Uniform with this Volume

A short Selection only.

THE CUSTOMS OF OLD ENGLAND

BY

F. J. SNELL

METHUEN & CO. LTD.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON

First Issued in this Cheap Form in 1919

This Book was First Published (Crown 8vo) February 16th, 1911

PREFACE

The aim of the present volume is to deal with Old English Customs, not so much in their picturesque aspect—though that element is not wholly wanting—as in their fundamental relations to the organized life of the Middle Ages. Partly for that reason and partly because the work is comparatively small, it embraces only such usages as are of national (and, in some cases, international) significance. The writer is much too modest to put it forth as a scientific exposition of the basic principles of mediæval civilization. He is well aware that a book designed on this unassuming scale must be more or less eclectic. He is conscious of manifold gaps—valde deflenda. And yet, despite omissions, it is hoped that the reader may rise from its perusal with somewhat clearer conceptions of the world as it appeared to the average educated Englishman of the Middle Ages. This suggests the remark that the reader specially in view is the average educated Englishman of the twentieth century, who has not perhaps forgotten his Latin, for Latin has a way of sticking, while Greek, unless cherished, drops away from a man.

The materials of which the work is composed have been culled from a great variety of sources, and the writer almost despairs of making adequate acknowledgments. For years past admirable articles cognate to the study of mediæval relationships have been published from time to time in learned periodicals like "Archæologia," the "Archæological Journal," the "Antiquary," etc., where, being sandwiched between others of another character, they have been lost to all but antiquarian experts of omnivorous appetite. Assuredly, the average educated Englishman will not go in quest of them, but it may be thought he will esteem the opportunity, here offered, of gaining enlightenment, if not in the full and perfect sense which might have been possible, had life been less brief and art not quite so long. The same observation applies to books, with this difference that, whereas in articles information is usually compacted, in some books at least it has to be picked out from amidst a mass of irrelevant particulars without any help from indices. If the writer has at all succeeded in performing his office—which is to do for the reader what, under other circumstances, he might have done for himself—many weary hours will not have been spent in vain, and the weariest are probably those devoted to the construction of an index, with which this book, whatever its merits or defects, does not go unprovided.

Mere general statements, however, will not suffice; there is the personal side to be thought of. The great "Chronicles and Memorials" series has been served by many competent editors, but by none more competent than Messrs. Riley, Horwood, and Anstey, to whose introductions and texts the writer is deeply indebted. Reeves' "History of English Law" is not yet out of date; and Mr. E. F. Henderson's "Select Documents of the Middle Ages" and the late Mr. Serjeant Pulling's "Order of the Coif," though widely differing in scope, are both extremely useful publications. Mr. Pollard's introduction to the Clarendon Press selection of miracle plays contains the pith of that interesting subject, and Miss Toulmin Smith's "York Plays" and Miss Katherine Bates's "English Religious Drama" will be found valuable guides. Perhaps the most realistic description of a miracle play is that presented in a few pages of Morley's "English Writers," where the scene lives before one. For supplementary details in this and other contexts, the writer owes something to the industry of the late Dr. Brushfield, who brought to bear on local documents the illumination of sound and wide learning. A like tribute must be paid to the Rev. Dr. Cox, but having regard to his long and growing list of important works, the statement is a trifle ludicrous.

One of the best essays on mortuary rolls is that of the late Canon Raine in an early Surtees Society volume, but the writer is specially indebted to a contribution of the Rev. J. Hirst to the "Archæological Journal." The late Mr. André's article on vowesses, and Mr. Evelyn-White's exhaustive account of the Boy-Bishop must be mentioned, and—lest I forget—Dr. Cunningham's "History of English Commerce." The late Mr. F. T. Elworthy's paper on Hugh Rhodes directed attention to the Children of the Chapel, and Dom. H. F. Feasey led the way to the Lady Fast. Here and often the writer has supplemented his authorities out of his own knowledge and research. It may be added that, in numerous instances, indebtedness to able students (e.g., Sir George L. Gomme) has been expressed in the text, and need not be repeated. Finally, it would be ungrateful, as well as ungallant, not to acknowledge some debt to the writings of the Hon. Mrs. Brownlow, Miss Ethel Lega-Weekes, and Miss Giberne Sieveking. Ladies are now invading every domain of intellect, but the details as to University costume happened to be furnished by the severe and really intricate studies of Professor E. G. Clark.

F. J. S.

Tiverton, N. Devon,
January 22, 1911.

THE CUSTOMS OF OLD ENGLAND

CONTENTS

ECCLESIASTICAL

CHAPTER I

LEAGUES OF PRAYER

A work purporting to deal with old English customs on the broad representative lines of the present volume naturally sets out with a choice of those pertaining to the most ancient and venerable institution of the land—the Church; and, almost as naturally it culls its first flower from a life with which our ancestors were in intimate touch, and which was known to them, in a special and excellent sense, as religious.

The custom to which has been assigned the post of honour is of remarkable and various interest. It takes us back to a remote past, when the English, actuated by new-born fervour, sent the torch of faith to their German kinsmen, still plunged in the gloom of traditional paganism; and it was fated to end when the example of those same German kinsmen stimulated our countrymen to throw off a yoke which had long been irksome, and was then in sharp conflict with their patriotic ideals. It is foreign to the aim of these antiquarian studies to sound any note of controversy, but it will be rather surprising if the beauty and pathos of the custom, which is to engage our attention, does not appeal to many who would not have desired its revival in our age and country.[1] Typical of the thoughts and habits of our ancestors, it is no less typical of their place and share of the general system of Western Christendom, and in the heritage of human sentiment, since reverence for the dead is common to all but the most degraded races of mankind. That mutual commemoration of departed, and also of living, worth was not exclusive to this country is brought home to us by the fact that the most learned and comprehensive work on the subject, in its Christian and mediæval aspects, is Ebner's "Die Klosterlichen Gebets-Verbrüderungen" (Regensburg and New York, 1890). This circumstance, however, by no means diminishes—it rather heightens-the interest of a custom for centuries embedded in the consciousness and culture of the English people.

First, it may be well to devote a paragraph to the phrases applied to the institution. The title of the chapter is "Leagues of Prayer," but it would have been simple to substitute for it any one of half a dozen others—less definite, it is true—sanctioned by the precedents of ecclesiastical writers. One term is "friendship"; and St. Boniface, in his letters referring to the topic, employs indifferently the cognate expressions "familiarity," "charity" (or "love"). Sometimes he speaks of the "bond of brotherhood" and "fellowship." Venerable Bede favours the word "communion." Alcuin, in his epistles, alternates between the more precise description "pacts of charity" and the vaguer expressions "brotherhood" and "familiarity." The last he employs very commonly. The fame of Cluny as a spiritual centre led to the term "brotherhood" being preferred, and from the eleventh century onwards it became general.

The privilege of fraternal alliance with other religious communities was greatly valued, and admission was craved in language at once humble, eloquent, and touchingly sincere. Venerable Bede implores the monks of Lindisfarne to receive him as their "little household slave"—he desires that "my name also" may be inscribed in the register of the holy flock. Many a time does Alcuin avow his longing to "merit" being one of some congregation in communion of love; and, in writing to the Abbeys of Girwy and Wearmouth, he fails not to remind them of the "brotherhood" they have granted him.

The term "brother," in some contexts, bore the distinctive meaning of one to whom had been vouchsafed the prayers and spiritual boons of a convent other than that of which he was a member, if, as was not always or necessarily the case, he was incorporated in a religious order. The definition furnished by Ducange, who quotes from the diptych of the Abbey of Bath, proves how wide a field the term covers, even when restricted to confederated prayer:

"Fratres interdum inde vocantur qui in ejusmodi Fraternitatem sive participationem orationum aliorumque bonorum spiritualium sive monachorum sive aliarum Ecclesiarum et jam Cathedralium admissi errant, sive laici sive ecclesiastici."

Thus the secular clergy and the laity were recognized as fully eligible for all the benefits of this high privilege, but it is identified for the most part with the functions of the regular clergy, whose leisured and tranquil existence was more consonant with the punctual observance of the custom, and by whom it was handed down to successive generations as a laudable and edifying practice importing much comfort for the living, and, it might be hoped, true succour for the pious dead.

In so far as the custom was founded on any particular text of Scripture, it may be considered to rest on the exhortation of St. James, which is cited by St. Boniface: "Pray for one another that ye may be saved, for the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." St. Boniface is remembered as the Apostle of Germany, and when, early in the eighth century, he embarked on his perilous mission, he and his company made a compact with the King of the East Angles, whereby the monarch engaged that prayers should be offered on their behalf in all the monasteries in his dominion. On the death of members of the brotherhood, the tidings were to be conveyed to their fellows in England, as opportunity occurred. Not only did Boniface enter into leagues of prayer with Archbishops of Canterbury and the chapters and monks of Winchester, Worcester, York, etc., but he formed similar ties with the Church of Rome and the Abbey of Monte Cassino, binding himself to transmit the names of his defunct brethren for their remembrance and suffrage, and promising prayers and masses for their brethren on receiving notice of their decease. Lullus, who followed St. Boniface as Archbishop of Mayence, and other Anglo-Saxon missionaries extended the scope of the confederacy, linking themselves with English and Continental monasteries—for instance, Salzburg. Wunibald, a nephew of St. Boniface, imitating his uncle's example, allied himself with Monte Cassino. We may add that in Alcuin's time York was in league with Ferrières; and in 849 the relations between the Abbey and Cathedral of the former city and their friends on the Continent were solemnly confirmed.

Having given some account of the infancy or adolescence of the custom, we may now turn to what may be termed, without disrespect, the machinery of the institution. The death of a dignitary, or of a clerk distinguished for virtue and learning, or of a simple monk has occurred. Forthwith his name is engrossed on a strip of parchment, which is wrapped round a stick or a wooden roll, at each end of the latter being a wooden or metal cap designed to prevent the parchment from slipping off. After the tenth century, at certain periods—say once a year—the names of dead brethren were carried to the scriptorium, where they were entered with the utmost precision, and with reverent art, on a mortuary roll.

The next step was to summon a messenger, and fasten the roll to his neck, after which the brethren, in a group at the gateway, bade him God-speed. These officials were numerous enough to form a distinct class, and some hundreds of them might have been found wending their way simultaneously on the same devout errand through the Christian Kingdoms of the West, in which they were variously known as geruli, cursores, diplomates, and bajuli. We may picture them speeding from one church or one abbey to another, bearing their mournful missive, and when England had been traversed, crossing the narrow seas to resume their melancholy task on the Continent. At whatever place he halted, the messenger might count on a sympathetic reception; and in every monastery the roll, having been detached from his neck, was read to the assembled brethren, who proceeded to render the solemn chant and requiem for the dead in compliance with their engagements. On the following day the messenger took his leave, lavishly supplied with provisions for the next stage.

Monasteries often embraced the opportunity afforded by these visits to insert the name of some brother lately deceased, in order to avoid waiting for the dispatch of their own annual encyclical, and so to notify, sooner than would otherwise have been possible, the death of members for whom they desired the prayers of the association.

Mortuary rolls, many examples of which have been found in national collections—some of them as much as fifty or sixty feet in length—contain strict injunctions specifying that the house and day of arrival be inscribed on the roll in each monastery, together with the name of the superior, the purpose being to preclude any failure on the part of the messenger worn out with the fatigue, or daunted by the hardships and perils, of the journey. The circuit having been completed, the parchment returned to the monastery from which it had issued, whereupon a scrutiny was made to ascertain, by means of the dates, whether the errand had been duly performed. "After many months' absence," says Dr. Rock, "the messenger would reach his own cloister, carrying back with him the illuminated death-bill, now filled to its fullest length with dates and elegies, for his abbot to see that the behest of the chapter had been duly done, and the library of the house enriched with another document."

One of the Durham rolls is thirteen yards in length and nine inches in breadth. Consisting of nineteen sheets of parchment, it was executed on the death of John Burnby, a Prior of Durham, in 1464. His successor, Richard Bell, who was afterwards Bishop of Durham, and the convent, caused this roll, commemorating the virtues of the late Prior and William of Ebchester, another predecessor, to be circulated through the religious houses of the entire kingdom; and inscribed on it are the titles, orders, and dedications of no fewer than six hundred and twenty-three. Each had undertaken to pray for the souls of the two priors in return for the prayers of the monks at Durham. The roll opens with a superb illumination, three feet long, depicting the death and burial of one of the priors; and at the foot occurs the formula: Anima Magistri Willielmi Ebchestre et anima Johannis Burnby et animæ omnium defunctorum per Dei misericordiam in pace requiescant.

The monastery first visited makes the following entry: Titulus Monasterii Beatæ Mariæ de Gyseburn in Clyveland, ordinis S. Augustini Ebor. Dioc. Anima Magistri Willielmi Ebchestre et anima Johannis Burnby et animæ omnium defunctorum per misericordiam Dei in pace requiescant. Vestris nostra damus, pro nostris vestra rogamus. The other houses employ identical terms, with the exception of the monastery of St. Paul, Newenham, Lincolnshire, which substitutes for the concluding verse a hexameter of similar import. It is of some interest to remark that, apart from armorial or fanciful initials, the standing of a house may be gauged by the handwriting, the titles of the larger monasteries being given in bold letters, while those of the smaller form an almost illegible scrawl. The greater houses would have been in a position to support a competent scribe—not so the lesser; and this is believed to have been the reason of the difference.

Almost, if not quite, as important as the roll just noticed is that of Archbishop Islip of Westminster recently reproduced in Vetusta Monumenta.

After the tenth century it appears to have been the custom in some monasteries, on the death of a member, to record the fact; and at certain periods—probably once a year—the names of all the dead brethren were inscribed on an elaborate mortuary roll in the scriptorium, before being dispatched to the religious houses throughout the land.

The books of the confraternities are divisible into two classes—necrologies and libri vitae. The former are in the shape of a calendar, in which the names are arranged according to the days on which the deaths took place; the latter include the names of the living as well as the dead, and were laid on the altar to aid the memory of the priest during mass. Twice a day—at the chapter after prime and at mass—the monks assembled to listen to the recitation of the names, singly or collectively, from the sacramentary, diptych, or book of life. The most famous English liber vitae—that of Durham—embraces entries dating from the time of Edwin, King of Northumbria (616-633), and was compiled, apparently, between the devastation of Lindisfarne in 793 and the withdrawal of the monks from the island in 875. In the first handwriting there are 3,100 names, a goodly proportion of them belonging to the seventh century. As has been already implied, various degrees are represented in the rolls of the living and the dead—notably, of course, benefactors, but recorded in them are bishops and abbots, princes and nobles, monks and laymen, and often enough this is their only footprint on the sands of time. The name of a pilgrim in the confraternity book of any abbey signifies that he was there on the day mentioned.

ECCLESIASTICAL

CHAPTER II

VOWESSES

Not wholly aloof from the subject treated in the previous chapter is the custom that prevailed in the Middle Ages for widows to assume vows of chastity. The present topic might possibly have been reserved for the pages devoted to domestic customs, but the recognition accorded by the Church to a state which was neither conventual nor lay, but partook of both conditions in equal measure, decides its position in the economy of the work. We must deal with it here.

Before discussing the custom in its historical and social relations, it will be well to advert to the soil of thought out of which it sprang, and from which it drew strength and sustenance. Already we have spoken of the heritage of human sentiment. Now there is ample evidence that the indifference to the marriage of widows which marks our time did not obtain always and everywhere. On the contrary, among widely separated races such arrangements evoked deep repugnance, as subversive of the perfect union of man and wife, and clearly also of the civil inferiority of females. The notion that a woman is the property of her husband, joined to a belief in the immortality of the soul, appears to lie at the root of the dislike to second marriages—which, according to this view, imply a degree of freedom approximating to immorality. The culmination of duty and fidelity in life and death is seen in the immolation of Hindu widows. The Manu prescribes no such fiery ordeal, but it states the principles leading to this display of futile heroism: "Let her consecrate her body by living entirely on flowers, roots, and fruits. Let her not, when her lord is deceased, ever pronounce the name of another man. A widow who slights her deceased lord by marrying again brings disgrace on herself here below, and shall be excluded from the seat of her lord."

A similar feeling permeated the early Church. "The argument used against the unions," says Professor Donaldson, "was that God made husband and wife one flesh, and one flesh they remained even after the death of one of them. If they were one flesh, how could a second woman be added to them?" He alludes, of course, to the re-marriage of the husband, but the argument, whatever it may be worth, applies equally to both parties. An ancient example of renunciation is afforded by Judith, of whom it is recorded: "She was a widow now three years and six months, and she made herself a private chamber in the upper part of the house, in which she abode shut up with her maids and she wore hair-cloth upon her loins, and fasted all the days of her life, except the Sabbaths and new moons, and the feasts of the house of Israel; and on festival days she came forth in great glory, and she abode in her husband's house a hundred and five years."

An order of widows is said to have been founded or confirmed by St. Paul, who fixed the age of admission at sixty. This assertion, one suspects, grew out of a passage in the First Epistle to Timothy, in which the apostle employs language that would, at least, be consonant with such a proceeding: "Honour widows that are widows indeed.... Now she that is a widow indeed and desolate trusteth in God and continueth in supplications and prayers night and day." Simple but very striking is the epitaph inscribed on the wall of the Vatican:

OCTAVIÆ MATRONÆ VIDVÆ DEI.

The order of deaconesses appears to have been mainly composed of pious widows, and only those were eligible who had had but one husband. This order came to an end in the eleventh or twelfth century, but the vowesses, as a class, continued to subsist in England until the convulsions of the sixteenth century, and in the Roman Church survive as a class with some modifications in the order of Oblates, who, says Alban Butler in his life of St. Francis, "make no solemn vows, only a promise of obedience to the mother-president, enjoy pensions, inherit estates, and go abroad with leave." Their abbey in Rome is filled with ladies of the first rank.

The chief distinction between deaconesses and widows was the obligation imposed on the former to accomplish certain outward works, whereas widows vowed to remain till death in a single life, in which, like nuns, they were regarded as mystically espoused to Christ. Unlike nuns, however, vowesses usually supported the burdens entailed by their previous marriage—superintending the affairs of the household and interesting themselves in the welfare of their descendants. St. Elizabeth of Hungary, though she bound herself to follow the injunctions of her confessor and received from him a coarse habit of undyed wool, did not become a nun, but, on his advice, retained her secular estate and ministered to the needs of the poor. But instances occur in which vowesses retired from the world and its cares. Elfleda, niece of King Athelstan, having resolved to pass the remainder of her days in widowhood, fixed her abode in Glastonbury Abbey; and as late as July 23, 1527, leave was granted to the Prioress of Dartford to receive "any well-born matron widow, of good repute, to dwell perpetually in the monastery without a habit according to the custom of the monastery." Now and then a widow would completely embrace the religious life, as is shown by an inscription on the brass of John Goodrington, of Appleton, Berkshire, dated 1519, which states that his widow "toke relygyon at y^e monastery of Sion."

The position of vowesses in the eyes of the Church may be illustrated in various ways. For example, the homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Ælfric testify to a triple division of the people of God. "There are," says he, "three states which bear witness of Christ; that is, maidenhood, and widowhood, and lawful matrimony." And with the quaintness of mediæval symbolists, he affirms that the house of Cana in Galilee had three floors—the lowest occupied by believing married laymen, the next by reputable widows, and the uppermost by virgins. Emphasis is given to the order of comparative merit thus defined by the application to it of one of our Lord's parables, for the first are to receive the thirty-fold, the second the sixty-fold, and the third and highest division the hundred-fold reward. Similarly, a hymn in the Sarum Missal for the festival of Holy Women asserts:

Fruit thirty-fold she yielded,
While yet a wedded wife;
But sixty-fold she rendered,
When in a widowed life.

And a Good Friday prayer in the same missal is introduced with the words: "Let us also pray for all bishops, priests, deacons, sub-deacons, acolytes, exorcists, readers, door-keepers, confessors, virgins, widows, and all the holy people of God."

In the pontifical of Bishop Lacy of Exeter may be found the office of the Benediction of a Widow. The ceremony was performed during mass, and prefixed to the office is a rubric directing that it shall take place on a solemn day or at least upon a Sunday. Between the epistle and gospel the bishop, seated in his chair, turned towards the people, asked the kneeling widow if she desired to be the spouse of Christ. Thereupon she made her profession in the vulgar tongue, and the bishop, rising, gave her his blessing. Then followed four prayers, in one of which the bishop blessed the habit, after which he kneeled, began the hymn "Veni Creator Spiritus," and at the close bestowed upon the vowess the mantle, the veil, and the ring. More prayers were said, wherein the bishop besought God to be the widow's solace in trouble, counsel in perplexity, defence under injury, patience in tribulation, abundance in poverty, food in fasting, and medicine in sickness; and the rite ended with a renewed commendation of the widow to the merciful care of God.

It is worthy of note that in these supplications mention is made of the sixty-fold reward which the widow is to receive for her victory over her old enemy the Devil; and also, that the postulant is believed to have made her vow with her hands joined within those of the bishop, as if swearing allegiance.

Several witnesses were necessary on the occasion. When, for instance, the widow of Simon de Shardlowe made her profession before the Bishop of Norwich, as she did in 1369, the deed in which the vow was registered, and upon which she made the sign of the cross in token of consent, was witnessed by the Archdeacon of Norwich, Sir Simon de Babingle, and William de Swinefleet. In the same way the Earl of Warwick, the Lords Willoughby, Scales, and others, were present at the profession of Isabella, Countess of Suffolk. This noble lady made her vow in French, as did also Isabella Golafré, when she appeared for the purpose on Sunday, October 18, 1379, before William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester. Notwithstanding the direction in Bishop Lacy's pontifical, the vow was sometimes spoken in Latin, an instance of which is the case of "Domina Alicia Seynt Johan de Baggenet," whose profession took place on April 9, 1398, in the chapel of the Lord of Amberley, Sussex.

That the vow was restricted to the obligation of perpetual chastity, and in no way curtailed the freedom and privileges which the vowess shared with other ladies, is demonstrated by the contents of various wills, like that of Katherine of Riplingham, dated February 8, 1473. Therein she styles herself an "advowess"; but, having forfeited none of her civil rights, she devises estates, executes awards, and composes family differences. This is quite in the spirit of St. Paul's words: "If any widows have children or nephews, let them learn first to show piety at home, and to requite their parents, for that is good and acceptable to God."

Allusion has been made to the ring as the symbol of the spiritual espousal. As such it was the object of peculiar reverence, and its destination was frequently specified in the vowess's will. Thus in "Testamenta Vetusta" we find the abstract of the will of Alice, widow of Sir Thomas West, dated 1395, in which the lady bequeaths "the ring with which I was spoused to God" to her son Sir Thomas. In like manner Katherine Riplingham leaves a gold ring set with a diamond—the ring with which she was sacred—to her daughter Alice Saint John. To some vowesses the custody even of a son or daughter appeared unworthy of so precious a relic; and thus we learn that Lady Joan Danvers, by her will dated 1453, gave her spousal ring to the image of the Crucifix near the north door of St. Paul's, while Lady Margaret Davy presented hers to the image of Our Lady of Walsingham.

In certain instances the formality of episcopal benediction was dispensed with, a simple promise sufficing. As a case in point, John Brackenbury, by his will dated 1487, bequeathed to his mother certain real estate subject to the condition that she did not marry again—a condition to which she assented before the parson and parish of Thymmylbe. "If," says the testator, "she keep not that promise, I will that she be content with that which was my father's will, which she had every penny." But, in compacts or wills in which the married parties themselves were interested, the vow seems to have been usually exacted. Wives sometimes engaged with their husbands to make the vow; and the will of William Herbert, Knight, Earl of Pembroke, dated July 27, 1469, contains an affecting reminder of duty—"And, wife, that you may remember your promise to take the order of widowhood, so that you may be the better maistres of your owen, to perform my will, and to help my children, as I love and trust you," etc.

Husbands left chattels to their wives provided that they took the vow of chastity. The will of Sir Gilbert Denys, Knight, of Syston, dated 1422, sets out: "If Margaret, my wife, will after my death vow a vow of chastity, I give her all my moveable goods, she paying my debts and providing for my children; and if she will not vow the vow of chastity, I desire my goods may be divided and distributed in three equal parts." On like terms wives were appointed executrices. William Edlington, Esq., of Castle Carlton, in his will dated June 11, 1466, declares: "I make Christian, my wife, my sole executor on this condition, that she take the mantle soon after my decease; and in case she will not take the mantle and the ring, I will that William my son [and other persons named] be my executors, and she to have a third part of all my goods moveable."

Such is the frailty of human nature that even when widows accepted the obligation of faith and chastity in the most solemn manner, the vow was occasionally broken. This will hardly excite surprise when we consider the youth, or comparative youth, of some of the postulants. Mary, the widow of Lewis, King of Hungary, was only twenty-three at the time of her profession. Our English annals yield striking instances of promises followed by repentance. Thus Eleanor, third daughter of King John, "on the death of her first husband, the Earl of Pembroke, 1231, in the first transports of her grief, made in public a solemn vow in the presence of Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, that she would never again become a wife, but remain a true spouse of Christ, and received a ring in confirmation, which she, however, broke, much to the indignation of a strong party of the laity and clergy of England, on her marriage with Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester." Another delinquent was Lady Elizabeth Juliers, Countess of Kent. When her first husband died, in 1354, she took a vow of chastity before William de Edyndon, Archbishop of Canterbury. Six years later she was wedded privately and without licence to Sir Eustace Dabridgecourt, Knight. As the result, the Archbishop of Canterbury instituted proceedings against her, and she was condemned to severe penance for the remainder of her life. In the light of these examples it is unnecessary to observe that the infraction of a vow so strict and stringent brought the utmost discredit on any widow who might be guilty of it.

The question has been raised why widows did not, instead of making their especial vow, enter the third orders of St. Dominic and St. Francis, both of them intended for pious persons remaining in the world. The answer has already, in some degree, been given in what was said regarding the extinct order of deaconesses. Followers of St. Dominic and St. Francis were bound to recite daily a shortened form of the Breviary, supposing that they were able to read, or, if they were not able, a certain number of Aves and Paternosters. They were further expected to observe sundry fasts over and above those commanded by the Church, and thus they became qualified for all the benefits accruing to the first two orders, Dominican and Franciscan. With the vowesses it was different. The one condition imposed upon them was that of chastity, as tending to a state of sanctification. They took upon themselves no other obligation whatever, and consequently acquired no title to the blessings and privileges flowing from the strict observance of rules to which they did not subscribe. Even after the Reformation the custom did not absolutely cease. At any rate, Anne Clifford, Countess of Dorset, who died in 1676, is stated, after the death of her last husband, to have dressed in black serge and to have been very abstemious in the matter of food.

Here and there may be found funeral monuments containing representations of vowesses. Leland remarks, with reference to a member of the Marmion family at West Tanfield, Yorkshire: "There lyeth there alone a lady with the apparill of a vowess"; and in Norfolk there are still in existence two brasses of widows and vowesses. The earlier and smaller, of about the year 1500, adjoins the threshold of the west door of Witton church, near Blofield, and bears the figure of a lady in a gown, mantle, barbe or gorget, and veil, together with the inscription:

ORATE ANIMA DOMINE JULIANE ANGELL
VOTRICIS CUJUS ANIME PROPRICIETUR DEUS.

The other example is in the little church of Frenze, near Diss, which contains, among a number of other interesting brasses, that of a lady clothed, like the former, in gown, mantle, barbe, and veil. This figure, however, shows cuffs; the gown is encircled with an ornamental girdle, and depending from the mantle on long cords ending in tassels. Underneath runs the legend:

HIC JACET TUMULATA DOMINA JOHANNA
BRAHAM VIRDUA AC DEO DEDICATA. OLIM UXOREM
JOHANNIS BRAHAM ARMIGERI QUI OBIT XVIII DIE
NOVEMBRIS ANNO DOMINI MILLINO CCCCXIX CU
JUS ANIME PROPICIETUR DEUS. AMEN.

Below are three shields, of which the dexter bears the husband's arms, the sinister those of Dame Braham's family, and the middle the coats impaled. In neither of these examples is the ring—the most important symbol—displayed on the vowess's finger. This omission may be explained, perhaps, by the fact that it was not buried with her, being, as we have seen, sometimes bequeathed as an heirloom and sometimes left as a gift to the Church.

Notwithstanding the desire of so many husbands that their widows should live "sole, without marriage," it is well known that second and even third marriages were not uncommon in the Middle Ages, and, provided that they did not involve an infraction of some solemn engagement, do not appear to have incurred social censure any more than at present.

ECCLESIASTICAL

CHAPTER III

THE LADY FAST

It was pointed out as one of the distinctions between vowesses and members of the third orders of the Dominican and Franciscan brotherhoods that the latter were pledged to the observance of fasts from which the former were exempt. Tyndale complains of the "open idolatry" of abstinences undertaken in honour of St. Patrick, St. Brandan, and other holy men of old; and he lays special stress on "Our Lady Fast," which, he explains, was kept "either seven years the same day that her day falleth in March, and then begin, or one year with bread and water." Whatever fasts a vowess might neglect as non-obligatory, it seems probable that she would not willingly forgo any opportunity of showing reverence to the Blessed Virgin, who, in the belief of St. Augustine, had taken vows of chastity before the salutation of the Angel.

It is not a little curious that the Lady Fast, in the forms mentioned by Tyndale, was so far from being enjoined by the Church as to be actually opposed to the decree of the Roman Council of 1078, which indicated Saturday as the day of the week appropriated to the honour of the Blessed Virgin. This usage was as well understood in the British Isles as elsewhere. Thus, in "Piers Plowman":

Lechery said "Alas!" and on Our Lady he cried
To make mercy for his misdeeds between God and his soul,
With that he should the Saturday seven year thereafter
Drink but with the duck, and dine but once.

Bower, the continuator of Fordun's "Scotichronicon," makes it a reproach to lax prelates that they suffer the common people to vary after their own pleasure the days kept as fast days in honour of Mary. In doing so he recalls that on Saturday, the first Easter Eve, she abode unshakenly in the faith, when the apostles doubted. Good reason, therefore, why Saturday should be dedicated to her as a fast. "But now," he continues, "you will see both men and women on a Saturday morning make good dinners, who, on a Tuesday or a Thursday, would not touch a crust of bread, lest they should break the Lady Fast kept after their own fancy."

Tyndale seems to have erred in intimating that the Lady Fast, if of an annual character, was regulated of necessity by the feast of the Annunciation, or, in the happier, more affectionate phrase of our forefathers, "the Gretynge of Our Ladye." The Blessed Virgin had no fewer than six festivals—those of the Conception, Nativity, Annunciation, Visitation, Purification, and Assumption—any one of which might be made the starting-point of the fast either by the choice of the votary or by the cast of the die. A third method is instanced in the "Popish Kingdom" of Barnabe Googe (1570), actually an English metrical version of a truculent German satire by one Thomas Kirchmeyer, who was scholar enough to Latinize, or Græcize, his homely patronymic into the more imposing correlative "Naogeorgus." The passage is as follows:

Besides they keep Our Lady's fast at sundry solemn times,
Instructed by a turning wheel, or as the lot assigns.
For every sexton has a wheel that hangeth for the view,
Mark'd round about with certain days, unto the Virgin due,
Which holy through the year are kept, from whence hangs down a thread
Of length sufficient to be touched and to be handled.
Now when that any servant of Our Lady cometh here
And seeks to have some certain day by lot for to appear,
The sexton turns the wheel about, and bids the stander-by
To hold the thread whereby he doth the time and season try,
Wherein he ought to keep his fast and every other thing
That decent is and longing to Our Lady's worshipping.

Although, as has been said, the "Popish Kingdom" had a German original, it is an extraordinary fact that no Continental example of the Lady Fast wheel is known to exist. Two English wheels have been preserved—both of them in East Anglian churches: viz., those of Long Stratton, Norfolk, and Yaxley, Suffolk. Of the two the former is the more perfect. That at Yaxley consists of a pair of wheels, cut out of sheet iron, which measure a little over two feet in diameter, and are similar and concentric, but separate. The Long Stratton wheels, on the other hand, have a pin passing through the centre which holds them together, and around which they revolve, each of them independently. To the same pin is attached the forked end of a long pendent handle, which was held by the sexton. Each wheel is pierced with three holes through which strings were passed, the total number coinciding with that of the six feasts sacred to Mary, or possibly to the six days of the week excluding Sunday, which did not rank as a fast day.

The instrument was worked in the following manner. Should a devout person desire to keep a Lady Fast, he or she repaired to the church to determine by the aid of the wheel which of the days or anniversaries should be observed. Thereupon the sexton took the wheel, which he either hung up or held at arm's length by means of a ring at the termination of the handle. He then set the wheel in motion, and the votary, standing by, caught at the strings as they spun round. Whichever string was caught decided the question on what day the fast was to be begun, whether on the feast of the Annunciation or that of the Assumption, or any other of the six feasts, or days of the week, of which the several strings were emblematical. The feast of the Assumption was known as Lady Day in Harvest, being observed on the fifteenth of August.

The compromise, which we style the Reformation, at first inclined to the retention of the Saturday fast; and, indeed, the legislature interfered to enforce its more regular observance. In 1548 a remarkable measure was enacted with this object, not so much, it is to be feared, out of any genuine concern for religion as for the benefit of the fishing community, whose interests had been injuriously affected by recent ecclesiastical changes.

"Albeit," it recites, "the King's subjects now having a more perfect and clear light of the Gospel and true word of God, through the infinite cleansing and mercy of Almighty God, by the hand of the King's Majesty and his most noble father of famous memory, promulgate, shewed, declared and opened, and thereby perceiving that one day or one kind of meat of itself is not more holy, more pure, or more clean than another, for that all days and all meats be of their nature of one equal purity, cleanness, and holiness, and that all men should by them live to the glory of God, and at all times and for all meats give thanks unto Him, of which meats none can defile Christian men or make them unclean at any time, to whom all meats be lawful and pure, so that they be not used in disobedience or vice; yet forasmuch as divers of the King's subjects turning their knowledge therein to satisfy their sensuality, when they should thereby increase in virtue, have in late time more than in times past, broken and contemned such abstinence which hath been used in the Realm upon the Fridays and Saturdays, the Embering days, and other days commonly called Vigils, and in the time commonly called Lent and other accustomed times: the King's Majesty, considering that due and godly abstinence is a means to virtue, and to subdue men's bodies to their soul and spirit, and considering also especially that Fishers, and men using the trade of living by fishing in the sea, may thereby the rather be set on work, and that by eating of fish much flesh shall be saved and increased, and also for divers other considerations and commodities of this realm, doth ordain 'that all statutes and constitutions regarding fasting be repealed, but that all persons neglecting to observe the ordinary fast days—Fridays, Saturdays, Ember days, and Lent—be subject to a fine of ten shillings and ten days' imprisonment for the first offence.'"

This measure, so inconsistent with the spirit of the age and so contradictory in its terms, was re-enacted at various dates during the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. It is perhaps the last "word" as regards the Lady Fast, but the legislature by no means suspended its vigilance in enforcing abstinence at the proper season. Discussion of post-Reformation fasting, however, or fasting in general, forms no part of our present undertaking.

ECCLESIASTICAL

CHAPTER IV

CHILDREN OF THE CHAPEL

The fact may not have escaped notice that Domina Alicia Seynt Johan de Baggenet "took the vow of widowhood in the chapel of the Lord of Amberley." Possession of a private chapel was, as it still is, a mark of social distinction. "It was once the constitution of the English," runs a law of King Athelstan, "that the people and their legal condition went according to their merits; and then were the councillors of the nation honoured each one according to his quality, the earl and the ceorl, the thane and the underthane. If a ceorl throve so as to have five hides booked to him, a church, bell-tower, a seat in the borough, and an office in the King's court, from that time forward he was esteemed equal in honour to a thane." Again, the laws of King Edgar relating to tithe ordain "that God's church be entitled to every right, and that every tithe be rendered to the old minster to which the district belongs, and be then so paid, both from the thane's inland and from geneat land, as the plough traverses it. But if there be any thane who on his boc-land has a church at which there is a burial-place, let him give the third part of his own tithe to his church. If anyone hath a church at which there is not a burial-place, then of the same nine parts let him then give to his priest what he will."

Domestic chapels were extremely common all through the Middle Ages. In the parish of Tiverton, Devon, there were at least seventeen, some of them within less than a mile of each other. Allusions to these oratories are found in the registers of the Bishops of Exeter, by whom they were severally licensed for the convenience of the owner, his family, and his tenants. As a rule, they were in rooms of the house or castle, not separate buildings. Andrew Boorde, in his directions for the construction of a sixteenth-century mansion, remarks: "Let the privy chamber be annexed to the great chamber of estate, with other chambers necessary for the building, so that many of the chambers may have a prospect into the chapel."

Great nobles of the post-Conquest period were not content with the services of a priest only. They maintained an establishment of singing men and boys analogous to the vicars-choral and choristers of the present time, who were described as "the gentlemen and children of the chapel." From the household books of the Earl of Northumberland (a.d. 1510-11) we learn that he had "daily abidynge in his household—Gentillmen of the Chapel, ix; viz., the maistre of the Childre, j; Tenors, ij; Counter-tenors, iiij; the Pistoler, j; and oone for the Orgayns; Childer of the Chapell, vj."

Particulars are recorded of the daily allowances of bread, beer, and fish during Lent. On Scambling Days it was usual not to provide regular meals, each having to scramble or shift for himself, but things were otherwise ordered in the mansion of the Percy, where the service of meat and drink "upon Scambling Days in Lent yerely" was properly seen to. Not only are we furnished with the "Ordre of all suche Braikfasts that shall be lowable daily in my Lordes hous thorowte the yere as well on Flesche days as Fysch days in Lent, and out of Lent," but accounts are supplied of the liveries of wine, white wine, and wax, and also of wood and coal, of which the Master and the Children of the Chapel were entitled to one peck per diem. The cost of the washing of surplices, etc., was not to exceed a stated sum. "Then shal be paid for the Holl weshing of all manner of Lynnon belonging to the Lordes Chappell for a Holl yere but xvijs. iiijd. And to be weshed for every Penny iij Surplesses or iij Albes. And the said Surplesses to be weshed in the yere xvj tymes against these Feasts following," &c.

The salaries of the choir were paid at definite intervals, and formed a charge on his lordship's property in Yorkshire. The scale of remuneration was as follows:

"Gentillmen of the Chappell x (as to saye, Two at x marks a pece, iij at iiijl. a pece, Two at v marks a pece, Oon at iiij marks, Oon at xxs., and Oon at xxs.; viz., ij Bassis, ij Tenors and vj Counter-tenors). Childeryn of the Chappell vj, after xxvs. a pece. And so the whole somme for full contentacion of the said Chappell wagies for oone hole yere ys—xxxvl. xvs."

The gentlemen slept two in a bed, as seems to have been the custom for priests also; the children, three in a bed. ("There shall be for vj Prests iij Beddes after ij to a Bedde; for x Gentillmen of the Chapell v Beddes, after ij to a Bedde; for vj Children ij Beddes after iij to a Bedde.")

Not only noblemen, but the Princes of the Church had their private chapels, for which the services of children were retained. George Cavendish, in his "Life of Wolsey," gives a glowing account of the Cardinal's palatial appointments, in the course of which he observes: "Now I will declare unto you the officers of his chapel and singing men of the same. First he had there a dean, a great divine, and a man of excellent learning; and a sub-dean, a repeater of the choir, a gospeller and epistler of the singing-priests, and a master of the children [therefore, of course, children]; in the vestry a yeoman and two grooms, besides other retainers that came thither at principal feasts.... And as for the furniture of the chapel it passeth my weak capacity to declare the number of the costly ornaments and rich jewels that were occupied in the same, for I have seen in procession about the hall forty-four rich copes of one settle worn, besides the candlesticks and other necessary ornaments to the furniture of the same." Such were the sumptuous surroundings in which "children of the chapel" were wont sometimes to perform their office.

An element of distinction enjoyed by peer and prelate was not likely to be absent from the first estate of the realm; and, in point of fact, the phrase "children of the chapel," so far as it is known, is more commonly associated with the King's court than any of the castles or episcopal palaces of the land. Certain of the King's "Gentlemen of the Chapel" seem to have received payment in money, including extraordinary fees, and provided for themselves, whilst others had board and lodging. The following table, though less complete than the Northumberland accounts, throws light on the rate of requital:

Another ordinance states that "The Gentlemen of the Chapell, Gospeller, Episteller, and Sergeant of the Vestry shall have from the last day of March forward for their board wages, everie of them, 10d. per diem; and the Yeomen and Groomes of the Vestry, everie of them, 2s. by the weeke." When not on board wages, they had "Bouche of Court," like the physicians. "Bouche of Court" signified the daily livery or allowance of food, drink, and fuel, and this, in the case of the Master of the Children, exceeded that of the surgeons to the value of about £1 1s. per annum. Thus it will be seen that the style "Gentlemen," as applied to the grown-up members of the choir, was not merely complimentary, but indicative of their actual status.

Meals were served at regular hours. "It is ordeyned that the household, when the hall is kept, shall observe certyne times for dinner and souper as followeth: that is to say, the first dynner in eating dayes to begin at tenn of the clock, or somewhat before; and the first souper at foure of the clock on worke dayes."

The duties of the choir also are plainly laid down: "Forasmuch as it is goodly and honourable that there should be alwayes some divine service in the court ... when his grace keepeth court and specially in riding journeys: it is ordeyned that the master of the children and six men ... shall give their continual attendance in the King's court, and dayly in the absence of the residue of the chappell, to have a masse of our Lady before noone, and on Sundayes and holy dayes masse of the day besides our Lady masse, and an anthem in the afternoone."

It was part of the business of the Master of the Children to instruct his young charges in "grammar, songes, organes, and other vertuous things"; and, on the whole, the lot of the choristers might have been deemed enviable. It is evident, however, that it was not always regarded in that light, for a custom existed of impressing children. This practice was authorized by a precept of Henry VI. in 1454, and one of its victims was Thomas Tusser, afterwards author of "Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry," who thus alludes to the matter:

There for my voice I must (no choice)
Away of force, like posting horse;
For sundry men had placards then
Such child to take.

Moreover, it has been shrewdly suspected that the whipping-boy, who vicariously atoned for the sins of a prince of the blood—in other words, was thrashed, when he did wrong—was picked from the Children of the Chapel. Certainly Charles I. had such a whipping-boy named Murray; and judging from this instance the expedient was not commended by its results.

Members of the choir were expected to be persons of exemplary life and conversation, to ensure which state of things there was a weekly visitation by the Dean. Every Friday he sought out and avoided from office "all rascals and hangers upon thys courte." The tone of discipline, to conclude from the poems of Hugh Rhodes, was undoubtedly high; and, whatever difficulties he may have encountered in training the boys to his own high standards, his "Book of Nurture" must always possess considerable value as a reflex of the moral and social ideals of a Master of the Children in the sixteenth century.

Rhodes's successor in the days of Elizabeth was Richard Edwards, a man of literary taste and the compiler of a "Paradise of Dainty Devices." The Master had now a salary of forty pounds a year; the Gentlemen nineteen pence a day, in addition to board and clothing; and the Children received largesse at high feasts and on occasions when their services were used for purposes apart from their ordinary duties. In this way the Chapel Royal is closely connected with the rise of the English drama. Edwards wrote light pieces for the children to act before Her Majesty, and, encouraged by success, fell to composing set comedies, which were also performed by the boys, under his instructions, in the presence of the Court.

We have limited our retrospect mainly to the Tudor period. As an extension of the subject would call for more space than we have at our disposal, those who desire more information concerning the "Children of the Chapel" will do well to consult a recent work entitled "The King's Musick" (edited by H. C. de Lafontaine: Novello & Co.), which carries on the record into the age of the Stuarts. Entries cited in this excellent compilation relate to eminent English composers. In December, 1673, for example, there was a "warrant to pay Henry Purcell, late one of the children of his Majesty's Chappell Royall, whose voyce is changed and gone from the Chappell, the sum of £30 by the year, to commence Michaelmas, 1673." This was in consequence of the sensible custom of retaining as supernumeraries boys who had given evidence of musical ability. Such is certainly true of Purcell, who, at the early age of eleven, had shown promise of his future career by an ode called "The Address of the Children of the Chapel Royal to the King and their Master, Captain Cooke, on His Majestie's Birthday, A.D. 1670, composed by Master Purcell, one of the Children of the said Chapel."

ECCLESIASTICAL

CHAPTER V

THE BOY-BISHOP

Mention has been made of Hugh Rhodes and his "Book of Nurture." It is pretty evident that this master of music was attached to the older form of faith, since he published in Queen Mary's reign a poem bearing the extravagant title: "The Song of the Chyld-Bysshop, as it was songe before the Queen's Maiestie in her priuie chamber at her mannour of Saint James in the feeldes on Saynt Nicholas' Day and Innocents' Day this yeare now present by the chylde bisshop of Poules church with his company. Londini in ædibus Johannis Cawood typographi reginæ, 1555." This effusion Warton derides as a "fulsome panegyric" on the Queen's devotion; and the censure is not wholly unjust, since the author, without much regard for accuracy, likens that least lovable of our sovereigns to Judith, Esther, and the Blessed Virgin. Meanwhile, who or what was the "Chyld-Bysshop," or, as he is usually styled, the Boy-Bishop?

In the first place it may be noted that the Latin equivalent of the phrase was not, as might be expected, Episcopus puerilis, but Episcopus puerorum, suggesting that the boy, if boy he was, was elevated above his compeers and possessed perhaps some jurisdiction over them. There is no question of the access of dignity, but the amount of authority enjoyed by him would have depended on the humour of his fellows, and boys are not always docile subjects even of rulers of their own election. This, however, is a minor consideration, since the Boy-Bishop, when we first make his acquaintance, has already emerged from the obscurity of school and playground, and made good his claim to the homage of superiors in age and station. Hence the term "Boy-Bishop" appears to define more accurately than its Latin analogue the rank and privileges of the immature prelate.

It seems to lie in the nature of things that the Boy-Bishop was originally an institution of the boys themselves, the chief figure in a game in which they aped, as children so commonly do, the procedure of their elders, and that, in course of time, those elders, for reasons deemed good and sufficient, extended their patronage to the innocent parade, and made it a constituent of their own festal round.

In tracing the migration of the custom from the precincts to the interior of the church we must not forget the tradition of the Roman Saturnalia, with the season and spirit of which it accorded, and to which the Christian festival, with its greater purity and decorum, may have been prescribed as an antidote. The pagan holiday was held on December 17th, and as the Sigillaria formed a continuation of it, the joyous celebration endured a whole week. The Boy-Bishop's term of office was yet longer, extending from St. Nicholas' Day (December 6th) to Holy Innocents' Day (December 28th).

The distinctive feature of the Saturnalia was the inversion of ordinary relationships; the world was turned upside down, and the licence that prevailed, by dint of long usage and inviolable sentiment, imparted to the merry-making a rough and even immoral character. Slaves assumed the position of masters, and masters of slaves; and the general nature of the observance is aptly described by the patron deity in Lucian's play on the subject: "During my reign of a week no one may attend to his business, but only to drinking, singing, playing, making imaginary kings, playing servants at table with their masters."

The advent of Christianity was impotent to arrest the annual scenes of disorder; and, in some form or another—sometimes tolerated, sometimes the object of the Church's anathema—the tradition held its own down through the Dark Ages, and we meet with the substance of the Saturnalia, during the centuries immediately preceding the Reformation, in the burlesque festivals with which the rule of the Boy-Bishop has been often identified. We shall see presently how far this judgment is correct. An example will, no doubt, readily recur to the reader from a source to which we owe so many impressions of the Middle Ages, some true, others false or at least exaggerated—we mean the historical romances of Sir Walter Scott. That writer has introduced into "The Abbot" an Abbot of Unreason, and he explains in a note that "The Roman Catholic Church connived at the frolics of the rude vulgar, who, in almost all Catholic countries, enjoyed, or at least assumed, the privilege of making some Lord of the Revels, who, under the name of the Abbot of Unreason, the Boy-Bishop, or the President of Fools, occupied the churches, profaned the holy places by a mock imitation of the sacred rites, and sang indecent parodies of the hymns of the church." The last touch, at any rate, may be safely challenged as untrue, and the whole picture has the appearance of being largely overdrawn. This is certainly the case as regards England, though there is evidence that on the Continent the Boy-Bishop celebration was, at certain times and in certain places, not free from objectionable features. In 1274 the Council of Salzburg was moved to prohibit the "noxii ludi quos vulgaris eloquentia Episcopus puerorum appellat" on the ground that they had produced great enormities. Probably this sentence referred to the accessories, such as immoral plays, but it is quite possible that the Boy-Bishop ceremonies themselves had degenerated into a farce. As the Rex Stultorum festival was prohibited at Beverly Minster in 1371, we must conclude that similar extravagance and profanity had crept into Yuletide observances in this country. The festival of the Boy-Bishop, however, was conducted with a decency hardly to be expected in view of its apparent associations. It would seem, indeed, to have been an impressive and edifying function, and that reasonable exception can be taken to it only on the score of childishness, and the absence of any warrant from Scripture, apart from the rather doubtful sanction of St. Paul's words, "The elder shall serve the younger."

There are weighty considerations on the other side. The mediæval Church derived stores of strength from its sympathetic attitude towards women and children and the illiterate; and there was a sensible loss of vitality and interest when the ministry of the Church was curtailed to suit the common sense of a handful of statesmen, scholars, and philosophers. At the time the festival was abolished, opinion was divided even among the leaders of reform. Thus Archbishop Strype openly favoured the custom, holding that it "gave a spirit to the children," and was an encouragement to them to study in the hope of attaining some day the real mitre. Broadly speaking, then, the Boy-Bishop festival is evidence of the tender condescension of Holy Mother Church to little children, and it does not stand alone. At Eyton, Rutlandshire, and elsewhere, children were allowed to play in church on Holy Innocents' Day, possibly in the same way as at the "Burial of the Alleluia" in a church at Paris, where a chorister whipped a top, on which the word "Alleluia" was inscribed, from one end of the choir to the other. As Mr. Evelyn White points out, this "quickening of golden praise," by its union of religious service and child's play, exactly reproduces the conditions of the Boy-Bishop festival. Certain it is that the festival was extraordinarily popular. There was hardly a church or school throughout the country in which it was not observed, and if we turn to the Northumberland Book cited in the foregoing chapter we shall find that provision was made for its celebration in the chapels of the nobility as well. The inventory is as follows:

"Imprimis, myter well garnished with perle and precious stones with nowches of silver and gilt before and behind.

"Item, iiij rynges of silver and gilt with four redde precious stones in them.

"Item, j pontifical with silver and gilt, with a blew stone in hytt.

"Item, j owche broken silver and gilt, with iiij precious stones and a perle in the myddes.

"Item, A Crosse with a staf of coper and gilt with the ymage of St. Nicholas in the myddes.

"Item, j vesture redde with lyons of silver with brydds of gold in the orferores of the same.

"Item, j albe to the same, with stars in the paro.[2]

"Item, j white cope stayned with cristells and orferes redde sylk with does of gold and white napkins about their necks.

"Item, j stayned cloth of the ymage of St. Nicholas.

"Item, iiij copes blue sylk with red orferes trayled with whitt braunches and flowers.

"Item, j tabard of skarlett and a hodde thereto lyned with whitt sylk.

"Item, A hode of Scarlett lyned with blue sylk."

There is an entry in the book showing upon what terms the custom was observed in the house of a great noble. When chapel was kept for St. Nicholas—St. Nicholas was, of course, the patron saint of boys—6s. 8d. was assigned to the Master of the Children for one of the latter. When, on the contrary, St. Nicholas "com out of the towne where my lord lyeth and my lord kepe no chapel," the amount is reduced to 3s. 4d.

Abbeys, cathedrals, and parish churches were equally forward in their recognition of the custom, and strove to celebrate it on a scale of the utmost splendour and magnificence. A list of ornaments for St. Nicholas contained in a Westminster inventory of the year 1388 comprises a mitre, gloves, surplice, and rochet for the Boy-Bishop, together with two albs, a cope embroidered with griffins and other beasts and playing fountains, a velvet cope with the new arms of England, a second mitre and a ring. In 1540 mention occurs of the "vj^th mytre for St. Nicholas bisshope," and "a great blewe cloth with kyngs on horsse back for the St. Nicholas cheyre." At St. Paul's Cathedral twenty-eight copes were employed not only for the Boy-Bishop and his company, but for the Feast of Fools. The earliest inventory of the church—that of 1245—speaks of a mitre, the gift of John de Belemains, Prebendary of Chiswick, and a rich pastoral staff for the use of the Boy-Bishop. At York Minster were kept a "cope of tissue" for the Boy-Bishop, and ten for his attendants, while an inventory made in 1536 at Lincoln refers to "a coope of rede velvett with rolles and clowdes ordeyned for the barne bisshop with this scripture The hye way is best." Typical of many other places, the custom was observed at Winchester, Durham, Salisbury, and Exeter Cathedrals; at the Temple Church, London (1307); St. Benet-Fynck; St. Mary Woolnoth; St. Catherine, near the Tower of London; St. Peter Cheap; St. Mary-at-Hill, Billingsgate; Rotherham; Sandwich, St. Mary; Norwich, St. Andrew's and St. Peter Mancroft; Elsing College, Winchester; Eton and Winchester Colleges; Magdalen College, Oxford, and King's College, Cambridge; Witchingham, Norfolk (1547); Great St. Mary, Cambridge (1503); Hadleigh, Suffolk; North Elmham, Norfolk (1547). When the goods of Great St. Mary, Cambridge, were sold, in May 1560, among the rest were the following: "It. ye rede cote and qwood yt St. Nicholas dyd wer the color red. It. the vestement and cope yt Seynt Nicholas dyd wer. Also albs for the children."

Recapitulating, the vestments and ornaments of the Boy-Bishop and his attendants, as gleaned from these and similar sources, were: (i) Mitre; (ii) Crosier or Pastoral Staff; (iii) Ring; (iv) Gloves; (v) Sandals; (vi) Cope; (vii) Pontifical; (viii) Banner; (ix) Tabard; (x) Hood; (xi) Cloth for St. Nicholas' Chair; (xii) Alb; (xiii) Chasuble; (xiv) Rochet; (xv) Surplice; (xvi) Tunicle; (xvii) Worsted Robe.

Usually the Boy-Bishop was chosen from the choristers of the cathedral, collegiate or other church by the choristers themselves; but at York, after 1366, and possibly elsewhere, the position fell, as of right, to the senior chorister. The date of the election was the Eve of St. Nicholas, when the boys assembled for an entertainment, and gloves were presented to the Boy-Bishop. On St. Nicholas' Day the boys accompanied the youthful prelate to the church; and we learn from the Sarum Use that the order in which the procession entered the choir was as follows: First the Dean and Canons, then the Chaplain, and lastly the Boy-Bishop and his Prebendaries, who thus took the place of honour. The Bishop being seated, the other children ranged themselves on opposite sides of the choir, where they occupied the uppermost ascent, whilst the Canons bore the incense and the Petit Canons the tapers. The first vespers of their patron saint having been sung by the boys, they marched the same evening through the precincts, or parish, the Bishop bestowing his fatherly blessings and such other favours as were becoming his dignity.

The statutes of St. Paul's Cathedral show that, as early as 1262, the rules underwent some modification. It was thought that the celebration tended to lower the reputation of the church; so it was ordained that the Boy-Bishop should select his own ministers, who were to carry the censer and the tapers, and they were to be no longer the Canons, but "Clerks of the Third Form," i.e., his fellow-choristers. But the practice remained for the Boy-Bishop to be entertained on the Eve of St. John the Evangelist either at the Deanery or at the house of the Canon-in-residence. Should the Dean be the host, fifteen of the Boy-Bishop's companions were included in the invitation. The Dean, too, found a horse for the Boy-Bishop, and each of the Canons a horse for one of his attendants, to enable them to go in procession—a show formally abolished by proclamation on July 25, 1542, but, nevertheless, retained for some years owing to the attachment of the citizens to the ancient custom.

The question has been raised—Did the Boy-Bishop say mass? The proclamation of Henry VIII. distinctly affirms that he did, but there is reason to suspect the truth of the statement. In the York Missal, published by the Surtees Society, there is a rubric directing the Boy-Bishop to occupy the episcopal throne during mass—a proof that he cannot have been the celebrant. But the Boy-Bishop, if he did not officiate at the altar, unquestionably preached the sermon. The statutes of Dean Colet for the government of his school enjoin that "all the children shall every Childermas Day come to Paule's Churche, and heare the chylde bishop sermon, and after be at hygh masse and each of them offer 1d. to the chylde bysshop." Specimens of the sermons preached on Holy Innocents' Day have come down to us from the reigns of Henry VIII. and Mary, and are of extreme interest. They, indeed, go far to justify the custom as a mode of inculcating virtue and, particularly, reverence in the minds of the auditors. The earlier discourse appears to have been prepared by one of the Almoners of St. Paul's, and the "bidding prayer" contains a quaint allusion to "the ryghte reverende fader and worshypfull lorde my broder Bysshop of London, your dyocesan, also my worshypfull broder, the Deane of this Cathedral Churche." The later discourse was pronounced by "John Stubs, Querester, on Childermas-Day at Gloceter, 1558," and, most appropriately, based on the text, "Except you be convertyd and made lyke unto lytill children," etc. Referring to the "queresters" and children of the song school, the preacher remarks, with a touch of delightful humour, "Yt is not so long sens I was one of them myself"; and, in explaining the significance of Childermas, adverts to the Protestant martyrs, who, alas! are without "the commendacion of innocency." It may be added that, according to the testimony of the Exeter Ordinale, the Boy-Bishop, on St. Nicholas' Day, censed the altar of the Holy Innocents, recited prayers, read the Little Chapter at Lauds "in a modest voice," and gave the Benediction.

We have seen that Dean Colet required his scholars to contribute, each one, a penny to the Boy-Bishop. At Norwich annual payments were made by all the officials of the cathedral church to the Boy-Bishop and his clerks on St. Nicholas' Day, and the expenses of the feast were defrayed by the Almoner out of the revenues of the chapter. An account of Nicholas of Newark, Boy-Bishop of York in 1396, shows that, besides gifts in the church, donations were received from the Canons, the monasteries, noblemen, and other benefactors. On the Octave he repaired, accompanied by his train, to the house of Sir Thomas Utrecht, from whom he obtained "iijs. iiijd."; on the second Sunday he went still farther afield, including in his perambulation the Priories of Kirkham, Malton, Bridlington, Walton, Baynton, and Meaux. En route, he waited on the Countess of Northumberland at Leconfield, and was graciously rewarded with a gold ring and twenty shillings.

These "visitations" seem to have been characterized by feasting and merriment and some undesirable mummery. Puttenham, in his "Arte of Poesie" (1589), observes: "On St. Nicholas' night, commonly, the scholars of the country make them a Bishop, who, like a foolish boy, goeth about blessing and preaching with such childish terms as make the people laugh at his foolish counterfeit." In some quarters regulations were in force to preclude such levity. At Exeter, for example, one of the Canons was appointed to look after the Boy-Bishop, who was to have for his supper a penny roll, a small cup of mild cider, two or three pennyworths of meat, and a pennyworth of cheese or butter. He might ask not more than six of his friends to dine with him at the Canon's room, and their dinner was to cost not more than fourpence a head. He was not to run about the streets in his episcopal gloves, and he was obliged to attend choir and school the next day like the other choristers.

It may be remarked that the Boy-Bishop proceedings had their counterpart in the girls' observance of St. Catherine's Day; and the phrase "going a-Kathering" expressed the same sort of alms-seeking as attended the ceremonies in honour of St. Nicholas.

In its palmy days the festival of the Boy-Bishop was favoured not only by the people, but by the monarch. Edward I. and Henry VI. gave their patronage to the custom, and the latter is said to have followed the example of his progenitors in so doing.

However, in 1542, Henry VIII. "by the advys of his Highness' counsel," saw fit to order its abolition, which he did in the following terms:

"Whereas heretofore dyuers and many superstitions and chyldysh obseruances haue been used, and yet to this day are obserued and kept, in many and sundry partes of this realm, as vpon St. Nicholas, Saint Catherine, Saint Clement, the holie Innocents, and such-like holie daies, children be strangelie decked and apparayled to counterfeit Priests, Bishopes, and Women, and so be ledde with Songes and dances from house to house, blessing the people and gathering of money; and boyes do singe masse and preache in the pulpitt, with other such onfittinge and inconuenient vsages which tend rather to derysyon than enie true glorie of God, or honour of his Sayntes: the Kynges maiestie, therefore, myndynge nothinge so muche as to aduance the true glory of God without vain superstition, wylleth and commandeth that from henceforth all such superstitious obseruations be left and clerely extinguished throu'out all his realme and dominions for as moche as the same doth resemble rather the vnlawfull superstition of gentilitie than the pure and sincere religion of Christ."

The allegation that boys dressed up as women is confirmed by a Compotus roll of St. Swithin's Priory at Winchester (1441), from which it appears that the boys of the monastery, along with the choristers of St. Elizabeth's Collegiate Chapel, near the city, played before the Abbess and Nuns of St. Mary's Abbey—attired "like girls."

The custom was restored by an edict of Bishop Bonner on November 13, 1554, much to the satisfaction of the populace; and the spectacle of the Boy-Bishop riding in pontificalibus—this was in 1556—all about the Metropolis gave currency to the saying—"St. Nicholas yet goeth about the city." Foxe tells us that at Ipswich the Master of the Grammar School led the Boy-Bishop through the streets for "apples and belly-cheer; and whoso would not receive him he made heretics, and such also as would not give his faggot for Queen Mary's child." (By this expression, which was common during this reign, was intended the Boy-Bishop; the Queen had, of course, no child of her own.) Amidst the sundry and manifold changes that marked the accession of Elizabeth the Boy-Bishop again went down; and the memory of the festival lingered only in certain usages like that at Durham, where the boys paraded the town on May-day, arrayed in ancient copes borrowed from the Cathedral.

On one or two points connected with the subject there prevails some degree of misapprehension, and thus it will be well—very briefly—to touch upon them. It is not now believed that the effigy in Salisbury Cathedral—"the child so great in clothes"—which led to the publication, in 1646, of Gregorie's famous treatise, is that of a Boy-Bishop, who died during his term of office and was buried with episcopal honours. There are similar small effigies of knights and courtiers. Nor, again, does it seem correct to state that the Boy-Bishop might present to any prebend that became vacant between St. Nicholas' and Holy Innocents' day. This usage, if it existed at all, was apparently confined to the Church of Cambray.

On the other hand, the Eton Ad Montem ceremony has the look of genuine descent from the older festival, with which it has numerous features in common. The Boy-Bishop custom, it will be remembered, was observed at the College.

Finally, reference may be made to the coinage of tokens, some of them grotesque, which bore the inscription Moneta Epi Innocentium, or the like, together with representations of the slaughter of the innocents, the bishop in the act of giving his blessing, and similar scenes. Opinions differ as to the purpose for which these tokens, which date from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, were struck, but it is extremely probable that they were designed to commemorate the Boy-Bishop solemnity. Barnabe Googe's Popish Kingdom tells of

"St. Nicholas money made to give to maidens secretlie,"

and in the imperfect state of human society this may have been, at times, their incongruous destiny.

ECCLESIASTICAL

CHAPTER VI

MIRACLE PLAYS

There is a palpable resemblance between the subject just quitted and that most characteristic product of the Middle Ages—the miracle play. It may be observed at the outset that instruction in those days, when reading was the privilege of the few, was apt to take the form of an appeal to the imagination rather than the reasoning faculty, and of all the aids of imagination none has ever been so effective as the drama. The Boy-Bishop celebration was not only the occasion of plays which sometimes necessitated the strong hand of authority for their suppression—it was distinctly dramatic in itself. Miracle plays represent a further stage of development, in which a rude and popular art shook itself free from the trammels of ritual, outgrew the austere restrictions of sacred surroundings, and yet kept fast hold on the religious tradition on which it had been nourished, and which remained to the last its supreme attraction.

The liturgical origin of the miracle play may almost be taken for granted, and the single question that is likely to arise is whether the custom evolved itself from observances connected with Easter, or Christmas, or both festivals in equal or varying measure. Circumstances rather point to Paschal rites as the matrix of the custom. The Waking of the Sepulchre anticipates some of the features of the miracle play, while the dialogue may have been suggested by the antiphonal elements in the church services, and specifically by the colloquy interpolated between the Third Lesson and the Te Deum at Matins, and repeated as part of the sequence "Victimæ paschalis laudes," in which two of the choir took the parts of St. Peter and St. John, and three others in albs those of the Three Maries. In the York Missal, in which this colloquy appears at length, its use is prescribed for the Tuesday of Easter Week.

Springing apparently from these germs, the religious drama gradually enlarged its bounds until it not only broke away from the few Latin verses of its first lisping, but came to embrace a whole range of Biblical history in vernacular rhyme. The process is so natural that we need scarcely look for contributory factors, and the influence of such experiments as the Terentian plays of the Saxon nun Hroswitha in the tenth century may be safely dismissed as negligible, or, at most, advanced as proof of a broad tendency, evidence of which may be traced in the "infernal pageants" to which Godwin alludes in his "Life of Chaucer," and which, as regards Italy, are for ever memorable in connexion with the Bridge of Carrara—a story familiar to all students of Dante. These "infernal pageants" were concerned with the destiny of souls after death, and their scope being different from that of the miracle plays, they are adduced simply as marking affection for theatrical display in conjunction with religious sentiment.

As far as can be ascertained, the earliest miracle play ever exhibited in England—and here it may be observed that such performances probably owed their existence or at least considerable encouragement to the system of religious brotherhood detailed in our opening chapter—was enacted in the year 1110 at Dunstable. Matthew Paris informs us that one Geoffrey, afterwards Abbot of St. Albans, produced at the town aforesaid the Play of St. Catherine, and that he borrowed from St. Albans copes in which to attire the actors. This mention of copes reminds us of the Boy-Bishop, and is one of the symptoms indicating community of origin. To this may be added that miracle plays were at first performed in churches, and, as we shall hereafter see, in some localities were never removed from their original sphere. The clergy also took an active share in the performances, as long as they were confined to churches; but on their emergence into the streets, Pope Gregory forbade the participation of the priests in what had ceased to be an act of public worship. This was about A.D. 1210. From that time miracle plays were regarded by the straiter sort with disfavour, and Robert Manning in his "Handlyng Sinne" (a translation of a Norman-French "Manuel de Péché") goes so far as to denounce them, if performed in "ways or greens," as "a sight of sin," though allowing that the resurrection may be played for the confirmation of men's faith in that greatest of mysteries. Such prejudice was by no means universal; in 1328—more than a hundred years later—we find the Bishop of Chester counselling his spiritual children to resort "in peaceable manner, with good devotion, to hear and see" the miracle plays.

We saw that the earliest religious drama known to have been performed in this country was one on St. Catherine. William Fitzstephen, in his "Life of St. Thomas à Becket," written in 1182, brings into contrast with the pagan shows of old Rome the "holier plays" of London, which he terms "representations of the miracles wrought by the holy confessors or of the sufferings whereby the constancy of the martyrs became gloriously manifest." Thus we perceive how the term "miracle" attached itself to this species of theatrical exhibitions. Probably, towards the commencement of the twelfth century, French playwrights fastened on the miracles of the saints as their special themes, and, by force of habit, the English public in ensuing generations retained the description, though subjects had come to be chosen other than the marvels of the martyrology. Dr. Ward would limit the term "miracle play" to those dramas based on the legends of the saints, and would describe those drawn from the Old and New Testaments as "mysteries" in conformity with Continental usage. The distinction is logical, but its acceptance would practically involve the sacrifice of the former term, since the Dunstable play of St. Catherine, the plays founded on the lives of St. Fabyan, St. Sebastian, and St. Botolph, which were performed in London, and those on St. George, acted at Windsor and Bassingbourn—no others are recorded—have all perished.

According to the "Banes," or Proclamation, of the Chester Plays, at the end of the sixteenth century, the cycle of plays acted in that city dates from the mayoralty of John Arneway (1268-76), and the author was Randall Higgenet, a monk of Chester Abbey. These statements are, for various reasons, open to impeachment. For one thing, Arneway's term is incorrectly assigned to the years 1327-8—a far more probable date for the plays, though there is no sort of certainty on the subject, and, in the nature of things, a cycle of plays is more likely to have grown up than to have been the work of a single hand. The later date is more probable, because the re-institution of the Corpus Christi festival by the Council of Vienne in 1311 has an important bearing on the annexation of the miracle play by the trade-gilds, and it was only on their assumption of responsibility that performances on the scale of a cycle of plays could have been contemplated, or possible.

There are four great English cycles—those of Chester, York, Wakefield, and Coventry. By a cycle is meant a series of plays forming together what may be termed an encyclopædia of history; it was attempted to crowd into one short day "mater from the beginning of the world." This ambitious programme bespoke the interested co-operation of many persons, and the gilds, embracing it with enthusiasm, transformed the Corpus Christi festival into an annual celebration marked by gorgeous pageants. The word "pageant," which appears to be etymologically related to the Greek πἡγμα, is technical in respect of miracle plays, and, in this connexion, is thus defined, by Archdeacon Rogers:

"A high scafolde with two rowmes, a higher and a lower, upon four wheeles. In the lower they apparelled them selves, and in the higher rowme they played, beinge all open on the tope, that all behoulders might heare and see them."

The pageants were constructed of wood and iron, and so thoroughly that it was seldom that they needed to be renewed. In the floor of the stage were trap-doors covered with rushes. The whole was supported on four or six wheels so as to facilitate movement from point to point; and as the miracle plays were essentially peripatetic—within, at least, the bounds of a particular town, and sometimes beyond—this was a very necessary provision.

Each pageant had its company. The word "company" here is not exactly synonymous with "gild," for several gilds might combine for the object of maintaining a pageant and training and entertaining actors, and the composition of the company varied according to the wealth or poverty, zeal or indifference, of different gilds. Thus it came to pass that the number of pageants, in the same city, was subject to change, companies being sometimes subdivided, and at other times amalgamated; and in the latter event the actors undertook the performance of more scenes than would otherwise have fallen to their share. Commonly speaking, there was probably no lack, whether of funds or players, at any rate as regards the principal centres. The cycles were the pride of the city, and it would have been a point of honour with the members of the several companies not to allow themselves to be outclassed by their competitors.

To enumerate the gilds taking part in the miracle plays is tantamount to making an inventory of industrial crafts at the close of the Middle Ages. The "Order of the Pageants of the Play of Corpus Christi at York," compiled by Roger Burton, the town clerk, and comprising a list of the companies with their respective parts, yields the following analysis: Tanners, plasterers, card-makers, fullers, coopers, armourers, gaunters (glovers), shipwrights, pessoners (fishmongers), mariners, parchment-makers, book-binders, hosiers, spicers, pewterers, founders, tylers, chandlers, orfevers (goldsmiths), marshals (shoeing-smiths), girdlers, nailers, sawyers, spurriers, lorimers (bridle-makers), barbers, vintners, fevers (smiths), curriers, ironmongers, pattern-makers, pouchmakers, bottlers, cap-makers, skinners, cutlers, bladesmiths, sheathers, sealers, buckle-makers, horners, bakers cordwainers, bowyers, fletchers (arrow-featherers); tapisers, couchers, littesters (dyers), cooks, water-leaders, tilemakers, millers, twiners, turners, tunners, plumbers, pinners, latteners, painters, butchers, poulterers, sellers (saddlers), verrours (glaziers), fuystours (makers of saddle-trees), carpenters, wine-drawers, brokers, wool-packers, scriveners, luminers (illuminators), questors (pardoners), dubbers, tallianders (tailors), potters, drapers, weavers, hostlers, and mercers.

The subjects of the plays were the story of the Creation, the Fall, the Deluge, the Sacrifice of Isaac, the incidents preceding the Birth of Christ, the Nativity, and in pretty regular sequence the chief events of our Lord's life to the Ascension; and, finally, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin. As a rule it is hard to discern any connexion between the nature of a scene and the craft or crafts representing it, but the assignment of the pageant in which God warns Noah to make an ark to the shipwrights, and of its successor, in which the patriarch appears in the Ark, to the "pessoners" and mariners has an obvious propriety, and must have conduced to the—not historical, but conventional—realism which was the aim of the miracle artists.

The whole town was made to serve as a huge theatre, and the many pageants proceeded in due order from station to station. "The place," says Archdeacon Rogers—he is speaking of Chester—"the place where they played was in every streete. They begane first at the abay gates and when the first pagiant was played, it was wheeled to the highe crosse before the mayor, and so to every streete; and so every streete had a pagiant playinge before them at one time, till all the pagiantes for the daye appoynted weare played; and when one pagiant was neere ended word was broughte from streete to streete, that soe they might come in place thereof excedinge orderlye, and all the streetes have their pagiantes afore them all at one time playeing togeather, to se which playe was greate resorte, and also scafoldes and stages made in the streetes in those places where they determined to playe their pagiantes."

Should the supply of pageants be limited, different scenes were acted in different parts of the same stage; and actors who were awaiting or had ended their parts stood on the stage unconcealed by a curtain. In more elaborate performances a scene like the "Trial of Jesus" involved the employment of two scaffolds, displaying the judgment-halls of Pilate and Herod respectively; and between them passed messengers on horseback. The plays contain occasional stage directions—e.g., "Here Herod shall rage on the pagond." We find also rude attempts at scene-shifting, of which an illustration occurs in the Coventry Play of "The Last Supper:"

"Here Cryst enteryth into the hous with his disciplis, and ete the Paschal lomb; and in the mene tyme the cownsel hous beforn seyd xal sodeynly onclose, shewynge the buschopys, prestys, and jewgys sytting in here astat, lyche as it were a convocacyon."

And again:

"Here the Buschopys partyn in the place, and eche of hem here leve be contenawns resortyng eche man to his place with here meny to take Cryst; and than xal the place that Cryst is in sodeynly unclose round abowt, shewynge Cryst syttyng at the table, and hise dyscypulis eche in ere degré. Cryst thus seyng."

The outlay on these plays was necessarily large, and the accounts of gilds and corporations prove that not only were considerable sums expended on the dresses of the actors, but the latter received fees for their services. The fund needed to meet these charges was raised by an annual rate levied on each craftsman—called "pageant money"—and varying from one penny to fourpence. The cost of housing and repairing the pageant, as well as the refreshment of the performers at rehearsals, would also come out of this fund. As the actors were paid, they were expected to be efficient, and the duty of testing their qualifications was delegated either to a pageant-master or to a committee of experienced actors. A York ordinance dated April 3, 1476, shows that four of "the most cunning, discreet, and able players" were summoned before the mayor during Lent for the purpose of making a thorough examination of plays, players, and pageants, and "insufficient persons," in whatever requirement—skill, voice, or personal appearance—their defect lay, were mercilessly "avoided." No single player was allowed to undertake more than two parts on pain of a fine of forty shillings.

From the York proclamation of 1415 we learn that the players were expected to be in their places between 3 and 4 a.m., while the prologue of the Coventry plays contains the lines:

At Sunday next yf that we may
At six of the belle, we gynne our play
In N—— towne.

This is interesting, as proving that pageants were sometimes acted in a number of places, somewhat in the style of strolling players. It is known for a fact that the Grey Friars of Coventry had a cycle of Corpus Christi plays; and it has been conjectured that they were forced by the competition of the Trade Gilds to exhibit them outside the town. Whatever may have been the case with the players, it is certain that such plays were not confined to the centres of which we have spoken. We read of a lost Beverly cycle, and of another at Newcastle, of which one play—"The Building of the Ark"—has fortunately been preserved. Like performances took place at Witney and Preston, at Lancaster, Kendall, and Dublin. The relative perfection of Chester and Coventry, and probably of York, were bound to influence those and other towns, which looked to them as the capitals of the dramatic art. Evidence of the popularity of miracle plays in places near and remote is forthcoming in the shape of literary remains or parochial records. Cornwall is famous for its religious drama, to which are due the best monuments of its dead tongue; but other counties were not backward in zealous attachment to the Miracle Play. A few excerpts from Church-wardens' and other accounts may be given by way of showing the extent of the custom:

Ashburton, Devon

1528-9. "ix^s ix^d for painting cloth for the players and making their tunics, and for 'chequery' for making tunics for the aforesaid players, and for making staves for them, and crests upon their heads for the festival of Corpus Christi."

1533-4. "ij^d rewardyd and alowyd to the pleers of Cryssmas game, that pleyd in the said churche."

1537-8. "j^d for a pair of silk garments (seroticarum) for King Herod on Corpus Christi day."

1542-3. "ij^s i^d ij devils' heads (capit. diabol.) and necessary things in the clothes for the players."

1547-8. "ij^s to the players on Corpus Christi day." (During the reign of Edward VI. the plays were discontinued, to be revived in that of his successor.)

1555-6. "ij^d payd for a payr of glouys for hym that played God Almighty at Corpus X^pi daye." "vj^d payd for wyne for hym that played Saynt Resinent."

1558-9. "ij^d for a payr of glouys to him that played Christ on Corpus X^pi daye."

St. Martin's, Leicester

1546-7. "Item p^d for makynge of a sworde & payntynge of the same for Harroode viij^d"

In the Corporation MSS. of Rye, Sussex, are the following entries:

1474. "Payed to the players of Romeney, the which pleyed in the churche 16^d"

1476. "Payed to the pleyers of Winchilse, the whiche pleyed in the churche yerde, vppone the day of the Purification of our Laday 16^d"

The performance of the York miracle plays went on until 1579. The Newcastle celebration outlasted them by about ten years. The Chester plays were acted till the end of the sixteenth century, and those of Beverley till 1604. What killed the Miracle Play? This is a deeply interesting speculation, but one with regard to which it is difficult to form a conclusion owing to the co-existence of rival influences, the relative strength of which cannot well be estimated. We have seen that Puritan opinion suspended the miracle play at Ashburton during the reign of Edward VI., and it would be natural to look for the same result from the accession of Elizabeth, whereas, at Beverley it was maintained all through the period of her rule. It is quite possible, however, that all this time efforts were being made by extreme Reformers to bring about its abolition, and that ultimately they were successful. Meanwhile the growth of the secular drama, which was hardly more to the liking of the Puritans, must have proved a powerful counter-attraction, and possibly it is to this rather than religious opposition that the extinction of the Miracle Play was actually due. At any rate, we need feel no surprise that with two such antagonistic forces at work the ancient and pious custom vanished from the land.

ACADEMIC

CHAPTER VII

ALMS AND LOANS

We wound up our first part with a draft on parochial records; and we enter on our second part with a further taxation of the same fruitful and unimpeachable source. Those familiar with the life of our ancient universities only in its more modern and luxurious aspects may prepare for revelations of the most startling character, for Oxford and Cambridge were nurtured not only in poverty, but in authorized mendicancy and—a learned phrase may be excused—regulated hypothecation. That clerks in those early days were not ashamed to beg is susceptible of various sorts of proof, one of which consists in the help so frequently afforded them by generous churchwardens. Let us glance at some sixteenth-century books of accounts:

Ashburton, Devon

Tavistock

Woodbury, Devon

(According to the "Alumni Oxon." Edward Carrow was elected Student of Christ Church, 1575, from Westminster School; and Richard Crocker, B.A., from Exeter College, 1594.)

Plymouth

Barnstaple

It is worthy of note that the amounts bestowed on this deserving class were in excess of the sums meted out to ordinary "travellers." It is also a fact that, while mention is often made of Oxford scholars, the reverse is the case with Cambridge men. On referring to Willis and Clark's "History of the University of Cambridge" we find that although notices occur of scholars in menial employment there is no indication that begging licences were granted them. Still, the following entries prove that occasionally incipient Cambridge men received public assistance.

Sheffield

Cawthorne, Yorkshire

From the beginning of the reign of James I. there are few entries relating to scholars "of Oxford." Those of other places, however, are named to the time of Charles II., and some of them must have belonged to Oxford, their native place being recorded in lieu of the university.

Youlgreave, Derbyshire

Heavitree, Devon

(This was one Nicholas Laskey, who was a son of Henry Laskey, of Heavitree, and was entered in the books of Wadham College as "filius pauperis." He matriculated May 23, 1667, at the age of seventeen; and was rector of Eggesford in 1674, and of Worthington in 1687.)

These examples are all comparatively late, but we may be certain that the practice to which they bear testimony had existed at a much earlier period, when contributions had been sought, not only from custodians of church funds, but from private persons, to whose charitable instincts or devout inclinations necessitous clerks successfully appealed. Chaucer says of his clerk of Oxenford:

Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre:
But al that he myghte of his frendes hente,
On bokes and on lerning he it spente,
And bisily gan for the soules preye
Of hem that gaf him wher-with to scolaye.

This diligent and conscientious student "loked holwe," and his "courtefy" was threadbare.

In MS. Lansdowne 762 is a poem wherein a husbandman is represented as complaining of the many charges of which he is the subject—taxes to the court, payments to the church, and exactions in the name of charity. Included in the last of these categories is alms to scholars:

Than cometh clerkys of Oxford and make their mone;
To her schole-hire they must have money.

It is hardly likely, perhaps, that such "scholar-gypsies" always procured licences, but such were issued, and, when obtained, were doubtless efficacious in promoting the object which the applicant had in view. The following is a specimen in English dress, the original being in Latin, and dated July 15, 1467:

"To the whole of the sons of Holy Mother Church, to whom the present letter may come, Thomas Chaundler, Professor of Sacred Theology, and Chancellor of the University of Oxford, greeting in the Saviour of all.

"Know the whole of you that we, with full affection, recommend to your worships by reason of his deserts N., a scholar of this University, a peaceable, and honest, and praiseworthy student, strongly beseeching you that when he shall chance to traverse your places, lands, castles, towns, fortresses, lordships, jurisdictions, and passages, ye freely suffer him to cross them without let, trouble, arrest, or injury, with his goods and chattels, or to make halt in his expeditions; and if at any time it shall befall that wrong be done him in person, chattels, or goods, ye deign to remedy the same as may behove in remembrance of the aforesaid University. Further, deign to assist him, when need press, with your charitable favours, receive him whom we recommend, and succour him with the protection of charity, devoutly considering that him who pitieth shall God also pity in meet and acceptable time.

"Given at Oxford, under the Seal of the Office of the Chancellery of the aforesaid University on the fifth day of the month of July in the fourteenth hundred and sixtieth year of our Lord."

From the wording of this letter-testimonial it would be a reasonable inference that it was granted to enable the recipient to travel to his home or some other place, but in certain cases the object may have been to replenish an exhausted purse and aid the distressed scholar to complete his academic course.

"Many," remarks Mr. A. Clark, "were in a condition of extreme poverty, which it is now difficult to recognize or even to imagine.... [They] were exempted from University and College dues, and lived from what they received from colleges or individual graduates in payment of the different menial services which they rendered." He gives a list of fifteen Oxford scholars to whom licences were accorded between 1551 and 1572, their duration varying from seven weeks to eight months. In the sixteenth century such passports had become necessary, or, at least, the absence of them, where scholars resorted to begging for a livelihood, was attended with serious risk. By the 4th section of the Act of 22 Henry VIII. c. 12: "Scolers of the Universities of Oxford & Cambrydge that goo about beggyng, not being aucthorysed under the Seale of the sayde Universities," were to be punished as idle rogues, and that punishment was far from light. This section was included in the Act of Elizabeth of 1571-2, but omitted from that of 1596-7.

Scholars were often reduced not only to beg, but to borrow; and as this method of raising money might not always have been easy, even where security was offered, a system of pledging was devised by the authorities for the benefit of impecunious members of the University, both high and low. In all essentials this department is hardly distinguishable from a pawnbroking establishment conducted under respectable auspices, but we should go sadly astray if we suffered our views of the institution to be tinged by the associations of a dingy shop in some back street in which hopeless penury plays its last shift. We should rather turn our eyes to the beatific vision of the Mons Pietatis as pictured by Botticelli—a hillock of florins, with the kneeling forms of worthy suppliants and the cloud-borne founder crowned by angelic hands. The poor scholar did not part definitely with his cherished possession; he might hope to recover it in sunnier days, and meanwhile he was enabled to tide himself over an awkward emergency. At the same time the brokers took care to make the transaction a source of profit to the University.

The earliest benefaction for the support of scholars at Oxford consisted in the annual payment of forty shillings by the townsmen in atonement for the execution of certain clerks. In the year 1219 this charge was undertaken by the Abbey of Eynsham, by which the fine was punctually disbursed to the period of its dissolution. A similar but smaller contribution was made by the Abbey of Oseney, but nothing is known as to its origin. Irregularities in the application of these funds induced the Chancellor, Robert Grosseteste, in 1240, to frame an ordinance which resulted in the creation of the "Frideswyde Chest." This treasury was the parent of many others—at the close of the fifteenth century there were as many as twenty-four—and it long remained the typical, as it was the earliest, form of scholastic benefaction, existing side by side with the foundation of colleges, to which it gave an important impetus. The management of these chests was, in all cases, practically identical. The preamble of the ordinance, by which the administration of the funds was regulated, first stated the name of the donor, and then proceeded to announce the desire of the University to requite his liberality by annual masses and celebrations. The beneficiaries also were enjoined to repeat so many "Pater Nosters" and "Aves" for the repose of his soul.

Next followed particulars of the sums that might be borrowed and those to whom they might be advanced, always on condition that a pledge of equal or greater value was first deposited by the borrower. The term within which the pledge might be redeemed was specified, as also the time at which an unredeemed pledge was to be sold after due notice had been given by public proclamation. It was usual to appoint as guardians a North and a South countryman, so as to obviate any complaints as to the allocation of the funds, and provision was made for the registration of loans and the audit of the accounts. The last chest to be founded—this was in the latter half of the sixteenth century—placed at the disposal of the University a sum raising the total amount to not less than two thousand marks; and the capital, not merely the interest, was available for the relief of embarrassed scholars. The pledges were valued by the sworn stationer of the University, and that they were expected to exceed in value the amount of the loan is shown by the terms of ordinances, in some of which the guardians are required to submit to the auditors an account of the capital and increase. In spite of precaution, however, cases of peculation were not unknown, for, on more than one occasion, guardians were accused of embezzlement, and there are statutes complaining of the "marvellous disappearance" of funds, the property of the University, and safeguarding their future administration.

The chests were divided into two categories—the "Summer" and the "Winter." This distinction seems to have been due to the date of the election of the guardians. In this matter, however, there was considerable variation, and in later ages the stipulations of the ordinances, in which the bequests were embodied, ceased to be observed. Another circumstance which deserves notice is that in the reforms instituted in the time of Archbishop Laud nearly all traces of this benevolent system were obliterated, and the names of founders—John Pontysera, Bishop of Winchester, Gilbert Routhbury, Philip Turville, John Langton, W. de Seltone, Dame Joan Danvers, etc.—consigned to the shades of academic oblivion. During the period when the funds were employed in conformity with the testator's design, the authorities, in their wisdom, ignored limitations of age, birth, and neighbourhood, and thus any member of the University, sophist or questionist, bachelor or master, was entitled to a share of the benefit. This wide charity cannot have met with unanimous approval. Large as the fund was, it would hardly have sufficed for the needs of every ill-clothed and ill-fed scholar; and, in the distribution of the money, it would be only in accord with common experience of human nature if an enterprising official, whose eagerness had outstripped his resources, should be preferred to some pinched, obscure stripling, and receive a wholly disproportionate share of the eleemosynary grant.

As an illustration of what sometimes occurred, we may take the case of Master Henry Sever, Warden of Merton Hall. He had carried out certain repairs of the buildings, and, in order to discharge the bill, had borrowed from Seltone chest the maximum amount permitted by the ordinance—sixty shillings. To obtain this advance he had pledged an illuminated missal of considerably greater value, and now he had come prepared to redeem it. He finds that the missal had been lent to some client for the purpose of inspection, a silver cup, estimated by the stationer to be worth even more, being deposited in its stead. This is not precisely what Master Sever had wanted. However, he takes the cup, assured that he will presently be able to negotiate an exchange with the person in possession of his missal.

This serves as a reminder that, if money was scarce, books—the mainspring of intellectual activity—were yet scarcer; and it is of the utmost interest to inquire how this famine of the arts was mitigated. Oral lectures were the rule, but books could not be entirely dispensed with; and even Wardens might not always be in a position to procure all the works of which they stood in need. The obvious remedy was a library or libraries; and such collections—they arrived in good time, chiefly through the bequests of virtuosi—constituted an invaluable resource to that vast horde of scholars whose scanty means would not allow them to purchase books. As the result of Mr. Blakiston's research, the famous library with which Richard Aungerville is said to have endowed Durham College, and, according to Adam de Murimuth, filled five carts, turns out to be a myth or rather a pious intention. The good Bishop died deep in debt, and the books, if preserved as a collection, went, it is now certain, elsewhere. Thirty-five years later, however, another bishop, Thomas Cobham, of Worcester, who died in 1327, bequeathed to the University a mass of books, and the statute referring to them provides that they shall be chained in convenient order in the "soler" over the old Congregation House, where all the property of the University was stored. The books were to be in the custody of a chaplain, who was to pray for the soul of the donor.

Another statute relates to a "chest of four keys," from which it appears that books were kept in coffers and lent upon indenture or security, exactly as was done in the case of money. It was also a by no means infrequent occurrence for persons to give or bequeath books on condition that they were chained in the chancel of the church for the use of scholars and periodically inspected by the chancellor and proctors. By far the greatest benefactor of the University in the matter of books was Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, who made many valuable presents during his lifetime, and on his death, in 1447, a final large instalment was added to the store. Of these only one remains in the Bodleian Library, but in contemporary letters there are many notes expressing gratitude for, and appreciation of, this splendid munificence, which advanced the cause of learning more perhaps than any other donation recorded in the annals of the University.

The well-being of the librarian was, very properly, a subject of concern. By an ordinance of 1412 his stipend was raised, and he became recognized as one of the chief officers of the University. Lest "hope deferred" should produce slackness in the performance of his duties, the proctors were bound to pay his salary regularly, and, as a further encouragement, every beneficed graduate, on his inception, was required to make him a present of clothes. A similar custom prevailed with regard to the bedels, and it is sententiously remarked that it would be absurd for one adorned with superior dignity to be endued with inferior privileges.

The ordinance of 1412 brought about other changes. At the outset the library was accessible to all scholars at stated times; permission was now confined to graduates or religious, and, in the case of the latter, to those who were of eight years' standing in philosophia. Thus a monk named Hardwyke, who did not possess this qualification, had to sue for a "grace," and even then the privilege was limited to one term. The reasons for these restrictions probably were that the undergraduate constituency in those days was composed, in a great degree, of careless and dirty boys, who would be apt to soil the manuscripts, while the monks had their own libraries, to which they could resort without encroaching on the slender resources of masters and bachelors. All graduates on admission were required to take a solemn oath that they would handle the books modo honesto et pacifico, nulli librorum per turpitudinem aut rasuras abolitionesque foliorum, præjudicium inferendo.

The librarian was granted a month's vacation, and the library was closed on Sundays and holy days, unless it should chance that a distinguished stranger desired to visit it, when leave was given him from sunrise to sunset, subject to the condition that he was not followed by a loud rabble. At all other times, the hours during which the library was open were from nine to eleven o'clock a.m., and from one to four o'clock p.m. Suspended on the wall was a large board inscribed with the names both of the books and the donors "lest oblivion, the stepmother of memory, should pluck from our breasts the remembrance of our benefactors." To the same intent thrice every quarter a solemn mass of the Holy Ghost, and once every quarter a requiem mass, were said at the altar of St. Katherine in the Church of the Blessed Virgin. Every night the books and the windows of the library were closed, and, with certain rare exceptions, books were not permitted to be removed.

ACADEMIC

CHAPTER VIII

OF THE PRIVILEGE

While money and books were the twin bases on which the fabric of the University reposed, it is plain that a great institution of the sort would involve the employment of numerous agencies not strictly concerned with the work of instruction, but engaged upon the not less necessary functions of maintaining order and ministering to the needs of the body. All persons so occupied were accounted as "of the privilege of the University," and were subject to the jurisdiction of the Chancellor. From an indenture between the University of Oxford and the Town, dated 1459, we find that the Privilege embraced:

"The Chaunceller, alle doctours, maistres, other graduats, alle studients, alle scholers, and alle clerkes, dwellyng within the precint of the Universite, of what condicion, ordre or degree soever they be, every dailly continuell servant to eny of theym bifore rehersed belonging, the styward of the Universite wyth their menyall men, also alle Bedells with their dailly servants and their householdes, all catours, manciples, spencers, cokes, lavenders, povere children of scolers or clerkes, within the precinct of the said Universite, also alle other servants taking clothing or hyre by the yere, half yere, or quarter of the yere takyng atte leste for the yere vi. shillings and viij. pence, for the half iii. shillings and iv. pence, and the quarter xx. pence of any doctour, maister, graduat, scoler or clerc without fraud or malengyne; also, alle common caryers, bryngers of scolers to the Universite, or their money, letters, or eny especiall message to eny scoler or clerk, or fetcher of eny scoler or clerk fro the Universite for the tyme of such fetchyng or bryngyng or abidyng in the Universite to that entent."

Parchment-makers, illuminators, scribes, barbers, and tailors were also, by convention, members of the Privilege.

Before going farther, it will be well to inquire what is intended by the "precinct of the University." There appears to have been some amount of uncertainty as to the radius included. In 1444 Henry VI. granted authority to the Chancellor to banish any contumacious person from the precinct of the University, which was taken to mean a circuit of twelve miles. On the other hand, on March 17, 1458, David Ap-Thomas swore on the Holy Gospels that he would keep the peace towards the members of the University, would inform the authorities of any plot against them which might come to his knowledge, would not assist in rescuing Richard Lude from prison, and would leave Oxford on the following day, nor presume to come within ten miles of the University for twelve weeks.

The Bedels

Of all the persons named as of the Privilege the bedels, as the executive officers, most distinctly represent its character and extent. The office of bedel was, of course, not confined to the Universities. In London, for example, the wards had their bedels, who were sworn, inter alia, to suffer no persons of ill repute to dwell in the ward of which they were bedels, and to return good men upon inquests. They were also to have a good horn and loud sounding. At Oxford the bedels were bound to make summonses for scholars at their request, and to arrest wrong-doers. The latter duty was naturally attended with some peril; and in 1457, one Richard of the Castle, flying from the hands of Came, Bedel, with drawn dagger, because he refused to go to prison, was banished from the University. Fines also were levied by the bedels, and they played a conspicuous part in the ceremonies of Congregation and similar assemblies. As the position was liable to abuse, they were bound by certain restrictions. Thus, they were forbidden to ask or receive [extraordinary?] fees from inceptors[3] and to carry anything away with them from the feasts at inceptions. They were required to attend funerals, but might not ask for a share of the offerings, nor for any present from the executors of the dead. And they had to give up their maces at the first congregation after Michaelmas, but were eligible for reappointment.

The bedels were of two grades—higher and lower; and the superior bedels were bound by immemorial usage to provide the inferior bedels with board and lodging and ten shillings a year for shoes. In 1337 the latter, on resigning their office in congregation, according to custom, complained that the superior bedels had neglected to furnish them with board. Thereupon the University decreed that the inferior bedels should be granted the option of standing at meals with the superior or receiving a weekly allowance of sevenpence as compensation. This allowance was to be suspended during the absence from Oxford of any inferior bedel, whether occasioned by his own affairs or those of the University. The annual payment of ten shillings for shoes was confirmed. Failure to observe these regulations subjected superior bedels to the loss of their office when the time came for the maces to be resumed.

The question will naturally arise—From what source, or sources, did the superior bedels obtain the means not only to provide for their necessities, but also to feed, house, and, to some extent, clothe their hungry and dissatisfied dependents? Light is thrown upon this subject in a way which shows that the superior bedels themselves may not have been without a grievance. At any rate, about seventy years later—in 1411—an ordinance draws attention to omissions on the part of the students, evidently inconvenient at the time, in the following words:

"The charity of students has in these latter days grown cold, so that they no longer make collections for the Doctors and Masters of their several faculties, nor make due presents to the Bedels; therefore it is decreed that henceforth all scholars, on receiving notices from a Doctor, Master, or Bedel of their respective faculties shall pay regular contributions according to the ancient statutes on pain of losing the current year of their academical course, and of forfeiting their privilege; and all principals of halls, at the notice of the Doctors, Masters, or Bedels, shall within a month from the commencement of such collection, take care that the members of their societies contribute, and send in the names of those who fail to do so to the Chancellor under a penalty of twenty shillings: and every Doctor or Master shall pay the Bedel honestly within a month from the commencement of the collection."

From a notice of the year 1432 it transpires that the bedels received one-twelfth of all fines inflicted for misdemeanours; and, in 1434, prior to the admission of inceptors, the Chancellor announced that each inceptor would be required to pay the ordinary fee of thirty shillings and a pair of buckskin gloves for each bedel, or, in lieu of gloves, five shillings to be divided among the bedels. Two licentiates protested against such payment, stating that it was contrary to the statutes, whereupon an inquiry was held, by which it was established that these fees had been paid to the bedels from time immemorial and were therefore due.

The appointment of the bedels rested with the Regent Masters, and was one of their most jealously guarded prerogatives. Mention has been made of John Came, who for many years held the office of bedel. When he was elected, in 1433, by four Regent Masters and the two Proctors in congregation, an attempt was made by the Chancellor and the Doctors of the four faculties to substitute a nominee of their own, one Benedict Stokes, on the ground that they were the senior members of the University, and represented a majority of their faculties. Realizing that the supremacy of the Faculty of Arts was menaced, the Proctors resisted this claim and demanded the admission of Came, with the result that the Chancellor reluctantly gave way. An appeal was entered by Richard Cauntone, a doctor of laws, and the candidate, Benedict Stokes, but three days later was renounced by both of them as frivolous, and their cautions were forfeited. Even then the matter did not end. Two days afterwards, information came to the Proctors that one of the doctors had given his scholars to understand that the election would have been invalid but for a vote recorded by a doctor. Thereupon the Proctors, in order to settle the question once for all, summoned a congregation, by which it was determined that the phrase "major part" imported a numerical majority.

The election of bedels was conducted in the same way as that of the Chancellor. Every such election was preceded by three proclamations made within eight "legible" days after the office had become vacant.

The relations between the University and the Town will be dealt with presently. Here it may be noticed that the bedels exercised some control over the proceedings of the townsmen which concerned the interests of students. As an illustration, when the goods and chattels of Harry Keys, a scholar, which had been left in the house of Thomas Manciple, were "presyd" betwixt Thomas Smyth and Davy Dyker, the valuers were sworn before John Wykam, Bedel.

If the bedels, as public officials, were necessarily and conspicuously of the Privilege, the remark is not less true of those humbler functionaries, the personal attendants of the scholars. As we have seen, the payment of the bedels depended in part on collections, and the gains of the scholars' servants were derived from the same source. Every master was compelled by statute to exact contributions from his scholars at the end of term at what was called "collection." At the present time the expression is applied to terminal examinations, and this use of it originated from the circumstance that fees were paid by the scholars varying in accordance with the subject of study. For grammar the statutable amount was eightpence, for natural philosophy fourpence, and for logic threepence per term, and it was usual to reckon four terms to the year. To each scholar were allotted two servants—a superior and an inferior; the former receiving threepence, and the latter one penny per term. There was no evading these charges; even the poorest student had to pay "scot and lot" towards the support of both classes of menials, some of whom were doubtless better off than himself. The division of these servants into orders, resembling those of the bedels, has descended to modern days, most Oxford colleges having their upper and under "scouts." This, it has been well observed, "is a curious instance of the vitality of insignificant customs, which exist while the greater give place to new."

At the commencement of the chapter, a list was furnished of various occupations—more or less connected with the work of the University—the professors of which were regarded as of the Privilege. The term "privilege," in this and similar contexts, denotes administrative autonomy and special jurisdiction; and members of these trades were amenable to the Chancellor, while the Chancellor had to answer for their good behaviour to the King and Parliament. In the Middle Ages the Chancellor was not, as he is to-day, a permanent and ornamental figure-head, the duties properly pertaining to the office being discharged by the Vice-Chancellor. He was the active and dominant centre of University life, and, as such, took cognizance of numerous details which would now be deemed too petty, and even ridiculous, for a personage of his dignity and importance. So great, however, was the pressure of judicial and other business that it was necessary that he should be relieved of part of the burden, and thus we often find commissaries sitting in his room and stead.

The Ministry of Trade

The powers of the Chancellor were very considerable. They did not extend to questions of life or death, but he could fine, he could imprison, he could banish, and, being an ecclesiastic, he could excommunicate; and these methods of reproof and coercion were constantly employed by him as ex-officio justice of the peace and censor of public morals. The privilege of the University was of a dual nature. It protected the scholars in any court of first instance but a University court; on the other hand, the University obtained full control over its scholars, who were forbidden to enter a secular court. Litigants were allowed to appeal, and very frequently did appeal, from the Chancellor's decision to Congregation, and, if they were still not satisfied and the matter was sufficiently grave, to the Pope—that is, in spiritual causes. In temporal causes an appeal lay to the higher tribunals of the realm and the King. The Chancellor, also, might appeal to the King, invoking the secular arm in cases where the voice of the Church proved ineffectual in dealing with rebellious subjects, and the letter addressed to the sovereign for this purpose was called, in technical language, a significavit.

Sometimes the King, moved perhaps by a petition from his lieges in one or other of the University towns, admonished the Chancellor to be more alert in the performance of his duty. In June, 1444, the head of the University of Oxford was in receipt of the following missive from Henry VI.:

"Trusty and welbeloved, we grete you wel, and late you wyte that we have understanden by credible report of the greet riotts and misgovernance that have at diverse tymys ensued and contynelly ensue by two circuits used in oure Universite of Oxon in the vigile of St. John Baptist and the Holy Apposteles Peter and Paule to the gret hurt and disturbance of the sad and wol vituled personnes of the same Universite, wherefore We, wolling such vices and misgovernaunce to be suppressyd and refused in the said Universite and desiring the ease and tranquillite of the said peuple in the same, wol and charge you straitly that ye see and ordeyne by youre discretione that al such vices and misgovernaunce be left and all such as may be founde defective in that behalve be sharply punished in example of all other; and more over We charge you oure Chancellor, to whom the governance and keeping of our paix within oure said Universite by virtu of our privilege roial is committed that in eschewing of all inconvenience, ye see and ordeyne that oure paix be surely kepe within oure Universite above said, as wel in the saide vigiles as at all other tymes; and for asmuch as We be enformed that the sermons in latin which ever before this tyme, save now of late, be now gretly discontynued, to the gret hurt and disworship of the same, We therefore, desiring right affecturusely the increse of vertu and cunning in oure said Universite, wol and commande you straitly that ye with ripe and suffisant maturite, advise a sure remede in that party, by the which such sermons may thereafter be continued and inviolably observed, wherein ye shal do unto Us right singulier pleisir.—Geven under oure signet at Farneham the 20 day of Juyn."

The reader will no doubt be interested to learn the occasion of this reprimand. The concluding portion invests it with a somewhat general character, and may be interpreted as pointing to a lamentable decline from a previous high standard of piety and learning, which only incessant preaching was calculated to rectify. Neglecting this postscript, it is pretty evident that the scandal arising from the observance of vigils was produced by the inconsiderate carousals of craftsmen included in the Privilege, and was therefore obnoxious to the magisterial notice of the Chancellor. It will be sufficient to refer to the riots on the Eve of St. John Baptist.

As was the custom in mediæval towns, different trades had different stations assigned to them, and the tailors, who must have driven a flourishing business in caps and gowns, had their shops in the north-west ward of St. Michael's Parish. In ancient days these satellites indulged at certain seasons—more particularly on the Eve of St. John Baptist—in unseemly demonstrations. They waxed very jovial, and, after eating, drinking, and carousing, "took a circuit" through the streets of the city, accompanied by sundry musicians, and "using certain sonnets" in praise of their profession and patron. As long as they kept within these limits there seems to have been no complaint, but the thing increased more and more. People were disturbed and alarmed, the watch beaten, and from blows the outrageous tailors passed to murder. And so it came about that their revelling, with the "circuit" of another profession on the Eve of St. Peter and St. Paul, was prohibited first by Edward III. and then by Henry VI. in the letter above cited.

Another trade closely associated with the University was that of the barbers. In the twenty-second year of Edward III. (1348) the whole company and fellowship of the barbers within the precincts of Oxford appeared before the Chancellor and announced their intention of "joining and binding themselves together in amity and love." They brought with them certain ordinances and statutes drawn up in writing for the weal of the craft of barbers, and requested the Chancellor to peruse and correct them, and, afterwards, if he approved, attach to them the seal of the University. The regulations having been seriously considered by the Chancellor, the two proctors and certain doctors, it was resolved to comply with the petition on the day following and constitute the barbers a society or corporation.

The first article stipulated that the said craft should, under certain penalties, keep and maintain a light before the image of our Lady in our Lady's Chapel, within the precincts of St. Frideswyde's Church; the second, that no person of the said craft should work on a Sunday, save on market Sundays and in harvest-time, or shave any but such as were to preach or do a religious act on Sunday all through the year; while a third provided that all such as were of the craft were to receive at least sixpence a quarter from each customer who desired to be shaved weekly in his chamber or house. One shave per week does not coincide with our modern notions of what is attractive and presentable in the outer man, but the same rule prevailed at Cambridge. The statutes of St. John's College in the latter university affirmed: "A barber is very necessary to the college, who shall shave and cut once a week the head and beard of the Master, Fellows, and Scholars, as they shall severally have need."

In the statutes of New College, Oxford, there is an injunction against the mock ceremony of shaving on the night preceding magistration. It is called a ludus (or play), and is believed to have been affined to the ecclesiastical mummeries so popular in the Middle Ages, in one of which the characters were a bishop, an abbot, a preceptor, and a fool shaved the precentor on a public stage erected at the west end of the church. There was also a species of masquerade celebrated by the religious in France, which consisted in the display of the most formidable beards; and it is recorded by Gregory of Tours that the Abbess of Poitou was accused of allowing one of these shows, called a Barbitoria, to be held in her monastery.

The only men of religion permitted to wear long beards were the Templars; and, speaking generally,[4] the presence or absence of hair was one of the marks of cleavage between the clergy (tonsi) and the laity (criniti). Even those privileged to wear long hair—we refer, of course, to the male portion of the community—were required to be shorn so far that part of their ears might appear, and that their eyes might not be covered. At first it may seem strange that the question of trimming the hair should come under the cognizance of the Church—the person himself or his barber might have been deemed at liberty to consult his own taste. The canon, however, which regulated the usage was based on the apostolic challenge: "Doth not nature itself teach you that, if a man hath long hair, it is a shame unto him?"

This ordinance applied a fortiori to priests, who had to be content with very little hair. At a visitation of Oriel College by Longland, Bishop of London, in 1531, he ordered one of the Fellows, who was a priest, to abstain, under pain of expulsion, from wearing a beard and pinked shoes, like a laic. It would seem that this spiritual person had been accustomed to ridicule the Governor and Fellows of the college, since he was commanded to abjure that bad habit also.

The correct explanation of the custom condemned by the New College statutes is doubtless that already furnished. Hearne, however, had an idea that it was a reflexion on the Lollards. Wiclif is always represented with a beard, and, as most of his followers were lay-folk, it was possibly a symbol of the sect, which may have recollected the text: "Neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard."

The interest of the University in expert tonsure is now well understood, but the craving for the subjugation of falsifying hair must have been quite secondary to that for the sustenance of the bodily powers, and accordingly the cooks stood very near to the purveyors of intellectual aliment. Nor did the Chancellor concern himself merely with the ratification of their ordinances; as the natural sequence, he, or his deputy, saw to it that they were properly respected, and formed a court of appeal for the settlement of internecine differences. Thus, on August 19, 1463, two persons, proctors of the craft of cooks of the University of Oxford, petitioned the Commissary against one of the members who had declined to contribute to the finding of candles, vulgarly called "Coke-Lyght," in the church of St. Mary-the-Virgin, and to a certain accustomed feast on the day of the Cooks' Riding in the month of May. A day was appointed for investigating the matter, when the defendant did not appear, but several witnesses were produced to confirm the plaintiffs' assertions. Robert, the cook of Hampton Hall, deposed that all the cooks of Colleges and Halls had been used to contribute to the annual feast; that he had been a cook for six years, and that the cooks had always nominated two of their number to gather contributions. His testimony was corroborated by Stephen, the cook of Vine Hall, as also by Walter, another cook, and John, the cook of "Brasenos." It is worthy of note that in the record of these proceedings the names are entered as "Stephanus Coke," "Walterus Coke," and "Johannes Coke," thus throwing light on the formation of one of our commonest surnames.

Not only were questions of public policy and "constitutional usage" determined by the Chancellor's court, but delinquents of all descriptions were brought up for judgment. Here we shall do well to remember that this was an ecclesiastical court, and therefore offences against good morals as well as the law of the land were dealt with. A person unjustly defamed as guilty of incontinence could clear himself by a voluntary process of compurgation—that is, by the sworn testimony of reputable friends. If, unhappily, he was guilty, he might rehabilitate himself by formally abjuring his indiscretions. Both scholars and others of the Privilege frequently appeared before the Chancellor in the character of penitents. In 1443 a certain Christina, laundress of St. Martin's parish, swore that she would no longer exercise her trade for any scholar or scholars of the University, because under colour of it many evils had been perpetrated, wherefore she was imprisoned and freely abjured the aforesaid evils in the presence of Master Thomas Gascoigne, S.T.P., the Chancellor. In 1444 Dominus Hugo Sadler, priest, swore on the Holy Gospels that he would not disturb the peace of the University, and would abstain from pandering and fornication, on pain of paying five marks on conviction. In this case four acted as sureties, singly and jointly. In 1452 Robert Smyth, alias Harpmaker, suspected of adultery with Joan Fitz-John, tapestry-maker, dwelling in the corner house on the east side of Cat-strete, abjured the society of the same Joan, and swore that he would not come into any place where she was, whether in the public street, market, church, or chapel, on pain of paying forty shillings to the University. On August 22, 1450, Thomas Blake, peliparius, William Whyte, barber, John Karyn, chirothecarius, "husbundemen" (householders), presented themselves before the Chancellor, and, touching the Holy Gospels, abjured the game of tennis within Oxford and its precinct.

At this point it will be convenient to refer to a custom not by any means confined to the Universities, about which there appears to be some degree of misconception. "Love-days," as they are called, have been strangely confused with law-days, whereas the very essence of the institution was the avoidance of litigation with all its expense and ill-feeling. The practice of submitting disputes to friendly arbitration was seemingly founded on the text: "Dare any of you having a matter against another go to law before the unbelievers and not before the saints?" In these circumstances it is not surprising that the clergy bore a great part in such proceedings; and thus we find Chaucer avouching of his Frere:

In love-dayes ther coude he mochel helpe,
For ther he was nat lyk a cloisterer,
With a thredbare cope, as is a poore scoler,
But he was lyk a maister or a pope.

The University, being a microcosm of the entire kingdom, an imperium in imperio, by virtue of the "privilege roiall," cases occur in which deplorable misunderstandings were referred to the decision of one or more graduates of position—either in the first instance, or, it might be, ultimately, to the Chancellor or Commissary—by persons subject to academic tutelage. When the affair had been adjudicated, forms of reconciliation were prescribed, the parties being required to shake hands, go on their knees to one another, give each other the "kiss of peace," and provide a feast at their mutual expense, the menu of which was sometimes determined by the arbiter.

This interesting and admirable feature of old English life receives such copious illustration from the annals of Oxford that it seems worth while to specify examples. Thus, on November 8, 1445, a dispute between John Godsond, stationer, and John Coneley, "lymner," having been referred to two Masters of Arts and they having failed to compose it within the time stipulated, the Chancellor intervened and decided that John Coneley should work for John Godsond for one year only; that his wages should be four marks, ten shillings; that he should himself fetch his work and return it to his employer's abode; that he should be thrifty in the use of his colours; and that his employer should have free ingress to the place where he sat at work. On July 7, 1446, four arbitrators, having in hand a quarrel between Broadgates and Pauline Halls, imposed the following conditions: That the Principals should implore reconciliation from each other for themselves and their parties; that they should give, either to other, the kiss of peace, and swear upon the Holy Gospels to have brotherly love toward each other for the future, and bind themselves to its observance under a bond to pay one hundred shillings for the violation thereof. The bond was to be in the keeping of the Chancellor, and he was to deliver it, should hostilities be renewed, into the hands of the aggrieved party. David Philip, alleged to have struck John Coneley, was commanded to kneel to him, and ask and receive his pardon. It is worthy of remark that the invariable phrase applied to past quarrels is "ab origine mundi," which left no loophole for the revival of ancestral feuds, however remote in point of time.

On July 21, 1452, Master Robert Mason, having delivered judgment in the case of Thomas Condale, a servant of New College, and John Morys, tailor, required both parties, as a pledge of goodwill, to invite their neighbours to an entertainment, and provide at their joint charges two gallons of good ale.

On January 10, 1465, Thomas Chaundler, S.T.P., Commissary-General of the University of Oxford, having been chosen as arbitrator between the worshipful Sir Thomas Lancester, Canon-regular and prior of the same order of students, and Simon Marshall, on the one part, and John Merton, pedagogue, and his wife, on the other, decreed that none of them should abuse, threaten, or make faces at each other, and that they should forgive all past offences. None of them was to institute further proceedings, judicial or extra-judicial, and within fifteen days of the date thereof they were to furnish an entertainment at their joint charges—one party to furnish a goose with a measure of wine, and the other bread and beer.

Finally, on February 6, 1465, Dr. John Caldbeke, arbiter between certain members of "White Hall" and "Deep Hall," ordered the parties to pardon each other and commence no ulterior proceedings. He imposed perpetual silence on them, and as to a certain desk, the causa teterrima belli, reserved the decision to the Chancellor. The disputants, accompanied by four members of each hall, were to meet at a time and place to be named, wine was to be provided for their mutual entertainment, and, before parting, they were to shake hands.

The question has been deferred too long—Against whom did the University maintain its privilege? In part, no doubt, against the King's officers, but, mainly, against the Mayor and Burgesses of Oxford, between whom and the scholars there was a simmering hostility bursting into periodical mêlées answering to, but infinitely more sanguinary than, the "town and gown rows" of more recent days. The general result of these disturbances, assumed to be acts of aggression on the part of the citizens, but more probably provoked by the insolence of the undergraduate portion of the University, of which there is abundant evidence, was to fortify the authority of the Chancellor and extend his powers. We have seen that the townsmen, at an early period, were mulcted in an annual tribute, of which they were afterwards relieved, for hanging certain clerks. This might have served as a sufficient warning of the inviolability of the erudite persons in their midst, but it failed of effect. Altogether there were three capital riots in the later Middle Ages, which we shall proceed to notice, together with the consequences.

Of these three great conflicts between townsmen and scholars the first occurred in 1214. This was ended by a compromise brought about by the Bishop of Tusculum, the Papal Legate, the King granting jurisdiction to the University in all cases where one of the parties was a scholar or a scholar's servant. The second tumult, which took place in 1290, induced the King to confer upon the University the custody of the peace, the custody of the assize of victuals, and the supervision of weights and measures jointly with the Mayor, who had hitherto borne full sway in matters of police. The third battle was in 1357. This was the famous riot of St. Scholastica's day—satis periculosa—which resulted in the excommunication of the Mayor, while he and the commonalty of the town of Oxford were laid under an interdict by John, Bishop of Lincoln. The Mayor, who was a vintner and drawn into the quarrel through it having arisen in his tavern, is stated in one account to have been originally in the service of the University—protected by the Privilege—and this, of course, was regarded as an aggravation of his offence. The end of it was that the rights before mentioned were confirmed with certain extensions—namely, the supervision of the pavement, and the custody of the peace as well between laics as scholars, while the Mayor was excluded from the custody of the peace between scholars.

As a species of penance the Mayor and his fellows were enjoined by the Bishop of Lincoln to attend an anniversary mass at St. Mary's on St. Scholastica's Day; and the scholars were forbidden, on pain of a long term of imprisonment, to inflict on any layman of the town, whilst on his way to the church, during the celebration of the mass, or in the course of his return, any injury or violence, lest he should be deterred from the observance of the duty. This caution was proclaimed through the schools year by year on the "legible day" immediately preceding the festival. Good relations were hard to restore, and as long after as 1432 the authorities were reduced to publishing the following edict in the hope of abating the scandal:

"Whereas there are no more suitable means of allaying the lamentable dissensions between the University and the Town, which are a sign of the wrath of the Almighty, than the devout supplications of priests walking in procession, therefore this ordinance is made for the regulation of such processions. First shall walk the Chancellor, after him the Doctors by two and two, in the rank of their several faculties, then Masters of Arts, then Bachelors in Theology, then Non-Regents, then beneficed Bachelors, then all other Bachelors, then secular priests non-graduates, then scholars, all by two and two, and all silently praying for the King and other benefactors living and dead, and for the peace and prosperity of the University. Priests non-graduates shall be bound to attend on pain of a fine of sixpence, but no licentiates of any faculty soever may in any wise be present at the act."

It would not be fair to conclude this account without giving the townsmen's version of the way in which the Privilege was exercised. This can be conveniently presented in the terms of two petitions, one of which certainly, and the other probably, dates from the second year of Edward III. (1328). If there be any truth in the allegations, it must be owned that the Chancellor abused his judicial position to a degree quite intolerable to the victims.

I

"To the King and Council; the Burgesses of Oxford complain, whereas the Chancellor and University of Oxford have cognizance of contracts, covenants, and trespass between clerk and clerk, or clerk and lay, they encroach on the franchise of the town, and draw to them these contracts, etc., between laymen, especially in certain gifts and actions brought before the Chancellor, wherein a clerk has some concern, who, by covine, are made to incur large sums which were not due, and thus the defendants are condemned and afterwards excommunicated in all the churches of the town, unless they agree thereto; and if they are not absolved of the sentence before the Chancellor, they are despoiled even to their breeches, and must give all their goods to the clerk. In the same way a plea of trespass in which there has been a cession to a clerk is made to terminate in a plea of debt, and thus charges of rent upon free tenements are proved, against law and in great burden to the tenements of the town. Thus the Chancellor encroaches on the franchises of the town, to the damage of the King's profits on writs and issues on pleas of debts, &c., pleadable before the Justices, or before the Mayor and bailiffs of the town. And with such proceedings taken before the Chancellor concerning merchants and other strangers passing through, as well as residents, the merchants will not repair thither on account of such evil doings, and the town is thereby greatly impoverished."

II

"To the King and Council: Walter de Harewell, burgess and inheritor in Oxford, showing that whereas the Chancellor of the University has cognizance of offences and contracts between clerk and clerk, and clerk and lay, in the town, but nowhere else, one William de Wyneye, clerk, impleaded him before the Chancellor for offences done out of his jurisdiction in a foreign county; the said Walter justified himself before the Chancellor, but the said Chancellor, notwithstanding, condemned him to prison and kept him in prison in Oxford till he contented the said William with a large sum of money, and made an obligation of £20 to be at the will of the said University, and still he had to find mainprise before he could be set free. And because when he was taken and led to prison by the bedels of the University, he entered his house and shut his coffers and chests and the door of his room for the safety of his goods and chattels, the said Chancellor banished him out of the town, and had it proclaimed everywhere, as though he were an outlaw, and sequestered all his goods and chattels, threatening if he entered the town to imprison him again for six days. No one ever had such franchise or power thus to outlaw, destroy, and banish the King's burgesses in the said town. Prays a remedy for charity."[5]

Owing perhaps to their peculiar position as the King's chattels, neither the chartered rights of the citizens nor the Privilege of the University could be directly asserted against the Jews, of whom a considerable body appears to have been settled at Oxford, but the unbelievers were not allowed to do as they pleased. A critical instance occurred at Ascensiontide, 1268, in connexion with a solemn procession to St. Frideswyde's, when certain horrible Jews, demoniaco spiritu arrepti, seized a cross from the bearer, broke it, and trampled it under foot. Complaint was made to the King, who happened to be at Woodstock, and he issued an order for the making of two crosses at the expense of the Jews, one of which was to be of silver gilt and portable, and the other of marble and stationary. These were to be preserved for the perpetual remembrance of the outrage; and the silver cross was presented to the Chancellor, masters, and scholars, to be borne before them in their solemn procession. An ordinance states that "since the relics of the Blessed Frideswyde repose in the borough of Oxford, and more especially ought to be deservedly honoured as well by the University as by others, particularly by all who dwell in the aforesaid town, that the said University may obtain, through the intervenient merits and prayers of the same, more abundant tranquillity and peace for the future, a solemn procession be made in the middle, to wit, Lent term, to the church of the same virgin, for the peace and tranquillity of the University, and that solemn mass be held there in respect of the above-said virgin."

ACADEMIC

CHAPTER IX

THE "STUDIUM GENERALE"

We have expounded with some particularity the conditions of University life; we have now to deal with University life in its more intimate relations. And first we must say something of the title, the Latinity of which is not above suspicion, though its convenience and expressiveness are beyond question. The term studium generale was applied, in mediæval times, to an academy in which instruction was imparted on all subjects, and which was thus differentiated from grammar schools and schools of divinity, in the former of which the curriculum was restricted to Latin, and in the latter to theology. The phrase connoted also a place of common resort, as distinct from mere local foundations, the advantages of which were confined to the immediate neighbourhood. According to Mr. Froude, no fewer than thirty thousand students "gathered out of Europe to Paris to listen to Abelard"; and the traditions of Oxford and Cambridge were equally hospitable.

The "Nations"

Before discussing the system of degrees, it is desirable to speak of the "men"—the candidates for graduation; and, in this connexion, stress must be laid on the cosmopolitan character of our older universities, which welcomed with open arms students of various races and of all ranks of society. The Oxford statutes contain a provision for the proclamations being made in Latin, that language being, as it is stated, intelligible to the different nations represented by the scholars. In addition to the native youth, Welshmen, Irishmen, and Scots were accustomed to repair to the banks of the Isis and the Cam, and the two former of these classes—at any rate at their first coming—might have been totally ignorant of English.

The reader will hardly fail to have been struck with the occurrence of Welsh names in the foregoing pages; and the records of judicial proceedings mention the case of a Cambrian scholar, who stole a horse from the stable of an Oxford inn and decamped with it, in the company of several compatriots, to the Welsh mountains, in consequence of which the unhappy innkeeper had to defend a suit brought against him by the horse's owner! Notices of the Irish and the Scots are no less characteristic of their imputed traits. Of the presence of the former there is interesting testimony in petitions to the Crown on the part of scandalized townsmen, in one of which they set forth that "there have been murders, felonies, robberies, and riots, &c., lately committed in the counties of Oxford, Berks, Wilts, and Bucks, by persons coming to the town under the jurisdiction of the University, some of whom are the King's lieges born in Ireland and the others his enemies called 'Wylde Irisshmen'; and that these misdeeds continue daily to the scandal of the University and the ruin of the country round about; the malefactors threaten the King's officers and the bailiffs of the town, so that these last, for fear of death, dare not do their duty and collect the fee-farm, &c. Pray therefore that all Irish be turned out of the realm between Christmas and Candlemas next, except graduates in the schools, beneficed clergy in England, those who have English father or mother, or English husband or wife, and many other exceptions, persons of good repute. And that graduates and beneficed men find surety for their good behaviour."

The Scots were cordially hated. Tryvytlam's poem "De Laude Oxoniæ" has the following stanzas, which, in the opinion of some, may be still apposite to the circumstances of University and national life:

Iam loco tercio procedit acrius
Armata bestia duobus cornibus.
Hanc Owtrede reputo, qui totis viribus
Verbis et opere insultat fratribus.
Hic Scottus genere perturbat Anglicos,
Auferre nititur viros intraneos.
Sic, sic, Oxonia, sic contra filios
Armas et promoves hostes et exteros.

By "Owtrede" is intended Uthred de Bolton, a celebrated English Benedictine, whose cognomen was probably derived from the manor of Bolton in Northumberland. It was a risky thing to hail from the border, as another instance is recorded in which a North-countryman found it necessary to purge himself of the imputation of being a Scot—one of the King's enemies.

The amazing part of the matter is that national distinctions and prejudices did not, as far as the British Isles were concerned, end here. In point of fact, when the word "nations" occurs in this connexion, the allusion is generally not so much to genuine differences of descent, government, customs, and language, as to an artificial separation of the inhabitants of England into North and South countrymen. The authorities deplored this division into Boreals and Australs—"diverse nations, which, in truth, be not diverse"—but they could not ignore it, and thus it became the established rule that of the two proctors—officials supremely responsible for the peace—one should be of the North and the other of the South. As we have seen, a similar practice obtained with regard to the University chests. Just as, at the present time, Welshmen and Scotsmen gravitate towards particular colleges, so in the early days "nations" seem to have favoured certain halls, and as few of the latter were provided with chapels, they appear also to have fixed upon certain churches for the purpose of devotion of partisan display. Accordingly, about the year 1250, the following edict was fulminated with a view to checking the exuberance of the "national" spirit in sacred buildings:

"By the authority of the Lord the Chancellor and the Masters Regent, with the unanimous consent of the Non-Regent, it is decreed and resolved that no festival of any nation soever be celebrated henceforth in any church soever with the accustomed solemnity and calling together of Masters and Scholars or other acquaintances, save in so far as any may desire to celebrate the festival of any saint of his own diocese with devotion in his own parish, where he lives, but not calling the Masters and Scholars of a second parish or his own, as also is not done at the festivals of St. Katherine, St. Nicholas, and the like. This also, decreed by the authority of the same Chancellor, we enjoin to be observed, on pain of the greater excommunication, that none lead dances with masks or any noise in churches or streets, or go anywhere wreathed or crowned with a crown composed of the leaves of trees, or flowers, or what not: on pain of excommunication, which we inflict from now, and of long imprisonment do we forbid it."

In 1252 a great disturbance arose between the Northern and Irish scholars, and it was resolved that twelve persons should be chosen on either side to draw up conditions of peace. These were that thirty or forty of each party should bind themselves not to disturb the peace of the University themselves nor comfort others in doing so, and they were to give secret information to the Chancellor if they should hear of any other person transgressing. If anyone was injured, he was to appear before the Chancellor; and if the Chancellor was suspected of partiality, there were to be associated with him two assessors from either side.

In 1313 a statute was issued that no one was to stir up any nation on account of some personal injury by conspiracies, leagues, or meetings in public or private with the name or title of nation; and that when the Chancellor or his Commissary inquired concerning a breach of the peace, none was to appear with other than the witnesses needful to him; nor was any Master or other to thrust himself in, coming with a party or sitting beside the Chancellor or his Commissary, save such as the Chancellor should hold it right to summon forth, if at any time it seemed to him fit. Seeing that the names of delinquents could be better learned through the Principals of Houses, who moved continually among their associates, it was determined that every Principal, resident or acting, as well of Halls as of Chambers, should, at the beginning of every year, within fifteen days or sooner, as should seem fit to the Chancellor and Proctors, come and make corporal oath, that if they knew of any of their society holding such assemblies, or consenting with those who held them, or commonly and often naming different nations with evil zeal, or disturbing the peace of the University, or practising the art of bucklery, or keeping a whore in his house, or bearing arms or in any way promoting discord between Northerns and Southerns, he should within three days inform the Chancellor or one of the Proctors, and all such disturbers of the peace were to be punished with imprisonment. This oath the servants were bound to take at the same time; and the Chancellor and Proctors, as touching their part, acknowledged themselves to be equally bound by virtue of the statute.

In order that such distinction of nations might henceforth be detestable and hateful to all, it was resolved that the following clause should be added to the oath of every incepting Master with respect to the observance of peace.