VALENTINE'S DAY.

North Otago Times, Volume XXIII, Issue 1198, 14 February 1876, Page 2

VALENTINE'S DAY.

Many of our readers, especially among the fair sex, will scarcely need reminding 1 that to-day is Valentine's Day; as the postman will bring to their doors much more attractive and romantic reminders than a newspaper can hope to give, in the shape of embossed envelopes, containing lace-edged billets-doux, breathing sweet perfume and messages dictated by that mischief-making darling whose name is Cupid, and whose sign is a heart transfixed with an arrow. And the postman won't need reminding of it either, for the increased weight of his letter bag will be reminder enough. One thing is at least certain, there will be more rhyme and poetry, good, bad, and indifferent, more pictures of "hearts and

darts, and churches, and altars, and doves, and roses, and lilies, and cherubs, and cottages, and bowers, and true-lover's knots, and forget-me-nots, and what not besides, sent flying about in white, in pink, in blue, in primrose, and in every shade of envelope, than on any other, or any other dozen, mornings of the year. We like to think of valentines of this sort only, for we utterly ignore the nasty, spiteful, spleen-inspired caricatures, that under the aegis of the Saint are also scattered broadcast by those whose unamiable disposition teaches them to delight in giving pain and annoyance. Pah ! we hope they will all die old maids and bachelors. Let all the nasty things he burnt — we don't mean the old maids and bachelors, but the missives — and let the pretty custom of a graceful valentine, on Valentine's morn, be cherished as long as Valentine's Day comes round. By-the-bye, though, perhaps few people have a very distinct idea as to how our Valentine's Day custom arose, so, for the benefit of all those who are in such case, we reprint the following information from Chambers : — Valentine's Day, the 14th of February, is, or more correctly was, celebrated in England, Scotland, and in different parts of the continent, particularly Lorraine and Maine in France, by a very peculiar and amusing custom. On the eve of St. Valentine, a number of young folk — maids and bachelors — would assemble together, and inscribe upon little billets the names of an equal number of maids and bachelor! of their acquaintance, throw the whole into a receptable of some sort, and then draw them lottery-wise— care, of course, being taken that each should draw one of the opposite sex. The person thus drawn became one's valentine. Of course, besides having got a valentine for one's self, one became, by the universality of the practice, some other person's valentine ; but, as Misson, a learned traveller in the early part of last century, remarks, " the man stuck faster to the vaientine that had fallen to him, than to her to whom he had fallen." These imaginary engagements, as may readily be supposed, often led to real ones ; because one necessary consequence of them wan, that for a whole year, a bachelor remained bound to the service of his valentine, somewhat after the fashion of a medieval knight of romance to his lady-love. At one period, it was customary for both sexes to make each other presents, but latterly the obligation seems to have been restricted to young men. During the 15th c.j this amusement was very popular among the upper classes, and at many European courts. From " Pepys' Diary," we see that in Charles II.'s reign, married as well as single people could be chosen. For some time back, the festival — at least in England and Scotland — has ceased to possess the graceful symbolic meaning it used to have, and has become a considerable nuisance. " The approach of the day is now heralded by the appearance in the printsellers' shopwindows of vast numbers of missives calculated for use on this occasion, each generally consisting of a single sheet of post-paper, on the first page of which is seen some ridiculous colored caricature of the male or female figure, with a few burlesque verses below. More rarely, the print is of a sentimental kind, such as a view of Hymen's altar, with a pair undergoing initiation into wedded happiness before it, while Cupid flutters above, aud hearts transfixed with his darts decorate the corners. Maid-servants and young fellows interchange such epistles with each other on the 14th of February, no doubt conceiving that the joke is amazingly good ; and, generally, the newspapers do not fail to record that the London post men delivered so many hundred thousand more letters on thnt day than they do in general." — Chambers' " Book of Days," vol. i. p. 255. The connection of the custom with St. Valentine is purely accidental. In the legends of the different saints of that name recorded in tlio "Aet-K Sanctorum" no traoe of the practice peculiar to the 14tli of February is found. It has been suggested by Mr Douce, in his " Illustrations of Shakespeare," that the custom may have descended to us from the ancient Romans, who, during the Lupercalia, celebrated in the month of February, were wont among other things " to put the names of young women into a box, from which they were drawn by the men as chance directed ;" and that the Christian clergy, finding it difficult or impossible to extirpate this pagan practice, gave it at least a religious aspect, by substituting the names of particular saints for those of the women ; and ,it is certainly a usage more or less widely extended in the Roman Catholic Church, to select, either on St. Valentine's Day or some other, a patron saint for the year, who is termed a valentine. But it is far more probable that the custom of choosing valentines is a relic of that nature-religion which, was undoubtedly the primitive form of religion in Northwestern Europe — as elsewhere ; and that it sprung from a recognition of the peculiarity of the season. Hence in Bailey's Dictionary the following explanation is given : " About this time of the year the birds choose their mates, and probably thence came the custom of the young men and maidens choosing valentines or special loving friends on that day."