Fiesta

“ Never, throughout the festival, ceases the laughter of joyous voices, the clang of the castanets, the melody of guitar and tambourine. Dances, song, and music, with jovial intercourse and good fellowship, all unite to preserve unflagging the rejoicing which is cultivated at that beautiful spot. ”

“ With the High Church people, again, it is a Holiday, to be enjoyed after a certain peculiar fashion of their own; while the great mass of the population outrage both these parties by treating half the day as a fast and the other half as a festival. ”

“ The word "fair" is derived from the Latin word feria, which means a festival, the parish feast day. On the festival of the patron saint of a village church crowds of neighbours from adjoining villages would flock to the place, the inhabitants of which used to keep open house, and entertain all their relations and friends who came from a distance. They used to make booths and tents with boughs of trees near the church, and celebrated the festival with much thanksgiving and prayer. ”

“ As our week consists of seven Sundays, it follows that our amusements are only signs in the calendar, epochs of time, to which no one pays heed; and a festival is nothing but a play-room for the plans which every one has in his head, the boards on which he is to act his leading part, and the season for continuing the intrigue against victims of love and of ambition. Here there is, every minute, a stinging mosquito, and the thistle-seed of beautifully painted trouble flies round far and wide. ”

“ The very presence of a lengthened festivity—for festivity can never be solitary—would, apart from its sacred causes, promote these wholesome effects. The extended space of time over which this festival is spread, the protracted holiday which it creates, points it out for the gathering together of distant friends whom the passing nature of an occasional and single celebration would fail to collect from their scattered places of the world. ”

“ The Origin and Purpose of Festivals—Ideas suggested by Christmas—Pagan and Christian Elements—The Names of the Festival—Foundation of the Feast of the Nativity—Its Relation to the Epiphany—December 25 and the Natalis Invicti—The Kalends of January—Yule and Teutonic Festivals—The Church and Pagan Survivals—Two Conflicting Types of Festival—Their Interaction—Plan of the Book.
It has been an instinct in nearly all peoples, savage or civilized, to set aside certain days for special ceremonial observances, attended by outward rejoicing. ”

“ The evening often finished with card games, reading newspapers, verse-making, fortune-telling, walks in the garden, impromptu dancing, perhaps gambling, and supper.
The nobility and gentry became more mobile and now mixed together at parties. At these afternoon parties, there were a variety of simultaneous activities, instead of everyone participating in the same activities together as a group. Guests could choose to engage in conversation, news, cards, tea-drinking, music, dancing, and even go into supper at different times. Sometimes a man other than her husband escorted a lady to a party. ”

“ The great day has actually come. The snowy cloths drape the pews; everything is in readiness for the solemn festival; the people come from far and near. But I am not concerned with those who, on this impressive and memorable occasion, throng around the table and partake of the sacred mysteries. ”

“ Great is the fascination to the children in all these things, and the little feet are never weary until the last booth is passed, and the quiet of neighboring streets, lighted only by wandering lanterns, strikes the home-returning party by its contrast with the light and noise of the festival. ”

“ For these reasons—and some others, which are more personal and less philosophical—we love all old traditions and holiday customs. Like honest Sir Andrew Aguecheek, we "delight in masques and revels, sometimes altogether." Many a happy chance has conducted us unpremeditatedly into the midst of some rustic festival, whose recollection is amongst our pleasant memories yet,—and many a one have we gone venturously forth to seek,—when we dwelt in the more immediate neighborhood of the haunts to which, one by one, these traditionary observances are retiring before the face of civilization! ”

“ One festival is for their weapons of war, which they regard as sacred, or as being possessed of an innate divine power. At all these festivals they have dancing and the beating of drums, as well as singing and many ceremonies. ”

“ Although the profuse but somewhat indiscriminate hospitality, and some of the ruder of the Christmas games and ceremonies of our mediæval ancestors, have declined or fallen into general disuse, the anniversary of the advent of the founder of the national religion yet remains the chief season set apart especially for genial social intercourse, the gathering together of relatives and friends, the interchange of mutual good-will, and of festive enjoyment. ”

“ The night-birds finish the evening at the Festa, some distance up the hill, where two bands play, and there is some dancing, and where the lights are not put out until the small hours are growing into big ones. ”

“ Thus then the winter land waited for the oncoming of that strange travelling festival of the world which has roved into it and encamped gypsy-like from old lost countries: the festival that takes toll of field and wood, of hoof and wing, of cup and loaf; but that, best of all, wrings from the nature of man its reluctant tenderness for his fellows and builds out of his lonely doubts regarding this life his faith in a better one. ”

“ FEASTS AND FESTIVALS. A festival or feast [1] is a day or series of days specially and publicly set apart for religious observances. Whether its occurrence be casual or periodic, whether its ritual be grave or gay, carnal as the orgies of Baal and Astarte, or spiritual as the worship of a Puritan Sabbath, it is to be regarded as a festival or “holy day” as long as it is professedly held in the name of religion.
To trace the festivals of the world through all their variations would be to trace the entire history of human religion and human civilization. ”

“ Then we celebrate our great festival, the only occasion on which we are permitted to be merry. If, however, you do not like to quit the house, remain as quietly as possible under ground, and, as you value your lives, do not look into the room before midnight ”

“ But the recurrent festival, celebrating some exploit in the chase or in war, or commemorating some departed chief, would furnish an occasion toward which men would look, for which they would prepare, and in which they would experience that pleasure which the excitement of a crowd affords, especially to the dependent mind, without resources of its own. ”

“ To end the old year merrily and begin the new one well, and in friendship with their neighbours, were the objects which the common [124] people had in view in the celebration of this tide or festival. New-Years Eve, therefore, was spent in festivity and frolic by the men; and the young women of the village carried about, from door to door, a bowl of spiced ale, which they offered to the inhabitants of every house where they stopped, singing at the same time some rude congratulatory verses, and expecting some small present in return. ”

“ This great festival was, in former times, kept with so much freedom and openness of heart, that every one in the country where a gentleman resided, possessed at least a day of pleasure in the Christmas holydays; the tables were all spread, from the first to the last, with the sirloyns of beef, [142] the minc’d pies, the plumb-porridge, the capons, turkeys, geese, and plumb-puddings, were all brought upon the board; and all those who had sharp stomacks and sharp knives, eat heartily and were welcome, which gave rise to the proverb, Merry in the hall, where beards wag all. ”

“ What an endless variety of interruptions must have been common! all of a kind eminently calculated to stimulate the imagination. Municipal functions, religious festivals with their splendid gatherings and processions, the exciting events of political contest, often carried to the point of actual combat, to say nothing of the frequent Saint's day holidays, enjoyed by the craftsman in jovial social intercourse. ”

“ The festival, therefore, becomes a saturnalia, during which servants forget their duty to their masters, children their reverence for parents, men their respect for women, and women all notions of modesty, delicacy, and gentleness. ”

“ YOU have not time, you have not thoughts, to spare for many words on a Festival-day. And yet, just because it is a Festival-day, you look to have some words spoken to you: and your Festival would not be complete without something of a sermon. ”

“ Some of them, with an air of perfect nonchalance, as if fearing no power on earth, and knowing no anxiety beyond the present moment, improved the season as a holyday, a sort of carnival extraordinary, devoted to visiting, dancing, and all kinds of sports. ”

“ After this ceremony they feasted upon all the offerings and presents of food, drinking the wine after their custom, as usual, until they had consumed it all. This was their feast of the new year, and the solemnity with which they believed themselves to render it perfectly agreeable to their idols. During the month Pop, there were also some of the most devout men who continued to celebrate this feast with their friends, such as the nobles and priests, they being, before others, always the first in the rejoicings and festivities. ”

“ On occasions of public rejoicing, as the commencement of a new year, the birth-day of the Emperor, and other festivals, plays are openly performed in the streets, throughout the day, and the strolling players rewarded by the voluntary contributions of the spectators. ”

“ For the hospitality, indeed, the merriment and good cheer, which prevailed during the season of Christmas, this country was peculiarly distinguished in the sixteenth century. Setting aside the splendid manner in which this festival was kept at court, and in the capital, we may appeal to the country, in confirmation of the assertion; the hall of the nobleman and country-gentleman, and even the humbler mansions of the yeoman and husbandman, vied with the city in the exhibition of plenty, revelry, and sport. ”

“ Holding festival, then, in our whole life, persuaded that God is altogether on every side present, we cultivate our fields, praising; we sail the sea, hymning; in all the rest of our conversation we conduct ourselves according to rule. ”

“ In the country, small dancing-parties, tea-parties, and conversaziones are also comprised under the head of parties; but the outdoor occasions are of much greater number and variety: croquet parties, sailing parties, boating parties, pic-nics, private fetes, berrying parties, nutting parties, May festivals, Fourth of July festivals —in fact, anything that will give an excuse for a day spent in out-door frolicking. ”

“ Is it not the French who set aside a special night for foolery, when everyone appears in fancy costume? They should set the celebration forward in the day, and let the blazing sun stare upon their mirth. ”

“ As to the purpose of the ceremony, there are those who maintain that entertainment is the main incentive, but the celebration or holiday seems to be a secondary consideration according to the explanation of the primitives themselves. ”

“ These festivals offer to each either profit or amusement; the peasants find in them a refreshing and salutary rest from toil, the tradesman fails not to fill his pockets with their hard earnings, the clown shows off his summersets, the young men are touched with the tender passion, and the young girls, with their white teeth and sparkling eyes, await with feigned indifference the proposals of their admirers. The village fête forms a bright epoch in rustic life, and the gay hours passed at them are the happiest, the most joyous, and the most enchanting of the year. ”

“ The wine and carousing constitute for them such a temptation that they cannot resist it. The festival comes, and almost every one of them is ready to stupefy himself, and even lose all semblance of human form. ”

“ Know that we have a festival, called the festival of the New Year, when all the people use to take boat and go a-pleasuring on the river. So I went out, with my comrades, and saw a boat, wherein were half a score damsels like moons, and amongst them, the lady Budour, with her lute in her hand. She preluded in eleven modes, then returning to the first, sang the following verses:
Fire is not so fierce and so hot as the fires in my heart that glow, And granite itself is less hard than the heart of my lord, I trow. ”

“ Barry, who takes a peculiarly serious view of all things musical, claims that Festival Sounds, Sounds of Festivity or Echoes of a Festival is the portrayal in music of scenes that illustrate some great national festival; that the introduction, with its fanfares, gives rise to strong feelings of expectation. ”

“ These festivities have up to this point been [87] occasions for rejoicing, with the single and significant exception of the melancholy singing of the bride’s friends on the eve and day of her wedding. There is a perfect naturalness about all the merry-making and festivals so far considered, and this is no less characteristic of the funeral celebrations now to be taken up. The description of these will conclude my treatment of the last group of festivals, which are more properly festival-ceremonies, or ceremonies that have been made the occasion of festivity. ”