Page:Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, Etc., with an Appendix Containing a Rare Tract.djvu/155

 wealthy. Barrowford rush-bearing is always held on the first Sunday after the 19th August. This festival is still visited by vast numbers of persons from Burnley, Colne, Padiham, and elsewhere. Cheap trips are run on the East Lancashire line from Burnley and Colne to Nelson Station. Riot and drunkenness reign supreme. Rush-bearing Sundays are also observed at other places, as Holme, Worsthorn, Downham, &c., but usually not in so disreputable a manner. Most of the clergy take advantage of these Sundays, and fix their "charity sermons" for those days. They thus obtain contributions from many distant friends, who pay special visits to their relatives on these occasions. In Yorkshire these pastimes take the name of "feasts."

HAMBLETON FAIR. is one of the most elevated points in East Lancashire. It ranks third to Pendle and Boulsworth. On the first Sunday in May vast numbers of persons are in the habit of climbing the hill; and this annual gathering has now taken the name of "the fair." The neighbouring Sunday-schools are almost emptied on that day, notwithstanding all the efforts of the superintendents and ministers.

 ROCHDALE RUSH-BEARING. annual ceremony of rush-bearing is celebrated in Rochdale and in many other parishes in Lancashire. This custom, partaking of the nature of a village-wake, is of high antiquity, probably as remote as the age of Pope Gregory IV. (A.D. 827), who, on the introduction of