THE BOOK OF DAYS. looks at least a portion of it. From this he will catch glimpses of glen and glade, and see the deer trooping through the long avenues, standing under some broad-branched oak, or, with their high antlers only visible, couching among the cool fan-leaved fern. They cannot prosecute him for looking through the great iron gates, which are aptly mounted with grim stone griffins, who ever stand rampant on the tall pillars, and seem to threaten with their dead eyes every intruder, nor prevent him from admiring the long high avenue of ancient elms, through which the sunshine streams and quivers on the broad carriage way as if it were canopied with a waving network of gold. He sees the great lake glimmering far down, and making a light behind the perspective of dark branches, and knows that those moving specks of silver which are ever crossing his vision are the stately swans sailing to and fro; the cawing of rooks falls with a pleasant sound upon his ear, as they hover around the old ancestral trees, which have been a rookery for centuries. Once there were pleasant footpaths between those aged oaks, and beside those old hawthorns-still covered with May-buds-that led to neighbouring villages, which can only now be reached by circuitous roads, that lie without the park: alas, that no 'village Hampden' rose up to do battle for the preservation of the old rights of way! Here and there an old stile, which forms a picturesque object between the heavy trunks to which it was clamped, is allowed to remain, and that is almost all there is left to point out the pleasant places through which those obliterated footpaths went winding along. We have now a great increase of flowers, and amongst them the graceful wood-sorrel-the true Irish shamrock-the trefoil leaves of which are heart-shaped, of a bright green, and a true weather-glass, as they always shut up at the approach of rain. The petals, which are beautifully streaked with lilac, soon fade when the flower is gathered, while the leaves yield the purest oxalic acid, and are much sourer than the common sorrel. Buttercups are now abundant, and make the fields one blaze of gold, for they grow higher than the generality of our grasses, and so overtop the green that surrounds them. Children may now be seen in country lanes and suburban roads carrying them home by armfuls, heads and tails mixed together, and trailing on the ground. This common flower belongs to that large family of plants which come under the ranunculus genus, and not a better flower can be found to illustrate botany, as it is easily taken to pieces, and readily explained; the number five being that of the sepals of calyx, petals, and nectar-cup, which a child can remember. Sweet woodroof now displays its small white flowers, and those who delight in perfuming their wardrobes will not fail to gather it, for it has the smell of new hay, and retains its scent a length of time, and is by many greatly preferred before lavender. This delightful fragrance is hardly perceptible when the plant is first gathered, unless the leaves are bruised or rubbed between the fingers; then the powerful odour is inhaled. The sweet woodroof is rather a scarce plant, and must be sought for in woods, about the trunks of oaks-oak-leaf mould being the soil it most delights in; though small, the white flowers are as beautiful as those of the star-shaped jessamine. Plentiful as red and white campions are, it is very rare to find them both together, though there is hardly a hedge in a sunny spot under which they are not now in bloom. Like the ragged robin, they are in many places still called cuckoo-flowers, and what the cuckoo buds of yellow hue' are, mentioned by Shakspere, has never been satisfactorily explained. We have little doubt, when the names of flowers two or three centuries ago were known to but few, that many which bloomed about the time the cuckoo appeared, were called cuckoo-flowers; we can find at least a score bearing that name in our old herbals. Few, when looking at the greater stitchwort, now in flower, would fancy that that large-shaped bloom was one of the family of chickweeds; as for the lesser stitchwort, it is rarely found excepting in wild wastes, where gorse and heather abound; and we almost wonder why so white and delicate a flower should choose the wilderness to flourish in, and never be found in perfection but in lonely places. Several of the beautiful wild geraniums, commonly called crane's-bill, dove's-bill, and other names, are now in flower, and some of them bear foliage as soft and downy as those that are cultivated. Some have rich rose-coloured flowers, others are dashed with deep purple, like the heart's-ease, while the one known as herb Robert is as beautiful as any of our garden flowers. But it would make a long catalogue only to give the names of all these beautiful wild geraniums which are found in flower in May. But the most curious of all plants now in bloom are the orchises, some of which look like bees, flies, spiders, and butterflies; for when in bloom you might, at a distance, fancy that each plant was covered with the insects after which it is named. An orchis has only once to be seen, and the eye is for ever familiar with the whole variety, for it resembles no other flower, displaying nothing that would seem capable of forming a seed vessel, as both stamen and style are concealed. Like the violet, it has a spur, and the bloom rises from a twisted stalk. The commonest, which is hawked about the streets of London in April, is the Early Purple, remarkable for the dark purple spots on the leaves, but it seldom lives long; Kent is the county for orchises, where several varieties may now be found in flower. (HISTORICAL.) 'May was the second month in the old Alban calendar, the third in that of Romulus, and the fifth in the one instituted by Numa Pompiliusa station it has held from that distant date to the present period. It consisted of twenty-two days in the Alban, and of thirty-one in Romulus's calendar; Numa deprived it of the odd day, which Julius Cæsar restored, since which it has remained undisturbed.'-Brady. The most receivable account of the origin of the name of the month is that which represents it as being assigned in honour of the Majores, or Maiores, the senate in the original constitution of Rome, June being in like manner a compliment to the MAY-HISTORICAL. 'Be it weal or be it woe, Beans blow before May doth go.' 'Come it early or come it late, Juniores, or inferior branch of the Roman legisla- Other proverbs regarding May are as follow: ture. The notion that it was in honour of Maia, the mother by Jupiter of the god Hermes, or Mercury, seems entirely gratuitous, and merely surmised in consequence of the resemblance of the word. Amongst our Saxon forefathers the month was called Tri-Milchi, with an understood reference to the improved condition of the cattle under benefit of the spring herbage, the cow being now able to give milk thrice a-day. It is an idea as ancient as early Roman times, stated by Ovid in his Fasti, and still prevalent in Europe, that May is an unlucky month in which to be married. CHARACTERISTICS OF MAY. While there is a natural eagerness to hail May as a summer month-and from its position in the year it ought to be one-it is after all very much a spring month. The mean temperature of the month in the British Islands is about 54°. The cold winds of spring still more or less prevail; the east wind has generally a great hold; and sometimes there are even falls of snow within the first ten or fifteen days. On this account proverbial wisdom warns us against being too eager to regard it as a time for light clothing: 'Change not a clout Till May be out.' At London, the sun rises on the 1st of the month at 4.36; on the 31st at 3.54; the middle day of the month being 15h. 36m. long. The sun usually enters Gemini early in the morning of the 21st. In May comes the cow-quake.' 'Mist in May, and heat in June, Make the harvest right soon.' In Scotland, in parts peculiarly exposed, the east wind of May is generally felt as a very severe affliction. On this subject, however, a gentleman was once rebuked in somewhat striking terms by one abnormis sapiens. It was the late accomplished Lord Rutherford of the Edinburgh bench, who, rambling one day on the Pentland Hills, with his friend Lord Cockburn, encountered a shepherd who was remarkable in his district for a habit of sententious talking, in which he put everything in a triple form. Lord Rutherford, conversing with the man, expressed himself in strong terms regarding the east wind, which was then blowing very keenly. And what ails ye at the east wind?' said the shepherd. It is so bitterly disagreeable,' replied the judge. I wonder at you finding so much fault with it.' And pray, did you ever find any good in it ? ' Oh, yes. And what can you say of good for it!' inquired Lord Rutherford. Weel,' replied the triadist, it dries the yird (soil), it slockens (refreshes) the ewes, and it's God's wull.' The learned judges were silent. First of May. St Philip and St James the Less, apostles. St Andeolus, martyr, 208. Saints Acius and Acheolus, martyrs, of Amiens, about 290. St Amator, Bishop of Auxerre, 418. St Briocus, of Wales, about 502. St Sigismund, King of Burgundy, about 517. St Marcon, abbot of Nanteu, in Normandy, 558. St Asaph, abbot and bishop at Llanelwy, in North Wales, about 590. May 1st is a festival of the Anglican church, in honour of St Philip and St James the Less, apostles. ST ASAPH. Asaph is one of those saints who belong to the fabulous period, and whose history is probably but a legend altogether. According to the story, there was, in the sixth century, a bishop of Glasgow called Kentigern, called also by the Scots St Mungo, who was driven from his bishopric in 543, and took refuge in Wales with St David. Kentigern also was a saint; so the two saints wandered about Wales for some time seeking unsuccessfully for a convenient spot to build a church for the fugitive, and had almost given up the search in despair, when the place was miraculously pointed out to them through the agency of a wild boar. It was a piece of rising ground on the banks of the little river Elwy, a tributary of the Clwyd, and Kentigern built upon it a small church of wood, which, from the name of the river, was called Llanelwy, and afterwards established a monastery there, which soon became remarkable for its numerous monks. Among these was a young Welshman, named Asaph, who, by his learning and conduct, became so great a favourite with Kentigern, that when the latter established an episcopal see at Llanelwy, and assumed the dignity of a bishop, he deputed to Asaph the government of the monas tery. More than this, when at length St Kentigern's enemies in Scotland were appeased or silenced, and he was recalled to his native country, he resigned his Welsh bishopric to Asaph, who thus became bishop of Llanelwy, though what he did in his episcopacy, or how long he lived, is equally unknown, except that he is said, on very questionable authority, to have compiled the ordinances of his church, and to have written a life of his master, St Kentigern, as well as some other books. We can only say that nobody is known to have ever seen any such works. After his death, no bishops of Llanelwy have been recorded for a very long period of years-that is, till the middle of the twelfth century. The church and see still retained the name of Llanelwy, which, the supposed second bishop having been canonized, was changed at a later period to St Asaph, by which name it is still known. Rogation Sunday. (1864.) MAY-DAY. the limbs, or with epilepsy and neuralgia, went away professing to have been suddenly and entirely cured in consequence of their devotions at the shrine of this quasi-Protestant saint. The Jesuits were of course scornfully incredulous of miracles wrought at an opposite shop. But nevertheless the cures went on, and all Paris was excited. In the autumn of 1731, the phenomena began to put on an even more striking shape. The votaries, when laid on the deacon's tomb, which was one slightly raised above the ground, began to experience strange convulsive movements, accompanied by dreadful pains, but always ending in cure. Some of them would be suddenly shot up several feet into the air, as by some explosive force applied below. Demonstrations of eloquence beyond the natural acquirements of the individual, knowledge of things beyond the natural scope of the faculties, powers of physical endurance above what seem to belong to human nature-in short, many of the phenomena alleged to happen in our own time under the influence of mesmerism-began to be exhibited by the convulsionaires. The scenes then daily presented in the St Medard churchyard became a scandal too great to be endured by the opponents of the Jansenists, and a royal decree was issued, shut(Seeting up the place except for its ordinary business of receiving the bodies of the dead. As the Parisian epigram went-for on what subject will not the gay ones of such a city make jokes?— is Rogation Sunday-the fifth after Easter one of the moveable festivals of the Anglican Church. It derived its name from the Gospel for the day, teaching us how we may ask of God so as to obtain. In former times there was a perambulation, in the course of which, at certain spots, thanksgiving psalms were sung. larger account under title ROGATION DAYS, May 2.) Born.-William Lilly, astrologer, 1602, Diseworth; Joseph Addison, miscellaneous writer, 1672, Milston, near Amesbury, Wilta; Sebastian de Vauban, 1633, Nivernois ; Arthur, Duke of Wellington, 1769; Dr John Woodward, naturalist, 1665, Derbyshire. Died.-Arcadius, emperor of the East, 408; Maud, Queen of England, 1118; Pope Pius V., 1572; John FRANÇOIS DE PARIS. In the history of the great Jansenist schism which troubled the church in France for a hundred years, the name of the Deacon François de Paris bears a conspicuous place, not on account of anything he did or said in his life, but what happened regarding him after his death. Dying at thirty-seven, with a great reputation for sanctity and an infinite number of charitable works among the poor, his tomb in the cemetery of St Medard came to be regarded with much veneration among such of the Parisian populace as had contracted any sympathies for Jansenism. Within about four years of his interment, this tomb was the daily resort of multitudes, who considered it a good place for their extra devotions. It then began to be rumoured that, among such of these individuals as were diseased, miraculous cures took place at the tomb of Paris. The French capital chanced to be then in want of a new sensation. The strange tales of the doings in the cemetery of St Medard came very opportunely. It became a fashionable amusement to go there and witness the revivals of health which took place at the Deacon Paris's tomb. Scores of people afflicted with deepseated rheumatism, sciatica, and contractions of 'De par le roi, defense à Dieu De faire miracle en ce lieu,' This prohibition, however, was only attended with the effect of shifting the scenes of the alleged miracles. The convulsionaires continued to meet in private, and it was found that a few particles of earth from the grave of Paris sufficed to produce all the usual phenomena. For years there continued to be assemblages of people who, under the professed influence of the deacon's miraculous power, could sustain enormous weights on their bellies, and undergo other tortures, such as human beings usually shrink from with terror. The Jesuits, unable to deny the facts, or account for them on natural grounds, could only attribute them to the devil and other evil spirits. A gentleman of the name of Montgeron, originally sceptical, afterwards made a believer, employed himself for many years in collecting fully certified proofs of the St Medard cures and other phenomena. He published three large volumes of these evidences, forming one of the most curious books in existence; bearing with patience several imprisonments in the Bastile as the punishment of his interference. There is no doubt of the sincerity of Montgeron. It cannot be disputed that few of the events of history are nearly so well evidenced as the convulsionaire phenomena. All that science can now say upon the subject is that the alleged facts are impossible, and therefore the evidence goes for nothing. May Day. The outbreak into beauty which Nature makes at the end of April and beginning of May excites so joyful and admiring a feeling in the human breast, that there is no wonder the event should have at all times been celebrated in some way. The first emotion is a desire to seize some part of that profusion of flower and blossom which spreads around us, to set it up in decorative fashion, pay it a sort of homage, and let the pleasure it excites find expression in dance and song. A mad happiness goes abroad over the earth, that Nature, long dead and cold, lives and smiles again. Doubtless there is mingled with this, too, in bosoms of any reflection, a grateful sense of the Divine goodness, which makes the promise of seasons so stable and so sure. Amongst the Romans, the feeling of the time found vent in their Floralia, or Floral Games, which began on the 28th of April, and lasted a few days. Nations taking more or less their origin from Rome have settled upon the 1st of May as the special time for fêtes of the same kind. With ancients and moderns alike it was one instinctive rush to the fields, to revel in the bloom which was newly presented on the meadows and the trees; the more city-pent the population, the more eager apparently the desire to get among the flowers, and bring away samples of them; the more sordidly drudging the life, the more hearty the relish for this one day of communion with things pure and beautiful. Among the barbarous Celtic populations of Europe, there was a heathen festival on the same day, but it does not seem to have been connected with flowers. It was called Beltein, and found expression in the kindling of fires on hill-tops by night. Amongst the peasantry of Ireland, of the Isle of Man, and of the Scottish Highlands, such doings were kept up till within the recollection of living people. We can see no identity of character in the two festivals; but the subject is an obscure one, and we must not speak on this point with too much confidence. In England we have to go back several generations to find the observances of May-day in their fullest development. In the sixteenth century it was still customary for the middle and humbler classes to go forth at an early hour of the morning, in order to gather flowers and hawthorn branches, which they brought home about sunrise, with accompaniments of horn and tabor, and all possible signs of joy and merriment. With these spoils they would decorate every door and window in the village. By a natural transition of ideas, they gave to the hawthorn bloom the name of the May; they called this ceremony the bringing home the May; they spoke of the expedition to the woods as 'going a-Maying.' The fairest maid of the village was crowned with flowers, as the Queen of the May;' the lads and lasses met, danced and sang together, with a freedom which we would fain think of as bespeaking comparative innocence as well as simplicity. In a somewhat earlier age, ladies and gentlemen were accustomed to join in the Maying festivities. Even the king and queen condescended to mingle on this occasion with their subjects. In Chaucer's Court of Love, we read that early on May-day Forth goeth all the court, both most and least, to fetch the flowers fresh.' And we know, as one illustrative fact, that, in the 6 MAY-DAY. reign of Henry VIII. the heads of the corporation of London went out into the high grounds of Kent to gather the May, the king and his queen, Catherine of Arragon, coming from their palace of Greenwich, and meeting these respected dignitaries on Shooter's Hill. Such festal doings we cannot look back upon without a regret that they are no more. They give us the notion that our ancestors, while wanting many advantages which an advanced civilization has given to us, were freer from monotonous drudgeries, and more open to pleasurable impressions from outward nature. They seem somehow to have been more ready than we to allow themselves to be happy, and to have often been merrier upon little than we can be upon much. The contemporary poets are full of joyous references to the May festivities. How fresh and sparkling is Spenser's description of the going out for the May: Siker this morrow, no longer ago, I saw a shole of shepherds outgo With singing, and shouting, and jolly cheer; Before them yode a lusty Tabrere, That to the many a horn-pipe play'd, Whereto they dancen each one with his maid. To see these folks make such jouissance, Made my heart after the pipe to dance. Then to the greenwood they speeden them all, To fetchen home May with their musical: And home they bring him in a royal throne Crowned as king; and his queen attone Was Lady Flora, on whom did attend A fair flock of fairies, and a fresh bend Of lovely nymphs-O that I were there To helpen the ladies their May-bush to bear! Shepherd's Calendar, Eclogue 5. Herrick, of course, could never have overlooked a custom so full of a living poetry. Come, my Corinna,' says he, How each field turns a street, and each street a park, Made green and trimmed with trees: see how Or branch; each porch, each door, ere this Made up of white-thorn neatly interwove. 'A deal of youth ere this is come Not content with a garlanding of their brows, of their doors and windows, these merry people of the old days had in every town, or considerable district of a town, and in every village, a fixed pole, as high as the mast of a vessel of a hundred tons, on which each May morning they suspended wreaths of flowers, and round which they danced in rings pretty nearly the whole day. The Maypole, as it was called, had its place equally with the parish church or the parish stocks; or, if anywhere one was wanting, the people selected a suitable tree, fashioned it, brought it in triumphantly, and erected it in the proper place, there from year to year to remain. The Puritans-those most respectable people, always so unpleasantly shown as the enemies of mirth and good humourcaused May-poles to be uprooted, and a stop put to 571 MAY-DAY. THE BOOK OF DAYS. MAY-DAY. all their jollities; but after the Restoration they rites re-commenced. Now, alas! in the course of were everywhere re-erected, and the appropriate the mere gradual change of manners, the May-pole 6 has again vanished. They must now be pretty| old people who remember ever seeing one. Washington Irving, who visited England early in this century, records in his Sketch Book, that he had seen one. I shall never,' he says, forget the delight I felt on first seeing a May-pole. It was on the banks of the Dee, close by the picturesque old bridge that stretches across the river from the quaint little city of Chester. I had already been carried back into former days by the antiquities of that venerable place, the examination of which is equal to turning over the pages of a black-letter volume, or gazing on the pictures in Froissart. The May-pole on the margin of that poetic stream completed the illusion. My fancy adorned it with wreaths of flowers, and peopled the green bank with all the dancing revelry of May-day. The mere sight of this May-pole gave a glow to my feelings, and spread a charm over the country for the rest of the day; and as I traversed a part of the fair plains of Cheshire, and the beautiful borders of Wales, and looked from among swelling hills down a long green valley, through which "the Deva wound its wizard stream," my imagination turned all into a perfect Arcadia. I value every custom that tends to infuse poetical feeling into the common people, and to sweeten and soften the rudeness of rustic manners, without destroying their simplicity. Indeed, it is to the decline of this happy simplicity that the decline of this custom may be traced; and the rural dance on the green, and the homely May-day pageant, have gradually disappeared, in proportion as the peasantry have become expensive and artificial in their pleasures, and too knowing for simple enjoyment. Some attempts, indeed, have been made of late years by men of both taste and learning to rally back the popular feeling to these standards of primitive simplicity; but the time has gone by-the feeling has become chilled by habits of gain and traffic-the country apes the manners and amusements of the town, and little is heard of May-day at present, except from the lamentations of authors, who sigh after it from among the brick walls of the city.' The custom of having a Queen of the May, or May Queen, looks like a relic of the heathen celebration of the day: this flower-crowned maid appears as a living representative of the goddess Flora, whom the Romans worshipped on this day. Be it observed, the May Queen did not join in the revelries of her subjects. She was placed in a sort of bower or arbour, near the May-pole, there to sit in pretty state, an object of admiration to the whole village. She herself was half covered with flowers, and her shrine was wholly composed of them. It must have |