—Penzance (Miss Courtney).
See “[Widow],” ante, p. 381.
Rashes.
A game played by children with rushes in Derbyshire, which is a relic of the old custom of rush-bearing. In the warm days of May and June the village children proceed in parties to the sedges and banks of dyke and brook, there to gather the finest and best rushes. These are brought with childish ceremony to some favourite spot, and then woven into various articles, such as baskets, parasols, and umbrellas. Small arbours are made of green bushes and strewn with rushes, inside which the children sit and sing and play at “keeping house” with much lordly ceremony. At these times they play at a game which consists in joining hands in a circle, and going round a heap of rushes singing or saying—
Mary Green and Bessy Bell,
They were two bonny lasses;
They built a house in yonder hill,
And covered it with rashes.
Rashes, rashes, rashes!
At each repetition of the word “rashes” (rushes) they loosen hands, and each picking up a lot of rushes, throw them into the air, so that they may fall on every one in the descent. Many of the articles made with rushes are hung over the chimney-piece in houses, and in children’s bedrooms, as ornaments or samples of skill, and there remain until the next season, or until the general cleaning at Christmas.—Thomas. Radcliffe, in “Long Ago,” vol. i. p. 49 (1873).
Queen Anne.
Lady Queen Anne, she sits in her pan,
As fair as a lilly, as white as a lamb;
Come tittle, come tattle, come tell me this tale,
Which of these ladies doth carry the ball?
My father sent me three letters, please deliver the ball.
If a correct guess is made by the opposite side, the queen and the child who had the ball say—