Ne'er cast a clout till May be out!

Where is the May flower?  It's late!

While I was standing tolerating the traditional Bank Holiday downpour the other day it occurred to me that the seasons seem to have lost their rhythm. There is a distinct lack of good grass growing and there is an abundance of cold wind and rain.

The seasons are simple in the equines world. There is no-grass (autumn and winter) and green-grass (spring and summer) and green-grass is late! Surely the Hawthorn blooms should be filling the air with their scent by now and the grass should be growing so fast that if I failed to eat it on time it would poke me on the nose!

A few weeks ago the sun was shining and the young fillies here were getting over excited . Merrylegs said she couldn't wait for the fresh (spring) grass to grow and to roll about in her dust bath every evening. I told her to hang tail as it would be a mud bath she'd be getting for the Hawthorn bush hadn't bloomed yet. We Gypsy Cobs know the Hawthorn Bush by another name. It's called the May Tree and the flowers themselves are the May. I should know, because I was born in May and I also know you can't expect good grass and good weather 'til the May is out.

You Twolegs think that this old saying is related to the month of May, but that is utter nonsense. You listen to an old Cob. .....“Ne'er cast a clout till May be out!”

T'is an English proverb. And if you're faintly doubting the word of this worldly wise old Cob then you'll find that the earliest citation can be found in a rhyme from a twolegs called Dr. Thomas Fuller, Gnomologia, 1732, although it existed by “word-of-mouth” well before that: i.e. - "Leave not off a Clout Till May be out!” So now you know and I think that the lateness of this flower is a matter of some concern and you should be paying attention to the rhythm of the seasons and the seasons are “out of kilter”.

*NB: We shouldn't be able to miss the the Hawthorn in at this time of year as it is an extremely common tree; especially in hedges. Hawthorns are virtually synonymous with hedges. As many as 200,000 miles of hawthorn hedge were planted in the Parliamentary Enclosure period, between 1750 and 1850. The name “Haw” derives from “hage”; the Old Tongue for “hedge” and it should be displaying it's beautiful flowers by now (in late April/early May). Using that allusion, 'till May is out' could mean, 'until the hawthorn is out [in bloom]'.