During the Christmas of 1529, Cardinal Wolsey, who had been disgraced a short time before, was dangerously ill, which produced a short return of favour with the selfish monarch, who became much worried with his state, and also the unsettled position of his own domestic arrangements; for although it was supposed that Ann Boleyn was in fact living with him as his queen, yet no divorce had taken place from Catherine, who had still a strong party in her favour, and excited much sympathy. However, for the king’s recreation, a solemn Christmas was kept at Greenwich, with justs, banquets, masks and disguisings, attended by the two legates and many of the nobility; but the queen gave them no manner of countenance, her mind being so troubled. In the two following years she kept the Christmas with him, and there were masks and interludes; but in his twenty-third year, at a solemn Christmas at Greenwich, there was no mirth, the queen and her ladies being absent—like Queen Vashti she refused to come, and no wonder, for in a very few days after her royal estate was given unto another, and Henry publicly married Anne Boleyn. After this time he does not appear himself to have mixed in the Christmas festivities, though yearly entries may be found of payments to players, for playing before him, and sometimes to the gentlemen of the chapel, and the children as before, with occasional notices of solemn Christmasses; but his temper grew worse, and his zest for these amusements gradually less, as his age and person increased.
In the Christmas of his twenty-ninth year, after the death of Queen Jane in the previous October, he appeared in mourning apparel, which was somewhat unnecessary, as he had made an offer, although an unsuccessful one, to the Duchess Dowager of Longueville, within a month after the death of his wife. His Twelfth Day, 1540, was rather unlucky for him; although great rejoicings were going forward, as he then married Anne of Cleves, from whom, as it is known, he was soon after divorced.
Card playing and other games were still continued, and different payments were made on this account; the king, one Christmas, having as much as £212 10s. for this purpose. Payments were made also to Princess Mary to disport her with at Christmas, generally £20, and in her own private accounts are payments at Christmas, varying from £1 to £4, to have in her purse and to play at cards. The Lady Anne Boleyn received as much as £100 at a time, towards her New Year’s Gift. The Princess Mary, from her childhood, had an establishment of her own, and was accustomed to these festivities before she had completed her sixth year, having a lord of Misrule, John Thurgoode, one of the valets of her household about this time; but the sanction of the great cardinal was necessary even for her; and in 1525 there is an application by the Council of her household to him, to know whether they may appoint a lord of Misrule, and provide for interludes, disguisings, or plays, and a banquet; and whether the princess was to send New Year’s Gifts to the king and queen, and the French queen, and of what value. The princess herself had received New Year’s Gifts as early as her third year, when the cardinal gave her a cup of gold; the French queen, a pomander; Lady Mountjoy, two smocks; a favourite gift by the bye, as we shall hereafter see that Queen Elizabeth had many of these, handsomely decorated, given to her. In after years we find at different times gifts of the following nature given to the Princess Mary. Lady Dorset and others gave her wrought smocks and handkerchiefs; her brother the prince, a little tablet of gold; the Princess Elizabeth, a little chain, and a pair of hose, wrought in gold and silk; the Lady Margaret, a gown of carnation satin of the Venice fashion; Lady Butler, a pepper-box, silver-gilt; the Earl of Hertford, a diamond ring; three Venetians, a fair steel glass; Mr. Thomas Hobbs, yeoman of the robes, a pair of silver snuffers; Mrs. Whelar, a pen and inkhorn, silver-gilt; the Italian dancer, a partlet of gold, wrought; Lady Brown, a fuming-box of silver; and the king’s master-cook, a marchpane; which was the usual present of this functionary. All the servants who brought these gifts had handsome presents in money in return, the king’s messenger having as much as forty shillings given him. Besides money gifts to her own household, and to the king’s minstrels and musicians, among whom the harper had 5s., she gave others of value in various Christmasses to distinguished persons; as, in 1543, a chair to the king, of which the covering and embroidery cost £21 6s. 8d.; also, to the lord admiral, a brooch of gold, of the history of Moses striking water out of the rock, and a balas set in the same; she herself having a brooch of the history of Noah’s flood, set with little diamonds and rubies; the king, and the queen for the time being, and the Prince Edward, as we may imagine, also received gifts from his sisters; and on one occasion the Lady Elizabeth gave him a cambric shirt of her own working. In the present day it would probably have been a couvrette, or an embroidered smoking cap, though he was rather young for that. His times were innocent of this strange fashion, though they had quite sufficient eccentricities of their own to answer for. It is a pity that the recent act, compelling chimneys to consume their own smoke, does not extend to smokers; it is almost worth while mooting the point, whether it does or not.
The nobility kept the feast in manner similar to the court, making allowance for difference of station. They had their lord of Misrule, or master of the revels, and their minstrels, their players, with their interludes and disguisings; the chaplain being frequently the maker of the interludes; and most minute rules were laid down to regulate the different payments and gifts. The Earl of Northumberland, whose household book has been so often quoted in illustration of the manners and customs of this age, used to give, when he was at home, to those of his chapel, if they played the play of the Nativity on Christmas Day, 20s.; and to his master of the revels, 20s.; to the king’s servant, bringing a New Year’s gift, he gave £5, or if a special friend of his own, £6 13s. 4d.; to the queen’s servant, £3 6s. 8d.; but to the servant (probably a domestic), bringing one from Lord Percy, only 12d.; to his three minstrels, on New Year’s Day, for playing at the chamber doors of the different members of the family £1 3s. 4d.; to his six trumpets, 20s.; to his officer of arms, for crying largess, 20s.; to the grooms of his chamber, to put in their box, 20s.; to the abbot of Misrule, 20s.; to his chaplain for making an interlude, the price seems to be 13s. 4d., rather moderate when compared with the other gifts. Different presents also to various sets of players; also 20s. each to the barne-bishops (boy-bishops) of Beverley and York, showing that the custom still existed.
Traces of the boy-bishop may be found as far back as the Constantinopolitan synod in 867, and as early as Edward the First’s reign, one of them was permitted to sing vespers before him at Heton, near Newcastle, in 1299, when on his way to Scotland, and received forty shillings for himself and the boys who sang with him. In the time of Edward the Second payments were made to this personage; and Dean Colet, in his regulations for St. Paul’s School, 1512, directs the scholars to go every Childermas Day to St. Paul’s to hear the child-bishop’s sermon, and each to offer him a penny. Henry the Eighth, however, put down the custom, which was revived by Queen Mary, but finally abolished by Elizabeth.
The Earl of Northumberland’s three henchmen presented him with gloves, and received 6s. 8d. in return; and his footmen also gave him gloves, and received 3s. 4d. in reward. My lord and lady were accustomed to make offerings at high mass on Christmas Day, New Year’s Day, and Twelfth Day; but of rather small amount, his lordship’s being 12d. and her ladyship’s 8d. In lesser establishments there was, of course, less state and smaller payments; and in the household accounts of the Lestranges of Hunstanton, in the eleventh of Henry, is a payment of 4d. to the Lord of Christmas, at Kyngstede. Different sums also are charged for New Year’s gifts.
The lower classes still continued the customs of their forefathers, but occasionally required some check, to prevent their revelries becoming of too gross a description, and to amend abuses. In the third of Henry the Eighth, people were forbidden to appear abroad like mummers, their faces covered with vizors, and in disguised apparel. But it was by no means the intention to debar them from proper recreations during this season; many indulgences being afforded them, and their landlords and masters assisted them with the means of enjoying their customary festivities, listening to their legendary tales round the Yule-log, and occasionally joining in their sports; a practice scarcely yet obsolete in some parts of the country, and pity it should become so.
“A Christmas gambol oft’ would cheer
The poor man’s heart through half the year.”
In the thirty-third of Henry, when certain games were forbidden to artificers, husbandmen, apprentices, servants, and others of that class, they were still allowed to play at tables, tennis, dice, cards, bowls, clash, coyting, and logating, at Christmas; though there is a proclamation by the Sheriff of York, where the privilege is extended beyond our ideas of liberality, as all manner of whores and thieves, dice-players, carders, and all other unthrifty folk, were to be welcome in the town, whether they came late or early, at the reverence of the high feast of Yule, till the twelve days were passed. One fancies a spice of irony in this invitation. Heywood, the epigrammatist, at a little later date, used to say, that he did not like to play at king and queen, but at Christmas, according to the old order of England; and that few men played at cards, but at Christmas; and then almost all, men and boys. Heywood evidently had not been initiated into any of our whist clubs, or he would have found not a few who play at other times than Christmas. And as to that time, there are still many houses where cards are regularly produced on Christmas Day, a practice which, certainly, to those unaccustomed to it, even the old order of England will not qualify.
There is a story told of an ambitious shoemaker, whose Christmas coat was spoiled, in the reign of Henry, by his seeking to imitate his superiors; and this at a time when the distinction of apparel was marked, and not as at present, when simplicity of dress is frequently the best mark of a gentleman. Sir Philip Calthrop, having bought as much fine French tawney cloth as would make him a gown, gave it to a tailor, at Norwich, to make up, when John Drake, a shoemaker, passing by, and admiring it, ordered one of the same materials and fashion. Sir Philip, calling in on a subsequent day, and seeing a similar gown-piece, asked for whom it was made, when he was told it was for a shoemaker, and to be of the same fashion as his own: upon which, his pride being touched, he ordered the tailor to make his gown as full of cuts as his shears would make it. The tailor fulfilled his directions, and performed the same operation for the gown of the unfortunate shoemaker, who, by some accident, could not go to fetch it away until Christmas morning, intending, no doubt, to astonish his wife and dazzle his companions with his splendour. On seeing the havoc made in his intended state dress, he began to cry out vehemently, but was told it was made exactly like the knight’s; upon which he exclaimed, “By my latchet, I will never wear gentleman’s fashion again.”