When the May-pole was drawn into the square, the foresters sounded their horns, and the populace expressed their pleasure by shouting incessantly until it reached the place assigned for its elevation:and during the time the ground was preparing for its reception, the barriers of the bottom of the inclosure were opened for the villagers to approach, and adorn it with ribbons, garlands, and flowers, as their inclination prompted them.

The pole being sufficiently onerated with finery, the square was cleared from such as had no part to perform in the pageant; and then it was elevated amidst the reiterated acclamations of the spectators. The woodmen and the milk-maidens danced around it according to the rustic fashion; the measure was played by Peretto Cheveritte, the baron's chief minstrel, on the bagpipes accompanied with the pipe and tabour, performed by one of his associates, When the dance was finished, Gregory the jester, who undertook to play the hobby-horse, came forward with his appropriate equipment, and, frisking up and down the square without restriction, imitated the galloping, curvetting, ambling, trotting, and other paces of a horse, to the infinite satisfaction of the lower classes of the spectators. He was followed by Peter Parker, the baron's ranger, who personated a dragon, hissing, yelling, and shaking his wings with wonderful ingenuity; and to complete the mirth, Morris, in the character of Much, having small bells attached to his knees and elbows, capered here and there between the two monsters in the form of a dance; and as often as he came near to the sides of the inclosure, he cast slily a handful of meal into the faces of the gaping rustics, or rapped them about their heads with the bladder tied at the end of his pole. In the mean time, Sampson, representing Friar Tuck, walked with much gravity around the square, and occasionally let fall his heavy staff upon the toes of such of the crowd as he thought were

approaching more forward than they ought to do; and if the sufferers cried out from the sense of pain, he addressed them in a solemn tone of voice, advising them to count their beads, say a paternoster or two, and to beware of purgatory. These vagaries were highly palatable to the populace, who announced their delight by repeated plaudits and loud bursts of laughter; for this reason they were continued for a considerable length of time: but Gregory, beginning at last to faulter in his paces, ordered the dragon to fall back: the well-nurtured beast, being out of breath, readily obeyed, and their two companions followed their example; which concluded this part of the pastime.

Then the archers set up a target at the lower part of the Green, and made trial of their skill in a regular succession. Robin Hood and Will Stukely excelled their comrades: and both of them lodged an arrow in the centre circle of gold, so near to each other that the difference could not readily be decided, which occasioned them to shoot again; when Robin struck the gold a second time, and Stukely's arrow was affixed upon the edge of it. Robin was therefore adjudged the conqueror; and the prize of honour, a garland of laurel embellished with variegated ribbons, was put upon his head; and to Stukely was given a garland of ivy, because he was the second best performer in that contest.

The pageant was finished with the archery; and the procession began to move away, to make room for the villagers, who afterwards assembled in the square, and amused themselves by dancing round the May-pole in promiscuous companies, according to the antient custom'.'

1

Strutt's Queenhoo-hall, a romance, vol. i, p. 13, et seq. See also à mass of curious information on this subject in Dr. Drake's Shakspeare, vol. i, pp. 151-172; and in the former volumes of Time's Telescope.

1. SAINT PHILIP AND SAINT JAMES THE LESS. Philip was born at Bethsaida, near the sea of Tiberias, the city of Andrew and Peter. He was one of the first disciples, and an apostle. James the Less, called also James the Just, and, by the apostle Paul, James, the Lord's brother, was the son of Joseph, afterwards husband to the Virgin Mary, as is probable by his first wife. The first of these martyrs was stoned to death, and the second, having been thrown from a high place, was killed by a fuller's staff.

*2. 1808.-JOHN COLLINS DIED.

He was the author and performer of an Entertainment,__consisting of recitation and singing, called THE EVENING BRUSH for rubbing off the Rust of Carê, which was very popular about the year 1788. Many of his songs had great humour and merit; but his Date Obolum Belisario, for simplicity and pathos, was a treat of a very high nature indeed.

*2. 1738.-FIRST METHODIST SOCIETY.

3.-INVENTION OF THE cross.

The Romish church celebrates this day as a festival, to commemorate the invention or finding of a wooden cross, supposed to be the true one, by Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great.

*3. 1495.-JAMAICA DISCOVERED.

*4. 1618.-BOOK OF SPORTS,

Or lawful Recreations upon Sunday after Evening Prayers and upon Holidays, was issued by King James I. This curious volume permitted Maygames, Morris-dances, Whitsun-ales, the setting up of May-poles, &c.; and had it not allowed churchales' and dancing on the Sabbath, would have been

The church-ale was a festival instituted sometimes in honour of the church-saint, but more frequently for the purpose of contributing towards the repair or decoration of the church. On this occasion it was the business of the churchwardens to brew a considerable quantity of strong ale, which was sold to the populace in the churchyard, and to

unexceptionable in its tendency. The Book of Sports was directed to be read by every minister to his parishioners, under a penalty.

*4. 1677.-DR. ISAAC BARROW DIed,

A celebrated mathematician and divine-but a very lengthy preacher. King Charles II. used to call him the most unfair preacher in the world, for he exhausted every subject he undertook.

6. JOHN EVANGELIST, A. P. L.

John the Evangelist, so called from the Greek term Eváyyeλos, the messenger of glad tidings, was a Galilean by birth, the son of Zebedee and Salome, the younger brother of James, but not of him that was surnamed the Just, and who was the brother of our Lord. His brother James and he were surnamed by Jesus, the Sons of Thunder, meaning the principal ministers of the gospel, and John was more endeared to him than any of his disciples. He was condemned to be thrown into a cask of burning oil, Ante Port. Lat., before the gate of Latina; hence the letters added to his name. He lived to the reign of Trajan, and died about ninety years of age.

7.-ROGATION SUNDAY.

This day takes its name from the Latin term rogare, to ask; because, on the three subsequent days, supplications were appointed by Mamertus, Bishop of Vienna, in the year 469, to be offered up with fasting to God, to avert some particular calamities that threatened his diocese.

the better sort in the church itself, a practice which, independent of the profit arising from the sale of the liquor, led to great pecuniary advantages; for the rich thought it a meritorious duty, beside paying for their ale, to offer largely to the holy fund. It was no uncommon thing indeed to have four, six, or eight of these ales yearly, and sometimes one or more parishes agreed to hold annually a certain number of these meetings, and to contribute individually a certain sum.—Drake's Shakspeare, vol. i, p. 177.

11.-ASCENSION DAY.

From the earliest times, this day was set apart to commemorate our Saviour's ascension into heaven: all processions on this, and the preceding rogation days, were abolished at the reformation. In London, on this day, the minister, accompanied by the churchwardens, and a number of boys, with wands, walk in procession, and beat the bounds of the parish. But this is not always practised, nor in every year. For an account of some curious ceremonies on this day in the south of France, see T. T. for 1818, p. 87.

*12. 1640. EARL OF STRAFFORD EXEcuted.

On this day he was brought from the Tower to the scaffold upon Tower Hill, where the Bishop of Armagh, the Earl of Cleveland, Sir George Wentworth, brother to the Earl of Strafford, and others of his friends, were present, to take their leave of him.

He told the people, when on the scaffold, with a composed undaunted courage, he was come to satisfy them with his head; but that he much feared, that the reformation that was begun in blood would not prove so fortunate to the kingdom as they expected, and he wished; and after great expressions of devotion to the church of England, and the protestant religion established by law, and professed in that church, of his loyalty to the king, and affection to the peace and welfare of the kingdom, with marvellous tranquillity of mind delivered his head to the block, where it was severed from his body at one blow; many of the standers by, who had not been over charitable to him in his life, being much affected with the courage and christianity of his death.

Thus fell the greatest subject in power, and little inferior to any in fortune, at that time in the three kingdoms; a man of great parts, and extraordinary endowments of nature, adorned with the addition of