CHRISTMAS CAROLS

Waikato Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2239, 13 November 1886, Page 3

CHRISTMAS CAROLS

In having our Christmas in the middle of summer without the invigorating and festive accompaniments of frost and snow we labour under a distinct disadvantage. The absence of the eerie condition of the Yule festival is perhaps » larere contributing cause to the utter wuit of imagination prevalent among our coloni.il born youth. Even the unfortunate Tigris yon Saurian suffers, as none believe in him except his inventors. A pood old fashioned ghost story is c.wiare to the colonial child, in (act he looks with suspicion on the sanity of the retailer. We shall be treated tLineasoii to a pantomime, and it is to be hoped he will condescend to be amused by it. Tho only form of Chribtmas enjoyments which seems to have taken a root in Hamilton is the annual performance of carols so well executed the last two years by the Choral Society under the able direction of Mr Tempter. The earliest recorded notice nf acaiol is in the 2nd century; at least we have unearthed a sarcophagus of that date in the catacombs, which beais a representation of a family with open mouths and upturned eyes evidently meant for a Christmas Family *Canl party. We are told that such carols gradually grewtoo festive, not to say bacchanalian, in their nature, but a little joviality at feast time was then rather the thin 1 ?. In England, in time* of more authenticated history, the Lord of Misrule or Abbot of Unreason superseded in polite circles the old fashioned carol and many crusty old curmudgeons probably owed temporal, if not spiritual, salvation to the rule which forbade seriousness during the Christmas saturnalia. Right reverend prelates in those days tippled a bit on occa sion and the witty Welsh Archdeacon, Walter Maps, tempore Henry 11., gives us a picture of such a roysterer in his Bishop Goliath whose favourite song is given as " Mcum cst propositum in taberna raori, Vinum sit appositum morientis ori. Ut dirant, cum venerint, angelorum cbori Den's sit propitius huic potatori." which has been freely translated somewhat as follows :— " When I die, let me die drinking: in an inn ; Bring the wine cup sparkling from the dusty bin, That when angels come to let the sinner in, God have mercy on this sot. the cherubs shall begin." The Reformation does not seem to have changed thing* much for a while, as a gentleman with the highly appropriate name and title of Dr. Still, Bishop of Bath and Wells, wrote a festive piece commencing this way :—: — " Back and side go bare, go bare, Back and side go cold ; But belly, God send thee ale eno — Plenty qjood ale and old " In later time's Dickens' descriptions of Christmases are enough t% make a tippler's mouth water and good templar forswear his vows. While, however, pi elates and peers, templars and tapmen enjoyed Christmas in this unceremonious, if uncanonical, fashion, the sober village Christian found his comfort in carols, adapted in idea to the rustic intellect, and in music to the powers in psalmody of the parish clerk. That reminds us that under Puritan regime Tute and Brady were once set to carol music. One of the oldest carols of which we have record is the well-known "Caput apri defero," printed in black letter by Wynkin de Worde, and preserved on a single leaf at Oxford. The first printed collection of carols is dated 1521, and in it may be found a carol of the fourteenth century, of which we give the first verse :— •' When Cryst was born o f mary fre In bedlem, in that fair cyte, Angellis songen with myrtn and gle, In excelsis gloria." Under Puritan inspiration carols gradually died out or were kept up in country districts as a good plea for strong drink at Yuletide. In recent days, however, they have been revived with something of the enthusiasm of ancient, chastened by the sobriety of modern, days. They are the solitary remnant of old Christmas customs left to us, except plum pudding, condemned by sanitary authorities as indigestible, and Christmis tre«s, damned bv moralists as conducing to avarice in tlu youthful mind.