his first arrival in Paris, composed by Negel Wircker, an English student there, A.D. 1170 :— The stranger dress'd, the city first surveys, A church he enters, to his God he prays. Next to the schools he hastens, each he views, Their manners, words, and looks, pronounce them wise. Theirs solid sense, with sparkling wit combin'd. Their graver studies jovial banquets crown, Their rankling cares in flowing bowls they drown.' Montpelier was another University whither Englishmen resorted, and is to be remembered by us if only for the memory of Andrew Borde, M.D., some bits of whose quaintness are in the notes to Russell in the present volume. Padua is to be noted for Pace's sake. He is supposed to have been born in 1482. Later, the custom of sending young noblemen and gentlemen to Italy to travel, not to take a degree-was introduced, and Ascham's condemnation of it, when no tutor accompanied the youths, is too well known to need quoting. The Italians' saying, Inglese Italianato è un diabolo incarnato, sums it up.' 5. Monastic and Cathedral Schools. Herbert Losing, Bp. of Thetford, afterwards Norwich, between 1091 and 1119, in his 37th Letter restores his schools at Thetford to Dean Bund, and directs that no other schools be opened there. Tanner (Not. Mon. p. xx. ed. Nasmith), when mentioning "the use and advantage of these Religious houses "-under which term 1 Pixus et ablutus tandem progressus in urbem, Et quia subtiles sensu considerat Anglos, Moribus egregii, verbo vultuque venusti, Dona pluunt populis, et detestantur avaros, Fercula multiplicant, et sine lege bibunt. A. Wood, Antiq. Oxon., p. 55, in Henry's Hist. of Eng., vol. iii. p. 440-1. 2 That Colet used his travels abroad, A.D. 1493-7, for a different purpose, see his Life by Dr Knight, pp. 23-4. "are comprehended, cathedral and collegiate churches, abbies, priories, colleges, hospitals, preceptories (Knights Templars' houses), and frieries" says, "Secondly, They were schools of learning & education; for every convent had one person or more appointed for this purpose; and all the neighbours that desired it, might have their children taught grammar and church musick without any expence to them.1 In the nunneries also young women were taught to work, and to read English, and sometimes Latin also. So that not only the lower rank of people, who could not pay for their learning, but most of the noblemen and gentlemen's daughters were educated in those places." 112 1 Fuller, book vi. p. 297. Collier, vol. ii. p. 165. Stillingfleet's Orig. Britan. p. 206. Bishop Lloyd of Church Government, p. 160. This was provided for as early as A.D. 747, by the seventh canon of council of Clovesho, as Wilkins's Councils, vol. i. p. 95. See also the notes upon that canon, in Johnson's Collection of canons, &c. In Tavistock abbey there was a Saxon school, as Willis, i. 171. Tanner. (Charlemagne in his Capitularies ordained that each Monastery should maintain a School, where should be taught 'la grammaire, le calcule, et la musique.' See Démogeot's Histoire de la Littérature Française, p. 44, ed. Hachette. R. Whiston.) Henry says "these teachers of the cathedral schools were called The scholastics of the diocess; and all the youth in it who were designed for the church, were intitled to the benefit of their instructions. Thus, for example, William de Monte, who had been a professor at Paris, and taught theology with so much reputation in the reign of Henry II., at Lincoln, was the scholastic of that cathedral. By the eighteenth canon of the third general council of Lateran, A.D. 1179, it was decreed, That such scholastics should be settled in all cathedrals, with sufficient revenues for their support; and that they should have authority to superintend all the schoolmasters of the diocess, and grant them licences, without which none should presume to teach. The laborious authors of the literary history of France have collected a very distinct account of the scholastics who presided in the principal cathedralschools of that kingdom in the twelfth century, among whom we meet with many of the most illustrious names for learning of that age. . . . The sciences that were taught in these cathedral schools were such as were most necessary to qualify their pupils for performing the duties of the sacerdotal office, as Grammar, Rhetoric, Logic, Theology, and Church-Music."-Ibid. p. 442. 2 Fuller and Collier, as before; Bishop Burnet (Reform. vol. i. p. . .) saith so of Godstow. Archbishop Greenfield ordered that young gentlewomen who came to the nunneries either for piety or breeding, should wear white veils, to distinguish them from the professed, who wore black ones, 11 Kal. Jul. anno pontif. 6. M. Hutton. ex registr. ejus, p. 207. In the accounts of the cellaress of Carhow, near Norwich, there is an account of what was received "pro prehendationibus," or the board of young ladies and their servants for education "rec. de domina Margeria Wederly prehendinat, ibidem xi. septimanas xiii s. iv d. . . pro mensa unius famulæ dictæ Margeriæ per iii. septimanas viii d. per sept." &c. Tanner. * Du Cange, Gloss. voc. Scholasticus. As Lydgate (born at Lydgate in Suffolk, six or seven miles from Newmarket) was ordained subdeacon in the Benedictine monastery of Bury St Edmunds in 1389', he was probably sent as a boy to a monastic school. At any rate, as he sketches his early escapades— apple-stealing, playing truant, &c.,-for us in his Testament2, I shall quote the youth's bit of the poem here: Harleian MS. 2255, fol. 60. Duryng the tyme / of this sesoun ver I meene the sesoun / of my yeerys greene The gerisshe sesoun / straunge of condiciouns [fol. 60 b.] ¶ Voyd of resoun/yove to wilfulnesse In my boyhood, up to 15, I loved no work Sauf pley or merthe /straunge to spelle or reede but play, lihtly tournyng wylde / and seelde sad For litil wroth / to stryve with my felawe ¶ I hadde in custom / to come to scole late Of my sovereyns / gaf no fors at al 1 Morley's English Writers, vol. ii. Pt. I. p. 421. yet I was afraid I came to school late, talked, lied to get off blame, and mocked my masters. 2 Edited by Mr Halliwell in his 'Selection from the Minor Poems of Dan John Lydgate.' Percy Society, 1840, quoted by Prof. Morley. strecched. (These collations are from Harl. 218, fol. 65, back.) 4 toke. 5 skoured. I stole apples and grapes, played tricks and mocked people, liked counting cherry-stones better than church. Late to rise, I was; dirty at dinner, deaf to the snubbings of my friends, [fol. 61 b.] reckless in God's service, chief shammer of illness when I was well, always unsteady, ill-conducted, sparing none for my pleasure. wex obstynat/ by inobedience My lust was al / to scorne folk and iape My wittys five/in wast I did abuse5 Loth to ryse/lother to bedde at eve Made deff ere/lyst nat / to them attende A child resemblyng / which was nat lyk to thryve Cheef bellewedir / of feyned 13 trwaundise At these monastic schools, I suppose, were educated mainly the boys whom the monks hoped would become monks, cleric or secular; mostly the poor, the Plowman's brother who was to be the Parson, not often the ploughman himself. Once, though, made a scholar and monk there, and sent by the Monastery to the University, the workman's, if not the ploughman's, son, might rule nobles and sit by kings, nay, beard them to their face. Thomas a Becket, him self the son of poor parents, was sent to be brought up in the "religious house of the Canons of Merton." In 1392 the writer of Piers Plowman's Crede sketches the then state of things thus: Now mot ich soutere hys soneseten to schole, And ich a beggeres brol And worth to a writere Other falsly to a frere the fend for to serven ; 2 Now every cobbler's son and beggar's brat turns writer, then Bishop, and lords' sons crouch to him, a cobbler's son ! His teeth with toylyng of lether tatered as a sawe. Here I might stop the quotation, but I go on, for justice has never yet been done to this noble Crede and William's Vision as pictures of the life of their times,-chiefly from the profound ignorance of us English of our own language; partly from the grace, the freshness, and the brilliance of Chaucer's easier and inimitable verse :Alaas! that lordes of the londe leveth swiche wrecchen, Lords And leveth swych lorels for her lowe wordes. They shulden maken [bichopes'] her owen bretheren should make childre, Other of som gentil blod. And so yt best semed, to y-clense diches And with the bandes of bakun his baly for to fillen God wold her wonyynge And fals freres forboden the fayre ladis chaumbres; They shulden nought haunten her house so ho[m]ly1 on nyghtes, gentlemen and set these scamps to clean ditches, and eat beans and and having women. If Lords but knew I their tricks, 1 Mr Skeat's readings. The abbot and abbots of Mr Wright's text spoil the alliteration. 2 Compare the previous passages under heading 1, p. vi. 3 May Mr Skeat bring the day when it will be! 4?randes. Sk. |