Chorus. Caput apri, &c.
III.
Our steward has provided this
In honour of the King of bliss,
Which on this day to be served is,
In Reginensi atrio.
Chorus. Caput apri,” &c.
According to Mr. Wade (Walks in Oxford, 1817, vol. i. p. 128) the usage is in commemoration of an act of valour performed by a student of the college, who, while walking in the neighbouring forest of Shotover, and reading Aristotle, was suddenly attacked by a wild boar. The furious beast came open-mouthed upon the youth, who, however, very courageously, and with a happy presence of mind, rammed in the volume, and crying Græcum est, fairly choked the savage.
In an audit-book of Trinity College for the year 1559, Warton found a disbursement “pro prandio Principis natalicii.” A Christmas prince, or Lord of Misrule, he adds, corresponding to the Imperator at Cambridge, was a common temporary magistrate in the colleges of Oxford.—See Brand’s Pop. Antiq. 1849, vol. i. p. 498; The Antiquary, 1873, vol. iii. p. 53; Wood, in his Athenæ Oxonienses, alludes to the Christmas prince at St. John’s and Merton Colleges.
Mummings at Christmas are common in Oxfordshire. At Islip some of the mummers wear masks, others, who cannot get masks, black their faces and dress themselves up with haybands tied round their arms and bodies. The smaller boys black their faces, and go about singing—
“A merry Christmas and a happy new year,
Your pockets full of money, and your cellars full of beer.”
Brand, Pop. Antiq. 1849, vol. i. p. 466.
Dr. Lee, in N. & Q. (5th S. vol. ii. pp. 503-505), has given a curious old miracle play, the text of which he says was taken down by himself from the lips of one of the performers in 1853.