HANGING MAY-BASKETS.
I.
"I am so glad May-day is coming!" exclaimed Ellen Moore. "What sport we shall have hanging May-baskets!"
"What do you mean?" inquired Frances, who lived in Pennsylvania, but had come to New England to visit her cousins.
"Never heard of May-baskets?" continued Ellen, in astonishment. "Do you not celebrate the 1st of May in Ridgeville?"
"Of course. Sometimes we go picking wild flowers; and at St. Agnes' Academy, where I go to school, they always have a lovely procession in honor of the Blessed Virgin."
"We have one too, in the church," replied Ellen; "but hanging
May-baskets is another thing altogether—"
"That is where the fun and frolic come in," interrupted Joe, looking up from the miniature boat which he was whittling out with his jackknife.
"You see," explained Ellen, "the afternoon before we make up a party, and go on a long jaunt up hill and down dale, through the woods and over the meadows, picking all the spring blossoms we can find. Finally, we come home with what we have succeeded in getting, and put them in water to keep fresh for the following day. Then what an excitement there is hunting up baskets for them! Tiny ones are best, because with them you can make the flowers go farther. Strawberry baskets—the old-fashioned ones with a handle—are nice, especially if you paint or gild them. Burr baskets are pretty too; and those made of fir cones. Joe has a knack of putting such things together. He made some elegant ones for me last year."
"Are you trying to kill two birds with one stone?" asked her brother, with a laugh. "Your compliment is also a hint that you would like me to do the same now, I suppose?"
"I never kill birds," rejoined Ellen, taking the literal meaning of his words, for the purpose of chaffing him. "Nor do you; for you told me the other day you did not understand how some boys could be so cruel."
"No, but you do not mind their being killed if you want their wings for your hat," continued Joe, in a bantering tone.
"Not at all," said Ellen, triumphantly. "In future I am going to wear
only ribbons and artificial flowers on my chapeau. I have joined the
Society for the Prevention of the Destruction of the Native Birds of
America."
"Whew!" ejaculated Joe, with a prolonged whistle. "What a name! I should think that by the time you got to the end of it you'd be so old that you wouldn't care any more for feathers and fixings. I suppose it is a good thing though," he went on, more seriously. "It is just as cruel to kill birds for the sake of fashion as it is for the satisfaction of practising with a sling; only you girls have somebody to do it for you; and you don't think about it, because you can just step into a store and buy the plumes—"
"But what about the May-baskets?" protested Frances, disappointed at the digression.
"Oh, I forgot!" said Ellen. "Bright and early May-morning almost every boy and girl in the village is up and away. The plan is to hang a basket of wild flowers at the door of a friend, ring the bell or rattle the latch, and then scamper off as fast as you can. You have to be very spry so as to be back at home when your own baskets begin to arrive; then you must be quick to run out and, if possible, catch the friend who knocks, and thus find out whom to thank for the flowers."
"How delightful!" cried Frances, charmed at the prospect.
"It is so strange that you did not know about it!" added Ellen.
"Not at all," said Mrs. Moore, who had come out on the veranda where the young folks were chatting,—Frances swinging in the hammock, Ellen ensconced in a rustic chair with her fancy-work, and Joe leaning against a post, and still busy whittling. "Not at all," repeated Ellen's mother. "In America it is but little observed outside of the Eastern States. This is one of the beautiful traditionary customs of Catholic England, which even those austere Puritans, the Pilgrims, could not entirely divest themselves of; though among them it lost its former significance. Perhaps it was the gentle Rose Standish or fair Priscilla, or some other winsome and good maiden of the early colonial days, who transplanted to New England this poetic practice, sweet as the fragrant pink and white blossoms of the trailing arbutus, which is especially used to commemorate it. In Great Britain, though, it may have originated in the observances of the festivals which ushered in the spring. On the introduction of Christianity it was retained, and continued up to within two or three hundred years,—no doubt as a graceful manner of welcoming the Month of Our Lady. That it was considered a means of honoring the Blessed Virgin, as well as of expressing mutual kindness and good-will, we can see; since English historians tell us that up to the sixteenth century it was usual to adorn not only houses and gateways, but also the doors as well as the interior of churches, with boughs and flowers; particularly the entrances to shrines dedicated to the Mother of God."
"And the 1st of May will be the day after to-morrow!" remarked Frances, coming back to the present.
"Yes. And to-morrow, right after school—that will be about three o'clock, you know,—we shall start on our tramp," said Ellen. "As you do not have to go to school, Frances, you will be able to prepare the baskets during the morning. Come into the house with me now, and I'll show you some which I have put away."