The Parish Clerk Part 29

_The Rev. E. G----, Vicar of Maldon._

Communicated by the Rev. D. C. Moore:

In the parish of Belton, Suffolk, there died in 1837 a man named Noah Pole. He had been clerk for sixty years. He wore a smock-frock; gave out all notices--strayed horse, a found sheep, etc. He was known by the nickname of "_Never, never_ shall be," for in this way he had for sixty years perverted the last part of the "Gloria," "now and ever shall be."

In the parish of Lowestoft, Suffolk, in the forties the parish clerk's name was Newson (would-be wits called him "Nuisance"). He was arrayed in a velvet-trimmed robe and bore himself bravely. The way in which he mouthed "Let us sing to the glory of G.o.d" was wonderful. But the chief amus.e.m.e.nt he afforded was the habit of hiding his face in his hands during each prayer, then towards the ending his head would rise till it rested on his thumbs, and then came out sonorously, "Awl-men."

At St. Mary's, Southtown (near Great Yarmouth), in the late thirties, etc., a man named Nolloth was clerk. He was celebrated for the uncertainty of his "H's." For example: "Let us sing to the praise and glory of G.o.d the Heighty-heighth ymn."

At Gorleston (the mother church of St. Mary's, named above) a tailor named Bristow was clerk. He was a very small man, and he had a son he wished to succeed him. The clerk's desk was pretty wide and they sat together. I can see them (sixty years after), one leaning on his right arm, the other on his left; and when the time came, the duet was _Ah_-men from the elder and A-men from the younger, one in "tenor" the other "treble." We schoolboys used to say "Big pig, little pig."

Nicholson, the clerk of St. Bees, if any student was called away in term, invariably gave out Psalm cvii., fourth part, "They that in ships with courage bold." In those days there were no trains and no hymns.

At Barkham there is an old clerk who succeeded his father half a century ago.

During the rebuilding of the church his sire, whose name was Elijah, once visited a neighbouring parish church, and arrived rather late, just when the rector was giving out the text: "What doest thou here, Elijah?" Elijah gave a respectful salute, and replied: "Please, sur, Barkham Church is undergoing repair, so I be c.u.med 'ere!"

Canon Rawnsley tells a pathetic little story of an old clerk who begged him not to read the service so fast: "For you most gie me toime, Mr.

Rawnsley, you most i'deed. You most gie me toime, for I've a graaceless wife an' two G.o.dless soons to praay for."

Hawker tells a story of the parish clerk at Morwenstow whose wife used to wash the parson's surplices. He came home one night from a prolonged visit at the village inn, the "Bush," and finding his wife's scolding not to his mind and depressing, he said, "Look yere, my dear, if you doan't stop, I'll go straight back again." She did not stop, so he left the house; but the wife donned one of the surplices and, making a short cut, stood in front of her approaching husband. He was terrified; but at last he remembered his official position, and the thought gave him courage.

"Avide, Satan!" he said in a thick, slow voice.

The figure made no answer.

"Avide, Satan!" he shouted again. "Doan't 'e knaw I be clerk of the parish, ba.s.s-viol player, and taicher of the singers?"

When the apparition failed to be impressed the clerk turned tail and fled. The ghost returned by a short cut, and the clerk found his wife calmly ironing the parson's surplice. He did not return to the "Bush"

that night.

The old parish clerk of Dagenham had a habit when stating the names to be entered into the register of saying, _Plain_ Robert or John, etc., meaning that Robert, etc., was the only Christian name. On one occasion a strange clergyman baptized a child there, and being unable to hear the name as given by the parents, looked inquiringly at the clerk. "Plain Jane, sir," he called out in a stentorian voice. "What a pity to label the child thus," the clergyman rejoined; "she might grow up to be a beautiful girl." "Jane _only_, I mean," explained the clerk.

All clergymen know the difficulty of changing the names of the sovereign and the Royal Family at the commencement of the reign of a new monarch.

In a certain parish in the south of England (the name of which I do not know, or have forgotten), at the time of the accession of Her late Majesty Queen Victoria, the rector charged his clerk to make the necessary alterations in the Book of Common Prayer required by the s.e.x of the new sovereign. The clerk made all the needed alterations with the greatest care as regards both t.i.tles and p.r.o.nouns; but not only this, he carried on the changes throughout the Psalter. Consequently, on the morning of the fourth day of the month, for instance, the rector found Psalm xxi. rendered thus: "The Queen shall rejoice in Thy strength, O Lord: exceeding glad shall She be of Thy salvation," and so on throughout the course of the Psalms and the whole of the Psalter. Also in the prayer for the Church Militant, when prayer is made for all Christian kings, princes, etc., the distracted vicar found the words changed into "Queen, Princesses, etc." After all, the clerk showed his thoroughness, but nothing short of a new Prayer Book could satisfy the needs of the vicar[94].

[Footnote 94: From the information of Miss Marion Stirling, who heard the story from Prebendary Thornton.]

Canon Gregory Smith tells the following story of a clerk in Herefordshire, who flourished half a century ago:

In the west-end gallery of the old-fashioned little church were musicians with fifes, etc. etc. Sometimes, if they started badly in a hymn, the clerk would say to the congregation, "Beg pardon, gents; we'll try again."

As I left home one day, the clerk ran after me. "But, sir, who'll take the duty on St. Swithin's Day?"

Once or twice, being somnolent, on a hot afternoon he woke up suddenly with a loud "Amen" in the middle of the sermon.

When I said good-bye to him, having resigned the benefice, he said, very gravely, "G.o.d will give us another comforter."

An old country clerk in showing visitors round the churchyard used to stop at a certain tombstone and say:

"This 'ere is the tomb of Thomas 'Ooper and 'is eleven wives."

One day a lady remarked: "Eleven? Dear me, that's rather a lot, isn't it?"

The old man looked at her gravely and replied: "Well, mum, yer see it wus an' 'obby of 'is'n."

The Rev. W.D. Parish, in his _Dictionary of the Suss.e.x Dialect_, tells of a friend of his who had been remonstrating with one of his parishioners for abusing the parish clerk beyond the bounds of neighbourly expression, and who received the following answer: "You be quite right, sir; you be quite right. I'd no ought to have said what I did; but I doant mind telling you to your head what I've said so many times behind your back. We've got a good shepherd, I says, an excellent shepherd, but he's got an unaccountable bad dog."

Some seventy or eighty years ago at Thame Church, Buckinghamshire, the old-fashioned clerk had a much-worn Prayer Book, and the parson and he made a duet of the responses, the congregation not considering it necessary or even proper to interfere. When the clerk happened to come to a verse of the Psalms with words missing he said "riven out"

(p.r.o.nounced oot), and the parson finished the verse; this was taken quite as a matter of course by the congregation.

In a Lancashire church, when the rector was about to publish the banns of marriage, the book was not in its usual place. However, he began: "I publish the banns of marriage ... I publish ... the banns"--when the clerk looked up from the lowest box of the "three-decker," and said in a tone not _sotto voce_, "'Twixt th' cushion and th' desk, sur."

Prayer Book words are sometimes a puzzle to illiterate clerks. At the present time in a Berkshire church the clerk always speaks of "Athanasian's Creed," and of "the Anthony-Communion hymn."

His views of art are occasionally curious. An odd specimen of his race was showing to some strangers a stained-gla.s.s window recently erected in memory of a gentleman and lady who had just died. It was a two-light window with figures of Moses and Aaron. "There they be, sir, but they don't much feature the old couple," said the clerk, who regarded them as likenesses of the deceased.

A clergyman on one occasion had some trouble with his dog. This dog emulated the achievements of Newton's "Fido," and tore and devoured some leaves of the parson's sermon. The parson was taking the duty of a neighbour, and feared lest his mutilated discourse would be too short for the edification of the congregation. So after the service he consulted the clerk. "Was my sermon too long to-day?" "No," replied the clerk. "Then was it too short?" "Nay, you was jist about right." Much relieved, the parson then told the clerk the story of the dog's misdemeanours, and of his fear lest the sermon should prove too short.

The old clerk scratched his head and then exclaimed, with a very solemn face, "Ah! maister ----, our parson be a grade sight too long to plaise us. Would you just give him a pup?"