God bless the master of this house,
Likewise the mistress too,
And all the little children
That round the table go.
Good master and mistress,
While you’re sitting by the fire,
Pray think of us poor children
Who are wandering in the mire.”
N. & Q. 3rd S. vol. xi. p. 144.
Some years ago it was the custom in Leeds, and the neighbourhood, for children to go from house to house singing and carrying what they called a “wesley-bob.” This they kept veiled in a cloth till they came to a house door, when they uncovered it.
The wesley-bob was made of holly and evergreens, like a bower, inside were placed a couple of dolls, adorned with ribbons, and the whole affair was borne upon a stick. Whilst the wesley-bob was being displayed, a song or ditty was sung.
At Aberford, near Leeds, two dolls are carried about in boxes in a similar way, and such an affair here is called a wesley-box.—N. & Q. 3rd S. vol. vi. p. 494.
At Ripon, on Christmas Day, says a correspondent of the Gent. Mag. (1790, vol. lx. p. 719), the singing boys come into the church with large baskets full of red apples, with a sprig of rosemary stuck in each, which they present to all the congregation, and generally have a return made them of 2d., 4d., or 6d., according to the quality of the lady or gentleman.
The sword or morisco dance used to be practised at Richmond, during the Christmas holidays, by young men dressed in shirts ornamented with ribbons folded into roses, having swords, or wood cut in the form of that weapon. They exhibited various feats of activity, attended by an old fiddler, by Bessy in the grotesque habit of an old woman, and by the fool almost covered with skins, a hairy cap on his head, and the tail of a fox hanging from his head. These led the festive throng, and diverted the crowd with their droll antic buffoonery. The office of one of these characters was to go about rattling a box, and soliciting money from door to door to defray the expenses of a feast and a dance in the evening.—History of Richmond, 1814, p. 296.
In Sheffield, a male must be the first to enter a house on the morning of both Christmas Day and New Year’s Day; but there is no distinction as to complexion or colour of hair. In the houses of the more opulent manufacturers, these first admissions are often accorded to choirs of work-people, who, as “waits,” proceed at an early hour and sing before the houses of their employers and friends Christmas carols and hymns, always commencing with that beautiful composition:
“Christians, awake, salute the happy morn,
Whereon the Saviour of mankind was born.”