An actual bridge was built up with sticks and boards, and surrounded by the ring of players, dressed in costume; without stood the devil. Little girls in variously coloured dresses represented the angels.

The repeated fall and rebuilding of the bridge was acted out, as described in the verses of the song. This fall was ascribed to the malice of the devil, who ruined it during the night (watching it, said the narrator, from the top of an ash-tree during the day).

The imprisonment of the child enclosed by the arms of the leaders was acted in a noteworthy fashion. A chain was taken and wrapped round the child in the form of a serpent (for the devil is a serpent, said the reciter); the captive was taken to a hut (representing apparently the entrance to the Inferno) built by the sea. Meantime, the rest of the train called on their leader for help; but he answered, "The devil has five feet, and thirteen eyes, and is stronger than I!" The performance lasted five hours, and the name of the edifice was the Devil's Bridge.

In this Irish game tests were employed to determine whether the captive should belong to the devil or not. One of these was the ability to walk on a straight line drawn on the ground.

Newell sums up his conclusions as follows:

"We suspect, however, that that part of the sport which relates to the warfare of good and evil powers does not belong to the original idea, but that a still more primitive game has taken on an ending which was common to many amusements in the Middle Ages. The central point of the whole is the repeated downfall of the structure. Now there is a distinct mythological reason for such a representation. In early times no edifice was so important as a bridge, which renders intercourse possible between districts heretofore separated. Hence the sanctity attributed in mediæval times to the architects of bridges. The devil, or (in more ancient guise) the elemental spirit of the land, who detests any interference with the solitude he loves, has an especial antipathy to bridges. His repeated and successful attempts to interfere with such a structure, until he is bought off with an offering like that of Iphigenia, are recorded in legends which attach to numerous bridges in Europe. It is on such supernatural opposition that the English form of the game appears to turn. The structure, which is erected in the daytime, is ruined at night; every form of material-wood, stone, and gold, is tried in vain; the vigilance of the watchman, or of the cock and the dog-guardian animals of the darkness— is insufficient to protect the edifice from the attack of the offended spirits.

"The child arrested seems to be originally regarded as the price paid for allowing the structure to stand. In times when all men's thoughts were concerned about the final judgment, a different turn was given to the sport-namely, whether the prisoner should belong to the devils or to the angels, who wage perpetual warfare, and dispute with each other the possession of departed souls. Finally, in quite recent days, religious allusions were excluded, and the captive, now accused of mere theft, was sentenced to be locked up, not in the Inferno, but in a commonplace jail." (p. 211.)

This mystical explanation of Mr. Newell's is extremely ingenious, but there does not appear to be any good evidence to connect the foreign games, which look rather like degraded "miracle plays," with the English London Bridge game; further, as Mrs. Gomme acutely points out, the tug-of-war incident does not come into the English game.

CHAPTER XIII.

"DRAW A PAIL OF WATER": WATER WORSHIP

game is usually played by eight girls, two

of whom face one another and stretch out their arms towards each other and join hands. Two others do the same, the four girls thus make a cross with their arms. They see-saw backwards and forwards, and sing a song, the following version of which is taken from Halliwell's Nursery Rhymes, Games, cclxxxvii. :

"Draw a pail of water

For my lady's daughter:

My father's a king and my mother's a queen ;
My two little sisters are dressed in green,

Stamping grass and parsley,

Marigold leaves and daisies.

One rush, two rush,

Pray thee, fine lady, come under my bush."

One girl gets inside the enclosing arms, and they repeat the song until all four have "popped under," when they "jog" up and down till they fall on the ground.

Sometimes only two girls join hands, or the four

may form a square with their extended arms, which they sway backwards and forwards singing the lines. Two arms are then raised, and one girl comes under; this is repeated till all four girls have entered the square, then their arms encircle each other's waists, and they dance round.

Halliwell* describes a different action to any of these. A string of children, hand in hand, stand in a row. A child stands in front of them as leader; two other children form an arch, holding both of the hands of the other. The string of children pass under the arch, the last of whom is taken captive by the two holding hands. The verses are repeated until all are taken.

A Belfast version of the song, collected by Mr. W. H. Patterson,† is as follows:

"Sift the lady's oaten meal, sift it into flour,

Put it in a chest of drawers and let it lie an hour.

One of my rush,

Two of my rush,

Please, young lady, come under my bush.
My bush is too high, my bush is too low;
Please, young lady, come under my bough.
Stir up the dumpling, stir up the dumpling."

It would be tedious to enumerate the many variants. of the song, but the following is a plausible restoration

* Nursery Rhymes, p. 63.

† A. B. GOMME, Tradit. Games, i., p. 103.