"MY VALENTINE"

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 39, 16 February 1931, Page 13

"MY VALENTINE"

FRAGRANT MEMORIES

St. Valentine's Day, which fell on Saturday last, will be recalled with fragrant memories by many sedate benedicts and confirmed bachelors as a festival which meant much in their romantic youth for the love tokens which it brought: from their amorous friends (states a writer in an exchange). ■ It is a moot point whether in these days of "flaming youth" the attempt being made to restore the old custom of sending valentines will meet with any great measure of success. Certainly there is little likelihood of the massive cards which were once popular, coming back into favour. These measured in some cases about eight inches by four, and wore ornamented at each corner with a different coloured ribbon, each bearing such tags as:— If you love some other fellow. Send me back this bow of yellow. If of me you some time think. Send me back this bow of pink. If for me your heart beats true. Send me back this bow of blue. If fop me your lovo is dead. Send me back this bow of red. . The observance of St. Valentine's Day by the exchanging of gifts between youth and maiden can be traced back as far as 1476 in England, and. to 1594 in Scotland. In the seventeenth cen-, tury, on the eve of St. Valentine _ the young people met together; the girl's names were written on slips of paper; every man drew one; the fair owner of the name became his Valentine* and received from him a pair of gloves. PBEFUMED POESY. The fashion of sending a paper valentine as an anonymous lovo token came later. The earliest of these consisted of beautiful colour prints, similar to the work of Baxter and Singleton. Even Bartolozzi occasionally designed Valentines, and the South Kensington Museum possesses a specimen, dated 1815. ' A feature of the Valentino in the '50 's and '60 's was the lovely little flower paintings, exquisitely fine and delicate. Sontimental verses always found a place, and these were frequently in tho beautiful handwriting that was an accomplishment of the Victorians. Occasionally some swain showed a sense of humour, and sent one after this mamier:— Oramercy, fayrc ladye, ye rose is redde, Tfaklns, ye violet's blue; Mass, byre Lady, carnations aro sweet, Aye, marry, and so aro you. .' The most striking characteristic was the paper lace of which the valentine was made. Trees, figures of men and maidens, cupids, and flowers, were embossed in intricate designs, and the master of this art was one Kidd, famous in his day. To find his name in the lace-work enhances the value of an old valentine to a collector. Tho great firm of Eimmel added one more attractibn by inventing the perfumed valentine in 186 S. During the next ten years it became a tawdry affair of pink satin, highly glazed pictures, and artificial flowers, and died unmourned.