April 23.
"For St. George and England" signalled Admiral Keyes, seventeen years ago, at Zeebrugge. "God for Harry, England and St. George" cried Henry V at Harfteur, according to William Shakespeare (who should have known, seeing that he was born on St. George's Day). Edward LI made St George the patron of England and of the Most Noble Order of the Garter. The Council of Oxford, in 1222, declared St. George's Day—the anniversary of the martyred Saint's death at Nicomedia in 303—4o be an English national festival. As an officer of the Imperial Roman forces, St. George visited Britain when he had not yet clashed with his Emperor Diocletian's hostility to the Christian faith. So whatever mysteries may attach to St. George's life, it fs certain that he is England's national hero. Gibbon, as that "precious rascal" Silas Wegg knew, was a fine historian but fell into jerror in identifying Ft. George with fraudulent yet prosperous army contractor who afterwards became Jarchbishop of Alexandria. But then Gibbon, a Cambridge man who failed to graduate, was better at "declining and falling", Mr. Boffin would say, than at understanding military psychology. Who ever heard of an English soldier going. into battle blessing an army contractor? Those who remember Flanders, even after Uncle Toby's time, will aver that the Army swore terribly about its contractors—and sergeant-majors as well. St. George may have been "one of them turnners". His legend may have confusingly absorbed the local atmosphere of his final resting-place at Lydda, where Perseus won Andromeda from her rocky prison with the Gorgon's head in his pocket. Yet it was inevitable that he usually performed at Christmas Jtime. In consonance with the mystery surrounding his career, St. George seems to have slipped into English folk-lore, without any de~ finite inspiration or direction. Sud~ denly—perhaps after that decision of the Council of Oxford in the 13th century—it is found that on his day processions or "ridings" were arranged in his honour by the guilds jof St. George. These "ridings" lasted until the 18th century, when they were still being performed at Norwich—a faithful observer of old English customs—as pageants or at Lydd as religious dramas. Mow-lever that may be, the entry of St. George into these precursors of th English stage-play, gave them national, as distinct from a purely local, flavour. St. George had a rival in the picturesque personality Robin Hood who had the advant-faze over the Capperdocian centurion in being a real English Earl according ¢o faithful tradition. And Robin's Maid Marian was a less shadowy figure than the unnamed beauly whom St. George was reputed to have saved from the Dragon. Still, in the long run, St. George triumphed, There were many reasons for preferring him to popular benefactor who, however Rood a marksman and friend of Our Lord King Richard 1, was a little disrespectful in his ' treatment of capitalists and sheriffs. It is satin~ factory to think that' St, George, and not he, is England's patron Saint; otherwise this might be a day of political disagreement, in~ stead of national rejoicing.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.