In other parts the first member of the opposite sex that is seen by any individual is said to be his or her “Valentine.” This is the case in Berkshire and some other of the neighbouring counties. Pepys, in his “Diary,” says, “St. Valentine’s day, 1667. This morning came up to my wife’s bedside, I being up dressing myself, little Will Mercer, to be her Valentine, and brought her name written upon blue paper in gold letters done by himself very pretty; and we were both well pleased with it. But I am also this year my wife’s Valentine, which will cost me £5—but that I must have laid out if we had not been Valentines.” He afterwards adds, “I find that Mrs. Pierce’s little girl is my Valentine, she having drawn me, which I was not sorry for, it easing me of something more I must have given to others. But here I do first observe the fashion of drawing of mottoes as well as names; so that Pierce who drew my wife, did also draw a mottoe, and this girl drew another for me. What mine was I forget; but my wife’s was, ‘Most courteous and most fair.’ One wonder I observed to-day, that there was no music in the morning to call up our new-married people, which is very mean methinks.” The custom of presenting gifts seems then to have been practised. In the “British Apollo,” 1708, a sort of “Notes and Queries” of the day, we read, “Why Valentine’s a day to choose A mistress, and our freedom lose? May I my reason interpose, The question with an answer close; To imitate we have a mind, And couple like the winged kind.” In the same work, “1709, Query.—In choosing Valentines (according to custom), is not the party choosing (be it man or woman) to make a present to the party chosen? Answer.—We think it more proper to say drawing of Valentines, since the most customary way is for each to take his or her lot, and chance cannot be termed choice. According to this method the obligations are equal, and, therefore, it was formerly the custom mutually to present, but now it is customary only for the gentlemen.” In Scotland presents are reciprocally made on the day. Gay has given a poetical description of some rural ceremonies used in the morning: “Last Valentine, the day when birds of kind Their paramours with mutual chirpings find, I early rose, just at the break of day, Before the sun had chased the stars away; A-field I went amid the morning dew, To milk my kine (for so should house-wives do). The first I spied, and the first swain we see, In spite of Fortune shall our true love be.”