2nd §, No 6., Fes. 9. 756.) 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
119 
rior to the wretchedly incorrect Catalogue issued 
by the Society in 1839 and 1850. I would ask, 
why is not a good and useful catalogue at once 
‘prepared for the benefit of students? I do not 
mean a senseless collection of copies of title-pages, 
but an intelligible list of authors and subjects, 
which should enable the inquirer not only to 
ascertain whether a book of which he was in 
search was included in the catalogue, but also 
what books on any art or science were contained 
in the library. ARTERUS. 
Dublin. 
BARONIES BY WRIT. 
(1S. xii. 346.) ’ 
I have not been able to find a case that satisfied 
me, as meeting your Querist’s question, which in- 
volves a point of considerable doubt and difficulty, 
but one of great interest. My notes, however, 
refer me to some remarks which struck me (bear- 
ing upon this subject), imbedded in a note in- 
serted in the Appendix to a volume entitled 
England and France under the House of Lan- 
caster, 8vo., 1852, a work bearing the stamp of a 
vigorous mind and legal learning. Having in- 
truded upon their quietude, I think they may well 
be transferred to a corner of your pages, where 
they cannof fail to meet the eye of persons inter- 
ested in such subjects, and your Querist will be 
gratified; for if the work in question is from the 
pen of a learned and distinguished person, as re- 
ported, they derive weight and importance, as 
proceeding from such a source. G. 
“Nothing but ignorance, both of our history and our 
ancient law, would ever have led to any doubt of Sir John 
Oldcastle’s being a peer. In that age the husband of a 
baroness in her own right was not only in practice sum- 
moned by writ to sit for her barony, but was held to have 
a right to the summons (Collins, Bar. by Writ; Maddox, 
Bar.); and Sir John Oldcastle, having married the 
heiress of the Cobham barony, was summoned to sit in 
the four last parliaments of Henry IV., and the first of 
Henry V. It is now settled law that any one summoned 
and sitting takes a barony in fee (or rather in fee-tail) ; 
therefore Sir John Oldcastle had such a barony, whether 
he took in right of his wife or not; the only doubt might 
be whether, had his wife left no issue by him, his barony 
would have descended to the issue of another marriage ; 
pebably it would not, for the summons calling him by 
is wife’s barony might be supposed to resemble the 
calling up of an heir apparent by his father’s barony, 
which does not create a new peerage, but only advances a 
person alioqui successurus. However, this is not the 
same case, though it may be a similar one to the marital 
summons, as the party so called is not alioqui successurus. 
The peerages of which we are speaking were said to be by 
the courtesy, and, like estates held by that tenure, only 
vested if there were issue born of the marriage. It must, 
however, be admitted that the subject is not free from 
difficulty. But nothing can be more certain than the 
existence of such peerages, and that Sir John Oldcastle 
enjoyed one is beyond all possible doubt. Considerable 
doubt prevailed in Lord Coke’s time, and later, as to the 
right of persons who had married peeresses in their own 
right to a courtesy in these dignities. Lord Coke (Co. 
Litt., 29 a.) will not pronounce any opinions, but after 
citing two cases, adds, ‘ Utere tuo judicio, nihil enim im- 
pedio.’ Hargrave (note, 167.) appears not to have been 
aware of the many cases of summoning by the courtesy 
to parliament in older times. Lord Hale (MS.) expresses 
no doubt of the title by courtesy. Com. (Dig. Estates, 
D. 1.) seems to incline to the same opinion, for he speaks 
of a dignity as holden by the courtesy, but he cites as the 
only authority, Go. Litt., 29. Certain it is that no such 
claim has ever been allowed (perhaps none has ever been 
made) since Lord Coke’s time.” — England and France, 
Notes and Illustrations, Appendix, p. 371. 
ALTAR-RAILS, 
(2" §. i. 95.) 
The absence of altar-rails is now (1856) thought 
to indicate a savouring of Puseyism. Save the 
mark! Tempora mutantur, indeed, one may well 
say, and a good many things besides The Times. 
In the moral as well as in the physical atmo- 
sphere — 
“ Above, in the variant breezes, 
Numberless noisy weathercocks rattle and sing of muta- 
tion. 
The question of Mr. Acwortu reminds one of 
the fitful changes of the popular mind as to 
ritualism. Archbishop Laud might perhaps have 
escaped with the cropping of his ears, had not his 
adversaries brought a railing accusation against 
him which cost him his head. Listen to the sturdy 
prelate at the bar of the Star Chamber. He says: 
“The thirteenth innovation is, the placing of the 
Holy Table altarwise at the upper end of the chancel, 
that is, the setting of it north and south, and placing a 
rail before it to keep it from profanation, which, Mr. 
Burton says, is done to advance and usher in popery. To 
this I answer, that ’tis no popery to set a rail to keep 
profanation from the Holy Table; nor is it any inno- 
vation to place it at the upper end of the chancel as the 
altar stood. And this appears both by the practice and 
by the command and canon of the Church of England.” 
—Laud’s Speech in the Stur Chamber, p. 57., 4to., 1637. 
Again, in the case of the Bishop of Ely : 
“ He enjoined that there should be a rayl set on the top 
of the new-raised steps before the Communion Table, so 
set altarwise as aforesaid, which ray] should reach from 
the south side of the chancell to the north within, which 
the minister only should enter, as a place too holy for the 
people,” &c.— Articles of Impeachment against Matthew 
Wren, Lord Bishop of Ely. 
It must be evident to any one who can count 
five on his fingers, that it was one of the heaviest 
charges of those heavy-headed and heavy-hearted 
folk the Puritans, that altar-rails were flat popery, 
and that the real, godly, gospel church was one 
which was railless. The charge was varied, like 
the counts in an Old Bailey indictment ; but they 
all came to the same thing in the end. Neal (His- 
tory of the Puritans, vol. ii. p. 221., edit, 1822), 
