ther things; as, when a horse comes last in the
race, they often say in the North, "He has got the mell."

All the other names of this country festivity sufficiently explain
themselves, except "Churn-supper;" and this is entirely different from
"Melsupper:" but they generally happen so near together that they are
frequently confounded. The "Churn-supper" was always provided when all
was shorn, but the "Melsupper" after all was got in. And it was called
the "Churn-supper" because, from immemorial times, it was customary to
produce in a churn a great quantity of cream, and to circulate it by
dishfuls to each of the rustic company, to be eaten with bread. And here
sometimes very extraordinary execution has been done upon cream. And
though this custom has been disused in many places, and agreeably
commuted for by ale, yet it survives still, and that about Whitby and
Scarborough in the East, and round about Gisburn, etc., in Craven, in
the West. But perhaps a century or two more will put an end to it, and
both the thing and name shall die. Vicarious ale is now more approved,
and the tankard almost everywhere politely preferred to the Churn.

This Churn (in our provincial pronunciation Kern) is the Hebrew Kern,
or Keren, from its being circular, like most horns; and it is the Latin
'corona',--named so either from 'radii', resembling horns, as on some
very ancient coins, or from its encircling the head: so a ring of people
is called corona. Also the Celtic Koren, Keren, or corn, which continues
according to its old pronunciation in Cornwall, etc., and our modern
word horn is no more than this; the ancient hard sound of k in corn
being softened into the aspirate h, as has been done in numberless
instances.

The Irish Celtae also called a round stone 'clogh crene', where the
variation is merely dialectic. Hence, too, our crane-berries,--i.e.,
round berries,--from this Celtic adjective 'crene', round.

The quotations from Scripture in Aram's original MS. were both in the
Hebrew character, and their value in English sounds.

CONTENTS.

BOOK I.

CHAPTER I.

THE VILLAGE.--ITS INHABITANTS.--AN OLD MANORHOUSE: AND AN ENGLISH FAMILY;
THEIR HISTORY, INVOLVING A MYSTERIOUS EVENT.

CHAPTER II.
A PUBLICAN, A SINNER, AND A STRANGER

CHAPTER III.
A DIALOGUE AND AN ALARM.--A STUDENT'S HOUSE.

CHAPTER IV.
THE SOLILOQUY, AND THE CHARACTER, OF A RECLUSE.--THE INTERRUPTION