Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 11, 1900.djvu/220

 2 1 o Co rresp ondence.

May Day. (Vol. X., pp. 443-4-)

I was at Wilton on the first of May, 1896. There I saw many parties of little girls, one of whom would carry a short stick, at the top of which was a garland or bunch of flowers. The girls would stand at the doors of houses and sing a song, the last line of which was : " Please give a penny for the garland." Wilton is a small town, and the garlands were numerous, so I suppose the house-to-house visitation was soon done, as when I left, soon after nine a.m., the girls were either wandering aimlessly about with their garlands or sitting on doorsteps counting their gains. I was told that the pence are collected in order to be afterwards spent at Wilton Fair, which is held on the first Monday in May.

The same day I reached Salisbury about eleven o'clock. Although it is only three miles from Wilton, the fashion of the May observance was different. The girls, instead of being in parties of four or five, went about in couples, each member of which held the end of a short stick, to the middle of which the garland was tied, and hung between the two girls as they walked along. The garland (as I suppose I must call it) was in the form of a crown, whose circlet and bows were covered with flowers. I did not hear any singing, and the girls went from shop to shop, within which they would wait until they received either money or a dismissal.

J. P. Emslie.

Burial Customs.

(Vol. X., pp. 253-4, 477.)

In the West of Scotland the belief in touching the dead to prevent dreaming of them or having any uncomfortable sensations afterwards, is common among the older people. The references to this in Folk-Lore recalled the memory of my grandmother (a well- educated woman, a native of Helensburgh, Dumbartonshire) placing my unwilling hand on the body of a dead child whose relations we were visiting. A mere infant at the time, seeing the dead child, and especially being forced to touch it, left a feeling of horror and dread that it took years to get free from.

Katherine Carson,