If more than one novice offered to the ceremony, they were initiated together, and the words which required it were changed from singular to plural. Supper was then brought in and placed on a long table, formed of rough deal boards, covered with green baize. The provisions consisted generally of good substantial fairkeeping fare; such as roast goose, fowls, pork, vegetables, fruit pies, and bread, which altogether were charged at the moderate price of one shilling a head. Malt liquor, punch, and wine, might be had ad libitum. Smokers ranged themselves round the fire, and the night closed like other convivial assemblies, but always in good humor, and without dispute. Good stout watchmen went their rounds about the fair every hali-hour, giving notice of their approach by bawl And so call up оп him ing out lustily-" Look about you there!" but they seldom detected, or disturbed, any nefarious operations. I will take up little more room than to observe, that the proclamation of the fair was conducted in a splendid style, and with becoming dignity, by the mayor of Cambridge, habited in a scarlet robe, attended by his mace-bearers, aldermen, and other members of the corporation, all habited according to their degrees, with a few members of the church. The cavalcade having arrived at the top of Garlickrow, near the old chapel, the recorder there read the proclamation. They then proceeded to the court-house, or little inn (B), where it was again read; and then the mayor alighted with his principal officers, and entered the inn,where he opened the court of pied poudre. Afterwards re turning to the centre of the fair, near the coffee-house (Q), proclamation was then made, and sometimes the mayor alighted and took refreshment. More usually the civic party returned to Cambridge, where a good corporation-dinner closed the corporate labors of the day. The principal London dealers, who at tended the fair, at the time I refer to, which is more than sixty years ago, were as follows: Mr. Roake, ironmonger, from Wood Street. Mr. Smith, silversmith, from Cornhill, Messrs. Cor and Herne, silk mercers, from Holborn. Mr. Cox was also proprietor of the glass-house, at the iron-foundry. Their stock of silks at the fair was never less than £2000. Mr. Smith, silk-mercer, from Fleet Street. Mr. Hewitt, toyman, from Smithfield. Mr. Haynes, Norwich warehouse, from Holborn his stock very large; he has sold on the first day of the fair 100 pieces of Hessens before breakfast. Mr. Lacy, hosier, from Clements' Inn passage, with a stock of £1500. Mr. Timewell, milliner, from Tavistock Street. Mr. Lany, laceman, from the same place. Mr. Bolt, laceman, from Sidney's Alley. The stock of goods of these two were of the richest kinds, as well as inferior. Mr. Murray, shoe-maker, from Bishopsgate. Mr. Adams, clog and patten-maker, from Shoreditch. Mr. Wilson, fine toys, from Charing Cross. Mr. Green, oils and pickles, from Limehouse. His store was wonderful for such a place. All the above dealers were in Garlick Row, and few of them took less money during the fair than from £1000 to £1500, some of them more. Mr. Monnery, leather seller and glover, from high Street, Southwark, had a large trade in gloves and leather, and was a man highly respected. Mr. Ward, whip-maker, from the Borough, had a very considerable stock. The handsome widow of Mr. Reddish, the player of Drury-lane theatre, was under his protection: the writer was under the tuition of Mr. R.'s father, who kept a school at Wandsworth. Many other traders of grea respectability kept this fair, especially dealers in iron, wool, slops, cheese, and pottery. I omitted to notice that the Shoemaker row was at the end of Garlick-row, and consisted of about ten or twelve booths; -that the basket fair, Tunbridge-ware fair, and broom fair, were behind Garlickrow, near the top: the openings denoted in the plan were for convenience of going to them. In the basket fair were to be had all kinds of hampers, baskets, and basket-work; hay-racks, scythe-hafts, pitch-fork, and spade-handles; and other implements of husbandry, waggon loads of which were piled up: a Mr. Fowler, of Sheffield, in Bedfordshire, bought a considerable stock of such materials. the Tunbridge-ware fair, were corn and malt shovels, churns, cheese presses, and a variety of snch goods. At If any materials, or goods, were not taken away within forty-eight hours after the fair had ended, the farmer of the fairfield had a lien on them, and a sharp look out was usually kept for such waifs and strays by his men. The importance of Stirbitch fair may be estimated by the great extent of ground it occupied. The circuit of the fair, beginning at the first show booth round by the cheese fair, the wool fair, and hop fair; then onwards to Ironmonger's-row, to the horse fair; northward on to the pottery fair, along the margin of the Cam, by the coal fair; then southward to the outside of the Inn, and proceeding in a direct line by the basket fair to the point whence you started made full three miles. I am, &c. ΣΗΝΥΑ. Somers Town, December 28. This was the death day of Logan, the poet, who disappointed of the professorship of History in the University of Edinburgh wrote the tragedy of Runnomede which was interdicted for patriotism by the lord chamberlain, and subjected him to the persecution by the presbytery of the church of Scotland. ile withdrew upon a small annuity to London, where he reviewed, wrote sermons and lectures on Romar. history, and minor poems, and perished not of penury but of a broken heart.* Charms. RURAL CHARMS. Sir Thomas Brown, in his "Quincunx artificially considered," mentions a rural charm against dodder, tetter, and strangling weeds, by placing "a chalked tile at the four corners, and one in the middle of the field, which, though ridiculous in the intention, was rational in the contrivance, and a good way to diffuse the magic through all parts of the area.” The three following rural charms occur in Herrick's Hesperides, 1 This I'lo tell ye by the way, Maidens when ye leavens lay, Cross your dow and your dispatch Will be better for your batch. 2 In the morning when ye rise, Wash your hands and cleanse your eyes, To disperse the water farre 3 If ye fear to be affrighted, When ye are (by chance) benighted: Carry nothing but a crust: There is mention of older charms in Bale's interlude concerning the laws of Nature, Moses, and Christ, 4to. 1562. Idolatry says: With blessynges of Saynt Germayne That neyther fox nor vermyne Shall do my chyckens harme. Take me a napkin folte No better thynge can be: Calamities of Authors, 1. 210. And good saynt Francis Gyrdle, Are wholsome for the pyppe: Whom now I over hyppe. Ady, by his "Candle in the Dark, 1655," helps us to another charm. He says, an old woman in Essex came into a house at a time when as the maid was churning of butter, and having labored long and could not make her butter come, the old woman told the maid what was wont to be done when she was a maid, and also in her mother's young time, that if it happened their butter would not come readily, they used a charm to be said over it, whilst yet it was in beating, and it would come straightways, and that was this: Come butter, come, Peter stands at the gate, This, said the old woman, being sai three times, will make your butter come, Or it was taught my mother by a learned church-man in queen Mary's days, when as church-men had more cunning, and could teach people many a trick, that our ministers now a days know not. In "Whimzies: or a new Cast of Characters," 12mo. 1631, the author, in his description of a ballad-monger, says "His ballads, cashiered the city, must now ride poast for the country where they are no lesse admired than a gyant in a pageant: till at last they grow so common there too, as every poor milkmaid can chant and chirp it under her cow, which she useth as an harmelesse charme to make her let down her milk." Grose tells us as a superstition, that "a slunk or abortive calf, buried in the highway over which cattle frequently pass, will greatly prevent that misfortune happening to cows. This is commonly practised in Suffolk." Lupton, in his third Book of Notable Things, 1660, says: Mousear, any manner of way administered to horses, brings this help unto them, that they cannot be hurt, whiles the smith is shooing of them, therefore it is called of many, herba clavorum, the herb of nails." Coles, in his Art of Simpling, says: "If a footman take mugwort and put intc his shoes in the morning, he may goe forty miles before noon, and not be weary." He further instances the potency of many herbs as charms. The same author, in his Adam in Eden, tells us: "It is said, yea, and believed by many, that moonwort will open the locks wherewith dwelling-houses are made fast, if it be put into the key-hole; as also that it will loosen the locks, fetters, and shoes from those horses' feet that goe on the places where it groweth; and of this opinion was Master Culpepper, who, though he railed against superstition in others, yet had enough of it himselfe, as may appear by his story of the earle of Essex his horses, which, being drawn up in a body, many of them lost their shoos upon White Downe, in Devonshire, neer Tiverton, because moonwort grows upon bens." Rue was hung about the neck, as an amulet against witchcraft, in Aristotle's time. Shakspeare, in Hamlet, has this passage: "There's rue for you, and here's some for me. We may call it herb of grace on Sundays." Rue was called herb of grace by the country people; probably for the reason assigned by Warburton, that it was used on Sundays by the Romanists in their exorcisms. Charms, and superstitious preservatives against thunder, are frequently mentioned by old authors. In Greene's Penelope's Web, &c., 4to., 1601, we read; 66 He which weareth the bay-leaf is privileged from the prejudice of thunder." And, in the old play of "The White Devil," Cornelia says: Reach the bays: I'll tie a garland here about his head, 'Twili keep my boy from lightning. Also in "A strange Metamorphosis of Man, transformed into a Wildernesse, deciphered in Characters," 12mo. 1634; under the bay tree, it is observed, that it is "so privileged by nature, that even thunder and lightning are here even taxed of partiality, and will not touch him for respect's sake, as a sacred thing." Again, cited from some old English poet, in Bodenham's Belvedere, or the Garden of the Muses," 8vo. 1600, we read: As thunder nor fierce lightning harmes the bay, So no extremitie hath power on fame. In "Jonsonus Virbius," Verses upon Ben Jonson, by Henry King, bishop of Chichester, is an elegant compliment to the memory of that poet, in allusion to the superstitious idea of laurel being a defensative against thunder: I see that wreath, which doth the wearer arme 'Gainst the quick stroakes of thunder, is no charme To keepe off death's pale dart: for (Jonson) then, Thou hadst been numbered still with living men: Time's sythe had fear'd thy laurel to invade, Nor thee this subject of our sorrow made. So, also, Leigh, in his observations on the first twelve Cæsars, 8vo. 1647, speaking of Tiberius Cæsar, says; "He feared thunder exceedingly, and when the aire or weather was any thing troubled, he ever carried a chaplet or wreath of lawrell about his neck, because that (as Pliny reporteth) is never blasted with lightning." The same author, in his Life of Augustus, mentions a similar charm. "He was so much afraid of thunder and lightning, that he ever carried about with him, for a preservative remedy, a seale's skinne." Here a note adds, "or of a sea-calfe, which, as Plinie writeth, checketh all lightnings." In Hill's "Natural and Artificial Conclusions," 8vo, 1670, is "A natural meanes to preserve your house in safety from thunder and lightning. An ancient author recited (among divers other experiments of nature which he had found out) that if the herb housleek, or syngreen, do grow on the housetop, the same house is never stricken with lightning or thunder." It is still common, in many parts of England, to plant the herb house-leek upon the tops of cottage houses. Andrews, in his continuation of Dr. from Arnot's Edinburgh, that "in 1594 Henry's History of England, tells us, the elders of the Scottish church exerted their utmost influence to abolish an irrational cnstom among the husbandmen, which, with some reason, gave great offence. The farmers were apt to leave a portion of their land untilled and uncropt year after year. This spot was supposed to be dedicated to Satan, and was styled the good man's croft,' viz. the landlord's acre. It seems probable that some pagan ceremony had given rise to so strange a superstition:" no doubt as a charm or peace-offering, that the rest might be fertile. Professor Playfair, in a letter to Mr. Brand, dated St. Andrew's, Jan. 26, 1804, mentioning the superstitions of his neighbourhood, says: “ In private breweries, to prevent the interference of the fairies, a live coal is thrown into the vat. A cow's milk no fa ry can take away, if a burning coal is conducted across her back and under her belly immediately after she has calved. The same mischievous elves cannot enter into a house at night, if, before bed-time, the lower end of the crook, or iron chain, by which a vessel is suspended over the fire, be raised vp a few links." Martin, in his Description of the Western Islands, says: "It is a received opinion in these islands, as well as in the neighbouring part of the main lard, that women, by a charm, or some other secret way, are able to convey the increase of their neighbour's cow's milk to their own use; and that the milk so charmed doth not produce the ordinary quantity of butter; and the curds made of that milk are so tough that it cannot be made so firm as the other cheese, and also is much lighter in weight. The butter so taken away, and joined to the charmer's butter, is evidently discernible by a mark of separation; viz. the diversity of colors: that which is charmed being paler than the other. If butter having these marks be found on a suspected woman, she is presently said to be guilty. To recover this loss they take a little of the rennet from all the suspected persons, and put it into an egg-shell full of milk: and when that from the charmer is mingled with it, it presently curdles, and not before.-Some women make use of the root of groundsel as an amulet against such charms, by putting it among the cream." Speaking of Fladda Chuan, Martin says: "there is a chapel in the isle, dedicated to St. Columbus. It has an altar in the east end, and, therein, a blue stone of a round form on it, which is always moist. It is an ordinary custom, when any of the fisherm en are detained in this isle by contrary winds, to wash the blue stone with water, all round, expecting thereby to procure a favorable wind. And so great is the regard they have for his stone, that they swear decisive oaths apon it." Martin says it was an ancient custom among the islanders to hang a he-goat to the boat's mast, hoping thereby to procure a favorable wind. In speaking of Iona, Martin says, "There is a stone erected here, concerning which the credulous natives say, that whoever reaches out his arm along the stone three times in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, shall never err in steering the helm of a vessel." Mentioning the island Borera, Martin says; "There is a stone in form of a cross, in the row, opposite to St. Mary's church, about five foot high: the natives call it the water-cross, for the ancient inhabitants had a custom of erecting this sort of cross to procure rain, and when they had got enough they laid it flat on the ground; but this custom is now disused." Martin, speaking of the island of Arran, mentions a green stone, much like a globe in figure, about the bigness of a goose-egg, which, for its intrinsic value, has been carefully transmitted to posterity for several ages. "The virtue of it is to remove stitches in the side, by laying it close to the place affected. They say if the patient does not outlive the distemper, the stone removes out of the bed of its own accord, and é contra. The natives use this stone for swearing decisive oaths upon it. The credulous vulgar believe that if this stone is cast among the front of an enemy, they will all run away. The custody of it is the peculiar privilege of a family called Clan-Chattons, alias Mack-Intosh." |