red burdens. Long after the
rushes ceased to be used in churches the ceremony was continued, and
I have witnessed a rush-bearing procession such as I have described.
There was a rush-cart with a large pile of decorated rush-sheaves,
and some characters from the May-day games were introduced. A queen
sat under a canopy of rushes, a few morris-dancers performed their
antics, and a jester amused the spectators with his quaint sayings.
A village feast, followed by dancing round a May-pole, generally
formed the conclusion of the day's festivities. In 1884 this
pleasant custom was revived at Grasmere in the Lake district, when
the children of the village carried out a "rush-bearing" after the
manner of their forefathers, and the village green again resounded
with songs of joy.

I fear that our ancestors were not always very cleanly people; they
seldom washed their floors, and therefore they were obliged to adopt
some device to hide their uncleanliness. The old rushes were not
taken away before the new ones were brought in; hence the lowest
layer became filthy, and one writer attributes the frequent
pestilences which often broke out to the dirtiness of their floors
and the masses of filthy rushes lying upon them. Perhaps some of the
wise folks in Lancashire discovered this, for we find the following
entry in the account books of Kirkham Church, 1631--"Paid for
carrying the rushes out of the Church in the sickness time, 5._s_.
0_d_." Straw was used in winter: it would seem very strange to us to
have our floors covered with straw, like a stable!

In this matter of cleanliness we have certainly improved upon the
habits of our forefathers: dirty cottages are the exception, and not
the rule, as they were in the days of "good Queen Bess"; and the
absence of those terrible plagues which used to devastate our land
in former times is due in a great measure to the improved
cleanliness and more careful regard for sanitation by the people of
England.

CHAPTER VIII.

AUGUST.

"Crowned with the ears of corn, now come,
And to the pipe sing harvest home.
Come forth, my lord, and see the cart
Dressed up with all the country art:
The horses, mares, and frisking fillies
Clad all in linen white as lilies.
The harvest swains and wenches bound
For joy, to see the hock-cart crowned."

HERRICK'S _Hesperides_.

Lammas Day--St. Roch's Day--Harvest-home--"Ten-pounding