It was also the custom at Oxford a generation ago for little boys to blow horns about the streets early on May-day, which they did for the purpose of “calling up the old maids.” “I asked an aged inhabitant,” says a correspondent of _N. & Q._ (_4th S._ vol. vii. p. 430), “how long the horn-blowing had ceased, and he replied, ever since the Reform Bill came in; but that he remembered the time when the workhouse children were let out for May-day early in the morning with their horns and garlands, and a worthy alderman whom he named always kept open house on that day, and gave them a good dinner.” “Calling up the old maids” no doubt refers to the practice of calling up the maids, whether old or young, to go a-maying. Hearne, in his preface to Robert of Gloucester’s _Chronicle_, alluding to the custom (p. 18) says:--“’Tis no wonder, therefore, that upon the jollities on the first day of May formerly the custom of blowing with, and drinking in, horns so much prevailed, which, though it be now generally disused, yet the custom of blowing them prevails at this season, even to this day at Oxford, to remind people of the pleasantness of that part of the year, which ought to create mirth and gayety.” Aubrey has this memorandum in his _Remains of Gentilisme and Judaisme_ (MS. Lansd. 266, p. 5):--At Oxford the boys do blow cows’ horns and hollow canes all night; and on May-day the young maids of every parish carry about garlands of flowers, which afterwards they hang up in their churches. At Combe, in the same county, troops of little girls dressed up fantastically parade the village, carrying sticks, to the top of which are tied bunches of flowers, and singing the following song:-- “Gentlemen and ladies, We wish you a happy May; We’ve come to show our garlands, Because it is May-day.” The same verse, substantially, is the May-day song at Wootton, an adjoining parish. The last two of the four lines are sometimes as follow:-- “Come, kiss my face, and smell my mace, And give the lord and lady something.” _N. & Q. 3rd S._ vol. vii. p. 425. At Headington, about two miles from Oxford, the children gather garlands from house to house. Each garland is formed of a hoop for a rim, with two half hoops attached to it and crossed above, much in the shape of a crown; each member is adorned with flowers, and the top surmounted by a crown imperial or other showy bunch of flowers. Each garland is attended by four children, two girls dressed in all their best, who carry the garland, supported betwixt them by a stick passed through it between the arches. These are followed by the “lord and lady,” a boy and girl, who go from house to house and sing the same song as is sung at Combe. In the village are upwards of a dozen of these garlands, with their “lords and ladies,” which give to the place the most gay and animated appearance.--_Literary Gazette_, May 1847.