Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, &c./Part 2/Wakes at Didsbury

DIDSBURY WAKES.

The Stockport Advertiser of August 5, 1825, contains the following paragraph:—"Didsbury wakes will be celebrated on the 8th, 9th, and 10th of August. A long bill of fare of the diversions to be enjoyed at this most delightful village has been published. The enjoyments consist chiefly of ass-races, for purses of gold; prison-bar playing, and grinning through collars, for ale; bag-racing, for hats; foot-racing, for sums of money; maiden plates, for ladies under twenty years of age, for gown-pieces, shawls, &c.; treacled-loaf-eating, for various rewards; smoking-matches; apple-dumpling-eating; wheel-barrow-racing, the best heats; bell-racing, and balls each evening. 'Que nunc prescribere longum est.' The humours of Didsbury festival are always well regulated; the display of youths of both sexes, vieing with each other in dress and fashion, as well as cheerful and blooming faces, is not exceeded by any similar event; and the gaieties of each day are succeeded by the evening parties fantastically tripping through the innocent relaxation of country-dances, reels, &c., to as favourite tunes, at the 'Cock' and 'Ring o' Bells' inns."

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