Philip Stubbes, a Puritan writer in the reign of Elizabeth, thus describes a May-day in England: “Every parishe, towne, and village assemble themselves together, bothe men, women, and children, olde and younge even indifferently; and either goyng all together, or devidyng themselves into companies, they go some to the woods and groves, some to one place, some to another, where thei spend all the night in pleasant pastymes; and in the mornyng they returne, bryngyng with them birch bowes and branches of trees, to deck their assemblies withall.... But their cheerest jewell thei bryng from thence is their Maie pole, whiche thei bryng home with great veneration, as thus: thei have twentie or fortie yoke of oxen, every oxe havyng a sweet nosegaie of flowers placed on the tippe of his hornes, and these oxen drawe home this Maie pole (this stinckyng idoll rather), which is covered all over with flowers and hearbes, bound rounde aboute with strynges from the top to the bottome, and sometyme painted with variable colours, with two or three hundred men, women, and children, followyng it with great devotion. And thus beyng reared up, with handekerchiefes and flagges streamyng on the top, thei strawe the grounde aboute, binde greene boughes aboute it, sett up sommer haules, bowers, and arbours hard by it. And then fall thei to banquet and feast, to leape and daunce aboute it, as the heathen people did at the dedication of their idols, whereof this is a perfect patterne, or rather the thyng itself.” The ceremony was almost identical with the Roman festival, where the Phallus was introduced with garlands. Both were attended with the same licentiousness, for Stubbes gives a further account of the depravity attending the festivities. PILLARS Another type of emblem was the stone pillar, remains of which still exist in the British Isles. These pillars or so called crosses generally consist of a shaft of granite with a carved head. In the West of England crosses are very common, standing in the market and receiving the name of “The Cross.” These stone pillars were first erected in honour of the Phallic deity, and on the introduction of Christianity were not destroyed, but consecrated to the new faith, doubtless to honour the prejudices of the people. These monolisks abound in the Highlands, they are stones set up on end, some twenty-four or thirty feet high, others higher or lower and this sometimes where no such stones are to be quarried. We learn that the Bacchus of the Thebans was a pillar. The Assyrian Nebo was represented by a plain pillar, consecrated by anointing with oil. Arnobius gives an account of this practice, as also does Theophrastus, who speaks of it as a custom for a superstitious man, when he passed by these anointed stones in the streets to take out a phial of oil and pour it upon them and having fallen on his knees to make his adorations, and so depart.