Drink, Money, and Candles: Superstitions and Observances of Yuletide and the New Year
BY
CHARLES HARDWICK
An excerpt from
TRADITIONS, SUPERSTITIONS, AND FOLKLORE, THEIR ORIGIN AND MYTHICAL SIGNIFICANCE
1872
Introduction
The observances of Yuletide and the New Year are deeply rooted in ancient traditions and beliefs, which have evolved over time into the festive practices we observe today. Many of these practices were developed as a way to celebrate the winter solstice and the return of the sun, which was seen as a symbol of hope and renewal.
In ancient times, the winter solstice was a time of great significance for many cultures, marking the longest night of the year and the beginning of the return of longer days. In many societies, it was believed that the sun was reborn on this day, bringing new life and light to the world. To celebrate this occasion, people would engage in various rituals and customs, often involving fire, music, feasting, and gift-giving.
As Christianity spread throughout Europe, many of these pagan traditions were absorbed and adapted into the Christian calendar. Yule, the Germanic celebration of the winter solstice, became associated with Christmas, and many of the customs associated with Yuletide were incorporated into the Christian holiday, such as the decoration of evergreen trees and the exchange of gifts.
Other superstitions and observances also developed around this time of year, many of which were believed to bring good luck and prosperity for the coming year. For example, in many cultures, it was customary to eat certain foods, such as black-eyed peas or grapes, on New Year's Day for good luck. It was also believed that the first person to cross the threshold of a house on New Year's Day would determine the household's luck for the coming year.
Drink, Money, and Candles: Superstitions and Observances of Yuletide and the New Year
If there by any possibility existed a doubt that the religion of the Messiah was one of love and not of gloom, the sunny side of the argument would be amply vindicated by the fact that, from the earliest Christian times, the anniversary of the advent of the Saviour was always celebrated with becoming social enjoyment. "Merrie Christmas," indeed, in spite of hail and rain, and sleet, and snow, the blustering of old Boreas, and the frigid embrace of "Jack Frost," has passed into a proverb. The mass of the British people, notwithstanding their characteristic constitutional phlegm, contrive to become conspicuously social at Christmas tide. They appear to have been too closely occupied with business affairs during the greater portion of the year to indulge much in the hearty humour and frank good-will which unquestionably form important elements in the national idiosyncrasy. Their habitual taciturnity, however, influenced by some law whose action is diametrically opposed to that which determines the elemental routine, generally thaws on the approach of Christmas. It is not too much to say that, at this period of the year, the manly generous side of the English character is seen to most advantage. Under the genial influence of Christmas associations, even stern, plodding "men of business" leave their well-worn official stools and well-thumbed ledgers, and enjoy heartily the Christmas meal of roast beef and plum pudding in company with their relatives and friends. Nay, at this festive season, we have seen the veriest old "money-grubbers" of the city, the most cool and calculating of the habitués of the stock-exchange, dance and frolic, and aid the juveniles of their social circles in the perpetration of practical Christmas jokes, the compounding of "snap-dragon," the fashioning of mistletoe bushes, etc., to the infinite delight of the youngsters and their own evident personal gratification. There is, undoubtedly, a time and a season for all things; and the British public especially appear for ages to have resolved that "Christmas time" is the season for the exercise of grateful memories, for the interchange of social loudness, the propagation of the great principle of progressive civilisation, "peace and good-will to man,"—yes, and likewise, for the temperate indulgence in harmless mirth, and hearty, jovial laughter.
Christmas is the season in which pantomimes flourish. By the bye, who ever heard of a pantomime that was not a "Christmas" one? I am certain I would not myself,—and I feel certain the most boisterous of the young imps who giggle themselves into a frightful condition of side-ache and cheek-ache when witnessing the tricks and jokes, stale or otherwise, of clown and pantaloon, and the perpetually unfortunate policeman, would endorse the sentiment,—I would not walk two streets' length, no, not two yards, to witness the best pantomime in the world on Midsummer's eve! One would as soon think of asking the cook, as a special mark of her personal regard, to give us a turn or two on the spit, accompanied by a copious basting with rancid butter! But it is quite a different affair on Christmas Eve, or "boxing night." The pantomime is, in every sense, unquestionably the property of "dear old Christmas," and then, and then only, can its rollicking fun, farce, fancy, and fairy marvels be thoroughly understood or enjoyed.
Pantomime, among the Greeks and Romans, as well as the Chinese, Persians, and other Oriental peoples, was a dramatic performance, in which action and gesticulation formed the most prominent features. The modern ballet is, perhaps, its most legitimate descendant at the present day. The name, however, is derived from two Greek words, which signify mimicry or "imitation of everything." The modern pantomime, therefore, with its universal hash of fun and frolic, of fairies and fiends, deities and dragons, of ghosts, goblins, and giants, of burlesque and ballet, painting and punning, of music and mountebanking, responds most accurately to the classical etymon.
Although the profuse but somewhat indiscriminate hospitality, and some of the ruder of the Christmas games and ceremonies of our mediæval ancestors, have declined or fallen into general disuse, the anniversary of the advent of the founder of the national religion yet remains the chief season set apart especially for genial social intercourse, the gathering together of relatives and friends, the interchange of mutual good-will, and of festive enjoyment.
After discussing the various opinions, facts, and conjectures advanced by others respecting the origin of "yule logs" and Christmas fires, Brand says: "However this may be, I am pretty confident that the yule block will be found, in its first use, to have been only a counterpart of the Midsummer fires, made within doors because of the cold weather at this winter solstice, as those in the hot season at the summer one, are kindled in the open air."
Precisely so; yet, as the Midsummer fires were not kindled for the sake of the warmth they afforded, but as a kind of incantation or a propitiatory sacrifice to the fire-god or the elements generally, if the two had a common origin, we may reasonably expect to find a similar principle or motive at the root of the Christmas observances. At the summer solstice the sun's heat parched the earth and burnt the vegetation. Hence the propitiatory ceremony of the fire worshippers. At the winter solstice his feeble rays were insufficient to the requirements of vegetable existence, and the severe cold added to the privations of both and man and beast. Hence the existence of a corresponding sentiment and corresponding ceremonial observances.
Brand further says: "On the night of this eve our ancestors were wont to light up candles of an uncommon size, called Christmas candles, and lay a log of wood upon the fire, called a yule-clog or Christmas block, to illuminate the house, and, as it were, turn night into day. This custom is, in some measure, still kept up in the north of England."
The early Christians were, and the learned of more modern times are, divided in opinion as to the precise day of the Nativity. The feast of the Passover and that of the Tabernacles have each found powerful advocates. According to St. Chrysostom, the primitive Christians celebrated the Christmas and Epiphany feasts at one and the same time. They were not separated till the council of Nice, in the year 325. Amongst the Armenians, notwithstanding, the two feasts were jointly celebrated till as recently as the thirteenth century. It has been urged by some that, as shepherds were watching their flocks by night in the open air, the birth of Christ could scarcely have occurred in the winter season. But so long as one time was accepted by the universal Church, it appeared to be of little moment which theory was adopted. Sir Isaac Newton, in his "Commentary on the Prophecies of Daniel," accounts for the choice of the 25th December on the ground of its being the winter solstice. He shows, likewise, that other feasts were originally fixed at the cardinal points of the year. "The first calendars having been so arranged by mathematicians at pleasure, without any ground in tradition, the Christians afterwards took up what they found in the calendars."
There can be little doubt that this view of the question is correct, and that many of the curious customs and ceremonies, which were for centuries religiously observed throughout the land, and many of which still linger about the holiday celebrations of remote districts, have an origin older than Christianity itself. The most orthodox and exemplary writers of the middle ages acknowledge this, and contend that the practice of the early Christians of appropriating the festive seasons of their heathen converts was productive of good results.
The testimony of Thomas Warmstry, whose now rare tract, entitled "A Vindication of the Solemnity of the Nativity of Christ," was published in 1648, is strongly in favour of this view. He says: "If it doth appeare that the time of this festival doth comply with the time of the heathen's Saturnalia, this leaves no charge of impiety upon it: for since things are best cured by their contraries, it was both wisdom and piety in the ancient Christians (whose work it was to convert the heathens from such as well as other superstitions and miscarriages) to vindicate such times from the service of the devill, by appointing them to the more solemne and especiall service of God. The blazes are foolish and vain, not countenanced by the church."
The "blazes" here referred to are evidently the yule logs and immense candles, which the worthy pastor denounces with orthodox precision. "Blazes" and "Pandemonium" are yet synonymous terms, in vulgar mouths, in many parts of Lancashire. Some of the ceremonies of this period, however, meet with his somewhat qualified approval. He says: "Christmas Kariles, if they be such as are fit for the time, and of holy and sober composures, and used with Christian sobriety and piety, they are not unlawfull, and may be profitable if they be sung with grace in the heart. New Yeare's gifts, if performed without superstition, may be harmless provocations to Christian love and mutuall testimonies thereof to good purpose, and never the worse because the heathens have had them at the like times."
One important attribute of the Yule log resulted from the fact that each succeeding brand received its kindling fire from the remains of its predecessor; hence its supposed supernatural influences. Herrick sings:—
With the last year's brand
Light the new block, and
For good success in his spending,
On your psaltries play,
That sweet luck may
Come while the log is a teending.
Etymologists have laboured hard to get at the root of the word Yule; some of them, however, with but indifferent success. Brand says:—"I have met with no word of which there are so many and such different etymologies as this of Yule, of which there seems nothing certain but that it means Christmas." Some writers, including the venerable Bede, derive it from hveol, the Anglo-Saxon form of our modern English word wheel, which, as I have already shown, is one of the Aryan types of the sun. Bede, I think, assigns the true meaning to the term when he says it is so named "because of the return of the sun's annual course, after the winter solstice." According to Mr. Davies (Cel. Res. p. 191), the god Bel or Beli was called Hu. Mallet in his "Northern Antiquities," says:—"All Celtic nations have been accustomed to the worship of the sun; either as distinguished from Thor," (? Bel) "or as considered his symbol. It was a custom that everywhere prevailed in ancient times to celebrate a feast at the winter solstice, by which men testified their joy at seeing this great luminary return again to this part of the heavens. This was the greatest solemnity in the year. They called it in many places Yole or Yuul, from the word Hiaul and Houl, which, even at this day, signifies the Sun in the languages of Bass-Britagne and Cornwall."
Brand objects to this etymology, on the ground that it "is giving a Celtic derivation of a Gothic word (two languages extremely different.)" This objection, however, falls to the ground with the discovery of the fact that both languages have a common origin, and that the several races and their superstitions are but separate developments of Aryan blood and Aryan mythology. In modern Welsh gwyl means a festival or holiday, and this may be the true root of the word gule, in the phrase "the gule of August," or Lammas-day. But the Welsh gwyl may itself be derived from the same root as yule, which, to our ears, now only signifies, as Brand says, "Christmas," or the festive season. Heulo, in modern Welsh, means to "shine as the sun." In India the term Huli festival is applied to the ceremonies attendant upon the sun's entering into the spring quarter at the vernal equinox.
In ordinary life we meet with very few persons who are aware of the fact that the practice of regarding the first of January as the commencement of a new year is of very modern origin, in England, at least. Prior to 1752, in most legal or official matters, and in private records, the year commenced on the 25th of March. At this time an Act of Parliament was passed which "directed that the legal year which then commenced in some parts of this country in March, and in others in January, should universally be deemed to begin on the first of January." This will appear to many as a strange species of legislation, savouring somewhat of the vanity and irreverence for which Canute, the great Danish King of England, rebuked his courtiers, when he ironically commanded the tide to cease flowing, lest, forsooth, it should damp his royal shoe-leather. The commencement of the year, as has been before observed, being not a fact in physics, but a conventional or civil arrangement for human convenience, is therefore a legitimate subject for legislative interference, with the view to arrive at a uniformity of style, and so facilitate business operations and the enquiries of historians and students of science.
The practice of celebrating the new year's advent on the first of January appears to have obtained to a considerable extent in England long prior to its legal recognition. The famous Puritan writer, Prynne, in his "Histrio-Mastrix, or a Scourge for Stage Players," published in 1632, has the following slashing tirade against the festive observances of this period:—
"If we now parallel our grand disorderly Christmases with these Roman Saturnals and heathen festivals, or our New Yeare's Day (a chiefe part of Christmas), with their festivity of Janus, which was spent in mummeries, stageplays, dancing, and such like enterludes, wherein fidlers and others acted lascivious effeminate parts, and went about their towns and cities in women's apparel; whence the whole Catholicke Church (as Alchuvinus and others write), appointed a solemn publike faste upon this our New Yeare's day (which fast it seems is now forgotten), to bewail these heathenish enterludes, sports, and lewd idolatrous practices which have been used on it; prohibiting all Christians, under pain of excommunication, from observing the calends, or first of January (which we now call New Yeare's Day), as holy, and from sending abroad New Yeare's Gifts upon it (a custom now too frequent), it being a mere relique of paganisme and idolatry, derived from the heathen Romans' feast of two-faced Janus, and a practice so execrable unto Christians that not only the whole Catholicke Church, but even four famous Councils" [and an enormous quantity of other authorities which it is useless to quote] "have positively prohibited the solemnization of New Yeare's Day, and the sending abroad of New Yeare's Gifts, under an anathema and excommunication."
Although there can be no doubt that the practices referred to were in existence prior to the introduction of Christianity, yet the threat of excommunication and anathema failed to root them out of the heart of the mass of the population, and they survive to the present day. Some of the gifts made to sovereign princes on the advent of the new year were not only valuable, but often quaint in device, and sometimes, according to modern ideas, in singularly bad taste. The accomplished scholar, soldier, and courtier, Sir Philip Sidney, on the New Year's Day of 1578, presented to Queen Elizabeth a "cambric chemise, its sleeves and collar wrought with black work and edged with a small bone lace of gold and silver. With it was a pair of ruffs interlaced with gold and silver, and set with spangles which alone weighed four ounces." His friend Fulke Greville likewise presented an embroidered chemise. On another occasion of a similar character, (1581), "Sidney made three characteristic presents—a gold-handled whip, a golden chain, a heart of gold, as though in token of his entire subservience to her Majesty, and his complete surrender of himself to the royal keeping." On one occasion, the Earl of Ormond presented to the Queen "a golden phœnix, whose wings and feet glittered with rubies and diamonds, and which rested on a branch covered with other precious stones. Sir Christopher Hatton tendered a cross of diamonds, furnished with a suitable motto; also a gold fancy, imaging a dog leading a man over a bridge, and garnished with many gems." Lord and Lady Cobham each presented a satin petticoat elaborately ornamented. Her Majesty, on New Year's Day, it appears, did not disdain to receive presents from her servants and tradesmen. Nichols, in his "Royal Progresses," records that a laundress solicited the Queen's acceptance of three pocket handkerchiefs and a "tooth cloth." One domestic sought favour with a linen and another with a cambric nightcap. Apothecaries presented packets of green ginger, orange candy, and "that kind of stuff." A butler's offering consisted of a meat knife, "with a bone handle and a motto carved thereon," while the dustman tendered "two bolts of cambric," the head gardener a silver-gilt porringer, with a "snail sticking to an oak-leaf for handle," and the "sergeant of the pastry" a "great quince pie with gilt ornaments." The Queen, in return, presented her courtiers, etc., with "gilt plate, showing her esteem by the quantity of the article" apportioned to each recipient. In his preface Nichols remarks that "the only remains of this custom at court now is that the two chaplains in waiting, on New Year's Day, have each a crown piece laid under their plates at dinner."
Old Thomas Warmstry, as we have seen, held much milder language on this subject than Prynne. He regarded the gifts as "harmless provocations to Christian love, and mutual testimonies thereof to good purpose," notwithstanding their heathen origin. The practice is by no means extinct at the present time. In many towns shopkeepers present their customers, on New Year's Day, with candles, nutmegs, spices, etc., in token of good will.
Brand speaks of an ancient custom, which is yet retained in many places on New Year's Eve: "Young women went about with a Wassail Bowl of spiced ale, with some sort of verses that were sung by them as they went from door to door." This liquor was sometimes called "Lamb's Wool," although it is difficult to conjecture now for what reason. In the "olden time" it appears to have been compounded of ale, sugar, nutmeg, toast, and roasted apples or crabs. The wassail bowl originally meant a health-drinking vessel, and is of very ancient origin. The name is derived from two Anglo-Saxon words wæs hæl, which signify "be in health," "wax (grow) in health," or in modern phrase, "good health."
Geoffrey of Monmouth refers to the Saxon practice of health drinking on important occasions, when describing the visit of the British King Vortigern to the palace of Hengist, the chieftain of the Teutonic warriors then recently arrived in Britain. During the banquet, Rowena, the beautiful daughter of Hengist, "came out of her chamber bearing a golden cup of wine, with which she approached the King, and making a low courtsey, said to him, 'Lanerd' (lord) 'King, wacht heil!' The King, at the sight of the lady's face, was on a sudden both surprised and inflamed with her beauty, and, calling to his interpreter, asked him what she said, and what answer he should make her. 'She called you Lord King,' said the interpreter, 'and offered to drink your health. Your answer to her must be, 'Drinc heil!' Vortigern accordingly answered 'Drinc heil!' and bade her drink; after which he took the cup from her hand, kissed her, and drank himself. From that time to this it has been the custom in Britain, that he who drinks to anyone says 'Wacht heil!' and he that pledges him answers 'Drinc heil?'"
In process of time, the practice of drinking healths on solemn or festive occasions was confounded with ordinary tippling, and the term wassail became applied indiscriminately to all festive intemperance. Hamlet says, speaking of the drinking habits of the usurper, Claudius—
The King doth wake to-night, and takes his rouse,
Keeps wassel and the swaggering up-spring reels;
And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,
The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out
The triumph of his pledge.
The Antiquarian Repertory (1775) contains a rude wood-cut of a bowl carved on an oaken beam, which had formed a portion of an ancient chimney recess. The vessel rests on the branches of an apple tree, alluding perhaps, Sir Henry Ellis suggests, to "part of the materials of which the liquor was composed." On one side the word Wass-heil is inscribed, and on the other Drinc-heile. A commentator on this relic informs us that it represents a Wassel Bowl, so beloved of yore by our hardy ancestors, "who, on the vigil of the New Year, never failed to assemble round the glowing hearth with their cheerful neighbours, and then, in the spicy Wassel Bowl (which testified the goodness of their hearts) drowned every former animosity—an example worthy of modern imitation. Wassel was the word, Wassel every guest returned, as he took the circling goblet from his friend, whilst song and civil mirth brought in the infant year."
A work entitled "Naogeorgus," but generally styled the "Popish Kingdom," published in 1570, and translated by Barnabe Googe, thus refers to the New Year's Day ceremonies of the time:—
The next to this is New Yeare's Day, whereon to every frende
They costly presents in do bring, and Newe Yeare's giftes do sende;
These giftes the husband gives his wife, and father eke the child,
And maister on his men bestowes the like with favour milde;
And good beginning of the yeare they wishe and wishe againe,
According to the auncient guise of heathen people vaine.
These eight days no man doth require his dettes of any man,
Their tables do they furnish out with all the meate they can;
With march paynes, tartes, and custards great, they drink with staring eyes,
They rowte and revell, feede and feaste, as merry all as pyes;
As if they should at th' entrance of this New Yeare hap to die,
Yet would they have their bellies full, and auncient friends allie.
I remember, very recently, at the conclusion of a public jubilee dinner, within a very few miles from Manchester, one of the guests suddenly died of apoplexy. This sad event, of course, caused the adjournment of the festive gathering. The reason I refer to it here is merely to state that I heard, to my surprise, one of the country visitors say, in a very consolatory tone, "Well, poor Joe, God rest his soul! He has, at least, gone to his long rest wi' a bally full o' good me-at, and that's some consolation." This seems to illustrate the meaning of the last couplet in the quotation from "Naogeorgus," the sentiment in which appears to have some affinity to the Greek and Roman notions of providing the dead with food and money to aid their passage across the Styx.
The Rev. S. Baring-Gould, in his "Curious Myths of the Middle Ages," says "it is a singular fact that only the other day I heard of a man in Cleveland (Yorkshire) being buried two years ago with a candle, a penny, and a bottle of wine in his coffin: the candle to light him along the road, the penny to pay the ferry, and the wine to nourish him as he went to the New Jerusalem. I was told this, and this explanation was given to me by some rustics who professed to have attended the funeral. This looks to me as though the shipping into the other land were not regarded merely as a figure of speech, but as a reality."
One writer says the "high feast of Yule lasted until the twelve days be passed," and consequently included our new year and twelfth night festivities. During this period a strong superstition yet obtains in Lancashire and Yorkshire respecting fire. A singular instance of this recently occurred to a friend of mine within three miles of Manchester. Seeing a cottage door open, he entered, and asked the good woman of the house to give him a light for his cigar. He was somewhat astonished at her inhospitable response: "Nay, nay, I know better than that." "Better than what?" he inquired. "Why, better than give a light out of the house on New Year's Day!" He contrived, notwithstanding, to ignite his cigar without the woman's assistance, and she seemed content. She had forgotten the best half of the condition, however, and committed the very blunder she sought to avoid. According to Sir Henry Ellis, in the North of England the superstition ordains that you "never allow any to take a light out of your house on New Year's Day; a death in the household, before the expiration of a year, is sure to occur if it be allowed."
Sir Henry Ellis likewise mentions a curious superstition still existing in Lincolnshire. It is considered unlucky to let anything be taken out of the house on New Year's Day, before something has been brought into it. The importation of the most insignificant article, even a piece of coal, is, it appears, sufficient to prevent the misfortunes occurring, which the contrary action, it is believed, would render inevitable during some portion of the year. This sentiment is expressed in the following popular rhyme:—
Take out, then take in,
Bad luck will begin;
Take in, then take out,
Good luck comes about.
A remarkable instance of the strength of the superstitious reverence for this day, or rather of the popular belief in the prophetic character of any incident occurring thereon, recently happened in Manchester. A publican, name Tilley, refused to serve a glass of whisky on credit during the New Year's Day's festivities, on the score that it was "unlucky" so to do. He said he preferred making the man a present of the liquor to the committal of any such act. The refusal so exasperated the thirsty customer that he stabbed the landlord in the abdomen, and, as the wound proved fatal, he was condemned to death for wilful murder, but the sentence was afterwards commuted to penal servitude for life. Thus the faith in the tradition produced a more tragic result than the most superstitious could have dreaded from its ignoration. Singularly enough, owing to the first day of the year happening on Sunday, the usual festival was postponed till the following day; so it appears in this instance the superstition accompanied the merry-making without reference to the date.
This practice of "bringing in the New Year" with festive rejoicing is still a very common one, especially in the north of England. A singular superstition in connection with it is evidently of very ancient origin. It is considered to be an unlucky omen if the first person who enters a house on the morning of the first of January happens to be a female.
Another unlucky omen is yet very commonly respected in Lancashire and elsewhere, even amongst comparatively educated people, at this festive season. It is considered to bode misfortune if the first person who enters your house on New Year's morning has a fair complexion and light hair. I have never heard this very popular prejudice satisfactorily accounted for. I can only suggest that it most probably arose from the fact that amongst the Keltic tribes, or the earliest Aryan immigrants, dark hair prevailed, as amongst the Welsh, Cornish, and Irish of the present day; and that when they afterwards came in contact with the Teutonic branch, as enemies, they found their mortal foes to possess fair skins and light hair. They consequently regarded the intrusion into their household, at the commencement of the year, of one of the hated race, as a sinister omen. The beards and hair of the ancient Aryan gods were golden or red, or fire-coloured. The Teutonic Thor, in this respect, was the counterpart of Indra and Agni. Red hair, no doubt, would have its admirers, where these gods were worshipped; and, of course, it would fall into contempt when the reverse was the case. The German early Christians, it appears, not only condemned Thor to the lower regions, but carried their dislike to the very colour of his hair. Hence the proverb, "Rother-bart, Teufelsart," or "Red-beard, devil-steered." They went so far, indeed, as to assert, without any other authority than the speciality of his personal character, that the beard of the arch-traitor, Judas Iscariot, was of this obnoxious colour. Dryden refers to it in the triplet which he despatched to Jacob Tonson, as a specimen of his power as a satirist, and which caused the celebrated publisher to deal more liberally than previously with the poor and angry poet. Dryden's lines are:
With leering look, bull-faced, and freckled fair,
With two left legs, with Judas-coloured hair,
And frowsy pores that taint the ambient air.
Kelly says the prejudice is of German and not of Eastern origin. Hence it is not improbable that the dethronement of the red-haired gods may have been at the root of the German antipathy. But the true Kelt does not simply abhor, on New Year's Day, the red hair of the Dane, but the brown or flaxen, or amber locks of the German as well. Indeed, black or dark hair and complexion are the chief objects of his concern in the individual who first enters his domicile on the dawn of the New Year. Many householders feast their friends on New Year's Eve, and send out shortly before midnight one of the party, with dark hair, expressly "to bring in the New Year," as it is termed. I remember, some time ago, the landlady of one of the Preston hotels, being unmarried, was in the habit of rewarding the fortunate dark-haired gentleman with a kiss for his propitious entrance into her hostelry on the morning of this festivity. Of course, the fair one had nothing but frowns and harsh words if a light-haired interloper happened to first cross her threshold.
Mr. T. T. Wilkinson, in his "Popular Customs and Superstitions in Lancashire," referring to the practice of divination at this season of the year, says:—"When a Lancashire damsel desires to know what sort of a husband she will have, on New Year's Eve she pours some melted lead into a glass of water and observes what forms the drops assume. When they resemble scissors, she concludes that she must rest satisfied with a tailor; if they appear in the form of a hammer, he will be a smith or a carpenter; and so of the others. I have met with many instances of this class in which the example given did not admit of easy contradiction."
The prophetic character of the weather during this period is a superstition common to all the Aryan tribes. So strongly is this characteristic of the season felt in Lancashire, at the present day, that many country people may be met with who habitually found their "forecast," as the late Admiral Fitzroy would term the operation, on the appearance of the heavens on Old Christmas Day. Mr. T. T. Wilkinson relates a singular instance of this superstition, which shows the stubbornness of traditional lore, even when subjected to the power and influence of legislative enactments. He says:—"The use of the old style in effect is not yet extinct in Lancashire. The writer knows an old man, R. H., of Habergham, about 77 years of age, who always reckons the changes of the seasons in this manner. He alleges the practice of his grandfather and father in support of his method, and states with much confidence that 'Perliment didn't change t' seasons wen they chang'd day o' t' month.'"
The New Year's advent is still believed to be a period especially favourable for divination of various kinds. A work named the "Shepherd's Kalender," published in 1709, soberly informs us that "if New Year's Day in the morning open with dusky red clouds, it denotes strifes and debates among great ones, and many robberies to happen that year."
The "weatherwise" placed much reliance on the prophetic aspect of the heavens at this period. A clergyman at Kirkmichæl, quoted by Sir John Sinclair, says, with reference to the practices of some of his parishioners,—"On the first night of January they observe with anxious attention the disposition of the atmosphere. As it is calm or boisterous; as the wind blows from the north or the south, from the east or the west, they prognosticate the nature of the weather till the conclusion of the year. The first night of the new year when the wind blows from the west they call dar-na-coille, the night of the fecundation of the trees; and from the circumstance has been derived the name in the Gaelic language. Their faith in the above signs is couched in verses thus translated:—'The wind of the south will produce heat and fertility; the wind of the west milk and fish; the wind of the north cold and storm; the wind from the east fruit on the trees.'"
A curious custom of this class is mentioned by Sir Henry Ellis, termed "Apple-howling," as being well known in Sussex, Devon, and elsewhere. Troops of boys gather round the orchards on New Year's Eve, and chant the following ditty:—
Stand fast root, bear well top,
Pray God send us a howling crop;
Every twig, apples big;
Every bough, apples enow;
Hats full, caps full,Full quarter sacks full.
The practice of divining or "fore-casting" the character of the weather, and influencing the vegetation of the coming year, by ceremonies and observations of atmospheric effects, at its commencement, or on New Year's Day, appears to be prefigured in the ancient Aryan mythology. On this subject Walter Kelly says:—"In the gloomy season of the winter solstice the Ribhus" (demi-gods, who aid in the ruling of the lightning and storms) "sleep for twelve days in the house of the sun-god Savitar; then they wake up and prepare the earth to clothe itself anew with vegetation, and the frozen waters to flow again. It appears certain, from some passages in the Vedas, that twelve nights about the winter solstice were regarded as prefiguring the character of the weather for the whole year. A Sanscrit text is noticed by Weber, which says expressly, 'The twelve nights are an image of the year.' The very same belief exists at this day in Northern Germany. The peasants say that the calendar for the whole year is made in the twelve days between Christmas and Epiphany, and that as the weather is on each of these days so will it be on the corresponding month of the ensuing year. They believe also that whatever one dreams on any of the twelve nights will come to pass within the next year."
Before the introduction of the New Style, previously referred to, this weather fore-casting was indulged in at the end of March. Brand gives an old rhyme which demonstrates the truth of this:
March said to Aperill,
I see three hogs upon a hill;
But lend your first three days to me,
And I'll be bound to gar them dee.
The first it sall be wind an' weet,
The next it sall be snaw an' sleet,
The third it sall be sic a freeze,
Sall gar the birds stick to the trees.
But when the borrowed days were gane,
The three silly hogs came hirplin hame.
Mr. Henderson, in his recent work on the "Folk-Lore of the Northern Counties," says, "Old people presage the weather of the coming season by that of the last three days of March, which they call the 'borrowing days,' and thus rhyme about:
"March borrowed from April
Three days, and they were ill;
The first o' them war wind an' weet,
The next o' them war snaw an' sleet,
The last o' them war wind an' rain,
Which gaed the silly pair ewes come toddling hame."
The mistletoe and the oak were both of sacred, or "lightning" origin amongst the Aryans, and the medicinal, mythical, or magical character yet attributed to the former both by the Teutons and Kelts, had, doubtless, one common origin. Walter Kelly says the mistletoe "possesses, in a high degree, all the virtues proper to botanic lightning, as is implied in its Swiss name, donnerbesen, 'thunderbesom,' and its mode of growth is conformable in all particulars to its exalted mythical character. It is a parasite, and like the asvattha and the rowan, it is everywhere believed to spring from seed deposited by birds on trees. When it was found on the oak, the Druids ascribed its growth directly to the gods; they chose the tree; and the bird was their messenger, perhaps a god in disguise." The mistletoe was supposed to protect the homestead from fire and other disaster; and, like many other mysterious things, it was believed to be potent in matters relating to courtship and matrimony. It is to this sentiment we owe the practice of kissing under the bush formed of holly and mistletoe during the Christmas festivities.
This matrimonial element in the mysticism which attaches to the mistletoe is artistically presented in the Scandinavian mythology. Freyja, the mother of Baldr, had rendered him invulnerable against all things formed out of the then presumed four elements, fire, air, earth, and water. The mistletoe was believed to grow from none of these elements. Another version is that she swore all created things never to hurt this the "whitest" and most loved of all the Æsir; but she overlooked one insignificant branch of the mistletoe, and it was by an arrow fashioned from it that the bright day-god, Baldr, the Scandinavian counterpart of Apollo and Bel, was killed by the blind Hodr or Helder. The gods, however, restored him to life, and dedicated the mistletoe to his mother, who is regarded as the counterpart of the classical Venus. Hence its importance in affairs of love and courtship. It is not improbable that the far-famed dart of Cupid may have some relationship to the mistletoe arrow to which the beautiful Baldr succumbed. In a Vedic incantation, translated by Dr. Kuhn, this death-dealing power of the mistletoe is ascribed to a branch of the asvattha.
The medicinal qualities of the mistletoe were also in high repute. "This healing virtue, which the mistletoe shares with the ash," says Kelly, "is a long-descended tradition, for 'the kustha the embodiment of the soma,' a healing plant of the highest renown among the Southern Aryans, was one of those that grew beneath the heavenly asvattha." This heavenly asvattha is the ficus religiosa, or "world tree," "out of which the immortals shaped the heavens and the earth;" and it is supposed to be the prototype of the yggdrasil, the cloud-tree of the Norsemen, "an ash (Norse askr), the tree out of which the gods formed the first man, who was thence called Askr. The ash was also among the Greeks, an image of the clouds, and the mother of men." The Christmas tree of the Germans, recently imported into this country, no doubt originated in these ancient mythical superstitions.
The wide-spread traditionary belief in this world-overspreading tree is confirmed by a passage in Merlin's celebrated prophecy. The magician says, "After this shall be produced a tree upon the Tower of London, which, having no more than three branches, shall overshadow the surface of the whole island." Of course Merlin is speaking figuratively of the future prospects of Britain, and refers to the domination of London as the metropolitan city of the British empire. Nevertheless, the origin of the mythical language used for this purpose appears to admit of no doubt.
The famous bean-stalk up which the renowned "Jack," of nursery story, climbed till he reached cloud-land, the abode of fairies and giants, is, unquestionably, a remnant of the Scandinavian yggdrasil, or cloud-tree. Beans and peas, as will be hereafter shown, in the Aryan myths, were connected with celestial fire, and with departed spirits. This Gothic skiey realm has likewise its counterpart in the Greek Phæakian domain, or "cloudland geography," as Mr. Cox aptly expresses it.
A certain reverence for both the oak and the ash exists yet in the minds of others better educated than the peasantry of England. The phrase, "Our hearts of oak," may shortly be superseded by "Our iron-clads," but the figure of speech, as applied to the fighting sailor, and not to the craft, will long survive the era of the conversion of the ships. The oak and the ash are weather-prophets at this day. An old rhyme says:—
If the oak's before the ash,We shall only get a splash;If the ash precede the oak,We shall surely get a soak.
This, of course, refers to the priority in the time of budding or coming into leaf.
Other Christmas customs and superstitions appear to distinctly exhibit an Aryan origin. The white-thorn is supposed to possess supernatural power, and certain trees of this class, in Lancashire called Christmas thorns, are believed to blossom only on Old Christmas Day. Mr. Wilkinson says that, in the neighbourhood of Burnley, many persons will yet travel a considerable distance "at midnight, in order to witness the blossoming." In the Arboretum at Kew gardens, Miss Pratt informs us, in her "Flowers, and their Associations," there is a tree of this kind which "is often covered with its clusters while the snow surrounds it." The thorn, as I shall afterwards show, was an Aryan "lightning plant," and, therefore, supposed to be endowed with supernatural properties.
The boar's head yet forms a prominent object amongst the traditionary dishes of Christmas festivities. Amongst the impersonations of natural phenomena in the Aryan mythology, the wild boar represented the "ravages of the whirlwind that tore up the earth." The boar is an animal connected with the storm and lightning, in all the Indo-European mythologies. Kelly says:—"Boars are winds, and their white flashing tusks were looked upon by the southern Aryans and the Greeks, as well as by the Germans, as images of the lightning." There exists yet a traditionary superstition very prevalent in Lancashire and its neighbourhood to the effect that pigs can "see the wind." I accidentally heard the observation made not long ago, in the city of Manchester, in what is termed "respectable society," and no one present audibly dissented. One or two individuals, indeed, remarked that they had often heard such was the case, and seemed to regard the phenomenon as related to the strong scent and other instincts peculiar to animals of the chase. Indeed, Dr. Kuhn says that in Westphalia this phase of the superstition is the prevalent one. There pigs are said to smell the wind. No one except myself, in the Manchester instance referred to, appeared to have any knowledge of the origin of the tradition, or that it was, at least, between three and four thousand years old, and, in all probability, very much older.
