163 PASTIMES AND HOLIDAYS. "What is a gentleman without his recreations?"Old Play. IN the Games and Diversions of a people, we may trace the distinguishing features of the national character; and the rude pastimes of our ancestors are a practical illustration of the courage and hardiness for which they were celebrated. Some of the old sports would be incompatible with the refinement of the present day, but others are of a nature less objectionable, and the memory of which is worthy of preservation. Many of the ancient Games and Holidays were rural festivities, commemorative of the return of the seasons, and not only innocent in themselves, but conducive to health and good-fellowship. Of this description were the May Games, the Harvest Supper, the Feast of Sheep Shearing, Midsummer-Eve rejoicings, and the celebration of the New Year: all these may be traced to the earliest times; indeed they are coeval with society, and the Feast of the Tabernacle among the Jews, and the ancient honours paid to Ceres, Bacchus, and Saturn by the heathens, were only analagous observances, under a different appellation. A revival of some of the old Sports and Pastimes would, probably, be an improvement in national manners; and the modren attractions of Rouge et Noir, French hazard, Roulette, "blue ruin," and muddy porter, be beneficially exchanged for the more healthly recreations of former ages, "Worse practices within doors," as Stowe remarks, "it is to be feared, have succceded the more open pastimes of the older time." The recreations of our Saxon ancestors were such as were common among the ancient Northern nations; consisting mostly of robust exercises, as hunting, hawking, leaping, running, wrestling and casting of darts. They were also much addicted to gaming; a propensity unfortunately transmitted, unimpaired, to their descendants of the present day. Chess was a favourite game with them, and likewise backgammon, said to have been invented about the tenth century. The Normans introduced the 1 chivalrous game of tournaments and justs. These last became very prevalent, as we learn from a artirical poem of the thirteenth century, a verse from which has been thus rendered by STRUTT in his "Sports and Pastimes:" 'If wealth, Sir Knight, perchance be thine, When the military enthusiasm which characterised the middle ages had subsided. and chivalry was on the decline, a prodigious change took place in the manners of the peo ple. Violent exercises grew out of fashion with persons of rank, and the example of the nobility was followed by other classes. Henry VII. Henry VIII. and James I. endeavoured to revive the ancient military exercises, but with only ephemeral success. We learn from Burton, in his "Anatomy of Melancholy," what were the most prevalent sports at the end of the sixteenth century.* Hunting, hawking, running at rings, tilts and tournaments, horse-races and wild-goose chaces, were the pastimes of the gentry; while the lower classes recreated themselves at May Games, Wakes, Whitson, Ales; by ringing of bells, bowling, shooting, wrestling, leaping, pitching the bar, playing with keel pins, coits, tronks, wasters, foils, foot-ball, balown, and running at the quintain. Speaking of the Londoners, Burton says, "They take pleasure to see some pageant or sight go by, as at a coronation, wedding, and such like solemn niceties, to see an ambassador or prince received and entertained with masks, shows, and fireworks." The following he considers common amusements, both in town and country *In his dry way, Old Burton says, and hounds, are rocks upon which men lose themselves when Cards, dice, hawkes, they are improperly handled and beyond their fortunes." Hunting and hawking, he allows, are" honest recreations, and fit for some great men, but not for every base and inferior person, who, while they maintain their faulkener, and dogs, and hunting nags, their wealth runs away with their hounds, and their fortunes fly away with their hawkes." -namely, "bull-baitings, and bear-baitings, in which our countrymen and citizens greatly delight and frequently use; dancers on ropes, jugglers, comedies, tragedies, artillery gardens, and cock-fighting." The winter recreations consisted of cards, dice, tables, shovelboard, chess, the philosopher's game, shuttlecock, billiards, music, masks, dancing, ule-games, riddles, cross purposes, merry tales of knights-errant, thieves, witches, fairies and goblins. In adddition to the May-games, morris dancing, pageants, and processions, which were common throughout the kingdom, the Londoners had peculiar privileges of hunting, hawking, and fishing; they had also large portions of ground allotted to them in the vicinity of the city, for the practice of such pastimes as were not prohibited; and for those, especially, that were conducive to health. On the holidays, during the summer season, the young men exercised themselves in the fields with leaping, archery, wrestling, playing with balls, and practising with their wasters and bucklers. The city damsels had also their recreations playing upon their timbrels, and dancing to the music, which they often practised by moonlight. One writer says, it was customary for the maidens to dance in presence of their masters and mistresses, while one of their companions played the music on a timbrel; and to stimulate them, the best dancers were rewarded with a garland; the prize being exposed to public view during the performance. To this custom SPENSER alludes,— "The damsels they delight, When they their timbrels smite, And thereunto dance and carol sweet." The London apprentices often amused themselves with their wasters and bucklers, before the doors of their masters. Hunting, with the Lord Mayor's pack of hounds, was a diversion of the metropolis, as well as sailing, rowing, and fishing on the Thames. Duck-hunting was a favourite recreation in the summer, as we learn from Strype. Having thus given a general view of public amusements from an early period, I shall shortly describe some of the most popular pastimes, many of which have been either modified or supplanted by other recreations. First, of the game of HAND-BALL. called by the French |