The Customs of Old England Part 3

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 a.s.sembled 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 Pet.i.t 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 ma.s.s? 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 ma.s.s--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 ma.s.se and each of them offer 1_d._ 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 p.r.o.nounced 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, n.o.blemen, and other benefactors. On the Octave he repaired, accompanied by his train, to the house of Sir Thomas Utrecht, from whom he obtained "iij_s._ iiij_d._"; 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 s.h.i.+llings.

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 b.u.t.ter. 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 superst.i.tions 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 ma.s.se and preache in the pulpitt, with other such onfittinge and inconuenient vsages which tend rather to derysyon than enie true glorie of G.o.d, or honour of his Sayntes: the Kynges maiestie, therefore, myndynge nothinge so muche as to aduance the true glory of G.o.d without vain superst.i.tion, wylleth and commandeth that from henceforth all such superst.i.tious obseruations be left and clerely extinguished throu'out all his realme and dominions for as moche as the same doth resemble rather the vnlawfull superst.i.tion 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 f.a.ggot 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. Circ.u.mstances rather point to Paschal rites as the matrix of the custom. The Waking of the Sepulchre antic.i.p.ates 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 "Victimae 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 G.o.dwin 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 partic.i.p.ation of the priests in what had ceased to be an act of public wors.h.i.+p. 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 Peche") 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 a 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 Ba.s.singbourn--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 a.s.signed 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-inst.i.tution 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 a.s.sumption 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 encyclopaedia 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 [Greek: pegma], 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 pa.s.s 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 princ.i.p.al 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 outcla.s.sed by their compet.i.tors.

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 a.n.a.lysis: Tanners, plasterers, card-makers, fullers, coopers, armourers, gaunters (glovers), s.h.i.+pwrights, 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 a.s.sumption 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 a.s.signment of the pageant in which G.o.d warns Noah to make an ark to the s.h.i.+pwrights, 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 pa.s.sed 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-s.h.i.+fting, of which an ill.u.s.tration 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 degre. 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 s.h.i.+llings.

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.