queen's majesty, had administered to her copious draughts of that nectar on which her majesty's vanity was known to thrive so marvellously. They appear, however, with a very nice tact, to have given no more of it on this occasion, than was sufficient to put her majesty into spirits, without intoxicating her;-for by this period of her life, it took a great deal of that sort of thing to intoxicate the queen's majesty; and the effect was of the pleasantest kind, and could not fail to be most satisfactory to the gentlemen of Gray's Inn. For, after the masque was finished (in which we presume there had been a little dancing, by the lawyers who would, as in duty bound, have stood on their wigs to please her majesty), and on the courtiers attempting, in their turn, to execute a dance, her majesty was most graciously pleased to exclaim, "What! shall we have bread and cheese after a banquet?”—meaning thereby, we presume, to imply that the courtiers could not hope to leap as high, or, in any respect, to cut such capers, as the lawyers had done. Now, this speech of the virgin queen we have reported here, less for the sake of any intrinsic greatness in the thought, or elegance in the form, than because, out of a variety of speeches by her majesty, which have been carefully preserved, we think this is about as good as any other; and has the additional recommendation (which so few of the others have) of exhibiting the virgin queen in a good humor. And further, because, having recorded the disgrace into which the gentlemen of Gray's Inn danced themselves, in the lifetime of her illustrious father, it is but right that we should, likewise, record the ample indemnification which they must have considered themselves to have received, at the lips of his virgin daughter. The celebrations at the inns of court were, from time to time, continued-down to the period of the civil troubles which darkened the reign of Charles I.; and so lately as the year 1641, when they had already commenced, we find it recorded by Evelyn, in his Memoirs, that he was elected one of the comptrollers of the Middle Temple revellers, “ as the fashion of the young students and gentlemen was, the Christmas being kept this yeare with greate solemnity." During this reign, we discover the several societies lessening their expenses by a very wise compromise of their disputes for supremacy-for in the eighth year thereof, the four Inns of Court provided a Christmas masque in conjunction, for the entertainment of the court, which cost the startling sum of £24,000, of the money of that day; and in return, King Charles invited one hundred and twenty gentlemen of the four Inns to a masque at Whitehall, on the Shrove Tuesday following. That our readers may form some idea of the kind of sports which furnished entertainment to men of no less pretension than Hatton, and Coke, and Crewe, we will extract for them a few more of the ceremonies usually observed at the grand Christmases of the Inner Temple,—before quitting this part of the subject. In the first place, it appears that on Christmas-Eve there was a banquet in the hall, at which three masters of the revels were present; the oldest of whom, after dinner and supper, was to sing a carol, and to command other gentlemen to sing with him ;—and in all this we see nothing which is not perfectly worthy of all imitation now. Then on each of the twelve nights, before and after supper, were revels and dancing;—and if any of these revels and dancing were performed in company with the fair sex (which, on the face of the evidence, doth not appear), then we have none of the objections to urge against them which we have ventured to insinuate against the solemn buffooneries, to which the bar was fined for refusing to surrender itself, in the time of James I. Neither do we find anything repugnant to our modern tastes, in the announcement that the breakfasts of the following mornings were very substantial ones, consisting of brawn, mustard, malmsey, which the exhaustion of the previous night's dancing might render necessary; nor that all the courses were served with music-which we intend that some of our own shall be, this coming Christmas. But against most of that which follows we enter our decided protest,―as not only very absurd in itself, but eminently calculated to spoil a good dinner. On St. Stephen's day, we learn that, after the first course was served in, the constable marshal was wont to enter the hall (and we think he had much better have come in, and said all he had to say beforehand), bravely arrayed, with "a fair rich compleat harneys, white and bright and gilt, with a nest of fethers, of all colors, upon his crest or helm, and a gilt pole ax in his hand,”and, no doubt, thinking himself a prodigiously fine fellow. He was accompanied by the lieutenant of the Tower, "armed with a fair white armour," also wearing "fethers," and "with a like pole ax in his hand,”—and of course also thinking himself a very fine fellow. With them came sixteen trumpeters, preceded by four drums and fifes, and attended by four men clad in white "harneys," from the middle upwards, having halberds in their hands, and bearing on their shoulders a model of the tower,-and each and every one of these latter personages, in his degree, having a consciousness that he, too, was a fine fellow. Then, all these fine fellows, with the drums and music, and with all their "fethers" and finery, went, three times, round the fire,-whereas considering that the boar's head was cooling all the time, we think once might have sufficed. Then the constable marshal, after three curtesies, knelt down before the lord chancellor, with the lieutenant doing the same behind him, and then and there deliberately proceeded to deliver himself of an "oration of a quarter of an hour's length," the purport of which was to tender his services to the lord chancellor ;—which we think, at such a time, he might have contrived to do in fewer words. To this the chancellor was unwise enough to reply that he would "take further advice therein;"-when it would have been much better for him to settle the matter at once, and proceed to eat his dinner. However, this part of the ceremony ended, at last, by the constable marshal and the lieutenant obtaining seats at the chancellor's table, upon the former giving up his sword;—and then enter, for a similar purpose, the master of the game, apparelled in green velvet, and the ranger of the forest, in a green suit of "satten," bearing in his hand a green bow, and "divers" arrows, "with either of them a hunting-horn about their necks, blowing together three blasts of venery." These worthies, also, thought it necessary to parade their finery three times round the fire; and having then made similar obeisances, and offered up a similar petition, in a similar posture, they were finally inducted into a similar privilege. But though seated at the chancellor's table, and no doubt sufficiently aroused by the steam of its good things, they were far 66 enough, as yet, from getting anything to eat, as a consequence: —and the next ceremony is one which strikingly marks the rudeness of the times. "A huntsman cometh into the hall, with a fox, and a purse net with a cat, both bound at the end of a staff, and with them nine or ten couple of hounds, with the blowing of hunting-horns. And the fox and the cat are set upon by the hounds, and killed beneath the fire." "What this 'merry disport' signified (if practised) before the Reformation," says a writer in Mr. Hone's Year-Book, "I know not. In Ane compendiouse boke of godly and spiritual songs, Edinburgh, 1621, printed from an old copy,' are the following lines, seemingly referring to some such pageant : - The hunter is Christ that hunts in haist, The hunds are Peter and Pawle, The paip is the fox, Rome is the Rox After these ceremonies, the welcome permission to betake themselves to the far more interesting one of an attack upon the good things of the feast, appears to have been, at length, given; but at the close of the second course, the subject of receiving the officers who had tendered their Christmas service, was renewed. Whether the gentlemen of the law were burlesquing their own profession, intentionally, or whether it was only an awkward hit, like that which befell their brethren of Gray's Inn, does not appear. However, the common serjeant made what is called " a plausible speech;" insisting on the necessity of these officers, "for the better reputation of the Commonwealth :" and he was followed, to the same effect, by the king's serjeant-at-law; till the lord chancellor silenced them, by desiring a respite of further advice,which it is greatly to be marvelled he had not done sooner ;— and thereupon he called upon the "ancientest of the masters of the revels" for a song, a proceeding to which we give our unqualified approbation. So much for the dinner. After supper, the constable marshal again presented himself, if possible finer than before; preceded by drums, -as so fine a man ought to be,-and mounted on a scaffold borne by four men. After again going thrice round the hearth, he dismounted from his elevation, and having set a good example, by first playing the figurant himself, for the edification of the court, called upon the nobles, by their respective Christmasnames, to do the same. Of the styles and titles which it was considered humorous to assume on such occasions, and by which he called up his courtiers to dance, our readers may take the following for specimens: "Sir Francis Flatterer, of Fowlehurst, in the county of Buckingham." "Sir Randle Rackabite, of Rascall Hall, in the county of Rabchell." "Sir Morgan Mumchance, of Much Monkery, in the county of Mad Popery ;" And so on, with much more of the same kind, which we are sure our readers will spare us,—or rather thank us for sparing them. The ceremonies of the St. John's day were, if possible, more absurd than those by which St. Stephen was honored: but, that we may take leave of the lawyers, on good terms, and with a word of commendation, we will simply add, that the concluding one is stated to be, that, on the Thursday following, "the chancellor and company partook of a dinner of roast beef and venison pasties, and at supper of mutton and hens roasted;" which we take to have been not only the most sensible proceeding of the whole series, but about as sensible a thing as they, or anybody else, could well do. So important were these Christmas celebrations deemed by our ancestors, and such was the earnestness bestowed upon their preparation, that a special officer was appointed for that purpose, and to preside over the festival, with large privileges, very considerable appointments, and a retinue which in course of time came to be no insignificant imitation of a prince's. We are, of course, speaking at present of the officer who was appointed to the superintendence of the Christmas ceremonials at court. The title by which this potentate was usually distinguished in England, was that of" Lord of Misrule," "" Abbott of Misrule,” or "Master of Merry Disports ;" and his office was, in fact, that of a temporary "Master of the Revels" (which latter title was formerly that of a permanent and distinguished officer attached to the household |