E LORD OF MISRULE

"On May days the wild heads of the parish would choose a Lord of Misrule,
whom they would follow even into the church, though the minister were at
prayer or preaching, dancing and swinging their may-boughs about like
devils incarnate."--_Old Puritan Writer._

All on a fresh May morning, I took my love to church,
To see if Parson Primrose were safely on his perch.
He scarce had got to _Thirdly_, or squire begun to snore,
When, like a sun-lit sea-wave,
A green and crimson sea-wave,
A frolic of madcap May-folk came whooping through the door:--

Come up, come in with streamers!
Come in, with boughs of may!
Come up and thump the sexton,
And carry the clerk away.

Now skip like rams, ye mountains,
Ye little hills, like sheep!
Come up and wake the people
That parson puts to sleep.

They tickled their nut-brown tabors. Their garlands flew in showers,
And lasses and lads came after them, with feet like dancing flowers.
Their queen had torn her green gown, and bared a shoulder as white,
O, white as the may that crowned her,
While all the minstrels round her
Tilted back their crimson hats and sang for sheer delight:

Come up, come in with streamers!
Come in, with boughs of may!
Now by the gold upon your toe
You walked the primrose way.
Come up, with white and crimson!
O, shake your bells and sing;
Let the porch bend, the pillars bow,
Before our Lord, the Spring!

The dusty velvet hassocks were dabbled with fragrant dew.
The font grew white with hawthorn. It frothed in every pew.
Three petals clung to the sexton's beard as he mopped and mowed at the
clerk,
And "Take that sexton away," they cried;
"Did Nebuchadnezzar eat may?" they cried.
"Nay, that was a prize from Betty," they cried, "for kissing her in the
dark."

Come up, come in with streamers!
Come in, with boughs of may!
Who knows but old Methuselah
May hobble the green-wood way?
If Betty could kiss the sexton,
If Kitty could kiss the clerk,
Who knows how Parson Primrose
Might blossom in the dark?

The congregation spluttered. The squire grew purple and all,
And every little chorister bestrode his carven stall.
The parson flapped like a magpie, but none could hear his prayer