canopie, as the last yeare, or in a chare triumphall, or uppon some straunge beaste that I reserve to you; but the serpente with sevin heddes, cauled hidra, is the chief beast of myne armes, and wholme* (holm) bushe is the devise of my crest, my worde† is semper ferians, I alwaies feasting or keeping holie daies. Uppon Christmas daie I send a solempne ambassad to the King's Mae by an herrald, a trumpet, an orator speaking in a straunge language, an interpreter, or a truchman with hym, to which p'sons ther were requiset to have convenient farnyture, which I referre to you.

"I have provided one to plaie uppon a kettell drom with his boye, and a nother drome wth a fyffe, whiche must be apparelled like turkes garments, according to the paternes I send you herewith. On St. Stephen's daie, I wold, if it were possyble, be with the King's Matie before dynner. Mr. Windham, being my Admyrall, is appointed to receive me beneth the bridge with the King's Brigandyne, and other vessells apointed for the same purpose; his desire is to have the poope of his vessell covered wth white and blew, like as I signefie to you by a nother 1a.

"Sir George Howard, being my Mr. of the Horsis, receiveth me at my landing at Greenwiche with a spare horse and my pages of hono', one carieng my hed pece, a nother my shelde, the thirde my sword, the fourth my axe. As for their furniture I know nothing as yet provided, either for my pages or otherwise, save a hed peece that I caused to be made. My counsailo", with suche other necessarie psons y' attend upon me that daie, also must be consydered. There maie be no fewer than sixe counsailors at the least; I must also have a divine, a philosopher, an astronomer, a poet, a physician, a potecarie, a m' of requests, a sivilian, a disard, John Smyth, two gentlemen ushers, besides jugglers, tomblers, fooles, friers, and suche other.

"The residue of the wholie daies I will spend in other devises: as one daie in feats of armes, and then wolde I have a challeng pformed with hobbie horsis, where I purpose to be in pson. Another daie in hunting and hawking, the residue of the tyme shalbe

* The evergreen holly is meant, a bearing peculiarly appropriate to the lord of Christmas sports.

† His motto, or impress.

spent in other devisis, which I will declare to you by mouth to have yo' ayde and advice therein.

"S', I know not howe ye be provided to furnish me, but suer methinks I shold have no lesse than five suets of apparell, the first for the daie I come in, which shall also serve me in London, and two other suets for the two halowed daies folowing, the fourth for newe yeares daie, and the fifte for XIIth daie.

Touching my suet of blew, I have sent you a pece of velvet which with a kinde of powdered ermaines in it, verrie fytt for my wering, yf you so thynke good. All other matters I referre tyll I shall speake with you.

"GEORGE FERRERS."

In other letters from this Lord of Misrule to the Master of the Revels, he applies for eight visers for a drunken masque, and eight swords and daggers for the same purpose; twelve hobbyhorses, two Dryads, and Irish dresses for a man and woman; and seventy jerkins of buckram, or canvas painted like mail, for seventy "hakbuturs," or musketeers of his guard.

Such are some of the testimonies borne by the parties themselves to their own right pleasant follies, and the expense at which they maintained them; and to these we will add another, coming from an adverse quarter, and showing the light in which these costly levities had already come to be regarded by men of sterner minds, so early as the reign of Elizabeth. The following very curious passage is part of an extract made by Brand, from a most rare book entitled, "The Anatomie of Abuses,❞—the work of one Phillip Stubs, published in London, in 1585; and gives a quaint picture of the Lord of Misrule, and his retainers, as viewed through Puritan optics.

"Firste," says Master Stubs, "all the wilde heades of the parishe, conventynge together, chuse them a grand Capitaine (of mischeef) whom they ennoble with the title of my Lord of Misserule, and hym they crown with great solemnitie, and adopt for their kyng. This kyng anoynted, chuseth for the twentie, fourtie, three score, or a hundred lustie guttes like to himself, to waite uppon his lordely majestie, and to guarde his noble personé. Then every one of these his menne he investeth with his liveries, of

greene, yellowe, or some other light wanton color. And as though that were not baudie (gaudy) enough I should saie, they bedecke themselves with scarffes, ribons, and laces, hanged all over with gold rynges, precious stones, and other jewelles: this doen, they tye about either legge twenty or fourtie belles with rich handekercheefes, in their handes, and sometymes laied acrosse over their shoulders and neckes, borrowed for the moste parte of their pretie Mopsies and looving Bessies for bussying them in the darcke. Thus thinges sette in order, they have their hobbie horses, dragons, and other antiques, together with their baudie pipers, and thunderyng drommers, to strike up the Deville's Daunce withall” (meaning the Morris Dance), “then marche these heathen companie towards the church and churche yarde, their pipers pipyng, drommers thonderyng, their stumppes dauncyng, their bells iynglyng, their handkercheefes swyngyng about their heades like madmen, their hobbie horses, and other monsters skyrmishyng amongst the throng: and in this sorte they goe to the churche (though the minister bee at praier or preachyng) dauncyng and swingyng their handkercheefes over their heades, in the churche, like devilles incarnate, with such a confused noise, that no man can heare his owne voice. Then the foolishe people, they looke, they stare, they laugh, they fleere, and mount upon formes and pewes, to see these goodly pageauntes, solemnized in this sort.”

66

At the Christmas celebration held at Gray's Inn, in 1594, to which we have already alluded, the person selected to fill the office of Christmas Prince, was a Norfolk gentleman of the name of Helmes; whose leg, like that of Sir Andrew Ague-Cheek, appears "to have been formed under the star of a galliard." He is described as being accomplished with all good parts, fit for so great a dignity, and also a very proper man in personage, and very active in dancing and revelling." The revels over which this mock monarch presided, were, as our readers will remember, exhibited before Queen Elizabeth; and it was the exquisite performance of this gentleman and his court which her majesty described as bearing the same relation for excellence to those of her own courtiers, which a banquet does to bread and cheese. must refer such of our readers as are desirous of informing themselves as to the nature and taste of the devices which could make

We

her majesty so eloquent, to the "Gesta Grayorum;" contenting ourselves with giving them such notion thereof, as well as of the high dignities which appertained to a Lord of Misrule, as may be conveyed by a perusal of the magnificent style and titles assumed by Mr. Henry Helmes, on his accession. They were enough to have made her majesty jealous, if she had not been so good-natured a queen; for looking at the philosophy of the thing, she was about as much a mock monarch as himself, and could not dance so well. To be sure, she was acknowledged by his potentate as Lady Paramount; and to a woman like Elizabeth, it was something to receive personal homage from―

"The High and Mighty Prince, HENRY, Prince of Purpoole: Archduke of Stapulia and Bernardia; Duke of High and Nether Holborn; Marquis of St. Giles and Tottenham; Count Palatine of Bloomsbury and Clerkenwell; Great Lord of the Cantons of Islington, Kentish Town, Paddington, and Knightsbridge; Knight of the most Heroical Order of the Helmet, and Sovereign of the same !!!"

It is admitted that no man can be a great actor who has not the faculty of divesting himself of his personal identity, and persuading himself that he really is, for the time, that which he represents himself to be ;-his doing which will go far to persuade others into the same belief. Now as her majesty has pronounced upon the excellency of Mr. Henry Helmes's acting, and if we are, therefore, to suppose that that gentleman had contrived to mystify both himself and her, she would naturally be not a little vain of so splendid a vassal. But, seriously, it is not a little amusing to notice the good faith with which these gentlemen appear to have put on and worn their burlesque dignities, and the real homage which they not only expected, but actually received. If the tricks which they played during their "brief authority," were not of that mischievous kind which "make the angels weep," they were certainly fantastic enough to make those who are a little lower than the angels" smile. A lord mayor, in his gilt coach, seems to be a trifle compared with the Lord of Misrule entering the city of London in former days:-and the following passage from Warton's "History of English Poetry," exhibits amusingly enough the sovereign functions seriously exercised by this im

portant personage, and the homage, both ludicrous and substantial, which he sometimes received.

"At a Christmas celebrated in the hall of the Middle Temple, in the year 1635, the jurisdiction privileges and parade of this mock monarch are thus circumstantially described. He was attended by his Lord Keeper, Lord Treasurer, with eight white staves, a Captain of his Band of Pensioners, and of his Guard; and with two Chaplains, who were so seriously impressed with an idea of his regal dignity, that when they preached before him, on the preceding Sunday, in the Temple Church, on ascending the pulpit, they saluted him with three low bows. He dined both in the Hall, and in his Privy Chamber, under a Cloth of Estate. The poleaxes for his Gentlemen Pensioners were borrowed of Lord Salisbury. Lord Holland, his temporary justice in Eyre, supplies him with venison on demand; and the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs of London with wine. On Twelfth-day, at going to church, he received many petitions, which he gave to his Master of Requests; and, like other kings, he had a favorite, whom, with others, gentlemen of high quality, he knighted at returning from Church.”

The Christmas Prince on this occasion was Mr. Francis Vivian; who expended, from his own private purse, the large sum of 20007., in support of his dignities. Really, it must have tried the philosophy of these gentlemen to descend from their temporary elevation, into the ranks of ordinary life. A deposed prince like that high and mighty prince, Henry, Prince of Purpoole, must have felt, on getting up, on the morrow of Candlemas-day, some portion of the sensations of Abon Hassan, on the morning which succeeded his Caliphate of a day;-when the disagreeable conviction was forced upon him that he was no longer Commander of the Faithful; and had no further claim to the services of Cluster-of-Pearls, Morning-Star, Coral-Lips, or Fair-Face. In the case, however, of Mr. Francis Vivian, it is stated that, after his deposition, he was knighted by the king-by way, we suppose, of breaking his fall.

In Wood's "Athenæ Oxonienses," mention is made of a very splendid Christmas ceremonial observed at St. John's College, Oxford, in the reign of our first James; which was presided over by a Mr. Thomas Tooker, whom we, elsewhere, find called