on a winter's morning, and he accordingly sent to the church to have it stopped for two hours. The deceased person was a wealthy farmer, and his widow complained bitterly over the delay in the tolling. It was so cruel in Mr. Y.,' she said, 'to keep the poor soul those hours a-waiting!' Now the passing bell' was supposed in former times to serve two purposes: it called on all good Christians within hearing to pray for the departing spirit, and it scared away the evil spirits, who were watching to seize it, or at least to scare and terrify it. Evidently the widow thought that for want of these helps the progress of her husband's soul to its rest was impeded.

There is, I am informed, among old-fashioned families in Northumberland, a feeling that the death of an inmate is a token of the Divine wrath, and that this wrath rests on the house until after the visit of the parish clergyman, which is therefore anxiously looked for and much valued. A friend informs me that he well remembers, when a curate in Northumberland, some twenty-four years ago, being told by a clergyman of that county that he had been frequently asked to 'bless the house' after a death had taken place in it.

CHAPTER II.

DAYS AND SEASONS.

Christmas-The Sword Dancers-Mummers-New Year's Eve-New Year's Day-Shrove Tuesday-Palm Sunday-Good Friday-Easter Day-Ascension Day-The Harvest, Mell Supper, and Kern BabySt. Agnes' Fast-April 1st-St. Valentine's Day-May 29th-St. Michael's Day-All Hallowe'en-St. Andrew's Day.

If we pass on to days and seasons, we shall find them marked in the North by time-honoured customs, unobserved for the most part elsewhere. Of course we must not look in Scotland for any note of Christmas, but in the English border-counties there is much to mark this blessed season. Yule-cakes are spread on our tables at Christmas-tide, and the yule-log lights up our hearths as duly as does the ashen faggot in Devonshire. In the city of Durham, and in many other northern towns, an old woman carries from house to house, on Christmas Eve, figures of the Virgin and Child, and shows them to the young people while she sings the old carol,

God rest you, merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay,
Remember Christ our Saviour was born on Christmas Day,
To save our souls from Satan's fold, which long had gone astray.
And 'tis tidings of comfort and joy!

We do not come to your house to beg nor to borrow,
But we do come to your house, to sing all sorrow away;
time of Christmas is drawing very near,

The

merry

And 'tis tidings of comfort and joy!

1 A Devonshire friend informs me of the legend connected with this west-country observance. It is said that the Divine Infant at Bethlehem was first washed and dressed by a fire of ashwood.

We do not come to your house to beg for bread and cheese,
But we do come to your house to give us what you please ;
The merry time of Christmas is drawing very near,

And 'tis tidings of comfort and joy!

God bless the master of this house, the mistress also,
And all the little children, that round the table go,
And all their kith and kindred, that travel far and near;
And we wish you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year!

Children carry about these figures through the West Riding of Yorkshire in what they call milly-boxes, a corruption of My Lady.' The boxes are lined with spice, oranges, and sugar. They call this going a wassailing.'

Later in the evening, the streets of many a Northumbrian town (I use the word in its fullest meaning) echo the same carol, or the yet finer one 'Christians awake, salute the happy morn!' In the West Riding the singers are dressed in the most fanciful attire, and are called mummers.' Throughout the district of Cleveland they carry about with them a 'bessel cup,' more properly a wassail cup, together with figures of the Virgin and Child, placed in a box, and surrounded with such ornaments as they can collect. To send these singers away unrequited is to forfeit good luck for the year. No meat is eaten there on Christmas Eve, doubtless because it is a fast of the Church; the supper there consists of frumety, or wheat boiled in milk, with spice and sugar, and of fruit-tarts. At its close the yule-cake and cheese are cut and partaken of, while the master taps a fresh cask of ale. This cake and cheese are offered through the season to every visitor who calls. At Horbury, near Wakefield, and at Dewsbury, on Christmas Eve is rung the devil's knell:' a hundred strokes, then a pause, then three strokes, three strokes, and three strokes again.

E

But to return to Cleveland. The yule-log (or clog) and yule-candles are duly burned there on Christmas Eve, the carpenter supplying his customers with the former, the grocer with the latter. It would be most unlucky to light log or candle before the proper time. The whole season has a festive character, and visiting and card-playing are kept up throughout it. Christmasboxes, however, are not common in Cleveland. New Year's Day is the time there for making presents, as in the eastern counties is St. Thomas' Day. The poor,

and especially poor widows, go from house to house on this last day, asking for Christmas gifts. This custom prevails also in the West Riding of Yorkshire, where the widows ask and commonly receive at the farmers' houses a small measure of wheat, and they call it 'going a Thomasing.'

St. Stephen's Day in Cleveland is devoted to hunting and shooting, it being held that the game-laws are not in force on that day; but I am not aware that the appletrees are deliberately aimed at, as is the case in Devonshire, with the view of ensuring a good crop of apples.

The old custom of hanging up a stocking to receive Christmas presents, a custom which the pilgrim-fathers carried to America and bequeathed, curiously enough, to their descendants, has not yet died out in the North of England. If any of my readers are folk lore collectors, they will divine my feelings on discovering in one of our northern capitals, among my own personal friends, a family in which, without the excuse of a child to be surprised and pleased, each member duly and deliberately hangs out her stocking on Christmas Eve to receive the kindly gifts of mother and sisters.

But a Christmas in the North would be quite incomplete without a visit from the sword-dancers, and this

may yet be looked for in most of our towns from the Humber to the Cheviot Hills. There are some trifling local variations both in dance and song: the latter has altered with the times; the former is plainly a relic of the war-dances of our Danish and Saxon ancestors. I had an opportunity last spring of making enquiries into the mysteries of sword-dancing from a pitman of Houghton Colliery, Houghton-le-Spring, Joseph Brown by name, and will simply relate what I heard from him on the subject. He was well qualified to speak, having acted as sword-dancer during the past twelve years, in company with eight other men, nine being the number always employed. Five are dancers, one a clothescarrier, two clowns, and one a fiddler.

There are two sets of verses used near Durham, termed the old and new styles. The old verses are certainly of the date of a hundred years back; they were always used till about ten years ago, and are still sung in turn with the modern ones. They are as follows::

First Clown: It's a ramblin' here I've ta'en

The country for to see,

Five actors I have brought,
Yet better cannot be.

Now, my actors they are young,
And they've ne'er been out before,
But they'll do the best they can,
And the best can do no more.

Now the first that I call on

Is George, our noble king;
Long time he's been at wars,

Good tidings back he 'll bring.

One of the sword-dancers here steps from the ring, in which all had been standing, and follows the first clown, holding his sword upright as he walks round the outside of the ring; and the first clown then sings: