Definition of "merry-making"

It is true, that two clowns, who drove before them a herd of cattle—one or two village wenches, who seemed bound for some merry-making—a strolling soldier, and a wandering student, as his thread-bare black cloak and his satchel of books proclaimed him—passed our travellers without observation, or with a look of contempt; […]

1820, [Walter Scott], chapter XIII, in The Abbot. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne & Co.] for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and for Archibald Constable and Company, and John Ballantyne, […], page 266