334 



NOTES AND QUERIES. [2"^ s. no 69., apeil 25. w. 



parishioners, whose office it was to pray for the 

 dead who slept within and around its walls. 



F. M. H. will find much illustrating this and 

 kindred subjects in Dr. Rock's Church of Our 

 Fathers. For beadsmen see vol. iii. pp. 131 — 142. 



It is to be wished that correspondents of " IS]". 

 & Q ," when quoting churchwardens' accounts and 

 other parochial documents, would give the name 

 of the parish to which each document belongs. 

 They would often by this means furnish a clue to 

 the answer of their Queries. In the case in 

 question I should not be surprised that, if the 

 name of the parish were known, some correspond- 

 ent would be able to furnish us with a copy of the 

 will of the founder of the charity. 



Churchwardens' accounts are a class of docu- 

 ments that have been hitherto very much ne- 

 glected. No student of social history needs to be 

 told their value, but unfortunately parish clerks 

 are neither antiquaries nor correspondents of 

 " N. & Q.," and so such documents remain hidden, 



{jerbaps perishing by damp, or affording paper to 

 ight the vestry fire. K. P. D. E. 



I find in the churchwardens' accounts for the 

 parish of Leverton near Boston, Lincolnshu-e, the 

 following entries : 



" 1535. To parish priest for the beade rolle of Thomas 

 Grafton and others, 1 shilling. 



" 1541. Copy of the Bed role belongyng to the prechynge 

 atte the prechynge crosse, done by Edmund Eobertson or 

 by hys hejTes, or his executors — that ye schall praye for 

 the gud estatte of Edmund Robertson, and Alice hys 

 wyflFe, 



" Fyrst, ye schall praye for the saulles of Edmund Ro- 

 bertson and Alice hj's wyffe, for whos saulles thys ser- 

 mone is mayd her thj's daye. 



" Item, ye schall praye for the saulles of Ryclierde 

 Robertson and Margaret hys wyffe, sumtyme beynge the 

 daAvther of Roger Jefferay. 



" Item, ye schall pray for the saulles of John Clements 

 and Agnes hys wyffe, and for the saulles of Master John 

 Thamworth and Thomas Covell, and for all Crysten 

 saulles." 



This last extract corroborates the opinion that 

 the " Bede Roll " was the roll of persons deceased 

 for whom masses and prayers were to be offered. 



There are many things alluded to in the parish 

 accounts of Leverton (which commence in 1493) 

 to which I shall call the attention of the readers of 

 " N. & Q." at some early future time. 



PiSHET Thompson. 



Stoke Newington. 



Since writing the above I have found the fol- 

 lowing sanctions for the opinion I have expressed : 



" Bede-roll (Saxon) is a roll or list of such as Priests 

 were wont to pray for in Churches." — See Blount's Glos- 

 sographia, 3rd edition, 1670, p. 78. 



" Bead-roll, a list of such who used to be pray'd for in 

 the Church." — Bailey's Dictionanj, 15th edit., 8vo., 

 1753. 



The bead roll was a roll, or list, of persons 

 whose souls were to be prayed for, and the amount 

 paid was for that purpose. Your correspondent 

 F. M. H. wishes for authorities : will you allow me 

 to refer him to HalliwelVs Dictionary of Archaic 

 and Provincial Words? where he will find the fol- 

 lowing : 



" Beadroll, a list of persons to be prayed for ; a roll of 

 praj-ers or hymns ; hence any list. They were prohibited 

 in England in 1550. See Croft's Excerpta Antiqua, p. 13. ; 

 Test. Vetust, p. 388. ; Topsell's Four-footed Beasts, p. 171. ; 

 Florio, in V. Chidppole." 



Would you allow me to suggest to your corre- 

 spondent F. M. H. that it might have been as well 

 if he had used the same precaution, which he 

 wishes to impress on those who reply to his Query, 

 and given the authority for his extract, as it 

 would be interesting to many to know to what 

 parish the account book belongs. 



Llbwellynn Jewitt, F.S.A. 



Derby. 



On the day after the publication of the Note on 

 this point by F. M. H., I was accidentally fur- 

 nished with an illustration to it. The old clerk 

 (Avho is also the schoolmaster) of a country parish 

 on the borders of Staffordshire and Shropshire, 

 told me that he had written a certain sick woman's 

 name upon " the Bede-roll." I imagined this to 

 be some charity list, but I found it to be that list 

 of sick persons who desired the prayers of the 

 congregation. The old clerk told me that he had 

 never called this sick-list by any other name than 

 " the Bede-roll." Cuthbekt Bedb, 



"the world unmasked." 

 (2"^ S. ii. 390. ; iii. 256.) 

 My edition of this work is published by J. 

 Phillips, London, 8vo., 1786; but not possessing 

 Le Monde fou prefere au Monde sage, I am not 

 able by comparison to decide whether the former 

 work is a translation from it. The latter is un- 

 doubtedly the production of Mdlle. Hubert, con- 

 cerning whom particulars will be found in the 

 Bib. Universelle, and other similar works. She 

 was also the authoress of Lettres sur la Religion 

 essentielle aVHomme, 1738, awork which has passed 

 through many editions, and forms the subject of 

 the present note. It is curious, indeed, to remark 

 how the standard of true religion varies from age 

 to age in men's minds ; the heresy of one century, 

 first persecuted, then tolerated, becoming the or- 

 thodoxy of the next ; while the religion which it 

 displaces becomes superstition, and a new form of 

 infidelity is born, destined to pass through the 

 same vicissitudes as its predecessors. Thus the 

 Letters which are now characterised as " a most 

 pithy and pointed growth of an earnest and de- 



