members his master and a near neighbour of his discussing the term New Year's Day as applied to the first of November and explaining to the younger men that it had always been so in old times. In fact, it seemed to him natural enough, as all tenure of land ends at that time, and as all servant-men begin their service at that date. I cross-examined him, without succeeding in any way in shaking his evidence. I should have been glad a few years ago to have come across this piece of information, or even Kelly's note, when I was discussing the Celtic year and trying to prove[1] that it began at the beginning of winter, with May-day as the beginning of its second half.
One of the characteristics of the beginning of the Celtic year with the commencement of winter was the belief that indications can be obtained on the eve of that day regarding the events of the year; but with the calendar year gaining ground it would be natural to expect that the Calends of January would have some of the associations of the Calends of Winter transferred to them, and vice versa. In fact, this can, as it were, be watched now going on in the Isle of Man. First, I may mention that the Manx mummers used to go about singing, in Manx, a sort of Hogmanay song,[2] reminding one of that usual in Yorkshire and other parts of
- ↑ See my Hibbert Lectures, pp. 514-5.
- ↑ I am indebted to Mr. Elton, M.P., for references on this subject to Hazlitt's edition of Brand's Popular Antiquities (London, 1870), i, 247-8, and Robert Bell's Songs of the Peasantry (London, 1857), pp. 186, 187, where the following is given as sung at Richmond in Yorkshire:
"To-night it is the New-Year's night, to-morrow is the day,
And we are come for our right, and for our ray,
As we used to do in old King Henry's day.
Sing, fellows, sing, Hagman-heigh.
"If you go to the bacon-flick, cut me a good bit;
Cut, cut and low, beware of your maw;
Cut, cut and round, beware of your thumb.
That me and my merry men may have some.
Sing, etc.
