British Popular Customs, Present and Past. T. F. Thiselton-Dyer

      The word scambling is conjectured to be derived from the Greek σκαμβος, oblique, indirect, &c.

      “The scambling and unquiet time.”

      Shak. Henry V. act i. sc. 1.

      —Med. Ævi Kalend. vol. ii. p. 350. Antiq. Repert. 1809, vol. iv. pp. 87, 91, 305.

Feb. 5.]

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Gloucestershire.

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      Feb. 5.]

      Gloucestershire.

      In Smith’s MS. Lives of the Lords of Berkeley, in the possession of the Earl of Berkeley (p. 49), we read that on the anniversary of the founder of St. Augustine’s, Bristol, i.e., Sir Robert Fitzharding, on the 5th of February, “at that monastery there shall be one hundred poore men refreshed in a dole made unto them in this forme: Every man of them hath a chanon’s loaf of bread, called a myche (a kind of bread), and three hearings therewith. There shall be doaled also amongst them two bushells of peys.”—Brand, Pop. Antiq., 1849, vol., i. p. 116.

Yorkshire.

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      In Leeds and the neighbourhood they eat a sort of pancake on the Thursday following Shrove Tuesday, which in that part they call Fruttors (Fritters) Thursday. The Leeds fritter, it is said in the Dialect of Leeds, 1862, p. 307, is about one-fourth the size of a pancake, thicker, and has an abundance of currants in it.

Feb. 8.] CHALK SUNDAY.

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      Feb. 8.]

      CHALK SUNDAY.

IRELAND.

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      In the west of Ireland nine-tenths of the marriages that take place among the peasantry are celebrated the week before Lent, and particularly on Shrove Tuesday, on which day the Roman Catholic priests have hard work to get through all their duties. On the first Sunday in Lent it is usual for the girls slyly to chalk the coats of those young men who have allowed the preceding festival to pass without having made their choice of a partner; and “illigible” young men strut about with affected unconsciousness of the numerous stripes which decorate their backs, while boys just arrived at manhood hold their heads higher, and show tokens of great satisfaction, if any good-natured lass affixes the coveted mark.—N. & Q. 2nd S. vol. iii. p. 207.

Feb. 10.] ST. SCHOLASTICA’S DAY.

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      Feb. 10.]

      ST. SCHOLASTICA’S DAY.

Oxfordshire.

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      This festival was formerly observed at Oxford. The following extract is taken from The Lives of Leland, Hearne, and Wood (1772. vol. ii. p. 312): Friday, the burghers or citizens of Oxford appeared in their full number on St. Scholastica’s Day at St. Mary’s. Alderman Wright, their oracle, told them that if they did not appear there might be some hole picked in their charter, as there was now endeavouring to be done in that of the city of London; he told them moreover that, though it was a popish matter, yet policy ought to take place in this juncture of time.[17]

[17] See ibid. p. 295.

      The origin of this custom was a furious contest between the citizens of Oxford and the students. Some of the latter being at a tavern, on the 10th of February, 1354, broke the landlord’s head with a vessel in which he had served them with bad wine. The man immediately collected together a number of his neighbours and fellow-citizens, who, having for a long time waited for such an opportunity, fell upon the students, and in spite of the mandates of the Chancellor, and even the King himself, who was then at Woodstock, continued their outrages for several days, not only killing or wounding the scholars, but, in contempt of the sacerdotal order, destroying all the religious crosses of the town. For this offence the King deprived the city of many valuable privileges, and bestowed them on the University, and the Bishop of Lincoln forbade the administration of the sacraments to the citizens. In the following year they petitioned for a mitigation of this sentence, but without success; but in 1357 a total abrogation of it was granted upon condition that the city should annually celebrate on St. Scholastica’s day, the 10th of February, a number of masses for the souls of the scholars killed in the conflict; the mayor and bailiffs with sixty of the chief burgesses being bound also to swear at St. Mary’s Church observance of the customary rights of the University, under the penalty of 100 marks in case of omission of this ceremony. It was further ordered, that the said citizens should afterwards offer up singly at the high altar one penny, of which sum forty pence were to be distributed to poor scholars, and the remainder given to the curate of St. Mary’s. This offering being omitted upon the pretence that masses were abolished, the University in Queen Elizabeth’s reign sued them for the sum of 1,500 marks due for such neglect during fifteen years; when it was decreed that instead of mass there should be a sermon and a communion at St. Mary’s (which at length came only to public prayers), and that the said offering should be made. The traditional story that the mayor was obliged to attend with a halter round his neck, which was afterwards, to lessen the disgrace, changed into a silken string, has no real foundation.—Ibid., p. 296.

Feb. 13.] ST. VALENTINE’S EVE.

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      Feb. 13.]

      ST. VALENTINE’S EVE.

      Misson, in his Travels in England (translated by Ozell, p. 330), describes the amusing practices of his time connected with this day. He tells us that on the eve of the 14th February, St. Valentine’s day, the young folks in England and Scotland, by a very ancient custom, celebrate a little festival. An equal number of maids and bachelors get together, and each writes their true or some feigned name upon separate billets, which they roll up, and draw by way of lots, the maids taking the men’s billets, and the men the maids’; so that each of the young men lights upon a girl that he calls his Valentine, and each of the girls upon a young man which she calls hers. By this means each has two Valentines;