Dec. 26.]

ST. STEPHEN’S DAY.

For some unexplained reason St. Stephen’s Day was a great period with our ancestors for bleeding their horses, which was practised by people of all ranks, and recommended by the old agricultural poet Tusser, in his Five Hundred Points of Husbandry (chap. xxii. st. 16), who says:

Mr. Douce says that the practice was introduced into this country by the Danes.

Naogeorgus, according to his translator, Barnaby Googe, refers to it, and assigns a reason:

In explanation, it may be stated that the Saint was the patron of horses, and that on this day, which the Germans call Der grosse Pferdstag, the Pope’s stud was physicked and bled for the sake of the blood which was supposed to be a remedy in many disorders.

Aubrey, in his Remains of Gentilisme (MS. Lansd. 226), says: “On St. Stephen’s day, the farrier came constantly and blouded all our cart-horses.” In the “Receipts and Disbursements of the canons of St. Mary in Huntingdon,” is the following entry: “Item, for letting our horses blede in Chrystmasse weke, iiij^d.”—Med. Ævi Kalend. 1841, vol. i. p. 118.

Christmas Boxes is a term now applied to gifts of money at Christmas given away on St. Stephen’s Day, commonly called Boxing Day, whereas, anciently, it signified the boxes in which gifts were deposited. These boxes closely resembled the Roman Paganalia, for the reception of contributions at rural festivals; from which custom, with certain changes, is said to have been derived our Christmas Boxes. At Pompeii have been found earthen boxes, in which money was slipped through a hole. Aubrey found one filled with Roman denarii.—Timbs’ Something for Everybody, 1861, p. 152; see N. & Q. 3rd S. vol. xi. pp. 65, 107, 164, 245; see also Fosbroke’s EnclyclopÆdia of Antiquities, 1840, p. 662.

Bedfordshire.

In Bedfordshire there formerly existed a custom of the poor begging the broken victuals the day after Christmas Day.—Time’s Telescope, 1822, p. 298.

Buckinghamshire.

It is stated in the Parliamentary Returns in 1786, that some land, then let at 12l. per annum, was given by Sir Hugh Kite for the poor of the parish of Clifton Reynes. It appears from a book, in the custody of the minister, dated 1821, compiled by an antiquary for a history of the county, that the rector holds a close of pasture-ground called Kites, which had been formerly given to support a lamp burning in the church of Clifton Reynes, but which was subject to a charge of finding one small loaf, a piece of cheese, and a pint of ale to every married person, and half-a-pint for every unmarried person, resident in Clifton on the feast of St. Stephen, when they walked in the parish boundaries in Rogation week. The close was annexed to the rectory in the 12th of Elizabeth.—Old English Customs and Charities, 1842, p. 120.

There was formerly a custom in the parish of Drayton Beauchamp called Stephening. All the inhabitants used to go on St. Stephen’s Day to the rectory, and eat as much bread and cheese and drink as much ale as they chose at the expense of the rector.

The usage gave rise to so much rioting that it was discontinued, and an annual sum was distributed instead in proportion to the number of the claimants. In time, the number of inhabitants, however, increased so considerably, that about the year 1827 the custom was dropped.—Ibid. p. 121.

Cambridgeshire.

St. Stephen’s Day was formerly observed at Cambridge. Slicer, a character in the old play of the Ordinary says,

This, says the annotator, was called St. Stephen’s pudding; it used formerly to be provided at St. John’s College, Cambridge, uniformly on St. Stephen’s Day.—Dodsley’s Old Plays, 1721, vol. x. p. 229; Med. Ævi Kalend. vol. i. p. 119.

Isle of Man.

Hunting the wren has been a pastime in the Isle of Man from time immemorial. In Waldron’s time it was observed on the 24th of December, though afterwards it was observed on St. Stephen’s Day. This singular ceremony is founded on a tradition that, in former times, a fairy of uncommon beauty exerted such undue influence over the male population, that she, at various times, induced, by her sweet voice, numbers to follow her footsteps, till by degrees she led them into the sea where they perished. This barbarous exercise of power had continued for a great length of time, till it was apprehended that the island would be exhausted of its defenders, when a knight-errant sprang up, who discovered some means of countervailing the charms used by this siren, and even laid a plot for her destruction, which she only escaped at the moment of extreme hazard by taking the form of a wren. But though she evaded instant annihilation, a spell was cast upon her by which she was condemned, on every succeeding New Year’s Day, to reanimate the same form with the definite sentence that she must ultimately perish by human hand. In consequence of this legend, on the specified anniversary, every man and boy in the island (except those who have thrown off the trammels of superstition) devote the hours between sunrise and sunset to the hope of extirpating the fairy, and woe be to the individual birds of that species who show themselves on this fatal day to the active enemies of the race; they are pursued, pelted, fired at, and destroyed, without mercy, and their feathers preserved with religious care, it being an article of belief that every one of the relics gathered in this laudable pursuit is an effective preservative from shipwreck for one year; and that fisherman would be considered extremely foolhardy who should enter upon his occupation without such a safeguard; when the chase ceases, one of the little victims is affixed to the top of a long pole with its wings extended, and carried in front of the hunters, who march in procession to every house, chanting the following rhyme:

After making the usual circuit and collecting all the money they could obtain, they laid the wren on a bier and carried it in procession to the parish churchyard, where, with a whimsical kind of solemnity, they made a grave, buried it and sang dirges over it in the Manks language, which they call her knell. After the obsequies were performed, the company, outside the churchyard wall, formed a circle and danced to music which they had provided for the occasion.

At present there is not a particular day for pursuing the wren: it is captured by boys alone, who follow the old custom principally for amusement. On St. Stephen’s Day a group of boys go from door to door with a wren suspended by the legs, in the centre of two hoops crossing each other at right angles, decorated with evergreens and ribbons, singing lines called Hunt the Wren. If at the close of this rhyme they are fortunate enough to obtain a small coin, they give in return a feather of the wren; and before the close of the day the little bird may sometimes be seen hanging about featherless. The ceremony of the interment of this bird in the churchyard, at the close of St. Stephen’s Day, has long since been abandoned; and the sea-shore or some waste ground was substituted in its place.

Norfolk.

It is an old custom in the town of East Dereham, to ring a muffled peal from the church tower on the morning of St. Stephen’s Day.—N. & Q. 3rd S. vol. iii. p. 69.

Oxfordshire.

The three vicars of Bampton, give beef and beer on the morning of St. Stephen’s Day to those who choose to partake of it. This is called St. Stephen’s breakfast.—Southey’s Common Place Book, 4th S. 1851, p. 395.

Yorkshire.

A correspondent of the Gent. Mag. (1811, vol. lxxxi. pt. i. p. 423) says, that in the North Riding of Yorkshire on the feast of St. Stephen large goose pies are made, all of which they distribute among their needy neighbours, except one, which is carefully laid up, and not tasted till the Purification of the Virgin, called Candlemas.

On this day, also, six youths, clad in white and bedecked with ribbands, with swords in their hands, travel from one village to another, performing the “sword dance.” They are attended by a fiddler, a youth whimsically dressed, named “Bessy,” and by one who personates a physician. One of the six youths acts the part of a king in a sort of farce, which consists chiefly of music and dancing, when the “Bessy” interferes while they are making a hexagon with their swords, and is killed.—Time’s Telescope, 1814, p. 315.

WALES.

On St. Stephen’s Day, everybody is privileged to whip another person’s legs with holly, and this is often reciprocally done till the blood streams down.—Southey’s Common Place Book (1851, 4th S. p. 365). In Mason’s Tales and Traditions of Tenby (1858, p. 5) this custom is alluded to as being celebrated at that place.

IRELAND.

On the anniversary of St. Stephen it is customary for groups of young villagers to bear about a holly-bush adorned with ribbons, and having many wrens depending from it. This is carried from house to house with some ceremony, the “wren-boys” chanting several verses, the burthen of which may be collected from the following lines of their song:

A small piece of money is usually bestowed on them, and the evening concludes in merry-making with the money thus collected.—Croker, Researches in the South of Ireland, 1824, p. 233.