tle of Shakespeare's
play, "Twelfth Night," took its origin in the festivities associated
with this festival. The season has, from time immemorial, been one of
merriment, "the more decided from being the proper close of the
festivities of Christmas, when games of chance were traditionally rife,
and the sport of sudden and casual elevation gave the tone of the time.
Of like tone is the play, and to this,"[640] says Mr. Lloyd, "it
apparently owes its title." The play, it appears, was probably
originally acted at the barristers' feast at the Middle Temple, on
February 2, 1601-2, as Manningham tells us in his "Diary" (Camden
Society, 1868, ed. J. Bruce, p. 18). It is worthy of note that the
festive doings of the Inns of Court, in days gone by, at Christmas-tide
were conducted on the most extravagant scale.[641] In addition to the
merry disports of the Lord of Misrule, there were various revels. The
Christmas masque at Gray's Inn, in 1594, was on a magnificent scale.

[640] "Critical Essays on the Plays of Shakespeare," 1875, p.
145; see Singer's "Shakespeare," vol. iii. pp. 347, 348.

[641] See "British Popular Customs," p. 473.

_St. Valentine's Day_ (Feb. 14). Whatever may be the historical origin
of this festival, whether heathen or Christian, there can be no doubt of
its antiquity. According to an old tradition, to which Chaucer refers,
birds choose their mates on this day; and hence, in "A Midsummer-Night's
Dream" (iv. 1), Theseus asks:

"Good morrow, friends. St. Valentine is past:
Begin these wood-birds but to couple now?"

From this notion, it has been suggested, arose the once popular practice
of choosing valentines, and also the common belief that the first two
single persons who meet in the morning of St. Valentine's day have a
great chance of becoming wed to each other. This superstition is alluded
to in Ophelia's song in "Hamlet" (iv. 5):

"To-morrow is Saint Valentine's day,
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window,
To be your valentine."

There seems every probability that St. Valentine's day, with its many
customs, has come down to us from the Romans, but was fathered upon St.
Valentine in the earlier ages of the Church in order to Christianize
it.[642] In France St. Valentine's was a movable feast, celebrated on
the first Sunday in Lent, which was called the _jour des brandons_,
because the boys carried about lighted torches on that day.