Page:Notes on the folk-lore of the northern counties of England and the borders.djvu/108

86 dew will be beautiful all the year. A relic of the old observance seems to survive at Warboys, in Huntingdonshire, where certain poor of the parish are allowed to go into Warboys Wood on May Day morning to gather and bring away bundles of sticks.

Ascension Day appears unmarked in the North by any peculiar observances. I only learn that near York it was the custom, twenty years ago, for children to lay rushes or “seggs” on their doorsteps to mark the festival. The Rev. G. Ornsby suggests that this has probably arisen from the streets having been thus strewn before the procession on this festival in pre-Reformation times. He was once at Cologne on Ascension Day, and witnessed a most imposing procession, the streets having been strewn previously with fir branches and other green things.

On Whit-Sunday cheesecakes were formerly eaten in the county of Durham. At Whitby it is the custom on Midsummer Day to eat white cake and “kidgelled” (query whipped or cudgelled) cream, for which repast presents of cream are sent by the milkman to his customers. This custom is said to be as old as the time of the Danes.

In by-gone days the festival of Corpus Christi was the occasion in Durham of a “goodly procession” of the trades companies to the Abbey Church. “The Baley of the towne did call the occupations that was inhabitens within the towne, every occupation in his degree, to bring forth ther Banners, with all the lightes apperteyninge to these several Banners, and to repaire to the Abbey Church doure, every Banner to stand a rowe, according to his degree; on the west syde of the waye did all the Banners stand, and on the east syde did all the Torges stand.” Then the Prior and convent came forth to meet them in their best copes with “S. Cuthbert’s Banner and two goodly fair crosses. All entered the Abbey Church together, and Te Deum was solemnly sung and plaide of the orgaynes.” Nay, this Durham procession of the trades companies on Corpus Christi Day did, in a mutilated form, survive the Reformation, and linger on till about eighty years ago. The companies still repaired to the Cathedral and attended Divine Service. The