May Rhyme for May-time. SWEET, fickle bird, whose single word, O'er dewy fields of unmown hay, From smoke of town, I hie me down, Say, what is love? A woman's glove, Are all the good old virtues dead? Have truth, and faith, and honour fled? Must true love linger on unwed? Dear cuckoo, tell me rightly! "Autres temps, autres mœurs," affaires du cœur Were once regarded duly; The preux chevalier to-day Makes ardent love and rides away; When "hearts are trumps" must woman pay ? Dear cuckoo, answer truly. Come clear thy throat and tune thy note, Speak, cuckoo, I implore thee! "Love one, love all, love day by day," "Time flies, it is not always May;-" Is that thy creed, is this thy lay? False cuckoo, I abhor thee! The nightingale doth tell her tale Than thine, thou vagrant varlet, who Ye maidens dear, lend willing ear, So shall my lyric preach to all A little Mayfair moral! BASIL HARRISON. Some bye-gone Bath Days. THE close of the seventeenth century witnessed the development of a phase of society whose votaries found at Bath amusement suited to every variety of taste and disposition in the fashionable world of the day. Not that the springs had been, by any means, unvisited aforetime, or that persons of distinction had neglected to avail themselves of such virtues as resided in them-no long time previous Barbara, Duchess of Cleveland, and Mary Beatrice, James the Second's Queen (albeit for reasons vastly dissimilar), had resorted thither-but about the era referred to, the monotony of such as sought relief from the healing fountains of the "queen of watering places," was relieved by the additional attractions of dancing and dissipation. Slight indeed, save to the crippled or infirm, had been the inducement to visit a city whose baths were described as bear gardens, whence modesty was altogether excluded, and into which dogs, cats, pigs, and human creatures alike were flung, even while visitors were bathing. The accommodation, also, was of the most meagre, not to say sordid, description. The floors of the rooms were coloured with a mixture of soot and small beer, to hide neglect and imperfection; the wainscotted walls were seldom painted, and the hearths and chimney-pieces were coated with whitewash. With the reign of Queen Anne, however, Bath began to assume a new character, as an asylum for wealthy invalids, and a resort for "ladies of quality," with their fans and essences, and for beaux all duly wigged and caned and snuff-boxed. In 1702 the queen herself arrived on a visit, being met on the confines of the county by a band of Amazons who escorted her to the city; and so powerful were the attractions of royalty, even at its dullest, that the necessaries of life rose a hundred per cent., the drinking pumps could not meet the demands of the visitors, and as much as a guinea a night was asked for a bed. The assembled company amused themselves by dancing under a tent on the bowling green to the music of a fiddle and hautboy. But dancing was not the only form of recreation provided. Lovers of high play just back from the continent, who, before returning for the winter to the attractions of London sought such centres of busy idleness as afforded opportunity for the exercise of their special talents, found at Bath a field for the manipulation of cards and counters VOL. LXXVII. H by no means unpromising. Howbeit; as if protesting against the foreign mannerisms elsewhere in vogue, the majority of those who resorted to Bath carried themselves as though proud of the insular roughness, and so country squires frequented the public rooms with pipes in their mouths, and danced, as long as seemed good to them, in their muddy boots. About the year 1705 Beau Nash appeared upon the scene, and soon assumed direction of the public amusements, demanding allegiance to a code of laws whose stringency but too plainly indicates how stern was the discipline needed to enforce any approach to good breeding. The son of a tradesman at Swansea, Nash had been under the necessity of quitting Oxford in consequence of having prematurely succumbed to the charms of some local syren; and the duties in connection with "carrying a pair of colours" having proved uncongenial, the young ensign reverted to his original intention of being called to the bar. Chosen to superintend the pageant exhibited by the Middle Temple in honour of the accession of William III., he so far attracted the royal attention as to receive the offer of knighthood. "If your Majesty make me a knight," he replied, "I wish it may be one of the poor Knights of Windsor, and then I shall have a fortune able to support my title." Steele, without mentioning names, gives an instance of his humanity.* It seems that being required to render his accounts to a committee of the Temple, he had charged as one item "for making a man happy, £10." He had overheard, he said by way of explanation, a poor man say to another that such a sum would render him the happiest man in the world, and he could not forbear trying the experiment. The age, however, was one of such kind of wit as is most distant of all other from wisdom. Having lost every shilling he possessed in play at York, Nash was offered fifty guineas if he would stand naked in a blanket at the Minster door, while the congregation was dispersing. He was recognised by no less a personage than the Dean. "What!" he exclaimed, "Mr. Nash in masquerade." "Only a Yorkshire penance, Mr. Dean, for keeping bad company," replied Nash, pointing to his roystering companions. In the then existing state of society at Bath, Nash saw and seized the opportunity of making himself "the little king of a little people." He became master of the ceremonies in succession to a Captain Webster, who had been killed in a duel, and inaugurated his reign by prohibiting the wearing of white aprons in the ball-room. One night the Duchess of Queensbury, entering *Spectator,' No. 248. the room wearing an apron trimmed with precious lace, Nash removed the offending garment and threw it among the ladies' maids on the back benches, observing that "none but waiting women appeared in white aprons." The heroine of this story was the famous beauty, Katherine Hyde, daughter of the Earl of Clarendon, celebrated by Prior in the pretty poem commencing, "Thus Kitty, beautiful and young." She it was who took Gay under her patronage, nursing him in sickness so carefully that he declared that had he been their nearest relative, the Duke and Duchess could not have treated him with an attendance more constant. Greater difficulty was, however, encountered in the endeavour to make the country gentry wear shoes and stockings and remove their boots. The habit was thus turned into ridicule : FRONTINELLA'S INVITATION TO THE ASSEMBLY. "Come, one and all, to Hoyden Hall, Let prudes and fools Mind fashion's rules, We Hoydens all decency slight; Come trollops and slatterns, Cocked hats and white aprons, We beat up for folly's recruits; In dress be as free At Hog's-Norton's squires in boots." And at length Nash so far succeeded in his crusade that when any gentleman presented himself in the ball-room in boots, he would walk up to him and gravely express regret that he should have forgotten his horse. Much indignation having been roused by a duel fought by torchlight, in which one of the combatants was run through the body, Nash saw a favourable opportunity for repressing the custom of duelling, and even wearing swords within his dominions was a practice subsequently forbidden. The ceremonies of the day, at this time, commenced with the bath. Between six and nine o'clock in the morning the fair bather was brought from her lodgings in a sedan, and as she entered the water there was set before her a little floating tray, on which reposed her handkerchief, snuff-box, and bouquet. A delightful picture of the scene is afforded by Anstey (1766): "Ah, 'twas pretty to see them all put on their flannels, 'Twas a glorious sight to see the fair sex |