Is noted in Doblada's Letters from Spain, as within the period that ushers in the carnival with rompings in the streets, and vulgar mirth. tast-pinned paper, unmindful of the physical law which forbids her head revolving faster than the great orbit on which the ominous comet flies." ST. AGNES' EVE Formerly this was a night of great import to maidens who desired to know who they should marry. Of such it was required, that they should not eat on this day, and those who conformed to the rule, called it fasting St. Agnes' fast. And on sweet St. Agnes' night BEN JONSON. Old Aubrey has a recipe, whereby a lad or lass was to attain a sight of the fortunate lover. "Upon St. Agnes' night you take a row of pins, and pull out every one, one after another, saying a Pater Noster, sticking a pin in your sleeve, and you will dream of him or her you shall marry." "The custom alluded to by Horace of sticking a tail, is still practised by the boys in the streets, to the great annoyance of old ladies, who are generally the objects of this sport. One of the ragged striplings that wander in crowds about Seville, having tagged a piece of paper with a hooked pin, and stolen unperceived behind some slow-paced female, as wrapt up in her veil, she tells the beads she carries in her left hand, fastens the paper-tail on the back of the black or walking petticoat called Saya. The whole Little is remembered of these homely gang of ragamuffins, who, at a convenient methods for knowing" all about sweetdistance, have watched the dexterity of hearts," and the custom would scarcely their companion, set up a loud cry of have reached the greater number of read'Largalo, làrgalo'- Drop it, drop it'ers, if one of the sweetest of our modern this makes every female in the street look poets had not preserved its recollection in to the rear, which, they well know, is the a delightful poem. Some stanzas are fixed point of attack with the merry light- culled from it, with the hope that they troops. The alarm continues till some may be read by a few to whom the poetry friendly hand relieves the victim of sport, of Keates is unknown, and awaken a dewho, spinning and nodding like a spent sire for further acquaintance with his top, tries in vain to catch a glance at the beauties :— Out went the taper as she hurried in; As though a tongueless nightingale should swell A casement high and triple arch'd there was, Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot grass, Full on this casement shone the wintry moon, done Her vespers But dares not look behind, or all the charm is fled. Soon, trembling in her soft and chilly nest, Stol'n to this paradise, and so extranced, Shaded was her dream By the dusk curtains :-'twas a midnight charm He took her hollow lute, Tumultuous, and, in chords that tenderest be, Upon his knees he sank, pale as smooth-sculptured stone. Her eyes were open, but she still beheld, Aquarius, OR, THE WATER BEARER. The sun enters Aquarius on this day, though he does not enter it in the visible zodiac until the 18th of February. Ganymede, who succeeded Hebe as cup-bearer to Jove, is fabled to have been changed into Aquarius. Canobus of the Egyptian zodiac, who was the Neptune of the Egyptians, with a water-vase and measure, evidently prefigured this constellation. They worshipped him as the God of many breasts, from whence he replenished the Nile with fertilizing streams. Aquarius contains one hundred and eight stars, the two chief of which are about fifteen degrees in height: His head, his shoulders, and his lucid breast, Glisten with stars; and when his urn inclines, Rivers of light brighten the watery track. January 21. Eudosia. St. Agnes. St Fructuosus, &c. Vimin, or Vivian. St. Publius. Epiphanius St. St. St. Agnes. "She has always been looked upon," says Butler, "as a special patroness of purity, with the immaculate mother of God." According to him, she suffered martyrdom, about 304, and performed wonderful miracles before her death, which was by beheading, when she was thirteen years old; whereupon he enjoins females to a single life, as better than a married one, and says, that her anniversary "was formerly a holiday for the women in England." Ribadeneira relates, that she was to have been burned, and was put into the fire for that purpose, but the flames, refusing to touch her, divided on each side, burnt some of the bystanders, and then quenched, as if there had been none made: a compassionate quality in fire, of which iron was not sensible, for her head was cut off at a single blow Her legend further relates, that eight days after her death she came to her parents arrayed in white, attended by virgins with garlands of pearls, and a lamb whiter than snow; she is therefore usually represented by artists with a lamb by her side; though not, as Mr. Brand incautiously says, " in every graphic representation." It is further related, that a priest who officiated in a church dedicated to St. Agnes, was very desirous of being married. He prayed the pope's license, who gave it him, together with an emerald ring, and commanded him to pay his addresses to the image of St. Agnes in his own church Then the priest did so, and the image put forth her finger, and he put the ring thereon; whereupon the image drew her finger again, and kept the ring fast, and the priest was contented to remain a b chelor; "and yet, as it is sayd, the rynge secrated animals were afterwards shorn, is on the fynger of the ymage and palls made from their fleeces; for each of which, it is said, the pope exacted or the bishops from eight to ten, or thirty thousand crowns, and that the custom originated with Limes, who succeeded the apostle Peter: whereupon Naogeorgus inquires, In a Romish Missal printed at Paris, in 1520, there is a prayer to St. Agnes, remarkably presumptive of her powers; it is thus englished by Bp. Patrick: Agues, who art the Lamb's chaste spouse, O, Lady, singularly great, After this state, with grief opprest From Naogeorgus, we gather that in St. Agnes' church at Rome, it was customary on St. Agnes' Day to bring two snow-white lambs to the altar, upon which they were laid while the Agnus was singing by way of offering. These con But where was Agnes at that time? The two white lambes? where then was as it is used now? Yea, where was then the Popish state, no palles at Rome to see, &c. St. Agnes' Shrine. Where each pretty Ba-lamb most gaily appears, On gold fringed cushions they're stretch'd out to eat, Yet to me they seem'd crying, alack, and alas! Then they're brought to the Pope, and with transport they're kiss'd, "I am Stopford, in "Pagano-Papismus," recites this ceremony of the Romish church. The sheep were brought into the church, and the priest, having blessed some salt and water, read in one corner this gospel, "To us a child is born," &c. with the whole office, a farthing being laid upon the book, and taken up again; in the second corner he read this gospel, "Ye men of Galilee," &c. with the whole office, a farthing being laid upon the book, and taken up again; in the third corner he read this gospel, the good shepherd," &c. with the whole office, a farthing being laid upon the book, and taken up again; and in the fourth corner he read this gospel, "In these days," &c. with the whole office, a farthing being laid upon the book, and taken up again. After that, he sprinkled all the sheep with holy water, saying, "Let the blessing of God, the Father Almighty, descend and remain upon you; in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen." Then he signed all the sheep with the sign of the cross, repeated thrice some Latin verses, with the Paternoster and Ave-Marias, sung the mass of the Holy Ghost, and at the conclusion, an offering of fourpence was for himself, and another of threepence was for the poor. This ceremony was adopted by the Romish church from certain customs of the ancient Romans, in their worship of Pales, the goddess of sheepfolds and pastures. They prayed her to bless the sheep, and sprinkled them with water. The chief difference between the forms seems to have consisted in this, that the ancient Romans let the sheep remain in their folds, while the moderns drove them into the church. |