an imposed penalty; * and it might therefore allude either to man's redemption by the Passion of Christ, or to the peculiar fasts and penances which all Christians endured more particularly at this solemn season, to obtain the Church's remission of their sins.

66

* The meaning of the word rests upon too good authority to be doubted. Hospinian, De Origine Fest. Christ. (fol. 54) says "Germani hanc septimanam-i. e. hebdomadam Passionis-vocant die Karrwochen a vetusto illo Germanico vocabulo, Karr, quo mulctam, seu pœnam pro delicto, vel potius satisfactionem pro pœnâ et mulcta nominarunt. Quando enim in foro judiciali reus, pro mulctâ a judice sibi impositâ, læso pro injuriâ damnove satisfacit, dicimus, er hat ihm ein abtrag, karr, oder aberwandel gethan." Ab hoc civili usu postea sacrificuli mulctas, quas pœnitentibus pro satisfactione delictorum imposuerunt, etiam in Latinâ linguâ Germanico vocabulo nominârunt Carrinas. Alii tamen scribunt Carenam, et a carendo derivant. Est hujus vocabuli frequens usus apud Burckhardum, Uvormaciae episcopum circa annum Domini, 1020, lib. 9. et in vetustis indulgentiarum bullis. Fuit igitur carena apud veteres in ecclesiâ jejunium aliquot dierum in solo pane et aquâ. Vocârunt ergò hebdomadam hanc Germani die Karrwochen, quòd in eâ pœnitentiam, hominibus a sacerdote impositam, communiter omnes agerent jejuniis, vigiliis, &c., pro peccatis admissis, quâ se Deo satisfacere posse falsò persuasum habebant. Potest tamen pio sensu sic vocari septimana hæc; in eâ siquidem pro mulctâ, à justo Deo humano generi impositâ, filius Dei in cruce morte suâ satisfecit, eosque ab æternâ damnatione liberavit. Ob easdem causas quoque dies Dominicæ passionis, der Karrfreitag appellatur." Hospinian DE ORIG. FEST. CHRIST. p. 54. Fol. Tiguri. 1612. It may be thus translated-"The Germans called this week Karrwoche, from that ancient German word, Karr, by which they signified the mulct or penalty for an offence, or rather the satisfaction of the mulct or penalty. For when in our courts of law, the condemned acquits himself to the injured party of the fine imposed upon him by the judge for the wrong done, we say that he has made amends, or given Karr, i. e. satisfaction. From this judicial use of the word, they afterwards called by the name of Carrinas the penance imposed by the priestlings on their penitents in satisfaction of their sins, the German phrase passing even into the Latin language. Others, however, write carenam, and derive it from carendo. The use of this word is common with Burckhard,

It was customary on this day to give a dole of beans to the poor, under the name of carlings, a word formed from carr just as dearling is the diminutive of dear; and even when the nature of the dole was changed, still it preserved the same appellation. Beans, peas, furmety, and whatever was the peculiar gift of the season, all were called carlings. Some, however, would derive carl, and care or carr, from two different roots, and would persuade us the day is called Carl Sunday because the gifts then made are to the carl or ceorl, i. e. husbandman. But this is too absurd to need refutation.

seem to have

Thus a writer

In some parts the word carling would been corrupted into Whirlin or Whirling. in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1789, p. 491, observes, that "in several villages in the vicinity of Wisbech, in the Isle of Ely, the fifth"-qy. fourth?" Sunday in Lent has been for time immemorial commemorated by the name of Whirlin Sunday, when cakes are made by almost every family, and are called from the day whirlin cakes.*

the Bishop of Worms, about 1020, and also in the old Indulgences. Carena, therefore, was amongst the old ecclesiastics a fast of some days upon mere bread and water. Hence the Germans called this week, Care-week, because all men performed in it the penance, imposed by the priests for their acknowledged sins, with fasts, vigils, &c., by which they falsely persuaded themselves they might satisfy God. This week, however, may be so called in a pious sense; inasmuch as the Son of God by his death upon the cross satisfied the penalty imposed by the Divine Judge upon the human race, and freed them from eternal damnation. For the same reasons the day of our Lord's Passion is called Car-Friday."

* Brand and his faithful Sancho Panza have fallen here into a strange error. They quote as an instance of whirling cakes, or at least of something to be eaten under the name of whirlin, the following passage from the Annalia Dubrensia, or Cotswold Games;

"The country wakes and whirlings have appear'd
Of late like foreign pastimes."

*

Originally beans were amongst the doles given at funerals, which will account tolerably well for their use upon a day sacred to the passion of Christ. But the custom has, beyond doubt, been borrowed from the ancients, who had some strange notions respecting this kind of pulse. They fancied that in the blossom of the bean they could read the word luctus, or grief, and held that they belonged to the dead, whose soul resided in them. There were, however, many religious uses of beans amongst the Romans. Ovid, when speaking of the offerings made at certain periods to the dead, says, the sacrificer rises with naked feet, and having washed his hands, flings black beans over his shoulder, exclaiming at the same time, "with these beans I redeem myself and mine." This is repeated nine times without looking behind him, in which case the ghost follows and picks them up, though what he does with them the poet has forgotten to tell us.‡

Surely a cake cannot be called a pastime, however amusing may be the eating of it. Any one but Sir Henry Ellis must at once see that this is an allusion to the Northern game of curling.

* "Fabis Romani sæpius in sacrificiis funeralibus operati sunt, nec est ea consuetudo abolita alicubi inter Christianos, ubi in eleemosynam pro mortuis fabæ distribuuntur.”—Moresini Papatus, in voce. Terque manus puras fontanâ perluit undâ ; Vertitur, et nigras accipit ante fabas,

+

Aversusque jacit; sed dum jacit, "hæc ego mitto;
His," inquit, "redimo meque meosque fabis."
Hoc novies dicit, nec respicit. Umbra putatur

Colligere, et nullo terga vidente sequi.

Fastorum, Lib. v. V. 435, et seq.

Skelton in his Colin Clout gives another example of this custom :

"Men call you therefore profanes,

Ye pick no shrympes nor planes;
Salt-fish, stock-fish, nor herring,
It is not for your wearing.

Pliny is exceedingly minute upon this subject, and though what he has said in regard to it must of course be familiar to many, it is yet interesting enough to be repeated in the old translation by Philemon Holland— "Moreover by ancient rites and religious ceremonies at the solemn sacrifice, called Fabaria, the manner was to offer unto certaine Gods and Goddesses beane cakes. This was taken for a strong food, being eaten with a thicke grewell or pottage; howbeit, men thought that it dulled. a man's senses and understanding, yea, and caused troublesome dreams in the night; in regard of which inconveniences, Pythagoras expressly forbade to eat beans; but, as some have thought and taught, it was because folks imagined that the soules of such as were departed, had residence therein; which is the reason also that they be ordinarily used and eaten at the funerals and obsequies of the dead. Varro also affirmeth that the great priest, or sacrificer, called the flamine, abstaineth from beanes both in those respects aforesaid, as also for that there are to be seene in the flower thereof certain letters or characters that shewe heavinesse and signes of deathe. Furthermore there was observed in old time a religious ceremonie in beanes; for when they had sowed their grounds, their manner was, of all other corne, to bring backe with them out of the fielde some beanes for good-lucke sake, presaging thereby that their corne would returne home againe unto them; and these beanes were thereupon called in Latin, Refrive, or Referiva. Likewise, in all port-sales, it was thought that if beanes were intermingled with the goods offered to be sold they would be luckie and gainful to the seller. This is certain, that

Nor in holy Lenton season

Ye will neither beanes nor peason.
But ye look to be let loose

To a pigge or to a goose."

of all the fruits of the earth, this only will be full and sound when the moon is croisant, notwithstanding, it were growne and half eaten before.”—Plinie's Natural Historie, Book 18, c. 12.*

At Newcastle-upon-Tyne, grey peas, steeped for a night in water and fried in butter, were substituted for beans, though for what cause does not appear, unless from being more palatable, or more suitable to the season.

* In the Latin, however, it is cap. 30 and not 12. The real cause why the Pythagoreans held beans in so much veneration was kept a profound secret both by the philosopher and his disciples, the pride of possessing an exclusive mystery being found sufficient to subdue the usual motives for talking. Jamblichus, in his life of Pythagoras, (cap. 31 p. 393, 8vo. Leipsic 1815,) relates a story of the Lacedemonian Timycha, the wife of Myllius the Crotonian, which equals the savage fortitude of Regulas.-Dionysius, the tyrant of Syracuse, having in vain tried to conciliate the friendship of the Pythagoreans, sent out his soldiers to hunt them down and destroy them, and his emissary succeeded in surprising a small party of them, who immediately took to flight. Being perfectly unincumbered they would have escaped their pursuers, but unluckily they came upon a field of beans at that time in full blossom, when, sooner than violate their creed by treading on the sacred legumes, they turned to bay, and fought to defend themselves with sticks and stones. In a short time they were all slaughtered. The soldiers, now returning, chanced to meet Myllius and his wife Timycha, who had been left behind by their friends because the advanced pregnancy of the latter prevented her keeping up with them in their flight. Satisfied with the previous bloodshed the soldiers forbore to harm them, but carried them to Dionysius, and he, having heard the tale and being urged by curiosity promised them not only their lives but all sorts of reward and honour if they would only explain why their companions had preferred dying to trampling upon the beans." And I," said Myllius, "would rather have trod down the beans than reveal the reason of such abstaining." Hereupon Dionysius ordered Myllius to be taken out of his sight, and the torture to be applied to Timycha, imagining that pain and terror would force her to confession. But the heroic woman bit her tongue in half that it might not betray her, and spate it in his face.