day for changing servants, previously to which that nuisance in a house, a general cleaning, takes place. Dr. Clarke, in the second volume of his Travels (4to, p. 229), speaking of customs handed down to us from the antients, says, 'The custom of blowing horns upon the first of May (Old Style) is derived from a festival in honour of Diana. These antient customs of the country did not escape the notice of Erasmus, when he was in England. He had observed them both at Cambridge and in London; and particularly mentions the blowing of horns, and the ceremony of depositing a deer's head upon the altar of St. Paul's church, which was built upon the site of a temple of Diana, by Ethelbert, king of Kent, in the time of Melitus, first bishop of London, as appears from a manuscript in the Cottonian collection. “Apud Anglos," says Erasmus, 'mos est Londini, ut certo die populus in summum templum Paulo sacrum inducat longo hostili impositum caput feræ, cum inamæno sonitu CORNUUM VENATORIORUM. Hac pompâ proceditur ud summum altare, dicas omnes afflatos furore Delia."

For an account of some antient ceremonies on May-day, see our last volume, pp. 129-131.

1.-SAINT PHILIP AND SAINT JAMES THE LESS. Philip was born at Bethsaida, near the sea of Tiberias, the city of Andrew and Peter. He was one of the first disciples, and an apostle. James the Less, called also Jumes the Just, and, by the apostle Paul, James, the Lord's brother, was the son of Joseph, afterwards husband to the Virgin Mary, as is probable by his first wife. The first of these martyrs was stoned to death, and the second, having been thrown from a high place, was killed by a fuller's staff.

3.-INVENTION OF THE CROSS.

The Romish church celebrates this day as a festival, to commemorate the invention or finding of a

wooden cross, supposed to be the true one, by Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great.

A recent traveller to the Holy Land, speaking of Calvary, says, 'Here we were shown the place where Christ was nailed to the cross, where the cross was erected, and the hole into which the end of it was fixed, and the rent in the rock; all of which are covered with marble, perforated in the proper places, so that the antient recipient of the cross and the rent in the rock may be seen and touched. Close by a cross is erected on an elevated part of the floor, and a wooden body stretched upon it in an attitude of suffering. Descending from Mount Calvary, we entered into the chapel of St. Helena, and went down into the low rocky vault in which the cross was found: in this murky den the discovery of the cross is celebrated by an appropriate mass every year on the 3d of May; it is large enough to contain about thirty or forty persons wedged in close array, and, on that occasion, it is generally crowded to the door. This year it happened that the day on which the festival was to be celebrated by the Romans, interfered with that on which it was to be celebrated by the Greeks, and we witnessed all the tug of war, the biting and the scratching, the pommeling and the pelting, the brickbats and clubs, the whimpering and the mewling, of ecstatic, palpitating monks, fighting for their chapel like kites and crows for their nests. All are lost that miss. The Romans are routed: "The devil aids the Greeks, and they are schismatics," said the panting superior, swooning from a blow that migh have cleft him in twain; "and you Englishmen, you live in our convent, and you see us beat, back and side, and you don't assist us." "How can you expect it?" rejoined a gallant Briton, "when, if we fell in your cause, you would not allow us a Christian burial." "Humph!" said the Roman, and called for the apothecary to rub his back with the balsam of Jerusalem, that had been well basted with the

blows of the cudgel, and undulated with bumps that rose like tubercles on the sides of a burning mountain. Coffee and Rosoglio consoled him for his defeat, and he whined himself asleep on that night as he had done on other nights before.

The fathers of the Roman Catholic convent regularly go through the ceremony of the crucifixion every year. A statue intended to represent our Saviour is nailed to the cross; the pilgrims are all called upon in succession to advance and kiss it.

The

cross is then erected, and the image is allowed to remain upon it for a given time; it is then taken down from the cross, when the nails are withdrawn from the hands and feet, kissed, and carefully laid by, to be sold to the deluded votaries, and carried away to work miracles in a distant quarter of the globe. The bloody image is then wrapt in a linen cloth, and carried down to the stone of unction, where it is anointed, powdered, and spiced, and bound up and laid in the tomb, in which it remains till the morning of the third day. At each stage of the ceremony the fathers sing a hymn, preach a sermon, or both, as may be deemed most suitable to the occasion.'-(Dr. Richardson's Travels, vol. ii, p. 325.)

4. ROGATION SUNDAY.

This day take its name from the Latin term rogare, to ask; because, on the three subsequent days, supplications were appointed by Mamertus, Bishop of Vienna, in the year 469, to be offered up with fasting to God, to avert some particular calamities that threatened his diocese.

6. JOHN EVANGELIST, A. P. L.

John the Evangelist, so called from the Greek term Eváyyeλos, the messenger of glad tidings, was a Galilean by birth, the son of Zebedee and Salome, the younger brother of James, but not of him that was surnamed the Just, and who was the brother of our Lord. His brother James and he were surnamed

L

by Jesus, the Sons of Thunder, meaning the principal ministers of the gospel, and John was more endeared to him than any of his disciples. He was condemned to be thrown into a cask of burning oil, Ante Port. Lat., before the gate of Latina; hence the letters added to his name. He lived to the reign of Trajan, and died about ninety years of age.

As a pleasing illustration of this day, we shall quote a most beautiful passage in EUSEBIUS, which relates the ecclesiastical tradition concerning the events of St. John's visit to Ephesus, after he had been set free from the confinement at Patmos, in consequence of the death of Domitian, and the toleration extended by Nerva, on his succession to the throne. We believe there is no reason to doubt the accuracy of this tradition; but if invention it be, surely it is one of the most touching and beautiful of inventions. The apostle, we are told, was one day engaged in a solemn ordination of ministers to serve in the church of Ephesus, when, looking round, his eye rested on, and was detained by the extraordinary loveliness and apparent innocence of the countenance of a certain youth who stood in the midst of the congregation. Turning to the bishop on whom he had just laid his hands, he exclaimed, In the presence of the church, and in the sight of Christ, I commit this young man to your utmost diligence.' The presbyter received the charge, and, in obedience to it, admitted the youth into his own family, where he was baptized, instructed, and reared up to manhood with all manner of kind and christian superintendence. In process of time, however, he became acquainted with a set of dissolute youths, who make it their whole business to exercise upon him every instrument of temptation-and, at last, he falls. One degree of vicious indulgence succeeds to another; until, at length, as the ecclesiastical historian has finally said, he, like a spirited and unbridled charger, galloping from the right path, and champing his reins, is

hurried, by the very nobility of his soul, more deeply into the abyss.' The end of his wicked course is, that he retires to Mount Taurus, with a number of the wild young men who had corrupted him, and, being elected their captain on account of his superior bravery, holds the whole region in terror by the boldness of his depredations.

A few years having elapsed, the old apostle returns to Ephesus, and, after transacting all public business of the church, turns suddenly round to the bishop, saying, 'Now, O bishop, restore to me the deposit which Christ and I, in the sight of this people, committed to thy care.' The bishop understands him not at first; but being asked in more explicit terms concerning the young man, rends his garments, and tells the story of his perversion, as it had happened. The aged apostle immediately inquired in what part of the mountain the young man lay with his band. Being provided with a guide, he penetrates the defiles of Taurus till he approaches the region infested by them. His guide then leaves him; but John advances, having determined to see the captain of the band. The old man is captured by some of the robbers, and is soon carried into the presence of their chief. We shall give the result in the words of Eusebius himself.

'The leader, armed as he was, awaited his arrival; and when he recognized John advancing towards him, overpowered with shame, he betook himself to flight. But the apostle, forgetful of his age, eagerly pursued him, exclaiming, "Wherefore do you fly from me? oh, my son! from your father, aged and unarmed? Pity me, oh, my child, and fear me not: you still possess a hope of salvation. I will make atonement for you to Christ. Willingly would I endure death on your behalf, even as the Lord died for me. I will give my own life as a ransom for you: stop, and believe: Christ hath sent me." The youth hearing these words, at first stood still, with his eyes