Windet einen Strauss!
"Rings erglänzet Sonnenschein,
Dustend pranget Flur und Hain.
Vögel-sang,
Lust'ger Klang
Tönt den Wald entlang."
In Lorraine girls dressed in white go from village to village stringing off couplets, in which the inhabitants are turned into somewhat unmerciful ridicule. The girls of this place enlighten the people of that as to their small failings, and so vice versâ. All the winter the village poets harvest the jokes made by one community at the expense of another, in order to shape them into a consecutive whole for recital on May Day. The girls are rewarded for their part in the business by small coin, cakes and fruit. The May-songs of Lorraine are termed "Trimazos," from the fact that they are always sung to the refrain,
"O Trimazot, ç'at lo Maye;
O mi-Maye!
Ç'at lo joli mois de Maye,