Our Lady’s Slipper. _Cypripedium Calceolus._
Dedicated to _St. Etheldreda_.
[180] Hibernian Magazine, July, 1817.
[181] Belfast Chronicle.
[182] Stow.
[183] Deering’s Nottingham
[184] Strutt’s Sports.
[185] Collinson’s Somersetshire.
~June 24.~
_Nativity of St. John the Baptist._ _The Martyrs of Rome under Nero_,
A. D. 64. _St. Bartholomew._
~Midsummer-day.~
_Nativity of St. John the Baptist._
At Oxford on this day there was lately a remarkable custom, mentioned by
the Rev. W. Jones of Nayland, in his “Life of Bishop Horne,” affixed to
the bishop’s works. He says, “a letter of July the 25th, 1755, informed
me that Mr. Horne according to an established custom at Magdalen-college
in Oxford, had begun to preach before the university on the day of St.
John the baptist. For the preaching of this annual sermon, a permanent
pulpit of stone is inserted into a corner of the first quadrangle; and,
so long as the stone pulpit was in use, (_of which I have been a
witness_,) the quadrangle was furnished round the sides with a large
fence of green boughs, that the preaching might more nearly resemble
that of John the baptist in the wilderness; and a pleasant sight it was:
but for many years the custom has been discontinued, and the assembly
have thought it safer to take shelter under the roof of the chapel.”
_Pulpits._
Without descanting at this time on the manifold construction of the
pulpit, it may be allowable, perhaps, to observe, that the _ambo_, or
_first_ pulpit, was an elevation consisting of two flights of stairs; on
the higher was read the gospel, on the lower the epistle. The pulpit of
the present day is that fixture in the church, or place of worship,
occupied by the minister while he delivers his sermon. Thus much is
observed for the present, in consequence of the mention of the Oxford
pulpit; and for the purpose of introducing the representation of a
remarkably beautiful structure of this kind, from a fine engraving by
Fessard in 1710.
This pulpit is larger than the pulpit of the church of England, and the
other Protestant pulpits in our own country. It is a pulpit of the
Romish church with a bishop preaching to a congregation of high rank. It
is customary for a Roman Catholic prelate to have the ensigns of his
prelacy displayed in the pulpit, and hence they are so exhibited in
Fessard’s print. This, however, is by no means so large as other pulpits
in Romish churches, which are of increased magnitude for the purpose of
congregating the clergy, when their occupations at the altar have
ceased, before the eye of the congregation; and hence it is common for
many of them to sit robed, by the side of the preacher, during the
sermon.
[Illustration: ~French Pulpit~