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NOTES AND QITEEIES. 



[2n* S. No 77., June 20. '57. 



they must undergo considerable pruning, if a large 

 circulation was desired for a reprint; as unfor- 

 tunately, words long since dead to ears polite, and 

 anecdotes decidedly too free, are plentifully scat- 

 tered. Monk CHESTER. 



TEMPLAR LANDS. 



(2°^ S. iii. 427.) 



As a general rule, monastic lands, discharged 

 from tithes as such, lose their privilege when 

 lensed to a tenant. The exemption holds good 

 only while the owner himself occupies and uses 

 them. This is decidedly the case with regard to 

 Templars* lands. 



All lands formerly belonging to Cistercians, the 

 Templars, and the Hospitallers, are similarly cir- 

 cumstanced. So also are lands that belonged to 

 other orders, if in their possession previous to the 

 limitation of exemption to these three by Pope 

 Adrian. Others, too, were specially exempted. 

 The pages of " N. & Q." are too limited to allow 

 of a minute detail of these cases, with all their 

 varying circumstances. The above will be a suf- 

 ficient reply to the question raised by S. J. W. 

 For further elucidation I subjoin an extract from 

 Godolphin's Repertorium Canonicum, p. 402. : 



" The order of the Prajmonstracenses were discharged 

 of all tithes of their land, the which ' manibus aut sump- 

 tlbus e.vcolebant prnpriis.' All the chief monks paid tithe 

 as well as other men, till Pope Paschal, at the Council of 

 Mentz, ordained that they should not pay tithes 't/e labo- 

 ribus suis;' and that continued as a general discharge till 

 the time of Henry II., when Pope Adrian restrained it to 

 three order.s viz., the Chtertians, the Templars, and the 

 Hospitallers; and the discharge which the order of the 

 Frcemonstracenses had was made by Pope Innocent the 

 Third, by his bull. And after, in the Council of Lateran, 

 ' ne Ecclesia nimium gravaretur,' it was pi'ovided, that 

 the privilege of the Templars should not extend to their 

 farmers." 



And now let me insert a Query arising out of 

 the above statement. 



By the statute of 31 Heni'y VIII. the monastic 

 possessions which came to the King by surrender 

 were to remain exempt from tithes, the same as 

 when held by the monasteries. It so happened 

 that the lands of the Hospitallers came to the 

 King by a special act of 32 Henry VIH,, and 

 were not included in the above exemptions ; and 

 the following case is cited by Godolphin (p. 400.): 



" The Templars were dissolved, and their possessions 

 and privileges, by Act of Parliament 17 Edward 11., 

 transferred to St. Johns of Jerusalem ; and their posses- 

 sions, bj' Act of Parliament 32 Henry VIII. cap. 24., given 

 to the King, It was resolved, — That the King and his 

 Patentees should pay Tithes of those lands, although the 

 lands ' propriis sumptibus excolantur,' because the privi- 

 ledges to be discharged of Tithes were proper to Spiritual 

 persons, and ceased when the person Spiritual was re- 

 moved; and the Statute of 31 Henry VIII. of dissolutions 

 did not extend to such lands as came to the King by 



Special Act of Parliament, as those lands of St. Johns of 

 Jerusalem did," — See Quarles and Sparling's Cas., More'a 

 Rep. 



And again (p. 404.) : 



" In an action of debt upon the Statute 2 Edward VI., 

 for not setting forth of Tithes, the Case was, the Lands were 

 a parcel of the possessions of the Templars, whose lands 

 were annexed to the Priory of St. Johns. The Templars 

 had a special privilege to be discharged of Tithes of those 

 Lands which ' propriis manibus excolunt.' By a special 

 act of 32 Henry VIII., the possessions of the Priory of St. 

 Johns were given to the King by general words of all 

 lands ' in tarn amplis modo,' &c. as the Abbots held them. 

 Resolved, — That the Defendant should not be discharged, 

 nor have the privilege — for, by the Common Law, a Lay 

 person was not capable of such a privilege, and the King 

 should not have the benefit of the privilege until the 

 Statute of 31 Henry VIII. But the Statute extends only 

 to such possessions as came to the King by Surrender, and 

 should be vested in him by that Act, and doth not extend 

 to possessions which are vested in him by another Act, 

 and these lands were given to the King by a special Act 

 of Parliament, and therefore not discharged of Tithes ? " — 

 Cornwallis and Sparling's Cos., Cro., par. 2. 



Is this the acknowledged law, that the Hospi- 

 tallers' lands, whether in the occupier's own hands 

 or let to others, are not discharged of tithes ? 



L. B L. 



FIRST ACTOR OP HAMLET. 



(2"'^ S. iii. 408.) 



Richard Burbadge was undoubtedly the first 

 actor of Hamlet, and his performance of this cha- 

 racter is thus alluded to in the curious Funeral 

 Elegy on the Death of the famous Actor, Richard 

 Burbadge, who died on Saturday in Lent, the 13th 

 of March, 1618: 



" No more young Hamlet, though but scant of breath, 

 Shall cry • Revenge ! ' for his dear father's death." 



" lu all probability (says Mr. Collier) the tragedy of 

 Hamlet was first performed in the winter of 1601, and by 

 this date Burbadge would seem to have become rather 

 corpulent ; Shakspeare, aware of this defect, as regards an 

 ideal representative of the Danish Prince, makes the 

 Queen allude to it in the fencing scene in the last act : 



" ' King. Our son shall win. 



Queen. He's fat and scant of breath. 



Here, Hamlet ; take this napkin ; rub thy brows.' " 



Memoirs of the Principal Actors in the Plays of 

 Shak.'peare, 1846. 



Joseph Taylor, on the authority of "Wright's 

 Historia Histronica, 1699, is sometimes stated to 

 have been the original Hamlet ; but Wright 

 merely says that he performed the part " incom- 

 parably well." Taylor probably took the part 

 upon the death of Burbadge. 



Downes, in his Rosci^is Anglicanus, 1708, has a 

 curious passage bearing upon this point : 



" The Tragedj' of Hamlet, Hamlet being performed by 

 Mr. Betterton ; Sir William (having seen Mr. Taylor, of 

 the Black-Fryers Company, act it; who being instructed 

 by the author, Mr. Shakespear) taught Mr. Betterton in 



