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THE PARISH CLERK.*

In the front rank of races of men and holders of offices that are alike dying out stands the parish clerk. He is a being seldom met with in these degenerate days-be sure that they are degenerate, they always are-and it is fitting that he should have his monument. Originally a man of learning, of culture and refinement, a man who aspired to and often reached the dignity of holy orders, he has passed through many strange vicissitudes. There have been times-notably when pluralism was rampant-when, though the proceeding was, strictly speaking, illegal, he baptised young and possibly old, took the marriage and burial services, read prayers, and "churches" women. He was probably as competent as, or more competent than, the parson he hoped to succeed; but complaints reached the bishop's ears, inquiries were instituted, and our worthy aquæbajalus was, metaphorically. hauled over the coals. Still, though robbed of these opportunities to add inches to his stature, he had many duties to perform. He conducted a crude orchestra; selected the hymns and psalms; read the lessons; carried round the holy water and asperged his parishioners:

Censing the wives of the parish fast: And many a lovely look he on them cast;

was usually ready with his responses and Amens; whipped the dogs out of church; generally slept soundly beneath the old three-decker while the sermon was proceeding; and often, in addition, like Chaucer's Jolly Absolon: "Well could he letten blood, and clip and shave." Times changed, and a

"The Parish Clerk." By P. H. Ditchfield. (Methuen, 7s. 6d. net.)

new order of parish clerk took his place: a less-educated order, who maintained the dignity of office through body rather than mind. With the change came, inevitably, a curtailment of privileges, and the relation of parson and clerk became that of master and man in place of that of companions, or at least of social equals; and to-day the last remnants of the power of the parish clerk are vested in the verger or sexton.

It is well, therefore, as we have said, that he should have his monument; but it is not well that it should be the monument which Mr. Ditchfield has erected. Our aquæbajalus has played a part important in social and ecclesiastical history; and he should have been treated seriously-not as a provider of mirth for the million. Not that we would be understood to sneer at mirth-we object to his being set up as an object for laughter. Mr. Ditchfield's book consists mainly of instances of unconscious humor on the part of the parish clerk with perhaps one or two of conscious humor.

There

is very little history, few records of manners and customs, practically nothing, in fact, of the office of the parish clerk and its significance. True, he gives us chapters on "The Antiquity and Continuity of the Office of Clerk"; "The Mediæval Clerk"; "The Clerks of London: their Duties and Privileges"; and so on; but there is nothing new in them, and for the most part they are mere pegs to hang anecdotes onmagazine articles rather than component parts of a serious piece of history. The chapters themselves are badly arranged; repetitions are frequent; the style is jerky and colorless; and anecdotes have been dragged in with little regard to probability. As

an instance of this last, we may take the story-a very good story in its way --of the clerk who, through failing eyesight, found a difficulty in reading the first line of the Psalm. "My eyes are dim, I canna see," he exclaimed; and the congregation promptly repeated the words after him. With a fine sense of the fitness of things, he spluttered angrily: "Tarnation fools you all must be"; and of course the congregation faithfully repeated his exclamation. The story, too, of the man who, when visiting a "ritualistic" church, was walking into the chancel when he was stopped by an official, has nothing to do with the parish clerk. "You mustn't go in there," said the official. "Why not?" "Oh, because I'm here to stop you." "To stop me? Oh, I see. You're what they call the rude screen, aren't you?" asked the gentleman. Mr. Ditchfield, in short, shows himself to be a cook who can make up a rechauffé at a moment's notice; and lest we seem ungenerous, let us say at once that it is a very delectable vegetarian rechauffé, though one occasionally finds in it an onion masquerading as a peach.

Seldom has our aquæbajalus proved a poet of any consequence, though Richard Furness wrote some very creditable verse. Of a different order was the Somersetshire clerk who revised Tate and Brady's metrical rendering of Psalm 1xvii. when the Lord Bishop of the diocese visited his church, and announced it as follows:

Let us zing to the praze an' glory of God part of the zixty-zeventh Zalm; zspeshul varshun zspesh'ly 'dapted vur t'cazshun:

Wy op ye zo ye little ills?
An wot var do 'ee zskip?
Is it acause ter prach too we
Is cum'd me Lord Biship?

Wy zskip ye zo ye little ills? An wot var do ee op?

Is it acause ter prach too we Is cum'd me Lord Bishop?

Then let uz awl arize an zing,
An let uz awl stric up,
An zing a glawrious zong uv praze
An bless me Lord Bishup.

A similar effusion, composed by another clerk when the Lord Bishop of Exeter held a confirmation in his church on the fifth of November:

This is the day that was the night
When the Papists did conspire
To blow up the King and Parliament
House

With Gundy-powdy-ire,

deserves to go down to posterity.

Our aquæbajalus was generally an accomplished maker of epitaphs and an advertisement issued by one of his tribe is worth quoting:

John Hopkins [it runs], parish clerk and undertaker, sells epitaphs of all sorts and prices. Shaves neat, and plays the bassoon. Teeth drawn, and the Salisbury Journal read gratis every Sunday morning at eight. A school for Psalmody every Thursday evening, when my son, born blind, will play the fiddle. Specimen epitaph on my wife:

My wife ten years, not much to my ease,

But now she's dead, in caelo quies.
Great variety to be seen within.

Canon Rawnsley used to tell a pathetic story of a parish clerk-whose life was not a bed of roses-who begged him not to read the services so fast; "For you moost gie me toime, Muster Rawnsley," he said; "you moost i'deed. You moost gie me toime, for I've a graaceless wife and two godless soons to praay for." Another clerk, who felt the burden of the matrimonial yoke and was in difficulties over the word "Mesech," read with marked feeling: "Woe is me that I am compelled to dwell with Missis."

We quoted a short time ago the story of a clergyman who left his sermon at his manse and set the congregation to work on the hundred and nineteenth psalm while he galloped off to fetch it. Inquiring how they were progressing on his return, "They've got to the eend of the eighty-fourth verse," he was informed, "an they're just cheepin' like wee mice." Mr. Ditchfield has an equally good anecdote of a parish clerk who was secretary to the races committee and was wont to hurry out of church to attend their meetings. This came to the knowledge of the rector and he prepared a very lengthy sermon, to be delivered on a day on which the committee met. The first half-hour passed, then the clerk began to get restless. Another half-hour went by, and the clerk looked up anxiously; but the rector was "getting set." At last, finding that it was too late to attend the meeting, our worthy aquæbajalus resigned himself to the inevitable. sermon over, he rose with a broad smile on his face and gave out: "The 'undred and nineteenth Psalm from yend to yend. He's preached all day and we'll sing all neet."

The

The anecdotes we have quoted have The Academy.

about them an element of probability, but we fail to see what purpose is served by dishing up such stories as the following of a clergyman whose dog emulated the achievements of Newton's "Fido" and tore and devoured some leaves of his master's sermon. The parson had to take duty for a neighbor, and fearing lest his mutilated sermon should have appeared too short, he consulted the clerk. "Was my sermon too long, to-day?" he asked. "Nay," was the reply. "Then was it too short?" "Nay, you was jist about right." Much relieved, the parson confided to the clerk the story of the dog's misdemeanors. The clerk scratched his face solemnly, and then: "Ah, maister," he said, "our parson be a grade sight too long to plaise we. Would you just gie him a pup?" The story is obviously an invention, and it is not even "a fond thing vainly invented." Jolly Absolon, in the course of many hundred years of activity, surely could have provided sufficient matter for an interesting book. It was scarcely fair of Mr. Ditchfield to label the volume before us "The Parish Clerk." It is little more than a scrap-book.

BOOKS AND AUTHORS.

De Quincey's "Reminiscences of the English Lakes and the Lake Poets"; Lockhart's fine and kindly Life of Robert Burns; and The Shorter Poems of William Wordsworth, with an Introduction by Ernest Rhys, the general editor of the series, are among the latest issues in "Everyman's Library."

An autobiographical fragment left by William Allingham has been edited for production by Mrs. Allingham and Mrs. Ernest Radford. It covers only the period of early childhood and a portion

of his later years, when he was on terms of intimacy with Carlyle and Tennyson. Messrs. Macmillan will be the publishers.

The nine stories which Eliza Calvert Hall gathers into a volume called "Aunt Jane of Kentucky" give pictures of the rural life of a generation ago as seen through the shrewd but kindly eyes of an old woman. They vary in theme and quality from "The Baptizing at Kittle Creek," which is little better than broad farce, to "Mary

Andrews' Dinner-Party" which shows a touch of tragic power. In different vein still are "Aunt Jane's Album," a charming study of the old-time patchwork quilt with its associations, and "The Gardens of Memory," where the quaint reminiscences are called up by a stroll between flower-beds. Little, Brown & Co.

Vasari is one of the many delightful authors in whom time has destroyed man's faith, and this is a great pity because his falsity is often so much more picturesque and brilliant than the truth, and one can wish the uncritical reader in search of simple enjoyment nothing better than to believe every word of E. Seeley's "Stories of the Italian Artists from Vasari." The translation is crystalline in its clearness; the colored plates are excellent, partly because they do not attempt to be brillient, and many of the half tones are almost startling in their reproduction of expression and sentiment. The volume is tastefully bound and no more delightful gift book could be desired. (E. P. Dutton & Co.)

"Full of human stuff," says the reviewer of "Punch," of "Growth," the new novel by the clever writer who signs herself "Graham Travers" but whose friends know her as Margaret Todd, M.D. A study of religious types and influences as encountered by a young student at the University of Edinburgh, the portraits of Agnostic, Non-conformist, Anglican and Romanist all show such skilful touches that it is not easy to tell where the artist's own sympathy may lie, though it might be at either of the two extremes. The reader who looks for some trend of positive conviction will be disappointed, but as a presentation of op

posing forms of modern thought the book is notable among recent novels. As a story it is decidedly above the average. The scene shifts from Edinburgh and the Scottish moors to Rome, then to the forests of Portugal; the student-group offers a variety of characters; the feminine interest is supplied by the pretty daughter of a prosperous Non-conformist deacon, a rich young woman doing philanthropic work along independent lines, and an actress; the plot is intricate enough to hold the interest to the end; and the style is brilliant and forcible. Holt & Co.

Henry

Particulars are now announced of the Cambridge History of English Literature, which is to follow the plan of the Cambridge Modern History. The work will be published in fourteen volumes of about four hundred and fifty pages each, and will cover the whole of English literature from Beowulf to the end of the Victorian age. As in the Cambridge Modern History each chapter will be the work of a writer specially familiar with the subject, and the History will give a connected account of the successive movements, both main and subsidiary, treating minor writers adequately and not allowing them to be overshadowed by a few great personalities. Vol. i. will cover the period from the origin to Chaucer, vol. ii. from Chaucer to the Renaissance, vol. iii. Elizabethan poetry and prose, vols. iv. and v. Elizabethan and Jacobean drama, vol. vi. Jacobean poetry and prose, vol. vii. the Caroline age, vol. viii. the age of Dryden, vol. ix. the age of Swift and Pope, vol. x. the rise of the novel, vol. xi. the earlier Georgian age, vol. xii. the Romantic revival, and vols. xiii. and xiv. the Victorian age.

SEVENTH SERIES
VOLUME XXXV.

No. 3280 May 18, 1907.

CONTENTS.

Vol. CCLIII.

1.

II.

III.

IV.

Is Literature Dying? By Herbert Paul. CONTEMPORARY REVIEW 387
Some London Children at Play. By Rose M. Bradley.

.

NINETEENTH CENTURY AND AFTER 395 The Enemy's Camp. Chapters X and XI. (To be continued) MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE 408

The Folk-Lore of the County Court. By Judge Parry.

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XIV. The Big 'Roos' Feeding-Ground. By M. Forrest.
BOOKS AND AUTHORS

A PAGE OF VERSE
May in the Meadow. By Florence M. Bradford.
For Dark-Fear. By J. Marjoram.

386

386

386

447

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