[728] Mayer, 229.
[729] Gentleman’s Magazine, lxxxi (1811), 1. 423. The dance was given in the north Riding from St. Stephen’s day to the New Year. Besides the Bessy and the Doctor there were six lads, one of whom acted king ‘in a kind of farce which consists of singing and dancing.’
[730] Bell, 178; cf. p. 193. I do not feel sure whether the actual parish clergyman took part, or whether a mere personage in the play is intended; but see what Olaus Magnus (App. J (i)) says about the propriety of the sword-dances for clerici. It will be curious if the Christian priest has succeeded to the part of the heathen priest slain, first literally, and then in mimicry, at the festivals.
[731] Printed by Mr. T. F. Ordish in F. L. J. vii. 338, and again by Manly, i. 296. The MS. used appears to be headed ‘October Ye 20, 1779’; but the performers are called ‘The Plow Boys or Morris Dancers’ and the prologue says that they ‘takes delight in Christmas toys.’ I do not doubt that the play belonged to Plough Monday, which only falls just outside the Christmas season.
[732] On the name Pickle Herring, see W. Creizenach, Die Schauspiele der englischen Komödianten, xciii. It does not occur in old English comedy, but was introduced into Anglo-German and German farce as a name for the ‘fool’ or ‘clown’ by Robert Reynolds, the ‘comic lead’ of a company of English actors who crossed to Germany in 1618. Probably it was Reynolds’ invention, and suggested by the sobriquet ‘Stockfish’ taken by an earlier Anglo-German actor, John Spencer. The ‘spicy’ names of the other Revesby clowns are probably imitations of Pickle Herring.
[733] The lines (197-8)
‘Our old Fool’s bracelet is not made of gold
But it is made of iron and good steel’
suggest the vaunt of the champions in the St. George plays.
[734] Is ‘Anthony’ a reminiscence of the Seven Champions? The Fool says (ll. 247-9), like Beelzebub in the St. George plays,