow right away, and " drownded " them both. The milking-stool was found half-a-mile away ; and all the land was flooded for miles and miles.' — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 148. which (being issueless) they mutually agreed to build a church, in thanks- giving to God for having prospered them in trade. — Communicated by a Catholic Priest. 352 Traditional Narratives. Ruskington. According to tradition, this church had anciently a very lofty spire, which fell down suddenly, and in its fall cast the bells over the southern wall of the churchyard, into the stream by which it is bounded ; — if such was really the case, the elevation of the belfry must have been very considerable, as the church-yard on the south is of some extent. — Sleaford, 1825, p. 328. Saltfleet. Tradition of bells being found in the sea. — Cf North, p. 645. SanclifiF. I went to see a place between Sanclif and Conisby, called the Sunken Church,''^' the tradition concern- ing which says that there was a church there formerly, but that it sunk in the ground with all the people in it, in the times of popery. But I found it to be only a fable, for that which they shew to be the walls thereof, yet standing, is most mani- festly nothing but natural rock. — Pryme, p. 106, and his editor's footnote. Saxilby. In Lincolnshire there once lived a man called Jack Otter, who had been married nine times, and had murdered all his wives one after another. One day he was angry with the woman he was courting, and whom he intended to take for his tenth wife. So he called her to go for a walk with him, and when they had got into a lonely place he stabbed her and buried her on the spot. But his crime was found out, and he was gibbeted on a post in the lane. Now a bird called a willow-biter [Parus coeruleus\ built her nest in the dead man's mouth as he * Sunken Church at SauclifF still exists, and is known by that name. The story is that the church and the whole congregation were swallowed up by the earth, but that on one day in the year (the anniversary, it is believed of that on which the church went down), if one goes early in the morning he may hear the bells ring for Mass. . . . There has clearly been no church here. The stone is certainly natural. Place Legends, 353 hung on the gallows tree, and brought up her fledglings in it. And hence this riddle is asked : There were ten tongues within one head ; And one went out to fetch some bread To feed the living in the dead. Addy, p. 10. Scredington. Tradition says that two small squadrons of horse, one in favor of the Prince of Orange, and the other of King James II. met here in Scredington Gorse — the latter laid down their arms without fighting at all, and becoming prisoners were lodged in the neighbouring churches, till the troubles were over. — Marrat, vol. iii., p. 243. Sedgebrook. Here is the Markham chapel in which the Upright Judge * Chief Justice Markham of the King's Bench, 1462, is buried, or is supposed to be.' There is a hazy local tradition that only his effigy is buried here and not his body ; also the same tradition has it that the judge, on being deprived of his office by the king, took sanctuary in the church and was fed there by his daughter, whose incised slab representing her head resting on a pillow now finds a place on the wall of the chapel. — HiSSEY, p. 424. Sibsey. Tradition of the bells of Stickford being lost in water, and subsequently hung at Sibsey. — Cf. North, pp. 640, 641. Solby. Tradition of the removal of bells from Solby to Benniworth, while the Benniworth bells went to South Willingham. — Cf. North, p. 312. Silk Willoughby. Just a few remnants of the Chapel of Silkby [hamlet] remain. In a field called * Butts Leas ' there is a pre-historic monument. By the north side of the road leading west from the cross are some tumuli known locally as the war-hills, which from their formation, z 354 Traditional Narratives, I take to be Danish tombs, though they may have been Saxon. By the side of the main road is a pond known as the 'warpond.' These are so named from the traditional battles fought here. — Wilkinson, p. 124. Sleaford. The Lincolnshire Rising. — Tradition states, and it is commonly believed here, that the rise of this family [Carr] was occasioned by the circumstance of a Carr (being a servant to Lord Hussey, at the time that he joined the Insurrection in Lincolnshire,) betraying the councils of his master, and on the attainder of Lord Hussey, was rewarded with his estates. But, we conceive, a slight attention to dates and other circumstances, will show this to be a ' vulgar error.' — Sleaford^ 1825, p. 115. Somersby Grange. We were told also that there is a tradition, handed down with the house, according to which there is a long secret subterranean passage leading from one of these cellars to some spot without. — Hissey, p. 327. Spalding Priory. There is another building that formerly belonged to the monastery, situate on the west side of the town, close by the road leading to Bourn, called Monk's House, but the original use to which it was appropriated, we have not yet been able to discover. Tradition speaks of racks, and whips, and other instru- ments of torture being deposited there, and of a subter- raneous passage leading from thence to the convent, passing under the west lode ; which has unquestionably obtained ever since the Reformation, and which, doubtless, had a similar origin with other such tales that were industriously propagated in those times of religious per- secution.— Marrat, vol. i., p. 275. Stamford. Roger Bacon, the celebrated Franciscan friar, who died in 1292 . . . is said to have resided at Braze- nose College. There is a legend that Friar Roger set his servant to watch when the brazen head spoke which formed the knocker of the college gate, and that had the Place Legends. 355 man snatched the ring from its mouth while it was talking Stamford would instantly have been walled with brass ! — Burton, Stamford, p. 71. Queen Elizabeth paid more than one visit to the town. On the first occasion, when she passed through in her progress into Lincolnshire in 1565, she dined at the house of the White Friars ; and tradition has it that, as soon as she passed from the building it fell to the ground. — Nevinson, p. 98. Stow. It is believed by many that a subterranean passage runs from Stow to Lincoln Cathedral. — Wilkin- son, p. 29. It is a common notion in those parts, both of learned and unlearned, that Stow was the mother church of Lincoln. — Beauties, vol. ix., p. 665; see also pp. 663, 664, 666. Stow Church. — The legend of its origin is that the Saxon Queen Etheldreda, travelling southwards rested at this spot, where she struck her staff into the ground, which took root, and opened up into an ash tree, and that in consequence a church was built. — ANDERSON, p. 68. Wearied with the fatigue of her journey, we are told, she [St. Etheldreda] lay down one noon-tide to rest in a shady place, with her maidens at her side, planting her ashen staff in the ground at her head. When she and her companions awoke they found to their amazement that to deepen the leafy screen and protect the sleeping saint from the fervour of the sun's rays, the staff — ^aridum et diu inveteratum'— had recovered its long lost life, and had clothed itself with fresh juicy bark and shot forth leaves and branches. The tree thus miraculously produced Thomas [of Ely] tells us, long remained and was celebrated as the largest ash tree in the province of Lindsey. The spot where she rested took the name of ' Etheldredastowe,' 356 Traditional Narratives, which signifies the resting place of Etheldreda, * and there in after days a church was built in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary.' We cannot now certainly point out Ethel- dreda's resting-place, but a long-standing tradition identifies it with Stow-in-Lindsey. — Lines. Arch. Soc, vol. xix., p. 325- Long Sutton, otherwise Sutton St. Mary's. On a pane, in one of the windows of the south aisle, is a painted figure of a knight in armour, in the act of being stung by a serpent. The inhabitants have a tradition that this is John o' Gaunt, who, they say, lies buried in the south aisle ; — this, however, is erroneous. — Marrat, vol. ii., p. 57. Long Sutton, foundations of house said to have been John of Gaunt's. — See White, p. 746. Sutton-on-Sea. The people of Sutton told him [Sir Joseph Banks] that their ancestors could discern the ruins of the original parish church at very low water. — WILKIN- SON, p. 215. Swaton Church. There is a tradition in the parish that the walls of the nave over, and in the sprandels of, the arches were formerly covered with . . . representations of passages in the life of Joseph, but these have been long since obliterated. — Lines. Arch. Soc.^ vol. ii., p. 144. Swineshead. In the wall of the abbey house .... which seems of the last century .... is fixed a battered figure of a cross-legged knight in mail, round helmet, surcot, shield and sword broken off at the knees. Tradition calls this the monk who poisoned King John, but it more probably belongs to the founder of the abbey here, Robert de Gresley, who held this manor in the time of Henry III. (Gough's Sepulchral Monuments). — Marrat, vol. iii., Additions and Corrections, Swines- head. Place Legends, 357 Nearly a quarter of a mile N.W. of the abbey [S wines- head], at the head of the old Haff where the fen waters originally entered, there was formerly a Danish encamp- ment, called the Man-war-rings ; — it consists of a round hill, on which buildings have stood, as a large quantity of very fine stones have been taken out. It is about sixty yards in diameter, and a subterraneous passage is said to have led from this hill to the abbey. It is moated round with two circular ditches, between which there is a coach road. — Marrat, vol. i., pp. 171, 172. Tetney Haven, which, tradition tells us, was one of the favourite landing-places of the Dane. — SXREATFEILD, p. 8. Temple Bruer. Oliver Cromwell planted his cannon on the neighbouring hills to the west, battered down a great part of the church, and pierced the tower with his balls, leaving an aperture as a memento of his presence, to which tradition still attaches his name. — Oliver (3), p. 30. There is a tradition of a subterranean passage from hence to Wellingore ; and it is said that there are men living who can remember seeing it open. We did not, however, discover the slightest vestige of such a passage. It is certain that the Prior had a Grange at Wellingore, but the existence of this communication between them is more than doubtful. — Topographical Society^ p. 74. We came to a narrow subterranean passage which appeared to take its rise in [a hypothetical] vault, [under the tower] and issuing under the north door by a winding direction eastward, passed on to the buildings in that quarter, the very foundations of which have disappeared. The walls of this passage are coated with plaister.^^ ^^ I am told that another passage exists in its primitive state. It is described as being formed of brick ; about 4 feet in diameter and 6 in height, and arched over ; 358 Traditional Narratives, perfectly clean and dry, and of sufficient capacity to admit a single person. It runs in a north-westerly direction, and is said traditionally to reach as far as Wellingore, a distance of two miles, but this is hardly probable ; although about six and thirty years ago it was opened and explored ; and one of the workmen pro- ceeded in with a candle to a considerable distance, until fear compelled him to return, after an expedition of more than an hour. We attempted to find the entrance of this passage, from the recollection of those who saw it at the above period, but without success. — OLIVER (3), p. 26 and footnote. The preceptor had also a warren house near the Grange, which had a subterranean vault beneath it ; and the spot where it stood is at present indicated by a willow-tree, which, according to tradition, grew originally ' out of the prior's oven.' — Geo. Oliver, Topography^ p. 177. Thorpe Latimer, which addition of Latimer it has most probably had ever since the above William le Latimer held the manor-house here. . . . The traditionary account of its supplementary name being derived from its having been the residence of the justly celebrated Bishop Latimer, is not supported by the slightest corroborative evidence that we have ever met with. — Sleaford^ 1825, pp. 254, 255. Threckingham. The village of Threckingham is situated in the hundred of Aveland, and was called, previous to A.D. 869, Laundon ; and about that time, on account of the burial of three Danish kings, it was changed to Trekingham,*^ and so by corruption into Threckingham, alias Freckingham. To confirm, in some measure, the truth of this matter, there is to be seen, in the south-west * Ingulphus^ pp. 20, 21, edit. Gale; see Camden's Britannia^ 'Lincoln- shire.' Place. Legends. 359 part of the churchyard, three stone coffins, with h'ds or covers entire, which, tradition says, once contained the remains of the above persons. There is an inscription of two lines upon one of the lids, but it is impossible to be read, by the devastation of time (see Plate iii., Figs. 10, II, 12). — [C], Topography, p. 178. There are ... in the church two full-length recumbent effigies of a warrior in chain mail, and a lady in robes, which Hollis says are those of Lambert de Trekingham and his wife. The knight has a shield, on which are the armorial bearings of the Trekingham family, so that Hollis has more probability on his side than the old clerk who gravely affirms that * these are images of a brave soldier who fought in Oliver Cromwell's times, and of his wife who fought with him like a man.' — Lines. Arch. Soc, vol. ii., p. 142. The church, dedicated to St. Peter, is large and well built of stone. ... At the east end of the north aisle are two figures carved in stone, representing a man and woman. . . . The figures, it is supposed, represent Lambert de Trekingham and his wife ; . . . Tradition calls these figures Lambert and Spain. — [C], Topography^ p. 178. Trusthorpe. In the square massive [church-] tower is a stone with the date 1606. This is thought to be the date of the preceding church. The original one, says tradition, was washed away by the sea. — WILKINSON, p. 215. Wainfleet. The inhabitants have a constant tradition, that this was a great town ; but when the haven filled up, Boston became the sea-port : likewise they say there is a road across the east fen called Salter's road, which probably was the Roman road ; and there are people now alive who knew such as had remembered it. Doubt- less this was a place where the Romans made their salt 360 Traditional Narratives, of the sea water, to supply all this province. — Stukeley, i., p. 29. Just outside my garden hedge at Wainfleet, there still stands a round barrow, and, when I told an old man one day how much I should like to open it, he remonstrated vigorously, for, said he, ' The king of the boggarts is shutten up inside that thear, an' if thou lets un out it 'ud tek aal the passuns i' the Maash a munth o' Sundays to lay 'un agin.' — Heanley, p. 5. Welton. There is a tradition in the parish, that a sub- terraneous communication subsists between Thwaite and Hanby Halls, but the present occupiers are altogether ignorant of its existence. — Oldfield, p. 276. St. Martin and St. Brice. — See Part II., SECTION III., Games and Sports, under Bull-Running. West Halton. [The Church] is dedicated to St. Etheldreda, who is said to have been concealed here for some time in the marshes during her flight from her husband Ecgfrith, King of Northumbria. . . . The place is called Alfham in the records, and according to some it was here, and not at Stow, that the ' miracle of the Staff' occurred. She slept by the wayside, leaving her staff in the ground at her head, and on waking found it had burst into leaf becoming ' the greatest ash -tree in the country,' and the place of her rest became known as * Etheldredestow,' and a church was built on the spot. Thomas of Ely, however, distinctly states that the church was dedicated to the Virgin, which would be decisive for Stow. — MURRAY, p. 199. Whaplode. King John, when on his march from Lynn to Swineshead a short time previous to his death, established a toll at Holbeach bridge, which is still taken of all persons passing over it (excepting the fishermen of Whaplode and Fleet) during one fortnight before, Place Legends. 361 and one fortnight after Michaelmas, in every year. — Marrat, vol. ii., pp. 108, 1 10. Winceby. There is an open field near Winceby, a village three miles east of Horncastle, where, tradition says, the bloody encounter [Winceby fight] happened, and a lane near it into which the King's troops are said to have been pursued. — Topography^ p. 191. The road adjoining to Winceby field bears the name of Slash Lane^ where it is traditionally related great numbers of the royal army were slaughtered, owing to their retreat being obstructed by a closed gate. — Weir, p. 2 1 , note. It might be expected that some vestige would remain of a traditional record of this eventful night. These vestiges are slight ; but there was, a few years ago, a gate across the high road from Tetford to Horncastle, where Mr. Fardell's Lodge at Holbeck now stands, which was called the clap gate, and the tradition was, that it was so called by the country people ever after, in recollection of the eager interest with which they had listened to the clapping of this gate, all night, as successive troopers passed towards the rendezvous. On the hill beyond Tetford was an ancient Roman encampment, in the parish of South Ormsby, where the story goes that some troops passed the night, while another watch is said to have been kept on the opposite hill ; on which spot, an old man has told me, that he has picked up bits of broken pipes and burnt bricks, such as soldiers would leave around a fire. In a house in the same parish it is reported that Cromwell slept, which is not very probable, though some officers may have done so, or he himself, perhaps, some nights before. It is less improbable, as is told by the same informant, now an old man, that he has spoken with a man whose father had told him that he remembered a man who had sat up all night casting bullets at the same house. — A. J., p. 40. 362 Traditional Narratives. The tradition of the country has preserved one record of this fatal fight, which, in conjunction with the account given by Vicars, is too consistent and circumstantial to be omitted. The country being then uninclosed, the only boundaries were those of parishes, which were divided by hedges, having gates upon the high-way, where the boundary crossed a road. At the boundary of the parishes of Winceby and Scrafield, near the bottom of a slight descent on the way to Horncastle, there stood a gate, which opened towards the scene of battle, in a corner formed by the angle of a fence. The flying horsemen pressing in multitudes against this gate it became impossible to open it ; the enemy pressed upon them from behind, and here such numbers were cut to pieces, that this lane obtained the name of Slash-lane^ which it has preserved to the present hour. — A. J., pp. 185, 186. Winteringham. There is a tradition here that the streets once flowed with blood, referring, no doubt, to the Danish massacres of the tenth century. — Hall, p. 58. Winterton. They have a tradition at Winterton that there was formerly one Mr. Lacy, that lived there and was a very rich man, who, being grown very aged, gave all that he had away unto his three sons, upon condition that one should keep him one week, and another another. But it happened within a little while that they were all weary of him, after that they had got what they had, and regarded him no more than a dog. The old man perceiving how he was slighted, went to an attorny to see if his skill could not afford him any help in his troubles. The attorny told him that no law in the land could help him nor yield him any comfort, but there was one thing onely which would certainly do, which, if he would perform, he would reveal to him. At which the poor old man was exceeding glad, and desired him for God's sake to reveal the same, for he was almost pined and starved to dead, and he would willingly do it rather than Place Legends, 363 live as he did. 'Well/ says the lawyer, 'you have been a great friend of mine in my need, and I will now be one to you in your need. I will lend you a strong box with a strong lock on it, in which shall be contained 1000/.; you shall on such a day pretend to have fetched it out of such a close, where it shall be supposed that you hid, and carry it into one of your son's houses, and make it your business every week, while you are sojourning with such or such a son, to be always counting of the money, and ratleing it about, and you shall see that, for love of it, they'll soon love you again, and make very much of you, and maintain you joyfully, willingly and plentifully, unto your dying day. The old man having thanked the lawyer for this good advice and kind proffer, received within a few days the aforesayd box full of money, and having so managed it as above, his graceless sons soon fell in love with him again, and made mighty much of him, and percieving that their love to him continued stedfast and firm, he one day took it out of the house and carry'd it to the lawyer, thanking him exceedingly for the lent thereof But when he got to his sons he made them believe that (he) had hidden it again, and that he would give it to him of them whome he loved best when he dyd. This made them all so observant of him that he lived the rest of his days in great peace, plenty, and happiness amongst them, and dyed full of years. But a while before he dyd he ubraded them for their former ingratitude, told them the whole history of the, box, and forgave them. — Pryme, pp. 162, 163. Witham-on-the-hill. Tradition of tower falling while the ringers were having an extra mug of beer. — NORTH, p. 757. Wolds. I heard a famous story in the county, the jest of which was postponing it from four to five weeks, because the clerk (a woman) had set her goose in the 364 Traditional Narratives. pulpit, and she would not allow the parson (ready enough doubtless to comply) to disturb the animal. — YoUNG, p. 437. MOOT-STONE, AND SITES OF MOOTS. Moulton. Elloe Stone. — Probably the most interesting relic of our early ancestors in South Lincolnshire is the Elloe Stone. The stone formerly stood on the waste land beside the highway, which was very much wider than it is at the present time, and formed a part of the old Roman road that ran from Spalding in a westerly direction and rejoined the late turnpike road at Fleet Hargate. — L. N. & Q., i., 141, 89. Between these two parishes [Moulton and Whaplode] in a green lane northwards, stands a little stone called Elho stone, whence the name of this hundred is derived: it is about the middle thereof, and was formerly the main road across the country, now called Old Spalding Gate. Old men tell us, here was kept in ancient times an annual court; I suppose a convention, sub dio^ of the adjacent parts to treat of their general affairs. A wood hard by is called Elhostone wood. — Stukeley, i., p. 24. Aveland. The tradition that has come down to us in respect of Elloe is also associated with the wapentake of Aveland. This name was likewise attached, it would appear, to a place of meeting; to quote the words of Sir Charles Anderson, ' the spot is surrounded by what was a moat. Here the sessions were formerly held under an oak-tree, probably a remnant of Danish or Saxon times, when the Thane held his court in the open air, as the Althing was, till this century, in Iceland;' in other words it was on this spot that the district thing was held. — Streatfeild, p. 249; cf Marrat, vol. iii., p. 122. Moot-Stone, and Sites of Moots, 365 Aslackby. Folk-moot, — About one mile westward [As- lackby], in a field called the Avelands {from which the hundred derives its name\ is a large space of ground enclosed by a moat; and here, it is said, about a century ago, the Sessions for this division were opened under a large tree, now no longer standing, and from thence were adjourned to Folkingham. — Lines., 1836, p. 16. SECTION III. BALLADS AND SONGS. Parson and Bacon. — A Lincolnshire song. I have within the last day or two heard the following capital song sung by a labouring man named John Blanchard of South Kelsey, who learned it when a boy at Nettle- ham, near Lincoln, about 1824. The tune, as he sings it, is something altered from that of * King John and the Abbot,' but is substantially the same : — A Methodist parson, whose name it was George, A jolly brisk tinker, just come from the forge, A virtuous woman that was George's friend, And he oft times went to her, her soul for to mend. Derry down, down, hey derry down. This old woman's husband, no Methodist was he. But a good honest Churchman, both jovial and free ; And he loved his brown jug, like a good honest man, And his house was well hung round with bacon and ham. Derry down, etc. George knew this man's wife, and often went to her, And out of a large slice of bacon would do her ; Till at length that this Churchman great notice had taken, And found out his old friend had come preaching for bacon. Derry down, etc. Ballads and Songs. 367 He looked round his house with an eager intent, He was fully determined to know how it went ; So one morning as usual he went out to work, But this cunning sly rogue slipped aside but to lurk. Derry down, etc. By-and-bye he came in, and he caught them at prayer, They looked very earnest, devout, and sincere ; And he looked round his house, and he easily guessed And he plainly perceived that his bacon had grown less Derry down, etc. Then he looked round his house so cunning and sly, And into George's pocket he cast a quick eye ; He thought he saw something lapp'd up in a rag. So he says, ' Honest man, what have you got in your bag ? ' ^ , Derry down, etc. So says George to his friend, ' It is the Holy Word, It's the Sacred Scriptur' sent down from above ; And when I'm at home I never am idle, And I make it my study for to read in this Bible.' Derry down, etc. * Then pull out your Bible,' the Churchman replied, * Or else by the Devil I'll Bible your hide ; I'll Bible it as you never had it Bibled in your life. For your Bible is bacon you've stole from my wife.' Derry down, etc. Then George shuffled about, and the Bible brought out Was a large lump of bacon lapped up in a clout ; So he took to his heels, for he dare not be idle, From that day to this he's preached without that Bible. Derry down, etc. So come all honest men that leads happy lives, I would have you take care of your bacon and wives ; 368 Ballads and Songs, If you've got a large flitch great care must be taken, For they'll preach like the Devil where there's plenty of Derry down, etc. I should be glad to know whether this exists in print in anything like its present form ; also whether it be not a new version of some ancient ballad in which the mendi- cant friars are satirised. — N. & Q/, vol. vi., p. 566. The Vicar and Moses. At the sign of * The Horse ' old Spin-text, of course, Each night took his pipe and his pot, With a jorum of nappy, quite pleasant and happy. Thus sat this convivial sot, Singing down derry, down derry down. The night it was dark when in came the clerk. With reverence due, and submission. First stroked his cravat, and twirled round his hat, And bowing proclaimed his petition, Singing down derry. * I've come, sir,' says he, ' to beg, do you see Of your reverence' worship and glory, To inter a poor baby with as much speed as may be And I'll walk with the lantern before ye,' Singing down derry. ' Bring Moses some beer, and me some, do you hear ? I hate to be called from my liquor. Come Moses, the King, it's a scandalous thing Such a subject should be but a vicar,' Singing derry down. ' O laws, sir, the corpse it does stay ! ' * Thou fool, hold thy peace, since miracles cease A corpse, Moses, can't run away.' Singing down derry. Ballads and Songs, 369 When they come to the grave, the clerk hummed a stave While the surplice was wrapp'd round the priest, And so droll was the figure of Moses and vicar, That the parish still laugh at the jest, Singing down derry. N. & Q.9, vol. X., p. 169. Mr. Howlett, of Kirton-in-Lindsey, . . . remembers an old man singing a song which began : — Come Davy, I'll tell you a secret, If you'll keep it snug in your breast : I would not for old Eldon city It came to the ears of the rest — and concluded with I went to Tom in the Long Jugs, For to hear his cracks and his jokes. And there stood an old woman telling fortunes, So I must be like other folks. With some chalk and a pair of old bellows, Two letters she wrote in my way : S stands for Sally all the world over And nothing but G. stands for Gray. N. & Q.^ vol. X., p. 170. The Farmer's Lament. — The verses of which the follow- ing is a copy were recited in January, 1888, by an old gentleman, a native of Louth, on his 87th birthday; he remembered their being commonly sung by children in the year 1 804. . . . THE farmer's lament. I Times are hard and very cold And all of us well know Our creditors we cannot meet, The corn it sells so low. 2 A 370 Ballads and Songs, 2 Our wheelwright and knacker is unpaid, So is the blacksmith too ; Our butcher, also, he must trust, The corn it sells so low. 3 Last year we could wear black-strap boots, When times so well did go, But now we scarce get shoes to wear. The corn it sells so low. 4 Then the grooms would bring our horse Around the farm to view, But all of us must walk it now. The corn it sells so low. 5. Miss Kitty must the parlour quit, So must Miss Nancy too. And round the milk-yard they must trot. The corn it sells so low. L. N. & Q., vol. v., p. 118. My father kept a horse, My mother kept a mare, My brother kept a grew (greyhound) My sister kept a hare. N. & Q.», vol. ix., p. 388. My friend Mr. Bartholomew Howlett, of this town, has asked me to forward you the enclosed, which he re- members hearing sung many years ago : THE LINCOLNSHIRE POACHER. Come all ye lads of high renown, That love to drink good ale that's brown. And pull the lofty pheasant down With powder, shot, and gun. Ballads and Songs. 371 Me and five more a-poaching went, To kill some game was our intent ; Our money all being gone and spent, We had nothing else to try. The moon shone bright, Not a cloud in sight ; The keeper heard us fire a gun And to the spot did quickly run, And swore before the rising sun That one of us lads should die. The bravest youth amongst the lot 'Twas his misfortune to be shot, His feelings never shall be forgot By all his friends below. For help he cried, which was denied ; He rose again to stem the best, And fight again with all the rest. While down upon his gallant breast The crimson blood did flow. N. & Q.^ vol. ix., p. 492. When I was bound apprentice in famous Lincolnshire, Full well I served my master for more than seven year. Till I took up to polching, as you shall quickly hear. O 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year. As me and my comarade were setting of a snare, 'Twas then we spied the gamekeeper — for him we did not care, For we can wrestle and fight, my boys, and jump o'er anywhere. O 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year. 372 Ballads and Songs, As me and my comarade were setting four or five, And taking on them up again, we caught the hare alive. We caught the hare alive, my boys, and through the woods did steer. O 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year. We throdun him over our shoulder and then we trudged home, We took him to a neighbour's house and sold him for a crown. We sold him for a crown, my boys, but I did not tell you where. O 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year. Success to every gentleman that lives in Lincolnshire, Success to every polcher that wants to sell a hare. Bad luck to every gamekeeper that will not sell his deer. O 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year. N. & Q.9, vol. X., p. III. A Lincolnshire lady told me, a week or two ago, that the following rude verses used to be repeated by an old man who sometimes came to Winterton about the year 1820 : What will you have for supper, King Henry, my son ? What will you have for supper, My own pretty one ? White rolls and butter, mother. Make my bed soon, For I'm sick to the heart, And I fain would lig doon. N. & Q.^ vol. vi., p. 427. Ballads and Songs. 373 There was a lady all skin and bone, Sure such a lady was never known : This lady went to church one day, She went to church all for to pray. And when she came to the church stile. She sat to rest a little while : When she came to the church-yard, There the bells so loud she heard. When she came to the church door, She stopt to rest a little more ; When she came the church within. The parson pray'd 'gainst pride and sin. On looking up, on looking down, She saw a dead man on the ground : And from his nose unto his chin, The worms crawl'd out, the worms crawl'd in."'^ Then she unto the parson said, Shall I be so when I am dead ? Oh yes ! oh yes ! the parson said, You will be so when you are dead. Halliwell, pp. 64, 65. Lincolnshire Ballad, — The fragment of a ballad given below was to be heard in North Lincolnshire some fifty years ago. Little Billy looked over his left shoulder : I see what I do not wish to see, I see the high-sheriff with seven score fellows A-coming to take both you and me ! L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 184. * ' . . . The version given above,' says Halliwell, * was obtained from Lincolnshire, and differs slightly from the one in "Gammer Gur ton's Garland," 8vo., Lond. 1810, p. 29-30.' As late as 1865 a variant of * the lady all skin and bone ' was repeated by an under-nurse at Bottesford, North Lincolnshire. The lines ought to be uttered with the grimmest emphasis, and after the last word a shuddersome shriek should be given, to represent the lady's agony of mind. 374 Ballads and Songs, jgJJUJ'lJ J ■' FT^ Lit-tle Dick-y looked o - ver his left shoul- A A A i ^ t der, And he said : * I can see what you none of you A ^ tffa^^^ P=P= ^^-1» y ^ ^ b^ else can see ; I can see the high she-riff and i h^LsM! r ri^^sa^-^^ F P • i^ fif - ty bravefel-lows,A com-ing to take both you and me.' L. N. & Q., vol. ii., pp. 219, 220. The Three Ravens. — The following version of ' The Three Ravens * is worth preserving in N. & Q. It and its sister ' The Twa Corbies ' have frequently been printed in various forms, but I do not remember ever meeting with a text identical with the one I now give. My father committed it to memory early in the last century, from the recitation of Harry Richard of Northorpe an old farm labourer who was quite ignorant of reading. Harry said that when he was young it was commonly sung at sheep- ch'ppings, harvest suppers, and such-like merry-makings. He added that the tragedy alluded to occurred in a grass close adjoining the river Eau (pronounced Ed) very near a deep pool in the stream called the Sloughter Hole. The statement is curious, but can hardly be accepted as his- torical. The ballad is so widely distributed that we may be almost sure that the identification of this Lincolnshire version with the Sloughter Hole at Northorpe is a case of transference, not a genuine tradition. Why this pool is called the Sloughter Hole is not known, but the name is assuredly very old. I have heard one person, and one only, called it Souter Hole, but this was I have no doubt a mere blunder, owing to defective hearing or memory. Ballads and Songs. 375 I have cross-questioned several natives of Northorpe on this point and not one of them had ever heard of the latter There were three ravens in a tree, As black as any jet could be. A down a derry down. Says the middlemost raven to his mate Where shall we go to get aught to eat ? It's down in yonder grass green field, There lies a squire dead and kill'd, His horse all standing by his side. Thinking he'll get up and ride ; His hounds all standing at his feet. Licking his wounds that run so deep. There comes a lady full of woe. As big wi' bairn as she can go : She lifted up the bloody head And kissed the lips that were so red. She laid her down all by his side And for the love of him she died. Written down 19 January, 1859. — N. & Q.^, vol. xi., p. 485. The Three Ravens {ib., xi., 485). — See Child's Ballads, v., 212. Sorb WiUrmghbg; or, 31 ixnz rtlation of a cJfamoMs ani ^looiip ^attti fonflkt in c^Ianb^rs, bg tht nobU atib baltant |Corb W^illoughby toith 1500 @ttflii«h asaittst 40,000 cSpaniarli«, tohere the (Englwk obtain^b a notable bictorg, for the fllorg anb renoton of onr Ration. To THE TUNE OF, Lord Willoughby. The fifteen day oi July with glistering speare and shield. 376 Ballads and Songs. A famous fight in Flanders was foughten in the field : The most coragious officers was English Captains three ; But the bravest man in Battel was brave Lord Willoughby. The next was Captain Norris, a valiant man was he ; The other Captain Turner that from field would never flee : With fifteen hundred fighting men alas ! there was no more, They fought with forty thousand then upon the bloody shore. * Stand to it noble Pike-men and look you round about ; And shoot you right, you Bow-men, and we will keep them out : You Musquet and Calliver men, do you prove true to me, rie be the foremost man in fight,' Says brave Lord Willoughby. And then the bloody enemy they fiercely did assail : And fought it out most valiantly, not doubting to prevail : The wounded men on both sides fell,. most piteous for to see, Yet nothing could the courage quell Of brave Lord Willoughby. For seven hours to all men's view this fight endured sore, Until our men so feeble grew, that they could fight no more : Ballads and Songs. yj7 And then upon dead Horses full savourly they eat, And drank the puddle water, for no better they could get. The Second Part. To the Same Tune. When they had fed so freely they kneeled on the ground. And praised God devoutly, for the favour they had found : And bearing up their Colours, the fight they did renew, And turning toward the Spaniard^ five thousand more they slew. The sharp steel-pointed Arrows, and Bullets thick did flye. Then did our valiant Souldiers charge on most furiously : Which made the Spaniards waver, they thought it best to flee ; They feared the stout behaviour of brave Lord Willoughby. Then quoth the Spanish General, ' Come let us march away, I fear we shall be spoiled all, if that we longer stay : For yonder comes Lord Willoughby With courage fierce and fell. He will not give one inch of ground, for all the Devils in Hell' And then the fearful enemy was quickly put to flight. Our men pursued courageously and rout their forces quite : 378 Ballads and Songs. And at the last they gave a shout, which echoed through the sky, * God and St. George for England ! ' the conquerors did cry. This news was brought to England^ with all the speed might be, And told unto our gracious Queen of this same Victory : • O this is brave Lord Willoughby^ my love hath ever won. Of all the Lords of honour, 'tis he great deeds hath done.' For Souldiers that were maimed, and wounded in the fray, The Queen allowed a Pension of eighteen pence a day : Besides all costs and charges she quit and set them free, And thus she did all for the sake of brave Lord Willoughby Then courage noble English men and never be dismaid, If that we be but one to ten, we will not be afraid To fight with forraign Enemies and set our Country free. And thus I end this bloody bout of brave Lord Willoughby. Printed for F. COLES in Vine-Street near Hatton Garden. (In Black-letter. Earliest extant copies apparently printed about 1640."^) — Rox. Ball., vol. iv., pp. 8-1 1. *Mr. Ebsworth thinks it may have been first issued in 1587 or a year later. Ballads and Songs. 379 m ihz 5tttrk£00e of guffolkc'e Cakmitg. To THE TUNE OF Queen Dido. [Abstract] When God had taken for our sinne the prudent Prince, King Edward, away, Then bloody Bonner did begin his raging malice to bewray. Beyond the seas many fled, and among them the Duchess of Suffolk with husband child and nurse 'with all their charge ' [see cut *] And so, with thankes to God on hie They tooke their way to Germany. Thieves assailed them and spoiled them of all their treasure and their store and moreover beat them. The nurse laid the child on the ground and fled. The others wandered and found shelter in a church porch where they lighted a fire. There the Duchess dressed the baby. And while she drest it in her lap Her husband made the infant pap. The sexton came and drove them out. From his hand the husband wrung the church-keys and with them struck the officiars head t so that it streamed with blood. Help came and the vagrants were haled to the Governor who could not understand what they said. Then master Bartu, \ brave and bold, in Latin made a gallant speech. Which all their misery did unfold and ther high favour did beseech. With that a Doctor, sitting by Did know the Dutches presently. * Lines. Arch. Soc^ vol. viii., p. i6. -[Lines. Arch. Soc., vol. viii., p. i8. X Bartu = Bartie = Bertie. 380 Ballads and Songs. And thereupon arising straight, with words abashed at this sight, Unto them all that there did wait, he thus broke forth in words aright : * Behold, within your sight ' quoth he, * A Princesse of most high degree ! ' With that the Governour and the rest were all amazed the same to heare, Who welcomed this new-come guest With reverence great and princely cheere, And afterward convey'd they were Unto their friend Prince Cassimer. A Sonne she had in Germany, Peregrine Bartu call'd by name, Surnam'd the good Lord Willoughby, of courage great and worthy fame : Her daughter young, which with her went Was afterwards Countesse of Kent. For when Queen Mary was deceast the Dutches home return'd againe. Who was of sorrow quite releast by Queen Elizabeth's happy raigne. Whose godly life and piety We all may praise continually. FINIS. London, Printed for Edward Wright Dwelling at Christ Church gate. Written by Thomas Deloney in the reign of Elizabeth : earliest edition now extant of James I. time. — Rox. Ball., vol. i., pp. 288-294. In Lines. Arch. Soc, vol. viii., pp. 17, 18, there is reference to a ballad. The most rare and excellent history of the Duchess of Suffolk and her husband Richard Bertie's calamity taken from Wood's Collection of Black Letter Ballads and Songs. 381 Ballads, vol. 401, p. 57. Two cuts are given: they resemble those given in the Roxburghe Ballads. For The Spanish Lady's Love, see PART III., SECTION I., Sagas, under Sir John Bolles. Ballad of Winceby Fight, Oct. iith, 1643. Hopton fought with might and main, ' Come, come,' said he, ' let's try again,' Till he lay sprawling on the plain. Upon the field of Winceby. Widderington he was so stout, ' Brave sirs,' he cried, ' We'll fight it out' But he was force to ride it out. And leave the field of Winceby. L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 115. Can any of the readers of ' N. & Q.' give me the words of an old song once very popular in Lincolnshire at Harvest-homes and Christmas time? The following is what I remember of it : * Oh dear my good masters, pray what shall we do. In this year sixteen hundred and seventy-two ? For since Queen Elizabeth mounted the throne Sure times like the present scarce ever were known.' N. & Q.*, vol. v., p. 401. Lincolnshire Songs. — The three following songs have lately been sent me from Stixwould, a village in Lincoln- shire, not far from Horncastle. They were repeated to my brother, the Vicar of Stixwould, by one of the oldest women in his parish. I. A song sung by his nurse to a Lincolnshire gentle- man, now over sixty years of age. 382 Ballads and Songs. The Jew's Daughter. You toss your ball so high, You toss your ball so low, You toss your ball into the Jew's garden, Where the pretty flowers grow. Out came one of the Jew's daughters, Dressed all in green ; * Come hither, pretty little dear, And fetch your ball again.' She showed him a rosy-cheeked apple. She showed him a gay gold ring ; She showed him a cherry red as blood, And that enticed him in. She set him in a golden chair, She gave him kisses sweet ; She threw him down a darksome well More than fifty feet deep. 2. The Lincolnshire Farmer. The doctor his medical man doth tend. The parson doth with him pray ; And the farmer doth to the market ride Upon the market day. The farmer doth to the market go To sell his barley and wheat ; His wife on a pilloring seat rides behind. Dressed up so clean and neat. With a basket of butter and eggs she rides So merrily on I'll vow ; There's none so rare that can compare With the lads that follow the plough. Ballads and Songs, 383 And when from the market they do return That is the best comfort of all ; We have a lusty black pudding in the pot And a good piece of beef and all. And then after supper a jug of brown beer Is brought to the table I'll vow ; And there's none so rare that can compare With the lads that follow the plough. 3. Song sung when the last waggon comes home after the harvest is got in. I rent my shirt and tore my skin To get my master's harvest in. Hip ! hip ! hurrah ! Harvest in and harvest home, We'll get a good fat hen and bacon bone. Hip ! hip ! hurrah ! Farmer — has got his corn Well mown and well shorn. Hip ! hip ! hurrah ! Never turned over and never stuck fast, The harvest cart has come home at last. Hip ! hip ! hurrah ! N. & Q.^ vol. ii., pp. 43, 44. I. Baby, baby, naughty baby, Hush ! you squalling thing, I say ; Peace this instant ! peace ! or maybe \sic\ Menschikoff will pass this way. II. Baby, baby, he's a giant, Black and tall as Rouen's steeple, Sups and dines and lives reliant Every day on naughty people. 384 Ballads and Songs. III. Baby, baby, if he hears you As he gallops past the house, Limb from limb at once he'll tear you Just as pussy tears a mouse. IV. And he'll beat you, beat you, beat you. And he'll beat you all to pap ; And he'll eat you, eat you, eat you, Gobble you, gobble you, snap ! snap ! snap ! N. & Q.^ vol. vii., p. 49. I remember well having this said to me in or about the year 1836. Only in place of Menschikoff stood the name of Cromwell, and instead of ' Rouen's steeple ' those who repeated it to me said ' Lincoln steeple. — N. & Q.^, vol. vii., p. 80. [Wellington took the place of Menschikoff in the version known to my mother, but she had heard Bonaparte also used.— M. P.] [A Collection of Broadside Ballads [of various dates — 1820-75, etc.] in the Brit. Mus. (Press Mark 1876, e. 3) contains many printed by /. Ringham, 50 Steep Hilly Lincoln. They are undoubtedly modern for the most part. A few may be of the eighteenth century, perhaps earlier, but most likely these are not Lincolnshire productions, or especially admired there. The titles of these doubtful ballads are : The Painful Plough : The Pretty Ploughboy : Rosetta the Farmer's Daughter and the Gay Ploughboy : The Wealthy Farmer's Son : The Young Sailor Bold : The Wild Boar Hunt— E. G.] The best version I remember to have seen of the * Jew's Daughter ' was printed by Mr. W. C. Atkinson, of Brigg in Lincolnshire, in The Atkenceum of January 19, 1867 (p. 96). It may have appeared in this form before, but if so, I have never seen it. Ballads and Songs. 385 The Jew's Daughter. The bonny boys of merry Lincoln Were playing at the ba', And wi' them stude the sweet Sir Hugh, The flower among them a'. He kepped the ba' there wi' his foot, And catched it wi' his knee, Till in at the cruel Jew's window, Wi' speed he garred it flee. * Cast out the ba' to me fair maid ; Cast out the ba' to me.' * Ye ne'er shall hae it, my bonny Sir Hugh, Till ye come up to me. * Cume up, sweet Hugh ; cum up dear Hugh ; Cume up and get the ba'.' * I winna cume up, I winna cume up. Without my playferers a'.' And she has gone to her father's garden, Sae fast as she could rin ; And pow'd an apple red and white, To whyle the young thing in. She wyled him sune through a chamber, And wyled him sune through twa ; And neist they came to her ain chamber, The fairest o' them a'. She has laid him on a dressing-board, Whar' she was used to dine ! And stuck a knife deep in his heart. And dressed him like a swine. She row'd him in a cake o' lead, And bade him lie and sleip ; Syne threw him into the Jew's draw-well, Fu' fifty fathom deip. When bells were rung and mass was sung, And ilka lady gaed hame, 2B 386 Ballads and Songs. Then ilka lady had her young son, But Lady Helen had nane. She row'd her mantel her about, And sair sair can she weip : She ran wi' speed to the Jew's castel, Where a' were fast asleip. * My bonny Sir Hugh, your mither calls ; I pray you to her speik.' * O Lady rin to the deip draw-well Gin ye your son wad seik.' Lady Helen ran to the deip draw-well, And kneeled upon her knee ; * My bonny Sir Hugh, gin ye be here, I pray ye speik to me ! ' * The lead is wonderous heavy, mither ; The well is wonderous deip ; A kene, kene knife sticks in my heart ; A word I donnar speik. * Gae hame, gae hame, my mither deir ; Fetch me my winding sheet ; For again in merry Lincoln toun We twa shall nevir meit' Cf. Linc.^ 1836, p. 27, for the same poem with slight verbal differences. MYSTERY PLAYS. Boston. The Grey or Franciscan Friars . . . were much celebrated for their annual exhibition of the mysteries, which were called 'Corpus Christi plays,' from the day on which they were performed. — Thompson, p. i i 2. It. to John Thorpe for Harod's coate. - xviij It. to Wm. Calow the younger all th' Apostyls' coats and other raggs. . _ . - viij iiij A Boake of the Stufife in the Cheyrche of Holbeach [1547]. — Church Furniture, p. 238. Mystery Plays, 387 Holbeach. Playei's. — It. to Anthony Heydon for the coats of the iij kyngs of Coloyne. . _ . . . viiij A Boake of the Stufife in the Cheyrche of Holbeach [1547]. — Church Furniture^ p. 238. It. to John Mays wyffe for the Dracon. - - iij. A Boake of the Stufife in the Cheyrche of Holbeach [1547]. — Church Furniture^ p. 238. The Lincoln City Waits, etc., 1564. The following list of stage properties connected with an old mystery play, as well as the words of a Christmas poem, spoken by the three waits of the city of Lincoln, are both taken from the eighth part of the Fourteenth Report of the Historical Manuscripts Commission: 1564, July. — *A note of the perti . . . the properties of the staige . . . played in the moneth of July anno sexto regni reginae Elizabethae, etc., in the tyme of the mayoralty of Richard Carter, whiche play was then played in Brodgaite in the seid citye, and it was of the storye of Tobias in the Old Testament.' First hell mouth, with a neither"! shap. I lying at Mr. Norton's house in Item, a prison with a coveryng. | the tenure of William Smart. Item, Sara('s) chambre. J Item, a greate idoll with a clubbe. Item, a tombe with a coveryng. Item, the citie of Jerusalem with towers and pynacles. Item, the citie of Raiges with towers and pynacles. Item, the citie of Nynyvye. Item, the Kyng's palace of Nynyve. Item, olde Tobyes house. Item, the Isralytes house and the neighbures house. Item, the Kyng's palace at Laches. Item, a fyrmament with a fierye clowde and a duble clowde, in the custodye of Thomas Fulbeck, alderman. remanyng in Saynt Swythunes churche. 388 Ballads and Songs. In Vol. IV. of the city Records is the following curious Christmas poem, spoken or sung by the three city waits (representatives, by their title of Senators, of the Three Wise Men?) as a warning beforehand for the right keeping of Christmas time, a ceremony called 'Crying Christmas.' The leaf is headed, 'Anno xxv. Officii Willelmi Hynde communis clerici civitatis Lincoln,' i.e. 1565, as appears from the heading of the first leaf of the Register itself. *The first Senatour. The Maker allmyghtye, the grounde of alle grace, Save this congregation that be here present, And bryng them all to the celestyall place That with pacyens wyll here the effect of our intent. The second Senatour. Oure intent and purpose is auncyent customes to declare That haue ben vsed in this citie manye yeres ago, And nowe for to breake them we wysshe ye schuld beware, For ther be grevous ponyishment for them y' wyll do soe. The thurd Senatour. At the tyme of Christmas myrthe hath ben made Throughout all nacyons of the Crystiane faith. And styll so to keip it ye nede not be affrayde, For then was our Savyour bourn as the Scripture saith. The first Senatour. At that tyme saith Saynt Johne appeared our perfight lyght And the Saveyour of all the world y* faithfully trust in hym. Saynt Luke in y* second chapitour declaryng his strength and might, Therfore at that tyme to be merye we wyssh ye schuld begyn. The second Senatour. The Aungelles with myrthe the schepperdes did obey, When they song Gloria in excelsis in tuynes mystycall, The byrdes w* solemntye song on every spray, And the beastes for joye made reuerence in there stall. Mystery Plays. 389 The thurd Senatour. Therfore w' a contrite hart let hus be merye all Havyng a stedfast faith and a love most amyable, Disdaynyng no man of power greate nor small, For a crewell oppressour is nothyng commendable. The furst Senatour. Whatsoeuer oppressor wyll be cruelle and not merye make Schal be sore fettered in a dongion full deip Wherin is todes and miteis w* many a gret snayke, That place is so dark you schall not se your fete. Second Senatour. Therfore Crystmas myrth I wold ye schuld esteme, And to feare God and schewe y^ deides of charyty boithe man and wyff, Or elles the people wyll assemble w' weapons scherpe and keene, Wherfore it wyll not prevaile to make any stryfif. Thurd Senatour. Bycause that holye tyme all good people do prepare Aswell kynges and quenes that is of most noble byrthe, As also dukes, erles and lordes royally wyll faire, And spend the tyme of Crystmas w^ joye and myrthe. The first Senatour. Forsomuch as all degrees within this r . . . Do hyghly esteym the tyme of Cry . . . To breke y' honourable custom I wold none to . . . But spend y^ tyme in hearyng and folowyng Gods word. Second Senatour. That is the cheiff cause hither we were sent To gyv^ the people warnyng to have all things perfightly, For they that do not breakyth M'' Mayours comaunde- ment And accordyng to the order ponysshed must they be. 390 Ballads and Songs. Thurd Senatour. Therfore endevour your selffes to have all thinges well, That no default be found neyther of riche nor pore But at that tyme help your neighbures as S. James doth (tell?), Refresshyng the pouertye y' cum myth to y^ dore. First Senatour. Breiffly we have declared thefifect of our mynd And I do not doubt but you wyll have it in remembraynce, One neighbour to another I wyssh ye schuld be kynde, For y^ tyme doith so spend nedes we must goo fro(m) hence?) The Second Senatour. Here we cannot tary, the tyme passith . . . This mortall worlde is but van(ity), . . . All magistrates and rulers we wold ye sch(uld) . . . Walkyng in your . . . The (thurd Senatour). The eternall Lord haue ... Unto other places . . . Power vpon you th . . . He y* all thynges . . . Amen.' Antiquary^ vol. xxxii., pp. 191, 192; cf Man. and Cus.^ p. 82. Stamford. The money given the players, I guess, was paid the wardens of the crafts or Trades, who, every year, acted the play of Corpus Christi * upon Corpus Christi day, in the north chancel of this church, called Corpus Christi chapel ; or elsewhere in the town. — Accompts of Churchwardens^ p. 131. * For further particulars of this play, see Peck's Annals of Stamford^ B. xiv. § 4, PP- 4, 5- SECTION IV. JINGLES AND RIDDLES. Pinchbeck Family (loth S. iii. 421). — Being a Lincoln- shire Pinchbeck, I was much interested in Mr. Under- DOWN's note on the Pinchbeck family. I wonder if he has heard the following doggerel, which I often had ■chanted at me when I was a National School boy : Adam and Eve and Pinchbeck Went down to the river to bathe ; Adam and Eve got drownded. And who do you think got saved ? The chief object of the chanter was to get the answer to the question in the last line, and then demonstrate it by pinching you. I used to think it was only a Lincolnshire verse, and I was much surprised to hear it when I came into Lancashire, where Pinchbecks are very scarce. ... — N. & Q.^^iv., p. 33; cf p. 7J. Jingle. — The following rhyme is believed to indicate the character from the colour of the eyes : Blue eye, beauty, Black eye, steal pie ; Grey eye, greedy gut ; Brown eye, love pie. Another version runs : Black eye, beauty ; Grey eye, greedy-gut ; Ate all the pudding up. E. Peacock, i., p. 99. 392 Jingles and Riddles. Th' nigher th' boan, th' sweeter th' flesh. Th' nigher th' grun', th' sweeter (or greener) th' gress. E. Peacock, i., pp. 124, 125. Made i' Bristol, Sell'd i' Yerk [York] ; Putten i' a bottle, An' call'd a curk [cork] E. Peacock, i., p. yj. Cock-a-doodle do, My Dame's lost her shoe ; My master's lost his fiddlestick, And does n't know what to do. E. Peacock, i., p. 65. Cushy cow bonny, give down thy milk. And I will give thee a gown of silk ; A gown of silk and a silver tee, If thou wilt give down thy milk to me. The two last lines often run thus : A gown of silk and a silver spoon. If thou wilt give down thy milk very soon. E. Peacock, i., pp. 77, 78. Some say the devil's dead, and buried in Cold Harbour. Thompson, p. 732. Ding dong bell, The cat's fallen ith well ; Who threw her in, Little Jacky Green. What a knave was that. To drown poor pus cat, Who never did no harm. But catcht a mouse ith barn. Stukeley Corr.^ i., p. 1 1 8. When the dove goes a benting The farmer is lamenting. BROGDEN, p. 2 2. Jingles and Riddles. 393 My father died when I was young, And left me all his riches ; His gun and volunteering cap, Long sword and leather breeches. And a variant tells us : My father died a month ago, And left me all his riches, A feather bed, a wooden leg. And a pair of leather breeches. I have been told that the ' volunteering cap ' form of the ditty is supposed to relate to the American War of Independence. — N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 217. Five score's a hundred, men, money and pins. Six score's a hundred in all other things. Thompson, p. 732. Five score's a hundred, Of men, money, and pins ; Six score's a hundred O' all other things. E. Peacock, i. p. 160. Grantham. An oft-quoted rhyme, not a valentine, taught — Green's forsaken, yellow's forsworn. And blue's the colour that shall be worn. As long as the member provided for Grantham by Buckminster was a Tory, blue, ' true blue ' was its Tory colour, but when azure flags floated in honour of Liberal opinions. Conservatives rallied round the red, and we juvenile politicians sang — Red (or pink) for ever. Throw the Blues over the river. We were very indignant if anybody reversed this order of the colours. — G. J., June 29, 1878. 394 Jingles and Riddles. Hobble-de-hoy, Neither a man, nor yet a boy. Brogden, p. 97. When a person holloas to any one at a great distance, a person near him often says : Holloa 's dead, An' I'm cum'd in his stead. at other times : Holloa's dead, an' his wife lives at Hull, Kept a coo but milk'd a bull. E. Peacock, U., vol. i., p. 275. Jack, a quarter of a pint measure, and the quantity contained in one. I'll tell you a tale Of a jack of ale, A hen, a cock, and a sparrow, My little dog has burnt his tail, And won't get home to-morrow. E. Peacock, i., p. 144. My lady goes to London, nim, nim, nim ; Gentleman follows after, trot, trot, trot, Baby goes gallopy, gallopy, gallop. Song of a mother nursing an infant. While the first line is being said she moves very slowly, rather more rapidly at the second, and very fast at the third. — E. Peacock, i., p. 179. Nim, — A rocking of the knee. Here my lady went nim, nim, nim. Old Rhyme. — Brogden, p. 136. Lasses is cumbersome, Lads is lumbersome. E. Peacock, i., p, 162. Jingles and Riddles, 395 If you marl land you may buy land ; If you marl moss there is no loss ; If you marl clay you fling all away. E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 341. Lincolnshire Jingle. — My master, old Pant, he fed me with pies. My mother, she learnt me plenty * off' lies ; My master, old Pant, he learnt me to thieve. So I cheat all I can, an' laugh in my sleeve. N. & Q.^^ i., p. 266. Hard upo' poother an' light upo' shot, An' then you'll kill dead o' the very spot. E. Peacock, i. p. 196. I slit a sheet, a sheet I slit, A new beslitten sheet was it. The words form a trial of skill for the tongue, like the well-known Peter-Piper, etc. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 43- Sneely-snawl put out your horn, The beggars are coming to steal your corn At six o'clock in the morning. Old Rhyme. — Brogden, p. 188. Nursery Rhyme. — There was a crookled woman, and she walk'd a crookled mile. She fun a crookled sixpence, agean a crookled stile ; She bowt a crookled cat, an' it catch'd a crookled mouse, An they all lev' togither i' a little crookled house. L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 249. 396 Jingles and Riddles, Old woman, old woman, Will you go a shearing? Speak a little louder, sir, I'm rather dull-of-hearing. Old Rhyme. — Brogden, p. 59, ' Old woman, old woman, Thoo mun go shearin' ; ' ' No, maister, no. For I'm dull o' hearin'.' ' Old woman, old woman, Thoo mun shear or thoo mun bind ; * ' No, maister, no, For ye see I'm stone blind/ * Old woman, old woman. Then thou mun go beg ; ' ' No, maister, no, For I'm lame o' my leg/ E. Peacock, 1., p. 95. Tunder, — tinder. Matches an' tunder ; When a man's married, he's fost to knock under. E. Peacock, i., p. 261. The water fell down the mill dam, slam. That's poetry. The water fell down the mill dam helter-skelter. That's blank verse. Old saying. — BrOGDEN, p. 94^ Wig. — A small cake. Tom, Tom, the baker's son. Stole a wig and away he run ; The wig was eat and Tom was beat, And Tom run roaring down the street. E. Peacock, i., p. 275. North Lincolnshire Household Riddles, 397 NORTH LINCOLNSHIRE HOUSEHOLD RIDDLES. 1. As I was going over London Brig, I spies a little red thing ; I picks it up, I sucks it blood, And leaves it skin to dry. Ans. An orange. 2. As I was going over Westminster Brig, I met a Westminster Scholar ; He pull'd off his hat, an drew off his glove, And wished me good morrow. Pray tell me his name, for I've told it to you. Ans. Andrew. 3. As I was goin' over Humber, I heard a great rumble ; Three pots a boilin', An' no fire under. Ans. Water under the boat. 4. When I was going over a field of wheat, I picked up something good to eat ; Neither fish, flesh, fowl, nor bone, I kep' it till it ran alone. Ans. A hegg. 5. As I was goin' over our gardin gap, I spied my Uncle Ned ; With pins and needles up 'n his back, An' we kep' joggin' on a-head. Ans. A pricky-otchin (urchin, hedgehog). 6. As I was goin' through our gardin, I spied a man in a red coat ; With a stick in his hand, and a stone in his throat, If you'll tell me this riddle, Til give you a groat. Ans. A cherry. 39^ Jingles and Riddles, 7. Round the house and round the house, And leaves a white glove i' th' window. Ans. Snow. 8. Round the house and round the house, And leaves a black glove i' th' window. Ans. Rain. 9. Round the house and round the house, And in my lady's chamber. Ans. The sun. 10. Hickamore, 'ackamore, Sits over th' kitchen-door ; Nothing so long, and nothing so strong, As Hickamore, 'ackamore Sits over th' kitchen-door. Ans. A cloud. ^Sunshine is the answer to another version of the riddle given in Mother Goose's Nursery Rhymes^ p. 149.] '., 1 1. Black within and red without. Four corners round about. Ans. The chimney. 12. Black within and black without. Four corners round about. Ans. The oven. 13. Black within and black without, Three legs an' a iron cap. Ans. A porridge-pot. 14. Full of holes and holds water. Ans. The reeken-hook, i.e. the pot-hook which hangs in the reekin', or chimney, with holes to regulate the height of the pot from the fire. North Lincolnshire Household Riddles, 399 15. A riddle a riddle as I suppose, Forty eyes and never a nose. Ans. A wire sieve. 16. There was a man rode over moss, Grey-grizzle was his hoss, Bent saddle was his bow ; I have told you his name three times, Still you may not know.' Ans. * Was' was his name. (The third line is probably wrong.) 1 7. Four-and-twenty white horses on yonder hill ; Gnaw they go, gnaw they go, now they stand still. Ans, Your teeth. 18. Ten men's length, and ten men's strength, An' ten men can't rear it. Ans. A waggon-rope. (The expected answer being a ladder.) 19. Brass cap an' wooden head, Spits fire and spews lead. Ans. A gun. 20. Nanny-goat, nanny-goat, in a white petticoat. The longer she stan's the shorter she grows. Ans. A can'le. 2 1 . Long legs an' sho't thighs. Little 'ead an' no eyes. Ans. The tongs. 22. Grows i' the wood, an' whinnies i' the moor, An' goes up an' down our house-floor. Ans. A sweeping-brush (which is supposed to be of horsehair.) 400 Jingles and Riddles, 23. Grows i' the wood, an' yowls in the town, An' addles it' master many a crown. Ans, A fiddle (the strings of which are <;«/-gut). 24. Black I am an* much admired, Men may seek me while they're tired ; Weary horse an' weary man, Tell me this riddle if you can. Ans. Coal. 25. My ribs is lined wi' leather, I've a hole i' my side, An' Fm offense (often) used. Ans, Bellows. 26. Mother, father, sister, brother, All runnin' after one another. And can't catch one another. Ans. Mill sails. 2.T, As I went out so I came in. An' out of the dead I saw the livin' spring ; Seven there were an' six there be, Tell me that riddle and then hang me. Ans. A bird with a nest and five young ones in a dead horse. 28. Riddle me, riddle me, riddle me ree, Tell me what my riddle's to be ? Thruff a rock, * thruff a reel, thruff an old woman's spin n in' wheel ; Thrufif a milner' hopper, thruff a bag o' pepper, Thruff an old mare's shink shank bone ; Such a riddle I have known. Ans. A worm. * ' Rock ' is here the spindle, as in the Jacobite song : * I sold my rock, I sold my reel, And sae hae I my spinning wheel And all to buy a cup of steel For Dickie Macphalion that's slain.' (See N. & Q.», vii., 331.) North Lincolnshire Household Riddles. 401 29. It is in the rock, but not in the stone ; It is in the marrow, but not in the bone ; It is in the bolster, but not in the bed ; It is not in the living nor yet in the dead. Ans. The letter R. 30. I turn Paraditum all clothed in green, The King could not read it, nor Madam the Queen ; They sent for the wise men out of the East, They said it had horns, but it wasn't a beast. Ans. Prick-holly. 31. In cums two legs an' sets hisself down Upo' three legs, wi' one leg in his hand. In cums four legs, an' throws three legs after four legs, An' gets his own leg again. Ans. A man sits on a three-legged stool in a butcher's shop, with a leg of mutton in his hand, which a dog snatches and runs away with. 32. When is an oven not an oven ? Ans. When she's a gate {i.e. agoing^ the fire 'drawing' satisfactorily). The wit of some of these is, I am afraid, dull enough ; but it is impossible to estimate the amount of amusement that they have afforded by the farm labourers' cottage fire-sides. I myself can well recollect the uproarious merriment that used to be excited by ' In comes two legs,' and ' Itum Paraditum ' caused rather a feeling of undefined mysterious awe. . . . The above were most of them * asked ' by one or two different nurse-maids, and by an old village dame named Mary Burton, who was a sort of oracle. I believe she explained the ' black glove ' [8] as being a black cloud seen through the window. I have also heard ' Itum Paraditum ' from my grandmother, who was born in 1772, and remembered it from her childhood. I have no doubt that both this one and some of the others 2C 402 Jingles and Riddles. were in existence long before that time. — N, & Q.^ voL viii., pp. 503, 504. A man without eyes saw plums on a tree, Neither took plums nor left plums ; pray how could that be. N. & Q.*, vol. X., p. 312. Lincolnshire Riddle. — I have just received the following riddle. Miss Mabel Peacock suggests that an incident in the Civil War may have given rise to it. Robert Portington, a connection of the Portingtons, then of Sawcliffe, and a Royalist of note, was bitten by a monkey when crossing a ferry on the Ouse, and died from the wound. The riddle may have become localized at other ferries near Sawcliffe, where the Portingtons resided, and in the neighbourhood of which the monkey story would be well known. As I was goin' ovver Butterweek* Ferry, I heard a thing cry ' Chickamaherry,' Wi' dorny 'an's t an' dorny face, White cockade, an' silver lace. N. & Q.io, i., p. 204. As I went over Lincoln Bridge, I met Mister Rusticap ; Pins and needles on his back, A going to Thorny fair.J A hedgehog. Mother Gooses Nursery Rhymes, Tales, and Jingles^ p. 166; Halliwell, 91. Elizabeth, Betsy, Tetty and Tes, They all went a hunting to find a bird's nest ; They found a bird's nest with two eggs in, They each took one and left one in. Old Saying; Brogden, p. 205. [Sometimes Elizabeth, Elsbeth, Bessie and Bess. — M.P.] * Sometimes Burringham. f Downy hands. J A girl from Boothby Pagnell, near Grantham, tells me that she has alway heard * Corby fair. ' North Lincolnshire Household Riddles, 403 Fatherless an' motherless, Born without a skin, Spok' when it caame into th' wo'ld, An' niver spok' sin'. The answer is crepitus ventris. E. Peacock, i., p. 223. Riddles. — Most of them current in Lincolnshire, but one or two from other sources. — Tales and Rhymes^ pp. 109-121. Tom Otter. — The two versions of an old riddle given below are commonly current in Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire, in which counties they are believed by tradition to refer to a titmouse and her brood, found between the jaw-bones of the murderer Tom Otter, who was gibbeted in the parish of Saxilby, in the year 1806. It does not seem unlikely that, in reality, they belong to a much earlier period. . . . There were nine tongues within one head ; The tenth went out to seek for bread, To feed the living within the dead. As I went out, so I came in, And out of the dead I saw the living spring ; Seven there were and six there be, Tell me the riddle and then hang me. The concluding line of the second version seems to imply that the person asking the riddle is in danger of death if a correct solution be given to his question. — N. & Q.^ vol. iv., p. 208 ; Brogden, p. 244 ; L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 184. Riddle. — See Part III., Section I., under the Lass ^at seed her own graave dug. SECTION V. PROVERBS. ' A crookled stick 'all do to beat a bitch wi*.' * As crookled as a dog's hint-leg.' E. Peacock, i., p. 75- ' Ax near, sell dear.' That is if you have corn, cattle, or other matters to sell, you are more likely to get their full market value if you do not ask too much. — N. & Q.*, vol. iii., p. 326. 'A healing coo soon forgets it cauf.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 35. * Clean vvatter of'ens cums oot 'n a mucky spoot' — H. T. BOTTESFORD, 1 886. That is, a good person may spring from a disreputable family. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 513. * Every dog has his day, and bitch her afternoons.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 87. ' Fit for naaither hedge-staake nor eldin.' . . . quite worthless. [Eldin is fire-wood.] — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 190. * He's heard the ohd cock craw,' said of children who repeat sentences or opinions which they have picked up from their fathers. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 127. It is said of a man, who after much display, suddenly comes to poverty, that 'he went up like an arrow and lighted in a cow-tod ' [alighted in cow-dung]. — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 71. Proverbs, 405 * Love daddy, love mammy, love awn-sen best,' a pro- verbial saying used to justify or explain acts of selfish- ness.— E. Peacock, i., p. 9. Meg-ullat, Mag-ullat, an owl. ' Every meg-ullat thinks her awn bubs best.' \Bubs here would be more accurately birds. There is reason to believe that bub, which com- monly means a young naked nestling, is not properly applied to owls.] — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 170. * Midsummer thistles are better than Michaelmas hay,' is a proverb meaning that the summer grass makes better hay than that of autumn. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 351. * That that's noht [naught] 's niver e' daanger ' : a proverb used when a worthless person is prosperous, or a worthless thing escapes destruction. — E. PEACOCK. II., vol. ii., p. 373. * To scrat where it itches Is better than fine cloas or riches.' Kirton- in-Lindsey. E. Peacock, i., p. 215. Rabbit-meat. — Anthriscus Sylvestris, Heracleum Sphon- dyliunt, and any other similar plant which rabbits are fond of. ' You can't gether rabbit-meat wi'oot findin' nettles.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 426. ' Them at steals geese should hide th' feather poke.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 8. . * The mellerest apple hes a crawk i'side,' a remark made to teach that no one is without faults. — E. PEA- COCK, II., vol. i., p. 143. ^T^NO flittings are as bad as one fire.' — COLE, p. 48. ' What's gotten o' th' divil's back goes out under his belly.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 280. * You mun put it in at th' mooth if you want it to cum oot at th' pap.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 357. 4o6 Proverbs. * You'll plaay wi' th' bull while {i.e. till) you get a horn in yer ee/ or *yer arse,' are common forms of caution given to reckless persons. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 79. Proverbs from Robert of Brunne, which are not in the French manual on which his book is founded : ' Loue ])ou Jjy chyldyr out of wytte ; Trust to hem ; and helples sytte.' Brunne, p. 40, 11. 1226, 1227. Pan seyj) he, * God shal alle saue ; Do wel ; wel shalt J>ou haue.' Brunne, p. 136, 11. 4301, 4302. He ys no more crystyn man Pan who so kally]) a blak oxe * swan.' Brunne, p. 137, 11. 4321, 4322. For J)us sey]) ))e olde man In a prouerbe ))at he can, * 3yue J)y chylde when he wyl kraue, And J)y whelpe whyl hyt wy'l haue, — Pan mayst J>ou make yn a stounde A foule chylde and a feyre hounde.' Brunne, p. 226, lis. 7238-7243. Yn a prouerbe of olde englys Telle men, and sojje hyt ys, * pat 30ug])e wones, yn age mones ; Pat ]>ou dedyst ones, ])ou dedyst eftsones.' Brunne, p. 239, lis. 7672-767^' Yn a prouerbe telle men ])ys * He wyys ys, J)at ware ys ' Brunne, p. 251, lis. 8084, 8085; also p. 305, 1. 9885. Parfor men seye, an weyl ys trowede, * Pe nere J)e cherche, J)e fyrj)er fro Gode.' Brunne, p. 286, lis. 9242, 9243. Proverbs, 407 For J)ys men se, and sey alday, ' Pe ))rede eyre sellej) alle away/ Brunne, p. 293, lis. 9478, 9479. ^[Though employed in Lincolnshire are common else- where].— HisSEY, p. 237. Lincolnshire Sayings, — In North Lincolnshire the sons and daughters of the soil use the comparison ' as awkward as a ground-toad ' — awkward meaning stubborn, sulky, ill to deal with. I am also informed that a certain woman who used to be very healthy was ' as strong as a little ground-toad.' Now in what way does a ground- toad differ from the ordinary reptile ? It is to be noticed that a man who has an inelegant seat in the saddle, riding with his knees too high and too forward, is compared with * a toad on a shovel ' ; while a woman who is too smartly dressed for her age or her appearance runs the risk of being likened to ' a toad dressed in muslin ' ; but in these two phrases ' ground-toad ' is never used. — N. & Q.9, xi., 509. Cf E. Peacock, i., p. 257 ; II., vol. ii., p. 568. [Cf. 9th S., xii., 514, for a reply which does not answer the question.] ' Bare as a bo'd's taail,' i.e. as a bird's tail. Said of a person who has lost everything which he possessed. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 29. 'As bare as a hwW \i.e. unfledged bird]. — E. PEACOCK, i., P- 39. Big as a barn side. Big as a barn door, Big as a house side. — Very big. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 47. * As big as bull beef and * As fussy as a dog with two tails' are . . . common sayings in North Lincoln- shire. ' As large as life ' is another variant of the former phrase. — N. & Q.^, vol. ii., p. 375. 4o8 Proverbs, ' As bug as the queen's coachman.' * As bug as a lop ' [flea]. ' As bug as my lord.' [Bug means proud, self- important. * As bug as a thrush ' is also used.] — E. Peacock, i., p. 40. As busy as Beck's wife. As stiff as Tommy Harris, As slow as old John Walker's chimes. Concerning the last of the three there is an old rhyme to Old John Walker's chimes, They went so very slow, That old John Walker scarce could tell Whether they went or no. N. & Q.^ vol. viii., pp. 368, 473. Dog-leg, a carpenter's tool. A kind of claw used for holding a piece of wood firmly on a bench. ' As crookled as a dog-leg ' is a common saying. It probably refers to this instrument rather than to the leg of the beast [see, however, the phrase as quoted from p. 75]. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 87. *As dead as nits.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 180. * As dear as saffron.' . . . Why saffron is used in this sense I do not know. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 455. Deep. — Cunning. ... * As deep as Garrick.' — E. PEA- COCK, II., vol. i., p. 162. * He's as deep as a well,' and * He's as deep as Wilkes,' are common expressions to indicate subtilty and craft. — E. Peacock, i., p. 83. Proverbial Sayings relating to the Devil. — See Part I., Section IV., Goblindom, under Devil. Kex^ Keck^ or Kecksy. — General name for any hollow- stemmed umbelliferous plant, such as the hemlock, cow- * As dry as an old kecksy! Cole, p. 7^. Proverbs. 409 False^ Fausse. — Sly, cunning, crafty. . . . ' She's diS false as a little fox.' * My dog's as false as any man.' So of a horse, * He's as fausse as a man.' Cole, p. 44. * As fell as a bull.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 7Z, * He's as fond [foolish] as a beasom.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 44. * As happy as a sow i' muck ' or * in a muck-hill ' ; a phrase setting forth the contented state of those who live for sensual pleasure. — E. Peacock, i., p. 233. * It's as hard as Brazil' — COLE, p. 20. * It's as hard as brazil.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 36. * As idle as a foal.' — COLE, p. 1 8. * As lame as a cat.' — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 98. 'Lame as a tree.' — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 576. ' As laazy as Ludlam's dog that lean'd his sen agean a door to bark.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 333. * As lousy as a coot.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 68. Stamford. — ' As mad as the baiting bull of Stamford.' — N. & Q.9, vol. ix., p. 98. * He was as mad as a Stamford bull, he was, that time, an' ripped oot, while I thowt he'd ha brussen hissen wi' bad langwidge.' — Taales fra Linkisheere^ p. 103. . . . * as meke as bryde yn kage.' — Brunne, p. 127, 1. 4007. * As pleased as a dog wi' two tails.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 87. * Poor as a craw, Poor as a wood.' — Very thin. — E. Pea- cock, II., vol. ii., p. 414. 4IO Proverbs » * As proud as a Louse.' We have two variations of this coarse and vulgar saying, viz., 'Pert as a louse' and as * Bug as a lop.' It would be difficult, I should say, to go beyond the latter. * Bug ' here means pert, over-bearing fear-inspiring, and is a common word. * Lops ' are the same as in the following children's rhyme : What are boys made of? Lops and lice. Rats and mice, That's what boys are made of What are girls made of? Sugar and spice, And all that's nice. That's what girls are made of N. & Q.8, vol. iii., p. 418. In Lincolnshire, anything ridiculously comical is said to be * As queer as Dick's hat band,' and this explanation is added ' which went nine times round and would not tie.* — N. & Q.2, vol., p. 232. * It's as queer as Dick's hat-band, that went nine times round an' would n't tie ' ; said of any person or thing which it is well-nigh impossible to manage. Common in many counties. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 84. ' As roond as a grun-stoan.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 249. * As sick as a newt' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 369. Short = liable to crumble. — * Short as cat-fat' — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 221. Whig, whey. — Obsolete in this sense, but commonly used in the saying, ' As sour as whig.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 273. Stunt. — Short (in manner), blunt Ex. He is as stunt as a hammer. — Brogden, p. 199. Proverbs. 411 ' As stunt as a hammer.' * As stunt as a dead worm/ — E. Peacock, i., p. 244. Thick — intimate. — * As thick as thack ' ; * as thick as three in a bed ' ; ' as thick as inkle-weavers ' ; * as thick as thieves.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 252. * Throng as Thorp's Wife.' — A proverb used to describe a woman who is ever busying herself about domestic affairs, but whose house and surroundings are nevertheless always in a mess. In Yorkshire the proverb runs, ' As thrang as Thrap's wife as hanged herself i' th' dish-cloot.' See Academy, July 21, 1883. The author never heard the suicidal portion of this in Lincolnshire. Cf Lawrence Cheny, Ruth and Gabriel, j., 73. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 562. r^^^= tight. — 'Trig as a drum.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 260. Pe knyzt amendede sejjyn hym weyl, And to ])e ded was as trew as steyl. Brunne, p. 75, 11. 2337, 2338. Wacken . . . sharp, quick-witted. ' As wacken as a witterick [i.e. a weasel]. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 266. ' Weet as thack,' i.e. wet as thatch ; very wet. The straw with which buildings or stacks are thatched is wetted before it is laid on, to make it bed properly. — E. Peacock, i., p. 272. Wick, quick [lively], * Wick as an eel.' — E. Peacock, i., p. 274. * As wise as a wisp.' — Stukeley Corr., i., p. 135. * He sweats like a brock ' [i.e. Cicada spumeria, which surrounds itself with a white froth commonly called cuckoo-spit]. — E. Peacock, i., p. 38. Brock. — The small green insect that encloses itself in froth, called Cuckoo-spit, whence the saying, * To sweat like a brock.' — COLE, p. 2 1 . 412 Proverbs, * He stinks like a brock ' \i.e, badger]. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 33. ' He fraames like a cat i' pattens,' said of a person who does anything in an unworkmanlike manner. — E. PEA- COCK, n., vol. i., p. 99. * Do it by degrees, as the cat ate the pestle,' is a proverbial saying in these parts. — N. & Q.®, vol. i., P- 390. {^Pestle = ^\^^ foot. — N. & Q.^ vol. ii., p. 265.] We have a proverb which says of something utterly worthless that it is ' neither good for hedge-stake nor elding.' — Archceological Journal ^ vol. Ixiv., p. 288. * All dolther an' pop, like a hot egg-pudding.' — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 86. ' To rain muck-ferks tines doon'ards,' or, * to raain three- tined muck-ferks,' are superlatives of * to rain cats and dogs.' — E. Peacock, H., vol. ii., p. 359. Hodge. — The inside of a pig's stomach (which is very bitter). Like the old woman who was told that nothing about a pig was lost, so she tried a bit of the hodge, but that beat her. — Cole, p. ^j. A person dressed in a very absurd manner is said to look 'like a sow wi' side pockets.' — E. Peacock, L, p. 223. The expressive Lincolnshire proverb 'Like a primrose in a casson' used of some incongruous piece of finery, e.g, a small flower or ribbon in a shabby or perhaps dirty cap. — N. & Q.^ vol. iv., p. 277. 'It's enif to deafen a spider,' is a remark made when one has suffered from some long and uninteresting dis- course.— E. Peacock, H., vol. ii., p. 511. Proverbs. 413 All in a piece. — Stiff with rheumatism, frozen, coagu- lated, 'I'm all in a piece like a stockfish.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 9. To lead the life of 'a toad under a harra'; to be in a miserable or depressed condition. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 568. 'No more use than a side pocket to a toad' is current in Lincolnshire. — N. & Q.^, vol. xii., p. 435. Anything very useless is said to be 'of no moore ewse then a side-pocket is to a toad.' A person dressed in a very absurd manner is said to look like a sow wi' side-pockets. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 483. 'Coud [cold] eniff to skin a toad.'—E. PEACOCK, i., p. 70. Bag 0' Moonshine. — An expression for nonsense; as *Such bother! why it's all a bag o' moonshine.' — COLE, p. 10. Plough-Balk. — An irregularity in ploughing, caused by the ploughshare being allowed to vary in depth, and spoil the uniformity of the furrow. Hence the Lincolnshire proverbs : ' More balks, more barley.' * Less balks, more beans.' E. Peacock, i., p. 195. Black Dog. — 'Now then, black dog!' said to a sulky child in allusion to the saying about a sulky person, 'He has a black dog on his back.' — COLE, p. 16. *He's set th' bea-skep [bee-hive] in a buzz;' that is, he has stirred up anger or raked up scandal. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 39. 'When bods hes two taails'; that is, when it is spring and the swallows come.' — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 60. 414 Proverbs. Dick upd sis. — Is this expression known anywhere except in the Isle of Axholme, where it is used in the sense of at sixes and sevens? 'Come in, and welcome, but we're just about flitting and are all dick upd sis' — N. & QJ, vol. v., p. 29. 'If you doan't like it you maay lump it, as dogs duz dumpling,' is said to a person who is compelled against his will to do some very disagreeable thing. [Dogs lump the dumpling by swallowing it in a lump.] — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p. 334. A person is said to have his 'eyes bigger than his belly' who takes more food upon his plate than he can eat. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 193. 'He's hing'd his fiddle upo' the door-sneck,' i.e. he is in a bad temper. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 104. 'He alus hangs up fiddle when he gets home' [i.e. he gives way to his ill-temper in his own house]. — E. PEA- COCK, II., vol. i., p. 202. 'Fools and foumards can't see by daylight.' I heard this near here the other day. Is it common? It certainly is not true of the second animal named at any rate. — N. & Q.^ vol. ii., pp. 88, 89. 'They bury them as kills their sens wi' hard work anean th' gallows.' This saying refers to the custom, once common, of burying executed criminals beneath the gallows on which they died. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 114. * He is a poor fool that's only one hole to run to.' — N. & Q.^ vol. i., p. 402. ' She (or he) looks like a Malkin.' ' I look a regular scarecrow.' — N. & Q.^ vol. ii., p. 34. ' May you hev perpetual itchin', behout ivver scrattin'.* A humorous form of curse common with women when they quarrel. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 144. Proverbs. 415 When sewing is done with brittle thread, or otherwise so badly that it breaks easily, it is said to be done 'wi' hot needle an' burnt thread.' — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 218. In the Isle of Axholme a left-handed person is called north-handed. — N. & Q.^ vol. vii., p. 235. * It caps old Oliver, and he capped Long Crown ' ; it beats old Oliver (Cromwell) and he beat the Cavaliers, called high or long crowns from the shape of their hats. — Thompson, p. 732. * He lives like Pelham ' ; the ancestor of the Earl of Yarborough : spoken of any one who lives in good style. — Thompson, p. 733. ' The pot '11 boil over afoore long ' ; said when a quarrel or scandal is anticipated. — E. Peacock, II., vol. i., p. 62. * That happened in the reign of Queen Dick ' ; i.e.. Never. — COLE, p. 115. ' They'll bite a bit quicker An' run a bit thicker ' : said of well-bred sheep in contrast with those of base pedigree. — E. Peacock, i., p. 252. * Adam and Eve in a shrimp's head.' Two of the shorter antennae or feelers attached to the head of a shrimp are called Adam and Eve from their fancied re- semblance to the human figure. — THOMPSON, p. 733. ' To-morra' cum niver.' An emphatic form of never. — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 569. * If you nobud saay traacle [treacle] she '11 lick.' — E. Peacock, II., vol. ii., p. 574. Fa la la, the burden of lascivious songs, (paWoyia, Twangdillo, Trangdildo. — Stukeley Corr.^ i., p. 135. Good lack! Guthlac. — Stukeley Corr.^ i., p. 135. Ods hartlings, harclings, p hercule. — Stukeley Corr., i., P- 135. 41 6 Proverbs, Great Cotes (?) Catching a Tartar. — Apropos of this saying, when recently driving with my old groom down a steep hill, I cautioned him not to let the horse, a spirited one, break away, when he exclaimed ; ' I've got her yet, like Billy Joy's cow.' On my asking for an explanation, he said it had been a very common expression in Lin- colnshire when he was a boy, and thereupon narrated the following bit of folklore. A certain small yeoman, Billy Joy by name, once upon a time went to Caistor fair to buy a cow. On returning with his purchase, he led her by a rope round the horns, the other end of which he kept in his hand ; but being naturally a lazy fellow, at last tied it round his waist. The day was hot, and the * bees was fell,' and so it came that on passing Cabourne horse dyke the cow took to the water, dragging her master, who had failed to untie the rope, slowly with her, to the great amusement of the onlookers, to the other side. All this time Billy, wishing to make the best of his enforced position, kept tugging at the rope and calling out, ' I've got her yet ! I've got her yet ! '— N. & Q.^ vol. viii., pp. 226, 227. SECTION VI. SAYINGS ABOUT PLACES. Ancholme and Witham. * As Kestiven doth boast, her Wytham so have I, My Ancum (only mine) whose fame as far doth fly, For fat and dainty eels, as hers doth for her pike, Which make the proverb up, the world hath not the like/ [Song of Lindsey], DRAYTON, iii., p. 1163. Wytham Eel and Ancum pike, In all the world there is none syke. Drayton, iii., 1163, note. ' Witham Pike, England hath nene like.' Fuller, vol. ii., p. 2. Witham. The natural commodities are pikes in that river near Lincoln, whence the proverb, * Witham pike, England hath none like.' — Quoted from Anglorum Specu- luMy or the Worthies of England in Church and State, by G. S., late of Broad Windsor, published in London 1684 ; L. N. & Q., vol. iv., p. 178. The river Witham . . . noted to a proverb for its pikes. — Camden, p. 362, col. i., Additions. Veni Witham, audiens illam Propter lubricant anguillam. Thence to Witham, having red there That the fattest Eele was bred there. Barnabe^s Journall, 0. 4. 2 D 41 8 Sayings about Places. Bag-Enderby. The lover of the daisy and the singer of it saw in those windows, as a boy, many marguerites in honour of the churches' patron saint ; and every time the old bell tolled, it said and says, ' Saintly Margaret, pray for us.' — Rawnsley, p. 8 ; N. & Q.^ vii., p. 236. Here is an old adage which says : Witham Pike, England has neen like ; and another : Ancholme eels and Witham Pike, In all England are nane syke. John Cordeaux ; L. N. & Q., vol. v., Nat. Hist. Sec- tion, p. 90; see Folk-Lore Journal, vol. iii., pp. 87, 88. Beckingham. There is a local saying at Beckingham that ' when you cannot see Claypole church spire, it is sure to be fine.' — HiSSEY, p. 415, Boston, that proudly calls itself * the capital of Fenland.' — HiSSEY, p. 248, Boston and Skirbeck. ' Skirbeck is a rectory, the parish church dedicated to St. Nicholas. Its parish surrounds the borough of Boston, whence the vulgar distich : * Though Boston be a proud town, Skirbeck compasseth it round.' N. & Q.\ vol. vi., p. 350. Boston. * It's as bare as Boston Scalp,' a sandbank near the entrance into the Witham [often pronounced Boston Scaup]. — Thompson, p. 733. Boston Stump. ' As high as Boston stump,' the church- steeple. — Thompson, p. 733. Bourne, Deeping, Stamford. * Peterborough for pride, Stamford for poor, Deeping for a rogue, and Bourn for a whore.' Barnabee's Journal, 0. 4. Butterwick. Butterwick over Freiston once bore sway, But now it is turned quite the contrary way. Thompson, p. 733. Sayings about Places, 419 Crowland — or Croyland as some writers have it. . . . The inhabitants appear to spell the name of their village indifferently both ways. One intelligent native, of whom we sought enlightenment, said he did not care ' a turn of the weathercock ' which way it was spelt, . . . He further remarked, apropos of nothing in our conversation, ' You might as well try to get feathers from a fish as make a living in Crowland ; and the people are so stupid, as the saying goes, " they'd drown a fish in water." ' — HiSSEY, p. 165. The following refers to Crowland : In Holland stands Crowland, Built on dirty low land, Where you'll find if you go, The wine's but so-so ; The blades of the hay Are like swords, one may say ; The beds are like stones, And break a man's bones ; The men rough and sturdy, And nought they afford ye. But bid you good bye. When both hungry and dry. Another rhyme on Crowland is : In Holland, O hark ! stands Crowland, d'ye mark ! There's wine such as 'tis, there's hay like a swys ; There's beds hard as stone ; and when you will you may be gone. And there is one of very great antiquity : Crowland as courteous as courteous may be, Thorney the bane of many a good tree ; Ramsey the rich, and Peterborough the proud, Sawtry by the way, that poor abbaye, gives more alms than all they. 420 Sayings about Places. Or as the lines appear in another form : Ramsey the rich, of gold and fee ; Thorney the grower of many a fair tree ; Croyland the courteous of their meat and drink ; Spalding the gluttons as men do think. Peterborough the proud, Sawtry by the way, That old abbaye Gave more alms than all they. Fenland N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 44-6. Another version is : Ramsey the rich of gold and fee, Thorney the flower of the fen country, Crowland so courteous of meat and of drink, Peterborough the proud as all men do think. And Sawtrey, by the way, that old abbaye Gave more alms in one day than all they. NORTHALL, p. 42 ; N. & Q.^ vi., pp. 281, 350. See also The Fenland, p. 138, where it is quoted from John Brixton's Hist, and Ant. of Peterborough-, Lines, Arch. Soc, vol. i., p. 351. In Holditch's History of Croyland, 18 16, it is said that the place is not uncommonly called * Curs'd Croyland.' — N. & Q., vol. X., p. 146. The abbey was always famous both for its splendour and hospitality, and the phrase ' curst Crowland ' is pro- bably a curious corruption of ' courteous.' — MURRAY, p. %6. Croyland's Chronicle is introduced to us with this quaint, however uncomplimentary, preface : In Hollandia, sit notanda Stat Croylandia memoranda. Ibi vinum tate quale ; Ibi faenum gladiale ; Ibi lectum lapidale ; Ibi vade, sine vale. Lines. Arch. Sac, vol. iii., p. 272. Sayings about Places, 421 'AH the Carts that come to Crowland are shod with Silver. Venice and Crowland, sic Canibus Catulos, may count their Carts alike ; that being sited on the Sea, this in a morasse and fenny ground, so that an horse can hardly come to it. But whether this place since the draining of the Fenns hath acquired more firmnesse than formerly is to me unknown.' — FULLER, vol. ii., p. 6. There was of yore an adage, * Sweet as Crowland bells.' — The Fenlandy p. JJ. There is a tradition, for which, however, there does not appear to be much foundation, that anciently there was a village called Dalproon^ on a site near the South Holland Sluice, and that it was washed away in the great flood of 1236. The tradition is preserved in the following lines : When Dalproon stood, Long Sutton was a wood : When Dalproon was washed down. Long Sutton became a town. Wheeler, p. 128. Deepingy etc. — * Deeping and Deeping and Deeping in row, Tallington, Uffington, Barholme and Stow, At the White House at Greatford there you must turn To Langtoft, Baston, Thurlby and Bourn.* N. & Q.^ vol. v., p. 13. Surfleet. They [the bells] are seldom used, as the tower and spire lean much, hence the local doggerel: Gosberton church is very high, Surfleet Church is all awry^ Pinchbeck church is in a hole And Spalding church is big with foal. North, p. 694. 42 2 Sayings about Places. Grantham, jingle concerning. — Folk- Lore, vol. xiii., p. 91. Heckington. A proverb that is quoted as current among the men of Heckington has no doubt some meaning. But it is not very apparent. It is given here with Hall's spelling : A hammer an a Betle Spelders arr Church Steple. Fenland N. & Q., vol. iv., p. 326. Place-rhyme relating to Holbeach, Whaplode, Moulton Western, Spilsby, Partney, and Skendleby. — Cf. SMITH, p. 128. 'From Hull, Hell and Halifax, Good Lord deliver us.' Hull, in the beginning of the great civil war, refused to admit Charles I. ; Halifax was notorious for its stern gibbet law; they are, therefore, bracketed with the place of torment. * As strong as Hull,' i.e. very strong indeed. The allusion is to the fortifications of that town, which were formerly much renowned in these parts. — E. PEA- COCK, i., p. 140. [In 1904 or 1905 a Kirton-in-Lindsey woman, who had been 'over-stressed' by having several members of her family ill at once, remarked, ' I tell'd 'em I wished they was in Halifax.'] Humber. Gone to Humber — lost. — E. PEACOCK ; Lindsey StaVy June 24, 1905. To set the Humber (or the Trent) on fire. — Antiquary ^ vol. xxxii., p. 310. 'When the Man and the Maid get together' — those being the tributary streams whose junction forms the river — 'they become Idle.' — Lines. Arch. Soc.^ vol. xviii., p. 4 * Kyme God Knows,' [is] well known to all explorers of Sayings about Places. 423 the Fens. The adjunct 'God knows' is supposed to be part of the following verse : 'It's Kyme, God knows, Where no corn grows, And very little hay ; And if there come a wet time, It weshes all away.' N. & Q.i, vol. iii., p. 340. In a short description of Kyme [by William Hall, a Lincolnshire man, b. 1748] there is quoted, in illustration of the neglected state of its drainage in the last century an adage that was * in almost every child's mouth in the country, about fifty years ago.' Kyme, God knows, Where no corn grows. Nothing but a little hay; And the water comes, And takes it all away. This was the usual reply of its inhabitants, when any person asked where they came from; but after the embankment and engine drainage took place, the hay not only became more secure, but the breed of stock became also famous; and likewise coleseed, oats, and other mer- •cantile commodities were produced ; insomuch that things took a different turn, indeed, and the reply now is Kyme, Sir ! Kyme ! ! Fenland N. & Q., vol. iv., p. 285. Lincoln. Like the Devil looking over Lincoln. — See Part L, Section IV., Goblindom, under Devil, Lincoln was, and London is, And York shall be The fairest City of the three.' Brome, 148. 424 Sayings about Places. About twelve years ago, I first heard in this locality the following : — . York was, London is, Lincoln shall be The greatest city of the three. N. & Q.*, v., p. 201 ; Folk-Lore Record, vol. i., p. 160. Henry II., . . . ascended the throne, and after being crowned in London, was crowned a second time at Wick- ford (Wigford), perhaps St, Mary's-le- Wigford, one of the churches erected by those English inhabitants of ' Up Hill,' expelled by the Normans shortly after the conquest, and then considered outside the city. The ceremony of coro- nation is said to have been performed without the city, on account of the English prediction that 'The first crowned head that enters Lincoln's walls. His reign proves stormy, and his kingdom falls.' White, pp. 479, 480. Lincolnshire. Lyncolnshire men ful of myghtys. Cambrygeshire ful of pykes : Holond ful of grete dykes. — Leland, vol. v., p. xxvi. [From a manuscript belonging to Thomas Rawlinson, prefixed by Hearne.] County Rime. — The following is in a MS. book, circa 1809 : — Cheshire for men, Berkshire for dogs, Bedfordshire for naked flesh, And Lincolnshire for bogs. N. & Q.» xi., p. 266. Messingham. Passing through Massingham [an error for Messingham], in Lincolnshire, a long time ago, a traveller noticed three men sitting on a stile in the churchyard, and saying, * Come to church, Thompson ! ' ' Come to church. Sayings about Places, 425 Brown ! ' and so on. Surprised at this, the traveller asked what it meant. He was told that, having no bells, this was how they called folk to church. The traveller, re- marking that it was a pity so fine a church should have no bells, asked the men if they could make three for the church, promising to pay for them himself. This they undertook to do. They were a tinker, a carpenter, and a shoemaker respectively. When the visitor came round that way again, he found the three men ringing three bells, which said ' Ting, Tong, Plufif,' being made respec- tively of tin, wood, and leather. — Ecclesiastical Curiosities^ p. 139. 'What a wonderful country is Linkisheer, Where the pigs shit soap and the cows shit fire.' The allusion is to the practice of using pig-dung instead of soap in washing clothes, and cow-dung as fuel. Both these practices, if now obsolete, have become so in very recent days. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 158. 'They hold together as the Men of Marham^ when they lost their Common.' Some understand it ironically ; that is they were divided with several factions, which Proverb, ntutato noinino, is used in other Counties. . . . Others use the Proverb only as an expression of ill successe, when men strive to no purpose, though plotting and practising together to the utmost of their power, being finally foiled in their under- takings. 2 Though this Proverb be frequent in this Shire, Marham is in Norfolk. — F. Fuller, vol. ii., p. 7. See also N. & Q.^, x., pp. 189, 357. * Nothrup [Northorpe] rise and Grayingham fall, Ketton (Kirton-in-Lindsey) yet shall be greater than all.^ E. Peacock, i., p. 181. 426 Sayings about Places. Sleaford. You mayn't have heard the saying ' Sleaford for sleep, Boston for business, Horncastle for horses, Louth for learning.'— HlSSEY, p. 232. The turnpike road called Hargate, leading from Spald- ing to Tydd, passes through the north end of the parish [Fleet] ; it was begun in the year 1764. Before this road was made, travelling here was very dangerous to passengers. Hence the following verse. 'Be you early, be you late, Be aware of Fleet Hargate.' Marrat, vol. ii., p. 91. Stow. There is a rhyme used here comparing the bells with those in some neighbouring parishes thus : Marton's cracked pancheons, And Torksey egg-shells : Saxilby ding-dongs, And Stow-Mary bells. ' Well is the man Atwixt Trent and Witham.' E. Peacock, i., p. 260. Trent. Abundance of shipp wraks and such like, . . . occasioned this common saying: Between Trent-fall and Whitten-ness Many are made widdows and fatherless. Pryme, p. 139. Uffington. All the towns adjoining to Spalding, Pinch- beck, and Deeping fens, had formerly right of common in those fens ; as well as the towns contained in the following old distich. Uffington, Tallington, Barham and Stow, One house in Gretford, and ne'er an ene moe. Marrat, vol. iii., p. 45. Sayings about Places. 427 River Welland. Mediaeval prediction : * Doctrinae studium quod nunc viget ad Vada Bourn Tempore venturo celebrabitur ad Vada Saxi.' Old Spenser sings* * And after him the fatal Welland went, That, if old sawes prove true (which God forbid), Shall drown all Holland with its excrement, And shall see Stamford, though now homely hid. Then shine in learning more than ever did Cambridge or Oxford England's goodly beams.' Welland. The commune Saying is there [near Stam- ford] that Wasche and Wiland shaul droune al Holande. — Leland, vol. vi., p. 26. Whitton. When I saw the town it put into my mind a song that I had heard of it, which ended at every verse thus : — At Whitten^s town end brave boys ! At Whitten's town end ! At every door There sits a . . . At Whitten's town end. Pryme, p. 139. Wildmore. ' He's as wild as a Wildmore tit ' ; a small horse, of which large numbers used to be raised in Wild- more Fen. — Thompson, p. 733. Wolds. — ^I've seen better things then that upo' th' wouds [wolds] ' : a sarcastic reply to one who boasts of his own possessions. — E. PEACOCK, i., p. 2^]. Grimsby. When this borough had dwindled so as to become a very inconsiderable place, the ignorance of its mayors was a standing joke among outsiders. An old gentleman who, if alive, would be upwards of a hundred * The Faery Queen^ Book IV., cant, ii., St. xxxv. 428 Sayings about Places. and ten years of age, told me a tale of a certain mayor who had a person brought before him for frying bacon. The culprit pleaded that this was not an offence ; but the mayor retorted that it was felony by common law. A scholar was, however, found, who explained the misinter- preted passage in the law-books. The felony consisted not in frying bacon, but in firing a beacon. — N. & Q.^^, i., p. 505 ; ii., p. III. Bardney. * I see you come from Bardney ' is said to a person who has the habit of leaving doors open when he could shut them. — Q.^^, iii., p. 145. Beckmgham. It used to be called ' Beckingham-behind- the-Times,' the rector said. — HiSSEY, p. 412. Belton. 'As fond as th' men of Belton 'at hing'd a sheap for stealin' a man.' — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 215. Cleethorpes. The ' Meggies ' or Cleethorpers have long been known by the alternative name of * Howlets.' — Watson, p. 130. The slang name for Cleethorpes is, and apparently has been for centuries, ' Megs Island ' or more correctly ' Mag Highland.' ... * Mag owlet ' is the recognised name of the great owl ; and in dubbing the inhabitants of the Mag Highland mag howlets, the neighbouring wits stand convicted of a double-barrelled pun, for a great part of the highland was occupied by Hoole — generally of old pronounced ' Howie,' and thus sometimes written. Doubt- less the joke is a patriarch among local 'chestnuts'; the point of it has long been lost and modern wit, rather less keen, has attempted to justify the Cleethorpers' claim to the term from the fact that much of a fisherman's work is done when the owls do theirs. — Watson, pp. 136, 137. Jenny Thorpers, — Cleethorpe folk. — Oliver, iv., p. 58. Sayings about Places, 429 Fen. Breedlings. — A term sometimes applied to dwellers in the fen. — Good, p. 25. Men of Kyme were in the neighbourhood known as * Fen-Coots/ those of Billinghay as ' Billinghay Bog- trotters.' — Fenland N. & Q., vol. iv., p. 327. The Fen-men — anciently the Girvii of Bede, and in 1689 the Breedlings according to Mr. Macaulay — were a century later, known as the Slodgers, or Fen-Slodgers. — THOMPSON, p. 644. ' Web-footed like a Fen-man,' a Fen-man having to live so much among the water, it was said to be necessary that he should be web-footed. The Fen-nightingale ; a frog. — THOMPSON, p. 733. [Thompson sets these proverbs so down as being peculiar to the district.] * A Fenman's dowry, threescore sheep and a pelt ' (a sheepskin, which was formerly used as an outward garment). Yellow- Belly. — A fen-man, said to be derived from the eels with which the fen ditches abound. In the adjoining districts of the counties of York and Lincoln, we hear the rural inhabitants, namely those of the former calling their neighbours of the latter, ' Lincolnshire yellow-bellies,' who respond in the same jocular ill-nature, by calling the people beyond Humber ' Yorkshire Bites.' — Brogden, pp. 227, 228. In discussing the question of the secluded Lincolnshire 'Yellow BeUies,' Dr. Morton, of Sheffield, who was born in a Lincolnshire village, tells me that he never thought that the yellow bellies 'were of the colour we now call yellow, but something of a bronze shade, and never, I believe, in company with light hair and eyes.' And he says, ' In Alford, my native town, there is a part occupied by a set who have a bad name, and with whom the ordinary farm labourer will have nothing to do. They are poachers, 430 Sayings about Places. hawkers, and tinkers, rarely regular labourers, and they are sometimes ignorantly supposed to be gypsies.' — Addy, p. xxix. Can any one of your readers tell me if any of the following sayings are known in Lindsey, as well as in the south of the county. . . . Fen-Tigers — meaning the people of the Lincolnshire Fenlands, and those of the adjoining Counties. Fen yellow-bellies — people of the Fenlands. Fen Nightingales — frogs. Lincolnshire Bagpipes — frogs. Web-footed like a Fenman. Lincolnshire Hogs — Lincolnshire people. Lindsey Star, June 24, 1905. Grantham Gruel, nine groats and a gallon of water. — Heart of Midlothian^ ch. xxviii. I have heard that the ' Grantham Toms ' once held a coroner's inquest to ascertain the cause of the death of a man who was then living ! And in more recent times, as some of your readers will remember, the fire brigade were one night called out to subdue a fire at Mrs. Allen's, Harrowby-hill, but they were unable to reach the scene of the conflagration — the rising moon. Lincoln. *We call it, awkward St. Swithin's,' said of a parish in Lincoln. — COLE, p. 8. Witham, N. and S. A gentleman who lived at South Witham, Lincolnshire, a hundred years ago . . . described . . . the ordinary impression made by the ringing of the church bells within hearing. North Witham, with its three bells, would ring, ' Who rings best .-* ' South Witham, otherwise Post Wytham, nothwithstanding, that it owned but two, would defiantly reply ' We do! We do!' A third village, having no more bells than South Witham, and labouring under the additional disadvantage that one of its bells was cracked, discordantly rejoined * You lie! I Sayings about Places. 431 cannot remember the name of that third village. — N. & Q.^ xi., 415. Lincolnshire Bagpipers. — A satirical appellation . . . parallel with which are the following . . . Lincolnshire Bagpipers, Leicestershire Bean -bellies. — Denham Tracts , vol i., p. 166. Lincolnshire Yellow Breasts, i.e. Lincolnshire people. — Cf. Kent's Lindum Lays and Legends, 1861, p. 219, [for the story of a Lincolnshire man who put a frog into a cage because he thought, from its yellow breast, it must be a lark]. Louth. ^ As false as Louth Clock! — The clpck which used to be thereon is now at Patrington in Holderness, and as one face is always an hour and five minutes before the other, the proverb still lives there. — L. N. & Q., vol. ii., p. 217. Scawby feast is held in October. The reason why flies disappear at this time is because they are all made into pies for that festival. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 209. Little Witham. ' He was born at Little Wittham.' This village in this County by orthography is Witham, near which a river of the same name doth rise. But such nominal Proverbs, take the advantage of all manner of spelling due unto them. It is applyed to such people as are not overstock'd with acuteness. The best is, all men are bound to be honest, but not to be witty. — FULLER, vol. ii., p. 7. Wroot. — When the country became flooded, and the water extended itself over sixty thousand acres of land, it nriust have been an holme or island, to which there could be an easy communication by boats from the sur- rounding country ; but when the water was partially drained, and the land left fenny, moorish and swampy, then Wroot became the most inaccessible of all places, and acquired the name of Wroot, — Out of England. — Stone- HOUSE, p. 384. 432 Sayings about Places. Yorkshireman. — A fly drowned in ale. — Brogden, p. 228. When the Grand Sluice was opened on 15th October, 1766, it disappointed many who came to the opening ceremony, and one of the disappointed ones gave vent to his feelings by composing the following : Boston ! Boston ! Boston ! Thou hast naught to boast on But a Grand Sluice, and a high Steeple, A proud, conceited ignorant people. And a coast where souls are lost on. Another version of this rhyme is as follows : O! Boston! Boston! What hast thou to boast on } But a proud people, And a lofty steeple, And a coast where ships are lost on, lost on. This has since been altered to : Boston, O Boston ! What hast thou to boast on ? High Steeple, proud people, and Sands Ships are lost on. Boston is again coupled with Skirbeck, and Boston pride appears always to call for notice : Though Boston be a proud town, Skirbeck compass it all round. And another : Skirbeck straddle wide, Boston full of pride. Then a rhyme on some neighbouring Churches : Gosberton Church is very high, Surfleet Church is all awry. Pinchbeck Church is in a hole, And Spalding Church is big with foal. Fenland N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 44-6. Sayings about Places. 433 Gainsborough. Gainsbro', proud people Built a new church to an old steeple. N. & Q.7, vol. viii., p. 56 ; Stark, p. 386. Hatton. The poor Hatton people Sold the bells to build up the steeple. Literary Byways, p. 104 ; cf. NORTH, p. 444. Legsby. Many years ago there was this local rhyme : A little ting-tang in a little steeple, or A thack church and a wooden steeple, A drunken parson and wicked people. North, p. 504. Luddington, poor people ; With a stoan chech an a wooden steeple. The stone church and the wooden steeple have both been replaced by a modern structure. E. Peacock, i., p. 162. Luddington poor people, Built a brick church to a stone steeple. N. & Q.i, vol. vi., p. 496. Owersby's parish Wicked people, Sold their bells to Kelsey To build a steeple. Literary Byways^ p. 104 ; cf. NORTH, p. 479. Pickworth folks, poor people. Sold a bell to mend the steeple. G. J., March 16, 1889. Poor Scartho people Sold their bells to repair the steeple. Literary Byways, p. 104 ; cf. NORTH, p. 627. 2E 434 Sayings about Places. Long Sutton. A not very flattering rhyme refers to Sutton : Sutton long ! Sutton long ! At every door a heap of dung. Some two, some three, The dirtiest town you ever did see. Fenland N. & Q., vol. i., pp. 44-6. SECTION VII. POPULAR ETYMOLOGY. Appleby. When you (go) through our wood on the Roman highway, as soon as you enter through the gate on Thornholme moor, the place round about is called Bratton- grave-hill. The vulgar says that there has been by that gate several people buried that have hanged themselves; amongst which there was one that was called Bratton, but I suspect there is something more than this in the antiquity of the name. — Pryme, p. 134. Crowle. When the late Archdeacon Stonehouse was collecting materials for his History of the Isle of Axholme he asked one of the older inhabitants what was the meaning of the name Crowle, the place where this person lived. The reply was, 'Well, sir, I doan't knaw for sure- ness, but thaay do saay as afoore Vermuden time this was omust th' only bit o' land e' this part that was unflooded, so folks crohled up here an' built hooses. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. i., p. 146. Billingborough is said to take its name from the ' boiling up ' of a copious spring close to the church, but it is more probably derived from a Saxon word expressing greatness or copiousness. — Lines. Arch. Soc., vol. vi., p. xii. Boston. Doughty's Quay, now generally called Duty Quay.— Thompson, p. 258. 43 6 Popular Etymology, Brothertoft. Tradition says that this place was originally inclosed from the fens by a grant to two brothers ; hence the name, Brother-Toft. — Marrat, vol, ii., p. 187. Aswic grange near Whaplode. . . . This is near Catscove, now Catch colt corner. — Camden, p. 352, col. i., Additions; Marrat, vol. ii., p. 81. Folkingham. Tradition, however, mentions a circum- stance which is said to have given rise to the name Falkingham, as spelt with an a, viz., that the three chiefs who bore the title of kings, slain in the famous battle between the English and the Danes, A.D. 869 or 870 (for an account of which see * Threckingham '), are supposed to have fallen in this parish, from which incident it was afterwards called Fall-king-ham. — Sleaford, 1825, p. 216. Falkingham, Folkingham or Fourkingham was first called Fourkingham because four kings or chiefs resided there.— G. J., May 18, 1889. Gunness. There is a little village, on the eastern side of the Trent, nearly opposite the Keadby railway station, the name of which is Gunness, though during this century it has been frequently spelt ' Gunhouse.' A person by no means uneducated once told my father that it was so called because during one of the Danish invasions these marauders lodged their guns there. — N. & Q.^ vi., p. 274. Holland. So called, as some would have it, from Hay^ which our Ancestors broadly term [sic] Hoy^ is divided likewise into two parts, the Higher and the Lower. — Brome, p. 142. Lindsey. Linsy-woolsy. — Some Lincolnshire people hold the foolish opinion that this fabric takes its name . . . from the parts of Lindsey in this country, and as a consequence misspell it Lindsey- woolsey. — E. PEACOCK, II., vol. ii., p, 325. Popular Etymology. 437 Lincoln. The Black Goats. — Immediately below the High Bridge, will be seen an inn, bearing now the sign of the Black Goats. It has been altered within a few years from that of the Three Goats, which I can well remember to have heard my father say was derived from the three gowts, or drains, by which the water from the Swan Pool, a large lake which formerly existed to the west of the city, was conducted into the bed of the Witham, below ... a corruption more easily accomplished in our Lincolnshire English, than in more polite language. — A. J., pp. 58, 59. Lincoln. The name Greestone Steps is in measure a duplication for Gree or Grice, or the old Greesen, means steps. Some people call them the Grecian Steps or Stairs . . they are certainly not Greek or anything of the sort. Tradition says that the sea used to come up to the steps. — Wilkinson, p. 54. The Grecian Stairs, — The name which specially claims our attention is that of The Grecian Stairs^ a flight of steps by which the ascent is gained from . . . the New Road, to a small ancient gateway leading towards the Minster Yard. This name appears to be rather a remarkable instance of more than one peculiarity in the English language, for it exhibits, if I do not mistake, at once the tendency to attach a meaning to a word, however absurd that meaning may be, and the practice of adding an explanation to a word which was becoming obsolete, even though at the expense of a tautology. The proper word is presumed to be ' the Greesen! which is the early English plural of gree, or step, to which the word stairs has been added, without dropping the original name when this was becoming obsolete ; thus making it, the Greezen Stairs, — A. J., p. 59. GLASGOW : PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. LTD. ♦i».^f*l. . /!V p GR V.5 Comity folklore PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY i,Mir'mM«M.i^V>iilitiMi«iii^^'lll^>^^w»w»^«>W*lWW*^*'**«««^»lW^*««W»»■'«^<>»'^'>«»'^ nil I iiifiii|iHMn|iiiiii'iiiiiiii>Mw*Ml'*''l' i*MiU|itil|MI!t|ii(lllf|ill|lilfj|;it|l||! Ji|t|'i|lVi^^ ; « ,ii n 1 T, ?.rr,,-.H..,.i-.u [JJJ* ymiMiffii ^^^^W 1 V|.:|-|.i-|.|4.::|.:l:»M:.^j:.:|.:|:.1.:i.faS|:.:l:^