As sung at Richmond, Yorkshire, on the eve of the New Year, by the Corporation Pinder. [THE custom of singing Hagmena songs is observed in different parts of both England and Scotland. The origin of the term is a matter of dispute. Some derive it from ‘au guy l’an neuf,’ i.e., _to the misletoe this new year_, and a French Hagmena song still in use seems to give some authority to such a derivation; others, dissatisfied with a heathen source, find the term to be a corruption of [Greek text which cannot be reproduced], i.e., _the holy month_. The Hagmena songs are sometimes sung on Christmas Eve and a few of the preceding nights, and sometimes, as at Richmond, on the eve of the new year. For further information the reader is referred to Brand’s _Popular Antiquities_, vol. i. 247–8, Sir H. Ellis’s edit. 1842.] TO-NIGHT it is the New-year’s night, to-morrow is the day, And we are come for our right, and for our ray, As we used to do in old King Henry’s day. Sing, fellows, sing, Hagman-heigh. If you go to the bacon-flick, cut me a good bit; Cut, cut and low, beware of your maw; Cut, cut and round, beware of your thumb, That me and my merry men may have some, Sing, fellows, sing, Hagman-heigh. If you go to the black-ark, bring me X mark; Ten mark, ten pound, throw it down upon the ground, That me and my merry men may have some. Sing, fellows, sing, Hagman-heigh. THE GREENSIDE WAKES SONG. [THE wakes, feasts, or tides of the North of England, were originally religious festivals in honour of the saints to whom the parish churches were dedicated. But now-a-days, even in Catholic Lancashire, all traces of their pristine character have departed, and the hymns and prayers by which their observance was once hallowed have given place to dancing and merry-making. At Greenside, near Manchester, during the wakes, two persons, dressed in a grotesque manner, the one a male, the other a female, appear in the village on horseback, with spinning-wheels before them; and the following is the dialogue, or song, which they sing on these occasions.] ‘’TIS Greenside wakes, we’ve come to the town To show you some sport of great renown; And if my old wife will let me begin, I’ll show you how fast and how well I can spin. Tread the wheel, tread the wheel, den, don, dell O.’ ‘Thou brags of thyself, but I don’t think it true, For I will uphold thy faults are not a few; For when thou hast done, and spun very hard, Of this I’m well sure, thy work is ill marred. Tread the wheel, tread the wheel, den, don, dell O.’ ‘Thou’rt a saucy old jade, and pray hold thy tongue, Or I shall be thumping thee ere it be long; And if that I do, I shall make thee to rue, For I can have many a one as good as you. Tread the wheel, tread the wheel, dan, don, dell O.’