718 SUNDRIES. 



bare. The decorations of the older religion were mutilated or 

 effaced or hidden, the ritual and vestments were abandoned, 

 the altars were taken away, plain tables no way separated from 

 the body of the church were substituted, and the cost of the 

 service reduced to the narrowest proportions. The principal 

 charge of a college chapel or church was for the wine con- 

 sumed at the four Communions which are customarily cele- 

 brated in the year. It is a mere delusion to imagine that the 

 advertisements of Elizabeth or the injunctions of prelates 

 induced, in places most amenable to influence, any beautifying 

 of the service till the time of Laud. The influence of this 

 person can be traced in the accounts, and nearly as much 

 perhaps, that of the Restoration. 



In the fifty and more years to which I have referred, there 

 are two purchases of a communion table, one by Corpus Christi 

 College in 1587, when 2,6s. 8d. was paid, another by Oriel 

 College in 1595, when the charge incurred was 2is. 6d. In 

 1584, and again in 1587, Corpus Christi College covered the 

 table with a ' carpet,' in the first year at a cost of 17^., in the 

 second, when the new table was bought, of i8s. icd. Any 

 one who compares this outlay with that incurred for hall or 

 chamber will see that the cost was stinted in the chapel. It 

 is true that, in 1624, Magdalen College purchased a velvet or 

 plush cloth at a considerable cost, .33 8s. lod. But I have 

 found no other similar expenditure. In New College, under 

 the year 1630, two velvet cushions lined with camlet are pur- 

 chased at 40^. ; but these are for the seats of the Warden and 

 Sub-warden. In 1608 Corpus Christi College bought six 

 Turkey cushions at a little over 5^. 6d. each. In 1607 

 Oriel College gave is. for a chapel lantern. In 1613 the 

 churchwardens of S. Mary Bredman, Canterbury, which was 

 once the church of the Mayor and Aldermen, bought two 

 pots, one holding a gallon, the other a pottle, for the Com- 

 munion. A pulpit in 1584 cost All Souls College 3. In 

 1626 Magdalen College, Oxford, put thirty-two brass candle- 

 sticks into the chapel at 2s. lid. each. 



