CHAPTER XXXV.

May-Day.

MAY-DAY is a word, which used to awaken in the minds of our ancestors all the ideas of youth, and verdure, and blossoming, and love, and hilarity; in short, the union of the two best things in the world, the love of nature, and the love of each other. It was the day, on which the arrival of the year at maturity was kept, like that of a blooming heiress. They caught her eye as she was coming, and sent up hundreds of songs of joy.

Now the bright Morning-Star, Day's harbinger,
Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her
The flowery May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow cowslip, and the pale primrose.
Hail, bounteous May, that dost inspire
Mirth, and youth, and warm desire:
Woods and groves are of thy dressing;
Hill and dale, doth boast thy blessing.
Thus we salute thee with our early song,
And welcome thee, and wish thee long.

These songs were stopped by Milton's friends the Puritans, whom in his old age he differed with, most likely on these points among others. But till then, they appear to have been as old, all over Europe, as the existence of society. The Druids are said to have had festivals in honor of May. Our Teutonic ancestors had, undoubtedly; and in the countries which had constituted the Western Roman Empire, Flora still saw thanks paid for her flowers, though her worship had gone away.*

The great May holiday observed over the West of Europe was known for centuries, up to a late period, under the name of the Belte, or Beltane. Such a number of etymologies, all perplexingly probable, have been found for this word, that we have been surprised to miss among them that of Beltemps, the Fine Time or Season. Thus Printemps, the First Time, or Prime Season, is the Spring.

The homage which was paid to the Month of Love and flow. ers, may be divided into two sorts, the general and the individ ual. The first consisted in going with others to gather May, and in joining in sports and games afterwards. On the first of the month, "the juvenile part of both sexes," says Bourne, in his Popular Antiquities, were wont to rise a little after midnight and walk to some neighboring wood, where they broke down branches from the trees, and adorned them with nosegays and crowns of flowers. When this was done, they returned with their booty about the rising of the sun, and made their doors and windows to triumph in the flowery spoil. The after part of the day was chiefly spent in dancing round a May-pole, which being placed in a convenient part of the village, stood there, as it were, consecrated to the Goddess of Flowers, without the least violation offered to it, in the whole circle of the year." Spenser, in his Shepherd's Calendar, has detailed the circumstanyes, in a Istvle like a rustic dance.

Sicker this morrowe, no longer agoe,

I saw a shole of shepherds outgoe

With singing, and shouting, and jolly chere;
Before them yodef a lustie tabrere‡

That to the many a hornpipe played,

Whereto they dauncen eche one with his mayd.
To see these folks make such jovisaunce,
Made my heart after the pipe to daunce.
Thos to the greene wood they speeden hem all,
To fetchen home May with their musicall;
And home they bringen, in a royall throne,
Crowned as king; and his queen attone]]
Was Lady Flora, on whom did attend

A fayre flocke of faëries, and a fresh bend

• Buskets-Boskets-Bushes-from Boschetti, Ital.

Yode, Went.

§ Tho, Then.

Tabrere, a Tabourer.

Attone, At once-With him

Of lovely nymphs. O that I were there

To helpen the ladies their May-bush beare.

The day was passed in sociality and manly sports ;-in archery, and running, and pitching the bar,-in dancing, singing, playing music, acting Robin Hood and his company, and making a well-earned feast upon all the country dainties in season. It closed with an award of prizes.

As I have seen the Lady of the May,
Set in an arbor (on a holiday)

Built by the Maypole, where the jocund swains
Dance with the maidens to the bag-pipe's strains,
When envious night commands them to be gone,
Call for the merry youngsters one by one,
And for their well performance soon disposes,
To this a garland interwove with roses,
To that a carved hook, or well-wrought scrip,
Gracing another with her cherry lip;
To one her garter, to another then
A handkerchief cast o'er and o'er again;
And none returneth empty, that hath spent
His pains to fill their rural merriment.*

Among the gentry and at court the spirit of the same enjoy. ments took place, modified according to the taste or rank of the entertainers. The most universal amusement, agreeably to the general current in the veins, and the common participation of flesh and blood (for rank knows no distinction of legs and kneepans), was dancing. Contests of chivalry supplied the place of more rural gymnastics. But the most poetical and elaborate entertainment was the Mask. A certain flowery grace was sprinkled over all; and the finest spirits of the time thought they

Britannia's Pastorals, by William Browne. Song the 4th. Browne, like his friend Wither, from whom we quoted a passage last week, wanted strength and the power of selection; though not to such an extent. He is, however, well worth reading by those who can expatiate over a pastoral subject, like a meadowy tract of country: finding out the beautiful spots, and gratified, if not much delighted, with the rest. His genius, which was by no means destitute of the social part of passion, seems to have been turned almost wholly to description, by the beauties of his native county Devonshire.

showed both their manliness and wisdom, in knowing how to raise the pleasures of the season to their height. Sir Philip Sydney, the idea of whom has come down to us as a personification of all the refinement of that age, is fondly recollected by Spenser in this character.

His sports were faire, his joyance innocent,
Sweet without soure, and honey without gall:
And he himself seemed made for merriment,
Merrily masking both in bowre and hall.
There was no pleasure nor delightfull play,
When Astrophel soever was away.

For he could pipe, and daunce, and caroll sweet,
Amongst the shepherds in their shearing feast;
As somer's larke that with her song doth greet
The dawning day forth comming from the East.
And layes of love he also could compose;

Thrice happie she, whom he to praise did choose.

Astrophel, St. 5.

Individual homage to the month of May consisted in paying respect to it though alone, and in plucking flowers and flowering boughs to adorn apartments with.

This maiden, in a morn betime,

Went forth when May was in the prime

To get sweet setywall,

The honey-suckle, the harlock,

The lily, and the lady-smock,

To deck her summer-hall.

Drayton's Pastorals, Eclog. 4.

But when morning pleasures are to be spoken of, the lovers of poetry who do not know Chaucer, are like those who do not know what it is to be up in the morning. He has left us two exquisite pictures of the solitary observance of May, in his Palamon and Arcite. They are the more curious, inasmuch as the actor in one is a lady, and in the other a knight. How far they owe any of their beauty to the original, the Theseide of Boccaccio, we cannot say; for we never had the happiness of meeting with that rare work. The Italians have so neglected it, that they have not only never given it a rifacimento or re

modelling, as in the instance of Boiardo's poem, but are almost as much unacquainted with it, we believe, as foreign nations. Chaucer thought it worth his while to be both acquainted with it, and to make others so; and we may venture to say, that we know of no Italian after Boccaccio's age who was so likely to understand him to the core, as his English admirer, Ariosto not excepted. Still from what we have seen of Boccaccio's poetry, we can imagine the Theseide to have been too lax and long. If Chaucer's Palamon and Arcite be all that he thought proper to distil from it, it must have been greatly so; for it was an epic. But at all events the essence is an exquisite one. The tree must have been a fine old enormity, from which such honey could be drawn.

To begin, as in duty bound, with the lady. How she sparkles through the antiquity of the language, like a young beauty in an old hood!

Thus passeth yere by yere, and day by day,
Till it felle ones in a morowe of May,

That Emelie

But we will alter the spelling where we can, as in a former instance, merely to let the reader see what a notion is in his way, if he suffers the look of Chaucer's words to prevent his enjoying him.

Thus passeth year by year, and day by day,
Till it fell once, in a morrow of May,
That Emily, that fairer was to seen
Than is the lily upon his stalk green,
And fresher than the May with flowers new,
(For with the rosy color strove her hue;
I n'ot which was the finer of them two)
Ere it was day, as she was wont to do,
She was arisen and all ready dight,
For May will have no sluggardy a-night:
The season pricketh every gentle heart,
And maketh him out of his sleep to start,
And saith," Arise, and do thine observance."
This maketh Emily have remembrance
To do honor to May, and for to rise.