IN one of the fine old Homes of England, the tapestry lining the Withdrawing Room represents a scene which must have been very familiar to the ladies whose diligent fingers accomplished this large piece of handiwork. It is a "Harvest Home" of more than a hundred years ago; and as the light from the huge logs burning on the hearth flickers on the figures it almost seems as if the gayly decorated horses are drawing on the cart laden with sheaves, as if the girl enthroned on the top of the corn is waving the small sheaf she holds overhead, and as if the harvesters are really dancing around; that in another moment the lad riding the leader must sound his pipe, and the old man following the dancers make a merry tune come out of his fiddle-strings. The Harvest is over, and the "last neck" is being carried home in triumph, held on high by the Queen of the Harvest, until it can be deposited in the centre of the supper-table in the big farmhouse kitchen.
This tapestry hangs in a house in Cornwall, a county in which, from its remote southerly position, many traditions have lingered. Among such traditions those connected with the harvest are probably some of the most ancient; handed down from generation to generation from the days when the Romans first brought civilization to England and left their stamp on the harvest as well as on the language, laws, numerals and the roads of this county.
Until the beginning of this century, Ceres was the name given as a matter of course to the queen of the harvest; and in Bedfordshire two figures made of straw were formerly carried in the harvest procession, which the laborers called Jack and Jill, but which were supposed to represent Apollo, the Sun God, and the beneficent Ceres, to whom the Romans made their offerings before reaping began.
The merry queen of the harvest, worked in the tapestry, had no doubt been chosen after the usual Cornish fashion. The women reaped in Cornwall, while the men bound, and whoever reaped the last lock of corn was proclaimed queen. As all were ambitious of this honor, the women used to hide away an unreaped lock under a sheaf, and when all the field seemed cut they would run off to their hidden treasures, in hopes of being the lucky last. When a girl's sweetheart came into the field at the end of the day, he would try to take her sickle away to finish her work. If this was allowed, it was a sign that she also consented to the wedding taking place before the next harvest.
The last lock of corn being cut, it was bound with straw at the neck, just under the ears, and carried to the highest part of the field, where one of the men swung it round over his head, crying in a stentorian voice, "I have it, I have it, I have it!" And the next man answered, "What hav-ee, what hav-ee, what hav-ee?" Then the first man shouted again, "A neck, a neck, a neck, hurrah!" This was the signal for the queen to mount the "hoaky cart," as it was called, and the procession started for the farmhouse.
Over the borders in Devonshire, the custom of "crying the neck" varied a little. The men did the reaping and the women the binding. As the evening closed in, the oldest man present collected a bunch of the finest ears of corn and, plaiting them together, placed himself in the middle of a circle of reapers and binders. Then he stooped and held it near the ground, while all the men took off their hats and held them also near the ground, and as they rose slowly they sung in a prolonged harmonious tone, "A neck, a neck, a neck!" until their hats were high over their heads. This was repeated three times; after which the words changed to "We have-'en, we have-'en, we have-'en!" sung to the same monotonous cadence. The crying of the neck, as it echoed from field to field, and from hill to hill, on a fine evening, produced a beautiful effect, and might be heard at a great distance.
A musical cry of this sort was also common in Norfolk, Suffolk and Gloucestershire; but the words sung were "Hallo, largess!" One of the men was chosen lord of the evening and appointed to approach any lookers-on with respect, and ask a largess, or money, which was afterwards spent in drink. Meanwhile the other men stood round with their hooks pointed to the sky, singing:
Hallo! Largess!