“He sette not his benefice to hire,
And let his sheep accombred in the mire
And ran to London, unto S. Paules,
To seken him a chanterie for soules,
Or with a Brotherhede to be withhold;
But dwelt at home, and kepte well his folde.
So that the wolfe ne made it not miscarry.
He was a shepherd, and no mercenary.”
It is impossible to estimate the number of persons who lived within the Cathedral Close, and were connected with its establishment. Besides the minor officers such as the almoner, vergers, surveyor, scribes, bookbinder, brewer, baker, &c., there were the chaplain and household of the Bishop, the higher officials already enumerated, the choir-boys, the bedesmen and poor, and a host of others.
The baker’s task was no sinecure. It is calculated that the yearly issue of bread amounted to no less than forty thousand loaves. The weight and quality of the loaves, varying according to the rank of the persons supplied, were matters of sufficient importance to be regulated by statute.
With such an ample staff, we may naturally expect that the religious life of the Cathedral exhibited a busy scene. Seven times a day the bells of the Cathedral sounded for the canonical hours. Nocturns or Matins was a service before day-break; Lauds, a service at day-break, quickly following, or even joining Matins; Prime, a late morning service at six o’clock; Tirce, at nine o’clock; Sexts, at noon; Nones, at three o’clock in the afternoon; Vespers, an evening service; and Compline, a late evening service, at bed-time. In 1263, it was ordered that Vespers and Compline should be said together.
Besides a very ample supply of vestments, sacred vessels, relics, and ornaments, old St. Paul’s possessed a fine store of service-books. The greatest treasures were probably the codices or manuscripts of the Gospels. Of these no less than eleven are mentioned in the inventory of the Visitation in 1295, some written in the very large letters of the Saxon period. The ritual books included many fine examples of psalters, antiphonals, books of homilies, missals, manuals, graduals, &c., all beautifully, and even gorgeously bound. The scriptorium of the Cathedral was an important department, and was ably governed. Here were prepared, not only the service-books needed for the church, but the cathedral statutes. The Pauline scribes wrote a bold, clear hand. The inks, both red and black, retain their full lustre, as may be seen by the beautiful examples remaining at the Cathedral Library.
Vestments, plate, and, unfortunately, books also have all disappeared. The loss of the latter is irreparable. Like Sarum, York, and Hereford, St. Paul’s had a “Use” of its own, and of this Use, unfortunately, no example is extant. In 1415, Bishop Clifford, with the consent of the Dean and Chapter, decreed that the Divine Office in St. Paul’s should henceforth be conformable to that of the Church of Salisbury.
The feast days were numerous. Those of the first class included two feasts of St. Erkenwald and the two feasts of St. Paul. On these days the bells were rung two and two before the peal was sounded; on ordinary days they were sounded singly. It will be seen that there was thus an unceasing round of services, extending almost through day and night.
The ordinary daily services were supplemented still further by occasional services. There were the pilgrims to the shrines of Erkenwald and Mellitus; and a short form of prayer, with a hymn, which appears to have been used on these occasions, was printed by the late Dr. Sparrow Simpson, Sub-Dean. An extraordinary instance of this devotion occurred in 1322, when Thomas, earl of Lancaster, grandson of Henry III., and cousin of Edward II., who was then king, was taken captive after his defeat at the battle of Boroughbridge. Six days afterwards he was tried, condemned, and beheaded in his own Castle of Pomfret by a court of peers, with Edward himself at their head. He was sentenced as a rebel taken in arms against the King, and his whole life-record was that of an unscrupulous, treacherous, and selfish man. Yet, owing perhaps to his kindness to the poor and bountiful patronage of the clergy, his fame grew after his death. Miracles were said to have been wrought at his tomb and at a tablet in St. Paul’s, erected to commemorate him.
The people prayed for his canonisation, and thronged to the Cathedral to pay their devotion to this saint of their own making. Leaden brooches, representing a knight holding a battle-axe, have been found in London, and were probably tokens given to pilgrims who had visited the tablet. The practice of distributing signs to pilgrims visiting the shrines of saints was a very common one from early times down to the Reformation period. These pilgrim signs, or signacula, were often worn by pilgrims in their hats as a sign of distinction, and a certain flavour of holiness attached to the wearer, who had braved what in those days were the real perils of a long and painful journey on foot to accomplish his pious purpose.
A similar practice, as is well known, prevails in the Mohammedan world, where a pilgrim to Mecca, the prophet’s birthplace, receives the honourable title of Hadji. The form of the signs varied greatly, and was generally a representation of the saint or his emblem. Many were issued at the shrine of St. Thomas at Canterbury, the Canterbury Bell being a frequent device; St. James of Compostella was represented by an escallop shell, and so on. The objects, which were small, and seldom much larger than a brooch, have been found in large quantities along the banks of the Thames, where the mud appears to have had a preserving influence upon the bronze of which they are made. We can well imagine the joyous return of Chaucer’s Canterbury Pilgrims, each wearing a pilgrim’s sign, when their long journey was completed.