Cambridge.
_Corporation Enactments_ (Vol. ix., p. 300.).--It is an easy, but generally
an unsafe thing to quote from quotations. ABHBA should have referred to
_The Dublin Penny Journal_, vol. i. p. 226., for his extracts from the Town
Books of the Corporation of Youghal, co. Cork; and, even then, might have
made farther reference to Crofton Croker's _Researches in the South of
Ireland_, p. 160., whence the paragraph (unacknowledged) was introduced
into _The Dublin Penny Journal_. Mr. Croker, moreover, fell into error with
respect to the dates of these curious enactments, which were long
antecedent to 1680 and 1703. I have seen them in the original (Book A), and
vouch for the accuracy of the subjoined:
"1613-14. Thomas Geoffry made a freeman (being a barber), on condition
that he should trim every freeman for sixpence per ann.
"1622. John Bayly made free, on condition to dress the dinners of the
several Mayors."
I may give you some farther extracts from a MS. Note Book relative to this
corporation at a future period.
SAMUEL HAYMAN, Clk.
South Abbey, Youghal.
_The Passion of our Lord dramatised_ (Vol. ix., p. 373.).--A drama on the
_Passion of Christ_ (the first specimen of the kind that has descended to
our days) is attributed to St. Gregory of Nazianzum, but is more probably
the production of Gregory of Antioch (A.D. 572). It is described by most of
the ecclesiastical writers: Tillemont, Baillet, Baronius, Bellarmin, Dupin,
Vossius, Rivet, Labbæus, Ceillier, Fleury, &c.
In 1486, when _La Mistère de la Passion_, or the Passion of our Saviour,
was exhibited at Antwerp, the beholders were astonished by _five_ different
scaffolds, each having several stages rising perpendicularly: paradise was
the most elevated, and it had two stages. But even this display was
eclipsed by another exhibition of _The Passion_, where no fewer than _nine_
scaffolds were displayed to the wondering gaze of the people.
In 1556, according to Strype (_Life of Sir Thos. Pope_, Pref. p. vii.), the
_Passion of Christ_ was represented at the Grey Friers in London, on Corpus
Christi Day, before the Lord Mayor, the Privy Council, and many great
persons of the realm. Again, the same historian informs us (_Ecclesiastical
Memorials_, iii. c. xlix.) under the date 1557:
"The _Passion of Christ_ was acted at the Grey Friers on the day that
war was proclaimed against France, and in honour of that occasion."
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It is generally considered that the last miracle play represented in
England was that of _Christ's Passion_, in the reign of James I., which
Prynne informs us was--
"Performed at Elie House in Holborne, when Gondomar lay there, on Good
Friday at night, at which there were thousands present."
Busby's idea, "that the manner of reciting and singing in the theatres
formed the original model of the Church service," is as absurd as it is
untenable.