with suche other unfittinge and inconvenient usages, rather to the derysyon than anie true glorie of God, or honour of his Sayntes. The Kynge's Majestie wylleth and commaundeth that henceforth all such superstitious observations be left and clerely extinguished throwout all this Realme and Dominions," &c. According to a small Cronicle of Yere's respecting London, it should seem that there had been a previous Proclamation, dated July 22d, 1540, in part, at least, to the same effect. In "Yet a Course at the Romyshe foxe: A dysclosynge or openynge of the Manne of Synne, contayned in the late declaration of the Pope's old faythe, made by Edmonde Boner, Bysshopp of London," &c. by Johan Harryson, [i. e. Bale,] Zurik, 1542, the author enumerates some auncyent rytes and lawdable ceremonyes of holy churche," then, it should seem, laid aside, with the following censure on the bishop : "than ought my lorde also to suffer the same selfe ponnyshment, for not goynge abought with Saynt Nycholas clarkes," &c. With the Catholic liturgy, all the pageantries of popery were restored to their ancient splendour by Queen Mary. Among these, the procession of the boy bishop was too popular a mummery to be overlooked. In Strype's Ecclesiastical Memorials, iii. 202, we read that, Nov. 13, 1554, an edict was issued by the Bishop of London to all the clergy of his diocese, to have a boy bishop in procession. In the same volume, however, p. 205, we read: Anno 1554, December 5, "the which was St. Nicholas Eve, at even-song time came a commandment that St. Nicolas should not go abroad nor about. But, notwithstanding, it seems, so much were the citizens taken with the mock of St. Nicolas, that is, a boy bishop, that there went about these St. Nicolases in divers parishes, as in St. Andrew's Holborn, and St Nicolas Olaves, in Bread street. The reason the procession of St. Nicolas was forbid, was, because the cardinal had this St. Nicolas Day sent for all the convocation, bishops, and inferior clergy, to come to him to Lambeth, there to be absolved from all their perjuries, schisms, and heresies." In the following page, Strype gives some account of the origin of this ceremony, in which there is nothing that has not been iij. libras, xvs. id. ob de perquisitis ipsius Episcopi per ipsum Johannem receptis: and the said Robert takes an oath that he will never molest the said John for the above sum. already noticed. He says, ibid. iii. 310, that in 1556, on St. Nicholas Even, "St. Nicholas, that is, a boy habited like a Bishop in pontificalibus, went abroad in most parts of London, singing after the old fashion, and was received with many ignorant but well-disposed people into their houses, and had as much good cheer as ever was wont to be had before, at least in many places." Warton informs us that one of the child bishop's songs, as it was sung before the Queen's Majesty, in her privy chamber, at her manor of St. James in the Fields, on St. Nicholas's Day, and Innocents' Day, 1555, by the child bishop of St. Paul's, with his company, was printed that year in London, containing a fulsome panegyric on the queen's devotions, comparing her to Judith, Esther, the Queen of Sheba, and the Virgin Mary. The pageantry of the boy bishop would naturally be put down again when Queen Elizabeth came to the crown: but yet it seems to have been exhibited in the country villages toward the latter end of her reign. The practice of electing a boy-bishop appears to have subsisted in common grammar-schools. St. Nicholas, says Warton, was the patron of scholars, and hence, at Eton College, St. Nicholas has a double feast; i. e. one on account of the college, the other of the schools. He adds, "I take this opportunity of observing that the anniversary custom at Eton of going ad montem, originated from the ancient and popular practice of theatrical processions in collegiate bodies.' But, with great deference to his opinion, I shall endeavour to show that it is only a corruption of the ceremony of the boy-bishop, and his companions, who, being, by Henry the Eighth's edict, prevented from mimicking any longer their religious superiors, gave a new face to their festivity, and began their present play at soldiers. The following shows how early our youth began to imitate the martial manners of their elders in these sports, for it appears from the close rolls of Edward I. memb. 2, that a precept was issued to the sheriff of Oxford in 1305, from the "Hoc anno 1464, in Festo Sancti Nicolai, non erat Episcopus puerorum in Scola Grammaticali in civitate Cantuariæ, ex defectu Magistrorum, viz. J. Sidney et. T. Hikson, &c." Lib. Johannis Stone, monachi Eccles. Cant. sc. de Obitibus et aliis memorabilibus sui cænobii, MS. Corp. Chr. Cantab. 417. King, "to prohibit tournaments being intermixed with the sports of the scholars on St. Nicholas's Day." It appears, by Hasted's History of Kent, iii. 174, that the master of Wye School, founded by Archbishop Kempe in 1447, was to teach all the scholars, both rich and poor, the art of grammar gratis, unless a present was voluntarily made, and except "consuetam gallorum et denariorum Sancti Nicolai gratuitam oblationem," the usual offerings of cocks and pence at the feast of St. Nicholas. See also Gent. Mag. for May, 1777, p. 208, and for Dec. 1790, p. 1076. All In the statutes of St. Paul's school, A.D. 1518, (see Knight's Life of Colet, p. 362,) the following clause occurs: these children shall every Childermas Daye come to Pauli's Churche, and hear the Childe-bishop sermon: and after he be at the hygh masse, and each of them offer a 1d. to the Childebishop, and with them the maisters and surveyors of the scole." Strype, in his Ecclesiastical Memorials, speaking of the boy-bishop among scholars, says: "I shall only remark, that there might this at least be said in favour of this old custom, that it gave a spirit to the children; and the hopes that they might one time or other attain to the real mitre made them mind their books." The following most curious passage from the "Status Scholæ Etonensis," A.D. 1560, shows that in the Papal times the Eton scholars (to avoid interfering, as it should seem, with the boy-bishop of the college there on St. Nicholas's Day,) elected their boy-bishop on St. Hugh's Day, in the month of November. St. Hugh was a real boy-bishop at Lincoln. His day was on November 17th. “Mense Novembri. In die Sancti Hugonis Pontificis solebat Ætonæ fieri electio Episcopi Nihilensis: sed consuetudo obsolevit. Olim Episcopus ille puerorum habebatur nobilis. In cujus electione et literata et laudatissima exercitatio ad ingeniorum vires et motus excitandos Etonæ celebris erat." THE MONTEM AT ETON. "But weak the harp now tuned to praise, When greedy thousands eager gaze, "When triumph hails aloud the joy Poems by Henry Rowe, 1796, i. 11. I HAVE just shown that the ceremony of the boy-bishop was called down by a proclamation under the reign of Henry the Eighth, and that, with its parent Popery, it revived under that of Queen Mary as also, that on the accession of Queen Elizabeth it would most probably be again put down. Indeed, such a mockery of episcopal dignity was incompatible with the principles of a Protestant establishment. The loss of a holiday, however, has always been considered, even with "children of a larger growth," as a matter of some serious moment; much more with the tyros of a school, that of an anniversary that promised to a young mind, in the cessation from study, and the enjoyment of mirth and pleasure, every negative as well as every positive good. Invention then would be racked to find out some means of retaining, under one shape, the festivities that had been annually forbidden under another. By substituting for a religious, a military appearance, the Etonians happily hit upon a method of eluding every possibility of giving offence. The Lilliputian see having been thus dissolved, and the puny bishop "unfrocked," the crozier was extended into an ensign, and, under the title of captain, the chieftain of the same sprightly band conducted his followers to a scene of action in the open air, where no consecrated walls were in danger of being profaned, and where the gay striplings could, at least, exhibit their wonted pleasantries with more propriety of character. The exacting of money from the spectators and passengers, for the use of the principal remained exactly the same as in the days of Popery; but it seems no evidence has been transmitted whether the deacons then, as the salt-bearers do at present, made an offer of a little salt in return when they demanded the annual subsidy. I have been so fortunate, however, as to discover, in some degree, a similar use of salt, that is, an emblematical one, among the scholars of a foreign university, at the well-known celebrity of " Deposition," in a publication dated at Strasburgh so late as 1666. The consideration of every other emblem used on the above occasion, and explained in that work, being foreign to my purpose, I shall confine myself to that of the salt2 alone, which one of the heads of the college explains thus to the young academicians : "With regard to the ceremony of Salt," says he, "the sentiments and opinions both of divines and philosophers concur in making salt the emblem of wisdom or learning; and that not only on account of what it is composed of, but also with respect to the several uses to which it is applied. As to its component parts, as it consists of the purest matter, so ought wisdom to be pure, sound, immaculate, and incorruptible: and similar to the effects which salt produces upon bodies ought to be those of wisdom and learning upon the mind." In another 1 It was formerly the custom on the foundation of Westminster School for the senior boys, on the day of the admission of a new junior election, to address the last of them at supper-time, accompanying the first three words of the formula with their appropriate actions: "Salsandus, calcandus, inspuendus; denique non credendus; abi junior." This custom has for many years been obsolete. To these indignities also at initiation (or rather to compromise to prevent them) I am desirous to refer the custom of exacting Garnish money at the first admission of debtors into prison, concerning which I find the following in the Gent. Mag. for May, 1752, vol. xxii. p. 239: "The sheriffs of London have ordered that no debtor, in going into any of the gaols of London and Middlesex, shall, for the future, pay any garnish, it having been found for many years a great oppression." 2 There are twenty plates illustrating the several strange ceremonies of the "Depositio." The last represents the giving of the Salt, which a person is holding on a plate in his left hand, and with his right hand about to put a pinch of it upon the tongue of each Beanus or Freshman. A glass, holding wine (I suppose), is standing near him. Underneath is the following couplet, which is much to our purpose; for even the use of wine also is not altogether unknown at present at our Montem procession at Eton: "Sal Sophiæ gustate, bibatis vinaque læta, |