Love, to thee I send these gloves,

If you love me,

Leave out the G,

And make a pair of loves!

It appears from Hall's Satires, 1598, that it was customary to make presents of gloves at Easter. In Much Ado About Nothing, the Count sends Hero a pair of perfumed gloves, and they seem to have been a common present between lovers. In Devonshire, the young women thus address the first young man they happen to meet on St. Valentine's day—

Good morrow, Valentine, I go to-day,

To wear for you what you must pay,

A pair of gloves next Easter-day.

In Oxfordshire I have heard the following lines intended, I believe, for the same festival:

The rose is red, the violet's blue,

The gilly-flower sweet, and so are you;

These are the words you bade me say

For a pair of new gloves on Easter-day.