64 CHILDREN OF THE CHAPEL AT BLACKFRIARS» 
practice, except the one of 1559-[60] next noticed, only children 
were to be impressed. in Elizabeth’s second regnal year, she 
issued a Privy Seal prohibiting the taking of singing men and 
boys from Windsor, Paul’s, or the Chapel Royal, but empowering — 
the bearer, not named, to take such from any other chapel.? It is 
not known what this special provision was made for, but it seems 
quite certainly a commission to the master of the children at 
Windsor for supplying vacancies, and not for the Chapel Royal. 
In 1562 the 1552 commission to Bower ts reported to have been 
renewed by Elizabeth, authorizing him “to take up well singing 
boys, for furnishing the Queen’s Chapel.”* I have not been able 
to find this commission, and I suspect the report is not true; for — 
Bower died 26 July, 1561,* and Richard Edwards was appointed 
to the office the same year.®> Chalmers in reporting this has either 
confused it with the commission te Richard Edwards of Dec. 4, 
1561,° or overlooked the natural chronology of a document that 
fell between the date of Elizabeth’s reappointment of Bower, 30 
April, 1559, five months after the beginning of her reign,’ and the 
date of his death, 26 July, 1561. In either case there is a mis- 
dating. 
*There was little further need 
for impressment of men-choristers ; 
for so many wanted the position of 
Gentleman of the Chapel that there 
seem sometimes, during the reign 
of Elizabeth and of James I., to 
have been more gentlemen extraor- 
dinary,—that is, applicants in line 
for promotion to active service as 
choristers,—than gentlemen  ordi- 
nary. See The Old Cheque-Book 
(wu. s.) 62ff., passim, particularly 
the strict regulations of the chapter 
against using influence on the Lord: 
Chamberlain in securing such ap- 
pointments, idem., 64, under date 
Dec. 2, 1592. 
*The Privy Seal dates 8 March, 
1559-[60]. It closes thus: “and we 
give power to the bearer of this to 
take any singing men and boys 
from any chapel, our own house- 
hold and St. Paul’s only excepted.” 
—Printed in full in John Nichols, 
The Progresses and Public Proces- 
sions of Queen Elizabeth (second 
ed. 1823), I, 81, from Ashmolean 
MSS. 1113 (Bodl. Lib.) 3yalsoeam 
J. P. Collier, op. cit. (1879), I, 170. 
SCF: George Chalmers, An Apol- 
ogy for the Believers in the Shake- 
speare Papers (1797), 359. 
“Cf. The Old Cheque-Book (u. 
s.), Notes. 
*Infra, 65°. 
° Infra, ibid. 
"Officers of Edward VI or of 
Queen Mary holding over under 
Elizabeth had their authority val- 
idated by reappointment. Accord- 
ingly a new patent was granted to 
Richard Bower as Master of the 
Children of the Chapel, dated “xxx 
Aprilis” in 1 Eliz. (1559). ‘This 
document provides for instruction 
and keep of twelve boys, for which 
Bower is allowed 40/. per year,— 
just the same as earlier given to 
him, Abingdon, Banester, and other 
masters of the children, and later 
to his successors, Edwards, Hunnis, 
and Gyles. The latter part of the 
178 
