SOME YORKSHIRE CLERKS
During many years of the time that the Rev. John Torre occupied the
rectory of Catwick, Thomas Dixon[82] was associated with him as parish
clerk. He is described as a little man, old-looking for his age, and in
the later years of his life able to walk only with difficulty. These
peculiarities, however, did not prevent his winning a young woman for
his wife. Possibly she saw the sterling character of the man, and
admired and loved him for it.
[Footnote 82: This account of the clerks Dixon and Fewson was sent by
the Rev. J. Gaskell Exton, and is published by the permission of the
editor of the _Yorkshire Weekly Post_.]
Dixon was strongly attached to the rector, so much so, that to him
neither the rector nor the things belonging to the rector, whether
animate or inanimate, could do wrong. He had a watch, and even though it
might not be one of the best, a watch was no small acquisition to a
working man of his time. He did not live in the days of the
three-and-sixpenny marvel, or of the half-crown wonder, now to be found
in the pocket of almost every schoolboy. Dixon's watch was of the kind
worn by the well-known Captain Cuttle, which Dickens describes as being
"a silver watch, which was so big and so tight in the pocket that it
came out like a bung" when its owner drew it from the depths to see the
time. It must, consequently, have cost many half-crowns, but yet as
timekeeper it was somewhat of a failure. In this, too, it resembled that
of the famous captain of which its proud possessor, as everybody knows,
used to say, "Put you back half-an-hour every morning, and about another
quarter towards the afternoon, and you've a watch that can be equalled
by a few and excelled by none." Dixon, therefore, when asked the time of
day, was usually obliged to go through an arithmetical calculation
before he could reply.
On Sunday, however, all was different; he then had no hesitation
whatever in at once declaring the correct time. For every Sunday morning
he put his watch by the rector's clock, and it mattered not how far the
rector's clock might be fast or slow, what that clock said was the true
time for Dixon. And though the remonstrances of the parishioners might
be loud and long, they were all in vain, for according to the rector's
clock he rang the church bells, and so the services commenced. He loved
the rector, therefore the rector's clock could not be wrong. Evidently
Dixon was capable of strong affection, a quality of no mean moral order.
Before the enclosure of parishes was common, and their various fields
separated by hedges or other fences; before, too, the ordnance survey
with its many calculations was an accomplished fact, much more measuring
of land in connection with work done each year was required than at
present. It was a necessity, therefore, that each village should have in
or near it a man skilled in the science of calculation. Consequently,
the acquirement of figures was fostered, and so in the earlier part of
the nineteenth century almost every parish could produce a man supposed
to be, and who probably was, great in arithmetic. Catwick's calculator
was Dixon, and he was generally thought by his co-villagers to be as
learned a one as any other, if not more so.
He had, however, a great rival at Long Riston. This was one Richard
Fewson, who, like Dixon, was clerk of his parish; but while Dixon was a
shopkeeper Fewson kept the village school.
Fewson's modes of punishing refractory scholars were somewhat peculiar.
Either a culprit was hoisted on the back of another scholar, or made to
stoop till his nose entered a hole in the desk, and when in one or other
of these positions was made to feel the singular sensation caused by a
sound caning on that particular part of his anatomy which it is said
"nature intends for correction." Sometimes, too, an offender was made to
sit in a small basket, to the cross handle of which a rope had been
tied, and by this means he was hoisted to a beam near the roof of the
school. Here he was compelled to stay for a longer or shorter period,
according to the offence, knowing that, if he moved to ease his crippled
position, the basket would tilt and he would fall to the floor.
On one occasion, with an exceptionally refractory pupil, his mode of
punishment was even more peculiar still. Having told all the girls to
turn their faces to the wall--and not one of them, so my informant, one
of the boys, said, would dare to disobey the order--he chalked the shape
of a grave on the floor of the schoolroom. He then made the boy, an
incorrigible truant, strip off all his clothes, and when he stood
covered only in nature's dress, told him in solemn tones that he was
going to bury him alive and under the floor. One scholar was then sent
for a pick, and when this was fetched, another was sent for a shovel. By
the time they were both brought, the truant was in a panic of fear, the
end hoped for. The master then sternly asked the boy if he would play
truant again, to which the boy quickly answered no. On this, he was
allowed to dress, being assured as he did so that if ever again he
stopped from school without leave he should certainly be buried alive,
and so great was the dread produced, the boy from that time was
regularly found at school.
If parents objected to these punishments, they were simply told to take
their children from school, which, as Fewson was the only master for
miles around, he knew they would be loath to do. Fewson taught nearly
all the children of the district whose parents felt it necessary that
they should have any education. He is said to have turned out good
scholars in the three R's, his curriculum being limited to these
subjects, with, for an extra fee, mensuration added.
But Fewson, if he did not teach it, felt himself to be well up in
astronomy. One summer, an old boy of his told me, he got the
children--my informant amongst the number--to collect from their parents
and others for a trip to Hornsea. When the money was all in he
complained that the amount was insufficient for a trip, and suggested
that a telescope he had seen advertised should be bought with the money.
If this were done, he promised that those who had subscribed should have
the telescope in turn to look through from Saturday to Monday. The
telescope was purchased, and each subscriber had it once, and then it
was no more seen. From that time it became the entire property of the
master. The children never again collected for a trip, and small wonder.
Fewson was a good singer and musician generally, so in addition to his
office as clerk he held the position of choirmaster. At church on
Sunday he sat at the west end, the boys of the village sitting behind
him, and it was part of his duty to see that they behaved themselves
decorously. Should a boy make any disturbance Fewson's hand fell heavily
on the offender's ears, and so sharply that the sound of the blows could
be heard throughout the church. Such incidents as this were by no means
uncommon in churches in the days when Fewson and Dixon flourished, and
they were looked upon as nothing extraordinary, for small compunction
was felt in the punishment of unruly urchins.
I have been told of another clerk, for instance, who dealt such severe
blows on the heads of boys, who behaved in the least badly, with a by no
means small stick, that, like Fewson's, they, too, resounded all over
the church. This clerk was known as "Old Crack Skull," and there were
many others who might as appropriately have borne the name.
As parish clerk, Fewson attended the Archdeacon's visitation with the
churchwardens, whose custom it was on each such occasion to spend about
£3 in eating and drinking. On the appointment of a new and reforming
churchwarden this expenditure was stopped, and for the first time Fewson
returned to Riston sober. Here he looked at the churchwarden and
sorrowfully said, "For thirty years I have been to the visitation and
always got home drunk; Sally will think I haven't been." He then turned
into the public-house, and afterwards reached home in the condition
Sally, his wife, would expect.
[Illustration: THE CHURCH OF ST. MARGARET, WESTMINSTER]
Insobriety was the normal condition of Fewson after school hours. It was
his invariable custom to visit the public-house each evening, where he
always found a clean pipe and an ounce of tobacco ready for him. Here
he acted as president of those who forgathered, being by virtue of his
wisdom readily conceded this position. His favourite drink was gin, and
of this he imbibed freely; leaving for home about ten o'clock, which he
found usually only after many a stumble and sometimes a fall. He,
however, managed to save money, with which he built himself a house at
Arnold, adorning it, as still to be seen, with the carved heads of
saints and others, begged from the owners of the various ancient
ecclesiastical piles of the neighbourhood. He died about seventy years
ago, and was buried at Riston.
Between Dixon and Fewson there was much friendly strife with regard to
the solving of hard arithmetical problems. This contest was no mere
private matter. It was entered into with great zest by the men of both
the villages concerned; the Catwickians and the Ristonians each backing
their man to win. "A straw shows which way the wind blows," we say, and
herein we may feel a breathing of the Holderness man's love of his clan,
an affection which has done much to develop and to strengthen his
character.
Dixon was employed by the harvesters and others to measure the land
which they had reaped, or on which they had otherwise worked. When the
different measurements had been taken, he, of course, had to find the
result. For this, he needed no pen, ink, or paper, nor yet a slate and
pencil. He made his calculations by a much more economic method than
these would supply. He sat down in the field he had measured, took off
his beaver hat, and, using it as a kind of blackboard, with a piece of
chalk worked out the result of his measurements on its crown.
Dixon must have been a man of resources, as are most Holderness men
where the saving of money is concerned. I have heard it said that the
spirit of economy has so permeated their character that it has
influenced even their speech. "So saving are they," say some, "that the
definite article, _the_, is never used by them in their talk." But this
is a libel; another and a truer reason may be found for the omission in
their Scandinavian origin.
Another parish clerk who held office at a church about five miles from
Catwick, by trade a tailor, was a noted character and remarkable for his
parsimonious habits. He is described as having been a very little man
and of an extremely attenuated appearance. The story of his economy
during his honeymoon, when the happy pair stayed in some cheap town
lodgings, is not pleasing.
His great effort in saving, however, resulted from his sporting
proclivities. Tailor though he was, he conceived a great desire to be a
mighty hunter. So strong did this passion burn within him that he made
up his mind, sooner or later, to hunt, and with the best, in a red coat,
too. He therefore began to save with this object in view. Denying
himself every luxury and most other things which are usually counted
necessaries, for long he lived, it is said, on half a salt herring a day
with a little bread or a few vegetables in addition. By doing so, he was
able to put almost all he earned to the furtherance of the purpose of
his heart. This went on till he had saved £200. Then he felt his day was
come. He bought a horse, made himself the scarlet coat, and went to the
hunt as he thought a gentleman should. His hunting lasted for two
seasons, when, the money he had saved being spent, he went back to his
trade, at which he worked as energetically as ever.
At the west end of the nave of Catwick Church formerly was erected a
gallery. In this loft, as it was commonly called, the musicians of the
parish sang or played. Various instruments, bassoon, trombone,
violoncello, cornet, cornopean, and clarionet, flute, fiddle, and
flageolet, or some of their number, were employed, calling to mind the
band of Nebuchadnezzar of old. The noise made in the tuning of the
instruments to the proper pitch may be readily imagined. Now, the church
possesses an organ, and the choirmen and boys have their places in the
chancel, while the musicians of the parish occupy the front seats of the
nave. This arrangement is eminently suitable for effectually leading the
praises of the people, but not perhaps more so, its noise
notwithstanding, than the former style; indeed, I am somewhat doubtful
if the new equals the old. The old certainly had the merit of engaging
most, if not all, the musicians of the village in the worship of
the church.
At the east end of the nave, in the days of the loft, stood a kind of
triple pulpit, commonly called a three-decker. It was composed of three
compartments, the second above and behind the first, and the third
similarly placed with regard to the second. The lowest, resting on the
floor, was the place for the clerk, the middle was for the parson when
reading the prayers and Scriptures, and the highest for the parson when
preaching. Such pulpits are now almost as completely things of the past
as the old warships from which, in derision, they got their name. Once
only have I read the service and preached from a three-decker, and then
the clerk did not occupy the position assigned to him. Dixon, however,
always used the little desk at the foot of the Catwick pulpit, and from
it took his share of the service.
It was part of his duty, as clerk, to choose and to give out the number
of the hymns. Now Dixon, like Fewson, was a singer, and felt that the
choir could not get on without the help of his voice in the gallery when
the hymns were sung. Consequently, he then left his box and went to the
singing loft; but, to save time, as he marched down the aisle from east
to west, and as he mounted the steps of the gallery, he slowly and
solemnly announced the number of the hymn and read the lines of the
first verse. When the hymn was sung, our bird-like clerk came down again
from the heights of the loft and returned to his perch at the base of
the pulpit.
Nowadays, we should consider such proceedings very unseemly, but it
would have been thought nothing of in the days of Dixon. Scenes,
according to our ideas, much more grotesque were then of frequent
occurrence. We have already looked on at least one; here is another
which took place in the neighbouring church of Skipsea one Sunday
afternoon some sixty years ago, and in connection with singing. The
account was given to me by a parishioner of about eighty years of age,
who was one of the choirmen on the occasion.
The leading singer, he said, there being no instrument, started a tune
for the hymn. It would not fit the words, and he soon came to a full
stop, and choir and congregation with him. At this, one of the
congregation, in a voice that could be heard the whole church over,
called out, "Give it up, George! Give it up!" "No, no," said the vicar
in answer, leaning over his desk, "No, no, George, try again! try
again!" George tried again, and again failed. But the vicar still
encouraged him with "Have another try, George! Have another try! You may
get it yet!" George tried the third time, and now hit upon a right tune;
and to the general delight the hymn was sung through.
Without doubt, in the days of our forefathers the services of the Church
were conducted with the greatest freedom. But we may not judge those who
preceded us by our own standard, nor yet apart from the time in which
they lived.
When two young people of Catwick or its neighbourhood feel they can live
no longer without each other, they in local phrase "put in the banns."
They then, of course, expect to have them published, or again in local
idiom "thrown over the pulpit." On all such occasions, according to a
very old custom, after the rector had read out the names, with the usual
injunction following, from the middle compartment of the three-decker,
Dixon would rise from his seat below, and slowly and clearly cry out,
"God speed 'em weel" (God speed them well). By this pious wish he prayed
for a blessing on those about to be wed, and in this the congregation
joined, for they responded with Amen.
Dixon was the last of the Catwick clerks to keep this custom. Much more
recently, however, than the time he held office, members of the
congregation, usually those seated in the loft, on the publication of
the banns of some well-known people, have called out the time-honoured
phrase. But it is now heard no more. The custom has gone into a like
oblivion to that of the parish clerk himself, once so important a
person, in his own estimation if in that of no other, both in church and
parish. "The old order changeth."
Thomas Dixon died at Catwick when sixty-seven years of age. He was
buried in the churchyard on January 2, 1833, and by the Rev. John Torre,
the rector he served so faithfully.
When Sydney Smith went to see the out-of-the-way Yorkshire village of
Foston-le-Clay, to which benefice he had been presented, his arrival
occasioned great excitement. The parish clerk came forward to welcome
him, a man eighty years of age, with long grey hair, thread-bare coat,
deep wrinkles, stooping gait, and a crutch stick. He looked at the new
parson for some time from under his grey shaggy eyebrows, and talked,
and showed that age had not quenched the natural shrewdness of the
Yorkshireman.
At last, after a pause, he said, striking his crutch stick on the
ground:
"Master Smith, it often stroikes moy moind that folks as come frae
London be such fools. But you," he added, giving Sydney Smith a nudge
with his stick, "I see you be no fool." The new vicar was gratified.
Yorkshiremen are keen songsters, and _fortissimo_ is their favourite
note of expression. "Straack up a bit, Jock! straack up a bit," a
Yorkshire parson used to shout to his clerk, when he wanted the Old
Hundredth to be sung. Well do I remember a delightful old clerk in the
Craven district, who used to give out the hymn in the accustomed form
with charming manner. He liked not itinerant choirs, which were not
uncommon forty or fifty years ago, and used to migrate from church to
church, and sometimes to chapel, in the district where the members
lived. One of these choirs visited the church where the Rev. ----
Morris was rector, and he was directed to give out the anthem which the
itinerant strangers were prepared to sing. He neither knew nor cared
what an anthem was; and he gave the following somewhat confused notice:
"Let us sing to the praise and glory of God the fiftieth Psalm, _while
you folks sing th' anthem_," casting a scornful glance at the wandering
musicians in the opposite gallery.
Missionary meetings and sermons were somewhat rare in those days, but
the special preacher for missions, commonly called the deputation, who
performs for lazy clerics the task of instructing the people about work
in the mission field--a duty which could well be performed by the vicar
himself--had already begun his itinerant course. The congregation were
waiting in the churchyard for his arrival, when the old Yorkshire vicar,
mentioned above, said to his clerk, "Jock, ye maunt let 'em into th'
church; the dippitation a'n't coom." Presently two clergymen arrived,
when the clerk called out, "Ye maunt gang hoame; t' deppitation's coom."
The old vicar made an excellent chairman, his introductory remarks being
models of brevity: "T' furst deppitation will speak!" "T' second
deppitation will speak!" after which the clerk lighted some candles in
the singing gallery, and gave out for an appropriate hymn, "Vital spark
of heavenly flame."
A writer in _Chambers's Journal_ tells of a curious class of clergymen
who existed forty years ago, and were known as "Northern Lights," the
light from a spiritual point of view being somewhat dim and flickering.
The writer, who was the vicar for twenty-five years of a moorland
parish, tells of several clerks who were associated with these clerics,
and who were as quaint and curious in their ways as their masters[83].
The village was a hamlet on the edge of the Yorkshire moors, near the
confines of Derbyshire. Beside the church was a public-house kept by the
parish clerk, Jerry, a dapper little man, who on Sundays and funeral
days always wore a wig, an old-fashioned tailed coat, black stockings,
and shoes with buckles. His house was known as "Heaven's Gate," where
the farmers from the neighbouring farms used to drink and stay a week at
a time. Jerry used to direct the funerals, make the clerkly responses,
and then provide the funeral party with good cheer at his inn. His
invitation was always given at the graveside in a high-pitched falsetto
voice, and the formula ran in these words, and was never varied:
"Friends of the corpse is respectfully requested to call at my house,
and partake then and there of such refreshments as is provided
for them."
[Footnote 83: By the kindness of the editor of _Chambers's Journal_ I am
permitted to retell some of the stories of the manners of these clerks
and parsons.]
Much intemperance and disorder often followed these funeral feastings.
An old song long preserved in the district depicts one of these
funerals, which was by no means a one-day affair, but sometimes lasted
several days, during which the drinking went on. The inn was perhaps a
necessity in this out-of-the-world place, but it was unfortunately a
great temptation to the inhabitants, and to the old Northern Light
parson who preceded the vicar whose reminiscences we are recording. Here
in the inn the old parson sat between morning and afternoon service with
a long clay pipe in his mouth and a glass of whisky by his side. When
the bells began to settle and the time of service approached, he would
send Jerry to the church to see if many people had arrived. When
Jerry replied:
"There's not many comed yet, Mr. Nowton," the parson would say:
"Then tell them to ring another peal, Jerry, and just fill up my glass
again."
The communion plate was kept at the inn under Jerry's charge. Three
times a year it was used, and the circumstances were disgraceful. Four
bottles of port wine were deemed the proper allowance on communion days,
and after a fractional quantity had been consumed in the church, the
rest was finished by the churchwardens at the inn. One of these
churchwardens drank himself to death after the communion service. He was
a big man with a red face, and was always present when a bear was baited
at the top of the hill above the village. One day the bear escaped and
ran on to the moor; everybody scattered in all directions, and several
dogs were killed before the bear was caught.
The successor of Jerry as clerk, but not as publican, was a rough,
honest individual who was called Dick. When excited he had two oaths,
"By'r Lady!" and "By the mass!" but as he always pronounced this last
word _mess_, it was evident he did not understand the nature of the oath
he used. He had a rough-and-ready way of doing things, and when handing
out hymn-books during service he used to throw a book up to an applicant
in the gallery to save the trouble of walking up the stairs in proper
fashion. He talked the broadest Yorkshire dialect, and it was not always
easy to understand him. This was particularly the case when, in his
capacity as clerk, he repeated the responses at the funeral service.
A tremendous snowfall happened one winter, and the roads were all
blocked. It was impossible for any one to go to church on the Sunday
morning following the fall, as the snow had not been cleared away. It
was necessary for the vicar, however, to get there, as he had to read
out the banns of marriage which were being published; so, putting on
fishing-waders to protect himself from the wet snow, he succeeded with
some difficulty in getting through the drifts. In the churchyard,
standing before the church clock, he found Dick intently gazing at it,
so he asked him if it was going. His reply was laconic: "Noa; shoo's
froz." He and the vicar then went into the church, and the necessary
publication of banns was read in the presence of the clerk alone.
In those days it was necessary that the wedding service should be all
over by twelve o'clock, and it was most important that due notice should
be given of the date of the wedding, a matter about which Dick was
sometimes rather careless.
The vicar had gone into Derbyshire for a few days to fish the River
Derwent. He was fishing a long distance up the stream when he heard his
name called, and saw his servant running towards him, who said that a
wedding was waiting for him at the church. Dick had forgotten to give
due notice of this event. The vicarage trap was in readiness, but the
road over the Derbyshire Peak was rough and steep, the pony small, the
distance ten miles, and the vicar encumbered with wet clothes. The
chance of getting to the church before twelve o'clock seemed remote. But
the vicar and pony did their best; it was, however, half an hour after
the appointed time when they reached the church. Glancing at the clock
in the tower, the vicar, to his astonishment, found the hands pointing
to half-past eleven. The situation was saved, and the service was
concluded within the prescribed time. The vicar turned to the clerk for
an explanation. "I seed yer coming over the hill," he said, "and I just
stopped the clock a bit." Dick was an ingenious man.
There was another character in the parish quite as peculiar as Dick, and
he was one of the principal singers, who sat in the west gallery. He had
formerly played the clarionet, before an organ was put into the church.
During service he always kept a red cotton handkerchief over his bald
head, which gave him a decidedly comic appearance.
On one occasion the clergyman gave out a hymn in the old-fashioned way:
"Let us sing to the praise and glory of God the twenty-first hymn,
second version." Up jumped the old singer and shouted, "You're wrang,
maister; it's first version." The clergyman corrected himself, when the
singer again rose: "You're wrang agearn; it's twenty-second hymn."
Without any remark the clergyman corrected the number, and the man again
jumped up: "That's reet, mon, that's reet." When the old singer died his
widow was very anxious there should be some record on his tombstone of
his having played the clarionet in church; so above his name a
trumpet-shaped instrument was carved on the stone, and some doggerel
lines were to be added below. The vicar had great difficulty in
persuading the family to abandon the lines for the text, "The trumpet
shall sound, and the dead shall be raised."
A neighbouring vicar was on one occasion taking the duty of an old man
with failing eyesight, and Dick reminded him before the afternoon
service that there was a funeral at four o'clock. "You must come into
the church and tell me when it arrives," he told the clerk, "and I will
stop my sermon." It was the habit of the old clergyman to relapse into a
strong Yorkshire dialect when speaking familiarly, and this will account
for the brief dialogue which passed between him and Dick as he stood at
the lectern. In due course the funeral arrived at the church gates, and
the first intimation the congregation inside the church had of this fact
was the appearance of Dick, who noisily threw open the big doors of the
south porch. He then stood and beckoned to the clergyman, but his poor
blind eyes could not see so far. Dick then came nearer and waved his hat
before him. This again met with no response. Then he got near enough to
pluck him by the arm, which he did rather vigorously, shouting at the
same time, "Shoo's coomed." "Wha's coomed?" replied the clergyman,
relapsing into his Yorkshire speech. "Funeral's coomed," retorted Dick.
"Then tell her to wait a bit while I finish my sermon"; and the old man
went quietly on with his discourse.
Another instance of Dick's failing to give proper notice of a service
was as follows; but on this occasion it was not really his fault. Some
large reservoirs were being made in the parish, and nearly a thousand
navvies were employed on the works. These men were constantly coming and
going, and very often they brought some infectious disorder which spread
among the huts where they lived. One day a navvy arrived who broke out
in smallpox of a very severe kind, and in a couple of days the man died,
and the doctor ordered the body to be buried the moment a coffin could
be got. It was winter-time, and the vicar had ridden over to see some
friends about ten miles away. As the afternoon advanced it began to rain
very heavily, and he decided not to ride back home, but to sleep at his
friend's house. About five o'clock a messenger arrived to say a funeral
was waiting in the church, and he was to come at once. He started in
drenching rain, which turned to sleet and snow as he approached the moor
edges. It was pitch-dark when he got off his horse at the church gates,
and with some difficulty he found his way into the vestry and put a
surplice over his wet garments. He could see nothing in the church, but
he asked when he got into the reading-desk if any one was there. A deep
voice answered, "Yes, sir; we are here"; and he began the service, which
long practice had taught him to repeat by heart. When about half-way
through the lesson he saw a glimmer of light, and Dick entered the
church with a lantern, which he placed on the top of the coffin. It was
a gruesome scene which the lantern brought into view. There was the
coffin, and before it, in a seat, four figures of the navvy-bearers, and
Dick himself covered with snow and as white as if he wore a surplice.
They filed out into the churchyard, but the wind had blown the snow into
the grave, and this had to be got out before they could lower the body
into it. The navvies, who were kind-hearted fellows, explained that they
could give no notice of the funeral beforehand, and they quite
understood the delay was no fault of the vicar's or Dick's.
Dick was, in spite of his faults, an honest and kind-hearted man, and
his death, caused by a fall from a ladder, was much regretted by his
good vicar. On his death-bed the old clerk sent for his favourite
grandson, who succeeded him in his office, and made this pathetic
request: "Thou'lt dig my grave, Jont, lad."
With Dick the last of the "Northern Lights" flickered out. Nothing now
remains in the village recalling those old times. The village inn has
been suppressed, and the drinking bouts are over. The old church has
been entirely restored, and there is order and decency in the services.
The strange thing is that it should have been possible that only forty
years ago matters were in such a state of chaos and disorder, and in
such need of drastic reformation.
Another Yorkshire clerk flourished in the thirties at Bolton-on-Dearne
named Thomas Rollin, commonly called Tommy. He used to render Psalm cii.
6: "I am become a _pee-li-can_ in the wilderness, and an owl in the
_dee-sert_." Tommy was a tailor by trade, and made use of a
ready-reckoner to assist him in making up his accounts, and his
familiarity with that useful book was shown when reading the second
verse of the forty-fifth Psalm, which Tommy invariably read: "My tongue
is the pen of a _ready-reckoner_," to the immense delight of the
youthful members of the congregation.