I will not deny that a taste among grown people for these childish amusements, bespeaks a great want of refinement; but I must own, on the other hand, that there is a charm in the remnants of primitive simplicity, which gave a relish to these scenes of domestic gaiety, not to be found in the more affected manners of the present day. The French, especially in the provinces, are still addicted to these joyous, unsophisticated family meetings. For my part, I lament that the period is nearly gone by, when neither bigotry nor fastidiousness had as yet condemned those cheap and simple means of giving vent to the overflow of spirits, so common in the youth of all countries, but more especially under this our animating sky; and cannot endure with patience, that fashion should begin to disdain those friendly meetings, where mirth and joy, springing from the young, diffused a fresh glow of life over the old, and Hope and Remembrance seemed to shake hands with Pleasure in the very teeth of Time. As Carnival approached, the spirit of romping gained fast upon its assiduous votaries, till it ended in a _full possession_, which lasted the three days preceding Ash-Wednesday. The custom alluded to by Horace of _sticking a tail_,[37] is still practised by the boys in the streets, to the great annoyance of old ladies, who are generally the objects of this sport. One of the ragged striplings that wander in crowds about Seville, having tagged a piece of paper with a hooked pin, and stolen unperceived behind some slow-paced female, as, wrapt up in her veil, she tells the beads she carries in her left hand; fastens the paper-tail on the back of the black or walking petticoat, called _Saya_. The whole gang of ragamuffins, who, at a convenient distance, have watched the dexterity of their companion, set up a loud cry of _Lárgalo, lárgalo_--Drop it, drop it--which makes every female in the street look to the rear, which, they well know is the fixed point of attack with the merry light-troops. The alarm continues till some friendly hand relieves the victim of sport, who, spinning and nodding like a spent top, tries in vain to catch a glance at the fast-pinned paper, unmindful of the physical law which forbids her head to revolve faster than the great orbit on which the ominous comet flies. [37] ... Nihilo ut sapientior, ille Qui te deridet, caudam trahat, SAT. II. iii. So he who dared thy madness to deride, Though you may frankly own yourself a fool, Behind him trails his mark of ridicule. FRANCIS.