We wish you happy May;
We’ve come to show our garlands,
Because it is May-day;
Come, kiss my face, and smell my mace,
And give the lord and lady something.[330]
In place of the final couplet it was sometimes the custom of one of the bearers to say, “Please to handsel the lord and lady’s purse.”
The practice once current in the North of England of going into the woods on the first of May, “when the day begins to break,” and bringing home “knots of flowers and buds and garlands gay” wherewith to adorn the windows and doors of the houses at sunrise, is illustrated in the following doggrel, which used to be sung in the streets of Newcastle-on-Tyne:[331]—
Rise up, maidens, fie for shame!
For I’ve been four long miles from hame;
I’ve been gathering my garland gay,