MAY EVE.
An old Roman kalendar, cited by Brand (Pop. Antiq. 1849, vol. i. p. 216), says that on the 30th of April boys go to seek the May-trees (Maii arbores a pueris exquiruntur), and in Dryden’s time this early observance of May seems to have been customary; one of his heroines
“Wak’d, as her custom was, before the day,
To do th’ observaunce due to sprightly May;
For sprightly May commands our youth to keep
The vigils of her night, and breaks their rugged sleep.”—
Med. Ævi Kalend. vol. i. p. 229.