The Sun.
London, England, 1824-02-26 00:00:00

LITERARY NOTICE.

ENCYCLOPEDIA of ANTIQUITIES and ELEMENTS
of ARCILEOLOGY, Classical and Mcdiaval. By the
Rev. T. D. FositßoKE, M.A. F.A.S. Author of the
" British Monachism," History of Gloucestershire, &c. &c.
In our last Notice of the " Eneyclopedia of
Antiquities.," we aNserted that " the utility of
such a work was beyond dispute." We are now
more confirmed in our opinion, on a re-perusal ;
and we think that this dictum will be readily con-
ceded to us, by every attenthe reader of M r. Fos-
broke's volume. The study of the history and man-
ners of former times is both commendable and use-
ful ; not only as it-tends to improve our minds, but
also to excite us to virtuous and noble actions.
The general inquirer will find this work to con-
tain much iiiforrirttion of the utmost utility ; and
.to the Student in the Science of Antiquities and
Archwology in particular, it cannot fail to he a
most accurate instructor, and an important guide,
as it refers, on all subjects, to works of the first
character, where more detailed information may
be obtained.—lt will give us sincere pleasure to
-find that illr. Fosbroke is called upon by the
public, for a second edition of the work ; with
a view to which we hope he will continue his
researces with the same ability that he has dis-
played in the present volume.—We shall now
,proceed to lay before our readers, a few amusing
extracts, interspersed with one or two occasional
remarks.

BED.—The day-bed, says Steevens, was a lazy fashion of
Shakspeare's mra. It was the meridian (or sleep at noon) of
the Romans, and the whole Middle Age. In our old bed-
rooms were two beds, one the truckle-bed. Here anciently lay
a harper or musician, to relieve them while awake, or to pro-
cure sleep; in ancient Greece and modern Russia, a person
who read them to repose ; sometimes the wife ; sometimes a
meniel servant ; sometimes the chamberlain or burtheyn. Very
long prayers were said before retiring, sometimes curious ones
in verse. Mass was said in the chamber, befors rising. The
beds cf man and wife were creditably fitted up. The sword
both among the Greeks and ourselves was suspended at the
bed's head. We find even ladies of a Lord's bed-chamber.—
The attendants, as,in Pliny's time, waited upon their Lord to
his room, and often slept outside near the door. Both Romans
-and English sometimes slept -in the dark, sometimes with a
light; sometimes the light was kept on account of saying the
canonical hours, which light was under the care of the
Chamberlain. The Romans, even women, appear upon
marbles, stark naked in bed. The night or chamber gown,
the Anglo-Saxons called nihtes rag!, and lig ragl ; and in this
they possibly slept, or in the Mandrel um before-mentioned, for
as women wore shifts in the Norman mra, and men, their night_
garments when in bed. Strutt might possibly mistake the close
sitting of the blanchetunz, when he affirms, that till the reign
of Henry VIII. both sexes slept naked. Under the pillow were
put their valuables, as now breeches. When just in bed, they
took their wine of repose. Rush lights were known to the '
Romans, and were used to burn about corpses, while they lay
above ground. Bed-making among the Romans was a great
art. 'They shook the clothes at rising, from superstition. St.
Ives made his own bed, as did the Monks just after rising. At
Buxton, about a hundred years ago, the visitors of the Baths
slept in one long :room ; the upper part being allotted to the
ladies, the lower to the gentlemen, both being separated only
by a curtain."—pp. 228, 9.
Boors.—The mode of publishing a book was by borrowing,
or even hiring, a place to read it in to an assembly of friends
and others; in doing which, if it was an accessible portico,
they were much annoyed by wags and boys. Giraltius Cam-
hrecsis used the same mode of making his writings known.—
Publicly burning had books ; fictitious names in titles ; selling
poer works for waste paper ; reading on journies ; using com-
mon-place books ; are ancient customs. It was deemed an af-
fectation of' superior ability to send books to women as well as
men ; and literary men by profession carried their books and
provisions in a scrip. In the middle ages, we find books wrapt
in cloths called Camino Librurunz. From the classical law-
books, because the titles were in red letters, being called Libri
Rutsticati, whence their French denomination " Les Ru-
bripes," came our Rubrics, applied to prayer-books. Books
in chapters were called Capita/aria. We meet with leaden
books, with leaden covers ; some written by the finger only.
Feliciter, instead of fink, at the end—marginal ornaments
called Lateralie—L'lack books called Libel Nieei, relating to
necromancy ; coloured with a particular blackness ; the letters
believed to be effigies of animals—Potteptica, books of public
acts, or private accounts of the goods and property of indivi-
duals—no paper books earlier than the tenth century, accord-
ing to Mabillon—Extraneous works written on the covers of
others—Bulls, acts of general chapters, &c. entered by the
monks in extraneous works—Omissions in the text, noted in the
margin. Knighton mentions books with wooden leaves. The
earliest instance of a printed title-page is about 1495 ; of
figures under the title 1505." p. 235.
CoaonEs.—Taylor the water-poet states the following con-
sequences of the introduction of coaches : " house-keeping
never decayed till coaches came to England ; till which time
those were accounted the best men, who had most followers and
retainers ; their land about or near London was thought dear
enough at a noble the acre yearly, and a ten-pound house-rent
now was scarce twenty shillings then. But the witch-craft of
the coach quickly mounted the price of all things (except poor
men's labour), and withal transtbrmed, in some places 10, 20,
30, 40, 50, 00, or 100 proper serving-men into three or two ani-
vials ; ( videlicet) a butterfly-page, a trotting footman, a stiff-
drinking coachman, a cook, or clerk, a steward and a butler."
p. 246. A very excellent account of all kinds of wheel-car-
riages are given.
OU R-0 L ASS.—On a bas-relief of the Matter-palace, of the
marriage of Thetis and Peleus, Morpheus holds an hour-glass,
or erepsydra, like the modern, and from Athenmus it appeers,
that persons carried it about them as we do watches. In a
wood-cut, in Ilawkin's Music the frame is more solid, and the
glass probably slitsped in and out. There is another cut (alone
in Boissard, held by death, precisely of the modern form.
Preaching by the hour-glass was put an end to by the Puritans,
p. 275.
A correspondent in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1804, p.
201, says they were made use ty' in the Puritanical time: (21'
Cromwell, by the preachers, who on first getting into the pul-
pit, and naming the text, turned up the glass ; and if the ser-
mon did not last till the glass was out, it was said by the con-
grega!ion that the preacher was lazy; if he continued much
longer, they would yawn and stretch, anti by these signs signify
that they began to be weary of his discourse,' and wanted to be
dismissed. Butler thus alludes to them as in the Puritanical
times :

" As gifted brethren preaching by
" A carnal hour-glass do imply."
11 n. Part I. Canto 111. v. 1061.

Mr. Denne in his " Addendo to the History of Lambeth"
says—" Some have imagined that the ancient fat:iers preached,
as.the old Greek and Roman orators declaimed, by an ho4r-
glass ; on the contrary, it has been remarked that the sermons
of several of them wcre not of this length ; and it is particu-
Lirly said, that there are many sermons in St. Austin's tenth
volume, which a man might deliver with distinctness and pro-
priety in tight minutes, and some in almost half that time. If
a judgment may be formed from Dr. Featley's Clavis Mystica,
the running of the sand was not in general sufficient fora single
turn of his mystic key. But he had the mortification of ob-
serving, that even when in St. Mary's pulpit, Oxford, notwith-
standing the piety, learning, and ingenuity displayed in his
sermons, embellished likewise with quaint and nearly ludicrous
conceits, adapted to excite curiosity, he was not able to com-
mand the attention of his audience for so long a period : and in
his Act Sermon, July 12, 1313, he indirectly reproved them for
not listening to him. The text was 2 Sam. vii. 2.; the .übject,

the ark between the curtains; and this is the paragraph al-
luded to I might enlarge and spread my medita-
tions to the full length of the curtail:es in my text ; but, be-
cause I see the time will outstrip me, if I make not the more
haste, and because I see many composing themselves to thei7
rest, and sonic first already, I will begin to draw the eartaincs,
and shut up all that has been delivered with a brief application
to ourselves." Unless, however, the Doctor was rapid in his
delivery, his brief application must have lasted half an hour."
P. In -L

We think it is most probable that the use of hour glasses were
discontinued efter the puritanical times of Cromwell. Hogarth,
in his " Sleeping Congregation," has introduced an nour-
glass, and Mr. Ireland in his description of this Plate relates an
anecdote of Daniel Burgess "of whimsical memory" who
never preached without one, " and he frequently saw it out
three times during one sermon." At one time he was preach-
ing against drunkenness at the Conventicle in Russell court,
" some of his hearers began to yawn at the end of the second
glass." He was not to be silenced by a yawn ; but " turned
his time-keeper, and altering the tone of his voice, desired they
would be patient a while longer for he had much more to say
upon the sin of drunkenness ; therefore,' added he, `my friends
and brethren, we will have another glass,—and then !' "
An hour glass exists in the present day in the church of St.
Alban, Wood-street; and is represented in the Gentleman's
Magazine for SepterrNl 1323.
PULPIT.—The ancient ambo or first pulpit, was an elevated
tribunal, ascended by two flights of stairs. On the higher was
read the Gospel, on the lower the Epistle; in the ambo were
read the lessons, and not only these, but every thing which
was to be recited to the people, and also prayers and ser-
mons. So early as 1483, we find a clock ordered to be placed
over it. Stone pulpits are frequent. A very fine one, stand-
ing on a slender column, occurs at South Molton church, De-
von. Some pulpits.; ancient also, were portable. Scarlet pul-
pit cloths are antique. Lecturers' pulpits have had an hour-
glass on one side, and a bottle on the other. p. 307.
A curious grotesque pulpit exists in St. Catherine's Church,
near the Tower, erected subsequently to the time of Mary-
It is covered with figures ; and each pannel, with represen-
tations of some temple, curch, or castle in ?inhibits. Dr.
Ducarel published some engravings of it, in his " History of
St. Catherine's."
WHIPPING POST.—Tying to a pillar, stake, &c. was a
classical punishment, mentioned in the New Testament, and
well known. The whipping post of Isidore and Papias was
placed in a ditch. The Capitulanies of Charlemagne ordered
a person of servile condition to be whipped naked at a post, in
presence of all the people. In 1095 the- Post was called Statua.
p. 350.
Butler thus describes the Whipping Post in his incompa-
rable- Iludibras. Part I. Can. 11. v. 1150, &c.:—
" At th' outwarding wall, near which there stands
A bastile built l'imprison hands.
By strange enchantment made to fetter
The lesser parts and free the greater,
For tho' the body may creep through
The hands in grate are fast enough,
And when a circle 'bout the wrist
Is made by beadle Exorcist.
The body feels the spur and switch,
As if 'twere ridden post by 'Witch.
At twenty miles an hour's pace,
And yet ne'er stir out of the place."