'SIGILLUM SUBDECANI CICESTRIÆ:

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born in the shadow of Salisbury Cathedral, having lived there all his days, and attended the services more than any other living being, was at last made sub-dean. This must have been late in life, and when

he was painfully deaf.

When I was Rector of Cholderton I chanced to investigate the contents of a jar on a cottage mantelpiece. Among trifles of no value there was an antique bronze seal of the usual shape. The device was a monk below a firmament praying to St. Peter above it. The legend was 'Sigillum Subdecani Cicestriæ.' The seal had been turned up by a labourer while scouring a ditch between Cholderton and Newton Tony. I found there certainly was a person called the Sub-dean of Chichester, but I was persuaded to postpone restitution till at least I could make it in person. I felt that as the 'sub-dean' no longer said prayers to St. Peter he might have no more right to the seal than myself. Several years afterwards I chanced to meet at dinner some officials of the British Museum, and had the imprudence to let out my find. They were down upon me at once. It was wanted to complete a series. I sent it next day, and had a very handsomely engraved letter of thanks. The seal is there in one of the glazed cases, with my name wrong spelt. In this matter veniam petimusque damusque vicissim. My old friend John Bathurst Deane took an impression of the seal to a meeting of antiquaries at Chichester, and greatly exercised the 'sub-dean,' who wrote to me with tender enquiries. I had to inform him of his now irreparable loss.

Being at Oxford not long after Burgon's appoint

ment to the Deanery of Chichester, I called on him to offer my congratulations, and naturally mentioned the seal, and asked rather a futile question-whether I ought not to have sent it to the sub-dean. At the mention of sub-dean' he became instantly several inches taller, his eyes glared like black diamonds, and his voice rang through and through me. 'Sub-dean! There is no sub-dean. There's nobody with a right to take my place when I am away.' 'But,' said I, rather weakly, 'is there not a parish of Chichester called the sub-deanery?' 'Yes,' he answered, 'and the man is called sub-dean, but he has no place in the Chapter.' 'Well,' I continued, descending to a still lower depth of humility, 'what ought I to have done with the seal?' 'You ought to have sent it to the Dean, and he would have put it among the other curiosities collected by the Dean and Chapter.'

I know not how or when Sub-dean Bayley, afterwards Archdeacon of Stow, became one of my father's friends and correspondents. He was a friend of Mr. Wayland, of whom hereafter, and he promised to find him preferment in the city of Lincoln; but that promise he thought better of. It was he who advised my father to send James to Grantham School, and one of my sisters to Miss Sheppard, the daughter of the clergyman who died while investigating the originals of our Prayer Book, and whose work, such as it was, she published by subscription. I used to hear of Sub-dean Bayley as a scholar, a man of the world, and a wit; and, what was more, the friend and associate of a small band of eminent churchmen anxious to raise the Church out of the mire and clay.

ARCHDEACON BAYLEY.

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His first archidiaconal Charge, delivered in 1826, lies before me, and I have perused it, as I have often before, with fresh instruction and amusement. It represents one of the oldest and most universal traditions of the Church, particularly of all ecclesiastical establishments, as the refuge of humour and pleasantry, and of the wit that cheers rather than exasperates. As this might give too light an idea of the Charge, I must add that the smile comes only here and there, and in the notes chiefly. Archdeacons Goddard, Bonney, and Blomfield had just done the hard work of the office. From the present Charge I learn, or at least am reminded, that archdeacons had formerly to inquire into the morals and manners of the

Religious,' and of the parishioners at large. They had to ascertain whether there were any rectors, or vicars, or parish priests, enormiter illiterati. They had to set the clergy, by way of tasks, passages of Scripture to learn by heart, which they were to say at the next visitation. They were to regulate the dress of the clergy, and enforce the tonsure. The clerks that wore long hair were to be clipped by the archdeacon's own hands, even against their will. The archdeacon was to see that the clergy did not appear 'parti-coloured,' or in red, green, or striped hose, or in long-toed shoes, or in embroidered nightcaps, or with golden spurs or gilt accoutrements, and that they did not make up their figures with shoulderpads, or other supplementary devices. They were to examine the clergy as to the way in which they spent their time, and what or how much, they ate and drank.

VOL. I.

K

All this, indeed, is now antiquated; so, too, happily, is a good deal that Archdeacon Bayley, in this Charge, described as still present and widely prevalent the neglected condition of our churches, the broken or discarded font, and the total absence of Psalmody while every conventicle and all Nature were resounding with the praise of God.

CHAPTER XXIII.

A SUN-LIT SPOT.

ONE sun-lit spot there was in that little world, which has often reappeared out of the gloom when I have met with some like vision, or read of one; or perhaps when people have condoled with me on being the native of a remote market-town, or have skitted at commercial gentility. On the higher ground northwest of the town, in what we used to call Mr. Torr's house, a pretty villa surrounded by shrubs and flowers, lived the Nettleships. Leaving the town in my ninth year, all I ever saw of the family were the mother and five daughters, of whom my memory singles out three. But what a mother, and what daughters! It was religion in its sweetest form, in combination with kind looks and gentle manners, with a continual flow of wit and humour, with taste and accomplishment, and with as much information as ladies can make use of.

On my mother's arrival at Gainsborough, the first

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year of this century, or, to speak more correctly, in the last year of last century, at the age of seventeen, Mrs. Nettleship at once showed great interest in the girlish bride. Lending her books, and directing her reading, she found my mother a ready pupil, always anxious to learn, and very reverential to those who had the advantage of her in education or in intellect. The earliest mention to be found of my brother John is in a letter from Mr. Sampson, then curate of Gainsborough, to my father and mother at Bath, in May, 1809, when my brother was just four years old: 'Master and Miss Mozley and Squire John dined at Mrs. Nettleship's last Monday.' I conclude that my mother had asked Mrs. Nettleship to keep an eye on the children.

I cannot remember Gainsborough without the Nettleships, as it were, gleaming upon the town. But what an afternoon it was that we youngers passed at their house, by invitation, not very long before our departure! Elizabeth Nettleship had already preceded us to the, neighbourhood of Derby, having married a brother of the gentleman whom I have designated as 'Gaius of Derbe.' In this way she became to us the longest, and nearest, and most familiar representative of a family which still beamed so numerous and so bright in our memories. By this time she is claimed as the ancestress of squires, merchants, and, I believe, M.P.'s.

But to return to that ever bright and warm afternoon. Not to dwell on the cakes, or the dainty slices of bread and butter, or the pretty china, it was the first time that I tasted coffee. No coffee I