The observance of particular days and seasons, and of certain customs connected with them, has been in all countries more or less mixed up with religion. Many of these customs have, it is well known, descended to us from pagan times. The Church, unable altogether to eradicate them, has, in some cases, tacitly sanctioned, in others incorporated them into her own system. At the Reformation some of these observances were thought to savour too strongly of their pagan origin, or to be too nearly allied to papal superstitions. Accordingly we find that in a country like Scotland, where reformation amounted to a total subversion of all the forms which had hitherto subsisted, even such a festival as Christmas was proscribed, and of course with it have fallen all the joyous observances which characterize that season in England. In Guernsey, from the reign of Queen Elizabeth to the Restoration of Charles II., the Presbyterian form of Church government reigned supreme, and the ministers seem to have set their faces strongly against anything which in their estimation could be looked upon as superstitious. In the reformed churches of Geneva and France, whose discipline the islands had adopted, all Saints’ days had been abolished, and, although the greater festivals of Christmas and Whitsuntide were retained, there were those in the insular congregations who would gladly have seen these also discarded. Dr. Peter Heylin, who visited the islands in 1629, tells us how “the Ministers were much heartened in their inconformity by the practice of De La Place, who, stomaching his disappointment in the loss of the Deanery of Jersey, abandoned his native country, and retired to Guernsey, where he breathed nothing but confusion to the English Liturgy, the person of the new Dean (David Bandinel), and the change of government. Whereas there was a lecture weekly every Thursday in the Church of St. Peter’s-on-the-Sea, when once the feast of Christ’s Nativity fell upon that day, he rather chose to disappoint the hearers, and put off the sermon, than that the least honour should reflect on that ancient festival.”
We find that in the year 1622 the Clergy of the Island complained to the Royal Court of the practice that existed in the rural parishes of people going about on the Eve of St. John and on the last day of the year begging from house to house—a custom, which, in their opinion, savoured much of the old leaven of Popery, and which, under the guise of charity, introduced and nourished superstition among their flocks; whereupon an ordinance was framed and promulgated, forbidding the practice under the penalty of a fine or whipping.
“Les Chefs Plaids Cappitaux d’apprés le jour St. Michell tenus le Lundy dernier jour du mois de Septembre, l’an 1622, par Amice de Carteret, Esq., Bailly, présents à ce les Sieurs Pierre Careye, Thomas Beauvoir, Thomas de l’Isle, Thomas Andros, Eleazar Le Marchant, Jean Bonamy, Jean Fautrart, Jean Blondel, et Jacques Guille, Jurez.
“Sur la remonstrance de Messieurs les Ministres de ceste isle, que la vueille du jour St. Jean et celle du jour de l’an se fait une geuzerie ordinaire par les paroisses des champs en ceste isle; laquelle se resent grandement du viel levain de la Papaulté, au moyen de quoy, soubs ombre de charité, la superstition est introduite et nourye parmy nous, au grand destourbier du service de Dieu et manifeste scandalle des gens de bien; desirants iceux Ministres qu’il pleust à la Cour y apporter remede par les voyes les plus convenables—A sur ce Esté par exprès deffendu à toutes personnes qu’ils n’ayent en aulcun des susdits jours à geuzer, ny demander par voye d’aumosne aulcune chose, de peur d’entretenir la susdite superstition, à peine de soixante sous tournois d’amende sur les personnes capables de payer la dite amende, et s’ils n’ont moyen de payer, et qu’ils soyent d’aage, d’estre punis corporellement à discretion de Justice; et quant aux personnes qui ne seront point d’aage, d’estre fouettés publicquement en l’escolle de leur paroisse.”
A little later, begging at Baptisms, Marriages, and Burials was prohibited on like grounds, and about the same time sumptuary laws were passed controlling the expenses on these occasions, and limiting the guests that might be invited to persons in the nearest degrees of consanguinity. Dancing and singing were also forbidden, and any persons convicted of these heinous crimes were to perform public penance in their parish church, barefooted and bareheaded, enveloped in a sheet, and holding a lighted torch in their hand.
It is not therefore to be wondered at if many observances and customs, innocent in themselves, came to be forgotten, and this would be more especially the case with such as were connected with the festivals of the Church. Still some few observances and superstitions have survived, and of these we will now endeavour to give the best account we can. We would, however, previously remark that the Guernsey people are an eminently holiday-loving race, and that, notwithstanding their long subjection to Presbyterian rule, and the ascetic spirit of modern dissent, the love of amusement is still strong in them. Christmas Day and the day following, the first two days of the year, the Monday and Tuesday at Easter and Whitsuntide, Midsummer Day and the day after, are all seasons when there is an almost total cessation of work, and all give themselves up to gaiety—and the household must be poor indeed where a cake is not made on these occasions.
But before launching into a description of their ceremonies, festivals, and superstitions, perhaps it might prove of interest if we here attempt to give a slight description of the dress of our island forefathers at different periods, during the last three hundred years, drawn from various sources.
We will begin by an extract from a letter written by Mr. George Métivier, that eminent antiquary, historian, and philologist, to the Star of June 20th, 1831:—