In place of the final couplet it was sometimes the custom of one of the bearers to say, “Please to handsel the lord and lady’s purse.” The practice once current in the North of England of going into the woods on the first of May, “when the day begins to break,” and bringing home “knots of flowers and buds and garlands gay” wherewith to adorn the windows and doors of the houses at sunrise, is illustrated in the following doggrel, which used to be sung in the streets of Newcastle-on-Tyne:[331]— Rise up, maidens, fie for shame! For I’ve been four long miles from hame; I’ve been gathering my garland gay, Rise up, fair maids, and take in your May. It now remains to trace back these ceremonies—these survivals—to their origin, and to show how once they were the essential outcome of a living creed, and had a serious, and, so to speak, sacramental significance.[332] The May-day celebrations combined three different usages. _First_, the bringing in of the May and the decoration of the homestead. _Secondly_, the planting of the May-pole and the dancing around it. _Thirdly_, the selection of some youth or maiden as King or Queen of the May. (1) The custom of going to the woods to fetch in the May is not by any means peculiar to England. It was until recently very general throughout Europe, and still survives in many districts, though sometimes Whitsuntide or Midsummer is the date chosen for the ceremony. This wide distribution at once stamps it as an ancient observance, and indeed it was already represented as such so long ago as the thirteenth century.[333] In some districts the branches that were brought in were fastened over the house door or upon the roof, or planted in front of the cattle stalls, a separate bush being attached for each head of cattle. Here the acknowledged purpose was to make the cows good milkers. “They fancy,” says a writer on the manners of the Irish, “that a green bough fastened on May-day against the house will produce plenty of milk that summer.”[334] In other districts the May-bushes were decorated with nosegays and ribbons and carried in solemn procession from house to house, the bearers singing a song and collecting their recompense in a basket. In some parts of Sweden on May-day eve boys still go round at the heels of the village fiddler, each with a bunch of freshly-gathered birch-twigs, singing songs in which fine weather, good harvests, and other blessings are entreated. At every cottage where they are duly compensated for their pains they adorn the door with one of their birch-sprays. In Stockholm on St. John’s eve miniature May-poles, known as Majstänger, are sold by the thousand.[335] In Russia the custom of decking the houses with branches at Whitsuntide is universal.[336] Similar instances might be multiplied indefinitely.