Formerly it was customary to take such hens as had not laid eggs before Shrove Tuesday, and to thrash them to death, as being no longer of any use. The same custom also prevailed in some parts of Cornwall.--Brand, _Pop. Antiq._ 1849, vol. i. p. 81; _Book of Days_, vol. i. p. 238. At Harding, in Flintshire, the lord of the manor, attended by his bailiff, formerly provided a foot-ball, and after throwing it down in a field near the church (called thence _foot-ball field_) the young and old assembled together to play at foot-ball.--Kennett MS. British Museum. At Tenby Shrove Tuesday was formerly a general holiday, when the time was divided between foot-ball-kicking and pancake-eating. The shutters remained upon the shop-windows, while the windows of the private houses were barricaded with wood, or blinded with laths, bags, and sacking.--Mason, _Tales and Traditions of Tenby_, 1858, pp. 17, 18. SCOTLAND. Fastren’s E’en is celebrated annually, after the Border fashion, in the month of February, the day being fixed by the following antiquated couplet: “First comes Candlemas, syne the New Moon; The next Tuesday after is Fastren’s E’en.” _Crowdie_ is mentioned by Sir F. M. Eden (_State of the Poor_, 1797, vol. i. p. 498) as a never-failing dinner on Shrove Tuesday, with all ranks of people in Scotland, as pancakes are in England; and that a ring is put into the basin or porringer of the unmarried folks, to the finder of which by fair means it was an omen of marriage before the rest of the eaters. THE HIGHLANDS. In the Highlands the most substantial entertainment peculiar to the evening of Shrove Tuesday is the matrimonial _brose_ (pottage), a savoury dish, generally made of the _bree_ (broth) of a good fat piece of beef or mutton, which being sometimes a good while _in retentum_, renders the addition of salt to the meal unnecessary. Before the bree is put in the bicker or plate, a ring is mixed with the meal, which it will be the aim of every partaker to get. The first bicker being discussed, the ring is put into two other bickers successively; and should any of the candidates for matrimony find the ring more than once, he may rest assured of his marrying before the next anniversary.