Oysters came into season on St James’s Day, and Hone later explained that the day was old St James’s Day, 5 August, when greengrocers ran to Billingsgate and tubs of oysters stood at street corners. London children gathered the shells thrown out from taverns and fish shops and built them into grottoes, with a candle stuck on top to be lit at night. By old St James’s Day these stood ready in the nooks of courts, and the children begged passers-by to mind the grotto, a penny to keep the candle burning. Chambers took it for a relic of the habits of Catholic England.
Grotto Day
5 August · London
No longer kept
they have these little fabrics in nice order, with a candle stuck in the top, to be lighted at night.
From Chambers's Book of Days, vol. 2, p. 122; Hone's Every-Day Book, vol. 2, col. 1072. Read the original
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