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238 HOWLY
(c) The game is evidently dramatic in form, and perhaps is illustrative of some fact of history, such as the toll upon merchandise entering a walled town. The changes in the words of the different versions are not very great, but they show the influence of modern history upon the game. The appearance of King George evidently points to the date when it was frequently played, though the older versions are doubtless those in which his Majesty does not do duty. Mactaggart has the following quaint note which perhaps may supply the origin, though it seems a far cry to the Crusaders:—" This sport has something methinks of antiquity in it; it seemeth to be a pantomime of some scenes played off in the time of the Crusades. ' King and Queen o' Cantilon' evidently must be King and Queen of Caledon, but slightly changed by time. Then Babylon in the rhyme, the way they had to wander and hazard being caught by the infidels, all speak as to the foundation of the game " (Mactaggart's Gallovidian Encyclopedia).
In the Gentleman:fs Magazine for December 1849, in a review of the Life of Shirley, it is stated that in many parts of England the old game of " Thread the Needle" is played to the following words, which refer to the gate of the city of Hebron, known as the " needle's eye."
How many miles to Hebron ?
Three score and ten. Shall I be there by midnight ? Yes, and back again.
Then thread the needle, &c.
The game is also described in Notes and Queries, iv. 141, as played in the same way as above, and the writer adds there are subsequent evolutions by which each couple becomes in succession the eye of the needle.
Howly
A street game played by boys in a town, one of them hiding behind a wall or house-end, and crying " Howly" to the seekers.—Atkinson's Cleveland Glossary,
See " Hide and Seek." |
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