MISCELLANEA. MR. SMEDLEY, Bengal Civil Service, has discovered some valuable ancient inscriptions in Behar. THE ST. STEPHEN'S RINGERS, BRISTOL. In less than three years the tintinabular brotherhood of St. Stephen's will be able to celebrate the third centenary of Queen Elizabeth's visit to Bristol, the memorable occasion on which, they tell us, they received their quaint charter. DISCOVERY OF ANTIQUE BUSTS.-A discovery has just It was on August 14, 1574, when her Majesty, having pre-been made in the court of a mansion at Nuremberg, built viously received "a fair needle-work purse, wrought with about 1556, of two busts, painted in oil, and covered with silver and gold, with 100l." entered the city in state, the plaster, which are considered to be antiques-they are of mayor and his brethren riding nigh before the maiden Pentelican marble, of good workmanship, somewhat inQueen, bareheaded, in scarlet," upon their good steeds, jured, and evidently portraits; the one is that of a woman, with their footcloths, and pages by their side." Upon that with ears pierced for rings. They are supposed to have occasion for a whole week-during which time she " lay been imported from Italy, and employed for garden ornaor lodged in Sir J. Young's house (Colston's School after-ments, defaced with coats of paint until their merits were wards), on St. Augustine's back-there were great doings hidden, then lost sight of until some one, who is conversant and brave shows on land and on river, when the tuneful with this order of art, recognised them in their disguises. Brotherhood of St. Stephen's Ringers kept up such a perpetual chime in honour of the Sovereign, that she recognized their merits by Royal letters, under which the Society has rung and eaten and drunk annually ever since. Amongst the numerous incidents of that ever-memorable visit was her Majesty's attendance at the Cathedral on Sunday, "where (we are told) was a speech to be read and a hymn to be sung. The speech was left out (adds the narrative) by an occasion unlooked for, but the hymn was sung by a very fine boy." The speech left out has been delivered in a thousand forms since then. FOREIGN. PARIS. THE publication of the new French Antiquarian Quarterly Romania, is postponed till next month. THE bas-relief, representing Henri IV. on horseback, which had been detached from the front of the Hôtel de Ville, Paris, shortly before the burning of that edifice, has been recovered. PICTURE SALES.-At a recent sale a study by Ingres for his celebrated picture of St. Symphorien fetched only 65 francs; at the same time a picture by Léopold Robert,-a peasant woman of the environs of Naples, weeping over the ruins of her house, destroyed by an eruption of Vesuvius,was sold for 780 francs; a portrait by Tintoretto, life-size, said to be that of Martin van Heemskerk, the Dutch artist, for 210 francs; and two portraits of Luther and his wife, Catherine von Bora, by Lucas Cranach, for 1080 francs, which induce some doubts as to the prosperity of the picture trade. It THE CHALICE OF ST. REMI.-An appeal has been made to the Minister of Public Education and Fine Arts to order the restoration to the National Library of Paris of the famous cup known as the Chalice of St. Remi, formerly in the library, but removed thence in 1861, and now in the cathedral of Reims. This cup, which is of gold, ornamented with precious stones, with its paten, which is also of gold, was formerly used at the coronation of the kings of France. Its date is considerably later than the time of St. Remi; but it is affirmed to be a remarkable fine work, and one of considerable interest from an historical point of view. was given by the Republic to the National Library. The legality of this gift was contested by the clergy of Reims, at the restoration of the monarchy, on two occasions, but without success. Under the Second Empire the claim of the clergy was again urged, and, backed by court influence, was this time successful, and the cup was restored to the cathedral of Reims, where it is supposed to remain. Some doubt has, however, been thrown upon the existence of this relic, and it is urged that it was only deposited in the cathedral, and that it would be safer in the National Library than in the hands of the priesthood. SEIZURE of POMPEIAN ANTIQUITIES.-A correspondent of the Athenæum writes:-The Naples and Florence Observer reports the seizure of some "sacksful" of antiquities abstracted from Pompeii. They were being driven through the streets in a cart, when they attracted the attention of Cov. Salazzaro, one of the Inspectors of the Museum, and the driver, who stated that they were antiquities from Pompeii which he had for sale, was arrested. Several of the articles are said to be of great beauty and considerable value. It appears that a German antiquary, who resided near Pompeii, had bought of the men engaged in the excavations many of the objects in question for trifling sums. He is now dead, and his widow determined to turn his collection into money. NEW ARCHEOLOGICAL AND 'ANTIQUARIAN BOOKS Book (The) of Remarkable Trials and Notorious Characters from Chaffers (W)-The Ceramic Gallery. Containing illustrations from the Latin. Collins (H.)-Cistercian Legends of the 13th Century. Translated Couch (Jonathan)-The History of Polperro: a Fishing Town on 12mo. cloth, 3s. 6d. (Washbourne). the South Coast of Cornwall: being a Description of the Place, English Reprints. Large paper edition. Nos. 25 to 30, 4to. sewed, illustrations. 2 vols. pp. 602. cloth, 18s. (Hotten]. With illustrations Thompson (Fas.)-The History of Leicester in the 18th century. 8vo. cloth, 10s. 6d. (Hamilton). White (Robert)-A History of the Battle of Bannockburn, Fought A.D. 1314 With Notices of the Principal Warriors who engaged in that Conflict. With Map and Armorial Bearings. 8vo. (Edin burgh, Edmonston & Douglas) pp. 202, cloth, 125, (Hamilton.) THE ANTIQUARY. SATURDAY, JAN. 27, 1872. DONIERT'S STONE. ORNWALL possesses more than an average number But the truth is evidently this :-Doniert's stone is the half stone, and the uninscribed and taller of the memorials is the other half stone; and it would be well for the sake of avoiding unnecessary confusion if this distinction were always in future adhered to.* The Cornish historian, Carew, visited these stones at the end of the sixteenth or beginning of the seventeenth century, and thus describes them : “There are two moor stones, pitched in the ground, very near together, the one of a more broad than thick squareness, about eight feet in height, resembling the ordinary spill of a crosse, and somewhat curiously hewed, with diaper work. The other cometh short of his fellow's length, by the better half, but well near doubleth it in breadth and thickness, and is likewise handsomely carved. They both are mortised in the top, leaving a little edge at the one side, as to accommodate the placing of somewhat else thereupon. In this latter are graved certain letters." CORN WAL, L, Pribed monuments of great antiquity. They were originally set up either by the Romans, or by the native inhabitants after the departure of their conquerors, or lastly, in still later times, but prior to the Norman invasion, by a mixed race of people who supplanted the Celtic population. "Some of these stones," says Professor Westwood," are simply flat blocks or shafts destitute of all ornament, or religious character, resembling in this respect the stones of an analogous character, found in such abundance The diaper work," mentioned by Carew, is common to in Wales and other parts of the west of England. The both stones, and is described by Borlase as 66 consisting inscriptions themselves afford very excellent materials for of little asterisks of two inches diameter, disposed in the the study of our early palæography, being generally in quincunx manner." It is in fact a kind of interlaced ribbon debased Roman capital characters, with scarcely any in-ornament, a design common to stone monuments in other termixture of the Hiberno-Saxonuncial, or minuscule localities. Although having a similar ornamentation, both characters. The orthography and formulæ of the inscriptions Doniert's stone and the other half stone are evidently parts also betoken a nearer approach to the Roman period than of quite distinct memorials, and do not represent a single is made by the more ornamental stones, such as the crosses of Doniert and Leviut, in which, as on some of the Welsh pillar broken in two, as a casual visitor might perhaps infer.† The height of Doniert's stone, or the half stone, is 5 feet stones, we find a prayer for the repose of the soul of the inches; breadth towards its base, 2 feet 8 inches, and departed." thickness at the top, I foot 9 inches. The other half stone is 7 feet 5 inches high; breadth near the top, I foot 7 inches, and thickness near its base, I foot 5 inches. Both of these stones still have the remains of a mortice on the top of each, in which a cross of some kind may have been inserted. The correct reading of the inscription on Doniert's stone is as follows: In the present paper my intention will be to give a general account of the former of the "ornamental stones," mentioned by Professor Westwood, in the above paragraph. Doniert's stone, then, lies in the eastern division of the county of Cornwall, in the parish of St. Cleer, a little to the north of Liskeard. Before archaeological excursions were as common as they now are, the very existence of this inscribed monument was known only to a few of the residents close by, so that tourists and others who had read of it either in Camden or Borlase, and who had come to search it out, had some little difficulty in ascertaining in what particular field or close it was situated. Thus we find Mr. Bond, of East Looe, who went with a party to visit this and other antiquities in the neighbourhood in 1802, writing-" I made inquiry at the house at Redgate after this monument, but could get no account of it for some time, though I questioned in a variety of ways; at last, however, we got information where it was situated. It is about a quarter of a mile off from Redgate, eastward, in a field next the high road. We got into this field, and seeing an erect stone went towards it, and found it to be the monument we sought. One moor stone stands erect, and the other with the inscription on it lies in a pit close by." This stone has since been raised from the desecrated position in which it had been lying for so many years. 9 DONI or Doniert: rogavit pro anima. Although somewhat defaced, the letters are still decipherable, and on re-erecting the stone in an upright position, the precaution was taken to place the inscription towards the north east to preserve it from the prevailing storms in this bleak district. Borlase imagines that a small cross was placed before the D, as in other early Christian inscriptions, but unfortunately this corner of the stone is broken off. There is, however, just room enough for such a cross. The signification of the two dots after the word Doniert is doubtful; by some, Camden for instance, they have been considered as the remains of another letter, perhaps an E. But the words taken as a whole may be translated-"Doniert prayed for his soul," or The "erect stone," seen by Bond, is spoken of by Bor-"Doniert besought prayers for his soul." The reason for lase, and many other writers, as the other half stone; but adopting this unusual form of rogatory prayer is thus Camden and Norden called Doniert's stone by this name, summed up by Borlase :and, only a year or two ago, both terms were used synonymously in the Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall. *This stone is at Camborne, West Cornwall.-E. H. W. D. VOL. II. NO. 20. Hals plainly says, "at the pedestal of the stone monument o Doniert, called the Half Stone." +This, for instance, seems to have been the impression of Wilkie Collins.-Rambles Beyond Railways, p. 53. "I rather think," says he, "that Doniert desired in his lifetime, that a cross might be erected in the place where he should be interred, in order to put people in mind to pray for his soul. So that this is, in my opinion, a sepulchral monument; and if we take it in this sense, the word rogavit is proper, and the whole inscription intelligible and according to the usage of ancient times." This Doniert is supposed by Camden, and others, to have been the same person as Dungerth, King of Cornwall, who was accidentally drowned in A.D. 872. Borlase says that the identity "cannot be disputed," but many years since* Professor Westwood expressed an opinion that Doniert's stone might possibly be as early as the seventh century—an opinion it should be said, grounded on the antique form of the letters, and tending to throw some doubt as to the truth of Camden's supposition. In conclusion, a few remarks may be made on the fall of Doniert's stone, temp. Charles II.; its subsequent restoration to an upright position; and the discovery of an underground chamber in proximity to it. An account of the circumstances which led to the overthrow of this stone has been preserved by Hals, though not printed by Davies Gilbert in his edition of that historian's work. I shall quote from the early edition, now a very scarce book. "In the latter end of the reign of King Charles II., I, with some gentlemen, went to view this (at that time thought) barbarous inscription, which the tinners of the contiguous country taking notice of, they presently apprehended we went thither in quest of hidden treasure there. Whereupon some of them, wiser than the rest, lay their heads together, and resolved in council to be beforehand with us; and, accordingly, went with pickaxes and shovels, and opened the earth round about the monument to the depth of about six feet, when they discovered a spacious vault, walled about and arched over with stones, having on the sides thereof two stone seats, not unlike those in churches for auricular confession. The sight of all which struck them with consternation or a kind of horror, that they incontinently gave over search, and with the utmost hurry and dread, throwing earth and turf to fill up the pit they made, they departed; having neither of them the courage to enter, or even to inspect into the further circumstances of the place. Which account I had from the mouths of some of the very fellows themselves. Some short while after, the loose earth, by reason of some heavy rains which fell, sunk away into the vault, which occasioning also a sort of terræ-motus and concussion of the other earth adjoining, the said monument was at length so undermined thereby, that it fell to the ground, where it still remains. "Would some gentlemen of ability and curiosity be at the charge of again opening and cleansing this underground chappel, or whatever else it may be denominated, it might probably afford matter of pleasing amusement, if not grand speculation, to the learned searchers into matters of antiquity." In 1849 the Exeter Diocesan Architectural Society undertook to do what Hals had suggested, and cleared out the vault. Mr. Charles Spence, lately deceased, published in the Transactions of that Society a valuable paper entitled * Arch. Jour., vol. viii. (1851), p. 205. "Iter Cornubiense," in which he details the proceedings of the party who were entrusted with the work. After raising Doniert's stone and placing it in an erect position—a mass of granite no less than two tons and a half in weight-the workmen were directed to dig down by the side of the other monolith. "After reaching a depth of about eight or nine feet, a hole was discovered in the side of the shaft, into which I followed the miners," says Mr. Spence, "and found myself in a cruciform vault, eighteen feet in length from east to west, and sixteen from north to south, the width of the vault being about four feet. The sides were perpendicular and the roof circular, and all smoothed with a tool, and as level as the rough nature of the naked rock would permit. Three-fourths of the place being filled up with loose earth, and no time remaining sufficient to remove it, it was determined that a party of men should be employed under the direction of Mr. Rule, of South Caradon mine, who most kindly undertook the office to dig it out; and the subsequent report of the men has been, that it is nothing but 'old workings'. in other words, ancient mine works." With this opinion it is perhaps difficult to agree, though to what use this subterranean chamber was applied, whether as an ancient oratory, or as a place of sepulture, is equally difficult to determine. The truth of Hals' statement as to the existence of a vault at this spot has, however, been corroborated by these investigations. I will only add that both Doniert's stone and the other half stone have been engraved in Borlase's Antiquities of Cornwall, and in Gough's Camden. A copy of the inscription is also given in many old works. A neat sketch may be seen in Norden's "Speculi Britanniæ Pars," Harl, MSS. 6252, fol. 85. E. H. W. DUNKIN. Kidbrooke Park Road, Blackheath, A PLEA FOR A NEW EDITION OF WYCLIFFE'S WORKS. SOME centuries hence, when, as we may hope, our present little sects in religion, philosophy, and politics will have become things of mere antiquarian interest, only studied by those who are concerned with the phenomena of worldgrowth, it will seem strange that the men of the nineteenth disputants, notwithstanding their historical ardour and century, those keen active thinkers and bitter philosophical their bitter tendency to hate one another on account of slight divergencies of thought, never had the energy or curiosity to insist upon a complete edition of the works of one of the greatest of their medieval thinkers. The poetical rubbish of the seventeenth century finds ready admirers and purchasers. The novels of Afra Behn are reprinted, and we are even threatened with a new edition of Shadwell and Etheridge; and yet of the writings of John Wycliffe, one of the noblest Englishmen that ever lived, that are printed can only he obtained in costly volumes, far many of them still remain locked in manuscript, and those beyond the reach of the ordinary reader. The dull and lifeless manner in which the long-suffering English child is taught history is, we imagine, the cause for this. If hu man beings had the knowledge of the past put before them in any way suited to the capacity of intelligent beings, it some interest in, some fellow feeling with, the great Soul cannot be but that the ordinary man and woman would have who did at least as much for England and the wor' (d as any Englishman that ever lived, except William Shakespere and Oliver Cromwell. While watery adaptations of Hume and the compilations of Mrs. Markham rule supreme in the schoolroom, and wild romances, misnamed histories, are alone devoured by excitement-seeking subscribers to Mudie, we cannot hope that things will become much better; but there are signs, trivial enough at present, that a change is taking place. Some few teachers are getting to know that the history of England as well as that of Palestine is worthy of reverend and earnest study; that Yorkshire, Leicestershire, and even Boetian Lincolnshire have had living men treading their highways and plucking flowers in their meadows, who are worthy of comparison with any man that ever spoke Hebrew or Greek. These ideas are only half realised at present by even the best of us. A man is still thought a dangerous sceptic-one who must necessarily hold loose opinions on the Athanasian creed, and whose views on infant baptism, divorce, and the social contract are shaky-if he presumes to say, that for English boys and girls it is as needful to know the names of the barons who compelled John of Anjou to affix his seal to the great Charter of liberty, as it is to be able to tell over the roll of the dukes of Edom or even the twelve sons of Jacob. Knowledge of facts proceeds rapidly enough, but ideas grow slowly. In the days of our grandchildren it may be that these opinions now thought so strange will have become common-place notions. It is not fitting, however, that we should be compelled to wait for ever for some of the results which the higher education will certainly bring about in time. It is not well that we should be "Turning to daisies gently in the grave," before the knowledge which would render us so much fitter for the sphere which we now fill should be given us. The great crash of the sixteenth century-that frightful ruin out of which for three centuries past we have been engaged with more or less architectonic skill, faithfulness, and capacity in building up new dwellings for our souls-was the result of a thousand intertwining threads of causation. To trace, even in the dryest fashion, the remote causes of the Reformation would require an encyclopædia full of pages, and patient labour worthy of the Scholar of Germany. But some of the greater causes, which if they did not originate, at least gave direction and colour to the movement, are within all men's grasp if they had the documents before them. ARCHAIC ROCK SCULPTURES IN OHIO. AT the archæological section of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, several diagrams were presented representing rock sculptures in Ohio that are presumed to be ancient and to have some significance. A paper on these curious hieroglyphic inscriptions was also contributed by Colonel Whittlesey, and is thus reported in the American Naturalist. The largest of the diagrams exhibited is a tracing made by Dr. J. H. Salisbury, of Cleveland, with the assistance of Mrs. Salisbury, from a mural face of conglomerate, near the famous "Black Hand," in Licking County, Ohio. Once there was a space of ten or twelve feet in height, by fifty or sixty feet in length, covered by these inscriptions. Most of them have been obliterated by the recent white settlers. In 1861, Dr. Salisbury took copies from a space about eight by fifteen feet, by laying a piece of coarse muslin over them, and tracing such as remain uninjured, life size, on the cloth. In this space there are found to be twenty-three characters, most of which are the arrow-head or bird-track character. These are all cut on the edge of the strata, presenting a face nearly vertical, but a little shelving outward, so as to be sheltered from the weather. What is left Another copy of the remnants of similar inscriptions was taken by Colonel Whittlesey and Mr. J. B. Comstock, in 1869, from the "Turkey Foot Rock," at the Rapids of the Maumee, near Perrysburg. These are on a block of limestone, and in the course of the twenty-five past years have been nearly destroyed by the hand of man. was taken by a tracing of the size of nature. On the surface of a quarry of grindstone grit at Independence, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, a large inscribed surface was uncovered in 1854. Mr. B. Wood, Deacon Bicknell, and other citizens of Independence, secured a block about six feet by four, and built it into the north wall of a stone church they were then building. Colonel Whittlesey presented a reduced sketch, one-fourth size of nature, taken by Dr. Salisbury and Dr. J. M. Lewis, in 1869, which was made perfect by the assistance of a photographer. Some of the figures sculptured on this slab are cut an inch to an inch and a half in the rock, and they were covered by soil a The real Father of the English Reformation was not the many-wived Henry ap Tudor, not the weak, cold-hearted sycophant Cranmer, but the deep-thinking, hard-hitting rector of Fillingham and Lutterworth. Wycliffe was to us what Luther was to Germany; but he did not live to see his work, and, therefore, his writings are buried in the dust of the great libraries, or in the costly quartos of book col-foot to eighteen inches in thickness, on which large trees lectors. The continental Teutons have done more kindly by their national hero. Luther's works, Latin and German alike, have had careful editorship, and we would ask, not only as religious men and as students of antiquity, but as Englishmen, for very shame whether we with all our wealth and with all the noisy bragging of our insular learning with which we fill magazine, journal, and newspaper, whether it is fitting that we should be behind them? Whether it is reasonable that he alone among the great lights of the modern world-section of a bell with its clapper. because forsooth he was an Englishman-should be forgotten or come before us in mutilated extracts. were growing. Like all of the others, they were made by a sharp-pointed tool like a pick, but as yet no such tool has been found among the relics of the mound-builders or of the Indians. The figures are very curious. Among them is something like a trident, or fish-spear, a serpent, a human hand, and a number of track-like figures, which the people call buffalo-tracks, but which Dr. Salisbury regards as a closer representation of a human foot covered by a shoepack or moccasin. Another figure somewhat resembles the The writer of these lines has no thought of taking upon himself the work of editor. He speaks from his heart, not by way of puff; for, alas! he knows of no undertaking of the kind he desires which the breath of any number of students such as he, were they to blow never so fiercely, could inflate into a "paying concern." But he would suggest that there are many undertakings in this country whereon wealthy men spend their substance that are not paying-horse-racing, gambling, and those matters which are touched upon in the Near the west line of Belmont County, Ohio, Mr. James W. Ward, then of Cincinnati, now of New York, in 1859 took a sketch of two large isolated sandstone rocks, on which are groups of figures similar to those already noticed. Here are the bird-track characters, the serpent, the moccasin or buffalo-tracks, and some anomalous figures. These are plainly cut, with a pick, into the surface of the rock, which, like the Independence stone, is substantially imperishable. Here we have also the representation of the human foot, and the foot of a bear. Another figure, which appears to be the foot of some animal with four clumpy toes, Prof. Cope thinks may be the foretrack of a Menopome. One peculiarity of these sculptured human feet is a monstrously enlarged great-toe joint, even greater than is produced by the modern process of shoe-pinching. This has been observed in other ancient carvings of the human foot upon the rocks near St. Louis, Missouri. These feet range in size from seven to fifteen inches in length. Of all these representations, the bear's foot is closest to nature. The bird-track, so-called, presents six varieties, some of which are anatomically correct. The human hand is more perfect than the foot. Dr. Salisbury finds, on comparison of these symbolical figures with the Oriental sign-writing, or hieroglyphical alphabets, that there are many characters in common. Some Soo years before Christ, the Chinese had a bird-track character in their syllable alphabet. The serpent is a symbol so common among the early nations, and has a significance so various, that very little use can be made of it in the comparison. These inscriptions differ materially from those made by the modern Red Man. He is unable to read that class of them which appears to be ancient. Lieut. Whipple has mentioned in the "Government Report of the Pacific Railroad Surveys," an instance of the bird-track character inscribed upon the rocks of Arizona. Prof. Kerr, of North Carolina, states that he has noticed similar characters cut in the rocks of one of the passes of the Black mountains, at the head of the Tennessee river. These facts indicate wide-spread universality in the use of this style of inscription, and they indicate something higher than the present symbolical or picture-writing of the North American Indians. ANCIENT ENGLISH AMUSEMENTS. Ages the most sacred personages and beings were personified Mr. Symons next spoke of some peculiarities in connection with fairs, and read an amusing description, as given by the A LECTURE on this subject was delivered in the Hull Me-poet Gay, of the articles exposed for sale in the public marts chanics Institute on the 11th inst., by Mr. JOHN SYMONS M.R.I.A., Vice-president of that institution. The lecturer thought that the revival of many ancient sports would be highly beneficial when the spread of luxury and dissipation tended to extinguish our boasted national bravery. It was the opinion of old writers that May games, Midsummer Eve rejoicings, and open-air games, which were once indulged in by the English people, were preferable to worse practices within doors. English antiquities had of late become a popular study, and he proceeded to point out how researches had added to the world's store of knowledge. Having referred to the antiquity of the Hebrew nation, the Romish and Puritan churches, etc., Mr. Symons went on to say that the ancient sports of the people could not be studied without acquiring some knowledge of mankind; wisdom might even be extracted from the superstitions of our ancestors. in his time; also a selection from the poems of the Rev. H. Rowe, bearing date 1796, and an old tract entitled "Bartholomew Faire, 1641." Mr. Symons quoted from several old authorities respecting hiring, or statute fairs, then called "mops," a remnant of which is still to be traced in many parts of the country. The display of merchandise and the conflux of customers at these principal and almost only emporia of domestic commerce were prodigious, and they were therefore often held on open plains. With reference to sports in connection with these fairs, the lecturer quoted from Grose a description of one called "Mumble of Sparrow," a cruel sport practised at wakes and fairs in the following manner:-A cock sparrow, whose wings were clipped, was put into the crown of a hat; a man having his arms tied behind him, attempted to bite off the sparrow's head, but was generally obliged to desist by the many pecks and pinches he received from the enraged bird. To "whip the cock" was a piece of sport practised at wakes, horse fastened into a basket, half-a-dozen carters, blindfolded and armed with their cart whips, were placed round it, and after being turned thrice about, began to whip the cock; if anyone struck it so as to make it cry out it became his property, The joke was that instead of whipping the cock they flogged each other heartily. A Druidical custom in the olden times was that of holding fairs in English churchyards. These were termed "love-races, and fairs in Leicestershire. A cock being tied and feasts," and were so denominated from the churchwardens buying and laying in presents, and also a large quantity of malt, which they brewed into beer and sold out in the church and elsewhere. The profits, as well as those from sundry games, were given to the poor, according to the Christian rule that all festivities should be rendered innocent by alms. Aubrey thus describes a Whitsun ale:-"In every parish was a church house, to which belonged spits, crocks, and other utensils for dressing provisions. The young people were there, too, and had dancing, bowling, shooting at butts, etc., the old people sitting gravely by and looking They also heard of dancing and singing in the churchyards, and of fighting in them at fair times, and on Christmas-days performances of a religious nature took place in our churches. Every theatrical performance was then condemned by the Rabbis. In those so-called "mystery plays" of the Middle on." In the course of the lecture Mr. Symons alluded to the meaning of the word "fool," and described the domestic and theatrical fool, the clown, the Lord Mayor's and trading companies' fool, and the Merry Andrew, and their costumes; also stating what their duties were. About the year 1680 was the last instance of a fool being kept. He said that in the 16th century the fool, or more properly the jester, was a man of some ability; and if his character had been strictly drawn by Shakespeare and other dramatic writers, the entertainments which he afforded consisted in witty retorts and sarcastical reflections. Sometimes, however, these |