Mischief Night: 4 November
From coast to coast across northern England the 4 November has become ‘Mischief Night’, a night of humour and hooliganism. On this night children are half under the impression that lawlessness is permissible. Householders’ front doors are repeatedly assaulted with bogus calls, their gates removed, their dustbin lids hoisted up lamp posts, their window panes daubed with paint, their doorknobs coated with treacle, their evening newspapers (projecting from letter-boxes) exchanged, their milk bottles placed so that they will be tripped over, their house numbers unscrewed and fixed on to other houses, their windows tapped, their backyards turned upside down and possibly ransacked for tomorrow’s bonfires, their drainpipes stuffed with paper and set alight. Both in villages and in great cities youngsters bent on mischief roam the streets in happy warfare with the adult world.
http://elt.britcoun.org.pl/f_class1.htm