r R. J. King remarks, in spite of all his
grievances, he had in him a sense that responded very readily to the
pretty customs and observances of the village, that marked, here with a
handful of flowers, there with a sheaf of wheat or a branch of holly,
the different festivals of the year.

Herrick's poem 'Christmas Eve' refers to a local custom that appealed to
him:

'Come, guard this night the Christmas-pie,
That the thief, though ne'er so sly,
With his flesh-hooks, don't come nigh,
To catch it

From him, who all alone sits there,
Having his eyes still in his ear,
And a deal of mighty fear,
To watch it.'

Mr King makes this interesting note on it: 'This custom, so far as I
know, is unnoticed by anyone but Herrick.

'A solitary watcher,

'"Having his eyes still in his ear,
And a deal of mighty fear,"

guarded the pie through the night before Christmas.

'The pie represented the manger of Bethlehem, and its contents the wise
men's offerings. The Devonshire "Christmas play" has had a curious fate.
Except, perhaps, in some of the moorland parishes, it has disappeared at
home. But the Newfoundland fisheries were long carried on for the most
part by sailors from the neighbourhood of Dartmouth and Tor Bay, and Mr
Jukes tells us that the streets of St John's at Christmas-time continue
to exhibit St George, the Turkish Knight, and all their companions, in
full vigour.'

The charm of Herrick's verses on country joys is deepened--to the
folk-lorist in particular--by remembering that the rustic ceremonies he
commemorates were probably the usual customs observed at Dean Prior in
his time. On a hot August evening he may have watched the happy and
excited children who are described in the poem 'The Hock-Cart, or
Harvest-Home.'

'About the cart, hear how the rout
Of rurall youngling raise the shout.
Pressing before, some coming after,
These with a shout, and those with laughter.
Some blesse the carte, some kisse the sheaves,
Some prank them up with oaken leaves;
Some cross the fill-horse, some with great
Devotion stroake the home-borne wheat.'

And many lines point to his acquaintance with all kinds of village
festivals, as, for instance, those which he addresses to 'Master
Endymion Porter.'

'Thy wakes, thy quintels, here them hast,
Thy May-poles too, with garlands grac't,
Thy mo