certainly appears to be the "iter processionale" referred to in the will of William Ryder. Any information as to the subject of the good woman's tradition would be very acceptable. Perhaps S.S.S. will allow me, in return for his satisfactory explanation of the "dark passage" in question, to over a very luminous passage in confirmation of his view of Goldsmith's.
H.G.T.
Lights on the Altar (Vol. ii., p. 495.).—In the 42nd canon of those enacted under King Edgar (Thorpe's Ancient Laws and Institutes of England, vol. ii. pp. 252-3.) we find:—
"Let there be always burning lights in the church when mass is singing."
And in the 14th of the canons of Ælfric (pp. 348-9. of the same volume):—
"Acoluthus he is called, who bears the candle or taper in God's ministries when the Gospel is read, or when the housel is hallowed at the altar: not to dispel, as it were, the dim darkness, but, with that light, to announce bliss, in honour of Christ who is our light."
C.W.G.
Time when Herodotus wrote (Vol. ii., p. 405.).—The passage quoted by your correspondent A.W.H. affords, I think, a reasonable argument to prove that Herodotus did not commence his work until an advanced age; most probably between the ages of seventy and seventy-seven years. Moreover, there are various other reasons to justify the same conclusion; all which A.W.H. will find stated in Dr. Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, vol. ii. I believe A.W.H. is correct in his supposition that the passage has not been noticed before.
T.H. KERSLEY, A.B.
King William's College.