Various References and Quotations about Morris Dancers Accompanying Rush Carts: Carrying Rushes to Church; The Morris-Dancers
Book Sections:
- Introduction
- Manchester: Alexander Wilson's 1821 picture
- Rochdale
- Scanned image section for pages 68 to 79
- Saddleworth: Burton's eye-witness account
- Skedlock: The children's rush-cart
- Morris: Other morris dance troupes
- Rushes: Other rush customs
- Pictures: 'Photos and Illustrations
- Back to NW Morris
Introduction
Burton's prime interest was in the rush-carts and rush bearing, however the book is heavily innoculated with references to morris dancers. Where the references refer to what we now refer to as 'NW Morris', quotations and comments will be included in this section. The quotations in this section are from Burton's chapters, Carrying Rushes to Church, The Rush-cart and The Morris-Dancers.
Carrying Rushes to Church
p.24: Originally it seems to have been the practice for the parishioners to carry the rushes to church in bundles. As the custom became more of a festival, these were ornamented, and were then born by young men and maidens dressed in their best attire, and bearing flowers to decorate the church. This method prevailed all over the country, but in South-East Lancashire a far more elaborate arrangement grew up. The rushes, which at one time had been brought to church on sledges, formed into the shape of a haystack, were placed in a cart, and the ingenuity of the people soon made this into an exceedingly novel and pleasing spectacle. Village vied with village in the beauty and size of their rush-carts; rivalry led to expensive ornaments; music and morris dancers followed, till the rush-bearing became a pageant, which once seen is rarely forgotten.
p.25: Many learned perswons have attempted to trace the origin of a very simple and easily explained custom in the mists of antiquity, and have attributed mystic meanings to it, which, however, appear to exist only in their imagination.
p.27: A thousand thanks for your clear and satisfactory representation and account of
the curious custom of Rush-bearing. But in an appeal to me you depend on a Rush, for I cannot
help you to any information respecting my namesake. ...
... The Puritan Magistrates and Ministers were opposed to the ancient custom of
bearing the Rushes to the Churches, probably from the intemperance and indecorum
which generally attended the ceremony. {1842 letter to Mr George Shaw of Saddleworth from
Sir Samuel Rush Meyrick}.
[JM: The correspondence then quotes concerning James I, "Book of Sports" - The Declaration of Sports, October 18, 1633. Which says, refering to Lancashire " ... that country is much infected, we mean Papists and Puritans ...", pointing out the reference to carrying rushes below.]
See: Gardiner, Constitutional Documents.
p.28. In "Whimzies, or, a New Cast of Characters," 1631. 12mo, a zealous
brother, it is said. 'denounceth a heavie woe upon all Wakes, Summerings, and
Rush-bearings, prefering that an act wherby pipers were made rogues,
by Act of Parliament, before any in all the Acts and Movements;" and
of a pedlar the author says: "A Country Rush-bearing, or Morrice-Pastoral,
is his Festivall: if ever ever he aspire to plum-porridge, that is the day.
Here the guga-girles gingle it with his neat nifles."
In Brathwaite's "Ar't Asleepe Husband?: A Boulster Lecture" (1640): "Such an
one as not a Rush-bearer or May-morrish in all that Parish could aubsist without him."
The Rush-Cart
p.39 South-east Lancashire was the home of the rush-cart. Almost every village had one, and the rivalry between the people sometimes rose to such a pitch that bloodshed occured.
p.39 Elijah Ridings, a Lancashire poet, in his "Village Festival," writes: .
Of lads and lasses pass along!
Now, watch the nimble morris-dancers,
The blithe, fantastic, antic prancers,
Bedecked with gaudiest profusion,
Of ribbons in a gay confusion
Of brilliant colours, richest dyes,
Like wings of moths and butterflies;
Waving white kerchiefs here and there,
And up and down, and everwhere:
Springing, bounding, gaily skipping,
Deftly, briskly, no one tripping.
All young fellows, blithe and hearty,
Thirty couples in the party;
"Village Muse," 1854, pp28-29
p.40 Roby writing in 1829, speaks of the custom as
"The cart .. is drawn round the dwellings of the principle inhabitants by
morris-dancers, who perform an uncouth dance, attended by a man in motley
attire, a sort of nondescript, made up of the ancient fool and Maid Marian.
This personage jingles a horse-collar hung with bells".
"Traditions of Lancashire," 5th ed, 1872, note p. 264.
Volume 1 of John Roby is available
via the Gutenberg project {See section on Hoghton Tower and Book of Sports}
However, Burton dismisses Roby's description as 'brief and inaccurate', and quotes
from Harland and Wilkinson's "Lancashire Legends," 5th ed, 1872 concerning rush-bearing in
East Lancashire. Morris dancers are not mentioned, but:
"Barrowford rush-bearing
is always held on the first Sunday after the 19th August. This festival is still visited
by vast numbers of persons from Burnley, Colne, Padiham, and elsewhere. ... Riot and
drunkenness reign supreme."
pp.42-47. We have, however, to turn to Bamford's, "Early Days," [1849, pp. 146-154] for a
complete account of the rush-cart, and the manner in which it was made:
... The folds or hamlets which mostly sent rush-carts to Middleton, were
Boarshaw, Thornham, Hopwood, Birch, Bowlee and Tonge ... By 'day-strike in a morning,
or by 'neet-gloom' in the evening, the jingle of morrice-bells would be heard along
the lanes and field-roads, for the lads, having borrowed each his collar of bells
at neighbouring farm houses, would hang them on their necks and come jingling them
home ... until the very air was clamerous of the bell tinkle and the musical
roll of the crotal. [crotal is Irish for a rattle. The collars with bells were
then used by the rush-cart drawers.] ...
If the party can go to the expense of having a set of morrice-dancers,
and feel inclined to undertake the trouble, some score or two of young men ...
precede the drawers, dancing in couples to various simple country tunes, one of
which may be measured by this stanza:
I cou'd doance morris if I wou'd;
An' if hat an' sark be drest,
I will doance morris wi' the best.
pp42-47 to be scanned
p.47. Of a different character was thye rush-bearing described by Miss Louisa Potter's, "Lancashire Memories." [1879] Instead of the cart being drawn by a band of young men with ropes and stretchers, horses, gaily decorated, were employed; ... A dozen young men and women, streaming with ribbons and waving handkerchiefs, preceded the cart, dancing the morris-dance. There was the shepherdess, with a lamb in a basket and a crook in her hand, dressed in white, with a green bower borne over her head, and always two watches at her side. There was the fool, a hideous figure in a horrid mask, with onions for ear-rings and a cow's tail for a pig-tail, belabouring the crowd with an inflated bladder at the end of a very long pole.
p.48. .. from Frances Ann Kemble's "Record of a Girlhood" (1878, vol2, p.185) ... in a letter sent from Birminham, 7th Sept, 1830: ... After this came twelve country lads and lasses, dancing the real old morris-dance, with their handkerchiefs flying ... after them followed a very good village band. The procession closed with a fool, fantastically dressed out, and carrying the classical bladder at the end of his stick. They drew up before the house and danced their morris-dance for us.