Aubrey (MS., 1686), tells us that in his day "at Woodstock in Oxon they every May-eve goe into the parke, and fetch away a number of Haw-thorne-trees, which they set before their dores." In Huntingdonshire, fifty years ago, the village swains were accustomed, at sunrise, to place a branch of May in blossom before the door of anyone they wished to honour. In Tuscany the expression, Appiccare il maio ad una porta, has passed into a proverb, and means to lay siege to a maiden's heart and make love to her. In the vicinity of Valenciennes, branches of Birch or Hornbeam are placed by rural swains at the doors of their sweethearts; thorny branches at the portals of prudes; and Elder boughs at the doors of flirts. In the villages of Provence, on May-day, they select a May Queen. Crowned with a wreath, and adorned with garlands of Roses, she is carried through the streets, mounted on a platform, her companions soliciting and receiving the offerings of the towns-people. In olden times it was customary even among the French nobility to present May to friends and neighbours, or as it was called, esmayer. Sometimes this presenting of May was regarded as a challenge. The custom of planting a May-tree in French towns subsisted until the 17th century: in 1610, one was planted in the court of the Louvre. In some parts of Spain the name of Maia is given to the May Queen (selected generally as being the handsomest lass of the village), who, decorated with garlands of flowers, leads the dances in which the young people spend the day. The villagers in other provinces declare their love by planting, during the preceding night, a large bough or a sapling, decked with flowers, before the doors of their sweethearts. In Greece, bunches of flowers are suspended over the doors of most houses; and in the rural districts, the peasants bedeck themselves with flowers, and carry garlands and posies of wild flowers.

In some parts of Italy, in the May-day rejoicings, a May-tree or a branch in blossom and adorned with fruit and ribbands, plays a conspicuous part: this is called the Maggio, and is probably a reminiscence of the old Grecian Eiresione.

Of the flowers specially dedicated to May, first and foremost is the Hawthorn blossom. In some parts of England the Convallaria is known as May Lily. The Germans call it Mai blume, a name they also apply to the Hepatica and Kingcup. In Devon and Cornwall the Lilac is known as May-flower, and much virtue is thought to be attached to a spray of the narrow-leaf Elm gathered on May morning.

In Asia Minor the annual festival of flowers used to commence on the 28th of April, when the houses and tables were covered with flowers, and every one going into the streets wore a floral crown. In Germany, France, and Italy, the fête of the flowers, or the fête of spring, commences also towards the end of April, and terminates at Midsummer. Athenians, on an early day in spring, every year crowned with flowers all children who had reached their

third year, and in this way the parents testified their joy that the little ones had passed the age rendered critical by the maladies incident to infants. The Roman Catholic priesthood, always alert at appropriating popular pagan customs, and adapting them to the service of their church, have perpetuated this old practice. The little children crowned with flowers and habited as angels, who to this day accompany the procession of the Corpus Domini at the beginning of June, are taught to scatter flowers in the road, to symbolise their own spring-time and the spring-time of nature. On this day, along the entire route of the procession at Rome, the ground is thickly strewn with Bay and other fragrant leaves. In the worship of the Madonna, flowers play an important rôle, and Roman altars are still piled up with fragrant blossoms, and still smoke with perfumed incense.

After the feast of Whitsuntide, the young Russian maidens repair to the banks of the Neva, and fling in its waters wreaths of flowers, which are tokens of affection to absent friends.

In the West of Germany and the greater part of France the ceremony is observed of bringing home on the last harvest wain a tree or bough decorated with flowers and gay ribbons, which is graciously received by the master and planted on or near the house, to remain there till the next harvest brings its successor. Some rite of this sort, Mr. Ralston says, seems to have prevailed all over the North of Europe. "So, in the autumnal harvest thanksgiving feast at Athens, it was customary to carry in sacred procession an Olivebranch wrapped in wool, called Eiresione, to the temple of Apollo, and there to leave it; and in addition to this a similar bough was solemnly placed beside the house door of every Athenian who was engaged in fruit culture or agriculture, there to remain until replaced by a similar successor twelve months later."

Well-Flowering.

From the earliest days of the Christian era our Lord's ascension into heaven has been commemorated by various ceremonies, one of which was the perambulation of parish boundaries. At Penkridge, in Staffordshire, as well as at Wolverhampton, long after the Reformation, the inhabitants, during the time of processioning, used to adorn their wells with boughs and flowers; and this ancient custom is still practised every year at Tissington, in Derbyshire, where it is known as "well-flowering." There are five wells so decorated, and the mode of dressing or adorning them is this: the flowers are inserted in moist clay and put upon boards cut in various forms, surrounded with boughs of Laurel and White Thorn, so as to give the appearance of water issuing from small grottoes. The flowers are arranged in various patterns, to give the effect of mosaic work, and are inscribed with texts of Scripture and suitable mottoes. After church, the congregation walk in procession to the wells and decorate them with these boards, as well as with

garlands of flowers, boughs, &c. Flowers were cast into the wells, and from their manner of falling, lads and lasses divined as to the progress of their love affairs.

"Bring flowers! bring flowers! to the crystal well,

That springs 'neath the Willows in yonder dell.

And we'll scatter them over the charmed well,
And learn our fate from its mystic spell."
"And she whose flower most tranquilly
Glides down the stream our Queen shall be.
In a crown we'll wreath

Wild flowers that breathe;

And the maiden by whom this wreath shall be worn
Shall wear it again on her bridal morn."-Merritt.

Before the Reformation the Celtic population of Scotland, the Hebrides, Ireland, Wales, and Cornwall were in the habit of naming wells and springs after different saints and martyrs. Though forbidden by the canons of St. Anselm, many pilgrimages continued to be made to them, and the custom was long retained of throwing nosegays into springs and fountains, and chaplets into wells. Sir Walter Scott tells us that "in Perthshire there are several wells dedicated to St. Fillan, which are still places of pilgrimage and offerings, even among Protestants."

"Thence to St. Fillan's blessed well.

Whose spring can frenzied dreams dispel,
And the crazed brain restore."

Into some of these Highland wells flowers are cast, and occasionally pins, while the surrounding bushes are hung with rags and shreds, in imitation of the old heathen practice. The ceremony of sprinkling rivers with flowers was probably of similar origin. Milton and Dryden both allude to this custom being in vogue as regards the Severn, and this floral rite is described in The Fleece' as follows::

"With light fantastic toe the nymphs

Thither assembled, thither every swain;

And o'er the dimpled stream a thousand flowers,
Pale Lilies, Roses, Violets, and Pinks,

Mix'd with the greens of Burnet, Mint, and Thyme,
And Trefoil, sprinkled with their sportive arms.
Such custom holds along th' irriguous vales,
From Wreken's brow to rocky Dolvoryn,
Sabrina's early haunt."

Bridal Floral Geremonies.

In all countries flowers have from time immemorial been chosen as the happy accompaniment of bridal ceremonies. Among the ancients it was customary to crown newly-married persons with a chaplet of red and white Roses. On arriving at the house of her husband, the Roman bride found woollen fillets round the

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door-posts, which were adorned with evergreens and blossoms, and anointed with the fat of wolves to avert enchantment.

In M. Barthélemi's Travels of Young Anacharsis' the author, describing a marriage ceremony in the Island of Delos, says that the inhabitants of the island assembled at daybreak, crowned with flowers; flowers were strewn in the path of the bride and bridegroom; and the house was garlanded with them. Singers. and dancers appeared crowned with Oak, Myrtles, and Hawthorn. The bride and bridegroom were crowned with Poppies, and upon their approach to the temple, a priest received them at the entrance, and presented to each a branch of Ivy-a symbol of the tie which was to unite them for ever.*

At Indian nuptials, the wedding wreath, the varamâlâ, united bride and bridegroom. At the marriage feasts of the Persians, a little tree is introduced, the branches of which are laden with fruit the guests endeavour to pluck these without the bridegroom perceiving them; if successful, the latter has to make them a present; if, however, a guest fails, he has to give the bridegroom a hundred times the value of the object he sought to remove from the tree.

In Germany, among the inhabitants of Oldenburg, there exists a curious wedding custom. When the bridegroom quits his father's roof to settle in some other town or village, he has his bed linen embroidered at the corners with flowers surmounted by a tree, on whose branches are perched cock birds: on each side of the tree are embroidered the bridegroom's initials. In many European countries it is customary to plant before the house of a newly-married couple, one or two trees, as a symbol of the good luck wished them by their friends.

Floral Games and Festivals.

Floral games have for many years been held at Toulouse, Barcelona, Tortosi, and other places; but the former are the most famed, both on account of their antiquity and the value of the prizes distributed during the fêtes. The ancient city of Toulouse had formerly a great reputation for literature, which had, however, been allowed to decline until the visit of Charles IV. and his bride determined the capitouls or chief magistrates to make an effort to restore its prestige as the centre of Provençal song. Troubadours there were who, banded together in a society, met in the garden of the Augustine monks to recite their songs, sirventes, and ballads; and in order to foster the latent taste for poetry, the capitouls invited the poets of the Langue d'oc, to compete for a golden Violet to be awarded to the author of the best poem produced on

Voyage du Jeune Anacharsis en Grèce, vers le milicu du quatrième siècle avant l'ere vulgaire.'

May 4th, 1324. The competition created the greatest excitement, and great numbers of people met to hear the judges' decision: they awarded the golden Violet to Arnaud Vidal for his poem in honour of the Virgin. In 1355, three prizes were offered-a golden Violet for the best song; an Eglantine (Spanish Jasmine), for the best sirvente, or finest pastoral; and a Flor-de-gang (yellow Acacia) for the best ballad. In later years four prizes were competed for, viz., an Amaranth, a Violet, a Pansy, and a Lily. In 1540, Clemence Isaure, a poetess, bequeathed the bulk of her fortune to the civic authorities to be expended in prizes for poetic merits, and in fêtes to be held on the 1st and 3rd of May. She was interred in the church of La Daurade, on the high altar of which are preserved the golden flowers presented to the successful competitors at the Floral Games. The ceremonies of the fêtes thus revived by Clemence Isaure commenced with the strewing of her tomb with Roses, followed by mass, a sermon, and alms-giving. In 1694, the Jeux Floraux were merged into the Academy of Belles Lettres, which gives prizes, but almost exclusively to French poets. The festival, interrupted by the Revolution, was once revived in 1806, and is still held annually in the Hotel-de-Ville, Toulouse.

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St. Medard, Bishop of Noyon, in France, instituted in the sixth century a festival at Salency, his birth-place, for adjudging a most interesting prize offered by piety to virtue. This prize

consists of a simple crown of Roses bestowed on the girl who is acknowledged by all her competitors to be the most amiable, modest, and dutiful. The founder of this festival had the pleasure of crowning his own sister as the first Rosiere of Salency. This simple institution still survives, and the crown of Roses continues to be awarded to the most virtuous of the maidens of the obscure French village. A similar prize is awarded in the East of London by an active member of the Roman Catholic Church-the ceremony of crowning the Rose Queen being performed annually in the Crystal Palace at Sydenham.

In the middle ages the Queen of Flowers contributed to a singular popular festival at Treviso, in Italy. In the middle of the city the inhabitants erected a mock castle of upholstery. The most distinguished unmarried females of the place defended the fortress, which was attacked by the youth of the other sex. The missiles with which both parties fought consisted of Roses, Lilies, Narcissi, Violets, Apples, and Nuts, which were hurled at each other by the combatants. Volleys of Rose-water and other perfumes were also discharged by means of syringes. This entertainment attracted thousands of spectators from far and near, and the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa himself accounted it a most pleasing diversion.

The custom of pelting with Roses is still common in Persia, where it is practised during the whole season that these flowers are