Imatges de pàgina
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

SCOTTISH CEREMONIES.

The following customs (observes Sir Walter Scott, in his new work on Demonology and Witchcraft,) still linger in the south of Scotland. The bride, when she enters the house of her husband, is lifted over the threshold, and to step on it, or over it, voluntarily, is reckoned a bad omen. This custom was universal in Rome, where it was observed as keeping in memory the rape of the Sabines, and that it was by a show of violence towards the females, that the object of peopling the city was attained. On the same occasion, a sweet cake, baked for the purpose, is broken above the head of the bride; which is also a rite of classic antiquity.

In like manner, the Scottish, even of the better rank, avoid contracting marriage in the month of May, which genial season of flowers and breezes might, in other respects, appear so peculiarly favourable for that purpose. It was specially objected to the marriage of Mary with the profligate Earl of Bothwell, that the union was formed within this interdicted month. This prejudice was so rooted among the Scots, that, in 1684, a set of enthusiasts, called Gibbites, proposed to renounce it, among a long list of stated festivals, fast days, popish relics, not forgetting the profane names of the days of the week, names of the months, and all sorts of idle and silly practices which their tender consciences took an exception to. This objection to solemnize marriage in the merry month of May, however fit a season for courtship, is also borrowed from the Roman pagans, which, had these fanatics been aware of it, would have been an additional reason for their anathema against the practice. The ancients have given us as a maxim, that it is only bad women who marry in that month.

The custom of saying, God bless you,' when a person in company sneezes, is, in like manner, derived from sternu

tation being considered as a crisis of the plague at Athens, and the hope that, when it was attained, the patient had a chance of recovery.

Anecdotiana.

A TAR'S EXpedient.

Bernard, in his "Retrospections of the Stage," relates the following characteristic anecdote of a son of Neptune. "Sir John Jervis's crew had been paid. off at Plymouth, and the ship put in dock; but immediately after, he received an order from the Admiralty to refit for sea. Walking one day in the neighbourhood of Plymouth, he encountered Jack with a lass under his arm, and a large dog running before him with a watch round his neck. Jack saluted his Commander, and made Poll and the dog do the same. Sir John then asked him if he would go to sea with him again, stating the orders he had received. Jack inquired the period Sir John was given to refit. "Only a fortnight,' was the answer. "That's unfortunate," said Jack, "for I've been kalkylating, your Honour, that with Poll, and the dog, and the watch, my money will jist last me a month; howsomever I can do this e'er, your honour-(aside)-I can keep two marms, two dogs, and two watches; and then I shall have unloaded the shiners in a fortnight, sure enough!"-This was "devotion to his Majesty's service," with a vengeance.

GREAT EATERS.

Theodoret relates, that a woman of Syria was in the habit of eating thirty fowls a-day, without being satisfied. A person named Phagon, in the presence of the Emperor Aurelian, is said to have devoured a boar, a sheep, and a pig. The Emperor Claudius Albinus ate, one morning at breakfast, 500 figs, 100 peaches, ten melons, 100 becaficos, 40 oysters, and a large quantity of raisins. The Emperor Maximian became so fat in consequence of excessive eating, that his wife's bracelets only served him for his rings.

[blocks in formation]

Diary and Chronology.

Wednesday, September 22.

St. Maurice and his Companions, mor. A.D. 286.

Our saint was a general officer of the Theban legion, which consisted of about 6600 men, who were all well armed; but they had learned to give to God what is God's, and to Cæsar what is Cæsar's. Maximian, having commanded them in vain to sacrifice to the idols, ordered his whole army to surround them; they suffered themselves to be butchered like innocent lambs, not opening their mouths but to encourage one another.

Sept. 22, 1820.-Expired at Rome, Frederic Gmelin, a celebrated engraver. This artist, who has been called the German Woollett, was a native of Badenweiler, near Basle. He is well known on the continent by his beautiful landscapes, and by the fine plates that illustrate the late splendid edition of Annibal Caro's translation of the Eneid, undertaken at the expense of her grace the Duchess of Devonshire.

Thursday, September 23.

St. Adamnan of Ireland, abbot, d. A.D. 705.-Sun rises 56m after 5-sets 3m after 6. Walnuts About this period of the year this delicious fruit, which dates its origin from the warm vales of Persia, is in general plentiful, and with sweet wine is a delicious and favourite desert. Anciently, many curious ceremonies were practised with nuts and walnuts, and the latter were commonly strewed at the Roman weddings, especially in all the avenues leading to the nuptial apartment, and before the feet of the bride on her way to the altar. This ceremony, says Dr. Hunter, was to show that the bridegroom had left off all hoyish amusements. To this nuptial sport allusions are frequently made by the poets; we find it mentioned by Catullas, who speaks of it thus:

Let the air with Hymen ring!
Hymen, to Hymen, sing!

Soon the nuts will now be flung;

Soon the wanton verses sung;
Soon the bridegroom will be told
Of the tricks he play'd of old.

Herrick, that delightful poet of our own country, also introduces the custom in one of his pieces, "Now bar the door, the bridegroom puts

The eager boys to gather nuts."

And the author of Sylva says, in Germany, "whenever they fell a tree which is decayed, they always plant a young one near it, and 'twixt Hanau and Franckfort, no young farmer whatsoever is permitted to marry a wife, till he bring proof that he has planted a stated number of walnuttrees," and the law is inviolably preserved to this day, for extraordinary benefits which this tree affords the inhabitants.

Friday, September 24.

St. Rusticus. b. of Avergne, d. 5th Cen-High Water 50m aft 5 Morning-14m aft6 After. Sept. 24, 1650.-The Princess Elizabeth, second daughter of Charles I., was interred on this day in a vault pear the communion table in the church of Newport, Isle of Wight. This unfor tunate lady, after her royal father's death, was confined in Carisbrook Castle, under the cus tody of one Mildmay, where, pining away with grief and melancholy, she expired at the premature age of 15 years. The coffin and urn containing her remains were accidentally discovered October 24, 1793, in a very perfect state, by some persons engaged in examining the ground to fix on a proper spot whereon to build a vault for the interment of a brother of the Earl of Dela war. On the coffin-lid was inscribed "Elizabeth, second daughter of the late King Charles, deceased Sept. 8, 1650."

Saturday, September 25.

St. Firmin, mar. 3rd Cent-Moon's First Quar, 52m after 6 Morn

Our saint is recorded to have received the crown of martyrdom at Amiens, where he was bishop. Sept. 25, 1066.-An invasion of England in different parts took place on this day, during the reign of Harold II.; by his brother, in the southern parts, and by the Norwegian, Harfager, in Yorkshire. Harold met the combined army near Stamford Bridge, since called Battle Bridge, where the royal army (in spite of the amazing prowess of a Norwegian, who defended a pass against the English army unmoved by force or promises, until slain by a spear from beneath the bridge on which he stood,) gained a victory so complete, that Harfager, and his brother Tostigh were both slain. The brave Harold had no leisure to enjoy his triumph for obtaining one of the greatest victories recorded in history, for the next day William the Norman landed at Pevensey, in Sussex, with 60,000 men, and seventeen days after, at the fight of Hastings, Harold lost his kingdom and his life.

Sunday, September 26.

SIXTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.

Lessons for the Day-2 chapter Ezekiel, morn-13 chapter Ezekiel, Even. According to the old style, this is Holy-rood-day. The Holy-rood was an image of our Saviour on the cross, placed upon a loft made for that purpose over the passage out of the church into the chancel. At Boxley Abbey, ia Kent, there was a miraculous crucifix called the Rood of Grace, which was one of the most famous impostures contrived by the Romish priests to pick the pockets of the superstitious multitude. By the help of secret springs it could rall the eyes, move the lips, and turn the head, at the approach of its credulous and deluded vota ries. When monasteries were dissolved, this juggling crucifix was publicly exposed to the de rision of the populace, and afterwards broken to pieces by Hilsey, Bishop of Rochester, at Saiat Paul's Cross.

Monday, September 27.

Sun rises 4m after 6-sets 55m after 5.

Sept. 27, 1730.-Expired at his Rectory, the Rev. Laureace Eusden, a poet of considerable merit; he was the author of several of the papers in the Spectator, and in 1718 he was preferred to the laureatship.

NOTE.-The Proprietors of the OL10 respectfully inform their Subscribers, that finding it impossible to execute the number of Engravings necessary to complete Part 38, promised on Magazine Day, to prevent disappointment they have enlarged Part 37 to six Num

bers, price 18. Gd.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic]

ILLUSTRATED ARTICLE.

Tales of the Tapestry :

BY HORACE GUILFORD.
For the Olio.

THE BABINGTON S.

A TALE OF CHADSTOW.

She had taken care to conceal her elegant shape, by fastening a large lump on her left shoulder, as if she had been crooked; her beautiful auburn hair was covered with a large coarse cap; and she had anointed her face and hands, in imitation of the gipsies, with

juice of walnut husks.

Popular Tales of the Germans.

PAUL BABINGTON, or, as he was more generally designated, the Black Priest of Chadstow, was unquestionably one of the handsomest men of his time. In vain did the sable Benedictine garb enfold his noble form with coarse and unsightly drapery; his majestic height, for he was upwards of six feet, his broad square shoulders, his brawny chest, his thick and towering neck, spoke him framed in the most mascu

VOL. VI.

P

See page 228

line proportion of man; and the fine contour of his animated, though somewhat full features, his bold and large eye, aquiline nose, and exquisitely formed mouth, whose red lips loved to display a clustering and splendid set of teeth, gave him every external grace that the eye delights to dwell upon; while his bushy sable beard, carefully trimmed, and his curly tonsure of the same hue, cherished to the utmost point that monastic rules allowed, or, to say truth, indulged rather beyond it, wreathed like a coronet his high, white forehead, testifying, in no slight degree, the opinion which the worthy monk entertained of his own personal attractions; and, to complete all, the clear brown of his cheeks, mantling with a rich healthy red, that told more of daily exercise in the field than of nightly vigil in the cell, fully testified the reputation he enjoyed of being an uncommonly finelooking man.

Many a fair lip had been heard to sigh that "a good knight was spoiled when Paul Babington was doomed to wield the rosary and crucifix, instead of

151

the sword and shield;" many a languishing eye longed to see those bold temples crested with the helmet, that were veiled with the cowl; many a white bosom heaved to think how gallantly that lusty form would have borne itself in the tournament, that moved so stately in the mass; and many a beauty that bent before him in confession, would have given her heart to have seen him at her feet as she knelt at his, the red-windowed aisle, with its carved vault, exchanged for the broad green and flowery meadow, with its flags and pavillions, white, red, yellow, and blue, and the high and sculptured confessional transformed into the gay canopied throne, where the queen of the festival dispensed the chivalric wreath. Yet Father Paul, at the period of our tale, was not a young man; he had seen more than forty summers, and it cannot be denied that a certain degree of obesity had begun to amplify his robust form. But there was an inextinguishable freshness of spirit about him, an open fearlessness of demeanour, a versatility of talent, a flow of conversational powers, and a fund of those nameless attractions which make you love a man before you know him, that, placing him on a par with, if not above, the glittering youth of his day, certainly detracted in no slight degree from the solemn and impressive attributes with which his sacerdotal character would otherwise have invested him.

Truth to tell, Paul Babington was never intended by nature for the priestly functions. His genius, undaunted and excursive in its range, disdained the prescribed formalities in which his profession ordained him to move; of science he had paced through all the paths, but most loved her forbidden track. And then, no Troubadour could chaunt a virelay or romaunt with such effect as his deep and manly tones produced. In every athletic exercise he was distinguished among his competitors; and in the noble science of Venery* he was confessed by all to be unrivalled. None knew so well how to rein a steed, or train a hound. The falcon ever took the surest flight from his large-handed glove, and the raven loved the day when, with brawny arms naked to the shoulder, he applied himself to the task of breaking the hart, for which the noble authoress of "The Book of St. Albans" gives such unblushing directions. The Abbess Juliana herself could not have pictured a finer hart of • The hunting of wild animals.

grease, a more picturesque forest, a huger oak-tree with forked branches, a more satisfied corbyn with his bone, or a more faithful disciple of her rules, than were seen in the sports of the Black Priest of Chadstow. Every rus tic amusement, also, flourished most freely when under his auspices. The May-pole, the well-flowering, the quoits, the bat and ball, all found in Father Paul not only a ready assistant, but a main spring. Nor were these his only flights from the prison of conventual rule; in the recently terminated wars of York and Lancaster, Paul Babington had fought under the Red Rose with such distinction, that, had it not been for the powerful interest of his brother Sir Oliver Babington, at King Edward's court, he would have experienced an eternal divorce both from bis clerical duties and his laical pastimes. As it was, he was subjected to heavy penances by his superior, the Lord Prior of the Benedictines at Coventry, although the discipline that there mortified his flesh in more ways than one, is said to have produced anything than the effect of reconciling the worthy priest to holy church.

From that period, report stained him (timorously, it is true, and only by slight tints, but no less stained him,) with the imputation of Lollardism; and the delight he occasionally took in studies to which the ignorance of the period affixed the term of sorcery, was another 'vantage ground which his open and fearless temper afforded to his enemies. However, to use an expressive Scottish phrase, he "jowked and let the jaw rin by." The rank, riches and respectability of his brother, Sir Oliver, who was most tenderly attached to him, invested the priest of Chadstow with great immunities; while the unsettled state of the kingdom (the death of Henry and the final flight of Margaret having but recently taken place), together with the general laxity of the clergy at this period, and their entire exemption from civil authority, conveyed to them by Edward, who was earnestly solicitous of their support, left Father Paul pretty much to the undisturbed pursuit of his inclinations. Not that we are to suppose him a vicious or depraved charac ter,-far otherwise-he was idolized by the small circle of poor who were under his care, no less than he was courted by the young and gay of his own station, nor was he less careful in administering to the wants of the one, than he was See Henry's Eng. vol. x. p. 34.

indispensable in promoting the enjoyments of the other. The chief point in his character which most threatened him was his persevering attachment to the exiled house of Lancaster,-an attachment which no arguments of his brother, who had espoused the opposite cause, (a circumstance very common in those times), could induce him for one moment to relinquish, even in thought. Our tale opens about that period when the bootless retreat of Edward from the Continent, whither he had led one of the finest armies that had ever crossed the Channel, excited general discontent. An expedition, the result of many negociations, of long and expensive preparations, which threatened Louis XI. with the loss of his crown and the dismemberment of his kingdom, had become fruitless and even highly disadvantageous to England; for the caged t conference on the bridge of Peguini had dissolved the most formidable confederacy that ever was organized against France, and given the crowned Fox such an insight into the councils of his foes, that they could never afterwards afford him the least disturbance. The popular mind was accordingly in a high ferment. Yorkists and Lancastrians not only began to lose their party spirit, but also frequent unions were set on foot between the two factions, the objects of which referred pretty plainly to the young Earl Henry of Richmond, then a refugee at the ducal court of Brittany.

Edward could not be long ignorant of this, accordingly history, while she records his attempts to get the Earl and his uncle into his hands, does not hesitate to ascribe to him intentions as sanguinary as his proceedings were hypocritical. As if this were not sufficient, treason stole into the very court itself, and dissensions in the royal family, of the most complicated nature, for a time both defied King Edward's sagacity to detect and his power to punish them. Sir Oliver Babington, a brave and high-minded, but at the same time a violent and imprudent man, had felt heavily the existing discontents. Surrounded by every thing that could make life enviable, one might imagine that the Knight of Curborough had small reason to embroil himself in the wild and veering politics of the period. He was blessed with a fair and virtuous wife, the personal friend of Queen Elisabeth, when only the Lady Grey of Groby.

See Ph. Comines, 1, 4, c. 10.

His only child, a son, the flower of his contemporaries, was betrothed-and (rare event) betrothed with mutual love, nourished from childhood-to Barbara Somerville, heiress of the ancient house of Whichnover, who had been Sir Oliver's ward, and was recently arrived at age, and consequently was now mistress of the venerable mansion and extensive estates of her ancestors. But in spite of all this, Sir Oliver shewed himself disgusted with the late measures. He had been one of the leaders in the French expedition, had remonstrated most strongly against the compromiso and retreat; and after pointing out, in the most forcible terms, the deceitful policy of Louis, he retired in sullen acquiescence with his sovereign's mandate to the towered halls of Curborough, one of his seats in Staffordshire.

In this remote and forested retreat, he had been received with no small delight by his brother Paul, who dwelt by the ancient and neighbouring church of Chadstow. Their intercourse was now renewed in more cordiality than had subsisted between them for some time, and much important and perilous matter was agitated between them, the result of which our story will unfold.

It was a windy moonlight midnight, on St. Mark's eve, 1476, when the porch of the old village church of Chadstow contained three watchers. Most readers know the superstitions attached of old to the vigil of Saint Mark too well, to need explanation here. The cemetery, surrounded by majestic trees, lay shadowed or brightened by the fitful planet, as the clouds, whirled by the gusts that groaned among the leafless branches, veiled the broad town in stormy darkness, or sheeted the landscape in troubled lustre. The huge elms and maples rocked and howled in the blast. The resounding aisles boomed from buttress to pinnacle, with its violence. The long rows of lancet windows clattered, and their lozenged panes, superb in painted story, now stood pale and dull in the muffled sky, and then, as the moon emerged, darted a many-coloured refulgence on the sculptured altartombs and variously attired effigies, with armorial blazons, that marked the Babingtons, and the Biddulfs of other days. The weathercocks gleamed and vanished like spirits on the summit of the massy edifice, and the broad dial on the Campanile, displayed and hid its brazen figures, like some illuminated book, opened or closed at the bidding of the necromancer.

« AnteriorContinua »