Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/446

 414 ^^^^ Chcvauchdc de St. Michel.

contemporary records and descriptions exist, and is the most likely to have adhered literally to the ancient order of procedure.

On the 27th of May 18 13, before Thomas Falla, Esq., seneschal of the Court and jurisdiction of St. Michel, and the vavasseurs of the said Court. " The Court being to-day assembled to regulate the order to be pursued on Wednes- day the 9th June proximo" (the day appointed by the Court for the Chevauchee of His Majesty to pass), having decreed the dress of the pions, went on to ordain that " Messieurs les prevots of the Court are ordered to warn all those who are obliged to assist at the said Chevauchee to find themselves with their swords,^ their pions,- and their horses, the aforesaid 9th of June, at seven"* o'clock in the morning at the Court of St. Michel, according to ancient custom ; in default of appearance to be subject to such penalties as it shall please the Court to award. And also shall Monsieur le Gouverneur be duly warned, and Thomas Falla, Esq., Senechal, and Messrs. Jean Mahy and Nicholas Moullin, Vavassors, are nominated by the Court to form a Committee so as to take the necessary measures to regulate the conformity of the said act concerning the dress of the pions. (Signed) Jean Ozanne, Greffier."

On the above day, conformably to the said Act, all the

^ The three members of the Chevauchee who wore swords were the King's sheriff, th« seneschal of St. Michel, and the porte-lance. Probably in mediaeval days they wore full armour, while the other mounted officials would have worn semi armour, and the unmounted nien would have worn fustian, with pikes, and probably bows of ribbon with the symbolic colours.

^ In the sixteenth century records of the Chevauchee no definite lime of meeting, further than "au temps et lieu accoutumee,," is mentioned. The earliest notice of a stated hour being recorded was on the 30th May 1608, when the Court was summoned to meet at si.x a.m. This continued to be the time appointed until 1660, when five o'clock was fixed upon, and this was the hour until 1705. Then, for many years, the Chevauchee was adjourned, and when it finally did take place in 1759, seven o'clock was the hour fixed. In 1768 the Court reverted to six o'clock, and in 1813, as we see, selected seven a.m. as the hour for the rendez-vous.