I know a draught of merry-go-downe, The best it is in all thys towne, But yet wold I not for my gowne, My husband it wyst, ye may me trust.
One of the women says, “God might send me a strype or two, if my husband should see me here.” “Nay,” said Alice, “she that is afraid had better go home; I fear no man.”
And ich off them will sumwhat bryng, Gosse, pygge, or capon’s wing, Pastes off pigeons, or sum other thyng. Ech of them brought forth their dysch, Sum brought flesh and sum fysh.
Nor was the “mery-go-downe” forgotten. On going home these revellers represent to their husbands that they have been to church.
It may be gathered from Dean Swift’s satirical advice to servants that ale and beer in his day formed the principal dinner beverages in polite society. In his directions to the butler, he tells him, “If any one {277} desires a glass of bottled ale, first shake the bottle, to see if anything be in it; then taste it, to see what liquor it is, that you may not be mistaken; and, lastly, wipe the mouth of the bottle with the palm of your hand, to show your cleanliness.
“If any one calls for small beer towards the end of the dinner, do not give yourself the trouble of going down to the cellar, but gather the droppings and leavings out of the several cups and glasses and salvers into one; but turn your back to the company, for fear of being observed. On the contrary, when any one calls for ale towards the end of dinner, fill the largest tankard cup topful, by which you will have the greatest part left to oblige your fellow-servants without the sin of stealing from your master.”
In the seventeenth century there lived an interesting person named John Bigg, better known as the Dinton Hermit, who subsisted chiefly on bread and ale supplied him by his friends. He only begged one thing—leather—with which he patched his shoes in innumerable places. A portrait of him is to be seen in Lipscombe’s History of Buckinghamshire. Two leather bottles hang at his girdle, the one for ale, the other for small beer.
Many records are in existence illustrative of the custom of distributing ale for charitable purposes. The following instances are selected from a collection of Old English Customs and various Bequests and Charities.
“At Piddle Hinton, Dorsetshire. An ancient custom is for the Rector to give away, on Old Christmas Day, annually, a pound of bread, a pint of ale, and a mince pie to every poor person in the parish. This distribution is regularly made by the Rector to upwards of 300 persons.”
“At Swaffham Bulbeck, Cambridgeshire. Before the enclosure, the tenant of the Abbey Farm in this parish, during those years in which the open field land was under tillage, used to give a slice of cake and a glass of ale to all parishioners who applied for it.”