March 21.]

EASTER EVE.

On Easter Eve it was customary in our own country to light in the churches what was called the Paschal Taper. In Coates’s History of Reading (1802, p. 131) is the following extract from the Churchwarden’s accounts: “Paid for makynge of the Paschall and the Funte Taper, 5s. 8d.” A note on this observes, “The Pascal taper was usually very large. In 1557 the Pascal taper for the Abbey Church of Westminster was 300 pounds weight.”—Brand, Pop. Antiq., 1849, vol. i. p. 158.

On the eves of Easter and Whitsunday Font-hallowing was one of the very many ceremonies in early times. The writer of a MS. volume of Homilies in the Harleian Library, No. 2371, says, “in the begynning of holy chirch, all the children weren kept to be chrystened on thys even, at the font-hallowyng; but now, for enchesone that in so long abydynge they might dye without chrystendome, therefore holi chirch ordeyneth to chrysten in all tymes of the yeare, save eyght dayes before these evenys the chylde shalle abyde till the font-hallowing, if it may safely for perill of death, and ells not.”

Cumberland, etc.

In Cumberland and Westmoreland, and other parts of the north of England, boys beg, on Easter Eve, eggs to play with, and beggars ask for them to eat. These eggs are hardened by boiling, and tinged with the juice of herbs, broom-flowers, &c. The eggs being thus prepared, the boys go out and play with them in the fields; rolling them up and down like bowls upon the ground, or throwing them up like balls into the air.—Brand, Pop. Antiq. 1849, vol. i. p. 172.

Dorsetshire.

During the last century it was customary in this county, on Easter Eve, for the boys to form a procession bearing rough torches, and a small black flag, chanting the following lines:

This custom was no doubt a relic of the Popish ceremony formerly in vogue at this season.—Brand, Pop. Antiq., 1849, vol. i. p. 160.

Middlesex.

Brayley in his Londiniana (1829, vol. ii. p. 207) mentions a custom of the sheriffs, attended by the Lord Mayor, going through the streets on Easter Eve, to collect charity for the prisoners in the city prisons.

Yorkshire.

In East Yorkshire young folks go to the nearest market-town to buy some small article of dress or personal ornament, to wear for the first time on Easter Sunday, as otherwise they believe that birds—notably rooks or “crakes”—will spoil their clothes.—N. & Q. 4th S. vol. v. p. 595.

In allusion to the custom of wearing new clothes on Easter Day Poor Robin says:

IRELAND.

The day before Easter Day is in some parts called “Holy Saturday.” On the evening of this day, in the middle parts of Ireland, great preparations are made for the finishing of Lent. Many a fat hen and dainty piece of bacon is put into the pot, by the cotter’s wife, about eight or nine o’clock, and woe be to the person who should taste it before the cock crows. At twelve is heard the clapping of hands, and the joyous laugh, mixed with an Irish phrase which signifies “out with the Lent.” All is merriment for a few hours, when they retire, and rise about four o’clock to see the sun dance in honour of the Resurrection. This ignorant custom is not confined to the humble labourer and his family, but is scrupulously observed by many highly respectable and wealthy families.—Brand, Pop. Antiq. 1849, vol. i. p. 161.