The cuckoo ale

In Shropshire, until shortly before Chambers wrote, labourers who heard the first cuckoo of the year left their work, made holiday of the rest of the day and drank what they called the cuckoo ale. Chambers counted it among the remnants of old customs that showed how large the cuckoo loomed in the beliefs of the Middle Ages. He gives it with other cuckoo lore, such as the luck of having money in your pocket at the first call.