ROMANCE IN AN ENGLISH CRADLE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19268, 3 January 1931, Page 14

ROMANCE IN AN ENGLISH CRADLE.

All old cradles are transfigured by the glamour of romance, recalling as they do their intimacy with the deepest experiences of life, their memories of ancestral homes, and the life story of their past inmates. All the pent-up love of mothers’ hearts* for ages past, all patience, endurance, and devotion, all the poetry of race are associated with cradles.

It is a long step from the first primitive cradles scooped from logs, needing no rockers because of the natural formation of the tree trunk, to the painted hanging cribs, bright with easily adjusted curtains, which ornament interiors to-day. During the Anglo-Norman period in England cradles were not in general use, although wealthy persons possessed them. In contemporary MSS. they are shown as square boxes on detachable rockers, protected at the sides to prevent bedclothes and baby from, falling out. Peasant mothers were often at a loss for a place of safety in which to place their children, for a law of the period laid down “that if a woman place her infant by the hearth, and the man put water in the cauldron and it boil over, and the child be scalded to death, the woman must do penance for her negligence, but the man is acquitted of blame.” English cradles of the fifteenth century were simply boxes swung on trestle supports. The sides were grooved all over, something like linenfold panelling without the shaped ends. It was suspended at each end by a post, usually surmounted bv a carved representation of a dove with wideopen eyes and folded wings. The bottom was formed by interlacing cords on which the mattress was laid. Queen Elizabeth’s cradle, which still exists, was probably in use almost for half a century before she was born in 1533. It is of oak with raised carved panels, with the head and foot shaped at the ton with a slot at the extremity for tire insertion of a curtain-pole. Another famous cradle of romantic interest, still in existence, belonged to James I. It is of oak and has fancyshaped rockers fixed to the under-side of the “ box,” turned rocking-posts at the four corners, and is inlaid with holly and boxwood. The hand that rocked this cradle was that of Mary Queen of Scots. It dates to 1566, the year in which the ill-fated Rizzio was I murdered. Cradles of the nobility of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were usually finely decorated by the wood-carver and painted and gilded. The hood, designed to protect the child’s head from draught, first appeared during the second half of the sixteenth century. The early hoods were not enclosed at the top until the middle of the seventeenth century. Then it was generally hinged to fold back in order to facilitate putting in and taking out the child. The typical Jacobean cradle had a top to its hood, which had balustered sides to enable the mother to peep in at her sleeping child. This simple style of cradle was in use for over two centuries by the cottagers of rural England. Those made during the Puritan regime may be recognised by their stern simplicity of design. From the sixteenth to the eighteenth century the cradle played a far more important part than it does to-day, and congratulatory visits on the birth of a child were important society functions. The mother’s bedroom w*as specially decorated for the occasion and the cradle covered with an elaborately worked quilt. Many cradles used in rural liomes were plaited of lime and willow twigs. Indeed, wicker cradles eventually came to have a great vogue, even among the aristocracy. The novel material was at once seized upon as a great convenience, as it was so light as to make the cradles readily portable, and after an illness a cradle could be destroyed without great monetary loss. Few of these cradles have survived . because of their perishable nature. Cradles made by Chippendale were in mahogany, constructed on the same lines as the seventeenth-century cradles with rockers, but the hood was daintily curved. They were also made after the style of a cot on four legs inserted in rockers. The fashion of hanging cribs between carved posts began early in the Georgian period, but was made fashionable by Ilepplewhite. Carved posts were about 4ft high terminating in spreading, turned, or reeded feet with a rail uniting them to support the cradle, which was swung between the two posts, the bottom of the cradle being about 2ft above the ground. The framework and hood were of wood filled in with cane-work. During the third quarter of the eighteenth century this type of cradle tended entirely to supersede the earlier form. The hood was replaced by a draped curtain hanging from a carved and shaped upright.

During hot weather wash the perches of fowlhouses every week with crude kerosene to get rid of mites and other vermin. The perches should be constructed so that the ends clear the sides of the houses and thus give pests no method of approach from the walls. It is also advisable, at this time of the year, to dust or spray the straw in the nests with insecticide.