The Merry Past 



endeavoured to restrain him, as a terrier would a rat, 

 he seized his taper, and, striding up to the Prince, 

 thus addressed him : " Please, your Highness, it may 

 do very well for you to stand here all night talking, 

 as you can lie as long as you please in the morning ; 

 but I have many a long mile to ride to my parish, 

 and there is no help for it : there's an old woman to 

 be buried that ought to have been put in the ground 

 last week, and she'll keep no longer, and there's a 

 young couple to marry that I put off last week — by 

 George, they'll keep no longer ; so your Royal Highness 

 will excuse me, but you must not keep me any longer!" 

 This was all in such '' good keeping" that there was no 

 standing it any longer — even the punctilious chamber- 

 lain was not proof against it ; and amid peals of 

 laughter the triumphant doctor strode off to his 

 roost. 



Some of the old fox-hunting parsons held very 

 peculiar views as to the performance of their duties. 

 One of these, the Reverend Mr. Wright, who had a 

 small living in the West of England, refused to read 

 the Athanasian Creed, though repeatedly desired to 

 do so by his parishioners. The parishioners com- 

 plained to the bishop, who ordered it to be read. The 

 somewhat curious Creed in question is appointed to 

 be said or sung, and Mr. Wright accordingly, on the 

 following Sunday, thus addressed his congregation : 

 " Next follows Athanasius's Creed, either to be said 

 or sung, and, with Heaven's leave, I'll sing it. Now, 

 clerk, mind what you are about." After this they 

 both struck up, and sang it with great glee to a fox- 



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