Part 20

The Old Year went out with much such a racket as we make nowadays, but of quite a different kind. We did not blow the New Year in, we "smashed" it in. When it was dark on New Year's Eve, we stole out with all the cracked and damaged crockery of the year that had been hoarded for the purpose and, hieing ourselves to some favorite neighbor's door, broke our pots against it. Then we ran, but not very far or very fast, for it was part of the game that if one was caught at it, he was to be taken in and treated to hot doughnuts. The smashing was a mark of favor, and the citizen who had most pots broken against his door was the most popular man in town. When I was in the Latin School a cranky burgomaster, whose door had been freshly painted, gave orders to the watchmen to stop it, and gave them an unhappy night, for they were hard put to it to find a way it was safe to look, with the streets full of the best citizens in town, and their wives and daughters, sneaking singly by with bulging coats on their way to salute a friend. That was when our mothers, those who were not out smashing in the New Year, came out strong after the fashion of mothers. They baked more doughnuts than ever that night, and beckoned the watchman in to the treat; and there he sat, blissfully deaf while the street rang with the thunderous salvos of our raids; until it was discovered that the burgomaster himself was on post, when there was a sudden rush from kitchen doors and a great scurrying through the streets that grew strangely silent.

The town had its revenge, however. The burgomaster, returning home in the midnight hour, stumbled in his gate over a discarded Christmas-tree hung full of old boots and many black and sooty pots that went down round him with a great smash as he upset it, so that his family came running out in alarm to find him sprawling in the midst of the biggest celebration of all. His dignity suffered a shock which he never quite got over. But it killed the New Year's fun, too. For he was really a good fellow, and then he was the burgomaster and chief of police to boot. I suspect the fact was that the pot-smashing had run its course. Perhaps the supply of pots was giving out; we began to use tinware more about that time. That was the end of it, anyhow.

JACOB RIIS in _The Old Town_

New Year Calls in Old New York

From old Dutch times to the middle of the nineteenth century New Year's Day in New York was devoted to an universal interchange of visits. Old friendships were renewed, family differences settled, a hearty welcome extended even to strangers of presentable appearance.

The following is an entry in Tyrone Powers the actor's diary for January 1, 1834: "On this day from an early hour every door in New York is open and all the good things possessed by the inmates paraded in lavish profusion. Every sort of vehicle is put in requisition. At an early hour a gentleman of whom I had a slight knowledge entered my room, accompanied by an elderly person I had never before seen, and who, on being named, excused himself for adopting such a frank mode of making my acquaintance, which he was pleased to add he much desired, and at once requested me to fall in with the custom of the day, whose privilege he had thus availed himself of, and accompany him on a visit to his family.

"I was the last man on earth likely to decline an offer made in such a spirit; so entering his carriage, which was waiting, we drove to his house on Broadway, where, after being presented to a very amiable lady, his wife, and a pretty gentle-looking girl, his daughter, I partook of a sumptuous luncheon, drank a glass of champagne, and on the arrival of other visitors, made my bow, well pleased with my visit.

"My host now begged me to make a few calls with him, explaining, as we drove along, the strict observances paid to this day throughout the State, and tracing the excellent custom to the early Dutch colonists. I paid several calls in company with my new friend, and at each place met a hearty welcome, when my companion suggested that I might have some compliments to make on my own account, and so leaving me, begged me to consider his carriage perfectly at my disposal. I left a card or two and made a couple of hurried visits, then returned to my hotel to think over the many beneficial effects likely to grow out of such a charitable custom which makes even the stranger sensible of the benevolent influence of this kindly day, and to wish for its continued observance."

At the period of which Power speaks there were great feasts spread in many houses, and the traditions of tremendous Dutch eating and drinking were faithfully observed. Special houses were noted for particular forms of entertainment. At one it was eggnog, at another rum punch; at this one, pickled oysters, at that, boned turkey, or marvellous chocolate, or perfect Mocha coffee; or for the select _cognoscenti_ a drop of old Madeira as delicate in flavor as the texture of the glass from which it was sipped. At all houses there were the New Year's cakes, in the form of an Egyptian _cartouche_, and in later and more degenerate days relays of champagne-bottles appeared,--the coming in of the lower empire.

Then followed the gradual breaking down of all the lines of conventionality into a wild and unseemly riot of visits. New Year's Day took on the character of a rabid and untamed race against time. A procession, each of whose component parts was made up of two or three young men in an open barouche, with a pair of steaming horses and a driver more or less under the influences of the hilarity of the day, would rattle from one house to another all day long. The visitors would jump out of the carriage, rush into the house, and reappear in a miraculously short space of time. The ceremony of calling was a burlesque. There was a noisy, hilarious greeting, a glass of wine was swallowed hurriedly, everybody shook hands all around, and the callers dashed out, rushed into the carriage, and were driven hurriedly to the next house.

A reaction naturally set in which ended in the almost complete disuse of the custom of New Year's Calls.

W. S. WALSH in _Curiosities of Popular Customs_

Sylvester Abend in Davos

It is ten o'clock upon Sylvester Abend, or New Year's Eve. Herr Buol sits with his wife at the head of his long table. His family and serving-folk are around him. There is his mother, with little Ursula, his child, upon her knee. The old lady is the mother of four comely daughters and nine stalwart sons, the eldest of whom is now a grizzled man. Besides our host, four of the brothers are here to-night; the handsome melancholy Georg, who is so gentle in his speech; Simeon, with his diplomatic face; Florian, the student of medicine; and my friend, colossal-breasted Christian. Palmy came a little later, worried with many cares, but happy to his heart's core. No optimist was ever more convinced of his philosophy than Palmy. After them, below the salt, were ranged the knechts and porters, the marmiton from the kitchen, and innumerable maids. The board was tessellated with plates of birnen-brod and eier-brod, kuchli and cheese and butter; and Georg stirred grampampuli in a mighty metal bowl. For the uninitiated, it may be needful to explain these Davos delicacies. Birnen-brod is what the Scotch would call a "bun," or massive cake, composed of sliced pears, almonds, spices, and a little flour. Eier-brod is a saffron-coloured sweet bread, made with eggs; and kuchli is a kind of pastry, crisp and flimsy, fashioned into various devices of cross, star, and scroll. Grampampuli is simply brandy burnt with sugar, the most unsophisticated punch I ever drank from tumblers. The frugal people of Davos, who live on bread and cheese and dried meat all the year, indulge themselves but once with these unwonted dainties in the winter.

The occasion was cheerful, and yet a little solemn. The scene was feudal. For these Buols are the scions of a warrior race:--

"A race illustrious for heroic deeds; Humbled, but degraded."

During the six centuries through which they have lived nobles in Davos, they have sent forth scores of fighting men to foreign lands, ambassadors to France and Venice and the Milanese, governors to Chiavenna and Bregaglia and the much-contested Valtelline. Members of their house are Counts of Buol-Schauenstein in Austria, Freiherrs of Muhlingen and Berenberg in the now German Empire. They keep the patent of nobility conferred on them by Henri IV. Their ancient coat--parted per pale azure and argent, with a dame of the fourteenth century bearing in her hand a rose, all counterchanged--is carved in wood and monumental marble on the churches and old houses hereabouts. And from immemorial antiquity the Buol of Davos has sat thus on Sylvester Abend with family and folk around him, summoned from alp and snowy field to drink grampampuli and break the birnen-brod.

These rites performed, the men and maids began to sing--brown arms lounging on the table, and red hands folded in white aprons--serious at first in hymn-like cadences, then breaking into wilder measures with a jodel at the close. There is a measured solemnity in the performance, which strikes the stranger as somewhat comic. But the singing was good; the voices strong and clear in tone, no hesitation and no shirking of the melody. It was clear that the singers enjoyed the music for its own sake, with half-shut eyes, as they take dancing, solidly, with deep-drawn breath, sustained and indefatigable. But eleven struck; and the two Christians, my old friend and Palmy, said we should be late for church. They had promised to take me with them to see bell-ringing in the tower. All the young men of the village meet, and draw lots in the Stube of the Rathhaus. One party tolls the old year out, the other rings the new year in. He who comes last is sconced three litres of Veltliner for the company. This jovial fine was ours to pay to-night.

When we came into the air we found a bitter frost; the whole sky clouded over; a north wind whirling snow from alp and forest through the murky gloom. The benches and broad walnut tables of the Rathhaus were crowded with men in shaggy homespun of brown and grey frieze. Its low wooden roof and walls enclosed an atmosphere of smoke, denser than the eternal snow-drift. But our welcome was hearty, and we found a score of friends. Titanic Fopp, whose limbs are Michelangelesque in length; spectacled Morosani; the little tailor Kramer, with a French horn on his knees; the puckered forehead of the Baumeister; the Troll-shaped postman; peasants and woodmen, known on far excursions upon pass and upland valley. Not one but carried on his face the memory of winter strife with avalanche and snow-drift, of horses struggling through Fluela whirlwinds, and wine-casks tugged across Bernina, and haystacks guided down precipitous gullies at thundering speed 'twixt pine and pine, and larches felled in distant glens beside the frozen watercourses. Here we were, all met together for one hour from our several homes and occupations, to welcome in the year with clinked glasses and cries of Prosit Neujahr!

The tolling bells above us stopped. Our turn had come. Out into the snowy air we tumbled, beneath the row of wolves' heads that adorn the pent-house roof. A few steps brought us to the still God's acre, where the snow lay deep and cold upon high-mounded graves of many generations. We crossed it silently, bent our heads to the low Gothic arch, and stood within the tower. It was thick darkness there. But far above, the bells began again to clash and jangle confusedly, with volleys of demoniac joy. Successive flights of ladders, each ending in a giddy platform hung across the gloom, climb to the height of some hundred and fifty feet; and all their rungs were crusted with frozen snow, deposited by trampling boots. For up and down these stairs, ascending and descending, moved other than angels--the frieze-jacketed Burschen, Grisens bears, rejoicing in their exercise, exhilarated with the tingling noise of beaten metal. We reached the first room safely, guided by firm-footed Christian, whose one candle just defined the rough walls and the slippery steps. There we found a band of boys pulling ropes that set the bells in motion. But our destination was not reached. One more aerial ladder, perpendicular in darkness, brought us swiftly to the home of sound. It is a small square chamber, where the bells are hung, filled with the interlacement of enormous beams, and pierced to north and south by open windows, from whose parapets I saw the village and the valley spread beneath. The fierce wind hurried through it, charged with snow, and its narrow space thronged with men. Men on the platform, men on the window-sills, men grappling the bells with iron arms, men brushing by to reach the stairs, crossing, re-crossing, shouldering their mates, drinking red wine from gigantic beakers, exploding crackers, firing squibs, shouting and yelling in corybantic chorus. They yelled and shouted, one could see it by their open mouths and glittering eyes; but not a sound from human lungs could reach our ears. The overwhelming incessant thunder of the bells drowned all. It thrilled the tympanum, ran through the marrow of the spine, vibrated in the inmost entrails. Yet the brain was only steadied and excited by this sea of brazen noise. After a few moments I knew the place and felt at home in it. Then I enjoyed a spectacle which sculptors might have envied. For they ring the bells in Davos after this fashon:--The lads below set them going with ropes. The men above climb in pairs on ladders to the beams from which they are suspended. Two mighty pine-trees, roughly squared and built into the walls, extend from side to side across the belfry. Another, from which the bells hang, connects these massive trunks at right angles. Just where the central beam is wedged into the two parallel supports, the ladders reach from each side of the belfry, so that, bending from the higher rung of the ladder, and leaning over, stayed upon the lateral beam, each pair of men can keep one bell in movement with their hands. Each comrade plants one leg upon the ladder, and sets the other knee firmly athwart the horizontal pine. Then round each other's waist they twine left arm and right. The two have thus become one man. Right arm and left are free to grasp the bell's horns, sprouting at its crest beneath the beam. With a grave rhythmic motion, bending sideward in a close embrace, swaying and returning to their centre from the well-knit loins, they drive the force of each strong muscle into the vexed bell. The impact is earnest at first, but soon it becomes frantic. The men take something from each other of exalted enthusiasm. This efflux of their combined energies inspires them and exasperates the mighty resonance of metal which they rule. They are lost in a trance of what approximates to dervish passion--so thrilling is the surge of sound, so potent are the rhythms they obey. Men come and tug them by the heels. One grasps the starting thews upon their calves. Another is impatient for their place. But they strain still, locked together, and forgetful of the world. At length, they have enough: then slowly, clingingly, unclasp, turn round with gazing eyes, and are resumed, sedately, into the diurnal round of common life. Another pair is in their room upon the beam.

The Englishman who saw those things stood looking up, enveloped in his ulster with the grey cowl thrust upon his forehead, like a monk. One candle cast a grotesque shadow of him on the plastered wall. And when his chance came, though he was but a weakling, he too climbed and for some moments hugged the beam, and felt the madness of the swinging bell. Descending, he wondered long and strangely whether he ascribed too much of feeling to the men he watched. But no, that was impossible. There are emotions deeply seated in the joy of exercise, when the body is brought into play, and masses move in concert, of which the subject is but half conscious. Music and dance, and the delirium of the battle or the chase, act thus upon spontaneous natures. The mystery of rhythm and associated energy and blood tingling in sympathy is here. It lies at the root of man's most tyrannous instinctive impulses.

It was past one when we reached home, and now a meditative man might well have gone to bed. But no one thinks of sleeping on Sylvester Abend. So there followed bowls of punch in one friend's room, where English, French, and German blent together in convivial Babel; and flasks of old Montagner in another. Palmy, at this period, wore an archdeacon's hat, and smoked a church-warden's pipe; and neither were his own, nor did he derive anything ecclesiastical or Anglican from the association. Late in the morning we must sally forth, they said, and roam the town. For it is the custom here on New Year's night to greet acquaintances, and ask for hospitality, and no one may deny these self-invited guests. We turned out again into the grey snow-swept gloom, a curious Comus--not at all like Greeks, for we had neither torches in our hands nor rose-wreaths to suspend upon a lady's door-posts....

However, upon this occasion, though we had winter wind enough, and cold enough, there was not much love in the business. My arm was firmly clenched in Christian Buol's, and Christian Palmy came behind, trolling out songs in Italian dialect, with still recurring canaille choruses, of which the facile rhymes seemed mostly made on a prolonged amu-u-u-r. It is noticeable that Italian ditties are especially designed for fellows shouting in the streets at night.... The tall church-tower and spire loomed up above us in grey twilight. The tireless wind still swept thin snow from fell and forest. But the frenzied bells had sunk into their twelve-month's slumber, which shall be broken only by decorous tollings at less festive times. I wondered whether they were tingling still with the heart-throbs and with the pressure of those many arms? Was their old age warmed, as mine was, with that gust of life--the young men who had clung to them like bees to lily-bells, and shaken all their locked-up tone and shrillness into the wild winter air? Alas! how many generations of the young have handled them; and they are still there, frozen in their belfry; and the young grow middle-aged, and old, and die at last; and the bells they grappled in their lust of manhood toll them to their graves, on which the tireless wind will, winter after winter, sprinkle snow from alps and forests which they knew.

JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS

XI

TWELFTH NIGHT

"Now have Good Day!" A Twelfth Night Superstition Twelfth-Day Table Diversion The Blessing of the Waters La Galette du Roi Drawing King and Queen on Twelfth Night St. Distaff's Day and Plough Monday

Down with the rosemary and bays, Down with the mistletoe; Instead of holly, now up-raise The greener box, for show.

The holly hitherto did sway; Let box now domineer, Until the dancing Easter-day, On Easter's Eve appear.

ROBERT HERRICK

Now have Good Day

_Now have good day, now have good day! I am Christmas, and now I go my way!_

Here have I dwelt with more and less, From Hallow-tide till Candlemas! And now must I from you hence pass, _Now have good day!_

I take my leave of King and Knight, And Earl, Baron, and lady bright! To wilderness I must me dight! _Now have good day!_

And at the good lord of this hall, I take my leave, and of guests all! Methinks I hear Lent doth call, _Now have good day!_

And at every worthy officer, Marshall, painter, and butler, I take my leave as for this year, _Now have good day!_

Another year I trust I shall Make merry in this hall! If rest and peace in England may fall! _Now have good day!_

But often times I have heard say, That he is loth to part away, That often biddeth "have good day!" _Now have good day!_

Now fare ye well all in-fere! Now fare ye well for all this year, Yet for my sake make ye good cheer! _Now have good day!_

_From a Balliol MS. of c. 1540_

A Twelfth Night Superstition

Twice six nights then from Christmasse, they do count with diligence, Where in eche maister in his house doth burne by franckensence: And on the table settes a loafe, when night approcheth nere, Before the coles and franckensence to be perfumed there: First bowing down his heade he standes, and nose and eares and eyes He smokes, and with hos mouth receyves the fume that doth arise Whom followeth streight his wife, and doth the same full solemly, And of their children every one and all their family; Which doth preserve they say their teeth and nose and eye and eare From every kind of maladie, and sicknesse all the yeare. When every one receyued hath this odour great and small Then one takes up the pan with coales, and franckensence and all An other takes the loafe, whom all the rest do follow here. And round about the house they go with torch or taper clere, That neither bread nor meat do want, nor witch with dreadful charme Have power to hurt their children or to do their cattell harme There are that three nightes only do perfoure this foolish geare To this intent, and thinke themselves in safetie all the yeare.

BARNABY GOOGE'S versification of _The Popish Kingdome_

Twelfth-Day Table Diversion

John Nott, describing himself as "late cook to the dukes of Somerset, Ormond, and Batton," writes in 1726: "Ancient artists in cookery inform us that in former days, when good housekeeping was in fashion amongst the English nobility, they used either to begin or conclude their entertainments, and divert their guests with such pretty devices as these following, viz:--

A castle made of pasteboard, with gates, drawbridges, battlements and portcullises, all done over with paste, was set upon a table in a large charger, with salt laid round about it, as if it were the ground in which were stuck egg-shells full of rose or other sweet waters, the meat of the egg having been taken out by a great pin. Upon the battlement of the castle were planted Kexes covered over with paste, in the form of cannons, and made to look like brass by covering them with dutch leaf-gold. These cannons being charged with gunpowder, and trains laid so that you might fire as many as you pleased, at one touch; this castle was set at one end of the table.

Then in the middle of the table, they would set a stag made of paste, but hollow, and filled with claret wine, and a broad arrow stuck in his side; this was also set in a large charger, with a ground made of salt with egg-shells of perfumed waters stuck in it as before.

Then at the other end of the table, they would have a ship made of pasteboard, and covered all over with paste, with masts, sails, flags, and streamers; and guns made of Kexes, covered with paste and charged with gunpowder, with a train, as in the castle. This being placed in a large charger was set upright in as it were a sea of salt, in which were also stuck egg-shells full of perfumed waters. Then betwixt the stag and castle, and the stag and ship, were placed two pies made of coarse paste, filled with bran, and washed over with saffron and the yolks of eggs; when these were baked the bran was taken out, a hole was cut in the bottom of each, and live birds put into one and frogs into the other. Then the holes were closed up with paste, and the lids neatly cut up, so that they might be easily taken off by the funnels, and adorned with gilded laurels.