This phrase has its origins with the constellations Leo, the Lion, and Aries, the ram . It has to do with the relative positions of these constellations in the sky at the beginning and end of the month.

Weather-lore, beliefs and sayings

Like most months, March weather lore has many old sayings to guide us:

'March winds and April showers bring forth may's flowers.'

'When March comes in like a lion it goes out like a lamb.'

'A dry March and a wet May
Fill barns and bays with corn and hay.'

'As it rains in March so it rains in June.'

'

DAFFODILS

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretch'd in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

tossing their heads in sprightley dance

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
and dances with the daffodils. 

lake windermere daffodils

China has today condemned what it calls the illegal auction in Paris of two bronze artefacts one of a rabbit - the other of a rat taken from a chinese palace 150 years ago. They are two of twelve bronze heads depicting the animals in the chinese  zodiac.

"Christie's took its own course and insisted on auctioning the relics looted from the summer palace in breach of the spirit of international pacts and the consensus on the return of such artefacts to their original countries," it said. The State Administration of Cultural Heritage does not recognise the illegal owners of the looted relics and will continue to utilise all necessary channels to recover all relics stolen and illegally exported throughout history," it said. “The auction would bring repercussions as it had "harmed the cultural rights and national feeling of the chinese people". A court in paris had rejected a chinese appeal to have the sale blocked. 

In 1860, a British and French expeditionary forces, having marched inland from the coast, reached Beijing and on the night of October 6 french units diverted from the main attack force towards the old summer palace and  extensive looting, also by british and chinese, took place. Their was no resistance to the looting from many imperial soldiers in the surrounding area.Envoys, Henry Loch and Harry Parkes, had gone ahead of the main force under a flag of truce to negotiate with the Prince I at Tungchow. After a  day of talks, they and their small escort were suddenly surrounded and taken prisoner. They were taken to the Board of Punishments in Beijing where they were confined and tortured. The emissaries were returned after two weeks, with fourteen other survivors. 20 British, French and Indian captives died. Their mutilated bodies were barely recognisable. The treatment of their people caused revulsion among the European army. On October 18^th 1860, The British High Commissioner to China, Lord Elgin, in retaliation for the torture and execution of the European and Indian prisoners, including the British envoys and a journalist for The Times newspaper, and wishing to spare Beijing itself,ordered the destruction of the palace.

Contemporry of the time the French author, Victor Hugo, disapproved of the action; in his "expédition de chine", he described the looting as, "Two robbers breaking into a museum, devastating, looting and burning, leaving laughing hand-in-hand with their bags full of treasures; one of the robbers is called France and the other Britain." He hoped that one day France would feel guilty and return what it had plundered from China. Today many relics which were taken from the gardens remain in foreign museums and private collections.

There are currently several plans in China for rebuilding the imperial gardens, but such moves have been opposed on the grounds that they will destroy an important relic of modern chinese history. The government decided to keep the ruined site in situ  to teach future generations about the consequences of being dominated by foreign powers. In addition, any rebuilding would be a colossal undertaking, and no rebuilding of above-the-ground structures has been approved. However, the lakes and waterways in the eastern half of the gardens have been landscaped, recreating long-forgotten vistas.

Let us not forget that in 4000 years of Chinese history more priceless artifacts have been destroyed in revolutions and civil wars than by any foreigners. All of the writings of Confucious to name but one episode. Many “plundered” artifacts held in museums give many of us a glimpse of civilisations long gone. Perhaps these items do belong in their natural surroundings, in the meantime they should be preserved for all of us and not just an elite.

From a contemporary report: http://www.qdg.org.uk/pages/China-War-1860-115.php

 We must put all this in countrywide context - in south western China a religious war was taking place - The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom [ simplified Chinese: 太平天国 ] it began in 1851. It was established with a large-scale revolt [the Taiping Rebellion], by an army led by Christian convert Hong Xiuquan. He established with capital Tianjing (Nanjing) and gained control of significant parts of southern China, at its height ruling over about 30 million people. They tried to institute several social reforms, such as strict separation of the sexes, land socialization, "suppression" of private trade, and the replacement of Confucianism, Buddhism and Chinese folk religion by Christianity, holding that Hong Xiuquan was the younger brother of Jesus. Troops were nicknamed the Long hair (長毛) as they sported a different queue to the Qing. Qing government papers refer to them as "hair rebels".The Taiping areas were constantly besieged and harassed by Qing forces. The rebellion was eventually ended in 1864 by the Qing army aided by French and British allied forces. Records suggest this was bloodiest civil war in history, with an estimated death toll of between 20 and 30 million dead. Today, artifacts from the Taiping period can be seen at the Taiping Kingdom History Museum in Nanjing.

Nobody knows just how long people have been making and eating pancakes, but you could almost call the flat bread made by Bronze Age families, twelve thousand years ago, a pancake. Pancakes were made by grinding grains and nuts and adding water or milk. This mixture was then shaped into flattened cakes and baked on the hot stones surrounding the fire.

Shrove Tueday is when traditionally the house is cleaned of ‘fat’ and also ‘yeast’ before the Christian season of Lent leading up to Easter. [The word shrove is a past tense of the English verb "shrive," which means to obtain absolution. Shrove Tuesday, in the Christian calendar, is the day before ash wednesday, which marks the beginning of lent ,a period of fasting. When Lent was observed more rigorously than it is now, the two or three days prior to Ash Wednesday, known as Shrovetide, were celebrated by games, sports, feasting, dancing, and general merrymaking.  

In Germany, Shrove Tuesday is called Fastnacht (Eve of the Fast); in Italy and other southern European countries it is called Carnival (Farewell to Meat); and in Brazil and the United States, Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday). Shrovetide feasts were designed to use up the food that could not be eaten during the Lenten fast. In Britain, Collop Monday was when people ate up their supplies of bacon, eggs, and meat and on Shrove Tuesday (now more generally known as Pancake Day) flour, eggs, milk, and butter were used up in the making of pancakes. According to tradition, revelry began with the ringing of the Pancake or Shriving Bell soon after midday, which was the signal for villagers to cease work and go home to make pancakes or join in the games and merrymaking. Pancake Day races are still held in parts of Britain today. In Slovenia, a 10 day carnival called Kurentovanje marks the passing of winter. As Kurent is thought to be an ancient God of hedonism, you can take a guess at the flavour of the festivities.

The Celtic calendar tells us that the second full moon after Deep Winter (usually the full moon in February) is known as Imbolc. This Midwinter celebration is the time when people turn their thoughts toward spring and celebrate the fact that winter will soon be over and the world will wake again. Candles are the most important symbols of Imbolc. During the Imbolc ritual, a central candle is lit to represent the light and warmth of spring. All those present light a candle from this central flame and the candles stay lit until the ritual is completed. The lighted candles symbolize driving away the darkness of winter and looking forward with hope to Spring. Winter is the time of year when everything is resting. Imbolc is the celebration which says 'We are ready to wake again to the beauty of the world in Spring.' Meat is an essential item for the Imbolc feast, and a good drink to have is apple mead.

In France the main ceremonial day for pancake eating is Candlemas on the 2nd of February. This holy day is six weeks after Christmas and is the day that Christ was presented at the temple by his mother. During this festival, French children wear masks and demand pancakes and fritters. In various parts of the country, there are different customs. In Provence, if you hold a coin in your left hand while you toss a pancake, you'll be rich. And in Brie the first pancake (which is never very good anyway) is always given to the hen that laid the eggs that made the pancake. And it's always regarded as bad luck to let a pancake fall on the floor while tossing it. Legend has it that Napoleon, who liked to make and eat them with Josephine, blamed the failure of his Russian campaign on one he had dropped years before at Malmaison during Candlemas.

Large or small, fat or wafer thin and made with a wide range of flours, pancakes are given different names by different peoples. There are Hungarian palacsinta, Chinese egg rolls, Jewish blintzes, Russian blini, Italian cannelloni, Swedish plattar, Mexican tortillas, American hotcakes, German pfannkucken, Norwegian lefser, Austrian nockerin, Welsh crempog and Australian pikelets: but undoubtedly the most famous of them all is the great French crepe. My favorite filling? A Sprinkling of sugar and lemon juice. I have sampled a chocolate filling at a Creperie in Vichy - but that is another story.

Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call today his own:
He who, secure within, can say,
Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
Be fair or foul or rain or shine
The joys I have possessed, in spite of fate, are mine.
Not Heaven itself upon the past has power,
But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour.

John Dryden

1731 – 1700

Dryden was born in the village of Aldwincle in Northamptonshire.  He was the eldest of fourteen children born to Erasmus Dryden and wife Mary Pickering, paternal grandson of Sir Erasmus Dryden, 1st Baronet (1553-1632) and wife Frances Wilkes, Puritan landowning gentry who supported the Puritan cause and Parliament. He was also a second cousin once removed of Jonathan Swift.

Dryden was the dominant literary figure and influence of his age. He established the heroic couplet as the standard meter of English poetry, by writing successful satires, religious pieces, fables, epigrams, compliments, prologues, and plays. Became  Poet Laureate in 1668. Following his death in 1700 and was buried in Westminster Abbey

Free country? You must be joking ! 

Buddy Holly died 50 years ago.  

Fifty years ago on February 3rd is the day music died, according to Don McLean at least - the day when Buddy Holly was killed in an aeroplane crash at the peak of his talents and passed into rock 'n' roll history.

In the half-century since, as well as inspiring McLean, Holly has been recognised as one of popular music's great pioneers, his influence felt by everyone from Bob Dylan to the Beatles.For one woman in particular, though, he's remained especially close. Peggy Sue Gerron, a lady of 68, is an unlikely piece of walking rock 'n' roll memorabilia. But in 1957, she was the girlfriend of Holly's best pal, Jerry Allison, and so became the inspiration for the singer's jiving classic.

Holly fans will know Ms Gerron's name appears in not one, but two, song titles by their idol - the other being, Peggy Sue Got Married. Striking a more melancholy note than its predecessor, it was recorded by Holly on a home tape recorder in 1958 and only heard after Holly's death.

                             peggy sue got married