Kent.
At Charlton, a fair was held on this day, and was characterized by several curious peculiarities. Every booth in the fair had its horns conspicuous in the front. Rams’ horns were an article abundantly represented for sale, even the gingerbread was marked by a gilt pair of horns. It seemed an inexplicable mystery how horns and Charlton Fair had become associated in this manner, till an antiquary at length threw a light upon it by pointing out that a horned ox is the recognised mediæval symbol of St. Luke, the patron of the fair, fragmentary examples of it being still to be seen in the painted windows of Charlton Church. This fair was one where an unusual licence was practised. It was customary for men to come to it in women’s clothes—a favourite mode of masquerading two or three hundred years ago—against which the puritan clergy launched many a fulmination. The men also amused themselves, on their way across Blackheath, in lashing the women with furze, it being proverbial that “all was fair at Horn Fair.”—Book of Days, vol. i. p. 645.
A sermon was formerly preached at Charlton Church on the day of the fair. A practice which originated by a bequest of twenty shillings a year to the minister of the parish for preaching it.—See Every Day Book, 1826, vol. i. pp. 1386-1389.