1234 3124 4321 4213
2134 1324 4312 4231
2314 1342 4132 2431
2341 3142 1432 2413
3241 3412 1423 2143
3214 3421 4123 1243
This method is known as “hunting the treble up and down,” and was invented by Fabian Stedman, a Cambridge printer, who printed in 1667 the earliest treatise on change-ringing. If the above table is carefully observed, it will be seen that the first bell, or treble, shifts its place by one each time, backwards or forwards, while the other three only change six times in all; in other words, if the treble was omitted it would be a peal of six changes on three bells.
The tenor bell of Exeter Cathedral, called “Grandison.”
Recast by Taylor, 1902. (See page [44].)
When we come to rings of five, six, or eight bells, these changes are, of course, capable of greater variety. On five bells we may have 5 times 24, or 120 changes; on six, 6 times 120, or 720; on eight bells, 40,320; and so on. But in actual practice it is very rare to have more than five or six thousand rung, even if there are eight or more bells; about 1,600 changes can be rung in the course of an hour, and two to three hours’ consecutive work is as much as an ordinary ringer is capable of accomplishing. The essential feature of each set of changes is to bring the bells round to the order in which they started; as they would naturally do in the peal given above.
The result of the introduction of systematic and organized change-ringing was that companies or societies of ringers were very soon formed. So early as 1603 we hear of a company known as the “Scholars of Cheapside,” formed in London. In 1637 was founded a famous London Society, that of the “College Youths,” probably a revival of the one just named; its name is derived from some connection with Sir Richard Whittington’s College of the Holy Ghost, near Cannon Street. It was to them that Stedman dedicated his Tintinnalogia, the work already mentioned. There is still an energetic “Ancient Society of College Youths,” but it is not certain whether it can trace an actual descent from the older society. Another well-known ringing society is that of the “Cumberland Youths,” originally “London Scholars,” who changed their name in 1746 in compliment to the victor of Culloden.