COLOURS, in the Latin and Greek churches, are used to distinguish several mysteries and feasts celebrated therein.
Five colours only are regularly admitted in the Latin church: these are white, green, red, violet, and black. The white is for the mysteries of our Saviour, the feast of the Virgin, those of the angels, saints, and confessors; the red is for the mysteries and solemnities of the holy sacrament, the feasts of the apostles and martyrs; the green for the time between pentecost and advent, and from epiphany to septuagesima; the violet in advent and Christmas, in vigils, rogations, &c. and in votive masses in time of war; lastly, the black is for the dead, and the ceremonies thereto belonging.
In the Greek church, the use of colours is almost abolished, as well as among us. Red was, in the Greek church, the colour for Christmas and the dead, as black among us.
To COLOUR Strangers Goods, is when a freeman allows a foreigner to enter goods at the customhouse in his name.