June 23.] MIDSUMMER EVE—St. JOHN’S EVE.
Reading edition
June 23.]
MIDSUMMER EVE—St. JOHN’S EVE.
On this eve people were in former times accustomed to go into the woods, and break down branches of the trees, which they brought to their homes, and planted over their doors, amidst great demonstrations of joy, to make good the scripture prophecy respecting the Baptist, that many should rejoice in his birth. This custom was at one time universal in England.—Book of Days, vol. i. p. 815.
It was a popular superstition that if any unmarried woman fasted on Midsummer Eve, and at midnight laid a clean cloth with bread, cheese, and ale, and then sat down as if going to eat, the street door being left open, the person whom she was afterwards to marry would come into the room and drink to her by bowing; and after filling the glass would leave it on the table, and, making another bow, retire.—Grose.
The same writer also tells us that any person fasting on Midsummer Eve, and sitting in the church porch, will at midnight see the spirits of the persons of that parish who will die that year come and knock at the church door, in the order and succession in which they will die.
The fern was a most important object of popular superstition at this season. It was supposed at one time to have neither flower nor seed, the seed which lay on the back of the leaf being so small as to escape the sight of the hasty observer. Hence, probably, proceeding on the fantastic doctrine of signatures, our ancestors derived the notion that those who could obtain and wear this invisible seed would be themselves invisible, a belief of which innumerable instances may be found in our old dramatists.—Soane’s Book of the Months.—See Brand’s Pop. Antiq., 1849, vol. i. p. 314.
People also gathered on this night the rose, St. John’s wort, vervain, trefoil, and rue, all of which were thought to have magical properties. They set the orpine in clay upon pieces of slate or potsherd in their houses, calling it a Midsummer-man. As the stalk was found next morning to incline to the right or left, the anxious maiden knew whether her lover would prove true to her or not. Young men sought also for pieces of coal, but in reality certain hard, black, dead roots, often found under the living mugwort, designing to place these under their pillows, that they might dream of themselves.—Book of Days, vol. i. p. 816.
In addition to the superstitious customs already mentioned there was the Dumb Cake:[67]
Two make it, Two bake it, Two break it;
and the third must put it under each of their pillows, but not a word must be spoken all the time. This being done, the diviners are sure to dream of the man they love. There was the divination by hemp-seed,[68] which consisted of a person sowing hemp-seed, saying at the same time,
Hemp-seed I sow, Hemp-seed I hoe. And he that is my true love, Come after me and mow.
The lover was sure then to make his appearance.—Soane’s Book of the Months.
Towards night, materials for a fire were collected in a public place and kindled. To this the name of bonfire was given, a term of which the most rational explanation seems to be that it was composed of contributions collected as boons or gifts of social and charitable feeling. Around this fire the people danced with almost frantic mirth, the men and boys occasionally jumping through it, not to show their agility, but as a compliance with ancient custom.[69]—Book of Days, vol. i. p. 86.
In the reign of Henry VII. these fires were patronised by the Court, and numerous entries appear in the “Privy purse Expenses” of that monarch, by which he either defrayed the charges, or rewarded the firemen. A few are subjoined, as examples of the whole:
“June 23 (1493). To making of the bonefuyr on Midsomer Eve, 10s.
“June 28 (1495). For making the king’s bonefuyr, 10s.
“June 24 (1497). Midsomer Day, for making of the bone-fuyr, 10s.
“June 30 (1498). The making of the bone-fuyr, £2.”
Med. Ævi Kalend., 1841, vol. i. p. 303.
In the months of June and July, says Stow, on the vigils of festival days, and on the same festival days in the evening after the sun setting, there were usually made bonfires in the streets, every man bestowing wood or labour towards them; the wealthier sort also, before their doors near to the said bonfires, would set out tables on the vigils, furnished with sweet bread and good drink, and on the festival days with meats and drinks plentifully, whereunto they would invite their neighbours and passengers also to sit and be merry with them in great familiarity, praising God for His benefit bestowed on them. On these occasions it appears that it was customary to bind an old wheel round about with straw and tow, to take it to the top of some hill at night, to set fire to the combustibles, and then roll it down the declivity.
Buckinghamshire.
The Status Scholæ Etonensis, A.D. 1560 (MS. Addit. Brit. Mus. 4843), says:—“In hac vigilia moris erat (quamdiu stetit) pueris, ornare lectos variis rerum variarum picturis, et carmina de vita rebusque gestis Joannis Baptistæ et præcursoris componere: et pulchre exscripta affigere clinopodiis lectorum, eruditis legenda.”
Cheshire.
The annual setting of the watch on St. John’s Eve, in the city of Chester, was an affair of great moment. By an ordinance of the mayor, aldermen, and common councilmen, of that corporation, dated in the year 1564, and preserved among the Harleian MSS. in the British Museum, a pageant which is expressly said to be “according to ancient custom,” is ordained to consist of four giants, one unicorn, one dromedary, one camel, one luce, one dragon, and six hobby-horses, with other figures. By another MS. in the same library, it is said that Henry Hardware, Esq., the mayor in 1599, caused the giants in the Midsummer show to be broken, “and not to goe the devil in his feathers;” and it appears that he caused a man in complete armour to go in their stead; but in the year 1601, John Ratclyffe, being mayor, set out the giants and Midsummer show as of old it was wont to be kept. In the time of the Commonwealth the show was discontinued, and the giants with the beasts were destroyed. At the Restoration of Charles II. the citizens of Chester replaced their pageant, and caused all things to be made new, because the old models were broken.—See Every Day Book, vol. i. p. 834.
Cornwall.
In Cornwall the festival fires, called bonfires, are kindled on the eve of St. John the Baptist and St. Peter’s Day; and Midsummer is thence in the Cornish tongue called “Goluan,” which signifies both light and rejoicing. At these fires the Cornish attend with lighted torches, tarred and pitched at the end, and make their perambulations round their fires, and go from village to village, carrying their torches before them; and this is certainly the remains of the Druid superstition, for “faces præferre,” to carry lighted torches, was reckoned a kind of Gentilism and as such particularly prohibited by the Gallick Councils: they were in the eye of the law “accensores facularum,” and thought to sacrifice to the devil, and to deserve capital punishment.—Borlase, Antiquities of Cornwall, 1754, p. 130.
On Whiteborough (a large tumulus with a fosse round it), on St. Stephen’s Down, near Launceston, there was formerly a great bonfire on Midsummer Eve: a large summer pole was fixed in the centre, round which the fuel was heaped. It had a large bush on the top of it.[70] Round this were parties of wrestlers contending for small prizes.—Brand, Pop. Antiq. 1849, vol. i. p. 318.
Cumberland.
Hutchinson (Hist. of Cumberland, vol. i. p. 177), speaking of the parish of Cumwhitton, says: They hold the wake on the Eve of St. John, with lighting fires, dancing, &c.
Lancashire.
The custom of making large fires on the Eve of St. John’s Day is annually observed by numbers of the Irish people in Liverpool. Contributions in either fuel or money to purchase it with are collected from house to house. The fuel consists of coal, wood, or in fact anything that will burn: the fire-places are then built up and lighted after dark.—N. & Q. 3rd S. vol. xii. p. 42.
Isle of Man.
Formerly the inhabitants lighted fires to the windward side of every field, so that the smoke might pass over the corn; they folded their cattle and carried blazing furze or gorse around them several times; they gathered bawan fealoin or mugwort as a preventive against the influence of witchcraft; and it was on this occasion they bore green meadow grass up to the top of Barule in payment of rent to Mannan-beg-mac-y-heir.—Train, History of Isle of Man, 1845, vol. ii. p. 120.
Middlesex.
The date of the first establishment of a regular watch or guard for the City of London is uncertain. Stow assures us it has been instituted “time out of mind;” and we have, as early as the 39th Henry VI., the following entries:
“Payde to iiij men to wacche wt the Mayre and to goo wt him a nyghtes, xvjd.”
“Payde in expenses for goyng about wt the Mayre in the town in the wacche, iiijd.”
The watch for the ensuing year was always appointed with much pomp and ceremony on the vigil of St. John, or Midsummer’s Eve; hence the appellation of the Midsummer Watch. On this night, as we learn from Stow, the standing watches in every ward and street of the city and suburbs were habited in bright harness. There was also a marching watch consisting of as many as 2000 persons, most of them old soldiers, who appeared in appropriate habits, armed, and many of them, especially the musicians and standard-bearers, rode on horseback. The watch was attended by men bearing cresset-lights,[71] which were provided partly by the companies, and partly by the City Chamber. Every cresset-bearer was presented with a “strawen hat and a painted badge, beside the donation of his breakfast next morning.” The constables, one half of whom went out on the Eve of St. John, and the other half on the Eve of St. Peter, were dressed in “bright harnesse, some over gilt, and every one had a jornett of scarlet thereupon, and a chain of gold, his henchman following him, and his minstrels before him, and his cresset light at his side. The Mayor himself came after them, well mounted, with his sword-bearer before him, in fair armour on horseback, preceded by the waits, or city minstrels, and the Mayor’s officers in liveries of woosted, or sea-jackets party-coloured. The sheriff’s watches came one after the other in like order, but not so numerous; for the Mayor had, beside his giant, three pageants; whereas the sheriff had only two besides their giants, each with their morris-dancer and one henchman.”
Stow says that King Henry VIII., in the first year of his reign, came privately into Westcheap to view the setting of this watch, “being clothed in one of the coates of his guard,” and at the next muster, which was on St. Peter’s night, “the king and queene came roially riding to the signe of the King’s Head in Cheape, and there beheld the watche of the citie, which watche was set out with divers goodly shewes, as had been accustomed.” In the 31st year of this reign (1539), however, the Midsummer Watch was discontinued; but it was revived, for one year only, by Sir Thomas Gresham, then Lord Mayor, in the second year of Edward the Sixth’s reign.—Stow’s Survey of London; Jupp, History of the Carpenter’s Company, 1848, pp. 40-44.
Northumberland.
In the ordinary of the Company of Cooks at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 1575, quoted by Brand (Pop. Antiq. 1849, vol. i. p. 318), is the following clause:—“And alsoe that the said fellowship of Cookes, shall yearelie of theire owne cost and charge mainteigne and keep the bonefires, according to the auntient custome of the said towne on the Sand-hill; that is to say, one bone-fire on the even of the Feast of the Nativitie of St. John Baptist, commonly called Midsomer Even, and the other on the even of the Feast of St. Peter the Apostle, if it shall please the Maior and Aldermen of the said towne for the time being to have the same bone-fires.”
Nottinghamshire.
Deering, in his Nottinghamia Vetus et Nova (1751, p. 123), quoting from an old authority, gives the following curious account of the watch once held at Nottingham. He says: “Every inhabitant of any ability sets forth a man, as well voluntaries as those who are charged with arms, with such munition as they have; some pikes, some muskets, calivers, or other guns; some partisans, or halberts; and such as have armour send their servants in their armour. The number of these are yearly about two hundred, who at sun-setting meet on the Row, the most open part of the town, where the Mayor’s serjeant-at-mace gives them an oath, the tenor wherof followeth in these words: ‘You shall well and truly keep this town till to-morrow at the sun-rising; you shall come into no house without license or cause reasonable. Of all manner of casualties, of fire, of crying of children, you shall due warning make to the parties, as the case shall require. You shall due search make of all manner of affrays, bloudsheds, outcrys, and all other things that be suspected,’ &c. Which done, they all march in orderly array through the principal streets of the town, and then they are sorted into several companies, and designed to several parts of the town, where they are to keep the watch until the sun dismisses them in the morning. In this business the fashion is for every watchman to wear a garland, made in the fashion of a crown imperial, bedecked with flowers of various kinds, some natural, some artificial, bought and kept for that purpose, as also ribbands, jewels; and for the better garnishing whereof, the townsmen use the day before to ransack the gardens of all the gentlemen within six or seven miles round Nottingham, besides what the town itself affords them: their greatest ambition being to outdo one another in the bravery of their garlands.” This custom was kept up till the reign of Charles I.
Oxfordshire.
About the year 750, says Plott, a battle was fought near Burford, perhaps on the place still called Battle-Edge, west of the town, towards Upton, between Cuthred or Cuthbert, a tributary king of the West Saxons, and Ethelbald, king of Mercia, whose insupportable exactions the former king not being able to endure, he came into the field against Ethelbald, met and overthrew him there, winning his banner, whereon was depicted a golden dragon; in memory of which victory, the custom of making a dragon yearly, and carrying it up and down the town in great jollity on Midsummer Eve, to which they added the picture of a giant, was in all likelihood first instituted.—Plott, Natural History of Oxfordshire, 1705, p. 356.
Worcestershire.
A very curious practice is observed on Midsummer Eve at Kidderminster, arising from the testamentary dispositions of two individuals once resident there. A farthing loaf is given to every person born in Church Street, Kidderminster, who chooses to claim it. The bequest is of very ancient standing, and the farthing loaf, at the time of its date, was far different to what it is now-a-days. The day is called Farthing Loaf Day, and the bakers’ shops are amply provided with these diminutives, as it is the practice of the inhabitants throughout the town to purchase them. Superadded to this bequest is another. About the year 1788 an old bachelor left a sum for the purchase of a twopenny cake for every unmarried resident in Church Street, to be given on Farthing Loaf Day, and also the sum of two guineas to be paid to a household in the said street, as remuneration for providing a supper of bread and cheese and ale, to which every householder in the street should be invited. The householders each take their turn in being host, but with a promise, that none except the occupiers of front houses should enjoy this dignity. The toast directed to be drunk after supper is, “Peace and good neighbourhood.” The money required arises from a sum which is lent at interest, annually, to any competent inhabitant of this favoured street, upon his producing two good sureties for the repayment at the end of the year.—Hone’s Year Book, 1838, p. 745; Old English Customs and Charities, p. 241.
Yorkshire.
On Midsummer Eve, at Ripon, in former days, every housekeeper, who in the course of the year had changed his residence into a new neighbourhood, spread a table before his door in the street with bread, cheese, and ale for those who chose to resort to it. The guests, after staying awhile, if the master was liberally disposed, were invited to supper, and the evening was concluded with mirth and good humour.—Every Day Book, vol. ii. p. 866.
WALES.
Bingley, in his Tour Round North Wales (1800, vol. ii. p. 237), says: On the Eve of St. John the Baptist they fix sprigs of the plant called St. John’s-wort over their doors, and sometimes over their windows, in order to purify their houses, and by that means drive away all fiends and evil spirits.
SCOTLAND.
The Eve of St. John is a great day among the mason-lodges of Scotland. What happens with them at Melrose may be considered as a fair example of the whole.
Immediately after the election of office-bearers for the year ensuing, the brethren walk in procession three times round the Cross, and afterwards dine together under the presidency of the newly-elected grand master. About six in the evening the members again turn out, and form into line two abreast, each bearing a lighted flambeau, and decorated with their peculiar emblems and insignia. Headed by the heraldic banners of the lodge, the procession follows the same route, three times round the Cross, and then proceeds to the abbey. On these occasions the crowded streets present a scene of the most animated description. The joyous strains of a well-conducted band, the waving torches, and incessant showers of fire-works make the scene a carnival. But at this time the venerable abbey is the chief point of attraction and resort, and as the torch-bearers thread their way through its mouldering aisles, and round its massive pillars, the outlines of its gorgeous ruins become singularly illuminated, and brought into bold and striking relief. The whole extent of the abbey is, with “measured step and slow,” gone three times round. But when near the finale, the whole masonic body gather to the chancel, and forming one grand semicircle around it, where the heart of King Robert Bruce lies deposited near the high altar, the band strikes up the patriotic air, “Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled,” and the effect thus produced is overpowering. Midst showers of rockets and the glare of blue lights the scene closes.—Wade’s History of Melrose Abbey, 1861, p. 146.
IRELAND.
The following extract is taken from the Liverpool Mercury, June 29th, 1867:—
The old pagan fire-worship still survives in Ireland, though nominally in honour of St. John. On Sunday night bonfires were observed throughout nearly every county in the province of Leinster. In Kilkenny, fires blazed on every hillside at intervals of about a mile. There were very many in the Queen’s county, also in Kildare and Wexford. The effect in the rich sunset appeared to travellers very grand. The people assemble, and dance round the fires, the children jump through the flames, and in former times live coals were carried into the corn fields to prevent blight: of course, people are not conscious that this Midsummer celebration is a remnant of the worship of Baal. It is believed by many that the round towers were intended for signal fires in connection with this worship.—See Gent. Mag. 1795, vol. lxv. pt. ii. p. 124; see Sir Henry Piers’s Description of Westmeath, 1682; and The Comical Pilgrim’s Pilgrimage into Ireland, 1723 p. 92.
Croker, in his Researches in the South of Ireland (1824, p. 233), mentions a custom observed on the eve of St. John’s Day, and some other festivals, of dressing up a broomstick as a figure, and carrying it about in the twilight from one cabin to the other, and suddenly pushing it in at the door. The alarm or surprise occasioned by this feat produced some mirth. The figure thus dressed up was called a Bredogue.
At Stoole, near Downpatrick, there is a ceremony commencing at twelve o’clock at night on Midsummer Eve. Its sacred mount is consecrated to St. Patrick; the plain contains three wells, to which the most extraordinary virtues are attributed. Here and there are heaps of stones, around some of which appear great numbers of people, running with as much speed as possible; around others crowds of worshippers kneel with bare legs and feet as an indispensable part of the penance. The men, without coats, with handkerchiefs on their heads instead of hats, having gone seven times round each heap, kiss the ground, cross themselves, and proceed to the hill; here they ascend, on their bare knees, by a path so steep and rugged that it would be difficult to walk up. Many hold their hands clasped at the back of their necks, and several carry large stones on their heads. Having repeated this ceremony seven times, they go to what is called St. Patrick’s Chair, which are two great flat stones fixed upright in the hill; here they cross and bless themselves as they step in between these stones, and, while repeating prayers, an old man, seated for the purpose, turns them round on their feet three times, for which he is paid; the devotee then goes to conclude his penance at a pile of stones, named the Altar. While this busy scene is continued by the multitude, the wells and streams issuing from them are thronged by crowds of halt, maimed, and blind, pressing to wash away their infirmities with water consecrated by their patron saint, and so powerful is the impression of its efficacy on their minds, that many of those who go to be healed, and who are not totally blind, or altogether crippled, really believe for a time that they are by means of its miraculous virtues perfectly restored.—Hibernian Magazine, July 1817.
