JOHN STOWE.

John Stowe the chronicler in his old age was reduced to poverty, or rather to actual beggary. Shortly before his death, when fourscore years old, he was permitted, by royal letters patent, to become a mendicant. This curious document is printed in Mr. Bolton Corney's Curiosities of Literature Illustrated, and sets forth, that

Whereas our louing Subiect, John Stowe, this fiue & forty yeers hath to his great charge, & with neglect of his ordinary meanes of maintenance (for the generall good as well of posteritie, as of the present age) compiled & published diuerse necessary bookes & Chronicles; and therefore we, in recompense of these his painfull laboures, & for the encouragement to the like, haue in our royall inclination ben pleased to graunt our Letters Patents &c. &c.; thereby authorizing him and his deputies to collect amongst our louing subiects, theyr voluntary contributions and kinde gratuities.

"YOUNG LEVITE."

Macaulay has been often assailed for the account which he has given in his History of the former condition and rank of the clergy. He says they frequently married domestics and retainers of great houses—a statement which has grievously excited the wrath of Mr. Babington and other champions. In a little book, once very popular, first published in 1628, with the title, Microcosmographie, or a Piece of the World discovered, and which is known to have been written by John Earle, after the Restoration Bishop of Worcester and then of Salisbury, is the following passage. It occurs in what the author calls a character of " a young raw preacher."

You shall know him by his narrow velvet cape and serge facing, and his ruffe, next his hire, the shortest thing about him. His friends, and much painefulnesse, may preferre him to thirtie pounds a yeere, and this meanes, to a chamber-maide: with whom we leave him now in the bonds of wedlocke. Next Sunday you shall have him againe.

1

The following is an additional illustration of Macaulay's sketch, from Bishop Hall's Byting Satyres, 1599:

A gentle squire would gladly entertaine

Into his house some Trencher-chapelaine;

Some willing man, that might instruct his sons,

And that would stand to good conditions.

First, that he lie upon the truckle-bed,

While his young maister lieth o'er his head;

Second, that he do, upon no default,
Never to sit above the salt;

Third, that he never change his trencher twise;
Fourth, that he use all common courtesies,

Sit bare at meales, and one half rise and wait;

Last, that he never his yong maister beat,

But he must aske his mother to define

How manie jerks she would his breech should line;

All these observ'd, he could contented be,

To give five markes, and winter liverie.

In a satire addressed to a friend about to leave the University, by Oldham, the condition of a chaplain in the times of Charles II. is thus pictured:

Some think themselves exalted to the sky,

If they light in some noble Family:
Diet, an Horse, and thirty pounds a year,
Besides th' advantage of his Lordship's ear,
The credit of the business, and the State,
Are things that in a Youngster's sense sound great.
Little the unexperienc'd Wretch does know,

What slavery he oft must undergo:

Who, though in Silken Scarf and Cassock drest,
Wears but a gayer Livery at best:

When Dinner calls, the Implement must wait
With holy words to consecrate the Meat:
But hold it for a Favour seldom known,

If he be deign'd the Honour to sit down.

Soon as the Tarts appear, Sir Crape, withdraw!
Those Dainties are not for a spiritual Maw:

Observe your distance, and be sure to stand
Hard by the Cistern with your Cap in hand:
There for diversion you may pick your Teeth
Till the kind voider comes for your Relief:
For meer Boardwages such their Freedom sell
Slaves to an Hour, and vassals to a Bell:
And if th' enjoyment of one day be stole,
They are but Pris'ners out upon Parole:
Always the marks of slavery remain,

And they, tho' loose, still drag about their Chain.
And where's the mighty Prospect after all,

A Chaplainship serv'd up, and seven years' Thrall ?
The menial things perhaps for a Reward

Is to some slender Benefice preferr'd,

With this Proviso bound, that he must wed
My Lady's antiquated Waiting-Maid,

In dressing only skill'd and Marmalade.

The following are additional evidences of the truth of Macaulay's picture. The first describes the life at Wrest in Bedfordshire, where Carew wrote, the seat of Selden's Countess of Kent:

The Lord and Lady of this place delight
Rather to be in act than seem in sight;
Instead of statues to adorn their wall,

They throng with living men their merry hall,
Where at large tables filled with wholesome meats,
The servant tenant and kind neighbor eats.

Some of that rank, spun of a finer thread,
Are with the women, steward and chaplain fed

With daintier cates; others of better note,

Whom wealth, parts, office, or the herald's coat,
Have severed from the common, freely sit

At the Lord's table.

Carew. To my friend G. N., from Wrest.

The instances from Gay and Pope, or rather Swift, need no

Cheese that the table's closing rites denies,
And bids me with th' unwilling chaplain rise.

No sooner said, but from the hall

Gay, Trivia, 1716.

Rush chaplain, butler, dogs and all,

"A rat, a rat, clap to the door."

Pope and Swift, Sixth Satire of Second Book of Horace.

NAMES.

"Polly" is one of those "hypocorisms," or pet-names, in which our language abounds. Most are mere abbreviations, as Will, Nat, Pat, Bell, &c., taken usually from the beginning, sometimes from the end of the name. The ending y or ie is often added, as a more endearing form: as Annie, Willy, Amy, Charlie, &c. Many have letter-changes, most of which imitate the pronunciation of infants. L is lisped for r. A central consonant is doubled. O between m and 7 is more easily sounded than a. An infant forms p with its lips sooner than m: papa before mamma. The order of change is: Mary, Maly, Mally, Molly, Polly. L for r appears in Sally, Dolly, Hal; P for m in Patty, Peggy; vowelchange in Harry, Jim, Meg, Kitty, &c.; and in several of these the double consonant. To pursue the subject: reduplication is used; as in Nannie, Nell, Dandie; and (by substitution) in Bob. Ded would be of ill omen: therefore we have, for Edward, Ned or Ted, n and t being coheir to d; for Rick, Dick, perhaps on account of the final d in Richard. Letters are dropped for softness; as Fanny for Franny, Bab for Barb, Wat for Walt. Maud is Norman for Mald, from Mathild, as Bauduin for Baldwin. Argidius becomes Giles, our nursery friend Gill, who accompanied Jack in his disastrous expedition "up the hill." Elizabeth gives birth to Elspeth, Eliza (Eloisa ?), Lisa, Lizzie, Bet, Betty, Betsy, Bessie, Bess; Alexander (x=cs) to Allick and Sandie. What are we to say of Jack for John? It seems to be from

Jacques, which is the French for our James. How came the confusion? I do not remember to have met with the name James in early English history, and it seems to have reached us from Scotland. Perhaps, as Jean and Jaques were among the commonest French names, John came into use as a baptismal name, and Jaques or Jack entered by its side as a familiar term. John answers to the German Johann or Jehann, the Sclavonic Ivan, the Italian Giovanni (all these languages using a strengthening consonant to begin the second syllable): the French Jean, the Spanish Juan, James to the German Jacob, the Italian Giacomo, the French Jacques, the Spanish Jago. It is observable that of these, James and Giacomo alone have the m. Most of our softened words are due to the smooth-tongued Normans. The harsh Saxon Schrobbesbyrigschire, or Shropshire, was by them softened into le Comté de Salop, and both names are still used.

BLOODY BAKER.

I one day was looking over the different monuments in Cranbrook Church in Kent, when in the chancel my attention was arrested by one erected to the memory of Sir Richard Baker. The gauntlet, gloves, helmet, and spurs were (as is often the case in monumental erections of Elizabethan date) suspended over the tomb. What chiefly attracted my attention was the color of the gloves, which was red. The old woman who acted as my cicerone, seeing me look at them, said, "Aye, miss, those are Bloody Baker's gloves; their red color comes from the blood he shed." This speech awakened my curiosity to hear more, and with very little pressing I induced my old guide to tell me the following strange tale:

The Baker family had formerly large possessions in Cranbrook, but in the reign of Edward VI. great misfortunes fell on them; by extravagance and dissipation they gradually lost all their