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Averell, 1653, æt. 92. He gave Averell, 1653, æt. 92. Mur. N.Tr. V. An inscr. anonymous, seventeenth cent. Mur. N.Tr.

and founder of hospital of Bablake. He gave lands to maintain ten poor men, and a woman to look after them, and other gifts, 1506 (? engr. 17th cent.), mur. N.C.A. V. Eng. inscr. to Lisle Cave, of Horspoole, co. Leic., Esq. (5th son of Fras. Cave, LL.D., of Baggraul (?) in same co.), born at Stamford, Northants, he had four daus. by his 1st wife, Mary, and two sons and four daus. by his 2nd wife, Judeth; 162. S. wall of S.A. VI. Eng. inscr. to Mrs. Mary, eldest dau. of Sir Thos. Vavasor, Knt., Marshall of the King's household, 1631. N. wall of N.A. VII. Lat. inscr. and fourteen Lat. vv. to John Wightwick (youngest son of John W., Esq., "seneschallus" of Coventry), fellow of Pembroke Coll., 1637, æt. 17. W. wall of N.A. VIII. Lat. inscr. (with two Eng. vv.) to Judeth, dau. of Thos. Edmonds, Esq., wife of John Moore, gent., 1636, æt. 72; and Eliz., dau. of Hen. Harewell, Esq., of Coventry, 1640, æt. 23. Joseph Moore, M.D. Oxon., pos. to his mother, wife and four inf. chil. (two shs. in stone); side of A.T. in S.C.A. IX. Eng. inscr. with arms, and twenty Eng. vv., "Written by Himself in the Agony and Doloro"s Paines of the Gout" to Capt. Gervase Scrope of that fam., of Bolton, Yorks., 1705. S. wall of S.A. II. Is not in this church, but in

Coventry, Holy Trinity. It bears the arms of Coventry, and also those of the Mercers' Co. quartering a chevron; the male eff. is length, and the wives kng., mur. N.N.A. Milverton.-I. Lat. inscr., six Lat. and six Eng. vv., to Mary, dau. of Geo. Palmer, gent., 1660, æt. 20 yrs., 4 mos., 4 days, mur. N. II. An inscr. stating that Mr. John Eyers, of Milverton, left by wil to the parish £3 per ann. to be paid quarterly from the rent of meadow he purchased of Thos. Beaufy, in the parish of Leek Wotton, for schooling poor chil., mur. N.

Preston Bagot.-Add the date 1633, now
C.

mur.

Solihull.-I. Correct: four sons and eleven daus. to Ist wife; and one son and two daus. (in one group) to 2nd wife. Now mur. Add II. Eng. inscr. to George Averell, gent., 1637, æt. 98. He had four sons and three daus. by Anne, his wife. Mur. N. Tr. III. Henry, son of Geo. and Anne Averell, 1650, æt. 73. Mur. N.Tr. IV. Anne, wife of George

Wotton Wawen.-I. has five shields and chamfer (not marg.) inscr. on two sides. Add II. Eng. inscr. to Lady Agnes, wife of Sir John Smyth, Knt., Baron of the Exchequer, dau. of John Harwell, Esq., and coheiress of Thomas Harwell, Esq., her brother, 1562,

mur. S.C.

WORCESTERSHIRE.

Worcester Cathedral.-Lat. inscr. to [Sir] Bath, one of the Justices of the Common Thos. Litleton, of Frankley, Knt. of the Pleas, 1481, on verge of Altar Tomb against

S. wall of S.A. ? restored.

Yardley.-I. Izabell Wheler left by will annuities to the sum of £3 yearly to the poor inhabitants of Yardley. Wm. Astell is in civilian attire, and Simon Wheler in armour. Over their heads is a shield of arms. N. wall of C. Add II. Eng. inscr. to Edward Este, "owtter Barrister of ye Inn Temple, London," 1625, æt. 27. He married Frances, youngest dau. of Thos. Whitfeld, of Mortlake, co. Surrey, Esq., mur.

S.Tr.

(To be continued.)

Curiosities of the Church.*

HE curious customs pertaining to the worship of the Church in England, brought together in this work by Mr. Andrews, form an unusually attractive, as well as handsome, volume. There is no attempt at exhaustive treatment of the various subjects discussed, nor is there much in these pages that will be new to the practised ecclesiologist; but at the same time the most experienced antiquary in churchlore will be glad to have this pleasant book at hand for reference, and to many readers much of the well-arranged information in the volume will be new and surprising.

The first subject discussed is that of early

Customs, Services, and Records. By William Andrews, * Curiosities of the Church: Studies of Curious F.R.H.S. Methuen and Co.; 8vo., pp. 202.

Price 6s.

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IIIO, and which is the first authentic record of an English drama. The actors were the pupils of a learned Norman priest, named Geoffrey, who shortly afterwards became Abbot of St. Albans. A good outline description is also given of the ancient plays of Chester, Wakefield, Coventry, and York. Mr. Andrews is, however, in error in saying that "the religious plays ended with the Reformation." That sturdy Reformer, Bishop Ball, wrote some astoundingly irre

or to some other thing from which they could not be removed. The finest specimen of a chained Bible in England is to be seen at the ancient church of Cumnor, near Oxford. It is strongly bound in wood covers, strengthened with iron, and fastened with a strong iron chain to the desk-board of a pew. It bears the date of 1611 on the title-page, and so is a copy of our Authorized Version. Bibles were not the only books chained in churches, and even at the present day many

others are still found, those occurring most frequently being Foxe's Book of Martyrs, The Paraphrases of Erasmus, and Bishop Jewell's works.

On torchlight burials Mr. Andrews also touches, but the subject is not very comprehensively treated. Nocturnal funerals are not altogether events of the past, for even in these days they are occasionally carried out. The Dyotts furnish a notable instance of the survival of a custom which has been observed in their family for centuries; during the last decade one of their race was buried by torchlight at St. Mary's, Lichfield.

We have been permitted to reproduce the illustration of the Caistor Gad-Whip, certainly a true curiosity of the church. It seems that at the parish church of Caistor, Lincolnshire, on every Palm Sunday, until a comparatively recent date, there was performed one of the most singular of our English manorial services. The estate held by this old custom was the Manor of Broughton, near Brigg. The ceremony was so peculiar throughout that the following particulars are given :

"The whip is taken every Palm Sunday by a man from Broughton to the parish of Caistor, who, while the minister is reading the first lesson, cracks it three distinct times in the church porch, then folds it neatly up, and retires to a seat. At the commencement of the second lesson, he approaches the minister, and kneeling opposite to him with the whip in his hand and a purse at the end of it, held perpendicularly over his head, waves it thrice, and continues it in a steadfast position throughout the whole of the chapter. The ceremony is then concluded. The whip has a leather purse tied at the end of it, which ought to contain thirty pieces of silver, said to represent, according to Scripture, 'the price of blood.' Four pieces of wych-elm tree, of different lengths, are affixed to the stock, denoting the different Gospels of the Holy Evangelists. The three distinct. cracks are typical of St. Peter's denial of his Lord and Master three times, and the waving it over the minister's head as an intended homage of the Blessed Trinity."

The origin of this custom has not been satisfactorily ascertained, though there is an idle tradition that it was the self-inflicted penance of some nun on the Broughton

VOL. XXII.

estate for killing a boy with such a whip. This remarkable ceremony continued to be

annually observed until 1846, when the property was sold.

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Many curious bits of information may be gleaned from the chapters on church scrambling charities, and on dog-whippers and sluggard-wakers, but space forbids us to do

more than mention them.

We feel sure that many will feel grateful to Mr. Andrews for having produced such a really interesting book.

The Coronation of King James J., 1603.

By WILLIAM BRENCHLEY RYE.

T may seem strange, and even open to doubt, to be told that amid the overwhelming flood of print in existence, and considering what has been done of late years in the investigation of minute points in our history, there should be no detailed description yet published in English of the ceremonial as it was actually observed at the Coronation of the most high and mighty King James I., and of his Queen Anne of Denmark, in Westminster Abbey, on Monday, July 25, 1603. Yet this statement we believe, after considerable research, to be the fact. Our historians, as well as the authors of special works on the subject of Coronations, have been hitherto content to regard and accept as a true and authentic account of the ceremonial, what is merely the programme or formulary as arranged by the heralds and the Archbishop of Canterbury (Whitgift), which is printed in Nichols's Progresses of King James I., from the Harleian MS., 293, but which is likely to have undergone modification and alteration. On account of the Plague which was then raging, the King did not proceed in state from the Tower to the Abbey on the day before the coronation, as had been the custom; and the citizens (save and except the Lord Mayor, aldermen, and "twelve grave assistants") were forbidden by proclamation to come to Westminster for fear of infection. The King, moreover, commanded that there should be no preparation made for anything, except so much as concerned the real part of the ceremonial to be

performed in the church. The disappointed
Londoners, however, were gratified by a public
procession and pageants on a grand scale on
Thursday, March 15 following,* in which
"rare" Ben Jonson bore a conspicuous part,
when
All the air was rent,

As with the murmur of a moving wood;
The ground beneath did seem a moving flood,
Walls, windows, roofs, towers, steeples, all were set,
With several eyes, that in this object met.

John Stow and Gilbert Dugdale report briefly as follows: the former (Annales of England, 1631, p. 827) says:

"The 25 of July being Munday, and the feast of the blessed Apostle Saint James, King James of England, first of that name, with the Noble Lady and Queene Anne, were together Crowned, and anoynted at Westminster, by the most reverend Father in God, John Whitgift, Archbishop of Canterbury, in the presence of the Nobilitie, and other, namely, Sir Robert Lee, Lord Maior of London, in a Gowne of Crimson Velvet, his brethren the Aldermen, in Gownes of Scarlet, and twelve principall Citizens admitted to attend on them; these, in the morning early, entred the Maior's barge at the three Cranes staires and were rowed to Westminster, all other Citizens stayed from passing thither, either by water or by land, as much as might be."

In contrast to the above sober notice, Dugdale indulges somewhat in the then prevalent euphuistic vein. He says (The Time Triumphant, 1604): "Well, here he is, happily planted and heartily welcome! What wants then but his blessed Coronation! At which was no small Triumph. For had you seen him in progress to it, as many did when he took barge at Whitehall, on Saint James's day [25 July]; such was his salutation to the people, and theirs to him. But anon comes forth England's Triumph, the worth of women, ANNE, Queen of England, and happy wife to our most gracious King, and whose husband (four Kings in one), accompanied with lovely Ladies (the only wedstars of the world for

* Dean Stanley, Hist. of Westminster Abbey, as well as Mr. William Jones (Crowns and Coronations,

1883, p. 230), have confused the dates. In the Pictorial History of England, vol. iii., there is a wood engraving of the coronation of James I. from a Dutch print dated 1603.

beauty and good graces), following her dear Husband to Coronation, with her seemly hair down trailing on her princely bearing shoulders, on which hair was a coronet of gold. She so mildly saluted her subjects, that the women weeping ripe, cried all in one voice, 'God bless the Royal Queen! Welcome to England! Long live to continue so!'

"To Westminster they went, and took on them the Royalty of the time, the complete order of Coronation; and by a general and free consent, enjoyed the Rights of Royalty, and were invest in Honour, possessed of Majesty, owners of Royalty, and made the only Commander of all Principality.

"The Triumph of that time I omit, etc., etc."

The interesting narrative which follows, translated from the German, was drawn up by Benjamin von Buwinckhausen, the ambassador who had been despatched by Frederick, Duke of Wirtemberg, to congratulate the new King of England on his accession to the British throne, and who was an eye-witness of the ceremony described by him. It was, without doubt, written expressly for the information of the Duke, who was most solicitous to be invested with the Order of the Garter, into which he had been elected six years previously, but for "certain considerations" the late Queen had delayed the completion of this high honour, much to the disappointment and mortification of his Highness. The Duke of Wirtemberg had himself visited England in 1592, travelling under the name of Count Mompelgard, and was quizzed by Shakespeare in the Merry Wives of Windsor as "Cosen Garmombles and "Duke de Jamanie."* The original German manuscript is in the State archives at Stuttgart, and has been printed, but without annotation, by the Literary Society of that place, forming (along with Breuning's Relation über seine Sendung nach England, 1595) No. 81 of their valuable publications. The translation is as follows:

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"As Saint James's Day, and after that St. Anne's (which are the names of the King and Queen, viz., 25th and 26th July, O.S.) drew nigh, and it being the time appointed

* See the introduction to England as seen by Foreigners, by W. Brenchley Rye, 1865.

for the Coronation and customary Consecration of their Majesties in the Church at Westminster, near London, in which place such ceremony has always from the earliest times been performed, the King would not suffer any alteration to be made, notwithstanding the great mortality prevailing, but for many reasons willed that it should proceed. Thereupon His Majesty first of all by public proclamation ordered, under pain of punishment, that no person should repair thither, unless obliged to do so on account of his employment or duty. Towards the city of London, in order the better to guard against the contagion, barricades had been made, and watch was kept, so that the people might not penetrate beyond these.* Notwithstanding this, however, not only the Church (which is one of the largest and finest in Europe), but also all places and streets around it were so crowded with people, and the river so full of boats, that one could not move for the multitude.

"Two days before the Coronation, the King had come from Hampton Court by water to his Palace near London, called Whitehall (Wittehall'), close by the before-mentioned Church, and invited all the assembled Royal, Electoral, and Princely Ambassadors to be present at this solemnity, and, early in the morning of the 25th July, they were conducted by persons specially-deputed to their proper places in the Chapel, where the ceremony would be performed. About ten o'clock, the King and Queen came on foot from Whitehall to the aforesaid Church, which was prepared as follows: From the King's Court, or Palace, to the Church the road was hung and covered with white drapery, but on both sides of the streets with violet-covered ('violfarben') drapery, which, as soon as the King had passed, the rabble ('der gemein Pöffel') tore in pieces, and divided it among themselves. similar fashion the floor of the Church was covered with white, but in the Chapel with scarlet ('mit rotem, scharlach '), as were also the steps and walls, and, in short, everything. The arms and banners of the Kingdom and

In

* Five hundred soldiers were levied in the Strand and in Westminster, to repress any tumults_and disorders during the time of the Coronation. They were paid eightpence per diem each for two days' attendance (Devon's Issues of the Exchequer).

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