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Geo: Haward Adshead
s^-' '
Of this Work only Five Hundred Copies
are issued, of which this is
No.
Rush-Bearing :
AN ACCOUNT OF THE OLD CUSTOM OF STREWING RUSHES
CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCH; THE RUSH-CART;
GARLANDS IN CHURCHES; MORRIS-DANCERS;
THE WAKES ; THE RUSH.
BY
ALFRED BURTON.
' Many precious rites and customs of our rural ancestry are gone, or stealing from us."
— // 'onisworth.
MANCHESTER: BROOK & CHRYSTAL.
i 8 9 i .
Contents.
PAGE
Rush-Strewing in Houses, i
Rush-Strewing in Churches, - 13
Carrying Rushes to Church, - 24
The Rush-Cart, ... 39
Garlands in Churches, - - 89
The Morris-Dancers, - 95
The Wakes, - - - 147
The Rush, - - - 166
Index, - - - 183
List of Subscribers, • ... 1S5
511655
LIB SETS
Jntrofcmction.
ANY of our old customs are fading away
into the dim mists of antiquity, and all but
the name will soon be forgotten. This is
much to be regretted, because they were attended with
a great deal of pure enjoyment, and were looked for-
ward to by the people for weeks before the event.
One of these is the old custom of strewing rushes, and
its attendant ceremony of the rush-bearing, with its
quaint rush-cart and fantastic morris-dancers. Once
common to the whole country, it now lingers only in a
few isolated places, principally in the hill districts of
Lancashire and Yorkshire. Many scattered notices of
the custom occur, but no general description, and it
would therefore seem that the time has come when some
effort should be made to place on record what is known,
before the knowledge of it fades from the recollection
of the passing generation, to illustrate the subject with
such views as actual representations of existing speci-
viii INTRODUCTION.
mens afford, before the custom itself becomes obsolete,
and, "like an unsubstantial pageant faded," leaves not
a trace behind. Although a dozen or more rush-carts
could be met with twenty-five years ago, now the
country has to be ransacked to find one, and that a
mere caricature of the once well-built, well-dressed
cart of former times, accompanied by a few young men
whose attempts to dance, the morris show how rapidly
it is being forgotten.
In the following pages no attempt has been made to
write a high-flown imaginary description of a picturesque
pageant, but to give such reliable historical information
as can be obtained, supplemented by descriptions of the
custom as practised in various parts of the country, and
existing instances. The illustrations, it is believed, will
give a good idea of its main features, and serve to show
the succeeding generation how their ancestors turned
simple customs into amusement, enjoyment, and a
general periodical holiday.
The saying,
" By many strokes the work is done
That could not be performed by one,"
is as applicable to book-writing as house-building, and
as the following work, some of the materials for which
have been gathered nearly twenty years, has been
INTR OD UCTION. i x
principally compiled (for in the nature of such a work
a compilation it must necessarily be) during the inter-
vals of a long and, at times, severe illness, I must
confess it does not come up to the standard I had set
before me, but failing health warns me that I had
better place on record such information as I had already
got rather than run the risk of losing the whole by
striving to complete an ideally perfect whole. I have
to thank Mr. \Y. H. Allmit, of the Bodleian Library,
Oxford, for quotations I could not obtain in Man-
chester ; to Mr. J. J. Alexander, of jS, King Street,
Manchester, I am indebted for much assistance in
obtaining some of the illustrations, verifying references,
etc. ; to Mr. William Andrews, f.r.h.s., Secretary of
the Hull Literary Club, I am under many obligations,
as well as for the loan of " A Lancashire Rush-cart,"
which appeared in his valuable " Curiosities of
the Church," and whose " Old-time Punishments,"
just published, bids fair to surpass it. To Mr. Morgan
Brierley, of Denshaw House, I am obliged for
notices of the custom in his neighbourhood. Mr. f.
Lawton, of St. Chad's, Saddleworth, willingly allowed
me to reproduce his picture of " Saddleworth Rush-
bearing." For the beautiful plate of the "Rush-bearing
at Borrowdale," I am indebted to the late Llewellynn
x INTR OD UCTION.
[ewitt, f.s.a. Mr. T. Oliver, artist, of 8, King Street,
Manchester, has rendered me great assistance with his
pencil, and considerably enriched these pages. Mr.
C. W. Sutton, of the Free Reference Library, Man-
chester, has afforded me much help in my researches
there. Lastly, to Messrs. W. & R. Chambers, Messrs.
Chatto & Windus, the proprietors of the " Art Journal "
and " The Graphic," I am indebted for permission to
use illustrations which have appeared in their works,
and which are dulv set forth in the text.
J
Alfred Burton.
October, 1890.
;^*gs^
l^US^-BEA^I^Q.
IRusb^strewino in Ifoouees.
N former times the floors of houses were com-
posed of nothing more than the earth, well
beaten and smoothed ; those of the better
sort were usually paved with tiles or flags,
and very little care appears to have been bestowed upon
cleanliness, as far as the floor was concerned, except that
it was occasionally strewn with fresh rushes, sometimes,
as a refinement, mixed with sweet herbs and flowers. I n
Thos. Newton's " Herball to the Bible," 1587 : " Sedge
and rushes, with the which many in the country do use in
Sommer time to strawe their parlours and churches, as
well for cooleness as for pleasant smell " are mentioned.
The species preferred was the Calamus aromaticus,
which, when bruised, gives forth an odour resembling that
of the myrtle ; in its absence, inferior kinds were used.
Even the palaces of royalty were frequently strewn
with rushes, straw, or hay. William the Conqueror
granted certain lands at Aylesbury to one of his
followers on condition of " Finding straw for the bed of
our lord the king, and to straw his chamber, and by
paying three eels to our lord the king when he should
come to Aylesbury in winter. And also finding for the
king, when he should come to Aylesbury in summer,
straw for his bed, and, moreover, grass or rushes
c
2 RUSH-BEARING.
to strew his chamber, and also paying two green geese;
and these services aforesaid he was to perform thrice a
year, if the king should happen to come three times to
Aylesbury, and not oftener." *
King John, in 1207, slept at the house of Robert
de Leveland, at Westminster ; and the Barons of the
Exchequer were directed to pay for the straw bought
on account of the visit of the king. A charge was
made in the "Household Roll of Edward II." for
John de Carleford making a journey from York to
Newcastle, for a supply of rushes for strewing the
king's chamber ; and according to the " Household
Book of Edward IV." the groom of the chamber was
to bring daily "rushes and litter for the paylettes all
the year."t In many of the larger manor-houses an
officer, termed the " rush-strewer," was kept, whose
duty it was to keep the hall floor duly supplied with
fresh rushes. " lvi. The proper officers are, between
six and seven o'clock in the morning, to make the fire
in and straw the King's privy chamber." \ Some old
houses had the lower part of the door cut away to
admit of the rushes for the floor extending to the
threshold, the latter being raised a few inches to pre-
vent the wind from rushing in at the opening thus
made.
The vast number of rushes brought into London
for the purpose of strewing the floors became such a
nuisance that as early as 14 16 it had been ordered that
all rushes laden in boats or skiffs, and brought to London
for sale, should be sold by the cartload, and made
up in the boats, not on the wharves near the Thames,
under a heavy penalty; and again, in 1419, "that the
rishbotes at the Flete and elsewhere in London should
be taken into the hands of the Chamberlain, and the
Chamberlain should cause all the streets to be
* See Blount's "Tenures of Land," 1679.
+ Parker's "Ancient Domestic Architecture," 1853, vol. 2, p. 101.
J "Household Orders of Henry VIII."
R USH-STRE WING IN HO USES. 3
cleansed." # " Green rushes, O," was long one of the cries
of London, but is now remembered only in a song.
John Lydgate, a monk of Bury St. Edmunds, who
wrote, about the middle of the 15th century, a quaint
old ballad called " London Lyckpenny," or Lackpenny,
says that in his peregrinations "One cryde mackerell,
ryster [rushes] grene, an other gan greete;" and in a
small folio collection of London Street Cries now in
the British Museum, supposed to be of the time of
Charles II., " Buy any Russes ?" occurs. These rushes
were used for strewing on the floors of the houses of
the citizens.
Sir Thomas More (1483) describes Elizabeth, the
widowed Queen of Edward IV., when in the Sanctuary
at Westminster, as "sitting alone amongst the Rushes
in her grief and distress."
At the christening of the Lady Elizabeth, 25 Henry
VIII. (1533-4), "all the walles betwene the King's
Place and the Fryars were hanged with Arras, and all
the way strewed with rushes."^
In a MS. account of the submission of Shane
O'Neale, on Twelfth Day, 4 Elizabeth (1562), pre-
served in the Carew MS. in the Archiepiscopal Library
at Lambeth Palace, mention is made of the creation as
earl of Con O'Neale, 34 Henry VIII. (1542-3). The
account of the ceremony states that " ffirst the Oueenes
closett at Greenwiche was richlie hanged w c cloth of
Arras and well strewed w t rushes.'' 1
Queen Elizabeth appears to have been the last
monarch whose palace was strewn with rushes. In
the description of an interview with the Queen at the
palace of Placentia, Greenwich, in 1 598, which appears
in the travels of Paul Hentzner, a German, it is stated :
" We were admitted, by an order Mr. Rogers had pro-
cured from the Lord Chamberlain, into the presence-
*Govett's "King's Book of Sports," 1890, p. 59.
tHarl. MSS., 1107.
4 RUSH-BEARING.
chamber, hung with rich tapestry, and the floor after
the English fashion strewed with hay (rushes), through
which the Queen commonly passes in her way to the
chapel." #
"When Henry III., King of France, demanded of
Monsieur Dandelot what especial things he had noted
in England during the time of his negotiation there,
he answered that he had seen but three things re-
markable, which were, that the people did drinke in
bootes, eate rawe fish, and strcived all their best roomes
with hay; meaning blacke jacks, oysters, and rushes." t
" The strewing of rushes when guests were expected
was deemed a token of respect. The wits of the
Elizabethan age had an old saying, to the effect that
many strewed green rushes for a stranger who would
not give one to a friend. It was deemed an act of
politeness to cover the floor with fresh rushes for a
guest, and if this were not done the host was said not
to care a rush for him." \
" Strangers have green rushes, when daily guests
Are not worth a rush."
—Lily, "Sappho and F/iao."
It is true that in the romance of " Twaine and Gawin"
we read :
" When he unto chamber yede,
The chamber flore, and als ye beds,
With klathes of gold were al over spred;"
but although floor carpets were sometimes used in the
chambers, this was uncommon, and they seem to have
been more usually, like the hall, strewed with rushes.
It appears that sometimes, as a refinement in gaiety,
flowers were mixed with the rushes. In a fabliau in
Meon (i, 75), a lady, who expects her lover, lights a
* Brayley's "Graphic and Historical Illustrator," 1834, p. 199.
f'Wits, Fits, and Fancies," 4to, 1614.
J Andrews' "Curiosities of the Church," 1S90, p. 54.
R USH-STRE 1 1 r ING IN NO USES. 5
fire in the chamber, and spreads rushes and flowers on
the floor :
" Vient a l'ostel, lo few esclaire,
Jons et flors espandre par l'aire." *
Bradshaw, in his "Life of St. Werburgh " (1500),
writes :
"All Herbes and flowres fragrant, fayre and swete
Were strewed in halls, and layed under theyre fete.''
Froissart, relating the death of Gaston, Count de
Foix, says that the count went to his chamber, which
he found ready strewed with rushes and green leaves,
and the walls were hung with boughs, newly cut, for
perfume and coolness, as the. weather was marvellously
hot. Adam Davie, Marshall of Stratford-le-Bow, who
wrote about the year 131 2, in his poem of the " Life
of Alexander," describing the marriage of Cleopatra,
says :
" There was many a blithe grome ;
Of olive, and of ruge floures,
Weren y strewed halls and bowres ;
With samytes and bawdekyns,
Weren curtayned the gardyns."
Frequent references occur in the works of the old
dramatists to the custom of freshly strewing rushes for
a guest. In the " Taming of the Shrew" Grumio asks:
"Is the supper ready, the house trimm'd,
rushes strew'd', cobwebs swept ? "
and in " Katherine and Petruchio," Act iv., Scene 1, it
is asked :
"Are the rushes strewn?"
In the old play of the "Two Noble Kinsmen," the
gaoler's daughter is represented carrying " strewings
* Wright's " History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments," 1S62, p. 246.
6 RUSH-BEARING.
for the two prisoners' chambers." Again, in Beaumont
and Fletcher's " Valentinian," n., 4:
"Where is this stranger? Rushes, ladies, rushes,
Rushes as green as summer for this stranger."
Heywood's "Dialogue," etc. (1576), also has "To
strew green rushes for a stranger;" and Hazlitt # says
the saying is still current in Cornwall.
The custom of strewing rushes in the way where
processions were to pass is attributed by poets to all
times and all countries. Shakespeare alludes to it at
the coronation of Henry; when the procession is re-
turning the grooms cry :
" More rushes, more rushes ! "
—Henry IV., Act V, Sc. 5.
Braithwaite's "Strappado for the Divell," (1615), has:
"All haile to Hymen and his Marriage Day !
Strew Rushes, and quickly come away ;
Strew Rushes, Maides, and ever as you strew,
Think one day, Maides, like will be done for you."
William Browne, in his " Britannia's Pastorals" (1625),
1., 2, in a description of a wedding, writes :
" Full many maids, clad in their best array,
In honour of the bride, come with their flaskets
Fill'd full with flowers : others in wicker baskets
Bring forth the marish rushes, to o'erspread
The ground whereon to church the lovers tread."
A correspondent, writing to the "Gentleman's
Magazine," t in 1782, says that in "riding through
Abingdon, in Berks, early on one of the first Sundays
in October, I found the people in the street at the
entrance of the town very busy in adorning the outside
of their houses with boughs of trees and garlands of
*" English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases," 18S2, p. 359.
tVol. 52, p. 558.
R USH-STRE WING IN HO USES. 7
flowers, and the paths were strewed with rushes. One
house was distinguished by a greater number of gar-
lands than the rest, and some were making to be fixed
at the ends of poles. On enquiring the reason, I was
told that it was usual to have this ceremony performed
in the street in which the new mayor lived, on the first
Sunday that he went to church after his election."
This custom has long ceased in Abingdon.
At York, on the Friday after Corpus Christi Day,
the clergy and corporation, bearing banners and lighted
torches, perambulated the streets, the houses being
decorated with tapestry and other hangings, and the
road strewed with rushes and flowers.
The straw and rushes were often allowed to accumu-
late in the houses until they became rotten and offen-
sive, a fresh strewing serving to hide the filth beneath.
Noblemen were in the habit of removing from one
dwelling - to another whilst the house was cleansed ;
whilst the lesser gentry frequently erected bowers in
the summer whilst the rushes in the hall were turned
out. An old author, writing in 151 1, thus speaks of a
custom which existed on "God's son-daye," or Easter
Day : " Ye know well that it is the maner at this daye
to do the fire out of the hall, and the black wynter
brondes, and all things that is foule with fume and
smoke shall be done awaye ; and there the fire was
shall be gayly arrayed with fayre flowres, and strewed
with green ryshes all about." This process was termed
"going to sweeten." The most pitiful complaints were
made by Lord Paget to Edward VI. 's privy council,
because, being in disgrace, he was confined to Beau-
desert, which, he assured them, "though pretty, was
too small, and had withal become, by some months'
residence, horribly unsavoury, and could not be sweet-
ened without the removal of his family." The refined
feelings of Thomas a Beckett prompted him to keep
* Miss Strickland's " Lives of the Queens of England," 1842, vol. 5, p. 424.
8 RUSH-BEARING.
his house in a clean and tasteful state: "for his Hall
was every daye in Somer season strewed with grene
Russhes, and in Wynter with clene Hey, for to save
the Knyghtes' clothes that sate on the Flore for defaute
of place to syt on." # The author of the "Life of
Olaus Tryggv," speaking of Thorleifer, one of the Yule
guests of Haquin, Earl of Norway, says :
"Selst han nidr ictarliga i halmimr,"
(He sat down on the last straw),
an expression which, however, might seem to imply the
use of bundles of straw, as the primitive predecessors
of a more artificial convenience for repose, were it not
otherwise proved to be the practice to employ straw as
a covering for the floors, t It was thought to be a
piece of unnecessary luxury on the part of Wolsey
when he wisely caused the rushes at Hampton Court
to be changed every day.
In the time of Queen Mary the floor was neither
swept nor washed, but received a fresh strewing of
rushes, which accumulated layer above layer, mixed with
the bones and droppings from the table. Erasmus, in
a letter to Dr. Francis, physician to Cardinal Wolsey,
describing the interior of common dwellings in the
reign of Henry VIII., says :
"As to the floors, they are usually made of clay, covered with
rushes that grow in fens, which are so slightly removed now and then
that the lower part remains sometimes for twenty years together, and
in it a collection of filthiness not to be named. Hence, upon a
change of weather, a vapour is exhaled, very pernicious, in my opinion,
to the human body. I am persuaded it would be far more
healthful if the use of these rushes were quite laid aside, and the
chambers so built as to let in the air on two or three sides, with such
glass windows as might cither be thrown quite open or kept quite
shut, without small crannies to let in the wind, for as it is useful
sometimes to admit a free air, so it is sometimes to exclude it."
* "The Festyvall," 1528.
tHampson's "Medii Mvi Kalendarium," 1841, vol. 1, p. 340.
R USH-STRE 1 VI NG IN HO USES. 9
When room was required for dancing :
"To mince it with a mission, tracying a pavion or galliardo
uppon the rushes," *
a circle was swept clear in the centre of the hall floor,
a custom mentioned by the early dramatists in the call
of "a hall, a hall." Shakespeare, in "Romeo and
Juliet," Act 1., Sc. 5 :
"A hall! a hall! give room, and foot it girls;"
and in Nicholas Brereton's "Workes of a Young Wit,"
1577:
"And then a hall, for dancers must have room."
Marston, in his "Scourge of Villanie," 1599, 8vo, also
says :
"A hall, a hall ;
Roome for the spheres, the Orbes Celestial]
Will daunce Kempe's Jigg."
Shakespeare has several allusions to the custom of
strewing- rushes on the floor :
" Let wantons, light of heart,
Tickle the senseless rushes with their feet."
— Romeo and Juliet, Act I, Sc. 4.
He also tells us how Tarquin
"being lighted, by the light he spies
Lucretia's glove, wherein her needle sticks,
He takes it from the rushes where it lies."
— Rape of Lucrece, IJ94-
and again, in "Cymbeline," Act 11., Sc. 2:
" Our Tarquin thus
Did softly press the rushes, ere he wakened
The chastity he wounded."
*"Riche his Farewell," 1581.
D
IO
R USH-BEARING.
In Ben Jonson's "Every Man out of his Humour,"
(in, 9) we find :
" Sweet lady, I do honour the meanest rush in this chamber
for your love ; "
but a contrary sentiment is in the " Dumb Knight,"
(O. PL iv., 475) :
" Thou dancest on my heart, lascivious queen,
Ev'n as upon these rushes which thou treadest."
A remarkable proof of the custom of laying rushes
on the floor is contained in a manuscript " History of
a moste horrible Murder corny ttyd at Fevershame in
Kente," in the reign of Edward VI., 1550. The
assassins, having strangled and stabbed Master Arden,
" toke a clowt and wyped where it was blowdy, and
strewyd agayne ye rashes that were shuffled w th
strugglinge." The rushes were among the means which
led to the detection and conviction of the murderers.
The mayor of Feversham and some of the townsmen
discovered the body in a field, and "than they lokynge
about hym, found some rushes of ye parlour sticky nge
in his slippars," whence they concluded that he had
been slain in a house, and not where the body was
discovered." #
In August, 1600, an attempt was made to assassinate
James VI. of Scotland, at Gowrie House. After the
affray one of the gentlemen who had accompanied the
king "found a silk garter lying among the bent or
roueh crass with which the floor of the round chamber
was covered." t
The practice of strewing rushes on the floors in
private houses is noticed by Dr. Johnson from " Caius
de Ephemera Britannica." It was extremely wide-
spread, and is mentioned in Weinhold's "Die Deutschen
*Harl. MSS., 542, fo. 31, 376.
tTytlcr's "History of Scotland," 8vo edition, 1879, vol. 4, p. 296, col. 1.
X USH-STRE WING IN HO USES. 1 1
Frauen in Mittelalter," Wien, 1851, p. 340. Liebricht,
in his " Gervase of Tilbury," 1856, p. 60, advances the
conjecture that this custom is probably a remnant of
some heathen rite, and this supposition is confirmed by
an observation of A. D. Kuhn, in his "Westphal
Sagen," etc., Leipsic, 1859, vol. 11., p. 1 ro, in reference
to an old Hindoo custom. Swift also remarks
on the practice in the " Polite Conversations,"
dialogue 1. #
The strewing of rushes in houses is now obsolete, -
though the custom lingered on till well in the present
century. I remember one old farmhouse in Cheshire,
where, twenty-five years ago, the parlour, which had a
flagged floor, was strewn on the 1st of May with green
rushes, over which sprigs of lavender and rosemary
were scattered. The huge fireplace was filled with
green boughs, stuck in jugs, and plants, the old
room having a most refreshing smell on being
entered.
Mr. William Andrews informs me that the custom
of strewing the floors with rushes is still practised at
the Hull Trinity House. No date is fixed for the
removal of the old rushes and the strewing of fresh
ones, which takes place as often as the rushes are dirty,
and there is no ceremony attending it.
Hone, in his "Year Book," p. 725, speaks of the
boarded floor of Trinity House, Deptford, being
strewed with green rushes on the occasion of the visit
of the Brethren of Trinity House, during the fair in
1825. The town hall at Liskeard, in Cornwall, was
strewed with rushes on particular occasions, as late as
1842.
The English stage was strewed with rushes in
Shakespeare's time ; + and the Globe Theatre was
roofed with rushes, or as Taylor, the " water-poet,"
* "Works," London, 1801, vol. 1, p. 280.
t Reed's " Shakspere," vol. 9., p 331.
1 2 R USH-BEARING.
describes it, the old theatre "had a thatched hide," and
it was through the rushes in the roof taking fire that
the first Globe Theatre was burnt down. Killigrew
told Pepys, in 1667, how he had improved the stage
from a time when there was " nothing but rushes upon
the ground, and everything else mean." To the rushes
succeeded matting.
1Ru0fo*6trewing in Churches
EATS were not provided in churches until the
fifteenth century, and the floors being flag-
ged made the feet of the worshippers exces-
sively cold after long standing, particularly
in winter. Much kneeling, also, was required by the ser-
vice, and some softer material became necessary, as
cushions could only be provided by the most wealthy.
The material found most suitable in the dwellings of the
people was equally available for use in the church, and
rushes were used as a covering for the floor from a very
early period.
The Tailors' Guild at Salisbury was under the
patronage of St. John ; wherefore, they decreed "that
the two stewardis for the time being, every yere, shall
make and sette afore Seynt John ye Baptist, upon the
awter, two tapers of one lb of wex, and a garland of
Roses, to be sette upon Seynt John's hed, and that the
chaple be strewed with green rushes." #
In Harl. MSS., 2103, fo. 81, is an order by the
visitors deputed by the Archbishop of York to enquire
into the state of the church of St. Oswald, Chester,
and its fitness for the celebration of divine service :
"27 August, 1633, . . . upon a diligent view taken by the said
commissioners of the said church of St. Oswald, it did appeare unto
them that the said church was very undecent and unseemely, the
stalls thereof being patched and peced, and some broken, and some
higher than other ; and that the said church was much defiled wth
rushes and other filthiness, The said commissioners did order and
* Friend's "Flowers and Flower Lore," 1886, p. 600.
1 4 R USH-BEARING.
enjoyne the said churchwardens to cause the rushes and other
filthiness forthwth to bee taken out of the same church . . . and
that the same Stalls should bee decently flagged or boarded over."
The church at Kirkham, Lancashire, was flagged
24th July, 1634; and in 1781 wood forms, instead of
rushes, were put into the church to kneel upon. At
Saddleworth the church floor was covered with these
substitutes for flags and matting till the year 1826,
when the church was paved for the first time. Bishop
Law visited that curious fabric a few years prior to that
time, and on seeing the rushes spread over the floor
said, " I would not lodge my horse in this place," -a
remark which was keenly felt by the churchwardens. #
The first wooden floor was of boards, two inches thick
and eighteen inches wide, laid on oak sleepers, to
which, however, they were not attached either by pegs
or nails, resting by their weight. It was removed
about seventeen years ago. Down to the year 1820,
the floor of Castleton Church, Derbyshire, was un-
paved, and covered with rushes. The floor of Pilling
Church, Lancashire, was covered with rushes till about
the year 1868.
Heybridge Church, near Maldon, Essex, was for-
merly strewn with rushes ; and round the pews, in
holes made apparently for the purpose, w r ere placed
small twigs just budding, t
The custom of taking these rushes to church
gradually developed into a religious festival, and al-
though some writers deny that there is any connection
between the rush-bearing and the wakes, or feast of the
dedication of the church to some saint, the evidence is
overwhelming that the custom of annually renewing
the rushes did take place at that time, for although
instances occur in which the rush-bearing, and also the
wakes, do take place at a different time to the saint's
* Raines MSS. (Chetham Library, Manchester), vol. i, p. 165.
t "Notes and Queries," 2nd series, vol. 1, p. 471.
RUSH-STREWING IN CHURCHES. 15
day to whom the church is dedicated, yet it should be
remembered that some wakes have been altered for
local reasons. It is said of one village in Cheshire that
the clerk gave out in the churchyard : " Th' wakes will
not be held till th' week after next, as farmer has
not got in his hay;" and this postponement till a day
more convenient to the parishioners has taken place in
more than one instance. On one occasion, William
Shawcross, of the " George and Dragon " Inn, Gorton,
altered the wakes until Eccles wakes Sunday, when,
consequently, few strangers visited Gorton, to the no
small chagrin of the wakes ruler, who declared that
henceforth, "let what come go," he would never inter-
fere with the wakes time again. In March, 1884, an
agitation was got up in Stockport in favour of holding
the wakes on an early day in August instead of the end
of September. In 1885 both dates were kept ; but
though the battle of the wakes raged for two or three
years the old one won the day, the people preferring
the "old original." At Disley, in Cheshire, the wakes
is said to have been formerly held after the first fall
of snow.
As the wake was a religious festival, always com-
mencing on Sunday, fresh rushes would be deemed
necessary for the occasion. The getting of the rushes
at such a time and bearing them to church would
naturally lead to some drinking and merrymaking ;
rivalry between the various townships in a parish would
take place, and so the bundle of rushes would come to
be decorated, the cart containing the rushes made
ornamental, garlands of flowers obtained to decorate
the church, till the rush-bearing at last became a pictur-
esque spectacle.
The rushes for the church were provided at the cost
of the parishioners, at the instance of the church-
wardens ; and where there were more than one town-
ship in the parish, each took it in turn for one year at
1 6 RUSH-BEARING.
its own cost, as a difficulty sometimes arose as to the
proportion to be borne by each township when done
collectively. At Newton Chapel, near Manchester,
the flooring being of clay, the pews were well carpeted
with rushes, which were yearly renewed by each town-
ship in its turn, at the wakes. These were Newton,
Failsworth, Moston, and Droylsden, but the latter has
ceased to attend, having now a church of its own, and
also holds its wakes at a different time to the other
three. In the Churchwardens' Accounts of Padiham,
under date 18 May, 1730, there is a
" Mem'dm. — That it was then agreed that the Inhabitants of each
Township or Liberty contributing to bringing Rishes to the Church
or Chappell of Padiham, each place bringing Rishes once in four
years respectively for that particular place, shall bear the Charges of
the Rishes bringing without charging the other Towns.
Witness our
" Hen. Kirkham. Tho. Whitaker.
John Bridge. R. Webster.
John Hitchon. Lra. Pollard.
William Robinson. John Whitehead."
Du Cange explains "Juncare — locum floribus vel
juncis spargere. J uncus, majoribus festis sparsus in
ecclesia et alibi. Consuetudines MSS. Sancti Augustini
Lemovicensis : 'In festo Augustinii . . . propositus
debet recipere juncum, qui dcbctur ex consuetudine ad
parandum chorum et capitulum.' : Here was clearly,
in this case, an obligation, derived from long usage, on
the neighbouring farms and farmers to bring in con-
tributions of freshly-cut rushes for the festival of the
local saint.
At the bishop's visitation, 23rd October, 1622,
Robert Aughton, of Penwortham, was presented as
contumacious " for not bearing Rushes with his towne
to the churche." # On the 26th September, 1623, John
Bell, Henry Knowle, Henry Walker, and Richard
* Raines MSS., vol. 22, p. 190.
RUSH-STREWING IN CHURCHES. 17
Birches, the churchwardens of Garstang, were sum-
moned before the bishop on the charge of having
warned the parishioners (under a penalty of ten groats
a household) to bring rushes to the church on the
Sunday, whereas St. James' Day was the day of rush-
bearing appointed by the bishop. They had also
neglected to " decently flag the church," and had failed
to provide bread and wine according to the canon. #
The sexton, as a rule, was the person who had to
see to the cleansing of the church of the old rushes.
In 1 68 1, 1 os. per annum additional was allowed to
Thomas Bishop, the sexton at Kirkham, for bringing
rushes into the church ; and in the Churchwardens'
Accounts, Padiham, 5 June, 1652, there is a regulation
for this work being done :
" It was thought fitt and agreed by ye Inhabitants of ye P'sh
church of Padiham that whosoever recyveth ye some of 6s. yearly for
sweepinge ye Alleys in church & that shall receive 2s. yearly for
clensinge ye church of ould rushes & Sweepinge against new rushes
come in shall do it duely, viz. ye Alleys weekly and also ye gutters of
ye church & ye pypes of lead to be clensed as often as neede shall
requyre."
There is also an entry in the Frodsham Town Accounts :
" 1630. Paid to Robert Raborne for getting out the old rushes of
the church, 00 ,, 00 ,, viijd."
The Churchwardens' Accounts at Burnley contain
several items for cleansing the church and getting out
old rushes :
" : 733"4- P a id Barnes [the sexton] for dressing
the church at the Rushburying - 010
1734-5. Paid do. for dressing Church at
Rushbearing - - - -010
1754. Sexton dressing rushes out - 010
1760-1. To cleansing church at Rushbearing- o 1 o
1778. To William Parker for carrying a Cart
load of Rushes into Church - -010."
* Fishwick's "History of Garstang," 1877-9, PP- 2 72-3-
E
1 8 RUSH-BEARING.
Du Cange notices the custom, and cites a monastic
manuscript in which it is stated that the almoner was
bound to find rushes for the choir and cloister on the
greater festivals.*
The following extracts from various Churchwardens'
Accounts show not only the antiquity but the prevalence
of the custom all over the country :
"1408. For one trusse of stree - - - vid.
1427. For rushes at Easter - - vid.
„ For straw at Chrystmas - - - ixd.
1599. Payd for rosmarye and bayes ye whole yeare t is. vid.
,, For a load of green rushes - - viiid.
1638. Payde the Clarke for strewings at Christmas is.
— All Saints', Bristol.
1493. For 3 Burdens of rushes for ye new pews - 3d.
1504. Paid for 2 Berden Rysshes for the strewing
the newe pewes - - - - 3d.
— St. Mary-at-Hill, London.
15 1 5. Paid for twelve burden of rushes for the
White Hall - - - 13s.
1544. Paid for rushes against the dedication day,
which is always the 1st Sunday in October is. 5d.
— St. Margaret's, Westminster.
1546. For rysshes in festo Pasce - - iiijd.
,, ryngyng at Ester - - - viijd.
rysshes at Wytsontyd - - - vjd.
„ „ Mydsomer - - - viijd.
1 55 1. ,, rushyes in festo omn' sanctor' - vjd.
1552. „ russhes against All Hallowtyde - xd.
,, „ ryngyng on All Hallow's nyght - xvjd.
(These entries are in every instance associated with charges for
ringing the Cathedral Bells.)
1584. To Edward Griffith for boughs, rishes, and
other thinges, at what time the Earle of
Leicester came hither - - xviijs. ijd.
— Treasurer's Accounts, Chester Cathedral.
* Glossary in voc. "Juncus."
t These were probably lo strew in the church on days of Humiliation and
Thanksgiving, when it was the custom to strew churches with herbs and flowers.
The Greeks have a custom at the present day of strewing the floors of their churches
with sprigs of myrtle, which give a peculiar crispness and freshness to the atmos-
phere.
5>
)) 5)
RUSH-STREWING IN CHURCHES. 19
" x 595- Gave for wine to the Rushbearers 3s. 8d.
1 599. Gave for wine to those who brought
Rushes from Buglawton to our chapel 3s. od.
1607. To the Rushbearers, wine, ale, & cakes - 6s. od.
— Congleton Town Accounts.
1623. Item, spent at the Rushbearinge - - viijd.
1626. Item, spent in fetchinge in Bybles, and at
the Rushbearinge ... xixd.
— Churchwardens' Accounts, Prestbury.
1767. Oct. 22. Pd. to the Rush Cart - 02 6d.
1785. Paid Cart load of Rushes - -060
— Rosthorne.
162 1. Paid for dressinge the church against the
Rushbearinge - ijs.
1625. Paid for sweeping and rubbing the pues
and formes in the church - - iijs. iiijd.
1 661. Paid for getting forth of all the mats,
rushes, and makinge the church cleane
against the Rushbearinge - - 3s. od.
1663. Spent the 15th day of August in attending
to see good order at the Rushbearinge 4d.
1670. Paid for moeing and getting of Rushes to
dress the church - - - is. od.
„ Paid for sweeping the Church before the
Rushbearing - - - - 2s. od.
1679. Spent on ye Rushbearing on those which
come to prevent disorder in the church 2s. od.
1685. Paid for the Rushbearing, of the Parish-
ioners and others for their pains - 7s. 6d.
— Wilmslow.
1603. Rushes to strew the church - - ixs. vjd.
1632. Paid for perfuming the church - - xxxs.
,, ,, ,, carrying the rushes out of the
church in the sickness time - - vs.
1776. Paid to the sexton for rushing the church xs.
— Toivn Accounts, Kirkham.
Item, Pd. Clarke for sweping church,
getting out Rushes, &c. - - 00 10 iod.
1642. Paid for getting out Rishes and sweep-
ing Church - - - 00 05 ood.
1649. ffor ringynge on the Rushberinge day - 00 01 00
2 o R USH-BEARING.
"1657. A shilling disallowed
17 1 7. Pd. Saxon for carrying Rushes into
church - - - - 00 01 00
— Churchwardens' Accounts, Rochdale.
1749. Pd. at rush cart for ale - - is. 8d.
— Castleton.
1768-9. Paid to the Rush Cart - - 2s. 6d.
1769. Forr the rush cart 2s. 6d.
— Hayfield.
1662. Getting and leading rushes for ye
church against ye Bishopp came - 6s. od.
1664. Getting and leading rushes for ye
churche against ye Bishop came - is. 6d.
— Leekr
At Hailsham, in Sussex, charges are made in the
Churchwardens' Accounts for strewing the church floor
with straw or rushes, according to the season of the
year ; and in the books of the city of Norwich are
entries for pea-straw used for a similar purpose. Up
to the passing of the Municipal Reform Act the town
clerk used to pay to the subsacrist of the cathedral a m
guinea a year for strewing the floor of the cathedral
with rushes on the Mayor's Day, from the western door
to the entrance into the choir. At Hardley, in Norfolk,
there are entries in the Churchwardens' Accounts for
strewing the church with rushes. They commence in
the year 1709, and the last is in 1736. The amount
paid was 3s. a year, but in some years it is entered in
half-yearly payments. After 1736 there is an annual
sum of 3s. for mats.
The charity of our ancestors flowed in any channel
which led to the service of the church, and the provision
of " strewings " for the church floor was not omitted,
either by gift or will. The " Reports of the Charity
Commissioners " afford several instances.
The Corporation of Bristol pay at Whitsuntide " for
ringing and strewing rushes in the church, 3s. \&. The
R USII-STRE WING IN CHUR CUES. 2 1
mayor and a part of the corporation go to Redcliffe
church on Whitsunday, when the church is strewed
with rushes." -"Charity Reports," viii., p. 607.
At Clee, Lincolnshire, the "parish possesses a right
of cutting rushes from a piece of land, the property of
Richard Thorold, Esq., called ' Bescars,' for the pur-
pose of strewing the floor of the church every Trinity
Sunday. A small quantity of grass is annually cut to
preserve the right." -" Ibid," xxxii., pt. iv., p.
422.
At Deptford, Kent, "The table of benefactions states
that a person unknown gave half a quarter of wheat, to
be given in bread every Good Friday, and half a load
of rushes at Whitsuntide, and a load of pea-straw at
Christmas yearly, for the use of the church. By a
decree of the Commissioners for Charitable Uses, dated
4th March, 6 James I. (1609), it was ordered that the
owners of three parts of land, whereof one was called
Lady Crofts, should from thenceforth for ever deliver
and distribute, every Good Friday, amongst the poor
people of Deptford, all the bread which might be made
and baked of half a quarter of good wheat ; and should
likewise yearly deliver at Whitsuntide half a load of
good green rushes, and at Christmas one good load of
new grass straw, in the pews of the church at Deptford.
The land charged is Brookley farm. By an order of
the vestry, 17 April, 1721, it appears that William
Wilkinson offered 21s. per annum for the time to come,
in lieu of pea-straw and rushes, which offer was accepted,
and since the year 1744, 10s. has been received in lieu of
the half quarter of wheat. The two sums of 21s. and
10s. are regularly paid, and distributed in bread."
" Ibid," xxx., p. 618.
At Wingrave, Bucks, "there is a piece of land, of
about three roods of meadow, left for the purpose of
furnishing rushes for the church on the feast Sunday.
It is let to Mr. Thomas Cook, at a rent of 21s. a year,
22 RUSH-BEARING.
which is received by the parish clerk, who provides
grass to strew the church, on the village feast day,
which is the first Sunday after St. Peter's day
(29 June)." — " Ibid," xxvii., p. 108.
At Glenfield, Leicestershire, "A close, called the
Church Acre, was set out, on the inclosure of Glenfield,
in lieu of lands in the open fields, the rent of which has
always been paid to the clerk of the parish, as a part of
his salary. The land is situated near the village, and
is let to Joseph Ellis for 30s. a year. In respect of this
land the clerk is obliged to strew the church with new
hay on the first Sunday after the 5th of July, and for
this purpose he is allowed to take a cut of hay from off
the land. This practice is understood to be in com-
pliance with the will of the donor of the land." — "Ibid,"
xxxii., pt. x., p. 1 58.
At Old Weston, Huntingdonshire, "A piece of green
sward, of about a rood, in the open field, belongs by
custom to the parish clerk for the time being, subject
to the condition of the land being mown immediately
before Weston feast, which occurs in July, and the
cutting thereof being strewed on the church floor, pre-
viously to divine service on the feast Sunday, and con-
tinuing there during divine service."- -" Ibid," xxiv.,
p. 57. In August, 1886, the nave and aisle of the
church were covered on the feast day with grass cut
the previous day on the land bequeathed for that pur-
pose. This is said to be in accordance with a bequest
left by an old lady who disliked the noise of the rustics'
boots in coming into church.
Collinson, in his " History and Antiquities of the
County of Somerset," # speaking of Tatton, says that
"John Lane, of this parish, gent., left half an acre of
ground, called the Groves, to the poor for ever, reserv-
ing a quantity of the grass for strewing the church on
Whitsunday."
* 1791, vol. 3, p. 620.
RUSH-STREWING IN CHURCHES. 23
Rudder # also says that at South Cerney "was a
custom, which prevailed till lately, of strewing coarse
hay and rushes over the floor of the church, which is
called ' Juncare,' and the lands which were subject to
provide these materials now pay a certain sum of money
annually in lieu thereof."
Redcliffe Church, Bristol, is still adorned with flowers
and strewed with rushes on Whitsunday, in accordance
with the will of William Mede, who gave a tenement
in 1494 to defray the expense, and for a sermon, etc. +
Of the parish of Middleton Chenduit, in Northamp-
tonshire, Bridges \ writes : " It is a custom here to strew
the Church in summer with Hay gathered from six or
seven swaths in Ashmeadow, which have been given
for this purpose. The rector finds straw in winter."
* " History of Gloucestershire," 1779, p. 328.
t Taylor's " Bristol," p. 165.
X " History of Northamptonshire."
Carrying IRuebes to Cburcb.
RIGINALLY it seems to have been the prac-
tice for the parishioners to carry the rushes
to church in bundles. As the custom became
more of a festival, these were ornamented,
and were then borne by young men and maidens dressed
in their best attire, and bearing flowers to decorate
the church. This method prevailed all over the
country, but in South-East Lancashire a far more-
elaborate arrangement grew up. The rushes, which at
one time had been brought to church on sledges, formed
into the shape of a haystack, were placed in a cart, and
the ingenuity of the people soon made this into an
exceedingly novel and pleasing spectacle. Village vied
with village in the beauty and size of their rush-carts ;
rivalry led to expensive ornaments ; music and morris
dancers followed, till the rush-bearing became a pageant,
which once seen is rarely forgotten. Though common
objects at the wakes till about twenty years since, they
are now rare, and a few more years will probably see the
last. One cause is the going away from home to the
seaside of the people at the wakes, leaving their own
festival to take care of itself. The difficulty of obtain-
ing rushes, owing to the draining of the land, in suffi-
ciently large quantities to fill a cart, still less a waggon
as of olden time, has, in many places, led to the abandon-
ment of the custom. Few men are now to be found
who are able to build a rush-cart, or who have seen one
built ; and the labour required also is often considered
too much to be given for nothing.
CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCIf. 25
Many learned persons have attempted to trace the
origin of a very simple and easily-explained custom in
the mists of antiquity, and have attributed mystic
meanings to it, which, however, appear to exist only in
their own imagination. "A simple observation of the
Suio-Gothic etymologist, I lire, on the Scandinavian
Julhalm, or straw of Tule, dissipates the learned con-
jectures of antiquaries as to the origin of the custom of
strewing floors with straw and rushes. . . Rudbeck,
according to Hire, derives the Julhalm from the rites of
Ceres, while others suppose it to be a commemoration
of the Virgin and Child in the stable, but Hire more
reasonably ascribes it to a natural desire to keep the
feet warm, although, as he says, the custom was not
peculiar to the northern climates, since it was also
observed at festivals in France." #
Glover t says the custom was "undoubtedly a relic
of Druidism, as on the days of sacrifice we find that
the places consecrated to the worship of the ancient
British deities were strewn with rushes ;" but Hampson
(p. 343) more justly observes : "In the feast of the
dedication of the church, nothing seems more likely
than that the people should supply the building with
new rushes, and the ceremony of carrying them in pro-
cession on that day merely made a part of the ordinary
festivities."
In 1842, Mr. George Shaw, of Saddleworth, wrote
to some of the leading antiquaries in the country,
describing the custom, and asking their opinion as to
its origin. The following extract from a letter by Sir
Samuel Rush Meyrick, is dated at Goodrich Court,
7th February, 1842 :
"A thousand thanks for your clear and satisfactory representation
and account of the curious custom of Rush-bearing. But in an
Hampson's " Medi .<Evi Kalenckrium," 1841, vol. 1, p. 340.
T " History of Derbyshire," 1829, vol. I, p. 305.
CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCH. 27
appeal to me you depend on a Rush, for I cannot help you to any
information respecting my namesake. I know of nothing in the
practices of the Pagan Britons or Saxons, nor in their religious
ceremonies, that has" the least reference to its origin. Indeed, as
strewing the ground or floors with such materials in Temples which
have no other canopy hut the sky would have been a needless waste
of labour, we cannot look further hack than the Introduction of
Christianity, nor with any certainty before that was cstahlished as the
National worship. This brings us to the latter end of the 3d
and commencement of the 4th Century. With respect to a shrine
being the model, I can say nothing in corrohoration. The delutora
of the ancients were in the form of a boat, or an ordinary chest, as
the Ark of the Covenant. Of the boat-shape, or resemblance to a
sheer truck, we may still find traces in the Pelew Islands, New Zealand,
and other places in the South Seas. Now I myself have never seen
any Roman Catholic Shrines but what resemble the Nave of a Church
with its high pitched roof, from the Anglo-Saxon time to that of the
Fifteenth Century. I can easily imagine the Romish Clergy impress-
ing on their flocks that it was a meritorious act to supply rushes, and
that this, by degrees, created a rivalry, which, heightened by the
chivalrous feeling exerted from the willing aid of tasteful or anxious
sweethearts, would lead to great embellishment. The convex conical
form, it appears to me, would be suggested, ex necessitate rei, as the
sledge could hold but little unless the load were filled up in that
manner, and then long twigs (now succeeded by iron rods) at the
angles would be requisite to keep it from falling. Narrow gaps and
confined roads would prevent any idea of extending the burden
laterally. As to the Royal Arms, they would not be a decoration
before the period of the Reformation, previous to which, as each
Rush-bearing was designed for the Church, it might have displayed the
sign of the Cross.
"... The Puritan Magistrates and Ministers were opposed to
the ancient custom of bearing the Rushes to the Churches, probably
from the intemperance and indecorum which generally attended the
ceremony. In the Declaration which James 1st put forth in the 15th
year of his reign, whilst in Lancashire, it was ordered 'that Women
should have leave to carry Rushes to the Church, for the Decoring of
it according to their old custom.' * This was revived injudiciously
by Ch. 1., in 1635."
James I. no doubt made the Declaration referred
to through the representations of the people of Lanca-
shire when he visited the county in 161 7. The desired
license was granted to the people of Lancashire only,
* Fuller's "Church History," 6, x, p. 24.
2 8 R USH-BEARING.
but its extension to the whole of England, by the pub-
lication of the "Book of Sports," on the 24th May, 161 8,
from the Manor of Greenwich, was occasioned by a
misuse of his informal assent to the petition. During
his stay at Hoghton Tower he witnessed many Lanca-
shire amusements, amongst them a "rush-bearing," on
the 17th July.
In " Whimzies, or, a New Cast of Characters," 1631,
i2mo, a zealous brother, it is said, " denounceth a
heavie woe upon all Wakes, Summerings, and Rush-
bearings, preferring that an act whereby pipers were
made rogues, by Act of Parliament, before any in all
the Acts and Monuments /" and of a pedlar the author
says : "A Country Rush-bearing, or Morrice-Pastoral,
is his Festivall : if ever he aspire to plum-porridge, that
is the day. Here the guga-girles gingle it with his
neat nifles."
So also, in Brathwaite's "Art Asleepe Husband?:
A Boulster Lecture "( 1 640) we find: "Such an one
as not a Rush-bearer or May-morrish in all that Parish
could subsist without him."
A passage in a satirical work of the seventeenth
century (Clitus's " Whimzies," p. 132), speaking of a
country braggadocio, says : " His sovereignty is showne
highest at May games, wakes, summerings, and rush-
bearings ; where it is twentie to one but hee becomes
beneficial to the lord of the mannoure by meanes of a
bloody nose or a broken pate," — that is, fined for
breaking the peace.
At Donnington, in Lincolnshire, the ancient custom
of strewing church floors with rushes was some time
ago annually observed on St. Bartholomew's Day
(25th August). In the morning a number of maidens,
clad in their best attire, went in procession to a small
chapel then standing in the parish, and strewed the
floor with rushes ; they next proceeded to a piece of
land known as the " Play Garths," where they were
CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCH. 29
met by the inhabit; in ts, and the remainder of the day
was spent in rustic games. *
The custom of carrying bundles of rushes to decorate
the church is yet observed at Ambleside, Borrowdale,
and Grasmere, in the Lake District. By the kindness
of the late Llewellyn Jewitt, Esq., I am enabled to give
the plate of the Rush-bearing at Borrowdale, from the
" Life and Works of Jacob Thompson,"! together with
the following description of it. The picture is the pro-
perty of Richard Radcliffe, Esq., of Byrkley Lodge.
mm
"The companion picture [to the ' Vintage '] the 'Rush-bearing,'
is as thoroughly illustrative of North of England scenery as 'The
Vintage ' is of that of Northern Italy, and in conception, grouping,
and treatment the two will vie with each other in artistic excellence.
As a study of mountainous scenery in one of the most romantic and
beautiful districts of English lakeland, it is ' without fault or blemish ;'
and if the artist's imaginative mind and poetic temperament have
run wild in giving to the procession of rush-bearers a character and an
extent not their own, he has, by so doing, produced a picture pre-
eminently lovely, and more than pleasing to the eye. The subject,
of course, is the old rural custom of ' rush-bearing,' i.e., the bringing
home of the last load of rushes— literally the ' harvest home ' of rush-
gathering — for the strewing of the floors of church and homestead.
The custom, formerly pretty general, and held to with tenacity in the
mountainous districts of Westmoreland and the High Peak of Derby-
shire, has now become all but obsolete. In one district with which
I am acquainted the rushes, gathered and tied up in small sheaves,
ornamented with ribbons, coloured papers, and sometimes improvised
masks, were piled up, in form of a pyramid, in a cart or waggon, and
the whole decorated with wreaths of flowers or ' greens,' and sur-
mounted by a garland or flag. Drawn by men or horses, also liberally
ornamented with ribbons and flowers, the load of rushes was taken
through the village, preceded by a band of music, and accompanied
by a crowd of people to the church gates, where it was unloaded, the
' decking ' taken off, and the rushes carried into the building and
strewed on the floor, both in and out of the pews, the garlands being
hung up near the chancel. The custom seems to have been pretty
much the same in the Westmoreland villages, and Mr. Thompson has
'poeticised' it by seating a 'queen' on the car, surrounded by
garland-bearing maidens.
" The landscape is that of Borrowdale, the charming and eminently
* "History of the County of Lincoln," 1834, vol. 2, p. 255.
t 1S82, pp. 78-81.
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CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCH. 31
picturesque little village of Borrowdale Grange, with its whitewashed
cottages and rural bridge, being beautifully rendered to the right, and
the grand mountain range rising up, cloud-capped to the skies. From
this village the procession, numbering some sixty or more figures, is
supposed to have started, and to be wending its way up the hill, and
round a lovely wooded knoll covered with herbage, to the church on
the left, near which are depicted, in all their sombre tint, the yew-
trees immortalised by Wordsworth as the
' . . . Fraternal Four of Borrowdale,
Joined in one solemn and capacious grove ;
Huge trunks I and each particular trunk a growth
Of intertwisted fibres, serpentine,
Up-coiling, and inveterately convolved.'
The church among the trees on the knoll, I ought to add, is in reality
that of Morland, which, from its picturesque character, just accorded
with the painter's views, and was accordingly introduced. Among
the figures are many portraits of well-known people — among the rest,
Mrs. Lowther, wife of Capt. F. W. Lowther, who sat for the ' Queen '
in the procession ; the late Rev. Dr. Jackson, Provost of Queen's
College, Oxford, and his then curate, but now successor in the rectory
of Lowther, the Rev. T. B. Tylecote ; and several of the villagers ;
and it is interesting to add that the picture was, in the main, painted
at one of the houses, that of Mr. Threlkeld, in the village of Borrow-
dale Grange, represented in the composition. . .
"As previously with the ' Vintage,' so with the ' Rush-bearing,'
this magnificent picture, on its completion, called forth many expres-
sions of profound admiration, both in prose and verse, from the few
who had the good fortune to be permitted to see it. Among these
the following lines, addressed to the painter by the Rev. James Dixon,
are eminently worth here printing :
' Fresh from the blazing orient o'er the sea,
The morning with its golden wings alights
On mountain tops, that lift their granite walls
Against the dark grey of the western sky.
The shadows in the valleys far below
Vanish, and leave all here in morning light —
The farmstead gleaming through its sycamores,
And village by the bridge, a woody cliff,
And mead with groups of cattle in its lap,
And pale stream that keeps wakeful all the night,
Nor ever stays its silvery foot to rest ;
And glassy level of the silent mere,
Within whose deep the mountain's golden crown,
And all the panorama of the rocks
And star-travelled regions of the sky, behold
Their counterfeit magnificent.
3 2
RUSH-BEARING
' It is so calm,
So fair, so sweet, such brilliancy of colour,
Such fresh and dewy atmosphere, that I
Could wish the morning for awhile would stay
Its flight on yon high mountain. Tis a present
No past can dim, no future can outshine,
Such as shall hang on memory's pictured walls
For future contemplation, when the din
And fretful stir of daily life has fallen,
And in the silence of our souls we hear
The low sweet voices of departed days.
The dalesmen are astir betimes in summer,
When dewy fields, knee-deep with grass and flowers,
Await the cutting. Columns of blue smoke
Rise from the village ; in a neighbouring mead,
That skirts the mere, a mower whets his scythe,
And echo blows her silver horn on high
From the hoar summit of a channelled cliff;
The milkmaid sings a love song as she goes
Down the green lane, festooned with eglantine,
To milk her cows, that low at her approach ;
And children are come forth to greet the morn
With the bright welcome of their rosy smiles.
But there is stir unwonted, for to-day
The valley keeps an ancient festival ;
And by the sun has clomb the morning sky
Above the purple ridges of the east
All toil is over. Here and there are seen
Gay groups of country folk in Sunday suit,
With mirth and joyance winding through the vale,
Down mountain passes from the neighbouring dales,
And by the gleaming margin of the lake,
And some in boats with banners on its breast.
A flag droops idly on the grey church tower,
When forth the bells clash out their jubilee,_
And fling their ancient music through the air :
Round after round from brazen throat leaps out,
Till all the rocks reverberate ; far away
On yon blue mountain breast the softened sounds
Hang like enchantment ; there is not a heart
But beats with sober gladness ; even they
Who waste with sickness, or are bowed with grief,
Forget their sorrows in the common joy.
And now the grand procession is arranged,
And through the village moves toward the church,
CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCH. 33
1 The old and young, the rich and poor, are met,
Sharing one common happiness alike ;
The old with thoughts that slip back on the past,
The young with fancies bright as their own smiles,
Painting the sunny future of their lives.
Conspicuous in the van, on the hill's slope,
The parish priest ascends, a grey-haired man,
Of aspect venerable and stature tall,
Of reputation such as a whole life
Spent in well-doing could alone achieve.
High honours in the schools had crowned his youth,
High dignities in the church his riper years ;
But dearer far to him of all his honours,
And most esteemed, is that of parish priest,
The sacred functions of whose holy office
Now for a generation he has filled.
Following, the lord and lady from the hall
Do honour to the time-worn festival,
Stepping from their exalted rank awhile
To walk on even terms with peasant life,
And by sublime democracy attest
The common heirs we all are of the past,
The common bonds that bind us in the present,
The common hopes that with mild splendour light
The life, the death, the life again, for all.
But priest and squire, grey rock and glassy lake,
And village dreaming of its own white walls,
And all the pictured mystery of the hills —
These all are but the setting to one group,
Which, in the foreground, 'neath the sycamore,
That spreads its emerald umbrage to the sky,
Moves with a motion every line displays,
And floods the space with beauty like a gleam
Of golden sunshine shot from a riven cloud
Upon the unsunned scenery of a vale :
There in the midst, throned on a rustic sledge
Frilled high with rushes in their greenness gathered,
The queen of beauty sits, in youthful bloom
The frost of Time's fierce winter shall not nip,
And round her hang a garland of fair maids,
Fair as herself, with wreaths of flowers yoked
In deathless fellowship of fairest fame.
Moving to the music of their own rich charms
In mystic dance of grace that fascinates
And keeps the head in thraldom while we gaze
And memory lasts.
34 RUSH-BEARING.
' And still the bells ring out,
Making melodious chimings in the air ;
And still the living group moves up the hill,
And all the glory of that summer day
In its serenity of loveliness abides ;
No cloud to gloom the freshness of its colours,
No night to fall upon it from the sky,
And blot it out for ever. As we gaze,
Our souls are all suffused with what we see —
The comeliness of old religious ways
That sanctify the current of our life,
Blended with one of nature's matchless moods,
Caught by the genius of the artist's hand,
To enrich the generations yet to come
In grand succession, until day and night
Shall fold their wings on the everlasting shore.' '
A description of the rush-bearing at Ambleside, in
1885, was given in the " Queen," # it says :
"As the town clock chimes 6 p.m. a band is heard in the distance,
and soon there comes down the main street of the town a procession
of young children — boys and girls — carrying devices of wooden frame-
work, covered with rushes, moss, and flowers. Leading the proces-
sion is a sweet-faced country lassie of eleven or twelve years of age,
carrying the churchwardens' rush-bearing, a plain upright piece of
wood, covered entirely with the green rushes gathered from the lake ;
then follows a bonnie blue-eyed boy bearing a device in the shape of
a harp, whose strings are formed of white peeled rushes, with the
boards or frame thickly adorned with the white water lilies. Crosses
of all kinds hung on moss-clad staffs, every shape and device which
the ingenuity and taste of the ladies of the parish could design, and
which the richness or delicacy of greenhouse exotics or the native
flowers of the field could adorn, appear, borne by the long line of
school-children who form the procession. When at length the gar-
lands have all been brought into the market-place, a halt is made, the
'rush-bearings' are all placed in the street, and a gay scene it is
which the town for the next ten minutes presents. . . . But the children
are taking up their crosses, the band commences the first bars of a
march, and the procession begins to move onwards towards the church.
When the churchyard is reached the children carry their floral offer-
ings into the sacred edifice, and the doors are locked to all others for
a short time, whilst the garlands arc deposited in the chancel aisle
and windows. This done, the congregation is admitted into the
church, and join in a short service, consisting of prayer, hymn, and a
* Sec " Public Opinion," 2nd October, 1885, p. 425.
CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCH. 35
brief address. The hymn which is sung is known as 'The Rush-
bearing Hymn,' * and, as descriptive of the origin, as well as the
reason for the commemoration of the custom which is being celebrated,
is worth quoting :
' Our fathers to the house of God,
As yet a building rude,
Bore offerings from the flowery sod,
And fragrant rushes strewed.
May we, their children, ne'er forget
The pious lesson given,
But honour still, together met,
The Lord of earth and heaven.
Sing we the great Creator's praise,
Who sends us sun and showers,
To cheer our hearts with fruitful days,
And deck our world with flowers.
These of the great Redeemer's grace
Bright emblems here are seen !
He makes to smile the desert place
With flowers and rushes green ! '
The rush-bearings remain in the church over the Sunday until the
following Monday afternoon, when the children again meet and bear
them through the town to a field, where an ordinary school treat is
given, and so ends the Rush-bearing Festival of that particular year."
"... At Grasmere, the Rush-bearing Festival was commemo-
rated this year three weeks later in the season than usual. The
patron saint of the ancient Grasmere church is Oswald, and the
vicar of the parish, after consulting the desires of his parishioners,
this year determined upon St. Oswald's Day [5th August] for the Rush-
bearing Festival. In almost every respect the festival is observed
here in the same manner as at Ambleside ; but the church, being
situate in the very centre of the village, the custom at Grasmere is for
the children to meet together in the churchyard, and place their rush-
bearings on the wall of the churchyard, where they remain for about
half-an-hour, to be inspected by the crowd of people who are collected
there."
The annexed engraving represents the rush-bearing
at Grasmere in 1888, from a sketch by Miss Wintle,
in the " Graphic," 22nd June, 1889 (pp. 676, 682). The
" rush-bearings " are generally tall crosses or shepherds'
* Composed by the Rev. Owen Lloyd, an accomplished young clergyman,
curate of Ambleside, who died, much lamented, about 1838 or 1840.
&
J
6 RUSH-BEARING.
crooks. The design is made in rushes, and stands
from one to four feet high, the whole is ornamented,
often covered with flowers, and in some cases the result
is very beautiful. They are placed on boards along
the edge of the pews.
A correspondent, "T.O.M.," writing to Hone's
"Year Book, "(pp. 553-4) 21st July, 1827, describes the
custom as then practised at Grasmere :
" The church door was open, and I discovered that the villagers
were strewing the floors with fresh rushes. I learnt from the old
clerk, that, according to annual custom, the rush-bearing procession
would be in the evening. . . During the whole of this day I observed
the children busily employed in preparing garlands of such wild
flowers as the beautiful valley produces, for the evening procession,
which commenced at nine, in the following order : — The children
(chiefly girls), holding these garlands, paraded through the village,
preceded by the Union band (thanks to the great drum for this in-
formation), they then entered the church, where the three largest
garlands were placed on the altar, and the remaining ones in various
other parts of the place. . . In the procession I observed the
' Opium Eater ' [De Quincey], Mr. Barber, an opulent gentleman
residing in the neighbourhood, Mr. and Mrs. Wordsworth, Miss
Wordsworth, and Miss Dora Wordsworth. Wordsworth is the chief
supporter of these rustic ceremonies. The procession over, the party
adjourned to the ball-room, a hayloft, at my worthy friend Mr. Bell's,
where the country lads and lasses tripped it merrily and heavily.
. . . The rush-bearing is now, I believe, almost entirely confined
to Westmoreland. It was once customary in Craven, as appears from
the following extract from Dr. Whittaker :
'Among the seasons of periodical festivity was the rush-bearing,
or the ceremony of conveying fresh rushes to strew the floor of the
parish church. This method of covering floors was universal in
/wuses while floors were of earth, but is now confined to places of
worship ; the bundles of the girls were adorned with wreaths of
flowers, and the evening concluded with a dance. In Craven the
custom has wholly ceased.'
In Westmoreland, the custom has undergone a change. Billy
[Dawson, the fiddler, who had been the officiating minstrel for the
last six-and-forty years], remembered when the lasses bore the rushes
in the evening procession, and strewed the church floor at the same
time that they decorated the church with garlands ; now, the rushes
are laid in the morning by the ringer and clerk, and no rushes are
introduced in the evening procession. I do not like old customs to
change, for, like mortals, they change before they die altogether."
38 RUSH-BEARING.
At Marton, a small village on the shores of More-
cambe Bay, the rush-bearing was observed on the
dedication-day, 5th August, the patron saint being
St. Oswald, or on the Sunday nearest St. Oswald's.
Lucas, a schoolmaster here, wrote a history of the
neighbourhood, still in manuscript,* and, referring to
the customs of the district, observes that :
"The vain custom of dancing, excessive drinking, etc., having
been many years laid aside, the inhabitants and strangers spend that
day in duly attending the service of the church, and making good
cheer, within the rules of sobriety, in private houses ; and the next in
several kinds of diversions, the chiefest of which is usually a rush-
bearing, which is in this manner. They cut hard rushes from the
marsh, which they make up into long bundles, and then dress them
in fine linen, silk ribands, flowers, etc. ; afterwards the young women
of the village, which perform the ceremony that year, take up the
burdens erect, and begin the procession (precedence being always
given to the churchwardens' burden), which is attended not only
with multitudes of people, but with music, drums, ringing of bells,
and all other demonstrations of joy they are able to express. When
they arrive at the church, they go in at the west end (the only public
use that I ever saw that door put to), and setting down their burdens
in the church, strip them of their ornaments, leaving the heads or
crowns of them decked with flowers, cut paper, etc., in some part of
the church, generally over the cancelli. Then the company return
to the town, and cheerfully partake of a plentiful collation provided
for that purpose, and spend the remaining part of the day, and
frequently a great part of the night also, in dancing, if the weather
permits, about a may-pole adorned with greens and flowers, or else in
some other convenient place."
* There is a copy of this MS. in the Watson MSS., Bodelain Library, Oxford,
vol. 4, folio.
£bc 1Ru6b*Cart
the home
every village
OUTH-EAST Lancashire was
of the rush-cart. Almost
had one, and the rivalry between the
people sometimes rose to such a pitch
that bloodshed occurred. Our information, therefore,
is more complete and varied here that can be obtained
elsewhere. Many writers have alluded to the custom,
and given illustrations of the rush-cart ; painters, too,
have depicted the scene ; and poets gone into raptures
over it. # Elijah Ridings, a Lancashire poet, in his
"Village Festival, "t writes:
" Behold the rush-cart and the throng
Of lads and lasses pass along !
Now watch the nimble morris-dancers,
Those blithe, fantastic, antic prancers,
Bedecked with gaudiest profusion
Of ribbons in a gay confusion
Of brilliant colours, richest dyes,
Like wings of moths and butterflies ;
Waving white kerchiefs here and there,
And up and down and everywhere.
Springing, bounding, gaily skipping,
Deftly, briskly, no one tripping.
All young fellows, blithe and hearty,
Thirty couples in the party ;
And on the footpaths may be seen
Their sweethearts from each lane and green
And cottage home ; all fain to see
This festival of rural glee ;
* There is said to be a little pamphlet entitled "The Rush-bearing : A Poem,"
printed at Huddersfield in 1784, but I have been unable to meet with a copy.
t "Village Muse," 1854, pp. 28-29.
4 o RUSH-BEARING.
" The love betrothed, the fond heart plighted,
And with the witching scene delighted ;
In modest guise and simple graces,
With roses blushing on their faces.
Behold the strong-limbed horses stand,
The pride and boast of English land,
Fitted to move in shafts or chains,
With plaited glossy tails and manes ;
Their proud heads each a garland wears
Of quaint devices — suns and stars,
And roses, ribbon-wrought, abound ;
The silver plate, one hundred pounds.
With green oak boughs the cart is crowned,
The strong, gaunt horses shake the ground."
Roby, # writing in 1829, speaks of the custom as
"An unmeaning pageant still practised in the northern and
eastern parts of Lancashire, for the purpose of levying contributions
on the inhabitants. An immense banner of silk, adorned with
tinsel and gay devices, precedes the rush-cart, wherein the rushes,
neatly woven and smoothly cut, are piled up, and decorated with
flowers and ribands, in rustic taste. The cart, thus laden, is drawn
round to the dwellings of the principal inhabitants by morris-dancers,
who perform an uncouth dance, attended by a man in motley attire,
a sort of nondescript, made up of the ancient fool and Maid Marian.
This personage jingles a horse-collar hung with bells, which forms not
an unsuitable accompaniment to the ceremony."
Roby's description is so brief and inaccurate that
we turn to Harland and Wilkinson's " Lancashire
Legends," t for information as to rush-bearing in East
Lancashire. They say :
" These used to have a real significance. The rushes were cut,
dried, and then carried in carts to the churchyard. The rushes
were then strewn along the aisles of the church and in the bottoms of
the pews, in preparation for winter. Carpets and cushions (locally
termed 'wishons,') were then unknown, except in the pews of the
wealthy. Barrowford rush-bearing is always held on the first Sunday
after the 19th August. This festival is still visited by vast numbers
of persons from Burnley, Colne, Padiham, and elsewhere. Cheap
trips are run on the East Lancashire line from Burnley and Colne to
Nelson Station. Riot and drunkenness reign supreme. Rush-bearing
* "Traditions of Lancashire," 5th edition, 1872, note p. 264.
t 1873, pp. 111-112.
4 2 R USH-BEARING.
Sundays are also observed at other places, as Holme, Worsthorn,
Downham, etc., but usually not in so disreputable a manner. Most
of the clergy take advantage of those Sundays, and fix their
' charity sermons ' for those days. They thus obtain contributions
from many distant friends, who pay special visits to their relatives
on these occasions. In Yorkshire these pastimes take the name of
' feasts.' "
We have, however, to turn to Bamford's " Early
Days," : for a complete account of the rush-cart, and
the manner in which it was made :
" But ' The Rush-bearing ' was the great feast of the year, and was
held on the anniversary of the dedication of the church. At Middle-
ton it is held on the third Saturday in August, or, if there be five
Saturdays in the month, it falls on the fourth. From tradition, as
well as from the custom itself, we may conclude that at first it was a
simple offering towards making the church floor comfortable during
the winter services. Every family having then its separate bench to
sit upon, some one or two of them would at first strew their own
floors with rushes to promote the warmth of their feet during the
stormy months. Others, perceiving how snugly and cosily their
neighbours sat, would follow the example. Probably the priest
would encourage the new luxury, and it would soon become common.
Thus Nan and Dick, and Bob and Bet, would be seen carrying
bundles of rushes to the church at the feast of the dedication, and the
church would be littered for the winter. Next, families forming
small hamlets of the parish would unite, and, pitching each their
quota of rushes into a cart, would send down their load. Some
of these hamlets, in order probably to ingratiate themselves with the
priest by rendering extra homage to the church, would arrange and
decorate their rushes with green boughs ; others would excel them ;
and a rivalry as to which hamlet could bring the neatest formed and
most finely decorated load of rushes would ensue ; and thus the
present quaint and graceful 'rush-cart' would be in time produced.
Music, dancing, and personal finery would accompany and keep
pace with the increasing display ; the feast would become a spectacle
for all the surrounding districts, and the little wood-shaded village
would annually become a scene of a joyous gathering and a hospitable
festivity, and thus the wakes, as they existed in my early days, would
be gradually produced.
"The folds or hamlets which mostly sent rush-carts to Middleton,
were Boarshaw, Thornham, Hopwood, Birch, Bowlee, and Tonge.
About a month or six weeks before the wakes, the young men
of the hamlets, as well as those of the town, would meet at their
* 1849, pp. 146-154.
THE RUSH-CART 43
respective rendezvous, which was some ale-house, where the names
of such as wished to join the party during the wakes were given in,
and the first instalment of money was paid. These meetings were
called 'enterings,' and they always took place on Sunday evenings,
when each one paid a certain sum towards a general fund, and a
trifle more for drink at their meetings. It was the interest of these
young fellows to raise as strong a party as they could, not only with
a view to a plenteous fund, but also in order to repel, if necessary,
aggression from other parties, for, as these little communities were
seldom without a few old grudges to fall hack upon should an
opportunity offer, it was very extraordinary indeed if a quarrel did
not take place amongst some of them, and half-a-dozen battles were
not foughten, before the wakes ended. It was consequently an
object with each to get as numerous a party, and as heavily-bodied
an one, as they could, agility and science not being so requisite in
Lancashire battles as weight, strength, and endurance. These
young fellows therefore mustered as imposingly as they could, and if
one or two of the young women of the place happened to have
sweethearts who came from a distance — and especially if they were
likely to clear" their way in a row — the courters would probably
be found joined with the brothers and friends of their fair ones.
Well, the ' enterings ' having been formed, and the subscriptions duly
paid, a rush-cart would be determined upon. Such a farmer's broad-
wheeled cart was to be bespoke. Then lads and lasses would, at all
spare hours, be engaged in some preparation for the feast. New
clothes would be ordered, and their quantity and quality would
probably depend on the amount of money saved during the year,
or on the work performed in a certain time before the wakes. Jack
would obtain, if he could, a 'bran new suit, wi' trindl't shirt ;' and
Bess would have her 'geawn made wi' tucks an' fleawnces ; new
shoon wi' ston op heels ; new stockins wi' clocks ; a tippit wi' frills
all reawnd, monny a streng o' necklaces ; an' a bonnit made by th'
new mantymaker, the prattyist 'at ever wur seen, wi' a skyey blue
underside, an' pink ribbins.' By 'day-strike' in a morning, or by
' neet-gloom ' in the evening, the jingle of morrice-bells would be
heard along the lanes and field-roads, for the lads, having borrowed
each his collar of bells at neighbouring farmhouses, would hang
them on their necks and come jingling them home, waking all the
echoes in the deep lanes, and the meadow-nooks, and the old grey
solitary places, until the very air was clamourous of the bell tingle
and the musical roll of the crotal. Ropes and stretchers would also
be borrowed, and the rushes growing in certain waste pieces having
been marked out, and, when necessary, bargained for with the owner
of the land, mowers were appointed, and a day or two before the
commencement of the wakes the rushes were cut down. An old
experienced hand was generally engaged to ' make the cart,' that is,
44 RUSH-BEARING.
to lay on, and build up, and trim the rushes, according to the design
which is always adopted in such constructions. The girls meanwhile
would all be employed at over-hours getting their own finery and that
of their brothers or sweethearts ready for the great event. Tinsel was
purchased ; hats were trimmed with ribbons and fanciful devices ;
shirts were washed, bleached snow-white, and neatly plated ; tassels,
and garlands, and wreaths of coloured paper, tinsel, and ribbon, were
designed and constructed, and a grand piece of ingenuity and
splendour, a kind of concentration of the riches and the pomp of
the party was displayed in the arrangements and setting forth of ' the
sheet.' This was exclusively the work of the girls and women ; and,
in proportion, as it was happily designed and fitly put together, or
otherwise, was their praise or disparagement meted out by the public,
a point on which they would probably be not a little sensitive. The
sheet was a piece of very white linen, generally a good bed-sheet, and
on it were arranged pretty rosettes, and quaint compartments and
borderings of all colours and hues which either paper, tinsel, or ribbons,
or natural flowers could supply. In these compartments were arrayed
silver watches, trays, spoons, sugar-tongs, teapots, snuffers, or other
fitting articles of ornament and value, and the more numerous and
precious the articles were, the greater was the deference which the
party which displayed them expected from the wondering crowd.
Musicians were also secured in good time ; a fiddler for the chamber-
dancing always, and never less than a couple of fifers and a drummer
to play before the cart. But if the funds would allow, and especially
in later times, a band of instrumentalists would be engaged, often a
sorry affair certainly, but still ' a band ' to swear to, and that would
be a great thing for the ears of the multitude. All true churchgoers
w r ere duly apprised of the wakes, as its date was cried by the bell-
man in the churchyard whilst the congregation were leaving the
church, on three Sunday afternoons previous to its commencement.
The morning of the great day comes, and everyone is in a state of
bustle and anxiety. Heads of families are bundling up their work
and hastening off to town in order to be back in time for the opening
of the wakes. And now, the rushes having been mown, are carted to
the place where the cart is to be made. The maker, with his assist-
ants, are all present ; the wheels are sunken in holes, and the cart is
well-propped to make it steady ; the peeled rods and binders are set
up so as to make the structure steady, and to give the proper form as
it advances ; ale is poured out and drunk liberally ; numerous
youngsters are playing and rolling about on the rush-heap, whilst
others are making of them small sheaves, bound at each end, and,
being cut in the middle with a scythe-blade, are called 'bowts'
(bolts) ; others again are culling the finest of the rushes, and making
them into ' bowts ' of a superior description wherewith to form a
neat edging to the front and back of the structure. And so they
THE RUSH-CART. 45
keep binding, and cutting, and piling up until ' the cart ' is completed,
which now presents the form almost of a flattened bee-hive, with the
ends also flattened and ornamented with a projecting edging of
rush-bolts, which gives them a quaint and trim appearance. The
sheet before described is displayed with all its wonder-exciting
treasures in front of the cart, sometimes another sheet, less costly, is
exhibited behind, and when that is not the case, letters and various
devices in flowers are generally found there. The top of the cart,
or rush-heap, is stuck with green boughs, which wave and nod like
plumes, and amongst them one or two of the young men, who have
been the latest married, take their seats astride the load. The
drawers, all don'd in ribbon, finery, and tinsel, now begin to make
their appearance, some dozen or so of the leaders having bells
around their necks. The drum is beating, the music is blowing and
snorting and screaming, the gay tinkle of morrice-bells is floating and
waking up the echoes. The children are wild with joyful expectation,
or astonished by the wonderous fairy scene. The girls, bepranked in
their new pumps, kirtles, and bonnets, now add beauty to the
spectacle ; and on the arm of each may be noticed the best
Sunday coat and doublet of her brother or her sweetheart.
The ropes are attached ; the stretchers noosed fast at proper
distances ; all is ready. The music strikes up louder ; the driver
clears the way with his long-whip, making it give a loud and clear
crack at every stroke — that being his feat — the word is ' Neaw lads,'
and at one strong pull and a heave of the shafts the wheels are
dislodged from their socket-holes, and the cart is slowly drawn up to
the level sward, amid the loud shouts of the admiring gazers ; and so,
with music-clangour, and bell-jingle, and laughter, and words of
caution, as ' Howd on, lads,' ' Gently, lads,' the quaint and
romantically fantastic spectacle moves towards the village of its
destination.
" If the party can go to the expense of having a set of morrice-
dancers, and feel inclined to undertake the trouble, some score or
two of young men, with hats trimmed, and decked out as before
described, precede the drawers, dancing in couples to various simple
country tunes, one of which may be measured by this stanza :
' My new shoon they are so good,
I cou'd doance morris if I wou'd ;
An' if hat an' sark be drest,
I will doance morris wi' the best.'
" In some later instances there have been processions of banner and
garland bearers, with all beautiful flowers, artificial or real, and apt
and ingenious devices. A choice beauty of the village may also, on
some occasions, be induced to personate the Queen of the Wake,
walking under a bower borne by four of her companions, and pre-
IARTKR AND WHIP.
THE RUSH-CART. 47
ceded by dancers and the other pageants described. But these
spectacles I should rather suppose to be of comparatively modern
introduction in this part of Lancashire.
"Arrived at the village, other parties similar to their own will be
found parading their cart on the highroad. The neighbouring folds
and hamlets, having been nearly deserted by their inhabitants, all are
there concentrated seeing the wakes and partaking in the universal
enjoyment. The highway is thronged by visitors in gay attire, whilst
shows, nut-stalls, flying-boxes, merry-go-rounds, and other means of
amusement are rife on every hand. Should two carts meet, and
there be a grudge on either side, a wrangle, and probably a battle or
two, settles the question, and they each move on ; if the parties are
in amity, they salute each other with friendly huzzas, the drawers
holding their stretchers above their heads until they have passed.
Each cart stops at the door of every public-house, which the leaders
enter tumultuously, jumping, jingling their bells, and imitating the
neighing of horses. A can of ale is then generally brought to the
door and distributed to the drawers and attendants, those who ride
on the top not forgetting to claim their share. When the whole
town or village has been thus perambulated, the cart is drawn to the
green near the church, where the rushes are deposited — or should be
• — though latterly, since the introduction of pews in the church, they
have generally been sold to the best bidder. The moment the
first cart arrives on the green, the church bells strike up a merry
round peal in honour of those who have thus been alert to testify
their devotion ; but as the rushes are now seldom left at the church,
so neither is the ringing so strictly performed as it was wont to be,
and, in fact, though the name and the form are in some degree
retained, it is evident that attachment to our venerable state-worship
has far less influence in the matter than it had in the days of my
early life.
" After disposing of their rushes, either by gift to the church (in
which case they became the perquisite of the sexton), or by sale to
the best bidder, the lads, and their friends, sweethearts, and helpers,
repaired to the public-house at which they put up for the wakes, and
there spent the night in drinking and dancing. On Sunday, some of
the principal banners and garlands, which had been paraded the day
before, were displayed in the church, and on Sunday night the lads
and lasses again met at the public-house, where they drank,
smoked, and treated their neighbours and friendly visitors from other
public-houses."
Of a different character was the rush-bearing
described in Miss Louisa Potter's " Lancashire
Memories." # Instead of the cart being drawn by a
* 1S79, pp- 52-53-
48 RUSH-BEARING.
band of young men with ropes and stretchers, horses,
gaily decorated, were employed ; and this is the more
usual custom of late times, though occasionally, where
only one horse is used, a number of young men range
themselves in front and pull away, but more for display
than assistance to the horse. Miss Potter writes :
" In August we had the rush-bearing, which was the annual gather-
ing of rushes to strew the aisles of the parish church, and keep it
warm during the winter. The rushes were most artistically piled on
a cart, in the form of a haystack ; the front was covered with a white
cloth, and adorned with silver tankards, cream-jugs, teapots, spoons,
arranged in patterns, and whatever could be borrowed in the way of
plate, which was always cheerfully lent. These were interspersed with
flowers, and always a large G.R. in marigolds, sunflowers, or holly-
hocks ; dahlias were unknown. The cart was drawn by four, and
sometimes six, fine horses, adorned with ribbons, and bells that jingled
merrily as they walked. A dozen young men and women, streaming
with ribbons, and waving handkerchiefs, preceded the cart, dancing
the morris-dance. There was the shepherdess, with a lamb in a
basket and a crook in her hand, dressed in white, with a green bower
borne over her head, and always two watches at her side. There was
the fool, a hideous figure in a horrid mask, with onions for ear-rings
and a cow's tail for a pig-tail, belabouring the crowd with an inflated
bladder at the end of a very long pole. It was a point of honour to
appear much amused with his antics, but many a little heart quaked
under its assumed bravery.
"The procession was closed by two garlands, carried aloft, of
coloured paper, cut into familiar devices ; and, at the close of the day,
the rush-cart was taken to pieces, the rushes strewed in the church, and
the garlands hung in the chancel, to remain until replaced by new
ones the following year."
The following description of the rush-bearing at
Heaton, near Manchester, is from Frances Ann
Kemble's "Record of a Girlhood' (1878, vol. 2, p.
185), and is contained in a letter sent from Birming-
ham, 7th September, 1830:
" During the two days, which were all we could spare for Heaton,
I walked and rode and sang and talked, and was so well amused and
pleased that I hope, after our week's work is over here, we may return
there for a short time. I must tell you of a curious little bit of
ancientry which I saw at Heaton, which greatly delighted me — a
' rush-bearing.' At a certain period of the year, generally the begin-
THE RUSH-CART.
49
ning of autumn, it was formerly the wont in some parts of Lancashire
to go round with sundry rustic mummeries to all the churches and
strew them with rushes. The religious intention of the custom has
passed away, but a pretty rural procession, which I witnessed, still
keeps up the memory of it hereabouts. I was sitting at my window,
looking out over the lawn, which slopes charmingly on every side
down to the house, when the still summer air was suddenly filled with
the sound of distant shouts and music, and presently the quaint
pageant drew in sight. First came an immense waggon piled
with rushes in a stack-like form, on the top of which sat two men
holding two huge nosegays. This was drawn by a team of Lord
W 's finest farm-horses, all covered with scarlet cloths, and decked
with ribbons and bells and flowers. After this came twelve country
lads and lasses, dancing the real old morris-dance, with their hand-
kerchiefs flying, and in all the rustic elegance of apparel which they
could command for the occasion. After them followed a very good
village band, and then a species of flowery canopy, under which
walked a man and woman covered with finery, who, Lord W
told me, represented Adam and Eve. The procession closed with a
fool, fantastically dressed out, and carrying the classical bladder at
the end of his stick. They drew up before the house and danced
their morris-dance for us. The scraps of old poetry which came into
my head, the contrast between this pretty picture of a bygone time
and the modern, but by no means unpicturesque, group assembled
under the portico, filled my mind with the pleasantest ideas, and I
was quite sorry when the rural pageant wound up the woody heights
again, and the last shout and peal of music came back across the
sunny lawn. I am very glad I saw it."
The author of " Scarsdale " # has given a graphic,
but rather exaggerated account of rush-bearings as
they were celebrated fifty years ago. He says :
" In front of the inn stood the rush-cart, which, to our southern
readers, may require a more detailed description. One of the larger
carts, used in Lancashire either to carry manufactured goods or to
bring harvest from the field, had been heaped with rushes to the
height of about twenty-four feet from the ground, f The rushes were
skilfully arranged into a perfectly smooth conical stack, rising to a
sharp ridge at the top. From this centre four hedges, formed of
rushes woven into a neat pattern, and each hedge about two feet high, •
descended to the four corners of the cart. On the summit was a
bower in the form of a crown, made of holly, laurel, and other ever-
*SirJ. P. Kay-Shuttleworth, i860, Svo.
t This is greatly overstated. The carts were usually from ten to twelve feet
high, if the latter, it was considered a big one.
I
5 o R USH-BEARING.
greens, round which were twined garlands. An immense wreath of
large flowers encircled the base of the arbour, and a smaller one
decorated its top. On each of the smooth sides of the cone, between
the boundary of rush-hedges, were inscriptions in brilliantly-coloured
flowers, such as 'Colliers and Weavers,' 'Fear God,' 'Honour the
King,' etc. Spangled flags of various bright hues hung from the
sides of the crowning bower. A large silver salver from the Hall,
with some silver tankards, hung on the front. About thirty young
men, with white shirts down to the waist, profusely adorned with gay
ribbons, and with wreaths of flowers on their heads, were yoked in
couples between two strong new ropes. Each couple held a stave
fastened on either side into a knot in the rope, and they were engaged
in practising some dances, with which their entry into the principal
streets of Rochdale was to be celebrated. A strong horse was in the
shafts, and behind was a band of other gaily-dressed young men,
similarly yoked between ropes, to hold the cart while descending any
steep hill. A bugle sounded to summon the dancers from the booth,
the revellers from the club-room, and the wandering groups and
whispering lovers from the garden. Some miles of road had to be
traversed, and all the rush-carts from the neighbouring villages were
to meet at Rochdale at noon. There issued from behind the house
the whole united band, with a big drum, two bugles, two trumpets,
several other brass instruments, with fifes, flageolets, etc. They were
the heralds of an immense banner, held in the air by four men, two
on each side, who grasped long slender poles, supporting a transverse
piece, from which swung this mighty achievement of the art of Scars-
dale. In the centre were the Scarsdale arms, which had never been
so fiercely emblazoned before. On the top was a view of Scarsdale
Hall, painted on paper, mounted on cloth. There were masonic
devices, emblematic monsters, wonderfully shaped spangles, roses,
wreaths, and other caprices of the imagination of the Scarsdale artists.
The result was one of barbaric splendour of colour and tinsel. This
marvellous pomp was heralded by a deafening clamour of the band,
which did its worst against rival sounds, even almost drowning the
frantic shouts with which the phenomenon of the banner was greeted.
Seth Diggle had been promoted to the post of honour on the top of
the cart, where he held a banner on which the Scarsdale arms were
emblazoned on the Union Jack. Before the cart was started for
Rochdale, however, a country-dance was formed on each side of the
road, it being the privilege of the young men yoked in the cart to
choose their partners from the prettiest country girls — nothing loth
for such a distinction. The band struck up loudly, the banners stood
grandly at one end of the two sets of thirty couples, and at the other
"the cart, with Seth in the bower at its crown. Half-an-hour was
devoted to this dance, when the bugle again sounded, the dance at
once ceased, the young men kissed their partners and took their
THE RUSH-CART. 5 l
places, and, amidst the shouts of the crowd, and the wildest efforts of
the band, the Scarsdale rush-cart started for Rochdale. About the
same time a similar fete was in progress at Hurstwood, at Martinmere,
at Eastleton, at Milnrow, at Smallbridge, at Whitworth, at Spotland,
and other villages, for it was the glory of Rochdale to assemble at its
rush-bearing, forty years ago, at least eight, and sometimes a dozen,
rush-carts from the neighbouring villages. Meanwhile the gala of
the rush-bearing was in the delirium of its frenzy, the rush-carts having
assembled in the street opposite the Butts, each with its band in front,
the order of procession extending over the bridge across the Roche,
and a considerable distance up Yorkshire Street. Every band played
with stentorian energy, 'Rule Britannia;' the young men drawing
every cart vied with each other in the vigour and picturesque character
of their dances, the flags in every bower on the top of the rush-carts
were waved triumphantly, the spangled and decorated banners carried
before each band glittered in the bright noon, from every window
hung flags or coloured draperies, handkerchiefs were waved, and loud
huzzas broke to swell the exulting torrent of acclamation. The mam
thoroughfares were crowded by a multitude of folk in their gayest
dresses. In side-streets were stalls with Eccles cakes, Everton toffy,
and Ormskirk gingerbread, and booths with shows of every kind
frequenting a country fair. Conjurers stood on their stages, watch-
ing for the passage of the procession, to attract a crowd of gazers by
their wonderful tricks. Mountebanks and clowns were ready to per-
form when the streets were clear from the grand pageant of the day.
There was a bear on the Butts, growling defiance at the dogs by
which it was to be baited, and climbing at intervals to the top of the
high stake to which he was chained. Then a pilot balloon of gay
colours floated gracefully from a garden of the ' Orchard,' near the
river, and the roar of guns boomed on the ear at short intervals as
the pretty phantom rose in the still air to a great height and then
floated away in the tide of an upper current. When the twenty-first
gun had been fired, the procession commenced its progress through
the town."
It is pleasing to turn from the noisy account just
given to the quaint little scene on the following page,
which illustrates some remarks on the custom by the
author of the " Pictorial History of Lancashire " : #
"Almost every village or hamlet within six miles of Bury has its
rush-bearing. The custom is easily accounted for ; the churches
formerly having neither boards nor flags, and the floor being com-
posed of clay, well trodden down, rushes were therefore strewed on
* 1S44, pp. 249-250.
52
R USH-BEARING
the aisles to prevent them being too cold, hence the taking away the
old rushes and bringing in fresh ones grew at last quite into a
periodical festival. A well-built rush-cart is very difficult to accom-
plish, and the whole pageant itself is a very picturesque sight. First
come the band of musicians, all gaily dressed, and a smart new
banner with some quaint device upon it ; then the fool or half-wit of
the village, dressed in the most absurd manner possible, generally a
cocked hat, scarlet hunting-coat and boots, sword in hand, and
mounted on a donkey ; then the cart with the rushes built in a
peculiar fashion like the roof of a house, the gable being to the front,
and sloping down over the wheels, beautifully cut, the edges being
closely shaved, and the triangular space in front adorned with rosettes
of ribbon, and streamers, tinsel ornaments, and even watches. The
top is surmounted with a small flag or banner, and astride of all,
A BURY RUSH-CART.
holding the said banner, a little boy or a young man, sometimes both.
The cart is drawn by thirty or forty young men, two and two, holding
high above their heads poles, which are fastened by ropes on each
side to the cart, there being to each pole about half-a-dozen bells.
The young men, and in fact all the persons forming the procession,
are most gaily dressed, the favourite style being straw hats with light
blue ribbons, white shirt sleeves tied with many-coloured ribbons, the
brightest handkerchiefs possible for sashes, * and ribbons again below
the knee. The cart and its drawers are flanked by ten or twelve
similarly dressed countrymen, each with a huge new cart whip, which
*Thc brilliantly-striped silk scarves known as " Mogadors " were in great
demand for this purpose.
THE RUSH-CART. 53
they ply lustily about, and crack loudly in time to the merry tune of
the musicians.
"There are but slight differences in the detail of the rush-bearings
in other villages. At Rochdale, the neighbourhood being very
populous, there are sometimes eight or nine rush-carts, each having
its band, etc., and they not infrequently meet in one of the narrow
streets, when generally a pretty stout battle takes place for precedence,
as it is well-known that those who arrive the first at the church always
receive a donation of five shillings. It must not be supposed that
these processions occur on the Sabbath day, the rushes are procured
for the Sunday, but the procession usually takes place a few days
before, the dates of each rush-bearing being calculated by the Sunday
previous. Instead of men, horses now frequently draw the cart, and
in most places the rushes are sold after the festivity, which, from
having no small portion of a religious character, has degenerated into
a mere holiday-making.
" Connected with rush-bearings, there is what is called the Skedlock-
Cart, * used by children in a small cart, wagon, or wheel-barrow,
made of the yellow flowers of the large weed, charlock, kedlack, or
cadlock, in imitation of the rush-cart."
These " skedlock-carts " used to be common enough
about Gorton twenty-five years ago. They were
generally made by children, in a small box set on
wheels. This was filled up with rushes, grass, or
docks, but always covered at the top with rushes, laid
lengthways, the ends being to the front and back.
These were tied on with string, and in the top thus
made were stuck any kind of wild flowers that could
be got, charlock, buttercups, daisies, meadow-sweet,
etc. ' The children's hats were dressed with flowers,
rush-whips, and small thorn twigs, on the thorns of
which flowers were stuck, were carried in the hand, a
larger branch being sometimes stuck in the centre of
the cart. On one occasion I saw one of these carts on
which sat astride a small child, just able to walk, its
hat covered with flowers, a bunch of buttercups in one
hand, and a stick of "swaggering dick" (with which
its face was smeared) in the other. The girls drawing
* Skedlock, Kedlock, Keddledock, and Kettledock, is a name given in Lanca-
shire to the common ragwort (Senecio Jacobcea), and also to charlock (s/'/ia/ts
arvensis.
f I
THE RUSH-CART. 55
the cart had adorned their hats with flowers, whilst the
boys improvised music out of tin whistles and old cans.
These carts were not made at the rush-bearing only,
but at any time during the summer when flowers could
be got.
In August, 1874, some children at Levenshulme had
a small rush-cart, and its train of morris-dancers.
Skedlock-carts are yet to be met with in the hill
districts of South-East Lancashire, the children going
round with an imitation rush-cart in a small box or
wheelbarrow, and collecting money to spend at the
wakes. They were to be seen at Saddleworth this
year (1890). The accompanying plate shows a sked-
lock-cart made entirely by boys at Uppermill in 1879.
It was very neatly built of rushes in a hand-cart, had
the "bolts" adorned with flowers, and the sheet in
front covered with tinsel and artificial flowers. The
larger boys upheld the shafts, whilst a long rope
enabled the smaller ones to assist in drawing. There
were the green boughs at the top, on which a boy rode
astride, a fifer and a drummer, a boy with a whip,
and the inevitable collecting-boxes. The whole formed
a complete rush-bearing in miniature.
At Didsbury, the rush-cart, followed by the morris-
dancers, went round the hamlets of Burnage and
Heaton Norris at the beginning of August. The
custom was continued until the Rev. W. Kidcl came to
Didsbury as incumbent, when it was discontinued on
account of the objections urged by that and other
gentlemen in the parish.
The four townships of Newton Heath, Moston,
Failsworth, and Droylsden, near Manchester, having
only one church among them (that at Newton
Heath), formerly joined in a rush-cart, which went
round each township once in four years. The rush-
bearing was held from time immemorial on the
Friday before the Sunday following the 18th of
5 6 R USH-BEARING.
August. Droylsden has since ceased to have any
connection with the other three (which still have their
wakes at the same time), and no longer keeps its
wakes on the day held by the others. As Moston,
Failsworth, and Newton Heath each have now a
church of their own, great irregularity has prevailed
for some years in the rush-bearings, as there being no
rush-cart one year, and two or three the next. Fails-
worth took the lead in this festivity, and their rush-cart,
always the largest, best dressed, and bearing the most
valuable plate, used frequently to extend their pere-
grinations to Manchester. One such promenaded the
streets on Tuesday evening, 25th August, 1874.
Heading the procession was a drum and fife band,
followed by a troop of about twenty morris-dancers
attired in fantastic costumes, and wearing hats covered
with flowers. After these came the rush-cart, drawn
by nine gaily-trapped horses. The rush-stack was an
exceedingly large one, weighing about three tons. At
the top were seated two men, who were surrounded by
green boughs and Union Jacks, whilst in front was a
fine display of silver cups, plates, etc. Behind the cart
were several men with boxes for contributions from
the spectators. At times the streets were completely
blocked by the crowd of sightseers.
Droylsden's rush-cart was always fabricated at
Greenside, and in 1793, John Wood, of Clayton Hall
Farm, provided rushes, waggon, and eight stump-
tailed horses to draw it from that hamlet to Newton.
Few complete brass bands were then in existence, but,
by gleaning in Gorton, Manchester, and other places,
an extemporised company of instrumentalists was
formed. Owing to dissensions in 181 7, a rush-cart
was made at the "White Hart," in opposition to the
orthodox pageant at Greenside. The rush-cart manu-
factured in Droylsden in 1855, perambulated the
village, and patronised Manchester, but did not visit
THE RUSH-CART.
57
Newton at all. In a waggon or cart was constructed
a coned and symmetrical pyramid, faced with bolts of
green rushes, and filled up with dried ones, and was
decorated with ribbons, flowers, and a glittering display
of silver plate. The procession was headed by the
chapel garland.*
From the MS., published and unpublished, of the
late John Higson, we are enabled to gather many
particulars of the rush-bearing at Gorton, a village
near Manchester, long celebrated for its breed of bull-
dogs, its sturdy men, and its wakes. In 1775, the
Openshaw rush-bearing to Gorton Chapel was discon-
tinued. About 1780, the rush-cart went out on the
Friday before the first Sunday in September, perambu-
lating the village, visiting Mr. Grimshaw's, High Bank,
and also the locality of Gorton Brook. On that night,
or Saturday morning, the rushes were " teemed " down
near the chapel gates. The old ones of last year
having been cleared out of the chapel, the new ones
were carried in, and carefully strewn in the bottom of
the pews, aisles, etc. On this day, also, the band,
accompanied by the " pikemen " carrying staves sur-
mounted with brass eagles, perambulated the village,
stopping nowhere, neither soliciting nor receiving any
contributions. The garlands which had adorned the
rush-bearing were placed in the chapel, they were sus-
pended on staves, which were fastened to the pillars in
front of the lofts [galleries], where they remained till
the next anniversary, when they were removed to make
room for their successors, and although they somewhat
intercepted the view of a portion of those who sat in
the galleries, yet no complaints were ever made. On
the Sunday the morris-dancers, and other officials
connected with the rush-bearing, all attended the
chapel, when an appropriate sermon was preached.
* Higson's " History of Droylsden,'' 1859, pp. 65-66.
K
THE RUSH-CART. 59
This day finished the wake, labour being everywhere
resumed on the Monday.
1800. The wake was held, and the rush-cart made
alternately at Edward Stannings, the " Horse and
Farrier," Bottom o' th' Brow, and William Shawcross,
the "George and Dragon" (now Chapel House).
1804. At this time much attention was devoted to
the annual rush-bearing. Early on this auspicious
morning, James Hibbert, of Fox Fold, and his assis-
tants, might be observed preparing the rushes, and
whilst they were erecting the pyramid, and decking it
out with silver plate, garlands, etc., the morris-dancers
were as eagerly decking themselves in their holiday
attire, and neatly covering their clean white shirts and
light "senglits" with various-hued ribbons, neckbeads,
and other trinkets. Choice horses were selected to
convey the rush-cart, the Gorton Band accompanied
the procession, and the dancers, in couples, tripped it
on the "light fantastic toe" to the tune of the "Morris-
dance," etc. It was customary for the cart to peram-
bulate the heart of the village ; it afterwards proceeded
to the out-skirts, and on the Saturday was dismantled.
There was generally a bear-bait under Fox Fold,
commencing at six a.m., and renewed at intervals of
three or four hours until nightfall. Bear and badger-
baits were held on the vacant land opposite the " Black
Horse," Bottom o' th' Brow, and bull-baits at the
"George and Dragon."
1805. Joseph Bradshaw, of Whiteley Cottages,
Gorton, the rush-cart maker, died, aged sixty-two, and
was succeeded by James Hibbert, of Fox Fold.
1829. At the wake this year there were five bull-
baits in or near the village, viz., at the " Plough Inn,"
" Chapel House," " Lamb Tavern," Marchington's
"Abbey Hey," and the " Bull's Head," Aspinall Smithy;
and a bear-bait at the " Black Horse." The rush-cart,
as usual, after perambulating the village, proceeded to
60 RUSH-BEARING.
Manchester. Ultimately, when the band and morris-
dancers were half-seas over, they entered Newton
Lane (the Irish pale). The former commenced the
tune of " Croppy lie down," instantly the war-whoop
was sounded, and hundreds of the "boys" immediately
commenced an unequal war on the rash and unfor-
tunate offenders. The assailants were armed with
brooms, pokers, tongs, knobsticks, etc. ; the musicians
turned their instruments into implements of war and
defence, music for once having failed to charm the
savage breast. The dancers tript their light fantastic
toes, Lancashire fashion, upon the posteriors of their
opponents. The rush-cart was mounted by two Irish-
men ; the drivers, alarmed for the safety of the plate
which adorned it, lashed their horses ; one scalader
contrived to escape, but the other was detained, and
driven to Gorton in gallant style, and upon him the
Gortonians wreaked their fury. The old fool wisely
enough turned his regalia, an old broom, into a weapon
of offence and defence. Many of the dancers, being
nimble of foot, commenced a speedy retreat, recollect-
no- that
o
" He who fights and runs away
Will live to fight another day."
At intervals throughout the day, "odd dancers" might
be seen stealthily approaching the village, covered with
wounds and glory, their dresses, plumes, and ribbons
woefully dishevelled and torn. Since this period the
rush-bearing at Gorton has gradually declined.
1832. " Paid 3s. for posting up bills as a caution for
and against the wakes."
1839. A rush-cart, made at Mr. Chadwick's, under
the auspices of Mr. Bennett, of Gorton Hall. It was
richly adorned with festoons of flowers, garlands, and
silver plate, and accompanied by the Gorton Band.
After visiting the hall, etc., they proceeded to Man-
« /
THE RUSH-CART 61
Chester, Mr. Bennett paying the toll over Blackfrlar's
Bridge.
1 84 1. A rush-cart was made at the "Waggon and
Horses," under the superintendence of Mr. Bennett.
One of the metallic ornaments consisted of a handsome
gold cup, won by one of Mr. Bennett's greyhounds in
a coursing match. The rush-cart visited the hall, and
paraded the village, and then went to Manchester,
where the dancers were liberally treated.
1842. Mr. James Stopford purchased, at Mrs.
Taylor's sale, Reddish, the bells formerly worn by the
horses drawing Gorton rush-cart.
1 85 1. A small rush-cart made at the "Chapel
House." It was drawn by three horses, decorated with
bells. The pyramid of rushes, however, was destitute
of ornament, either of flowers or silver plate. It was
surmounted by two men amongst oak branches. The
procession was headed by a banner, the fool, men
cracking long whips, etc. The band were dressed in
uniform, and were accompanied by about ten couples
of morris-dancers. Amongst the procession were
several with alms boxes, the funds collected being spent
in drink.
After this time, the rush-cart was only made at inter-
vals, although the wakes was held as usual, now and
again bursting out into something like its old splendour.
On the 9th September, 1874, a rush-cart was made in
the old style. The morris-dancers (or " molly-dancers,"
as they are now often called by the ignorant), were led
by the fool, who bore the title of "King Coffee" in-
scribed on his hat. " The dancers made a very pleas-
ing march, wheeling round with a sort of salute, and
falling into two lines facing each other. Their dress
was remarkably gay, and in good taste. It was almost
a copy of the dress of Spanish dancers or bull-fighters.
Red or blue 'shorts,' or knee-breeches, long stockings,
gaily coloured sashes over their full shirts, with plenty
6 2 R USH-B EARING.
of brooches and other ornaments about chest and neck,
straw hats piled high with flowers, and curious long
knotted skeins of cotton hanging from their wrists,
which the dancers used somewhat in the way of casta-
nets. The dance was gone through with remarkable
precision, and even gracefulness. The procession was
aided by two men carrying long carter's whips, and
followed by the famous old rush-cart." #
About a week before the wakes a number of boys in
the neighbourhood go about collecting money. Four
of them, two at each end, carry a pole, astride of which
sits a boy with his face blacked, his coat turned inside
out, or else wearing an old one torn to ribbons, and
altogether dressed as outrageously as possible. They
form a procession, headed by other boys with tin
whistles and cans, and on arriving at a house sing the
old rush-cart song.
"In the course of the year," says Edwin Waugh, +
"there are two very ancient festivals which are kept
up, each with its own quaint peculiarities, by the Hey-
wood people, and commemorated by them with general
rejoicing and cessation from labour. One of these is
the ' Rush-bearing,' held in the month of August, an
old feast which seems to have died out almost every-
where else in England, except in Lancashire. Here,
in Hey wood, however, as in many other towns of the
county, this ancient ceremony is still observed, with
two or three days' holiday, hilarity, and feasting, in the
hay season."
In a letter to Browne Willis, 22nd November, 1726,
from the Hon. H. Egerton, of Heaton, near Prestwich,|
the latter says : " I am making what enquiry I can as
to Dedication of Churches, but there being few such
festivals as Wakes observed in this Neighbourhood,
* " Manchester Guardian." — Notes and Queries, No. 456.
t " Sketches of Lancashire Life and Localities," 1857, p. 168.
X Willis MSS. , vol. xxxv., f. 359, Bodleian Library.
THE RUSH-CART. 63
we shall be, I doubt, defective. As to ours of Prest-
wich, we have nothing but a Custom of bringing Rushes
to Church in a cart, with great Ceremony, Dancing
before it, and Cart and horses adorned with Plate,
Ribbons, and Garlands. The time anciently and
usually observed is about St. Bartholomew's Day [25th
August], whenever 'tis supposed its dedication is to y'
Saint. They have Wakes at Eccles and Ratclyffe, but
at the last of no long-standing, unless formerly lay'd
aside and lately revived."
Manchester had no rush-cart of its own, but every
year a number of carts visited the town from the out-
townships, some coming as far as from Oldham and
Rochdale. They were always looked forward to, and
liberally treated, and the inhabitants had thus the
opportunity of inspecting the rival carts, and criticising
the proficiency or otherwise of the morris-dancers who
accompanied them. The accompanying view of such
a scene is taken from a fine picture, painted by
Alexander Wilson, in 182 1 (formerly in the possession
of Mr. Roger Wilson, of Woodford, Cheshire), repre-
senting a rush-cart in Long Millgate, Manchester. #
The canvas is studded with characteristic figures,
inclusive of the artist himself (his bandaged foot requir-
ing temporary crutches), the Rev. Joshua Brookes, and
Gentleman Cooper, the tall, enthusiastic pedestrian
who walked to Doncaster and home again, during forty
successive years, for the pleasure of witnessing the
exciting race for the St. Leger stakes. In addition to
these, there is Mr. John Ogden, the grocer, vignetted
through his shop window, and a full-length portly
boniface in the centre, Mr. Henry Slater, of the "Bay
Horse Tavern." In the heart of the crowd a sweep,
astride on a pig, upsets a man engaged in carrying
beer who in turn capsizes an optician bearing a weather-
* Reproduced also in Procters " Memorials of Manchester Streets," 1874, pp.
36-37.
64 RUSH-BEARING.
glass marked "much rain." Taking advantage of the
uproar, a thief is abstracting from the pocket of a dandy
a packet of billet doux. Some of the curious devices
borne at the rush-bearing are depicted, and it is notice-
able that the morris-dancers are represented in trousers
instead of knee-breeches, and wearing the curious
helmet-shaped hats occasionally worn by morris-
dancers, instead of straw hats. Wilson's picture per-
petuates a scene that was of very frequent occurrence
in Manchester during a long series of years. But the
Irish, taking- offence at some orange-coloured lilies
adorning a rush-cart, fell upon the dancers and dispersed
them, a proceeding which occurred on several sub-
sequent occasions, and led to a discontinuance of the
visits of the rush-carts.
On the 31st August, 1882, a rush-cart from Oldham
came to Manchester, and paraded the principal streets
about five o'clock in the afternoon. It was made in an
ordinary two-wheeled cart. The angles were feathered,
and formed of rods about an inch thick, the tops project-
ing about a foot, and painted blue. On the top of the cart,
almost hidden by a great bough of oak, was a little man
with a very dirty face, and wearing a red jacket. The
sides of the cart were plain, on the back, "V. R.,"
formed of yellow flowers stuck in the rushes. The
front was covered with a clean white cloth, on which
were fastened several watches, a tea-urn, and three
large silver salvers, besides several silver cups, cream
jugs, a teapot, and spoons. The cart was drawn by a
grey horse in the shafts, decorated with flowers and
ribbands. From the ends of the shafts were two long
ropes, kept apart by seven "swingle-trees," or
"stretchers" (wooden poles which keep the chains
asunder behind a chain-horse), to each of which were
three young men, dressed in their every-day clothes.
These assisted the horse in drawing. There was a
band of music, a banner, and then Ave boys dressed
THE RUSH-CART. 65
up, two with straw hats trimmed with flowers, the other
three with large caps resembling helmets (as shown
below), formed of laths, and covered with ribbons and
rosettes. They had knotted handkerchiefs tied to their
wrists, and danced the morris to the two usual rush-
cart tunes. There were, also, a boy with a wooden
box to receive money, and a great carter, armed with
an immense whip, who preceded the procession and
produced a series of loud cracks with his whip. There
was no fool.
MORRIS-DANCER S HAT.
Rochdale, being an ancient market town, and the
centre of a number of populous villages, probably saw
more rush-carts in its streets at one time than any other
place in England, eight or nine being a not infrequent
number at w r akes time, and, as the streets were narrow,
collisions between rival rush-carts were frequent. Local
jealousies, party-strife, and often an inclination to have
a fight for supremacy led to much disorder, and more
than once downright bloodshed. The ill-feeling
L
66 RUSH-BEARING.
between the Whigs and Jacobites at the time of the
Scotch rebellion, in 1745, lasted for some years, and
often broke out into riot. On the 20th August, 1 748,
Adam Robinson brought an action at the Lancaster
Assizes, in the Court of King's Bench, against James
Ramsbottom and Abraham Lowton, for trespass, which
affords a glimpse at the manners of the time. Robin-
son complained that in 1747, at Rochdale, Ramsbottom
and Lowton, with sticks, stones, and staves, and force
of arms, attacked his dwelling-house, called the " Union
Flagg Inn," in Rochdale, broke 100 panes of glass,
and other wrong did to the damage of £10.
"It is usual at Rochdale to have a sort of Feast
every year in August, called the Rush-bearing, when
the Fools and Populace of one Township in the Parish
vie with another in the strength of their Mob or Party,
the shew of their Garlands, and such nonsense, and
since the Rebellion they've Distinguished themselves,
by the Aid and Genius of a certain Justice of the Peace
in the Neighbourhood, into two Parties, called Blacks
and Jacks, i.e., Whigs and Tories. On the 10th
August, 1747, the Blacks, not content with making
their show in the streets only, attacked Mr. Robinson's
house, pretending some of the Jacks were drinking
there, and about eleven o'clock at night several scores
of 'em, assisted by some recruiting soldiers, broke
open the house, and cast many stones out of the street
in at the windows, and wounded several people of the
house within, and, after insulting and threatening the
plaintiff and his family, ransacked and plundered the
house, and committed great enormities. The aid of
the civil power was called in, and the mob dispersed.
• ••••••••
"A witness deposed that he saw a Plaid handker-
chief hung out of the window. Garlands dressed up
with orange-coloured ribbons not liked, and ' down
with the Rump ' was the word, when the garlands were
A l.ANC\SHIRE RUSH-CAKT.
68 RUSH-BEARING.
demolished. A song was sung in praise of the Duke
of Cumberland, when stones and piss-pots were thrown
from the Union balcony. A man almost killed, Union
house disaffected and abusive, mob loyal," etc. #
In Jesse Lee's copy of Baines's " History of Lanca-
shire," now in the Public Reference Library, Man-
chester, t is the following draft of a letter to Hone's
" Year Book," % dated 4th May, 1825. It differs some-
what from that given by Hone, and the latter's wood-
cut, represented on page 67, bears little resemblance to
the sketches sent, which we reproduce on pages 69,
70, and 72. He writes :
" As the celebration of the Wakes are now approaching, I beg leave
to send you a brief account of them, or, as they are called in this part
of Lancashire, Rush-bearings, the origin of which I had explained to
me by a very old person who died several years ago, who stated that
in his remembrance (before Parish Churches were paved, or rendered
more comfortable by the use of stoves and the present method of
heating and ventilating), rushes were brought by persons out of the
country in bundles, adorned with flowers, ribbons, etc., some very
plain and others tastefully decorated with garlands, for which the
parties received a small acknowledgment from the churchwardens.
These rushes were put into the churchyard, spread, and regularly
turned until sufficiently dry to be taken into the church, the bottom
of which was strewed, and which served to keep the feet of the con-
gregation from being chilled by the pavement, and, in some instances,
by a clay floor. The improvements in Manufacture and Commerce
since then having rendered the working-class more refined and
luxurious, hath almost done away with the old method of rush-
bearing, and the present system of building not requiring the aid of
rushes, the Feasts are celebrated by the display of rushes in carts,
most tastefully formed, of which the sketch I send may convey a
better idea than a long description. Some are drawn by horses, gaily
dressed, but they are more generally] drawn by the young men, §
preceded by music and a banner, some of which I have seen four or
live yards broad by six or eight long, || composed of silk of various
* Raines MSS., vol. xiv., pp. 438-441, Chetham Library.
t Vol. ii., pt. 3, p. 635.
t See the "Year Book," 1832, pp. 552-556.
§ "To the number of twenty or thirty couple, profusely adorned with ribands,
tinsel, etc."— "Year bonk."
|| "Having on either side, in the centre, a painting of Britannia, the king's
arms, or some other device." — " Year Book."
THE RUSH-CART.
69
colours, joined together by fretwork of narrow ribbon, and profusely
covered with roses, stars, and fringes of tinsel, * which, when viewed,
dazzles the eye of the beholder if the sun shines upon it. The pro-
cession is preceded and flanked by a number of men with long cart
whips, which are in continual action of cracking, and causes a clear
path, t after which, a number of men with horse-bells about them,
jumping grotesquely and jingling the bells, after them, the band, and
sometimes a number of young men as Morris-dancers, f followed by
young women bearing garlands, and, lastly, the cart ; upon the front
of the same is a white cloth, covered entirely with plate, such as cups,
tankards, spoons, and watches. § Great rivalry exists between the
young men of the neighbouring villages which shall produce the best-
formed cart and banner, and it not infrequently happens that when
:=*e"^>*i..-
as 77uz7yas/wms2#to 30 couples
two of the processions meet in the street a conflict takes place, and
many bloody noses made. A contribution from the different in
* "Which in this part is called 'horse gold.' "— " Ibid." A name by which it
is yet (1890) known in Saddleworth.
t "Some thirty years ago, the advent of Rush-bearing was marked by the
cracking of whips. These whips were made of rope and string, the lash being five
feet long, and the handle about eighteen inches, and, when skilfully used, the result
was a crack as loud as a pistol shot."— Fish wick's " History of Rochdale," 18S9,
p. 533. There was also another kind often used, having long heavy handles and
lashes, requiring the use of both hands, and more difficult to use than the first-
named.
% " But without the ancient appendage of bells."—" Year Book.
§ "Rushes are laid transversely on the rush-cart, and are cut by sharp knives
to the form desired, in which no little art is required. The bolts, as they are
termed, are formed of the largest rushes, tied up in bundles of about two inches in
diameter. These bolts are, as the work of making proceeds, affixed to rods fixed
in the four corners of the cart, and carved to the form required. When the cart is
finished, the load of rushes is decorated with carnations and other flowers, in
different devices, and surmounted by branches of oak, and a person rides on the
top."— "Year Book."
THE RUSH-CART. 71
habitants enables the parties to sacrifice at the shrine of Sir John
Barleycorn, which is continued for several days. These Rush-
bearings ... are generally held in the months of July, August, and
September. . . . Rochdale Rush-bearing commences on the 3d
Sunday in August. I have seen six or seven carts on one day, viz.,
on the Monday from Newbold, Lowerplace, Bagslate, Marland, Milk-
stone, Broad Lane, Spotland, Smallbridge, etc. The Rush-bearings
round this part are Ripponden, Ashworth, Littleboro, Milnrow,
Rochdale, Heywood, Oldham, Royton, Shaw Chapel, Whitworth, and
Middleton, at which places the customs are much alike.
"The person who forms and cuts the rushes is called the
' featherer.' It was a featherer who was one of the persons
unfortunately shot at the riot in this town (April, 1796, I believe), * in
memory of which the men who drew the Marland cart, for a number
of years after, each wore a black scarf ; but it is now discontinued.
There is a remarkable anecdote in the 'Imperial Magazine,' 1822,
vol. iv., col. 1203, respecting the fate of the above two men."
"The rush-bearing is now (1820)," writes Canon
Raines,+ " on the Monday after the third Sunday in
August. Formerly, it began on the Saturday immedi-
ately preceding the third Sunday, but, owing to the
dissipated scenes which were witnessed on the Sunday,
Dr. Hind, about 1780, forbad the rushes to be brought
to the church on the Saturday,! and also forbad the
usual notice to be given to the parishioners to bring
* In Sir Samuel Rush-Meyrick's letter to Mr. George Shaw, already quoted, he
speaks of this occurrence as "an accident at Rochdale, on Easter Monday, in
1794 or 5 (but qy. 1793)." The riot, however, which took place through a scarcity
of bread, occurred on the 5th August, 1795, and the circumstances were as follows:
A practice formerly prevailed at Rochdale for the men of the town to play football
with the men of the neighbouring country places, which seldom ended without a
quarrel. In one of these disputes, about the year 1745, a man named C , from
Marland, four miles from Rochdale, killed a man belonging to the latter place ;
but, as no proper evidence could be obtained of the fact, he escaped without
prosecution. Some time after, he left Rochdale, and went to reside at Congleton,
in Cheshire. There he heard the Gospel, and became converted. After a lapse
of fifty years, he went on a visit to Rochdale to see a relation. On the Monday
after his arrival he walked down to the bridge. Some disturbance happening that
morning, the volunteers were ordered out, and were drawn up on the bridge, and
as C was shaking hands with an old acquaintance, who had been present in the
former fray when the man was killed, they received orders to fire. C and his
old acquaintance both fell, the former dead, the latter surviving a short time.
These were the only men who lost their lives, and, as near as possible, where the
man fell whom C killed.
t Raines MSS., vol. xiv., p. 438, Chetham Library.
% Me also prohibited the carts being introduced into the churchyard, to the great
displeasure of sundry important personages.
SKETCH OF THE GENERAL APPEARANCE OFABANNER WHICH IS
CARRIED BY MEN UPON A NUMBER OF REEDS TIED TOGETHER.
THE RUSH-CART. 73
the rushes, which, from an early period, had been pro-
claimed by the sexton, standing on a tombstone,
immediately after evening service, the Sunda)
preceding the Rush-bearing."
About the year 1868, the late James Dearden, Esq.,
of Rochdale, finding that no rush-carts then came to
Rochdale, offered a prize of ten guineas for the most
handsome that came, five guineas for the next best,
and one guinea for each that came. About twenty
appeared, and a number also turned up the following
year.
Bishop Gastrel, # in 1 7 1 7, alludes to "the disorderly
custom called Rush-bearing (at Milnrow) on Saturday
next before St. James's Day." The church is dedi-
cated to St. James. At Milnrow, the feast is
sufficiently near St. Bartholomew's Day to point out
its origin.
" 161 7, July 25th, St. James Day. — At Whalley,
ther a rush-bearing, but much less solemnitie than
formerly." — Journal of Nicholas Assheton. + The
Rev. Canon Raines adds :
"Prior to 1636 there are now no accounts at Whalley, and no
reference to the custom is made till 1700, after which time there are
regular entries every year for cleansing the church. ' St. pd. for
Dressing ye Church against St. James' Day, 05s. ood.' The rushes
were brought on the rush-cart, by the north gate, into the church,
free of expense. Garlands were suspended in the church, and on the
top of the steeple. It is about seventy years since the floor of
Whalley Church was strewed with rushes ; and after the occasion for
its use ceased, the rush-cart soon disappeared, though the festival
itself was kept up, and the morris-dancers played their part in it, for
more than twenty years afterwards. Not fifty years since, on the 5th
of August, the village was crowded like a fair ; booths were erected,
and horse races, and other rustic sports, attracted numbers of people
from the surrounding country. The late R. Grimshaw Lomax, Esq.,
was in the habit of staying at Whalley, on the 5th August, on his
annual return from Stonyhurst 'Academy Day,' and, along with Mr.
Adam Cottam, endeavoured to keep alive the taste for old English
* " Notitia Cestriensis," vol. i., p. 216.
t Chetham Society, 1848, pp. 29-30.
M
»s>
K
Q^
«
w«
THE RUSH-CART. 75
sport ; but the festival gradually declined, and within the last two
years St. James' Day, the rush-cart, and the festival, have altogether
ceased in Whalley. It may be observed that St. James' Day, old
style, would be on the 6th August, and the rush-bearing, the 5th of
August, would therefore be the Eve of St. James."
The custom of rush-bearing was not so elaborately
nor so enthusiastically observed in Cheshire as in
Lancashire, though in its main features the same, and
is now almost obsolete. Ormerod * describes :
" The great and peculiar feature of the festival [the wakes] as the
rush-bearing, which is still in use in many parts of the county.
This ceremony [as in use at Lymm, in 181 7] consists of carrying to
church the rushes intended to be strewed on the clay floor under the
benches, which are piled neatly up in a cart, and a person constantly
attends to pare the edges with a hay knife, if disordered in progress.
The cart and the horses are carefully selected from the various
village teams, and decorated with flowers and ribbands, and on the
rushes sit persons holding garlands, intended to ornament the church
for the year ensuing. These are composed of hoops slung round a
pole, connected by cross strings, which are concealed by artificial
flowers, cut paper, and tinsel. One is placed in the rector's, or
principal, chancel, and the others in the subordinate ones belonging
to the several manor-houses of the parish, and they are frequently
ornamented by the young ladies of the respective mansions. The
cart, thus loaded, goes round to the neighbouring seats, preceded
by male and female Morris-Dancers, who perform a peculiar dance at
each house, and are attended by a man in female attire (something
between the fool and the Maid Maryan), who jingles a bell to the
tune, and holds a large wooden ladle for money. As night ap-
proaches, the cart, with its attendants, returns to the town where the
church is situated, and there the garlands are fixed, whilst a peal is
rung on the bells, and the concourse of village revellers is attracted
to view the spectacle."
In Coles MSS., preserved in the Harleian Collection,
British Museum, there is an account of a rush-bearing
at Bunbury, dated 30th July, 1755 :
" Being at my worthy Friend, the Rev. Mr. Allen's, house, at
Tarporley, and hearing that there was a famous Rush-bearing, as the
Cheshire people call it [to be held at Bunbury], on account of the
hanging up of a new Chandelier of Brass in the Church, which cost
* "History of Cheshire," 2nd edition, 1882, vol. i., pp. 81-2.
7 6 R USH-BEARING.
the Parish about Thirty-Pounds, we took a ride there in the evening
to see the ceremony.
" This parish is a very large one, and has about a dozen Townships
depending on it, which all send, at different times, Garlands and
large kind of Fans, adorned with gilt paper cut into various figures,
and mixed with Flowers. These were borne by separate persons,
each having one in his hand, and coming in procession from their
different Townships, at intervals ; and many of the neighbouring
villages, also, sending them Garlands, all which were set up in
different parts of the Church, made it look very ornamental, and gave
the whole village an air of gaiety and cheerfulness not usual in the
more Southerly parts of the Kingdom.
"On the Dedication Day of their Churches in the North, it is
usual to strew them with rushes, and otherwise adorn them ; but it
had not being practiced at Bunbury within the memory of man.
But, having new-roofed their Church about two years before, and very
handsomely cieled it, and buying the aforesaid brass Branch, they
were desirous of solemnising the memory of it, and the day following
was to be ushered in with Ringing of Bells, and two Sermons, and
great Psalm-singing, and other Festivities. St. Boniface is the Patron
Saint of the Church, on which day their Wake is held."
At Christleton Rush-bearing in July, 1810, one of
the principal attractions was a bull-bait.
Holt, on the Dee, formerly had the floor of its church
strewn with rushes ; and Wrexham was celebrated for
its rush-bearing, in which its celebrated ale bore no in-
considerable part.
In the parishes of Farndon, Holt, Aldford,
Coddington, Tilstone, Isacoed, Gresford, and Harthill,
they have a custom which has not, I believe, been
noticed elsewhere, that of " hilling" or decorating the
graves and tombstones with rushes and flowers, in
addition to dressing the church. The day observed is
the 1 6th July, or the first Sunday after, formerly the
first Sunday after Midsummer Day (old style).
In Chambers's "Book of Days,"* it is stated that
'in Cheshire, at Runcorn and Warburton, the annual
rush-bearing wake is carried out in grand style. A
large quantity of rushes, sometimes a cart-load, is
* 1863, vol. i., p. 506.
UPPERMILL RUSHCART, 1889.
THE RUSH-CART. 77
collected, and, being bound on the cart, are cut evenly
at each end, and on Saturday evening a number of
men sit on the top of the rushes, holding garlands of
artificial flowers, tinsel, etc. The cart is drawn round
the parish by three or four spirited horses, decked with
ribbons, the collars being surrounded with small bells.
It is attended by morris-dancers, fantastically dressed.
There are men dressed in women's clothes, one of
whom, with his face blackened, has a belt, with a large
bell attached, round his waist, and carries a ladle to
collect money from the spectators. The party stop
and dance at the public-houses in their way to the
parish church, where the rushes are deposited, and the
garlands are hung up, to remain till the next year."
The custom is now discontinued.
At Forest Chapel, near Macclesfield, the little church
is usually crowded on the rush-bearing Sunday. Until
a comparatively recent period the floor of Wincle
Church was neither paved nor flagged, but spread with
rushes. These were renewed annually, on a certain
Sunday in July, when it was customary to decorate a
cart with flowers, and bear them to church. This was
celebrated with great rejoicing, and was termed the
" rush-bearing ; " and in after years, when rushes were
no longer used, the drinking and name were still kept
up, but they are now wisely discontinued. The
" wake," entirely distinct from the rush-bearing, still
recurs annually, though somewhat on the decline.*
Finney, in his MS. "History of the Parish of Wilm-
slow," written c. 1780, thus alludes to the custom in
that village :
" In order to ornament the church for this festival (that of the wakes
or dedication), there is a custom called a Rush-bearing, for two town-
ships, in their turns, to bring in a cart-load of Rushes, nicely dressed
and ornamented with flowers, on the Saturday but one preceding the
festival. They often vie with each other in finery, in morrice-dancing,
# <(
The Reliquary," vol. v., p. 3.
7 8 R USH-BEARING.
and in tinsel, painted paper, and flower garlands. The Rushes are
spread upon the floors in the farmers' pews and between the benches,
and serve to keep their feet warm in winter, and to kneel upon at
their prayers, and the garlands are fixed up in the church, and
make a tearing show. It is, however, unfortunate for the parish that
the Wakes happen in the midst of the harvest, when they ought to be
all at work, instead of amusing themselves with Races, Riot, and
Drunkenness." *
In Derbyshire the rush-bearing clung to the villages
in the High Peak till a late period, but, as far back as
1829, the custom had considerably declined, owing to
new churches having been erected, and modern con-
veniences introduced. It has now entirely ceased.
Mr. Farey, speaking of the rush-bearing at Chapel-en-
le-Frith, states that it usually took place at the latter
end of August, on public notice being given by the
churchwardens of the rushes being mown and properly
dried, in some marshy part of the parish, where the
young people assemble. The carts are loaded with
rushes, and decorated with flowers and ribands, and
are attended to the church by the populace, many
huzzaing and cracking whips by the side of the rush-
cart, on their way thither, where everyone lends a hand
in carrying in and spreading the rushes. At Whitwell,
instead of rushes, the hay of a piece of grass-land,
called the "church close," is annually, on Midsummer
Eve, carted and spread in the church, t
Dr. Johnson has preserved an account of a pageant
exhibited at Dent, in Yorkshire, on the rush-bearing
(St. Bartholomew's Day), after the Restoration, in
which, among other characters, "Oliver and Bradshaw,
Rebellion and War, were represented, all decked by
times with vizardes on, and strange deformities ; and
Bradshaw had his tongue run through with a red-hot
iron, and Rebellion was hanged on a gibbet in the
market-place. Then came Peace and Plenty, and
* Earwaker's " History of East Cheshire," 1S77, vol. i., note, p. 81.
t Glover's " History of Derbyshire," 1829, vol. i., pp. 305-6.
UPPERMILL PvUSHCART.
(SIDE.)
THE RUSH-CART 79
Diana with her nymphs, all with coronets on their
heads, each of which made a several speech in verses
of their loyalty to their king."
There are many quiet little valleys running into the
hills on the east and south-east border of Lancashire,
where the inhabitants retained many of their old
manners and customs till a recent date, but the spread
of manufacturing industry into these out-of-the-way
places, and the introduction of railways, have led to a
rapid increase in the population, and consequent change
in its character. The parish of Saddleworth is a
typical specimen, and bears the curious anomaly of
being included in the County of York for civil, and in
the diocese of Chester for ecclesiastical, purposes, a
state of affairs which has given rise to a saying that,
while York holds its body fast, Chester ministers to its
soul. Comprising several hamlets, the rush-bearing
(which takes place on the second Saturday after the
1 2th August), led to many rush-carts being drawn to
the parish church at Saddleworth. Mr. George Shaw,
J. P., who gave a lecture on the subject of rush-bearing
in the Mechanics' Hall, Uppermill, on the 31st
December, 1870,* states that at that time there were
seldom more than two or three, though, in his early
days, five or six, and on great occasions, such as
election times, double that number appeared ; and that
he once saw twelve at the church at one time. There
are people yet living who remember as many as eight
being drawn to the church on the Wakes Saturdav.
1 •
The last time rushes were spread in the church was in
1 82 1 ; they were often spread to a depth of twelve to
fifteen inches. After the rushes ceased to be used on
the church floor, they were used as bedding for cattle.
Some few years ago the landlord of the " Church Inn "
used to give a sovereign a load for them, but of late
years no cart has been taken up to the church.
* Reprinted in Bradbury's " Saddleworth Sketches," 1871, 8vo., pp. 253-259.
8o RUSH-BEARING.
On ordinary occasions the rush-carts came from
Cross, Boarshurst, Friezland, Running Hill, Harrop
Dale, Burnedge, Uppermill, and Greenfield. " The
Cross rush-cart always claimed precedence, and was
allowed the privilege of backing up to the old porch of
the church ; the Boarshurst between the gate piers
opposite, front to front ; the Running Hill was gener-
ally stationed under the great yew tree ; and the
Friezland always went up to the ' Cross Keys Inn.'
There seemed to be some tacit understanding that this
should be the arrangement. How or why, I cannot
tell, but I very well know that fifty years ago any
other positions would have been deemed wrong, and
entirely out of order." *
There is a tale told of Burnedge that, on a particu-
larly wet wakes, they built their cart in a barn, but for-
got the height of the barn door, and, when all was
ready, it was discovered that it was higher than the
doors, and it had to be partly pulled down, and, in this
degraded state, dragged to the church, the builders
consoling themselves with what is now an old adage,
" If we cannot bring th' rush-cart to our minds, we
must bring our minds to th' rush-cart." t
There is in the possession of Mr. Thomas Shaw, of
St. Chad's, Uppermill, a very fine picture of Saddle-
worth rush-bearing in the olden time, but, unfortunately,
both the name of the painter, and the date when it was
executed, are unknown. It was painted from sketches
made by his brother, Mr. George Shaw, and was
probably executed about 1830, as the old church was
pulled down in that year. In the centre of the picture
is the old church of St. Chad, backed by the green
hills, and flanked by the old yew, and an ash tree.
Four rush-carts are represented in different positions,
and the foreground is completely covered with a multi-
* " Saddleworth Sketches," p. 254.
t " Ibid."
UPPERM1LL RUSHCART.
(BACK.)
THE RUSH-CART 81
tude of figures and booths. All the humours of such
a scene are represented ; the morris-dancers caper on
the left hand ; barrels of beer are being emptied by
thirsty souls ; and a donkey creates confusion in one
corner by running away, upsetting everything in its
way.
During the last fifteen years, there have been seven
rush-carts built in Saddleworth, and the accompanying
illustrations * will show how little variation in size
and shape takes place.
Uppermill now takes the lead in the celebration of
the wakes, known as " Longwood Thump." Last year
(1889), the rush-cart was so badly made that the top
fell to pieces, bringing clown the riders. A row ensued,
and in the mclcc the cart itself was broken. So dis-
graceful were some of the scenes witnessed in the
evening, that many people thought no rush-cart would
be made this year ; but the landlord of the " Com-
mercial Inn," being a new one, and wishing to
ingratiate himself with his customers, called to his aid
a number of men who were anxious to wipe out the
failure of the previous year, and it was determined to
have a rush-cart in the old style. A committee of
twelve was appointed to superintend the affair.
Subscriptions were canvassed for, a shilling constituting
a member, and the rush-cart builder, now a sailor by
profession, and who is considered the best builder ot a
rush-cart in the neighbourhood, set to work. Early
on Sunday, the 17th August, a number of men went
up the hill to the moss reserves to cut the long rushes
needed for making the bolts, which must be of a
superior kind to the short hard ones used for the body
of the cart ; and these rushes require to be selected as
long as possible, and cut with a knife. In doing this,
all the party got over knee-deep in the bog, some of
* The plates show the Uppermill rush-carts of 1875, 1SS0, 1881, iSSS, 1889,
and 1890 ; and the Greenfield rush-cart of 1888.
N
8 2 R USH-BEARING.
them up to their thighs, whilst one sank up to his
waist, and had to be hauled out. They brought down
fifteen large bundles of fine, pliant rushes, none less
than four feet six inches, and many over six feet in
length. On the Monday, the builder of the rush-cart
proceeded to tie them up into bolts four inches in
diameter, rejecting all the broken ones. An assistant,
in the meantime, mowed the shorter rushes required
for the body of the cart, and brought them in to be
tied up in larger bundles ready for the building. It
was at first intended to build the cart in a small field
behind the inn, but, on sinking holes for the wheels,
the ground was found to be so soddened with the late
heavy rains, that it was considered unsafe to trust so
great a weight as the rush-cart on it, and it had,
therefore, to be made in the yard, where the ground
was firmer. The cart was one of the small two-
wheeled ones used for carting stone in the neighbour-
hood, and was sunk in the ground up to the axle, being
further secured by slotches, and trestles under the
shafts, so as to render it immovable. At noon, on
Thursday, the actual building of the cart began. An
iron rod, bent to the angle required, was fixed at each
corner, and tied at the top, to strengthen the structure
and guide the builder in placing the rushes. The body
of the cart, having been filled with loose rushes, well
trodden down, the bundles — the ends cut straight with
a scythe blade — were laid, keeping the face as nearly
as possible to the curves it would finally assume, the
longer and finer bolts being placed with the ends to
the front and back of the cart only, and not trans-
versely as well, as in the carts made in some places.
Being twice the usual diameter also, they gave the
edge a more substantial, but less pleasing, appearance,
and, in addition, did not project so much as usual,
being only six inches at the bottom, and increasing to
twelve inches at the top of the cart ; yet they were
UPPERMILL RUSHCART.
(FRONT.)
THE RUSH-CART. 83
further kept in position by having a strip of long,
narrow white lath up each side. When the bundles in
the body of the cart were laid in their places, the
string: that bound them was cut, so that the rushes
might lay closely together, and were well pressed
down, so as to make the whole structure as substantial
and compact as possible. The usual height to which
the rushes are piled in these small carts is from nine to
ten feet above the side, but, as the maker was deter-
mined to make a finer and better one than that of
last year, he decided to build twelve feet. This
required great care in consolidating the rushes and
keeping to the curves, any deviation from which would
have entailed a similar disaster to last year. This
great height, for so small a base (six feet by four feet),
as will be noticed on looking at the illustrations, gives
the rush-cart a very tall appearance, much different to
the huge, substantial ones which used to be built in
waggons, and which, to the same height, were half as
much longer and wider. This peculiarity is to be
observed in all the rush-carts built in the hill districts,
in former times as well as the present. Having
arrived at a height of ten feet, the builder began to use
the bolts made of long rushes, in order to bind the top
together as much as possible, and, finally, as these left
a small face unfilled along the top, made two good
bundles of rushes, which were placed across the others,
or lengthways, to fill up this space, and afford a more
comfortable seat for the two men who had to ride upon it.
The sides swelled out (at the cart wheel) to a distance
of eighteen inches, and then gradually sloped upwards
and inwards to the the top, the greatest projection
being at a height of two feet six inches above the side
of the cart. The front and back did not curve out-
wards, but sloped gradually inwards from bottom
to top.
The builder and his assistants had proceeded so far
84 RUSH-BEARING.
by Friday night, but a strong, south-westerly gale
springing up in the night-time, accompanied by
torrents of rain, daylight on Saturday revealed a most
unpleasant state of affairs, for, as the cart was being built
in a yard sheltered on two sides by high buildings, it had
not been thought necessary to secure the top with
ropes, and the settling down of the rushes, caused by
the rain which soaked in, and the strain of the wind on
so high and narrow a structure, had bent over the cart
to one side, the mischief being aided by the sinking of
one of the wheels. Though somewhat disheartened,
the builders commenced to put the best face upon the
matter that could be done, for to have had no rush-cart
after the trouble that had been taken, and the boasting
which had taken place, would never do. To take down
the rushes in order to straighten it would be to nearly
dismantle the cart, and time was pressing, so it was
decided to get boards and ropes, and endeavour to pull
the top over into something like its original shape, and
then trust to the man who pares the faces of the cart
to put as presentable an appearance as possible upon it.
This was done, and though several inches were pared
off one side, yet it left the cart with a most unpleasant-
looking hoist. The substantial character of the
building w r as, however, showm by the treatment it
received, and survived. This led to a delay of a couple
of hours, and as it had been stated that the rush-cart
would be drawn out about three o'clock, and as much
remained to be clone, everv hand that could be found
room for was set to work. Trestles were placed, and
whilst one man pared the face of the rushes smooth
and into shape with a scythe blade, others were making
fresh blades as sharp as a razor, for the toughness and
density of the rushes took the edge off the blades very
quickly. This paring is rather a dangerous business,
for, the blade slipping, the man nearly cut off his thumb,
and, two years ago, a man almost cut his left hand off.
UPPERMILL RUSHCART.
(THREE QUARTER.)
THE RUSH-CART. 85
Others procured two large branches of ash, and tying
them securely to strong pointed stakes, drove them
down into the rushes at the top of the cart, leaving the
centre clear for the riders. Another was trimming the
edges, or " feathering," with a pair of shears, whilst
the front of the cart was being embellished with the
sheet. This was a piece of bleached calico, cut to the
shape of the front of the cart, and was ornamented with
a border of red and blue braid, crossed diagonally, and
in the diamonds thus formed were fastened artificial
flowers. At the bottom of the sheet was a large rosette
of silver and gold tinsel and blue ribbon, above which
was a large crown in silver. This was surmounted by
the figures " 1890," in white, on a black ground. Then
came a large heart in silver, on which was displayed
some coloured scraps, artificial Mowers, of various kinds
and colours, filled up the blank spaces, and the whole
affair, when the sun shone upon it, had a most gor-
geous appearance. No plate has been displayed on the
Saddleworth rush-carts for some years past. Natural
flowers were stuck in the ends of the bolts, both at the
front and back of the cart. These were to have
been dahlias of various colours, a number of which had
been promised, but, failing to arrive, resource was had
to the neighbouring gardens, and shift made with such
flowers as they afforded. New ropes were attached to
the ends of the shafts, the latter being crossed by a
number of strong wooden bars, to enable the men to
hold up the front of the cart, and check its descent
down hill. In these ropes "stretchers," seven feet
wide, were placed, the first at a distance of ten feet
from the shafts, the remainder (of which there were six)
at intervals of six feet.
As the moment for drawing-out arrived, the excite-
ment became intense ; the inn-yard was crammed with
men and boys all wanting to have a hand in hauling in
the ropes. Trestles and props were knocked away, the
86 RUSH-BEARING.
ground in front of the wheels dug out, the ropes run
out to their full length, and the stretchers manned by
as many as could lay hold (I counted over seventy
drawers), who roughly sized themselves, the boys next
the cart, increasing in height to the tallest in front.
Two men mounted the cart, sitting back to back, and
steadied themselves by the large branches before-
mentioned. This post is one much coveted, although
rather dangerous. I have been informed of three men
who have fallen off and broken their backs, and have
myself witnessed several ugly falls, but these chiefly
occur through the rider getting too much beer. In the
present instance one of the riders had provided himself
with a tin can tied to the end of a long string, so as
not to miss his share through inability to reach it.
The whip was now brought out, it was twelve feet
long, having a lash two feet long at the end, and was
an inch and a quarter thick at the handle. It had been
well oiled several times in order to make it pliable,
and was a most formidable implement. The " band "
now collected, consisting of two fifers and a drummer,
and, everything being ready, the men laid hold of the
shafts, the boys began "girding," or straining at the
ropes, the word " neaw lads" was given, and for a
moment quietness reigned, but the music struck up,
the men shouted, the cart gave a slight heave, and then
rose up to the level ground as the strain told. Till
now there had been but little noise, but as soon as the
cart began to move freely a most extraordinary sight
presented itself, for the music changing to the old rush-
cart tune, a cheer was given, and instantly the whole
of the drawers commenced to dance, if such it may be
termed, or rather capered most vigorously, at the same
time swaying from side to side of the road, and carry-
ing the stretchers high above their heads. The cart
was now run into the square, where it was greeted with
a cheer from the crowd assembled to witness the
88 RUSH-BEARING.
spectacle. Here a rest was taken, beer served round,
and the cart and its ornaments criticised by the on-
lookers.
The scene which presented itself was an extremely
picturesque one. On one side of the square runs the
high road, lined on one side with stalls and booths of
various descriptions, containing nuts, gingerbread, hot-
peas, toys, and pots. The square itself was filled with
other stalls of a similar character, swing-boats, and a
merry-go-round, whilst the whole was backed by the
clean-looking grey stone houses, above which towered
a couple of factory chimneys, the blue hills in the
distance just giving it a rural look, and leading the
mind to the quieter scenes beyond. *
Having refreshed themselves, and decided on the
route to be taken, the carter cracked his whip, the band
struck up " The girl I left behind me," the drawers
began capering, and, with a shout, the rush-cart started
on its way to Greenfield, calling at all the public-houses
on the way, where the drawers were liberally regaled
with ale, and contributions given to the expenses of
the show.
The illustrations of the cart here given t show it
when the building was completed, and before the sides
had been pared to their proper shape and smooth
surface. They also show the damage done by the
storm, and, notwithstanding the care spent upon its
building, the cart, which was to excel any previous one,
was finally judged by its makers as " th' worst we ever
made." It cost just £g in building, of which the
builder had £\ for his services, and weighed about
fifty cwt. On the Tuesday, the rushes were given to
the owner of the cart, as some recompense for the
damage done to it last year.
* See Frontispiece.
t See Uppermill Rush-carl -side, hack, front, ami three-quarter.
t^*4&*-$?
(Barlanfcs in Cbnrcbes.
T was customary to decorate the churches for
the greater festivals and special occasions
from a very early period :
" 1602. Paid for Flowers and Rushes for the church
when the Queene was in town - - xxd."
— Churchwardens' Accounts, St. Lawrence, Reading.
The old rushes were removed, the floor and walls
swept, and the church "dressed" for the ceremony.
This consisted of garlands and flowers, which were
often put in their places before the rushes were brought
in ; but, on the other hand, the garlands used in the
procession were deposited after the rushes were laid.
The Churchwardens' Accounts, Wilmslow, Cheshire,
contain several payments for this service :
- xxd.
" 1 618. Paid for dressinge of ye church
162 1. Paid for dressinge the church against the
Rush-bearinge
1 63 1. Paid for dressing the church at the Rush-
beariner -------
ljS.
Us-
Garlands of natural flowers were extensively used,
and were often gathered at the expense of the
parish :
"1626. Payde for dressinge the greate Churche
Garlande, which wee gathered in
Bollen ffee iiijs. vjd."
— Churchwarden? Accounts, Wilmslow.
" 1796. Pd. Mary Burrowes for Dressing Singers'
Garland ------ 2s."
— Churchwardens' Accounts, Holmes Chapel.
O
9 o RUSH-BEARING.
Lysons # states that the rush-bearing " was attended
by a procession of young men and women, dressed in
ribbands, and carrying garlands, etc., which were hung
up in the church. ' We saw these garlands remaining
in several places."
Finney, who wrote a MS. " History of Wilmslow,"
speaks of the garlands of tinsel and paper hung up in
the church. Those borne at the rush-bearing were
also placed there, "and make a tearing show."
Bagshaw t says Astbury Church " was once adorned
with garlands and flowers, and the seats and floor
covered with rushes ; but this custom has fallen into
disuse."
The "Bristol Times and Mirror," 2nd June, 1879,
contains an account of the " Rush Sunday at St. Mary
RedclifT Church," which is interesting :
"Yesterday, being Whit-Sunday, the ancient custom of strewing
the floors of St. Mary RedclifT Church with rushes was observed, and
the Mayor, with a large number of the members of the Corporation,
attended the morning service. The magnificent parish church had
been decorated for the occasion. Azaleas, rhododendrons, water-
lilies, etc., were arranged on each side of the altar, and the effect
enhanced by the blending of the colours was extremely pleasing. On
the altar were crosses, composed of the finest white and red azaleas,
etc., with beds of mosses and floral devices. The top rails of the
front choir-stalls were lined with strings of blue-bells, lilies, white
azaleas, and evergreens, and in front of the reading-desk was a sacred
monogram, worked in somewhat similar flowers, while the panels and
base were also decorated. The decorations of the pulpit were not so
extensive, but were chaste. Special pains had been expended upon
the font, which was surmounted by a floral canopy, the base being
divided into panels by strings of flowers, in the centre of which were
various devices, embedded in moss and evergreens. Crowds
assembled in front of the Council-house and around the church to
view the starting and arrival of the civic procession, the pageant
apparently lacking none of its old attractions. Admission was by
ticket until the arrival of the Mayor and Corporation, when the doors
were thrown open, and the sacred edifice was soon filled to overflow-
ing. The sermon was preached by Canon Norris, B.D., Vicar of the
parish."
* "Magna Britannia," Cheshire, 1S10, p. 463.
t " History of Cheshire," 1850, p. 412.
GARLANDS IN CHURCHES.
9i
A description of the quaint custom at Castleton, in
Derbyshire, will form a fitting sequel to the foregoing. 1 1
has long been the custom here to make a huge garland
of flowers on the 29th May, heading a procession
formed of the villagers, which parades the streets. I
saw this garland made on the 29th May, 1885. The
framework was of wood, thatched with straw. Interior
diameter, a little over two feet, outside (when covered
with flowers), over three feet six inches. In shape it
CASTLETON GARLAND.
somewhat resembled a bell, completely covered over
with wild flowers — hyacinths, water-buttercups, butter-
cups, daisies, forget-me-nots, wallflowers, rhododendrons,
tulips, and ornamental grasses, in rows, each composed
of the same flower, which had been gathered in the
neighbourhood the evening before. The top, called
the " queen," was formed of garden flowers, and fits
into a socket at the top of the garland. It weighed
over a hundredweight, required two men to lift it, and
92 X USH-BEARING.
had occupied four men from noon till five o'clock in
the afternoon to make. This garland is borne on the
head and shoulders of a man riding a horse, and wear-
ing a red jacket. A stout handle inside, which rests
on the saddle in front of him, enables him to hold it
upright. It completely envelopes him to the waist,
and is roomy enough to enable ale to be passed up to
his mouth, of which he took good care to have a share.
His horse is led for him, preceded by a band of music,
and followed by another man on horseback, dressed as
a woman, who acts the fool. These are followed by
the villagers, dancing, even old people who can scarcely
walk making a point of attempting to dance on this,
the greatest day in the year at Castleton. After parad-
ing the village, the " queen " is taken off the garland
and placed in the church, the garland being hoisted
with ropes to the top of the church tower, where it -is
placed on one of the pinnacles and left till it has
withered away, when the framework is taken down and
kept for another year. The other pinnacles have
branches of oak.
The procession starts at six o'clock in the evening
from the inn whose turn it is to take the lead in the
festivities, as the villagers have their work to attend to
during the day. The country people flock from all
parts ; but the custom, fortunately, is not sufficiently
known to ensure the attendance of the riff-raff from the
towns, whose presence would soon vitiate its primitive
simplicity, and sow the seeds of its decay.
Garlands were formerly placed on the top of the
tower of Whalley Church, Lancashire. At Didsbury,
and at Eccles also, garlands were formerly suspended
in the churches. Dr. Wray, one of the vicars of Roch-
dale, made an order that, " the garlands should not be
suffered to stay in the church after Monday. In the
year 1770, numbers of women were seen returning
home in liquor at six o'clock on Tuesday morning.
GARLANDS IN CHURCHES. 93
The old custom of bringing the garlands on the Satur-
day, and fetching them on the Monday from the church,
where they are deposited on the Saturday evening,
may be continued."
At Droylsden, near Manchester, the garland, which
always preceded the rush-cart, was placed in the chapel
at Newton Heath. Four beams projected between the
windows on the north side, one of which appertained
to each township, for the purpose of displaying, for four
years, the garland which had preceded its rush-bearing.
The garland consisted of a wooden framework, several
yards in circumference, ornamented with artificial
flowerets, cut in divers-coloured papers, and surmounted
with a tinsel crown or the imitation of a bird, conven-
tionally treated. Each township, as its turn came
round, every fourth year, fetched out its old garland,
and, by dint of reconstruction and improvement, at-
tempted to surpass all previous efforts of the rival
villages. #
A writer in Hone's "Year Book," 1831, speaking of
Grasmere Church, says that he was "particularly
attracted by the paper garlands which he found de-
posited in the vestry. They were curiously and taste-
fully cut, and he was almost tempted to beg one."
* Iligson's " History of Droylsden," 1859, p. 65.
THE MORRIS-DA.Ni I RS.
(The fll>oiTts*H>anccr$.
IE morris-dance was introduced into
England from Spain in the sixteenth
century, and speedily became popular, so
it much so, that it was engrafted on a more
ancient pageant, that of the play of Robin Hood, and
the characters partook of both. " The morris-dance, in
which bells are gingled," says Dr. Johnson, "or staves
or swords clashed, was learned by the Moors, and was
probably a kind of Pyerhic or military dance."
" Morisco," says Blount, # "(Span.) a Moor; also a
Dance, so called, wherein there were usually five men,
and a boy dressed in a girle's habit, whom they called
the Maid Marrion, or perhaps Morian, from the Italian
Morione, a headpiece, because her head was wont to
be gaily trimmed up. Common people call it a Morris-
Dance." It is supposed that its name, in Spanish
Morisco, a Moor, points to its origin ; and it was
popular in France as early as the fifteenth century,
under the name of Morisque. It was probably intro-
duced into this country by dancers both from Spain
and France, for in the earlier English allusions to it it
is sometimes called the Morisco, and sometimes the
Morisce or Morisk. Douce says it has been supposed
to have been first brought into England in the time of
Edward III., "when John of Gaunt returned from
Spain, t but it is much more probable that we had it
* " Glossographia," 1656.
+ See Peck's " Memoirs of Milton," p. 135.
96
R USH-BEARING.
from our Gallic neighbours, or even from the
Flemings."
At a splendid feast given by Gaston de Foix, at
Vendome, in 1458, " foure young laddes and a damosell,
attired like savages, daunced (by good direction) an
excellent Aforisco, before the assembly." * Coquillart, +
a French poet, who wrote about 1470, says that the
Swiss danced the Morisco to the beat of the drum.
Tabourot (Thoinot Arbeau) j relates that in his youth-
ful days it was the custom in good societies for a boy
to come into the hall, when supper was finished, with
his face blackened, his forehead bound with white or
yellow taffeta, and bells tied to his legs. He then pro-
ceeded to dance the Morisco, the whole length of the
hall, backwards and forwards, to the great amusement
of the company. He hints that the bells might have
been borrowed from the crotali of the ancients in the
Pyrrhic dance. He then describes the more modern
morris-dance, which was performed by striking the
ground with the forepart of the feet ; but, as this was
found to be too fatiguing, the motion was afterwards
confined to the heel, the toes being kept firm, by which
means the dancer contrived to rattle his bells with more
effect. He adds that this mode of dancing fell into
disuse, as it was found to bring on gouty complaints.
This is the air to which the last-mentioned morris was
performed :
x
t-
♦ ♦ ♦
$
3Z
H
Txr
A. T i I f T 1 I t 1 1 '"•
1 i 1 1 1 ° A =:
Favine's "Theater of Honour," p. 345.
t "CEuvres," p. 127.
t " Orchesographie," etc., 1589, 4m.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 97
One of the accounts of Petrarch's coronation says
that after supper, to amuse the company, composed of
the most handsome Roman ladies, he danced "en pour-
point une belle et vigoreuse morcsque" with little bells
attached to his arms and legs, an act which they
regarded as a token of politeness and greatness of
mind, worthy of a poet who had just triumphed. *
Douce says it appears that the Morisco, or Moor
dance, is exceedingly different from the morris-dance
formerly practised in this country, it being performed
with the castanets or rattles, at the ends of the fingers,
and not with bells attached to various parts of the dress.
The real and uncorrupted Moorish dance was to be
found in Spain, where it still continues to delight both
natives and strangers under the name of the fandango.
It may be likewise remarked that the exquisitely pretty
music to this lively dance is undoubtedly Moorish. +
At a religious ceremony in Spain, exhibited on
Corpus Christi Day, James I.'s ambassador, the Earl
of Nottingham, attended, and a spectator records that
there were among the parties to it eight giants, and
two Moors with tabor and pipe playing, and he was
scandalised by observing that "the dragons, giants,
and morrice-dancers paraded and danced in the very
ranks of the friars' procession." j
The earliest representation of the morris-dance is
an exceedingly scarce engraving on copper by Israel
Van Mecheln, or Meckenen, so named from the place
of his nativity, a German village on the confines of
Flanders, in which latter country this artist appears
chiefly to have resided, and therefore in most of his
prints we may observe the Flemish costume of his time.
From the pointed shoes that we see in one of the
figures, it must have been executed between the years
1460 and 1470, about which latter period the broad-
* " Mem. de Petrarque," ii., append. 3, 9.
t " Illustrations of Shakspeare," etc., 1839, pp. 577-578.
I " Somers Tracts."
~G
5
fc/j
iunich morris-dancers, c. 1480 (Figs. 7, 8, 9, and 10).
i o 2 R USH-BEARING.
toed shoes came into fashion in France and Flanders.
It seems to have been intended as a pattern for gold-
smiths' work, probably a cup or tankard. The artist,
in a fancy representation of foliage, has introduced
several figures belonging to a Flemish May-game
morris, consisting of the lady of the May, the fool, the
piper, two morris-dancers with bells and streamers, and
four other dancing characters, for which appropriate
names will not easily be found. #
In the old town-hall at Munich there is a series of
ten figures of morris-dancers, carved in wood by
Erasmus Schnitznar, in 1480, and described by Helen
Zimmern in the "Art Journal." t They are in niches
in the frieze of the State Room (called the "dancing
room "), and formerly consisted of twelve figures, but
two were given by Louis I. of Bavaria to the sculptor
Schwanthaler, who discovered them, and caused them
to be cleaned. All the figures have bells, and No. 6
has the long streamers to his sleeves. The Moor is
represented by figure 4.
At Betley, in Staffordshire, there is a painted
window representing a set of morris-dancers, which is
described in Steeven's " Shakspeare " (Henry IV., part
1). There are eleven figures and a maypole : 1. Robin
Hood; 2. Maid Marian; 3. Friar Tuck; 4, 6, 7, 10,
and 11. Morris-dancers; 5. The hobby-horse ; 8. The
maypole; 9. The piper ; and 12. The fool. Figures 10
and 1 1 have lonof streamers to the sleeves, and all the
dancers have bells, either at the ankles, wrists, or knees.
There is a striking resemblance between these figures
and those in Israel's engraving, and it would seem that
the period of execution, as to both, was nearly the
same. Toilet, the owner of the window, thought it
was of the time of Henry VIII., c. 1535, but Douce
attributes it to that of Edward IV., which appears more
I > nice, " Illustrations of Shakspeare," etc., p. 6S5.
I 1SS5. pp. 121-124.
MORRIS-DANCERS, C. 1500.
From a painted window at Betley.
io 4 RUSH-BEARING.
likely to be the case. # The figures of the English
friar, maypole, and hobby-horse seem to be an addition
of later date.
Walpole, in his "Catalogue of English Engravers,"
under the name of Peter Stent, describes a painting at
Lord Fitzwilliam's, on Richmond Green, which came
out of the old neighbouring palace. It was executed by
Vinckenboom, about the end of the reign of James I.,
and exhibits a view of the above palace. A morris-
dance is introduced, consisting of seven figures, viz. :
a fool, hobby-horse, piper, Maid Marian, and three
dancers, the rest of the figures being spectators. Of
these, the first four and one of the dancers Douce has
reduced in a plate from a tracing made by Grose.
The fool has an inflated bladder, or eel-skin, with a
ladle at the end of it, and with this he is collecting money.
The piper is pretty much in his original state; but the
hobby-horse wants the legerdemain apparatus, and Maid
Marian is not remarkable for the elegance of her person.
Few, if any, vestiges of the morris-dance can be
traced in England beyond the reign of Henry VII.,
about which time, and particularly in that of Henry
VIII., the churchwardens' accounts in several parishes
afford materials that throw much light on the subject,
and show that the morris-dance made a very consider-
able figure in the parochial festivals.
The Churchwardens' Accounts of Kingston-upon-
Thames, contain numerous entries relating to Robin
Hood and the morris-dancers, as :
"1508. For paynting of the Mores garments, and
for sarten gret leveres - -024
„ For plyts and ^ of laun for the Mores
garments ------
2 11
* This window was first engraved in Johnson and Steeven's " Shakspeare,"
1778, 8vo., at the end of the first part of Henry IV. ; in Reed's, and also Malone's
editions ; in Gutch's " Lytell Geste of Robin Hode," 1847, appendix, p. 349 ; and
in Brand's "Popular Antiquities," 1879, 8vo., Chatto & Wimlus. There is a
large coloured plate of it in Sangsler's re-issue of Knight's "Old England, or the
Museum of Antiquities."
1 06 R USH-B EARING.
"1508. For Orseden for the same - - - o o 10
„ For bellys for the daunsars - - -0012
1509-10. For silver paper for the J/tfm--dawnsars -007
1519-20. Shoes for the J/(?rw-daunsars, the frere,
and Mayde Maryan, at 7d. a peyre -054
1521-22. Eight yerds of fustyan for the Mores-
daunsars' coats - - - - - o 16 o
„ Adosyn ofgold skynnesfor the Morres - o o 10
1536-37. Five hats and 4 porses for the daunsars - o o 4}4"
In 1536-37, amongst other clothes belonging to the
actors in the play of Robin Hood, left in the keeping
of the churchwardens were : "4 Morres-daunsars cotes
of white fustian spangelyd, and two gryne saten cotes,
and a dysard's [fool's] cote of cotton, and 6 payre of
garters with bells." In 1537-38, the articles comprised :
" a Mouren's [Moor's] cote of buckram, and four morres-
daunsars' cotes of white fustian spangelid, and two gryne
saten cotes, and disardde's cote of cotton, and six payre
of garters with belles."
In Coates' " History of Reading," the churchwardens'
accounts of St. Mary's parish are said to contain the
following entries :
"1557. Item, payed to the Morrys-Daunsars and
the Mynstrelles, mete and drink at
Whitsontide - ---034
Payed to them the Sonday after May Day - o 020
Pd. to the Painter for painting of their
cotes - - - - - - -028
Pd. to the Painter for 2 doz. of Lyvereys - o o 20."
The following curious notice is taken from the
original accounts of St. Giles', Cripplegate, 1 57 1, pre-
served in MS. Addit. 12,222, f. 5 :
" Item, paide in charges by the appointment of the parisshioners,
for the settinge forth of a gyaunt morres-dainsers, with vj. calyvers
and iij boies on horsback, to go in the watche befoore the Lorde
Maiore uppon Midsomcr even, as may appere by particulers for the
furnishinge of the same, vj.li., ixs., ixd."
It appears from the Churchwardens' Accounts of
Great Mario w that dresses for the morris-dance
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 107
" were lent out to the neighbouring parishes. They
are accounted for so late as 1629."*
In 1557, there was a May-game in Fenchurch
Street, London, with a Lord and Lady of the May,
and a nwrris-dancc. +
The allusions to the morris-dancers became very
frequent in writers of the time of Queen Elizabeth.
In a rare tract of this period, entitled " Plaine Percevall,
the Peace-Maker of England," mention is made of a
"stranger, which seeing a quintessence (beside the
Foole and the Maid Marian) of all the picked youth,
strained out of a whole endship, footing the Morris about
a May-pole, and he, not hearing the minstrelsie for the
fidling, the tune for the sound, nor the pipe for the
noise of the tabor, bluntly demaunded if they were not
all beside themselves, that they so lip'd and skip'd
without an occasion." \
Shakspeare, in " Henry V.," mentions the Whitsun
morris-dance :
"And let us do it with no show of fear ;
No ! with no more than if we heard that England
Were busied with a Whitsun morris-dance."
And in another play, "All's Well that Ends Well,"
act ii., sc. 2, he speaks of the fitness of a "morris for
May-day." In later times the morris was frequently
introduced upon the stage. Stephen Gosson, who
wrote about 1579, in a little tract entitled "Players
Confuted," speaks of " dauncing of gigges, galiardes,
and morices, with hobbi-horses," as stage performances.
Herrick, in his " Hesperides," speaking of country
blessings, says among them were :
" Thy Wakes, thy Quintals, here thou hast,
Thy Maypoles, too, with garlands grac't :
Thy Morris-dance ; thy Whitsun ale ;
Thy Sheering flat, which never fail."
* Langley's "Antiquities of Desborough," 1797, 4 to -> P- r 4 2 -
t Strypes' " Eccl. Memorials," iii., p. 376.
J Brand's "Observations on Popular Antiquities."
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 109
In Laneham's letter from Kenilworth Castle, a
Bride Ale is described, in which mention is made of "a
lively Moris-dauns, according to the Auncient manner :
six dauncerz, Mawdmarion, and the fool."
To the puritans, the morris-dance was particularly
obnoxious, and their diatribes against it are numerous
and severe. Stubbes, in his "Anatomie of Abuses,"
1585, p. 107, describes it as follows : "They strike up
the Devil's Dauncc withall, then martch this heathen
company towards the church and churchyarde, their
pypers pyping, their drummers thundering, their
stumpes clauncing, their belles ingling, their handker-
chiefes fluttering about their heacles like madde men,
their hobbie-horses and other monsters skirmishing
amongst the throng ; and in this sorte they go to the
church (though the minister be at prayer or preaching),
dauncing and swinging their handkerchiefes over their
headesin the church, like Devils incarnate, with such a
confused noise that no man can heare his own voyce."
Another of these credulous fanatics # writes: "The
second abuse, which of all others is the greatest, is this,
that it hath been toulde that your dauncers have
daunced naked in nettes."
Richard Baxter, who was more moderate in his
opinions, and his testimony, therefore, of greater value,
in his " Divine Appointment of the Lord's Day," tells
us : "I have lived in my youth in many places where
sometimes shows or uncouth spectacles have been their
sports at certain seasons of the year, and sometimes
morricc-dancings, and sometimes stage plays, and some-
times wakes and revels. . . . And when the people by
the book [of Sports] were allowed to play and dance
out of public service-time, they could so hardly break
off their sports that many a time the reader was fain to
stay till the piper and players would give over ; and
* Fetherston's " Dialogue agaynst light, lewde, and lascivious dauncing," 1582,
121110., sign D 7. See a passage to the same purpose in Northbrooke's " Treatise
against dicing, dancing, etc.,*' 1597, 4*°-> <°- 68 l '-
no R USH-BEARING
sometimes the morrice-dancers would come into the
church in all the linen, and scarfs, and antic dresses,
with morrice-bells jingling at their legs. And as soon
as common-prayer was read did haste out presently to
their play again."
In Ben Jonson's play of " Bartholomew Fair" (1614),
a puritan, who was once a baker, but now dreams and
sees visions, "gave over his trade, out of a scruple he
took that in spiced conscience, those cakes he made
were served to bridals, maypoles, morrices, and such
profane feasts and meetings ;" and he describes "stage-
players, rhymers, and morrice-dancers" as a beam in
the eye of the brethren.
Barnaby Rich, also,t has a fling at the extravagance of
dress in 1615 : "And from whence commeth this wear-
ing, and this embroidery of long locks, this curiosity
that is used amongst men, in frizeling and curling of
their haire, this gentlewoman-like starcht bands, so be-
edged and belaced, fitter for Maid Marion in a Moris-
dance then for him that hath either that spirit or
courage that should be in a gentleman ? "
Notwithstanding these, objectors, the morris-dance
remained as popular as ever, and Thomas Hall, in his
" Funebriae Florae, the downe fall of May-games,"
(1660), 4to., observes: "If Moses were angry when
he saw the people dance about a golden calf, well may
we be angry to see people dancing the morrice about a
post in honour of a whore, as you shall see anon."
The following description of a morris-dance occurs
in " Cobbe's Prophecies, his Signes, and Tokens, his
Madrigalls, Questions, and Answers" (1614) :
" It was my hap of late, by chance,
To meet a Country Morris-dance,
When, cheefest of them all, the Foole
Plaied with a ladle and a toole ;
When every younger shak't his bells
Till sweating feet gave fohing smells ;
+ "The honestie of this age," 4to., p. 35.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 1 1 1
" And fine Maide Marian, with her smoile,
Shew'd how a rascal 1 plaied the voile ;
But, when the Hobby-horse did wihy,
Then all the wenches gave a tihy ;
But when they gan to shake their boxe,
And not a goose could catch a foxe,
The piper then put up his pipes,
And all the woodcocks look't like snipes," etc.
A morris-dance in Fleet Street, London, is described
in a seventeenth century manuscript in the Harleian
M.S., 3910 :
" In Fleet strete then I heard a shoote ;
I putt of my hatt, and I made no staye,
And when I came unto the rowte,
Good Lord ! I heard a taber playe,
For so, God save mee ! a morrys-daunce.
Oh ther was sport alone for mee
To see the hobby-horse how he did praunce
Among the gingling company.
I proffer'd them money for their coats,
But my conscience had remorse,
For my father had no oates,
And I must have had the hobbie-horse."
King James I. in his Declaration, 24th May, 1618,
orders that the people should not be debarred from
"having of May-games, Whitson-ales, and Morris-
dances, and the setting up of Maypoles."
Greene's "Quip for an Upstart Courtier" (1620)
describes that effeminate youth as acting the part of
Maid Marian : " to make the foole as faire, forsooth,
as if he were to play Maid Marian in a May-game or
a Morris- Dance."
In Pasquil's "Palinodia" (1634), we are told that:
" The lords of castles, mannors, townes, and towers,
Rejoic'd when they beheld the farmers flourish,
And would come downe unto the summer-bowers,
To see the country-gallants dance the Morrice."
Among the Crown jewels, on the accession of
Charles I., there was "One Sake of goulde, called the
Morris-Dauncc." Its foot was garnished with six
! j 2 7? USH-BEARING.
great sapphires, fifteen diamonds, thirty-seven rubies,
and forty-two small pearls ; upon the border, about the
shank, twelve diamonds, eighteen rubies, and fifty-two
pearls, and standing about that were five Morris-
dauncers and Taberer, having amongst them thirteen
small garnishing pearls and one ruby. The Lady
holding the salt had upon her garment, from her foot
to her face, fifteen pearls and eighteen rubies. Upon
the foot of the same salt were four coarse rubies and
four coarse diamonds ; upon the border, about the
middle of the salt, were four coarse diamonds, seven
rubies, and eight pearls ; and upon the top of the said
salt, four diamonds, four rubies, and three great pearls ;
[the lady] had upon the tyre of her head ten rubies,
twelve diamonds, and twenty-nine garnishing pearls.
By a special warrant of Charles I., dated at Hampton
Court, ;th December, 1625, a large quantity of gold plate
and jewels of great value were transferred to the Duke
of Buckingham and the Earl of Holland, Ambassadors-
Extraordinary to the United Provinces, who were
thereby authorised to transport and dispose of them be-
yond the seas, in such manner as the king had pre-
viously directed these noblemen in private. The
splendid gold salt called the Morris-Dance, above
described, weighing one hundred and fifty-one ounces
and three-quarters, was thus disposed of. *
On the first May-day after the restoration of Charles
II. (in 1 661), a maypole was erected in the Strand.
In the procession which took place to it was " a Morice-
Dance, finely deckt, with purple scarfs, in their half-
shirts, with a Tabor and Pipe, the ancient Musick, and
danced round about the Maypole, and after that danced
the rounds of their liberty." t There is an engraving,
by Vertue, of this procession, in the prints belonging to
the Society of Antiquaries.
* Hone's "Year Book," 1832, p. 428.
t "Cities Loyalty Displayed," 1661, 4to.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 1 1 3
In "Articles of Visitation and Inquiry for the Diocese
of St. David" (1662) occurs the following : " Have no
minstrels, no morris-dancers, no dogs, hawks, or hounds
been suffered to be brought or come into your church,
to the disturbance of the congregation ? "
Other writers refer to the early morris-dance :
"The queen stood on some doubt of a Spanish invasion, though it
proved but a morris-dance upon our waves."- - Wotton.
" How like an everlasting morris-dance it looks,
Nothing but hobby-horse and maid-marrian."
—Messenger's Very Woman, hi., 2.
"One, in his catalogue of a feigned library, sets down this title of
a book, 'The morris-dance of hereticks.' " — Bacon.
" The sounds and seas, with all their finny drove,
Now to the moon in wavering morrice move."
—Milton.
" I took delight in pieces that shewed a country village, morrice-
dancing, and peasants together by the ears." — Peacham.
Mr. Waldron, the editor of "The Sad Shepherd"
(1783, p. 255), mentions seeing a company of morris-
dancers in the summer of 1783, at Richmond, Surrey,
from Abingdon. They were accompanied by a fool,
in a motley jacket, who carried in his hand a staff about
two feet long, with a blown bladder at the end of it.
with which he either buffeted the crowd to keep them
at a proper distance from the dancers, or played tricks
for the diversion of the spectators. The dancers and
the fool were Berkshire husbandmen taking an annual
circuit to collect money. Another company of this
kind was seen at Usk, in Monmouthshire, which was
attended by a boy Maid Marian, a hobby-horse, and a
fool. They professed to have kept up the ceremony
at that place for the last three hundred years.
The "Star," of the 9th August, 1792, states that,
" On Monday [July 30th], the morris-dancers of Pendle-
ton paid their annual visit in Salford. They were
adorned with all the variety of colours that a profusion
R
n 4 * USH-B EARING.
of ribbons could give them, and had a very showy
garland."
Hone saw a troop of Hertfordshire morris-dancers
performing in Goswell Road, London, in 1826 ; and a
correspondent, writing to the "Every Day Book,"*
describes what was evidently the same company as
being in Rosoman Street, Clerkenwell, in June of the
same year :
" They consisted of eight young men, six of whom were dancers,
the seventh played the pipe and tabor, and the eighth, the head of
them, collected the pence in his hat, and put the precious metal into
the slit of a tin painted box, under lock and key, suspended before
him. The tune the little rural-noted pipe played to the gentle pulsa-
tions of the tabor, is called :
' Moll in the wad and I fell out,
And what d'ye think it was about.'
This may be remembered as one of the once popular street songs of
the late Charles Dibdin's composition. The dancers wore party-
coloured ribands round their hats, arms, and knees, to which a row
of small latten bells were appended, somewhat like those which are
given to amuse infants in teeth-cutting, that tinkled with the motion
of the wearers. These rustic adventurers . . . came from a village
in Hertfordshire. . . . The ' set to,' as they termed it, expressed a
vis a vis address. They then turned, returned, clapped their hands
before and behind, and made a jerk with the knee and foot alternately.
. . . They intended sojourning in town a week or two, after which
the box will be opened, and an equitable division take place, pre-
viously to the commencement of mowing and hay harvest. ... It
was the third year of their pilgrimage."
Gutch, t writing in 1847, says that, a very few years
before, he witnessed "a numerous retinue of morris-
dancers, remarkably well habited, skilfully performing
their evolutions to the tune of a tabor and pipe, in the
streets of Oxford University ; and he is credibly in-
formed that at Chipping Norton and other towns in
Oxfordshire a band of dancers traverse the neighbour-
hood for many days at Whitsuntide. At Droitwich,
also, in Worcestershire, on the 27th of June, a large
* 1S27, VOL 2, pp. 792-795.
t " Lytell Geste of Robin Hode," 1847, note, p. 365.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 115
party of morris-dancers still continue to parade the
town and neighbourhood, it is said, in commemoration
of a discovery of some extensive salt mines."
Miss Baker, in her " Glossary of Northamptonshire
Words " (1854), speaks of them as still met with in that
county; and Halliwell # also speaks of the morris-dance
as still commonly practised in Oxfordshire, though the
old costume had been forgotten, and the performers
were only dressed with a few ribbons. Morris-dancing
was not uncommon in Herefordshire in the earlier part
of the present century. It has been practised during
the same period in Gloucestershire, Somersetshire, and
Wiltshire, and in most of the counties round the metro-
polis. On the 4th of February, 1886, it was revived
at Stratford-on-Avon, and caused much interest.
In the "Journal of the Archaeological Association, "t
it is stated that the morris-dancers who go about from
village to village in Derbyshire, about Twelfth Day,
have their fool, their Maid Marian (generally a man
dressed in woman's clothes, and called "the fool's
wife,") and sometimes the hobby-horse. They are
dressed up in ribbons and tinsel, but the bells are
usually discarded.
In October, 1885, there were six or eight morris-
dancers at Northenden, in Cheshire. They had light-
coloured trousers, tied with ribbons at the knees, white
shirt sleeves, straw hats trimmed with ribbons, and
artificial flowers. The music was made by a triangle,
fifes, and drums. On the 21st September, 1889, being
Stockport wakes, a band of morris-dancers perambulated
the streets in the evening, dressed in white stockings,
knee-breeches, white shirts trimmed with ribbons, and
small caps. They were preceded by a good band of
music playing dance tunes, in front of which was a lusty
man plying a big whip. In rear was " owd sooty face,"
* "Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words," 1850.
t 1852, vol. 7, p. 201.
STOCKPORT MORRIS-DANCER.
THE MORRIS-DANL 'ERS. 1 1 7
with a well-patronised collecting-box. On the follow-
ing Monday, they paraded Edgeley, preceded by a
lurry decorated with arches, and carrying a number of
little girls prettily dressed. At the wakes held in 1890,
a troop of morris-dancers were habited in black jockey-
caps, white shirts, black knee-breeches, blue sashes,
white stockings, and shoes. Instead of handkerchiefs
they had thick white cords tied to the wrist and knotted
at the end.
In the early part of the present century, some
hundreds of young men could be seen every autumn in
Lancashire dancing the morris. Rush-carts were then
numerous, and nearly all had dancers accompanying
them. As the number of rush-carts gradually declined,
the morris-dancers became less numerous, but some
were to be seen at one place or another every year,
and are still to be met with. There is a very good
troop at Shaw, near Oldham, and another at Mossley.
They go about to the various wakes in the neighbour-
hood, and, with frequent practice, have attained a high
degree of skill.
o m
No particular season or occasion appears to have
been chosen for the performance of the morris-dance,
although it was most in request at the May and Whit-
suntide games. It was introduced at any festival or
merrymaking, Christmas not excepted. In the House-
hold Accounts of the Kytsons of H engrave Hall,
Suffolk, 1583, there is an item :
" In rewarde to the morres-dancers, at my rar. his return into the
country, ijs."
Sheriffs, too, had their morris-dancers. #
In the old play of "Jacke Drum's Entertainment"
(1601):
" The taber and pipe strike up a morrice. A shoute within :
A lord, a lord, a lord, who !
Ed. : Oh, a morrice is come, observe our country sports,
Tis Whitson tyde, and we must frolick it.
* " Survey of London," edition 1618, 4to. , p. 161.
1 1 8 R USH-BEARING.
" Enter the mortice.
The Song.
Skip it, and trip it, nimbly, nimbly,
Tickle it, tickle it lustily,
Strike up the taber, for the wenches' favour,
Tickle it, tickle it lustily.
Let us be seen on Hygate greene,
To dance for the honour of Holloway.
Since we are come hither, let's spare for no leather,
To dance for the honour of Holloway."
Warner's ''Albion's England" (1602, p. 121) says:
"At Paske begun our Morrise, and ere Pentecost our May."
Stow * describes the citizens of London of all estates,
in the month of May, " lightly, in every parish, or some-
times two or three parishes joining together, had their
several mayings, and did fetch in Maypoles with divers
warlike shows, with good archers, morris-dancers, and
other devices for pastime, all the day long, and toward
the evening they had stage plays, and bonfires in the
streets."
A tract, of the time of Charles I., entitled " My-
thomistes," printed by Henry Seyle, at the " Tiger's
Head," in St. Paul's Churchyard, speaks of "the best-
taught countrey Morris-dauncer, with all his bells and
napkins," as performing at Christmas.
" How they become the Morris, with whose bells
They ring all in to Whitson Ales, and sweat
Through twenty scarfs and napkins, till the Hobby-horse
Tire, and the Maid Marian, resolv'd to jelly,
Be kept for spoon meat."
— Cotgrave's English Treasury of Wit and Language (1655).!
Stevenson, in his "Twelve Moneths " (1661), speak-
ing of April, tells us : " The youth of the country make
ready for the Morris-da nee, and the merry milk-maid
supplies them with ribbands her true love had given
her."
* " Survey of London," edition 1603.
tSee Shirley's "Lady of Pleasure," 1637, act 1.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 119
In a Whitsun-ale, last kept at Greatworth, North-
amptonshire, in 1 785, the fool, in a motley garb, with
a gridiron, painted or worked with a needle, on his
back, carried a stick with a bladder, and a calfs tail.
Majordomo, and his lady as Queen of May, and my
lord's morris (six in number) were in this procession.
They danced round a garlanded maypole. A banquet
was served in a barn, and all those who misconducted
themselves were obliged to ride a wooden horse, and if
still more unruly were put into the stocks, which was
termed being my lord's organist.
Miss Baker * describes the celebration of a Whitsun-
ale early in the present century, in a barn at King's
Sutton, fitted up for the entertainment, in which the
lord, as the principal, carried a mace made of silk, finely
plaited with ribbons, and filled with spices and perfumes
for such of the company to smell as desired it. Six
morris-dancers were among the performers.
The number of dancers appears to have been un-
limited, ranging from one, in the individual morris, to
twenty or thirty at the Lancashire rush-bearings, the
number being then limited only by the number of young
men in the neighbourhood willing to learn the dance.
Chambers says the number was at one time limited to
five, but varied considerably at various periods. In
the painted window at Betley, of the time of Edward
IV., there are eleven characters : Robin Hood, Maid
Marian, Friar Tuck, piper, fool, hobby-horse, and five
dancers. In the painting, by Vinckenboom, of Rich-
mond Palace, about the end of the reign of James I., a
morris-dance is introduced in the foreground, consisting
of seven figures : a fool, hobby-horse, piper, Maid
Marian, and three other dancers. Peck says this dance
was " usually performed abroad by an equal number of
young men, who danced in their shirts, with ribands,
and little bells about their legs. But here, in England,
* "Glossary of Northamptonshire Words," 1854, vol. 2, pp. 433-4.
THE FOOL.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 121
they have always an odd person besides, being a boy
dressed in a girl's habit, whom they call Maid Marian,
an old favorite character in the sport." In Israel's
print there are nine characters ; and Strutt mentions
five dancers and two musicians, but this appears to
have been a dance of fools.
" Four reapers danced a morrice to oaten pipes."
— Spectator.
And Temple says :
" There went about the country a set of morris-dancers, composed
of ten men, who danced, a maid marian, and a tabor and pipe."
The characters of Maid Marian, Robin Hood, the
hobby-horse, and Friar Tuck, were omitted in course
of time, not being required in the dance. The fool
survived, and as " owcl sooty face," "dirty Bet," and
" owd mollycoddle " is yet known to the spectators of
a Lancashire morris-dance.
Beckwith, in his edition of Blount's " Jocular
Tenures," says that at Kidlington, Oxfordshire, on the
Monday after Whitsun week, there is " a Morisco-dance
of men, and another of zvo??te?i."
The dress of the morris-dancers varied according to
the means and taste of the performers. The principal
dancer appears, however, to have been more highly
dressed than the others. In the "Blind Beggar of
Bednal Green," by John Day, 1659, it is said of one of
the characters : "He wants no cloths, for he hath a
cloak laid on with gold lace, and an embroidered jerkin;
and thus he is marching hither like the foreman of a
morris." In the Kingston-upon-Thames accounts,
already quoted, the Moor's coat, in 1 536-37, was of buck-
ram, whilst those of the dancers were of fustian. The
Spanish morris was also danced at puppet-shows by a
person habited like a Moor, with castanets ; and Du
Jon informs us that the morris-dancers usually blackened
their faces with soot, that they might the better pass
s
122 R USH-BEARING.
for Moors. In " Pasquill and Marforuis " (1589),
Penry, the Welshman, is " the foregallant of the
Morrice with the treble belles, shot through the wit
with a woodcock's bill."
Stubbes, in his "Anatomie of Abuses," 1585, thus
describes the dress of the morris-dancers : " The Lord
of Misrule investeth his men with his liveries of greene,
yellow, or some other light wanton colour. And, as
though they were not gaudy ynough, I should say, they
bedecke themselves with scarries, ribbons, and laces,
hanged all over with golde ringes, precious stones, and
other jewels ; this done, they tie about either legge
twentie or fourtie belles, with rich handkerchiefe in
their handes, and sometimes laide a crosse over their
shoulders and neckes, borrowed for the most part of
their pretie Mopsies and Bcssics, for bussing them in
the darke."
We have seen, from the Kingston-upon-Thames
Churchwardens' Accounts, that in 1536-37 the dresses
of the morris-dancers consisted of four coats of white
fustian, spangled, and two green satin coats, with
garters on which small bells were fastened. The
curious old tract, "Old Meg of Herefordshire, for a
Mayd Marian, and Hereford Towne, for a Morris-
Daunce," etc. (1609), describes the musicians and the
twelve dancers, "having long coats of the old fashion,
high sleeves gathered at the elbows, and hanging
sleeves behind ; the stuff, red buffin, striped with white,
girdles with white, stockings white, and red roses to
their shoes ; the one six, a white jews cap, with a jewel
and a long red feather ; the other, a scarlet jews cap,
with a jewel and a white feather ; so the hobby-horse,
and so the maid-marian was attired in colours. The
whifflers * had long staves, white and red."
Scarves, ribbands, and laces, hung all over with gold
rings, and even precious stones, are also mentioned in
* Men who kept back the crowd.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 123
the time of Elizabeth. * Miles, the miller of Rudding-
ton, in Sampson's play of " The Vow-breaker, or the
Fayre Maid of Clifton" (1636), says he is come to
borrow "a few ribbandes, bracelets, eare-rings, wyer-
tyers, and silke girdles, and hand-kerchers for a Morice,
and a show before the Oueene."
Knee-breeches appear to have been usually worn by
the morris-dancers, partly owing to appearance, and
partly to convenience in use ; but in Alexander Wilson's
painting of the rush-cart the dancers have long trousers,
shoes, white shirts trimmed with ribbons, and helmet-
shaped hats. The costume worn now, and for many
years past (colour being left to individual taste, except
in the case of the breeches, which are gtnerally of the
same colour and material in each band of dancers),
consists of shoes with buckles, white stockings, knee-
breeches tied with ribbons, a brightly-coloured scarf or
sash round the waist, white shirt trimmed with ribbons
and fastened with brooches, and white straw hats
decorated with ribbons and rosettes. White handker-
chiefs, or "streamers," are tied to the wrist.
The early morris-dancers were adorned with small
bells :
" The Morrice rings while Hobby-Horse doth foot it featously."
— Beaumont and Fletcher's "Knight of the Burning Pestle •"
and
"... I have seen him
Caper upright like a wild Morisco,
Shaking his bloody darts as he his bells."
—Shakspeare's "Henry VI." Part 2, Act m\, Sc\ 1.
At Kingston-upon-Thames, 23 Henry VII., 1531-32,
" belly s for the dawnsars " cost I2cl. The Church-
wardens' Accounts of St. Helen's, Abingdon, Berkshire,
contain mention of the morris-bells from the first year
of the reign of Philip and Mary (1554-55) to the thirty-
fourth of Elizabeth (1592). In 1560, payment was
* Stubbes' "Anatomie of Abuses," 1585 ; " Knight of the Burning Pestle," act iv.
124
RUSH-BEARING.
made for "two dossin of Morres-bells," and they are
also mentioned in the Churchwardens' Accounts of St.
Mary-at-hill, London.
There is good reason for believing that the morris-
bells were borrowed from the genuine Moorish dance,
a circumstance that tends to corroborate the opinion
with respect to the etymology of the morris. Among
the beautiful habits of various nations, published by
Hans Weigel, at Nuremberg, in 1577, there is the
MOORISH LADY DANCING THE MORRIS.
figure of an African lady, of the kingdom of Fez, in the
act of dancing, with bells at her feet.
In the preface to " Mythomistes," a tract of the time
of Charles I., there is an allusion to the bells in the
morris-dance : " Yet such helpes, as if nature have not
beforehand in his byrth, given a Poet, all such forced
art will come behind as lame to the businesse and
deficient as the best-taught countrey Morris-dauncer,
with all his bells and napkins, will ill deserve to be, in
an I nne of Courte at Christmas, tearmed the thing they
call a fine reveller."
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 125
A note signed " Harris," in Reed's edition of
"Shakspeare" (1803), informs us that " Morrice-
dancing, with bells on the legs, is common at this day
in Oxfordshire and the adjacent counties, on May Day,
Holy Thursday, and Whitsun-Ales, attended by the
Fool, or, as he is generally called, the Squire, and also
a Lord and Lady, the latter, most probably, the Maid
Marian, . . . nor is the Hobby-horse forgot."
Strutt, in his " Sports and Pastimes of the People of
England," 18 10, observes that the garments of the
morris-dancers were adorned with bells, "which were
not placed there merely for the sake of ornament, but
were to be sounded as they danced. These bells were
of unequal sizes, and differently denominated, as the
fore bell, the second bell, the treble, the tenor or great
bell, and mention is also made of double bells. Some-
times they used trebles only, but these refinements were
of later times.* In the third year of the reign of
Queen Elizabeth (1561), two dozen of morris-bells were
estimated at one shilling."
At first, these bells were small and numerous, and
affixed to all parts of the body, the neck, shoulders,
elbows, wrists, waist, knee, and ankle ; the wrist, knee,
and ankle being, however, the principal places. The
number of bells round each leg sometimes amounted
from twenty to forty. They were occasionally jingled
by the hands.
All the Munich morris-dancers have bells, principally
at the knees, and this peculiarity is also shown in the
Betley window, where the dancers have them at the
knees only. In Israel's print they are attached to the
wrists and ankles ; Kemp wears a broad garter below
the knee, with three rows of bells, and this is also the
case with the morris-dancer in Vinckenboom's picture.
Their use in the English dance seems to have existed
only about a century or a little more, and they are now
* See Rowley's "Witch of Edmonton," 165S, act i., sc. 2.
126
R USH-BEARING.
not used, their use seems to be entirely forgotten.
Those used in Lancashire were the collar of horse-bells,
and were worn round the neck of the fool, who jingled
them as he capered about. Napkins or handkerchiefs
took the place of the bells, probably from the streamers
attached to the sleeves of the dancers, which were
slashed and left open. (See Nos. 10 and n in the
Betley window, and No. 6 of the Munich figures.)
These handkerchiefs were attached to the wrist, and
are now so used, the graceful manipulation of the arms
and handkerchiefs forming a graceful feature in the
dance.
The cut above is curious, inasmuch as it shows that
the fondness for the handkerchief among the morris-
dancers in the middle of the seventeenth century had
superseded the use of bells and other ornaments for the
hand. The verses beneath give a lively description of
the personal appearance of this important character.
The cut is copied from Dr. Dibdin's edition of More's
" Utopia," vol. 2, p. 266 :
" With a noise and a din,
Comes the Maurice-Dancer in,
With a fine linen shirt, but a buckram skin.
Oh ! he treads out such a peale,
From his paire of legs of veale,
The quarters are idols to him.
Nor do those knaves inviron
Their toes with so much iron,
'Twill ruin a smith to shoe him.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 127
" Ay, and then he flings about
His sweat and his clout.
The wiser think it two ells,
While the yeomen find it meet
That he jangle at his feet
The fore-horse's right eare jewels." *
The following picture is taken from Randle Holmes'
curious "Academie of Armorie," iii., p. 109, and shows
the mode of using the handkerchief.
The streamers which proceed from the sleeves and
flutter in the wind, though continued in very modern
times, were anciently not peculiar to morris-dancers,
examples of them occurring in many old prints. The
handkerchiefs, or napkins, as they are sometimes called,
were held in the hand, or tied to the wrists or shoulders. +
In the " Knave of Hearts" (161 2), we read :
" My sleeves are like some Morris-dansing fellow."
The morris-dance of the present day varies greatly
from that of the period of its introduction. It is a
progressive dance, and bears little resemblance either to
the Spanish fandango, or the Greek Pyrrho Saltatio.
Sir John Hawkins j describes it as "a dance of young
men, in their shirts, with bells at their feet, and ribbands
of various colours tied round their arms and flung
* "Recreation for Ingenious Head Pieces," etc., edition 1667, i2mo.
t " Knight of the Burning Pestle," act iv.
J "General History of Music," 1776, vol. 2, p. 135.
ia8 R USH-BEARING.
across their shoulders." Dr. Johnson (1785) says it
was "a dance in which bells are gingled, or staves or
swords clashed, which was learned by the Moors, and
was probably a kind of Pyrrhic or military dance;"
this, however, seems to bear a greater resemblance to
the sword-dance, formerly practised in England, than
to the morris-dance. Douce states that the Moorish
dance is "exceedingly different from the morris-dance
of the present day, it being performed with the casta-
nets or rattles at the ends of the fingers, and not with
bells attached to various parts of the dress ; and that it
is identical with the fandango." The true explanation
probably lies in the supposition that the Moorish dance
was the parent of the fandango, which, as it passed
through various countries, was modified by its learners,
a process which takes place in most things introduced
from a foreign country. Time, too, and disuse for long
periods, has led to a considerable change in the postures.
The introduction of modern musical instruments and
tunes has also contributed to the change.
" Come, bustle, lads, for one dance more,
And then cross morris three times o'er."
— Riding's " Village Muse," 1854.
It is not surprising to find so popular a dance as the
morris frequently introduced upon the stage. In
N ashes play of " Summers' last Will and Testament,"
there is a stage direction : " Ver goes in and fetcheth
out the Hobby- Horse and the Morrice-Daunce, who
daunce about." Afterwards, there enter three clowns
and three maids who dance the morris, and at the same
time sing the following song :
" Trip and goe, heave and hoe,
Up and downe, to and fro,
From the towne, to the grove,
Two and two, let us rove,
A Maying, a playing ;
Love hath no gainsaying,
So merrily trip and goe."
THE .MUSICIANS, 1890
1 30 R USH-B EARING.
In Randolph's "Amyntas," act v., the stage direction
is, "Jocastus with a morrice, himselfe Maid-marrion."
From time immemorial the music which marked the
time of the morris-dance was provided by the pipe and
tabor, and, when the old piper ceased to exist, was
continued by a fifer and a drummer down to our own
day, a couple of fifers and a drummer being considered
the correct thing. Thus in " Much Ado about
Nothing : "
" I have known when there was no music with him but the drum
and fife, and now he would much rather hear the tabor and pipe."
"John the piper " occurs in some Newton charters
about 1346. Drayton (" Eclogue" iii.) observes :
" Myself above Tom Piper to advance,
Who so bestirs him in the Morris-dance,
For penny wage."
In 1585, John Taylor published his " Drinke and
Welcome," in which he mentions "the fagge-end of an
old man's old will, who gave a good somme of mony
to a Red-fac'd Ale-drinker who plaid upon a Pipe and
Tabor, which was this : ' To make your Pipe and
Tabor keepe their sound, and dye your crimson tincture
more profound, There growes no better medicine on the
ground Than Aleano (if it may be found) To buy
which drug I give a hundred pound.'"
These wandering minstrels were a constant source
of trouble to the churchwardens by their piping during
the time of divine service, and drawing the rabble
together. In 1 579, a mandate was issued at Manchester
against pipers and minstrels making and frequenting
bear-baiting and bull-baiting on the Sabbath days, or
upon any other days. At a Visitation held at Garstang,
5th August, 1596, "John Baxter, Pyper," was returned
contumacious for " that he hath used to Pype uppon
the Saboth daie before Even songe." He was ordered
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 131
to "doe soe noe more hereafter uppon paine ot the
Lawe, not withstand'g the Judge hath tollerated the
s a John to Pype and Plaie upon Sundaies in the even-
inge soe that hee begin nott to Plaie before sixe of the
Clocke in the eveninge." And at another Visitation,
held at Stockport, 19th September, 1598, "John
Baillie" was deemed contumacious "for pypinge in
time of Divine Eveninge praier."
In the Stockport Parish Registers, under date 1st
January, 1610, is entered the baptism of " ffraunces,
sonne of William Hunte, of Stockport, a pyper ; " and
on the 19th March, 161 1, "an infant of William Huntes,
of Stockport, pyper," was buried. The name of another
Stockport piper occurs on the nth December, 1625,
when " Susanna, a pore chyld of William Hayes, a
pyper," was buried.
There are two little tracts relating to the morris-
dance, which, from their antiquity and rarity, require to
be noticed. The first is entitled : " Kemp's Nine
Daies' Wonder," " performed in a daunce from London
to Norwich. Containing the pleasure, paines, and
kinde entertainment of William Kemp betweene
London and that Citty, in his late Morrice. Wherein
is somewhat set downe worth note ; to reproove the
slaunders spred of him ; many things merry, nothing
hurtfull. Written by himselfe to satisfie his friends.
London, printed by E. A., for Nicholas Ling, and are to
be solde at his shop at the west doore of Saint Paules
Church." 1600, 4to., b. 1. *
Kemp performed a sort of dancing journey between
the two cities in 1599, which caused such a sensation
that he was induced to print an account of it in 1600,
* Of the original edition, only one copy, a quarto of about twenty pages, is
known, and is in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. In 1840, it was reprinted for the
Camden Society, with notes by the Rev. A. Dyce ; and, in 1884, Mr. Edmund
Goldsmid, F.R.H.S., reprinted it in the " Collectanea Adamantrea" series of re-
prints, also with notes. An interesting article on "Will Kemp, and his Dance
from London to Norwich," with a facsimile of the woodcut, is given in Walford's
"Antiquarian," 1886, vol. 10, pp. 241-250.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 133
dedicated to " Mistris Anne Fitton," # one of Queen
Elizabeth's maids of honour. The title-page is adorned
with a woodcut, representing Kemp dancing, and his
attendant, Tom the Piper, playing on the pipe and
tabor, whom Kemp, in his book, calls Thomas Slye,
his taborer.
Kemp started from London at seven in the morning,
on the first Monday in Lent, and, after various adven-
tures, reached Romford that night, where he rested
during Tuesday and Wednesday. He started again
on Thursday morning, and made an unfortunate
beginning by straining his hip, but he continued his
progress, attended by a great number of spectators,
and on Saturday morning reached Chelmsford, where
the crowd assembled to receive him was so great that
it took him an hour to make his way through them to
his lodgings. At this town, where Kemp remained till
Monday, an incident occurred which curiously illustrates
the popular taste for the morris-dance at that time :
"At Chelmsford, a mayde not passing fourteene years of age,
dwelling with one Sudley, my kinde friend, made request to her
master and dame that she might daunce the Morrice with me in a
great large roome. They being intreated, I was soone wonne to fit
her with bels ; besides, she would have the olde fashion, with napking
on her amies ; and to our jumps we fell. A whole houre she held
out ; but then being ready to lye downe, I left her off; but thus much
in her praise, I would have challenged the strongest man in Chelms-
ford, and amongst many I thinke few would have done so much."
Other challenges of this kind, equally unsuccessful,
took place on Monday's progress, and on the Wednes-
day of the second week, which was Kemp's fifth day
of labour, in which he danced from Braintree, through
* Mr. Goldsmid, in his reprint, assumes this to have been a mistake, and that
her name was Mary ; but the fact is, there were two sisters, Ann and Mary Fitton,
both of whom were maids of honour to Queen Elizabeth. They were the daughters
of Sir Edward Fitton, Knt. , of Gawsworth, co. Chester, by Alice, daughter and
heiress of Sir John Holcroft, Knt., of Holcroft, co. Lancaster. Anne married,
about 1595, Sir John Newdegate, Knt, of Erbury, co. Warwick. Mary married,
first, William Polwhele, gent., and secondly, Captain Lougher.
T 3 4 RUSH-BEARING.
Sudbury, to Melford. He relates the following
incidents :
"In this towne of Sudbury there came a lusty, tall fellow, a butcher
by his profession, that would, in a Morrice, keepe me company to
Bury. I, being glad of his friendly offer, gave him thankes, and
forward wee did set ; but, ere ever wee had measur'd half-a-mile of
our way, he gave me over in the plain field, protesting that, if he might
get a ioo pound, he would not hold out with me ; for, indeed, my
pace in dancing is not ordinary. As he and I were parting, a lusty
country lasse being among the people, call'd him faint-hearted lout,
saying, ' If I had begun to daunce, I would have held out one myle,
though it had cost my life.' At which words many laughed.
' Nay,' saith she, ' if the dauncer will lend me a leash of his bells, I'le
venter to treade one myle with him myselfe.' I lookt upon her,
saw mirth in her eies, heard boldness in her words, and beheld her
ready to tucke up her russat petticoate, I fitted her with bels, which
she merrily taking, garnisht her thick, short legs, and, with a smooth
brow, bade the tabrer begin. The drum strucke, forward marcht I
with my merry Mayde Marian, who shooke her fat sides, and footed
it merrily to Melford, being a long myle. There parting with her
(besides her skinfull of drinke), and English crowne to buy more
drinke, for, good wench, she was in a pittious heate. My kindness
she requited with dropping some dozen of short curtsies, and bidding
God blesse the dancer. I bade her adieu, and, to give her her due,
she had a good eare, daunst truly, and wee parted friends."
Having been the guest of " Master Colts," of Mel-
ford, from Wednesday night to Saturday morning,
Kemp made on this day another day's progress. Many
gentlemen of the place accompanied him the first mile.
" Which myle," says he, " Master Colts his foole would
needs daunce with me, and had his desire, where
leaving me, two fooles parted faire in a foule way.
I, keeping on my course to Clare, where I a while
rested, and then cheerfully set forward to Bury." He
reached Bury that evening, and was shut up there by
an unexpected accident, so heavy a fall of snow that
he was unable to continue his progress until the
Friday following. This Friday of the third week since
he left London, was only his seventh days' dancing,
and he had so well reposed, that he performed
the ten miles, from Bury to Thetford, in three hours,
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 135
arriving at the latter town a little after ten in the fore-
noon. " But, indeed, considering how I had been booted
the other journeys before, and that all this way, or the
most of it, was over a heath, it was no great wonder,
for I far'd like one that had escaped the stockes, and
tride the use of his legs to out-run the constable, so
light was my heeles, that I counted the ten myle as a
leape." At Thetford, he was hospitably entertained
by Sir Edwin Rich, from Friday evening to Monday
morning, and this worthy knight, " to conclude liber-
ally as hee had began and continued, at my departure
on Monday, his worship gave me five pounds," a con-
siderable sum at that time. On Monday, Kemp
danced to Hingham through very bad roads, and
frequently interrupted by the hospitality or importunity
of the people of the road. On Wednesday of the
fourth w r eek, Kemp reached Norwich, but the crowd
which came out of the city to receive him, was so great,
that, tired as he was, he resolved not to dance into it
that day, and he rode on horseback into the city, where
he was received in a very flattering manner by the
mayor, Master Roger Weld. It was not till Saturday
that Kemp's dance into Norwich took place, his
journey from London having thus taken exactly four
weeks, of which period nine days were occupied in
dancing the morris. #
The second tract was printed in 1609 (4-to.), and bears
the curious title of " Old Meg of Herefordshire, for a
Mayd Marian, and Hereford Toivnc for a Morris
Daunce ; or Tivclve Morris Dauncers in Hereford-
shire of Tivclve Hundred Years Old." It is dedicated :
" To that renowned Ox-leach, Old Hall, Taborer of
Herefordshire , and to his most invincible, weather-beaten,
Nutbrowne Tabor, being alrcadie old and sound, three-
score ycarcs and upward. To thee {old Hall), that for thy
Aq-q and Art migfhtest have cured an Oxe that was
* Chambers's " Book of Days," 1S63, vol. 1, pp. 632-3.
i 3 6 RUSH-BEARING.
eaten at Saint Ouintins, that for thy warlike musicke
mightest have strucke up at Bullen, when great
Drummes wore broken heads, thy little continuall
Taber had been enough to have put spirit into all the
souldiers : Now, Twevie-pipe, that famous Southern
Taberer with the Cowleyan windpipe, who for whuling
hath beene famous through the Globe of the world, did
never gain such renowne and credite by his pipe and
Taber, as thou (old Hall), by striking up to these
twelve hundred yeares Morris-dauncers : Nor art thou
alone (sweet Hall) a most exquisite Taber-man, but an
excellent Oxe-leach, and canst pleasure thy neighbours.
The people of Herefordshire are beholding to thee, thou
guist the men light hearts by thy Pype, and the women
light heeles by thy Taber : O wonderful Pyper, O
admirable Taber-man, make use of thy worth, even
after death, that art so famously worthy in thy life,
both for thy age, skill, and thy onbruized Taber, who
these threescore yeares has kept — sound and oncract,-
neither lost her first voyce, or her fashion: once for the
countrye's pleasure imitate that Bohemian Trisui,
who at his death gave his Souldiers a strict command,
to flea his skin off, and cover a drum with it, that alive
and dead, he might sound like a terror in the ears of
his enemies : so thou, sweet Hereford Hall bequeath
in thy last will thy velom-spotted skin, to cover Tabors:
at the sound of which to set all the shires a dauncing."
The account then opens : "The courts of kings for
stately measures : the city for light heels, and nimble
footing : the country for shuffling dances : western
men for gambols : Middlesex men for tricks above
ground : Essex men for the hay: Lancashire for horn-
pipes : Worcestershire for bagpipes: but Hereford-
shire, for the morris-dance, puts down, not only all
Kent, but very near (if one had line enough to measure
it) three-quarters of Christendom. Never had Saint
Sepulchres a truer ring of bells : never did any silk-
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 137
weaver keep braver time with the knocke of the heel :
never had the dauncing-horse a better tread of the toe:
never could Beverley fair give money to a more sound
taborer, nor ever had Robin Hood a more deft Mayd-
Marian."
Thus much for the honour of Herefordshire. The
preceding paragraphs afford a specimen of the ortho-
graphy, and the succeeding extracts, duly abbreviated,
or with the spelling modernised, will give a fair notion
of this remarkable performance :
" Understand, therefore, that in the merriest month
of the year which last did take his leave of us, and in
that month, as some report, lords went a- Maying, the
spring brought forth, just about that time, a number of
knights, squires, and gallants, of the best sort, from
many parts of the land, to meet at a horse-race near
Hereford, in Herefordshire. The horses having, for
that year, run themselves well nigh out of breath,
wagers of great sums, according to the fashion of such
pastimes, being won and lost, and the sports growing
to the end, and shutting up, some wit, riper than the
rest, fed the stomachs of all men, then and there
present, with desire and expectation of a more fresh
and lively meeting in the same place, to be performed
this year of 1609. The ceremonies which their
meeting was to stand upon were these, that every man
should engage himself, under his hand, to bring, this
present year, to the place appointed, running horses
for the race, cocks of the game to maintain battles,
etc., with good store of money, to fly up and down
between those that were to lay wagers. He that first
gave fire to this sociable motion, undertook to bring a
'hobby-horse ' to the race that should outrun all the
nasfs which were to come thither, and hold out in a
longer race."
When the time arrived, " Expectation did, within
few days, make Hereford town show like the best
u
1 3 8 R USH-BEARING.
peopled city. Inns were lodgings for lords. Baucis
and Philaemon's house (had it stood there) would have
been taken up for a knight. The streets swarmed
with people, staring, and joyfully welcoming whole
bravies of gallants, who came bravely flocking on horse-
back, like so many lusty adventurers. Bath made her
waters to boil up, and swell like a spring-tide, with the
overflowing of her own tears, to see her dearest guests
leave her for the love of a horse-race at Hereford, the
number of them being, at least, two or three hundred.
Amongst many of the better ranks, these marched with
the foremost : lord Herbert, of Ragland, sir Thomas
Somerset, Charles Somerset, count Arundel's two sons,
sir Edward Swift, sir Thomas Mildemay, sir Robert
Taxley, sir Robert Carey, sir John Philpot, sir Ed.
Lewes, sir Francis Lacon, sir James Scudamore, sir
Thomas Cornwall, sir Robert Boderham, sir Thomas
Russell, sir — Bascarvile, sir Thomas Conisby, sir
George Chute. These were but a small handful to
those rich heaps that were gathered together. But by
these, that had the honor to be the leaders, you may
guess what numbers were the followers."
At the appointed day, " there was as much talking,
and as much preparation for the ' hobby-horse ' pro-
mised the last year, as about dietting the fairest
gelding this year, upon whose head the heaviest wagers
were laid. To perform a race of greater length, of
greater labor, and yet in shorter time, and by feeble,
unexercised, and unapt creatures, that would be an
honor to him that undertook it, that would be to Here-
fordshire a glory, albeit, it might seem an impossibility.
Age is nobody in trials of the body, when youth is in
place. It gives the other the bucklers, it stands and
gives aim, and is content to see youth act, while age
sits but as a spectator; because the one does but study
and play over the parts which the other hath discharged
in this great and troublesome theatre. It was, there-
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 139
fore, now plotted to lay the scene in age, to have the old
comedy presented, fathers to be the actors, and beard-
less boys the spectators. Sophocles, because he was
accused of imbecility and dotage, should rehearse his
CEdipus Coloneus, while the senate, and his own wild-
brain sons, stood by, and were the audience ; and to
set out this scene with mirth, as well as with wonder,
the state of the whole act was put into a morris-dance."
Now, then, to set forth these performers and their
show, as nearly as may be, in the language of the old
narrator :
The Morris and its Officers.
Two musicians were appointed to strike up, and to
give the alarm. The one of them {Squire of Hereford),
was a squire born, and all his sons squires in their
cradles. His instrument, a treble violin, upon which
he played any old lesson that could be called for, the
division he made on the strings being more pleasing
than the diapason. "In skill he outshines blind
Moore, of London, and hath outplayed more fiddlers
than now sneak up and down into all the taverns there.
They may all call him their father, or, if you reckon
the years rightly which are scored upon his head, the
musicians' grandsire, for this tuneable squire is 108
years old. Next to him went old Harrie Rudge, the
taborer. This was old Hall, of Hereford. The waits
of three metropolitan cities make not more music than
he can, with his pipe and tabor, if, at least, his head be
hard-braced with nappie ale. This noble old Hall,
seeing that Apollo was both a fidler and a quack-salver,
being able to cure diseases, as well as to harp upon one
string, would needs be free of two companies as well
(that is to say), the sweet company of musicians, and
that other, which deals in salves and plasters, for he
both beats a tabor, with good judgment, and (with
better) can help an ox if he find himself ill at ease.
i 4 o R USH-BEARING.
The wood of this old Hall's tabor should have been
made a pail to carry water in, at the beginning of king
Edward the sixth's reign ; but Hall, being wise, because
he was, even then, reasonably well stricken in years, saved
it from going to the water, and converted it, in those
days, to a tabor. So that his tabor hath made
bachelors and lasses dance round about the May-pole
threescore summers, one after another, in order, and is
yet not worm-eaten. And noble Hall himself hath stood
(like an oak), in all storms, by the space of fourscore
and seventeen winters, and is not yet falling to the
ground."
Whifflers. — The marshals of the field were four.
These had no great stomach to dance in the morris, but
took upon them the office of whifflers. I. Thomas
Price, of Clodacke, a subsidy man, * and one upon
whose cheeks age had written 105 years. 2. Thomas
Andros, of Begger Weston, a subsidy man, for he
carried upon his back the weighty burden of 108
years. 3. William Edwards, of Bodenham (his name
is in the king's books likewise), and unto him had time
also given the use of 108 years ; and, besides the
blessings of so many years, the comfort of a young
wife, and, by that wife, a child of six years old.
4. John Sanders, of Wolford, an ironworker, the hard-
ness of which labour carried him safely over the high
hill of old age, where she bestowed upon him 102
years. These four whifflers, casting up what all their
days, which they had spent in the world, could make,
found that they amounted to 423 years, so that if the
rest of their dancing brotherhood had come short of
their account, and could not (every man) make up one
hundred years, these offered were able to lend them
three-and-twenty years ; but the others had enough of
their own, and needed not to borrow of any man.
See how the morris-dancers bestir their legs. Litt
* One assessed on the Subsidy Roll, a wealthy person.
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 141
up your eyes, leap up behind their heads that stand
before you, or else get upon stalls, for I hear their bells,
and behold, here they come :
1. Of twelve in the whole team, the foreman was
James Tomkins, of Lengerren, a gentleman by birth,
neither loved of fortune, nor hated of her, for he was
never so poor as to be pitied, nor ever so rich as to be
envied. When fourscore and eighteen years old he
married a wife of two-and-fifty years old ; " she brought
him a child that is now eight years old (living), the
father himself having now the glass of his life running
to fill up the full number of 106 yeares."
2. After him comes, lustily dancing, John Willis,
of Dormington, a bone-setter, his dancing fit to his
weight of ninety-seven years. "His purpose in being
one of the Morris was both honest and charitable, for
he bestowed his person upon them, with intent to be
ready at hand if any dislocation should be wrought
upon any joynt in his old companions by fetching lofty
tr i c ks — which, by all means possible, they were sworn
to avoid."
3. Room for little Dick Phillips, of Middleton.
How nimbly he shakes his heels ! Well danced, old
heart of oak ; and yet, as little as he seems, his courage
is as big as the hobby-horse's, for the fruits of his youth,
gathered long agon, are not yet withered. His eldest
son is at this present fourscore years of age, and his
second son may now reckon threescore ; at our lady-
day last, he made up the years of his life just 102.
4. Now falls into his right place William Waiton,
of Marden, with 102 years at his heels. " He was an
old fisher, and of a clean man an excellent fowler."
5. Here slips in William Jl fosse, who, contrary to
his name, had no moss at his heels. He bears the age
of 106.
6. Now cast your eyes upon Thomas Winney, of
Holmer, an honest subsidy man, dwelling close by the
1 4 2 R USH-BEARING.
town. "He dances with ioo years about him, where-
soever he goes, if the churchyard and cramp take him
not.
7. But how like you John Lace, of Madley, a tailor,
and an excellent name for it ? "In his youth he was a
hosier — born before the dissension between cloth
breeches and velvet breeches, he carries fourscore and
seventeen summers about him, and faine would borrow
three years of James Tomkins [the foreman] to make
him an hundred ; and James may very well spare them,
and yet leave three toward the interest."
8. But what say you to John Careless ? " You let
him passe by you, and seem as careless as he, a man
of fourscore and sixteen at Midsummer next. He
hath been a dweller in Homlacie threescore years and
two, and known to be a tall man, till now he begins to
be crooked, but for a body and a beard he becomes any
Morris in Christendom."
9. At the heels of him follows his fellow, William
Maio, of Egelton, an old soldier, and now a lusty
labourer, and a tall man. " Forty years since, being
grievously wounded, he carried his liver and his lights
home half a mile, and you may still put your finger into
them, but for a thin skin over them ; and for all these
storms he arrives at fourscore and seventeen, and
dances merrily."
10. But look you who comes : "•John Hunt, the
Hobby-horse, wanting but three of an hundred, 'twere
time for him to forget himself, and sing but 0, nothing
but 0, the hobby-horse is forgotten. The Maid-marian,
following him, offers to lend him seven years more, but
if he would take up ten in the hundred his company
are able to lend them."
1 1 . But now give way for the Maid Marian, old "Meg
Goodwin, the famous wench of Erdistand, of whom
Master Weaver, of Burton, that was fourscore and ten
years old, was wont to say she was twenty years older
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 143
than he, and he died ten years since. This old Meg
was at Prince Arthur's death, at Ludlow, and had her
part in the dole. She was threescore years (she saith)
a maid, and twenty years otherwise, that's what you
will, and since hath been thought fit to be a Maid-
marian, at the age of 120."
1 2. Welcome John Mando. He was born at Cradly.
A very good two-hand sword man, of the age of one
hundred, on black Monday last, and serves in place of
Morgan Deede, who climbs to that a^e within four
years, here present dwelling in the town ; but he has a
great desire to keep his bed and be spared.
These eighteen persons, the fiddler, the taborer, the
four whifiiers, and the twelve dancers in this morris
carried about them 1837 years. "And, for a good
wager, it were easy to find, in Herefordshire, four
hundred persons more within three years over or under
an hundred years ; yet the shire is no way four-and-
twenty miles over."
For the fashion observed amongst the musicians,
and the habit of the dancers, take a view of both.
" The musicians and the twelve dancers had long coats
of the old fashion, high sleeves gathered at the elbows,
and hanging sleeves behind ; the stuff, red buffin, striped
with white, girdles with white, stockings white, and red
roses to their shoes ; the one six, a white jews cap with a
jewel and a long red feather; the other, a scarlet jews cap
with a jewel and a white feather ; so the hobby-horse,
and so the maid-marian was attired in colours ; the
whifflers had long staves, white and red. After the
dance was ended, diverse courtiers, that won wagers at
the race, took those colours and wore them in their
hats."
The Speech before the Morris.
"Ye servants of our mighty king,
That came from court one hundred mile
To see our race, and sport this spring,
Ye are welcome, that is our country stile,
1 44 R USHBEARING.
" And much good do you, we are sorry
That Hereford hath no better for you.
A horse, a cock, trainsents, a bull,
Primero, gleck, hazard, mumchance ;
These sports through time are grown so dull,
As good to see a Morris-dance,
Which sport was promised in jest,
But paid as truly as the rest.
A race (quoth you) behold a race,
No race of horses, but of men,
Men born not ten miles from this place,
Whose courses outrun hundreds ten.
A thousand years on ten men's backs,
And one supplies what other lacks.
Lenvoy.
This is the Lenvoy (you may gather)
Gentlemen, yeomen, grooms, and pages,
Let's pray, Prince Henry and his father
May outlive all these ten men's ages.
And he that mocks this application
Is but a knave past reformation."
After this speech, "old Hall struck up, and the
Morris-dancers fell to footing, whilst the whifflers in
their office made room for the hobby-horse."
The narrative concludes by inquiring : "And how
do you like this Morris-dance of Herefordshire ? Are
they not brave old youths ? Have they not the right
footing, the true tread, comely lifting up one leg, and
active bestowing of the other ? Kemp's morris to
Norwich was no more to this then a gaillaird, on a
common stage, at the end of an old dead comedy, is to
a coranto danced on the ropes. Here is a dozen of
younkers, that have hearts of oak at fourscore years,
backs of steel at fourscore and ten, ribs of iron at a
hundred, bodies sound as bells, and healthful (accord-
ing to the Russian proverb) as an ox, when they are
travelling down the hill to make that 120. These
shewed in their dancing, and moving up and down, as
if Mawlborne hills, in the very depth of winter — all
their heads covered with snow — shook and danced at
THE MORRIS-DANCERS. 145
some earthquake. Shall any man lay blame on these
good old fathers, because at such years they had not
spent all their wild oats ? No, we commend (as 'Fully
saith) a vouno' man that smells somewhat of the old
signior, and can but counterfeit gravity in his cheeks ;
and shall we not heave up with praises an old man that
at 108 years' end can rake his dead embers abroad, and
show some coals of the lusty Juventus glowing in him
even then ? Such an old madcap deserves better to be
the stuffing of a chronicle, than Charino- Cross does for
loosing his rotten head, which (through age, being wind
shaken) fell off, and was trod upon in contempt. Were
old Stowe alive, here were taborino; work enough for
his pen ; but, howsoever, so memorable a monument
of man shall not wither in oblivion, if the sweet April
showers, which drop from the Muse's water, can make
it grow up and flourish. A dishonour were it to poets
and all pen-men if acts of this worth should not en-
comiastically be celebrated and recorded. Oh ! if all
the people in the kingdom should have their clays
stretched out to the length of these men, clerks and
sextons might go and hang themselves in the bell
ropes, they would have cold doings ; prodigal heirs
might beg, they should hardly find an almanack that
would tell them when their lands should come to their
hands by the death of their fathers, for they themselves
would have white beards before they could arrive at
their full age. It were no hoping after dead men's
shoes, for both upper leather and soles would be worn
out to nothing. As great pity it were (Old Margaret,
or rather new Mayd-Marian) that all men's wives
(especially those that like dutch-watches have alarums
in their mouths) should last so long as thou hast done,
how would the world be plagued ? Alas ! what do I
see? Hold, Taborer ! stand, Hobby-horse ! Morris-
dancers, lend us your hands ! Behold one of the
nimble-legged old gallants is by chance fallen down,
x
1 4 6 £ USH-BEAR1NG.
and is either so heavy, so weary, so inactive of himself,
or else five of his fellows are of such little strength,
that all their arms are put under him, as levers, to lift
him up, yet the good old boys cannot set him on his
feet. Let him not lie for shame, you that have, all this
while, seen him dance, and though he be a little out of
his part, in the very last act of all, yet hiss at nothing,
but rather, Summi Joins causa plaudite" *
This dance is referred to in Sir William Temple's
" Miscellanea," part 3, Essay on Health and Long
Life; and Howell, in his "Parly of Beasts," 1660, p.
122, also alludes to it.
Brand states that a few years ago a May-game, or
morris-dance, was performed by the following eight
men, in Herefordshire, whose ages, computed together,
amounted to 800 years : J. Corley, aged 109 ; Thomas
Buckley, 106; John Snow, 101 ; John Edey, 104;
George Bailey, 106; Joseph Medbury, 100; John
Medbury, 95 ; Joseph Pidgeon, 79.
* Hone's "Year Book," 1832, pp. 418-422.
Gbc Makes.
: So blithe and bonny now the lads and lasses are,
That ever, as anon the bagpipe up doth blow,
Cast in a gallant round about the hearth they go,
And, at each pause, they kiss — was never seen such rule
In any place but here, at bonfire, or at Yule ;
And every village smokes at wakes with lusty cheer,
Then, ' Hey' (they cry), ' for Lun and Lancasheere,'
That one high hill was heard to tell it to his brother,
That instantly agreed to tell it to some other."
— Drayton.
IGILS, or wakes, are of great antiquity,
probably coeval with Christianity itself.
Nelson, in his " Companion for the Festi-
vals and Fasts of the Church of England,"
has many references to them, from which we gather
that vigils, from the Latin word vigilcz, signify watch-
ings, it being the custom, in primitive times, to pass a
great part of the night that preceded certain holy days
in devotion and religious exercises, and this even in
those places which they set apart for the public worship
of God. But when these night meetings came to be
so far abused that no care could prevent several
disorders and irregularities, the Church thought fit to
abolish them, and these night-watches were converted
into fasts, still keeping the former name of vigils. The
early Christians, who generally apprehended that the
end of the world was near at hand, employed part of
the night in watching and prayer, expecting that at
midnight the cry would be made, " Behold, the Bride-
* 1757, pp- 563-566.
1 48 R USH-BEARING.
groom cometh ! " Others have referred the rise of
these night-watches to the necessity Christians were
under of meeting in the night for the exercise of their
religion, in order to avoid persecution by their enemies.
Tertullian confirms the custom of frequenting the
assemblies for religious worship, and of receiving the
Eucharist before day, and Pliny, in the account he
gave to the emperor concerning the Christians, their
meeting before day to sing hymns to our Saviour, etc.,
makes a part of it. When persecution ceased, and
Christians had the liberty of performing their devotions
in a more public manner, they still continued their
night-watches before great festivals, particularly that of
Easter. This practice was in great vigour in the time
of St. Jerome, who defended these vigils against the
objections of Vigilantius, who endeavoured to have
them abolished, on the ground of the disorders com-
mitted at them. The council of Eliberis, held anno
305, forbade the admission of women, to prevent the
ill consequences of these promiscuous assemblies, but
they were not abolished till after St. Jerome's time, nor,
as some think, till the beginning of the sixth century.
Strutt, in his "Sports and Pastimes of the People of
England," 18 10, says the wakes greatly resembled the
agapce, or love-feasts, of the early Christians, and quotes
an old writer, who says :
" And ye shal understond and know how the Evyns were first
found in old time. In the begynning of holy Churche, it was so that
the people cam to the Churche with candellys burnyng, and would
wake, and come toward night to the church in their devocion ; and,
afterwards, the pepul fell to letcherie,and songs and daunses,with harp-
ing and piping, and also to glotony and sinne ; and so tourined the
holyness of cursydness ; wherefore holy faders ordeyned the pepull to
leve that waking and to fast the evyn, but it is called vigilia, that is,
waking, in English, and eveyn, for of eveyn they were wont to come
to churche."
On the conversion of the Saxons by St. Augustine,
the heathen Paganalia were, with some modifications,
THE WAKES. 149
continued among the converts, by an order of Pope
Gregory the Great, written about the year 601, to
Mellitus, the Abbot who accompanied St. Augustine
in his mission hither. His words are to this effect:
"On the day of dedication, or the suffering days of
holy martyrs, whose relics are there deposited, they
may build themselves booths of the boughs of the
trees about those churches which have been turned to
that use from temples, and celebrate the solemnity with
religious feasting, and no more offer beasts to the
devil."
The 28th Canon, established by King Edgar,
ordered those who came to the wake to pray devoutly,
and not to betake themselves to drunkenness and
debauchery. The festival of the day on which the
church of any parish was dedicated, is also specially
enjoined in the law of Edward the Confessor.
"Wake," says the " Imperial Dictionary," "is the
feast of the dedication of the parish church, formerly
kept by watching all night. # At present, most fast
days are popularly called wakes in the rural districts of
England, but the peculiar wake of country parishes was
originally the day of the week on which the church
had been dedicated, afterwards the day of the year.
Every rural parish had its wake every year, and most
of them had two wakes, one on the day of dedication,
and another on the birthday of the saint to whom the
church was dedicated. The festival of the dedication
has long since been entirely discontinued, whilst t he-
saints' day festival still subsists in some of the rural
districts of England, in the altered form of a country
wake,"
In proportion as these festivals deviated from the
original design of their institution, they became more
popular, the conviviality was extended, and not only
the inhabitants of the parish to which the church be-
* Dr. Johnson, in his "Dictionary," 1785, gives a similar origin.
i5°
RUSH-BEARING.
longed were present at them, but they were joined by
others from the neighbouring towns and parishes, who
flocked together on these occasions, and the greater
the reputation of the tutelar saint, the greater, generally,
was the promiscuous assembly. The pedlars and
hawkers attended to sell their wares, and so, by
degrees, the religious wake was converted into a
secular fair. Booths were erected, often in the church-
yard, though this use of the churchyards had been
A COUNTRY WAKE (WELFORD, WARWICKSHIRE).
frequently forbidden by Church councils, beginning
from the time of Edward I. #
The riot and debaucheries which eventually took
place at these nocturnal meetings, became so offensive
to religious persons that they were suppressed, and
regular fairs established to be held on the saints' day,
or upon some other day near to it, as might be most
convenient (Strutt). The Abbot of Ely, in King
* Bourne "Antiq. Vulg.," 1777.
THE WAKES. 151
John's reign, inveighed heavily against the practice of
holding these fairs on the Sunday, but it was not
entirely abolished until the reign of Henry VI.
At first the feast was regularly kept on the day in
every week on which the church was dedicated. Many
of the churches being dedicated to the Holy Trinity,
Trinity Sunday was the principal day throughout the
country for holding these festivals, but upon complaint
that the number of holidays was excessively increased,
to the detriment of civil government and secular affairs,
and upon the discovery that the great irregularities
which had crept into these festivities by degrees,
especially in churches, chapels, and churchyards, were
highly injurious to piety, virtue, and good manners,
both statutes and canons were made to regulate and
restrain them, and, by an Act of Convocation passed
by Henry VIII. in the year 1536, their number was
considerably reduced. The feast of the dedication of
every church was ordered to be kept upon one and the
same day everywhere ; that is, on the first Sunday in
October, to the total abolition of the observance of the
particular saint's day (Brand). The Act caused much
dissatisfaction, and in many parts of the country was
totally disregarded.
In Manchester, during these holidays, the pageants
of Robin Hood, Maid Marian, and Friar Tuck, were
exhibited in the church, and were generally got up by
the priests. The expense of these exhibitions were
defrayed by the churchwardens, who made collections
from house to house for that object. After the passing
of this Act, the wakes were removed from the church
to the churchyard.
In 1579, an assembly of ecclesiastical commissioners,
consisting of Henry, Earl of Derby, Henry, Earl of
Huntington, and William, Bishop of Chester, held at
Manchester, issued a mandate against pipers and
minstrels making and frequenting bear-baiting and
1 5 2 R USH-B EARING.
bull-baiting on the Sabbath clays, or upon any
other days, and also against superstitious ringing of
bells, wakes, and common feasts, drunkenness,
gaming, and other vicious and unprofitable pursuits.
Stubbes, in his " Anatomie of Abuses," 1585, speak-
ing of wakes and feasts, says : " This is their order
therein : Every towne, parish, and village, some at one
time of the yeare, some at an other (but, so that every
one keeps his proper day, assigned and appropriate to
itselfe, which they call their wake day), useth to make
great preparation and provision for goode cheare, to
which all their friendes and kinsfolkes, farre and
neere, are invited." He adds that there are such
doings at them "insomuch as the poore men that beare
the charges of these Feastes and Wakeses are the
poorer, and keep the worser houses a long tyme after.
And no marvaile, for many spend more at one of these
Wakeses than in all the whole yere besides."
In Ben Jonson's play of " Bartholomew Fair," 1614,
a zealous puritan, rejoicing in the name of Zeal-of-the-
Land-Busy, when in the stocks at the fair, describes
himself as " One that rejoiceth in his affliction, and
sitteth here to prophesy the destruction of Fairs and
May-games, Wakes, and Whitson-ales, and doth sigh
and groan for the reformation of these abuses."
In 1632, the Lord Chief Justice Richardson and
Baron Denham were on circuit in Somersetshire,
where wakes and ales abounded, and took action, with
the general consent of the whole Bench, ordering that
these festivals should be altogether suppressed. # This
order led to great commotion, t and, to settle the
difficulty, Laud, by direction of Charles I., wrote a
letter, dated 4th October, 1633, to Pierce, the Bishop
of Bath and Wells, to enquire into the management of
* Kcnnet, " Parochial Antiquities," 181S, ii., p. 309.
t To counteract the order issued by the judges to the clergy, the king ordered
his declaration of the 18th October, 1633, to lie read in the churches on the 2nd
February in every year. See Govett's, "The King's Book of Sports," 1890, p. 106.
THE WAKES. 153
the wakes and other festivals. * Pierce summoned
seventy-two of the better sort of clergy, who, in
November of the same year, certified " that on the
festivals (which commonly fell on the Sunday) Divine
Service was most solemnly performed, and the congre-
gation fuller, both in the forenoon and in the afternoon,
than upon any other Sunday ; that the clergy desired
they might be continued, and that the people, in most
places, were of the same sentiment. They believed
these annual solemnities serviceable for preserving the
memory of the dedication of the churches, for taking
up differences by the meeting of friends, for cultivating
a good correspondence among neighbours, and for
refreshing the poor with the entertainments made upon
those anniversaries." t
On the 1 8th October, 1633, Charles I. issued his
warrant, in which "His Majesty finds that, under pre-
tence of taking away abuses, there hath been a general
forbidding, not only of ordinary meetings, but of the
Feasts of the Dedications of the Churches, commonly
called Wakes. Now, his Majesty's express will and
pleasure is that these Feasts, with others, shall be
observed, and that his Justices of the Peace, in their
several Divisions, shall look to it, both that all disorders
there may be prevented or punished, and that all
neighbourhood and freedom, with manlike and lawful
exercises, be used."
A note by Laud, giving the causes of the publication
of this declaration or warrant, says : "A great
distemper in Somersetshire, upon the forbidding of the
Wakes, in sourness of this opinion : An Act of the
Judge, that rid that circuit, March 15, 1627, and
followed by another, 1630, and his Majesty troubled
with petitions and motions of some of the chief men in
that county, on both sides." \
* "Calendar of State Papers," 1633, p. 231.
t Rush worth's " Historical Collections."
X Prynne's " Canterburie's Doom," 1646, p. 148.
T 5 4 Jt USH-BEARING.
In Hinde's " Life of John Bruen, of Bruen-Staple-
ford, in the County of Chester, Esquire," 1641, the
author, speaking of Popish and profane wakes at
Tarvin, says : " Popery and Profannes, two sisters in
evil, had consented and conspired in this parish, as in
many other places, together to advance their Idols
against the Arke of God, and to celebrate their solemne
Feastes of their Popish Saints, as being the Dii Tute-
lares, the speciall Patrons and Protectors of their
Church and Parish, by their Wakes and Vigils, kept
in commemoration and honour of them, in all riot and
excesse of eating and drinking, dalliance and dancing,
sporting and gaming, and other abominable impieties
and idolatries."
Sir Aston Cokain's "Small Poems of Divers Sorts,"
1658, has the following :
" The Zealots here are grown so ignorant,
That they mistake Wakes for some ancient Saint,
They else would keep that Feast ; for though they all
Would be cal'd Saints here, none in heaven they call."
Smith, who wrote an account of the manners and
customs of the inhabitants of Cheshire, about the
year 1600, # says: "Touching their House-keeping,
it is bountiful and comparable with any other shire
in the realm, and that is to be seen at their Weddings
and Burials, but chiefly at their Wakes, which they
yearly hold, although it be of late years well laid
down."
In "A Serious Dissuasive against Whitsun Ales,"
1736, a postcript adds: "What I have now been
desiring you to consider as touching the evil and
pernicious consequence of Whitsun Ales among^ us,
doth also obtain against . . . the ordinary violations
of those festival seasons commonly called JJakes.
And these latter, in particular, have been oftentimes the
* Printed in King's " Vale Royall of England, or the County Palatine of
Chester Illustrated," 1656.
THE WAKES. 155
occasion of the profanation of the Lord's Day, by the
bodily exercise of wrestling and cudgel-playing, where
they have been suffered to be practised on that
holiday."
The Bishop of Chester, Dr. Jayne, preaching at Ast-
bury Church on the 5th of October, 1890, regarded
" the venerable institution, known as Astbury Wakes,
as a reunion by which old associations, old friendships,
were revived, old memories awakened and renewed,
and an institution by which that sad tendency, that
centrifugal tendency of the present day, to break away
from the centre and forget old ties and claims, would
be counteracted."
Dr. Gower, in his " Sketch of the Materials for a
History of Cheshire," 1 77 1, tells us: "I cannot avoid
reminding you, upon the present occasion, that Fru-
menty makes the principal entertainment of all our
Country Wakes — our common people call it ' Firmitry.'
It is an agreeable composition of boiled wheat, milk,
spice, and sugar."
The hospitality exercised at the wakes is noticed by
Tusser :
" Fill oven full of flawnes, Ginnie passe not for sleepe,
To-morrow thy father his wake-daie will keepe."
It is used in the same sense in " Hamlet," i., 4 :
" The king doth wake to-night, and take his rouse."
And in King's " Art of Cookery " :
" Sometimes the vulgar will of mirth partake,
And have excessive doings at their wake"
Mention has been made of the frequency with which
old customs are referred to by the old dramatists and
poets. The wake consequently comes under notice :
" By dimpled brook and fountain brim,
The wood-nymphs deckt with daisies trim
Their merry wakes and pastimes keep-"
— Milton.
156 R USH-BEA RJNG.
And Dry den :
"... Putting all the Grecian actors down,
And winning at the ivake their parsley crown."
The " Government of the Tongue " speaks of " the
droiling peasant who scarce thinks there is any
world beyond his village, nor gaiety beyond that of a
wakey
In Lancashire, and particularly the south-eastern and
eastern portions of the county, the wakes is the great
holiday of the year. Though nominally commencing
on the Sunday, it, in reality, began on the Satur-
day, on which day the rush-cart went round the
neighbourhood, and lasted till Wednesday or Thursday
in the following week. For some time previously
work is steadily adhered to, in order that funds may be
provided for the coming festival. The housewife
cleans down the house (and a woman who does not do
so at wakes time is looked upon by her neighbours as
shirking her work), household treasures are brought
forth, and displayed to the best advantage, the copper
kettle, won at some local gooseberry-show, receives an
extra polish, and the old grandsire's watch hung over the
mantle-shelf, the wife's ''grandmother's teapot" is
displayed on the shelf against the wall, the pot church
and dog ornaments on the mantle-shelf receive a good
wash, and the chest of drawers, corner cupboard, and
case-clock, get such a polish that they would
serve as looking-glasses. Clean curtains are placed in
the windows, and two or three pots of flowers, if not
already there, brighten up the scene. The fire-grate
is " blacked," and the floor — nearly always of Hags in
the country districts — scoured and sprinkled with sand.
A batch of bread and oatcake is baked, pies and other
dainties made, and often a brew takes place, if not of
ale, then of nettles or some other herb, for the
great impetus given to the increase of population in
THE WAKES. 157
the manufacturing districts, has led to many seeking
work and a home in the towns, and the wakes time
affords an opportunity for revisiting relatives and friends
in the country. Feasting and merrymaking take
place, and in the evening these town-families may be
seen returning home, laden with flowers, fruit, eggs,
butter, fowls, and other country products. If the
wakes is a noted one, strangers turn up in great
numbers to see the rush-cart and morris-dancers, and
generally to carouse with anyone likely to be " hail
fellow, well met ! " This unfortunately leads to
drunkenness, brawls, and often riot.
The principal scene to be found at the wakes is on
the green, or some open space as near the centre of
the town or village as possible. Here gather a
motley assemblage of fly-boats, merry-go-rounds,
11 dobby-horses," swing-boats, " Aunt Sallys," " knock-
em-downs," weighing-machines, " try-your-strength,"
and electric machines, shooting-galleries, and other
devices for abstracting money from the pocket. The
appetite is appealed to by booths for the sale of
ginger-bread and sweet-cakes, especially made at some
of these country wakes, bread and cheese, hot peas,
toffy, " pop," and "ginger-beer," toys for the children,
and nuts for all. In the larger towns these are in-
creased by an occasional menagerie, a theatre — at
which the performers make more show outside
than in, — conjurers, marionettes, peep-shows, fat
women and tall men, with monstrosities of various
kinds. Occasionally a "cheap-jack" will be found
palming off his rubbish on the gaping idler, whose dis-
satisfaction with his bargain merely serves to sharpen
the wit of his companions. Here also may be seen the
cart of the travelling photographer, who, for sixpence,
turns out your likeness, ready framed, "while you
wait."
Such are the sights which meet the eye. The sounds
158 £ USH-B EARING.
which greet the ear are almost beyond description.
Steam organs, steam whistles, hurdy-gurdies, drums,
trumpets, gongs, rattles, men shouting, women scream-
ing, children blowing penny-trumpets and crying, rifles
popping, dogs barking — each trying to make itself
heard above the rest — raise such a pandemonium that
the quiet man who " does the wakes" stands a good
chance of having a headache which will last him for
days. The public-houses in the neighbourhood of the
wakes ground do a roaring trade, and the passer-by
hears a medley of singing and shouting, brawling and
cursing, followed sometimes by an adjournment of the
revellers to the pavement, in order to settle some
drunken dispute. Towards evening, maudlin fellows
may be seen led off home by their wives, the latter
with their finery disarranged, their faces the colour of
a peony, and tempers spoiled for a month at
least.
In the outskirts dog-racing, and often dog-fighting,
rabbit-coursing, pigeon-flying, running, leaping, wrest-
ling, bicycle racing, and other sports, are provided.
Formerly these sports were of a more brutal character,
and the wakes without a bait of some kind was con-
sidered a farce. Bull-baiting was the one most in
vogue, anyone being allowed to slip a dog on payment,
generally, of a shilling. A well-trained dog ran under
the bull's legs, and pinned it by the lips, the bull often
raising the dog high in the air, and bringing it down
with a whack on the ground in its pain. That dog
was voted the best which pinned the bull in the neatest
manner, and held on the longest. Young dogs, run-
ning straight at the bull, often met with severe treat-
ment. Now and again the bull would break loose,
and speedily clear the spot. In bear-baiting, the above
tactics would not do, and a good dog at a bull would
make but a poor show with a bear, who had to be
pinned before he could use his claws. Badger-baiting
160 RUSH-BEARING.
also took place at many inns, the badger being placed,
tail first, in a tub laid on the ground, so that he could
only be met in front, and the dog had to lay hold and
draw him out. Cock-fighting and dog-fighting were
often eclipsed by a fight between two men in the old
Lancashire style, stripped to the skin with the excep-
tion of a pair of clogs, striking, wrestling, " puncing,"
now up, now down, for the fight was continued on the
ground until the vanquished one cried off. Shins
presented a sorry sight, gashed in all directions by the
kicks from the clogs, and for weeks after had to be
carefully washed and bandaged. Yet these fierce
encounters did not arise so often from hatred or a
quarrel, but on slight provocation, as : " So-and-so is
a better mon, and con feight thi." " Con he, by G — d,
aw'll feight him," and the thing was done. The
Lancashire lad was as ready for a fight as an Irishman,
and several skits hit off this trait. Some little time
after the resumption of work following a strike at
Preston, a quaker shop-keeper called to his neighbour,
" Hearsto, John, things are mendin', it's a lung time
sin' aw saw a battle i' th' market-place, but aw've sin
three this morning," and so accustomed were the wives
to this fiorhtin^ that it is related of one woman who went
to fetch her " mon " from the wakes, and finding him
disinclined to do so, asked him, "Was to foughten ? "
and receiving the reply, " neaw," told him to " get
foughten, and come whoam."
The " Stockport Advertiser," of the 25th August,
1825, contains the following paragraph: " Didsbury
wakes will be celebrated on the 8th, 9th, and 10th of
August. A long bill of fare of the diversions to be
enjoyed at this most delightful village has been
published. The enjoyments consist chiefly of ass-
races, for purses of gold ; prison-bar playing and
grinning through collars, for ale ; bag-racing, for hats ;
foot-racing, for sums of money ; maiden plates, for
THE WAKES. j6i
ladies under twenty years of age, for gown-pieces,
shawls, etc. ; treacled loaf-eating, for various rewards ;
smoking matches, apple dumpling-eating, wheelbarrow-
racing, the best heats ; bell-racing ; and balls each
evening. ' Que nunc prescribere longum est' The
humours of Didsbury festival are always well-regulated,
the display of youths of both sexes vieing with each
other in dress and fashion, as well as cheerful and
blooming faces, is not exceeded by any similar event,
and the gaieties of each day are succeeded by the
evening parties fantastically tripping through the
innocent relaxation of country dances, reels, etc., to as
favourite tunes, at the ' Cock ' and ' Ring o' Bells '
inns."
A singular wakes custom was introduced into
Droylsden about 1814 from Woodhouses, where
it had been prevalent for more than a third of
a century. Chambers, in his " Edinburgh Journal "
of November 19th, 1824, gives it a notice, as does
also Bell, under the title of " The Greenside
Wakes Song," in his annotated edition of the
" English Poets."
The ceremonial issued from Greenside, and consisted
of two male equestrians grotesquely habited. One,
John, son of Robert Hulme, of Greenside, personified
a man ; the other, James, son of Aaron Etchells, of
Edge-lane, a woman. They were engaged with spinn-
ing-wheels, spinning flax in the olden style, and
conducting a rustic dialogue in limping verse, and
gathering contributions from spectators. Latterly a
cart was substituted for a saddle, as being a safer
position in case they grew tipsy. Both Bell and
Chambers translate the rhyme into " gradely English,"
and render Threedywheel tread the wheel, but it is
evidently thread the wheel, as will be seen by a
perusal of the original idiomatic and more spirited
version :
i6 2 R USH-BEARING.
" It's Dreighhodin wakes, un wey're commin to teawn,
To tell yo o' somethin' o' great reneawn,
Un iv this owd jade ull lemmi begin,
Aw'l show yo heaw hard un heaw fast aw con spin.
Chorus.
So its threedywheel, threedywheel, dan, don, dill, doe.
Theaw brags o' thisel', bur aw dunno' think it true,
For aw will uphowd thi fawits arn't o few ;
For when theaw hast done, un spun very hard,
O' this aw'm weel sure, thi work is ill marred.
Chorus.
Theaw saucy owd jade theaudst best howd thi tung,
Or else awst be thumpin' thi ere it be lung;
Un iv ot aw do, theaust sure for to rue,
For aw con ha' monny o one as good as you.
Chorus.
What is it to me whoe you can have ?
Aw shanno be lung ere aw'm laid i' my grave ;
Un when aw am deod yo may foind, iv yo con,
One ot'il spin is hard is aw've done.
Chorus.
Com, com, mi dear woife, here endeth my sung,
Aw hope it has pleost this numerous thrung ;
Bur iv it has mist, yo needn't to fear,
Wey'll do eawr endeavour to pleos urn next year.
Chorus.
So its threedywheel, threedywheel, dan, don, dill, doe." *
A hand-bill, of which the following is a copy, sets
forth the programme of sports at the Eccles wakes of
1830:
" Eccles Wake.— On Monday morning, at eleven o'clock, the
sports will commence with that most ancient, loyal, rational,
constitutional, and lawful diversion,
BULL-BAITING,
in all its primitive excellence, for which this place has long been
noted. At one o'clock there will be a foot-race ; at two o'clock, a
bull-baiting, for a horse-collar; at four, donkey-races, for a pair of pan-
* Higson's " History of Droylsden," 1859, pp. 65-66.
THE WAKES. 163
niers; at five, a race for a stuff hat ; the day's sport to conclude with bait-
ing the bull, ' Fury,' for a superior dog-chain. This animal is of
gigantic strength and wonderful agility, and it is requested that the
Fancy will bring their choice dogs on this occasion. The bull-ring
will be stumped and railed round with English oak, so that
The timid, the weak, the strong,
The bold, the brave, the young,
The old, friend, and stranger,
Will be secure from danger.
" On Tuesday the sports will be repeated \ also, on Wednesday,
with the additional attraction of a smock-race by ladies. A main of
cocks to be fought on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, for twenty
guineas, and five guineas the byes, between the gentlemen of Man-
chester and Eccles. The wake to conclude with a fiddling-match, by
all the fiddlers that attend, for a piece of silver."
At the wakes held 2nd September, 1833, a swing-
boat broke down with seven or eight children in it,
and one girl was killed. During the baiting of the bull
several cows passed near to the ring, and whilst winding
their way through the crowd, a bull-dog suddenly
sprang on one of them, which caused the affrighted
animal to overturn a cart of nuts, and a girl had her
leg broken in consequence.
Eccles was long celebrated for its wakes and its
cakes, but the former has almost died out. Bull and
bear-baiting ceased in 1834. The bull used to be
baited on the south side of a plot of vacant land at the
Regent Road entrance to the village. At the last bull-
bait, a stand erected for the use of spectators fell, and
several people were injured. One of them, a woman,
died some little time after. The last bull that was
baited in Eccles was taken to Chowbent, and as it was
led out of Eccles it was bestridden by a fiddler and a
trumpeter, both of whom played on their respective
instruments. The ring, fastened to a post sunk into
the ground, remained for some time after. The bears
used to be baited on the south side of a plot of waste
ground near the " Cross Keys Hotel." #
* " Manchester Guardian." — Notes and Queries, No. 1192.
i6 4 RUSH-BEARING.
A picture of Eccles Wakes was painted by Joseph
Parry, R.S.A., of Manchester, in 1822, for the late Mr.
Thomas Kaye, publisher and editor of the " Liverpool
Courier." Like Thompson, in his picture of the Rush-
bearing at Borrowdale, the artist has drawn freely on
his imagination, and the scene is quite unlike the
village of Eccles. The picture is thirty-five inches
long, and twenty-four inches wide, containing not less
than 200 figures. In the background is a church, with
large masses of foliage, intermixed with which are
several old-fashioned tenements, conspicuous among
them standing "The Old Original Red Lion." On
the extreme left are depicted a bull-bait and the prize
ring, while combats with single-stick are going on in
various parts of the ground. In the centre are a train
of morris-dancers, a sweep assuming the character of
" Flibbertigibbet," the tomfool of the village, and other
amusing characters in grotesque costumes. A genteel
group occupies the centre of the foreground ; the papa
and the children are enjoying the fun very much, while
the lady turns up her nose at the disorderly scenes.
On the right, a vendor of the far-famed Eccles cakes
plying his trade, two devoted worshippers of Bacchus,
a lad on an ass, and some domestic scenes form a
motley group. *
A small pamphlet, without date, was published,
entitled: "The Country Wakes: A Critique upon a
Picture of Eccles Wakes, painted by Parry, of Man-
chester," 1822, i2mo., 15 pp.
In Westhoughton, at the annual feast or wakes, there
is a singular local custom of making large flat pasties
of pork, which are eaten in great quantities on the
Wakes Sunday, with a liberal accompaniment of ale ;
and people resort to the village from all places for miles
round, on this Sunday, just as they rush into Bury on
Mid-Lent or Mothering Sunday to eat simnels and
* " Manchester Guardian. " — Notes and Queries, No. 974.
THE WAKES. 165
drink bragot ale. On the completion of the wakes in
August, 1890, a peculiar procession took place, in which
the members of the "Bone Club" took part. The
leaders carried broom-handles, upon which were placed
skeletons of cows' heads, decorated with ribbons, and
others carried jaw-bones. The music was provided
with tin whistles. Copious refreshments were provided
at public-houses.
Zbc IRusb.
Can the rush grow up without mire? can the flag grow without water?"
—Job, viii. , 2.
|HE rush, "trodden under foot," was con-
sidered of so little value as to give rise to
the saying, "not worth a rush," in which
sense it is used by Gower :
" For til I se the daie springe,
I sette slepe nought at a r 11 she."
Other instances occur, as :
" Not ivorth a rush, master, whether apes go on four legs or two."
— I? Estrange.
" But bee not pinned alwayes on her sleeves ; strangers have greene
rushes, when daily guests are not worth a rush." — Lylfs " Sapho and
Phaon" //., 4..
And
"John Bull's friendship is not ivorth a rush." — Arbuthnot.
Skelton also makes use of the same term, yet, like
many other of our old sayings, it requires some modifi-
cation. The pith of the rush formed a cheap and
easily-obtained wick for the "rush-light;" the rush
supplied the only carpet or covering for the rude floors
of our ancestors for centuries ; the " hassock " on which
he knelt ; mats, which sold at from 6d. to several
shillings, on which he cleaned his shoes ; seats for his
chairs ; ropes for several purposes ; toys for his children ;
a charm for the cure of disease ; and, formed into a
ring, was used for the purpose of deluding ignorant and
THE RUSH. 167
immoral females into a mock marriage. Baskets were
made of rushes in the earliest times. They were also
used for wrapping in them concrete milk (? cheese). An
instrument to catch fish was also made of them. Rolls
to stuff capes of robes were made of the pith. There
were particular trades who worked in them. The
species Scirpus was manufactured into hats, mats,
thatch for houses, sails of ships, etc. The pith, covered
with wax, was the wick of torches. It was also termed
the papyrus, and the interior laminae might be used for
a fine paper. *
Rushes were also used for beds. An eighteenth
century ballad says :
" Fair Lady, rest till morning blushes,
I'll strew for thee a bed of rushes."
— Oh ! Lady Fair.
And in the first part of " Henry IV.," Hi., 1 :
" She bids you
Upon the wanton rushes lay you down."
Goldsmith also mentions this use of the rush :
" My rushy couch and frugal fare."
The rush is frequently mentioned by the old writers :
" Man but a rush against Othello's breast,
And he retires."
— Shakspeare, " Othello.' 1 ''
" Your farm requites your pains ;
Though rushes overspread the neighb'ring plains."
— Dryden.
" In rushy grounds, springs are found at the first spit." — Mortimer.
" The timid hare to some lone seat
Retir'd ; the rushy (en or rugged furze."
— Thomson.
In Lancashire, "hassock" is a reed, rush, or coarse
grass (such as " scuch " or "couch" grass), formerly
used for making mats ; hence the term is applied to
* See Foshrooke's " Encyclopaedia of Antiquities," 1843, vo1 - *> P- 5°9-
1 68 RUSH-BEARING.
mats, and to the cushions, or "stools," on which people
kneel at church :
" 1729, July 1. Set my son John to lead [cart] hassocks to Long-
ridge." — Walkderis Diary.
Stacks, barns, outhouses, and cottages were often
covered with sods instead of thatch. The coarse grass
and rushes from the top of a moss was much used for
this purpose. Again quoting Walkden, under date
7th July, 1729 :
" So wanting some hassock turf to top our stack with . . . son
John led me 4 double loads home, and 2 double loads to John Bleas-
dale's for John Bleasdale, at 3d. per load." " July 8. In the after-
noon, finished my stacking." " July 9. ... I sodded the turf stack
top."
A Scotch ballad tells us how Bessie Bell and Mary
Gray :
" They bigged a bower on yon burn brae,
And theekit it ower wi' rashes."
Twisted into ropes, the rush was used for securing
thatched roofs, and for trussing hay and straw, being
more pliant and stronger than ropes made of straw.
The accompanying figure of an Italian rush-gatherer,
from a drawing by E. Cecconi, is taken from the "Art
Journal," 1885, p. 375.
The word juncare — meaning to strew with rushes-
is sometimes used in the West of England, when
referring to the custom of strewing rushes, evidently
derived from the Latin juncus, a bulrush. Du Cange
gives, "Jtmcare, spargere flores." Jonciere is a bed of
rushes ; juncous, full of rushes. — (Ash's " Dictionary,"
1779). Juncare (old Latin), to strew with rushes,
according to the old custom of adorning churches.-
( Bailey's " Dictionary," 1789). Joncher, to strew, to
spread, or cover (as) with rushes. — (Cotgrave).
Rush-bearings have been absurdly attributed, in their
origin, to an anonymous festival, in which the Pagans
expressed their unity and concord by rushes. " I was
- .' 1 tlLv:.1*.'&; 'if : wi' «)S?<!i
•"■^k^
THE RUSH GATHERER.
2A
1 7 o R USH-BEARING.
led to this," says Ebenezer Hunt, "by examining the
Latin Juncus, a Rush, which both Rider and Littleton
derive 'a Jungendo, quoniam ejus usus ad juncturas
utilis ; vel quod junctis radicibus hsereat,' from joining,
because it was used for binding things, or because it
joins together in the roots, it being the custom formerly
to make ropes of them, and which, in some measure,
obtains among country people in our day ; and the roots,
adhering together in their growth, will bear the latter
sense ; either of which is farther confirmed by its
German name, Binz, from binden, to bind. — Vide
Parkhurst's 'Greek Lexicon,' under Schoinion."*
Dr. Bullein, t who speaks much in general com-
mendation of the rush for its utility, informs us that
" rushes that grow upon dry grounds be good to strew
in halles, chambers, and galleries, to walke upon, de-
fending apparrell as traynes of gownes and kertles from
dust. Rushes be olde courtiers, and when they be
nothing worth then they be cast out of the doores ; so
be many that do treade upon them."
In Somersetshire, the name of bulrush is applied to
the common rush (June us), "and this is quite intelli-
gible, if we understand the name to be the same as
Pole-rush or Pool-rush, which is said to be found in old
writers. This was given to the plant from its growing
in pools, like the French Jonc d'eatc, and the Anglo-
Saxon Ea-risce, only that the Scirpus is to be under-
stood in these cases." \
The "rush" in most frequent use was probably the
Acorns calamus, or sweet flag, which though, botanic-
ally speaking, not a rush at all, would be thus loosely
classed by a rustic gatherer.
Rush-chairs. — "The use of rush-bottomed chairs,"
says Tuer, § " which are again coming into aesthetic
* Ilampson's " Medii .-Evi Kalendarium," 1S41, p. 343.
t " Bulwarke of Defence,'' 1579, fol. 21.
X Friend's " Flowers and Flower Lore," 18S6, p. 475.
§ "Old London Street Cries," 1885, p. 108.
Q
S
o
H
ttj
1 72 RUSH-BEARING.
fashion, cannot be traced back quite a century and a
half." The chairs in the time of Elizabeth were wood,
with the seats and backs stuffed. In that of Queen
Anne, they were seated and backed with cane. In the
country districts the cry of "chairs to mend" is fre-
quently heard, the stock-in-trade of the travelling
chair-mender consisting of a thick bundle of pliant dried
rushes, generally six feet long, and a few tools, and,
in some cases, a smaller bundle of split canes. The
charge for re-bottoming a chair runs from is. 6d. to
2s. 6d., and they are more comfortable to sit upon than
cane ones.
Rush-charms. — In Devonshire, the rush is used in
a charm for the thrush, as follows : Take three rushes
from any running stream, and pass them separately
through the mouth of the infant, then plunge the rushes
again into the stream, and as the current bears them
away, so will the thrush depart from the child.
In Cheshire, rushes are used as a charm for warts.
I have several times seen an old man proceed as follows :
Taking a long, straight rush, he tied three knots on it,
then, making it into a circle, he drew it over the wart
downwards nine times, at the same time mumbling
something (which he stoutly refused to divulge, on the
plea that if he did the cure would not work). The
wart would disappear in three months, unconsciously.
I have met several people who firmly believe in its
efficacy. It seems that the secret was told him on the
express injunction that he should only impart it to one
other person, with a similar injunction, in his lifetime,
otherwise he would lose the gift.
To find a four-leaved clover, a double-leaved ash,
and a green-topped rush was deemed very lucky :
"With a four-leaved Clover, a double-leaved Ash, and green-
topped Seave,
You may go before the queen's daughter without asking leave."
Rush-fuzes.- -The Cornish miners formerly used
THE RUSH. 173
rushes for fuzes, the pith being taken out and then filled
with gunpowder. A prepared fuze of paper, or match,
was affixed to the top of the rush, of a length sufficient
to permit the miner to get out of the way of the ex-
plosion.
Rush-lights, or candles with rush wicks, are of the
greatest antiquity, for we learn from Pliny that the
Romans applied different kinds of rushes to a similar
purpose, as making them into flambeaux and wax-
candles for use at funerals. The earliest Irish candles
were rushes dipped in grease and placed in lamps of
oil, and they have been similarly used in many districts
of England. In Baret's "Alvearie," fol., London, 1580,
R. 481, "The rush, weeke, or match that mainteineth
the light in the lampe " is spoken of. Aubrey, writing
about 1673, says that he saw at Ockley, in Surrey,
" the people draw peeled rushes through melted grease,
which yields a sufficient light for ordinary use, is very
cheap and useful, and burnes long." *
The Rev. Gilbert White has devoted one letter in
his interesting work t to this simple piece of domestic
economy. He tells us :
"The proper species is the common soft rush, found in most
pastures by the sides of streams and under hedges. Decayed
labourers, women, and children gather these rushes late in summer.
As soon as they are cut, they must be flung into water, and kept
there, otherwise they will dry and shrink, and the peel will not run.
When peeled they must lie on the grass to be bleached, and take the
dew for some nights, after which they are dried in the sun. Some
address is required in dipping these rushes into the scalding fat or
grease. The careful wife of an industrious Hampshire labourer ob-
tains all her fat for nothing, for she saves the scummings of her bacon
pot for this use ; and if the grease abound with salt she causes the
salt to precipitate to the bottom, by setting the scummings in a warm
oven. Where hogs are not much in use, and especially by the sea-
side, the coarse animal oils will come very cheap. A pound of com-
mon grease may be procured for fourpence, and about six pounds of
grease will dip a pound of rushes, which cost one shilling, so that a
* Chambers's " Book of Days," 1S63, vol. 1, p. 507.
t " Natural History of Selborne."
i 74 RUSH-BEARING.
pound of rushes, ready for burning, will cost three shillings. If men
that keep bees will mix a little wax with the grease, it will give it a
consistency, and render it more cleanly, and make the rushes burn
longer, mutton suet will have the same effect.
"A pound avoirdupois contains 1600 rushes; and supposing each
to burn on an average but half-an-hour, then a poor man will purchase
800 hours of light, a time exceeding thirty-three entire days, for three
shillings. According to this account, each rush, before dipping, costs
one thirty-third of a farthing, and one-eleventh afterwards. Thus a
poor family will enjoy five-and-a-half hours of comfortable light for a
farthing. An experienced old housekeeper assured Mr. White that
one pound and a half of rushes completely supplied her family the
year round, since working-people burn no candle in the long days,
because they rise and go to bed by daylight.
"Little farmers use rushes in the short days both morning and
evening, in the dairy and kitchen ; but the very poor, who are always
the worst economists, and therefore must continue very poor, buy a
halfpenny candle every evening, which, in their blowing, open rooms,
does not burn much longer than two hours. Thus, they have only
two hours' light for their money, instead of eleven."
Rush-lights were, however, not peculiar to the
southern part of the country :
" In the fall of the year, a caller at any Seathwaite farmhouse will
notice upon a hanging shelf, or some such repository, a bundle of
what looks rather like dirty straw, but which, on examination, turns
out to be half-peeled rushes saturated with fat, and are the principal,
if not the sole provision made for the supply of light to the household
in the evenings of winter. In the dales around Seathwaite, a pro-
verbial saying may be heard to the effect that a ' Seathwaite candle's
a greased seeve,' seeve being Cumbrian for rush."*
I remember these rush-lights in Cheshire, within the
last twenty years, being sold twenty for sixpence.
They were as thick as the present "twelves" candles
(twelve to the pound), but half as long again, and gave
a steady but dim light. There were some curious bits
of folk lore connected with them ; for instance, if a
rush-light in " swealing " curled over, it denoted death ;
if a bright star appeared in the flame it portended a
letter. One old woman used to make her own lights,
in a somewhat similar manner to that related by Gilbert
* Ilarland and Wilkinson's " Lancashire Legends," etc., 1873, p. 204.
THE RUSH. 175
White, gathering the long pliant rushes growing in
very wet places, and dressing them by the side of a
pond, wetting them several times a day in the manner
thatchers do with straw for thatching. When sufficiently
cured, she peeled them (the pith alone being used).
The grease was " dripping," which she got from her
better-provided neighbours, and mixed with it a little
mutton fat, boiling it in a large pan on the fire. Then,
-taking several rush piths, and tying one end to a stick
with thread, so that they hung down, she dipped them
into the pot, which stood on the "hob" to keep the
grease warm, afterwards hanging the stick on some-
thing to cool, whilst she went on with another lot,
alternately dipping and cooling till they were thick
enough to her liking.
A writer describes them as " a small blinking taper,
made by stripping a rush, except one small stripe of
the bark which holds the pith together, and dipping it
in tallow." When used as night-lights, the length of
time they were required to burn was regulated by
thrusting two pins through the pith, on burning down
to which the light went out.
A "rush-holder" was used in burning them, specimens
of which are given on next page. Figure 1 is an ordinary
rush-holder, from Chambers's " Book of Days ; " figure
2 shows specimens of Sussex iron rush-light and dip-
holders in the collection of Lady Dorothy Nevill, taken
from the "Art Journal" (1886, pp. 372-3); a is an
early form of rush-holder, the spring clip for the rush
is inserted in the stand, the whole is a foot high ; b is
a rush-light and dip-holder combined, with rack stand
for altering the height of light, it is about three feet
high ; c is a rush and dip-holder ; d is a rush-light and
holder stand ; the candlestick is gone in this example,
but the dotted lines give its place ; in the opinion of
Lady Dorothy Nevill it was a votive candle for a
church ; e rush-holder and candlestick, this, in her
THE RUSH. 177
ladyship's opinion, was suspended in the roomy old
fire-place ; /' is the top only of a stand rush-holder,
drawn on a larger scale ; here the artist in iron has
ornamented the top with a rude resemblance of a cock.
The stand itself is about four feet high, and the light can
be raised or lowered when required.
Shakspeare alludes to the rush-candle :
" Be it moon or sun, or what you please ;
And if you please to call it a rush-candle,
Henceforth it shall be so to me."
And Milton :
" If your influence be quite dam'd up
With black usurping mists, some gentle taper,
Though a rush-candle from the wicker hole
Of some clay habitation, visit us."
A Lancashire "saying" says of a sprightly youth :
" His een twinkle like a farthing rush-light."
Rush-rings. — A passage in Shakspeare's "All's
Well that Ends Well," Act ii., Scene 2 :
"As Tib's rush for Tom's forefinger,"
which long puzzled commentators, led Douce * to write
a learned note on the subject, which is worth repro-
ducing. He says :
"The covert allusion mentioned by Mr. Ritson is, in all probability,
the right solution of this passage ; but the practice of marrying with
a rush-ring may admit of some additional remarks. Sir John Hawkins
had already, in a very curious and interesting note, illustrated the
subject ; and it must appear very extraordinary that one of the sub-
sequent notes should question the practice of marrying with a rush-
ring, on the grounds that no authority had been produced in support
of it. This must therefore be explained. The fact is that the author
of the doubts had never seen Sir John Hawkins' entire note, which
had originally appeared in the edition of 1778, but was injudiciously
suppressed in that of 1785. In the edition of 1790, there is only a
* " Illustrations nf Shakspeare, and of Ancient Manners," 1839, pp. 194-196.
2B
1 7 8 R USH-BEARING.
brief and general statement of Sir John's opinion, and this led to the
doubts expressed. In 1793, Mr. Steevens restores a note which he
had already cancelled, and, with all its authorities before him, permits
them to be questioned ; but there are many who will comprehend his
motive.
"The information from De Breul (not Breval, as misprinted),
'Theatre des antiquitez de Paris,' 161 2, 4to., is worth stating more
at large. The author tells us that in the official court of the church
of Saint Marinus, those who had lived unchastely are conducted to
the church by two officers, in case they refuse to go of their own
accord, and there married by the curate with a rush-ring. They are
likewise enjoined to live in peace and friendship, thereby to preserve
the honour of their friends and relations, and their own souls from
the danger they had incurred. This is only practised where no
method of saving the honour of the parties and their connexions can
be devised. A modern French writer remarks on this ceremony,
'pour faire observer, sans doute, au mari, combien etoit fragile la
vertu de celle qu'il choisis sait.'
"With respect to the constitution of the bishop of Salisbury in
1 21 7, which forbid the putting of rush-rings on women's fingers,
there seems to be an error in the reason for this prohibition as stated
by Sir John Hawkins, but for which he is not perhaps responsible.
He says it is insinuated by the bishop ' that there were some people
weak enough to believe that what was thus done in jest, was a real mar-
riage.' The original words, as in Spelman's ' Councils,' are these : ' ne
dum jocari se putat, honoribus matrimonialibus se abstringat.' Now, un-
less we read ' adstringat,' there is a difficulty in making sense of the
passage, which seems to mean, 'least, whilst he thinks he is only
practising a joke, he may be tying himself in the matrimonial noose.'
It is to be observed that this consequence was not limited to the
deception of putting a rush-ring on the woman's finger, but any ring
whatever, whether of vile or of precious materials."
In Green's " Menaphon " is this passage: "Well,
'twas a good worlde when such simplicitie was used,
sayes the old women of our time, when a ring of a rush
would tie as much love together as a gimmon of golde."
But rush-rings were sometimes innocently used. Thus
in Spencer's "Shepherd's Calendar," 1579, 4-to.,
yEgloga xi. :
" Colin: 'Where be the nosegays that she dight for thee?
The colour'd chapelets wrought with a chief,
The knotted rush-rings, and gilt rosemary ?
For she deemed no thing too dear for thee.'"
THE RUSH. 179
In D'Avenant's " Rivals," also :
" I'll crown thee with a garland of straw, then,
And I'll marry thee with a rush-ring."
Again, in Fletcher's " Two Noble Kinsmen," Act
iv. :
" Rings she made
Of rushes that grew by, and to 'em spoke
The prettiest poesies : thus our true love's ty'd ;
This you may lose, not me ; and many a one."
" And Tommy was so to Katty,
And wedded her with a rush-ring?
— Winchest. Wedding Pills to Purge, Mel., vol. i., p. 2/6.
Brand # says : " A custom extremely hurtful to the
interests of morality, appears anciently to # have
prevailed both in England and other countries, of
marrying with a Rusk-Ring. It was chiefly practised,
however, by designing men, for the purpose of debauch-
ing their mistresses, who sometimes were so infatuated
as to believe that this mock ceremony was a real
marriage."
Shakspeare, speaking of love, says :
" He taught me how to know a man in love ; in which cage of rushes
I am sure you are not a prisoner."
Rush-ropes. — Ropes, stronger and more durable
than of hemp, are said to have been made of rushes.
Plot t was shown at Park Hall, in the parish of
Caverswall, " a rope that past between the runners of
the oat-mill . . . made only of the pillings or rinds
pull'd off the pith of the juncus lcevis panicula sparsa
major, or juncus lcevis vulgaris, both of which it seems
are Candle rushes, which, they told me, would not only
last a year, i.e., longer than one of hemp, but that it
would not stretch as hempen ones do, which, it seems,
is a great convenience in the working of such a mill."
* " Popular Antiquities," edition 1877, p. 359.
t " Natural History of Staffordshire," 1686, p. 379.
1 80 R USH-BEARING.
Westmacott, whose " Historia Vegetabilium Sacra ;
or, A Scripture Herbal," was published in 1694, eight
years only after Plot's work, speaks of the same rope
in almost identical words : " A rarity not far off me, at
Park Hall, is a rope that passes between the runners
of the oat-mill, made only of the peelings or rinds of
candle-rushes, juncus Icevis vulgaris, which doth not
only last longer than one of hemp, but will not stretch
as hempen ones do, which is a great convenience in the
working of such kind of mills. The moss-rush, Juncus
acutus Ca?ubro Britannicus, is called goosecorns. Bull-
rushes, in some counties, are called bumbles."
At the present time, rush-ropes are made by Messrs.
James Evans & Co., Gaythorn, Manchester, for use as
cores in iron foundries, and for packing purposes.
iiiGmMffl^^
RUSH-PII'E.
They are spun on a machine, and are of uniform
thickness throughout, free from knots, are very strong,
and do not unwind on being cut. They are made in
lengths of about 200 yards, and the price per 1000
yards is about : No. 1 (thick), 17s. 6d.; No. 2 (medium),
lis.; No. 3 (thin), 8s. 6d. The rush-ropes are much
preferred to straw-ropes, and are mostly used for
cylinders and special kinds of work, and where a
particularly true core is required.
Rush-toys.- — Children plait and bind rushes into a
variety of toys, as whips, pipes, miniature chairs,
baskets, caps, harps, etc. In the autumn, rush-pipes
arc frequently sold in the streets at a penny each, the
stem about two feet long, and the bowl three-and-a-
half inches in diameter. Bulrushes are also sold at
three a penny.
THE RUSH. i. Si
Wright (" Dictionary of Obsolete and Provincial
English," 1869) gives :
" Rushy-mils. — A sportive imitation of mills, made by the sin p-
herds in running water, and composed of rushes."
" His spring should flow some other way ; no more
Should it in wanton manner ere be seene
To writhe in knots, or give a gown of greene
Unto their meadowes ; nor be seene to play,
Nor drive the rushy-mils, that in his way
The shepherd made."
— Brown, " British Pastimes" I., /., V. 722.
Shakspeare, " Coriolanus," i., 4, says :
" Our gates,
AYhich yet seem shut, we have but pinned with rushes ;
They'll open of themselves."
The word rush bears several meanings, as :
Rush (s.) — A merry-making.
A patch of underwood.
A disease in cattle.
Rush-bearing (s.) — The day of a church's dedication.
"Another name for the parish wakes, held at the feast of
the dedication of each church, when the parishioners
brought fresh rushes to strew the church." — JVdre's
" Glossary," 18SS, p. 756.
Rush-i;uckler (s) — A swash-buckler.
" Take into this number also their servants ; I mean all
that flock of stout, bragging rush-bucklers"- — " More's
Utopia" by R. Robinson, vol. 2, p. jp, Dibden.
Ri she (v.) — To dash down.
Rushewes, or Rishews (s) — An article of confectionery.
Rushin (s.) — A tub of butter.
Rushing (s.) — Refreshment.
Rish (s.) — A rush.
(v) — To gather rushes.
(s) — A sickle.
(adv.) — Directly, quickly.
Rishundry (s.J — Loose corn left in the field, and become so dry as
to be rather brittle.
Whatlmujht likekcmscauM^ss fJte rusty true
Ticket;
William Andrews &* Co., Tlie Hull Press.
ZP*WZ=^
3nfcey.
Abingdon, Mayor's Sunday at, 6
Aylesbury tenure, i
Bear-baits, 59, 158
Benefactions at
Bristol, 23
Deptford, 21
( lien field, 22
Middleton, 23
Old Weston, 22
South Cerney, 23
Tatton, 22
Wingrave, 21
Blacks and Jacks, riot, 66
Bone club, a, 165
Bull baits, 76, 1 58
Churches, rush-strewing in, 13
Rush-carrying to, 24
Characters at, 28
Dixon, Rev. J., poem by, 29
Donnington, 28
Hone's Year Book quoted, 36
Lake district, 29
Lloyd, Rev. Owen, hymn by, 36
Marton, 38
Origin of, Notes on, 25-27
" The Queen " quoted, 34
Thompson, Jacob, picture by, 29
Winter, Miss, sketch by, 36
Contumacious Robert Aughton, 16
Dancing, 9
Easter Day Customs, 7
Frumenty, 155
Garlands in Churches, 89
Castleton, 91
Droylesden, 93
Redcliff, 90
" Going to sweeten," 7
Graves, decorating, 76
Greenside wakes' song, the, 162
Houses, rush-strewing in, 1
Juncare, 168
Kemp's nine days' wonder
Incident at, 131
At Chelmsford, 133
At Sudbury, 134
King, rushes for the, 2
Lancashire pugnacity, 160
Liskeard, recent use of rushes at, n
London, regulations at, 2
" Longwood Thump," 81
Manchester, Alexander Wilson's picture,
63
May-Day custom, a, II
Morris-dance, the, 95
Baxter, Richard, on the, 109
Betley, window at, 102
At Christmas, 118
Churchwardens' accounts, 104
At Clerkenwell, 1 14
Cobbe's account, 1 10
On Corpus Christi day, 97
In Cripplegate, 106
Dancers, 95
In Derbyshire, 115
Donee's remarks, 197
Dress, 121-28
Harleian MS., in
In Lancashire, 117
Salt, in
Officers, 139
Speech, 143
Munich, carving at, 102
In Northamptonshire, 1 15, 1 19
1 84
INDEX.
Morris-dance —
At Northenden, 115
In Oxfordshire, 114
Petrarch coronation, 97
Puritan diatribes, 109
At Reading, 106
The restoration, 112
Van Mecheln's engraving, 97
Yendome, 96
Vinckenboom's painting, 104
Murder, incident of, 10
Old Meg of Herefordshire, etc., 135-142
Processions, 6
Remarkable customs, M. Dandelot, 4
Restoration ceremonies, 78
Riot at Gorton, 60
Royal residences, etc., 3
Rush-bearing, Jesse Lee's description, 6S
Rush, the, 166
Chairs, 170
Charms, 172
Holders, 175
Lights, 173
Many uses of, 166-70
Mills, Rushy, 181
"Not worth a," 4, 166
Rings, 177
Ropes, 179
Toys, 180
Rush-cart, the, 24, 39
At Burnedge, 80
At Bunbury, 75
At Chapel-en-le- Frith, 78
At Dent, 78
Described by (or in)
Bamford's early days, 42
Sir J. P. Kay-Shuttleworth, 49
Frances Ann Kemble, 48
Lancashire legends, 40
Lancashire memories, 48
Pictorial history of Lancashire, 51
Elijah Riding, 39
Roby, 40
At Didsbury, 55
At Droylesden, 56
At Forest Chapel, 77
At Gorton, 57
I [igson, John, 57
At Lynn', 75
At Manchester (visit), 63
At Milnrow, 73
At Newton Heath, 55
A riot, 71
Rush-cart —
At Rochdale, 65
At Runcorn, 76
Saddleworth, 79
Uppermill, 81
At Whalley, J],
At Wilmslow, 77
Rush-cutting, right of, at Clee, 21
Rushy Mills, 181
Rush-strewing in churches, 13
At Bristol, 20
At Castleton, 14
At Halshani, 20
At Hardley, 20
At Heybridge, 14
At Kirkham, 14
At Norwich, 20
At Pilling, 14
At Salisbury, 13
Skedlock-carts, 53
Stage, the, 1 1
St. Oswald's Church, Chester, 13
Tenures, 1
Town and churchwarden's accounts,
etc., 17
Trinity House, Hull, etc., 11
Unseemly customs, 8
Vigils, see Wakes, 147
Wakes, 14
Charles I., 153
At Didsbury, 160
At Disley, 14
At Droylesden, 161
At Eccles, 162
At Gorton, 14
In Lancashire, 152
At Manchester, 151
At Newton, 16
Quotations
Hinde and others, against, 154
Dr. Jayne, in favour, 155
Ben Johnson, 152
Old Writer re Strutt, 14S
Pope Gregory, 149
Stubbs, 152
At Stockport, 14
Suppressed, 150
At Westhoughton, 164
Whifflers, 140
Whitsun-ale, 119
York, priestly processions, 7
Xtet of Subscribers.
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21)
WAKES AND RUSHBEARINGS.
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF OLD=TIME
CUSTOMS.
[SPJfCLAIu]
"Many of our old customs are fading away into
the dim mists of antiquity, and ail but the name
will soon be forgotten. This is much to be re-
gretted, because they -were attended with a great
deal of pure enjoyment, and were looked forward
to by the people for weeks before the event. One
of these is the old custom of 6trewing rushes, and
its attendant ceremony of rushbearing, with its
grand rush-cart and fantastic Morris dancers.
Once common to the whole country it now lingers
in a few isolated places, principally in the hill
districts of Lancashire and Yorkshire."
The above extract is from a volume on " Wakes
and Rushbearings," published in 1891, under the
editorship of Mr. Alfred Burton. It happily and
exactly describes the moribund state of one of
our oldest and merriest customs. The Wakes we
have still with us. It is recognised as a general
holiday in many parts of South-East Lancashire,
and in some districts of Yorkshire, Derbyshire,
and Cheshire. But even the Wakes cf to-day is
not what it was in olden times. It is shorn of
the religious ceremonial of rushes, and the merry-
making time now runs on different lines, while the
Morris dancers are not to be seen, or, if seen, they
are mere caricatures.
* * *
The rushbearing ceremony, which usually
brought the Wakes holiday to a close, goes very far
back in our domestic history. In ancient times
houses, even of great nobles, had no mats or car-
pets. The floors used to be covered with a plentiful
supply of rushes. If guests of ncte came in clean
rushes were strewn to add to their comfort. If no
such attentions were paid the person was "nor,
worth a rush" — a phrase in common use even to
this day. Queen Elizabeth, it is said, was the last
monarch of these realms who had her rooms strewn
with rushes. As folks became more refined Oriental
mats and rugs gradually took the place of our
ruder floor-covering. Long afterwards, however,
rushes were stili used in churches. They made
the bare floor more comfortable for the poor wor-
shippers who had no cushions to kneel on; and at
Wakes time every year these rushes were cere-
moniously renewed. At first they were carried by
the merry makers in bundles under the arm. Later
this was not considered elaborate enough; and so
inganious Lancashire and Yorkehire folk hit upon a
curiously designed cart known a.s the rush cart.
It carried huge pile.^ of rushes, and was gaiiy orna-
mented and mada the centre of much pomp and
ceremony. Here is a pen picture of it by Elijah
Ridings, a Lancashire poet: —
Behold tbe rush cart and the throng
Ol .'ads and lasses pa 93 along!
Now watch the nitnbio Morris dancers.
Inos.-; blithe, fantaatic antic prancers;
Bedecked with gaudiest profusion
Hi ribbons in a gay confusion,
Of brilliant colours, richest dyes,
Like wings ajid moths and butterflies.
Behold the strong-limbed horses stand,'
rhe pride and boaal of English I ind
Killed to move ia Bbafts or chains.
With plaited glossy tails and manes;
Jheir proud heads each a garland wears
OJ quaint devices— suns and stars,
And roses, ribbtfn-wrought, abound;
ihe dver-plate one hundred pounds,
,,V .' - cart is crowned:
Jhe strong gaunl boraes Bhake the ground
i
At a time when the Wakes holiday is in full
swing in many parts of Lancashire, it ie ini
ing to recall that in those far off times Gorton
was " a village near Manchester, long celebrated
for its breed of bull dogs, its sturdy men, and its
wakes." The Oldham Wakes has a notorial
its own; and so have the Wakes of Ashton-under-
Lyne, Staiybridge, Stockport, and other places.
About 1730, I gather from an interesting lecture by
Mr. Hugh Dean, of Gorton, the rush-cart went out
in Gorton on the Friday before the first Sunday
in September, perambulating the village, visiting
the homes of local celebrities, accompanied by
bands and pikemeu carrying staves, surmounted
with brass eagles, and, of course, followed by an
admiring throng. That same evening or on the
following morning the rushes used to be teemed
down near the chapel gates. The old ones of the
previous year having been cleared out of the chapel
the. iinv ones wer-o r orsfull/ strewn in the bottom
of the -ppvrji, aisle-:, <^e. The garlands which
adorned the rush-carts were ak-o placed in the
chapel. They were suspended on staves, which
were fastened to the pillars in front of the lofts,
where they remained till the next anniversary. On
Sunday the Morris dancers and other officials con-
nected with the rushbearing all attended the.
chapel, when an appropriate sermon was preached.
This was the finish up of the Wakes, for labour
was resumed on the Monday. This little account is
typical of what took place in most places. The
custom gradually died out, mainly because of the
introduction of heating appliances and mats into
the churches and chapels. So late as 1863 Mr.
James Dearden, the lord of the manor of Rochdale,
made heroic efforts' to resuscitate the custom in
that thriving and go-ahead town. Ke offered ~a
prize of ten guineas for the best rushcart, five
guineas for the second best, and a guinea to all
competitors., That year Rochdale had a particu-
larly gay Wakes indeed, but ae the prizes were not
offered again there were few rush-carts in the fol-
lowing year, and lack of appreciation in subse-
quent years practically killed the custom.
How many people, I wonder, could tell without
turning up records that the Morris dance was
brought to England in the reign of Edward III.,
when John of Gaunt returned from Spain. " lu !
the dance," says Dr. Brewer, "bells were jingled,
and staves- or swords clashed. It was a militaiy
danco of the Moors or Moriscos, in which five men
and a boy engaged; the boy wore a morine, or head
piece, and was called Mad Morion.'"" At the time
this dance was introduced into England the tourna-
ment was still the first of sports. Bull bailing,
bear and badger baiting, cock-fighting were the
recognised Wakes pastimes. On Sundays and ho i-.
days, after divine service, the poor pebpb went in
for practising archery, which they were bound to
do by royal proclamation. Money was extremely
scarce in those days. The haymakers got a penny
a day: labourers three halfpence; masons three-
pence; carpenters twopence, and ?o on. The
people in each county were not allowed to go out
of their own county for work, although the men of
Staffordshire, Derbyshire, and Lancashire eiuojtd
certain privileges in that respect. The Introduc-
tion of the Morris dance enabled the dancers and
rushbearers to solicit money from the local gentrv
and with the proceeds make merry in the time-
honoured fashion— that is to say, they became -"•-■-
ee idingiy drunk and for the time being too
manner of liberties.
* •• *
As the old Wakes customs died out others snra^r
lated ground converted into a
showground, the attract i being the meS
round, with mammoth musical tfstrumont mSS
penny shows. These penny shows arff
and wonderfully derieed. They ini e S
shows una primitive dramatic rmSIVntafmnV
■r.,s with performing lions P andwS
aults.*t-arms picture galleries, the fat won
h< i n, and other human curiosities, sK
testing machine shooting booths, and ZS
er attractions toy stalls, sweetie stalls ice
" barrows, ami similar things beloved of
-•'■'•May bumpkins and juveniles. Bu in : t ,V i, "I
Pairs killed .lie old kkee cued J s? ffi£
their urn are being slowly killed by the superior
attractions ot seaside places such as Bkeknool
Southport, New Brighton, Morecambe, &o. '
* * *
Time was when holiday makers had no other
option but that of staying in their native towns
and villages, varied by occasional visits to En
Chester, where they saw many unfamiliar sights
and encountered many strange adventures All
that was changed when the railway companies
found out the means of drawing away thousands of
.Pleasure seekers into what was to them ''fresh
woods and pastures new." At first even railwlv
! travelling was expensive and could only be irdn Wl
in sparingly Then those ever ente^i^S
panies found that they could profitably take rial
sengers for fifty and sixty miles and back for *the
small sum of halt-a-crown. From that time to the
present day new experiences and very delightful
holidays came with the Wakes; and to meet the
need tor "pluto /'-the newest slang £rm for
S^^T? 9 %S* km K Population organised " goivl
: oil clubs These clubs have taken root not only
in public-houses but in savings banks, and in mills
and workshops. Trifling subscriptions regularly
made every week for months before the Wakes
accumulate into tidy sums, and when the holiday
comes tnousands of pounds are taken for the sole
purpose of spending in change of scene and p>ea
sure. Our operatives and workers generally can
thus afford very comfortably all the exactions of
sea-side places and the expenses of travelling, etc
The change throughout is for the better! and
picturesque as were the old customs we are well
and oi them. ^
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