‘It would appear that they have descended to us, not from any Popish practice, as some _pious_ souls affirm, but from one which was actually, and, like the word which we use to signify the great festival of the Church, _Easter_, to a paganism as ancient as the worship of _Astarte_, in honour of whom, about the time of the Passover, our pagan ancestors, the Saxons, baked and offered up a particular kind of cake. We read in Jeremiah (vii. 17, 18): “Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the Queen of Heaven.” [See also Jeremiah xliv. 18, 19.] Dr. Stukeley, in his _Medallic History of Valerius Carausius_, remarks that they were “assiduous to knead the Easter cakes for her service.” The worship of a Queen of Heaven, under some significant name or other, was an almost universal practice, and exists still in various parts of the globe. She is usually represented, like the Madonna, bearing her son in her lap, or like Isis, with the infant Horus. We may see such images in the Louvre, and in the great Ethnographical Museum at Copenhagen, where the Queen of Heaven of the Chinese, _Tien-how_, figures in white porcelain, side by side with _Schling-mu_, the Holy Mother. Certain metaphysical ideas are apt to flow in a common channel, and get clothed in the same symbolical dress. Hence we find a Queen of Heaven, no less in Mexico than in China, in Egypt, Greece, Italy, and England; and, under the pagan title of a Christian festival, preserve, along with our buns, the memorial of her ancient reign.’ CHAPTER XIII. GINGER BREAD AND CHARITY BREAD. But there is a bread which must not escape notice—a true bread—although somewhat sweet and spiced. When it was first introduced into England no one can tell, but it was well known in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, for Shakespeare, in _Love’s Labour Lost_ (Act V., S. 1), makes Costard say: ‘An I had but one penny in the world, thou shouldst have it to buy gingerbread.’ And we find it used in a similar way to the educational biscuits of the present day; for Matthew Prior, in his _Alma_ says: ‘To Master John, the English maid A horn-book gives, of gingerbread; And, that the child may learn the better, As he can name, he eats the letter.’