A minor festival, Plough Monday, used to be celebrated on the first Monday after Twelfth Night. A plough, dressed up with ribbons by the villagers, was taken round from house to house. Its escort consisted of a number of rustics dressed up in various mummers’ guises, and chanting verses, the text of which was “God speed the Plough.” The principal performers were Bessy and the Clown, Bessy being, in fact, a man dressed up in fantastic female weeds. Bread, cheese, and ale were asked for at the farmhouses and seldom refused, and a variety of curious dances and uncouth antics completed the entertainment of the day. { 241}
The season of Lent, of course, was marked by no special festivities, but when Easter Sunday was passed, the reaction from the enforced restraint of the previous period made the enjoyment of the Easter-week festivities all the keener. Easter Monday and Tuesday were in some places noted for the curious custom known as “heaving;” on the Monday the men “heaved” the women (_i.e._, lifted them off the ground and kissed them), and on the Tuesday the women’s turn came, and they heaved the men. “Many a time have I passed along the streets inhabited by the lower orders of people,” says one who has witnessed the ceremony, “and seen parties of Jolly matrons assembled round tables on which stood a foaming tankard of Ale. Woe to the luckless man that dared to invade their prerogatives! as sure as seen he was pursued, as sure taken, heaved and kissed, and compelled to pay a fine of sixpence for ‘leave and license’ to depart.”
The antiquity of the custom is proved by an entry in one of the Tower Rolls of payments made to certain maids-of-honour for having taken Edward I. in his bed and “lifted him.”
The second Monday and Tuesday after Easter were known in olden days as Hock-tide. The Tuesday was the principal day, and was designated Hock Day. Many derivations have been suggested for the name; the best seems to be that which connects it with the German _hoch_ (high). Hock Day would thus denote a day of high festivity. Be that as it may, the name is of great antiquity. In the Annals of Dunstaple we read that in 1242 “Henry III., King of England, crossed over on _Ochedai_ with a great army against the King of France.” On Hock Day the women of the village would go into the streets with cords in their hands, and every one of the opposite sex whom they could catch, was bound until he purchased his release by a contribution for the purposes of the common feast. On this day the feasting seems to have frequently passed into excess, and sometimes with direful results; the Annalist of Dunstaple tells that on Hokke-day in the year 1252 the village of Esseburne was “burned down miserably.” In 1450 a Bishop of Worcester prohibited the celebrations of Hock-tide, on the ground that they led to dissipation and other evils. There seems to be no connection between this festival and the Hock-cart spoken of by Herrick, and to be mentioned anon, save that the name of each takes its derivation, if our surmise be the correct one, from the word _hoch_. The Hock Day meaning High Day; and the Hock Cart, the harvest-home wain piled _high_ with the trophies of autumn.