pronunciation, contracted as it now appears. Dr. Johnson supposes this term to be a corruption of Lattermath, which signifies a second mowing of grass.

ST. STEPHEN'S DAY.

It was an ancient custom to gallop horses on St. Stephen's day, December 26, until they perspired, and then bleed them, to prevent their having any disorders during the ensuing year. This practice is supposed to have been introduced by the Danes. Blessings were also implored upon pastures.

ST. THOMAS' DAY.

This day, the 21st day of December, is denominated the shortest day. At the village of Thornton, near Sherborne, an ancient custom exists among the tenants, of depositing 58. in a hole, in a certain tombstone in the churchyard, which prevents the lord of the manor from taking tithe of hay during the year. This must invariably be done on St. Thomas' day, before twelve o'clock, or the privilege is lost.

EMBER WEEK.

EMBER. The Latin name, Quatuor_Tempora, the Four Times, has remained in modern languages. In Spanish and Portuguese the term is Temporas. The German converts them into Quatember, and thence, by the easy corruption of dropping the first syllable, a corruption which also takes place in some German dialects, we get the English Ember. Thus, there is no occasion to seek after an etymology in embers; or, with Nelson, to extravagate still further to the noun ymbren, a recurrence, as if all holy seasons did not equally_recur. In Welsh, Ember week is Wythnos y cydgorian, the Week of the Processions. Ember Weeks are those in which the Ember days fall. They were appointed for imploring the blessings of the Almighty on the fruits of the earth, and upon the ordinations performed in the Church at these Seasons. The Ember days are the Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after the first Sunday in Lent, after Whitsunday, after the 14th of September, and after the 13th of December.

DOG DAYS.

In an ancient calendar preserved by Bede, the beginning of the dog-days was placed on the 14th of July. In one prefixed to the Common Prayer, printed in the time of queen Elizabeth, they are said to begin on the 6th of July, and to end on the 5th of September; and this was continued from that time till the

Restoration, when that book was revised, and the dog-days omitted. From that time to the correction of the British calendar, our almanacs had the beginning of the dog-days on the 19th of July, and the end on the 20th of August; but since that correction, the times of the beginning and end have been altered, and the former was placed at the 30th of July, and the latter at the 7th of September. The dog-days have been commonly reckoned for about forty days, viz., twenty days before, and twenty days after the heliacal rising; and almanac-makers have usually set down the dog-days in their almanacs to the changing time of the star's rising; and thus they had at length fallen considerably after the hottest season of the year; till of late, a very proper alteration has been introduced into the almanacs, and they have been made to commence with the 3rd of July, and to terminate with the 11th of August. The propriety of this alteration will be evident, if we consider that the ancients meant to express by the dog-days, the hottest time of the year, which is commonly during the month of July, about which month the dog-star rose heliacally in the time of the most ancient astronomers, whose observations have been transmitted to us.

Ancient authors tell us that on the day the canicula, or dogstar, first rises in the morning, the sea boils, wine turns sour, dogs begin to grow mad, the bile increases and irritates, and all animals grow languid; and that the diseases ordinarily occasioned in men by it, are burning fevers, dysenteries, and frenzies. The Romans sacrificed a brown dog every year to Canicula, at its rising, to appease its rage. The Egyptians carefully watched the rising of this star, and judging by it of the swelling of the Nile, called the star the sentinel and watch of the year. Hence, according to their mode of hieroglyphic writing, they represented it under the figure of a dog (that faithful animal having been, even in these times, distinguished for his peculiar qualities of watching over the affairs of man), or of a man with a dog's head, and worshipped him under the name of Anubis, whose figure was hung up in all their temples, to give notice of the approach of the inundation of the Nile.

GULE OF AUGUST.

The first day of August is so called. According to Gebelin, as the month of August was the first in the Egyptian year, it was called Gule, which being latinized makes Gula, a word in that language signifying throat. "Our legendaries," says Brand, surprised at seeing this word at the head of the month of August, converted it to their own purpose." They made out of it the feast of the daughter of the tribune Quirinus, who they. pretend was cured of a disorder in the throat (gula), by kissing

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the chain of St. Peter on the day of its festival. Forcing the Gule of the Egyptians into the throat of the tribune's daughter, they instituted a festival to Gule upon the festival day of St. Peter ad Vincula.

CRISPIN'S DAY.

St. Crispin was a shoemaker, and consequently was chosen by the craft as their Patron Saint. The Rev. Alban Butler, in his "Lives of the Saints," says, " St. Crispin, and St. Crispinian, two glorious martyrs, came from Rome to preach at Soissons, in France, towards the middle of the third century, and, in imitation of St. Paul, worked with their hands in the night, making shoes, though they were said to be nobly born, and brothers."

This day, in 1415, is famed in the annals of England, as the one on which the memorable battle of Agincourt was fought.

LOW SUNDAY.

The Sunday after Easter-day is called Low Sunday, because it is Easter-day repeated, with the church service somewhat abridged or lowered in the ceremony, from the pomp of the festival the Sunday before. Other writers have supposed that it was called Low Sunday because it is the lowest or latest day for satisfying of the Easter obligation, viz., the worthily receiving the blessed Sacrament.

INVENTION OF THE CROSS.

Mr. Audley says, the word Invention sometimes signifies the finding a thing that was hidden; thence the name of this festival, which celebrates the alleged finding of the Cross of Christ by St. Helena, who is said to have found three crosses on Mount Calvary, but the true one could not be distinguished, till a sick woman: being placed on each, was healed by one, which was therefore pronounced the True Cross. Mr. Audley quotes, that the custody of the cross was committed to the bishop of Jerusalem. Every Easter Sunday it was exposed to view, and pilgrims from all countries were indulged with little pieces of it enchased in gold or gems. What was most astonishing, the sacred wood was never lessened, although it was perpetually diminished, for it possessed a secret power of vegetation! Ribadeneira says, "the Cross being a piece of wood without sense or feeling, yet it seemeth to have in it a living and everlasting virtue; for although severed, parted, and divided, it still remains whole and entire for all that come to reverence and adore it."

ROGATION SUNDAY.

The fifth Sunday after Easter is called Rogation Sunday. The term Rogation signifies supplication, from the Latin rogare, to beseech.

Rogation Sunday obtained its name from the succeeding Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, which are called Rogation Days, and were ordained by Mamertus, archbishop of Vienne, in Dauphine; about the year 469, he caused the Litanies, or Supplications, to be said upon them, for the deliverance from earthquakes, fires, wild beasts, and other public calamities, which are alleged to have happened in this city; hence the whole week is called Rogation Week, to denote the continual praying.*

RESTORATION DAY.

This day (May 29th) is so called from its being the anniversary of the day whereon king Charles II. entered London, in 1660, and re-established royalty, which had been suspended from the death of his father. It is usual with the vulgar people to wear oak-leaves in their hats on this day, and dress their horses' heads with them. This is in commemoration of the shelter afforded to Charles by an Oak, while making his escape from England, after his defeat at Worcester, by Cromwell, on the 3rd of September, 1651. This day is appointed in the liturgy of the English Church as an anniversary festival in commemoration of the restoration of the monarchical form of government in these realms.

BLACK BARTHOLOMEW.

Mr. Audley says, there is a shocking propriety in the epithet given to this day (August 24th) for the horrid massacres of Protestants, which commenced in the reign of Charles IX. In Paris only, ten thousand were butchered in a fortnight, and ninety thousand in the provinces, making together one hundred thousand. This at least is the calculation of Perefixe, tutor to Louis XIV., and archbishop of Paris: others reduce the number much lower.

SICILIAN VESPERS.

This is another of those bloody massacres which so much disgrace history. It occurred on the 30th of March, 1282, when the Sicilians rose on the French, and destroyed in cold blood eight thousand of them. The signal was the sounding of the vesper, or evening prayer bell; and from whence came the term of the Sicilian Vespers.

PALM SUNDAY.

So called in commemoration of boughs, or branches of Palm Trees, being carried in procession before Christ when he rode into Jerusalem.

* Butler.

TRANSLATION OF SAINTS.

Of the origin of the translation of Saints, a great deal has been written; it is, however, generally supposed to take its data from the following:-In the year 359, the emperor Constantius, out of a presumed, and perhaps not inconsistent, respect, caused the remains of St. Andrew and St. Luke to be removed from their ancient place of interment, to the Temple of the Twelve Apostles, at Constantinople; and from that example, the practice of searching for the bodies of saints and martyrs increased so rapidly, that in the year 386, we find almost the whole of the devotees engaged in that pursuit. Relics, of course, speedily became of considerable value; and as they were all alleged to possess peculiar virtues, no expense or labour were spared to provide such treasures for every public religious foundation.

Ameruth Peyral, in his manuscript Chronicle of the Popes, says, that England is remarkable for its number of saints, whose bodies it has preserved from corruption. He observes, there is no soil so adapted to preserve corpses from corruption, as the soil of this country. Upon this ground, it is supposed, popish writers might imagine relics more plentiful than otherwise.

CARLING SUNDAY.

Carling Sunday is so called by the lower orders in the north of England, because it is their custom to eat immense quantities of small peas, called carlings, fried in butter and pepper and salt, on the second Sunday before Easter. This is said, by an old author, to take its rise from the disciples plucking the ears of corn, and rubbing them in their hands.

SHROVE OR PANCAKE TUESDAY.

Pancake Day is another name for Shrove Tuesday, from the custom of eating pancakes on this day, still generally observed. A writer in the Gentleman's Magazine, 1790, says, that Shrive is an old Saxon word, of which Shrove is a corruption, and signifies Confession. Hence Shrove Tuesday means Confession Tuesday, on which day all the people in every parish through the kingdom were obliged to confess their sins, one by one, to their own parish priests, in their own parish churches; and that this might be done the more regularly, the great bell in every parish was rung at ten o'clock, or perhaps sooner, that it might be heard by all. Since the Reformation the custom of ringing the great bell in our ancient parish churches, at least in some of them, still remains, and obtains in and about London the name of Pancake-Bell: the usage of dining on pancakes or fritters, and