bottles of wine to any strange clergyman that shall at any time preach." This good old custom is still preserved in some of the city churches in London (St Dionys. Backchurch, for example), where wine and biscuits are liberally provided in the vestry every Sunday for the officiating clergyman. When the Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress, and certain members of the Corporation, attend in state, to hear some popular preacher, wine, cake, and biscuits are handed round, by direction of the churchwardens, to all who have the entrée of the vestry, at the conclusion of the morning service, whilst the amount of the collection is being ascertained.

PRESBYTERIAN PARITY.

AITLAND, the Jacobite historian of Edinburgh, relates

M

with infinite zest the following anecdote of the Rev. Robert Bruce, the zealous Presbyterian minister who boldly bearded King James I.:—“1589, August 15.—Robert Bruce, one of the four ministers of Edinburgh, threatening to leave the town" (the reason, from what follows, may be easily guessed at), “great endeavours were used to prevent his going; but none, it seems, so prevalent as that of the increase of his stipend to one thousand merks, which the good man was graciously pleased to accept, though it only amounted to one hundred and forty merks more than all the stipends of the other three ministers."

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A FOPPISH DEAN.

ICHARD CORBET, Dean of Christchurch, elected Bishop of Oxford in 1628, translated to Norwich in 1632, and who died in 1635, appears, to judge from the following epigram, to have indulged in a certain amount of foppery in his younger days :

PATTEN'S HONESTY.

"A reverend Dean,

With a starch'd band clean,
Did preach before the king;
A ring was espied

To his band to be tied,
O that was a pretty thing

It was that, no doubt,
Which first put him out,

That he knew not what was next;

For to all who were there,

It did plainly appear

He handled it more than his text."

157

CHURCH-GOING.

N old man, who for years walked every Sunday from
Newhaven to Edinburgh to attend the late Dr Jones's

church, was one day complimented by that venerable clergyman for the regularity of his appearance in church. The old man unconsciously evinced how little he deserved the compliment by this reply: "'Deed, sir, it's very true; but, aboon a', I like to hear the jingling o' the bells and see a' the braw folks."

PATTEN'S HONESTY.

MONG the good qualities the Rev. Mr Patten had to boast of, that of a good paymaster was not included; on the contrary, fame spoke so unfavourably of him, respecting this article, that none of the Canterbury tradesmen (he was curate of Whitstable) would let him have a single article of goods, without first depositing the ready money for it. Under this predicament, his wig had long passed through the medium of straight hair to the state of curling negatively or inwards; in plain terms, it was reduced to the condition of being only fit for a scare-crow. But how to get another was the difficulty: he had not the money, and Christian faith was wanting.

In this extremity, he accidentally heard of a new peruke-maker from London, who had lately settled in the High Street. To him he went a little before dinner-time, and bespoke a full cauliflower wig. The barber, struck with the reverent appearance of his new customer, whose character had not yet reached his ears, gladly undertook to serve him; and his dinner being ready, he respectfully begged the honour of the doctor's company to partake of it, and afterwards introduced a large bowl of punch. Patten ate and drank heartily, and got into great good humour. When the bowl was empty, the barber would have proceeded to business, and produced his measures; but Patten cut him short, and greatly surprised him, by saying, he need not trouble himself to measure him he would get his wig elsewhere. The barber, fearing he had taken offence at something that had passed at table, humbly begged pardon if he had been wanting in respect, protesting it was unintentional, and contrary to his meaning. "No, no, sir," answered Patten; “it is nothing of that. Look you, I find you are an honest, generous fellow; it would be a pity to take you in. I should never have paid you for the wig; I will, therefore, get it elsewhere."

ST PAUL'S, A PAWNBROKING ESTABLISHMENT.

IN 1361, Michael de Northburgh, Bishop of London, bequeathed a sum of a thousand marks to be placed in a chest in the treasury of the cathedral, to form a fund for loans upon pledges, but without interest. He further directed that, if in any case at the year's end, the sums borrowed were not repaid, then the preacher at St Paul's Cross should, after his sermon, declare that the pledge would be sold within fourteen days, if not forthwith redeemed. The good bishop, by the by, did not contemplate benefiting the lower orders of his countrymen only by this judicious charity. It was provided that, while a poor layman might borrow to the extent of ten pounds from

the fund, the dean or any of the principal canons of the cathedral might have a loan of twice that sum; a citizen or nobleman one to the same amount; and the bishop of the diocese one of forty, or even of nearly fifty pounds.

MYSTICAL SPEAKING.

PREACHER of the name of Ker, on being inducted into a church in Teviotdale, told the people the relation that was to be between him and them in the following words:" Sirs, I am come to be your shepherd, and you must be my sheep, and the Bible will be my tar-bottle, for I will mark you with it ;" and laying his hand on the clerk or precentor's head, he said: “ Andrew, you shall be my dog.”— "The sorrow a bit of your dog will I be," said Andrew.-" O Andrew, you don't understand me; I speak mystically," said the preacher.—“Yea, but you speak mischievously," said Andrew.

DR WATTS.

R ISAAC WATTS was remarkable for his vivacity in conversation, although he was never forward in dis

playing it. Being one day in a coffee-room with some friends, he overheard a gentleman say, “What, is that the great Dr Watts?" The doctor, who was of low stature, turned suddenly round, and, with great good humour, repeated a verse from one of his lyric poems, which produced a silent admiration of his modesty and talents :

"Were I so tall to reach the pole,

Or mete the ocean with my span,

I must be measured by my soul;
The mind's the standard of the man."

PREFERMENT.

MONG the daily inquirers after the health of an aged Bishop of Durham during his indisposition, no one was more sedulously punctual than the Bishop of Exeter ; and the invalid seemed to think that other motives than that of anxious kindness might contribute to this solicitude. One morning, he ordered the messenger to be shown into the room, and thus addressed him: "Be so good as to present my compliments to my lord bishop, and tell him that I am better, much better; but that the Bishop of Worcester has got a sore throat, arising from a bad cold, if that will do."

PITHY APPEAL.

CERTAIN reverend gentleman in London, having to preach a charity sermon, said nothing on the subject until the sermon was ended. He then told the congregation that this was a mere matter of business, and as such he would talk of it. They knew as well as he that they had certain poor to provide for, who looked to their purses. He then merely read the text-" He that giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord"—and added, “ If you approve of your security, down with your money."

REV. MR SHIRRA'S FIGURATIVE PREACHING.

T Kinghorn and other Scotch ferries it was formerly the practice of the boatmen whose turn it was to sail, to call the loungers and passengers from their potations and lurking-places by bawling through the village—" The boat, aho! to Leith, aho!" One day Mr Shirra was preaching in the Burgher tent at Kinghorn, on a fast-day, and observing some