Volume 2 — From Once a Week. A BUNDLE OF CHRISTMAS CAROLS.

Carols, as the name implies, are joyous songs for festive occasions, at one period accompanied with dancing. In an old vocabulary of A.D. 1440, Caral is defined as A Songe; in John Palsgrave's work of A.D. 1530, as Chanson de Noël; whilst in Anglo-Saxon times the word appears to have been rendered Kyrriole, a chanting at the Nativity. The earliest carol in English, known under that name, is the production of Dame Berners, prioress of St Alban's in the fourteenth century, entitled A Carolle of Huntynge. This is printed on the last leaf of Wynkyn de Worde's collection of Christmas carols, A.D. 1521, and the first verse modernized runs thus:

Milton uses the word carol to express a devotional hymn:

And that distinguished light of the English Church, Bishop Jeremy Taylor, speaks of the angels' song on the morning of the Nativity as the first Christmas carol: "As soon as these blessed choristers had sung their Christmas carol, and taught the Church a hymn to put into her offices for ever," etc.

According to Durandus, it was customary in early days for bishops to sing with their clergy in the episcopal houses on the feast of the Nativity. "In Natali praelati cum suis clericis ludant, vel in domibus episcopalibus." These merry ecclesiastics sung undoubtedly Christmas carols.

But carols, like everything else, must be divided into two sorts, religious and secular—the carols "in prayse of Christe" and the merry songs for the festive board or fireside. These may be broken up into further varieties, thus:

Of the variety called Legendary, I propose now to speak. These are, as a rule, the most popular of all carols, deriving mainly, as I said before, their origin, and many of their expressions, from the ancient mysteries. In the old plays songs are frequently introduced which resemble, in a very striking manner, what are commonly called carols. The following song of the shepherds occurs in one of the Coventry pageants:

The last lines actually form the chorus of one of the carols in the fifteenth-century manuscript formerly in the possession of Mr. Wright:

Again, in Ludus Coventriae:

A sixteenth-century carol commences:

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In the Coventry Plays again we find:

A genuine carol of the sixteenth century supplies us with the following:

And one of the reign of Henry VI.:

The "Cherry-Tree Carol," formerly a great favorite throughout England, recollections of which yet linger amongst the country-folk, is in many instances a literal copy from the Coventry Mysteries. I give the popular version of the "Cherry-Tree Carol:"

St. Joseph refuses "with words most unkind" to grant her request, apparently unaware that his spouse is about to become the mother of the Son of God. The unborn Saviour, however, directs the Blessed Virgin to

Another version gives the following reply of S. Joseph:

I give a portion of the rest of the carol, some of the verses being remarkably touching and beautiful:

In the fifteenth pageant of the Coventry Mysteries the following lines occur:

It is interesting to note the way in which the more modern composition retains all the incidents and traditions of the mediaeval mystery. Our popular carol speaks of St. Joseph as an old man, and an old man was he, while the mystery represents him as saying (p. x.), I am an old man, and I am so aged and so old.The tree is the same, there is the same desire of the Virgin Mother to taste the fruit, the same refusal and bitter retort of her husband, the bowing-down of the tree, and the regret of St. Joseph for his unkindness. Mr. Hone was not ashamed to say of the "Cherry-Tree Carol:" "The admiration of my earliest days for some lines in it still remains, nor can I help thinking that the reader will see somewhat of cause for it."

The following example is still given on almost every broadside annually printed: it is called "The Three Ships." I ought perhaps first to state that the Three Ships are supposed to signify the mystery of the Holy Trinity, the Incarnation being, as the Speculum Vitae Christi hath it, "the high work of all the Holy Trinity, though it be that only the Person of the Son was incarnate and became man:"

Another rude and rather amusing version is sometimes given of this carol, called "The Sunny Bank:"

An old Dutch carol, given by Hoffman, commences:

And thus explains the mission of the ship:

This translation is taken from Mr. Sandys' book on "Christmas-tide." About the sixteenth century a similar carol was sung at Yule, which is given by Ritson:

Another specimen I take from a Birmingham collection; it is called "The Seven Virgins." This is given also by Mr. Sylvester from "the original old broadside." It is singular, however, that his old copy should include a line which he confesses to be a "modern interpolation!"

Many of my readers will recollect the famous carol of "The Seven Joys," still croaked out in the streets of London and elsewhere about Christmas time. Very similar carols to this exist of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, one of which I select from Mr. Wright's manuscript. I have, as in all other cases, modernized the orthography:

OF THE FIVE JOYS OF OUR LADY. * * * * *

The following carol for St. Stephen's day is from a manuscript of the time of King Henry VI. The reader will be amused to find the great proto-martyr here introduced as a servant of King Herod, and intrusted with the task of bringing in the boar's head, a famous dish, and "the first mess" at Christmas and other high festivals. There was evidently some honor attached to this office, for Holinshed tells us that King Henry II., in 1170, on the day of his son's coronation, served him as sewer, bringing up the boar's head, according to the manner; and in 1607, at St. John's College, Oxford, the "first mess was carried by the tallest and lustiest of all the guard."

This brings us to the more modern legendary carol of "The Carnal [a bird] and the Crane," in which the same incident occurs of the bird crowing in the dish:

Herod then gives orders for the general massacre of the young children, and the Saviour, with Joseph and his mother, travel into Egypt amongst the "fierce wild beasts." The blessed Virgin being weary, "must needs sit down to rest," and her son desires her to "see how the wild beasts come and worship him:"

The Holy Family continuing their flight, pass by a husbandman "just while his seed was sown:"

King Herod comes afterward with his train, and furiously asks of the husbandman whether our Saviour has passed by; the husbandman replies that

Herod, supposing that it must be "full three quarters of a year since the seed was sown," turned back, and "further he proceeded into the Holy Land." A manuscript of the fifteenth century, preserved in the British Museum, contains a representation of the flight into Egypt, in which the above legend is introduced. The city of Bethlehem stands in the background, and on the right, in the distance, a field of corn and a reaper, who is in conversation with a soldier by his side. A curious Scotch tradition states that when Herod and his soldiers made their inquiry of the husbandman, "a little black beetle lifted up his head, and exclaimed, The Son of Man passed here last night. " Black beetles are probably not more popular here than in Scotland, but Highlanders, whenever they find the dastardly insect, kill it, repeating the words, "Beetle, beetle, last night. "

"The Holy Well" is a very favorite carol with the broadside printers; I have seen it side by side with a very lively "legendary" production, "Flyaway Carol:"

The Magi or three Kings of Cologne form the subject of many an old carol. The names of these "famous men" are supposed to have been, Kasper or Gaspar, King of Tarsus, young and beardless; Melchior, King of Nubia, old, with long beard and grey hair; and Balthazar, King of Saba, a negro. Their offerings were, as is well known, symbolical; to use the words of the Anglo-Saxon Hymnary, translated by the recorder of Sarum:

From an old commentary on the gospel of St. Matthew, we gather some curious matter relating to the history of the Three Wise Men. A certain nation dwelling close to the ocean, in the extreme east, possessed a writing, inscribed with the name of Seth, concerning the star which was to appear:

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"Twelve of the more learned men of that country * * * has disposed themselves to watch for that star; and when any of them died, his son or one of his kindred * * was appointed in his place. These, therefore, year by year, after the threshing out of the corn, ascended into a certain high mountain, called Mons victorialis, having in it a certain cave in the rock, most grateful and pleasant, with fountains and choice trees, into which, ascending and bathing themselves, they prayed and praised God in silence three days. And thus they did, generation after generation, watching ever, lest peradventure that star of beatitude should arise upon themselves, until it appeared descending on the mountain, having within itself, as it were, the form of a man-child, and above it the similitude of a cross; and it spake to them, and taught them, and commanded them that they should go into Judaea. And journeying thither for the space of two years, neither food nor drink failed in their vessels."

Other old accounts state that their journey occupied twelve days only: "they took neither rest nor refreshment; it seemed to them indeed as one day; the nearer they approached to Christ's dwelling, the brighter the star shone." [Footnote 51]

Drawing described below.

There appears to have been no decided opinion or tradition as to the form of the star; it is shown thus by Albert Durer, in an old book which I have by me of 1519: it is drawn with eight points, the lowest one being much longer than the others; in another book, 1596, I find it represented as a star of six points; in some old pictures it is shown as a sort of comet, and it is described to have been "as an eagle flying and beating the air with his wings," having within the form and likeness of the Holy Child.

In "Dives and Pauper," printed in 1496, we gather the following account of it:

"Dives. What manner of star was it then? "Pauper. Some clerks tell that it was an angel in the likeness of a star, for the kings had no knowledge of angels, but took all heed to the star. Some say that it was the same child that lay in the ox-stall which appeared to the kings in the likeness of a star, and so drew them and led them to himself in Bethlehem."

I wish it were possible to give here a quaint illustration of the journey of the Three Wise Men, from a sheet of carols printed in 1820, which forms one of the wood-cuts procured with no little difficulty from the publisher by Mr. Hone, and is but little known.

The history of the Magi is even traced further; after their return to their own country they were baptized by St. Thomas the Apostle, became missionaries with him, and were, it is said by some, martyred.

Their journeyings did not, however, end with their deaths—their bodies were translated to Constantinople, thence to Milan, and afterward to Cologne, where they are still preserved in the cathedral, and their history recorded in a series of frescoes. Their shrine at Cologne was once exceedingly rich and magnificent, but during the excitement of the first French revolution many of the jewels which adorned the monument were sold and replaced by paste or glass counterfeits. The following description of their tomb I gather from Mr. Fyfe's book on "Christmas:"

"The coffin is stated to have two partitions, the lower having a half, and the upper a whole, roofing. The former compartment contains the bones of the three kings, whose separate heads appear aloft through the aperture in the half-roofing; and on this roofing are inscribed the names Gaspar, Melchior, Balthazar, encrusted in rubies. {355} The heads are adorned with crowns weighing six pounds apiece, of gold, diamonds, and pearls. It is asserted (but doubted) that the tomb and its contents are of the value of £240,000."

From the offerings of the three kings arose the practice of Christmas gifts, and the festival of the Epiphany has always been observed in remembrance of their visit to Bethlehem; it has also been the custom from earliest times for our sovereigns to offer the three mystic gifts of gold, myrrh, and incense at the altar on the day of the Epiphany, which custom is still observed at the Chapel Royal, the royal oblations being received by the dean or his deputy in a bag of crimson and gold. The Epiphany is also a "scarlet day" at the universities. After this long roundabout discourse, I am almost afraid to weary my readers with a second edition of the wanderings of the Wise Men, but I must rely upon their generous forbearance; the accompanying carol is from a manuscript of the time of King Henry VII.:

I will conclude with a modern specimen of a legendary carol written by the Rev. Dr. Neale, and published in Novello's shilling collection. The story of St. Wenceslaus, the good King of Bohemia, is given by Bishop Jeremy Taylor in his "Life of Christ:"

'"One winter night, going to his devotions in a remote church, barefooted in the snow, * * his servant Podavius, who waited on his master's piety, and endeavored to imitate his affections, began to faint through the violence of the snow and cold, till the king commanded him to follow him, and set his feet in the same footsteps which his feet should mark for him; the servant did so, and either fancied a cure, or found one, for he followed his prince, helped forward with shame and zeal to his imitation, and by the forming footsteps for him in the snow."

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