The Parish Clerk Part 4

There seems to have been some difficulty in collecting this money; so it was agreed in 1579-80 that "John Marshall shall every month in the year during the time that he shall be clerk, gather the holy loaf and thereof yield an account to the churchwardens."

Subsequently we constantly meet with such records as the following:

"It'm for the holy loffe xiii s. vi d."

Ultimately, however, this mode of collecting money for the providing of the sacred elements and defraying other expenses of the church was, as we have said, abandoned in favour of pew-rents. The clerk had long ceased to obtain any benefit from the custom of collecting this curious form of subscription to the parochial expenses.

An interesting doc.u.ment exists in the parish of Stanford-in-the-Vale, Berkshire, relating to the holy loaf. It was evidently written during the reign of Queen Mary, and runs as follows:--

"Here following is the order of the giving of the loaves to make holy bread with videlicit of when it beginneth and endeth, what the whole value is, in what portions it is divided, and to whom the portions be due, and though it be written in the fifth part of the division of the book before in the beginning with these words (how money shall be paid towards the charges of the communion) ye shall understand that in the time of the Schism when this Realm was divided from the Catholic Church, the which was in the year of our Lord G.o.d in 1547, in the second year of King Edward the Sixth, all G.o.dly ceremonies and good uses were taken out of the church within this Realm, and then the money that was bestowed on the holy bread was turned to the use of finding bread and wine for the communion, and then the old order being brought unto his [its] pristine state before this book was written causeth me to write with this term[27]."

[Footnote 27: The spelling of the words I have ventured to modernise.]

The order of the giving of the loaves is then set forth, beginning at a piece of ground called Ganders and continuing throughout the parish, together with names of the parishioners. The collecting of this sum must have been an arduous part of the clerk's duty. "And thus I make an end of this matter," as the worthy clergyman at Stanford-in-the-Vale wrote at the conclusion of his carefully drawn up doc.u.ment[28].

[Footnote 28: A relic of this custom existed in a small town in Dorset fifty years ago. At Easter the clerk used to leave at the house of each pew-holder a packet of Easter cakes--thin wafery biscuits, not unlike Jewish Pa.s.s-over cakes. The packet varied according to the size of the family and the depth of the master's purse. When the fussy little clerk called for his Easter offering, at one house he found 5 s. waiting for him, as a kind of payment for five cakes. The shilling's were quickly transferred to the clerk's pocket, who remarked, "Five shilling's is handsome for the clerk, sir; but the vicar only takes gold."

The custom of the clerk carrying round the parish Easter cakes prevailed also at Milverton, Somerset, and at Langport in the same county.]

In addition to his regular wages and to the dues received for delivering holy water and in connection with the holy loaf, the clerk enjoyed sundry other perquisites. At Christmas he received a loaf from every house, a certain number of eggs at Easter, and some sheaves when the harvest was gathered in. Among the doc.u.ments in the parish chest at Morebath there is a very curious ma.n.u.script relating to a prolonged quarrel with regard to the dues to be paid to the clerk. This took place in the year 1531 and lasted until 1536. This doc.u.ment throws much light on the customary fees and gifts paid to the holder of this office. After endless wrangling the parishioners decided that the clerk should have "a steche of clene corn" from every household, if there should be any corn; if not, a "steche of wotis" (oats), or 3 d. in lieu of corn. Also 1 d.

a quarter from every household; at every wedding and funeral 2 d.; at shearing time enough wool for a coat. Moreover, it was agreed that he should have a clerk's ale in the church house. It is well known that church ales were very common in medieval times, when the churchwardens bought, and received presents of, a large quant.i.ty of malt which they brewed into beer. The village folk collected other provisions, and a.s.sembled in the church house, where there were spits and crocks and other utensils for dressing a feast. Old and young gathered together; the churchwardens' ale was sold freely. The young folk danced, or played at bowls or practised archery, the old people looking gravely on and enjoying the merry-making. Such were the old church ales, the proceeds of which were devoted to the maintenance of the poor or some other worthy object. An arbour of boughs was erected in the churchyard called Robin Hood's Bower, where the maidens collected money for the "ales."

The clerk in some parishes, as at Morebath, had "an ale" at Easter, and it was agreed that "the parish should help to drink him a cost of ale in the church house," which duty doubtless the village folk carried out with much willingness and regularity.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE OLD CHURCH-HOUSE AT HURST. BERKSHIRE NOW THE CASTLE INN]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE OLD CHURCH-HOUSE AT UFFINGTON. BERKS NOW USED AS A SCHOOL]

Puritanism gradually killed these "ales." Sabbatarianism lifted up its voice against them. The gatherings waxed merry, sometimes too merry, so the stern Puritan thought, and the ballad-singer sang profane songs, and the maidens danced with light-footed step, and it was all very wrong because they were breaking the Sabbath; and the ale was strong, and sometimes people drank too much, so the critics said. But all reasonable and sober-minded folk were not opposed to them, and in reply to some inquiries inst.i.tuted by Archbishop Laud, the Bishop of Bath and Wells made the following report:

"Touching clerke-ales (which are lesser church-ales) for the better maintenance of Parish-clerks they have been used (until of late) in divers places, and there was great reason for them; for in poor country parishes, where the wages of the clerk is very small, the people thinking it unfit that the clerk should duly attend at church and lose by his office, were wont to send in Provisions, and then feast with him, and give him more liberality than their quarterly payments would amount unto in many years. And since these have been put down, some ministers have complained unto me, that they are afraid they shall have no parish clerks for want of maintenance for them."

Mr. Wickham Legg has investigated the subsequent history of this good Bishop Pierce, and shows how the Puritans when they were in power used this reply as a means of accusation against him, whereby they attempted to prove that "he profanely opposed the sanctification of the Lord's Day by approving and allowing of profane wakes and revels on that day," and was "a desperately profane, impious, and turbulent Pilate."

It is well known that the incomes of the clergy were severely taxed by the Pope, who demanded annates or first-fruits of one year's value on all benefices and sundry other exactions. The poor clerk's salary did not always escape from the rapacity of the Pope's collectors, as the story told by Matthew Paris clearly sets forth:

"It happened that an agent of the Pope met a petty clerk carrying water in a little vessel, with a sprinkler and some bits of bread given him for having sprinkled some holy water, and to him the deceitful Roman thus addressed himself:

"'How much does the profits yielded to you by this church amount to in a year?' To which the clerk, ignorant of the Roman's cunning, replied:

"'To twenty shillings, I think.'

"Whereupon the agent demanded the percentage the Pope had just demanded on all ecclesiastical benefices. And to pay that sum this poor man was compelled to hold school for many days, and by selling his books in the precincts, to drag on a half-starved life."

This story discloses another duty which fell to the lot of the mediaeval clerk. He was the parish schoolmaster--at least in some cases. The decretals of Gregory IX require that he should have enough learning in order to enable him to keep a school, and that the parishioners should send their children to him to be taught in the church. There is not much evidence of the carrying out of this rule, but here and there we find allusions to this part of a clerk's duties. Inasmuch as this may have been regarded as an occupation somewhat separate from his ordinary duties as regards the church, perhaps we should not expect to find constant allusion to it. However, Archbishop Peckham ordered, in 1280, that in the church of Bakewell and the chapels annexed to it there should be _duos clericos scholasticos_ carefully chosen by the parishioners, from whose alms they would have to live, who should carry holy water round in the parish and chapels on Lord's Days and festivals, and minister _in divinis officiis_, and on weekdays should keep school[29]. It is said that Alexander, Bishop of Coventry, in 1237, directed that there should be in country villages parish clerks who should be schoolmasters.

[Footnote 29: If that is the correct translation of _profestis diebus disciplinis scolasticis indulgentes_. Dr. Legg thinks that it may refer to their own education.]

It is certain--for the churchwarden accounts bear witness to the fact--that in several parishes the clerks performed this duty of teaching. Thus in the accounts of the church of St. Giles, Reading, occurs the following:

Pay'd to Whitborne the clerk towards his wages and he to be bound to teach ij children for the choir ... xij s.

At Faversham, in 1506, it was ordered that "the clerks or one of them, as much as in them is, shall endeavour themselves to teach children to read and sing in the choir, and to do service in the church as of old time hath been accustomed, they taking for their teaching as belongeth thereto"; and at the church of St. Nicholas, Bristol, in 1481, this duty of teaching is implied in the order that the clerk ought not to take any book out of the choir for children to learn in without licence of the procurators. We may conclude, therefore, that the task of teaching the children of the parish not unusually devolved upon the clerk, and that some knowledge of Latin formed part of the instruction given, which would be essential for those who took part in the services of the church.

Nor were his labours yet finished. In John Myrc's _Instructions to Parish Priests_, a poem written not later than 1450, a treatise containing good sound morality, and a good sight of the ecclesiastical customs of the Middle Ages, we find the following lines:

"When thou shalt to seke[30] _gon_ Hye thee fast and _go_ a-non; For if thou tarry thou dost amiss, Thou shalt guyte[31] that soul I wys.

When thou shalt to seke gon, A clene surples caste thee on; Take thy stole with thee ry't,[32]

And put thy hod ouer thy sy't[33]

Bere thyne ost[34] a-nout thy breste In a box that is honeste; Make thy clerk before thee synge, To bere light and belle ringe."

[Footnote 30: Sick.]

[Footnote 31: Quiet.]

[Footnote 32: Right.]

[Footnote 33: Sight.]

[Footnote 34: Host.]

It was customary, therefore, for the clerk to accompany the priest to the house of the sick person, when the clergyman went to administer the Last Sacrament or to visit the suffering. The clerk was required to carry a lighted candle and ring a bell, and an ancient MS. of the fourteenth century represents him marching before the priest bearing his light and his bell. In some town parishes he was ordered always to be at hand ready to accompany the priest on his errands of mercy. It was a grievous offence for a clerk to be absent from this duty. In the parish of St. Stephen's, Coleman Street, the clerks were not allowed "to go or ride out of the town without special licence had of the vicar and churchwardens, and at no time were they to be out of the way, but one of them had always to be ready to minister sacraments and sacramentals, and to wait upon the Curate and to give him warning." This custom of the clerk accompanying the priest when visiting the sick was not abolished at the Reformation. _The Parish Clerk's Guide_, published by the Worshipful Company of Parish Clerks in 1731, the history of which it will be our privilege to investigate, states that the holders of the office "are always conversant in Holy Places and Holy Things, such as are the Holy Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper; yea and in the most serious Things too, such as the Visitation of the Sick, when we do often attend, and at the Burial of the Dead."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CLERK ACCOMPANYING THE PRIEST WHEN VISITING THE SICK]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CLERK ATTENDING THE PRIEST, WHO IS ADMINISTERING THE LAST SACRAMENT]

Occupied with these numerous duties, engaged in a service which delighted him, his time could never have hung heavy on his hands.

Faithful in his dutiful services to his rector, beloved by the parishioners, a welcome guest in cot and hall, and serving G.o.d with all his heart, according to his lights, he could doubtless exclaim with David, _Laetus sorte mea_.

CHAPTER IV

THE DUTIES OF READING AND SINGING

The clerk's highest privilege in pre-Reformation times was to take his part in the great services of the church. His functions were very important, and required considerable learning and skill. When the songs of praise echoed through the vaulted aisles of the great church, his voice was heard loud and clear leading the choirmen and chanting the opening words of the Psalm. As early as the time of St. Gregory this duty was required of him. In giving directions to St. Augustine of Canterbury the Pope ordered that clerks should be diligent in singing the Psalms. In the ninth century Pope Leo IV directed that the clerks should read the Psalms in divine service, and in 878 Archbishop Hincmar of Rheims issued some articles of inquiry to his Rural Deans, asking, among other questions, "Whether the presbyter has a clerk who can keep school, or read the epistle, or is able to sing as far as may seem needful to him?"

A canon of the Council of Nantes, embodied in the Decretals of Pope Gregory IX, settled definitely that every presbyter who has charge of a parish should have a clerk, who should sing with him and read the epistle and lesson, and who should be able to keep school and admonish the parishioners to send their children to church to learn the faith[35]. This ordinance was binding upon the Church in this country as in other parts of Western Christendom, and William Lyndewoode, Official Princ.i.p.al of the Archbishop of Canterbury, when laying down the law with regard to the marriage of clerks, states that the clerk has "to wait on the priest at the altar, to sing with him, and to read the epistle." A notable quarrel between two clerks, which is recorded by John of Athon writing in the years 1333-1348, gives much information upon various points of ecclesiastical usage and custom. The account says:

[Footnote 35: Decr. Greg. IX. Lib. III. t.i.t. i. cap. iii., quoted by Dr.

Cuthbert Atchley in _Alcuin Club Tracts_, IV.]

"Lately, when two clerks were contending about the carrying of holy water, the clerk appointed by the parishioners against the command of the priest, wrenched the book from the hands of the clerk who had been appointed by the rector, and who had been ordered to read the epistle by the priest, and hurled him violently to the ground, drawing blood[36]."

[Footnote 36: John of Athon, _Const.i.t. Dom. Othoboni_, t.i.t. _De residentia archipreb. et episc._: cap. _Pastor bonus_: verb _sanctae obedientiae_.]

A very unseemly disturbance truly! Two clerks righting for the book in the midst of the sanctuary during the Eucharistic service! Still their quarrel teaches us something about the appointment and election of clerks in the Middle Ages, and of the duty of the parish clerk with regard to the reading of the epistle.