“The twenty-fifth of October,More Snobs drunk than sober.”*

From Online Etymology Dictionary:

“snob (n.)

1781, “a shoemaker, a shoemaker’s apprentice,” of unknown origin. It came to be used in Cambridge University slang c. 1796, often contemptuously, for “townsman, local merchant,” and passed then into literary use, where by 1831 it was being used for “person of the ordinary or lower classes.” Meaning “person who vulgarly apes his social superiors” is by 1843, popularized 1848 by William Thackeray’s “Book of Snobs.” The meaning later broadened to include those who insist on their gentility, in addition to those who merely aspire to it, and by 1911 the word had its main modern sense of “one who despises those considered inferior in rank, attainment, or taste.” Inverted snob is from 1909.

Then there is that singular anomaly, the Inverted Snob, who balances a chip on his shoulder and thinks that everyone of wealth or social prominence is necessarily to be distrusted; that the rich are always pretentious and worldly, while those who have few material possessions are themselves possessed (like Rose Aylmer) of every virtue, every grace. [Atlantic Monthly, February 1922]”

Margaret Makepeace, Lead Curator, East India Company Records, posted at blogs.bl.uk on 25 October 2015:

“St Crispin’s Day

The Battle of Agincourt was fought between the English and French armies 600 years ago on 25 October 1415, St Crispin’s Day.

And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.
(Shakespeare’s Henry V Act 4, Scene 3)

St Crispin is the patron saint of shoemakers, cobblers, and leatherworkers. In the third century two brothers, Crispin and Crispinian, went from Rome to France where they preached Christianity and worked at night making shoes. The Roman governor had them put to death and they were made saints having been martyrs for their faith.

Shoemakers traditionally celebrated St Crispin’s Day with a day off work and much merrymaking. Newspapers often published stories of shoemakers ‘on the drink’ as they kept St Crispin’s Day. *An old rhyme ran:

The twenty-fifth of October,
More Snobs drunk than sober.

If it rained on 25 October, St Crispin was said to be helping shoemakers by sending weather that made people think of buying new shoes and galoshes.

William Hone, in The Every-day Book (1825), tells the story of Emperor Charles V roaming incognito in Brussels when his boot needed mending. He found a cobbler but it happened to be St Crispin’s Day. The cobbler refused to leave the jollities to carry out the repair in spite of being offered a handsome tip by the Emperor: ‘“What, friend!” says the fellow, “do you know no better than to ask one of our craft to work on St. Crispin? Was it Charles himself, I’d not do a stitch for him now; but if you’ll come and drink St. Crispin, do and welcome: we are as merry as the emperor can be.”’ Charles accepted the offer. The cobbler guessed that Charles might be a courtier and drank a toast to the Emperor. Charles asked if he loved the Emperor: ‘“Love him!” says the son of Crispin; “ay, ay, I love his long-noseship well enough; but I should love him much better would he but tax us a little less”’. The next day, Charles summoned his host to court. When the man realised whom he had entertained the previous day, he feared his joke about the Emperor’s long nose would cost him his life. However Charles thanked the cobbler for his hospitality and as a reward ordered that the cobblers of Flanders should bear arms of a boot with the Emperor’s crown upon it, and that the company of cobblers should henceforward take precedence over the company of shoemakers in processions…”