[404] Another Fleming, Thomas Hylocomius, a native of Brabant, was master of St. Alban's Grammar School, 1570-1596 (Watson, Protestant Refugees, pp. 137-139). But there is nothing to show that he encouraged the study of French.
[405] Authorities for the use of French in Scotch schools are: J. Strong, Secondary Education in Scotland, Oxford, 1909, pp. 44 et seq., 76, 142; T. P. Young, Histoire de l'enseignement primaire et secondaire en Écosse, Paris, 1907, pp. 12 et seq., pp. 64 et seq.; J. Grant, Burgh Schools of Scotland, London and Glasgow, 1876, pp. 64, 404; F. Michel, Les Écossais en France et les Français en Écosse, 1862, ii. p. 78.
[406] Autobiography and Diary of Mr. James Melville, minister of Kilrenny and Professor of Theology in the University of St. Andrews, ed. R. Pitcairn (Wodrow Soc., Edinburgh, 1842), pp. 16 et seq.
[407] His daughter Esther, who married a Scotch minister Kello, became famous for her calligraphy. Some of her work, preserved in the Bodleian, was admired by Hearne (Collections and Recollections, Oxf. Hist. Soc., 1885, i. p. 38).
[408] D. Murray, Some Early Grammars, etc., in use in Scotland, in the Proceedings of the Royal Philos. Soc. of Glasgow, xxxvii. pp. 267-8. In the List of Books printed in Scotland before 1700, by H. G. Aldis (Edinburgh Bibliog. Soc., 1904), there is not one book on the French language amongst the 3919 titles recorded.
[409] Pasquier, Letters, Amsterdam, 1723, lib. i. p. 5.
CHAPTER IV
HUGUENOT TEACHERS OF FRENCH—OTHER CLASSES OF FRENCH TEACHERS—RIVALRIES IN THE PROFESSION—THE "DUTCH" AND ENGLISH TEACHERS
We have seen that some of the refugees who came to England as a result of the persecutions in France and the Netherlands were professional schoolmasters; others joined the profession on their arrival, through force of circumstances, or as a means of repaying hospitality. The lot of such teachers varied considerably. Some lived and taught in gentlemen's families; others thrived by waiting on a private aristocratic clientèle; others gained a more precarious livelihood under less powerful patronage; and yet others opened private schools, often with decided success. Many of these teachers[410] were denizens, and had long teaching careers, chiefly in London; a certain Abraham Bushell, for instance, a native of "Rotchell," had been a "schoolmaster of the French tongue" in London for twenty-two years in 1618, during which time he had attended the French Church. Many other French teachers were members of the French Church, which naturally, seeing that it fostered a French school itself, took a particular interest in the French schoolmasters generally. Thus in 1560 all French schoolmasters having schools in London were summoned before the consistory, which was seeking to ascertain how many belonged to the Church, and also what book they used in teaching the children. Eight were ready to conform to the Church and its discipline;[411] a ninth, one Gilles Berail, refused to conform, on the plea that he attended the English parish church and understood English as well as French.